is it wise to eat a lot of fruit sugar when you have candida overgrowth?
isn't that feeding the problem?

Probably not the best idea, see how you react, might be best eliminating large amounts. How do you know for sure you have candida overgrowth, most of the websites have no clue about candida and the symptoms.

Best idea would be to start repopulating your good bacteria via fermented foods such as water kefir, cultured veggies.

Your problem is probably too much fat. I suggest 80/10/10 by Dr. Graham. Good read.

too much fat really has nothing to do with candida overgrowth.

candida turns from its harmless yeast form to its overgrowth fungal form when the PH of the intesine is alterated to an alkaline PH. This usually occurs because of anti-biotics etc killing off the good bacteria which secrete acids which keep candida in check.

powerlifer,

I think what Utopian Life is referring to is the documented cases of clinical candia albicans overgrowth that were successfully treated using a low fat vegan diet. The premise is that high serum triglyceride levels bar the quick metabolization of sugars, allowing the fungal cells to feed continuously, in what amounts to an endless log phase. We've all read about people who tried low sugar cooked, and even low sugar raw with boatloads of "good bacteria" and found themselves still battling candida after months, who, once they reduced fat to almost nil, found their intestinal terrain righted itself and the candida population was starved to maintenance levels in a relatively short amount of time. No amount of probiotic bacteria will help you if you don't tackle the candida concertedly.

but the body needs fat! not only to digest vitamins in fruit and veg..

Want2know,

Yes, the body needs fat, but it doesn't need anywhere near as much on raw(remember, nutrients are generally more bioavailable raw) than most people think. There are trace amounts of fatty acids in almost everything, and what Utopian Life and I refer to when we talk about limiting fats is "overt fats"--oils, nuts and nut butters.

could you like these studies tamukha?

i get the theory behind it and i know the people on low carb diets who battle there candida problems all there life with maintenence then as soon as they up their carbs even gradually all symptoms come back.

getting the proper PH of the intestine back in balance was what i was meaning, repopulating your good bacteria is one part of this, but you will likely still suffer from low stomach acid if acid dependant for absorbtion nutrients such as zinc are deficient.

powerlifer,

Studies[snort!]? You must be joking : ) There's no money in it, and I'm sure you'll agree there's no disinterested science anymore(or almost). I am referring to cases in Dr. Graham's practice--they are mentioned in "80/10/10"--and on Shazzie's old weblog(don't know if cases are still posted there . . . hmmm, just got back from there; boy, it's changed). I myself have experienced superfast clearance of symptoms on low fat/relatively high fruit, where in contrast, low fat, high greens, high digestive enzymes/probiotics did nothing. Part of the problem with the latter, as I'm sure you know, is that excess hunger initiated by a diet heavy in low-glucose promoting foods causes wild glucose fluctuations that allow everything from blood borne fungi to cancer cells to freely feed.

ahh by documented cases i thought you meant studies my bad.

yeah ive seen the anecdotal stuff from low carb, low fat, fruitarian, its just in alot of these cases the people dont actually have candida in the first place, the most reason why fruitarian help some is because of low bile flow and a diet low in fat would relieve them of many of there symptoms.

most candida sufferrers are self diagnosed and the candida websites dont make it any easier as they attribute every disease/symptom under the sun with candida overgrowth when half the time they have no relation to candida whatsoever.

Well, I was diagnosed by me MD. And the symptoms were consistent with that, rather than any other disorder(at the time, my liver and digestion had been excellent). The one outstanding case I was told of was of a colleague of a friend of mine, who, after many months on the Atkins diet, was diagnosed by a team of gastroenterologists with life threatening candidiasis(which I'd never heard of). He was hospitalized on the verge of sepsis, and they advised him to stop eating fat and to eat fruits and vegetables. Of course, his liver must have been harmed consequently. In any case, if it's a self-diagnosed case of "pseudo candida," probiotics wouldn't help either, right?

getting diagnosed by a good physician is essential for candida i reckon.

for sure, you need to get to the route of the problems and with chronic illness that can take alot of trial and error, especially as most mainstream doctors arent too keen on helping.

another thing is alot who try probiotics try encapsulated probiotics that have been sitting on the shelf for best part of the year and wonder why they dont work. Fermented foods is the way forward if after a month or two your not seeing any benefits from a high intake of water kefir etc then id be looking at other routes of health problem.

My candida is really weird.
I ate the 80/10/10 diet, no fats at all, for 3-4 months. Some of my candida symptoms went away, but the thing is that the candida itself never went away or even started to die off. Instead my blood sugar was erratic, I was almost passing out from hypoglycemic episodes multiple times a day by month 3 and the only thing that would relieve it would be fruit, for maybe 30 minutes, and then another blood sugar crash. (Yes, I was eating 3000 calories a day and I'm a small girl).

Anyways like I was saying, for some reason eating tons of fruit did not aggravate my physical symptoms, it aggravated a lot of my emotional/mental symptoms, but at the same time it definitely did not make my candida go away, if anything it is worse now because of it. I have a feeling that somehow eating fruit w/ no fat just stabilizes the overgrowth, without doing much else.

The same thing happens when I eat only starches (potatoes and beans mainly, but NOT grains). I don't have any physical symptoms (my yeast infections, mouth infections, and other things go away), but at the same time my candida definitely does not die off because some other symptoms get worse, and there is no die off.

Compared to glucose, my candida is highly reactive to fructose. If I were to eat like 10 potatoes vs. 10 bananas, the 10 banananas would give me immediate candida symptoms, like as soon as it hits my mouth they will go crazy. I have a funny feeling that fructose is behind candida in the first place.

Also, if I eat glucose and fat, I don't get a candida reaction (again, excluding all grains). But if I eat fructose and fat, I get a HUGE reaction.



The only way to rid candida is to eliminate ALL sugars... Do rainbow green live food cuisine, it works really well.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/08/2012 08:29AM by raeraj.

Eliminating all sugars still won't do much if you don't get the terrain back in check though. The problem is that when you kill off the acid producing gut bacteria there is a shift in PH from slightly acidic to alkaline.

This turns on the candida growth gene and allows the candida to morph from its natural yeast form to hyphal fungal tissue penetrating form. This is why candida and other opportunistic pathogens occur after antibiotic use. The gut flora which secrete various acids and anti-microbial compounds are what keep these opportunistic pathogens in check.

I still believe though the candida has to be one of the most over blown self diagnoses. I fell into that trap years ago when i first stumbled onto natural health with my chronic symptoms. I still believe that food allergies, mild adrenal fatigue and bile stagnation are much more common and misdiagnosed as candida.

[www.vegankingdom.co.uk]



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 01/08/2012 11:14AM by powerlifer.

Maka,

The diet you list, apart from its not being raw and vegan--this is a raw vegan website and animal-food talk isn't allowed--will literally starve the brain of glucose. I assume it wouldn't be done for more than a couple of weeks . . . .

The best way to deal with candida overgrowth is to restore the flora. To do that you need probiotics (preferably water kefir), and prebiotics. And you also need to restore full stomach acid, because stomach acid kills yeast, and stomach acid does decline with age. Candida likes an alkaline environment, so you can use zinc mainly to keep your stomach acid at an optimal level. Using digestive bitters on the tongue to stimulate the vagus nerve would also increase stomach acid. You should also limit your carbs and sugars.

Check out my raw food review blog at rawfoodland.com!