How Digestion Relates to All Chronic Disease
In this series of digestion, we have learned how digestion is supposed to work, what goes wrong with digestion, and some ways to help common digestive issues. Some of you may be thinking,
"well, I don't have digestion problems. So, what does digestion support have to do with me?"
Let us take a look at how digestion relates to ALL disease by focusing on the major epidemics in our society today: diabetes, autoimmune disorders, depression, and cardiovascular disease.
Digestion and Diabetes
Digestion is influenced by the foods we eat and specific organs can become over-burdened when we eat too much of something. A lifestyle of eating high sugar snacks, sugary drinks, highly refined snacks, bread, pasta, sandwiches, and desserts creates a heavy burden on the pancreas. This organ is responsible for releasing insulin which has one role of shuttling glucose to cells for energy. However, never before in history have humans had access to so much sugar and today a highly processed and sugary meal/snack floods the blood with glucose that the pancreas is unprepared for. Not enough insulin is released to bring glucose levels down, so the pancreas works harder and harder to make more insulin and finally, blood-glucose levels are dropped, but often too low and so the person might crash 1-2 hours after a meal and crave more sugar or stimulants, like coffee, to get back to homeostasis.
After repeated experiences of stressful sugar overload, the pancreas eventually becomes worn out. At the same time, insulin becomes less effective because glucose begins to stick to proteins and hormone receptors, like the insulin receptor. Insulin resistance, metabolic syndrome, and diabetes results.
Healthy digestion of carbohydrates becomes impaired during this process as well because the pancreas not only supplies insulin, but it also supplies enzymes for a further breakdown of carbohydrates. Someone who has a burdened pancreas might need to supplement with digestive enzymes and change their diet to bring their body back into a healthy balance.
Digestion and Autoimmune disease
The impaired digestive system means that the breakdown of food is not optimal, therefore the assimilation of nutrients is disrupted. The undigested food can disrupt the microbiome, the natural balance of bacteria in the gut, which breaks down the cells that help with the absorption of nutrients. These damaged cells in the intestines and dysbiosis (imbalanced microflora) allow the undigested food to break through the walls of the intestine and enter the bloodstream as an unrecognizable nutrient. The undigested food particles send signals to the body’s immune system as antigens and the body begins to create antibodies and immune response to these foods.
When a person continues to eat these certain foods that cause a reaction, the person’s immune system gets overburdened, constantly reacting to these particular antigens and eventually suppressing the immune response to other antigens entering the body. These other antigens can potentially affect tissues throughout the body and since the immune system has been over-burdened it does not realize it.
Eventually, the body’s ability to distinguish from self and non-self is lowered and the immune system starts attacking and killing cells that are the self, thus an autoimmune disease presents. Which autoimmune disease is present depends on which self-tissues the body is attacking.
Digestion and Depression
The small intestine lining and the blood-brain barrier are made of the same tissue and there are more neurons in your gut than in the entire spinal cord. This lining is called the enteric nervous system. Our gut microbes utilize the enteric nervous system to send signals to your brain and visa versa. Metabolites produced by microbes in the gut also affect the brain (ex. hormones like the 'happy hormone', serotonin).
A healthy bio-diverse micro-biome is essential to a healthy gut-brain connection. Taking care of the small intestine micro-biome looks like: fully digesting proteins, carbs, and lipids so as to not break through the wall of the small intestines; eating homemade fermented foods so as to keep the diversity of your local micro-biome; and limiting sugary, processed/refined, and toxic 'foods' that feed pathogenic bacteria in your gut.
The wonderful thing about this gut-brain connection is that it is a two-way street. Mindfulness and intention during meals and throughout the day can help balance your microbiome and your mood. Also, vagus nerve stimulation is essential to a healthy microbiome and brain.
Digestion and Cardiovascular Disease
As with autoimmune diseases, inflammation in the small intestines, dysbiosis, and poor digestion can cause overall inflammation in the body. This is because undigested food and toxins produced by pathogenic bacteria leak into the bloodstream through the small intestine wall. These foreign substances can cause damage to the endothelial lining of veins and arteries.
A high inflammatory diet, such as toxic oils, margarine, sugar, and refined carbohydrates, contributes to the inflammation in the endothelial walls. Without a proper immune and anti-inflammatory response, these conditions can become fatal. It is important to support the body's immune and anti-inflammatory systems by supporting digestion and removing possible allergens and toxins from the diet and environment.