Body Betrayal
6 days, 5 hours, 21 minutes. That's the time I've spent without drinking tea.
Virtual hugs accepted.
It's been a difficult week. I had a horrid case of acid reflux but it felt like I had a silent, giant ulcer that exploded and sent ripples of pain from my upper abdomen to terrorise and take my body hostage. It was not fun, made worse by the fact that abdominal pain is absolutely foreign to me. Guys, if abdominal pain qualified me as a woman (since menstruation likes to painfully reinforce the presence of an abdomen in many ladies), I'm a pretty fine man. I eat like a stray dog as well and never get stomach upsets so this experience was unearthly. Not to mention the resultant burning sensation, ugh!
So to kind of tame my tummy and not push anything to the edge, I decided, aside from my prescribed drugs, to control the acidity through my diet and this is where hard choices were made. I've been having smoothies for breakfast, lots of oats, plain water, broccoli and boiled mains. I have missed grease, salt, sugar, spice and everything nice (shout-out PowerPuff Girls!). The pain was so excruciating, it didn't take much to convince me to drop tea as well. I feel guilty for saying it! You might be thinking, well surely, you said yourself that tea is so diverse; there must be one that you could have had right? Well, this is kinda true but there's a common denominator. Caffeine.
The long and short of acid reflux is that the hydrochloric acid produced in our stomach flows back up into the oesophagus which was not built for that pH or madness so it just burns!! you know when you've got an open scar, then something....salty gets in there, and you wince, and it cools right? Only this time, stop at wince, keep wincing, and now try imagine it over a wider area, internally. Hell.
Anyway, at the base of the oesophagus where it meets the stomach, there is a bundle of muscles referred to as lower oesophageal sphincter (LOS). This muscle usually contracts to close off the stomach, thus keeping its contents in and preventing any back-flow, ultimately protecting your oesophagus as well. When you eat or burp, it must relax temporarily to let food in and allow you to expel air. When you get acid reflux, it just means the LOS stayed relaxed and your stomach contents got a chance to come up!
-Been dreaming of sweet peppermint tea!
How does tea get mixed up in all this? Well, when I was looking at my dietary options, one of the things discouraged is caffeinated beverages. This is because caffeine helps relax the LOS so it would aggravate the symptoms of acid reflux and most tea has caffeine. I thought to maybe then set aside black and green tea, and settle on herbal teas. However, care has to be taken with the type of herbal tea selected. Any minty teas are off the table because mint functions in the same way as caffeine does in this case, and guys, I unfortunately love a good peppermint tea. The best herbal teas would be chamomile because it does generally soothe digestive disturbance; ginger because it helps with the nausea and is thought to support in the emptying of stomach contents into the intestines which would alleviate acidity; and finally, licorice because it has anti-inflammatory effects, has a historical use in treating gastric ulcers, plus it helps increase the mucous coating in the oesophagus and this further protects the lining and soothes the effects of the acidity.
Now with all this, it is important to understand the tea you purchase. Making sure that it is made from the herbs and not just flavoured with them using essential oils is key, otherwise you are not really helping your system. I have come to appreciate the difference and I think it is quite common for people to think they are taking healthier steps because they think they're having herbal tea when really it is just flavoured. I hope to research more on this and will expound in future posts.
For now, I have given you the lowdown on tea and acid reflux. I hope you never suffer the same, but in case you do and you're a bit more bolder than I am, you know what tea you may have. I'm going to slowly reintroduce my system to my stray dog diet now so guess who's gonna have a sip of tea after this question mark?
xx
The Ultimate Tea Girl
- About that slow reintroduction...nope