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Your gut health is the key to your overall health. As Dr. Tom O’Bryan says, “if there is only one thing you are going to do to be as healthy as possible, focus on creating an anti-inflammatory environment in your gut.” With 80% of our immunity in our gut, your health suffers when your microbiome is out of balance.
I like to think of our bodies as boiling pots and can only handle so much toxic stress before boiling over. We are increasingly exposed to high levels of toxicity through our environment, emotional stress, and food. It may seem overwhelming, and you might be wondering where do I even begin? I wanted to share with you what I have learned and tips from experts on the Heal Podcast.
When someone tells me they have just been diagnosed with Lyme, the first thing I say to them is you got to clean up your diet ASAP. It took me a long time to realize that, and it’s tough to do. But it is worth it. Erika Schlick, a Lyme Warrior and nutrition specialist believes that “our food is medicine, and the sooner we can see it that way, the better we will feel and start to heal.” So how should you eat? Until your gut is balanced and healthy, Dr. O’Bryan and Erika recommend a Gluten-free, dairy-free, and no sugar diet. I would even take it one step further and eliminate coffee, alcohol, and inflammatory foods. The quicker you clean up your diet the faster you will heal.
Second, you need to think about how you are detoxing. I wrote a full blog just on detoxing, which you can find here. The simplest form of detoxing is to drink tons of water. It is so important to flush out all of the toxins in your body. Dr. Tom O’Bryan detailed that “we should be drinking a third to a half-ounce of water per pound body weight. So if you weigh 120 pounds, that’s 60 ounces of water a day, that’s eight eight-ounce glasses a day.”
Your gut health goes beyond the food you eat. Then the next step is to reduce your environmental triggers. Aida Garcia-Toledo’s podcast episode is a great place to start. She breaks it down and explains where the hidden toxins are in your home. Dr. Jaban also gave us an easy first step to “start by turning your phone on airplane mode at night. Your alarm will still go off, and it will protect your body from harmful EMF’s while it is resting and regenerating.”
It is crucial to get rid of the toxic burden or reduce it before going after the infections in your body. There is no magic pill. As Rachel Lincoln Sarnoff explained, “it is just habits. And sometimes we don’t stop to think about our habits, but once you start looking at it, you can work on those pieces that you can control.”