GERD – a week later

Aug1

So, this is what my life has been for the last 6 days since days since I went to the ER and figured what I got myself into:

– Six meals a day, or 7 sometimes, every hour and a half. But NO food after 6:30 pm, or it’ll hurt when I go to sleep.
– My meals are: a banana, an apple, oatmeal, one chicken breast, rice porridge, pasta with vegetable broth, honey, pears, bread, saltines, some steamed vegetables. That is IT. That is all I am eating. One single item is a meal.
– No big meals, all has to fit in a tiny bowl.
– Nothing to drink that is not water. No big gulps, tiny sips all throughout the day. I will venture into fat free milk and ginger tea this weekend.
– GERD Medication two times a day, Plus TUMS, plus Mylanta shots.
– I chew a lot of gum, saliva helps dilute the acids in my stomach
I schedule my food intake in the morning, and I don’t change anything.

It still hurts.
I feel weak, and I lost 3 pounds in 4 days. But I feel better than last week.
I quite probably have an ulcer. And a problem for life. Apparently, GERD doesn’t get cured, you learn to manage it. We will see soon what that means.

I realize I brought this to myself. People who get GERD usually are drinkers, or smokers, or have higher BMI, or eat spicy foods. I don’t do any of those, but I was the one always finishing everybody’s food, the biggest the meal the better, and loved night binging! Still, I REGRET NOTHING. I really had fun while it lasted, even if it now has to come to a screeching halt. Also, it could be the aspirin I’ve taken for 10 years. Or stress (??). A hernia is a huge probability too. We will know soon hopefully. I am visiting a gastroenterologist and my cardiologist next week!

I wonder what this will do for my marathon training. I just lost a week, and I am on week 6. I might have to skip Mohawk-Hudson but hopefully I can still do NYCM. Juan takes me on walks every day, and they’re very slow, the first days I couldn’t manage more than a block or two. Last night I didn’t really want to go out, I was so tired, work had wiped me out, but I managed to walked a mile… We shall see. I need to focus on stopping all this acid pumping into my stomach first.

23 thoughts on “GERD – a week later”

  2. hope you feel better soon…and find out what the cause is. i know when i developed a gluten allergy, it was the most frustrating thing in the world not knowing exactly why…or how..or what was going on and causing all of the pain!

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  5. I’m so sorry- I know how much you liked FOOD! 🙂 Hope you can get it figured out soon, and feel better. Also, what can be done to prevent this, because it sounds horrible and I don’t ever want it…?

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    • thanks Peg, well, the worst is smoking, high BMI, drinking and eating spicy foods. I did none of that, but what I did:
      stress
      eating BIG meals
      really weird eating habits, like eating a lot, then not eating for 8 hours…
      or… nsaids, aspirin…
      those are the main things!

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  6. 2 years ago after many years of intestinal misery I was told to stop all gluten and all dairy. It sucked. It was miserable. It was a pain in the butt but the pain in my stomach and intestines was miraculously gone in 48 hours. I will say it took me nearly 2 years to finally stop seeing food as what it is to so many of us: celebrations, fun, sexy, exciting, a reason to travel, a reason to run, a reason to get out of bed. It has become energy and nothing more. Have a lot of patience with yourself and be willing to let yourself have a meltdown now and then when you really want to eat something but you know it’ll make you miserable so you have to say no. You feel like a small child and would like to throw a tantrum right in the restaurant while watching everyone around you eat pizza, burgers, and fries. Not to mention beer and milkshakes. Many people tell me that at least there are gluten free substitutes now but even those leave me bloated and gassy and in a carb craving cycle that drives me mad. I had to really focus on what made me feel the best within my food selection option and put aside my envy for all the food around me. I hope that you get more relief soon and maybe the specialists can offer some insight as well.

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  7. I know all too well what GERD is. I was diagnosed in 2004, and since then it seems to have gotten worse. I never did like spicy foods, and all the starches, fried foods, etc. I have been a healthy eater for quite some time. I do not eat red meat, seldom fried foods, no mexican, or hot spicy foods, a slice of someone’s pizza once a year maybe, no alcohol, just weak wine (Moscato) every now and then (maybe 1-3 glasses a month). So, I have no idea how I ended up with GERD. I eat only white meat, lots of vegees and fruits, drink lots of water, and exercise (not as often as I should, but at least 3 times week). My first real attack (this is what I call it), was about a month and half ago, It was difficult to swallow, when I did, it felt like I had spasms in my upper chest, stomach, back. It was awful, thought I was dieing. I had not been taking my prevacid for about a month or so, and prior that time, I was only taking it periodically. However, after this attack I have taken my prevacid daily, and of course my throat feels much better. What I totally dislike about this GERD thing, is it feels like I have heart flutters in my throat a lot, and as soon as I eat something I get the hiccups. Have you experienced this?
    – Barbara

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    • Hi Barbara, I don’t know A LOT about GERD as I only really heard about it a month ago, but for what I figured out, it’s just a collection of symptoms, not really the cause. I’d talk to your doctors until you figure out what is causing the GERD… If you haven’t check with a dr, I’d say please do, it could be many things, in my case, it was an ulcer, and I hope to be done with the diet once the ulcer clears, but please do check, there’s gotta be a solution!!! Hoping for the best!

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      • Hi, thank you for your comment. I do have a gastrointestinal doctor, and unfortunately I have gerd, and how I got it, don’t quite know. It began with having acid reflux, then it turned into gerd. I have heard it is a fibro tag-a-long, like most people who have fibro have gerd. I have also heard that people who have had hysterectomys are prone to gerd, and of course it is the result of eating too much spicey foods, which I have never eaten. So, here I am with gerd. I take prevacid and it helps, but just having gerd period, is the most uncomfortable disease. The belching all the time, the full feeling in your chest, and stomach, and you have to watch what you eat for sure or else you will be in trouble, and the heart flutters which I heard are gerd spasms, so what do you do? I just pray that I am carried through this one like all the others.

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