Candida Infection: Consider it pure joy to face trails . . . produces PERSEVERANCE

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Fast forward to Oct 31st, about 70 days of choosing LIFE for my body and declaring and believing God's truth. I had been following the strict diet for 70 days and honestly I was expecting that by that time I would be better.  I thought that I would be done.  I thought that I would have energy again and that I could be able to eat sugar again. It had been 70 days! That was a lot of days of just vegetables!

Do not get me wrong, I was having fun cooking and learning how to cook and really started to enjoy baked eggplant and aparagus and soba noodles and artichokes with homemade italtan dressing.  And there was battles won in my digestive system and being able to process more foods. I was now eating reintroducing foods in small amounts like grains (quinoa, millet, brown rice) and meats (chicken, fish and beef) and nuts.  And my body was able to handle small amounts of oil so I was able to cook with more variety which was great.  But it was 70 days and I was growing impatient with God's timing with his healing.  I was growing weary of declaring and believing without seeing.  I was losing heart about the possibility of ever going back to my normal life of having energy and eating normal food again. And it was seeping through in my thoughts, attitudes, words and choices everyday. I recognized that I started to give up and started declaring my identity based on what I was experiencing and seeing again. Stating, this is how I am.  This is amount of strength I have and will have.  This is the way I will feel forever.  I was growing weary of fighting and losing hope in winning.

I remember it so clearly because Dan's brother and daughter, Kelby and Kaeyln were visiting from NC.  I was low on energy and did not have the strength to do all the things we wanted to do. I could not even make it a full day without a nap and walking up stairs were still hard and done very slowly step by step.  I was ok with that on day 10 but day 70! I expected more! After a day of fun out, we arrived home and I was exhuasted.  We still planned to go out again and I had a terrible attitude.  Dan noticed and asked me about it.  I said I am fine lets go but he knew better and basically locked me up in our room telling me to met with Jesus (I love my husband!).

As I sat alone in my room, I did not even know where to start.  I realized that distance had grown between me and my father, me and my lover, me and my counselor. I just sat. And after a while started to pour out my hear to God, I just said whatever was on my mind and heart.  Being honest with him.  Afterwards, I begged Him to speak to me again.  I needed another rock to stand on.  I needed to hear his voice of reassurance and comfort and hope.  I waited. And waited.  It seemed like forever and finally a verse came to my mind.  James 1:2-4, Consider it pure joy to face trails because the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.

Perseverance,  my daughter, I am teaching you perseverance so that you can be mature and complete. My response to God's gentle voice: Perseverance! NO! Can you pick another scripture.  Pick another word.  I do not want to learn about perseverance.  It is right up there with patience and giving! Give me another word.  I waited for my new word my new verse.  Again I heard perseverance.  And another scripture (Romans 5:1-5) was brought to mind about perseverance. And then another one, Hebrews 12:1-3, perseverance again.  Ok, God, I surrender you win.  Teach me about perseverance.

I turned to the back of my bible and looked up perseverance and all the scriptures that had the word in it.  I spent the whole night in our room soaking up truth about perseverance.  Allowing His truth to sink in again.  I mediated on them, slowing down my reading pace and investigating them word by word, digging out the most I could out from each word of God.  Hope was being restored, I started to get color again and feel life in my spirit to believe!  God was teaching me something, he was teaching me perseverance and I was going to do everything I can to learn the lesson! I started to make declarations from the scriptures (below) to be able to memorize and proclaim out loud to myself.

I came out of my room, with my spirit alive and joyful! Declaring that through suffering God was producing perseverance in me. My faith is growing more and more and perseverance is a characteristic to boast about. I am a women throwing off everything that hinders and sin that entangles, so I can be strengthen to run the race marked out for me with perseverance. I am choosing to fix my eyes on Jesus so that I do not grow weary or lose heart and more!

And I can testify that God has produced perseverance in me! I have grown in strength, in muscles, in weight, in energy! Last week, just about 2 months after the night Dan locked me up with Jesus, we went on a 2.5 mile mountain hike in the Appalachian Mountains in VA. Again it was the word of God, that gave me life and joy to continue to persevere, to continue to get up and fight, to get up and believe, to get up and love Jesus with the energy and strength that He gave me each day allowing perseverance to finish its work in me to make me mature and complete!

Perseverance Declarations

I thank God for producing perseverance in me through suffering which leads to character and hope (Romans 5:1-5).

Perseverance is boast worthy and increases my faith (2 Thess. 1:3-5).

I am being strengthen to run the race marked out for me with perseverance by throwing off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles (Hebrews 12:1-3).

I choose to fix my eyes on Jesus so I will not grow weary or lose heart (Hebrews 12:1-3).

It is pure joy to face trails because it is testing my faith which produces perseverance in me (James 1:2-4).

I choose to let perseverance finish its work in me so that I can be mature and complete, not lacking anything in Christ Jesus (James 1:2-4).

Perseverance is being added to my faith (2 Peter 1:5-7).

Jesus sees and commends how I am enduring hardship without growing weary (Rev 2:1-3).

I am worthy of the kingdom of God as I persevere (2 Thess. 1:3-5).  

Candida Infection: Choosing LIFE

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So I know I shared about the victory (YAY) but I want to go back and share a little more about the struggle and battle to the victory, where God was teaching me how to fight so that I could overcome and stand firm in the victory!

RECAP:

God speaking it is ok to rest and then making it up the hill.  Deciding to seek Him through the battle! Then God revealing scripture and calling me to base my identity on his Word instead of my experience and beginning to speak out declarations to my mind, spirit and body based on His truth producing FAITH in me.  And then God opening my eyes to the way He had completely planned me and my environment and circumstances for me to overcome the battle in my body.  The next step was learning how to fight! 

I wish I could share with you that after I decided to believe God's Word and make declarations that it was as easy as 1, 2, 3 and bam VICTORY! But honesty it was not.  It was hard learning how to fight.  It felt like a roller coaster, up and down, good days and hard days.  Days of victory and times of falling.  I felt like a baby beginning to walk.  Taking one step and then falling and having to get up again for another try.  As I making declarations based on God's Word, I was faced with all the lies I believed that were in complete conflict with his truth.  I had to demolish arguments and every pretension that set itself up against the knowledge of God and take captive every thought and making it obedient to Christ (2 Cor 10: 5). And it was a lot of fighting. I had to decide to face the lies that were not planted by my heavenly Father and allow Him to pull up every one by the roots (Matthew 15:13). 

For example one of the lies I believed was that it was not fair for me to have to follow such a strict diet when other people could eat whatever they wanted.  I felt restricted and limited like I was in chains or jail when others seemed to be running free and have so much freedom.  This lie started to really effect the way I viewed and interacted with other people.  I actually would get angry with others for being able to eat a chili or a cookie and start to build bitterness and resentment in my heart toward people and towards God for forcing me to be on the diet.  And it was even harder as it was during Community Dinners, where our staff and community would get together for a meal of fellowship.  The team would make a great taco bar, order out or go out to a restaurant and I would have my celery and cucumbers (oh goodie).  

One day at the end of the month of September, so about a month or so from seeing the specialist, there was a community dinner.  As we pulled up to our base, I told Dan and Kimberlee to go in and that I needed to stay in the car and meet with Jesus for a bit before going in.  I sat in the van and put a demand on my faith.  I told God, I need to hear your voice before I go in.  I need something to be able to stand on firmly as I go in and see everyone eating something but me.  I need to hear your voice, speak to me! 

I sat and waited.  Waited with expectation of God speaking.  After some time, the verse in Acts "you have made known to me the path of life" came to mind. I found the verse but saw a cross reference in Psm 16.  So I turned to Psms and read the chapter and verses 5-6 jumped off the page into my heart. 

Lord, you have assigned me my portion and my cup, 

you have made my lost secure. 

The boundary lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; 

surely I have a delightful inheritance. 

 I reflected on it and revelation came.  God had clearly assigned me what to eat and how much to eat (my portion and my cup).  And the diet that I was given by God (boundary lines fallen) were in PLEASANT places.  It was the path of life for me and my body! For my body a taco or a cookie was death, not life. For others maybe it was life but for me it was death. I was not in prison.  I was not restricted. I could choose to eat a taco from the taco bar or a cookie.  But God made know the path of life for me and it was a place of LIFE and FREEDOM for me.  And it was my decision to CHOOSE to LIFE.  To choose to walk in the path that God has clearly laid out for me.  

In my heart, I felt a God give me a promise, as you choose to walk in the path of life and choose to stay in the boundary lines I have given you, you will experience true FREEDOM and LIFE (delightful inheritance).  Your heart will be glad, your tongue will rejoice and you body will rest secure (v. 9).  This was the rock that I needed to be able to stand. I entered the community dinner and was able to eat my veggies, repeating the verses and promises God had just spoken.  

This past Sunday, YWAM DC had our first community dinner coming back from Christmas break. There was no question or struggle about what I would do.  I brought my meal of LIFE.  My heart was glad as I cooked my brown rice pasta and tomato sauce.  Today my tongue (fingers) are rejoicing as I share this blog and my body was at rest and secure on Sunday as I was walking out the path of LIFE that God has laid out for me. 

I was planning on writing this blog a couple days ago right after our first community dinner to testify of the victory and to share that I am now walking with ease. However every time I planned to write it something else would happen or come up.  I love the plan of God.

Last night I fell again. 

After learning how to walk and getting comfortable (and prideful) with walking, I fell.

And with a fall, God was giving me another choice . . . a choice to based my identity on God's Word about who I was or use experience to empower a negative identity. 

After dinner at a friends house, I arrived home and snacked on almost everything I had in my cabinet after just having dinner! I hear God's gentle voice . . . you have a choice . . . choose life . . . choose portions in my boundaries.  But I continued to eat.  I choose to ignore the prompting of the Holy Spirit and continue to clog my digestive system into overload.  Finally, I called Dan for accountability (I needed to tell someone to tell me to stop!).  He told me to go up to our room, take the way out of the temptation that God was providing. I took the way out and I went up to my room.  However, I went with saddness and disappoinment in myself for falling after walking for so long.

As I woke up this morning to pray and process with God, I felt his voice write that blog.  Choose to remember the rock I gave you and stand on the truth of my Word and choose to base your identity on that instead of what you are feeling or the choice you made last night.  Choose to take your thoughts captive and allow me to align them with my Word.  Choose to get up and start walking again and as you do I will continue to hone in your fighting skills, so you will have peace in your promised land. 

Candida Infection: THE BATTLE WON!

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GOD IS OUR HEALER and RESTORES US! HE HAS WON THE VICTORY! 

I saw the specialist there is no more traces of the overgrowth of Candida in my system! 

The results reflected the complete restoration that I knew in my spirit that God did in me.  Out of 14 body systems and organs only 6 of them were in the yellow and the other 8 were in GREEN (functioning how they are supposed to without stress)!  My first results I had ALL 14 body systems and organs in the MID range yellow and 7 clearly over the MID range closer to the red (really bad) area! Even the specialist was taken back by the amazing results! 

Thank you and all glory goes to the FATHER, JESUS and HOLY SPIRIT! 

Thank you for your love, encouragement and prayers! 

It was awesome to be able to process with Calvin what I learned during the last 4 months and discuss about what are possible next steps for me my results showed that my liver is still struggling to function as it was created for.  So right now I am praying through what standard of eating and living God desires for me to make a lifestyle now that I have the freedom to choose. I want applying the lessons He taught me through the battle.  I want to use the freedom to glorify God and choose life for my body! 

Even though I have the results, I would still like to share the rest of the process with you.  Today, I wrote two blogs # 1 Candida Infection: Called to Believe God's Word and #2 Candida Infection: God, the Master Planner.  So to get the story in order go down to Called to Believe God's Word first and then read God, the Master Planner.  

There is still more to testify and share so I will continue to blog the process that God took me through to the victory and the lessons that I have learned through the battle. And the last blog will share even more about the results and processing I am going through now. 

Candida Infection: God, the Master Planner

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After God showed me scriptures and I started to declare them over my life.  All of a sudden, I felt like "something like scales fell from my eyes and I could see again, like Paul when Ananias placed his hands over his eyes after he was blinded by the light on the road to Damascus (Acts 9:18).  I was able to see all the ways that God has planned and prepared me for this trail!

1. First of all, when I started to react in Costa Rica was the start of the Bible School we did.  Everyday we had work duties to serve the base. Guess where God placed me? COOKING DINNER FOR THE BASE IN THE KITCHEN! When I found out I struggled so much, I will clean the dishes, sweep the floor or wash tables but do not ask me to cook! I did not cook at all and an area I felt every insecure.  Almost daily, I had to pray before 400 work duty time just to have a good attitude in the kitchen as I cooked dinner for the base.  About half way through the school, my flesh broke and I fully received the place where God put me and started learn from others in the kitchen and prepare me for 4 months of cooking my every meal.  During this time I had already identified that I was reacting to dairy and had cut out milk etc completely but I was still reacting to a lot of the food that was cooked at the base and I did not know why.  By being in the kitchen I was able to see how much butter the cooks put in the mashed potatoes or oil was used to cook the vegetables and avoid those things and able to put a portion aside for me before they put in the butter or oil. I would only be able to do this by serving in the kitchen for my work duty. 

2. Secondly, we had already planned to move to the states, Washington DC in July.  The move to July was also completely planned.  The ability to access the specialist who I could completely communicate with in English and ask whatever questions I desired, where in Costa Rica communication was a struggle.  As well as in the states the knowledge of Yeast infections is way more common and I had more accessibility to healthy, organic food stores. 

3. Not only did He plan which country I was to live in during the infection but He planned the exact location and family I would live with.  As we moved to DC, we were not sure where we would live as the staff housing was full.  The base leaders decided to open their home and guest room for Dan and I to live in with them (Jason and Kimberlee Hershey) and their four children.  This was a complete blessing as Kimberlee know how to cook and cooks HEALTHY.  Even before I went to the specialist, God had me eating healthy with the Hershey family, and when I was on the strict diet living with a family that does not have sweets or desserts in the house was such a blessing as I was less tempted to cheat and eat sugar.  Finally, I knew that I could not eat dairy and as I shared that with Kimberlee one of the first days we arrived, she shared that she also was not eating dairy because she was nursing her youngest child and he was reacting when she ate dairy so she had stopped it in a couple months before, around the same time I did! Come on, that is only GOD and his perfect planning! 

4. After I went to the specialist and learned the strict diet that I could eat, I really was overwhelmed. Remember, I never learned to cook.  Growing up my mom worked full time and had 4 kids under the age of 5 so she spend her energy on us rather than cooking for us.  She cooked maybe about 5 times for my whole childhood.  We ate fast food and out at restaurants everyday.  Literally everyday! The food I knew was soft or hard at TACO BELL, large frosty at WENDY's and quarter pounder at MCDONALDS.  So vegetables like artichoke, eggplant, asparagus or grains like quinoa and millet were foreign concepts to me.  Let alone how to cook or eat them! Kimberlee became my teacher and mentor.  All day I had a source that I could access all day and night that could guide me through it.  And the freedom to cook in a large kitchen and fridge with only one family to schedule around and cook with. 

5.  The location of the Hershey house is 4 blocks away from a Yes Organic Market.  I was able to walk to get fresh organic vegetables everyday if I needed to.  And every time I walk back to the house, I had to climb up the victory mountain as a reminder of God words spoken over me.  As I climbed the mountain, I was rest keeping my eyes forward and focused on Jesus and declare the words He spoke the first day I walked up the hill.

6. Finally, as we moved to DC, we prayed about the where God was calling us to serve with YWAM DC.  Should I serve with finances or administration or planning for worship teams for David's tent etc.  As I prayed, the place where my heart jumped was serving at home with Kimberlee with her children as a nanny.  This was not something that was presented to me to do but God continued to lay it on my heart.  After sharing with the Hershey's it was a need they had been praying for.  So before I knew I had the Candida infection and would be low energy and sick often, God placed me serving at home where I had the freedom to say I need to rest today.  Kimberlee was so amazing with being flexible and understanding about my needs to rest or cook throughout the day.  If I served with David Tent, I would never not had the energy or strength to run with the team or the the freedom to rest and focus on allowing my body to be restored by God. 

God is the Master Planner and clearly prepared me personally and orchestrated my life circumstances for the trail of Candida battle. After God opened my eyes to all of this, my perspective on the battle completely changed.  God was in CONTROL and my MASTER PLANNER. 

Master Planner: a person who makes the perfect and ultimate detailed plan for achieving something and makes it happen

"I am God and there is no other . . . I say: My purpose will stand and I will do all that I please. . . What I have said, that will I bring about what I have planned, that I will do." 

Isaiah 46:9-11

Candida Infection, Called to believe God's Word instead of life experiences

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So I arrived home after struggling up the mountain near my house physically exhausted but my spirit soaring! I was determined to seek God and his plan in all of the things I was experiencing!  

As I sought him, He brought to my mind from a devotional page (Day #10) our YWAM team was doing together, Ignite Faith by Steve and Wendy Backlund.  

"Here is a major life question: Does our experience create our identity or does our identity create our experience? The answer is . . . (drum roll please) . . . our identity creates our experience. Remember those who think they can and those who think they can't, are both right. What we believe about ourselves will either bind us or launch us.  . .

When it comes to who we think we are, 

God is calling us to believe His Word instead of negative experiences."

God was calling me to believe and based my identity based on HIS WORD rather then what I was experiencing day to day.  To focus on God's promises rather than how I was feeling or even what I was seeing with my human eyes.  He was calling me to know HIS TRUTH and PROMISES in HIS WORD and start declaring them over my life and see them come to pass. 

So I waited.  I said God show me your truth and promises in your Word. He brought me to four scriptures, the last one was the promise I held on to and declared over and over during the last 4 months. It was my promise of His plan in my life through Candida infection. I wrote them out as declarations (statements that directly apply the scripture to me personally). 

I am a new creation, the old is gone and the new has come. 2 Cor 5:17

I can do all things through Him who strengthens me. Phil 4:13

I am a royal priest, a chosen person, a holy person, a person belonging to God so that I may declare the praises of him who called me out of darkness into his wonderful light. 2 Peter 2:9 

God himself will restore me, make me strong, firm and steadfast, after I have suffered a little while. 1 Peter 5:10

I started to speak out loud the promises and scriptures God revealed to me during our time together even though I saw no evidence of it in my physical body or with my human eyes.  I started to speak out the promises and scriptures even if I did not truly believe them at first but He wanted my flesh, my feelings, my thoughts, my brian to hear the TRUTH over and over and come into alignment with God's Word! It says in Romans 10:17, "faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ."  I needed to hear the message (God's truth and promises) over and over so that it would produce faith in me that then would see the truth I was declaring in the spirit manifested in the physical! 

I am a daughter of God who bases my identity on God's Word rather than my life experiences! I am a woman who holds on to the Words of truth that God has spoken over my life and believes I am who the Bible says I am! It was only after I got to this point that I could declare things statements in faith, that God could open my eyes to see how God had prepared the soil and planted the seeds in my life and circumstances to produce a crop in my life multiplying it to a hundred times what was sown. 

Candida Infection: The mountain . . . our first VICTORY!

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So after the visit with the Herbalist, I started to follow the strict diet and cut out all sugar. On the way home from PA, the bus ride, I started to feel sick.   We arrived back and I was sick in bed for 5 days with a sore throat and body pains and headaches.  I felt like I was hit by a car! I was so weak that I could not even get out of bed to take a shower. For the next two weeks, it was 1 good day where I had energy and strength and then two DETOX days (weak days where I had no strength or energy).  And during that time my body would still react to food, even though I was following the list the specialist gave me rigidly! 

One day during this time on a good day, I was walking back from a Yes Organic Market near where we were living and I approached an upward incline, a mountain to me! I need to walk up it to get home.  I started to walk up and did not have the strength to continue going.  I started to cry because not being able to walk up and questioning myself what was happening to me and my body.  Cry because of how weak I felt and so not in control and that I did not have strength to continue.  I started to look at the storms and waves in my life and I started to sink.  

I cried out to God to save me and give me strength to arrive home.  I stood still looking at the rest of the mountain before me waiting on God. I felt him say,

"My daughter, whom I love, it is ok to stop and rest as long as your eyes are fixed on me and your desire to continue to follow me forward.  It is not how important how fast you go but where you are going that matters to me."

 I stopped and rested, keeping my eyes forward and mind on Jesus the whole time.   After a while, and I collected myself, I started the upward mountain with renewed strength and energy.  I walked slow with a constant pace and made it up the hill! 

When I arrived on top it was literally a HUGE VICTORY! And I celebrated as much as I could! I jumped a few times and shouted! Saying Yes God! Thank you God! Not caring what other people thought, as there was a bus stop right across the street of the top of the hill and a person waiting at it! God and I just fought and won my first battle with Candida and I was rejoicing! 

After the hill, there was easy flat ground all the way home.  I felt like I was skipping home that day! As I crossed the street and felt the nudge of the Father speaking promises over me.  

"I promise you will make it to flat ground. You are at the bottom of the mountain right now but you will make it to flat ground again."

I arrived home, my body exhausted but my spirit ALIVE! I knew the only way I was going to get through this life experience and trial was by keeping my eyes fixed on Jesus and searching out God's ultimate purpose and plan in it all.  I was determined in every stage to be a seeker of God in the mist of a storm.  And that is exactly what I did.  I dove into the bible searching for scripture and promises that I could hold on to during this time. 

And WOW did God spoke! He gave me scriptures to hold on to, revealed How He has been preparing me and my circumstances for a battle of Candida for his higher purposes in my life! In the next blog I will share about how He opened my eyes to see all of His planning. 

Candida Infection: From the beginning . . . what is Candida and how did I get it?

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Many of you know that I have been fighting a Candida infection and have been praying for recovery and health.  Thank you so much as our prayers are powerful and effective.  It has been a hard trial in my life but can confidently say am doing much better and now can say that I do have the Candida infection under control and getting another check up on December 18th, which I know will reflect the healing and restoration that God has done in my body.

Through a series of blogs, I want to share what God has done and taught me through the joy of the trail of having Candida! I will start with this blog from the beginning. What is Candida and how did I get it and the process I went on to discover I had it.

First what is Candida? Candida is a fungus (a form of yeast) in all of our mouth and intestine and when it is under control there is no negative effect on us.  However, when it starts to grow and gets out of control it weakens the intestinal wall allowing food flow into the bloodstream and thus releasing toxins throughout the body.  Which then causes all kinds of symptoms such as fatigue, joint pain, headaches gas and much more.  You can read more about Candida and the process of getting it under control at this website: http://www.thecandidadiet.com/whatiscandida.htm

There are many causes of an overgrowth of Candida such as poor diet of a lot of sugar and carbohydrates, antibiotics, or a long period of stress or anything else that can weaken your immune system.   For me it was probably a combination of them (as I have a lower immune system, have always had a diet full of sugar, processed foods and carbohydrates) but the final blow that caused my Candida to over populate was the 3 weeks of antibiotics for my infected root canal in Costa Rica done in March.

After I stopped antibiotics and started to eat again, I noticed that I started to develop food allergies.  My body would start to react (fatigue, bloating, gas, headaches and body pain) when I would eat certain foods.  It was happening for a couple weeks before we identified what kinds of foods.  The first thing I noticed was dairy.  At the base we had cheese and broccoli soup one night and there was no doubt something was happening after that night (my stomach bloated to where I could have been mistaken for 7 months pregnant) and Dan and I began to research more.  So after that night, I stopped dairy from my diet (which was hard! no cheese, no sour cream means basically no Mexican food which I love and cut out all desserts).  But my body was still reacting so I started to keep a food diary, tracking foods that eat and when my body would react.  I started to eliminate foods that I reacted to like fatty foods like avocados.  And this was all happening when we were doing the 3 month intense bible school in Costa Rica.

We moved to the states the first week of July and the food allergies worsen and the effects became stronger, quicker and to many more foods.  My candida was growing! By the end of August, I had cut out almost everything from my diet and spend much time in prayer asking God for wisdom.  And through prayer God told me to go on a Daniel fast to clean my system.  I started to eat only fruits and vegetables I was already only drinking water (Daniel fast was only vegetables and water, I am not sure why I continued eating fruit but I did thinking it was part of the diet).  Anyways, my body was still reacting to the limited diet I was eating.

In late August, we made a trip to PA to visit Dan's family and share with our supporters in the area. On the way to the visit, Dan and I decided we would find a doctor when we arrived back to DC about my health. God had other plans! During that visit, Dan's mom, Patty, could not believe how much I was still reacting and the effect it was having on me and my daily life.  The heart of compassion and love that she has as well as the gift of service and hospitality, on Monday she called a Naturalist Specialist for a Health Analysis at Natural Solutions in Grove City, PA.  We were leaving on Wednesday morning so Tuesday was the only day we could see the doctor.  She called the this specific specialist was only in one day a week, TUESDAYS! And he only had one appointment for the next day! Completely God! We made the appointment.

Patty and I showed up the next day and saw the specialist.  He did a BioMeridian Testing, which assesses the energy meridians (channels) of the body and determines how each organ, tissues and systems are functioning! Through this test and by looking at the results he was able to tell me many things I was experiences such as food allergies, sleeping problems, going to the bathroom all the time, fatigue etc.  Then he tested me for food allergies.  And all the things I cut out my body was allergic to but the one I did not know was SUGAR was feeding my Candida.  Even the natural sugar in fruits was allowing the Candida overgrowth to continue to gain strength.  He put me on a strict diet basically vegetables and water (Daniel Fast that God already told me to do! He directs us to all truth and freedom!) and gave me a list of probiotics and antifugals to take for the next 4 months.  He also explained that during the next 4 months I had the opportunity to and he believed I could recover from the Candida infection because of the quick response we had to stop eating certain foods, the short length of me coming in and seeing him and the hope and joy he saw in my eyes (JESUS).  He explained that my body was under a great amount of stress and normally when the body is under as much stress my body was experiencing, people are very depressed and on anitdepressites.  He asked if I was experiencing any of that.  I looked at Patty, my mother in law, and she said that those were not words that would describe me at all.  I agreed that it has been hard couple months but I was not depressed but filled with joy! Again, only JESUS!

However he did share that during the 4 months I would get much worse before I started to get better.  There would be days where I would be weak and sick in bed and they were good days because the Candida was dying and loosing control and toxins were being released from my body.  Also that my body would naturally hunger for sugar and things that would feed the Candida but it would take self-control to say no and stay on the strict diet.  I shared that I understood and would see him in Dec.

It was that day, Tuesday Aug 21st around 12:30, that I promised God in my heart that I will go through anything and do everything I needed to do to see victory in my life in the area of my health.  Little did I know, how God has already prepared me and my life for this victory in my life and the lessons He planned to teach me through it! The next couple blogs will be about exactly that!