I love eclectus, the female is a beautiful red, and the male a green, yes? I had an Alexandrine parrot for 6 years, but my wife left the cage door open by mistake and he flew away, it broke my heart. I'm getting an African Grey next.
You may like to hear my own personal story of the yeast infection I used to have when I was in my mid twenties.
I used to live by myself in a small house in an area in Brisbane (Australia) that was prone to flooding, it was cheap rent and I was working at the time in a flour-mill.
One week I would work the day shift, the next week the afternoon shift and the following week I’d work the midnight shift. I started to feel increasingly stressed and tired and one winter developed a bad cough that got worse to the point where I took an antibiotic. My little house was cold and damp and I even had to bail water out of my bedroom after it rained heavily, yes, it is true. The walls were covered in a thin moist film that I later discovered was mold. My diet at the time was not the best; I was craving sweet foods, take-out and lots of bread. My bowels were either blocked up or I was experiencing diarrhoea and lots of gas. I felt terrible and my health was going down hill fast. My skin started to get itchy and I had developed a bad case of athlete’s foot and jock itch.
To give you the background to all this, a few years prior, I had thirteen mercury fillings replaced over a period of two weeks in 1983, but started to notice that my health was beginning to deteriorate and by early 1985 I was feeling increasingly anxious, had developed a skin rash, athletes foot and several other manifestations of a candida yeast infection, all unbeknown to me at the time, including incredibly strong sweet cravings.
I had issues with my girlfriend who thought I was a hypochondriac, because my health had deteriorated to the point where I had to seek medical help, and the doctor was of little help because all the test results all came back normal and he wanted me to see a psychiatrist. I knew I wasn’t going crazy, I knew that there was something undermining my health but couldn’t put a finger on it, until I later read The Yeast Connection by Dr. William Crook and then The Missing Diagnosis by Dr. Orion Truss.
My girlfriend at the time started to doubt me and told me that all my problems were in my head, a view strongly supported by her mother and that I needed to “wake up to myself”, see a shrink and take an antidepressant. I decided to end that unsupportive relationship and move out of our flat and had a garage sale a few weekends later to downsize. A naturopath was looking through some of my gear at the garage sale and asked me why I had such dark circles under my eyes. I told her about my health and the first thing she told me was to get a hair analysis done to determine the mercury levels, because she thought that having all these mercury fillings replaced may have some bearing on how I was feeling, and how the methyl mercury (released from the new fillings) may have been one of the contributing factors in the development of my yeast infection.
I went to see her and showed her Dr. Crook’s book, “The Yeast Connection”. What she said made a lot of sense, and I started getting treatment for my yeast infection. Unfortunately what she didn’t do was carefully walk me through the various procedures of mercury detoxification and candida eradication and I had a seriously strong Herxheimer reaction (“die off”) and got to one of the lowest points in my life, even contemplating suicide at one point, something I would never wish on anybody. I trust that there will be people with a significant yeast infection who can perhaps relate to my story. My whole world had come crashing down around me – I had no girlfriend, my girlfriend’s mother and even my own mother thought I was nuts, I was unemployed and felt absolutely terrible. How much worse could it get?
After many hours of reading and study, it took over one year before I got my life back, and I did so through a careful diet regime of steamed vegetables, lean proteins, eggs, yogurt, plenty of relaxation and a change of residence. In the early to mid eighties, health-care professionals did not see candida yeast infections as a problem at all, so you were basically left to sort out your own mess, or just shut your mouth and take an anti-depressant for the rest of your life.
After recovery my health went to a whole new level, I met my new partner who encouraged me to study naturopathy. Even before I graduated I had begun to specialize in yeast infections and read every single book on the topic, which was before the Internet. Today I have about eighty books on candida, trialled well over a hundred different yeast infection products on patients and pretty much worked out what works and what doesn't. I have patients from over 30 countries (Skype) and run a busy international candida consultancy with my wife.
My health today is excellent, I detox annually in the spring and undergo a one-week cleanse each fall. My weight is ideal and so is my blood pressure and I’ve never felt better. Since my recovery I've helped over 15,000 patients with candida and many with all kinds of strange and weird gut problems, and so my book was created - Candida Crusher.