---
title: "Surprising (and Often Ignored) Causes of Bloating"
entity: "blog"
canonical_url: "https://www.drdanwool.com/blog/bloatingcauses"
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lastmod: "2024-04-09T07:00:00.000Z"
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## Did you know...?

[video transcript]   Did you know that more than 70 million Americans every year suffer from indigestion? Seems like it should be a lot more, right?

## Bloating: That "Six Months Pregnant" Look

It's Dr. Dan with another "lunch and learn" video. Today we are talking about bloating. I have people who come to me and they say, "Doc, I look like I'm six months pregnant." Well, what causes that, and how do we fix it?

This is a very common complaint. It's actually so painful sometimes and so uncomfortable that people go to the hospital for this. So let's get into it.

 

## The Mechanical Culprits of Bloating: Air & Mass

Part of bloating is mechanical. We're bloated; it feels like we're full of air, and that's because we are full of air. Half of that is CO2, so it actually goes to how we eat. We're swallowing air as we eat.

Now, we've become a convenience culture, and we're eating lots of food, and we're very busy, and we have to eat it fast. So we can take down a Chipotle bowl in, say, five minutes. It's probably not the way we were designed to eat. In fact, I know it's not the way that we were designed to eat. And so while we're wolfing all that down, we're swallowing all this air, and that's CO2 that gets trapped in our gut. We get burping, we get farting, and it becomes incredibly uncomfortable.

So if that's half the air, what's the rest? Well, that comes from what we eat. Now, it could be mechanical. Did you know your stomach is the size of your fist? And that stuff's really big if you actually stop and look at it. So if you're eating a Cheesecake Factory-size triple portion and taking it all down because you're in the "Clean Your Plate Club," it is going to just physically stretch that stomach, get it bigger and bigger and bigger. And of course, that mass is going to take up mass inside of you, and it's going to be very uncomfortable.

So we have the air, we have the physical mass, but what else causes bloating?

 

## Bloating and Microbial Mischief: What You Eat vs. 

## What You Feed

Let's again go back to what we eat and what causes the air. Well, we have microbes all throughout our microbiome. It is in our large intestine, it's in our small intestine, and we have digestive enzymes in our stomach, and we're breaking down this big bolus of food into little tiny nutrients. Sometimes those microbes and enzymes are creating chemical reactions that cause gas.

So what types of things are we talking about? Well, we can have something called Small Intestine Bacterial Overgrowth (SIBO). These are microbes that are normally in the large intestine. We have a lax sphincter that dumps the food down there. They sweep up into the small intestine, and they have a "keg party" where they don't belong. All of that gas that they're kind of farting out ends up becoming gas in your gut, and we have that "six months pregnant look." We don't want that.

But it also comes from the types of foods we eat. Now, we already talked about what happens if you eat too much, but you can also eat too little. So imagine if you just ate the same three things every day. You're Tom Hanks, you're on the "Castaway" island, and you can only eat sweet potatoes and fish. Well, guess what your microbes are going to do? All the ones that digest everything else are going to kind of go down into remission. You might have a few here and there, but really the ones that are going to digest your food are the only ones that are digesting sweet potatoes and fish.

And so it's kind of the same with our diets. If you go on a really, really restrictive diet, there are only so many types of microbes that are going to digest your food, and the others kind of die off. And so then it comes time to eat that other food. Let's say you have fish and sweet potatoes, for instance, and in comes a steak. Well, you really don't have the microbes to make that happen.

## Bloating and FODMAPs

There are certain foods, actually, that cause this more than others. A lot of times it is sugars, especially fructose. This is the sugar found in fruit, and then fructose when it combines with different fats and oils. These are called FODMAPs (Fructooligosaccharides), and there are also things, additives to food, called sugar alcohols. So, sorbitol, mannitol, these things can also cause gas and bloating.

So we eat these things, they cause all this gas, and it doesn't get digested. That air, that gas takes up mass, and it starts pushing up against our heart. It starts pushing up against our lungs. We feel uncomfortable, we get sweaty. It starts to cause pain, and we've got to reach for something to fix it.

 

## Natural Remedies & Lifestyle Shifts to Reduce Bloating

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### Carminative  (gas relieving) herbs for bloating

Well, naturopathically, I like to do it with herbs. These herbs are called carminatives, and they really do a great job in settling down gas. And you probably know them from traditional remedies: we've got peppermint, chamomile, cinnamon, ginger. These are all carminative herbs. There are other things like rosemary and thyme if you like your Simon and Garfunkel. So you can get into those. You can drink it as a tea, you can do it as a tincture, and these things will help to settle the gas down.

### Slow down when eating to help  reduce  bloating

But you know, I'm all about self-care. So let's go back to why that would happen in the first place. Well, we have these two nervous systems: sympathetic and parasympathetic. If you were wolfing down food, you are causing a sympathetic response. You're tightening everything up. It's not digesting properly. And we have to stop and slow down. Think about when you were a kid. You sat down to family dinners, everybody around, laughing, having a good time, eating slowly. Nobody rushing to get done. Nobody rushing to get back to work. Nobody watching an iPhone while they were eating their meal and getting really testy news that is pissing them off. No, we're relaxed. Parasympathetic state is "rest and digest," and that's what you should be doing.

### Reduce volume to ease bloating, starting with your fork

So don't eat too much. Don't eat too little. Slow down. Chew your food. We don't want these big, giant masses, these big rocks that we're throwing into lava. No, we want little, tiny pieces that just dissolve really quickly. So don't eat too much, don't eat too little, as we talked about with the different microbes in your gut, and pay attention to what is causing you this discomfort. Is it a certain kind of food? There are food sensitivities that people will have. There is inflammation in the gut that can spin off different food sensitivities over time.

### If chronic bloating, get tested... 

So what do we do? If you've watched these videos, you know, I test, test, test. Lots of different things can cause bloating. Lots of different things can solve it.

 

## Your Custom Bloating Solution Awaits!

If you want your custom solution to your bloating, please give me a call. I offer free 15-minute visits in person here in Scottsdale, Arizona at Chambers Clinic. We are the best naturopathic doctors in the Valley and I am one of the few naturopaths who specialize in gastroenterology. I offer telehealth either on Zoom or phone. Nobody leaves without direction. Please give me a call at (480) 741-2102 or go to my website, [drdanwool.com/booking.](drdanwool.com/booking)

## Oh...one more thing

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About the Author

## Dr. Dan Wool, NMD

Dr. Dan Wool is a naturopathic doctor who specializes in gastroenterology, hormones and men's health in Scottsdale, Arizona. [Set up a free 15-minute discovery call with Dr. Wool today! ](https://drdanwool.com/booking)

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