Digestion and gut health

By Mangia Paleo January 7, 2014 Health and Nutrition 3 Comments

Digestive problems occur when good bacteria is disturbed in your intestines. If the good bacteria cannot function properly then how will your guts? It won’t. And that’s called constipation and diarrhea, my friends.
For example: Billy from the American suburbs takes a trip to Mexico and drinks the tap water because he’s dumb. Then Billy gets diarrhea at Señor Frogs, but there’s no toilet paper in el baño. Billy’s trip to Mexico is ruined all because he disrupted his gut flora. Don’t be like Billy.

Okay, Billy’s situation is actually not related to regular gut flora functions or any bowel diseases. But it is a great example at how something as simple as what you eat/drink can make or break you. When your body doesn’t recognize a food or bacteria it will try to get rid of it since it can’t process it. That’s what happened to Billy. The moral of the story is to eat whole foods, not processed foods. Eat food your body will recognize as such so that it can filter proper nutrients.

What is gut flora?

Gut flora is the term to describe the microorganisms that live in our digestive tract. Most of this microbial population is bacteria. But this is good bacteria. When you eat fake processed foods the good bacteria is like, “WTF, mate? I don’t know what this junk is” and gets upset with you.

Maintaining good gut flora helps keep the nice bacteria doing its job. When you eat foods that we, as humans, are intended to eat the body will recognize this and digest it much better than processed and fake foods. Seriously, cheese you spray out of a can? Ugh.

Good Bacteria Aiding Digestion

You may have heard of probiotics aiding in digestion and intestinal health. Probiotics are the good bacteria I was telling you about. You know how crumby antibiotics can make you feel? Well doesn’t the name “probiotic” just sound more positive? It does wonders for digestive health as well as your overall health. Live and active cultured probiotics are what you want to look for – but pay no attention to the women in yogurt commercials. You can take probiotics in supplements such as Green Vibrance and Kombucha. I find the process of Kombucha absolutely disgusting, but Reed’s Kombucha is such a treat! It’s like a really healthy soda almost. I wouldn’t lie to you.

Taking enzymes can also guide digestion. Digestive enzymes are the little guys that make sure our food gets processed and absorbed into nutrients. Enzymes can be found in the foods we already eat, however, unless you’re eating the fruit right off the tree then you’re not really getting a whole lot of enzymes from food. They are usually shipped unripened and don’t have time to develop them before getting to your grocer or fridge.

Why should I care?

Firstly, your gut makes up about 70% of your immune system. It’s KIND OF A BIG DEAL. If your intestines are well then how can you be?

Secondly, our digestive tract is super huge and really important to living a clean lifestyle. Imagine if you ate food, it traveled down to your stomach that’s not there and it just loosely sloshed around your body? Well, that’s called death. But hey, at least you’d never have to interrupt your day of sloshing to go poo.

You have intestines. And, believe it or not, you really need them. Therefore, you must take care of your body as you would anything else you love in your life. Unless you want to end up in a foreign bathroom amidst an out-of-tune mariachi band with no toilet paper. Your choice, amigo.