Gut Health and Mental Health

The link between physical and mental health is evident. However, many people aren't aware of specific brain-body interactions, such as gut health and mental health. There needs to be more light shown on the impact your stomach's health has on your emotional state and vice versa. 

In this article, we'll get into the details about gut and mental health, the relationship between the gut microbiome and mental health, and problems like leaky gut and anxiety. 

You won't find us padding or covering up this important subject with euphemisms. There's no shame here because we know that discussing gut health is vital. Our bellies are intrinsically related to the health of our mind and our body overall.

How Gut Microbiome and Mental Health Correlate 

There's been a great deal of research to support the connection between the gut microbiome and mental health. The list of ways one impacts the other is too extensive to expand upon in one article, so we'll highlight the three most important ones. 

1. Physical Pain Creates Emotional Turmoil 

Physical pain takes a toll on mental health. If you've ever had a sickness or injury that wouldn't go away, you know how distressing, frustrating, and even angering it can become. 

Poor gut function is also a type of pain, and the annoyance can get to the mind. You want the pain to stop because it drains your energy. You're tired of not only having to function with discomfort while also pretending it's not there. 

That upset belly can grow from just a slight irritation when you have too much cheese to a big problem that shows up in other systems in the body. Over time, physical pain may disrupt and change neurotransmitters. And if it goes on long enough, your pain can even permanently change how your brain is wired.

Unchecked physical illnesses often become the roots of chronic mental illnesses. 

2. Gut Problems Create Confinement

Poor gut health, in particular, contributes to depression. Medical problems centered on the gut can be debilitating, whether due to pain or having to plan the day around access to a restroom. You can no longer just go out for a walk in the woods if you want; outings become sources of stress instead of something exciting.

Gut problems are subtle stressors that grow into an underlying state of stress in your digestive, heart, and neural systems. 

Now you're constantly having to think, "If I go to this event, I'll have to stay in this area because that's where the restroom is." There aren't many thoughts more demoralizing than this, and it goes against the human need for freedom. Restricted movement causes psychological damage extremely quickly. 

When our lives become limited, it opens the door to depression because we don't get to do what we want to and know we're missing out on what's happening in the outside world. 

3. Stress Ruins Gut Health

The relationship between gut health and mental health is undeniable. Many people's appetites are changed drastically by stress, either by being unable to eat or using food as a coping mechanism. 

And stress in the mind and belly becomes a cycle: maintaining a stressful mentality damages your tummy, and leaving poor digestion unchecked worsens your mentality. 

4. Leaky Gut and Anxiety 

Leaky gut and anxiety are two disorders that are more related than you might think. A leaky gut is characterized by compromised intestinal barriers that lead to toxins passing into the bloodstream because the intestine doesn't process them properly. 

So, how does this complication exemplify the relationship between gut microbiome and mental health? 

Common symptoms of a leaky gut include fatigue, difficulty concentrating, and other cognitive ability inhibitions. Over time, these symptoms take a toll on your ability to respond to life stressors and perform daily responsibilities due to anxiety created in response to inflammation in the gut. 

Anxiety is a largely physical response to discomfort, causing the body's neurons to work overtime. In general, inflammation and infections cause the body to exert excessive force to keep functioning. This overall system fatigue causes various mental health disorders. 

Super Greens and Life Changes to Improve Your Gut Health

The most straightforward way to heal a leaky gut and anxiety is by offering your body the nutrients it needs. Super greens help regulate digestion and bathe the body with the nutrients it needs to thrive. 

Super greens don't increase or lessen bowel movements but make bowel movements regular and manageable instead of sporadic and harmful. 

However, power greens don't fix everything. A good diet can improve stress in the gut, but you'll also need to make lifestyle changes to decrease stress in your mind if you want to heal completely. Combine a good diet with lifestyle adjustments that reduce stress. 

Pay attention to your consumption: the foods you consume and the information you consume through your eyes and ears need to harmonize to help your body find peace. 

The Takeaway: Resetting Body and Mind 

If your mental health is compromised, your body will soon follow, and the reverse is also true. And as one gets worse, the other will too. This pattern will keep going on as long as you allow it to. 

To reset your gut health, you've got to focus on your mental health too. 

Lower your stress levels and increase your general mental health by choosing to focus on the present. Some known ways to create harmony in place of stress include listening to classical music, meditating and exercising, and having joyful and fruitful conversations with people you love.

Give your gut the nutrition it needs by eating healthily and giving your belly breaks to empty itself completely. Wash your tummy and let it rest by drinking pure water and herbal teas, and nourish your gut with whole and fresh foods like super greens. Find out what you need more and what to stop consuming.

Your daily super greens have the best effect when combined with stress-free mental practices. Protecting your gut health and mental health means releasing stress through the way you eat and the way you think.