What is natural Immunity, do I already have natural immunity, and are there ways to increase my natural wellness?

Now that we’ve experienced a pandemic, we’re all infectious disease experts. Just look at Facebook if you don’t believe me.

We’ve spent a lot of time looking at how Covid works. How it transmits. How long it stays contagious on inanimate objects. How far it can travel in the air.

How much time have we taken to look at what can be done to strengthen our own natural immunity?

Is there a way to boost your health naturally?

I don’t care how many masks you wear, or how much antibacterial gel you use, you can’t outrun a virus.

You can do your best to avoid it, but in the mean time, be prepared to fight it if you have to. We may or may not be out of the woods with Covid. Who knows what’s coming next. That’s why NOW is the time to be getting prepared.

It’s like Mr. Miagi in The Karate Kid. Of course you want to avoid the fight, but when you can’t, you want to win swiftly and with grace; not with eyes swollen shut, dragging one leg behind you as you call yourself the “winner”.

Bacteria Are a Big Part of Natural Immunity

Our mitochondria are originally engulfed bacteria that have developed a symbiotic relationship, a clever partnership, with our “human host” bodies. We provide a comfy place for the bacteria to live, and all the food it could ever eat, and in exchange, it generates energy for us. Good deal! (Longevity Paradox, Steven R. Gundry, MD page 2-3)

Wait, Doesn’t Bacteria Kill us?!

Bad bacteria does take over and stress our bodies. This weakens the body, which is what we experience as illness. Each way these bacteria stress us manifests as a different “symptom”. Tiredness, cough, runny nose, vomiting, etc.

But we have a lot of good bacteria in our bodies as well. They are critical to our survival.

We’ll get to that a little later, but first, a review:

Understanding the Basics of the Immune System Will Help Us Understand How We Develop Natural Immunity.

Think of the immune system in terms of an army on guard, keeping watch for anything suspicious.

You have white blood cells that are in charge of wandering around and looking for anything that looks odd or out of place.

Whenever something funky is noticed, the white blood cells move into action. Everyone has their role, and knows what to do.

The eosinophils call in the APB. The neutrophils swoop in and destroy the foreign invaders. The monocytes are the cleanup crew. They come in afterwards and chew up all the debris so it doesn’t gunk up the works. Your lymphocytes are posted as guards. They’re the ones that are trained to know what suspicious activity to look for in the future. They’re the “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me” guys. They’re not gonna let the same enemy in twice.

This is, of course, extremely simplified, but it paints a picture. Your body is trained to recognize and respond to stuff that shouldn’t be there.

What’s more, it likes the work! Just like everything else in our world, it thrives on just a little bit of stress. It’s like exercise.

Trees need the “exercise” of wind to “learn” develop the root system and flexibility to withstand it. That’s why a freak wind storm in typically calm climates will uproot 50 year old trees. They never exercised.

We all know that our muscles need exercise. Studies have repeatedly shown the benefits of exercising your brain to keep it active. It’s no different with your immune system.

Your immune system wants to exercise. It wants to be robust and recognize all the bad guys. Don’t keep it in the dark so that when someone shady does slip in, all your lazy “mall cop” white blood cells go into a frenzy and spill their coffee down their shirts!

Keep them on high alert. Train your white blood cells to be badass snipers instead.

What does this mean?

“Exercise” Your Immune System To Strengthen Your Natural Immunity

Well, to belabor the “natural immunity as an army on defense” analogy, you’d need two things from your soldier white blood cells; Physical ability and education.

Your body needs the opportunity to be exposed to the normal pathogens of our day. It’s the water we swim in. Depriving yourself of the opportunity to recognize and respond to everyday bugs around you is a disservice.

Did you know that kids with dogs have decreased risk of asthma? And people who hand wash their dishes have fewer allergies and less incidence of eczema? Guess why? Because of their exposure to germs. Handwashing your dishes doesn’t get them as clean. And that’s a GOOD thing!

Your dog tracks all sorts of germs in from outside. Awesome! Way to go, Fido! You really are my bestie!

That’s your education. That’s your training. That’s your snipers on constant alert (not red alert, just competent and aware.)

So, that’s part one. Stop being so freaked out about all the illnesses and bad bugs we’re exposed to on a daily basis. You got this, boo!

Feed your bacterial appetite, rather than your human appetite to strengthen your natural immunity.

Part two, though, is to be nice to the nice bacteria. They’re like any enemy turned ally. They’ve realized that it’s easier to work together than it is to always be fighting, so they called a truce.

The bacteria said “Feed me and house me, and in turn, I’ll help you digest your food, and regulate your hormones. Whaddaya say?”

There’s so much more to it than that, even. The good bacteria in your body are responsible for your skin health, absorbing the nutrients from your food, breaking down the stuff you don’t need anymore, protecting you from an overgrowth of the bad bacteria, and also has protective properties against toxins in your body. These are your friends. You would do well to treat them well. Pamper them, even. Eat the things they like (fiber, fermented foods, healthy fats, etc), and they will pamper you back with glowing skin, balanced moods and a healthy weight.

Every time you take antibiotics, you are killing off some of your microbiome.

This is a problem for two big reasons:

First, you need those bacteria to do all the cool stuff they do for you.

Second, when they’re gone, there’s that much more food and space for the bad guys to get cozy and settle in.

Of course we need antibiotics. I, myself would be dead several times over, if not for antibiotics. But be careful about when you use them. Realize that so much of your body’s function relies on bacteria. Unnecessary antibiotics are “friendly fire”. You’re accidentally killing off your own troops. Careful with that!

Check out this TikTok video for a quick overview of this.

Make sure you’re fairly certain of your diagnosis before you begin a round of antibiotics. And also ask yourself if you might be just as well off fighting this fight all by yourself. Remember that you’re building natural immunity every time you fight off the latest bug going around.

Setting Up “Fences” To Keep Everyone Where They Belong Strengthens Natural Immunity

Part 3 is just to set up a few fences. You wouldn’t let the neighborhood kids wander into a danger zone where they’re gonna get hurt, would you?

You increase the demand on your immune system when you make it run crowd control on harmless things in your body that just ended up in the wrong place.

When you let things through your gut lining, normally unharmful stuff starts being attacked by your white blood cells, just because it’s in a place where it doesn’t belong. It’s like getting mad at kids for playing in a restricted area that wasn’t marked. It’s not like they meant to break the rules. They just didn’t know them. Why are you getting mad at the kids? You didn’t build a fence, or even bother to put up a no trespassing sign. It’s not fair.

When you mistreat your gut, it loses its integrity, and stuff starts slipping through that shouldn’t.

Your body sees this normally “meh, whatever” stuff as a huge threat, and has to attack it.

If you were an army about to attack a nation, could you ask for anything better than a civil war to destabilize and weaken your opposition’s defense? This is the reason your gut lining is so critical to your immune system.

Instead of having all your resources to fight off bad guys, without proper barriers and boundaries, you have to spend energy on needless crowd control. Your immune system is stressed and weakened. It doesn’t have the resources to fight off the real invaders when they come, because it’s busy with internal mayhem.

What’s worse, this is how auto-immune disease begins. An attack on something that is either neutral or beneficial, by an immune system that has been triggered into some sort of overactive defense response.

Pay attention to your gut health. It’s a huge line of defense, both for civil and foreign invaders. Here’s a quick overview on maintaining your gut health.

TL,DR Summary. Here’s How To Improve Natural Immunity:

Take antibiotics, BUT ONLY WHEN YOU NEED THEM.

Get an immunization, but only when the benefit outweighs the cost.

Use hand sanitizers sparingly. If you’re going in to visit someone that’s immunosuppressed, this isn’t the time to be sharing your robust microbiome.

In the mean time, go to the gym, and I don’t even care if you work out. Just wander around and touch all the equipment. Get some exercise for your immune system.

Eat things that boost your gut health.

Decrease the overall demand on your body by reducing the other stressors in your life. Chronic pain and bad posture are big stressors and energy consumers in the body. Go see your chiropractor to make sure you’re aligned and you’re flowing properly.

You were meant to be able to handle most of the germs in our world today. The more you exercise your immune system, the more ready you’ll be for the next thug that comes along.

Don’t be afraid of germs. They’re your friends in many ways.

Of course, wash your hands. Don’t be gross. Just don’t stress the small stuff (get it, like the MICRObiome?).

There are so many ways you can increase and preserve your natural immunity and natural wellness.

Empower yourself toward great health by taking the steps you can to improve your own natural immune response!