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what triggers crohns?

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Crohn's Disease
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Posted 1/18/2015 11:05 PM (GMT 0)
so I've been curious lately what triggers UC/Crohns.

Growing up I was the model of health, never got sick although I was very overweight as a kid and slimmed down when I hit puberty. I got UC at the age of 26, and Crohns when I was 32.

Obviously something set off my UC and crohns. By that logic couldnt something trigger UC/Crohns to stop? Seems a little one-sided :(
Posted 1/18/2015 11:22 PM (GMT 0)
UC/Crohn's does stop - it's just unfortunately never for good. Just as patients can spontaneously go into remission, so they also spontaneously relapse. (Meds mediate this response, but don't really fundamentally alter it, i.e. they may delay the time to relapse by months or years, but no med keeps the disease at bay for an entire lifetime.)

Anyway, the original trigger is created by some unholy combination of genes + environment + immune system + gut flora, which nobody understands. For the last one, it's not yet known whether the disordered gut flora precedes the onset of Crohn's disease or is caused by Crohn's disease. So, disordered gut flora might be a part of the trigger or it might not. The first three - genes, environment and immune system - are definitely involved somehow.
Posted 1/19/2015 3:30 AM (GMT 0)
For me, stress is often a trigger. Also I tend to get bad relapses in spring/summer, while a lot of people report more relapses in winter. Could I be getting more attacks in summer because of the available fresh fruit that comes around in that season? Also in summer, sometimes our tap water smells like musty old potato sacks but at times during the summer, they dump more Chlorine in our water to purify it, sometimes you can smell it in the tap water, so I've given that thought as well, but to be honest with you, I wish I knew the answer then there would be no relapses at all.
Posted 1/19/2015 9:23 AM (GMT 0)
I think my original trigger was getting parasites in the Domincan Republic in 2007, then lots of antibiotics in early 2010, resulting in c. diff. Six months later, after otherwise near-perfect, life-long health, my intestines "exploded" and I went from health to 20 bloods bms/day literally within a week.
Posted 1/19/2015 2:19 PM (GMT 0)
I know exactly what triggered my CD, it was two years of taking a daily low dose of antibiotics prescribed to me by a dermatologist for an acne problem that I had since a kid.  This over use of antibiotics killed all the good flora in my gut and allowed all the bad drug resistant stuff to over populate.  This out of balance of bacteria in my gut caused inflamation which lead to me being diagnosed with CD in the colon after having two massive rectal fistuals appear next to my anos. 

Well thanks to healingwell, I discovered the SCD diet and after 6 months of following this diet with fanatical dedication, I got my gut flora back into balance,  which in turn,  lead to both fistulas healing up and all my symptoms going away.  No more blood in bms, no more white mucus, no more fistulas.   The only drug I ever took was pentassa. 

That was in 2007 , and I still follow the SCD diet and to this day, I have not had one symptom from my crohns since 2007.

 

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