It is Mid-April, you would think I would be loving the weather changes and feeling good about my health and all the things to come in my life. Instead I feel drained, frustrated, and completely beat down sometimes. The healthier I have eaten and tried taking care of myself, the more health problems arise. I started this blog with intent to bring you along for the journey, not knowing that this journey has only begun. I thought I would be feeling amazing and sharing all the knowledge with you on how to heal and feel great with me. Truth is this is a process. It is a lifetime of learning about our bodies and trying new things to feel our best. No one has the same journey or experiences, if they do share similar issues then it is a different journey on how they got there and how to heal for them. I simply want to put my story out into the world in hopes to inspire others and give knowledge in helping others to have hope of living their best and healthiest lives.
In that said, today we are talking about Candida. In my last blog I told you about the hives I experienced (and occasionally still have flare ups). I told you about how I was feeling and the frustration with the last few months. Well, it continues. I had a few days where I thought things were looking up, I felt good and I was so motivated with the knowledge of my delayed food allergies that I truly thought everything was perfect and would be normal again. To my dismay, it wasn’t over. Remember when I mentioned the cut in the corner of my mouth and the sores that wouldn’t go away, well those little are still causing me pain and so much frustration. I also found out about the same day that I have a small cavity, first one ever. I did what I do best and researched like crazy, because knowledge is power…it is also sometimes scary AF! Every time I would eat something my mouth would crack open and bleed, I was completely fed up. My Naturopath had told me it was simply a B5 deficiency, however EVERYTHING I researched said a B2 deficiency. My research also told me it was likely called Angular Cheilitis, which was a big scary word for inflammation of the corners of the mouth. This is caused from saliva collecting there and causing microorganisms, like bacteria, but more common a fungus like yeast overgrowth—Candida.
I was fully freaked out. I had never in my life experienced a yeast infection, that I knew of. I have always tried my best to be clean. I have been eating the healthiest I have in my entire life! Why was this happening to me?!? After I chilled out a bit and kept learning all I could about Candida and found that it is way more common than I thought. In fact everyone has Candida, it is actually good and our body needs it, however 65-70% of people have Candida overgrowth and never even know about it! Overgrowth of Candida can cause many different health issues. I found so many good YouTube videos about the topic and highly recommend that anyone that thinks they have it or are just curious about learning a bunch about it to check it out.
I wanted to make sure that this is what I was experiencing, so there is a home test that you can do that is really simple. In the morning, before you brush your teeth or drink anything, spit a dime size amount into a glass of water. While you are getting ready for the day, you will check on the spit to see what is happening (if anything), for about 45 minutes. Basically, if the spit floats you are good(no Candida overgrowth), if the spit sinks there are more of them then there are of you(bad shit probably should seek medical care for this), and if the spit grows legs then you have some overgrowth of Candida—the length matters, if they are short then it isn’t so bad, if longer then you want to get onto a regimen quickly. So, if anything happens to the spit besides floating, you should probably look into getting it taken care of—whatever route you decide. Oh, it says to do this like six days in a row to I guess verify that you have it or whatever, but as soon as I saw it growing little legs I was like okay I have this let’s move on to healing.
You know me by now, I looked into ALL the natural ways to heal this for good. There are several ways that I found that completely contradict each other though, so do your own research and listen to your body! If something doesn’t seem right, try something else.
I found the Candida diet, which talks about eating low carb, high fat, high protein and basically no fruit/sugar. I found the 80-10-10 diet, which talks about eating high carb, low fat, low protein and was all for fruit. I FULLY believe in eating whole plant-based foods and not eliminating my fruit, the sugar found in fruit is naturally occurring and fruits have so many good vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants, why the hell would anyone think they were bad. So 80-10-10 looked and sounded perfect for me. I had already eliminated most processed foods, but now even more so need to keep this junk at bay for a while. I got myself a good B-Complex to make sure I am not deficient in anything, I also take a prenatal, B12, Algae based DHA and EPA. My Naturopath was informed about my findings and she agreed it was likely Candida and told me to take a garlic supplement at a high dose 3x a day for three days, 2x a day for two days, and 1x a day for a week. She also told me to apply one drop of Frankincense essential oil to the roof of my mouth nightly and eat good foods adding garlic and cilantro where I could. Occasionally I will try oil pulling, so hard for me because I gag every time. I am taking a good probiotic and drinking a supergreens drink full of all the good stuff—surprisingly really yummy. And really trying to keep the corners of my mouth as dry as I can.
I haven’t really been able to tell much of a difference yet, it is day 5 of starting the garlic and Frankincense. I think the corner of my mouth might be getting a little better, but then I open my mouth just slightly too wide to eat something and feel it rip again. Like I said so frustrating. I have continued my research to find anything else I can add to help heal this stuff quickly. There is a great Youtuber that shares natural health remedies, pretty sure she said that she is a Holistic Nutritionist as well, her channel is Montreal Healthy Girl. She has taught me a lot about Candida and many other things to heal naturally. I will likely be ordering more things online and also learning to make some fermented foods to start implementing very soon so I can feel my best.
Sharing this journey with you all has been a challenge, mostly because it is hard to admit to having health issues when I have tried so hard to be my healthiest the last few years. I am becoming more knowledgeable as I go though. I am learning about my body. I never knew I had a “journey” to share. I am becoming more aware that I do and that this is my journey that I am living right now. It may not be perfect or glamorous, it may not be anything I dreamed my journey would be, but it is mine. I will continue to share my experiences here on my blog. I hope to empower and inspire my readers to learn about their own body and to listen to what it is telling them and share my thoughts on how to heal naturally. God gave us so many things to naturally heal ourselves, we just need to know our body good enough to do the research and give it what it needs to feel good.
Much Love,
Ashley