Candida Yeast Infection Causes and Symptoms - By: fedupbloating

What is candida?

Candida Overgrowth was practically unheard of before World War ll. With the introduction of antibiotics accompanied by poor lifestyle and diet, candida overgrowth has grown to epidemic proportions in today’s society.

Candida, Latin for “clear and white, like pure quartz” is a collection of more than 20 species of yeasts that results in many common bacterial infections. The most commonly known Candida group is known as Candida Albicans: these fungi live on the surface of our bodies and under certain conditions can become so numerous that they cause infection in warm moist areas of the body such as the genitalia (thrush), mouth, skin, armpits, nails, and ears. The yeast infection also has the ability to enter the bloodstream and spread throughout the whole body (Systemic candidiasis) which can be life threatening.

How we keep healthy
Our gut flora is made up from over 1200 species of bacteria, yeast and other organisms numbering 100 trillion in total inhabiting the human gastrointestinal tract. Many of these organisms help to protect us from disease and contribute to our health by producing short chain fatty acids which helps to supply human energy requirements, produce a number of valuable nutrients such as B vitamins and vitamin K and helping to enhancing immune function. Often called ‘friendly bacteria’ they include names beginning with Lactobacillus or Bifidobacteria, which denotes the genus (group) they belong to. Food manufactures often add these good guys to foods like yoghurts.

Besides friendly bacteria the human gastrointestinal tracts contains organisms that only benefit us when their numbers are kept low by competing friendly bacteria. These micro organisms include coliform bacteria (E.coli etc), yeasts/fungus and bacteroides. Candida yeast is one of the most common residents of the human mucous membranes such as the gut, urinary tract and vagina.

Candida causes
Candida is a “dimorphic” organism, which means that it can exist either as a round yeast cell or as a fungus (mycelial form) with spindly outgrowths called hyphae that can penetrate the body tissue of the host. In healthy individuals Candida remains in the yeast form as it is kept in check by friendly bacteria and a healthy immune response. If the friendly bacteria are disrupted Candida can increase its numbers drastically, change into a fungus form and the Candida causes health problems.

The balance of organisms in the intestines can be disrupted by different factors. Probably the most important factor is the use of antibiotics. Antibiotic comes from the word antibiosis which means against life, a process by which life could be used to destroy life. They don’t discriminate between friendly and pathogenic bacteria so every time you take them for infection you wipe out large numbers of friendly bacteria in your intestines that are protecting you from other potentially harmful intestinal residents.

Unfortunately twenty-first century living is causing many problems to the human immune system. These are some of the other factors that cause a Candida overgrowth.
• Over use of stimulants like alcohol, unhealthy beverages, drugs and smoking.
• Illness, surgery, diabetes, pregnancy, frequent medication.
• Malnutrition caused by a lack of vitamins and minerals, due to a diet full of junk food with high sugar, saturated fats and high refined bad carbohydrates.
• Stress, breathing wrong, lack of exercise and fresh air, a polluted environment.

How candida poisons the body
Candida yeast produces alcohol (ethanol) and acetaldehyde (chemical responsible for hangover symptoms) as the major products of its metabolism. A healthy body detoxification system can eliminate this problem, however an overgrowth of intestinal Candida, means the levels of alcohol entering the bloodstream are greatly increased. If your body is constantly absorbing a high level of alcohol for years this will affect health as nutrients and valuable liver enzymes will become depleted resulting in oxidative stress, due to being constantly overworked trying to detoxify the yeast products.

Direct damage to multiple body systems can also be caused by the yeast products. Effectively the whole body is poisoned by a Candida overgrowth, resulting in an array of Candida symptoms affecting the whole body.

How to get rid of Candida
If you want to get rid of your candida overgrowth you need to address all the causes of you candida overgrowth. The first thing you need to do is to follow a candida diet which starves the candida but gives your body optimum nutrition. In addition to following a candida diet you need to boost the efficiency of your immune system by avoiding toxins and taking supplements. After you have followed the candida diet for a while and die-off symptoms have gone, introduce antifungal to your candida diet to kill the candida. The final step of how to get rid of candida is to introduce beneficial bacteria, in the form of Probiotics In addition to the diet plan you need to address the many other causes of your candida overgrowth.

Candida symptoms
There are many different symptoms of a candida overgrowth. This is because when the candida breaks through the gut and bowel walls it goes off round the body setting up colonies and infecting organs and muscle tissue. This often results in a wide range of unpleasant candida symptoms affecting different parts of the body in different severity for different people. Hence this makes it almost impossible for most doctors to diagnose. Candida symptoms include allergies, IBS, asthma, migraines, depression, arthritis, PMT and many other illnesses and chronic conditions.. It is still uncertain whether Candidiasis exists in the body as the result, or the cause of some immunologic diseases.

About the Author

I have suffered from a candida overgrowth for most of my life which has resulted in lots of health problems, illnesses and food intolerances. After 3 spine fusions, registered disabled, dependant on others and in constant agony I discovered the existence of candida. Find out more http://fedupbloating.com/candida-causes-and-candida-symptoms. Source of this article is http://fedupbloating/candida

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