Psychological responses (2009-6-30)
Food aversions can develop if, say, a person had a bad vomit- inducing shrimp dinner one night. The response would be to associate the shrimp dinner with the painful aftereffects and avoid it.
Archive for June, 2009
General GI disorders (2009-6-25)
Problems like irritable bowel syndrome, which causes gut-related symptoms like diarrhea and abdominal pain, are caused by sensitive nerves and result in inflammation in the intestinal walls. For example, we usually all pass the same amount of gas a day (about fourteen times, or 1 liter total), but some of us sense discomfort from [...]
Enzyme deficiencies (2009-6-20)
When your intestines lack enzymes to metabolize specific foods like milk or grains or beans, the food remains undigested, so you start feeding your intestines’ ravenous bacteria. The result: lots of intestinal dilation and more gas than a Hummer fuel tank. The most common of these is lactose intolerance (the lack of GI agreement [...]
Slow the Process (2009-6-15)
Especially before your meal. If you have a little of the right kinds of fat just before you eat, you can trick your hormonal system by sending the signal to your brain that you’re full. If you eat a little fat twenty minutes before your meal (70 calories or so of fat in the form [...]
Fasting Phase (2009-6-10)
When you’re sleeping or go long periods without eating, your body needs to have a supply of energy to keep your organs functioning. Once you use up all of your available glucose during the digestive phase of metabolism (your body stores only about 300 calories in the short-term glycogen reservoir), it taps a long-term reservoir: [...]
Digestive Phase (2009-6-5)
Your hypothalamus orchestrates this phase of metabolism by receiving signals from throughout your body about whether you’re hungry or not, so that your body can use energy to power itself. Here’s how: Your body has a short-term reservoir for energy in the form of glycogen, a carbohydrate primarily stored in your liver and muscles. After [...]