You’re eating well, meal prepping, eating lots of veggies, health starches and protein! But you’re bloated still! Here is a quick lesson on digestion and 5 tips on how to fix a bloated belly for once and for good! If you’re up for a BIGGER challenge check out my Flat Belly Challenge!
FIX A BLOATED BELLY: LET’S TALK DIGESTION!
Digestion starts at the mouth! Your teeth breaks down food into smaller piece while your saliva helps turn food into a form that can be absorbed. They are a CRUCIAL part of digestion so make sure to chew mindfully and slowly!
As food travels down your throat and esophagus, your brain triggers your stomach to get to work! Once foods reaches your stomach, digestive enzymes and hydrochloric acid (aka stomach acid) begin to break down food. By the time food passes through your stomach to your intestines, it’s liquid! In the small intestine is where most of the nutrient absorption happens. 90% of nutrients are absorbed in the small intestine! Needless to say, a healthy stomach and gut is essential to digestion!
Fix A Bloated Belly: Here Are 5 Things You Can Do Today To Keep Your Digestive System Healthy
1. Add Some Vinegar
Start each meal with 1 to 2 tablespoons of organic apple cider vinegar. Apple cider vinegar improves stomach acid!
2. Get Fermented
Ingest some probiotics (aka live bacteria) from fermented foods like kimchi, sauerkraut and organic yogurt. They help boost the good bacteria in your gut that help digest food!
3. Get Digestive
No we don’t mean those digestive cookies! We mean enzymes! Buy a bottle of digestive enzymes and have them before each meal to help you break down food. It’s one thing to eat good food, it’s another to be able to break it down and absorb it. So give your stomach some help!
4. Drink More Water
Ensure you are drinking LOTS of water. Remember healthy veggies, grains and fruit often come with fibre. Fibre needs water to move through the digestive tract. Aim to drink 2.5 litre of water PER DAY! Best way to do this is to keep a 1 litre water bottle on you at all times and drink two to three of those per day.
5. Heal Your Gut
L-glutamine and aloe have proven to help improve gut healthy and heal a leaky gut! A tablespoon of both can do wonders!
Follow the above 5 fixes and monitor your symptoms. If you are STILL feeling gassy and bloated, there is a chance that you are intolerant to one or more of the foods you are eating. At that point, it’s best to speak to a healthy practitioner and get tested!
It’s also important to note that some people’s gut cannot withstand a lot of high fibre foods. If this is you, scale back on fibrous veggies and see if you feel better. It is recommended that we take in 21 to 38 grams of fibre per day. But again remember not everyone’s gut is the same. Play around with those numbers and see what works best for you! Some will feel better on the lower end of that scale! And if you up for the ultimate challenge, check out our Flat Belly Challenge!
