Liver Health for Irregular Mammograms

On the second day of our Spring break travels, I got the news that my recent mammogram had come back with a new, suspect growth. While scary, it didn’t come as a total surprise. A few months earlier I’d run a DUTCH (dried urine test for comprehensive hormones) test on myself and I discovered that my body was no longer eliminating “bad” or 4-OH estrogen well. I’d been slowly addressing the underlying issues that have my body recycling estrogen, but clearly my actions thus far weren’t enough.

I had to sit with the potential bad news for several weeks before I could run more tests. A whole month passed before I got word that while suspect, the growth is not currently breast cancer.

I’ve taken this scare as fuel to push my own health goals with more urgency. Mainly I’m focused on liver health, as the liver is responsible for detoxing hormones. More specifically, the liver has five main detox pathways. One of them, methylation, is responsible for estrogen detox, and I know that I am a poor methlyator for some reasons I get into below.

Gut health must come before you do any liver work (if your gut health is poor your body may recycle toxins instead of releasing them), but because I’ve done a lot of ground work on my gut already, I was able to dive deeper into liver health right away.

Why I know my liver needs some love:

I often wake up between 2-4 am
I feel more sluggish and less energetic than I would like to in the evenings.
My LDL cholesterol is out of the Functional range (above 130).
My most recent DUTCH results (Dried Urine Test for Comprehensive Hormones) show my body is not doing a good job of clearing “bad estrogen”, which is a precursor to breast cancer.
I have two mutations on my MTHFR gene that impair my methylation process by 50%. Methylation is one of the main processes by which the liver rids the body of estrogen.
Every since a back injury 5 years ago, it’s harder for me to break a sweat when I exercise or to do more cardio intensive exercise in general.

So what am I doing to address my own health issues related to my liver?

Lifestyle:

B Complex Vitamins
64 oz water/day
Sweat more (Infrared Sauna)
Prioritize exercise 3-5 times a week, particularly important if you don’t methylate well
Incorporate more and varied types of fasting throughout the year (intermittent, 24-hour, 36- hour and longer multi-day water fasts) to give my liver and digestive system a break
Castor Oil packs every other night

Diet

Eat more fiber. Through eating more vegetables at each meal as well as 4 tablespoons of ground flax seed in water to get to 30g fiber/day.
Bitters: making sure to get some every day, through milk thistle seed extract in water, or adding dandelion greens to my salads.
One week Liver cleanse, where I give the liver a break for one week by eating mostly vegetables and seeds.
Post cleanse: Being very mindful of fat, protein, caffeine and alcohol intake to not overdo it.

I make a dressing with a good dollop of honey to counter the very beneficial bitterness of dandelion greens

These practices take some adjustment and preparation. One of the huge benefits to specific organ cleanses are that they help you learn to recognize how it feels to have an organ working well or sluggishly, and to be able to address any issues down the road, preemptively, long before they turns into bigger health problems down the road. During a cleanse, it is important to have delicious alternatives so that meals remain enjoyable and satisfying, albeit lighter.

On the weekend before I begin my cleanse, I make a big batch of Grain Free Cereal to eat in the mornings, prep salad ingredients to eat for lunch all week, and then make a couple of light, veggie soups like miso soup for dinner. I also have lots of Flackers crackers and Miyoko’s cashew cheese on hand for snack emergencies when a small fat boost was needed to get through the day.

There’s no quick fix to liver health, these changes take time and commitment. But just incorporating one or two small shifts in lifestyle or diet each week can add up to big results. As we become more intimately aware of each organ and what it needs to thrive, it gets easier to make different choices. Addressing liver health used to sound a bit far out to me. But as I’ve learned more about why I need to (fear is an excellent motivator) I am starting to see results that give me a more intimate understanding of this massively important organ.

I am still in the process of incorporating all the changes I’ve listed, but I am already noticing improved sleep, skin quality, whiter whites in the eyes, improved & more frequent digestion, less inflammation, and slightly darker pee & poop as more bile is released—all signs of improved liver health.