Irritable Bowel

Chris says we have Irritable Bowel Syndrome in our house.

Abigail's bowel irritates us all.

Now I realize this needs some explanation. You see we are trapped in a terrible cycle. When Abigail was much younger she got constipated and when she finally went it hurt. No problem, when she gets over the constipation with lots of pear juice, oatmeal, and other fiber, the pain will go away and she will be a regular as clockwork. Going joyfully.

Not my girl. She remembered the pain and now she chooses constipation. Yes, chooses it. She hides herself in various corners in order to sweat through the urge to go and hold it. For days. At least 48 hours, and somewhere before we hit the 72 hour mark the Irritable Bowel hits. Struggling to win the battle against her own biological mechanisms, prune juice (we graduated to the potent stuff), and fiber, she becomes cranky, clingy, and stinky.

Of course when she finally resigns herself to the inevitable, it hurts. And the cycle begins again: she is pleasant, for the next 66 or so hours. Then the strike of Irritable Bowel.