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S2E15: What To Do For Detox Symptoms

Two weeks ago we talked about some of the symptom patterns that can arise as you’re working with MTHFR. Honestly, they can show up for lots of people, but detox symptoms are especially common for us MTHFR folks. So let’s talk about a few things we can do to tackle this feeling. Remember, step one is to recognize your pattern of detox symptoms, so start there. Go through your symptom tracker and see what symptoms seem to flare up together, and if any of those might just be related to detoxification.

There are a few ways we can cope with detox symptoms and they fall into two general categories.

  1. Decreasing the amount of stuff your body has to do that day
  2. Increasing the ease of actually eliminating whatever it is you’re detoxifying.

Detoxification is a process that is happening when you have detox symptoms coming up. It is happening because you have junk that needs to go, and it stops when the junk is gone. So our goal is to get the junk gone faster. How’s that for creative use of the English language?

How To Deal With Detox Symptoms
How To Deal With Detox Symptoms

Decreasing Your Tasks For The Day

Your body has a whole list of stuff it has to do every day. There’s cell division, cell repair, and cell elimination when they’re too damaged to fix. There’s all of the normal stuff you do like pumping blood, collecting and distributing oxygen, and fighting off the constant stream of invading bacteria, viruses, fungi and other pathogens. There’s digestion and elimination and the manufacture of all of the enzymes and fluids involved in that process. There’s blood to be filtered and waste to be eliminated. It’s hard work, running your body.

Of course, as the wearer of the meat-suit, you don’t have to think about any of that. You can just happily go about doing all of the things you normally do while your body handles it all. Pretty amazing, when you think about it.

So on days when detox symptoms are coming up and you haven’t had a big exposure (like you didn’t go out drinking, drive all day in a formaldehyde soaked new car, or accidentally eat the lead paint), then it means your body just has too much on it’s plate that day. The stuff on your body’s plate is what I like to refer to as your bucket. Your bucket is filled up with all of your body’s work that is going on right now because of things you’re doing right now like breathing and eating and maintaining homeostasis. When your bucket overflows, that’s when you see symptoms. These detox symptoms are no exception – that bucket is too full.

Long-term there are lots of things that you can do to take a chunk out of your bucket, like eliminating food sensitivities, cleaning up your diet, getting better sleep and clearing some of the toxins out of your home and environment. But what about short-term? Like these detox days when your bucket is overflowing.

Intermittent Fasting

In good news, there are short-term bucket clearers too and one of my favorites is intermittent fasting. Fasting, which essentially boils down to not eating, is a great way to take some of your body’s to-do list off of the table. If you’re not eating food for a little while then your body doesn’t have to do all of the digestive things it normally does. It doesn’t have to make so much of the enzymes and fluids, it doesn’t have to do all of the mixing and moving that food requires, and it doesn’t have to absorb, sort, or eliminate anything. In fact, not digesting takes a huge chunk of work out of there and your body can use those resources for other things.

Now, obviously not eating long-term isn’t a great strategy – you need to eat at some point, but if you wake up feeling gross and like you’re detoxing, stick to water for the first part of the day. If you can, stick to water only (with some hydration support like salt, a squeeze of lemon or lime, or even some apple cider vinegar) until dinner time. Then, eat a healthy dinner and head to bed.

So actually, this day is easier than normal because in addition to not doing the metabolic work of eating you also don’t have to cook or find food. Bonus! Of course it does get in the way of all of the Covid-eating we’re all doing these days, but maybe that isn’t a bad thing to miss for a day as well.

Increasing Elimination

The other strategy to help your body over the hurdle of detox symptoms is to help your body detoxify faster or more efficiently. There are a few things you can do towards this goal.

Liver Support

The best liver support for this type of day is something gentle like a detox tea, or a digestive aid like bitters, apple cider vinegar, or a digestive enzyme with ox bile before meals. These are gentle things that are unlikely to push you further into symptom territory and that will give your liver a bit of a boost to get through whatever it is working on this particular day. I don’t suggest liver supportive supplements unless you’re working with a practitioner, simply because for MTHFR folks some of the liver support supplements can push just a little bit too hard and actually cause symptoms instead of helping to resolve them.

What To Do If You Have Detox Symptoms
What To Do If You Have Detox Symptoms

Gentle Detox Aids

There are a number of gentle detox aids and I’ve talked about many of them before. These are ways you can physically help your body to detox without pushing your liver or detoxification pathways too hard. In fact, these things will help when you have symptoms. My favorites are:

  1. Sweat It Out – Sweating is a great way to boost circulation and to eliminate small amounts of toxins including heavy metals, which MTHFR folks have a hard time eliminating because they need to be methylated. Sweating it out can be accomplished in a wet or dry sauna, a hot bath, a hot car, or even with a great workout. Just make sure you wash the sweat off afterward because you can reabsorb lots of things from your skin. Also, you’ll smell better.
  2. Castor Oil – Castor oil is one of my favorite old-timey remedies and one of the most effective things you can do to support detoxification. It should not be taken internally – you would regret that – but it can be applied topically. My favorite way to use it is to slather up before bed, put on my castor oil pajamas, and go to sleep like that. I’m sleeping and detoxing all at once. I talked quite a bit about castor oil last season in Season 1, Episode 24 on Gentle Detox Strategies. If you need a refresher on using castor oil, that’s a great place to look.
  3. Fiber or Clay – Fiber and clay can both be taken internally, although make sure your clay is actually food grade before you mix it up and drink it. Both of these are what is called a “gut sponge,” meaning they bind to toxins and carry them out of your body so that they are actually eliminated and not reabsorbed. Human bodies are incredibly thrifty and we tend to eliminate toxins, then go back through what we’ve eliminated and pick them up again. Especially if they look like fats or other precious resources. That means hormones that need to be eliminated are especially susceptible to this reabsorption because they are built on a cholesterol backbone and our bodies have been well trained through the millennia to keep cholesterol around. Fiber and clay both have big porous structures and toxins get bound to them, then they can’t be reabsorbed so they are effectively eliminated.
  4. Magnesium – Magnesium is a mineral and it’s very common to be deficient Your body uses more of it when you’re detoxing and taking magnesium can help if you get stalled out somewhere. Also, magnesium helps encourage healthy bowel movements, muscle relaxation, and sleep. I prefer to take magnesium before bed, but a small dose in the morning if you feel like you’re detoxing can be helpful too.
  5. Antioxidants – When your body is doing a lot of extra work, it is also creating a lot of extra free radicals and detoxification is no exception. Also, with MTHFR our master antioxidant, called glutathione, can be compromised so bolstering this system is a good idea. I’m not married to any one antioxidant and actually I prefer to rotate through different ones because each has an affinity for different tissue types. Essentially when I buy an antioxidant product, I buy something different each time. I’ll go from vitamin C, to vitamin E, to something like resveratrol, to a mixed product. The more coverage, the better. We talked a lot about antioxidants and glutathione in Season 1, Episode 14 and if you need a refresher, that’s a good place to start.
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MTHFR is a common genetic mutation that can contribute to anxiety, depression, fatigue, chronic pain, infertility, and more serious conditions like breast implant illness, heart attack, stroke, chronic fatigue syndrome, and some types of cancer. If you know or suspect you have an MTHFR variant, schedule a free 15-minute meet-and-greet appointment with MTHFR expert Dr. Amy today.

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Amy Neuzil
Amy Neuzil

Dr. Amy Neuzil, N.D. is a leading expert in MTHFR and epigenetics, and she is passionate about helping people achieve optimal health and wellness for their genetic picture. She has helped thousands of people overcome health challenges using a simple, step-by-step approach that starts with where they are today. Dr. Neuzil's unique approach to wellness has helped countless people improve their energy levels, lose weight, and feel better mentally and emotionally. If you're looking for a way to feel your best, Dr. Amy Neuzil can help. Contact her today to learn more about how she can help you achieve optimal health and wellness.

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