The Bloated Belly Whisperer: See Results Within a Week and Tame Digestive Distress Once and for All
304
The Bloated Belly Whisperer: See Results Within a Week and Tame Digestive Distress Once and for All
304eBook
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Overview
America's trusted digestive nutrition expert shares her personal program to vanquish bloating in a groundbreaking book that will help readers see results in a week or less!
With 50 recipes from former Bon Appétit editor and cookbook author Kristine Kidd
“This book could be a game-changer for anyone suffering from chronic belly upset...a deliciously do-able plan to keep you happy, healthy and bloat-free.” --Ellie Krieger, MS RD, host of Ellie’s Real Good Food, and award-winning cookbook author
"With candor and science-based expertise, Freuman offers invaluable information for readers suffering from a range of debilitating digestive issues." -- Publishers Weekly, starred review
Bloating: ugh. About the most common complaint they get from patients, according to gastroenterologists. But Tamara Duker Freuman, a highly trained and sought-after nutritionist, knows something many doctors don’t: every unhappy belly is unhappy in its own way. That’s why Tamara’s clients call her “The Bloated Belly Whisperer,” and for good reason—for many years she’s successfully helped her clients accurately describe their symptoms, and find a course of treatment that delivers rapid and lasting relief.
In The Bloated Belly Whisperer, Tamara guides readers through the same steps she would use in a consultation, first with a quiz to help them hone in on their specific symptoms, and then by discussing the latest research and patient stories to offer dozens of solutions that will reduce abdominal bloating in a week or less by:
· Helping identify the specific cause of bloating
· Equipping readers with the right terminology and questions to take to their next doctor’s visit
· Teaching the most effective dietary remedies for each particular brand of bloating
· Laying out the tools and healthy practices to end abdominal distress and bloating once and for all
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781250195272 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | St. Martin's Publishing Group |
| Publication date: | 12/24/2018 |
| Sold by: | Macmillan |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 304 |
| Sales rank: | 499,099 |
| File size: | 7 MB |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
Every Unhappy Belly Is Unhappy in Its Own Way: The Many Ways to Be Bloated
I STARTED MY CAREER AS a dietitian in a gastroenterology practice, fresh out of graduate school. I was light on real-life experience with people who had digestive problems, but I arrived full of textbook knowledge about all of the conditions I thought I'd encounter in my new job. I'd done my homework and read up about how to use diet to manage diarrhea and constipation, the pain of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), and the heartburn associated with acid reflux. I felt ready to address whatever complaints my patients would bring.
But in the three years of my dietetics education and all those months spent training in the hospital, I had never once heard of the problem that patient after patient showed up complaining about: bloating.
Bloating? What did that even mean? It wasn't a clinical condition I had ever learned about, and as far as I could tell, there was no official definition of what it was and how it should be treated. So each time patients told me they were bloated, I probed deeply to understand exactly what they meant. I asked them to describe the feeling of being bloated, what times of day it happened, what circumstances brought it on, how long it lasted, what made it better, what made it worse, whether it was painful, what it looked like, what other symptoms accompanied it. I needed to understand what this "bloating" thing was so that I could help fix it.
The more bloated patients I questioned, the more I came to understand that bloating was not a single, uniform experience that could be fixed with a one-size-fits-all solution. To some, bloating described a feeling of excessive fullness after eating — sometimes even after eating very little. To others, it described a distended belly that looked "pregnant" after eating. Some people belched when bloated; others farted. When bloating was accompanied by gas from either end, it might be painful ... or not. And when bloating was painful, it was sometimes a pressure-type pain at the top of the stomach underneath the rib cage, a series of sharp gas pains on the sides, or a crampy pain below the belly button. Some bloating was relieved after going to the bathroom, and some wasn't. Some people woke up feeling bloated, while others found that their bloating built as the day progressed. Bloating meant so many different things.
Bloating is a symptom of something else, not a medical condition unto itself, and after spending years in my medical nutrition practice interviewing thousands of patients with digestive problems, I came to recognize distinct patterns among the different types of bloating that patients presented. As these patterns became clear to me, I became better and better at matching a patient's description of their bloating experience with its most likely underlying medical cause. I was then able to recommend tailored dietary advice that would address my patient's unique brand of bloating and collaborate with their doctor to help them get the proper diagnosis and, when appropriate, the right treatment. My bloated patients were getting better, often within days of initiating the right diet regimen.
So I started writing about bloating online in an attempt to share what I'd learned with people who might not have access to a local dietitian who was highly specialized in digestive disorders. And that's when the emails and calls started pouring in. I've heard from athletes in the Middle East battling bloating as they trained for endurance competitions and computer programmers from India who suffered tough digestive consequences when following their family's traditional vegetarian diet. Mostly, though, I heard from countless people all across America who just couldn't figure out why they were so darn bloated all the time, who felt that they'd tried everything and were desperate for a solution.
A grateful patient once remarked to me that I was like her "bloating whisperer," and my husband got a good laugh about that nickname. But it stuck. While it's certainly not a title I ever aspired to as a little girl fantasizing about what I'd be when I grew up, I embrace it nonetheless. As fate would have it, learning the secret language of bloating has become something of my calling in life, and this book is my way of sharing this knowledge with all the bloated bellies I won't have occasion to meet personally. I hope it helps you or someone you love.
Every Unhappy Belly Is Unhappy in Its Own Way
A hundred and fifty years ago, the Russian author Leo Tolstoy wrote in his famous book Anna Karenina: "Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way." I think the same can be said about bellies. All happy bellies are alike; every unhappy belly is unhappy in its own way. What I mean by this is that people with happy bellies have digestive systems that function exactly as they're supposed to. Their stomachs secrete the right amount of acid to get the digestion process under way efficiently. The muscle separating their stomach from their esophagus (food pipe) prevents acid or other stomach contents from refluxing backward. The nerves that control their stomachs and abdominal wall muscles direct these muscles to stretch just the right amount after eating a meal. The pacemaker cells that control stomach emptying keep food moving along into the intestines at a normal rate. Their stomachs and small intestines have sufficient levels of enzymes to break down food into absorbable nutrients effectively. Their small intestines harbor the right number of bacteria and fully absorb the nutrients in their food. Their large intestines (colons) keep undigested fiber and waste moving along at a regular pace, resulting in bathroom patterns that are as predictable as a Swiss train schedule.
Then there's everyone else.
People with unhappy bellies have digestive systems that misbehave along any number of these dimensions. Bloating can result from dysfunction at one or more of these steps in the digestive process. The trick is to figure out the underlying cause of your bloating so that effective dietary — and, when appropriate, medical — remedies can be applied. After all, every bloated belly can be bloated in its own way.
When You Hear Hoofbeats, Look for Horses, Not Zebras
Most of my bloated patients have sought answers elsewhere before they ended up in my office. They've seen at least one doctor — and often several of them. They've consulted the internet and sometimes even seen a variety of alternative medicine practitioners. Often they've undergone many tests: colonoscopies, endoscopies, blood tests, stool tests, and ultrasounds. (All normal.) Sometimes they've also tried a variety of medications, supplements, gone gluten-free, and spent hundreds of dollars on "food sensitivity" tests, still to no avail. This lack of diagnosis and resolution despite what feels like an extensive search invariably leaves my patients with the impression that whatever is causing their problems must be pretty rare, exotic, and serious.
In reality, though, almost all of the bloated patients I see are afflicted by one of just ten reasonably common and easily diagnosable medical conditions. If your doctor or other health-care provider knows what she or he is looking for, a very detailed food and symptom history is often all it takes to narrow down the possibilities to one or two leading contenders. From there, you may be just a blood test, breath test, motility test, or diet trial away from the answers you've been looking for.
To be sure, there are plenty of rarer medical conditions that cause bloating — what we call zebras in the clinical world — that are not covered in this book. That's why books like mine aren't meant to be a substitute for personalized medical advice from a well-credentialed doctor. Some very serious medical conditions — including ovarian cancer — can first appear with a bloated, pregnant-looking belly — in that case, one that's filling with fluid. If things don't feel quite right, I encourage you to make an appointment to see a medical doctor to rule out the more serious stuff.
But the odds are still overwhelming that the medical explanation for your bloating — and the range of treatment options — is indeed contained somewhere in this book. You'll understand what I mean when you encounter that one paragraph that describes your bloating experience to a T, and you feel as though I'm talking exactly about you.
This book describes those ten most common medical causes of bloating I encounter in my clinical practice — the "horses" rather than the "zebras." Chapter 2 will help you navigate this book by introducing you to your digestive anatomy, equipping you with some vocabulary, and giving you a short quiz that will help you prioritize which chapters in parts 2 and 3 to start reading first. These chapters are grouped based on the origin of your bloating — stomach or intestines — and describe each type of bloating in great detail and its medical cause, including:
* a detailed description of what that type of bloating feels like and other symptoms with which it's typically associated;
* an explanation of the underlying cause of that type of bloating;
* a discussion of the types of tests a doctor might use to diagnose the cause;
* a review of medical treatments commonly used to treat that type of bloating;
* a review of dietary remedies that are effective for the condition; and
* stories about patients of mine who experienced that type of bloating, with details about how they were diagnosed and then treated with diet, supplements, medication, and/or lifestyle changes.
The fourth part of the book goes deeper into the specifics of the various therapeutic diets I recommend for each type of bloating, with specific food lists and meal ideas. Rather than focus on laundry lists of everything you can't eat, I focus more on teaching you what you can eat. That's why I teamed up with world-class recipe developer Kristine Kidd, who created fifty fantastic recipes for this book that are tailored to the specifications required for each therapeutic diet. Kristine spent twenty years as food editor at Bon Appétit magazine and is no stranger to restricted diets herself; she's got celiac disease and a garlic allergy. But when life hands a true foodie a couple of diet restrictions, she hits the kitchen and finds delicious work-arounds. In other words, don't think for a minute that you'll need to subsist on bland chicken and white rice for the rest of your life just to keep your bloating at bay!
Finally, I've included an encyclopedia of dietary supplements commonly used for digestive health, with a science-based evaluation of their effectiveness and safety. Because there is so much contradictory information on these products in circulation, I believe it's important to offer an unbiased opinion about which products may be helpful and which products may be hype. For the record, I do not sell any dietary supplements; I don't get commissions or kickbacks for referring people to supplement marketers. To avoid conflicts of interest, my clinical practice has a policy of refusing visits from pharmaceutical company representatives. If I green-light a product, it's because I've seen published evidence — or have firsthand clinical experience — that it works and that it's safe.
* * *
My intention is for you to use this book to facilitate a productive conversation with your doctor. I want to equip you with the descriptive language and relevant issues to mention during your appointment so that you can help your doctor home in on the problem most likely afflicting you. I also want to familiarize you with the diagnostic process associated with these common digestive disorders so that you won't be surprised when your doctor suggests various tests, procedures, or medications. Most important to me as a dietitian, I want to empower you with effective nutritional remedies so that you can control your own symptoms. In some cases, dietary change alone can completely control bloating. In other cases, medical therapy may be called for in addition to diet. Your doctor will help you decide on the most appropriate plan for your individual case, and your belly will offer feedback as to what's working best.
This book should not replace the advice of a doctor. I am not a doctor, and I cannot dispense medical diagnoses. Even if you recognize your brand of bloating to a T in this book, you cannot assume that the associated medical diagnosis applies to you without proper testing. Your doctor may look at other pieces of information, including family history, your personal medical history, blood test results, and any other symptoms you may be experiencing to determine whether there might be another cause of your bloating that should be investigated other than the one(s) I've suggested in this book. A good gastroenterologist is worth his or her weight in gold. Find one — and never let him or her go.
Finally, if your bloating is accompanied by any of the following symptoms, you should see a doctor promptly:
* blood in your stool
* difficulty swallowing
* recurrent vomiting
* unintentional weight loss of more than a few pounds
* nutritional deficiencies, including anemia
* sudden onset of constipation not related to a change in diet
* fever
* jaundice (yellowing of your skin and the whites of your eyes)
* a "pregnant-looking" belly that is always equally distended, even when you wake up and/or haven't eaten anything in hours (in other words, there are no circumstances under which it gets flatter)
* persistent, excessive hiccuping
Now: If you're ready to figure out how to get rid of that bloated belly of yours once and for all, then let's move on to chapter 2 so you can learn the language and take my diagnostic quiz!
CHAPTER 2How to Use This Book and Diagnostic Quiz (Don't Skip This Chapter!)
IF YOU'RE READING THIS BOOK, then you've got a bloated belly in need of some answers. Your quickest path to finding them is to start reading the chapters most likely to pertain to you. To help steer you to the right ones, I've designed a quiz to help you identify the causes of bloating that are most consistent with your symptoms, and I'd recommend you start reading the chapters indicated by your quiz results. Once you recognize your brand of bloating in one of the chapters, you can skip ahead to part 4 to learn more about using fiber to manage your bloating, the therapeutic diet I recommend for your type of bloating, and what supplements may be helpful — or harmful.
Another, less direct approach would be to flip directly to the section of each chapter that describes what bloating from that condition feels like and to read each one consecutively until you find the description that feels like you're reading about yourself. Then, start reading that chapter from the beginning, in its entirety, before moving on to part 4.
If you're a fellow dietitian or other clinician using this book for continuing education, then get out your highlighter and read it start to finish. Pay special attention to the types of questions asked in the quiz below as key clues to your assessment detective work, and study the descriptions of bloating in each chapter; this will help you discern the unique characteristics of each type so you'll recognize it readily when you see it.
Know the Lingo
I use a lot of terms throughout this book to describe different parts of your digestive system and its, ahem, outputs. Let's take a moment to make sure we're all on the same page with terminology.
* I use the terms stool, bowel movement, and poop interchangeably to refer to solid waste or feces. It's the stuff that comes out of your anus.
* I use the term defecation interchangeably with pooping and moving your bowels.
* I use the terms gut and bowel interchangeably to refer to the entirety of your intestines — both the small intestine and the colon combined. (Purists would correctly point out that, biologically speaking, gut should also include the stomach, but, for our purposes, we're going to use the term more narrowly, in the way most of my patients think of it.)
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "The Bloated Belly Whisperer"
by .
Copyright © 2018 Tamara Duker Freuman.
Excerpted by permission of St. Martin's Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Part I: Introduction
Chapter 1: Every Unhappy Belly is Unhappy in its Own Way: The Many Ways to be Bloated
Chapter 2: How to Use this Book&Diagnostic Quiz (Don’t Skip this Chapter!)
Part II: Upper Abdominal Bloating that Originates in the Stomach
Chapter 3: The “Food Baby” Twins: Gastroparesis and Dyssynergia
Chapter 4: The Sour Stomach Bloat: Classic Indigestion
Chapter 5: The Distressed but not Distended Bloat: Functional Dyspepsia
Chapter 6: The Belchiest Bloat of All: Aerophagia
Part III: Lower Abdominal Bloating that Originates in the Intestines
Chapter 7: The Backed-up Bloat: Constipation-Related Bloating
Chapter 8: The Bacterial Bloat: Small Intestinal Bacterial Overgrowth (SIBO)
Chapter 9: The Gassy Gut: Bloating By Way of Carbohydrate Intolerances
Chapter 10: Malabsorptive Bloating: Celiac Disease and Pancreatic Insufficiency
Part IV: Dietary Remedies for Bloating
Chapter 11: Flexing Fiber to your Advantage
Chapter 12: The GI Gentle Diet
Chapter 13: The Low FODMAP Diet
Chapter 14: A Field Guide to Digestive Support Supplements for Bloating
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