Hey everyone, I’m Sophie. I’m 15 and have been struggling with Irritable Bowel Syndrome for about 2 years. I still remember how it all began. I was sitting with my mom eating lunch at a deli, when I suddenly became intensely nauseous. My mom said I turning white like a ghost. I went to the bathroom with her, and was suddenly overcome with an incredible fear of throwing up- Emetophobia. This all happened two days before sleep away camp… My mom assumed it was a stomach bug and sent me on my way. Now I was already a little underweight for my age and always had been. By the end of camp I had lost 11 pounds. A 71 pound 13 year old girl. Camp was a tough struggle and I was constantly in and out the nurses office. I had horrible stomach pain, burning, and nausea. I began to have a mentality that if I didn’t eat, I couldn’t throw up… The nurses eventually got concernced as the summer progressed. They sat me down and told me they were worried that I had an eating disorder. I sobbed for over an hour after this. I didn’t care about my weight at all. I felt sad and alone because they made it seem like everything was in my mind and that my pain wasn’t real. one of my counselors came in and said that she had an eating disorder when she was little and that she knows how it’s rough. That made me feel even worse. She now sat next to me at meals and told that if I didn’t eat they would send me to a facility like her when she was my age to treat me. This terrified me and made me even more sad. She thought I was lying. Then the camp finally took me to a hospital. The doctors said I simply had functional dyspepsia and gave me Pepcid. It worked for 2 weeks then stopped. When I got home i had every test done in the book- endoscopy, colonoscopy, endless blood work, and more. My parents eventually put me into CBT. It was torturous for me to say the least. my parents say that I was too young to understand it. I started seeing a therapist who put me on medication that really helped. paroxitine and mirtazipine. Fast forward a few months and I started seeing a GI doctor at a children’s hospital. Then the puzzle pieces came together when I began to get mucus in my poop. I was officially diagnosed with IBS. That day was amazing, and i realized that despite what some people said, I wasn’t making everything up. I’m still learning to live with this, and its bit easy. i still get nausea attacks and flare ups every now and then. But trust me- it has to get worse before it gets better.
