Recent years have witnessed the leaky gut as a major topic of research interest in medical sciences. Studies are revealing how abnormalities and variations in the composition of your gut can alter normal physiology and contribute to diseases varying from inflammation to obesity (1).

Being a “Nutrition Therapy Practitioner”, I have worked one on one with many physicians and tens of hundreds of clients in a medical setting to educate on Gut Health and Repairing. My goal and passion is to educate everyone with the knowledge and tools needed to not only repair their leaky gut 100%. But also to restore their body to one they can feel pain free with promising research based guides to provide them everything that required for repairing their GI and promoting overall health. 

Although leaky gut is an extensive subject, as everything is interconnected in your body. In this article, I’ll take a critical look at the leaky gut and its effects on your nervous system. 

Moreover, I’ll also discuss the modern approaches to a missing and ignored link in obtaining freedom from leaky gut. 

First thing first;

What Is Leaky Gut?

Has someone you know been experiencing symptoms of diarrhea, constipation, headache, fatigue and joint pain? Then they may have a syndrome or a condition called leaky gut syndrome or increased intestinal permeability. 

When you have leaky gut or intestinal permeability, the pores in your small intestine increase in size. It allows undigested food and other environmental toxins to enter in your bloodstream. Your body responds to these foreign particles and toxins by activating some mechanisms such as immune system, to maintain homeostasis. When the immune system is stimulated it is also in a stressed state. 

How Leaky Gut Affects Your Nervous System? 

Have you ever had a gut-wrenching experience, or had ever felt butterflies in your stomach? That’s because your intestine and brain are connected in a bidirectional manner. Recent research studies show that your brain affects your gut health, and your gut may even affect your brain health (2, 3, 4).

As, your brain and the gut communicate in a bidirectional way, through the autonomic nervous system (ANS) (5).

So here, I will talk about your autonomic nervous system, which is divided into two categories (6);

• Sympathetic Nervous System (SNS)
• Para-Sympathetic Nervous System (PNS)

The autonomic nervous system regulates your essential bodily functions, without conscious direction, such as heart rate, pupil dilation, body temperature, blood pressure, sweating and digestion (7)

Sympathetic nervous system and leaky gut

The sympathetic nervous system drives your “fight-or-flight” response. It directs your body’s prompt involuntary response to threatening or stressful situations. 

In any stressful condition, a flash flood of hormones and neurotransmitters boosts your body’s alertness, and heart rate by keeping your sympathetic nervous system stimulated (8).

If it relates to leaky gut, the particles, including toxins that leak into your bloodstream can cause an inflammatory or immune response. It’s also stressing to your body (9). As your body does not know the difference between internal and external stresses, it handles stress, in the same way, to continue maintaining homeostasis in your body.

Especially when leaky gut runs for years, your body stimulates the sympathetic system all the time to maintain homeostasis. This can lead to chronic inflammation and autoimmune disorders.

Persistently stimulated SNS and your gut microbiota 

Gut microbiota, are the beneficial microorganisms that coexist in your digestive tracts in a non-harmful manner. They also help protect your body from the penetration of pathogenic microbes. 

Persistent leaky gut stimulates your sympathetic system all the time. This kind of environment could lead to these bacterial colonies out of balance. This condition is known as dysbiosis. 

When the foundation of the microbiome is compromised it directly affects the diversity and strains of bacteria residing. It can promote the growth of pathogenic bacteria in your gut.

Moreover, your gut microbiome within your GI also contributes to produce neurotransmitters in your brain (10). Imbalance of your gut microbiome also influences your mental health (11).

Dysbiosis is also associated with multiple other diseases including cancer (12)(13).

Para Sympathetic System

Another component of your autonomic nervous system is the parasympathetic nervous system. It’s opposite to your sympathetic nervous system. It works to calm the body down. This system also encourages your body to “rest and digest” to counter the fight-or-flight response. Blood pressure, breathing rate and hormone flow return to normal levels as the body settles into homeostasis, or equilibrium, once more (14).

Is your brain causing your leaky gut?

In general, your brain does not cause leaky gut. But still, it can have an impact on the continued breakdown of gastrointestinal walls. Not only that, it can also affect how quickly the GI can heal.

Your brain-gut axis works in both ways. For example, stress contributes to an acidic environment with-in your GI, which in turn leads to leaky gut and microbiome imbalance. 

The microbiome imbalance can result in more pathogenic or non-beneficial bacteria within your GI. This condition can also promote an imbalance of your brain chemicals because your GI is responsible for the production of neurotransmitters (brain chemicals).

How to get freedom from a leaky gut?

Like your sympathetic system can affect your GI and worsen the leaky gut, you can reverse the whole cycle by maintaining your body via stimulation of the parasympathetic system. It will help you with your digestion and restore homeostasis by allowing your body to be in a “healing state” for the repair of broken GI walls. 

The hence-forth leaky gut situation will improve considerably.