When your digestion is sluggish, the rest of your body will feel it. You can end up with an imbalance in your hormones that affect the way you think and look. Hormonal imbalances can lead to depression, anxiety, and an increase in natural oil production.
Let’s not think about the discomfort and pain associated with a sluggish digestive system. Sometimes there’s just no way that you can sit without feeling fat and bloated, even if you have no weight to lose!
Poor digestion is usually linked to your diet. Most of your immune system lives in your gut, and if it reacts to the food you’ve eaten, it will become inflamed. That doesn’t mean you just have to live with it until the food is expelled and the immune system stops reacting.
You can improve your digestive within just two days. That’s right! 48 hours and the discomfort can be a thing of the past. Here are the steps you need to take over the two days.
Start Your Cleanse Right Away
Whether it’s one thing that you’ve just eaten or an accumulative problem, you need to start your cleanse right away. Stop eating the junk and focus on a healthy and balanced diet.
You don’t have time to eliminate the trigger foods right now. You just want to get rid of absolutely anything that is causing the sluggish digestive system. Don’t even think about a trial and error just yet. That can come later when your digestive system has repaired.
While your body can naturally detox itself, you can take steps to help. Start your morning with some lemon water. This will completely cleanse the system, fighting away at bacteria build up and balancing out the acid levels. Despite lemon being acidic, when mixed with water it has a more alkaline property!
Make an effort to start your cleanse as soon as you feel sluggish and uncomfortable. Get a tracker out and make a note of everything you eat and do to make sure you put your body first.
Stock Up on the Probiotics
Your digestive system will suffer from a build up of bad bacteria in the gut. You need to get rid of these bacteria by adding good bacteria to it. Yes, this can sound like a backward thing to do, but it is one of the best things for you.
Probiotics are the good bacteria that you want to stock up on. The good bacteria will overpower the bad stuff in your gut and help to line the intestines with an absorptive layer. You’ll find it easier to gain all the nutrients from any food that you choose to eat.
Don’t worry about your immune system. It does know the difference between the good and bad bacteria. The good bacteria don’t cause a disease. They help to produce the fatty acids and vitamins that your body needs to thrive.
They also help with the breaking down process of foods. This is important when you’re dealing with a backed up digestive system. Your body needs help to break down whatever food is in the way. You’ll find it much quicker to get rid of the reasons for the gas and bloating when you stock up on probiotics.
Change the Way You Currently Eat Your Food
Let’s look at the food you’re eating now. It’s not just about the type of food that you eat, but the way that you eat it. Too many of us consume our food as quickly as possible. It could be due to distracted eating (due to the computer or TV), or it could be linked to having to rush our food due to work. Whatever the reason, we don’t always chew our food fully.
Your body has to break down the food eventually. If you don’t chew it properly in the mouth, the digestive system will have to deal with it instead. The problem is your digestive system is already struggling. If you add more to it, your poor digestive system will just get worse.
When you’re trying to overcome the poor digestive system, you’ll need to chew your food. Make an effort to chew at least 10 times because you swallow. Do this for every single bite.
You can find this trick helps to avoid a backed up digestive system in the future. It will also help you to stop overeating. When you spend more time chewing, you slow down the consumption of food. Your stomach has the chance to pass a message to the brain to say you’re full, so you don’t feel the need to eat as many calories.
It can be hard to slow down your eating if you’re in a high-stress environment. Try to get away from your desk or the meeting room to eat as many of your meals as possible. You deserve this chance to eat in a relaxed way.
Drink Plenty of Water
Lemon water is a good way to start your day, but you want to make sure you remain hydrated throughout the next 48 hours. Water is essential to help your body break down all the food that is currently backing you up.
Water will digest solid lumps of food while helping your body to absorb all the nutrients. So you don’t just get rid of the underactive digestive system, but you will be a healthier person in the process. The water will help to dissolve the water-soluble fiber and will help to push through the non-soluble fiber in the digestive system.
Your stools will also become softer and easier to pass. This can help to prevent constipation while dealing with a poor digestive system.
Water will also be good to avoid digestive complaints in the future. When the body gets dehydrated, it will take water away from the least important parts. The digestive system is one of the first areas the water is taken from, as the organs are considered more important.
Avoid drinking too much water while you’re eating. When you do this, you dilute your stomach acid, which makes it much harder for the body to break down the food before it hits the intestines.
Get More Bitter Foods in Your Diet
It’s time to support the amount of acid your stomach has available to break down food. One of the best ways to do that is by eating more bitter foods. Lemons are good, but you can also get the benefit from other citric fruits and bitter greens. Stock up on mustard greens, kale, and rocket to help improve the breaking down process.
When your body breaks down more food before reaching the intestines, the whole digestive system has less work to do. It will be easier to push the waste through, absorb the nutrients, and get rid of the blockages.
It’s the bitter taste that you want. I know this will sound awful to eat, but it will be good for just a two-day period. With the bitter taste, your body gets the memo to start secreting more digestive juices. Your body gets the message that it needs to work effectively. Of course, chewing your food properly will also do this. You alert your stomach that food is coming and encourage it to produce more acid.
You can also boost the stomach acid by eating more acidic foods and ingredients. You want to eat all those foods you’ve been told to avoid for heart burn! It’s time to put balsamic vinegar on your salads and to add a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar to water.
Add Extra Fibre to Your Diet
Make sure all your meals have some fiber in them. You can get good sources of fiber through vegetables, fruits, and legumes. Vegetables tend to be the best because of their water content without as many natural sugars. You can get a range of tastes, colors, and nutrients through them. Stock up on cucumbers, carrots, celery, and more.
Fruits and legumes will further help to increase your fiber count. Legumes can also help to increase your protein count, especially if you go on a meat-free diet for a short period.
Getting fiber is essential.This is the nutrient that helps to boost your digestive system’s efforts. The fiber will encourage the contraction of the muscles to push the waste through the system. Soluble fiber will be easy to dissolve, but you want to consider some insoluble fiber. This will help to push your waste through your digestive system to get rid of it.
You can also take fiber additives if you don’t get enough in your diet.
There are two types of fiber additives that you can get. It’s possible to get a fiber supplement that will break down the food for you. As a temporary fix, this can be good. It will help to break down the foods that are currently blocking your system and causing the problem.
However, don’t come to rely on them. They are temporary for the first two days.
After this, you want to add a full fiber supplement that encourages the digestive system to work. Better yet, just get your fiber naturally through more fruits, vegetables, and legumes. You will feel much better.
Get Rid of All the Bad Stuff
Now take a look at all the food in your cupboard. Once you’ve got through the two days, you want to make sure this doesn’t happen again—or at least it happens as little as possible. You know to keep eating your probiotics, drinking water, and chewing your food, but what else can you do?
Let’s start with the food that you eat. Get rid of all processed foods and artificial sweeteners. They are bad for you. Yes, artificial sweeteners can be worse than natural sugars. When you want to keep sugars to a minimum, opt for natural sweeteners like Stevia instead.
Artificial sweeteners cause a number of bad bacteria in your gut to increase. You need to take more probiotics to balance out with the good. Is it worth it?
Meanwhile processed foods are just full of empty calories. They don’t offer any nutritional benefits, but your body still has to break them down and burn them. Some of the preservatives are known toxins, too! You’re damaging your liver and kidneys with the unnecessary foods. It’s hard to skip them as they are addictive. Once you’ve got through some of the withdrawal symptoms, you’ll wonder why you even bothered with processed foods in the first place.
It’s also worth giving up the gluten. This isn’t necessarily going to help, but it can if you have chronic digestive problems. Gluten is one of those common ingredients that people are allergic to. If they’re not allergic, they’re intolerant. Your immune system views gluten as an enemy and will attack it, leaving you bloated and in pain.
Likewise, you may want to avoid the soy. Like gluten, it can be an irritant in the body and cause a problem with inflammation and bloat.
Gluten and soy will be two ingredients that you want to test after your two days. During your two days just get rid of them completely and give your digestive system a chance to heal.
It can also be worth looking out for some organic foods. Too many fruits and vegetables use preservatives and pesticides. Produce and meat can be injected with antibiotics and growth hormones. They’re genetically modified to make them bigger and create more for the growing population.
You want to avoid these products as much as possible. Organic foods go through rigorous testing to make sure they are free from chemicals. You can know you’re not putting harmful chemicals that can cause problems for your digestive system.
It is possible to improve digestion in just two days. When you follow a more liquid diet that is full of bitter and fibrous foods, you will find that the waste pushes out. You can improve the bacteria levels in your gut and the lining of your intestines to get more nutrients and feel more like yourself.
