This Leafy Green Food May Be Your New Natural Liver Detox Secret
6 minute read
If you are concerned about your liver and want to thank it for all it does for you, turning to cabbage might be the best way to do that. As anti-inflammatory food that is high in fiber, rich in chlorophyll, and has detoxifying effects, it’s easy to see why.
In addition to giving your liver a boost and stopping inflammation, cabbage has also been used to improve bone and colon health, prevent digestive disorders, and treat peptic ulcers. Cabbage has even been found to be an excellent aid in weight loss.
A Little More About Cabbage
There are three basic types of cabbage: the red/purple variety, green cabbage, and savoy cabbage. Loaded with antioxidant phytonutrients, all types of cabbage are ready to battle free radicals as they attack the body and give you an edge against disease.
The red/purple cabbage is gaining popularity for its ability to support blood health and protect red blood cells. Rich in anthocyanin antioxidants, this type of cabbage has boosted levels of beta-carotene, lutein, and total blood antioxidant capacity while reducing oxidized low-density lipoprotein (LDL).
In a study, the Savoy cabbage has been shown to be connected to human ingestion of isothiocyanates which are linked to cancer-prevention. These powerful isothiocyanates are known help reduce the risk of prostate cancer, colon cancer, and bladder cancer.
While cabbage is packed with nutrients, it’s the ability to function as a detoxifying agent for your liver that is most noteworthy.
Cabbage and Your Liver
Your liver’s main function is to aid in digestion and eliminate toxic substances from your body. Your liver is the only internal organ that can regenerate. Of course, this doesn’t mean it can continue to do this forever. If the liver is damaged beyond its ability to regenerate a transplant might be necessary. This is why it’s so important to support liver health throughout your life.
Liver disease is a term used to encompass many different health problems. It can be caused by genetic problems, viruses, alcohol use, exposure to certain chemicals, an auto-immune system reaction, and more. But, no matter the cause, all liver disease tends to progress in the same manner until the organ is so damaged that it cannot function in a capacity sufficient enough to keep you alive.
A study published in the Journal of Nutrition and Metabolism looked at how different foods can affect the body’s natural detoxification system, or the way the liver removes toxins from the body. While it had been believed that cruciferous vegetables activated a particular enzyme, this study determined that not all of these vegetables create the same reaction. Luckily, it appears that cabbage still boosts your liver health and reduces the effects of toxins.
Taking a deeper look into how toxins affect the body, the study found that an accumulation of toxins plays a significant role in cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes, and obesity. Not only that, but dietary intake and environmental influencers may have a large effect on the individual and even subsequent generations.
What this means is that eating better now, including foods like cabbage, which is good for the liver and boosts its ability to detoxify the body, can possibly reduce the amount of toxins in your body. This means that maximizing the effects of food to reduce the impact of toxins is essential.
How to Detoxify the Liver and Stop Inflammation
One of the most popular ways to do a liver detox with cabbage is through cabbage soup. This is a diet fad that’s been around since about the 1950s. Back then it was mainly used for weight loss, but it’s gained popularity in recent years for its detox qualities.
It’s for the reasons mentioned above that the cabbage soup diet is good for helping the liver process toxins and flush them out of the body. But there are other benefits to the diet that can also help your liver, mainly weight loss and its anti-inflammatory properties.
The viscera, the area inside of your torso, can collect fat, called visceral fat. This fat takes up a lot of space and presses on your organs, including the liver, causing them to function at a reduced capacity. Losing weight helps all of your organs function better because you lose visceral fat.
| Related: How to Keto Diet With Good Fats for Better Liver Health |
Not only does visceral fat cause problems, but fat in your liver, or a fatty liver can cause huge problems and lead to liver disease. There are many different causes of fatty liver, but obesity is one, excessive belly fat can be a contributor, and high intake of sugar and refined carbs doesn’t help.
If you’re having problems with inflammation that’s inhibiting your liver from working properly, a cabbage detox diet will help, as will simply adding more cabbage to your regular diet.
In addition to adding cabbage, to really support your liver health, it’s recommended that you add a supplement geared toward your liver function. The 1MD supplement LiverMD is an excellent choice because it’s designed specifically for your liver and kidney health.
Packed with targeted nutrition, it restores the liver’s ability to work at its antioxidant capacity.
The Bottom Line
Cabbage may be the best thing that ever happened to your hard-working liver. It’s been found over and over that cabbage offers significant support to the liver and can help the body in many other ways as well.
Whether you’re going to try a cabbage detox to flush your system and reinvigorate your liver, or you just want to add more cabbage to your regular diet, you’ll reap the rewards. To make your health changes even more significant, consider adding a liver-specific supplement to help your body fight free radical damage and keep your liver healthy.
