very concerned..

[alpaca]

hello, I've been drinking noble kava for many years now and its had a huge positive impact on my life. for a few months i've been experiencing abdominal pain and initially was told it was biliary colic which was a relief at the time. 1 week ago my doctor had me do a follow up ultrasound because of the fatigue i was still experiencing and it showed that i had mild diffuse hepatic infiltration (lamens terms: mild fatty liver) when asked what to do my doctor said not to be to concerned about it unless my AST/ALT levels are elevated so i had my blood drawn. He said it was a very common condition. I don't understand, i'm only 20. i am on a mostly vegetarian diet for depression, i've never been overweight and actually am underweight for my age. I don't drink alcohol but do consume nicotine via vaporizer. I drink about 3 shells of noble every other night using 3 - 5 tablespoons each use. Should i limit my kava intake? i don't want to immediately come to the conclusion kava is the underlying issue but I'm very worried.

 

[TheKavaSociety]

it seems that kava has nothing to do with it. However, if you want to make sure, perhaps take a break from kava for a couple of weeks and see how you feel.

 

[alpaca]

thanks for the quick reply! I'm not sure what else could cause this, i don't take any medications or additional supplements. kava, yerba mate and nicotine are the only psychoactives i consume. i am going to take a few weeks off and see how that goes, i would hate never to be able to drink kava again.

 

[TheKavaSociety]

God knows. an allergy to broccoli? your age? bacterial infection? weight loss? there could be literally thousands of things that could be responsible for your "condition". maybe you've had this problem for years but never detected it properly. Still, if you are 100% sure that kava is making you unwell then I would advise against drinking it. I know you like it, but why not at least take a longer break from kava to see if you feel better?

 

[Kojo Douglas]

It was pretty disrespectful of your doctor to say you have an unremarkable gall bladder!

But yeah, what Henry said.

Hope you feel better, alpaca!

 

[Edward]

I am on a mostly vegetarian diet for depression.

I think a mostly vegetarian diet would give me depression rather than cure it but what ever works for you brother.

I wouldn't think that kava would be causing you the issues you describe but that's just as a heavy kava drinker talking, don't listen to me, I have trouble standing up most nights ;-)

 

[LoGun4340]

From what I heard an excess of sugar in the diet can lead to fatty liver, just something else to consider.

 

[Crunked]

hello, I've been drinking noble kava for many years now and its had a huge positive impact on my life. for a few months i've been experiencing abdominal pain and initially was told it was biliary colic which was a relief at the time.

Just a shot in the dark, but if you are on a vegetarian diet it is likely to be relatively high in fibre. I think kava also contains fibre. http://kavaforums.com/forum/threads/kava-and-clogged-pipes.1542/

It is possible that the fibre content of your diet could cause abdominal pain. Counter-intuitively, really high fibre can cause constipation as the gut becomes inflamed. But as Henry said, there are many possible explanations.

 

[tribal1209]

You drink Yetba Mate. Don't factor that out! I drank herbs mate for a few years. Nice full Smokey gourds of it that I imported from South America.
A couple years into me drinking the stuff I suddenly developed horrific abdominal pain any time I would eat something. I had pain in the right area just under my ribs....I had no idea what the heck was going on. I had ultra sounds, blood work, went to doctors, had an endoscopy...aside from acid reflux(which I already knew I had), they said everything checked out. I felt with this condition for almost 2 years losing weight, being zapped of energy and feeling like crap.

On an unrelated issue I decided one day to not drink yerba mate anymore in an effort to lesson my caffeine intake. When I stopped the herbs mate ALL SYMPTOMS disappeared! I could not believe it. It was as simple as quitting Yerba Mate. I theorize that I developed an allergy to it or something along those lines. I don't know what it was but I have been healthy as heck ever since.

 

[Zac Imiola (Herbalist)]

Could have even been something it was being treated with when growing. or even what they used to smoke the yerba could have caused issues. Ecspecially if your drinking same kind all the time. it could have easily have been a pesticide or other pollutant in the area.
Never know. even mountain rose herbs had to recall some jiagulon once from me because it contained very very trace amounts of pesticide somehow.
Definitley don't factor anything out.
Typically fatty liver can be caused by the excess sugar... but also if you are eating certain vegetarian and raw foods maybe kavas liver inhibition is causing an inability to digest some of the non cooked parts of the veggies.
Raw food can be good but can also take exyta work for our body's to digest and kava won't help with that for sure since it's cooling to the digestive system