Ep. 9 How to Cope with IBD, Motherhood, and Covid Stress

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There’s never been a more stressful time for us.

Dealing with IBD is challenging enough, but now we are dealing with more demands on us from our kids at home more than usual and the stress of living in a world with coronavirus. Has your IBD taken a hit during this crazy time?

You are not alone.

In this episode, we get real about the unavoidable stress we can’t get rid of. But that doesn’t mean have to accept all the negatives that come with stress like this. We discuss how the stress response affects our IBD and how, if we have the right tools, we can overcome this challenge. I also introduce you to my 3-Step Stress Management System that gives you the tools you need to keep your IBD flare at bay and your stress at a level you can live with.

We talk about:

• How our stress is at an all-time high right now
• Our physiological response to stress and why it makes our IBD flare
• The difference between acute stress vs chronic stress and which one has a greater impact on our IBD
• The 3-Step Stress Management System to help you get through these stressful days

And so much more!

After this episode, you’ll be more in control of the chaos around you with clinically proven stress management tools you can use right at home. Listen in to help release the pressure you’re feeling from having Crohn’s and colitis, along with the added demands of motherhood, and the fear of Covid that’s affecting us all.

Episode at a Glance:

• [02:37] We start with the role stress plays in our life when we are dealing with the mega triple threat of stress from IBD, Motherhood, and Covid.

• [12:30] We learn all about the stress response at the physiological level, from the first twinges in the gut, to the recognition in the brain, to the nervous system cascade, and the ravages of the hormone release of cortisol when our stress never gets a break.

• [18:16] We talk about the difference between acute stress and chronic stress and how these two types of stress will impact your IBD, each in different ways.

• [20:43] We explore how subjective vs objective experiences are at the core of how we engage with the stress in our body.

• [25:16] We detail the 3-step process to turn your unbearable stress into manageable stress. It starts with recognizing your stress, then seeing your stress as subjective, and finally, making friends with your stress.

• [29:24] We put our newfound stress management toolbelt to the test by going through an example of how we can use the 3-step stress management system in a real life acute stressful situation.

• [35:45] We look at a real life example of my client, Abby, when she used the 3-step stress management system for chronic stress from colitis symptoms, a family member with Covid, and homeschooling her children stress.

• [40:51] You can take this episode to the next level by downloading my free resource guide: Your Stress Management Toolbelt by going to karynhaley.com/stress

Rate, Review and Subscribe on Apple Podcasts.

Episode Links:

Get my FREE Stress Management Toolbelt mentioned in the episode

Covid-19 Demands Forcing Parents to Take Time Off

Psychological Stress and IBD: New Insights Into Pathogenic and Therapeutic Implications

The Mega Triple Stress Threat: Crohn’s and Colitis, IBD, and Motherhood

Win a copy of my cold and flu buster recipe (you’ve got the ingredients right in your kitchen)

[00:04] Welcome to the episode dear listener. Before we get started today. I want to let you know that you can win a copy of my Kitchen Arsenal Preventive and Kitchen Arsenal Cure Recipe Guide to kick that cold or flu right to the curve before it even starts or before it gets nasty. I love this guide because it’s so important as we head into cold and flu season with the added pandemic at our hands, we just can’t boost our immune system enough right now. These rescue remedies are full of ingredients you already have in your kitchen, but they are usually reserved just for my clients. I’m sharing them with you today so if you want to get your hands on these must have sickness buster recipes, all you have to do is leave a written review on The Cheeky Podcast for Moms with IBD on itunes, and take a screen shot of your review. Email it to hello@karynhaley.com with the subject line: podcast review, and I will send you your Kitchen Arsenal Preventive and Kitchen Arsenal Cure Recipe Guide as my way of saying thank you for listening and reviewing the show. My email again is hello@ k-a-r-y-n-h-a-l-e-y.com and I can’t wait to reward you for leaving a review. Alright, let’s get into the episode.

[music]

INTRO You’re listening to The Cheeky Podcast for Moms with IBD, a safe space for moms with Crohn’s and colitis to connect, explore powerful tools for healing and transform our lives to thrive in motherhood and in life. I’m your host, Karyn Hayley, IBD Health Coach, Integrative Wellness enthusiast and mom of three outstanding kids. After having Crohn’s disease for 30 years and working as a health advocate exclusively with IBD clients for the last 10 years. I know it’s time to bring the types of candid conversations I have with my clients out into the open. It’s our time to go on an IBD healing journey into it, like only a mom can. Let’s do this.

[music]

Has Stress Taken Over Your Life?

Let me ask you a question. Are you feeling stressed? On a scale of 1-10, where are you at?

Stress just comes with being human, right? Maybe a little more for us.

[02:37] We’ve got IBD and all the lovely symptoms that come with that- abdominal pain, bloating, gas, diarrhea, hemorrhoids, rectal fissures, or fistulas, weight loss, fatigue… sometimes heartburn or acid reflux, ulcers in your mouth, possibly joint pain or skin rashes… the challenges with crohn’s and colitis abound.

Then, there’s motherhood and don’t get me started on the stress that creates. I’ve been a mom for almost 19 years, YIKES! Oh the stressful moments that have come up through my kids lifespan. Yes, there have been some crazy stressful, out there moments you can never plan for when my then 2 year old wandered off at one of those big, crowded craft fairs (thankfully he saw his dad in the distance and hopped out of the stroller to run to him, but I didn’t know that and it was a stressful few minutes screaming his name), or when one of my kids accidentally shot the other one with a bee bee gun or when my then 8 year old got a concussion because his brother dared him to take a steep jump on his bike (thank god he was wearing a helmet. I don’t even want to think of how bad that could have been). We all have crazy motherhood moments. But it’s not just about the crazy moments. Those day to day moments create stress too. If you’re in the baby and toddler phase, wow the stress of sleep deprivation. With school aged kids, keeping up with their activities is a nightmare, and with teenagers and hormones, all that need to separate and spread their wings, the mental stress and worry you have for them is so intense. 

Apparently, motherhood and IBD isn’t enough, now we’ve got coronavirus to contend with.  Many of our kids are schooling at home, spending hours and hours each day on a computer trying to learn, social distance and deal with how crazy it is that they can’t hug or hang out with their friend. How do you explain that to a 5-year-old? Maybe you’ve had to leave your job during all this to care for your kids. According to census.gov 1 in 5 parents left jobs to provide childcare for their kids and in women 25-44 years old, they are 3 times more likely to leave their jobs than men. And since we have IBD with a diminished immune function and increased inflammation, especially if we’re on biologics or steroids, we’re worried about contracting Covid. And what’s our prognosis if we do get it…

Just mentioning all the stress we are under right now makes my heart beat a little faster. It makes me feel for YOU dear one. How are you doing right now? Has your Crohn’s or colitis suffered because of it? Mine definitely has. You are under more stress than is reasonable. We both are. This is tough. There’s no denying it.

Feeling overwhelmed with stress makes me wonder- what effect does all this stress have on IBD. When it comes to all the things I can think of that negatively impact our Crohn’s and colitis, what we might eat, the quality of our sleep, and our stress levels, something I’ve learned from clients and in my own experience is that stress has a huge a bigger impact on our IBD than we might initially realize.

[06:59] Many stress gurus out there tell you that all you have to do is reduce levels. Stop feeling stress, ignore the stress, put on the right armor and stress won’t bring you down. Just have less stress.

I’m sorry, but I’ve got to call B.S. on that.

We’re moms. We have a chronic illness. Now we have to deal with coronavirus and quarantining. We can’t harry potter this whole thing away. Stress doesn’t work like that.

Studies show that adverse life events like a pandemic, chronic stress, depression (which I’d argue are all stress related), each one of these increases the likelihood of an IBD flare-up.

How can we navigate everything that’s going on in our life right now, with a positive attitude and without letting stress get so impactful that it brings our Crohn’s and colitis right into the toilet.

[08:04] Like every good mystery tv show, we love it when the detective has that a-ha moment that changes the course of everything. And within our stress mystery, our a-ha moment starts with a little thing called insight. Insight into what’s going on behind the scenes, within our body. Today, we’ll start our stress and IBD conversation by unraveling this stress mystery at its most basic level, the a-ha moment level. At this first moment we might not initially recognize, but if we do recognize it at this point and we do start to be conscious of what’s going on, we can use this inside our body knowledge, not to our detriment, but to our advantage.

What’s coming up on today’s episode?

Today on the podcast, We’ll uncover the hormone that controls all this stress and wreaks havoc on our gut health if we don’t stop the vicious cycle. We’ll talk about what objective and subjective stress is and what it has to do with our IBD stress response, we’ll get into the difference between acute stress and chronic stress, again focusing on how that impacts our Crohn’s and colitis and finally we’ll talk about the 3 step stress busing process you can use to do it like a mom and ensure your stress won’t bring your IBD down with it.

Let’s start with the stress mystery, the would-be a-ha moment if we’re aware of it. The insight piece into what’s going on inside our body when we first experience stress. This is the knowledge we all need to get started really understanding our stress and how it affects all the systems in our body, and our gut the most. If we don’t have that a-ha insight early on, stress will start to impact us in negative ways.

[10:16] To say that our bodies are complicated is the understatement of the year, especially when it comes to the stress response. I get kind of geek out excited at this whole process, and I could go on about it for far too long, but for the sake of time in our episode today, I’ll give you the highlights. If you’re like me and you want to know this stress response, nervous system reaction inside and out, you can check out my stress management toolbelt pdf guide. It’s a resource I created just for you, if you want to take today’s conversation deeper. Your stress management toolbelt will walk you through the whole body’s response to stress at the nervous system level, definitely cool information to have because when you have that a-ha moment of “I think I’m getting stressed” early, you can nip it in the bud before it starts to harm your gut. My stress management toolbelt will also guide you through acute stress vs chronic stress in more detail than we’re talking about today, and also give you 11 stress busting techniques that you can hold in your imaginary toolbelt and whip out at a moment’s notice—whenever you need them.

I’ve got a FREE resource I think you are going to LOVE.

If you want to get your hands on this new, free resource, just go to karynhaley.com/stress or find the link in the show notes. That’s k-a-r-y-n-h-a-l-e-y.com/stress

OK, how about a quick highlight into our stress response at the nervous system level? Remember, if you can catch your stress here and have that a-ha moment, you’ll be world’s ahead of all the stressed out, fatigued mamas out there. You’ll know exactly what to do about it. And we’ll talk about how you can do just that, in a moment.

When you think about stress, you might think you would feel it in your head first with your thoughts, but nope, even at the nerve ending level in our body, it starts in our gut. And of course, if you listened to episode 6, use the gut brain connection to your IBD advantage, you know that this makes complete sense. Can you catch your stress here with the first twinges or gurgles in your belly, if you can you might be able to ward off a full blown stress meltdown or an anxiety attack. As you might expect, because of that awesome gut brain connection we have, our stressful feeling continues to rise as it moves up the vagus nerve into places in the brain like the amygdala and the hypothalamus. If the stress continues to build, our amazing body that it is, knows it’s time to alert the whole body through the sympathetic nervous system. And if we aren’t in a true fight or flight scenario, the good news is that our nervous system has this great shut off system called the parasympathetic nervous system.

It’s so cool how our body has all the warning systems built in. This is the reason I get so geeked out over this. Our body’s want to be in balance and they have truly ingenious systems to help that happen. We just have to listen when they talk. Usually, we just aren’t in tuned enough to notice the tingles and the twinges when our body is talking to us. If the parasympathetic nervous system, our fail safe to get the body back on track fails to turn off quickly, here’s where the trouble begins. That amazing body, who’s systems are always in constant communication with each other, signals energy bursts of hormones like adrenaline. Now if you’ve been multi-tasking during this stress response within the body explanation, here’s where I want you to come back to me because here’s where you have the power to affect change in your body.

A constant energy surge of adrenaline, when we never allow the body to calm down, creates the release of another hormone, cortisol. And whoa, let me tell you about the ravages of bursts of cortisol that never go down because we’re experiencing constant stress. Cortisol is like a wildfire in your body. Tiny little firefighters are in there trying their hardest to make a dent, but the fire keeps burning and burning. This is the place where your IBD is going to take a hit, every time.

Can you imagine a constant stress fire in your body, one that never goes out. Of course it makes our gut disorder worse. An internal wildfire and IBD don’t mix.

[16:25] With all the stress we are feeling right now, between IBD, motherhood, and Covid, can you imagine how the nervous system reactions and our hormones like cortisol and adrenal levels are wacking out our health. These systems and chemicals have direct links to our immune function and our inflammatory response.

We know Crohn’s and colitis are autoimmune diseases (the immune system literally attacking the body) and we know this illness involves inflammation throughout the body. It’s no wonder we are so impacted by stress.

Now, some people might give up here. Some might say, there’s nothing I can do about it. And to that I say hell to the no. Fear not, awesome mama, because this insight will set you free when it comes to stress. The good news is that the age-old wisdom that says knowledge is power, really is true. Insight about what’s going on with this stress inside your body, can really be the difference from, same old flare-up to thriving with IBD.

The impact stress will have on you depends on two things- how long does the stress last and what level of intensity is the stress at.

When it comes to how long we’ve had the stress, we’re talking about the difference between acute and chronic stress. With acute stress, the stress is short lived. It comes when you least expect it, out of the blue. One minute your fine and the next- wham! It’s the slamming on the breaks when a car pulls out in front of you, it’s the call in the middle of the night telling you a loved one is in the hospital. It could even be an unexpected argument with your spouse when things heat up quickly. With acute stress, we usually feel it physically, whether we recognize it or not. Butterflies in your stomach, heart pounding, sweat forming on your brow. You know the feeling.

Acute and chronic stress affect your IBD in different ways.

With chronic stress, we’ve been dealing with it for a long time. It’s that chronic level of cortisol surge that makes us feel fatigued, depressed, chronically anxious, and physically sick. Chronic stress like homeschooling your kids when you never did that before, leaving your job because your family needs you at home, living in a world of fear thinking you’ll contract Covid at every corner. That’s chronic stress. It’s all about the cortisol. Research shows that high levels of stress in this sustained state is associated with immune suppression, low levels of constant inflammation, grief, sadness, and marital challenges.

Are any of these scenarios familiar to you? If they are, what role does stress play here? And what can we do about it? Do we have any control when it comes to stress? Is there anything we can do about it?

Well, remember, I’ll never be fan of the just don’t feel the stress mentality. That’s just nonsense. But if psychology has taught me anything it’s that while we can’t control what life throws at us, we can control our reaction to it.

[20:43] Have you ever heard of a objective vs subjective experience? Objective experiences are factual, there’s no denying the facts. Subjective experiences are those where matters are more gray. It involves thoughts and feelings and everyone has a different reaction.  I’m a teacher at heart, so when I think of objective vs subjective, I always think of a test. There’s the objective kind with only one right answer, like a multiple choice test, or there’s the subjective test, like the essay portion. I’m always more partial to the essay type, because I like to live in the gray.

The subjective part of stress, our thoughts and feelings behind it, that’s what we can control. It’s not the stress itself that kicks our IBD in the butt. It’s our reaction to it.

Why is it that the exact same experience, like an argument with a friend, can be perceived by one friend as not a big deal, a blip, while the other friend might have a searing, burning memory of what happened.

When we learn to see stress as subjective, we have the power to set stress free.

Experiences are subjective. They’re all about our perception. Stress is subjective too. And how we experience the stress in our life will determine how it impacts our Crohn’s and colitis. I don’t know about you, but that’s enough to make me want to work harder at my reaction to the stress in my life. Because there’s actually a piece of it that I can control. Why do you think I work every day to lessen my type A tendencies? It’s a constant battle, but I work at it every day because I know it’s within my power. Maybe you can relate?

Knowing that we have the power to frame our stress to our own subjective experience is a powerful tool. It can take some of the pressure off our initial reaction.

Take our acute stress reaction for example—remember that’s the in the moment, unexpected type of stress. We might feel like we want to explode when a co-worker challenges us on a project we thought was great or when we get into an argument with our partner, or when our kids are trying our patience with sassy remarks. Knowing that stress is subjective, we know that we don’t have to settle for our first reaction. We can take a deep breath and change the course of our response, and thus, reduce our body’s stress response to what’s going on. It’s a win for us, and whoever is annoying us too. Because engaging in petty fights like that is never going to get you the desired result you’re looking for. Both parties just walk away angry and annoyed—and stressed!

And if you’re saying, well all of this sounds wonderful in a perfect world, right? If you’re thinking you could never manage your stress in this subjective way, I get it. I used to think of myself in that way too. The truth is that anyone can do this. We just have to start small, be ok with imperfect baby step action, and celebrate the small wins. I’m a work in progress with this type of stress response too. I’m definitely getting better, but I work at it everyday. And you can to.

I know you can do this mama. You can have a positive impact on your stress and use it to keep your IBD in check.

This 3-Step Stress Management System will give you the tools you need to get started on stress busting today.

[25:16] Let’s talk about the three-step process, you can use when it comes to putting on your stress management toolbelt. We’ll start with the steps and then I’ll give you a real life scenario you can relate to so we can try this out in real time.

#1- When it comes to stress, we recognize it, as early as possible. If we can recognize it at that physiological level, the level I talked about earlier where the feelings start in your gut, move up through your brain and then out into the entire nervous system and into a hormonal chemical reaction where cortisol gets released—if we can notice our stress here first, with the sweaty palms, tingles in the armpits, racing heart, queasy feeling in the gut, etc… we have a chance to put a halt to the stress response before it gets out of control.

Recognize it early.

#2- Whenever we recognize it, we make stress a subjective experience. We address our own thoughts and feelings behind the stress. Why are we reacting this way? What about this moment is particularly triggering? Can you take a step back and let what’s going on marinate for a beat before you react? When stress is at play, taking a beat is always wise. If I have to respond in this moment, how can I reframe what your feeling and let it guide your response? What if the other person’s negative emotions have nothing to do with you and everything to do with them? Does knowing this change your response?

Stress is subjective. Reframe it and make it work for you.

#3- I know you’re going to think this is crazy, but we have to make friends with your stress. Yep, I said it. Make friends with your stress. Let it be your best girlfriend, who talks to you, gives you signals to help you be your best self, gives you warnings when something is off. Isn’t that just the best girlfriend in the world? Who has your back more than stress? When you make friends with stress, you see it in a whole new light. A light that can guide you to positively impact your Crohn’s and colitis instead of letting it bringing you down.

Make friends with your stress.

[28:57] So, there you have it. That’s your 3 step stress response. Recognize it early, reframe it if possible, and make friends with your stress. Let’s put these steps into practice for both acute in the moment stress and more long term stress so you can do it like a mom and rock your stress management toolbelt.

Let’s take this plan to the next level with a real life acute stress example.

Ok, let’s take an acute problem that all moms encounter, like the demands on a mom’s time. We all experience this daily. When we have kids, our time is never our own. Kids need help with schoolwork, kids need to go to dance or football practice, kids wanting a snack, or to be read a bedtime story, or if you have kids like mine, their favorite time to get your attention is when you’re in the bathroom. With 3 energetic boys, any given day in my house is enough to give me stress that raises my blood pressure and my heart rate. Since this used to be a daily pitfall for me where I would end up being at best annoyed mom and on my worst day, yelly mom, I knew I had to get a hold of this before it ruined my relationship with my kids.

I used this very 3 step stress busting plan I just outlined to get this acute stress under control.

Step 1- Whenever this happened, I started to recognize it at the cellular level. For me, if I caught it early, I could feel a tightness in my belly. If it was later on in the stress journey, I had an anxious feeling, almost like I was on hyper alert when the kids started to constantly vie for my time and attention.

Step 2- Now that I recognize it, it’s time for the reframe. How could I see this differently? What could I compromise on and what was set in stone? In a moment of reflection about this stressor, I realized that I was actually the culprit and most of the problem. I wasn’t setting enough boundaries with my kids so they thought I was always in mom mode. I work from home, I homeschool my kids, I take them to activities and break up the arguments, and make sure they’re fed. Too much! I needed to realize my limitations and set a schedule for when I’m in mom mode and when I’m in work mode. Once I set a schedule, I stuck to it. And it was hard- especially when my kids wanted to do fun stuff while I was in work mode. But little by little, (imperfect baby steps right?) they got used to it, I got used to it and I began to feel the stress of always being pulled in different directions melt away.

Step 3- I made friends with this stressor.  I’d be lying if I said this process always works. It doesn’t, but because I’ve made friends with this stressor, because I know my own personal pitfalls with this, I can recognize and course correct quickly when I feel myself getting sucked back into old habits.  Being flexible and open to trying new things has actually made this stressor a confidence booster for me because I realized I had control over it. My kids still haven’t learned not to bother me when I go to the bathroom, but I handled that too by locking on the bathroom door. Bathroom time is my time, no exceptions.

With this stressor, I mainly used the reframe technique, but there are 4 other acute stress busting techniques I mention in your stress management toolbelt- that free resource I mentioned at the top of the podcast. I love the other techniques too. You can check them out when you download my free resource guide at karynhaley.com/stress.

Now, this process I just described for dealing with the acute stress, when as moms our time is not our own, it may or may not work for you. Either your situation is different or you have younger kids. If this is the case, I know there’s still a solution for you. It just might take some brainstorming on your part. How can your partner help out, what about a babysitter, family member or friend? Who can help you lighten your load so you don’t constantly feel the stress on being pulled in a million directions?

How does this process work for chronic stress?

[35:45] Let’s look at the more devastating type of stress chronic, ongoing stress. The kind that will definitely impact your IBD in negative ways. For this kind of stress, I want to introduce you to my client, Abby. Abby has had just about as much stress as she can take. Since coronavirus, Abby has had to quit her part-time job to stay home with her kids, she started homeschooling them and she felt lost, her dad was diagnosed with covid-19 and he lives a plane ride away, she couldn’t see him or help with his care and Abby’s colitis started to suffer.

In step 1 of our 3-step stress management plan:

#1- Recognize. Abby recognized her thoughts and feelings for what they were, chronic stress brought on by sucky life events that were largely out of control. Remember the a-ha moment of insight is key. Abby had been in overdrive so long, she didn’t even know she wasn’t in normal mode. I remember when she had this a-ha moment with me in a session, I literally heard her sigh. I could almost see a weight being dropped from her shoulders.

#2- The reframe. Was there a possibility of a reframe here? There’s so much going on. What could be done? After processing this with Abby, she realized that she was taking all of this on and not accepting help from people in her life who were offering it. Abby was understandably lost in grief, stress, and a need to seem perfect and in control for her kids and family. For Abby, the reframe was in admitting she needed help. Abby’s in-laws who are healthy kept offering to help with the kids, but she kept telling them she had it all under control. When Abby and I chatted, she made the decision that she would take her family up on their offer to help. Abby and I also discussed some dietary changes that might help strengthen her digestive system at this time and she decided to make an appointment with her gastroenterologist to see if he had anything ideas for her as well.

#3- Step 3, make friends with stress. Abby is still working through making friends with her stress. She’s been through a lot, like all of us IBD moms living in the time of Covid, but she’s adapted a few of the chronic stress busting techniques from my stress management toolbelt and she’s working on it every day. Abby loves to dance and sing so she’s taking time to do that every day, whether it’s in the shower, in her car or in her kitchen as she cooks dinner. Abby has started a 10-minute meditation practice daily with grounding meditations in the morning before getting out of bed and gratitude meditations before she goes to bed a night.  These small imperfect steps are making Abby feel a bit lighter already.

I’m so proud of her and I know you can do this too. Remember this concept about stress management is never about getting rid of stress completely, or at all really. And it’s never about perfection. It’s about seeing stress as subjective and knowing we can have power over it. It doesn’t have to make our IBD worse. When we commit to making stress busing a practice that we work at, little by little, tweaking as we go, we are already making massive steps in the right direction.

[40:51] You can take this episode to the next level by downloading my free resource guide: Your stress management toolbelt by going to karynhaley.com/stress. And as always, if you get stuck, reach out. I’m always happy to help. Hello@karynhaley.com

May your gut healing journey be full of a-ha moments and may you always wear your imaginary stress management toolbelt because you never know when that acute or chronic stress might come into your life and try to derail you from the incredible place you know you deserve to be.

Wishing you a cheeky and healthy journey. Bye for now!

Ready to take your gut healing to the next level?

One last thing, if you’re still with me and if you are, you’re definitely my kind of gal, we have to get to know each other better. If you’re tired of living on the hamster wheel of IBD with all the ups and downs between flares and remission, if you’re struggling to get control of your abdominal pain, gas, bloating, diarrhea, and other troubling IBD symptoms, go to my website, it’s karynhaley.com, and my mom had to be just a little bit different, spell my name with a Y. So it’s K-A-R-Y-N-H-A-L-E-Y dot com, and schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you gut your life back. It’s a power-packed 30 minutes. You don’t have to live in IBD status quo. There’s so much that can be done to transform your life so you can thrive in motherhood and thrive with IBD. I’ve seen my clients walk this path and it gives me so much joy to take that journey with them.

My entire coaching practice is run online, so you never have to leave your house and you never have to get out of your jammy or yoga pants for us to work together. You know, I’m wearing them too. If you’re ready to take your first amazing step towards healing, I’m ready to chat with you. Schedule your free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session today at karynhaley.com. Click on the Work With Me tab and I’ll see you soon.

It’s important to note that the information in this podcast and in this episode is for general information purposes only and not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice. The statements made in the Cheeky Podcast for moms with IBD, either by me or my guests, is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Before implementing any new treatment protocols, do yourself a favor and consult your physician first. Thank you so much for listening, for being here, for saving the space for us to spend some time together. Until we chat again, I’m wishing you a cheeky and healthy IBD journey.

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Ep 8: The IBD Sleep Connection Interview With a Sleep Expert

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

We know there’s a connection between sleep and IBD, but what is still a mystery is if it’s the Crohn’s or colitis making it hard to get a good night’s sleep or is it our poor sleep that makes our IBD flare. It’s time to get to the bottom of this “is it the chicken or egg” scenario once and for all.

In this episode, we’ll tackle the gut/sleep connection head on as we go straight to the expert source. Dr. William Brim, sleep expert, joins the podcast to shed light on this important topic for all of us suffering with IBD.

I asked Dr. Brim about:

• The gut/sleep connection: Why do we struggle with sleep when we have IBD and is our poor quality sleep having a negative effect on our IBD?
• The unique role our circadian rhythm plays for our microbiome
• The surprising truth about over-the-counter sleep aids like Melatonin, Gaba, and CBD Oil
• The best 4 sleep must do’s to ensure we sleep like a baby

And so much more!

After this episode, you’ll be geeking out on all things IBD and sleep. Dr. Brim provides cutting edge research information that will give you multiple a-ha moments. You’ll never look at your gut/sleep connection the same again.

Episode at a Glance:

• [3:13] Dr. Brim, our sleep expert, is a Health Psychologist and speaks nationally and internationally on the topic of sleep. Dr. Brim has trained over 5,000 clinicians in non-medical treatments for sleep disorders.

• [09:06] Dr. Bill says that there’s really no question that reduced sleep causes an almost immediate change in the gut microbiota. A recent study showed that after just 2 nights of being sleep deprived, there is a significant increase in bacteria in the gut such as Corio bacteria, ACA, and an increase in firmicutes.

• [18:30] Disruptions to the circadian rhythm can result in increased inflammation as well as increased gut permeability. This can then increase our chances of having an IBD flare-up.

• [21:18] Probiotics can improve the gut microbiota and therefore improve the inflammation response in our gut. Because of your improved microbiome, this small step can also improve the quality of your sleep.

• [26:39] The more you stress about not sleeping well, the more negative impact it will have on your IBD. You have to take it in stride, treasure good sleep, and protect it as best you can, but don’t over-compensate if you have an occasional bad night sleep and get worried that you have insomnia. That worry will always create more insomnia.

• [31:06] Dr. Brim explains “worry time.” Set aside time each night to get your anxious or stressful thoughts out of your head before going to bed, outside of the bedroom. If you get in bed and all those thoughts pop back in your head, get back out of bed, go back to that quiet place and write your worries down again. When you feel sleepy again, go back to bed.

• [33:24] Are melatonin, Gaba and CBD Oil effective sleep aids? Dr. Brim explains the upsides and downsides of these popular over-the-counter treatments.

• [47:12] There is no panacea when it comes to sleep, but there are several tips everyone can take away to help them have good sleep. Dr. Brim shares his 4 best sleep hygiene tips to help everyone get a better night’s sleep.

• [59:28] Power naps or snooze fests? Which one is better for us with IBD. Dr. Brim says that either are OK, actually, as long as they don’t affect our sleep at night.

• [1:00:02] Dr. Brim disses the idea that blue light makes it OK to watch TV on your device in bed. Sure, the blue light may diminish your melatonin, but it’s not enough to suppressive your melatonin enough to make you sleepy and the activity of watching TV in bed, keeps your mind racing and is terrible to do just before bed.
• [1:11:18] Go to karynhaley.com to schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you get your life back.

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Episode Links:

• Find a qualified Behavioral Sleep Provider

How Does IBD Affect Sleep? (or should we say how does sleep affect IBD)

[music]

0:00:04 S1: INTRO You’re listening to The Cheeky Podcast for Moms with IBD, a safe space for moms with Crohn’s and colitis to connect, explore powerful tools for healing and transform our lives to thrive in motherhood and in life. I’m your host, Karyn Hayley, IBD Health Coach, Integrative Wellness enthusiast and mom of three outstanding kids. After having Crohn’s disease for 30 years and working as a health advocate exclusively with IBD clients for the last 10 years. I know it’s time to bring the types of candid conversations I have with my clients out into the open. It’s our time to go on an IBD healing journey into it, like only a mom can. Let’s do this.

[music]

Win your own Kitchen Arsenal Prevention Recipe Guide!

Welcome, welcome to the episode, mama. Before we get started today, I wanted to let you know that you can win a copy of my kitchen arsenal preventive and kitchen arsenal cure recipe guide to kick that cold or flu right to the curb. Before it starts, I love this guide, I love it because it’s so important as we’re heading into cold and flu season right now, of course, with the added stress and the added pressure of a pandemic on our hands, we just can’t lose our immune system enough right now. And these rescue remedies, they’re full of ingredients that you already have in your kitchen, but I usually reserve it just for my clients. I’m sharing it with you today so that you can get your hands on these must-have sickness buster recipes.

0:01:41 S1: All you have to do to get the guide is leave a written review for The Cheeky Podcast for moms with IBD on iTunes, take a screenshot of your review and email it to me, email it to me at hello@karynhaley.com, with the subject line: PODCAST REVIEW, and I’ll send you your kitchen arsenal preventive and kitchen arsenal cure recipe guide as my way of saying thank you. Thank you for listening and thank you for reviewing the show. My email again is hello@k-a-r-y-n-h-a-l-e-y. dot com, and I can’t wait to reward you for leaving your review.

Alright, let’s get into the episode. I’m especially looking forward to today’s episode because it’s my first interview on the podcast, I love adding in another voice to our IBD mom experience, especially with a subject that I’m not that well-versed in, but super curious about. today we’re talking about sleep, sleep and IBD. What’s the connection here? There’s so much to dig into. Lately, the whole gut and microbiome has been under a great deal of focus, and that’s beautiful because it’s led to some really interesting research. One of the areas of focus for this microbiome is how it affects our sleep, and we’ll explore this and many other sleep-related topics with today’s guest.

0:03:13 S1: So let’s go ahead and get into it. Let’s find out a little bit more about today’s guest. Our guest today is Dr. William Brim, he’s a Clinical Health Psychologist and behavioral sleep expert. He’s the director of a National Department of Defense Training Center, and has trained over 5,000 clinicians nationally and internationally, in non-medical treatments for Sleep Disorders, he conducts research and has published numerous articles and book chapters on PTSD and sleep disorders. He regularly presents at national and international conferences and has testified in numerous civilian and military courts, and provides consultation and coaching and behavioral interventions for sleep disorders. Welcome to the show, Dr. Brim.

0:04:06 S2: Hi Karyn, I was wondering if I was ever gonna make it on your podcast…

0:04:09 S1: Well, of course. You’re my first interview. Oh, there you go. I have to tell you, there’s one thing that’s missing from your bio, you forgot to mention that you have an absolutely fabulous IBD health coach for a wife…

0:04:24 S2: Best in the world.

0:04:27 S1: That’s me so… Full disclosure for our dear listeners, Dr. Brim is actually my husband, so I thought he would be the perfect to have first on the show. What’s really cool, and Bill, I’m sure you agree with this, what’s really cool about us is that both of us being in the healthcare field, sometimes I get to work with you on your presentations when it comes to all things gut health. And when it comes to sleep, you actually work with some of my clients before to help them when they have sleep challenges, so we have this kind of cool thing going where we get to work with each other a lot, and I think it’s fun.

0:05:07 S2: I come to you for questions about sleep and the gut all the time.

0:05:13 S1: Well, I’m gonna keep you in charge of sleep and I’ll be in charge of the gut. So welcome, I’m really happy to have you here. I thought I would start with just going over the format, so everybody knows what we’ll be doing today. Okay, so we’re gonna start with a couple ice-breaker questions, these are just some completely fluffy questions, totally easy to answer, but I find that they’re interesting questions because they will let us know a lot about your inner personality, so to speak, and then after that, we’re gonna just dive in, we’re gonna dive in and talk about all things sleep. How does sleep affect IBD. What I think is interesting is it’s kind of this chicken and egg thing, what comes first, so how does sleep affect our IBD? And how does our Crohn’s and colitis affect our sleep? So what I’d love to do today is get into all of that with you, and then lastly, I’d love to finish with a lightning round just really quick off the cuff questions that I know people have when it comes to sleep. We might get to some of those during our talk, but just in case, I would love for us to do that lightning round at the end, How does that sound for you? Sounds great.

0:06:27 S1: Okay, I have my questions. What you’ve written down here. Okay, I don’t need to look for the ice breaker questions ’cause I know what those are. Let’s get started with our ice breaker questions. Okay, completely fluffy a promise. Question number one what is your favorite ice cream flavor?

0:06:45 S2: Moose tracks. No cookies and cream. No, no, Rocky Road. No, can I say ice cream?

0:06:57 S1: All ice cream in a… I think you did all of the Ben and Jerry’s flavors, so that… We are Ben and Jerry’s lovers in our house.

0:07:05 S2: And they have a great… Now they have the dairy-free Ben and Jerry’s too.

0:07:11 S1: Yeah, they do. They make it with cashew milk. It’s really delicious. Actually, I don’t have it a lot because it’s still a lot of sugar in it, I tasted it on…

0:07:21 S2: You put enough cookies and cream in and it’s good.

0:07:23 S1: Yeah, exactly. Well, I don’t, but you would… Right. Alright, so an eclectic mix of ice cream flavors, so I guess that tells us something about your personality, I’m sure. Okay, second question, second question is… Cats or dogs? Dog. Of course our viewers don’t know that, but I know that because we have a dog.

0:07:50 S2: We have a beautiful golden retriever, Luna. Who was around here somewhere?

0:07:54 S1: Do we have any other pets?

0:07:56 S2: Oh yes, we have a whole household of pets, we have birds, we have bearded dragons, dogs, we have them all…

0:08:05 S1: Yeah, and I’m sure everybody can see… Well, if you’re seeing this on YouTube, you can see if you’re listening, you don’t see us, but we’re actually in different rooms of the house. We’re not together. What happens when we’ve done this together before, and when we do it together, you get that echo-y kind of noise when we both have our computers, so I’m in my podcast space in… Bill is in his presentation space, so we’re actually in different rooms, but we’re in the same house and we’re hoping that the kids are going to give us this time so that we can talk about all things gut and sleep. Okay, so let’s go ahead and just dive in and I wanna get straight to the sleep, talk about the sleep and gut connection, so when it comes to the sleep and gut connection, I know there are probably a lot of problems that we could talk about. What are the biggest challenges that you’re seeing when it comes to sleep and gut disturbances…

There’s no question, reduced sleep will impact our microbiome.

0:09:06 S2: Yeah, I think there’s really no question that reduced sleep causes an almost immediate change in the gut microbiota. There was an interesting study a few years ago where researchers had normal healthy adults go two nights with reduced sleep opportunity, so they were reduced to only four, about four hours total time in bed, so they were sleeping less than four hours, and they compared them to themselves when they only had… When they had two nights of normal sleep opportunities, so about seven and a half hours of sleep, and then they took the stool samples from them at the end of both opportunities and they compared the stool samples following each period, and they found that after just two nights of reduced sleep opportunity, there were significant increases in bacteria in the gut such as Corio bacteria, ACA, and an increase in firmicutes that can lead to obesity and type two diabetes, and that was only after two nights of reduced sleep. And a lot of people that struggle with sleep problems obviously have more than a couple of nights of sleep, so the more chronic that sleep problem becomes, the more build up of these bad gut bacteria can be…

0:10:24 S2: And this is what we kinda call… You know this better than I do, what you would call intestinal dysbiosis, probably it would be the best word, which is just a fancy way for saying your gut biome is all kind of jacked up… Right, right, and we know that stress, depression, anxiety, poor sleep, disturbed circadian rhythm, all these things result in a disruption to a healthy Gut micribiome, and we know that altered microbiota may affect the function of both the nervous system and the immune system. And that reduces your ability to cope with psychological stress, physical stress, it makes you more vulnerable to stress, and it’s clear that poor sleep and gut dysbiosis are correlated with obesity, diabetes, metabolic syndromes, and most importantly, probably for IBD is inflammatory diseases.

0:11:23 S1: Wow, I can’t believe how much information we’ve been able to gather with this whole… All the new research on the microbiome, isn’t it crazy, like just how many pieces you can connect it to all stemming from the microbiome, and of course, when you’re talking about this for quality of sleep, even for a couple of days, and you’re talking about the effects of it on the gut and then it leading to inflammation, that just really makes me think about us, of course, the IBDers, because we’re the ones that this inflammation, inflammatory, bowel disease. So how does that fit into everything…

0:12:02 S2: Yeah, I think… For me, I think of sleep is like that old canary in a coal mine saying, When we have sleep problems, it’s often one of the first indicators that something’s out of balance in our body, sleep… Our ability to sleep is kind of like an early warning system, and there are several studies that suggest that poor sleep can be an early warning sign of an impending flare or sub-clinical inflammation itself, so before you’re even aware that you’re having a flare or that there is inflammation that warning signal of disruption to your sleep could occur, and if you’re not getting good sleep, you have a two-fold higher increase of a flare compared to people with IBD who are getting a good night sleep, so we know that poor sleep leads to inflammation, even like sub-clinical inflammation can lead to poor sleep disturbance, so I’ll mention sleep disturbance and sometimes I’ll mention sleep deprivation and sometimes I’ll mention insomnia, and those are really three different things, sleep disturbances when you’ve just not gotten a good night’s sleep or something’s interfered with your sleep, sleep deprivation is when you’re not giving yourself enough opportunity to sleep, you’re reducing the opportunity to sleep, and insomnia is when you have the inability to sleep, even when you’re giving yourself a lot of opportunity for sleep, and all three are known to worsen acid reflux, they can lead to ulcers, they lead to increase in the risk of fatty liver disease, and they can exacerbate symptoms of lupus and arthritis and may even increase the risk of colon cancer.

0:13:52 S1: Wow, I know you and I have had this conversation before. What’s more important getting your sleep or in food, because of course, you and I would have that conversation and you know, I hate to admit it to you, but it’s amazing to me just how important sleep is, it’s crazy, all of the disruptions that can happen in your body… And when it comes to IBD, those are just massive. The inflammatory response, the immune system response. It just makes me wanna go to sleep, get a nap, make sure that I’m doing it right, which you know, sometimes I struggle with… We all do right? We all struggle with that. Something that has been just kind of going around in my mind as you’ve been talking, is this circadian rhythm… Right, I’m sure when you talk about sleep, you talk about the circadian rhythm, so how does that fit into this whole picture here?

0:14:48 S2: Yeah, well, let me ask you this, what is the most rhythmic thing that you can think of on the planet… And please don’t say the boy band BTS or something like that.

0:14:59 S1: I don’t even know what that is. What is the most rhythmic thing on the planet? I feel like this is a test. What happens the most consistently, the sun comes up and down is that what you’re looking for, you… Yeah, exactly, exactly.

0:15:15 S2: It’s the rhythm of the rotation of the earth, right, that rhythmic rising and setting of the sun. And we’ll see how this plays a key role in our sleep and in our health, but this rhythm is so regular and so consistent that it affects nearly every living thing on the planet, the plants orient to the sun, animals whether they’re nocturnal, which means they’re waking active at night or diurnal like us, and awake and active mostly during the day, all have consistent rhythms that are oriented to this rhythm of the Sun, every cell in our body, and this is where it gets really important. Every cell in our body has a rhythm, not necessarily a 24-hour circadian rhythm, but a rhythm that’s maintained by a mass of a master clock that’s in our brain, and this master clock has to be set every day by exposure to bright light or to daylight, things like body temperature, hormone release like melatonin, which helps regulate the timing of our sleep, growth, human growth hormone, which fuels our growth as kids, but also as adults, it maintains our tissues and our organs, which is also key plasma cortisol levels, which is a steroid hormone that is key to our body stress response and helps to regulate our bodies sugar levels, metabolism, memory formation, and it helps with anti-inflammation, among other things.

0:16:44 S2: All are regulated on this circadian rhythm. And circadian rhythm plays a key role in good quality sleep, when we have consistent sleep, that helps to keep our master clock in tune with our body and keeps all of those… All of our cellular activity in tune with our body.

0:17:05 S1: I love that, and that’s such a good explanation, because I know everybody’s heard about the circadian rhythm, but to hear about how it all works and how when we have to have a good circadian rhythm, it makes such a difference to our overall health. Absolutely.

0:17:20 S2: I mean, you know you have good rhythm when things are regular, right. When you’re hungry, about the same time every day when your period is regular, when your bowel movements occur regularly, when you’re sleepy about the same time every day, many of you probably wake up about the same time every day, even on your days off, even when you could sleep in. And this is because your master clock is in tune, you’re consistent with your wake time, you’re consistent with your exposure to light, but there’s a lot of ways that our rhythm can get disrupted. Shift work is the big one, right? But so is having an inconsistent bedtime and wake time, many sleep disorders and medical conditions disrupt the circadian rhythm as well.

0:18:07 S1: You are so good about that 10 o’clock every night. And then there’s me. So I know that’s definitely something I could work on, right? And it probably affects my circadian rhythm, and I’m guessing that just having IBD alone might affect my circadian rhythm, would I be right about that?

When our circadian rhythm is disrupted so is our gut.

0:18:30 S2: Yeah, I think absolutely, and it’s a two-way street, I think, between the circadian rhythm and the disruption… Circadian rhythm and IBD. But anyway, when this rhythm is disrupted, imagine that someone out on the dance floor that has no rhythm. This rhythm of this imbalance can lead to a range of adverse metabolic effects, it can increase the amount of pro-inflammatory gut bacteria, and the imbalance also promotes increased gut permeability, and this is a big word, like this translocation of bacterial components across the epithelium, the consequences basically of this is that you have metabolically active tissues that are exposed to like chronic low-level inflammation, and that can result in metabolic signaling and disruptive metabolic signaling, and then further inflammation, and then you’re back to that dysbiosis, poor sleep, stress, dysbiosis cycle where your gut is affecting your sleep, your sleep and lack of sleep is causing you to be stressed out, and that stress is releasing cortisol cytokines, which are telling your body’s immune response to turn on and or inflammatory themselves, and then back to that your gut biome again. And so we get in this cycle that we talked earlier, and it increases inflammation throughout the body and increases the risk of a flare for those with IBD.

0:20:10 S1: I have to tell you, it just sounds all pretty grim. It sounds pretty grim for those of us with IBD, I came to this conversation thinking I was gonna talk to you about the chicken or the egg and what it really doesn’t seem to matter because it’s all this cycle that just this endless negative cycle.

0:20:26 S2: I think it’s a… It’s a two-way street though.

0:20:29 S1: Tell me, you have some good news here is… I hope you do.

0:20:34 S2: Well, I know, and this happens all the time, it always feels outside of our control, like How am I supposed to do something about that, how can I possibly change my gut microbiome, how can I affect my master clock in my brain? You can’t just say, Oh, you should increase your healthy gut microbes and just kinda go and just kind of imagine it, or maybe at least… At least not directly so, but the good news, I think, is that there are things that are in our control that we can do, and I’ll suggest probably a couple of things that have scientific support on…

0:21:13 S1: You are my science guy.

Probiotics play a big role in helping our inflammation and our sleep.

0:21:18 S2: But I think one of them is more in your area and that I can suggest them for you, and then one is a little bit more in my area, and you may wanna talk some more about the first one and the first one is the fact that some probiotics, we know, act on the enteric nervous system, which is basically essentially your gut and at the and the immune system, and then they can improve your stress response, they can reduce that cortisol release that I talked about, and pro-inflammatory bacteria, which is a bad thing, and then improve the guts ability to make neurotransmitters, which help with mood, like anxiety and depression, and melatonin, which helps with sleep regulation. The second thing, and so you can talk some more about those types of things, and then the second thing has to do with improving your sleep to the best of your ability, and there are several things that you can do that you have control over in that area.

0:22:23 S1: Well, in terms of the probiotic, I just have to agree with you that… And from everything that you’ve said even before then, it all just kinda leads up to this, you started by talking about how we… Even when you talked about that study, how even from two hours of two days with sleep deprivation, it actually impacted your microbiome and the bacterial balance in there, so it completely makes sense that if you take a probiotic, it’s going to help with the whole microbiome in it probably will even help you sleep better, and I know… I know that it will also help your IBD symptoms, so all of that completely makes sense to me.

0:23:01 S2: Yeah, I agree, and I would say just remember that good sleep happens when we’re healthy and when we manage our stress, and when we’re consistent and regular with our healthy sleep behaviors, I think sleep happens right. You can’t not sleep. And for this reason, I think a lot of people take sleep for granted, but there’s a host of enemies out there that are waiting to steal little bits of our good sleep and our health, and even though good sleep happens naturally, I think we have to be a little bit paranoid and a little bit willing to fight to defend our good sleep, even though you will fall asleep if you wanna sleep… Well, that’s in your control. Right.

0:23:47 S1: Right, that makes sense. Now, I have to switch gears just a little bit here, because in preparing for this episode, in this interview, I have to confess, I don’t know why, ’cause I knew it was with you, but I just got a little bit nervous about it. Typically, it’s me and the camera… I’m doing an interview and it’s with you, so… I don’t know, it made me a little nervous. So over the last weekend, I went to our IBD mom tribe, The Gut Love Community, and so I ask them what do they doing… What do they wanna know? What did they want to know about sleep and what questions would they have for the seed expert, so is it okay with you if I just share some of those questions?

0:24:26 S2: Let’s give it a try.

0:24:27 S1: Okay, so our first question comes from Maria, and Maria says, How important is a good night’s sleep when you IBD. Is it more important for us with IBD than non-IBD ears to have good quality sleep?

0:24:43 S2: Yeah, I think a lot of that’s like what we were just talking about, I think it’s absolutely the case. Everyone is affected by a bad night sleep, right, everybody has an impact from a bad night sleep, whether it’s an acute impact and it just affects your next day or it becomes kind of a recurrent chronic problem that has longer lasting effects, we know that poor sleep results in a whole host of physical and psychological problems, and that kind of cascade includes inflammation all throughout your body, and as I had mentioned earlier, I think there is such a clear correlation between sleep and IBD that poor sleep can actually predict a flare, so I think absolutely it’s important to get good sleep and to try your best to have an environment that… Again, like I said, where you fight where you treasure sleep… Where you fight for it and you don’t just take it for granted.

0:25:48 S1: Yeah, so we definitely have to prioritize it, and I can speak from my own experience, I’ve seen it with clients, to where they just… You go through a period in your life that’s particularly stressful, or maybe you’re a new parent and you’re not getting enough sleep, it is so tough, it will always… You know, it always, when I am under that chronic stress, I just know it’s going to affect my sleep… And then it’s gonna affect my IBD, and so I’ve learned over the years to really treasure it, and even if I’m going through a time when I can’t get the sleep that I need, I make sure that I prioritize naps. I don’t know, you might have an opinion on that, but I definitely will. Just try to make sure I get enough sleep. Sometimes you just have to do the best you can. ’cause we’re all human and so imperfect action, right?

The more you worry and stress about not sleeping, the more it will negatively impact your sleep.

0:26:39 S2: And it’s important to note too, that everyone has a sleepless night every once in a while, it’s not unusual to have a sleepless night, and the biggest concern is not to over-react to that sleepless night to over compensate for it, or to get worried and add anxiety because I mean, who hasn’t said, Oh, I got an awful night sleep last night, and tonight I’ve gotta get a good night sleep, or I’m gonna feel bad the next day, or I’m gonna fail, or I’m gonna have a car accident or whatever. And it’s really hard to sleep when you’re going, Oh my God, I’ve gotta go to sleep right now, go to sleep, go to sleep, go to state right now, that’s not conducive to good sleep, right. So you just have to kinda take it in stride again, treasure, good sleep, protect it as best you can, but don’t kinda over-compensate if you have an occasional bad night sleep and get worried that you have insomnia.

0:27:33 S1: You just… Perfectly segue into the next question. The next question comes from Karyn. And Karyn incidentally is Karyn K-a-r-y-n, just like me. Karyn … She has a question about sleeping anxiety, so it’s a perfect set-up for what you were just mentioning, are any hacks or restless sleep when you go to bed with your mind racing… That’s a big one, right? Karyn mentions that she already does some breathing before bedtime and she writes down her tasks, the things she asked to do for tomorrow, she’s wondering, is there anything else you’d recommend for those racing thoughts at bed time?

0:28:16 S2: Yeah, absolutely Karyn. And I’ll tell you, first of all, that you are right on track. One, in fact, I would say the most common concern of people that have sleep problems is being anxious or worried, it’s one of the most common things we hear, either that the anxiety or worry interferes with falling asleep or you wake up in the middle of the night, and you start worrying and you can’t get back to sleep, but you’re on the right track with what you’re doing. So what we typically recommend is what I call worry time, or what it’s called worry time, and that’s where you set aside time, like you do to jot down your worries, and people tend to have a couple of different worries, right, they just have these generalized worries about life and things. And who doesn’t have that? Now, especially right, so you have these general worries and then you have specific things like, This person is ill, or I have this specific problem, or like a to-do list where I have to do this tomorrow, I have to do that tomorrow, I have to do this tomorrow, and when you’re lying in bed trying to go to sleep and you’re having those worries or those thoughts, or you’re making those lists, have you ever actually gotten out of bed and done any of those things? Probably not, you just lay there in bed and you kind of ruminate and perseverate on them, right.

0:29:34 S2: So Karyn’s doing exactly the right thing that we recommend, which is have some worry time, set aside time to get those worries and thoughts out of your mind, if it’s a did list so you don’t wanna forget anything, write it down, write down that to-do list. If it’s just general worries, set aside some time, go into a quiet room, set your phone aside, tell your family or anybody that’s in the house that turn your phone off and set aside some quiet time and just do a brain dump, get all those worries and thoughts out of your head. Just kinda get them out because… And the reason why we want you to set aside that quiet separate time is because why do you think… As soon as you get in the bed, all those worries pop in your head, it’s because that’s a quiet time, you don’t have the distraction of the TV or the phone, or the kids or whatever, and so your mind hates that vaccum, so… All those thoughts and worries are gonna rush in, so what we wanna do with worry time is exactly what Karyn’s doing, which is set aside time, get those worries out of your head, then you have a routine, have some kind of boundary between your worry time and going and getting in bed, so I usually say, Do your worry time and then brush your teeth, wash your face, put on your pajamas, do your relaxation exercise outside of your bedroom, and then if you’re feeling sleepy, go get in the bed.

Set aside “worry time” each night, away from your bed, to get your negative or anxious thoughts out before getting into bed.

0:31:06 S2: Then the second key is, so all those things, the worry time, the writing things down, getting things out of your head and doing relaxation are… Great, so my number one recommendation is to make sure you’re doing those outside of the bed and outside of the bedroom, and give yourself some boundaries from a border between doing that worry time and getting in bed, so you kind of relax between them and then the second piece to it is, if you get in bed and all those thoughts pop back in your head, you need to get back out of bed, don’t lie in bed and worry, get back out of the bed, go back to that quiet place if you want to, you can write them down again, do another brain dump and then do another relaxation exercise, and then if you feel sleepy, get back in bed, but don’t spend time in bed worrying, or else you make the bed a place where you worry rather than to

0:32:03 S1: A so good. So good. And there were actually a couple of things that were going through my mind when you were talking about that, that I just wanted to mention. And one of those is that I bet… And you could tell me if I’m wrong about this, but I bet this whole anxiety and worry before we go to bed has gotten worse in recent years because we are constantly connected to something, whether it is social media or our phone or the TV or a podcast, right. We’re constantly connected to something, and so when it’s time to go to bed and we shut all that down, now we’re like, Okay, mind racing. Yeah, exactly. Right, so I bet that’s actually got worse. Oh yeah, and then the other thing I just wanted to mention is that when you said when you… When you can’t sleep or you’re worrying and get out of bed, I go and do what you need to do and then come back… I always remember you saying, What is the bed for? Sleep and sex, and that’s it. Don’t do anything else in the van, so certainly you don’t wanna be worrying when you’re in bad, ’cause then you’re gonna connect all of those together.

0:33:08 S1: Absolutely. Yeah, cool, awesome. I think Karyn will appreciate that response.

0:33:13 S2: Okay, I sound… It sounds like Karyn is doing… They’re absolutely the right thing. The thing to make sure you’re doing is separate that worry time from the bed.

0:33:24 S1: Yeah, exactly. Love it. Okay, Aisha says, What are your thoughts on melatonin, CBD oil or GABA? Those sleep aids. Do they work? That’s your question.

Do sleep aids like Melatonin, CBD Oil, or Gaba work?

0:33:38 S2: Okay, this is a tricky one. My answer is yes, no, and maybe… And that’s not in order, again, that’s not an order, that’s for all three of them. Well, let me try and take them in order, and I think the… First of all, melatonin. So melatonin is the one that most people are aware of. Yeah, so let me briefly explain what Melatonin is, melatonin is a hormone in our body naturally makes melatonin, the precursor are… Interestingly, the precursor for melatonin is serotonin, which a lot of people are familiar with is a neurotransmitter that helps to regulate mood and is made by our gut and so you have… If you have reduced serotonin, you may have reduced melatonin, and that may affect the timing of your sleep, but the important thing is that melatonin is a hormone that is naturally released as the sun starts to set it as it gets dark outside, and melatonin is a signal that sleep is coming. It’s basically a darkness signal, asleep is coming signal, it’s not a hypnotic like an Ambien or something like that, that I hate to use the word but knocks you out.

0:35:11 S2: Melatonin is not a sleep aid, it’s a timing aid, and so because of that, a lot of people think of it, because a lot of people think of it as a sleep aid, they take it in correctly and so they it and then they expect it to knock them out within, say, 30 minutes. It doesn’t work that way. If you wanna take melatonin, melatonin is helpful to make feel sleepy, when you wanna feel sleepy, it helps you with the timing of sleepiness, so most people would take it a couple of hours before they want to fall asleep, so if your bedtime is generally around 11 o’clock, then you would probably take melatonin around 9 o’clock, and then it just slowly starts to signal your brain to start kind of quieting and… So I would say that if you’re taking melatonin, you’re taking melatonin as a sleep aid to knock you out within a couple of minutes, it’s probably not gonna do that, but it can help with the timing of sleep, especially helpful for jet lag in particular, but it’s not an inert substance. So there are side effects from taking melatonin, even though it’s over the counter, there are interactions with other medications, even though it’s over the counter, so I always recommend that folks consult with a prescriber before they…

0:36:40 S2: Take melatonin. Sure, so that’s melatonin. Okay, CBD, there’s really not a lot of research on CBD. CBD can help, and there’s some good research on CBD regard helping to reduce anxiety, so if somebody’s anxious, it might helpful for that… What I can say is that there’s more research about THC, which is the psychoactive substance part of marijuana, there’s a lot more studies about THC, and we know that it does help people to fall asleep… But it also does affect the… What we call the sleep architecture. There’s a rhythm, we’ve been talking about Circadian Rhythm, which is like a 24-hour cycle, but there’s also a cycle of rhythmic it to your sleep as well, and we call that rhythmic or the sleep architecture basically. And we know that THC (marijuana) has an impact on that sleep architecture, it can cause you to have more light sleep, it can affect your REM sleep, which is when a lot of people dream, and so it can affect those things, so even though it might help you fall asleep, it can disrupt your sleep over the course of time.

0:38:06 S1: So it’s kind of hit or miss, we know less about CBD, but again, CBD may be helpful for people to particularly have kind of anxiety and kind of the calming effect of that… I’m thinking that if they have anxiety before they go to bed, that’s possible, not that I’m not… You can hold you to this or anything, but it’s possible that it could then help them get to sleep if anxiety is their main trigger, and just as a side note, I do have some clients that take it and swear my in for sleep, so I’m guessing it’s probably the anxiety component that’s helpful for them.

0:38:45 S2: And I think that’s a great point, and what I’ll say is that I said, yes, no, and maybe… And the maybe part of that is that it can be very individual. Just because I say, no, studies show… Well, studies mean that you’ve given this to hundreds of people and it probably worked for some people, it probably didn’t work for other people, and there may have actually been adverse events for some other people… Right, right. If these things work for you and you’re taking them right, and you are consulting with someone about taking them, especially if you’re on other medications and things like other supplements like that? Then they may be helpful for you, and if they are, then that’s great. I’m not saying you kinda know to them, and by any means.

0:39:29 S1: It sounds like specifically with CBD, we just need more research, it just hasn’t been a more research or be helpful.

0:39:35 S2: Absolutely, and it’s under way, there’s a lot of research going on, and again, as marijuana in particular is being legalized and then there’s medical marijuana that’s been around for a lot longer than that, there is a lot of good research where they’ve actually given people what they call blind research where the person is getting… They don’t know if they’re getting the real CBD or they’re getting a placebo and needed as the researcher, and then they can delineates a lot of the research right now is just kind of me being given CBD, I know I’m getting CBD. And then self-rating, Oh, I feel better. And so the research is getting better, but I think there is some good solid basis for that… Yeah, now GABA is interesting because we know even less about GABA of how it works, and especially what is the benefit of supplemental GABA. Now, GABA is an amino acid. It’s a what we call an inhibitory neurotransmitter, I kinda think about it as the breaks for the brain, right, it helps to kinda slow you down, it helps to reduce stress, it helps to increase kind of a feeling of relaxation, and so…

0:40:53 S2: All those things sound good. When you’re trying to go to sleep, decreases increased relaxation, that should be conducive to sleep, and that’s kind of the idea, but again, GABA is made naturally by the body, and what we don’t know is… it occurs naturally in some foods as well, and so… But what we know is by digesting supplemental Gaba, does that actually go into the system and is it utilized by the body in the same way that naturally occurring GABA is, or is it just you’re paying money to take a supplement that just goes out the system… Right, we just don’t know what the uptake is of supplemental Gaba, but Gaba does help with sleep, it does help with relaxation, it does help to reduce stress, and it’s naturally occurring kind of endogenous to our body, Again… and there is some good studies, as I’m just thinking about it, of GABA, not necessarily Gabi by itself, like GABA along with 5 HTP, being taken together, being helpful to… Okay, if you’re using it under the guidance of someone and you’re aware of the kind of potential side effects and interactions, it may be helpful to one answer, but it was a great question.

0:42:27 S2: Yeah.

0:42:27 S1: There you know what, Aisha isn’t the only one wondering that question I get asked about those three supplements all the time, so I’m sure that helped a lot of people…

0:42:36 S2: Again, when you’re not getting good sleep. It’s really, really painful. I mean, people don’t think of insomnia as a pain condition, but I’ve worked with enough people who literally will say I am physically in pain because I didn’t sleep, and if you’ve had a couple of sleepless nights or if you’ve even had multiple days of not being able to sleep for whatever reason, or you’ve traveled and you’ve just kind of been jet lag, it does physically hurt, you do kinda a risks. Yeah, and so it’s not surprising that when people aren’t sleeping, they’re desperate to feel better.

0:43:16 S1: You can even be delirious from lack of sleep.

0:43:18 S2: Absolutely, and so I think that… Sorry, I think that desperation leads people to reach out to anything that they hear that might help, and I think you have to be cautious. There are very few things that we know work for most people with regard to sleep, and I can talk a little bit about those, but I gonna get there in a… A lot of people that are willing to take advantage of people that are desperate to get good sleep, so just to have your eyes open to your research and work with someone to see what works well for you.

0:43:57 S1: Okay, alright, good advice. So thank you. I have one more question from Jenna, and her question is about Ambien. We haven’t… I don’t think we talk… We maybe touched on it a little, but she says that she’s been on Ambien for a while now, and she’s wondering… Is it damaging? I guess, I think what she’s saying is it was working for her to sleep, but she’s wondering about her gut because she has colitis, so Is it damaging her gut? Can talk about that?

0:44:27 S2: Alright, a reminder that I’m not a physician. I don’t know what the saying is, I didn’t stay in a Holiday Inn or whatever it is, the last night, so I’m not a physician, so I know, but I won’t talk about specifics. I will tell you that Ambien is a sleep aid, and it is an effective sleep aid for many people, what we do know is that it does lose its effectiveness for sleep over time, so if Jen has been on it for a long time, it may not be working as well for her? For her sleep, so you’re always wondering those… Ambien is not a medication that you’re intended to be on for long periods of time, ideally, people should take it for a couple of weeks or a month at the most, these are not intended for long-term use, and many of the studies have not looked at the long-term use lines, another sleep aid that has been tested for a little bit longer, but again, long-term for these sleep aids is like six months.

0:45:32 S1: You and I, we won’t mention any names, but we have a friend who’s been on Ambien for 10 years…

0:45:39 S2: Yeah, it’s not doing what it was at one point in that situation, but with regard specifically to… And IBD, I can’t really say what I can say is that things like diarrhea, constipation, nausea, upset stomach, those type of things are side effects of ambient, and so it might be hard to kinda tease those apart, it could be masking symptoms, it could be causing symptoms, and so it can cause those things as side effects, the other thing I would say to keep in mind is that, again, Ambien is not in an inert substance, it is a medication and it does have interactions with other drugs or other medications that a person might be on, especially like pain medications and things like that. So I think the best course of action is check with your physician, check with your prescriber, and if you’re concerned, it might be worth taking a break from the Ambien or finding a different medication.

0:46:42 S1: Alright, awesome, sounds good. This has been so helpful for everyone, connecting the IBD sleep dots. I love it. The one thing we haven’t really touched on, and I think it would be valuable for people are just like, what are some actual rituals or tips, like things you could tell us about… Good sleep hygiene, I guess that’s the word, right. What the… Yeah, what are some general tips that you can give us just to make sure that we’re all doing the best we can with sleep?

There is no panacea when it comes to sleep, but there are several things you can do to make sure you have quality sleep each night.

0:47:12 S2: Sure, yeah, I think… First of all, I have to say that there is no panacea… I kinda said this before, there is no panacea, and these tips that I have to share are not a panic either, they’re not a treatment. If you have a sleep problem, if you have in Sami, you have sleep apnea, those types of things, you need to get help for those conditions, the… These tips are essentially behaviors that good sleepers do, and they may help you with your sleep, and to have a healthy gut, they can help to break that dysbiosis cycle we were talking about, so that’s the caveat that I have to give. My first tip is, hands down, the most important advice that I can suggest is to, like we said earlier, treasure your sleep, protected from all enemies out there that are trying to steal your sleep. Don’t take sleep for granted. As many of you know who have struggled with insomnia or sleep deprivation or who do shift work, sleep is a precious commodity that sometimes you have to consciously protect, you have to put effort into protecting your sleep, don’t put effort into sleeping, but put effort into protecting your sleep.

0:48:28 S2: So let me give some specific tips, and these are, again, these are just tips, these are things that good sleepers often do naturally, that might help reduce sleep problems, but again, they’re not treatments for sleep disorders if you have… if you have sleep apnea, if you have another sleep disorder, talk to your primary care doc, ask for a referral to a sleep specialist, don’t just take the medications, you go to your primary care doc and they say, Here, try Ambien ask to talk to a sleep specialist first, or look for a sleep specialist yourself that can help… You can start at behavioralsleep.org, they have a great provider Search tab that is just folks that have been trained in behavioral sleep, so behavioralsleep.org and use their provider search can help. So tip number one have a consistent bed. I can hear it already boring… No one wants to be told when to go to bed, our kids don’t like to be told when to go to bed, we don’t wanna be told when to go to bed, and we don’t wanna be told him to wake up either.

0:49:31 S2: But of those two of bedtime and wake time, probably having a consistent wake time is most important. Interesting, having a consistent wake time is key to that circadian rhythm, ’cause remember what resets that master clock every day. Right, light sunlight. So the more consistent you are with getting up, getting up at the same time every morning, even on your days off, get some exposure to light, go take a walk, go sit by a window, get up, turn on lights, move around and let your body know that it’s time to set the clock for the new day. Get up regardless of when you went to bed, if you had a bad night sleep, are you stayed up late, don’t sleep in… It will mess up your clock, you’ll feel worse over time, kind of that jet lag feeling all day, save up that sleepiness. So that are more likely to be able to sleep well the next night, the more consistent you are, the better you’ll feel, and the more in tune every cell of your body will be.

0:50:38 S1: Got it. So that was a number?

0:50:42 S2: Do you want another… I’ll give you another one.

0:50:48 S1: Yeah, absolutely. Give us as many as you can.

0:50:50 S2: I kind of alluded to this already when I talked to Karyn, have a down time before bed. I know, again, I can hear it already boring. Today, too many of us rush around doing a thousand things, doing chores, checking email, doom surfing on social media, and then we realize… Yeah, I just heard that in a couple of weeks ago, we’re kind of caught up in all these activities and then we realize it’s time to go to bed and we’re like, Oh my God, it’s time to go to bed, and I have to kinda run and we dive into bed because it’s bed time, we don’t pay attention to our body, and when our body says It’s sleepy, we pay attention to this external thing, time and say, Oh, it’s bed time, I have to go get in bed even if I’m not sleepy… Good sleep unfolds naturally when you’re sleeping, and it’s hard to be sleepy if you’ve just been running around and you’re all physically and emotionally wound up, you have to shoot… If you have a bedtime that you’re shooting for, then why not have a wind down time that you’re shooting for? It doesn’t have to be that long.

0:51:55 S2: It can be very simple, brush your teeth, wash your face, put on your pajamas, do some kind of… Spend a few minutes relaxing, do some light stretches, do some breathing exercises, do meditation, read a book, limit your screen time during this wind down time, and when you feel sleepy, get in bed, listen to your body, don’t get in bed when you’re tired… If we did that with all getting bed every right away, Don’t listen to your body and when you’re sleepy, go get in bed and then allow yourself to fall asleep quickly within 10 or 15 minutes, so that’s my second tip.

0:52:36 S1: We’ll take another one.

0:52:37 S2: You already told you already took some of the excitement out of this one, but you won’t say this one’s boring because this one is the bed is for sleep and sex on… Right now, I have your attention.

0:52:48 S1: Sorry, I didn’t know you were gonna say that one.

0:52:53 S2: I seriously… Have you said it… And we’ve heard this before, right, the bed is for sleep and sex only, and all I had that sleep should only happen in the bed, the bed is for sleep, and sleep is for the bad… Sex can happen anywhere, right? But sleep is for the bed, we get into this habit of doing too many things in the bed besides sleeping, and when that happens, the bed becomes a place where we do everything but sleep, it becomes a cue for activities besides sleeping. It can be watching TV, it can be reading, it can be doing work, looking at the news or looking at social media, most commonly, it just becomes a place where we become frustrated and anxious… Right, and if you’ve ever been exhausted and gotten in bed and turned off the lights and you’re like, Oh, I can’t wait to get in bed, and you crawl in the bed and then suddenly you were all of a sudden weren’t sleepy because you’re mind racing with hundreds of things, like we were talking about earlier, this is a good sign that your bed has become paired, it’s become associated with the bed has become a queue for being anxious and worried and awake instead of being sleepy and going to sleep.

0:54:10 S2: And like I said earlier, you usually don’t get out of the bed and do those things, you don’t do anything about those things you’re worrying about, you just kinda sit there and you toss and you turn, you get frustrated and the bed becomes that place where you feel anxious, so if you do feel sleepy, what’s interesting is that if people do get out of bed, they often go sit on the couch and then they fall right to sleep it… If you’ve ever done that, right, you can’t sleep in the bed and you get out of bed and you go downstairs, or you go in the other room and you sit on the couch and you’re instantly falling asleep as… That’s the best proof ever… Right, that the bed has become associated with being awake and worrying, and the couch has become where you go to sleep, right. If you ever need more proof and you’ve made the couch where you sleep in the bed where you worry, so only sleep in the bed, don’t treat your bed like a couch and don’t treat your couch like a bed… Always keep them separate. This is a really common issue that comes up with a lot of people with medical concerns too, so it’s kind of related to that, so I wanna mention that…

0:55:17 S2: What if we have to get up to go the bathroom? During the night?

0:55:20 S1: I forgot to ask that. Yes, thank you for bringing that up.

0:55:24 S2: The same thing applies, and that’s why I bring it up at this point, ’cause the same thing applies, if you get up to go to the bathroom in the night and you’re sleepy after you go to the bathroom, you’re sleepy, getting… You get back in bed and go back to sleep. That’s great. That’s perfect, but if you don’t go right to sleep, get out of the bed, don’t just lie there trying to make yourself sleep, don’t try and force yourself to sleep, don’t stay in bed worrying about going back to sleep, get up. Go sit on the couch, relax. Do something boring, but don’t fall asleep on the couch. If you start to feel sleepy sitting on the couch, get up and go get back in the bed, and if you get in the bed and all of a sudden you can’t sleep again, then you might wanna think about going back to the couch and doing something boring until you feel sleepy again and you may repeat this pattern and you may end up having a bad night sleep… Right, what are you gonna do? You’re gonna save that sleep that sleeping is up and you’re gonna have a better night sleep tonight.

0:56:22 S2: Makes sense. Yeah, and then finally, I’ll just mention really quickly, my last tip, and that’s related to your bed in your bedroom, right? Your bed in your bedroom should be a refuge… Right, and I don’t mean like an animal refuge where you have a bunch of exotic animals like we do, or even house pets in your bedroom, your bedroom should be quiet and peaceful, and my client, if you’re in an environment where there’s a lot of noise than a white noise maker or a fan would be okay, because what you want with noise is something that’s consistent in volume and tone, it doesn’t change, it’s just kind of really steady, you don’t wanna use a TV to fall asleep because again, that’s associating, that’s using your bed as a couch, plus the TV, the volume goes up and it goes down, and if you have it on a timer, it shuts off and all those changes and noise can disrupt your sleep. A noise maker or fan? That’s okay. It should be cool. It should be dark. Our body temperature is naturally decreasing as we sleep, and if your body can’t cool down because the room is too hot or your covers or your bed kinda hold the heat in, your sleep will be disrupted, so make sure that you have a nice, cool, dark bedroom, and a good comfortable mattress is helpful, right?

0:57:47 S2: Don’t worry, you don’t want a mattress, it’s too hard or too soft, you want one that’s comfortable for you, and I guess I would say don’t get hung up on the mattress thing, a lot of people have this in their mind that they have to sleep in the bed in their bedroom. And I often say, if you’re more comfortable sitting up slightly, say in a recliner because of either chronic pain or overweight or any of those kinds of things, that’s fine, as long as you can sleep there, undisturbed… Where is your best sleep? But all these things, if you don’t sleep in the bed, all the same rules apply to where you do sleep… And you can sleep on the couch if you want. But all the rules apply to the couch, that should be where you sleep, that’s the only… Where you sleep, you don’t do anything in there, it should be quiet, it should be cool, it should be comfortable and you don’t hang out there except for when you’re sleeping, that’s just your sleeping place. So those are my tips.

0:58:41 S1: Got it, it. Those tips are fantastic. I think that they’re apropos for everybody, right? They’re perfect. Yeah, that was a perfect way to end it. I have a quick lightning round. Okay, this is just yes or no. If you feel like you wanna add a little bit to it, you can feel free, and actually, I have 10 of them, I think we’re gonna end up skipping some of them because you’ve already answered a lot of these that I had put in my Lightning Round, so… Number one, Okay, this is what you didn’t answer, power nap or snooze Fest for IBDers. You know how most people can do a 10-minute power nap and they say that’s best for them, but for IBDers can we do a snooze fest…  or is it still best for us to do the power nap?

What’s better, a power nap or a snooze fest?

0:59:28 S2: Yeah, I usually say with regard to naps, my short answer is, naps are fine, unless you have a sleep problem, if you have a sleep problem and you’re using naps to compensate for that sleep problem, all you’re gonna do is exacerbate that sleep problems, so when patients… When I work with patients or clients who have insomnia, no napping is the rule while they’re in… While they’re in insomnia treatment, but as far as getting good sleep for people with IBD, if you’re not having insomnia, a nap is great, and I… I usually recommend about either a power nap, if you have less than half an hour or so to sleep, then take a power nap, keep it to 10 to 20 minutes, right. Otherwise, take a two-hour nap. Right, and that has to do with that rhythmic it that I talked about when we sleep, if you’ve ever kind of fallen asleep and you intended to a 10-minute nap, but you woke up after an hour and you kind of felt sluggish and slow and you can’t really get started again, right? That’s because you woke up when you were in deep sleep, and if you let yourself take a nap for an hour and a half to two hours, you’ll be back to kind of…

1:00:42 S2: You’ll wake up and lighter in a lighter stage to sleep and you won’t wake up feeling kind of all sluggish and things. So I recommend 10 to 15 minutes or 90 to 120 minutes.

1:00:54 S1: Okay, cool. I think you mentioned this one, noise makers, you said Yes, it’s okay. Noise makers are. Okay, I was on about that. Consistent in tone and volume. Yeah. Okay, are over the can, we talked about the supplements separately, but I keep seeing these supplements like sleep aid supplements, nano medicine, but supplements at the health food store where they’ll have melatonin and GABA and I don’t even know what else, but all a myriad of sleep aids in that… Yes or no? No. No. Okay. Natural light. Alarm clock, yes or no?

1:01:36 S2: If that’s good for you and that helps you wake up feeling refreshed, I think it’s okay. There’s no evidence that they’re any better than any other kind of… alarm clock.

1:01:45 S1: Okay. It’s TV and be okay. If you have the night time like you know, I’m talking about the blue light that… Okay, no. I guess or no, but I have to hear more ’cause you know I do this.

Finally we have an answer to the question about whether we should use blue light devices at bedtime!

1:02:00 S2: Yeah, so the problem is not… So there’s two issues, the blue light part, everybody got excited about the blue light screens, admit this light that’s in the blue range, and we know that blue light suppresses melatonin, and we talked earlier that melatonin is supposed to be signaling you that it’s time to be sleepy. So if you have blue light that suppressing melatonin, then it’s gonna make you not feel sleepy, and the reality is that that’s true, but the reality is that the dose of blue light that you would need to suppress your melatonin enough to cause a problem is probably not the most powerful thing, the most powerful thing is what you’re doing on that device, right? So if you’re watching a TV show and you’re getting caught up in it, that engagement, that kind of cognitive arousal, that mental arousal of that activity, if you’re playing a video game… Does a blue light… Suppress, melatonin. Yes, but probably the bigger problem comes from the activity you’re doing on that device, then from the blue light, a lot of people feel like they have to fall, I have to fall asleep to the TV, but you will find in the long run that watching TV on the couch in your living room, and then when you feel sleepy going and getting in your bed will help significantly in the long run.

1:03:28 S1: Yeah, got it. Okay, you mentioned about being… You can proper yourself up, I think you said if you’re overweight or something else, you mentioned how people with IBD, we’re talking about heartburn and reflux or pain is what… Yeah, you mentioned chronic pain. Is it OK to sleep up, you know?

1:03:56 S2: Yeah, again, I think if you’re comfortable and you’re able to maintain quality sleep in that position or in that recliner or whatever, then… Sure, I think absolutely, but again, I would try and be as consistent as possible, that is your bed, so you’re consistent with getting in there, you’re consistent with getting out of there, and you don’t do anything in that recliner or change whatever, but sleep.

1:04:24 S1: Okay, got it. Sleep Number beds… And I don’t mean to pick on sleep Number beds, but all the beds that say you’re gonna have the best sleep ever if you choose our mattress, I think you touched on this earlier, but not really anything to that… Yes. No, what do you think? You find what’s comfortable for you. Okay, and if that’s a Sleep Number bed, then go for it, and if that’s whatever they do in some other country, then that’s all good too.

1:04:55 S2: If I had insomnia, I would not go out and buy a Sleep Number bed believing the gimmick that it’s going to cure my insomnia, comfort is great, and if a Sleep Number bed is what makes you comfortable, that’s great. But sleep number beds, cooling beds, cooling pillows, heavy mattresses, heavy Comforter, all these things are mostly gimmicks is at least as far as helping you with a sleep problem.

1:05:22 S1: Pick the one that’s best for you. It sounds like.

1:05:25 S2: Okay. Is it true that we shouldn’t eat two hours before bed… I think about this because of IBDers, and our food in our gut, stop eating two hours before we go to sleep. Yes, I think part of what regulates our circadian rhythm, besides the bright light is eating of our meals and the timing of our meals, so would say what’s more important is being consistent in your eating, and if having a very light kind of thoughtful snack, a couple of hours before bed time helps you to feel a little more drousy here as part of your evening wind down time, then I think that’s okay. But I would certainly not eat a heavy meal in a couple of hours of going to bed…

1:06:14 S1: Okay, and along with that things, eating or drinking things to make you feel drowsy is in a wives tale… Drink warm milk? I think it’s warm milk can help you go sleep, that’s a bad thing for us with IBD because oftentimes milk is inflammatory, so… Yes.

1:06:32 S2: I never argue with wives, old or otherwise, Find something that is comforting to you, that’s part of your wind down time, and if that… If you’re able to tolerate milk and that’s something that feels good to you, then… Sure, do that. A nice relaxing nonverbal tea is accreditation.

1:06:55 S1: I am a big advocate of tea, I think tea can help you find out… I love a Chamomile tea before going to bed.

1:07:00 S2: That something that’s non-caffeinated, that you can make a part of your routine, and then again, if one of the things that you think is waking you up in the middle night is you’re really hungry or something, and you think as a Light healthy snack might be helpful then. I think a thoughtful healthy snack before that is fine.

1:07:18 S1: Yeah, I’m gonna skip my last one, I had one last one, but I can answer it myself, see, I learned on this podcast here, is it true that if you’re having trouble sleeping, you should get out of bed… Yes, the answer is yes! And then when you’re sleepy, then you can get back in bed… How did I do? Perfect. Awesome. Oh my goodness, it has been such a pleasure. A joy, you know, I love working with you. So any excuse that I can have for us to work together, I love it, so that you so much for being my first podcast guest.

1:07:52 S2: Thank you for having me. 1:07:54 S1: I feel like we’ve only just begun. We’ve only scratched the surface here, so we’re gonna probably have to have you back again, I’ll gather more questions and you know where to find me… Hopefully, you’ll join us again. Thank you, Dr. Bill, Good night. Thank you so much for being here, for spending this time on the time on The Cheeky Podcast for Moms with IBD, thank you for just sharing the space with us today Until we chat again, I’m gonna wish you a cheeky and healthy… If I could clear my throat, IBD journey. Bye for now.

Thank you so much for joining me today and for listening to today’s episode. When it comes to IBD, I know there’s a lot of resources out there, and I’m truly honored that you chose the Cheeky Podcast to get your IBD information today. If you found this information helpful, please give us a rating and review, it helps other moms find the podcast and see what we’re doing over here to help IBD moms everywhere. And if you feel called to do it, share this podcast with an IBD mom who you know could really use an uplifting message today, because that’s what we’re all about over here at the Cheeky Podcast.

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Ready to take your gut healing to the next level?

One last thing, if you’re still with me and if you are, you’re definitely my kind of gal, we have to get to know each other better. If you’re tired of living on the hamster wheel of IBD with all the ups and downs between flares and remission, if you’re struggling to get control of your abdominal pain, gas, bloating, diarrhea, and other troubling IBD symptoms, go to my website, it’s karynhaley.com, and my mom had to be just a little bit different, spell my name with a Y. So it’s K-A-R-Y-N-H-A-L-E-Y dot com, and schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you gut your life back. It’s a power-packed 30 minutes. You don’t have to live in IBD status quo. There’s so much that can be done to transform your life so you can thrive in motherhood and thrive with IBD. I’ve seen my clients walk this path and it gives me so much joy to take that journey with them.

My entire coaching practice is run online, so you never have to leave your house and you never have to get out of your jammy or yoga pants for us to work together. You know, I’m wearing them too. If you’re ready to take your first amazing step towards healing, I’m ready to chat with you. Schedule your free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session today at karynhaley.com. Click on the Work With Me tab and I’ll see you soon.

It’s important to note that the information in this podcast and in this episode is for general information purposes only and not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice. The statements made in the Cheeky Podcast for moms with IBD, either by me or my guests, is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Before implementing any new treatment protocols, do yourself a favor and consult your physician first. Thank you so much for listening, for being here, for saving the space for us to spend some time together. Until we chat again, I’m wishing you a cheeky and healthy IBD journey.

[music]

Ep 7: Seven Gut Healing Diets Even a Foodie Will Love

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Would eating certain foods help heal my IBD?

What food should I be eating to help my Crohn’s and colitis?

With so many diets that are supposed to heal, how do I choose the best one for me?

If you’ve ever found yourself asking any of these questions, this is the episode for you. We’re breaking down the 7 best gut healing diets, talking about the main foods associated with each diet, and finding out who their best for. Let’s end the, “what should I eat to heal my gut?” question once and for all!

We’ll talk about:

• How anyone can become an IBD Foodie, even if you’re currently a Standard American Diet connoisseur (like I used to be)
• The best 7 gut healing diets worth considering
• Spoiler alert: there’s no all or none diet, it’s about doing the best you can. And there is no ONE diet when it comes to IBD, there’s only the best diet for you based on your symptoms and your lifestyle
• Grab your episode FREEBIE right here. 7 IBD Foodie Diets Explained

And so much more!

After this episode, we’ll end the confusion, uncertainty and overwhelm that comes when you just don’t know how to get started with a gut healing diet. This information will take you from hell no to let’s go. You’ve got this mom friend and I’m right by your side.

Episode at a Glance:

• [01:50] When it comes to being an IBD Foodie, it definitely doesn’t come easy for me. Learn about my Standard Italian American Diet roots that almost kept me from learning to use food as medicine.

• [03:52] It’s tough to stay away from some of the food that I know harms by digestive system, but the food I get to eat is also delicious, exciting, and exotic in some cases. Thinking about your IBD food as something completely new (and not something inferior) is key to your IBD Foodie success.

• [06:36] There is no one size fits all diet. Your IBD Foodie Diet is about finding the eating plan that works best for your symptoms and your lifestyle.

• [09:25] When in doubt, the Whole Foods approach is the perfect place to start.

• [12:30] If you know you are sensitive to gluten and dairy (and many IBDer’s are), a Whole Foods, plus the removal of gluten and dairy can give you much symptom relief when it comes to healing your IBD.

• [17:22] The Paleo Diet is similar to the Whole Foods approach, but also removes grains, a common gut disruptor for those of us with IBD.

• [21:28] The Specific Carbohydrate Diet was made with you in mind.

• [24:15] What’s the difference between the SCD and GAPS?

• [28:40] The SIBO Specific Diet can be a God send to those suffering from IBD and Small Intestinal Bacterial Overgrowth.

• [32:08] None of these diets need to be your FOREVER. Just your NOW.

• [33:50] The Autoimmune Paleo Diet is the most restrictive eating plan, but the good news is that it’s a short-term plan, plus with this restriction comes the opportunity for immense healing.

• [37:41] If you’re ready to take your IBD Foodie life to the next level and really learn how you can put what we talked about today into action, you’re going to want my free resource, 7 IBD Foodie Diets Explained. It will give you all the information you need to get started on the diet of your choice today. KarynHaley.com/diet

• [40:49] Go to karynhaley.com to schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you get your life back.

Rate, Review and Subscribe on Apple Podcasts.

Episode Links:

• Free Resource: Karyn’s 7 IBD Foodie Diets Explained
• Allison Siebecker’s SIBO website
• Monash University’s FODMAPs website

7 Gut Healing Diets Even a Foodie Will Love

[music] [00:05] INTRO You’re listening to The Cheeky Podcast for Moms with IBD, a safe space where moms with Crohn’s and colitis connect, explore powerful tools for healing and transform our lives to thrive in motherhood and in life. I’m your host, Karyn Haley, IBD health coach, integrative wellness enthusiast, and mom to three outstanding kids. After having Crohn’s disease for 30 years and working as a health advocate exclusively with IBD clients for the last 10 years, I know it’s time to bring the types of candid conversations I have with my clients out into the open. It’s our time to go on an IBD healing journey and do it like only a mom can. Let’s do this.

[music] [00:50] What’s up mama, Karyn with you today in ep 7 of the cheeky podcast for moms with IBD to talk about one of the most juicy topics– food. But not just any kind of food, my friend, my favorite kind of food—gut healing food.

Over the last 12 years, I’ve become quite the IBD foodie, but I definitely didn’t start out that way.

[01:50] I grew up with an Italian mom- homemade sauce was a weekly staple in our house and so was Italian bread, and mashed potatoes, and pizza and cannoli, spumoni ice cream and Italian cookies—Oh the Italian cookies–at my wedding reception, at Salvatore’s Italian Gardens—yes, if you’re picturing glitz and glam with lots of chandeliers and crystal and European statues—that was my wedding reception—and for dessert it wasn’t enough for my Italian family to have the traditional wedding cake, and Jordan almonds at every place setting and baked Alaska for dessert, no-no, we also had to have Italian wedding cookies, mostly because it was Italian protocol but also just in case someone was still hungry after all that dessert!

What my non-Italian husband and his family must have thought about this wedding, the wedding I had dreamed about as a little girl, literally the reception package was called the wedding of your dreams, dreamt about before I even before meeting  my husband. So, yes, if the food at my Italian wedding gives you any insight into my foodie life before I became an IBD foodie, trust me, I get what is was like to be a Standard American diet Foodie. I don’t come from granola, health nut family stock. If that’s you too right now, I want you to know that you can still be a foodie when you become an IBD foodie, it’s just a different kind of foodie when you choose food as medicine.

[03:52] I’m certainly not going to stand here and tell you IBD healing food isn’t a sacrifice, because it is. I’d be lying if I told you different. My mouth still waters when the take out box of pizza enters our home and I know I won’t be eating it or when my teenage son, who makes all the Italian dishes of my youth makes his  scrumptious lasagna, but my mouth also waters when I make my IBD foodie almond flour pizza with caramelized onions and roasted red peppers, or my own no bread Thanksgiving stuffing, or my dairy free cashew cream cheesecake. Those are all delish too!

There just different. So, before we go any further into the specific IBD healing diets and how they might work for you, know that the best way to become an IBD Foodie is to:

Be committed and dive in with gutso. If you’re going do it, do it. The mama who gets pulled into it or dabbles one day and indulges in mac and cheese the next, will always regret her decision. Wait until you are ready to get started and then completely commit.

Think of your new food and your old food as completely different—don’t think of it as a substitute or a less than version. It’s not less than, it’s just different. think of your grain free pizza as something completely new, exotic, and exciting. And something you have the privilege to try. It’s a slight mindset shift, but it will have a huge impact on how you move through our new IBD foodie life. And whether you stick with it.

Be ready to embrace seasoning and spices you’ve never heard of or tried before. The right seasonings can take a meal you might think of as boring, to delectable and delish and something you’ll even share with friends and family who never even know just how healthy it is.

[06:36] With that said, let’s dive in to your 7 options for gut healing diets. Of course, you know that the Specific Carbohydrate Diet is going to be one of them. Many moms with IBD think the SCD is the only option out there. It’s the one touted as the best diet for IBDer’s. But the truth is, there is no one size fits all diet. There’s loads of Crohn’s and colitis friendly food to consider. It’s about picking the diet that works best for your symptoms and your lifestyle. Only you can decide what’s best for you. And it will usually take some trial and error when your new to the world of IBD diets.

There’s most assuredly more than 7 options out there, but these are the top 7 I work with most. And there’s so much information within each one of these diets that I could take a whole episode (scratch that, multiple episodes) for each one. But today is more about an appetizer smorgasbord—where you’ll get a little of this and a little of that. Just enough to tempt your tastebuds and your mind.

If you want to go deeper and find out more about a particular diet, I you can download my free guide 7 IBD Foodie Diets Explained—it will take this conversation deeper for you with suggestions for further reading about each diet, specifics about who the diet is best for and a section I call what’s on the table and what’s off the table so you know exactly what you can and can’t eat on each eating plan.

Go deeper to find out the best IBD healing diet for you!

You can access to this free deeper dive resource by going to karynhaley.com/diet. That’s karynhaley.com/diet or you can find the link to this freebie in the show notes for episode 6.

[09:19] We’ll start with the least restrictive approaches first and continue on to the more restrictive diets as we go. I always tell clients, start with the least restrictive option when it comes to diet. If that works, great! If not, you can always go deeper until you find the diet that works best for you.

The least restrictive IBD Foodie diet is the Whole Foods approach.

So IBD Foodie diet #1 is the Whole Foods approach. I know you’ve heard about this way of eating. It’s touted as the best eating plan for everyone, not just those with IBD. In a gutshell, the whole foods approach cuts out pretty much everything in your pantry. With this approach, you stay away from boxed, packaged, and canned foods in favor of foods in their whole and natural state. Processed food, refined sugar like high fructose corn syrup, chemicals, dyes, artificial flavors are all off the table. Food in its natural and whole state is the key.

The Whole foods approach is high in whole fruits and vegetables, (berries, leafy greens) quality protein (chicken or fish) and fats (from avocados or healthy nuts and nut oils), it usually includes smaller portions of carbs like gluten free grains quinoa and rice as well. But gluteny grains that make sourdough bread may also be included for its health benefits. Usually GMO’s (genetically modified organisms) and unfermented soy are off the table too and organic is preferred in a whole foods approach.

For some people, this is enough to help bring their IBD into remission. Staying away from high amounts of sugar, most gluten, processed food, and all the chemicals in food is enough. Whether this diet works for you usually depends on your disease activity as well as other health factors. In my practice, I actually have an 8-week Deep Dive Gut Rebalance program for this way of eating. And I have it because for some moms with IBD it can be a first line of defense for standard American diet mamas who are pretty mild in their disease activity, or who are ready to commit fully to whole foods, but want to go through this step before deciding whether to make bigger changes to their diet. If you’re currently on the standard American diet and this whole food as medicine approach is new to you and you want to start as slow as possible with an IBD foodie diet, whole foods is a good starting place.

Many moms with IBD can be sensitive to gluten and dairy.

[12:30] Moving on to Approach # 2 is the Whole Foods diet, plus the removal of Gluten and Dairy.

Again, this appeals to the moms who have mild disease activity, ones just moving on from the standard American diet, but especially moms who already know they are gluten and dairy sensitive. With this approach, you start with the whole foods diet, and add on these 2 key pieces—no gluten or dairy.

When it comes to gluten sensitivity and this IBD foodie diet, it’s best if there’s not even the occasional gluten, like you might find with the whole foods only approach, instead it’s eliminated completely. The thing about gluten which is a protein found in many grains like wheat, barley and rye– is that it’s very common to for IBDer’s to have difficulty digesting this substance. There definitely needs to be more research to find out about the exact mechanisms at play here in terms of gluten and IBDers, but we know that in many individuals, gluten can be a gut disruptor, and lead to intestinal permeability, also known as leaky gut, and it can further aggravate your IBD due to its ability to increase intestinal bacteria. Many people with Crohn’s and colitis feel better when they follow a gluten free diet so it’s always worth a trial period away from it. Usually 3 weeks to 3 months is recommended.

Now the diary removal with this eating plan is an interesting conversation. We know that dairy can be inflammatory for many people and when you already have an illness that involves inflammation, you may not want to push your luck here. We also know that we are the only species to drink another animal’s milk. When you think about it, that’s kind of weird in and of itself isn’t it? What I’ve seen in my practice with dairy is that many people do see improvement with their IBD symptoms when they remove it.

But what’s interesting about dairy is that unlike gluten, there seems to be a continuum of what people can tolerate. For some, just a splash in their morning coffee or tea is all they can tolerate. For others, they might tolerate a small glass of milk with food, but not on an empty stomach. For others, no dairy works. Dairy tolerance can be very individual. Common symptoms dairy sensitivity might include feeling bloated or gassy, sometimes with smelly gas or having diarrhea after eating. For some it isn’t about the gut at all. They might have chronic Sinus or allergy issues, excessive mucus or even heartburn from dairy sensitivity. With dairy, there’s two potential culprits that might affect you. There’s the milk sugar itself- that’s the lactose like in lactose intolerance but there’s also a protein found in dairy (the casein) Some are more sensitive to the lactose over the casein, but many are sensitive to both.

The great news for those with dairy challenges is that there’s so many dairy alternatives now. Most people with dairy sensitivity find an alternative they like- cashew, almond or coconut milk are just a few possibilities. There’s even cheese alternatives that taste good, one of my favorite being a brand called Siete- they are in most grocery stores in the U.S. but you can also buy online. Their non-dairy cashew queso dip is delish.

The whole foods plus gluten and dairy free approach is great for anyone with IBD wanting to try a less restrictive gut healing diet, that removes two of the most common gut disrupters, gluten and dairy. You might notice some big improvements.

Is the Paleo Diet the gut healing approach that’s best for you?

[17:22] The 3^rd IBD foodie approach is the Paleo diet. This eating plan has gained in popularity in recent years. It’s even available on the grocery store shelf in pretty much every grocery store. Remember, we’re going in descending order here with restrictiveness so the Paleo a little bit more restrictive than the whole foods gluten/dairy free approach because of course it includes everything I mentioned earlier but also excludes grains, legumes, dairy, most sugar, and white potatoes as well. This diet is high in whole veggies, fruits, quality meat and fat, organ meats, sweet potatoes are included but rice and quinoa are not, and other grains are not. This is your first on our list of many other gut healing diets that go beyond the gluten free grains to say no to all grains.

So that makes this is a good time to explain the why behind a grain free approach for IBDer’s so you can decide if you want to stay away from grains too. First of all, in the world of paleo—were talking about eating like our paleolithic ancestors. These prehistoric beings hadn’t yet cultivated crops, so that’s one of the reasons there’s no grains on the paleo plan. For us IBD gals, grains can be damaging to our digestive system. They contain proteins called lectins as well compounds called phytates. These compounds can promote inflammation and inhibit digestion so you can see why grains might cause problems for us specifically. The specific carbohydrate diet, which also restricts grains goes even beyond this reasoning to avoid grains and we’ll talk about that in just a minute. One last important thing to note about paleo is that Sweeteners are have restrictions. Your main sweetener on paleo is maple syrup, but raw honey, real stevia and coconut sugar can also be used. White sugar would never be used.

There’s a lot wrong with what our doctors are telling us about the food we eat.

In talking about these first 3 gut healing diets, the whole foods approach, whole foods plus gluten/dairy free and then paleo, I’m reminded of how so often we’re told by medical professionals that diet has nothing to do with our illness and what we eat will make no difference to how we feel. Sure, you might be told eat bland, but that’s the extent of the conversation.

When we talk about this and you hear about the complications you can experience from things like gluten, dairy, grains, and sugar—with impacts like disrupted digestion, inflammation, possible leaky gut– And we also know that staying away from processed food can have the oppose effect on our digestive system, how is it possible that the food we eat doesn’t affect our Crohn’s or colitis. It makes no sense! We have to have a paradigm shift here. We have to include food in our IBD wellness plan. We have to talk about this and spread the word. I feel like lately we’re in the middle of a shift here, even for our doctors. I hope so. What we eat matters and can have a big impact on how we feel. It doesn’t need to be your only approach, but it must be part of your overall approach.

The Specific Carbohydrate Diet was created with YOU in mind.

[21:28] We’ve made it to the #4 diet on our list of IBD Foodie diets.

Number 4 is the big kahuna—the specific carbohydrate diet. The SCD actually very similar to paleo—with the whole foods approach and emphasis on fruit, veg, quality protein and fat and does not include gluten, grains, refined sugar and most dairy, but in some ways, it takes things a step further as it really hones in on the gut and IBD health. Elaine Gottschall, who made the diet famous in Crohn’s and colitis circles used this very diet successfully with her daughter who had colitis, so unlike the first 3 we’ve talked about today, this is the first one that was really popularized with us in mind.

What’s the difference between paleo and SCD? Well, some foods on the paleo are not allowed on SCD and some foods on SCD are not allowed on paleo. Take dairy for instance—dairy is a no go on paleo, and most dairy isn’t allowed on the SCD, but homemade lactose free fermented dairy in the form of yogurt is allowed on SCD. In fact, it’s the crux of the diet due to its probiotic/gut flora balancing properties. Another difference is the sweeteners. Maple syrup is allowed on paleo, but not on SCD due to it being a disaccharide which is more of a complex carbohydrate and harder for us to break down by our digestive system. Honey, as a sweetener, is allowed though because it’s a monosaccharide and easier for our digestive system to digest.

You see, in SCD land, it’s not about eating like our paleolithic ancestors, it’s not about eating a whole foods approach, it’s about eating in a way that encourages the easiest digestion of the food we eat and promotes the best bacterial balance for our entire body.

See how this diet is tailor made for IBDers? Slight differences, but for some with IBD it matters a lot.

What’s the difference between the SCD and the GAPS diet?

[24:01] Moving on to Diet #5 on our IBD Foodie list is the GAPS diet—gaps stands for gut and psychology syndrome. This diet, created by Dr. Natasha Campbell McBride, was based off of the SCD so it’s very similar, but as its name suggests, it was created more for psychological challenges like anxiety and depression and also autism and ADHD. Interestingly, it’s also helpful for Crohn’s and colitis and if you are a believer in Hippocrates wisdom that all disease begins in the gut, you can see why it’s become a go to IBD foodie diet too.

GAPS is so closely linked with SCD that the differences are subtle. GAPS includes the homemade fermented yogurt, but Dr. McBride recognized that many people with these types of challenges can be sensitive to dairy and advised that we wait a little while, until our symptoms are more stable before adding in the lactose free (but not dairy free) yogurt. Dr. McBride also keeps fruit at bay in the beginning of the diet. Fruit contains sugar, yes natural sugar, but sugar non the less so fruit consumption is restricted in the beginning to give the gut time to rebalance the sugar and bacterial balance within the digestive system. Remember, sugar feeds bacteria—more sugar—more bad bacteria. Less sugar, even from fruit = a better bacterial balance.

Chicken soup a staple on the SCD is rich in gut healing bone broth properties is changed to meat stock on GAPS- Again, very similar, but cooked with less water and less time is more for when you’re in gut healing mode instead of remission according to Dr. McBride. The last notable difference between SCD and gaps is the fermented, probiotic rich cultured foods like sauerkraut, and kefir, and eventually fermented, cultured veggies to help with that bacterial balance in the gut. Truthfully, I think Elaine Gottschall would appreciated this angle on gut healing, but it’s just more emphasized on the GAPS diet.

How are we doing?

Is the difference between SCD and GAPS making sense? Have you been thinking about trying any of the diets so far? These are definitely the most popular 2 in the world of gut healing IBD diets. Remember one is not better than the other, there’s just the diet that works best for you—both symptom wise and taking into account your lifestyle.

As you can imagine, there’s a huge learning curve with diets like this—definitely more than the whole foods approach. There’s also more cooking at home and more ingredient restrictions. But on the flip side, there can also be more of a healing reward. We have to balance all of this when deciding on the best gut healing diet for you.

Remember, if you want to take this a step further and really sus out what this would look like for you, go ahead and download my resource guide: 7 IBD Foodie diets explained. It breaks down the specific food- what’s on the table, what’s off the table, who the diet is best for, and gives more information for further study to help you decide where is the best place for you to start. If any of these diets appeal to you, you can download your guide by going to karynhaley.com/diet or by clicking the link in the show notes.

Small Intestinal Bacterial Overgrowth (SIBO) may be holding you back from true IBD remission.

[28:40] OK, home stretch time.  IBD Foodie diet # 6.

Remember, we get more restrictive as we go. That can mean more healing for some with more complicated IBD challenges. These next couple can be a god send and they could be the answer for you. #6 is called the SIBO Specific diet.

Have you heard about this eating plan? The SIBO Specific diet, created by SIBO expert, Dr. Allison Siebecker, takes the FODMAPS diet and the Specific carbohydrate diet and mashes them into one. Now, let’s back this train up just a couple feet and all get on the same page before we move on and talk about the specifics of this diet.

First, let’s chat and get brief overview of SIBO. SIBO stands for small intestinal bacterial overgrowth—it’s exactly what it sounds like, an overgrowth of bacteria in the small intestine. If you follow what we’ve been talking about this whole episode with regard to IBDer’s having an imbalance of bacteria in their intestine, you can absolutely see that people with IBD are prone to this bacterial overgrowth in their small intestine. Since we are focused on the small intestine with SIBO, I definitely see this gut struggle more with Crohnie’s and those with colitis since their disease can occur anywhere along the GI tract and often finds its way to the small intestine. 

When it comes to SIBO, there’s a diet that’s been very helpful called the Low FODMAPs diet. FODMAPs stands for—all the acronyms in this episode. You know I love a good acronym- FODMAPS stands for fermentable, oligosaccharides, disaccharides, monosaccharides, and polysaccharides. FODMAPs. If you’ve got a really good ear, you’ll remember back when I spoke about the SCD, I mentioned disaccharides. These saccharides rear their ugly heads again and wreak havoc on our digestive system. A diet low in these short chain carbohydrates and sugars can be very helpful in easing SIBO symptoms.

You might be wondering why I would bring this diet up here. We’re talking about Inflammatory bowel disease, not SIBO. But like I mentioned, IBD and SIBO can go hand in hand. If fact, with my clients, I see it all the time. Many people with Crohn’s or colitis also suffer from SIBO and that’s where the SIBO Specific Diet comes in handy.

It’s basically a combo of the low fodmap and specific carbohydrate diet. I love this diet for mamas who have both IBD and SIBO.

None of these diets are your forever. They are just your NOW.

It is quite restrictive, but the good news is that it’s not meant to be on forever. Usually, once symptoms clear up, you can move to a less restrictive diet. Like all of these diets—accept the whole foods approach which I always recommend, it’s not forever, it’s just for now. As you are able to add in more foods, you should always take that opportunity to add variety and health to your eating plan.

One last side note about SIBO, just like with all of these gut healing diets, the SIBO specific diet is just one part of the healing plan. Yes, it’s a crucial part, but there’s other supplements and lifestyle factors, possibility medication, that are included to bring your disease into full remission. Going into those specifics on this particular episode goes beyond our focus for today, but the good news is that we’ll get there in other episodes—so much to talk about when it comes to healing IBD!

BTW, there’s links to Dr. Siebecker’s website if you think you might have SIBO and want more info and also to the Monash website if you want more FODMAPs info in the show notes. Love those sites. Definitely worth a peek if you believe you have SIBO.

The Autoimmune Paleo Diet takes our immune system and inflammation into account to help us heal our gut.

[33:50] The last IBD Foodie diet we’re going to talk about today, the last one for your consideration is diet #7. And diet #7 brings us circling back to the paleo diet, only this eating plan, called the autoimmune paleo, it takes the autoimmune aspect of our disease into account. Think back to paleo, very whole foods approach, eating like our paleolithic ancestors, no grains, legumes, beans, or dairy, certain sweeteners allowed, high in veg, fruit, high quality protein and fat, organ meats, but where paleo is more a lifestyle diet for those who are interested in eating healthy, autoimmune paleo is more about healing by removing the paleo foods that might cause inflammation for a short period of time to allow the body to restore microbial balance, correct nutrient deficiencies, and release toxins, before moving into the traditional paleo way of eating.  Paleo allowed foods like nuts, seeds, chocolate, eggs, nightshades… get removed to allow the body the time it needs to fully heal. These foods are then added back in when the time is right. Most people who start with autoimmune paleo, transition to a paleo approach and stay there as long as they feel well. Maintenance time back on the autoimmune paleo is used for body resets if necessary.

So, there you have it, the top 7 IBD Foodie diets explained—in an appetizer smorgasbord kind of way. Is there a lot more you should know if you want to begin one of these eating plans? Absolutely. The idea behind this episode was to let you know what’s possible. I hope that its got your juices flowing about what could be possible for you.

Wait a minute, I’m a vegetarian. Which gut healing diet is for me?

You probably noticed that in this episode, I never mentioned the vegan or vegetarian diet. This was actually purposeful. All of these diets can be adapted for vegans and vegetarians. Whole foods, SCD, Paleo, FODMAPs—they’re all doable for vegans and vegetarians with some modifications. That’s why I didn’t give these diets their own gut healing category. If you follow a vegan or vegetarian lifestyle, you can adapt any of these IBD foodie diets as your own. It does take some careful thought and planning as some of these diets are structured as meat intensive, but it’s doable, so don’t give up. You can go for it too!

It’s time to Do it Like a Mom!

[37:41] So, as always we’ve come to the part in the podcast where we talk about how are you going to do it like a mom. #1- You are going to Download my resource guide 7 IBD Foodie Diets Explained at karynhaley.com/diet or click the link in the show notes. #2-You’re going to peruse the information and let it sink in. You can do this by making yourself a pro/con list just like Rory from Gilmore Girls (great show if you haven’t seen it) and then #3- you’re going to pick one and get started. Just do it. After you pick the one that speaks to you right now (not forever just now), go for it with gusto. Dive in with all your heart. Think of each new food as something completely new, not a substitute, but something completely new and exciting, you’re going to use spices and seasonings liberally…. And if the one you pick isn’t the right one for you, you’re going to switch it up a little.

Keep trying. Keep taking chances, keep your healing journey moving forward.

As always, be the tortoise. This isn’t a race, baby steps always win the day.

Rome wasn’t built in a day and neither was your gut health mama. Build it, stone by stone, step by step and you will get there. You will get there and I’ll be there with bells on to give you virtual hugs and high fives.

You can do it. I believe in you.

As always, If you listened to this episode and still have questions or if you download the guide and want some help figuring out what’s best for you, that’s what I’m here for. The beauty of this IBD mom tribe is that we support each other. I’m here for you. Don’t hesitate to get in touch.

[40:19] Thank you so much for joining me today and for listening to today’s episode. When it comes to IBD, I know there’s a lot of resources out there, and I’m truly honored that you chose the Cheeky Podcast to get your IBD information today. If you found this information helpful, please give us a rating and review, it helps other moms find the podcast and see what we’re doing over here to help IBD moms everywhere. And if you feel called to do it, share this podcast with an IBD mom who you know could really use an uplifting message today, because that’s what we’re all about over here at the Cheeky Podcast.

[music]

Ready to take your gut healing to the next level?

One last thing, if you’re still with me and if you are, you’re definitely my kind of gal, we have to get to know each other better. If you’re tired of living on the hamster wheel of IBD with all the ups and downs between flares and remission, if you’re struggling to get control of your abdominal pain, gas, bloating, diarrhea, and other troubling IBD symptoms, go to my website, it’s karynhaley.com, and my mom had to be just a little bit different, spell my name with a Y. So it’s K-A-R-Y-N-H-A-L-E-Y dot com, and schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you gut your life back. It’s a power-packed 30 minutes. You don’t have to live in IBD status quo. There’s so much that can be done to transform your life so you can thrive in motherhood and thrive with IBD. I’ve seen my clients walk this path and it gives me so much joy to take that journey with them.

My entire coaching practice is run online, so you never have to leave your house and you never have to get out of your jammy or yoga pants for us to work together. You know, I’m wearing them too. If you’re ready to take your first amazing step towards healing, I’m ready to chat with you. Schedule your free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session today at karynhaley.com. Click on the Work With Me tab and I’ll see you soon.

It’s important to note that the information in this podcast and in this episode is for general information purposes only and not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice. The statements made in the Cheeky Podcast for moms with IBD, either by me or my guests, is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Before implementing any new treatment protocols, do yourself a favor and consult your physician first. Thank you so much for listening, for being here, for saving the space for us to spend some time together. Until we chat again, I’m wishing you a cheeky and healthy IBD journey.

[music]

Ep 6: Use the Gut Brain Connection to Your IBD Advantage

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The gut-brain connection is a fascinating topic, but for IBD gals, concepts like the gut-brain connection, the second brain, and the vagus nerve get catapulted to a whole new level.

Join me on this podcast episode, as we geek out on all things gut-brain connection, and then we take it even one step further by finding out the latest on what Harvard Medical School doctors are saying is different about how those of us with IBD can use this gut-brain phenomenon to our IBD advantage. Seriously awesome information!

We’ll talk about:

• The typical gut-brain connection everyone has
• How IBDer’s have a slightly different gut-brain connection than non-IBDer’s
• How you can use this difference to your IBD advantage

And so much more!

After this episode, you’ll know the exact steps you can take to use the gut-brain connection and your vagus nerve to help lessen your IBD symptoms. Powerful stuff!

Episode at a Glance:

• [02:53] The gut-brain connection is so vital to our overall well being and our gut health. Learn about how the second brain in our gut controls our thoughts, feeling and emotions.

• [05:61] According to scientists at Harvard Medical School, this gut-brain connection is especially true for people with IBD because we already have distress in our intestines, so anything we feel with this gut brain connection, we will actually feel it deeper,

• [07:29] Harvard Medical School scientists also show that when we have IBD, we actually respond to therapies that focus on stress reduction, anxiety reduction, depression, intervention more readily than our non IBD counterparts.

• [09:51] We can harness this vagus nerve to our advantage. We can hone and improve the connection our gut and brain has, and we can lesson our IBD symptoms by learning how to affect change at this level.

• [10:26] Belly breathing has been shown as one of those therapies that can help reduce stress, anxiety, depression, even our pain response, inflammation levels, and it can even strengthen our immune system, plus belly breathing goes even further than just gut level healing, it can also lower our heart rate and our blood pressure.

• [13:40] Belly breathing technique number one is the 4-7-8 breath. Let’s try this technique out together.

• [17:11] Belly breathing technique number two, is called Four Square. Four Square is a steadying and grounding breath. Let’s try this technique together.

• 19:15 Our last belly breathing technique is called the Double Exhale breath. It’s good for breathing to relieve panic or anxiety or even really strong pain that you’re having. Let’s go ahead and try last this technique together.

• [24:24] How you can do it like a mom? You can do this like a mom by picking one of the techniques, commit to trying it daily, for the next seven days, and observe how you feel. Extra points if you teach it to your kids too.

• [26:11] Go to karynhaley.com to schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you get your life back.

Rate, Review and Subscribe on Apple Podcasts.

Episode Links:

• Harvard Health Publishing Gut-Brain Connection
• A Study: Vagus Nerve as Modulator of the Brain-Gut Axis in Psychiatric and Inflammatory Disorders
• What Does the Vagus Nerve Do?
• Diaphragmatic Breathing and Your Vagus Nerve

Use the Gut-Brain Connection to Your IBD Advantage

[music] [00:05] INTRO You’re listening to The Cheeky Podcast for Moms with IBD, a safe space where moms with Crohn’s and colitis connect, explore powerful tools for healing and transform our lives to thrive in motherhood and in life. I’m your host, Karyn Haley, IBD health coach, integrative wellness enthusiast, and mom to three outstanding kids. After having Crohn’s disease for 30 years and working as a health advocate exclusively with IBD clients for the last 10 years, I know it’s time to bring the types of candid conversations I have with my clients out into the open. It’s our time to go on an IBD healing journey and do it like only a mom can. Let’s do this.

[music] [00:52] Well, hello, dear one, welcome to episode number six in the cheeky podcast. In this episode, it’s time for us to have a total psychological geek-out session, I get positively giddy with this topic, I’m not even kidding, I get just fascinated by the whole world of psychology in the Study of Brain… I studied it as one of my majors in undergrad, and then I studied Health Psychology in graduate school, so today’s topic for me, it just puts me completely in my happy place when I get to marry psychology and IBD. It’s true. It’s elation for me.

And we’re going to uncover some absolutely fascinating information today, I can’t wait.

So let’s dive into our topic for this episode, the gut brain connection and how we can use it to our IBD advantage.

Is the Second Brain More Important Then the First One?

[01:45] Let’s go ahead and start with this connection between the gut and the brain, have you heard that we don’t actually just have one brain in our body, we have two, and we have this brain, of course, the one that everyone is familiar with, the one on our head, but we also have one that’s often termed by scientists who study that gut brain axis as the second brain, woo-hoo-woo, the second brain and this brain is housed in our gut.

As you can imagine, growing up with a mom like me who was on the one side, a gut health enthusiast and then also a lover of all things, psychology of the brain, my kids were always hearing about this gut brain connection, and of course, the second brain.

Kids Say the Darndest Things!

[02:43] I remember when my youngest was in first grade. He was learning all about the parts of the human body in school, when they got to the brain, he raised his hand and he promptly asked the teacher, When are we going to talk about our other brain? So this thoroughly confused his teacher, and then a 20-minute argument ensued between my kid and the teacher… And, after that, I got a call from said teacher asking me what nonsense was I teaching my kid at home. Thankfully, after a little bit of chatting about it, after hearing my explanation, the teacher became intrigued and she was open to me coming into the classroom to talk to the kids about this second brain of ours, so I think that it was definitely a cool learning experience for the kids in his first grade classroom, but it was also a learning experience for me because I learned that I might need to tell my son that talking about the second brain school isn’t always going to be a welcome or an understood topic.

So the second brain, the one it’s housed in our gut, it’s not like there’s actually brain matter there, but it does deserve its name. Did you know there’s actually more nerves housed in the gut than there is in the brain, did you know that our gut actually has a thinking and feeling mechanism? How else can we explain a gut feeling? How else can we explain the butterflies in our stomach before an important doctor’s appointment? How can we explain the nauseous feeling we get in our gut when we hear bad news? How about the physical pain we might feel in our stomach when we’re stressed out? The guy is called in the second brain because we actually think and feel there, and the reason we do is because of an amazing nervous system pathway that connects to the brain and the gut, called the vagus nerve. I love talking about the vagus nerve. This communication super highway, it’s constantly sending signals back and forth, connecting the thoughts and the feelings we’re having between our brain in our gut… Go ahead, go ahead right now and just touch the back of your head at the base where your head ends and your spine begins… I’m doing it now, so we’re doing it together, go ahead and touch there. This is the beginning of this nerve system circuitry, this is the beginning of that vagus nerve, I’m talking about. This mass nerve ending system, it begins here, but then it spindles its way through several organ systems down through our body, it goes through the heart, and then it makes its way into the digestive system, and it ends in the colon, the gut brain axi and the second brain, it wouldn’t be possible without this super communication highway, that biggest nerve.

[05:55] For most people, the cool factor of the vagus nerve and our second brain, it ends there and… That’s pretty cool, right? I’m thinking you’re agreeing with me, that it’s a pretty cool system that we have this connection between our gut in our brain, but here’s where the situation gets down right ingenious for those of us with IBD.

Those Harvard Geniuses Know More Than We Do.

According to scientists at Harvard Medical School, this gut-brain connection is especially true for us because we already have distress in our intestines, so anything we feel with this gut brain connection, you know those butterflies, the nausea, the stress, the pain, because we have intestinal distress, we will actually feel it deeper, people who have GI disorders, we perceive pain more acutely because our brains are more responsive to pain signals from our gastrointestinal tract, and when we feel stress or anxiety, it makes the pain in our gut feel even worse…

Seriously. Fascinating, right?

You might be thinking, well, dang that kind of sucks for me. It’s great that now I understand why I feel those gut emotions so deeply, but there’s only negatives associated with it, there’s no positive, there’s more pain, more stress, more anxiety, there’s no positive spin there… Here’s what I where I want to challenge you. I want to challenge your thinking on this a little bit, because on the surface, if we just look the surface here, it might seem like a downside, but actually I think it’s pretty cool that we know ourselves, so well, most people don’t have a clue.

Most people don’t have a clue how they’re gut and brain connects, they don’t feel it like we do, they don’t feel it with the kind of intensity we feel, the kind of intensity we feel with these feelings and emotions.

The Best News of All.

So on the flip side of this bad news is that because of that, we feel things so deeply in our gut, and according to those same Harvard Medical School scientists, when we have IBD, we actually respond to therapies that focus on stress reduction, anxiety reduction, depression, intervention more readily than our non IBD counterparts.

So there is the flip side. There’s the cool part here.

[08:23] And studies abound, it’s not just the smarties at Harvard, other smart scientists who have replicated this work in their own research, they’ve also replicated the psychological approaches that are helpful to decrease digestive symptoms, and now you know, now you know the why behind why psychology and IBD, they go together when the psychology of all of this can really be our best friend here.

Now, so often, so often doctors want to dismiss us with statements like, You’re just too emotional, or those symptoms, they’re all in your head, or the pain you’re describing… I know it isn’t that bad, but we know different… We know now that our bodies are actually designed that way, and I propose, I propose it’s time for us to use this design to our IBD advantage. Now we have the insight. And insight is great, right? We know the why, we have the insight, knowing why something is happening and it’s the first step, but it’s only just the beginning, if we know we have a strong gut brain, vagus nerve connection, if we know we’re more likely to benefit from psychological intervention here, now we need to think about what do we do about it.

What Can We Do to Use This Information to our IBD Advantage?

[09:51] Can we, maybe harness this Vegas nerve to our advantage, can we actually hone and improve the connection our gut and brain has, could we even dare I say lesson our IBD symptoms by learning how to affect change at this level? This neurological level?

Yes, yes, yes, we can. We can even get started on that right here, right now, with one of the absolute easiest techniques out there, no special equipment needed, just you and your breath. When it comes to truly affecting this gut brain connection and helping our IBD symptoms, belly breathing, that breathing from the diaphragm, it’s been shown as one of those therapies that can help reduce stress, anxiety, depression, even our pain response, inflammation levels, and it can even strengthen our immune system, plus belly breathing goes even further than just gut level healing, it can also lower our heart rate and our blood pressure, that’s just too many wins for me, you gotta count me in, I hope it counts you in too. Deep breathing is a technique that I use all the time. I love this method, I have been using it for years now, and I’ve grown to absolutely love it. And reap the benefits from it. In my IBD life, using the gut brain connection to our IBD advantage, number one, it works within the moment, acute stress, acute pain, acute anxiety, acute depression, when that just hits you, you least expected it hits you, it’s acute, it’s strong, it’s in the moment and deep breathing can work for that.

Number two, when you do it regularly, it will also work for the chronic type of issues you might be having like ongoing stress, ongoing pain, anxiety and depression, you might be feeling. And best of all, number 3 here with this belly breathing technique, the one I’m going to show you today, you can do it anywhere. Any time. Any place. And no one even knows you’re doing it. Awesome sauce. Can I get an Amen? Let’s do it. Let’s go ahead and do it. Let’s get started using my top belly breathing techniques right now, I’m going to teach you my top three.

[12:28] Alright, are you comfortable? It’s always great to be comfortable when you do belly breathing, so just kind of wiggle around in your seat or if you’re walking around the kitchen, take a seat for a second. If you’re driving in the car, be careful with this because I don’t want you to get too comfortable, but get comfortable.

Alright, are you ready for a transformation?

Let’s do this, let’s do this like a mom, and let’s do it wherever you are right now. Belly breathing technique number one is the 4-7-8 breath. I like to start this breath out with an out-breath, just to clear the lungs, so go ahead and take a breath in and out.

Okay, with this breath, we breathe into our nose for four seconds, we hold it for seven seconds, and then we let it out through our mouth for eight seconds. In for four, hold for seven, out for eight. Let’s do it.

It will be even better for you if you place one hand on your belly, right where your diaphragm is, because you want to make sure that’s where the breath is coming from, not from up in your chest, so go ahead if you can, if you’re not driving, place a hand on your belly.

If you can, and you’re in a place where you can do it, it also is helpful to really go in and to go in and we close our eyes. So go ahead and just close your eyes, let your breath release again with a whoosh or a sigh, and breathing through your nose for account for two, three, four. Hold it, two, three, four, five, six, seven. And out through the mouth… two three, four, five, six, seven, eight.

Good job.

Now, I want to mention two things to you, two things that will help you take this breath to the next level, number one, if you can… When you’re doing this breath, you want to go ahead and put your tongue on the roof of your mouth, right behind your front teeth, go ahead and do that now, so you can kind of get that feeling. And this is called fire point, it’s an energy point in Chinese medicine, you can keep your tongue there throughout the breath, and then the other option for you is to let out a louder than normal whooshing sound when you exhale out. Okay, both of these options for this breath are just that, options because it depends, if people are around, I said You could do these breaths anywhere and you can, but sometimes it’s a little bit difficult when you’re making loud noises, so you probably don’t want to do this using the whooshing sound in a work meeting or at a family dinner, but if you’re by yourself, I would go for it, go for it. With those two options, let’s go ahead and try the 4-7-8 breath one more time together with these two things, with the tongue on the roof of your mouth, right behind your front teeth, and with the whooshing sound. Here we go, ready? hand on your belly, close your eyes if you can. relax and breathe in. Two, three, four. And hold it. Two, three, four, five, six, seven. Let it go two, three, four, five. 6-7, 8. How’d you do?

Nice, good job.

Okay, my advice for the 4-7-8 breath is to do it first thing in the morning before you even get out of bed, four times in a row, and then four times in a row again before you go to bed. It helps you unwind.

It’s amazing, it’s amazing how this particular breath, it helps you wake up in the morning and get sleepy at night, plus I’ve also used it successfully in the moment with that in-the moment, pain or in the moment stress, when I feel like I’m going to lose it that kind of stress.

You’ve probably never had that feeling as a mom but just in case you ever have it… Yeah, you can use this breath there too.

Breathing Technique # 2

[17:11] Let’s talk about belly breathing technique number two, it’s called Four Square, Four Square is a steadying and grounding breath. That’s why I love it, because as mom’s so much of the time… We need some grounding, right? Or just kind of living “aahhhh” the time. I can’t think of a better way to describe it than “aahhhh”, so that grounding, that centering, that steadying breath can be really helpful.

It involves breathing in for a count of four, holding for a count of four, breathing out for a count of four, again, holding for four, and then repeating. See how rhythmic that is, it’s an all-in counts of four, so it’s very… a rhythmic type of breathing, it’s very… Steadying, grounding and calming. Let’s go ahead and give this one a try. Remember, if you’re at a place where you can get comfortable and close your eyes, hand on your diaphragm, can breathe in two, three, four. Hold two, three, four. Let it out. Two, three, four. And hold two, three, four.

One more time. In two, three, four. Hold two, three, four. And out two, three, four.

How did that go for you?

I think that that one I was counting a little bit fast, I would love for you to just when you’re doing it on your own, I’d like for you to do that just a little bit slower, like one, two, three, four more like that, but you get the idea for grounding. For centering. For stabilizing… four square, it’s a good one.

Okay, so just like the 4-7-8 breath, this one you would want to repeat with a repetition of four… That’s a great place to start. And see if it works for you. You can use it anytime, anywhere…

One More Breath Exercise Before We Wrap Up.

[19:15] Our last belly breathing technique, it’s called the double exhale breath.

It’s good for breathing to relieve panic or anxiety that you’re having that, acute panic or anxiety or even really strong pain that you’re having, it will work on the panic and anxiety to help move you away from the panic, and I love it because it helps you in relaxed stages, it helps you relax yourself in stages, when you’re having a moment, when you’re having that panic or anxiety moment and you feel your heart is racing and you feel like you just can’t calm down. There’s just no way that you could go from 10 level to one in one breath.

So this particular breath lets you calm down slowly, and I love it for pain as well, especially abdominal pain, when you’re feeling that pain, it’s never going to go from 10 scale to one in one second, right? Or even in one breath, so with this technique, you go down in stages once you work it in stages, so when you’re having either of those issues, I really like the double exhale breath.

The Double exhale breath, it involves a good belly breath in for a count of two, and then you breathe out that same amount of time doubled, so from two, you would breathe out for… For the next breath, we breathe in for three seconds, and then out for six seconds, and then you can see the pattern here for the next one in four seconds and out at… We continue In and Out, multiplying by two with every inhale exhale until we start to feel more calm, more relaxed, and  until we start to feel like we have less pain. Let’s go ahead and try it. We’re going to start with a two four breath, and then a 3/6 and then a 4/8. alright, are you relaxed? Are you comfortable? Do you have your hand on your diaphragm, and if you can, you can close your eyes, let’s go head and breathe in to… I like to hold it for a second here, and then let it out, two, three, four, hold for a second and breath in to the hold and out two, three, four, five, six, hold. And breath in two, three, four. And hold and out. Two, three, four. You can do it 6-7-8. how’d you do? Good job. So you can see, that’s how you would use that breath, it’s always in for a count and then out for double and keep increasing it, see how that goes in those stages.

[22:10] Alright, there you go.

There you have it, the three belly breaths that you can use to get your gut brain axis in check and use it to your IBD advantage.

Let’s Recap.

Let’s go ahead and you recap everything we talked about today, number one, we all have a gut brain connection, the connection occurs through a nerve circuit communications super highway called the vagus nerve. Number two, because of this connection, we have what scientists refer to it as the second brain housed in or get, just tell your kids not to mention it at school.

Number three, we’re a little different than our non-IBD counterparts because we feel things like pain, stress, anxiety and depression more deeply, we feel it more deeply in our gut than others, the situation can be damning for some, not for us, because we know how to strengthen this highway of super communication.

Number four, we can use our psychology to decrease our stress response, our anxiety response, or depression symptoms, inflammation levels, it can help our immune system, our pain levels, and ultimately we can use it to our IBD advantage.

One of the easiest methods we can employ to bring this change about is deep belly breathing, there’s many types of breathing exercises out there, but the three that we learn today are the 4-7-8 breath, the four square breath and the double exhale breath.

So how are you feeling?

[23:54] I hope you’re feeling relaxed. If these breathing techniques are completely new for you, you might not be feeling any positive response yet, it can take some time, keep at it, Keep trying it, and it will become more natural, it will become easier for you. And over time, you will begin to notice that it helps with many of the symptoms you experienced both physical and emotional symptoms.

Lastly, we’ve got to close this out by talking about how you can do it like a mom. You can do this like a mom by picking one of the techniques, commit to trying it daily, let’s say for the next seven days, observe how you feel, observe what you think about it, and if you’re feeling extra inspired, go ahead and teach one of these techniques to your kids… My favorite, the favorite one I like to teach to my kids is the 4-7-8 breath, I’m often heard in the house saying something like, Would you like to take a moment with a 4-7-8 breathing? I think a consequence might be coming your way, sometimes kids and especially teenagers, they just need to take a moment to collect themselves before saying something they might regret. And by the way, it works for adults too. I’ve used it there as well, don’t forget, pick one of the belly breathing techniques we talked about today and try it out, try it for a week, and if you do… Will you please let me know how it goes? Until we chat again, I’m wishing you a cheeky and healthy IBD journey.

Thank you so much for joining me today and for listening to today’s episode, when it comes to IBD, I know there’s a lot of resources out there, and I’m truly honored that you chose the tacky podcast to get your IBD information today.

If you found this information helpful, please give us a rating and review, it helps other moms find the podcast and see what we’re doing over here to help Moms everywhere. And if you feel called to do it, share this podcast with an IBD mom who you know could really use an uplifting message today, ’cause that’s what we’re all about over here at the Cheeky podcast.

Are you Ready to Take your Gut Healing to the Next Level?

[26:11] One last thing, if you’re still with me, and if you are, you’re definitely my kind of gal, we have to get to know each other better, ’cause if you’re tired of living on the hamster wheel of IBD with all the ups and downs between flares and remission, if you’re struggling to get control of your abdominal pain, gas, bloating, diarrhea and other troubling IBD symptoms, go over my website, it’s Karynhaley.com, and my mom had to be just a little bit different of my name with a Y… So it’s K-A-R-Y-H-A-L-E-Y dot com. And schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause trouble shooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you get your life back. It’s a power-packed 30 minutes. You don’t have to live in IBD status quo. There’s so much that can be done to transform your life so you can thrive in motherhood and thrive with IBD.

I’ve seen my clients walk this path, and it gives me so much joy to take that journey with them. My entire coaching practice is run online, so you never have to leave your house and you never have to get out of your jammy pants for us to work together, you know, I’m wearing them to… If you’re ready to take your first amazing step towards healing, I’m ready to chat with you, schedule your free 30-minute IBD, root cause trouble shooting sesh today at Karynhaley.Com. Click on the work with me tab and I’ll see you soon. It’s important to note that the information in this podcast and in this episode is for general information purposes only and not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice. The statements made in the Cheeky podcast for moms with IBD, either by me or my guests, is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Before implementing any new treatment protocols, do yourself a favor and consult your physician first. thank you so much for listening, for being here, for saving this space for us to spend some time together until we chat again, I’m wishing you a cheeky and healthy IBD journey.

[music]

Ep 5: The Top 3 SCD Missteps Everyone Makes

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The Specific Carbohydrate Diet seems to work like gangbusters for many with Crohn’s or colitis, while others are left feeling like they’ve lost their invitation to this great SCD healing party.

If you’ve ever tried the SCD and felt like a failure or if you’ve heard about the diet, but didn’t really know how to get started, this is the episode for you. Today, we’re pulling back the covers on the most common missteps I see moms making when it comes to this eating plan. After listening to this podcast, you’ll be able to start (or go back to) the SCD with confidence, knowing what went wrong the first time and how to make sure that doesn’t happen in round two.

The SCD is confusing and overwhelming at first. There’s no doubt about it. In this episode we cover what all the confusion is about as we talk about how, with the right information, you can go from SCD Zero to SCD Hero in no time.

Episode at a Glance:

• [0:50] Today, we’ll be talking about the 3 common missteps that are keeping you from being successful on the SCD

• [5:01] Misstep #1 that many people make when trying the SCD is that you don’t do the introductory diet or you do it, but you don’t do it correctly. And yes, there is an incorrect and a correct way, and it will be the difference between becoming an SCD completer and an SCD drop out.

• [12:06] The Intro Diet are helps correct malabsorption quickly and efficiently. It brings your intestines back into working order in just a matter of days, and then it prepares your body for an amazing healing journey.

• [17:41] This is the place to listen if you want to know exactly what you’ll be eating on the Specific Carbohydrate Diet- Intro phase. The general overview of foods, plus sample meal plans will help you get started with confidence that you’re doing it right.

• [23:00] Misstep #2 happens when you introduce all the SCD foods, all in their health and glory all at once, or just too fast for your gut in it’s healing fragile state. Please do yourself a favor if you want to reach remission with the SCD, go slow.

• [27:27] After the intro diet is complete, introduce one new food at a time. Once that new food is part of your rotation, you continue to eat it and you move on to the next food.

• [28:49] If a food you eat on the SCD doesn’t agree with you, set it aside for now. You can always go back and try that food again later after more intestinal healing has taken place.

• [37:24] Misstep #3 Not knowing the difference between “die-off” and a true food reaction can keep you in the dark when it comes to knowing your symptoms and what they mean for you.

• [39:47] Anytime you are adding in new fermented foods or supplements, “die-off” may occur. Although die-off seems bad in the moment, it’s actually a good thing and should settle rather quickly.

• [44:40] Do it like a mom: We’re all running our own race here. I appreciate and support you without judgment, wherever you are on your IBD journey. That’s how you can do it like a mom. You can do it like it fits for you

• [46:54] One last thing, if you’re still with me, and if you are, you’re definitely my kinda girl, we have to get to know each other better. Go to karynhaley.com, and schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you get your life back. It’s a power-packed 30 minutes.

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Episode Links:

• 10 More SCD Missteps to Avoid (FREE resource)
• Pecanbread Website
• SCD Study Worth Checking Out
• Another SCD Study Worth Checking Out
• One last SCD Study Worth Checking Out
• The SCD in Children
• Bristol Stool Chart
• Breaking the Vicious Cycle

The Top 3 SCD Missteps Everyone Makes

[music]

00:05 INTRO You’re listening to The Cheeky Podcast for Moms with IBD, a safe space where moms with Crohn’s and colitis connect, explore powerful tools for healing and transform our lives to thrive in motherhood and in life. I’m your host, Karyn Haley, IBD health coach, integrative wellness enthusiast, and mom to three outstanding kids. After having Crohn’s disease for 30 years and working as a health advocate exclusively with IBD clients for the last 10 years, I know it’s time to bring the types of candid conversations I have with my clients out into the open. It’s our time to go on an IBD healing journey and do it like only a mom can. Let’s do this.

[music]

00:50 KARYN: Well, hello there lovely mama. Today, we’re gonna talk about one of my absolute favorite topics in the world, the specific carbohydrate diet, SCD, as it’s often called, and you’ll definitely hear me say that on this episode. I love this topic. The SCD is the diet I work with most in my coaching practice. It’s the gut-healing diet you hear about in many Crohn’s and colitis Facebook groups, in internet searches, on social media, and it’s the diet that worked for me 12 years ago when I finally decided I was never gonna get any better with a medication-only approach. Where are you at in your experience with the SCD? Is this an idea that’s completely new to you? Have you dabbled in it, or are you an SCD pro? No matter what your SCD status, if you’ve got IBD, you’re gonna benefit from what we’re talking about today. It’s the top three SCD missteps everyone makes. As moms, we make mistakes all the time. We might yell at our kids when they don’t deserve it in a moment of stress. That would never be me, of course. We might accidentally leave one of our children at a park because we thought our spouse had him. That’s certainly not me. [chuckle]

02:16: We might even get busted trying to add zucchini to the spaghetti sauce. Definitely never me. But if it was me, it may have happened earlier this week. Thankfully, with most mom pitfalls, we get a do-over the next day, we get a second chance to turn the beat around as Gloria Estefan would say. We’re moms, we’re human, we have to give ourselves a break. And if you struggle with that, I’m giving you the grace. So please, please give yourself a break when you mess up. It isn’t always our fault. As moms we’re learning, we’re growing, we’re evolving all the time. When we know better, we do better. Same goes for the specific carbohydrate diet. And let me just get this out of the way right from the beginning of this episode. When you’re first learning about the diet, it’s confusing as hell. Can I get an amen? It’s frighteningly confusing actually. If we can allow ourselves the room to make mistakes in our daily mom life, and get to do daily do-overs, why can’t we do that with the SCD too? When we know, it’s just like motherhood, it can be confusing, overwhelming, and stressful at times. Today, I’m gonna help give you that do-over. We’re going to become a bit of a detective here, a nutrition detective, if you will, so you can get absolutely clear on why the SCD might not be working for you.

03:55: And if you haven’t tried the SCD yet, you’ll never have to fall for these missteps ever. You’ll be set up for SCD success right from the get-go. If this is your first time hearing about the specific carbohydrate diet or you don’t really know much about it, do yourself a favor, grab a copy of Breaking the Vicious Cycle by Elaine Gottschall, BTVC as I like to call it, and lots of other people like to call it too. You’ll hear me say that today in the episode. There’s a link for Breaking the Vicious Cycle in the show notes, so be sure to click there and you can grab yourself a copy. We won’t be going into all the details and all the why’s behind the diet today, a little, but not really very heavy and not enough to where I really would like you to be if you’re starting the diet. So for now, if you’re an SCD newbie, know that the SCD is a way of eating that’s nutrient-dense, it’s gut healing with food that can help bring that Crohn’s or colitis into remission.

Are you making Misstep # 1?

05:01: With that said, are you ready for misstep number one? Let’s dive in. Misstep number one. You don’t do the introductory diet or you do it, but you don’t do it correctly. And yes, I have to tell you, there is an incorrect and a correct way, and it will be the difference between becoming an SCD completer and an SCD drop out. The intro diet matters. I really never like to be a strict schoolmarm about most things when it comes to health because the truth is there’s so many different ways to transform your health successfully, but if you are choosing the SCD to heal your IBD, the introductory diet matters, doing it right matters. If you’ve made the mistake of trying the SCD without starting the intro or you did the intro, but you didn’t do it with complete adherence, it’s all good. It’s all okay, mama. It’s time for a do-over. The good news is that you can go back. You can go back and do the intro any time. Even though I started the SCD 12 years ago, I still go back to the intro diet for tune-ups and to crush a flare-up flat right in its tracks before it gets out of control. You can always go back and start again. And if you’re on the SCD somewhere in the beginning stages and it’s not going well, I want you to pay special attention to this episode because I’m gonna help you get out of SCD hell and into SCD swell. Yes, I actually wrote that. [chuckle]

06:49: And now I’m laughing at myself saying it, it didn’t sound corny when I thought of it earlier. Moving on, it’s not your fault, don’t go beating yourself up over this. Don’t go thinking that your IBD is hopeless either because it isn’t your fault. For those who have read the Breaking the Vicious Cycle book cover to cover, it’s 200-plus pages, but the actual introductory eating plan, the foundation for the diet, it takes up one page, one. It’s no wonder the introductory diet didn’t work for you, it’s no wonder you didn’t do it correctly, it’s a blip in the book. I never thought that I would get it right, and I wouldn’t have got it right if I didn’t work with a health coach to help me along the way. Now, I know some of you mamas, you have the BTVC book handy and you’re looking at it, and you’re looking in it, and you’re seeing a whole chapter dedicated to the introductory diet, and you’re saying to me, “No way, that’s not true. There is more than one page to the intro, there’s a whole chapter, Karyn.”

08:01: But if you look a little bit closer, the part of the chapter that actually tells you what to eat during the introductory period is one page long. Not even a page, I have to amend that, it’s one half a page long. Now, before the stoning begins on me from the SCD Elaine-loving purists, I know you’re out there, just know that I love this book. I think Elaine Gottschall was a goddess on high. The best mama in all the land for helping her child heal from ulcerative colitis. But there are parts of this book that are just confusing for us lay mamas who are desperate for a way out, stressed about how to get there and want someone to take us by the hand and lead us step by step through how all this just works, especially the intro part. This book just doesn’t do that. I don’t know about you but after I read The Intro Diet chapter, I didn’t feel confident that I even had a clue what to do next. Here’s just a little glimpse of what it looked like for me after reading this part, the intro part of the book.

09:14: Here’s me. “Okay, so I’m currently eating a diet that consists of a bagel with cream cheese for breakfast, a healthy… ” She said in quotes, “Healthy whole wheat sandwich with deli meat and Kraft American cheese slices for lunch. I’m having spaghetti and meatballs for dinner then some Ben & Jerry’s Chunky Monkey Ice Cream for dessert, and you want me to eat dry-curd cottage, what? What the hell even is that? Where do I even buy that? And besides this dry-curd stuff, what is there to eat on this besides like three or four things on this diet? What? What? What?” Okay, that’s just a small glimpse into the craziness that went on in my brain after reading that particular part of the book. So it’s no wonder you’re confused. I was too. Why do you think I read Breaking the Vicious Cycle, screamed at the front cover, threw it in a corner and never picked it up again for five years? This intro diet misstep is not your fault. This is all so confusing and different from what we’re used to. On top of that, only one half a page of the BTVC book is dedicated to what you’ll eat on the intro. It’s no wonder you didn’t do the intro right, or you didn’t do it at all.

10:40: And I really can’t stress the importance of this part of the diet enough. Seriously, I just have to say it one more time. Doing this part correctly is crucial for gut repair. I’ve seen it be the difference between SCD success and failure for many. The intro part of the diet is all about giving your digestive tract what it needs to heal. As we go through and talk about this misstep number one, not completing the intro part of the diet, I want you to know that if you’re on the fence about the SCD or if you’ve never heard of it, but you’re curious about what it might mean for your IBD health or if you’ve tried it and it didn’t work, this part… This part in particular, I want you to pay close attention to because I really want you to understand the why behind this. The why behind it is so important, and if you’re multi-tasking, come back to me for this part, ’cause this part is key. For those of us who are dealing with gut struggles like Crohn’s and colitis, and we have an imbalance of gut flora, sometimes it’s called intestinal bacteria, if there’s an imbalance there, the intro part of the SCD is the first step to help clear out these damaged microbes and it happens in the quickest way possible.

The power of the SCD Intro Diet, when done correctly, is HUGE.

12:06: Elaine Gottschall, that awesome SCD leader, along with Dr. Sidney Haas championed the Specific Carbohydrate Diet movement. After Dr. Haas had studied the benefits of the elemental diet where a feeding tube is used to bypass the gut and allow it time to heal, he saw the amazing results people had on the elemental diet, and he decided to create an elemental diet style without the feeding tube that anyone could do. The elemental diet and The Intro Diet are really similar in that they both correct malabsorption quickly and efficiently. The Intro Diet, it brings your intestines back into working order in just a matter of days, and then it prepares your body for an amazing healing journey, powerful stuff. Think of it like a detox, only in my opinion, it’s a much healthier option, and it’s something that is very different from a traditional detox that’s really just truly harsh on your system. This detox is specifically designed for IBDer’s, so it’s gentle, it’s healthy, and it’s truly transformational.

13:22: Now that we have fully embraced the gut transforming why’s behind the intro diet, let’s talk about the how. How does this intro part work? The intro diet, it usually lasts between one and five days, and the number of days you complete the intro will depend on your symptoms, and frankly, if you tolerate the boringness of the food you’ll be eating. It’s advised by Elaine that you never go more than five days as additional time becomes counterproductive to your healing. One to two days of the diet is usually sufficient if you have mild disease or mild diarrhea. Three to four days is usually recommended and needed if your disease is more active and you have increased diarrhea. And then the five days is reserved for those with severe disease. I’ve been blessed to be a witness as a coach during enough intro phases to know that you’ll know when it’s time to move on, both physically and emotionally. When diarrhea starts to subside, and you’ve had that last piece of bland chicken that you can stomach, it’s time to move on. Don’t be frightened if you’re not having a, “Praise Jesus, I am healed,” kind of moment. Gut healing doesn’t really work that way, at least for not anyone that I’ve met.

14:47: But it’s a starting place. It’s a sign of good things to come. It’s a rite of passage. It’s kind of like crossing the stage when you graduate from high school. There’s a feeling of completion, but also the knowledge that the future awaits. It’s a bright future where you aren’t exactly sure what comes next, but you’re hopeful and you’re willing to put the time in to get to the place you want to be. That’s the story of starting and finishing the intro part of the diet. It’s like high school, but a lot shorter and hopefully a lot less hair spray. Is the intro diet fun? Is it a cleansing party with balloons and confetti? Not unless you live with a family of crazy people who are partying it up with you to help you get through the intro. The truth is, it’s actually kind of boring, and unless you take some pretty drastic steps in preparation, you will be hangry and you won’t be eating a lot of variety in the foods you’re eating for those few days. But, but what will you get in exchange? A lot, my friend. I mean, life-transforming a lot. It’s worth every annoying second you’re in it, so don’t give up. You’ve got this. You’ve got this. I know you can get through it. And of course, you know I’m here for you for moral support.

16:17: Okay, we’ve got the why, we’ve got the how, now let’s dive into the what. What exactly will you be eating? This is the part where I see lots of missteps happening, so I wanna go over this. Keep in mind that what you’ll be eating is the same few foods, but these foods are known for their nutrients, the nutrients that are in them, as well as the crap that’s not in there. So there’s no gluten, no grains, no refined sugar, no lactose from dairy, sounds tasty, right? Actually, it is, and over time, I’m willing to bet that you are going to capital L-O-V-E, love this food just as much as I do. Just not the intro part of it. What Elaine does really well in the BTCV book is provide recipes for the SCD legal food. So I am going to let you look to her book for those recipes, between her book and a great little website called PecanBread. I know kind of a funny title, but PecanBread, if you’re on the SCD, it probably does make sense to you with all the nut flour. But look there, and you’ll definitely get some recipes. I will leave a link in the show notes for PecanBread so that you can just click it and go there when you’re ready.

Your step-by-step, what to eat and when, guide to the SCD intro diet.

17:41: There’s lots of recipes between there, between the book, I know you’ll be set. So for today, let’s focus on what eating will look like during those five days. Here’s what you’ll be eating, here’s what’s included in the intro diet. Various broiled meats like chicken, turkey, ground beef, or pork. You can also have white fish, dry curd cottage cheese with a bit of homemade yogurt, a homemade chicken soup, well-cooked. I mean, well-cooked, like four hours cooked. Pureed carrots, eggs, and those are okay once your diarrhea has cleared. SCD legal apple cider or Welch’s Grape Juice, homemade gelatin. And what those are like are, maybe when you were little, you had those jello jigglers or Knox blocks, they’re kind of like that. And also homemade cheesecake, so you’re not gonna have to desert dessert. And it’s a cheesecake without a crust, so it’s more like a cheesecake pudding, I’d say, but it’s tasty.

18:44: There’s homemade pear sauce, water, of course, is allowed. And Elaine would say that you could have SCD legal diluted juice, so you’re diluting that half juice, half water. And I would say probably weak black tea would be okay. So what would an actual day look like in this SCD intro diet part? Let me give you a couple of different examples so that you could see what you might be eating during this time. So for breakfast, you might have homemade pear sauce, dry curd cottage cheese moistened with a little bit of homemade yogurt, some weak black tea, and a cup of chicken soup. That’s the chicken soup, but just the broth, not with the chicken, just the broth for breakfast. Another breakfast might be two scrambled eggs. If you don’t have any diarrhea, you could have scrambled eggs. Some homemade pear sauce, Welch’s Grape Juice diluted with water, and that cup of homemade chicken broth. For lunch, you might have a bowl of the chicken soup this time with the chicken and maybe with some pureed carrots added in, a homemade smoothie that would be consisting of a half of a frozen very ripe banana, one half cup of SCD approved juice, like Welch’s or Dole pineapple juice.

20:08: You could also put in the smoothie a small dollop of yogurt, puree that up, probably would be delicious, and you could also have the homemade gelatin, that might be one option for lunch. Another option could be some ground pork patties broiled, and you might have that with a bowl of chicken soup with that carrot puree, some gelatin squares and the same smoothie. Dinner… What would dinner look like? Dinner could be broiled ground beef meat balls with pureed carrots, SCD legal apple cider and another cup of the chicken soup, just the broth, with some cheesecake for dessert. Another option for dinner might be some broiled white fish with that dry-curd cottage cheese topped with a dollop of yogurt, some pureed carrots and again that cup of chicken broth, just the broth with of course some cheesecake for dessert. I’m sure you’re getting the picture here of how this might look for you, lots of variations on the same few foods. Love it or hate it, you can’t get around the fact that The Intro Diet, if it’s done correctly, it works, it works for many. Most of the evidence that the SCD works is based on personal accounts, but there are some research studies conducted that have been really promising. I’m gonna leave some research links in the show notes below, just in case you’re a research girl like me.

21:37: Is the SCD perfect? No, of course it’s not perfect, and I’d be remiss if I didn’t tell you that there’s actually some things about the SCD in general and The Intro Diet specifically that I find a little bit questionable. After using the diet myself religiously for two years and then being on a modified version of it for the last 10 years, plus seeing what works and what doesn’t work for others, it’s given me a good perspective on the diet. A future episode is already in the works to chat about some of the possible limitations or the questionable parts of this diet, so that it can help you make the best decision possible for you. I’m definitely looking forward to that conversation. But for the most part, if you do this diet with fanatical adherence, that’s Elaine Gottschall’s words, not mine, it works. Yes, for most people, it works. What’s the bottom line for you with misstep number one, mama? The bottom line is this, don’t skip the intro. Do the intro as directed by Elaine, follow the additional info I gave you in this episode regarding the intro, and you will be set up for SCD success from day one, even if you have to go back and start it again.

Are you falling for SCD Misstep #2?

23:00: It’s worth it. You’ve got this. You know you can do it. I know you can do it. You’ll be glad you did. I’ve been there too, and I’m here to walk this journey with you. So let’s say that you went ahead and you followed the intro steps to a tee and you’re ready to move on, what’s next. Well, for you, that’s not going to be misstep number two, because you’ll listen to this episode. For those other IBDer’s out there what’s misstep number two for them? Misstep number two happens when you introduce all the SCD foods, all in their health and glory all at once, or just too fast for your gut in it’s healing fragile state. Please do yourself a favor if you want to reach remission with the SCD, go slow. And I know, I know what you’re thinking, I can hear you, I can hear you in my ear, I can hear you telling me, “Karyn, I do go slow.” When you think you’re going slow, I say go slower, like creeper slow, like introducing foods to a baby slow, like tortoise slow. Remember, who wins the race between the tortoise and the hare in the end? It’s not the hare, right?

24:27: Maybe you’ve completed the intro and you’re feeling pretty well. I know it’s tempting to want to move ahead fast, but every single mama I know who’s done this has lived to regret it. The Breaking the Vicious Cycle book doesn’t even mention this, and it certainly doesn’t mention stages of food, but that little website I mentioned earlier, Pecanbread, it does. In fact, they have a great SCD Stages Chart on their site, and I highly recommend checking out that and following it religiously. The SCD works best in stages, it works best when we think of ourselves like babies beginning to eat new foods again. You wouldn’t introduce all the fruit and all the meat and all the veggies to a baby all in one day, right. And why not? Because you know, you’d never have any idea what worked for them and what didn’t. What’s going on with that rash that little Johnny has on his cheek? I have no idea. He ate 57 foods today. Okay, that’s a bit of an exaggeration, but you get the idea, you can’t introduce it all at once. As soon as you successfully complete the intro phase, do yourself a massive favor, only adding one new food at a time, don’t add in anything else, nothing else during this time, and I’m not just talking about food here either, not the new hair product that promises no frizz and no fly-aways, not that new laundry detergent with the dream fresh scent, not even a new supplement, nothing.

26:11: Eat this one food, this one food for three days in a row, and see how you feel. Use your food/mood/poop journal that we talked about in episode four to see how that particular food is treating you. And if you haven’t listened to that episode, go back and take a listen when you’re done with this one. You’ll learn all about the FMP journal, complete your FMP journal, and if you feel after three days that that food has worked for you, you make it a part of your diet and then you move on to the next food.

26:44: Sorry guys, Karyn here breaking into the episode for just a sec. I realized that after I recorded the episode, I might have confused you a little bit with this part, so let me clear it up. While you’re introducing new foods with just one food at a time for three days, you aren’t just eating that one food and only that one food for three days. That would be ridiculously torturous. Instead, you’re eating everything from The Intro Diet that agrees with you, and all other foods you’ve added in so far plus that one new food. Of course, you can continue to eat everything you’ve tried successfully and things you know that work for your body.

27:27: Once that new food is part of your rotation, you continue to eat it and you move on to the next food. So in an ideal world, the amount of food you eat would be increasing every three days, you start out with just a few foods on The Intro Diet, but by the time you reach the full diet, there’s zillions of foods out there that you’re eating and you’ll continue to move in that direction all the time. Sorry if I made you say, “What?” Hope it clears up any confusion. Now, back to the episode. If you experienced any symptoms with that food, like it could be abdominal pain, bloating, excessive gas, diarrhea, constipation, lots of symptoms out there you might experience, and you’ll know, you’ll know if you had any of these symptoms because you’ve been tracking them in your FMP journal. If you have any of those symptoms, it’s time to stop eating that food, not forever just for now. Remember back in Episode 3, Let’s Talk About Poop, Part One, I mentioned that there are so many other things that affect how you feel both physically and emotionally, it may not be the food, it may not be the food that’s causing this current reaction, so that’s why you don’t wanna say goodbye forever.

What to do if you eat a food on the diet that doesn’t agree with you.

28:49: Remember, it’s your hormones, your sleep, stress, anxiety, depression, just to name a few things, so it’s always good to be sure before you set a food aside for a while. Now you’ll hear all kinds of theories, all kinds of theories on when to try that food again. If you have a food that doesn’t agree with you, when do you try it again, and from all of those theories, really, they’re probably all good. For what it’s worth, here’s what I like to recommend. If a food on the SCD bothers you, set it aside for one week, this gives your hormones, your mood, etcetera, all those other things, it gives them time to settle down, then try the food again. Still have a reaction, I want you to set it aside for three months. Three months. It’s a long time, especially in SCD land. Remember in SCD land, things are moving at a snail’s pace. Can you even imagine all of the intestinal healing that’s taking place in those three months, give it three months. Try again, if the food works, now you can add it to your rotation, if it doesn’t work, now it’s time to ditch it.

30:03: Ditch it for about a year. That’s a lifetime in SCD land. And in that time, if you try it again and the food still doesn’t work, I’m willing to bet that it’s probably a no-go for you. Sorry, there’s just some foods that won’t work no matter how much time we give them. Now that we’ve spent a moment on what to do when food doesn’t work, let’s get back to adding in new foods that do work. Let’s say you complete the intro phase and you’re ready to start adding new foods. In the SCD Stages Chart, like the one we see on the Pecanbread website, we move following a direct and logical SCD path, first by adding in well-cooked, peeled and deseeded foods. Next by adding in well-cooked foods that have peels and seeds, and then finally raw foods. There’s other delights along the way, like larger helpings of SCD yogurt and nut butters and nut milks and nut flours. Ham and bacon is in there too, along with some truly delicious desserts. That’s a process, and it flows nicely with the healing process that’s going on in your gut at the same time. You see, as your digestive system becomes stronger, as your mucosal lining and the epithelial cells regenerate in your intestine, you will be able to tolerate and digest more foods.

31:35: Doesn’t it completely makes sense that a food you couldn’t tolerate a month ago, now that more healing has taken place, it’s a food you can tolerate now. It’s always worth a try. Remember the key here, the key in adding new foods in this phase is to go tortoise slow, adding in only one new food at a time, one new food every few days. When we go at this pace, we know exactly what’s working for us and what isn’t, and then we can make necessary modifications. When we go at this pace, we allow our gut the time it needs to heal. It’s been quite a while for me, back in 2008 when I started the SCD, but I do remember. I remember being advised to go slow and yes, it was hard, but I adhered to it. I clung to every last rule because I knew that it was important and it was working for me, I remember trying pickles for the first time. Oh, oh what a taste that was. I remember that I hadn’t had pickles and years and I was so excited. I picked a standard pickle brand, a brand that shall not be named, but they were SCD legal. After about a day of eating those pickles, I started to get heartburn and then a rumbling in my belly and bloating after I ate them. I tried them for one more day, but experienced the same thing, so sadly, I knew that pickles were not for me, at least not for now.

33:14: A week later, I tried again and the same reaction occured, definitely the pickles. Cut to three months later, three months later, the next time I ate those pickles, I picked a different brand. I picked a different brand, and this brand I will name ’cause they are truly the best pickles in the world, Bubbies. Bubbies pickles are different. First of all, they are the best-tasting things on the planet, and secondly, they’re just healthier. They have more natural ingredients, and they’re a very traditional pickle. And I just love them. And guess what? No symptoms. No symptoms at all. Bubbies are now a staple in my house, and I’ve gotten my hubby into them as well. Reintroducing a food with success is great, but it doesn’t always work that way. And I have that story too. Take bell peppers, for instance. For me, peppers are my kryptonite. I’ve tried them over and over, raw and cooked with no luck. Diarrhea and abdominal pain is the outcome for me. I did figure out though that I can tolerate a roasted red pepper without the skin and they’re delish, but that’s the only kind of pepper that works for me.

34:33: I know it might be hard to believe that you’ll know your body so well. Just like what I’m talking about here, you’ll know your body so well that you know what kind of pepper you tolerate or the only brand of pickles that works for you while others don’t. But if you stay this course and you don’t fall prey to step number two by going too fast with your diet and you commit to keeping some type of food journal, this kind of freedom and delight in all the healthy delicious amazing foods you can eat, it will be your reality too. Well, we’ve made it to misstep number three. As promised, the last pitfall we’re gonna cover in this episode, today we’re covering the top three missteps I see most often, pitfalls that will really hold IBDers back when it comes to successfully using the SCD to quiet IBD symptoms. In coming up with these three, I actually whittled this list down from a much larger list of pitfalls, but I wanted to pick the ones that you needed right now, the ones that I knew you needed to get started. But it’s those smaller mistakes, those other ones that I can’t mention that we don’t have time to talk about today, they’re still in my mind, and I don’t like to keep any information that I have that might be helpful for you.

35:57: So with that in mind, I thought that I would go ahead and create a PDF for you with all of the pitfalls that I couldn’t fit into this episode today. So if you’re gonna be starting the SCD soon or if you know that you’ve tried it before, it didn’t work so well, and you were just waiting for a more step-by-step approach or heck, even if you’re rolling along fine and everything is great, but I don’t know, information is just always better, right? Even if any of those scenarios fit for you, I wanna encourage you to download this new guide that I have, 10 More SCD Mistakes to Avoid. You can get it by going to the show notes. You can click on it there, or you can also go to karynhaley.com/missteps. That’s K-A-R-Y-N-H-A-L-E-Y dot com forward slash missteps. M-I-S-S-T-E-P-S Karynhaley.com/missteps. The information from today plus my new guide, 10 More SCD Missteps to Avoid. It will definitely help you. It will come in handy as you navigate your way through this eating plan. I want success for you. I want healing for you. This information today on this episode, plus the PDF guide, it’s gonna help you on your way.

Has SCD Misstep #3 been a stumbling block for you?

37:24: Okay. We’ve made it to misstep number three, misstep number three that I see SCD-ers making all too often. This is a big one and a challenging one for many. You’re not sure about the difference between die-off and a true food reaction. I have to say that one more time. You’re not sure about the difference between die-off and a true food reaction. This one is gonna take a little bit of explaining, and it’s good information either for those who have never tried SCD and you’ve never heard of die-off, all the way to those who know exactly what I’m talking about, but are struggling to still… To figure out what is going on when they don’t feel well on the SCD. Let’s start this misstep with the term die-off. What is die-off? The proper name is the herxheimer reaction, but nobody calls it that. It’s most commonly called die-off. The most common place where people on the SCD usually experience die-off is in the intro phase.

38:33: It’s very typical here. The point of the intro period is to clear out your body of toxins and bacterial overgrowth. The bad bacteria while they’re thriving in your gut, they have this warm and cozy home, and of course, they wanna keep it that way. But the intro diet provides them with a losing battle for this bacteria because you’re not giving them what they need to thrive. You’re not giving them the complex starches and the refined sugars. As this unhealthy bacteria die, toxins are released in your body. Rest assured, even though it sounds terrible, this is actually a good thing. In fact, it’s a great thing. It means that your body is moving towards health, but unfortunately, the toxins, they can create this die-off, meaning that the bad bacteria is releasing toxins. During this time, diarrhea might get worse, brain fog can also occur. Irritability, moodiness, anxiety, bloating and gas are also common symptoms of die-off. There’s several things that you could experience that could be due to this die-off reaction.

39:47: When else during the SCD can you experience this die-off? Any time you’re adding in fermented foods or supplements. The crux of the SCD that homemade fermented yogurt, that’s a very common place. There’s a strong possibility that you will experience some die-off here because all the new gut bugs that are entering and leaving your system and the toxin release that it creates, that creates this die-off. This should balance out and eventually you should be able to get back to feeling more normal, but there can be some bacterial upset before that occurs. Other times you might feel those die-off symptoms when you add in other fermented foods, maybe later in the eating plan, you enter in sauerkraut or Kimchi. You might also experience a die-off reaction if you add in a supplement like a probiotic for your healing regime. And again, for that same reason, adding in good bacteria, adding in the ferments can create that die-off reaction for a little while, although things should settle out. There’s a common theme here, right? With the die-off. It’s the bacteria. Whenever you change the bacterial balance in your gut, you might experience those die-off symptoms. That’s why when mamas are adding in these new foods or supplements, I always recommend going slow, slow, slow. Can I say that again? [chuckle] Slow. Going slow will help your body adjust over time.

41:29: Sure, you can go from zero yogurt to two cups a day, but I wouldn’t recommend it. The die-off from the fermented yogurt is just too strong. So that’s die-off. The question is, what’s happening when you’re introducing a new food and you have a reaction to it, is that die-off too? Let’s get back to my pepper sensitivity, I think this is gonna help with this. How about the diarrhea and the abdominal pain that I experienced there when I tried those peppers? Was that die-off? Well, chances are probably no. Die-off usually occurs from fermented food and supplements, and over time, it’ll subside and you’ll actually be healthier for it. Whereas with a true food sensitivity from a food you just don’t tolerate because of inflammation in your intestines or leaky gut where food particles break through the gut wall, and they make their way into your bloodstream, it’s more a true food reaction here. And the reaction doesn’t usually change over a few days, it’s longer-lasting, and a good reason to stay away from that particular food for a while. Now, when you’re feeling not quite right on the SCD, whether it’s gut symptoms like diarrhea, abdominal pain, or other symptoms like headaches, skin rash, brain fog, remember to think about what you’ve been eating lately. If you’re using the FNP journal, you’ll know what to do.

43:04: One last note worth mentioning about die-off. In the BTVC book, Elaine talks about two times on the SCD when die-off is common. Number one is what we talked about here, in the intro phase. Number two is after about two to three months into the diet. If you’re sailing along swimmingly, feeling great on the eating plan, and then out of nowhere, wham, you start having any of those gut or non-gut symptoms, think about the possibility it could be die-off. Apparently, it’s a last-ditch effort by those gut bugs who are hanging on for dear life. Just like any die-off experience, it will disappear. I’ve seen die-off go away in anywhere from three days to two weeks, no matter when you experience it. In all honesty, I have to say that this two to three month die-off period, it didn’t happen for me, and I rarely see it happen with my SCD clients. It can happen though. So definitely it’s something to watch out for. All right, ladies, we did it. We made it. We made it through another episode together. Good for you girlfriend. You have got your mind on your health and you’re rocking this thing. You’re working it every day. I know you are. I see you, I feel you. There’s an army of IBD mamas out there in the world, and we’re all beautifully and forever connected by our hope, our drive, and our commitment to good health and good motherhood.

Do it like a mom!

44:40: Now, one last thing before we wrap up, we’re gonna talk about how you’re gonna do this like a mom. How are you gonna make sure that these missteps don’t befall you? How are you gonna do this like a mom? Well, maybe, maybe today is the day you start a gut-healing diet like the SCD. Maybe it’s next week or next month, whatever that day, and whenever that day comes for you, it’s all good. When the time is right, you’ll do it like a mom and you’ll know. Don’t forget it took me five years. Even after I knew about the SCD, it took me five years to give it a try. We’re all running our own race here. I appreciate and support you without judgment, wherever you are on your IBD journey. So that’s how you can do it. That’s how you can do it like a mom. You can do it like it fits for you. Do it however it fits in your life. Don’t forget if this information was helpful for you and you wanna take it one step further, don’t forget, check out my hot off the press PDF about other possible missteps you might encounter on this SCD eating plan. You can get your hands on the free PDF, 10 More SCD Missteps to Avoid by checking the show notes for the link, or by going directly to karynhaley.com/missteps.

46:17: Thank you so much for joining me today and for listening to today’s episode. When it comes to IBD, I know there’s a lot of resources out there, and I’m truly honored that you chose the Cheeky Podcast to get your IBD information today. If you found this information helpful, please give us a rating and review, it helps other moms find the podcast and see what we’re doing over here to help IBD moms everywhere. And if you feel called to do it, share this podcast with an IBD mom who you know could really use an uplifting message today, ’cause that’s what we’re all about over here at the Cheeky Podcast.

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Are you ready to take your gut healing to the next level?

46:54: One last thing, if you’re still with me and if you are, you’re definitely my kind of gal, we have to get to know each other better. If you’re tired of living on the hamster wheel of IBD with all the ups and downs between flares and remission, if you’re struggling to get control of your abdominal pain, gas, bloating, diarrhea, and other troubling IBD symptoms, go to my website, it’s karynhaley.com, and my mom had to be just a little bit different, spell my name with a Y. So it’s K-A-R-Y-N-H-A-L-E-Y dot com, and schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you gut your life back. It’s a power-packed 30 minutes. You don’t have to live in IBD status quo. There’s so much that can be done to transform your life so you can thrive in motherhood and thrive with IBD. I’ve seen my clients walk this path and it gives me so much joy to take that journey with them.

48:02: My entire coaching practice is run online, so you never have to leave your house and you never have to get out of your jammy or yoga pants for us to work together. You know, I’m wearing them too. If you’re ready to take your first amazing step towards healing, I’m ready to chat with you. Schedule your free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session today at karynhaley.com. Click on the Work With Me tab and I’ll see you soon.

48:29: It’s important to note that the information in this podcast and in this episode is for general information purposes only and not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice. The statements made in the Cheeky Podcast for moms with IBD, either by me or my guests, is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Before implementing any new treatment protocols, do yourself a favor and consult your physician first. Thank you so much for listening, for being here, for saving the space for us to spend some time together. Until we chat again, I’m wishing you a cheeky and healthy IBD journey.

Ep 4: Let’s Talk About Poop Part 2

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Did you catch Episode 3: Let’s Talk About Poop Part I? If not, go on back and take a listen to that one first. Ep #4 is Part II in the series and you’ll definitely miss a bunch of important pre-information if you don’t start there.

Let’s Talk About Poop Part II continues our candid (sometimes uncomfortable) conversation about our poop. Today, we dive into the poop tracking acronym tailormade with moms in mind– it might help us even more than the Bristol Stool Chart we learned about in Ep. #3, we explore the many mom-centered ways we can keep track of our food, mood, and poop to get our Crohn’s or colitis under control, and we talk about how you can get your hands on the best free Food-Mood-Poop tracker right now. Plus, we explore how we can use this poop conversation to help better our kid’s health as well.

Even if the whole concept of getting comfortable talking about your poop makes you uncomfortable, I urge to take a listen. The whole subject is tackled with grace and humor, and it’s definitely a conversation we need to have to get our IBD into remission once and for all.

Episode at a Glance:

• [0:50] Did you join me for the last episode? I hope so, because this conversation really started back in episode #3. Do yourself a favor, if you haven’t listened to the last episode, let’s talk about poop part one, go back and take a listen

• [3:40] What tool can give you more information than the Bristol Stool Chart? Try the acronym, BE AWARE, for what to look for when it comes to poop on more of an individual and a personal level.

• [14:33] Use the Food-Mood-Poop Journal to help you track your IBD symptoms. There are many ways to journal: Free Form, Notes App on your Phone, Video Selfie, FMP pdf. Pick the one that speaks to you.

• [19:42] If you want to get your hands on my Food Mood Poop Journal system, the one that I use with all my clients, look here in the show notes for the link, or go to karynhaley.com/journal to grab your copy

• [23:51] If you’re ready to start getting comfortable tracking your poop, it’s time to take my poop challenge. Get your copy of the BSC in the show notes, look in the toilet when you poop for 3 days and tell me you did it. Leave me the comment “Cheeky” in the comments for this episode on my YouTube channel (@IBDHealthCoach) and I’ll be supporting you all the way!

• [26:28] Do it like a mom! Don’t let another day go by without sharing this information with your kids. The more they get comfortable looking in the toilet and having the proper language to talk about their poop, the healthier they’ll be.

• [26:29] One last thing, if you’re still with me, and if you are, you’re definitely my kinda girl, we have to get to know each other better. Go to karynhaley.com, and schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you get your life back. It’s a power-packed 30 minutes.

Rate, Review and Subscribe on Apple Podcasts.

Episode Links:

• Your FREE Food-Mood-Poop Journaling System
• Leave me your Poop Challenge message HERE
• Evernote- the app to add notes in your phone
• Bristol Stool Chart
• Breaking the Vicious Cycle

Let’s Talk About Poop Part 2

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00:05 INTRO: You are listening to The Cheeky Podcast for Moms with IBD, a safe space for moms with Crohn’s and colitis, connect, explore powerful tools for healing and transform our lives to thrive in motherhood and in life. I’m your host, Karyn Haley, IBD health coach, integrative wellness enthusiast, and mom to three outstanding kids. After having Crohn’s disease for 30 years and working as a health advocate exclusively with IBD clients for the last 10 years, I know it’s time to bring the types of candid conversations I have with my clients out into the open. It’s our time to go on an IBD healing journey and do it like only a mom can. Let’s do this.

[music]

00:50 KARYN: Well, hey there, dear one. Did you join me for the last episode? I hope so, because this conversation really started back in episode number three. Do yourself a favor, if you haven’t listened to the last episode, let’s talk about poop part one, go back and take a listen. Then jump back to this episode and I’ll be right here waiting for you, Richard Marx style of course. Okay, just a quick reminder in case you missed the last episode. The last episode, episode three had us diving into why we should care about our poop? What to look for and track when we’re monitoring our poop? And the lovely Bristol Stool Chart, the actual chart that gives us ratings for our poop consistency.

01:38: We spent a lot of time just getting really comfortable with the idea of talking about our poop, looking at our poop, thinking about our poop. So, if you haven’t had the chance to listen to that episode, go on back, and I will be here when you come back to episode number four. We ended part one of this two-parter, pondering the question, “Is there something better out there than the BSC? Is there a problem with always relying so heavily on the BSC?” Let’s go ahead and answer that question now. Remember Jenny, Jenny from our part one episode, in the let’s talk about poop episode part one? Jenny is my client who for all intents and purposes, was living a pretty symptom-free life, but Jenny couldn’t enjoy that life or even believe it existed, because she wasn’t having the perfect poop.

02:32: I’d heard about the same belief pattern from other ladies besides Jenny, mom’s having trouble seeing beyond the Bristol Stool Chart. It was a head scratcher for me. A problem I really felt that I needed to solve. And trying to make up for this challenge, I recently developed my own poop indicator. It’s not a replacement for the BSC, [chuckle] definitely not. I’m not claiming that what I’ve developed is better than what they’ve developed, but it’s a poop indicator nonetheless, and one that I think can go hand-in-hand nicely with the Bristol Stool Chart, so we really can know if we’re out of the IBD woods. So what’s even better than the BSC alone? Well, the Bristol Stool Chart with the seven different types of poop ranging from those little marble-y pebbles at the number one side going through the sausage-style poop at the number four, and moving its way down the chart with liquid poop at number seven, this chart isn’t without its limitations.

Is there a better tool than the Bristol Stool Chart to track your poop?

03:40: And I saw this affecting too many of my clients. I recently decided to create my own mom friendly acronym, ’cause what mom doesn’t love an acronym. This is my acronym, BE AWARE. You know acronyms, where the letters of the word stand for something. I’m making up acronyms all the time for my fifth grader to help him understand some sort of school-related concept or to study for a test. I love acronyms when it comes to remembering something, so I thought BE AWARE  might work, because it would help all of us BE AWARE of what to look for when it comes to poop on more of an individual and a personal level. So, this acronym goes like this, the first letter, B, in BE AWARE stands for base, base your thoughts about your poop on more than food. I mentioned this in the last episode too. But your poop is about more than just what you eat. Yes, the food you eat definitely affects what your poop looks like, but remember, it isn’t all about poop. Their stress and anxiety levels, depression, other mood challenges, hormones and sleep, there is so many other factors that can come into play here.

BE AWARE is the acronym for savvy moms who wonder why.

04:57: So, definitely we want to be looking at some of those other factors as well. The Bristol Stool Chart doesn’t really let us focus on the why behind what our poop looks like, but as moms, we’re always curious about the why, which is why the first letter of this acronym is fitting for us to consider. E, the E in BE AWARE stands for extremes. Extremes on the Bristol Stool Chart means that something might not be quite right. We’ve talked about the poop stages, in the middle of the Bristol Stool Chart being more common, but the number one poop where you have those tiny pebbles, almost marble like, and then it goes all the way to the number seven on the chart where your poop is pure liquid in the toilet, these are what we call the outliers, the extremes, and you’ll definitely want to talk to your doctor about these different poop levels.

05:57: Remember, there is so much that can be done to help your IBD symptoms, whether you choose to use food, making lifestyle changes, finding mindset techniques that work, or medication when you need it. You know I love a good integrative approach when it comes to helping you with IBD, whatever works, mom-friend, no judgment, whatever works. So, talk to your provider, work with him or her on what to do for what’s best for your IBD healing journey. When it comes to those outliers, the one or the seven, it’s definitely worth talking to your doctor about. A, the A in the BE AWARE stands for always look, always look in the toilet. It’s not enough to look once a week or even once a day. You know as well as I do, that your first poop of the day can look much different from the second and the third, and so on. It’s about looking for patterns. Not just one poop. Always look. The W, W in BE AWARE stands for what, what’s your normal? Remember that the pop that’s normal for you isn’t necessarily the poop that’s normal for me, or your spouse, your neighbor, your friend with IBD even. Follow your poop patterns over time, and it will help you figure out what’s your normal, what’s normal for you.

07:24: Next we have A, the letter A, the second A in the word BEAWARE, our acronym here, the A stands for avoid, avoid unnecessarily stressing about your poop. Remember my client, Jenny, she is the perfect example of someone who was stressing about her poop. I know this is tough. I really do. I know it’s tough. If you’re going 20 times a day, that’s stressful, and there’s bound to be some necessary stress behind that challenge. Remember though that stress, any kind of stress, is going to have a negative impact on your poop. The gut-brain connection is so strong, our thoughts affect our gut, and our gut response in turn affects our poop. In an upcoming episode, we’ll talk about a mom center technique and several of them actually, to help you manage your stress, but for today, know that unnecessarily stressing about attaining the perfect poop like Jenny was trying to do, it’s an exercise in futility. It’s never going to work out the way that you want it to.

08:35: We’ve made it to R. R in our acronym, BE AWARE stands for review, reviewing the Bristol Stool Chart. Review the Bristol Stool Chart, and I say that purposely. Review it. You don’t need to worry about memorizing it, have it available to give you the language to talk about your poop with your doctor. Have it available to lightly gauge where you’re at, it is valuable. And it gives you good information. It’s just not necessarily stress-worthy if you’re where you want to be, note it. Put that thought in your mind about what number you’re at and then move on, especially, especially if everything else about your health looks good. We’ve got another E here, the E at the end, the E at the end of our acronym, BE AWARE stands for exceptions, exceptions to the rule. Just like in language, arts, and spelling class, we talk about I before E, except after C. There’s exceptions when it comes to judging our poop too, especially for IBDer’s. Are you like me where you’ve had portions of your small intestine removed? Maybe you have a J-pouch after a partial colon removal or possibly you have an ostomy.

09:56: In cases like this, exceptions definitely apply. Extensive portions of removed intestines will most certainly affect the state of your poop. So instead of relying heavily on the charts or acronyms, talk to your doctor about what poop should look like for you, for your individual case with the amount of intestine that you’ve had removed. So there you have it, there’s the BE AWARE acronym. B is for base, base it on more than food, E is for extremes. Those ones and sevens are a good time to talk to your doctor. A, the first A is for always look in the toilet. W, what’s normal for you may not be normal for her. A, the second A is for avoiding unnecessary stress. R to review the Bristol Stool Chart, don’t memorize it, but keep it in the back of your mind. And E, the last E is for exceptions. There’s always exceptions to every rule. And if you have had portions of your intestine removed, you might be an exception to this category.

11:07: We are almost their mama or in the home stretch, we’re in the home stretch of this poop talk. It’s time for a quick check-in. How are you doing? Are you ready to bring this topic home? [chuckle] Okay, let’s do this. Wait second, before we do that, I need to just take a quick deep breath. Let’s take a deep breath in, hold it, and then let it out. It’s always good to just take a deep cleansing breath sometimes. Okay, let’s do it. Let’s bring this home. We’ve talked about so many things, and let’s talk about poop part two. Well, really, both of these episodes, we’ve talked about lots of things about your poop in both of these episodes. We talked about getting comfortable looking in the toilet, not just once, but regularly to look for patterns. We’ve talked about having the poop language to describe what’s going on in the toilet, to describe it to your doctor and most importantly to yourself. The Bristol Stool Chart along with my BE AWARE acronym is great to do this.

12:16: And we talked about also, how there’s more things that affect our poop, besides what we eat. Remember our mood, our sleep, our hormones, and there’s lots of other non-gut factors that can also affect what’s going on with our poop. Most importantly, we know that in order to get our IBD into remission, we have to track all of this, so that we can look for clues and patterns that can help us get to that root cause, so that we can develop those root cause thoughts about how we got here, and how we can improve. This is a ton of information to keep track of, and I want you to be able to get started on this tracking today. I want you to have all the tools you need for tracking success. Do you know where I’m going with this, ladies? I know many of you already have a head start, but we don’t have to keep all this data in our head. Many of us moms think we can. I know we fancy ourselves, I know I do as superwoman, but it’s hard, it’s hard to keep this all down without writing it somewhere.

13:25: I know from experience that when I’ve tried to do it, I get busy. I forget what I ate for lunch. I forget what kinda mood I had yesterday. When we all try to keep this information in our head, we never make those necessary connections to help us heal. But when we keep a food, mood, poop or an FMP journal, like I like to call it, all the pieces start to fall into place. All of this poop watching starts to pay off. We are getting to the meat of it mom-friend. I love it. Okay, the food, mood, poop journal is just what it sounds like. It’s a journal that tracks what you eat, what your moods are, your gut and non-gut symptoms, and how all of this comes together to affect your poops. It’s an outstanding IBD Information Gathering Tool, and I highly recommend you get started with the FMP journaling today. If you’re thinking, I’ve done this before, it didn’t work for me. I’ve got a question for you, did you track just your food and your poop? I’m sorry, not enough.

Which Food-Mood-Poop Journaling System is best for you?

14:33: Did you do it consistently? If not, it probably didn’t show you much. The best news about journaling for IBD health is that there are so many ways to do it, I promise you, there’s a way that’s going to fit for your lifestyle and your time. Let me share with you a few ways my clients have found that work for them. Way number one, a free flowing journal, if you’re a journal gal, if you have kept a diary for years, this is the method for you. Just make sure you track more than your poop and what you eat. You’ll also want to journal about your daily mood, your symptoms, remember both GI and non-GI related. For example, my free form journal entry might say something like, for breakfast, I had two sunny side-up eggs fried in butter, one blueberry muffin, and then you might… If it’s a store bought muffin, you might wanna include the brand. For example, you could say Udi’s brand, gluten-free, a cup of black tea.

15:45: And then you might say something like, felt tired, restless night sleep, had a headache before breakfast, perked up after eating, something like that. You could even say headache went away, but felt some bloating, had some gas after eating, ran to the bathroom to poop a couple of hours later. And then you would probably describe your poop, poop was light brown, BSC number six. See how that comes in handy? The BSC is great. Saw bits of food in the toilet. And then you might add a note saying something like, wondered if the milk I put in the eggs bothered me, there were bits of blueberry in the toilet, something like that. See how that free-flowing journal might look. Remember, no one but you is looking at this journal, so make a free-flowing journal or it could be a bullet pointy journal, whatever works for you. Just as long as you can read it and it makes sense to you. That’s all that matters with this type of food, mood, poop tracking.

16:49: Okay, moving on to another way, you might want to try this out, food, mood, poop journaling, another way to do it is to do it on your phone. If you have your phone attached to you all the time, use the note section in your phone. If you like the free-flowing journal kind of way, the one that I just mentioned, but you don’t really feel like writing things out all the time, how about the Notes app in your phone? It’s perfect for this. Or there’s another notes app that I really like, it’s called Evernote. I’ll put a link for that in the show notes. So, whatever works for you, but you’re gonna do the same type of information here. Your food that you’re eating, your mood, your GI and non-GI symptoms, and your poop, of course, using the language that the Bristol Stool Chart gives you along with your thoughts centered around the BE AWARE acronym. So, same kinda thing as the free-flowing journal, but instead of doing it on paper, pen and paper style, this one’s gonna go directly in your phone, wherever you keep notes.

18:00: Way number three. Way number three to use the food, mood, poop journaling. If you wanna take your cell phone to a whole new level, a level, a little bit different than the one used in number two, you can do some IBD tracking with a video selfie. If you’re a selfie girl, you know who you are. If you love a selfie, if you are making videos all the time anyway, why not put your food, mood, poop journal right in the mix. Follow the same format from the past two ideas, but you’re gonna do this one in a video format. Save your videos on your phone, maybe you could even do a summary at the end of the day, and it will help you keep track of patterns that emerge. Just be sure that you go back and watch it so that you can see what those patterns are.

18:47: Okay, we’ve made it to number four, and this is the last one. This is the last way and this is the way that I do it. It works for me, and it’s kind of a cross between the written word and a more simpler form of journaling. It’s my very own food, mood, poop journal. It’s a printoutable filloutable, PDF with the symptoms that you can just circle both non-GI and GI symptoms. You can just circle what’s going on. There’s also a smiley and sad faces that you can circle for your mood. There’s also sections for you to write down what you’re eating. It’s the method all my clients start with on day one. Yep, all my clients start with food, mood, poop journaling as well, and it’s amazing. It’s amazing to see the connections that they can begin to make when they start out.

You can get your hands on your very own Food-Mood-Poop Journaling System right HERE.

19:42: Since it’s my goal for you to be awesomely successful here with the food, mood, poop journaling. I’m gonna give you my journaling system for free. Maybe it’s the best method for you or maybe not. Maybe there was one of the other methods that I mentioned that sounds better to you, but not knowing how to start this journaling thing, it’s definitely not going to stand in your way of starting… Getting started with this FMP journaling. Not on my watch. If you want to get your hands on my food mood poop journal system, the one that I use with all my clients, all you have to do is click on the food mood poop journal link. It’s in the episode notes and voila, it’s yours. If you don’t have the notes or you don’t know how to get to the notes, you can also go to karynhaley.com/journal. That’s karynhaley K-A-R-Y-N H-A-L-E-Y/journal forward slash journal. You can also get your copy of the Food mood poop journal there as well. Also, and it’ll be in the show notes, so go ahead, get it, it’s yours. And whatever method works for you, you can go ahead and get started. So did you pick the best food, mood, poop journaling method for you? Are you ready to get started today? You can do this, mama. I believe in you. I know you can, and I’m here if you get stuck along the way. Always feel free to email me if you’re stuck, hello@karynhaley.com. I’m here to answer your journaling questions any time.

21:20: Phew, what a whirlwind of poop-filled info on both of these episodes. How many times do you think I said the word poop in this episode? I don’t even think I could count. Can you imagine if it was a drinking game? I don’t even wanna think about that. How did you do? Did we get you all comfy and cozy with thinking about and talking about your poop? Did we take away some of the stigma attached to talking about it openly? I hope so. It’s vital for us to go there. I know it’s uncomfortable, but we really had to do it. And if you can’t think of anyone who is willing to go there with you, if you need to talk it through, I’m always happy to go there. In the name of IBD remission, I will go there with you. I’ll go there with you, mom friend. With all of this info that you have from today’s episode, it’s time for a poop challenge. Remember the poop challenge I spoke about way at the top of this podcast? Of course, it’s a poop-related challenge. I’m gonna take it myself and I hope you’ll take it with me. My challenge is to use this. Find the Bristol Stool Chart in the show notes.

I’ve got a challenge for you! A Poop Challenge.

22:39: That’s from the day before there in the show notes for let’s talk about poop part one, or you can Google it and you can find your own. But go ahead and find the Bristol Stool Chart and print it out. Then for the next three days, make a promise and commit to yourself to look in the toilet bowl every time you go number two. Take a quick peek. You can do it. I know you can do it. For the next three days, I’m gonna be doing it too right along with you. I know you might think it’s second nature to me at this point, but I forget too, so this is my reminder as well. And if you do print out your very own copy of the Bristol Stool Chart and you do check in the toilet bowl for three days right along with me, I wanna support you. I wanna cheer for you, I want to support your efforts. So if you do it, if you participate in the Check Your poop challenge for three days in a row, I want you to let me know. If you’re listening to this podcast on iTunes or other platforms like Stitcher, you might not know that The Cheeky Podcast for moms also airs on YouTube.

23:51: And if you’re watching this on YouTube, you already know that. Either way, if you take the bold bad ass mama move and complete the three-day poop challenge, I want you to let me know in the YouTube comments for this video. This episode title is, let’s talk about poop part two. It’s on my YouTube channel at IBD health coach. There’s a link for it in the show notes. It’ll take you right there. When you arrive on the episode, if you write cheeky in the comments, that’s cheeky like the podcast, C-H-E-E-K-Y. I’ll know exactly what you mean, and I’ll be cheering right by your side. It’s our little secret code to each other to support each other in poop health, and in IBD health, and to know that we’re taking big, bright, bold steps to help our IBD heal every day. That secret word again is cheeky, just like the name of the podcast. And if you put in the comments of let’s talk about poop part two, not one… You’ll see one there. So don’t get confused. It’s not episode one, it’s episode two. So part two of let’s talk about poop, go to my video YouTube channel, put it there and we’re gonna be giving each other a virtual high fives. So you go girl, you can do this. And just in case you’re driving or distracted right now, remember that the link for the YouTube version of this podcast is in the show notes, so you can go and get it later when you can. But the poop challenge is on, and I can’t wait to share this challenge with you.

Do it Like a Mom!

25:38: Alright, poop challenge thrown down. Last but definitely not least, we’ve gotta talk about how you can take all this awesome poop information from today and from the previous episode and do it like only a mom can, so how can you take your book knowledge and do it like a mom? You can share this poop information with your kids. It’s that simple. With information this good, we can’t keep it to ourselves. We’ve got to support our kids with it too. Whether they have got challenges or not, everyone needs to get comfortable talking about their poop. I swear, teaching my kids about the Bristol Stool Chart and giving them the language to get comfortable talking about their poop, it’s one of the best things I’ve ever done as a mom.

26:28: By saying to me something like, “Hey mom, my poop’s a at number six, I can quickly get out the magnesium or push the salads and get their guts back on track. And when two of my kids one time said to me on the same day, “Mom, I’m at a number one, I could quickly deduce that there must be a stomach bug going around the house. I got them quarantined to push the probiotics, got some bone broth in their system, and we got that gut bug under control fast. I imagine the power and comfort level it will give your kids to get knowledgeable and comfortable talking and thinking about their poop, it’s priceless, and it’s a gift that will benefit them for a lifetime. We talk about all these gifts that we give our kids, our kids, all the wisdom that we pass down, but we never think about helping them know the language for their proof. This is information that will help them throughout their whole lives, no matter what name you call it in your home.

27:32: As we wrap up this episode, I want to mention one last time, don’t forget to get your hands on the free resource, the food mood poop journal. That will help you get started right away on your journaling. No matter what method you choose, definitely try to get started on that because it’s really gonna help you start to look for those patterns and see what’s going on with your poop. You can get your hands on that free resource at karynhaley.com/journal or just go to the show notes, click on the link and you can get it there as well. Alright, mama, you made it. You made it through these couple of episodes of a very uncomfortable, not much talked about conversation, but one that is just so needed. One that we just had to have. Enjoy the rest of your day. Enjoy the rest of your night. Poop talk out, at least until the next time, she said with a wink.

28:35: Thank you so much for joining me today and for listening to today’s episode. When it comes to IBD, I know there’s a lot of resources out there, and I’m truly honored that you chose the Cheeky Podcast to get your IBD information today. If you found this information helpful, please give us a rating and review. It helps other moms find the podcast and see what we’re doing over here to help IBD moms everywhere. And if you feel called feel a call to do it, share this podcast with an IBD mom who you know could really use an uplifting message today, ’cause that’s what we’re all about over here at the Cheeky Podcast.

Are you ready to take your gut healing to the next level?

29:14: One last thing, if you’re still with me, and if you are, you’re definitely my kind of gal. We have to get to know each other better. If you’re tired of living on the hamster wheel of IBD with all the ups and downs between flares and remission, if you’re struggling to get control of your abdominal pain, gas, bloating, diarrhea and other troubling IBD symptoms, go to my website. It’s karynhaley.com, and my mom had to be just a little bit different, she spelled my name with the Y. So it’s K-A-R-Y-N H-A-L-E-Y.com and schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause trouble-shooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you get your life back. It’s a power packed 30 minutes. You don’t have to live in IBD status quo. There’s so much that can be done to transform your life so you can thrive in motherhood and thrive with IBD. I’ve seen my clients walk this path and it gives me so much joy to take that journey with them.

30:22: My entire coaching practice is run online, so you never have to leave your house and you never have to get out of your jammy or yoga pants for us to work together. You know I’m wearing them to. If you’re ready to take your first amazing step towards healing, I’m ready to chat with you. Schedule your free 30-minute IBD root cause trouble shooting sesh today at karynhaley.com. Click on the work with me tab and I’ll see you soon. It’s important to note that the information in this podcast and in this episode is for general information purposes only and not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice. The statements made in the Cheeky Podcast for moms with IBD, either by me or my guests, is not intended to diagnose, treat, to cure, or prevent any disease. Before implementing any new treatment protocols, do yourself a favor and consult your physician first.

31:18: Thank you so much for listening, for being here, for saving this space for us to spend some time together. Until we chat again, I’m wishing you a cheeky and healthy IBD journey.

Ep 3: Let’s Talk About Poop Part 1

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Warning: We’re about to have an uncomfortable conversation.

But, we must. We must have this conversation when we have IBD. It’s a moral imperative.*

It’s time for us to have the poop talk. This is a biggie, such a big convo that we’re dedicating it to a two part episode. In this episode which is Part I, we talk about the why, and the what. Why do we need to care about our poop anyway and what the heck are we supposed to be looking for anyway. We dive deep into the why knowing about our poop and looking in the toilet every time we go is so crucial to our IBD healing, we cover the importance of the Bristol Stool Chart and we wrap up by asking the question, “Is there a better way to track our poop than the BSC?”

This episode is told with humor and grace, but also with the power that it deserves. When we move from squimish to comfortable when we talk about our poop, and learni what to look for in the toilet, and learn the best language to describe our poop to our health care provider, we have a leg up on everyone else trying to manage their IBD. We, dear mama, can now get to the root causes of our gut struggles and the root causes are where all the healing magic happens.

Buckle up, it’s going to be an uncomfortable, bumpy ride. But we’ll get through it together.

*Reference to the 80’s movie Real Genius with Val Kilmer (fun quarantine watch)

Episode at a Glance:

• [0:56] When we talk about our poop, we take away the stigma and the uncomfortable-ness everyone has with this subject, and it gives us a way to connect and share in a way we usually stay away from, and it gives us the freedom on our IBD healing journey.

• [7:45] Just how important is paying attention to your poop when it comes to IBD? In a word, huge. It’s also important to embrace the act of looking at the toilet every time we go, and also to help us get comfortable with knowing what it is we’re actually supposed to be looking for when we look.

• [10:21] Knowing more about your poop and taking a peek at the toilet every time you go, can help you judge your current inflammation response or how you’re doing with digesting fats in your food. Taking a peak also tells you how well you’re digesting and absorbing the nutrients in your food, it gives you clues about potential food sensitivities and intolerance you might be having, plus it gives you a window into the balance of your gut flora.

• [15:52] The Bristol Stool Chart was invented by Stephen Lewis and Ken Heaton at the Bristol Royal infirmary. Thanks to these lovely gentleman, we now have the language to talk about our poop in a way that we can understand, our doctors can also understand, and in a way that helps us judge where normal-ish is and where we fall in that spectrum.

• [21:00] The case of Jenny, a generally healthy IBD gal who learned a valuable lesson about the strengths the limitations of the Bristol Stool Chart.

• [22:24] When thinking about what’s going on with our gut health, we must consider factors other than poop. Factors like abdominal pain, gas, bloating and heartburn, and forget our digestive tract for just a moment, there’s other non-gut factors that can also affect our poop consistency.? What’s our mood, our anxiety, our stress, our anger, and depression? These things have all been shown to affect our poop frequency and our consistency. Our hormone fluctuations affect our poop too.

• [26:29] One last thing, if you’re still with me, and if you are, you’re definitely my kind of girl, we have to get to know each other better. Go to karynhaley.com, and schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you get your life back. It’s a power-packed 30 minutes.

Rate, Review and Subscribe on Apple Podcasts.

Episode Links:

• Get your own Bristol Stool Chart
• Breaking the Vicious Cycle
• What exactly are normal stools?

Let’s Talk About Poop Part I

00:05 INTRO: You are listening to The Cheeky Podcast for moms with IBD, a safe space for moms with Crohn’s and colitis, connect, explore powerful tools for healing and transform our lives to thrive in motherhood and in life. I’m your host, Karyn Haley IBD health coach, Integrative Wellness enthusiast, and mom to three outstanding kids. After having Crohn’s disease for 30 years and working as a health advocate exclusively with IBD clients for the last 10 years, I know it’s time to bring the types of candid conversations I have with my clients out into the open. It’s our time to go on an IBD healing journey and do it like only a mom can. Let’s do this. Well, hello there, beautiful IBD mama, so happy to share this time with you today.

00:56 KARYN: And I think, I think for this episode, it’s gonna be best to just jump in and rip the band-aid off and come right out and say it, we’ve got a slightly uncomfortable topic to cover on this episode of The Cheeky Podcast, and also on the next episode, it’s a two-parter, if you will, because when it comes to this topic, you just can’t get enough. And you, dear listener, I’ve gotta give you kudos. And bow to your hutzpah, as they say, dear listener, I gotta give you kudos, because I know you saw the title and you hit play anyway. Bravo to you, dear one. And I understand the apprehension. We’ve gotta go there though. We really do have to go there. In a podcast with an IBD focus, we just have to go there. We have to talk about it, because when we talk about it, we take away the stigma and the uncomfortable-ness everyone has with this subject, and it gives us a way to connect and share in a way we usually stay away from, and it gives us the freedom on our IBD healing journey, sinking deep into the belly of this subject makes us stronger, savvier women, when it comes to not only our gut health, but our total health as well, so we have to go there, we have to go there, mama, we have to have the poop talk. And this two-parter episode, our star with the spotlight on her, will be our poop.

02:27: And the crowd goes wild. Poop. It’s actually a dream in my life, a dream that everyone, not just IBDer’s, get more comfortable talking about their poop, but we, as moms with IBD, we need to connect and have this conversation even more, and I know just how uncomfortable this might be making you right now. It’s not a conversation you probably have with most of your friends, I can just picture this now, “Hey girl. How was that poop you just had? Everything come out okay?” It might even be making you more uncomfortable than being in fifth grade elementary school and going to that sex ed talk you went to with all your classmates sitting around you, and remember how painful that was, this one might be even more painful, so… Poop, we know without a shadow of a doubt that everyone does it, but it’s this little secret that no one gives us permission to talk about, definitely not talk about in the open, especially women were taught, it’s private, it’s dirty, it’s a little secret to keep quiet about. It almost feels to me like in social circles, we have to pretend we don’t even do it, it’s not lady-like to talk about.

03:44: Many of us are even taught as girls that we shouldn’t pass gas and certainly not out loud, and definitely never smelly gas. I’ve always wondered, why is it that boys and even grown men can laugh about their bodily functions, and we aren’t even taught to call it by its real name? As little kids, our parents come up with euphemisms for poop, like make dirt or mud or caca or doodie or do do. What name did your parents give your poop? My family went in the complete opposite direction when it came to talking about poop. In my house, growing up with a nurse, as a mom, we were expected to use the proper terminology for everything. We weren’t even allowed to say poop in our house. It was bowel movement or BM, if we were feeling particularly edgy. We never even said pee, it was always urinate. As a kid, I thought my friends were so cool as they got to use clever names for poop, I had to use the proper terminology, and I bet… I bet you, my mom is listening right now, she’s listening to this episode, and she’s offended that I’m using the word poop and not bowel movement. I’m sorry, mom, but bowel movement just sounds way too sterile, way too medical.

05:06: So today, when we have this talk, we’re gonna go with poop, it seems like a happy middle ground for most of us, I guess. Besides not talking about poop, if you’re like me, you probably never even gave your poop a second thought until you started having IBD symptoms like diarrhea or constipation, or until the doctor gave you that lovely diagnosis, inflammatory bowel disease. Not a sexy sounding diagnosis, by the way. Why couldn’t it be some sexy French sounding name, like [05:40] ____ something like that. Sorry, I digress, but really, why couldn’t it have been a sexier name? The point is, most people don’t really give their poop a second thought as a kid, and I was really no exception, it was something I reluctantly pulled myself away from an activity to do. I ran into the bathroom to have that “bowel movement,” she says in quotes. And I was in and out, two minutes flat, then back to innocent childhood fun until that fateful day. Until that day when I was 16, 17 years old, and I went to the bathroom, and my poop was covered with blood.

06:24: It wasn’t until that day that I had the most profound thought I’d ever had when it came to my poop, and I thought to myself, “Huh, I think it’s been four days since I pooped last.” That was the day my happy go-lucky, pretty much non-existent relationship with poop changed forever. Today, if it was four days… If four days went by, and I didn’t poop, I’d know it. I’d know it if one day went by and I didn’t pop, because now I know just how important my poop is, and I know just how much valuable information is located in the toilet when we go number two, and there’s another euphemism that we tend to use for poop. For me, there’s this before picture, this before picture I have of me as a teenager who… By the way, just so you get a clear idea of what was going on with me at the time, I had been having other DI symptoms for three years by this time, nothing poop-related, but I hadn’t been diagnosed with Crohn’s yet, and I certainly had never thought about my poop in any significant way, compare that to the picture, the after picture of a person whose life was altered dramatically on that fateful day, where my four-day old poop suddenly changed everything.

Just how important is it to pay attention to your poop?

07:45: The unfinished puzzle of the previous three years trying to figure out what was wrong with me came together in that one important life-altering poop. Just how important is paying attention to your poop when it comes to IBD? In a word, huge. If you’re one of my awesome clients and you’re listening to this podcast right now, I know you’re chuckling. You’re chuckling, because you know that we never get through a session without talking about poop. Today, we’re gonna bring that candid conversation out into the open so that we can all benefit from talking about it. My goal with this episode is not only to encourage you to get comfortable with this word, this poop word, this drop the kids off at the pool, this make a turd, whatever you guys call it, but to also embrace, to embrace the act of looking at the toilet every time we go, and also to help us get comfortable with knowing what it is we’re actually supposed to be looking for and what that dookie… Yep, there’s another euphemism, what that dookie means for our gut health and our overall health as well. In today’s episode, let’s talk about poop. Part one, we’ll dive into why getting super cosy and comfortable with our poop is the key to getting our IBD into remission.

09:09: We’ll talk about what you should be thinking about and looking for when it comes to your poop, and we’ll also talk about the Bristol Stool Chart, an actual chart that gives us ratings for our pop. I’ll tell you where you can get your own copy, and trust me, you’re gonna want your own copy so you can print it out, and how it can be beneficial for you, and more importantly, when you should throw it in the toilet. In Episode 4, let’s talk about poop part two, which is actually available now, you can download that right now after you listen to this episode, so you don’t even have to wait a week for it. In that episode, we’re gonna talk about a mom-friendly acronym that will come in handy to help you pay closer attention to your poop. I’m gonna tell you how you can get your hands on the best free resource to help you keep track of your own symptoms and poop, and… Yes, while you’re in gut healing mode, everyone should be doing that. For those of you who are new to talking about poop, those of you who are feeling really uncomfortable with this conversation, and those of you who never look in the toilet bowl, I’m gonna give you a fun little poop challenge so you can start taking baby steps, baby steps with your poop.

10:21: I love me some baby steps, so it’s gonna help you with that. And after we talk about all of this, we’ll get to the most important part, I’ll tell you how to do it like a mom, so all of that is coming your way in the next episode, episode four in Let’s Talk about Poop, Part Two. Alright, but for today, we do have a lot to get to. So let’s go ahead and dive in. First up, why should we even care about this? Why do we wanna get comfortable talking about our poop? Why do we wanna get comfortable looking at our poop? Other than judging your poop to see what kind of day you might have, which is really common with us IBDer’s, there’s more going on in the toilet bowl that we should be aware of when it comes to poop. Knowing more about your poop and taking a peek at the toilet every time you go, can help you judge many things that are going on inside your body, like your current inflammation response or how you’re doing with digesting fat in your food. You know fat is super important to help you keep your weight on and to give you energy for the day, and the question is, are you digesting fat? Well, you can find that out right in your poop.

Possible inflammation, how well we are digesting and absorbing key nutrients, probable food sensitivities, and bacterial balance can all be found when we look in the toilet.

11:30: Taking a peak also tells you how well you’re digesting and absorbing the nutrients in your food, it gives you clues about potential food sensitivities and intolerance you might be having, plus it gives you a window into the balance of your gut flora, that bacterial colony in your gut. These issues are all important to IBDer’s, and I’m only just scratching the surface here. When it comes to the information we can find in our poop. Tracking our poop over time is also important, it’s not just about that one poop in the moment, it’s about seeing what’s going on over time, looking for patterns. These patterns will often give us clues about where our body might be stuck and how to make necessary improvements, even if your poop is like many with IBD and you always have diarrhea because your poop is talking to you in that scenario too. Once we get comfortable with knowing what’s going on with our poop and we start to look for patterns over time, we can then start to learn more about the language we need to talk about our poop with words more than, “It kind of looks like diarrhea,” or, “I had a little constipation.”

12:46: We’ll talk more about the language that helps us talk about our poop in just a bit, but it’s important too to know that language because when we know how to accurately describe our poop to our doctors and to ourselves, that’s when we can start to make active and positive changes to help get our IBD under control. Remember, what it feels like coming out isn’t always what it looks like in the toilet. That’s why we have to take a look. We also should make ourselves a promise that we’ll take a look every time, not once a week, not once a day, but every time. If we don’t get comfortable looking in the toilet to notice patterns in our poop over time, and if we don’t have the language to talk about our poop, we’re powerless, we’re powerless to dive into the root causes of our gut challenges and then find ways to heal. So what should you be looking for? What should we actually be looking for when it comes to our poop? Well, we know that our poop is important, and we know that we need to get comfortable taking a peek at it and learning the language of how to describe it, so now let’s talk about what we’re actually looking for when we take that peek in the toilet. With poop, the standard things that everyone should be looking for apply. Those things are color, shape, size, texture and smell. Those are really pretty standard measures for everyone when it comes to poop. When it comes to IBDers, we wanna take this process a couple steps further.

14:26: Is there blood in your poop, or in the toilet bowl, or on the toilet paper when you wipe? How much mucus or oily rings is there in the toilet or on the toilet paper when you wipe? Are there pieces of food in your poop? How many poops are you having a day? Are you pooping every day? Are you straining when you poop? Is it painful when you poop? Does your poop have an offensive odorous smell? Do you barely make it to the bathroom in time or maybe not at all? All of these poop factors mean something, from problems located in our rectal area to general inflammation throughout the digestive tract. Pooping can help us detect signs of anal fissures or hemorrhoids or an inability to digest fat in our food. Maybe it can help us detect food intolerances, and so on, I’m gonna leave it up to you to talk to your healthcare provider about what this all means for you, but just know that these factors are important. Knowing all this information about your poop can be the difference between knowing what’s going on at the root level versus being in the dark and wondering what steps you should take next. After hearing about all that can go wrong with your poop, you might be wondering, what does the perfect poop look like? How do I know if I get to the perfect proof? Is there a normal poop?

15:52: Should I be striving for that? And what if I can never get to that? Should I be worried? The short answer is no. There really isn’t a “perfect poop”. Since everyone’s different, what’s normal for you, what’s normal for me, and even what’s normal for someone without IBD, could be quite different. I know it’s a little bit confusing. But here is where that poop language we talked about earlier kicks into high gear because the good folks at one of my favorite countries in the world, big cheerio to my friends in England, the Bristol Stool scale and the Bristol Stool Chart was invented by Stephen Lewis and Ken Heaton at the Bristol Royal infirmary. Thanks to these lovely gentleman, we now have the language to talk about our poop in a way that we can understand, our doctors can also understand, and in a way that helps us judge where normal-ish is and where we fall in that spectrum. So what the heck is the Bristol Stool Chart and Bristol Stool scale, and when can it be helpful, and when should we maybe throw it in the toilet? Well, I just mentioned that the Bristol Stool scale was developed in England back in the 1990s, the early 1990s, I think.

17:09: So not really that long ago, at least not to me, a mama born in the 70s, it doesn’t seem like it was that long ago. And the beauty of the Bristol Stool scale is that it gives us the language for what we’ve been looking for. Are you familiar with this? Have you tried it? Have you heard of the Bristol Stool scale? Just in case you haven’t seen this lovely invention before, I want you to picture it, it’s this very simple poop or stool chart with numbers for each type of poop. There’s seven different pictures of poop, each is a different consistency from solid pebbles all the way to liquid. Each poop has a number associated with it. A number one on the scale is the hardest, poop pebbles, very constipated, think marbles. Number two and three are not as firm or pebbly, but they’re still on the constipated side. When you get to the poop picture for number four, you will see that that’s what we all consider, that standard sausage style poop. Pictures of poop with the numbers five and six, they go more on the less than solid side, and then we finish out with a number seven, which is considered pure liquid poop. So it’s important to say one last thing about the makeup of this scale, these are not real poops, but their cartoon drawings of poops. So you don’t have to wince when you’re thinking about it, if you’ve seen a poop emoji and yet you didn’t have any problems with that, I know you’ll be fine looking at this chart.

18:45: What I absolutely love about the Bristol Stool Chart is that anyone can understand it, I dare say that a toddler can even point to a picture of the poop that looked similar to theirs. Finally, someone is giving us a guide, and we don’t have to describe our poop by saying something that our doctor might not even be able to picture, like slightly mushy, or kind of oatmeal like. This language is much better because it gives us even more specific language when it comes to describing our poop. A picture says a thousand words. We can say something to our doctor, like it was a number six on the Bristol Stool Scale, or even better, you can say it was kind of between a five and a six on the Bristol Stool Chart. Most gastroenterologists are familiar with the Bristol Stool Scale. So next time you go for your doctor’s appointment and the doc says, tell me about your poop consistency, you can wow them with your Bristol Stool Chart knowledge.

19:49: And hey, if they’ve never heard of it, like one gastroenterologist I recently met, you can help them learn something new, and it’s helpful for their practice and also for all of their patients. Okay, I know though, many of you, just like my clients, are wondering in the back of your mind, where is that elusive perfect poop we’re all striving for on this scale? Remember that while there is no true north star when it comes to poop, most experts believe that somewhere in the range of 4-5 on the Bristol Stool Chart is considered that normal poop. Knowing what we’re striving for, and I have to say striving for ish, it makes all the difference. We can now track where we’re at, we can make subtle changes, we can keep track of our peeking over time and begin to move towards the normal poop range. If you wanna get your hands on your own copy of the Bristol Stool Chart, check my show notes, there’s a link to my favorite Bristol Stool Chart, waiting for you there. It’s definitely worth printing out, finding a safe place to pin it up at home, maybe in the bathroom.

We can all learn about the limitations of the Bristol Stool Chart from my client, Jenny.

21:00: Now as excited as you can see I get when I talk about poop and the Bristol Stool Chart, I want you to know that the chart isn’t perfect, and it does have some limitations, especially for us, IBDer’s. Take my client Jenny, that’s not her real name, but we’re gonna call her Jenny for today. She’s been working with me for a while, and she feels really well, her IBD diet is mostly figured out, she’s developed some ways to manage the stress that’s been affecting her GI tract, she’s even come up with some great exercise routines that are low impact and they fit with her energy level. Jenny’s abdominal pain is gone, and she’s not experiencing the bloating and gas that she had every time she was eating anymore. Best of all, those frequent hourly trips to the bathroom, they’ve gotten much less. So what’s the problem? Jenny so focused on what poop number she’s on in the BSC, that Bristol Stool Chart, that she sees all of her progress as a failure. She doesn’t consistently achieve that perfect number four poop, so she thinks that everything is wrong with her gut health, even though all those other signs and symptoms point to steady progress. Do you see the problem here? Jenny is so focused on the Bristol Stool Chart that she isn’t seeing all of the success around her.

22:24: Sometimes she does actually get a number four, and those are great days. And on other days, she’s finding that she’s more of a five or six, and it definitely makes her freak out. She’s wondering what’s wrong with her? Is her disease out of remission? Is she doomed to never find the perfect poop? Jenny isn’t able to trust that what she’s doing, she’s doing well, and that she’s feeling well because she’s put so much stock into this one thing, and that’s the problem for us IBDer’s, because although poop is important, it’s important to take a peek in the bowl, and it’s important to track our poop over time, but remember that pop is just one factor, there’s so many other factors we need to keep in mind when it comes to our gut health and so many reasons we may not achieve consistency with our poop, and we may not have that perfect poop. So we must consider other gut factors, factors like abdominal pain, the smell of your poop, gas, bloating and heartburn, and forget our digestive tract for just a moment, there’s other non-IBD factors that can also affect our poop consistency. What did we have to eat that day? What’s our mood, our anxiety, our stress, our anger, and depression? These things have all been shown to affect our poop frequency and our consistency. Our hormone fluctuations, that affects our poop too. Anybody ever heard of period poops?

Stress, hormones, anxiety, depression, and other mood challenges can also affect the consistency and frequency of our poop.

23:58: It’s normal, it’s normal and natural for all women to experience this, even lack of sleep can affect your poops. So while we do get lots of information from looking at our poop, tracking our poop over time and being comfortable with the Bristol Stool Chart numbers and pictures, we also wanna be aware that the Bristol Stool Chart is not the end all be all, and we don’t want to use it to create a block that keeps us from believing that we’re in remission. Poop fluctuations are normal for everyone, and it doesn’t always mean that you’re in the middle of a Crohn’s or Colitis flare-up. I’ve heard about the same phenomenon with other clients, besides Jenny, it’s really quite common, clients that are having trouble seeing beyond the Bristol Stool Chart. Is the BSC holding you back? Is there a better answer out there? Is there a better way to keep track of your poop? Next time on The Cheeky Podcast for moms with IBD. I said that, and now I’m thinking about that serial podcast, do you guys know that podcast? If you haven’t listened to that one, it’s fascinating, it’s a murder mystery ride that always ends with something like, “Will the accused finally go free? Next time on Serial.”

25:16: I’m just channeling my favorite podcasts, I know I told you guys I’m a podcast junkie. Anyway, our next episode, let’s talk about Poop, Part Doo, will be as illuminating as this one. We’ll talk about a mom-friendly acronym that will come in handy when it comes to tracking your poop. I’ll tell you about the most awesome free resource available to help you track your symptoms and your poop, and if you’re new to talking about poop, I’ve got a challenge for you, and of course, we’ll talk about how you can do all this like a mom. Remember to check out the link in the show notes for that free copy of your Bristol Stool Chart. It’s a link for my favorite one. I know you’re gonna love it. I definitely think it will come in handy for you and for your doctor’s appointments.

26:04: Thank you so much for joining me today and for listening to today’s episode. When it comes to IBD, I know there’s a lot of resources out there, and I’m truly honored that you chose the Cheeky Podcast to get your IBD information today. If you found this information helpful, please give us a rating and review, it helps other moms find the podcast and see what we’re doing over here to help IBD moms everywhere.

Are you ready to take your gut healing to the next level?

26:29: And if you feel called to do it, share this podcast with an IBD mom who you know could really use an uplifting message today, ’cause that’s what we’re all about over here at the Cheeky Podcast. One last thing, if you’re still with me, and if you are, you’re definitely my kind of gal, we have to get to know each other better. If you’re tired of living on the hamster wheel of IBD with all the ups and downs between flares and remission, if you’re struggling to get control of your abdominal pain, gas, bloating, diarrhea and other troubling IBD symptoms, go to the website, it’s karynhaley.com, and my mom had to be just a little bit different to spell my name with a Y, so it’s K-A-R-Y-N H-A-L-E-Y.com, and schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you get your life back. It’s a power packed 30 minutes. You don’t have to live in IBD status quo. There’s so much that can be done to transform your life so you can thrive in motherhood and thrive with IBD. I’ve seen my clients walk this path, and it gives me so much joy to take that journey with them.

27:50: My entire coaching practice is run online, so you never have to leave your house and you never have to get out of your jammy or yoga pants for us to work together. You know I’m wearing them too. If you’re ready to take your first amazing step towards healing, I’m ready to chat with you. Schedule your free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session today at karynhaley.com. Click on the “work with me” tab and I’ll see you soon. It’s important to note that the information in this podcast and in this episode is for general information purposes only and not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice. The statements made in the Cheeky Podcast for moms with IBD, either by me or my guests, is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Before implementing any new treatment protocols, do yourself a favor and consult your physician first. Thank you so much for listening, for being here, for saving this space for us to spend some time together. Until we chat again, I’m wishing you a cheeky and healthy IBD journey.

Ep 2: The Upside of IBD

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We experience the downside of IBD daily— from the physical challenges with abdominal pain, bloating, gas, heartburn, diarrhea, joint pain… to the emotional impact with stress, anxiety, sadness, anger, frustration, annoyance… at this terrible disease that’s affected our lives so negatively.

But what if it wasn’t all negative energy? What if there was a upside to this unfortunate diagnosis? I believe there is. There are unexpected gifts I’ve received from having IBD and I know I wouldn’t have them without walking this IBD journey in life.

In this episode, we explore the positive impact IBD has had on our lives. When the struggle is real, day to day, and we’re in the middle of a flare up, we may want to bury ourselves in covers in our bed. We may feel we have no other choice, but to go to that dark place and never come out. But, if we open ourselves up to pulling the covers off, just a little so a glimmer of light shines in, we see all the beauty and incredible gifts we now possess—even through the darkest of days.

Come with me on a journey in episode #2 as we explore just how wonderful we IBD mamas are, in sickness and in health.

Episode at a Glance:

• [0:50] There’s a fatigue that comes when we can’t be there for our kids in the way that we really want to be, and all of this is important and it should never be swept under the rug because it’s so much a part of our life with IBD.

• [3:00] You can wrap yourself up in the darkness sometimes, but I’m going challenge you to not live there. That place can swallow you up whole and never let you out. When you open the covers just a little bit and you let just a little bit of that light come in, you can see all the gifts that IBD has given you.

• [5:15] It’s tough being an IBDer in this world and when someone shows you kindness, it rubs off on you, and then you spread that kindness out into the world. For all the suckiness of having Crohn’s or colitis, you are kind. And this makes you a better human.

• [6:08] I know that you’re more likely to engage in acts of service, and more likely to commit to causes you believe in. I may not have the scientific research to back me up here, but I definitely have the anecdotal data from my 10 years of working with mom clients who have IBD. For all the suckiness of having Crohn’s or colitis, you are full of commitment and service to others in need. This makes you a better human.

• [7:40] I know that you’re resilient, and you know how to put hard things in perspective. For all the suckiness of having Crohn’s or colitis, you are resilient, and you put hard things in perspective. This makes you a better human.

• [9:45] I saved the best for last. I know that because of the adversity you faced, you know how to savor life and you feel gratitude deeply. You know how to find peace, hope, and joy in the smallest of victories, in the smallest of moments. For all the suckiness of having Crohn’s or colitis, you savor life and you feel gratitude deeply. This makes you a better human.

• [10:56] So today, right now, I want you to do it like a mom. Soak in this pure moment of positivity. Feel proud of yourself. Step away from the negativity, the pain, the suffering, the struggle. I know you have it, but just for one moment, just step away for one moment.

• [14:01] One last thing, if you’re still with me, and if you are, you’re definitely my kind of girl, we have to get to know each other better. Go to karynhaley.com, and schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you get your life back. It’s a power-packed 30 minutes.

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The Upside of IBD

00:05 INTRO: You are listening to The Cheeky Podcast for Moms with IBD, a safe space for moms with Crohn’s and colitis to connect, explore powerful tools for healing, and transform our lives to thrive in motherhood and in life. I’m your host, Karyn Haley, IBD health coach, integrative wellness enthusiast, and mom to three outstanding kids. After having Crohn’s disease for 30 years and working as a health advocate exclusively with IBD clients for the last 10 years, I know it’s time to bring the types of candid conversations I have with my clients out into the open. It’s our time to go on an IBD healing journey and do it like only a mom can… Let’s do this.

[music]

00:50 KARYN: Well, hey there, IBD mama. so happy to connect with you today. I’ve just gotta tell you, I can’t think of a better topic to officially kick off your healing IBD journey. And with our topic for today’s episode, it really is gonna set the tone for this podcast and hopefully, for your life, because if you’re anything like me, you get sick and tired of all the negativity surrounding us every day when we have IBD. I know, we have got pain, we have awful bloating and gas, and there’s multiple trips to the bathroom. There’s fatigue and the guilt that comes with it, when we can’t be there for our kids in the way that we really want to be, and all of this is important and it should never be swept under the rug because it’s so much a part of our life with IBD.

01:42: And in other episodes, we’re gonna go there. I promise you, we will go there, but not today. Today is the day. Today is the day we set the dial to positivity and seeking out what is possible. It’s all about celebrating who we are and the complete package of who we are, from every angle. Let me put it to you this way, ’cause this is how it makes sense to me. When I think about those crappy one-dimensional characters in a bad movie, I know that you know what I’m talking about because you suffered through those kind of movies before, just like me.

02:20: We know that in real life, people aren’t one-dimensional like that. We might even find ourselves, like I have before, screaming at the screen saying, nobody is like that in real life. There’s more to this character, just like those artificial movie characters. No one really is that one-dimensional, and to characterize ourselves just as IBD sufferers, it’s frankly, and honestly, it’s not fair to the extraordinary people that we are. There is more to us, and today, we’re gonna talk about and embrace and celebrate the positive and strong side of each of us.

You can wrap yourself up in the darkness sometimes, but I’m going challenge you to not live there.

03:00: This amazing side of us that I’m talking about, the side that shines in the sun, is none other than what I like to call the upside of IBD. Think there’s no upside? I know. Some days, I feel that way too, but if you give me just a few minutes today, I promise, I’m gonna convince you that there is an upside to being diagnosed with this chronic illness. I’m willing to bet that even though right now, there might seem like there’s a lot of down days for you, as you search for answers, and sometimes, we have to embrace those days. I embrace them too. You can wrap yourself up in the darkness sometimes, but I’m gonna challenge you to not live there. That place can swallow you up whole and never let you out. When you open the covers just a little bit and you let just a little bit of that light come in, you can see all the gifts that IBD has given you.

Empathy is a way of life for you.

04:04: Let me ask you a question. Do you have empathy? In a world full of selfies and curated social media and cancel culture, I bet because of your illness, and you can see things from someone else’s point of view, I’m willing to bet that you feel for others who are in pain, or suffering more deeply. Whenever I’m in a conversation with a girlfriend and they are telling me about a friend or a family member dealing with cancer or a divorce, or their kid has some sort of challenge like an illness, the feeling of empathy comes really easily to me. I can easily put myself in their shoes because I know what it’s like to feel emotional and physical pain too. For all the sucky-ness of having Crohn’s or colitis, having killer empathy that makes you a superior friend, spouse, daughter, sister, it’s an upside of having IBD. You’re the one people come to because they know you’ll understand.

You are kind and compassionate.

05:15: You may not be walking in their shoes, but you understand the size, the color, the fit, and the feel of their shoes. Try this one on for size. I might not know you personally, but, I bet I know you’re kind. I bet, I know you’re the kind of person, people say, “Oh, Sheila… She’s so kind. She’s always thinking of others.” You know how much someone’s kindness means to you. The doctor who went out of their way to spend a few extra minutes with you on a day when you were having a hard time, the stranger who let you cut in line in the bathroom because you really had to go. It’s tough being an IBD-er in this world and when someone shows you kindness, it rubs off on you, and then you spread that kindness out into the world.

06:08: Now, I’m not talking about that syrupy, sweet saccharin kind of kindness, or even the Mother Teresa kind of kindness, but you’re kind… In general, you’re kind. I know that about you. For all the suckiness of having Crohn’s or colitis, you are kind. And this makes you a better human. What else do I know about you? I know that you’re more likely to engage in acts of service, and more likely to commit to causes you believe in. I may not have the scientific research to back me up here, but I definitely have the anecdotal data from my 10 years of working with mom clients who have IBD. time and time again, You amaze and inspire me with your grace, your compassion for others, and your commitment to make all lives better.

You’re committed to people and causes you believe in.

07:00: Take Rose. She’s a current client of mine who’s using the specific carbohydrate diet to get her ulcerative colitis in remission. Every time we chat, she makes my heart melt, telling me about the foster dogs that she’s taking care of. Rose knows that I’m also a dog lover, and she texts me pictures of her rescue pups. Rose is giving back, even though, as we know, she has her own challenges in life. For all the suckiness of having Crohn’s or colitis, you are full of commitment and service to others in need. This makes you a better human.

You’re resilience and perspective on hard challenges is inspiring.

07:40: I know that you’re resilient, and you know how to put hard things in perspective. Take COVID, quarantining, and this unexpected home schooling situation. I bet, just thinking about the chaos it created makes you wanna pull your hair out or cry. Lord knows I’ve done both of those things. All of this definitely threw me for a loop for a beat. In the beginning, I was afraid to have anyone leave the house. I was afraid to bring anything into the house, even groceries or take out food or shoes. How crazy is that, right? The kids would want to bring their shoes into the house. They would into their house with shoes, walk into our house with shoes on their feet, and I would get all freaked out, “Oh, maybe there’s a germ on them, leave them outside.”

08:29: In the beginning, we were all dealing. We were all reeling and we just had to keep our head above water, right? But look at me now, because I have already had to be resilient and put things into perspective with Crohn’s. I’ve already done it with that. I’ve realized that although Coronavirus is still stressful at times, I’m okay. I’ve learned that with a little bit of effort, our family, even a family with usually annoying teenagers, we can actually become closer. We can rely on each other and even help each other out sometimes. It’s definitely not perfect. I gotta be honest here and tell you that my house isn’t as clean as it used to be, and I might see the kids in the same clothes day after day. And my hubby and I, we still can’t find time for a quiet moment together, but… It’s okay. I know, just like a bad IBD flare, this too shall pass. For all the suckiness of having Crohn’s or colitis, you are resilient, and you put hard things in perspective. This makes you a better human.

Savoring life is your secret special sauce.

09:45: There’s one last thing. One last thing about you and I saved the best for last. I know that because of the adversity you faced, you know how to savor life and you feel gratitude deeply. You know how to find peace, hope, and joy in the smallest of victories, in the smallest of moments. Making it to watch your son at the school play when you didn’t know if you were up for it, a moment of peace where you drink a cup of tea in solitude for a whole five minutes without the kids busting in on you, a knowing smile between you and your partner. With just one book, it tells you that everything’s gonna be okay. These small moments are moments that take, many take for granted, but not you. You know just how fragile health can be. You appreciate the good moments. You savor them, take them into your heart and soul, and remember them when time gets tough.

10:56: By now, you know the mantra. Say it with me, ladies. For all the suckiness of having Crohn’s or colitis, you savor life and you feel gratitude deeply. This makes you a better human. Would you have these gifts if you didn’t have inflammatory bowel disease? Maybe, probably to some extent, but would they be as honed and is deeply felt? Would you be as empathetic, kind, committed to others, and resilient? Would you savor life, feel gratitude as deeply? Would you hold your loved one so close to your heart? I’m betting not. And that’s what makes you a better human. So today, right now, I want you to do it like a mom. Soak in this pure moment of positivity. Feel proud of yourself. Step away from the negativity, the pain, the suffering, the struggle. I know you have it, but just for one moment, just step away for one moment.

Do it like a mom.

12:07: Put your right hand on your heart and your left hand on your belly. Remember, I know a lot of people like to listen to podcasts in the car, so not if you’re driving, but if you have your hands free and you’re able to, right hand on your heart, left hand on your belly. Take a deep breath in with me through your nose. Hold it briefly, and then let it out with the sigh. As you let that breath go, I want you to think about one thing you’re grateful for today. You’ve got this. You’re already one step ahead because you’re a better human. I’m honored to be with you. I’m honored to be with you on this journey, Mama, because you are one great human. I just have to tell you today, you’re one great human. Remember, we’re all imperfect. We’re all imperfect humans, whether we have IBD or not, but having IBD makes you a stronger, more powerful, insightful, generous woman. You’ve got this.

13:23: Thank you so much for joining me today and for listening to today’s episode. When it comes to IBD, I know there’s a lot of resources out there, and I’m truly honored that you chose the Cheeky Podcast to get your IBD information today. If you found this information helpful, please give us a rating and review. It helps other moms find the podcast and see what we’re doing over here to help IBD moms everywhere. And if you feel called to do it, share this podcast with an IBD mom who you know could really use an uplifting message today, ’cause that’s what we’re all about over here at the Cheeky Podcast.

Are you ready to take your gut healing journey to the next level?

14:01: One last thing, if you’re still with me. And if you are, you’re definitely my kinda gal, we have to get to know each other better. If you’re tired of living on the hamster wheel of IBD with all the ups and downs between players in remission, if you’re struggling to get control of your abdominal pain, gas, bloating, diarrhea and other troubling IBD symptoms, go over to the website, it’s Karynhaley.com, and my mom had to be just a little bit different, spelled my name with a Y. So it’s K-A-R-Y-N-H-A-L-E-Y dot com. Karynhaley.com and schedule your very own free 30 minutes IBD Root Cause Troubleshooting session with me, where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you get your life back.

14:50: It’s a power-packed 30 minutes. You don’t have to live in IBD status quo. There’s so much that can be done to transform your life so you can thrive in motherhood and thrive with IBD. I’ve seen my clients walk this path and it gives me so much joy to take that journey with them. My entire coaching practice is run online, so you never have to leave your house and you never have to get out of your jammy or yoga pants for us to work together. You know I’m wearing them too. If you’re ready to take your first amazing step towards healing, I’m ready to chat with you. Schedule your free 30-minute IBD Root Cause Troubleshooting sesh today at Karynhaley.com. Click on the work with me tab and I’ll see you soon. 15:37: It’s important to note that the information in this podcast and in this episode is for general information purposes only and not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice. The statements made in the Cheeky podcast for moms with IBD, either by me or my guests, is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Before implementing any new treatment protocols, do yourself a favor and consult your physician first. Thank you so much for listening, for being here, for saving this space for us to spend some time together. Until we chat again, I’m wishing you a cheeky and healthy IBD journey

Ep 1: What’s Your Why?

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This is exciting. A podcast. A dream come true.

Do you have Crohn’s or colitis?

Are you a mom?

Do you want to get your IBD into remission so you can thrive in motherhood and thrive in life?

Heck yeah…

Well then, welcome to the Cheeky Podcast for Moms with IBD, a safe space where moms with IBD connect, explore powerful tools for healing, and transform our lives so we can say goodbye to the struggle of IBD and hello to symptom free living.

In this introductory episode, we explore the why behind the podcast and the why behind your healing journey. There’s many reasons why you might want to be free from the shackles of IBD and many reasons why taking your life back is your #1 priority. They’re all good reasons—no preconceived notions and no judgement. Wait until I tell you my why! Perhaps you can relate.

If you’ve been struggling to get your IBD under control, check out this episode. Be ready for a little introspection and a whole lota self love.

Episode at a Glance:

• [2:00] Learn how to carve out your own healing path, by keeping healthy by whatever means necessary, whether it’s finding a gut healing diet that works for you, making positive lifestyle changes using mindset techniques or only using medication when it’s absolutely necessary, is the key to find your health and a  balance in your life.

• [5:18] The power that comes when you know your body so well that no matter what provider you allow into your sacred health space, you come to the table as partners, partners on your healing journey.

• [7:50] What’s your why? Why do you want heal your IBD? There’s no judgment here. If I can admit that my why is me, you can allow yourself a safe space to be true to your why too. And whether you get crystal clear on it today or you need some time to let it marinate, it’s all good, mama.

• [9:00] The Cheeky Podcast for Moms with IBD is your safe space to finally find a tribe of moms who are just like you. We’ll laugh, we’ll cry, we’ll be honest, raw and real, and above all, we’re going take this journey together, and we’ll explore ways we can heal, and we’ll put the power back into our hands, and we’re going do it like only a mom can.

• [10:04] One last thing, if you’re still with me, and if you are, you’re definitely my kind of girl, we have to get to know each other better. Go to karynhaley.com, and schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you get your life back. It’s a power-packed 30 minutes.

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What’s Your Why?

[music]

00:05 INTRO You’re listening to The Cheeky Podcast for moms with IBD, a safe space for moms with Crohn’s and colitis connect, explore powerful tools for healing and transform our lives to thrive in motherhood and in life. I’m your host, Karyn Haley, IBD health coach, integrative wellness enthusiast and mom to three outstanding kids. After having Crohn’s disease for 30 years and working as a health advocate exclusively with IBD clients for the last 10 years, I know it’s time to bring the types of candid conversations I have with my clients out into the open. It’s our time to go on an IBD healing journey and do it like only a mom can. Let’s do this.

[music]

00:51 KARYN Well, hey, hey there mom friend, and welcome to the very first episode of The Cheeky Podcast for Moms with IBD. How cool is this? I’ve been a podcast junkie for as long as I can remember, so it’s really a thrill to bring this podcast to you, especially in a topic that’s nearest and dearest to my heart. I honestly don’t know where this endeavor is gonna take us, but one thing’s certain, we’re gonna take this journey together. What could possibly be wrong with that? Now, when it comes to Inflammatory Bowel Disease, I’ve gotta tell you girlfriend, I have been through all the highs and the lows on this roller coaster of sickness and health. From my first 20 years with Crohn’s, with every anti-inflammatory and immune modulating medication you can imagine just being thrown at me to see what worked, almost like if you can imagine this, throwing cooked spaghetti on a wall to see what type of noodle sticks best. Spoiler alert, not a single one of those worked.

Carve out the healing path that works for you.

02:00: That first 20 years also left me enduring multiple surgeries to remove portions of my small intestine while I continued to do everything my doctor told me to do. Let’s contrast that with the last 12 years where I finally learned how to carve out my own healing path, where I kept healthy by whatever means necessary, whether it’s finding a gut healing diet that works for me, making positive lifestyle changes using mindset techniques or only using medication when it’s absolutely necessary, I found a healthy balance between all of these modalities that tend to work for me. And I still remember, I still remember that fateful day, that day that changed everything for me when my gastroenterologist… That’s a hard one to say. When my gastroenterologist, who I trusted with my life, when she told me, “There’s nothing else I can do for you.”

03:02: Have you had a moment like that with your doctor before where the news is just so abrupt and so decidedly negative? If you’re listening to this podcast, I’m betting you know that moment well. It’s full of feelings of being discouraged, and defeated, and dejected, and in that moment, in that moment, I felt all those things for about 30 minutes. And after 30 minutes, my vision, it all of a sudden it got clear, it was almost like a blurry camera lens you look through and it suddenly finds its focus. I know that if… I know, you know what I’m talking about there, it finds its focus instantaneously, and it was instantaneous that moment. In that moment, there was an absolute clarity, there was an absolute clarity where I decided that never again, never again would I be uneducated about my illness. I would never again work with a medical provider where they were the all knowing guru on high, the only one that had the power.

04:11: I would never again be little Miss, “do whatever you’re told.” And if I’m being totally honest with you… Totally honest here, the truth is that it really wasn’t the doctor’s fault, not really. They were just following their own Hippocratic Oath as a doctor, they were trying to help me in the best way that they knew how, but in that moment, I realized that this model, it would no longer work for me, the doctor on high and the patient is the royal subject, I knew that if I was gonna claw and crawl my way out of this illness and be able to thrive in life, in life, I was gonna thrive in life, I would have to take the control back, I’d have to take control of the wheel, I would have to put myself in charge of my own fate, I would have to flip the switch and come to my doctor’s appointments with knowledge about IBD, with a deeper understanding of how healing actually works, not sickness, but healing, how healing works.

Becoming partners with your health care provider, instead of giving away your power, will set you free.

05:18: And most importantly, with power, the power that comes when you know your body so well that no matter what provider you allow into your sacred health space, you come to the table as partners, partners on your healing journey. Even in the last 12 years that have mostly been positive for me in terms of IBD remission, there have been some challenging times as well. I’ve heard of people who heal their Crohn’s or their colitis and never looked back, for better or worse, that’s not me. Getting my IBD in check is a 24/7 job, and most of the time, I thrive, and sometimes I falter. Through it all though, I never give up, never, because 12 years ago, I got clear on my why and my why was me, my future, and the life vision I had for myself, and it didn’t include me being at the mercy of this invisible illness.

06:24: Now, as a mom, I know you might think that my why is selfish, having a why that’s me, especially when we’re moms, we’re taught that everyone comes before us and oh, the guilt that we feel when we put ourselves first, but when I finally realized my why was me, my health and my life, I realized that when I took the time to empower myself, educate myself, support myself with the rest I needed when I needed it, and change… Pretty much changed the trajectory of my healing journey, when I did that, then I could give my best self to those around me, taking the power back, empowering myself, choosing me as my why on this healing journey, it gave me the strength to be the best version that I could be, the best me that I could be, and by being the best me, it makes me a better mom and a better wife, sister, daughter, friend, worker, advocate, human, on this journey of life. So while you’re listening to my story and this introductory episode of The Cheeky Podcast for Moms, my hope is that my why plants a seed for you to start thinking about your why.

Be honest with yourself– what’s your why?

07:50: What’s your why? Why do you wanna heal your IBD? There’s no judgment here. If I did admit that my why is me, you can allow yourself a safe space to be true to your why too. And whether you get crystal clear on it today or you need some time to let it marinate, it’s all good, mama. It’s all good. It took me 20 years literally, to finally figure out my why, and I know that it won’t take you that long. If what I’ve been talking about today resonates with you, you’re gonna love this podcast, it’s all about helping you find the power, the knowledge and the support that only a mom can give. As we go on this IBD healing journey together. We’ll dive deep into the pros and the cons of all the gut healing diets, we’re gonna get real on lifestyle changes that actually work to calm your symptoms, we’ll explore our mindset and our beliefs and how they impact our illness, and we’re gonna do it all through the lens of a mom. The Cheeky Podcast for Moms with IBD is your safe space to finally find a tribe of moms who are just like you. We’ll laugh, we’ll cry, we’ll be honest, raw and real, and above all, we’re gonna take this journey together, and we’ll explore ways we can heal, and we’ll put the power back into our hands, and we’re gonna do it like only a mom can.

09:26: Thank you so much for joining me today and for listening to today’s episode, when it comes to IBD, I know there’s a lot of resources out there, and I’m truly honored that you chose the The Cheeky Podcast to get your IBD information today. If you found this information helpful, please give us a rating and review, it helps other moms find the podcast and see what we’re doing over here to help IBD moms everywhere. And if you feel called to do it, share this podcast with an IBD mom who you know could really use an uplifting message today, ’cause that’s what we’re all about over here at the The Cheeky Podcast.

Are you ready to take your healing journey to the next level?

[music]

10:04: One last thing, if you’re still with me, and if you are, you’re definitely my kinda girl, we have to get to know each other better. If you’re tired of living on the hamster wheel of IBD with all the ups and downs between players and remission, if you’re struggling to get control of your abdominal pain, gas, bloating, diarrhea, and other troubling IBD symptoms, go to the website, it’s karynhaley.com, and my mom had to be just a little bit different, spelled my name with a Y, so it’s K-A-R-Y-N-H-A-L-E-Y.com, and schedule your very own free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting session with me where we discuss the challenges you’ve been having, we set goals to help you move forward, and we talk about how we can work together to help you get your life back. It’s a power-packed 30 minutes. You don’t have to live in IBD status quo, there’s so much that can be done to transform your life so you can thrive in motherhood and thrive with IBD. I’ve seen my clients walk this path and it gives me so much joy to take that journey with them.

11:11: My entire coaching practice is run online, so you never have to leave your house and you never have to get out of your jam and your yoga pants for us to work together. You know I’m wearing them too. If you’re ready to take your first amazing step towards healing, I’m ready to chat with you. Schedule your free 30-minute IBD root cause troubleshooting sesh today at karynhaley.com. Click on the Work With Me tab, and I’ll see you soon. It’s important to note that the information in this podcast and in this episode is for general information purposes only and not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice. The statements made in the The Cheeky Podcast for moms with IBD, either by me or my guests, is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease. Before implementing any new treatment protocols, do yourself a favor and consult your physician first. Thank you so much for listening, for being here, for saving this space for us to spend some time together until we chat again, I’m wishing you a cheeky and healthy IBD journey.

Is overwhelm holding you back from starting the Specific Carbohydrate Diet? Let’s change that today!

Have you thought about using a more natural approach to quiet your gut challenges?

Have you been dragging your heels on starting the SCD because you just don’t have the support you need to be successful?

Have your gut symptoms got to the point where you feel like you’ve run out of options?

If you’re shouting YES! to one or more of these questions, I’ve got a new video I made with you in mind. It’s all about helping you decide if the Specific Carbohydrate Diet is the eating plan for you.If you’re just starting out on the SCD or if you’re on the SCD fence, this is going to help you move forward on your gut healing journey.

Continue reading

SCD Veterans Spill the Beans: What Every Mom Should Know Before Starting the Specific Carbohydrate Diet

Why do we scour the internet when we want to know how to do something?

We search for things like “heal IBD naturally” or “what is the Specific Carbohydrate Diet”…

Or “how to remove turmeric from my carpet”—Yep, just searched for this one yesterday after an unfortunate spilling incident of my simply delicious morning detox drink… and no, I still haven’t gotten it out so if you have any ideas, send them my way.

We search the internet to find answers for the same reason we seek out the advice of wise friends and confidants.

We seek out information like this because we want to learn from people who’ve come before us.  We want to soak in their knowledge and benefit from their experience, right?

I’m a HUGE fan of all the unsung heros in my life.  Most of them don’t even know I exist, but their insights and knowledge have affected me greatly.  In all honesty, if it wasn’t for these wise and wonderful teachers, I don’t know where I’d be.

Getting the benefit of someone who’s come before you can cut  down on– 

• Wasted time trying to figure out your next steps.
• All the errors we make along the way.
• Feeling lost and stressed and alone. 

Win. Win. Win.

If you were to ask me what I want more than anything for you, I’d tell you it’s this.  I want to cut out all the hassle and wasted time for you.  I want to cut out the stress and heartache that comes with taking 20 years to find your way.  Trust me, I know this all too well. I’d tell you that I want you to get to the finish line that much quicker than I did.

So– with your speedy and stress-less healing in mind, I recently went straight to the SCD source.  

Continue reading

Afraid to Travel: You Don’t Have to Ditch Your Travel Plans When You Have IBD

Sometimes I want to curl up in a ball and head to bed when the word “travel” comes up.

Have you ever felt this way?

It’s just such a headache no matter which stage of IBD you’re in.

I remember back to my first 20 years with Crohn’s when I didn’t want to travel because I knew that no matter where we went, I’d spend more time in the bathroom than looking at the sights.  And now, even 10 years into using food, lifestyle and supplements to quiet my symptoms, I still get the occasional uugghhh feeling when it comes to travel because I know all that goes into making travel a successful experience.  But now, instead of all that dread about finding bathrooms, my dread is all about…

• Where can I buy the food I need away from home?
• Where do I stay that has a place for me to refrigerate and cook my food?
• Do I have all my food packed for the trip?
• What will I do if I get there and I forgot something or can’t get the food I need at a local grocery store? 

But here’s the thing—I never want you to think you can’t commit to an IBD eating plan (like gluten free, dairy free or even grain free like the SCD) because you won’t be able to travel anymore.

Hell to the no, girlfriend!

You can still travel.

You can still live out your bucket list of dream destinations.

I’m proof positive that it can work.  I’ve done it many times over the years and I know you can too.

And best of all, you’ll be healthy, happy and bathroom free (at least as much as everyone else) while you’re away.

Sound good? Awesome, let’s start this convo—

Continue reading

Crohn’s, Colitis and Comfort Food: The #1 Food You’re Only Eating Once a Year, but Should be Eating Year-Round

 

*Hey busy mama? Want the audio version of the blog intro? Click HERE to listen on-the-go. Then go straight to the video.*

Comfort Food.

What feelings come to mind when you hear this phrase Comfort Food?

• Warmth
• Happiness
• Feeling good all over
• Cozy
• Relaxed
• Sinfully delicious
• Blissful food coma

And of course… comfort.

Comfort food is, well in a word—comfortable.  It’s like that old, but much-loved sweater.  It just feels good when you put it on.

I used to be addicted to the standard American diet comfort food.  French bread, my nana’s pasta, white rice, mashed potatoes with gravy, mac and cheese…  I thought these foods were comforting my belly when my IBD flared.  And the truth is, they did feel awfully good going down.  They’re rich and gooey, creamy and delicious. But what I didn’t find out until 20 years into my struggle with Crohn’s is that all these supposed comfort foods are ENORMOUS gut disruptors, not gut comforters.

As these starchy delights digest in your achy belly, they create a sugar-filled environment.  And guess what all those lovely bacterial, creepy, crawly, critters in your gut love to feed on to multiply?

Continue reading

The Crohn’s/Colitis Vitamin D Connection: The What, Why and How of This Gut Healthy Vitamin

Why should Vitamin D matter to you, dear mom friend?

Sure, Vitamin D is the “it” vitamin these days.  Many practitioners are talking about the link between vitamin D and pretty much everything from colds to cancer.

But besides the general health benefits of Vitamin D, why do we—moms with Crohn’s and colitis—need to sit up and take close notice of this powerful vitamin?

Well, it turns out that “everything from colds to cancer” includes a HUGE effect on our Crohn’s and colitis.

If you’ve been around our free and fabulous Gut Love Community for a while, you know I love to bury my nose in research to sift through the goodness and the crap (and there are a lot of crappy studies out there paid for by big pharma and special interest groups) to come out the other side with solid, real, unbiased facts.

Because of this love affair our medical community is having with Vitamin D, I decided it was time to dig into the research to find out for myself if there’s a connection between our illness and our D levels.

Continue reading

In Sickness and Health: The Impact of Crohn’s and Colitis on Our Kids

Have you ever wondered how your kid’s life might be different if you didn’t have a chronic illness?

• Would they be better adjusted?
• Would they be happier?
• Would their life be easier?

I wonder these same things all the time, but the truth is, an unaffected childhood isn’t my kids lot in life and it isn’t your kids either.

I’d venture to say that if your child had a choice, they wouldn’t have raised their hand to say, “Yes, please, please, can my mom have an incurable chronic illness?”  What kid would?

Continue reading

5 Eating Plans Worth Trying to Help Quiet Your Crohn’s and Colitis

 

 

 

 

 

Who has the magic pill?

The one that cures Crohn’s and colitis.

If you’re out there with it, please, pretty please, send it my way.  There really isn’t much I wouldn’t do for a cure. How about you?

Continue reading

Want to Conquer your Crohn’s and Colitis Symptoms Naturally? Here’s your ONE and ONLY starting place

How many times have you said to yourself, “I’m ready for a natural approach to help quiet my Crohn’s or colitis, but I just don’t know where to start.”

If I had a nickel for every time I said that to myself, I think I’d be a millionaire. I probably said it for close to 10 years before I finally did something about my debilitating Crohn’s Disease.

Or how about these obstacles:

There’s just WAY too many options.
What if they don’t work?
What if I get worse?

And the confusion goes on and on and on…

But what if I told you that no matter what eating plan you choose, like going gluten free or Paleo or the Specific Carbohydrate Diet, or supplements you decide to take, or meditation, yoga, Pilates or whatever the next big healing treatment is out there…

Whatever natural approach you choose, there’s really only ONE place to start. Only one full-proof method and if you use it right, it will take away all the confusion, fear and guesswork out of the “where do I start” syndrome we are all too familiar with.

Check out my latest gut healing video to find out all about how you have the power to take your health back. And I’ve got your first, fool-proof step right here.

Continue reading

Quick Gut Healing Wins for Crohn’s and Colitis

Oh, the New Year’s resolutions!  They’re flying around everywhere.  Can you see them?

• Lose Weight
• Gain Weight
• Manage Stress
• Be Mindful
• Exercise More
• Relax More
• Eat Less

It’s a yo-yo of more or less isn’t it?

And if you’ve got Crohn’s or Colitis, I bet at least one of those resolutions you made is to quiet your gut struggles.

But gut healing takes time. It takes patience.  It takes perseverance and lots and lots of trial and error. Yes, true gut healing takes time.  We’ll get there mom friend.  I promise you. Don’t forget, 2018 is your year of healing.

But here’s the thing and I know it to be true because I’ve been there too…

You want to feel better NOW.

I want you to feel better now.

That’s why even though I know you’re going to be working enormously hard this year on true and lasting healing, I still want to give you some “out of the gate” feel better right now tools.

I’ve come up with 7 things you can start today to give your gut some much needed relief.

Continue reading

Ditch the Holiday Flare-Up: 9 Weird Ways to Reduce Holiday Stress

Why do we always accept that a flare-up is inevitable during the holiday season?  We rush and we stress and we give up sleep and we hurry to get everything done.  A holiday Crohn’s or Colitis flare-up is just par for the course, right?

Like all good moms, we read books, spend countless hours online searching for answers and talk to our friends about how to get through the holidays with an ounce of sanity and a healthy gut. We hear the answers loud and clear…take up yoga, learn to meditate, use stress management techniques.

But what if you’re like most moms and you don’t have time to learn a new coping skill during the holiday hustle and bustle?

Well, get ready to enjoy the holidays without the inevitable flare-up because I’ve got you covered.

I’m going to share with you some unusual tips and techniques that will actually do a number on the stress circuit going round and round in your body and it has nothing to do with meditation or yoga.  In fact, you don’t have to learn a new skill at all AND I’m going to show you that it doesn’t even take a ton of time to say goodbye to the holiday stress flare-up.

So, what’s the secret to getting rid of the holiday manic-panic attack that always makes our gut struggles flare? Read on to find out.

Continue reading

5 Reasons Why Gluten Free Doesn’t Work and What to do Instead

Have you given the gluten free eating plan your best effort and still feel like you’ve come up short?

• Maybe your gut pain is still there.
• Maybe your diarrhea hasn’t gone away.
• Maybe there’s just something off, but you can’t figure out what it is.

You’re not alone.

This happens much more than most of us realize.  It might seem like everyone’s jumping on the gluten free bandwagon and it’s going like gangbusters for them, but the truth is, there’s a lot of confused mamas out there wondering if the gluten free bandwagon is for everyone but them.

Well, listen up because I’ve got some good news for you.

I know why gluten free isn’t working like you’d hoped and today, I’m going to share with you why. Continue reading

What the Heck is Dry Curd Cottage Cheese and What Do I Do With It?

Dry Curd Cottage Cheese.

What?

If you are just starting out on the Specific Carbohydrate Diet or you are thinking of trying this eating plan to help quiet your Crohn’s or Colitis, you’ve likely heard of Dry Curd Cottage Cheese.  It’s an important part of the SCD, but it’s probably one of the most confusing parts as well.

What the heck is DCCC and what do I do with it? That’s probably the #1 question I get when it comes to the SCD.

In this Gut Love Live Sesh, we continue our SCD Made Simple: Cooking for Summer Series by not only answering this question, but also showing you how to bake an SCD staple: DCCC

In this video, we cover:

• What is Dry Curd Cottage Cheese?
• Why is it on the Specific Carbohydrate Diet?
• Where do I buy it?
• What do I do with it?
• Plus, we’ll make one of my favorite DCCC recipes from start to finish

Grab a cup of tea, take a break from the kids and join me as we get some mom time to laugh, cry and support each other on our gut struggle journey.

 

Q and A Book Giveaway: Your Top IBD Questions Answered

IBD is confusing.

And there’s just not enough time in the doctor’s office to get all your questions answered. So, you sit and wait and wonder and more questions come and more confusion sets in.

That’s why I created an opportunity for you to get some of those questions answered.  It’s called Q and A Book Giveaway and I am so excited to share our first Q and A sesh with you.

I reached out on Facebook and Instagram and asked you, “What are your top questions about IBD?”

Wow, your Q’s really surprised me.

They were raw and insightful and super juicy.

Best of all, they were questions that everyone has. I know because I’ve had the same ones in my 30 years with Crohn’s disease.

Plus, as a bonus on this video, I gave away one of my favorite books: Managing IBD: A Balanced Guide to Inflammatory Bowel Disease by Jenna Farmer.  She wrote a fantastic book on IBD and I just had to give it to one lucky Gut Lovin’ Mama.

Check out this latest Gut Love Live Video Sesh.  We cover a lot of ground.

Here’s what we talk about:

• How do I talk to my significant other about my bathroom issues?
• What’s the #1 thing, besides diet, that you recommend for a healthy gut?
• How does IBD affect your mood through anxiety and depression?
• What are the best foods to eat to help your gut and your immune system?
• Plus, we also talk about the power of sleep in healing your gut
• And my Health Psychologist hubby joins us as we get to the bottom on the emotional side of IBD

Grab a cup of tea, take a break from the kids and join me as we get some mom time to laugh, cry and support each other on our gut struggle journey.

Did you like this video? If these gut healing tips were valuable for you, why not make it a habit?

Join other moms working to balance motherhood with gut struggles in our Gut Love Community for Moms.

http://www.glutenfreedomformoms.com/gutlovecommunity/

It’s a private and priceless (free free free) place for you mom friend, when you’re ready to move beyond medicine and get support and encouragement on your journey to be the mom you always dreamed you’d be!

The Gut Love Community offers a place for you to:

• Share with other moms who actually get what it’s like to be a mom with gut struggles
• Get access to free master classes and specials only offered in our community
• Discover gut healing recipes that the whole family will enjoy
• Get your burning questions answered on how to best heal naturally from chronic gut issues like Crohn’s, Colitis and IBS.

http://www.glutenfreedomformoms.com/gutlovecommunity/

See you in the community!!

 

 

7 Must-Do Steps to End Your Gut Struggles: Part III

It’s Part III in my 3-part video series: 7 Must-Do Steps to End your Gut Struggles.

Didn’t watch Part I and Part II? No worries! These are stand alone videos.  BUT, you’ll definitely want to go back and check out Part I and II when you have some mom time. It will give you even more great tips to quiet your gut issues like Crohn’s, Colitis, IBS , chronic diarrhea or constipation.

Grab a cup of tea or a glass of wine and take a load off with me as we discuss all things GUT HEALTH.

In this video, we’ll cover:

• The best way to form a new gut healing habit
• Why gut healing tips you’ve heard before are not rocket science, but still hard to make stick
• How knowledge and willpower are just the tip of the behavior change iceberg
• What teaching your kids gratitude has to to with your own gut health
• How to use your thoughts and feelings to manifest your healthy future
• Why jumping on the gluten freedom train will be the best trip you ever took
• How baby steps are actually tailor-made for mamas

Did you like this video? If these gut healing tips were valuable for you, why not make it a habit?

Join other moms working to balance motherhood with gut struggles in our Gut Love Community for Moms.

http://www.glutenfreedomformoms.com/gutlovecommunity/

It’s a private and priceless (free free free) place for you mom friend, when you’re ready to move beyond medicine and get support and encouragement on your journey to be the mom you always dreamed you’d be!

The Gut Love Community offers a place for you to:

• Share with other moms who actually get what it’s like to be a mom with gut struggles
• Get access to free master classes and specials only offered in our community
• Discover gut healing recipes that the whole family will enjoy
• Get your burning questions answered on how to best heal naturally from chronic gut issues like Crohn’s, Colitis and IBS.

http://www.glutenfreedomformoms.com/gutlovecommunity/

See you in the community!!

 

 

7 Must-Do Steps to End Your Gut Struggles: Part II

It’s Part II in my 3-part video series: 7 Must-Do Steps to End your Gut Struggles.

Didn’t watch Part I? No worries! These are stand alone videos.  BUT, you’ll definitely want to go back and check out Part I when you have some “mom time”.  It will give you even more great tips to quiet your gut issues like Crohn’s, Colitis, IBS , chronic diarrhea or constipation.

Grab a cup of tea and take a load off with me as we discuss all things GUT HEALTH.

In this video, we’ll cover:

• why we have to give ourselves a break when we are making big changes
• how a food journal can be your ultimate guide to gut healing
• why the saying “you are what you eat” is so wrong, wrong, wrong
• how to “Do it Like a Mom” when it comes to gut health
• why 5th graders may be the key to knowing what’s healthy and what’s not
• why I’m cringing and you’ll also get to meet my new little furry friend!

Did you like this video? If these gut healing tips were valuable for you, why not make it a habit?

Join other moms working to balance motherhood with gut struggles in our Gut Love Community for Moms.

http://www.glutenfreedomformoms.com/gutlovecommunity/

It’s a private and priceless (free free free) place for you mom friend, when you’re ready to move beyond medicine and get support and encouragement on your journey to be the mom you always dreamed you’d be!

The Gut Love Community offers a place for you to:

• Share with other moms who actually get what it’s like to be a mom with gut struggles
• Get access to free master classes and specials only offered in our community
• Discover gut healing recipes that the whole family will enjoy
• Get your burning questions answered on how to best heal naturally from chronic gut issues like Crohn’s, Colitis and IBS.

http://www.glutenfreedomformoms.com/gutlovecommunity/

See you in the community!!

 

How to Make SCD Legal Yogurt: Your Quick and Easy Guide to Get Started Today

Are you ready to try SCD or GAPS to help heal your chronic gut struggles like Crohn’s, Colitis, chronic diarrhea or constipation?

It’s time to learn how to make the most important food in the diet—the fermented homemade yogurt.

In this video, we’ll cover:

• how to keep yogurt making simple and painless
• your step by step guide so you’ll know exactly what to do even if it’s your first time
• the best kind of milk to buy to make your yogurt
• your SCD Legal options to use as a starter for your yogurt
• the simple tip I use to cool my yogurt quickly
• my #1 recommendation for a yogurt maker
• why it’s worth it to invest in a glass yogurt container

Did you like this video? If these gut healing tips were valuable for you, why not make it a habit?

Join other moms working to balance motherhood with gut struggles in our Gut Love Community for Moms.

http://www.glutenfreedomformoms.com/gutlovecommunity/

It’s a private and priceless (free free free) place for you mom friend, when you’re ready to move beyond medicine and get support and encouragement on your journey to be the mom you always dreamed you’d be!

The Gut Love Community offers a place for you to:

• Share with other moms who actually get what it’s like to be a mom with gut struggles
• Get access to free master classes and specials only offered in our community
• Discover gut healing recipes that the whole family will enjoy
• Get your burning questions answered on how to best heal naturally from chronic gut issues like Crohn’s, Colitis and IBS.

http://www.glutenfreedomformoms.com/gutlovecommunity/

See you in the community!!

 

 

 

7 Must-Do Steps to End Your Gut Struggles Part 1

So, you’ve made the decision.

You know you want to heal.  Your ready to quiet your gut struggles and be the mom you always dreamed you’d be!

Now what?

This video is going to walk you through it all.  By the end of this video, you will put an end to the confusion of “how do I get started” today.

Here’s your 7 “Must Do” steps when you’re ready to get started on healing your gut naturally.

This is Part 1 is a 3-part series and it isn’t just going to give you the WHAT to do, this series is all about the HOW you can make it happen in your super busy mom life.

It’s hard being a mom when we struggle with chronic gut issues like Crohn’s or Colitis.  We don’t have time to figure all the pieces out

Well, I can’t wait for you to watch Part 1 in this 3-part series on your first and best gut healing steps (easy ones you can start today) because it’s going to be the nudge and the knowledge you need to get you moving in a healing direction.

Grab a cup of tea and take a load off with me as we discuss all things GUT HEALTH.

 

 

Are you IN yet?

Join other moms working to balance motherhood with gut struggles in our Gut Love Community for Moms.

Here’s the link for the Gut Love Community 

http://www.glutenfreedomformoms.com/gutlovecommunity/

It’s a FREE AND FABULOUS place for you mom friend, when you’re ready to move beyond medicine and get support and encouragement on your journey to be the mom you always dreamed you’d be!

The Gut Love Community offers a place for you to:

• Share with other moms who actually get what it’s like to be a mom with gut struggles
• Get access to free master classes and specials only offered in our community
• Discover gut healing recipes that the whole family will enjoy
• Get your burning questions answered on how to best heal naturally from chronic gut issues like Crohn’s, Colitis and IBS.

And here’s the link one more time:

http://www.glutenfreedomformoms.com/gutlovecommunity/ 

5 Mindset Hacks to Help With The Overwhelm That Comes When You’re a Mom With Gut Struggles

 *Click Here to Get Your Top 12 Mindset Hacks to Ease Our Emotional  Overwhelm  Cheat Sheet

The 5 Best Gut Healing Diets Worth Trying

Click Here to Get Your 5 Gut Healing Diets Explained Cheat Sheet From This Video

The Best On-the-Go Snacks for Moms Healing Gut Struggles With Food

 *Click Here to Get Your On-the-Go Snacks Cheat Sheet for This Video*

The Cure For Your Cold or Flu is Right in Your Kitchen