Understanding Body Cleansing: The Process of Elimination

Herbs can have what herbalists call a cleansing effect on the body. Herbs that cleanse are herbs that help the body to eliminate built-up waste materials—some people refer to these waste products as toxins. When toxins build up in the body, they can be the cause of many irritating and depleting ailments. Many times, by just cleansing the body, the ailment you were suffering from disappears. This is basically what a cleanse is.

When we cleanse, the toxins will exit the body faster than normal. Therefore, you might expect some extra activity at your body’s exits! These exits are the four elimination channels, which carry off waste products:

1. The bowel
2. The lungs
3. The kidneys
4. The skin

The skin eliminates uric acid waste products through the pores of the skin; the urinary tract carries off liquid waste products; the respiratory system (lungs and sinuses) carry off gaseous wastes and excess mucus; and the bowel eliminates solid waste matter.

This natural elimination process not only speeds up through an herbal cleansing, but it also speeds up naturally if the body is trying to rid itself of a foreign invader, such as a cold virus, bacteria, or a parasite.

The process of cleansing, eliminating, or detoxing may include a variety of symptoms, including a runny nose, a rash, or diarrhea. The mistake that many people make is to stop this natural process with a medication designed to stop or suppress these annoying symptoms. By medicating the symptoms, however, you are actually plugging up the elimination channel and allowing the bug that caused your body the problem to stay inside your body. This can allow the toxins to settle back into your body tissues and cause another problem sometime later. I see this constantly with people who experience recurring sinus infections. When you help the body eliminate its invader, you will help put a stop to this vicious cycle.

Many times a cleanse offers a breath of fresh air to organs that have been suffocated with mucus build-up. The colon, for instance, can harbor wastes that can fester in the body for years—and sometimes even decades. Most people who are in general good health can benefit from an herbal cleansing before starting on a nutritional/herbal program.

Cleansing the bowel and digestive tract periodically will help ensure that nutrients will be more efficiently absorbed and properly utilized by the body. Natural cleansing can consist of a three-day cleanse or several weeks, depending on the type of cleanse and how toxic your body tissues are. The act of cleansing first and then building is like cleaning out your refrigerator before going shopping for more food. Ridding yourself of old, moldy cucumbers and cleaning the bins before you put new, fresh foods back in is a good idea for your body, too.

Many cleansing herbs will be bitter to the taste and are best taken in a pill form.
Examples of some cleansing type herbs include:

• Cascara sagrada Helps clear the bowel
• Burdock root Helps cleanse the blood
• Yellow dock Helps cleanse the blood, liver, and bowel

Building: We’re Going to Pump You Up!

The herbs you use to build the body can also be used in smaller doses to maintain your results. You can use the herbs as foods and nourishment to build and maintain your immune system so that you keep yourself from getting ill in the first place. When you’re weak and need nourishment, you’ll need more nutrients than when you are just maintaining your health. Be ready to take a lot of herbs until you reach that level.

Using herbs as nutrition will help build up and maintain your body and will help protect you from being vulnerable to disease. Most herbs considered building or nutritive herbs will be salty to the taste, which means they have a high mineral content. Minerals nourish your body and help build strong bones, hair, skin, and teeth.
A few examples of building herbs include:

• Alfalfa Rich in minerals; great for structural system
• Horsetail Rich in silica; feeds structural system, hair, and nails
• Kelp Rich in iodine and other minerals; nourishes and builds the thyroid

Usually you will build up with herbs after you go through a cleansing stage. Once the body has rid itself of the old toxins and irritants that were making you feel sick, you are in a much better position to be able to use herbs as foods to nourish your body and maintain your health and vibrancy. So let’s talk about cleaning out those pipes!

Activating Properties

Herbs have activating qualities to them, also known as stimulation. This activation may be needed when an organ of the body is functioning sluggishly or under par. Some herbs have tonifying properties, meaning that they tone the glands or functioning of the body, much like exercise tones your muscles. Some herbs can actually stimulate and support your body to help it do its job better. Activating herbs have a stimulating effect on the body organs and can give you a jump-start on health. This effect might be compared to the feeling of suddenly being pushed into an icy cold pool on a hot summer day. (Now that’s activating!)

These activating herbs are not necessarily used long-term, but they can be a catalyst to helping you recover.
An example of some stimulating herbs include:

• Capsicum Stimulates blood circulation
• Horseradish Stimulates respiratory passages
• Peppermint Stimulates alertness and digestion

How Herbalists Seek Their Answers?

Many herbalists that I know got their start by first seeking answers to their own health issues and found herbs to be their solution. Their experience engaged them in a passionate study until folks began seeking them out for their knowledge and understanding of how herbs can also work for them, too. So, I guess it was about “thyme” for a resurgence of nature and a rediscovery of our responsibility to take care of our families and ourselves. This is one of the reasons why herbs are back in the spotlight once again.

Looking at this table you might think, “Why take all those herbs when I can take a drug in one pill?” There are two answers to that question. First, most companies will offer you herbal products that combine several herbs geared toward a certain condition into one pill. Granted, you will need a few of these pills every few hours, versus one of the OTC (over-the-counter) drugs, but the effects herbs have on your body are positive. Synthetic drugs of any kind can have permanent negative effects on your body and can lead to a damaged liver, kidney failure, decreased immune, and even death.

Second, take a look at the long list of ingredients listed on the back of that package of drugs you wanted to take. You are not getting just one ingredient, but also several chemicals, dyes, and synthetic materials (mostly words you never knew existed) all combined into one pill or dosage. You will also see a list of warnings and cautions to take into consideration. Are you really taking that for your health or for convenience? Why not bear through what you can, while helping your body get well with the use of herbs? Consider using medications when you feel that you must stop your symptoms immediately. Then get home as soon as possible, get some rest, and take your herbs!

Herbs Are Popular Again—It’s About Thyme!

Why we are turning back to home remedies? My guess is that, just like in the pioneer days of the West, people around the globe are realizing that there is not really any magic pill to cure all ills. They may be realizing (if even subconsciously) that we are products of nature, and that surgery and medicines do not change that fact. Many people begin to look for answers elsewhere when their medical treatments don’t prove effective or when physicians do not have all the answers. They seek a kinder, gentler approach to health. Herbs and nutritional information is widely available and is a healthy and safe solution for many.

Since herbs are a safer alternative to medications, many times you’ll get well before you run out of patience and get a prescription for your ailment. Unlike synthetic materials, the body can eliminate herbs if they are not able to be utilized.

If you do experience “side effects” when using an herb, the effects are usually a result
of your body rapidly eliminating wastes. Unless you have a kno

• Headaches: Circulation has been stimulated before the body has been cleansed.Work with your herbalist to go through a cleanse before you begin any herbs designed to increase your circulation. Blood carries waste materials to the head area.
• Rashes: Usually because the blood is eliminating wastes. Try going on a bowelcleansing regimen first before working with herbs that cleanse the blood. wn allergy to an herb, herbs are generally safe. Some common herbal cleansing side effects you could experience include:
• Sinus drainage: Herbs can loosen long-standing mucus deposits. Drainage is common especially if you have had a history of sinus or respiratory conditions. A client of mine went on an herbal program and began feeling mucus draining from her nose, inside her ears into her throat, and experienced many odd sensations in her head, despite the fact that she hadn’t experienced allergies in a few years. After one week of copious drainage, her long-standing congestion was gone for good!
• Nausea: Cleansing of the digestive tract—predominately the liver—is taking place too rapidly. Cut back on the cleansing herbs slightly to slow your cleansing process.
• Vomiting: Cleansing is taking place to rapidly. Handle the situation the same as you would for nausea.
• Diarrhea: Too much of the bowel stimulant herbs can cause diarrhea. Loose stool is different than diarrhea, however, and is a positive cleansing sign. Diarrhea is characterized by griping pain in the intestines, and the stool is predominately liquid.

Herbs with Medicine: Making It Complementary

Herbs work differently than medications. Sometimes herbs have a cleansing or a detoxifying effect (detoxing means to remove toxins from the body). Toxins can be construed as anything toxic, poisonous, or of no positive value to the body.

By strengthening you, herbs can make your body more effective at eliminating foreign substances from your system. Some medications have byproducts that are unnatural to the body (synthetic materials), so the cleansing herbs may lessen the effect of your medications by pushing out these foreign substances.

Conversely, some herbal properties have the same effects as medications and can actually enhance the effects of each other. This can also be a cause for caution. Make sure your prescribing doctor monitors your prescription dosages if taking herbs and medications together. It is always wise to let both your prescribing doctor and your herbalist know any and all supplements and medications you are taking to avoid unpleasant interactions.

I have found that many of my clients who have been on medications when starting on an herbal program have been able to cut back or even eliminate their medication. This has happened with synthetic thyroid medications, insulin, and even antidepressants. However, do not attempt this yourself—supervision by a competent physician is important when working with herbs and medications together. It’s exciting to see how herbs can strengthen the body and lessen the need for drugs. The body is truly a sufficient manufacturing plant, which requires the correct raw materials to keep it running smoothly.

The Difference Between Herbs and Medicines

Fundamentally, the body (via the brain) knows what to do and how to process a whole food, such as an herb, but a drug is a more aggressive substance that forces a chemical change in the body. This is why drugs need to be administered by doctors: They can be dangerous and are deadly substances if used incorrectly. Herbs are much more forgiving. If you overdose on an herb, the worst you may experience is vomiting and a headache. In contrast, drugs need to be taken with much more caution and regulation, as they can cause death when taken in the wrong combination or dosage.

Be smart when taking herbs and medications. Although your herbs may make you feel like you do not need your medications anymore, it is very important to never go off your medications without working with your prescribing doctor. Let me explain why this is so important. Let’s say for example that you suffer from high blood pressure. First of all your body is raising your blood pressure in an attempt to improve your circulation that is being inhibited (many times due to fat clogging the arteries).

Then the doctor gives you a blood pressure medicine that blocks the mechanisms that allow your blood pressure to raise. This is an artificial cure, because now your body really wants to raise your pressure in an attempt to get the nutrient, oxygen-rich blood to all areas of the body. In a sense, your body works harder and pressure builds as the medication works against your body’s natural process. If you suddenly discontinue your medications, the cork can be blown out, so to speak, and your blood pressure can rise to dangerously high levels very fast. (I liken this example to pushing hard against a door to open it and suddenly someone opens the door.)

It is so much wiser and easier use herbs first, to get to the source of your problem, (in this case, cleaning the cholesterol) and have your blood pressure return to normal as your body was designed to do in the first place. This is the natural approach to health and is where many medical doctors and holistic practitioners differ.

Unlike using a synthetic medication designed to suppress a symptom immediately, nature tends to have her own time schedule. Depending on your genetic makeup, you will have to wait for the results, which vary from person to person. Sometimes you will use an herb that works overnight for you, and other times it will take a much longer time to notice changes.

Our bodies all work a little differently. For one person, an herb will work within 20 minutes; for you it might take two weeks. Remember, however, that your body is sick because it usually is missing one or many nutrients. How fast you will notice healing evidence depends on the extent of your deficiency and how long you have been deficient.

Remember that nature takes her time, so hang in there and continue feeding your body the nutrients it needs to heal itself!