Show Your Gut Some Love - Why Taking Probiotics Can Transform Your Health
More than just a passing health fad, probiotics are here to stay people. Growing bodies of research backing the benefits of probiotics continue to stack up. Furthermore, what scientists are learning about probiotics and the brain-gut connection (pretty weird if you ask me) shows that by supporting a healthy gut, you may profoundly decrease levels of anxiety, depression, and in general, how you feel as you move through this world day to day and how supporting healthy gut bacteria with probiotics is one step is one step you can take to improve and maintain good mental health.
Well what is the brain-gut connection? In almost every language and culture there is some link to emotions and your intestines.
" butterflies in my stomach ", "gut-feel", "love sick", "gut instinct". You can probably remember when was the last time you had this feeling.
Colloquialism aside, there is actually a nervous system in your intestinal tract that explains these feelings that human beings have tried to explain for thousands of years now.
The Enteric Nervous System (ENS) have also been referred to as "the second brain" hidden in the walls of your gastro intestinal system contains over 100 million nerve cells through your entire GI tract ( mouth to rectum). The ENS system sends signals through your nerve cells to your central nervous system and your "first brain" and vice versa.
For many years, researchers and doctors believe that people who suffered from depression and anxiety concurrently dealt with IBS or GI disturbances because their brain told their gut they were "upset" and their gut followed suit. Now the thinking is that these signals go both ways, and perhaps the ut is a lot bossier than we thought.
If you or someone you know have suffered from depression or high levels of anxiety or hopeless and out of control, this information can be greatly empowering! By supporting your gut with healthy bacteria like probiotics (and an absolutely health balanced diet full of fresh vegetables, fruits and healthy fats), we may be able to tell our brain to chill out and get happier!
Benefits of probiotics:
1. Probiotics improve symptoms of constipation, diarrhea, irritable bowel syndrome, acid reflux, ulcerative colitis, and chronic stomach pain.
2. Help restore "healthy bacteria"
3. Increase immune fighting bacteria in your gut meaning you may get sick less if you use them.
4. Probiotics decrease your gut's propensity to to inflammation and injury.
5. Probiotics increase receptor sites in the intestinal tract for pain relief so by taking them can relieve one's sensitivity to pain in that area.
How to integrate probiotics in your everyday life:
The health food stores have a lot of probiotic selections! This is because there are many strains for many different purposes.
As a general rule for probiotics, look for a product with at least 1 billion colony forming units and containing the genus lactobacillus bifidubaterum, or saccaromyces boulardii. Pick a product that is geared toward helping the symptoms you are experiencing.
Lastly, incorporate probiotics in whole form food. It is always a good idea to integrate probiotics in your food diet. While supplements are a guaranteed way to get probiotics everyday- just like with vitamins, they are best absorbed and used by the body in food from. Try adding the food listed below to your daily diet and you can be sure you are getting probiotics to in your body.
-sauerkraut
-tempeh
-kombucha
-kimchi
-yogurt
-fermented cucumbers
-miso soup
-pickles
XOXO,
Karen