Bloated? Watch the Fruit!

Last week I sent out an email asking readers to send me their burning questions.

What a great response I got! Thank you for taking the time to submit them. I loved reading them and I look forward to addressing many of them in upcoming blog posts. If you didn’t get a chance to ask me, it’s not too late – send them along!

One common concern for many women (including many of the women I work with) is digestive complaints, particularly bloating.

There seems to be an awful lot of bloated bellies!

There’s nothing worse than going for lunch at midday only to return back to your desk feeling bloated like a balloon and having to continue on with your work. Talk about feeling unproductive.

I’ve even had women tell me that they get so bloated at times they look as if they’re 5 months pregnant!

So how does this relate to fruit?

Well, fruit seems to be one of those foods people are often confused about. Is it healthy or not? Is it best limited? Are the sugars bad? Does it disrupt blood sugar? What do I think?

People are looking for answers!

I figured I’d tackle both of these topics at once, and how they relate to each other.

I‘ll start first though by saying I love fruit! I think it’s a perfect food, brimming with easily assimilated nutrients that can provide a quick source of energy when needed. It also has the highest water content of any other food, making it a very powerful cleanser, which we can use to our benefit when consumed properly.

Here’s the caveat though.

Fruit can be too cleansing for some people if they’re not internally clean enough for it, which is why it often exacerbates digestive issues, particularly bloating.

For example, if you have undigested food sitting in your stomach or intestines, or your bowel is impacted with waste matter (or you’re constipated), then when that cleansing fruit is thrown into the mix and hits those contents it’s going to “stir things up” or “awaken” old dehydrated waste matter. In other words, it’s going to cause some movement.  Not necessarily a bad thing! But, at the same time, it can cause a lot of uncomfortable bloating and gas…not very comfortable say if you’re at work.

You might recall one of the principles of proper food combining is to always eat fruit alone and on an empty stomach. This is because it’s the quickest digesting food. And while there are definitely some exceptions to this rule which you can read about here, generally people who suffer from digestive problems, such as bloating, do better separating fruit from other foods.

This is why the ideal time to enjoy your fruit is the first thing in the morning before you’ve eaten anything else or well after other meals, such as late in the afternoon.

So is fruit healthy? That depends on what type of body it’s going into!

Now with that said, even when proper food combining is adhered to and/or bloating isn’t an issue, there are a few other scenarios where it may be best to limit your fruit intake to only lower sugar, sour/acid fruits, such as berries, grapefruit, green apples, pomegranate and cranberries, OR avoid them altogether until your body is either clean enough for it, or your symptoms have subsided.

These scenarios include:

1) Systemic yeast problems or other fungal related-issues (i.e. Candida overgrowth). Unfortunately, sugar feeds yeast –  even the natural ones found in fruit. I wrote more about this here and here.

2) Weight loss. Although you don’t necessarily need to cut out fruit, I find people usually do better limiting their fruit intake to a few pieces earlier in the day and emphasizing the lower sugar, sour/acid fruits mentioned above.

3) Blood sugar problems (i.e. diabetic, metabolic syndrome). In this case, it’s usually best to stick with the lower sugar, sour/acid fruits mentioned above, or you can lower the glycemic index of the fruit by mixing it into a smoothie with (for example) greens and avocado, or by pairing your sour/acid fruit with a small serving of high-quality seeds (i.e. berries with a tbsp of hemp hearts), which is a fairly benign combination.

Keep in mind that if you’re having fruit first thing in the morning, you can always follow it up with something else  20 minutes (or more) later. You don’t only have to eat fruit!

In closing, fruit is not an enemy to be vilified. Once your body becomes clean enough for it (and your digestion back on track), you’ll likely be able to enjoy it more abundantly without the unpleasant reactions.

Have a burning question that you’d like me to address in an upcoming blog post? Contact me and ask away!

xo Elaine