Digestive Issues caused by anxiety???

[Purple4]

Hello Everyone.

I am having major digestive issues that my GP says are caused by stress and anxiety.

After the birth of my first child over 21 years ago I was diagnosed with IBS. I have spent over 20 years being aware of what I eat and know my triggers. I have always had a 'podgy' lower tummy but have never experienced the bloating and distended tummy I now have. I seriously look pregnant. My tummy distends from my sternum, (right under breasts) and is tight and painful.

Over the last 3 months or so it has become worse so I went back to my GP and was brushed aside by him saying its anxiety related. I expressed my fear of something serious wrong with me so he refered me to a surgeon for a gastroscopy and colonoscopy. Also ultra sound on kidneys and liver as I have pain in my left kidney.

The specialist told me not to be too hopeful for answers which has left me feeling deflated. I'm having the procedures done a week before Xmas.

Does anyone else suffer from this?? When I eat my tummy tightens and becomes painful. I have never been 'regular ' with going to toilet. Part of me feels like there is a blockage in my bowel.

I am fed up with feeling fat and bloated and rarely leave my house.

[highhopes]

Hi and thank you very much for speaking out. I am sorry to hear that you are feeling uncomfortable.
I have Severe Anxiety and suffer from OCD. My triggers are almost everywhere (Anxiety, Cleanliness OCD and PTSD which bounce off each other). When I was on medication I felt so much better and my stomach felt so much more comfortable. I think I was so tense with anxiety that I was actually squeezing my stomach muscles.
I was sure mine was related to Anxiety. Would you mind if I could ask if there might be anything that may be make you anxious or may be a stress triggering event (or thought).

[Purple4]

Thanks for you reply

Nothing major has changed to justify how I feel. I have certainly delt with more stress and anxiety at other stages in my life.

If there is no medical diagnosis I guess it could be due to being tense all the time. My body doesn't know how to relax and I guess I'm always on guard.

[highhopes]

You are most welcome. I can relate to not knowing how to relax and feel like you are always on guard. Its never a comfortable feeling so I can definitely relate.

In my case, how every situation/action is acted out in life is self-judged (i'm my worst enemy sometimes) and felt confidence isn't my strongest point. For this reason I over analyse things and as a result sometimes I miss the bigger picture. What I mean by this is that I feel like I want to make every moment perfect and end up only seeing a very narrow "perfect" perspective. As a result I may find myself unintentionally making life a bit harder for my partner.

Could I ask if there was a feeling of being tense all the time? Do you find your mind always active / find it difficult to relax?

[Purple4]

I struggle to relax. My mind doesn't switch off. I over think everything, run different scenarios through my mind. It becomes so overwhelming that I shut down and keep to myself. I don't sleep well and have a history of insomnia. My GP has prescribed meds to help me sleep when required. I feel I always need to be doing something to keep bad thoughts away.

The only time I don't feel tense would be when I'm alone doing something I enjoy.

I also am my own worse enemy.

When reading your last post it reminded me of self sabotaging. Do you feel this is what you do?

[highhopes]

Thank you again for sharing. Reading in your post, so much sounds very similar to me and could relate to it all.

I can totally understand what it feels like when you mention not being able to switch off. I find its like that feeling when you are comfortable in bed and realise you have to go and switch off the lights in the other room.

Feeling like running through different scenarios is extremely overwhelming. I do the same thing with pretty much everything in life. It can make you feel exhausted even if you wanted a full day of relaxing. The mind takes up a lot of our energy and can change our perspective of everything we do/feel.

Great point regarding Self sabotaging. In my case I am not sure I deserve to be happy because I am not my 'perfect' self that I perceive I want to be. Doing everything 'perfect' and being 'perfect' to everyone around me. This over analyzing as you mentioned feels very cruel doesn't it.

From what I can see from your post, personality wise I would think you ask very little from others but a lot from yourself.

[Purple4]

You hit the nail on the head!!!

Exactly right about not asking or expecting anything from others.

What I am trying to learn is to put my needs first, or at least see them as important. I don't have any excuse not to now as I have raised my family and live alone.

I just need to get my tummy issues sorted so I can think about leaving the house and going back to work.

[highhopes]

Thank you for your reply. It can be so very difficult to put your needs first. It seems much easier to help others than help ourselves.

In the back of my mind I know that I will be often more effective if I can help myself first. The best example I think I could give would be -

A car has broken down and it needs to go up hill, it looks straight forward enough. 1 person pushes while the other steers. It is very difficult for 1 person to push so the person steering decides to hop out and help.

For some reason even with 2 pushing the car up the hill now its even harder than before with 1 person.

They both evaluate the situation and find that the person steering kept leaving the handbrake up in fear it would roll back onto the person pushing it.

Sometimes people don't always see the extra efforts you put in and why we do them, at the same time it might end up making every day components people may think are more straight forward much more difficult.

We do things because they make us feel comfortable, and I think thats a very important thing. I think the overthinking component is because we want to avoid bad things to happen. That just means you put in 110% in everything you do.

As you say though there is nothing wrong with giving 90% for everyone else and 10% for yourself (or vice versa sometimes 🙂 )

[Niberg]

I’m currently suffering from similar problems. I thought it was due to being sick when I was over seas, I got better and then 2 days after being home got stomach pain, reflux and felt tense around my stomach area. I’ve had many tests done all coming back normal apart from being deficient in some things. I’m also having an endoscopy done a week before Christmas. Started taking anti-depressants which is slowly making my tummy pain go away. But still can’t wrap my head around my anxiety potentially causing such physical symptoms! Really panic somethings wrong like a parasite haha

[Courage2020]

I also have very similar issues.Pretty much to do with my Anxiety.But last 2 months I've been using this Medicine made by Blackmores "Digestive Aid".It helped me alot to manage digestive issue at this moment.You can bought it from local chemist.