Love Your Gut

Ep. 84: The Truth About Fibermaxxing (and How To Do It Right)

• Heather Finley

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Fibermaxxing is the latest wellness Tik Tok trend which involves loading up on beans, seeds, and high-fiber foods in the name of better gut health. But is more fiber always better?

For some, adding fiber means smoother digestion, steadier blood sugar, and more energy. For others, it leads to gas, constipation, or bloating that only gets worse. So what’s the truth?

In this episode of the Love Your Gut podcast, Dr. Heather breaks down what fibermaxxing gets right, what it gets wrong, and how to eat fiber in a way your gut can actually handle. 

You’ll learn:

  • Why fiber is suddenly trending (and why most people don’t get enough)
  • What the largest gut health study says about dietary diversity and your microbiome
  • The “Fiber Ladder” approach to increase intake without feeling miserable
  • A simple breakdown of fiber types: soluble, insoluble, prebiotic, resistant starch, and polyphenols
  • Why you might feel worse when you cut out fiber (and what that really means about your gut)
  • A practical meal framework (PFCC: protein, fat, fiber, color) to use daily

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Welcome to the Love Your Gut Podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Heather Finley, registered dietitian and gut health specialist. I understand the frustration of dealing with GI issues because I've been there and I spent over two decades searching for answers for my own gut issues of constipation, bloating, and stomach pain. I've dedicated my life to understanding and solving my own gut issues. And now I'm here to guide you. On this podcast, I'll help you identify the true root causes of your discomfort. So you can finally ditch your symptoms for good. My goal is to empower you with the knowledge and tools you need so that you can love your gut and it will love you right back. So if you're ready to learn a lot, gain a deeper understanding of your gut and find lasting relief. You are in the right place. Welcome to the love your gut podcast. Hello. Hello. Happy Thursday and welcome back to the next episode of the Love Your Gut podcast. I am really excited about today's episode. I'm not a big TikTok girly, but I know TikTok is very popular and I often get sent reels from, or I guess they're not called reals. Whatever. I get sent things from TikTok and it's all about the new trend, fiber maxing, so I figured I would just record a podcast episode on Fiber maxing because it's all over social media right now, whether you are on TikTok or on Instagram. I've started to see it pop up and I wanted to speak into this because, well, fiber is something that we talk about a lot with our clients. For some people, eating fiber means better poops, steadier blood sugar, less bloating by the end of the day, but for others, the more is better mentality that we're seeing with fiber. Maxing leads to lots of gas, stomach pressure. Bathroom habits that might feel unpredictable and just overall discomfort. So first I wanna just, if you're not familiar with what fiber maxing is, it's all over the internet and people are talking about maxing out your fiber and. Depending on where you look, some people are saying to go way above and beyond the recommended amount of fiber per day to help with fullness and blood sugar and all the things, and the truth is. Your body needs fiber for a lot of reasons, but from a gut perspective, your gut bacteria, the trillions of bacteria that are in your gut called your gut microbiota, or what a lot of people call your microbiome as like the collective of bacteria really depend on fiber, but there's. A lot of differences in types of fiber and how our body breaks them down, and if you can't handle fiber from vegetables, beans, chia, seeds, et cetera, nuts without bloating or pain, that's really not a reason to avoid it forever. We often hear from people that are scared of the produce aisle. It is a sign that your gut needs support and that can be fixed with the right testing and a plan for your body. So today we're gonna talk about how to use fiber wisely, which kinds of fiber matter, how to add them in without feeling miserable. And then the exact tweaks that I use with clients who are constipated and can't go to the bathroom, as well as those that have the opposite issue. If you've tried adding in fiber slowly and still react, I'll also explain. When is the time to do some testing so you can stop guessing and finally feel better? So by the end of this episode, you'll know what types of fiber do what and why. Your hormones, your energy your gut, your blood sugar, really care, the pitfalls of fiber maxing and how it can backfire. And then a simple step-by-step approach to increase your fiber, what I call the fiber ladder. And then all the different types, so soluble, insoluble, prebiotic, resistant, starch, polyphenol, and why they're all different in what they do. And then how to tell when it's really not actually a fiber problem, but a gut problem. So. Teaser here. If fiber keeps backfiring, you don't need a stricter diet. You need to know why your body can't tolerate fiber. So there's a lot of ways that we can dig into that and I'll share that today. So why is Fiber having a moment? Every year there's this new nutrition at Girl. For the last few years, it was all about protein, right? Cottage cheese, protein, popcorn, protein, pretzels, protein. Everything, protein, ice cream, protein had the spotlight and now I feel like protein is kind of stepping aside, which I'm so glad about because yes, protein is so beneficial, but I feel like people have just gone way obsessed with protein where like. They can't eat anything that isn't like protein enriched and that's just not what we need. We for sure need a lot more protein maybe than some people think, but it doesn't need to be added to every possible food product that we purchase. So fiber is kind of stepping onto the scene. I actually predicted this in like 2021. I think I made this post on like December 31st and said like. Fiber or prebiotic fiber is gonna be the new IT girl, and maybe I was a couple years ahead, but fiber is stepping onto the scene and here we are. Fiber maxing is trending, and I'm not against fiber maxing, but I do think that people need to know how to actually add fiber in and when enough is enough. So why are we talking about fiber? Most people don't eat enough fiber depending on where you look. They say 20% of Americans maybe even less hit their daily fiber goals. Women need around 25 ish grams a day. Men need about 35, 38 grams a day. But the average American only eats 10 to 15 grams per day, and that's less than half. So unlike trends that are about cutting out foods, you all know that here at Got Together and the Love Your Up podcast, we are not about cutting out foods. We are. Adding more in fiber maxing is all about adding more in. So more fruits, more vegetables, more beans, more grains, nuts, seeds. That feels really exciting and doable and not another list of like, don't do this. So here is where I stand. I am pro fiber pro, lots of different types of fiber and pro personalization. What I am not pro is misery. So if you go from 10 grams of fiber to 50 overnight because TikTok told you to, you're going to feel awful. The goal is not to hit the biggest number. The goal is to use fiber in a way that supports your gut, supports your hormones, supports your energy, and makes you feel good. So. When we talk about gut health, we are talking about your microbiome, the trillions of tiny bacteria living in your gut, and these little bugs do lots of things for you. They train your immune system. They decide how fast food moves through your gut. This is called gut motility. They help you absorb nutrients. They protect your gut lining from getting quote unquote leaky, and they even influence your hormones, your mood, and so many other things. They help you produce vitamins and short chain fatty acids, and here's where, what studies show diversity of bacteria in your gut equals more gut resilience. So the more different bacteria you have, the stronger your gut is. The American Gut Project. This is the largest gut health study ever found. The number of plants people ate each week was the biggest predictor of gut health, not whether someone was vegan or paleo or. Following Hill 30 or carnivore or whatever special diet they were doing, it was the diversity of plants that they ate. So the magic number was 30 different plants a week. That might sound like a lot and it it is, but it's also not. That means different fruits, veggies, grains, beans, nuts, seeds. Herbs, spices. We're not just talking about fruits and vegetables here. So you can think of your gut like a garden. You feed it to grow the plants that you want, and what feeds it? Two big things. Fiber and polyphenols, and even resistant starches. So fiber is the part of the plant that your body can't digest. Your microbes eat it and turn it into gut fuel, or. What we talk about a lot with our clients, short chain fatty acids, short chain fatty acids are byproducts of fermentation in the gut. So a big one that you've probably seen supplementally is butyrate, but also acetate and propionate, and then polyphenols. These are the colorful compounds that are found in foods like berries and herbs and teas and spices. They're kind of like the fertilizer for your microbes, and these are found in a lot of like those deep, dark, really pigment rich foods. So, dark purple, dark blue, dark green, et cetera. If you try to eat salad or beans or flax or whatever it might be, and you feel worse, you feel really bloated, your stomach is cramping. It's not because fiber is bad. It's because your gut can't handle it, and that's where testing helps us to see if you're quote unquote good bugs or your commensal bacteria are too low, or if bad bugs or quote unquote opportunistic bacteria are crowding them. And if inflammation is slowing things down. If you listened to my podcast episode from last week where I talked about if you needed a GI map, I talk a lot about what you see on the GI map and how you might see low. Beneficial bacteria, you might see a lot of unwanted bacteria, and I compared this to a target parking lot, and this is where fiber really is part of the picture. What we see in so many of our clients is very depleted microbiome. I was actually having a conversation with a woman yesterday who's gonna start with us in gut together, and she was sharing with me how she had done multiple herbal protocols for her gut. So she had done, I think like Biocidin and she had done Candibactin, ar, and vr, and then she had done xifaxin and she's like, I have a couple theories. I have one theory that. My gut is just really depleted. I have another theory that maybe I just need to do another kill protocol or another theory that like I'm just totally missing what's going on, and I was like, well, it could actually be a combination of both. I imagine because you've done so much. Quote unquote, killing your beneficial bacteria are probably pretty depleted, and because you're not tolerating a lot of foods and your diet is really restricted, she had done like low FODMAP and low histamine and was like, all these diets are contradicting each other, and it's so confusing. So what I told her was like, what I absolutely know and could almost guarantee is that you don't need more killing. We probably need a lot of rebuilding. And part of that is getting the gut back in shape and giving these microbes the fuel that they want. And so that's where. Stepping up the fiber ladder and supporting the gut and to being able to tolerate fiber and having a specific plan can be really helpful. So let's talk about when fiber helps and when it backfires. Fiber helps when your gut can actually process it. So that's step one, is can your gut and your microbes even break down fiber? The benefits can include regular bowel movements. Yay, softer stools. Yay. More steady blood sugar, lower LDL cholesterol, better satiety, so you feel fuller after meals or more butyrate. So this is a short chain fatty acid gut fuel that lowers inflammation and really the goal of fiber digestion, one of the goals. Is short chain fatty acid production. There's so much going on in your gut and behind the scenes when you actually eat a meal that you have no idea is even happening because it's just happening in your gut and you're not necessarily seeing this, but it is so cool when you're eating these fibrous foods that feed your beneficial bacteria. Your gut is basically paying you back in dividends with these short chain fatty acids, but. Fiber can backfire. If maybe you eat too much too fast, like you go from 10 grams on average a day to 40 grams in one day, more is not better, and fast is not better. Maybe you don't drink enough water. You need a lot more water. As you increase your fiber intake, maybe if you have IBS or SIBO or very slow motility, you're gonna be more sensitive to fiber. That doesn't mean that you shouldn't ever eat it. I'm gonna talk about that in a little bit. And then maybe if you're sensitive to higher FODMAP carbs or certain fibers that create gas, again, that doesn't mean be low FODMAP forever. That's gonna make things worse. But the rule of thumb here is start low, go slow, sip lots of water, mix different types of fiber. And think of this like training for a marathon. You are gonna build up gradually and you're gonna. Get your gut in shape. Remember, your gut is muscle and it has to get back in shape and your gut bacteria are gonna take a little bit of time to digest this, especially if you don't have the bacteria you need to digest certain types of fibers. So many people will say. Oh, I don't eat FODMAPs. They're gonna feed bad bacteria. Or I'm not going to eat this fiber because it's gonna cause this unwanted overgrowth. And that is just not true. Fiber is the main food for your good bacteria. If you're just cutting it all out, you're creating more parking spaces in your gut, or more opportunities for unwanted bacteria to grow. And if you feel better cutting out plants or cutting out fiber, that's. Not a good thing. That is a red flag, that your gut is imbalanced. I know the carnivore people are probably gonna come after me when I talk about this on social media. They, they already have. But if you're cutting out. All fibers in all plants and saying, oh, it changed my life so much better. Guess who we see a lot of in our practice? People that have done that and six to 12 months later are like, oh wait, I felt great. And then now I'm having skin issues and sleep issues and, and inflammation that, I dunno where it's coming from. All these things. Well. Yeah, you cut out fiber because you couldn't tolerate it, and then now you're not getting any of the benefits. You're not getting short chain fatty acid production, et cetera. So how do we actually ramp up fiber without feeling so miserable? We want to increase this slowly and methodically, and this is where you really should work with someone to help you figure this out. Typically, you're gonna want to add, I would say three to five max, like seven grams per week. That could mean. Adding more chia in a smoothie. Two tablespoons of chia seeds is 10 grams of fiber. That's a lot. That's like a third of what you need per day. Or maybe swapping rice for lentils or mixing it half and half. You definitely wanna make sure you're drinking plenty of water a. Walking after meals can help. Getting enough minerals to help your gut contract can be really helpful. Maybe then you get comfortable with that for a week. You're kind of settled in an extra three to seven grams of fiber. Next week, let's add some different foods, so diversity is key. Maybe you start adding in different types of vegetables or different types of seeds or nuts, and then. The next week, maybe you're tolerating foods really well, you're gonna add a gentle prebiotic fiber, like partially hydrolyzed GU gum or sono Fiber can be really good to help feed bacteria and just get a more concentrated source. For sensitive guts, which is probably most people listening to this podcast, I recommend starting with resistant starches. Resistant starches aren't necessarily fiber but they are a class that helps to. Feed beneficial bacteria. So like green banana flour, you're probably not gonna find that in the grocery store, but there are a lot of products like sensitive gut. Fiber is one that we use. Biome is another fiber that has resistant starch in it. It's resistant potato starch. You can add polyphenol. Or partially hydrolyzed, Gugu is usually pretty tolerable. I will put some links to these different products in the show notes or in a blog post that you can check out what might work for you. I also think that if you're just really struggling from a food standpoint, like maybe you tried to add in a different type of fiber and your gut went crazy, maybe you tried adding in a tiny bit of beans or a tiny bit of lentils or a different type of vegetables, zucchini, or whatever it might be. Trying a fiber supplement. Actually, this can be a great time to do so because you can really control the dose. So do we, of course, prefer for you to get fiber from food? Yes. But sometimes you need to be a little bit methodical about how to get your body to tolerate it. So starting with something, you know, okay, I am gonna add in a little bit of resistant starch fiber or a little bit of partially hydrolyzed gorg gum and slowly build up from there. Sometimes like, like the biome fiber for example, that's one that we recommend to our clients a lot. We would maybe have them start with like a teaspoon of it, where like the serving is like a tablespoon and a half, so you wouldn't start with the whole serving. And this can be a great way to. Slowly build tolerance and gain confidence in your body's ability to tolerate it. And then you would just increase it as your body tolerates it and know that like there might be a little bit of bloating or a little bit of gas, it shouldn't be painful or uncomfortable, but as your gut adjusts, you might account for some of that. So maybe don't do this like when you're about to go on vacation. So track your response. Use the Bristol stool chart for your stool type. No gas bloat. Check energy, timing of meals, and just remember, if you keep climbing the ladder of low and slow and different types and you still can't handle it, that is a time to maybe look into what's going on. Testing can show if you're low in beneficial bacteria, if methane producing bugs or slowing things down. Maybe if you. Pathogens, or maybe you need some pancreatic enzyme support to help you digest these fibers, that can all be really helpful to see on testing. So just a quick breakdown of the different types of fibers. So the ones that you're probably the most familiar with are soluble fiber and insoluble fiber. And I don't get too caught up in the weeds on, you have to add X amount of soluble and X amount of insoluble because. For the most part, most foods have both, but there are some foods that are more concentrated sources of these types of fiber. So soluble fiber is gentle and kind of gel-like so it slows digestion, it studies blood sugar, it softens stool, so can actually be great for both constipation and diarrhea, depending on. What you're dealing with, and you would just go really slow and see how your body responds. But some food examples would be oats, barley, apples, citrus, carrots, beans, flax, chia. These are all great. Some supplements would be like P cilium, not my preference if you're struggling with constipation, but can be good if you have diarrhea. Partially hydrolyzed gorg gum or sun fiber. Acacia gum can be good, and this can be really good for constipation or just really sensitive guts. And then insoluble fiber adds bulk and kind of sweeps the digestive tract so it speeds things up and it also adds mass to your stool. So you would do this more after your motility is moving well, or if you have looser stool. So it can be found in foods like wheat, brand nuts, seeds, leafy greens, broccoli stems. Here's a reality check though, and something that I think a lot of people forget is that vegetables don't actually have that much fiber. One cup of spinach. So your spinach salad that you're eating has one gram. Literally one gram, one cup of zucchini has two grams. And not that those grams don't matter, but if you're really trying to increase your fiber intake, you're probably not gonna meet your goals by adding in more spinach. Two tablespoons of chia seeds has 10 grams, just to show you the difference. Or one avocado has. 10 grams. So if you eat half or even a quarter of an avocado, you're getting a big boost of fiber, beans, nuts, seeds. Those give you way more bang for your buck. I think we get caught up a lot in oh, we have to eat salad for a healthy gut, and that's just not true. I think a lot of our clients actually feel better when they stop eating so many salads and so many raw vegetables and start focusing on getting fiber from other sources. So vegetables are still important for vitamins and color, but I wouldn't rely on a salad to necessarily meet your fiber goals. Then we have prebiotic fibers. So hear me when I say this. Not all fiber is prebiotic. But prebiotic fiber is fiber. So prebiotic fibers are the specific type of fiber that feed beneficial bacteria. So not all the fiber you're eating is necessarily feeding your bacteria, but they are doing the other things, like I mentioned, helping to move stool, helping to gel stool, helping to. Make you more full, helping to lower cholesterol, blood sugar, balance, all the things. So these specific fibers are probably the ones that you don't tolerate if you have IBS or SIBO or GI issues. So phos or fructooligosaccharides and inulin. Things like onions, garlic, asparagus. These can cause a lot of gas. Goss, galacto, oligosaccharides. These are beans, lentils broccoli, et cetera. And good for bifidobacteria, partially hydrolyzed gorg gum, which I've mentioned before. This is gentle. It helps boost bifidobacteria Acacia Gum. This is another gentle option. Zos is Oats corn Huss, et cetera. Glucco Manin is another type. You've probably seen this in like various noodles, like kja root and then sono resistant starch I mentioned as well. This is a newer. Quote unquote, fiber or potato starch that helps reduce methane. We use this a lot with our constipated clients, so resistant starch, like I mentioned, is not. Technically a prebiotic, but it does have prebiotic like effects. So it feeds gut bacteria, it makes butyrate, it improves stool and insulin sensitivity, stool consistency, and we can get this from various types of resistant starch. If you wanna get really in the weeds, there's like. RS one, RS two, RS three. We don't need to focus on that, but whole grains and legumes and raw potato starch and green bananas and cooked in cooled starches. So like cooked and cooled potatoes, cooked in cooled rice can all be really beneficial. And this is again, where I recommend starting if you really don't tolerate fiber, so cook a potato. Cool it. Even if you reheat it, you're gonna get some resistant starch there. And then polyphenols, so they're not fiber, but they act like it. 90% reach the colon. They feed good bacteria, they boost antioxidants. We can get this from like berries, cherries, pomegranate, cocoa, coffee, herbs, spices. So adding herbs and spices to your meals doesn't just make them taste better. It also helps them to, it also helps you to feed your beneficial bacteria, so, use herbs and spices in your meals. That's a great way to boost your plant points. So fiber maxing versus fiber diversifying the trend online is about eating more grams of fiber, but I don't necessarily agree with this completely because research says that the better goal is variety. You could get 40 grams a day of fiber just from chia seeds or oats or flax, but that's only gonna feed a few types of your microbes. Your gut needs a buffet, so instead of maxing one or two foods, we want to diversify. Soluble fiber insoluble, fiber resistant starch, prebiotics, polyphenols, and get 30 different plants a week. I bet if you got 30 different plants a week, you would hit your fiber goals. So every unique food counts, blueberries and raspberries. Two chickpeas and lentils. Also adding two. So you wanna think about how you can get your plant points if you're stuck eating the same three veggies, then. Maybe pick a new one. Go to the store, try something new. Add a different herb or spice into your meal. All these things can matter. So too much fiber and just some special considerations. Gas and bloating. If you're increasing your fiber to quickly, you could experience some gas and bloating. Your microbes go into overdrive. You could experience constipation if you aren't drinking enough water. And diarrhea, especially with too much soluble fiber nutrient blocks. If you increase your fiber too much, you will block nutrient absorption. So as far as fiber maxing is concerned, I agree with maxing out your fiber intake. To an extent to what your body actually needs, and you can get some pain and distension, especially if you have IBS or sibo. So if you have IBS or sibo, I would go with some gentler options to start. So acacia Fiber, partially hydrolyzed gu. Gum resistant starches. Polyphenols, if you're constipated, some soluble fiber can be helpful. Resistant starch, polyphenols can be helpful if you have diarrhea or urgency. Just add stuff that's gonna help bulk and go slow. And then if everything backfires, then I would really start very, very slow with resistant starches and probably look at some testing to see what's going on. So let's talk about a practical game plan in Got together. With our clients, we use a framework called PFFC. This is protein, fat, fiber, and color. If you hit all four at your meals, you're gonna balance your blood sugar, you're gonna feed your gut, and you're gonna support your hormones. So the reason that we have fiber and color is because, again, like I mentioned, vegetables don't necessarily have fiber. They have color, which has a lot of other benefits or polyphenols also are gonna fit into that color category. So an example would be for your protein, maybe you're choosing chicken, fish, eggs, tofu, tempe for your fat. Maybe you're choosing avocado or olive oil, nuts, seeds for your fiber. Maybe you're choosing. Oats or lentils or beans. And then for your color, maybe that's where you're adding berries or herbs or cacao nibs if you're having like a yogurt bowl or something. So you wanna rotate your fiber, you wanna rotate your color, try to not eat the same thing every single day if you can, and follow that PFFC framework and know that if you can't tolerate fiber, it's not necessarily a fiber, it's your gut. So fiber is not an optional thing. It's something that keeps our bodies very healthy, and your gut and your hormones really depend on it. And if it keeps back backfiring, then your gut needs a little bit of support, and that is exactly what our team can help you with. We have our full Got Together program. Our spots for October are getting pretty full. It's that time of year where people start worrying about the holidays and travel and wanting to get. Things going, so definitely jump on my calendar if you want to apply and see if you are a good fit or if you wanna do an audit and kind of get started that way. That's a really low cost option for you to get my eyes on your case and see why you might not be tolerating fiber and what pieces are missing in your case. Maybe like the example I just gave a little bit ago about the client who had done three different. Protocols for her gut and was still feeling really bad. If that's you and you wanna get my eyes on your case and tell me everything you've done and do our assessment form and let me look at the gaps and point out some opportunities for you, that is a great option to get started. And then if you did decide that you wanted to work with us, you can actually apply the cost of the audit to any of our programs, within 30 days. That can be a great place to start. I would love to hear your fiber questions. I hope that this is helpful. Like I said, I will link some different fiber options in the show notes and on a blog post if you want to peruse, and I'll see you next week on the next episode of Love Your Gut podcast. Thanks for joining.

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Dr. Heather Finley

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