Can Learning To Detox Your Body Boost Your Natural Defenses
Saturday, September 20th, 2008 Subscribe To Our Feed
I’ve always considered myself to be fairly healthy and in reasonably good shape. I’ve hardly ever been ill, and can’t remember the last time I had a cold or virus of any kind - or at least not that lasted longer than about 12 hours. So it was completely out of the blue when I began feeling constantly tired and lethargic, and I was even finding it hard to get up in the morning. Over the course of about 12 months I’d seen my doctor many times and had all the tests he threw at me, but they couldn’t find anything wrong with me.
Over dinner one evening a herbalist friend of mine advised me that I should look into doing a detox, and put some effort into learning how to detox the body and how my eating habits may be affecting my health. I didn’t know the first thing about detoxing, so I spent a few weeks doing some research to learn all about it, and get to grips with what is really involved and why the natural health industry recommend following a detox diet and in particular the 7 day detox diet so strongly.
Something else she recommended I try was a foot detox. I now treat myself to a foot massage at least once a week, if you don’t want to invest in a foot spa, the foot detox can work just as well - but doing it this way you miss out on the relaxing foot massage at the same time
There are some very simple things you can do to help detox your body.
Lots of water and herbal teas
Making sure you take in plenty of fluids is very important while you are following a detox diet because the water will help your body excrete toxins from your system. Drinking plenty of water also has other health benefits like promoting regular bowel movements, helps your internal organs function more efficiently, and encourage clear skin. Your goal should be to drink about 8 glasses (or 2 liters) of water each day, although you will need more in hot weather or on days when you are exercising.
As a rule of thumb, for every hour that your exercise each day, drink an extra 2 glasses of water. Tap water which has been filtered to remove the chlorine and impurities is the best option. Keep your water at room temperature as it’s more refreshing that way. Feel free to substitute herbal teas if you can’t face all that water - loose leaf tea is the better option if it’s available. Green tea, horsetail, camomile and roibosch (or redbush) are particularly good as their additional properties assist in the detox process. Roibosch and green tea is especially healthy as it is rich in antioxidants.
Choose Organic Food Where Possible
Buying organic produce where possible is better for your health but not totally necessary, because organic is usually much more expensive, but if you can afford to stretch to buying a few organic products it will be a great help.
If you can’t buy many organic foods, don’t worry. Just eating plenty of fresh fruits and veg is more important regardless of them being organic or not, than skimp on quantities. However, there are some good reasons for going organic on a healthy detox diet.
The use of artificial chemicals, pesticides and fertilizers are not allowed when growing organic foods, which means they are very low or even free from toxins like man made chemicals and toxins. Organic farming is a hotly debated and controversial topic because there’s a lot of evidence that the accumulation of toxins from man made chemicals and bug sprays overtime may cause health problems in the future.
There is a lot less processing of organic produce on its journey to your kitchen. Ultimately this means organic foods not genetically modified and are free from hydrogenated fats and artificial additives. On top of that, organic foods usually taste better too.
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