depression

It’ll be 2 weeks tomorrow that I drank my third vial of 2500 TSO ova, which began a massive flare up that I am barely getting under control.  Today is day 3 on 60 mg. of Prednisone, tomorrow I return to 40 mg.  I am getting weak and have lost 10 pounds in this time.  Luckily, the pain is receding.  The last 2 nights, I managed to sleep until 4 Am (rather than getting up 3-5 X), and though I’m still having mostly diarrhea, there were some formed pieces in it as well.  I still have no appetite, am dizzy, and have terrible pain around the anus.

Sigh.

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So I added 15 hookworms in the end of June.  Symptoms had gotten pretty bad, and I was down to just a few eggs in my egg count.  I had an MRendoscopy and that showed mild inflammation in the ilium, but bad inflammation in the sigmoid colon, with a fistula going from colon to ovary.  Nice. I’ve never had a fistula before that I’ve known about, so despite the worms helping over the last 2.5 years, they didn’t prevent this.  It’s obvious I need enough of them to keep efficacy going. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s been 2.5 years now that  I’ve been playing with hookworms.  It’s been a very exciting and trying journey.  When I began, my choices were TSO (trichuris suis ova, or  pig whipworms), or a trial for hookworms at the University of Nottingham.  I chose TSO, but the FDA had blocked importation of it temporarily, and I wasn’t going to get any for several months.  I contacted Nottingham, and they would take me as a patient, but I had to travel to England 6 times and I had 50% chance of a placebo, and they only gave you 10 worms, and if it worked, they weren’t allowed to give you any more if you needed them. Read the rest of this entry »

I have virtually eliminated my anxiety and depression overnight by soaking my feet in magnesium.  Anyone with Crohn’s disease should try this.  I’ve been religious with my oral magnesium glycinate tablets for months; tolerating about 400 mg. a day.  It’s helped the twitching a bit, but as I’ve been going to the bathroom more the last few weeks (food choices, or are the hookworms starting to fail?  Ah, the ever present paranoia.) Read the rest of this entry »

I reinfected with 10 worms about 10 weeks ago, and this time, side effects have been bad. Not as bad as the first time, but worse than February, when I was hosting no worms. Seems if there are worms in me, then reinfection somehow is worse. This was similar last year.

The short list of suffering? My joints hurt. This time in my hands, hips, and ankles. My muscles are sore. And not from activity. My nerves hurt. At times they burn, other times just sore to the touch. I am slightly dizzy at times. My lips are tingling, hands and lower arms sometimes go numb. I’ve had terrible anxiety and depression, which caused insomnia, somewhat managed by Celexa and Ambien. Not sure whether to blame that on the worms or just the fear of the symptoms they cause, or just the hell of the last few years. Sometimes my head tingles. My muscles are twitching. All over, jumping around. Read the rest of this entry »