NACⁱ is my friend, NAC is my friend....  I keep telling myself that, in hopes of convincing myself  (thanks, David!). Haven't quite doubled the dose, but I'm working up to it.   I don't feel 'lousy', but I don't feel as good as I did up 'til now.  Sarah, your description of 'permanently about to come down with something' is pretty accurate for me.  My sinuses keep clearing, yet I don't have the sick, sinus-infection feeling I've become so familiar with over the years.  This is weird, but I just keep telling myself it's all for the good and this too, shall pass.  (Two margaritas helped immensely last night.)  Hang in there, Marie!

Sinus infectionsⁱ are very common with cpnⁱ, often becoming chronic. As a youngster I had sinus problemsⁱ for years until they gradually faded away. Now, since starting NACⁱ, I am having a lot of nasal discharge. There may be two reasons for this; bursting the EBs and softening the mucus. Chlamydial EBs are very sturdy, geodesic spheres - they have an uncanny resemblance to WW1 sea-mines - whose coats contain proteins locked together by disulphide bonds. When they are burst outside host cells they die. One might expect their contents to be quite allergenic. This could give a flare-up of sinus symptoms. Actually, the symptoms I feel now are nothing like that dull, unremitting sinus pain, worse on bending forward, and while running, that I used to feel. This is completely different. The mucus-loosening properties of NAC may help, too.

Incidentally, a person with PCRⁱ positive cpn infection, who has been on the Vanderbilt regimen (including anti EB medication) for some time, told me that he experienced no symptoms when he recently started taking NAC. Perhaps all his EBs were history.

On a further, speculative, note, I have wondered whether a proportion of the EBs were faulty, and lacked attachment mechanisms. This would lead, over the decades, to a large body of EBs which did nothing except take up space. These would be burst by NAC, too. As I say, this is speculation, but it might account for the extraordinary symptoms NAC produces. Since I started taking it the fining of the soft tissue in my face and neck has accelerated.

David

Yes, it is I...KK2, in the NACⁱ thread!  I know, I know, I am allergic to sulfa meds, and there is indeed a sulfur bond in NAC, but after researching this, and chatting with Dr. Stratton, I decided to try one 600 mg capsule--yesterday.  Apparently there is no more sulfur in a 600 mg cap of NAC than say in a 3 ounce  steak, so I reasoned it was worth trying as I can eat meat, no problem.

I was fine at first, but several hours later I felt my sinuses clog up, became sleepy, awoke later feeling flushed and ill as though I was coming down with something.  These all sound like typical NAC/ Cpnⁱ reactions.  The interesting thing is that I also have a mildly painful gland under my left ear[the side I usually get ear/ sinus infectionsⁱ on].  Also a feeling of "fullness" in the left ear, gradually feeling more like an ear infection.  I decided to wait until today to try another pill.

Today, after one more single dose, things are about the same, with continued malaise,  but now add tenderness around the eyes, fatigue, nausea--maybe better described as an "anorexic" attitude toward food.  I am still on the fence about whether this is necessarily a mild allergic reaction.  I would expect things to settle down over time if it is simply the NAC "flu". 

I'll keep you guys posted.

Thank you Paul and Altesa.  Your responses help me very much.  Slower is better- no doubt.  I cannot imagine taking more than one 600 mg capⁱ of NACⁱ per day at this point.  I may just do QoD[every other day] for a time.  The ear fullness is kind of warm and painful.  The feeling has conjured an eerie flashback of my 3-yr-old self being curled up on my folks' bed and holding an icebag over my left ear---same kind of pain. 

Altesa, I have had motion-sickness problems most of my life, and am uncomfortably sensitive to certain smells.  The smell inside a car on a rainy day can get me headachey and nauseous virtually immediately--something to do with the rain combined with car exhaust[UGH]  Also, it is interesting that your problems were worsened with Flagylⁱ.  I just completed my 2nd five-day pulse last week and my ear/sinus was definitely affected more this time.

I plan to keep at it with the NAC as I am not seeing the rash that I used to get when I took Bactrim years ago.  I am becoming more confident each day that Cpnⁱ has been an unwelcome guest in my body for quite some time.

Paul- Maybe we should get a microbiologist to weigh in here like Chuck or David as my understanding is that the EBⁱi'si are mostly extracellular, and once they penetrate a host cell and form an inclusion they convert to RB's which are all intracellulari.

Hey Jim,

One reason we should not have the microbiologists weigh in here is that they will suggest starting on NACⁱ early;) All joking aside, this is really a very difficult dilemna and one in which reasonable people can disagree. I was just posting my opinion and I should have stated it as such or with information on both sides. So anyway I will try to answer this a little more thoroughly this time.

In the current protocol, one of the first "drugs" that is used is NAC. The reasoning behind this (which I find quite sound) is that if you are able to break open an EB outside of a cell that is a huge plus. You kill the "spore" before it ever gets into a cell and never have to deal with killing it in a cell where the killing process can cause damage or stress to the cell. And if your blood looks like the photo on the front page of this site, which has what are presumably huge numbers of EBs attached to red blood cells, this is obviously the only way to go. It is also highly probable that NAC opens EBs inside of cells either directly or by being converted to Gluthathione which allows the ABXⁱ to kill them. Additionally NAC has some anti-oxidant and liver protecting properties.

However I do not think that photo is typical. I think most people have far fewer EBs floating around than this. And I believe the first priority of treatment is to get the replicating organisms under control as (1) they are making new Cpn and (2) they are causing most of the side effects which limits how quickly you can progress to adding more ABXⁱ. I think the second most important part of the treatment is getting rid the persistent organisms as (1) they can at any time switch to a replicating state and (2) cause a lot of symptoms as well which limits the speed of treatment. This of course means that you are completely ignoring the EBs which do have to be dealt with. But while they are in this state they do not replicate or cause any symptoms. So my opinion is that they should be dealt with later rather than sooner.

I really cannot say which of these is the right course. I am basing my opinions on what seems right to me and personal experience only. So people should keep this in mind when considering this.

- Paul