For those who have taken Diflucan

When I started antifungals, I did get die off reactions and herxes but I also felt better.

I looked back at my notes. I started Fluconazole late July 2019 and Nystatin Nov 1, 2019.

A couple days after Nystatin: increased body pain, sore scalp, palms, and soles

19 Nov 19
- since getting to full dose Nystatin, I have noticed the following improvements: less chemical sensitivities, less pain, less cognitive problems, less food cravings
- still have worse exercise intolerance (ex. - when rolling up sleeping bag)
- when I first increased to full dose, I had gas, bloating at night and abdominal discomfort, irritability, worse sensitivities, increased pain especially feet and ankles
- last 2 days I noticed some increase in cognitive issues after having improved before that
- did have a flare of skin symptoms in the past week: tiny bumps on back and abdomen that itch, hurt, and scab; bart scratches on shoulder blade after shower
- have had migrating pain, especially feet and ankles, yesterday it was right elbow and hips, occasionally knees or neck
- have higher tolerance for other treatments since Nystatin

12 Dec 19 - noted that the bumps were healing up and going away

I had big skin reactions to die off - tiny bumps on my back, hips, and abdomen. Took about a month to go away.

WalkingbyFaith said...


As a side note, treating yeast/mold and treating parasites all have brought out bartonella flares for me at times - scratch marks, striae on abdomen flaring with pain and turning purple, and rage/psych symptoms, also a lot of hormonal wonkiness (female here).

I am not sure exactly why, but I have noticed that.

the fairly recent Zhang studies showed the Azole antifungals ( of which Fluconazole/Diflucan is one) had very good activity against bartonella - which is i think why the OP is taking it
they worked better than rifampicin or clarithromycin
many people in the bartonella groups mention getting the bart streaks when treating bart

there is also one interesting study in its use for lyme - but here the mechanism is not clear as other studies found fluconazole to have no activity against borrelia in vitro - and yet in a small trial the majority of chronic lyme patients got better after 25 days of fluconazole alone.

not sure about nystatin - thats largely confined to the gut i thought

Diflucan is strong stuff.

Ive read that killing the yeast alone with this can cause a herx, thats from people who dont even have a tick infection!!!

That said, yes, I herxed on it to some degree. I remember feeling very hot and a little "loopy" after two weeks on Diflucan.

I had candida positive tests too- no guessing. Nystatin did absolutely NOTHING to ward off my digestive candida. Thats why the LLMD went with Diflucan.

Reviewing my notes again. I started Fluconazole on July 24, 2019. This was 16 days after fleeing a moldy house and moving into my car. I was already having significant MCAS symptoms and was flaring badly due to unmasking from mold.

I started Fluconazole very slowly due to the severity of MCAS and fear of herxing horribly. Started with 1/3 tablet days 1-3, 1/2 tablet days 4-7, then a whole 100 mg tablet daily.

On August 8, 2019, I wrote: have swelling in abdomen, sides, and back- yeast die-off??

I was also taking Mimosa pudica and passing ropeworm during this time period. That alone can cause lots of symptoms to flare. During that August, I was also taking nigella sativa. Had a note at the end of August that brain function had been worsening for weeks. On Sep 9, I again reported cognitive function had been really bad. On Oct 1 had psych symptoms and wanting to die.
2 Oct 19
- 1st day off Fluconazole and joint pain is worse
- maybe my joint pain is mostly from yeast/fungus

Most of my notes indicate bowel issues - ropeworm and probably yeast/mold in the gut.

1 Nov 19 is when I started Nystatin. I took 2 months of Fluconazole daily and stopped. At some time between 2 Oct and 1 Nov, I was Fluconazole Fri-Sat-Sun plus the Nystatin 2x day. I didn’t start to feel better until I started Nystatin, but that’s also when the bart symptoms flared according to my notes.

my notes state the following - mostly from Dr SP's videos

"tetracycline and Diflucan(fluconazole) 2 weeks on 2 weeks off pulsed - as used recently in bart patients by Dr S Philips - is his preferred approach and says cures 50% of his bart patients - see fuller write up in ideas store - poss long QT and or liver issues with Diflucan i think so would need LFT - could poss use doxycycline at the double dose often used by llmds in place of the tetra. "

standard dosing regimes are here
https://www.rxlist.com/consumer_fluconazole_diflucan/drugs-condition.htm
i don't think LLMDs will be diverging too far from these - esp dr SP as he is pretty conservative in approach

the small study for lyme was 25 days of 200mg per day

safety labs like liver function tests are advised with Diflucan

pulsing possibly safer than continuous use

the study on lyme patients - only a small trial but interesting
https://daignet.de/site-content/die-daig/fachorgan/archiv/2004/ejomr-2005-vol.9/334.pdf