Tongue coating

ok, this is gross, and driving me insane!!

i have like a thick coating on my tongue - only at the VERY back of my tongue near my throat - it seems to be getting worse, and is iritating the crap out of me. it seems to be the one thing that seems to be making the ms unbearable - it keeps iritating my throat, makes me cough, start dry retching...

anyhoot - i THINK it's come about from me eating more cheese these last few weeks - i have cheese with breakfast each morning as i thought the protein would make the food last a bit longer... instead, of got this nasty coating... hmmmm

i have tried cleaning my tongue with the toothbrush - dry retching BIG time. tried mouth wash - cant get it far enough back in my throat to do anything (gargle) without dry retching...

can anyone help me - im sure if i can get this under control, it will make this MS thing soooooooo much more tolerable!

I had that when pg with DD was horrible, nothing I did seemed to help me but I did have very severe m/s. I also had a constant metalic taste in my mouth.
I think drinking something fizzy might have helped but to be honest I can't really remember, 5 odd years ago now (eek)
It did go away in the end though.

So although I'm not of much help, I certainly symathise.

anything that gives me hope it won't last forever is good

drinking helps - i just cant have a constant stream of fluid into my mouth! pg bladder is bad enough at the best of times!

heheh oh I hear ya on that one!
Seems like lately the toilet has become my best friend.
Small sips often might do the trick
*fingers crossed*

BG: a white coating on the tongue can be caused by several things... usually a combination of things. The cells of the mouth have one of the fastest turn-over rates in our body... so if you have any nutrient deficiencies then it will show up in symptoms in the mouth such as a white tongue (dead skin cells of the tongue) and mouth ulcers before any other part of your body. First of all though i would try increasing hydration... drink more water. Your body needs water to perform any cellular regeneration... when you are dehydrated everything slows down (and builds up). Secondly I'd increase your consumption of fruit and vegies. Your digestive system could be getting all blocked up and the healthy bacteria levels could be getting out of balance. If you could stomach InLiven or Fast tract this could be the fastest method of getting rid of the problem. Removing it manually will only help in the short term. You'll eventually need to address the reasons why it's building up. I look at my tongue daily and I get it too when i'm run down and have been eating too much sugar and dairy (dairy has it's own kind of sugar that bad bacteria love and thrive on if you eat/drink too much of it). Soft drink could make it worse.... it will de-hydrate you and feed the bad bacteria.

So, in a nutshell: drink more water and eat more natural foods...avoid the highly processed. When i was pregnant I craved watermelon. This could be something that might hit the spot with your ms ATM.

ETA: with the avoidance of drinking... I think this could be the basis of your problem. I know how awful it is to have that full bladder feeling all the time. But this will get better in your 2nd tri (well it did for me) please don't slow down on drinking... you need it more than ever.

And I found this...

Furry white tongues come in two varieties: a little furry and very furry. A little furry is fine - it's the normal layer of bacteria that every tongue should have. A very furry tongue is often not fine - especially if it's a thick and cheesy-looking white fur coating.

Scrape a fingernail across your tongue and look at the path it carves. A big groove could indicate a problem. A very furry tongue typically indicates an overgrowth of Candida albicans - a yeast that lives in every digestive tract (and that can travel to the mouth, and elsewhere).


When Candida albicans thrives on the tongue, it could just be an annoying local overgrowth. The official name for this is oral "thrush." But bear in mind that a very furry tongue might indicate that Candida is also present in large numbers in the digestive tract, hidden from view, and could have spread beyond the borders of the intestines.

When Candida albicans overgrowth runs rampant in the digestive tract, it mutates from a yeast infection into a fungal infection. The condition is then called Candidiasis.

Candidiasis is capable of pushing through the mucosal intestinal lining that separates the gut flora (intestinal bacteria) from the bloodstream. When this happens, toxins normally eliminated by passing through the digestive tract now "leak" into the bloodstream.

The immune system is forced to deal with this constant drizzle of toxins at the expense of other important tasks - like gobbling up ever-present cancer cells before they nest somewhere (among other things). A compromised immune system is a recipe for chronic health problems.

The first line of defense in a healthy immune system is the intestinal wall and the probiotics (good bacteria) that colonize there. In general, probiotics keep Candida albicans at a manageable level so that Candidiasis does not develop. Antibiotic use and general unwellness, however, can diminish the number of good bacteria and give Candida the upper hand.

Like most fungus infections (miserable toenails anyone?), Candidiasis is a bear to get rid of. And once it gets going, the symptoms display themselves in any number of obnoxious and puzzling ways. There is a long list of symptoms for Candidiasis: bloating, constipation, and diarrhea are the most familiar. Less familiar symptoms include chronic fatigue, frequent headaches and irritability, back and neck pain (muscles), depression, anxiety, irregular menstrual cycles, itchy nose, and even eye floaters and/or blurred vision.

In other words, symptoms are so diverse that you don't know whether to visit your family doctor, allergist, orthopedist, gynecologist, psychiatrist, ophthalmologist, or witch doctor for relief. And yes, women are more susceptible - but don't kid yourselves fellas, it's NOT just a gal-thing.

If you think you have Candidiasis (or a lesser yeast infection), and you have symptoms telling you that "something" is just not right with your overall health, get thee to a doctor for a test. It's painless ... and it's important to track down symptoms that are troubling.

You think you have a sweet tooth? Well so does Candida. You love sugar - Candida loves sugar. Does sugar make you fat and happy? Sugar makes Candida fat and happy as well. And does sugar give you a nice rush of energy? It gives Candida a rush of energy too. To keep Candida under control, you must cut back on sugar.

Yeast get their energy by fermenting sugar (just like cancer cells). But fermentation is a very inefficient way to create energy - in other words, it takes LOTS of sugar to produce a little energy. A high sugar diet feeds Candida (and cancer cells) - and we know all about the dangers of sugar and type 2 diabetes.

Every living thing 'excretes' something. Yeast excrete alcohol. If you 'crave' sugar regularly to cure a shaky feeling or to get rid of headaches (and you don't have diabetes), you might be a victim of Candidiasis. No, you're not an alcoholic. But your body wants its 'fix' of alcohol - and when it doesn't get it, you get low-level withdrawal symptoms that temporarily 'go away' with a bag of jelly beans. Now you know why.

Probiotics and digestive enzymes likewise help to keep Candida at bay. Also consider taking a good garlic supplement (unless you love fresh garlic and have found ways to mix it into your daily food intake). Candida is destroyed by garlic, as are any number of other pathogenic gut bacteria.

Remember: Candida albicans in the digestive tract can never be eliminated - but it can be managed quite effectively. Should you test positive for Candidiasis, an anti-fungal drug may be prescribed - and that's fine. But you can't take such a drug forever, so you must become pro-active in keeping your gut flora in balance.

I was going to say the same as Bath. More fluids (even though the loo trips are a PITA) and more fruit and veges.

Mineral Water is great with a dash of lemon, makes your mouth feel clean and its good fizzy....oh how I love fizzy when preg!

ooh, i'm still drinking HEAPS - probably four pump bottles of water a day minimum, plus about half a litre over night - the only time i don't have a bottle on hand is when i'm sleeping! and even then, if i wake to go to the loo, i have a drink as well! i "might" have half a bottle of dry ginger ale (today it's only a couple of sips so far) depending on how much i want something other than water. have had less than a litre of any sugary drink in over 6 weeks! very unusual for me! i bought some juice yesterday, thinking it would be good to have something different - read the ingredients today, and it said "not recommended for pregnant or lactating women" in teeny tiny font - i wonder how many women havent noticed it...

anyway - i guess the only thing that has changed (apart from growing a gremlin in my tummy!) is the cheese every morning - so i'm going to take a break from that, up the fruit intake if i can (the sugar in the fruit isn't sitting well) - i live on vegies though (would be vego if i didnt hate mushrooms so need meat for additional protein!), so don't know what else to do!

With the frequent loo trips: I have a theory (one of hundreds LOL) that your bladder is like your stomach... it can be stretched and shrunk according to how much fills it on a regular basis. So, if you drink less and less eventually it will be able to hold less while still feeling comfortable. Perhaps what you need to do is bite the bullet and just drink heaps for a few days... keep it full so that after a while it's capacity (or sensitivity to capacity) will be increased. I find that over summer (when i lose my appetite in the heat) my stomach shrinks... meaning it doesn't take much to make me feel full.... so i end up eating less. Like I said, it's just a theory... but what have you got to lose (excpet a few more trips to the loo for a while). i'm sure your body will love the extra hydration... it will also do great things for bubba's amniotic fluid which has to be replenished frequently.

ETA: just saw your last post... that's great about the fluids :) Do you think it could be candida then?

i guess it could be - i'm leaning towards something cheese related - my bro used to get it all the time as a kid so he'd be banned from cheese for a while (this was a guy who could eat a block of cheese over three days cos he'd have it on toast for brekkie, sandwiches for lunch) plus drink up to 2L of milk a day! every time it happened, mum would stop the dairy, and he'd come good

so, i'm trying elimination from today - no more cheese this week - if that stops it, so be it! if not, i'll try and see if there is something else . don't want to go to GP as they'll use a tongue depressor to look - and i'll hurl on them! plus it's a 60k round trip, which will make the queasies worse!

hoping it's just the cheese (i've gone from not eating brekkie at all, to eating brekkie with cheese every day... have lost almost 5kg though...) - the only other thing it could be is the morning half banana... eliminate one, if it don't work, the banana will go too (just have to find a simple 6am replacement...)

sounds like you're drinking heaps, I find I feel a bit water logged if I drink too much water, at the moment I am having about 2-3 L a day but sometimes I just can't drink anymore, so I have something fizzy.
By fizzy I mean soda water with something mixed in it, like fruit juice or a little cordial.

I like the sound of Lulu's mineral water though, will have to give that a go too.

i've gone off fizz big time - even the dry ginger is allowed to go flat

wondering if i can convince DH to go and pick some lemons and maybe i'll make up an iced lemon water drink - see how that sits... the acidic lemon might attack the nasties at the back of my tongue...

I doubt if it would be the banana ;) if anything bananas would be really good for the health of your mouth (ever heard about eating a banana at the first sign of a mouth ulcer?). The white coating is dead skin cells and bacteria. I guess your diet is contributing to this... but what is on your tongue is not actually cheese... it's dead cells and bacteria.

ETA: have you been on anti-biotics or immune suppressant drugs lately?

A dental hygienist mentioned this in another forum: ...you're doing the right thing by brushing it daily (your dr. probably suggested that because he suspected poor oral hygiene).....otherwise, don't eat a lot of dairy products, if you are. The dairy could bring out the candida in your mouth, making the overgrowth worse.

the only thing different to pre-preg is the blackmores ms tabs - which are ginger and vit b6

i'm thinking more the cheese is adding to the imbalance as it's more dairy than my body is used to (hope that makes sense)

normally, i might have a small serve of cheese once a week and only milk in my cuppa. it's something i don't have a lot of cos i have IBS which dairy messes with

come to think of it, my belly is a bit ick at the moment too (but i've been blaming Gremlin - poor little tacker!). just asked DH to get me some grapes as well as bananas, plus the fruit we have here, hopefully it will be enough...

...forgot to say that if it's thrush (a yeast outbreak) then garlic (if you can stomach that) would help.

Make sure you get enough calcium though... oranges are a good source...as well as sardines (if you can stomach them)... from what you are saying you might be getting low on calcium which hasn't got anything to do with your white tongue issue but will affect you in other ways... you might find that you start getting leg cramps for example... now THAT's something you really dont want believe me!!! A very common thing in pregnancy.

Bath - i'm an oddity in human form - i actually got told a couple of years ago to reduce as much calcium intake as possible (within reason of course) as i have calcified lymph nodes in my stomach and underarms - i also had a bone chip lodge in the muscle at the front of my ankle and it grew into a full blown bone that had to be removed... so calcium wise, i've generally on the safe side! my body obviously processed what i have taken in really well! i won't cut it out all together, but will cut back and see if it makes a difference....

am a no go on oranges (trigger migraines - except blood oranges which i can't get locally - so am growing them myself), sardines are a definite no go - and garlic isn't the best at the moment either...

grrrrrrr - stoopid weird body! lol

Fruit salad and lots of it! Seemed to do the trick with me!!! I made up heaps and froze it so I had it on hand whenever I needed it!!!

There are lozenges you can get for oral thrush if it's that. I'm not sure if they are safe during pg though. You might need to ask a doctor or pharmacist. I hope it gets better soon for you.

Hi BG I had oral thrush in the first trimester, (I am prone to thrush). I used probiotics and and an oral antithrush treatment and this cleared it up well. I tried nilstat first but couldn't tolerate the taste while I had morning sickness, I changed to daktarin oral gel and that was much better. These are available over the counter, I checked with two pharmacists before I took either to check their safety during pregnancy and they are fine. I breathe through my mouth a lot and this seems to make it worse especially if I have a cold

Cutting down refined sugar helps too. Good luck.

might have to get to the pharmacy tomorrow and get something - sick of feeling so blah!

it's soooo irritating that, if i'm not actively drinking, it feels so horrible

well, last night was awful - lay in bed for almost 2 hours trying to get comfortable - breathing with mouth open (normal) left everything dry and icky. breathing with mouth closed felt wrong. so i decided to call the Nurse On Call service for advice. what a waste of HALF AN HOUR!!

she got fixated on the nausea - not listening to the fact that i have been controlling the nausea, but this coating is making the it harder to control the cough and associated hurl reflex. she went off on a tangent, asking about weight loss, dizziness, severity of the nausea - ummmmmm, i'm PREGNANT, nausea is normal, dizziness is normal, weight loss happens in first tri regularly! so she gave me all these natural hints on dealing with nausea (gee thanks, i KNEW all that) and asked if she'd helped - ummmm NO

eventually got her to look up oral thrush (as i'm more and more convinced this is what it is) - nothin! great. her big suggestion was to take panadol (umm, i'm not in pain!), and then maybe use throat lozenges that numb the throat area. i'd thought of that earlier, but didnt think it would help, so when she said that i thanked her, hung up, and got into the strepsils! worked for last night, was able to sleep, but i'm back to icksville today, so going to the pharmacy today to get some sort of treatment. might talk to thema bout pro-biotics as well. they don't usually sit that well with the IBS, but i think an upset tum will be easier to cope with than the tongue yukkies!

started on Daktarin oral gel yesterday - OMG - if Nilstat is worse than that, i don't ever want to taste it!! it's like pure sugar syrup! gross!!!

didnt seem to be getting much relief, and last night i was back to the same situation as the night before so panadol, strepsil, off to bed - no relief, so i went to the ensuite and used some more mouth wash. not sure how it worked cos i couldn't get it to the back of my throat, but i got some mild relief. constant salivating like i was going to be sick stopped - and then i had the problem of feeling dehydrated! doesn't seem to have completely gone away, but it's also no where near as bad

unfortunately, the dehydrated feeling left me just as icky last night, and had to take maxalon to help calm my stomach for sleep. couldn't stomach toast this morning, so two attempts at half a banana each, and finally got to eat something more solid about half hour ago. i can see it being a loooooong day trying to manage the ms today..

:hug: I'm glad you've had a little relief. I hope everything clears up quickly for you.