HOW TO AVOID TOO MUCH ACID IN THE BODY.
Overeating causes alkaline foods to turn acidic in the body.
As the spring season approaches and we think about Easter, planting gardens, taking our Mothers out for Mother’s Day, summer vacations and picnics, we think about the meals and food we use to celebrate. This spring and summer is especially big for us since the heat means covid will decline and the vaccine circulation will increase. Hopefully we can start to have some form of normalcy. This is my favorite season personally because it means getting back out into nature for hikes and photos.
With warmer weather comes more outdoor activity and hopefully healthy foods. But we all know what picnic food is like so lets talk about our inclination to indulge ourselves as part of our celebrating.
If we want to talk about overeating, we first have to look at the stomach and understand what it’s designed to do. Your stomach is, basically, a small sack that is meant to hold your meal temporarily. It’s roughly the size of your fist, and ideally should only hold about two and a half ounces of food in it at a time. The stomach can expand to hold about a quart of food, but the more you put in, the more you disrupt the stomach in its basic function. The stomach is unique in that it secretes digestive enzymes, most notably hydrochloric acid (HCl). HCl breaks down proteins so that once your food reaches your intestines, that turkey you ate is now in smaller, more manageable particles that can be absorbed by your body through a healthy intestinal wall, and eventually used by your body to rebuild and repair (I want to add here that not everyone has a healthy intestinal wall or the proper amount of HCl to complete this task, but that is a topic for another day). HCl is also, on a side note, meant to acid-wash any parasites or disease that lingers on the food you eat, protecting you from taking on any internal scavengers that will use you for their own benefit.
Learn how the harmonic egg can help with digestion.
With the relaxing vibrations of the bowls the digestive track goes into rest and digest mode allowing our body to function at its best.
““Tip: Try not to drink liquids while you eat (it dilutes stomach acids), breathe, chew mindfully long enough to liquify your food, and know that it takes twenty minutes for your belly to signal to your brain that you’ve had enough.””
When you overeat and overfill your little sack, you begin to disrupt this process. The stomach churns your food, rolling it around to give it a thorough dose of digestive enzymes and HCl. This breaks down the cellular membranes of the food and also gives it that proper sterilization before it moves on into your intestines. However, overeating limits the stomach’s room to churn and move, which means not everything is getting broken down, and parasites can hide and never get dealt with. Suddenly, what should be an easy two to four-hour process becomes a sluggish eight-hour exercise in futility. Exhausted, your stomach will finally move that undigested food into your intestines, where it will now rot, ferment, and create a host of issues that can include inflammation, leaky gut, gas and bloating, and an unhealthy microbiome.
What happens when we over eat: Exhausted, your stomach will finally move that undigested food into your intestines, where it will now rot, ferment, and create a host of issues that can include inflammation, leaky gut, gas and bloating, and an unhealthy microbiome.
Overeating can also create problems in your esophagus. The stomach has a door in, and a door out. These are called sphincters. When you eat, the stomach will close the esophageal sphincter tightly so that none of the HCl will escape and accidentally burn the esophagus, causing acid reflux. With chronic overeating, that muscle becomes weaker because you force that door open too often.
So, we’ve determined that by overeating, you risk your esophageal health, your intestinal health, and you allow parasites an easier entry into your body. What else can happen? Well, since this is just a quick blog post, I’ll keep it brief.
By compromising your intestinal health, you open yourself up to arthritis, gout, weight gain, a compromised immune system/autoimmune issues, chronic inflammation, yeast overgrowth, an acidic pH balance (even if you eat alkaline foods, overeating and not allowing them to digest properly will putrefy them in your intestines and turn them acidic), and toxicity issues.
A healthy gut is your superpower!
It’s your way of allowing your body to operate optimally, and if you compromise that system by hindering your stomach (the first step in the process), then you’ve already lost that battle.
A healthy gut is your superpower! It’s your way of allowing your body to operate optimally, and if you compromise that system by hindering your stomach (the first step in the process), then you’ve already lost that battle.
So, be of get outside and enjoy each other in what ever capacity we can. Enjoy your food, but don’t over-do it. Try not to drink liquids while you eat (it dilutes stomach acids), breathe, chew mindfully long enough to liquify your food, and know that it takes twenty minutes for your belly to signal to your brain that you’ve had enough. Not only will you taste and enjoy your favorite foods more thoroughly, but this will also allow your body to truly appreciate and use that food to keep you energized, healthy, and ready to rock through the Summer days with those you love.
Learn more on how you can support your own healing and better digestion with the Harmonic Egg