The “poop” on poop
On every DS forum I’ve been in, the topic eventually comes up. What to do about poop. Or more specifically, what to do about not pooping. Constipation is one of those parts of the “syndrome” that causes considerable anguish for both the person dealing with it and mom.
Causes of constipation seem to group into three areas.
1) What we put into the gut. This includes water (not enough), fiber (not enough), and to much of a host of difficult to digest foods (including milk and wheat).
2) Problems with gut dysbiosis. According to Natasha Campbell McBride and many other experts it works like this: Start with poor indroduction of gut flora from birth, then administer antibiotics to kill all the flora, leaving no good bacteria, the eat the modern diet devoid of cultured foods. Vaccines further damage the gut wall. All this results in gut walls stripped of microvilli, which means that enzyme production for digestion is slowed or stopped. The gut gets plugged up with putrifying food and bad bacteria. This has been discussed here and here.
3) The above problems of intake and gut dysbiosis are not confined to DS but abound in the normal population. However, in DS there is a special problem: Problems with gut motility: Serotonin is the neurotransmitter responsible for peristalsis (movement of food in the gut), and serotonin has been found to be low in Trisomy 21. The motility is also hampered by late crawling/walking and general sedentary lives of many with DS.
All this combines to present a problem that moms of kids with DS have put their mind to solving. Constipation in Down Syndrome is a recently edited and reloaded page on this site which collects solutions and discussion from posts on the ES email list. And not surprisingly, the solutions to constipation involve changing the diet, healing the gut, and improving gut motility.
Filed under: diet, gut, health, medical | Tagged: constipation, gut health, vaccines
