Helen's Story
1st June 2022

After 25 years of struggling with her IBS, Helen had finally found what works for her.

Here she shares her story and how she has learned to live well with IBS.

I can trace my IBS back to my early childhood, although I wasn’t diagnosed until adulthood. My symptoms have always been predominantly bloating, but I’ve always been upset by the suggestions that people with IBS ‘feel ‘bloated. I’ve never ‘felt’ bloated. I’ve felt extremely distressed, depressed angry and anxious. My stomach had been physically distended so much that I struggled to function physically and ha two sets of clothes.

My GP prescribed a range of treatments which didn’t help and gave advice which was counter-productive (eating bran was the worst!) and inferred it was all in my mind.

Over the 25 years or more, I believe I’ve spent thousands of pounds trying to treat myself using internet cures and I sympathise with so many others who, in the absence of good medical advice , have done the same.

My management of IBS began to change around two and a half years ago. I’d been a member of The IBS Network, on and off, for some time, but I decided to grasp all the information on the members’ section of the website and try to use only evidence-based advice. I read Peter Whorwell’s book on the management of IBS and realised that someone out there believed in the symptoms of people like me.

I tried The Low FODMAP diet, without success. And then I tried hypnotherapy, which I was lucky enough to get for free from a hypnotherapist in training, (The IBS Network publicised the offer a while ago). Hypnotherapy doesn’t ‘cure’ IBS. It subtly changes the way the mind works, changing your focus from the negatives onto the positives, and re-setting your mind into problem-solving mode.

I made changes to my life on the good days and took up running, which gave me a sense of achievement. At the same time, I developed more symptoms including reflux, dizziness and nausea, and noticed that this was worse when I drank certain things, and ate certain things – particularly tea, wine, eggs and pro-biotic foods, supposedly so helpful to the gut.

I tried a dietitian, without success, but I then found a website which included contact details for a British expert on food allergies and intolerances. I’ve always had minor allergies and wondered if there was a connection. When I emailed the director of the website with a list of my trigger foods, she immediately asked if I was histamine intolerant. She charged nothing for this, and it changed my life.

I still have IBS. I’ll always have IBS. But the bad days are few and far between and I can cope with them.

This is what I’ve learned:

• What you suffer from is real and valid and you deserve support.

• The IBS Network members’ website is a huge, trustworthy and amazing evidence-based resource to use.

• Hypnotherapy helps, but not in the way you expect it to, and you need to be prepared to change your thinking and take some risks, (I’m now a trainee hypnotherapist myself).

• Trust yourself – we are all different. Your triggers might not be the same as someone else’s. I can eat onions and garlic with impunity. I was afraid to notice my triggers for many years because I didn’t have confidence in my experience – it was all in my mind after all.

• Keep a food / mood diary (The IBS Network can supply you with one) and consider everything.