I only decided to do GT5 because of a HCL issue and I am very concerned about thinning of my stomach lining. I have NEVER burped with the baking soda test and know your HCL challenge is a different method but I am a bit discouraged by it. Can you help?

ADDITONAL INFORMATION: I have lost 5 family members from stomach cancer. I have NEVER burped baking soda test (taking 1 tsp of baking soda with 4 oz-6 oz of room temperature water the first in the morning) and 8 weeks later into this program, I am still not able to burp, where everybody else in my family was able to burp within 5 seconds. I was NOT an antibiotic user, a baby born vaginally, never had ear infections etc… but I had H.Pylori (15 years ago) and got treated with triple antibiotics back then - we did not know probiotics.

A: The HCl test was established by Dr. Jonathan Wright and is a reliable test for low HCl. The baking soda test is less reliable and subject to varied influences. I forgot about it due to unreliability, and now remember that if you have thinning or a damaged mucosal barrier, the HCl will burn at a low dose, which then does not mean that you have adequate HCl like it does with people who have an undamaged barrier. So there are two ways low doses of HCl cause burning: 1) adequate HCl production, and 2) damaged mucosal barrier. So forget about burping and see if one HCl capsule causes burning. If it does, based on your history, then it affirms mucosal thinning or damage. If you need several capsules, then your mucosal barrier may be better than you think, but your parietal cells are still making low HCl. Correcting HCl is not the same thing as correcting the stomach lining. So if it all comes down to helping your body repair and restore the stomach mucosal lining, you should tailor specific nutrition for that, begging the question, "Why are you working to re-colonize the colon when your damage issue is in the stomach?" Nothing wrong with improving the entire G.I. Tract, but let's focus on your stomach. Here are some suggestions: mix glutamine powder, slippery elm herb, and the contents of 1 MBC capsule into 1 oz of aloe vera liquid plus 2 oz of water. Add three drops of fulvic minerals, some liquid zinc and some liquid silica. Drink this before each meal for three months, then re-evaluate via the HCl test (and can certainly give the baking soda a try as well.) Adjust your diet to include healing foods, e.g. organic vegetable juice (with cabbage if you do okay with it). Have a Christa Ginger Pickle frequently. The challenge at hand is to 1) remove the cause; 2) support your body's natural self-repair processes consistently. This will give you the best nutritional opportunity to help correct the damage caused by H.Pylori and the collateral damage of the Rx antibiotics. You may be trying to repair damaged genes, so give it some consistent attention. Take care and many blessings.