Feel Better, Live More with Dr Rangan Chatterjee - #284 BITESIZE | 4 Simple Tips to Improve Your Gut Health | Jeannette Hyde

Episode Date: June 16, 2022

Our gut health impacts so much more than simply our digestive system. The gut is now being implicated in a host of different conditions, including joint pain, brain fog, insomnia and depression. Feel Better Live More Bitesize is my weekly podcast for your mind, body, and heart.  Each week I’ll be featuring inspirational stories and practical tips from some of my former guests. Today’s clip is from episode 40 of the podcast with nutritional therapist and author, Jeannette Hyde. In this clip, Jeannette explains why the health of our gut microbiome is so important for good physical and mental health. She shares some great strategies she’s used with her own clients that will help us improve our relationship with our gut bugs. Thanks to our sponsor http://www.athleticgreens.com/livemore Show notes and the full podcast are available at drchatterjee.com/40 Order Dr Chatterjee's new book Happy Mind, Happy Life: UK version: https://amzn.to/304opgJ US & Canada version: https://amzn.to/3DRxjgp Support the podcast and enjoy Ad-Free episodes. Try FREE for 7 days on Apple Podcasts https://apple.co/3oAKmxi. For other podcast platforms go to https://fblm.supercast.com. Follow me on instagram.com/drchatterjee Follow me on facebook.com/DrChatterjee Follow me on twitter.com/drchatterjeeuk DISCLAIMER: The content in the podcast and on this webpage is not intended to constitute or be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your doctor or other qualified health care provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have heard on the podcast or on my website. 

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10. And these packs are perfect for keeping in your backpack, office, or car. If you want to take advantage of this limited time offer, all you have to do is go to drinkag1.com forward slash live more. Welcome to Feel Better Live More Bite Size, your weekly dose of positivity and optimism to get you ready for the weekend. Today's clip is from episode 40 of the podcast with nutritional therapist and author, Jeanette Tde. Now in this clip, Jeanette explains why the health of our gut microbiome is so key for good physical and mental health. And she shares some great strategies that she's used with her own clients that can help us improve our relationship with our own gut bugs.

with our own gut bugs. Generally, time-restricted eating and time-restricted feeding is a very safe recommendation that can impact weight, blood sugar, immune system, inflammation levels, all kinds of things in the body. So it makes sense that when you make that recommendation with a patient, Jeanette, all kinds of different diseases or conditions may start to improve. in the body. So it makes sense that when you make that recommendation with a patient, Jeanette, all kinds of different diseases or conditions may start to improve.

Well, the gut starts healing itself. It goes into healing and repair mode. The wonderful Sachin Panda is one of the main guys behind the time-restricted feeding research from the Salk Institute in San Diego. And I remember in 2015 when I was writing The Gut Makeover, looking at his mouse studies that were coming out at that time, and I literally thought I was reading them wrong. There were three groups of mice. They were all given exactly the same calorie count of food over four months. You had one group that could eat the food, the chow, at any time they felt like it. You had one group that could eat the food, the chow at any time they felt like it.

You had one group that could eat in a 12-hour window and one group that could eat in an eight-hour window. And at the end of it, the mice that were eating all day long, the kind of Western 24-7 snacking all day long kind of pattern, they were all obese. And the ones in the 12-hour window and the 8-hour window lost weight. The ones in the 8-hour window lost most. They also dissected their guts and looked at their microbiomes. And the microbiomes of the 12- and the 8-hour ones were much, much, they were healthy, the bacteria was thriving, and all this kind of thing.

There are all kinds of very interesting pieces of research out there for dealing with gut issues and manipulating your microbiome and improving symptoms of IBS that often people haven't, you know, it hasn't come on their radar yet. If I think back to that conversation I had with Professor Panda, you know, he talks about, and I've read all his research papers about how restricting our eating window can have multiple downstream consequences. You know, we focus for so long on changing what we eat. Maybe we need to put as much focus on when we eat. The microbiome will flourish and have more diversity just by not having food sort of charging through it you know all day long yeah so what happens it's like i say to people it's like think of it like a lawn you need to not walk over it for a few hours let it have time to flourish and thrive that's a great analogy and i think you know often a lot of the things we're talking about to improve people's

gut health we're talking about the foods that they can put in through their mouth you know that are going to help you know feed and nourish their their gut bugs on their microbiome but we don't give as much attention to saying hey guys we need a period of time where we're not putting those foods down even if they are healthy gut friendly foods your body like your lawn as the analogy you just used needs a bit of time just to sort of reset yeah and for the big cases like inflammatory bowel disorder and stuff like that, and also diverticulitis and some of the really bad IBS cases, I start by saying, do a 16 hour fast with an eight hour window. So that's eight hours in the daytime where they would eat food within. Yeah. and do that for the first month.

So for instance, let's say somebody tells me they hate breakfast. I leap on that. I leap on that fact. That's one of my key entry points. I'm like, oh, you don't like breakfast. Well, you don't have to eat breakfast. And they're like, really? I've always been told I've had to eat breakfast, so they don't.

So suddenly, instantly, those kind of people might be very happy to start eating at 12 to late. like really i've always been told i've had to eat breakfast so they don't so suddenly instantly they're those kind of people might be very happy to start you know 12 to late yeah and i've had several of these cases and i i thought i was just doing it you know to regularize the microbiome and put that in better shape so that is going to have a knock-on impact i wasn't expecting the results as fast as they're coming so So one thing I found with that time-restricted feeding is I just found that people could imagine instantly that that was something attainable, easy. They're not going to have to go hungry. They don't have to sort of forfeit any foods that they love and they enjoy, do they? So they literally go, oh, okay, rather

than eating at 10pm when my husband comes in and going to bed with heartburn every night and I've noticed I've put on a lot of weight over the last year I'll eat with the kids at six and I'll have a cup of cup of herbal tea with my husband while he's eating his dinner when he comes in at 10. I went out for lunch with my brother and my sister I think it just came organically into the conversation about time-restricted feeding. My sister was saying that she was doing slim fast and all these other things. And she put on a lot of weight over the last year or so. She was eating late. She was having the acid reflux. And I was talking about time-restricted feeding. Anyway, I saw her very recently. She walked back into the room and I said,

you're looking really well. How are you? She said, oh, I've lost a stone. She said, I did that thing you told me to've lost a stone she said the I did that thing you told me to I'm having dinner with the kids at six now instead of waiting for the husband and I've lost that amount of weight and I mean she looks fantastic and she said that is the only difference I made it took her three months she did that in three months but coming back to Sachin Panda don't you think that's sort of like incredible? It's because it's a very practical intervention for people. It makes intuitive sense.

And this is about, you know, this whole idea that we're not designed to eat, you know, 24 hours a day or certainly from 6 a.m. all the way to 11 p.m. You know, our bodies are just not designed for that. And in my book, The Four-Pillar Plan, I talk about a 12-hour window. And the reason I talk about that is because I think that's pretty much practical and achievable for everyone, for pretty much everyone. And I do in clinic, I do go a bit deeper with some people. And I cover that in a book. I say, guys, some people will benefit from going low and short, but just start there, right? See if you can get that dialed in. And I know I try my very best to do that and I manage to on most days. But I know you've been using this in your clinic with patients since 2015.

So what are those common problems that you're seeing in your clinic? And what are some of those things that people are actually doing? They think they're being healthy with, but actually when they see you, they're not being quite as healthy as you might want them to be people can be just sort of focusing really hard on the diet and i'd have a conversation with somebody and you know they're actually seated 12 hours of the day these ibs patients you know yeah um driving to work then being in very sort of demanding jobs and driving home and and it's only as we're talking and they're explaining it to me I might feed it back and go do you realize you're you're seated

for 12 hours a day and they go really I've not really thought about it like that do you know what I mean and I said you don't you're not having a lunch break either are you and they're like um no I haven't got time for lunch you know they're eating at the desk and all that stuff as well but physical activity is important right for our for our guts? Yes, totally. Because, you know, when you're moving, your gut bacteria improves and you produce short-chain fatty acids, which help with the gut lining and to keep that repaired and in good shape. So again, moving around if you have IBS is really important. Some people never even imagined that the fact that they're wolfing down their desk while they're answering 20 emails is part of part of the problem as well and then on top of the IBS you normally have people often quite low mood or their anxiety is really bad or they're not sleeping very well or they can't lose

any weight even though they might say to me I'm eating 1500 calories a day I've been doing this for two years you know nothing's happened you know the weight has got stuck as well um but lots of them and then they i see the food diaries and often it's like wonderful food diaries very very sort of all-round diets eating a good quality breakfast lunch dinner lots of variety you know they're doing lots and lots of good things do you want to know what the butt is the butt is it's a massive blind spot for a lot of people is the alcohol and binge drinking at the weekend. And these are all walks of life. People who are retired, some people have, you know, the high flying jobs and they're drinking a lot of alcohol. And they haven't put two and two together that their IBS is terrible all the time.

You know, like not even knowing if they're going to make it to the loo on time. You know, the IBS is terrible all the time, you know, like not even knowing if they're going to make it to the Luon time, you know, the IBS is so bad, but they've got this kind of big thing, elephant in the room that's not being acknowledged. Yeah, that's really interesting, Jeanette. I wonder if we could just finish off with four big tips that we can leave my listeners with that they can start putting into practice, hopefully immediately to start improving their health okay so the first one i would say is maybe keep a diary about your drinking because i think that a lot of us we don't realize till we actually see it in black and white how much we are drinking alcohol yes and i think that you know especially in ibs or if you've got a tissue it's a big factor so you know it's just worth seeing it in black and white.

And sometimes that can, you know, you start to have a conversation with yourself about, well, actually, maybe my partner and I will try and do this, that or the other. It's much easier to drink less if you've got support and, you know, you're supporting each other. Eat in a 10-hour window. If you've got a weight issue or a digestive issue, start trying to eat in this 10-hour window. If you've got a weight issue or a digestive issue, start trying to eat in this 10-hour and be really, really anal about it, by the way. If you're not at the moment having fermented foods, yeah, look out for things like kefir. They are in all the supermarkets now and they taste delicious. You just put them in the blender with a handful of berries in the morning, spoonful of flax seeds, and you've got a very gut-friendly

breakfast. The more diversity of fruit and vegetables you have with all the fiber the textures the color the plant chemicals and everything in there that that promotes lots of diversity of different bacteria in in the gut and when you have diversity of bacteria then that that correlates with good health really hope you enjoyed that bite-sized clip hope you have a wonderful weekend and i'll be back next week with my long-form conversational wednesday and the latest episode of bite science next friday Friday.