Lupie Poop

For the past week, I've felt really obsessed with my own poop. It's because I'm going to my rheumatologist today, and I know one of his questions is going to be, "How are your stools?" And I want to be ready for the answer. Before lupus, I paid very little attention to what came out of me, and that was pretty much by choice, but my doctor at this point has reinforced that it's important to look at my poop.

Because of the ulcers I'm prone to get and the meds I'm taking, my poop is supposed to be a good indicator of how I'm doing. But because of my years of poop observance, I've been able to come up with this nice poop color scale that I'll happily pass on to you.

Black--bleeding in upper GI tract. Call doctor.
Red--Lower GI bleeding. Call doctor. (I get this sometimes, hemroids.)
Yellow stools -- For me, this means too much Imuran.

For those of you who are truly worried about the poop that comes out of you, here's a site from about.com.