3 Reasons Eating Dandelions Could Help Your Gut Health
Video Transcript:
Hi everybody. And welcome back. Today, we're talking about three reasons eating dandelions could help with gut health. So I'm going to talk about these three reasons, and then I'm going to share how you could incorporate this into your eating, what forms you could take it in, and also some safety concerns that some people should really be mindful of because it's not going to be safe for everybody, which is actually pretty common in medicine and nutrition.
3 Reasons Eating Dandelions Could Help Your Gut Health
Number one is the dandelion root has a large amount of inulin. And inulin is a prebiotic, pre before the pro. So it's basically food or the probiotics in your gut.
So those good bacteria will eat the inulin in the dandelion root and it's going to help them to grow. It's their food. And we know that more diversity in the bacteria in our gut is tied to better health outcomes.
Now, another thing that inulin can help with is stabilizing blood sugars, because it's a pre-biotic, it's a type of fiber. And so if you have diabetes or pre-diabetes, this can really help to keep your blood sugars stable. Now I want to cut in here and share a little bit about the background of using dandelions as food and as medicine.
So dandelions have been traditionally used in Chinese medicine. They've been used by 22 native American tribes and in Germany, it's been approved by Germany's Commission E, which is basically their scientific advisory board to help with dyspepsia, and indigestion, to help with bile flow, and to help with low appetite.
So that's pretty significant. In Austria and the Czech Republic, it's in there at national Pharmacopia, it's also in the Ayurvedic and British Pharmacopia. So as you can see, it's really respected by these national organizations around the world for good reason.
Number two is that it can help lift bile flow. So as mentioned, in Germany as a part of their national scientific advisory board and proving bile flow is used that they have recognized for dandelions. So what this does is basically bile created in the liver stored in the gallbladder.
And when you eat a meal, that gallbladder releases a bolus of bile into the small intestine. So mouth, esophagus, stomach, small intestine, and that's where this bile is released and that's going to help to absorb fat. So fat's mostly absorbed through the third part of the intestine the ileum, and we need enough of that bile production to support that fat absorption.
Also, if someone's struggling with constipation, lack of bile could be one component of this because bile has a mild laxative effect. And also it can help to simulate stomach acid, which we've talked about before this time, it needs to be really acidic.
It's supposed to be really acidic to start that breakdown of food. So this is all really important and something that eating dandelion can help with. So before we dive into number three, I want to share our FREE GUIDE: 5 ways to improve gut health that you can download.
So the number three way that dandelion can help with gut health is that it's a liver tonic. So we have all these natural detoxification systems in our bodies. Our body knows how to detox, but it does need the proper nutrients in order to do this properly.
And dandelion can actually help and assist with this process of these detoxification systems through the liver. And this can help with things like hormone imbalance, which could help in a roundabout way with things like skin health, because of how all of that is tied in with proper functioning and needing proper functioning of the whole gastrointestinal tract.
Three additional benefits of eating dandelions
Okay. So before we dive into how you can eat and take dandelion, I want to share three additional benefits beyond what I just mentioned.
So the first one is it has powerful anti-inflammatory benefits, so this could really help to improve your immune system.
The second one is that it seems to have antiviral properties as well.
And then the third one is that it seems to help to improve insulin secretion. So not only does that root have that inulin that can help with blood sugar balancing, but it could also be helping to improve insulin secretion. So really great food for anybody at risk for pre-diabetes or who has pre-diabetes or diabetes.
How to eat and take dandelions
So now let's dive in and talk about how you can take dandelion. Of course, you can just go and snip it from the grass and eat it that way you can put it on salads. Just be super careful about pesticide residue on it.
Most lawns, a lot of lawns, especially in the United States are sprayed with pesticides or roundup. Especially because dandelions are seen as a weed, people are trying to get rid of them. So I wouldn't go to the park and necessarily like harvest dandelion to eat, if, in your yard, you know that you're not spraying chemicals on your grass. That would be probably the most ideal way that you can get in some good quality dandelions.
Now, there are other ways that you can take it too if you want to try to get a higher dose of it for maybe improved therapeutic benefit, or you could try doing this on top of just incorporating some dandelions into like your salads would be probably the biggest way, the number one way that people eat dandelion. So these other ways are that you could take a tincture of dandelions.
So it would come and tell me an alcohol suspension, and you could take a dose of that about 20 minutes before a meal. And that would help to wrap up everything that we talked about, that bile secretion and help to basically absorb your meal because of those things that we already talked about.
And then another way is, of course, dandelion teas. So you could go to your store, it's becoming more popular, so it's probably easier to find as a tea or you can dry it out yourself. If again, you have a yard that's not sprayed, just clip it.
And this is a more affordable way to get it in. You can just take about one to two teaspoons and one cup of water, steep for about 15 minutes. And you can drink that about one to three times a day and just do that for a week and see if you notice any benefit.
Now, the last way that you could take dandelion is in capsule form, but this isn't as common. Your, I actually don't think I've ever seen a 100% dandelion capsule. It's usually a combination product that's working to help support detox pathways or, you know, support bile production or something of that sort.
But always starting with real whole quality foods is going to be best. Now, safety information. This is really important because I don't want you to be taking this if you have certain issues going on. So please keep listening to this part.
Reminder
So in general, dandelion is a pretty safe herb, but there are six reasons that you're going to at least want to chat with your doctor on this one.
So the first one is any gallbladder or bile duct issues for obvious reasons because it helps to stimulate those pathways.
The second one is any sort of kidney issue like chronic kidney disease, or obviously kidney failure.
The next one is if you're on any sort of blood thinners or diuretics, make sure to check with your main healthcare provider or your doctor. If you want to try dandelion, it could be contra-indicated there.
Next one is if you're having gastritis, so stomach inflammation, because as mentioned, it can help to increase stomach acid.
Or if someone has a stomach ulcer, we actually will want to decrease stomach acid until that heals before trying to get stomach acid up again, which is for the most part important for that breakdown of food, right? But if you're having inflammation in the stomach or a stomach ulcer, then you don't want to increase stomach acid. We need to let that heal first before then working to increase stomach acid.
And then the sixth thing is if you have allergies in the Aster family, so like Ragweed, this could make your allergies worse.
So if you get those seasonal allergies, like actually this time of the year when dandelions are popping up, you might, you could probably try it if it makes your allergies worse, just back down and cut it out again.
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I hope you all have a great day and I'll see you next week, Tuesday at 3:00 PM, central time is when we release our new videos.
Thank you all, see you soon.
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