Probiotic pills? One Strain Doesn’t Fit All!

Why your probiotics pills might not be doing the trick, and how to overcome.

Welcome to the third in our series of explaining the health benefits of kombucha. 

Our mission with Fix8 has always been to put flavour at the forefront of a functional product. No more “holding your nose as you drink a green juice” - finally, a healthy product that tastes delicious. 

Last time, we covered the importance of the gut-brain axis, and discovered that over 80% of our immune system AND serotonin (happy hormones) are produced in our gut. To catch up on the magic of the gut-brain connection, see here.

Ok, so we know we need to be having this good bacteria to help with diversity in the gut, but quite often the response is: “can’t I take a pill for that?”
 
As more and more people (now including you!) are learning about the importance of gut health + maintenance, pro/prebiotic pills are becoming daily doses for lots of people. And understandable so, we think if we ‘take this pill’ then we’re getting all we need. A quick fix? Not so fast.

According to experts… 

The two key things about your gut flora are:

1. The number of healthy microbes in your gut
2. The variety of healthy microbes in your gut

One Strain Doesn’t Fit All 

You see, the company’s making these pills tend to focus on specific strains of biotics that are proven to assist in one particular problem area - bloating, indigestion or inflammation, for example. But when it comes to our gut - we have millions of different strains! 

So, with probiotic bacteria, it’s not one size fits all (or as we like to say: one strain doesn’t fit all!). These pills contain ‘millions’ of a single strain, which quite frankly is useless unless it is going to propagate in our guts. What we want is diversity.

The other important thing to note, is that when we consume a manufactured supplement/pill, the body sometimes doesn’t recognise it as food, and therefore is far less interested in using it. Hence we can find we simply excrete much of our supplements. 

But, by consuming nutrients and vitamins from wholefood that the body recognises, we are increasing the bioavailability of the food/drink. We’ll save that topic for another day, but if you are curious, see here.

Variety is the spice of life

So - enter wild fermented food and drink! 

Wholefoods + Wild Fermentation = Bioavailable probiotics

You see, when you eat some fermented cabbage or drink some Fix8 kombucha, you’re taking in all the nutrients from the cabbage (vitamins, fibre) and the tea (polyphenols, antioxidants) - as well as a host of diverse probiotic bacteria that the body can more readily absorb.  

The takeaway:

• Your gut is home to trillions of different microbes (which are hungry for diversity)
• Our body recognises wholefood better than manufactured ‘probiotic pills’
• Avoid a reliance only on supplements, and focus on consuming a variety of food/drink with probiotic bacteria on a daily basis to support overall health
• Drinking fermented products like Fix8 kombucha, alongside a varied diet full of colourful food will really add ‘fuel to the fire’ of good bacteria in your gut, and overall well being