Have you ever marked when your tummy is well – all is well? And if the tummy is feeling out of sorts – you feel miserable for days, weeks, or even years at a time!

Why does this happen?

This is because your intestines are home to not only your digestive system but your nervous system and immune system as well.

Fad diets, high usage of antibiotics, stress and environmental toxins all play a part in weakening your gut.

Your gut is the pathway through which nutrients are incorporated into the body. If your gut health isn’t up to par, even the most nutritious foods may not be broken down or absorbed properly. Eating healthy food is only half of the nutrition story. You need to be in the ideal state to digest food, too.

So while it’s important to make wholesome food choices, it’s just as important to prepare your body to digest it.

 

How different parts of gut get affected:

Mouth: Not chewing food thoroughly is a setup for digestive troubles. Mechanically breaking your food down to a liquid state mixes in digestive enzymes that begin dissolving proteins, carbs, and fats even before you swallow. Always remember to eat your solids like liquids and liquids like solids.

Stomach: Your stomach digests food with enzymes and acids, distilling it into a slurry that moves into the small intestine. Over stuffing your stomach may lead to incomplete digestion that can negatively affect your assimilation of nutrients and encourage the overgrowth of bad bacteria and yeast leading to bloatedness.

Lymphoid Tissue: An important player in your immune system, about two-thirds of this tissue is located in the gut. It’s job is to filter, process or neutralize food-borne chemicals and bacteria. Add undigested food particles to the mix, and the immune system can become overtaxed.

Large & Small Intestine: If there is inadequate fibre in your system, elements of slow-moving waste can re-enter the system, creating a variety of inflammatory and toxicity problems throughout the body.

Gut Lining:  Under a continuous assault from processed foods, sugar, food intolerances, stress, toxins, alcohol, infections, and medications, it is easy to irritate or inflame this lining.

Hence, it all starts in the mouth and is scientifically taken forward to nourish our body. If we don’t take care of this process, it is easy for our digestive process to go out of whack.

 

How to heal your gut?

The 3 point Gut Healing Plan

Eliminate

The first step towards healing your gut is to identify and remove sources of gut irritation, rather than attempting to suppress its symptoms with drugs.

• The common irritants include sugar, dairy, gluten, soy,caffeine and the chemical additives found in many processed foods. It may be none, one or all that may be contributing to irritation of gut lining in your case. Try and eliminate one by one for two weeks, then reintroduce the food, and keep notes on its effects. If you feel bloated, fatigued, or gassy, add that food to your elimination list.
• Avoid alcohol and NSAIDs

Eat to Rebuild

The second step is to give your body what it needs to rebuild the gut lining.

• Whole foods to provide natural fibre to eliminate toxins from the body.Whole foods are also full of vitamins, minerals, phytonutrients and enzymes the small intestine needs to heal.
• Eat plenty of raw foods. Raw fruits and vegetables provide digestive enzymes that get killed after cooking.
• Get more omega-3 fatty acids. Flax seeds,fatty fish,walnuts are some natural sources.
• Add a probiotic: These beneficial bacteria strengthen your immune system, improve metabolism, help your body make vitamins, and aid in the absorption of minerals.
• Eat fermented foods: To get your good probiotic bugs to stick around, eat daily servings of prebiotic- and probiotic-rich foods such as yogurt (dairy or nondairy), dosa or idli,sauerkraut and khimchi.

Eat mindfully. 

Before taking your first bite, look at your food and take in its aroma – this will trigger the cephalic phase of digestion, an initial release of enzymes that help break down your food.

As you eat, chew thoroughly, paying attention to your food’s flavour and texture. Avoid multitasking or rushing while you eat. Take pauses and breaths between bites, allowing your digestive system to keep pace.

Avoid screens while eating and focus on chewing your food well, listen to your stomach and stop when it gives you the full signal.

 Get stress and sleep under control: Lack of sleep and stress, both come in way to heal your gut. Do your body a favor and stay rested and practice stress management techniques so that it can focus on healing.

 

Super Foods to Heal your Gut

Sugar cane

Crunchy sugar cane releases good sugars and fibre slowly into your system. Known to stimulate and boost the immune system, sugar cane juice is a rich supply of Vit. C, antioxidants and relieves symptoms of constipation, bloating and cramping.

Gulkand

Prepared from dried rose petals, gulkand is known to improve appetite, better digestion, reduce stress, acidity and stomach heat. This flower wonder can treat ulcers, minimize intestine swelling and strengthen the heart, liver and central nervous system.

Coconut Water

We all know this – but here it is once again. Coconut water is composed of important sugars, vitamins, minerals, amino acids, and phytohormones. It also contains inorganic ions that boost your body’s antioxidant system.

Desi Ghee

One of Ayurveda’s most treasured foods, ghee has incredible healing properties.

From our dals to khichdi and halwas to chapati; ghee is a high quality food source of butyric acid, which makes it an ideal pick to support the health of the intestinal walls. The cells of your colon use butyric acid as their preferred source of energy. Ghee also plays a key role in balancing hormones and maintaining healthy cholesterol.

Gut Healing Benefits from your Masala ka Dabba

• Turmeric/Haldi: A powerful anti-inflammatory agent.
• Cumin/Jeera: A natural digestive, it relieves diarrhoea, bowel spasms, gas and stomach aches.
• Garam Masala: Improves digestive fire. It increases your body temperature which raises your metabolism and decreases constipation.
• Carom/Ajwain and Fenugreek/Methi: The seeds have water-soluble fiber which can help soothe an upset stomach, constipation and inflammation in the stomach.
• Mustard/Rye: An excellent source of magnesium and dietary fiber, so it can help with constipation or irregular stools. Mustard seeds can also stimulate your appetite, soothe an upset stomach, and act as a laxative.
• Sesame/Til: These seeds are packed with fiber which can help reduce constipation and diarrhoea both. There is also a lot of copper in sesame seeds which reduces inflammation and assists in the intake of iron.
• Fennel/Saunf: Provides relief from constipation, diarrhoea, indigestion and flatulence. Fennel also has an amino acid called histidine that can help treat anaemia.

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