MY GP SAYS that I am suffering from IBS — not the Tory leader, but a much louder, more active pain in the gut called irritable bowel syndrome. This is the closest I have come to being fashionable in years. According to The Times, the condition “affects a fifth of the world’s population”.

Believe me, what my doctor calls IBS is real. One afternoon this week, when I was supposed to be writing this, I was doubled up in Trafalgar Square, downing painkillers while passing tourists and policemen stared at me as if I was some madly sweating addict in a suit and tie.

But discussion about IBS is painful for different reasons. It seems to highlight some problems with the obsessive way that we approach health issues today.

Like other talked-about modern conditions, IBS is a catch-all “syndrome” — a loosely identified collection of symptoms, rather than a properly diagnosed medical condition. My main symptom is severe abdominal discomfort that keeps me up a couple of nights a week. You don’t want to know the details of other people’s IBS; let’s just say that the symptoms vary.

The term appears to define any gastric problem for which there is no other known diagnosis. So while it is easy to get a label for your condition, which many might find reassuring, it is much harder to find a cure. One sufferer suggests that IBS stands for “I’m basically stumped”.

The only pattern I have spotted is that my IBS seems to be brought on by anything I enjoy eating. My Trafalgar Square performance followed an attack by a duck, of the deliciously roasted variety. So maybe IBS is just a fancy new term for the old saying: “I like it, but it doesn’t like me.”

The diverse symptoms give plenty of scope for any man and woman (doubled-up) in the street to be an expert. Everybody I meet who has had IBS (and that seems to be just about everybody) suggests a different cure. Most involve some sort of worthy dietary or lifestyle change, from eating “friendly bacteria” yoghurt to taking up Pilates.

You will be shocked to learn that the official medical advice includes cutting down on alcohol. The extent of my GP’s advice was to take Mebeverine (an anti-spasmodic that relaxes the muscles and restores the gut’s normal movement), drink less wine and “eat less onion”.

As is common with newly defined syndromes, IBS has become an “identity illness” for some people. They define themselves as members of “our IBS community”, or even “activists” fighting for the right to take some controversial treatment. They spend their time studying food labels, forming self-help groups and running IBS support websites, where they swap horror stories and tips.

While all of this may possibly be therapeutic for some, the You-Are-What-You-Suffer obsession with syndromes seems an unhealthy symptom of our times. Most people say that their IBS symptoms passed in time, yet this sort of morbid approach seems guaranteed to keep you feeling ill.

One underlying factor of IBS on which everybody seems to agree is (you know what’s coming) the stress of modern living. So all I have to do is get a relaxing life. However, lying awake at night in discomfort, wondering whether I will be fit to work the following day, is not helping me to destress.

Maybe I should be rereading Catch 22. In any case, if the only cure really is a stress-free life, perhaps you can keep it. Serenity sounds worse than an ulcer to me. Stress — can’t sleep with it, can’t live without it.