After taking Flagyl to treat Clostridium D. for one week (2 pills 3x daily with meals), I've changed how I approach meals. I almost never feel hungry. However, after 4-5 hours, when I usually feel hungry, I feel incredibly nauseas. At first I did NOT want to eat with that nausea. Then I learned that eating actually decreased the nausea. I also had to eat to protect my stomach from damage from flagyl. I saw meals as a catch 22. If I didn't eat, I'd feel so nauseas that I might throw up. If I did eat a meal, I had to take the flagyl after the meal and start the increasing nausea cycle all over. Nevertheless, I kept reminding myself that I wanted to get well, to be well when I'm in Maui this October, and to kill that potentially fatal bug (clostridium difficile) in my gut which caused all those flu like symptoms for 2 months before I started treating with flagyl.
Flagyl causes a horrible metallic taste. I tried taking those pills in the middle of one salad meal. Every bite of salad thereafter tasted like metal. So I take the pills after I eat a meal to prevent ruining the taste of the meal. The nausea and gut pain starts immediately after I take the pills. Those symptoms peak (get most intense) 1-1/2 to 2 hours afterwards. However the nausea never goes away. I initiallly drank a lot of ginger tea, which greatly decreases the nausea. I still noticed nausea, but don't worry that I'm going to throw up all the time. Then I got so sick of the metallic taste of ginger tea with stevia (and reflux possibly caused by ginger tea) that I stopped drinking it. However extreme fatigue and nausea today motivates me to try more ginger tea tonight. If I can't control this nausea, I don't know how I'll survive the next 2 days of flagyl. Going to bed doesn't help relieve nausea. I actually get worse as I reflux even more.
Here are some other 'fun' side effects within an hour after taking flagyl: A stabbing pain in my stomach for awhile; a slight headache, almost no hunger sensations so I only eat by the clock or when the nausea gets so bad that I have to eat something; cramping gut pains that feel like I might get diarrhea (fortunately I prevented actual diarrhea by taking a daily probiotic), refluxing that horrible metallic taste PLUS stomach acid. Maybe that was from drinking so much ginger tea to decrease nausea. Did I mention the nausea?? LOL
Despite all those awful side effects I've managed to eat 3 meals daily (in order to take the flagyl with meals) plus my morning glass of apple juice. I don't take the flagyl with juice, but the juice stops the nausea, gets rid of the horrible taste from either the flagyl or last night's poorly digested dinner and raises my blood sugar enough to wash my face and get dressed, rather than sit in front of this computer all morning.
During the past week while experiencing all those side effects, my food cravings dramatically changed. I actually craved fatty ground meat. So we had ground lamb patties one night. Then I craved FRENCH FRIES! I NEVER crave white potatoes, but do enjoy sweet potatoes. Last night I prepared for dinner, basa (fish) poached on a bed of sweet onions with garden fresh dill, oven fries (less oil and less chance of grease burning the cook), and coleslaw with pineapple. If I could find an allergy free fish stick product, I might have eaten that. (Unfortunately, Ian's fish sticks added cane sugar to their ingredients, which precludes me eating those now.) Tonight we're eating leftovers from our fish dinner. Right now I'm craving french fries so strongly I can taste and feel them in my stomach. Of course my meat and potatoes husband LOVES my new cravings. I don't know whether these cravings will continue after I finish the flagyl (6 more doses to go). However, I'm fantasizing about going to Outback for a steak and baked potato dinner in the very near future. As soon as I tell my husband, I know he will say, "Let's go tonight!" LOL
I really miss hunger cues. Before flagyl I relied on those to tell me when to eat (when I felt hungry) and how much to eat (enough to take away the hunger). Now I can only rely on intense nausea and a little full feeling in my stomach. I regret eating past full, because that causes burning reflux with the metallic taste and even more extreme nausea and discomfort. Before flagyl I often feared getting hungry (because I thought that meant low blood sugar). Now I look forward to feeling normal hunger again. It's difficult for me to eat only when I'm hungry and stop eating when I no longer feel hungry if all I feel is nausea.
However, I've noticed the nausea cue seems to work the same way hunger used to work. When I eat, the nausea goes away. The absence of nausea plus body comfort tells me I've eaten enough. However I always have one more bite of something (especially something sweet like ice cream) after I take the flagyl to mask that horrible taste. Fortunately I can stop after one spoonful of ice cream, because more will make me feel uncomfortable. I savor those times before flagyl hits peak intensity in my blood (and makes me nauseas) and when flagyl intensity decreases enough to let me feel normal before I have to eat another meal, because of nausea, and take another @#$%^& flagyl dose.
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Put your Flagyl inside a double zero gelatin capsule and that will help alleviate the bad taste and make it easier to swallow. Do this with any of your hard to swallow pills. They make different sizes of gelatin capsules if you have larger pills.
Thanks for your suggestion. However, you replied to a post which I wrote over 3 years ago. I stopped taking Flagyl after a little over 2 weeks. It didn't resolve my C-diff infection. However, several months (and repeat cycles, especially a pulse dose treatment) eliminated my C-diff infection.
If you read more recent (2012 posts), you'll see that I haven't had any more infections since late 2010, after I eliminated the causes for my frequent infections (low stomach acid, low vitamin D, low thyroid, low white blood cells). I'm always amazed when I receive replies to old posts. Fortunately I don't take any bad tasting meds now. I actually chew and swallow my thyroid supplememts.
I forgot to mention in my previous post that VANCOMYCIN eliminated my c-diff infection, after flagyl did absolutely nothing except make me feel nauseas. However, tapered and pulse dose treatment with Vancomycin was the most effective (and last) treatment.
What is tapered and pulse dose? Thanks
Tapered dosing just means lowering the amount of the daily dose. Pulse dosing means lengthening the time (hours or days) between doses. The C diff bacteria produces spores which are immune to Vancomycin antibiotic. In order to fully kill off all the C diff bacteria, you need to kill the new bacteria which develop from spores. So if you change the dosing schedule to longer and longer periods between doses, you allow the spores to morph into full blown bacteria between doses. Then you hit those newly developed bacteria with another dose of vancomycin and kill the new bacteria. However some spores may have not morphed into spores. So you wait a little longer with a longer period between doses (pulse) and hit the newly developed bacteria with another 'pulse' dose.
Actually that taper and pulse dose systerm was developed at a local hospital and their study was published online a year or so before I was fighting c diff. So I tried their recommended taper and pulse dose technique to wipe out my c diff. My next stool test showed no c diff.
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