THE FORGOTTEN ORGANS OF DETOXIFICATION
By Nettie Ramsay, ND
I guess it is understandable that your skin, bowels, lungs, kidneys and liver are not at the forefront of your mind every single day; that they are the origins that can save your life if you take care of them. Why do so many people have constipation? Why do so many have kidney disease? Liver issues? COPD? Skin problems? Because the organs of elimination or detoxification are overwhelmed and when they are overwhelmed they stop functioning properly. Toxins are simple to understand, like electricity, they take the path of least resistance. If you have a weak area that is not able to combat the toxic assault our bodies are under,, that’s where the toxins land. If you do nothing about eliminating the toxins, that’s where the toxins will stay.
In the 1930s Dr. Henry G Bieler, wrote a book called, “Food Is Your Best Medicine.” Amazon calls this book a pioneering nutritional classic. What I learned about detoxification from Dr. Bieler is still monumental in my natural health practice: a. If your liver is unhealthy it throws toxins to the blood, and b. If your kidneys are unhappy and unable to process toxins properly they throw toxins to your lungs.
Your body is doing what it needs to do to help with elimination and detoxification. Those angry, red splotches on your skin may actually be toxins thrown off by the liver. The original detoxification plan is that your lymphatic system gathers up toxins from the blood and takes them to your liver. Your liver then processes them and sends the toxins to the bowel and they are eliminated. Now, if you do not eliminate in a timely manner while all the toxins are sitting in your bowel, your blood runs through and recirculates the toxins.
When your blood has too many toxins to handle they start coming out through your skin. Actually, your skin is the largest organ of elimination, and your body is doing what it is supposed to do. If your body is already eliminating toxins, using drugs to stop that reaction and send the toxins back into your body could be doing more harm than good. The real answer to the red, splotchy skin might be proper elimination. By not eliminating toxins through the bowel on a regular and timely basis we add to the toxins that are circulating. My clients often ask, what is normal bowel elimination? Unfortunately, normal is chronic constipation. We don’t want normal, we want healthy, regular elimination. I counsel my clients to have a goal of one bowel movement, per meal, per day. Think of this as a goal; if you’ve been constipated for 30 years it is unlikely that you’re going to reach that goal in a week, a month or even a year. The more toxins that you eliminate normally; the fewer toxins you will have to deal with by other means.
Kidneys are even more forgotten and neglected than bowels. While kidney disease runs rampant in our nation; how many public service announcements have you seen or heard telling people to take care of their kidneys? Okay, how many kidney dialysis clinics have you seen popping up in residential neighborhoods? Men and women of Hispanic and African-American heritage are the biggest sufferers of kidney disease. We have often heard that diabetes is the silent killer; I would call the silent killer: kidney disease. The non-profit organization The Kidney Disease Fund stated that in 2015 ”kidney disease was the 9TH leading cause of death in the United States. An estimated 31 million people in the United States (10% of the adult population) have chronic kidney disease (CKD). Nine out of 10 people who have stage 3 CKD (moderately decreased kidney function) do not know it...” Is there anything that you can do if you do have kidney disease? Do you just wait until it damages your kidney function so badly you need dialysis? Those thoughts are just too sad, of course there are things that can be done.
Don’t wait until you break, detoxification is a huge part of being healthy. Whether people know it or not, building health means getting rid of the toxins you have accumulated. Drinking good water is probably the most important issue for detoxification and building health. Your kidneys need water to keep the toxins flowing out, most people are dehydrated and don’t know it. The small intestine takes out nutrients and after the leftovers go to the large intestine, the only thing it removes is water. If you are not drinking enough water it will reflect in slower bowel transport time.
When I say good water, I mean either spring water or good filtered water preferably not in plastic. If the only thing we are able to do for detoxification is drink water in the correct amount we will be doing something positive. Dr. Carolyn Dean is a conventional medical doctor and a naturopath, she recommends drinking half of your body weight in ounces per day. That means if you weigh 150 pounds you would drink 75 ounces of water per day. In addition to that she recommends that you add ¼ teaspoon Himalayan or Celtic Sea salt per quart. Both Celtic salt and Himalayan salt contain all the minerals of the ocean, which is exactly what our bodies need. Consider giving it a try, this way you will be taking care of a couple of those forgotten organs.
Nettie Ramsay ND, 281-794-5255, has a teaching practice in Houston, Texas and can help you with Nutritional Issues, Hair Tissue Mineral Analysis, Nutritional Blood Analysis and New Decision Therapy.