I've posted on the Bowel Problems message board about what I've been going through since last June if you wish to have a read of a more in depth testimony but the short version is that I've been hospitalised twice due to really bad, sharp, stabbing pains in the lower right side of my abdomen. This has been put down to bad attacks of IBS (although I'm still not convinced).

However since my last hospitalisation in July last year, the pain has never gone. It is there constantly and varies in intensity day to day. I have had terrible anxiety and palpitations, feel like bursting in to tears one minute and slapping some one the next. Could it be that due to all this anxiety and stress that my brain has become more 'aware' of a pain being there and making it in to something bigger than it is?

The doctor has said that my anxiety and state of mind are not helping the pain and he's asked me to try and remain as stress free as possible and prescribed some anti-depressants - one a night to aid my sleep etc. The anxiety has decreased although I'm still feeling irritable and anxious. The pain seems to have died down a little but I had dinner with vegetables on Sunday and the pain was quite bad and I had to lay on the floor all afternoon to ease the pain. It's taken two days for the pain to die down. Could it be that my anxiety about the pain has made my brain subconciously act on it as soon as I've eaten??

sorry if this doesnt make sense - bit of a warble!!