Reducing Uric Acid Naturally

y There are several different aspects of what needs to happen and what needs to be understood, in order to lower uric acid by diet and lifestyle measures.  About four years ago, my wife Sharon and I put together my video program, Kill Your Gout FOR GOOD.  The goal of the program is to give you all the how-to, to get gout under control. That means, both directly and indirectly, lowering blood uric acid levels and that is what we are going to cover in this post.

Bio-Individuality

The first thing that we need to talk about is bio-individuality, or how we are all biochemically unique.

What was going on in the lives of your parents six months before they conceived you is big. It plays into how healthy you were when your were born.  The food they were eating and what they were drinking also a big factor.   The level of stress, drugs, (prescription and/or recreational) toxic chemicals in the immediate environment, etc, etc, etc…get the picture?  These are the things that make a difference in why you have gout today.

What was the state of your health when you were born?  What were you fed?  Were you born vaginally or by C-section?  At an early age, were you put on antibiotics?  How many courses of antibiotics have you been on in your lifetime?

As you grew up, how well did you eat, sleep, and exercise? Did you do drugs and drink alcohol? Did you experience a lot of stress and were you exposed to toxic chemicals? (agriculture, industry, construction, manufacturing, household cleaners, paints, glues, solvents, etc.)

Ok, I know…”what does this have to do with reducing uric acid?”  Everything.  Keep reading.

Food You Eat vs. How Well Your Body Works

Most people think that gout is “caused” by what they eat.  It’s not.  It’s “caused” by food only because your body isn’t breaking down and processing the foods you are now eating as well as it used to. (you didn’t used to get gout, right?)  So, since your body isn’t dealing with the foods you’re eating (even though there is much more to it than that, keep reading – below we talk about endogenous and exogenous purines) eating certain foods and types of foods, and avoiding others, does help.

Here’s the deal: Eating healthier, alkaline-forming foods, generally improves your overall health, and that results in better control of gout by maintaining lower levels of uric acid.  The more crap foods we assault our bodies with (processed foods, fast foods, high fructose corn syrup, etc) and expose ourselves to toxic chemicals in our environment, the more it breaks down our overall good health and diminishes the proper function of our organs.  The result?  High levels of uric acid.

Let me explain a little bit more.

Protein Breakdown

Most of us, due to any number of poor decisions about diet and otherwise, have trashed our GI systems.  Our gastrointestinal tract has several different parts, but it works in a north to south process.

If we don’t chew our food properly, it makes it harder for the stomach and stomach acid to do its job.  Soon the mucosal lining and parietal cells in our stomachs stop producing the amount of high quality hydrochloric acid that does the all important job of breaking down the foods we eat, especially the proteins.  Remember proteins?  Like high protein foods such as red meat and shell fish?  Well those foods are typically rich in purines!  Remember purines?  As in, “eat a low purine diet”?

Well, if the proteins/purines don’t get broken down right, the absorption process of the small intestine is screwed up and so are the processes of the large intestine.  What does that mean to you?  Excess uric acid is produced and you end up with too much uric acid in your blood stream.

But Uric Acid Is an Antioxidant?!

Exactly!  Uric acid is NOT the bad guy!  Uric acid does a lot of really important protective duties for us, especially in the entire cardiovascular system.  It only becomes a problem when there is too much in the blood.  But…why is there too much in the blood?

Love Your Kidneys

The kidneys are these fascinating organs that we really need to love on. (I only have one, I was abducted by aliens, I was born in New Mexico…just kidding, they think I was born with only one…but I was born in New Mexico)  The kidneys in general are responsible for maintaining the pH balance of our overall body chemistry.  One of the many things they do, is to hold on to, or let go of, uric acid, on a moment to moment basis.  It’s not the same, or processed at the same rate, but it is a similar concept of how our bodies manage and regulate our blood sugar. (which by the way, has a whole lot to do with kidney health, which is why gout and diabetes have a very close relationship)

So…letting yourself get chronically dehydrated, decade after decade, eating crap food, and exposing yourself to toxic chemicals, (even before you were born) and a million other things, can cause your poor little kidneys to limp along at half speed.

Endogenous and Exogenous Purines

Here’s the real kicker: Purines are part of the cell structure of every cell of every plant, animal, and human being. And guess what?  Our cells live and die.  And we make new ones.  So what do you suppose our bodies do with the old, dead cells and the purines that make them up?  They get “recycled” – the process is called apoptosis.

Here’s what you really need to know: We have to deal with more purines from internal sources (endogenous) than we do external sources (our food – exogenous).  So, will eating a lower-in-purines diet and eating a lot more alkaline-forming foods help?  Absolutely.  But more importantly, we all need to continuously be working in every way possible to improve the health of our body cells, tissues, organs, and systems…if we want to control our uric acid and stop getting gout.

Here’s What You Do

There are several things you have put in place if you want to reduce your uric acid levels.  The following are not necessarily in order, but taking them in this order will produce faster results for most people.

First:

Invest in your health and buy my Kill Your Gout FOR GOOD program.  I give you ALL the how-to to get the job done.

Then:

• Start right away with drinking half your body weight in ounces of (ionized alkaline) water.  Making a practice of this will make your kidneys VERY happy.  Will this make you have to go to the bathroom a lot?  Probably.  That’s a good thing.  You want to get rid of excess uric acid right?  How do you think that happens?  Exactly.  Just learn to like to pee a lot.  Having to pee a lot is way better than getting gout attack after gout attack, wouldn’t you agree?
• Breathe fully, deeply, and completely, every minute of every day for the rest of your life.  Keeping your blood oxygenated is fundamental to good health and killing gout.
• Eat high quality food you’ve prepared yourself.  Eating properly prepared, nutrient dense, whole foods is going to help keep your body healthy – which means keeping your digestion working correctly and your kidneys monitoring and processing the uric acid the way they are supposed to.
• Supplements.  I’m not a big fan of supplements although I take a handful morning and evening.  There are three reasons for this: #1) So much of the food available to us at affordable prices (or our perceived concept of what is affordable which is carefully guided by the marketing power of Big Food) is at best, nutrient devoid. #2) And, at best, we have no control of the nutrient density of the foods we eat unless we become educated about soils and make the commitment to grow our food ourselves. #3) Due to the changes of our physical environment and our lives from the standpoint of stress, mental activity, and emotions, knowing what we are biochemically deficient and imbalanced in, on a day-to-day basis, is nearly impossible.  The way to manage that is best done with nutrient dense whole foods, but in this modern world, supplements can fill in some of the gaps and create a more complete picture.

Supplements For Reducing Uric Acid

There are a number of different supplements that in a generalized way, are pretty good for pretty much everyone with gout to take advantage of.  When I speak of them in terms of lowering uric acid, I am not talking about these specific supplements having specific biochemical functions that target ways or means in the body to lower uric acid.  The reason they work (again, with varying results because everyone is biochemically unique) is because they help restore the body’s ability to process purines, and improve the function of various organs, and the result is better elimination and processing of uric acid.  The lowering of blood uric acid should be viewed more as a by-product of improved health.

What To Buy

Here are a few of the supplements that can be used to enhance your properly prepared, nutrient dense, whole food diet.  I’ve added my affiliate links to Amazon if you want buy them there – I of course appreciate the added boost, every little bit helps, but more than anything, I just want to give you an example of what to look for.  Here they are:

• Betaine Hydrochloric Acid w/Pepsin (for improving digestion)
• High quality, well-balanced Multi-Vitamin/Multi-Mineral
• High quality, well-balanced B-100 complex
• High quality, well-balanced Essential Fatty Acids
• Chewable Zinc Lozenges
• Solaray Triple Strength Tart Cherry
• Solaray Total Cleanse Uric Acid
• Biotics Li-Zyme Forte
• Himalaya LiverCare

In addition to supplementation, one of the easiest and most beneficial things to supplement with, is cultured and fermented foods.  Find different ways to add in high quality sauerkraut, yogurt, kefir, kombucha, and others.  The perfect no-brainer is our old gout standby, Apple Cider Vinegar.  Put a tablespoon in 2oz of high quality water and sip it with every meal.  This helps improve digestion and breakdown of foods, as well as improve the healthy bacterial environment of the small and large intestines.

 ☆ Bottom-line:  Reducing uric acid naturally is just a matter of improving your overall health – it’s not rocket surgery.