Your gut is delicate and easily offended by what you decide to put into it. Dr. Mark Hyman has been practicing and promoting this with ‘Functional Medicine’ for the past 15 years. When dealing with reflux and bowel disorders most MDs rely on surgical and pharmaceutical interventions, while covering up the true contributors to the illnesses.
The standard American diet is low in fiber, rich in sugar, low in nutrients and high in additives and chemicals. America’s pharmaceutical abuse on NSAIDs, antibiotics and acid-blocking drugs disrupt the gut from doing it’s job to stay in balance. Bacterial and yeast infections can produce in the gut due to a high sugar and refined carbohydrate diet.
The chemicals that break down our food sit in the epithelial layer of our gut. When we develop a poor diet, have an increase in stress, over-medicate, or become infected our gut becomes ‘leaky.’ A leaky gut means our epithelial later is damaged and cannot digest our food properly. When the food does not digest properly larger molecules of food “leak” into our circulation. The body then fights against those molecules and develops antibodies to common foods. This is how food allergies develop, causing sickness and inflammation.
So how do we heal our guts? Dr. Hyman suggests seven ways to get back a healthy gut.
First, if you notice allergies to any foods to try an elimination diet for a week or two. This means to cut out gluten, dairy, yeast, corn, soy and eggs to see if there is a change in symptoms.
If you have not noticed an allergy try eating whole, unprocessed foods that contain a good amount of fiber, such as vegetables, beans, nuts, seeds and whole grains.
If yeast or bacteria is present in your gut it needs to be treated as soon as possible.
Taking digestive enzymes, probiotic supplements and omega-3 can help with your ecosystem.
Lastly, gut healing nutrients such as zinc and glutamine are suggested to get our guts back on track.
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