Today I’m going to talk about something that nearly everyone suffers from to some degree – INFLAMMATION. So let’s define it properly first. What exactly IS Inflammation?
Inflammation is the immune system’s response to a stimuli that is viewed as foreign or toxic to the body. We call these antigens. The body looks at these as a threat, and will go to work immediately to eliminate them. To do this, your body has to attack it and get rid of it. The method the body uses is inflammation. That is one of the body’s defense mechanisms against antigens. Fevers are another type of defense mechanism that actually make the environment inhospitable by “cooking the bugs”. So understand that these things are not BAD, in an of themselves. They are the body’s way of dealing with invaders.
Inflammation will mobilize some of the body’s defenses, which are your white blood cells. Inflammation is a blood rush to the affected area. So what does this look like in real life? You can either have an over reaction or an under reaction, depending on the circumstances. There is pain to keep us from moving that particular part of the body, so the body can heal. Usually redness and swelling as fluids and blood rush to the site to start the repairs. This is called vascular dilation. So inflammation has a purpose in the body. It isn’t always a bad thing.
Without going into detail about the inflammatory chemicals involved, which are cytokines, leukotrienes and prostaglandins, what they do is tell the immune system what type of cells should be triggered, and how many should be triggered. But the problems come in if it miscalculates or misestimates. This causes either too much firing or not enough firing in the immune system, which creates collateral damage. This is what happens in auto-immune disease. The body’s immune system is attacking itself and destroying the entire body. Then we have what’s called collateral damage.
But, as with everything I present to you, there is an easy inexpensive way to deal with this BEFORE it gets out of control.
It’s vitamin D. I’ve said it a million times, this is not rocket science, folks!
So why Vitamin D? Because it is an immune modulator. What that means is that it modifies or controls something. It varies the strength of something, turning it either up or down. Just like aspirin will inhibit or turn down the prostaglandins, vitamin D will do the same thing, with no side effects.
So whether you are suffering from an injury or an immune condition that has become chronic, or an autoimmune condition, vitamin D is one of the best approaches to take to try and modulate what’s going on in your body. The minimum amount in these instances is 20,000 IU per day. If you are in the chronic phase, you might want to take 30,000 – 50,000. Make sure you are taking vitamin K2 with it.
Think about it. How many people do you know personally who have arthritis, asthma, allergies, auto-immune disease, fibromyalgia. Now, of those, how many are taking Vitamin D in therapeutic doses every day? It’s so very unnecessary!
Even mainstream medicine will acknowledge that chronic inflammation is the ROOT CAUSE of most chronic illnesses. It’s estimated that at least 50% of people are dealing with it! Here is a list of the most common:
Heart disease
Cancer
Chronic pain
Type 2 diabetes
Neurological diseases
Many digestive disorders
Autoimmune diseases
Insomnia
Anxiety
And yet they CONTINUE to deal with the symptoms of inflammation without getting to the root cause. And that, my friends, is where the Herb Gal comes in.
Next week we are going to continue this discussion and address the herbal alternatives to help you deal with this condition. As I always caution, you need to address this with a QUALIFIED Health Practitioner, and if they aren’t an herbal specialist, please give me a call and let me help you.
There’s just no reason to continue to suffer like this when there are natural solutions that will not give you side effects. So start taking that vitamin D, and Let’s Get Better!
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