Liver Love Part 1: What to do the Day After Consuming Lots of Alcohol

Hello Everyone,

Like many of you already know, your liver is overworked when a person consumes a lot of alcohol, as well as from an overload of fats or sugar. Although drinking affects your liver heavily, your brain, your intestines and your skin also suffer from over consuming alcohol. It can cause premature aging, sagging skin, and gray hairs, leaving you looking well beyond your years!

Your liver is very important because it helps you absorb fats, controls infections, remove bacteria and toxins from your blood, process drugs and alcohol and produces proteins to help with blood clotting. Your liver is valuable, and you only have one!

Too much alcohol or any other type of liver injury can lead to cirrhosis, a condition where the liver has been harmed to the extent that it starts building scar tissue, which in turn, does not allow for the liver to regenerate new healthy cells. Other factors that causes cirrhosis are obesity, and hepatitis C. Your liver is important, and you need to give it love to keep it healthy

Here are a few tips on what to do after a hangover:

1. Drink lots of water: Alcohol leaves you very dehydrated so replenishing your body with water is the way to go!

2. Take a multivitamin: Alcohol depletes you of your vitamins and minerals so you need to stock up on those essential basics the next day. (Remember, price is not a good index of quality for vitamins.)

3. Eat yogurt: Alcohol weakens your intestines, so taking a form of probiotic will help produce a healthy fauna of bacteria that will protect you from intestinal infection.

4. Take a spoonful of Bee Pollen: Bee pollen has B vitamins, antioxidants, and protein which is perfect for what the body craves after a long night drinking.

5. Eat green leafy vegetables: Vegetables will help with providing vitamins and minerals, as well as hydrate you.

6. Take a licorice capsule: Licorice is helpful for aiding a variety of ailments, one of them being liver disorders*.

7. Take milk thistle, panang ginseng, or  dandelion capsules: Aids with detoxing your liver!

8. Avoid processed foods, fats and caffeine: These foods provide toxins with will slow the recovery of your liver.

9. Add some lemons to your life: When life gives you lemons, your liver is happier! Lemons have diluted hydrochloric acid which supports protein digestion**. But unlike the old saying, don’t make lemonade as it is loaded with so much sugar that it defeats its beneficial purpose.

10. Take a light walk: Walking helps with your overall health, and helps fight the depressed and low feelings caused by the depletion of vitamins and minerals from the high alcohol consumption.

11. Mince some garlic: this is a sulfur based compound that gives a helping hand to the active detoxification of the liver. (And it also gets rid of extra estrogen, the hormone that make women moody)***

I added a lot of options for the possibility that you might have a liver-loving item already in your home.

*Dray, Sarah. “How to Recover Your Liver Health.” November 22, 2010. http://virtuousandbeautiful.wordpress.com/wp-admin/post-new.php

**http://aim4health.com/liver.htm

***http://www.detoxyourbodytoday.com/Foods-Good-For-The-Liver.html