328-SYNCPodcast_Yeast

Jenny Swisher: [00:00:00] Welcome friends to [00:01:00] this episode of The Sink Your Life Podcast. Today we’re diving into a topic that may seem awkward, but it’s something that we need to cover because a lot of women deal with us. We’re gonna be talking about some common vulvar issues that pop up in perimenopause. Dominantly candida and yeast infections, but I’ll also touch on urinary tract infections, bv, otherwise known as bacterial vaginosis and bladder infections as well.

It seems like these issues are on the rise. Just recently, I was listening to a credible functional medicine doctor and podcaster talking about the increase in bladder infections in the last couple of years, and we already know that 77% of women will encounter a yeast infection at some point in their lives, if not before the age of 40, then probably in their forties or fifties.

So what is with all the issues. Well, I can tell you after experiencing my first ever yeast infection at the age of 41, it is not fun. I eat a healthy diet. I have clean hygiene, if not obsessively so, and yes, it still happened to me. So let’s start by defining candida or yeast infections, because the reality is it doesn’t always occur in [00:02:00] just the vaginal biome.

Candida can exist in our gut, on our skin, and elsewhere in the body while yeast, candida is a fungus that lives on all of us. When the yeast begins to dominate, it can multiply quickly and create infection. Right now in the Midwest, these 90 degree humid temperatures make for the perfect breeding ground for yeast infections.

Symptoms of a yeast infection can include things like itching and burning of the vulva. A cottage cheese like discharge from the vagina, though not always, and a heck of a lot of discomfort and swelling. Currently, there are a few different options out there for treating acute infection. There is monsta cream or vaginal suppository at your local pharmacy offered over the counter.

There’s also boric acid, which can be found over the counter as well. And there’s prescription diflucan, which comes as a one pill oral capsule option for healing and killing the yeast infection. Now, sometimes yeast infections can be misdiagnosed, which is why getting a swab done with your local doctor can be useful.

However, those tests can take three to four days for the test results to come back. So doctors [00:03:00] should be able to guess based on your symptoms and especially the discharge. That’s a huge clue, and they can offer you advice and even prescriptions without the diagnostic test. I still recommend getting the test done because you wanna know what’s causing the issues if the medication does not help it.

Candida or yeast infections often happen as the result of a disrupted microbiome. If you’ve been on antibiotics lately, or if you don’t take a regular probiotic, if you’re consuming a lot of high sugar foods or breads and starches, you could be festering an environment for candida overgrowth. Oftentimes, yeast infections are misdiagnosed or they become confused with bv.

BV is bacterial vaginosis with bacterial vaginosis. There may be a funky discharge, but it’s usually not cottage cheese like, like it is with yeast. It’s usually foul smelling, maybe a fishy odor, and it can involve an itchy vulva as well. In this case, often antibiotics of some kind might be needed. So if you’re in the hands of a good doctor, you can have all the swabs and tests done in one visit, including a urine test and vaginal [00:04:00] swab that can look for yeast infection, bacterial vaginosis, UTIs, and so forth.

I highly recommend doing this. Like I said, even if you’re confident in what you’re dealing with, urinary tract infections are also not fun. There’s lots of burning with urination, frequent need to urinate and discomfort, and these are all signs of A UTI. Oddly enough, UTIs correlate strongly to low estrogen levels, which is why we see an increase in UTIs in women and perimenopause.

A very close family member of mine who died from Alzheimer’s disease, she dealt with dozens of UTIs in her later years, and I can’t help but think knowing what I know now about estrogen and the impacts on brain health, that something as simple as vaginal estrogen could have been a game changer for her.

By the way, if you’re in perimenopause and dealing with vaginal dryness or common UTIs. Working with a functional practitioner and getting on some vaginal estrogen can be game changing for you. It’s not systemic like oral estrogen, so it can be an option even for cancer survivors. So ask your doctor. And finally, bladder infections woof.

[00:05:00] As someone who has dealt with kidney stones and bladder infections in my previous life in my twenties, let me tell you that none of these things are fun. Getting proper treatment is key for any and all of the things we’re talking about today. So what exactly ties in here with perimenopause and the rise of these issues in perimenopause?

Well, we’ve already mentioned the tie in with lower estrogen, and I wanna dive deeper into that. Estrogen helps tissues in your vagina and urethra stay elastic and moist. Estrogen loss can thin these tissues and cause dryness, irritation, and other changes that set the stage for things like these UTIs and yeast overgrowth, for example, estrogen loss weakens the muscles of our urethra.

This makes it easier for bacteria to enter our urethra and move up into the bladder causing more bladder infections. Estrogen also raises the level of healthy bacteria that normally live in our vagina and bladder. Healthy bacteria help fight off infection causing bacteria well after menopause. Low estrogen means you have less healthy bacteria to help prevent infections, and as you know, based on [00:06:00] where you are in your sort of perimenopausal journey, estrogen declines last.

Progesterone declines first, but all of these declines. Lead to a dry vagina. So this is why keeping tabs on our hormone levels and whether they’re optimized along with our symptoms can be key. We do not just have to suffer. So while there are plenty of pharmaceutical options out there to kill the vaginal or vulvar infections quickly, making sure that we’re creating a microbiome and vaginal biome that’s healthy is the proactive method to avoiding these issues and perhaps using estrogen.

Probiotics and not just any probiotic, but ones that reach the intestines and don’t die in the stomach is key. Even vaginal probiotics can be game changing as well. I will link up an interview that I did with the founder of Good, clean Love, along with my own links to my favorite vaginal products from them.

Those have been hugely helpful for me, my friends, dealing with any of these things, yeast infections, BV UTIs or bladder infections are a huge disruption to life. I’ve been unable to work out for almost a week due to the discomfort. I can’t swim in the pool [00:07:00] with my kids until this is resolved. It’s a huge pain, but it does offer me a chance to do a gut check.

Quite literally. Perhaps this was caused by my recent antibiotic, so I will increase my probiotics and probiotic foods. I’ll limit my starch intake, and yes, take the pharmaceutical to help kill this off. Now, this is a topic, much like periods or menopause that women just don’t talk about a lot. But I know for me, when I started to see these signs, I wanted information.

My hope for you is that this podcast offers you information about topics that are hard to discuss even with your doctor or your friends, and that you can get what you need to overcome it and feel good again. So thanks so much for tuning in as always, my friends. I hope it’s helpful. I hope you’re having a great summer.

Until next time, we’ll talk soon. Bye-bye. [00:08:00]