Still Think Fatty Liver Disease Is Only For Alcoholics? WRONG!

Whenever a person hears fatty liver disease what comes to his/her mind is ‘that’s for people who drink alcohol’ well guess what? You might have a fatty liver too and don’t even know.

A fun fact, in the human body the liver always shouts out ‘I’m not getting any attention, any respect and all these go to the heart, the lungs and the kidney not knowing how important I am’

Not funny? It shouldn’t be.

Now this shows how important the liver is as it controls all metabolic activities in the body, and this is why they call the liver ‘the multi-tasking champion’ for how it is important to our bodies.

Fatty liver disease (FLD) is a silent epidemic which means it can happen on your body and you would never know meaning it doesn’t have symptoms, many people nowadays think that people who are skinny and have rashes have FLD but all these are myths, although there are some cases in which you should go check a doctor to see if you have FLD, these include;

• ·         Jaundice (this is the yellowing of the skin)
• ·         Yellow eyes
• ·         Distension in the abdomen
• ·         Bleeding from the GI tract

These are just some of the symptoms, all these can happen if you do not perform screening, but whenever a person has metabolic risk factors such as diabetes type 2, bad news, you do not need screening but rather you should just go to your doctor and ask if you are affected or not and for those having high blood pressure(HBP), sleep apnea, high cholesterol, overweight, , family history of having FLD you are in a bigger risk of having FLD hence you should perform screening as soon as possible.

Many people wonder that anhaa fatty liver diseases is caused by eating too much fat, I can stop or reduce eating fats and I’ll be safe, I’m sorry to inform you that you should really research more on your health, oils and fats (which is one thing of course) is not the only factor for one to have FLD but it doesn’t have a greater role than how sugar does. YES you heard right SUGAR! . 

Sugar is the cause of many diseases, and the bad thing about is that it is addictive meaning that it will urge you to eat more and more of it, but that’s a topic we’ll dive in later, back to FLD, Now for non-alcoholic fatty livers the following is what puts people at risk to getting fatty liver diseases;

1.  Increased Waist size/circumference

Yes I’m talking about your big belly!, according to the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), people are encouraged to keep their waist measurement to less than half their height to reduce the risk of potential health problems, greater than that oh lord you should go check if you have FLD.

Increased waist circumference according to research can cause visceral fat which releases free fats to the bloodstream which overwhelms the liver’s ability to process them leading to fat accumulation in the liver(FLD) also increased waist size can cause insulin resistance, inflammatory processes and much more.

It has been known that the waist circumference is indeed a more reliable factor and a better implicatory for health than the Body mass index (BMI) for more information you can check out the book written by Kristin Kirkpatrick and Ibrahim Hanounah called “Regenerative Health” or you can research on your own from this link.

 

       2.    Insulin Resistance

Now this topic can be a little nerdy since it involves a little understanding of biology but since I am not an expert in biology (researched deep down about it though) I can break it up to you in simple understandable terms.

If you eat sugars you end up craving more sugary foods (dopamine hit), this triggers your pancreas to release insulin, which acts like a key, unlocking your cells and allowing glucose to enter for energy now when your cells respond properly to insulin, your blood sugar levels return to normal. 

The insulin resistance begins as some sort of lock on your cells hence become damaged and in return the insulin cannot unlock the cells and let glucose in even though your body is producing enough insulin, now the cause of this resistance may be due to fats in your abdomen (visceral fat around your abdomen, releases harmful substances that can interfere with insulin signaling), unhealthy diet, genetics or other many more factors.

Capisce?

Other factors that put people at risk of getting FLD include pre-diabetes, high cholesterol, overweight (Current studies estimate that 75% to 90% of adults with obesity or diabetes also have a fatty liver).

Interesting information; In France (where it originally started) they practice this act called ‘foie gras’ where they force-feed ducks with loads of carbs in order to fatten them up, too much carbs causes fatty livers for the ducks which in return whenever a human purchases and eats it leads to them having a fatty liver too, so be very careful on what you eat because everything you eat has an effect on the body. 

Okay so I don’t say that you should completely leave eating sugary foods or carbs (although it’s a good practice too for those who can) but honestly speaking it is really hard to stop eating sugary foods or stop eating carbs, but the point is that people should reduce eating carbs, reduce eating sugars. 

Did you know that although honey is very important to the human body but too much consumption of honey is harmful since honey is not tied to fiber and the fact is that anything that will increase the level of blood sugar on the body affects the liver. 

Many people die not because of liver diseases but rather what the liver disease causes, talking about cardiovascular diseases such as heart attacks and strokes.

 //From the book ‘Regenerative Health’, before the book was published the liver associated organizations used to call FLD, non-alcoholic fatty liver but right after the book was published and according to its research the name changed to be ‘metabolic associated dysfunction fatty liver diseases’.//

There is a big relationship between FLD and chronic inflammation, now chronic inflammation involves diseases that can affect vital organs of the human body such as the heart, digestive system, reproductive system and also the brain, the relationship here between FLD and chronic inflammation is that FLD can affect the heart health, digestive health, reproductive health, brain health, cancer, alzheimers and many more chronic diseases.

Nowadays we have an environment in which people are consuming foods that they are not capable at all to stop eating a good example is breads, brown sugar, sugarcane, cornflakes, cakes, rice and many more (list them) and without them knowing these foods change how their brain works, ever wondered how lazy you are after eating any sugary foods.

From the book ‘ikigai’ it talks about the recent studies about the BLUE ZONES where it is researched to have people experiencing longevity they not only live much longer than the rest of the population but also they suffer from fewer chronic illnesses among the blue zone regions (you can go research the other 4) is the famous ‘Okinawa, Japan’ where the locals are famous to eat vegetables, sweet potatoes, fish and a special dish they call ‘tofu’ , according to scientists they have discovered that the key to longevity is diet, exercise and there other more (I would advise to go read the book).

Focusing on these two people in Okinawa consume little amount of meat and have a special principle stated ‘hara hachibu’ which means ‘fill your belly to 80%’ which is also important and a good practice, also talking about exercise they don't perform hard exercise rather than walking and work on their gardens.

Wanna know why I chose people from Okinawa as an example, research studies by nutritionist shows that Okinawans consume an average of 1800-1900 calories while the american's go up to 2200-3300 calories which is dangerous!

Credit: Getty images

Lets talk about Japanese, these guys are known as the country with the highest living expectancy in the world with an average of 85 years for men and 87.3 years for women, amazing ikr!! So these guys have this incredible miracle diet called the Okinawa's miracle diet that I would love you guys to know. 

According to the ‘The Okinawa Program’ the summarized discoveries were;

·         They eat vegetables a lot although they have different 206 foods including spices and usually ate an average of 18 different foods everyday

·         They eat at least 5 servings of fruits and vegetables everyday including carrots, spinach, red peppers, cauliflowers, legumes, and soy products such as tofu, so we can say most of their calories came from vegetables.

·         They eat white rice every single day and sometimes adding noodles

·         They rarely eat sugars and if they do then it is cane sugars (see, its not that they don’t at all but they control their sugar consumption)

·         They eat fish an average of three times per week

Honestly speaking this diet would’ve been hell to me (although it is nice), because it is truly seen to a human that the more rules that you add in the more it is hard for one to follow and maintain the lifestyle in the long term and this is why many people leave dietary interventions. 

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 63% of youth and 49% of adults in the United States drank a sugar-sweetened beverage on a given day in 2011-2014 , hence we drink things that feed our body with space, addictive things and not nutrients.

GOOD NEWS!!

FLD is treatable and reversible, if detected early the liver has the capacity to regenerate which can cause it to be treated, but this process is yet to be discovered in the coming years and known to save many medicine problems in the future. 

Now FLD can be reversible if one can change their diet, lifestyle change (you can either use the Okinawas, or you can come up with your own which will be a better practice) and for your information no drug can treat FLD and that’s according to FDA.

People may ask themselves now who is at risk?

Our medical doctors may have the best intentions for us (and I can say they do have good intentions for us) but honestly they are not up to the latest research, now listing out the people that may be at risk of having FLD;

• ·         Age, as we age we are more prone to have FLD
• ·         Length of time your metabolic health has suffered
• ·         What your mother ate at Utero, this involves her diet and the mode of delivery.
• ·         Genetics, you should ask if in the family history there was someone who once had FLD and if they have you should ask for screening

So the goal here is to keep things realistic and I can say that the diet that works for most for preventing FLD is the diet that you like the most, so get up and take a diary or even a piece of paper and try to write down the harmful things that you consume in your eating life and make a simple plan such that it can make you leave the harmful and addiction step by step. 

Don’t expect to leave that habit in a week or two, it may take time but if you really love yourself and your health, I advice you to start now. Many teens get their hopes up that their bodies can handle the toxics at their age but don’t know that they destroy their livers and other parts day by day, so start now and I am sure you can reach the healthy life.

 

Thank you for your time.💙