Antibiotic Brain Fog – Some Possible Solutions

I experienced memory loss, disconnectedness, loss of reading comprehension, and slow-thinking while I was going through fluoroquinolone toxicity. Losing my ability to think, and feeling as if I had lost my ability to do my job (I held onto my job and my employer was kind and patient through the whole ordeal), were truly terrifying. I felt stupid. I was scared that I was stupid, or worse–that I had some sort of permanent brain damage.

Thankfully, those symptoms subsided, and my mind has recovered along with the rest of me. I describe the things I did to heal my brain after fluoroquinolone toxicity in the post, “Healing my Brain After Cipro.” The things that helped my brain to heal are:

1. Time
2. Meditation
3. Sudoku Puzzles
4. Reading
5. Writing
6. Researching

All of those things truly did help me. Each one is a process, not a quick-fix. Being patient and letting the healing hands of time do their magic helped my brain to heal. Meditating every day for a minimum of 20 minutes helped to calm my mind, increase my confidence, give me patience, increase my concentration, and enable me to feel more connected to the world and the people in it. Sudoku puzzles, reading, writing, and researching all helped in that using my brain seemed to make it stronger and more capable.

I wholeheartedly recommend each of those things to everyone who is struggling with brain-fog. They’re helpful, empowering, and they can’t hurt.

I want people to realize that their brains can heal without doing anything drastic, and that with time and use, your floxed mind can heal along with the rest of you.

However, many people look at that list and say, “Those things aren’t going to work for my SEVERE brain fog. I need something more drastic than sudoku puzzles.” Fair enough.

I am risk-averse and, frankly, I’m not a very good biohacker because I’m risk-averse. Therefore, I tend toward gentle, non-invasive, healing methods.

Many of you are willing to take more risks than I am though, and for you, I think that the advice of Dave Asprey (“the world’s most famous biohacker” according to Men’s Fitness Magazine) in his post, “13 Nootropics to Unlock Your True Brain” may be helpful. I highly recommend that each of you read the article because Dave has a lot of excellent insight in it. I’m going to go over some of his recommendations and how they relate to “floxies” in this post.

Dave’s nootropic recommendations:

1. Modafinil (Provigil), armodafinil (Nuvigil), and adrafinil. I have heard of anyone suffering from antibiotic brain-fog trying these nootropics. If you have something to report about them, please let me know and I’ll add it to this post.
2. Racetams. Look at the comments on the bottom of the post, “The Mitochondrial Link – Fearless Parent Podcast #81.” The person commenting as “Your Future” gives a lot of interesting information about racetams and mitochondria.
3. Nicotine. Yes, seriously, nicotine. More information about nicotine can be found HERE. For floxies, it should be noted that fluoroquinolones inhibit CYP1A2 enzymes. Nicotine induces CYP1A2 enzymes. There are significantly safer ways to try nicotine than through smoking or chewing tobacco products and some of those options can be found in “Is Nicotine the Next Big Smart Drug?” It should also be noted that broccoli also induces CYP1A2 enzymes, and it has none of the drawbacks that nicotine has. However, this post is about things that can perk-up your brain, and nicotine can do that while broccoli, unfortunately, can’t.
4. Amphetamine (Adderall). A floxie friend told me that Adderall helped him immensely. Be careful. Adderall, of course, is not without consequences. Here is the warning label for Adderall – http://www.accessdata.fda.gov/drugsatfda_docs/label/2007/021303s015lbl.pdf. Here are patient reviews of Adderall – http://www.askapatient.com/viewrating.asp?drug=11522&name=ADDERALL+10. I wouldn’t take it, but that’s just my extremely biased opinion.
5. L-theanine. From Ruth’s recovery story on Floxie Hope, “L-Theanine helps my brain to be a less noisy place—it ‘cuts the chatter’ as Dr. Whitcomb says.” More information about Ruth’s experience with L-theanine can be found in the comments on her story.
6. Bacopa monnieri. Here are some Floxie Hope comments that note how people dealing with FQ toxicity responded to bacopa monnieri. https://floxiehope.com/comment-page-30/#comment-27587, https://floxiehope.com/comment-page-46/#comment-37325, https://floxiehope.com/ruths-story-cipro-toxicity/comment-page-6/#comment-35332.
7. LSD. I haven’t heard from anyone who has tried LSD post-flox. If anyone has anything that they’d like to share with me and/or the Floxie Hope audience, please contact me. I find the stories of healings that occur post hallucinogenic drug use to be interesting. As I said though, I’m risk-averse and not eager to try things like LSD.
8. Unfair Advantage. Unfair Advantage is a Bulletproof product that contains Bio-identical ActivePQQ™ and CoQ10. It enhances mitochondrial function. There is evidence that fluoroquinolones damage mitochondria, and mitochondrial support supplements such as Unfair Advantage may help floxies in multiple ways. I tried Unfair Advantage just before I was on Bulletproof Radio discussing fluoroquinolone toxicity. I was fully healed at the time that I tried it, so my experience may not be as dramatic as the experience of someone who is recently floxed, but I did find that it improved my energy level and concentration.
9. Bulletproof Upgraded Aging Formula. I don’t know of any floxies who have tried the Bulletproof Upgraded Aging Formula. If you have an experience with it, please contact me.
10. Forskolin & artichoke extract. I haven’t heard from anyone who has tried Forskolin & artichoke extract. Please contact me if you have an experience with it. As with all of the things mentioned in this section of this post, more information about them can be found on 13 Nootropics to Unlock Your True Brain. “Forskolin” is a very fun word though. Say it ’til you giggle, ’cause laughter really is good medicine. :p

Please do plenty of independent research before you try any of these. They all have their pros and cons and informed consent really is important.

Things like a healthy diet, getting enough sleep, minimizing anxiety, and healing the gut can also be helpful for getting through fluoroquinolone-induced brain-fog. Those things have no negative side-effects, so concentrating on them is highly recommended.

I hope that the things mentioned in this post help you to get your mental capacity back! Please be patient and kind to yourself as you go through the healing process. Healing takes time, and it may take trying a variety of different things before you find things that heal your mind and body. Patience and kindness toward yourself as you go through the healing process certainly can’t hurt, and they will probably even help.