Have you ever looked the most important digestive supports in your quest to improve your digestive
challenges?
In today's video, I'm going to share the top nine digestive practices you don't want to
skip if you have IBS, SIBO, or other digestive challenges.
Stay tuned.
I'm Amanda Malachesky, Certified Functional Nutrition and Lifestyle Practitioner and Digestive
and Allergy Detective.
I help you figure out why your digestion is misbehaving and what you can do about it,
even when you've been told you just have to live with it.
I'm here to share my hard-won, no BS, creative, all-natural approaches to healing your gut
struggles.
If you're ready to get down to work and get beyond your symptoms, be sure to subscribe
to my channel to get notified of my new video every Monday.
A lot of people get hung up on the herbal, pharmaceutical, or diet treatment protocols
for their digestive problems like IBS and SIBO, and that's really what's promoted all
over the internet.
But they overlook the most important foundational practices.
It's difficult to truly recover if you skip over these steps and you don't keep them in
mind while you're working on yourself.
No matter what's causing your digestive distress, whether it's diarrhea or constipation or bloating
or heartburn or gas or burping or just whatever general indigestion is happening, the tips
I'm about to share with you are going to help improve your digestive function and will support
whatever techniques or approaches that you're already using.
Just using these steps, my client Erica resolved gallbladder pain attacks, daily nausea, and
poor appetite.
And you can feel better, too.
So let's get started.
Tip number one is to support your stomach acid.
Your stomach should naturally and ideally be acidic, on the pH scale of a one or a two.
That's really acidic.
What the acid does is it breaks down protein so your body can use it, and it also kills
any unwanted microbes like parasites or bacteria.
It also helps you absorb iron and vitamin B12.
Stomach acid also helps your digestive tract keep moving, and it stimulates your pancreas
and gallbladder to release the enzymes and bile that you need to help digest your proteins,
your carbohydrates, and your fats, so basically everything.
Lots of people mistakenly think that heartburn is caused by too much stomach acid, but this
is actually not true.
It's actually the opposite.
A normal acid level keeps the opening to the stomach closed.
This is called the pyloric sphincter.
But when the acid levels get lower, the opening to the stomach opens and lets stomach contents
up into the esophagus, and this burns those sensitive tissues there.
Stomach acid naturally declines with age and also often in people who eat a vegetarian
or a vegan diet.
To support your stomach acid, you can drink a little bit of apple cider vinegar or lemon
juice and a little bit of water 15 minutes or so before a meal, or you can also try using
supplemental hydrochloric acid capsules or tablets.
As I always say, start low and go slow.
If you need additional help with supplements, check out my video called Supplements to Help
Digestion and IBS.
Tip number two is to use digestive enzymes.
Enzymes help break down your food, and they attach to your digesting food particles to
help them pass through the lining of your intestines into your bloodstream.
There are naturally occurring enzymes in many, many plant foods, especially fruits and vegetables.
So it's always a good idea to include lots of colorful fruits and veggies in your diet.
If you're struggling with poor, sluggish, or troubled digestion, though, you can try
adding a digestive enzyme supplement by taking them before each meal.
There are many different types, so you may need to experiment to find the one that feels
right for you or feels like it really helps you the best.
Always start low and go slow.
Tip number three is to use probiotics and probiotic foods.
Probiotics can help crowd out pathogenic parasites, bacteria, and yeasts, and they help create
a good gut environment.
Some probiotics can even help your body manufacture essential nutrients and vitamins, and they
can also help regulate your immune system.
So they're obviously super awesome little bugs.
The challenge is to choose the right probiotics for you.
People with digestive problems often have a challenge with this.
Everyone's different, and people with digestive troubles are often sensitive to certain types
of probiotics.
Generally, soil-based probiotics and spore-based probiotics are going to be easier to tolerate
for people with IBS and other digestive challenges.
But, as always, pick one, start low, and go slow.
To learn more about how you can choose the right types of probiotics for your body, you
can check out my earlier video, Probiotic Guide For IBS and SIBO.
Tip number four is to make sure that you're getting a healthy dose of essential fatty
acids either from fish oil or cod liver oil.
These fats help repair and restore your gut lining and can help with constipation as well
as brain and hormone health.
As always, start low and go slow, and assess for any adverse effects.
Tip number five is to support your vagus nerve function.
Your vagus nerve is like your body's brain to gut and gut to brain superhighway.
Vagus nerve malfunction can be a huge part of constipation and slow motility challenges,
as well as stress-related digestive issues like IBS.
To support your vagus nerve function, you can try gargling, trampoline jumping, singing
loudly, practicing deep breathing or meditation, belly laughing, or yoga are all great options,
or any combination of these daily.
Have you ever heard of the vagus nerve before?
Comment yes or no in the comments.
Tip number six is to use habits that encourage good motility.
Motility is the speed that things move through your intestines.
This one is more of, obviously, a support for those of you struggling with constipation.
Two really easy hacks you can use are fasting each day between your dinner and your breakfast,
so no midnight snacking or bedtime snacking, and to avoid snacking between meals if you
don't already struggle with low blood sugar.
Also, daily exercise supports normal motility.
And then don't forget about tip number one earlier, about stomach acid.
This also really helps.
Tip number seven is to practice mindful and thorough chewing.
Paying attention to your chewing allows your nervous system to drop into the rest-and-digest
phase, which, as the name suggests, helps your body digest properly.
Using this tip means sitting down to eat and giving yourself some undistracted time to
focus on your food.
This means put down your phone, give a little thanks for your meal, and to connect in with
your family or friends and chew.
Tip number eight is to incorporate digestive bitters into your routine.
Digestive bitters stimulate the flow of your digestive secretion, such as your saliva,
pancreatic enzymes, and bile, which all help break down your food better.
You can get bitters from bitter greens, like dandelion or milk thistle, or you can find
bitter preparations in tincture form and you can take them just before a meal along with
your digestive enzymes and stomach acid support.
Finally, tip number nine is to avoid your food sensitivities.
Some sensitivities can be overcome, and we want to work toward that.
But some are really ongoing, and if you keep consuming foods that are irritating the lining
of your gut, you're not going to make a whole lot of healing progress.
If you need help figuring out how to get clear on your specific food sensitivities, check
out my earlier video called How to Identify Your IBS Food Triggers, or you can grab my
free Food Symptom Diary.
I've left a link for that below.
There's instructions in there about how to use it.
I've shared my top nine foundational digestive support tips with you, but what if you need
a little bit more support putting them to work or digging deeper into your root causes?
I have three free options to help you.
I've put together a short guide to map out what a path to symptom resolution looks like,
and it's called The Roadmap to Recovery.
Inside this guide, you can start mapping out your own path to recovery with some short
exercises.
I've left a link for you below to click over there and grab your free copy.
If you'd rather talk to me, I'd like to invite you to meet with me over the phone to help
you get clear on how you can move forward with your case.
You can schedule a free assessment session with me by visiting my website at confluencenutrution.com/contact
and using my online appointment scheduler to talk further.
I also have a private Facebook group called Hope For Healing Chronic Illness, where you
can ask questions of me and our community.
So come check us out.
If you liked this video, please let me know by liking it below.
Subscribe and share it with your fellow digestively challenged friends or family.
Comment below with "helpful" if this video helped you.
See you next time.