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Hello All,
I received a lot of information to the candida request - so many, so full of information/advice, that I wasn't able to use the computer 'savy' enough without my son's help. I'm really sorry about the delay. Well, its Labor Day and my son is home, so here is the beginning of some of the replies.
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Your story sounds much similar to mine. After I was diagnosed celiac I went on the G/F diet but did not seem to feel much better. Finally I went to a naturopath clinic in Toronto where I was diagnosed as having systemic candidiasis.
I followed the candida diet for a while and when I got feeling better I thought I could tolerate a bit of yeast but this was not the case. More recently, after eating some good G/F bread (4 or 5 slices a days for about a week) I found out that yeast was the obvious problem. It was the only change that I had made to my diet. I felt sick all over, ie., depression, aches and pain, difficulty urinating, sore throat, sleepless nites. etc etc.
Now after about 2 weeks in to the yeast free diet I feel so much better that I am prepared to go without my good G/F bread in exchange for good health. So it's back to the old rice cakes. I just wish that the medical community would recognize yeast as being a major health problem in a lot of people. I have a number of Dr. William Crook's books on the yeast connection which I refer to for good information.
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Years ago, my gynecologist put me on a yeast-free, simple-carb free diet because of systemic candidiasis (sp?). I later found out that people close to me, who knew other patients of his, too, considered him something of a quack. But I did feel better on the diet, although it has been so long that I don't remember all the specific symptoms I was trying to relieve. I think a burning stomach, sinus trouble, aches, brain fog and some fatigue were the primary ones.
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The controversy of candida generally surrounds the extent of symptoms claimed by popular literature. But there is NO controversy in conventional or alternative medicine that candida is a real health concern. I work for an ear/nose/throat specialist who just prescribed nystatin for a candida infection on a patient's vocal cords. It looked like a cancerous lesion & the biopsy results were candidiasis! Conventional medicine, as is often the case, is years behind alternative medicine in diagnosis & treatment of candida. But they are coming around.
I have also recently read of a woman who was misdiagnosed with leukemia when what she really had was a candida infection of the blood. She is a nurse on a pediatric oncology unit. The oncologist who wrote the article believes the woman "caught" the candida infection from the pediatric patients. It's well known that pediatric leukemia patients almost always get systemic candida infections and are routinely treated with anti fungal medication along with chemo. So this doctor is questioning how many cases of leukemia are actually candida infections. I was treated two years ago by a GI specialist for candida with ketoconazole, but the infection came back after only a few weeks. Again, six months ago, in spite of a good diet, my candida problem flared up worse than ever. I had white patches in my red & irritated mouth, gas & bloating in my belly, a rash on my bottom and the usual fatigue & brain fog. My doctor prescribed ketoconozole & I followed up with a 1 to 3 cups of kefir a day.
The drug plus the kefir cured it. I've been symptom free since. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that this is the end of chronic candidiasis for me. I believe it is as long as I drink my kefir daily.
There are a lot of products on the market for combating candida and I've tried a lot of them in the past. About the only dent they made was in my pocket book.
I've found that kefir is the only thing that has kept candida at bay for this long. Kefir is cheap, easy to make at home,requires no special equipment or such. It's made a MAJOR impact in my well being. In fact since I've been drinking a cup of kefir a day, I can indulge in a sweet decadent dessert once a week without a candida flare up.
Otherwise there's no refined sugar in my diet (except for the little bit in mayonnaise). I do eat brown rice, potatoes, yams, etc. They don't cause me gas or bloating as long as I drink my daily kefir. I drink goat milk kefir. Cow's milk kefir causes me allergy symptoms. There are other factors that contribute to candida overgrowth > besides diet.
Lack of stomach acid and digestive enzymes also sets the stage for candida overgrowth. When foods are poorly digested, both yeasts & pathological bacteria in the intestines over grow. Taking sufficient quantities of supplemental digestive components has been an important part of my regimen for fighting candida for the last 2 1/2 years. I take four Thorne Bio-Gest capsules with every meal. It's expensive, but essential for my health. Because of many years of undiagnosed celiac disease, food allergies, & pernicious anemia my GI track no longer makes adequate amounts of stomach acid & digestive enzymes. My doctor> explained to me that it's rare for a middle aged person to ever fully recover these functions & said I will likely need to supplement for life. There's a great book written on this subject, WHY STOMACH ACID IS GOOD FOR YOU by Jonathan Wright MD ND. Of course because stomach acid is so essential for proper digestion and healthy GI flora, chronic use of anti acid
medications such as Tums, Zantac, Nexium, Prilosec can cause candida overgrowth as well. These medications can also contribute to osteoporosis & anemia because they block the absorption of minerals & other important nutrients.
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