Help me please - newbie
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Help me please - newbie
Hi anyone and everyone. I am posting this because I feel I have a lot of the same symptoms that many of you face, without a diagnosis. For the past five years I have been suffering from many different symptoms associated with my diet. Past health history relating to these issues has included the removal of a brachial cleft cyst when I was in grade 11 that cause prevalent sore throats, laryngitis, bone-wracking coughs and pre-pnemonia type symptoms for months before it was diagnosed and removed. Before and after the removal I was put on many rounds of antibiotics. After this I suffered chronic fatigue, and very poor concentration and motivation. I was also intensely self conscious after this happened because I would always feel like my clothes were too tight and no matter how much I ate I was always hungry and tired. I also had a huge issue with thirst and have been tested for diabetes many times because it runs in my family. Throughout high school I was 140-145 pounds throughout the day but I never weighed myself that regularly because I ate a LOT and it didn't seem to have that much effect on me. I am also 5'9" tall and have been that way since I was sixteen. Up until grade 12 I suffered from irregular periods and was finally put on BC in grade 12 to try and make me regular, which worked but I suffered emotional outbursts. During first year university I became very ill during my first couple of weeks from what the doctors thought was mono and strep throat but what was actually oral thrush, which was again treated with antibiotics and pushed me to extreme fatigue. I remember going to the doctor about a month later because I was much more bloated than usual, felt nauseous and like I had a lot of acid in my stomach, and suffered from very liquidy stools that were mahogany in color and sometimes painful. The doctor gave me an anti-ulcer medication which was actually a treatment for H. pylori. This worked on my stools but I don't remember any change in my energy level. I constantly suffered from fatigue, bloating, irritability/depression, thirst, unmotivation and poor concentration. My weight would fluctuate from 145-152 pounds each day. The next year I felt so terrible about my appearance and constant fluctuation in weight, that I decided to try more exercise and clean eating. I was running for half an hour three times a week and involved in an aerobics class. I didn't notice any significant difference in weight loss and decided to try a dietary change as well. I ended up having a high protein diet because that's what I craved after I worked out and I felt such a huge change in my energy levels. I went for a couple weeks on this diet with a small weight loss, but I found I was getting tired when working out and thought it might be from a depletion of carbs. So I started eating more carbs (bread, oats, cereal, yogurt). I started losing weight and within about a week and a half I went from 148 pounds to around 138 with a drastic drop in energy level and mood. I also remember that around this time I started to smell heavily of chlorine while working out (I lost a LOT of salt), I would wake up 6-7 times a night from either a full bladder and being very thirsty or muscle cramps, an extremely low heart rate and bp, low vitamin B12, and the loose stools came back. I went to the doctor and he prescribed me an antacid which helped my stools while I was on the medication but again I stopped taking it and I dont remember it helping with any of my other symptoms. After a weekend out with my friends I ended up getting very ill with a respiratory infection, which was treated with another round of antibiotics which completely did me in. The fatigue was so bad that I didn't end up losing any more weight because I stopped exercising altogether because any activity made me too tired. I sunk to an incredibly low depressed state from lack of sleep, and although I had been put on antibiotics my ears and nasal passages were so dry and achey that I suffered frequent nightmares so my stomach and ears were keeping me from sleeping well. I went to see a cardiologist about my low HR and BP and she suggested I use electrolyte supplements and a high salt diet, and have since started taking vit B12 as a daily supplement. The doctors also put me on a nasal steroid to help with my nose and ear inflammation. At this point I started gaining some weight back but was still constantly fatigued, irritable and unmotivated. Finally a doctor said I might be celiac, so I got a colonoscopy done which proved to be negative, but I decided to try a changed diet anyways. I eliminated all gluten and dairy from my diet and that helped to an enormous extent. After trying this diet for a few months I realized a pattern that when I eat gluten/dairy I get a very bad burning sensation in my abdomen. my stomach feels like it's full of acid and I won't sleep well because I'll have stomach cramps. I also won't retain any water and if I do eat gluten/dairy by accident it usually takes a few days for my stomach to feel better again. I also enter a more depressed state after these episodes. Since that time I have also eliminated all fruit but bananas because they tended to give me the same cramping feeling as when I had gluten or dairy. I have a very limited diet; I eat eggs, tuna, raw carrots, lettuce, raw peppers, half a banana, and chicken every day and have occasionally almond milk and gatorade. I used to eat nutribiotic protein powder regularly until it became too expensive. I take vit B12 which helps my mood, and electrolytes and salt which help my thirst and low BP. I started this diet almost a year ago and have had no problems with belly bloat, extreme weight fluctuations, mood swings, nasal/ear pain, lack of period or chronic fatigue as long as I stick to this diet. Until recently. About a month ago I had a UTI which was treated with antibiotics. After that I was struck with a bad respiratory illness. After this happened it seemed like my stools were never put together. They started becoming flaky, loose and not formed at all and I'd have to go to the bathroom very urgently every morning and face extreme pain in my abdomen until I did. This itself would be enough to make me marginally tired, but my earaches have returned once again so abdominal and ear pain is giving me intense sleeplessness. Up until this point I had regularly been going to the gym with no problems but now I suffer from fatigue and poor muscle tone maintenance. I am literally being driven crazy by my stomach and ear issues leading to this fatigue and depression. I am once again on nasal steroids/rinses which helps marginally but not enough. I never had any of these issues as long as I stuck to my diet until the recent antibiotic use: like I said, after I switched to a gluten free, dairy free, very bland diet I had regained/had regular periods, no mood swings or depression, no ear pains keeping me from sleeping, and a huge increase in energy levels. After a month of very little sleep I can't go a full day without a huge nap in between, my weight has dropped a good five pounds this month without me trying very hard (although I think it's from decreased muscle tone) and i've been waking up in the middle of the night multiple times with incredible thirst, dry nasal passages and a very full bladder. Please, I've done so much in the past years already to try and improve my lifestyle that I no longer have any idea what to do. I'm depressed, angry and this diet was working until recently and it's so reduced now that if I had to cut anything else out I don't know what I'd eat!! I just want to know if anyone can relate to my symptoms again I'm not celiac, not gluten or lactose intolerant I just eat that way and it makes me feel so much better. I routinely take vit B12, vit D in the wintertime, electrolyte pills (which haven't been very useful lately), nasal steroids, asthma medication and that's it. If anyone has any suggestions or insight I'd really appreciate it because I can't take this inconsistency anymore. :(
Hi Emie,
Welcome to our internet family. Wow! Your doctors have really been attacking your gastrointestinal health with all those antibiotics. Please be aware that just because your doctors weren't able to diagnose it, doesn't mean that you do not have celiac disease. The tests they use have an unacceptably-high rate of false negative results. Many GI specialists still don't know how to properly diagnose microscopic colitis, either, and even fewer know how to treat the disease.
You may be very close with your diet, but it just needs to be fine-tuned a bit. Over half of us are sensitive to soy and all legumes, for example, and soy or soy lecthin is in a majority of foods. Most of us cannot tolerate iceberg lettuce, either, until we are in remission and our intestines have healed.
Here are some more things to try — over a third of us are sensitive to eggs, some of us can't tolerate foods that are high in salicylates, and many of us have problems with foods that are high in histamine content. So you might try avoiding those foods to see if that helps.
Regarding your constant thirst, and the need to urinate frequently — as you probably know, those are symptoms of diabetes. If you're not diabetic, though, then those symptoms may indicate a magnesium deficiency. Many of us do not get enough magnesium in our diet, so we have to take a supplement. That can also affect your blood pressure and other things.
I take a 240 mg magnesium supplement tablet every day. If I start showing symptoms, or feel that I'm getting very little in my diet, I take 400 mg per day. A magnesium deficiency can cause leg and foot cramps, and restless leg syndrome, also.
It's a good idea to take at least 4,000–5,000 IU of vitamin D daily, also, especially in Canada, where the sunlight is not nearly as effective as it is nearer to the equator. Vitamin D helps to boost the immune system, and a deficiency makes us more vulnerable to disease. People who have digestive system diseases tend to be deficient in vitamin D, and a vitamin D deficiency can lead to the development of other autoimmune diseases, also, if it's not corrected.
Again, welcome aboard, and please feel free to ask anything.
Tex
Welcome to our internet family. Wow! Your doctors have really been attacking your gastrointestinal health with all those antibiotics. Please be aware that just because your doctors weren't able to diagnose it, doesn't mean that you do not have celiac disease. The tests they use have an unacceptably-high rate of false negative results. Many GI specialists still don't know how to properly diagnose microscopic colitis, either, and even fewer know how to treat the disease.
You may be very close with your diet, but it just needs to be fine-tuned a bit. Over half of us are sensitive to soy and all legumes, for example, and soy or soy lecthin is in a majority of foods. Most of us cannot tolerate iceberg lettuce, either, until we are in remission and our intestines have healed.
Here are some more things to try — over a third of us are sensitive to eggs, some of us can't tolerate foods that are high in salicylates, and many of us have problems with foods that are high in histamine content. So you might try avoiding those foods to see if that helps.
Regarding your constant thirst, and the need to urinate frequently — as you probably know, those are symptoms of diabetes. If you're not diabetic, though, then those symptoms may indicate a magnesium deficiency. Many of us do not get enough magnesium in our diet, so we have to take a supplement. That can also affect your blood pressure and other things.
I take a 240 mg magnesium supplement tablet every day. If I start showing symptoms, or feel that I'm getting very little in my diet, I take 400 mg per day. A magnesium deficiency can cause leg and foot cramps, and restless leg syndrome, also.
It's a good idea to take at least 4,000–5,000 IU of vitamin D daily, also, especially in Canada, where the sunlight is not nearly as effective as it is nearer to the equator. Vitamin D helps to boost the immune system, and a deficiency makes us more vulnerable to disease. People who have digestive system diseases tend to be deficient in vitamin D, and a vitamin D deficiency can lead to the development of other autoimmune diseases, also, if it's not corrected.
Again, welcome aboard, and please feel free to ask anything.
Tex
It is suspected that some of the hardest material known to science can be found in the skulls of GI specialists who insist that diet has nothing to do with the treatment of microscopic colitis.
Welcome Emie. So sorry that you've had such a hard road.
Tex is our "expert", so I would take his advise to heart. We all have different intolerances and it sounds like you DO HAVE a gluten and dairy intolerance ( like most of us). The doctors don't test for food intestinal sensitivities, only for allergies ( which are different).
If you can afford it, there is one lab here in the US that you can send a stool sample to and find out your main food problems. It's called Enterolab. Check out their web site. Like Tex said, soy and eggs are also main culprits of problems. You could add other meats to your diet to give you more to eat. I do well with rice and rice products also. Raw fruits and veggies usually don't sit well until we have healed out gut.
My question to you is why haven't you had biopsies with your colonoscopy to determine if you have an Irritable bowel disease? It seems like that would be the natural course to take. You need a DIAGNOSIS!
Take Care and keep us posted
Leah
Tex is our "expert", so I would take his advise to heart. We all have different intolerances and it sounds like you DO HAVE a gluten and dairy intolerance ( like most of us). The doctors don't test for food intestinal sensitivities, only for allergies ( which are different).
If you can afford it, there is one lab here in the US that you can send a stool sample to and find out your main food problems. It's called Enterolab. Check out their web site. Like Tex said, soy and eggs are also main culprits of problems. You could add other meats to your diet to give you more to eat. I do well with rice and rice products also. Raw fruits and veggies usually don't sit well until we have healed out gut.
My question to you is why haven't you had biopsies with your colonoscopy to determine if you have an Irritable bowel disease? It seems like that would be the natural course to take. You need a DIAGNOSIS!
Take Care and keep us posted
Leah
Hi Emie,
Welcome!
Suggest swap out your raw carrots and raw peppers with cooked carrots and cooked peppers. Eliminate lettuce for awhile. Also suggest eliminate gatorade. The sugars and numerous ingredients in gatorade can be
problematic for us. On the first page of this forum that loads when you sign on there is a recipe for a homemade sports hydration mix that is safer for us. Look in the welcome area. (not in the recipe section.)
Some people have problems with eggs.
Have you tried an antihistamine yet? That may help.
PS. It looks like anti biotics are very dangerous for your gut health. Tex has a safer anti biotic that can be used if something comes up down the road.
Best wishes,
Brandy
Welcome!
Suggest swap out your raw carrots and raw peppers with cooked carrots and cooked peppers. Eliminate lettuce for awhile. Also suggest eliminate gatorade. The sugars and numerous ingredients in gatorade can be
problematic for us. On the first page of this forum that loads when you sign on there is a recipe for a homemade sports hydration mix that is safer for us. Look in the welcome area. (not in the recipe section.)
Some people have problems with eggs.
Have you tried an antihistamine yet? That may help.
PS. It looks like anti biotics are very dangerous for your gut health. Tex has a safer anti biotic that can be used if something comes up down the road.
Best wishes,
Brandy