As a life-long journalist, the troubled state of the newspaper business has given me serious concern recently. I love reading the paper and I’ve written for it from time to time. The paper I’m talking about, of course, is the New York Times.
I didn’t know how important the paper was to me until just the other day. Wednesday, in particular, I realized that it might just save my life.
Let me explain. One of the dastardly microbes that caused the kids trouble this winter is a bacteria called Clostridium difficile. Nina tested positive for it, which sent us scrambling in multiple directions one night a few months ago. First to try and find the antibiotic that the on-call doctor wanted to prescribe, and then to the Internet to find out just what this thing was. Nina’s diagnosis didn’t make sense. C. difficile, as it’s called, is one of the more-or-less regularly occurring bacteria in the gut. It only becomes a problem if an antibiotic taken for some other infection disrupts the balance of bacteria in the intestinal tract. Nina had not been taking an antibiotic, so it didn’t make sense that she had it. The cure the doctor prescribed was so hard to find that we waited until the morning to talk to Nina’s regular pediatrician. By that time, her symptoms had abated and the doctor agreed to a wait-and-see approach, combined with a probiotic called Florastor. I had thought of things like probiotics as expensive placebos until this experience. She hasn’t been troubled since.
On Tuesday, the science section of the times ran a detailed article on the increased prevalence of C. dif. It seems to be striking all kinds of normal people who take antibiotics for legitimate reasons. I’m pretty sure I will need to take some kind of antibiotic at sometime over the rest of my life, and I’d like to avoid this unpleasant and potentially deadly side effect. So I’ve been thinking I should start taking a probiotic.
The following day, the food section ran a fascinating piece by Harold McGee about making your own yogurt, which is, of course, full of probiotics. I love this idea, and can’t wait to try it out. Who knows, maybe it will be my salvation. I hope something or someone can figure out a way to save the newspaper business.
Great article! I could really relate to your words. Our son who is only four has had severe food allergies and Eczema since he was a baby. He has been through so much and we have felt helpless right along with him. He has had three full years of itching, bleeding, sleepless nights, and all kinds of specialists. No one offered any hope or answers. All that we were left with was a bunch of expensive and harmful drugs for him like steroids. YUCK. It was getting worse by the day for him and the meds were not good for his little body. We heard of a probiotic called Vidazorb and they have a kid-friendly purple chewable bee that he LOVES. He eats it like candy 🙂 The best part is that it has WORKED and cleared him almost completely! We like to say that God heard our prayers and gave us a miracle 🙂 I know our little boy would agree. He is actually able to eat all kinds of foods now and looks and feels great! It has been a loooong road but we are finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. Probiotics are awesome and as I keep learning about them, I see how vital they are to all of us for prevention. Sorry to hear about your Nina, I am glad you have it figured out! Take care, Caroline
I love to make homemade yogurt. Maybe it will be good for me as well as yummy.