Hello, candida, adrenal/thyroid and possible crohn's

[steve-H]

I dont really know where to start to but i will say that i have been ill since about 18 and i am now 25 so about 7 years. My first symptoms were gas/bloating tiredness and then not long after came adrenal/thyroid symptoms. I'm pretty fed up with being ill.

I have been to see a gastro doc i think 6 years ago and then 4 years ago, colonscopy and endoscopy both came back normal apart from inflamation of the stomach and bacteria in the large bowel. I was told i have IBS and passed off to a nutrtionist. I then battled thyroid/adrenal problems for the next 4 years hoping that if i could get my under active thyroid sorted and get the correct amount of T3 into the cells it would help with my stomach. Well my health problems have gotten so bad i have had to quit my job and i am now going to see another gastro doc in a months time who is going to do a capsule endoscopy.

I am unsure if i have Crohn's but i have candida and i am pretty sure atleast inflamation of the bowels. I very rarely get D only if i dare to touch alcohol (which i have not in the last 6 months and before that it was about 1 every 6 months) My stools are usually too hard and have some undigested food and the gas/bloating is insane at the minute and i am on a restricted diet due to candida.

Now i self-treated with hydrcortisone due to an adrenal saliva test and it was one of the best feelings my mood totally changed for the better and my well being improved when i first started taking hydrocortisone. I have been unable to wean in the last 3 years and i have always needed quite a higher dose than the average person 40mg+

I wonder if i am battling adrenals fatigue aswell as crohns which is why i have not bee able to wean or reduce my dose. I feel i need to get off the steroids to have any chance of curing my candida, but if i have inflamation of the bowel would this be impossible?

Thanks for reading
Steve

 

[David]

Hi Steve and welcome!

I don't have any answers to your questions and musings but wanted to welcome you.

Out of curiosity, with the adrenal/thyroid stuff, did you ever get your vitamin D levels tested?

Best of luck with the capsule endoscopy and please let us know what they find.

All my best to you.

 

[Gianni]

Hi Steve! Welcome to the Forum

Sorry to hear the tough road you have had.

I am also interested about the Vitamin D levels.

Also you mentioned you are on a restricted diet to candida, could you please share the extent of your diet?

Also are you still seeing a nutritionist and a G.i. doctor?

 

[steve-H]

Hi guys thanks for the welcoming.

I did have my Vit D tested about 1-2 years ago it came back within range, i dont have the actual result to hand. I have tried supplementing with vit D but never felt any benefit from it.

My diet is just that of plain meats,eggs,potatoe,salad, as other foods just make my symptoms even worse! I am to see a new Gi doc on 12th of Nov so fingers crossed!

Steve

 

[Gianni]

Hello again Steve,

I would suggest getting a vitamin panel done and making sure you are still within range on your vitamin D as well as the other essential vitamins. Supplementing for Vitamin D won't get you any results worth while. The only true way to get good healthy vitamin D is through sunlight so by just being outdoors for 15 minutes a day you are getting all the vitamin D you need. If you do this, you should notice a great improvement in overall mood and it should help your adrenal and thyroid problem.

As for Candida, I too had Candida when i was first diagnosed and also was on steroids. I started to treat my candida while on steroids through diet, and i did feel a difference so i believe you can start to treat yourself. As for your current diet, it seems to me like these are just foods that aren't going to aggravate the candida, not actually combat the candida. The Fatigue and im guessing anxiety that you are feeling are most likely directly related to the candida overgrowth you are expierencing. You mentioned that you have a lot of gas and aren't completely digesting your foods. The candida is pushing out the beneficial floral in your gut that help assimilate and digest proteins and nutrients. Without these it is possible to feel that you aren't correctly digesting your food. If you want i can share with you the diet i used to help correct my candida problem. It is a long process to correct Candida overgrowth and they tend to be very stubborn but it is very worth the effort as once you correct your gut, everything else falls into place.

 

[steve-H]

Hello again Steve,

I would suggest getting a vitamin panel done and making sure you are still within range on your vitamin D as well as the other essential vitamins. Supplementing for Vitamin D won't get you any results worth while. The only true way to get good healthy vitamin D is through sunlight so by just being outdoors for 15 minutes a day you are getting all the vitamin D you need. If you do this, you should notice a great improvement in overall mood and it should help your adrenal and thyroid problem.

As for Candida, I too had Candida when i was first diagnosed and also was on steroids. I started to treat my candida while on steroids through diet, and i did feel a difference so i believe you can start to treat yourself. As for your current diet, it seems to me like these are just foods that aren't going to aggravate the candida, not actually combat the candida. The Fatigue and im guessing anxiety that you are feeling are most likely directly related to the candida overgrowth you are expierencing. You mentioned that you have a lot of gas and aren't completely digesting your foods. The candida is pushing out the beneficial floral in your gut that help assimilate and digest proteins and nutrients. Without these it is possible to feel that you aren't correctly digesting your food. If you want i can share with you the diet i used to help correct my candida problem. It is a long process to correct Candida overgrowth and they tend to be very stubborn but it is very worth the effort as once you correct your gut, everything else falls into place.

Please elebaorate and i am very happy for your advice regarding the candida.

If you have some time would you be interested in sharing your story or point me in the right direction to have a read if you have posted it on this forum. Are you saying you had candida, were on steroids (was this for adrenals or other reason?) and then you got diagnosed with crohns, how are you these days?

Thanks
Steve

 

[Gianni]

Please elebaorate and i am very happy for your advice regarding the candida.

If you have some time would you be interested in sharing your story or point me in the right direction to have a read if you have posted it on this forum. Are you saying you had candida, were on steroids (was this for adrenals or other reason?) and then you got diagnosed with crohns, how are you these days?

Thanks
Steve

Hey Steve, sorry for the delayed response.

First I'll adress my story. I don't have a "my story" thread on this forum but i probably should, i will make one in the near future. But a quick summary of my story: I was diagnosed with severe crohns disease in the summer of 2010 and spent 28 days in the hospital including 5 days in I.C.U. I was released after getting things under control through remicade, antibiotics, painkillers, and an abscess draining procedure. After i returned home i was told i had a rather large candida problem due to the antibiotics and was told not to worry. I continued to feel horrible as they didn't advise me to stop the antibiotics. I started getting sick frequently and was pretty much fed up with the doctors. So i discontinued all my medication on my own without the doctors being aware(except my prednisone because you have to taper off and to not taper off would have been extremely dangerous) ( i realize that was a risky idea now but it paid off... maybe it was luck)(And in no way am i suggesting you do the same thing... in retrospect i probably wouldn't have been so headstrong) and adopted a raw vegan diet after doing lots and lots of research into nutrition and the research of Dr. Max Gerson. My first business was removing the Candida because candida can be extremely dangerous as is DRASTICALLY effects your immune system and makes your body susceptible to illness. So yes I attempted to rid my Candida while on the steroid Prednisone, the doctors gave me prednisone to help deal with the inflammation and infections in my body.

My Candida diet: You can look up various Candida cure diets online but this is what i did... I avoided all processed and refine sugars and when i say avoided i mean looked at the back of every label of every parcel of food i ate and if it said sugar i didn't dare eat it. I also stayed away from yeast in breads and the like, and seeing as many many breads contain yeast I nearly avoided breads all together. I incorporated a HEAVY dose of vegetables into my diet because vegetables create an alkaline state in your body and help change the environment that the Candida got used to and replaces it with an environment gut flora will thrive in. To get the optimal amount of vegetables into my diet, i didn't only eat a raw vegan diet but i also juiced a substantial amount. If you aren't familiar with juicing i highly suggest you look it up, I will be making a juicing thread soon. By juicing you can throw in so many vegetables into the juicers and it liquifies it and it super concentrates the amount of vegetables you can consume in a day.

I regulated the amount of fruits i ate as they do contain sugars. They are natural sugars but its really important to not indulge in fruits because too much of any kind of sugar is not ideal for our guts.

Also i would suggest never taking antibiotics. Of course I am not a doctor but what i've researched about antibiotics is just frightening. If you do take antibiotics think of it as a reset button because as soon as you take them all the progress you've made in trying to eliminate the Candida is wasted and you are back to square 1. Of course for life threatening situations antibiotics should be used like an abscess bursting or something along the lines of that. But in most cases your body doesn't need antibiotics to fight off an infection... if you give your body something to work with like healthy nutrition in the form of vitamins, fiber, minerals then your body can fight for itself without medical intervention.

These days I'm great. The severe inflammation and ulcers that were evident in my first scope have all disappeared as i got another scope a few months back and there showed "no evidence of the disease" But of course my doctor didn't want to hear what i was doing... He just said "Don't tell me, just keep doing it". But ya i couldn't be more happy with the diet i have chosen and the results i have seen from it.

I hope this has helped

All the best

Gianni


PS. (edited in): A good way to test your Candida levels everyday is: Right when you wake up BEFORE you drink or eat anything, grab a glass of water and collect saliva in your mouth. Spit the saliva into the top of the glass and watch the saliva for a few minutes. Watch as ,most likely, the saliva sinks to the bottom of the glass. The more of the saliva that sinks, the more Candida you have. During your mission to rid the candida, regularly test your levels and eventually if you do things right one morning your saliva will float at the top and stay afloat which shows minimal yeast/candida ! This(click that) thread will help explain the test more thoroughly.