If you have common symptoms such as bloating, wind, loose stools or diarrhea, urinary tract infections, vaginitis, dandruff, jock itch, fungal nails, a white coating on your tongue, allergies, fatigue, brain fog, headaches and other symptoms, you might just have a Candida overgrowth in your digestive tract.
In fact, the majority of stool tests we run with clients detect some degree of Candida overgrowth and we’ve worked with hundreds of people who were struggling to get rid of stubborn Candida problems.
The reason most people have a hard time getting rid of Candida and other fungal overgrowth situations is that they don’t fully understand why the overgrowth developed in the first place and they go about “treating” it the wrong way.
Why Candida overgrows
Candida along with other yeast and fungal organisms such as Geotrichum are considered by most experts to be part of your normal gut flora, or “microbiome.”
The microbiome consists of some 1,200+ species of microorganisms that, under normal circumstances, live in harmony and provide numerous beneficial effects.
Problems occur when the balance is tipped in the favour of certain types of organisms, which become dominant and overgrow.
The following underlying or ‘trigger” issues can lead to fungal overgrowth:
- The use of antibiotics.
- Eating a poor quality diet.
- Underlying toxicity (especially mercury).
- Primary gut infections (parasites and bacteria).
- Low stomach acid and other digestive secretions.
- Stress.
- Poor nutrient status.
- A weak immune system.
Let’s briefly look at these triggers individually.
Antibiotics
Antibiotics are over-used and one of the problems of this over-use can be Candida overgrowth. Antibiotics kill off friendly bacteria as well as bad bugs. The depletion of good bugs enables Candida and other fungi to overgrow.
Poor Quality Diet
A poor quality diet can lead to Candida overgrowth on many levels. Overconsumption of processed grains (white flour), soft drinks and alcohol are primary factors because Candida loves sugar.
Underlying Mercury Toxicity
Candida overgrowth is often found in people who have an underlying issue with mercury toxicity. It just so happens that Candida is able to transform harmful forms of mercury into less harmful ones. Thus, your body allows it to overgrow!
Primary Gut Infections
It’s very common to see Candida showing up alongside other bad bugs, including H. pylori, worms and protozoan parasites. The immune system can only fight so many bad bugs, so when a primary bad bugs takes hold, Candida overgrowth often follows as the immune system struggles to maintain control.
Low Stomach Acid and Other Digestive Secretions
A healthy gut environment requires tightly controlled amounts of stomach acid, pancreatic enzymes and other secretions such as bile. For these secretions to be properly made and squirted into your digestive tract, you need healthy cells and optimal nutritional status. Bad foods, stress, bad bugs, antibiotics, alcohol, etc. can damage cells and result in nutrient deficiencies. When digestive secretions drop too low, the environment becomes suitable for bad bugs to overgrow.
Stress
Any form of stress, whether it’s emotional, physical, inflammation can suppress your digestive secretions and, importantly, your immune function. When your immune function drops, opportunistic bugs such as Candida, parasites and bacteria can overgrow.
Poor Nutrient Status
You need optimal nutrient status to keep your immune system healthy, produce energy and provide raw materials for things like stomach acid, enzymes and bile. Poor nutrient status opens you up to infection and the unwanted overgrowth of bad bugs.
A Weak Immune System
Your immune system can be affected by any or all the above factors. If your immune system isn’t working properly, you will most likely develop chronic, insidious, unwanted bad bug infestations.
The Hompes Method Vitality Scale
It’s easy to explain these concepts using the Vitality Scale. Poor food, inappropriate lifestyle choices and excess stress lead to a situation in which you have too much bad stuff and not enough good stuff in your body.
As a result, you begin a gradual descent down the vitality scale. When your vitality and immune function reach a 7 or 6, you begin opening yourself up to the acquisition of bad bugs.
They don’t appear or overgrow for no reason, or because you’re unlucky. They appear because your body’s vitality isn’t high enough to keep them away.
Once these bad bugs are in and have made your gut their stronghold, they begin to create symptoms in the Seven Areas of Health. These symptoms escalate as more toxins and fewer nutrients are able to enter your body due to a damaged gut.
You continue to slowly (or quickly in some cases) descend the Vitality Scale.
The concept of your personal Vitality Scale is emphasized by the medical system. It is well known that Candida kills patients with advanced cancers and immune disorders such as AIDS – it’s the infection that finally finishes these people off.
Well, these poor folk are already down at a 2 or 3. You do not go from, say, a number 8 on the vitality scale to a number 2 overnight. It takes time.
In order to reach a number 2, you have to move down through 7, 6, 5, 4 and 3. So ask yourself this question: at what number do bad bugs like Candida become a problem?
In my experience, it’s somewhere around 6 or 5, which is the point on the vitality scale people have reached when they contact us.
Eliminating Candida
Trying to treat Candida and other bad bugs is okay, and you do need to get them under control, but long term symptom relief is not likely if the main reasons why the bugs got in there in the first place are not addressed.
This is why some people spend years on anti-Candida diets, herbal supplements and other half-baked approaches without success.
Anti-Candida diets can be counterproductive because they restrict carbohydrates too much, which leaves people feeling tired and moody because carbohydrates and sugar are essential for the body to function properly.
In reducing carbs too much, people starve Candida AND themselves in the process, which reduces vitality levels even more!
One client found his oral Candida magically disappeared – along with half a dozen symptoms including IBS and tinnitus – when his dentist removed four mercury amalgam fillings.
There’s no way he was ever going to clear his Candida overgrowth without having those dental fillings replaced*
The best long-term strategy for Candida elimination is to simply follow the main Hompes Method Basics principles of:
- Removing bad foods, bad bugs and bad toxins.
- Replacing good foods, good bugs and good nutrients.
Every person’s journey will be different. Nutritional requirements will differ, bad bug and bad toxins levels will differ and stress levels will differ.
The first step is always to complete our online health assessment and run an initial consultation with a Hompes Method practitioner.
From there, we can guide you to run the appropriate laboratory tests from the Testing Toolkit and then hold your hand through a series of protocols to help you remove the bad foods, bad bugs and bad toxins, whilst rejuvenating your vitality.
If you’ve been struggling on with a fungal overgrowth and have exhausted your options, we’d be delighted to be of service.
Please click here book a consultation and begin your journey towards a Candida-free body.
* We do not recommend you have your dental fillings removed without following a proper protocol. There is a chance that the procedure can make you MORE toxic if it’s not performed correctly. Contact us if you need help finding a dentist trained in safe mercury removal.