Author: Eric Bakker

Greetings. It’s Eric Bakker, naturopath from New Zealand, author of Candida Crusher and formulator of the Canxida range of supplements. Thanks for tuning in. I’ve got a question here from a gentlemen in England, a Mr. Paul Wilson from Sussex in the UK. Paul’s asking me, “Eric are night sweats connected to Candida? Can Candida cause night sweats?”

Let’s have a look at different kinds of reasons why you can get night sweats first, Paul. In fact, there are about eight or nine different reasons. I’ve just pulled up a list here and I’m going to go through a few things with you to explain to you more about night sweats.

Night sweats is a condition that we refer to when you’re in bed, you’re got the covers on you, you’re sleeping, and you wake up really hot and sweaty as opposed to fevers, which can happen at night or during the day. So fevers are almost every time immune related and usually involve some kind of infection like influenza, for example. There are different kinds of tropical diseases that can cause fevers as well.

Menopause. Obviously, you’re a guy so I wouldn’t expect you to get the same kind of symptoms. Some men do go through what we call andropause, so they go through a kind of a male menopause. But many females go through peri-menopause and menopause. So the menarche is the beginning of the menses. The menopause is really the end of the menses. It can occur. I’ve got some patients who go through menopause as young as 38 and some who go through it as old as 62. There is no sort of defined date here, but I seem to find that probably I’d say mid to late 40s, between around 47 and 52, seems to be the key age for development of menopause.

So what happens in this situation is the ovaries that produce the bulk of the sex hormones, estrogen and progesterone, they start declining. So the feedback loop between the ovaries and the pituitary is not so active anymore because the woman’s active menstrual years are really behind her. She doesn’t need to reproduce anymore. So the ovarian pituitary hypothalamic loop starts to slow down and the ovaries atrophy, they shrivel up a bit, they get smaller. What happens is the woman will notice that her period may go into decline. She may have a heavy cycle one month and maybe skip one another month. Some women have a very smooth transition. Others will have a much harder transition.

I find especially the women who go through a lot of stress have this because the adrenal glands make about 30 to 40 percent of the sex hormones, and the ovaries make the remainder. If a woman has had a huge amount of stress in her life raising teenagers, going through a divorce, gone through lots of financial hardship, she may have a considerable adrenal weakness or fatigue, so the adrenals at this point can’t step up to the plate and deliver the right level of hormones that the woman requires, estrogen and progesterone, and DHEA in particular. As her ovarian function declines. This causes a disparity and this often for many women I see can create anxiety, hot flashing, grumpy person, libido can hit the floor, all sorts of things can occur. And particularly the lack of estrogen, we find the hot flashes occurring. And they can typically occur at night in bed where she can throw off the covers. Husband can be cold. She can be hot. So the covers can go on and off all night.

Hot flashes in this case can often be accompanied with mood disorders, anxiety or depression, tiredness, muscle pain and weakness. I find in my experience that low estrogen often occurs commonly with low testosterone, so you may want to go to a doctor and get some salivary testing done. You can also get some urinary tests done now for metabolites. There is a really good lab called Precision Analytical that does what we call the Dutch test, which is superb for looking at the stress hormones, the sex hormones, and what we call the androgens as well. That’s a very good test, the Dutch test. That will determine what your level of hormones is like. If you’re worried about menopause, get tested and then get these levels of hormones balanced. Quite often, this will make a big difference for menopausal night sweats.

Idiopathic hyperhidrosis. Idiopathic means we don’t know what the hell caused it. There is no known cause. Some people get random sweats where they can’t define any kind of immune illness or hormonal imbalance underpinning it. It’s quite rare having the idiopathic, but some people will have this quite bad. I’m quite sure that if the person was checked carefully for different kinds of foods or heavy metals or issues in the body, they may find a level of toxicity there or a major food problem. The person is consuming a food or drinking something that they shouldn’t be doing. Alcohol, I found, has sometimes underpinned the idiopathic hyperhidrosis. Some people get flushing from different kinds of preservatives in wine, for example, can cause flushing. And the person will go to the doctor and the doctor says, “Look, we don’t know what’s causing this sweating.” If you drink alcohol and you suffer from night sweats and no one can work out what it is, just stop the alcohol temporarily to see if there’s a link there between booze and the no known cause sweating.

Infections. Infections are quite a well-known cause of night sweats, especially conditions like tuberculosis, but also conditions like endocarditis or a bacterial infection of the heart valves. Osteomyelitis or bone infection. There are many kinds of infections that can cause it. I know there are different tropical diseases that can cause a lot of night sweats in people. I think dengue fever is one of them. And in Australia, we’ve got Ross River virus, for example. I think it’s a virus and it’s spread by mosquito bites and that can cause drenching night sweats as well. And often these infections are accompanied by extreme fatigue, if you get a lot of sweating. Malarial drenching is a typical one where the person will have saturated sheets from night sweats. Usually a blood test will uncover if you’ve got an infection or not underpinning night sweats. So if you’ve been traveling to different countries, that could be one of the causes. You could have picked up an infection.

Cancers. Of course, cancers like lymphoma, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma is more common than Hodgkin’s lymphoma, but the lymphomas involve cancer of the lymphatic system with the enlargement of lymph glands typically in the neck. I found some patients will find, men will find it when shaving. That can often underpin sweating, too. And again, blood tests will pick this up, so your doctor should be able to pick up if you’ve got lymphoma or any kind of infectious disease that could be underpinning night sweating.

Pharmaceutical drugs. There are different kinds of drugs that can cause night sweating or sweats, flushes in general. Antibiotics, for example, from as many as 10 up to 25 percent of people who take different kinds of antibiotics can experience night sweats. Not many people know that. And also, paracetamol, Tylenol, Advil, different pharmaceutical drugs like aspirin can cause flushes and sweating in some people. If you’re taking a pain medication and you suffer from night sweats, again, you may want to see if there’s a link there. Antacids, for example. Some people report with antacids that they get flushing or sweating. Aspirin is a common one, actually.

Hypoglycemia. Low blood sugar. I made a big mistake when I was in my 20s a long time ago when I went for a run, a long jog outside, and I came back and I drank a can of Coke. What a dumb thing to do. I had low blood sugar, but when I put 12 or 15 teaspoons of sugar into my body, I hit the floor because I immediately elevated my blood sugar. A large amount of insulin was produced to reduce it, my insulin levels just plummeted, and so did my blood sugar, I just dropped and I felt really weak. I collapsed. I got hot flushes, I got cold flushes, and I got shaking and chills. This can happen with really low blood sugar. Type 1 diabetics can have this with poor insulin control. They can get a lot of sweating and flushing.

Thyroid problems. Very common. Hyperthyroidism. If you’ve got very low TSH, get your blood level checked and you’ve got maybe shaking, maybe anxiety and sweating can often accompany that as well. So people who get very hot or very cold may need to get their thyroid hormones checked if they’re uncertain what’s going on there. With hyperthyroidism, we’d expect the person to be more on the skinny side. With high levels of anxiety and can’t relax, so they can sweat typically.

The last one is a rare neurological condition. It can be some conditions like autonomic neuropathy, autonomic dysreflexia, these are all weird names that we give to unusual conditions involving the nervous system, which can either be through infection or injury. There are different kinds of reasons why a person may have a damaged nervous system, and that can cause inappropriate responses peripherally in the body. They can get all sorts of weird sensations accompanied by flushing and sweating. Some people that have had strokes can experience that as well.

That’s eight general reasons why night sweats could occur. Paul, I hope that answers your question. But probably the more common ones we see in women, especially 40s and 50s, would be menopause. And the other common reason I would see with night sweats would be infections of some sort.

To answer your question, can Candida cause night sweats? Yes. It can. It’s definitely something I’ve seen. And in fact, I had a lot of heat myself when I had this condition and a lot of sweating and flushing. Remember fermentation is often involved, especially if the person’s consuming alcohol or eating sugars and has a yeast infection because they’ll be fermenting on the inside. And fermentation creates gas and heat and that can make you sweat, particularly if you crave sugars. If you’ve got farting, bloating, burping, and sweating and you crave sugar, there is a chance that you’ve got a yeast infection.

That’s a long-winded reply to your answer, Paul. The eight reasons why you can have sweating and also Candida can definitely be there in a relationship with night sweats. Thanks for tuning in.

Greetings. It’s New Zealand naturopath, Eric Bakker. I’m the author of Candida Crusher and the formulator of the Canxida range of dietary products. I’ve got an email question here from a man called Jeff Allen. Jeff Allen is from a small town called Paraparaumu here in New Zealand in the southern part of the North Island. And Jeff’s asking, “Is Candida and diabetes connected? Can one cause the other?” Good question, Jeff. Let’s talk a bit about the Candida and the diabetes connection.

There are different kinds of diabetes. In fact, there are three types of diabetes, but two are more commonly recognized. Type 1 or an autoimmune diabetes and Type 2, what we call mature age onset. Type 3 diabetes is a newer form also called metabolic syndrome and it comes about from obesity, high blood pressure, dyslipidemia, so you’ve got elevated blood lipids. This Type 3 not many people have heard about that one.

Diabetes is a very common phenomenon, Jeff. It’s a growing epidemic in the western world and it comes through western living. It comes through basically eating the wrong kind of food, not exercising, and getting obese and major blood sugar dysregulation occurs. Blood sugar regulation occurs primarily through a gland called the pancreas, which secretes a hormone called insulin. Only a very small percentage of the pancreas is involved in the production and release of insulin through the acini cells. The bulk of the pancreas makes up enzymes and bicarbonate to help assist digestion.

Insulin is very important because it’s a hormone that allows the body to push glucose inside the cell. It binds to receptor sites and activates cells, so glucose powers up the body. Another hormone called cortisol is produced by the adrenal gland, and cortisol helps the body to assist in the long-term regulation of blood sugar between meals when the blood sugar level drops. The brain will sense that and it will actually liberate stored glucose called glycogen by way of cortisol. I hope you’re still with me and understand this. You may want to watch the video again.

Insulin is required to get the blood sugar into the cell through receptor sites on the cell. Cortisol is released when blood sugar level drops a little bit too much because cortisol will allow the body to breakdown stored sugar, generally in the liver and some other parts of the body, to be released in the bloodstream, which would then be converted to glucose.

If you’ve got diabetes, it’s much easier for you to get a urinary tract infection because you’re going to have more blood sugar output, a urine output of sugar, and mellitus means sweet urine, diabetes mellitus. That could be another thing that diabetics get is increased incidence of urinary tract infections, vaginal infection, and also skin yeast infections. Many kinds of yeast infections are prevalent with diabetes because of their dysregulation of glucose, and of course, Candida loves glucose, so it will feed on that.

Type 1 diabetes is entirely different. It’s generally juvenile and you’re born with it. It is an autoimmune disease, meaning that the body is actually attacking the pancreas and destroying it, causing a permanent lifelong dysregulation of glucose, usually requiring the injection of insulin. Here in New Zealand, we have ads on TV now for slow release insulin that you can actually inject.

Type 3 diabetes or metabolic syndrome is really I call it “metabolic sindrome.” Because sinners get it. Dietary sinners get it. Exercise sinners get it. These are people that sit on the coach with a remote control and often don’t want to do too much. They end up very large people and they get not just the diabetic, Type 2 problems, but they get a lot of hypertension and many other associated problems that go with obesity.

What happens with the Candida? Candida creates actually a real problem in the body because it can actually make this enzyme called secreted aspartyl protease or SAPs. The University of California, San Diego, worked this out a while ago that this secreted enzyme that Candida actually produces has a really bad effect on the body by destroying the receptor sites on cells and not allowing glucose to really go into the cell to power it up. So this creates an increase in glucose in the body.

Candida, in fact, can cause Type 2 diabetes. It’s not really well known by medical practitioners, and they tend to laugh at this whole thing. But research has shown now that it actually does occur. So people with severe Candida, in many cases, can actually develop diabetes. This protease, this enzyme, is also linked with hypertension. It’s linked with immune dysregulation. It’s linked with a big yeast infection. There certainly is a link there, Jeff, between these two sorts of things.

The other big thing you’ve got to remember is diabetes can come about also when you’ve got severe adrenal problems on top of Candida. Candida and adrenal fatigue often go hand in hand. These are two conditions I commonly see. Particularly, people non-responsive to treatment for Candida who will get partially well, then relapse. They can often have an adrenal fatigue problem. Because they’ve got a problem with their cortisol, so cortisol is one of the most powerful hormones to regulate your immune function. If cortisol is not working properly, you’re going to have a really big problem. And if you’ve got these secreted protease enzymes floating in your body from Candida stuffing up or ruining the receptors on the cells and you’ve got low cortisol, you’re going to have a major problem on your hands.

These are a couple of mechanisms by which some Candida patients don’t seem to recover. How they’ll get partially better and then relapse. Partially better and then relapse. Many inexperienced practitioners that treat Candida patients don’t really understand the concept of the secreted aspartyl proteases. They don’t look at the by-products of Candida metabolism like mannan and the glycol toxins produced by Candida, particularly poisons that neutralize the immune function.

The immune system is very important when it comes to protecting the body from the effects of diabetes. It down regulates inflammation, stops infections; it’s very powerful also to help control autoimmune responses to stop Type 1 diabetes getting worse. There are multiple connections by which Candida and diabetes exist. The main thing I’d like you to understand is it’s important to get a yeast infection under control because it’s not only linked with diabetes; it’s linked with many other kinds of chronic degenerative diseases that we know.

That’s a long convoluted answer to your question, Jeff, but I hope you do get some appreciation for this. Don’t forget to do my yeast infection quiz to see what your score is. You can do that on yeastinfection.org and please subscribe to this channel for more videos like this. And don’t forget my Canxida range of dietary supplements. You’ll find that at Canxida.com. Thanks for tuning in.

Greetings. It’s Eric Bakker from New Zealand. I’m a naturopath. I’m an author of a book called Candida Crusher and also the formulator of the range dietary supplements called Canxida. Thanks for tuning in. I’ve got a question here today from a lady in Colorado, USA. Taylor Humphrey from Colorado, USA. Taylor is wanting to know, “How do I know if I have a Candida overgrowth infection?”

Taylor, let’s explain that in some detail in this video today. I’m going to read a little bit of information from my book, Candida Crusher, and I’ll explain a little bit as I go along. This is a very common question I get and I think I’ve answered it in other videos and articles that you can find at yeastinfection.org. How do I know if I have a Candida yeast infection? Let’s have a look at that in some detail now.

Chapter 3 in my book is quite an extensive chapter and contains a huge compilation of all the common signs and symptoms of a Candida yeast infection and all the less common signs and symptoms. It’s often been stated by many experts in medicine that many people exhibit signs and symptoms of Candida yeast infections. But how do you know that you’ve got one? Would it be through sinusitis? Would it be through itchy skin? How do you know if you’ve got a Candida yeast infection?

There are many ways you can pick that. Sometimes an inexperienced doctor will overlook these vague symptoms and treat the patient for something other than a yeast infection. I know this all too well after helping many patients with Candida for almost 30 years now that have visited other practitioners who were diagnosed with irritable bowel syndrome, constipation, diarrhea, parasites, food allergies, leaky gut syndrome, gall stones, inflammatory bowel disease, and many other complaints.

Some of these patients were desperate to get help and had become disillusioned about treatment and wondered if they would ever get well. Some of these cases have proven to be very difficult to deal with and is it any wonder? If you were told that you have no diagnosable health problem, but you knew yourself for certain that you did. If you had been to several doctors with little success and, in addition, tried self-help, but improved only little as a result, than you’ve probably been disillusioned, too.

I can still remember how I felt when I had a serious Candida infection in the 1980s. No one to turn to. Not being taken seriously by any doctors, family, or friends, and mainly because there was no clear-cut diagnosis. That’s why this chapter is particularly important because it really outlines also the testing of Candida, which we’ll go into a little bit in a minute.

Spot the Candida patient. There is a box here on this page. When a patient comes into my practice with a very restricted or limited diet and multiple digestive complaints, complaining of many food allergies and sensitivities, there is a big chance that they will have a major problem with intestinal dysbiosis or SIBO, including various strains of bad bacteria, yeast, and possibly parasites. Some of these patients have visited many practitioners. Others will have spent many hours online with Dr. Google and can often tell you exactly what is wrong with them, but all you need to do is listen to them.

Why am I confident in assuming that they have digestive issues and Candida? Because of comprehensive stool testing, which we’ll explain a bit in a minute. And if you look in the right places, you can usually find what you’re looking for. These are the patients that may have a bag or two full of dietary supplements, including products like digestive enzymes, parasite cleanse, immune boosters, bowel products, bowel cleansers, detox product, you name it. Products like constipation and diarrhea aids, glutamine, aloe vera, you name it, probiotics, and they’ve taken everything these people.

Is this you looking at this video right now? Or maybe you’re a doctor looking at this right now. In today’s internet age, the patient will tell you that he or she has been doing some research online with the help of Dr. Google and can relate to having yeast infection issues. Let’s go over a few signs and symptoms in a minute.

A Candida overgrowth can generally cause so many symptoms, the most of common of which in my experience are fatigue, bloating, gas, food allergies, carbo cravings, vaginitis or thrush, anxiety, depression, impaired memory, poor concentration, brain fog, feelings of unreal, general weakness, tiredness, or malaise. Additionally, numerous other symptoms may less commonly be exhibited. Of these that I see frequently in the clinic include cystitis or urethritis, a urinary tract infection, menstrual irregularities, loss of sex drive, stiff, creaking and painful joints, muscle pain, indigestion. The common ones of course are diarrhea and constipation. Inhalant allergies, multiple chemical sensitivities, mucous or catarrh, extremely common, hay fever, sinusitis, persistent cough (very common), heart arrhythmias, discolored nails (very common, especially the large toenails), acne, and other skin eruptions. Nail and skin issues are a classic telltale sign of a yeast infection. Earaches, headaches, and dizziness.

How can so many symptoms be associated with a Candida yeast infection? Is this all a load of bologna? Is this all crap? Is this just a person who’s a hypochondriac and making it all up? Candida has been called the “great contributor” for many different reasons. One of the primary reasons is Candida affects the immune system on multiple levels. It’s a very clever organism. It can evade capture. It can cripple the immune system. It can cause upregulation. It can cause downregulation of immune function. And what it often does profoundly is affect the digestive system on multiple levels. By affecting the gut, we also affect what’s called the vagus nerve. A major nerve that connects our digestive system, but also our heart, lungs, and other organs, up to our limbic system or part of the brain. Now, it does that because it’s part of what we call the autonomic nervous system, in particularly, the parasympathetic.

Recent research in the US has shown, for example, that when some patients take an antibiotic called tetracycline, they can actually fry receptors in their gut, prohibiting the uptake of a hormone called GABA and that can create major anxiety for these patients. An antibiotic linked with anxiety. Yes, it’s true. If you think about that, receptors can also be affected negatively by a yeast infection, by the chemicals that the yeast produces, and also when yeast die, they can create all sorts of problems for the immune system and for the receptors. Not just in the gut, but in many parts of the body. These receptors will link up to nerves that link up to other parts of the body and, hence, the problem can be very widespread.

There are multiple mechanisms that are being investigated right now in countries like Israel, Japan, England, and America. Plenty of scientific research is being conducted not just into yeast, but also into viruses and parasites like borrelia that cause Lyme disease. And many of these kinds of problems are virtually ignored by mainstream doctors and they have been for a long time. But in the future, a lot of this information we’re talking about now will be mainstream. I just hope that day comes soon enough for a lot of my suffering patients.

Candida, the great contributor. Yeast infections may also contribute significantly to the underlying cause of a number of medical conditions as diverse as pre-menstrual tension, irritable bowel syndrome, asthma, eczema, psoriasis, Urticaria, epilepsy, schizophrenia, multiple sclerosis, adrenal fatigue, hypothyroidism, hypoglycemia, ileocecal valve dysfunction, etc. and even hyperactivity. And of course I’ve discussed part of the etiology or the cause of a lot of these conditions with Candida just before.

I think that’ll do for this video, but that’s really to explain to Taylor Humphries from Colorado. How do I know if I have a Candida overgrowth infection? As I mentioned, you will have been to multiple doctors. You will have read online. You’ll be confused. You’ll be on supplements. You may be going to xyz doctor in this part of town who could be treating you for this complaint and this doctor over here treating you for that kind of complaint.

Unfortunately, many people in my natural health profession still don’t treat Candida seriously enough. They will still treat the symptoms. Naturopathic doctors, in my mind, are almost, in many cases, similar to allopathic doctors. They’ve been taught by supplement companies to treat the symptoms because it’s profitable to treat symptoms. If a company makes 500 products and the products all target separate symptoms, that’s very profitable. And if you think about it, Candida can contribute to so many different conditions. If you could only locate Candida, find out that you’ve got it, treat it, eradicate it, clean up the gut, and then watch what happens to the body, I think you’ll be quite impressed.

Coming back to testing. One of the key things I find is comprehensive stool testing. In my mind, it’s one of the best tests to determine whether you have a Candida yeast infection or not. But not just a yeast infection, you can also pick up parasites, bad bacteria, and more importantly, what kind of level of beneficial bacteria you’ve got, which we call the policemen of the gut. So you need lots of police there to keep the bad guys in check. I’ve read so many stool tests the past year, hundreds of them, where patients are showing a severe lack of beneficial bacteria and only moderate amounts of Candida, if at all.

It’s important for you to do some assessment if you’ve got a seriously bad problem and you just can’t get a handle on it. Consider the comprehensive stool test. It’s certainly worth doing. If you go to my site EricBakker.com, you can actually assess that through the lab tests. You can click on the top and you’ll actually see the tab. Make sure that you do my quiz at yeastinfection.org. Please do the quiz to see if Candida does contribute to your health problems and to what degree of severity you may have a yeast infection.

You can read a lot more, of course, in my book. This is only just part of my book. The book is 700 pages. This is half of the book. And you can get the book through CandidaCrusher.com. Also, you can access some of the best dietary supplements in the world for yeast infection and SIBO through Canxida.com. You’ll find some supplements there that have taken a long time to develop.

Taylor, I hope that answers your question about how do I know if I have a Candida infection. Thanks for tuning in.