It has been four years since Jenny nearly lost her life in a battle against Clostridium difficile—a dangerous antibiotic-resistant microorganism that infects the intestines. C. diff is normally kept in check by beneficial communities of microbes in the gut. But, when antibiotics knock those out, it grows and spreads, releasing toxins that can cause diarrhea and, in extreme cases, death. Treatment options for these cases are limited and 29,000 people were killed by the infection in the United States in 2011 alone.

“It was awful,” shares Jenny, a Reddit user who contracted C. diff in December 2010 when she was 30 years old.

The condition lasted more than six months and time after time, hospitals would send her home with nothing more than some antibiotics—which would only end up prolonging the infection.

“I remember [I] showed up at the ER relapsing,” she describes while fighting back tears. “I looked him square in the face and said, ‘You are sending me home to die.’ And all he said was, ‘There’s nothing more we can do for you here.'”

Finally, Jenny located a gastroenterologist who specialized in C.diff infections. After hearing her story and reviewing her symptoms, he recommended a rarely used, controversial procedure: A fecal microbiota transplant (FMT).

An FMT, he told her, would repopulate her gut with the microbes that were needed to drive out the C. diff infection—but would require doctors to transplant someone else’s stool into her intestines.

“At the time [I thought], ‘That’s some crazy stuff,'” she recalls. “That’s so not going to be me.”

But, by that point, she was game to try anything. The doctor referred her case to a fecal transplant expert who called her immediately.

“You know you are in the shits when a specialist calls you and asks, ‘How quickly do you need this?’”

Heather, Jenny’s wife, was chosen as the donor and the procedure was scheduled soon after.

On the day of the FMT, the lab had about six hours to prepare the sample and perform the transplant before microbes begin to die off. The lab begins with the donation, applies a salt-water solution, and then puts it through a filter and a blender to get the right consistency. Then, using a colonoscope, they apply the sample directly into the intestines.

It only took a week for Jenny to feel better.

“It worked,” she says now, ecstatically. “I am alive because of this. There is no doubt in my mind—no doubt.”

Jenny is not alone. More than 90 percent of C. diff sufferers who have been given FMT have not relapsed. Still, the procedure remains controversial—and difficult to regulate. In 2011, Jenny was the third patient to receive an FMT at the hospital she was staying at, with even her own doctor discouraging her from discussing the procedure with nursing staff or hospital employees for fear that they might put an end to it.

Since then, FMT has broken into mainstream consciousness. The research looking at how bacteria can benefit the body holds enormous promise to unlocking the secrets behind many modern ailments.

If you Google the word “microbiome”—which is the term for the communities of symbiotic bacteria that live on and inside you—you can find results linking the new science to cures for everything from acne to Ebola. Increasing the diversity in your gut biome has been touted as a potential weight-loss strategy, an aid to depression, and even holds promise for improving cancer treatment.

With public curiosity and support booming, scientists and the medical industry are racing to better understand the mechanisms behind the benefits. Between 2007 and 2012, the number of journal articles published on the microbiome increased by nearly 250 percent and set off a gold rush, with a wide range of companies jumping on the biotic bandwagon.

“What you’re witnessing with fecal transplants right now is this kind of grassroots revolution of the public demanding better treatment for their gut diseases, and they are thinking the microbiome is the way to do it,” explains Dr. Lita Proctor, the Program Director for the Human Microbiome Project at the National Institutes of Health.

There’s still many unknowns, however, and Proctor says many scientists are concerned that public demand for FMT may be premature.

“There is always that tension between those of us who tend to want to get the science in a place where we can better understand what the system is doing to those who really see the promise and want to go ahead and jump ahead,” Proctor says. “Stool is a waste product—it is meant to leave the human body, and all of us are carriers of pathogens. So there are a lot of potential hidden dangers associated with fecal transplants.”

Even so, people are eager for FMT solutions. The success stories have even inspired a movement to do them at home. Websites like thepowerofpoop.com, offer details about how to DIY fecal transplants. These sites promise a wide range of benefits.

Proctor says these DIY procedures are dangerous, even if they are successful. The microbiome is a complex system and there’s still no sense of what might happen down the line. Often though, they don’t go as planned right from the beginning.

“I remember going to a number of different GI doctor meetings where the doctors in the audience acknowledged that the first time they learned that their patient had done a fecal transplant at home,” Jenny shares, “is when they come into the doctors office and they have a raging gut infection.”

Still, FMT has proven to be a badly needed solution for some C. diff sufferers like Jenny. The FDA has struggled to regulate FMTs, while questions still remain from the scientific community.

In 2013, the FDA classified poop as a drug, so it would fit within the medical regulatory parameters, and the following year released guidelines that allowed FMTs on a case-by-case basis.

“Right now, [FMTs are] really more for emergency response,” Proctor explains. “There’s no way that this is a longterm solution to C. diff infections or other kinds of conditions, but all these GI docs and the FDA are getting so much demand and so much pressure from the American public to help them cure their gut conditions. [So the FDA is] trying to come up with interim responses until somebody can come up with a product that is verified to be free of pathogens, and free of other harmful materials, and shows obvious and clear treatment of C. diff infections.”

That product may actually soon be ready for market. Seres Therapeutics, a company working on microbiome therapies, has created a single-dose capsule that will work similar to an FMT—without the ick factor. The drug, named SER-109, will contain the needed microbes but will be purified and cleared of potential pathogens.

It’s still in a trial phase, but researchers are confident about its promise. In their study, 97 percent of C. diff patients showed no signs of infection for as long as eight weeks. Seres Therapeutics company reports that its official results will be ready in 2016.

Until then, scientists from around the world are making great gains with understanding the functions of microbiome and the safety and success rates of FMT. Earlier this week, researchers met to discuss the latest in both FMT clinical treatments and commercial enterprise at the American College of Gastroenterology Scientific Meeting in Honolulu, Hawaii. At the meeting, the results from the first placebo-controlled trial were presented, showing that the procedure was 91 percent successful at curing C. diff, without any known side effects.

Jenny, now four years out from the procedure, has showed no signs of relapsing but has had a few complications. In the months after her FMT, she says she came down with Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS), which has since taken care of itself, but she continues to struggle with “reactive arthritis” that might be connected.

Regardless, she says she is grateful to the doctors who saved her life and is eager to share her experience with anyone who will listen—whether it’s researchers who continue to contact her or even curious members of the Reddit community. She created a Reddit account just to do an Ask Me Anything (AMA) session, choosing the user name LuckyJenny.

“Emotionally, nothing really gets my goat anymore,” she wrote in a response to one user. “Stuff at work doesn’t get me riled up, stuff at home… I’ve got a really different perspective on life now.”