The state of your gut is a key contributor to Endometriosis symptoms. Sounds weird, doesn’t it? How can it be that an organ that is not even connected to your reproductive system causes symptoms that have to do with your menstrual cycle?
Your gut, and in particular its wall, plays a key role in many body processes, including:
- Digestion of food: your stomach and intestines work very hard to break down the food you eat into a format that your body can use. They need to break that lovely piece of steak you had for dinner into the smallest units possible: proteins, vitamins, and minerals. They do this using enzymes, bile, and gut bacteria
- Nutrient absorption: once your food has been broken down and digested into proteins, vitamins and minerals, they are transported through the wall in your intestines into the blood stream and taken to their next destination in your body to do their important jobs.
- Nutrient creation: some B vitamins and vitamin K are created by gut bacteria
- fighting off viruses and bacteria: the gut bacteria, or microbiome, also play a key role in fighting off viruses and bacteria
- Facilitating a ‘waste disposal’ system: the intestinal wall has a layer of mucous that helps the waste move through and help to produce a nice, easy to pass, poo.
Most women with Endometriosis have leaky gut – or gut hyperpermeability.
If you have leaky gut, your intestinal wall is damaged, and is allowing undigested food particles through into your blood stream. You can compare it with a brick wall that has bricks missing in some places and mortar in others, allowing all sorts of debris coming into the house.
Those undigested food particles in your bloodstream trigger the immune system, which causes inflammation (read more about the role inflammation plays in your Endometriosis here).
A damaged gut wall also means there is less surface area through which nutrients can be absorbed, which means likely nutrient deficiencies. These nutrients may be crucial for hormone production or energy, for example.
The reduced intestinal wall surface area is also a problem for the gut bacteria that live on that wall. There is less space for them, so your ‘army’ of defenders and vitamin producers is not big enough to keep up with everything they need to do.
And finally, when you have leaky gut, the mucous layer on the intestinal wall is damaged and there is not enough lubricant in your gut to help move the waste down towards your colon. The result is dryer, rougher poo and this contributes, or causes, constipation.
So what causes leaky gut?
The biggest culprits are processed foods and foods that you are intolerant to. Unfortunately, foods that are generally considered healthy (such as fresh fruits or vegetables) can be foods that your digestive system is not able to cope with.
Healing a leaky gut means finding out what foods you are sensitive to and removing them from your diet. This allows your gut wall to heal and your immune system to be triggered less, reducing your inflammation as a result.
Most food intolerances are unique to you, but there are some that cause problems for most women with Endometriosis. If you would like to find out if you have some of these foods in your diet, I have a free diet assessment tool for you.