Why Am I Always Bloated?
Do you wake up with a flat stomach and as the day goes along, your stomach feels bloated? Do you have upper abdominal pain and bloating? Or are you bloated all the time?
There are multiple causes, and it is reversible, so don’t settle with, “This is just the way it’s gonna be from now on!” This is an issue I have suffered from and have had to try many dietary changes, supplements, and biohacking techniques to find results. Not all of them worked but some have, so, first let’s start with why you are feeling bloated all of the time:
10 Reasons You Are Feeling Bloated
1. Microbial Fermentation
The number one cause of bloating is “Microbial Fermentation”, or the chemical breakdown of a carb or a microbe in the large intestine. These microbes are turning the carbs into things that the body can’t break down on its own. It turns some into short chain fatty acids, lactic acid, methane, hydrogen gas (very explosive), Co2, nitrogen, and hydrogen sulfide. These enzymes make cellulase to break them down. This reaction results in painful and odorous gases. If this happens in the small intestine, it creates a condition called SIBO.
2. Insulin
When you eat sugar or carbs, your insulin spikes. When it spikes, you start getting visceral fat, especially around the belly. Your stomach is a great indicator of your insulin level; if your mid section is distended, you probably have high insulin.
Your liver starts getting fatty and spills into other organs. If you have the “top roll” of fat on your stomach, that is Fatty Liver. Fatty liver is caused by eating too many carbs and not from eating fat. And you don’t need to be drinking alcohol to create a fatty liver. In fact, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease is the fastest growing chronic disease.
If you have love handles, that is also from high insulin. Even fruit can cause high levels of insulin. Many people get their blood sugar tested but not their insulin. You have to specifically ask your doctor for that test.
3. Cortisol
This hormone is made by the adrenal gland and is the stress hormone. It can raise insulin without eating anything, and it turns protein into glucose. So you can raise your blood sugar through stress without eating sugar (I know it isn’t fair!) Then you become insulin resistant, and your blood sugar goes up. This is why high cortisol leads to diabetes.
4. Liver
You have liquid that is leaking out of the liver into a sack around your midsection called ascites. This is most often caused by liver scarring, otherwise known as cirrhosis. Scarring increases pressure inside the liver’s blood vessels. The increased pressure can force fluid into the abdominal cavity, resulting in ascites.
5. Fiber
Lots of “health” foods use different fibers because they are trying to bulk up the foods without adding the carb calories. They use inulin, chicory root, corn fiber, vegetable fiber, to name a few. Also, you might be eating vegetables you aren’t used to as you are switching to a healthier diet. Some people can tolerate these fibers well and some can’t, resulting in painful gas and bloat.
6. SIBO
Bacteria that should only be in the large intestine is in the small intestine, creating fermentation where it doesn’t belong. In this case, you don’t want to have a pre- or probiotic, including some vegetables and fiber, as they will aggravate the situation by feeding those bacteria.
7. Sugar Alcohols
On a keto diet or any kind of “healthy diet”, you are probably trying to find substitutes for those sweet snacks you are missing, and you use the sugar substitutes like erythritol, xylitol, sorbitol, and maltitol. Some people are sensitive to them and they can create gas, diarrhea, and constipation.
8. Frequent Eating
Normally food takes 4-5 hours to digest through the system. If you eat every three hours, then you have food on top of food and it is overwhelming your digestive system. This is why I recommend intermittent fasting to give your digestive system a break to start healing and repairing it’s leaky gut as well. As you eat constantly, your gut never has a break to start healing those holes inside your intestinal walls.
9. Leaky Gut
As I mentioned above, when you start a ketogenic diet you still might be suffering from a leaky gut. A leaky gut causes inflammation throughout the whole body and can also surface as bloating and distention.
10. Food Poisoning
If you contract food poisoning such as salmonella or E coli, something that I am personally prone to, it feels like World War 3 is occurring inside your stomach, causing very painful bloating and causing an inflammatory response in your intestines.
How to Get Rid of Bloating Immediately
Take Accelerated Fast®
Accelerated Fast®™ quickly puts you into fat burning mode, so that your body is snacking on your fat stores throughout the day and cutting down on the frequent eating. This allows digestion to rest and reduce the bloat. It will also reduce your insulin and your blood sugar, help with stress and cortisol levels, cut the sugar and carb cravings so you are not tempted to eat the carbs that cause bloating in the first place.
Intermittent Fast
As you give your body a break from digestion, Intermittent Fasting allows proper digestion to occur with one to two meals a day. You are able to do this seamlessly if your body is in ketosis and knows how to use its body fat for fuel. Furthermore, the rest from digestion, with the help of the Keto Detox Bundle helps heal Leaky Gut.
Use ION* Gut Health
ION* Gut Health (formerly RESTORE) heals Leaky Gut by restoring the tight junctions in your intestinal walls so that the inflammation can subside. It has also been proven to protect you from toxins and GMO threats to your intestinal tract.
Supplement with Nano Silver
Accelerated Colloidal Silver™ boosts your immune system, and helps devitalize the pathogens that could also be causing bloat like parasites, viruses and bad bacteria.
Take a Probiotic
Taking probiotics, unless you have SIBO, can help build up the good bacteria to alleviate gas and bloating. Accelerated Leaky Gut Bundle is a unique probiotic formula that kills off the candida, salmonella, and bad bacteria throughout the gut.
Add Digestive Enzymes
If you don’t have the proper enzymes in your stomach to break down your food, you can suffer from bloat. As we age, we have less enzymes to break down our foods. You may not be able to digest what you used to. That is a sign you need add enzymes.
Follow a Low Carb Diet
If you have bloating, you want to focus on foods with proteins and fats that won’t cause that bloat. Too many vegetables can be detrimental to a condition that causes distention in the gut. You want to eliminate high sugar and carbs in addition to avoiding foods like garlic, onions, fruit, asparagus, milk, and dairy. And if you still don’t find relief, you may want to try a carnivore diet by just eating animal products and cutting out all vegetables to allow the digestive system to reset. It is the true “elimination diet.”
Add Specific Foods
Eating foods like fennel, ginger, anise and peppermint help release the gas by relaxing the muscles. Also, ingesting apple cider vinegar or HCL helps acidify the stomach to help break down the food.
Eliminate Lectins
Lectins are in plant-based foods and can be toxic to the body causing leaky gut. They do not get broken down by your GI tract, and they disrupt digestion, reduce energy absorption, weaken your immune system, and throw off your gut bacteria. They poke holes into your intestinal walls and they are linked to weight gain. They include nightshades, all beans, fruits, grains, corn, dairy, some nuts and seeds, and some vegetable oils.
Relieve Constipation
Many are constipated and bloated simultaneously. The answer to constipation bloat is not to eat more fiber; it can actually cause a further back up of the system and cause an increased below tissue. Laxa Comfort is the best instant Indian home remedy for constipation. The Intestinal Formula works just as well.
Use a Detox Powder with Zeolite and Activated Charcoal
Accelerated Cellular Detox® powder helps soak up food poison, alcohol, and toxic chemicals in addition to improving regularity and decreasing bloating. It works by killing parasites and fungus and cleans the whole digestive tract. It helps balance the digestive system, makes stools softer, in addition to coating ulcers and bringing down inflammation for people with IBS and colitis.
Sara Banta
Sara Banta is a Stanford University Graduate with a Degree in Economics and Psychology, and a certified Natural Supplement Expert & Graduate of the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. Sara is the Founder of Accelerated Health Products and host of the health & wellness podcast, Accelerated Health Radio.