Your 2nd Brain-The Gut- & How Much It Influences Mental Health

Your Second Brain is a term for the Enteric Nervous System that regulates our digestive tract. It refers to how our gut and brain are in constant communication with each other and influence each other by using the same cells and chemicals. This influence is an area that researchers are continually learning more about. We have long understood that what happens in our brain (stress, anxiety, trauma, etc.) can influence our body and digestion- stomach aches, indigestion, muscle tension, illness, etc. It is now accepted that what occurs in our digestive tract (gut) can also influence what occurs psychologically in our brain, impacting one’s stress and mental health to the point of developing mental illnesses.

Studies have shown that there are altered gut microbiomes of those that suffer with depression and anxiety. Our gut microbiome is the trillions of microorganisms living in our digestive tract. The gut microbiome is the main center of our whole human microbiome. It includes 70-80% of all of our immune cells, 95% of our serotonin (mood/sleep regulation) and 70% of our dopamine (motivation/pleasure/reward), over 500 million neurons, and 39 trillion microbial cells.

We are learning that the gut-brain-immune system axis can play a crucial role in our mood/ psychological state, sleep, emotional resiliency, and even physical pain sensitivity. Our gut and brain communicates 24/7. What we are ingesting and the health of our microbiome impacts what those messages will be.

When It Goes Wrong:

Too little amounts of food (not necessarily intentional fasts), inflammation causing foods, and foods lacking nutritional value can deprive our brain of important energy sources and cause vital nutritional deficiencies, chronic inflammation, and impacts to our immune system. These three changes can also impact our mental health at clinical levels.

The dietary changes in the current Standard American Diet (SAD) lean heavily towards foods that can cause inflammation and lack nutritional qualities, by focusing on highly processed, highly refined sugary foods, and high saturated fats.

Inflammation

Acute or brief inflammation is a necessary healing response of our immune system. Chronic inflammation, though, can cause damage to our cells and their DNA structure and overwork our immune system, sometimes leading to autoimmune disorders or symptoms. Chronic inflammation is linked to an extensive variety of psychiatric and physical illnesses. Sometimes inflammation is the cause of our mental or physical symptoms and sometimes it is the result of them, but it often plays a role. Many medications for psychiatric illnesses include a form of an anti-inflammatory in them. Being able to naturally work on decreasing inflammation in your body through stress management (therapy) and dietary changes, can have a significant impact on psychiatric and physical illnesses. This doesn’t mean you need to immediately eliminate all inflammatory foods, but if your diet consists mainly of the foods listed below, then you may want to look at finding a more balanced diet to reduce short and long-term impacts. The ultimate goal is balanced blood sugar levels, balanced immune systems, and eliminating chronic inflammation because they are critical to our physical and mental health.

When we consume a lot of inflammatory foods we can comprise the integrity of our intenstinal lining. Leaky gut is a term used when the connections between cells in our intestinal tract become loose and weakened, allowing toxins to pass through. The foods we eat, stress, inflammation, infections, and certain medications can all cause and increase leaky gut. Leaky gut can then lead to food sensitivities and new food allergies being formed when the threshold for a certain food’s tolerance in the gut is surpassed. Leaky gut also allows for the passing of inflammatory messages and communications from the gut to the brain. This can lead to inflammation in the brain. The longer our brain is inflammed, the higher the risk that those changes can become chronic and long-term, as seen with mental health disorders like depression.

Immune System

Inflammation can also negatively impact our autoimmune system, even to the point of developing autoimmune disorders. Many autoimmune disorders can also cause chronic inflammation. Both of these scenarios can impact mental health, as the immune system, like the gut, is also in constant communication with our brain. Some common autoimmune disorders are Hashimoto’s, Rheumatoid Arthritis, Celiac Disease (which has been consistently growing in the US over the past decade), IBD like Ulcerative Colitis and Crohn’s (the most common autoimmune disorder in US), Gout, Diabetes, Lupus, Addison’s, Sjogrens, Graves, and PANS/PANDAS. I will discuss some of the specifics of a few of these disorders and their unique influences on mental health in upcoming blogs.

Many of these disorders can begin to develop as early as childhood and into late adulthood. As our immune systems begin to decline as we age, maintaining healthy immune boosting habits can be a source of countering that natural decline. Studies in elderly patients showed that maintaining a strong nutrient rich diet had a positive impact on their immune systems and reduced their risks of illness and infection amongst their peers.

Most don’t realize the significant role our immune system has on not only how we feel but also in how we think. When we feel unwell we can become anxious about social interactions, financial security, future health, and much more. We can become sad or feel defeated by constant pain, nausea, cancellations of plans, cost of healthcare, etc. These examples are just reactions to the experiences that can be caused by our physical health. When we also acknowledge the impacts at a biological and neurochemical level in our body and brain, we begin to see just how important planning for and maintaining our gut health is.

More information about how to actively address your gut health will follow in the rest of this microbiome & gut health series.

In the meantime, check out the mental health awareness or adult strategies section of the blog list to find where you can get started on addressing your stress responses and working to mentally reduce stress and inflammation in your body.

What areas would you like to see covered in this series? Leave a comment below: