Conquering Strep Throat w/o Antibiotics...tell me how I'm doing and when am I out of the woods.

[anudi01]

So my kids came down with what presented as the good ol' fashion flu.  One at a time they got sick each one the day after the next.  I found out that their cousin, who they had been playing with a few days before had a confirmed case of strep.  I wasn't going to take them to the doctor, but decided that I should have the strep test done to see if that was what I was dealing with.  The rapid strep came down negative for all 3 of them.  The next day, my oldest daughter looked more ill than the day before, and the others were much perkier.  She was wiped out and feverish...they all were, but she was more so.  Sure enough, the next morning, I get a call from the doctor's office that one of the streps came back positive after a couple days growth.  It was in fact the oldest daughter, who was now looking in much worse shape than the others.  At that point I started to treat the strep this way:

1tsp ACV w/honey

3 drops oil of oregano (mixed with juice)

2 grams of Sodium Ascorbate mixed with Emercen C

I repeated this 4 times equally spread out over the day..actually the first day I did the SA to bowl intolerance then I backed off.

So today, everyone is looking and feeling much better.  The fevers have seemed to subside.  There is no evidence of strep rash, and none of them are complaining of a sore throat.

So, I figure...we're winning the battle.  But I'm not sure how to proceed to make sure we're out of the woods!!

Here's what I am thinking I'll do.

Tomorrow, I'll begin the same regimen, but back off to each of those doses down from 4 times daily to 3 times.  The next day, assuming everyone is still looking better, go down to 2 times, then the following day to 1 time.  Then after that, I figure I'll keep up somewhat with the SA and begin to support and rebuild the immune system with probiotics and other immune building supplements/foods.

Do you think this is good enough?  Should I have them retest for strep to make sure?  Only one of them had a confirmed case, but I think my son got it too.  They did prescribe the antibiotic and I got it, but never took it.  I don't like to argue about these kinds of things with the ped.  Plus, I was going to administer it if I thought we did not have in under control.  Luckily, thank God, we didn't have to!!!

So please, experienced Mamas...let me know what you think.  I really feel good about the way this worked out, I think.  And I want to confirm with some others on this method, if I should ever (hopefully not) have to deal with this again.

TIA!!!

[tanyalynn]

Your plan sounds reasonable to me.  Personally, I wouldn't re-test because strep bacteria in asymptomatic kids is pretty darn common (bet I can't find that study again, but a study that swabbed *asymptomatic* kids found a surprisingly high % of the kids had strep bacteria in their throats in the late winter/spring, so it looks like a fairly common bacteria in the population).  I'd treat based on symptoms, and it sounds like you're already on the getting-better side there.

It feels nice to figure out what our kids need to heal, doesn't it? 

[ameliabedelia]

It sounds like you are doing really well.  I would probably continue that regime for a week (about the same length as you would take the antibiotics) and then stop it (as long as symptoms continue to improve).   

For antibiotics, it's important to finish the round, so I would think the same thing would hold true for natural antibiotics as well.