Did you know as many as 1 in 5 people suffer from irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) in the UK?
A recent study shows there is a very good chance your IBS symptoms worsened at some point over the past couple of years, due to the stress of the pandemic. You maybe even experienced digestive symptoms for the first time. Such digestive symptoms may be common but are by no means normal, with many suffering in silence, feeling embarrassed and not seeking help.
We’re coming to the end of IBS awareness month and whilst gut health is for life and not just April, it offers a prime opportunity to talk about IBS and some of the potential root causes with Lucy Harris, IBS and gut health nutritional therapist, Cornwall and online.
What is IBS?
It is a catch-all diagnosis covering a number of gastrointestinal (GI) symptoms including abdominal pain, bloating and a change in bowel habits (e.g. more diarrhoea or constipation). It is often given once other GI conditions such as inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), coeliac disease and bowel cancer, have been ruled out. For those fortunate enough to have never experienced IBS or digestive issues you may assume it’s ‘just’ those surface level, tip of the iceberg gastrointestinal symptoms.
In reality, IBS sufferers (a whopping 10-20% of the UK population) all know there is so much more they have to put up with and these issues are rooted much deeper below the iceberg (see image below). Because it generally isn’t life threatening, you can often feel dismissed and like you’re not being taken seriously, when in fact it can affect all aspects of your life and leave you feeling pretty rubbish and alone.
There may also be many non-digestive symptoms such as brain fog, fatigue and PMS you haven’t even associated as potentially being connected to your IBS.
IBS Symptom Root Causes
Your GP may recommend some dietary or lifestyle changes and possibly suggest some medications to help with your symptoms. Whilst these may help relieve your symptoms many people continue to experience ongoing problems because the underlying ‘root’ cause(s) haven’t been identified.
These digestive symptoms can have a number of causes and we want to find the unique sources (roots) of your issues so we can start addressing them. It’s like if you have a garden full of weeds and you pick only the stems and flowers. You’re not attacking the source and they’ll grow back. Instead you want to pull up the roots to completely remove the weed, making it much less likely to return.
There can be a wide variety of different factors including those in the image below.
Are you ready to start identifying your personal root causes?
Just because you have an IBS diagnosis it doesn’t mean you can’t do further digging to investigate what is causing your digestive symptoms. Some of the many identifiable causes of IBS are shown in the image above and it’s only when we can work out what is driving your symptoms that we can decide the best way to tackle them.
When working 1:1 with a nutritional therapist we’ll deep dive into your current health concerns and symptoms, medical history, lifestyle, nutrition, environmental factors and supplements/medications. This helps establish your personal medical timeline and ‘IBS story’, going all the way back to childhood. If we need to delve deeper I may also recommend functional lab tests (e.g. SIBO breath test, comprehensive microbiome stool test). Once we’ve identified your personal triggers we’ll be ready to start optimising your gut health and getting you feeling great again.
If you don’t want to spend any longer just managing symptoms and are ready to dig deeper click here to book a free no obligation discovery call to find out if this is the right approach for you. Offering consultations in Cornwall and online.