Detox Your Liver for Weight Loss and Vital Health
The Liver and How it Relates to Losing Weight
Many of us are unaware of how the health of our Liver is connected to the health of our bodies. Have you been dieting, exercising and constantly struggling with weight loss? When it comes to weight loss there are so many diets, fads, and trends that often don’t get to the root of the problem. That’s because if you are having an extra difficult time losing weight it can often be a sign of a sluggish, pre-fatty or fatty liver. And quite often we can be doing everything else BUT focusing on cleansing our liver to lose the weight. Our liver is one of our most important organs! If people truly understood everything our liver does for us they would learn all they could to properly heal and take care of it.
What does Our Liver do for our Body?
The liver has digestive functions, it produces bile which helps us to digest our food. It regulates our blood sugar, deactivates hormones, metabolizes fat, and synthesizes vitamins and protein. It is also one of the major detoxification organs in the body. Essentially serving as the body’s filter, removing toxic substances from the blood.
However, all these processes become impaired when we don’t know how to take care of our liver or which foods to eat to keep it healthy. Also, if we have taken prescription drugs in the past, been a heavy drinker, eaten high fat foods or the standard american diet, if we have been exposed to chemicals, food additives, heavy metals, pesticides or experienced viral infections- all of these factors bring about a heavy toxic load on the Liver. Consequently it becomes sluggish, pre-fatty and then fatty in later stages. Quite often doctors will not detect that you have a fatty liver condition until it’s in that last stage where it’s most advanced.
Signs of a Sluggish or Fatty Liver
If you have a fatty liver you can expect to have trouble with weight loss. Fat cells accumulate in the body to protect our body from toxins. These fat cells are going to encapsulate and hold toxins if the liver isn’t filtering them properly. Also, because the liver is inefficiently producing our stomach bile we end up with poor digestion, bloating or flatulence after meals. You may encounter blood sugar issues which can then lead to loss of appetite, dizziness, nausea and vomiting. Hormonal irregularities are a possibility since the liver filters our hormones. This will effect men and women differently. For women, we may experience irregular periods, heavy or clotted menstruation, fibroids in the breasts or uterus, hot flushes or ovarian cysts, mood swings or menopausal symptoms. Men may experience low testosterone, lack of drive, mood swings and grumpiness, and even man boobs. Not fun. Since 80% of our cholesterol is generated by the liver, you may experience trouble with fat levels in the blood like elevated triglycerides or low HDL and high LDL. Skin issues like acne, rashes, boils, eczema could also be an effect of liver damage. If the liver isn’t able to detoxify the blood, the body may push toxins through the skin to remove them. Allergies can also be caused by an over burdened liver as well.
You Can Detox Your Liver
All of this sounds like a real bummer if you ask me. Most of the time these symptoms will start off as quite mild and as the liver damage gets worse you will end up with full blown symptoms and wonder why any of this happening. The good news is, with the proper knowledge you can begin to detox and heal. Here is how to begin regenerating the liver.
1. Start by drinking lemon water in the morning, every morning.
2. Reduce your fat intake and eliminate bad fats and animal fats. If you are going to eat fat, eat it minimally from good sources like avocado, coconut and coconut oil, soaked nuts and seeds, raw olive oil, etc. This is imperative! You won’t be able to detox the liver if you don’t decrease your fat intake.
3. Most of your calories should be coming from organic fruits and vegetables with a focus on Liver supporting foods. These include wild blueberries, cherries, cranberries, grapes, dates, mangoes, papaya, pears, asparagus, artichokes, sprouts, radishes, cilantro, cucumbers, cruciferous vegetables, and leafy greens including dandelion greens.
4. Drink simple green juices. We love the simple celery juice and the celery, cucumer and cilantro juice combo as recommended by one of our favorite health specialists- Anthony Williams, the Medical Medium. Juice dandelion greens with apple, celery and lemon. Dandelion is a powerful liver cleanser!
5. Supplement and heal with powerful medicinal herbs. Dr. Robert Morse has a Liver Gallbladder Formula in Capsules and Tincture, which we recommend in glycerine over alcohol if the liver is struggling. This formula includes herbs such as, Milk Thistle, Dandelion, Artichoke Leaf, Burdock Root and many others that are known for powerfully healing and detoxifying the liver.
6. Avoid Alcohol! The point is to reduce or completely eliminate the toxic load on the body because it all falls upon the Liver to filter them out.
7. Avoid junk food, processed food, fried food, anything with a high amount of colorants, preservatives or pesticides.
8. Do your best to get off of chemical medications, prescription or even over the counter drugs. Of course do this in a safe and effective way. The body doesn’t recognize these inorganic substances and treats them as toxins..and they are toxic…to the liver!
9. Try to buy cleaning products, soaps, shampoos and body care products that are organic and chemical free.
10. Don’t smoke cigarettes. Just…don’t. For too many reasons.
You Have the Power to Heal
I hope this article helps you to understand your liver better and puts you on the right path that to keep you healthy and balanced. Remember, with the right tools we become empowered and we have the ability to heal ourselves naturally. It is up to us to bring our body back into balance, no one can do that for us. If you have any questions please contact us, we are happy to help.