Is Detox Just a Fad or Does it Stack up as a Necessary Part of Modern Living?

Detox and cleansing methods have been flooding papers, magazines, and social media platforms  in the past few days. So has the  ‘eat clean’ recipes which  always makes me chuckle inwardly as we now need this terminology to sell a product or recipe when in actual fact its just eating food without a barrel load of fillers, chemicals, artificial flavours, sweeteners that we are designed to eat.

I always imagine what my grandparents or great-grandparents would say if they came back to find this mess we have made or allowed the manufactures of food and the chemicals industry to make.

Never in our history have we become so confused about food and diet. We now need a degree in chemistry to eat a fork full of food or how much our own water needs are.  We now have to find a ‘guru’ to tell us instead of tuning in to our own needs.

One article I saw flash up recently which basically said detox is a fad and that our body is equipped to do that job for us.  So I wanted to put my thoughts in writing about such an article which is one of many I have seen over the years.  

The word ‘detox’ has been so widely used and yet for many so misunderstood that it has divided opinions from the medical to the alternative naturopathic health communities.

Then there is the amount of so called detox supplements and gimmicks some are just great marketing which has caused the word detox to lose some of its meaning.

We take in toxins from the environment and many  made inside our body from the by- products of metabolism so naturally the body has its own built in system to neutralise, filter and eliminate toxins when it is functioning well. So there is truth in the statement that the body does detoxify so long as it is functioning optimally.

I wanted to outline some key points we have to keep in mind when we read or see articles that say it just happens naturally.

• We are swimming in chemicals, which were not around in my grandparents early years that’s for sure. Think about a child born today, in the first few months they have carried toxins from mum via the placenta (unless she has done the best thing and been detoxifying before conception or led a very clean life which is virtually impossible today), breast milk can carry toxins into the milk, or drinking formula milk, then of course the amount of vaccines taken into the body…..that is just in a few weeks/months. Then we continue to be exposed to chemicals in food, environment, drugs etc over our lifetime.

• Our body does the best it can to capture, filter and eliminate toxins via lungs, kidney, liver, sweat, lungs, small and large intestine. It will try to store what it can but like any other storage, the more you put in without periodically clearing it it will be overloaded. 

• Our system has another helping in hand from our Bacteria. This is crucially important to note that our commensal bacteria helps to capture and eliminate toxins, a sigh of relief you might think, but what microbes do you have? Medical Drugs, sugar, alcohol, chlorinated water, stress, genetically modified food, and of course Antibiotics to name a few kill which our favourable types of bacteria, so its is not rocket science when reading this that of course we are also losing one of our main inbuilt detox systems due to this modern world and way of life.  We are becoming sicker due to the demise of our friendly bugs, autoimmune diseases, allergies, food intolerances, inflammation and more.

• The role of our intestinal tract is crucial for filtering and eliminating toxins as well as absorbing nutrients. Digestive disorders and diseases are now unfortunately common from GERD , Cohn’s, IBS, Colitis, celiac, constipation, ulcers etc. People often feel they are bloated, have excess of gas and belching – whilst we all produce some gas from digestion and an excess gives us clues that we may not be digesting well or protein is causing putrefaction or we are fermenting, or experiencing bacterial/yeast/parasitic overgrowth.

• Our colon health (large intestine) is crucial for waste elimination. Don’t be fooled that 1 bowel movement removes all the waste. Our standard diets high starchy carbohydrates, animal protein, excess dairy, sugar and the like will be sticking around. With most people eating 3 meals and topping up with snacks there is a lot going down and a lot to get rid of. What about those who do not have daily bowel movements – where is all that waste going? It is still in there causing a inner polluting of the body.

• We might be living longer but many are on medical drugs, how many people do you know at 40 that are pre-diabetic, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, on antidepressants or other? Could this not indicate we are not clearing toxins efficiently?

• We are becoming weaker as we can see with the increase in allergies, asthma, diabetes, heart disease, autoimmune diseases, cancers. Look at the increase in infertility, is this not a big warning sign from other nature that we are naturally blocking the reproduction of our own species.  Is there a link between our toxic world and these issues?

• We live more unnaturally than before, from our lights, air conditioning, central heating, computers, 24 hour tv, mobile phones and on it goes.

• Lack of refreshing sleep – when we sleep our body can give up its toxins that have been captured, taken to the liver to be filtered then eliminated in the morning. If we do not have good sleep this mechanism is also faulty.

• Hormone symptoms such as menopause symptoms that are often like a curse on normal life for a woman. Menopause is natural the symptoms are not. A lifetime of toxins can show signs when women grow through their menopause with symptoms that we have come to know in this modern world.

• We are becoming sicker and using more medication prescribed or over the counter, or you may be turning to supplements in a way to treat the symptom instead of the cause which is block regulation, blocked pathways, wastes in the system, less strength and fortitude for our body to do its ‘normal’ job of detoxification. 

• Think about our energy levels, many of our so called energy is fake, as it comes from stimulants, sugar, caffeine, supplements, smoking, alcohol, excess exercise. None of this is ‘true vitality or energy’, when taken away truth reveals itself which is general fatigue and burnout. We need good vitality and energy to detoxify the body efficiently.

So, yes our body is equipped to detoxify and protect us, but with so much of these influences from birth, our lineage, our weakened system, our continued opposing of nature due to our lifestyle, break down in our commensal bacteria and intestinal function,  how then can we even suggest that our body does the job of  detoxifying toxins and it needs nothing more than extra water and some extra vegetables to do the job?

Cleansing and Detoxification needs to be a lifestyle to embrace rather than a destination to get to in a few days of a ‘detox programme’.  You cannot get out years of waste and bring vitality and strength back to weakened organ in a few days.

Once you start you will then become more aware of how unnatural our living has become and look through different lenses, how nipping, tucking, botox and fillers have no place in a natural body. Or resorting to excessive amounts of protein shakes and supplement to counteract the excess stress, eating/drinking the wrong foods too frequently, which results in excess exercising in an air condition gym to try to counterbalance it – this will age you quicker than you can imagine!!

You might think you are doing ‘good’ but it is only matter of time that the external will reveal the internal. I quote a friend the other day, ‘you cannot varnish tarnish’! We have to clear wastes efficiently for an optimal working system.

It is such an inverted world we are now living in, is it time for you to take off your current lenses and begin to look at the elephant in the room!