Three words: Toenail Fungus Sucks!
In fact, it sucks so much, it compelled me to create an entire blog around the topic. Some may call it crazy, but I will not stop until I rid the world of nasty toenail fungus forever!
The first thing we need to do, is to determine whether or not it is actually toenail fungus that you have. Other problems like athletes foot have similar symptoms, but need to be treated differently. It’s also important to note that these symptoms and treatments apply both to nail and toenail fungus, so it doesn’t matter which you have.
What to Look for If You Think You Have Toenail Fungus: The Symptoms
Alright, so there are three phases (or stages) of a toenail fungus infection – each looks different, each has different symptoms, and each take different lengths of time to treat.
Stage 1: Initial Stage 1-12 Month Infection
It’s actually hard to identify it as toenail fungus within the first month or so, but after the first month you should start to notice the following symptoms:
- Nail face starts to develop horizontal or vertical streaks of a lighter tint. This is the fungus starting to develop.
- You may see some ‘white fungus’ starting to develop on the cuticle of your nail.
- You may also start to notice your nail starting to chip and become brittle.
The good news is, if you are still in the initial stage, the nail fungus is relatively easy to cure. One all natural solution that works really well at this stage can be found here.
Stage 2: Rooting Stage 12-24 Month Infection
If you are in this stage of the infection, it is crucial that you start treating it now. If you wait any longer, you will have to either take a very dangerous prescription to kill it, or get laser surgery which costs A LOT of money. Save yourself a lot of time and money by getting this treated while you still can.
Look for these symptoms:
- Nail is completely covered with nail fungus
- Nails have started to break and no longer resemble the shape of a regular nail
- Your nail also begins to thicken and raise up off the nail bed.
If your nail looks like the above picture, you still have time to use a simple natural solution. I recommend this solution if you are in this stage – you are looking at at least 4 bottles, most likely 6.
Stage 3: Fortified Stage 24
month+ Infection
If your nail fungus infection looks like the image below, you aren’t going to be happy. I have heard of people having success with natural remedies for a stage 3 infection, however it takes a REALLY long time to clear up. We’re talking at least a year of daily treatment before it starts to cure. While I don’t like to recommend prescription drugs for nail fungus, at this stage it might be the only viable option for you.
These are the symptoms you should look for:
- Nail is completely incased in fungus
- It is extremely brittle
- Nail has become extremely thick up to a centimeter of thickness
- The nail appears to be falling off
Now Let Me Show You What You Need to Do To Treat Toenail Fungus
Here’s the deal. When your toenail fungus infection reaches a certain point, it becomes almost impossible to treat using natural remedies and even prescription drugs. If your toenail looks like the Stage 3 Infection above, most likely your only course of treatment is removal of the nail and laser surgery to burn out the fungus. I advise you to talk to your doctor about this, because only he/she can properly diagnose you.
However, if you have had an infection lasting less than 2 years, home and natural remedies work wonders.
Here are some home remedies you can try:
Vinegar Foot Baths
Some people have success with vinegar footbaths, however must fail because the vinegar footbaths consume too much time out of their day. To get the best results out of a vinegar bath, you need to soak your nails for around 45 minutes per day, every single day for a period of 3-6 months. Heavier infections we are talking to up to a year. It is suggested you changed the vinegar base once every few days, so it can get pretty costly after a few months of treatment.
3% Peroxide and Water Mixture
I personally have never tried this before, but I’ve had a good number of subscribers reporting to me that they had success with this treatment. The only problem is you have to soak your nails in the mixture just as long as you do the vinegar treatment.
Bleach and Water Mixture
My subscribers also also reported to me that a few teaspoons of bleach and a water mixture have a good effect. You will want to test this though to make sure your mixture isn’t strong enough to burn you.
There’s only one major problem with the above treatments, and that is they take up a lot of your time. I don’t even want to know how much of my life I wasted soaking my feet in disgusting foot water…
That is why I always recommend a natural spray solution
The advantage of using a natural spray is that not only is the treatment more powerful than the ones listed above, it doesn’t require any sort of tedious soaking. You just spray it on once in the morning and once in the evening. 30 seconds per day certainly sounds a lot better than 45 minutes per day if you ask me…
One solution I always recommend to my subscribers and readers is Zeta Clear. It’s very effective because it also comes with a natural oral tablet which attacks
If you want more information about this solution, check out my more in-depth review of ZetaClear here.
