Yoga for your Liver 瑜伽為您的肝臟
Over the holidays, many of us will drink, stay up past bedtime, eat an extra slice of pie and sleep in. Fun as they are, these activities can tamper with our circadian rhythms, the feedback loops that sync our body’s functions to our external environment.
The liver, which helps regulate your body’s metabolism, gets thrown off by unhealthy patterns of sleep or by changes in diet or alcohol consumption. If you’re experiencing indigestion or your energy levels are low after too many holiday parties, your liver could be out of sync.
Circadian rhythms are important for helping the liver anticipate the body’s demands throughout the day, such as stockpiling energy after meals and releasing it when we sleep.
Our daily liver cycles are molded by an interplay between sleep, food and alcohol. Sleep affects the master clock in our brain. Like most other bodily organs, the liver is partly governed by this central rhythm.
But the liver also has its own internal clock, which can be affected by food and alcohol.
To keep your liver’s clock consistent this holiday season, avoid extreme behaviors, said Lei Yin, an assistant professor of physiology at the University of Michigan.
That means maintaining your central circadian rhythm with a regular sleep schedule. You can stay up a little later, but try to avoid doing so more than two hours past your normal bedtime. A helpful tip is to go on a walk in the mornings. Light is the most powerful way to reset our internal clock, Dr. Yin said.
It also means staying cognizant of how food and alcohol affect your liver’s timers. Try to stick to normal mealtimes. And it’s fine to drink a little, but avoid binge drinking, which is defined as more than four or five drinks in two hours.
In the short term, sticking to these guidelines might ease your transition back to reality, once the holidays are over. In the long term, maintaining a regular schedule and drinking less can safeguard your metabolism and prevent disease.
This article is an edited version of a piece that originally appeared in the New York Times
(New York Times, Steph Yin
假期中，很多人都會飲酒、熬夜、吃宵夜、晚睡晚起。這些行為儘管好玩，卻會擾亂生理時鐘，也就是讓身體功能與外部環境保持協調的反饋迴路失調。
肝臟是幫助調節身體新陳代謝的器官，不健康的睡眠模式、飲食方面的變化或者飲酒，都會擾亂它的節奏。如果你有消化不良的症狀，或者在參加多場假日派對之後感到疲憊不堪，有可能你的肝臟已經失調了。
在幫助肝臟全天候調節身體需求方面，例如在飯後儲存能量，或在睡覺時釋放能量，生理時鐘發揮著重要的作用。
肝臟每天進行的循環是由睡眠、食物和酒精之間的相互作用所主導的。睡眠會影響我們大腦中的主要生理時鐘。正如人體大部份的器官，肝臟在一定程度上也受這個主要生理時鐘所主宰。
但肝臟也有自己的內部生理時鐘，而該生理時鐘會受到食物和酒精的影響。
密西根大學生理學助理教授雷音說，要讓肝臟的生理時鐘在放假期間正常運轉，必須避免極端的活動。
這包括保持規律的作息時間，讓主要生理時鐘維持正常。你可以稍微晚一點睡，但盡量避免比平常就寢時間晚兩小時以上。一個實用的小撇步是在早上出門散步。「沐浴在陽光下是重設內部生理時鐘最有效的方式，」雷音博士說。
此外，要維持肝臟的正常運作，也須要隨時注意自己攝取的食物和酒精對肝臟的生理時鐘所造成的影響。應規律進食三餐。只喝一點酒沒有關係，但應避免飲酒過量，即兩個小時內飲酒四到五杯以上。
從短期來看，遵守這些原則應該可以讓你在假期結束後較為容易地回歸平日作習。從長期來看，規律作息以及少飲酒可以保護身體的新陳代謝機能並預防疾病。
本文為編輯後的版本，原文已於紐約時報刊登
（紐約時報李瓊譯）
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