Looking for natural cures to GERD instead of wasting money on prescriptions every day?
Want to learn how to cure acid reflux for good instead of suppress your symptoms?
Are you interested in addressing the underlying cause of your acid reflux then…
You’ve come to the right place!
I naturally cured my acid reflux and want to help you do the same. I used to take Prilosec every day for several years. I have been free of my symptoms from acid reflux for 8 years without any medication!
If you think acid reflux is only a nuisance, think again. Serious medical problems can come from untreated acid reflux (even cancer!) If you have acid reflux every day your body is telling you something is WRONG! Listen up and get to the root of the problem.
Why Do I Want to Help You
I have lost two people from esophageal cancer, my Father and a close family friend. Untreated acid reflux is directly linked to a higher risk of esophageal cancer (the oncologist said it was directly a result of untreated acid reflux, but I have not been able to find research to back that up). Esophageal cancer is typically silent until it is too late. My father passed away 9 months after his diagnosis.
Personally I suffered from acid reflux for several years and was able to overcome my acid reflux naturally without medications – 8 years acid reflux free! After my father’s passing I became more aware of what I was putting into my body and the effect it had on my health. We are what we eat!!!
My goal is to educate others about the risks of untreated acid reflux and help them cure themselves without medications – the side effects always have a list of other concerns. Acid reflux is a sign from our body that something is out of balance, we need to get to the root of the problem to fix it.
What Happens Inside Your Body When You Have Acid Reflux
First, let’s cover what happens inside your body when you have Acid Reflux or GERD(Gastrointestinal reflux). During normal digestion your food travels down your esophagus into the stomach and your lower esophageal sphincter (LES) acts as a flap to keep the contents of your food in your stomach. Sometimes that flap relaxes and lets the contents of your stomach come back up your esophagus and… BAM you have the symptoms of acid reflux. The burning sensation is actually your stomach acid burning and irritating your esophagus.
Symptoms
There are a variety of symptoms of Acid Reflux and it affects everyone differently. Typically if you have symptoms two or more times per week your doctor will diagnose you with acid reflux. Confirmation is often done by your doctor with a barium x-ray.
- Metal or acidic taste in your mouth (you are actually tasting your stomach acid)
- Pain in the chest and upper stomach area often a burning sensation (why its called heartburn)
- Nausea
- Burping
- Bad Breath
- Bloating
- Abdominal pain
- Vomiting
- Problems swallowing or painful swallowing
- A dry cough
- Chronic dry cough
- Feeling of a lump in your throat
- Wheezing
- Hoarseness
- Wearing away of your teeth
- Some people do not notice symptoms at all
Foods that Trigger Acid Reflux
- Acidic foods (think tomato sauce)
- Spicy foods
- Caffeine (yes this means coffee)
- Alcohol
- Chocolate
- Citrus foods
- Fried/greasy foods
Other Causes of Acid Reflux
Many people think it is only the foods we eat that cause Acid Reflux, in fact there are many more variables. If you are like me, you probably didn’t always have symptoms of Acid Reflux when you ate trigger foods. Some other causes are:
- Stress
- Eating right before bed
- Hiatal Hernia
- Medications such as antihistamines, sedatives, painkillers and high blood pressure medications
- Pressure on your stomach from being overweight or pregnant
- Improper balance of good bacteria in your digestive track
- Chronic inflammation in your body
- Leaky Gut
Natural Cures for Acid Reflux
- Change to your diet to eliminate trigger foods (Caffeine, alcohol, citrus, fried, spicy,
chocolate) - Take a probiotic and eating fermented foods to fix the gut bacteria to more good bacteria than bad. Eliminate as much sugar as possible from your diet as sugar feeds the bad bacteria.
- Drink apple cider vinegar (I mix 1 tsp with one cup of water and add honey to make it more palatable)
- Eat pomegranate seeds
- Avoid foods that cause inflammation in your body. This will be different for every person. Mine are gluten, dairy, eggs and soy.
- Sleeping on your left side
- Eat your last meal 2-3 hours before bedtime
- Eating Smaller meals
- Lose weight to decrease pressure on your LES
- Drink a big glass of water to dilute stomach acid
- Baking soda – Add 1 tablespoon of baking soda to a cup of water and drink. It should give immediate relief
- Aloe vera juice – Drink 2 tablespoons to soothe your throat
- Colon cleanse and/or enemas
Need Personalized Help Curing Your Acid Reflux?
If you get acid reflux daily more than likely you need more help. A multitude of issues is probably causing your acid reflux.
Jeff Martin – a certified nutritionist and former acid reflux sufferer – can teach you his step by step system on how to successfully get freedom from your acid reflux. It is 150 pages of jam-packed valuable information on how to naturally and permanently eliminate your acid reflux from the root and achieve lasting freedom from digestive disorders – without drugs, antacids or any kinds of gimmicks.
I highly recommend it – it’s very honest and straightforward without all the hype and b.s. you see all over the internet today. Here is the website where you can find out more.
Dangers If GERD is Left Untreated
If GERD is left untreated, it can cause SERIOUS damage to your esophagus. Our stomach lining provides protection from the damaging effects of stomach acid. Our esophagus was designed to be protected by our LES, since acid reflux sufferers LES does not work properly it lets stomach acid into our esophagus. Our esophagus does not have a lining to protect it – the stomach acid can severely damage our esophagus.
Esophagitis
The esophagus becomes inflamed; ulcers and scar tissue may develop if the stomach acid continues to come in contact with the esophagus. The scar tissue can build up causing a narrowing in the esophagus called an esophageal stricture that can cause food to get caught in the throat and difficulty swallowing. Rings and abnormal tissue can develop in the esophagus and cause difficulty swallowing as well.
Barrett’s Esophagus
The stomach acid causes damage to the esophagus, causing the cells of the esophagus to change to mimic the cells of the small intestine. Barrett’s Esophagus is a precancerous condition and there is an a clear correlation between Barrett’s Esophogus and developing esophageal cancer.
Esophageal Cancer
Esophageal Cancer usually occurs if Barrett’s Esophagus is left untreated. Most of the time there are not symptoms until the cancer has grown and the patient encounters trouble swallowing because of the tumor. The survival rates of esophageal cancer are not good. It is a cancer that grows aggressively.
Esophageal cancer is more common in men, associated with heavy alcohol and tobacco use and the risk increases for those over 55 years old.
According to the US National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health – “The incidence of esophageal adenocarcinoma has rapidly increased over the past several decades.” Esophageal adenocarcinoma is one of the two types of esophageal cancer.
Problems with Prescription Medications
While prescription medications to treat Acid Reflux alleviate the symptoms, they are just masking the symptoms and not treating the root cause of your problem. If you are like me, you don’t want to just take a pill to treat your symptoms.
Proton Pump Inhibitors (PPI’s) are prescribed often for those with Acid Reflux, they come with side effects especially long term use. Common PPI’s are Nexium, Prilosec, Prevacid, and Protonix.
There are some side effects you should be aware of with long term use (over 1 year):
- Increase risk of C. Diff infection
- Contribute to bone loss and increase your risk of osteoporosis
- Deplete your magnesium levels (read about why magnesium is so important)
- Increase risk of heart attack
- Trouble absorbing vitamin B12
If you’ve naturally cured your Acid Reflux or gotten relief from your Acid Reflux symptoms…
I’d love to hear from you in the comments section below.
Resources
http://www.webmd.com/heartburn-gerd/guide/untreated-heartburn
http://www.healthline.com/health/gerd/and-your-throat#3
http://www.sanfordhealth.org/featurestories/View/755a10ce-99de-42fc-a4a8-2d2997566266
http://www.healthline.com/health/gerd/esophageal-cancer
http://www.cancer.org/cancer/esophaguscancer/detailedguide/esophagus-cancer-key-statistics
http://seer.cancer.gov/statfacts/html/esoph.html
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3265012/
https://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/gerd.html
http://www.niddk.nih.gov/health-information/health-topics/digestive-diseases/ger-and-gerd-in-adults/Pages/symptoms-causes.aspx
http://www.medicinenet.com/proton-pump_inhibitors/page2.htm
http://www.naturalnews.com/035720_acid_reflux_natural_remedies_heartburn.html
Hi There! I'm Shannon - I help women regain their health from the inside out so they can lead healthy, happy lives - full of energy and effortlessly maintain an ideal weight. 
Thank you Shannon, these look like some really great suggestions. I’ve struggled with this for a long time, particularly at night.
I usually sleep on my back – why would it be helpful to sleep on my left side?
Is yogurt a good source for the probiotics, or are you recommending a probiotic supplement?
I’ll give a few of these a try, one at a time, and see what works.
Larry
Sleeping on your left side seems to relax the LES (lower esophageal sphincter) so that it can block the acid from coming back up.
Yogurt is a good source of probiotics – personally I needed a high potency probiotic supplement in addition to yogurt. Probiotics and diet were key for me.
Hi, I really enjoyed your article.
I am also on the path to eating naturally. I did not realize that acid reflux could lead to cancer. My mother suffers with acid reflux so I will be referring her to this site. Thank you for the very informative article. I also enjoyed reading about the list of food that may be helpful.
Shelby I thought acid reflux was just a nuisance and did not realize it could lead to big health issues like cancer until it directly effected my family. Please do share it with your mother!
What a useful article! I’m suffering of acid reflux for years now.
My doctor told me that sleeping on my belly can worsen my reflux-symptoms. The fact that you advise sleeping on the left side makes me rally think it could help as well.
I’m using baking soda as well and it helps a lot. I wonder if it’s not bad for the stomach to use it regularly? Do you know anything about it?
Loosing weight is in process. 😉
Thank you Shannon, great post!
Adam
I don’t know of any precautions of taking baking soda daily. It helps to make your body more alkaline which is a great thing to ward off cancer and other diseases.
Losing weight is a great side effect 🙂
Awesome article!
While the condition is quite unpleasant, the information was not.
How much baking soda should be used? I’m visualizing a glass of lukewarm water and adding baking soda. Also, how quickly does it work?
I love learning natural ways to cure and heal ailments. Sometimes alcohol or spicy foods give me a terribly upset esophagus. Thank you for the information
Baking soda should work pretty immediately. I would start with a teaspoon and work up from there. You could also mix it in juice or tea to make it more palatable.
Thank you, for super helpful information and no hype.
So glad it was helpful to you Cassie! Here’s to hoping you can kick the acid reflux too.
Shannon
Can acid reflux cause a dozen sensation in the chest?? I was scared it was my heart but had pretty much every cardiac test test there is and they found nothing. Doctor said it could be gerd, but I don’t get a burning sensation , just a uneasy feeling and spasms in my chest and upper stomach area.
I mean spasm not dozen
Hi Brian! My mother in law had a similar experience and she was diagnosed with GERD too. And years later that was indeed the cause. I’m by no means a Dr but just sharing my personal experience. I hope you are experiencing some relief!
Such a great read. Thank you for the essential information everyone needs to know.