Candida Cleanse
Side Note: Due to an insane amount of questions in my inbox regarding my cleanse - I am giving you guys an exclusive behind the scenes into the content The CitySteaders (or Insider’s Group) gets mixed into our monthly deep dives.
A few months back, I challenged myself to a Candida Cleanse. Candida is yeast, a type of fungus, that that is typically found in small amounts on your mouth, skin and in your intestines and it’s surprisingly more common than you would think. I believe a lot of that has to do with the frequency of antibiotic use (which to no surprise, destroys your gut microbiome.) If you’re unsure if you may have an over growth or not - here are some potential symptoms:
Bad breath
Bloating, belching, intestinal gas, and/or abdominal pain
Constipation or diarrhea
Endometriosis or infertility
Fatigue and chronic fatigue
Frequent mood swings
Impotence
Insomnia
Loss of sexual desire or feeling
Muscle aches, weakness, or paralysis
Pain and/or swelling in joints
Poor memory, foggy thinking, or feeling "spacey"
Prostatitis
Troublesome vaginal itching, burning, or discharge
Now, can you have those symptoms and it be related to something else? Absolutely - but for many people, there are mysterious things going on with their health and enough people aren’t talking about how parasites can amplify illness if not in balance with your gut microbiome. I am pretty regular at doing coffee enemas, and I’ve found that it’s easy to notice candida in you poop post enema once you flush it out of your intestines because it typically floats to the top covering the surface area of a section of the toilet and is almost frothy or foamy in appearance.
I decided to cleanse because I had a layer of white film on my tongue (which can mean many different things, one of them being candida overgrowth) and I also noticed a higher volume of candida post enema.
Let’s dive into what the cleanse actually looked like - I will preface this with saying that this isn’t a “diet” that I would implement just because.
It’s not easy to stick to when fighting sugar hungry parasites and yeasts in your body. You WILL feel symptoms of die off or the “sugar dragon” as they call it when your body is detoxing sugar likely around days 2-7 depending on how much sugar you’re withdrawling from. As much as we like to think that sugar isn’t that big of a deal, your body literally develops addictions to it that mimic cocaine. Coming off of it will likely result in headaches, grumpiness and heightened irritability. This isn’t shared to scare you out of a cleanse, it’s shared because it’s real - and if you’re going to push through and get to the other side with less inflammation and more energy - you’re going to have to understand what you’re up against and be prepared mentally. A lot of this cleanse is mental - it will push you.
During my Candida cleanse, I cut out all sugars - we aren’t big into eating processed sugar, but we do consume quite a bit of honey, maple syrup and natural fruits. This had to be the hardest part of the entire cleanse. I take that back… still having to prepare and serve these foods to my kids was the hardest part! If you’re a mama and you’re diving into this - just know - your will power will be tested!
Instead of focusing on all the foods you can’t have - it’s important to look at what you CAN have!
So what CAN you have?!
Likely a lot of things you’re eating now. The list is longer than what I’m listing here but these were some of my go-to’s:
Grass Fed Beef
No Sugar Added Bacon
Chicken
Salsa (make sure it’s no added sugar)
Raw Dairy - this literally saved me! Raw milk, yogurt, butter, cheese and even raw ice cream when I used a dash of stevia in desperation 😅
Cucumbers
Peppers
Lettuce & Spinach (other greens too!)
Onions/Garlic
Spices with no added sugar
Coconut
Bone Broth
Steamed Vegetables
Fermented Foods
Apple Cider Vinegar
Coconut Oil
Organic Meat (I get them via supplements - you can snag some here)
Avocado
Olives
Cinnamon
Some approved items that helped curb my sweet tooth on my harder days were: Raw milk, Granny Smith apples, sweet potatoes, raspberries, strawberries and blueberries.
My go to seasonings were adobo, garlic, onion, oregano, parsley, basil, coconut aminos, cinnamon etc.
Really getting creative with flavors helped me feel like I was having new experiences instead of recreated meals I loved and being let down - just being honest here!
When looking for meal inspiration, I found this website really helpful. Yes it was different than what I’m used to eating in the sense that I don’t eat a heavy vegetable load usually, but for a short period of time it really did help decrease my swelling and inflammation, making it easier for me to manage with my more animal based diet post cleanse.
I will note that I’m not a fan of sweetening foods with stevia, although I did get desperate at one point in my cleanse around week two and I used a tiny bit of stevia to sweeten my ice cream instead of the maple syrup that my body loves so much! If you’re wondering why I’m not a fan of stevia, here’s a really great video that breaks down some of it. Feel free to deep dive further on your own and come to your own conclusions!
So what should you avoid?
High Sugar Fruits
Meats with added sugar (bacon etc)
Gluten
Grains
Lunch meats
Fish like tuna and swordfish
Pasteurized Dairy Products
nuts and seeds
Condiments with added sugar (Ketchup, BBQ, Soy sauce)
Refined vegetable/seed oils
Alcohol
Refined
Sweeteners (Honey, Aspartame, Cane sugar, Agave, Maple Syrup)
Yeast
Make sure to look closely while grocery shopping because sugar is added to everything. If you’ve never done a whole30 or similar cleanse diet before, this will be a huge eye opener for you. The brand Primal Kitchen is really great at producing quality no added sugar products to use as condiments and sauces.
Fun Fact: I discovered post cleanse is that dates are surprisingly awesome at being an anti parasitic food - check out that post here: https://www.instagram.com/p/Cq4AqsfuMaG/