well if i am haveing a flare up i tell my docs. no one wants to stay in a flare up. i really don'tunderstand your second ? but if your asking how long it takes for symptoms to start after meds run out . it can take a weekk or two . but it starts a little at a time. and if your asking how ling does it take for meds to kick in . it can take at leasta week to see them go away. bowel movements are different for every one. but from my side. you do get less of them . you may still have some but not as many . i hope that helps out a little. you must be new to this. if there is any thing you don't know about your illness get on the computer and look it up. its a very helpful when yor docs. don't fill you in.good luck.

I am currently in a 4 year flare up.......and that is with medication.

My flare-ups lasted for months at a time before I was diagnosed. Of course, not knowing what it was and having people, including doctors, tell me it was all in my head made it worse. I think my BMs were fairly normal between flares before my surgery. Since then, I have only had greater or lesser degrees of diarrhea. When medications work, they seem to do it fairly quickly.

I think that your relief depends on the med. Prednisone works for me immediately...I'm talkin' hours--if that. My other meds seems to have taken much longer though. I think one of them is sorta working, but it took a while for me to be able to tell.

Oh yead, the BM's were pretty normal while on the right meds. I felt like a normal person again.

Flare up never ended, on meds for 10 monthes straight. Never had a regular BM. UC sufferers should look into a j-pouch. It was the best thing I ever did. Check out j-pouch.org. It is super!

I have had uc for 12 years now. During that time I have been taking Asacol so really I have been on constant medication. When I experience flare ups the prednisone usually relieves the symptoms within days although for the bleeding to stop completely can take weeks depending on the severity of the symptoms. I have had many flare ups since the diagnosis, probably one a year now but I did manage a couple of years in remission. I would say I've had three pretty severe flare ups which resulted in time off work to recover but generally the GI has got things under control with prednisone. The longest flare up is difficult to define since the bleeding can stop and the number of bm's can reduce but you always have to taper slowly of the prednisone so you can still feel pretty bad due to the side effects of the pred. I would say the bleeding for me can last about four weeks but it's important to get that under control fairly quickly. I'm speaking from experience here since I ended up having a blood transfusion when I was first diagnosed....don't want to get to that point ever again if I can help it.
When a flare up ends bm's are pretty much normal - one a day. One thing I recommend, keep good notes about the things that seem to help you during a flare up (we are all different) and your docs advice so that you can refer back to this info. Make sure you get plenty of rest, keep an eye on your diet and drink a lot of water.