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Habits And Immune System


habits and immune system  

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For some reason, I have an AMAZING immune system. I have had ONE cold in the last 15 years!!!! If I didn't have POTS(and low blood sugar), I wouldn't have a need to see a doctor. And, now that I said that, I'll probably come down with a diarrhea virus or something like that!

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I do get sick a lot, but less now that I am working on building up my immune system with vitamins and probiotics. I know people have said this before, but I do notice that my actual POTS symptoms are better when I am sick...so in a very weird way, I guess i kind of don't get too mad if i have a cold, etc because at least I can attribute my symptoms to an actual virus, etc and not just my body being weird! Plus my orthostatic intolerance and hypoglycemia feelings get a bit better!

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I was recently diagnosed with hypoimmunoglobulinemia (haha, and I thought pronouncing POTS was bad lol), which basically means that my body isn't making some of the antibodies it is supposed to make. So, I am always getting infections and it takes a long time to get over them. My POTS feels a lot worse when I have an infection. I currently am trying to get over C. Diff. (had it for over a month now), a sinus infection, and infections in both my ears. It makes you wonder how the immune system is involved with POTS.

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I've posted before about getting sick a ton since POTS and not having my body kick the bugs. My symptoms are always bad when I'm ill and particularly bad when I've got something viral. Never been a smoker, wasn't sick much as a child, rarely exposed to secondhand smoke, and with no diagnosed immune syndrome.

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I don't get sick often, especially for the usual creeping crud that goes around. Instead, when I do get sick, it's usually a multi-system affair and I'm looking at a serious condition with potentially deadly consequences. I had a few friends who picked up the oink flu and I made daily deliveries of food and meds to them without a single sniffle myself.

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Hi, potsy, dana and anyone else that doesn't run a fever when they are actually sick. I too have hypogammaglobulinemia or CVID. It is diagnosed by Immunoglobulins Quantitative with Immunofixation, if any of your igg, igm or iga's come back low they then check a sub igg panel, ige, igd and do a vaccine challenge test. A screening test on your CBC that might show something is off is your ig/ratio. If that shows high it means some of your immunoglobulins are suppressed. That happened to me on and off for years and no doctor ever looked into it. My neuro checks this routinely in all his patients, which is how they found mind. Looking back over my life I can see there were signs probably from birth.

When you have hypogamma your body is not able to mount an immune response and produce a good fever to fight things off. I will feel like I have a fever and or infection with the achy's and pain but no fever. When my colon ruptured with pertinitis and wbc of 20,000 the highest my fever got was 100.2. Now when I feel like I'm fighting something I have a standing CBC to see if my WBC is elevated, so I can get on antibiotics right away. I now do rocephin antibiotic shots as the orals weren't effective and messed my gi tract up and caused yeast infections. We still don't know for sure what is causing my infections and assume it is GI or female related as that is where the worst pain is. I also am now on IVIG to replace my defective immune system as well. It has helped but it is not 100%.

Interesting recently we found out I have autoimmune issues, I always thought I did. Hypo and autoimmunities tend to show up together. Autoimmune and/or infections can cause dysautonomic type symptoms. I've had a positive ana on and off for years. I have autoimmune SFN, then hasimoto thyroid showed up and now have an autoimmune condition of the skin called lichen planus. If any of the women here get repeat vag infections and/or are inflamed down there a lot, it is something that should be considered. My new rheumy has said I have UCTD (undefined connective tissue disease) this is a new diagnostic code for patients that don't fit the full description for something like lupus or sjogrens. I have some symptoms of both of those as well. It took forever for these things to be diagnosed, I have however had symptoms of all of these conditions for years, prior to any treatment plan.

Can any of you relate? If not hope my story is helpful! I am grateful if my story shortens some one here's path to diagnosis. I hope no one has to go thru what I did.

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Arizona Girl,

I agree I need to get these things checked.You are the 2nd person in a week to tell me this and the other person was on a different forum! lol Interestingly even as a kid I had trouble mounting fevers. I'd tell my mom I was really sick (sore throat), but wouldn't have a fever. Doctors would tell me I was making it up (funny how this started so young...haha) and it was probably just a virus, but then the culture would come back positive for strep. When I do get a fever though it is always really bad 104+.

I also have a positive ANA (just found out) and my rheumy isn't really sure why and is just keeping an eye on it. It's hard to really know where to go from here though. I am negative for sjogrens and lupus too.

When I take supplements which "support" the immune system, my POTS gets worse so I definitely think mine is immune related somehow. It makes sense considering I had viral onset.

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I rarely get the things that are "going around" even when all my kids and husband have them.

As a child I was sick all the time and ran high fevers frequently.

On the rare occasions when I am sick (or have a big increase in allergy symptoms) it flares my POTS tremendously.

My ANA always comes back normal. I had one C-reactive protein come back elevated but all the subsequent ones have been normal.

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