The Simple Eating Habit That Can Improve Gut Health

22 Oct 2026 · 1 min

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In this short educational segment, Brigid Titgemeier explains how simple changes to eating behavior can boost gut health. She describes how thorough chewing stimulates digestive enzymes in the mouth, which aids nutrient breakdown and supports a healthy gut microbiome. Brigid emphasizes the importance of eating in a relaxed, seated position that activates the parasympathetic "rest‑and‑digest" nervous system, combined with deep breathing and slower eating. This state enhances nutrient absorption and reduces bloating compared to eating while standing or in a fight‑or‑flight mode with shallow breaths. The core recommendation is to sit down, take deep breaths, chew thoroughly, and slow down to support digestive function.

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Chewing your food helps to increase digestive enzyme release in your mouth. That helps to break down your food. That helps with supporting a healthy gut microbiome and getting more of the benefits from the foods that you're consuming. It increases likelihood that you're absorbing the nutrients that you're actually consuming. So sitting down, being in a rested state, being in more of that rest and digest state, which is activating that parasympathetic nervous system, is great for increasing nutrient absorption and supporting gut health, decreasing bloating and other symptoms compared to standing up at your encounter and being in fight or flight, taking very shallow breaths and not activating that parasympathetic nervous system. So what we want to do is we want to get into a more relaxed state, take some deep breaths, chew your food, slow down a bit to help support your digestive tract.