June 18, 2021
Your body is hard at work protecting you from the invisible toxins you come in contact with every day. From the pesticides sprayed on your food, to the chemicals put inside your food, to the vehicles you use to get the food – you are faced with a multitude of toxins. While there are things a person can do to reduce the number of toxins they come in contact with, it is impossible to completely avoid all exposures. This may seem depressing at first thought, but if you give your body the right tools, it is amazingly efficient at naturally ridding the toxins from your body. There are some toxins that your body excretes with very little issue, but there are others that bioaccumulate, which means they build up in your body and start to wreak havoc on your systems. This can create a whole variety of symptoms such as headaches, tiredness, weak immune system, and gastrointestinal issues, to name a few.
Your body detoxifies through many different systems: the gastrointestinal, the urinary, the respiratory, the lymphatic, and the skin. These systems all play important roles in detoxification, but one of the main sources of action happens with the liver and kidneys. If your systems become overloaded with toxins, or if you don’t naturally support the detoxification process, many parts of your body with take a hit. Toxic overload reduces liver and kidney function which will aggravate the entire body, creating a host of symptoms and contribute to general feelings of unwellness and chronic disease. Your digestion will become sluggish, your skin will be prone to rashes and acne, and you will feel tired and easily stressed and overwhelmed. When you support your body’s natural detox systems, you will have more energy, clearer skin, and healthier hair. You can reduce the symptoms of some chronic diseases, support weight loss, and improve fertility. You can feel more alive and more alert, you can feel more relaxed and less stressed, and you can sleep better! Here are five tips that you can incorporate into your life to start detoxing from toxins and help boost your body’s ability to eliminate them when you come in contact with them.
5 Ways to Naturally Support Detox
Drink More Water
Water is an essential part of all body functions, and a lot of people aren’t drinking enough of it. One way that you detox is through sweat, so it’s important to drink enough water to replace sweat loss and keep the toxins moving out of the body. As part of the detox process, the kidneys help transport toxins, but without adequate water, the kidneys cannot do their job properly. The same goes for the liver. Because many of our organs cannot function optimally without water, making sure you drink enough of it is probably one of the most important (and easiest!) things you can do to support detox. The DRI (dietary reference intake) for men is 3.7 L a day, and for women, it is 2.7 L a day. This can change based on weight, activity level, environment, and metabolic rate, so it is important to take your specific needs into account when calculating how much water you need to drink in a day.
Choose Organic Food
Many foods are grown with the use of herbicides and pesticides and have even more exposure to chemical sprays during transportation to prolong their shelf life. By the time your food has reached the grocery store, there’s no saying how much of what chemical is on it. Your body can handle small amounts of chemicals and toxins, but when a majority of your food comes from non-organic products, your body can be bogged down and have a hard time eliminating it all. By choosing organic foods more often, you can decrease your overall exposure to chemical sprays and help avoid the bioaccumulation of toxins that can cause so many unwanted symptoms in the body.
Incorporate Herbs
The world of herbs is vast and can be overwhelming at times, but incorporating them into your diet is a great addition to a healthy lifestyle. There are many different herbs that have shown to be beneficial for a variety of symptoms, but milk thistle is one of the best-known detoxifying herbs. Since the liver is the primary organ for processing toxins, it’s important to support and protect liver function. Milk thistle has been shown to protect the liver cells from toxic damage and has been beneficial in helping cirrhosis of the liver and hepatitis. Another detoxifying herb is licorice. It not only helps protect the liver but also helps the digestive tract get rid of bacteria toxins while also protecting the intestinal walls during the detox process. A few other detoxifying herbs are dandelion root, artichoke leaves, turmeric, goldenseal, garlic, nettle, and burdock.
Try Green Vegetables
Packed full of nutrients, green vegetables – including sea vegetables – all have great things to offer the body. Some examples of green vegetables include spinach, broccoli, alfalfa, collard greens, and cabbage. These also include sea vegetables like spirulina and chlorella. There are a number of reasons why green vegetables are great for supporting detox, and one of the reasons is that they are full of antioxidants. These nutrients help protect the cells against oxidative stress which can lead to things like inflammation, some cancers, and faster ageing. What gives green vegetables their colour is the pigment called chlorophyll, which also greatly supports the detox process by absorbing toxins. For example, the sea vegetables spirulina and chlorella are often used in detox programs because they bind to heavy metals and help eliminate them from the body. One great way to add these dark green vegetables to your diet is to add them to smoothies. Your smoothie will change in colour thanks to the beneficial chlorophyll, but it packs a great detox punch!
Use Essential Oils
Like the world of herbs, the world of essential oils is also large, but one good detox oil is grapefruit essential oil. It helps with things like brain fog, headaches, energy, and mood. It is a great addition to the detox process because it helps the lymph glands drain. You can use a couple of drops in a diffuser, inhale it directly from the bottle, or apply it to the skin with a carrier oil. Other good essential oils for detox include lemon, lavender, peppermint, bergamot, and oregano. (Please consult a professional if you are pregnant or breastfeeding.)
These are just a few of the many ways to naturally help your body detox. The body itself has an amazing detoxification process, we just need to give it the proper support to help it do what it was designed to do. By incorporating these small changes into your lifestyle, you can begin to take charge of your health and feel like yourself again.
