I cannot offer first-hand experience here, since never in my life have I had the problem under discussion. However, when my father-in-law was living with us, he did have the problem and I gave him prune juice. It worked very well. If you don't like prune juice, you can put nice little cut up pieces of prunes in your oatmeal (delicious!), you can make prune brownies, prune souffle dessert, prune cookies, prune/nut bread. Dried prunes are also good cooked in a little water which softens them up and water turns to juice. They slide down really easy (and out as well). Makes a nice little warm side dish at breakfast. If you have kids you can tell them those little dark pieces in the cookies or the oatmeal are mushy raisins.

All of which reminds me of the old story about the constipated mathematician. He worked it out with his pencil.

Sorry, couldn't resist... (and we all need levity!)

Martin has the same problem. He said Movicol helps a little, but also take Lactilose as it lubricates the poo and makes it slide more easily. Lactilose is not harmful as I was allowed to take when I was pregnant. Martin just told me a s well that the secret and the best advice he can give is: take a magazine, go and sit on the loo every day, even if you don't think you need to go, and sit and wait. And more often than not, you will go a little bit. A little bit is good as it's if you wait too long that it builds up that's when you need to dig out.

Please accept my entrance into the "no____!" Club. (Feel free to delete).

I've never in my life been constipated(70 years, a pregnancy, hysterectomy, hemorrhoidectomy), and I can see now how blessed I've been! Don't know yet what the combo is that suddenly brought this about, but it's been 24 hours and I just returned from a painful 40-mile RT trip for daily radiation. The nurse suggested Senokot, which I took about an hour ago and I'm now sipping some split pea soup.

Good grief, this is awful. I've known people from my past who suffered constipation on a regular basis and I have no idea how they managed to function.

This too shall pass (literally). (I'm such a whiner.)

My sympathies to all those who sit and wait. I've also heard that a small stool (the kind you put your feet up on) helps one get into the proper position for easy success. I had some out of town company recently and the first morning, she asked me for some reading matter. I started to go through my favorites, i.e, John Grisham, Buddha, Eckhardt Tolle and she interrupted with "Anything!" and I realized she was on her way to the bathroom. The read and sit must work, though because one day as my daughter passed the bathroom where her youngest son (9 yrs) was sitting on the poo place, she asked him what he was doing checking out his shorts. He said he was reading the label on his underwear because he had forgotten his book. So, to all those who sit and wait, just remember, "stuff happens". . . . eventually.

As a nurse (a very long time ago) dealing with people who suffered this as a matter of course, we had "manual evacuation days". This was very unpleasant for the patients and not much fun for the nurses either.

To avoid having too many on our list, we would start with laxatives taken orally, progress the following day to liquid paraffin taken orally and then a suppository just before the last resort of manual evacuation.

I had success with a glycerin based suppository (ask your pharmacist) and then getting the patient to squat on the toilet seat rather than sitting on it (relaxes the relevant muscles which lessens the pain) and then push on the belly area. They would also have to be patient as the motion could take a while. Reading is good, sudokus are good, crosswords are good but you have to remember to keep straining.

The only problem with the squat is that toilets are not really designed for this and success may also require a bit of clean up if your aim is a bit off. Take old towels with you just in case and keep the toilet brush handy. This is still preferable to the digital or manual evacuation method which is even more messy.

Following my ordeal last Friday, the Senokot finally did its job, so now I'll get ahead of this so it doesn't happen again following Wednesday's Erbitux treatment by taking one immediately upon arriving home thereafter. (It was the following Thursday/Friday that the constipation occurred.) So since then, back to "normal.")

The suggestions from all of you are good ones, but I think they assume the constipation hasn't reached the point (like it did for me, late Friday after I had first posted) where the spasms were basically involuntary because I was so impacted. Remember that I'm eating solid foods, as well as lots of liquid protein drinks, so I was definitely plugged up real good.

The rest of the treatment is okay; about what I expected. Burning in my throat and mouth are tolerable, but yesterday my lips were burning up. (I'm fair skinned and my lips have always been vulnerable to sun, etc., anyway, so that didn't surprise me either.) After trying all sorts of moisturizing solutions, I finally remembered Bag Balm (very heavy on lanolin) which I use in the winter when my fingers crack. Bag Balm is used extensively on dairy farms to keep cows' udders from chaffing so bad that they bleed especially in winter. True story. Now you can buy it at any pharmacy and it comes in a cute little green tin with a pink clover design so if guests discover it in your bathroom, they don't think you really live in a barn when they're not there.

I don't see that anyone has mentioned this, but constipation during treatment is something everyone deals with, and it is not related to the chemo, but the pain meds usually. Most of the heavy duty pain medications will stop things up. So all throughout treatment to take some kind of stool softeners routinely, regardless of when you have had treatments or when you take your pain meds, is the best plan.

Also dehydration can cause the big C. In fact one is pretty lucky NOT to get constipated during this Tx.

I had the same problem and was given prescription laxatives and stool softners. A lady I talked to who had gone through the same thing told me to get Miralax. You mix it in any drink and you can't taste it and it worked within 3 days. Hope this helps. Prayers for your husband going up.