So, I started on this cleanse my doctor wanted me to do. I began on Sunday. The cleanse involves drinking lots of water and herbal and decaf green tea. Also, for the first 2 days I am supposed to keep hunger at bay with bits of fruit and fruit juice. After the 2 days, I add in vegetables, and a bit of olive oil and continue on for a total of one week. I am also to take a multi vitamin, and some liver/detox support supplements (NAC, Alpha Lipoic Acid, NOW Detox Formula, charcoal, and silymarin).

Meanwhile back at the ranch, I had over the past few months been alkalizing with magnesium, calcium, and trace minerals, as well as taking chlorella and probiotics, colostrum and slippery elm for leaky gut, and HCL for additional stomach acid. I discontinued all these for the cleanse. BTW, the cleanse is designed to help my liver. I also have candida which I had been having a hard time eradicating probably due to my liver issues, up until recent months (alkalizing!), when it had starte to retreat.

The first day of the cleanse was great. I drank a lot of water, and did not feel the need for any fruit until almost 5pm. I also noticed that I did begin to detox fairly quickly and easily. I found LOTS of candida in my stool, and I got my first menstrual period in about 4 months (over the last few years of battling candida, I have observed that when candida is in a bad flare, my periods get screwy or stop), so I was pretty happy about that. And it was fairly cramp free. I had read a long time ago that calcium helps with cramps, and I had been getting a lot more calcium than usual the last month or so when I read here on this site about needing to balance magnesium with calcium. Hmmmm. Could menstrual distress be caused by acidity, too?? :)

Next day my blood sugars, which had been running high, high, high (I am a type 1 diabetic), normalized, and then began to plummet. I was not prepared for such a drastic reduction in insulin need, and not knowing where my blood sugars would end up, I had to experiment with reducing my insulin dosage as I went along. Of course, I inevitably made errors, and wound up with many low blood sugars over the course of the day, and needed to eat a lot of fruit to keep my blood sugars from dropping. And that is where the trouble began.

During these days, I had also been watching my ph very closely, and it remained in the 7.4 range the whole first day and half of the second. Towards the end of the second day my ph had begun to nose dive. By the morning of the 3rd day, there were apparently not enough buffering minerals left in me, and my ph remained at 5 the whole day, no matter what I ate or did. And, lo and behold, at the very same time, I felt it: Candida flare! Yup, there it was, all over my tongue again. And I had an itchy vaginal area too. And my energy, which had been fine, sucked. Also, I had cravings for carbs, which always happens when candida flares. And bloat.

So, by now it was day 3 anyway, and I was able to start adding in veggies that evening, which helped greatly with the hunger that the candida surge had brought on. But, I decided to go off plan a bit and so last night before bed I took some magnesium oxide (Oxypowder) and some calcium, and when I woke up this morning, my ph was a respectable 6.7 and it bounded to 7 by afternoon. I began feeling draggy again about 2pm, so I had another hit of mag and cal, plus a little bit of baking soda and citric acid, and within a half hour, my energy was good again, and ph back to 7.4+. Also, here it is about 3pm my time and I have not had any hunger, tho I am about to eat some veggie casserole to keep my blood sugar up, because it too has responded remarkably quickly and is going low again. At least now I have figured out my situation and can continue on my cleanse and actually reap some benefits now. Today, along with my veggies, I am still eating some fruit, and candida is still falling back, I assume 'cause I have the minerals now. If I had not read this website recently, I would probably have had no clue as to what was happening to me, probably would have mistaken the candida surge for a detox reaction, and certainly never would have come up with the tools to fix it!

I believe that what happened is that I had been going along well last 3-4 months, alkalizing, candida was going away even tho I was eating at least 1-2 servings of fruit/day, and then when I began this cleanse, the fact that I ate so much fruit (3-5 servings/day) and nothing else, without also having my usual minerals, that the lack of minerals allowed the fruit, which would otherwise have been healing, to cause the candida to re-surge. And the fact that adding these alkalizing things back has so rapidly changed things back around is amazing. To me, this is proof in my mind that Moreless? assertion that candida people can eat fruit as long as they have adequate minerals accompanying it and/or in reserve, is accurate. It is clear to me that I need a lot of work in the way of mineralization, but am happy to be (FINALLY!!) on the right track. This forum rocks!

One clarification please. Am I correct to assume that alkalizing won?t STOP a detox process, but will only buffer the acids that the detox process is creating? Thus, to see a PH of 7.4 while I am detoxing does not mean that nothing toxic is coming out, just that what is coming out is being buffered? My fear was that too much alkalizing will halt the detox process, but my experince is telling me this may not be so?

THANKS!