Gastritis Support Group
Gastritis is a medical term for inflammation of the lining of the stomach. It means that white blood cells move into the wall of the stomach as a response to some type of injury. Gastritis has many underlying causes, from infection with the bacterium H. pylori, bile reflux, or excessive consumption of alcohol or certain foods or drugs like aspirin.
Hi I still get a lot of pain and recently Ive had reflux coming back at night. I have to go back to see the gastro and hopefully will get referred to the hospital in my nearest city. Ive been on Sucralfate,Carafate and have now been told by the pharmacy that I cant have it due to a manufacturing problem. Does anyone know what else I can try? I have Gaviscon which doesn,t seem to do much. I can,t keep up the Slippery elm because of my meds. Im on 3 PPIs a day now and the pain is just so bad. Nothing seems to work still. I mjust hope that the cause is found. I may be facing another endoscopy but they haven,t said yet. All I want is to be out of this nightmare but its not getting better. Thanks
I drink 6 cups of coffee a day but my pain is a zero if I avoid these things:
Pain meds- OTC ( Ibuprofin, aspirin) and prescription narcotics
Soda Pop- all of them are high in phosporic acid
Alcohol
Vitamin C in pills
Magnesium in pills
Juice
Chlorinated city water
Tea
Metamucil and Citrocal- they are insanely high in citric acid
Citric acid things like lemonade, oranges, etc.
Peppermint/Cinnamon anything- gum, mints, teas ( I ate a whole in my stomach with Altoid mints 20 years ago!)
Do you take/eat any of those things? I REALLY feel there is something in your diet that you are missing as a cause to your pain. WE just HAVE to figure out what it is! Are you doing sit-ups or crunches? Those cause me a 10/10 pain for several days if I do them. Our stomachs can't handle that type of exercise, if you have chronic gastritis.
My coffee is an arabica bean blend so it's low in acid. I use 2/3 of a teaspoon per cup and use 3 heaping tablespoons of powder creamer to reduce the acidity. The coffee is Walmart's brands and tthe creamer is Walmart's Extra Rich powder cream.
The slippery elm works awesome and you can take it with other meds- just not one hour before or after them.
Take your meds at 7 am. Start taking slippery elm at 8:15 and continue till 11:00am. Eat at noon and take meds. Start elm again at 1 and use till 5. Etc..
If it's too yucky for you, I take my elm as a thick paste that is like oatmeal. I make a week's worth at a time and keep it in the fridge. One half coffee cup of water and micro it for 30 seconds. Stir in 2-3 heaping tablesppons of powder and stir it till melted. Cover with saran wrap and take a teaspoon whenever you want. It goes down so easy as a cold paste. Mix in some honey if it still is unsavory.
That works so good for me that I don't even take my Prilosec or Carafate anymore.
Another thought is, can you take sinus meds- no high blood pressure? I take one Sudafed in the morning and at noon and at 3 for allergies. It has made my pain so much less. I don't really understand why because it is made for sinuses. My guess is is that it's drying up the acid and bile in ym stomach? I get it from the pharmacist behind the counter.
I hope and pray you find the source of your terrible pain:(
Lori
I know that you have had some ups and downs with this and though it is time to start looking at things again, take a few deep breaths and know you will get through this. It is a tough path to walk but you ARE stronger than the gastritis.