The Best Heartburn Cures are Not What You Think

The Key is to Understand the Role of Stomach Acid

Heartburn is also known as acid reflux or acid indigestion. It is the most common symptom of GERD (Gastroesophageal reflux disease).

Heartburn Symptoms

A burning pain in the chest near the breastbone and into the neck and throat. The pain and pressure sensation can last 2 hours and is usually worse after eating. In bad cases, it can cause coughing, vomiting and other respiratory problems from the irritation of the acid. Other symptoms may include chest pain, tightness in the throat and difficulty swallowing.

1. Narrowing of the esophagus from scar tissue produced in reaction to contact with stomach acid which may produce difficulty with swallowing.
2. Ulcers of the esophagus
3. Barrett's esophagus - a change in the lining of the esophagus that can increase the likelihood of esophageal cancer.

Some Foods may initiate bouts of heartburn. Especially-bad foods are caffeinated beverages, citrus fruits, chocolates, acidic vegetables, fatty foods, mint and spicy foods. Tobacco can also be a cause.

However, the root cause is not excess stomach acid. The symptoms are caused by acid being where it should not be but the real cause is actually too little stomach acid. To properly understand this in detail, see the importance of stomach acid.

AlkaSeltzer, Prilosec, Rolaids, Tagamet, Tums and Zantac all work by neutralizing the acid thus helping to remove the symptoms and because they get quick relief people think they are solving the problem but antacids are not heartburn cures. Rather, like putting tape over the check engine light on your car dash they are only masking the problem while doing nothing to correct the real cause - in fact they will make it worse. See the problem with antacids.

To help avoid getting heartburn:

1. don't eat too much at a meal
2. eat a smaller evening meal
3. take a spoonful of apple cider vinegar in a glass of water ½-hr before a meal
4. avoid junk food
5. reduce sugar intake
6. reduce grain (especially refined) consumption
7. take acidophilus
8. take digestive enzymes
9. drink plenty of water (how much is plenty?).
   
10. reduce stress

To help relieve symptoms while experiencing heartburn:

1. avoid bending over
2. avoid clothing that is tight around the waist
3. avoid lying down after eating
4. go for a walk

To permanently remove your heartburn problem:

In summary, what is happening is that a lack of stomach acid means the stomach contents are not being properly digested. They are essentially being rejected by the digestive system which has built-in sensors that tell the appropriate door-way when to open to allow the stomach contents into the small intestine.

Your digestive system is like a dis-assembly line (the opposite of an assembly line). You don't put the wheels on the car before putting the tires on the wheels. A better understanding of how our bodies work would help us to understand many health matters much more easily.

One stage of this step-by-step process in our digestive is this illustration. If you were to take a handful of peanuts and chew them up to the point of being ready to swallow and suddenly notice you missed one and throw it into your mouth too then you wouldn't immediately swallow the mouthful. You know to chew up the additional peanut first and then swallow so you don't choke on an unchewed peanut. The rest of your digestive system works the same way except that it happens so automatically you are not aware of it. Food needs to reach a certain level of processing digestion before it is moved on to the next stage.

Most people with heartburn, when tested, are found to have too little stomach acid. To solve your problem, you really need to properly understand the importance of stomach acid. Read that page and you will understand the secret that most people don't about the real cause and which heartburn cures (not just treatments) really work.

Skip the "heartburn cures" that give only temporary relief and learn what really works.