If you have night sweats and wake up at 3 am, you might have candida, but it is a pretty solid sign you are quite low in estrogen.
If you also have mood swings or unreasonable rage, joint pain, gastrointestinal distress, intolerance to noise, light-headed, or get obsessed and can't let things go, you need to have your estrogen checked, or at least try taking one of the herbal supplements to see if the symptoms get better.
You don't need to be "old" to have an estrogen loss.
This is especially likely if you have these problems below: - you have lost a lot of weight, because estrogen is stored in fat cells; - you have lowered your cholesterol, because estrogen is made from cholesterol; - you have stopped drinking a fair amount of beer, because beer contains a plant estrogen.
The candida movement is very negative about taking hormones, but the long-term health risks from an estrogen deficiency are very serious, and the short-term problems like insomnia and night sweats certainly aren't any fun.
Like cholesterol, nearly everyone in the medical community is so adamant that you don't get too much estrogen, that it's quite difficult to get someone to take you seriously when you don't have enough.
But, the problems that might follow deficiency include heart disease, macular degeneration of the eyes, many forms of cancer, and prolapse of the uterus, bladder, or other internal organs.
Many of the symptoms of estrogen deficiency are also on the list of symptoms for candida.
Sandra Cabot wrote an excellent book about hormones, including many natural supplements that can work for some women.