Throughout the holiday season for Christmas and New Year’s Eve, many find themselves over-indulging on both the delicious food available and the flow of alcohol. With diet and alcohol intake being two of the biggest factors that can cause issues to your liver, it’s little wonder that many people feel their bodies getting sluggish in the starting months of the year.
What Does the Liver Do?
Your liver is the largest organ in your body and it’s responsible for a number of essential actions. Most importantly:
- The creation of essential bile production
- Aids in the regeneration of blood cells
- Stores vital vitamins and minerals for later use
- Produces blog sugars when the intake of them is low
- Aids in metabolizing carbohydrates, fats, and proteins.
What Impact Does Alcohol & Diet Have on Your Liver?
- Diet: As it’s the liver’s job to break down the fats that enter your body, if you overload on fatty foods in your diet then your liver has to work overtime to break them down. Most of us are guilty of over-indulging during the festive season and this can cause strain on our livers.
- Alcohol: We are often told that alcohol has a negative impact on the liver, particularly if it is in excess of 4 glasses at one time. The reason for this is because when our body breaks down alcohol it produces toxic chemicals that can damage the liver.
What are the Best Detoxification Methods?
The sudden introduction of increased alcohol and poor diet can cause normal liver function to become out of balance. The best option is to detoxify the liver. St Mary’s Thistle (also known as Milk thistle) can have the following benefits for your liver to try to counteract the overindulgence of the festive season and get your liver back to running at an optimum level:
- Aids in the regeneration of new liver cells
- Detoxifies the liver from the chemicals in alcohol
- Protects the liver from future impact of alcohol consumption
- Promotes normal liver function.
If you’re interested in learning more about how herbal medicines can assist you with an extensive range of illnesses, ailments and promotion of healthy organ and body function, please review the contents for the Australian School of Herbal Medicine online course and enrol today. Contact Us here for more information.