Gut health expert shares ways to manage stress, have more energy in new book
CHICAGO (CBS) — A functional medicine gut expert says maintaining a healthy gut is the key to managing stress and gaining more energy.
In the book "The Gutsmart Protocol: Revitalize Your Health, Boost Your Energy, and Lose Weight in Just 14 Days with Your Personalized Gut-Healing Plan," Dr. Vincent Pedre says the key to having those two things and more is maintaining your gut health.
"The gut is the foundation to total wellness," he said.
Dr. Pedre says his latest book is based on more than a decade of work with patients on gut health issues.
"Part of my mission with this book was to help people understand the underlying root causes for a whole constellation of symptoms that they may be feeling in their body, so the GutSmart Protocol is not just about gut symptoms. It's also about symptoms you may be experiencing in other parts of your body, like migraines, allergies, asthma, autoimmunity, fatigue, even just joint achiness, that you think is related to just getting older or something else, and it's actually rooted in gut health."
He says that when people avoid foods such as wheat or gluten, dairy, alcohol, and sugar, they often see an improvement in their gut health almost immediately.
When it comes to sugar, Dr. Pedre says it's one of the biggest inflammatory molecules and a disruptor of the gut microbiome.
"It actually promotes the growth of harmful bacteria and yeast in the gut, which are then going to cause a cascade of inflammation, which is the chronic denominator for every degenerative disease, and alcohol is also a gut disruptor because it disrupts the balance of the gut microbiome, leads to increased gut permeability or leaky gut and then inflammation that then leads to weight gain."
Dr. Pedre says small changes can have a huge impact on how you feel. One example is reducing sugar to less than 25 grams each day. Meditation and breathwork can also improve gut health.
Those looking to start their gut health journey can take Dr. Pedre's gut health quiz, and follow him on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and LinkedIn for more information.