Published on 12, July, 2020
I have been having lots of stomach pains and pain around the rib cage. I have had scans and blood tests but they have not found any medical answer. I have been seeing an osteopath and she says that it is all due to anxiety. Does anyone else get this and if so how do you prevent it? I am so fed up of constantly being in pain.
For me, the peppermint oil tablets provided some 'instant' relief (which may simply have been the placebo effect)
Longer term, breathing exercises, visualising my guts un-knotting and CBT style mental exercises helped.
Basically my stomach will tell me the 'truth' about my stress levels, so I've learned to listen to it and take action
Cbt can work for some people as it works on the anxiety that causes the ibs which is great, I tried this myself but I found no benefit from Cbt, logically it made sense but I couldn't handle the stress of going!
I do use some of the techniques but I really don't find they work that well for me, l know others really benefit from it though
There was an interesting news item quite recently about people with IBS and other painful conditions benefitting more from CBT than from taking tablets.
As original prankster has said anxiety can cause ibs, I have had this issue for years the more stressed and anxious I get the worse the ibs gets, then I get anxious about that and end up going round in circles!
Working on the anxiety or stress is likely to help, think I might look in to the mint capsules that op suggested!
I used to get stomach pains - cramps and bloating - from IBS which is largely anxiety based.
I found Colpermin capsules (mint oil) really helped but the key is to find a way to reduce your anxiety