As far as the c-diff, my situation was really a little different. A year ago when I was taking the antibiotics I noticed a little bit of blood in my stool (somewhat minor). It lingered off and on and so I went to see my GI. He did a stool culture and it came back positive for c-diff "antigen" NOT "toxic". I have a friend who is studying infection disease and she claimed this did not mean that I necessarily had the full blown c-diff infection.
I experienced some diahrea and more frequent stool with occasional blood/mucous but my symptoms were never in anyway debilitating. I was tested a couple other times and always came back positive for the c-diff antigen which from what I understand, is not totally uncommon as many people end up being "colonized".
Regardless, after several months, things eventually settled down. I have reached the point where I am only dealing with inflammation in the rectal/last part of the colon area as I have normal BMs which are regular and not overly frequent, but occasionally have some bright red blood when i wipe. This is why I am still on the rectal meds and things were starting to simmer down with that but now that I'm on antibiotics it freaks me out.
Problem is I have been dealing with this cough/throat/chest congestion for close to 2 weeks so afraid the antibiotics may be the only way to overcome that.....