Help!!! Crazy nastiness happening with my tongue!

Hi All,

I so don't know what to do about this - I have this crazy nastiness happening with my tongue at the moment.  I had surgery exactly 1 week ago today, and this all started to get this bad about 3 days ago.  It was at it's worst last night though!

What's happening is that my tongue is this disgusting color of yellow, smells soooo nasty and feels like sandpaper.  I've been complaining for a couple of days to my husband about it and have been brushing my teeth/tongue constantly!  Last night it got so bad, he took a picture.  His words "you gotta see this".  Once I saw the pic - I immediately said email it to me so I can ask the boards.

So here's me asking the lovely and wise people of the boards... what the heck is happening to my tongue?  Did any of you go through this?  Will this end?  Is there anything I can do to speed up the process so I don't have so much nasty going on in my mouth?

(Thanks to Liz for the tips on posting a pic to with my post... I still couldn't get it, but I've uploaded the pic of my lovely tongue for you all to see what I'm talking about to my profile.  Please feel free to look if you want to put some imagery behind this one =)

sounds like thrush.  i got it too.  its from the antibiotics killing good bateria in your mouth.  call your surgeon, they will prescribe a mouth wash and it will be gone!!!

That's thursh- call your doc!

I second what Lisa said!  I had it too after surgery. So not fun!

Ketosis? 

Have you recently followed a low carb diet? After which you have become aware of a sudden change in your breath from always fresh to a smelly one? If your answer is yes, then there’s a probability that you are afflicted with the condition identified as ketosis bad breath. You may not be familiar with this although halitosis is the usual set back for a lot of people who are following a low carb diet plans like the South Beach Diet or Akins Diet.

A standard part of low carb diets is that they have the tendency to hold back the quantity of carbohydrates that a person can consume. As an alternative, the person is suggested to dine with foods containing mostly proteins.

Incidentally, carbohydrates are what invigorate our bodies and gives its energy. Once the body has a little supply of carbohydrates to burn, as a substitute, it turns to fat stockpile and utilizes them up for energy. This process is called ketosis.

In the course of ketosis the body makes use of more water than it is normally necessary. Consequently, this can decrease the levels of the saliva in your mouth and can lead to dehydration. This is an important fact since dried out mouth is the number one aspect that can produce oral bacteria and make them grow excessively resulting to halitosis.

To boot, for the period of ketosis, a particular chemicals called ketones are discharged. These ketones can disturb your body's ph balance, and yet again resulting in a bout of foul smelling breath.

Send the pic to Brader's office.   Yes, it does look like thrush.    Don't be tongueing the hubby til it clears!

say ahhhhhhhhhhhh

I agree with well everyone. Give Dr Brader's office a call and have them call in something for thrush. BUT it can also be ketosis setting in. You'll notice over the next few months a yucky taste in your mouth and the feeling of really bad breath. It's your body processing everything and adjusting.

Feel better!

Liz

Thanks again for helping post that pic - I still can't figure out why I couldn't get it after uploading it to my profile. 

I called Brader's office and emailed in a picture of my tongue and his nurse called me back and told me she would be surprised if it was thrush because I'm not a baby/elderly.  Then said "just a reminder, Brader is a surgeon, not a family doctor - so if you need a script, you'll need to make an appointment with them".

She said it nicely, but I was so shocked!  I am only a week out from surgery and all along you hear "call if you have any questions, concerns or complications."  I guess I would consider my yellow tongue a complication after being in the hospital, but who knows!  Trying to let it go - just wasn't up for the rudeness early this morning.  Appt. with my PCP tomorrow afternoon... hope it gets taken care of quickly.
 (Oh, I just went through old posts this morning from when I was out over the holiday and with surgery - and I saw your baby bump pic.  It's absolutely adorable!!!  You look wonderful pregnant!)

Well....I hope you don't mind....but I shared your pic w/ a few of the nurses at work last night and a few of them said the same thing....about thrush and baby/elderly.  My theory was that you just had surgery and adults normally only get thrush when they are "immunocompromised".  Having just had surgery....I thought you still could get it.

Hope you got answers from your pcp!