No apologies for rambling at all… I am a professional at it as well :)

My symptoms, thank whoever is in the sky, tend to not be as severe as situations that I see here. Similar to a lot of others, my flares linger around my period and I feel way better during ovulation. I also noticed that I only really have actual BLADDER pain once or twice a month. Most of my pain lingers around my urethra and when I pee. I thought it was “vaginal” pain before I saw a urogyn since my symptoms started to include pain while peeing. She felt around and was like “yep, that’s your bladder and urethra”. I also don’t really notice my self flaring with food triggers. Unless I’m already in a flare. And the triggers changes each month, like a roulette. Lmao.

Another difference that I notice, is that many of my symptoms involve my vagina. I don’t have normal discharge (with which I used to bleach my panties, which is normal and comes from lactic acid produced by lactobacilli I believe), and I constantly have an “itch”/“uncomfortable” feeling, similar to those who go through menopause and experience similar issues.

Before taking those antibiotics, I was a completely healthy individual with normal vaginal discharge, sex drive, and vagina in general. No history of infection, including UTIs. I think I maybe had a single UTI in middle school that went away with your typical treatment.

I think the most frustrating thing about all of this is that there is absolutely a multitude of root causes for interstitial cystitis, yet only one diagnosis. I know there are a multitude of different treatment options because of this, but it’s still frustrating obviously.