Symptoms of increased immunity

The frequency of relapses of old illnesses is significantly reduced, recovery from physical stress becomes faster, and long-standing chronic fatigue subsides. The "fever, rash, detoxification" and other symptoms reported online are not universal signals, and may even be an early warning of physical damage.

I met a girl who works in the new media. She always suffered from purulent pharyngitis when the seasons changed. She had to take cephalosporins for a week every month. Last year, she adjusted her diet and added strength training twice a week. This autumn, her temperature dropped twice in a row. She only coughed for two days. She drank more warm water and was fine. She didn't even take pharyngitis lozenges. This old problem comes to your door less often and the symptoms become milder, which is actually the most intuitive signal - your immune cells can finally eliminate the pathogens before they make a big move.

There is also an interesting detail. After many people become immune, they don’t notice it until they stay up late at night to catch up on a project, or do a leg workout until they are shaking when going down the stairs. In the past, it would take three or four days to recover, and maybe they would catch a cold along with it. As a result, they woke up the next day except that their muscles were a little sore, and they did whatever they were supposed to do, without even sneezing. This is actually an increase in the immune's stress capacity. In the past, the immune system would collapse as soon as the body got tired. Now, even if you occasionally make it happen, it can keep it going.

There are also many people who have been in the state of "either they are seriously ill or they just feel tired all the time. When they get home from get off work, they slump on the sofa and don't want to move. It's troublesome to even go downstairs to pick up a package." After adjusting for two or three months, they suddenly find that they can still go to the supermarket after get off work, and they can still think about going out to climb mountains with friends on weekends. The tiredness that was sinking in their bodies, like lead filled with lead, has disappeared inexplicably. This is because chronic inflammation used to consume your immune reserves for a long time. Once the immunity catches up and the inflammation level drops, the body's ineffective energy consumption will naturally be reduced, and people will naturally feel better.

Speaking of this, someone must ask, is it true that "improving immunity will cause rashes, diarrhea, and low fever due to detoxification" that are widely circulated on the Internet? In fact, practitioners in different fields have different views on this matter.

In the mainstream evidence-based medicine system, there is currently no research that can prove that these discomforts are directly related to the improvement of immunity. Most of the so-called "detoxification reactions" are either caused by respiratory or gastrointestinal infections, or temporary discomfort during the adjustment of lifestyle. For example, if you suddenly switch to a high-fiber light diet after eating takeout, which is heavy in oil and salt, the gastrointestinal tract is temporarily unsuitable and has diarrhea. This is the gastrointestinal adjustment and has nothing to do with immunity. If your fever reaches above 38.5 degrees and you still cough up yellow phlegm and have watery stools, don’t hesitate and go to the hospital directly. It’s definitely not detoxification but a real illness.

However, in the evaluation system of functional medicine, there is indeed a term for "immune reconstitution response" - some people who have many low-activity pathogens lurking (such as latent Epstein-Barr virus, low-concentration pathogenic bacteria in the mouth and intestines), after a sudden increase in immune cell activity, the immune system will clean up these latent "fish that slipped through the net", and may experience symptoms such as low-grade fever, mild oral ulcers, and sporadic rashes for 1 to 3 days. The symptoms are usually very mild and can subside on their own without taking medicine. There will be no organic damage if they go to the hospital for examination. But this situation only occurs in a few people, and it is definitely not a necessary "standard signal".

I met a guy a while ago who took several Internet-famous immune supplements to improve his immunity. After a week of taking them, he developed a red rash all over his face. It must be that he had to detoxify for half a month, and his skin became more and more itchy and peeling. When he came to ask me about it, I asked him to go to the dermatologist. It turned out that he was allergic to a certain plant extract in the supplement. He took anti-allergy medicine for three days before it went away. He was just asking for trouble.

In fact, I often tell my clients that your immune system is like the security team in your community. If the security in your community was good before, but the security guards just changed from being a little fishy to being serious on duty, you would not feel anything at all. At most, they would occasionally drop express delivery in the past, but now they never do it again.； If there have been a lot of small thieves in your community before, and the security guards have just replaced a group of more powerful ones, there may be a little noise during the cleaning, but it won't be a big deal. If there is a disturbance and the doors and windows of your house are smashed, it is definitely not because the security guards have changed well, but because there are robbers, and you need to call the police (go to the hospital) quickly.

If you really want to judge whether your immunity has improved, you don’t need to look for any special symptoms. Your own feelings are the most accurate - are you less sick than before, get better faster when sick, and are you more energetic at ordinary times? As long as these items are accounted for, even if there is no "reaction", it is a real improvement. If you really feel unsure, go to the hospital to check lymphocyte subpopulations and immunoglobulins. The indicators cannot fool anyone and are much more reliable than those messy "detoxification standards" on the Internet.