How Your Gut Microbiome Influences Your Weight
Have you heard of your gut microbiome? A topic which has recently gained popularity among the diet and health community, researchers began studying the gut microbiome in the 1980s with lab mice.
Back then, we assumed that the bacteria that populated our intestines were simply enjoying the benefits of the warm, wet environments and plentiful food sources available within our bodies. However, as research progressed, we began to understand that our bodies’ relationship with these bacteria is much more symbiotic than previously thought.
Gut bacteria actually plays an important role in regulating your nervous system, immune system, digestive system, and endocrine system. New research published in 2021 even showed a link between our gut bacteria, type 2 diabetes, and weight loss.
Read on to define your gut microbiome, learn how it influences your health and weight, and discover how to improve your own through diet and lifestyle changes.
What is Your Gut Microbiome, Anyway?
A biome is defined as an ecosystem which is characterized by its environment and inhabitants. In nature, a biome represents a specific habitat such as a rainforest, and all that defines that habitat including the plants, animals, topography, and even weather.
A microbiome, as the name suggests, is a scaled down version of a biome, where a diverse population is contained within a small space.
When we refer to your gut microbiome, we are talking about your gastrointestinal tract which includes your stomach, small, and large intestine. However, most of your gut bacteria are actually concentrated in your large intestine, or colon.
Some of the bacteria within this space are free floating, and some attach themselves to the mucous lining of your digestive tract. The trillions of organisms that live within your gut include thousands of species of bacteria, viruses, fungi, and even parasites.
Everyone’s gut microbiome is unique to them, inherited first from the mother during birth and breastfeeding and influenced over time by environmental exposure.
When you eat food, your digestive process breaks the food down into smaller and smaller pieces which are absorbed by your digestive tract into your bloodstream. Not all food is readily broken down by the body though, and that’s where the gut bacteria steps in.
This bacteria assists in breaking down food into small enough molecules to be absorbed by your body. What isn’t digested is excreted as waste in the form of stool.
Why is the Gut Microbiome Important?
In a symbiotic relationship, both parties benefit from the presence of one another. We provide shelter and food to these bacteria, but what do they provide to us?
Like we mentioned previously, this bacteria helps us to metabolize food, but that’s not it’s only job. It turns out that your gut bacteria plays an important role not only your digestive system but also your immune and endocrine system.
What’s more is that the most recent research around the microbiome indicates that your gut bacteria actually influence your weight and even your likelihood to develop obesity related chronic illnesses like type 2 diabetes.
gut Microbiome & Your Digestive System
We already discussed how your body breaks down foods into smaller pieces to be absorbed. However, there are certain complex carbohydrates known as insoluble fiber which can’t be broken down by your body.
Instead, the gut bacteria steps in and breaks these carbohydrates down into pieces small enough to be absorbed. A byproduct of this process are short-chain fatty acids and enzymes which help your body to absorb certain vitamins including B1, B9, B12, and K.
The other thing that your gut bacteria help metabolize is bile which is produced by your liver to break down fats. Your liver actually recycles bile and this bacteria is an integral part of this process. Without this process, your body wouldn’t be able to digest fats, increasing your blood cholesterol and causing major health issues.
gut Microbiome & Your Immune Sytem
You may not realize it, but your gut plays an important role in your immune system, housing 80% of the immune cells in your body. The good bacteria helps your immune system to learn how to differentiate between beneficial and harmful bacteria so it knows what to attack.
Picture a healthy forest with a huge variety of plants and animals ranging from the tallest trees to the tiniest mosses. The forest is so dense with life that when invasive species come in, they struggle to compete because there aren’t enough resources to exploit.
Now imagine that forest is cut down, exposing the environment to invasive plants and animals who can quickly populate the area, outcompeting the native organisms for space.
How does this compare to your gut? Well, there are trillions of different organisms that populate your gut microbiome. The rich diversity makes it impossible for the bad bacteria and viruses to compete with the native organisms, and they fail to thrive.
If you have a diminished microbiome, these bad players more easily take over, outcompeting the helpful bacteria and causing harm or illness.
Additionally, the short-chain fatty acids produced by these bacteria also help to create a physical barrier within your intestines, preventing toxins from being absorbed into your bloodstream and even controlling for inflammation.
gut Microbiome & Your Endocrine System
Your endocrine system is made up of several different glands in your brain, thyroid, pancreas, kidneys, and ovaries or testes. Your endocrine system is responsible for producing the hormones that control important regulatory functions like digestion, mood, and sexual hormones.
Your largest endocrine system is actually made up of the cells in your intestinal lining and the hormones secreted there help control your metabolism, blood sugar, hunger, and satiety cues by releasing hormones like ghrelin and leptin.
Your gut microbes are an important part of this process because they interact with the endocrine cells, triggering metabolic responses. Research is ongoing to understand exactly how your microbiome is involved in the metabolic process.
How Your Gut Bacteria Influence Your Weight
Researchers hope to better understand how your gut microbiome influences your weight, and one study published in 2021 gave us our clearest explanation yet.
The study looked at a group of individuals who were given behavioral coaching in the form of a dietitian and a nurse. Half of the group lost an average of 1% of their bodyweight monthly over the course of a year, while the other half had stable weights and BMIs throughout the timeframe.
All individuals had genetic material from blood and stool samples analyzed to identify the genes within their gut bacteria in addition to other health markers.
The difference between these two groups were that those individuals who did not lose weight had specific gut bacteria that were more efficient at metabolizing carbohydrates, indicating that more calories from carbs were being absorbed than in the group who lost weight.
More research is needed to understand better how the composition of your gut bacteria influences your weight, but shifting your diet to better diversify your microbiome is a good place to start.
Improving Your Microbiome
Your gut bacteria is influenced by your diet and other lifestyle factors. Like we discussed earlier, having a large diversity of good bacteria in your gut helps to outcompete the bad stuff that may contribute to weight gain, just like a healthy forest keeps out pests and invasive weeds.
Diversify whole foods in your Diet
The good bacteria you want to encourage does not thrive on a diet high in sugar or saturated fats. Instead, these foods feed the harmful bacteria. Processed foods tend to lack fiber, which is the main food source for healthy bacteria, and they also contain chemical additives and preservatives which can hurt or diminish your microbiome.
In order to encourage a variety of microorganisms to thrive in your gut, you should eat an equally wide variety of plant fibers to feed them.
Focus on eating as much variety as you can of whole foods including fruits, vegetables, whole grains, lean meats, poultry, and fish which provide your body with fiber, healthy fats, and protein.
Avoid harmful chemicals
There are many environmental chemicals which are toxic to your gut microbiome including alcohol, tobacco smoke, pollution, pesticides, and antibiotics. While your microbiome is pretty resilient when it comes to short term exposure to these toxins, chronic exposure will harm or even kill them.
Sometimes medications like antibiotics are necessary to recover from illness, but you should avoid chronic exposure by limiting how often you take them. You should also avoid animal products like meat and dairy that use antibiotics on their livestock feed.
Similarly, you should avoid frequent alcohol use and you should certainly quit smoking or using nicotine products like vapes in order to encourage a healthy diversity of microorganisms in your gut.
Using Probiotics and Prebiotics
Probiotics are the helpful microbes that you can ingest in the form of supplements and fermented foods. Prebiotics are the foods rich in dietary fiber that feed your gut bacteria.
We discussed how you can eat more prebiotics by eating a diet rich in a wide variety of plants, but where do you get probiotics?
Probiotics are found in fermented foods like yogurt, kimchi, sauerkraut, pickles, kombucha, miso, tamari, tempeh, apple cider vinegar, and certain dairy products. When shopping for these products, look at the labels for the phrase “contains live active cultures” to ensure you are getting foods that have living probiotics.
Wrapping it Up
Your gut microbiome plays an important role in your overall health, from your immune system and endocrine system, to your digestion and weight maintenance. Encouraging a healthy and diverse microbiome helps you to prevent illness and helps your body thrive.
You can encourage a healthy microbiome by eating a wide variety of fiber-rich plant foods, probiotics, and avoiding harmful chemicals and overusing antibiotics.
As always, reach out to our team here at TeleHealthNP for support or guidance throughout your weight loss journey.
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