@thull , thank you! I've started to do that when I start to think I MIGHT have an sbo coming on, just in case. It just seems to make sense that if things are just starting to stick together in there, some gentle massage in the area snd a little stretching might loosen things up. These are all the kinds of things I wish a GI could explain/confirm/deny for me, but hearing others' personal experiences is also a big help!
In the past few days I've made a major change in my eating habits (nothing but juice, water, coffee, tea, and popcicles until evening, followed by a really healthy and easy-to-digest dinner). I've put a lot of thought into it, and I'm hoping that it will make future sbo's a lot less severe, or at least change the patterns so that the worst of it happens during the day instead of always in the middle of the night! We'll see what happens, but I feel a lot less anxiety when I know there's nothing in my stomach that would have too much of a hard time getting through quickly.