Eat whole grains for colon health.

Eating whole grains for the health of your colon may seem like old news. To be sure, we have heard this for a while now. So why restate old news? I do it to give the chance for not just information but motivation to add whole grains to our diets.

Did you know that the average person carries about 15 extra pounds of ‘stuff’ in their colon that has not been cleaned through? Vegetarians can blame this on a diet with meat; Cardiologist can blame it on the fat in the average diet; but both would agree that a lack of fiber contributes to this impacting problem.

When your colon is healthy, you digest your food better; enzymes are absorbed into the walls of the intestines more readily to be used in digestion and nutrient absorption. Wouldn’t it make sense to keep those walls ‘swept’ clean to have the most surface for digestion and absorption inside the longest organ in our bodies? Yes.

Whole grains offer this benefit. The average person gets between 10-16 grams of fiber a day. The recommended minimum amount is 20 grams. Whole grains offer the much more fiber than white breads or processed flours.

By adding whole grains to your diet, you’ll not only improve your colon health, but you will also improve the digestion of your other foods and enzymes in your system as well. The side benefit is that you may also lose the 15 pounds of ‘matter’ that you may very well carry around in your middle. Lightening this load can be a very good thing!