Raw food anyone?

As most of you know, I've been having issues with my stomach for the past month or two.

I got sick the end of June with what I'm labeling a viral infection. It had me knocked out for 3 days with achy bones and joints, headaches and a slight fever. After three days of that, I had about a week and a half worth of a dry, hacking cough and congestion. A few days after that disappeared, my stomach became distended. It's weird. I wake up in the morning and it's flat like normal, and as soon as I visit the ladies' room (before I even eat anything) it's puffed out like I just ate two Thanksgiving dinners. It only gets larger as the day goes on regardless of how much I do or don't consume.

Now I know I've put on a couple (okay maybe 5) pounds over the past month or so, but a weight gain that slight is normally not accompanied by one not being able to button any of her pants (even the leftover size 8s from a couple years ago) due to a swollen stomach. Nor does a slight weight gain result in bad stomach cramps and occasional nausea and vomiting.

At this point some of you are probably thinking to yourself, "Maybe she's pregnant." Let's be clear on that, the resounding answer is "NO!"

After waiting a week from the appearance of the distended stomach to make sure it wasn't just related to typical PMS bloating, I decided a visit to my doctor was in order. She did a round of blood work to check for pregnancy and other things and everything was negative besides slightly elevated liver levels. She then decided to send me for an ultrasound on my liver, pancreas, gallbladder and kidneys just to make sure there was nothing abnormal there. The only thing that showed up was a small polyp on my gallbladder.

When I was in discussing these test results with her, she admitted that she really thought my pregnancy test was going to come back positive (which was not true!) and wanted to do a second round of blood work to check the liver levels again and to test for Lyme's (seeing how I live on a farm, that may have been the original thing that started everything off the end of June). She also wanted me to see my gynecologist to see if she noticed anything abnormal. She didn't notice anything out of the ordinary, but is performing a pelvic ultrasound just to make sure. I go for that this coming Monday and after we get those results and my second round blood work results, then my internist will decide whether she's going to send me for a CT scan or to a gastroenterologist.

So where does the raw food figure into this?

At this point, I'm desperate to try anything that will make it so I can actual button my pants again (Sidetrack here: Okay, so I put on 5 pounds, but I've put on the same 5 pounds before a year ago and did not have these issues of my clothes not fitting. I'm always 5 pounds within my goal weight which keeps me in the same size clothes. I am completely baffled why none of my regular size pants are fitting me and why my stomach is so huge because normally I carry my weight in my legs. Anybody have any thoughts?), and so that I don't have to wear blousy shirts so people don't think I'm pregnant, and so I can actual go the bathroom and eat a meal without getting an uncomfortably full stomach, occasional nausea and rarely vomiting.

I've looked into allergies of different kinds but I could eat the food one day and have no side effects and the very same food the next day could make me sick to my stomach. I've researched symptoms of different intestinal diseases. It sounds the closest to IBS, but we're still waiting for the results.

As far as my diet goes, I'm trying everything from eating Dannon Activia yogurt every day, reducing my carb intake and the last few days focusing on a raw food detox (where all I can eat is raw fruits and veggies…yuck for a person like me who only likes cooked veggies. After all, one can only eat so many salads in a given day!). My stomach doesn't hurt as much as normal, but stomach is still incredibly bloated and full feeling even after a simple glass of water.

So, this is what I've been dealing with lately. Don't suggest a raw food diet to any of you unless you're madly in love with eating pounds worth of raw veggies a day.