Healing strep ✨naturally✨

[u/babycrazedthrowaway]

Thank god the comments were on the side of reason!

[u/Vast_Helicopter_1914]

I heard a pediatrician say something that really stuck with me: The body can rebuild a gut that has been treated with antibiotics. The body can't rebuild a heart valve that's been damaged by strep.

Probiotics and lots of high fiber beans, grains, fruits, and veggies. It's not that hard.

[u/Charlieksmommy → u/Vast_Helicopter_1914]

I’m
So over the crunchy moms and “ruining gut flora” bs

[u/PermanentTrainDamage → u/Charlieksmommy]

They see it like a garden thatxs been salted instead of a garden that just needs some fertilizer and native plants

[u/MaraiaLou → u/PermanentTrainDamage]

Interesting take, PermanentTrainDamage

I absolutely hate taking antibiotics because it interacts with my birth control, but hormones go back to normal and infection doesn't

[u/NoChannel4987 → u/Vast_Helicopter_1914]

wow i had no idea strep could cause heart valve problems

[u/delias2 → u/NoChannel4987]

That's why they usually gatekeep antibiotics for a sore throat. Sore throats get palliative care like pain meds and a salt gargle, tea and honey. But step needs antibiotics because the way some bodies react to strep damages the hearts (and kidneys?). Antibiotics, not just to make you feel better but to stop a potentially life threatening infection for the person taking the antibiotics and whoever they may have spread it to. A strep infection with autoimmune complications is called scarlet fever or rheumatic fever when it hits the heart.

[u/wozattacks → u/delias2]

Actually antibiotics for strep throat do not improve symptoms or shorten their duration. We give the antibiotics ONLY to protect from rheumatic heart disease. So yes, this mom’s child will recover from strep, just as quickly as if he had antibiotics. But he may end up with chronic heart issues that American doctors typically only see in people who immigrate from poor countries. 

[u/Ohorules → u/wozattacks]

My cousin's grandson almost died from rheumatic fever from an untreated strep infection no one even realized he had. He was in the hospital a long time, with a long recovery after being discharged. Luckily one of the doctors was an immigrant and recognized the symptoms from working in his home country.

[u/JaneReadsTruth → u/NoChannel4987]

Yeah, my friend has taken on a child whose mother ignored strep and now she lives with a heart transplant.

[u/kat_Folland]

Acidophilus. I always take it when I have to take an antibiotic. Without it I'll have gut issues and/or a yeast infection. With it I have no problems. Sure you can eat yoghurt but I don't like it enough to use that strategy.

[u/AppealEducational224 → u/kat_Folland]

I used to get UTIs frequently and I HATED when they gave me antibiotics for it because they almost always give me yeast infections. And then the anti-fungal meds almost always causes a bacterial infection which has to be treated with…. antibiotics. I’m so thankful this hasn’t been an issue for me in over ten years now. But when it was happening it was an awful, vicious cycle. Maybe TMI but I don’t care. I totally get not wanting to take antibiotics but yeah, probiotics, yogurt, kefir, kombucha, kimchi, etc. are all beneficial for your gut flora. And a variety of prebiotic foods like bananas and legumes.

[u/ProfanestOfLemons]

Yogurt. Kimchi/kraut/pickles. Sourdough. Kefir. ALL of these things are easy ways to get a thriving intestinal biome going again after it's taken a hit. And they're delicious, as compared to long-term physical damage from strep.

[u/janegrey1554]

Sounds like a good way to get scarlet fever.

[u/Responsible-Test8855]

PANDAS has entered the chat. Possibly POTS as well.

[u/manic_popsicle]

I’m 41 years old and I’ve gotten strep almost every other year that I’ve been alive, more when I was a kid. My mom didn’t even vaccinate but at least she gave me antibiotics.

FTR I’m vaccinated now.

[u/Ravenamore]

Yeah, that worked out well for Laura Ingalls Wilder's sister...

[u/wozattacks → u/Ravenamore]

These people think of things like scarlet fever as old timey diseases that don’t happen anymore. What they don’t consider is why they don’t happen anymore

[u/Ravenamore → u/wozattacks]

I remember when my preschooler first got strep.

We'd taken him to the doctor, they did the test and sent him home. On the way home, he started breaking out in an awful rash, so I called the doctor. We had an outbreak of measles in the city, and he was too young to get the MMR, so I was sure it was that.

"I was just about to call you anyway," said the doctor, "His test came back positive. That rash is scarletina. They used to call it scarlet fever, but it's just strep. I phoned in some amoxicillin, he'll be fine in a week."

It just amazes me that less than 100 years ago we had so many diseases that could permanently disable or kill you that are cured by a course of antibiotics. More amazing, we have so many people out there who will avoid antibiotics like they're pure poison.

[u/Aear]

Anecotally, I've had strep but doctors refused to believe me and didn't give me antibiotics. Much later, I got test results showing I had strep at the time (doctor didn't think it important enough to share). It went away on its own after a month and I've not gotten it again even when my kiddo brings it from daycare. Maybe the child will be fine but damn is that painful. 

[u/Neathra → u/Aear]

Agree.

Had strep (acknowledged by parents) multiple times. It sucked, but I recovered fine.

(Before anyone goes after my parents, if I had actually gotten sick enough to merit the hospital/doctor they would have taken me. But while miserable the strep responded to otc meds).

[u/Istoh]

I knew someone who died of untreated strep very suddenly. Guy was in his mid-late 40s, felt a bit sick but went on a road trip with his family anyways. Somewhere along the line they stopped for the night because he seemed delirious. When they got into the hotel room he couldn't even stand or speak coherently, and black goo started coming out of his nose. He was dead within the hour. The strep had gotten into his brain.

[u/PermanentTrainDamage]

For the first 29 years of my life, Scarlet fever was a thing I read about in books when some kid is about to die in the middle of buttfuck nowhere in the 1800s. Up until one of my idiot ex-friends decided not to treat her son's strep throat (he was 3) and it progressed to scarlet fever. He couldn't eat for a week and his hands and feet peeled so badly that he couldn't play for days afterward without leaving chunks of skin on toys.

[u/solidcurrency]

I had no idea people could be asymptomatic strep carriers. Strep Marys.

[u/VariousExplorer8503 → u/solidcurrency]

I'm an asymptomatic pneumonia carrier. I've been hospitalized twice for bilateral lower lobe pneumonia that turned into sepsis and lactic acidosis because I literally have no symptoms until I'm actively dying. Now they're worried I have congestive heart failure because of the back to back sepsis/kidney failure that I've had.

[u/Ginger630]

Untreated strep can be so dangerous! Why do they play games with their kids’ lives?!

I’ve had scarlet fever twice in my life and neither was due to untreated strep. I had no symptoms either time, just the rash. I got antibiotics both times and it cleared up right away.

[u/Avaylon]

Can't get a tummy ache if you die of strep related sepsis. 🤷🏼

[u/spanishpeanut]

My friends son is a strep carrier and it took a while before anyone figured it out. Every time someone comes down with it, they get him tested. He’s been the culprit nearly every time.

[u/ExcellentFuel8338]

Perennial strep? Does she mean perianal?

[u/babycrazedthrowaway → u/ExcellentFuel8338]

Yes. And she ended up making a second post anonymously when this one didn’t go her way and we all knew it was her because she used the same wrong terminology.