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Does your practitioner ever stop to ask you how are your bowels moving? What about your nutritionist? Your personal trainer? Chances are, unless you are suffering from a serious bout of irregularity or IBS, no one has brought it up yet, have they? It's interesting, because the more you think about what you eat, the more you should be concerned about what is making its way out!

The old saying goes, 'You are what you eat.' Generally speaking, our meals travel through our digestive system in about 12-24 hours. This passage is called transit time, and when all systems are firing properly, (ie: stomach acids, digestive enzymes, bile production) we will typically have 1-3 healthy bowel movements per day, assuring that nutrients are used, and waste is excreted. Healthy digestion means our body is able to use the nutrients we consume, and a healthy system finds its natural weight. It also makes for an absence of symptoms such as gas & bloating, nausea, and constipation.

The nutrition industry, often modifies the saying above to read 'You are what you eat, and what you absorb,' recognizing once you consume good foods your digestion and constitution must be strong enough to break down and utilize what you are getting through the diet. Unhealthy or impaired digestion can lead to a failure to absorb ones' foods properly, causing a cascade of problems including acid indigestion, irritable bowel and a failure to thrive.

Digestive care specialists will often comment, 'You are what you eat, but also what you do not eliminate.' Indeed, if your bowels are irregular, then what are you made of? Where is all that undigested & constipated food going? A-ha, waste and trash build-up! I don't intend that to sound flippant, I am genuinely serious about this. So there we have the connection between constipation & weight retention. And the answer is simple: Improve digestion & eliminate constipation, and you will encourage your body to naturally shed excess weight. Simple dietary changes such as adding more fiber, and seasonal colon cleansing can help you promote regularity & associated weight loss.

The scale is a difficult measurement tool to trust, especially over a short period of time. That is because our weight fluctuates due to the amount of food in our belly, as well as the amount of water we are retaining around our cells. So what we see on the bathroom scale isn't necessarily representative of our fat stores. If your body is dehydrated, it can become constipated, and will do all it can to hold onto what little liquid we consume. This can lead to a decrease in the number of healthy eliminations, (i.e. constipation,) which leads to a greater likelihood of a higher reading on the scale.

It's a vicious cycle, but one that can easily be broken if you give your body the right tools. If the body has sufficient water to hydrate the system, it will eliminate more water through urination. If the bowels are given a fiber rich diet, they will be more regular, and these eliminations will also promote a natural weight.

So let's assure that, 'We are what we eat and that we eliminate properly.' A diet rich in fruits, vegetables and whole grains will provide the nutrients & fiber which keep our body functioning optimally, keep our energy high and our constitution strong and healthy. And isn't that better than being full of waste & suffering from overweight?