Maintaining a healthy pH level is vital to enjoying a healthy lifestyle. The more balanced and slightly alkaline levels the body is, the better opportunity we have to encourage a healthy environment and combat bacteria, viruses and fungi. The idea behind a balanced diet by enjoying acidic and alkaline foods is to consume 60-80% of alkaline foods and 20 – 40% of acidic foods. The reason for this is our body needs to remain slightly alkaline and our pH balance should remain around 7.40. You want to remain in the range of 7.35 to 7.45. The more our system becomes acidic, the more strain it places on our body. Basically the more acidic, the more the body needs to offset the rise. If we don’t consume alkaline foods, the body needs to balance itself out in others ways by extracting calcium, sodium and other essential vitamins to neutralize the higher acidic levels. This is called acidosis. Download a free copy of the Alkaline and Acidic Report (with food chart) The longer the body remains acidic the greater the chances of bacteria buildup, illness and disease. Research has pointed to the fact that fungi, bacteria and other unhealthy cells thrive in acidic and low oxygen environments. In fact, terminally ill cancer patients usually have extremely high acidity levels, sometimes 500X normal levels of a healthy individual. Thus, keeping your pH in balance is vital to healthy tissues, cells and your overall lifestyle in general. By the way, cherry juice is an alkaline drink. What is Acidosis? Acidosis is when there is increased acidity in the blood, tissue and when the kidneys aren’t removing acid from the body fast enough. Here are some the symptoms of Acidosis
Feeling a fatigue
Increased feeling of anxiety
Insomnia
Hypertension
Weight gain
Diarrhea
Headaches
The Benefits of an Alkaline Diet The body needs a blood pH level that is more alkaline than acidic. The best way to keep our body slightly more alkaline is to consumer more alkaline foods, while reducing the acidic food intake. This simply means making the decision to eat more of the right foods and reduce consumption of the wrong foods. Alkaline Foods and Acidic Foods? The initial step in keeping the pH in balance is the have a list of the type of foods that are alkaline and which foods are acidic. In addition to knowing which food is which more importantly is knowing how a particular food reacts in the body once it is consumed. For example, lemons and limes are acidic in nature, but they boost alkaline levels in the body once they are in the digestive tract. In addition to the food itself, if the food you are eating has been sprayed with pesticides is important to remove these pesticides before consumption. As a rule of thumb, you want to consume foods that are a close to the way Mother Nature intended as possible. This means less processed foods like fast food and white rice and more fresh and pesticide-free and organic foods. The reason is if a pesticide used on the food tend to push the food higher up on the acidic level. So buying organic or pesticide-free food and washing the food that you eat the skin of it vital. Foods that your eat the skin including fruits and vegetables. Brief Listing of Acid and Alkaline Foods I’ve put together a brief list of alkaline and acid foods to help you to get started: Acidic Foods
Highly Acidic: Liquor, lobster, beef, soft drinks and sugar
Moderately Acidic: Popcorn, soy milk, pork, mustard and green peas
Low Acidic: Tomatoes, shell fish, lamb and milk
Extremely Low Acidic: Zucchini, pine nuts, fish and venison
Alkaline Foods
Highly Alkaline: Tangerines, mineral water, lemons, limes and pumpkin seed
Moderately Alkaline: Garlic, cantaloupe, apples, and grapefruit
Low Alkaline: Green tea, radishes, cabbage and blackberries
Extremely Low Alkaline: Grapes, lettuces, raisins, strawberries and cucumbers
Action Steps: The best way to get started is to download and print off the free Alkaline and Acidic food chart and tape it to your refrigerator. This has a listing of foods ranging from highly acid to extremely low acidity and highly alkaline to extremely low in alkaline. As mentioned above, simply enjoy a diet that is 60 – 80% alkaline and 20 – 40% acidic. This may help to maintain a pH balance of about 7.4 and within the range of 7.35 to 7.45 How to Test Your pH levels Here are a few ways to test your pH levels in your body. Each test has its own range so read the instructions and expected levels with each test. You can contact your doctor or health care provider. for these tests.