Hi there,
low fodmap seems to work for me too.
My background22yo and pretty stressful last 10y at least with a gaslighting/bullying brother and high academic pressure. Physically speaking I was also long term sleep deprived. Similar to most I think POIS fully developed at least during puberty, with symptoms mainly cognitive (depression, anxiety, brain fog). Physically, periods of hair loss are well correlated with O's. Im balding with 22yo even though I am currently stress-free, work out and sleep pretty normally for the last couple months.
Unsuccessfully tried many supplements here on this forum, but only ginger made a big difference.
My theorySomeone here hit home describing POIS as O causing "tryptophan breakdown". While many here overthink the process down to a nuclear level, the main thing to understand is the following:
tryptophan -> serotonin -> melatoninBasically, my stress-damaged gut tolerates less stress (which O's are to some extent) and with every O tryptophan is not digested properly/destroyed in mythe gut. See these links:
http://www.balancedgrub.com/constipation-motility/slow-gut-and-unhappy-youhttp://whole9life.com/2014/11/food-mood-fodmaps/With missing tryptophan, serotonin and melatonin aren't produced properly leading to depression and sleep troubles. You also can't just take tryptophan supplements because it's broken down again/"eliminated" in your body with every O.
Why am I so sure of the theory and of this in general? Just take collagen. (Collagen is popular with "leaky gut" people even though the science behind it is lacking) Nevertheless, collagen is used in science to clinically simulate depression (its effect on the brain). How? Well, collagen/gelating causes tryptophan depletion(
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15084421/). Having taken collagen once, the immediate effects/impact on my body/brain felt EXACTLY like POIS, like if I had just had an O (which I hadn't for 2 weeks though)... Got depressed, anxious and foggy again with bad sleep.
My FODMAP experienceAfter ginger, the gut-relation seemed pretty prominent so I started no/low FODMAP diet for 6 weeks (week 5 now) just for fun and the change is tremendous (with ups and downs though normally). I am doing a strict elimination diet basically just eating eggs, meat, fish, greens, carrots, and paprika (rarely ginger) disallowing for any other foods diluting the diets effects (nuts, fruit).
POIS is 99% gone which is insane because no single suggested treatment on this forum apparently eliminated mental effects completely except for IBS-related treatments as far as I know. Additionally, my previous "clinical depression" is gone completely as well. And the best health indicator for physical effects: Hair loss, is also gone. This change got rid of my brain fog finally (even non-POIS related) and the overall adjustment is relatively minor (diet).