The Colon Club

I got a urinary tract infection (thanks, menopause ) yesterday and am on a 3 day course of Bactrim antibiotics. I just started my 2nd day of the pills and my gut is rebelling, I've been in the bathroom repeatedly with diarrhea. I know I didn't have any real alternatives to antibiotics for this, but I'm really worried that I'm just rolling out the red carpet for a c diff recurrence by taking an antibiotic.

I'm clinging to the hope that the diarrhea is just from something I ate, and that it will clear up. Or that it's just a side effect and I'll get through this. Positive thoughts, prayers, and any other good stuff is welcome. Sorry to take this a little off topic. Honestly at this point if I had to choose between the chemo-related neuropathy and future recurrence of c diff, I'd keep the neuropathy and tell c diff to take a friggin' hike. It needs to get out of my life!

That sounds awful. How about a big bowl of yogurt with live cultures every morning?

Jannine wrote:I got a urinary tract infection (thanks, menopause ) yesterday and am on a 3 day course of Bactrim antibiotics. I just started my 2nd day of the pills and my gut is rebelling, I've been in the bathroom repeatedly with diarrhea. I know I didn't have any real alternatives to antibiotics for this, but I'm really worried that I'm just rolling out the red carpet for a c diff recurrence by taking an antibiotic.

I'm clinging to the hope that the diarrhea is just from something I ate, and that it will clear up. Or that it's just a side effect and I'll get through this. Positive thoughts, prayers, and any other good stuff is welcome. Sorry to take this a little off topic. Honestly at this point if I had to choose between the chemo-related neuropathy and future recurrence of c diff, I'd keep the neuropathy and tell c diff to take a friggin' hike. It needs to get out of my life!

I was recently on Clindamycin antibiotic for a tooth abscess, which can cause diarrhea and c diff. I was told to take a probiotic 1 hour before taking my antibiotic. I purchased Align. It was expressive, but it did not cause my gut to go into overdrive and worked great. Antibiotic can destroy the good bacteria along with the bad.

I had a chronic UTI for about a year, probably the result of clustering and sitz baths. At one point I was refusing to take an antibiotic because diarrhea was a known side effect and I just couldn't do it anymore. The pharmacist persuaded me to try taking a probiotic 1-2 hours before taking the antibiotic. It worked. My primary care physician, naturopathic oncologist, and gastroenterologist all recommended VSL#3; you can buy it OTC but you have to ask for it at the pharmacy counter because they keep it in the fridge back there. It will run about $50.

Positive thoughts for you—been through a c diff nightmare with my daughter before and it is no fun.

Probiotics and more probiotics.

Thanks, all; the words of encouragement and suggestions helped a lot. I was able to grab Align and am taking that. Nobody around here had VSL#3 or visbiome in stock (I called a LOT of pharmacies), and apparently if you buy it direct they only ship Monday-Wednesday. But I'll take the Align for now, and put in an order for the stuff that's actually refrigerated so I'll have it sometime next week.

My gut seems to have settled down, for now; I'm feeling a lot better than I did yesterday. Hopefully it'll stay that way. Phew.

Bactrim is really strong stuff and there are other alternatives but I think that Bactrim is commonly used for UTIs. I'm sure that you're aware of how dangerous some particular side-effects are that affect a small percentage of people. It doesn't sound like you have any of those though.

I had no problems with the Bactrim, fortunately.

I took Align for a week, until my shipment of Visbiome arrived yesterday. (This is the rebranded original formula of VSL#3, apparently.) It came in a big 12" square refrigerated box, along with a sensor that turns red if it got too warm at any point during shipment. All that for a smallish jar of probiotic pills, which is now nestled in the fridge.

So far so good; my bowel movements are holding pretty steady and I don't feel like I'm in the days-long decline of c diff invasion at this point. Hopefully everything is going to be fine. I'll take the Visbiome for a full month, at least, to try to give my gut flora time to get reestablished.

I'm glad you're doing better!

Back on antibiotics. This time I had a tooth that was going bad. It had a root canal 18 years ago but has looked suspect at the root for quite a while. Last month they x-rayed it and there was definitely infection going on at the root. So today I had it pulled, with the intent of adding an implant in a couple months. Well the tooth came out cleanly despite the expectation that it was fractured, and my bone looked good; no need for a bone graft. So they asked me if I wanted to go ahead and get the implant now. I said sure. It was super easy and I'm not having any pain. But they did put me on Amoxicillin while it heals. I guess if I'd done this in two stages it probably would've been two rounds of antibiotics? But at least this way I didn't have to get numbed up again, and I get the crown sooner.

I'll keep taking my probiotics in the mornings and keep my fingers crossed that the Amoxicillin doesn't mess with my gut too much. Things have been holding steady so I'm hopeful that I'll get through this round without any problems cropping up.