The Insanity of SIBO
Feel like you have been chasing your tail for the last few years or many months? Wondering what the heck you can possibly eat when you go out to eat at a restaurant? Also wondering when the many trips to the bathroom may stop and how?
Welcome to the lurid, un-fun world of GI distress, aka – IBS/SIBO. SIBO is an accentuation, bastardization, demonizing of what was once IBS. Treatment for IBS used to be eat fiber, take a probiotic, exercise and see a therapist. Treatment for SIBO is now: adopt nuke mentality, gather multiple prescriptions for Rifaximin, consider FMT, the elemental diet and moving to another country and then hoping against hope that it doesn’t come back. All the while trying to evade the many fun accompaniments of SIBO such as not sleeping, losing your mind, losing too much weight, gaining too much weight, not drinking, never eating out again, and crop dusting loved ones with your toxic arse-nal. Oh, wait there’s more, hoping you have enough thousands of dollars to pay your functional medicine doctor/naturopath now turned SIBO expert to bring you through multiple courses of treatment with possibly no abatement in sight (some do get better – yay!).
Are we ready to make a board game out of this? Who are the lucky few that make it out of this jungle and how did they do it?
What makes up the constellation of SIBO and why can’t you just take a pill?
SIBO is the end of the road for dysbiosis. Friendly bacteria get swept up in the madness but the real villains are resistant bacteria such as E.Coli, streptococcus, klebsiella and enterococcus. They may be listed on your stool test as “commensal” and perhaps a few decades ago they were, but then you were besotted with life and the conundrum of infections, stress and toxicity. Those friendly commensal bacteria did a Jeckyl/Hyde in your guts like a persistent bad Halloween movie. It still playing and it will everyday. SIBO isn’t something you solve overnight or in 2 weeks. It’s like a MRSA infection of your gut. These bacteria have adapted to your diet, supplements, behaviors and immune system. The frat party they are enjoying is without a bouncer or guard (hydrochloric acid) and they have plenty of friends (viruses, candida and parasites). The partygoers happily consume your minerals, B vitamins and use your liver as a port-a-johnny. When they eat, they produce neurotoxins -which make you feel worse. These toxins can inflame nerves and cause pain in other areas of your body. Your immune system and adrenals get stressed which can make the battle more arduous and your anxiety levels worse.
The only way out of this mess is not by taking more Rifaximin. It is through a comprehensive approach which includes – avoiding food that feeds it, building up and supporting your immune system, naturally restoring hydrochloric acid, detoxifying pollutants and cleaning up the liver, treating the bacteria with targeted herbals, and repopulating the gut with the good guys. It’s a wild ride and quite a journey. Lowering the load of this bacteria can take up to 2 years and some of the other BFF’s such as viruses will also need to be dealt with. Some people may also have issues like deep -seated depression, higher levels of environmental toxicity, multiple prescription medicine and their residues, etc. It is the hope by all affected that they will go to a natural practitioner and be taken care of but this is not always the case. Without a comprehensive approach, people will always be struggling to battle this relentless condition. Adopt the mind-set now that you don’t need to nuke the frat party, but gently show them the door. Know that you will have the tools you need to get through this.
It is my life’s work and endeavor to help end the suffering from IBS/SIBO as I have suffered miserably from it myself. My peeps are on the path to getting better after having worked so hard for it. The information will be provided to you, all you need to do is trust the process.
Tammy Russell is a Reiki Master, Certified Biofield Tuning Practitioner, & Intuitive Energy Healer with a Masters in Nutrition. She combines her expertise in functional medicine and advanced intuitive healing to create individualized protocols to target your health concerns.
