- May 10, 2012 at 10:41 am #81470
JavizyMemberTopics: 20Replies: 945
A lot of members on here mention stress and anxiety, and some people have the impression that it’s just a natural part of everyday life. It’s hard to express how important it is to keep it well under control. Poorly controlled stress won’t just slow your treatment down, it could make the condition worse and prevent any progress at all. If you’re the kind of person who flips out at your computer or spends an hour worrying in bed at night, you’re doing yourself as much harm as someone eating pizza or drinking coke, which is a real shame given how much effort everyone is putting in with the protocol. I came across an interesting blog post today that highlights the significance of this.
Here are some especially interesting parts.
Not only does stress affect the physiological function of the gut, but it has also been shown to actually cause changes in the composition of the microbiota, possibly due to the changes in neurotransmitter and inflammatory cytokine levels. (6) Research in mice has found that exposure to stress led to an overgrowth of certain types of bacteria while simultaneously reducing microbial diversity in the large intestine of the stressed mice. (7, 8) Furthermore, this disruption of the microbiota increased susceptibility to enteric pathogens.
Chronic exposure to stress may lead to the development of a variety of gastrointestinal diseases such as gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), peptic ulcer disease, IBD, IBS, and even food allergies. (9) Experimental studies have shown that psychological stress slows normal small intestinal transit time, encourages overgrowth of bacteria, and even compromises the intestinal barrier. (10) Chronic stress may therefore play an important role in the development of small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (SIBO) and leaky gut syndrome.
And from this podcast.
…if you continue to have activation of…the fight-or-flight response, even if it’s at a low level, that will break down the intestinal barrier and cause leaky gut and cause changes in the intestinal microflora, so it would predispose you towards less good bacteria and more opportunistic or bad bacteria.
For anyone who’s interested in learning more about the physiology of stress and it’s role in everything from ageing to depression, I highly recommend Why Zebras Don’t Get Ulcers. Sapolsky has an engaging writing style and keeps you interested even though he’s covering some pretty technical topics. I also recommend Jon-Kabat Zinn’s program mentioned at the end of the article. His book Full Catastrophe Living helped me overcome my ridiculous aggression and anxiety pretty fast. It’s so simple to achieve you’ll wonder why you ever wanted to punch your monitor or scream at someone who won’t get out of the way.May 10, 2012 at 11:11 am #81476
dvjorgeParticipantTopics: 283Replies: 1368
There is another thing really important. The intestine is the organ that needs more blood in the body when is resting. The fast intestinal cell turn over requires blood and nutrients.
Chronic stress (stored in the hypothalamus) keeps the body ready to a fight or flight response 24 hours. This chronic state steals the blood flow needed to regenerate the intestinal lining. Overtime, this lack of blood flow will cause an imperfect cell barrier and leaky gut.
It is well determined by science that chronic stress affects the health of the intestinal lining and deteriorates the health.
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