Phase 3-4, week 5 of treatment

I tried to split this post into three sections- insights from the last week, background, and a summary of each day. If you are a friend or family member, I’d recommend sticking with the background and insights. If you’re someone who is having digestive issues, or is wondering what treatment might be like, I’d recommend reading everything.

This post is for informational purposes only and is not intended to treat or diagnose anyone. Go see a doctor for diagnosis and treatment.

Also, my brain fog is pretty intense at times. I try to make sure what I write is correct, but I may get things wrong from time to time.

Insights from the last week:

I got super behind on blogging, so I’m writing insights a few weeks later. I know I’m starting to sound like a broken record, but the less I sleep, the less I’m able to function. This week was rough because I was trying to recover from a big event and I wasn’t sleeping. By the end of the week I could do very little.

Background:

This particular bout of health issues flared in 2015. My job had become extremely stressful and travel intensive, in conjunction with some major life changes: moving in with my boyfriend, becoming a Christian, getting married 2 weeks after being proposed to, becoming a step parent, then planning a wedding reception for the following summer.

 In 2016, I was finding I could no longer work full days, and my hair was falling out. When I felt that work was finally slow enough to go to the doctor, I was diagnosed with adrenal fatigue and told to take a month off of work to rest. HA! It didn’t seem possible at that point. However, I did take 2 weeks off then go back at half time in May of 2016. Over the summer I was able to do less and less, and I finally ended up quitting my job in October 2016.

Between October 2016 and June 2018 I had the opportunity to learn how to rest and was able to work on a treatment plan for adrenal fatigue. I was feeling like I was making good progress in the first 3-4 months of 2018. Looking back now, I can see where I was sliding back a bit in April and May. In June, I experienced an extreme energy crash that left me looking for answers, since I didn’t think I had done anything significantly different than I had previously. In the beginning of July 2018, I went and saw a functional medicine doctor who ran a bunch of tests up front to figure out what other things might be wrong with me.

As mentioned in my post about the results from the last visit, my test results show that I have a yeast overgrowth, a parasite, SIBO (small intestinal bacterial overgrowth), and gut dysbiosis.
Previous test results indicated I have low stomach acid, nutritional deficiencies, and hormone imbalances with the adrenal glands, ovaries, and thyroid.

I have been on supplements for the hormone imbalances (previously diagnosed as adrenal fatigue) for a while. They started with my previous doctor. The new doctor is continuing to work on those issues, but with different supplements.

I started the fifth week of my 4 phase, 10 week treatment plan on October 1st, 2018. Phase 1 worked on the yeast, phase 2 worked on SIBO, phase 3 will work on SIBO and the parasite, and phase 4 will continue with the SIBO. The supplements for everything else will continue through the whole treatment period. This week is phase 3 & 4.

I currently take 11 different supplements throughout the day. One is a phase specific treatment pill. Three are for the hormone imbalances, 3 are for nutritional deficiencies, and 4 are for digestive support.

Day 29

If you read the post from last week, you’ll know I felt terrible last night before bed.
Despite that, I slept pretty well for 8 or 9 hours in a row, and I feel ok this morning.

I’m a bit on edge this morning. I did a stupid thing and scheduled one appointment every day for the next 5 days. With not sleeping well the last few weeks, I know I’m more prone to feeling fatigued.

On days I’m really fatigued, driving makes me super nervous because it’s hard to track everything that’s going on, especially during busy traffic times.

The more I think about it, the more this feels like anxiety. I used to have high levels of continuous anxiety that impacted how I functioned daily.  I haven’t experienced high level or continuous anxiety for about 2 years, so I apparently forgot what it feels like.

One of the things I so enjoy about blogging daily about my treatment period is that it gives me a chance to reflect on what is happening. Once I am able to realize something is happening, I can usually take steps to correct an issue.

While 4 out of the 5 appointments are health related and would be useful to attend, I need to remember that I can cancel any of the appointments this week and the world won’t explode.

I have continued to feel anxious throughout the day. It became especially prominent when I went to my step daughter’s school to explain and kick off a fundraiser for the cheer team.  I maybe didn’t explain it as well as I could, and afterwards, I realized it would have been useful to include a list where families could keep track of who they are pre-ordering for.

I felt super anxious about not having thought through these issues, and felt even more anxious about what the reaction to the fundraiser might be.

I’m setting up the fundraiser on my own time without any assistance, and I’m having to order supplies out of my own pocket. I tried to logically tell myself that if someone was mad about the way I put it together, or was confused about the documentation, they just don’t have to participate.

Normally when I work things through that way the anxiety resolves itself. But it’s not.

We are in the process of switching from iPhones to Androids and setting up a new phone account. I ordered phone accessories from Amazon ahead of getting service tomorrow because I wanted to have everything together before I went. I accidently ordered the wrong screen protectors. Both ordering incorrectly and the thought of going in tomorrow to set up service is causing me anxiety. At this point in my journey, where I have learned to extend myself grace for mistakes, and have also learned that giving into what-ifs is a recipe for a panic attack, this is definitely not normal.

 I thought I had seen in some documentation somewhere that anxiety could be a side effect of Metronidazole. When I went back to research if the two are connected, I didn’t find anxiety on any side effect lists. However, I did find several blogs and forums that talk about the two being related.

If I’m still feeling anxious for no reason tomorrow I’m going to call my doctor and ask about it.

As it gets later in the evening, I’m finding myself feeling more physically fatigued, which is a big contrast to feeling caffeinated before bed last week on the Xifaxan. I’m not sure if I’m tired enough to go to sleep, but I wonder if trying to go to bed at 8:30 pm would be useful from a rest standpoint.

I’m realizing I’m feeling anxious about going to sleep. I remember this! It goes like this:  I’ve got a bunch of stuff to do, so I should stay up and finish it all before going to bed.

However, I have learned empirically that it is better just to go to sleep and work on the list of things the next day when I’m more rested.

It’s funny how I can go back and explain to myself the solutions to these anxiety problems now.

Day 30

The melatonin and youtube adult bedtime stories discovered in week 3 are working really well to get to sleep! I fell asleep pretty quickly, and woke around 6:15 ish, which was around 8 hours.

I laid in bed for while after I woke up since I was still feeling tired. Even with laying there for a while, I was able to get up and moving earlier that when I was having trouble sleeping. I would wake up at 9 or 9:30 am, and not be mobile til late afternoon.

I’m still feeling anxious today. The more I thought about going to the phone store to set up our new accounts, the slower I got ready. I finally just decided to ask my husband if he would set up the accounts when he got back from his work trip. There are other advantages to this- the new screen protectors should be here by that point, and if he sets up the account we can use his work discounts.

I just called the doctor’s office to ask if there’s anything that I can do about the anxiety, and they suggested L-theanine. I had a supplement called theanine serene in my medicine cabinet that had L-theanine and some other things in it, but only had one pill left.  I went ahead and took the one pill, and will try and get another bottle this afternoon. The nurse I talked to said I could stop the metronidazole if the anxiety gets to be really severe, but I’m going to try and hold on. After today, I have 4 more days on the Metronidazole, so the end is in sight!

Day 31-Day 34

This week has been rough and I haven’t made it a priority to log each day. Typically after a day is done I can’t remember what happened.

I’ve still not been sleeping well. I can typically get to sleep just fine, but I tend to wake up for a few hours around 3 or 4 am. Sometimes I can fall back asleep, sometimes I can’t.

When I’m not sleeping, it makes every thing else exponentially more difficult.  While I’ve always taken my antibiotic, there was a day or two this week I didn’t take my supplements. I haven’t been eating well this week. I’ve been able to walk the dogs every day, but haven’t felt well enough to go to the gym.

Several of my health care appointments piled up this week. I went to my counselor on Tuesday, the Rossiter on Wednesday, the chiropractor on Thursday, and had a lymph drainage massage done on Friday.

I haven’t experienced anxiety the rest of the week, and I think it’s more related to my busy weekend last weekend than a side effect of the antibiotic.

Speaking of antibiotics, today (day 34) was the last day of the Metronidazole! I’ll go to herbal antibiotics tomorrow.

Day 35

Today I started the herbal pills- Olivirex and Berberine. I honestly couldn’t remember why the doctor had me on them, so I had to do some research.

The Olivirex seems to be an herbal antibiotic, and has some other benefits. As I was looking around, it seems like several people mentioned they were taking if for leaky gut and lyme disease. 

Berberine appears to do a bunch of things, but my guess is my doctor has me on it due to it’s lab tested ability to help normalize gut bacteria. It also looks like it may help with blood sugar issues. Since I have polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS), I’m wondering if Berberine will also help with my hormonal issues.

With my treatment plan, I’m to only take Olivirex once a day (with breakfast), and Berberine twice a day (with breakfast and dinner).

I took the first dose about an hour before my family and I went to church yesterday. I noticed during the middle of the service that I started to get really hot and had air hunger (feels like you can’t breath enough). I also noticed that when I rose to sing worship songs that I felt very light headed. The lightheadedness went away after about 20 seconds or so. At one point I thought about leaving the service to go outside and cool off and get some air (which is something I have never done).

I just want to point out here that just because something is natural DOES NOT mean that it is with out side effects.

About 2 hours after the morning pills, I no longer felt pronounce heat, lightheadedness, or air hunger.

I was quite tired the rest of the day, but that’s pretty normal for the last few weeks.