Gut Disruptor #1: Stress
- Olivia Borer
- Nov 4, 2015
- 4 min read
A couple of weeks back, I posted about the benefits of probiotics. I also mentioned that two of the main disrupters of our gut bacterial balance are stress and antibiotics. Today, I want to expand on how stress is a disrupter of our gut flora. Subsequently, four future posts in this mini-series will outline four other gut disrupters: antibiotics, lifestyle, food, and dehydration.
Before we dive in, let’s quickly review why it is so vital that our gut bacteria are in balance.
Our gut bacteria are composed of good (beneficial) bacteria and bad (harmful) bacteria, and total over 100 trillion bacteria living in our gut.
90% of our immune system is in our gut, which means that our balance of gut bacteria can determine how often we are sick, how we feel, and our overall general health and well-being.
Our gut bacteria aid in the digestion of food and help with the absorption of vital nutrients by our cells.
Our mood, digestive health, sleep, brain function, and numerous other bodily functions are largely influenced by our gut bacteria balance.
Okay, now that we have our basic facts straight, let’s uncover first of five major disrupters of our precious and valuable gut bacteria: stress.
What Does Stress Do to Our Gut?
Simply put, stress wreaks havoc on our minds and bodies. It increases our production of the stress hormone, cortisol, which, if it remains chronically elevated, cortisol can be very damaging to the body. This increase in cortisol puts our body in a constant state of “fight or flight” (or sympathetic state), which causes our body to think that it is constantly under attack from outside forces.
As a result, our blood pressure rises, our heart rate increases, and our blood vessels are restricted. When we are constantly in the “fight or flight” state (also known as chronic stress), our body never has a chance to relax and return to a parasympathetic state. Consequently, our gut lining (which keeps good things in and bad things out of our gut) becomes permeable, allowing harmful pathogens to enter into our gut and disrupt our gut flora balance. Chronic exposure to stress also simulates the growth of certain “bad” bacteria, thereby reducing the diversity of the bacteria in the gut.
Hopefully this brief summary made it clear: stress is not good for our gut. So, what are major sources of stress in our lives? Lack of sleep; family, school, undereating, and job demands; starvation; anxiety… the list goes on and on.
When thinking about the sources of stress in your life, consider both emotional and physical stressors. Lack of sleep and our jobs are common sources of stress, but undereating (and thereby undernourishing) is another more common source of stress on the body (especially since society tells us that 1200 calories a day is maintainable and acceptable - NOT TRUE!).
What Can We Do About Stress?
Obviously, stress is inevitable, but how can we combat the sources of stress in our lives and make lessen stress's effects on our guts?
First, take time each day to sit and just be still. Maybe you meditate during this time, maybe you pray, maybe you journal. Either way, take a small portion of your day (as little as 5 minutes!) to allow your body to relax and unwind, not bothered by the demands of your life. Start out slowly and gradually increase this time as you become better at relaxing and destressing.
This is vital around meal time. Make sure that you sit down and take time to eat and enjoy your meals. Rushing through meals without chewing properly or getting into a nourishing mindset will ultimately result in an increase in stress for the body and digestion system.
Second, assess your current situation: is your source of stress something you can control (like a dirty house) or something out of your control (a demanding professor at school)? If your job is the main source of your stress, can you switch jobs or somehow make it more manageable by switching departments? If your dirty house constantly stresses you out, can you hire a cleaning service to come every other week or spend 15 minutes every day cleaning, so that the mess never gets out of control? If school and tests are the main source of your stress, can you ask for tutoring or invest in a planner and commit to allotting your time properly for all your activities?
By assessing what you can and can’t control, you can pinpoint areas of stress that you have the power to positively change.
Lastly, what in your life can you remove that causes you stress? Are you involved in one too many clubs or organizations? Try cutting one activity out of your life and see how that effects your stress levels.
Starting the change to reduce the stress load in your life is not easy. However, managing our stress properly helps keep our gut bacteria in balance, as well makes us healthier overall. I challenge you to take one active step towards better managing your stress. Write this step down so that you are held accountable. This one small change could be a huge step in the right direction.
Here are a few more informative links about stress and gut health:
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