New Gut Health Documentary -- Must Watch??

Review of 'Hack Your Health: The Secrets of Your Gut' Documentary

In this episode of 'The Nourished and Thriving Show,' host Katie Lovitt, a registered dietitian, shares her thoughts and review of the Netflix documentary 'Hack Your Health: The Secrets of Your Gut.' Lovitt praises the documentary for its comprehensive approach to explaining the importance of gut health, its impact on overall well-being beyond digestive symptoms, and its holistic perspective on the connection between various body systems. She appreciates the accessible explanations, use of animation, and tips on dealing with food sensitivities and expanding diets for those with IBS. The episode also addresses the gut-brain connection and the importance of a varied diet. However, Lovitt expresses concerns over the documentary's dismissal of microbiome testing's usefulness and the portrayal of at-home fecal transplants. She concludes by encouraging listeners to watch the documentary and share their thoughts on Instagram.

00:00 Introduction to the Show and Host
00:59 Personal Anecdote and Discovery of the Documentary
02:30 In-depth Review of 'Hack Your Health: The Secrets of Your Gut'
05:26 Key Takeaways and Recommendations from the Documentary
11:22 Critical Perspectives and Disagreements
13:24 Conclusion and Invitation for Engagement

Find Katie:

Website - www.nourishthrivewellness.com
Instagram - @nourish.thrive.nutrition
Facebook

Transcript

0:00

overall I was really impressed. I think that this documentary is exactly what we need to help increase awareness of the impact of the gut and our digestive tract and the microbiome. On our overall health and wellbeing, it's not just about digestive symptoms. Hey, everyone. Welcome to The Nourished and Thriving Show. I'm your host, Katie Lovitt. I'm a registered dietitian on a mission to help you increase your impact and legacy on the world while healing your gut and reducing your IBS symptoms. I'm so grateful to have you here. Each week I'll inspire you to live vibrantly and provide valuable resources and information that empowers you to take bold action towards your health goals. Before we dive in, make sure you follow or subscribe to my show wherever you're listening so you never miss an episode. Ready? Let's go! Hey everybody. Welcome back. I am really excited to talk with you guys about this. Topic. I was a little bit surprised, honestly, whenever I watched this Netflix documentary. I don't watch a lot of TV because we have a lot of other life obligations, but sometimes I will put in my AirPods and catch something on my iPad while I'm doing dishes, folding laundry, all of that. It kind of makes those tasks go a little bit faster, late at night, right? Anyone else doing that? So while I was looking for something to watch, I had finished Emily in Paris, which I had avoided watching that for a while because it didn't really seem like my five. It seemed a little bit young, but it was a really fun show. And you all have to let me know if you've watched it. I'm excited for the new season to come out whenever it comes out. And yeah. If you guys have any other good, like dish washing laundry, folding shows where it's like, you don't have to pay a lot of attention, but you can just like listen in and it's fun and makes the time go by. Send me your recommendations, but I have a recommendation for you now for most of you guys, this may not be like a good dishwashing. Show especially if you're not somebody who has a really strong background in science, in nutrition and gut health it may be something that you really want to stop and truly watch and absorb and. I really like, see, so I'll let you make that decision for yourself. I'm going to give you guys my thoughts, my review on the new Netflix documentary. Called hack your health, the secrets of your gut. Now. This documentary, you know, so many of the Netflix documentaries, especially of late are so skewed. What was that one that just came out, I'm totally blanking on the name, but it was about like the twins and like one study followed a vegan diet and the other followed a non vegan diet. I think by now we've all seen how skewed that study was. And it was really interesting. Like seeing what the actual study said and what they highlighted on the documentary, because those things actually were not the same. If you want my thoughts on that, if you want to hear more about that. That's like documentary and that beacon twin study, let me know. And I'd be happy to like, share my background on that. But I'm a little bit leery of food, documentaries and health documentaries, because they have an angle, right. Well, This one, you. I was curious, obviously, hack your health, the secrets of your God. It sounds very like kitschy, very attractive. So I had to see what it was all about, what they were saying. If it was accurate, if, if it was inaccurate if it had a slant to it and overall I was really impressed. I think that this documentary is exactly what we need to help increase awareness of the impact of the gut and our digestive tract and the microbiome. On our overall health and wellbeing, it's not just about digestive symptoms. And if you've been around for very long, you've heard me say that, yes, I, 100% want your digestive symptoms to improve. And that's why most people seek me out to get my help is because they're struggling with symptoms. But that's not the only role that your gut health plays in your overall health. It has so much of an impact on how well you age, chronic disease risk, all of that. And more and more research is coming out. That just says the same thing over and over again. And so I was really glad that this documentary came out because it really brought some of that to light. There were definitely more things that I liked about this documentary and agreed with and things I disagreed with, but there were a couple of things I have different thoughts on and. A little bit of like caution for you guys. So I wanted to just come here, share that with you guys. Share my thoughts, encourage you to go take a watch. And I love to chat with you on Instagram. Hear your thoughts around it. If you end up watching it, if you guys have any questions after watching it, that I don't cover today. I don't want to do like a spoiler for you. So I don't want to like go into all of the information, but I just wanted to hit my high points on what I liked, what I thought was really well done. Why I think you should watch it. And then just a couple of like heads ups of things to be. Aware of, as you start watching it, that may not be. Ideal for everyone. Okay, so let's get in first off, I've already hinted at this. I loved the holistic perspective that the documentary brought, they mentioned how we have all these different doctors and all these different specialties. And they're looking at everything in a silo. They're looking at each organ system in a silo, but everything is connected. We're humans, everything is connected and your microbiome impacts everything. And I thought that the documentary did a really great job of explaining this. And helping the viewer to understand the importance of this. I think sometimes we just brush things off and we're like, oh yeah, yeah, it's fine. Like in me really make it more insignificant than it is while we make other things more significant than they are. But I thought that this documentary did a really great job of yes. Bringing that to the forefront and also explaining the how and the why. And they did not also with descriptions on how digestion and how your gut works. I don't know exactly where this was, but at some place, I think somewhere in Europe, there is some sort of like a gut health museum that they were like in, and it had these like interactive gut health things. If someone knows where this is, I probably should have researched before recording this, but. I didn't, if someone knows where it is or has been to it, like, I need to know the details on this. It looks so cool. Like you can go interact with your villi. It shows an on the documentary. It like shows like how your stomach is and the stomach shape. And if you have an air bubble trap, you should lay on your left side. Now, like literally shows you physiologically. How that relieves the trapped air in your stomach. For those of you guys who've like heard, oh, have your stomach hurts, lay on your left side. Like, that's one of the reasons why but they really described the, how. And I think that that's so important because when we understand how something works and how something's supposed to work, we can really compare and contrast how you're working and see the gaps of. What needs to be fixed so that we can restore optimal function. Okay. And they do this with explanations. Yes. By several researchers and experts in the fields. But they also have these adorable little, like. Felt animation things. It's really cute. You guys, if y'all have seen the trolls movies, like the OG trolls movie. It would be like princess poppy explaining gut health with a scrapbook. It was really, really cute, but it really did a great job of illustrating their points and getting the message across because some of these topics are really complicated and difficult to understand, especially if you don't have a biology, science, or nutrition background. And so if you're ever like confused on gut health, you're like, I really want to learn more, but it just feels really overwhelming to try and learn about. This documentary is going to do a really great job of explaining how your gut health works, how digestion works has cute little animations. They like brought your microbiome to life into little like friends and foe. And I love that because you guys know, I talk about our good Temi bugs and our bad tummy bugs. Aren't good. Tummy bugs are like our friends or pets and we have to make sure they're well fed. And this documentary was kind of in line with that. So it was, it was cute. It was cute, but also like helpful, right. So they did it in a really fun way. It wasn't like this really dry science review. It was really relatable, really understandable. And I loved that. I also loved how this documentary. Really explained food sensitivities and why it can be so challenging to expand your diet whenever you have IBS. So if you're somebody who's struggling with chronic digestive symptoms and you have a really limited diet and you're like, I want to eat more types of foods, I just feel like I react to everything. The documentary really spent a decent amount of time. Talking through why that is and what to do about it. Spoiler alert. I told, I told you I wasn't gonna do that, but I think it would be helpful. So it's, you know, they really recommend, and this is what I recommend with my patients too, is like micro doses of new foods that you feel like you react to. If it's not like a true food allergy, right. If it's a true food allergy, like that's a different ball game. But if it's something that you just feel like I eat this and I get heartburn, or I eat this and get bloated. It's a microdose start with one bite. Start with one bite and see how you do and gradually increase it from there. And it's because you don't have those organisms anymore in your gut that can help break some of those fibers and foods down. And that's why you tend to react to them. So it takes time to rebuild your microbiome, right? But definitely check out the documentary because it goes into this a lot more. They also did a really nice job explaining how the gut and brain are connected. The microbiome and Parkinson's connection got brain access. Alzheimer's all of that. As well as like that, it's all in your head thinking that you may have been told before and how it actually is partly in your head, but not like in a, you're just crazy. I'm going to blow you off kind of way, but just how, like our thoughts impact our gut health and our gut health impacts our thoughts and it can become this really vicious cycle that can be difficult and challenging to break. And so it explained that, and this is something I actually work with my clients on and got rehab too, because that gut brain connection is so foundationally important that if you don't get that fixed, like your whole results are going to be completely undermined. And then the last thing that I really loved about this documentary is they recommended something else they recommend frequently, and that's eat at least 20 to 30 different types of fruits and veggies each week. This has just been shown to tremendously reduce your. Gut symptoms, your gut health issues. And all of that variety is so key because we want a lot of different types of organisms living in our gut to balance everything out. Not let one thing like takeover and they all eat different types of foods and fibers and nutrients. And so eating a variety in your diet, not eating the same thing every single day is going to be really helpful in keeping that from happening. Now a couple of things I disagree with. Okay. It's just a couple. And the first one is that they do stay in here. That testing is not helpful. Like testing your microbiome is not helpful. And honestly, in some ways I don't fully disagree with this. Like I never give like a specific targeted. Probiotic to grow one type of organism, right? Because it's all about balance and diversity and our microbiomes honestly are constantly changing. And it can take like four to eight weeks for us to fully see the benefits from taking a probiotic. So in that respect, like knowing your exact levels and taking a super targeted approach where you're just targeting certain types of organisms, that's not how it works, but testing can be super helpful to just get an understanding of the general layout of your gut, what your issues are. And also the God that the gut test that I use, it's not just testing your microbiome. It's also looking at how well you're digesting your food, multiple inflammation markers, and over a hundred different, bad organisms that can cause damage. And that is really helpful information to know and understand. So I did disagree with that. And then the second one. Is it showed at length. One of the girls that they were studying. Doing an at home fecal transplant. Okay. Fecal transplants can be wife Seine, especially in patients with C diff. They can really have a huge benefit on people, struggling with chronic digestive issues that just aren't getting, you know, better by doing other things. But doing something like this at home, I would never recommend, I think there's way too many risks. What if that other person has bad bacteria, the girl herself who was doing it said she was using her brother's stool to do this. And her brother has a background of depression and anxiety. And while she was doing it, she was becoming more depressed. And so. I just think that there's not enough known, there's a potential to do real harm. And so that's something I definitely don't recommend you doing. So those are my two negatives, but I really encourage you. Go take a watch at the documentary. Let me know your thoughts. And I will chat with you over an Instagram. Send me a message. Let me know what you think. Let me know what questions you guys have about it. And we'll talk soon. Thank you so much for listening to the entire episode. I hope you are feeling inspired and empowered to take bold action towards your health goals. If you enjoy what you heard, don't forget to follow my show so you never miss a new episode. And it would mean the world to me, if you left me a review, so others know what to expect from my show. Last, get in touch. Let me know what bold action you're taking. Let me know how you're inspired. Follow me on Instagram@the_healthygut_dietitian. I've put a link in my show notes for you, so you can simply click and follow. Come say hi, I respond to all my messages and I can't wait to get in touch.