Digestive Health All Disease Begins in the Gut

Do You Know 10 Things Which Affect the Health of Your Gut?

Life Extension has devoted an article to probiotics in their May 2014 issue proving that cancer and many aging diseases are contributed to by imbalance of probiotics in the colon. Wow! It only makes sense that we put a whole-hearted effort into caring for our digestive systems and the probiotics in our colons! Did you know that just 24 hours of antibiotics kills off the healthy probiotics in your gut, thus wrecking your digestion and damaging your health, until such time as you restore proper floral balance within your intestines?

Unhealthy digestion is evident when any of the following conditions are present: acid reflux, gas, bloating, negative reactions to food, loose stools or constipation, inflammation anywhere in the body, skin disorders anywhere on the body, eczema, dermatitis, hives, psoriasis, rosacea, cracked finger nails, acne, parasites, candida, food allergies, throat and nose issues (clearing throat, runny nose, etc.), iron deficiency, gallbladder diseases, B12 deficiency, arthritis.   

Poor digestion will eventually cause one’s health to break down. Therefore it is crucial to focus on perfect digestion if you want a long and vital life! 

Healthy digestion results in feeling energy, vitality, comfort and peace after a meal. 

Do You Know the Four Keys to a Healthy Gut?

1. One needs to restore a proper balance of the 100 trillion microbes living within the gut by providing abundant probiotics.
2. One also needs to provide adequate amounts of minerals and vitamins as these provide your gut the building blocks it needs to function properly.
3. One also needs to stop damaging the intestinal wall, which is accomplished by removing stress, tension, fear, GMO grains, glutton, carbs, and toxins.
4. Finally, a colon cleanse is generally necessary to release built up fecal matter from the inside of the intestinal wall which, if present, is poisoning one from within their gut, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Dr. Schulze is one place where you can purchase a good colon cleanse. 

Since the surface area of your gut can cover two tennis courts when stretched out flat, assume it will take a bit of time to heal the gut (several weeks to several months). Considering the fact that all disease begins in the gut, it is worth your time and effort to fully understand your digestive system, and take all necessary steps to ensure its health. Your comfort, life and well-being depend on it.

The intestinal wall is the gatekeeper that decides what gets in and what stays out 

Have you ever considered the fact that the contents of the gut are technically outside the body? The gut is a hollow tube that passes from the mouth to the anus. Anything that goes in the mouth and isn’t digested will pass right out the other end. This is, in fact, one of the most important functions of the gut: to prevent foreign substances from entering the body. When the intestinal barrier becomes permeable (i.e. “leaky gut syndrome”), large protein molecules escape into the bloodstream. Since these proteins don’t belong outside of the gut, the body mounts an immune response and attacks them. Studies show that these attacks play a role in the development of autoimmune diseases like Hashimoto’s and Type 1 diabetes, among others.

Can You Picture Each of the Various Parts of Your Digestive System?

Do You UNDERSTAND the Digestive Process?

Digestion actually begins in the brain. When you see or smell your food, saliva begins to be produced. Then by chewing your food thoroughly, you prepare it properly for the HCI and digestive enzymes in your stomach to break the food down.

The pH of gastric acid is 1.5 to 3.5 in the human stomach. This low pH level typically keeps it free of microbes. Battery acid has a pH of 1.0, so we’re talking about a really acidic environment. If your gastric acid pH rises, it results in: gas, bloating, bacterial overgrowth, indigestion, and heartburn. One of the benefits of this highly acidic environment is that it helps keep the rest of the digestive tract more sterile. It’s difficult for pathogenic bacteria to survive in this acidic environment. If the acid level starts to fall (pH begins to rise), it can reduce the stomach's ability to kill off pathogens.

Blood type "A" people tend to need an HCL supplement. Also, HCL declines with age, especially if over 60. You may need 1 capsule with a snack, 2 with a light meal, and 3 - 4 if eating meat. If gassy after a meal, you are not digesting food well, so you may need more HCL or digestive enzymes. If you get a burning sensation in your stomach, you have taken too much HCL, so immediately drink down a full glass of water to delete your stomach acid, and then back off a capsule in the future. Steps to strengthen digestion are provided here. 

The food is then dumped into your small intestines accompanied by bile from the gall bladder and digestive enzymes from the pancreas which complete the digestion and prepare it for absorption through the wall of your small intestines into your body. The flora in the intestine works to break down food particles into vitamins that we can use. Finally, waste leaves the body via the colon.

1. Read this article Heal Your Gut by Chris Kresser. It presents an easy to understand and impressive overview of how your gut works, what makes it break down, and simple steps for fixing the two primary functional breakdowns, which are the intestinal wall allowing things to leak through which shouldn’t, and the 100 trillion microbes within the gut becoming unbalanced and toxic.
2. Learn about the brain in your gut, from Mercola, a TED talk, Scientific American, and Wikipedia.
3. The New Testament’s Greek word for the gut is splankna, and is translated as “compassion.”  Jesus moved by compassion, healed. Click here for a blog on Compassion & Splankna. Also, the Holy Spirit flows from our innermost being (Jn. 7:38 - belly).
4. To deepen your understanding of gut health, click on each hyperlink below:

• Eating This Can "Tear Holes" in Your Gut
• Why Your Gut Flora Powerfully Dictates Whether You're Healthy or Sick
• How Inflammation Affects Every Aspect of Your Health
• The Brain-Gut Connection
• Your Gut-Brain Connection – Could it Be Hijacking Your Health?
• Gut Flora May Offer Clues About Autism
• The Case for Healthy Bowels: The Vital Connection Between Your Gut and Your Health
• "Leaky Gut" Intestinal Protein Linked to Autoimmune Disorders
• Is a Leaky Gut Causing You to Pack on the Pounds?
• The GAPs Diet and What can you eat on the GAPS Intro Diet? Also: What can you eat on the GAPS diet? and Seven Health Benefits of the GAPS diet.

Do You Know What Steps to Take to Strengthen the Digestive System?

1. Constipation: Add fiber to your diet.
2. Loose stools: Parasites will cause loose stools, requiring you to do a parasite cleanse. Many are lactose intolerant. This produces loose stools, so try omitting dairy products, or take a Lactaid pill whenever you eat dairy (available in all grocery stores). If your stomach is too alkaline, one result will be loose stools. Click here to earn more about maintaining the proper acid level in your stomach.
3. Improve digestion: No liquids during meals, and if you do drink a bit, make sure it is room temperature. Take a good digestive enzyme and a good probiotic (as digestion takes place in both the stomach and in the intestines).  To digest foods, your stomach needs to be acidic. Using muscle testing, my stomach acid tested as being to alkaline. In response, I muscle tested strong for taking HCl Digestive Enzyme with each meal to increase hydrochloric acid in my stomach.  I was taking HCI years ago and quit because a  naturopath I respected, advised one needs to be very careful with HCI (which is true - never take on an empty stomach or if you have duodenal ulcers). If you take too much you will have loose stools, so cut back. Obviously, I should not have quit as I now re-discovered that HCI was crucial in restoring my digestion! When not taking HCI, my body would heat up after each meal. With HCI, my body felt good after a meal! To ensure you have plenty of minerals in your system so your body can effectively do the work of rebuilding, take a good multivitamin. We recommend muscle testing to discover which of the above products to take. All products must be whole food products and not synthetic, as synthetic vitamins have been proven to shorten lifespan. 
4. Eat the most digestible foods. We have made the following changes:

• Largely dropped grains from our diet as they are very hard on the walls of the colon.
• We enjoy protein shakes twice a day as described here. Without adequate HCI in your stomach, these are hard to digest.
• Add fermented foods (two are listed below) as all fermented foods are outstanding for healing digestion and balancing gut flora.

Greek Yogurt (All Natural Greek Yogurt) with live cultures – the yogurt must be unpasteurized and have no added sugars or artificial anything, and if you prefer, it can be low fat. Mix with stevia, berries, nuts, and shredded coconut to enhance its taste and healing value. Delicious!

Apple Cider Vinegar (Purchase Bragg Organic Raw – Unfiltered Apple Cider Vinegar and mix with water and stevia or honey, and it tastes fine). Apple Cider Vinegar when taken before meals increase the digestion, is healing for the colon, and produces weight loss.  

5. Detox: Take cell detox and body detox, and/or a good colon cleanse kit which you can purchase from any health food store. Use bio-degradable cleaning solutions, body soaps, and creams.
6. Get off antibiotics as they kill flora in the colon, as does chlorinated water so use a good water filter on the faucet you drink water from as well as a de-chlorinator for your showerhead so you don’t breathe in toxic chlorine steam from the hot water. Installing these keeps many toxins from entering your body. Toxins damage probiotics and put a heavy load on your body's systems. You can purchase sink filters here and shower filters here.
7. Why not end a meal with one of your favorite teas which help with digestion? Examples include Tulsi, Novel, Green, Chai, Peppermint or Kombucha.

Extremely Valuable Resources:

• My Childhood Allergies Were So Bad, My Parents Almost Put Me in a Bubble
• Is Your Stomach Too Alkaline
• How to Relieve Gas Naturally (Also, order his excellent free downloadable book “Reversing Digestion Misery” which is advertised in the margin of this same web link). I discovered the best solution to be taking HCL, food enzymes and Beno with meals and three probiotics on an empty stomach and away from food.

How My Digestion Was Healed!

After halfhearted attempts for 30 years to heal my digestion, it got totally out of hand, with a rash moving across my body and my system reacting to ALL foods. So I tackled it head-on and took all of the above steps to restore my digestion. I had come to the unbelievable point that in order to eat any meal, I needed to take 11 digestive aid pills with each meal, just so my system would not react to food (3 digestive enzymes, 3 probiotics, 3 HCL, and 2 gas and bloating).

The week I experienced the greatest digestive healing was when I added in recommendations from Dr. Frank Berzanski, my Maximized Living chiropractor. He suggested Max GI, Albizia 1:2, Braggs Apple Cider Vinegar, and Men’s Multivitamin. In addition, that week I stopped eating grains, switched from drinking ice cold water with meals to room temperature water. I chewed my food longer, ate slower, and drank much less with each meal.

That week, I could feel that something changed inside. The inflammation I had experienced when I ate was gone! With such great healing success that week, I decided to begin taking Braggs Apple Cider Vinegar before each meal (you can purchase this in many grocery stores. Make sure it is Braggs). My sense is that Braggs Apple Cider Vinegar was pivotal in greatly improving my digestion, although I am not sure as the week I experienced the greatest improvement was a week I was doing quite a few things differently. I shall write an entire blog about Apple Cider Vinegar and fermented foods. That week, my digestion got healed! It is amazing! It is interesting that Braggs Apple Cider Vinegar is acidic so that in itself was contributing to more acidic digestive juices in my stomach. I discovered later, that I could replace Braggs Apple Cider Vinegar with Betaine HCI.

In reflecting back, I noticed that when I drank coffee or Apple cider vinegar before a meal, my digestion appeared better, thus apparently lowering the pH of my stomach. Coffee has a pH of 4 and Apple Cider vinegar between 3 and 4. Water is around 6.5.

Symptoms gone! The body rash that moved from legs to arms to shoulders and chest is now completely gone. My body's aversion to all foods, which I had for 18 months, is now gone. My constant need to clear my throat is gone. The issue with my nose dripping constantly is now gone.

What We Do to Maintain Digestive Health

1. Take Food Enzymes and HCL with each meal. Take  probiotics on an empty stomach. 
2. Global Healing Center provides Oxy-Powder which is an outstanding colon cleanse. With 12,700+ reviews, it receives an unheard rating of 4.85 out of 5! Oxy-Powder gets oxygen into the intestine which kills off any anaerobic bacteria that should not be living there and scrubs the small and large intestines. I used Oxy-Powder and experienced excellent results. For maintenance, take it perhaps one week a month or whenever you experience constipation, loose stools, or order-filled or gaseous intestines. Generally taking just 2-4 capsules for a few days will resolve the issue. Global Healing Center sells Oxy-Powder, as well as a liver, cleanse and a parasite cleanse.
3. We purchase Lactate from the grocery store and take 1- 2 any time we consume dairy.
4. I also continue to take Betaine HCI as I have an alkaline stomach.
5. Anxiety was healed with Clearing Cellular Memories - A Prayer Workshop For Healing Emotional Roots to Diseases

So Why Didn't God Show Me How to Heal My Digestion Years Ago? 

Since I hear His voice through two-way journaling and receive His guidance through dreams why was this solution not revealed earlier?

Answer: I have discovered that God is a God who hides Himself (Isa. 45:15), and He asks us to become kings and earnestly search out a matter (Prov. 25:2). Generally, full answers are not revealed until we become whole-hearted in our search. That is why I have learned to focus for a year on a topic, so I really learn what God wants to reveal to me in that area. Actually, in reflecting back, I realize I had known 30 years ago that I muscle tested to take Betaine HCI, but had discontinued because of a generally worded caution by a person I respected, without taking the time to re-muscle test to see if my body still needed Betaine HCI. Had I re-tested myself, I am sure I would have spared myself years of poor digestion because of having a stomach that was too alkaline to digest food properly.  Yup, live and learn!

Also, God’s design for how we learn things includes more than just personal journaling and dream interpretation. We are not an island, but members of a body where God gives different pieces of the puzzle to different people, so it’s wise to listen to others ahead of me in an area and learn from them.

There are many ways God speaks to us, and I have laid some of these out in what I call “The Leader’s Paradigm” (scroll down a bit) which you can review here. So I expect to gain truth from all the ways God speaks, and do not feel I have any right to limit Him to simply two.

Finally, I do not believe that just because God and I have been conversing for more than 25 years I have already heard everything He has to say to me or teach me. I expect to continue to receive revelation for every aspect of my life until the day I go home! He tells me what is most important or what I am able to hear day by day. I trust Him to reveal Truth to me according to His will and His schedule.

Digestive Health Series

• Digestive Health – All Disease Begins in the Gut
• Leaky Gut Syndrome Affecting Up to 80% of the Population 
• Exploring Apple Cider Vinegar – An Amazing Fermented Health Food
• A 21 Day Prayer Meditation for Digestive Health 
• Why Is it Valuable to Repeat a Prayer BOTH Morning and Evening?

Go Deeper - Get Healthy!