Keeping your blood pH alkaline creates a healthy environment in which to live.
Do you find yourself feeling tired and getting sick way too much, and it’s confusing to you because you eat healthy foods? The culprit could be that you are consuming too many acidic foods and beverages. Many healthy foods can cause a pH imbalance.
Our bodies are meant to be alkaline environments, but we have changed their bodies from this natural state to one that is acidic. This is evidenced by the increase in illnesses such as cancer, heart disease, diabetes, arthritis and more. Basically, if your body is acidic, it will attract sickness.
There are many reasons why we have increased our acidity:
- We consume mostly acidic foods – such as meat, carbohydrates and alcohol
- Our stress levels have skyrocketed
- We are on toxic overload – much of what we eat has toxins like junk and fast foods
- We overuse pharmaceutical drugs
The pH scale ranges from 1.0 to 14.0, with 7.0 being neutral, 1.0 to 6.0 being acidic and 7.1 to 14.0 being alkaline. The ideal pH for humans is 7.365. When your body is too acidic, it will move into overdrive trying to do anything it can to raise its pH level, but in doing so, it puts unneeded stress your body. This means it will neglect other vital functions in order to try to balance the pH.
A pH Imbalance Can Cause:
- Obesity and weight gain
- Numerous diseases since an acidic environment is one that is prime for diseases to grow and survive
- Osteoporosis because it takes calcium from your bones
- High cholesterol because the body creates cholesterol to aid in neutralizing the acids
- Anemia because it pulls iron from your red blood cells
- Muscle spasms because it pulls potassium from your muscle tissues
You Body’s pH Can Affect Your Risk of Cancer
There are theories floating around that an alkaline diet has not only the potential to reduce the risk of cancer, but that it also has the ability to cure it! Michael Murray, author of Acid Alkaline Diet Simplified says, “At a pH of 8.5, cancer cells can no longer survive. Therefore, a high alkaline diet can potentially decrease one’s risk of cancer or even help fight the disease.”
Clues That Your Body May Be Too Acidic:
- You are frequently lethargic, anxious or irritable
- You catch several colds a year
- You are constantly congested
- You have gained weight
- You have chronic pain and/or inflammation
- You have consistent joint pain
- You suffer from heartburn
- You have poor digestion
- You have had bone loss
- You experience muscle weakness
- You have urinary tract issues
- You get kidney stones
- You have receding gums
- You suffer from acne and other skin problems
- You have chronic yeast infections
- You have experienced premature aging
How Alkaline Are You?
Even if you have some of these symptoms, you may still want to know your exact pH level, and fortunately it is easy to test your pH level in your own home. You can buy testing strips from many pharmacies and health food stores or even online. The ones that test with saliva are often considered easier to use than the ones that test with urine. Be sure to test your pH either one hour before eating or two hours after eating.
Other pH Balancing Methods
In addition to food, there are other ways to balance your body’s acidity and alkalinity. Here are some tips as outlined in Michael Murray’s book, Acid Alkaline Diet Simplified:
- Choose water as your usual beverage – To put this in perspective, Michael points out that pure water is neutral, non-herbal tea is 600-800 times more acidic, coffee is 700-1000 times more acidic and soda is 50,000 times more acidic! Now maybe you can see how much our diet affects our pH. Hopefully you understand why it is important to avoid coffee, tea and soda.
- Breathe properly – Most people breathe from their chest instead of from their lower lungs, which is the wrong way to breathe because it doesn’t provide the body with the full amount of oxygen it needs. The body has an easier time ridding itself of acids when it gets a lot of oxygen, so breathing properly is important.
- Be careful what foods you combine – Acid reflux comes from combining the wrong foods. Proteins can be combined with vegetables and sparingly with fats. Carbs can be combined with vegetables and sparingly with fats. Proteins and carbs should not be combined and fruits should not be combined with anything (with the exception of lemons, limes, tomatoes and avocados).
- Manage your stress – Feelings like fear, anxiety and anger cause your body to create extra acids and at the same time, they make your digestive system shut down. That means your body is creating more toxins at the same time that it has stopped eliminating toxins. This is a big reason why stress causes so many health issues.
Now that you understand the important points relating to alkalizing your body, it’ll be much easier to make good decisions when it comes to your health. Most of us don’t realize how much one simple aspect of our health, like our pH level, can drastically affect us inside and out. But now that you know, what are you going to do with that knowledge?
Adapted from Faith M. Davis of Carpe Vita Inc. Oct 18 2012.
Pilateon 