Candida, Fungus, and Flora Imbalances

In this, the first of many blogs, we shall discuss yeast overgrowth and infections. It is exceedingly rare that yeast is the cause of disease. For that, your immune system must be very low, like clinically low as after chemotherapy or with late-stage AIDS. More commonly it is a mild irritant. I work with people all the time with so-called systemic candida. They are very sick and have multiple system failures at a subclinical level (meaning it is not a diagnosible disease, usually, but is ruining their life nonetheless). Of maybe 300 of these cases in the last 4-5 years, only two actually had a serious candida overgrowth even present! The rest of them had some candida present, but it was not significant.

To correctly understand infection, we need to understand that the germ is nothing, the behavior and response of the body is everything. To those who know about Louis Pasteur's last words on the subject, this may sound familiar, but it is something very much discovered on my own as it has been rediscovered by natural healers in every age. The behavoir of the body is determined by the internal conditions like chemistry, unusable particles from digestion, weakness of cells and tissues in an area, lymphatic congestion, nerve supply, general tone and hydration levels (which can be excess or deficient) and perhaps other factors of balance, nourishment and elimination.

In one course I took from NAIMH (the North American Institute of Medical Herbalism), Dr. Bergner shared information on an Iranian study where individuals with dysentery were given high doses of golden seal. In this study, intestinal flora counts were done before and after to see the effect of the treatment on healthy bacteria. The individuals all got better from the dysentery and the bacteria counts were completely unaffected, including the pathogenic bacteria that caused the dysentery! For those steeped in Western medicine, this may seem totally inconceivable, but to natural healers, this is just stating the obvious. The germ is nothing, the terrain and the subsequent response of the body is everything.

In the case of systemic meltdown attributed to candida, however, even the identification of candida as a trigger is an error. Actually, candida shows up at the end, not the beginning of the illness.

So, I want to distinguish between that discussion about systemic meltdown, which is discussed elsewhere in the courses for sale on this site and also elsewhere in my radio shows and articles all over the internet, and the current discussion which is about actually killing candida and other yeasts and fungal infections.

When this overgrowth occurs in adults in the intestine, an itchy sensation will follow and often spreads to the hair follicles throughout the body since the overgrowth gets into the lymphatic system. Such an infection is simple to kill and is usually quite easy to kill. The remedy we use for thrush and for all intestinal overgrowths of yeast or fungus is white Oak Bark. My preference is to stir the powder into water, but a decoction is also very good if you happen to have cut (pieces) root. I know of nothing so powerful. To clear the lymphatic system, a combination of black walnut leaves or hulls, pau d'arco and bayberry works very nicely. Pau d'arco is a carrier and a blood alterative in this situation and, in my estimation, is grossly overestimated as a candida killer. It is, however, a splendid blood alterative, changing the disease function of the blood into a state of healing or health. Alone, alteratives rarely heal significant disease, but they do put the body into a state of healing so that other wise choices are effective.

There are many popular articles talking about candida remedies and I have looked at and experimented with most of them. I will be honest, I find most of them so overstated that they are virtually useless or so slow that I would never consider exchanging oak bark for any of them.

For children with thrush, we usually like to give the oak bark powder in a little juice, which actually serves to carry the oak bark to the candida like a Trojan horse and is easier to take. For adults, water is fine. The use of the decoction may require more frequent use since it gets used and then is gone. In that case, I would use 2 ounces 1-10 times per day for 1-14 days. Generally, all fungal infections in the intestines and lymph are destroyed in 3 days. Usually in one day. If, however, it takes longer than 2 weeks, fungus and yeast are not the problem and you have misdiagnosed the situation.

In cases of vaginal or topical yeast, just a douche or application of the decoction of oak bark will do. However, in many cases in my practice I have found that vaginal flora imbalances where a bacteria, not a yeast is the problem, are increasingly common. In these cases, we use a tea made of granulated garlic (only the granulated seems to work) and use that as a douche. Additionally, we stay off all the refined foods that any person wanting to be healthy would avoid: dairy, bread, refined sweeteners (white ones of ANY type), processed and packaged food and all processed meats. Stubborn cases may need additional help to drain the lymphatic system of the lower abdomen to cure vaginal flora imbalances forever.

Finally, it is important to know that if a person has something like invasive aspergillosis, which is a fungal infection of the lungs or other tissues that destroys them, further help is needed to restore the immune system, heal the damaged tissue and kill the infection, which can build a wall around itself to protect itself from normal immune response. Only very toxic tissues give way to this infection, but if it occurs it can be difficult to repair and needs extra help.