What Is Leaky Gut Syndrome and How Do You Know If You Are Suffering From It?

You may be experiencing symptoms such as bloating, flatulence and stomach pains, or you may have something worse like an autoimmune condition and may be wondering what is leaky gut syndrome and do you currently have it?

Leaky gut syndrome may still be somewhat a mystery to your doctor or pharmacist, and you may be feeling rather helpless right now.

So what is leaky gut?

This article and free video series below will help you to understand what it is and exactly what you can do to fix leaky gut.

In this article, you will learn:

Leaky gut syndrome has finally started to be accepted as a real condition by the medical establishment. Leaky gut currently affects millions of people worldwide and new evidence shows that it may be the trigger for many more serious issues in the body.

For many years leaky gut was outcasted and considered to be something that was made up by alternative health practitioners. The UK government health service website, NHS.uk is one of these accusers, however the only argument they make is that there is not enough scientific evidence to back up the claims that leaky gut can trigger more widespread issues in the body.

This shunning of leaky gut as a medical condition is most likely due to the sheer lack of understanding of how the gut really works. However in more recent years scientists are much closer to understanding gut health and there is now growing evidence to support leaky gut being a real health issue.

This has led to many sufferers of leaky gut syndrome being dosed up on unnecessary medications by their doctor, given completely wrong diagnoses, or told that there is nothing wrong with them, and left feeling helpless. I was one of those people and hopefully you will learn a lot from my personal story and avoid the pain I went through!
When you understand what is leaky gut syndrome exactly and how leaky gut is caused you can begin to understand exactly why it is such a big problem, and exactly what you need to do to fix it!

I personally suffered from leaky gut syndrome many years ago and this eventually led to an autoimmune condition called ulcerative colitis. Ulcerative colitis left me housebound for nearly 1 year! I was bleeding 40x a day from my backside and I lost 20 kilos in weight!

Thankfully I found a way to cure it and go into remission from ulcerative colitis by 100% natural methods without any medical intervention.

In this article I will help you understand exactly what is leaky gut syndrome and if you are actually suffering from it.

What Is Leaky Gut Syndrome?

Leaky gut syndrome is defined as a disruption in the permeability of your intestinal gut lining. In other words, the gut lining, a wall of cells found in your intestines, becomes weaker, meaning substances from things you consume can pass through it and enter your blood stream that would otherwise be stopped by a healthy gut lining.

This means stuff like gluten, bad bacteria, chemicals and undigested food can pass into your blood stream and freak out your immune system that’s not used to all these foreign substances. This leads to an inflammatory response and all the symptoms associated with leaky gut syndrome.

The progression of leaky gut syndrome could well be the trigger for food allergies, low energy, lethargy, tiredness, chronic inflammation, inflammatory bowel disease, thyroid issues, and even autoimmune disease.

A paper published in the Frontiers of Immunology does a great job at explaining exactly what is leaky gut syndrome by summarising a lot of the new scientific evidence linking leaky gut and the role of gut microbiome in the initiation of autoimmune disease.

The key points from the paper are (simplified into plain english where I can!)

  1. Leaky gut is a widespread phenomenon that affects both mammals and non-mammals.
  2. Growing evidence suggests that gut microbiome (good bacteria) is important in modulating gut permeability and intestinal barrier functions.
  3. Recent advancements in molecular biology including next-generation sequencing technology has enabled researchers to gain new insight into the role of the gut microbiome.
  4. Numerous factors can affect gut permeability, such as various diet-derived compounds (refined food, chemicals, pesticides, gluten), alcohol consumption (too much booze), and gut microbiota dysbiosis (where bad bacteria upset good bacteria)
  5. A leaky gut allows the entry of exterior antigens (stuff from food, toxins, parasites and drugs) from the gut lumen into the host, which may promote both local and systemic immune responses (triggers an inflammatory response)
  6. Multiple diseases may arise or be exacerbated due to a leaky gut, including autoimmune diseases such as inflammatory bowel disease, celiac disease, autoimmune hepatitis, type 1 diabetes (T1D), multiple sclerosis, and systemic lupus erythematosus

It seems modern scientists are finally catching up with what ancient medical systems such as Ayurveda and Chinese medicine have been telling us for thousands of years. That most diseases begin in the gut!

What Are The Causes Of Leaky Gut Syndrome?

A variety of different factors can affect gut permeability and gut microbiome. This can lead to chronic inflammation inside the gut as well as systemically in different areas of the body. These include diet, stress, infections, alcohol, burns and trauma.

2 Major Causes Of Leaky Gut Syndrome

1) Diet Induced Leaky Gut Syndrome:

  1. Vitamin D has been shown to protect against leaky gut syndrome. So deficiency of Vitamin D could be a trigger for leaky gut.
  2. A study involving mice was shown that low fibre diets led to the development of a weaker gut lining.
  3. Refined food, sugar and alcohol affect the gut microbiome that can lead to leaky gut syndrome.
  4. Lectins and phylates are proteins called antinutrients that can damage the gut lining. Lectins actually are produced by certain plants to protect them from being eaten, yet humans still eat them on a mass scale.

2) Stress Induced Leaky Gut Syndrome:

  1. Chronic emotional stress can affect the gut microbiome and trigger leaky gut syndrome.
  2. Chronic alcohol consumption has been shown in various studies to damage the intestinal permeability that leads to leaky gut syndrome. It can also prevent the activity and growth of good bacteria.
  3. Some species of bad bacteria can produce alcohol, including E. coli and Weissella confusa, and this may be the mechanism by which they compromise the intestinal barrier function.
  4. Infections can also affect gut permeability. Helicobacter pylori that causes stomach ulcers is known to trigger leaky gut syndrome.

Constipation and Leaky Gut Syndrome

If your digestive system is affected and you suffer from bouts of constipation, the undigested food, bad bacteria and particles of faeces can also seep through your gut lining wreaking havoc in your body.

What Are The Symptoms Of Leaky Gut?

If leaky gut is left untreated and allowed to progress you may experience the following symptoms:

  1. Excessive bloating/flatulence/cramping/IBS
  2. Tiredness/low energy/lethargy
  3. Skin rashes/acne/psoriasis
  4. Chronic inflammation and pain.
  5. Food allergies
  6. Headaches/Migraines
  7. Low mood/mood swings

If untreated they can progress to:

  • Autoimmune disease
  • Thyroid conditions
  • Obesity
  • Diabetes Type 1
  • Degenerative brain diseases like Alzheimers, Parkinsons, Dementia
  • Depression

How To Treat Leaky Gut Syndrome In 3 Easy Steps:

Fortunately I have managed to reverse leaky gut and the resulting autoimmune condition I suffered from by following a 3 step protocol that I now recommend to my clients with very positive results.

STEP 1: Change Diet

First step is to remove from the diet known triggers of leaky gut syndrome. This includes refined foods, sugar, alcohol, and food that contain lectins and phylates. Then replace with a diet that is rich in nutrients, healthy fats and beneficial prebiotics and fibre that aids the growth of good bacteria.

STEP 2: Repair With Colostrum

Colostrum is my special antidote to leaky gut syndrome. It contains a variety of growth factors, immune factors and nutrients that heal the gut lining and promote the growth of a healthy gut microbiome.

Learn More about Colostrum and its benefits here

STEP 3: Rebalance With Probiotics

I recommend high strength probiotics to repopulate the gut and intestines with good bacteria that fights off bad bacteria and prevents damage to the gut lining.

 

For a more in depth article on my special gut healing protocol for healing leaky gut and other digestive issues like IBS and inflammatory bowel disease go here now.

References:

Leaky Gut As a Danger Signal for Autoimmune Disease
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5440529/

Hooper LV, Littman DR, Macpherson AJ. Interactions between the microbiota and the immune system.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22674334

De Santis S, Cavalcanti E, Mastronardi M, Jirillo E, Chieppa M. Nutritional keys for intestinal barrier modulation.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26697008

Leaky Gut Syndrome NHS.uk
https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/leaky-gut-syndrome/

Defining Leaky Gut Syndrome
https://www.webmd.com/digestive-disorders/features/leaky-gut-syndrome