Several years ago, I faced a major battle with intestinal infection. It was, by far, the sickest I had ever been in my adult life. Inspired by learning this morning a new Steemian friend is having his own difficulties at the moment, I thought I would write down my story of struggle and recovery. Perhaps it will be of help to him and to others, facing a similar struggle.
This post is dedicated to the speedy and full recovery of our fellow Steemian @daan, currently in a hospital in Belgium.
The battle begins ...
Being somewhat slow (stubborn more like it), my story begins sitting in a doctor's office years ago and being told, after repeated earlier warnings, a certain set of symptoms gave me a significantly increased chance of contracting esophageal cancer.
Having now gotten my full attention, the doctor convinced me to undergo the first surgery of my adult life. I will spare you the details, as that is not what this story is about, although it starts there.
Successfully through the resulting abdominal surgery, I was up and about that evening, pushing myself to demonstrate to the staff I was recovering fine and could be sent home ASAP. In spite of my best efforts, for what I considered liability purposes only, they still kept me overnight, but by the next morning, I was allowed to leave.
Following doctor's orders (sort of ... 😉), I took it easy for the first couple of days. By then it was the weekend and I had things to do and places to go. So, I started being more active and even got up on the roof and did some minor maintenance work on our air conditioner. It was the middle of August and very warm.
Overall, I was feeling very good, almost "too good to be true" good ... In hindsight, I still don't know what this represented, but it was like the eye before the storm ...
By Monday of that week, my children had returned to school, my wife was working, and I was home alone. The day started off OK and on I went into the early afternoon. Attending to some task downstairs, I started to climb up the stairs and ... Wham!
In a remarkably short period of time, I felt suddenly very chilled. Getting to the top of the stairs, it affected me enough, I thought I would sit down in my chair for a bit. To let it pass ... Yes, well, within 5 minutes, I was trembling with chills and thinking about what effort it was going to take to simply get out of the chair and go find a blanket. It was the middle of August and hot! The blankets were put away for the summer!!
Thankfully my daughter arrived home and helped me by getting a sheet. I just stayed in my chair until my wife got home. By that time, although I looked terrible and she wanted me to go back to the hospital and the ER unit, I said no. I was starting to feel some better. Right ...
My rally didn't last long - maybe an hour or so. In another hour or so beyond that, I was in even worse shape than when this all started and agreed to go back to the hospital ...
In ER, they administered a bunch of tests and early in the morning hours, a doctor finally showed up to give me the "good news!" I was suffering from an e coli infection in my intestines.
Oh wonderful ... 😧
Down I Go ...
Let's see ... Did I mention yet I am a little slow? I had a very powerful antibiotic administered and sent home. In spite of the prognosis, I still was very confident in my overall health and was sure I would "kick it" soon enough. A little set back to be sure, but I wasn't really concerned about it.
Big mistake ...
Definitely taking it easy this time, by the 7th day, I was due to go back to work. My appointed time off, for the original surgery, was over. I was fortunately returning after the American Labor Day holiday, so I just had to get through 4 days ...
In returning to work, after a fairly short time, I was dealing with my co-workers expressing their concern that I didn't look like I should be back at work. I didn't look well at all ...
I thanked them for their concern, but said I would be OK ...
By the end of the week, with a scheduled trip out of town planned weeks ahead of time for the following week, I was given one last chance to be stupid. I took it. My boss gave me the opportunity to not go, but I said I would be OK and could make it. What a moron ... 😞
I really still didn't have any idea of what I was up against. I was soon to find out ...
Somehow, that Sunday, I managed to drive myself over two mountain passes to my appointed destination. I was there on time for the beginning of the conference first thing Monday morning. By mid-morning, however, I excused myself and told the receptionist I needed to go back to my room and get some rest. I would back that afternoon.
Sure ...
By that evening, it finally sunk in I was in trouble. Really in trouble. I slept little that night and only by divine intervention, did I somehow manage to drive myself back home the next morning. I didn't hesitate. Told my wife we were headed back to ER. And off we went ...
With another long night of testing complete, again in the early morning hours a doctor gave me my next dose of "good news!" I was diagnosed with having a serious clostridium difficile infection ...
Wow. I had at least heard of e coli. What on earth was this?
Clostridium Difficile
Here is what the famous Mayo Clinic has to say:
"Clostridium difficile (klos-TRID-e-um dif-uh-SEEL), often called C. difficile or C. diff, is a bacterium that can cause symptoms ranging from diarrhea to life-threatening inflammation of the colon."
Life threatening ... Yep, I was in trouble ... If you want to know more about it, you're welcome to read the Mayo Clinic's informative overview. I hope to never experience it again and would like to focus on "the rest of the story"...
The "Reader's Digest" version of what follows took place between the Labor Day and Thanksgiving Day holidays in America - a period of about 10 weeks. During that time, I was in an incredible struggle to regain my health.
After weeks of alternating between the surgeon and our family physician, all options had been exhausted. Nothing was working. I was getting worse ... By then, I had done considerable research of my own, trying - so far in vain - to figure out what I could do.
During that time, I learned that most of us actually have "c-diff" in our intestines, but it is "dormant," in a healthy person. Well ... WHAT wakes it up? The "nuke" antiobiotic "sent down" to knock out the e coli infection is the answer. Sure, it knocked down the e coli, but it also knocked down everything else! And, in doing so, opened Pandora's Box in my intestines ...
So ... I was sent to the specialist in our part of the world for this type of illness. I had only one question - how are you going to restore the health of the "good guys" enough to drive the "c-diff" back into dormancy?
His unforgettable answer, "I don't know ..." Wow!! What he did do was prescribe what is by far the most expensive medication I've ever been given - vancomycin. He said this would suppress the "c-diff" and sent me home ...
Blessing of Good Friends
With all my story and the struggle down, we turn now to the good part. It began with a dear friend at work. She had read a book and didn't know if it would help, but recommended I read it - "The Maker's Diet", by Jordan S. Rubin:
This book contains the remarkable story of the survival of the author of his own "hell on earth." While I was bad off, reading this book made me feel somewhat better, as Jordan was definitely in far worse shape. He truly was at death's door.
Over the years since that I have recommended this book to family and friends, I always say the same thing. Whether you fully subscribe to all he has to say, you owe it to yourself to read it, for the fascinating insights you will gain into the essential importance of our intestinal health.
In the book, you will read all of the details of how he survived. And from there, went on to literally make it his mission in life to help others avoid what he endured.
Essential Importance of our Intestinal Health
Most likely, at one point or another, we've all heard of the amazing scientific breakthroughs fairly recently in mapping our DNA. The insights gained are remarkable and we're probably still in the early stages of the resulting transformational benefits for our health care.
Have you ever heard of the Human Microbiome Project though? Probably not. Yet, arguably, it has a similar scope and will ultimately also have very beneficial long-term affects on our health care.
Fundamentally, this is study of what lives inside all of us, principally in our intestines, that is not in fact us, but them! Them what? Exactly!
Here is a quick introductory comment, from this study:
"Our bodies are inhabited by trillions of microorganisms. Yet, because of their small size (each microbe is less than 1% the width of a human hair), these rich communities of bacteria, fungi, and other microbes makes up only 1 to 2 percent of the body’s mass. Prior to the launch of the Common Fund’s Human Microbiome Project (HMP) in 2007, a growing body of evidence indicated these microbes that inhabit our bodies provide benefit."
Only 1 to 2% of the body's mass ... Think about that just a minute and let that sink in. That's a lot of "bugs!" What are they doing in there? Are they "friendly?" Or are they foes? Rest assured, I can certainly vouch for the answer on at least one of them ...
The scope of this scientific undertaking to simply identify all of the different types of microbes, let alone begin to understand their intricate interactions with each other is incredible.
All of this massive scientific undertaking came years after the story you read in Jordan Rubin's book. He came to personally understand, far beyond most, the enormous benefits of "getting it right" when it comes to our intestinal health.
I know it sounds like "overkill," but there is hardly a book I would recommend more highly than this one, for everyone to read. It is that good and that important to our health.
⭐ Happy Ending 🌈
Leaving out a lot of the gory details, the highlights are, after trying 4 different probiotics and several other prescriptions, nothing was working. By divine intervention, the meeting with the doctor above and beginning to take vancomycin paralleled my finishing Rubin's book and finding the nearest source of his amazing probiotic - Primal Defense Ultra.
Between the doctor's medication, this awesome probiotic, and a prescription from a highly-regarded naturopathic doctor to repair the damage to my intestinal wall, I slowly began to regain my health. I was fairly comfortable sitting with my extended family during our favorite holiday - Thanksgiving. By the first of the year, I knew I was finally "out of the woods," and getting back to normal.
I did not miss another day of work for over 4 years. Due to my significantly improved "gut health," even if I do get a little under the weather, I just don't get as sick as other and recover more quickly. And, I am not a young man ... 😉
Wrapping this up, I am going to give you the top 3 items in my daily diet (all new to me ...) which I am unlikely to ever give up. At least not willingly. They have become that important to me:
- Rubin's Garden of Life probiotic - Primal Defense Ultra. The formulation he credits with saving his own life. [Reading the book just to find out the details of this part of his story alone is worth it ...]
- Redwood Hill Farm's Cultured Goat Milk Kefir - An amazing cultured food, as prescribed by Rubin. Not only is it a great source of many active cultures, it's great help with swallowing any supplements you take (like probiotics!), and the fat content led to a remarkable improvement in my "good" cholestrol numbers. That is, it alone is really healthy! When you stop consuming something and your body says, "Hey! What's going on up there? Where's the kefir?!", you know you are doing something good for yourself.
- OK, now the hardest one for me - drinking enough water! Yeah, I know, may sound silly to some of my dear readers, but it is the truth. Could write a whole post about just that. But, I finally got there! Here is my "secret recipe" to finally overcoming my challenge - 1) Filter out all chlorine [and everything else that is not water...], 2) Drink it at room temperature, 3) Drink it in a glass container, not plastic, and 4) "Rule of thumb" - drink the number of ounces of water that is half your body weight in pounds - about 80 ounces a day for me ...
In addition, just learning to eat all the other cultured foods "out there" regularly is a great habit to develop - yogurt, sauerkraut, kombucha (an ancient cultured tea tradition from China), etc.
Regularly consuming all of these things contributes to maximizing the number of "good guys" in your gut, 💪 while keeping the "bad guys" suppressed ... 👍
Thank you for investing your time to read through this post. I hope you will take some additional time, for your own well-being, to take a "deeper dive" into the topic of your intestinal health.
Trust me, it will pay huge dividends!
Until "next time," all the best to you for a better tomorrow, as we all work together to build our Steem Community! 👍 😊
Respectfully,
Steemian @roleerob
Posted using Busy.org and “immutably enshrined in the blockchain” on Thursday, 4 October 2018!
