Sore joints – especially in my knees, bloated stomach, terrible smelling frequent gas, an uncomfortable full feeling in my stomach, ovary pain, anxiety, low energy points during the day – this was my life.
Experts (Gynecologist) highly recommended I have a hysterectomy, have a heap of tests including x-rays, MRI’s and day surgery to have a look around in there.
I chose to break the rules. I decided not to jump to my specialist’s advice of operations and tests (which would have been a 12 week recovery period) but instead follow my gut instinct which was yelling to me ‘isn’t there another solution?
I am so happy I listened to my own advice.
I no longer have any joint soreness, no bloated stomach, I’m on top of my gas problem (much to my partners delight), I feel calm, lots of energy and my right ovary pain has gone!
Why was I suffering from these common complaints even though I ate healthy (or so I thought), exercised regularly and slept well?
This question led me on a journey of discovery and may help you discover WHY your gut health is SO IMPORTANT and in just a matter of weeks can often turn your health (and in my instance my life) around.
You may be surprised to know:
Bloated stomach, smelly gas, a full stomach, and even sore joints, anxiety, depression may be signs you need to look at the health of your gut.
Gut bacteria can affect your liver health. Women over 35 aim for a healthy liver, as the liver is the major fat burning organ in our body.
Poor liver function may increase your chances of cardiovascular diseases such as atherosclerosis, high blood pressure, heart attacks and strokes.
70% of your immune system is situated in your gut.
Scientists have been exploring the link between gut health and anxiety and depression with interesting findings depending on your ‘good bacteria versus bad bacteria’
My gut health started with dabbling in different ideas including reducing my sugar intake (which included fruit, honey, high sugar yoghurt and the obvious sugar culprits such as lollies, biscuits, cakes etc.)
I started to feel calmer, my joint pain started to subside and I started to have ‘all day energy’ with no afternoon slump.
I was inspired.
My next step was to look at the wheat and gluten that I was currently eating. This included bread, wraps and flour. I started to replace bread and wraps with salads, flour with coconut flour or gluten free flour, and started to increase my intake of nuts, seeds and good fat. My carbohydrates for energy included sweet potato, basmati rice and baked pumpkin (along with 40g blueberries and 1 piece of fruit a day)
My stomach started to feel flat, I no longer suffered from that uncomfortable full feeling and best of all my pain in my right side (that the doctors wanted to give me a hysterectomy for) reduced to 5-10%.
I had an ah-ha moment –
Food really is medicine and I am healing myself slowly through practice, patience and consistency.
My discoveries around gut health continue today. I do not have all the answers. I have much to learn and would like to share with you the professionals that have helped me so far take the steps into better gut health.
I highly recommend the following as a starting point.
Podcasts:
180 Nutriton - 180nutrition.com.au/180-tv-guests
180 Nutrition provide health sessions chatting with specialists, thought leaders and health professionals that challenge conventional thinking, share new insights and give some great, easy to use tips tricks and strategies to the listeners.
I really recommend these podcasts as a great starting point.
Website:
Dr. Josh Axe https://draxe.com/
Dr. Josh Axe is a certified doctor of natural medicine and clinical nutritionist with a passion to help people get healthy by using food as medicine.
Dr. Josh is an amazing resource for up to date research and information, 100’s of gluten free, gut healthy recipes, natural remedies and more. Check him out.
