Fix constipation with 2 nutrients - it’s not what you think!

let's talk about poop or specifically why you're not pooping now if you guys don't know my personal story a lot of why I got into traditional Chinese medicine and was going into the medical field anyway was really because of lifelong GI issues and I'm embarrassed to say publicly on a camera a lot of that was pooping and bowel issues let's talk about some of the most common reasons I see why people have bowel issues as it's one of the most common reasons people come in to see me as well as vitamins and nutrients that may be related and of course what is the traditional Chinese medicine point of view and herbal formulas that can help hi guys I'm Dr Alex hin board licensed acupuncturist and doctor of traditional Chinese medicine and author of the health book master the day so let's jump in now a lot of my personal story involves digestive issues now GI issues run on my maternal side of the family so my mother has some degree my grandmother has some degree a lot of people on my mother's side are just in general constantly complaining about their digestion and digestive problems now for me I seem to be fine until my early 20s but around my early 20s I began to have lots of issues regarding bloating what today would be diagnosed as sibo so bacterial overgrowth just feeling so bloated that I was short of breath and couldn't even sleep I was having such abdominal discomfort after a while I began having lots of alternating bowel patterns so it could be a day 2 3 5 days without a bowel movement the absolute worst and the most extreme was I had actually taken a trip to Philippines and Thailand with my girlfriend at the time I must have been 20 or 21 and it was about 7 or 8 days without a bowel movement and I was in such bad pain that that we actually canceled one of our best trips we had planned renting catamarans to go all throughout the islands and really have this very idyllic sort of vacation because I wasn't feeling well now I know lots of people get Travelers constipation but for me this was a regular thing and I ate perfectly well every single day I was eating oatmeal in the morning I was eating Mediterranean diet I wasn't excessively consuming anything you shouldn't be eating and this became a really big problem for me and it really became quite a big pain point it started off by me going to the GI specialist and really the GI specialist was probably the least useful specialist I've ever seen doing endoscopies and colonoscopies and telling you absolutely nothing about what's going on especially functional issues like what I had but in general the main problems I was having were an IBS like pattern and I wouldn't go to the bathroom for 2 3 4 5 6 days then I'd basically get diarrhea and abdominal cramping and then I would feel better I would get bloating all the time even from healthy foods and it was becoming a big issue for me around this time I pivoted to see an acupuncturist and the very first Formula he put me on gave me the most normal and healthy digestive function of my entire life didn't cure me but the very fact that there was a simple lowcost herbal compound that's from 1500 years ago blew my mind because my GI specialist never told me anything about that now a lot of what I was curious about was what was the origin of my problems I didn't eat an unhealthy diet ever I didn't have a high stress life it made no sense to me and I was curious about what was the root cause of my problems now I've recently put together a free root cause quiz it's like an eight or 10 page handout that we've put together on a little quiz you can score yourself on regarding where are your symptoms coming from from a traditional Chinese medicine point of view it's very unique and very interesting so it's a link right below this video I would highly recommend checking that out because it is honestly Illuminating and I think it's going to help you figure out a little bit more about where your health issues come from now when we loop back around to getting to the root cause of for example constipation specifically there are three common patterns that are diagnosed from a traditional Chinese medicine point of view based on the presentation pattern number one is what we call Chi stagnation Chi stagnation you could just think of this as irregular or alternating bowel movements CH stagnation is sort of the pattern where either you have bowel movements every other day very common in women or for example it can be quite severe you're going 2 3 4 5 days highly correlates with stress and anxiety or for women around their menstrual cycle and Chi stagnation when you think of it you could honestly just think of this as poop stagnation right we don't need to make it seem esoteric stagnation is sort of like someone who's traveling and because of the irregularity their bowels are also irregular so these people tend towards General irregularity or alternating stool patterns the cause of this typically is stress and emotions or an regular lifestyle overall second one is what we call due to heat or dryness these are the kinds of people that have basically bowel movements every 3 four 5 six seven days I mean the worst I've ever seen is 20 days that to me is baffling that those people exist and they aren't in the hospital but these are people who generally have much more regular bowels once every 3 days or more and this kind of heat in general what I see is linked to a very poor diet these are people who eat high carb diets high sugar high sodium fried food that kind of thing not a lot of Consciousness necessarily around eating and so the stools are very irregular and very very dry and hard very prone to hemorrhoids and that kind of thing the main cause here in my experience typically is standard American diet although not every cause right medications can do that and medical conditions can do that the third one is what we call dampness this is very paradoxical because some people who have rapid transit have diarrhea or loose stools but some people people who are very constipated will also have IR regular bowel movements but when they have those bowel movements they're often soft or sticky or wet for these kinds of people they typically eat a healthier diet but they're eating lots of foods that generate what Chinese medicine calls dampness it's recognizable because the difference between a hard dry bow movement and a soft wet one or diarrhea dry and moist right it's the water content on the dampness side typically these people eat too many smoothies too many raw vegetables they may be raw vegans they may be drinking too many liquid drinks in general green juices smoothies that sort of thing and general what they need to be consuming is more cooked Foods cooked vegetables instead of raw vegetables no smoothies no protein powders that sort of thing these three are the most common constipation patterns that I see let's discuss more about where they come from from a traditional Chinese medicine point of view and what formulas we utilize to treat them but first I promise to talk about some of the nutrients linked to constipation so I want to direct you to one research paper here this research paper is called the association between dietary factors and constipation in adults living in luxemborg and taking part in this survey now in this particular study they found that there is a positive Association meaning an increased chance or frequency of constipation with people who had a higher total energy intake calories as well as sodium intake there was a negative correlation meaning less constipation for people who had a higher fat intake now there's something else here that is very important and very useful at the end researchers said we found that grains fatr Foods total fats and starch es were associated with a lower constipation score while sugary products sodium and higher energy intake or calories were correlated with higher constipation score this is interesting because in some ways very obvious and in other ways not so obvious but fats generally can have a lubricating effect on the intestines and sugars and salts can have the opposite effect so something that's worth keeping in mind here in terms of overall dietary intake when we're talking about nutrients that improve it or more nutrients that worsen it but what about from a traditional Chinese medicine point of view now when we talk about what we call the chi stagnation constipation what's very important is that this kind of irregularity is strongly correlated with emotions and stress one kind of chi stagnation is emotional stagnation any high amount of stress anything that causes resistance I don't want to go to work I hate this I don't want to do this anything that produces physical resistance or let's say nervous system resistance produces blockages somewhere in the body and strong enough emotions influence physiology that have Downstream effects that is the most non-mystical way I can describe Chi and how the disruption of chi flow causes disease that is a very material functional physiological way of looking at it for example it's well known even with women Chi stagnation is a major cause of menstrual irregularities but what does that mean many women know from experience high stress periods can cause them to miss a cycle or to have a really painful menstrual cycle what is happening there right ancient doctors called that Chi stagnation emotional factors can lead to physical physiological changes but for the chees stagnation kind of constipation it's based a lot on regularity number one stress pressure deadlines number two typically irregular eating right not eating breakfast having a huge lunch small dinner next day huge breakfast these kinds of irregularities with diet and eating often will produce this kind of cheese stagnation constipation sometimes people like this are eating big meals because they're fasting and they're actually just putting a huge amount of food in their body to digest at once but on top of that there is often rushing and not taking time for proper meals this is a big cause of chei stagnation kind of constipation and in general there's a general just anxious or rushed temperament the number one formula I end up using for this is something called bansa Shong this formula is high in herbs that are very bitter these bitters have a downward descending effect and a gastric regulating effect now the dryness the heat kind of constipation the number one correlation I see with this is just very poor diet and not drinking a lot of water so typically when people come in they have the heat kind of constipation where there's an average of once every 3 days or more typically there's just not a lot of Consciousness dayto day about their diet so in the morning they're eating breakfast sandwiches they're having their extra- large latte or Frappuccino lunch is whatever the office is eating maybe there's a doughnut or a sugary snack in the afternoon or a second coffee and dinner is just basically they may go out to an Italian restaurant for business they're getting a pasta dish and two glasses of wine now there's nothing wrong with those on an individual basis but the cumulative effect of just sort of always eating what tastes good it's high calorie it's high sodium like we just talked about and maybe even high sugar so these people have a lot of interior dryness and inflammation often in the intestines and digestive system they almost always will also have acid reflux or indigestion and tend towards high blood pressure for these tight I typically use either the first Formula B shishang if this upper GI issues or if it's purely lower GI floating irregularity I use sisan so Frozen extremities powder it's called This is high in herbs like duure immature orange peel and bow p& which are very very good for the peristalsis and they're very good for also blood sugar regulation now the third constipation pattern the dampness one where people typically when they come in to see me they often eat a healthy diet or they're orthorexic right they're eating like only raw vegetables and raw smoothies and smoothies and green juices and it's too much raw and cold from a Chinese medicine point of view these people are often benefited from having more cooked Foods no smoothies no green juices that kind of thing in general a formula that works really well is called leonan regulate the middle pill this formula is very good for what we call interior cold so the dampness is as a result of all the raw vegetables all the smoothies the liquids the cold iced smoothies green juices sometimes they're literally cold and sometimes they're what Chinese medicine would call the chi is cold lemon juice you want to drink in the summer right you don't want to drink ginger juice when it's 90° out and humid that's the chi quality the temperature quality so for these kinds of people this formula will often firm up those stools quite a lot so three General kinds of constipation nutrients that are related to it again if you guys want to work with me one to one in my private practice I work with a very limited number of new patients every month in Los Angeles or virtually via tele medicine there's info right below this video or you can just go to Dr Alex hind.com Clinic to call or email us and besides that don't forget I've also put together that free quiz here to discover the root cause of where a lot of your symptoms are coming from and I have another related video on some of the other causes of constipation health issues right up here