Poop and Your Gut Microbiome
Yeah, that’s right, poop ? !
It can be a sensitive topic and a little embarrassing, but essential none the less! While this is kind of an uncomfortable life story, I’m telling it in the hopes that it will help someone else.
I dealt with constipation big-time as a child all the way until adulthood into my 30s. When I was a kid my mom would have to give me an enema every four days because I couldn’t poop! It was just part of our life; someone would say where Suzy and then someone else would say oh has it been four days? They would know that I was getting the treatment.
As I got older it turned into taking laxatives which really messed up my system! For as long as I can remember I was always trying to find remedies to help with my chronic constipation. It turns out when you have a chronic constipation like that your bowels just are not working right and you don’t get the urges, the system gets very stuck. I pretty much had figured that it was just the way my body was and lived with the discomfort of constipation.
Fast forward to the time after my second daughter was born and I was training for a marathon with friends. I mentioned this issue that had just become the way of life for me. Also, my three-year-old was having a similar issue and would cry every time she had to poop. We started a nutritional plan of adding lots of produce to our diets that had surprisingly fast results. In a matter of days, we were ALL amazingly regular! It was life-changing, and it started a cascade of many health benefits that I am so thankful for today.
Now since the study of the Gut Microbiome has exploded in recent years, research is showing that a variety of fruits, vegetables, and other plants are key to creating an ecoculture inside our gut that leads to biodiversity that is important for our health. Not only does it restore the good bacteria for healthy bowel movements, but also decreases systemic inflammation. It’s interesting to note that much of our neurotransmitters that are produced in our body come from our microbiome in our gut. When you eat fiber from plants you are feeding the good gut bacteria in your microbiome.
It’s so common that people either have overactive bowels or lazy ones like mine, and I just wanted to get this out, so you know you’re not alone in the struggle.
It’s always a good time to support a healthy microbiome and train your bowels to be regular.
Don’t feel embarrassed if your bowels are cranky, reach out and I’d be happy to share more about what worked for me!
