Digestion Basics Part 3- The Gut-Liver Connection
by Manny Aragon
Its been about 3 weeks since my six week gut rebuilding/ liver cleansing protocol ended and here’s whats happened:
My body fat is up
Inflammation is up (I can feel it in my gums)
Sleep is not quite as good
My first pimple appeared yesterday
Im not as energetic- It seems harder to do two workouts in a day
My muscles have tightened and workout soreness has lingered longer than usual.
My stomach is not as settled as usual
Whats changed: In three weeks, I have eaten IN-N-OUT 3 times, I’ve had 4 nights where I’ve drunk alcohol, Ive eaten rice 3 times, Ive eaten not regulated my sugar intake as carefully, and actually, on a lark, drank a cup of decaf coffee once. Additionally, I’ve eaten several foods on the inflammatory list and stopped taking the Tumero/Resveratol/Ultra D (powerful anti-inflammatory) combo.
I wanted to see how long it would take for my digestion, well being, and skin would take to start responding to the changes in my diet. Well- the results came pretty quickly
As a result of the increased burden on my liver, and also my reduced nutrient intake, I can plainly see the changes to my body brought on by metabolic liver triage. You see, metabolic liver triage, while not a technical term, is my way of explaining what happens to liver functionality when it becomes bogged down by the metabolic needs of digestion- It literally has to choose how much energy to allocate to its myriad functions and metabolic needs take precedence.
Lets take a look at why this is a problem for the body shall we?
The makeup of intestinal bacteria and the foods that you eat help to determine the level of integrity of the lining of your gut. The gut lining, in turn, helps to regulate what you absorb and what your body keeps out of the internal environment. Some things should just not be in there. When these things do get past the gut lining- for example, if it is “leaky”- the body responds with systemic (body wide) inflammation.
Now to the liver. The liver handles myriad functions in the body. It is truly a miracle organ for all of its usefulness. It creates hormones from the fats that we eat, it regulates blood sugar and stores ready reserves, it secretes bile into the intestine to help us digest, break down, and absorb fats, it regulates blood fats, cholesterol, and it detoxifies toxins that are either ingested directly, absorbed, or created as the by-products of digestion and other bodily mechanisms.
When we overeat and when we eat foods that are difficult to digest, and/or contain toxins (like grains, simple sugars, fake fats, and man modified fats) it causes our liver to concentrate its efforts on processing these things at the expense of others. This allows toxins to build up in the body, inflammation to run rampant (with its long term predictable consequences) and metabolic disease to progress.
The best way to get out of this situation is to eat an anti- inflammatory whole foods based diet. The catch is- it takes a while to clean your body out. Even with a good diet. And this discourages people so they then go back to their old ways. Further compounding the problem. A detox and cleanse helps to speed this process along- getting results much more quickly and proving its effectiveness while providing motivation from results the participant can see and feel.
I encourage you to find out more by attending our complimentary webinar on this topic on Wednesday March 27th from 4:00-5:00 pm. Register HERE