Candida Overgrowth. What To Do Now?

[Strongbad]

Okay, after lots and lots of research and experiencing a huge variety of symptoms, I finally conclude that I suffer candida overgrowth, not appendicitis.

I experience die-off symptoms, candida stools, fever, chill, depression, brainfog, dandruff, flakey skin on my face etc. I've been consuming 3g of aspirin + 1.5g of glycine + lots of vitamin k2 everyday for 6 days to clean off the candida off my gut. I had to quit yesterday (the 6th day) because it came to the point that the aspirin hurts my stomach even with the help of glycine.

I get the aspirin idea from this thread: https://raypeatforum.com/community/threads/aspirin-as-an-antifungal-drug-even-against-candida.6764/

I don't know what to do with my diet anymore. Some people say sugar and fruit are bad since they feed candida. Some says that starch is bad. Some says that white rice is bad but brown rice is good. Anti-candida says remove carb out of the diet but glucose removal makes metabolism worse and worsening candida overgrowth.

Some says it's better to make your gut sterile, but others say it may be better to keep candida in stomach but balanced with other bacterias.

I'm confused. Very confused.

My diet is currently 50% lean organ meat, 30-40% green vegetables, 20-10% carbs. I no longer consume dairy products. I'll get enough calcium from green vegetables.

I have to be careful with the carbs part. Which one I can and can't consume. I have orange juice, sugar and raw honey laying around in my fridge and kitchen yet I'm cautious about consuming them in fear of candida flaring up. The only carb I consume is brown rice, since it has lower GI and doesn't feed candida (so they say online)...

My current supplements:

Vitamin B1, b2, b3, b5, p5p, biotin, c, LE Super K (K2), liposomal glutathione, epsom salt bath, ionized magnesium, l-carnitine, l-lysine, MSM.

 

[kaizen]

Your diet sounds clean as a whistle.. maybe too clean... Are you stressing yourself out? Are you stressed when you eat something that "wasn't part of the plan?"

Maybe some more carbs, no?

 

[nikotrope]

I am testing aspirin to reduce stomach problems. Sodium has been one of the best supplements for my stomach and gut. But salt and aspirin are a bit harsh on the stomach so I have been trying aspirin/glycine/baking soda (1g/1g/3g) in hot water 3 times a day for a couple days and it doesn't hurt my stomach. More than that it reduces stomach aches. I also take caffeine and k2.

 

[tara]

My diet is currently 50% lean organ meat, 30-40% green vegetables, 20-10% carbs.

% by volume, weight, dry weight, or calories?

 

[Strongbad]

% by volume, weight, dry weight, or calories?

By overall calories.

 

[ecstatichamster]

Have you tried working up to 4 or 5 tablespoons of coconut oil? It contains caprylic acid which is very effective against candida.

 

[tara]

By overall calories.

Not trying to talk you out of it - i'm sure it has some good things going for it, and if you can eat it without pain that beats anything that gives you pain.
I 'm just amazed that you can eat that much greens. :)
I looked up brocolli, for instance, and you'd have to eat about 4 kg to get about a 1000 calories.

 

[Brian]

I don't know much about candida, but as for making aspirin non-irritating the best method I've found (which Haidut has posted about) is dissolving 1/8 teaspoon baking soda for every 325 mg aspirin in a little warm water. I experience no irritation whatsoever on 1 gram of Aspirin at a time, which is the highest I have ever taken at once.

 

[squanch]

Okay, after lots and lots of research and experiencing a huge variety of symptoms, I finally conclude that I suffer candida overgrowth

No you don't.
Unless you get a positive stool test for candida albicans from a doctor or your mouth looks like the picture I posted below you do not have candidiasis. Real candidiasis outbreaks generally only occur in severely immunosuppressed people and are resolved with a few days of antifungal drugs. We all have the candida yeast in our body but even a moderately healthy immune system keeps it in check (much like the dormant herpes virus).

A white coating on the tongue is NOT oral candidiasis, it's just an overgrowth of relatively harmless other yeasts that live in your mouth. For me it's usually caused by maldigestion because you don't chew your food (especially starches) properly, you gulp down cold liquids during a meal, you eat things that are hard to digest in general, improper combination of macronutrients etc.

F.uck that whole anti candida alternative health fear mongering bull****, it's a small industry created to scare people and sell them useless supplements.
Been there, done that, ruined my health even more with that low carb antifungal fasting cleanse nonsense.

I've not looked at your other threads and don't know your current health problems but trust me, this whole candida thing is not the answer

 

[nikotrope]

Candida overgrowth is the extreme and Strongbad probably doesn't have it. Candida like bacteria are releasing ammonia probably leading to other gut problems like high nitric oxide, serotonin and endotoxin. While many think they have candida overgrowth, they probably have bacteria overgrowth and/or parasites. Symptoms are very similar.

 

[narouz]

Candida overgrowth is the extreme and Strongbad probably doesn't have it. Candida like bacteria are releasing ammonia probably leading to other gut problems like high nitric oxide, serotonin and endotoxin. While many think they have candida overgrowth, they probably have bacteria overgrowth and/or parasites. Symptoms are very similar.

Okay, after lots and lots of research and experiencing a huge variety of symptoms, I finally conclude that I suffer candida overgrowth, not appendicitis.

I experience die-off symptoms, candida stools, fever, chill, depression, brainfog, dandruff, flakey skin on my face etc. I've been consuming 3g of aspirin + 1.5g of glycine + lots of vitamin k2 everyday for 6 days to clean off the candida off my gut. I had to quit yesterday (the 6th day) because it came to the point that the aspirin hurts my stomach even with the help of glycine.

I get the aspirin idea from this thread: https://raypeatforum.com/community/threads/aspirin-as-an-antifungal-drug-even-against-candida.6764/

I don't know what to do with my diet anymore. Some people say sugar and fruit are bad since they feed candida. Some says that starch is bad. Some says that white rice is bad but brown rice is good. Anti-candida says remove carb out of the diet but glucose removal makes metabolism worse and worsening candida overgrowth.

Some says it's better to make your gut sterile, but others say it may be better to keep candida in stomach but balanced with other bacterias.

I'm confused. Very confused.

My diet is currently 50% lean organ meat, 30-40% green vegetables, 20-10% carbs. I no longer consume dairy products. I'll get enough calcium from green vegetables.

I have to be careful with the carbs part. Which one I can and can't consume. I have orange juice, sugar and raw honey laying around in my fridge and kitchen yet I'm cautious about consuming them in fear of candida flaring up. The only carb I consume is brown rice, since it has lower GI and doesn't feed candida (so they say online)...

My current supplements:

Vitamin B1, b2, b3, b5, p5p, biotin, c, LE Super K (K2), liposomal glutathione, epsom salt bath, ionized magnesium, l-carnitine, l-lysine, MSM.

Read "thebigpeatowski"'s thread "The Best of Times, The Worst of Times."

 

[narouz]

No you don't.
Unless you get a positive stool test for candida albicans from a doctor or your mouth looks like the picture I posted below you do not have candidiasis. Real candidiasis outbreaks generally only occur in severely immunosuppressed people and are resolved with a few days of antifungal drugs. We all have the candida yeast in our body but even a moderately healthy immune system keeps it in check (much like the dormant herpes virus).

A white coating on the tongue is NOT oral candidiasis, it's just an overgrowth of relatively harmless other yeasts that live in your mouth. For me it's usually caused by maldigestion because you don't chew your food (especially starches) properly, you gulp down cold liquids during a meal, you eat things that are hard to digest in general, improper combination of macronutrients etc.

F.uck that whole anti candida alternative health fear mongering bull****, it's a small industry created to scare people and sell them useless supplements.
Been there, done that, ruined my health even more with that low carb antifungal fasting cleanse nonsense.

I've not looked at your other threads and don't know your current health problems but trust me, this whole candida thing is not the answer

I believed similarly, Skally.
I don't anymore.
Maybe you don't have a candida problem; I don't know.
But because you tried some things and they didn't help you,
that doesn't necessarily justify your certainty that there is no such thing as fungal overgrowth.
It is a certainty that almost all of mainstream medicine shares with you.

 

[charlie]

This is a thread for @thebigpeatowski :)

 

[tara]

My undestanding is that Skally is right when it comes to systemic candida overgrowth - very rare, only generally happens under severe immune supressed conditions, and is very dangerous - probably not what Strongbad has.

I am very skeptical about the benefit of starving anything out, especially if it involves medium or long term undernourishment.

However, I don't know about what might be going on in the gut itself, and I think TBP's hypothesis was that she had something resistant growing in the gut itself (not systemic), and that that was causing trouble and pain? Regular microbiota should be alterable by diet, metabolism, and maybe antibiotics, fairly quickly. But if there are biofilms protecting either fungi or bacteria, they may be harder to dislodge, right?
Strongbad clearly has something going on causing pain, possibly in the gut - without some definite test results, it's probably hard to know what species it is, or even whether it's promarily fungal, bacterial, parasitic, or maybe something else.

Flowers of sulphur are one possible tactic against fungii and parasites, I don't know if they do anything with bacteria.
Garlic is antibacterial and anti-fungal, I don't know about parasites. A bit hard on the gut.
Oregano oil is antifungal, not sure what else. Posibly has some down-sides.
Diatomaceous earth is anti-parasitic, but probably quite hard on the gut lining, which may already be struggling.
Apple cider vinegar (or any vinegar, I think) is anti-fungal, but I don't know that any of it gets as far along the GI as the trouble appears to be.

Apppendicitis is generally caused by blockage of the appendix, and overgrowth of bacteria and gases with nowhere to go. Rupture is life-threatening.

 

[LucH]

Two ways to fight against candidose (in French)
http://mirzoune-ciboulette.forumactif.org/t157-tactique-pour-lutter-contre-le-candida-albicans.
I would use extracts of widow bark instead of aspirin (salicine).

 

[tyler]

You could try an anti fungal drug such as ketoconazole. It's commonly prescribed for candida and yeast based skin infections. It usually requires a prescription but i'm pretty sure inhousepharmacy.vu has it in their stock.

 

[narouz]

My undestanding is that Skally is right when it comes to systemic candida overgrowth - very rare, only generally happens under severe immune supressed conditions, and is very dangerous - probably not what Strongbad has.

I am very skeptical about the benefit of starving anything out, especially if it involves medium or long term undernourishment.

However, I don't know about what might be going on in the gut itself, and I think TBP's hypothesis was that she had something resistant growing in the gut itself (not systemic), and that that was causing trouble and pain? Regular microbiota should be alterable by diet, metabolism, and maybe antibiotics, fairly quickly. But if there are biofilms protecting either fungi or bacteria, they may be harder to dislodge, right?
Strongbad clearly has something going on causing pain, possibly in the gut - without some definite test results, it's probably hard to know what species it is, or even whether it's promarily fungal, bacterial, parasitic, or maybe something else.

Flowers of sulphur are one possible tactic against fungii and parasites, I don't know if they do anything with bacteria.
Garlic is antibacterial and anti-fungal, I don't know about parasites. A bit hard on the gut.
Oregano oil is antifungal, not sure what else. Posibly has some down-sides.
Diatomaceous earth is anti-parasitic, but probably quite hard on the gut lining, which may already be struggling.
Apple cider vinegar (or any vinegar, I think) is anti-fungal, but I don't know that any of it gets as far along the GI as the trouble appears to be.

Apppendicitis is generally caused by blockage of the appendix, and overgrowth of bacteria and gases with nowhere to go. Rupture is life-threatening.

I'm pretty sure I've been suffering for a year or two with a fungal overgrowth in my gut.
I've discussed it a bit here and there scattered about the forum.
I hope to write it up more thoroughly here sometime.

It has been a devilishly weird condition to figure out
because I had the same certainty Skally above does:
Candida is just a made up disease designed to separate you from your money.

And I'd also hear repeatedly what you noted, tara:
that if one has systemic candida, one is probably on death's door.
There's that kind of either/or perception of yeast/fungal infection in mainstream medicine.
I've come to question it.

Take this one fact under consideration:
I believe it was haidut who, a few months back here on the forum,
posted about discoveries recently made about fungi being found in the brains of Alzheimers' patients.
They were able to detect the fungi with some sophisticated technology--
can't recall the name of it now.
And in that same article--it was a solid, scientific study--the authors noted that they had also found fungi in the bloodstreams of people: not dying people but people in a condition of some degree of health.

I started getting the idea that maybe this detection of fungi in the bloodstream of (at least semi-) healthy people has not really made it out into mainstream science/medicine. I mean, fungi in the blood would qualify as "systemic" fungus, right?


Now...I can't recall (or if it was discussed in close detail) just what elements of the fungi were detected: whether it was live fungi cells, or if it was some kind of detritus of dead fungi.

But my point is: this would seem to contradict the commonplace you noted:
that people, generally, just don't get systemic fungus/yeast.
Or they'd be dead.

I can't put my hands on it now, but I think it was from an article that thebigpeatowski posted, from a researcher at Great Plains Labs. As I recall, his view was that it is not necessarily live fungi that are getting into the bloodstream, but rather particles of dead fungi. But those particles are still troublesome--inflammatory. I'm sorry to be so haphazard in supplying sources, but...I'm just not up for a serious report now.

thebigpeatowski was having all sorts of gut (and beyond) issues. Pretty severe. Tried all the Peat stuff. No go. Tried all sorts of doctors: no go. We had been conferring about the possibility if was a fungal issue. And we talked about Nystatin. I was thinking of trying it, but was too cowardly. But she gave it a whirl. It immediately knocked the gut issues right out. But it was just one dose. The problem would return. She'd take the Nystatin. Again: knocked the symptoms out immediately. After a while she got more serious about it and took Nystatin for like 3 months. Last we heard from her she doing great. You can read all this in great detail on her ginormous thread.

I had different symptoms, but also seemed to be perhaps gut-centered. Like I said, I paused (coward) on the Nystatin. Instead, I tried a whole bunch of stuff (I won't detail it here, but I've noted it in different threads), and something seemed to help significantly. After a process of elimination over several months I figured out that it was mainly the probiotics--certain sophisticated pricey ones--that were mainly helping me. S. boulardii was, I believe, the central one. It is a fungus which kills the candida fungus.

So the S. boulardii made a big difference with me.
Diagnosis by treatment, this seems to confirm, to me, that it is likely a yeast problem I've been struggling with for going on almost 2 years. Maybe longer, more under the radar.
Same analysis with thebigpeatowski: diagnosis by treatment (Nystatin) pointed to yeast/fungi. Nystatin does not have an antibacterial action. Only anti-fungal.

So I got a small amount of Nystatin and tried it orally until it ran out--about a week and a half.
Again, a very significant positive effect on my symptoms
(briefly: severe heart palpitations/skipping/racing, severe lower backache, very irritated anus, bad loose poops, loss libido and energy generally, bad sleep, erectile dysfunction, tinnitus, and more...)

With thebigpeatowski and with myself as guinea pigs, it's pretty hard to escape the conclusion that we had a gut overgrowth of some kind of yeast/fungi, mostly likely candida. We both had pains and swelling in the cecal area.

My backache seemed to emanate from my cecal area. By the way, thebigpeatowski and me both have had appendectomies. When I looked down at my stomach, my lower right quadrant of my abdomen was distended. Now it's not. My intuitive take is that I had (and probably still do to some lesser degree) a fungal overgrowth in my cecal area. Candida goes through different phases, and in one of those phases it develops...what are they called?....hyphi? Those appendages that they can drill into your intestinal wall with. I think they were doing that to me. How did that cause me to have the systemic symptoms I noted? I don't know precisely, but as I mentioned earlier, it may not be that such symptoms require live fungal cells getting into the bloodstream. Maybe it is just parts--bits of cell walls or whatever--that leak into the bloodstream though the Leaky Gut.

I also think maybe the fungi may've caused some dysfunction of my ileocecal valve--causing it not to close all the way and thus allowing bacteria/fungi in the colon to back up into my lower small intestine and higher.
I have had for about 2 years a chronically coated tongue. Since I started the S. boulardii and Nystatin, my tongue has been like 90% clear.

I'm going to try a serious, bigpeatowski-style regimen of Nystatin soon. I will report.

But to come back to your point, tara:
I heard from many quarters exactly what you say:
that if fungus escaped the gut into the bloodstream you'd be dead.
I suspect that may not be true now.

This disease I'm thinking is a fungal disease I've been dealing with...
it's a damn tough one to deal with if you're a big Peat follower, as I am.
Because Peat poo-poos it too.
One of those rare areas where his views coincide with mainstream medicine.
Because of my Peat proclivities, I kinda had a blindspot about the candida/fungal possibility.
I just didn't seriously consider it for a long time--because of Peat.

 

[Giraffe]

@Strongbad , I read in another thread that you went very low fat, and I wondered if that was causing the trouble with the gallblader.

 

[Strongbad]

I did went very low fat for a while. Then again, I've modified the diet so many times within a year, from all OJ + sugar + milk to eventually very low fat (lots of potatoes) to deplete PUFA then to more balanced diet (meat + vegs + carb).

I do recall that the abdominal pain started sometime in March last year when I started the OJ + sugar + milk diet thing. I never knew what it was and it started very weak so I (mistakenly) brushed it off.

Now, it's a beastly monster inside my intestinal tract. As a matter of fact, last night I had major heart palpitation, body running in adrenaline/cortisol and the flare-up pain on lower right abdomen was unbearable. I lost 3 hours of sleep due to the pain.

There's so much information about whether it's candida or not and all the possible solutions in this thread (and the rest of the internet). Haidut did mention that candida overgrowth happened to people with surpressed immune system, so that might be the culprit of all this mess.

And no, I don't have those white spots inside my mouth (based on the Skally's picture).

Anyway, I'm literally scrapping my diet regimen again. I have to thread it very carefully.

 

[narouz]

Now, it's a beastly monster inside my intestinal tract. As a matter of fact, last night I had major heart palpitation, body running in adrenaline/cortisol and the flare-up pain on lower right abdomen was unbearable. I lost 3 hours of sleep due to the pain.

I had lower right abdomen distension.
And palpitations/skipping/racing bigtime.

The area you describe is the where the ileocecal valve is.
I researched around on the internet about it,
and I found that some refer to dysfunction of that valve as The Great Mimic--
because it can cause a very broad and seemingly unrelated host of symptoms,
like heart palpitations, for example.
The valve can get stuck open, so that bacteria/fungi? from the colon back up into the small intestine.

My speculation about myself is that fungi infested that area,
causing the distension,
causing leaky gut,
and maybe messing up the ileocecal's functioning.
Another angle: I've read that endotoxins from fungi get dumped into the liver,
and that the liver then can cause palpitations.

If I were you I would try taking some S. boulardii
(and if you can afford it also L. reuteri and b. coagulans).
See if things improve over a few days.
An expensive but really good product is called Syntol.
You can google.
You could take that by itself--it's a blend of those probiotics I mentioned, plus specific enzymes and more.
Special capsule to get the stuff down far to the end of the small intestine/cecal area.