Chronic Bronchitis

[giselle]

Hi everyone,

I am new here, I am SO grateful to have found this board because I feel like I am on the verge of falling apart. In brief, I wanted to know if anyone has had the experience of getting repeated episodes of bronchitis, asthmatic bronchitis, or other similiar illnesses while still ingesting wheat and gluten. I am too sick to begin to explain everything, but I am only just beginning to go wheat free. I developed chronic bronchitis over a year ago and have had so many antibiotics/inhalers, etc. and I keep relapsing. I am very frightened from being so sick and weak. My life is in standstill, I can barely function or think. Sorry for the poor writing.

I am newly diagnosed and overwhelmed. Very depressed and teary. But most of all, the bronchitis is scaring me because of how sick it makes me and my doc says I will get resistant to meds if we arent careful. I am about to have a sputum culture done as well.

I would be so very grateful for any feedback.

Completely overwhelmed, giselle

[Guest Eloisa]

Giselle,

Sorry you feel so bad but I completely understand. I used to get chronic sinus infections and my husband used to get chronic bronchitus all the time. I know that having celiac disease weakens your immune system therefore you get sick easily and its takes longer to get well. I just want to let you know that there is hope in this. I take Reliv shakes which are nutritional supplement that are taken in liquid form and since I've taken them I no longer have sinus issues that turned into infections. I've completely gotton off of all my sinus medications and have not had a sinus infection since I've been on Reliv. My husband who was sceptical about taking anything finally went to a Reliv meeting and heard all the great health stories and was convinced to start taking Reliv. Since him being on it, he has not had any bronchial infections and is off his sinus meds as well. He also suffered from old athletic injuries (knee, broken vertibre, broken bones and arthiritus) and had severe intestinal damage in his early twenties. When he started taking Reliv he initially started because of all of the aches and pains he had from injuries but wound up benefiting from all other issues his body has been going through.

Eloisa

[cdford]

Also, if you use a hot tub regularly, be sure to tell your doctor as this can sometimes trigger infections that react like bronchitis.

[Guest nini]

yeah, prior to being dx and going gluten-free, I used to get upper respiratory infections and bronchitis ALL the time. Seems like I would just get off of treatment for one and BOOM along came another one.

[anewsprue]

Hello all, don't know if it's celiac disease related but I just got out of the hospital on Monday after being admitted with pneumonia and pleurisy. I still hurt, can't breathe well at times but feel a little better overall. I think my immune system has left the building, it's just been a very tough year.

[giselle]

Hi everyone,

Thanks for the great replies and info. I just got the results of my culture back and found I have Viral Chronic Bronchitis. It's good that I got a second opinion because I had been given 4 different very long courses of powerful antibiotics over the last year. My second doc said I was lucky to have not developed a resistant strep infection (MRSA), scary stuff.

After reading other posts here, it seems I have a severe case of fibro "fog" (also have fibromyalgia like several of you) and I guess that is why I am so mentally overwhelmed about where to begin in starting my wheat/gluten free diet.

I am happy to hear that many of you got relief from your bronchitis after starting the diet, so I guess I have some hope now. Perhaps I should go to the thread about the diet and see how others got going.

Thanks again for your efforts in helping me. In friendship, giselle

[BellaSara]

I was having autoimmune problems and had chronic bronchitis all winter long. I decided to try the gluten free diet to see if it would help. After about five days I was doing good and my bronchitis was starting to heal. I went and I bought what I was told to be gluten free spelt bread. After about 3 pieces I got very tired and took a nap. My bronchitis came back full force and I was immobilized for a week. I also got a very bad case of plurisy which I still have slightly. All from three pieces of bread.

[mouse]

For MANY years I would get Bronchitis so severly that I would end up as a patient in the hospital or intensive care. I had an 18 hour window to get on antibiotics before I ended up in the hospital. And of course this would always happen on a weekend LOL. Had the pneumonia shot and exactly 2 weeks later I had pneumonia and again landed in the hospital. Two years later I had a very rare and painful pneumonia and ended up in the hospital. Went from intensive care to cardiac intensive care. 6 days after I was admitted I had lung surgery. I was there two weeks and that was when my husband started talking about early retirement and to get me out of the cold. A long bout of allergy attacks would trigger Bronchitis and my doctor gave me potent antibiotics to keep on hand. Since I have been gluten-free (year and a half) I have not used an Epi-Pen and had one bout of Bronchitis the beginning of this year. It was Asthmatic Bronchitis and required a trip to the emergency room with lots of meds fed intraveniously - BUT, I was not hospitalized. This has been the best year and a half that I have had with only relative minor asthma problems (except for the one just mentioned. This beats the last 15 years. So, I think that going gluten-free made a big difference in all of this.

Armetta

[Misa]

Bronchitis was actually the reason I started to investigate celiac disease I got really bad coughing spells everytime I ate gluten grains. It took a while for me to see the connection, but one day after yet another coughing attack I suddenly said to a friend; Iget this everytime I eat bread. Saying it out loud made me think of course and just after the first gluten-free day my coughing stopped and hasn't returned in six weeks now.....

It just blows me away how many symptoms can be gluten-related.

Misa