What causes a stomach to produce excessive gas?

Page 1 of 2 [ 22 posts ]  Go to page 1, 2  Next

Ragtime
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 2 Nov 2006
Age: 45
Gender: Male
Posts: 7,927
Location: Dallas, Texas

10 Feb 2009, 1:23 pm

While I was in the hospital having my gallbladder removed recently, the lady doing the sonogram pointed to a ridge-like shape on the screen, and said "Your stomach produces a lot of gas". Which is absolutely true, and happens so often and to such a degree that it often will ruin an entire day.

But I don't understand the physics and chemistry of what is going on in a stomach that produces debilitating gas pains from, say, the small bowl of oatmeal I had this morning, which apparently didn't agree with my stomach one bit -- despite the fact that oatmeal usually does go down just fine with no problems. But, that's my stomach: it randomly mis-processes regular, usually-safe-for-me food. What on Earth is going on in there?? I once even got incredible gas pains after using those "Beano" drops in my food! The stuff was completely ineffective, and it was "Maximum strength".

Anyone have any info on the digestive tract as partains to out-of-control gas and bloating after even tiny meals?
I am desperate to find the answer to my lifelong problem which is getting worse. I'm going to start seeing a GI (gastrointerologist) on a regular basis, because I believe my system is completely out of control.


_________________
Christianity is different than Judaism only in people's minds -- not in the Bible.


0_equals_true
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 5 Apr 2007
Age: 41
Gender: Male
Posts: 11,038
Location: London

10 Feb 2009, 1:43 pm

Stomach is not the same as GI tract.

I presume you are talking about stomach yes? Where does it bloat/hurt?

There are loads of theories. Bacteria does produce gas on it, but in your stomach it is probably more a case of a reaction to some irritant causing excess acid and a pissed off stomach.

Your stomach does the initial digestion, so it may simply have trouble coping with the initial load, as with indigestion.



0_equals_true
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 5 Apr 2007
Age: 41
Gender: Male
Posts: 11,038
Location: London

10 Feb 2009, 1:46 pm

You know the reason why eating is good while drinking isn't so much that food absorbs alcohol, but the fact that eating triggers a the pyloric sphincter to close while digesting food thus giving your liver breaks and releasing the booze slowly rather than all at once.



Jezabel_Starfox
Hummingbird
Hummingbird

User avatar

Joined: 23 Oct 2008
Age: 48
Gender: Female
Posts: 23
Location: stranger in a strange land

10 Feb 2009, 2:29 pm

It could be food intolerance. Perhaps you are senstive to specific foods as this could cause bloating and gas. I personally have discovered I am gluten and wheat intolerant and that means I have to avoid all foods that contain wheat and gluten in my diet or I hurt very bad from bloating and gas and suffer other health consequences. All my doctors missed making the connection between my symptoms and the cause and I just elimated all wheat and gluten for a two week trial to see what happened and I was very happy to find many of my issues cleared up on the new diet. Intolerences to specific foods can build up over a lifetime so if you have been dealing with this for a long time and it is getting worse (as what happened to me) it is time to rethink what you are putting in your gut.



MR_BOGAN
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 5 Mar 2008
Age: 123
Gender: Male
Posts: 2,479
Location: The great trailer park in the sky!

10 Feb 2009, 4:04 pm

^like what that post said.

I used to have a problem with bloating and gas and like you it was gradually getting worse. Go on a gluten free diet for two weeks, then eat a whole lot of bread. If you notice a difference you are on to something.

Read all your food carefully, because lots of food have hidden gluten in them. Best bet is to stay away from processed food, you should be able to do it for a couple of weeks.

hmmm, also try going off dairy and also refined sugar, you should be able to do that for a couple of weeks. A lot of people become lactose intolerant, but that goes away after about 6 months once you have been on a gluten free diet. I was fine with dairy but had a problem with refined sugar, but I am fine with sugar now. Use honey instead of sugar.

Plan out your two week diet and it will be easy.



Ragtime
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 2 Nov 2006
Age: 45
Gender: Male
Posts: 7,927
Location: Dallas, Texas

10 Feb 2009, 5:25 pm

0_equals_true wrote:
Stomach is not the same as GI tract.

I presume you are talking about stomach yes? Where does it bloat/hurt?

There are loads of theories. Bacteria does produce gas on it, but in your stomach it is probably more a case of a reaction to some irritant causing excess acid and a pissed off stomach.

Your stomach does the initial digestion, so it may simply have trouble coping with the initial load, as with indigestion.


It's my stomach. Upper center abdomen, 1 or 2 inches below the breastbone. My bowels hurt too, but my stomach is definitely the locus of the pain. (I'm in the ER now. The pain got out of hand. It peaks and troughs. It's in a temporary trough right now.)

Food irritates my stomach. Every kind of food there is. (Especially right now.)

This morning I've been feverish, had a peak of maximum, unremitting pain for 45 minutes (after that it went down to about 90%), my forearms and hands tingled into numbness, I've sweated, I've shivered, I've growled like a mad dog and groaned involuntarily with every breath. Food poisoning or stomach flu are my only two guesses, besides incredible bloating that I'm sure is beyond safe parameters. That's why I'm here in the ER, because I'm genuinely concerned these symptoms indicate a dangerous condition. They took a lot of blood for testing earlier, and now they're checking out the X-rays. I've never had these symptoms before. I've had severe gas most of my life, so I know the difference between that and my current condition. (I began this thread when all it was was extreme gas, but it's blossomed into a whole new thing now.)


_________________
Christianity is different than Judaism only in people's minds -- not in the Bible.


Ragtime
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 2 Nov 2006
Age: 45
Gender: Male
Posts: 7,927
Location: Dallas, Texas

10 Feb 2009, 5:35 pm

Jezabel_Starfox wrote:
It could be food intolerance. Perhaps you are senstive to specific foods as this could cause bloating and gas. I personally have discovered I am gluten and wheat intolerant and that means I have to avoid all foods that contain wheat and gluten in my diet or I hurt very bad from bloating and gas and suffer other health consequences. All my doctors missed making the connection between my symptoms and the cause and I just elimated all wheat and gluten for a two week trial to see what happened and I was very happy to find many of my issues cleared up on the new diet. Intolerences to specific foods can build up over a lifetime so if you have been dealing with this for a long time and it is getting worse (as what happened to me) it is time to rethink what you are putting in your gut.


It's possible, but gluten is in so many things that the task of eliminating it seems daunting. (Or am I thinking of carbs?) Would you please list for me some foods that don't contain wheat or gluten? I'd like to try abstaining from it.


_________________
Christianity is different than Judaism only in people's minds -- not in the Bible.


Jezabel_Starfox
Hummingbird
Hummingbird

User avatar

Joined: 23 Oct 2008
Age: 48
Gender: Female
Posts: 23
Location: stranger in a strange land

10 Feb 2009, 7:04 pm

I hope everything is resolved quickly and you can begin to feel better soon. Hopefully the doctors can help resolve what is troubling your system. It can seem daunting to make such a diet change, after all it is a lifestyle change. But not as daunting as living the rest of life in pain over something that can be easily remedied with awareness and determination, or so I have found.

I have found some gluten-free substitutes in local grocery stores and food co-ops. Glutino and Kinnickinick are two gluten-free brands that have products that I thought tasted good. I get cookies and pretzels and cereal and breads (which are frozen because they lack preservatives) in these brands. Sonoma brand gluten free tortillas are good for sandwiches and tacos. Plus, there is a bunch of other regular brands that are gluten free. I eat a lot of fresh veggies and fruits, 100% meat products, and look for labels that say "gluten free" and I keep a list of ingredients on my phone for quick reference because it's been hard to keep all the hidden stuff straight (like modified food starch you avoid, but modified corn starch is okay). A good gluten-free cookbook goes a long way too! Cross contamination concerns me so we buy seperate condiments and write GF. I had pizza the other night with the kinnicknick brand pizza crusts and I just found hamburger buns by the same company so we are doing burgers tonight. Quick and easy meals isn't always possible, and it can get expensive, so I am learning how to get back to the basics which really has been easier than I thought it would be. Here is a few links I have found helpful...hopefully they will help you too!

http://www.glutenfreeinfo.com/Diet/S-FoodList.htm
http://www.celiac.com/articles/181/1/Sa ... Page1.html
http://www.celiac.com/articles/182/1/Un ... Page1.html
http://www.csaceliacs.org/gluten_grains.php
http://www.csaceliacs.org/gluten_choices.php



MR_BOGAN
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 5 Mar 2008
Age: 123
Gender: Male
Posts: 2,479
Location: The great trailer park in the sky!

11 Feb 2009, 5:00 am

munch out on rice and potatoes for two weeks.



0_equals_true
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 5 Apr 2007
Age: 41
Gender: Male
Posts: 11,038
Location: London

11 Feb 2009, 9:55 am

You might be able to get a doctor to stick an endoscope down there. It sounds evasive but it is relatively routine procedure nowadays. They put you under, then feed it down your throat, poke around for a few minutes, remove it and bring you around again. You a free to go after then, you just got to remember not to drive car straight after, as will any general anaesthetic.

Celiac disease affects the bowels, but it can be detected sometimes by looking as your stomach lining.



0_equals_true
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 5 Apr 2007
Age: 41
Gender: Male
Posts: 11,038
Location: London

11 Feb 2009, 9:57 am

MR_BOGAN wrote:
munch out on rice and potatoes for two weeks.

This works well for gassy bowels (as do any complex carbohydrates). but if the problem is more then a bugs then it only temporary.



MR_BOGAN
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 5 Mar 2008
Age: 123
Gender: Male
Posts: 2,479
Location: The great trailer park in the sky!

11 Feb 2009, 2:54 pm

0_equals_true wrote:
You might be able to get a doctor to stick an endoscope down there. It sounds evasive but it is relatively routine procedure nowadays. They put you under, then feed it down your throat, poke around for a few minutes, remove it and bring you around again. You a free to go after then, you just got to remember not to drive car straight after, as will any general anaesthetic.

Celiac disease affects the bowels, but it can be detected sometimes by looking as your stomach lining.


I had that done, it didn't show anything and the doctors said their was nothing wrong with me. :roll:

Two week diet is the best test.



0_equals_true
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 5 Apr 2007
Age: 41
Gender: Male
Posts: 11,038
Location: London

11 Feb 2009, 3:33 pm

for what? It is universally known that if you just eat potato and rice, it is easy on your system. But you can't do that forever or you'll die of malnutrition.



MR_BOGAN
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 5 Mar 2008
Age: 123
Gender: Male
Posts: 2,479
Location: The great trailer park in the sky!

11 Feb 2009, 3:41 pm

gluten intolerance.

Yeah eat meat, fruit and veges as well.



Ragtime
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 2 Nov 2006
Age: 45
Gender: Male
Posts: 7,927
Location: Dallas, Texas

12 Feb 2009, 9:58 am

While waiting several hours in the ER waiting room, my extreme pain eventually tapered off to almost nothing, at about four hours after my last meal. But even after 8 hours of fast, the doctor could hear all kinds of bowel gurgling (gas) in his stethoscope.

The ER did X-rays, CT scan, and blood work, and all of those tests came up negative. My white count was 1500 (which is why they decided for the CT scan), but that was the only anomaly, and they said it could have many different causes, including stress. (And I definitely had stress!) The doctors (the one on duty, plus my surgeon) did a very poor job of trying to identify the problem. They had no answers or theories whatsoever to offer me. In fact, my surgeon smiled, blithely said I was fine and could go home, and started walking right out the door despite my still-very-worried face. While she was walking out the door, I said, "But, I can't eat. Every tiny amount of even mild food that I eat gives me a violent reaction and unimaginable pain." She said, "Well, start slow." :roll: Uh, slower than the oatmeal that set it off that morning? Slower than the half-cup of chicken broth which did even worse? After my surgery, I had already nursed myself slowly back to eating full, normal meals within the past week, and the stuff I had been eating the morning my extreme pain began was all very mild food, in small portions.

And the other doctor, the one on duty at the time I came in, kept asking me questions and immediately interrupting all my answers with bored-sounding "MM-HM... MM-HM...". I wanted to say, "Well just go away if you're not even going to let me talk! Find me a doctor who will actually listen to my list of symptoms."

It was actually the nurse who came up with any theory as to what had wracked me with unimaginable pain that morning. I have IBS, and the Hydrocodone I was talking for post-op pain slows down digestion. I didn't know that. My particular digestion is very tricky even under normal circumstances, so his guess (and I agree with it) was that any medication that's going to be screwing with my particular digestion has the ability to wreak havoc on it. So, he went and got me a better prescription -- one made specifically for IBS, called Dicyclomine. It "decreases bowel hypermotility", which decreases cramping, which I definitely have, and from which I had been suffering in unbearably extreme degrees that morning.

So, I've quit taking the Hydrocodone, and my stomach is working normally now. I was initially afraid to eat even Jello when I got home from the hospital this time, because my reactions to everything were so violently debilitating that same morning. When I got home from the ER this time, I literally ate just one teaspoonful of Jello and waited 10 minutes as a test. No problems. I ate the rest. Again, no problems. The next day, I graduated myself to tiny portions of real food. I was just fine. I still have nothing but diarreah since then, but hopefully that will clear up. I have IBS-A, so that's not exactly a foreign symptom to me.

I hate doctors.


_________________
Christianity is different than Judaism only in people's minds -- not in the Bible.


Jezabel_Starfox
Hummingbird
Hummingbird

User avatar

Joined: 23 Oct 2008
Age: 48
Gender: Female
Posts: 23
Location: stranger in a strange land

12 Feb 2009, 11:32 am

Well, you are ultimately in charge of your own body and have to make the decision about what to do with your situation. Its so frustrating to have doctors not listen to the patient as I have felt and experienced what you experienced in the ER.

I eventually became aware that IBS symptoms and symptoms for food intolerence can be the same. I was given a prescription for the exact same medicine as you a couple of years ago. The Dicyclomine helped for a short term period, but I noticed that it slowed me down to the point of pain. Even modifying the dosage didn't help. I had to stop taking it because I started to experience serious side effects.

When you posted the meals you ate, oatmeal and chicken broth, I identified gluten/wheat in these particular foods. The jello was safe because there is no gluten in jello. Its up to you, but you may consider it would be worth trying out a gluten free diet if you do not see any recovery from your symptoms or start to suffer side effects from long term use of the prescription.