Hi!

I am new here and am so glad to have found you all! I would greatly appreciate any thoughts you could share based on your own personal experiences with pancreatitis because I am at a bit of a loss. I have been to an internist for various abdominal symptoms, and have been told on both visits that it is chronic pancreatitis (although the tests are still ongoing and so far show nothing). I just don't think this makes sense and am wondering whether it could be IBS instead (or something else entirely?). Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated!!!

My symptoms are as follows, and come and go; lately they have been around more often, which is why I finally bit the bullet and went to see a doctor for it (no medical insurance):

-severe almost constant bloating where my entire abdomen goes quite hard (I am skinny and underweight, BMI under 18, yet it makes me look 6 months pregnant)
-stools that range from yellow to bright orange (as in carrot, sorry about TMI) and somewhat loose (but not diarhhea)
-mucous from time to time, often discharged separately from a bowel movement (sorry again about the TMI!!!)
-very sensitive blood sugar; get the shakes and irritable if I am not careful about remembering to eat every 2 hours
-pain from time to time, usually in my upper right quadrant; radiates to back...hurts but is NOTHING like what you guys seem to be going through, I feel so badly for you all
-nausea from time to time, no vomiting though...tends to last an entire day or a few days..sometimes it just shows up on its own, other times it happens every time I eat...sometimes eating a high fat meal triggers it either immediately, or the next morning when I get up
-wake up at night occasionally due to pain on the right side under my ribs; recently woke up because I swore I was having a heart attack; it was like someone had taken a metal belt and tightened it around my chest where my brastrap would be and was pulling it as hard as they could...I have an unusually high pain threshold but must admit had never felt anything like it...since my breathing didn't seem compromised I sucked it up, figuring it wasnt' a heart attack and after an hour or so it subsided (hope that doesn't happen again anytime soon...got very very close to dragging myself to emerg)
-a few times my entire abdominal area has felt itchy, but no visible rash
-it seems at times my face is a bit orangey...but not my eye whites...or am I just imagining this?
-sometimes I feel sick every time I eat, other times I feel fine
-symptoms improve if I cut out fat
-when I am going through a period with a lot of these symptoms, sometimes when I eat I feel the food is all just sitting there, somewhere around my back teeth maybe, and just not moving through my system, and I don't mean constipation, just somehow the whole digestive process has ground to a halt; in fact when I am getting alot of the symtpoms, my whole digestive system seems out of whack and everything starts being off
-I have to be careful to sleep elevated, or I wake up from coughing fits, which I suspect is GERD but I haven't bothered to have it checked out because keeping elevated at night solves that problem...probably should get a scope for it one of these days though...
-very tired a lot of the time
-I don't drink any alcohol at all, never have, nor do I smoke

The tests I have done so far have been bloodwork, which once showed slightly high (double) amylase and lipase (that was in May) but recent bloodwork (2 weeks ago) has been cheerfully normal except for calcium at the low end of normal, and very slightly elevated Rheumatoid Factor.

Normal CT scan.

An MRI is tomorrow (I have to fast after midnight...will be a fun blood sugar day...ugh)

The internist is absolutely convinced this is chronic pancreatitis. I am absolutely convinced that I don't want to have this and that the symptoms are not severe enough for it to be this, nor do I think that they match closely enough. The only thing that makes me hesitate is that my Chinese Medecine doctor (who treats my allergies) took my pulse and told me that there was something wrong with my pancreas.

Any thoughts on how to differentiate between this and IBS, or another abodominal problem, would be greatly appreciated! I am hoping not to bankrupt myself with a huge medical issue and maybe just have it go away on its own if I am lucky.

Thank you and sorry about this very long post!