Michael Harrop
Active member
Have done FMTs from 10 different donors prior to this one https://forum.humanmicrobiome.info/threads/my-detailed-experiences-lessons-from-13-different-fmt-donors-jun-2018.53/
Last one was from HumanMicrobes.org, Donor UT-AW-1998. https://forum.humanmicrobiome.info/threads/humanmicrobes-org-donor-ut-aw-1998-no-improvement-for-ibs-d-cfs-mild-a.102/
HumanMicrobes.org results tracking: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1E9TFLqh9I2ZZhDSvGljyhukU-71fFMmJ/edit#gid=174339095
Ears have been leaking (mostly at night) for past few weeks. It's caustic and burns my skin. Not too sure what the trigger is/was, but I'm pretty sure it has to do with multiple things:
1. Chronic infection. My body seems incapable of mounting an immune response. I haven't really been sick in over a decade, but I've been feeling unwell all the time. Cause could be an ear infection, head cold, etc. that my body can't fight off.
2. Related to the Alzheimer's mechanism of drainage of waste and toxic proteins https://archive.ph/19Ibb#selection-2475.11-2479.0. I have mild Alzheimer's symptoms so clearly my waste-clearing system isn't working well. My circulation seems poor too. There may be blockages.
02/09/2022: First stool I received was small, dark, type 2, dry, uniform. The odor and taste are very mild, like healthy stool. It was refrigerated in a zip lock bag for ~24 hours, with the air removed. I took 0.5-1tbls orally, first thing in the morning on an empty stomach, with water, ~2 hours before breakfast. Refrigerated another same dose for the next day, and straight-froze the rest.
Maybe caused a slight increase in energy that day, but the change could have been due to other normal variation as well.
I've consistently noticed that when I have certain types of major changes to my gut microbiome I dream of an apocalyptic scenario where the world is being destroyed by volcanoes, monsters, massive waves, etc.. I think it's clear that the gut microbiome impacts dreams. I wonder if it would even be too much to say that gut microbes are communicating through dreams to some extent. Technically "communication" would qualify as signals of "good/happy" "sad/bad", so it's not too much of a leap.
Continued taking one small dose each morning. Did a deep retention enema after ~5 days, then another enema a week after that.
About 5 days in I was able to stop taking Cholestyramine. Then a few days later stopped taking iron, but had to add back a smaller dose.
02/23/2022: Historically, I used to feel best with light brown stools. After 5-7 donors that changed, and all symptoms would drastically worsen unless my stool was dark. I was using iron + Cholestyramine to make my stools dark. After two weeks of FMTs from this donor I stopped taking them, and my stools are now light brown with none of the severe symptoms (somewhat like sepsis) I would normally experience. Though I did start to have more mild versions of the same issues, so I added back some iron to darken stool again, and that helped.
02/26/2022: Second stool I received was softer than the first (type 4 vs type 2-3), but otherwise similar. Kept it refrigerated and took two doses orally (1st mid-day I received it, 2nd early morning next day) before using the softer half for enema the day after I received it. 1.5 hours after the enema I experienced heavy fatigue in bed. Cool/light burning sensation at cecum that spread to whole right side colon.
I haven't had a reaction like this from a stool donor in a very long time. The previous enemas from this donor were with frozen stool, and I experienced a more mild reaction from them. In general, enemas from this donor seem significantly more powerful than all other donors I've used in recent years (at least the last two thirds of the 11 donors I've used). Enemas from this donor seem to have a larger impact than upper route too. This type of heavy sleepy fatigue is not something I've experienced in a long time. Donor 6 once triggered a similar thing.
Factors that may have contributed: stool softer than last time. Fresh, not frozen.
It seems to be the softness, since this softer 2nd stool seemed to reverse some of the benefits I got from the 1st one, and I had to add back BAS. Then I did a fresh enema with the 3rd stool and noticed no reaction.
I kept the stool in the refrigerator while using it for a week. Didn't notice any issues/problems.
03/15/2022: Third stool's firmness was in between 1 & 2. The impacts were closer to stool #1, and did allow me to stop BAS and add peanuts again. This donor has also had a fairly strong mucus-related effect. Mucus production has increased. My farts smell like mucus, overall odor of BMs is drastically reduced. I'm thinking that if I fast now the benefits/results may be significantly different from what I've experienced in the past. I'm hoping/thinking this donor may be able to fix/improve my mucosa barrier.
04/23/2022: Fast didn’t seem to do much, but I didn’t get diarrhea from it (which is new). IBS is significantly improved still.
Longer logs: https://forum.humanmicrobiome.info/threads/my-detailed-experiences-lessons-from-13-different-fmt-donors-jun-2018.53/
Continued benefits & new benefits months after stopping:
2022-05-09: Holy shit. Apparently I can eat meat now. I haven't been able to tolerate protein for like a decade, after I took Rifaximin. Will update with more details soon.
2022-05-14: Yep, not only can I tolerate, meat, eggs, protein, but I'm craving them and they're beneficial for me.
2022-05-24: Have gotten further improvements to head/brain. I've been starting to be able to lie my head flat at night. Ever since I used donor 5 and started getting bad head trouble, I've had to incline my bed plus use a folded pillow to prop my head up during sleep, or instead of some mild recovery during sleep my head gets much worse - inflammation, swelling, feeling full, etc.. Seems to be related to these drainage issues: https://archive.ph/19Ibb#selection-2475.11-2479.0
Temporarily lost most of the benefits from stopping iron & eating mushrooms (disruptive prebiotic effect):
Lost around 05/25/2022. Back by 06/16/2022.
My stools got lighter in color, and larger, and then loose & undigested (from the mushrooms). I started getting bad gas. The detriments were nowhere near what they would have been prior to this donor. In fact, I didn’t experience any severe head problems at all. Thus, the brain protection that this donor gave was quite durable.
My tolerance for fat and protein dropped extremely low. Hasn’t been this low for many years.
I’ve experienced two sets of phenomenon since donor 8:
1. FMT benefits are very easily perturbed/lost. It seemed the microbes only occupied a top layer and didn’t penetrate to lower ones. Possibly due to not enough FMTs.
2. There’s an ability to switch back and forth between states. One state is more tolerant of fat & protein and can be boosted & switched to by taking iron & BAS, and cauliflower (and possibly bok choy) seemed to boost it as well.
I was worried I upset things to the point of completely losing the benefits. But it seems that this donor is powerful enough, and/or my FMT procedure was good & long enough that the benefits were durable and long-lasting, and I was able to regain all benefits.
I would continue with a 1x/week dose but there are some other donors I’m interested in testing. (fell through)
2022/08/09: It seemed like the benefits were starting to wear off, so I started a 1x/week dose.
2022/09/17: It looks like my new "ideal" is zero iron. I don't actually know if the 1x/week dose caused this, or if it just seemed like benefits were wearing off because my new "ideal" changed. Either way, FMT from this donor is reversing the damage from Prescript-Assist and Donor 5. And my status is changing back to what it was prior to those two things. And it's even reversing some of the damage done from Rifaximin in regards to protein & fat intolerance.
Sleep & IBS are also improved again after finding this new normal. I'm still fatigued a lot though.
The "new normal" faded, and I went back to 1-2 iron per day.
I'm not really sold on the 1x/week dose. It's probably decent as a maintenance dose but nothing more than that.
For many years (discovered after donor 5) I was dependent on bok choy to keep my stools firm. This donor seemed to fix that.
11/01/2022: Doing fairly well on 1-2 iron per day. Gas is often an issue again though due to the instability.
I'm often going for walks after meals instead of fatigued in bed; but not all the time.
Original 24 Apr 2022 (20 comments).
Last one was from HumanMicrobes.org, Donor UT-AW-1998. https://forum.humanmicrobiome.info/threads/humanmicrobes-org-donor-ut-aw-1998-no-improvement-for-ibs-d-cfs-mild-a.102/
HumanMicrobes.org results tracking: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1E9TFLqh9I2ZZhDSvGljyhukU-71fFMmJ/edit#gid=174339095
Prior to FMT:
Everything pretty much the same as prior to UT-AW-1998. Except worse tolerance for fat/cheese since AW's microbes seemed to crowd out AR's.Symptoms:
CFS (chronic fatigue syndrome), IBS-D. Very low brain function. Still very underweight. Brain frequently feels inflamed and "full", poor circulation, and other things that are hard to describe such as a pressure/circulatory pain, a bludgeoning feeling, etc.. My memory is terrible. I feel like I have mild Alzheimer's/type 3 diabetes https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2769828/. Chronic sinus stuffiness. Wounds heal extremely slowly, poorly, and incompletely, and are caused easily. I've been having problems with swelling of my feet and face. Permanent "bruising" showed up in my feet. Dark bags under eyes. Face frequently pale and swollen. Many food intolerances, including to many FODMAPs. Almost no sex drive.Ears have been leaking (mostly at night) for past few weeks. It's caustic and burns my skin. Not too sure what the trigger is/was, but I'm pretty sure it has to do with multiple things:
1. Chronic infection. My body seems incapable of mounting an immune response. I haven't really been sick in over a decade, but I've been feeling unwell all the time. Cause could be an ear infection, head cold, etc. that my body can't fight off.
2. Related to the Alzheimer's mechanism of drainage of waste and toxic proteins https://archive.ph/19Ibb#selection-2475.11-2479.0. I have mild Alzheimer's symptoms so clearly my waste-clearing system isn't working well. My circulation seems poor too. There may be blockages.
Diet:
Jack cheese, select fruits, white sweet potatoes, olive oil, some limited spices, honey, basmati white rice, some leafy greens, broccoli and cauliflower.Supplements:
Cholestyramine (BAS), imodium, creatine, b complex, 5k vit d, 65mg iron (ferrous sulfate), 25mg zinc.Summary:
Similar but different from RDS-AR. Better at some things, worse at others. Should be safer, but a little weaker overall for my bile acid metabolism & fatigue issues. But possibly a little stronger in regards to protein & other various food tolerance. Mild overall improvements; moderate improvements for IBS. Allowed me to stop BAS, add peanuts, walnuts, brazil nuts, avocados, increase amount of cheese, improved some IBS aspects such as making fart & stool odor very mild, and improved stool consistency, and decreased size of stools. No noticeable problems or differences from frozen vs refrigerated for up to 9 days. Did a 3 day juice fast afterwards; didn't notice any significant benefits from that. Tried black eyed peas and oatmeal - tolerance definitely improved, but one of them still seemed too problematic.02/09/2022: First stool I received was small, dark, type 2, dry, uniform. The odor and taste are very mild, like healthy stool. It was refrigerated in a zip lock bag for ~24 hours, with the air removed. I took 0.5-1tbls orally, first thing in the morning on an empty stomach, with water, ~2 hours before breakfast. Refrigerated another same dose for the next day, and straight-froze the rest.
Maybe caused a slight increase in energy that day, but the change could have been due to other normal variation as well.
I've consistently noticed that when I have certain types of major changes to my gut microbiome I dream of an apocalyptic scenario where the world is being destroyed by volcanoes, monsters, massive waves, etc.. I think it's clear that the gut microbiome impacts dreams. I wonder if it would even be too much to say that gut microbes are communicating through dreams to some extent. Technically "communication" would qualify as signals of "good/happy" "sad/bad", so it's not too much of a leap.
Continued taking one small dose each morning. Did a deep retention enema after ~5 days, then another enema a week after that.
About 5 days in I was able to stop taking Cholestyramine. Then a few days later stopped taking iron, but had to add back a smaller dose.
02/23/2022: Historically, I used to feel best with light brown stools. After 5-7 donors that changed, and all symptoms would drastically worsen unless my stool was dark. I was using iron + Cholestyramine to make my stools dark. After two weeks of FMTs from this donor I stopped taking them, and my stools are now light brown with none of the severe symptoms (somewhat like sepsis) I would normally experience. Though I did start to have more mild versions of the same issues, so I added back some iron to darken stool again, and that helped.
02/26/2022: Second stool I received was softer than the first (type 4 vs type 2-3), but otherwise similar. Kept it refrigerated and took two doses orally (1st mid-day I received it, 2nd early morning next day) before using the softer half for enema the day after I received it. 1.5 hours after the enema I experienced heavy fatigue in bed. Cool/light burning sensation at cecum that spread to whole right side colon.
I haven't had a reaction like this from a stool donor in a very long time. The previous enemas from this donor were with frozen stool, and I experienced a more mild reaction from them. In general, enemas from this donor seem significantly more powerful than all other donors I've used in recent years (at least the last two thirds of the 11 donors I've used). Enemas from this donor seem to have a larger impact than upper route too. This type of heavy sleepy fatigue is not something I've experienced in a long time. Donor 6 once triggered a similar thing.
Factors that may have contributed: stool softer than last time. Fresh, not frozen.
It seems to be the softness, since this softer 2nd stool seemed to reverse some of the benefits I got from the 1st one, and I had to add back BAS. Then I did a fresh enema with the 3rd stool and noticed no reaction.
I kept the stool in the refrigerator while using it for a week. Didn't notice any issues/problems.
03/15/2022: Third stool's firmness was in between 1 & 2. The impacts were closer to stool #1, and did allow me to stop BAS and add peanuts again. This donor has also had a fairly strong mucus-related effect. Mucus production has increased. My farts smell like mucus, overall odor of BMs is drastically reduced. I'm thinking that if I fast now the benefits/results may be significantly different from what I've experienced in the past. I'm hoping/thinking this donor may be able to fix/improve my mucosa barrier.
04/23/2022: Fast didn’t seem to do much, but I didn’t get diarrhea from it (which is new). IBS is significantly improved still.
Longer logs: https://forum.humanmicrobiome.info/threads/my-detailed-experiences-lessons-from-13-different-fmt-donors-jun-2018.53/
Updates:
Continued benefits & new benefits months after stopping:
2022-05-09: Holy shit. Apparently I can eat meat now. I haven't been able to tolerate protein for like a decade, after I took Rifaximin. Will update with more details soon.
2022-05-14: Yep, not only can I tolerate, meat, eggs, protein, but I'm craving them and they're beneficial for me.
2022-05-24: Have gotten further improvements to head/brain. I've been starting to be able to lie my head flat at night. Ever since I used donor 5 and started getting bad head trouble, I've had to incline my bed plus use a folded pillow to prop my head up during sleep, or instead of some mild recovery during sleep my head gets much worse - inflammation, swelling, feeling full, etc.. Seems to be related to these drainage issues: https://archive.ph/19Ibb#selection-2475.11-2479.0
Temporarily lost most of the benefits from stopping iron & eating mushrooms (disruptive prebiotic effect):
Lost around 05/25/2022. Back by 06/16/2022.
My stools got lighter in color, and larger, and then loose & undigested (from the mushrooms). I started getting bad gas. The detriments were nowhere near what they would have been prior to this donor. In fact, I didn’t experience any severe head problems at all. Thus, the brain protection that this donor gave was quite durable.
My tolerance for fat and protein dropped extremely low. Hasn’t been this low for many years.
I’ve experienced two sets of phenomenon since donor 8:
1. FMT benefits are very easily perturbed/lost. It seemed the microbes only occupied a top layer and didn’t penetrate to lower ones. Possibly due to not enough FMTs.
2. There’s an ability to switch back and forth between states. One state is more tolerant of fat & protein and can be boosted & switched to by taking iron & BAS, and cauliflower (and possibly bok choy) seemed to boost it as well.
I was worried I upset things to the point of completely losing the benefits. But it seems that this donor is powerful enough, and/or my FMT procedure was good & long enough that the benefits were durable and long-lasting, and I was able to regain all benefits.
Benefits started wearing off? Or a "new normal"? Tested a 1x/week dose:
2022/08/09: It seemed like the benefits were starting to wear off, so I started a 1x/week dose.
2022/09/17: It looks like my new "ideal" is zero iron. I don't actually know if the 1x/week dose caused this, or if it just seemed like benefits were wearing off because my new "ideal" changed. Either way, FMT from this donor is reversing the damage from Prescript-Assist and Donor 5. And my status is changing back to what it was prior to those two things. And it's even reversing some of the damage done from Rifaximin in regards to protein & fat intolerance.
Sleep & IBS are also improved again after finding this new normal. I'm still fatigued a lot though.
The "new normal" faded, and I went back to 1-2 iron per day.
I'm not really sold on the 1x/week dose. It's probably decent as a maintenance dose but nothing more than that.
For many years (discovered after donor 5) I was dependent on bok choy to keep my stools firm. This donor seemed to fix that.
11/01/2022: Doing fairly well on 1-2 iron per day. Gas is often an issue again though due to the instability.
I'm often going for walks after meals instead of fatigued in bed; but not all the time.
Original 24 Apr 2022 (20 comments).
- FMT Clinics
- I included all required info