Case Study: Overcoming Bloating And Allergies
Maree was a 39 year old lady who came to see me for help with abdominal bloating, frequent colds and sinusitis. Maree was a slim person but she had a big bloated abdomen that bothered her. She knew to avoid soda and pastry because they both intensified the bloating and made her feel extremely uncomfortable.
Maree wasn’t having a bowel motion often enough; she only went every second day. She also mentioned that her stool floats. These are indicators of malabsorption and dysbiosis (too much bad bacteria and not enough good bacteria in the bowel).
The other problem Maree wanted help with was chronic sinus infections, a runny nose, sneezing and itchy throat. The hayfever symptoms came and went and were much worse during Spring. The blocked sinuses were a constant problem, and she caught a cold every few months. She regularly suffered with sinus headaches and her continual blocked nose made it difficult to sleep at night. The poor sleep was starting to wear her down. Maree was a single mom with a full time job and a hectic life. She was starting to become quite frustrated and depressed about continually feeling unwell.
Bowel problems and sinus problems often go hand in hand; it is very common to see those two conditions in patients. The old herbal medicine textbooks recommend bowel and liver cleansing herbs for chronic sinus and respiratory conditions. This is not surprising once you realise that the majority of the immune cells in our body are found in the intestines. If the health of the bowel is poor and there is too much bad bacteria, yeast or parasites growing there, the immune system will suffer. The allergy symptoms Maree experienced caused her body to produce excess mucus. Mucus is a perfect breeding ground for bacteria, thus encouraging repeated sinus infections.
My recommendations
- Maree ate a lot of bread. This is understandable considering how busy she was. Her teenage daughter often spent the evening at a friend’s house; therefore Maree often ate a sandwich for dinner. That’s in addition to eating toast for breakfast and a sandwich for lunch. There are a number of problems with this – Maree didn’t eat a lot of vegetables; the yeast in bread aggravates bloating; wheat and gluten are a common cause of food allergy or intolerance. I asked Maree to base her diet on vegetables, salads, protein and healthy fats instead. I told her she could eat gluten free bread occasionally if she was particularly busy.
- Avoiding gluten would help to reduce the abdominal bloating, but in order to help Maree feel better faster, I asked her to take 2 BactoClear capsules twice daily with meals. This would help get rid of the bugs that produced the gases that made Maree bloated. BactoClear capsules contain thyme, oregano and clove essential oils. They have an amazing natural antimicrobial effect in the body. They help to kill bad gut bugs and also the bacteria creating recurrent sinus infections.
- I gave Maree LivaTone capsules to help increase bile flow. Bile is the body’s own natural laxative and it would help to improve Maree’s bowel habits. Having at least one bowel motion each day is important because waste that is allowed to sit around in the intestines provides food for all the wrong bacteria and parasites.
- In order to reduce the sinus discomfort and help to improve Maree’s sleep, I recommended Allergy Relief tablets. This formula contains stinging nettle, quercetin, bromelain and other anti-allergy, anti-inflammatory ingredients to help hayfever symptoms and excess mucus in the sinuses.
- I gave Maree a blood test and discovered her vitamin D level was far too low. This did not surprise me, since she had an office job and lived an entirely indoor life. Low vitamin D can cause fatigue and it weakens the immune system, predisposing a person to allergies or infections. I asked Maree to take one vitamin D capsule with breakfast each day.
6 weeks later
The first thing Maree told me when I saw her again was how much better her abdomen felt. The bloating was entirely gone. She said “The change of diet and supplements felt like a nuisance at first but now I feel so good there’s no way I’m going back to how I used to eat. My tummy feels flat and comfortable after I eat. I think I finally feel normal. This is the way people are supposed to feel after eating”. It was so nice to see how excited she was about feeling better.
Maree’s sinus and hay fever problems were around 80 percent better. I asked her to take a vitamin C supplement and also include fermented foods such as sauerkraut or kimchi in her diet. This is important for re-establishing healthy levels of good microbes in her bowel. Beneficial microbes have an anti-inflammatory and anti-allergic effect.
The above statements have not been evaluated by the FDA and are not intended to diagnose, treat or cure any disease.
Know someone who might benefit from this article? Share it!
2 Comments
Search
Shop Our Products by
Health Interest
-
Hormone & Thyroid Health
-
Liver & Gallbladder Health
-
Digestive Health
-
Bone & Joint Health
-
Women's Health
-
Immune Health
-
Healthy Aging
-
General Health
Most Recent Articles
Need Help?
1-888-75-LIVER
Monday to Friday, 9:00 am to 5:00 pm MST
100%
Satisfaction Guaranteed
If it’s faulty or wrongly described, we’ll replace it.
I would need to know what part of your brain was operated on and what for ? brain cancer. Steroid drugs can cause a leaky gut. The best thing to try is to restore healthy bacteria in your gut. Try Super Digestive Enzymes with meals. Try a 2 week raw juices fast - worth a try. Also try more fermented foods
Beneficial Fermented Foods for the Digestive Tract
Fermented foods are extremely beneficial because they produce a more favourable population of bacteria in the intestines. This can reduce many types of chronic digestive and bowel symptoms and even overcome disease. Fermented foods are a potent way to use food to add to the diversity of good species (micro-organisms) inhabiting our digestive system.
Normal gut flora has more than 600 different species and most available commercial probiotic products contain a maximum of nine species. After any course of antibiotics it is necessary to repopulate our intestine with as wide a variety of healthy micro organisms as possible. Many people with chronic digestive and bowel problems have a host of bad species in their gut and not enough good or healthy species (probiotics). Until this is reversed you cannot restore your health.
Dairy sourced
Yoghurt – purchase full fat, unsweetened, unflavoured and preferably organic or biodynamic. This type of yoghurt may be purchased or made at home by using prepared yoghurt as the starter or a commercial product like EasyYo or Progurt may be used. Avoid the sweetened choices, as sugar kills the probiotics.
coconut yogurt is excellent
Kefir – is cultured probiotic milk; it’s easy to make at home from commercially available freeze dried granules, which are available from health stores.
Cheese – Camembert, Brie and mouldy cheeses are fermented. Always buy these fresh and do not allow them to age for too long.
Normal cheeses do not use probiotics in their manufacture.
The Center for Science in the Public Interest has published a list of foods that have sometimes caused outbreaks of Listeria: hot dogs, deli meats, pasteurized or unpasteurized milk, cheeses (particularly soft-ripened cheeses like feta, Brie, Camembert, blue-veined, or Mexican-style queso blanco), raw and cooked poultry, raw meats, ice cream, raw vegetables, and raw and smoked fish. Sourced from Wikipedia
Crème fraiche - is cultured cream. After being seeded with probiotics it is cultured for 3 - 4 days before being churned. This process results in resulting in both probiotic rich butter and real buttermilk.
Cultured buttermilk – is the liquid portion of the butter churning process. It may be flavoured with berries, coffee or vanilla and some stevia drops to make a probiotic rich drinking yoghurt. It is often used in flap jacks, but the cooking kills the beneficial bacteria.
Vegetable sourced
Sauerkraut – traditional European winter food. It is cabbage based with other available vegetables added, then salted and naturally fermented with fresh liquid whey from either aged yoghurt or kefir.
Kalekraut – is very similar to Sauerkraut but is made with kale instead of cabbage. It is made the same way and the resultant product tends to be less sour in flavour.
Kim Chi – is the national dish of Korea and is made in a similar way to sauerkraut with the addition of many other vegetables, spices and especially chilli. It also tends to be quite highly salted and many types have added salted fish.
SEE RECIPE:http://perfecthealthdiet.com/2013/03/shou-chings-moms-kimchi/
Recipes
Mauritian Cabbage Pickle
½ a firm cabbage, finely sliced.
3 carrots, julienned.
¼ pound fresh green beans, thinly sliced.
Other vegetables in season may be added to your taste.
Place the vegetables in the sun in a thin layer to partially dehydrate.
Meanwhile
2 onions thinly sliced lengthways, gently fried in 3 tablespoons of virgin coconut oil.
Add 3cm fresh ginger, grated.
1 whole garlic onion; peeled and passed through presser.
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon turmeric, depending on taste
1 tablespoon white mustard seed and gently heat this mixture til turmeric becomes dark in colour.
Turn off heat and add the sliced vegetables.
Add ¼ cup of cold pressed extra virgin olive oil and apple cider vinegar (with the mother).
Celtic sea salt may also be added to taste.
The pickle is ready for use and is best stored in the refrigerator and improves with age.
Grain sourced
Sourdough bread – by definition this bread uses wild yeasts for fermentation, which makes the nutrients far more bio available.
Gluten free varieties are not available commercially, although there are many recipes on the net.
Soy or Rice Sourced
Natto – definitely not for the feint hearted. This food is eaten with gusto in Japan but in western countries it has not gained the same popularity. Natto is soy beans that have been fermented with a bacteria and the product is distinctive in both taste and appearance.
Miso – is a fermented product of soy or barley or rice. Some brands have a mixture of these, which makes it a gluten free or very low gluten product. Miso may be enjoyed as a meal starter or soup and may be added to meals to impart a distinctive salty-sweet flavour and beneficial nutrients.
Tempeh is blocks of soy bean that have been fermented with a beneficial fungus. It may be sliced and added to salads or stir fried and used in the same way as tofu.
Plant Sourced
Kombucha Tea – requires sweetened tea for the growth of this probiotic rich drink. It is made by adding a kombucha starter to cooled sweetened tea and left to ferment at room temperature til sweetness is replaced by a more acidic taste.
Apple cider vinegar – is easily purchased and the best probiotic value is found in a product with a ‘mother’. The mother is sediment on the bottom of the bottle and this provides a rich source of probiotic.
Vinegar – is probably our best known household fermented food and it is produced from the fermentation of wines, fruits or flowers. Inferior vinegars are simply diluted acetic acid and are definitely not a healthy alternative. These are often simply identified as white vinegar or malt vinegar.
Dr Sandra Cabot