Well, I have suffered through both. In March 2007, I had a Peterson's space hernia.  I suddenly had waves of pain in my lower abdomin surrounding my belly button.... like pretty bad labor pains.  I went to bed hoping to sleep it off.  I woke up in the a.m. and the pain had intensified to the point I could no longer stand up straight and when the waves of pain hit, I couldn't stand at all.  I was still having bowel movements, but they were skinny like spagetti.  This ended with hernia repair surgery. Fast forward to April 2008.  I started noticing pain under my sternum upon waking.  It almost felt like anxiety but it definitely hurt.  I took my Prevacid and about an hour later, the pain would go away.  Then I started noticing that certain foods and drinks caused me more pain.  Then it progressed to the point that I had the same bad pain in my chest in the afternoon as I did in the morning.  Meanwhile, I was going to the doctors and begging for pain relief and answers.  Then I had a seizure.  Everything was confused by the siezure - suddenly, everyone was focusing on the siezure activity and not the orginal complaint.  I end up with a neurologist who puts me on siezure medication and tells me not to drive for 3 months.  Meanwhile, I'm not a believer that siezures are the problem.  I see my GB surgeon and he orders the plethora of testing.   I have all of my tests complete except for one... my appointment to go over the tests with my surgeon is a week and 2 days away .... when suddenly, I wake up in the morning in excrutiating pain.  It felt like I was having a heart attack.  Pain in the middle of my chest, radiating horribly in my shoulder and I couldn't catch my breathe.  LONG story short - I had a perforated ulcer.  My gastric contents were emptying into my abdominal cavity.  Once at the hospital, the only test that showed something wrong was the chest CT showing air under my diaphragm.  They flew me out and I had emergency surgery that night. I will say, that while all the testing was going on at the first hospital, I took 3 little sips of tea, just dying for something to comfort me.  I felt that tea hit my stomach and spread all over in my abdomin like flames.  That's when I knew what was wrong - and when I started screaming and passing out.  THAT is a pain I never want to experience again.  If you have pain in your chest - especially after eating or drinking - DEMAND to be checked for an ulcer.  I came so close to meeting my maker that I saw angels and people with halo's in my room and I kept mumbling about how beautiful they were.   Also leading up to the ulcer, my iron dropped extremely low and I was very very exhausted just going from one room to the next.  I was scheduled for iron infusions the day my ulcer perforated.  Needless to say, I missed that appt.  SO pay attention to any correlation bewteen low iron (anemia) and chest pain after eating or drinking. Hope that helps! Pam

call your bariatric surgeon and ask his oinion You may need a CAT scan of abdomen by someone who knows what to look for and check for bowel obstruction.  My first friend who died of an obstruction had been sent home from hospital several weeks earlier witha diagnosis of "food poisoning"

I've been constipated for the last three days, and stomach was very bloated and hurt everywhere.  Then this morning i've had diarrhea twice and stomach still hurts pretty badly.  I had RNY in March 2007 and everything has been great up until now.  Does anyone have any suggestions? Thanks for any advice. Evelyn

Butterfly Reborn,      I read a bit of your postings, boy have you been through it girl!  Life is so unfair at times, but we cannot dwell on that can we?  We just have to move on, one day at a time and  make the best of what we are given.   I have a daughter , age 16, who at age 9 was diagnosed with a life threatening neuromuscular disease.  It used to bother me when people would ask me how I cope with it.  NOT very well, I would think, but what choice do we have but to face our woes and go on, or be quitters and give up on everyone  and everything in our lives?  Anyway, enough said about all that, I believe that all things happen for a reason, even if we never know what the reason is.     Well, I went to my WLS surgeon the other day.   He thinks it is either my gallbladder or a Petersen's hernia.  So I guess I will be having a HIDA scan to see if it is something with my gallbladder or if I need an exploratory surgery to check for an internal hernia.  I was certainly not planning on more surgery this summer but it looks like I may be headed that way. I was wondering did you have episodes of pain alternating with periods of no pain or very little pain with the inernal hernias?  The more I read about the internal hernia symptoms (which I am unable to find a lot about) the more I think that may be the cause of the pain--at least based on symptoms.  The surgeon didn't seem to think it is an ulcer because I would have pain almost immediately after eating. Hmm.... what I had was painful enough, but I am sure it could have been worse.  I am sure that a complete bowel obstruction is just about unbearable, and I think a bad gallbladder attack would have been more painful than what I experienced.  However, I knew that pain was NOT from anything that made sense, like eating too much at once, and it lasted quite a while, about 8 hrs.  Then it subsided almost as quickly as it started, tenderness gone and all.  The pain would start within 10-15 secs of swallowing even jus****er!  I don't think that sounds at all like a gall bladder or an ulcer. I am an OB nurse by trade, and I have to applaud you at your advocacy of your health care and treatments.   It is so important to be your own advocate.  I have learned to be an advocate for my daughter's health.  Some docs are great about it, others kind of skeptical.  Most listen to me, but it helps that I can put RN behind my name.   Thanks for listening.  Janet

On Sunday I went to the ER and was admitted to the hospital and released last night 5-7-08.  Went in the hospital with horrible abdominal pain, not able to keep anything down and spiked a fever.  Admitted to hospital.  Stool came back positive for blood and hemoglobin sitting at 10.0; CT scan showed free fluid in my abdomen, about 1/2 dozen kidney stones, and my pouchie is inflamed.  Sent home on carafate, protonix, nasau meds and pain meds.  Endoscopy was attmepted but they claim I kept gagging so they couldn't perform it?!?!  I still don't feel right.  Kicker of the whole thing I was out of town when all this happened and at an out of town hospital and my surgeon was never contacted?!?!  I had my gastric bypass on 9-15-06 Any thoughts and/or advice would be appreciated! Jill