3 Ways You Might Be Sabotaging Your Candida Diet
The Candida Diet can be a big change, especially if you’ve been eating a regular Western diet full of junk food and sugar. Making these big, healthful changes to your diet isn’t always easy, but it’s worth it when you start enjoying better health and increased vitality.
It is important to be prepared and formulate a plan to succeed. For example if you have a sweet tooth, make sure you have some Candida safe cookies on hand or some pre made dessert ready for when that craving arises. Once you get used to a new way of eating it will become way easier.
Altering your diet is hard enough without having any other obstacles thrown in your way. But the fact is that some people don’t complete their treatment plan because they find the new diet too difficult to follow. However, this has very little to do with the diet itself.
More than three quarters of those people failed to finish their treatment simply because they didn’t follow the diet correctly.
If you are looking to start your Candida Diet soon, and you’ve finished reading through all the information on this site, I want to share with you three of the most common reasons why Candida sufferers like you fail to finish the diet. Remember: avoid these three mistakes if you want to succeed in beating your Candida!
Table Of Contents
Mistake #1: Getting Too Hungry
The Candida Diet is a fairly strict eating plan that limits carbs, but that doesn’t mean that you should ever go hungry. Not eating enough is one of the most common mistakes that I see in Candida dieters. It’s all too easy to get too focused on the foods to avoid and forget just how many delicious foods to eat.
If you’ve been eating salads all day but still feel famished, try baking some coconut bread. This filling snack contains very few carbohydrates but it’s a really satisfying food that you can eat throughout the day. Make sure that you buy a good organic brand of coconut flour. Here’s a great coconut bread recipe to try. A good tip is to mix the coconut flour with another flour like buckwheat. If you use coconut flour alone the bread can sometimes be too dry.
Make sure you are prepared with snacks in the house and especially when you go out too so you don’t end up starving and forced to eat something not suitable for the candida diet. You can find many ideas on our snack page in the recipes section of this site.
Mistake #2: Hidden Ingredients In Supplements
All too often Candida sufferers pick up the first supplement they can find without looking at the label. We’ve all done it! When it comes to beating Candida, we have to be a little more picky with our supplements. There are lots of hidden ingredients that may actually make your Candida worse.
Why do I call them ‘hidden’ ingredients? They’re almost always listed on the label, but often they’ll be right down at the bottom, listed under ‘other Ingredients’ in much smaller writing. The manufacturer really wants you to concentrate on the active ingredients in the supplement, not so much on the extra stuff they put in there!
One of the main ingredients to watch out for is a simple sugar named glucose or dextrose. This can feed your Candida overgrowth, but unfortunately many probiotics list it in their ‘Other Ingredients’. It’s really just another name for sugar.
When you’re buying probiotics and antifungals for your Candida treatment, be sure to check the label. The recommended products page has updated recommendations for lots of great supplements that will work on a Candida treatment plan.
Mistake #3: Not Preparing For Your Cleanse
When you’ve been suffering from a Candida overgrowth for years, it’s tempting to jump right in and start the cleanse immediately. But if you start the cleanse without the right preparation, you’ll be making the process a lot more difficult than it needs to be.
You can reduce your Candida symptoms, and possibly prevent Candida Die-Off, by taking a liver-supportive supplement like milk thistle or molybdenum. Start taking it when you begin the cleanse or even a few days before. Both of these supplements will help your body to expel the Candida toxins that can be released during the cleansing process.
Another great way to prepare is to start cutting down on your sugar and caffeine intake as you approach Day 1 of your cleanse. Eliminating these addictive substances can lead to withdrawal symptoms that might confuse or delay your recovery. Take a week or two before you start to ditch the sugar and cut back or eliminate coffee, ideally. Your body will thank you when you begin the first stage of your treatment.
If you need more guidance during your Candida diet, you should know that the treatment program that I designed with Dr Eric Wood comes with lots of detailed advice on diet, probiotics, antifungals, and more.
3-Month Candida Elimination Kit Start Your 3-month Candida Cleanse
This Candida Kit contains all the supplements recommended on the Candida Diet:
- LIVER ONE to process and remove the toxins created by Candida.
- CANDASSIST to inhibit and weaken the Candida colonies in your gut.
- PROBIOTIC to replace the Candida yeast with probiotic bacteria.
Plus... the CANDIDA DIET RECIPE BOOK with 50+ low-sugar recipes
Thanks Lisa! I’ll definitely try to avoid those..
I was taking the candidate supplement you suggest, but I received an email newsletter with info on ingredients to watch out for. And the candidate has one of the sugars in it you say actually can feed your candida. Just wanted to let you know.
Hi Jackie! Candidate contains a small amount of ethanol that is used as a preservative. It allows the herbal remedy to be taken in a liquid form, which greatly improves the absorption. Generally I would say to avoid alcohol in supplements, but an herbal remedy like Candidate is really useful for reducing Candida symptoms.
Is there any recommended timeframe for phasing out cleansing supplements like milk thistle? I’ve continued to take it plus pantothenic acid and molybdenum past the initial cleanse phase into stage 1 of the diet (along with probiotics and antifungals).
If I skip stage one will I be able to succeed if I just do stage 2 ??
Hi Anna!
Take a look here – https://www.thecandidadiet.com/cleanse-questions.htm
I have been on stage 2 of the diet for five weeks now and feel amazing. I was thinking of having a coffee that also contains chicory…would this ruin everything?
Chelsea
Hi Chelsea, it probably wouldn’t ruin everything but why take the risk? If you’ve already quit the caffeine then your cravings should have gone. Try to hold out for longer if you can!
I am feeling like my candida is gone. To make sure what do I do? Go to the doctor and request a blood test for candida? Do you have any suggestions Lisa?
Chelsea
Tests for Candida can be fairly expensive and time-consuming, so are you sure you need one? If you are feeling much better, it sounds like you might have it beaten! Just make sure you don’t go back to your old eating habits and you should be free of Candida for good.
Lisa, in regards to my coffee question on 4/25…
I did not drink coffee on a regular basis probably one cup a week and it was usually half caffeine half decaf. I enjoy the taste of coffee 🙂 With that being said, would decaf coffee be ok with chicory added? Or is this pushing it?
Thank you for your input.
Chelsea
If you’re drinking it that infrequently then it’s probably not going to cause any problems. Ideally you should stick to the chicory though!
Hello,
I’ve just been told by a holistic practitioner that I should not eat sauerkraut or kimchi as part of my anti-candida diet because during the fermentation process these foods start to contain vinegar. She said eating fermented cabbage that’s been sitting in the natural vinegar from fermentation cancels out all of the benefits of the probiotic properties. She said Dr. Bernard Jensen gives this advice.
Have you heard this before Lisa, and what would you recommend? Thanks!
Sauerkraut is great natural probiotic for Candida sufferers, but you should make your own rather than buying the store brands that contain added vinegar.
There is a difference between fermented and pickled. Pickling using vinegar but fermenting does not. Sauerkraut by the brand name Bubbies (they have pickles too) are fermented in a salt brine. Recipes for homemade fermented foods are out there, those are good for building your microbiome. I actually feel better when I eat a little of the Bubbies pickles and try to eat 1/4 cup or so per day.
Look for live culture as a key word.
Food does not turn to vinegar from fermenting. Your Dr is not versed well in that IMO.
Hi Lisa, I get confused about labels. I will buy food that has 0 sugars and gluten free. But it still has carbs ie; blue corn chips with quacamole. I dont understand the connection between carbs and sugar. Can you help me. Thanks
Carbohydrates are a group that comprises starch, sugars and dietary fiber. The fiber is good for you, but the starch and the sugars can feed your Candida.
Simple carbs break down into sugar and/or yeast food
Hello Lisa
What a joy to find you with such clear teaching thank you. I am nearly 70yrs old and very fit. Though a little overweight, which is reducing since being on the cleanse.
I started because my Dr could not give me any internal treatment for a large amount of warts and a rash on my body. I figured the route cause was candida and am 7 days into the cleanse. All my life I have been plagued with eating disorders and can hardly believe that I am not hungry or craving.
My question is can I continue the cleanse longer than 10 days as I personally feel I need longer?
Thank you sooo much for your amazing help B
Hi Lisa. I’ve read a couple of time that when on the candida diet you need to rotate your foods so as not to develop food allergy’s, is this true? Thanks
No that’s not true, but you should be careful to adopt a balanced diet and not ‘over-eat’ particular foods!
I am getting a redirect error on the links to your program – Ultimate Candida Diet and Get Relief Now.
Please try again now!
Okay so no homemade corn tortilla? Lol
I am so excited! I had heart issues (salvo) and my cardiologist referred me to a specialist for a catheter ablation procedure and prescribed me Beta Blockers … I figured I would give it one more try before I would do meds and any aggressive cell killing in my heart and did some doctor google research and came accross a Candida / Yeast Detox plan which led me to the Candida Diet by Lisa. A light came on and I jumped on it as I knew I had nothing to loose at this point. It made so much sense that I was a Candida sufferer. Day two of my detox the cravings for sweets stopped (that’s a first) and no more brain fog, sharper mind and best of all my heart went back to a completely normal heart beat. Someone out there on google wrote that Candida can affect the heart. My cardiologist initially told me on my first visit to cut sugar and caffeine what he didn’t say was not only stop taking sugar but also get the sugar that’s already in me out! I’m so happy and after 5 weeks I shared the news with him and he said that’s excellent news. I’ve been going through the cookbook by Lisa and totally obsessed with it. So far my favorite is the Cabbage Curry! Thank you Lisa you may have saved my life!
Thanks Silvia 🙂
Alongside the diet, what drugs can I take. Am asking becuz I’ve been on terbinafine for 7months but no results. I live in Africa and following a strict candida diet is quite difficult n very challenging! What can I do?
Please I need help.