Went to the Urologist yesterday, no infection at this point in time. I'm sure I had one at the point I started my last round of antibiotics, although not totally positive that I had one when I did my two day cranberry extract/d-mannose every two hours regimine.

The doctor prescribed me what he calls an "anti-bacterial." (Generic for Bactrim DS, Sulfamethoxazole/TMP DS TAB) I kept referring to it as an antibiotic, and he kept specifying "anti-bacterial," although he agreed that it was essentially an anti-biotic. I never did quite figure out the distinction he was trying to make ;)

I'm supposed to take this stuff every time I have sex. I expressed concerns about negative impact on the immune system taking antibiotics so often, but the doctor confidently assured me that it only effected bacteria in the urine, not in the blood stream, and there was nothing to worry about. (He'd never heard of d-mannose and seemed non-plussed at my description despite that I noted it had worked successfully for me for a year and a half)

A quick search by Patri showed that there is definitely far less a concentration in the blood stream with this antibiotic than with most.

However, this stuff is also used to treat infections of the fluid that surrounds the brain (meningitis), ear, and lung infections, which means that it is indeed traveling through the blood all over the body.

Patri had never heard what I'd taken as common knowledge that antibiotics effect the immune system, so we looked into that and there really isn't concrete evidence one way or the other. There is plenty of evidence that prolonged (normal) antibiotics are bad for you. I guess the intestinal tract is what tends to suffer most.

Plan of Attack: I'm going to make taking the cran/mannose extract every morning part of my daily routine in hopes that it will work preventively. It didn't last long when I did this with d-mannose by itself before, but this stuff from vrp.com tastes like kool-aid to me, so that might help ;)

Plus of course it seems much more important now: before having d-mannose every few hours if I had an infection worked, but it doesn't anymore and I don't know if the added cranberry extract will make a difference.

I'm going to feel very silly going back to the doctors office in a few weeks with a UTI if this doesn't work, but it definitely seems worth one last try for the non-antibiotic stuff, although I've decided that regular antibiotics won't be the end of the world ;) On the bright side, he sent me home with a couple of urine sample cups, so if I get an infection all I have to do is fill one of those and bring it in (the place is only 2 miles from home), and they'll process it and phone in a prescription on the spot. Beats the hell out of going to emergency rooms or waiting at Planned Parenthood during their short hours of operation.