One of the most common health problems almost all of us face is acidity, which is nothing but a simple health condition. However, like any health disorder, if kept unattended for a prolonged period of time, it might cause deeper damage. Not all acids are harmful to the body. Often the digested food in our body undergoes acid reflux under which the food is digested.
Our teeth mash the food we consume as it passes down the food pipe. Once inside, the acids in the body break down the food and its particles and nutrients and then use it efficiently in the appropriate places. This is an integral part of the digestion process.
Formation of Acidity in the Body:
Often there are times when this acid production in the body increases in amount, which is summed up as acidity. Also known as acid dyspepsia, it is thus described as a medical condition occurring and reoccurring in nature caused by the body’s inability to digest a certain kind of food, by incorporating the wrong food in your diet or by the simple increase of acidity levels inside your body.
The acid responsible for breaking down food inside the body can be termed as hydrochloric acid, which is helpful in dissecting food into carbohydrates, proteins, roughage, vitamins and other nutrients. When the hydrochloric production in the body increases its amount, it starts acting abnormally, causing destruction instead.
Often, one can use certain home remedies to curb acid refluxes. Lemon juice, for once, is a very good remedy. One can think of a solution by adding water. Mint leaves and apple cider vinegar are a common remedy too. However, the main ailment is to eat right and avoid certain kinds of food, pickles or sour foods, to be specific, as much as possible. Although the prime reason is already mentioned, here are some causes of acidity.
What Are The Causes and Symptoms of Acidity (Acid Reflex):
Even though acidity is a simple enough condition ignoring it might be difficult. That is why it is best to keep an eye out for the symptoms in case you are coming down with one.
Causes of Acid Reflex:
Let’s know the top 9 cause of acidity that helps to keep away from acidity.
1. Natural Hydrochloric Acid:
The first and foremost reason to avoid acidity is hydrochloric acid, which is the prime reason for acidity. Naturally, an unknowing increase in this body acid causes acid refluxes, which are then medically termed acidity.
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2. Lifestyle:
Your acidity depends on your lifestyle or how you handle your body and food. Someone who smokes too much may have higher chances of acidity. The same goes with alcohol consumption which affects the liver. The case with drug abuse is the same. When consumed in excess, these substances produce more hydrochloric acid in our bodies.
3. Oily Food:
Oily food is not only havoc for your face but also your body. Elders often advise us to stay away from oily food while you thought they were talking about our facial benefits. Many people don’t know that oily food can also cause havoc in the acidity section.
4. Caffeine:
One commonly unknown reason is the consumption of Excessive caffeine, which too might be a serious cause of your acidity. So try to stay away from caffeine-related drinks and foods.
5. Lack of Physical Exercise:
This also forms a part of the lifestyle process where your obesity or idleness might be why you repeatedly suffer from acidity. Physical exercise, as much as a simple jog in the morning, can help you better with your digestion and its working, thereby maintaining the acid reflux in your body.
6. Emotional Stress:
Regarding acidity, it is not only your physical aspects you should be worried about, but also your emotional part. Our emotion leads our body. Excessive stress or too much pressure in certain environments, emotional distress, and depression might also improve your acidity.
7. Persistent Feeling of Change In Taste:
Often acidity patients have noticed a sour bitter feeling persisting in their throat, which makes food, the normal ones, taste bad. Moreover, that feeling sticks to you all day long, making your mouth taste weird and funny. This is because the hydrochloric acid, now excess due to the acid condition, sometimes finds its way up to the back of the throat and then goes down. At extreme measures, if this happens during sleep or while you’re lying down, you can have a mild choking feeling. It may end up with you puking it out at times too.
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8. Alcohol:
The intake of too much alcohol is one of the most important acidity causes, and you should thus refrain from this habit as soon as possible. Alcohol has certain quantities that, when taken in excess, cause a lot of acid formation inside the body. This is because food habits become irregular with the intake of alcohol, and a lot of imbalance is thus caused.
You will often see that when you take in a lot of alcohol at once, you will feel full and thus not feel like taking your meal after that. This is what does all the effect because when the alcohol reacts on an empty stomach, it causes acidity to take place easily.
9. Misuse of Sedatives:
It is a fact that overuse of any medicine actually diffuses the use and effect of it in the body. This is why you should refrain from excessive usage of the medicine. Next, you should stop popping pills for every small problem you have. The usage and following of herbal remedies are thus much better. You must understand that the pills and syrups in the medicine stores are made with certain chemicals, which have side effects on your digestive system, thus increasing acidity problems.
Symptoms of Acidity:
Let’s know the top 10 symptoms of Acidity that really help to get the early treatment.
10. Pain:
Acid-like unwanted body gas also causes pain, and it targets mainly the chest area or the diaphragm area, which is just below the chest and right above your stomach. This can be caused by the extreme pressure of the acids hitting the chest diaphragm or chest cavity.
11. Serious Coughing:
Acidity sometimes causes excessive coughing or dry coughing or wheezing, which might be so bad that it worsens a bad case of asthma. These coughs are dry in nature, exerting too much pressure on the chest, again when the chest muscles might start painting. One might start barfing due to excessive stress if it is too much.
12. Swallow Troubles:
Often, hydrochloric acid in your throat might cause scarring, so swallowing might become difficult.
13. Obesity:
You should definitely keep a watch on your weight always because too much weight and obesity may lead to an innumerable number of diseases and disorders, and it is also a cause of acidity. People with weight issues tend to face a lot of pain and indigestion problems, and gas and acidity are like the two twins never leaving the side. However, there are many yoga postures that are great remedies for digestion problems and reduce your body’s weight. You should start practising these without second thoughts now.
14. Chest Injury:
You will be shocked to know that even an old injury to the chest can prove to be very bad for these problems. You will find out that, at times, you may face problems with gas and acidity regularly and, with a lot of checking, find that it does not decrease despite the fact that you are maintaining a very healthy lifestyle. This might be a problem if you have some chest injury or suffered one a few years back. In that case, you must visit a doctor and get all the necessary tests for further remedies.
15. Shallow Breathing:
This is common among the acidity symptoms that you will experience shallow and very rapid breathing. You may not know why you face this because you experience no pain. This is, however, most of the time the case that you are suffering from severe acidity problems and that you may feel extremely restless during this time because the irritation inside the body is not clear and you do not know how to calm it down. This painful and irritating situation can simply be avoided by maintaining a good and healthy lifestyle.
16. Vomiting:
This is the most common of the symptoms of acidity, which takes place in every person. Most of the time, acidity takes place due to overconsumption and mostly overeating junk food and oily stuff. This basically forms a layer of acid near your food pipe near the throat and starts making you feel dizzy, and you also feel a bad breath whenever you take a burp. This is when the food starts coming up and is forced out of the throat. You will also find that there is a slight burning sensation near the throat after the vomiting during the acidity takes place.
17. Confusion:
This is one very common thing that has to happen when you feel sick. Especially when we are talking about digestive disorders, you tend to feel confused because the first part is you do not even understand what goes wrong with you. This is because no external symptom takes place during the course of which the acid forms in the body. After it has formed, you will feel a certain irritation inside the body, which is unexplainable and causes the most irritation and confusion.
18. Jaundice:
It is the ultimate stage and one of the most dangerous symptoms of acidity. This is after excessive acid has been formed inside the body that you start becoming yellow. This is the reason for which jaundice was earlier known as yellow fever. It is when you are restricted from eating anything that even has a little spice because the acid has directly affected your liver at this time. You are to maintain extreme restrictions during this period and only eat boiled food that fills your stomach and provides the necessary nutrition but does not allow even a little bit of acid to form inside.
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19. Fruity Breath:
This is not very common among all the acidity symptoms because this one is special for people already suffering from diabetes. In this symptom, after the acid formation in the body, you always have a fruity breath and feel like something of that sort is stuck just near your throat. This is a very bothering situation and is very irritating too.
Acidity is a very common problem among everyone and even more so nowadays with all the consumption of oily and junk food and the less exercise and healthy lifestyle. The main acidity symptoms are mentioned in the article above, and you should take care and prevent these.
