Posts Tagged ‘liver’
By Daniel Stern,
Licensed practitioner of Chinese Herbal Medicine
One question on everyone’s mind, almost without exception, is “how can I stay healthy, fit and full of life?” The liver, among its other duties, digests fat and filters poisons out of our system. A healthy liver is vital to the body. What can we do to keep it that way?
What are the things that injure the liver? Many people are already familiar with some of them: excessive animal fat including butter, ice cream and cheese, saturated fats like chocolate or coconut, trans-fats like margarine, deep-fried food, unspecified “vegetable fat”, and dietary contaminants foreign to the body’s ecology like artificial sweeteners, preservatives, food coloring and flavors.
Also foreign to the body, which filters all poisons through the liver, are synthetic medicines of any kind, including prescription drugs and over the counter medications. A few of these are natural and are tolerated (and not even processed by the liver), but many, if not most, are problematic and are contra-indicated for people with liver problems.
While you must heed your doctor’s advice, in my opinion it’s necessary to weigh the benefits and the costs and look for a natural substitute if possible. There are physicians in many cities who are also naturopaths or herbalists, and who would make a good choice for a personal health practitioner.
Less well-known is the danger of synthetic vapors, which are filtered by the liver as well. People in fires often die of liver failure from the smoke, and not the flames. Of particular danger are manufactured cleansers, paint solvents, aromatic additives to detergent, soap and perfume, newly bought rugs and cheap electronic devices made with plastic. If you air them out for a day to a week, the odor will often leave, but with other items like cheap shoes and luggage, it will almost never go away. If you can smell it, and it didn’t come from a tree, I recommend caution.
What occurs for many people with compromised livers, even young people, is an excess of cholesterol in the blood. Many, if not most, people over a certain age test high for it. This can lead to gallstones, arteriosclerosis , heart attacks, and strokes. Dietary cholesterol from meat and eggs accounts for a small fraction of our cholesterol. Most of it is produced by the body’s own liver, which is responsible for its balance in the body.
An excess of meat is considered a problem not because of the small amount of cholesterol present, but because the hard fats in it are difficult for the liver to process. When the liver is stressed, it does not metabolize its own cholesterol correctly, leading to gallstones and arteriosclerotic plaque.
A cholesterol test is a good informal way to measure the health of your liver, even though a liver panel is more thorough. Drugstore test kits work fine if used correctly, and can test for both total cholesterol and HDL cholesterol. However if you take vitamin C, or get more than 500 mg of it in your diet, the HDL test can give you a false result and can appear dangerously low. On the other hand, total cholesterol is often thought to be a sufficient measure of it in your blood. Some authorities consider a reading of less than 200 a good result for a test, but the graph actually starts at 125, which is considered by many to be ideal.
Open for question are other products that have not been investigated thoroughly, like canola oil ( a genetically modified oil ) GMO’s in general, carbohydrates that have been heated over 350 degrees and contain acrylamides, also a possible carcinogen, e.g. potato chips, coffee, dark toast, or anything burnt in a fire or an oven. There is also a question about dairy in general, to which many people are sensitive. If you want to be diligent about this, eat a particular food for a week, and then test yourself with a drugstore cholesterol kit. You will be amazed at what you find out.
Candida infection can also invade the liver. This is not widely known or accepted in this country, but Russian venerealogists and textbooks outline this danger of the strain present in America, listed in their books as Candida Albicans Northamericansis.
Candidiasis of the liver cause it to swell up to twice its size, and can cause it to metabolize cholesterol incorrectly. Topical treatments for Candida do not address the full invasion of the body, and systemic anti-fungal treatment is required. In addition, both partners in a relationship need to be treated to avoid re-infection, whether the man is overtly symptomatic or not.
There are dozens of herbs recommended for the liver, and I have personally tested quite a few. While many seem to help in the short run, the problems always seem to re-emerge. What does work, in my experience, is eliminating all offending items from the diet and environment, not as easy as a “magic bullet”, but very effective, and good for the general health as well.
Fortunately the liver has a miraculous power to heal quickly, in as little as a day or two, or several weeks in more serious cases. You can measure your progress with a drugstore kit, or with a more formal blood or liver panel.
DISCLAIMER
This commentary is the personal opinion of the writer, not a substitute for professional medical prevention, diagnosis, or treatment. Please consult with your physician, pharmacist, or health care provider before taking any home remedies or supplements or following any treatment. Only your health care provider, personal physician, or pharmacist can provide you with advice on what is safe and effective for your unique needs or diagnose your particular medical history.
OTHER ARTICLES
The Medicine Hunter goes on a foraging tour through Central Park with Steve “Wildman” Brill in search of sassafras root. It’s said to help detoxify the liver, and it’s the main ingredient in a popular soft drink.
The Small Organ With a Big Job
Your gallbladder is the smallest major organ in your body, and its importance is often underestimated. This little pear-shaped organ sits beneath your liver; its job is to store and secrete the bile produced by your liver to emulsify fats for digestion. When food passes through your stomach, hormones stimulate your gallbladder to expel bile into the first stage of the small intestine, called the duodenum. Once bile enters the duodenum, it begins to break down fats, allowing them to be absorbed by your small intestine. In addition to emulsifying fats, bile, which is extremely bitter, stimulates peristalsis, the cramp-like movement of your colon which moves food through your intestines. Bile is a mixture of bile acid (also called bile salts) and cholesterol. The cholesterol in bile acts as a buffering agent to prevent bile acids from eating away at your gallbladder and small intestines.
Gallbladder Woes
The most common problem people experience with their gallbladder is gallstones. This condition causes excruciating pain, and most of the time results in the removal of the gallbladder. Every year over half a million gallbladder surgeries (cholecystectomy) are performed. Gallstones are made mostly of cholesterol but have other minerals in them as well. A diet high in fat and cholesterol can contribute to the formation of gallstones.
Common symptoms people experience when they have gallstones include pain and tenderness on the right side of the body, referred pains to the shoulders and the back between the shoulder blades, tension in the hips and thighs, cramping and gas in the abdomen, mental and overall physical tension, and migraine headaches.
Temperament and Gallbladder Health
All emotions are grounded in various parts of the body. A person with a healthy gallbladder will tend to have a balanced temperament, but one whose gallbladder is distressed may likely suffer from suppressed anger or outbursts of ill-temper. This type of behavior may lead to rash decisions. When your liver and gallbladder are balanced and healthy, decisions tend to be made from an emotional equilibrium. When treating people who experience difficulty in making decisions, many Oriental healers will recommend that they eat simply, avoid extremes in emotions, and meditate. The idea is that these practices will help restore harmony throughout the body and facilitate healthy gallbladder function, thereby assisting the person to make the right decisions.
Gallbladder Maintenance
One of the best ways to protect against gallstones is to lower your body’s overall cholesterol level. Avoid high fat foods, such as meat, all dairy, eggs, sugar and honey. Eat foods that are known to strengthen the gallbladder, such as leafy greens, wheat, sour tasting foods (for example grapefruit juice), apple juice (malic acid in apples may help soften gallstones), and cabbage tea. Flaxseed tea may also be helpful during a gallbladder attack. Place 1 tablespoon of organic flaxseed in 12 ounces of good water. Bring to a boil and simmer for 10 minutes. Strain and sip slowly while the tea is hot/warm.
Is Your Liver as Healthy as it Can Be?
Your liver, a large organ with over a thousand duties to perform, has a connection to other areas of your body, as well as to your everyday life. It’s important to be aware that the absence of liver disease does not necessarily mean your liver is healthy and functioning at optimal levels. Take the easy self-tests below to find out if your liver may need your attention.
- Lie down and find your liver. Your liver is located in your right upper abdomen and can often be felt under your rib cage on the right side of your body. With your hands, gently palpitate that area and see if there is any tenderness or discomfort. Close your eyes and meditate on your liver; “feel” your body’s great laboratory and notice any thoughts or feelings that might come to you.
- With your fingertips, press down on your skin, and then quickly lift your finger. If a blanched, white area remains, it may indicate that there is increased vein pressure due to liver congestion.
The task of your liver is essentially to inspect everything you do, what you eat, drink, breathe, think, even your emotions and all of the decisions you make. It is your body’s largest internal organ and reservoir of blood. It plays a major role in digesting foods, eliminating wastes, preventing infection, balancing hormones, and producing essential blood elements.
A person with a strong liver enjoys healthy digestion, clear skin, strength and flexibility, good eyesight, the ability to sleep deeply, and stable emotions, especially the emotion of anger.
A person with an unhealthy liver may experience mood swings, depression, IBS, menstrual problems, eye problems, migraines, gallstones, insomnia with nightmares, and violent behavior.
Fun Facts About Your Liver
- Spring is the season when your liver enjoys an increase in energy (chi).
- Bitter greens, dandelion, kale, spinach, and turnip greens, refresh and revitalize your liver. Sour-tasting foods also energize and invigorate your liver. Foods that stress your liver are sugar, fried foods, alcohol, coffee, caffeine, chocolate, drugs and too much dairy and meat.
- Your liver is a great reservoir of blood and is responsible for supplying adequate blood, oxygen, and energy to muscles, tendons and joints. If they are tight, stiff, or weak, these symptoms may reflect a congested or deficient liver.
- If your liver becomes congested, its ability to send blood, oxygen and energy to your eyes is diminished, which causes weakening of the eye muscles, and affects your eyes’ ability to maintain their original shape.
- Your liver receives optimal amounts of energy between the hours of 1AM and 3AM. If you wake up regularly around this time, it may benefit you to work on calming your liver and your thinking.
