Autoimmune: 6 Steps To An Optimal Immune System
Autoimmune diseases can present some major issues for those diagnosed. They’re often difficult to understand and can present numerous symptoms that are painful and inconvenient. Our immune systems are complex and require a multi-faceted approach in order to continue to function properly, but where do we even start? What do we do if we’re already suffering from autoimmune problems?
On this episode we take a close look at how our immune systems function and what measures we can take to help strengthen our immune response. We take a look at the underlying causes of autoimmune issues, and Ed lays out a six step approach that we can all employ in our lives to help make our immune response the best it can be.
Some Topics We Discussed:
What is an autoimmune disease, common autoimmune issues and some symptoms of them? (1:55)
What triggers autoimmune disorders? (8:58)
How can you promote optimal immune function? (17:36)
Ed’s plan for practicing mindfulness. (25:22)
Key Takeaways From This Episode:
Autoimmune is when your immune system sees your cells as an enemy instead of a friend. (4:04)
It takes about six to 10 visits to a healthcare professional, before autoimmune is even suspected. (5:15)
Emotions are a major issue in causing autoimmune. (9:44)
Get 5-25 minutes of sunshine per day. (26:41)
Products + Resources:
CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL SHOW TRANSCRIPT
Brian Strickland 00:11 Hello, friends, you are listening to The Holistic Navigator Podcast, where we believe in the body's ability to heal itself if given the proper nutrients and care. My name is Brian Strickland. I'm the producer of the show. And here with me in our studio is your host, Ed Jones. What's going on, Ed?
Ed Jones 01:00 Good morning, Brian. And here we are again on another Wednesday recording, I look so forward to these things. You know, I've been talking to clients and other people for 41 years. And The Holistic Navigator is my platform for discussing instead of one person hopefully discussing and talking with 1000s, which is happening because we are moving up in the ratings. And we're getting more and more positive feedback.
Brian Strickland 01:26 Well, folks, on today's episode, we're speaking about auto immune issues. They can often be a lifelong burden with flare ups occurring at the drop of the hat due to specific environmental conditions or lifestyle changes. But the good news is, is there are some steps that might help alleviate some of the symptoms associated and help restore your immune system to its regular functioning. We want to provide some solutions that really aren't talked about many other places. So to begin, as always Ed, can you just give us a quick breakdown of what an autoimmune disease is? A few of the commonly diagnosed diseases and what symptoms are associated with these?
Ed Jones 02:07 Absolutely Brian. The word autoimmune, what does it really mean because you know a lot of people until they get diagnosed or they have a family member, they really don't have a clue. And what it kind of comes down to is, you know, we all know that we have an immune system, which is comprised of mainly the white blood cells. And their job in many different parts to this is their soldiers. It's very similar to the military. And when we're trying to protect a certain part of the world, and people who want to destroy that come in, we activate the right parts of the military. Well, that's the way the immune system works. A cold, a flu, a germ, a cut on your hand, many, many, probably 10,000 different pathogens that if it invaded us, and we did not have the ability to fight it, we would be dead within not days, but within hours. So what is autoimmune? Well, let's just picture in your mind, the military again, and you have been called to be a soldier and you you're staying on a big base, military base somewhere in the world. And there's 1000s of you men and women in this particular place, and you're all on the same path, you're there to promote what you believe in as being the right thing and being very safe and healthy. But what if in that military base, all of a sudden, five, or 10, or 20, or 500 of the people who were in the base start sneaking around and attacking and destroying and poisoning any way that they can the big picture group from the food and to the machines, you name it. These traitors are coming in and doing damage. That is what auto immune is people is when your immune system sees your cells as a enemy instead of a friend.
Brian Strickland 04:14 So before we really get into what triggers that happening in someone's body, let's just quickly talk about some of the few commonly diagnosed autoimmune disorders or diseases that are out there. Can you just give us a brief rundown of what they are and really how they can affect people?
Ed Jones 04:32 Absolutely, because we all know people who have Crohn's disease, which is a gut issue. Rheumatoid arthritis, we see the big swellings of the hands and the body parts and being unable to move. Ulcerative colitis. Sometimes, even all the way down to undiagnosable things but yet we know that the body is being destroyed. There's dozens of different terms for autoimmune.
Brian Strickland 05:00 Is lupus categorized in that as well?
Ed Jones 05:02 Lupus is also one of those. It's quite common these days. Now with autoimmune, here's the real truth of it. It takes about six to 10 visits to a healthcare professional, before autoimmune is even suspected. And it takes five years average time for an official diagnosis and 50 million Americans are now living with autoimmune. It did not used to be that way. Again, we're going back to The Holistic Navigator's complete philosophy that we are our own worst enemy in this country word. We are the ones destroying the health with everything from glyphosate to nutrient deficiencies to blank, blank, blank. But the problem is, many people are going to live their whole life with a kind of subtle autoimmune, this not diagnosed, but it's truly detracting from their quality of life. Because if you're not full blown, and you don't go to a good diagnostician, then you may we'll never have a term for what you have. And some of these things can be like headaches, anxiety, brain fog is a huge one. Body rashes with like bumps on the skin or flaking skin. Some cases of acne actually are autoimmune. Rosacea. It's a big one, eczema, psoriasis, dermatitis. Even things like asthma and frequent colds can be partially auto immune. You can imagine, if you're driving your automobile and somebody didn't like you, and they were putting, let's say, kerosene a little bit in the gas tank, not a whole lot, not enough to stop it just enough to make it run rough. You would have a hard time figuring it out. And you just know your car's running rough. Fatigue and hyper activity. Big time is a feeling of just worn down and never had that spark of life that many of us remember as we're younger. Muscle pain and weakness that comes and goes. And, of course, stomach cramping, bloated stomach and gut issues from top to bottom. So that's a big list.
Brian Strickland 07:14 Yeah. In your experience, have you seen kind of like a surge of autoimmune in the recent years as you've been in this business for a long time? So I just was curious if, if this is more prominent today than it was a 40 years ago?
Ed Jones 07:29 Well, in 1979, when I started my professional journey into this holistic world, you know, the bigger most common ask question was, how do I lose weight. That was still an issue even in the late 70s. But we did not hear autism was rarely mentioned. And autoimmune was not common. It was found. But it was usually people who had gotten, you know, unhealthy first, and they were quite elderly. But there are so many great options for people other than the standard conventional advice. Now, well, I will say very quickly, there are times in places a person has no choice initially, if you can't get out of bed and you cannot function, the drugs work decently well to alleviate symptoms. But the way that they do it is by turning the switches that we have in our body, the often on switches, the immune systems switch is turned off. Whoops, that doesn't sound too logical, because I think we need an immune system to fight other things, including the Big C word. That's why people on these drugs have such a higher risk of other diseases that can be quite terminal. My take is we do what we need to initially, but at the same time, we are recruiting your team approach and your wisdom to fix the machine and not just a treat a symptom.
Brian Strickland 08:58 Right. Well, before we kind of get into those more natural and realistic options, can we talk just really quickly about what triggers this and somebody? I mean, it's it's obvious that this is happening, it's not just a fluke. So are there environmental factors or their lifestyles that people are adhering to that makes us more common in some individuals?
Ed Jones 09:21 Absolutely. Brian, and you know, I have eight reasons why people generally triggered with autoimmune. The first one is the predominant reason that triggers it. Now triggering doesn't mean that that's going to keep going and going. But when you consider a trigger and these other things, that's why will not go away. First one emotions. Emotions cause auto immune. I will say with it. 90% certainty. I asked. Almost every single person who comes to me who says what other ideas do you have for auto immune because I don't want to be on these drugs. And I believe more in a more holistic approach and I will say, Tell me your story. And they will is very similar in most cases. You know, some of them woke up one morning with it. And some it was a progressive decline of health. And I said, did you have any traumatic event in the past 12 to 24 months before your symptom? 90% Yes, death in the family, a job loss. I am so convinced of one single thing after my 41 years is our cells within our bodies have antennas on them. And what that means is they are hearing and receiving the thoughts and emotions that we have and our experiences and storing them within the cells. There is a guy named Bruce Lipton, he wrote a book the Biology of Belief, which has sold over 100,000 copies. I started following Bruce Lipton long ago. And he taught medical school students the fact that what directs a gene and a cell is called epigenetics is above the cell level and emotions are one of the most powerful influences on what tells a cell to do. And secondly, a guy named Dr. Emoto, he wrote 25 years ago stunned me hit it was called The Hidden Messages in Water. And what he did was he took photographs with a very special camera of the molecule of water, and then expose that water molecule to words, words like Hitler, hate, love, caring, and he would do a photograph afterwards. And when you see these photographs, it is stunning. The shapes that changed because of a word that was expressed to water. So if water can change because of an emotion, just imagine what's happening within our body. So that's one. Number two leaky gut. If you imagine that your gut lining is the size of a tennis court, if it was laid out in the end, so it's humongous. It's job is to transfer nutrients within the cell, but allow anything that's toxic, or not supposed to be crossing that barrier to to be blocked. Well, what's happened because of glyphosate, foods that have antibiotics, prescription drugs, non sterile rojo anti inflammatories, and the list goes on and on, we are putting holes in this lining. And it was called a tight junction. When it's healthy. It's called a tight junction. Imagine you were living in the middle of summer. Back in the day, we didn't have air conditioning and you had screen doors on your house, the screen door is like your gut lining. It is going to let air come through, but prevent the bugs and keep them outside. But your little sneaky, seven year old is just bored. And he comes out cross one summer day with a little pocket knife and he starts sticking little holes in this green door. Obviously, the bugs are gonna start coming through along with the air. That's what leaky gut is, when you have these small holes within the gut. What is happening is molecules from your food and anything else that passes through the gut lining is going to go within the body, in the system in the organs and launch themselves every single time that you eat. Well, the body is going to see this as an enemy. It doesn't care that broccoli is nutritious. It's not supposed to be in an unaltered state passing through a gut lining, so the body attacks it. But along with that it can attack the cells that are lining it. So all of a sudden you have an immune system that thinks hey, it's world war three, we got to take care of these bad guys, but the bad guys keep coming because you don't fix the original cause leaky gut. Three heavy metals. Mercury, lead. arsenic is humongous what this can do to redirect the immune system. Anyone listening who has autoimmune guarantee you never been tested for heavy metals. Number four infections. Yes, normal infections can somehow trigger the kind of direction that the immune system takes. That one I think does go back to a mixture of emotions and other things. It's a little bit more difficult during the infection part to determine why it happened. Five is nutrient deficiencies. We are living in a nation of very depleted people. It's like growing roses and if you don't have the soil proper, you're not going to have the strong resilient roses that are showing the beauty and colors and smells. It just can't happen because it all comes from the root which is the foods that we eat and the liquids we drink. Vitamin D deficiency. Vitamin D, as I have said, so many times it's not a vitamin. It is a hormone it directs our genetic structure is so directed by vitamin D, you have to get a blood test people. Do not do not follow the ridiculous recommendations of most conventional people in medicine, just take 1000 units and you're fine. I have to do 14,000 a day to be at my minimum of 51 nanograms. So you have to do something, get a blood test, which you can do off of our website, under products, go to Direct Labs and order it yourself. Number seven, chronic inflammation. My gosh, Brian, how many times if I mentioned the word chronic inflammation? It is so destructive to and corrosive to our body parts. I'm not going to get into how to address it. We've had plenty of podcasts in the past about that. But the diet is key and I do lean toward a keto diet. Then lastly, the microbiome. We all know what that kind of means these days has become a common word, which is the gut flora, the huge amounts of you can say bacteria, other things that are not us that are living within the gut lining. So that's the eight reasons Brian.
Brian Strickland 16:16 Yeah, and that ties in real close with leaky gut obviously. We wanted to tell you about our new partnership with Thorne. If you're looking for answers about a particular health issue, and want to skip the clinic, Thorne's home test kits are a convenient way to not only get the answers that you need, but guidance towards better health as well. So their test kits range from vitamin D, heart health, testosterone, fertility test, and there are even more. The process couldn't be simpler, all you have to do is order one of the kits, it gets sent straight to your door, then you just collect the appropriate samples and drop the return envelope in your mailbox. And in about eight to 10 days, you can view your results on any mobile device or desktop. So if you're interested in if you want to see all the home kits that are available, visit theholisticnavigator.com/products. Alright, so we've got eight simple steps or eight simple items that somebody can really kind of take a calculated approach to what to look at if they're if they've been diagnosed with an autoimmune disease. But what about for somebody who's wanting to promote the optimal function of an immune system? What natural and holistic options do they have, whether it's supplements or lifestyle changes to to really help boost that immune system?
Ed Jones 17:53 Well, there are a number of those I have listed my top six. The top six things that I have seen that when a person's immune system is we will say not optimal, because I have to be, you know, careful. I'm not treating a medical condition. And if you do have autoimmune, then check with your doctor, I have to legally say, but I do also promote the fact that it's up to you people. You own your body. And if you decide that you have to check everything out, and everything has to be WebMD proved. And you might as well quit listening right now. Because I am empowering people. That's why I do what I do. But legally check with your doctor, you got issues. But here's the six things that people can consider. And this isn't a pick and choose list, Brian. This is actually all six. One, we're going back to the leaky gut, there is a protocol to fix that screen door that has holes in it. It is something that Meredith Mason, the nurse practitioner, and myself talked about on the previous way back previous Holistic Navigator. You have to listen to that because without the leaky gut fixed, you are going to be treading water at best and it will always always reoccur. Now number two, testing. You can if you can find a person who is very skilled in functional medicine, go to them. I recommend it so highly, but you don't have to because today we have the ability to order things to determine what's out of balance in your body. And so these are the testings that I would recommend for anyone who's questioning Where is my body and why do I not feel well? Even though I've been to three docs and they all say I'm fine. First off heavy metals. We've talked about that you can test that through a company called Thorne. How do you get it you go to theholisticnavigator.com products and you go down to Thorne and you order the heavy metal test kit. Secondly, Is there is a new microbiome test that I'm totally personally involved in at this stage and I will be releasing my results in future Holistic Navigators called Gut Bio. I used to recommend other companies, but this one is going to outshine the other for I think, a couple years at least. So we have to know that microbiome is not about just eating yogurt people and taking your favorite probiotic. That does not always work. When it comes to regular blood work, you need to get someone or yourself again, through Direct Labs at our website, you got to look at the basic panels, you got to look at thyroid antigens, your nutrient deficiencies, which you can test again, vitamin D, and B 12, and folic and omega three. Those are the big ones, and also rheumatoid factor, sed rate and CRP. Those are all the things that define inflammation. And it's not that expensive, believe it or not. Now, how do we deal with the nourishment? You know what, Brian, I know, we've talked about this endlessly, which is the Core five and 41 years, I've noticed that there's a one single combination of nutrients that I do totally believe that 99% of all people must have, if you're going to age gracefully and reduce a lot of the chronic diseases of our society. What is it? Omega threes in high doses quality product has to be bought, you cannot be ordering this stuff and expect it to be what you want many times because the heat alone in the summer can destroy an omega three very quickly and you won't know it. It's kept in a capsule, it's not going to melt. It just destroys the quality. So shop at your local health food store that knows what they're doing and cares. Omega threes first. Green drink second. Why do I keep harping on green drinks? It's not because of the nutritive value, it's because it opens up the liver to get rid of toxins and some heavy metals. Thirdly, we're talking about vitamin D. You have to do vitamin D, somewhere between 2000 and probably 15,000 units. Occasionally I find someone who does not need a vitamin D. But that's rare. Multivitamin, not your normal big box, tablet is full of artificial colors and flavors and talc powder, blank, blank, blank. You want something of very quality origin. And then probiotics. This is the one single thing that in this conversation I sometimes want people to hold off on until they fix the leaky gut. Because guess what people? The probiotic itself can be seen as an enemy because of that screen door in that hole. So occasionally, I will say let's hold off on the probiotics until you get the gut biotest and then fix leaky gut and then we start replenishing those good bacterias. You have to do that. So I've gone through right now number one was leaky gut, number two, we talked about the testing. Number three was the nourishment. Then number four is emotions. What do we do about emotions? Boy, it's very easy for me to handle a question on cholesterol, and other issues than it is emotions. There's not a real big, standard manual for emotions. But here's my take my personal is that we are full of negative traumatic, angered, destructive emotions from probably very, very early in life. And we're humans, we're resilient people. But when that cup gets overfilled, that's where symptoms occur. So the key is not to run from it. It's learning how to pull the drain on that bathtub before it overflows and floods your house. How do we do that? I don't know how we do it. I can tell you how Ed Jones does it. I do it through exercise five days a week. Very heavy duty. It's it is empting some of that excess stress. Secondly, I am a huge fan of something called EFT Emotional Freedom Technique. It is a tapping method that relies on the same points that acupuncture does. And what you do is and you can learn this for free. In fact, if you go to Mercola.com type in EFT he has some great training and information. You don't have to spend a penny. But remember people everything takes some discipline. Don't expect magic bullets from anyone. So devote yourself. Devote yourself to this stuff at least for a period of time or you're not going to get results. I am a very lifelong follower of mindfulness and meditation. So people who are into that, again, we want to be disciplined in order to get results because it's not going to happen if you're not. In fact, an old indian saint named Ramana Maharshi said enlightenment is not your birthright, it is only achieved through proper effort. Effort, effort people every day, since I was 14, I have meditated. You want to do it and make it easy get an app on your phone called Insight Timer. Inside timer is wonderful, it's free. And it will help you have the discipline to do it. And my own take on this is learning to calm the body on a daily basis is key to do it through methods of mindfulness, not through alcohol and weed and eating and TV. And I came up with this acronym get: GET. If you can do these three things. When you are ultimately stressed. It will notch it down considerably. And it will start relaxing. G stands for gut. It's called a soft belly technique. Anytime you're ultimately stressed and you stay that way, you're going to react instead of respond to your life circumstances. But if you can be more of the flow, just like in water is going to flow around you instead of knocking you down. So G relax your gut, soft belly. Secondly, E relax your eyes have soft eyes right now, I can assure you, if you think I want to have soft eyes, that's when you realize that your eyes are tense. Oh wow. They are tense. Let me soften them. Lastly is your tongue. When you have a relaxed tongue, a relaxed eyes and a relaxed gut, you can not help but be in a better place. Got it covered the last thing here, which is I want people to get sunshine and five to 25 minutes per day at least every other day. There's something more to sunshine than vitamin D and we don't know what it is. And then believe it or not people I'm going to recommend a drug. I think there's only four or five really outstanding drugs in this world but this one for autoimmune is key. It's called low dose naltrexone. Low dose naltrexone is my favorite drug of my entire life. It was approved 20 years ago. If you go and start reading about it, you can see the words rheumatoid, MS, Parkinson's, fibro, Chron's, just to mention a few. And what it is is a drug that you take very teeny amounts, which is one to four milligrams at bedtime, and it blocks the opiate receptors. And in the middle of the night, it balances the immune system so it quits doing its attacking. And there's one site that I love for inflammation is called ldnscience.org. And Dr. Burkson, if you will Google Dr. Berkson and One Radio Network one is spelled out o n e. e speaks of this and you will not believe the stories you will hear Believe it or not people I'm not taking a drug in so many years, but I take a one milligram low dose naltrexone every night and there's nothing wrong with me because I do fully believe as we age, our immune system does not stay as accurate. Well, Brian, that covers it. I think pretty dang well on auto immune topic. And I want to thank everyone for tuning in and listening. Always remember what apocrine he said in the year 460 BC everyone has a doctor in him or her. We just have to help it in his work. And the natural healing force within each of us is the greatest force and getting well. Our food should be our medicine and our medicine be your food. Thank you so much. Thank you, Brian. And thank you for everyone listening. This is Edward with The Holistic Navigator.
Brian Strickland 29:03 The information on this podcast and the topics discussed have not been evaluated by the FDA or any one of the medical profession and is not aimed to replace any advice you may receive from your medical practitioner. The holistic navigator assumes no responsibility or liability whatsoever on the behalf of any purchaser or reader of these materials. The holistic navigator is not a doctor nor does he claim to be please consult your physician before beginning any health regimen.