trouble with bowels, what else is new!

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azgirl

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Joined
Jan 20, 2014
Messages
961
Reason
PALS
Diagnosis
12/2013
Country
US
State
AZ
City
Tucson
OK, hospice nurse wants me to double amount of water I'm getting. Don't know if that's tolerable. Starting to put sixteen ounces of water in gravity bag on slow drip.

wants me to go from thirty ounces to sixty. Does that seem like a lot?

says stool softener and dense food require lots of water, but sixty ounces! I have five boxes of food most days, will cut it to four and replace with water. Five box equal forty ounce food.

bowel movements difficult, but every two days. Need help with abdominal massage and leaning forward to accomplish

how much fluid do you all get?
 
I'm still get around and can eat but I try to drink 64 ounces of water every day. I also take 1,200 mg of magnesium and limit dairy. I still do the psyllium every morning and, sometimes, I still have constipation. Mine started long before ALS when I started taking Remeron.

About once or twice a month I resort to fleet enemas.
 
No that's not too much, I used to give around 25 ounces of water of a morning with panadol and movicol before I even got him out of bed.

He would have taken in 60 - 80 ounces of fluids a day, which in Australia is recommended for any person as a healthy fluid intake.
 
I try to get a minimum of 60 ounces of non-caffeinated liquid a day.

Normally I have one 17 ounce Gatorade, 2 x 17 ounce waters and 1 12 ounce beer.

I also eat pineapple in the morning which currently helps my system moving and keeps me regular.

Matt
 
well ok then I trust you guys. But I'm thinking will need some bigger, big girl panties!
thought I had enough for someone so inactive, but I've been wrong before!
thanks
 
I don't know if you have any other medical conditions but my husband did and had to have a fluid restriction of 2 liters ( 67.5 oz) a day. We had to include in the total a percentage of the tube feed (75% for his) into the daily total. Your feed could be adding another 40 oz to the 60 or 100 oz a day.
 
Kate, yep Kay said her food adds to around 40oz.

Kay be careful replacing one of your feeds each day with water as now you are lowering your calories.

Remember that you should be flushing well before and after feeds and you need to add that in to your daily intake.
 
I am doing about 35 oz of water. I weigh about 100lbs. I have a colostomy bag so I don't have the classic poop problems but I do take miralax to keep things moving.
 
Sorry if I sounded like I was questioning your math, my key point I was trying to make was if there are other medical issues it's good to run the total by your Dr so not to get in a fluid overload which happened to my husband.
 
my weight is good and stable. No other health issues , healthy as can be otherwise.


yes I count every ounce used including flushes. Up to fifty ounces water today and I call enough for now.

will see how it goes if you know what I mean!

thanks again everyone!
 
we want to keep your weight stable Kay :)

do let us know how it goes ... :roll:

Oh Kate, I just thought you missed that Kay did that math in the original post :)
 
no feeding tube but about 36ounces of thickened liquid a day and i eat about 1.5 - 2 cubs of pudding consistancy food a day including baby food prunes. myralax is added to my morning thickened ice coffee, i also will drink as part of my total thickened prune juice with seltzer water, and i am able to go in small amount every day and a half or so. it is much better than it was when the nurse had to help.
 
I was having that problem a lot and even ended up in the ER for it at one point. I started doing Metamucil through my feeding tube 3x per day. It's just 8oz water and 1 TBS metamucil, at ever meal. Now I am back to being regular and non-painful BMs.
 
Kristina,

Thank you for that information. I had no idea you could use Metamucil (psyllium) in a tube. I guess if you dilute it enough, it won't stick going down. I've been terrified that I'd have to look for another source when I got a tube. Do you use it in caplet/pill form?
 
Kim, I never tried it in caplet form. I just use the powder mixed with water. I do 1 cup of water (8 oz) with 1 tablespoon metamucil powder. I mix it quickly and immediately pour it down my tube. If you wait too long it would become over thick and hard to get down tube, but when you do it immediately it goes down with no problems at all.
 
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