How I cured my gastritis
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When I got diagnosed with mild gastritis (but no H. Pylori) and esophagitis, I looked all over the internet to find what to do. I did not find many accounts of people who have cured themselves successfully and how they did it. So I thought I would write my story once I am cured. Here it is. If you have cured yourself from gastritis too, please share your experience below as well.
Many people ask how long it takes to be cured. At first I started on dexilant for a month but I did not see any improvement. After a month I kept taking dexilant and I started the low acid diet in parallel. I got much better in 2-3 days. After two months on dexilant and one month on the diet, I felt completely good. Then I stopped the dexilant cold turkey and got a lot of pain and acidity back in my stomach. Now I regret I did not take the dexilant a little longer as my stomach was obviously not healed and not strong enough to go through the rebound effect of stopping dexilant. I regret also that I did not stop dexilant slowly taking it every other day for a week, then every three days for a week, .... I felt anxious about taking a medication that has so many side effects taken long term and I wanted to stop immediately, which was not reasonable.
Anyway there I was back at the beginning with stomach pain and acidity day and night. I felt pain related to the esophagitis as well which really scared me. I hesitated to take dexilant again but I decided to try to cure myself the natural way. Below I describe what I did. I got cured in approximately two months, getting slowly better week by week. After two months of natural cures I had no stomach pain anymore and no excess acid, I was able to sleep again, felt like a new healthy (and lighter -- I lost a few pounds) person. However after those two months, I felt that I needed to follow the diet another month for my stomach to get strong and be able to handle a less strict diet.
THE CURE
Books
Most of what I did is summarized in two books which I found very useful:
The first book is "Dropping acid: the reflux diet cookbook & cure" by Jamie Koufman. This is the book I based my diet on. The only disagreements I have with the author regard dairy products that I stopped taking as they make the stomach produce more acid (very clear for me), and the use of ginger, manukka honey and aloe vera which I find too irritating and/or acidic (and I don't feel that they help). Also she does not talk about salt which is known to be irritating for the stomach lining in excess, I felt an improvement when I lowered my intake in salt. I will explain the diet more in details below.
The other book is "Ulcer free! Nature's safe & effective remedy for ulcers" by G. Halpern. I know you may have gastritis and no ulcers but the two conditions are related and what cures one usually cures the other too. I used some of the natural supplements recommended in this book. In particular slippery elm (this one is actually not mentioned in the book) and DGL licorice for stomach pain (coat the interior of the stomach lining), Zinc-Carnosine (reduce inflammation and protects stomach lining - I felt a great improvement after starting to take it especially with acid production at night), and cabbage juice (finished my recovery with this one, after two days I had no stomach pain anymore at night). I describe the supplements more below.
What did not work for me
Mastic gum hurts my stomach. It is supposedly helpful against H. Pylori which I knew I did not have (I had been tested).
Prelief removes the acid in food and stomach very efficiently but causes constipation.
Tums works well for 45 minutes but then there is a rebound effect with the stomach producing more acid.
Manukka honey hurts my stomach (Too acidic, Ph level 4, but maybe also because of the tea tree essential oil in it). It is supposedly helpful against H. Pylori.
Aloe Vera is too acidic (around Ph level 4), and I don't feel it is doing anything positive.
Ginger is irritating and I don't feel it is doing anything positive.
Probiotics helps with digestion but not really for the stomach.
Zantac works very well at removing the acidity but makes me feel dizzy and incredibly tired.
PPI worked very well at removing the acidity and pain in my stomach while I was taking it while doing the diet, but I had a bad rebound effect when I stopped (one must stop slowly by taking it every other day for a while). Also having too low acid in the stomach because of PPI might cause problems in the long term (problems with Calcium and B12 absorption, bacterial infection more likely).
39 likes, 3077 replies
donclaudio ines6375
Posted
I have DGL (both chewables and capsules), Slippery Elm (both chewables and capsules) and 240 Doctors Best PepZin Gi in my stash of supplements.thanks ines6375...Claudio
ines6375 donclaudio
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I hope it helps.
I am not very familiar with the consequences of gall bladder removal but I read that a low fat high fiber diet is helpful. Low fat is also good for gastritis but for the fibers it is a little bit more trickly. From my experience rough fibers like wheat bran or in raw vegetables can be irritating to the stomach, but fibers from cooked vegetables, fruits, most cooked whole grains are ok for the stomach and they should be beneficial after gall bladder removal. I am not sure why the fibers are good after bladder removal, maybe because they trap the fat and/or the bile?
donclaudio ines6375
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slow cooking..2 plus hours..i.e. chicken/turkey...use ground turkey breast on occasion.
Lots and lots of all kinds of vegetables...have a garden..so all organics.
I am somewhat confident that PepzinGI, dgl, slippery elm will work...if I can keep her compliant for at least 2 months..preferably 3. She is Chinese..59 current weight is 98lbs...was 122lbs...has stablized at this weight..has energy, sleep normal...good apetite...so have some good basics in her favor. Again, thanks...claudio
matt85910 ines6375
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Every morning I get up and feel hungry, normal hunger pains, nothing extravagent pr mega painful, just the same as when youve missed a meal or something. I have my breakfast, and my probiotics and all is once again fine with the world. Then about 11am every morning, the stomach starts grinding and I feel really lethargic. I have something to eat, turkey / chicken sandwich, cereal, whatever I have it really makes no difference and I feel lousy for about 2-3 hours. I have something else to eat and then it starts to go off. By 4pm its gone off and I am back to normal again, I can eat, sultanas, bread, allsorts of things and its fine, I have my evening meal, cabbage, potatoes, white meat and beetroot usually and still all is fine, have a cup of tea and a few plain biscuits at about 8pm and still all is fine. Goto bed at about 9pm and thats it, next day same thing...... does your body do something at that time of day, as it also always seems that if I am goto the loo for a 10-200 thats when it will be. Its V strange.
Sfter the side effects of the triple therapy wore off, things were great for about 10 days, then this started. Any ideas?
ines6375 matt85910
Posted
I am glad to hear that you are feeling better overall and the fact that you are hungry in the morning is a good sign. I don't know about the feeling you experience midday. What do you mean by lousy? Do you suspect the h. pylori is back? I don't know what is the success rate of the triple therapy.
Probiotics can give momentarily some gas and bloating, you could try one day without it to check if they are the cause. Do you eat the cabbage and beets raw or cooked? Raw cabbage makes me feel lousy/tired, and I find raw beets irritating. Also around midday everybody has a drop of hormons that makes us tired around nap time. One last idea: have you tried eating what you eat at dinner but at lunch?
I am feeling better too. I switched to 30 mg dexilant 9 days ago and still no pain or anything. I started eating more fat and some more acidic fruits in small quantities and my stomach is very forgiving. I have no pain at all anymore.
matt85910 ines6375
Posted
cabbage and beets are cooked, raw would drive me mad lol. Im hoping it is something else other than the h py. as I have been without drugs since the end of the trip therapy. Its nowhere near as bad as it was before I had the trip ther. but I was hoping it would have stayed gone like it appeared to be a week ago. Ive not changed my diet at all in the meantime so I know its not that, Ive been very very good, nothing fatty at all, none of my favourites, even though I still dream anout steak pie! lol. Going to the Dr tonight to see what nuggets he can come up with.
donclaudio ines6375
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matt85910 ines6375
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romanqueen82063 matt85910
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matt85910 romanqueen82063
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ines6375 matt85910
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I tried Zantac twice, it works but I don't like it because it makes me feel dizzy. But if you can tolerate it, it is better than the PPI because there is no rebound effect when you stop.
donclaudio matt85910
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Ines6375 experienced "dizzyness" this is one of the side effects of Zantac...please check out the others should any surface expecially loss of concentration....could present a problem subject to when it happens.like performing some tasks....claudio
ali63625 matt85910
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fellios matt85910
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How is your health now?
Can you please expound on what you mean by stomach grinding as well as your lethargic and lousy feeling?
romanqueen82063 ines6375
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ines6375 romanqueen82063
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Raw apple cider vinegar is to help with acid reflux due to lack of stomach acid. Some also think that it helps regulate the digestive flora. But it is NOT recommended for gastritis. The problem is that it is very irritating to the stomach lining and it would hurt a lot to consume it. I used to be in pain when eating something slightly acidic, I can't imagine taking apple cider. I actually had pain with aloe vera in water, which is ph level 4 which is nothing compared to the ph level of apple cider vinegar which is 2.4. Moreover gastritis usually goes hand in hand with excess acid, so there is no need to add more acid.
About fasting I do not recommend it. The problem is that gastritis is not cured in one day. I takes weeks to feel an improvement, months to be completely cured. You can't fast for so long. So you need to find something you can do over a long time which is medication and diet. Moreover fasting weakens the body and makes it consume its own muscles etc, really not recommended. And another problem with fasting is that after a few days, you get really hungry and then it is really hard to control what you eat and stick to a diet, and you are more likely to eat things that are irritating and hurt your stomach lining. Eating one meal a day is not good either because you are going to be so hungry that you will eat too much, it is going to be hard to digest, cause reflux, ... and if you don't eat too much at that one meal you are going to weaken yourself. The best is to eat normal size meals throughout the day. I eat breakfast, lunch, snack and early dinner (6 pm is best, so 5 hours before sleep).
romanqueen82063 ines6375
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sheny1979 romanqueen82063
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ines6375 sheny1979
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donclaudio ines6375
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need some help...Dexilant it was introduced here in 2008 or 2009, Takeda modifed it with an MR..(Modified Release)....prescribed for the "management" of erosive esophagitis and and for nonerosive reflux disease
My understanding it has a dual delayed-release delivery system, and "PH" programmed..first in the duodenam, and then in the small intestine. It can be taken anytime ....Is your Dexilant the same? We may have different formula/s?? and thanks...Claudio
ines6375 donclaudio
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My doctor said indeed that dexilant can be taken anytime. I tried morning and evening just to check if there is a difference and for me it seems to be working better if I take it in the morning. But it should not make a difference.
donclaudio ines6375
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what prompted me to ask was the unique delivery...my guess without a study would be ...first. coat for timed release, to duedenum, 2nd coat
released into small intestine ph released.
Would appear to be somewhat difficult to reduce 30mg pill....perhaps you meant reduce by maybe taking 30 mg every other day?
There are many on this and other forums who believe their onset was caused by an "antibiotic". Could be either cause or trigger.
If I would modify the probable causes..by rank..this might be on top or very near.after toxin insult/s..although an antibiotic ..especially a broad spectrum "imo" could be considered a toxin. Claudio
Claudio
ines6375 donclaudio
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I was thinking of the antibiotic because I read a study of bacteria in the esophagus. They study the bacteria living in a healthy esophagus and bacteria living in an inflammed esophagus. They found out that the bacterial flora was different. They don't know if it is a cause or a consequence of the inflammation. The problem is that the antibiotics wipe out all the bacteria and afterwards the balance of bacteria is disturbed for a while. These kind of researches are very interesting but they are still at the beginning. Anyway in my case I blame more my previous diet and stress.
donclaudio ines6375
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pepsin is the errosive enzyme and not acid, and I think the enzyme once flushed up can remain "inactive" due to ph...but can be immediately reactivated with acid. Gaviscon puts a raft on top thus preventing acid from pepsin contact that would "activate" pepsin...just a thought...so your thinking on kinds of foods may be quite valid for esophagus.insults....Claudio