I find that the foods that affect the volume of gas and those that affect the odor are basically unrelated.
I’m slightly lactose intolerant, and if i drink a lot of milk i get gas, but unless i also eat stinky foods, it doesn’t have much odor. There’s some sugar in apple juice that i don’t digest, and apples give me gas. I don’t have a lot of issues with beans, but many people do.
If i eat a lot of onion and garlic i get a bit more odor. Fish increases the odor. Shellfish even more than finfish. Having a stomach bug sometimes makes my intestines smell terrible. In the letter case, i like to eat yogurt and drink kefir, both of which have probiotics that can help my gut flora get back to normal.
Inulin is a fiber sometimes added to yogurt, though. It’s supposed to help the probiotics flourish. But you might want to check and see how you react to it. It increases the volume of gas for many people.
If you are worried for your health, i don’t think you need to be. It is possible for gas to damage your gut. My father literally burst his lower intestine from excess gas, and got sepsis. But my father had an extremely fragile gut (he was in rehab from major gut issues when it happened) and he had severe constipation and pain for two days before his gut burst. His problem was that the gas wasn’t passing. If you are farting, the gas is passing through you. And if you don’t have any pain, it’s not putting a lot of pressure on your innards.
Personally, i only worry about gas if I’m going to be trapped in tight, unventilated spaces with other people. Which is to say, i try not to drink a lot of milk or eat anything stinky before long flights, and otherwise don’t care.
After beano, try probiotics, and to mask the smell- chlorophyll.
That was my problem, but regular probiotics have gotten it to the point where cheese is safe, and even some ice cream. But i shudder what would happen if i chugged a tall glass of whole milk.
Lots of people have issues digesting FODMAPS, and one symptom of that is gas. The way to find out is to experiment with your diet, but it helps to know what to keep track of. Most beans are high in FODMAPS, but so are lots of other foods.
I’ve appreciated advice from each of you and am naturally taking notes. I made an appointment with a CN to plan a regimen and have previously spoken with my doctor about my diet as part of health.
There is always the possibility of making a virtue out of necessity: if you can’t stop it, turn it into a job. Here are two famous examples:
Perhaps the White House needs a serious jester soon? Guaranteed to break the ice at international receptions!
And for our modern times, with TikTok and other social media, this gentleman may be an example to follow:
Perhaps with a detour via America’s Got Talent or a similar show.
Good luck!
Now that we’ve gotten to humor… a cousin once sent Mrs. Cretin a pack of undershort filters for dealing with my alleged emanations. Despite my indignation I went ahead and tried one. Cut it into two halves, rolled each half into a small cylinder, had Lovey stick one into each nostril. THEY WORKED!!
For the last maybe 5 years, I’ve had lower gut pain every day, which lasts for about 4 hours. This pain ranges from about a 4 to a 7 in intensity, with a 10 being your arm ripped off by a chainsaw. Weirdly, there’s no pain before it starts, and when it’s finally run it’s course for the day, I feel fine. But those hours are pretty miserable.
I tried probiotics, I tried excluding dairy, I tried glutin-free. I went in for my regular colonoscopy (small polyp, nothing to worry about), then made an appt for the pain. Of course, I saw a nurse practitioner, not the doc. I had a CT scan, and an ultrasound. I tried a couple meds they tried. They never got to the bottom of my pain, and I’m sort of resigned to having about 1/4 of my waking time in real pain. Honestly, it’s sort of miserable. I like to volunteer to do dog rescue transports, but only do the early ones, because I’m never sure when the pain is going to start, and it’s bad enough that driving is difficult.
If I recall correctly, I had minimal pain the day of my last colonoscopy. I don’t remember the pain level for the day before. I’d say about 5% of days I have minimal pain. but that doesn’t seem to correlate to times I’ve eaten. Defecation will usually bring on pain about 15 minutes after, if I haven’t started my pain yet. It usually starts at least 3 hours after I get up in the morning. But sometimes (today, for example), instead of starting at 10 am, it didn’t start until 4:00 pm. Generally it feels better to be up and moving than to be reclining. I’ll often use that time to feed horses, or move bales of hay or bags of feed.
IANA medical anything, but my late wife had many intestinal adhesions. So I’ve got some vicarious experience with them.
Intestinal adhesions increase the odds of intestinal blockages. Which are life threatening events albeit over the course of days, not hours.
You might try switching to a diet of all soft food for a few days to see if that changes anything. By “soft” I mean applesauce, oatmeal, pudding, pureed soups, wet mashed potatoes, etc. Stuff eaten with a spoon where chewing is 100% optional. But chew it anyway and take plenty of liquids with it.
Since it takes a couple days for stuff to make a complete trip through you, and longer if there’s a bottleneck in there, you’ll need to keep this up for probably 5 days before you’ll see a change in the pain if there is to be one.
It’s not a very fun diet, but it is a diagnostic one.