How To Boost Your Immune System

In these times there is even more reason to educate yourself and learn ways to strengthen your immune system. If your immune system is strong it is designed to fight viruses and bacterial infections. Some of our top tips to boost your immune system that you can implement into your daily life are:

1. Eat nutrient rich foods and drink bone broth

It is important to eat a wide range of organic fruits, vegetables, proteins and carbohydrates focusing on getting the full a range of vitamins, minerals and amino acids from your food. Minerals and vitamins that can specifically boost your immune system are: zinc, selenium, Vitamin C and Vitamin D and bone broth.

• Zinc rich foods: pumpkins seeds, oysters, grass-fed beef and cashews.
• Selenium rich foods: brazil nuts, eggs, sunflower seeds and liver.
• Vitamin C rich foods: red pepper, kiwi fruit, orange, and strawberries.
• Vitamin D rich foods: egg yolks, wild caught salmon and mackerel, organ meats, and some mushrooms.
• Drink bone broth: drink 4-5 cups a day to increase the variety and amount of good bacteria in your gut.

* Avoid eating packaged, processed and sugary foods. (Check out the EWG’s 2020 list of the Clean 15 and Dirty Dozen foods).

2. Get into the sun

Vitamin D is critical for our health because it plays an important role in your bacteria balance, fighting infections and prevention of chronic diseases and cancer.

To get your Vitamin D from the sun:

• Expose your torso (your chest and abdomen) without sunscreen for 20 minutes everyday. Avoid getting your skin wet for up to one hour so it has time to absorb into the skin.
• If you can’t get into the sun everyday, especially during winter, increase natural food sources of Vitamin D, such as egg yolks, wild caught salmon and mackerel, organ meats, and some mushrooms.
• Otherwise, you can take a Vitamin D supplement. I’d recommend speaking to a health practitioner about getting your Vitamin D levels checked before taking a supplement so you don’t get a toxic overload.

3. De-stress

Stress alone can change your microbiome (the bacteria in your gut). Until the stressor is removed, your bacteria will be negatively effected. First identify your stress triggers and then make the changes needed to relieve those stresses.

Some tips to de-stress are:

• meditation
• breath work
• plug back into nature e.g. nature walks, ocean swims
• move your body e.g. yoga, tai chi, run, surf
• change in mindset
• journal write
• emotional freedom technique (EFT)

4. Get quality sleep

Sleep is an essential component in staying healthy because it’s the time when the body heals, repairs and rejuvenates. If you are chronically sleep-deprived your immune system will be depressed. Good sleep hygiene can be helpful in getting quality sleep. Ideally, you want to be in bed between 9:30-10pm because 10pm onwards is when your body is supposed to be absorbing your micronutrients from the day. It is also important to turn off technology atleast 1 hour before bed. Screen time before bed can affect you falling asleep at night and can affect your circadian rhythms (a natural, internal process that regulates your sleep-wake cycle and repeats roughly every 24 hours). If you have to do work on a computer make sure you wear blue light glasses so again screen time from your day/evening doesn’t impact you sleep and circadian rhythms.

Sleep hygiene tips:

• go to sleep the same time every night
• avoid caffeine after 3pm
• eat at least two hours before going to bed
• avoid sugar at night
• stop using devices at least one hour before bed
• put your phone on flight more
• turn wireless modem off for the night

5. Use Essential Oils

Essentials oils have powerful medicinal benefits to support your immune system. Some of our favourites are:

• Wild Orange - colds, stress, insomnia
• Cinnamon - cold & flu, germs and bacteria
• Eucalyptus - congestion, cough, bronchitis and pneumonia, sinusitis, cold & flu, fever
• Rosemary - respirator infections, adrenal and chronic fatigue
• Frankincense - immune system and cellular health
• Melaleuca - sore throat, tonsillitis, cold & flu, bronshitis
• Litsea - coughs, bronchitis, cough, cold, chills & infections, fatigue, sleep issues.
• Clove - immune boost, infections, virus & cold
• Arbovitae - viruses, respiratory issues, & bacterial support

We have created easy-to-apply roller blends to harness the healing powers of these oils with our Immune Support and Breathe Easy blends.