Owatonna Chiropractor Details the Benefits of The GAPS Diet on Skin and Gut Health

The skin and the liver are the two major detox organs of the body. When someone’s liver is stressed to the max with detoxifying the body, then it will often manifest in skin issues and conditions. My family and I often observe that when we are not eating correctly, we will break out with acne. When we begin to tighten up our diet and eat healthier and more nutritious meals the skin blemishes clear up without exception.

What constitutes the proper diet is one of the most hotly contested and fiercely debated topics in health. My family has done the elimination diet, the ketogenic diet, and the GAPS diet. We have enjoyed all these diets and we believe that all of them can have amazing results for people in transforming their health. We have found the GAPS diet to be the best for our family.

The diet was created by Natasha Campbell-McBride in her clinical practice to work with her cases that were not responding to conventional methods. It centers around the idea that a healthy gut is essential to proper absorption of nutrition and removal of waste product. The GAPS diet is focused on sealing and healing the gut.

The diet relies heavily upon natural foods. Healthy fats are essential for repairing the microbiome (the good bacterial colony in our guts) as well as the gap junctions which lay between the cells which make up the gut wall. The gap junctions become damaged from chemical exposure from the things that we consume. When this happens, it allows proteins and other under digested chemicals to pass into the blood stream through the leaky gut. This can cause autoimmune conditions like food sensitives and allergies. The solution is to repair the gap junctions and restore a nice smearing of microbiome across the entire digestive tract.

The way the GAPS diet accomplishes this is through meat stock and probiotics. The meat stock is made from boiling meat, typically beef, chicken, or fish. The stock will become super concentrated with fat. This fat rich broth is consumed three times per day for the entire time that someone is on the GAPS protocol. The probiotics are often made at home and can include items like sourdough, yogurt, kefir, sauerkraut, kvass, and fermented vegetables.

We really enjoy fermenting green beans, onions, garlic, and cabbage. Chicken broth is our favorite flavor of meat broth, and it is the most economical. Organic chicken should be preferred because commercially raised chicken can be high in arsenic due to the types of feed they give to the chickens. Homemade yogurt is delicious, and you can find a lot of exotic and fun cultures online. You will want to pasteurize the milk before you make the yogurt culture. We learned that the hard way after many failed attempts.

It is best for you to read Dr. Natasha’s two books before embarking on the quest to master the GAPS diet. Her first book has a yellow cover and is titled, “Gut and Psychology Syndrome: Natural treatment for autism, dyspraxia, ADD, dyslexia, ADHD, depression, and schizophrenia.” Her second book is titled, “Gut and Psychology Syndrome: Natural treatment for allergies, autoimmune illness, arthritis, gut problems, fatigue, hormonal problems, and neurological disease.” You can find both books on the internet easily.

This diet is certainly not for everyone. It can be very time consuming and expensive, but the healing my family and I have experienced while faithfully adhering to the protocol is second to none. I would strongly consider the GAPS diet before doing any treatment that is more invasive like drugs and surgery. There are many resources and communities which can help support you as you begin your journey. There are also many helpful recipe books that have been made to help make the GAPS diet as easy and convenient as possible. Consider finding a GAPS coach in your area and get started with healing and sealing your gut to enjoy robust and abundant health!

About the author:

Dr. Joshua Burnham sees many patients with chronic pain disorders. He is an Owatonna chiropractor that specializes in the Gonstead Technique.