Upper abdominal musclular pain.... normal?

[andrewdisco]

Hi there, long time listener, first time poster.

I was just wondering if anyone could tell me if upper abdominal pain is normal for cfs ? it's an intense aching muscular type pain across the bottom of my rib cage. I also have some mild pain in the bottom corners of my stomach as well. It feels almost like there is an outward pressure against my bottom ribs.

It's really quite uncomfortable, mainly when sitting, and is resulting in me having to lie down all the time and also to avoid car travel. Popping benzo's or pain killers help. It's also not nearly as obvious standing up...

Getting to sleep, even with the help of benzo's to relax those muscles, is quite difficult due to the pain, which results in me having to sleep face down as well for the first part of the night.

So far I've had an ultra sound and a colonsoscopy and gastroscopy and everything was good. So i've booked in for an MRI next week.

I've had my cortisol levels checked and they spend alot of time above the topof normal but not high enough that you'd say there could be a tumor on my adrenals.

 

[ukxmrv]

Hi Andrew, welcome to the forum. Hope someone can help.

When I had pain at the top and the bottom I discussed this with the infectious diseases consultant that I see in the UK. Her opinion was that it was glands in those areas causing the pain.

The adrenal one is interesting as most CFS patients in research papers published have low cortisol. Scans of the adrenal glands showed some were shrinking in CFS.

I do get other pain in my stomach and for me this was helped by taking Betaine HCL supplements to increase acid in my stomach (the exact opposite to what some non-CFS docs told me).

How's your general digestion and stomach emptying?
Hope the MRI scan helps and you get some answers.