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Stomach flutters and very strong pulsing in tummy?

211K views 36 replies 10 participants last post by  flux 
#1 ·
Anyone else experience either of these? My doc said the heartbeat was normal but it sure as heck is not normal to me! I have never had a pulsing like that in my stomach! There are times when my tummy is visibly pulsing. Then the flutters too feels like the quickening when you are pregnant..weird! It freaks me out and even though I am on the pill and regular this still makes me paranoid so I always am testing ha ha! I am IBSC/D and also get the bloating and the stomach noises. It all just started after my daughter turned one really bizarre. I always kinda had tummy issues with going the bathroom but this other stuff is all new!~Steph
 
#3 ·
quote:There are times when my tummy is visibly pulsing
In step with your heartbeat?
quote:Then the flutters too feels like
Are these independent?
 
#4 ·
Wow - exactly like me!!! I feel the pulsing REALLY strongly when I'm lying down, and it has amazed my DH!! And the fluttering I get too - I've never thought of it being like when I was pregnancy, but now that I'm thinking about it, yeah, it does!!I hope someone can answer these questions and that this thread can be kept up top until someone does.Deirdre
 
#5 ·
Just a thought.....there's a major blood vessel called the abdominal aorta which goes from our heart and down somewhere near the belly button - I think I'm right in that. For those that are slim build it's probably quite normal to feel this pulse. Anyone have any other ideas?
 
#6 ·
Thanks for the replies glad I am not the only one was scared a minute as hadnt' found any posts about this ha ha.Flux-yes it is right along with my heartbeat and the flutters are either when my tummy is doing its gurgling and sometimes just little twitches (but that could be from my wellbutrin also)Thanks again
 
#7 ·
quote:yes it is right along with my heartbeat and the flutters are either when my tummy is doing its gurgling and sometimes just little twitches
This implies they are independent. The former related to the heart and the other related to something odd going on in the intestine.
 
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#8 ·
when i first started getting ibs i noticed that pulsing in my stomach. i had never felt it before - you can also look down and see it and it does go along with the heartbeat. usually i happens when i feel tight in that area. flux i know there is a major vessel there - could this be evidence of blockage for some of us. i know this symptoms is not benign as it is related to ibs for so many of us and is very real. how can it be explained???
 
#9 ·
quote: flux i know there is a major vessel there - could this be evidence of blockage for some of us.
Impossible. A blockage in some major artery like that would probably cause massive ischemia to some major organ and you would need the ER immediately. What is being described does not sound that it has to be abnormal and it certainly does not sound related to IBS.The intestinal fluttering, however, does suggest some sort of partial obstruction that is being overcome. That is, a pseudoobstruction. That is also not related to IBS.
 
#10 ·
Flux, are you saying that it's not really normal or a symptom of IBS? (I was a little confused by your wording.)What worries me is that this strong pulse with a bulge is a symptom of an aortic aneurysm. My father had an aneurysm when I was one, and it is genetic.Any ideas as to what would cause this pulsing and bulging, flux??Deirdre
 
#11 ·
"Stomach butterflies scramble EGGs Butterflies in your stomach aren't all in your head, according to Larry VandeCreek. Using an electrogastrograph, an external electrical monitoring device that is to the stomach what the electrocardiograph is to the heart, he and his colleagues at Ohio State University in Columbus have been able to measure the "butterflies." The technique is also being used to study other conditions, among them motion sickness, which Pennsylvania State University researchers have linked to erratic electrogastrograms (EGGs). Like all muscles, the stomach muscle is stimulated by electricity. While the electrical signal in the stomach is minuscular compared with that in the heart, it can still be picked up by electrodes placed on the skin. Electrical signals from the stomach were first measured in 1922, but the much stronger heart signal made external recording difficult. In the past several years, however, sophisticated electronics has enabled the stomach signal to be isolated from the heart's.VandeCreek and his colleagues tested 20 people who claimed they were prone to stress-related stomach upsets, and 20 people who said they were not. In the study, which has not yet been published, electrodes were placed on the skin over the stomachs of fasting volunteers. The readings were initially identical, with amplitudes averaging 50 to 70 microvolts. But when the butterly sufferers were asked to imagine themselves in a stressful situation, their wave forms intensified to as much as 500 microvolts. "It's a little storm in there," VandeCreek says. Readings from people without the problem remained steady."Science News, Feb 22, 1986 v129 p117(2)
 
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#12 ·
no i mean a blockage in the colon. b/c it felt like it was fron the colon bunching up and pushing the vessel closer to the front of the abdomen as when its happening you can SEE it pulsate adn when its NOT happening you can't see it-i did tests! flux its definitely related to ibs b/c i used to get it exactly when i had a flare up and it sounds like others associate it with that too. i would always get it when things felt tight. of course i have no scientific backup, but when something happens EVERY time its common sense there is some relationship - and thats the EXTENT to which i'm going to argue about it! as i feel like real **** today. and don't have the energy for fluxations.
 
#13 ·
quote: The intestinal fluttering, however, does suggest some sort of partial obstruction that is being overcome. That is, a pseudoobstruction
Any reference or just a guess?.Secondly it seems that butterflies in the stomach do exist as flutters."Anxiety can cause gastrointestinal muscles to flutter, causings a sensation called "butterflies in the stomach." Stress can cause the release of adrenaline and other hormones that elicit physical sensations. " Glamour, July 2003 v101 i7 p79(1)Flux don't roll your eyes and say it is Glamour magazine. They do have journalists with a science background who report on this stuff
 
#14 ·
quote:that this strong pulse with a bulge
Bulge? There is a bulge? It is true that pulsatile masses are associated with aortic aneurysms. That should be checked out.
quote:it seems that butterflies in the stomach do exist as flutters
.No, butterflies is a nervous sensation. It does not involve ANY muscle movement.
quote:They do have journalists with a science background who report on this stuff
Spare us.
quote: b/c it felt like it was fron the colon bunching up and pushing the vessel closer to the front of the abdomen
The arteries are behind. I suspect something could be pushed near an artery behind it and that is transmitting pulsations of the artery. Anyway, obstructions are never related to IBS. However, abnormal contractions can result in pseudoobstruction.
 
#16 ·
quote:eek:ne does feel the flutters, muscular or neural. What do EGGs measure?. Butterflies exist as that,
I would consider fluttering to involve motion, which is somehow produced by contractions. But butterflies are not contractions. They are specific sensations and they don't even have to be originating from the gut. If butterflies resulted in changes in the electrical control actitvity of the gut, they could be recorded by an electrogastrogram only if they occurred in the stomach itself, but I haven't seen any evidence of that (Where did VandeCreek publish?). How would you get someone to have butterflies?
 
#17 ·
I don't know where/ if Vandecreek published it in a journal .But I found something on him on the web-Stradley Publications2. Stradley, R.P., S. Johnson and L. VandeCreek, et al. The electrogastrogram (EGG) response to feeding in small and large dogs (abstr). Conf. Res. Workers in Anim. Dis. Nov. 11, 1991.He is apparently a prof in Ohio STate
 
#18 ·
quote:VandeCreek and his colleagues tested 20 people who claimed they were prone to stress-related stomach
But was and how was that validated? What is stressful to one person may not be to another.
quote:which has not yet been published,
Presumably, it never was, but that doesn't say whether he ever submitted and it got rejected or it just was never submitted. It's a bit odd to have something published in a popular magazine before it was accepted in a real journal.
quote:butterly sufferers were asked to imagine themselves in a stressful situation,
Was the situation different for each person or did they have to imagine the same thing? How did he establish that what was to be imagined was truly stressful? I would think one would expose all the subjects to a stressful situation. For example, a dichotic listening task.
quote: their wave forms intensified to as much as 500 microvolts. "It's a little storm in there,"
It also doesn't say how this specifically relates to butterflies if it does at all. Finally, if it somehow was related, then it implies that the average Joe does not experience them.I also found http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov:80/entrez/quer...3&dopt=Abstract http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov:80/entrez/quer...8&dopt=Abstract which both suggest that stress does affect EGG recording in healthy people. So based on the limited description that we have here, this was a poorly done study and it didn't seem to be related at all to stomach butterflies, which I believe are manifested only as a sensation. In conclusion, then, fluttering and the stomach butterflies are two completely unrelated phenomena.
 
#19 ·
You raise some very good questions. I don't have the answers to the, in the absence of an actual paper. Unless he ithinks tthat butterflies are always produced under stress in these sufferers. You are right that we don't know that how he could even reproduce a condition which would create butterflies in everyone and each time.I have written to Stradley of Stradler Publications asking him to help me contact Vandevreek. Maybe something useful will come out of it. It is strange that his results werrte published in a mag before it was published in a journal. He must have got too carried away with it.
 
#24 ·
one last fact from the article"He and his colleagues are currently looking at anorexics; preliminary daa indicate they get butterflies just thinking about food. He also hopes to use the technique in biofeedback experimens to see if upset-stomach sufferers can be trained to normalize their stomach contractions. "
 
#26 ·
I traced Larry Vandecreek in Bozeman, Montana but I was so thrilled I forgot all my questions, flux
He says it was done so long ago that he doesn't remember much of it and said that the work had been taken over by gastroenterologists (he was in the Department of Family Medicine then). He says they are only interested in a problem if it is organic. I told him that I found the association of stress and EGG and nothing about stomach butterflies and EGG. He said people under stress could feel similar sort of feelings. I forgot to ask him how he reproduced butterflies. flux you please contact him and gret more info and tell us about it.
Thanks. Directory Assistance will be able to give you his tel number.
 
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