© 2015 Kebba Buckley Button, MS, OM. World Rights Reserved.
Many people would make one or two easy changes in their daily habits if they could feel much better and less stressed as a result. Are you one of them? Here are some points to ponder regarding a condition affecting many people and causing silently deteriorating health, yet which you can easily and inexpensively control. It’s called acidosis, meaning excess acid in the body’s fluids. Relative acidity is measured on the pH, or potential hydrogen, scale that indicates hydrogen ion concentration. The pH scale goes from 1 (extremely acidic) to 14 (extremely basic, or alkaline). The body operates best when its pH is between 7.35 and 7.45, ideally at 7.4. Yet diet and stress tend to acidify the body’s fluids. Accumulation of biochemical waste in the body can also lower pH. And a pH too acid can cause you to feel vague stress, to feel ill at ease.
While the condition is simple, the symptoms are many. A person with acidosis may experience frequent fatigue, allergies, bronchitis, colds and flu, foot fungus, acne, boils, eczema, age spots, arthritis, diarrhea and/or constipation. Effects less easy for the individual to see are serious internal processes, such as the inflammation of veins, arteries, and the muscle tissue of the heart. This creates cardiac system issues that result in elevated blood pressure, which in turn increases the deterioration.
Acidosis also leads to premature aging via accelerating free-radical damage to cells. Cells are actually poisoned by inefficiently eliminated cellular waste. An acidic pH prevents the proper storage and release of cellular energy, meaning that the body cannot respond fully to stress or infection. Red blood cells clump together, which limits their oxygen-carrying capacity and leads to fatigue and weakness. Cancer cells thrive in lower-oxygen environments such as acidosis can create. Other mechanisms caused by acidosis may lead to pancreatic dysfunction, diabetes, weight gain, and osteoporosis. Aside from all this, acidosis can make you cranky: you have acid stress! Foods and moods work together!
The body has natural mechanisms for monitoring and controlling its acid-base balance. When plasma is too acidic, the respiratory system speeds breathing, and the kidneys can produce substances that turn the pH around. The body also uses intracellular absorption of hydrogen atoms by molecules of protein, phosphate, and carbonate in bone, thus raising the pH to less acidity.
So what can you do to help yourself beat acidosis? First, get litmus paper from your pharmacy and test your saliva. The litmus paper will turn color to indicate the acidity of your saliva. If your saliva’s pH is too low/acidic, re-assess your current stress, exercise (or lack thereof), and diet. To feel better and have better moods, consider these dietary changes:
- Stop drinking any sodas or sugared drinks, or any artificially sweetened products. Switch to juices or filtered water.
- Stop eating sugared desserts and foods made mainly with white flour and yeast, such as pizza and bagels.
- Eat dark-green leafy salads, other green vegetables (broccoli, cabbage, celery, parsley), and root vegetables (carrots, yams, daikon radish).
- Eat fruits, especially fresh fruits, such as apples, apricots, bananas, cantaloupe, dates, figs, grapefruit, peaches, and grapes. For dried fruit, try raisins.
- Eat rice and buckwheat, almonds, dairy products, and eggs.
Now try shifting your breath, since the oxygen –carbon dioxide balance causes your blood to be more alkaline or acidic.
- Exhale to a count of 8, and inhale to a count of 4. Notice how calm you feel.
- Whenever you feel stressed, exhale to the end of your breath. If you do this quietly, you can do it in front of anyone, even at meetings.
Try changing your diet for a week, and add rhythmic breathing practice. Check your pH again. Notice if these changes make you more relaxed, clear-minded, and vital. If so, you are making a major investment in your long-term health. Why not feel your best, starting now?
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- Kebba Buckley Button is a stress management expert. She also has a natural healing practice and is an ordained minister. She is the author of the award-winning book, Discover The Secret Energized You (http://tinyurl.com/b44v3br), plus the 2013 book, Peace Within: Your Peaceful Inner Core, Second Edition(http://tinyurl.com/mqg3uvc ). Her newest book is Sacred Meditation: Embracing the Divine, available through her office. Just email SacredMeditation@kebba.com.
- For an appointment or to ask Kebba to speak for your group: calendar@kebba.com .