Remove Toxic and Inflammatory Foods
Water and diet are the first places to start detoxing your liver. Caffeine, alcohol, processed foods with refined sugar, unhealthy fats, additives, and preservatives do the opposite of detoxing your liver. You should also remove inflammatory foods such as gluten and dairy.
7+ Days After Alcohol Consumption
It typically takes seven days for the liver to detox but a couple of months for the symptoms to eventually disappear.
Many citrus fruits, including lemon, can be added to water to help stimulate and flush out the liver. Lemons are high in nutrients like vitamin C and antioxidants. To help prevent liver disease, enjoy four to six tablespoons of lemon juice mixed with water each day.
Advocates claim that conducting a cleanse with apple cider vinegar helps to flush toxins from the body, regulate blood sugar levels, and encourage healthy weight loss, all of which can improve liver health. However, there's little scientific support for these claims.
Research shows that people who drink a lot of soft drinks are more likely to have non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). Studies don't prove that the drinks were the cause. But if you down a lot of sodas and have been meaning to cut back, this could be a good reason to switch what you sip.
According to the American Liver Foundation, there are no medical treatments – yet – for non-alcoholic fatty liver disease. So that means that eating a healthy diet and exercising regularly are the best ways to both prevent liver damage from starting or reverse liver disease once it's in the early stages.
Some people with liver disease experience skin itching all over their body or in specific areas, like the feet or arms. Itchiness is not a symptom of liver disease on its own, though. Liver disease is a condition affecting your liver's ability to function.
Fried foods, like chicken fingers and French fries, are high in saturated fat. Eating too much saturated fat can lead to increased liver fat content, according to a 2021 review in Frontiers in Nutrition, which over time, could become cirrhosis.
French fries, wafers, burgers, and pizzas do no good to your liver. These food items are high in saturated fat or trans-fat content and are difficult to digest. In other words, your liver needs to work hard to process these food items.
Myth 3: Drinking hard liquor is worse than drinking beer or wine. Contrary to popular belief, the type of alcohol you drink doesn't make a difference – what matters is how much you drink. "The safe limit is fixed at 14 units a week," explains Dr Lui. "Below this limit, alcoholic fatty liver is less likely to occur.
Signs and symptoms
However, as your liver loses its ability to function properly, you're likely to experience a loss of appetite, nausea and itchy skin. In the later stages, symptoms can include jaundice, vomiting blood, dark, tarry-looking stools, and a build-up of fluid in the legs (oedema) and abdomen (ascites).
So what happens when you stop drinking? The good news is that the liver is the only organ that can restore and regenerate itself. Because the liver is in a constant state of regeneration, in many cases the healing process can begin within just weeks after foregoing alcohol.
For other conditions, the most common symptom is jaundice — a yellowing of your skin and the whites of your eyes. Jaundice develops when your liver can't clear a substance called bilirubin. Other signs of liver disease may include: Abdominal (belly) pain (especially on the right side).
Many dark berries — including blueberries, raspberries, and cranberries — contain antioxidants called polyphenols, which may help protect the liver from damage.
A juice cleanse, often called a juice fast, is a detox diet that involves drinking only raw vegetable and fruit juice for 3 days. According to juice cleanse advocates, the diet fills the body with phytonutrients and antioxidants, protecting the body from free radical damage and eliminating toxins.
Bottom Line: Nutrition plays a major role in improving fatty liver disease. Additionally, many foods are good for fatty liver, such as bran, salmon, coffee, berries, sunflower seeds, eggs and garlic. Be sure to include these nutrient-dense options regularly and always consider your overall diet and lifestyle habits.