The Life of Candida Albicans

Candida albicans is bacterial yeast which usually lives mainly in the small intestine with other “bad” bacteria, including E. coli, Staphylococci and additional varieties of candida. Living alongside these bad bacteria are trillions of “good” bacteria. Together, these all help to make up our normal “gut flora”, and they work within our immune system to keep us healthy.

But candida albicans is a sneaky little yeast / fungus that can exist two ways: (1) either as yeast which can’t penetrate the small intestinal wall, or (2) as fungus which can get out and go anywhere.

Also working in our immune system are white blood cells, needed to kill infection and keep the immune system in balance. Often, the heat, swelling and redness around a surface infection site indicates that the white cells have rushed to that site to fight the infection-causing invaders. They do this invisibly on the inside as well:

The white cell travels from the blood vessel to the offender. Just like “Pac-man”, they eat the organism, including excess candida albicans. Besides eating it, the white cell must ensure that the organism doesn’t grow or divide once inside, so the white cell must kill the organism by an “oxidative burst” – producing a combination of oxygen and hydrogen which helps detect the presence of a pathogen and destroy it. The entire process is called “phagocytosis”.

In suppressed immune systems, the white blood cells are either destroyed by valiant but harsh chemicals (like chemotherapy or antibiotics), or can’t function properly because, like good nurses and police officers, they are overworked and there are too few to go around.

At this point, the good bacteria may perish and the candida albicans fungus multiplies and takes over. It begins to grow and multiply into millions of yeast cells that stay in the body. The small intestine can no longer contain this yeasty fungus.

It’s often been said that “a healthy gut makes the whole body healthy”. Once the candida yeast fungus has “exploded”, it interrupts gastric and intestinal processes:

The digestive process actually starts in the mouth, where through mastication (chewing) our saliva begins breaking down the properties of the food, which then travels through the esophageal tract, into the other processing organs to separate nutrients from waste, down the intestines, and to wait in the colon for expulsion.
If candida yeast fungus is clogging the esophagus and blocking the intestines, the mucus which is supposed to help the waste “slide out” is hindered. The villi (tiny projections in the small intestine that help digest nutrients) can’t work. “Peristalsis”, the pumping motion that moves the food along, is challenged. So either too much nourishment escapes in diarrhea, or the food will stay in the colon too long, like garbage between pickups.
The candida yeast fungus has by this time penetrated intestinal walls, can gravitate to pretty much every organ, and carries tiny food particles with it out into our bloodstream, where they have no business being. This often causes “leaky gut” (sometimes equated with GERDS/acid reflux).
Then the yeast fungus creates infections and an especially lethal toxin – “acetaldehyde” – a cousin of formaldehyde. This can bring about mental and emotional symptoms of candidiasis and systemic candida – the “foggy brain” feeling, depression, anxiety and more – as it interrupts signals from the spine (peripheral nervous system) to the brain.

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The Life of Candida Albicans: How It Spreads