Healing Hypothesis

Health Begins in the Gut

Digestion and your stomach 

Once you’ve chewed, and your food makes its way down your esophagus, the next phase of digestion occurs when the food enters your stomach.

Side bar in case you missed it, I’ve created what I call my Healing Hypothesis, which are 8 concepts, or pillars, I use in my practice to help you heal. They are what I used to help myself heal from my health issues, so I know first hand that they work!

The first pillar of my Healing Hypothesis is health begins in the gut. This means that no matter what chronic and complex health conditions you may have, impaired gut health may be involved, and this is why I’m walking you step by step through the process of digestion. If your digestion is impaired, your overall health will be too.

There are countless things that can go awry with digestion and the stomach. The ones I’ll talk about are the more common ones I happen to see in practice.

As food enters your stomach, muscles there churn the food with digestive juices, which are made of stomach acid and enzymes.

There are glands in the lining of your stomach that secrete stomach acid and enzymes and they continue the breakdown of food into nutrients that can be absorbed and used by your body for fuel.

Your stomach is covered with what’s called your gastric mucosa, and the cells there have a variety of functions.

Some cells secrete mucus to protect the stomach lining from acidic secretions and prevent the stomach from digesting itself.

Some cells secrete hydrochloric acid (HCl). HCl is important for a lot of things:

  • It is important for digestion to breakdown nutrients and liberate ones like vitamin B12 and iron from foods they are in so they can be absorbed

  • It is important for killing pathogens

  • It is important for gut motility, and

  • It is important to activate enzymes that digest protein in your stomach

With this list of important functions in the stomach, when things go wrong, they can really go wrong:

  • If we don’t have mucus secretion, we can develop ulcers

  • If we don’t have enough HCl

    • We can develop bacterial and fungal infections, and overgrowths and imbalances in the gut

    • We can’t extract important nutrients from food (like B12 and iron)

    • We have decreased gastric motility, which can also lead to bacterial and fungal infections, overgrowths and imbalances, and constipation, and

    • Lack of HCl inhibits protein digestion

The next question is, what can cause these issues? Again, lots of things:

  • NSAIDs (aspirin and ibuprofen for example) are a major cause of damage to the gastric mucosa

  • Food allergies, and food sensitivities

  • Infections like H. pylori

  • Gut dysbiosis (imbalances and overgrowth of gut bacteria and fungus)

  • Poor diet, and

  • Consumption of alcohol

These are all examples of factors that can damage your gastric mucosa, impair your digestive processes, and lead to problems with digestion and absorption of nutrients from the foods you eat, and they are all modifiable, you can do something about it! These factors also create a vicious cycle, in that a damaged mucosa can lead to these issues, and the issues then continue to damage the mucosa.

A very common issue I see in my clients as it relates to digestion in the stomach is in fact low stomach acid, and they have symptoms like heartburn, reflux, GERD, gas, bloating, belching, constipation, diarrhea, and stomach pain.

Notice how low stomach acid can cause symptoms of reflux, heartburn and GERD. This is important to know because if you go to your conventional doctor for these symptoms, you will likely be prescribed an acid blocking medication because they don’t check your acid levels. This will further lower your already low stomach acid, and lead to even more significant problems, including exacerbating those mentioned that result from not having enough HCl.

While not diagnostic, there is an at home DIY test you can do to see if you have enough stomach acid. Click here to learn more and try it yourself!

Another issue I see often is gastroparesis. It is a condition that effects gastric motility and slows it down, or prevents it from working at all. It can be caused by medication use (opioids/pain medications, some antidepressants, medications for high blood pressure, allergy medications and others). Gastroparesis is a common complication of blood sugar imbalances, insulin resistance and diabetes. There is no cure for gastroparesis, but it can be managed and/or improved by addressing underlying causes.

Hiatal hernia is yet another! Here, the upper part of your stomach bulges through your diaphragm, and up into your chest. If the hernia is large food and acid can back up into your esophagus and cause reflux, heartburn, difficulty swallowing, chest or stomach pain, vomiting, and black stools. A common conventional treatment is acid blocking medications. Remember to beware because these can be harmful, and lead to low stomach acid and the problems that can cause. There are also diet and lifestyle tips that can help with symptoms that a hiatal hernia can cause.

If you experience issues like those mentioned here, there are nutritional, lifestyle and supplement interventions that can help, and you can schedule a free 15 minute consultation with me to learn more, click here to get on my calendar.

Remember that at any time, if you have questions for me, you can contact me. It’s literally me on the other end of this technology, waiting to hear from you to learn what I can do to support you on your health journey.

P.S. If you know someone that might benefit from this information, please share the love (forward them this link) <3
 
Your partner in health,
Jennifer, MPH, MS, CNS
Functional and Clinical Nutritionist