Welcome to CHEESESLAVE Q & A!
Every Sunday, I answer your questions. I’ll answer as many questions as I can each week. If I didn’t answer your question this week, please check back next week.
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1. Question: Thoughts On Sublingual B12 Tablets / Cod Liver Oil And Fish Oil?
Ann Marie, I need your advice!
I have been on the full-GAPS diet since the end of March 2011 to heal from severe reflux and a host of other issues. I have made tremendous progress, but I have some lingering issues, so I have decided to start the Intro diet in late January.
I also recently switched to a doctor who is holistically-based (I do not have a GAPS doctor nearby). For one thing, it was time for me to do that, and for another, I knew that candida overgrowth is one of my issues, and I needed some support with that. He did some bloodwork, and then made several recommendations. For one, my B12 was 256. He feels it should be over 800, so he recommended 5000 mcg sublingually. Additionally, he recommended fish oil for EPA and DHA.
Here are my questions. First, the sublingual B12 tablets all have some form of sweetener in them (like xylitol). I know these aren’t allowed on the GAPS diet, but I don’t know how to dramatically raise my B12 in another way. Although the doctor supported my eliminating foods to promote healing, I’m guessing he thinks the benefit of the B12 outweighs the damage (this is where it would be really helpful to have a GAPS physician nearby). What are your thoughts?
Also, I am taking fermented cod liver oil, but he felt I needed the higher doses of EPA and DHA in fish oil, with a higher ratio of EPA to DHA. I’ve read that there are concerns about the quality of fish oils, but Nastasha Campbell-McBride actually recommends supplementing with cod liver oil AND fish oil in the GAPS book for the same reason as my doctor (revised edition, page 272). What are your thoughts on this?
Thank you so much for all that you do! So much of what I have learned in the last year has come from your site and others like it. I am really looking forward to the day when I am healed and can enjoy some of the foods I enjoy so much. Cheese will be one of the things at the top of the list!
Thanks,
Lauren
Answer
I personally would not worry about the sweetener in the B12 supplements. If you are low in B12, I’d take the supplements.
For the fish oil, there is a good brand at the GAPSdiet.com store — you can find them under supplements on my resources page.
2. Question: Recommendations For UTIs, Yeast / Bladder Infections?
Hello!
I love your blog and sincerely appreciate all you do to promote real, whole, nourishing foods and educate your readers on how to best care for our bodies!
I have a new sweet teenage stepsister who is really suffering right now and I feel that the “treatment” she is receiving is only making her situation worse. She has a long history of getting UTIs, yeast infections, and bladder infections that have gotten increasingly more painful and frequent in the last year.
Her doctor keeps putting her on different antibiotics, one after another, and then prescribes her another medication for the yeast infection that will come as a result of all the antibiotics, plus a pain killer to ease the pain of her bladder spasms. She also drinks a lot of cranberry juice, which is sweetened and I imagine the sugar in that just feeds the bad bacteria and makes things worse.
She is absolutely sick of feeling this way and is fed up of constantly being medicated — especially since it never even cures the issues! I know there must be something she can do with her diet or natural supplements or some alternative way of trying to manage this besides antibiotics — but I’m not sure what. Do you have any suggestions or ideas for dealing with UTIs, yeast infections, and bladder infections?
I know you are not a doctor, but she and I would greatly appreciate your advice!
Thank you,
Mallory
Answer
Of course you know I am not a doctor and can’t diagnose or treat anything.
UTIs, yeast infections, and bladder infections are all caused by a lack of good gut flora. Taking antibiotics is only going to make matters worse (as she is experiencing). That is a road to nowhere. It is unfortunate that most doctors do not understand the importance of probiotics.
If it were me, I’d stop the antibiotics and get on a therapeutic grade probiotic. Not all probiotics are the same and the vast majority of them do not work.
I recommend Biokult, which you can find at the GAPSdiet.com store under supplements on my resources page. I also like ThreeLac, which you can find on Amazon.
In addition to that, she can consume homemade kefir and yogurt (fermented for at least 24 hours). Applying kefir and yogurt to the vaginal area helps a lot as well.
Just be careful and go slow with the fermented foods and probiotics or else she will have a “die-off” reaction and feel worse before she feels better.
3. Question: Thoughts On Taking CLO / Sunscreen With Us On Vacation?
Cheeseslave,
My family and I will get the opportunity to spend a few weeks in a tropical location and I have a couple questions:
1) Do you recommend me traveling with our Cod Liver Oil/high Vitamin butter blend? We plan to soak up lots us vitamin D while we are there, so I am not sure if it is “necessary” to take along.
Also 2) do you recommend wearing sunscreen at all, if so what kind?
Thank you!
Answer
When my husband went to Hawaii a couple years ago, we packed our cod liver oil capsules. We took a lot of capsules each day in an effort to avoid getting sunburned. Amazingly, we did not burn the entire trip, and I normally always burn. We drove around the island all day in a convertible with our skin exposed and went snorkeling for a few hours and no sunburn. Read about it here.
I think the other thing that helped was we were eating seafood for 2-3 meals per day. Click here to read about what we ate. Both seafood and cod liver oil are very rich in omega 3 fatty acids which have been shown to reduce the risk of sunburn.
I don’t recommend wearing sunscreen unless you are starting to burn. Why? For one thing, most sunscreens are carcinogenic. Also, sunscreen actually blocks the absorption of vitamin D. However, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to pack a natural, non-toxic sunscreen in case you are starting to burn and want to protect sensitive areas such as your nose and shoulders.
That said, I think it’s better just to cover up with a hat and cover-up. But if you have kids, for example, who don’t want to get out of the water, a non-toxic sunscreen is a good thing to use if they are starting to get too pink.
You can look for safe sunscreens by searching on the Skin Deep website.
4. Question: Is There A Technique To Help With Gag Relfex While Oil Pulling?
Hi.
My holistic dentist recommended oil pulling. She said either sesame oil or olive oil. I have tried it a few times (with each oil) but I have a real active gag reflex and after about 2 minutes I feel like I am going to throw up and have to spit it out (is it good to have it go down the pipes or will it clog it?). I am supposed to work up to 20 minutes.
I feel like I am never going to make it. Is 2 minutes better than none? Is there a technique to help with the gag reflex? Help!
Thanks,
Susan
Answer
If you don’t enjoy doing it, I would not do it. There are other ways to detoxify, such as coffee enemas or juicing.
And yeah, I’d say 2 minutes is better than none. But I would not do it if I didn’t like it. Life is too short to suffer for the sake of your health.
5. Question: What Is The Best Way To Build Back My Gut Lining?
Hi there.
I’ve been GFCF since 2004 and on GAPS for 11 months, really still sort of on the intro diet as I still can’t do raw veggies except in juice, and I can’t tolerate any fruit/sugar. I just got test results through Diagnos-Techs that show I have essentially no intestinal secretory IgA / gut lining, which probably explains the psoriasis that came on a month or two after my daughter was born (at home, in August 2010. Same thing happened after my son was born via c-section in March 2006 and lasted until he was two – more on a blog post I just put up at http://crunchychewymama.com/index.php/my-gut-she-leaks/ )
Anyway, my question is, in addition to L-Glutamine, what is the best way to build back my gut lining? I have been strict to GAPS in terms of excluding stuff, but I have slacked on the organ meats and lard, etc. Baby is still nursing (17 mos) and still waking some in the night. Test also showed some bacteria but no parasites, and very low pancreatic enzyme activity. Oh, and Casein and Gliadin Ab SIgA — no surprise.
Thanks!
Jessica
Answer
Colostrum but if you are allergic to dairy, sounds like you can’t do that. Perhaps you could try fermenting the colostrum and see if you can tolerate it. Bone broth and gelatin powder are the other things that will heal and seal the gut lining.
I am curious if you have had your thyroid tested. Also curious about your body temperature. Psoraisis is quite common for people who are hypothyroid. And it sounds like you are eating a super-low carb diet, which would exacerbate hypothyroidism.
What are you eating? I think 11 months is way, way too long to be on the intro diet. What kind of symptoms do you get when you eat fruit? Dr. Natasha recommends that we keep pushing through and keep introducing new foods instead of avoiding them for extended periods of time.
Please comment with your answers below.
6. Question: Recommendations For A Nourishing Oil To Use On Massage Patients?
Hi Ann Marie,
I am a sports massage practitioner in the UK. Having recently converted to traditional food, I am now concerned about finding a nourishing oil to use for massage patients.
My concerns are:
What is the omega 3 to omega 6 ratio or the supposedly good oils for massage (sweet almond/ blend oils)? Understanding if this is important when just massaging with oil and not consuming it?
For my baby I use cold pressed organic olive oil. But the smell would be too ‘edible’ and cheap for my work.
In England we have this supplier: http://www.nhrorganicoils.com/products.php?category_id=762 Would you recommend anything they have on offer?
Thanks for your time with this.
Thanks also for the hard work you do.
Natasha
Answer
The skin does absorb the oils we use.
I would use coconut oil. Coconut oil is the healthiest option. Expeller-pressed coconut oil has no odor. It’s also a lot less expensive.
Olive oil would be fine, too. Ghee would also be very healthy (and has a long shelf life) but people may not like smelling like butter.
7. Question: Advice On Unhealthy Flora / Best Diet For Breastfeeding?
Hi,
I have a few questions relating to my pregnancy. The first is that today I found out that I am positive for group b strep. My midwife is pretty easy going and said that either I can take amoxicillin orally for 48 hours, taking it every two hours for that time period. Or I can wait to see when my water breaks, and possibly not take anything if it doesn’t break until labor (and if it does break in advance, taking antibiotics then).
Since I have already put far too many antibiotics in my system and am working on my gut health, I am leaning towards the second option. I am 38 weeks and dilating fairly quickly. Do you know of any good immediate things I can do to improve my vaginal flora? I am already taking probiotics orally and drinking kefir and kombucha daily. I just began inserting a probiotic into the vagina.
I’ve been wondering if there is a way to test for other harmful bacterias, or test the area in general to see if you have GAPS. Is that possible? Or is it more, watching for symptoms of unhealthy flora?
My other question is, if I think that I have GAPS, and know that my partner has GAPS, what is the best diet for breastfeeding? I am going to try to follow Dr. Campbell-McBride’s recommendations for introducing foods, but I haven’t come across anything about what to eat while breastfeeding. I wasn’t able to follow a GAPS diet while pregnant, but tried to do as much as possible. Should I begin that ASAP?
Any insight would be really helpful.
Thanks for the help.
Megan
Answer
I’m not a midwife or a doctor so I can’t advise you what to do. I personally try to avoid antibiotics as much as possible but I do take them when they are medically necessary.
Which probiotic are you using? Most probiotics do not work in my experience. See my answer above to question #2.
There is no good test to find out if you need the GAPS Diet. The only way to tell is to do the elimination diet (or “intro diet”) for a few weeks and see if it helps you and how you react to reintroducing the foods you avoided. Unfortunately I don’t recommend doing that because you are pregnant.
If you know you have issues with gluten or dairy, I’d avoid those foods and eat the Full GAPS diet or just a regular WAPF diet without the gluten and/or dairy.
Therapeutic grade probiotics are key. Whatever you eat, it’s essential that you eat enough, and carbs in particular. I see a lot of people on GAPS being too restrictive (such as avoiding fruit, honey and other carbohydrates) and I don’t think that is wise, particularly when you are pregnant and/or nursing.
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{ 23 comments… read them below or add one }
Thanks so much for your reply, Ann Marie! I’ll try to answer your questions.
In July (so now 8 mos ago), my thyroid was a little low (T3 at 2.1, where “normal” starts at 2.3), but my TSH hadn’t risen yet (1.94). My TPO was elevated to 149, indicating Hashimoto’s acting up. I had Graves’ (hyperthyroidism) in 2004 but treated it with meds, diet and complementary medicine. After my son was born in 2006, I went hypo but treated it with Standard Process Prolamine Iodine and some other supplements, which, if I recall, included Thyrophin PMG and A-F Betafood, per a naturopath’s recommendations. My second child was born in August 2010. I didn’t get any postpartum bloodwork until July 2011 when I was feeling pretty bad. I hadn’t been napping like I did with my first child and am pretty clear that my adrenals are tapped out!
After these July results (which also showed my cholesterol at 451), I went to a chiropractor who uses Applied Kinesiology and other modalities. This was not the same doc as 2006, but she muscle-tested me for some of the same stuff: Thytrophin PMG, A-F Betafood, Cataplex A-C-P, and a B vitamin. I did start to feel a lot better in just a week or two, and I was much better through the fall. But then I took on a volunteer project, which was fun and rewarding, but apparently also draining. That wrapped up in January, just after I did the test that showed no SIgA and low pancreatic enzyme activity.
After that, she put me on L-Glutamine and Thorne’s Colostrum, which doesn’t say casein-free but she researched before ordering and determined it would be safe for me. It has not caused any problems. She said she’s found that in some patients, the bad bugs actually feed off of probiotics and that she’s not testing (energetically) that I should take a probiotic. I’m on goldenseal and another Standard Process herb for the bacteria and making sure to eat lots of garlic. There’s another supplement from SP – Dermaco – that she wanted me on but said the nursing baby (now toddler) couldn’t tolerate. I’m considering weaning when she is two if I’m not better.
What I eat: I juice in the morning, usually carrot, lettuce, parsley, celery and sometimes beet and kale. I was doing some lemon during a cold but that seemed to upset my stomach. After an hour or so, I eat an egg or two cooked in lard or coconut oil, whatever meat I have leftover – usually roasted chicken or roasted, stewed or ground beef, sometimes salmon – and sautéed-ish/steamed (w/broth) veggies. I drink broth (usually chicken) with onion, carrot and celery. I usually have sauerkraut and sometimes add olive oil (love that Chaffin Orchards!) I might also eat some nut flour “bread” – half the time made just with packaged almond flour, the other half with crispy nut flour I’ve made myself. If I’m still hungry, I might eat some crispy nuts or a spoonful of coconut butter. I might drink a very little kombucha or Kevita with water.
Lunch and dinner are similar – meat and cooked veggies, broth, maybe nuts or nut “bread.” I take fermented CLO – supposed to be twice a day but often I just get once.
If I eat raw foods, I usually end up with cramping and an unpleasant experience (or several of them) in bathroom. It’s clear I’m just not digesting stuff with lots of fiber. Without going all TMI, lately things have firmed up, shall we say, so I’m thinking I can try a little raw stuff. Cucumber seems okay (if totally not seasonal!)
Fruit… Well, similar problems on the output – cramping, loose – but also I feel like any sugar at all just creates more mood highs and lows. And I have a hard time just stopping with a few bites of something; it’s a little addictive. So it’s easier to just not eat any; a little can quickly become too much and then I have to ignore my children so I can sit on the toilet and then be moody besides! When I started GAPS, Monica Corrado (of Simply Being Well) recommended I stay off all fruit for several weeks. I tried some in the summer – hard not to when things were in season! – but it always seemed like the more I had, the more I wanted and then got to feeling bad. This chiro muscle-tested that I should just stay off all fruit until things improve. In a few weeks, I’m seeing another practitioner that helped another friend on GAPS with allergies. Maybe I have a fructose sensitivity we can clear. With the compromised pancreatic enzyme activity, it seemed like maybe my body just can’t break it down (and blood sugar always comes up whenever I get energy work).
I had stopped taking the B vitamin for a while but last weekend took just a few drops of the Premier Research Labs B and feel like it helped a lot. Unfortunately, it seemed like it also wired the baby, so I continue to search for balance in taking care of me and of her.
After your comments to me on your GAPS myth post, I’ve taken my temp a handful of times, and it’s usually between 97.0 and 97.4. I haven’t looked at my BBT; I’m still not cycling at 19 mos (didn’t until 29 mos after my son was born). I’ll try to start a temp chart. When I had Graves in 2004, my temp should have been elevated but was low b/c of the adrenal fatigue. I think we might have gotten it up some but am not sure if I kept that info.
A little boy has now climbed into my lap, so I’ll go ahead and post and await your and your readers’ insight! Thank you!
Jessica
“She said she’s found that in some patients, the bad bugs actually feed off of probiotics and that she’s not testing (energetically) that I should take a probiotic.”
I’ve never heard this before from anyone. Bad bugs do not feed off of probiotics — that’s false. Good bugs kill the bad bugs. You need more good bugs to get rid of the bad bugs.
Good gut flora have a few different jobs. One of their jobs is to kill off the bad bugs. Another one of their jobs is to strengthen and reinforce the gut lining. So adding good gut flora is critical to healing a leaky gut.
“It’s clear I’m just not digesting stuff with lots of fiber.”
When you eat too low carb, your thyroid downregulates and your digestion gets more sluggish.
“Fruit… Well, similar problems on the output – cramping, loose – but also I feel like any sugar at all just creates more mood highs and lows. And I have a hard time just stopping with a few bites of something; it’s a little addictive.”
It may feel addictive because your body is craving carbs! If I ate as low-carb like you are, I’d crave fruit and other carbs as well. I don’t think it’s addictive — I think it may be your body craving what it needs.
The number one reason I see people not getting better on GAPS is because they are not taking a therapeutic grade probiotic. They’re either not taking a probiotic at all, not taking a good brand, or they are not taking enough of it.
Dr. Campbell-McBride makes it very clear that fermented foods are necessary pretty much from the beginning of the diet *in addition to* a therapeutic-grade probiotic. If you aren’t getting better and have to stay on the intro diet, my guess is this is why.
So if I were you’d I’d get on Biokult or Threelac or GutPro — those are the 3 therapeutic grade probiotics that I know of. Start slow, as little as 1/10th of a capsule per day. And slowly build up. As you rebuild the good gut flora population in your gut, you should find that you can tolerate more foods. As you can tolerate more foods, try adding in kefir, yogurt (24 hour ferment) and sour cream.
I’d add more carby GAPS food to your diet — including fruit, squash, honey and date sugar. If you can’t find date sugar with no additives (sometimes they add oat flour so read the ingredients), you can make your own by dehydrating dates and grinding them.
If you can’t tolerate raw fruit, eat stewed fruit, like peaches or apples or bananas saueteed in coconut oil or ghee. You can also make homemade jam with stewed fruit. I have a recipe for crock pot apple butter in my GAPS Diet cooking class. If I were you, I’d be eating jam and stewed fruit on my nut bread every day. You could also try eating baked squash such as butternut squash with coconut oil or ghee with date sugar or honey.
I wouldn’t worry about trying to introduce raw veggies yet. Build up the good gut flora first. As your gut heals and seals, you will be able to tolerate food that are harder to digest. It’s kind of like feeding a baby. In the beginning, they do best on cooked meats and broth. Slowly you start introducing stewed and cooked veggies and fruits with plenty of fat. Babies don’t do well with raw veggies for a while.
Finally, please don’t worry about trying to stay “in season” with foods. My goodness, your diet is already SUPER restricted as it is!
Hi Jessica,
Just wanted to mention that nutritional yeast flakes are a great source of vitamin B’s and they don’t cause a hyper kid
> I’m a nursing mama so know what you mean about vitamins passing through and making kid wired.
Hope that helps!
Genevieve
Beta Strep is one of the few things I will absolutely take antibiotics for. It can be deadly for the baby!
Quick thought on the UTI situation. While she’s waiting for the probiotics to colonize her digestive and urinary tract, as an immediate help, she might want to consider using d-Mannose. It is a natural supplement (powder you mix with water and drink) that prevents the bacteria from adhering to the bladder wall, so that is is easily flushed out of the bladder. A friend of mine had recurring UTI’s, and after repeating several courses of antibiotics, to no avail, she went to the local health food store, looking for something that could help. The lady working at the store recommended D-Mannose, and when my friend used it, it quickly cleared the infection up and it (finally) didn’t return.
I too used to suffer from recurring problems in my “lady bits”. I finally got on a good probiotic and have not had one problem since. It’s been 3 years! Actually I did have one UTI when I went to Costa Rica and did not bring my probiotics with me as they had to be refrigerated…But still, that seems to solidify that the probiotics really have made a difference. The brand i take is renew life, they have one specifically for womens issues. Poor thing, I hope she gets better, it’s really hell dealing with that
When I tested positive for strep b, my midwife had me take a douche with betadine in it when I went into labor. You might ask about that option. The thing about standard protocols for delivering babies is that conventional medicine is always trying to scare the consumer and the consumer should really question everything
I tested positive for Strep B and with my highly medicalized birth of my first son I was pumped with antibiotics every 3-4 hrs during my 24 hour induction. It was horrible. And I believe the reason my son has eczema. Anyone I talk to who was treated with antibiotics during labor has a child with eczema. When i was pregnant with my daugther 3 years later I still tested positive for Streb B, but ate lots of probiotic food and drank lots of kombucha along with my WAPF diet and put biokult probiotics in my vagina once a week. My birth 3 years later was 100% natural and I arrived at the hospital 10 minutes before she was born so there was no time to even put a needle in me or anything, and had there been time I would have refused antibiotics. She was born 100% healthy and she does not have any eczema. There is lot’s of research done that the antibiotics don’t even help with Strep B infection. Here is a really good post about it: http://www.thehealthyhomeeconomist.com/to-strep-b-or-not-to-strep-b-that-is/
@Mallory,
UTIs can be very painful. I’ve had them and always take antibiotics for them because they can lead to other very serious problems. And, I understand the pain! Mine were always very, very painful; in fact, I’d pee blood which is just scary. So that is the one time when I said yes to antibiotics.
That said, I’ve never had recurring ones like your step sister has. If I were her, I’d cut out all sugar for a while and maybe grains and starches if she will do that. I’d replace sugar cranberry juice with unsweetened which probably tastes horrible. You can also get cranberry pills. I’ve also done Uvi Ursi tincture before. And she should probably put a good probiotic up her vagina if she’s up for it, at least she should take some orally.
It sounds like she needs to get things under control. Once she does, she’ll probably be able to eat fruit and other carbs, but she might need to see what she’s sensitive too. I would not take anything for the yeast infections even though I would take something for the UTIs, but that is just me. Good luck. I feel for her.
Anyway, if I had her problem, that’s what I’d do.
I am not a doctor either, but we use herbs, foods, essential oils, and other things for what ails us. In the case of UTI’s one can take Juniper Berries (capsule form or as tea) or Cranberry Leaf Extract (capsule form) as both will help rid oneself of an UTI. Corn silk tea is also good for flushing the kidneys. I always take 5 capsules of the cranberry leaf extract 3 x’s per day for several days and it is knocked out easily.
My daughter tested positive for Strep B while pregnant for her son who will soon be 2 years old, and she refused to take antibiotics with him. She used some natural items to douche with (garlic tea made with 3 whole cloves of garlic 3 x’s per day~ YES! You will smell like garlic!), and some other items I can’t remember that she had researched. She had her baby at home (unassisited) then went to the hospital and just said he came ‘too soon’ so that she could not be charged with ‘child endangering’. He was healthy as a horse and so was she. This time around she has hired a midwife and is planning a home birth without all the interventions she experienced at the hospital (including the ‘prenatal care’). She will enjoy another water birth with this baby.
As for sunscreen, I have found that organic coconut oil works wonders. I am fair-skinned and burn easily. I must mow my great-aunt’s 1/2 acre lot once a week from April to Oct and I sometimes must do this during the hottest and sunniest time of the day (mid afternoon), which leaves me vulnerable to burns. As long as I slather coconut oil on liberally I do not burn. The only time I burned (slightly pink) last year was when I did not put enough oil on my nose! I use coconut oil for so many things!!!
Hope all this helps.
Blessings~
Lori
I use something called D-Mannose for UTIs and I haven’t had to go on antibiotics. I start taking at the very first tiny sign of a yeast infections. Also, I have been taking and eating probiotics. So far I haven’t had another!
Oops! I meant UTI not yeast infections that second time!
“If it were me, I’d stop the antibiotics and get on a therapeutic grade probiotic. Not all probiotics are the same and the vast majority of them do not work.”
You really don’t want to stop taking antibiotics in the middle of a prescribed course of antibiotics. You can wind up breeding antibiotic-resistant bacteria in your body, which surely no one wants.
Either opt not to do the antibiotics from the start or finish the entire course. Either way, you could use probiotics, although you’d want to wait to finish any antibiotics you’re on first.
My advice to those trying to heal their gut:
You might think that the problem isn’t probiotics because you’re already taking them, but if you’re not seeing progress TAKE MORE. I had/have digestive issues, psoriasis, eczema, etc. that is in remission thanks to massive amounts of probiotics. I take an entire sheet of biokult *per day*, in addition to fermented foods. Gaps diet made my skin worse (including intro). I’m now on the Perfect health diet. PHD is good, but the probiotics really are what make the difference. I have seen signs that indicate that I will be able to cut down once I reach a certain level of healing. I wish I had known that a longgg time ago.
I have many years of home birth midwifery training. My midwife mentor and I would treat group B strep positive moms with probiotics, orally and vaginally, garlic, echinaceae tincture, oregon grape root tincture, and usnea tincture, (orally). We would then retest 2-3 weeks later, as time allowed. Most of the women retested negative. For those who did not test negative, we watched the baby closely for any signs of infection/distress and would transport to a nearby NICU should those symptoms present. It is important to understand that many women carry Strep B vaginally with no symptoms. It can come and go on it’s own as well. The baby can also carry it asymtomatically. It is rare, but definietely serious, when a baby becomes ill with GBS. But know that antibiotics prenatally or in labor has many of it’s own risks as well. These are personal decisions to weigh out. Do know that you have the right to make your own decisions in you and your babies health, and no one should get pressured into anything that does not feel right for oneself.
On a separate note regarding Vitamin b12, injections are a common way to increase levels and that would bypass the need for a sublingual.
my uti symptoms go away in about 0.2 seconds when i take 1/4-1/2 tsp. baking soda in some liquid. and i used to get chronic utis….
to Jessica I would politely suggest adding in some carbs/healing your metabolism ala Matt Stone….we were on GAPS for well over a year and were only getting worse/more allergies/more symptoms. aka my thyroid was starting to crap out. We were on GAPS for food allergies. 15 to be exact, none of which were healed on GAPS. In about 4-5 weeks of loosely following Matt’s advice we’ve gotten rid of 3 allergies off the top. Just my two cents
Thanks for your answer. I’ll buy some refined coconut oil to use for my massages.
Natasha
Regarding Q#2, If it hasn’t been brought up yet, is she sexually active, with someone or even just herself? (I know, such an embarrassing conversation to have with a teen!) Because that partially could be a cause of reinfection if they are using lube, spermicide, not using proper hygiene, etc. Has the style of underwear been considered? Thongs and synthetics are not helpful at all. Traditional cotton underwear changed daily is best. What about menstural products? Tampons or pads? Scented or unscented? Try something as natural as you can get, unscented organic cotton, or even cloth pads.
I like the traditional medicinals brand tea called Cran-aid. It is quite bearable to drink unsweetened and should have similar affects as cranberry juice.
Hi!
Can you explain this quote (taken from answer 5 above). “And it sounds like you are eating a super-low carb diet, which would exacerbate hypothyroidism.”
I was under the impression low carb was good (GAPS Diet and traditional diets are low carb, aren’t they)? I have a thyroid problem, and have been trying to implement a lower carb type diet. Am I doing more bad than good?
Read this: http://www.cheeseslave.com/why-i-ditched-low-carb/
To the girl who wrote in about her step-sister suffering from the never ending cycle of UTI’s and yeast infections, I can SO RELATE! I suffered with this for years and have finally in the past year managed to get it somewhat under control. My doctor actually told me that I would need to be on some sort of low grade antibiotic for the rest of my life to control the problem. I pretty much had some sort of infection all the time. There’s no way my insurance would cover me working with a naturopathic doctor (though, in an ideal world that would have been my first step) but after LOTS of experimentation I figured out a system that finally kicked the infections.
Cranberry juice never worked for me. It may be working for her and if it does she should probably look into getting the cranberry pills and taking those to avoid the sugar content. If it’s not really helping though, taking Uva Ursi tablets (you can get them at Whole Foods) worked wonders for me. They couldn’t kick a full blown infection but when I felt one coming on I would start taking those and about 90% of the time I could avoid antibiotics that way. Uva usi works better if your system is basic (as opposed to acidic) so sometimes I would mix a spoonful of baking soda with water and drink that to help things along. The two regimens together are usually pretty effective. Marshmallow root is another herb that’s good for bladder infections. It has mucilaginous qualities which helps lubricate the lining of your bladder ( a good thing if it was constantly irritated like mine was). Hibiscus tea is also nice for soothing the bladder (and it’s delicious!).
Then, for prevention, I started taking really strong probiotics (like Anne Marie suggested) and trying to get fermented foods into my diet any way I could. I even started brewing my own kombucha, which was really helpful. This didn’t fix things quickly, but I can definitely feel it a year later. It’s important to keep it up despite any negative symptoms you’ll get initially. In my case, it gave me terrible acne.
The single thing thing that helped me the most though was taking fermented cod liver oil in large doses. I started off with the pills and eventually started taking the gelled oil straight. I noticed the biggest difference when I started taking it straight and I think it’s because the doses are larger. It’s not as bad as people say, if I hold my nose and swallow it with water I can’t even taste it. If I feel any sort of illness or infection coming on now, the first thing I do is take several tablespoons of the fclo. I only use the uva ursi tablets now in extreme cases.
I hope this helps!
-For those who are on antibiotics you can take a probiotic called “Florastor”- is is not affected by antibiotics as it feeds/proliferates the healthy yeast in your system. My holistic doc recommends it. http://www.pureformulas.com/florastor.html
-for problems digesting foods/low pancratic enzymes, have you tried supplementing w/ enzymes? Zypan by Standard Process, HCL with Pepsin, or vegetable based enzymes are good options. I take w/ every meal.
hope this helps!
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