My journey with H Pylori
Hey Hey Diva Friends!!!!
WOW! This past month has been a roller coaster. Time is just flying by and I can't believe it's almost spring already. Wasn't yesterday NYE?? :)
Anywho - I've been very upfront and honest with you about my health journey over the past year or....so I thought! I realized recently that while I chatted with my newsletter VIPS and talk extensively with my personal clients about it I never created a post about my H Pylori experience....so here we go!
To learn about my food sensitivities testing click here
In July 2017 I got my stool test back. Good news - there was only one thing that showed up. Bad news, it was H Pylori.
What is H Pylori?
It's a spiral shaped bacteria found in the cell lining of the stomach. You can acquire it from eating uncooked foods, drinking impure water, and saliva. Most likely if you have it your spouse does too. Your likelihood of infection is equal to a persons age whether they are symptomatic or not.
Over 50% of the population has
H. Pylori and doesn't know it!
How the heck do you have a bacteria overgrowth and not know? Well, sometimes the symptoms can go unnoticed. Or if you do notice them, you don't attribute them to the actual problem.
For example here are some of the symptoms:
Heartburn/acid reflux
Upper abdominal pain
Belching
Gastritis
Duodenal/Peptic ulcers
Carcinoma
Headaches – migraine
Constipation
Nausea
Acne
Halitosis
Undigested food in stool
Need for digestive enzymes
Chronic dysfunction at T6-T7 (upper middle spine in between your shoulder
blades.
Aches similar to muscle soreness in upper/middle back
Wow!! So... let's say none of those symptoms worry you a little...
H Pylori causes 90%+ of duodenal ulcers 80% of gastric ulcers and infected people have 2-6x increased risk of gastric cancer.
So, I'd say it's worth treatment right?! Well friends, if you know me, you know I'm pretty hard core. I jumped in and did the whole shebang! Unfortunately, when I retested in Feb 2018 I received this bummer news:
Oh my gosh Kylene, why are you sharing this?! You're a practitioner - shouldn't you be sharing success stories? Well I'm sharing this because I want to be HONEST with you. Sometimes these buggers are flat out hard to kill. One of the downsides to this particular test is that it doesn't give you a measurement. I've since moved on to using another test that does which is very helpful. This would allow me to see how much progress I made during the first round of treatment.
Why would it still be there?
So many possible answers so here are a few:
- Recontamination through toothbrushes, kissing, sharing utensils, toothpaste etc....
- Severity of the initial imbalance. Like I mentioned above its a bummer I couldn't see the progress level on the test, but ultimately that's information I don't need. If it shows up, there are enough present to take action.
- I wasn't quite as strict as I could have been round #1. I still did things like drink coffee and splurge on sugar which are things that can feed or create a happy environment for the little suckers.
- Duration of the imbalance. This may be something I've had for 2 years or it might be something I've had for 10. No way to know!
What to do?
Well what the heck do you do now? You already went through the protocol - do you do it again? How do you know it works?
Just like sometimes it takes a few round of antibiotics, or a few DIFFERENT antibiotics to kill a particularly difficult bacteria or viral infection, the same is true when using herbal remedies. In fact, potent herbal remedies taken over a longer period of time have been shown to be more effective than short term antibiotics for gut dysbiosis and imbalances. This can be due to the fact that antibiotics wipe out the good bacteria as well as the bad, leaving you susceptible for another negative bacterial overgrowth. Antibiotics, birth control, prescriptions and NSAIDS have all been shown to cause gut imbalance and inflammation as well so that's not a route I'm willing to go.
The second round of my protocol did change slightly. We tweaked a few things and I doubled down on details like replacing my toothbrush regularly, watching my sugar, and ditching coffee until I get the all clear. Do I think it's working? Absolutely - whenever I'm on the protocol I feel AMAZING. I basically don't get sick and if I do it's short lived and easily overcome. I have tons of energy, and well....I just generally feel better.
I'm still in the middle of round two and will move on to the upgraded testing for my follow up that will allow me to see levels should the H Pylori still be present. I wanted to share this with you because it's a TRUTH that the healthy answer isn't always easy. it just isn't. It costs money and it takes time to do things the more natural way. But is it worth it?! 100%
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