IBS Tales

I’ve had a few queries lately about a product called Digestrol, so I thought I’d write an explanation about why I wouldn’t recommend it, and why in fact it’s a good example of the kind of product you probably shouldn’t touch with a barge pole.
Let’s start with what the manufacturers, Techmedica, say about the product [...]

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I’ve been helping out with quite a few media-related things lately, partly due to people finding the IBS Tales website and partly because it’s currently something called “Gut Week” in the UK, which is an awareness week for stomach and bowel disorders.
So, yesterday I made the very brave decision of saying yes to a live [...]

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The weekend of the guy who lives in the flat upstairs
On Saturday, he wakes up with his girlfriend. They talk and giggle for a while (the ceiling is fairly thin, and the sound just travels down). They then make love (girlfriend is pretty loud, bed is pretty squeaky). They get up and clank pans around, [...]

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You quite often hear people talk about “pain thresholds” when it comes to IBS, because of course pain is such as vital part of the joy that is an irritable bowel. But I’ve always been a bit confused about the concept.
Now, I understand that if I am in a room with nine other people, and [...]

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There was a painful article in the Guardian newspaper a while back, written by a journalist who had lost his 13 year-old son to cancer. Matthew Engel describes life before and after the cancer (“We were not quite as happy as we bloody well should have been”), and also how he coped with other people’s [...]

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