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Have you ever wondered why so many seemingly unrelated health issues—like hormonal acne, period pain, fatigue, and digestive troubles—often appear together? The answer lies in the intricate relationship between your gut and your hormones. From processing nutrients essential for hormone production to eliminating excess oestrogen, your gut plays a pivotal role in keeping your hormones balanced.

In this post, I’ll explore how nurturing your gut can be the key to unlocking better hormonal health and overall well-being.

How Gut Health Influences Hormones

1. Microbiome and Hormonal Metabolism
   Your gut microbiota—the ecosystem of bacteria in your digestive tract—plays a critical role in regulating hormones. Specific bacteria in the microbiome metabolize and recycle hormones like oestrogen through the “oestrobolome.” An imbalanced microbiome, or dysbiosis, can lead to excess estrogen recirculation, increasing the risk of PMS, endometriosis, and estrogen-dominant conditions.
2. Nutrient Absorption
   The gut is responsible for absorbing key nutrients (like B vitamins, zinc, and magnesium) required for hormone production. Altered absorption can lead to deficiencies of these nutrients which are vital for healthy hormone balance.
3. Oestrogen Detoxification
   It also helps eliminate excess hormones, such as estrogen, through bowel movements. Issues like constipation or dysbiosis may reintroduce excess hormones into circulation, exacerbating imbalances.
4. Stress and the Gut-Brain Axis
   This connection goes both ways, as gut issues can affect stress hormones due to the role of the gut bacteria in production of neurotransmitters and cortisol levels. Chronic stress impacts your gut lining and microbiome diversity, impairing digestion and increasing inflammation. This can disrupt adrenal hormones, leading to fatigue, poor sleep, and heightened PMS symptoms. It’s a vicious cycle.
5. Histamine and Ovarian Activity
   Dysbiosis can cause an overproduction of histamine, a compound involved in immune and allergic responses but also strongly involved in conditions like endometriosis and IBS. High histamine levels can stimulate the ovaries to produce more estrogen, exacerbating conditions like oestrogen dominance and premenstrual symptoms.

Signs Your Gut and Hormones Are Out of Sync

• Persistent digestive issues (bloating, constipation, reflux, nausea, poor appetite or diarrhea).
• Hormonal symptoms like acne, mood swings, or irregular periods.
• Low energy or brain fog that doesn’t improve with sleep or rest.
• Skin conditions such as eczema, acne or easy welting.

Steps to Support Your Gut and Hormonal Health

• Dietary Choices
  • Incorporate fibre-rich foods (vegetables, legumes, and whole grains) to feed healthy bacteria.
  • Add fermented foods like sauerkraut, kimchi, and kefir, which provide beneficial probiotics (not as much of this if you have histamine issues).
  • Have a variety of plant foods to help provide beneficial nutritional compounds and a variety of fibre types, which reduces inflammation in the gut and supports microbiome diversity.
  • Limit inflammatory foods, including sugar, alcohol, and processed items, to reduce systemic inflammation
• Supplement Strategically
  • Use strain-specific probiotics that are specific to your health concerns to support gut diversity and hormone metabolism. Consult a naturopath to find the right strains for your needs.
• Feed the gut bugs
  • Specific prebiotic fibres can help to reduce the overgrowth of bacteria which impair oestrogen detoxification.
  • Glucomman, found in konjac noodles are helpful in reducing betaglucoradinase.
  • PHGG is a low fodmap prebiotic fibre that is a good allrounder, helping to regulate bowel motions and supporting microbiome balance.
• Stress Management
  • Chronic stress and poor sleep disrupt the gut-brain axis, which can dysregulate hormones. Incorporate stress-reduction techniques like yoga, meditation, or gentle walks to calm the nervous system
• Hydration and Gentle Detoxification
  • Drinking sufficient water supports bowel regularity and toxin elimination. Simple rituals like starting the day with warm water and lemon or apple cider vinegar can enhance digestion.
  • Adequate fibre and water helps with regular bowel motions which is important because you need regular bowel motions to support oestrogen detoxification and clearance.
• Restorative Practices
  • Improve sleep to regulate cortisol and support nightly hormone repair.
  • Incorporate gentle, restorative exercise, such as walking or pilates, to avoid over-stressing the adrenals.

Long-Term Benefits

Balancing your gut is the foundation for hormonal health. By addressing digestive issues, supporting your microbiome, and managing inflammation, you can improve symptoms such as period irregularities, skin problems, and fatigue.

By healing your gut, you’re not only improving digestion but also empowering your body to regulate hormones naturally. Balanced hormones mean better skin, more energy, fewer mood swings, better hormone balance.

Supporting your gut is a long-term investment in your health. By adopting these practices and seeking personalized care from a naturopath, you can achieve better balance and resilience in both your gut and hormones.

Disclosure: Links to products are affiliate links. This means that, at zero cost to you, I will earn an affiliate commission if you click through the link and finalize a purchase.

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Acne is such a common issue that people ask a naturopath to help with. It can really affect your self esteem, and in some instances can be painful and uncomfortable.

There’s no magic, quick fix for acne whether you see a naturopath or try the conventional medicine route, and sometimes you have to try a few different approaches before finding what works best for you. Typical timelines are often small improvements within two weeks, and more visible results around 3 months. When treating the underlying causes of acne naturopathically, this can sometimes take even longer, however the benefits of treating these underlying causes are often wide reaching.

As with most naturopathic approaches to health issues, it’s about finding out what the underlying cause of the issue is.

In the case of acne, it’s important to consider that skin is connected to other body systems – in particular the nervous system, the endocrine system (that’s hormones) and the digestive system. Imbalances in one or more of these systems will very commonly cause skin problems.

I’ll talk in more detail about these systems later, how to tell whether they’re the issue for you, and what you can do to help them.

Listen to the audio of this article here

It’s been a hot minute since my last episode of Guts and Girl Bits, I have been occupied with my busy home clinic and I have also been writing some e-courses, which I will talk a bit about later. Of course, I have also been spending time with family, would you believe my youngest Lara is now in Kindergarten? How time flies!

It was almost a year ago I started planning this podcast episode but I got rather distracted by everything else. However I’ve had some spare time to sit down and record, and I am hoping to stay on this momentum and release some more podcasts in the next few months. Please get in touch if you enjoy these podcasts, and if you have any questions or requests for future episodes I’d love to hear from you.

Sorting out your skin issues can be sooo frustrating when you’re doing it by yourself – do I need to go on medication? Does my diet make a difference? Are my hormones out of balance? Maybe this skin product will help? No, maybe this one, no, this one, no this one. Maybe I need a skin peel? Maybe I need laser? Maybe I need to go vegan? Maybe paleo? Do I need to detox? AUUUGH!

Rest assured you’re not alone, soo many women (and I do treat men occasionally to) come to me at their wits end with their acne.

Naturopathic approaches to any type of health condition always stem from one of the core naturopathic philosophies: treat the cause.

What the cause of acne is may vary from person to person, and that’s where a naturopaths consultation questions come in handy – delving into the different body systems like gut health, nervous system health and hormones, and sometimes using functional testing to get to the bottom of it. I’m going to try and give you some clues about it later so you can get a bit of an idea for yourself, and I will also discuss some of my favourite treatment options.

Emunctories

When it comes to root cause medicine, the way that the body is able to eliminate waste is an important consideration for any skin concern.

Naturopathic medicine is built around a set of philosophies, and one of these is the theory of emunctories.

The term emunctories is a bit of a funny word, but it refers to an organ or duct that removes or carries waste from the body.

Traditional naturopaths often consider the theory of emunctories when establishing a treatment plan, they may not use the term emunctories (I do, I think it’s a fun word to say, can you tell, I’m saying it a lot) but we always want the body to be eliminating waste efficiently, and to minimise the burden on our elimination systems. If our eliminatory system is unable to handle the load that is placed onto it, this will cause symptoms to express.

The emunctory system exists in tiers. These tiers will prioritise the primary emunctories, and if that system is overloaded it will progress downwards.

Primary emunctories are the main channels of elimination of the body that we want to be carrying the majority of our waste burden.

The primary emunctories are:

• Sweat
• Through the liver and intestines, passing bowel motions
• Through the kidneys and bladder, urination
• Through our breath

We can support our primary emunctories by drinking adequate water, eating lots of fibre and supporting our gut microbiome, breathing exercises, sweating through exercise or saunas.

The secondary emunctories include the skin and the mucous membranes of the urogenital tract, the respiratory tract, the digestive system. If our primary emunctories are overloaded or not working effectively, then toxins can be excreted through the secondary emunctories. This often shows itself as skin conditions, phlegm, diarrhoea (usually this may be a bit more mucousy).

What can commonly occur is that symptoms that express on this level are treated with suppressants, for example cortisone based creams, decongestants or cough suppressants.

If the secondary emunctories are suppressed or unable to cope, symptoms may start to appear in other areas such as in menstruation, emotions, swollen lymphatic glands, fevers and other irritations of mucous membranes.

So if we were to look at treating acne in keeping with this philosophy of emunctories it would look like this:

1. Making sure you’re eliminating properly through your bowels, by working on your diet and using herbal medicines that support this
2. Using herbs that are classed as ‘depuratives’ – these are herbs such as burdock and clivers, and they help to improve the elimination of the primary emunctories
3. Drinking plenty of water to support kidney function
4. Encouraging good lymphatic flow with lymphatic drainage techniques and exercise
5. Making sure you’re getting your sweat on – exercise or saunas

The importance of the gut

So let’s talk a bit about the digestive system how does that affect acne. It’s no secret that the health of your gut will impact on almost every system of the body, so of course it affects skin. There’s a few ways in which it can do this.

Think back to what we talked about with the concept of emunctories and how important that is. An overburdened digestive system will overburden the emunctories, leading to skin congestion and inflammation. Your skin is like a looking glass to your gut health.

Gut health impacts on hormonal health. Oestrogen has to be metabolised through the liver and bowels, and if that’s not eliminating effectively than oestrogen doesn’t get fully eliminated, instead it gets recycled in a more active form, and too much oestrogen will have a proliferative effect on your acne.

Intestinal permeability, or leaky gut, can cause inflammation, often via histamine excess. Histamine and inflammation will often show up as redness and acne. Histamine will also be driven up by oestrogen, which is why acne may be worse at certain times in your cycle.

One of the subtypes of acne which is caused by a fungal overgrowth often goes hand in hand with an altered gut microbiome.

Gut issues are linked to other types of skin condition as well such as eczema psoriasis and rosacea.

Clues that your gut may a problem for your skin health:

• You experience gut symptoms like bloating, altered bowel motions, IBS, gas.
• You experience fungal infections such as thrush or tinea.
• Your acne flares up after eating certain foods
• Your acne is mostly around forehead, mouth and cheeks.

Improving gut health

The main things that we want to be focusing on when improving your gut function is

• making sure that you’re digesting food appropriately with good levels of digestive acids and enzymes
• ensuring that you have the right balance of gut bacteria, and that you are absorbing your nutrients effectively as well
• supporting the lining of the gut health with herbs and nutrients
• avoiding highly inflammatory foods and any foods that you might be intolerant to as these will aggravate inflammation worsening any type of skin condition.

The nervous system

Does stress cause health issues? I’ve heard this concept dismissed a lot, but I am a firm believer that yes, stress can cause physical symptoms, especially things to do with the skin.

When we’re going through high periods of stress we will experience impacts on our inflammation levels due to an increase in our cortisol and histamine levels, and our reproductive hormones can be affected which increases sebum and keratin production, and increased hormone sensitivity in your skin.

Stress will also impact on our gut health, which will contribute towards skin inflammation and increased chance of skin infections.

Signs your nervous system could be a player with your skin health:

• Feeling like you’re constantly on edge
• Oversensitivity to sensory stimulation e.g. noise
• Brain fog, difficulty thinking clearly
• Poor quality sleep
• You’ve been living off coffee and stimulants
• Feeling out of balance emotionally, anxious or depressed
• Fatigue
• Low libido

How to support your nervous system

1. Make sure you’re doing fun things and laughing, as these are great ways to burn off your stress hormones
2. Try to reduce sources of stress, if that’s at all possible – maybe that might be asking for help with something that is putting a burden on your shoulders.
3. Make sure you’re eating enough – low calorie, and nutrient poor diets can be a source of stress to the body. Similarly for those who are in need of nervous system nourishment, focus more on weight training and low intensity exercise rather than high intensity exercise.
4. Get plenty of sleep
5. Practice screen boundaries
6. Practice mindfulness exercises each day
7. Get someone to talk to, perhaps a psychologist or a counsellor.

Stress can have such a big role on our health that I consider it to be one of the most important things to address. I have created an online group Naturopathic program that provides individualised care in a group setting, focusing on the pivotal factors for a healthy nervous system and adrenal gland health. If you are feeling like your nervous system needs some nourishment, I’d love for you to join me in my program Beat Burnout.

Hormone Balance

One of the most well known hormones that cause acne is testosterone. Testosterone and it’s family of hormones, androgens, cause acne by binding to receptors in the skin, increasing oil and keratin production, resulting in oilier skin with a potential for blocked pores. The bacteria (and sometimes fungi) which causes inflammation in our skin loves to feed on this, so extra fuel for the bacteria means the bugs grow, triggering an immune response in the area, resulting in more acne.

If you have a irregular periods, hirsutism (excess hair growth, such as chin hair) or have been diagnosed with PCOS there’s a good chance that high testosterone levels are a driver for your acne.

If your acne tends to get worse around the time that you are ovulating as well as when you are about to get your periods but then gets better when you start your period that’s a sign that the fluctuating levels of oestrogen are playing a role.

We need oestrogen, it can be our best friend but if we’re not metabolising or excreting it properly then it can elevate histamine, causing inflammation. Oestrogen needs to get metabolised and excreted through the gut to be in a good balance, otherwise it can be too proliferative.

Oestrogen and histamine work closely together when oestrogen is at its highest histamine will follow suit and if you have issues with high histamine that can also cause oestrogen to be high as well.

If you are not ovulating regularly or well, you may not have enough progesterone to counter oestrogen, and lack of progesterone doesn’t help skin health either.

Signs you may have hormonal acne

• Your acne worsens around ovulation or premenstrually
• Acne is located on the chin, jawline, back and chest
• Your period is irregular or painful
• You may also experience PMS symptoms
• You have oilier skin than normal
• You have thicker, coarser or more hair than normal for your genetics

How to assess your hormones

There are several ways to get an insight into your hormones

I am a big fan of using the DUTCH test, which is performed using urine sample to measure hormone metabolites. It can give you insight into not just the overall level of your hormones, but also the quality of metabolism of your hormones, whether they are being metabolised down the friendly or the angry pathways.

Blood tests don’t look at metabolites but they are very useful to get insight into your overall hormone balance. It’s vital to test on specific times in your cycle to be able to make use of these results.

Testing at day 2 or 3 of your cycle (the 2^nd or 3^rd day of your bleed) will give a baseline of low levels. Test FSH, LH and Oestradiol at this time.

After you ovulate, your hormones will start to raise, and usually peaks 7 days after ovulation, so at this time you want to do another test, measuring progesterone and oestradiol.

At either of these tests you will want to also measure testosterone profile (SHBG, androstenedione, testosterone, DHEA, free testosterone), prolactin, thyroid profile and fasting insulin.

If you are on the OCP, the female reproductive tests will not be reliable by thyroid function and insulin can be measured.

Does your diet make a difference to acne?

Yes, it does.

Your diet can affect your skin in different ways but one of the big drivers of acne we know is inflammation and then another big driver for acne as well is your hormone balance.

It makes sense that if we’re eating foods that are inflammatory then that’s going to make your gut health and acne worse. Inflammatory foods may be foods that you are intolerant to, or it may be foods which are generally considered to be inflammatory.

Some of the big ones for that is wheat and dairy. I often recommend cutting out dairy as a first step when you try to address acne because it reduces inflammation and so you could swap that for almond milk or oat milk or rice milk whatever your preference is. Lactose free milk isn’t really going to make that much of a difference because a lot of the inflammation comes from the protein. Some people find that A2 milk can be helpful for them but initially I recommend cutting it out altogether to get an insight.

After inflammatory foods, bad guy #2 is sugar. Sugar, in particular refined sugar and highly processed foods are an issue because it can increase the production of a substance called insulin like growth factor 1 (IGF-1). This acts to increase the hormones known as androgens in our body such as testosterone and what these can do is make our skin produce more oil and keratin. Rewind back to the section on hormones if you need a refresher on this.

Insulin is an important hormone but when we’re eating a high GI diet it’s often going to be making acne worse so aiming for a low GI diet is going to make a big difference there. Imbalances in blood sugar levels can also trigger cortisol and histamine imbalance so you really want to be keeping your blood sugar levels nice and stable.

If you have a blood test that shows up high levels of insulin then this can actually be a marker that you do have a bit of insulin resistance which is a sign that you really need to get your blood sugar levels back under control. Insulin resistance is a leading cause of high testosterone and PCOS.

Now don’t get me wrong sugar is not all bad I am a big fan of fruit and potato but what we want to avoid is foods that have a lot of sugar and have a lot of refined carbohydrates and not much else and so that might look like ice creams, jams, juices, packaged foods, excessive amounts of white breads and pasta, sauces with added sugar, soft drinks, lollies, cakes and other sweets.

The other important dietary consideration is your fibre and water intake. Because one of the goals when supporting skin health is improving elimination through the gut and supporting our emunctories, you want to ensure that you’re getting plenty of water and fibre.

Fungal acne

Let’s talk about fungal acne.

For some people, the cause of their acne is actually fungul.

Some people experience a little bit of a different type of acne that can be more stubborn and doesn’t respond to the typical types of treatments. One of the reasons that this is so stubborn is that because a lot of skin products that are recommended for conventional acne will feed this fungus.

Fungal acne is also known by the term pityrosporum folliculitis – an infection with a type of yeast called Malassezia which lives in the hair follicles and eats our natural oils and any oil that you happen to apply onto it. This type of acne tends to express itself more on your forehead, and may also show up on your back, chest, shoulders and along the hairline and in the T zone.

When tackling this type of acne the treatment goals are to support your immune system, gut microbiome and balance hormonal health.

If you suspect that you have fungal acne, you may like to try an anti-fungal shampoo or cream which, if beneficial will provide insight into your acne cause.

Q&A Transcript

I did a shout out for some questions when planning this podcast:

One of the submitted questions was how to prevent acne coming off the pill and this is such a fantastic question because it’s a really common thing that people consult with me about. If you had acne before you went on the pill there’s a pretty good chance that you’re going to experience some acne when you come off the pill again. Unfortunately taking the oral contraceptive pill doesn’t always fix any underlying issues that might have caused the acne to be there in the first place but what it does a fantastic job of is reducing the oil production in the skin which means that you’re going to have very little acne if any. When you come off the pill this oil production is going to increase and it gets a little bit confused because you haven’t really been making any oil for however long so it’s like hang on how do I do this how much oil do I have to make again and so it goes a bit crazy and usually it’s going to be crazy for around six months or so then it starts to settle down but there are things that we can do to help reduce the intensiveness intensity of the crazy.

So what can you do if you’re about to come off the pill? I recommend starting with cutting down inflammatory foods and for most people I recommend supplementing with zinc. I typically don’t prescribe hormonal regulating herbs for three months after coming off the pill because I want the body to try and set up that communication through that HPO axis itself but what I do like to do is encourage emunctory support with herbs, support liver function to improve the clearance of the contraceptive and to make sure your lymphatic system and your immune system is happy.

Question 2 – How long does it take to fix acne?

How long remedies may take to fix acne will depend on what the underlying cause is.

In my experience the redness and inflammation will settle down within a few weeks, and then the frequency and severity of breakouts reduces, and healing time improves.
It’s different with everyone, and as much as I wish everyone had great results there are some people who take a bit longer to see changes, and some people who get occasional relapses.

On the whole I find 6-12 months a typical length of time until someone is able to ease off the herbs and supplements, they’re feeling good about their skin at this point. If there’s a lot of scarring this then needs to get sorted with a beautician, especially one who does laser treatments for scarring.

Question 3 – Are probiotics helpful for acne?

Yes, I usually do have a focus on gut health when treating acne, especially if it’s on the cheeks. But probiotics can be helpful.

A general reminder with probiotics is that you want to be strain specific. The code at the end of the probiotic name tells you which species it is, and therefore you understand which role it plays.

Some of the strains I look at using are Lactobacillus salivaris ls-03, lactobacillus rhamonsus LL, lactobacillus casei lc03, and some Bifidobacterium such as the breve br03, or the animalis ssp.

Question 4 – My teenager has acne, I don’t want her to go on harsh medications, is there anything that can be done?

Yes of course! Treating teen acne is not too dissimilar to treating adult acne. We want to be balancing blood sugar levels to reduce it’s impact on hormones, and reducing inflammation by cutting down on inflammatory foods such as dairy, and potentially high histamine foods. Supplements can be handy, for instance zinc, vitamin B5, inositol and or berberine rich herbs.

A summary of my favourite treatments for acne:

• A probiotic specific for acne health
• Balancing mineral health – typically this may be zinc, but in some cases copper may be needed. You can use a HTMA to assess mineral levels
• Support gut function with gut healing nutrients and diet
• Lower inflammation by eating a low dairy, or low histamine diet
• If hormones are out of balance you can address this. Here is where it gets a bit more individual. Ensuring good ovulation is an important first step. Some common nutrients I provide for this is inositol which supports blood sugar level balance and ovulation. Zinc has an anti-androgen effect and can be helpful.
• Balancing omega- fatty acids through diet, and potentially supplements.
• Herbal medicine to support emunctories, stress levels and hormone balance, as well as reduce infection and support immune health. Some common herbs I opt for are Coptis, which is rich in berberine, Chaste tree, if indicated for ovulation, Withania for stress support, burdock as an emunctory support.

Thank you for listening, if you have enjoyed this episode please leave a review, subscribe if you haven’t already and as always feel free to get in touch.

The post A Naturopath’s Deep Dive Into Acne appeared first on Alison Mitchell Naturopath.

Gut Health

All disease begins in the gut – Hippocrates.

Your digestive system is more important for your overall health than you probably realise. It’s so much more than whether you do your number two’s regularly: digestive health impacts on your immune system, inflammation, hormone balance, mood, energy, skin, brain health and more!

Naturopaths and other holistic health practitioners have long been banging on about the importance of ‘healing the gut’ for a wide range of digestive disorders and overall wellbeing. In the last few decades, research into the importance of a healthy digestive bacteria balance (our ‘microbiome’) and digestive lining have been booming.

Put simply, the digestive system is a hollow tube ranging from mouth to anus, and is actually a continuation of our skin (just in a different format). You can imagine it like you’re a donut! And think about this: everything inside your digestive tract is actually outside of your body. Along this tube the surface of the skin changes, e.g. in the stomach there is a thick coating of mucous which helps to protect against the strong acids that are created there, and in the intestines the surface changes, developing a lot of finger like folds and protrusions called villi. Villi are designed to increase the surface area for both absorption of nutrients and room for immune cells. Almost like in a factory chain, other glands and organs will come into play, depositing enzymes and acids at various points that help us break down our food more effectively.

The bugs that live in your gut

If I told you that your body contains 10 times more bacteria than human cells, would you be reaching for the soap? Well you don’t have to worry because the majority of these bugs are working to keep you healthy. They are actually so interconnected with us, that we are now considered to be a ‘super-organism’ (1) (2).

The majority of the bacteria exist in your digestive tract, and there they work to detoxify harmful chemicals, process nutrients (and in some cases they actually create nutrients!), control the unfriendly bacteria that live there (yes there are usually always some bad guys present, about 15%, but the state of your good bugs determines whether the baddies cause a problem), control the immune system, produce energy for the rest of the body and much, much more.

The Goodies

There are over 400 known types of bacteria within our digestive tract. In some people there are more, and in others who may be eating a processed diet or have had damage to their gut flora, the diversity of these bacteria are significantly reduced. Interestingly, the bacteria in our gut are different throughout the different stages of our life.

Our friendly bacteria can be damaged by certain medications and lifestyle habits. Antibiotics are one of the most well known causes of damage to our friendly bacteria, and recently it has been discovered that some of our good bacteria may never recover after a course of antibiotics* (3).

Antibiotics, while often over used can sometimes be necessary and in some cases are life savers. Limiting their use and ensuring that if taken they are used correctly can help to prevent the development of antibiotic resistance. Consider your options before taking antibiotics, and if you do have to take antibiotics then see a practitioner who can guide you on how best to mop up at the damage.

Feeding the Good Guys

Whereas Probiotics are the organisms, Prebiotics are their food.  The use of prebiotics is often neglected, but it’s an important part of recolonising your gut. You can get various isolated prebiotics in supplement form, or you can consume a variety of foods which contain these compounds, particularly those high in soluble fibre.

Fermented foods are another key tool in keeping your digestive system happy. The act of fermentation allows beneficial bacteria that naturally live on the food to grow, and it also makes a whole host of nutrients within the food more bioavailable (meaning we can get more out of it). You can buy fermented food, or grow it yourself.

You should aim to have a variety of fermented foods~ and prebiotic foods consistently.

Regularly chow down on these to keep your good bugs thriving*:

• Almonds
• Apricots
• Asparagus
• Avocado
• Banana (especially green)
• Beetroot
• Garlic
• Jerusalem artichokes
• Kefir~
• Kimchi~
• Kombucha~
• Lentils
• Plantain
• Pumpkin
• Sauerkraut~
• Sweet Potato
• Witlof and Wombok
• Yoghurt (free from added sugar and chemicals)~
• Zucchini

* If you have Fructose Malabsorption, some of these foods may cause digestive discomfort. Seek advice from your health practitioner if you are unsure.

The Baddies

There are a huge range of unfriendly pathogens that if allowed to get out of control can cause all sorts of havoc in your digestive system.  Some can even cause trouble with your mood. Chronic infections can result in a wide variety of symptoms that are often unexplained such as aches and pains, fatigue, brain fog, unexplained inflammation and recurrent infections –fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome are just a couple of conditions that can have a chronic infection as an underlying driver (4) (5).

There are a huge range of organisms that lie dormant in our digestion: many, many forms of bacteria, viruses, protozoa (e.g. malaria and giardia), fungi, yeasts and parasites can exist in our gut.  Some of them can be deadly killers, and others may not be lethal but can result in a variety of nasty symptoms.  Our immune system, digestive juices and the presence of our good bugs are what keep it all in check.

The Gut and Your Immune System

“The immune system present in the gut makes more immunological decisions in a day than the rest of the immune system does in a lifetime”.  (6)

If your immune system isn’t behaving itself properly, you might want to consider that your digestive system is the culprit.

Your digestive system has a special mucosal lining over the surface of your intestines, and the health of your gut flora (the complex, extremely important colony of bacteria within your digestive system, also known as the microbiome) has a huge amount of immune decisions to make on a daily basis – it has to deal with bacteria, viruses and food, and decide each time whether it is a friend or foe. It is via this mechanism that your gut health can contribute towards skin conditions such as eczema and psoriasis as well as autoimmune conditions such as SLE (Lupus), Rheumatoid arthritis, Graves disease and more.

The gut reports to the immune system

There is a special type of cell within the digestive system called a dendritic cell.  This cell is responsible for determining whether our immune system should be on high alert or not.  Occasionally this cell will extend a little feeler (almost like a tentacle) and take a handful of whatever is in your digestive system to examine, to then report back to the rest of the immune system whether everything is okay or not.  This can explain why your diet can have an effect on allergic conditions such as hayfever and eczema, as well as autoimmune conditions (7).

Immune cells in the gut

There are also a lot of other players involved in the gut, such as the immune cells Immunoglobulin A (sIgA) and certain T lymphocytes.  sIgA helps to protect the epithelial layer from being inhabited by bacteria and viruses.  This helpful immunoglobin is actually produced by lymphocytes (a type of white blood cell) which are actually created by Bifidobacteria (a good bacteria that exists mostly in the colon).  Unfortunately, Bifidobacteria are easily damaged, especially by antibiotics.

Enzymes do more than digest food

When you think about digestive enzymes, you’ll probably be thinking that they’re there to break down your food so it’s primed for absorbing.  They also have another important role to play, and that’s in breaking down substances that might be harmful to your immune system.  Due to poor eating habits, the secretion of enzymes is compromised in a large proportion of people.  Implementing habits such as chewing each mouthful more and taking time to enjoy and concentrate on your meal are helpful for stimulating the cephalic phase of digestion – where your brain tells the rest of the digestive system to get ready for food, and consequently more enzymes and acids are produced.

The Gut and Your Mood

The state of our intestinal lining and the balance of bacteria within our digestive system have a major role to play in the production of our neurotransmitters: chemical transmitters that tell our brain whether we should be feeling such ways as happy, sad, agitated, or calm.

When the balance of our gut bacteria (collectively referred to as the microbiome) is affected, this can affect your mood.  Studies have found that the microbiome can have a major impact on stress levels and anxiety (8).  In fact, by treating imbalances in our microbiota, it is possible to support a wide range of mental health disorders (9), (10), (11), (12), (13).

The second brain

The nerves in your digestive system are constantly speaking to your central nervous system.  If your gut is irritated for some reason – say you’ve eaten something that you’re intolerant to (like gluten, for example), you’ve generally got a bad diet, there’s an imbalance in your microbiome (that’s your collective gut bacteria, remember) or you’ve got an infection – this can create an inflammatory reaction and will certainly make you irritated as well.

We know that depression is both associated with, and worsened by inflammation.  This inflammation in the brain can be driven by inflammation in the gut, which can be caused by intestinal permeability (leaky gut) and bacterial imbalances (dysbiosis).  Treating leaky gut can help reduce the severity of depression (10), (14), (15), (16), (17).

Neurotransmitters in our gut

Serotonin is produced in large amounts in our digestive system.  In people with Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) there is too much serotonin in their digestive system.  This is why antidepressants known as SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors) can improve the symptoms of IBS: these act by reducing the amount of serotonin taken into cells in the rest of our body which allows more to get into the brain.  However in some instances anti-depressants can affect the gut negatively, because if you weren’t making enough serotonin in the gut in the first place, you can end up with even lower levels in the digestive tract and so it can become irritated, affectively you’ll get a depressed gut (18), (19).

A vicious cycle

When your gut is upset, you feel upset.  But stress can affect your digestive system just as much as it affects your mood.  It can impair the secretion of digestive acids, slow down the motility of the gut, allows the unfriendly bacteria to grow, reduces your friendly bacteria and exacerbates intestinal permeability (leaky gut) (20), (14).  This is a recipe for an unhappy digestive system, and as you know this can then go on to send more messages to your brain: so you can see how the cycle continues.

People with gut problems are more likely to experience anxiety and depression.  Some studies have found a high proportion of anxiety in those with gut conditions such as Irritable Bowel Syndrome(IBS), Crohn’s disease and coeliac disease (21), (22), (23).

Look after your gut and it will look after you

The body has an amazing ability to heal, if given the right means to do so. If you eat a predominately plant based diet that is free from processed food, get your microbiome happy by feeding the good bugs with prebiotics and occasionally adding in some good bugs with fermented foods and probiotics, you’ll be on the right track to start healing your gut.

Works Cited

The post The Importance of Gut Health appeared first on Alison Mitchell Naturopath.

A few years ago I was interviewed by Carly Taber for Casa de Karma. It was a very well received podcast at the time but the website is no longer live, so I am going to share some of my content from there over the next few weeks. Here is a video version of the podcast episode where I was interviewed all about gut health.

The post Gut Health Explained – an interview appeared first on Alison Mitchell Naturopath.

I find that more and more people are aware of the importance of a balanced gut microbiome these days. The good bugs in your gut influence things like your immune system, hormone detoxification, metabolism, nutrient absorption, mood, skin health, levels of inflammation, reaction to food, oxidative stress, and more.

But did you know that antibiotics aren’t the only medication that can affect the bacteria in your gut, and in fact aren’t the biggest culprit for upsetting the balance.

I have gone knees deep in a research paper to find for you what medications will influence your very important microbiome. There are several commonly used medications which will potentially have a negative impact.

The main ones that were found to have an impact are:

• Proton pump inhibitors (PPIs) were one of the most notable drugs that influenced the bacteria, influencing multiple pathways, especially increasing the Streptococcus parasanguinis bacteria and affecting many pathways of bacteria’s ability to help our digestion of carbohydrates and fat
• Metformin seems to correlate with an increase of Escherichia coli, but also appeared to show an increase in the metabolic function of the microbiome, which may contribute to its effect.
• Antibiotics decreased overall Bifidobacterium levels
• Laxatives also affected multiple bacteria but were correlated with higher levels of  Alistipes and Bacteroides bacteria groups and a decrease in bacteria that digest starches

And to a lesser degree:

• SSRI antidepressants
• Oral steroids increased Methanobrevibacter smithii in those with inflammatory bowel disease. This is a bacteria which influences metabolism which could potentially explain the weight gain frequently observed in oral steroid users.
• Anti-androgen oral contraceptives
• Vitamin D and calcium supplements
• Levothyroxine use was associated with an increase of Actinomyces group

The analysis explored a multiple of different papers which examined the different microbiome associated with different medication use and found these patterns. In many instances it was thought that the microbiome changes are a result of the medications, however it is possible that when certain over growth or undergrowth of certain bacteria was present that this could be responsible for the condition that prompted that medications prescription in the first place. Given the majority of the conditions included things like constipation, reflux, inflammation and mood disorders, it makes sense as these conditions can be affected by an imbalance in your gut bacteria.

Overview of the number of associated microbial features.

Reducing the damage

While some of these correlations may not be the fault of the medication but just a reflection of the nature of the disease, it is still notable that many medications to disrupt our microbiome. In some instances, there are important reasons for taking medications, in which case you need to take steps to ensure you’re supporting your gut microbiome.

Feeding your good bacteria is one of the most important steps, and this is achieved by eating foods rich in prebiotics. Plant foods are the most notable source of this, and the bigger variety you can have, the better.

Including fermented food such as saurkraut, kimchi, kefir and kombucha and yoghurts can introduce some bacteria, but it isn’t always guaranteed that they will bring the type of bacteria you need to replace. If you tolerate these foods (people with histamine intolerance or SIBO may find them problematic) then it’s certainly beneficial to include them.

Probiotic supplementation can be very valuable, however the important thing to remember is that you need to choose a strain of probiotics that meets your aims.

Nutrients that support gut health lining include glutamine, n-acetyl-glucosamine, lysine, glycine and proline.

In some cases, it may be worthwhile discussing with your health practitioner whether there are alternatives to these medications. While natural medicines will not be as powerful as conventional medicines, in some conditions they can provide a very satisfying effect, reducing the need for medications.

Photo by Adam Nieścioruk on Unsplash

Herbs for the Gut

Herbal medicines can soothe the digestive system beautifully, and for conditions such as GORD (reflux) they can reduce the requirements for these medications.

For reflux: consider herbs such as Marshmallow root, Ribwort, Meadowsweet, Licorice (avoid if you have high blood pressure) and Dandelion root.

For reducing inflammation in the gut: A tablet containing herbs such as Boswellia and Turmeric can be particularly beneficial.

For sluggish bowels: a regular brew of Dandelion root, Ginger, Licorice, Yellow Dock and Cinnamon can help to get things moving.

References

Vich Vila A, Collij V, Sanna S, Sinha T, Imhann F, Bourgonje AR, Mujagic Z, Jonkers DMAE, Masclee AAM, Fu J, Kurilshikov A, Wijmenga C, Zhernakova A, Weersma RK. Impact of commonly used drugs on the composition and metabolic function of the gut microbiota. Nat Commun. 2020 Jan 17;11(1):362. doi: 10.1038/s41467-019-14177-z. PMID: 31953381

The post Medications and your Microbes appeared first on Alison Mitchell Naturopath.

Worm your kids. You’re welcome.

You’d be surprised at not only how common worm infestations are in kids, but also how much something like worms can do to your kids. It can affect their behaviour, sleep, energy levels and more.

And by the way, you don’t have to have an itchy bum to have worms. If you suspect that your kid (or yourself) might have worms, then you need to have a look. I’ll talk more about what the symptoms of worms can be, and what symptoms it can cause below.

I find gastro-intestinal infections to be a key driver for many symptoms in children, but especially so in mental and behavioural health. Taking herbs and nutrients for brain health to improve behavioural problems is all well and good, but if you’re not treating the cause you will be pursuing and endless journey.

Signs and Symptoms of Worms

Symptoms of a worm infection can include, but does not have to be all of these:

• Mood swings, anger and violence
• Digestive pain
• Diarrhoea
• Disturbed sleep
• Nightmares
• Teeth grinding
• Nose picking
• Weight loss
• Poor appetite and/or fussy eating
• Fatigue
• Iron deficiency
• Vulval irritation and pain, itching or discharge
• Food cravings and a relentless appetite
• Urinary incontinence (more common in girls)

The key age group for worms is 7-11 years of age, but any person regardless of age can get worms. If worm infestations become chronic or recurring, that can be a sign of deeper digestive and immune imbalance.

The mature female worm travels through the digestive system (6 cm every 30 minutes) and will typically leave the anus to lay eggs along the perineum. The larvae will cause itching and irritation, and kids will often scratch down there during their sleep, potentially re-consuming the eggs or larvae (continuing the cycle) by putting their fingers in their mouth or nose.

How do you know if your kid has worms?

A skilled practitioner can find clues to a gut infection through standard blood tests – one of the reasons I ask all my patients to bring recent copies of blood tests along to blood tests. Other more complicated stool analysis tests can give you information about the state of the digestive system, but when it comes to looking for confirmation of worms, the best thing is to have a look yourself. I warn you, none of these methods is going to be delightful.

Method 1: Use some sticky tape on the skin around anus first thing in the morning. Do this for three days in a row. If you can see little white balls, this is likely worm eggs, and confirmation of an infestation. You can then take this tape to your doctor to look at under the microscope for confirmation but often you will be able to tell yourself.

Method 2: In the middle of the night when the female worm is out laying her eggs it’s possible to see her in the midst of her adventure. Use a torch, sneak in and try not to wake your kid, and have a look at the bottom. It looks like a small white thread.

Method 3: Look in the toilet bowl. Sometimes you can see evidence of worms that have been pooped out. But this technique is only going to show up in more severe cases.

How to get rid of worms.

Let’s face it. Kid’s are gross. It can be disturbing to think of but kids will often have some trace of faecal matter on their fingers which they transfer to their mouths at some point. Various studies have found that worm eggs are found under finger nails of kids and can contamination is also often found in their bed sheet, toys and pyjamas.

There are lots of things you need to do to reduce re-contamination. Keep nails short, and nag try to encourage them not to put their fingers in their mouth.

If your kid does have worms: wash pjs and sheets in hot water, and wear a mask and gloves when doing so because when you change the sheets you’ve got a good chance of breathing in the eggs. Eww. Underwear may need to be ironed to kill any eggs if cases are more persistent.

I don’t object to the common worming treatment available in chemists on a semi-regular basis (don’t forget to repeat the course), but there are herbal options available if you need or prefer them. It is however possible for the worms to become resistant to conventional options which can make things very tricky as the common chemist option isn’t going to work.

If you think about how far these worms can travel when they exit the anus at night, you can understand why there can be issues with the urinary tract related to this. It’s an important thing to consider with young girls with frequent issues in this area, but also worth considering for older women with unexplained urinary and menstrual concerns.

If the case becomes persistent or chronic, more needs to be done to support digestive health – chat with your practitioner about this.

And here’s another consideration, many supplements such as probiotics that are common for gut health can actually perpetuate chronic worm infestations because it dampens the immune response – an action that is fantastic in any other instance, but not appropriate right now.

Listen to the podcast here:

iPhone   Stitcher   Youtube   Soundcloud  Spotify 

Recommended Products

The post You’ll be surprised (and a little grossed out) at this cause of kid’s behavioural problems. appeared first on Alison Mitchell Naturopath.

Health & Wellbeing Podcast #38

Coeliac disease is an autoimmune disease that causes strong reactions to wheat. It can affect your hormonal health, mental health, nutritional status and more.
In this episode I chat with herbalist Sarah Corbett about her personal journey with coeliac disease, and the herbal allies she used to help herself heal.
We chat a lot about coeliac disease in general and a little about women’s health and the risks of gluten contamination that people with coeliac / celiac disease need to be aware of in their herbs and supplements.

The Podcast

Click here to listen on Soundcloud or via the embedded player below.

iPhone   Stitcher   Youtube   Soundcloud  Spotify 

Podcast breakdown

3:13 Sarah’s experiences growing herbs in her garden
4:17 What’s the difference between gluten intolerance, wheat allergy and coeliac disease.
Sarah’s journey of being diagnosed with coeliac disease, and the healing process
09:46 the difficulties of a coeliac diet
10:45 how rare is coeliac disease, the prevalence of women having coeliac disease and autoimmune conditions
14:30 the symptoms Sarah was experiencing to prompt her seeking a diagnosis
15:50 Getting diagnosed with coeliac disease
20:56 Has the incidence of coeliac disease been increasing
22:00 Viral infections as a potential trigger for autoimmune disease/coeliac disease
24:00 Hormonal imbalances and coeliac disease – is there a link?
27:00 Mental health and coeliac disease, how it can impact brain chemistry, and impact the gut-brain axis. How living with a chronic disease such as coeliac disease can impact your mental health.
29:50 what are some of the biggest understanding around coeliac disease
31:00 how can we heal with coeliac disease. The increased nutritional needs.
33:00 Would you have done anything different to treat yourself now that you know what you do with herbs? What herbs did you use to heal yourself when you were diagnosed with coeliac disease?
Healing herbs: Plaintain (Plantago lanceolata), vulverary herbs including Calendula (Calendula officinalis), lymphatic herbs, immune-modulators, astringents, bitters, carminatives, Cleavers, Peppermint, Marshmallow, Reishi, licorice..
35:43 Does she use herbs as liquid extracts, teas, food etc?
38:30 Intestinal permeability and microbiome imbalance
39:56 Gluten contamination in herbs and supplements – what to think about
43:49 advil liquid gels contains gluten
47 :44 gluten free recipes
49:47 Favourite herbs for gut health
52:11 Sarah’s personal protocol.
55:00 How to get in touch with Sarah, Rowan and Sage

About Sarah

Clinical Herbalist and creatrix of Rowan + Sage, a small-batch apothecary brewing plant potions and other herbal magic in the heart of Atlanta, GA. Sarah’s path as an Herbalist blossomed from experimentation with plants to support her own health challenges, specifically through her experience with Celiac Disease. She is a forever student of the magic of nature & the human body, holding a Bachelors of Science in Psychology with an additional focus on Nutrition, certifications from the College of Purna Yoga, and over seven years of combined self-study and formal education in Herbalism. Through her work with Rowan + Sage, Sarah offers a line of Celiac-safe herbal products made from locally sourced herbs grown in her bioregion and offers one-on-one wellness consultations to help others experience vibrant well-being.

Get in touch

www.rowanandsage.com 

Instagram: @rowanandsage

Facebook: @rowanandsageshop

Pinterest: www.pinterest.com/rowanandsage

The post Coeliac Disease – How to take control of your health and healing your gut with herbs. appeared first on Alison Mitchell Naturopath.

Health & Wellbeing Podcast #32

Medicinal Mushrooms are growing in popularity all over the world, and not without reason. Medicinal and functional mushrooms are showing a huge amount of promise when it comes to improving our health and wellbeing. You might have heard of some of the more common mushrooms like Shiitake and Reishi mushroom, but there’s a whole heap of mushrooms with different benefits.

I was privileged to have a mushroom expert on the podcast – Jeff Chilton, founder of one of the leading medicine mushroom companies, Nammex.

Jeff is a wealth of knowledge and is very passionate about quality of mushroom supplements, something which we talked a lot about in this podcast. On top of that, he’s also a very lovely man, and patiently waited while I had to look after baby Lara a few times in the podcast, or while airplanes flew over (it was a noisy day then it seems!).

We spoke about the different properties of medicinal mushrooms, why it’s important to grow medicinal mushrooms organically, some of the quality issues that we face in choosing medicinal mushroom supplements, and Jeff shares a trick that we can do at home to tell if our mushroom supplements are quality or not.

Did you Know – Your Mushroom Supplements could contain grains.

Did you know that there are many types of mushroom supplements sold that contain grain? In a cost saving measure some companies will grow the mushrooms on grain. The mycelium (like the tiny roots of the mushroom) will spread throughout the grain and when it comes time to harvest, both the mycelium and the grain is taken. It’s virtually impossible to separate the grain from the mycelium, but not all companies are transparent with this. In some analysis it’s found that the chemical components of the supplements match the profile of the grain – so you’re essentially taking a glorified grain supplement.

Thankfully there’s an easy way to tell if your supplement contains grains – Jeff tells you how to do this in the podcast.

The Podcast

Click here to listen on Soundcloud, or via the embedded player below.

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Don’t forgot to leave me a 5* review on iTunes or on your podcast app.

Understanding Mushroom labels

Fruiting body refers to the part of the mushroom you see growing – usually that’s the cap and stem.

Mycelium is the cobweb like root structure that grows below the surface. This may be referred to on supplement labels as hyphae, mycelium or myceliated grain.

Another phrase that may be used is ‘full spectrum’, meaning that the mushroom contains both mycelium and fruiting body. To be truthful companies should detail the percentage of fruiting body contained in their supplements, and should not use the term full spectrum if the mushroom is grown on grain.

Benefits of Medicinal Mushrooms

Medicinal mushrooms have been used in traditional chinese medicine for centuries. There’s countless types of mushrooms used medicinally, but there are some select mushrooms which have been studied, and these are the more popular ones.

The benefits they show vary depending on the mushroom, and usually take a few days-weeks to achieve their effect.

There are so many types of medicinal mushrooms, but these are some of the more popular ones and their reported actions.

Shiitake

Lentinula edodes

• Immune tonic
• Anti-viral, anti-fungal, anti-bacterial
• Can be used in cooking
• Lowers blood cholesterol
• Lowers blood pressure
• Potential anti-cancer activity

Reishi

Ganoderma lucidum

• Immune tonic
• Adaptogen – helps the body cope with stress
• Calms the nervous system
• Supports good sleep
• Brain tonic
• Strengthens heart Qi
• Potential anti-cancer activity
• Can reduce allergies

Lion’s Mane

Hericium erinaceus

• Brain tonic
• Supports the nervous system, including nerve repair
• Supports stomach health and helps to heal stomach lining
• Anti-inflammatory
• Anti-microbial

Chaga

Inotus obliquus

• Anti-oxidant
• Immune modulator
• Balances blood sugar levels
• Supports pineal health
• Improves sleep
• Anti-viral
• Anti-fungal

Cordyceps

Cordyceps sinesis CS-4, Cordyceps militaris

• Adaptogen – improves the bodies ability to cope with stress and reduces fatigue
• Improves athletic performance
• Tonic for the new mothers
• Improves mental clarity
• Helps recovery after a big infection/illness
• Lung and cough tonic
• Sexual tonic

I find this mushroom so interesting I’m dedicating a whole blog post to it – I’ll add the link here when it’s up in a week.

Jeff’s links:

www.nammex.com

realmushrooms.com/

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