Stress and your Gut.
The mind body connection is real – Stress and your Gut.
I see the impact of stress in my clinic daily. Stress is increasingly normalised because we are constantly on call, beating a deadline, firefighting, rushing between roles, switching hats and dealing with a long list of demands. But stress being normal, doesn’t make it healthy.
I’m not actually a fan of the word Stress. It’s become an overused throwaway comment and we’ve come become numb to the sentiment. It’s too easy to dismiss the reality of how stress impacts our lives, it’s everywhere and so we just accept it as a part of life. But in truth, if stress is not managed properly, it can wreak havoc on all our body systems and overall wellbeing... Not least of all it brings your digestion to a grinding halt, leaving food fermenting in your gut, cultivating a home for unwelcome bacteria and causing a world of bloating, pain, gas and a nervous relationship with the bathroom!
Just because stress has become implicit in a modern life doesn’t mean we can’t proactively manage our stress levels.
How Stress Affects Your Digestive System - Unravelling the Truth
Stress can trigger a cascade of reactions throughout our bodies - it's not just your mind that is affected! When we're stressed, our bodies release adrenaline and cortisol, which can increase heart rate, blood pressure, and contribute to chronic diseases like high blood pressure and heart disease. Stress can also weaken our immune systems, making us more susceptible to illnesses. Understanding the hidden impact stress has on your body is crucial to overcoming its effects.
Chronic stress causes digestive issues because we were built for short term stress. Running away from the predator is a greater priority than digesting that apple. And so our body redirects resources away from integral organs to our brain, our legs and our arms, in the hope that once we escape, we can go back to that healthy snack.
Stress makes us vulnerable to ulcers, pathogenic microbes, and damage to the lining of the digestive tract, increasing allergies and inflammation. Then there’s the fermentation and putrefaction of our food, a slowing down of the time food takes to pass through the body, poor liver health and most definitely IBS and SIBO.
And here’s what you need to know about why it’s so important for digestive health to make sure that you are keeping your stress under control:
Stress shuts down the digestive secretions we need to break down our food well
Stress changes the balance of bacteria in our gut, favouring the bad guys that cause a world of problems – including perpetuating stress!
Chronic stress slows down movement through our digestive system. More time for food to ferment inside you. Motility is at the heart of bloating issues.
Keep Your Cool: Manage Stress Naturally
Now that you know stress can take such a hefty toll on both your physical and emotional health, especially your gut health what can you do to overcome this? Often we turn to unhealthy coping mechanisms, junk food, mindless scrolling, Netflix without the chill... but why not try some natural ways to manage your stress that actually work?
Here are my top five tips I give my clients to override the stress response:
1. Move. Find movement that soothes your system and tells the body it is no longer under threat. While running or cross fit can help use up stress hormones, if you’re under chronic stress, the ideal answer is slow nourishing movement. Try walking in nature on your lunch break, biking to the supermarket, stretching while netflixing, ballet plies while tooth brushing... it all counts.
2. Loud humming and gargling vibrates the vagus nerve which controls our stress response. To switch on your rest and digest state, try humming along in the car and make a habit of gargling in the shower.
3. Breathe. The brain controls the body… but the breath controls the brain! When we exhale for longer than we inhale we tell our body it’s not under threat. Try in for 4 out for 6. Keep going.
4. Eating when you're stressed is the fast track to bloat. Don’t try to eat a bowl of ‘comfort pasta’ when you have no enzymes, hydrochloric acid or bile to break it down. It’ll just move like a lump to your gut and feed bacteria in the small intestine – right where we don’t want them! Instead bitter flavours like tahini, basil and coriander and sour flavours like lemon juice will stimulate digestive juices and switch the vagus nerve to go back to rest and digest. So a small salad might be the road back to happiness after all. I also love prescribing herbal bitters. A few ml’s before meals to prepare the digestive tract before we eat.
5. Healthy Gut bacteria actually release the neurotransmitter GABA, which activates the vagus nerve and creates a state of rest and digest. If you suffer from bloating any old probiotic WILL NOT DO. We needed to be targeted to get the results you're looking for. Beware some probiotics will actually INCREASE inflammation.
All in all, stress is part of life, but it doesn't have to control your life.
Can you now see how managing your stress is essential for anyone looking to overcome chronic gut problems? By taking care of yourself and practising healthy habits, you can manage your stress levels and improve your overall health, and I can tell you you won’t overcome SIBO or IBS without addressing the stress.
Share this with the people you care about. Stress affects us all.
If you’re ready to finally overcome bloating, pain and gas issues book in a discovery call to learn about how I can help you.
