The Gut-Brain and Brain-Gut Connection

More than hundred trillion bacteria that weigh around 4.5 pounds are in your gut- small and large intestines at any time of the day and the night. And they are proven to affect your mood and emotions and stress levels throughout the day. A lot of these bacteria are good for your health, carrying out important tasks for your overall health like improving your immune system and protecting you from diseases. They help with the digestion and fighting the harmful by-products of digestion and not leaving much space for the bad bacteria.

According to a study at UCLA that fed probiotic yogurt to a group of people twice a day for four weeks, non-probiotic dairy product to a second group and their standard diet to the third group. Their brain responses in a brain scanner were measured after this 4-week period. And the results showed that the brain functioning of the probiotic group was much different, both when active and at rest.

Your gut health can even affect your personality, not just your emotions and behavior. In another study with the shy and outgoing mice, first all the bacteria were wiped out with the antibiotics and they were fed the microbiota of the other group. They ended up swapping personalities, the shy became extrovert and the extroverts became shy.

If you feel intestinal pain or nauseated during the stressful times this does not mean these physical conditions are all in your mind. But more like that your brain or psychology influences the physiology and the symptoms, the contractions and the movement on the intestinal tract and worsen the inflammation and make you more exposed to infection. Another research paper suggests that the pain can be perceived more severely by the people with gastrointestinal tract issues as their brains can be more perceptive to the pain signals that come from the intestines.

If you focus on improving your GI condition with psychotherapy to reduce your anxiety, stress and depression rather than the medical treatment you’ll get faster and better results, according to a review of many studies on gut health and brain connection. Many experts believe that the relationship between the brain or depression and the irritable bowel syndrome is like a frustrating, vicious cycle with one of them making the other one worse rather than one causing the other directly. The treatments that help with relieving stress and anxiety can often help your with the gut health too.

For some people the irritable bowel syndrome symptoms can be the reasons for distress that feels just like depression. And they can lose interest and avoid their social activities, worrying what may happen with their diarrhea or tummy pain. They may also be too tired or lazy to take any action like changing their diets to ease the symptoms like diarrhea or constipation. And the whole thing of feeling down and emotional distress can make their bowels worse. Embarrassment, shame, fear, loss of freedom can accompany the depression and IBS. Some antidepressants may help with depression and mood problems and it is best you talk to your doctor whether taking meds might help and which med and how you should take them.

Even if you are not depressed you can get relief from certain antidepressant medications as they block the way how brain processes certain emotions. Gut bacteria may control your satiety as they can partly decide what and how much you eat. According to The American College of Gastroenterology, the two classes of antidepressants can help with the IBS symptoms- tricyclic antidepressants and Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). According to another study by a trusted university source roughly 30% of IBS sufferers also suffer from mild to severe depression, which is the most common psychological disorder experienced by the IBS patients. The GAD- Generalized Anxiety Disorder or excessive and constant worrying is found in about 15% of those with IBS- irritable bowel syndrome.

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Can Depression Cause IBS and Loose Stool

There is a strong relationship between your brain and gut health and overall stress levels during the day and they affect your digestive health deeply. Stress and depression actually impact the composition and the activity of your gut microbiota.

What happens is when you’re really stressed your blood pressure will go up and you’ll get dehydrated, and water and potassium are released into the intestinal tract by both the dehydration and blood pressure. And you will mostly experience loose stool or diarrhea. If you are one of those people that are inclined to be depressed and anxious, even if mildly, you are more likely to suffer from chronic irritable bowel syndrome with diarrhea or occasional loose stools- more liquid than normal stool.

At this point you may want to have a close look at how your brain and mind can be connected with your gut health and intestinal tract or vice versa. Different studies found that the two are interconnected: On the one hand you have the microbiota that may potentially cause depression, contribute or make it worse, and on the other hand the fear, anxiety, stress and mild or heavy depression may cause loose bowel movements straight away.

You may want to pay attention to this brain and gut connection, but obviously not worry too much over it as up to 15% of adults suffer from IBS symptoms. And less than half of these people are actually diagnosed with the Irritable Bowel Syndrome Disease. And in the UK these numbers are higher, with 2 in 10 adults have IBS with episodes 5-6 times or more each week. When you just think about it, some people shit themselves when they are really really scared, simply because of the adrenaline that make your bowels overactive.

And when you have mild depression or mildly anxious all the time you’re running some amount of fear constantly and this can and does cause mild chronic diarrhea. Well this is not pleasant at all but harmless at the same time. If you start worrying about your loose stool condition it will only make it worse. And you may want to just let it go. You may want to use probiotics, watch your diet and eliminate foods that trigger the bowel movements, go for a low-FODMAP diet. But at the end of the day it will often come down to how you feel generally.

I find that I feel better during the day and the evenings than I do when I wake up early in the mornings, with subconscious mind setting it all the bad or suppressed thoughts free during the sleep. Do you feel sick in the tummy when exposed to certain situations, feel butterflies in your stomach or have a gut-wrenching experience? Depression, anxiety, sadness and similar feelings can all trigger loose stools because your intestinal tract is simply quite sensitive to negative emotions, and positive.

The simple thought of wanting to eat a certain food or feeling hungry and craving something may release the juices of your stomach before you even attempt to eat. Your brain and thoughts affect your tummy and gastrointestinal tract directly. And this works two ways, with also the troubled intestine sending bad vibes and signals to your mind. You can have diarrhea and other symptoms of IBS simply because of the depression and anxiety. If you can not find a single physical reason for having the loose stools, you will not be able to heal your gut without taking your emotions, mood and stress levels into consideration.

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The Difference Between No Added Sugar, Unsweetened and Sugar-free

You may see “no added sugar”, “sugar-free” and “unsweetened” on food labels and this can get confusing at times. Which one is better and whether “sugar-free” actually means zero sugar? Sugar isn’t always bad for you, it is more the way you consume the sugars. The naturally occurring sugar in fruits and veggies should always be a part of a healthy diet, but not the sugars in processed foods, baked foods and sodas, and they should be kept at a minimum level.

The latest Dietary Guidelines for Americans recommends that less than 10% of your daily calories must come from these added sugars. If your diet is high in sugar and you do not rinse your mouth after having sweets, you’ll have dental cavities by time or sometimes in a very short period of time, your risk of chronic diseases like type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular diseases will be increased. There are also health risks associated with the use of artificial sweeteners, as they can’t be good for health and they don’t curb your appetite for sweet and you crave for more of those sweet things.

The reason the fructose in fruits and lactose in dairy are often OK is because they come in combo with protein, fiber, natural fats, minerals and vitamins and healthy enzymes. Sweet potatoes, apples, bananas, milk and unsweetened yogurt should all be made a part of a healthy diet. High fructose corn syrup, granulated sugar, maple syrup, honey and brown sugar are all types of added sugar in baking. You will often find the artificial sweeteners in sugar-free foods, including saccharin, aspartame and Sucralose.

Polyols, the sugar alcohols like mannitol or sorbitol are also used in these foods for sweetening purposes s they don’t cause tooth decays, but may act as laxatives in some people. If a certain food has less than 0.5 g rams of sugar per serving, then it is considered sugar-free according to FDA. But you need to be careful with the size of servings and how many servings you can have in one go. Because it is often very easy to eat lots of the sweet foods as they can taste so good and 3-4 standard servings may be your single serving.

The “no added sugar” claim on certain foods like fruit juice, preserves, peanut butter, granola or muesli means no extra sugar is added manually and there may be natural sugars, sugar alcohols or artificial sugars in them. And the “unsweetened” label on food items like apple sauce, iced tea, coconut milk and almond milk means there is none of the sugar alcohols, sweeteners or added sugars but it may steel have the naturally occurring sugars. Out of these food labels about sugar content in foods, your best bet will be the “unsweetened” foods.

But your main concern should be the total nutritional value and health benefits rather than just the sugar or sweetener content of a certain food product. And you can’t go wrong with vegetables and some fruits, as long as consumed in moderation. Please also note that many athletes are reported to have a high sugar diet for sudden energy needs in their intense activities. Or if you work out regularly at the gym you may want a sweet healthy snack after your work out for speedy recovery of muscles and another one early in the mornings when your muscles need that insulin spike. We’re talking more about the normal, average person’s daily sugar needs here.

It is widely accepted by health authorities that there are good fats and good sugar sources and cutting out sugar completely may feel like fasting and some people can easily indulge in sweet things in very large amounts in one go, after eating no sweet for a while. But generally speaking, zero or minimal sugar consumption will lead to lack of appetite for sweet things and not being able to drink tea or coffee with added sugar or not being able to drink fruit juices or soft drinks after a while. You need to try out and see for yourself what works out best for you and your body and what makes you feel better, as long as you minimize your sugar consumption.

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Sugar Addiction and Cravings:

Are You Addicted to Sugar?

We all consume added sugar of some sort, in one way or another even if we are very careful and sometimes without knowing it. If you check the ingredients of what you buy at the shops, you may not see sugar mentioned, but it is usually still there in other forms. But how do you know if you’re addicted to sugar and consuming too much of it?

The first symptom is lethargy, which is like feeling tired, fatigued and having a lack of energy and enthusiasm to do anything or perform in your usual activities during the day and feeling down and even depressed. It is a bit like being a daily joint smoker and not want to do much else other than sitting down on the couch and having a smoke.

They are both addictive, the only difference is sugar doesn’t give your body the same kind of high and offers absolutely no health benefits if we consider the medical use of cannabis, not that we’re recommending anyone to smoke. And to be in that way you don’t really have lots of sugar either.  Having normal amounts of added sugar daily is adequate for being addicted and for it to be a burden on our body.

If you feel fatigue and get the munchies at around 11am in the morning and at around 4 in the afternoon, this often shows hypoglycemia as a response to the hyperglycemia because of the sweet meals you have at breakfast and lunch. These are fast sugars that cause the insulin spikes that in turn cause hypoglycemia. And the more this happens the more you can be suspicious of your pancreas being in a pre-diabetic stage.

It will be completely up to you what your body is trying to tell you and in a few years time you’ll be quite likely to have diabetes and heart disease. If you are feeling tired after a meal you are either eating too much or more of the wrong things- high quantity or low quality, like high sugar. The thing is you’d know that it is hard to stop eating the sweet treats after having a bite, cookies, cakes, ice cream, flavored milk and even dry fruits. Just like a cigarette smoker that craves more cigarettes, you will want more cake.

Many people fall into this sugar addiction and can’t do without it and they experience physical and mental symptoms in case of a lack of sugar. Headache is common as a withdrawal symptom from sugar, just like caffeine. The addiction, harmful effects for health (physical and psychological) indeed make sugar a drug, just that we don’t know which class drug. Having said that everyone is different and sugar will easily become an addiction or a drug for some and maybe not for others, or no to the same extent or at the same speed.

This addiction is an easy one to fall into, given the fact that sugar is available everywhere. We have to pay attention to the type of sugar, because a very sweet cookie will not be the same as a piece of fruit, even if organic and without the other harmful substances. The sugar and fat combo has almost no nutritional value but is great tasting and so easy to eat lots of it before feeling disgusted. On the other hand there is much less sugar in an apple and contains vitamins and fiber, is much lower in calories and has antioxidant properties to fight off inflammation and cancer.

The dietary fiber in a piece of fruit decreases the absorption speed of sugar, not giving a spike in blood sugar. It is absolutely silly to point out a single culprit that makes bad things happen in our bodies or cause illnesses, this is sometimes sugar, sometimes fat or meat. And this leads to diets that exclude certain foods and the creators of these restricting diets act like they hold the absolute truth and say things like “Avoid sugar at all costs” or “Fat makes you fat”. It is always a good idea to have everything in moderation, as part of a generally healthy diet, even if you’re trying to lose weight to be able to keep that weight off.

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Foods Against Inflammation and Pain

Having a healthy diet overall will generally help with combatting inflammation. But there are certain anti-inflammatory foods that specifically help pain and inflammation. Your body’s inflammatory state is often related to the lack of nutritional and metabolic balances.

There is too much of free radicals during the oxidative stress, because of pollution, emotional stress, infections, iron overload, smoking, excessive physical exercise and more. When the pH of your body is too little or too high- below or above pH value of 7, you have the acid imbalance. You may also have an intestinal flora imbalance with more of harmful bacteria than good bacteria in your gut.

Even though your body needs plenty of Omega 3 and Omega 6 essential fatty acids to function properly,  you may have a high omega 6 / omega 3 ratio.  And excessive consumption of Omega 6 fatty acids can cause inflammation while Omega 3 has anti-inflammatory properties. As these Omega 3 and Omega 6 fatty acids are not synthesized by your body you need to have healthy eating habits overall.

You may be consuming too much of simple sugars and trans fats in your diet, as well as the refined grains, which can easily lead to the chronic inflammatory state. With an anti-inflammatory diet you will be able to maintain the acid balance, reduce oxidative stress and inflammation while enhancing a healthy gut balance. You may, for example, switch to plant proteins from animal protein as your intake of proteins would be 50% each for animal and plant sources. Vegetarian protein is found in tempeh, quoin, tofu, veggie mince etc.

Increasing your dietary fiber intake will increase your intestinal microbiota. You may want to reduce your salt intake and go for herbs and spices like pepper, turmeric and ginger. Reduce your salt intake you may want to add salt in starchy foods during cooking rather than after. And try sometimes having rice, potatoes and other starchy foods instead of salty bread. Cheese contains lots of it and you may want to have not more than once a day. Omega 3-rich foods include salmon, herring, mackerel, sardine, salmon, trout, walnuts, rapeseed, hempseed, flaxseeds, chia seeds and Brussels sprouts.

You may want to eat more of whole grains and legumes that are high in fiber and low in glycemic index. Fruits and veggies contain high amounts of antioxidants and help maintain gut microbiota. And you probably want to have veggies at every meal and two fruits a day. Please go for the natural regular non-skimmed milk for a decent balance and adequate calcium intake. Small amounts of dark chocolate or cocoa every day may help fight stress and reduce inflammation.

Drink plenty of water (2-2.5 liters per day) to help with muscle fatigues, reducing the cramps, enhancing intestinal transit and improving overall body functioning. By focusing on an anti-inflammatory diet you will be reducing the risk of diabetes, cardiovascular disease, Alzheimer’s disease, obesity and more. Extra virgin olive oil contains Oleocanthal that blocks the enzymes that cause inflammation, just like the pain killer ibuprofen. So you may want to use olive oil throughout the day on your salads, meals and dips.

Pineapple contains Bromelain enzyme that helps digest protein and decrease the inflammation risk. Eating pineapple can help decrease knee osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis pain and swelling in people with carpal tunnel syndrome. Apple has the anti-inflammatory quercetin antioxidant which is a type of flavonoids and has the anti-cancer properties. Nuts and seeds are rich in tryptophan amino acid and help reduce pain in about an hour.

Tryptophan containing foods are chicken, turkey, sunflower seeds, dairy products, rice, beans, seafood, soy and legumes. Leafy greens like spinach, Swiss chard, bok choy, kale contain lots of carotenoids with the pigments that give the green and orange colors and that have anti-inflammatory effects. Whole grain cereals including brown rice help fight leaky gut and irritable bowel syndrome. They help relax the nerves, muscles and blood vessels and reduce the frequency of migraines.

Grapes, blackberries or a glass of red wine contain resveratrol that blocks enzymes that cause inflammation just like aspirin but without any ill effects on your stomach. Other major anti-inflammatory foods include cranberry juice (reduced bladder inflammation), cherries, strawberries and raspberries (anthocyanin), nectarine, apricot, oranges (less of joint inflammation), green or black tea (flavonoids), onion and garlic, broccoli (glutathione), cauliflower, potatoes, avocados, tomatoes, watermelon and fish. So there is a long list of healthy foods that you can consume with anti-inflammatory properties and you are not restricted to just a few special foods.

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