A Game-Changer: pH-Consciousness (revised after rogue code removed)
by Angeline Pacy on 02/28/15
Have you ever gotten a muscle cramp during exercise? Some people call it a “Charlie Horse.” That horrible pain is from lactic acid build-up in the muscles and it is from a local change in pH (where an acid builds up). But, what if similar issues were happening around the body everyday, and we couldn’t feel them in quite the same way? We’d want to do something about it, right? Definitely!
Thanks to the internet, health-conscious people are growing more aware about the importance of the body’s pH and related tools to boost health. Never has such a fundamental principle in medicine, capable of impacting patient lives and reducing healthcare spending, been so overlooked in the clinical setting in exchange for wasted healthcare dollars. The positive impact potential is enormous because pH changes are associated with so many preventable illnesses. Understanding pH can at first feel complex because it is both environmental and genetic. The environmental stressors that influence pH are often controversial too. But, don’t let that discourage you from taking charge of your wellness.
Don’t Miss Ancient pH Mysteries Revealed Here
I remember a time when I was growing up, I was about 15 years old, when I had a very intellectual argument with my mother over this very commonly debated scientific topic. This topic surrounded the systemic outcome of ingesting raw apple cider vinegar. Vinegar, also known as acetic acid, is in fact exactly what its name suggests; it is an acid. Despite that simple logic, my mother insisted that after ingesting this acid, it would have an over-all alkalinizing effect in the body.
"Mom, how can that be," I questioned? "I just don't understand."
A common denominator for altering pH involves the microbiome. Some microbes, fed by a proper diet, create a more alkaline environment. In contrast, many pathogenic microbes and infections, including intracellular organisms, create an acidic environment. It turns out that my mother was right about the "mother colonies" found in raw apple cider vinegar. There are several components to raw vinegar, amongst them being living microbes (called "mother") and enzymes, that aid in creating a more alkalinizing body (systemically).
This stands in stark contrast to acids found in beverages like many colas, such as phosphoric acid, among other seemingly innocent combinations of acids, that create an environment so acidic in the blood that the pH changes leach calcium from the bones and teeth (in order to buffer the blood as a compensation method and bring it back into homeostasis). Diets high in acid-producing foods will lead to diseases like osteoporosis and tooth decay (as a result of this demineralization-buffer feedback loop).
The body is designed to buffer itself, to keep pH stable. But, this gets more difficult as we age. Even young people can have serious pH problems due to causes both in and outside of one’s control. We can help this process or hurt it simply by our lifestyle.
What is pH?
Understanding the basics of pH and its context in the body is helpful. The body must stay within a certain range of many different values in order to maintain balance or homeostasis. One of those important values is most certainly pH. For starters, pH is a measurement, based upon a number scale of 1-14, that represents the acidity or alkalinity of a solution (technically hydrogen ion H+ concentration). On this pH scale, the number 7 is neutral; lower number values are acidic or stronger acids and numbers with values higher than 7 are more alkaline or stronger bases.
Interesting, different parts of the body have varying pH values. This delicate balance within various bodily fluids is known medically as acid–base balance or homeostasis. A healthy pH of blood serum is at approximately 7.37, where as Cerebrospinal Fluid (CSF) can be measured at 7.5. Both being acids, gastric juice (stomach acid) has a pH value of approximately 1.5-3 and urine a value of approximately 6 (but can range from 4-8). In the clinical setting, patients are identified as acidic (acidosis) when blood pH falls below 7.3. In contrast, when the blood's pH is too high (alkaline) patients are diagnosed with alkalosis.
Some pH changes happen outside of the blood and can’t be measured without a muscle biopsy, among other things. Unfortunately, routine testing for pH is typically limited to blood serum and often ignores the other crucial areas of the body that better-reflect both health and illness. There are a series of biochemical changes that happen throughout the body that impact pH long before problems are detected by a basic blood test. Even serious pH disorders are often only transient and extremely difficult to detect except when blood is taken immediately in an attack.
Impact of pH Changes
Scientists have proven that unhealthy pH can denature proteins. While an acidic stomach acid is perfect for denaturing proteins for digestion and also protect the body from invading germs, it is crucial to protect other types of proteins in the body from acidity.
All sorts of chaos happens in the body, across systems, when acidic pH pH inactivates enzymes that are crucial for many biological functions (enzymes are a type of protein). Critical metabolic processes are slowed down in an acidic environment (through enzymatic deactivation). Although more rare in a clinical setting, enzymes can also be deactivated in an environment that is too alkaline (which also causes micro-organisms to grow where they should not). It’s really about acid-base balance that keeps bodies thriving.
A slight shift in intra-cellular pH (within the body's cells) can cause the onset of spontaneous and hereditary genetic mutations by damaging (denaturing) DNA. Shifts in intracellular pH are known to activate genetic pre-dispositions in diseases such as Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, initiating the disease process. This news can empower society to focus on things like target therapies, infectious disease care, and life-style choices that prevent the denaturing of DNA and other delicate structures in the body.
As a culture, chronically-ill patients most often have a pH that is far too acidic in areas of the body that benefit from an alkaline environment. Inflammation and vasoconstriction are associated with a higher level of acidity in the body (low pH) too. Another disease-state commonly associated with an acidic body is epilepsy. The likelihood of seizures increases dramatically in an acidic body. Regardless of what came first, altered pH or inflammation, pH is an important therapeutic and diagnostic target to consider in any wellness plan.
A Closer Look at Environment
What factors can we discuss here that impact pH in the body? Most certainly diet has a fundamental impact upon the body's pH. A diet that is high in foods that create an acidic environment will lead to chronic illness and pathological states.
For example, dental plaque is comprised a type of living biofilm that is produced in the mouth after eating starchy and sugary foods. It surrounds tooth enamel and creates a locally acidic environment that leads to tooth decay and cavities (dental carries).
Interestingly, this plaque in the mouth correlates to cardiovascular disease that caused by plaque in the arteries (coronary artery disease). Could this change in acid-base balance and microbiome place patients at higher-risk for heart disease? That’s what it looks like!
The microbiome is negatively altered by diets overly dominant in sugars, and starches, this includes grains and even fruits when eaten excessively (see the term ‘advanced glycation end-products’). It places the body at higher risk for all sorts of disease and accelerated aging, including infectious disease! The shift in pH is often influenced by microorganisms in the flora and related biofilms that are dependent upon those simple sugars.
In contrast, a diet rich low-glycemic fruits and vegetables, many raw foods, protein, and healthy fats, can promote systemic better pH balance. It will feed healthy organisms in the microbiome that going on to influence the whole body and health in positive ways (systemically) Enjoy these easy tools to boost pH-consciousness today!
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