Introducing Your Immune System

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As your body’s official Defense Department, the immune system protects against all enemies. Toxins in the air. Viruses and bacteria that get into the body. Everything.

And immune system headquarters is smack-dab in the middle of the most interactive, butt-into-everybody-else’s-business system known to man, the endocrine system.

The all-for-one, one-for-all endocrine system also includes the thyroid, adrenals, etc. If any part of it gets into trouble, the others jump in to help. This team effort means you can’t have problems with a single gland, the thyroid, for instance; they’re all in there bailing like crazy.

Want an example of the interactivity that goes on?

The pineal gland manufactures melatonin to handle it’s body-clock functions, but also to send along a supply to the thymus, leader of the immune system, so it can do its thing. The thymus, in turn, sends some melatonin to the adrenals to help them along.

But that arrangement falls apart if we let fluoride in our lives. Fluoride turns the pineal into stone, unable to produce any melatonin. Then the thymus and the adrenals don’t get what they need, and they slide down a slippery slope to various diseases, including autoimmune diseases.

Signs of a weakened immune system:
•    You get sick all the time. Colds drag on forever, the flu moves in for the season, etc. A healthy immune system can defend against colds and flu. Shingles, too.

•    Allergies announce an overwhelmed immune system. They’re  the body’s way of holding up a sign that says, “There’s trouble in thymus paradise.”

•    Depression means your endocrine system, including the thymus, is out of whack.

•    Heavy-duty sweating for no particular reason can mean thymus trouble.

•    Inflammatory diseases such as inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).

•    Frequently swollen lymph glands.

•    Muscle testing that reveals a weak infraspinatus, one of the rotator cuff muscles, points to a weakened thymus.

•    At the end of the out-of-whack road lies cancer. It’s good to get the parade stopped before you get that far.

Things you need to do:
•    Take responsibility for your health; don’t outsource it to doctors or various poobahs to fix. Work with them, but don’t give them total control. You’re the one with the most “skin in the game.”

•    Discover the toxins in your life and get rid of them.

•    Get a good diet going. It won’t be anything like what you read. Here are some facts: Caffeinated coffee is a health drink, good saturated fat blesses your socks off, salt is necessary for life, etc. The kind of diet I’m talking about makes you drool even thinking about it.

What not to do:
•    Some doctors insist autoimmune diseases come from a thymus that’s “too strong.” Well, no. Autoimmune disease means the thymus is in trouble; it’s not too buff.

But they’ll suggest ways to slow the thymus down, and may even suggest removing your thymus. Those are really bad ideas, and while they can sound like a quick fix, you end up in worse shape than you were.

•    Remember that your one-of-a-kind body needs one-of-a-kind solutions. The endocrine and immune systems are too complicated for simplistic solutions, but listening to your body and responding to symptoms, step-by-step, works really well.

I hope you’ll let me help you. There’s much to learn and even more to gain.

God is good,
Bette Dowdell

About the author: Bette Dowdell defines determination. In a really deep health ditch, with doctors who didn’t help, she got her Oh-Yeah! attitude in gear and researched her way out. She never intended to be a health expert, but sometimes a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do. Subscribe to Bette’s free e-mails about solving health problems at

http://TooPoopedtoParticipate.com

References:
Allergies and The Immune System: http://www.drgangemi.com/kids/htartallergies/
The Weakened Immune System: http://www.digitalnaturopath.com/cond/C46953.html
Understanding the Immune System: http://www.niaid.nih.gov/topics/immunesystem/pages/default.aspx

Bette Dowdell
A drunk driver pretty much destroyed my health a month before my first birthday. Doctors said I was fine--for years. Finally realizing my health was up to me, I started researching. I got out the health ditch I was in, and found my future: Giving people the information they need to understand how to take control of their own health. It's been an amazing journey, and I look forward to all that is yet to come.