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Lately, I've been putting more focus on exercise. Not just because it helps me de-stress, boosts my creativity, and makes me sleep like a baby, but because I genuinely enjoy it! Plus, it's well known that exercise does wonders for your immune system, mood, muscles, and heart.

But did you know that exercise also plays a key role in your gut health? Yes, research shows that working out benefits your digestion and whole gut in ways you might not expect.

Let’s Talk Gut Health

I’m sure you’ve heard that taking a light walk after a meal helps your digestion. It turns out that’s not just an old wives’ tale. In fact, post-meal walks can help food move through your system up to 30% faster and can balance your blood sugar levels. Keeping your digestive system moving also means you’re likely to be more “regular”—which is always a good thing!

Even more interesting is that regular exercise doesn’t just help after you eat; it helps...

This week I’m sharing something about your gut that you might not know about, and it’s a bit of a “which came first, the chicken or the egg?” situation.

Think about a time when you’ve felt nervous, on edge, or worried about something. That’s definitely been me lately, worrying about my son. It’s been a rough week as he hasn’t been improving as quickly as we had hoped and it’s impacting his ability to attend school and focus.

Like me, you might have had an uneasy feeling in your stomach about it. That’s because a big part of your stress response happens inside your gut, inside your “second brain” that resides in your digestive tract. It’s called your enteric nervous system. It’s made up of layers of cells (more than 100 million of them) that line your gastrointestinal tract, all the way from your esophagus to your rectum.  

Your Second Brain

Your enteric nervous system communicates directly...

It makes sense that if you want a healthy gut, you should eat healthy… But where to start? There’s so much information out there and it can be overwhelming to sift through it all, let alone overhaul your entire diet…. Which is exactly why I’m making things simple for you! 

What Your Gut Wants to Eat

Your gut is so important to your health because it impacts everything from your digestion to your brain to your heart and even your mood. As you get older, it becomes even more important to focus on your everyday wellness routine – and that includes your diet and your gut health! Even if you’re not experiencing any symptoms of poor gut health, you’ll want it to stay in tip-top shape. 

A simple way to support your gut health is to feed it properly. All the bacteria in your gut need to eat to survive, just like you. The “good” bacteria love to nibble on insoluble fiber (prebiotics) that are tough enough to survive the trip...

Right now, I’m busy working on my first gut health book to help you improve everything from your digestion to your immune system. Before I get to all that, though, I thought I would share why I’m so passionate about gut health: It’s been a key part of my family’s well-being (and not-so-well-being) over the past decade. 

Where It All Started

Up to eleven years ago, I wasn’t really concerned about gut health other than I knew to avoid antibiotics if I could and that it wasn’t a bad idea to take probiotics. But then my almost seven year old son was diagnosed with osteomyelitis (a bone infection) in his femur. He had been really sick for a few days and finally the doctor on call at the emergency department tested him for staphylococcus aureus (staph infection). When she got the results, she told us to go directly to the nearest children's teaching hospital.

Within about 24 hours, they confirmed that the infection was in his bone. They put him on...