Episode 291: How to Support Your Gut While on Antibiotics
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This is a resource-rich episode for the next time you have to take antibiotics. Erin discusses specific tools to put in place so that antibiotics do the least amount of damage to your gut. She also helps you weigh out the pros and cons before taking antibiotics, and what to do to mitigate any issues if you do have to take them. Be sure to share this episode with anyone you know who is on — or has recently been on — antibiotics!
In this episode:
Weighing out the pros and the cons before taking antibiotics [10:56]
What kind of probiotics are best? [16:44]
When should you take them? [24:03]
Supplements & herbs that support the gut lining [28:30]
How & why to support liver detoxification [30:43]
Foods to eat & foods to avoid [33:16]
Resources mentioned:
Kion Aminos (Get 20% off monthly orders and 10% off one time orders)
Ned Natural Remedies (get 15% off your order with code FUNK)
Organifi supplement powder (save 20% on your order with code FUNK)
LMNT Electrolyte Replenishing powder (Use code FUNK get a free sample pack with any purchase!)
Qualia Senolytic (get up to 50% off and an extra 15% off your first purchase with link + code FUNKS)
Learn more about Immune Support and Gut Health
Related episodes:
62: Lyme Prevention & Gut Health
78: How to Eat for True Gut Health
81: Why You Need to Stop Self-Treating Your Gut
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Erin Holt [00:00:02]:
I'm Erin Holt, and this is the Funk'tional Nutrition podcast, where we lean into intuitive functional medicine. We look at how diet, our environment, our emotions, and our beliefs all affect our physical health. This podcast is your full bodied, well rounded resource. I've got over a decade of clinical experience, and because of that, I've got a major bone to pick with diet culture and the healthcare model. They're both failing so many of us. But functional medicine isn't the panacea that it's made out to be either. We've got some work to do, and that's why creating a new model is my life's work. I believe in the ripple effect.
Erin Holt [00:00:39]:
So I founded the Funk'tional Nutrition Academy, a school in mentorship for practitioners who want to do the same. This show is for you if you're looking for new ways of thinking about your health and you're ready to be an active participant in your own healing. Please keep in mind this podcast is created for educational purposes only and should never be used as a replacement for medical diagnosis or treatment. I would love for you to follow the show, rate, review and share because you never know whose life you might change. And of course, keep coming back for more. Hello, my friends. Today we're going to talk about how to support your gut when you have to take antibiotics. We're going to talk about how to weigh out the pros and the cons before taking antibiotics.
Erin Holt [00:01:25]:
I'm not going to get real into the meat and potatoes of specifically why we want to be conscientious about antibiotic use. I'll list out some episodes that you can go do a deeper dive on that. But I am going to talk about, if you are on antibiotics, what to do to support yourself best to kind of like do the least amount of damage to your microbiome to your gut. We'll talk about different probiotics. We'll talk about when to take probiotics when you're on antibiotics. We'll talk about specific gut healing, supplements, herbs, foods, dietary strategies. Basically, this is the protocol that I put myself on anytime I have to take antibiotics. And I originally released this back in June of 2020 when I had just come off of antibiotics for ear infection.
Erin Holt [00:02:10]:
And this June 2023, I had to go on antibiotics for an upper and lower respiratory infection. And I followed this exact strategy. And what's interesting, a few months later, I did a GI Map stool test on myself for some other stuff, and I was really surprised that my beneficial species hadn't taken a hit. The last time I went on antibiotics, I did a stool test after the fact. And man, they were really leveled out, which is not uncommon. And it's why we want to be very, very conscientious about not overtaking antibiotics, because they really do have a detrimental impact to our microbiome, to the beneficial species in our gut. But these strategies really helped. But one thing I also did that I haven't done in the past is I took a higher dose of spore based probiotics.
Erin Holt [00:03:02]:
Now, we talked about this two weeks ago in the probiotic episode. So if you want more information on what spore based probiotics are, go back there. But in that episode, I talked about how these guys have more of a potential to actually replace the beneficial species that we lose or to essentially repopulate the gut. Not many probiotics can do that, but these guys do have some research behind them that indicate that they might have more potential to do that. And I was really surprised to see my post antibiotic stool test to see that the beneficial species were not sadly low as they have been in the past. Now, I'm choosing to rerelease this episode because it is chock full. It's been over three years, and it's so chock full of information that I wanted it to be front and center, especially as we move into the holidays. I've talked to a lot of people who have been on antibiotics lately, and so I just kept sending them this episode and sending them this episode.
Erin Holt [00:04:05]:
So I wanted to be higher up in the podcast queue. Easy access. And when we navigate the holidays, usually there's a lot of travel. Our schedule is off. Our sleep might be ofF. We might be eating things that we don't typically eat. Perhaps more sugar, perhaps more alcohol consumption, perhaps more stress. Definitely interfacing with more people.
Erin Holt [00:04:28]:
So all of this can kind of create a perfect storm for getting sick or for getting run down, for our immune system to be suppressed. And so if you catch something gnarly and your doctor tells you you need antibiotics, you'll have this episode to refer back to as a resource. That's my intention. One thing that I did not mention in the original episode that I really want to talk about here is the importance of rest while you're taking antibiotics. So what we tend to do is we treat medication, including antibiotics, as just like a quick fix or a Band Aid. So we just kind of continue on our typical day, our typical week, our typical life, and just cross our fingers and hope that the antibiotic does its job. But the way that antibiotics work in some cases is to knock down the pathogenic bacteria, and then your immune system has the opportunity to kind of take over and really clear out the infection. So we need to give our immune system what it needs.
Erin Holt [00:05:27]:
And as I said, this podcast episode will outline a lot of strategies, but rest is so huge. I was just talking to a friend recently who went on antibiotics for an ear infection, and the five day course of antibiotics didn't clear the ear infection. She had to go back to the doctor, and I was like, well, were you resting? And she's like, absolutely not. So we have to rest. We have to give our body the time and the space to convalesce, to actually heal itself, to repair itself. And that is true whether you're taking antibiotics prescription or you're taking herbal antibiotics, antibiotics for some type of GI infection or gut protocol. It's just something that's pretty overlooked, the importance of rest for repair, for restoration, and for overall immune system health. So I wanted to be sure to add that to this podcast.
Erin Holt [00:06:21]:
You've got to rest your body. One of the strategies that I mentioned, more of a food as medicine type of strategy, is turmeric, as it can be really supportive for the gut. We all know that turmeric also helps to bring down inflammation. The way that I've been getting turmeric in lately, I'm on a real hot streak with this. It's through Organifi chocolate gold powder. So it's a turmeric drink. It's kind of like that golden milk drink, a turmeric rich drink, but it also has cocoa powder in it, and it tastes so good. I make it after dinner, so it's kind of like my dessert every night, and I'll make it with almond milk or coconut milk.
Erin Holt [00:07:00]:
And then I'll do a heaping scoop of the Organifi chocolate gold powder. The bonus is that it also has lemon balm in it, has turkey tail, it has reishi mushroom. All of these things are really supportive of the overall nervous system, which is like, I need all the nervous system support I can get during the holidays. I'm somebody who likes a schedule. I like to know what to expect. I'm a little bit of a homebody. So when I'm up and at 'em and interfacing with all of the people throughout the holidays, when the social calendar is booked, I also like to make sure that I'm caretaking my nervous system throughout all of that. So if you want to try Organifi chocolate gold powder, head to organifi.com/funk and you'll save 20% that's Organifi.com/FUNK
Erin Holt [00:07:47]:
All right, so let's talk antibiotics. Here we go. I am not going to get into the whole tale of why antibiotics are bad. I've picked that over time and time again. We have episode, and I don't mean to say antibiotics are bad or why antibiotics can be detrimental to gut health, to overall health. We talked about it in episode 62, where I talked about Lyme prevention and gut health. We talked about it in episode 78, How to Eat for True Gut Health.
Erin Holt [00:08:21]:
We talked about it in episode 81, Why You Need to Stop Self Treating Your Gut. So cruise on over to those episodes if you want to do a deeper dive on antibiotics and why they can be detrimental. Cliff's notes is that we take antibiotics to kill bad bacteria. Right. Pathogenic bacteria that are causing problems, like the stuff going on in my ear. But they don't just exclusively choose the bad bacteria. They can also kill off the good bacteria that belong in our gut. And when that happens, it disrupts a very delicate ecosystem, which causes dysbiosis, imbalance in the gut.
Erin Holt [00:09:07]:
Essentially, when good bacteria die off, you can become more susceptible to the overgrowth of opportunistic organisms. Our entire health, even our mental health, is really reliant upon the functioning of our gut and the ecosystem that resides within. And in order for our gut ecosystems to be considered healthy, they have to be diverse. So there has to be a lot of different species, and there has to be a lot of them. And what antibiotics does is essentially crush that diversity. So if this gets worse, the more we use antibiotics. So if you're a product of the, like myself, chances are you've been on antibiotics a lot. The more antibiotics you use, the less diverse your gut ecosystem is.
Erin Holt [00:09:56]:
With every course, diversity is reduced. All of that is problematic. Some species in our guts can rebound post antibiotics, but not all of them can. The worst offender is an antibiotic cocktail. So this is like the thing that we want to reserve for when we're in absolute dire straits and there's no other option. But that's doing three or four antibiotics in a short period of time to kill off an infection. That's what an antibiotic cocktail is. That leads to the biggest decrease in diversity, the biggest loss of species, and it can have very long term effects, like, up to years.
Erin Holt [00:10:37]:
This isn't like a quick turnaround thing. Some species can even go extinct. Like, we don't have the ability to grow them back. So this can have devastating consequences. Right. So we try to reserve that for absolute necessity. With my ear. I'm just going to briefly kind of talk about, we have to have some ways to weigh out the pros and the cons.
Erin Holt [00:11:03]:
How do we know taking antibiotics is the right choice? Right. We really should be at the point now where we all understand we have to strongly consider the use of them versus just going to that for the first thing that we do. The first intervention with my ear, I was having these crazy headaches. Like, really bad headaches. Like, headaches I've never experienced before. They were just taking me out. I think a lot of them had to do with stress and tension. And so I was getting the bad headaches.
Erin Holt [00:11:35]:
Bad headaches, bad headaches. They got a little bit better, and then they came rip roaring back, and it came back with nausea and dizziness. Like, I just felt really wonky. And then I started feeling sick. Like, took a three hour nap, like, couldn't get out of bed. Just like something was off. So I eventually went into the walk in because I was like, what the heck is. What's up? This is not normal for me.
Erin Holt [00:11:56]:
And turns out I had an ear infection in one of my ears. In talking to some body work professionals that had hands on my body, they said that what can happen is when the muscles in your neck get super tight. I'm totally butchering this. This is not my area of expertise. I should have probably looked this up before trying to explain it, but something about the ear canal, it can keep the ear from appropriately draining. So I think what happened is I had these insane tension headaches super tight in my neck and my shoulders, because, hey, I'm not doing all the self care practices that I used to do, pre quarantine. I'm not getting massages, I'm not getting biofeedback, I'm not getting as much energy work. I'm not having hands on my body, which is something that I really need to keep myself in good health.
Erin Holt [00:12:52]:
I'm not going to the yoga studio. I'm not practicing yoga in a heated environment like I did. So there's a lot of tension. Right? So it all makes sense for sure. But because I was in so much pain and because I can easily go down a fear spiral of something really bad is happening, just with a history of chronic illness, I decided that getting on the antibiotics, because I had been feeling really bad for quite a while, it just made the most sense for me. So I kind of did this. My point of saying all of that is I did this internal pros, cons, pros, cons, pros. Cons.
Erin Holt [00:13:29]:
And where I netted out was that taking amoxicillin was the best choice for me in that moment. So we all kind of have to figure out and talk with our physicians as well and figure out, is this the best choice? So what I'm about to outline is a fairly comprehensive approach. It might seem like an aggressive approach, especially if you've never considered these things before, but antibiotics are kind of aggressive, but they can also be life saving. So if we need antibiotics, we need to have the tools in place to support ourselves while we take them and after we take them. So just really throwing down a lot of support to try to do the least amount of damage, knowing that we're going to do some damage. Right. We kind of just have to make peace with that and not go into a fear spiral around that. That is something that I've taken off my plate.
Erin Holt [00:14:22]:
Like, I know my gut's going to get messed up. Okay, that's happening. Cool. Whatever. Taking it off my plate as a stressor, I also have tools to put in place to support my gut. So I'm going to do that.
Erin Holt [00:16:05]:
Let's start with probiotics, because it's pretty well known that it's a good idea to take probiotics when you're on antibiotics.
Erin Holt [00:16:47]:
First of all, they're effective both for the prevention and the treatment of antibiotic associated diarrhea. So that's something that a lot of people experience when they're on antibiotics, is this diarrhea. And probiotics, certain strains of probiotics can really be helpful to mitigate this, but it goes even deeper than that. Probiotics can actually augment antibiotic activity and can be a really supportive adjunct to antibiotic therapy. It can support the use of antibiotics in your body. We have this long held belief that taking probiotics is important with antibiotics because they replace the microbes that are wiped out by the antibiotics. And that's a very overly simplistic idea, and it's probably not even true. We know that probiotics don't colonize for long periods, so it's not like we kill off the good guys, but then we can just replace them by taking a probiotic.
Erin Holt [00:17:46]:
That's actually not how it works, but they do tend to work in transition, like, while they're going through your body, while they're in your body, even for a couple of weeks after. And that's still a really good thing, especially with antibiotic use. Taking probiotics when you're taking antibiotics can reduce the risk of antibiotic induced super infections in the gut and in the vagina. If you ever have taken an antibiotic that had got a yeast infection or a bacterial infection, you know what I'm talking about, right? That's pretty common. And so when we take probiotics with the antibiotics, it can reduce the chances of this probiotics can also have some antimicrobial activity in and of themselves. They can secrete antibacterial substances, and this can lower the pathogenic bacterial populations, which I think is really cool. They also have the ability to disrupt biofilms. I've talked about biofilms before, but biofilms are kind of like packaging where pathogens can hide.
Erin Holt [00:18:54]:
So it's like a covering and a coating, and it can be hard to kill the pathogens if it's covered by a biofilm. So disrupting the biofilm allows the antibiotics to get in and do its job a little bit better. So there's a lot of different cool things that probiotics can do, and it's more than just, well, I don't have diarrhea. There's a lot of things going on under the hood that probiotics. That probiotics can help you with. They can also support proper gut motility. They can down regulate toxin release by pathogenic bacteria. So the bad bacteria, the bad guys can release toxins, and probiotics can down regulate this.
Erin Holt [00:19:36]:
This is a big one. They can inhibit the growth of yeast in other opportunistic pathogens. What can happen is when we kill off the good guys, it makes space for the opportunistic things to come into play, yeast being one of them. I've heard this analogy a couple of different times, and I love it, and I've used it myself. It's like a parking lot analogy. So if you imagine your gut is a full parking lot, all the spaces are filled up with cars. When you use antibiotics, you can kill off some of the good bacteria, and so those parking spaces open up. And if we don't fill them with good guys, then the opportunistic or bad guys can slide into those parking spots.
Erin Holt [00:20:23]:
And yeast is a fantastic example of this because it's extremely, extremely opportunistic. And this is why antibiotic use puts us at a greater risk of fungal overgrowth. And so certain strains of bacteria can inhibit fungal overgrowth, it can inhibit yeast, candida, it can prevent its biofilm formation, and it can even kill off the fungus. So that's another reason why we should be taking probiotics and then some probiotic strains can actually kill intestinal pathogens. It's that antimicrobial activity that I was talking about. So definitely you want to throw down on some good probiotic support while you're on antibiotics. One example of this is Saccharomyces boulardii. Saccharomyces boulardii is actually a yeast.
Erin Holt [00:21:23]:
It's a non pathogenic yeast, and it's a yeast eating yeast. It helps to gobble up other types of pathogenic yeasts. This one is great for the diarrhea, but I just like taking it in general while you're on antibiotics. So this is the first thing that I tend to recommend for folks on antibiotics is Saccharomyces boulardii. That's like, if you had to do one thing, I think it would probably be this one, maybe this one, and a good quality broad spectrum probiotic. You can get it pretty inexpensively at most health food stores, so pretty easy to find. You might need to be careful. I almost hesitate saying this if you know that you produce antibodies to yeast, you might have to stay away from Saccharomyces boulardii, but I don't see this being a huge issue in my practice and the people that I work with.
Erin Holt [00:22:14]:
I generally see it as a safe thing. If you know that you've reacted to Saccharomyces boulardii in the past, obviously you don't want to take it when you're taking antibiotics. Another really great one, the three that I'm going to recommend are very potent, therapeutic probiotics. I use them a lot clinically, and this is, one of these is what I'm currently taking while on antibiotics because I have long standing gut issues. So I'm not trying to play, I am not messing around. So one is called Custom Probiotics. You do need to purchase them direct from the website customprobiotics.com. This is a powder, not cheap.
Erin Holt [00:22:58]:
It's over $100 per bottle at this website. You can get a sample size jar for around $40. So that's something to consider. Another great one is Gut Pro. That's another powder. And another good one is by the Gut Institute. And that's another powder. But those are all around the same price point.
Erin Holt [00:23:18]:
They're all powders. You mix them with water, you can put them in a smoothie if you want to, but they're all around $100 for a full bottle. That bottle will last you a long time, but definitely an investment if you're looking for something less expensive. Klaire Labs ABX support is a pretty good one. It depends on where you buy it, what the cost is, but I do think it's less expensive than the other ones that I've mentioned. This one actually has the Sac boulardii. So it has Saccharomyces boulardii. It has some lactobacillus and two different bifidose strains, which are really important.
Erin Holt [00:23:50]:
So those are some things to consider. If nothing else, just go to your local health food store and grab something off of the shelf and do that. You do want to be conscientious of when you take them, try to take them about 2 hours away from your antibiotics. This can be a little bit of a puzzle, a little bit of a Tetris game, figuring out when you take your antibiotics and when you take your probiotics. But we don't want to, when you're taking a strong antibiotic, it can basically decimate the probiotic. So it doesn't make sense to spend all this money on a good quality probiotic to not have it be effective. So do try to space those out the best that you can. I also think it's a really smart bet to do some immune system support.
Erin Holt [00:24:38]:
We know that we've got the majority of our immune system in our gut right in the mucosal layer, and if we're trying to clear an infection, we're asking the immune system to do a really big job. It just doesn't happen. It's like a call to action for our immune system. Like, all right, we've got this infection. We got to clear it. You guys ready? All right, let's go. So supporting the immune system while you're trying to clear an infection is important, and this looks like supporting mucosal immunity as well. Now, probiotics can do this.
Erin Holt [00:25:13]:
Probiotics enhance mucosal immunity, which in turn will support the eradication of the organisms right there at the mucosal layer. But other ways to support mucosal immunity would be Saccharomyces boulardii. That's another one that does it. Vitamin A is great. Short chain fatty acids. So butyrate. I like a product by Apex called Enterovite because it has three different short chain fatty acids that can be really supportive immunoglobulins. So there's different products that I use clinically for immunoglobulins.
Erin Holt [00:25:52]:
But talking about a food as medicine approach, if you can tolerate dairy, if you can tolerate whey, doing some non denatured, grass fed whey protein is great. Jarrow makes goat whey. If you can't tolerate cow dairy, that's a pretty inexpensive product you can get. And I would consider that for the immunoglobulin support. And I also think just doing some gentle adrenal support isn't a bad idea when you're trying to clear the infection. It's like really trying to bolster the system. So those are all ways that you can support overall mucosal immunity while you're trying to clear the infection.
Erin Holt [00:28:14]:
And you would also want to consider supporting the actual lining of the gut. So we know that antibiotics can make us more susceptible to intestinal permeability or leaky gut. So this is especially true if you've had issues with gut health and autoimmunity in the past. You know this about yourself. It's not a bad idea to throw down some extra support here.
Erin Holt [00:28:57]:
So there's a bunch of different types of leaky gut powders. The one that I use, the one that I'm using right now is called Repairvite by Apex Energetics, but all the different companies make them. Basically, what you're looking for is some type of combination of L-glutamine, DGL, which is a type of licorice, aloe vera, slippery elm, marshmallow root, chamomile, really, any mucilaginous I can never say that word because it's such a weird word to say. Any of those type of herbs will also be really supportive. You just kind of want that to support the mucosal layer, that slippery lining of the intestine. So if you work with herbs and you love plant medicine, any of those type of herbs will be great. Or you can just grab one of the powders, if that's more of your jam. Omega3s are also really supportive of the lining of the gut.
Erin Holt [00:29:55]:
Doing some good quality fish oil. Turmeric is also great. So you could start cooking more with turmeric. You could do a turmeric supplement, however you want to go about that. Those are all great ways to support the lining of the gut. And then it's not a bad idea to consider liver support. So we could do liver supportive foods, which I've talked about a ton. These are really getting in all of your colors.
Erin Holt [00:30:24]:
You can listen to the detox episodes that I've done here to figure out what liver supportive foods are. Any of the sulfur rich veggies, your cruciferous veggies, those are all really great in terms of supplementation. Milk thistle is great. Alpha lipoic acid is supportive. N-acetyl cysteine or NAC is really great. And the interesting thing about N-acetyl cysteine or NAC that I'm just going to throw in here is that I've talked about this on the Lyme episode. I did talk about this, which I rereleased recently. So you might have recently heard me say this, but antibiotics can muck up the mitochondria.
Erin Holt [00:31:07]:
We need mitochondria for so many different things. So this is not great. This tends to be more with long term antibiotic use, which is why I brought it up in the Lyme episode, because so many folks with Lyme or with Lyme co infections are put on long term antibiotics. So I thought it was a relevant thing. Maybe not so relevant for somebody that's just doing like a one week course of one antibiotic to clear up an ear infection. But I'll throw it out here because this is the antibiotic episode after all. But there was a study published in 2013 titled Bacterial Antibiotics Induce Mitochondrial Dysfunction and Oxidative Damage in Mammalian Cells, and that showed that antibiotics can impair mitochondrial function after just four days of use.
Erin Holt [00:31:58]:
Now, again, this was done in cells, not in human bodies, but kind of interesting. The big thing to point out here is that these researchers were able to restore mitochondrial function, ATP production by supplementing with N-acetyl cysteine prior to antibiotic usage. So that could be something to consider. If you know that you're about to go on antibiotics, that might be something to consider working that into rotation. It's just good overall liver support anyway. And why we want to support the liver is when, as I mentioned earlier, these bacteria, pathogenic bacteria, can release biotoxins, and they can do that when they're being killed off, too, which might be totally fine, but our liver has to process these biotoxins. So it does sort of backload on the liver a little bit, which is why it's not a bad idea to support the liver. Even if you're just doing, like, dry skin brushing or sweating or doing Epsom salt baths, it doesn't have to be in the form of supplements.
Erin Holt [00:33:05]:
You could do food as medicine and some gentle lifestyle practices as well. I always want to give different options for different folks, but those are all things to consider. And then finally, and perhaps most importantly, let's talk about diet. So what can we do with our food while we're on antibiotics? And number one, cut out the sugar. That's a really big one, because sugar feeds the opportunistic bacteria and especially the yeast. So when I'm saying opportunistic, basically, when given the chance, these things will thrive, and they're given the chance with antibiotic use because we're clearing out those parking spaces. So they're like, hey, an opportunity to get in to the gut and kind of anchor in and throw down and thrive. So we want to prevent that from happening.
Erin Holt [00:33:59]:
So we don't want to feed the guys, right? We don't want to feed these opportunistic bacteria in yeast. So reducing sugar is a smart bet. And it's also just supportive of overall immune system, which we're trying to do anyway. I would also strongly encourage no fried foods. Those are really problematic for the gut. No alcohol, because that is also a direct gut irritant. And then depending on who you are and whether or not you're immune, reactive to wheat, no wheat. I kind of say this for a lot of people, because wheat can just muck up the gut, even if you're not feeling effects of it.
Erin Holt [00:34:40]:
But those are all things to consider. The funny part about this, or the ironic part about this, is that when I'm feeling my worst, that's when I tend to want more of those things. I tend to crave the comfort foods. I want more grains. I personally don't do great with a lot of grains. But when I'm feeling not great, I want more grains. It's like super weird. This is when I tend to want more wine.
Erin Holt [00:35:06]:
I'm like, I'm already feeling crappy. Let's just go all in. It's a very messed up mentality, but there we are. So I kind of have to remind myself. And then, plus, when you're not feeling good, you don't have all of this energy to cook healthy meals. You're just like, give me whatever. Like toast. Sure, whatever.
Erin Holt [00:35:27]:
But that's actually working against what we're trying to do. Variety is hugely important. Hugely, hugely important. So what's happening with the antibiotics, like I said at the start of the show, is that you're killing off good bacteria, you're lowering the diversity. So basically everything you have to do while you're on antibiotics and for months after is to try to bring back that diversity. And this is where variety comes into place. Now is not the time when you're on antibiotics and post antibiotics to stick to the same old things. Like, I'm just going to eat the same old thing.
Erin Holt [00:36:09]:
You want to throw as much diversity at your gut as possible because that's what our guts thrive on. So we want diversity in colors, we want diversity in polyphenols, we want diversity in fibers. I provide a really extensive list on different types of fibers and prebiotic fibers in episode 78. I'm not going to rehash all of that here because that would be silly because I already did that. So that would be a good episode to check out if you want specific suggestions on foods to work in. But really any type of prebiotic rich foods, leafy greens, bitters, onions, garlic, leeks, asparagus, bananas, especially if they're a little green apples. Listen, pectin is a wonderful type of prebiotic fiber. And doing slow cooked apples is such a good thing to do while you're trying to feed your gut.
Erin Holt [00:37:06]:
It's an instant pot applesauce recipe on my website. Basically what I do is I chop up the apples, keep the skins on because that's where the pectin is. Oh, my goodness. God bless me. And I just chop them up and I throw them in the instant pot with some cinnamon for like three minutes. That's it. And then you have applesauce. It's chunky applesauce.
Erin Holt [00:37:28]:
Yummy. Super high in pectin, which is good to feed your gut. So things like that, doing oats, if you can tolerate those, cocoa, flaxseeds, any type of roots, roots and tubers, chicory root jicama, Jerusalem artichokes, all of those are wonderful to feed the good guys in your gut. They all help to increase the beneficial bacteria that we're looking for. And then you also want to work in probiotic rich foods. So the prebiotics are the fibers that feed the good bacteria. So probiotic rich foods are ones that have good bacteria in them. Fermented foods, sauerkraut, fermented veggies, kimchi, any type of miso, if you can get your hands on some good quality miso paste.
Erin Holt [00:38:21]:
I love to do salad dressings with miso. You can cook with miso, but when you heat it, you kill off the beneficial bacteria. So I like to do different types of sauces with miso or just if you're doing a miso soup, just make sure you're not boiling the miso. You're stirring in the miso after the fact. If you can tolerate dairy, yogurt with live active cultures, kefir kombucha is great. And any type of fermented pickles, all that kind of good stuff. And a little bit goes a long way. It's not like you have to do a ton of this, but work it into your day to day life.
Erin Holt [00:39:01]:
So that's really all I have for you guys. Kind of a short and sweet episode. Why we want to be mindful of antibiotics, why we want to choose carefully. But if that is the right choice for us and that's something that our body needs, how we can support the overall immune system, the gut, and our ecosystem to make sure that we do as little damage as possible. So hopefully that helped. You guys feel free to share this episode. And if you're so inclined, leave me a review on iTunes. Thanks for joining me for this episode of the Funk'tional Nutrition podcast.
Erin Holt [00:39:46]:
If you got something from today's show, don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, share with a friend, and keep coming back for more. Take care of you.
