Irritable Bowel Syndrome & Riding?

[emily_in_nc]

I don't have IBS that I know of, but on the morning before a ride, I am always in and out of the bathroom several times. I drink coffee, which does trigger it, but even before coffee, it seems to be triggered by just thinking about riding! I don't have this issue on work days or non-riding weekend days, other than rarely; but it's like clockwork on riding days. Because of that, I do think it's in large part psychological in my case. It's actually a good thing in that once I am all "cleaned out" I never have to think about my bowels during a ride.

DH has this same issue on riding days...we are like two peas in a pod. Fortunately, we rarely do group rides/events where there is a set start time, so we can just trade turns in the bathroom until we're both completely done. Sometimes that means leaving later for a ride than we'd planned, but so be it.

[Velocivixen]

I saw a GI doctor and he took a very lengthy and involved history. As a young child I recall having very painful stomach aches, being very constipated with rock hard stools and vomiting a lot. I lived in a very stressful household (alcoholic lived there) and it was like walking on egg shells. Seemed to manifest in my stomach. Now I have the opposite problem as I described above. Life now is extremely calm, low key and relaxed. I used to work in a job where a co-worker was harassing me (boss knew but nobody did anything) and it got to the point in the morning prior to work I would vomit or have terrible diarrhea because of the thought of having to work in that dysfunctional environment.
So my GI doc did both a colonoscopy then an upper/lower GI (EGD) and ruled out a bunch of stuff. The culture for H-Pylori was negative, despite him finding two tiny ulcers. He put me on Protonix which I took for a couple of years. I finally quit taking it. However because of the two ulcers he couldn't say for certain if the ulcers caused the problems or if it was IBS. My ulcers went away and I still had a lot of symptoms, so I believe it's IBS.

[DarcyInOregon]

Velo, I had IBS for quite a few years, was diagnosed with it after a lot of testing, and I managed to reverse the condition. For the years I suffered from it, my intestines would spasm and the pain was awful. The bowel movements would either be flat as a pancake or be diarrhea. And yes, I had the same accidents that you did, mistaking something more critical for gas.

I reversed the conditoin by 1)learned to control stress, 2)eliminated food chemicals and caffeine from the diet, 3)went totally heart healthy with the nutrition, along with the increase of fiber from fresh fruit, veggies, whole grains, legumes, etc. as already mentioned and eliminated processed foods from the diet, 4)swallowed the probiotics every day for over a year as already mentioned, and 5)put daily exercise as a priority over other things.

Because I eat so much fiber, I have to get up extra early before the morning rides to make sure I've had enough trips to the bathroom. If the starting point requires a drive, I make sure I get there early enough to avail myself of the toilet facilities if needed.

[Velocivixen]

Hi Darcy, thanks for sharing that. I've lost 116 lbs., exercise almost daily, eat whole foods, prepare most of my foods at home, and have extremely little stress. I do drink coffee every morning though. I typically also eat Nancy's Organic non fat yogurt, so I wonder if I have a sensitivity to milk. Yogurt has so many natural probiotics though. I eat a lot of veges & fruits, whole grains, beans & legumes and drink plenty of plain water.

[grey]

I am shocked to see how many of us have stomach issues!
Velo, I have several odd things going on, not all like your issue, but I have had one of those embarassing "I thought it was gas" incidents. At work, 10 years ago. Thankfully nobody was in the bathroom, and my office was right next to it. I had worn stockings as well as undies and thankfully it didn't go past the stockings (hiding that in the office trash???? OY!) and I found a way to get home ASAP. Horrifying.

I worked from home for many years, and the stress and late nights of my old occupation were killing my stomach, much like you describe. Who would have thought graphic design and marketing could be so brutal? Just try having a printer screw up a 200K job sometime. For those years, everything I saw online for IBS symptoms, I had.

Stress is huge for me. I've managed to reduce most of it to a very manageable level, but still have a few things that set off my stomach. No coffee. Ever. When I have it, my stomach knots up into a ROCK, it swells, it hurts from start to finish, I get reflux, and it takes 24 hours for everything to relax again. An unrelated issue for me with coffee is arrythmia, mix that with exercise and you get a very scary experience. For whatever reason, for me coffee is poison. Shame, because I love it so. I have decaf once in a great while, but it still gives me some of the above symptoms. I think it's the acid.

Stress, or going on vacation/visiting family means extra precautions. I bottle up. So I pack carrot juice and extra fruit, am super careful about what I eat, and get up early to relax enough to encourage movement. I have to do this "getting up early thing" anytime my routine is disturbed by something (company, added stress, a morning bike ride). Should all this prove ineffective, prune juice becomes my friend, but it also tears me apart along the way.

I'm still sorting out what my trigger foods are, because I also experience a lot of bloating. There are times you'd swear I was five months pregnant! It seems I may have a little gluten intolerance - barley and kasha are the worst, but pasta seems to be fine. I bake our bread & grind my own wheat, so I've been opting for amaranth and oats and making rice and bean flours instead. It's interesting and fun to experiment.

I'm vegetarian, I'm very careful to eat lots of fresh fruit and veggies, legumes, etc. I avoid dairy save for about three "cheats" I allow myself per month (cheese = lockdown. Dairy also causes several "female" issues for me, and at only 27, I had arthritis so bad some days I couldn't lift a pan. Got rid of cheese, I'm all good now - no arthritis and no doctors trying to diagnose endometriosis when it isn't there).

I've knocked out a lot of sugar, opting for stevia instead, and drink a lot of home-made herbal tea. I subsititute Teechino for coffee - it satisfies that craving and is alkalizing instead of acidic. Like Darcy, exercise is paramount. I've also started including a probiotic, but haven't been good about taking it every day. Noticing improvement though.

[Velocivixen]

Thanks everyone for sharing on such an intimate and personal topic.

[ny biker]

Am I the only one who finds that a surprising number of club rides start someplace where there are no bathroom facilities anywhere nearby? Not just no toilets at the ride start (like a school or park and ride lot), but no gas stations, fast food, convience stores, etc. within miles. I learned years ago to check in advance and I won't do a ride if there are no nearby restrooms. And I don't even have the severe problems that many of you have. But I still want to pee before and after the ride regardless of any other needs that sometimes arise at the last minute. The only thing I can figure is that the rides are planned by guys who figure they'll just find a nearby tree.

Anyway, </rant>.

I typed my earlier post on my phone, which kinda limits my ability to type long messages. So to elaborate a bit, my friend with ulcerative colitis told me she had reached the point where she could only run errands one at a time to minimize the amount of time she spent away from home. Her diet was extremely limited and she was losing weight. Since she started to take Align, she no longer has to plan her activities around proximity to a bathroom, and she's been able to go back to eating some foods that had previously caused major problems. And her weight is back to where it was before. She said it's the only thing that has really helped with her symptoms.

[BleeckerSt_Girl]

I'm going to second what Knotted said- take soluble fiber supplements about twice a day in a modest amount. Metamusil is the somewhat expensive brand name of the psyllium grain husk soluble fiber. This type of fiber, as Knot said, tends to 'normalize' your bowels- in other words if you are too constipated it helps move things along gently, and if you have IBS with unpredictable diarrhea attacks, it really helps solidify and normalize that too.

Here's what I take, 2 capsules, twice a day:
http://www.allstarhealth.com/f/yerba...llium_husk.htm
It's the same thing as Metamusil but way cheaper. It's gentle and natural and simply helps normalize everything. It can help a LOT if you take a modest dose routinely.

Other than that, I'd say you ought to forget the coffee in the morning- it's obviously triggering a morning attack for you. You state you have a normal event when you get up and then a loose attack after your coffee.
Try some herbal tea (no caffiene) in the morning with a small amount of toast or something, along with a couple of fiber capsules. Take your fiber as well before going to bed, or with evening meal. I bet if you do this you will see a huge improvement.
Definitely avoid fruits or veggies with hard-to-digest skins- like tomato, peppers, apple skins, grapes, eggplant, and also mushrooms. Lettuce can be bad troublesome too.

[Biciclista]

I don't have the morning coffee but I still have the "attack" if that's what you want to call it.

[Velocivixen]

@Mimi, yes I can have this same problem before a run or during. That's why I try to wait to very late morning to run to ensure that I'm "running on empty" For me this is strictly a morning issue. It varies also. Today I have had my typical 2 cups of coffee with no problems. I'm actually also sort of "revved up" because I've got an atypical day with lots of running around & errands. So I like how one poster called it the "dreads" as emotion can definitely affect it, although with me seems to be unpredictable. Because it's only in the morning for me I think it is influenced by what I eat the night before AND the caffeine in the morning. Seems to be the combination. Then when you add on emotional stress or whatever it can trigger.
Happy riding.