Can we die because we don’t eat enough vegetables? This woman’s testimony on Twitter warns against a lack of water and fiber in the diet. She “almost went there” and tells.
Staying hydrated and eating well is essential … even if we often tend to forget it. The testimony of this professor reminds us how our health can be endangered if we do not adopt the right reflexes. It’s simple: she almost died because she “does not eat enough vegetables.”
In her tweets, Mioumi Madame explains what happened on September 8, 2021. Today marks the beginning of a long journey, between going back and forth to the emergency room and a diagnosis that is difficult to establish and then to accept. Why did she almost die? Because of an abscess as large as a clementine that formed in his intestine, mainly from a lack of fiber (mostly found in vegetables) and hydration. This ordeal changed her life as she has now changed her diet and lifestyle. Here is his testimony, published with his consent.
Intense and unexplained pain
It stings a bit when I pee. And I’m a little more tired than usual. “Normal” I said to myself, it’s back to school, I’m tired, nothing to worry about. Thursday, Friday, same feeling, quite light, I don’t pay too much attention and end my week. And this weekend, it’s the Fête de l’Huma, which I’ve been waiting for two years, this edition being the last one at La Courneuve right next to my house.
We come back after the IAM concert, and the next day I’m bent over, impossible to go back on Sunday. For that to happen, I really have to be unwell, because missing a day of the Huma Festival has not happened to me in 10 years. And at this point, I still do not panic. So I stay on my sofa on Sunday, telling myself that maybe it will pass. Monday is not past, so we go to the emergency room of the hospital in my city. At the gynecological emergencies (the only ones open in his city editor’s note), surprise, we think I have a gynecological problem. I am told that it may be my IUD that has moved since I should have had it changed 6 months ago. The intern examines me, obviously taking care not to warn me before setting the ultrasound probe and yelling at me when I jump. I end up in tears, it’s great. She tells me that if things don’t get better tomorrow I must go to my GP.
I scream when I go to urinate, I wake up screaming, I have wanted to die permanently for 3 days.
A urinary tract infection?
The next day things are no better, so head for the general practitioner. So my general practitioner, he is a rather … particular character, shall we say. He’s retired and helping out in the office next to me because there is a shortage of doctors. He prescribes me an antibiotic, and he tells me that if tomorrow there is not a significant improvement, I must come back. I will be back. This time he gives me a 10-day course of antibiotics, and he orders a CT scan. I make an appointment directly for the next day. And here I am at a level of pain that I have never reached. I scream when I go to urinate, I wake up screaming, paracetamol and spasfon have almost no effect, I have wanted to die permanently for 3 days. The next day I wake up crying and crying, and I tell my boyfriend to take me to the emergency room, the real ones this time, because it’s really, really not right at all.
I’m off for a urinary tract CT scan, seeing as everyone’s thinking of pyelonephritis or kidney stones. So cool, no need for contrast products. A cliche. Two shots. And finally a nurse who comes to give me a contrast product. There I understand that probably this is not what we thought, that’s good I love surprises. So after 4 hours, a doctor comes to see me. But not an emergency doctor. A surgeon. Gastroenterologist. He tells me “Hello Madam, do you know why you are here?” I tell him that I was coming for a basic urinary tract infection but that I don’t know more.
The scary diagnosis
He tells me that’s not it at all actually. I have an abscess “the size of a clementine” in the intestines, that it is very, very urgent, and that several scenarios can occur:
- either the abscess bursts, I have peritonitis and there is a one in two chance that I will die.
- either the abscess does not fart but does not go away, then we operate urgently and I have an ostomy for 4 to 6 months.
- or I react well to antibiotics and I can be cured with just pills.
Instantly I listen to it, I record the news. I ask questions, I am very pragmatic and cold in my reception of the diagnosis. So I’m going to be hospitalized for at least 3 days, with horse antibiotic therapy, and we’ll see. The doctor leaves, and there I collapse. I’m afraid, I think I’m going to die, I think about my husband, that I can’t leave him, that I’m going to kill him with grief.
12 hours after my arrival in the emergency room, I go up to the hospital room in which I will stay for 5 days in the end. And the same evening, the same doctor explains to me where my problem comes from. I did what is called a diverticulitis. In the intestines there are two walls: the mucous membrane, inside, is in contact with food and will absorb all the small nutrients good for the body; on the outside, the muscular system contracts to move whatever is left over to the exit. When you don’t eat enough fiber, your muscles have to contract a lot more to bring it all to the end of the tunnel. In addition, since I don’t drink enough water, the body still needs water. Suddenly, it will dry out your stool to collect the slightest drop of water to function. So not enough fiber + dried out poo + sedentary lifestyle (because yes, when you exercise it’s also good for your poo) all seasoned with cigarettes, alcohol and chronic stress, your muscular she works like crazy . And it contracts so much that it can create diverticula. This happens when the mucous membrane passes through the muscularis, forming a small sac. It’s not a big deal most of the time. And in reality, it’s been years that I have seizures of diverticula but very small, that I manage all alone at home with paracetamol and a day off work. Until this crisis too many.
Take care of yourself, really.
The start of a “new life” with another diet
In the end I reacted very well to the antibiotics, so after 5 days I returned home with a month of antibiotics morning, noon and night and a residue-free diet to follow for as long. During the second month I had to patiently reintroduce the sources of fiber one by one. After a month without fruit or vegetables I was quite flat and the antibiotics stripped my stomach, so we leave for a month of vitamins, minerals and yeasts. I must eat at least 500g of vegetables per day, I see 2 liters of water, I have quit smoking and I have not had a drop of alcohol. I play sports 5 times a week (quiet eh, hiking and swimming, we go all smooth), I still haven’t returned to work because I’m still too weak, but this episode was really the beginning of new life.
Take care of yourself, really. It’s not a polite phrase there. TAKE. CARE. OF. YOU. It would be too stupid. And warn your loved ones about this disease with an unpronounceable name, I have the impression that it is quite unknown when it is easily preventable.
Remember that only a health professional can provide medical advice and that this testimony should not be used to make their own diagnosis.