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How Your Nervous System Affects Your Digestion

How Your Nervous System Affects Your Digestion

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When digestion feels unpredictable, the temptation is to focus exclusively on food. Perhaps you consider what you ate, what you shouldn’t have eaten, and what might need to be eliminated.

Sometimes those details matter, but there’s another layer that often explains why the exact same meal feels fine one day and not the next.

Much of digestion is guided by the vagus nerve, one of the main pathways of communication between the brain and the gut. It helps coordinate stomach acid production, enzyme release, gut motility, bile flow, and the body’s shift into a rest-and-digest state after eating.

When that signaling is disrupted, digestion can feel slower, noisier, and more reactive regardless of what’s on the plate. Here’s a deeper look at how the vagus nerve affects digestion and what can support its function.

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Is Heartburn Caused by Lack of Acid?

Is Heartburn Caused by Lack of Acid?

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Do you joke about heartburn? Perhaps it started off as an occasional, nagging burning in your chest and you blamed Grandma’s cooking. Is it still occasional, or has it crept into regular discomfort? Are you wondering if heartburn is caused by lack of acid instead of too much?

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Got the Guts to Be Healthy?

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We all know someone who is making an effort to improve their health. What steps are they taking? Exercising, not drinking sodas, and eating less processed foods are common first steps.

In my years of study and observation, I have come to the firm conclusion that health begins in the gut … and the flip side is equally true … that disease also begins in the gut. Read more

Stoke the Fire and Fuel Your Cells

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stomach-acidThere are several avenues by which the outside world enters your body, including breathing, consuming liquids or solids through your mouth, and absorption through your skin. Digestion is involved when you eat or drink.

Digestion – like breathing – is a process we tend to take for granted, unless you notice signs that something’s amiss.

Have you felt the burn of acid reflux or GERD? Read more

Stoke the Fire in Your Gut

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stomach-acidIn prior articles, I have outlined the path that our food takes when we eat a bite. Starting with chewing, and then swallowing to send the food down the esophagus into the stomach, where it meets with stomach acid to aid in the next stages of digestion.

We aren’t aware of the intricate process that our food goes through once we swallow a bite. You may have heard the phrase “you are what you eat,” yet I would say that is not a complete statement. Simply eating doesn’t make the food become a part of you. It must be broken down into its constituent components – proteins into amino acids, carbohydrates into starches and glucose, and fats into fatty acids – in order for your body to absorb them. Read more