Ways to Love Your Liver to Lowering Your Toxic Burden

Ways to Love Your Liver  to Lowering Your Toxic Burden

“When Life Gives You a Lemon…

…squeeze it, mix it with 6 ounces of distilled water, and drink twice daily,”
quipped Ann Heustad, RN, in a 2004 newspaper column. Lemon juice helps
stimulate the cleansing action of the liver. Although lemon tastes acidic, it helps
raise the pH of your saliva, making it more alkaline. This helps you better absorb
your nutrients.

Try the juice of half a lemon in a glass of water when you wake up, for a
powerful, cleansing way to start the day. Or mix lemon with olive oil in the evening
for a potent liver and gallbladder flush while you sleep. Don’t undervalue the
effectiveness of this underappreciated fruit.

Oranges and tangerines are also powerful liver-supportive fruits, because they,
too, contain limonene, a phytochemical that has been found to thwart cancer in
animal models (Patil et al. 2009). The protective characteristics of limonene are
likely due to the fact that it is a strong stimulator of both phase I and phase II
detoxification enzymes.

Fiber Packs a Punch—Again

Every day, the liver produces about a quart of bile, which transports toxins to be
dumped into the intestines. Once inside the intestines, the bile, with its toxic cargo,
gets absorbed by fiber and is eliminated. A diet low in fiber will undermine this
process, so please recall that the Eating for Health model recommends 30 to 40
grams of fiber daily.

Beets

Beets improve liver function primarily by thinning the bile so that it can move
more freely through the liver and into the small intestine. There, it breaks down fat
and fuels peristalsis, helping to efficiently move waste out of the body. Look for
organically grown beets, because as a root crop, beets are notoriously prone to
absorbing toxins in the soil. We like to roast beets in the oven in pieces, covered
with a thin layer of olive oil and thickly sliced organic onions.