Hannah Aylward (00:00.088)

So fermentable fibers and resistant starches support short chain fatty acid production because they essentially give these microbes their raw material to ferment. So your gut produces these short chain fatty acids, which we can also call them like postbiotics. So we have prebiotics, which you’ve likely heard of before. These are these fermentable carbohydrates, these good fibers, right? These prebiotics really feed the probiotics or those bacteria themselves.

And then as a byproduct, these probiotics, these bacteria, give off these postbiotics, aka short chain fatty acids.

Hannah Aylward (00:40.376)

Welcome to the Nutrient Dense Podcast. I’m your host, Hannah Aylward, holistic health coach, functional gut health practitioner, and the founder of HAN. So many people are continuously failed by conventional and alternative health care. We are here to do it differently. Alongside my team of functional registered dietitians, I’ve helped hundreds of women around the world overcome their chronic digestive issues when nothing else worked.

I’ve learned a thing or two about what it really takes to transform your health from the inside out, and I’m here to share it all with you. Please keep in mind that this podcast is for educational purposes only and should never be used as medical advice. Now, let’s dive in. Your transformation is waiting.

Hello, hello, my dear, and welcome back to the nutrient dense podcast. In today’s episode, we’re going to be diving into all things short chain fatty acids. So we’re going to be talking about the gut microbiome. We’re going to be talking about short chain fatty acids, the gut barrier, the immune system, and why short chain fatty acids are honestly one of these key players in microbiome health, reducing things like inflammation, supporting the gut barrier, and so much more. And I feel like they are.

Just not talked about enough in kind of the functional medicine space and in in holistic health spaces. So I wanted to dedicate honestly a whole podcast episode to this topic alone. So it’s gonna be like a a little mini training for today. So we can we can dive on in. So you’ve probably heard about good gut bacteria, bad gut bacteria. We talk a lot about that on this show here. We talk a lot about fiber and feeding the good gut bacteria and all of that stuff. But

What happens after those bacteria actually eat up the right foods and what do they make? And why does this actually matter when it comes to our gut health, maintaining optimal gut health, supporting gut repair, our gut barrier function, and the balance of the microbiome overall? So we often talk about the microbiome in terms of which bacteria are present, but what these bacteria are doing in their activity really matter too. So

Hannah Aylward (02:45.56)

These microbes transform parts of our food into compounds that interact with our bodies. And these things called short chain fatty acids are one very important example. And I, you know, when we’re working with clients on my team, we are always supporting short chain fatty acid production because of its impact on the gut microbiome, colon pH, the gut barrier, and so much more that we’re gonna get into today. It’s really this missing key player, right? So once again, if you listen to this podcast, you’ve heard me.

You’ve heard me say it before. Gut health is not simply about what we remove from our diets. It’s not about just removing dairy and removing gluten and removing sugar, and then that’s supposed to heal the gut. I want to flip this narrative on its head and I want you to start to ask yourself, am I getting in enough of the good stuff? Am I getting in enough of what my body needs to do its job? Whether that’s specific macronutrients or micronutrients.

And in this case, something like fiber and allowing and really supporting this short chain fatty acid production. So we want to shift the mindset away from what do I make sure that I’m never eating again or I can’t eat anymore, like those long lists of no foods, into what do I need to make sure I’m getting in enough of to maintain a strong and diverse and resilient gut microbiome.

And how can I bring in these habits in my day-to-day life to support my gut health now and forever moving forward? So I just offer that perspective shift for you. It’s not just about what you remove. We also need to make sure we’re getting enough of the good stuff to maintain optimal gut health and also, of course, reach that state of good, solid gut health too. So let’s get into short chain fatty acids specifically. What are these? Essentially some.

Carbohydrates escape digestion in the small intestine and they go into the colon. So the colon is the large intestine. Carbohydrates will escape digestion in the small intestine, which is going to be kind of upstream from there. And then they’re going to go and reach in their way into the colon. Now these microbes ferment these carbohydrates, producing things called short chain fatty acids, along with other substances, including different gases. The three main short chain fatty acids are acetate, propionate, and butyrate.

Hannah Aylward (04:55.394)

You may have heard of butyrate before. I feel like that one’s a little bit more commonly known. We it’s definitely something that we talk about a lot on my team with our clients and on this podcast. Now, they act as both energy sources and signaling molecules, these short chain fatty acids. So, first up is butyrate. We’ll kind of dive into that one here. Butyrate provides energy for your colon cells. So much of it is used locally by the cells lining the colon.

It essentially supports the intestinal barrier. So if you’ve heard of something like leaky gut, a lot of people talk about leaky gut or increased intestinal permeability and how this can absolutely lead to things like chronic bloating, digestive issues, widestream systemic inflammation. It can even cause joint pain. It can absolutely show up on the skin too, right? So we can see it as like rashes, acne, breakouts, that kind of thing. It will lead to this more so systemic inflammation that can show up in many different places of the body when we have.

Degradation of that gut barrier. And I have a whole podcast episode on Lee Gut itself. I believe it’s episode three. So if you want to dive deeper into that, you can go listen to that episode next. I break down Lee Gut, what it is, what causes it, how do we fix it, food recommendations, supplement recommendations, and I go into all of that in that episode. So you can check that one out next. But our gut barrier or gut lining is incredibly important, right? So

Butyrate is used locally by these cells that line the colon and it really supports that intestinal barrier. So it influences mucus production and the regulation of tight junctions. And tight junctions are, you can think of it as bricks on a wall, right? So your epithelial or that cellular layer of your gut lining is made up of these different tight junctions. Now, in the case of leaky gut or increased intestinal permeability,

These junctions get a little leaky. And then we have undigested food proteins, toxins, particles, potentially parasites passing through these junctions that should be nice and tight to protect us, but they are now leaky due to typically underlying issues, chronic stress, dysbiosis, that kind of thing. But when we get this increased intestinal permeability, and when these tight junctions are now leaky, we end up with systemic inflammation and

Hannah Aylward (07:09.1)

These tight junctions should be nice and tight like that brick wall. So think of like you’re looking at a brick wall and there’s like cement in between all of the bricks and they’re nice and tight. Like what’s the game Tetris? You when you’re like trying to find the perfect, it’s like the perfect fit, it locks right in. That’s how we want these cells that line our gut barrier to be. Now, when they get leaky, is when we run into those bigger issues, we end up with leaky gut, that kind of thing. This is also very prominent when it comes to autoimmunity. So

When we look at those with autoimmune conditions, we typically have some variation or level of severity of increased intestinal permeability. And when it comes to something that’s referenced as the autoimmune triad, leaky gut or increased intestinal permeability is oftentimes a part of this autoimmune triad that really contributes to the presentation and expression of autoimmunity. So leaky gut and the gut barrier play a huge role in this. This isn’t just like

colitis and Crohn’s, right? It’s also Hashimoto’s or rheumatoid arthritis or many different autoimmune conditions, not just those ones that you would kind of like directly think of when it comes to gut health, like UC or Crohn’s. So all in all, this gut barrier is super important for our overall health. It really helps do so much, which we’re gonna get into, but butyrate, going back to this super important short chain fatty acid,

It helps to support this intestinal barrier, right? So it influences the mucus production and the regulation of these tight junctions, the structures that help to control the passage between these intestinal cells. It also helps to regulate immune activity. So it can influence inflammatory signaling and immune cells involved in maintaining tolerance. Now your gut microbiome is influencing your immune system expression and kind of communicating with your immune system all the time, nonstop. So if we’re ever looking at

Someone that gets sick very often or catches colds and can’t overcome them or anything to do with the immune system and wanting to strengthen immunity or support optimal immunity. If we’re not looking at the gut, we’re like totally missing the mark here because the gut is influencing and informing the immune system day in and day out. Then we have another short chain fatty acid that’s called propionate. And it’s largely taken up by the liver. It can serve as a raw material for glucose production.

Hannah Aylward (09:26.872)

But it also participates in appetite and glucose signaling. So research shows effects on gut hormones such as GLP1, which can help coordinate insulin responses and fullness. And propionate is involved in this. It participates in appetite and glucose signaling here. It also influences immune activity. So just like butyrate, it acts through these receptors and pathways involved in inflammatory regulation. And then we have acetate.

Acetate is generally the most abundant short chain fatty acid. More of this short chain fatty acid reaches the bloodstream than propionate or butyrate. It also provides fuel and building materials. So these tissues can use it for energy and as a substrate for making molecules such as fatty acids and cholesterol. It supports microbial crossfeeding as well. So even though butyrate is kind of the one that you think about more often when it comes to gut health because of its impact on the gut barrier.

Some of these butyrate-producing bacteria actually use acetate made by other organisms to produce butyrate. So it supports this microbial crossfeeding and it also acts as a signal. It interacts with receptors involved in immune and metabolic regulation. So they, these three short-chain fatty acids are incredibly important with kind of even more emphasis. They all have their different roles, right? But even bigger emphasis.

On butyrate and acetate. And then, of course, propionate is also involved in appetite and glucose signaling. These are really important compounds. And all three of these short chain fatty acids can also contribute to lowering colon pH, which is incredibly, incredibly important because it helps to shape microbial growth and activity. And these things tend to work together as well, right? So the benefits of all these short-chain fatty acids work together.

So it’s more useful to kind of like support the abundance and the production of short chain fatty acids overall, more so than just simply working on increasing one of them on its own. So the simplest way to put it is that your gut microbes eat up these different fibers, right? And then they produce these things called short chain fatty acids that are super anti-inflammatory, supportive of the gut barrier, help to inform the immune system, coordinate insulin responses and fullness.

Hannah Aylward (11:41.388)

And they play huge, a huge role in immune system function and gut barrier function. And butyrate is one of these really important short chain fatty acids because it is an energy source for the cells that line the colon or the large intestine, right? So this provides a direct connection between microbial fermentation and the cells that maintain that intestinal surface. So just kind of a fancy way of saying.

We need to get your gut microbiome and your gut microbes producing adequate butyrate that will then help to strengthen and reinforce a strong intestinal barrier or that gut lining that so many people speak about. Now they also influence barrier function. So this intestinal barrier is a living and selective interface, right? It allows for nutrient absorption. So this is where you absorb the nutrients from the food that you eat.

Is all along that gut barrier. We’ve got many nutrients absorbed in the small intestine, and then we have some in the large intestine as well. And now, this gut barrier, this is why we run into so many issues, like system-wide, when we have deeper gut issues. So if you have chronic bloating, constipation, diarrhea, food sensitivities, etc., we’re likely looking at microbial imbalances in the gut microbiome. That will then lead to degradation of that gut barrier, which will then lead to poor nutrient absorption because.

Of the fact that we’re absorbing the nutrients from the food that we’re eating through that gut barrier, right? So this gut barrier is semi-permeable in nature to allow us to absorb the nutrients from the food that we’re eating. We run into issues when this barrier is compromised and it gets leaky, it gets hyperpermeable. And then we have all this stuff flowing through the gut barrier that shouldn’t. And on the other side of that gut barrier is the majority of our immune system, which is why.

This is all interconnected, right? These microbes influence the gut barrier, and the gut barrier influences the immune system, which then contributes to potentially systemic inflammation or calming that inflammation as well. So it’s such a key part of all of this. And I wanted to make this episode to walk you through kind of some of the science behind this and then also some things that we can do to support the production of these short chain fatty acids and just highlight these very cool compounds that I think don’t get enough attention.

Hannah Aylward (13:59.17)

But also because we can support this production through the food that we are eating. And it’s when we’re looking at the gut barrier, leaky gut, everyone wants to talk about supplements, right? It’s like L-glutamine or this or that or whatever. It all has its time and place, no question. These are things that we use with clients, different formulas, combinations, different compounds, all of it, different amino acids, that’s all great. L-glutamine is more so specific to the small intestinal barrier.

And butyrate is kind of more specific, that specific cuel source for the cells in the large intestine or the colon. So that’s kind of what we’re speaking to here. But we can support, we can support these short chain fatty acids having these anti-inflammatory effects, having these immune system supportive effects, and having these gut barrier supportive effects through the food that we’re eating. So these short chain fatty acids communicate with the immune system.

And they interact with receptors and cellular pathways involved in immune regulation. So this is helping to coordinate immune activity rather than just boost the immune system, right? Boosting the immune system is kind of like a vague term. It doesn’t fully make sense. But these short chain fatty acids help to coordinate this immune activity more so than like boosting it overall.

Hannah Aylward (15:20.886)

And this intestinal lining is a very thin cellular boundary between the gut and what’s in the gut microbiome and the underlying tissues where many of these immune cells reside.

And a functioning gut barrier permits the absorption while limiting inappropriate exposure to microbial components. I’m gonna say that again because that sounds kind of stiff. And a functioning gut barrier, a healthy gut lining, allows for this absorption of these nutrients to take place while also limiting exposure to microbial components.

And when this permeability increases, these microbial products, things like lipopolysaccharide, which is an endotoxin that’s given off by gram-negative bacteria, and that can contribute to immune activation, right? So if we want to talk about decreasing inflammation, we want to talk about supporting autoimmune conditions, we want to talk about decreasing food reactions and and food sensitivities, right? So when you go for something like it a food sensitivity test or an IgG panel.

We’re kind of just seeing has the immune system been exposed to this food before? So they’re not inherently bad. It doesn’t necessarily mean that you have quote unquote sensitivities to all of these foods that show up on these test results. It kind of just means your immune system’s been exposed to them. But you will mount a bigger response. That test result will look kind of deeper in the red. It’ll be like high immune reactivity, right? To certain foods. And they’re oftentimes the foods that you eat more regularly and most often, not every time, right? But oftentimes.

We’ll see this as foods that people eat a lot of. And it’s not the food’s fault. It’s because we have these undigested food particles as a result of like maldigestion moving through this gut barrier, triggering that immune system activation because of the fact that that gut barrier is hyperpermeable. So this is where this conversation about short chain fatty acids like comes back into play because these short chain fatty acids naturally help to support a strong intestinal barrier.

Hannah Aylward (17:20.204)

Which is then going to impact immune system activation. There are also different bacteria that provide different short chain fatty acids and some that help indirectly by feeding other microbes. So when we run functional stool testing on clients, certain stool tests will have a breakdown of the short chain fatty acid producing bacteria. And then other stool tests will just list out the bacteria and we can see with our knowledge what are the levels of the short chain fatty acid producing bacteria, right? How are these looking?

So overall, when we’re looking at some of these butyrate producers, things like Fecalibacterium prosnitiae or the Rosburria species are involved in that production of butyrate. When it comes to something like propionate, we’ll see Acromantium mucinophila be a propionate producer here. We’ll see bacteroid species species as well. And then when it comes to acetate, bifidobacterium species, many bacteroides species, Acromantium mucinophila, these are some of these like.

Kind of big bacterial players, I would say, in the gut microbiome. Once again, when we run functional stool testing, we can see levels of these gut bacteria. So sometimes, I think sometimes, you know, people expect their stool test to come back and it’s like, we’ve got all of this overgrowth and all of this stuff to attack. And we totally see that in practice. But what we’ll also see, and what I when I’m talking to other practitioners and and colleagues more recently, we’re seeing a lot of depletion. We’re seeing people without.

good levels of the short chain fatty acid producing bacteria. So we’ll see those with low levels of the calibacterium presnanitiae, with no Acromancium misinophila, with low levels of some of these like key stone players in the gut microbiome that also are involved in the production of these different short chain fatty acids. So we can see it, right? When we look at someone’s stool test and they have no Figalibacterium presnitia and they have no Acromancium misinophila,

I can al already kind of make the assumption or educated guess that their gut barrier is struggling because they have very low levels or maybe even undetectable levels of these short chain fatty acid producing bacteria. So I hope that this isn’t going like too high level. You don’t really need to understand all of the ins and outs of all of these bacteria, right? But this is why, for the millionth time, I feel like I say it too much, you wanna work with someone who knows how to read the test. It’s not just like, you’ve got overgrowth. Let’s give you oregano oil.

Hannah Aylward (19:41.954)

There’s a lot more to functional stool testing, reviewing these test results and making suggestions based on these test results and kind of understanding the ins and outs of all of this. There’s also some interesting research that we’ll see in those with, I don’t want to misspeak here, but I believe it’s psoriasis have lower levels of Fecalibacterium presnanciaei on average. We’ll see those with irritable bowel disease. So we’ll see Crohn’s or colitis.

When we look at the gut microbiomes of this population, we’ll see lower levels of these short chain fatty acid producing gut bacteria. That makes sense, right? These are like big inflammatory conditions. And we see lower levels of these bacteria that help to produce these short chain fatty acids that are then anti inflammatory and protective of that gut barrier. So I don’t believe we have the science yet to say low levels of this literally cause this. So we don’t really have the causation data yet.

But there’s we do have the correlation data. Like when we look at this population, we see lower levels of this. And then when I take a step back and I think about that, I’m like, yeah, of course, right? Because these bacteria are supportive of the gut barrier and have these anti-inflammatory effects. So just something to consider here different bacteria kind of contribute to the production of these short chain fatty acids differently and produce some of these things differently. So some of our important butyrate producing

Bacteria include things like Fecalibacterium presnitia, roseburia, and they don’t work alone either, right? So other microbes provide ingredients they use to make butyrate. It’s really all of these microbes working together. Now, the other point that I wanted to make here that I think is very important is the fact that short chain fatty acids will influence colon pH and therefore the microbial balance of the gut microbiome.

So lower pH just means it’s more acidic and higher pH means it’s more alkaline, right? We’re bringing it back. We’re bringing it back to like middle school science class. Short chain fatty acids are acids. So their production can lower the pH of the colon contents. And the colon does not have one uniform pH, right? So conditions will vary along along the length of the colon. So the pH is not the same throughout the entire colon. But why does this actually matter? So different microbes respond differently to their surroundings. Your gut is an ecosystem.

Hannah Aylward (21:59.8)

Your gut microbiome is an entire ecosystem, which is also why when we’re looking at one probiotic or one thing here, we have to take this entire ecosystem into consideration if we want to really help support someone move through their chronic digestive issues and get better and really stay better. This is not a one intervention kind of thing, right? We have to understand to the best of our ability this ecosystem as a whole. So pH can

Actually, influence the microbes or the and the organisms that can actually grow and how they compete and which compounds they produce. So a mildly acidic environment can actually discourage the growth of some of these potentially harmful gut microbes. So all in all, your microbiome helps create its own environment. And when bacteria ferment fiber, they produce acids that can make the colon’s content more acidic. And that shift helps shape which microbes thrive and also what they produce next.

So this is important, especially if you’re someone who has done functional soul testing before, if you’ve had gut dysbiosis before, and it continues to come back. That’s what I really want to emphasize here. If you have something like SIBO that keeps returning, I have a whole podcast episode on why that could be. Go listen to that episode next. We’ll link that below in the show notes for you. And then also we can have this dysbiosis in the large intestine or the colon, right? Now, if this dysbiosis continues to come back, it’s something that

Maybe you’ve worked with someone through before and it comes back again. There are a couple of different reasons for that. Or if you feel like you can kind of like never get over that hump and the dysbiosis just continues to be there, there are many underlying potential like underlying contributors to this, but we have to also look at the pH of the colon. Now, when we support the short chain fatty acid production, we help to allow essentially allow that colon to be more acidic.

Which is what we want, because then that can inhibit the growth of these other unsupportive gut bacteria. So if we’re once again, if we’re seeing that the dysbiosis continues to come back, we want to create the environment in which these bad gut bacteria won’t overgrow again. There are many things that go into this, but encouraging a healthy colonic pH is a big part of this. And short chain fatty acids play a role in this as well.

Hannah Aylward (24:28.152)

We are big fans of eating enough protein over here on Team Han. Protein is essential for muscle repair, a strong gut lining, balanced blood sugar levels, and so much more. For most of our clients, we like recommending around 100 grams of protein per day to start, and adding in a good quality protein powder can be super helpful for hitting those numbers. It’s an easy add-in, you can throw it into a smoothie or even add it to oatmeal. Choosing the right protein powder can feel so overwhelming.

Half of them are full of fillers and crap ingredients, and the other half honestly just taste bad. Equip protein is one of my go-to recommendations for our clients and one of my personal favorites. We love it because it only has a small handful of ingredients. It’s 100% carefully sourced, real foods, no additives, allergens, chemicals, fillers, or other junk. It’s gluten-free and it contains 21 grams of protein per serving. Equip’s Prime Protein also offers

a complete amino acid profile. It’s also independently tested to make sure that the protein powder is free of harmful amounts of heavy metals and toxins like glyphosate, which is honestly super hard to find. Equip prime protein is a grass-fed beef protein. So it is animal based, but it’s dairy free, unlike whey or casein protein powders. Grass-fed beef protein is packed with collagen, gelatin, and micronutrients that your body needs.

We also see that it’s typically much better tolerated in our clients with chronic gut and digestive issues over something like a plant-based protein powder. In addition, some of their flavors do contain natural flavors, but they’re distilled vapors from natural and organic compounds or fruits like vanilla, coconut, and strawberry, and are processed without any chemicals, fillers, binders, or artificial ingredients, which once again is incredibly hard to find. Personally, I buy both the chocolate and the vanilla.

Flavors of the Equip Prime Protein, but honestly, they have like so many other incredible flavors out now. If you’re interested in trying out Equip Prime Protein, you can use the code HANNAHAYLWARDHHC at checkout for 15% off. And we’ll pop that code in the show notes of this episode for you as well. So once again, you can go to equipfoods.com, choose the flavor of protein powder that you want, and then use code HANNAHAYLWARDHHC for 15% off.

Hannah Aylward (26:43.318)

I’m a big believer that the right supplements can be game changing when it comes to overcoming things like burnout, gut issues, slow thyroid function, low energy, acne, and so much more. But the supplement industry is honestly the wild, wild west. The FDA doesn’t approve supplements before they’re sold, so it’s really important to choose high quality brands whenever purchasing. Many brands aren’t third party tested. Some don’t actually contain what’s even listed on the label. Totally crazy, I know.

And quality can vary a lot from company to company. That’s exactly why we use Fullscript with all of our clients. Through my online supplement dispensary with FullScript, you can get access to all of the professional grade third-party tested supplements that I trust and use with clients. FullScript vets brands before they’re introduced into the supplement catalog, and they hold them accountable to quality standards every year.

Whether you’re looking for a high quality magnesium or probiotic or digestive enzymes, maybe vitamin D, anything in between, you can shop them all in one place with confidence on Full Script. This is personally where I purchase all of my supplements, and I’m not kidding when I say I have all of my friends and family purchase from there too. If you’re going to invest in supplements, you wanna actually get what you think you’re getting and not just a bunch of fillers or random ingredients.

As a listener of the Nutrient Dense podcast, you’ll also receive 15% off of your orders and you’ll get free shipping on orders over $50. You can get exclusive access through my personal FullScript store at us.fullscript.com/welcome/han. Through this link, you can also access my favorite product catalogs like supplements for nervous system support and my current favorites for gut and digestive health. Once again, you can go to us.fullscript.com/welcome/han, or find that link in the show notes below and get access to practitioner grade third party tested supplements for 15% off.

Hannah Aylward (28:44.27)

Now, here’s really the most important portion of this whole of this whole like science-y deep dive that I’m walking you through on today’s episode. We know that short chain fatty acids are important. We know how important butyrate is, it supports the gut barrier, that gut lining. If we’re dealing with something like leaky gut, if we’re dealing with chronic bloating, if we’re dealing with skin issues, you know, systemic inflammation. We gotta take a look at all this. Now, what do we actually do to support the production of these short chain fatty acids?

This is where fermentable fibers and resistant starches really come in. So fermentable fibers and resistant starches support short chain fatty acid production because they essentially give these microbes their raw material to ferment. So your gut produces these short chain fatty acids, which we can also call them like postbiotics. So we have prebiotics, which you’ve likely heard of before. These are these fermentable carbohydrates, these good fibers, right? These prebiotics

really feed the probiotics or those bacteria themselves. And then as a byproduct, these probiotics, these bacteria give off these postbiotics, aka short chain fatty acids. So if we want to reverse engineer that process and support the short chain fatty acid production and support a healthy colon pH and support a healthy gut barrier and support healthy immune response and decrease inflammation.

Well, then we’ve got to start at the baseline and support this short chain fatty acid production through fermentable fibers and resistant starches. So these are gonna be found in things like oats or beans, lentils, certain fruits and vegetables, right? And resistant starches can be found in like cooked and cooled potatoes. Oats are another good source of this. Cooked and cooled rice, even, which you don’t wanna eat for too many days after. So little caveat there. But if you’re making rice and then you have like leftovers the next day,

Pop it in your fridge, eat the rice the next day. It’s gonna be higher and it’s resistant starch content. And prebiotics, something like inulin. These also help to provide those fermentable substrates, but tolerance to these can vary. So I would say inulin overall, if you are have a sensitive gut, you’ve got a lot of gas and bloating, inulin is probably gonna send you over the edge. So this is a prebiotic that’s found in like olipops. No hate to olipop, love an ollipop, but it’s it’s a prebiotic that’s added into something like an olipop.

Hannah Aylward (30:56.724)

And it’s it’s just very gas producing. So if you have a lot of bacterial overgrowth, if you have something like SIBO, I would not recommend this overall. It’s probably gonna flare you, make you super bloated and gassy. So if you didn’t know why those things, Oli Bob’s made you gassy, that’s just one example. It’s found in other things too, right? But it can be great. It’s a great prebiotic source, but it can kind of send you over the edge.

If you already have a lot of bacterial overgrowth present in the gut. So that’s another kind of thing that you can look out for in your own gut patterns and your own digestive issues. But these are the things that we want to include in the diet. And I would recommend, even if you can only tolerate a small amount of these things, it is still going to be supportive. So if you are listening to this and you’re like fiber bloats me, go listen to the my last podcast episode, because I literally talk about why you’re eating healthier and you’re feeling worse.

you know, fiber bacterial overgrowth, that can be an underlying root cause here. And not maybe not root cause, but just reason as to why you feel more sensitive when you start to eat healthier. But with that being said, this is why it’s so important to walk through a good eradication phase if you have that overgrowth present. And then we need to work on supporting the re-inoculation of our good gut bacteria. And this is often missed. It’s totally missed when we do something like we take antibiotics.

It’s totally missed by a lot of functional medicine doctors out there that just throw like oregano oil and antimicrobials and everything at it without a proper like refeeding phase. We want to be refeeding the gut throughout the entirety of the gut work. That’s how we do it on my team to tolerance, right? So we want to make sure that we are eating a diverse diet, that we are including as many dietary fibers and plant fibers in the diet as we can to tolerance because of its impact.

On short chain fatty acid production, supporting the growth of good gut bacteria, these anti-inflammatory compounds, et cetera. So there’s kind of a balance to strike here. And I would say even if you can eat like a tablespoon of beans a day and you feel like, okay, that’s kind of my max. If I eat more, I’m super bloated and gassy, but I can eat a small amount, I recommend it. And we will walk clients through this process too of like slow reintroduction of these foods after we kind of clean up that gut microbiome.

Hannah Aylward (33:12.524)

Because we’ll just find that, you know, if people have a lot of overgrowth or SIBO at the beginning, they just can’t tolerate a lot of these foods. In theory, they are very good, but can cause more bloating if we are already dealing with an imbalanced gut microbiome. But once again, with that being said, even if you can tolerate small amounts of these foods, small amounts of oats, lentils, beans, cooked and cooled potatoes, I would recommend getting them in where you can. Try to find the ones that work for you.

Find the fibers and the resistant starches that work for you and keep those in your diet. And another strategy that we will actually use to help people increase their tolerance and support the short chain fatty acid production and just gut diversity overall is adding in, making like a little mash of different vegetables. So you can get different veggies when you go to the grocery store, cook them really well.

So you can boil them or roast them or whatever, blend them up and almost make like a mash, like a mashed potato, but you could have something other than just potatoes in there. You could have, you know, sweet potato, broccoli, green beans, zucchini, whatever it is. But you’re we’re just trying to get more diversity in the diet. Blend it all up and then have like a scoop of that a day. You can even freeze it and kind of like thaw it out when you’re ready to eat it so it lasts a bit longer. This is something that we learned in another training with a functional medicine provider.

But it just helps to make sure you don’t completely lose the tolerance of these foods. If you can’t eat them and if you stop eating them, you can lose the ability to tolerate these foods. And it will also increase this plant diversity in the diet with like a very simple strategy here. So we want to, even in small amounts, continue to get exposure to these foods. And I’ll often say to clients too: you know, if you haven’t eaten an apple in like 10 years because they bloat you so much, they have fermentable carbohydrates in them. That’s why.

This is likely due to a maldigestion issue and a bacterial overgrowth issue. But if we can, we want to keep small amounts in the diet. So maybe it’s not eating a full apple. Maybe it’s eating two slices of an apple a day. And you can even cook it, dice it up and throw in an oatmeal or something like that. So you’re still getting a little bit of exposure and you’re still supporting those gut microbes and allowing them to flourish, but we’re not like overdoing it and sending ourselves into a big flare. I think this is an important distinction to make.

Hannah Aylward (35:32.256)

Especially with the clients we see. Like the clients we see are sensitive, they’re bloated, they’re gassy. They can’t tolerate a lot of this stuff. So it’s how can we keep it in the diet in small amounts? And then also, of course, what do we need to do to repair that gut environment? So we can then get to the point where we can tolerate these foods more. And then we can work on that more like long term strategy with short chain fatty acid production and colon pH and gut barrier health and all of that. Cause we can tolerate these foods better after we work on rebalancing the microbiome piece.

So, although this episode got a little sciencing in the weeds at times, I hope it explains to you why it’s important to support short chain fatty acid production, what these things are. I find that they’re not talked about enough, honestly, in this space. They’re super supportive, they’re highly anti-inflammatory, they’re supportive of metabolic function. They are supportive, directly supportive of that gut barrier, right? Butyrate is this like primary fuel source of that gut barrier.

In the large intestine. So it’s like if we want to talk about things like leaky gut, if we want to talk about long-term microbial balance in the gut microbiome, these are things that we have to discuss, right? So they’re super important when it comes to systemic inflammation, gut barrier function, et cetera. And then what you can take with you after this episode is building variety within your tolerance, right? So including different plant foods in the diet.

Making something like a little veggie mash, eating a slice or two of apple, if you can’t tolerate a whole one, we want to make sure that we are including different fermentable fibers in the diet along with resistant starches. So cooked and cooled potatoes, oats, overnight oats, all of those things are great sources and they totally, they totally count. If we starve the gut microbiome of fiber, this is where we run into a lot of damage with these heavily restrictive diets. If we starve the gut microbiome of fiber,

We’re starving these good gut bacteria. We are decreasing the short chain fatty acid production. We are going to set ourselves up for bigger issues down the line and kind of like spinning our wheels to get better, which is why these restricted diets they never work long term. They can absolutely be used for short-term intervention, but they are never a long-term strategy because of their more like widespread impact on the gut microbiome and the gut ecosystem as a whole. So we can understand how all of these pieces.

Hannah Aylward (37:51.658)

Inform one another, right? We have the food that we eat informing our bacteria, informing our short chain fatty acid production, informing our gut barrier, and then informing our immune system. So this is where diet plays a huge role in all of this, right? We want to make sure that we are increasing our diversity. We’re aiming for 30 plus different plant foods per week, even a tablespoon of these foods. If this feels hard for you right now, you’re listening and you’re like, I can tolerate like 10 foods, because we’ll totally see clients like that.

Where can you start really low and slow? And maybe it’s you add one new fruit or veggie or or gluten-free whole grain or herb or spice or whatever into your diet a week. Start really low and slow, adding in, you know, small amounts here and there, slowly working to support these microbial communities in the in the gut environment and then supporting that short chain fatty acid production. So we want to start low and slow. We want to increase gradually. Don’t just dive into a bunch of resistant starch. That would make

anyone bloated and gassy, truly anytime we dramatically increase fiber, it’ll just cause a lot of bloated and gas, even in a healthy gut microbiome. So because these gut bacteria eat up these fibers and then they ferment and they give off gas, right? There’s a middle ground to be kind of found here, which is also why working with a professional can be super helpful to walk you through this process to understand what’s your tolerance, what are we looking at here, and when is the right time to bring these things in versus do we need to clean up the microbiome a little bit?

First, before we add in diversity, that kind of thing. And it’s also why people can just feel so confused when they’re like reading stuff online and it’s like fiber, fiber, fiber. Yes, in theory, absolutely, yes. I mean, I’ve talked all about it in this podcast, right? It is absolutely important. But if you’ve got a lot of bacterial overgrowth, like it’ll probably flare you. So we’ve got to find the middle ground with all of it here. And if you’re also finding that you’re trying to introduce, you’re like, okay, listen to that podcast episode with that girl Hannah.

And she told me to eat more resistant starch and fermentable fibers. So I started adding them in, and I just can’t get past this. I’m so bloated. I’m so gassy. We got to start to explore other stuff, right? We’re likely looking at dysbiosis, large intestine or small intestine, maybe some fungal stuff, maybe some maldigestion patterns. And you want to work with a professional kind of through all of that. So overall, these short chain fatty acids connect what you eat and what your microbes actually do, and they help to fuel that colon lining.

Hannah Aylward (40:14.976)

Influence immune activity and really shape the pH in the environment of the colon, shaping that pH that then impacts the bacteria that can overgrow in the colon as well. And we’re really supporting an entire gut ecosystem here, right? So your gut microbiome is an ecosystem, which is why it’s never a single strain probiotic. It’s never just this one thing that’s gonna like do it all. There’s so much more that goes into all of this. But if you take away one thing from this episode.

Start feeding your bacteria the right foods, adding in some resistant starches low and slow, adding in some plant diversity low and slow, feeding those gut bacteria, allowing that short chain fatty acid production to take place. That will then directly impact, positively impact, your gut barrier. And then that can also contribute to better tolerance of more and more foods. So I hope this episode was helpful for you. That’s some of the science behind what the heck’s going on in your gut. It’s a small piece of it. There’s obviously so much more.

But you’ve got some takeaways. I hope it was helpful. And I will see you in next week’s episode. Thanks for being here with me, and I’ll see you next week. Thanks for joining me for this episode of the Nutrient Dense podcast. If you found this episode valuable, don’t forget to subscribe, leave a review, share with a friend, and come back next week for a new episode. See ya then.