Probiotics?

[Eddy Edson]

My problem: Since I've upped fibre levels I belch a lot. I'm sure this isn't from swallowing air. Whenever I drink anything, a lot of belching happens. By itself this isn't much of a problem, but even though I drink a *lot* of water, I'm also quite constipated, which is a bigger issue.

I have this image of my gut microbes rabidly fermenting away, hopefully producing all kinds of good things, but also grabbing more than their fair share of whatever I drink. Does that make any sense?

This has been going on for several weeks & I need to do something about it. Reducing fibre is one obvious possibility, but it has such a good effect on my BG levels, satiety and hopefully other stuff, that I'm a bit reluctant to do this.

So: probiotics - worth a try, or are they just woo? Any insights gratefully received!

(Should say that exercise doesn't seem to have much impact.)

 

[mikeyB]

Forget about probiotic foods like yogurts. What Is happening is that your gut bacteria are busy organising themselves to cope with the higher fibre diet. They can’t help it, fermenting the goodies for you. Say thank you, as you contribute to global warming.

It’s changing your diet that encourages your microbiota to change, and it makes no difference how many Activia you swallow, if it’s not the right bacteria for your diet, you’ll just poo them out.

Interesting that you’re a bit bunged up. That probably means you’re not consuming enough liquid to help the fibre along. Simple as that. A bit of lactulose will help the current problem because it draws liquid from the colon to soften the stool. Just like “diabetic” sweeties. Lactulose is cheaper from your neighbourhood pharmacy.

When I was a lad, 3 pints of Draught Bass would sort you out because of the Epsom salts in the water they drew to brew it. It’s a Coors brewery now.

Does that all sound reasonable?

 

[Eddy Edson]

Forget about probiotic foods like yogurts. What Is happening is that your gut bacteria are busy organising themselves to cope with the higher fibre diet. They can’t help it, fermenting the goodies for you. Say thank you, as you contribute to global warming.

It’s changing your diet that encourages your microbiota to change, and it makes no difference how many Activia you swallow, if it’s not the right bacteria for your diet, you’ll just poo them out.

Interesting that you’re a bit bunged up. That probably means you’re not consuming enough liquid to help the fibre along. Simple as that. A bit of lactulose will help the current problem because it draws liquid from the colon to soften the stool. Just like “diabetic” sweeties. Lactulose is cheaper from your neighbourhood pharmacy.

When I was a lad, 3 pints of Draught Bass would sort you out because of the Epsom salts in the water they drew to brew it. It’s a Coors brewery now.

Does that all sound reasonable?

Excellent - many thanks! Off to chemist tomorrow.

I see some vague warnings about lactulose and BG impact but on digging there doesn't much in it.

 

[Deleted member 21371]

It is possible to become "addicted" to it. In the sense that your body adjusts to the effect it has, and it becomes difficult not to use it.
So worth trying it, but not as a long term solution.

 

[mikeyB]

Agree, travellor, but as I said, upping the fluid intake should do the job long term. I should have made that point.🙂

 

[Eddy Edson]

Agree, travellor, but as I said, upping the fluid intake should do the job long term. I should have made that point.🙂

Thankee. I've been drinking a lot of water to try to move things along, but so far the result is just more urination. See how it goes with the lactulose.

 

[Eddy Edson]

Lactulose report: Mmmmm peaceful, easy feeling!

 

[Sally W]

Try chia seeds. I use them to make jam. I found them far too helpful one day when I ate too many ! 😱

 

[Eddy Edson]

Try chia seeds. I use them to make jam. I found them far too helpful one day when I ate too many ! 😱

Ha! I am the king of chia seeds. They're magic, but maybe I eat too many - like a gut full of plasticine ....

 

[TheClockworkDodo]

What fibre are you eating, Eddy? Have you tried Inulin?

 

[Northerner]

A bit of lactulose will help the current problem because it draws liquid from the colon to soften the stool. Just like “diabetic” sweeties. Lactulose is cheaper from your neighbourhood pharmacy.

OMG! 😱 You've brought back an evil memory 😱 When I left Uni I went to work in France for a while and got extremely ill (as did my girlfriend - we think it may have been due to drinking unpasteurised milk). I managed to get hold of a French doctor who prescribed some capsules called 'Lacteol', which contained lactulose - they were horrible! 😱 Might just have been that particular brand, of course, but I can still taste them {{{shudder}}}

 

[Deleted member 21371]

OMG! 😱 You've brought back an evil memory 😱 When I left Uni I went to work in France for a while and got extremely ill (as did my girlfriend - we think it may have been due to drinking unpasteurised milk). I managed to get hold of a French doctor who prescribed some capsules called 'Lacteol', which contained lactulose - they were horrible! 😱 Might just have been that particular brand, of course, but I can still taste them {{{shudder}}}

There was an interesting article on unpasteurised milk this morning.
Is it a wonder food, of just another trendy fad, that could actually be bad for you?

I wonder, does everyone drink unpasteurised milk cold, or do they cook with it, or add it to tea or coffee?

Saying as pasteurisation is simply heating raw milk to 71.7°C for 15 seconds, I wonder how many rush off with the magic raw wonderfood, then happily pasteurise it themselves, having been fed the tag line "pasteurisation is bad for milk, it's all down to big dairy profits", rather than "heating is bad in general".

Which we do to most of the food we eat anyway, and it's no different to the effect it has on enzymes, bacteria, nutrients...?

 

[mikeyB]

It’s the taste. Raw unpasteurised milk is delicious. When I was building deer fences in Dumfries and Galloway on a break from uni, the farmer would leave a four litre canister of milk straight from the cows outside the caravan. Nothing better on cornflakes. Pasteurisation kills that flavour, and what else?

Didn’t get any bowel problems. Baby cows don’t.

 

[Deleted member 21371]

It’s the taste. Raw unpasteurised milk is delicious. When I was building deer fences in Dumfries and Galloway on a break from uni, the farmer would leave a four litre canister of milk straight from the cows outside the caravan. Nothing better on cornflakes. Pasteurisation kills that flavour, and what else?

Didn’t get any bowel problems. Baby cows don’t.

Actually scours, a bacterial bowel infection destroys the calfs gut. Not that uncommon.

 

[mikeyB]

Scours doesn’t occur in well managed dairy farms. If the calves get colostrum in their very early feeds, it reduces the incidence almost to zero. And it’s mainly viral, not bacterial, rotavirus and corona virus. It’s the calves that get it - doesn’t affect the milk.

 

[Deleted member 21371]

Scours doesn’t occur in well managed dairy farms. If the calves get colostrum in their very early feeds, it reduces the incidence almost to zero. And it’s mainly viral, not bacterial, rotavirus and corona virus. It’s the calves that get it - doesn’t affect the milk.

It's a general catch all term, bacteria, parasites, viruses can all cause it.
And fresh milk straight from the mother obviously is better than milked product, put into holding tanks, then into a tanker, off loaded into a dispenser, put into a hand washed bottle, then taken home in a warm car to a fridge, and used a day or two later.
I used to work at the front end of a dairy, what came out of the filters when we emptied the tanker from the farm wasn't pleasant.
I'd drink fresh milk then , but not the trendy bottle it yourself fad that's happening now.

 

[Eddy Edson]

Well this is giving me the ... Actually, it isn't, which is the problem 🙂

Lactulose helps only a little bit, in a Bristol scale-pathetic kind of way. Ex-Lax ditto. I've experimented with dropping BP meds and statin, without much success. MetaMucil does nothing, not surprisingly, given that the prob surely isn't a lack of fibre.

Maybe it's a vagus nerve thingie?

Anyway, off to see the doc tomorrow. I've gone from somebody who didn't see a doc for decades, to harassing the poor fellow every few weeks.

 

[mikeyB]

It won’t be the vagus nerve, that was one of the questions in an exam at uni - “Describe the course of the vagus nerve.” It ends up at the diaphragm.

It’ll be your biome. It always is, these days🙂

 

[Eddy Edson]

It won’t be the vagus nerve, that was one of the questions in an exam at uni - “Describe the course of the vagus nerve.” It ends up at the diaphragm.

It’ll be your biome. It always is, these days🙂

Well, if dealing with it requires a "fecal transplant", I quit 🙂

 

[MikeTurin]

It’s the taste. Raw unpasteurised milk is delicious

IF you buy directly in the farm from the milk fountain machine, it costs less than buying milk in the supermarket, because you are cutting the middlemen.
Not to mention the fact that all milk sold in the malls has some cream removed in the process, and anyway industrial process used now homogenize the milk.

Milk from the farm has more cream but the cream tensd to separare from the milk, and someone could think the milk is spoiled, when is not. And anyway it tastes way better even when boiled.