4. Symprove Diary, Week 3.

I’ve come to dread Wednesday mornings. That’s the day I start each week of Symprove. When it’s chilled from the fridge it isn’t exactly heaven in a bottle, but it’s a dream compared to room-temperature Symprove. It pierces my tongue just that little bit more, and the aftertaste hangs around for the full ten minutes before I can consume anything else to drown it out.

Nobody with IBS is in a fortunate position exactly, but opening with a complaint about the way something tastes as opposed to the effects it has on my digestion should be considered something of a positive starting point. It’s getting harder and harder to remember exactly when to post these entries, but that’s because each day seems to be relatively uneventful when compared to the behaviour of my bowels just under a month ago.

Spending four days with my wonderful, understanding, caring girlfriend – who’s been watching me go through this stressful period from miles away – also had me feeling settled and comfortably distracted in ways that I hadn’t been settled and comfortably distracted in weeks. She’s pictured above.

This isn’t to say there haven’t been problems. Anxiety doesn’t just disappear like that. I’ve spent the odd evening this week feeling uncomfortable and uncertain, unable to control my thoughts when there’s even a sliver of doubt over whether my body has digested my food properly. But what I am realising once more, like I’d managed to months ago before things went south again, is that the effects of my anxiety impact my condition more than I’d previously thought.

When you have an autoimmune disorder that negatively impacts your gastrointestinal tract and intestines, you begin to associate any symptoms or unusual movements around your middle regions with thoughts of uncontrollable diarrhoea and other kinds of awful bathroom trips. It means that any twitch or spasm or hint of bloating send panic signals to my brain which, in turn, churn my stomach anyway and make all that twitching, spasming and bloating feel worse. It’s the nasty cycle that fulfils itself.

All this is to say that while my dosage of Loperamide, Symprove and Silico Gels, as well as my still-very-restricted-even-if-slightly-expanded diet, might have stabilised my insides for now, they don’t seem to be improving my doubts, pessimism and anxiety. I’ve tried counselling, too – three times – and I’m still in a precarious position where any alteration from the norm sets my brain whirring and sets my intestines twisting. Maybe mental health medication is the next avenue for me to explore.

In terms of what we’ll call “results”, things have been steady this past week. Hell, I’m verging on constipation, which is a change of scenery. Last Sunday, I just didn’t go. I had to make two visits on the Monday to make up for it. The same happened again yesterday, this Tuesday. The problem with taking so many medications to slow down my gut’s transit time is that I’m not sure what’s working – has the Symprove had an effect, is it the increased dose of Loperamide, is it that gel? Maybe I shouldn’t question it, maybe I should just carry on with what’s “working”.