Naturopathy

Well, I'm continuing my journey, and I'm thinking that, along with a GI, it might be a good idea to get a Naturopath in my corner as well. Only problem is....I grew up in a Doctor's family, and have no idea how to even communicate with a Naturopath!!!

So, any suggestions? It seems like every one of them will have their own way to "test" you and how to "help" you. I don't have the time nor the health to take a bunch of them for a test drive, so I'm wanting any advice you can give me!

Keeping myself informed and open......

i was on a naturepath once, but didnt like it .. oh wait you said naturopath! sorry i have to use that one every chance i get... saw one of the dr kinds too! didnt like him either..my MIL goes to one and she told him about me.. he said if i only came and saw him and got my juice from him i could be well.. well poorer is all i would be me thinks.

newfoundsun,

I don't have anything to offer in terms of a Naturopath. But if you find luck with one please let us know. I just wanted to say that I'm really enjoying reading your blog. Thank you for taking the time to write it and post it, it's very encouraging to me:) Thank you.

Newfoundsun,

What kind of test is the Naturopathy running on you? Sounds interesting, that's awesome that your insurance covers it too:) Good for you!

Yes, it is a stool test. But from what I've read about this specific test is that it goes way beyond just looking for blood or other basic things. If it can give me more information other than just "yes your body is out of whack and you have inflammation" then I will consider it well worth it!

Okay, so recently I had some more visits with Naturopaths. I might get long-winded, but wanted to send an update on what's going on now in that area. I have seen two Naturpaths so far, and believe I'll go with the second because he has Crohn's. The first though (I'll call them N1 and N2) is the one who wanted the stool sample, so that's what I'll focus on in this post.
First off, I had no idea you could tell all this stuff from a pile of poop. This test looked at a few different areas. The first was my digestion. I was in optimal range for all of those results.
The second was absorption, meaning…how well my body can absorb what’s being put into it. This had a very interesting result. There were 5 things it looked at. The one out of whack was cholesterol, but not the HDL or LDL kind. (I’ll try to remember all this correctly!). Basically what this translates into is that I have a fat absorption problem. This means that all the fat that I’m putting into my system (meaning, the good fats that my body needs as well as the bad fats it doesn't need), my body is not creating enough of the enzyme Lipase which helps digest and ABSORB these good fats. Without the lipase, the good fats are just passing through my body and I am not getting the benefit of them.
The third area we looked at were metabolic markers. This told me primarily that my hydrochloric acid in the stomach can be a bit higher. With more hydrochloric acid, my stomach will be able to break down foods even better. It will also balance out the SCFA distribution, but I cannot remember what all that means. Sorry! Since my hydrochloric acid was just on the verge, he did not want to prescribe any supplements, but instead told me to eat one lemon a day to see if that will be enough. Easy enough!
With metabolic markers we also looked to see if there was mucus or blood in the stool (two very good markers of inflammation). I did not have excess mucus but still do have blood in the stool (since we cannot see it, it is called “occult” blood). Thankfully it is not the explosive bloody stools like I hear other crohnies talk about! There is nothing that needs to be done with these markers.
The last part was microbiology. Basically, what is the make-up of bacteria or pathogens in your stool. Here, I’m again doing pretty good. I have no pathogens to worry about. No other bacteria that we might need to treat. HOWEVER, I have NO lactobacillus in my system. Because I have NONE of these, that means there is nothing to really fight off the bad stuff, and so I need to get those into my system NOW. Looking back, I believe I have had this imbalance for years, and the medical doctors just never took notice of it or if they did, never had any suggestion other than more antibiotics, which really didn't help. I also question, again, the GI doctor who prescribed Flagyl and had my files available to him which showed the lack of this good bacteria. I wonder if he would have prescribed this knowing I had nothing in my system to fight off the bad stuff.
SO…all of this analysis to say that I am now on these products: Intestinal Repair Complex (which helps to repair the gut), NESS #5 (which is a lipase enzyme), and Pro Flora Colonizer (which has the acidophilus and rhomnoisus bacteria that I need to help re-colonize my gut). I have started these, and will try them over the next two weeks.
All in all, I like N1 because he is VERY knowledgeable. This appointment was much better than the first one, but I still have questions about treatment. Specifically….is he just treating the symptoms in front of him, or is he treating the whole person? If he's just treating the immediate symptoms, what's the difference between him and a medical doc?
I will be going back to N2 (the one with Crohn's) next week and see what he has to say about the stool sample, and also a food allergy test I have done. Overall, I'm glad to know about the things the stool sample revealed. I think it will help me in the long and short term of this disease. I'm still a titch skeptical about Naturopath's, but I wonder....would an MD or GI doc have done the tests to reveal the deficiencies we found? Hmmm........

newfoundsun, thank you for the amazing updates! You have really been through a battery of tests and gained a lot of insight!

I thought it was really interesting that you had no lactobacillus in your stool sample! Also, it very interesting that the IV treatment gave you such great energy! That's great! Please keep us updated on anything more you discover!