Sometimes your heartburn wakes you up at night, and sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes you feel that burning pain in the morning, and sometimes in the afternoon. Sometimes you don’t feel it at all. What’s going on?Heartburn can be aggravated by a variety of different lifestyle and diet factors. The trick is discovering what causes your symptoms, so you can figure out what to do about it. You may find that by making certain lifestyle changes, you can avoid medication completely.
Try creating a "Trigger Chart" to track your symptoms. While it may seem like a lot of work at first, doing this for even a week or two could illuminate the causes of your chronic reflux. You can then bring this information to your doctor and work with him or her to find a treatment plan that’s right for you.
Create a page for each day. On the left side of the page, write the following questions, and on the right side, fill in the answers.
First, consider your heartburn:
Did you have an episode of heartburn? What were your symptoms?
At what time of day?
How bad was it?
Did it affect your ability to do daily activities?
How long did it last?
Did you have any additional symptoms? For example, did the pain
radiate to another part of your body? Did you have stomach pain?Then, think about possible triggers:
What did you eat and drink and when?
Did you sit down and eat, or did you eat on the run?
Did you exercise? Did it affect your heartburn?
Did you smoke?
Did you take any medications? If you took an antacid or other heartburn medication, did it help? How much? Did your symptoms come back later? How much later?
Were you under stress today?
Were you lying down or bending over when you first felt the reflux?It is important to fill out a chart even when you don’t have any reflux. That way, you can see what you are doing differently on the "good" and "bad" days. If you discover that you are not doing anything differently, than it may be time to look at medication or surgical options.
