Over the past several years the immune system has met many challenges.  Here’s the thing, the immune system stays STRONG with the right foods, stress management, and healthy habits. Society even went as far as placing hand sanitizer on a pedestal, thats great for the outside of our bodies, but immune function starts deep inside!

If your interior habitat is not strong, your exterior cleanliness will only go so far.

Even though some of you may not relate, I have been a mom for a while now.  During all of these years, I have always gotten “the look” from others who simply think I am nuts for being so pickey about the foods that me and my children eat.

The bottom line is this…

Sugar will lower the immune system, and that sugar, is not just sugar. Sugar, flour, dairy, and alcohol all break down and metabolize as a sugar. When our bodies have to digest sugars, certain vitamins and minerals, that support our immune function, have to “leave their post” to help out in the digestive process, leaving the immune system unattended, and short handed, for a period of time. In other words, your immune system will not work at maximum capicity if you have been eating pasta with cream sauce and wine!

I truly don’t mean to sound like a downer, but creating the right combinations, and minimizing the sugars (sugar, flour, dairy, and alcohol) can keep your immune system running strong.  Take the past example I just gave you.  It’s about making a choice, do you want wine or pasta? If you choose wine, then make dinner grilled salmon with sauteed vegetables. Basically, limit your sugars to zero or 1 per meal and snack.

This is the time to ramp up your nutrition through your foods. Your interior habitat needs the very best fruits and vegetables as your multi-vitamin. The darker the richer the color, the more nutrients they provide. Set up your kitchen with fresh ingredients in the refrigerator. Next, have your freezer set up for the ultimate back-up. This is where batch cooking is so helpful. You can make some wonderful soups and stews with tons of fresh ingredients and then freeze them for those days that the refrigerator runs bear. My top favorites are Mexican Chicken Soup and Savory Indian Spice Lentils.

The more nutrition you pack into your foods, the stronger your system is to deal with any health challenges the season may bring.

Great food alone, can not support your immune system. You also have to learn how to manage your stress. Managing stress is directly related to proper digestion. We can choose all the right foods, but if we are not aware of our stress levels, we miss out on the vast array of nutrients we consume. In other words, if we are stressed, our digestion is stressed, and we don’t fully absorb all the nutrients from our foods. This can lead to low immunity and other health issues.

Anything that creates stress in our body, will lower the strength of our immune system.

This refers to daily stress, illness, life, work, kids, blah, blah, blah. Some of us can deal with so many things at once, and other can not. This is where I like to encourage relaxation rituals as your “go-to” in times of non-stop crazy. If you can take yourself out of your current situation, even for a brief moment, you can reset your brain and look at everything with fresh eyes. If you stay on a non-stop hamster wheel, you simply ramp up the stress to volatile proportions.

Relaxation rituals refers to something you truly enjoy. This is where you can place all of your focus on something, even for a moment. I love to have a cup of tea, solving world peace on a video chat, or delving into a great book. You know your thing, so make sure you have what you need to make it happen at a moments notice. Journaling can also be a very helpful tool. Having the ability to write out your thoughts, and even responding to your thoughts with no judgment from others ,is very powerful.

Relaxation works to diffuse some stress, but not all of it. We are all different. For some, movement is the magic pill. Exercise is a great way to help relieve stress and help with other areas of our lives. Did you know that exercise will boost the nutrients needed to strengthen the immune system. It sure does, but as long as you are doing it in a healthy manner. There’s a fine line between working out too much and working out enough for health benefits. If you work out so much that you wear yourself out, that is too much. Your goal should always be to work out enough to energize and invigorate the body to feel great. There’re tons of workout options across the net, and they don’t all have to last an hour. Check out my YouTube Channel for FREE workouts and tips

And one last thing, how are you sleeping? We physically and mentally recover in our sleep. This recovery is a re-set, so when we start the next day we start fresh, and ready to go. What if we didn’t fully recover? This means that the stress from the day before is still there, and it will layer up with todays stresses. Layer after layer, the stress can take over, and soon you don’t even realize you are carrying so much on your shoulders. Every morning you should wake up ready to get up, no snooze, no nothing. If you find it hard to get up and keep that groggy, sleepy thing going on through the morning, you are not fully rested.

We have sleep cycles that are so important for us to recover. This is deep sleep, and in a perfect world we would have 6-7 60-minute cycles per night, this is RECOVERY! Set yourself up for success by making sure your room is pitch dark, colder than usual, and your home oozes serenity, in every way. Want to check out how your sleep cycles are doing? Sleep with a #FitBit or exercise watch, that tracks your sleep for a few nights in a row and see where you are at. If you are not bringing in some good Z’s, reevaluate your nighttime rituals so that deep sleep becomes the norm.

There you have it, a strong immune system is built on great nutrients, plenty of rest, low stress, movement, and a zest for life. It’s time to reevaluate your current habits and start implementing the ones that will make your immune system SuperPower strong!

In Peace, Love, and Health,

Adita

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©Copyright 2024, Adita Lang. Adita Lang works with individuals and groups to maximize their health through exercise and nutrition. She is available for Coaching and Public Speaking.

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