painful trapped wind

Hi . Sorry to hear that you’re having problems. I seem to remember being encouraged to drink peppermint tea or cordial in hospital to help with trapped air after surgery so you could try that and also keep a food diary to see if certain foods make it worse. I’m sure Ian aka will be along shortly with some handy tips and links.

Take care

Karen x

Hi I'm very sorry to hear that you are suffering from the dreaded trapped wind syndrome which can be difficult to get relief from.

As  has mentioned peppermint tea can sometimes help as can a few drops of peppermint oil in warm water and sipped.

But trying to find the reason behind it can be difficult to establish and again the first step would be a food diary and recording everything that passes your lips which includes foods and liquids and noting the symptoms you experience then repeat the meal plan by missing out one or more of the components to see if you still experience trapped wind. You should also be aware of the foods and beverages that cause wind and eliminate them, also how you eat (not talking table manners but) don't rush your food, avoid talking during a meal if you can and either have a drink before or after the meal not during.

You should be able to contact the specialist nurse between appointments for advice or your GP maybe able to prescribe something to relieve the trapped wind.

The only things I could add to the things you are doing just now are a warm bath, hot water bottle held over the area and of course doing some dreaded exercises a gentle walk around may give some relief. Many years ago I had an umbilical hernia which used to cause me tremendous pain and the only way I could get relief was to walk it off and walks got longer and longer until eventually I had it repaired. Hopefully it will not come to an operation but I would speak to your GP about it and maybe get referred back to the hospital for opinions.

Sorry I haven't been of much help above but I've saved the following till last and it's some advice on Exercises for Ostomates which is a fact sheet from the Ileostomy Association (IA) which you might find of interest.

If you use a smartphone there is a very simple food diary app in the Google play store that might help in keeping a food diary (look for the green box with a leaf on it) nothing fancy about it you just add the information you want to add, in whatever format you want and it doesn't bother about calories! 

Please keep in touch and tell us how you are getting on, it's always nice to have a follow up and learn how a problem was solved.

Ian

Left the worst part to the very end - lagers, beers and soft drinks should be avoided if possible (carbonated soft drinks can still be taken if left to go flat) as the bubbles won't help.

Hi ,

Painful trapped winds takes me back to when I had a complete bowel blockage last year, and that was most certainly not a good place to be. So my suggestion would be to get in touch with the specialist nurse (can you e-mail them?), but also maybe a visit to the GP? If this could potentially be something that you may need surgery for at some point in the future, you would want it on record when it started to be a problem.

Back in the days before cancer I used to joke that I needed to be half-dead before going to the doctors. Not anymore!

Hope you get it sorted soon.

Yolande