Health Update

For those of you who may be interested, I have a health update for you. I was sent to a gastroenterologist on Thursday with the idea I may need to have an endoscopy procedure. This is a rather unpleasant sounding procedure in which the doctor places a tube with a camera on the end of it down your esophagus into your stomach to look mainly for ulcers and take a small biopsy.

I was greatly relieved to hear from the gastroenterologist that he did not feel I needed that procedure at this time. After going over all my records and tests from the ER and my primary doctor and with the sudden onset of my symptoms, he seemed to be in agreement with the ER doctor that the ibuprofen had caused small ulcerations in the lining of my stomach. He said these ulcers can take 2-4 weeks to heal completely, and he has known a few patients who took several months to get 100% back to normal. The medications I was given by my primary doctor on Monday will aid in my stomach's healing and help control the nausea. He made a follow up phone appointment with me in 3 weeks at which time he said he was confident all my symptoms would be gone.

I only managed to work a day and a half this week. As of today's writing on Saturday I am greatly improved from last week but still definately having some pain, nausea, and fatigue issues. My children and I did some volunteer work this morning at the local animal shelter and I am so exhausted now I will likely be in bed for most of the rest of the day.

I have always known that doctors caution you on the use of ibuprofen and the stomach upset it can cause for some people, but NEVER dreamed it could do this to me. I was taking prescription strength which is 800 mg 3 times a day. Just for comparison, over the counter ibuprofen is only 200 mg/ tablet so it is a significant difference. The funny thing is that I have taken presciption strength before for an ankle injury when I first started running a few years ago, and had no ill effects whatsoever. As much as I hate to say this, perhaps age plays a factor here. It does seem that once you turn 40 your body begins to fall apart...LOL.

I am relieved to know nothing is seriously wrong with me, but impatient to get back to 100% and all my normal activites.