Fungal Overgrowth
The beginning
72% of all disease begins with inflammation in your body.
Inflammation is caused by chronic stress, processed foods, sugar, antibiotics, chemotherapy, steroids, birth control...the list goes on. These culprits create an imbalance in our microbiome resulting in an ineffective and unhelpful ratio of certain microbes and bacteria. Candida is a fungus that can grow in our intestines due to this imbalance.
This bacteria, or candida, starts in your lower colon, and has pretty much only two jobs:
1. To help decompose your body when you die
2. To help your body get the very last of the nutrients from your food by breaking it down in your lower colon.
Candida is normally in the colon and exists as single celled sessile (not mobile) organisms. The perfect storm of excess blood sugar, low thyroid, and low hydrochloric acid allows what’s called “pleomorphism”–a change from one life form to another. The Candida cells join together into a mobile form called “hyphae”. This fungal mass can then travel to other parts of the body.
Quickly, Candida, or bacteria, can become out of control, and your colon has a direct path to the liver called the portal vein. This is the route Candida yeast will use to easily invade the liver. Once yeast gets in the liver, they cause inflammation. This inflammation causes the liver to OVERPRODUCE what it normally makes- cholesterol (sound familiar?), triglycerides, CRP, clotting factors, liver enzymes etc.
The liver stores glucose. Candida loves sugar, so the yeast feeds on this sugar-- which in turn ferments and turns to alcohol. The creation of this alcohol damages liver cells and causes the condition Non-Alcoholic Steatohepatitis or fatty liver disease. (If you easily fall asleep after a big meal, then it's because you're basically drunk.) Your body also produces antibodies and cytokines to kill this bad bacteria which can cause tissue damage as well. This condition will eventually become cirrhosis, the scarring of the liver we see in alcoholics.
Candida can travel throughout your entire body and in the case of autoimmune conditions, cytokines are being released in a specific tissue site due to this overgrowth.
Some microbes, often Candida yeast, attempt to hide inside these cells. The immune system tries to attack the bad bacteria but may damage normal cells in the process. The immune system is doing the same thing whether it’s eczema, IBS, asthma, Hashimoto’s, multiple sclerosis, ulcerative colitis, psoriasis, vitiligo or rheumatoid arthritis.
The chronic production of cytokines in arteries causes “heart attacks” and strokes.
It is your genetics that determine where that overgrowth occurs.
Cholesterol & Thyroid
When you know and understand the cause of disease and inflammation in the body, your solutions and treatments can make a lot more sense. If you have high cholesterol, how would taking a drug to lower cholesterol to ANYTHING to REALLY help? Remember, your liver is only overproducing cholesterol because it is overproducing these antibodies to kill bad bacteria. Get your bad bacteria under control and your cholesterol will balance as well.
Also of note, cholesterol is the building block to all of your hormones, and your brain is made up of cholesterol! Your entire body NEEDS it
Same goes with thyroid. It's never JUST about your thyroid! In order to have healthy thyroid function, you have to be able to convert inactive T4 hormone into active T3 hormone.
20% of this conversion occurs in the intestines. 60% of this conversion occurs in the liver. In order to have a healthy thyroid, gut health and liver health need to be optimized. Also, thyroid is responsible for keeping body temps high enough to burn off bad bacteria, so it is CRUCIAL your thyroid is working properly. It has a very important job to keeping bad bacteria at bay.
It's a viscous cycle
As you can see, this is a viscous cycle. If you have severe overgrowth, it makes for a sluggish gut and liver and in turn will make thyroid function low which allows for more bad bacteria growth because of low body temperature.
Are you beginning to see see why I am such an advocate for stable blood sugar, good gut health and reducing inflammation? This description of what is happening in your gut and liver are reasons why addressing those core issues can create MIRACLES!
The path to good health is SUPER SIMPLE. No, it is not always "easy"...But when you start to see and treat symptoms as sacred messengers and work WITH them, getting to the ROOT and NOT simply quieting symptoms with drugs and medications, you will create powerful and lasting health!
People are so fearful, worked up and panicked by the medical industry and a specific diagnosis that we rush to taking drugs and seek out the "quick fix". This goes for weight loss as well. It is so difficult to lose weight and impossible to maintain weight loss when the body is in a chronic state of inflammation. As Dr. Mark Hyman, a functional medicine practitioner says, "Being fat is being inflamed." That's an uncomfortable statement to hear, but knowing the root cause of your weight gain is empowering.
We are intricately interconnected. We are fearfully and wonderfully made. Utilizing nutrition and high grade supplements to fill in nutrition gaps will yield incredible results in your health journey. This requires consistency and adopting a lifestyle to support your mind, body and soul and it is very do-able when you decide to do it. Start by starting.
Three ways to get started today:
1. Give up processed food: fast food, or anything with a list of ingredients on the box that you don't comprehend.
2. Get rid of sodas and energy drinks filled with dyes, sugar and toxic overload. That includes diet soda.
3. Quit sugar.
4. Hydrate properly with clean water
5. Add fiber to your diet with whole foods
6. Eat a balanced ratio of protein, carbs and healthy fats
