Detox Articles

Article / Updated 09-27-2023

If you have food allergies, you need to avoid certain foods. Never eat the specific food you are allergic to, of course, but also make sure to avoid caffeine, sugar, and alcohol. The most allergenic foods include eggs, soy, wheat, tree nuts, peanuts, milk, and shellfish. Luckily, there are many foods you can eat! Vegetables and fruits, along with salmon, local honey, and tea, are all excellent sources of nutrients, especially omega-3 fatty acids. You’ll start feeling better when eating to detox your body. Garlic Salmon Vegetable Salad Preparation time: 20 minutes Cooking time: 7 minutes Yield: 4 servings Ingredients: 5 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil 2 tablespoons flaxseed oil 1/3 cup freshly squeezed orange juice 2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice 1 tablespoon mustard 1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper 1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves 2 tablespoons olive oil 5 cloves organic garlic, peeled and minced 1 pound wild Alaskan salmon 1 organic red bell pepper, chopped 1 organic yellow bell pepper, chopped 8 ounces organic button mushrooms, sliced 4 cups dark leafy organic greens 1 cup mung bean sprouts Instructions: In small bowl, combine extra virgin olive oil, flaxseed oil, orange juice, lemon juice, mustard, cayenne pepper, and thyme; mix well and set aside. Heat 2 tablespoons olive oil in skillet over medium heat. Add garlic; cook 1 minute. Then add salmon; sauté 4 minutes, then turn. Sauté 2–3 minutes longer until just cooked. Remove salmon and garlic from heat; let cool 10 minutes. Break salmon into chunks. Combine salmon with bell peppers and mushrooms in large bowl; pour dressing over all. Toss to mix. Serve on greens; garnish with sprouts. Per serving: Calories 469 (From Fat 319); Fat 35g (Saturated 5g); Cholesterol 53mg; Sodium 180mg; Carbohydrate 13g; Dietary Fiber 3g; Protein 27g.

Cheat Sheet / Updated 03-27-2016

To be truly healthy, you have to limit the amount of toxins entering your system and be proactive about detoxifying the harmful substances already in your body. By making smart food choices, improving your eating habits, boosting your health with dietary supplements, and exercising every day, you can decrease your toxicity and improve your health naturally.

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

Grocery stores are designed to encourage maximum sales, not maximum health. In fact, grocery store layouts discourage healthy food choices – the kinds of choices required by a detox diet. The aisles in the center are full of processed foods; you often have to walk past a bakery to get to the produce; and the last items you see as you’re waiting in line to check out are candy bars and sodas. To make the healthiest, least toxic food choices when you’re shopping for food, keep these tips in mind: Stick to the perimeter of the store. Even though you have to pass the bakery on this route, you also find the produce, meat, and dairy sections there. The less time you spend in the aisles full of canned and boxed foods, the better. Read all food labels, and don’t buy foods with ingredients you can’t pronounce. Whenever possible, buy foods that are 100 percent organic. Don’t buy any item that contains high fructose corn syrup. Buy fish with the lowest mercury content. Avoid any farm-raised fish, and opt for wild Alaskan salmon whenever possible. Pick out plenty of spices to liven up your dishes and increase the amount of antioxidants you include in your diet. If you’re going to eat beef, make sure it’s grass-fed and 100 percent organic. Don’t buy or eat any white foods except cauliflower and mushrooms.

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

All of us need to take vitamin, mineral, and other supplements to ensure good nutrition and to aid our bodies’ natural detoxification efforts. If you decide to purchase supplements, make sure you’re buying safe, effective varieties. Otherwise, you’re throwing your money away. Here are some questions to ask when considering which supplements to purchase: Are the products made in the United States? Standards for purity are generally higher in the United States than in many other countries. Stick with supplements made in the United States whenever possible. Does the supplement company make its own products? Sometimes the company on the label is simply repackaging supplements that are made elsewhere. Buy from companies that make their own products. Does the company have a research department? The answer you’re looking for is “yes.” You want to buy from a company that conducts thorough in-house research on its products and makes that research available to consumers. Are the supplements made in a facility that follows Good Manufacturing Practice regulations (which are specified by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration)? If not, look elsewhere! In a mineral product, is clay one of the ingredients? If so (which is often the case), don’t buy the product. In a mineral product, are the minerals chelated? You want chelated minerals whenever you can get them. Does the company test every batch of its supplements? Does it use an outside, independent lab for the tests? Can it provide you with the test results? You want a resounding “yes” to all three questions. When you find a company that answers “yes,” buy all your products from it. In a calcium product, are you getting calcium hydroxylapatite, calcium citrate, or calcium carbonate? Hydroxylapatite is the best, citrate will do, and carbonate is not worth your money.

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

If toxins are making you ill, you need to work with a doctor or other healthcare professional to get proper diagnosis and treatment. And if detoxification is a health priority for you — whether you’re sick or not — you need a doctor whose training goes beyond traditional medicine. The doctor you need will integrate ideas from traditional and alternative treatments to create the best treatment program for you. (Hence the term integrative physician.) To locate a physician who is open to and familiar with detox dieting and the ideas behind detoxification, contact one these organizations: American College for Advancement in Medicine (ACAM): Visit the Web site or call 1-800-532-3688 to tap into ACAM’s Physician Referral Service. You can search for a doctor by last name (if you already have someone in mind), by zip code, and/or by specialty. International College of Integrative Medicine (ICIM): The ICIM Web site features a service called “Find a Practitioner.” You can search by state, zip code, and/or specialty. You can also e-mail ICIM to request information.

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

Making smart food choices is only half the battle when it comes to eating right. To make the most of your detox diet, be sure to adopt the following eating habits: Eat slowly. Don’t multitask during your meals, and don’t eat in front of the television. Focus on the food in front of you, and take your time with it. Chew your food thoroughly. Your mouth plays an essential role in digestion. The more you chew, the smaller the bites of food are when they enter your stomach and intestines, allowing your body to extract nutrients more effectively. Plus, chewing soaks the food in saliva, which is a super fluid that aids your body in many ways, including by decreasing the acidity of the food you’re eating and starting the digestion of starches. Take a 15-minute rest after each meal. A rest isn’t always possible, of course, but you should strive to take this break whenever your schedule allows. Doing so helps you make sure your digestive system gets all the blood flow it needs to perform effectively. (Moving immediately after a meal forces your muscles to divert blood away from your digestive system.) Don’t skip breakfast! You need the essential energy that healthy, non-toxic food provides. People who skip breakfast tend to overeat later in the day — and to make poor food choices. Plan your meals ahead of time. If you don’t plan your meals, you may succumb to cravings and compromise your detox diet by eating processed foods or fast food. Don’t drink beverages while eating. This suggestion sounds odd to many people, especially because we often hear that drinking water before, during, and after a meal can help you lose weight. But drinking too much during a meal dilutes your stomach acid, which means your stomach can’t properly digest food. To maximize your nutrient absorption and minimize digestive problems such as gas, bloating, and constipation, save your drinks for between meals.

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

If you’re not enjoying optimal health, or if you’re struggling with obesity, you need to take a good, hard look at the many benefits of a detox diet. Changing what you eat (and how you eat it) so that you’re focusing on wholesome, healthy foods and cutting out toxic ingredients is the first and most important step toward ensuring good health and maintaining a healthy weight. The principles for detox dieting are relatively simple, but the changes they require can be pretty tough. (They’re not as tough, however, as living an unhealthy and obese life.) Losing those extra, harmful pounds Not many people make the connection between toxins and obesity, but clear, proven relationships exist that you need to understand if you want to stay at a healthy weight. Getting on (and sticking with) a detox diet will go a long way toward minimizing your toxicity. And if you can make detox dieting a part of your life for life, you’ll lose the extra, harmful pounds that weigh you down and damage your health. Body fat is toxic! You don’t run into many people who are fond of fat, and for good reason. In addition to being unattractive in the eyes of many people, fat is also a storehouse for toxins in your body. Fat-soluble toxins are tucked away in fat cells to prevent them from harming your organs and other vital tissues, and when the toxins are more concentrated, the fat cells get bigger in an effort to keep them diluted. If you can avoid toxins and detoxify the toxins you’re already carrying around with you, shedding fat becomes much easier. Body fat stresses your body’s systems For every pound of fat your body makes, it has to make about 4 miles of blood vessels. Carrying 25 extra pounds of fat means your heart has to pump blood through another 100 miles of vessels. As you can imagine, that’s not good news for the most important muscle in your body, and it’s just the beginning. Fat wreaks havoc on your joints, contributes to diabetes, and causes too many other conditions to list here. Lose the toxins, lose the unhealthy foods from your diet, and you’ll lose the fat. And then your health will flourish. Tackling unhealthy habits Choosing the right toxin-free foods and ensuring that your eating habits are as healthy as possible will do more than just help you to eliminate excess fat. Giving your body the healthy fuel that it needs can also be a critical factor in helping to kick unhealthy habits like drinking and smoking. What’s more, if you really embrace detox dieting, you can greatly enhance the recovery and healing process that takes place after you’ve put down the bottle and snuffed out your last cigarette. Pair those dietary choices with some more detoxification efforts — saunas, for instance — and you can go from an unhealthy smoker or drinker to a healthy, detoxified person in a fraction of the time.

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

The food choices you make can have a tremendous impact on your allergies. Of course, when it comes to food allergies, the choices you make about what you eat can be a matter of life or death (in extreme cases). But even with more common allergies, like pet or seasonal allergies, you can make a lot of headway just by picking out the right food options. As always, the general rules for food apply: Avoid toxins by cutting out processed foods, skip on foods that contain additives, and eat organic whenever possible (remembering that 100 percent organic is the best). Just taking these steps can do you a world of good because you’ll eliminate the toxic load from your diet and greatly reduce the stress you put on your immune system. Here are a few examples of healthful foods that will help you keep your body in tip-top shape and less likely to fall prey to uncomfortable and dangerous allergies: Fish and fish oil: Be sure to keep in mind — and avoid — the types of fish that commonly contain mercury. Fruits: Apples, blueberries, and papaya are a great place to start. Green vegetables: Try broccoli, spinach, Brussels sprouts, and asparagus. Orange or yellow vegetables: Carrots, squash, peppers, and pumpkin are just a few examples. Choosing locally grown or produced foods is another way to lessen your allergy troubles. One of the top choices is local honey, made by bees that live in your area. This may sound a little farfetched, but local honey can help you with your allergies. All honey contains very small amounts of pollen, which bees constantly bring back to their hives after visiting hundreds and thousands of plants to collect the nectar that provides their food source. Local honey contains trace amounts of the types of pollen that are most common in your area — the pollens that cause your seasonal allergies to flare up twice a year (or more for some people). When you eat the honey, you expose your body to just a little bit of the pollen — not too much. Over time, your immune system figures out how to deal with these allergens in a healthy, normal way, instead of going haywire and causing dreadful allergy symptoms like sneezing, wheezing, and itchy eyes. Even if you haven’t had problems with food allergies in the past, it always helps to be alert when you’re eating top offenders like milk, wheat (gluten), eggs, peanuts, shellfish, soy, and tree nuts. If you experience troubling allergy symptoms after consuming these types of foods, consult your doctor.

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

Bacteria are on and in us all the time, including the kinds of bacteria that can cause infections. The trick is that they’re present in extremely small numbers, and they don’t start being harmful unless they’re given the chance to multiply. You want to make sure the bacteria around you don’t get enough momentum to grow in number and challenge your immune system on a dangerous level. Here goes: Wash your hands and bathe regularly. Although this is some pretty basic advice, the importance of washing your hands can't be overstated — especially before you eat anything. Bathing on a regular basis is equally important. If you do these two things, you’ll greatly reduce the bacterial threat without much effort at all. Wash your food. Of course, it doesn’t do you much good to wash your hands if bacteria are on your food. Fruits and vegetables should be washed thoroughly as soon as you get them home. Most people wait to wash until they’re going to eat their produce, but it’s better to wash it as soon as you get home from the store. Don’t let fruits and vegetables sit unwashed in the fridge or on the counter because that situation encourages bacterial growth and also allows any toxins on the produce to continue to penetrate into the interior of the food. Cook meat thoroughly. If you eat meat, be sure it’s cooked all the way through. And don’t allow meat to sit at room temperature for any extended period of time. Maintain a healthy level of stomach acid. You need the right amount and strength of stomach acid to kill off the bacteria that could otherwise enter your body through your digestive system. To assure that your stomach acid is at the right levels, don’t take acid reducers unless you have documented high acid levels. If you have problems with acid reflux or ulcers, you need to see a doctor and be tested for H. pylori, a bacterium that causes many of these types of ailments. You also need to have your stomach acid level tested with the Heidelberg gastric analysis. You can go to this doctor referral site to find a physician who has this equipment and can do the testing. Avoid contaminated water. If your main source of water is a well, make sure you have it tested for the presence of dangerous bacteria. If you travel internationally, be sure to drink water that you know has been treated to kill bacteria and other microorganisms. (Bottled water may be your only option in these situations.) When you travel to another country, don’t assume that you can drink from a water source just because you see the locals drinking from it. People adapt to the bacteria where they live, and what is commonplace and not detrimental to the health of one person in one area could cause disease in another person.

Article / Updated 03-26-2016

If you need or want to have amalgam fillings in your teeth removed, you and your dentist should follow these protocols to limit your exposure to the toxic mercury they contain. The patient’s protocol before dental work on amalgam fillings As the patient, you should take the following supplements starting before your fillings are removed: Cilantro: Helps with mercury removal Vitamin C: Improves immunity and detoxification Alpha-lipoic acid: Aids liver health Garlic: Boosts immunity and has sulfur Kidney formula (with juniper and uva ursi): Strengthens kidney health Liver formula (with milk thistle and olive leaf): Boosts liver health Vitamin D: Aids kidney function and bones Turmeric: Helps immunity Vitamin B complex: Aids liver function You should also take detox baths once a week while the fillings are being removed. This aids the removal of mercury and other heavy metals from the skin. In the bath water, add 2 cups Epsom Salt (which contains magnesium sulfate) 1 cup baking soda 2 to 3 teaspoons of powdered vitamin C 2 to 3 teaspoons of yellow mustard powder These substances will help pull heavy metals from the skin. Yellow mustard contains sulfur, for example, which bonds to mercury and pulls it out of the skin. Soak in the tub for 15 to 20 minutes, and then scrub your skin with soap. The bath water will begin to turn dark gray and cloudy. The discoloration will leave a ring around the tub, which lab tests have found to contain aluminum, lead, and mercury. For additional assurance, you can have an IV with vitamin C before the filling removal and a chelation treatment with DMPS after removal. The dentist’s protocol when removing silver-colored fillings The dentist should use a certified mercury removal protocol, which includes these measures: Clean air filtration in the room where fillings are being removed A rubber dam to prevent mercury pieces from being swallowed or inhaled Water coolant to keep the filling from heating up (because heat releases toxic mercury vapors) High-speed suction or vacuum for removing toxic vapors and debris Filtration masks for all employees in the room while the procedure is performed If your dentist won’t follow this protocol, search for a dentist who will. Online, look for biological or holistic dentists at these Web sites: The International Academy of Oral Medicine & Toxicology The International Academy of Biological Dentistry and Medicine The Holistic Dental Association