Redub's Progress Log

[Redub]

Follow the IC diet as well:
viewtopic.php?f=13&t=8733

And don't be like those people who say they are following the diet, then when you chat to them you find out they are actually drinking multiple cups of coffee daily, or breaking the rules in some other way.

I hesitate to say this because I don't want to be one of 'those people' but I actually did this for quite some time. Aside from getting rid of coffee it actually wasn't a big deal since I only really drank water and coffee/tea so I just had to cut out spicy food and tomato products. I pulled a list from some IC website and there were other foods on there but they weren't part of my regular diet anyway so getting rid of them wasn't a challenge.

I don't remember the timeline offhand but when I finally weened myself off caffeine (last cup coffee was Christmas Eve 2019) my symptoms started improving dramatically. This is also around my 3rd session of PT so I can't point to which one was helping the most but getting rid of caffeine brought my life long anxiety down to zero. That's a huge improvement on it's own but obviously it's something that ties into this condition. So I am done with coffee forever. The only way I see myself ever consuming caffeine again is if I get back into competitive endurance sports in which case I might use it during a race but that's it.

Anyways, I have since started adding back some foods. Mainly occasionally hot sauce and tomato products. I haven't really noticed a difference the day off or after consuming those so I don't think they are triggers. It might be worth while to cut them out again for 4 weeks and recheck though.

[webslave]

I haven't really noticed a difference the day off or after consuming those

You won't, after a day. It takes weeks off to see improvements.

[Redub]

I meant I took them out of my diet for weeks/months. Now the day of or after if I consume them I don't have any increase in symptoms so I am assuming they aren't problematic.

[webslave]

Wrong assumption, Redub. For instance, I am celiac but I can eat gluten for a week or so before symptoms start building up.

Dietary changes do [usually] not make instant differences, whether starting or stopping.

There are exceptions like sodium benzoate and acid foods, that can hurt on the same day or shortly thereafter.

[Redub]

Got it, I'll spend some time thinking about it. I just started acupuncture and since things aren't very bad at the moment I am going to try to take a bit more of a troubleshooting approach rather than the shotgun, try everything at once approach I started with when things were bad.

[Redub]

So I had some real good days after acupuncture so despite my life long belief in it being a sham I guess I am going to have to rethink that. I had a few days where I was just about 100%. Basically I only noticed an issue if I really focused on it or right before bed. It was nice to have some change that wasn't "errmm... maybe i am feeling better?".

I also have been very adamant about getting stretches, self PT/foam roll and meditation in since last week so that might help as well.

That upward turned ended today though. My wife made breakfast and it was extra spicy and things are way worse today. That sucks because it was delicious but oh well. Things got much worse about an hour or two after eating. My plan is to abstain from spicy foods for a few weeks and retest just to make sure it isn't a false positive.

[Redub]

Weekly Update:
The flare up from last week gradually got better each day, as expected. Nothing notable happened during PT.

Tuesday I had acupuncture in the morning and later that day things got way worse. Wednesday morning was REALLY bad. 9/10. Worst it's been since this was an 'acute' situation. I ended up going up to the local sleazy market and bought some kratom. This did help reduce pain and calmed me. The stuff is addicting(from what I read) so I won't be using it often but it came in very handy yesterday. Today things are much better. Still higher than baseline but i can actually do stuff.

So here is what is interesting. Last week I assumed spicy food was the trigger but this week I had another flare up with nothing out of the ordinary. The one thing that happened on both days of the flare up was acupuncture. The first few sessions brought me down to almost 100% fine but the last 2 might have caused huge flare ups, the worst I have had in the last 5 months. My PT thought 'maybe' and I'll ask the acupuncturist about it at my appt next week. We know that PT can cause flare ups and that is often a good sign but you don't hear as much about how acupuncture affects CPPS.

[gigabyte80]

"Last week I assumed spicy food was the trigger"

Dr. Wise in his book says that he does not believe that diet does not have an impact on this condition.... I also get flare ups out of the blue - have been on Prostanex with zero impact - on the contrary it affected my gut due to my IBS

[Redub]

Dr. Wise in his book says that he does not believe that diet does not have an impact on this condition

I've read entries from plenty of folks who have had diet cause issues. In the books he also says diet is important for folks with IC. I haven't been diagnosed with IC but since my symptoms are mostly urinary, urethra or bladder related I haven't ruled it out. I've also been working with physical therapists who have A HEADACHE IN THE PELVIS on their shelves but I haven't had a ton of improvement from them nor has my self treatment that I learned from A HEADACHE IN THE PELVIS helped much so I am taking anything he says with a grain of salt. His work has helped many but he clearly can't make statements that cover the broad spectrum of CPPS/Prostatitis/whatever.

[Redub]

Weekly Update

I asked a few acupuncturists (including my own) about how things caught WAY worse the day of and after treatment and they said it's normal. My acu wants me to lower the dosage of the herbs she gave me as well. Last week things gradually got better but at my best I was a 4/10. My acu appt was yesterday and as expected things got worse and are just now starting to become more manageable. I took kratom again to deal with it. I am going to continue acupuncture until the end of the month. If no big improvements I am done. Maybe I'll try a different place or maybe not.

The only thing I can think of to try is to double down on an elimination diet. Here is basically what I eat 6 days a week:

• Ezekial bread
• Eggs
• Cottage Cheese
• Grapes
• Avocado
• Onion
• Beans
• Herbal tea

Pretty basic diet. Nothing on there is on the IC diet bothersome section but since I eat the same stuff all the time I guess I can try to mix it up with only 'least bothersome' foods.

How bizarre that Pretzels and Popcorn are on the last bothersome food list on IChelp.org.

[webslave]

Pretzels (gluten) and popcorn? They have no idea.

[Redub]

Yeah, i think next week I am going to cut out dairy and anything with gluten for 4 week. My food list will be more like

*Rice or quinoa
*eggs
*Whatever veggies are on sale
*Fresh fruit(non citrus)
*Powdered peanut butter
*beans
*Herbal Tea

[Redub]

Aight, been at the elimination diet for a week. My food list is pretty basic.

• rice/quinoa
• Beans
• Eggs
• Avocados
• Asparagus
• Herbal Tea
• Water

The plan is to keep that up until the end of June. The vegetable in there might change for some variety but that's about it. So far no major changes but I didn't have a flare up after my acupuncture appt this week so that is progress. I am back to having just a slight tingling feeling of urgency/frequency that comes and goes. I also think when REAL urgency comes it is more intense which is annoying. My guess is the area is just overly sensitive at the moment.

I haven't been talking about internal trigger points because it obviously feels humiliating and guys don't really like talk about things going up the poop schute but kind of my goal of logging everything I do here is that it might help someone else out so here we go. I rarely find trigger points now and the ones I do find tend to be fully gone by the next session. I am doing the sessions 1-2 times a week.

I'm also now of the opinion that if you are dealing with a flare-up or pain that kratom is good solution. It's not a perfect solution as people can become addicted to it but it's childsplay compared to benzos or regular pharmacy pain killers. It also has a mood lifting effect which, for someone like me who is predisposed to broody depression, is quite a boon. I think as long as someone is pursuing treatment and doesn't rely on kratom to fix anything it is worth a shot.

I'll update again next week

[Redub]

Weekly Update

Things are staying even. No flare ups. Occasionally I feel a mild urethra tingle. 12 more days on the elimination diet.

[Redub]

Update

I had a flare up yesterday... the only thing that was different was I had my last acupuncture appt. I can safely say acupuncture causes a flare up though I think it's similar to a flare up when doing trigger points or whatever since the severity of the flare ups were lessened after each appt that they happened. I will go back to acupuncture if flare ups start happening on their own more often and I can't find a cause. Anyways, used kratom today to deal with the flare up which more or less killed the physical symptoms and gave me a big, energetic mental boost.

So far things are going in a great direction. Aside from the flare up yesterday/this the problems have been basically non-existent. Next week I am going to add cooked onions back into my diet.