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Vitamin D & Acid Reflux Redux

Long-time readers may recall my sinus infection that just wouldn't die. Over six months, I took antibiotics, long naps, a decongestant that gave me an allergic reaction so bad I stopped to wonder if I'd wake up the next morning. It finally ended when I came up with SWAMP and took megadoses of vitamin D, Mucinex and salt.

It's February and once again, I've been fighting off a cold for a few weeks. While SWAMP consists of taking 50,000 IU of vitamin D for two days, I've had to take 40,000 IU for the past several days to keep my cough from getting worse. I'm not the only one who's taken large doses like this long term. Jeff T. Bowles, a layman, wrote and self-published a book called THE MIRACULOUS RESULTS OF EXTREMELY HIGH DOSES OF THE SUNSHINE HORMONE VITAMIN D3 MY EXPERIMENT WITH HUGE DOSES OF D3 FROM 25,000 to 50,000 to 100,000 IU A Day OVER A 1 YEAR PERIOD (caps in original) about his research and experiences. Bowles is a little crazy, and his problems (mostly bone and joint pain) are much different from mine. The book badly needs an editor. But it has some of the freshest thinking I've seen in a long time and Bowles has clearly done a lot of reading on the subject. He suggests (based on reading Vitamin K2 and the Calcium Paradox and an article on vitamin D toxicity by Chris Masterjohn, he recommends taking vitamin K2 if you're going to take large doses of D3. With that in mind, I think that SWAMP can be done, if necessary, for longer than two days when necessary.

The other part of SWAMP is taking Mucinex and salt. Several days ago, the convenience store in my building was out of Mucinex, so I bought Su-Phedrine PE (phenylephrine HCl). I had to double the dose to get decongested (I used to take two regular Sudafeds, often, before going low-carb and wheat-free). I finally realized today that this was causing my acid reflux to return, since nothing I was eating or drinking should have caused it. The drug is a methylxanine, and according to drugs.com,

Methylxanthines increase gastric acidity and may also relax lower esophageal sphincter, which can lead to gastric reflux into the esophagus. Therapy with products containing methylxanthines should be administered cautiously in patients with significant gastroesophageal reflux.

Drugs.com also lists nervousness, bleeding, loss of appetite, headache and confusion as side effects (I've had them all), among others, including raised blood glucose concentrations. It would be nice if this were mentioned on the box. I've also noticed the side effects are worse when I'm under more stress.

I'm going back to Mucinex (guaifenesin), which doesn't cause any reactions in me.
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Comments

tess said…
in anybody else, i'd be concerned about them balancing vitamin A with their Ds, but i'm confident you have it covered! :-)

i ended up conquering my frequent sinus infections with echinacea and goldenseal in combination. have you gone the herbal route?
February 03, 2013
Lori Miller said…
Good point about the vitamin A. I eat liver once a week and my daily vitamin pill has A in it, so I think I good.

I'd had sinus problems most of my life, and I've tried herbal remedies. Maybe I didn't take enough or didn't take the right thing, but they didn't have any effect on me.

SWAMP requires an antibiotic, antiinflammatory and mucus thinner to kill the bio, open (uninflame) the sinus passages and let them drain. (Imagine your sinuses as a stream that's been blocked and become a swamp.) It looks like echinacea and goldenseal have all that covered. Just add salt!

What doses do you take, and for how long?
February 03, 2013
tess said…
when it was bad, i'd take a whole dropper-full of the combined tincture in water three times a day. tastes NASTY, but using kahlua as a chaser gave me a reward for doing it. ;-) about a week of that, and then lay off a week -- repeat if needed. i did this even before the days i began using a neti-pot, and i have to get really run down to get another infection.
February 03, 2013
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