Unfiltered from the heart

i share this as a cautionary tale…
please learn from my mistakes & avoid the pitfalls
or find ways to climb back up again

the “gut attacks” started nearly 2 years ago
at first, i thought it was a repeated nora virus infection
where the gut pain was the worst & sometimes only part
– though it took me a bit to realize, i was barely in the bathroom…

the attacks seemed so random that i became afraid to eat
when they happened, all i could do was lie down and not move a muscle
it took all i had just to focus on each breath & not die
for it certainly felt the opposite of life

healthcare professionals prescribed anti-spasmodic meds
with serious sedative effects – which would have kept me from being able to
work, drive, or take care of my kids – i didn’t take even 1 dose after reading
the pharmacy pamphlet, i really couldn’t afford to just “knock out”

my colonoscopy was “clean” with a 10-year recall
yes, the colon can be clean
& if you’ve had a colonoscopy, you know what i mean!

“on my own” so to speak, to try to sort it all out
for about a year, i tried the FODMAP elimination regimen
nixing many of my fave & signature foods: garlic, onions, artichokes, strawberries, melons, asparagus, beans & sprouts, breads, beets, celery & oh so many others – so just naming a few
– because they set off the gut attacks, too

for a bit, it was not fun to be me, especially at any potluck event!
but at least i was not having that awful pain
(prior to this, i was well-known at work for the garlicky homemade lunches)

it’s taken me some time to sort it all out (or at least partially)
but it seems i had wiped out the diversity of my gut microbiota
self-diagnosed with SIBO & IBS-the pain kind

in the post-mortem, it seems the onset was a serious food rut
during The 2020 with the anti-biotic effects of
increased exposure to hospital-grade disinfectants
with a sprinkle on top of higher than ever levels of stress from
working in a hospital-based outpatient healthcare setting

the food rut: from eating many of the same foods month-to-month &
having a lot of one source of probiotic food, it seems the lack of food & gut diversity supported the beneficial bacteria growing into the small intestine
where the structures could not expand & this created a whole lot of pain
(i’d rather have an unmedicated birth again than a fraction of that pain)

now, in slowly expanding my pre- and pro-biotic regimen
after much research, some time & experimentation (so much gratitude to Drs. William Davis & Tim Spector & their teams as gut microbiome researchers)
i am excited to say, i can now have many of the “nixed” foods again & even on the very same day
most excitedly the garlic & onions

so may this share keep more guts happy!
variety (for gut biodiversity) is certainly the spice of life!

{image: pexels}

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