Yet Another Health Post
I started this quite a while ago and never finished. Soooo, many words. But, I do want to keep a record to come back to, if needed.
Dr. Kessinger took his time and went over my 23andme report in detail. We found a few things of interest, but the two biggest is that I have reactive hypoglycemia and I also have the CBS mutation which means that high-sulfur foods may be a problem for me.
He actually had brought up the possibility of reactive hypoglycemia on my previous visit, based on my symptoms and blood work alone, but he wanted to make sure he wasn't missing anything. I have to admit, since we already eat well, I didn't give it much thought. I mentally brushed it aside and was expecting there to be something else. Once I got home, though, I started researching reactive hypoglycemia and what I found was really interesting (to me). First of all, it's not very common and is hard to diagnose. That would explain why it took so long to figure out.
Secondly, as this article helps explain, reactive hypoglycemia can effect so many different systems in the body: adrenals, thyroid, liver, hormones, on and on. It's so important to get this under control. I thought I was doing well, but I realized that I really need to be more careful about how many carbs I eat and how I eat them. The GAPS diet doesn't restrict fruit or honey. And while I don't eat a lot of either of those things, I do sometimes choose fruit as a snack and I do use honey and molasses to sweeten my coffee and tea. I've also been bad about snacking. In the interest of losing weight (or at least not gaining more of it) I try and put off snacks if at all possible. I realize now that that's a terrible plan for me and am being very particular about what I eat and how often I eat it.
I'm also swearing off high sulfur foods for a while: onions, garlic, broccoli, cabbage, eggs, etc, for a while until that methylation pathway clears up.
Another thing we found is that I'm genetically disposed to gut dysbiosis. Since this information fits with symptoms I've been having we decided to pay attention to it and change up some things. Namely, I decided to get with it and take my probiotic three times a day instead of just one like I had been doing. I also need to get back into making kombucha and I need to find veggies other than cabbage to ferment.
We agreed that parasites are an important factor, too, which wasn't a surprise to me after Dr. Angies report revealed 20ish parasites in my system! He gave me a general parasite cleanse supplement which I'll take along with Dr. Angie's Bio-Kleen. I also purchased some diamotaceous earth, but won't start taking that for a while until present symptoms calm down a bit!
Vitamin D deficiency also showed up as a problem for me. I have a supplement, but haven't been very good at taking it as often as I should. Also, the dosage that was first recommended to me needed to be bumped up. So, more vitamin D, more often!
Oh, we also found that my body has a hard time converting glutamate to GABA. Glutamate excites and GABA calms down. As soon as it comes in I'll be adding a calming formula to my seemingly endless list of daily supplements. Luckily, some of these things are only temporary as we try and get everything back under control and back to normal.
The software that interpreted my genetic report was pretty cool. It included a suggested plan of treatment based on the most prevalent issues. Dr. Kessinger cross-referenced that with the blood work results and then with my symptoms so I feel good that the things we're targeting are going to help me see results.
Update: I eliminated sulfur foods for a month and didn't see any changes at all. I went ahead and added them back in.
Even though I didn't think I needed to do much more than tweak my eating habits, I guess it was making a bigger impact than I thought because I had some odd symptoms. At first, I felt hungry all the time. I countered that by breaking my meals down into 200 calories and eating every two hours. Then, I started waking up with extreme thirst in the middle of the night. All of that passed and now I can go longer in between meals and I'm sleeping like a log at night.
I did two months of a parasite cleanse and now I'm supposed to take a month off. Then I do one more month on.
With everything I've been doing/taking I can say that I feel just as good as I did while on the strict GAPS diet...without having to be on the strict GAPS diet. Yay!
My biggest complaint is still that I can't seem to do any serious working out without tingling and numbness in my extremities which I'm sure contributes to my other complaint: that I can't lose weight. Also, fatigue comes and goes. I still wear out easily. Still, I feel like I've made good progress in just a few months time. My next appt is in just a week and we should be moving on to the next phase so that has me hopeful for more progress!
Dr. Kessinger took his time and went over my 23andme report in detail. We found a few things of interest, but the two biggest is that I have reactive hypoglycemia and I also have the CBS mutation which means that high-sulfur foods may be a problem for me.
He actually had brought up the possibility of reactive hypoglycemia on my previous visit, based on my symptoms and blood work alone, but he wanted to make sure he wasn't missing anything. I have to admit, since we already eat well, I didn't give it much thought. I mentally brushed it aside and was expecting there to be something else. Once I got home, though, I started researching reactive hypoglycemia and what I found was really interesting (to me). First of all, it's not very common and is hard to diagnose. That would explain why it took so long to figure out.
Secondly, as this article helps explain, reactive hypoglycemia can effect so many different systems in the body: adrenals, thyroid, liver, hormones, on and on. It's so important to get this under control. I thought I was doing well, but I realized that I really need to be more careful about how many carbs I eat and how I eat them. The GAPS diet doesn't restrict fruit or honey. And while I don't eat a lot of either of those things, I do sometimes choose fruit as a snack and I do use honey and molasses to sweeten my coffee and tea. I've also been bad about snacking. In the interest of losing weight (or at least not gaining more of it) I try and put off snacks if at all possible. I realize now that that's a terrible plan for me and am being very particular about what I eat and how often I eat it.
I'm also swearing off high sulfur foods for a while: onions, garlic, broccoli, cabbage, eggs, etc, for a while until that methylation pathway clears up.
Another thing we found is that I'm genetically disposed to gut dysbiosis. Since this information fits with symptoms I've been having we decided to pay attention to it and change up some things. Namely, I decided to get with it and take my probiotic three times a day instead of just one like I had been doing. I also need to get back into making kombucha and I need to find veggies other than cabbage to ferment.
We agreed that parasites are an important factor, too, which wasn't a surprise to me after Dr. Angies report revealed 20ish parasites in my system! He gave me a general parasite cleanse supplement which I'll take along with Dr. Angie's Bio-Kleen. I also purchased some diamotaceous earth, but won't start taking that for a while until present symptoms calm down a bit!
Vitamin D deficiency also showed up as a problem for me. I have a supplement, but haven't been very good at taking it as often as I should. Also, the dosage that was first recommended to me needed to be bumped up. So, more vitamin D, more often!
Oh, we also found that my body has a hard time converting glutamate to GABA. Glutamate excites and GABA calms down. As soon as it comes in I'll be adding a calming formula to my seemingly endless list of daily supplements. Luckily, some of these things are only temporary as we try and get everything back under control and back to normal.
The software that interpreted my genetic report was pretty cool. It included a suggested plan of treatment based on the most prevalent issues. Dr. Kessinger cross-referenced that with the blood work results and then with my symptoms so I feel good that the things we're targeting are going to help me see results.
Update: I eliminated sulfur foods for a month and didn't see any changes at all. I went ahead and added them back in.
Even though I didn't think I needed to do much more than tweak my eating habits, I guess it was making a bigger impact than I thought because I had some odd symptoms. At first, I felt hungry all the time. I countered that by breaking my meals down into 200 calories and eating every two hours. Then, I started waking up with extreme thirst in the middle of the night. All of that passed and now I can go longer in between meals and I'm sleeping like a log at night.
I did two months of a parasite cleanse and now I'm supposed to take a month off. Then I do one more month on.
With everything I've been doing/taking I can say that I feel just as good as I did while on the strict GAPS diet...without having to be on the strict GAPS diet. Yay!
My biggest complaint is still that I can't seem to do any serious working out without tingling and numbness in my extremities which I'm sure contributes to my other complaint: that I can't lose weight. Also, fatigue comes and goes. I still wear out easily. Still, I feel like I've made good progress in just a few months time. My next appt is in just a week and we should be moving on to the next phase so that has me hopeful for more progress!
I'm really impressed and intrigued with your health journey, Jenn! Please post when you have your next appointment - I'm interested in what the doctors have to say after all your changes.
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