Hey everyone! I have been lurking here for awhile and decided to finally jump in.
My journey started just about a year ago when I got a stomach bug. It was making the rounds with my coworkers, so I didn't think anything about it, except it never really went away. The only bothersome issue was that I had lost about 50 pounds in the year prior, but I had gone from a desk job to unemployment to retail where I was on my feet moving all day, so I thought it was normal.
So my D and stomach cramping kept getting worse. I went to see my PCP when I started having terrible pain in my bum every time I went to the bathroom, which was getting on to about 20 times a day at that point. Because I had a bowel resection when I was 17 due to a rare birth defect (Meckel's Divertculum), my PCP referred me to a CRS to make sure it wasn't related.
The weekend before my appointment with the CRS, my best friend dragged me to the ER because my pain was so bad. This didn't really accomplish anything but moving up my appointment, so at least a little good came out of it. So I went to see the CRS and he did his exam (lovely) and came right out and said, I think you have Crohn's disease. He said the normal procedure is to do a colonoscopy, but because of the D I had already been having and how, um, torn up, I already was, he thought that would basically amount to torture. He diagnosed me with an anal fissure, an RV fistuala and an abscess. Two days later I had a fissurectomy and the biopsies confirmed Crohns. He put me on cipro, flagyl, norco and ativan and referred me to a GI.
By October 1st I met with the GI and he prescribed 50 mg prednisone, but wanted me to heal up some more before he did a colonoscopy because I still had really bad D. So I spent a couple days in the hospital because by this time I couldn't eat, was vomiting all the time on top of the D, and was still in a huge amount of pain. Had a CT that confirmed narrowing of my TI. A couple weeks later I had my colonoscopy that confirmed Crohn's colitis as well. My GI started me on Remicade and after my loading doses we added azathioprine. That gets us to Feb when I finally weaned off of pred.
As of June I was still having pain issues and still not having "normal" bowel habits, so my GI started me on Entocort because he believes that my Crohn's has gotten to be just in my small bowel.
So as of now I am on Remicade every 8 weeks, 100 mg of azathioprine, 9 mg of Entocort, Ambien CR, fluoxetine and percocet as needed, which is about once daily.
I feel really lucky that I was diagnosed so quickly, and I absolutely love my medical team. I have been released by my CRS until I need him again, but am still working with my GI to get everything under control. Active symptoms for just about a year and still fighting it, but I'm getting there. Its so nice to finally meet all of you!
My journey started just about a year ago when I got a stomach bug. It was making the rounds with my coworkers, so I didn't think anything about it, except it never really went away. The only bothersome issue was that I had lost about 50 pounds in the year prior, but I had gone from a desk job to unemployment to retail where I was on my feet moving all day, so I thought it was normal.
So my D and stomach cramping kept getting worse. I went to see my PCP when I started having terrible pain in my bum every time I went to the bathroom, which was getting on to about 20 times a day at that point. Because I had a bowel resection when I was 17 due to a rare birth defect (Meckel's Divertculum), my PCP referred me to a CRS to make sure it wasn't related.
The weekend before my appointment with the CRS, my best friend dragged me to the ER because my pain was so bad. This didn't really accomplish anything but moving up my appointment, so at least a little good came out of it. So I went to see the CRS and he did his exam (lovely) and came right out and said, I think you have Crohn's disease. He said the normal procedure is to do a colonoscopy, but because of the D I had already been having and how, um, torn up, I already was, he thought that would basically amount to torture. He diagnosed me with an anal fissure, an RV fistuala and an abscess. Two days later I had a fissurectomy and the biopsies confirmed Crohns. He put me on cipro, flagyl, norco and ativan and referred me to a GI.
By October 1st I met with the GI and he prescribed 50 mg prednisone, but wanted me to heal up some more before he did a colonoscopy because I still had really bad D. So I spent a couple days in the hospital because by this time I couldn't eat, was vomiting all the time on top of the D, and was still in a huge amount of pain. Had a CT that confirmed narrowing of my TI. A couple weeks later I had my colonoscopy that confirmed Crohn's colitis as well. My GI started me on Remicade and after my loading doses we added azathioprine. That gets us to Feb when I finally weaned off of pred.
As of June I was still having pain issues and still not having "normal" bowel habits, so my GI started me on Entocort because he believes that my Crohn's has gotten to be just in my small bowel.
So as of now I am on Remicade every 8 weeks, 100 mg of azathioprine, 9 mg of Entocort, Ambien CR, fluoxetine and percocet as needed, which is about once daily.
I feel really lucky that I was diagnosed so quickly, and I absolutely love my medical team. I have been released by my CRS until I need him again, but am still working with my GI to get everything under control. Active symptoms for just about a year and still fighting it, but I'm getting there. Its so nice to finally meet all of you!
