[Guest]

Ladies and Gentlemen:I'd like to tell you my story. I am a 42 year old, successful business woman, wife and mother. On the outside, I look healthy and happy. But I suffer daily from the debilitating effects of IBS. I have been saddled with this disease since I was 15 years old. To give you an idea of the ramifications of this disease, try to remember your worst case of "Montezuma's revenge," and imagine that occurring hourly. For 14 years, I have had to stop at the bathroom once and often twice on my 30-45 minute commute to work each day (this was even without putting anything in my mouth to eat that morning). I rearranged everything to allow for bathroom stops on all my journeys. And that's just the start of my day.At work, I cannot eat anything if I know that I have to visit a client or be in an unfamiliar environment. And still I've had to get up from meetings to run to the bathroom - using an excuse like "I'm having problems with my contacts."I even turned down a promotion, partially because I knew it entailed travel and speeches - all the things I avoid due to my disease. I have had numerous "accidents" at work when I did not make it to the bathroom in time and had to go home in tears. I also can't count how many times I have had accidents in my car because I either couldn't find a bathroom, or knew if I did, it would be too late, and I'd "lose it" in front of others. Can you imagine a life like this? After almost 30 years of this, and numerous depressing trips to the doctor (being told it was all in my head and to try stress therapy), I gave up. I learned to alter my life to fit this disease, no matter how horrible the outcome. I married a wonderful, caring man who put up with my daily screams of "HURRY!! I have to find a bathroom NOW!". We learned to eat at home or only to visit restaurants within a 15 minute drive (with many bathroom options on the way home). And of course, travel outside of our city was a nightmare. There are so many things I could list that were an impossibility for me because of IBS.I'm telling you all this to help you see what life was like before and after Lotronex.My new family practitioner mentioned the drug to me when I told her I'd suffered for 30 years, but didn't want to try any more drugs that wouldn't work - I'd tried them all.She prescribed Lotronex, and the change was life altering! For the first time I could actually say that I was cured. No more excruciating pain, no more diarrhea, IT WAS A MIRACLE!! If I'd won the lottery and you'd asked me to give it all up for this medicine, I would gladly have done so. For the first time in my adult life, I thought of traveling again and seeing the world - enjoying the normal aspects of life without fear. I have a son, almost three, and I can't imagine taking him to a park, going for a bike ride or sitting at a soccer game watching him play without this drug.I have stockpiled enough Lotronex to last 4 more months. What will I do when that runs out? I can't even imagine. How can a group of people, ALL of you involved, take this away from me and all the others suffering from this horrible, debilitating disease?You have shown us that a cure does exist, and then you have taken it away. How can you live with that? If you cannot get the FDA to approve this drug again, then produce it and ship it to other countries where we can have access to it.I am ready to try anything in hopes of experiencing normalcy again. Please look into your hearts and souls and DO WHAT IS RIGHT!Thank you for listening,Diana Hoyt