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Yoga for Diarrhea--Really

Sitting in another doctor's office this week, I wondered if I was on my way to a 17-year bout with diarrhea, like John Nicholson in The Meat Fix . I wondered if this doctor would have any fresh insights. I wondered why Community Health sent me to a clinic 30 miles away when I live in a city full of doctors. This doctor saw that the lab never ran the lab test for ova and parasites as they were supposed to, so she opened the order for the test. After an examination and taking my symptoms, she suggested seeing a gastronenterologist. I countered with a request for a prescription for a gut zoomer test. She looked it up and was skeptical of it and admitted she wouldn't know know to read the results, but she did write out a prescription for it. No way was I going to get scoped and run the risk of ending up like Wolverine , who went in healthy for a colonoscopy and nearly died after getting perforated and needing an intestinal transplant.  Later that day, my stomach felt like it was bu
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BNR17: the Mother Lion of Microbes

Hazards have been lurking where I never expected them. A chipped fuse on a pressure cooker last week, and last night, navy bean soup and probiotics.  The new fuse on my pressure cooker held out despite my apprehensions: it looked a little different from the old one and maybe it was cheap junk that would blow out and let hot soup spray me while I washed the dishes. But the fuse held and I had a wonderful dinner of navy bean soup. Later, though, I was thirsty and my potassium was low.  Then the trouble started at 4:00 this morning. I woke up hot and jittery with diarrhea and spent a rough day at work. I've also been having what feels like  sleep paralysis , but while I'm wide awake. The problem has to be bacteria--beans are full of prebiotics that bacteria love to eat. Dr. Davis said based on some similar reactions to SIBO yogurt, I'm probably having a die-off reaction from BNR17, one of the ingredients in SIBO yogurt and in the Synbiotic 365 I started taking a few months ago
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Quarantined Again

 March found me back in quarantine, as it did last year. This time, it wasn't a bad cold, but a three-week case of diarrhea. Pepto Bismol, Candibactin BR, black seeds (nigella), NAC, thyroid medication and probiotics did nothing; a jar of kimchi made it a lot worse. So I went to urgent care, where the doctor prescribed a stool test for C. difficile and other nasties that will make you extremely ill. C. diff is so toxic that my employer advised me to stay home until results were in. Of course, I didn't want to infect others, so I quarantined myself...again. I'm even working on my computer in the sunshine as I did last year. I forgot that it's hard to see the screen.   Photo from pixabay.com All the test results were negative, so I'm still trying to figure out why I have diarrhea. Hypotheses include too much B vitamins and too much gut bacteria. It all started shortly after beginning a new probiotic and re-starting thyroid medication (25 mg). As I mentioned, I took
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Michigan Gov Named Indiana Businessperson of the Year

"We thank you for the revenue!" says a satirical(?) billboard just south of the Michigan-Indiana border. The billboard also honors(?) Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer as Indiana's businessperson of the year and welcomes residents of her state to "free-roaming Indiana." Whitmer made the news last year when she banned sales of gardens seeds and activities such as boating or traveling to a second residence. Sheriffs in various counties refused to enforce some of the orders . Peaceful protestors, mostly in cars but some of them armed, stormed the capital and surrounding blocks.  Photo from Steve Swick. Michigan's excess deaths per capita has been among the worst in the US.  Sign owner Steve Swick says,  It’s from the frustration that we see so much with Michiganders who are coming over the border,” said Swick, a Michigan native who grew up about 15 miles north of the billboard in Coldwater. Whitmer “effectively shut down and destroyed small businesses and industri
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Food Freedom Bills and an Outbreak of Reason

What if you could take a flamethrower to everything that was wrong with 2020: the lockdowns, the riots, campus speech codes, chokeholds, the endless emergency orders by fiat? The Indiana assembly has all that and much more in its sights this season . Isolate Grandma? She should soon be able to see a caregiver she's related to. Caught rioting? Three hots, a cot and no government job for you. States of emergency? Not without permission from the legislature, and they're in no mood for mission creep . Speakers you disagree with on campus? Grit your teeth or head for a safe space. Defund the police? LOL, the assembly is looking to repeal the law requiring licenses to carry handguns by persons not otherwise prohibited from doing so.  Also on the agenda: prohibition of conversion therapy , civil forfeiture reform , a ban on police chokeholds, decriminalization of marijuana, body cams and dash cams for the police, allowing pharmacists to prescribe and dispense birth control pills and p
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The NUMBERS! And Fairness! D'oh!

I'll start with some  good news : "...residents 70 and older can now register to receive the coronavirus vaccine through the state [of Indiana]'s website." The CDC and some academics wanted to vaccinate essential workers to " level the playing field ," because "essential workers" include a higher proportion of non-white people than the over-70 crowd does. As readers surely know, the over-70 crowd is far more likely to die of COVID than anyone else. No, the link doesn't go to the Babylon Bee or The Onion : they really called for more deaths in the name of Fairness.  And sorry, teachers , but you don't get to jump the line in front of doctors, nurses, essential medical staff and old people, either.  Oldsters among the first to get COVID vaccines in Indiana. Photo from Pixabay . At least the state of Indiana is more interested in saving lives than ideology. Would that the state had such an interest in science and data. Like most other places,
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The Purge, COVID, and Return of GERD

The Purge I've been nostaligic for the days five to ten years back when the worst interaction you might have online was a nasty comment or two. Moderators, who might have to deal with a few hundred comments at most, blocked the trolls if they became too disruptive. Now that Facebook and Twitter are excommunicating people wholesale, maybe we'll go back to smaller, moderated sites and leave the yelling and screaming to the maddening crowds over there.  Dave Rubin asked Tulsi Gabbard today how she'd moderate Twitter. In practice, I don't think it's possible. It's too big with too many users who are completely unhinged and ready to come after you IRL if they don't like what you say. Then there's Facebook, which seemed like a platform for narcissists during the few weeks I used it long ago. They say people used to live in groups of about 150--maybe it's time for virtual communities to return to something closer to that number. Not only was there less trou
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