For the last few years I’ve been struggling with feeling sick a lot and there was a long period when I used be sick every time I ate anything. A few months ago a dietician at my local hospital put me on a very restricted diet to try and work out whether there are particular foods that are causing the problem.

While I’ve been on the diet my sickness levels have been much more stable, but over the last few weeks I’ve again been struggling, even though I’ve been sticking to the diet. I’ve always been a bit sceptical about any particular food being the problem, because it’s always felt as if anything I eat causes problems. I often say it feels as if I’m allergic to all food.

Recently I went to a follow-up appointment at a specialist gastroenterology clinic I’d been referred to. I didn’t expect much from the appointment, in fact I almost cancelled it. But I’m really glad I did go.

The doctor immediately said “Good news, sort of. We’ve found the problem”. This really did feel like good news. She explained that one of the specialist scans they’d done showed that I wasn’t re-absorbing a specific type of salt that’s produced by the liver during the digestion process. This salt should be reabsorbed back into the body, but that’s not happening for me so it is going into my colon and causing problems.

This is a chronic condition but there is medication that will help soak up the salt so it causes less of a problem. The medication comes in powder form so it’s a bit of extra work to prepare it but that’s all worth it if it means I can eat easily again.

My tics have been celebrating with a nausea based song:

“Nah, Nu-nu-nu-nah, Nu-nu-nu-nah, Nu-nu-nu-nah, Nu-nu-nausea”

Fingers crossed that from now on sick tics are the only queasiness I need to worry about.