Detox?

Do we live in a world of preservatives, additives, pesticides, hormones, lead, mercury, PCBs, BPAs and EMFs not to mention artificial colors, artificial flavors, nitrites, nitrates, trans fats and high-fructose corn syrup? We sure do. Are some or all of these harmful to our health and well-being? Absolutely.  If these substances contribute to ill health and our “environmental” aging, isn’t it logical that ridding our bodies of them would help turn back our biological clocks?  Yes.

Happily, our magnificent bodies are designed to do just this. We are self-cleaning machines with protective layers of skin, air-filtering lungs and powerful blood-purifying livers.  But hold on a minute:  What if the detritus of modern life — the poisons we choose and those that are “chosen” for us — are overloading this system, creating a body burden that can make us ill and speed up our biological clocks.  We should actively, purposefully cleanse ourselves, right?

Welcome to the world of detox, an enormously lucrative cottage industry, from fasts, diets, teas and supplements to cleanses, herbal wraps and irrigations, from chelation therapy and IV infusions to Chinese foot pads and harmonic water. There’s hype.  There’s hoax.  And there may be things that work.  Alternative and conventional medicine are at odds about the value of detox.  Most conventional researchers say that, with a few exceptions, detox is unnecessary, virtually ineffective – and may even be harmful.  But alternative health providers – and their satisfied patients – claim significant health benefits for some detox plans.  I am one of the satisfied, in fact.  I did a 2-week progressive elimination detox diet (I wrote about this in Counterclockwise), and I felt better for it.

The controversy rages and is not about to go away any time soon.  Neither are the hucksters who feed on our fears.  I’d like to suggest that at least some of our body toxic obsession is ill-placed.  Don’t get me wrong.  I do believe we humans are managing to toxify our environment (and thus, over time, our bodies).  But I would argue that we are polluting ourselves in other, very important ways we seem to care little about.

The 24/7 news cycle (no news being good news…ergo all news is bad news) is every bit as poisonous to our spirit as pesticides are to our bodies.  It eats away at the soul to hear, every moment of every day, about the ugliness and evil some people perpetrate on each other.  And I would argue that our new way of experiencing the world – hyper-connected, disjointed, detached, machine-driven, lightning fast  — is toxic to our humanity.  Lest you think I inhabit some elevated position here, let me confess that I am right now toggling between working on this little essay, making witty (?) comments on other people’s facebook updates and shopping for shoes at zappos while also checking emails on my phone…all this as I travel by rail between Seattle and Eugene.  It’s a lovely stretch of terrain, but I am hardly glancing out the window, let alone allowing the soft, swaying rhythm of train travel to seep into my bones. I am a poster girl for this other kind of toxification.

So rather than obsessing about amalgam fillings or researching the merits of coffee enemas or debating the optimum temperature of the sweat lodge, perhaps we could refocus at least some of that attention.  How about engaging in an occasional 24-hour detoxifying news fasts or an “Unburden and Unplug for a Day” vacation or a “Sounds of Silence” evening?  We can, and should, take action to mitigate these other toxicities.

Now excuse me while I turn off all devices, take a deep breath and simply stare out the window.