Dumping Question

Hey everyone,

You are all so helpful, informative and good at giving great advice. I don't think I've seen anybody post about this.

When you experience dumping syndrome, is it soley caused by high fat/sugar foods? Or can it be caused by eating too quickly? I am on full fluids, not cheating, but eating/drinking a bit too quickly. I find after I've ingested anything--water, protien drink, soups-- I get really gassy. Not just burping, but tooting too. And sometimes I feel like the gas is almost like having the runs. So everytime I have to toot, I'm running for the toilet, just in case.

Or am I still expelling gasses from the surgery? I only had surgery on March 5.

Other than this, I'm recovering really well. I was up dusting and doing laundry and organizing the house. I am actually getting bored sitting at home. But don't want to venture far from home incase I need a toilet.

Am I dumping, or is it just gas?

It took me about a week to get the gas out from surgery.. but you continue to re-build up gas by swallowing air when you talk, breathe, eat and drink. In the beginning the tummy is a challenge...

Dumping is different for everyone.. I dump on too much sugar, carbs or fat..cold/hot sweats, shakey feeling, wanna vomit and sometimes I do... even almost 2 yrs out..

Its probably gas..better out than in... massaging the tummy, patting your back (like you would burp a baby), gas x (if approved by your Dr), and freely passing gas will all help!

Good Luck!

Michelle

Dumping is a very specific physical reaction by the lower portion of your intestine to too much sugar that has not been processed by the upper portion of your intestine (since it has been bypassed), so, o, just eating too fast cannot cause dumping.  It can, however, cause discomfort.  Dumping does not usually include gas.  You are just experiencing the joys of your body adjusting to the bypass and having to eliminate the gas from the surgery itself.  Because diarrhea is common before you get back on solid foods, it is wise to be cautious and treat flatulence as if it might include diarrhea!

BTW, the reaction to fat is technically not dumping.  It is just a reaction to ingesting too much fat when you are malabsorbing fat.  The body is used to being able to absorb it and the lower intestine gets unhappy when it gets all that fat.

Lora

I have to disagree with you on this one Lora - I  majorly dump on sugar and fats - if I eat something with mayo or cream cheese within 20 minutes I am on the can with the most disgusting diarhea and massive amounts. It is foul smelling just like if I eat too much sugar - sometimes it is worse with the fats since the fats float.

I never dumped for the first 2 1/2 years it wasnt' until I changed my diet to try to gain weight that I suddenly discovered the joys of dumping.  My surgeon actually told us at the beginning that if we drink and eat at the same time you can dump but I think it was just a tactic to get us not to do it.  For me it causes me to throw up because the fluids get stuck on top of the foods and cant' go anywhere until I bring up both the fluids and food that have since gotten stuck.

I definitely won't question your experience with sugar and fat, but -- for whatever it is, or is not, worth -- everything I read in the medical literature before I had surgery (I wanted to understand exactly what this mysterious, strangely-named phenomenon that I might experience actually was) indicated that the dumping physiology is specific to sugar.

Lora

While dumping doesn't bother me too much now, I found that fat & sugar combined lead to dumping on a smaller amount of sugar than straight up sugar.


It could be that the fat could be a mechanism that inhibits the absorption of sugars in the mouth and pouch, and therefore more of the sugars are diverted to the small intestine and therefore causes dumping. But overall it really is the worst dumping when combined with fats. I can eat a lot more sugar without dumping if there is no fat involved. 9 g of sugar is fine, but 9 g of sugar with a substantial amount of fat, and I'm dumping like crazy.

Thanks for everyone's input. I guess I am just have post surgery gas. Funny, in the hospital, nothing, or not much was happening. But Friday and Saturday were insane. Today hasn't been bad.

Pre surgery, I had a pretty strong stomach. It wasn't often that I'd have dirreah or vomitting. And when I did, it was the worst experience ever. I know it's unpleasent, but I am horrified whenever it happened. So with Friday and Saturday being really gassy, and well..feeling like I'm leaking when I fart...panicked a bit. Not panicked, but wanted to be sure it was only post surgery gas.

Sexy stuff!

I had diarrhea starting from the first time I had a BM after surgery, but the gas didn't really kick in until days 4-6. The gas and diarrhea were gone by about a week out.

I have never actually done any reading on it other than the paperwork I got from my surgeon and NUT but they say it can be from both.  I will now have to check further.

The weirder part is years ago long before I had my RNY, I had a Lap Nissan Fundoplication which is surgery to correct reflux - they take the top part of the stomach - the Fundos and wrap it around the esophagus to make a tighter sphighster (SP?) to prevent the acid from coming back up.  Well, the weirdest thing happened was within 1 week after surgery I had a strange phenomenom of profound diarhea after eating sugar and fats and it was massive and just like now - when I did research at that time I came up with dumping.  When I asked the surgeon about it, he said impossible but I knew better because I knew what was happening.  He said it can only happen after WLS - well now so many years later - that was in 1998 - I have the exact same type of diarhea - hasn't happened since 2 months after the surgery back then.  It is very strange.

That IS weird, but the more I hear about different people's experiences with various things, I sometimes wonder if there are times when our bodies -- which rely on a lot of different types of internal feedback and on specific interactions -- just have trouble figuring out what to do at first when there is some type of disruption.  Of course, it is also amazing how much our bodies are able to adapt to things (as with overcoming the malabsorption).

Lora