Acid Reflux Natural Cures

Holidays can be a miserable time for someone suffering from acid reflux or GERDS. Holiday eating is usually very different from our day to day eating routine. We eat at different times, eat different foods, and eat MORE!

Whether you are doing the cooking or whether you are visiting family and friends, the change in diet during the holidays can wreak havoc with your acid reflux. The holidays can be stressful enough without worrying about extra heartburn or reflux spoiling your good cheer.

I received some great tips from my friends at My Fit Foods in Houston, Texas to help with the problem of gaining weight during the holidays. They are also good tips for acid reflux sufferers as well.

1. Do not avoid eating fat.  Eating moderate amounts of fat a meal can help you feel full sooner and keep you full longer, just don’t overdue it.
2. Don’t skip meals. Eat small snacks if you are saving up calories.  Skipping meals leads to hunger, low energy levels and improper food choices..
3. Don’t pass up favorite foods or deprive yourself completely.  Moderate consumption is the key.
4. Don’t tempt yourself by keeping trigger foods or comfort foods around the house.  If you have them, it increases the likelihood that you will overeat.
5. Plan meals by keeping in the mind the demands you’ll have on your schedule that day.
6. Don’t go to a party starving.  Before you leave home, eat something light or drink a meal replacement shake.  Also, drink a great deal of water the day of the party.
7. When you attend holiday festivities, station yourself away from the buffet table. Make a clear-cut decision to distance yourself from all the goodies.
8. Alcoholic beverages pack on the calories [and can contribute to acid reflux] so if you’re drinking alcohol, stick to light beer or a champagne spritzer.  Watch out for the eggnog, it’s high in calories and fat.
9. If you do find yourself feeling depressed, soothe your spirit with a massage, manicure, pedicure or facial.  Men can enjoy this too.
10. When you shop, eat before you leave home so you won’t resort to cookie breaks
11. To satisfy your sweet tooth, set limits.  For example, you might allow yourself two decadent desserts per week.
    Just because it is the holidays doesn’t mean you should give yourself the license to eat everything that passes by.  Factor in the little extras into your daily intake.
12. Help out by saving fat and calories when it’s feasting time.  Make or buy wild rice stuffing, baked sweet potatoes, whole-grain rolls and angel-food cake with fruit.
13. Enjoy the season, not just the food!

This will not be a popular blog post for those who enjoy a glass of wine with dinner or an ice cold beer at the ballgame. However, I should make you aware that there are conflicting studies about the connection between acid reflux and alcohol. Some believe that alcohol contributes to acid reflux by relaxing the lower esophageal sphincter (the body part that closes off the esophagus from the stomach) so it gets lazy and lets the contents back up.

In addition, there is an indirect connection because of alcohol’s effects on weight gain and eating habits. We do know that excess pounds and poor eating do contribute to acid reflux. I ran across some statistics from my favorite food store, My Fit Foods, that you may not know.

Immediate damage:

1. 1 shot of alcohol is about 100-150 calories.  It takes about 2 miles of fast cardio to burn off.
2. 1 average glass of wine, about 6 oz., is 300 calories or so.  It takes about 3 miles of fast cardio to burn it off.
3. 1 average size margarita is about 500 calories.  It takes 5 miles of cardio to burn off.
4. All alcohol increases insulin levels, making you store most of it as body fat when you consume it.  Add that alcohol to a sugary blend like a Margarita or Hurricane and you’re packing on fat.

Longer term damage:

1. In addition to the excess calories alcohol puts in your body, alcohol also depresses your metabolism for up to 16 hours after drinking it, causing even more weight gain.
2. This metabolic depression means that you’ve got to tack on another 2 or 3 miles to all the values above to burn off the calories that you now temporarily slowed metabolism neglected to.
3. Most people also tend to eat starchy foods when they drink alcohol,  to nurse the fatigue and sluggishness some people can feel the following day.
4. This extra carbohydrate consumption not only adds extra unneeded calories, but since it results in such a high insulin spike, most of those extra calories will be stored as body fat.

So…what to do? If you absolutely cannot go without your wine, beer, marguerita, etc., moderation should be the key. Try experimenting with reducing your alcohol intake to see if your acid reflux improves. Also, drink water at the same time to dilute the effects. If you are drinking red wine for its heart benefits, try a Resveratrol supplement instead.

To Your Health!

If you are fed up with taking acid reflux medication, check out Heartburn No More, a compilation of 11 years of trial and error which has helped many people. The author also gives you 8 bonuses including one-on-one counseling.

Does stress cause acid reflux? Probably not. But it does make an already existing condition worse. For many of us, eating certain foods is a natural reaction to stress. They call those comfort foods. For me comfort foods tend to be higher in fat like french fries or chocolate cake. It is natural to associate stress with acid reflux when it is actually just an indirect relationship.

What are your comfort foods? Are those the same foods that cause your acid reflux to flare up even if you are not under stress. It can be very helpful to pinpoint your trouble foods. Keep a journal of your acid reflux attacks noting the foods you ate just prior and any emotional or stress conditions you were experiencing.

One of the best remedies for stress is exercise which is also a good acid reflux remedy as well. So walking for 30 minutes instead of driving through McDonald’s for french fries has multiple obvious benefits. If you take to the bed in times of high stress levels, don’t eat first and then lie down. Stress–>Eating poorly–>Lying Down. Three strikes.

Another remedy is to supplement your digestive enzymes. If you are naturally unable to digest some of the common comfort foods containing fats, carbohydrates and fiber perhaps you should consider a product such as Ultra-Zymes from Healthy Choice Naturals. Digestive enzyme supplements have also helped many with their IBS, bloating, chronic constipation, gas and lactose intolerance.