I've got a gut feeling...
 

The following explains a lot of things to me about why exercise, diet and meditation is so important.

How Does Serotonin in the Brain Affect Your Bowels?

"IBS and Serotonin: The Brain-Stomach Link

Overview

Serotonin is a neurotransmitter (or chemical messenger) that controls and stabilizes your mood and functions in your brain. What might surprise you is that it’s also crucial to the functions of your digestive system. Your gut produces about 95 percent of the serotonin in your body, and changes in your serotonin level affect your gut as well as your brain.

Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is a common condition that primarily affects your large intestine. Causes of IBS are not clearly understood, and symptoms include abdominal cramping and pain, bloating and gas, and diarrhea or constipation. It’s characterized by episodes of flare-ups, which can last days, weeks, or even months.

The Brain-Stomach Link

The enteric nervous system is a semiautonomous nervous system located in your gut. It’s embedded in the lining of your gastrointestinal system, from your esophagus to your anus, and hundreds of millions of nerve cells direct movement through it. It can perform some tasks on its own, independent of the brain, such as coordinating reflexes and secreting enzymes, one of which is serotonin.

Neural pathways connect your enteric nervous system and your brain, and each affects the other — think of butterflies in your stomach when you're nervous, or having to use the bathroom when you’re anxious, even though you just went. Additionally, flare-ups of IBS in your gut can be caused by stress or anxiety from your brain.

What Does Serotonin Do?

Serotonin, mainly produced in your gut, plays a vital role in the communication between your gut and brain, and also in the proper functioning of your gut.

Serotonin affects many aspects of your gut function, including:

the motility of your bowels, or how fast food moves through your system
how much fluid, such as mucus, is secreted in your intestines
how sensitive your intestines are to sensations like pain and fullness from eating

Some nerve receptors are responsible for sending messages to your brain that signal nausea, bloating, and pain, while others change your sensitivity to or intensity of how distended or full your intestines feel. Levels of each of these receptors vary from person to person. For example, your stomach may interpret what others perceive as a normal feeling of fullness, as pain.

People with IBS who experience constipation often have lower levels of serotonin, the muscles in their rectums are less reactive to serotonin, and they’re more likely to have hard or lumpy stools. Those with IBS and high levels of serotonin can have diarrhea, and their rectums are more reactive, with loose or watery stools.

Addressing Serotonin Issues

IBS patients have to deal with a variety of symptoms, not all of which are related to the bowel. Low levels of serotonin may make you more prone to fibromyalgia, a heightened sensitivity to pain in muscles throughout your body. Altered levels of serotonin can also interrupt your sleep patterns and are associated with chronic depression and anxiety disorders.

Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are a group of drugs commonly used to treat depression. These drugs allow more serotonin to be available for your nerve cells to use, but antidepressants and antianxiety medications might not treat IBS. Research continues to look for medications that are specifically designed to treat the serotonin changes seen in IBS without damaging side effects.

Talk to your doctor about current and emerging serotonin-related therapies that could address your specific symptoms. Don't forget that exercise and relaxation techniques like meditation can alter your serotonin levels enough to have a positive impact on your symptoms.

Outlook

The nervous systems of your brain and your gut are connected by neural pathways, and serotonin plays an important role in both, regulating basic functioning and mood. Serotonin can affect your IBS symptoms, and altering serotonin levels through medication can help treat them."

Very interesting reading for me tonight because I have been to the doctor several times over the past three days with abdominal pain. Tomorrow they are sending me for an ultrasound, and are going to check on my gallbladder. Maybe I need to redistribute my serotonin!

Monologue on the topic of seratonin and 'being full of **it.'

As can be seen in the above excerpted dissertation on the 'second brain', the mythical 'gut', the health of mind is closely intertwined with that of the bowels.

Does this mean that if one is constipated one is 'full of ....'? Or conversely if one is 'full of ...' is one constipated?

There are a number of ways to find out.

I suggest research as being efficacious.

Make a note if someone says 'you're full of ....'. Check the state of the bowel movements. After about three events, or non-events as the case may be, it may be safe to come to a tentative conclusion.

Perhaps you are sufficiently perspicacious to be able to divine the above for your self.

Further : Because it's possible to not be aware of pain in the gut on a conscious level while the sub conscious is very well aware of it, the sub conscious can excert pressure on the conscious and make one act out, for example, aggressively (perhaps determined by the degree of negative or otherwise, potty training one had to endure) in response to outside stimuli.

One may feel an overweening need to repair cellars, clean gutters, solve crimes, put things right or otherwise act out the state of ones bowels. The situation may present itself in many odd ways, or not.

Whatever, as has been said, fibre is your friend. It helps to lose weight and to exercise.

To feel ok about however you may be : meditate.

Cheers.

As an IBS sufferer, thank you for this, Grymt.

I think this should interest everyone, not just people like us.

Ahhh, yes, the stomach as the "second brain." I went through YEARS of having gut pain and all the docs wanted to do was tell me I had IBS and prescribe me pills (which made me sicker, by the way). I finally decided to do a bit of my own trial and error and figured out I had a slight lactose intolerance. That means I can eat a little bit of cheese at a time but definitely no milk or yogurt. The creamier the dairy the worse it is on my stomach.

I have long had an obsession with clearing out my gut. I cannot agree more that a healthy gut is vital for a healthy mind. I had an aunt who suffered severe migraines regularly and was also chronically constipated. Coincidence ...?

I've experimented and re-experimented with diets, done juice fasts, had my share of colonic hydrotherapy - the "works" so to speak. I have come to the conclusion that regular active exercise plus avoidance of complex carbs works best for me.

Recently I have added daily half-hour mediation - partly because I have felt for quite a while I should make a regular practice of it and partly Grymt because you and other people I know IRL report such positive effects.

I am a huge fan now.

Meditation is: making me calmer and more confident, giving me clarity on my thoughts and purpose, causing vivid dreams, and giving me ideas and greater creativity in life.

Thank you for the inspiration to start doing this.

Thanks for sharing this, so interesting. Mind and body, ever connected, and what we put in effects so much.

Thank's all for posting. I always had a feeling that this is how it is. My therapist put me in touch with the idea of 'the second brain' and this topic flowed from that. I'm glad it makes sense to others too.