How to Use Garlic to Treat a Yeast Infection at Home

If you have a yeast infection right now, I feel for you...

The characteristic itching and burning are enough to drive anyone crazy. I’ve been there, and I’ve successfully treated it with the kitchen mainstay which is garlic.

Also known as Allium sativum, garlic is a medicinally active plant with lots of benefits that you can check out on our Instagram, but it’s particularly useful in a pinch for vaginal yeast infections.

If you get chronic yeast infections, this will only be a temporary cure. With frequent vaginal yeast infections, you probably have a systemic overgrowth of Candida albicans fungus, which means that your gut is also overgrown with Candida and you likely experience symptoms such as:

• General fatigue and tiredness
• Frequent vaginal and oral thrush
• Frequent urinary tract infections
• Gut issues such as poor digestion, bloating, regular diarrhoea, and constipation
• Joint pain
• Frequent sinus infections
• Fungal conditions on the skin, particularly the armpits, groin, and under the breasts

To treat a vaginal yeast infection with garlic, follow the following steps:

1. Peel one clove of garlic and cut off the hard bit at the bottom that connects it to the rest of the bulb.
2. This step is optional, but if your yeast infection is particularly nasty or if you have tried a whole clove of garlic already without results, simply cut your clove in half to expose the inside of the garlic. This will allow the medicinal phytochemicals to leave the garlic more easily and kill the fungus.
3. Coat the clove in coconut oil (coconut oil is also anti-fungal and will aid with removing the yeast infection, but other oils like olive will work too) to make it less irritating to your already sensitive vagina
4. Insert the clove into your vagina while in bed and leave it there overnight. Do not push it too deep because you want to be able to easily remove it with your fingers the next morning. If it accidentally goes too deep, simply push as if you were having a bowel movement and it will move further down or come out on its own.

This method usually works to eradicate a yeast infection within one night. If you need to, use it a second night.

Be careful not to cut the garlic too small, as you want to be able to get the whole piece out.

Please do your own research, and consider various sources, both for and against the use of garlic as a topical vaginal yeast infection treatment. This article is not medical advice but is a recommendation made on personal experience.

Whatever treatment you choose to use, good luck with healing your yeast infection!