The Link Between Aging and Elimination
by Dian Freeman
Many people are confused about natural approaches to preventing premature aging. If we are lacking sufficient stomach acid and enzyme production, our food will not be correctly broken down enough to be absorbed. What we do not digest becomes putrefied sludge and is very toxic. Plus, if the bowels are working too fast, even the digested nutrients will be fast-tracked out and not absorbed. In both cases, nutrients we thought we were getting will be wasted and toxins we do not want can be absorbed. Also, the reverse is true. If our bowels are slow or clogged and the contents stay in there too long, waste products will be absorbed, causing systemic toxification, free radical damage and premature aging.
No matter how well we eat, the number of supplements we take, how far we run or how long we meditate, if we are not digesting our nutrients completely they cannot be absorbed. Digestion begins in the stomach. Low stomach acid leads to the putrefaction and fermentation of food in the stomach, which causes acids to burn the stomach lining and make gas bubbles that can push that acid up into the throat. This reflux is most often due to the lack of stomach acid, not too much. We can purchase stomach acid, HCL, in supplement form or put a couple of teaspoons of natural apple cider vinegar in a glass of water with a natural sweetener. Taken with a meal, vinegar acts like HCL in the stomach.
To aid digestion, the use of vinegar in salads, pickles before and with a meal, and fermented side dishes were part of every meal in early cultures. Today, people take pills to turn off stomach acid. This is a quick route to osteoporosis and dementia. The bones cannot receive minerals unless they have been broken down by acid in the stomach, while the brain also requires minerals to perform its many miraculous functions.
Digestion continues in the upper part of the small intestines (duodenum), where enzymes are added from the pancreas. If the this organ is overworked from making insulin to meet the requirement of storing the amount of sugar and starch that most people are eating today, it often is unable to produce enough enzymes to finish the job of digestion. Insulin is a formable inflammatory hormone that causes not only early aging, but many inflammatory conditions, as well. We are able to take digestive enzymes as a supplement with each meal. Doing so allows for the use of every nutrient that is ingested.
A smoothly running bowel depends not only on well-digested nutrients, but on proper peristaltic motion enabled by fiber. Harsh, whole grain fiber like bran blocks the absorption of minerals. Insoluble fiber such as the strings and veins of a from vegetables and soluble fiber from gelatinous plants such as the interior of apples not only helps move the bowel, it also soaks up sugar, toxins, cholesterol and fat before it can be absorbed into the body. Common supplemental soluble fibers include psyllium hulls and flax seed.
The key to healthy and productive senior years is getting the nutrients in and the waste out. Absorption and elimination are essential to any anti-aging list.
Dian Freeman, MA, certified in clinical nutrition, has a private nutritional consultation practice in Morristown. For more information, email Dian2@wellnesssimplified.com or visit WellnessSimplified.com.
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