I've been dealing with candida for 6 years. About 6 months ago, I decided I was tired of the constant yeast infections and taking super strong anti-fungal medications, and I committed to changing my lifestyle to overcome candida. For the past few months, I've been cruising this Candida Forum to figure out how to make myself feel better. I have finally shown improvement in the last 3 weeks, and wanted to share my story in hopes that it will help someone else.

From December '09 to April '10, I was following the low carb, anti-candida diet. I ate tons of meat, whole grains, greens and limited myself to a half serving of fruit a day. On the anti-candida diet, I managed to avoid getting any more yeast infections, but definitely didn't feel well. I had difficulty falling and staying asleep. I lost 10 pounds and was constantly hungry. Every day I was dealing with either painful constipation or diarrhea, and had quite a bit of undigested food appear too.

About a month ago, I was extremely hungry and had nothing on hand except a banana. I would normally eat half a banana, but I was just too hungry to care. Sure enough, within hours I felt like I was going to develop a yeast infection. It was at that point I decided that the anti-candida diet was unsustainable for me. It seemed crazy that after months of following the strict diet, I couldn't even eat 1 banana without feeling bad. I wondered if I was really "healing" on this diet, or just managing to barely keep the wretched candida at bay. A few days later, I decided to switch my diet completely and go low fat, high carb. I will never go back to fat again.

My goal was to make fruit my main source of calories. Since Sugar is a big no no when you eat a lot of fat, I had to let my body process all the fat in my blood before eating fruit. To transition, I ate tons of grains for 3 days straight (6-10 cups) and no overt fat at all. Then on the fourth day, I went on a banana binge. I ate about 12, and guess what... no symptoms at all! In fact, I suddenly felt like I had energy. The fact that a week before I couldn't even eat 1 banana and then I could suddenly eat 12 was all the proof I needed. From that day on, I have followed a strict diet of having 80% of my calories come from carbohydrates, 10% from fat and 10% from protein. For carbohydrates, I eat a lot of raw fruits (15-20 pieces a day) and cooked grains (1-3 cups a day). I eat one serving of animal protein a day. I've pretty much had to cut out all oils in my diet because the fat in grains, fruits and animal protein all add up to around the 10% of fat calories I need. I do miss putting oily dressings on my salads, but not enough to go back to the anti-candida diet.

Since making the change, I am feeling better every day. I no longer have constipation/diarrhea issues. In fact, my bathroom visits are quick and easy... in and out in 2 minutes flat. The undigested food is gone, and I have 1-3 movements a day, instead of 1 miserable one like I did before. My body is feeling stronger, and I've managed to gain 3 pounds over the last 3 weeks. I've been able to fall asleep much easier, and no longer wake up in the middle of the night. I'm slowly starting to feel sparks of energy in my brain. Most importantly for me, I don't feel constant hunger. Now when I'm hungry, I eat a bunch of fruit and my problem is solved.

There are a few things to keep in mind if you decide to make a chance:
1. You have to be ready to give up fat and cannot cheat on the diet. During the second week, I decided to eat 15% in fat calories for a few days to see what would happen. On the third day, I started to feel a yeast infection coming on. I immediately stopped myself from eating any fat for the next 3 meals, and the symptoms disappeared.
2. You can't combine fruits willy nilly. Fruits digest at different rates, and you want to eat fruits together that digest at around the same rate to avoid fermentation of the fruit in your gut. The best route to go to avoid bad fruit combos is to eat mono meals. Choose 1 fruit and eat until you're full (ex. 7 oranges).
3. You have to be ready to eat A LOT of fruit. Many fruits are low in calories, so you either need to have high calorie fruits (banana, dates, mango) on hand or tons of low calorie fruits (peaches, strawberries).

I wanted to share this because when I was thinking of switching, I looked high and low for a "success story" on a low fat, high carb diet. I was super scared that switching would just make the problem worse. I'm living proof that for some people, a low fat, high carb diet can help the body heal. I still have a ways to go before I can say I'm healthy, but I'm confident that I'm on the right path now.