First Flare Since Progress

I'm in the middle of a moderate flare, the first one since I made all that progress a couple weeks ago.  I told myself that this would happen, especially if I tried to introduce new foods to my diet.  But it's still really hard.

I'm at school, technically doing my grad assistantship, but omigod how can anyone concentrate when her body feels like this?  I just want to call off work and go home, but of course I won't.  What would I say to my advisor?  The two times I've called off before, he's told me I should exercise to keep myself from getting colds.  Well guess what, buddy.  I do exercise, and I haven't had a cold in like two years.

So I'm crunching down asparagus and telling myself that this flare will subside and that I will get back to the level of pain I was at before.  And I'm planning what to do next because planning's how I mollify myself.

Since I think my pain is gut-related, and since I haven't pooped normally in forever, I'm digging into IBS to see if there are any pearls of wisdom out there that might help me.  The main recommendation for IBS is to avoid trigger foods, most of which are completely out of my diet to begin with -- caffeine, chocolate, grease, sugar, fats -- the good stuff.

Then I came across this website which claims that to recover from IBS, one should eat a low-fiber diet.  It says all this stuff about how fiber for regular bowel movements is bogus and how a low-fiber (also called low-residue if you have Crohn's or ulcerative colitis) diet is best for a messed-up gut.

Well, given that I eat so much raw roughage, my diet is, according to this website, not IBS-friendly right now.  And yeah, I know my pain was even lower in some ways than it has been recently when my diet was all cooked -- eggs and hash browns and steamed zucchini and fish.  I think that was also the time I was constantly pooping Mr. Hankey.

I don't know if the website's right or not, but I guess it's worth a shot to switch to a low-fiber diet and see what happens.  Because, like I said, making and executing plans is basically my way to stay sane.

Gah back to work...can't life just PAUSE sometimes?!

P.S. I think I'm flaring because I tried to eat peanut butter last night.  D'oh...

P.P.S. For some reason I wore a pair of my higher heels today and I feel like a crab walking in them around my crotch.