So the message that needs to be heard is that symptoms need to be understood so that we can learn what causes them, not what can mask them. And we need to deal with the many things we do which can aggravate and strain the defence systems of the body to allow a chance for healing and recovery.
Where infection is concerned, the ideal outcome is that the bacteria, virus or yeast is contained and overwhelmed by the homoeostatic defences of the body. Unfortunately, when your homoeostatic mechanisms have to deal with too many demands at the same time, they may not always be able to achieve that outcome. Take, for example, someone who:
1 is not getting enough essential vitamins and/or minerals in the diet, and/or
2 is eating a poor diet loaded with refined carbohydrates and sugars, and/or
3 is not getting adequate exercise, and/or
4 has picked up a viral or yeast infection which never seems to quite go away, and/or
5 is not sleeping well, or getting enough exercise, and/or
6 is under work and/or emotional stress, and/or
7 has a slight hormonal imbalance, and/or
8 has a history of antibiotic use, and/or
9 is taking the contraceptive pill.
Each of these ‘problems’ (stresses), and others, may be relatively minor and could probably be eliminated by eating more sensibly, exercising more, ensuring a better exercise and sleep pattern, doing something positive about the emotional stress, or getting advice and treatment for the hormonal, viral and yeast problems. But, if nothing is done and these various adaptive demands (and others) continue, the body’s defence and repair systems eventually become so overloaded that chronic symptoms start to appear.
And, of course, whatever emotional stress, nutritional deficiencies and acquired toxicities, and biomechanical stresses there may be (poor posture, tense muscles, poor breathing habits) that are added to this ‘load’, all are coped with in the context of the unique genetic characteristics with which each of us is born (see notes on blood types and secretor status in Chapter 1, page).
It seems that some people have inborn abilities to handle some of the ‘stress’ load more efficiently than others so that the symptoms, and their severity, that emerge from similar stress burdens will not be the same from one person to another.
What’s the solution?
One of two things needs to be done:
1 There is a need to stop and reverse the factors which are causing the adaptive demands that are overloading the body’s ability to cope;
2 There is also a need to provide help to the repair and support systems of the body to allow them to more efficiently handle the load they are coping with.
These changes need to take account of the person’s unique characteristics and personal history (including their medical history). If the right changes are made, the homoeostatic defence systems should be able to begin to work more efficiently again to detoxify, fight infection, rebuild and repair, and symptoms should gradually ease. Some of the actions needed to help in recovery from a Candida overgrowth might involve:
1 ensuring optimal nutrition (removing tasty toxins and increasing nutritionally whole foods), and/or
2 a need to learn to handle stress differently, and/or
3 taking specific action to deactivate yeasts or other organisms, and/or
4 rebalancing hormonal status and the chemistry of the body (such as vitamins, minerals, trace elements, amino acids), and/or
5 detoxification of the system, particularly the liver, and/or
6 helping to heal the lining of the intestines, which may have been damaged by overgrowth of yeast, and/or
7 whatever else that may be needed to help reduce the adaptive demands that are overloading the homoeostatic systems.
About Candida
Candida albicans is a member of the yeast family. Strictly speaking, it is a member of a subgroup of the family of organisms known as fungi (or moulds). Yeasts live virtually everywhere on the planet and can derive their nutrients from most organic sources. This means anything that is alive, or has been alive, can support yeasts – whether animal or plant. Rather than having roots like other plants, yeasts can derive their nutrients via the enzymes they produce. Given the right conditions for growth and replication, yeast is capable of almost explosive growth, as anyone who has made bread will know.
Roger Williams, Nobel prize-winning scientist, stated that if a single yeast cell is given a highly favourable environment, with a good assortment of nutrients and the correct temperature, it can, within 24 hours, produce a colony of over 100 yeast cells.2 At that rate of reproduction, Williams calculated, within one week, one cell could turn into a yeast colony weighing one billion tons.
The fact that this has not happened, and is not likely to happen, is solely because the environment is seldom ideal for any creature on earth, least of all for yeast. It does, however, highlight a very pertinent point in our understanding of the Candida problem: Candida is a yeast which lives inside of you and me and, as far as is known, every other adult on earth and most children as well. It seldom takes over our entire body but, when it does, the consequences are horrific. It can only achieve such a state if the environment for it is excellent and if the defence mechanisms that the body has to control its spread are weakened or absent. This can happen, for example, in advanced immune-deficiency situations, such as in AIDS.
As Williams pointed out, in Nature, yeast cells are almost always hampered by imperfect or inadequate environmental conditions. Were it not so, they would have engulfed the earth long ago. The same fact controls the colonies of Candida (and other yeasts) that live in and on you and me.
UNINVITED RESIDENTS OF THE BODY
Candida is usually a resident of the digestive system, largely in the lower end of the intestines. It also tends to occupy sites in the vaginal regions and on the skin, without causing any symptoms when general health and immune function are good.
Research has shown that most people have antibodies to Candida. The presence of these antibodies indicates that the individual’s immune system has, at some time, been challenged to respond to the presence of the yeast. Dr Truss states that, by the age of six months at the latest, Candida is living in, or on, at least 90 per cent of people, as evidenced by a positive skin-test reaction when extracts of Candida are injected just under the skin.3 This reaction shows that there has been a previous presence of the yeast to which the body has developed defensive antibodies.
The fact that yeast lives in all of us, and yet many people sail through life with no apparent ill effects, indicates that we have learned to cope with our uninvited yeast passengers. Unlike certain other minute creatures that live in our digestive tract and which serve a useful purpose, such as Lactobacillus acidophilus (which helps in the breakdown of food and in the synthesis of some of the B vitamins), there is no symbiotic (mutually beneficial) relationship with Candida. There is no trade-off whereby a ‘room’ is given in exchange for some useful function. So Candida is a pure and simple parasite – a freeloader. This is perhaps inevitable, given the multitude of opportunistic microscopic creatures in both the animal and vegetable kingdom. Most, if not all, plants and animals enjoy similar relationships with bacteria and fungi. Some of these relationships are symbiotic and good for both parties, while others are distinctly one-sided.
So Candida, for all the musical sound of its name, is an unwelcome squatter in your body and represents a potential danger. Once we know what sort of situation removes or reduces the ability of your body’s defence systems to control it naturally, and what gives Candida the chance to proliferate, we will begin to understand what needs to be done to contain it when it gets out of hand and starts producing health problems.
It may be that we cannot actually stop yeast from taking