How Do You Repair Your Immune System After A Lifetime (Or Just A Few Months) of Damage?
Don’t let this be your only defense against infection.
I have a friend that from all appearances should be healthy. She is thin and active. Yet she is constantly sick. A cold. The flu. Strep throat. Just goes to show that being hot and sexy doesn’t necessarily make one healthy.
Then I got to thinking about how this isn’t all that abnormal. So many people accept illness as a regular part of being alive. But is it really? Is illness the normal human life, an inevitable part of drawing breath? I don’t think it is. And I say that as someone that’s rarely ever sick. Of course, when you’re surrounded by sick people, you’re eventually going to get ahold of something, but with a strong immune system, what puts others down for days, you’ll deal with in hours.
So how I would advise someone to repair their immune system after a lifetime of destroying it? What can one do over the course of, say, 3 months to turn around (or at least start to turn around) the damage of years and years of poor diet, poor habits, and poor health?
First, Do No Harm
The very first thing that has to be done is to stop damaging your immune system! There are three dietary elements that are prevalent in most people’s diets that do a good bit of damage to the immune system. So if you’re one of those people that catches every single bug that rolls through the neighborhood, your first order of business is to deal with these trouble spots.
Not so cute when you realize they're making you sick
Sweet Temptations
Yeah, I’m going after your sweets first and foremost. Candy bars, cakes, cookies, pie, ice cream…there’s no place for these things when you’re trying to repair your immune system. Why? The sugar and processed grains cause a sharp rise in insulin levels, which suppresses growth hormones, which suppresses the immune system. If you’re constantly beating your immune system down with sugar and processed grains, you have no hope of repairing yourself. How bad is it?
These studies show that in adults, cell mediated immunity is significantly depressed after sugar ingestion (75 grams). A 100g portion of sugar can significantly reduce the capacity of white blood cells to engulf bacteria. Maximum immune suppression occurs one to two hours after ingestion and remains suppressed for up to five hours after feeding.
Replace your high-carb foods of processed grains and sugars with more vegetables and fruits. Your waist-line will thank you, as well.
Skip The Sauce
I’m not talking about the Hollandaise sauce. I’m talking about the beer, wine, vodka, gin, rum, or bourbon that we all love so much. Every time you sit down and have three or more drinks, you’re suppressing your immune system:
One drink (the equivalent of 12 ounces of beer, 5 ounces of wine, or 1 ounces of hard liquor) does not appear to bother the immune system, but three or more drinks do. Damage to the immune system increases in proportion to the quantity of alcohol consumed. Amounts of alcohol that are enough to cause intoxication are also enough to suppress immunity.
That doesn’t mean you can’t have a drink. It means you don’t want to get tanked.
Avoid New Fats
Once upon a time, mankind ate three kinds of fat, in naturally-occurring proportions: mostly monounsaturated, a good bit of saturated fat, and little in the way of polyunsaturated fats. But then some well-meaning, but misguided scientists decided that saturated animal fats were a bad idea and told us to eat more of those polyunsaturated vegetable oils.
Unfortunately, polyunsaturated fats are highly immunosuppressive, and as Ray Peat has pointed out, are used for their ability to suppress the immune system in organ transplant patients.
Immunosuppression was observed in patients who were being “nourished” by intravenous emulsions of “essential fatty acids,” and as a result coconut oil is used as the basis for intravenous fat feeding, except in organ-transplant patients. For those patients, emulsions of unsaturated oils are used specifically for their immunosuppressive effects.
So go back to the past…swap out your corn, peanut, canola, and other new oils for butter, lard, and coconut oil. And definitely avoid trans fats, the absolute worst thing you can put in your body.
Now, Start Repairing
So basically, the above three guidelines push you towards a diet of real foods. But for the average person, that’s not going to be enough to get back to health in any reasonable amount of time. You need to call in some reinforcements to help your body make use of all the good fuel you’re giving it.
Bacteria Are Your Friends
Pop-quiz…what is the most abundant thing in your body? It’s not cells. Your body has about 10 trillion cells. And your intestines have about 10 times that many bacteria in them, helping you digest food and serving as a first-line of defense against pathogens coming in orally. So what happens when you take antibiotics, which you probably turn to at the first sign of a sore throat? Antibiotics are like shooting a fly with a bazooka. They kill off everything, including those beneficial bacteria in your guts. Any wonder your digestion sucks?
So find a good probiotic supplement and start getting your intestines back in shape. These bacteria will serve as your friends, fighting off invaders, as long as you keep them happy with plenty of nutrient-dense foods. And that sugar I told you to stop eating? It helps the bad bacteria flourish and overwhelm your good bacteria.
Fermented foods like kefir, kombucha, and sauerkraut are great food sources of probiotics.
Turn Off Conan And Go To Bed
When you’re asleep, your body is repairing. While you’re trying to get healthy, you need to get at least 8 hours of sleep per night and preferably more. Since you probably have daily obligations, that means you need to go to bed earlier or grab some naps. If you can’t get more sleep, everything else becomes even more important. “The Late Late Show” really isn’t worth your health, so you better come up with another excuse for why you can’t go to bed earlier.
Soak Up Some Vitamin D
It’s a beautiful thing that vitamin D is one of the most important vitamins there is and that it’s free! Get outside and get some sun. Some sun without sunblock! Food sources of vitamin D can’t even come close to the amount of vitamin D your skin produces. And since we’re told to avoid the sun because it’s going to kill us, most of us are vitamin D deficient.
Eat Nutrient-Dense Foods
Meat, vegetables, nuts, seeds, tubers, squashes, fruit, and healthy oils like butter, lard, olive oil and coconut oil. That’s really all there is to it. These foods are full of vitamins and minerals that will support your health instead of destroying it.
Add A Few Important Vitamins
I’m not a big fan of individual vitamin supplementation. Most people are focusing on taking a ton of vitamin C or extra this or that. But the body is far more complex than just adding some vitamin C, a bit of vitamin E, a dollop of B-complex and stirring. However, there are a few that most of us are getting far too little of.
As I mentioned above, vitamin D is very important and few of us get enough. I’ve heard recommendations to take 1000IU per 25lbs of bodyweight. You can get your vitamin D checked as part of the D-action study. I bet yours is low…mine was and I very rarely get sick, so don’t assume your vitamin D levels are good.
Magnesium and zinc are two important minerals that most people don’t get much of. And exercise only increases the need for these two minerals. I take a cheap zinc-magnesium supplement (ZMA) from NOW Foods most days of the week to make sure my zinc and magnesium levels stay at optimal levels where they can help with testosterone production.
And Finally, Try To Relax
Constant stress is an immune system killer. With our daily hustle and bustle, most of us are like racecars in the red. Eventually that engine is going to blow. We keep our cortisol levels sky-high with work stress, family stress, the stress of the commute, hurried lunches, and late nights.
So turn off the news, which tends to do nothing more than stress people out, and take up a hobby. And being outside in a natural setting, perhaps hiking or just hanging out at the park allows you to relax AND get some sun.
Why Is This So Important?
Boy, that sure sounds like a lot of work. Dropping sugar? Keeping more fresh food around the house? Supplements and sleep? Why not just take advantage of modern medicine and its ability to keep us well?
One simple reason: modern medicine does not keep you well. It typically does no more than mask the symptoms of the damage you are doing to yourself.
Do you want a prime example of how futile modern medicine is against illness? Study: Drug not working against flu:
With Tamiflu no longer effective against this particular flu strain, known as H1N1, physicians are turning to zanamivir, which has problems of its own. The drug, which is inhaled, is not recommended for some of the very populations that would need it most – very young children and people with respiratory problems
Drug-resistant flu, Methicillin-resistant Staph (MRSA), antibiotic-resistant bacteria…everytime we dose the population with drugs indiscriminately, we’re sowing the seeds of our own illness by creating these strains of bacteria and viruses that can resist our drugs.
You’re Your Only Hope
Obi-Wan Kenobi can't help you now
In the end, you can rely on modern medicine, which is very good at treating things like broken bones but not so good at keeping people healthy, to kill off every little bug. Or you can recognize that illness isn’t normal and there’s no reason that you should be laid up multiple times per year with a cold or the flu or strep throat.
You can recognize that there are people that stay healthy for years on end because they treat their bodies right. They eat right, they exercise, they sleep, and they avoid toxic environments. There’s no reason you can’t do the same.
That doesn’t mean you’ll never get sick. A couple weeks ago, I took my first sick day since sometime around 4th grade. Seriously. It’s been that long since I’ve felt bad enough to have to stay home from work or school. Okay, I might’ve missed a few college classes due to feeling bad, but that wasn’t driven by illness. Hah!
But remember that it takes time. You didn’t get 50 pounds overweight overnight, so you wouldn’t expect to lose 50 pounds overnight. You didn’t get to where you are in 3 months. This is just a set of things you can do to start feeling better. But it’s a journey you have to continue. And believe me that all the cookies in the world aren’t worth the feeling of vomiting your guts out.
Take charge of your health…live well, be well.
Any other advice on repairing the damage most people are doing to their bodies?
About Scott
Scott Kustes loves to cook and loves to eat. He started Real Food University to help you get maximum enjoyment out of the meals that you eat. To find out more about how he has rebelled against the fast food culture and counting calories or carbs, join the Real Food Revolution.
45 Reader Comments
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Good post Scott as always. I am currently good on all but the alchohol. I am working on dropping that one way back over the past couple weeks.
The SoG
This shouldn’t have been published yet. Hopefully it’ll be even better when I get it done.
Cheers
Scott
[...] how timely is this – Scott at Modern Forager posted this today about repairing years of damage your immune system. The only thing I seem to be doing wrong [...]
Good post. I do all these. Maybe go a little heavy on the vitamin supplementation. Zinc is one I’ll have to check into. How much zinc do you think we should be getting? Would there be a different amount for my wife? I’m not sure how much my multi has and whether I took that into account when I decided what to take. If not, I can switch my magnesium to the ZMA.
Great post. I think it’s also important to note even those that are so called “fit” and who get sick often need to balance their workouts and sleep. Most I know like that sleep very little and workout waaaaaaaay too much, and wonder why they are always getting run down. People like to blame “catching a cold”….sorry, your immune system is just shot by your own doing. A cold is one thing….but people who ignore it and continue down the destructive path may be going towards more serious health issues with a compromised immune system, unstable fats in their diet, excess oxidative damage and so forth….like cancers or heart diseases.
I cannot stress enough how spot on this assessment is. I have watched my other half go from being precisely the same sickly, always-ill specimen described in the first paragraph, to someone who has been ill only once in 12 months and that was a minor cold she deflected in a matter of a few days. This was achieved through diet alone – pretty much as described above. Exercise was not involved.
So do yourself a favour and give this a go. You may add years onto your life.
Most people on primal or low carb diets are getting plenty of zinc but they need to make sure their zinc and copper are in balanced amounts 10-11/1, Too much zinc can give you a relative copper deficiency
Joe, nonegiven is right about the zinc/copper balance. They compete for the same absorption channels. That said, the ZMA supps are 3 pills for men and 2 for women per day. But I don’t take it daily. Meat is a good source of zinc and is quite bioavailable, as opposed to the zinc in grains. Convenient huh?
“The best sources of zinc include beef, lamb, pork, crabmeat, turkey, chicken, lobster, clams and salmon.”
As for copper, World’s Healthiest Foods says: “Excllent sources of copper include calf’s liver, crimini mushrooms, turnip greens and molasses.
Very good sources of copper include chard, spinach, sesame seeds, mustard greens, kale, summer squash, asparagus, eggplant, and cashews.
Good sources of copper include peppermint, tomatoes, sunflower seeds, ginger, green beans, potato, and tempeh. ”
Again, no grains.
Mike, right-o. I have a friend that appears to be the epitome of health and everyone thinks he’s so in shape. No doubt, he’s very strong and can run for days. But he can catch a cold that lasts for 2 or 3 weeks. Seems to be more on the “beat your body into submission” way of thinking.
Methuselah, good stuff on your better half.
Nonegiven, good call on the copper.
Cheers
Scott
Nice job Scott.
Thanks.
To which I might add, if you are going to be in the hospital for even an elective surgery, you must go in with a strong immune system and do everything you can to keep it strong while you are in the hospital. And to a lesser extent, this even applies to visiting a friend who happens to be in the hospital.
Hospitals are incubators for super-bugs, and in my experience it’s fairly common for hospital patients to acquire one they didn’t come in with. And if you wind up going to a post-hospital rehab facility, you’re chances of acquiring a super-bug increases dramatically.
Nice article. I wish more people understood your points.
I do my best to follow all of them with an occasional late night with two many glasses of wine. >.<
I wish doctors would preach this as well. My mother won’t listen to a word I say about nutrition and exercise because her doctors don’t support it. They just keep changing her medicine.
Since she’s an obese 45 year old with high blood pressure, diabetes, congestive heart failure, chronic bronchitis and severe edema (legs and lungs) she obviously needs more than a few pills to get herself better. What’s worse is the side effects from all the pills she’s on makes her feel worse and flares her asthma, but the doctors keep hoping they find a new “magic” pill instead of recommending exercise and good nutrition. I can’t imagine what a few less cookies and a few good nights of sleep could do for her.
Rayna – I feel your pain about people and doctors. The best course of action for those people is to find OTHER doctors….especially ones who focus more on lifestyle changes and getting them off medications. Meds are just a route to destruction as they just hide the symptoms and make more problems….never solve anything. There are also plenty of books out there written by Drs about more natural healing methods, Dr Eades has Protein Power, there’s another one called Ultraprevention by 2 Drs (although they preach vegetarianism, but outside of that has some good info). The key is knowing when a person isn’t going to listen to you (like most family members are) and trying to find some other “authority” in his/her eyes that they will listen too. You can also look for a better Dr in the area or ND.
Great article, as usual, Scott. I’d also like to thank you for a previous post that you did about the book “The Promise of Sleep”. I put it on my Amazon wish list and hubby got it for me for Christmas. Awesome read! It gave us some ideas too, for addressing his snoring, which we just assumed was one of those things people just have to put up with.
My suggestion for another post – maybe some sort of update on what’s been happening in the sleep research world since “The Promise of Sleep” was published.
I know people who get sick all the time and use the excuse “there is a bug going around”. They almost expect to get sick. It is crazy. Do you think the mind plays a role as well? I tell those same people that “I never get sick”.
What about people who are medicine junkies? I swear that the people who get sick 4-5 times each winter are the ones who are quick to go to the store to buy cold medicine.
Just my observation.
Rusty: That’s a great observation and it’s totally true!
Rayna: I have friends and family that do the same thing and refuse to believe that what they eat impacts their health.
I had a great doctor when I lived in Salt Lake City who would tell his patients that they did not get sick because they “caught” a bug but rather that they got sick because their immune system was too weak to fight off the bug. He would provide a list of things to do to enhance the immune system and then ask his patients to wait 10 days to see how they felt before he would consider prescribing an antibiotic. It’s very rare these days to find docs like that.
Rod, you’re right that there’s no better place to get an infection than the hospital. My stepdad was recently hospitalized, then rehospitalized for much longer due to an infection he acquired while there.
Rayna, if you’re solid everywhere else, an occasional few too many drinks isn’t going to kill ya. I’ve found family is often the hardest to deal with. You want to help, but can’t be too overbearing. As Mike said, you can look for other doctors. In the end, those of us that aren’t doctors face the uphill prospect of trying to convince people we know something when we have no credentials.
Angel, I was trying to get in touch with Dr. Dement for an interview to discuss the new developments in sleep research but never heard back from him unfortunately.
Rusty, you’re right. If you get sick, it’s because your immune system is beaten down for one reason or another….over-stressed, eating like crap, not enough sleep, or some combination. And I know too many people that are more than willing to reach for the medicine at the first hint of anything…same with parents that are afraid to let their kids come into contact with any germs.
JanetM, if only your doc would be like others. Too many people are killing themselves with medicine instead of letting their bodies handle it. But we can’t have any days of inconvenience!
Cheers
Scott
Thanks everyone. Good points all around.
I guess I’m going to have to try “other” methods to help out the mom. Thanks for the suggestions
JanetM, I just reread what I wrote and it’s quite awkward. I meant if other doctors would be like the one you mention!
Cheers
Scott
“So find a good probiotic supplement and start getting your intestines back in shape.”
Hear, hear, hear.
Now to get Mike OD on the probiotic bandwagon.
Nice synopsis and guidelines, Scott.
“Now to get Mike OD on the probiotic bandwagon” ….funny…didn’t know I was against them? http://lifespotlight.com/health/2008/03/19/is-your-gut-leaking-what-to-do-about-it/
An above poster mentioned about the zinc- copper relationship. One thing to consider about that is what water do you drink for the most part. In many households that use copper piping for their drinking water and for people who drink mostly their tap water they may have higher than desired levels of copper in their system. Best way to get a handle on this is to find a nutritionalist , naturopathic doctor or anyone experienced in interpreting results, to have something like a hair analysis done. Such tests can also be revealing as to what other metals are present or deficient to the desired norm.
In January of this year, I changed my eating habits (I omitted grains and sugars from my diet) and started taking vitamins, beta glucans, and probiotics. What a difference!
I’m overweight and have a grocery list of medical diagnosis’s… and a shopping cart full of meds to go with them. in 2008, with the help of my doctor, I started a weight loss plan. I lost 25 pounds, but by August I plateaued and didn’t lose any more weight. I was sick a lot last year and took a lot of antibiotics. I also was taking a lot of meds for pain relief.
I started to question if my inability to lose weight was more related to my medical conditions rather than what I was eating. After a lot of research, I made many changes in January. My doctor doesn’t fully support these changes, but has taken a wait and see attitude.
Since starting my current program, I have lost 31 pounds (only 60 more to go) and my my pain levels are greatly reduced. I have NOT taken ANY of my prescription meds since January.
Earlier this year my son got sick with the flu (throwing up for about six days) followed by a nasty cold. It took him 5 or 6 weeks to recover. I figured that I would catch his bug. I didn’t, however I did feel nauseous for a couple of days… I wasn’t sure if I had a mild case of the flu or if I was experiencing a “die off” effect from the changes I made in my diet.
Bottom line is that this post makes a lot of sense. I have experienced how the recommended changes can positively affect the quality of life. I look forward to continued weight loss and a happier AND healthier life!
Jay, another good point about the copper intake. I’m considering finding about my heavy metal status through an ND.
Marti, thanks for serving as proof that this lifestyle works. Keep up the great work!
Cheers
Scott
I’d like the name of the study about the effects of sugar ingestion about cell-mediated immunity. I have a friend undergoing chemotherapy and we’d like as much information about immune system health as possible to take to the oncologist.
Vegemel, I’m sorry to hear about your friend. Here is where I initially found the quoted text…should’ve linked to it. http://www.chronicprostatitis.com/sugar.html There are two studies that text is referencing:
1. Bernstein, J., et al, Depression of lymphocyte transformation following oral glucose ingestion, Am. J. Clin. Nutr., 30:613, 1977
2. Sanchez, A., et al, Role of sugars in human neutrophilic phagocytosis, Am. J. Clin. Nutr., 26:180, 1973.
I hope that helps!
Scott
[...] How Do You Repair Your Immune System After A Lifetime (Or Just A Few Months) of Damage? [...]
Glad to see you approve of probiotics; my memory must have escaped me because I’ve read that article.
As for copper, I live in an area that allegedly has a fair amount of copper in the water according to a naturopathic doctor who advises people not to take supplements containing copper. FWIW
Thanks for a great article with so many wonderful health tips. I’d like to mention that bacteria serve a useful function, and that is to break down and recycle decaying matter.
Enervating practices, such as lack of sleep, overeating, bad eating, cause toxins in our body build up beyond our body’s ability to excrete them. So internal bacteria and those in the environment find a food supply and proliferate. Once the food supply is gone, the bacteria die off and are themselves excreted. (I’m not talking about our wonderful intestinal friends.)
Essentially, bacteria come in and clean up our messes. Keep your body clean and the bacteria cannot thrive. Taking drugs to kill of these bacteria is the worst folly. Sadly, antibiotics are what catapulted “medicine” into the role of hero.
Hey Scott, with many people’s allergy season around the corner, if not already here, I’m curious as to people’s thoughts behind allergy meds. As far as my family goes, we rarely get sick and rarely take medicine when we do, but god knows when the pollen comes around everyone’s moaning about their sinuses. I’m lucky I don’t get them so badly, so I don’t need to medicate, but I feel the majority of us (people in general) take something like Allegra, Mucinex, and whatever shove-up-your-nose-spray is the rage.
Hi, Gary-A,
I’ve had quite an amazing experience with allergy and sinus medication. I’ve had a lot of trouble with extra mucous and allergy season, and got to the point where allergy medicine didn’t work any more, and I did NOT want to get allergy shots from the hospital. My husband, bless his dear heart, found an amazing electric pulsile nasal irrigator: http://www.grossan.com. This is NOT a neti pot. This shoots an softly pulsing stream of water solution (you can make your own with kosher salt and water, but I find the ones created by Hydromed much more comfortable) up each nostril. After doing this for months, I stopped having to take allergy medicine AT ALL. And, do you know what? Since I hadn’t taken my Allavert for 6 months, the one weekend where Ragweed was OFF THE CHARTS and my irrigator wasn’t enough, I took ONE dose of Allavert, and how ’bout that, it actually WORKED again for me. These days, I take Allavert once in a blue moon when my irrigator isn’t quite enough, but I do NOT take more than one dose because that one dose is usually all I need to stop my unstoppable sneezing jags. Once the Allavert stops my reaction on those once-in-a-blue moon times, the irrigator will take it from there. Another thing I noticed, is that the irrigator is FANTASTIC when I feel I’m starting to get a cold. There have been at least 3 times when I thought I was a goner – feeling the body aches and all those symptoms that tell you you’re about to get sick, and I’ve done a nasal irrigation and that has just cleaned me out and I was fine.
Good luck,
Sarah
Joanne, agree with you completely about antibiotics. The absolute only reason I would use them is a) if I have an infection that will kill me without antibiotic use or b) when undergoing surgery. Given all that nasties in the hospital, I think it would be unwise to forgo their use when having the skin opened up.
Gary-A, I have no clue about allergy medicine because I’m one of those lucky people that doesn’t have any known allergies. Well, other than crawfish, but that’s easy enough to avoid.
Sarah, thanks for your comment. That should help out lots of allergy sufferers. Like Gary-A.
Cheers
Scott
Scott, let’s hope you never have to undergo surgery. Yikes!
Gary – try and actually track food and allergy responses…..as I feel like I have a bad allergy whenever I have too much dairy or grains (which usually feels like an increase of inflammation)…but when I don’t, I feel fine while everyone else around me complains of allergies. So good motivation for me to get off dairy and grains….although the occasional pizza won’t kill me.
Joanne, I had surgery on my shoulder in June 2007 and I’ve unfortunately dislocated it three times since then. Another surgery is a definite possibility. But the gut can be repopulated with friendly flora after a dose of antibiotics with probiotic supplements (which I took hyperdoses of in the first week after surgery) and fermented foods. The real problem is that we use antibiotics willy-nilly and people absolutely don’t eat fermented foods. Couple that with the typical highly processed diet that gives the unfriendly bacteria plenty to feed on and you have a recipe for trouble…the first line of defense in the immune system is down.
Cheers
Scott
Great stuff.
You know, I quit drinking back in January. I feel better and have easily 20X the energy I had before. I am more focused. I am less tired. My workouts are going better. My life is going better.
I know that alcohol is a drug that I dare say MOST of the population is hooked on to some degree. However, I swear if you can wean yourself from it, you’ll be amazed at how much better life is without it.
Try something new. Dare to be sober.
Personally, I’d love to see sobriety become the new trendy thing to do.
Excellent post. I just might add one thing that a lot of people overlook (or don’t know about). Check your body pH. Illness cannot take hold when our body pH is slightly alkaline.
Most Americans have an acidic body pH – generally very acidic. This is because of items mentioned in your article – eating too many sweets, processed foods, junk food, trans fats and polyunsaturated fats. Oh, and of course not drinking enough purified water (coffee, bottled juices, soda, etc. don’t count people!).
Our cells produce acids every day as part of their normal activities. We need to give our bodies enough of the right kinds of foods (raw fruits and vegetables – organic is best) so it has the raw materials needed to buffer all those acids and safely dispose of them.
When we don’t give our body what it needs, those acids build up in our tissues. A high acid, low oxygen environment is a welcome sign to germs and disease.
For more information on why body pH is important, how to test it, and how to correct it, please check out my site. The specific pages about pH balance start here:
http://www.how-to-boost-your-immune-system.com/body-pH.html
Wishing everyone the best of health!
Excellent article, maintaining a healthy immune system is so necessary with so many diseases and sicknesses floating around. I love your suggestions on how to repair the immune system as well, thanks!
Is there a chance that these suggestions don’t work for everyone? Within the past 3 months or so, I have eliminated all grains, sugars, and cut down on alcohol to 1-2 glasses of red wine on most nights. I eat a lot of veggies (including raw fermented veggies like kimchi), eggs, dairy (including raw cheese), and some meat. I take 1500-2000 IU of Vitamin D daily. And I’ve been sick 3 different times in the past month. I’ve never been this sick so often when eating the SAD, with excess grains, beer, sugar, PUFAs, etc. What gives?
[...] http://www.fitnessspotlight.com/2009/3/23/how-do-you-repair-your-immune-system-after-a-lifetime-or-j… [...]
This is a GREAT article! So few people know that sugar and refined carbs are the cause of many illnesses taking over the body. I figured it out for myself when I realized that (especially during cold/flu season) the more sugar I ate, the more I caught bugs. Into my late 20′s I would constantly be coming down with pesky sicknesses. Then, I drastically changed my eating habits and switched to a low carb diet to lose a little weight. After doing so, I lost 30lbs and didn’t catch a cold or flu for two whole years!
To add to the portion on supplements… If you are having a tough time giving up alcohol to stay healthier, take a supplement called Milk Thistle daily. This helps the liver to re-generate cells and dump toxins, and lessens the bad effects of alcohol. Alcohol was another thing that made me catch bugs more easily, and although I cut back, it’s still tough to have weekends without! So, I discovered Milk Thistle and it has done wonders for me. Even after several days of binge drinking, my system recovers quickly with the help of the Milk Thistle, and plenty of sleep. I also take a Whole Foods Multi-Vitamin because the Kelp and Spirulina in them balances blood sugar levels which can also spike from too much alcohol.
Thanks again for this informative post!
Hi there, I’m a 15 year old female who is currently battling with high cholesterol and thyroid problems. But I was devastated because I had no idea.I must say this article has really opened up my eyes, and helped me improve my eating habits and lifestyle. I eat less meat, and consume more leafy greens and fruits for snacking and continued on with getting enough calcium. We consume too much as to satisfy our self and so we are not aware of the damage being done to our bodies, I encourage everyone to check their levels, because it sure had saved my life. And continue to have an active lifestyle, at least 30 mins of continuous cardiovascular workouts 3-4 times a week is important, including muscular endurance workouts every other day. Minimize your hours on the computer and t.v, and go for a nice walk instead. And last of all remember to get your 8 hours of sleep. That’s a must. Good day everyone. =)
H.R., you likely have high cholesterol BECAUSE you have thyroid problems. It’s a known symptom of thyroid disease. The rest of your post is great…well, except for the eat-no-meat comment. Meat’s just fine.
Great article! It’s nice to see like-minded individuals putting out truthful and helpful information out there!!
Very informational article, thank you so much for sharing! I am actually getting back on track on living a healthy lifestyle, and it’s funny that you mention that a sexy/ripped body doesn’t mean healthy….because I know a girl with the same issues! This list comes in very handy to me at this point, I recently bought vitamin packs and joined my neighborhood gym, and I am feeling the difference in my body and mood. I am working on eating better, and keeping feeling this well with this lifestyle.
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