How to Detox Your Body
Spring is in the air! This week, I have noticed the sounds of melting snow dripping through the gutters and birds tweeting outside the window. I saw the matted-down leaves that escaped fall raking finally exposed after months under a snowy blanket and sunlight dancing off still-barren trees even after dinner was complete. I have that familiar, hopeful pull to think about gardening, grilling, and patio time. Unfortunately, I have also started to see another sign of the season that does not give me the same sense of hope—talk of spring detoxes.
Of course, this chatter of cleansing your body and removing toxins isn’t strictly limited to springtime, but it does seem to have a spike around this time. The idea of shedding our winter coats and spring cleaning doesn’t seem to stop with our clothes and our homes. It is more frequently about our bodies, too.
It is important to keep in mind a few things as you navigate detox and cleanse messages during this time of year. First, your body has a pretty amazing system in place that detoxes your body on a daily basis. And second, all those packages of juices, shakes, and supplements are trying to profit off your fears. The very same fears that those products are perpetuating in their marketing. One way to avoid the pitfalls of very convincing marketing messages cultivated to help you part with your hard-earned dollars in exchange for a box of green juice or a canister of powder is to know more about how the body works.
Where do toxins come from?
How did the toxins even get into your body to start with? Well, there are a few different ways; some come from outside of the body, things like prescription or over-the-counter drugs, chemicals from things like treating your lawn or fertilizing gardens (and large-scale farms), and cleaning and personal care products, just to name a few. But then there are toxins, like the phone call in horror movies, that come from inside the body. When the body goes about its business of digesting food to maintain itself, some toxins are created along the way.
Most often, these toxic compounds are fat-soluble and can be stored in our adipose tissue (aka fat). This can be one reason quick weight loss can result in feeling less than stellar. Toxins are quickly released into a body that is likely also experiencing a deficiency in key nutrients that support proper detoxification. This creates a backlog of toxins to manage, leading to an increase in undesirable effects on the body like inflammation and tissue damage. Just another reason in an already long list of reasons to avoid extreme weight-loss diets.
Alright, so we have this mix of toxins in the body from the normal process of living in the world, but, as I mentioned, the body has tools to deal with them.
What does the body do with toxins?
The way the body gets toxins out is through things like pee, poop, and sweat. For the most part, these are water-based excretions, and toxins are fat-based. I think we can all remember the elementary school demonstration of mixing colored water with vegetable oil. No matter how hard we shook that jar, it only took a few minutes for those substances to separate to their own sides, like a middle school dance. So how do we get fat-soluble toxins out in these water-based excretions?
Detox HQ: the LIver
I would like to introduce you to an amazing organ you have hanging out in the upper right-hand side of your midsection, the liver. A lot of life-supporting activity happens in the liver, but for now, we are going to focus on its role in detoxification.
The liver has a two-phase detoxification pathway to rid the body of toxins. Two-phase simply means there are two steps in the process. Phase one is a series of reactions that take the fat-soluble toxins and makes them a little more water-friendly. However, this process also makes the toxins much more reactive and damaging. It is the classic case of “it gets worse before it gets better.”
Do you know what is required to support this first phase? Yep, nutrients! Things like B vitamins, flavonoids, phospholipids, and branch-chain amino acids. Ideally, we would like to move quickly from the first phase to the second phase to minimize the amount of time that the toxins spend in the intermediary, reactive state that can damage tissues. But to support this in-between state, having a good intake of antioxidants like Vitamins A, C, and E, selenium, zinc, thiols, and bioflavonoids, from foods colorful fruits, vegetables, herbs, and spices, help minimize the potential damage.
It is phase two that takes those reactive intermediates and turns them into substances that the body can actually excrete through the previously mentioned pee, poop, and sweat. And guess what? Phase two also needs nutrients, but different nutrients than phase one. The second step requires lots of amino acids like glycine, taurine, glutamine, cysteine, and methionine. Amino acids come from the protein in our foods.
Often, detox and cleanse programs ramp up the first phase of detoxification but don’t supply the necessary nutrients (like protein) to finish the job. This has the potential to leave your body in a more damaged state than before you started the detox.
What does it all mean?
Ok, so what does this all mean in terms of how to detox our body? In short, it means we don’t need to buy expensive detox and cleanse programs.
Your body needs you to eat plenty of vegetables, proteins, and healthy fats to keep the liver detoxification system humming along. Fiber is important to help move waste products through the intestinal tract to be excreted. (Those juice cleanses that literally throw the fiber in the garbage? Not so great!).
Staying hydrated by drinking enough water (and water-containing foods like vegetables and fruits) to pee and sweat is also a good detox move. Speaking of sweat, try to do it every day. Exercise is the obvious option, but the use of infrared saunas or hot baths can help.
The other thing you can address is some of the sources of outside toxins. Now we can’t control everything in the environment, but choosing organic foods, when feasible, can reduce the pesticide intake that the liver needs to process. Reminder: Eating fruits and vegetables is beneficial regardless of if they are organically or conventionally produced.
Finding greener options for cleaners and personal care products does the same. Stop chemically treating your lawn and gardens. Install a water filtration system. Clean the air in your home with the help of an air purifier or fill your space with green plants. These are all ways to reduce the load that comes into the body.
Now, there are some people with genetic variations, or who need to take life-supporting drugs, or who have an overload from exposure to heavy metals or molds that may need more help than a nutrient-dense diet and regular exercise can provide. Those individuals should work with a licensed practitioner to find support specific to their unique needs.
For the rest of us, making small changes to our daily habits to reduce our exposure to external toxins and to support our liver with a nutrient-dense diet to efficiently run the detoxification process is a better investment of our time and money than any flashy green juice detoxification plan. If you struggle to maintain a nutrient-dense diet or you aren’t regularly peeing, pooping, or sweating, reach out for additional personalized support – no gritty daily shakes required.
The information provided is for educational and informational purposes only. It is not intended to be medical advice or to diagnosis, treat, cure or prevent any disease. This information does not replace a one-on-one relationship with a physician or healthcare professional. Dietary changes and/or the taking of nutritional supplements may have differing effects on individuals.
To learn more about how working with a nutritionist could help you, schedule a free 15 minute call.