Gut issues are frustrating. I’ve been there. I’ve experienced the bloating and discomfort that shows up after dinner, or lunch, or snacks, or any meal really. Chronic constipation that constantly needs some type of supplemental help— sometimes you have a random movement and other times you feel it and it just doesn’t come. There’s the daily acid reflux. Or maybe a SIBO diagnosis you got two years ago and have been quietly managing since.
You probably don’t connect them to blood sugar though. At least most women don’t. A gastroenterologist will talk about your gut. Your primary will talk about your numbers. And you’re left pieces it all together. Happens all the time.
In twelve years of working with women on this specific issue, I almost never see one without the other now (especially with our food systems shifting so drastically the past decade). I see so many combinations: borderline A1C and bloating. Insulin resistance and IBS. A “less bloated middle” sitting at the top of someone’s goal list right next to “reverse pre-diabetes and stay in the 5.4 to 5.5 range.”
These two—your gut and blood sugar—run together because they share a single root — chronic, low-grade inflammation.
Here’s the loop. When your gut is inflamed, your cells actually stop hearing insulin clearly, so your pancreas pushes out more to compensate. Your A1C goes up, and you’ll know if this is true if you crash 30 to 60 minutes after eating. Your middle gets puffier. And when your insulin is high, the bacteria in your gut shift, your stomach acid weakens, things slow down — the reflux starts, the bloating intensifies, the “I ate something I shouldn’t have and now I’ll feel and see the impact for two days” pattern starts.
As long as you’re treating one end of that loop, the other end keeps undoing your work.
Here are several daily habits that can support both digestion and blood sugar:
Cooked vegetables instead of raw, because raw kale and raw onions and big chopped salads are wrecking a gut that’s already inflamed.
Protein at every meal in amounts your digestion can actually handle (not the firehose).
Carbs eaten at the time of day your body processes them best — not zero carbs, please, no more zero carbs, your gut and your hormones need them. I know it’s scary but you can start with some low glycemic ones.
A 12-hour pause overnight so your gut can finish its work while you sleep.
A short walk after meals that lowers your post-meal glucose and gets your digestion moving in the same ten minutes.
Maybe you’re thinking:
I’m so bored with my meals already.
I hate meal planning.
I can’t eat onions, garlic, leeks, raw vegetables, red meat, gluten, dairy, eggs, or whatever else I already can’t eat. The last thing I need is a longer list of “can’t.”
Restriction on top of restriction is not the answer — and it’s the trap most plans walk women into.
As always, please keep your doctor in the loop. This works alongside their care, not instead of it.
You have options. You have a path. Rooting for you.
Kindly,
Jen