Holy Histamines

That's getting a little carried away, but I've never noticed a problems with histamines until recently.  I guess my spinach bread with turkey breast lunch meat and cashew cheeze is a bit heavy on the histamines and I itch after I eat it.  It's so good though.  Guess I'm going to have to do a little research and figure out how to keep my histamines low for a while as I imagine constantly triggering a histamine response doesn't help with gut healing.  Boo!  I've been making Pesto spinach wraps in the dehydrator and it was so fun to be able to eat a sandwich type thing again.  Back to the drawing board!

Stress is such a bugger!

We all like to pretend that stress doesn't matter.  We like to think we are handling it or that we are not stressed.  My husband purchased me the Inner Balance gadget for Christmas with a lovely meditation pillow. Inner Balance is a cord (with an app, of course!) that you plug it into your "i" device, in my case my iPad, and clip it onto your ear.  The sensor on your ear measures your heart rate variability as a way to determine your level of stress and help you learn how to train your mind to bring your heart rate variability to a less stressful pace. There is a lot of science around it, books, etc. none of which I was interested in enough to read.

The first few uses over Christmas break I was easily able to keep it in the green (meaning good heart rate variability, low stress and their term "coherence").  Fast forward a couple of months and I have increase to level 2 and am trying to do around 10 minutes of my HeartMath every day.  Some days, more often than not, it's HARD to get into and stay in coherence.  Dang!  I thought with all my yoga and everything that I was so chill. Apparently not :(  It's amazing how I can be sitting there doing great, in the green, and my mind just wanders to something I have to do or don't want to do and boom! I immediately go into the red.  Then you have to focus again on breath, gratitude, heart thoughts, working your way through blue back to green only to wander and go back to red.  Wow!  It's so much more relaxing to be unplugged and not know :)

I've found when I eat in a rush or under any stress my food just sits in a giant lump in my stomach and doesn't want to go anyway.  I get a little reflux even sometimes.  If it happens to be dinner when this goes down then the next morning can be rough.  So, even though Dr. Pimental has done research that shows that stress alone does not cause SIBO, it can definitely contribute to your symptoms and inhibit your ability to digest.  And remember that the stress hormone cortisol is catabolic, meaning it breaks things down, definitely not helpful for healing!

Dr. Ruscio and Dr. Siebecker podcast

Discussing SIBO treatment - diet, prebiotics, probiotics, etc.

Contemplating Digestive Enzymes

And came across this article. Seems like a good basic description. For me I'm most interested in breaking down protein since I know I have difficulty there and with vegetable fibers since I have a hard time chewing them completely. Still on the hunt for what, I can't honestly say I've noticed a difference with any of them, except ox bile.  I'm currently using OrthoMolecular Products DigestzymeV. It's fairly comprehensive but expensive, especially if the whole family is taking it.

I heard Mike Mutzel say recently that you should avoid DPP-IV in your routine digestive enzyme because it doesn't something bad in your gut.  Of course I can't remember what he said exactly or whether it was on his podcast or in one of the online summits he's been involved in.  The only enzyme I've seen it in are those targeted to gluten/dairy specific digestion.

I've also recently heard that you shouldn't take a digestive enzyme with Cellulase in it because this is not an enzyme that humans actually have (ruminant animals like cows do). I have yet to come across a comprehensive enzyme that doesn't have it.

Two new podcasts I'm listening to:
Gut Guardians
Nourish Balance Thrive

Such a viscous cycle...

I've been exhausted and pretty miserable.  My thyroid tests came back and while my TPO antibodies have dropped to the low 100's, my hormones still remain on the low side of the lab's range of normal.  It's frustrating because I look at them from a Functional Medicine ideal standpoint and my ARNP looks at the lab norms.  I think if it were just my thyroid I wouldn't be in such rough shape but since it's the whole thyroid-adrenal-gut thing it's been tough.  Freezing (low body temp), hair falling out, exhausted, not feeling rested, water retention, weight gain, loads of freaking fun, just ask my husband.  Thankfully my motility seems to be staying out of the game although I am still doing Iberogast before each meal, ginger between breakfast and lunch and again at bedtime and Vit C and Magnesium with every meal.  Vit C is supportive to the adrenals and my body just doesn't seem to ever get enough magnesium.  I'm trying to do ConcenTrace Minerals in water when I can remember but they are gross :)  I am great at remembering pills because I can organize those in individual containers.  The tinctures not so much, even though they are right next to where I hang out the most.

Update:
My ARNP finally called in a prescription for T3 2.5mcg in the morning and at bedtime.  I wanted to try a T3/T4 combo since my T4 is borderline low but there just don't seem to be many good options out there and she wouldn't prescribe.  So I did what I always do and went rouge.  I went back through all my notes and found that you can get one product that may be beneficial without a doctor and that is Thyro-Gold.  The ND of my nutrition program had recommended it but didn't clue me in that it was not prescription.  I went ahead and ordered a bottle since I had instructions on how to take it and I wasn't sure 2.5mcg BID was going to cut it (I was on 15 mcg BID before I stopped meds and crashed).  I have to say I have felt a bit better this week (after starting meds on Monday), but not stellar and I am still really tired.  The Thyro-Gold just arrived so I think I may start it tonight in place of the nightly T3 and see how it goes.  I react poorly to Adrenal glandulars (they make me beyond exhausted) so I may have to contact the ARNP to increase the dose if I react to thyroid glandular as well.  It's a bit tricky given that sometimes the antibodies can get riled up when you add in more thyroid gland.  We'll see.

This week I've been reading:
The Prime - which I love and find really fascinating.  It's written by a neurologist who is also trained in Ayurveda so she uses lots of herbs for healing and health.
Why Do I Still Have Thyroid Symptoms and Root Cause - just gathering information on how to best support my body and what my options are.  It's good to be educated!
Thank goodness I have so many great libraries in such close proximity to my house.  I can't imagine the cost of buying all the books I want to flip through and then where the heck would I store them?!?!?

testing, testing

H. Pylori retest came back negative today.  So happy for that.  I dreaded another round of treatment so it's nice to hear it's gone and I can move on.

I saw my primary care provider today to review thyroid labs from late November.  Since going off my T3 supplement I have been slowly crashing.  My antibodies were in the mid 200's (likely due to the H. Pylori) so she wants to do a retest to see where my hormone levels and antibodies are now. It would be nice if everything came back stellar but I know I need a little supplementation in the form of hormones to boost me back up and support motility and healing.  Results should be back in a couple of days.

SIBOwise things have been pretty calm.  I'm sure there are some little bugs in there but they seem to be held at bay for the moment.  

My ARNP kind of scolded me for not keeping up on the bone broth.  I made excuses but I know better so I came home and put some stew meat and marrow bones in the hot pot and started a batch of soup.  It's much easier on digestion and I need to keep that in mind.  I'd much rather sit with a jar of nuts, kale chips and chocolate :)

If you haven't been watching/listening to the Fat Summit you may want to check it out.  It's been pretty good so far.

Self Sabotage

I was thinking about self sabotage this morning as it's been a topic bounced around a bit. As I drove I started thinking about what I would say.  When I got home and popped open my email I discovered a blog post by Petra8Paleo on the subject and Sean Croxton's new podcast The Sessions which cover it, both far more eloquently than I ever could.  

Off to do my HeartMath.

A post to read

One of the best thing to come out of my struggle with SIBO is my friendship with this guy.  Here he outlines his treatments and the protocols used by all the major players. Thank you!

Stuck in a rut

I am in a big time rut.  Not sure which way I want to go.  My bloating is pretty minimal although I felt really bloated after drinking hot water yesterday morning, go figure.  My food is in a rut, my routine is in a rut, all in kind of a negative way.  I'm feeling the need to branch out but that takes decisions and I'm really sick and tired of making decisions :)  Remember the good ole days when you bought what was available, did what the doctor (or neighbor) told you and just spent a lot of time hanging out.  That's how my family was anyway. Everything is so pressured these days, so much information, options, responsibilites, worries.  Maybe it's just because I'm a grown up, but I remember my mom doing lots of crafts, having coffee and game nights with friends, doing things for pleasure.

So I've been working on rebuilding and reseeding my gut, taking tons of probiotics (ColonCare, OrthoBiotic, Primal Defense, MegaSpore and PrescriptAssist), sometimes all in one day at different times but generally I rotate.  The links are not necessarily the best prices or best places to buy just links from either stores I use or places that I have seen that carry hard to find products. I am not affiliated with any or them nor has anyone advised me to use these products.  In other words proceed at your own risk.  

I put my uBiome results through a program to create a uBiome tree and then consulted with Dr. Grace Liu.  She seems to be the one on the cutting edge of the microbiome, talking a lot on her podcast about different bacterial families and their impact on gut health, but it seems that she bases a lot of her information from animal studies since not many human ones have been done yet.  That said, she is wicked smart and all over the paleo community these days.  (Dr. Ruscio encourages caution here and doesn't believe the microbiome is clinically useful at this point.)  I was hoping that she was going to say I was ready for adding in some fibers and feeding my little critters but she said, "you are not ready".  Now if the one person out there who is pushing people to feed their microbiome tells you no, you have to listen. She feels I need to get my adrenals and thyroid better supported, build my good flora and then I can move forward.  After our call she emailed me two pages of information and recommendations.  Well worth the money spent, in my opinion.

She also brought up an interesting point that I think we may start hearing more of, hidden viruses and pathogenic bacteria.  She claimed that strep can hide out in the gut and "induce autoantibodies".  She said that a couple of the probiotics above contain streptococcus but I couldn't find it on the label and have emailed the companies to clarify.  I could find information online that they used to but nothing to indicate they still do (in my quick search).

So I've been looking into a couple of different diets protocols as well in an attempt to shake things up.  I hate counting anything which is why I hang out where I am but really need to expand my horizons a bit.  I'm also still hanging onto an extra 8 pounds that I have put on since August.  While I am not overweight, I just don't feel myself and I haven't been keeping up my usual activity level so I am feeling really out of shape.  I've started ZGym (the bunny slope workouts).  She eats like a rabbit which is why she is so thin :)  I looked at her food log.  Anyway so I purchased the AltShift book and the Fast Tract App (already have the book).  The former seems real meat heavy and the latter just too much counting.  I've been playing around with adding carbs but I really turn into a carb monster and then overdo it.  I wonder what my blood sugar is doing???

So, been doing a lot of questioning, a little bit of experimenting, some grumbling and wallowing :)