Constipation Symptoms, Causes & Solutions

Conditions / Constipation

About Constipation

Healthy bowel movements are key to effective gut detoxification and overall well-being. Forum Health can help you get regular and feel your best.

Regular bowel movements are the primary way your body eliminate toxins, metabolized hormones, and other waste products. But when you’re constipated, waste stagnates in the digestive tract. This irritates your gut lining, allowing harmful bacteria to flourish.

Eventually, your bloodstream reabsorbs waste and circulates it throughout your body.

This nasty process leads to systemic problems. And those can sap your energy, cause irritability, and increase your risk for serious illnesses.

Forum Health’s Dr. Shilpa P. Saxena explained this process on the TEDx stage:

Constipation is embarrassing and uncomfortable. It can also be painful — even debilitating. Gas and bloating are common. You might also experience abdominal cramps, hemorrhoids, anal fissures, lack of appetite, and vomiting.

How often should I poop?

Bathroom issues can be difficult to talk about. As a result, most people don’t know what’s normal.

Conventional understanding is that bowel movements should occur at least once every three days. But in functional medicine, we believe daily elimination is essential for effective gut detoxification and overall health.

You should have at least one healthy bowel movement per day. Otherwise, you could accumulate harmful toxins.

What makes a healthy bowel movement?

You can have regular and frequent bowel movements but still be constipated.

Truly healthy bowel movements meet these four criteria:

Spontaneous (not induced by medication)
Easy to pass (not requiring you to strain)
Soft but solid (long, snake-like pieces)
Complete (feeling satisfactorily empty)

What causes constipation?

Constipation has many potential causes, including serious illnesses and medication use. But most cases are rooted in diet and lifestyle. Addressing these areas will often restore normal intestinal function, improve bowel movements, and relieve constipation.

Poor Fiber Intake

It’s important to eat the right amount of fiber — and the right kind. This helps keep the muscles in your gastrointestinal tract strong.

Lack of Hydration

If you don’t drink enough water, you might have hard stool that’s difficult to pass. A general rule of thumb: What’s half your body weight in pounds? That number is how many ounces of water you should drink each day.

Other Diet Choices

Your body has unique nutritional needs. Constipation could be caused by an unknown allergy, intolerance, or sensitivity. Or, you could be eating too much sugar or processed food.

Stress

The gut and brain are connected. If you experience chronic stress, the bacteria in your gut can change, potentially leading to depleted magnesium.

Lack of Exercise

Beyond relieving stress, exercise can be useful to “get things moving.” If you sit too much, your digestive system might not function properly.

Forum Health’s Approach

Over-the-counter medication and fiber supplements can mask your symptoms. But they don’t resolve constipation. And overuse can inflict damage in the long run.

With so many possible causes, constipation clearly calls for a functional and integrative medicine approach. Forum Health providers act as medical detectives. We’ll assess your whole body to identify underlying causes and develop a custom treatment plan.

We’ll help you address lifestyle and diet issues for lasting results. As a Forum Health member, you have ongoing access to a personal health coach. You’ll also work toward ideal gut health through a detox program tailored to your unique needs.

If you would like to find out more contact us today to schedule a 15 minute health advisor call or schedule an appointment.

Hear From Our Patients

For most of my life, I was told I needed all these different doctors with different specialties to figure out what was happening in my body. What I really needed was a functional doctor who listened and treated me as a whole person with connected systems. With the support of my Forum Health care team, I’m slowly but surely reversing my severe eczema, hypothyroidism, allergies, and chronic fatigue.

My parents, myself, and my children have been patients of Dr. Peterson for several years. He is an amazing doctor! The amount of time that he spend talking with us about our medical history and ALL of our symptoms was kind of shocking at first. He is incredibly thorough, both in talking to us as patients and in the testing that he does. I have been so impressed with the progress we have made because of his willingness to do testing.

After I had my daughter, I was diagnosed with Hashimoto’s. I felt awful at the time. I was exhausted, bloated, had trouble concentrating, had heart palpitations, dizzy spells, and generally felt like I was carrying a backpack of bricks with me all day, every day. When I came to Dr. Taylor’s office he implemented a thorough and detailed plan for me...

Amazing doctors that actually listen and care about your health!

... Not only am I feeling better first the first time in years, but I’m finally losing weight and inches in a healthy, sustainable way! They’ve helped me to heal my gut and we are taking my PCOS on head on - it’s amazing and something that conventional medicine has been spinning their wheels with for years! I cannot wait to see where this journey takes me and know that I am a client for life!

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