Hey, Coyote. I've suffered from depression off and on for the past three or four years as a result of my chronic pain. I'd been losing weight for quite a while, but it was slowly. About fifteen pounds over two years. Then, a little over two months ago, my weight began to dive. Since then I've lost an additional seventeen pounds, and presently weigh 135. It's dropping so fast that I'm now losing a pound every other day, even though I'm already way underweight.

I did try a gluten-free diet, again that was four years ago, but I only avoided the obvious wheat products like bread, crackers, cereals, etc.

Cara - You're mention of H. Pylori is very interesting, because I was diagnosed with that following an endoscopy just over two months ago. The GE said it was the worst case he'd ever seen. I went through a fifteen day regimen of very strong anti-biotics, but I haven't been retested since then. When I inquired about a retest, I was told not to worry about it unless the symptoms returned. Well, I've been living with abdominal pain and extreme discomfort for so long that it's hard for me to distinguish a few symptoms from all the others. So a retest for H. Pylori would definitely seem worth pursuing. Thank you very much for bringing that up.

Mrsd -thank you very much for thinking about this so hard, and for all the info you've given me. I've been through this time and time again, and I can still find no pattern to my symptoms, other than the fact that I have a very localized stabbing pain in the lower left quadrant of my abdomen that hurts nearly a hundred percent of the time. That was my very first symptom, and I really believe that everything else has spread from there.

And Linda - yeah, it makes you think, doesn't it? I hope you can get your weight back up, too.

Thanks again everybody. Very much! I'm still studying this and going through the info you have all given me. God bless you all...

Idealist