Heating Pads Have Changed My Gut Game!

Gut cramps are some of the worst pain I have ever experienced in my entire life. Nothing doubles me over, clutching at my tummy, with rhythmic breathing to pass the pain, quite like an IBS cramp (that, or an absolutely gut-busting joke). It’s amazing how I can go from eating one of my favorite beef taquitos, to hunched over like an alien is trying to burst out of me.

IBS pain like no other

I’m usually able to handle this pain. Sure, it’s beyond excruciating, but I’ve gotten pretty good at knowing what to do. I’ll do my tried and true method of massaging my intestines and moving stuff around or hiking my feet up onto my squatty and blasting that butt poison right out of there. That is… if it’s willing to come out.

I had never experiences stomach pain quite like this before. Like I was an over inflated balloon, swollen, but not gassy. Acid reflux building, but no poopies.

All these symptoms awoke me at 3 a.m. Cool, now sleep isn’t even safe against a tummy attack! I tried all my methods of relief as stated above. Heck, I even threw in some Pepto Bismol and Alka-Seltzer tablets for good measure just to quell the beast inside me, but to no avail.

I used a heating pad

I thought I was a goner, that I had to sleep sitting up in fetal position all night. A hellscape fit only for Satan’s thirstiest demons. I snuck downstairs, rifled through my closet to find one last option. Something I had only heard about in legend. A tool that so many other IrritableBowelSyndrome.net community members turn to in their time of need. Like a beacon of light in the darkness, I grabbed for a heating pad.

If I wasn’t gonna pass this monster from within, if this IHOP Salisbury steak I was digesting didn’t want to reveal itself and rather gestate, I knew It was time to incubate that sucker to term.

I needed the warming comfort of a heating pad on my tummy. I plugged it in, slid him under my shirt, and sat there, waiting for what felt like a lifetime, before it kicked on. May I say, nothing felt as good as that heat did in that moment. Like when Aslan roared the White Witch out of Narnia, I felt the pain start to melt from within. The sheer joy I felt in that moment. Knowing that now, I might actually be able to get some sleep. That I won’t have to stay awake, curled in a ball fighting these internal pains. My stomach could afford to find a little peace.

Learning new tricks for IBS relief

My stomach as been so tumultuous as of late, which is incredibly frustrating. Especially when you unlock new and cool ways to feel discomfort. At least I have such a wonderful community that has given so much to one another. With each shared story is another tool in our tool belt! Hopefully I’ll fill that belt right up whenever another form of IBS pain rears its ugly head.