Herbivore

I am SO fed up with my stomach. Following my trip to Leicester last Monday and my consumption of tomato and ginger soup, which sounded quite safe for the digestion but turned out to be lethal because the chef had added red peppers to the recipe (not mentioned on the menu, of course), I got agonising indigestion as the ulcers were woken up good and proper. Oh, for a battalion of Gaviscon ad firemen with their soothing hoses.

By Wednesday it was feeling okay-ish. I ate bland food ill Friday, then went mad and drank half a bottle of white wine. Mistake. I was supposed to visit a friend in Aylesbury yesterday but Mr G warned there was bad traffic and it might take two hours to drive there, and I couldn't manage more than 45 mins between visits to the loo. (Irritable bowel, irritable bladder and irritable ulcers; it's terrible trio to suffer from.)

The tum is still dodgy today. I've clocked up four loo visits so far and have the nasty pain in my right side that I always get when the innards feel disturbed. The doc says the pain is referred pain from the ulcers but I'm not so sure. Ulcerwise, I feel fine today; it's the bowels that are grumbling, so I think the pain is connected to them. Whatever it is, I have never found anything that eases it. Not my probiotics, not my Gastrocalm digestive aids, not even peppermint tea.

I bet that there is a herbal cure somewhere in the world, one leaf that would ease my symptoms. In Greece once, I was sold a bag of leaves labelled Dictum that was meant to be a cure-all for stomach problems. I brought it home, didn't know what I was supposed to do with it (Boil it? if so, how much should I use? Have it in a salad? Smoke it?) and ended up throwing the whole lot away. For all I know, it could have been that elusive cure. Anyone know what Dictum is?