The Truth About Detoxing

detox

The best part about detoxing is that your body does it naturally. Seriously, that’s what your kidneys and liver are for. The WORST part about detoxing is that it’s become a pseudoscience fad and the environment has to suffer.

In fact, a lot of detoxes are actually harmful for you. And how are they harmful for the environment? Because these “detox solutions” often come in the form of pills or powder, which is often packaged in plastic. So basically, you are scamming your body and polluting the environment, and it might be making you ill.

Here’s what WebMD says about detoxes:

“They’re popular, but they aren’t proven to do what they say they’ll do: flush toxins out of your system. In fact, they may be risky and even backfire.” Source.

So how to you cleanse your body without the risky backfire? Easy, support your organ’s natural functions by staying hydrated, eating healthy, taking a break from alcohol/soda (if you indulge), and avoid smoking at all costs.

If you are truly worried about the health of your liver or kidneys, don’t assume anything, ask your doctor, and if they are worried, they will run blood tests to test their function.

There actually are natural products that will help lower your ALT/AST levels (which are the enzymes produced by your liver, and when high, indicate there is an issue). Your doctor will let you know the safest course of action.

Don’t fall for diet fads, or health fads, or even vitamins fads, if you read up on the history of how vitamins became a commercial “necessity,” it’s actually a little scary. Also, are your vitamins/supplements FDA approved? Why not? Look into that.

vits.gif

Good idea: checking with your doctor and taking a *recommended* supplement or multivitamin.

Bad idea: assuming you need extra nutrients and taking handfuls of vitamins and supplements because it sounds healthy.

I don’t trust doctors blindly, but they are licensed for a reason. I would definitely listen to my doctor before listening to Steve – the Whole Foods employee in the soap aisle with the blonde soul patch. No offense Steve, you are great.

Adam Ruins Everything – Why Detox Cleanses are a Rip-Off | truTV

Resources:

WebMD: The Truth About Detox Diets

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s