Japanese Knotweed

I never tolerated pharmaceutical antibiotics, so have used entirely other things for antimicrobial treatment. What happens when you take antibiotics now? What sort of thing did you pick up while traveling (respiratory virus, stomach bug, etc.)?

Am I understanding correctly that you pulsed antibiotics continuously for 25 years? Have you treated with herbs or Japanese knotweed specifically before?

I am someone who usually reacts very strongly and negatively to antimicrobial treatment. Many find Japanese knotweed to be more of a supportive herb without much antimicrobial activity, but that has not been my experience. I have needed to increase my doses very slowly for any herbs with antimicrobial properties in order to feel functional.

Do you experience burning usually as a symptom of tick-borne disease or as a symptom of herxing? I ask because I wonder, if the burning is not a typical symptom for you, if perhaps you are having an allergic reaction to the Japanese knotweed.

Sorry for the barrage of questions! Just trying to get a sense of what's going on for you. Welcome to the forum!

We are not sure what I may have picked up. I have a GI map test result in two days. The regular pathogen panel only showed positive pcr for c diff but the c diff gdh Naa test with toxin and reflex to pcr was both negative. I am now on a low fodmap type diet and a medical grade 900 billion probiotic which normalizes my stool but each time I try even one dose with two drugs of antibiotics I start with soft stool all over again despite the probiotic. I definitely cannot eat certain foods now. I did pulse antibiotics for 25 years and was 95 percent symptom free for at least 15 of those years. I was actually scuba diving when all this happened. Now I am a wreck and all my Lyme symptoms are coming back. The burning has always been one of my symptoms which is really painful. I cannot get in to see my llmd until Jan 9th but my integrative dr has me trying herbs so I am all new to that and don’t know what to expect. I feel like I am relapsing as opposed to having a herxheimer but honestly I have never been good at telling the difference. You would think after 25 years I would know more about that. I get burning with the disease and then it will worsen with herxing and eventually clear up totally.
I do think something happened to my gut in the carribean and now it has flared my symptoms but also I have been a Lyme patient that could never go very long without antibiotics. Or at least that is how it looked to my doc and I.
I am on low dose naltrexone at 0.5 mg but have trouble sleeping so cannot raise it yet. I am on mirtazapine for depression and anxiety, amitriptyline and gaba for nerve pain and klonipin for sleep. For years I just used low dose amitriptyline and low dose klonipin. Now I take 15 mg of mirtazapine, 600 mg gabapentin, 20 mg amitriptyline, and 1.5 mg klonipin and melatonin and l Thea one all to sleep. I feel like a regular drug addict. I was on minocycline and rifabutin three days a month maintenance and metro and fluconazole two days after that. I did great for years with that. Now like I said back to square one.
I would love to know about the ivermectin for immune modulation. I know my doc uses methylene blue even in people on low dose antidepressants. He is just very careful with dosing.
Which herbs do you guys use to treat with and how did you start out?
I hope that clarifies things a little better. Sorry I was not more thorough in my initial presentation.
Also don’t care for my current gi doc but stuck with him for a bit.
Any suggestions greatly appreciated.

I am reading Healing Lyme right now as we speak. I am curious about people's different levels of functioning on herbs. I am a veterinarian so hard to get my head out of western medicine even though I am rehab and acupuncture certified. Do the herbs really work? And my understanding is that it takes much longer to get well? I had hoped to go back to work part time in about 6 months. That sounds like that might be unreasonable. Our profession is very stressful but I can get a different job. I am out on STD right now. But don't want to sit at home forever unless that is what I have to do.
Thoughts anyone?

Hi Goingfar,

You said that you are “curious about people's different levels of functioning on herbs.”

In my case I was trying to rid my body of parasites (with anti parasitics) first then after about 6 months I added more herbal tinctures to combat more specifically Lyme and coinfections. Also, some of the things that I was taking for parasites would be of some help with Lyme & cos… And to be honest I think that I was taking Cryptolepis tincture to start on Lyme & cos. while on anti parasitics.

I started taking Ivermectin, nitazoxide, Fenbendazole and Black walnut woodworm tincture. I would start with taking one of them (3xday) and then skip 5 days then take it again (3xday) skip 5…I change to a different one after a few cycles…I did this for 6 months.
(The only one I took 2xday was the nitazoxide because that came in a 6 pill package.)

After the 6 months I started taking skullcap, Black Walnut woodworm & Japanese knotweed tinctures…And was detoxing with herbal teas, Quercetin with Bromelain, NAC & Turmeric…among others.

When I got to about 2-3 months I was seeing some improvement but still not as much as I’d like. (I keep having this rash on my hands and dryness and wrinkles that never seem to go away.

So now along with my herbal tinctures I’m back to pulsing with ivermectin 2xday-7 days on 7 days off and after a few weeks I see a little more improvement.

In summary: I believe parasites were leaving my body…I never had terrible herx reactions just loose stool that at times looked strange to me and I had stuffy nose with light green contents.

As for herbal tinctures I don’t have bad herx reactions either. Maybe this is because of getting rid the parasites first.

As another note: I did have to go gluten free, dairy free and sugar free.

Hope this helps,
MyJourney101

Post Edited (MyJourney101) : 12/20/2023 11:18:34 AM (GMT-8)

No, upon my research I’ve found out that parasites can be very common in our country. You can pick them up very easily through undercooked food or even through your pets.

Post Edited (MyJourney101) : 12/20/2023 4:27:13 PM (GMT-8)

Goingfar said...
Fot those of you using herbal tinctures.......are you taking these with food or without?

I took mine without.