hey fellow pouchers.....
Just for the heck of it I thought I would report something encouraging and positive for any of you early on with pouch and wondering about whether you might ever be able to go out with your friends again for a night which might involve drinking etc.....

I am now just over a year with pouch. I stopped eating today at ~4pm and then after exercising I drank some grape juice to try to move things along. By 8pm or 9pm I was feeling pretty empty.

I headed out with friends for some drinks/socializing @10:30pm and I am just getting home at a little before 2am and I am happy to report... It is possible !!!! I didn't have urges, cramps, gas, trips to bathroom etc... I went 3 hours .. had 4 or maybe 5 beers? and I'm home now and it was almost a night I might have had 10 years ago.

Sure I might be up all night with butt burn for all I know??? but just in case you were wondering... a night of drinking/socializing with friends or strangers is not an impossible dream.

Mike,

My first decade with my J pouch was essentially from ages 29 to 39, and I did a lot more socializing then, than I do now. I never had any problems. I tend to drink girlie mixed drinks like Cosmopolitan, Sex on the Beach, Pumpkin Pie martini, etc. and they all go down well.

Friday night I stayed overnight in New York City, got a room at the Loews Regency on 61st and Park (very nice room on 14th floor with balcony overlooking Sotheby's on 61st) and my friend and I went out for dinner to a popular tapas restaurant in the Flatiron District called Sala One Nine:

http://www.salaonenine.com/

The place was absolutely packed, younger crowd mostly in their 20s and 30s, yuppie types, a lot of people drinking Sangria and having a good time. Unfortunately despite the fairly good size of the restaurant, there was just one small unisex bathroom. During the evening I had to go twice, one time waiting in a line. The difference with the J Pouch is that continence is strong and waiting is NO PROBLEMA. When I had UC it was BIG PROBLEMA.

I did happen to notice a blonde haired woman making several trips to the bathroom which was very close to our table. She looked a bit anxious to get in the bathroom and I started wondering if she had UC. Maybe she drank too much Sangria, I guess there is no way to know, but she looked impatient waiting. I could see bathroom stress in her face.

Best advice is to gauge your continence level and if it is good and you go out on an empty stomach everything should be OK. Taking an antispasmodic like lomotil before you go out should help.

I had my last episode of butt burn about 19 years ago..it faded away about 1 year post pouch. I cannot drink red wine, that is the only thing that gives me a problem. I get diarrhea from it.

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Thank you guys for posting this. This gives me hope. My social life in the past year has gone way down, bc of UC. Being 23 the bar is a big part of life, and I feel like I have missed some things with my friends. I am not even a month out yet from my take down, but this gives me hope that I will once again be able to go out and have a drink with my friends.

quote:

The place was absolutely packed, younger crowd mostly in their 20s and 30s, yuppie types, a lot of people drinking Sangria and having a good time. Unfortunately despite the fairly good size of the restaurant, there was just one small unisex bathroom. During the evening I had to go twice, one time waiting in a line. The difference with the J Pouch is that continence is strong and waiting is NO PROBLEMA. When I had UC it was BIG PROBLEMA.

What if you're on antibiotics? I'm on flagyl since 5 months and cannot drink cos of that, can you drink with cipro for instance?

I have had relatively small amounts of alcohol with cipro and flagyl, and never had a problem although it is not supposed to be consumed with flagyl. I never take the medicine with the alcohol, and if I drink a lot during the night I skip the dosage that night and take it the next day when the booze is mostly out of my system. Is it going to kill me if I miss a nighttime dosage of cipro and flagyl when I have been taking these drugs for 17 years? I don't think so. I have not had a problem using common sense to get around these issues.

I am not really a big drinker. I drink socially once a week max. In my younger days I would go out 2x per week drinking mostly vodka mixed drinks and never had a problem and I actually felt vodka drinks calmed my bowels and slowed things down.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: CTBarrister,

Hey Manuel, not that I encourage drinking on meds (although I have a daily glass of wine), there can be an antabuse effect with flagyl, but it doesn't happen with everyone (thank you Jan for mentioning this some time ago!).

I ran a test at home a year or 2 ago, and had a sip of wine while on flagyl: nothing happened. Continued to "experiment", and found I am not one who suffers from the antabuse effect - yay. You could do some research on the web, and carefully test it out (at home) if you feel so inclined.

BTW, I also take milk thistle daily in an effort to keep my liver healthy. My liver tests always come back normal.

this is great to hear....im only 5 weeks post takedown, and just started socializing again, though definitely not drinking, even though everyone around me was, and it was definitely hard not to, but at this point im not even to a predictable normal, so i dont want to throw alcohol in the mix...BUT it is promising to hear this.

I don't know if I would have the antabuse symptoms while on Flagyl and having an alcoholic drink because the few times I've been on Flagyl I've had a perpetual case of mild nausea. Any food or drink turns my stomach slightly upside down. The drug does work to get rid of pouchitis so I bear with it for the length of time my doc says to stay on it. Worth the price, for me!

I have had alcohol and flagyl in my system and no antabuse symptoms but like I said in the last post, if I am going out and drinking heavily or more than one drink, I skip the nightime flagyl dosage. But the truth is that I probably do have some level of flagyl still in my blood anyway and I can tell you I have gotten away with it. But just because I have does not mean you will. Try a small amount of liquor and see what happens. If nothing happens then try a little more. Use common sense in trying to figure out how your body responds to the different meds being interacted with booze and you should be OK.

My record for not going, while up and active, is almost 7 hours. That was heaven.

Mike, I like your system.

DJBHusky, I laugh to myself sometimes.... after going thru what all of us have, I know for me I definitely have heightened awareness to all things digestive or output related. When I'm in a restaurant I can't help but notice what foods others are eating or not eating, when people get up and walk out of a gathering presumably to use the facilities I can't help but take a glance at their face or the way they are walking and wonder for a moment what may lurk under the surface for them...

10 years ago I wouldn't have thought twice about seeing people head to restrooms etc..etc... now when I watch 4th of july hot dog eating contest ... well, I can't hardly watch it.

One footnote to this topic (again on a positive note)... It's just over a year since my takedown and I had pretty much accepted that I might never be able to do any eating in the evening or late night snacking anymore......Every time I had tried over past year I paid for it to the extreme.....

Well the other night I got a late night craving for taco bell and I said time to take a gamble...I took a lomotil then headed for taco bell drive thru and got 2 soft tacos and some nachos and cheese. I came home and chased that with a klondike ice cream bar.

I'm happy to report I did do an extra trip to restroom overnite and a little rougher in the morning but I made it through ok. No emergency room the next day or an entire day soaking in the tub.......

happy memorial day weekend every one... !!!

quote:

when people get up and walk out of a gathering presumably to use the facilities I can't help but take a glance at their face or the way they are walking and wonder for a moment what may lurk under the surface for them

It's the same thing with me. However, what initially drew my attention to that blonde haired woman was the fact that she was an attractive woman, and had nice legs. Although that is what made me notice her at first, I then observed her walk over to the lavatory which happened to be near my table, and she had this anguished look on her face, like she really, really needed to get into that bathroom, which was a single unisex bathroom for a large and bustling restaurant. Not a very good bathroom to patron ratio, but in New York City, where rental space is precious, it's not really unusual. When I see that look on someone's face, having suffered with UC for 20 years, it's kind of like "been there and done that" and I automatically wonder if it is someone with IBD, and whether they are going to make it or whether I may be witnessing Accident City.

But I really think the women with IBD have it much tougher than we do. Every time I am in the lower level food court in Grand Central Station in New York City, I notice the long line extending out of the women's restroom and no line extending out of the men's restroom. And I know that if I am a woman with IBD who really, really needs to go and get on the toilet at once, the chances of getting into that bathroom "in time" are a lot less than for the males who have no long lines to wait through.

By the ways, last night I went out with my private investigator and two of his friends and we had dinner and drinks. I had two Sex On The Beach vodka drinks, and took my flagyl dosage later that evening and had no problems. I rotated onto xifaxin today.

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