Autoimmune Hepatitis: What, Why, and How I Reversed it in 5 Months

What is Autoimmune Hepatitis?

The answer is very simple. Autoimmune Hepatitis (AIH) is when the bodies immune system starts attacking your liver cells. This leads to liver inflammation which eventually leads to liver scarring /cirrhosis, and eventually to liver failure.

How do you know if you have it?

Symptoms: Joint pain, fatigue, loss of appetite, rashes, jaundice, abdominal discomfort or fluid build up in abdomen.

Some very important things to know about it. Frequently associated with other AI Dis. So this may explain other symptoms your experiencing that aren’t typical AIH symptoms.

About half the adults that have AIH also have a second autoimmune disease. Some very common ones are Celiac, PBS (Primary Biliary Cirrhosis) and also, RA, Ulcerative colitis, Graves’ disease or Hashimoto’s.

Something else you need to know

Bad part about AIH is that because liver is so resilient  you could be getting liver damage for years and not even know about it. It’s not uncommon for people to find out when liver is already 90% damaged!  Thankfully because of see what happened to my mother and grandmother which had AIH I caught mine early.

Big Question – Why?

1. Viral Infections: specifically Hep A,B,C: These viral infections are one of the most common sources of Hepatitis. (BTW “Hepatitis” means inflammation of the liver.)

What are the sources of viral Hep?

Hep A – Ingesting fecal matter (microbial amounts) Maybe the restaurant cook didn’t wash hsi hands after the bathroom.

Hep B – Contact with the bodily fluids of an infected person (such as blood, semen). It’s frequenstly sexually transmitted.

Hep C – Very similar to Hep B but it’s mostly blood contact. You can get B,C at hospitals if they’re not sanitizing thing properly.

2. Vaccines: A study looking at 12 random AIH patients found that three of them had it due to Hep A, B vaccinations!1 The first Hep vaccination started in 1982. So if you were 6 or younger during in 1982 you probably got it.

3. Medications: Which ones? Listen to a quote from a study on drug induced liver trouble.

“Drug-induced liver injury is a potential complication of nearly every medication that is prescribed, because the liver is central to the metabolic disposition of virtually all drugs and foreign substances.”2

Some quick facts:

• Drug-induced liver injury is the most frequent reason for the withdrawal from the market of an approved drug,
• Drug-induced liver injury accounts for more than 50 percent of the cases of acute liver failure in the United States today.
• More than 75 percent of cases of unusual drug reactions result in liver transplantation or death. 3

Which Drugs?

Tylenol is the most common cause of liver failure in US according to Mayo Clinic.

“Taking too much acetaminophen (Tylenol, others) is the most common cause of acute liver failure in the United States.”4

A few other common drugs:

Risperidone and phenothiazin, nitrofurantoin, methyldopa, lovastatin, minocycline.5

4. Gut Dysbiosis: The liver is on the receiving end of what’s going on in the gut good or bad.
If you have a sick deranged gut situation the liver is going is to be taking the brunt of that. Gut Dysbiosis is a imbalance in the gut bacteria in which there is too much bad bacteria. This situation will hurt the liver.

5. Bad blood: What does the liver do?  It filters blood. So if you have dirty blood you will have a compromise the liver.  How do you get bad blood? If you don’t drink enough water (already have ascites, and fluid build up – be careful) or eat junk foods you will have bad blood.

6. Refined Sugar: Glucose does not have to processed by liver but fructose does. Studies found that fructose is only bad when in excessive amounts. And when it is ingested in excess becomes a  liver toxin.

Can you think of a source of fructose that comes in a high concentrated form? High Fructose Corn Syrup!

Another Factor

Genetics: One study followed about 58 family members of AIH patients for only 4 years)and found that indeed some of them also got AIH.  In those family members that also they found a defect in their T-Cells responsible for mediating immune reactions to things that threaten the liver. There is a definite genetic link with AIH.

How to Reverse it

I’m going to be the barer or bad news and good news. The bad news is is that AIH can be fatal. Both my mother and grandmother died from it.

How? 5 Steps

1. Remove all the toxic factors

AVOID: Sources of Viral Hepatitis. Don’t share needles, razors, toothbrushes. Who are you sleeping with (50% of people with Hep C don’t know, almost 70% of those with Hep B don’t know.

AVOID: Bad blood & Gut Dysbiosis. Avoid junk foods like pizza, fast food, TV dinners, donuts, twinkles, cookies, sugary cereals.

AVOID: High sugar diets, especially High Fructose Corn Syrup.

AVOID: Alcohol

AVOID: Meds (under supervision of a good Doctor)

AVOID: Vaccines

AVOID: Gluten. Studies have found a strong connection to liver inflammation and gluten.

“AIH is an idiopathic chronic inflammation of the liver, frequently associated with Celiac Disease.”6

I read the study of a 50 year old male with AIH and all the meds weren’t helping. They did one thing that achieved total remission.

“immunosuppression along with strict gluten-free diet (GFD) helped achieve remission.”7

The strict gluten-free diet is all they did and it worked.

Low Fat: Liver is big player in processing fats. This means to help speed up healing you want a low fat diet.

I read a study8 in which they tried treating epileptic children with Keto Diet. There were 141 kids 7yrs old was the average age, and treated them for an average of 15 months. Here’s what happened.

Within…

• At 1 months 3 kids had elevated liver enzymes (assoc w liver disease)
• At 6 month 3 more kids had Hepatosteatosis (fatty liver)
• At 12 months 2 more started getting gall stones

“Long-term ketogenic diet treatment stimulates liver parenchymal (actual organ tissue) injury, hepatic steatosis (fatty liver) and gallstone formation. Patients should be monitored by screening liver enzymes and abdominal ultrasonography in order to detect these side effects.”9

Interpretation? IT BOMBED! Therefore you want to cut out food high in saturated fat like:

• Fried foods
• High cholesterol foods (associated with fatty liver)
• Meat… I would say no meat
• Animal products (dairy, cheese)

Yki-Jarvinen, the co-author of a new study  on saturated fat and the liver said this.

“Saturated fats such as in butter, fatty cheeses and coconut oil are thus the worst thing to eat from the liver perspective,”10

What about Walnuts, Avocado, and Olives?

What do I eat?

There are still tons of options. You want organic, non-GMO, plant foods like heathly grains, nuts, seeds, vegetables, and fruits.

2. Heal Leaky gut

A damaged gut is involved in almost every autoimmune case. Those holes have to be patched up in order to reverse an Autoimmune Disease.

3. Nutrifty

Autoimmune patients are notoriously deficient in vitamins and minerals. We have to replace those. Organs have been damaged from years of the body attacking itself. What is needed is high nutrients to give your body the building blocks to repair all the damamge.

4. Cleanse/ Detox

With autoimmune diseases there is ALWAYS toxic build up. We have to get that stuff out and usually it will not come out naturally. Therefore in this step we utilize natural methods to dislodge, bind up and remove toxic waste that’s trapped in the body.

5. Reduce Chronic Stress

Chronic stress from the following situations can undermine the previous four steps.

• A recent injury
• Grieving the loss of a loved one
• Divorce
• Abusive situation
• Financial hardships
• Stressful job

Therefore we have to learn how to manage these situations.

Some quick tips for making stress much more bearable are, getting 8-10 hours of sleep every night, taking hot baths with magnesium Epsom salt, and exercising 4-5 days a week.

I followed these 5-Steps and in a little over 5 months my autoimmunity was reversed. All my inflammation was gone and my liver looked excellent in the ultrasound images.

Related Posts

1. Ozaras, Resat; Tahan, Veysel; Tabak, Fehmi “More on autoimmune hepatitis and acute hepatitis A” European Journal of Gastroenterology & Hepatology: March 2016 – Volume 28 – Issue 3 – p 360
2. William M. Lee, M.D. “Drug-Induced Hepatotoxicity” October 26, 1995 N Engl J Med 1995; 333:1118-1127
3.  ibid
4. Mayo Clinic
5. Krebs S, et al. “Risperidone-induced cholestatic hepatitis.” Eur J Gastroenterol Hepatol. 2001 Jan;13(1):67-9.
6. Umair Iqbal, MBBS, Ahmad Chaudhary, et al. “Association of Autoimmune Hepatitis and Celiac Disease: Role of Gluten-Free Diet in Reversing Liver Dysfunction” Journal of Investigative Medicine High Impact Case Reports April 19, 2017
7. ibid
8. Nur Arslanab, Orkide Guzel, et al. “Is ketogenic diet treatment hepatotoxic for children with intractable epilepsy?” Seizure Volume 43, December 2016, Pages 32-38
9. ibid
10. Elizabeth Parks,1 Hannele Yki-Järvinen, et al. “Out of the frying pan: dietary saturated fat influences nonalcoholic fatty liver disease” J Clin Invest. Jan 23, 2017;127(2):454-456.
11. Gupta, Vikas et al. “Oily Fish, Coffee and Walnuts: Dietary Treatment for Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease.” World Journal of Gastroenterology : WJG 21.37 (2015): 10621-10635. PMC. Web. 17 June 2018.