Has anyone here tried therapeutic probiotics?

[wombato]

Yes, I know that doesn't sound like a post on sleep, but it's related.

I read all of these posts about people in the same boat I am in, or was in, and I wonder if anyone has tried therapeutic probiotics (on everyone in the family) and if that had any effect on sleep.

It would probably be difficult to say, because the effect would be so gradual.  I'm asking because I read the book Gut and Psychology Syndrome by Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride.  In the book, the author explains how "mental" things are connected to what happens in the gut, to gut flora.  I don't totally agree with her diet (based on the specific carbohydrate diet), even though I make and consume a lot of the same foods (bone broth, cultured veggies, real fats, foods sourced from local farms and pasture-based animals).  

But I totally can see what she means with the messed up gut flora, how it is passed on to the child, and how that could explain some things about my child (he has reflux I can hear in his sleep, even though it doesn't clearly bother him, and his poop has never been "normal," almost always mushy or like rocks, even though the frequency is good) and it might explain his wacky behavior (the book is about helping children with autism, ADHD, and more - the author's child had/has autism).  My child falls within the realm of normal behavior, whatever that means.

By therapeutic probiotics, I mean strong ones, the kind a practitioner would recommend, with a variety of organisms.  BioKult is one of them.  At least I think that is what it means - I've never come across a good definition of the term, but I'm abusing it :)

[Partaria]

Hi,

Not sure if this is the info you're looking for, but here goes. :) My son, from birth to 4 months, was just really a fussy baby. His poops were normal and he didn't seem to have reflux. But I just had this strong intuitive sense that something was not right. Our MD kept telling me that all babies fuss, but I just didn't buy that was all. DS seemed like such a joyful child, and when he would scream inconsolably for hours, I just felt like there was something concrete- some physical issue we weren't addressing for him. I just felt that it was not in his nature to cry like that. So I took him to a functional medicine doc, and had a whole nutrition/digestive health workup done of both of us. (I was exclusively BFing him so I wanted to be sure there was nothing I was eating that was making him sick.)

Turns out I could've skipped most of that. When I told the doc he was born via Csection, she said, "oh he needs probiotics." She said that babies who don't pass through the vaginal canal miss out on some vital flora, and typically need probiotics to repopulate the gut. So we got him on a probiotic powder (I just smeared it on my breast before he nursed), and I tell you, he became a different child. The inconsolable crying stopped literally overnight. The next day it was gone, never ever to return. He started smiling more and responding to us more. When he did cry, he could accept our cooing and cuddling and calm down, whereas before, he would just keep screaming as though he didn't even notice we were there. Oh, and if you're interested, the brand we used was Klaire.