Hi there, I'm Eric Bakker, naturopath.
Thanks for looking at this video.
I have a question here from a lady in America, who's asking me, "Eric what were your Candida
symptoms and how long did it take you to treat them?
How did you cope with these symptoms before they went away?
What professional help can we seek to get a correct diagnosis and treatment plan for
our specific symptoms or body part?
Well, questions, questions.
When I got Candida, it was a long time ago.
It was back in the 80's.
There wasn't a lot of help around, I can tell you now.
Doctors were totally hostile to the whole idea of a male having Candida, and many of
them still are today.
My symptoms were basically a bad, well, male area.
You know, jock itch kind of thing.
But I also had Candida on my skin.
I had white patches, fungal patches on my skin, also had poor immune function.
I had bad chest infection.
Now when I think back, it probably was fungal.
It was probably Aspergillus.
It was very bad.
I used to work in a flour mill, and I received antibiotics, and I'm very, very sick.
I was depressed.
I'm very depressed.
I lived in a crappy, crappy little home that was prone to flooding.
There was black mold growing on the walls.
Back in the 80's, nobody paid any attention to black mold.
Yes, I was sick continually, probably for about a good six months until I started to
seek help.
I had to basically help myself because there was nobody really around that could help me.
Apart from the odd naturopath, that had read some articles previously on Candida.
It's something I had to work through myself.
It took about a year to recover.
It was pretty devastating, especially the depression side.
The loneliness side.
I coped because I think I'm a strong person.
I managed to pull myself through it.
Many people can't do that.
It's quite tough for them.
And that's why I'm pleased I've created now these videos and this channel, this resource
for people.
This is exactly what I would've liked when I was in my twenties, to be able to view this
kind of information, because I thought I was crazy.
How I coped, basically, was spending time outside.
Spending time in the garden, like I normally do.
Cooking good foods, listening to nice music, that's how I coped, but it was tough.
And also talking to some friends.
Spending some time with some of my good friends, that helped me through it as well.
I certainly didn't get any encouragement or hope from any healthcare professional people
that I knew, none at all.
There was no internet back then, there was no mobile phones even, there was nothing.
There was no technology to speak of.
There were libraries, but that's as far as it went.
So, yeah, I had to basically do all the research myself, and find out how to get better, which
really allowed me to think, "How can I help other people?"
Then I became a naturopath.
And of course then, the rest is history.
I wrote a book in 2013, and here I am today.
What professional help can we seek to do get a correct diagnosis and treatment plan?
Well, professional help, you can go to someone, and most naturopaths today understand about
Candida, parasites, and see about bacterial problems.
Back then, they didn't.
Most naturopaths were interested in healthy eating and fasting, but many of them didn't
have any kind of treatment plans for gut problems, apart maybe from specialized diets.
Back then not even many people were using probiotics or antimicrobials when it came
to gut problems.
So the professional help you can seek is someone who is experienced in treating digestive disorders,
Candida problems, parasite problems, irritable bowel syndrome.
There are plenty of healthcare professionals out there today who actually are very good
in this particular area.
A correct diagnosis, in my opinion, is a stool test.
So, if you go in to see someone, ask them that you wanna comprehensive stool analysis
that includes parasitology, and also that includes a yeast culture.
That's going to give you very good information.
The treatment plan depends on the practitioner, but again, if you follow the Candida Crusher
treatment plan, you're going to be following a plan that tens of thousands of people have
followed so far.
So you're probably going to get a good outcome.
The only thing is you may need to get some professional help when it comes to interpreting
the stool test result.
But you can self treat this problem, if you stay on track, it's not a problem at all.
What treatment plan for specific symptoms, body type?
Well, that really depends on the kind of symptoms you've got, depending on the kind of help
that you need.
But, yeah, check out the information on yeastinfection.org, have a look at our quiz.
Have a look at the over thousand videos on this channel.
I've created a ton of information for people to read and to become as enlightened about
this area.
More importantly, to take these kind of matters into their own hands, and self treat, because
going to a medical doctor is going to give you no real answers for most functional gut
disorders.
In many cases, in fact, you'll only walk away with a prescription for an antibiotic, which
will create more problems.
So, don't go down that path.
Look for a functional medicine doctor, so a medical doctor with natural training experience.
Or look for a naturopathic physician, someone like me who's had training and specializes
in these types of problems.
Generally, then you'll get the correct diagnosis and the correct treatment.
But check out Candida Crusher, it's a good book.
It's been around for five years.
It's easily available online.
It's got all the information in it that you need to help you recover.
I hope that answers your question.
Thank you.