Severe Cramps - a relapse or PI-IBS?

[Ali-Mar]

On Saturday morning, around 7:00 AM, I woke up due to abdominal pain that led to a BM, started with some mucus, and semi-formed sorry for TMI. Mucus is not my norm and haven't had abdominal pain for almost a week prior to that ...

What concerned me was; few hours late around 1:00 PM, I had severe cramps, 5 or 6 on the scale, out of 10. That also led to loose, mushy, and mucus BM .. as mentioned, mucus is not my norm, I had mucus and severe cramps only when had an active C-Diff ..

I have been on Dificid taper for over 4 weeks, and last time I relapsed, it was one day shy of 5 weeks post Vanco...I was very sure that I was relapsing since it was close to a similar time that I relapsed last time ( 4 weeks post regular dose) and also had severe cramps and some mucus. It was not as much much as the last time, but I thought that might be due to that I am still on Dificid taper. So I switched to 2 pills per day instead of one every 48 days.. That was the dr original l instruction to switch to a regular dose of Dificid when relapsing. The cramping was relieved after the BM. The abdominal pain continued all Saturday and all day Sunday. All week last week, I hardy had abdominal pain... Today, I had one BM and little mucus no more cramping and no more abdominal pain. I have been taking 2 pills per day for a total of 3 days now.

I called the dr office today and waiting to hear back.

Can PI-IBS cause SEVERE Cramps?

BTW, I am still on a bland diet - the only thing different I did Friday night dinner, I had more rice than usual, I had twice as much, I had 4 cups of rice instead of 2 cups that I normally have, mash potato, quinoa, chicken breast, sauerkraut and green beans

[poppy86]

I'm sorry you're having those cramps. In my experience, and from what I read, IBS can definitely have bad cramping, which is relieved with a BM. But it can vary greatly from person to person. I really hope you're not relapsing and that this is just part of recovery. It's so confusing dealing with all of this.

[beth22]

I wonder if something is going around because I am usually C and last week was having M and more frequent bms too. I had been having on and off symptoms for over a week, called the GI and he had me test. The c diff was negative and so was the culture. PI-IBS can certainly cause your symptoms, but a virus can too. Try to eat bland foods for a few days and see if that helps. I took Pepto Bismol and that helped me. Will see how things are in the next few days, but I am due for a colonoscopy (UGH) as I had one 10years ago. I know some people have said that Dificid is hard on the GI tract too. When I was on vanco tapers, the vanco irritated my colon too and caused cramping and looser stools at times as well. Maybe the Dificid is doing that to you.