Not much if it's a functional disorder, sorry to say. It won't hurt certainly, going thru CBT sessions. It may help other areas.

Hi Rozy288 - I thought I had replied already, but cannot find my response. A short recap is my CBT was seven sessions (over seven weeks). It retrains your brain and weakens the anxiety connection between brain and and gut-- and gives you the tools to relax anytime you wind up. Its listening with eyes closed to a therapist's reading of the CBT imagery text for relaxation. You then are emailed the recording and practice every day (once a day; the recording is about 20 minutes long) . Your job is simply to sit and listen daily. It worked great for me. Virtual appts. GI Psychology, Burke, VA. My therapist was Tina. What a life changer - no talking, no drugs.

I have functional dyspepsia (similiar to IBS, but affects upper GI pain), and I also work with a GI psychologist, and it's really made a difference. I work with a GI psychologist and also a GI-trained dietician.

With the GI dietician, she was able to help bust the myths (there are so many and it's so confusing!) about what to eat and what not to eat, and help me figure out what would work for me. I had similiar issues to you in that I would feel so uncomfortable eating and get full too quickly. Being hungry and not eating enough is a problem, and I ended up being underweight. I ended up developing disordered thoughts about eating, or food anxiety because of all the random diet information being given to me by providers. And then I learned GI conditions are a risk factor for eating disorders. Thankfully, I never got that far.

I'm not sure what you mean by eating "small and healthy," but depending on what each person can tolerate, even something that's "healthy" might not be the "best." Sounds cheesy, but it's very individual. i.e. I learned I don't tolerate sulfurous foods well, so I can eat eggs, but not on an empty stomach (like for breakfast, and I definitely couldn't do a boiled egg for a snack). I can have broccoli in small amounts, but large amounts are more difficult and cauliflower is problematic. And I definitely don't tolerate them as raw vegetables (cooking softens the texture and reduces the sulfur making them easier to digest). My dietician helped me test things out safely and gave me ideas for things that might work better.

With the GI psychologist...it is difficult to find someone, and there can be long waits. If you wanted to learn more, there's a GI psychologist, Dr. Megan Riehl, who I follow, and she recently put out a book called "Mind Your Gut" with the GI dietician, Kate Scarlata. They also have a podcast if that's easier to process. They talk about some of the concepts @researchmaven mentioned: calming the brain/gut connection.

We work on strategies to manage stress about my symptoms, which actually ended up improving my symptoms. And eventually, we're working toward gut-directed hypnotherapy, which I really want to try. It's like @resesarchmaven said, your therapist works with you to create a recording, very much like a guided meditation that addresses the things you're having trouble with, and then you listen to it. It does take about 12 weeks a few times a week of listening, based on the research anyway. The research that's out there has shown it can help up to 70% of people with IBS. There are also recordings you might be able to find on YouTube and definitely on the free app Insight Timer, but I'm not sure if they're from certified providers.

I don't tolerate medication well, so I'm really glad I had these options. Wishing you the best of luck.