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).

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  • Posted

    Diagnosed with Gastitis last year. Now I have polyps on my gallbladder.

    any advice? Pain is dreadful, feel sick all the time. Weight loss. Need to feel normal.

     

    • Posted

      How old you are ? What's the biopsy report of your stomach ? For gallbladder you should get it removed soon.
    • Posted

      Jayne,

      Muhammad is correct...my take is that even small ones can grow,

      and present problems...and frequent ultrasounds to "monitor" are

      only anxiety boosters. The gold standard "lap" is fast, quick recovery, and minimum complicatiions..., surgery center vs hospital, just choose a good surgeon. It took us a few weeks to chase down what we considered was our best shot..and he was as good as any can be. A tall, mild mannered Chinese Dr. from Taiwan (former professor)...we paid cash for the surgery center/anestheologist/dr...about $6K...Post surrgey recovery protocol is important to avoid "adhesions".

      Claudio

    • Posted

      Got appointment 6 March, to see consultant. going to ring Monday, see if I pay they can see me quicker. Thanks for your advice x
    • Posted

      I'm 57. Biopsy on stomach was Gastitis. No H pylori. 

      Yes I definitely want rid of gallbladder. Fed up with being in pain.

    • Posted

      I would exhaust all other options before removing gallbladder. I've heard that it has long-term consequences ie fatty acid (omega 3) defieciencies and colon cancer (which occurs on the opposite side of the colon from which the bile is now continually secreted and exposed to). I also know someone who now has fibromyalgia that developed several years post gallbladder surgery, perhaps coincidence just saying.
    • Posted

      Hi Jayne,

      I could find no evidence whatsoever in the scientific community of any of the remarks made by Deb....Scientific Community means "world wide" not just down town ny/london. There is not another"SAFE"  option known today...some suggest  frequent (EUS) monitoring.??

      The bile duct, cystic, and blood supply ports are first identified , titanium clipped and then cut, evaluated. Removal then takes place, and a reevaluation of the clips before surgery termination.

      cholecystectomy is the 2nd most common surgeries in the US...complications...first two weeks of loose stools. Any other complication equals that of a dental tooth removal..

      Neither Deb nor any known scientist in this field can guarantee polyps will remain benign.At one time it was "size", then ""growth", and lastly 

      Sessile morphology...controversy as to which ones will and which ones will not?? difficult because even small change...and EUS cannot easily ID changes when the polyp/s are less than 1mm.

      There is a saying..a measured risk for a measured gain...its a question you might ask your dr?

      , spoke earlier with Ann, she said "Nick suggested you take resveratrol 100mg x 1 daily for one week, following week x 2, and third week x 3...add 100 to 250mg of Milk Thistle pre bedtime daily.

      I'll PM you with the medical studies of these two so you can choose with prudence...btw...took us nearly a year for gastritis to resolve post surgery....Claudio

    • Posted

      Thank you so much Claudio. You are so knowledgeable. I do not want to chance leaving the gallbladder in, I would worry all the time about the polyps growing. Besides which the pain at the moment is dreadful. I think the gastritis is healing but it's hard to tell at the moment because all my stomach is painful. 

      I hope your wife is keeping well x

    • Posted

      I don't consider myself "knowledgeable"..I do try to keep informed...I once had a younger brother who was "knowledgeable" but he passed away from ALS..so no longer have a "sounding board" and must reach out to connections in Japan, and China plus I subscribed to 2 medical journals.

      Recall easily at one time wife could not "move" around..each step down our stairway was "painful" amd ,more than a few times "tears". I used a lot of natural anti inflammatory type supplements..theracumin, quercetin, bromalain, natto kinase, berberine, and others..don't know if one or the combo worked because I used so many.

      Just hope your pains vanish quickly. What really helped was DGL...and when it seemed to wane we used slippery elm...then back to DGL...suspect the body adjusts to these sorts of supplements, therefore cycling them would help their benefits. Claudio

       

    • Posted

      Jayne, forgot, I used l glutamine 2 g at least twice a day....while our Gi was clueless, oncologists use this via IV to help repair stomach lining from the harshness of chemo...claudio
    • Posted

      Hi don , can u tell where U get this glutamine whixh form is avaloable in market the best one ?
    • Posted

      Hi Muhammad,

      difficult to know "best"... I've used the MND forum for sources, but if I mention them, the moderators will delete.

      So will need to send them to you via PM...Claudio

    • Posted

      this thing is acting up.

      I will get some slippery elm on Monday. Thank you 

    • Posted

      Slippery elm helps me alot. I using Now brand. My stools look so good now and lesser pain.
    • Posted

      I agree with Deb, my sister in law just removed her gallbladder because she had gallbladder attacks and now she has terrible acid reflux problems, stomach pain and is worse than before.

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