Candida Curse – Is Yeast Ruining Your Life and What You Can Do

Hi. My name is Dr. Tom Rofrano from the Natural Medicine Clinic in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida and today, I’m going to talk to you about candida curse: is yeast ruining your health? We’re going to go over some basic symptoms of yeast overgrowth, how to find out if you have it, and then some solutions for you to help you get better.

A Patient’s Symptoms

In my 30+ years of practicing chiropractic, nutrition, and functional medicine this is a typical patient I would see. A 38-year-old woman, came in complaining of a laundry list of issues: Fatigue, abdominal pain, bloating, gas, belching, indigestion, constipation, diarrhea, nausea, eczema on most of her body, irritability, mood swings, PMS, headaches, dizziness, itchy eyes, dry skin and hair, easy bruising, chest pain, hyperactivity, sinus congestion, rashes, itching, food allergies, hair loss, frequent urination, recurring yeast infections, sugar, bread, alcohol cravings, insomnia, and brain fog. And she’s more of a typical patient that I see.

Celiac Disease and Gluten-Free

She had seen many doctors over the previous 10 to 15 years, many of them were specialists, and finally, she got her allergist to test her for Celiac disease. Sure enough, it was positive, and she went on a gluten-free diet and though she still had all her symptoms, she temporarily felt better. After a while, she still had all those other symptoms I mentioned and was back to just feeling terrible. That’s when she found our office and went through an initial evaluation and thorough testing. We found out there were several things going on, and typically, when someone has all these symptoms, it’s not just one thing.

Yeast Overgrowth – Candida and Antibiotic Use

One of the main things going on her was yeast overgrowth; Candida. Yeast is a type of fungus and candida albicans is the most popular type of yeast. We have a normal amount in our systems and in our gut, but when that gets out of balance and overgrown, that’s when you can get all these symptoms. One of the most common causes of this is antibiotic use. I mean, even a one week course of antibiotics can wipe out your healthy, good bacteria for months and months, which allows a yeast overgrowth and all the bad bacteria and yeast to overgrow and take over.

Acid-Blocking Drugs and Yeast Overgrowth

Another factor is antacids; one of the most prescribed drugs in the United States. If you look at their side effects, one of the primary ones is yeast overgrowth (candidiasis). By killing off acid in your stomach, that compromises one of the primary protective mechanisms your body has against yeast and bacteria- pathogenic bacteria. Yeast overgrowth, caused by acid-blocking drugs, birth control pills, and other drugs is a reason why women are more likely than men to have yeast overgrowth, although men have it too.

Yeast Symptoms and Autoimmune

Yeast overgrowth can affect many different areas in body and brain function, resulting in symptoms like fatigue, brain fog, headaches, dizziness, irritability, mood swings, anxiety, sinus congestion, and post nasal drip. If you ever feel like this mucous just keeps going down. Take chronic cough, for example, if you’re overly sensitive to perfumes and fragrances or car exhaust, and you’re overly sensitive to that with allergies or itchy ears. Although it’s most common in women, it’s something that I dealt with years ago. These are all symptoms that can be related to yeast.

Yeast overgrowth is also one of the more common causes of autoimmune conditions. I see so many patients over and over with Hashimoto’s and other autoimmune conditions, and yeast overgrowth is one of the primary causes. And that is actually what caused my own autoimmune conditions which I was able to clear up almost 10 years ago.

Itchy Ears

So what caused mine? Well, my father was a medical doctor. So growing up, I was on a lot of antibiotics with every little sniffle. When I was like six or seven and had chronic sinus congestion, the answer was to take antibiotics. That  was just wreaking havoc on my system, and I ultimately got my tonsils removed. That set the stages for all of these yeast-related issues and a whole bunch of other things. Getting back to the sinus and the itchiness in my left ear, and for some reason, it was mostly my left, it would be triggered whenever I would have a glass of wine or have some bread or apple cider vinegar. You know, those things which were supposed to be so healthy for you, but my ear would start itching and that’s all yeast related.

Other Yeast-Related Symptoms

In addition to the itchy ear, I had abdominal pain, gas, bloating, and diarrhea. Constipation is another symptom, though I didn’t really have that. Yeast is almost always involved with gut issues like IBS, and I certainly had plenty of food sensitivities. When you have yeast overgrowth, it can cause leaky gut, which then makes you more prone to, and increases the number of food reactions you have. And I had plenty of food reactions- gluten and many other foods.

Consider Genitourinary Symptoms

When it comes to genitourinary symptoms, the traditional medical person will only recognize yeast overgrowth as vaginal yeast infections, give you the topical prescription for that, and that’s pretty much the extent of it. They don’t really believe or don’t acknowledge, that yeast can affect you systemically, except in severe cases and hospitalized patients. But it’s really not on the radar and patients tell me if they even bring it up, they’re practically laughed out of the room. Traditional medicine is kind of run like in the military, with the old policy of ‘Don’t ask. Don’t tell.’ It’s like one symptom, one drug.

Compounding Symptoms

Sometimes you get past that one symptom and then don’t hear anything from a patient. Or patients are more like the woman who had 38 different symptoms, and doctors may try to give them 38 different drugs for those. Well, that one patient did go to dozens of specialist though. But anyway, skin issues, acne, sunspots and are treatable. This is something I had when I was in college. They call them sunspots, white spots on your back, neck, and shoulders. Those are related to yeast — internal yeast overgrowth — and you can absolutely get rid of those when you get this yeast under control. Other symptoms, like fungal infections on your nails, white coating on your tongue, eczema, psoriasis, skin rashes, and itchy eyes, ears, or skin.

One of those common things with patients is itchiness all over their body, at night especially, and it’s just driving them crazy. Then we put them on the diet we’re going to talk about with some of the supplements, it clears up within a matter of a few weeks. Numbness and tingling (something I had plenty of), joint pain, muscle aches, fibromyalgia type symptoms, autoimmune conditions, and then cravings for sugar, alcohol, or bread, difficulty losing weight, PMS, and there’s even more, but those are the basic, and that’s enough for today.

What’s the Solution?

There are so many symptoms, but what’s the solution? It basically comes down to: How do you even know if you have those? With our seven-step functional free program, my step one is a thorough evaluation; a whole body health analysis that includes lab testing and testing for yeast, if we suspect that, and stool testing, which is very important because it can determine the parasites, yeast, and types of bacteria. Knowing what type can help clear it up. A thorough evaluation and symptom profile is important.

As far as treatment goes, It’s pretty straightforward. The Free Diet which is free of the most common allergens; gluten, grains, yeast, sugar, soy, legumes, dairy, etc. And within this Free Diet, is the candida diet. There’s also a bunch of other diets within this, all in one. You don’t have to do a candida diet, a gluten-free diet, or a Paleo diet; this encompasses all of that by taking the best of each and putting it into one diet.

A Quick Summary

If you want to a copy of phase one of the Free Diet, just click here. Phase one involves avoiding starches, sugar and even most fruit because you’re really cutting down the sugar intake. Starches and sugars really thrive on yeast. Instead, you’re eating plenty of healthy proteins, vegetables, and healthy fats. Take one serving of fruit a day, and its outlined in there, but the diet is intended to starve off the yeast, so skipping anything with sugar or yeast, so no wine, beer, vinegar, or mushrooms, even cutting out fermented foods.

Supplements

In addition to this diet is the nutritional supplement. The one I’ve found over the years to work the best is natural medicine formulas. A product called Yeast Defeat that has different ingredients, herbs in it and other ingredients that help kill off excess yeast. And then we have our probiotic line. ProbioSupreme™ 30– that’s so vitally important to getting the normal but healthy bacteria to increase in your gut. So between the Free Diet, the supplements and there are almost always other things involved as well besides that, because these can wreak havoc on your system.

Start With the Diet and Move Forward

We address getting these other things under control, but if you just start and follow the diet it will help you feel better. Later you can add these antifungal, supportive digestive supplements, which can help dramatically. Let me know if you have any questions or any other things you want me to cover.

I know a lot of patients that come in, and a lot of you out there, have chronic health issues and you’re feeling terrible inside and out. But really, if you can get to the underlying cause and start addressing these and come up with some permanent solutions, then you can come up with solutions to help get things cleared up. And your body does have an amazing ability to heal so you can get better.