Good health begins in the gut

That’s why I almost always start helping people treat chronic problems by fixing their digestive health first, whether they’re suffering from gastrointestinal distress symptoms like bloating, diarrhoea, constipation, reflux, increased gas, nausea, painful stomach cramps - or not.

The highly sophisticated digestive system is where 80% of your immune system lives. And 90% of your body’s serotonin (a neurotransmitter more commonly referred to as the “feel-good” hormone), that’s responsible for regulating things in the body like mood, appetite, and sleep is found not in your brain, but in your gut.

Just a couple of reasons why compromised digestive health can play out all over your body – joint pain, muscle aches, insomnia, weight gain, skin conditions, fatigue, allergies, autoimmune disorders, brain fog and more..

Digestive Health - How does your digestive system work? 

The digestive system is made up of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract, also called the digestive tract - and the liver, pancreas, and gallbladder.

The hollow organs that make up the GI tract are the mouth, esophagus, stomach, small intestine, large intestine, and anus. The liver, pancreas, and gallbladder are the solid organs of the digestive system.

Bacteria in your GI tract, also called gut flora or microbiome, help with digestion. Parts of your nervous and circulatory systems also help. Working together, nerves, hormones, bacteria, blood, and the organs of your digestive system digest the foods and liquids you consume every day, and then convert them into energy and basic nutrients to feed your entire body.

Your hormones and nerves also control signals flowing within your GI tract, and back and forth from your GI tract to your brain (along the gut-brain axis). For example, the neurotransmitter serotonin can actually modulate motility in the gut, so when levels of serotonin are too high or too low, this can cause either constipation or diarrhoea.

You are what you digest and absorb

You’ve probably heard the old saying, “You are what you eat,” but I’d like to add to that and say, “You are what you digest and absorb.” If you’re eating healthy foods and wondering why you are still experiencing bloating or lack of energy, look to your digestive health. Your body may be working hard to break foods down, but just cannot assimilate the nutrients.

What causes poor digestion and absorption?

It’s easy to associate digestion purely with "fuel-conversion" - the breaking-down of food into nutrients for your body to use. In reality, it’s way more complex than this and when any of the digestive organs aren’t functioning as they should there’s the potential not only for poor digestive health but also for chaos elsewhere in the body.

Here’s some of the most common scenarios in which digestive health can be disturbed:

• Insufficient digestive enzyme and stomach acid production - both of which are essential for digestion and absorption of nutrients.
• Damage to nerves or tissues - that reside in the GI tract can prevent proper functioning and nutritional uptake from food by the body.
• Stress - produces stress-related hormones like adrenaline which will decrease blood flow to the gut and subsequently compromise the integrity of the delicate mucosal barrier that lines the intestinal walls. This is often why IBS sufferers’ digestive health symptoms worsen during stressful times.
• Leaky gut syndrome (LGS) or intestinal permeability - where there’s damage to the lining of the gut wall and harmful toxins, bacteria plus partially digested foods can break-free from the GI tract and enter the immune system, setting off a cascade of unfavourable digestive health events.
• Underlying viruses or gut infections - like candida, parasites, or SIBO (small intestine bacteria overgrowth), which can cause for example, things like nutrient deficiencies (as these unwanted organisms consume ingested foods), and poor fat metabolism which reduces the absorption of fat soluble vitamins - A, D, E & K.
• Gut dysbiosis (microbial imbalance) – poor diet, stressful living and medication such as antibiotics severely disrupt your digestive health and the ecology of your gut, leaving a state of dysbiosis where pathogens such as yeasts and bad bacteria can flourish, while healthy bacteria diminishes.

Gut Microbiome – a welcome or unwelcome intrusion

Within your gut is a large, bustling community (otherwise known as microbiome) of what should be mostly beneficial microorganisms (including microbes like viruses, fungi and bacteria).

This intelligent ecosystem makes up the majority of your immune system, and your body contains 10 times more bacterial cells than human cells. Hard to believe I know, but in truth you’re actually more bacteria than human. Fascinating!