Several months ago, I was at the grocery store. As I walked down an aisle, this warm, wonderful feeling spread through me. Why? Because I realized that I felt good. Not just okay, not just better, but really, really good. For the first time in over three years.
It was such a memorable moment, I will never forget it.
But the next day light symptoms returned. I slid back into being "okay."
Ah, well. It was nice while it lasted . . . that one glorious moment.
So what happened?
I've wrote about this before so I apologize if you've already read it.
When my G.I. and I talked about tapering off of the mesalamine and taking only Rinvoq, I thought he said to taper completely off. He said that he told me to taper down to one daily pill and stay on that.
Regardless of whose fault it was, tapering completely off of the mesalamine put me into a flare. And despite going back on four daily mesalamine pills, I am having a heck of a time getting back to that oh-so-close full remission I was at in April and May. (Sigh) . . . I was so close.
My Almost Disastrous Day
My husband and I went to a PGA tournament this past week, as we did last year. Last year was great, I had no UC symptoms at all. I was worried about the semi-long drive, but it was all fine.
Not so this year. We had tickets for the Thursday and Friday rounds, and so arrived at our hotel on Wednesday. At the restaurant for dinner Wednesday evening, I had a "chicken pot pie." I put the words chicken pot pie in parenthesis because, while that is what it was called, it wasn't a pie, and it was awful. It was chicken soup in a bowl with a weird pastry thing sitting on top of the bowl. The soup tasted greasy and the pastry thing tasted like lard.
Back in the hotel, my stomach felt off. But it has felt achy and uncomfortable on and off for awhile, so I just thought it was that.
At 5:00 a.m. I was awakened by that lousy, familiar "I have to poop NOW!" feeling and barely made it to the bathroom. There was lots of diarrhea, blood, and pain. I went again an hour later, but luckily no more blood. We'd planned to head to the golf course around 6:30, but the way my stomach was feeling, I knew I wouldn't make it. So my husband left by himself. Twenty minutes later I ran to the bathroom again.
Afterwards, I was laying in bed wondering if this was where I was going to spend our whole trip when I remembered that I had packed prednisone into my medicine bag . . . for just-in-case situations. Well, this was definitely a just-in-case situation!
I took one prednisone pill. If it didn't work, I'd take more. But thankfully, thirty minutes later, I was feeling much better. Two hours later I was feeling even better, so I hopped on the shuttle bus and met up with my husband at the 18th hole. The rest of the day was great. I had an "Oh, no" moment the next day, but there was a bathroom right next to me so no problem. The rest of the trip went fine.
I am blaming the pretend chicken pot pie for my problems. But I'm also still recovering from a flare, so my colon could be more susceptible than usual. Still, I hope to never eat something that greasy and nasty again!
© Colitis Senioritis 2024
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