The Body’s Second Brain: How Your Gut Could Be Affecting Your Emotions
We’ve all had that feeling of butterflies in our stomach, or
what can be described as a gut-wrenching feeling, and we always told to follow
our “gut-instinct.”
All these phrases and feelings clearly show that our
emotions are affected by our gut.
We all have a
microbiome, and they are as unique as our neural pathways
The body has more bacteria than cells, which means we are
literally more bug than human. This huge amounts of bacteria is called
microbiome. Most of this bacteria resides in the gut.
The gut doesn’t just help with digestion, it’s a key player
in regulating inflammation and immunity.
A healthy gut is different for different people and it
certainly involves diversity.
The gut as a second
brain.
The gut has a complex system of about 100 million nerves.
This is called the enteric nervous system.
The ENS is called the second brain and arises from the same
tissues as our central nervous system during fetal development. It has many
chemical parallels to the brain.
The gut and the brain communicate a lot and involve
endocrine, immune and neural pathways.
Our emotions play a big
role in our gut health.
Given how closely the gut and brain interact, it has become
clear that emotional and psychosocial factors can trigger symptoms in the gut.
This is especially true in cases when the gut is acting up and there’s no
obvious physical cause.
Mental health impacts
gut wellness
In light of this new understanding, it might be impossible
to heal FGID’s without considering the impact of stress and emotion. Studies
have shown that patients who tried psychologically based approaches had greater
improvement in their symptoms compared with patients who received conventional
medical treatment.
Poor gut health can lead
to neurological and neuropsychiatric disorders
Vice-versa, poor gut health has been implicated in
neurological and neuropsychiatric disorders. Disturbances in gut health have
been linked to multiple sclerosis, autistic spectrum disorders, and Parkinson’s
disease. This is potentially related to pro-inflammatory states elicited by gut
dysbiosis-microbial imbalance on or inside the body. Additional connections
between age-related gut changes and Alzheimer’s disease have also been made.
Further, there is now research that is dubbing depression as
an inflammatory disorder mediated by poor gut health. In fact, multiple animal
studies have shown that manipulating the gut microbiota in some way can produce
behaviors related to anxiety and depression.
Experts on the gut on
Ideapod
Dr Rhea Mehta, the world renowned author and specialist on
nutrition, is on Ideapod sharing ideas about the gut being your second brain.
Check out her user profile and
engage with her ideas.
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