The weird question: ... an example - Say I eat homemade artichoke dip (lots of fiber and cheese) than, two hours later I eat plain yogurt mixed with fresh berries. Five minutes later I'm crampy and gassy. IS IT THE FOOD FROM 2 HOURS AGO THAT DOESN'T AGREE WITH ME OR THE FOOD FROM FIVE MINUTES AGO? (The yogurt was whole, not non fat)
One would think after 2 1/2 years of life with a j-pouch, I would know what agrees with me, but I often run into situations like I just mentioned.
I remember eating chicken noodle soup when I had my bag and it would fill the bag as I ate it. I would have thought that to be impossible! (Do I not have a stomach and small intestines that should absorb some of that soup?)
I am totally confused as to the time frame for digestion so I don't know which foods are causing the problems. How do we figure out what agrees with us short of eliminating everything and starting out with ONE food for an entire day and adding one food a day. I can't see doing that.

Jody, this question stumps me too. With my ostomy I could have some soup, put the mug down and go to empty my bag which was then full of the same soup! How on earth is that possible? I thought the exact same thing: hey, how fast is this stuff going through me?!! I find, though, with my pouch it takes about an hour or so for the stuff to come out again. So I'd put my money on the artichoke dip in your case. The action of eating will usually make the guts start working, which is why we will often need to go right after eating. We should then be passing things we've eaten previously, not the stuff we've just swallowed...so that's why I could never understand why I felt like the thing I'd just eaten landed straight in my bag. At times I thought I may as well just pour the food straight into the toilet bowl!

Yeah, that would happen to me too just after surgery until my gut had adjusted.

My friend Karen and I were bedmates in hospital after our respective takedowns and one day she ate some chocolates that her hubby had brought for her. She may as well have just missed out the middle man and chucked them all down the loo because within just 5 minutes of eating them she was passing them through her j-pouch!

Funnily enough I never have had that problem with chocolate, but then again I don't really like the stuff that much so I wasn't missing much! (yeah... I'm weird! )

It will get better with time.

Shell

I'm 6 years post takedown and I have the same things happening. My doctors are all like "No, no, thats impossible, transit time can't be that short, you still have intestines blah blah blah." and I'm just like "No. You don't understand."

As crazy as this sounds, I've tested it before by eating blueberries. And I've always wanted to drink a different color koolaid each day so I have rainbow poops for a week

But back to the point. I think the food thats bothering you is the second one. I think pretty much with us, the second it gets down there, it either agrees or doesn't. But I don't know, I might be wrong. In my case, my intestines are empty by the time I eat again so I usually know what the culprit was.

And Soph, I know what you mean. It kills me to go out to dinner with my boyfriend and have him drop 50 bucks on us, then have me just poop it all out in a matter of minutes. It's very frustrating.

I think the only way to know for sure is to start keeping the dreaded food diary again. Write those 2 foods down as possible bad foods and then try them again, but at different times. Good luck.

I also believe that what doesn't bother us one day will tear us up the next.

Yeah, there are a few foods that I'm SURE don't agree with me. When I eat cooked salmon, I poop pure liquid every time.
I like Chelseas idea for those mystery "don't agree" foods. - I'd like to color code them!
I try to eat a healthy variety every day which certainly doesn't help the process of figuring out which foods give me pain.
Ques: If I eat something that does agree with me and than two hours later eat potato chips, can the potato chips cause the first item to come out like liquid or is it already digested? (I know the potato chips will cause discomfort, but can they change the consistency of the previously ingested food?)
I don't want to be having this confusion in another 3 years, so yes maybe I'll start the dreaded food diary, and spread out my food intake. And dye my foods neon colors!!!

For me it was orange soda with an ostomy. I could drink that and like you said, before I was finished with it, it was already squirting out into my ostomy bag.

Yeah, I agree with the food diary idea. Real drag, but probably the most useful course of action. My monster foods actually don't bother me as much these days - I think I can eat most things now, though if I forget my probiotics or run out of psyllium wafers I'm in big trouble!