To request an Action Plan to address Restoring Kidney Health Click Here

Restoring Your Kidney Health by Restoring Your Vital Qi

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!  As we begin a New Year, I wanted to start the New Year Off with a column designed to educate you on the different organs of the body so you can begin to appreciate how to restore your health with simple practices and simple understandings.  To that end, I'd like to start with the health of your Kidneys.  The reason for this is because of the 5 Element Theory given to us by Traditional Chinese Medicine.  During the Winter, the theory says the Water Element, divided into your Kidney and your Bladder, is most active.  This is because the Water Element is considered maximally contracted, and during the Winter things become maximally contracted, or shut down and hibernating. 

I'm sure you all are aware that your Kidneys are normally a paired organ, having a right and a left Kidney, which controls and regulates all your fluid levels, as well as your electrolyte balance.  They also, with the help of the Adrenal Glands, regulate your blood pressure balance.  Since the two main electrolytes, sodium and potassium are so vital to your overall health, it's important to keep your Kidneys functioning at their highest level possible.  Another function of the Kidney relates to its role in regulating fluid balance within the Large Intestine.  As discussed in the November issue of Holistic Health, if you need a refresher, go to the search function and type in Large intestine and refer to previous issues for that vital information.

Traditional Chinese Medicine will tell you that the Kidney contains all of your "Vital Qi" or the "life force" you were born with.  If you abuse your Kidneys, or your reproductive organs (which are an extension of the Kidneys), you will lose your Vital Qi and will shorten your life-span.  Similarly, if you don't replenish your Kidney energy on a regular basis, through proper diet and nutrition, your Kidneys will lose their energy and you will not be healthy, nor live very long.

As just eluded to, through proper diet and nutrition, you can maintain a high level of function within your Kidneys, while maintaining their Vital Qi.  The easiest way to do this is by eating lots of whole foods and natural foods, while minimizing and eliminating all the artificially man-made ones that are high in artificial colors, sweeteners, and other preservatives.  These of course are designed to increase the shelf-life of the food artificially, while draining you of your Vital Qi.  Unfortunately, these long lasting shelf foods can decrease the length of your life dramatically.

The other easy way to maintain health of your Kidneys is to be sure to drink adequate amounts of water.  Since it's the Kidneys that regulate and control all fluid balance within the body, maintaining proper fluid levels is important for the health of your Kidneys. This is especially true during the times it is cold.  Dehydration when it is cold out is very common, yet difficult for most to appreciate.  Since your body will be doing everything it can to stay warm, the metabolism of different parts of your body will increase and cause you to lose water in the process.  Witness this when you breathe out while outside and witness the condensation.  All of that is essentially water being lost.  Therefore, be sure to drink adequate amounts of water on a daily basis.  What is the proper amount of water?  Ideally, one quart of water for every 50 lbs. of weight, everyday.  This means the standard 8 - 8 oz. glasses would be sufficient if you weighed a mere 100 lbs.  Since most adults do not, you figure a pint of water (16 oz.) for every 25 lbs.  So if you weigh 125 lbs, you would require 5 pints (80 oz.) daily, 150 lbs. would require 3/4 of a gallon (96 oz.) daily, 175 lbs. 7 pints or 112 oz. daily, and if you weigh 200 lbs. you'll need 1 gallon of water a day.  This will keep your Kidneys flushed and help to decrease the stress on your whole metabolic system.

Sure, initially this may seem like an impossible feat.  But if you slowly increase your water volume from the deficient amount you currently consume on a daily basis to the more appropriate volume, your Kidneys will begin to accommodate to the new, more healthy volume of water.  Likewise, with the new added volume, your Kidneys will begin functioning in a more normal fashion and you might be surprised that all of your symptoms seem to disappear.  The reason for this is that most symptoms have to do with the by-product of being dehydrated.  During the Winter months this is most evident, as most people have health problems when the weather gets cold.  Staying properly hydrated and allowing the normal metabolic cycles to run smoothly, allows for the body to fix most of its functional problems on its own.

Some common conditions you can relate to Kidney weakness or stress are things like Low Back pain, Knee pain, and other symptoms like ringing in the ears.  This is because the main sense organ associated with your Kidneys is the ears.  Muscles associated with your Kidneys are the major hip flexors known as the Psoas and the Iliacus muscles and the Upper Trapezius muscles of the neck.  This sometimes helps a patient to understand the relationship between upper neck pain and low back/hip pain.  The health of your Kidneys helps to regulate both of those areas.

The chief general emotion associated with your Kidneys is Fear, with the lesser ones being dread, bad memory, contemplated, or impending doom.  The natural emotion of fear creates activity such as the fight/flight reaction.  This crystallizes the activity of the Nervous System and the Brain, providing the tendency to stay alive.  Some may equate this with a person's willpower.  People who have a strong willpower are people with healthy Kidneys.

Pathological emotions, on the other hand, create weakness and collapse.  Fear, when involved, paralyzes the activity within the body and weakens the body-mind system.  It also damages the Nervous System and weakens the Immune System.

How To Help The Kidneys

There are several different ways to help support your Kidneys in maintaining normal function.  The first and most basic way to support your Kidneys is with a supplement from Standard Process called Renafood.  It gives your Kidney its basic building blocks which allow your Kidneys to maintain balanced function.  If one has damaged Kidneys, then we would supplement with something by Standard Process called Renatrophin PMG.  This allows your Kidneys to rebuild themselves by supplying specific ingredients designed to do just that.  Another way to support normal Kidney function is through herbals.  And I work with a company called Mediherb, which maintains the highest standards of any herbal supplement company out there.  For improving and maintaining normal Kidney function, the following herbal remedies are tremendously helpful.  Bilberry 6000, Boswelia Complex and DermaCo.  For liquid herbal support, the recommended tonic is Nettle Leaf.  All of these products can be obtained through the office.

What To Consider

To ALL My Current Practice Members, if you feel you may be having Kidney concerns, because you know you are dehydrated and your urine is too dark, or you may have low back pain or hip pain, or have trouble standing up from a sitting position, ask me to do the Kidney Health Check you on your next regularly scheduled office visit.  Normally this is a $75.00 value, but for the month of January, the cost is FREE!  It only takes a few minutes, and we can then discuss what can be done to improve the health of your Kidneys, which will translate to improving your overall health.  Since it is my intention to help you become as healthy as possible, I encourage you to call me or e-mail me with any and all of your questions.  My phone number is (845) 561-BACK (2225) or my e-mail is Dr. Huntoon To schedule an appointment, call the Office and let me know you want your Kidney Health Check on your next normal office visit during the Month of January.

If you are not currently a patient at my office and would like to become one, please call the Office and tell us to schedule you for my FREE Health Care Class.  This class is where I will be happy to answer any and all health related questions and advise you what your best option would be to get well.  So I invite you to my FREE Health Care Class every Tuesday night at 6:30 pm.  For information about our FREE class, where you can ask all your health related questions and have them answered by me, call the office and speak with Dr. Huntoon. Our phone number again is (845) 561-2225.  Since class size is limited, we require you to call and reserve your seat in our next class.

 

To request an Action Plan to address Restoring Kidney Health Click Here

Dr. Huntoon has a single mission:

To support as many people as possible in their quest for health and enable them to improve and maintain their health to the highest level possible, while educating them about the benefits of Chiropractic, Natural Healthcare and Holistic Living, so they in turn can teach others to support us having a healthy community.

Your Choice

• Continue doing the same thing and nothing changes or it may get worse

OR

• Try something different and get a different result that makes you happier and healthier.