There can be an underlying anatomic problem causing acid reflux - hiatal hernia, This occurs when part of the stomach prolapses upward through your diaphragm (a muscular structure which normally has a small gap to allow passage of the esophagus). Hiatal hernias may be asymptomatic, but if large enough tend to cause reflux of acid into the esophagus and symptoms of reflux. The dietary and lifestyle measures mentioned earlier may be enough to relieve symptoms, but if they or meds don't do the trick, surgery to fix the hiatal hernia may be necessary. Any other underlying G.I. issues would require a good gastroenterology consultation and not a nebulous "gut healing protocol". Sometimes acid reflux improves whether or not you take steps to reduce risk factors. I used to have a lot of discomfort from it at night some years ago and took medication for a short time. More recently it's only occasionally that I have mild symptoms, and I'm not taking any meds, herbs or special precautions. Sometimes conditions get better on their own and whatever interventions you were trying wrongly get the credit. This post was edited by eric_oh on Fri, Jan 24, 14 at 17:49

Hey I had your same problem, beds full of rubble and thus alkaline soil, i could solve the problem a bit and im still working on it, i currently have lowered the ph by 1 point. What i did was: till, remove the rubble, added lots of cow manure, not aged plain and fresh (i did this because i was not going to plant anything there immediatelly and fresh manure is more acidic), i added once a month generous amounts of iron sulphate (so iron would be available, cause in high ph it tends to lock up not be available, and also it is very acidic, because it contains sulphur), and watered every week with an vinegar solution. After 5 months of doing this i planted roses and some herbs, and they suffered from cholriosis, but in time and with more additions of iron suphate and vinegar an OM i managed to solve this, and now im doing great in that bed. Hope this helped

Happy Holidays, to Chris and Kim. I appreciate Kim's experience and logic. My neighbor ordered a big pile of dirt mixed with mushroom compost (horse manure & brown bedding). I tested the pH of his dirt, it's slightly less blue in red cabbage juice than mine (pH 7.7). At first he got the darkest green lawn in the neighborhood. But his lawn looked worst when there's hot weather and no rain, thanks to the salt content. Mike_Rivers, a retired chemist, mentioned that horse manure is 1/4 the salt of other manures, with chicken manure the highest (per University of Colorado's data). I thought I could turn my azaleas and rhododrendrons dark-green by using acid fertilizer Lilly Miller 10-5-4 with chicken manure, but I killed 2 rhodos by using it 3 times: 10+10+10 equals 30 in Nitrogen, that's much higher than the 0.7 nitrogen per horse manure application. Sulfur is useless in turning my acid-plants dark green, it's the chelated iron that does the job. I tested Espoma garden sulfur on my acid plants, and they are still yellow. For salt content, most damaging is urea and ammonium nitrate, around 80% salt index, it's like dumping a cup of salt on your rose bush. The lowest in nitrogen is anhydrous ammonia at 47%, but I don't see listed anywhere. Phosphorus: superphosphate is lowest in salt, at 7.8, and triple superphosphate at 10. For potassium, monopotassium phosphate (52% P and 35% K), has lowest salt at 8.4, and potassium chloride, use to de-ice in cold zone is a killer with 116.2%. For organic sources, grass clippings, alfalfa, leaves are lowest, then blood meal, then horse manure, cow manure, and highest salt is chicken manure (also highest in nitrogen). Here is a link that might be useful: University of Illinois data on salt index

protemp: If you recently set up a large water softening tank and use the bagged "salt" from the grocery store to soften it, you will have an ionic inbalance shortly. If you purchased your fish locally, then you should mimic the water they were living in at the store..presumably the same as your tap? In any case, RO units hook up to distilled (aka softened) water for extreme water purifaction - taking all disolved minerals like calcium, sodium, and phosphate. Yes hard water has sodium, as well as magnessium, phosphorous, and calcium. What your unit does it replace all of those with sodium, which makes the water "softer" by reducing divalent ions (Ca+2, Mg+2) for monovalent ions (sodium: Na+1). reducing the pH and hardenss of the water, slightly. People use water softening devices to reduce, not elimate, scale and lime (calcium, magnessium, etc.) deposits from municipal water. I would check with a local fishstore and describe what set up you have and see if they can offer alternatives. Since I also have relatively hard water, I do not keep discus, even though I would like to. I would argue that saturation of water with only sodium is more harmful than all the other ions that are naturally found there. For example, and this is relative to this forum, I was using softened water to water a palm (before I knew what it was) and had a problem with the leaves turning yellow. It was only then that I realized the water was defecient in magnessium and calcium that I was in trouble. So what I do, especially for palms and other big plants, I water with hard water (which has all the essential nutrients and then some) and flush with RO repeatedly to wash away any salts.