Posts Tagged ‘constipation’

What constitutes constipation? Well, you are constipated if you have 1 or fewer bowel movements every day.

Why does this go on?

For several reasons…

It may well be that you have merely transitioned your intake from one that was NOT “oh so healthy” to your brand new healthy nutrition plan. Because you are probably, now, feeding your body more fruits, vegetables and natural foods that contain more healthy fiber, your body is trying to get used to it and adjust.

This may not be the only reason you might be experiencing constipation. One of the generally common reasons individuals have a difficult time with “number 2″ is that they are dehydrated. If your colon is not absorbing an adequate amount of water, it will not be able to force the bad stuff out.

You know what happens to this bad stuff? It stays inside you, making you exceedingly uncomfortable, exhausted, and nastiest of all…Prevents you from losing weight!

Yes, if you maintain a toxic build up inside your colon, it makes it tremendously challenging for your body to absorb nutrients and burn bad fat off your body.

Now those are merely 2 of the many reasons you could be experiencing constipation…There are many more. The more imperative question is how do you tackle this uncomfortable dilemma?

I am not going to suggest some laxative or even some natural herbal formula. Many of these supplements can be extremely destructive and send you sprinting to the bathroom. Not to mention make it quite challenging to leave the house (imagine drinking way too much prune juice.)

Here are various easy and natural ways you can combat the old Pooping dilemma:

1. Make sure you are drinking an adequate amount of water each and every day. How much is enough? You should be drinking half of your body weight in ounces of water every day. For instance, if you weigh 200 pounds, you need 100 ounces of water (Yes! That much!) You don’t have to start with that amount all at once but make certain you slowly build yourself up to drinking your targeted amount.

2. Add freshly ground flaxseeds to your meals. Fresh flaxseeds can be purchased at most supermarkets and health food stores. I grind mine up in a coffee grinder and have 1 TBSP mixed with water each morning. You can as well add your tablespoon to your morning oatmeal, yogurt or even to salads or on top of fruit. Not only will you be increasing your fiber content for the day, you will be adding extra healthy Omega 3′s to your meals.

3. Make certain to include enough raw foods into each one of your meals. No, I am not suggesting you put a raw steak on a plate and consume it. But you must ensure that there is at least 1 raw factor to each meal. For instance, for breakfast and snacks include some fresh fruit. For lunch and dinner have a few raw veggies (cucumbers, carrots and tomatoes). Cooked vegetables are fantastic (I love my sautéed spinach and cooked cauliflower) but you will benefit more from the naturally occurring enzymes in fruits and veggies if eaten raw so make certain to include both cooked and raw into meals.

4. Start every morning with this fantastic “digestive tonic”: 1 TBSP lemon juice in one glass of water with a dash of cayenne pepper. This morning drink will help to stimulate your bowels and discharge whatever “bad stuff” may be trapped to your colon walls.

You can learn more great tips about creating a healthy lifestlye by watching this presentation at Healthy Lifestlye Change…

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Everyone gets constipated at one time or another, and wishes there were home remedies for constipation. Well, there are some excellent home remedies for constipation.

Constipation is caused by a number of things, but the most common are delay in passing a bowel movement, content compaction due to dehydration, or just an occasional occurrence. Regardless of what caused it, it’s all resulting in bowel difficulties that make the bowel movement either extremely difficult or quite painful. Do be aware, that depending on the severity, if the impaction is relentless enough, it may require medical intervention.

Adding fiber to your diet will help tremendously in stopping constipation. Fiber is obtainable through fruit, fruit skins, seeds, grains, nuts, and green vegetables. When you first add fiber to your diet, if you have not been eating fiber, you may find that you’ll pass a tremendous amount of gas. Give the gas a chance to dissipate in your body. This means that you should give it a chance of about 15 to 20 days of eating more fiber than before.

What fiber does for your body is to actually bulk up your stools. Further, then it helps your stools to retain water, making them much easier to pass.

Chew properly and eat three meals or more a day so that your colon is filled properly. Do not hurry meals as that encourages compaction. You will need to stay away from constipating foods such as cheese, refined sugars, alcohol, carbonated drinks, sweets, fried foods, and white flour.

Eating yogurt is one of the best ways to keep your colon healthy. It instills good bacterial flora in your body, which is actually essential to proper digestion as well as elimination. You will want to purchase yogurts that bear the words ‘live active cultures’ on them.

Curing constipation is not reliant on foods alone. You will need to hydrate much more. That means drinking fluids. Water is the best fluid, of course, but lemon flavored water may be easier to drink in large quantities. There are a number of other ways to ingest fluids, such as fruit juices, vegetable juices, soups, milk, and numerous fruits that contain a lot of fluids naturally, such as watermelons.

Mild exercise, even when you are suffering from constipation, is essential to keep things moving inside your body. Walking is one of the best ways to remove constipation, and if you walk daily, you will find that constipation is a thing of the past. If you are approved by your doctor to do more exercise, you may find that swimming, for example, may cure you of constipation for good!

Contracting the anal muscles as a response to tension in your life has often been the culprit in creating episodes of constipation. Modern technology has a number of biofeedback programs for you to cure this; however, relaxing your anal musculature can be learned by simply concentrating on letting those muscles relax. You may practice contraction and relaxing of those muscles at any time even if you are engaged in other activities.

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