July 2025

The Liver

• Meet The Liver – What Does It Do For You? And Why Is It Important??
• Liver Imbalance – What Can Go Wrong?
• “Detox is a Lifestyle: How to Support Your Natural Liver Detox
• Herbal Support For The Liver

Last week, I described how the liver functions as a master chemist that produces, stores, and detoxs chemical compounds.

Liver Imbalances – What could go wrong?

Medications that might reduce bile production and flow are:

• Hormonal medications, specifically oral contraceptives and estrogen therapy.
• Statins may interfere with bile acid synthesis since they inhibit cholesterol, a precursor to bile acid production.
• Some antibiotics, like erythromycin, can reduce bile flow.
• Some calcium channel blockers, as well as ACE inhibitors that are meant to reduce heart rate and blood pressure, may reduce bile flow.

If you need to be on any of these meds, you want to be proactive and support bile production by eating bitter foods and herbs.

What can go wrong with storage?

Storage issues in the liver are similar to storage issues in a warehouse.

• There might be too many products and not enough storage space.
• The doors might be stuck and won’t open when you need something stored inside.
• The warehouse sends too many products.

The liver is a storage unit for many essential compounds that are vital to a healthy body, including glucose, iron, and some vitamins.

What can go wrong with glucose storage?

The liver functions as a glucose storage space, storing glucose as glycogen. Malfunctions in glucose storage and utilization can occur due to genetic conditions or a storage crisis due to excessive caloric intake, such as obesity.

Genetic storage conditions, such as glycogen storage diseases, occur when there is a malfunction in enzymes that are involved in the synthesis of glycogen or in the breakdown of glycogen into glucose. The result is an abnormal glycogen accumulation in the liver and an inability to release glucose from storage when the body needs it. The symptoms include an enlarged liver with an energy crisis because glucose is not released into the blood. Therefore, cells don’t receive the fuel they need to function.

A more common storage issue is nonalcoholic fatty liver, a condition where excess caloric intake is stored in the liver as triglycerides. When the liver produces more triglycerides than it can export to other fat storage sites, triglycerides accumulate in the liver.  

In some cases, a high demand and low supply of choline, an essential compound for triglyceride export, contribute to the accumulation of triglycerides in the liver. At other times, dysbiosis leads to gut bacteria producing excess short-chain fatty acids, which must be processed by the liver, thereby adding to its metabolic burden.

Nonalcoholic fatty liver can create a vicious cycle with insulin resistance.

On the one hand, excess liver fat contributes to insulin resistance.

On the other hand, insulin resistance can impair the liver’s ability to regulate glucose production. The resulting metabolic dysfunction further promotes the accumulation of fat.

What can throw off iron Storage?

The liver is the primary storage site for iron in the form of ferritin. Problems may arise when the liver hormone hepcidin fails to regulate iron metabolism properly. You end up with too much iron in the blood, leading to toxicity and inflammatory problems, joint pain, depression, diabetes, and heart disease,” as the iron essentially “rusts” in the body.

Issues with storing vitamin

The liver stores fat-soluble vitamins (A, D, E, and K). A healthy liver helps maintain balanced levels of fat-soluble vitamins in the blood. If the liver releases too many vitamins, they might become toxic. On the other hand, if the liver doesn’t release enough vitamins, it will manifest in deficiency symptoms.

What can go wrong with detox processes?

The liver is the primary organ for detoxing the body. It can become congested for many reasons, from a genetic tendency to chemical exposure to toxins or damage to hepatic cells following a disease such as hepatitis.

When the liver is clogged, the filtration of toxins from the blood slows down, leading to issues such as free radical damage, skin eruptions, and allergies.

There are two ways for the liver can lose balance: excess or deficiency.

Excess liver function

In excess liver, it can push toxins into the first detox phase. If the first phase outpaces the second phase, you might end up with highly toxic compounds escaping back into the blood, resulting in the symptoms of congestion, such as skin issues and allergies.

Deficient liver function

A deficient liver happens after chronic exposure to toxins such as drugs, alcohol, food additives, or pharmaceuticals. A liver disease such as hepatitis can lead to deficient liver function.

Some signs of a deficient liver are:

• Sluggish digestion
• Fat intolerance
• Nausea
• Chronic constipation
• Increase in chemical and food intolerances.
• A yellowish complexion

Supporting the liver detox function is part of growing health from the roots up. It includes:

• Reducing toxic overload
• A nutrient-dense diet that supports liver detox
• Movement
• Sleep
• Following the circadian cycle when timing meals and rest.

Next week, I will share a detailed support plan to support your liver’s innate capacity to detox. I want to emphasize that it is not a detox program, as I don’t believe in detox protocols; in some cases, they can cause more harm than benefit.

I believe in a lifestyle that supports the liver’s natural capacity to detox. For more information on “Detox Is A Lifestyle,” stay tuned for my next post.