may I present my case to you. It has been puzzling me for so long I don't even really know where or how to start... anyways, it all starts about two years ago. I had finally gotten my shit together, did some sport, ate healthy, and lost 60lbs (210->150). Man, that felt good! I also tried some weird diets like low-carb and gluten free to get there. This is when I developed problems. I originally put it off as being part of the low-carb thing, never thought much about it. But now, I would feel very weak often, and started going to unitversity less and less until I eventually decided not to go at all anymore. I just couldn't do it. I didn't feel right.
My solution was to work my ass off the rest of the semester, move to a different city, and try it again. Here I am. Still feeling shit. But this time, if I don't solve it, I don't know what to do with myself. In the meantime, I have also developed depression and was feeling much more shitty than ever before.
So, I tried some things. Vitamin D helped really well against the depression (win!). However, my main symptom is still there. I don't really know how to put it in words. Basically, my stomach is killing me. But it's not like the pain is localised there: I get intense headaches, my muscles hurt. I can't think. I have also noticed that my breath and urine smell funny, and sometimes in the morning I have this intense bacteria-fungus-whatever taste. I can't sleep well, which probably causes 90% of my problems. I can only describe it as being "like an infection", because I feel sick in a similar general way, without it getting (much) better.
I'm trying to juggle university, working, and making new friends, but I can't do it like this. The pains are unpredictable, come and go apparently randomly. I don't seem to react to one kind of food over another. But it is linked to eating somehow. I try to drink as much as I can.
Alcohol is a bit of a strange thing for me. Sometimes, after drinking alcohol, I have to spend the next couple of days with pains I don't even want to try to remember. On other times, alcohol seems to even help somehow, especially when I take a PPI just before going to bed. I don't know what's going on, might have to do with the disinfecting properties of alcohol.
My doctor is prescribing me a PPI, which is an odd thing. It works in general, but I feel strange when I take it, and I've had adverse reactions (like feeling extremely dizzy and sick) that I attribute to it. I am also having an endoscopy in two weeks. It was actually scheduled later but I called them randomly when I was having bad pain and told them I can't wait that long. They re-scheduled it
The doctor at the gastro clinic where I have my endoscopy in two weeks — a really old, funny dude — told me he thinks it's probably Helicobacter pylori, especially since I lived in Asia for a couple of years. I have done some research, but I can't seem to find much information about the typical symptoms. I will know for sure in two weeks, but it would make a lot of sense, seeing that I have had all this stomach trouble, but I haven't once had diarrhoea, which Helicobacter seems to inhibit (it doesn't want to get flushed down). Also, alcohol making my situation much worse or much better temporarily also supports the thesis that it could be an infection, since alcohol weakens the immune system but also disinfects.
I've also heard of a case from Turkey where Helicobacter and Candida were working in some kind of synergy. Since I also found an article that Candida, if found in the stomach, can also be found in the blood, I had the hypothesis that that might explain my headaches and that Candida is weakening my immune system somehow. I dunno, I don't know shit about medicine. These are all just random-ass hypotheses created while being in a lot of pain and desperately scraping google for anything of interest.
Anyways, what do you guys think. Does it sound like a case of Helicobacter to you, from the symptoms? Does anyone have similar experiences? Does anyone have a tip on how I can get better? I already thought about nuking my stomach, which sounded like a good idea while I was in pain but might in fact make matters worse
Cheers, Mike