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HOW TOXINS AFFECT YOU

After reading the first chapter of this book, you should already understand that the buildup of toxins in your body can result in you feeling less than your best. Your digestive system may be sluggish, you might have trouble sleeping, and you could feel bloated or full even when you have not eaten a particularly large meal. Your body is equipped to eliminate the toxins you take in, but if your toxin intake exceeds the ability of your body to handle them, your body might start storing them, which could result in a number of physical side effects.

The first place your body will begin to store toxins is in your fat cells. Your body may also start to store toxins in your ligaments, bones, and even muscle tissue. As more toxins accumulate, you could begin to experience aches or joint pain. If the accumulation continues, it may spread to cellular tissue, resulting in the dysfunction of an organ or the development of a health condition such as impaired vision, heart failure, or pulmonary disease.

Your body is equipped to eliminate the toxins you take in on a daily basis, but if your intake of toxins exceeds your body’s ability to handle them, it might start storing them, which could result in a number of physical side effects.

In addition to affecting the way you feel physically, toxins can also have an effect on your emotional well-being. A number of toxins, especially environmental ones, have been linked to disturbances and changes in the body’s hormonal systems. Toxins have been known to cause numerous mental health problems, including depression and anxiety, by altering or hampering the healthy function of the brain.

Toxins can also affect your brain by altering or inhibiting the activity of neurotransmitters, which are the chemicals in the brain that transmit signals, facilitating communication between your brain and nerve cells. When these neurotransmitters are damaged, it could affect the production of certain chemicals within the brain, such as serotonin, which could affect your mood. In addition, toxins can damage the structure of the brain itself. Neurotoxins such as lead and mercury are known to kill brain cells, affecting behavior, mood, coordination, and even intelligence.

How Toxins Affect the Way You Look

Skin problems can be incredibly embarrassing, especially when they continue to plague you into adulthood. Unfortunately, the modern Western diet does little to repair skin problems. In fact, the food you eat and the toxins you encounter on a daily basis are partially responsible for things like redness, blackheads, inflammation, and pimples. The more toxins present in your body, the more it will affect the way you look. Your skin is the largest organ in your body, and it may also be acting as a storage unit for toxins. When the other detoxifying organs—your liver, kidneys, and lungs—are overloaded with toxins, your skin ends up picking up the slack.

Not only do excess internal toxins end up in your skin, but your skin also absorbs toxins from the environment around you and from the products you put on it. Everything from lotions, shampoos, fragrances, and cosmetics potentially contain toxins that can damage your skin. Toxins from the environment may also enter your skin either by being absorbed through the air or through skin contact with soil or water. All of these toxins block your pores, resulting in acne, greasy skin, and other skin problems.

Your skin eliminates toxins by pushing them through your pores to the surface of your skin. If too many toxins accumulate in your skin, however, it could lead to redness, inflammation, or breakouts.

Toxins and the Aging Process

Before you can understand how toxins affect the aging process, you need to understand the aging process itself. Many people don’t consider themselves to be aging until they hit the thirty- or forty-year mark. In reality, however, you start aging from the moment you are born.

Your body is made up of around one trillion individual cells, and as many as one billion of those cells die every minute that you are alive. These cells do regenerate, but the rate of regeneration versus cell death slows over time. As you get older, the cells in your body will start dying more quickly than they can be regenerated.

Aging is a completely natural process and it cannot be avoided. There are certain factors, however, that speed up the aging process. Nutritional deficiencies and high levels of stress, for example, can accelerate the aging process, making you look and/or feel older than your true age. The buildup of toxins in the body also contributes to accelerated aging by hastening the rate at which cells die without also increasing the rate of regeneration. Keep in mind that, as a whole, your body can handle a significant amount of toxins. The individual cells, on the other hand, can be killed by even the smallest amount, and these cell deaths are in addition to the cell deaths that occur naturally.

The human body is designed to efficiently absorb nutrients, filtering out and eliminating waste products and toxins. If you put more toxins in your body than it can handle, however, the excess toxins will be set aside and stored. Extreme toxin buildup can lead to serious diseases, including age-related disorders such as osteoporosis, Alzheimer’s, and osteoarthritis. Detoxifying your body will help flush out those excess toxins, restoring your body’s natural rhythm and stopping additional cell death.

Detoxing for Healthy Skin and Hair

Earlier in this chapter you learned how toxicity can affect your skin, but you may be curious about just how that process works. Your skin is made up of two primary layers: the epidermis and the dermis (which includes sebaceous glands). The epidermis is the outermost layer of skin from which dead skin cells are shed, taking toxins they contain along with them. The second layer of skin is the dermis, which constantly regenerates, forming new skin cells and pushing old skin cells to the top to be shed. The sebaceous glands secrete sebum, which is an oily matter that lubricates and waterproofs the skin as well as releases toxins from fat cells.

Every day, your body sheds between two and three billion dead cells. In addition to eliminating toxins through the shedding of dead skin cells, toxins and impurities can also be released through sweat glands. Thus, exercising to induce sweating is an easy way to boost your body’s natural detoxification. Though your skin does eliminate some of the toxins in your body on a daily basis, many people’s bodies are still “toxic” in that they contain more toxins than the body can handle. It is in cases like this where a detox diet can be especially effective.

Before engaging in a detox, it is important to realize that you are likely to experience some side effects. Remember, the goal of detoxifying your body is to eliminate excess toxins, and those toxins have to go somewhere. One of the many ways in which those toxins will be released is through your skin. You shouldn’t be surprised, then, if you experience an increase in blemishes or skin oil during the first few days of your detox. Don’t worry—once you have cleansed your body of excess toxins, you will see the healthy, glowing skin you’ve been wanting.

By cleansing your body and skin of toxins, you will be unclogging your pores, which will result in a clearer complexion.

Not only can a detox improve the health of your skin, but it may also restore your hair to its natural beauty.

By cleansing your body and skin of toxins, you will be unclogging your pores, which will result in a clearer complexion. You will experience relief from acne, uneven texture, and excess oil. You may also experience a reduction in fine lines, age spots, and dark circles under the eyes as a result of improved capillary circulation. Not only can a detox improve the health of your skin, but it may also improve your hair. After detoxing, you can expect your hair to be smooth, shiny, and soft. Chemical-laced hair products can dry out or damage your hair, making it frizzy and unmanageable. Detoxing can restore your hair to its natural beauty.

Detoxing for Organ Health

One of the main organs involved in eliminating toxins from the body is the liver. It plays an essential role not only in eliminating toxins, but also in breaking down nutrients and producing red blood cells. The liver is largely responsible for detoxifying harmful substances, and it fulfills this role in several ways: by filtering the blood to eliminate toxins; by synthesizing and excreting bile to get rid of fat-soluble vitamins like cholesterol; and by producing enzymes that neutralize harmful chemicals. Your liver acts without regard to where the toxins come from—it treats those produced by your body the same way it treats toxins from food, medications, and environmental factors.

Your lungs, kidneys, and intestines also play a role in removing toxins. The lungs, for example, filter out allergens, mold, and other airborne toxins. Your kidneys are responsible for filtering your blood and diverting waste products to the bladder so they can be eliminated. If any of these organs becomes overworked or bogged down with excess fat, inflammation, or toxin accumulation, it could limit your body’s natural detoxification abilities. Detoxifying will help restore proper function to your organs.

Below you will find valuable information regarding your organs’ roles in detoxifying the body as well as information on what happens when these organs aren’t functioning to full capacity.

Kidneys

Your kidneys are the primary detoxifying organs of your urinary system. They filter your blood, removing wastes and diverting them to the bladder so they can be eliminated from your body. Your kidneys also help regulate mineral levels and electrolytes to prevent toxic buildup.

If the function of your kidneys is impaired, they may not be able to properly filter toxins from your blood. Kidney disease and damage is often caused by high blood pressure, diabetes, poor eating habits, inflammation, and overuse or prolonged exposure to medications and toxic chemicals.

Liver

As has already been mentioned, the liver is the most important organ for detoxification. It breaks down nutrients and toxic substances, excreting toxins through bile and urine.

Unfortunately, liver disease is a fairly common problem and it can affect your liver’s ability to properly filter out toxins. Some of the most common causes of liver disease and damage include excessive alcohol intake, poor diet, and abuse of drugs or other toxic chemicals.

Lungs

Your lungs are the first organs to come into contact with airborne toxins, and they serve to filter these toxins and other harmful substances out of the air you breathe. The lungs are also responsible for delivering oxygen to your blood.

Shallow breathing can greatly reduce the efficiency of your lungs in detoxifying the body. This can be caused by or exacerbated by a poor diet, air pollution, and smoking.

Skin

You may be surprised to hear that your skin is responsible for eliminating about one-third of the toxins, bacteria, and viruses that enter your body. If the other detoxifying organs (liver, kidneys, and lungs) become overworked, your skin steps up to take on the extra load.

Your skin eliminates toxins by pushing them through your pores to the surface. If too many toxins accumulate in your skin, however, it could lead to redness, inflammation, or breakouts.

Detoxing for Weight Loss

You probably already know that if you eat more calories than you burn, you will gain weight. You may not know, however, some of the additional factors that play into weight gain and weight loss. Adipose tissue is the type of tissue used by the body to store energy in the form of lipids (fat). This type of tissue is typically found beneath the skin, but in cases where there is too much adipose tissue, it can begin to back up in and around the organs. Your liver, the largest internal organ in your body, is especially prone to storing excess fat. The more fat stored in your liver, the less efficient it will be.

The food you eat and the other toxins you put into your body have a direct effect on the condition of your liver and on your ability to lose weight. In addition to the toxins you put into your body, your liver may also begin to produce its own toxins as it works overtime trying to digest all of the excess sugar, fat, and other components of processed foods. The toxins your liver cannot immediately deal with are stored in fat cells, which leads to weight gain. If your liver is healthy and you eat a diet of clean, wholesome foods, your liver will be able to handle all of the toxins that enter your body, and it will metabolize your fat cells for energy rather than storing them.

Detoxing will provide a number of benefits, but one of the most important ones is that it will clean up your liver. This is an essential step in achieving healthful weight loss, because unless your liver is able to break down the food you eat (eliminating the toxins rather than storing them), you may have difficulty losing weight no matter how hard you try. Detoxing will help you to eliminate stored toxins, cleaning up your internal organs so they can resume their proper functions. In addition to cleansing your body, the detox diet will also help you reorient your eating habits so you are more likely to lose weight and keep it off for good.