The Real Health Podcast

On today's episode of the Real Health Podcast, it's all about the gut brain connection. Most often, hear about how the brain affects the gut, but today, we're gonna talk about how the gut affects the brain, specifically with the depression, anxiety, symptoms like IBS, and food reactions, how that actually can affect how you feel on a day to day basis. Well, welcome back to another episode of the Real Health Podcast. Today, it's all about the gut brain connection. And it's something that we hear a lot about, how the brain affects the gut through the vagus nerve and how when your brain is stressed, your gut can feel stressed as well.

But we're actually gonna flip it. We're gonna talk about how the gut directly impacts the brain. So not just how the brain affects the gut, but when your digestive system is unwell, how does that impact how you feel mentally? Is it brain fog, anxiety, depression? Well, all of those are linked to a dysfunctional gut.

Actually, when we look at studies with IBS, irritable bowel syndrome, this is not a digestive issue alone. Research validates the gut brain connection in IBS. And so when we simply say, hey, I feel just really bloated or my stomach feels anxious, there's an entire network of nerves called the second brain of the gut that directly impact how you feel and your mood more than than the brain sometimes itself. And so caring for the gut, like if you're in the season where you're struggling with anxiety or depression, it's, you know, coming up into the wintertime, you're like, I just need that vitamin D for mood boost. We got to look to the gut first because we don't want to just give ourselves vitamin D expecting us to get out of a mood, seasonal disorder when the reality is we're pounding sugar for holidays and disrupting our gut microbiome, creating inflammation and driving anxiety that way.

Your anxiety, your symptoms of anxiousness, depression, low mood, brain fog, feeling inflammation in the body, poor recovery, poor sleep can directly be tied to how healthy your gut is. So let's get into it. Let's talk through it. And the first thing you have to understand is that the gut has its own nervous system. There is an entire network of nerves, billions of nerves, hundreds of millions of neurons in your gut that we call the enteric nervous system.

And it's... We associate as the second brain of the body. And the enteric nervous system is responsible for motility of the gut, so bowel movements daily. One of the big issues that we see in constipation is not necessarily the food you're eating or the probiotics you aren't taking, but it's actually due to a stressed nervous system. And when the nervous system is stressed and in fight or flight, we're not in rest, digest and having proper bowel movements.

We see this a lot in kids, and it's why kids respond so favorably to chiropractic care because chiropractic care directly deals with the enteric nervous system. And by adjusting their little pelvis and tailbone and low back, those nerves directly control motility of the gut. The enteric nervous system is essential not just for intestinal motility, but also for blood flow to the gut, is right necessary for digestion and energy of your cells. Another important concept with the enteric nervous system is something we call the vagus nerve. And you might have heard of this as the calming down nerve or the biohacker's nerve to help, affect stress.

But the vagus nerve is not just a pathway of communication between the brain and the gut. It is actually a pathway of information from the gut to the brain. When your gut releases toxins from bad organisms like strep and staph and, citrobacteria, these overgrowth of bad bugs or viruses or even parasitic infections, you're sending these endotoxins up the pathway of this nerve that's driving a neurological stress response. This can create symptoms like anxiety. And we see this a lot in kids with that situational PANDAS episode where all of a sudden they start having tics, Tourette's, and psychotic symptoms.

It's a lot of times associated with that nasty, strep bug that we see proliferate in their gut. And so the vagus nerve can directly be impacted with your gut health, which will directly affect your brain. And those two systems are constantly in communication. So your brain doesn't simply tell your gut what to do. Your gut is constantly sending information back.

It is a two way conversation. It is not just brain to gut. The other important aspect of how the gut impacts the brain is most people don't realize that 90 to 95% of serotonin is actually produced in the stomach, in the gut, in the gastrointestinal tract. So virtually all serotonin, which is an inhibitory neurotransmitter, this is a break type hormone to the brain, is produced in the gut. Think of it this way.

That SSRI, the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor, that increases serotonin levels, the big flooding of serotonin in the brain, that directly affects mood and depression and anxiety. That medication is already in the gut, and it's in the gut through specific cells, and those cells, when they're healthy, can create adequate serotonin levels that can transfer through the enteric nerves, through the vagus nerve, get to the brain, get into the bloodstream. And as you have adequate serotonin from a healthy gut, we can have normalization of mood in a lot of cases. And so what we should be looking at is how well our gut is making serotonin through a healthy intestinal cells. Those intestinal cells, they are so important, to the production of serotonin.

And so for you, if you're dealing with anxiety, depression, and we need to maximize serotonin before we necessarily jump on a medication, we should consider optimizing gut. And at the end of this podcast, towards the end, we'll give you some solutions to do that. So there are reasons behind it. And one of the big issues with not producing enough serotonin is just not enough beneficial bacteria. That's usually an issue.

Sometimes there's a gut lining issue. The intestinal lining is inflamed, and we'll talk through some solutions to support that. But there is an incredible nutrient that I use that dramatically improves the gut to brain access, gives your cells energy they need to repair in your intestines, and can dramatically influence how you feel on a day to day basis. So I'll give you that one at the end of the podcast today. There are five ways an unhealthy gut may affect the brain, and the first one is altered vagus nerve signaling.

When the vagus nerve is stressed, your brain's gonna be stressed. When we get poor communication between gut and brain, we are in a stressed state, and as the gut is distended and inflamed and there's these signals that are being sent to the brain, this will directly affect how you feel. Your digestive system is constantly getting information, reporting information to your brain. So, it doesn't just get it, it reports it. When the vagus nerve is stressed, your brain is going to be stressed.

The second is microbial imbalance, when the gut doesn't have enough beneficial and broad based bacteria and it's overgrown with these nasty bacterial loads or infections, fungus, yeast, or parasitic infections. This can release a toxin in the body that directly affects how you feel, and we see this in psychiatric diagnoses. The question isn't just what bacteria live in your gut, but fundamentally what are they doing? And when we improve the diversity of your gut flora, it directly will affect mood. There's specific probiotics that have been given, researched, and now given and prescribed for mood disorders and even symptoms like ADHD.

There is a very specific probiotic strand given for ADHD. And so if we think about that for a second, it's incredible how the bacteria of your gut directly affect your mood. Number three, the intestinal barrier is essential to get right. If your intestinal barrier is dysfunctional, inflamed, it is not gonna produce specific, what we call short chain fatty acids that allow energy to happen in your cells. When this gut lining is permeable, you're gonna be leaking food proteins into your bloodstream that's creating chronic inflammation.

And this is number four, this immune activation because intestinal barrier breakdown, this immune activation and chronic inflammation signaling is going to drive massive autoimmune like symptoms. It could be chronic fatigue, it could be joint pain, it could be brain fog, and all of those can be associated with a gut intestinal permeable issue that is driven through chronic inflammation. And so the question then is proposed, can gut dysfunction cause anxiety, depression, and brain fog? And the answer is absolutely yes, 100% yes. And so a patient is experiencing bloating or irregular...

If you have bloating, irregular bowel movements, poor sleep, difficulty to focus, starting having some memory issues, increased anxiety during digestive flare ups, and greater sensitivity to stress, these are several overlapping symptoms that are all tied to a dysfunctional gut. And when we look at this as like a diagnosis, it could be diagnosed as IBS, which fundamentally is a multifaceted problem of gut barrier issues, gut microbiome problems, poor production of short chain fatty acids, chronic inflammation. And the gut, just as much as it can create harm to the body by being unwell, it can create health and wellness if you care for it well. So today, here's your five strategies, five ways to improve your gut brain connection. How do we improve this connection piece to improve mood disorders, whether it's seasonal or non seasonal, whether it's anxiety or depression, whether it's focus or memory issues, whether it's brain fog or energy.

These are five ways. The number one is gonna... You gotta feed your microbiome every day. So do something to feed your microbiome. For me, it's usually kombucha, sauerkraut, kimchi, something fermented.

But something fermented is really important. Number two, feed it through fiber. So selective fiber. So that's a lot of just plants. It could be also seeds like chia seeds.

It could be even, hey, I can't get enough in, so I'm going take in insoluble fiber supplements. But fiber fundamentally is feeding your organisms in your gut. So if you're not taking fiber, we're not stabilizing blood sugar, and we're not feeding bacteria. And if we're not consuming fermented foods, then we're not growing the bacteria in our gut. Something that's really important about fermented foods, don't consume the same fermented food every day for the next five years.

That's called monoculturing, and monoculturing is a problem where you're growing a specific strand of bacteria without diversifying those bacteria. So one thing that you really have to understand here is gut microbiome balance is crucial with diversity. Not consuming the same foods and the same fermented foods every day for the rest of your life. You've got to diversify the bacteria. Number three, you gotta prioritize sleep.

If you don't sleep, your gut can get into an IBS state pretty quickly. Seven to eight hours a night is essential. Sleep timing is is is sometimes just as important, making sure you're going to sleep and waking up at the same time for the proper cortisol release. Regulate stress. See sunlight, walk, train, sauna, but get adjusted.

All of those help regulate stress. And if you can become better stress adaptive, your gut will directly benefit. And the last one is if you have persistent symptoms and you're doing all the right strategies, there's a problem here. Get a stool analysis, figure out what's going on in the gut. Is it a permeability issue?

Is it gut dysbiosis? Do I have bacterial infections, yeast infections, parasitic infections? Am I allergic to gluten? Am I celiac? These are really important questions.

And so if you've done a lot of work on your gut, you're supporting stress, you're taking in a healthy nutritional balance, you're getting sleep, you're getting adjusted, you're working out, and you're still in that state, you got to dive in deep and figure out what's going on. Don't just assume it'll go away, especially because the gut could rebound pretty quickly when you're doing the right things. So what about probiotics? Alright. A lot of people talk about them.

And I would tell you this. I... I've been a huge fan of probiotics, and there are situations where absolute probiotics are are are right. But more bacteria isn't always better. You heard it right from me, a guy that's recommended probiotics for years.

More bacteria or more probiotics or everyone taking them isn't always better. We want the right intervention for the right person. One person may not need... I I do labs and see them. One person doesn't need more probiotics.

They have actually too much. But all of sudden, you see a strand like achromanxia that's low or nonexistent, and we need to specifically target that guy. Someone may need fungus, like saccharomyces is a yeast, saccharomyces is blurred. They may need that. One person may just need fiber.

We need to feed the bacterial system. And so it's really important to look at what you specifically need and don't just take a probiotic just to take it. It doesn't necessarily mean it's right for you. Now, what is that supplement I talked about before, which I think is an absolute game changer when it comes to optimizing the gut. Well, when the gut bacteria, when those microbes ferment things like dietary fiber, they produce a special compound, a very special compound.

And these are called short chain fatty acids or SCFAs. Short chain fatty acids are just a remarkable molecule, specifically butyrate or in supplement form, call it butyric acid. And butyrate helps... They literally help fuel colon cells and supports intestinal barrier function. If you are having an issue of chronic intestinal permeability problems, you may not be producing enough short chain fatty acids.

And instead of taking months to rebuild your intestinal flora, you could actually take short chain fatty acids or butyric acid today to help reestablish that intestinal barrier by fueling your colonic cells to regrow and redevelop that... Those actin myosin... The the actin, gliding, junctions to reestablish the intestinal barrier. And butyric acid is actually really important not just in intestinal permeability, but blood brain permeability. When you look at that actin zone of the gut, it it is the...

Excuse me. It's exact same gut, barrier exists in the blood brain barrier. So when you ever whenever you have a leaky gut, you typically have a leaky brain. So taking butyric acid can effectively eliminate brain fog very quickly. So if you're dealing with brain fog, right, after you eat, chronic fatigue, poor energy, butyrate or butyric acid is an absolute game changer, and it's one of my favorite ways to feed your gut microbiome.

Actually, I would take butyrate or butyric acid over probiotic 10 out of 10 times. And so if just like, Hey, I've been taking this probiotic for a while. I don't feel much different. Or, Hey, I'm looking to optimize my gut. What's one nutrient I should be looking at?

Butteric acid should be something you absolutely look towards. And when we look at the effects of butyric acid, we see a major impact on the neuroimmune system. And this is this is a powerful way to start altering or altering how your immune system's interacting with your brain. Mutyric acid, game changer. So today, how does the how does the gut affect the brain?

Well, in a lot of ways, specifically how you feel, your mood, how you're functioning, your energy. And if you support your gut right, you can make a dramatic improvement in your overall health. But if you get stuck and you've been doing all those right things, make sure you work with the provider to look at those labs figure out what is going on in the gut. And worst case, you just want to jump on something and look at a supplement that can optimize the gut, check out Butyric Acid. Thanks for listening to another episode of the Real Health Podcast.