Your “Gutprint”

Your “gutprint”

Ever wondered why you felt worse after going gluten-free?

Or gained weight on a vegan diet?

How about chugging on goat milk even though you’re “lactose-intolerant”?

I have one answer: your gut microbiome (GM)!

Sometimes you hear gut flora or gut microbiota, which both refer to the bacteria, archaea and fungi that reside in the GI tracts of humans and other animals. Your GM, or as some would simply say, microbiome, refers to all the microbes and their genes. While some may hang out in your small intestines, most of these guys are found in your large intestine.

We actually have several communities of microbes all over our bodies: ears, skin, nose, mouth, genitals, etc. They consist of not only bacteria, but also archaea, viruses, fungi and parasites. Collectively, these microbes along with their genes is called the human microbiome, with the biggest community being our GM.

Like your fingerprint, your GM is unique to you, hence the word “gutprint.” :) Unlike your fingerprint, however, your gutprint changes over the course of time based on a number of things like diet, lifestyle and environment. In general, having a good balance of good and bad strains of bacteria constitute a healthy GM. It’s when you have more of the bad than the good guys or when they chill where they shouldn’t be that all hell breaks loose.

There has been a ton of research that link our GM to almost every physical or mental chronic disease and condition out there. Check out some of it here. Everything from weight gain to depression, our gut microbes have so much more control over our health than we know.

So while it’s common to associate the gut with digestive issues, its ties to our well-being goes way beyond feeling bubblies in the tummy or acid reflux. As you think about your body and symptoms you feel on a regular basis, there’s a good chance that it’s connected to the state of your GM.