Hi Hv

I have been battling candida and parasites for 3 years now and have tried just about every treatment going and am probably in a worse state than when I started.

The only time I made significant progress is when I started taking milk kefir made with good quality raw milk. My god the die off was unbelievable like a really terrible flu, hallucination, barely able to stand, you get the idea but my bloating reduced hugely over a 4 week period, more energy no more coated tongue. Trouble is I could no longer get hold of raw milk and my kefir lost its healing ability almost overnight.

I now have a regular supply of good quality raw milk and got some new grains which were incredibly plump and healthy looking and produced a VERY yeasty tangy (and pretty foul) brew which gave me massive die off again. Trouble is after only a few batches It is no longer working and has lost its yeasty smell and the grains are shrinking.

I even bought myself a food probe and my Kefir ferments at a pretty constant 25-27oC in a warm airing cupboard. The girl I got them from advised that her kefir always felt really warm to the touch (which I take it to mean that it must be up towards 37oC, would that be a reasonable assumption?) from the fridge they sat on so was thinking that they maybe need a higher temperature as the jar doesnt feel warm to the touch even though the kefir is around 27oC.

However Dom's Kefir Site suggests 22oC as optimum and anything around 30oC will start to destroy the mother culture. I know if I can get this right I can make good headway with my health but just cant seem to get it right. Im pretty frustrated and confused.

I think that the key could be to get the right conditions for the friendly yeast strains to grow as the times I have had success has been when the kefir has been very yeasty (producing quite a thin and runny kefir). In your opinion HV is it these yeast strains that would be more successful in killing pathogens like parasites and candida etc?

Am I right in saying that the yeast strains will grow best between 30 & 35oC? And at this temperature do you think that my milk kefir grains would die and if so can you explain to me why the grains I got were VERY healthy but produced very yeasty and thin Kefir. Also if the temperature is increased to between say 30 & 35oC what effect would this have on the beneficial bacteria in the raw milk?

I have also tried lots of other fermented foods and the raw milk kefir is the only thing that has ever worked.

Thanks for reading.

kind regards