and, somehow, profit.
Here are some of the top myths about digestion, and the truths behind them.
Heres the cheat sheet:
Themouthis the first stop, and actually plays an important role.
Tastes and smells signal the rest of the digestive system that food is on its way.
A swallow sends food on a trip down theesophagus, which pushes it tube-of-toothpaste style toward the stomach.
(The triptakes about eight seconds.)
This motion, called peristalsis, ends by triggering the stomachs entrance to open.
In thestomach, food is drenched in an acid bath.
This helps to kill microbes and partially unravel proteins.
From there, they cango where theyre needed.
In thelarge intestine, trillions of microbes devour what we couldntmainly fiber and other prebiotic carbohydrates.
Thats good news for us, since these microbes waste products are essential to our health.
Theyrewhere we get most of our vitamin K, for instance.
The stomach is just one of many players!
Thats one claim behind raw food diets and detoxes.
Theres no shortage of enzymes, really.
They help with germination, photosynthesis, respiration, decomposition, and so on.
They cannot help with any human body functions, including digestion.
Our bodies produce their own digestive enzymes for that, about 22 of them.
Want to see my sources?
Pick up any high-school biology textbook.
I have that textbook.
Remember our little tour through the GI tract?
The only absorption going on is when teeny tiny nutrients get absorbed in our small intestine.
Sorry, liver.)
(Youcanabsorb a tiny bit of alcohol through your stomach, but not much.)
That means the alcohol hits your bloodstream all at once, instead of in small doses.
The result: a quicker, stronger buzz.
Its one tenet of food combining, which weve seen before iscompletely bogus.
The other version has to do with acid in your blood.
According toalkaline dietdevotees, too much acid in our food leads to too much acid in our blood.
But that urine test sure sounds convincing, doesnt it?
Heres why it doesnt matter: pH changes in your urinedont reflect the pH of your blood.
No, dummy, thats what they threw out.
Dont think this theory is dead.
In reality, the bacteria in our colon are good for us.
We dont need to constantly evict them, or worry about their waste products.
(Remember how their waste products include vitamins and other helpful things?
We and the bacteria work together.Were a great team.)
Waste doesnt get stuck inside us, either, so theres nothing that needs to be flushed out.
Now that weve rephrased the question, are yousureyou want more calories?
Not exactly health food.
Whole grains and vegetables, especially raw vegetables, contain tons offiberandprebioticcarbs.
I mention raw because cooking makes these foods slightly more digestibleby partially destroying the fiber.
Fiber slows down digestion, keepingthe dreaded carb comaat bay.
Theres another way fiber is good for us.
That means that eatingsoluble fiberandresistant starchamounts to feeding our trillions of gut buddies.
