“Prevention is not just better than cure, prevention IS the cure." Professor Robert Lustig
As the days get longer and brighter, and we follow the roadmap out of lockdown, many of us are feeling hopeful at the prospect of better months ahead.
If you feel the same, we’re keen to fill you with fresh inspiration about how you can support your immune system, and overall health and wellbeing, over the coming months with our series of immune focused blogs.
In this three part series, we have covered 'What drive low immunity', 'Supporting your immunity' and 'Post viral', along with some other useful tips.
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Series 1: What drives low immunity?
Normally the immune system is equipped to swiftly deal with exposure to pathogens. However, our immune defences are often compromised nowadays, resulting in low immunity, notably frequent, severe, and/or persistent infections. Other than the obvious risk factor – high environmental exposure to pathogens (e.g. from public transport, schools) - what are the other causes of low immunity?
Identifying and addressing the ‘why’ behind our presenting signs, symptoms, or conditions is a cornerstone of how we work as natural health practitioners. This approach facilitates implementation of natural interventions (the ‘what’) tailored to an individual’s unique needs, which have the most chance of helping them to feel better. Indeed, understanding why we might be prone to low immunity, together with a clear idea of why we want to feel better, helps us to find the inner drive needed to implement sustainable, nourishing habits, and the right immune support.
In this vein, we’re going to explore the role of poor digestion, obesity and vitamin D, and stress in driving low immunity.
Series 2: Supporting Your Immunity
"Take care of your body. It's the only place you have to live" Jim Rohn
In the first instalment of our Immunity Series, we explored the various factors which can increase our risk of low immunity, with a view to you learning how to nourish your immune system at a deep level. Moving forward, we want to empower you with an understanding of the nutrition and lifestyle ‘tools’ which you can use to support your immunity in day-to-day life.
There are various life stages which can impact our overall health, least not our immune health. You might be pregnant and wondering how to best support yourself and your baby, or already have young children and keen to learn how to provide them with the best possible immune support at this time of year. You might have a high stress lifestyle and feel like you're only just staying afloat with your ‘life load’, all of which can negatively affect our immunity if we’re not careful. You might be concerned about an elderly family member, given the fact that elderly individuals tend to be prone to low immunity too.
This latest blog series explores how to optimise immunity during each of these life-stages, particularly as we head into these winter months
Series 3: Post-Infection Support
Following on from our 'Low Immunity' and 'Supporting Immunity' series, we hope that you feel empowered with an understanding about how to comprehensively and holistically reduce your risk of infection in the first place, and support yourself if and when you have an infection. Now, we are shifting our focus towards how best to support ourselves post-infection since this is often characterised by symptoms which have a significant impact on an individual’s quality of life.
We often under-estimate the importance of supporting our immunity until we fall ill, and also how long it can take to recover until we experience lingering symptoms following an infection. Recovery from an infection ‘normally’ lasts one to two weeks. For some, however, this recovery process can last months, even years, characterised by prolonged post-infection symptoms, such as chronic fatigue, brain fog, muscle aches, and loose bowel movements. So, why do some individuals experience this prolonged recovery period, and others do not?
Identifying the underlying drivers of lingering post-infection symptoms, and how they can go on to affect our physical and mental health, facilitates implementation of tailored nutrition and lifestyle interventions which have the most chance of helping individuals to feel better. This is important now more than ever given the emerging problem of ‘post-viral fatigue/ syndrome.’
Over the next few blogs, we will delve into the ‘why’ and ‘how’ behind these prolonged post-infection symptoms, focusing on three integral areas: energy, cognitive health, and digestion.