| intermittent abdominal pain, heartburn, indigestion...what are these symptoms?
I don't know if this is digestive or bowel related, but I think it might be digestive, but I'm going to go ahead and explain both symptoms.
I've been feeling bad off and on for a little while now, but lately the symptoms have stuck around. It seems as if for the past several months I've been getting heartburn and/or gas more frequently than I ever have in the past.
Lately my bowel habits haven't been exactly regular. I was put on laxitives 3 times in the past 3 months, once because the dr told me to after seeing an excess amount of gass in an xray of my intestines, and twice before having an IVP to check for kidney stones (I had my first -and hopefully only - stone 3 months ago, what my dr throught was intestinal problems was actually a kidney stone). I had also taken one stimulant laxative pill a few days before I went to the dr because I thought my pain might have been constipation. Besides that I'd never used laxatives in my life. When I was put on laxitives the 2nd and 3rd times, it definitely stung coming out. Since then I've been on and off constipated, had occasional diarrhea (not much), but mostly constipated (really large, hard, and dry) until I started eating more fiber and taking fiber supplements. Now the stool is softish and orangish, but I still have trouble getting it all to come out - I know there's more left in my intestines but it just doesn't want to come out. In addition, the area around my anus feels swolen - presumably from all the whiping when I go to the bathroom, it doesn't seem to swell unless I've been going and whiping a lot (I'm guessing these may possibly be hemorrhoids, which if it gets worse I will get checked out).
Back to my stomach and heartburn and such - recently I've been getting intermittent stomach and lower abdomen pains usually in my left side (from mid belly to left side) and lower left, and a little in my lower right side. The lower pain seems to migrate a lot. And the stomach pain comes and goes, not there for more than a minute at a time. But I can definitely feel something even when I just drink a glass of water.
I am concerned because for a long time now I have been taking high doses of ibuprofen (with a lot of food) in order to relieve the pain of cramps. Nothing else over-the-counter really works, or lasts long enough. I was advised by my dr to take the ibuprofen (800mg at a time) with food, and have been doing so for quite some time, but I am worried that it may have done dammage to my stomach and possibly my intestines. The only times my stomach has ever really hurt bad before, was during my period or after (presumably because of the ibuprofen, but who knows).
I don't think I've eaten anything bad in the past little while (cook all my chicken/meats/fish thoroughly) that would cause me any problems.
It feels as if I have a lot of gas as well. A lot of times my stomach will make these noises on the left site as if something is moving or gas is bubbling up, and I almost never feel nauseated, but a lot of times I'll feel as though there's some air that needs to be burped up.
Taking a malox relieves the heartburn symptoms temporarily, but if I go to eat or drink some things a little later, they come back.
Here are some questions to you all:
1) does anyone have any guesses on what it could be? how serious does it sound?
2) Is there anything I can take that would settle my stomach/curb any heartburn/gas for a while? I'm used to taking an antacid or two and being fine for the rest of the day.
3) This is completely unrelated, to my previous description, but as long as I'm inquiring, I figured I'd ask...
I'm not a big drinker at all, no particular reason, I just don't, I prefer to be a DD instead. I most certainly do not consume alcoholic beverages on a regular basis, and never have. One day some friends and I were having a little get together at my place, and I decided to consume a fair amount of alcohol - started with one shot something then onto a glass of something else - and by the time I was 2/3 of the way through that glass, I began to have the worst heartburn I have ever experienced in my entire life. It was pretty unbearable. It just came out of nowhere. I downed some malox tablets and within a half an hour I was ok, but I tried to finish off my drink and I felt the heartburn coming back.
Is this problem common with alcohol? I happened to be talking to a friend on the phone, and he said to me ohh it's only gonna get worse. What can I do in the future to prevent this incredible heart burn when I decide I feel like drinking?
Thanks for reading through my long post!
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