My personal experience with drainage modalities
My drainage story
I am a person with longstanding digestive issues.
Ever since my childhood, I struggled with belly aches, inconsistent stool patterns, and all kinds of other digestive symptoms. I would full-on vomit from stress. I was a somaticizer, with big emotions that I wasn't allowed to express, so I stuffed them down... into my body.
Over the years, I have tried just about every diet, supplement, herb, and strategy imaginable to address these issues.
I did functional stool tests, and was told that my results were some of the worst that the practitioner had ever seen, in terms of the type of pathogens I had, as well as the sheer amount of them.
I tried doing parasite cleanses, but they only made me sicker. My body couldn't handle them. I was too sensitive.
I tried all of the classic gut-health supplements: HCl, probiotics, digestive enzymes.
I tried gut-healing diets, including 6 months on the GAPS Nutritional Protocol, and even became a practitioner in that field. While the GAPS diet did wonders for so many of my peripheral symptoms, my digestive symptoms did not change much, despite all of the easy-to-digest, enzyme-and-microbe-rich food I was preparing and consuming.
I tried classical homeopathic remedies. Homeopathic bowel nosodes were also recommended, but did little to shift my digestive symptoms.
I think I have experienced just about every kind of digestive symptom that a person could have.
I have had bouts of no appetite and burning pain. I've had periods where I simply couldn't eat anything, and started to waste away.
I spent years waking up every morning with abdominal cramps.
I have been to the hospital TWICE for symptoms that seemed like "classic" appendicitis. The first time landed me an abdominal laparoscopy (fortunately, my appendix, which was fine, remained intact). The second time turned out to be a case of spontaneous C. diff.
I had periods of my life of complete digestive shutdown, as if the nerves of my digestive system were outright paralyzed. It wasn't just backed up -- it was switched off.
Even when I didn't feel outright miserable, I usually struggled with some sort of reaction to different foods. My diet became very restricted.
I had chronic diverticular pain, too.
I was a classic "tough case," caught between a rock and a hard place, toggling between interventions that didn't work and interventions that made me feel worse.
It seemed that no matter what I ate, no matter which remedies or supplements I took, no matter how I tried to balance my microbiome, I would only achieve limited success. Even if things got better for a little while, they would soon revert to how they were, or shift into something new.
I became a Certified Human Intestinal Microbiome in Health and Disease Expert. I made sure to consume prebiotics, probiotics, and postbiotics. I learned the cutting-edge strategies for dealing with digestive issues. I tried biofilm busters, Chinese herbs, coffee enemas, colonics...
I was clearly doing "all the right things," as someone with a lot of education, professional clinical experience, motivation, and discipline to implement all of the standard strategies, and even the outside-the-box ones!
But I wasn't getting better. Nothing was moving the needle. And some approaches just backfired and caused other issues.
For years, I had steatorrhea (floating, greasy stools). This indicates an inability to digest fats. I was investigated for exocrine pancreatic insufficiency and found to only be a borderline case, thankfully. I took digestive enzymes, which helped for a little while, but then even those wore off. It seemed that my body just wasn't able to digest fats, which is problematic in a variety of ways.
Finally, I started on drainage therapies.
Before starting on drainage, I was having urgent diarrhea nearly every morning (except for the days when I was just completely constipated), floating stools, abdominal cramps, rectal pain and hemorrhoids.
Within 3 DAYS of being on a drainage remedy, selected for my particular symptoms and vitality level, my stools began to sink to the bottom of the toilet!
I no longer experienced pain, urgency, or diarrhea.
My stools became formed, typically close to the coveted #4 on the Bristol Stool Chart.
Instead of only having bowel movements in the morning, they became spaced out throughout the day, which is desired for optimal elimination.
I used to wake up in the morning and immediately feel abdominal pain, but that hasn't been a thing for me anymore.
I'm sure everything that I did in the past must have laid some groundwork. But I will never not be amazed at how only several days of drainage were able to accomplish what months of being on a therapeutic diet could not.
Most importantly, the results have been lasting.
I have continued to stay on drainage therapies, because my body needs the support. I'm a poor detoxifier and poor methylator, with an autoimmune disorder, so I will probably remain on some form of drainage forever.
Besides my improved digestion, I have also been getting better sleep, which is huge for me. Since implementing drainage remedies, my heart rate variability has improved, I'm sleeping for longer, and getting more deep sleep.
I have been studying and practicing drainage since 2018, and am eternally grateful for the gift of these therapies.
I have seen great results within my practice, as well as with my family members.