CrossFit South Bend

Today we're going to talk about a basic intro to your digestive system, and how it actually works. You don't need to be going into the medical field to know that this stuff is important. You should have just a basic understanding of how this stuff works, because it ends up being overall important. Not just for your digestive health, but for your overall health. So, let's talk about how things work when you actually eat food. What happens in between when the food enters your body, and then when it exits out the backend. First thing, your mouth. When you start eating food, your body produces saliva to basically coat that food. And, there are certain enzymes in your mouth, typically salivary amylase, which helps break down certain starches and sugars from the food that you're eating. And then of course, chewing is going to be a huge part of that start of the digestive process. You're basically taking whatever it is, whether it's a steak, or roasted vegetables or something like that. Which, by itself, if you just put it into your small intestine, wouldn't be very digestible, or absorbable in terms of extracting the nutrients out until you start this process. So, again with your saliva. You're kind of lubricating it essentially. And then with your teeth, you're basically grinding it up. Then with those enzymes, and the salivary amylase, you are basically getting it ready for future things down the line. And, that active chewing starts to activate that parasympathetic nervous system. Now, technically even though I started with the mouth. Technically, even before that there's going to be your brain. When your brain knows that you're going to eat, it starts to secrete digestive enzymes, it starts to anticipate the food. Things like smelling your food, or anticipating your food can kind of help start that digestive process. But technically, physically, it's going to start with the mouth. Once we get past the mouth, the food basically goes down your esophagus, and then it gets to your stomach. A very common misconception is that digestion takes place in the stomach. That is not the case. Really what takes place in the stomach is preparation for digestion, if by digestion we mean absorption of nutrients, which actually takes place in the small intestine. What happens in the stomach? Well, that stuff that you just chewed up basically gets down there, and then assuming that your stomach acid is sufficiently acidic, which it should be. It's typically about a PH of two, which is very acidic. Water is a seven. So, once it gets down there, that acid basically breaks a lot of that stuff down, and prepares it to be absorbed in the small intestine. Now, another thing to realize about the stomach is that, there really isn't that much in the way of bacteria in the stomach. We talk a lot about probiotics and stuff like that. That's going to be much more located in things like the small intestine, and to an even greater degree, the large intestine. Isn't to say that there isn't some bacteria in the stomach, but it's going to be a very, very small quantity 'cause it's obviously a super acidic environment. Okay, next point is really going to be the heart and soul of digestion. This is the small intestine. When we talk about leaky gut, or when we talk about a healthy gut, or we talk about are you absorbing your food. This is where the action takes place. So, your small intestine is basically where that food that you chewed up, and then was broken down by your stomach gets absorbed. And, if the acid from your stomach isn't sufficiently acidic, then your pancreas isn't going to release digestive enzymes to properly break down your food in your stomach. So, this whole chain is very important. n your small intestine, there is a lining basically of single cells called, "enterocytes," that help your body absorb nutrients from the food that you're eating, but also keep bad stuff out. This lining is incredibly, incredibly important. It's what allows good stuff into your body, and it's what keeps bad stuff out. Now again, going back to this notion of bacteria. We said that there's a very small amount in the stomach. There's definitely a bit more in the small intestine. But, you don't want too much there, because then that's going to interfere with digestion. Really where the vast majority of the bacteria is going to be, is in your large intestine. When we talk about probiotics, and healthy bacteria in the microbiome, that's really in your large intestine. Your large intestine is basically where three main things happen. You absorb water, a lot of the compounds that your body can actually absorb like fiber and other compounds get broken down by your bacteria in your large intestine. And then, you basically, you're preparing things to essentially exit your body. When we talk about probiotics, healthy bacteria, there's something like a trillion bacteria in your large intestine, and that's where you want bacteria to be. So, it's so important that all of these things are working together in harmony. And, if one thing is off, like if you have too much bad bacteria in your large intestine, or insufficient stomach acid in your stomach, or you're not chewing your food in your mouth. Any one of those things can mess up digestion. And, as we've talked about, digestion is incredibly important for the health of your overall body. I hope now you have a good sense of how digestion works, just a basic sense. And, in the next few videos we'll talk even more in depth about how this stuff works. All right guys, thanks so much for tuning in. We'll see you next time.  

Today, we're gonna talk about how to eat healthy at local restaurants. The first idea I wanna give to you is this idea that look, if you're only doing this once in a great while, don't worry about it so much. It's not gonna be that big an issue as long as you're eating healthy, real whole food the vast majority of the time. But if you are eating at restaurants on a regular basis, that's something you need to potentially consider cutting back on and some of the tips in this video will hopefully help you pick some healthier fare. Tip number one, when it comes to eating healthier at restaurants these days, it's a whole lot easier just because menus are online so you can actually check out this stuff before you go. You can see what stuff fits in the dietary template that you're following. A lot of restaurants tend to have really good gluten free menus now. They have a lot of options and healthier fare for people when you actually go to the restaurant. Another thing to say is when you get there and you're actually looking at the menu or if you're looking at the menu beforehand, most entrees at most restaurants are meat or quality protein plus veggies plus healthy fat. Let's say steak, broccoli, and baked potato. Or salmon and rice and some sort of vegetable. That's the way it is and the nicer restaurant you're eating at, the easier it is to eat healthy. A lot of times, when you're actually looking at the menu, look at those entrees and those are gonna tend to be in a pretty healthy mold. Now what do you do about the waiter or the waitress? We have to balance between two ends of the spectrum here. On the one hand, you don't wanna be that jerk who orders the Cobb salad and then takes everything that makes a Cobb salad a Cobb salad. But at the same time, you're the one paying for and ordering the meal. Try to be nice and appreciate to your waiter and waitress but at the same time, if you have dietary restrictions, don't be afraid to ask for that and don't be afraid to say something if you wanna make the food a bit healthier. Now, here's some practical tips for eating out at certain places. If you're going to a Mexican restaurant, try to emphasize meat and veggies and then try to cut down as much as you can on the beans and rice and to the lesser extent, some cheese. If you're going to a Japanese restaurant, some sushi, you can get some sashimi, white rice isn't the worst thing in the world, and get some vegetables there. If you're going to an Italian restaurant, most classical Italian cooking doesn't actually involve gobs of carbohydrates. That's really just American Italian cooking so don't be afraid to get something like chicken with some vegetables and some tomato sauce. Hopefully those tips gave you a sense of how to eat healthy but remember, at the end of the day, if you're not doing this terribly frequently, enjoy yourself when you're out and it's not that big an issue but if you are doing it frequently, either cut down on the frequency or try to involve these healthy tips as much as you in your healthy eating when you're eating out. Alright guys, thanks so much for tuning in. We'll see you next time.

Today, we're going to talk about some super simple home remedies that you can use to help improve your digestion. In other videos, we'll talk about more advanced things but today we're going to talk about the super simple ones that pretty much anyone can do at home and these are things that you would want to check off the list first just to make sure that it's not something super simple that you've overlooked. Number one is a huge one and I would readily admit that this is something that I work on myself, but it is really an important issue. Chew your food. Chew your food. There are a couple of reasons why that's important. One of my favorite sayings when it comes to digestion is there are no teeth in the stomach. What does that mean? It means once things have essentially gotten to your stomach, there's acid to help break things down, but if you have a piece of food that basically hasn't been chewed properly and it's making a way down to your stomach and then your small intestine, it's not going to be absorbed properly if you didn't break it down sufficiently in your mouth. You want to chew your food. Chewing your food sufficiently also helps activate certain enzymes in your mouth that help start to break down certain compounds in the food and it activates the parasympathetic nervous system, the so-called rest and digest nervous system that's necessary to help you digest. If you're in a constant state of sympathetic, kind of go, go, go mode, then it's going to be very hard to digest food. Along with that same idea of chewing your food, you want to sit down and eat your food. This is something, while the chewing I'm still working on, sit down and eat your food I've gotten pretty good at. Most of us today eat on the run whether it's in our car or we're answering emails. I routinely get emails from people who tell me I don't take a lunch or it's 15 minutes or they're just gobbling down food. Again, if you've activated that sympathetic nervous system, it's going to be very hard to digest in that mode. You want to sit down. Take some time out. It doesn't need to be all the way to French culture where they take an hour and a half each day for food, for lunch although that would be nice. But it shouldn't be five minutes where you're scarfing down something and answering emails and driving somewhere either. Take some time out and sit down and eat your food. Number three, water. Water is great, super healthy for you, but at the same time you shouldn't necessarily be drinking it during your meals. There are different reasoning you hear behind this. Some people suggest that it dilute stomach acid. Some people suggest that if you have cold water it's going to reduce the rate at which enzymes are going to be breaking down your food. But just in general, you want to try to eat your food and not drink it, so one of the most compelling reasons I've heard is this idea that people use water as a means to swallow otherwise improperly chewed food. If that's your reason for drinking water when you're eating, then you probably want to slow down, chew your food and not drink a bunch of water to have it go all the way down. Number four, you want to try and express gratitude or de-stress or maybe it's 10 deep belly breaths or maybe if you're religious, maybe it's praying or maybe it's meditation or maybe it's a quick laugh before a meal. Something where you're activating that parasympathetic system and you're not constantly in this go, go, go mode where you feel like you can't really properly digest things. Then number five is going to be that you want to try and cook your food or mash it. If you really are having digestive issues, one of the best things you can do is, A, cook your food. That's going to "predigest" it for you. Then in addition to that, the more you mash up the food, the easier it is to digest so something like, I don't know, white potato fries are going to be harder to digest than baked potato that has basically been mashed up. Hopefully, those things can help you with your digestion and you definitely want to try those things first before you go deeper down the rabbit hole and we'll talk about some alternative strategies for improving your digestion in later videos. All right, guys. Thanks so much for tuning in. See you next time.