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How to Maintain a Healthy Gut for a Healthier You

Post by: KATHY SKINNER in gut health, digestine
Does your gut feel off?  It could be lacking some of the good bacteria it needs to properly function! 
 
The digestive system plays a major role in your overall health as it acts as the hub for all your nutrients and decides how everything you eat impacts the rest of your body. Without good digestive health, you will experience a host of uncomfortable issues such as abdominal. discomfort, bloating, indigestion and more. 
Additionally, you may also get a lack of proper nutrition from the food you eat, which then negatively impacts your health and well-being. This is why digestive health is so important, and why we want to keep it healthy.

So, what can you do to maintain a healthy gut?

The first thing you can do, and possibly the easiest, is to drink water. The digestive system needs to be well-hydrated to function well. Make sure to drink enough water according to your weight and physical activity level. Without good hydration, you may suffer from constipation, dehydration, and a host of other unwanted symptoms. For good digestive health, make sure to drink enough water every day.
The general rule to follow is half your body weight in ounces. 
Need some help drinking more water? Check out Ways to Flavor Your Water so You Will Want to Drink More

 
The next thing you can do for your gut is to eat plenty of fresh vegetables and fruits. These provide essential nutrients, as well as natural enzymes that can aid overall digestive health and function. A balanced diet full of healthy fruits and vegetables can help improve the way your digestive system works. Eat a diverse range of whole foods. Eating plenty of whole grains, fruits, and vegetables is critical to a balanced microbial ecology. Our bodies thrive off diversity and whole foods help promote digestive enzymes in the gut and lower intestines.

As you build your diet with these whole foods, add fermented and probiotic foods to your diet as well.  
Kimchi, yogurt, kefir, and sauerkraut are all probiotic-rich foods that can encourage the expansion of healthy gut bacteria. There are many healthy foods that contain natural prebiotics. The highest amounts are found in raw versions of the following: garlic, onions, leeks, asparagus, Jerusalem artichokes, dandelion greens, bananas, and seaweed.

In general, fruits, vegetables, beans, and whole grains like wheat, oats, and barley are all good sources of prebiotic fibers. Probiotic foods contain beneficial live microbiota that may be even more beneficial for your microbiome, again, bringing that amazing diversity. 
Probiotic foods are fermented foods like kefir, yogurt with live active cultures, pickled vegetables, tempeh, kombucha tea, kimchi, miso, and sauerkraut. 

As you plan your diet around these amazing foods, it goes without saying that you’ll want to avoid eating chemical-laden and processed foods. Chemical food additives, artificial sweeteners, and food preservatives can interfere and affect the digestive process.

Diversity in your diet is important because microbiota synthesizes certain vitamins and amino acids, including the B vitamins and vitamin K. For example, the key enzymes needed to form vitamin B12 are only found in bacteria, not in plants and animals. The more diversity your body has, the more it can help produce a diverse number of vitamins.
 
An often-overlooked part of gut health are enzymes. They are specialized proteins that act as catalysts for cellular function, enzymes play a critical role in growth, healing, reproduction, breathing, thinking, immune function, hormone regulation, detoxification, and thousands of other biochemical functions. 
Enzymes also assist in the digestive process and in converting food into energy in your cells—making exogenous enzymes. These must be consumed because your body is unable to produce them, and this is one of the most important components of our diets. 

Fresh, raw foods naturally contain sufficient enzymes for proper digestion in the body. However, when food is cooked and processed, these naturally occurring food enzymes can be destroyed. A balanced diet that consists of whole, unprocessed foods should be adequate to meet our food enzyme needs, but that is not always a practical approach. 
When you’re constantly running from one thing to the next, food prep can take a backseat on the list of priorities. You don’t mean for this to happen, but it does, sometimes. 
So, what’s the answer to this nutrient deficiency? A whole-food supplement of food enzymes! Taking a supplement like this is a convenient way to guarantee that we have enough enzymes for proper digestion and utilization of the nutrients you consume. Want to know what enzyme supplement I take? Ask me HERE so you can get a 25% discount.
 
In addition to the lifestyle habits mentioned, you can replenish your reserve of enzymes, probiotics, and prebiotics through supplementation, as well as supporting healthy nutrition levels. Your gut thrives off diversity, yet even the best nutritional experts struggle to get the exact amounts of nutrients they need. 
The best thing you can do is arm your gut with a strong, natural probiotic. The proprietary blend PB Restore® offers more support than any other probiotic supplement out there. If you have a probiotic supplement, take it out and count the strains it has—I bet it isn’t more than 30! 

Contact me to learn how you can try PB Restore and get a 25% discount too!


 




Blessing for Health, Joy & Laughter,
Kathy

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