Re: brainfog all the time Candida? Dysbiosis? Leaky gut?

Hi! I'd want to suggest you to follow the low FODMAP diet for a while to see is the situation improves; it's 3 days i'm on it and ii've noticed great improvements: my skin got better, brain fog improved, bloating is lessening and same for reflux (disappeared) and constipation; throath phlegm has significantly improved.
I'm still avoiding (for now) some lectin-full foods, due to food sensitivities , to introduce them later. Simply avoiding these couldn't solve the problem.

I decided to try this diet out because i've read brain fog may be caused by a unbalanced microbiota. How can a low FODMAP diet help, then?

The principle behind it is you avoid (or greatly lower) the oligosaccharide intake, which are the more complex types of sugar, that bad bacterias can use to feed themselves.
Simple sugars (monosaccharides) are allowed, because the body quickly absorbs them, and thus cannot be used by bacterias.

You can find some info here (as well as around on the web)
http://www.med.monash.edu/cecs/gastro/fodmap/

This mechanism to be justified, presupposes that an unbalanced microbiota has been developed, so when you give some sugars to your body, bad bacterias will prevail over the good ones, and produce fermentation, as well as toxic substances (such as acetaldehyde for candida overgrowth).

Thus a low FODMAP diet will practically starve bad bacterias, giving the body a chance to re-establish a healthy microbiota balance. After some time (max 6 weeks) you are going to introduce oligosaccharides again, gradually.

Seeing your post i thought that your improvements, triggered by excluding some foods, may have been interrupted by bacterias finding new high FODMAP foods to feed them with.
It's a highly speculative theory, of course, but anyway i would suggest you to give this diet a try.
Few days (3-4) will probably be enough to produce tangible results, if this is the source of the problems.

Another theory, in my opinion, may involve parasites.

On my third day on low FODMAP diet i've improved a lot, but i've became a bit drowsy (it's a different feeling from brain fog).
I think it may be both some bacterias die-off effect and body adapting to a new diet and to process proteins (i ate really few before). Anyway, i'm feeling quite well.

Last thing: it's probably better not to go ketogenic, because it seems that it would make fighting yeast harder for the body, and also wouldn't make sense, since bacterias wouldn't feed on allowed sugars.

I hope this could prove helpful!