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.

Phase 2/3, week 4 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:

There was a lot that happened over the past week. I switched treatment pills, participated in wedding festivities, and my step daughter was at our house this week.

With the new treatment pill I thought sleeping wouldn’t be an issue, but it turns out I was wrong about that. I have been more fatigued this week than previous weeks and therefore had trouble tracking symptoms in the app I use, and there were some days I missed some of the supplements I take in liquid.

I realized that when I have expectations on how a day will go and then something changes and I can’t do things in the same order or need to delay a task that it causes me stress. Now that I realize it’s happening I can address my level of expectation.

Even though I have several issues with my digestion, the symptoms I experience most frequently and with higher severity are related to stress and hormones.

With starting the new treatment pill, there have been some new side effects: loss of appetite, weird taste in the mouth and dark colored urine. There have been some like trouble sleeping and feeling light-headed, that have stayed the same. With the lightheadedness, I only notice it on days I have experienced higher stress or didn’t sleep well.

At my doctor’s recommendation, I tried melatonin to help me sleep later in the week, and it appears to be helping.

I had a few conversations this week that made me realize that I may be isolating myself more than I realized. I also found that conversations that focus solely on my physical issues are draining, whereas conversations that include faith are energizing and uplifting. I need more faith-filled conversations!

Many people ask if I’m getting better. That’s actually not a straightforward question. I physically do not feel good because of lack of sleep and because of some of the treatment side effects. It is possible that my body is getting better even though I’m not capable of noticing at the moment.
This treatment plan is heavily focused on my digestive issues.

 As previously mentioned, my more prevalent issues have to do with stress and hormones. I have been on supplements that help support my hormone issues for several years now. The new doctor has switched the brands of hormone support supplements I’m on, but the glands that are supported are the same (adrenal, thyroid, ovaries).

While I’m hopeful that treating the digestive issues will help my body overall, I’m trying to be realistic with how I may feel at the end of the treatment plan at the beginning of November. It may very well be that I still feel fatigued.

 I’ve had hormone issues since at least 2001, and I started to see a counselor for anxiety in 2005 or 2006. I had digestive issues since at least 2009. That’s 17 years of thrashing my internal bits to some degree. I’m not sure if one 10 week treatment plan is going to ‘fix’ ALL the things that are wrong.

The way I’m thinking about it is that my digestion will hopefully improve after the treatment, and after it’s working better for a while it will help the other body systems function better. I don’t know if anyone can give an exact timeline for how that might go.

So, am I getting physically better? Probably. It at least seems like the treatment plan helps with forward motion.

I'm happy to report that emotionally and spiritually I'm doing really well. With the help of a counselor, I'm unwinding the poor mental wiring that I feel led me to make poor life decisions which in turn led to the extreme stress I experienced a few years back.

On a spiritual level, I'm learning so much. My faith is growing exponentially and I am able to share that faith with others. I have several blog posts about faith planned that I haven't had time to write yet, but you'll be able to find links to them here when I do.


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 fourth week of my 4 phase, 10 week treatment plan on September 24th, 2018. Phase 1 will work on the yeast, phase 2 will work 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 has some of phase 2 and 3.

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 22

The wheels are starting to come off the cart a bit. I woke up late. I took my treatment pill after I woke up, but didn’t eat anything until noon. I forgot my liquid supplements this morning because I typically take them with breakfast, but I didn’t actually eat breakfast.

I had a somewhat stressful conversation this morning, and decided that if I ate my feelings in the form of potato chips that would probably be fine. The things I did today felt rushed because I didn’t leave the house for errands until 3:30ish, and I needed to have dinner ready at 6:30.

I know most of my poor choices today are due to feeling tired and then feeling rushed because I’m sleeping so late. At this point, I’ll take sleep whenever I can get it.

Switching topics- this has been the third or fourth day using the squatty potty and it’s awesome.

It’s about 8:30pm and the wired/tired feeling is already present. I’m going to try and go upstairs and get in bed sooner and see if I can actually fall asleep earlier. I have just been staying up and going with the wired feeling, so I have been awake much later.

Tomorrow will be a hectic day, so going to bed earlier would be super helpful if I can manage it.

Day 23

While I did fall asleep sooner last night, it was super windy, and the wind woke me up a few times in the middle of the night.

Today has been long and I’m at the point later in the evening where I’m fatigued and can’t quite make whole thoughts.

I craved junk food today, wondering if it’s because I’m not getting enough calories?

Day 24

Today is the last day on Xifaxan! Still didn’t sleep well despite going to bed early again last night (those bedtimes stories for adults on youtubethat I mentioned in the week 3 post are really helping in getting to sleep!).

I mentioned in an earlier post that I try and chart my symptoms, foods, medicines, etc. in an app called my symptoms. I’ve been really bad at that the last few days. I’m not sure if it’s because I stopped caring, or it’s because I lack motivation from being tired.

Typically, I would feel stressed about not having kept up on tracking everything. At this moment:
 I.just.don’t.care.

I’m both excited and nervous to be switching pills tomorrow. Excited because I’m hoping to sleep better. Nervous because I’m a bridesmaid in a wedding this Saturday and I don’t know what new side effects, if any, might pop up.

The rehearsal dinner is tonight and I did ok energy wise!

Day 25

 No change in sleeping or fatigue level. I started the new treatment pill (Metronidazole) today, and it tastes pretty bad. The taste lingers after the pills taken, but it’s not over powering. I did feel a little nauseous after taking the second dose, but it’s possible that was due to car sickness.

I didn’t feel great after taking the 3^rd dose this evening, but not sure if that’s related to the pill or not. 

I’ll be interested if I sleep better tonight.

I’m hoping that if I start sleeping better that I can start going back to doing some elliptical workouts at the gym this week.

Day 26

I slept worse last night than the previous few nights. I had a weird bowel movement this morning….it looked mostly normal, but there were parts that looked grainy.

I was looking up the side effects of Metronidazole on stool when I found this:

  

Wayyyyyy down on the bottom of the page I did find that trouble sleeping IS a side effect! DANG IT!

Trouble sleeping was not mentioned in the sheet that came from the pharmacist.

I’m feeling super fatigued right now. I’m getting real tired of the whole not sleeping thing, so I called the doctor and asked if there was anything I could do to help with sleeping. She mentioned natural calm, melatonin, and CBD oil. Since I already have natural calm, I opted to try the melatonin. I would have no trouble trying CBD oil, except for that it’s rather expensive, and I’m only on these pills another week or so. I got some melatonin on the way to the vet appointment, so we’ll see how that works.

As I’m re-reading the entry for this day, I’m wondering why I didn’t ask my doctor sooner about help with sleeping. I’m going to blame it on brain fog and not thinking clearly.

Day 27

Today was a big day! My best friend got married, and I was a bridesmaid in the wedding. I left the house around 10:15 am and didn’t get back til around 9:30pm. With events like this, it seems like I get surges of adrenaline that will carry me through an event. I did notice that I would get tired when there were periods throughout the day when we were sitting and waiting on the next thing. This happened at least 3 times.
But it was oh-so-worth it! What a joyous occasion!

I slept about 8 hours last night! Not sure if it was the melatonin, or if I’m so exhausted from not sleeping the last few days that I kind of crashed. 

I didn’t have a bowel movement today, and I didn’t stick as closely to my eating plan as I should have. Since my symptoms are more hormonal in nature, I figured a little bit of cheating would do much to my digestion, especially since the foods I ate were still low FODMAP, just not paleo.

Since I’ve been failing at entering things into my symptom tracker, I don’t remember if I took any psyillum husk yesterday. I did well with bringing and taking my pills. I just didn’t bother taking the supplements, like the psyillum, that I typically add to a liquid.

I rode down to the wedding with a friend of mine who is having some similar health issues. It was so good to talk to someone who understands what it’s like to have chronic stuff! We also spent a good deal of time talking about faith, and Jesus, and staying connected. 

It’s so easy (and mentally draining) to focus on the physical, that when I get a chance to talk about and focus on the spiritual it’s like a battery recharge!

It’s making me realize I need to be connecting with people and having spiritual conversations at least once a week, if not more.

Day 28

 Today has been a little rough, as I suspected.

I was able to go to sleep at a reasonable time, but woke up several times in the middle of the night, then woke up at 6:15 ish because of low blood sugar. When I finally ate a little I was able to go back to sleep for a bit.

I was fatigued for most of the day. I was able to rest after we came home from church, but not sleep. 

A few friends from church set up a meal train for me a few weeks ago and we received two different meals today. With all the wedding festivities going on the last few days, I haven’t been making food. I now have food for a few days, so I’m super grateful for those who brought meals today!

After the evening metronidazole dose, I noticed I had a headache and felt a little light headed.

One of the Metronidazole side effects I read about was urine that was darker than normal, which I noticed last night and this morning. Today I tried to drink more water than normal in the event I got dehydrated from yesterdays events. I’m at about 2.5 liters for the day.

Speaking of side effects, one that I forgot to mention is loss of appetite. I find that it’s especially prevalent in the morning. Since I normally update the post in the evenings, I always forget to write about it.

This evening, I did notice that I wasn’t really hungry for dinner. However, once I started eating it, I wanted more as soon as I was finished.

After dinner my headache was growing worse and I felt overtired. I went to lay down around 9:15 or so. I laid there for a while and continued to feel worse.  The headache became the worst I can remember, and I started to feel nauseous. After 15 to 20 minutes I ran to the bathroom, because it became a situation where there was going to be something that came out of some orifice.
Surprisingly, I had a normal bowel movement, but while it was occurring I had chills and felt like I might pass or throw up.

When I went back to bed the headache had lessened, but I still felt shaky and had chills. Despite all of that, I actually slept pretty well!

Phase 2, week 3 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 have not slept well this week, so my adrenal fatigue symptoms are getting worse again. I looked into Xifaxan side effects, and trouble sleeping appears to be one of them. For lack of a better term, I feel caffeinated, especially in the evenings. Another Xifaxan side effect I had was feeling off-balance/lightheaded. That symptom faded over time, but did show up again one day this week when I was feeling particularly fatigued.

On days I’m feeling fatigued, it’s really nice to just have meals that are ready to eat. I’ve decided that if there is a day I feel decent it would be beneficial to cook something in bulk.

I bought the Monash University FODMAP app this week, and I wish I would have just spent the $8 sooner. I didn’t realize that food serving sizes are necessary in determining if something is high FODMAP or not. A serving of a particular veggie might be fine at 1/3 c, but at ½ c becomes high FODMAP. I was really frustrated with not knowing about that.

I also got a squatty potty this week on sale. I forgot to update about it on the daily posts, but I have found that it really helps have more comfortable and faster bowel movements (especially for someone that tends towards constipation).

In the continuing battle to get to sleep/sleep better/sleep more, I discovered bed time stories for adults on you tube. This has been a great find for me, and I do think it helps me fall asleep faster than I would on my own.

From day 21:

 In listening to the bedtime stories, I learned something about focus that relates to my life in general. As I listen, my mind sometimes wanders and fixates on something- a conversation from earlier in the day, what needs to be done tomorrow, conversations I need to have, etc.
When I realize that my mind has drifted, it is possible for me to choose to continue with where my mind wants to go, or to return my focus to the story. Sometimes I choose to refocus on the story, and I can stay there. Most of the time I choose to focus on the story, and my mind drifts back to what I was thinking about again and again and again. Each time I realize the drift has happened, I can choose to refocus on the story.

I have a whole set of blog posts planned about the faith aspect of this journey that I haven’t finished yet. They are separate posts because that’s how I’ve operated the last few months- I focus on the physical, then I focus on the spiritual. Sometimes I spend more time focusing on the physical than I would like. I do need to be aware of the symptoms I am experiencing, but obsessing about them isn’t helpful. Being aware of the food I’m eating is necessary, but beating myself up for making a food mistake isn’t helpful.
Jesus once told his disciples: "My food," said Jesus, "is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. John 4:34 NIV
Truly, it is spiritual sustenance that is keeping me going at this time.
Today I even moved on from ‘just keeping going’ to the type of sincere gratitude that makes you emotional all day. God has been SO GOOD to us, I can see and feel how in all things He has been/is working for the good of those who love Him, and have been called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28).

  

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 third week of my 4 phase, 10 week treatment plan on September 17th, 2018. Phase 1 will work on the yeast, phase 2 will work 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 was all phase 2.

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 15

At this point, I’m sure one of the Xifaxan side effects I have is trouble sleeping. It is starting to kick my butt. It’s about 9:30 pm right now and I feel a bit like a zombie- fatigued, but not very sleepy.

I think the off balance/light headedness is either starting to fade, or I’m getting used to it.

I’m not as hungry as when I first started taking Xifaxan, so that side effect has also faded.

I’m still irritable most days, but I don’t know if that’s a direct side effect, or if it’s more related to not sleeping.

While I slept 8 hours last night, I’ve been getting 5-6 hours for the last several days before that, and I’m not caught up at all.

It took me a long time to get motivated to get going today. I needed to run a few quick errands then make a few batches of soup for this week. I also needed to make dinner for some friends we had over. Even though I was feeling fatigued, once I got going I was able to keep going.

We don’t have my step daughter this week, and my husband is going out of town for a few days, so I’ll have 2 whole days where I will have the house all to myself. I really like days home alone when I’m not sleeping well, because it’s much more quiet and there’s less going on. The less sleep I get, the more irritable I get. The more irritable I get, the less I can handle extra activity and noise.

 I also don’t have to cook for other people. While I do like cooking, I also like leftovers. Like, I can eat left overs almost indefinitely. My family, on the other hand, can only eat the same meal 2-3 times before they refuse to eat any more of it. Between the soup and the dinner I made today, I probably wont have to cook until next week.

Day 16

I finally slept a little longer last night, something between 8 and 9 hours.  Still not caught up on sleep, and feeling pretty fatigued today. I’m so glad I don’t have to worry about cooking the rest of the week. If the trend of not getting enough sleep continues, I’ll very likely be non-functional by the end of the week.

I’m still having daily bowel movements, though the last few were a Bristol scale 2-3, so towards the constipated side. I’m still glad things are moving and not just hanging out in my intestines.

I was going to try and go to a yoga class today at noon, but seeing as I now have 4 minutes to get there, that’s not going to happen.

I rested most of the day and felt a little better in the evening.

For several weeks now, I’ve been trying to make sure I take my treatment pills with my meals. The current treatment pill itself doesn’t need to be taken with food, but I know if I take all my supplements on an empty stomach I’ll feel nauseous. 

It made for some strange meal times if I happened to wake up late. I finally gave up trying to take the treatment pills at meal times. I’m shooting for taking them at 9am, 2pm, and 7pm. I set phone alarms to remind me.

I had some really strong food cravings this evening and I’m blaming it on PMS. I may or may not have had a few tortilla chips and a few cookies. It was all low FODMAP, but not paleo. I very nearly walked to the store and bought some potato chips, because crispy and salty sounds AMAZING. Thus far I have resisted, but not sure how long I can hold out.

I was super tired in the evening, but when I laid down to go to sleep my mind was running rampant due to a phone call I received. Sometimes when my mind won’t shut off, I imagine myself getting dressed, walking to the store, buying something, then coming back home. Normally this is so mundane I end up falling asleep partway through. But not tonight. I would make it from my room to my closet before my mind would wander off again. I started the exercise 5-6 times before I finally gave up.  After laying there a few hours, I happened to think of a girl I used to work with who told me she would listen to podcasts to help her fall asleep. I didn’t feel like searching for a podcast, so I looked on you tube for some sort of sleep aid. I found I few hour long videos that were stories for falling asleep. Here’s the one I listened to.

The narrators voice was enough to keep my mind loosely engaged on the story, and to keep it from running amok. I’m not sure how long I listened, but it feels like I got about halfway through.

Day 17

I slept a little longer last night, but didn’t feel rested upon waking. I ended up finding out later in the evening yesterday that I needed to run several errands today, and ended up having two visitors. 

The last few weeks more than 2 things per day tends to max out my capacity, so this felt like a test.

I had a friend drop by quickly in the morning to drop off some things. I then needed to box and print postage for 2 of my husband’s amazon orders. I don’t do this very often, so it takes 4 times longer than it needs to. I then needed to ship out the orders and go to the subway nearby to grab sandwich for my daughter since I was picking her up from school to have lunch together. After subway, I stopped by Macy’s to pick up my daughter’s homecoming dress, then went to her school to pick her up. She wasn’t feeling well, so she ended up coming home with me for a few hours to rest before I needed to take her back to school for cheer practice. When I got home I walked and fed the dogs right away because a storm was blowing in. About an hour after that, another friend came over for the evening.

While it is good to know I could manage everything, it definitely maxed my capacity. I don’t think it would have been possible earlier in the week when I was only sleeping ~6 hours per night.

My cycle started yesterday, and it was close to the predicted start date in my period tracker app. This is always good news for me; I used to have 40-60 day cycles. Now my cycles are more regular and occur approximately every 31 days. I hope this means that my hormones are in a better place than they were a few years back.

Since listening to a sleep story last night worked pretty well, I looked for another one and found a video that was based on Psalm 23.

I was physically uncomfortable last night, so it feels like I listened longer tonight than the night before. I do feel like these videos are helpful, so I will try to continue with them.

Day 18

I slept about 8 hours again last night, but am still waking up tired.  As I mentioned previously, the off balance feeling is gone, so the most noticeable symptom of the Xifaxan at this point is trouble sleeping.

My bowel movements are still happening daily, and are typically a 2 on the Bristol scale. There were a few days I haven’t had as much water, so I’m wondering if that might be the cause for the scale score.

I tried to be smarter with outstanding chores today. I had a few phone calls I needed to make, so while I made them I worked on a large pile of dishes from a few days ago, and watered all the indoor plants. Talking on the phone seemed to help overcome my chore inertia.

My husband had been gone on a business trip the last few days, but came home around lunch. I had a few other errands that had piled up over the week, so we went and ran a few hours of errands this afternoon. We headed back home around 5pm, and I was feeling pretty fatigued at that point.

It’s about 8pm now, and feel mentally and physically exhausted, but not sleepy tired.

I will be so glad when I’m off these pills and get rid of the caffeinated feeling! I’ve got about one more week to go before I switch to the metronidazole. I'm hoping It won't make me feel caffeinated!

One thing I realized yesterday is that if there are any days that I feel half way decent, I should be cooking something in bulk. I did make a small batch of muffins yesterday just to try them. I liked them, so the next time I feel ok I’ll make a double batch and freeze them.

Speaking of freezing things, I could have made more soup either yesterday or today, but I have no more of my preferred storage containers-  Ball wide mouth quart size jars.  I was able to get a dozen more jars today, so the next time I feel good I’ll be able to make another batch of soup.

Given the up and down nature of my energy levels, I still think one of the best things I can do for myself is to continue to cook in bulk when I can so I have the right kind of food to eat when I’m feeling tired.

Day 19

The fatigue is getting worse. It’s especially bad in the morning, but I start to feel more normal after 5 pm. I’m still trying to use the adult bedtime stories to fall asleep. They help to a degree, but I don’t know how much I can fight the side effect with other things.

I felt off balanced/lightheaded again this morning. I thought that side effect had faded. I was more tired this morning than previous days, so maybe that’s why I felt that way again.

I made two purchases today which may be helpful.
1. I got a squatty potty on clearance from Bed, Bath, and Beyond and was able to use a coupon, so ended up getting it for about $15. I’m excited to try it.

2. I finally paid for the Monash University FODMAP app (https://www.monashfodmap.com/i-have-ibs/get-the-app/). I’ve been increasingly frustrated with doing a google search for every food I might want to eat and decided the $8 was worth it. I haven’t had much time to look into it, but I anticipate it being helpful.

Day 20

I woke up several times last night. I was tired this morning and felt highly fatigued in the afternoon. Started to feel more normal after about 7:30 pm.

I had a chance to look more at the Monash food app today. I’m really frustrated that I didn’t buy it sooner. There have been various recipes I’ve looked at that ID a certain food or recipe as high or low FODMAP, but the designation really isn’t that straightforward. Most foods listed in the app have a volume at which the food contains moderate to high FODMAPs. The app also identifies which type of FODMAP/s that a particular food has. 

A few weeks back I found a recipe for zuchinni soup that was supposed to be low FODMAP. Well, it turns out Zuchinni is ok in a 1/3 c serving, but has moderate FODMAP content at ½ c. I have been eating large amounts of this soup multiple times a day. Since the soup is blended, I have no way to know how much Zuchinni I’ve been eating per serving. Unfortunately, Zuchinni is high in the one fodmap I have the most issues with: oligos-fructans.

I really wish I would have known about the app, bought it, and gotten used to low FODMAP eating BEFOREEEE I started the treatment plan. Thinking back on what I’ve been eating, I really haven’t been doing a great job at eating low FODMAP the last few weeks.

Who knows how much this will affect my treatment plan. As far as I can tell, treating SIBO is still an evolving sciencec. There are a few different diet recommendations that people with SIBO can follow, and low FODMAP is just one of them. I had previously read that some people try and eat FODMAPs while on antibiotics to activate the bacteria so that they are active enough to be killed off. Honestly, there probably is no one-size-fits all treatment or diet. Every body is different.

 I tried a stir fry recipe tonight trying to follow vegetable amounts from the app, and something in it caused symptoms. Maybe because I ate too much at once? I didn’t measure my serving size, but I was pretty sure it was all within limits. The only thing not in the app that I added were sweet potato glass noodles. Sweet potatoes are ok in smaller amounts, but the noodles were processed so they may have been different. I’m feeling discouraged.

Day 21

I woke up around 2 am with stomach cramps, which is the first time that’s ever happened. I’m assuming that was caused by something I ate for dinner yesterday. Eventually went back to sleep and woke up again around 9 am. Even though I feel like I slept enough overall, waking up is hard and mornings are slow.

This morning I needed to move a little faster to make it to our 10 am church service. Sometimes having a little motivation is helpful!

I felt pretty fatigued in the afternoon for a few hours, but was able to get some chores done later in the evening.

I’m still feeling wired/tired around bed time, and am trying to use some sort of adult bedtime story to help my mind calm down enough to sleep.

In listening to the bedtime stories, I learned something about focus that relates to my life in general. As I listen, my mind sometimes wanders and fixates on something- a conversation from earlier in the day, what needs to be done tomorrow, conversations I need to have, etc.

When I realize that my mind has drifted, it is possible for me to choose to continue with where my mind wants to go, or to return my focus to the story. Sometimes I choose to refocus on the story, and I can stay there. Most of the time I choose to focus on the story, and my mind drifts back to what I was thinking about again and again and again. Each time I realize the drift has happened, I can choose to refocus on the story.

I have a whole set of blog posts planned about the faith aspect of this journey that I haven’t finished yet. They are separate posts because that’s how I’ve operated the last few months- I focus on the physical, then I focus on the spiritual. Sometimes I spend more time focusing on the physical than I would like. I do need to be aware of the symptoms I am experiencing, but obsessing about them isn’t helpful. Being aware of the food I’m eating is necessary, but beating myself up for making a food mistake isn’t helpful.

Jesus once told his disciples: "My food," said Jesus, "is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. John 4:34 NIV

Truly, it is spiritual sustenance that is keeping me going at this time.

Today I even moved on from ‘just keeping going’ to the type of sincere gratitude that makes you emotional all day. God has been SO GOOD to us, and I can see and feel how in all things He has been/is working for the good of those who love Him, and have been called according to His purpose (Romans 8:28).

Phase 1 to 2, week 2 of treatment: yeast overgrowth to SIBO treatment

I tried to split this post into three sections-background, insights from the last week, 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.

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 second week of my 4 phase, 10 week treatment plan on September 10th, 2018. Phase 1 will work on the yeast, phase 2 will work 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 had a little of phase 1 and 2.

I currently take 11 different supplements throughout the day. Only 1 pill is for the SIBO. Three are for the hormone imbalances, 3 are for nutritional deficiencies, and 4 are for digestive support.

Insights from last week:

I switched treatment phases in the middle of this week. I went from the antifungal nystatin to the antibiotic Xifaxin. I was very pleased to see my bowel movements get back to normal by the time I started the antibiotic. The antibiotic is causing a few minor side effects: trouble sleeping, feeling off balance/lightheaded, and moodiness.

Although trying to blog about what’s going on everyday can sometimes feel like just one more thing to do, there are a few benefits. The first is that the blog acts like a virtual accountability partner. If I write something here and know that at some point someone will read it, it helps me to succeed in doing what I wrote. I’m also finding writing things down helps me to be more strategic about my day. It also helps with tracking how I’m feeling overall so I can get a big picture view of how things are going. With my memory not working well, I don’t always remember how I am feeling week to week.

I’m also processing parts of the treatment in a different way than I might normally. For example, from day 5: The more this week goes on, the more I view the treatment process as a person trying to hold 10 very large non-helium balloons at once. Each balloon has a label- food, sleep, digestion, supplements, kid herding, chores, exercise, spiritual pursuits, social time, etc. I can only hold so many balloons at once before one pops out of my arms, or I bend over to pick one up and I drop 3 more. It’s now painfully obvious I can’t hold 10 balloons at once.

I’m not sure how to deal with the balloons. Perhaps hold different balloons on different days? But some, like the treatment medicines and supplements, HAVE to be 3 times a day, everyday. Maybe one arm can hold the every day balloons, and the other can hold a few alternating balloons? Just trying to wrap my head around it at this point is causing me anxiety.

I did some large batch cooking this week and found that having food ready to eat throughout the week was amazing. There were several days I didn’t feel like cooking last week, and it was super helpful to have food that was premade and nutritious. I will try to continue to make big batches of food 1-2 days a week so it’s one less thing to think about.

Day 8

I only slept about 5 hours last night, but am actually feeling decent this morning.

The last few days I’ve really been focusing on getting my digestive system more normal. I feel like it’s finally started to work, because I had a more normal bowel movement this morning!!! Who knew pooping could be so exciting?! Too much info too soon for a Monday?

At the end of week 1, I started ‘eating’ mostly liquids to help give my digestion a bit of a break. This has mostly consisted of pureed soup and a beef sourced protein powder called PurePaleo Protein by designs for health (sounds gross, but not bad in almond milk!) I also increased my fluid intake to 2-3 liters of water a day, and added psyllium husks for fiber.

I had a protein powder/psyillum husk drink and green soup again for breakfast, and still feeling pretty good. I got desperate over the weekend, y’all. The thought of killing things off with the treatment and then having them just hang out in my intestines wasn’t something I could handle, apparently! I did call my doctors office to ask about my liquid ‘eating’. The nurse who answered said it was fine for a few days to get things back on track. She also said everyone kind of struggles at first and that if it helps me to feel better then it’s fine! Given that information, I’m going to try and make 1 or 2 pureed soups with different veggies for some variety. If I can manage to make 2 soups today, it should last me most of the week.

I don’t even really have to cook much for my family this week because we have a ton of left overs for breakfast, lunches, and dinners. WINNING!

I have been on the computer all morning finishing up the post for phase 1/week 1 of my treatment plan, and starting the post for the 2^nd week, so at this point (about noon) I need to stop and figure out what the rest of my day is going to look like. I have a tendency to prioritize poorly sometimes. For example, I’ll make it a really big deal that laundry needs to be done but neglect the actual important thing for the day, like making soup.

I did good on prioritizing, although sometimes unexpected things come up. Take the broth I needed for the soups. I took the jars out of the freezer and this is what I saw:

I was super tired the night I put the broth in jars, and I forgot them on the counter and then went upstairs to take a bath. My husband happened by a while later, and I asked him to put them in the fridge for me. Normally I leave the lids on really loose until the broth cools and before I put them in the freezer. I think he tightened them a bit more than I usually do, because the jars were not overfilled.

So I did what anyone who spent hours making bone broth would do….I put the jars upside down in a glass bowl and microwaved them to get my broth!

After a few minutes in the microwave, all the glass pieces fell off, and the frozen broth chunks were left. I extracted the broth chunks with some tongs, dumped the glass into the trash and rinsed the bowl, then returned the broth chucks to the bowl to microwave them some more.

I realized that the broth needed to be totally liquid so I could strain it through a sieve and coffee filter to make sure all the glass pieces were out. Fun fact: broth does not go through a coffee filter that well. I think the fat clogs up the filter. So I had to use several filters. I’m not even making this up.

So the ‘simple’ task of thawing broth to make soup later in the day took about 30 times longer than I anticipated.

Because the broth thawing took longer than planned, I made a poor food choice for lunch. Since I was out of green soup, I had some left over gluten free waffles I found in the fridge. So much for going all liquid.

After lunch, I went out to run a bunch of errands, including getting ingredients for the soups I would be making:

Here are the recipes I tried today:

Garlic infused olive oil: https://www.fodmapeveryday.com/recipes/garlic-infused-oil/

Low FODMAP Silky Zucchini Soup: https://www.gatheredtable.com/recipes/965123

Carrot Ginger Soup: https://www.foodfanatic.com/recipes/carrot-ginger-soup-recipe/#print

The zuchinni soup called for the garlic infused olive oil, which I was excited to try since I haven’t been able to have garlic recently. Apparently, the fructans in onions and garlic are water soluble, but not oil soluble, which is why the garlic infused olive oil is considered low FODMAP. It wasn’t as strongly flavored I had hoped, but I still used it in the soup recipe.

The zucchini soup I liked, and it was written to be low FODMAP. This is going to sound weird, but it kind of tasted like a breadstick dipped in a pesto/spaghetti tasting sauce. I think the macadamia nuts in the recipe are what give it the unique flavor. This soup made a big batch, which is awesome! I’m going to leave one big jar out for this week, and freeze the smaller ones so that I have some available for days I don’t feel like cooking.

The carrot soup was a normal recipe, so I had to modify a few things to get it to be low FODMAP. The result was ok. I think it would be amazing with the garlic and onions in the recipe for those who can eat them. I added some paprika, chipotle chili powder, some additional cayenne, and about ¾ tsp salt and that seemed to help. This soup made about 5 cups less than the other soup, so I still have lots of leftovers

.

I’m glad I made two soups today. That will help me feel like I have choices for my liquid ‘eating’ the rest of the week. I also made a few cups of brown rice to go with the soups for an easy grain for the rest of the week.

As you may have already surmised, my energy levels have been surprisingly good for how little I slept last night. While I was able to keep myself motivated to keep going with my to-do list, I did find I was super irritable today.

One other thing to note about today- cortisol manager had been recommended to me by my new doc, but they were out of stock when they recommended it. The supplement came in today, so it’s the first night that I’ve taken it. It should help with the hormone imbalances. I had some adrenal building herbs given to me by my previous doc, and I had been taking those while I waited.

Tomorrow I’ll have a lot fewer errands to run, and I’m hoping to get to the gym to work out a bit and sit in the sauna. I’m also hoping to do some laundry and do some general cleaning around the house (which I have been terrible at since the energy crash in June).

Overall, I can say I did feel noticeably better today, with obvious GI distress or pill side effects. YAY!

Day 9

I didn’t sleep well again last night, and I’m feeling kind of lethargic. I also noticed when I woke up that my sinuses were super dry. I’ve been purposely pounding water, so I don’t think I’m dehydrated. It might be time to start up the humidifier!

 I think not sleeping well the last few nights might be due to lack of exercise. I think I only made it to the gym once last week. Most of the time I go I only do 30 minutes on an elliptical, but it seems to help with sleep quite a bit.

I had the carrot soup for breakfast this morning, and was brave with the psyllium husk and went from a half to a whole teaspoon.

I ran several errands before heading to the gym for an hour long gentle yoga class. I was gone for about 4 hours, then came home and started some laundry.  I also had to pick up my step daughter and her friends from school later in the afternoon, fix them a snack, make them dinner, and then take them to a tumbling class. I realized a little too late that the location of the tumbling class had been moved from last year, and instead of being 5 minutes from our house it was 15 minutes away. I hate running late to things like that; it tends to trigger my anxiety. Between all the errands, house chores, and kid herding I was feeling really anxious for about an hour. When I got home I went and walked the dogs to help calm myself a little.

This is the first Tuesday we’ve had my step daughter where she had tumbling classes instead of regular cheer practice.  In future weeks, I will make sure not to plan much for Tuesdays and focus on crockpot meals!

Even though I did quite a bit today I didn’t feel great while doing it. I’m still thinking it’s due to lack of sleep.

I ‘ate’ mostly soups today, with a muffin, some grapes, and a protein bar being the only ‘solid’ things I ate. Surprisingly, I’m not that hungry if I eat enough soup. I’ve been trying to put extra garlic infused olive oil in the soup after I heat it up to help with satiety.

I did have a bowel movement today, but it was a 1 on the Bristol scale, which indicates constipation.  I guess I should just be happy I had movement 2 days in a row!

I’m drinking my magnesium supplement as I’m writing (9:45 pm) and starting to get tired. Since I ran around frequently today and got some exercise I’m hopeful that I will sleep better tonight!

Day 10

I didn’t sleep well again last night. Part of that was I had a hard time falling asleep due to the anxiety I experienced from yesterday evening, and some of it was waking up early and not being able to go back to sleep.

I was able to do some laundry and cleaning this morning, but after lunch I could barely keep my eyes open. I tried to take a nap, but not sure I actually slept much. I mostly just laid down and rested for a few hours.

I pushed myself to go to the gym later in the afternoon to see if that would help with sleep.

On my way to the gym I think I experienced a prolonged hot flash. I only experienced hot flashes with the antifungal the first day or so, and then sporadically when I didn’t eat enough.

My bowels were moving again today, which makes it 3 days in a row! Still a Bristol scale 1, but at least things are moving.

I was hoping to have normal bowel movements by the time I started the antibiotic for SIBO tomorrow. While I have been more regular the last few days, I wouldn’t say things are back to normal.

Speaking of tomorrow, I’m a little nervous starting the new medication. The pharmacist had mentioned that many people experience lightheadedness the first day or two they start taking Xifaxin. I intentionally did not plan anything for tomorrow in the event I experienced any side effects. With other prescription drugs I’ve taken, I don’t often experience side effects.

I think I’m going to try an Epsom salt bath tonight and see if it helps with sleep at all.

Day 11

I slept a little better last night, but still not long enough. I had the wired/tired feeling when trying to go to bed, which is related to the adrenal fatigue. I woke up early again for no particular reason.

I was super irritable this morning, and generally pretty sluggish. I did have a normal bowel movement, though! So that was exciting.

At this point in the day I’ve taken 2 Xifaxin doses. I noticed a little bit of lightheadedness at lunch, but it wasn’t pronounced.

I do feel pretty ‘spacey’ today…I’m having a difficult time tracking with one thing, and am getting easily distracted.

The last two days I’ve been in my Pjs until late afternoon. The last few months I had been doing a good job of getting dressed right after breakfast and feeling prepared for the day. The last two days I just haven’t felt like it. Taking a shower and getting dressed just seems like more energy than it’s worth. Sometimes it’s those types of details that let me know how tired I actually am.

I’m also noticing a higher level of resistance to starting tasks. For example, I need to go check the mail and drop off a package at the post office. Most days, that’s an easy task. Today, getting the gumption to put on normal clothes and leave the house just isn’t happening.

My guess is that the tiredness and lack of motivation is related to not sleeping the last few days.

Later in the afternoon, and a few hours after taking my dinner dose of Xifaxin I did start to notice that I felt off balance, which could be related to the light headed symptom I was warned about. I also noticed I was significantly more hungry than normal. I wonder if it’s related to the gut bacteria dying off…maybe they’re sending signals for food because they’re dying off?

The wired/tired feeling was present again before bed. It was likely exacerbated by being out of the house too late. I haven’t seen my husband much this week, so I rode with him to go pick up our daughter from cheering at a volleyball game, which would have been a short trip. Except for the last game had just started, so we stayed to watch since we were already there. Then we ended up taking another one of the cheer girls home after the game was over. What would have been a 40 minute excursion turned into a 2.5 hour excursion and not getting home until 10:30pm. Next time I’ll just stay home.

Day 12

Between staying out late yesterday, not falling asleep til midnight, and being woken up at 6:15 this morning, I didn’t sleep well or long enough. Oddly enough, I don’t feel as tired as I did yesterday.

The more this week goes on, the more I view the treatment process as a person trying to hold 10 very large non-helium balloons at once. Each balloon has a label- food, sleep, digestion, supplements, kid herding, chores, exercise, spiritual pursuits, social time, etc. I can only hold so many balloons at once before one pops out of my arms, or I bend over to pick one up and I drop 3 more. It’s now painfully obvious I can’t hold 10 balloons at once.

I’m not sure how to deal with the balloons. Perhaps hold different balloons on different days? But some, like the treatment medicines and supplements, HAVE to be 3 times a day, everyday. Maybe one arm can hold the every day balloons, and the other can hold a few alternating balloons? Just trying to wrap my head around it at this point is causing me anxiety.

So, I’ll move to other topics.

Soup update: Yes, I ‘ate’ liquids most of the rest of the week. I did have a burger patty and a brat last night for dinner and felt fine, so there have been some solid foods here and there.

 Remember on day 1 of this week where I was saying I had so much left over soup that I was going to freeze some? Well, that didn’t happen. When you eat soup for 3 meals a day on most days, those jars get used up really fast. I think I’m down to one serving of carrot soup and 2-3 servings of zuchinni soup. I loved having a quick, nutrient dense meal ready when I needed it. I will try and continue making a large batch of soup a week just for when I don’t feel like cooking.

Digestion Update: I had a normal bowel movement AGAIN this morning! That’s a few days in a row now. I can’t tell you how excited I am that my digestion is back to normal now that I’m in the antibiotic phase!

 I do think the soup helped with this, as well as adding the psyllium husks to my routine. I’m going to try and go back to eating mostly solid foods and see what happens.

I’ve mentioned feeling wired/tired before bed the past few evenings. Tonight was a little different. For lack of a better word, I felt caffeinated. After about 9pm I was feeling pretty restless and decided to go shopping at Ross since they close at 11pm. I figured I had been going to bed later than that the past few nights and figured it wouldn’t be a big deal. It took me a long time to start to feel tired- probably around 1 am.

Day 13

I probably slept 6-7 hours last night. Not enough, but I didn’t feel terrible when I woke up.

My digestive tract continues to move normally.

Today my husband helped a girl from out church move. I didn’t ‘move’ so much as fetch forgotten items and tried to make sure people were staying hydrated. I carried a few things here and there, but nothing heavy.

I discovered when I arrived at the apartment that if I moved quickly I was really off balance, and that I was pretty irritable. I also discovered stairs don’t help with feeling off balance.

I was probably out of the house 4-5 hours. When I got back I had some lunch and then could barely keep my eyes open. I slept for about 2.5 hours in the afternoon, and woke up in time for dinner.

It’s about 8pm currently, and I’m still feeling tired and off balance. I’m wondering if I’ll be able to go to bed at a normal time tonight, or if I’ll start feeling caffeinated again in few hours.

I wondered if the caffeinated feeling was related to the Xifaxin, so I spent some time trying to see what other people’s experiences with Xifaxin were and stumbled across this forum thread.

It looks like other people have experienced increased hunger and moodiness, but I haven’t yet found where other people feel caffeinated. I did, however, find that trouble sleeping is a common side effect of Xifaxin. I’m going to assume that my feeling caffeinated is related to the trouble sleeping side effect.

After thinking about the forum thread I read where people experienced increased hunger, I recalled that when I quit gluten in the summer of 2016 that I was RAVENOUS for about a week. It didn’t matter how much I ate, I was starving 10 minutes later.

In relation to FODMAPs, I know I have big reactions with onions and garlic, both of which belong to the fructan category. Wheat also falls into the fructan category, and I wonder if the hunger I had when I stopped eating it was related to SIBO bacteria versus an allergy or sensitivity.

Day 14

I didn’t sleep well again. We went to church this morning and I noticed I couldn’t quite catch my breath. This is a new symptom, and not sure what it's related to.

I spent much of the afternoon lying in bed and binge watching a show on Amazon. I was too wired to sleep, but too tired to do anything upright.

I managed to drag myself to the store in the early evening to get a few things for dinner this week.

I noticed after dinner that I was craving carbs. My cycle should be starting in a few days so I’m going to assume that’s PMS related.

I took an epsom salt and lavender essential oil bath hoping it would help make me tired. It did help me to relax, but I didn’t fall asleep until midnight.

As am editing this blog post I'm noticing how I write less on the days I'm tired. I'm going to assume that the post for week 3 is going to be relatively short...lol.

Treatment Preparation

To start off- I’m not a doctor, nor do I pretend to be one on TV. I’m sharing my results and what treatments were recommended to me by my doctor in the hopes it’s useful to hear about someone else’s experience.  None of this information is intended to diagnose or treat anyone.

 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.

I talked about my treatment plan at the end of my 3rd functional doctor visit: Results and a treatment plan for GI issues post.

To recap quickly, it’s a 10 week plan with 4 different phases, and each phase is targeting a part of my diagnosis.

When I look at the plan objectively, it does not seem difficult. I have to take a bunch of pills at different times of day. During certain phases I have to eat certain foods and other weeks I’m to follow a paleo-ish diet.

Practically, however, this is overwhelming to me.

Why?

First, my brain doesn’t work like it used to, because one of my symptoms is brain fog. The best analogy I can come up with is this: my brain used to work like a new computer- it was fast and could handle lots of windows and programs open at once. Currently, my brain works like my 8 year old desktop- it’s got lots of programs and junk on it so it’s bogged down and slow. If too many things are open or happening at once, I cease being able to take input and I will have to go lay down. If I focus on one thing at a time, I seem to do ok. If there are 2 or more things happening at once, I don’t process well.

Second, I have fatigue that is unpredictable. I have a certain level of fatigue all the time. The all-the-time fatigue limits me to 1 big thing a day (going out for lunch, going to the gym, going to church), or 2-3 small things a day (appointment, chores, making meals, picking up the kid from school, etc.).  Some days it’s much worse, and I can get up and have breakfast, nap for a few hours, get up and sit upright for a few hours, sort of eat something for dinner, sit around some more, then go to bed. Those days, I have no motivation, and nothing gets done. Before the big energy crash in June, I knew what things would make me tired for a few days. At this point, I don’t always know what triggers the higher fatigue days.

So, on a practical level the brain fog makes it hard to complete sequential steps because any other thing that comes up becomes a tangent. Example: I’m awake! I’ll go downstairs and eat breakfast and take my pills. Oh, the dog wants out. Oh look, there’s tomatoes that are ready to be picked. Maybe I’ll go out to the garden and see what else needs to be picked. Wow, there’s a lot of weeds in the yard…it’s nice and cool out now, maybe I’ll just pick a few. Wait, wasn’t I going to have breakfast? This happens all day long with different things.

On bad fatigue day, things that I would normally do, like cooking breakfast, become really hard. Like prepping to climb a mountain hard. It seems like so much work I just don’t do it. On those days, I tend to eat poorly and don’t eat enough. I also tend to be apathetic, which isn’t great when you’re trying to relate to people.

Knowing that brain fog and fatigue are going to be my biggest hurdles during treatment, I’m trying to take them into consideration while I’m preparing to start treatment. I'm allowing myself almost a week to prepare so that I can give myself enough time to process through everything, and because I want to start treatment on a Monday.

Preparations:

1.       A new pill organizer

My treatment plan as given to me by my doctor consists of a giant list of pills with how many and what time of day to take them. This includes every thing over the entire course of treatment, so it’s a little overwhelming since I’m taking certain pills during certain weeks. I already get confused looking at it during the day, so I decided I needed a bigger pill organizer! As you can see, my old pill organizer (the blue one) only had pills for am and pm, and the new one has compartments for four times a day. I’m hopeful that just having all the pills ready to go and not having to think about them will work out for me.

2.       Checklists and trackers!

Not only is checking stuff off a list immensely satisfying, but I can make my checklists in Excel, and I LOOOVEEE me some excel spreadsheets! In fact, I decided that a nicely crafted Excel spreadsheet is one of my love languages…lol

I currently have 3 spreadsheets started:

-A 10-week pill tracker that has all the right pills at the right times of day, and has the right pills for the right phases. Being consistent with taking pills is not something I have ever been good at. I’m hoping if I can check off each pill as it’s taken, that I will remember to take them.

-A general daily schedule to help keep me on track. As I mentioned, I tend to get off task really easy. I’m hoping to use the general schedule to help me fill in my day planner appropriately.  I’m hoping if I have a plan already written out it will help me stay on track.

3     Not planning/starting many new things; rescheduling things that are close to a meal

I have found it’s hard for me to have events scheduled close to meal times, especially breakfast. Since I never know how sleep will go, I may or may not wake up with enough time to make breakfast AND take all my pills. Anything over the next 10 weeks that is scheduled before about 1pm will need to be rescheduled for the afternoon. For 10 weeks, my whole life will revolve around eating and taking pills.
I had a handful of things that I’ve scheduled for the next 10 weeks. I’m going to try and do them if I can. However, I’m not going to try and plan or start a bunch of new things. For example, a friend told me about a weekly community Bible study on Thursdays from 9:15 to 11:15am. I really wanted to do it, but with it starting early and being close to both breakfast and lunch, I realized it just wasn’t something that was going to work in this season. I realize being social is still important during a time like this, so I will still make plans to see friends on occasion, but only at times that work for me. I’ll probably rely on phone calls more to keep in touch with people because it’s easier to do spontaneously.

4    Symptom correlation

I did this today! About a month ago, I downloaded a symptom tracker called ‘my symptoms'. 

It tracks dang near everything- meals, drinks, sleep, exercise, bowel movements, supplements, more I can’t remember, and there’s even an ‘other’ category where you can add random stuff that doesn’t really fit into another category. Since my only noticeable GI symptom of SIBO is constipation, I went through a csv file I was able to export from the app and see what foods may have caused constipation. For me, I have a lag time of about 2 days between the food and symptom, so it took me a while to go through and try and figure out which foods were the problem. Onions are a really obvious trigger food. It seems that squash may also be a trigger, but not as bad as onions. I wanted to identify trigger foods so I knew what they were. 

5     Find recipes

I need to confirm this with my doctor, but I think I eat a paleo-ish diet during phases 1 and 4, and eat a bunch of high FODMAP foods during phases 2 and 3. *Update- I called my doctor to clarify what I should and shouldn't be eating during different phases, and they told me to NOT eat a bunch of high FODMAP foods that trigger symptoms because it can make you feel bad. Good thing, I called....I was remembering my research and not what they told me*
I’d like to find several good recipes for both phases, and have them printed out and ready to look at. I also need to either find recipes that make leftovers, or start doubling recipes…. it’s really nice not to have to cook every night, and this may help to cut down on the number of freezer meals I need to prepare. I’m hoping to do this tonight and tomorrow.

6    Food prep

I know there are going to be bad fatigue days where I won’t want to cook during the process. I’m hoping if I can make and freeze a few meals that I’ll at least be able to eat well on those days. Because of the amount and type of pills I’m taking, I need to take them with a decent meal. A few weeks ago, I ate a small meal and took all my supplements with it and felt really nauseous….it was not fun. I don’t think I’ll be able to prep food for the whole treatment period, but I’m thinking if I could make a few meals for the next 2 weeks it will be a start. I’m mentally preparing myself to do meal prep about once every week or two throughout the process. I’m hoping to do the initial meal prep over the weekend.

There was one last loose end that got tied up today that I was super excited about. One of the antibiotics that was prescribed was Xifaxin (Rifaximin), which is notoriously expensive. My doctor had faxed the prescription into a pharmacy, and we were waiting to see how much my insurance would cover. When I called the pharmacy this morning they told me that after insurance I was looking at about $1300 for the pills I needed. But then they told me they applied some sort of other co pay discount, and it brought the price down to about $200. I was dumbfounded! When the rep asked if I could do the lower amount it took me a few seconds before I was able to say yes! I was so overwhelmed with gratitude with the lower price that when I got off the phone I just spent a few minutes praising God.

The doctor was waiting on finalizing the treatment plan until we found out the price of the Xifaxin, so it felt like a relief to get it paid for and figured out.

So that’s what I’m doing to prepare. Hopefully, all these preparations are worth it!