You're right about the naming thing. Although it's accurate, in a way, a lot of people snicker when I mention it. But my problem is that everyone always wants to know what's wrong but when I say IBS they don't take it serously! It's like IBS has become the booger joke of the adult world--gets a laugh every time. So, I've found the best response, for me, is to say I have a functional bowel disorder. (1)They take my problem seriously, (2) they stop bugging me with questions. Here's what happens when I say "Functional bowel disorder":
"Functional" - They don't exactly know what this means, so they start thinking...not giggling. (Confusion works to my benefit.)
"Bowel" - Whoa! TMI! is the reaction I see on their faces.
"Disorder" - Again, they're not quite sure what this means, but because I've linked it with bowel and another ambiguous medical term they go, Ooh, serious problem that I don't think I want to know more about.
Then I add in pain predominant just to make the point that this condition is not easy nor dismissable. To me "irritable" just isn't descriptive enough and it's an adjective that seems like a judgment call. Might as well call it "stubborn" colon or something.
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Brain-Gut Disconnection?
