Understanding Harmful Ingredients in Gut Health Supplements

Juniper discusses the harmful ingredients commonly found in gut health supplements and emphasizes the importance of checking supplement labels for optimal health and well-being. She encourages everyone to prioritize a holistic approach to gut health, including a nutrient-dense diet, regular exercise, stress management, and quality sleep.

Transcript

Welcome to Follow Your Gut, the podcast where women like you are empowered to take charge of your family's health and happiness. I'm your host, Juniper Bennett, formerly known as Sarah. I'm the founder and CEO of Only Organics, and as a momma to four, I have personally gone through the ups and downs of Navigating, the sea of misinformation and the runaround from our medical system while caring for my family's health and well being. This podcast is dedicated to educating and empowering you on the significance of gut health and how it affects everything from your family's sleep to your mood and everything in between. By understanding the foundation of your wellness and the causes of common yet preventable symptoms, you can achieve a deeper level of health and happiness for your family. Join me as we explore the world of gut health and enhance our lives from the core of our well beings, all while honoring our powerful intuitions. I'm so happy you're here. Let's dive into today's episode.

Welcome to episode 60. Understanding Harmful Ingredients and Gut Health Supplements. At the time of recording this, my family and I are at a massive reservoir called Flaming Gorge and it is currently 96 degrees outside. My children and husband are out splashing in the lake and I hope that you can hear their giggles in the background because it's quite distracting to me because it just as a mom, it just warms your heart when you can hear so much joy. I'm so happy to be here with you sharing this topic because there are so many fad gut health supplements being rolled out all the time. Gut health in general has become a popular topic of discussion and absolutely for a good reason. But again, there are so many gut health supplements out there that claim to offer quick fixes, promising a flourishing microbiome, and improved overall mental and physical well being. However, not all ingredients found in these supplements are beneficial.

In this episode, we are going to discuss some commonly used ingredients in gut health supplements that may actually cause more harm than healing. It's important to understand that nurturing gut health is not a onetime solution, but rather a lifelong commitment to a healthy lifestyle.  I don't know where you are in the world right now, but I think across, at least across the North America, it is so hot. I mean, we are in our bus. We don't have air conditioning. 96 degrees for us is a scorcher. So we're going to spend the whole day in the lake and we're going to make it through. And I have to new mantra. I'm actually going to record an entire episode. There's flies swarming around me. If you want the treat of watching this, I am sharing it on YouTube as well. I'm swatting flies and wiping sweat off my forehead. And anyways, this is just real Deal and I'm recording this one on the spot here. It's going to air in two days from actually, no, this is going to air tomorrow. I'm recording this monday, July 17. I usually prepare these podcasts a bit more in advance, but this is a topic that is so hot and happening right now and I feel it's incredibly important to speak on it.

As a leader in the gut health space, it feels incredibly important to me that I shine light on ingredients that are thrown into these gut health supplements that are really greenwashed, that are. They are saying all the right words. So let's get into it. As we dive into these ingredients, I know you are going to be thinking, well shoot, juniper. These are in everything. This is impossible. But what I want you to keep in mind as we talk about these different ingredients, is that today we are focusing specifically on gut health supplements. Of course, the more we can avoid these ingredients in general, the better off we are. But I'm not sharing this information to overwhelm you. Rather, this is a conversation worth having so that you can go check your gut health supplement labels right now and make sure they are actually benefiting your health. And while it is next to impossible to avoid these ingredients completely, they should absolutely not be in the supplements that you are taking to benefit your health. Your supplements should not contribute to the problem. All right, so here's the list of ingredients. I'm going to share the ingredient and then go into that specific ingredient a little bit further in depth. Natural Flavors although seeing the word natural might put your mind at ease, natural flavors are more like natural disasters. The Food and Drug Administration defines natural flavors as derived from plants and animals. But that doesn't mean that your watermelon flavor comes from watermelons. In fact, watermelon flavor includes anywhere from 50 to 100 chemical ingredients that food and supplement brands do not required to disclose. Some of these chemicals have been proven to be toxic and even lethal in large doses. Not to mention how disruptive they are to your delicate good gut bacteria. So I want to reframe that to really make it digestible for you. To get one natural flavor, we're going with watermelon here. To get that one watermelon flavor, whatever they started with, plant or animal, it has been cycled through, processed with 50 to 100. The average is 70 chemicals for one natural flavor that you never even know you are being exposed to.

The second ingredient is citric acid. This is common in food. It is naturally found in citrus fruits. But what you're commonly seeing in foods and supplements is it is a food additive used as a flavor enhancer or preservative. And again, while it occurs naturally in citrus fruits, the citric acid used in processed foods and supplements is made from a chemically formed black mold that typically feeds on corn syrup. We all know that mold is not beneficial to our health, nor is something that is being fed GMO corn syrup. Not only that, but citric acid alters the acidity in your gut, affecting the balance of beneficial bacteria. The next ingredient isolated ingredients. Gut health supplements often boast about their isolated nutrients, such as isolated fibers or vitamins. And while these nutrients are important, they are best when you get them from whole food sources rather than in isolated forms. Isolated ingredients lack the natural fiber and synergistic compounds found in whole foods, which are crucial for properly digesting that nutrient, whatever it is, that vitamin, that mineral, that fiber. And it's really important for your nutrient absorption. Without the whole food, your body doesn't know how to process that isolated nutrient, fiber or vitamin.

Really quick. Are you wondering if you or your child have. A gut imbalance. Take my quick and easy quiz to find out in less than 60 seconds. Understanding your gut health is the first step in leading your family toward optimal health and happiness. Visit WW only on Le organics.com Pages quiz, or simply click the link in the show notes to take the quiz. Now you.  

The next one. Is refined sugar, including cane sugar. It's known to be detrimental to our overall health. This isn't new news, and its negative impact on your gut health should not be overlooked. Refined sugars feed harmful bacteria in your gut, leading to an overgrowth of those bad bacteria. Sugar should not be in your gut health supplement. They don't need to be colored. They don't need to be flavored. They should be pure and raw. You don't need these additives. 2s In alignment with sugar is artificial sweeteners, like aspartame, sucralose saccharine. All of these alter the composition and diversity of your gut bacteria. They can lead to an overgrowth of certain bad bacteria while reducing beneficial bacteria. And this bacteria imbalance causes inflammation, which creates havoc for your metabolic health, including your glucose tolerance and your insulin sensitivity. Also, artificial sweeteners are intensely sweet, often hundreds of times sweeter than natural sugars. Regular exposure to high intensity sweeteners can desensitize your taste buds and increase cravings for sweet foods, potentially leading to an unhealthy dietary pattern that negatively affects your gut health. Anytime we are consuming something artificial, 1ur brain interprets it as what it's doing, right? So if we are eating artificial sweetener that's hundreds of times sweeter than sugar, our bodies begin to crave that amount of sweetness, and we are much more likely to consume. Sweets and we get these super high dopamine rushes in our brain from these intense sweeteners and it impacts our whole body's regulation, our cravings, what our bodies, what our gut and brain are communicating back and forth, what they need. They wreak havoc on our gut health and our brain health, on our food craving things.

These flies, they are really swarming me. The next one is preservatives such as sodium benzanate and sulfites. These are added to food products and supplements to extend their shelf life. These preservatives contains antimicrobial properties that impact your gut bacteria. Not only that, but they compromise the integrity of your intestinal barrier, allowing toxins and harmful substances to enter your bloodstream. A solid quality gut health supplement does not need preservatives emulsifiers. This is the last ingredient we are going to go over today. There are, of course, many others I should have included artificial dyes, but I didn't because. Among the newer gut health supplements that seem to be like raging on instagram. And they are fad supplements. They are actually, from what I have found, they are colored with natural, with pomegranate or with 1s chlorella or spirulina. So they are being colored naturally, which is beautiful. So I didn't include those here. But that is another thing, maybe another topic for another day, how artificial dyes impact our gut health. So the last one here is emulsifiers. These are additives used to they're used in processed foods and supplements to improve texture, stability and shelf life. Examples include lecathin, polysorbates and keragenen. These emulsif fires disrupt the gut microbiome and cause inflammation. These changes may contribute again to metabolic disorders such as obesity and inflammatory bowel disease. I know these ingredients are next to impossible to avoid completely. But at the very least, the supplements that you are spending your time and energy on should absolutely not contain them.

If you are sitting there right now looking at your supplement ingredient list in disbelief, go ahead and throw them away. This is your permission. Do not consume gut health supplements that include the ingredients that we just went over. That is your red flag that that gut health supplement company is there for a profit. They are not there for your health. They do not have your best interest in mind. A quality gut health supplement does not include these ingredients. A company that is their value, their focus is to enhance your health. They are not going to include ingredients that are detrimental to the whole purpose of you taking that supplement in the first place. I can't emphasize it enough. A quality supplement that is dedicated to your health and well being will never include these ingredients. Nurturing your gut health is not a journey that can be simplified with a quick fix approach or a magic juice. It requires a holistic lifestyle approach. And if you are being told by any influencer on Instagram or any email that is flooding your inbox or any news article you have read, you are being misled to believe that that supplement is in your best interest if it includes these ingredients. And if it's just a quick fix, all you have to do is drink this juice and you are going to have better mental health, you're going to sleep better, you're going to do all these things. You are being lied to.

It requires a holistic lifestyle approach for true balance and overall wellness, including a nutrient dense diet, regular exercise, stress management and quality sleep. While a gut health supplement can be helpful, it is essential to scrutinize their ingredients before incorporating them into your gut health lifestyle and routine. This is actually why I created Onle, to provide families with a trustworthy brand of quality supplements that only include the ingredients that you need and nothing more. This is not an episode to sell my own products. It is an episode to highlight how important it is for you to take charge of your wellness, to not let yourself be greenwashed and misled by fancy words like natural flavors. I hope this short and sweet episode was helpful to you and helps you in making informed decisions about the supplements you bring into your home. Thanks for joining me today. I will be back next week.

Thank you for tuning in to today's episode of Follow Your Gut. As a reminder, the information shared on the show is not just for your children, but also for you as a woman win at Only Organics, I have created a line of the best quality gut balancing supplements and products that have transformed my family's health and happiness. Head to www.onlyonics.com to start your journey to optimal gut health today. Lastly, I always want to be very transparent that I am not a medical professional and the information shared on this podcast is based on my personal experience and research. Please always listen to your own inner voice of wisdom and your healthcare professional. Join me again next week for more insights and inspiration on taking charge of your family's health and happiness. I'll see you then.