Malabsorption
You are what you eat or more accurately, what you absorb. Malabsorption is a disorder characterised by the impaired ability of the gastrointestinal tract to absorb nutrients from food, leading to malnutrition despite adequate dietary intake. It can result from defects in any of the three phases of digestion and absorption: The first part is breaking down food into digestible pieces – luminal (involving digestion and solubilisation), second is mucosal (involving absorption across the intestinal lining), or third postabsorptive (involving transport via blood and lymphatic systems) – eliminating the waste that is left over when all the good stuff has been absorbed.
Malabsorption disorders cover the second stage. They include specific food intolerances caused by enzyme deficiencies, as well as various gastrointestinal diseases that affect your digestive system. Under the malabsorption umbrella are carbohydrate, fat, bile and protein malabsorption. Some gastrointestinal diseases, such as celiac disease and inflammatory bowel disease, cause general malabsorption of all kinds of nutrients. In other cases, you may have particular difficulties absorbing a particular kind of nutrient. Some of these types include:
Carbohydrate malabsorption
Some people are sensitive to one or several carbohydrates (sugars). You may experience this primarily as gas pain and abdominal bloating. Carbohydrates that aren’t fully absorbed in your small intestine get fermented by the bacteria in your colon. The bacteria break them down into gasses and short-chain fatty acids. The gasses cause intestinal gas, and the short-chain fatty acids cause fatty stools.
Fat malabsorption
This is a common type of malabsorption, possibly because it has so many causes. Fats that aren’t absorbed in your small intestine pass to your colon, causing fatty stools (steatorrhea). Fatty stools are greasy and runny and particularly smelly. They may be light-colored and float. Fat malabsorption also leads to the malabsorption of fat-soluble vitamins (A, D, E and K).
Bile acid malabsorption
Sometimes fat malabsorption results from a lack of bile from diseases of the gallbladder, bile ducts or liver. But sometimes it results from another problem, leaving leftover bile acids in your small intestine and passing these on to your colon. This side effect is called bile acid malabsorption. Leftover bile salts trigger your colon to secrete water, causing chronic diarrhea.
Protein malabsorption
Protein malabsorption doesn’t usually occur by itself unless you have a particular intolerance. Examples of this include milk protein intolerances and gluten intolerance.
How do you know you’ve got it?
This isn’t necessarily easy to diagnose and I certainly had no idea this was an issue until it was brought to my attention. I didn’t have most of these symptoms, but in hindsight gluten and dairy intolerance were pretty obvious and a few others that would come and go. It’s one of those good to get sorted chronic things, unlike a screaming acute frozen shoulder which definitely took priority.
- Fatigue
- Bloating
- Gas
- Floating stools
- Abdominal pain
- Nausea and Vomiting
- Diarrhoea
- Muscle wasting
- Bruising easily
- Dehydration
- Frequent infections
- Unintentional Weight loss
- Dry skin and skin lesions
- Dry hair and hair loss
- Edema (swelling with fluid)
- Anemia
- Irritability, Apathy Fatigue
- Growth delays in children
- Amenorrhea (skipped periods)
- Night blindness (vit A deficiency)
- Weak bones and bone pain (vitamin D deficiency).
- Bleeding gums and nosebleeds (vitamin K deficiency).
- Sore, red tongue (vitamin b12 deficiency).
- Paleness, weakness and dizziness
The Healy programs I ran
I ran them in this order, when I could fit them in and with the bracelets on. Not more than 2 a day. No change to my diet which is already gluten and dairy free.
- Gastro BH2
- Classic Physical P3
- Pita P3
- Conflict Balance P3
- Gastro DN
- Spleen Pancreas M2
- Bioinformation DN6
- Small Intestine M1
- Digest All DCH
- Pure Gold
- Balance Gold
- Rigidity DN5
- Food intolerances BH2
- Balance DN6
NB: P3 = Power of 3, DN = Digital Nutrition, BH = Bioenergetic Harmony, M = Meridian, DCH = Deep Cycle Holistic
What I noticed afterwards
- I break a B complex capsule into a smoothie and sometimes I would get a niacin flush (hives for an hour) after finishing the whole thing. After this series of programs I got a niacin flush after drinking half of a smoothie.
- When I have beetroot, my urine is normally reddish the day or 2 following, but this time, it was the usual non-red colour.
- I have been muscle testing my supplements for years and usually I need 15 drops of zinc and 4 drops of selenium, after retesting I only need 10 of zinc and 2 of selenium.
https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/22722-malabsorption
Image by Sora Shimazaki
