Under normal circumstances, I’m one of the biggest carnivores you’d ever meet, but during early pregnancy, the last thing I want to look at is meat or eggs (let alone actually EAT them!) The fact is though, pure animal fats/proteins are essential to good health.
Animal food contains nutrients that you can’t get any place else, and pure animal fats (lard, tallow, butter) are invaluable when it comes to healthy
living.
Dealing with meat aversions is well worth the effort because with good fat and protein, your body can more efficiently use the nutrients you give it.
This means you can heal better.

Most people think that yogurt is good for people with yeast, but in many cases, we candida sufferers are very sensitive to any dairy but butter. I never would have believed this a year and a half ago, but once I gave up dairy (other than butter), it was easy for me to see why I had to do it.
For financial reasons, I’ve been eating dairy recently (including heavy cream which is quite low in carbs), and I’m definitely having some yeast issues that I never had without the dairy (SEVERE epigastric pain, sinus/ear problems, vaginal yeast, yeast on my skin…)

While yogurt does contain beneficial bacteria, you don’t get nearly enough to outweigh the issues that the dairy itself can cause for candida sufferers. Taking a good quality probiotic is a much better choice in my opinion as you’re curing candida.

Having PCOS (polycystic ovaries) myself (which is associated to insulin resistance), I find it is absolutely AMAZING how quickly these things resolve themselves as we start to treat candida. The same thing can be said for endometriosis. As you heal your body and deal with the candida, your body is more able to use (and appropriately react to) all your hormones including reproductive hormones, insulin, thyroid, adrenal, and pituitary hormones.

A: Sounds like “no starch” isn’t quite enough for you because your immune system needs some SERIOUS support. This means that you’ve got to provide it an abundance of the vital nutrients it needs to heal. The great news is that you’ve found us, and we can help with that.

I have arthritis in my lower spine and pelvis, so I understand your struggle. Fortunately for me, when I eat cleanly and take my supplements, when I get good rest, and when I move my body, I hardly notice the arthritis. (I’m only 30! I’m not supposed to have arthritis yet! *grin*)

Q: A few months ago I had a cortisone injection in my sacrum, which caused a major candida overgrowth within 30 hours, with many symptoms  ncluding Inflamed colon – painful bowel movement followed by constipation. Vaginal burning. Inflamation of the joints - foot joint pain, leg muscle pain and cramping. Cold feet. Fatigue. It was after this happened that I heard of candida and starting tyring to cure the fungas.

A: When I first tried to get treatment for my back pain (I didn’t know it was arthritis at the time), I went to see an orthopedic guy. (I’d been seeing a chiropractor for a long while, and he’d been helping, but it just wasn’t enough.) Anyway, he diagnosed the arthritis and put me on a prescription NSAID. The med worked at first, but pretty soon the pain was awful again, so I went back. He offered either PT or cortisone injections in my spine,
and fortunately I knew enough to know there was NO WAY I was letting someone inject me with steroids! I know how it is to be desperate, but the
problem with cortisone is that it suppresses the immune system. (That’s how it works. If it can suppress the immune system, then the auto-immune
issue will supposedly get better. Well, as we all realize now, suppressing the immune system just makes EVERYTHING worse!)

Q: I have been following the candida diet and taking the supplements and doing all the other treatments recommended and am doing great. Except when I go off and decide to introduce coffee, alcohol, dairy or fruit back into my diet. My symptoms return, then I get strick again. Its a horrible cycle. I’m getting tired of it. I just want to get better. I think a support group is going to help address those issue……the reality of daily life. I know what I need to do to heal, I just don’t always have the will to do it. I look forward to the sharing of everyone’s experiences. It’s very hard to do this alone.

A: I think we all struggle with this at one point or another. I know I get a little down sometimes thinking, “Poor me. It’s just not fair that I can’t eat whatever I want and still be healthy.” The fact is though, I’d rather restrict my diet than continue to feel SO bad. When you put it in that kind of perspective, it makes things a LITTLE easier.

I find that when I’m most tempted to eat off plan, it’s either an emotional need (like seeing my son’s birthday cake this weekend that was just SCREAMING to me), or I’ve unintentionally introduced something to which I’m reacting. For instance, last year I was having a lot of cravings and I wasn’t losing weight. (I’m obese, and my goal is to cure my candida and get to a healthy weight.) Anyway, I’d switched brands of magnesium citrate, and it turned out that the new brand had rice powder in it. You wouldn’t think rice powder would make that much of a difference, but my problems went away and the weight started to come off again after I eliminated that brand of Mg citrate.

Sometimes we have to be SO careful!

When I got pregnant it was impossible to ignore the symptoms of systemic yeast, but I hadn’t put all the pieces of the puzzle together to deal with it. I didn’t eat well during that pregnancy, and I was VERY unhealthy. I weighed over 270 by the time I delivered her, and I was ridden with candida.

I did some research, and I discovered that I needed to follow the anti-yeast version of Atkins, but because of addiction, I just couldn’t give up the foods that were keeping me sick. I took Nystatin for a while, but the die-off symptoms were too severe, so I just came to accept that I had a yeast problem but wasn’t really in a place mentally to do anything about it. (I was in denial, BIG time!)

Early last year, I finally came to terms with the fact that I was going to have to buckle down if I really wanted to feel better. In March, I started following a very strict anti-yeast diet (meat, oil, veggies, eggs), I discovered the wonders of coconut oil, and I started a supplement regimen that worked well for me. I started feeling better, and I lost about 25lbs (down to 213 in July), but I feel victim to my addiction again, and it took me quite a while to get back on track.

When I became pregnant again in January though, I KNEW my health depended on getting healthy. Due to some circumstances that are out of my control at the moment, I’m not eating as strictly as I need to be, so I’m having some candida issues, but I’m so much healthier than I’ve been through any of my other pregnancies (including the last one where I did follow a low-carb plan but ate whole grain and fruit).

I’ve got a lot of experience with what DOESN’T work, and I’d love to share that knowledge with others so that they don’t have to learn the hard way
like I did. I’m quite certain that I’ve stumbled on what DOES work though. I’m loving the journey to health (even when it’s hard sometimes), and I’d love some company along the way.