Day 26 - Little Things

Today was a busy day with no earth-shattering things to consider as firsts.  However, a couple of things stood out to me that were new to me on this day.

I have a case with CASA that I was assigned to in February.  Since that time we have had two different CPS caseworkers assigned to the case, neither of which every returned a phone call or an email or did anything on the case as far as I could tell.  Today I met the 3rd caseworker for the case and she was wonderful!  Because she was already 3 ½ months behind on what was going on, I met her at her office in Killeen and we talked about the goings on with the kids, the parents, the grandparents, the caregiver and what seemed like the best plan for the children.  We both agreed on it, and she wants us to work closely together to make things happen.  It is so refreshing to get someone from CPS who realizes that CASA and CPS should be a team effort working to get the best for the children who are in the system.  So this meeting was a really big deal to me.

Tonight, my trainer had the nutritionist come back for another lesson--this time just on the digestive system's role in our health and well-being.  I learned a number of fascinating things and already knew a few things that we discussed.  The digestive system is a 5 step process:
1.  The Brain--digestion starts when we see and smell food--the Pavlov dogs salivating model.  If we don't start producing saliva for the digestive process before we put food in our mouth, we will not have successful digestion.  Also this is where we should focus our minds on eating, relaxing and thinking about our food--not watching TV, reading, racing through the meal or being stressed which can inhibit digestion.  She says "rest and digest".
2.  The Mouth--this is where we make the food digestible through mastication with the saliva and enzymes that are in it which break the food down to a liquid state before sending it on to the next step.  It is in the mouth that carbs are broken down--and if they don't get broken down, they are not absorbed in the stomach or gut and go straight to the colon where they sit and cause us to feel bloated.  She told us that even smoothies or other liquid drinks, even juices, need to be chewed in order to be in the mouth long enough for the saliva enzymes to break them into usable nutrients.
3.  The Stomach--this was an interesting part to me.  This is where the physical breakdown of food is done through the acids in the stomach.  This is also the first line of defense for any pathogens that enter our bodies through either food or airborne--the place where allergens can be defeated or not.  She said that 90% of Americans have too little aside in their stomachs and can not digest their food effectively to absorb nutrients.  This is actually where heartburn, GERD, reflux come in--there is not enough acid in our stomach to break the food down for the next step of the process and so the stomach sends it right back up out into the esophagus because it is not ready for digestion.  Taking Tums or other acid blockers exacerbates the issue rather than helping it.  They give immediate relief of the heartburn, but the cycle continues because the alkaline in the products neutralizes the acids in the stomach and up things come once again because they aren't digested enough to go on to the next step of the process.  The nutritionist advised to begin taking 1 teaspoon of unpasteurized apple cider vinegar (mix with water if desired, even some honey and sea salt) 30 min. before each meal to give the stomach more acid so it can work as it is supposed to.  Or you can take digestive enzymes by capsule or probiotics.
4.  The Small Intestines (Gut)--The food from the stomach is full of acid and now must be neutralized as it goes into the small intestines so they add alkaline to the digesting food at this point.  People who have a system that doesn't put enough alkaline in to stop the acids are the ones with ulcers.  Most all of our nutrients are absorbed in the gut and sent into the blood stream.  Also 70-80% of our immune system is in the gut where the airborne things that come in through out nose or mouth get neutralized.
5.  The Large Intestines (Colon)--this is mostly water, waste and some nutrients such as vitamins are absorbed here.  It holds our undigested food which goes out as waste and holds good and bad micro-organisms.  The total process takes 5-6 hours and that is why we should just eat 3 regular meals a day rather than 6 small ones as some diets recommends because otherwise our digestive system never gets to rest.

For my daughter who has my stomach issues, she said to read the book Why Stomach Acid is Good For You--I'm going to order it and you can borrow it!