Linda’s personal story of living with silent reflux
I am a 60 year old female. My illness started about a year ago. My only symptoms are a cough and the feeling of needing to clear my throat. That’s it. No indigestion or burning in my throat.
At the very beginning, I would have these coughing fits for about 10-15 minutes right after eating and then be ok till I ate again. The coughing was very painful like I was pulling a muscle or something. I do have thyroid nodules, so I thought maybe that was the cause. I scheduled an appointment with the doctor who was tracking the size of the nodules and after an ultrasound, he said there was no change in them and they weren’t the cause of my cough. He sent me on to a pulmonologist. She took me off my blood pressure medication lisinopril as it is known to cause a cough. No change. She tested me for allergies and did a chest x-ray. No allergies and x-ray was clear. She sent me on to a gastroenterologist. She did endoscopy and colonoscopy. Test revealed that I had a small hiatal hernia, esophagitis, and gastritis. She said I had silent acid reflux. All this takes place over about 6 months.
By this time, the cough had turned into just a dry hacking cough all throughout every day and several nights a week. She put me on omeprazole and famotidine and suggested the usual diet changes. I stopped my Diet Coke habit, and stopped eating tomatoes, onions and citrus fruits. The famotidine made my joints ache and upset my stomach, so I only take the omeprazole twice a day. They seemed to help some, but I was still plagued with that cough.
Like all of you, I went online searching for help and came across this blog. Someone had posted about having silent acid reflux and suggested a book by Dr. Jamie Kaufman, “Dropping Acid, The Acid Reflux Diet Cookbook and Cure”. I started following the recommendations in the book and I must say I am 99% better in only about 5-6 weeks, with improvements starting relatively soon after I started following the diet.
I read food labels looking for hidden acid and started drinking alkaline water. It’s all I drink. I ordered a water picture online that filters water and makes it alkaline. I call it my magic water, LOL. There is no way of really knowing for sure, but for me it seems the alkaline water helped the most.
I still have random coughs, but it’s nothing like before and I don’t cough at night anymore. My next step is to see if I can wean myself off the omeprazole.
I understand that this is not scientific and is only what my experience has been. I know what seems to have helped me may not work for others. I can’t see any harm in trying. So I hope sharing all this helps someone else.
Best wishes for a future without reflux.