FERTILE-ME : FOOD AND I - LET'S GET DETOXIFIED!

Ok, my last Fertile-Me blog was explaining a little bit about hormonal imbalance and the endocrine system and I also mentioned some factors that may cause hormonal imbalance amongst which are stress and environmental factors . These two factors I believe are the most human manageable factors. So today I would be talking more about importance of detoxification by body organs (especially the kidney and liver) and how healthy foods and acupuncture may help regulate or fix hormone balance.

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Then My first real test comes today as I was asked by my acupuncturist to get on a 3 days fruit diet and two weeks diet of no white rice, no seasoning, no salt, no cold foods, no sugars! Mehn, I am finished!!! How am I supposed to survive this month? Ok so This new food prescription I was told helps to cleanse the body system and encourage better body detoxification. So it got me wondering how does detoxification help with hormonal imbalance? This gave rise to today's Fertile-Me blog topic:

Hormonal Imbalance: Kidney ,Liver Detoxification and Acupuncture Solutions

Overall body detoxification is very important for healthy living as toxic substances exist practically everywhere. Most times toxic chemicals find their ways into the body from exposures to chemicals in the environment, but some toxins are produced through normal body chemical reactions in the body. The human body was designed to combat and eliminate toxins with organs and systems to carry out detoxification naturally and keep the body healthy; these organ systems include the skin, the digestive tract, and the lungs, but two organs are especially important: the liver and the kidneys.

The Lungs detoxify by removing gaseous toxins (for example gas anaesthetics are removed from the body by the lungs).

The Digestive System detoxifies by eliminating toxic foods either by vomiting or diarrhoea.

The Skin detoxifies by reducing the penetration of toxic substances (water soluble toxins don't get in through the skin well; however, oil soluble toxins do penetrate easily).

The Kidneys detoxify by secreting toxins or filtering toxins out of the blood into urine.

The Liver detoxifies by changing the chemical nature of many toxins. Ref

The liver is well known to be the busiest organ in the body. It has over 500 functions including detoxification. Toxins, poisons and a lot of metabolic by-products that are generated by body metabolism need to be detoxified and eliminated. These metabolic by-products include broken down blood cells, cellular waste and – of course – hormones

When it comes to hormones and the liver, estrogen is the most important with regards to female fertility as it is a hormone that is intricately involved with the menstrual cycle and all things female.

The liver’s major detoxification role is to covert toxins which are mostly fat soluble to water soluble forms and make them less toxic or excreted easily.

It has 2 phases for detoxification.

At Phase I toxic chemicals are converted to a less harmful chemical. This is achieved by various chemical reactions such as oxidation, reduction and hydrolysis. During this process free radicals are produced, and an excess of this free radicals can destroy the liver cells. Antioxidants such as vitamin C and E and natural carotenoids help fight or reduce the damage caused by these free radicals. If antioxidants are lacking and toxin exposure is high, toxic chemicals become far more dangerous.

At Phase II toxins are made water soluble to be excreted through bile and urine. Here, the liver adds another substance (eg. glycine, cysteine or a sulphur molecule) to a toxic chemical or drug, to render them less harmful. Thus this phase have pathways called the conjugation pathways.

In the Phase II liver detoxification process, one of the liver’s pathway that processes estrogen is the sulfation pathway.
Here if there is a build up of toxins from chemicals like pesticides or environmental pollutions, estrogen will remain in the body and start to build up. Over time, this build up results to elevated estrogen levels thereby generally causing hormone imbalance. This is a major underlying factor that causes things like, PCOS, PMS, fibroids, endometriosis, ovarian cysts and many other health issues women face.

For stimulation of Phase II detoxification or efficient detoxification, Sulphur containing foods and amino acids are essential nutrients the body will require. Below are examples of food to take to aid stimulation of liver phase II detoxification.

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Eggs and cruciferous vegetables (eg. broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower. brussels sprouts) onions, leeks, raw garlic and shallots are all great sources of natural sulphur compounds to enhance phase two detoxification.

Amino Acids: Glutathione, N-Acetyl-cysteine (NAC), methionine and taurine are all sulfur-containing amino acids that will open up multiple liver pathways and flush toxins out. They contain antioxidant properties and are also powerful liver detoxifiers.

The Brassica family vegetables have been long revered for their positive role on liver function mostly due to their high sulfur content. These include cabbage, kale, broccoli, kohlrabi, collards, turnip, rutabaga and Brussels sprouts. Other beneficial foods include onions, garlic, eggs, flax, and beets.

Herbs like Milk thistle, dandelion, turmeric, artichoke and chanca piedra (aka “stone crusher” – amazing for gallstones!) are powerful detoxifiers and rejuvenators. Milk thistle is a liver protector, while turmeric gives additional benefits like anti-inflammatory and anti-cancer.

Mineral and Vitamins that support general liver detoxification include vitamin C, zinc, magnesium, B-complex and omega 3 oils.

Nutrients specific to estrogen metabolism:

These can be taken together.

Indole-3-carbinol (I-3-C) & DIM (diindolylmethane) – extracts from the brassica vegetable family contain sulphur and their actions directly target the estrogen pathway.

Fibre is needed to bind estrogen in the colon and prevent its re-absorption.

Probiotics help prevent bound of estrogen in the colon from becoming unbound and reabsorbed

Calcium-d-glucorate prevents pathogenic bacteria from converting bound estrogen in the colon to unbound estrogen and being reabsorbed.

This might be a lot to take in at once. If you are unsure of what to eat please seek professional help/advice. It is also important to allow time play its role. While the liver can be cleansed relatively quickly, hormones take a much longer time to get back into balance. (Hoping mine doesn't take so much time, to avoid me fretting!)

Bitter herbs too help improve phase 1 and 2 detoxification by promoting the flow of bile thus assisting the liver in its detoxifying capacity. This is because the bitter taste on the tongue stimulates specific bitter taste buds at the back of the tongue that stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system to trigger a number of reflexes. These reflexes are important to the digestive process and general well being. Ref

Not to be a bore I had to drop a list of foods or fruits you can eat for better liver detoxification and I will post about how acupuncture helps detoxification process in the next Fertile-me blog. I am off to the market to get me some fruits! I don't know if i can survive on fruits alone. Wish me well people!