Latest / Love Your Gut / Ep. 66: Taking Magnesium but still constipated? Here's why

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Ep. 66: Taking Magnesium but still constipated? Here's why · Love Your Gut

• 0:03
  Dr. Heather Finley: Welcome to the Love Your Gut Podcast.
• 0:05
  Dr. Heather Finley: I'm your host, Dr.
• 0:06
  Dr. Heather Finley: Heather Finley, registered dietitian and gut health specialist.
• 0:10
  Dr. Heather Finley: I understand the frustration of dealing with GI issues because I've been there and I spent over two decades searching for answers for my own gut issues of constipation, bloating, and stomach pain.
• 0:21
  Dr. Heather Finley: I've dedicated my life to understanding and solving my own gut issues.
• 0:25
  Dr. Heather Finley: And now I'm here to guide you.
• 0:28
  Dr. Heather Finley: On this podcast, I'll help you identify the true root causes of your discomfort.
• 0:33
  Dr. Heather Finley: So you can finally ditch your symptoms for good.
• 0:36
  Dr. Heather Finley: My goal is to empower you with the knowledge and tools you need so that you can love your gut and it will love you right back.
• 0:43
  Dr. Heather Finley: So if you're ready to learn a lot, gain a deeper understanding of your gut and find lasting relief.
• 0:48
  Dr. Heather Finley: You are in the right place.
• 0:50
  Dr. Heather Finley: Welcome to the love your gut podcast..............
• 0:54
  Audio Only - All Participants: Welcome back to the next episode of the Love Your Gut podcast.
• 0:57
  Audio Only - All Participants: I am so glad that you're here and really excited today to talk to you about minerals for constipation, and even just share some personal stories with you that hopefully help you to feel a little more seen and heard on your own journey.
• 1:13
  Audio Only - All Participants: So we're gonna get real about something that so many women deal with, but nobody wants to talk about, which is constipation.
• 1:21
  Audio Only - All Participants: If you have ever been.
• 1:22
  Audio Only - All Participants: So bloated and constipated that you've considered asking your barista for a to-go coffee and a laxative.
• 1:28
  Audio Only - All Participants: This one is for you.
• 1:30
  Audio Only - All Participants: I'm also gonna share one of my most embarrassing stories involving a restaurant, my dad, and a Dr.
• 1:35
  Audio Only - All Participants: Pepper, and what all those things have to do with each other.
• 1:38
  Audio Only - All Participants: Why traditional constipation advice often fails.
• 1:42
  Audio Only - All Participants: And what finally helped me and so many of my clients find relief, which is minerals.
• 1:47
  Audio Only - All Participants: So let's take it back to teenage me.
• 1:51
  Audio Only - All Participants: We were on a family vacation and I had been so constipated.
• 1:54
  Audio Only - All Participants: If you travel and you struggle with constipation, you know the struggle and.
• 2:00
  Audio Only - All Participants: Stomach aches, jeans won't fit.
• 2:03
  Audio Only - All Participants: Why won't my body work?
• 2:04
  Audio Only - All Participants: Kind of constipation, just so miserable.
• 2:08
  Audio Only - All Participants: We sat down, we were in San Francisco and exploring the city and you know, walking around and I remember we sat down at this.
• 2:16
  Audio Only - All Participants: Kind of nice restaurant and the waiter came over and asked me what I wanted to eat, and I just burst into tears at the table in public.
• 2:24
  Audio Only - All Participants: My dad was mortified.
• 2:26
  Audio Only - All Participants: My mom bless her, took me outside and said, let's go get you a Dr.
• 2:31
  Audio Only - All Participants: Pepper.
• 2:31
  Audio Only - All Participants: Apparently that was kind of the go-to constipation remedy of the time.
• 2:36
  Audio Only - All Participants: Spoiler alert, Dr.
• 2:37
  Audio Only - All Participants: Pepper was not it.
• 2:39
  Audio Only - All Participants: It was funny in hindsight and we still joke about it now.
• 2:43
  Audio Only - All Participants: But in the moment, I just remember feeling so frustrated and helpless.
• 2:48
  Audio Only - All Participants: I was so miserable.
• 2:49
  Audio Only - All Participants: I felt like my GI issues controlled every moment of my day.
• 2:55
  Audio Only - All Participants: Not only even just my day, my family's day, I was on, I.
• 2:59
  Audio Only - All Participants: Vacation with my entire family.
• 3:01
  Audio Only - All Participants: I have a brother and a sister, and it ruined the trip because I was so miserable.
• 3:07
  Audio Only - All Participants: It ruined this nice dinner that we were out to.
• 3:10
  Audio Only - All Participants: And then I remember we were going to see our grandparents the next day and kind of same thing, like we sat down to eat dinner and I was just like, how am I supposed to eat more food?
• 3:18
  Audio Only - All Participants: I haven't gone to the bathroom in.
• 3:20
  Audio Only - All Participants: Days.
• 3:21
  Audio Only - All Participants: So fast forward, I basically made a career out of busting the Dr.
• 3:25
  Audio Only - All Participants: Pepper myth and helping women understand what their gut is actually trying to say.
• 3:30
  Audio Only - All Participants: And I'm really excited to share with you a little bit about constipation today and why constipation advice often fails.
• 3:38
  Audio Only - All Participants: So you've probably heard the basics.
• 3:40
  Audio Only - All Participants: Drink more water, eat more fiber, try a probiotic.
• 3:44
  Audio Only - All Participants: I remember in college, one of my roommates, her mom was a dietician.
• 3:49
  Audio Only - All Participants: And I was still struggling with constipation even in college.
• 3:52
  Audio Only - All Participants: And her mom said, oh, I heard the newest thing is eat Activia yogurt.
• 3:57
  Audio Only - All Participants: And I think still Activia is kind of the, the thing that a lot of pediatricians and doctors will recommend.
• 4:03
  Audio Only - All Participants: And it's not that any of those things are wrong advice, they're just really incomplete.
• 4:09
  Audio Only - All Participants: So you might be drinking water till you're sloshing around, you know, eating kale with every meal, taking all these probiotics, and you probably still feel stuck, like literally.
• 4:20
  Audio Only - All Participants: And the reason is because constipation is not just about fiber or water, although those things can be helpful, it's often about.
• 4:29
  Audio Only - All Participants: Minerals.
• 4:30
  Audio Only - All Participants: It's often about digestion, it's about gut motility, it's about nervous system.
• 4:35
  Audio Only - All Participants: So I wanna give you a visual.
• 4:36
  Audio Only - All Participants: Today we're gonna hone in specifically on minerals and why this is typically the first step that we take with all of our clients because minerals control so many things in the body.
• 4:49
  Audio Only - All Participants: So.
• 4:50
  Audio Only - All Participants: I want you to think of your gut like a long pipe.
• 4:53
  Audio Only - All Participants: Fiber is like the leaves going through the pipe and water is like flushing the pipe with liquid.
• 5:00
  Audio Only - All Participants: So if the pipe is too dry or the muscles around it aren't squeezing properly, the fiber is just gonna sit there.
• 5:06
  Audio Only - All Participants: So you're gonna have leaves in your pipe that are just stuck, you know, causing a backup.
• 5:12
  Audio Only - All Participants: So it's like throwing dry leaves into a clogged pipe and expecting it to clear itself when you are eating more fiber, taking a probiotic, whatever.
• 5:22
  Audio Only - All Participants: So that's why people say, I eat all the right things, but I still don't go to the bathroom.
• 5:26
  Audio Only - All Participants: The part that nobody tells you is that, that the pipe isn't just mechanical, it's electrical as well, and that's where minerals come in.
• 5:34
  Audio Only - All Participants: Minerals help to electrify this system.
• 5:38
  Audio Only - All Participants: And there's a unique trio that really powers digestion, and it can be more complex than this.
• 5:44
  Audio Only - All Participants: But I wanna talk about the three minerals that really fire up digestion, especially if you are constipated.
• 5:52
  Audio Only - All Participants: So number one is sodium.
• 5:54
  Audio Only - All Participants: This helps to keep the gut hydrated.
• 5:56
  Audio Only - All Participants: Without enough sodium, your stool gets hard and dry.
• 6:00
  Audio Only - All Participants: So it's trying to, it's like trying to squeeze Play-Doh through a straw.
• 6:03
  Audio Only - All Participants: Sorry for all these analogies, but I think it's helpful to understand like, what we're dealing with here.
• 6:09
  Audio Only - All Participants: You can't do that if it's not hydrated.
• 6:12
  Audio Only - All Participants: Which is why, you could even take all the magnesium in the world and nothing's gonna shift for you.
• 6:18
  Audio Only - All Participants: The next one is potassium.
• 6:20
  Audio Only - All Participants: This is essential for muscle contraction, including, remember, your gut is a muscle, the muscles that move waist through your colon, so no potassium, your muscles are like, nah, I'm on strike.
• 6:32
  Audio Only - All Participants: I'm not doing anything.
• 6:34
  Audio Only - All Participants: And the number one mineral that we see clients deficient in our programs.
• 6:39
  Audio Only - All Participants: The testing that we do is potassium.
• 6:42
  Audio Only - All Participants: There are studies that show that like 90, 97% of Americans do not get enough potassium in their diet.
• 6:49
  Audio Only - All Participants: So over time we're just dealing with these huge deficiencies, which is why constipation is not getting better.
• 6:55
  Audio Only - All Participants: I.
• 6:56
  Audio Only - All Participants: Then we have magnesium.
• 6:57
  Audio Only - All Participants: You've probably tried this, right, like you've taken magnesium citrate, magnesium glyconate, magnesium oxide, whatever it might be, and it may help a little bit.
• 7:06
  Audio Only - All Participants: But magnesium alone is typically not the full picture.
• 7:10
  Audio Only - All Participants: Magnesium will help your intestines relax, so peristalsis or this muscle contraction, these wavelike contractions can actually work.
• 7:19
  Audio Only - All Participants: Most people know about magnesium.
• 7:21
  Audio Only - All Participants: But like I said, magnesium alone doesn't work if potassium and sodium are out of balance.
• 7:28
  Audio Only - All Participants: And that's what we often see on HTMA testing is the clients in a magnesium loss.
• 7:35
  Audio Only - All Participants: So they're utilizing tons of magnesium because magnesium is used for so many different metabolic processes in the body, but the magnesium isn't being utilized effectively because.
• 7:46
  Audio Only - All Participants: We need sodium to help with absorption.
• 7:48
  Audio Only - All Participants: We need potassium to help with contraction.
• 7:51
  Audio Only - All Participants: We need things like boron as well to help with magnesium.
• 7:54
  Audio Only - All Participants: And we see all of these off on testing.
• 7:57
  Audio Only - All Participants: So I remember thinking that I had cracked the code when I discovered magnesium.
• 8:01
  Audio Only - All Participants: I was like, yes.
• 8:02
  Audio Only - All Participants: You know, maybe this is what's gonna help fix my constipation.
• 8:06
  Audio Only - All Participants: And it did.
• 8:07
  Audio Only - All Participants: But after a few weeks, kind of same story, bloating, fatigue, still stuck, tired, not having daily bowel movements because I was burning through potassium, barely getting any sodium.
• 8:20
  Audio Only - All Participants: This was in like the two thousands when sodium was like very much.
• 8:25
  Audio Only - All Participants: People were scared to eat salt and so.
• 8:29
  Audio Only - All Participants: I never salted my food.
• 8:30
  Audio Only - All Participants: I never consumed sodium because I thought it was quote unquote bad, and the reality is I actually needed quite a bit more sodium.
• 8:38
  Audio Only - All Participants: And that's a big mindset shift that a lot of our clients have to get over is like, wait, I thought I wasn't supposed to eat.
• 8:43
  Audio Only - All Participants: So.
• 8:44
  Audio Only - All Participants: Salt.
• 8:44
  Audio Only - All Participants: But the reality is, especially if you're eating a really whole Foods diet, you do need sodium.
• 8:50
  Audio Only - All Participants: Obviously there's a balance.
• 8:52
  Audio Only - All Participants: I'm not saying go and like load up on tons of extra excess sodium, especially if you have high blood pressure, but you do need.
• 9:00
  Audio Only - All Participants: Sodium to help with all of these processes in the body.
• 9:04
  Audio Only - All Participants: And so getting none is not helping you.
• 9:07
  Audio Only - All Participants: So when I started diving deeper into functional testing, specifically HTMA and hair tissue mineral analysis, it totally blew my mind because although my normal blood work was fine, my HT MA was showing that I was so, so, so depleted.
• 9:25
  Audio Only - All Participants: And that's what we see with so many of our clients.
• 9:27
  Audio Only - All Participants: So.
• 9:28
  Audio Only - All Participants: Here's the deal.
• 9:29
  Audio Only - All Participants: You can be doing all the right things.
• 9:31
  Audio Only - All Participants: You can be taking all the magnesium, you can be eating all the fiber, drinking all the water, but if you have these underlying mineral deficiencies that are contributing to your constipation, you have to address.
• 9:44
  Audio Only - All Participants: That.
• 9:45
  Audio Only - All Participants: And so we wanna take a deeper look into, you know, how do we balance these things out?
• 9:50
  Audio Only - All Participants: How do we make sure that you're getting enough potassium in your diet?
• 9:54
  Audio Only - All Participants: How do we make sure you're getting enough sodium in your diet, the right type of magnesium, et cetera.
• 10:00
  Audio Only - All Participants: So if you're doing all the right things, still not going to the bathroom, it's maybe time to zoom out a little bit and look at what's going on under the surface.
• 10:10
  Audio Only - All Participants: I highly recommend getting an HTMA test.
• 10:13
  Audio Only - All Participants: This is one of the most basic but.
• 10:16
  Audio Only - All Participants: Powerful functional test that you can do, especially if all of your other lab work has been quote unquote normal.
• 10:24
  Audio Only - All Participants: HTMA gives us a snapshot into what's going on inside of your cells, which is gonna tell us a lot about why you're constipated, why you're tired, why you have hypothyroidism symptoms, why you're having acne, why your hormones are out of whack.
• 10:40
  Audio Only - All Participants: All of that.
• 10:41
  Audio Only - All Participants: It's not just a snapshot, it's a true story of what's going on in your body.
• 10:46
  Audio Only - All Participants: It shows us if you're depleted, burned out, if your gut is sluggish from low potassium or sodium, it can tell us a lot about why maybe your iron levels are low.
• 10:56
  Audio Only - All Participants: So I'll put the link for the HTMA, in the show notes if you wanna get started.
• 11:00
  Audio Only - All Participants: That is the.
• 11:02
  Audio Only - All Participants: Best way really to get started if you're looking to start your journey on kind of this functional approach and root cause.
• 11:09
  Audio Only - All Participants: This is the first test that we do with all of our VIP clients because we can't make progress from a gut perspective, especially if you have like.
• 11:19
  Audio Only - All Participants: Parasites or h pylori or an overgrowth of unwanted bacteria.
• 11:24
  Audio Only - All Participants: Those things, of course, are contributing to your symptoms, but we can't push your body to get rid of any of those things if you don't have minerals on board.
• 11:33
  Audio Only - All Participants: So regardless of what you're struggling with, minerals are the best place to start.
• 11:37
  Audio Only - All Participants: It's super easy.
• 11:39
  Audio Only - All Participants: Once you purchase the HTMA, we mail it to you.
• 11:41
  Audio Only - All Participants: You send in your hair sample, I promise it's not a lot of hair.
• 11:44
  Audio Only - All Participants: We'll help you understand why your body is stuck so we can help you move forward.
• 11:49
  Audio Only - All Participants: You'll meet with our team one-on-one to go over your plan, and you'll start feeling better.
• 11:54
  Audio Only - All Participants: Literally.
• 11:55
  Audio Only - All Participants: So quick.
• 11:56
  Audio Only - All Participants: Minerals are.
• 11:57
  Audio Only - All Participants: Probably my favorite test because we see results so quick for people, especially from an energy standpoint.
• 12:04
  Audio Only - All Participants: So I wanna tell you about a case or a client that we worked with.
• 12:07
  Audio Only - All Participants: We'll call her Sarah.
• 12:08
  Audio Only - All Participants: She was doing everything right, green smoothies, yoga, taking magnesium, still constipated.
• 12:15
  Audio Only - All Participants: Her HTMA came back and showed super low potassium, a burned out sodium level.
• 12:20
  Audio Only - All Participants: What we call a slow oxidation pattern.
• 12:23
  Audio Only - All Participants: Basically, her whole system was moving in slow-mo, and this is what we see on 80% of the tests that we get back.
• 12:30
  Audio Only - All Participants: We added food-based potassium sources into her diet, so she was really.
• 12:36
  Audio Only - All Participants: Focused on getting potassium and what she was eating every day, and this is something that you can do today.
• 12:41
  Audio Only - All Participants: Coconut water, potatoes, yes.
• 12:43
  Audio Only - All Participants: Eat potatoes.
• 12:44
  Audio Only - All Participants: They're super high in potassium.
• 12:45
  Audio Only - All Participants: Adrenal cocktails.
• 12:47
  Audio Only - All Participants: Uh, cream of tartar, bananas, avocados.
• 12:50
  Audio Only - All Participants: Adding those foods into her diet was super helpful.
• 12:53
  Audio Only - All Participants: We boosted her sodium intake.
• 12:55
  Audio Only - All Participants: She was eating a primarily whole foods diet, so we wanted to make sure she was getting a mineral rich salt like Celtic salt, Redmond salt, et cetera.
• 13:04
  Audio Only - All Participants: And we continued magnesium in the right form.
• 13:06
  Audio Only - All Participants: And within two weeks she was having regular easy bowel movements.
• 13:11
  Audio Only - All Participants: Her bloating was improving.
• 13:12
  Audio Only - All Participants: She wasn't desperate anymore.
• 13:14
  Audio Only - All Participants: And I, this is not a one-off story.
• 13:17
  Audio Only - All Participants: This is a, this is something we see all the time.
• 13:21
  Audio Only - All Participants: The best part is that she actually was able to decrease the amount of magnesium that she was taking.
• 13:27
  Audio Only - All Participants: Because her body was actually absorbing the magnesium a lot better with sodium and potassium on board.
• 13:33
  Audio Only - All Participants: So here's what you can do today.
• 13:36
  Audio Only - All Participants: If this episode is hitting home with you, you've tried all the things, you feel really tired, you feel burnout, you know, no matter how much you sleep, you're still struggling.
• 13:46
  Audio Only - All Participants: No matter how, how much magnesium you take, you're still constipated.
• 13:50
  Audio Only - All Participants: You can start paying attention to your mineral intake and not just fiber, um, and not just water.
• 13:56
  Audio Only - All Participants: You need minerals to help your cells to be hydrated.
• 14:00
  Audio Only - All Participants: I often use the analogy going from raisins to grapes.
• 14:03
  Audio Only - All Participants: We don't want shriveled up cells.
• 14:05
  Audio Only - All Participants: We want really plump hydrated cells and minerals help you do that.
• 14:10
  Audio Only - All Participants: You can add in potassium rich foods like I mentioned.
• 14:13
  Audio Only - All Participants: So potatoes, bananas, coconut water.
• 14:15
  Audio Only - All Participants: You can add cream of tartar to your mineral mocktail.
• 14:18
  Audio Only - All Participants: You can salt your food.
• 14:20
  Audio Only - All Participants: Don't be afraid of sodium, especially if you're constipated and you have low energy.
• 14:24
  Audio Only - All Participants: You can continue magnesium, but pair it with potassium and sodium for the best results.
• 14:29
  Audio Only - All Participants: And then if you want real answers, get the HTMA.
• 14:32
  Audio Only - All Participants: It's truly one of the most eyeopening tools that we use.
• 14:35
  Audio Only - All Participants: So if you've ever.
• 14:36
  Audio Only - All Participants: Cried at a restaurant like me, because your gut wouldn't cooperate, or, you know, you feel like your gut has ruined your travel plans or anything like that.
• 14:45
  Audio Only - All Participants: You've tried every supplement.
• 14:47
  Audio Only - All Participants: I really think that minerals is the best place to start.
• 14:51
  Audio Only - All Participants: And this trio of potassium, sodium, and magnesium is really helpful for getting the bowels to move.
• 14:58
  Audio Only - All Participants: Then you can move on to other root causes that could be at play, contributing to some of the other symptoms that you might be.
• 15:08
  Audio Only - All Participants: If you haven't already, you can download my free mineral guide.
• 15:12
  Audio Only - All Participants: The link will be in the show notes as well.
• 15:14
  Audio Only - All Participants: And this will be a great place to get started as far as you know, adding more minerals into your diet, adding mineral mocktails into your diet to help with thyroid energy, constipation.
• 15:26
  Audio Only - All Participants: I literally have it broken down in the guide.
• 15:28
  Audio Only - All Participants: On, like if you experience this, make these drinks, or add these ingredients and have like all the links, recipes to make it super easy.
• 15:38
  Audio Only - All Participants: The best part about minerals is that it's something that you can easily incorporate regardless of how busy you are, because it takes no time at all.
• 15:46
  Audio Only - All Participants: And you notice the immediate benefits from it.
• 15:49
  Audio Only - All Participants: So I know this was a shorter episode, but I hope it's helpful to help you understand perhaps why you're so constipated, why magnesium isn't working for your constipation, and perhaps a different lens that you can look at for this.
• 16:03
  Audio Only - All Participants: So I'd love to hear your thoughts.
• 16:05
  Audio Only - All Participants: If you have any questions, feel free to DM me on Instagram.
• 16:08
  Audio Only - All Participants: That's where I hang out the most.
• 16:09
  Audio Only - All Participants: Would love to hear your questions and your thoughts, and I'll see you on the next episode of the Love Your Gut podcast.
• 16:16
  Dr. Heather Finley: Thanks for tuning in to this episode of the Love Your Gut podcast.
• 16:19
  Dr. Heather Finley: If this episode made you laugh, nod, or say OMG, same.
• 16:24
  Dr. Heather Finley: Send it to a friend who needs to hear it too.
• 16:26
  Dr. Heather Finley: And hey, drop a five star rating and review while you're at it.
• 16:29
  Dr. Heather Finley: Your gut and mine will.
• 16:30
  Dr. Heather Finley: Thank you.
• 16:31
  Dr. Heather Finley: I'll see you on the next episode of the Love Your Gut podcast.