For Sharon - Bowel Disorders Message Board

twisten · 10-10-2006, 06:46 PM

Sharon, I'm just wondering how long you've had crohns for? Sorry if you already have it posted somewhere and I missed it. Seems like we have so much in common with what is happening right now with us. I was diagnosed in 2002 but have had bowel problems since my teens and I'm in my early 40's now. They kept telling me it was just IBS because my blood work is usually okay. Even had a fistula and the bowel/ovary problem I mentioned to you and they still didn't diagnose crohns for a couple of years after that. Seems like crohns is one of the last things the doctors think to test for.

Sharon76 · 10-11-2006, 01:06 AM

Hi Twisten

I was diagnosed with Crohn's in April of this year, but i got severely ill in August 06, rushed to hospital several times but yet it wasn't until the following April i got a diagnosis!

I started having bowel problems in my early teens, back then we were allowed to go to the doctors without our parents being present, and i remember the docotr pushing it off IBS every time i went and sending me away with colofac, which never done any good. At the age of 21 i asked to get referred to a gastro but i was told i didn't need his resources. So, i just ignored things and got on with my life until it got out of hand.

When i was at my worse, bowel was twisted, severe pain, vomiting, anorexic, the doctors in the hospital still missed crohn's. Even my blood work was coming back all messed up with very high liver enzymes and my left kidney stopped functioning properly..............to this day i still can't understand how they missed it. That was why i changed hospitals, i was terrified that i would die under their care.

I'm 30 and at one point really didn't think i would make it to me 31st birthday or see my children grow up. I remember when i got my diagnosis and i started to feel abit better with the drugs my father told me he was so scared when he came to see me in the hospital he really thought i was going to die. It was at that point he realised how serious and how debilitating crohn's can be.

that is one thing i had a hard time with, trying to get people to understand how bad this illness is, alot people thought i was playing on it when i couldnt get out of bed due to the pain, it was when these people saw me at my worse and the extent of my weight loss they understood the severity of it.

twisten · 10-12-2006, 11:23 PM

I hear you on people not understanding. Lots of times we look good so they assume well you look fine so things can't be that bad. Yeah right!! If only they could feel it!! I just about died when I had my fistula so that kind of helped wake some people up because they saw how serious it could be. Of course it was 2 (I think) years later before I was diagnosed but they had already seen the damage it could do.