@jager5210 I do tend to think like you that our body can have multiple health conditions that can cause similar symptoms and if we can find out the different causes we can improve our help the related symptoms. I do have to preface that with I have no medical training or background but if it were so cut and dried like some suggest there would not be so many people with hard to diagnose issues.

@jager5210 Hi Barry. You might be able to work some things out for yourself. You can explore the possibility of food allergies or sensitivities that can cause inflammation that leads to leaky gut. That happened to me when I developed a gluten problem, and before I figured this out, a lot of food allergies followed because the leaky gut let incompletely digested food enter the blood stream. You can test this yourself with an elimination diet and see if you can improve. Diet can have a huge impact on health or disease and you probably already have knowledge about healthy foods, but you can still be allergic to healthy food. Avoiding foods like sugar and highly processed carbs that cause inflammation helps a lot too. You can add a good pro-biotic to start colonizing the gut with good beneficial bacteria which can over time replace the bad bacteria. There are also some medical foods from Metagenics or Orthomolecular for detoxing and reducing inflammation, and they also have some supplements to kill off bad bacteria before you start a detox. These products are expensive and sold by doctors offices and specialty pharmacies and you can find them online.

You could just start with foods in your diet to see if that is a cause of your gut issues. You start by eating one thing for a few days until you feel better. If that goes well, add one other thing. Keep track, and when you add something that makes you feel bad, write that down on your list to avoid. It will take awhile to figure things out. This is what I did long ago when my doctor would not listen to me about gluten and back then even the existence of celiac disease was controversial. I developed these issues suddenly after the stress of going through surgery years ago. Initially I thought I had a wheat allergy, so I was baking bread with spelt and that was fine for awhile, but then I started reacting to that, and I tested through diet to figure it out, and everything with gluten made me react and a few times I ate things with gluten (a rice milk product) unknowingly and still reacted. I have been gluten free for 20 years. I also had sharp pain in my hands that ended when I took dairy out of my diet. It is usually the specific proteins in foods that cause the allergies, and I can use butter without issues because it is the fat from milk. FYI- with all the gluten free foods available today, junk food is still just that with or without the gluten. Gluten can be in so many things and you can find information online about that. Humans did not evolve eating grains, but during biblical times, the cultivation of grain in agriculture allowed the population to grow and survive with the additional food sources.

Here is some information about gluten and celiac disease. Even if you are not gluten sensitive, you might feel better without it.

https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/celiac-disease/symptoms-causes/syc-20352220
https://celiac.org/about-celiac-disease/what-is-celiac-disease/

@jager5210
Just a suggestion (as C.dif is easy to test for)... tell your PCP or anyone at an Urgent Care Clinic that you've had ongoing diarrhea for weeks, despite taking a probiotic, and that you're concerned that it may be C.dif. They will give you a lab order... the lab will give you a test kit... your results will be returned in about two days. If it's negative, that's a good thing and it will relieve your mind. If it's positive, then you have something for a gastro doctor to work with. No, I'm not a proponent of lying to the doctors, but sometimes one needs to clear obsessive thoughts which may be getting in the way of your healing.