Sorry to hear about
your troubles Mike
I wish you healing.
about
the immune system forgetting, I'm not sure that's a factor. Think about
something like... a wound on your skin. The immune system remains active in the wound until it is healed, then it backs off. The immune system does not keep attacking the skin. Our immune system is very intelligent! The bowels are similar. This notion that the immune system becomes sensitized to colonic epithelium "somehow" and then always attacks it, actually has next to no evidence. There are no IBD cell-surface markers that make us particularly susceptible to immune attacks on the colon. If you dig deep, there is not much positive evidence for the autoimmune theory of disease in IBD. They are just assuming it's somehow that because they haven't been able (or are unwilling) to find the real root cause.
True genetic mutations that cause severe disease are rare, and the IBD rate is increasing globally. The reductive theory of disease means that, although we as a cohort are more susceptible to oxidative stress, it's our living environment (food, pollution, stress, etc.) that is ramping our oxidant levels sky high and triggering IBD.
It's also my understanding from Pravda's papers that once the gut is sealed, IBD vanishes. This suggests that in someone who is prone to high oxidative stress and hydrogen peroxide to start with, an initial injury locks the body into a vicious cycle of immune activation and failure to wound repair. This aligns with how most of us started our IBD journey: infection, antibiotics, or an extreme stressful event... which all falls under the umbrella of: injury.
The cellular redox biochemistry aspect of this is hard to type about
on a forum. It takes a lot of study. I captured some of the primers in my other thread. The basic problem we have is that hydrogen peroxide corrodes the bowel wall (creates injury), then the immune system attacks to try and deal with the injury by activating inflammation... but inflammation is oxidative, so more hydrogen peroxide is produced which continues the vicious cycle of inflicted injury. To stop UC, we should not be suppressing the attacking immune system, which is only just trying to do its job. We instead need to neutralize the hydrogen peroxide so that the biochemical attack that started the whole thing is ended. Then the immune system can complete its job of healing the wound. Our problem is "auto-oxidative", not autoimmune. Our immune systems are normal. What we become is hyper-immune activated because the immune system is struggling to deal with an injury that it can't heal while making the injury worse in the process.
Pravda's papers confirm this.
As to the other bowel conditions you speak of, I think digestive disease is complicated and there won't be a shotgun approach for everything. For example, Crohn's is more than likely caused by a myobacterial organism (MAP) and they are trialing a vaccine now. I don't think Pravda's approach would work on Crohn's but a lot of Crohn's patients also have colitis features, so maybe reducing oxidation status would still help them too.
In general it is my firm understanding that the modern way humans live is driving this diseases. We are exposed to more garbage from our environment and oxidative stress than any other time in history. If Crohn's really is caused by MAP, then it's caused by contaminated food supply (industrial farming, dairy and beef specifically), which has huge implications. A nutrient-poor food system also contributes to this problem.
I believe that the fundamental reason why they are acting like they don't know how to fix these diseases is because in order to do so, they'd have to admit that we have major problems with our food systems, and our way of living in general. Since big pharma and agriculture are all owned by the same conglomerates, they are not going to point a smoking gun at themselves. Imagine a future when oxidative exposure is so bad for everyone that we all have to take novel antioxidants just to maintain basic health. Is that the kind of future we're supposed to feel good about
? Well, it looks like we might be heading there, as the IBD rate is growing quickly in the west. Some of us were always destined for UC because our oxidation status was always naturally high. But maybe others were more, let's say, middle-ground and they could avoid the disease... until now, when peak environmental oxidation has risen to higher levels, and now a whole new cohort in the middle range is being captured (statistically), and getting UC. I predict that at the rate we're going, even people who have mild oxidative problems will be getting UC in the next 50 years.
Consider this. People prone to increased oxidative stress have probably always been around throughout history, but only now are we seeing skyrocketing disease rates -- and it's not just because of increased medical diagnosis. The background rate has been going up since the year 2000, steadily. Canada has some of the highest rates of UC. The rate has climbed 300% since 2008. Imagine how bad oxidative exposure must be now that so many people are developing UC, and that we have to invent a novel antioxidant to stop it? That's not normal. Our environment is screwed up!
Old Mike said...
As I sit here with a disconnected rectum 6 months out, I wish you all luck. Right now I am into diversion colitis,which
anyone with a diverted rectum will get to some degree. I can feel something going on myself not just mucus discharge.
Anyway something to think about,don't believe the systemic immune system forgets easily,second many supplements are not overly bioavailable,lots of first pass destruction in the liver,or poor absorption.
Here is Pravda on diversion colitis.
PS: I am on a facebook ostomy group,you would not believe the number of people having gut
surgery due to diverticulitis,septic and all, seems like one or two a day. 18000 in the group so far, its not just UC,Crohns,FAP or cancer. Shocks me to see what goes on.
https://jjgastrohepto.org/pdf/jjgh-v2-1150.pdf
Oldmike