back, stomach and rib pain

[lmanders]

I have had c. diff for 2 months and have been healing. I no longer have the cramping and mucus with blood and haven't for over a month. The symptoms that I have are back,stomach and pain under by ribs. I have had a few relapses after feeling better and trying coffee or having too much fiber. I had IBS and diverticulosis prior to the c. diff and would have the same type of pain if I had an IBS or diverticulosis attack. I keep praying that when I wake up that everything will be back to normal and when it isn't I panic and I know that isn't helping. If anyone else had these types of symptoms and how long you had them will you please let me know.

[nsewell]

I had the same things going on after c-diff. Mine was from the ibs. I have now been c-diff free for about 10 months and things have lessened. Also the thing that helped the most was a heating pad.

[Christina]

I am 6 months post c-diff and still have them. I am on meds. for Post Infectious IBS which do seem to help most but not all of the time. I've been told most likely this is how I will be from now on because I had some mild stomach issues even as a child.I've also been told that if you did not have previous issues then eventually over time it will heal.Not much to do as it beats c-diff. hands down. I'm making th best of it and trying to adjust to my new me.

[lmanders]

Is the back pain the only symptom that you have from the ibs?

[Christina]

I have back, stomach (under my ribs and lower on the left side),cramps, nausea and diarrhea maybe 4-5 times a month depending on the month, occasionally more. I take Desipramine every night (a low dose), Bentyl for the cramps, and Reglan for the nausea. I also am on a PPI for acid reflux which is something I did not have before c-diff. Although, I had mild stomach issues off and on prior to c-diff they have never been this severe.
Hope this helps.

[lmanders]

Do you have the back and stomach pain when you don't have the other symptoms or is just when you have the diarrhea and nausea ?

[Sheila1]

lmander,
As you know, CDiff can be a very painful disease, especially with severe illness, and can take a long time for the intestines to fully heal. Alot depends on your own body and the immunity being built back up, etc.

I do remember having some pain under my right rib cage after the first day or two of my initial illness but I was in the hospital on a bucketful of meds. and don't really know what caused it for sure. It went away within a day or so of returning home. Since then (and before cdiff, occasionally) I have some under my left rib cage that I attribute to trapped gas, usually GasX helps or massaging it in a downward motion or laying down on my left side for a little while.

I only had the severe cramping pain when I was severely ill or relapsing. Milder cramping before and after a relapse for a little while; once the flagyl/vanco started working good, they would mostly disappear except for some cramping when visiting the ladies room sometimes.

I did, though, have 'wounds' type pain for 3 months, extremely painful and tender spots, even to the slightest pressure had to carry a pillow everywhere I went to prevent anything from touching my abdomen (not near my surgery, was definitely intestines). Cat walked on it one day and I thought I was gonna pass out it hurt so bad... anyway that pain very suddenly became more diffuse when my last relapse began and then very gradually started getting better.

Now, 8 mos. later, I have occasional (meaning a couple to a few times a day) 'twinges' of crampy type pain and have finally gotten over having 'heart palpitations' and panic every time it happens. (well...mostly.... every now and again it happens a little sharper than normal and I have to shove my heart back down to where it belongs and remind myself to breathe).

Back pain I've had for a couple years so I don't know if it was any worse with the cdiff.

As always, if your pain is severe you should see your doctor to be sure nothing else is going on. He may be able to suggest some things to help with your particular symptoms.

As a side-note, it is thought that diverticula may perhaps make cdiff a little more difficult to treat - the thought being that vanco passes through the intestines and the bacteria hiding in the diverticula don't get hit as well with the medicine and continue to produce, so may take longer to eradicate. I read this in a study from Dr Ciaran Kelly but I don't have authority to post it. If you need further info. on this you can PM me.

Hope you're on the mend now!

[Sheila1]

Finally...found a free, but small, piece about diverticula being suspicious for recurrence. I found several but they were all paid articles/studies.

This is from The Answer Page-Hospital and Critical Care section. It's a site used for continuing medical education for medical professionals.

You may have to register to view the question/answer, but it's free.

The Answer Page - spores and diverticula

Note - while the answer was dated 4/12/07 it is copied from prior question/answers and actually dates prior to 2003, so the medicine regime isn't what is currently the suggested programs in more recent articles. See FAQ's, Articles by CDiff Experts for more recent treatment info.

[AlexL]

I have also had pain under my ribs on both the left side and right side. The difficult part about c.diff is that when you get pain in different parts of your stomach (or body) you begin to worry something else might be causing it besides c.diff. Of course, this is always a possibility, but if the feelings are usually the same with some variation in intensity, it probably is just the c.diff causing its mischief. I also have had that panicky feeling when unusual symptoms pop up or usual symptoms pop up in a more severe way. I make myself take a step back and ask myself if this is just a return of an old symptom that I recognize that is probably from c.diff (or post-infectious c.diff) or truly something new that needs evaluation. This is really a tough disease to recover from, but you will recover!

[michellebue]

I also have lower back pain, stomach pain and pain under my ribs. Usually my left rib. The back and stomach pains I had prior to c-diff because of IBD and IBS. But I never had pain under my ribs. I actually didn't even tell my doctor for awhile at first because I thought he would think I was crazy. But I began to worry that perhaps there was something else wrong with me so I eventually told him. There was nothing else wrong with me. He said it is more than likely gas pain.

It has really subsided for me lately. I rarely even get it anymore (knock on wood!!)

I hope yours starts to feel better soon!!!

[lmanders]

I have had 2 recent episodes of cramping pain after I ate - with the first one I had mild diarrhea and then the cramping went away which was very typical for the type of ibs that I had prior to getting c diff. - with the second episode which was last night the cramps were more severe and lasted for several hours but I never had diarrhea. I am wondering if this is pretty common with other people ?

I have always taken Omega 3 Fish Oil and yesterday I took a little more than I usually do and am wondering if that could've caused the cramping.
I also had oatmeal with milk yesterday and perhaps that was a little too much for my stomach.

I saw my Doctor on Monday and she really feels that this is just a situation that my gut flora is not back to normal yet and she says that will take time.

[nsewell]

I get cramps all the time and no D. sometimes they last quite a while and others not long. I think is all part of the IBS. Or something I eat.

[lmanders]

I was just reading Dr McDonald's article andunder alternative regimens it talks about doing fecal enema's to replace the microflora disrupted by c. diff - has anyone had this done for the post infectious ibs ?