What a pain in the ... - Striper Talk Striped Bass Fishing, Surfcasting, Boating

JohnR · 07-17-2001, 11:54 AM

I've been suffering from some elusive abdominal discomfort for the past few months. Elusive as it never seems to occur at the Doc's office. This has cut into my fishing time too and has kept me home several times that I've had the opportunity to go (as well a few days home from the office ).

Well, yesterday, I had to take an "Upper GI" test (any of you ever have one of those?). Well, it wasn't too bad other than they made me drink a fizzy coctail drink with many solutions ending in "ium". Now I'm thinking back to my chemistray days and I'm thinking helIUM, not bad - used for ballons, and chromIUM - well, dresses up cars nicely, right?

Well, the primary solution was barIUM. They have you drink all this stuff and hop onto this multi-axis x-ray table (a relic by the looks of it) and have you rotate left and right, 20 degrees 45, 82.5 and all this other crappola while taking numerous x-rays... It wasn't too bad really - the hard part was that I was thinking of all the not-so-pretty "IUMs": UranIUM, PlutonIUM, IridIUM... So the question to any of you potential chem-geeks, what the heck is Barium? All I really know is that it's also used in far less pleasant medical tests (that I don't need - phewww)

STEVE IN MASS · 07-17-2001, 12:22 PM

Barium is a chemical element in the magnesium/calcium/strontium family. It can occur as an isotope, and therefore can be slightly radioactive (SAFE!) and tracked thru your system, allowing the physicians to see various aspects of your insides using devices that pick up radioactive materials. Yeah, you sort of "glow" inside.

That is as much as my chemical engineering "geekhood" background knows......

chris L · 07-17-2001, 12:57 PM

well steve that was a good lay mans description . That is thew way it was explained to me some 19 years ago when I had an upper GI . tastey isnt it ? yumm yummm NOT . I had alcohol gastritis ! I used to drink more than my body wanted inside it . I ended up with some serious stomach problems for about 5 yrs . Then it just went away I dont know if the alcohol killed the nerve endings or what happened but I can eat spicey food again and I still have a stomach liner ( thats a good thing otherwise Id be holely ) . good luck john !

schoolie monster · 07-17-2001, 12:59 PM

I hope everything turns out ok... good luck with the results.

Patrick · 07-17-2001, 01:16 PM

John,

I've been run through quite a few tests to get to the root of my stomach problems. Not very fun at all.

Now I'm not a doctor, never claimed to be one but I have lived through chronic stomach pains so I DO have real life experience here. If I can offer one piece of advice, keep asking the doctors questions. Sometimes the patient knows his body better than what those tests tell you. So pry pry pry pry at the doctors and force them to do every test they can.

I'm sure everything will work out fine. Just keep on your Dr.'s butt about doing something about it. That's what we did and as it turned out, it wasn't even my stomach, it was my mind.

Good luck to you.

JohnR · 07-17-2001, 01:39 PM

As much as I suspected Steve - I've had a bit of a glow the past few days anyway...

Quote:

Now I'm not a Doctor...

...But I played one on TV... Just Kidding :P ...

Well , this is definitely painfull at times but hasn't driven me bonkers yet... I do want to get to the root of the problem and corrected. The only good thing so far is they more than the typical chemical/organ function test and every thing is really great (need to lose weight and quit smoking for good though)...

Chris - if I maintained the high rate of uhh, partying when I was younger I may have had those problems too but since I fish, I very rarerly have 2 beers in one night once every other week...

Mike P · 07-17-2001, 02:30 PM

John--not trying to play doctor here, but is that discomfort kind of centered right in the sternum area, or right below? Sort of like an intensive stomach cramp for 20-30 minutes followed by general queasiness? Goes away for days at a time, then recurs when you eat something fatty?

My daughter had the "messy" barium procedure when she was 15 months old, they thought a piece of her intestine had telescoped into the piece below that, turned out only to be a case of giardia she got from her sitter's pool.

Saltheart · 07-17-2001, 03:09 PM

Barium , unlike most of the harmfull iums , is a lighter element and therefore pretty safe. Uranium , plutonium , etc are extremely heavy and therefore bioaccumulative and in general much more radioactive. During the 13 years I owned White Materials Engineering , we used to work with Lithium , Barium and Strontium a lot. Not a problem.

Plug · 07-18-2001, 09:52 AM

Sounds like you might be brewing an ulcer. Listen, get rid of the stress. Go ahead and boot Patrick, everyone els has.

Just kidding Patrick.

redcrbbr · 07-18-2001, 10:34 AM

went through the same procedure last march, turned out i had a full "sack" of gall stones. the hackers, i mean doctors told me it was hepititas, cause my blood was afu from the gall bladder. when the gall bladder acted up i thought i was having a bloody heart attack, being a typical stupid man, i blew it off as gastritus. till one day enough was enough. they did the upper GI, and 2 weeks later i was like brand new. my only comment on the barium is when it comes out...it looks like baby poop. good luck and hope it isn't anything serious

Fishpart · 07-18-2001, 02:11 PM

You are not allowed to be sick...There is fishing to be done and a little man who wants Dad to teach him to fish. Hope you get straightened out soon.

Jenn · 07-18-2001, 09:20 PM

Sorry to hear you arent up to snuff....when I read your first post all I could think of was a friend of mine who just had a "barium" ordeal.....I wasnt sure if I wanted to continue reading! HA!HA! Anyway from what I hear consider yourself lucky you didnt need "that other test"

....AND I need to chew you out a little here...not for the weight (because I am not one to talk) but about the smoking...I TOLD YOU BEFORE I have been smoking MORE for you! HA!HA! (really isnt funny....but true) I know it isnt easy to quit....but I give you credit for trying!! Keep at it!!

Wow...no booze, no smokey treats, no junk fattening gooey food....I really feel for ya... :*

chris L · 07-19-2001, 11:12 AM

john
I wasnt implying that drinking was the cause for your discomfort . I was just saying the results of my test . yours my frind is probably stress related and as plug said is probably the start of an ulcer . its so hard to say no to fine german wine and beer ! thank god I dont live there anymore . when I was in germany I never fished it was about the ladies and good times . thats about the only time in my life I didnt fish . and Im so mad at myself for not fishing , at least I traveled while I was there .

JohnR · 07-19-2001, 02:18 PM

No prob Chris, wasn't taken that way... I don't think it's an ulcer either as they've checked for that and have pretty much ruled that out (it moves around far too much)...

Plug - That ain't enough to give me an ulcer

...

Redcrbbr - ...baby poop and worse - albino [img=http://www.striped-bass.com/Images/evil.gif]

Chris - just think, when we're hammering the big fish on the big push in late September - they'll be hoisting the 1 liter gray ceramic mass at Bad Kanstadterfest - einz, zwei, drei, tzoofahhh!!!