Acid re­flux is a com­mon con­di­tion where stom­ach acid flows up in­to the tube that con­nects the stom­ach to the throat, called the oe­soph­a­gus. Acid en­ters the oe­soph­a­gus be­cause of a weak­ened ring of mus­cle at the top of the stom­ach (called the low­er oe­sophageal sphinc­ter (LES)). Usu­al­ly, when we con­sume any food or drink, that ring of mus­cle tight­ens and clos­es off the top of the stom­ach so that noth­ing flows out of the stom­ach, back up the tube. With the ex­cep­tion of burp­ing or vom­it­ing, that tiny door­way should re­main closed. How­ev­er, when it is un­able to shut prop­er­ly be­cause it has be­come weak­ened for some rea­son, and gas­tric juices end up flow­ing back up the tube, then this al­ters prop­er di­ges­tion, of­ten caus­ing many un­pleas­ant symp­toms. If left un­treat­ed, acid re­flux can evolve in­to a con­di­tion known as GERD (gas­tro-oe­sopha­gal re­flux dis­ease).

Here are a few nat­ur­al reme­dies:

Al­ter your di­et

Do:

Avoid your trig­ger foods and in­clude foods that are an­ti-in­flam­ma­to­ry, sooth­ing to your gut and easy to di­gest. These can in­clude green leafy veg­eta­bles, cu­cum­ber, ochro (okra), al­monds, oat­meal, white fish, white meat, brown rice, co­conut, av­o­ca­do, soups and sal­ads (with­out raw onion).

Drink lots of wa­ter through­out the day.

Do: Take the time to chew your food prop­er­ly and eat more slow­ly.

Con­sume less al­co­hol.

Don’t:

Con­sume processed foods (for ex­am­ple, sausages, tinned meats and foods high in ar­ti­fi­cial in­gre­di­ents), condi­ments (for ex­am­ple, ketchup, mus­tard, bar­beque sauce, gar­lic sauce or sal­ad dress­ing) or fast foods.

Drink while eat­ing. A sip of wa­ter for the mois­ture is okay, but a glass of juice is not. This di­lutes the stom­ach acid and caus­es a longer time for di­ges­tion, lead­ing of course to fer­men­ta­tion, gas, bloat­ing and acid re­flux.

Skip meals. This can lead to overeat­ing when­ev­er you do eat.

Don’t eat and lie down. It is best to wait at least an hour af­ter eat­ing be­fore you lie down.

Change your sleep­ing po­si­tion

Acid re­flux of­ten strikes in the night time. Be sure to sleep in an el­e­vat­ed po­si­tion by stack­ing your pil­lows at least six inch­es high­er than usu­al. If you sleep on your side, be sure to sleep on your left side, as this po­si­tion pre­vents acid from trav­el­ling up the oe­soph­a­gus.

Re­duce your stress lev­els

Stress is like a ball of en­er­gy that be­gins in the mind and is stored up in the body. It must be re­leased or else the body will im­plode, fig­u­ra­tive­ly speak­ing, of course. Find a way to re­lease this en­er­gy, whether it be by mod­er­ate ex­er­cise, out­door ac­tiv­i­ty, med­i­ta­tion, prayer, or what­ev­er healthy means that you choose, and re­store bal­ance to the en­er­gy in your body.

Try nat­ur­al sup­ple­ments

Ep­som salt/mag­ne­sium – re­lax­es smooth mus­cle tis­sue and re­duces spasm of the oe­sophageal sphinc­ter, pre­vent­ing the es­cape of acid from the stom­ach.

Gin­ger and turmer­ic – an­ti-in­flam­ma­to­ry and aid di­ges­tion when tak­en in mod­er­a­tion.

Paw paw – Con­tains the en­zyme pepsin which aids in the ef­fec­tive break­down of food in the stom­ach.

Raw, un­fil­tered ap­ple cider vine­gar – con­tains help­ful pro­bi­otics and re­stores the stom­ach’s acidic PH for ef­fec­tive di­ges­tion.

Ac­ti­vat­ed char­coal – re­duces gas and bloat­ing, and re­moves harm­ful tox­ins from the gut caused by bac­te­r­i­al or yeast over­growth due to cer­tain med­ica­tions.

Pro­tect your gut lin­ing

Help your gut to heal by restor­ing its mu­cos­al lin­ing. Liquorice root (not for high blood pres­sure pa­tients), slip­pery elm, aloe ve­ra and ochro/okra can help with this, all in mod­er­ate amounts.

Pro­bi­otics like, yo­gurt, kom­bucha, fer­ment­ed veg­eta­bles or pro­bi­ot­ic sup­ple­ments help to re­pop­u­late the gut with “good” bac­te­ria, aid­ing prop­er di­ges­tion.

Leah Lewis, MPH.

CEO/ Prin­ci­pal Con­sul­tant

Leah Lewis is a health and well­ness pro­gramme ex­pert and is the founder and prin­ci­pal con­sul­tant of To’ren Health­care Con­sul­tan­cy. Through her com­pa­ny, she helps lead­ers around the world to cre­ate and man­age win­ning health pro­grams and poli­cies, while in­spir­ing oth­ers to live healthy lifestyles.

Web: www.toren­health.ml

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E: llewis@toren­health.ml

Tel: 868-478-0807