Seven or eight times a day bowel movements and I had diarrhea frequently and strong pain
once a day so my bowel movement is quite normal I have no more pain I feel very happy and
quite normal. it looks like a miracle almost. we'll break down exactly how she did it, how
she turned around her condition, her diagnosis of IBS and did a complete 180. all the details
and all the science behind it starting right now. in case the resemblance isn't clear enough
this is my beautiful mom. she struggled with gastrointestinal problems for years. it was
really debilitating, 7-8 bowel movements a day, pain, discomfort. her quality of life was
completely shot. I felt confined to my house. I didn't dare go very far away. it was difficult
to go anywhere, even to work. and I had to retire because of it and I felt a little depressed
and unhappy of course. a little or a lot.
She saw doctors, she saw a gastroenterologist with a great reputation and he diagnosed her
with irritable bowel, IBS, and gave her a list of foods to avoid. basically what's called
a low fodmap diet. and they told me it had no cure and told me to avoid a lot of vegetables,
fruit and legumes and that was all.
That was it.
This is what you have and this is what you don't eat now for the rest of your life.
She eliminated most fruits and vegetables, her diet was mostly white potatoes, white bread,
White rice, White pasta and animal foods. chicken, fish, eggs, that was the gist. maybe one or two
vegetables here and there and there were two fruits she could handle, bananas and apples.
most fruits and vegetables were off the table, whole grains and legumes, off-limits. she wasn't
alone, of course. unfortunately, we see this pattern more and more, people reporting that
they go to this length to try to manage their gastrointestinal problems but obviously this
was a concern for all of us. of course she had to avoid foods that triggered the crises but we worried about
the long-term consequences of eating like this and sure enough her cholesterol shot
up, her blood glucose and blood pressure were all high. we knew how to fix that in theory. eating
more vegetables, more fiber and less refined foods and less saturated fat would bring all
those values back to normal. but she couldn't tolerate any of it. we felt like our hands
were tied. so at this point I moved back to Europe to try to help figure this out. we saw
more specialists but the verdict was always the same: you have IBS and these are the foods
you avoid now. I knew we had to learn more, obviously there was an underlying issue that
wasn't being addressed. so I went through endless material.
Peer-reviewed studies, books, seminars by researchers and specialists. it was a little overwhelming at first,
we had a lot of questions and honestly not that many answers but eventually patterns
started to emerge. all the experts talked about reintroduction. how elimination diets are temporary.
This was the opposite of the message we got from the clinicians who saw my mother but
it aligned with the science.
in all likelihood she had dysbiosis.
An imbalance of the microbes in her gut. that would explain her difficulty digesting foods
that are fine for everybody else.
We know that dietary changes affect the composition of the microbes in our gut very quickly, within
days.
We also know that it's possible to reintroduce fiber rich foods without triggering IBS symptoms
one key benefit of fiber is it feeds the microbes in our gut and those little bugs return the
favor by producing short chain fatty acids.
which are very beneficial for our intestinal epithelial cells.
So the hope was that by slowly putting back those fiber rich foods the short chain fatty
acids produced by the microbiome would help heal her gut.
So we started experimenting very slowly and gradually. first, white starches and grains,
then whole grains.
Then legumes and finally the greens and other vegetables. this sequence followed the advice
of some experts according to ease of digestion of each food.
in the beginning it was really slow progress, she had flareups now and then, we would just stop and take a step back
and give it a few days and then try again.
but after a couple months of this process we started seeing some results.
Foods that she could not handle before started being okay.
It was a light of the at the end of the tunnel, it was the first indication that we were on
the right track. after about four months of this, when we got through phase 3, everything
changed, suddenly she could handle everything.
No symptoms, she was just fine. for the first time in years she felt completely normal. it's
now been several months and she's been completely fine. now I eat everything, it's not restricted
I forgot my lists, I even try to eat quite varied food, all kinds of vegetables, all kinds
of legumes, all kinds of fruit. when I see something different I buy
and I eat. my bowel movements are quite normal, I have no more pain.
I feel very happy and quite normal. in all likelihood her microbiome normalized. it was
like a muscle that was kind of atrophied and just needed to be strengthened again. the fiber
we reintroduced was the workout that the muscle desperately needed and the flareups were the
sore pains when you work out too much and you're hurting the next day. you get the idea.
Not surprisingly, now that she's on a very healthy diet again, her cholesterol came down
to normal levels, her blood glucose normalized, her blood pressure is looking better. not surprising,
that's all expected.
The take-home message here is that we have to be wary of simplistic answers.
if food X causes problems just avoid it.
That logic seems like common sense but it doesn't address the root of the issue and
it may create more problems in the long run. it's a Band-Aid.
My mother's experience illustrates that it's possible to feel great while eating the very
foods that used to be a problem.
That's reversal.
Now of course, your case may be different, it might take you longer, it might take you medication,
you might have other conditions associated.
Or It may be easier and faster for you. my mother's story is just that. it's an anecdote.
And I've cautioned people against leaning too much on anecdotes before and I want to do it
again here.
The science showed management of symptoms with reintroduction of fiber rich foods. all
we did was follow the lead of those studies, and sure enough they worked as advertised.
So for you watching you should mainly look at the scientific evidence, less so the anecdote.
The data should mainly inform your decision-making.
and speaking of decision-making, I highly recommend if you're struggling with gastrointestinal
issues of this kind that you see professional help if you haven't yet. I'm not a professional
gastroenterologist and the Internet is packed with unqualified advice unfortunately.
It's really important to get a proper differential diagnosis and to rule out other issues.
Get a second opinion, get a third opinion if you need to. in our case the first doctors
we saw didn't have a great solution.
The answer was not to give up and go do something random and unscientific, the solution was more
expertise, more knowledge, more science.
that's where the answers eventually came from. now, it's not easy, I get that. I just went through
the process myself, it took me a lot of time and effort to find the answers and I do this
for a living. Science and medicine are my job. so i can only imagine how hard it is for everybody
else out there. and that's why I'm making these videos. if this saves you some time and some
suffering that my mother had to go through then this video has done its job.
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Thanks for watching and I'll see you on the next one