How does stress affect your gut?
How does stress affect your gut?
Healthy Living
No conversation about gut health is complete without talking about stress.
Your gut is a fascinating area, and we could (and do!) talk about this all the time (we even have a whole programme dedicated to this!). Today we want to talk with you about how involved your nervous system is in the digestion and absorption of your food. The human gut is lined with more than 100 million nerve cells – that’s practically a brain in itself! So it makes sense that stress causes digestive problems right?
Did you know that the opposite of the “fight or flight” state of stress that we are all familiar with is called “rest and digest”?
Your body does not easily manage stress and digesting food at the same time. Here are some ways that stress affects your ability to digest your food:
- SHUT DOWN: Stress can have varying effects on digestion. For the majority, it either fully or partially shuts the process down, leaving food sitting in your gut undigested for longer periods of time, often resulting in bloating and constipation. For some others, it can be a more acute response, whereby the body chooses to purge food while stressed, and cause bowel looseness or vomiting.
- REFLUX: The stress response can cause the trapdoor that closes off the esophagus from the stomach to spasm, causing stomach acid to make it’s way back up into the esophagus, causing it to burn the esophageal lining -reflux. This can be a silent condition, that can cause great harm.
- GUT BACTERIA: When your body is experiencing a stress response, the chemical reaction that is produced by a part of the nervous system (the sympathetic nervous system) wipes out a large proportion of your good gut bacteria. Over time, this can lead to a weakened immune system and systemic inflammation.
- REDUCED BLOOD FLOW: Another way the stress response can affect your digestive system is by decreasing overall blood flow to the body. When you are stressed, your blood flow is redirected to the brain and to the limbs, as the body perceives you are under attack. You need the blood directed to those parts of your body for quick thinking and fighting or fleeing. If your body is stressed while you are eating, due to eating too fast, eating in a negative emotional state, or eating too much, then it can cause your metabolism to slow down.
CORTISOL AND INSULIN: Stress chemistry produces two hormones that are part of this whole process – cortisol and insulin. These hormones that are released when you are stressed tell the body to store weight, store fat, and not build muscle.
So with what’s been happening all around us lately, do you think our guts are in the best state for digestion? Probably not.
Given that the brain needs to prepare the body for food, by telling the gut to produce stomach acid, enzymes and bile, what do you think our takeaway food culture is doing for our gut health? There is often no time for the brain to achieve these things, so food lands, often poorly chewed, in a gut that isn’t ready to receive it.
Calming the nervous system then, has profound effects on your ability to digest and assimilate your food.
The above is only the beginning. By understanding how your stress levels affect your digestion, you are starting a profound shift in your health.