[HN Gopher] Microbial ecosystems in the mouth and gut are linked...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Microbial ecosystems in the mouth and gut are linked to many ills
        
       Author : aluket
       Score  : 128 points
       Date   : 2021-02-12 19:11 UTC (3 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.economist.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.economist.com)
        
       | arminiusreturns wrote:
       | I had the pleasure to work with a top geneticist whose domain of
       | specialty was the microbiome, and he continually insisted there
       | are tons of discoveries to be made in the arena (which he and
       | those researchers we sequenced for did often, from dentistry to
       | studies of the monitor lizard to chrons disease, just all over in
       | subjects you might not expect).
       | 
       | Less on topic, I learned how to read scientific papers and filter
       | bullshit ones (even in respectable journals) from good ones under
       | his tutelage, and am forever grateful to the vast array of
       | science and tech I was exposed to while supporting the tech side
       | of a "every major sequencer" sequencing lab.
        
         | domino24 wrote:
         | Who did you work for? I am interested in getting more involved
         | in this exact field and would appreciate any helpful direction
         | :) I am digesting anything I can find on the topic, but I feel
         | it is greatly underappreciated still, as I agree there is MUCH
         | to be discovered.
        
       | pazimzadeh wrote:
       | > Dr Sampson has tested this hypothesis in mice. He bred a strain
       | of E. coli that cannot make Curli and injected mice with it,
       | while injecting others with unmodified bacteria. Those that
       | received Curli-producing bacteria expressed higher levels of
       | synuclein and demonstrated symptoms like involuntary rigidity
       | which, when seen in people, are associated with Parkinson's
       | disease. That is tantalising.
       | 
       | These mice were mono-colonized with E. coli, whereas both mice
       | and humans normally have a diverse gut flora. I colonize mice
       | with E. coli containing curli all the time and the mice do not
       | exhibit any rigidity or symptoms of Parkinson's. So it's
       | interesting but not quite as huge of an effect as you might
       | think, unless your microbial flora is really disrupted. May be
       | relevant if you have an antibiotic resistant strain of E. coli
       | blooming in your intestine following antibiotic treatment/some
       | other disruption of your microbiota.
       | 
       | A gut bacterial amyloid promotes a-synuclein aggregation and
       | motor impairment in mice
       | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7012599/
        
         | boplicity wrote:
         | As someone with IBD, I really wish the hard science about
         | bacteria would start to filter into actual treatments. I know
         | there are possibilities there, and many patients have found
         | avenues of success, but there is so much guesswork involved
         | that it is very frustrating. Hopefully there will be definitive
         | answers in the future. My gastroenterologist, who has quite a
         | lot of training from very good schools, has absolutely nothing
         | useful to say, in terms of the microbiome.
        
           | throw345hn wrote:
           | As someone with IBS, totally agree with you. I wish the
           | research would trickle down into actual treatments. I have
           | started following a lot of research about gut etc but very
           | little of it leads to something that can mass consumed.
           | 
           | I spent thousands of dollars on trying out medications,
           | tests, visiting a number of highly trained doctors etc,
           | nothing came up in tests and at the end almost all doctors
           | threw their hands up and categorized my gut issues as IBS
           | which is just a catchAll term for which there is no specific
           | treatment other than trying out a number of things.
        
       | newobj wrote:
       | Excited for more research in gut health.
       | 
       | I know HN hates to entertain any lay science, but I wonder if
       | scraping my tongue, as I do with a copper scraper, is good or bad
       | for your oral biome?
        
         | eth0up wrote:
         | Below is an interesting bit of research which gets quite close
         | to tackling your curiosity, or at least stimulating it. It
         | specifically concerns oral hygiene and blood pressure, with a
         | focus on nitric oxide. Tongue scraping seems beneficial, though
         | there's no mention of copper. However, chlorhexidine (mouthwash
         | ingredient) seems a disruptor of NO and may contribute to
         | higher BP. I need to read the article myself, but a brief skim
         | left a big impression.
         | 
         | https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33066082/
        
         | abledon wrote:
         | in the morning, even scraping with your hand is good since
         | you're removing the dead stuff thats accumulated on your tongue
         | during sleep. eating this stuff has no nutritional value and is
         | considered a 'toxin' in yogic traditions.
         | 
         | lot of those online sites are just trying to 'sell something'
         | to make a living so they mandate you 'need' a metallic scraper.
        
         | StavrosK wrote:
         | Probably!
        
           | recuter wrote:
           | Indubitably!
        
         | sherr wrote:
         | Dentists (ones I have) usually recommend brushing your tongue
         | as part of your tooth brushing routine. This helps prevent bad
         | breath I think, which is correlated with oral hygiene.
        
       | DNied wrote:
       | PAYWALLED
        
       | echelon wrote:
       | As a layman, this is so exciting! It feels as though we may be
       | getting closer to finding a cause for a diverse set of
       | neurodegenerative disorders. Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, etc.
       | 
       | Gut and oral microbiota having influence across the blood-brain
       | barrier seems so plausible. If they get into the nervous system
       | and migrate, they could cause inflammation in the brain leading
       | to damage over time.
       | 
       | The immune system is incredible, and we'll no doubt find it a
       | fertile ground for progress against a lot of diseases.
        
         | wyldfire wrote:
         | Do we know whether these microbes are cause or effect? On the
         | bright side I'd say even if they're [only] an effect of those
         | illnesses, we'd have an excellent opportunity for earlier
         | diagnosis.
        
       | bsanr2 wrote:
       | Adding to the anecdotes:
       | 
       | Around summer 2014, I began to focus very heavily on "bulking"
       | for strength training. This was about a year after I'd developed
       | very obvious symptoms of lactose intolerance and had had to cut
       | uncultured dairy out of my diet. My meals were not diverse: fruit
       | and Greek yogurt in the morning; chicken cooked in Indian sauces,
       | roasted potatoes, and some green (usually broccoli or spinach)
       | for lunch and dinner, along with protein shakes and a pre-workout
       | carb load (such as PB+J). Drinks were water, orange juice, and
       | kefir.
       | 
       | That winter, my health collapsed. I started developing skin
       | abscesses, and the antibiotics I received for a particularly bad
       | episode caused me to develop a C diff infection. I had to
       | severely limit my food intake, as too much or certain kinds would
       | cause me to develop cramps, listlessness, and diarrhea, and lost
       | about 40 pounds in 3 months. My body could not hold onto food
       | long enough to process it correctly and I developed symptoms of
       | incomplete digestion, and especially of fat indigestion (symptoms
       | improved with anti-diarrheals).
       | 
       | The next 3 years were a long battle to try to get back to normal.
       | Store-bought probiotics didn't help; digestive enzymes did.
       | Things didn't improve noticeably until after I began eating
       | homemade sauerkraut, and especially after I began taking enzymes
       | on an empty stomach (I was told that this might help to break
       | down some structure that might harbor unhelpful bacteria).
       | 
       | Eventually, I was able to return to most foods without issue,
       | until last year, when a prediabetes scare prompted to try a
       | ketogenic diet (this also seemed to solve a lingering issue, of
       | multiple daily and urgent movements).
       | 
       | All this to say... I don't really know what's going on. I've
       | found some things that seem to work, but I could only guess at
       | why, based on the timing of my downturns and upturns and of my
       | interventions.
       | 
       | I've spent literal days over this period trying to understand why
       | my body is acting and reacting the way that it does, and
       | following the (often slapdash) advice of people who target the
       | microbiome as the source of ill or good health has sadly seemed
       | to be the most efficacious route. However, I'm still not able to
       | achieve the level of well-being I'd like to, and I attribute that
       | largely to the dearth of hard facts available relating to diet
       | and the human microbiome. Over the course of this journey, I've
       | seen more and more professionals begin to take the issue
       | seriously, but not nearly the level or quality of research we'd
       | hope to see with such a fundamental topic. Here's to seeing that
       | corrected before I have to punch whatever card this adulthood of
       | gut trouble has been leading to.
        
       | inamberclad wrote:
       | Seems like a good plug for a startup I used to work for. I'm no
       | longer associated with them aside from my personal friendships
       | but they're creating a pretty cool oral health product:
       | https://freshhealth.com/
        
       | andrewzah wrote:
       | This is something that I've been thinking about lately.
       | 
       | Last ~May, I spontaneously developed rashes exactly in the middle
       | of the back of my hands at the same time. This lead to skin
       | sensitivity and ultimately skin rashes across my body.
       | 
       | At this point I've visited my dermatologist what, 20 times? In
       | addition to my general physician, bloodwork, etc. Biopsies and
       | bloodwork and other tests don't show anything abnormal, asides
       | from excessively high IgE - 600 and now about 1,000. I recently
       | started on Dupixent but it's too early to tell if it's helping or
       | not.
       | 
       | There doesn't seem to be any clear indicator, so I'm wondering if
       | I ate something + stress, which affected my gut microbiome. My
       | family has no history of this sort of issue and it seriously
       | started about overnight.
        
         | rusabd wrote:
         | Are you losing weight? I had some rash appeared spontaneously
         | after start losing weight and it took almost a year to clear
         | out
        
         | tnayrb wrote:
         | I'm no expert, but something similar happened to me a few years
         | back. The conclusion was an allergic reaction to the sun...
        
           | andrewzah wrote:
           | Did it go away on its own?
        
             | aedocw wrote:
             | I can't confirm today because it's very overcast, but as of
             | a few days ago the sun had still not gone away.
        
         | nerdponx wrote:
         | There's almost never harm in trying an elimination diet. Cycle
         | out one major food at a time (eg wheat, eggs, milk, meat,
         | nightshades, seafood), for a couple weeks at a time.
         | 
         | Maybe start gradually introducing fermented "live" foods as a
         | matter of routine.
         | 
         | Worst that happens is you eat more veggies and try out a
         | different diet. And if you find something that helps, all the
         | better.
         | 
         | It's pretty well known now that skin conditions can be related
         | to gut conditions.
        
         | airstrike wrote:
         | For what it's worth (very little, since it's a medical anecdote
         | shared online), my wife had a nasty case of hives for the first
         | time in her life after trying a sarecycline treatment. Took us
         | quite a while to connect the dots, though, and to this day we
         | don't know if it was really what caused it (or stress, or the
         | fact that she took 3 different vaccines on the same day, or
         | everything combined)
         | 
         | All of that is to suggest that you think about what you have
         | changed about your diet, medication or anything else either in
         | May or shortly before that
        
           | andrewzah wrote:
           | > what you have changed about your diet, medication or
           | anything else either in May or shortly before that
           | 
           | Well, there are only 2 things I can think of. Firstly, due to
           | covid I had been working at home from March to May. Before
           | covid I would still go out a lot to cafes/social workspaces
           | and get sunlight. And around mid-march I started running. By
           | May I was running about 5k-7k daily throughout my
           | neighborhood.
           | 
           | So we initially thought it was a bug related thing, but
           | everything came back clean. We tried eliminating food, but
           | nothing really seemed to have an effect after a week or two.
           | 
           | I spoke to my immunologist and he believes it's not food
           | related as I already have food related allergies (peanuts),
           | so eating something else should give me quick reactions like
           | peanuts do. Also, he said it's rare for adults to
           | spontaneously develop something like that. Bloodwork has been
           | inconclusive because my IgE is so high that it's causing
           | false positives. I did a diff of my allergy bloodwork from
           | and back in October, and multiple values did increase.
           | 
           | I have tried basically everything- getting more sunlight,
           | using sensitive detergent (3 different brands), cutting out
           | coffee/gluten etc. Hell, we even replaced the carpet in my
           | parents house with hardwood, and once I moved into my house
           | we cut out the carpet as well.
        
             | michael1999 wrote:
             | Tick borne disease?
        
             | rriepe wrote:
             | Check out Dr. John Sarno's works. It's mostly about back
             | pain but he covers other manifestations of the condition he
             | calls TMS. He talks about a personality type which you seem
             | to fit.
        
       | wwww4all wrote:
       | Mouth and gut health are directly related to physical health AND
       | mental health.
       | 
       | The gut is often called the second brain, and lots of mental
       | health issues like anxiety, depression, stress, etc can be
       | greatly helped by improving diet and healthy gut.
       | 
       | It's criminal that medical establishments are controlled by
       | pharmaceutical companies and establishment media spreads
       | prescription drug propaganda.
       | 
       | Everyone needs to do their own research about gut health and
       | direct impacts to physical and mental health.
        
         | tomrod wrote:
         | > The gut is often called the second brain, and lots of mental
         | health issues like anxiety, depression, stress, etc can be
         | greatly helped by improving diet and healthy gut.
         | 
         | Who calls it that? I've seen a comment or two before, but
         | certainly not "everyone" calling it that. It's a nice analogy
         | that probably could be stretched way too far, as these things
         | go.
         | 
         | Are the causal links clearly _known_ or correlation shows that
         | the link may be identifiable?
         | 
         | > It's criminal that medical establishments are controlled by
         | pharmaceutical companies and establishment media spreads
         | prescription drug propaganda.
         | 
         | Hmm... this sounds like conspiratorial thinking. Do you have
         | evidence of this, and if it is the case, a reason why this
         | status quo is worse than other alternatives?
         | 
         | > Everyone needs to do their own research about gut health and
         | direct impacts to physical and mental health.
         | 
         | Why? Wouldn't it be more reasonable for scientists to research,
         | work towards consensus, then report findings, rather than
         | duplicating the fixed costs of setting up laboratories and
         | health testing facilities in our garages? Considering I did
         | this, what is the likelihood I find a stronger connection or
         | novel fact about certain microbiota that inhabit my or my
         | families' bodies? Or perhaps you're being less precise in your
         | terminology, and you're advocating that people study
         | scientists' research rather than conducting wetlab studies.
         | Could you clarify?
         | 
         | Analogously, we should also all study the universe, but few
         | advocate for all to build radio telescopes on their available
         | rooftops.
        
           | chiefalchemist wrote:
           | > Hmm... this sounds like conspiratorial thinking.
           | 
           | Does it? Why so? There are a handful of entities with control
           | and they all tend to have the same mindset. There's no need
           | for a conspiracy. Their context and objectives are the same.
           | There are a limited number of paths to that goal. They will -
           | like starlings - naturally "sync." No conspiracy necessary.
           | 
           | The fact of the matter is, more and more "traditional
           | medicine" that was long dismissed is proving to be healthy.
           | The use of hallucinogens to treat mental health come to mind.
           | How does Big Pharma deliver value to share holders with
           | plants that most anyone to grow?
           | 
           | Editorial: You sound naive, and likely a Big Pharma employee.
        
           | [deleted]
        
       | bserge wrote:
       | Or many ills affect the body in more extensive ways than thought.
       | Constipation could be an early warning sign of Parkinson's and
       | other problems, for example, not that you'd be able to tell.
       | 
       | I'm pretty "natural", never had antibiotics and stuff. But I can
       | tell you I've got plenty of problems that can _never_ be fixed by
       | gut bacteria.
       | 
       | Besides, modern lives are anything but natural.
        
       | vmception wrote:
       | Interestingly, this is what holistic practitioners and
       | naturopaths have been trying to say for a long time
       | 
       | They've just substituted the scientific method with no method at
       | all and devoid of all peer review or capability of it
       | 
       | As technology improves I expect individualized and therefore
       | holistic treatments to be at the forefront
        
       | tempestn wrote:
       | It really seems like some decades in the future we'll look back
       | at the results of gut microbiome research as akin to the
       | discoveries of bacteria and viruses. Before those discoveries it
       | was known that people got sick, and that developing sickness was
       | correlated with various things, like proximity to sick people, or
       | poor hygiene, but the mechanisms behind those correlations
       | weren't known. (Or they were suspected, but with some
       | misconceptions or lack of detail.)
       | 
       | I expect and certainly hope that as this system is better
       | understood, it will unlock numerous significant advances in
       | medical science. Would just be nice if that process could happen
       | faster!
        
       | forgotmypw17 wrote:
       | A long time ago, our ancestors were single-celled.
       | 
       | Then, some cells decided to live together, form a slime, division
       | of labor, organs, etc. And today, voila, we have humans.
       | 
       | However, the single-celled never went away. We have been living
       | together, co-evolving together, all this time.
       | 
       | No human has ever lived without a microbiome. We have been in
       | symbiosis all this time. The immune system picks off the baddies,
       | while the goodies get to stick around, serving all sorts of
       | useful functions. Not only that, but the goodies actually edge
       | out the baddies, because they consume most of the resources
       | available to microbes. Combined with help from immune system
       | police, a balance is reached.
       | 
       | That's the way it works until you introduce various ways to harm
       | the microbiome. Preservatives in the food. Substances which
       | indiscriminately kill bacteria on the skin and elsewhere.
       | Antibiotics. Then the balance is thrown off, the baddies get to
       | proliferate unchecked, the immune system can no longer cope with
       | their scale.
       | 
       | I've stopped using any products which harm my microbiome. It's
       | not easy, and it's not a one-day or one-month or one-year
       | transition, but it's paid off in ways I didn't even imagine
       | possible when I started out.
       | 
       | Edit: When I post about this stuff, I often get asked about
       | specifics. For reasons of privacy, and several others, I would
       | rather not get into them. Do your own research, find your own
       | way. Don't wait for everything to be handed to you on a plate.
       | I've provided more than enough information in this comment.
        
         | colordrops wrote:
         | If you aren't willing to post specifics about your own
         | activities, you could at least provide references for the
         | statements you did make, e.g. battle to consume resources, and
         | throwing the microbiome off.
         | 
         | Don't bother to make vague generalizations without being
         | willing to back them up, especially anonymously. It makes the
         | statement nearly information-free. And this is coming from
         | someone who agrees with your assessment.
        
         | madaxe_again wrote:
         | My wife had terrible acne for years - she tried every product
         | under the sun, visited dermatologists, all of it.
         | 
         | About nine months ago I persuaded her to try absolutely
         | nothing. Just wash her face with mild soap and water when she
         | showers or after exercise. It was a hard sell. A really hard
         | sell. It looked sinfully angry for the first few weeks, and
         | then, bit by bit, started to fade.
         | 
         | Now... her skin is perfect, the scars are subsiding, and she
         | hasn't had even a hint of acne or so much as a zit in four
         | months.
         | 
         | The crux of my hypothesis was that she was eradicating her skin
         | microbiome over and over, and possibly breeding incredibly
         | resistant bacteria with no competition.
         | 
         | I take a similar approach with oral hygiene - I don't brush, I
         | don't use toothpaste or mouthwash, I just use a wooden
         | toothpick to get anything stuck out. I started this in my teens
         | at boarding school, as toothbrushes were often "borrowed" for
         | cleaning rugby boots, and then replaced in the rack. At the
         | time, I figured not brushing was better than god only knows
         | what being rubbed into my gums. I had _appalling_ breath and
         | swollen gums for several months - but both just disappeared
         | after adaptation.
         | 
         | I go to see a dentist every few years, mostly out of a sense of
         | obligation, and have never had a carie, cavity, periodontal
         | disease, or anything - I'm pushing 40. The most they've ever
         | done is polish them. By my age my mother had lost half her
         | molars, my father had a gobful of crowns and fillings, so it's
         | not genetics.
         | 
         | Maybe I'm talking crap, but I think we significantly
         | underestimate our bodies abilities to maintain themselves, and
         | buy into the idea that we require products to keep them
         | working.
         | 
         | Unfortunately, weaning yourself off this stuff usually involves
         | some degree of disruption, be it honking breath, or skin so
         | angry you don't want to be seen in public.
        
           | kart23 wrote:
           | I've heard that some people do indeed have better bacterial
           | biomes than others, some will be fine without brushing or
           | flossing, and others will have problems. Saliva has a large
           | part to play in preventing caries and bad breath, dry mouth
           | can cause a lot of the issues you describe. Also, water
           | fluoridation has made quite a big impact in public dental
           | health. Remember that most people used to lose teeth
           | regularly before the advent of fluoride toothpaste, often
           | very early in their lives. Do you think that these people's
           | teeth were maintaining themselves? Looking at old WW2 videos
           | made me realize this, where many soldiers in their 20s had
           | completely black teeth or massive gaps.
           | 
           | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_fluoridation#History
        
           | accounted wrote:
           | A similar, and perhaps better option:
           | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miswak
        
           | bserge wrote:
           | Yeah, I'd say don't apply that thinking to _everything_.
        
           | titzer wrote:
           | Did you have your wisdom teeth out? Are your teeth straight?
           | That makes a huge difference.
        
           | da_big_ghey wrote:
           | For what it's worth, I've done the same, but it only worked
           | because I wasn't eating a bunch of sugary garbage. Definitely
           | nobody should try it who eats that sort of stuff even
           | somewhat often.
        
             | pengaru wrote:
             | Exactly.
             | 
             | A close friend of mine had horrible dental hygiene, rarely
             | brushing, drank soda and beer as his water, and only went
             | to the dentist after developing intolerable pain something
             | like a decade into this mode.
             | 
             | When he came to work the day after his dentist visit, he
             | said the dentist told him "this is what we call mountain
             | dew mouth" when examining his teeth.
             | 
             | If you don't eat stuff that makes plaque thrive, the
             | consequences of ignoring it are less severe.
        
         | Grimm1 wrote:
         | You lost me at antibiotics. Overuse is a problem for certain,
         | but we'd have a lot more death, and possibly worse, disability
         | without them.
        
           | serverholic wrote:
           | You just made up an argument for a point that the OP wasn't
           | making.
        
             | Xunjin wrote:
             | He is not wrong... OP did not make this point however you
             | can infer it, from his point of view
             | 
             | Actually in my limited knowledge about biology, both are
             | right, when things are way discompensated, you have to use
             | things to kill bacterias which almost take control of a
             | part of your body (the baddies one) .
        
         | croes wrote:
         | Is it that why now more people live on earth than ever since?
        
           | titzer wrote:
           | Probably because of reduced all-cause mortality, increased
           | food production, and the relative peace of the 20th century.
        
             | azinman2 wrote:
             | Relative peace of the 20th century? At least 108M have died
             | in war. I believe it to be one of the biggest on record,
             | and certainly not one of the peaceful times. So relative
             | peace compared to what?
        
               | zabzonk wrote:
               | > So relative peace compared to what?
               | 
               | Total world population.
               | 
               | https://www.vox.com/2015/6/23/8832311/war-
               | casualties-600-yea...
        
         | RankingMember wrote:
         | > Edit: When I post about this stuff, I often get asked about
         | specifics. For reasons of privacy, and several others, I would
         | rather not get into them. Do your own research, find your own
         | way. Don't wait for everything to be handed to you on a plate.
         | I've provided more than enough information in this comment.
         | 
         | Come on now, are you really going to post about how something
         | "paid off in ways I didn't even imagine possible when I started
         | out" and not name even one example? This lowers your comment to
         | being basically on the same tier of conversation as conspiracy
         | theorists who brush off requests for proof with "DO YOUR
         | RESEARCH, THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE I CAN'T GIVE YOU SPECIFICS".
        
           | johnchristopher wrote:
           | Haha, that's what he did :D.
           | 
           | Coincidentally I looked at op's profile and found this URL
           | again http://hn:hn@sHiTMyseLf.com/index.html. I had stunmbled
           | upon it in a previous thread (don't remember which one, but I
           | only look at profile when I read some specific kind of
           | comments).
           | 
           | I didn't get what the website was about last time and I
           | didn't spend time enough this time either.
        
             | forgotmypw17 wrote:
             | That URL was obfuscated to prevent bot abuse.
             | 
             | It will now be replaced with a new one.
        
           | trhway wrote:
           | unfortunately mentioning any specifics risks transforming the
           | conversation into arguing about such a specific item with the
           | results being projected back onto the main statement. It also
           | risks sounding like one is pushing his/her pseudoscientific
           | stuff. In the area like microbiome with highly individual
           | situations and relatively low level of established science
           | any specifics is just an anecdote not much suitable for
           | rigorous discussion. (i have myself found a couple ways of
           | dealing with my SIBO (test based diagnosed by GE) for example
           | and almost never discuss those specifics. It is really an
           | area of "do you own research" and the useful methods/etc. are
           | really "out there".)
        
             | johnchristopher wrote:
             | Maybe so but "Don't wait for everything to be handed to you
             | on a plate. I've provided more than enough information in
             | this comment." is really condescending and not inspiring
             | much trust.
             | 
             | It's also a classic move when you can't backup your claims.
        
             | bsanr2 wrote:
             | "This worked for me, but might not work for you, because of
             | our specific circumstances," followed by a detailed
             | description, would suffice, and in turn be much less
             | useless and condescending.
             | 
             | Please, discuss specifics (as I have).
        
         | M5x7wI3CmbEem10 wrote:
         | how did you start?
        
           | Diederich wrote:
           | Starting in around 2013 or so, I stopped using any kind of
           | soap or cleaner on my body, with a couple of exceptions. I
           | still wash my hands regularly, and I use a tiny little bit of
           | fairly bland, unscented soap between my legs in the shower.
           | Note that my head hair is quite long, naturally coming down
           | to my mid/lower back.
           | 
           | How do I get my body/face clean in the shower? Very hot water
           | and very vigorous scrubbing/rubbing.
           | 
           | After doing that for a week, my body odor virtually
           | disappeared, even when I was hot and sweaty. While my overall
           | skin and hair condition had always been ok, it improved
           | noticeably.
           | 
           | I did this after reading a number of articles online about it
           | and figured it would be worth trying.
           | 
           | As a bit of an experimental control, I didn't tell my wife
           | that I was doing this. We do regularly brush and braid each
           | other's hair. After about two weeks, she said that my hair
           | was more full and healthy than it's ever been, and she also
           | confirmed the body odor changes.
           | 
           | So this is anecdotal: it was useful for me, and might be
           | useful to some others. However, given everything we're
           | learning about microbiomes in _and on_ the body, it seems to
           | make a lot of sense.
        
             | jimlikeslimes wrote:
             | Tried this for months, I really smelled bad. Good friends
             | telling me unprompted etc. YMMV.
        
               | pengaru wrote:
               | I concur.
               | 
               | I've lived in homesteading environments where numerous
               | people go months bathing sparingly using just water,
               | while still actually getting things done involving
               | significant labor, sweating and generally getting dirty.
               | 
               | Everyone reeks in these conditions. They don't realize
               | it, and their intimate partners who are in constant
               | contact also don't quite appreciate the degree of odor,
               | because it's shared.
               | 
               | But from an outsider perspective, it's _ripe_.
               | 
               | There's probably an evolutionary reason for this, members
               | of a tribe will smell similarly when eating the same food
               | and sharing space/objects in close quarters. I can easily
               | imagine how that would be advantageous. Foreigners will
               | stink.
        
               | Diederich wrote:
               | > bathing sparingly
               | 
               | That could be a difference; I scrub a good long time
               | using quite a bit of hot water.
        
               | sharadov wrote:
               | I used to use hot water + scrub. Was told it's terrible
               | for your skin by my dermatologist, you start developing
               | eczema in some cases in the long run. Warm water, white
               | unscented mild soap and no scrub was his recommendation.
        
           | forgotmypw17 wrote:
           | .
        
             | volkk wrote:
             | can you expand on that? and also what do you mean by ways
             | you couldn't even imagine?
        
         | refurb wrote:
         | Knowing that what you eat - more fiber, less fiber, more carbs,
         | less carbs, etc, how do you optimize your microbiome when there
         | is so much variety among humans? Which is the right biome?
        
           | atian wrote:
           | You can start at blood type.
        
       | dragosmocrii wrote:
       | It's interesting to see more and more articles lately reporting a
       | strong connection between ilnesses (or lack) and one's microbiome
       | health. What I noticed from my experience, is that kombucha and
       | kimchi make me feel great if I consume these regularly (once or
       | twice a week). Sometimes I will indulge in some crap food like
       | pizzas and noodles, which make me feel unwell, but kombucha and
       | kimchi work as a reset :)
        
       | andrebotelho wrote:
       | solid read
        
       | dekken_ wrote:
       | https://outline.com/TtrWGF
        
       | bigmattystyles wrote:
       | Completely anecdotal, personal experience. It wasn't Accutane but
       | when I was a pimply teen, in an effort to remedy the acne, I was
       | prescribed doxycycline and another topical antibacterial
       | ointment; in any case, I never had heartburn or experienced
       | depression prior to that but a few months after starting those
       | meds, both started. It's likely unrelated but whenever I read how
       | crucial biomes are - I can't help but wonder. For the record, I
       | preferred the acne.
        
         | gr1zzlybe4r wrote:
         | Anecdotally I wonder about this sometimes too. I took Accutane
         | mostly because I had a parent that really drove me to take it
         | (I think projecting some of their own issues with acne onto my
         | completely normal amount of teenage acne) and I definitely feel
         | like it changed my mood during and after taking it. I didn't
         | drink at all on it either. It's a drug that you shouldn't be
         | able to have a teenager take unless it's approved by a panel of
         | dermatologists or something. I had no idea of the severity of
         | the side effects from it when I took it.
        
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