[Amanda Malachesky]

Hi all,

I thought I'd share my personal success story to provide some hope out there that you CAN heal.

My IBS developed slowly over a number of years, and went along with a number of hormonal symptoms. I was living a very stressful life, building a house while living in a 450 square foot yurt with my baby son and husband. Money was always tight, and childcare was hard for me.

By the time my second son was born 5 years later, I was having frequent diarrhea attacks, randomly, alternating with constipation. I was also fatigued, anxious, and had a lot of problems with my menstrual cycles.

My doctors couldn't identify anything wrong and suggested I go to therapy. I knew this wasn't right, and started on a journey of self-exploration and research that would take 10 years, and lead to a career change.

I learned about SIBO in 2015 and thought that surely this was the problem. It turned out I had an extremely high level of methane. But after herbal treatment, I quickly relapsed. I also tested positive for parasites, and it turned out I also had endometriosis.

I had surgery to correct the endometriosis, and I hoped that would resolve my gut problems, but it only made them worse.

After years of aimless testing, supplementation, and diet change, I finally put my design background to work to develop a methodical approach to my IBS. I started by shoring up my innate digestive function. I got serious about dealing with my stress, and focused on chewing my food.

I used a series of elimination diets to figure out which specific foods I could eat, and which ones I had to avoid.

Then, I got serious about treating my underlying infections. In 2021, I finally bit the bullet and decided to treat my SIBO with rifaximin, which I had to do several times to clear it, but I've now been SIBO free for an entire year, and my symptoms are so much better.

I no longer have random diarrhea, bloating, heartburn, and rarely have gas. I understand what I need to avoid food wise, and best of all, I was able to add some foods back into my diet.

Now I put all this knowledge and training to work to support others with their IBS and SIBO, because there is a method to the process. If you skip steps or don't do certain parts right, you won't get lasting results.

If you apply a comprehensive strategy to your IBS case, you can make significant progress, and reduce or eliminate your symptoms. But it's the strategy that's often the missing piece!

I welcome any inquiries for help...

 

[NinaS]

Success is possible guys. You could be almost normal. I'm not a gut health coach, but i have a similar story and also I saw a noted improvement with Rifaximin (Xifaxan). In my case, I had already found a stable or core/safe diet that causes no diarrhea or gas. It was a limited and restrictive diet, but it was safe. And yet even on that safe diet (which had been safe for almost a year at that point), I was having gas or loose stools, and I couldn't figure out why as I literally ate only 3 foods for a few weeks.

Turns out I had some sort of parasite or bad actor that was eliminated with Xifaxan. The gas was gone almost immediately in a single day (i was told to take 2 a day I think). But I had to keep taking it or it would come back , for some time.
In my case, one of the doctors prescribed me a regimen of probiotics with or after the Xifaxan.

This was a game changer for me.
His prescription was 150 billion capsule of bifido/lacto probiotic (VSL) for 3 times a day for 2 weeks.
I actually was not able to follow his prescription because VSL is made from milk, and has residue milk in the pill.
I had a bad reaction to it causing a gas that smelled like sour milk... yes gross.

So, I immediately stopped taking that VSL probiotic and looked for one that had the same strains or many of the same strains of bifido and lacto bacteria but without the milk.
I found Renew Life had a 150 billion capsule, so I took that for the 2 weeks, and then switched to an 80 billion dosage once daily for months (which became 2 years).

At this point, after my elimination diet combined with the above. I had slowly added foods every 3 days (add if no reaction, don't add if negative reaction). At 1 year from the probiotic treatment I tested some foods I was previously very intoelrant to, and coudl now have small or medium amounts (apples have very high fructose and I couldn't have one for 5 years without immediately going to the bathroom, until this treatment).
I can even have a scoop of icecream.. Imagine that, I couldn't have probiotics that had maybe 1 or 2 grams of Milk a day back then, and now I can have a full scoop of icecream that has 30 + grams of milk?

Our exact methods for getting better may not work exactly for you.
But having a method and strategy is good to get to an improved lifestyle, and hopefully one day to normalcy.

I do think elimination diets are a good start. Wish everyone the best here. I joined to try to help too. I realized it was ungrateful of me to have found a good solution and not help those suffering, especially when I know how bad the suffering could be.