How to Support Your Liver Health

Hi friends! Today’s episode is kind of a “part 2” to last week’s episode on liver health. In that episode, we covered what the liver does and a few of the really important roles that it plays in our overall health, as well as what can happen when we don’t support our liver health. In this episode, I’m sharing practical ways that we can support the health of our livers as they support the rest of our bodies. 

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There are a number of ways that we can help support the health and function of our livers and most of them can be done from the comfort of our homes! So that’s great news! I’ve broken these down into a couple of categories to hopefully help it be easier for you to remember (you can always go to the show notes as well). 

The very first thing that we can do to support the health of our livers is… can anybody guess it?? You know what I’m going to say...

Improve gut health

I know that I sound like a broken record here, but I’m not exaggerating when I say that the health of our gut affects just about everything else in our bodies - especially our livers. If our guts aren’t healthy, toxins can be recirculated right back into the liver, instead of being excreted as they are designed to be. 

So if you are experiencing a lot of gut health issues, work with a professional trained in gut health to address the root cause. If you struggle with constipation or regular bowel movements, this is something that needs to be addressed ASAP with a treatment that will address the root cause and not just force your body to go. Unfortunately, these kinds of medications, while necessary at times (for short-term use), do nothing to heal to cause of constipation, and can harm the balance of the microbiome even more, which just perpetuates the problem. 

Here are a few ideas to help, if this is something you are struggling with: 

• High-quality bone broth daily 

• Deep breathing/box breathing before all meals

• Eating every 3-4 hours (fiber, protein, and fat)

• Add more variety to your meals (change out produce often)

• Gargle every day (start small and build up to 2-3 minutes at a time)

• Take a multi-strain probiotic (best to start this after a few weeks of the daily bone broth)

• Hydrate!! (½ body weight in oz of filtered, mineral water daily; can also add electrolytes to help)

Prioritize key nutrients 

Your liver is dependent on certain nutrients to function effectively. It needs protein to supply amino acids which assist with detoxification. It also needs liver-friendly nutrients including vitamin C and B vitamins, zinc, and selenium,  as well as antioxidants found in cruciferous vegetables like broccoli, cauliflower, brussels sprouts, cabbage, and kale, for example. Healing foods like garlic and turmeric can also support liver function by assisting with the production of liver enzymes.

One simple tip for increasing the intake of these essential nutrients is to aim for half a plate of vegetables at every meal, making sure to include some/all of the cruciferous ones that I just mentioned. If you’re also working on your gut health, most of these veggies are more easily digested when cooked (sauteed, roasted, steamed, etc.).

There are some other nutrients and herbs that may also be helpful in supporting the liver: 

• NAC (N-acetyl cysteine) and Glutathione are both antioxidants that have been shown to support the liver 

• Milk Thistle, dandelion root, and astragalus are commonly used to nourish the liver and assist in healing, especially for those with congested/fatty livers. You can often find Liver Support Teas that are made of a blend of these herbs. 

Increase lymphatic movement

Unlike the circulatory system, the lymphatic system doesn’t have a pump to keep things moving. It is dependent on the movement of your muscles and tissue to move the lymph around to different lymph nodes in the body to be filtered and then recirculated.

Moving our bodies every day for even just 10-15 minutes can help increase circulation as well as movement within the lymphatic system. Dry Brushing is also a helpful tool for increasing lymph movement in the body and can be done daily or several times a week before showering or taking a bath. 

Reduce toxic burden

One major way that we can help support the health of our livers is by reducing our exposure to toxins. As I’ve talked about many times, the body - specifically speaking here about the liver - is designed to filter toxins, so we don’t need to try to be 100% toxin-free or live in a pure bubble, however, we can place an undue burden on the liver when the number of toxins we are exposed to and the rate at which we are exposed to toxins is really high. Remember how in the last episode we talked about how every single thing we breathe, digest, or absorb has to be filtered through the liver. So when we are continually eating, breathing, and absorbing things that are full of chemicals that are harmful to our bodies, we have created a huge workload for our livers. 

So what are some simple ways to reduce our exposure: (have entire episodes about this 24, 64, and 65)

• Choosing organic produce (for the dirty dozen) and organic, antibiotic-free meats dramatically reduce the number of herbicides and pesticides we are exposed to.

• Increase awareness of the ingredients in personal care products and cleaning products. (EWG)

• Decrease foods/substances that create a greater workload for the liver such as alcohol/drugs, sugar, caffeine, high-starch carbohydrates (especially w/o protein and fat). 

Use Alternative therapies

There are a few other ways to support the liver that I wanted to mention:

• The use of a castor oil pack over the liver is believed to increase circulation to the liver as well as help in the production of one of our master antioxidants - glutathione. 

• Epsom salt baths are helpful for many things, especially in relief from sore muscles and even in reducing stress. Some also believe that the absorption of magnesium sulfate from the epsom salts can also support the liver. 

• Acupuncture has been shown to improve circulation and therefore decrease stagnation. There are many studies showing that acupuncture is helpful for liver function. 

• TCM believes there to be a direct link between unresolved feelings of anger or sadness and poor liver health. We know unresolved emotions and trauma can also lead to chronic inflammation and even poor adrenal health as well. So all the more reason to be sure you are paying attention to your emotional health as well, managing stress well, as well as seeing a counselor if you feel that you need some additional support navigating through past experiences or feelings (most of us do). 

Adding in a combination of few of these ideas into your daily and weekly rhythms will help support not only your liver health but your overall health as well.

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Why Liver Health Matters

Hi friends! In today’s episode, we are talking about our livers and why it’s so important that we take good care of them! The health of our livers is probably not something that often crosses our minds, but it is one of the most important organs in our bodies both for everyday function and long-term health. So let’s get into talking about the liver…

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The liver is the unsung hero of our bodies. It performs over 500 essential functions and unless something is going wrong, it rarely ever gets noticed. Most people I know don’t go around thinking about their livers throughout the day, yet it’s functions are vital to all other body systems’ ability to function. 

For example, here are a few of the essential functions the liver is responsible for:

Digestion and absorption

Our livers help turn our food into energy. It stores and distributes both fat and glucose, as well as metabolizes both cholesterol and protein.  It produces bile which is vital for digestion and absorption of key vitamins and nutrients and then distributes those nutrients out to the body. It also produces key enzymes that are needed for other chemical reactions all over the body. In addition to distribution, it also stores vitamins and minerals that will be needed in the future. So just by listing these few things, this shows that our livers help regulate our blood sugar, cholesterol, and hormone levels. 

Immune Function

Our livers produce of certain proteins and components of the immune system such as cytokines as well as various other immune cells. Our livers maintain a certain amount of controlled inflammation which assists the body in detoxification, but when this becomes uncontrolled or dysregulated, it can lead to systemic inflammation which damages the immune system and can even lead to auto-immunity or cancer. 

Hormone Function

The liver is hugely important for hormone health. Our livers create proteins and cholesterol that carry hormones all over the body. In addition, it also helps deactivate hormones and assist with ridding our bodies of excess hormones, or ones that we no longer need. This process is vitally important. For example, with the hormone estrogen, our livers actually regulate which kind of estrogens our bodies produce, as well as help with the processes that remove excess estrogen from the body. Without this essential function, an excess of estrogens can build in the body leading to estrogen-dominant diseases and cancer.  

Detox 

The function that our livers are best know for is detoxification. The liver is responsible for the movement of the blood in our bodies. As a matter of fact, almost 1½ liters of blood pass through our liver every single minute in order to be filtered. Through this process it extracts toxins and stores nutrients for later use (which we discussed when talking about digestion and absorption). The liver detoxifies in three phases that must stay in sync with each other. 

Phase One is bioidentification. This is when your body sends out enzymes that put a red flag on all toxins. Phase two is conjugation. This is when the body attaches molecules to those flagged toxins to make them either water soluble or fat soluble. Phase three is elimination. This is when the body actually flushes the toxins from our bodies when we use the bathroom (and sometimes through sweat). If one of these phases isn’t working correctly, it can damage our body’s cells and allow the toxins to continue to circulate in our bodies, further taxing our livers and creating a loop of inflammation. Every single substance we breathe, ingest, or absorb through our skin will pass through our liver, which creates a huge workload for it every single day. 

The point here is that every other system in the body is dependent on the function of the liver and when our livers are healthy, and functioning well, this works great! However, the truth is that the majority of Americans are walking around with less-than-healthy livers. 

What happens when our livers aren’t healthy

It’s estimated that up to 90 million Americans (that’s almost ⅓ of the American population) has Fatty Liver Disease, which is basically inflammation of the liver that occurs when apprx. 5% of cells in the liver are replaced with fat cells. This causes the liver to be unable to keep up with it’s 500+ essential functions and add to systemic inflammation in the rest of the body, which can lead to other chronic diseases like heart disease, diabetes, even Alzheimers and Dementia. 

If Fatty Liver Disease is left untreated, it can progress into Fibrosis, and even Cirrhosis of the liver, which leads to liver failure (fatal). Liver Disease doesn’t just occur because of alcohol or drug use or Hepatitis. Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease is the most common form of liver disease and is caused by a combination of lifestyle and genetics - most commonly high-starch/high-sugar diets, insufficient protein intake, intake of trans fats and artificial chemicals, unresolved emotions and trauma, lack of movement in the lymphatic system, and overexposure to environmental toxins. It’s not usually only too much fat, as the name would suggest.

Symptoms of an unhealthy liver or fatty liver disease

There aren’t always immediate symptoms, which can make it tricky. When symptoms do occur, some common ones are:

• Abdominal pain, fullness in the upper right side

• Nausea, loss of appetite (especially in the AM)

• Swelling in legs/abdomen

• Fatigue

• Brain Fog/confusion

• Waking up at night in the 2-3 am range regularly

You can ask your provider to run labs to check enzyme levels most commonly found in the liver ALT and AST. If either level is over 30, especially ALT, this can be indicative of a damaged liver. It’s important to note that by the time these levels are above normal, damage to the liver is already happening. So we don’t want to wait until then to care for and support the health of our liver. 

The good news is that livers regenerate and that our body has an amazing ability to heal. It will need some support from us, but an unhealthy liver, even most diseased livers, with the exception of cirrhosis, can be become healthy and well-functioning again. 

In the next episode, I am going to share ways that you can support your liver health to prevent an unhealthy, sluggish, or diseased liver, as well as ways that you can help your liver to heal if you are already experiencing liver dysfunction or disease. Make sure you stay tuned for that episode! 

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