A healthy gut – how to make your intestines well with a little bacteria

Brian Strickland  00:00

Hey everyone, welcome back to Nutrition Made Simple a video series that we created that takes a look at common or even complex health issues and we break them down into natural, easy to understand and actionable steps that pretty much anyone can take. I'm Brian Strickland here with me is Ed Jones, the owner, founder of Nutrition World. And last month, we took a look at our core four as kind of a common theme throughout the month. But this month, we're focusing on gut health. And so today, in particular, we're going to be talking about these probiotics, what they can do for your health and how they can help and why they're so important as a supplement, a daily supplement. But before we get started talking about that, we've got to take a look at a general term, and that is the microbiome, and that's located in your gut. So, Ed, to start us out, can you just give us an idea of what the microbiome is and how it affects our health?

Ed Jones  01:00

Well, thank you, Brian. And, you know, the microbiome is being discussed heavily throughout the world now, because we're learning that within our intestines is trillions of bacteria that are really not what we call us. They're actually something beyond us. And they are to me similar a little bit to a software program in a computer, they regulate so many functions. You know, for most of the time of history until probably 1520 years ago, even GI docs, everybody thought that the gut was a piece of plumbing, and actually was nothing but to allow things to pass through and get out. Now we know that the gut is actually at least 60% of our immune system, and at least 60% of our brain chemistry. That's why when you get a stomach bug, you get anxious, and you can be even depressed and you can be anxiety driven like crazy. It's because all these bacteria within the gut have gone little haywire. And they've they've created almost just like a computer, it's really shutting down in some ways. So it is vital to our health. In fact, Hippocrates said 1000s of years ago, you know, health and disease begins in the gut. I mean, I don't know how he knew so much with intuition back then.

Brian Strickland  02:19

Yeah, so the microbiome just refers to a general term, the place where good and bad bacteria are kind of housed within our gut. And on the topic of good and bad bacteria. That's a good segue into talking about probiotics real quick. Because we do recommend taking a daily probiotic supplement that's actually part of our core for we, we have integrated with our greens powder, but we do carry and recommend external supplements as well. So why don't you just take a brief moment to just explain what probiotics do and or what they are and what they do?

Ed Jones  02:56

Well, a probiotic, Brian is is nothing more than a combination of different species of this microbiome colony. It's a family actually. And if we, you know, live in the old days, where we had dozens of people in our close community, and they were all related to us, I think most of the time minus the drama that occasionally could occur, they were all helpful to our existence and our future. That's what the probiotics is hopefully doing when we introduce them back into the colon. It's not a perfect system, people, let me tell you a lot to know about it. We still have a lot to learn. But it's the best that we have. And it has evolved in the past even five years to a level that is pretty astounding to me.

Brian Strickland  03:41

Yeah, so much about health is really about balance, right? It's and even within our gut, it's that balance between good and bad back bad bacteria, that the bad bacteria overrun the good, well, then that causes a lot of issues, obviously. And that's something that we want to avoid. And that is also what makes probiotics so important. One of the biggest questions that we get often, especially with supplements is, supplements are meant to kind of fill in those nutritional gaps where our diets might not contain enough of the foods that we need to really function and feel our best. And probiotics are no different. You can get them from your diet and nutritional sources. So can you tell us what foods we need to be eating to keep those probiotic levels high?

Ed Jones  04:28

Well, great question number one is introducing good bacteria is very key to our longevity or are being disease free. A lot of what goes on in our future will be determined by this family of microbiome. Sadly, people don't understand that introducing them is only half of the battle. We have to feed them. And I use this analogy constantly that if you have carpet in your house, you can throw grass seed down put water on it, the grass seeds will sprout, but how long will they live? Not long because They need food. What is the food is called a prebiotic. A lot of those are fibers. You know, the average person from the primitive cultures eats about 50 to 80 grams of fiber per day, I talked to people and have for 40 plus years, when they tell me what they eat, I can tell mentally, they're getting about 20 grams of fiber. That's what we have so much diverticulitis, and so many hemorrhoids, and so many problems with their health issues. So we have to up that, even if we're doing this, and you can purchase prebiotics, or you can eat a lot of good fiber. And that's certainly what we need to be doing anyway. Yeah. And as far as you know, introducing good bacteria in the gut with food, it's fine, but most of us don't eat cultured foods. And if you eat foods that are labeled with good bacteria, but they're full of sugar and some other things, it's going to be almost worthless.

Brian Strickland  05:51

Yeah. So there's a particular yogurt that comes into mind. That's a very good example of that. It's good to eat live culture foods, and typically that means fermented so things like sauerkraut, some dairy products, like yogurts, kefir that is also a very good source. But chances are, like Ed said, we aren't eating enough to really get the good enough good bacteria that we need. And that's why we recommend probiotic supplements. So with that in mind, there are a lot to choose from just like anything else that we would have in the store, and it can feel overwhelming trying to pick the right product for you. I think you would say, as well, it does take some trial and error, sometimes, especially probiotics, it's not an exact science necessarily. There are particular strains, there are colony forming units, which that's what you'll see on the front, like the 50 billion or the 20 million, whatever it is that you decide to take. So why don't we take a moment and let's talk about how to pick a quality probiotic first. And then we can get into the different strains and kind of what to look for with that?

Ed Jones  07:13

Well, again, a great question. And I used to think it was hard to go into a computer store and pick a computer, this is actually more difficult if you really want to figure out the details. The good thing is we've determined a lot of details. And we're here to help guide you to make it easy. So you don't have to do a lot of homework if you don't want. But yet, it's still part of his personal experimentation. And you can look at these labels, because there are numerous fancy words on the back of these boxes. The big key to this is, is it completely potent at time of purchase, we make sure of that I guarantee you. Secondly, will it travel through the acidic stomach without being destroyed. That is what used to happen to the probiotics. And that's why we got very few results. They might have been quality, but they were killed during the process. Most technology today is using certain types of specialized capsules that allow it to go through there because it needs to be in a neutral or alkaline environment to survive. And all the brands we carry generally do that. saying that it's still somewhat of an inexact science, I can tell you, I've taken over 40 brands of probiotics, 10 of those are my friends. 10 of those are neutral and 20 of those Actually, I don't really feel as good as I want on those. What does that mean, I might have more gas, I might have different intestinal things that just don't feel right. So I've had to experiment. These are brands that I've come to trust a lot, but we have a full selection of other ones in each of these is bacteria for the small intestines and the large. And when you look at the labels, I don't like to give exact numbers, but most of the time you want at least 10 billion. And you can do as much as you want all most. And before I forget, I want to make sure there's a couple instances where I don't recommend people to do probiotics, one of which is if they have pancreatitis, there's a couple studies showing that that might be something to wait on till you get through that crisis. And I advise people who have extremely what I call leaky gut syndrome, to probably delay it slightly while you're trying to fix the leaky gut. Those are the only two things that normally I don't recommend them for. But if you have medical conditions, check with your doctor. And of course, like you mentioned or we would mention we have refrigerated forms and and non refrigerated forms. What is the difference? You know, back in the old day, I'd say most brands have to be refrigerated but the technology has improved to a point now where like probalan it's non refrigerated and I will use those when I travel because I'm telling you the refrigerated brands, they get weak very quickly to the exposure of light and heat and moisture. They really degrade fast. These are bacterias it's almost like carrying a goldfish. with you. And if you don't take care of it, you know what's going to happen. So, you know, utilizing brands that are we trust, because we've done the homework, and then you experiment with diking it sometimes with meals, and sometimes without, I'm sorry, is not such an exact science, but we are complex beings. And what works for Brian may not work for me, the good thing is they're extremely safe. Once you build the good bacteria, you can count on having a better immune system, usually better emotional health because of the fact that it produces those and big times, how many people have you heard that had colon diseases? Well, of course, you're going to have more susceptibility, if you have the wrong bacteria in that part of the gut, because it's producing a toxin. And those toxins are carcinogenic, they, they cause troubles on all fronts. So we want that family to come back in that our friends, our cousins, or brothers and sisters, that take care of us. This is your family. And it is live. And they do care about you. Because I use the analogy again of a parking lot. your intestines are like this massive parking lot that's got a trillion spaces, parking spaces. When you take an antibiotic, or you eat foods with Roundup, or you drink chlorinated water, or you don't do anything healthy, that parking lot like an antibiotic, you'll clean out the parking lot. Well guess what moves in within one day of not having the antibiotic, usually the bad guys, unless you put the good guys in that parking space, once they're in the parking space, the bad guys will come through and can't find a place to park so they just keep moving. That's the goal people that's the goal.

Brian Strickland  11:33

One thing that I want to hit on before we move on is you mentioned it early there on a lot of the probiotic supplements. If you look really hard at the fine print, it will actually say at the time of manufacture. And that should be a red light going off when you're picking out a probiotic supplement. So all that means is that at the time it was manufactured, it's guaranteeing the amount that you see on the label. Well, once you buy it, or once it sits on a shelf, and it's shipped in a hot truck, and then it sits on a shelf for even longer, those bacteria can degrade. And you're not actually getting the amount that's listed on the box making it an ineffective product, we partner with companies that actually guarantee the amount that's listed on the box, whether that's them taking extra precautions to ensure that it's shipped safely is a big one. But the important thing is to know that you're you're getting what you pay for with any of the probiotics that we have on our shelf. So I just want to hit on that before we move on. So we have a select number of probiotics, obviously, two of the biggest trends that you're going to see are bifidobacterium and lactobacillus, those are, those are pretty much the two big hitters that you're going to find in pretty much any probiotic supplement. But with that being said, there is something that's really unique, that isn't as popular necessarily, and that spores, I don't know a whole lot about them. So I'm going to talk about that for just a second.

Ed Jones  13:04

I love spores, Brian, and the reason I do is because the research is very clear. If you're on an antibiotic, you know, many times even the doctor will say you need to get a probiotic. The problem is the probiotics going to be killed with every single dose of your antibiotic means you really are not even treading water, you're going backwards. I'm not saying not to do it, but the benefit will be very little. But a spore is is almost like a probiotic in a special egg and it's protected. And when you take a spore, you can take it with an antibiotic and it won't kill it. It's amazing how better people do on spores opposed to probiotics. So my heavy duty recommendations, you're on an antibiotic for whatever reason you need. Just put these aside, come in and get a spore great company called thrive makes one. Dr. Mercola makes one and I just would only do spore sometimes I only do spores anyway, I really there. They agree with me very well.

Brian Strickland  14:03

Yeah, that's what that's what I was gonna ask this is something that you only do when you're on an antibiotic, or would you take them in place of like a traditional probiotic?

Ed Jones  14:10

I am a huge fan of taking it off and on. I love planting different seeds. So I don't do the same thing all the time. And again, I'd rotate back and forth when they look at cultures. Well, in fact, I read on the on a big study where they found someone from 1000s of years ago. And they were able to look at the type of bacteria that was in their gut, obviously, through DNA and other things, the diversity that those people had 1000s of years ago, we don't hold a candle to it. We have maybe seven to 10 different bacterias they can add 40 to 100. And that's important because the people who are living now in very remote places have three times more diversity than we each of these good bacteria are doing something positive for us. They're eliminating a poisoned a toxin, they're producing better immune systems. I mean, we have probiotics for mood. We have probiotics for prostate, we have product probiotics for, you know, female issues, not to treat them but to make your body optimal so that you have less trouble with those. It is the future of holistic and preventative medicine is getting better and better at doing this. I've had 12 stool tests done, because I'm so intrigued by and only when I do the right good probiotics Do I have better stool test and I still have a report card would have a B-. I have never made the a level yet. And I eat better than probably 95% of all people. But I will admit I do not particularly like the cultured foods, like sauerkraut and other things as my daughter will eat a whole jar full. I just don't do that. But without these, I'd be doomed.

Brian Strickland  15:53

Yeah, those foods aren't typically on everyone's list. And that's understandable it it can be an acquired taste, but they are very important for our diet. So we really hope that helps. hopefully that answered some of the questions that you may have. These are really safe. There's more research everyday coming out about the benefits of probiotics for gut health issues, like he said emotional health issues. It is a really important part of a supplementation regimen that we highly recommend for for pretty much everyone. So yeah, hopefully that was helpful. If you have any other questions, please reach out to us and let us know you can give us a call or visit us in store. Reach out here on YouTube, social media, whatever floats your fancy, we're always happy to help. So thanks, everyone. We'll see you next time.

Ed Jones  16:43

Thank you and good health.