Good Morning,

I have a question concerning the use of magnesium sulfate. My fiancé takes Epsom salts on a daily sometimes 2 or 3 times a day. Every time he eats he makes a Epsom and water mix and drinks it. About 30 minutes later he's using the bathroom. He has been doing this for the last 3 years, what are the effects of the long term use of Epsom salt? I cannot get him to understand this is dangerous. I've noticed that he appears to be bloated in the abdomen area. I am afraid he is going to do some damage to his body.

Epsom salts has long been used to treat constipation, but should not be taken 3 times a day. He can't possibly be constipated that much. He is encouraging the food to basically go right through him without any benefits to his body. I suggest he stop this practice immediately. There are a lot of other healthy ways to treat constipation, and that is eating more fruit and vegetables, flax seed added to morning cereal, or bran for that matter keeps everything on an even keel.

Tick

Tick, I am convinced that he has a eating disorder. He is not constipated. Is there a site that I can print so that he can read about the harm he is doing to his body. Digesting all this Epsom salt must have an adverse effect on him.

This is a disorder called PICA. Pica is the ingestion of items that do not have any nutritional value.

Here is a pretty good website for that... Medscape: Medscape Access (http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/914765-overview)

And another one.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pica_%28disorder%29

Can you explain better what kind of disorder pica is, J_9? I'm interested too. R.

Pica is basically when someone eats items with no nutritional value such as corn starch, dirt, laundry soap... just to name a few.