TO wonder if my chronic constipation IS actually my own fault?

[BladdersRoom]

Been chronically constipated for years. A while back, this resulted in me being rushed to hospital in agony with an impacted bowel.

Doctor's have always said I need to eat more fibre and my response was always "I do! That doesn't work for me!"

However I've been following my fibre intake on MFP recently and have realised I NEVER hit target. In fact, the most I've ever managed was 15g one day but most days it's between 2g and 7g

So is this actually the cause of my constipation?? I'm considering going veggie so that my meat substitutes contain so much more fibre but I'm worried that I'm going to end up a bloater.

Is my fibre intake (or lack of) really enough to have caused this long battle with constipation?

Why are you eating two dinners a day?

A really easy one is lightly fry a chopped onion and a couple of cloves of garlic, after a couple of minutes add a tin of chopped tomatoes and a tin of beans (e.g. black beans). Squeeze in a good lot of tomato puree and half a stock cube. If you like heat add some chilli powder or chopped fresh chillies, otherwise maybe some smoked paprika and black pepper. Cook for 10 minutes, you can add other veg like spinach, peppers.

Lots of fibre, cheap and yummy. Brown bread roll on the side as it's quite low calorie.

I don't know why I thought I ate a lot of fibre - I suppose I was kidding myself. I remember one trip to the doctors where she recommended stuff like pears so I ate a pear a day for a week and decided it didn't work

And yes I eat like this every single day.

Do you only ever have shakes for breakfast? The best way to get more fibre is to eat it not drink it.

Why aren't you eating any vegetables?

ImperialBlether - I'm not eating two dinners a day, I have breakfast, lunch and dinner

How much caffeine do you have? That can affect the digestive system

My diet is very low in protein too so I'm trying to increase that with the protein shakes.

Caffeine - one coffee a day and millions of cups of tea

High fibre diet would be something like
Freshly squeezed orange juice
Fruit & fibre or all-bran
Couple of dates

Handful raw unsalted nuts

Large salad with avocado, tomatoes, spinach, nuts and seeds on top

Hummus and carrot batons

Fish, roasted sweet potato, green beans
Fruit salad with natural yoghurt and flaxseed

What you describe is basically stodge and will never get you moving!

One pear might not have been cutting it

My brother gets constipated and eating 3 portions of fruit a day as a general rule, on top of veggies with dinner, sorts it for him. Fruit is quite sugary but he doesn't eat a lot of sugar otherwise.

One portion a day isn't a lot. The NHS recommends 5-10 every day.

That seems low fibre to me too.
Easy changes would be a handful of porridge oats in your smoothie. Jacket potato and baked beans for lunch rather than the ready meal (frozen jackets are still high fibre if you want easy- but dear imo) and stick grated carrot, grated courgette and and a can of lentils in your bolognaise with the beef. You won't even notice they are there.
It's about tweaking so you still feel you are eating the same rather than a huge change that you won't keep up.

Add a glass of water south every meal and you'll soon crack it.

Your second menu is much better, but you still need t add at least another couple of portions of fruit or veg each day. Why do you feel you need a protein shake for breakfast?

Try

Bran flakes for breakfast and a coffee.

Lunch large bowl of vegetable soup, a whole grain role, activities yoghurt and a large orange.

Dinner fresh fish, asparagus, brown rice. Afters fruit salad.

Fresh orange juice twice a day.

you'll be shitting in no time.

*Activia yoghurt

Add flax seed to your breakfast shake

Add green veg to your lunch and dinner
Swap white spaghetti for brown

Homemade soup is great for increasing your veg and fibre intake. Google recipes for 'lentil and vegetable soup' or even buy a soup recipe book. (Much healthier than two dinners a day.) I bought a Nutribullet a few months ago, and have three or four of those a week, using a mixture of frozen fruit and veg.

I don't mean to scare you, but the long term consequences of your current diet are not good. Please make the fairly simple changes sooner rather than later!

Fruit and/or veg with every meal. That day you posted looks like you're avoiding fibre

You need to up your water intake to at least 2 litres or more, will help with the bloating as well.

Increasing fibre doesn't work unless you have the fluids to help it swell in the bowel otherwise it will get worse as the fibre will just absorb what it can from the bowel and bung you up even more. I suffer from IBS and upping water and massaging tummy is sometimes the only way I can go if I get badly bunged up.

I have no appetite in a morning so a milkshake is all I can manage usually. Plus I'm scared to eat too much sugar in case I get fat and cereal is saturated in it

You could try something like this for a quick fix. I've just started slimming world and these are ok for the syns but they don't half make you poo presumably due to the high fibre content of them 5g per cake square thing.
Scran a box of those and see if it helps any, course if your impacted might want to go a bit slower.

The diet you describe doesn't sound low in protein! Swap the shake for brand flakes and add more veggies!

It is worth changing your diet, adding more fruit and fluid too. However,k if you have been chronically constipated for years your bowel may need time to become strong enough - it might have been weakened over time. I have to say I'm not a doctor! So I would urge you to go and see a GP. They might give you movicol so that you have time to readjust. There is not a quick solution.

I am half way through a 1kg punnet of cherries and I can feel my insides gurgling (tmi).

You really need to introduce lots of yummy fruit and vegetables into your day.

Not a healthy diet at all. Whole meal bread and pasta are not the best carbs to have. LapinROse has suggested a good diet plan to follow.

FWIW my son suffers with constipation and we were told to vastly increase his water intake, we can really notice the days when he's not drunk enough. GP told us milk doesn't count towards his fluid intake. Pears also work well for him too but you said these weren't for you.

People are supposed to eat five a day. (Well actually it's ten but they didn't think we'd get near that).
I think you need to drastically change what you're eating. I'm sorry to say that is a terrible diet, and actually quite scary that you thought it was ok.
I'm not a saint with food, but if I had a ready meal (and I would include dolmio as a ready meal) it would be as a once a week 'luxury.'