Two Solutions to Give Your Overall Health a Pick-me-up

Disclaimer: Results are not guaranteed*** and may vary from person to person***.

If you’re not feeling 100%, it may because of a buildup of toxins in your body. Introducing two natural bacterias into your body could be the answer to help you feel better.

You’ve probably heard about probiotics in the news or at the grocery store. Probiotics are “friendly” bacteria. They help your digestive system to work efficiently — both to digest and absorb nutrients, and to remove toxins. Probiotic supplements can literally contain billions of friendly bacteria in a single dose. Two of the most popular strains of friendly bacteria are Lactobacillus acidophilus and Lactobacillus bifidus. Some supplements mix together a variety of different strains of these good bacteria.

So, why would someone want to take a billion friendly bacteria with their morning breakfast? There are about 150 types of yeast that live naturally in your body. Some are beneficial to you; others are harmful. Having a lot of beneficial yeast in your body means you are less likely to get infections. Your overall health will be better, too — including your energy levels. But when the bad yeast in your body multiplies and becomes greater in number than the good yeast, you can experience all kinds of nasty symptoms.

That’s where probiotics can apparently come to the rescue. When you have an overgrowth of bad yeast, you are more prone to infections, immune system diseases, weight gain, weight loss, brain fog, digestive problems, and fatigue — to name a few! There’s one form of yeast in particular that’s likely to cause you problems. It is called Candida albicans. Candida thrives on the surface of moist, mucous membranes, such as those in your intestinal tract. Candida is basically the reason the probiotic industry has become a hugely successful one. Unfortunately, most of the refined foods found in a typical Western diet feed Candida. Sugar, white bread, soft drinks, condiments, corn syrup, and leavened bread are a few of the foods that nourish the growth of Candida. And, since most of us can admit to having some of these foods in our diets, most of us do indeed have a Candida problem to some extent.

So, where do prebiotics come into the equation? If probiotics can rescue us from Candida overgrowth, why do we need to worry about prebiotics? Well, according to the newest research, prebiotics have one advantage over probiotics: they feed and nourish the growth of probiotics, so they’re actually first in the line of defense against harmful bacteria. Prebiotics are non-digestible foods that make their way through your intestines. By feeding probiotics, prebiotics help to strengthen the good guys in your intestinal bacteria. The Japanese have been using prebiotics for years. Because prebiotics are relatively stable and can withstand food processing, a commercially prepared prebiotic has been added to infant formulas, as well as many adult foods.

In one clinical trial, patients with liver disease benefitted from supplementation with probiotics. In another clinical trial, patients with colitis were divided into three groups of 40 participants each. Group one was administered probiotics, group two prebiotics and group three a combination of both probiotics and prebiotics. The researchers found that the group with the combined therapy scored much higher on quality-of-life questionnaires than did either of the single treatment groups.