Bowel Health

Nothing is more distressing than having issues with your bowels.  Whether it’s simply constipation, diarrhoea, bloating, irritable bowel syndrome (IBS aka spastic colon) or more serious problems such as inflammatory bowel disease (IBD e.g. Crohn’s disease or ulcerative colitis), it takes away from your quality of life.  

Bowel disorders can be either functional or structural.  Functional disorders are disorders where the gut is normal, but does not work properly (e.g. constipation and IBS).  Functional disorders are the most common problems affecting people with bowel issues.  Structural disorders are disorders where the bowel is abnormal and therefore does not work properly (e.g. diverticular disease, IBD and colon cancer). 

Food intolerances can also cause bowel and digestive issues.  A food intolerance occurs when a person has difficulty digesting a particular food, and this leads gut symptoms such as gas, bloating, pain and diarrhoea.  A food intolerance is therefore a digestive system response to certain foods (compared to a food allergy which is an immune response to a food).  It is important that the offensive food(s) is(are) removed from the diet, BUT it is also important that we don’t just eliminate a food, especially when it can provide good nutrition, because we ‘think’ we have an intolerance. 

Keeping your gut bacteria healthy and diverse is important for bowel health as well as general health (your gut health affects your whole body).  The food that you eat plays an important role in the types of bacteria that exist in your gut.  Having a healthy diet is therefore vital for every part of your body to function well.

I can help you with your bowel issues by working out what foods and behaviours affect your problem and how to change them into healthier ones.