Candida…Friend or Foe!

Candida Albicans is one specific type of the “opportunistic group” of Candida fungi that can cause intestinal Candida overgrowth. It is usually found in our intestines, where it forms part of our ‘gut flora,’ the community of microorganisms that helps us digest food, detoxify, protect against pathogenic bacterial overgrowth, and support our immune system. Candida overgrowth occurs when this balance in our intestines is disturbed and the Candida fungus starts to overwhelm the rest of these microorganisms. This weakens our immune system and affects our ability to properly digest food. Additionally, the Candida cells release waste products, like the neurotoxin acetaldehyde, that can cause symptoms across the rest of our body.

The main causes for such disruption are a prolonged high-sugar diet, antibiotics and of course STRESS!!

Of course, there are others factors that can be added to the above list, but those three are the BIG ONES…and are so much a part of our modern and convenient lifestyle.

(Since this is a fairly long article…if you don’t want to read the whole story behind the point I’m trying to make just skip to the line further down that begins with…..”Candida loves sugars, yeast…”)

Our modern, comfortable lives were supposed to keep us safe from infections and dis-eases but the opposite is happening and it seems that cancer and more immune system related conditions are becoming an epidemic. Everywhere I turn, I hear of someone who has been affected by either one or the other. 

Under the label of convenience, we are actually disrupting, even more, our physical, mental and of course spiritual health. And when I use the word spiritual, I never refer to a religious belief, because that, I consider being a totally different category from spirituality.

Stress is a normal chemical reaction that our bodies have inbuilt that help us in a situation of danger. It gives us that extra energy to escape and find quick solutions.

Today we live in constant stress. Our bodies release these same chemicals on a daily basis to the point that their circulation become a norm and we don’t know how to stop it. Stress becomes the real danger. 

We’ve created a society that is adding more and more burdens on our lives. We have trapped ourselves inside a vicious circle of comforts, commodities and convenience but also where we expect everything to happen fast. Such choices force everyone to act fast, at home, at work, and even when we spend time doing things we love. We often seem to be in a hurry to move onto the next thing, in our never-ending list of “TO DOs”. We have reached a point where we need to force ourselves to slow down, and often with great difficulties. It feels as if the art of relaxation has been lost and we don’t know how to simply be. 

I recently watched a documentary called ‘Happy’. It was shown that there only very few happy countries in the world. They are places where people live more balanced lives, and society is built in a way that provides a great support system for everyone. There, people are not overworked, stressed, worried about how they are going to pay their bills or put food on their table, neither is difficult to find a job. They have plenty of free time to do the things they love to do, they have time to live, to be with friends and family and time to just BREATH and BE!

On the contrary a country like Japan, where the society is so much based on production and economic growth (money), people are actually dying because of physical exhaustion! How crazy is that!?

We are working more and earning less, which forces us to have to work even longer hours or have more than one job, and for many, just to have enough to “SURVIVE”. Most people live under a constant pressure of having to be in a certain way, overwhelmed by those powerful external influences brought on us by the media, politics and religions that expect us to conform to their ways. 

We depend on everything external to us.

Our nutrition depends on big companies producing and delivering the food to our doorsteps. Do you really believe our health is important to them?

Lots of people today, buy food online with a simple click of a button or a touch on a screen.

Do we ever wonder about what’s inside the food we eat? Totally trusting those big companies whose main objective is profit, not in the means of our health but in the means of MONEY!

Most of the food we buy today contains a high percentage of different chemicals that have been used during their production (fertilizers, pest-killers) and then to prolong their shelf-life. Only a small amount of that can be washed off with water, the rest remains inside the food we eat. Fruits, veggies, grains, they all have porous skin, which means what goes on top is also partly absorbed. 

The wheel of life spins round and round with all its elements deeply interconnected with each other and we are all part of that too.

When we buy convenience foods, such as ready-meals, partially ready-meals or refined products, that come with long lists of additives and unnatural flavours, we add even more chemicals in our already battered bodies. 

How dysfunctional is all this? To the point that is destructive to life.

More dis-eases are created, more people are getting sick and more children are born with genetic disorders and screwed up immune systems. 

(For those who have decided to skip reading the above….continue from here!)

Candida loves sugars, yeast, moist and warmth. Western diet and shall we now dare to say…world diet is today based on sugar and yeast, especially sugars.

Sugar is present everywhere, it’s in grains, fruits, vegetables, pulses but….these…are the natural sugars! Then, there are all other kinds of processed, refined sugars that we add to the above ingredients to add more flavour. This is the big selection of products that most of the population consumes daily, week after week, month after month and year after year. We have even given the sweetest name of all to some of these wonderful products!

…we call them “comfort food”, “feel good food”!! 


Do we really, truly, feel so good afterwards?!

Our mind seems to think so, but our bodies (if we listen carefully!) say the opposite!

They turn us into “sugar addicts” and “sugar cravers” and slowly but surely they mess up and upset our delicate balance of the gut flora. For sure they did it to me! …and I can only vouch for myself!   I didn’t think I had a sugar addiction because I believed I had control over it… but did I? Obviously not.

Our vital organs and body cells need proper nutrition to function properly, and for sure don’t need such an excess of chemicals and sugars if we want to experience a real sense of happy health and general well-being. 

So, a long-term sugar injection that began in childhood, lots of worries, stress, and hormonal changes with the menopause have all brought me to the place I am today, having now to re-learn how to truly take care of myself and this mysterious and wonderful body I have. 

So, I understand how I got here, but the “Why?” has been the question that has been puzzling me for a long time. If I look at it on a purely physical level…nobody taught me the true meaning of ‘loving myself’ and what to do to achieve that. 

How do we love ourselves?

Well! It all depends where we look for answers. 

Some recommend us to eat dark chocolate because it contains antioxidants that are good for our bodies! Ok, I can agree with that if the chocolate had no sugar, in which case most of us really won’t go near that darn thing because without some kind of sweetener is not that appealing to our taste buds! 

Aaah! But it makes us feel good!!

…for a little while, only! 

The feel-good factor comes mainly from two main compounds contained in cocoa: Tryptophan (an amino acid found in small quantities in chocolate, that is used by the brain to make serotonin, the neurotransmitter that can produce feelings of happiness) and Phenylethylalanine a chemical that arouses feelings similar to those that occur when one is in love. It has been called the “Love Drug”. This chemical also acts as an anti-depressant by combining with dopamine that is naturally present in the brain. 

The point is, comfort food, chocolate, alcohol, sugar, drugs …are just palliatives and are the opposite of what self-love is because these are the factors that in the end cause us to feel unhappy and unhealthy. 

So what it is this “love yourself thing”?!

Well, Miss Candida is teaching me this lesson that neither my parents nor society could. It is teaching me how to take care of my self, love and heal my body and consequently my mind too. It is showing me how to be kind, gentle and compassionate with myself and not just towards others.

Candida is forcing me to look at my whole lifestyle. Eating habits, thinking habits, work ethics, relationships and old believe patterns, all need to be rebuilt from scratch. It’s teaching me to put myself first, not in a selfish manner but with the realisation that if I don’t take care of my health first how can I ever take care of everything else. I’m the bright sun of my own little universe and I need to shine and stay strong so that all that is orbiting around me can function harmoniously.  

As a conceptual photographer, this experience like many others before and many more to come has given me the opportunity to explore it on a creative level too.

This process is making me strong and helping me finding other positive solutions to what otherwise could be perceived as a miserable time in my life. Instead, I choose to embrace it all with a positive and happy outlook and the excitement these changes have already started bringing into my life. 

A new beginning and a new photographic project. 

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