A woman with an undiagnosed bowel condition makes her look look 8-months pregnant.

Joanne Turton, 33, said for the past 15 years she has been living with an unusually bloated stomach. But after a number of failed attempts at finding a cause or cure, a pacemaker was tried and improved her bowel movements.

Turton, a mother to a 5-year-old girl, recalled her years as a teenager and described the disorder as "painful" and "uncomfortable."

"It hurts all the time and I get stabbing pains in my side," Turton told The Daily Mail. "It has affected me all my life and means I can't go out and socialize with friends like a normal person."

A remarkable pacemaker device was offered to Turton as a trial procedure and since receiving a Gastric Electrical Stimulation, GES, she felt better "for the first time."

According to the University of California San Francisco, a GES involves surgically implanting a pacemaker-type device in the abdomen then pulsates electrical stimulations to nerves, ultimately smoothing the lower muscles of the stomach.

However Turton's story took a turn for the worse when the planned operation to permanently install the device was canceled at Castle Hill Hospital in England.

"I was so excited to finally be getting the operation," Turton said. "It was a relief knowing there was finally a light at the end of the tunnel. Now I've been left in limbo and I don't know what is happening."

The NHS Hull Clinical commissioning Group, CCG, arrived to ease her plight and offered to pay for the operation, although Turton is relieved, she still has no word on when or where an operation will take place.

The spokesperson for the group said that the operation is accredited in very few districts of the United Kingdom, so it will have to take place outside Castle Hill Hospital.

GES is normally recommended for patients suffering from gastroparesis, which delays food from entering the small intestines from the stomach. The common reason behind using GES is for diabetes, but in special cases like Turton's the conditions could be unknown or medically uncontrollable.

Gastroparesis is a little-known disease that affects nearly 5 million Americans including children, in some cases it shows for a brief period then disappears on its own.

Other known treatment options include:

  • Diet Restrictions
  • Severe cases: Feeding through Tubes or IV nutritional support

According to The Gastroparesis & Dysmotilities Association, severe gastrointestinal motility diseases like gastroparesis costs one patient a staggering $1 million every year in direct medical expenses.