More about “getting sick”
by Dr. Carl Gillman · November 19, 2009 In my last article, I mentioned two concepts that deserve further exploration and clarification.
Firstly, I mentioned the flu can take hold when the body gets overly acidic. This does not mean to avoid citrus or other such acidic foods in winter. Actually, the opposite would be a good idea. When you eat food, your body metabolizes it or breaks it down into parts your body can use. The amount of heat needed to fully digest food is measured in calories. But what of the result after the breaking down is done? Fruits and vegetables tend to end up as an alkaline ash, or the opposite of acidic. If you squeezed a lemon and caught its very acidic juice on a pie tin, placed it in the oven and burned off the juice, you would have an ash residue, which would be alkaline. Add a little water, stick pH paper in it, and you would have an alkaline result. The same type of result happens to your body. So, fruits and vegetables alkalize the body, while meats and carbohydrates tend to acidify. Eating too few vegetables to balance a high protein and carbohydrate intake will result in a slightly acidic internal system over time. When this is allowed to happen, people become more susceptible to sickness. The range of difference on the pH scale I am referring to is not that wide. Healthier people would resist this shift from alkaline to acidic for a longer period of time, while the more inform would make this transition quicker. It is important to eat a lot of vegetables and a few fruits along with your protein. The idea of a balanced diet really is balance...pH balance.
In a nutshell, internal pH in a healthy person should be just over pH 7.0, or slightly alkaline. Too far above or below this mark and your health will suffer greatly and quickly. For instance, your blood must be between pH 7.35 and 7.45 all the time. No exceptions. Anything outside of this range and you would be quite ill. While your blood is slightly alkaline, your stomach fluids are strongly acidic, around pH 1.0, so digestion can be achieved. Minerals are normally used to balance the acidic digestion, but can be depleted through the bowel and bladder. Insufficient replacement of the minerals leaves a deficit. Your kidneys then produce ammonia, with a pH over 9.2, in a last ditch effort to balance the strong acids of digestion. Maintaining a diet of high acid ash floods as the bulk of what you eat will make the kidneys work harder. Again, balance is the goal. Anything which tips the balance one way will have to be compensated for as much as possible. Push the envelope for too long and the compensations become harder to maintain. Once the pH shifts, you are naturally more likely to become ill.
Secondly, I mentioned increasing your vitamin D intake in winter. Last week in this column, Dusty Feldman covered vitamin D very well, and I highly recommend following his advice there. I will only add that vitamin D in very high quantities, usually over 5,000 IU’s per day, is toxic. Keep to the recommended amounts, favoring the upper end during winter and decreasing it in summer, and you’ll do well. If your sunlight exposure goes up, your vitamin D supplement amount needs to go down or you may find yourself sick from too much vitamin D. “Sunburn” is more about acute vitamin D toxicity than it is actually burning skin. Your skin is producing more vitamin D in a short time than your body can process in that time. Redness, swelling and irritation, even pain are the result. Melanin, or skin pigment, is also involved, of course. The more of it you have, the darker your skin and the slower the toxic build up of vitamin D occurs. Certainly, there are risks regarding skin cancer from too much sun exposure as well, but we’ll have that for another column.
Dr. Gillman, a chiropractor for people of all ages can be reached at the West Liberty Chiropractic Center, 627-4787. |
