Originally Posted by birdgirl73
Wow. Even though the first part of this thread's old, it's amazingly how timely this topic is in my life right now. I'm having GERD these days. And it worries me.
I had it 20 years ago for the first time when I was pregnant. Your whole digestive system slows down, and then your growing baby crowds the stomach up, making the reflux more likely. I took Rolaids and, I think, Zantac then. Had it for about a year and a half after he was born, too, till I got all the baby weight back off.
Then it didn't bother me for about five years. But then I had a ruptured appendix and bad peritonitis afterwards, and basically they ended up having to take out part of my intestines and a part of my stomach, too, and I was left with lots of scarring in my insides that slows my digestion down--and lots of ability to produce acid with the stomach that remained. If I didn't eat late at night, made sure not to eat greasy stuff or meat, ate acid-neutralizing foods (alkaloid-base foods like yogurt), ate plenty of fiber, I was fine. All that surgery also caused me to get thinner. which helped too. But still it would happen occasionally. And in recent months since I've been worried about my sister and now stressing about school, too, it's gotten fairly bad again. I hate it. I sometimes wake up coughing and choking, feeling that burning just rising in my throat. I have to sit up, chew Maalox till it passes, take one of the acid blockers (which I know some of you disagree with, but they've saved me from aspirating a couple of times).
I'm worried because I still can't stop it completely--and because chronic GERD is a really strong precursor to esophageal cancer, which is a killer. Our former Texas governor just died of it yesterday, only six months after being diagnosed.
I'm going to try the vinegar tip one of you suggested so the alkaline can help neutralize the acid (makes perfect sense), and I'd also be curious to hear what are particularly helpful yogurts. I don't want to get cancer, and I'd also like to be able to stay comfortably asleep. I'm pretty much destined to be stressed right now, but I do deal with that fairly well with exercise. I'm thinking yoga might help calm me, too, and possibly quell the acid production. More advice and/or recommendations would be very welcome!