Excess Gas: the solutions that work

Call it belching, bloating, flatulence, farting, morning thunder, a raspberry, a fizzle, or just the proper English "wind", excess gas can be a real problem for some people who shift to a whole foods diet. However, once you know the tricks, it's one of the easiest problems to get rid of.

I only wish I had known about these tips earlier. After graduating from the Kushi Institute in 1985, there was a period of almost a year where I became convinced that farting as much as I did was just a normal by-product of eating whole foods. I could have made a lot of money from propane companies if I could have just figured out how to bottle it.

But like everything else in the nutritional world, there is a cause and effect to excess gas. A cleanse consists largely of a plant-based diet, including plenty of beans, fruits, and vegetables. Absolutely superior for your health, but they can be high gas-producers. Fibrous foods aren't entirely broken down during digestion, so small carbohydrate particles pass into the intestines, where bacteria breaks them down and produces carbon dioxide, hydrogen, and methane gas as a by-product, which must eventually exit your body from your colon.

Here are the cures I've found that work:

1. Chew better: swallow with saliva.
This means one thing: before swallowing, wait until you get that feeling as if the saliva glands have opened up. We all know what that feels like. If you've forgotten, it's easy to feel it: just take a small bite of, say, a whole grain dish. Chew. As you chew, pay attention to your mouth, and at some point, you'll feel the glands open up, and you'll feel saliva enter your mouth. At that point, you've just cut down the gas you will experience by at least half. Why? Pepsin, and a variety of other enzymes that are mixed with saliva. Pepsin is the body's anti-fart juice. This first step is often the weirdest for people to get, because we've been raised with refined foods. One of the great joys about refined foods is that [i]you don't have to chew.[/i] If I've been eating whole grain dishes for months, and then go out and have some delicious white bread at our local Italian restaurant, the first thing I am always amazed with is how quickly white bread MELTS in my mouth. I mean, who needs to chew when someone has ground up the extraordinary complex thing called "wheat kernels"? And because my saliva glands are so well exercised, the saliva initially just pours from my mouth. What's even weirder, though, is if I continue to put a lot of flour products into my diet over a week, my saliva glands stop turning on. Then, when I do go back to a whole grains diet, every thing initially feels like cardboard in my mouth. My saliva glands aren't working, they've been shut off. I always have to slow down at that point, and remember how to chew a bit slowly, at least until the saliva faucet gets going again. In terms of gas, nothing works as well as simply waiting until we have some saliva before swallowing. The cool thing about this tip is that after a day or two of paying attention to this, your saliva glands work better and faster, and you don't have to think about this step so much.

2. Watch your food combinations
Most of us have heard of the idea of "food combining." There are charts that show what foods work well with others. What I've learned is that everyone will have different food combinations that work, and don't work. Here are the basic ideas to play with:

• Eat fruit alone. If you've eaten a big meal, don't eat fruit until an hour or even 2 hours later. If you eat a piece a fruit, don't eat anything else for about an hour afterwards. This rule also can apply with sweets. Some sweets are horrible combinations of sweet, flour, fat, and protein. The worst of combinations.
• Watch Proteins and Carbohydrates combinations. This is a tricky one, since some combos work. However, it's something to watch for. For instance, I don't do well with brown rice and beans, but I do fine with quinoa and beans. Go figure.

3. Too much of a good thing. Beans have a notoriety that, while deserved, is often simply because of the volume consumed in a single meal. Try eating less of a bean dish. Same goes with eggs. Same goes with cruciferous vegetables (these are vegetables of the mustard family, such as mustard greens, cabbages, broccoli, cauliflower, brussell sprouts). Instead of piling on your portions at one meal, spread them out throughout the day.

4. Properly prepared foods: I can tell the difference, digestion-wise, between a well-cooked grain or bean dish, and one that is not. So do most people. Learn the proper proportions of salt, when to add the salt, how long to soak, how long to cook a dish. Add a piece of kombu seaweed to all your bean dishes (kombu contains enzymes that help break proteins down).

5. Carry cheap Charcoal capsules with you. Also known as "activated charcoal", it's easily the most natural substance out there for helping deactivate gas in the body. Centuries ago, Native Americans drank powdered charcoal to find relief (I've actually done this camping, just chewed on a small amt of blackened charcoal from the fire. It worked!). Also works with diarrhea, constipation, skin wounds, and cramps. It also has the added benefit of removing pathogens. Pop one or two capsules during a meal. If you're experiencing a lot of gas and you want fast relief, open two capsules in a glass of water, stir and drink. I actually don't mind the taste at all.

6. Be sure you're doing your 3 Rs throughout the day. ReMineralize, ReBacterialize, ReEnzymize-ing are the ground elements that help improve overall digestion. You can usually get enzymes, probiotics, and blue green algae and other green superfoods (barley, Chlorella, etc) locally at your health food store.

7 The apple cider vinegar cure. You'll be amazed at the effectiveness of this one. Mix 1 tablespoon of organic, raw apple cider vinegar with about 8 ounces of water. Drink it 2-3 times each day. Be sure you find a source of raw Apple Cider Vinegar that contains the "mother" in it (the cloudy part). Here's one of the cheapest sources online . Or get it at your local store. Again: only raw, only cloudy stuff. At $6 per pint, get a couple to save on shipping. Get your charcoal capsules there, too.

To a gasless cleanse,

Scott

PS: Since you asked: here are some fun facts on farting (taken mainly from the book, Who Cut the Cheese?)

Where does the word 'fart' come from? My mom told me it's a swear word.
According to Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, our word fart comes from the Old English word feortan, presumably of echoic origin (means "originates from an echo"). In other words, the word was chosen to sound like the object named. Although I would thing "bbrrhhllaaaa" would've been a better choice.

Is it really possible to light a fart?
You obviously must not be a guy. Guy's figure this out in grade school and yes, you can not only light them, you can produce flames of two or three feet. It's a phenomena not to be missed before you die.

Benjamin Franklin didn't really write an entire book on farting, did he?
He sure did, and it is still in print. Called Farting Proudly, it's a book that you will find yourself quoting and reading out loud to anyone that listens. Especially if they're upwind.

Are farts acid, neutral or alkaline?
Farts tend to be rich in carbon dioxide, and may also contain hydrogen sulfide, the substance primarily responsible for the stench of farts. If a fart were to be dissolved in water, carbon dioxide would interact with water to produce carbonic acid, and hydrogen sulfide would make hydrosulfuric acid. These are both weak acids, so farts (at least when in solution) are mildly acidic.

Why do farts seem to follow the farter?
I'm sure that everyone has experienced this phenomenon, in which one delivers forth of a silent but potent one, and then steps rapidly away, only to have the thing cling to you. Part of the reason for this is the turbulence that follows in the wake of a moving person. The fart "slip streams" or is actually pulled along in the farter's direction by the air currents behind the person. Another factor is that part of the wind is caught in the farter's clothing, and diffuses out slowly after the main part of the emission has dispersed.

Is it true that some people never fart?
No, not if they're alive. Girls will tell you they don't, but that's only because they haven't developed the pride that most men have towards their wind.