The liver is one of the most important organs and is responsible for a wide range of functions, including metabolic and digestive tasks, hormone production, and detoxification. When the liver is unhealthy or diseased, the patient can suffer from a number of ailments. While it’s easy to treat any of these issues with medications, it’s imperative that the root of the problem itself is treated. An unhealthy liver left unaddressed will eventually result in liver disease or liver failure – which can occur gradually or suddenly.
When the liver is in poor health, it can no longer process waste from red blood cells, which leads to jaundice; synthesize proteins, which leads to poor blood clotting; high blood pressure; deterioration in brain function; kidney malfunction; immune system failure; and much more.
Needless to say, we need our livers to be healthy & stay healthy!
Click to Open in New Window
There are many facets of our lifestyles that can damage our livers. Consider these 5 and how to navigate around them, if not avoid them altogether:
1. Recreational and Prescription Drugs
We all know recreational drugs can be harmful to our livers, but what about prescription drugs? Have you ever checked the side effects of those you’re taking? Keep a close eye on them and voice your concern to your doctor. Refer to the Physicians’ Desk Reference and find out for yourself.
2. Obesity
An excess of weight not only puts a strain on your heart, but it’s tough on your liver, too. Body fat actually starts building up around your liver, which can lead to fatty liver disease.
3. Smoking
When we consider the destruction caused by smoking, our thoughts generally go straight to our lungs. Unfortunately, though, all of the chemicals contained within the cigarette smoke reach the liver and inhibit its ability to function and filter toxins out of the body.
4. Pesticides and Heavy Metals
The pesticides and heavy metals in our environments, personal care products and diets are huge contributors to liver damage, and it’s been discovered that even minimal exposure to environmental pesticides or the pesticide residue on non-organic food can contribute to liver cancer.
5. Alcohol
The most well-known cause of liver damage, excessive drinking, has the power to bring down your entire liver function. As a filtration system, your liver’s job is to convert ingested alcohol into a substance that’s less harmful, to be released back into the bloodstream. But when your liver has too much alcohol to contend with, it isn’t able to tend to its other responsibilities, which leads to numerous other health problems – first just evident in hangovers, and later developing into ailments like liver diseases and fibrosis.
The good news is that taking care of your liver is not too tough. Based on the above list, it should be easy to come up with a few lifestyle changes that will help restore your liver to its healthiest state: monitoring drug use, getting to a healthy weight and maintaining it, kicking your smoking habit, eating organic and using non-toxic sprays indoors and out, and moderating alcohol consumption.
In addition to these, it’s extremely helpful to take a liver support supplement, such as Vital Defense, by NutriPlex Formulas. Vital Defense
provides your liver with support in filtering out toxins from food and the environment. Whereas most liver supplements contain isolates or synthetics of their own that create more work for the liver, Vital Defense is 100% whole food and has no side effects.
Luckily, when given the proper support, your body is often able to heal itself. So, if you commit to making the necessary changes to repair your ailing liver, and feed it the nutrients that are lost in battling so many toxins, it will work with you to become healthy once again.