Transcript: Hey mama. Welcome back to Follow Your Gut with me Sarah Bennett, founder of ōNLē ORGANICS as a mama of four. I've gone through the ups and downs of sleepless nights. Undiagnosed symptoms got in the complete runaround from the medical system and I've found a different way. No more waiting out your child's symptoms, endlessly Googling in the middle of the night and feeling lost and alone in your family's wellness.
This podcast will empower you to take leadership of your family's wellness. So you can experience that deep health and happiness that your family so greatly deserves. In today's episode, we are talking about what every mama needs to know about gut health during pregnancy birth and beyond let's dive in.
We are going to take this episode in three stages. The first is going to be where to start nurturing your gut in pregnancy and what that means, why it's important. The second is birth and the exchange of bacteria that happens during birth. And then the third part is beyond. So your introduction to motherhood and childhood and everything beyond.
Okay. So during pregnancy, oh, mama. I wish so badly someone had given me this information at the beginning of my motherhood journey when I was pregnant with my daughter almost 12 years ago. Oh my gosh. Her birthday's coming up. It's always very sentimental. If I had this information, so much of my motherhood would have been so different and so greatly enhanced and quite honestly, many, many years of my second child struggling would have been spared if I had known this, but we're not here to drown ourselves in guilt.
I wasn't given this information, but I hope that I can gift it to you and it can make a difference in your life, your motherhood and your children's childhood. So while pregnant, you know, this, your body is working on. Over time, it's working extra hard, every single part of your body, your reproductive system, your nervous system, your hormones, your digestive system.
Everything is working harder to grow a human and to support your expanding miraculous body through this time. Well, in this cycle. Okay. I want you to picture it's a three. Part cycle like a circle and there's three different parts on here. One is your bodily systems. So again, your reproductive system, your nervous system, your digestive system, all of your systems are in this category.
The other one is your hormones, your progesterone, your testosterone, all of your estrogen. Your serotonin, all of your hormones are in this category. And the third is your gut bacteria. All three of these categories are all working together all of the time. And at anywhere in this cycle. Things can go a little bit haywire, say you catch a cold.
Your immune system is a little compromised. So your hormones try to overcompensate to help heal your body and influx of hormones can throw your gut bacteria out of balance a little bit. And the cycle continues. so your body is already working on overdrive, and now it's a little bit outta whack and there are things that you can do to proactively support your body in staying in alignment within this cycle.
This cycle can be. Thrown off by anything, the stress of pregnancy, maybe you're having to take medications for your pregnancy. Maybe you had to take antibiotics. Maybe you are just not sleeping. Well, maybe you have really, really terrible morning sickness and you are throwing up all the time. All of these things impact your gut bacteria.
And when your gut bacteria is impacted 70% of your. Immune system stems from your gut. 95% of your serotonin is produced in your gut. When your gut bacteria is out of balanced, it's not producing serotonin optimally, and it is not supporting your. Immune system at its full capacity. And so it is really, really helpful to nurture your gut bacteria.
So your bacteria is balanced throughout pregnancy. This strengthens your entire body when your body is in alignment and supported. Throughout pregnancy, you get to come into birth strong and ready for this big event, which takes us to the second stage birth. So all of this preparation in pregnancy, everybody takes a multivitamin and there's all these parts that we do in pregnancy to prepare for our and support our growing child and our expanding body.
But culturally, we kind of bypass our gut health and yes, to answer your question, supporting your gut is so much more than simply taking a probiotic. Okay. But here we are the big event that you've been preparing for birth. All of this preparation for your gut bacteria, it was not only for your body and to strengthen you for birth and postpartum.
It's also for your child while in utero, your baby's gut bacteria is sterile. Meaning there is not good bacteria there. It's not bad bacteria. It's sterile. your child's first bacteria exposure is either while passing through the birth canal or environmental bacteria. If your child is born cesarean section, and just like everything I share on this podcast, this is not coming from a place of judgment.
There is no judgment here. I quite honestly, I don't care how your child was born. I care for your heart and your experience and your story, but it's it. Doesn't the purpose of this episode. Isn't for me to care about how your child was born. It is simply, I'm here to give you information, to empower your motherhood, to either help you understand.
Where your child is today and your body is today or help you prepare if you are at the beginning of your journey, if you are a pregnant mama. Okay. So when your child passes through your birth canal, their first exposure. Is your gut bacteria. You transfer your bacteria to them when they're passing through your birth canal.
So the quality of your gut bacteria becomes the foundation of your child's gut bacteria for their entire life. If your child was born via cyan section, their first exposure is environmental bacteria. And this becomes the foundation of their gut bacteria for their whole life. It has been studied and studied and studied again, and it has shown that children born via cesarean section have a different.
Makeup of gut bacteria, then children born vaginally. Again, please do not drown yourself in guilt here. This is not a place of guilt. This is a place of hope. So we're gonna keep on going and we're gonna move into the next stage, which is beyond I share this birth stage with you though, because it is important for you to know.
Where your family is at? What foundation are you starting from? Did you nurture your gut during pregnancy? I sure as heck didn't. I didn't know. I needed to, at least for my first two children. And so where are you? What is your children's? What is their foundation? What is your foundation? Okay. Now beyond.
I'm gonna actually pause right here for a second and share a story with you. So my first and second child, I had no clue the importance of my gut bacteria. It was not something on my radar. It was not anything I ever considered. I did everything. My midwife told me I had a good multivitamin. I did an omega supplement.
I was eating really nurturing foods, but I didn't know that there was more I could do beyond that. I didn't know it should be. And, um, when my second child was born pretty immediately after birth, he developed a long list of symptoms like eczema. He had colic, he was a really restless sleeper. He literally woke up more than 15 times a night for two and a half years.
Because his body was so unwell, he was so uncomfortable. He couldn't sleep and his body wasn't absorbing nutrients. So he was breastfeeding around the clock. And as he got older, we saw behavioral issues and it took two and a half years to get to the bottom of it. By the time we finally did, I was pregnant with our third child and the natural path that helped me learn that all of my child's symptoms were connected to his gut bacteria.
He had an extreme gut imbalance. Talk to me because I, I was very curious what happened? What did I do wrong? Right? Like, of course I blamed myself as, as mamas do. And he said, it's not your fault, but it's likely that you had a significant imbalance during pregnancy. And I transferred it to my second child during birth and.
so I'm here pregnant with my third child and I've never repaired my gut from my second child. So of course I ask, well, should I do something different for. My third baby. And so he put me on this entire gut rebalancing protocol alongside my son. We essentially rebalanced our guts side by side together.
And can I tell you the most fascinating thing? My third child has the strongest gut of everyone in our family. I, he is. He rarely, rarely. experiences, gut imbalance symptoms. He is so rock solid, and what's really fascinating too, is his personality and his confidence and like his emotional wellbeing. He is just so, so solid.
And I really attribute so much to this from me having this awareness and rebalancing my gut. Before he was born so that I could pass on strong, healthy gut flora to him. Okay. Well then I had my fourth baby and I didn't know that gut imbalance is really common and that our gut bacteria fluctuates like our hormones and our immune systems.
I thought that once I rebalanced my gut. I was good. And so I didn't even consider doing it again when I was pregnant with my fourth child. Well, when my fourth child was born, he, he was strong. He was healthy. I had a beautiful birth, but at four months old, he developed eczema really bad. He went from being a really sound sleeper to not sleeping.
And he had so many symptoms and I had blocked my second child's experience from my mind, because I was such a traumatic time. That it took me a little bit of time to, to piece it all together and realize, oh my gosh, these symptoms that I'm seeing are exactly. Like our second child, I'm gonna rebalance his gut.
And so I did, and his symptoms went away just like my second child, every single one of his symptoms, his behavioral, like he would scream and scream and scream. He had tried to rip his penis off. He was so uncomfortable. It all went away. When I rebalance his gut. So this takes me to the beyond. Thank you for letting me fill you in there with that.
I get the question all the time. Can I do a gut rebalance while I'm pregnant? Can I take your supplement cleanse? Can I take nourish? Can I take these while pregnant? And because I'm not a doctor, I can't outright say yes, it's safe or no, it's not safe, but I always like to share my experience and what I have seen in my children.
And I have heard the same from so many mamas who have gone ahead and done a gut rebalance. In pregnancy and what they see in their children following is remarkable. So beyond this is where I was with my second child. And my fourth child is in this beyond phase. And I'm gonna tell you another little story here, because it really speaks to how powerful it is.
To nurture our gut bacteria. So once we went through this entire gut rebalance with our fourth child and all of his symptoms went away, I looked at my husband one day and I was like, what are we doing? Everything that we had done to rebalance our children's gut bacteria. There are zero negative side effects.
Why don't we live this as a family, as a lifestyle? Why don't we all do this all day? Every. There are zero negative side effects. And so I implemented everything for our whole family. And this is the beyond that we are living in right now is with a great awareness of how significant our gut bacteria is and how different it is.
We went from my husband and I basically living our entire lives. Some variation of imbalance, maybe it was a minor imbalance at times, extreme. At other times, we pretty much solidly live in this balanced state because we now have this awareness and life is so profoundly different. Our clarity, our patients, our sleep, our moods, our digestive health, every part of our health is so much more.
Balanced and beautiful and easy now, but this wasn't the case. This wasn't the case postpartum with my first child, my second child, my fourth child. My postpartum experience with my third child after doing the gut rebalance alongside my second child was beautiful, but I didn't know. I didn't know. I thought I was just getting better at it because I'd already done it three times.
I didn't have the full awareness of how impactful my gut being balanced was for my entire wellbeing. At that time. What I've since had the opportunity to learn is that. Our gut bacteria is at the most fragile state in infancy. This is why I saw my children's gut imbalances surface. Right. You know, between birth and four months, this is a really, really common time for imbalance to surface for you to see those symptoms arise, mucus, poop, sour, smelling, poop, even blood in your child's poop.
whether you're breastfeeding or formula feeding any, if your child's poop smells sour, this is one of the first signs of a gut imbalance, um, skin rashes. So chronic diaper rash, or really like inflamed red itchy rashes, like eczema, even baby acne. We are told all of this is normal mama. This is not normal.
This does not have to be your child's normal. You can support your child's gut by nurturing yourself, the end of pregnancy. And from the time of birth, you can be supporting your child's gut. As for you newly postpartum and moving into motherhood, no matter how many children you have birthed, every time you give birth, it is like this beautiful new beginning for your body.
You have the opportunity to rebuild your body for the rest of your life. When you birth your child, you birth a new version of you. Imagine yourself being supported in this way. That's really nurturing a balanced gut, which supports all of your bodily systems, your reproductive system, your hormones, your immune system, your digestive system, your nervous system.
Everything is so supported and you get to gracefully. Move into motherhood from this really grounded place of support and nurture it is so, so powerful and amazing. I wish that every single mama could experience this. If every mama, instead of being gifted, all of the baby toys and the billions of things that mothers are gifted while pregnant, if they were simply gifted supplements and lifestyle awareness of how to nurture their gut bacteria.
all of our experiences would be so profoundly different. I want you to think about how common postpartum depression is. I said this at the beginning, but I'm going to say it again here, because it is so significant, especially for postpartum. Mama's. 95% of your serotonin is produced in your gut. Serotonin is your make all or break all hormone.
It affects your mood, your sleep, the entirety of your emotional wellbeing. If your gut is imbalanced, which it likely is, unless if you are intentionally nurturing your good bacteria, your body is not producing serotonin optimal. You can get blood work done to see where your serotonin levels are. But unfortunately, her medical system isn't designed to dig for roots.
It is designed to treat symptoms. So if your levels are low, you'll likely be prescribed in antidepressant, which again, no judgment on you ever antidepressants do wonders for so many people. but this is where there's gaping holes in our system. No one ever pauses to consider why your serotonin levels are low in the first place.
Our system is just so quick to fix each individual problem individually. So you take a medication that fixes your serotonin, but the root cause was never addressed your gut imbalance. Your gut bacteria being imbalanced causes inflammation in your gut. So your body's not producing serotonin optimally.
This was never addressed. So your body will continue trying to communicate with you with other symptoms. Maybe it's acne, constipation, diarrhea, migraines, uh, huge fluctuations and rapid hormone fluctuations. Extreme PMs, chronic mastitis. Do you see why I'm so passionate about this? I have experienced pregnancy birth and beyond with both a balanced gut and an imbalanced gut.
The difference is profound and all mamas deserve to have this awareness. So by this point, you're wondering. What does it even mean to nurture your gut bacteria? Where can I start? How can I start? What can I do? So I started my business only organics. I thought I was simply going to share the supplements that helped my family rebalance our guts.
I began sharing them and families were seeing the same remarkable results as my family had. But these families kept coming to me with so many questions. What should we be eating? Are there foods we should be avoiding? How should I parent my child who can't sleep? I'm so sleep deprived myself. How do I get through this?
My child has a gut imbalance and life is so hard. Do you have any survival mode advice for me right now? How do we get through until the supplements arrive? You mentioned I should avoid certain foods. I don't really know how do you have any recipes you can share and like a hundred more questions. And I found myself responding to each family.
They all had the same questions, but I was writing them each individual emails and it, it wasn't like it wasn't organized in a really nice way for them, a practical way for them to just grab it and take it and run and really make change. So it was at this point that I realized, oh, of course, supplements, supplement, whatever lifestyle you live.
My family has had years to fine tune our gut nurturing lifestyle. I've done hundreds and hundreds of hours of research learning the gut inside and out. These families had such wonderful success with the rebalancing supplements. And they wanted more. They wanted to take control of their wellness, take leadership and do more.
They wanted to experience this deeper because what they were seeing was so good. So I created my course called happy and healthy from the inside out. This course teaches you step by step, how to live a gut nurturing lifestyle, no more guessing or elimination diets. It is literally everything you need to get fired up and passionate with documentary and book recommendations.
Every recipe you'll ever need. There's a soul care routine for mamas to support you throughout your journey. Step by step, how to rebalance the gut and so much more everything you need to. so maybe you are a supplements kind of gal starting with my cleanse and nourish is a great place to start. I have a bundle option that when you get on subscription, it ends up costing less than a tank of gas, like significantly less, and you get free shipping, or I have a full rebalance kit.
That is another really good supplement option. When you buy the kit, you'll get an instruction card of how much to take to fully rebalance your gut along with a little calendar to help you track your rebalance. There's an adult and child option. There are all the same products, just different amounts. If you are a, I wanna learn it all and heal from the ground up kind of gal.
My course is for. This is where I was. I wanted to know everything up front. So I had confidence to make change in my family. When I very first took these supplements. When I was pregnant with my third child, I took every single supplement to my midwife and I had another natural path that it all and make sure with me that it was safe for me during pregnancy.
I refuse to put supplements inside my family's body until I know everything about that supplement every possible negative side effect, what the ingredients are, everything my course teaches you all of this so that you can make the decisions that best resonate with your mama heart. And I wanna tell you, it is never, never too late to start.
Both of these are really great options. I'm going to link my shop below, along with my course. So you can explore either one of them. If either of them are speaking to you today, I have never opened my course up like this before I usually host an online gathering of sorts and then welcome. A bunch of mamas in at the same time.
So I can support all the mamas working through the course at the same time, but I have more and more mamas coming into my world, wondering where to start. So I'm going to give this. Way a try. I guarantee my course. So if you learn and implement and follow everything I teach your overall wellness is guaranteed to improve.
If you have any questions, please DM me on Instagram. @onleorganics. I love talking. It all send me poop, pictures, skin, pictures. I'm in it with you. I love supporting mamas going through this because together we get to. Transition your family into a state of thriving. It is absolutely magical to support and watch mamas heal their families from the inside.
Okay, mama, until next time. Thank you so much for joining in.
Before you go, something you should know is that everything I share on this show is also applicable to you, not as your child. And did you know, I started only organics as a way to create and share the absolute best quality supplements and products that support gut balance shop only organics.com. That's www.onleorganics.com. Lastly, I always wanna be very transparent that I am not a doctor, a nutritionist or a dietician. I am a certified family health coach, and most importantly, a mama with a passion sharing my story and the products and practices that have brought abundant health and happiness to my own family.
Please always listen to your own inner voice of wisdom and your healthcare professional. See you next week.
