How to Heal a UTI: No Antibiotic Necessary

A urinary tract infection, or UTI, can feel like an attack on your most vulnerable and personal area. It’s not always obvious what’s going on down there, and it might be hard to know what to do.

The good news is that there are excellent natural treatments out there. One of these is the Ayurvedic approach, which is a combination of diet, lifestyle, and herbal solutions. It’s a holistic method that draws from generations of wisdom.

If you’re wondering how to heal a UTI using Ayurveda, here’s a brief guide on what you need to know:

How Do UTIs Occur?

These infections occur when bacteria enter the urinary tract. It’s not something only people with vaginas experience, but it is more common in this population. In order to understand where UTIs come from, you should first understand the urinary tract.

What’s important to know is that the urinary tract is a complex system. It interacts with your entire body, and the cause of a UTI may be from elsewhere in the body.

For example, if you haven’t been drinking enough water, that could put you on the path to a UTI. This is because the urinary tract’s design is to experience the flow of urine on a regular basis. If you’re not taking in enough water, you may not be releasing enough urine to clean the tract.

Urine may not seem like the cleanest thing in the world, but it actually has low bacteria growth as it exits your body. Bacteria will quickly arrive once the urine leaves your body, but the passage through the urinary tract should be a clean one.

If you are holding your pee for any reason or aren’t drinking enough water, your body may not be flushing bacteria from your urinary tract as it should. And if you have a UTI, your urine may already lend itself to bacterial cultures even within the body.

UTIs also commonly happen during pregnancy. The immune system of a pregnant person is already somewhat compromised, making any infection more likely. And besides this, there are several bodily changes that take place during this period that can leave a pregnant person at a higher risk of a UTI.

Some of these changes are hormonal. Progesterone levels during pregnancy can affect the muscles in your urinary tract, disrupting the usual processes. Other changes are due to the physical pressures that can build up in a pregnant person’s body.

The Ayurvedic approach to understanding UTIs also takes into account diet and emotions. The idea is that these things affect your energy and that a disruption in your body’s natural energy flow can give rise to these infections. Keep reading to learn more:

Energy in the Body

The Ayurvedic understanding of a UTI has to do with energy. Therefore, the causes and treatments have to do with energy as well.

According to Ayurvedic belief, there are 3 energies or doshas in the human body. These are combinations of 5 elements that every person is believed to contain: earth, fire, water, air, and space. The doshas are vata dosha (the combination of air and space), pitta dosha (the combination of water and fire), and kapha dosha (the combination of water and earth).

Ayurvedic treatment of a UTI is based on the idea that these infections are linked to disruptions in all three doshas. These disturbances are mainly attributed to diet, lifestyle, and emotion.

Disruptions in vata dosha can be due to a cold or dry diet, as well as fear-based emotions. In pitta dosha it could be alcohol, pungent foods, or strong desires. And kapha dosha disruptions are often heavy foods and a sedentary lifestyle.

This is not a complete list of the things that can cause unrest in your 3 doshas. Rather, it is a brief collection of things that might be useful in understanding the cause of a UTI.

Why Go Natural?

For those who are new to natural remedies, antibiotics may seem like a more straightforward option. Why take the time to learn about other methods?

Well, overuse of antibiotics can lead to some unpleasant side effects, including antibiotic resistance and damage to your healthy bacteria. Antibiotic resistance happens when the bacteria cells that survive the medicine start to multiply over generations. Over time, this can lead to bacteria colonies that are mostly resistant to antibiotic treatments.

Antibiotics are sometimes necessary, but you should be careful of overuse. Make sure the situation warrants them because the side effects can be unpleasant.

You should also be interested in protecting your urinary tract’s healthy bacteria, which are crucial components to your body’s regulation. If you use antibiotics unnecessarily, you might risk harming these “good” bacteria.

According to this study, 42% of mild UTIs can be treated without antibiotics. This isn’t to say that antibiotics should be avoided at all costs. But when there’s a natural UTI treatment that’s been known to work, it is worth a try.

Ayurvedic treatment has been shown to be an effective option for the treatment of UTIs, and it’s a natural alternative to try before considering antibiotics.

How to Heal a UTI With Ayurveda

The Ayurvedic approach to healing a UTI is a process of putting your 3 doshas back in balance. There are specific routines for UTI treatment that are targeted toward each dosha.

To re-balance vata dosha, you can try a full-body or local massage with vata-alleviating medicated oils or local heat above the pelvis. For pitta dosha, Ayurveda experts recommend a cold bath, cooling oils, and cooling pastes. And for kapha dosha, you can try a treatment of bitter and cleansing herbs.

Beyond these measures, Ayurveda also takes into account the lifestyle aspects of UTI treatment and prevention. For example, yoga and meditation treatments can prevent emotional imbalance.

Your Ayurvedic treatment will likely include herbs you can take to boost your body’s response. These include

• Gokshura
• Punarnava
• Sathavari
• Chandana, and
• Coriander

Gokshura and Punarnava help balance your kidneys and urinary tract, Sathavari helps the immune system, Chandana helps your digestive system and works with the body’s fluids, and Coriander balances your pitta dosha.

The non-herbal nutrients you intake can make a difference as well. You can try changing your diet in order to correct whatever foods were disturbing your 3 doshas.

As a general health precaution, you can also enhance immunity and detox your system with a panchakarma cleansing treatment. It involves diet recommendations, herbal enemas, and other special procedures. In Ayurveda, this is a way to balance your doshas and even decrease stress.

Now You Know

Because every human body is different, every infection is different too. We can’t provide all the answers to a specific case of infection in this brief guide, but your local Ayurvedic practitioner might. The good news is that in understanding your body’s response to infection, you might stumble across some illuminating new knowledge about energy balance throughout your body.

If you want to learn how to heal a UTI using a specialized Ayurvedic approach, you can contact us today to schedule an appointment.

Be well, and take good care of your doshas.

• October 19, 2020
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• Dr. Stomy Jose