I'd be grateful for people to read my symptoms and provide insite. Thank you!

Hello! I am hoping to have some of you in this community read about my situation and if some of you have experienced similar issues maybe you can provide recommendations or guidance on treatment.

about 4 years ago I ate some mexican food and immediately had LOTS of incredibly foul smelling gas and soft stools. My stools were maybe a little yellow/brown BUT now they are normal color. I am not sure if it was because of the meal or another reason. I was prescribed cipro and flagyl and my symptoms went away for 6 months. Then they came back. I’m not sure what triggered it. Possibly alcohol consumption did trigger it this time. I wasn’t a big drinker but I remember that I was drinking some whiskey the evening my symptoms started again.

So, I was prescribed only flagyl this time and that did nothing. My symptoms were still gas and soft stools but also i could hear my stomach making noises that I never heard before. I had minor stomach/intestinal pain. Not one food source would trigger it more than others.

So at this point I did every test you can think of. Upper endoscopy, colonoscopy, breath test, MRI of intestines, blood tests, celiac test. Everything came back normal. So then my doctor prescribed rifaximin which did nothing (strange, you will see why later).

So, at this point I was incredibly depressed because I had horrible gas and it was affecting my social life. I tried changing my diet, cutting out wheat and dairy, also tried an only fruit/vegan diet and nothing worked or improved my symptoms. In fact I slowly lost 30 pounds and was skin and bones. I could not gain weight or muscle no matter what I ate or even if I exercised. After many months my doctor gave me rifaximin once again and within 2 days I gained 15 lbs. Trust me, this was not water weight. This was muscle. I no longer felt bony in my hands and back. My muscles filled out quickly. It was amazing. I felt so strong and healthy and I felt almost cured! Incredibly the amount of stool in my bowl movements was cut in half or more. It was like I was actually digesting my food. However, after I stopped the medicine my symptoms slowly came back and I slowly lost all of that weight that I gained. This made me think that I was not digesting correctly and when I took the rifaximin I temporarily was able to digest food that my body craved and I was able to build muscle quickly. If I had bacteria or an infection I’m not sure why rifaximin didn’t kill it completely. Why did my symptoms come back when I stopped the medicine? One bad thing, after this antibiotic I developed lingering heartburn.

So, after a few weeks I tried more rifaximin. I felt better and some weight returned but the effects were not as good as that first time. My symptoms also returned even while I was STILL on the course of rifaximin. It’s liked it worked for the first few pills and stopped after that.

I have been dealing with this for years so it is hard to get the exact timeline of things happening. But I was experiencing heartburn and symptoms of vertigo for the first time ever. The rifaximin got rid of the vertigo and made my stools more solid. I also tried NEOMYCIN which cured my heartburn but my main symptoms remained. The pain in my stomach/intestine was now a burning pain that would come and go and specific food would not make it better or worse. Also I could not put muscle on and I felt so bony all over my body.

I have tried cipro again which had no effect. The ONLY thing that has made me feel cured in these last 4 years was the initial cipro/flagyl combination and about 1 and ½ year later when I tried rifaximin for the first time.

Because I have felt so good with certain types of antibiotics I still believe I have an infection or bacteria. Are there other antibiotics I can try? Do you think I have an infection?