Chronic constipation and how it effects your health

The average American suffers from constipation!

Chronic constipation!

Did you know it’s estimated that over 4 million people in the US are dealing with this issue? This dynamic is a root cause for people getting sick.

Pooping daily is essential for our overall health. When we do not excrete toxins with bowel movements (BM) daily, those toxins end up reabsorbed. Not having daily BM’s is like not taking out the trash from your kitchen when it’s full. It starts to overfill, spill, get messy, and smelly.

Your stool is the exit way for waste in your body that includes toxins, pesticides, drugs, chemical, plastics, heavy metals, damaged cholesterol, and excess estrogen. Chronic constipation leads to reabsorption of the waste, and this can contribute to bacterial overgrowth, affecting your gut lining, and excess estrogen which is known as estrogen dominance. This affects women but even men as well.

If any of my clients are experiencing chronic constipation, this must be addressed right away.

Here are a few recommendations I give my clients

➡️Magnesium citrate. Most people are deficient with this very important mineral, and it is needed to get things moving down there.

➡️Hydration. So many people are dehydrated. Sip water throughout the day. Hydrate between meals not during your meal.

➡️Increase fiber by eating more fruits and veggies.

➡️Eating lots of healthy fats. Yes, fats such as avocado, olive oil, wild salmon, walnuts, and coconut oil. The best lubrication for your GI pipes isn’t water but grease. Fat helps to move your stool.

➡️Take a daily probiotic but make sure it is the right variety to meet your needs. A brand that is more Bifidobacterium might be helpful.

In my experience as a Functional Medicine Coach, most of my clients get rapid relief from taking magnesium because they are not eating foods that are high in this critical mineral. Even if they do, many of the plant foods have much lower magnesium content due to over farming the same soil and using chemicals to spray.

The reason magnesium is better than medications that force your body to push stool out artificially is because it’s what your body naturally uses to move stool along, via natural wave like muscle movement along the GI tract.  Majority of the time chronic constipation is magnesium deficiency.

Reading this and been dealing with constipation for quite some time? I encourage you to try these foundational tips to start but as always most times we have to dive deeper into why a person is dealing with slow motility and that’s what I do with my clients.

Ready to dive in with me and get to the root cause? You can schedule your FREE 15-minute consultation today by clicking this link here.

April Johnson is a AFMC Certified Practitioner, Functional Medicine Health Coach, and Integrative Nutrition Health Coach at Firefly Hollow Holistic Wellness Center.