The 3 P's of Gut Healing

And it has nothing to do with food, per say!

As you are about to embark on any sizeable change, more than likely there are feelings of overwhelm by the enormity, and that is totally understandable. Sometimes these feelings can over power you and prevent ACTION from making taking place.

When starting your gut healing journey, there is plenty to consider such as the foods to include and exclude, how you are ACTUALLY going to bring the family on board, where do you get the food from and then WHAT are you going to make that the family WILL eat with the path of least resistance. Like everything, there is a process to change and its needs to be tackled in small bit sized chunks.

So, let’s get into it.

So the first P in gut healing is PLANNING!

It all starts with planning. Actually it starts a little before this with a clear defined Vision of EXACTLY what you want to achieve during your healing journey, WHY you want this and by WHEN, but that is a blog post for another day.

When starting your gut healing journey, planning is crucial and paramount to your success on any protocol you choose. Without this, you are guaranteed to set yourself up for failure.

Wikipedia defines planning as the following:

Planning (also called forethought) is the process of thinking about and organizing the activities required to achieve a desired goal. It involves the creation and maintenance of a plan, such as psychological aspects that require conceptual skills. There are even a couple of tests to measure someone’s capability of planning well. As such, planning is a fundamental property of intelligent behavior.

Actions to consider when planning your gut healing journey:

1. Be clear from where you are now and where you need to be. Break it down into smaller steps or milestones as to how you will achieve your desired outcome

2. Identify any obstacles UPFRONT that could get in the way of the plan being a success and you achieving your desired outcome of optimal health. Also include potential strategies that could be employed to mitigate the obstacles. In project management terms (my former life) this is referred to as risk management, you literally plan what to do in the event of something going wrong before it happens.

3. Identify any help or support you may need to carry out your plan. That could be in the form of home help, specialised practitioners, health coach etc.

4. Be clear on your start date and the length of time you will participate in your chosen protocol, i.e. 30 days, 3 months, 6 months etc. This needs to be flexible

5. Be clear on the protocol you will be following for your healing journey. There is no one size fits ALL and it may mean a combination of different healing protocols

6. Know where to source your food from

7. Meal Plan – this step is non negotiable and is crucial to the success of any gut healing program

The next P of gut healing is PREPARATION.

Give yourself the time you need to get organised. Do not rush this step. It took me at least 6 weeks of planning and preparation before actually starting the GAPS protocol. This was crucial to our success and more importantly my SANITY.

Things to consider when preparing your healing journey:

1. Be clear of the foods to remove from your diet and which ones to include

2. Get your pantry stocked with healing essentials, see this blog

3. Identify where and how you can create convenience so that you are not chained to the kitchen

4. Identify where in your week you can block out time to do the crucial activities such as meal planning and food preparation. These activities are key and without it, success and long term sustainable lifestyle change just will not take place.

The last P of gut healing is PERSISTENCE.

Let’s not kid ourselves; initiating any change is hard and overwhelming, especially if you are coming from a place of stress. The learning curve is very steep and more often than not you are just not sure you can actually do this. I know this feeling too well, I’ve been there myself! But you just need to start, and take one day at a time. You will be guaranteed to take a few steps backwards before you go forwards and the journey may be rocky, but you need to keep going. Whenever the feelings of failure or overwhelm come knocking (and they will) just keep your end goal at the forefront of your mind. Imagine your life as if your family was experiencing abundant optimal health.

Imperfect ACTION will always out weigh perfect INACTION. Just need to be willing to try

If you need help with you or your child’s gut healing journey, book in for a free 15 minute call, email me or check out my work with me page to see if one of my programs are a suitable fit for you.

Chantal is a Certified Nutrition & Wellness Coach who specialises in working with stressed and overwhelmed mothers of immune & digestive challenged children to heal their child’ gut by implementing a wholistic personalised step by step plan.

How do I know if I need gut healing?

Well, just about ANY physical symptom of dis-ease will be the result of a gut and/or cellular function imbalance as the root cause. That means about 97% of the population can be of benefit to healing their gut, including you!

Treating anything else is just a band-aid solution and symptom management.

According to Dr Natasha Campbell-Mcbride (Author of Gut and Psychology Syndrome), adults and children with gut issues display the following symptoms to various degrees:

• Digestive (colic, reflux, bloating, flatulence, diarrhea, constipation, feeding issues (fussy eating – limiting food to white starchy carbohydrates))

• Autism

• ADHD

• Allergies

• Eczema

• Food sensitivity/intolerance

• Behavioural issues

• Weakened immune system – constantly getting sick and not recovering quickly, chronic infections

• Asthma

• Anxiety

• Depression

• IBS (abdominal pain, bloating, stool abnormalities and flatulence)

• Auto-immune disease

She goes on to explain that a healthy adult carries 1.5-2kg of bacteria in the gut and that they are all in a well organised system. The number of functions that the bacteria fulfill in our bodies are so vital, but if we made our gut too sterile, we would probably not survive.

Dr McBride also mentions that 80-85% of our immunity is located in the gut wall and that the bacteria within us outnumber human cells in our body by 10:1. In essence we are more bugs than cells. These numbers alone demonstrate the importance of GUT HEALTH!

So how do we get out of balance with our gut in the first place?

Thankfully the list of culprits is not too long and the factors that affect it are within our control to remedy so that we CAN alter the health of our gut.

FACTORS THAT AFFECTS THE MICROBIOME:

1. Antibiotics - there is absolutely no question that there is a time and a place for the use of antibiotics, but not at the levels seen today. The truth of the matter is that most sickness, if nipped in the bud early using age old remedies, can be resolved without the use of countless courses of antibiotics. See my workshops page for Managing Your Child's Health Naturally

2. Pharmaceuticals - The use of ANY pharmaceuticals will have a negative impact on the gut microbiome. If there is a need a consume a pharmaceutical, then suitable follow-up care should be employed

3. Diet- This is 100% in our control and it can have the single biggest impact on the health of the gut. A diet that is rich in packaged, processed, colours, additives and preservative laddened food will put the gut flora out of balance and have a detrimental effect to the health of the gut.

4. Stress - This is quite often the elephant in the room and is actually the TRUMP card when it comes to your health & well being. A stressed mind and body will outweigh a healthy diet any day.

5. Environmental toxins - We need to be aware of the environmental factors that surrounds us on a daily basis and how they could be/are affecting your health. By this I mean, the quality and source of your food, the products that you are using to clean, the products that are applied to your body and being absorbed by the largest organ, i.e the skin and the electromagnetic fields you are exposed to.

How to heal the gut?

This is something that does NOT happen overnight and requires patience, perseverance and most importantly flexibility. There is definitely is no "One Size Fits All" approach, but the fundamentals remain the same regardless of the type of healing protocol you need to follow.

1. Get back to basics - a wholefood nutrient dense diet is NON NEGOTIABLE. Health is not found in a box or convenient, I checked :-). It's about what is important 80% of time and the remainder 20% is with no guilt (if your symptoms allows this level of flexibility)!

2. Include fermented food and drinks in your diet - Start this slowly and with caution as some individuals can be very sensitive to the die-off reactions when starting to include this daily. Also add a quality broad strain probiotic daily.

3. Include broth and grass-fed gelatine - This needs to be consumed daily and multiple time a day for a therapeutic effect.

4. Stress Management - This is the key to the puzzle. We cannot avoid stress, but we can definitely learn how to handle it better. Find a way that sits well with you and more importantly teach your offspring to do the same. This is one of the best life tools you can provide them.

If you need help with you or your child’s gut healing journey, book in for a free 15 minute call, email me or check out my work with me page to see if one of my programs are a suitable fit for you.

Chantal is a Certified Nutrition & Wellness Coach who specialises in working with stressed and overwhelmed mothers of immune & digestive challenged children to heal their child’ gut by implementing a wholistic personalised step by step plan.

My Top 10 Gut Healing Pantry Essentials

Your gut healing journey does NOT have to be an ALL or NOTHING approach, but instead can be a journey of small progressive measured steps to an ultimate destination. That destination will be different for everyone, but do know that at some point in that journey, for a period of time, ALL known inflammatory/trigger foods will need to be removed simultaneously in order to achieve an environment that allows the body to heal the gut. This is not meant to be long term, but enough to achieve healing.

So with this in mind, is it really beneficial to have a few pantry staples on hand so that you are always including a gut healing food in some way in your diet on a daily basis or even multiple times a day without out even thinking or making it a big deal.

There are a stack of others that can be included, but these are my top 10 to have on hand.

 My top 10 pantry staples, in no particular order:

1.  Good Quality Oils such as Olive oil & Coconut Oil – these are a great source of fat that can be added to make salad dressings, marinades, add to tips and included to bliss balls and smoothies (maybe not the olive to a bliss ball and smoothie, I’m not game, but feel free to try:-)).

2.  Gelatin (Collagen & Hydrolsed). This is an absolute MUST to any gut healing protocol and is so easy to add to the diet on a daily basis. Ensure you are sourcing an organic pasture fed brand.

a.       Collagen Gelatin – this is great to make gummies, marshmallows, puddings, jelly, panacotta etc

b.      Hydrolysed Form– this is fabulous to add to just about everything. As it is un-flavoured and dissolves in both hot and cold liquids, it's so versatile. I add it to my tea, smoothies, blissballs, dips etc

3.  Powered broth – great for when you don’t have of your own on hand and a little goes a long way. Add it to scrambled eggs, stews, casseroles, or a crumbing mixture for chicken strips/nuggets

4.  Tamari – a fabulous alternative to soya sauce which is also wheat free and gluten free with a much more subtle flavour the kids like.

5. Vinegar – Apple cider & Balsamic – Used for salad dressings and added to cooking for a great depth of flavour. Ensure the Apple Cider is organic, unfiltered with the mother. Also great to use as a digestive aid before meals.

6. Nuts & Seeds –Any fresh variety that tickles your fancy, great for snacking, making nut milks and flours for baking. For optimal nutrition & digestion ensure they are properly prepared by soaking and dehyrdrating.

7. Desiccated or shredded coconut – Must be organic with no preservatives added. Can also be used to make coconut milk, the left over pulp can then used to make coconut flour and coconut butter if you have a high speed blender. Good source of protein & fibre.

8. Cocoa or Cacao – Get the best quality possible, great for making bliss balls, slices and homemade chocolate milk.

9. Nutritional yeast flakes – This little number is packed full of nutrition, especially B Vitamins, which are essential for energy production and the nervous system, and has a nice savoury flavour. Some even used it as cheese substitiute. I like adding it to savoury muffins, stews, casseroles or crackers. Easily obtained from a good health food shop.

10. Seaweed – Dulse flakes or nori seasweed sheets- Another great addition that is jam packed full of vitamins and minerals. I often add these to stews and seeded crackers. The seaweed sheets are great for making sushi rolls at home.

So get shopping and stocking that pantry with the essentials to start you on your journey.

If you need help with you or your child’s gut healing journey, book in for a free 15 minute call, email me or check out my work with me page to see if one of my programs are a suitable fit for you.

Chantal is a Certified Nutrition & Wellness Coach who specialises in working with stressed and overwhelmed mothers of immune & digestive challenged children to heal their child’ gut by implementing a wholistic personalised step by step plan.

The 4 lessons I learnt healing from Adrenal Fatigue

After many years of working solidly to rebuild my little man's immune system, I remember very distinctly the day I took a sigh of relieve thinking we were finally at a place with his health I could only dream about.

This was also the noticeable decline of my own health; although there were many earlier signs I chose to ignore.

Lesson 1 - Don’t ignore your body’s speech through physical dis-ease

Leading up to that that day, I was experiencing many symptoms of physical dis-ease, but I just brushed them under carpet until I could no longer ignore them. These symptoms were starting to impact my daily life and my ability to complete simple tasks. Some of these symptoms included things such as:

• Lack of energy

• Lack of enthusiasm

• Extreme exhaustion to the point of not being able to get out of bed after 10 hours of solid sleep

• Weight gain for no particular reason

• Brain fog, unbelievable brain fog

• Irregular cycle

• Emotional

• Angry and irritable for much of the time without obvious cause....think cranky pants mum CONSTANTLY...poor kids

• Inability to concentrate on a task for long periods of time

These symptoms were quite uncharacteristic for me, but I just put it down to the struggles of motherhood. With this in mind, my attitude was “ Pull up your big girl pants and get on with the job" whilst trying to keep the facade of a mother that had it all together (which clearly I didn’t)

I knew there was cause for concern when I woke up crying most mornings due to the sheer feeling of exhaustion and not knowing how I was going to get through the day, and quite often my husband would return home from work seeing a very similar picture.

After trying to implement a few self care strategies myself without any improvement, I consulted my qualified health care practitioner whom diagnosed me as having severe Adrenal Fatigue, stage 3 or 4 I believe. I thought she had lost her mind to be honest, especially when I was told recovery would take nothing less than 9 months but closer to 2 years because of the state I was in. My instant thought was,  “I’ll show her, I’ll knock this over in 3 months, just tell me what I need to eat and what supplements I need to take”.....ha ha little did I know.

Lesson 2 - Surrender, accept the situation and ask for help

This is how I spent much of my recovery time in the early days.

Having this diagnosis was almost like music to my ears as now I had an explanation for the symptoms I was experiencing. It also felt like someone gave me permission to just let it be. It was at this time my body then started adrenal crashing multiple times a week, which was quite scary initially as I did not understand what was happening. In simple terms this meant I was in an enforced horizontal position for most part of the day. I was physically unable to complete basic household functions or drive for periods longer than 10 minutes and virtually left me incapable of looking after my family. This killed me inside, but I now also knew that I had no choice but to surrender to the current situation rather than fight it nearly every minute of the day. I could no longer fight what my body needed, and instead, I gave in and showered it with whatever was required. I was unbelievably blessed that my mother was able to stay with me 3-4 days a week for 3 months whilst I rebuilt myself again. Initially I felt like such a failure having to accept this help, but this mentality was no longer serving me or my healing and once again practised the art of surrender.

My treatment plan as recommended by my health care practitioner included the following:

1. A nourishing diet, excluding GLUTEN, minimal grains, focusing on quality proteins, fats and abundant vegetables. Plenty of daily broth and fermented food.

2. Quality, broad spectrum probiotics

3. Adaptogenic herbs – the tinctures changed as my needs changed.

4. High doses of Vitamin C

5. Antioxidant supplementation

6. Acupuncture

7. Rest as much as was needed, sometimes this was napping 4 hours in the day or multiple little naps until I became stronger and was able to sustain stable energy throughout the day.

Please note, I provide this purely for information purposes, seek guidance from a qualified health professional if you think you are suffering from Adrenal Fatigue. Treatment for each person is very unique. This is what worked for me over a period of time.

Lesson 3 - Healing had more to do with my mind, than my physical body

It soon became clear that eating and supplementing alone was not going to aid my recovery but my mental and emotional well being was big a part of that picture. Initially I resisted this if I’m perfectly honest and thought it was a load of crap. As a type ‘A” personality I’m results driven, not method driven. Liking the method was irrelevant. If I wanted the result of feeling abundantly healthy and energetic again, I needed to do whatever I had to, and once again practised the art of surrender. At this stage I was starting to get pretty good at recognising when I needed to do this. Therefore I listened to what was being recommended to me and reaped the benefits.

My daily emotional well being practices looked like something like this;

1. Guided visualisations of being healthy and energetic- usually done whilst napping

2. Gratitude

3. Deep breathing, usually 1-3 minutes multiple times a day

4. EFT tapping

5. Mantra’s affirming health & vitality

Lesson 4 - Forget being superwoman

Prior to being struck down with Adrenal Fatigue, I loved to idea of being able to do it ALL and run a million miles a minute, but going through this experience has been one of my darkest and challenging times and I never want to experience it again. So once again I realised that this thought pattern was no longer serving me or my family and I let it go. I do what I can with ease, rather than push myself beyond my limits.

I now intuitively listen to my body, and in fact, she is my queen and I honour it. If it says it’s tired and showing any signs of physical dis-ease, I immediately stop, re-focus, re-group and get back to basics. I then become the priority over ANYTHING else and I feel no guilt for doing this, as trying to be selfless and ignoring my needs got me into a lot of trouble. So far, this practise is serving me well:-)

Full recovery did take me closer to the 2 year mark, but after 7-8 months applying ALL of the above I had sufficient energy to at least get through the day without crashing. I can still be prone to bouts of fatigue if I’m not tuning in to my physical & emotional needs quickly enough, but this is very easily resolved these days.

I am so grateful to have experienced this condition (even though I did not think it at the time, in fact I remember cursing it) and the lesson’s it has taught me. In every challenge there is a seed of benefit.

As mother’s we are so hard on ourselves and it’s time to just give you a break. We are doing the most important job in the world if, but in order to do that well, we need to look after ourselves first and it’s totally OK to tend your needs before anyone else. This is setting up very healthy boundaries for you. We are doing the best we can with what we know and have available to us at the time, and when you know better, you can then do better.

This whole experience has really amplified my belief that optimal health is so much more than what we eat, albeit it is super important and foundational. Being healthy is a combination of pillars and they all need to be in balance to experience health & vitality.

Just know that you “ARE ENOUGH” and you deserve to feel “AMAZING”, because YOU are WORTH IT.

XX

If you need help with you or your child’s gut healing journey, book in for a free 15 minute call, email me or check out my work with me page to see if one of my programs are a suitable fit for you.

Chantal is a Certified Nutrition & Wellness Coach who specialises in working with stressed and overwhelmed mothers of immune & digestive challenged children to heal their child’ gut by implementing a wholistic personalised step by step plan.