Ten years. That’s exactly how many days have passed since I decided at Christmas to finally find out what is causing the half-yearly abdominal problems and diarrhea. Three months later, it turned out that a tropical parasite, Entamoeba Histolytica (1) had caused my complaints.
Everybody has a story. Now you can read mine, which is about how I got rid of the symptoms of dysbiosis and several other intestinal infections, including histamine intolerance, after this dangerous parasitic infection.
Ten years ago I ate a salad at a canteen of a spring conference. When I got home, I was sure that something terrible had happened. I couldn’t get out of the bathroom for hours. My life has radically changed since that day. It took me ten months to discover that this dangerous parasite caused my symptoms.
Fecal fertilization is standard in the Mediterranean or Tropical zone. In early spring, most of the vegetables are imported from these areas.
Entamoeba Hystolitica spreads with feces and can travel in cystic form for a long time, for example, on the surface of a cucumber, and can’t be washed off.
You can eat the cyst of the parasite mainly with contaminated vegetables or drink it with water. My symptoms started 1 hour after I ate the salad containing imported, unpeeled cucumber.
Symptoms
The symptoms can include loose stools, stomach pain, cramping, less frequent bloody stools, and fever. In some cases, this amoeba penetrates the liver, lung, or brain and forms an abscess, which is very uncommon.
Due to the cystic reproduction of the parasite, it is excreted from the body intermittently, i.e., when it develops, it usually causes symptoms when it is designed and can be tested in the stool. The symptoms depend on the extent of the infection.
Treatment
The treatment is Metronidazole and/or Tinidazole for amoebiasis. I had to take high doses of Metronidazole for ten days. The drastic extermination of this parasite has had consequences for years. I took a high amount of antibiotics, but I didn’t take any probiotics with it. Before this happened, I had been entirely healthy; I didn’t think ten days of antibiotics would determine my life that much for the next ten years.
After eight days of taking Metronidazole, I started to feel dizzy one night. The parasite caused sudden dizziness anyway; I thought it was the side effect of the medicine killing them. My heart was beating very hard, I had pain in my chest, I couldn’t sleep, and I realized that my tongue was blackened in the morning.
…and what followed
Dysbiosis
Intestinal dysbiosis has developed due to the high-dose oral antibiotic. I was sent to abdominal and brain CT to be sure that Entamoeba had not attacked my liver or brain.
Salmonella
4 weeks after the Metronidazole treatment, I had become infected with Salmonella. I had to take Sulfamethoxazole to treat the infection.
Clostridium Difficile
2 weeks after the Salmonella infection, due to the control stool test, it turned out that I had been infected with Clostridium Difficile. I had to take probiotics only because the treatment of Clostridium Difficile is also Metronidazole or, in severe cases, Vancomycin, but the doctors knew that I was in a bad condition, so they wanted to wait 2 weeks and repeat the test after taking probiotics. Fortunately, it was negative, so there was no need to take antibiotics again.
SIBO
My gut was completely damaged. I was taking probiotics, and sometimes I was fine, but nothing was the same when I was completely healthy. 4 months later, I went to a wellness hotel with my husband for some days. We went to the jacuzzi and sauna every day, so we just enjoyed our stay. On the fourth day at night, I felt dizziness again, but it was extreme vertigo, and I had severe diarrhea. I felt so bad that I had to go to the ER. I got an infusion, and they sent me home. The following day I needed another injection again because of vertigo. I got better, but I wasn’t well. After one month, all food went through me undigested in 1 hour. The gastroenterologist sent me to do an H2 breath test to diagnose SIBO, but I knew immediately that I had SIBO based on the symptoms. Other symptom were extremely painful perioral dermatitis on my face and continuous pain around my liver.
Perioral Dermatitis
Extremely painful perioral dermatitis (POD) developed on my face due to my terrible gut health if you have POD, itis useless to treat with steroids because it always relapses until the root cause is treated.
Duodenal Ulcer
The SIBO was so stubborn that I got five doses of rifaximin to treat SIBO, but after the fifth dose, I developed a duodenal ulcer. If I had known about berberine, I would have skipped the fifth dose of rifaximine and replaced the antibiotics with it.
Vertigo
I had to go to the ER every two months because of severe vertigo. It took me five years to discover that my dizziness, lightheaded feeling, and vertigo were caused by histamine intolerance.
SIBO treatment
If your SIBO always relapses, don’t give up and try something natural. It would be best if you got rid of SIBO to avoid the long-term consequence of this health issue, such as metabolic syndrome or autoimmune health problems.
Read the Natural Remedies of SIBO article, where you can find product recommendations with detailed descriptions and SHOP links.
