Many people seem to have a great diet, but it also seems that it hasn’t been correctly digested. That’s why I want you to know about a very common problem that many of us have.
Low stomach acid.
This is a frequently and unnoticed problem that is related to another diseases such as stomach cancer, asthma and rheumatoid arthritis. If you have symptoms such as acid reflux, heartburn, burping, bloating or nausea after your meal, then you might have problems with your stomach acid.
People with gastrointestinal issues, particularly inflammatory gut diseases and celiac disease, are more prone to have heartburn. If you have already made changes in your diet and lifestyle but you haven’t gotten the wanted results, you might have low stomach acid.
How do low stomach acid levels affect you?
- Enough levels of stomach acid are necessary to properly absorb many nutrients like proteins, vitamin B12, folic acid, and minerals such as iron, copper, zinc and calcium.
- Stomach acid is also a crucial part of immune system. In normal conditions it represents a barrier that easily and quickly eliminate bacteria that get into the body. It also keep the natural bacteria that live in our gut down, keeping it away from the stomach.
Today I want you to know three of the most common and visible patterns that show low levels of stomach acid:
1. You don’t feel good when you eat meat.
A pattern is an observation that links different clues, and this particular one affects women more than men very often. Why is this then? I think it is a two-sided problem: the first one is physiological, due to low stomach acid. And the second one is related to beliefs that are created to deal with the physiological symptoms.
This could be a typical scenery:
Mary is perfectly connected to her body. Ever since she can remember, she doesn’t like to eat red meat nor any meat in big amounts. When she is asked about it, she answer: “I just never liked meat, I don’t like how it makes me feel”.
I think it is totally justified and accepted by its feelings. She really feels bad, weak or sick when she eats a big portion of meat, and that is because she does not have the ability to correctly digest it. She needs more stomach acid to properly break the protein structure, no matter the color (white or red) any type of meat will make her feel worse than she does not eat it.
If you are the kind of people who don’t really like meat, I challenge you to give a try eating it but also taking betaine HCL and you will probably regain your desire for eating meat.
2. Having acid reflux after a meal.
This pattern is particularly paradoxical. On one side the burning pain caused by your stomach acid that moves to unprotected areas of your esophagus. This make you take anti-reflux medication to make the pain away, so it is easy to gather that high stomach acid levels cause the heartburn or GERD. But this is actually not true.
Medication advertising and modern social media have made us believe that acid reflux and GERD are consequences of high stomach acid levels. This is nothing else but marketing coming from people who is only willing to make profits from you by selling you their messages.
On the other side, there is a strong theory that explain GERD as a result of insufficient stomach acid levels, leading to certain conditions that cause increased intra-abdominal pressure (IAP). When IAP rises up, the pressure over the lower esophagus sphincter (LES) also increases, so it opens and the stomach acid goes up originating the pain and burn sensation (even in small amount). This issue could be really annoying and harmful because the esophagus tissue is not protected against the stomach acid.
Just like someone that have suffered from heartburn and acid reflux, I know how terrible it can be and no one has to suffer for it. Betaine HCL supplementation can help getting rid of the pain during sleep and it contributes to digest proteins.
3. Burping or bloating after eating.
After having a meal, do you feel any of the following symptoms?
- Do you burp right after eating and/or feeling bad breath or smell?
- Do you feel gassy 1 or 2 hours after a meal?
- Do you feel abdominal bloating after a meal and it takes couple of hours?
- Does your stomach hurt and you have the feeling the food is fermenting in it?
If you have answered yes to any of these questions, you might have low stomach acid levels because these symptoms indicates that you are not having good digestion.
What really happens is that the food ingested is being fermented by the bacteria in the gut and the by-product produces gas. If your stomach acid are very low and the bacteria are living in the stomach, gas is generated after a meal. Even after several hours, burping may occur leaving a bad taste in mouth which is an indicator that food is still in the stomach when it should be in the small intestine. When the stomach acid levels are too low the gastric content is not pour into the gut at time.
Bloating and flatulence can be explained by different problems, one of them is the bacteria overgrowth in the stomach or small intestine. In this organs shouldn’t be bacteria because enough quantity of stomach acid protects them from bacteria growth by killing them. Another issue could be a slowly digestion that gives enough time for bacteria to move and reproduce.
If you are suffering any of these symptoms, you can check the link below and test your stomach acid levels by yourself.
