Acid reflux is a terribly common problem among people in today’s fast paced culture of high fat foods and things that can be eaten on the go. There are a number of acid reflux foods to avoid, and certain things that will help eliminate and prevent your heartburn.

First, let’s look at what acid reflux actually is and how it happens. Stomach acid helps to break down food in your stomach so that your body can extract the vitamins and nutrients it needs. Certain things like difficult to digest foods, stress, smoking, or lying down after eating can cause that acid to creep up into your esophagus. This causes pain, indigestion, burping, hiccups and can even result in damage to the esophagus if the reflux occurs frequently.

Trigger Foods

Everyone has their own foods that will set off acid reflux, however there are a few common triggers. These foods should be avoided to help prevent damage to the esophagus, and keep heartburn at bay. They include:

• Garlic
• Caffeine
• Alcohol
• Citrus (including juices that are high in acids)
• Onions
• Meats that are difficult to digest (like ground beef, marbled sirloin and chicken wings)
• Dairy

To help find out what your own triggers are, start a food journal. Keep track of what you eat, how much you eat and when you eat it. That will help you to better understand what sets your acid reflux off, and narrow down your specific triggers. Some of your food triggers may surprise you!

What you can do

Now, just because there are a ton of foods you should avoid doesn’t mean you need to go on an extreme, crash course diet. It’s always best to try to maintain a balanced diet, so things like dairy, citrus and meat that are part of a healthy diet should not be completely cut out. They should just be consumed in moderation, and possibly in tandem with other heartburn preventatives.

Heartburn Preventatives

Sometimes foods that are known to cause heartburn for you just can’t be avoided. Maybe you’re at a friend’s house and they cooked nachos for you with ground beef, onions, and a whole host of other heartburn triggers just waiting to settle into your stomach. So what can you do?

Try taking a papaya enzyme tablet after you eat. Papaya contains digestive enzymes that will help your body to digest foods and prevent acid buildup that causes reflux.

Try drinking a full glass of water after you eat. This will help dilute stomach acids and flush your digestive tract out so you won’t have to experience excess irritation. For more effective relief or prevention, try adding a tablespoon or two of apple cider vinegar to a full glass of water. This will help neutralize the acid in your stomach in addition to washing it away.

Eat an apple before or after your meal. Apparently the old adage “an apple a day keeps the doctor away” has some basis, as many people are finding success with this technique for keeping acid reflux at bay.

There are countless home remedies you can try to prevent and relieve heartburn. The Reflux Remedy Report promotes natural heartburn remedies and can help you prevent your acid reflux, as well as formulate a diet appropriate for acid reflux. For more information on acid reflux food to avoid and other preventative measures you can take, visit refluxremedy.com today!

Gallbladder disease can have very similar symptoms to heartburn, and although the gallbladder is connected to the digestive system, no genuine link has been found yet between the gallbladder and heartburn.

The Gallbladder

The reason people think they’re experiencing heartburn when they have a gallbladder issue is the pain is extremely similar and located in the same place that heartburn would be. The symptoms of gallstones and gallbladder disease include pain in the upper abdomen, belching, indigestion and nausea.

The gallbladder is used to store bile that then helps aid in the digestive process. After eating, the body signals the gallbladder to release the bile to help break down food in the small intestine.

For people who have problems with their gallbladder, antibiotics and surgery are generally the best options.

Heartburn

Heartburn is the result of too much acid in the stomach. This acid is then allowed to escape the stomach into the esophagus, resulting in pain that often radiates through the chest and into the neck as a burning sensation. Like a gallbladder problem, heartburn can also result in belching, indigestion and hiccups.

Heartburn has a number of causes. Food is one main cause. Things like spicy foods, onions, garlic, alcohol, caffeine and acidic citrus fruits can all cause heartburn, although many people have their own unique food triggers.

A person’s lifestyle can also stir up trouble in the heartburn department. For example, eating large meals can lead to heartburn. The influx of food in the stomach causes pressure to build and excess acid to be produced which irritates the esophagus. To solve this problem eat smaller meals more often. That helps the stomach digest foods more easily and keeps heartburn at bay.

Additionally, don’t eat right before bed, no matter how small the meal is. If you remain upright after eating, gravity helps keep food and acids down in your stomach, but if you lie down they can easily creep into your esophagus and cause pain and irritation.

Smoking can also cause heartburn, so if you smoke, don’t. It’s thought to increase the body’s acid production, leading to heartburn. It also slows the body’s ability to heal, so any damage done from excess acid takes much longer to be repaired.

Similarly, stress causes an influx of acid production in the stomach. So, try to keep stress out of your life as much as possible. Meditate, take deep breaths, count to 10, put on some soothing music, or even add a light exercise routine to your day. All these things can help you achieve a calmer mindset and prevent heartburn pain.

Heartburn pain can be relieved in a number of ways. Drinking a large glass of water is one simple way to reduce toxins in the stomach and wash acids through the system, relieving pain. Antacids can also help, although you should avoid becoming a pill popper if you have frequent heartburn. For more natural relief, try ginger. Whether candied or taken in tea form, it can help with all kinds of stomach indigestion problems.

For more natural tips and tricks for relieving heartburn, visit refluxremedy.com.

Although it’s easy to mistake a gallbladder issue with heartburn, the two so far have not been connected. Make sure you stay in tune with your body so that you can distinguish between the two health problems.

Aloe has long been known to help with burns, however did you know aloe juice can help put out the internal flames of heartburn? Aloe juice for acid reflux is one of the many natural remedies that can be used to help relieve the pain of heartburn.

Aloe actually has a number of healing properties, and its enzymes help the body in many ways. Specifically when found in juice form, it can help calm the body?s production of stomach acid and return it to a more natural digestive cycle. The problem with reaching for antacids every time you experience acid reflux is they tend to eliminate all stomach acids, and the body does need some acids to naturally break down food and be able to absorb its nutrients. Aloe juice helps to naturally restore balance to the body and ease indigestion.

For frequent heartburn sufferers, prevention is often the key. So, to keep acid reflux at bay, try drinking a quarter of a cup of aloe juice 10 minutes before a meal. That way your body will be ready to receive and break down the food you throw at it.

It?s important to note though that aloe should only be consumed in juice form. It can be found at your local market or organic food store. Consuming aloe gel from a plant you may have in your home, or gel that?s meant to treat sunburns functions as a laxative and will cause diarrhea. Because of that, make sure you only use aloe gel for topical purposes.

Other natural remedies

Aloe juice isn?t the only thing that can help relieve acid reflux. There are a huge amount of things you can do to help relieve acid reflux without taking medications.

First of all, try drinking a cup of tea. Ginger and chamomile tea both have soothing properties and can help relieve heartburn pain, in addition to diluting acids and washing toxins through the digestive system that much faster.

Even a glass of water can accomplish this task easily. Similarly to tea, it will help wash damaging acids away, giving your stomach a chance to settle. If your heartburn is bad, try mixing your glass of water with a tablespoon or two of apple vinegar cider. This will help speed relief to the burning area.

Additionally, some people have found relief by simply consuming an apple. Something about the apple has compounds and enzymes that help relieve acid reflux. They weren?t kidding when they said an apple a day keeps the doctor away!

To keep heartburn away along with your quarter cup of aloe juice, don?t eat too close to bed time. This helps keep food and acids from creeping up into your esophagus where they don?t belong. If you happen to break this rule, try sleeping propped up a bit. Putting a pillow under your head will also help keep stomach acid down in your stomach, which lets you sleep soundly through the night. Additionally, don?t eat large meals. Smaller meals consumed on a more frequent basis help the digestive system deal with food and nutrients in smaller doses, rather than all at once, which can result in the overproduction of stomach acid.

Aloe juice for acid reflux is only one natural way to douse the flames of heartburn. For more on this and may other tips for relieving acid reflux, read The Reflux Remedy Report at www.refluxremedy.com. The Report focuses solely on holistic heartburn remedies, and is sure to have a solution that will work for you!

If you suffer from frequent heartburn, you may want to consider lifestyle changes to prevent heartburn.

Before we get too far into that though, let?s look at heartburn a bit more closely. Heartburn happens when acid in the stomach that?s meant to help break down food escapes into the esophagus, causing irritation and pain. Symptoms of heartburn often include a burning sensation that can surge up into the neck, burping, hiccups, and indigestion. Frequent heartburn can be very damaging to the esophagus, and steps should be taken to alleviate it, and allow the body to heal.

This will change your life

The first thing, and possibly the easiest, lifestyle change you can do to prevent heartburn is to stop eating large meals. Consuming less food more often can help the stomach more easily digest meals, and absorb all the nutrients it needs to heal damaged areas. Large meals can result in a buildup of pressure and acid, which produces heartburn pain.

Next, pay close attention to what you eat. Keep a log of what foods you consume, and particularly what foods cause heartburn. Then, simply avoid those foods. Everyone has their own irritants, but some common triggers for heartburn include garlic, caffeine, onions, citrus fruits and alcohol. Eliminating these foods, or consuming them in extreme moderation, can often help stem the frequency of heartburn.

Then, pay attention to when you eat. Eating too close to bedtime, or right before a nap can bring heartburn on like there?s no tomorrow. This is because gravity is your ally when it comes to keeping stomach acids down. When you lie down, gravity can no longer help you, so acids and food can creep up into the esophagus with little resistance. To avoid this scenario, don?t eat less than 2 hours before you want to lie down. This is especially important after a big holiday meal. It may be tradition for you to take a nap on the couch immediately following an overdose of tryptophan, but you?ll regret not breaking that tradition later.

If you do decide you want to lie down right after a meal, or you just have to have that evening snack right before bed, prop yourself up to help keep your esophagus above your stomach. Just one extra pillow under your head can sometimes be all your body needs to help it keep stomach acids where they belong.

You should also avoid tight clothing and anything that puts pressure on your abdomen. Wearing a belt too tightly can often force acid into the esophagus, which results in heartburn. So, buy clothes that fit you correctly to avoid this problem.

Additionally, if you?re overweight try losing some of it. Along the same lines of wearing clothes that are too tight, added weight on the abdomen places unnecessary pressure on the stomach, making it difficult to digest foods properly and easily allowing acid to be overproduced and escape.

There are a number of lifestyle changes to prevent heartburn you can try ? these are only a few of them. To find out more, visit www.refluxremedy.com and read The Reflux Remedy Report.