HOW  TO GROW A HEALTHY GUT GARDEN

ONE \\ Create A Healthy Soil Environment

The quality of the soil in your gut garden will hugely influence the quality of the gut flora (microbes) that grow there. An integrative approach is needed to prepare an inner environment that will promote flourishing gut flora.

Fibre is an essential factor in gut healing. The optimum environment for healthy gut microbes occurs in a digestive system where wastes, toxins and hormones are regularly eliminated through the bowel. You can’t heal a constipated skin!

Fibre Sources: Avoid processed foods and eat a whole-food diet rich in fruit and vegetables. Bestow Be Cleansed powder and Bestow Gut Love + includes a range of soluble and insoluble fibres to promote regular elimination.

Avoid Aggravating Foods
As part of preparing the gut for healing it is important to remove common aggravating foods like grains, beans, pulses, legumes and night-shades. These foods contain anti-nutrients (phyto-actives that have no nutritional value), which can be irritating to the gut. After your gut is stronger, you can try re-introducing these one at a time.

Fortify the Gut Wall
Healing and repairing the gut wall is a vital part of an integrated approach to gut restoration. A leaky, permeable gut allows harmful microbes to escape and enter the blood stream where they can cause irritation and inflammation in the skin.

Bone broths are a key feature of the Bestow Love Your Gut Programme, because they contain specific amino acids which help to repair the gut wall. Liquorice, slippery elm, organic sulphur and L-glutamine are key ingredients in Bestow Be Cleansed powder and Bestow Gut Love + and are instrumental in facilitating healing and repair of the gut wall.

TWO \\ Plant Good Seeds

Probiotics are the good seeds you plant in your gut garden. Probiotics are beneficial live microbes (bacteria and fungi) which your gut needs in order to thrive. Stress, poor diet and some medications can deplete good bacteria populations. To support your gut, you need to supply it with probiotics on a daily basis.

SOURCES OF PROBIOTICS
Fermented foods generate beneficial live bacteria and fungi as part of the natural fermentation process. Sauerkraut, kombucha and coconut yoghurt are key foods in the Bestow Love Your Gut Programme for this reason.

Organic fruit and vegetables provide beneficial microbes via the tiny particles of unsterilized soil they carry. These microbes will provide protection against allergens in the environment in which they grow, so eat organic produce from your local area for optimal health benefits.

Probiotic Powders/Supplements are a great way to boost your probiotic intake on a daily basis. Bestow Gut Love + is a world-class synbiotic powder including probiotics, prebiotics and enzymatic action for a thriving gut garden.

Note:It’s important to eat from a variety of probiotic sources in order to supply a wide range of microbe strains. The goal is to grow a garden with a variety of beneficial gut flora, so make sure you plant more than one type of seed!

THREE \\ Fertilise the Plants

Prebiotics feed probiotics. They are particular types of foods containing resistant fibres which feed the live beneficial bacteria and fungi in the large intestine. They pass through the small intestine undigested. This means that when they reach the large intestine they can feed the beneficial microbe populations. Prebiotics provide fertiliser and nourishment to help the good plants grow.

SOURCES OF PREBIOTICS

Dietary sources of prebiotics all have resistant fibres as a common denominator. In the Bestow Love Your Gut Programme, key prebiotic food sources are sweet potato, onion, garlic, leek, banana and apple.

Prebiotic powders provide a helpful gut boost. Bestow Be Cleansed powder and Bestow Gut Love + supplies prebiotics in the form of flax fibre and slippery elm.

FOUR \\ Starve the Weeds

Your diet is an essential dimension of gut health. As well as nurturing good seeds, you need to starve the weeds in your gut garden. The bad microbes in your gut can easily overtake the populations of good bacteria if you don’t keep them in check.

Avoid sugar, processed food and alcohol altogether while you are healing your gut in order to give your gut flora a chance to thrive without being choked out by weeds.