Hi all -

I've never posted here, but am trying to figure out what's going on with my sweet MIL.

She's 77 and healthy except for low thyroid and for caregiver stress which she discounts. Over the last 4 to 6 weeks, she's begun to have intense intestinal cramping about 12 to 14 hours after eating a regular meal. For the first several weeks of this time period, she was eating many of her garden-grown tomatoes. Those tomatoes were suspected of causing all of this, so she hasn't had any for about two weeks. Even without tomatoes, the pain continues to occur about 12 hours post-meal and is accompanied by soft stools. The only thing (so far) that helps is if she eats only bread, crackers, broth, pudding, or mashed potatoes. That's been her diet for the last 10 days. Saturday night she had those same bland food items at a cafeteria and was miserably sick with the intense cramps yesterday. What is happening????:confused:

MIL is scheduled for a CT scan and a colonoscopy.

Do these symptoms sound familiar to you? If so, please let me know what your diagnosis is or what your thoughts are.

Thanks so much! Barbara

Sounds like it could be diverticulitis (sp?)...tomatoes are a killer for anyone with that condition....and once inflammation occurs, it takes a while to settle down.

Thanks! I wonder why sausage on a biscuit would also set this pain off unless that's as big a problem as the tomatoes were. Would it be likely that she should/would have had milder symptoms of diverticulitis before now??

Sorry to be mystified. Her CT scan is tomorrow afternoon and no one has said when her colonoscopy is scheduled.

Thanks again! Barbara

Hi all -

Titchou, you were right! AMIL had a CAT scan that showed diverticulitis and she's feeling better after two weeks of antibiotics. She's having an EGD and colonoscopy today, so hopefully those will find nothing scary.

Thanks! Barbara

Wow! Great! The tomato thing was what made me think of that. I'm glad she's feeling better.

Wow! Great! The tomato thing was what made me think of that. I'm glad she's feeling better.

Why do tomatoes hurt if you have diverticulitis and why would antibiotics solve that problem?

Hi again,

My mother-inlaw's doctor called to say that Part 2 of her diagnosis is that she also has colitis and a red stomach from too much acid. The colonoscopy showed the diverticulitis has healed and is now diverticulosis ( -itis being the word ending when it's inflamed). She's on Prevacid and Ascol (think that's it) for the red stomach and colitis and she's feeling lots better.

WhatDoIHave, my MIL was told that tomatoes are a challenge to digest when you have gut troubles because they're acid and both the outer skin of the tomato and the seeds aren't easy to digest. The antibiotics are to treat the general inflammatory and infection processes that have the interior of the intestines so irritable and painful.

Barbara

Barbara:

Great! I hope she is back to normal in no time. Intestinal inflammations can be tough.

Titchou