Why am I sick ALL the time? Kind of long...

[Pariah]

For some background info...

Last year was extremely stressful for me. I spent until late August getting out of a very abusive relationship. From September to the present, things have gotten a lot better for me except that I'm sick constantly. In October I was hospitalized for a week with a kidney infection that was near blood poisioning in severity and on very strong iv antibiotics. I've had two more UTIs and another kidney infection since then, all requiring strong antibiotics that made me really sick to take (bad headaches, nasuea, etc.) but since UTIs seem to turn into kidney infections particularly quickly for me, I took them as directed. I had tons of blood taken while in the hospital and nothing abnormal came back and my kidneys work fine. I've never had these problems before, nor have I ever been sick so much. Last winter I was sick once, and before that I really can't remember when.

Since the hospitalization I've been sick constantly...colds, flu, sore throat here and there, etc. I work out six days a week (running, Insanity, the gym) when I'm not sick enough to prevent it. I need to lose some fat and gain muscle but I'm not in awful shape (5'4", 135 pounds). My diet isn't bad but could use some work (no fast food, minimal junk). I attempted to hire a nutritionist who basically took my money and disappeared on me, which...is incredibly infuriating, but that's another topic. Anyway, I think that perhaps my money would be better spent going back on the raw milk and other very clean farm food my son and I were getting from a local place. Maybe resetting my diet and starting from scratch with the very basics (their organic meats, veggies, raw milk, etc) would help.

Any thoughts? Is it all the antibiotics? I just got over a cold last week and woke up this morning feeling sick again and this is getting really frustrating. I've had to skip out on two 5K races because I had to take off so much training time and just feeling generally crappy for the past few months is really frustrating me. My son is staying healthier and I've started dating a really good guy who has taken care of me a lot while I've been sick, so those are two important things that have been working out. But this is really wearing me out...

[jgallagher66]

I am not an expert on this by any means but one thing that occurred to me that you might want to try since you did have to take all of those antibiotics is some probiotics. They seem to really help immune function and antibiotics really mess with the balance of bacteria in your gut.

I'm also a huge believer in the healing power of fruits and vegetables especially those high in vitamin C and lots of greens. If you are having trouble packing them into your diet, consider juicing. I actually don't juice but I eat a ton of fresh fruit and vegetables. If I felt that my immune system was stressed though and I started getting sick a lot, I would try to pack in the fruits and veggies by juicing because I think the vitamins and minerals in them are so essential to a healthy immune system.

Another thing I think helps is to get outdoors as much as possible. For me at least an hour a day. You may already be doing that though if you're running. I think the exercise is excellent too but you're already doing that.

And of course washing your hands a lot can go a long way in avoiding colds and flu.

Hopefully, as the stress eases you'll get sick less often. There are lots of things you can do to avoid utis. The probiotics can really help and taking probiotics to avoid utis is even starting to hit the mainstream media. D-mannose is also supposed to help and vitamin c. Lowering your sugar intake is really helpful so be very careful with cranberry juice since it's often sweetened.

I hope you stay healthier! It's horrible to be sick.

[sbgrace]

That round of infections and the antibiotics likely did a real number on your immune system. Much of our defenses are in our guts and yours has been through the wringer.

I'd do things to boost the immune system. Things we've done with my son:

1. Epicore
2. Florastor Probiotic
3. Colostrum
4. Optizinc
5. healthy eating and sleep of course
6. adequate vitamin D; a healthy adult can take up to 10,000 IU per day of D3 without toxicity. In your place, if you're not already supplementing, I'd assume I was low and take 10,000 IU of D3 6 days a week. Consider a 25 OH D test after 4 months. You want a level of 50 or above (50-80 ideal). The slip will say 30 is fine. It's deficient. The vitamin D council has great information on this and also test kits you can get without a doctor.
7. Another high quality, proven to work probiotic. We use culturelle. Acidophilus Pearls have research as well. Klaire labs probiotics are great.

If you can only pick a few things vitamin D levels are vital and rebuilding your gut bacteria would be very important if you haven't worked on that--a good probiotic and one of the ones that specifically boosts immune function like Florastor would be ideal.

Try to protect yourself from infection while you're rebuilding (hand washing, not touching face with unwashed hands best defense).