how many of you traveled to India or a developing country before you got sick?

[humanrising]

I was just reading a thread by someone who said they had three trips to India before they got sick. Noticing a lot of people mentioning they traveled to India before they got ill.

I lived in Nepal for 7 months on a college study program I created. I lived with Nepalese families. I tried to be careful what I ate and drank but really it was impossible. Both Nepal and India are extremely difficult to avoid getting ill with dysentery or other food borne illness.

I also had the usual load of vaccines before I left. I lost almost 30 pounds got amebic and bacterial dysentery at least 9 times and of course had all the serious meds to deal with it.

I bounced back well when I came home. went to India for 3 months a couple years latter same as Nepal health wise and yes I went back again another year latter for "wash rinse and repeat". I love this part of the world and since I was able to recover my heath when I came home each time I didn't worry about it too much. I was a bit naïve about chronic illness and what could happen by all I was exposing myself to.

I was such a healthy outgoing adventurous person who loved traveling and volunteering ( really wanted to work for an NGO in a developing country) so I thought that as long as I did all I could to take good care of myself I would be ok. I really didn't see my self ever falling apart bit by bit until I was ruined like this. I had a few moments when I "saw god" while sick in Nepal and India but even when I was so ill I was "out of body" I didn't see it being long term, I would get better or maybe not but oddly I never imagined me having a long term illness. ...seems stupid now but its difficult to imagine something you have little knowledge of and all that youthful positive excitement about the world.

Ron Davis's son went to India and did photography before he was ill, Jennifer from unrest went to China.
made me wonder how many of us might have traveled out of the country before we got sick... even if it took a few years before we got sick, how many of us got "loads" of vaccines and even how many of us are the adventurous outgoing individuals ……. that so many people appear to be here?

 

[percyval577]

I think I know my impacts, borrelia and much later EBV, I also have been only one time out of Europe (after the borrelia impact).

I really don´t think that your travels are of particular importance, though the times you have been ill may be, or the vaccines. But I am not sure if this could have been foreseen, maybe in the future when genetics are better known (or when vaccines are better understood and done?). So far I don´t think that there is statistical relevance.

 

[Seven7]

For me was opposite, came from developing to developed, got like 500 vaccines in USA. So I know a lot of plp take a lot of stuff when traveling, so I wonder if that is it.

 

[Wolfcub]

It makes me wonder about gut dysbiosis possibly being at least a part of the basis of illness? Either as a result of the infections, or parasitic invasions, or the treatments for food/water borne illnesses which can be very harsh on the system. Just a thought....I don't know.

I was never a traveller. I actually hate travelling. Also the last vaccine I had was for a protection against having a "blue baby" and that was in 1977.
But the illness 17 months ago that "never went away" affected my gut. I don't know what it was....some but not all flu-like symptoms odd head pains, exhaustion and an upset gut. The gut part did start to get better though.
However, as my reactions to things I take/swallow have now gone quite haywire, I am very reluctant to experiment with probiotics.

 

[Sushi]

I was in India many times and also lived in Africa. Lots of parasites and drugs to treat them. Also some of the drugs to prevent Malaria have come under suspicion in ME/CFS patients who have taken them.

 

[ljimbo423]

It makes me wonder about gut dysbiosis possibly being at least a part of the basis of illness? Either as a result of the infections, or parasitic invasions, or the treatments for food/water borne illnesses which can be very harsh on the system. Just a thought....I don't know.

It took me about 8 years and many thousands of hours of researching (averaging 25-30 hours a week) and trying countless supplements, to learn my gut- (severe dysbiosis), was causing my CFS.

Now that I've found how to treat it successfully, my health has improved dramatically and continues to. Even after 42 years of having CFS, 30 years being disabled from it and several years being severe and mostly bedridden.

ME /CFS researcher Chris Armstrong has said for a few years now that he believes CFS starts in the gut. I don't need any more proof than my returning health!

I'm now functioning at a 6 (6-7 hours a day of physical activity) on the disability scale here at Phoenix Rising and continue to improve.

 

[hapl808]

Happened to me in SE Asia after a really bad GI illness. My worst relapse happened many years later - again on a trip to SE Asia, although with more flu-like symptoms.

 

[bread.]

I tick all the boxes, India, vaccines, etc.

 

[brenda]

This makes me feel depressed because l am thinking of spending a month in a beach hut in India to improve my health. Were you all strict about bottled water and uncooked food?

 

[valentinelynx]

Nope. Only after I was ill, and only to Mexico and later the Amazon.

 

[pamojja]

Though it is true that I travelled 1 year North and Central America, about 8 years South Asia (India and all neighboring countries) and 1 1/2 years overland from North to South of Africa - am also pretty certain to know my health difficulties really started with 4 plasmodium falciparum malarias caught in Central Africa. And which let me to leave this continent I liked the most, because otherwise I would already be death 20 years ago.

However, having travelled so much - and now with illness for recuperation on yearly vacations - I've always met a lot of aging travellers being in better shape. Travelling does expose to infections which in those countries do cause high infant-mortality. And when westerners travel there later in life they might come down for the same reasons, just later. But not particularly with ME/CFS, and any anectodal answer to such questions of its forum can be taken even less than observational.

 

[Pearshaped]

Another swiss ME patient told me he was in england just before onset as well as other patients he knows.Me too. so definetely no developing country here..but makes one wonder...

A family member recently told me that there are several (!) cases from missionaires who lived in India for more than a few months.they fell ill.came home.hospital.and despite docs couldn't find ANYTHING they died.There are some bugs out there we don't know and therefore cant have a test for it..

 

[Moof]

I didn't – I only travelled abroad for the first time several years after I became ill, and I've never been to a developing country.

 

[Sushi]

This makes me feel depressed because l am thinking of spending a month in a beach hut in India to improve my health. Were you all strict about bottled water and uncooked food?

I was very careful. Just takes one restaurant worker not washing their hands.

 

[Centime Tara]

I got sick when my husband brought a flu back from Peru. I got pneumonia, and I think that’s what (re)activated the ME.

 

[brenda]

I was very careful. Just takes one restaurant worker not washing their hands.

So, sticking to cooked food then, is still unsafe.

 

[Art Vandelay]

I started to decline after I caught a stomach bug in Sydney (Australia) of all places. It turns out the government there had been using partly-recycled sewerage in all sorts of applications (eg, watering crops, sporting fields, public parks) which led to a huge increase in people catching stomach parasites across the state.

 

[Sarah94]

No

 

[gm286]

Travelled to India in 2007 on a school trip. No obvious symptoms over there. When I returned, I had noticeably increased gastro-intestinal disturbances (IBS). Increased fatigue, weaker ability to hold myself upright if seated, more need to support my neck with my hands. And reddish-fluid filled spots between top of feet and soles. I would consider this akin to slow-onset enteroviral infection.

It got a lot worse after going to college that same year. Acute-onset fever and cough, passed out for three days, and they could not confirm mononucleosis on tests when I had checked in to the health center.

 

[madone]

Indonesia in 2017. The usual vaccines before.
Got Salmonella Typhi and campylobacter jejuni there. That was the beginning.