Topical Antibiotics vs Oral Antibiotics: What’s the Difference and What Does It Mean for Long Term Healing? | 184

There are several research studies that have recently come out that show that 30 to 50 % of oral antibiotics have been unnecessarily prescribed. If we go with this lower number, 30%, this means one in three antibiotic prescriptions are unnecessary.

This equals about 47 million unnecessary prescriptions per year in the United States alone. This is significant because when you are prescribed these antibiotics, you're not being educated on how they impact your internal health and your long-term health. And when it comes to topical antibiotics, no one's really taking the time to explain how those also impact your internal ecosystem.

This is exactly what we are going to be covering in this episode, the difference between oral and topical antibiotics and how they impact your microbiome and your long-term health. And by the end of the episode, you're going to know exactly your next step if you have needed antibiotics. And you're also going to have a new knowledge base so that you are not one of these statistics taking antibiotics unnecessarily.

Really quick before we dive in, just want to acknowledge that this is not about being pro or anti-medicine or pro or anti-antibiotics. This is about having the information so that you can make informed decisions and be your best advocate, be your child's best advocate and have the tools to be able to intentionally heal if antibiotics are necessary.

When you take oral antibiotics, it travels throughout your entire body through your bloodstream. So let's say that you have an ear infection. The antibiotics aren't just going to your ear. It's not a centralized treatment. If you have a UTI, the antibiotics aren't just going straight to your bladder. They impact your entire body. And in this process, they aren't able to distinguish between beneficial and harmful bacteria. So they just go in and they eliminate all of it. The problem with this is, is that your body is home to trillions of good bacteria, bacteria that you need. 70 to 80 % of your immune system resides in your gut and is structured and supported by your good bacteria.

This good bacteria helps regulate inflammation, nutrient absorption, and not to mention your brain. Your vagus nerve runs from your gut to your brain. This is a communication highway. And when you don't have enough good bacteria in your gut, this communication highway gets really blurry. This is why after antibiotics, you might experience yeast infections or a change in your digestion. You might suddenly experience constipation or diarrhea, or you might start seeing undigested chunks of food in your poop or your child's poop. You might develop new food sensitivities or notice a new skin rash. You might notice your immune system is suddenly very compromised and you or your child or whoever is needed the antibiotics is suddenly catching every cold and flu that goes around and you're getting hit really hard with it. you might notice the onset of extreme anxiety or depression.

This is because your good bacteria has been eliminated with the antibiotics. And when all of that good bacteria is pushed out, it makes your body a very hospitable environment for bad bacteria and yeast to move in really quickly. And unfortunately, we live in a world today where we are exposed to so many chemicals and pesticides and toxins that our microbiome doesn't just bounce back on its own really quickly. And going to the grocery store and grabbing a probiotic off the shelf, or even better, listening to most doctors recommendation of just eating a lot of yogurt, this isn't going to cut it. Not only because our exposure is so tremendous, but also because we are not getting beneficial bacteria from our food like our ancestors did. Not only is our soil and our food mineral deficient, it's microbial deficient. And so it's really, really important to have this awareness so that if antibiotics are necessary, you know that you have to intentionally heal your gut after.

We'll go into this more later in the episode, but for right now, I want to jump into how topical antibiotics are different than internal. So topical, you obviously apply it to the skin, and it's primarily for a very localized area which is beautiful because it's not going to impact your entire body the way that oral antibiotics do. But it's important to understand that your skin absorbs what you put on it. I get asked this all the time. If me or my child needs topical antibiotics, is it going to negatively impact our microbiome like oral antibiotics would? Yes and no. Your skin is your largest organ and it absorbs what you put on it. And so while topical antibiotics are generally applied to a very central location, The disruption to your internal good bacteria is not nearly as extreme as taking oral antibiotics, but it does impact your internal ecosystem.

It's also important to understand that your skin has its own microbiome that protects the skin barrier. It regulates topical inflammation and it helps defend against pathogens. So. We really don't want to oral or topical antibiotics unless if they are absolutely necessary.

So how do you tell? How do you know when antibiotics are absolutely necessary? Well, first we need to acknowledge how often us parents are really pushed into a corner and forced to choose between trusting medicine and trusting our intuition. And the truth is both of these two things really need to work together. Your intuition as a parent, as a mom, as a woman, is one of the most powerful tools that you have when it comes to your and your child's health.

It can also be really helpful to understand the difference between a healing response and an infection that's worsening. So a healing response will look like fluctuating. It's ups and downs. It's getting better and then maybe getting a little worse and then getting better a few steps forward, a few steps back. This is the body working through something, but gradually over time improving. A situation that might need more support through antibiotics look like the symptom, maybe it's a rash, maybe it's like an open oozing rash on the cheek. It's consistently getting worse and it's spreading quickly.

I really encourage you to trust yourself. Trust your inner knowing. Set the fear aside and ask yourself what's needed in this moment. What does my child need right now? What do I need right now? And immediately your body is gonna tell you. And just as quickly your mind's gonna get really busy with a lot of stories and a lot of noise. I encourage you to listen to that very first message that your body gives you. Your body knows. Your intuition knows. I know many of you listening are deep into your rebalancing journey. When you arrived here, your child was experiencing topical steroid withdrawal. And with eczema or TSW, we always have to be really, really mindful of staff. And it can be really intimidating when a doctor or dermatologist says, you have to use this topical antibiotic something that's coming up a lot right now in our private community, the Rebalancing Collective, is the fear around accepting, whether it's oral or topical antibiotics, it is going to undo the healing.

And I want you to hear this, using a medication when it's needed is not undoing anything. When a medication is absolutely needed, and you know this because you're listening to your body, you're listening to your intuition, when it is needed, we have to set aside the fear that we are undoing anything and we have to step into trust. We have to surrender. We have to accept that for whatever reason, This is meant to be part of the journey and you are not undoing anything. If oral antibiotics are needed, you can choose to continue the supplements or pause the supplements. I typically recommend pausing the supplements because the antibiotics really negate any benefits of the supplements. But there's a lot of families that just want to do anything and everything they can within their control to keep the healing momentum moving forward. So they choose to continue the rebalancing supplements.

If this is you and you choose to continue rebalancing while taking antibiotics, you'll just want to take the medication and the supplements three to four hours apart. And then after the antibiotics are finished, after the prescription is done, you're gonna wanna restart the rebalance with the SuperStart dose for four days. Or if you notice a flare in symptoms post antibiotics, you'll stay at that SuperStart dose until the flare eases off.

Now, if topical antibiotics are prescribed, and again, you know with your body, with your intuition that it's necessary, it's okay. It is okay. It's part of the journey. You can continue rebalancing and you can also continue the topical products. So wash, glow, and magic stuff. They're not going to have a negative interaction at all. You can continue to use all of it. And trust, you are not undoing anything. Another common question that comes up is if there's going to be a withdrawal from topical antibiotics the way they're often as with topical steroids.

No. So the way topical steroids work is they suppress immune response. They are typically used longer term and withdrawal happens when you stop using them.

For topical antibiotics, they don't suppress the immune system. They're simply killing the bad bacteria that's on the surface. And yes, as we talked about, some is going to be absorbed by the body, but it's not going to hit the internal bacteria as hard as oral antibiotics do.

So now, whether you are rebalancing or you are new here, you're new to the podcast, or you're new to ōNLē or maybe you've been around for a while, but you've recently needed antibiotics, let's talk about what to do. And this also speaks true to you if you are someone who took antibiotics five years ago, or you took antibiotics during pregnancy, and your child is now experiencing asthma, allergies, eczema, behavioral issues, sleep issues, colic. Okay, this is true for all of you. If you have taken antibiotics, it is very, very important for you to intentionally heal your gut, whether you are experiencing symptoms or not yet. Because a lot of times an imbalance will grow and grow and grow under the surface and you don't know that it's there until it comes screaming out.

But if you have needed antibiotics, your gut is imbalanced. This is why we created the Antibiotic After Care Bundle. It's going to clear any bad bacteria, yeast, mold, fungus, or parasites that are very opportunistic and move in after antibiotics. It's also going to replenish your good bacteria and essential minerals to restore your entire internal ecosystem.

So to recap all of this, oral and topical antibiotics, they impact your body different. They do not create dependency. It's not a dependency. It's that if you don't intentionally heal after antibiotics, your immune system is greatly compromised, and you're going to need more antibiotics. So it's not. dependency in that your body needs antibiotics, it's dependency in that your immune system is greatly negatively impacted and you're going to end up on antibiotics again and again. but topical antibiotics, they are not going to create a dependency. It's just really important that while you are using those topical antibiotics, you are really focused on keeping the body's drainage pathways open. You're really focused on avoiding the foods that feed bad overgrowths. And you're continuing to be really consistent with the supplements that are keeping the good bacteria protected inside the body. because we have to remember why that topical symptom showed up in the first place, right? That topical symptom, whatever it is, an eczema rash that turned into a staph infection or a... bacterial vaginosis that is now requiring antibiotics, all of this stems from an imbalance in the gut. so continuing to focus on the root issue is really important. Again, you can avoid being one of these statistics, one of 47 million people that are unnecessarily prescribed antibiotics every year.

You can do this by asking questions, learning all that you can, advocating for yourself and your child. And at the end of the day, listening to your intuition and your body above all else. No one else knows. You are the only one that truly knows. And I understand that it can be really hard to hear your intuition when there's a lot of fear. This is why it's really important to Out loud, ask yourself, what do I do in this situation? What does my body need? What does my child's body need? Are antibiotics needed right now? This might sound way out there and way woo for you, but you will immediately, your body will tell you immediately, listen to that.

Healing is not about avoiding every intervention. It's about supporting the body so that the microbiome becomes stronger and more resilient over time. When your gut microbiome and your skin microbiome are restored, your body becomes far less vulnerable and these cycles stop repeating themselves. This healing takes time.

Don't lose hope.

Trust your body, follow your gut.

Transformation:

 "I want you to know how your cleanse has changed my daughters life.. We are on day 34 ish I think. I originally got it after she was diagnosed with Asthma following a mold exposure in our home that resulted in recurring respiratory illnesses last year. I refused to accept the diagnosis. I took her to an oriental medicine doctor who explained how eczema is usually a result of a kidney weakness ad gut issues. Which makes sense..she had been on antibiotics several times since birth, and was given children's Motrin (hard on the kidneys) for teething pain, and then had mold exposure she wasn't able to detoxify from. We removed gluten from her diet (already dairy free) and seed oils and limit processed snacks. But then we got your cleanse... Within two weeks we saw changes we never expected or thought had anything to do with her current health situation.."

This is such a powerful example of what happens when we stop separating symptoms and we start supporting the body as a whole. There are so many pieces here that could have been labeled as separate issues, asthma, mold exposure, antibiotics. But what all of these have in common is the root foundation of this child's body being compromised and needing support.

And once the gut is supported and the body finally has what it needs to detox, regulate and calm inflammation, everything starts to shift. Even when things feel complex or layered, healing is simple. It isn't always easy, but the path forward is simple. And when you fully commit to rebalancing, you experience changes that you would never have expected would be connected to an imbalance, just like this child. 

Now for our question of the week. 

"May I ask if you have any insight on if OTC pinworm meds effect gut health?" 

So yes, over-the-counter pinworm medications are designed specifically to go in and kill the parasites, but they're not intelligent enough to be selective, meaning they're also very disruptive to your beneficial bacteria in your gut. And beyond that, they're an elimination-only approach. This means they focus only on killing the worms. They don't address the environment that allowed the parasites to thrive in the first place. They don't break down biofilms. They don't address heavy metals that parasites so often bind to. And they're not supporting your body's drainage pathways, which this part's really, really essential for safely removing the dying worms and toxins from the body. So what happens is the parasites are killed, but the toxins that they release get recirculated in the body instead of properly eliminated. Not to mention the heavy metals that were potentially dislodged and are now just circulating throughout the body. And all of this circulation of the toxins and the heavy this is just as disruptive, if not more, to the gut and the immune system than the pinworms are. This is why parasite cleansing, it's not just about killing, it's a process. The body needs to be prepared and there needs to be support in place to both eliminate and replenish at the same time. Otherwise, you end up creating more imbalance than you started with. This is exactly why the parasite cleansing bundle is so effective. It's not just focused on elimination. It's focused on the body as a whole, preparing the body eliminating the parasites along with any other bad overgrowth, bad bacteria, yeast, mold, fungus, heavy metals, toxins, while also restoring the entire environment of the gut so that the body can clear what it needs to and actually stay and thrive in balance.