Though you don't have a real big bio load you probably should be changing water once a week. With testing of the nitrates you can better judge exactly how much water to change.
One possibilty is taht over time your pH acn drop do to the biological activity of waste being broken down. This creates acids thus lowering your pH. It may be that when you added the new water it caused a pH swing and may have shocked or stresses you aro. There are many factors that go into this, explaining them is kinda usless since you are not testing your water.