Leaky gut vs blocked detox pathways?

[beadmama]

What would be the difference between leaky gut and blocked detox pathways if any? Just trying to figure out our next course of action to figure out all of our food issues. How would I figure out if we have leaky gut or blocked detox pathways. Do the two go together and if so in what order do you address them?

DD seems to be reactive to most food chemicals and that seems to be more of a detox pathway issue than a leaky gut issue. Since starting the enzymes with food she no longer has undigested food in her stools but they still alternate from mucosy mushy to solid and good. Foods high in sulfur give her slap you in the face ammonia smelling poo. So that says detox pathway to me.

Any advice?

[tanyalynn]

I think for most people it's a combination issue, but which one is more problematic varies (or I'm sure sometimes they're equally problematic). For us, given DS's and my general lack of bad digestive symptoms, and the relatively short list of foods that are problematic for DS (gluten, dairy, soy, cashews (as an intolerance, not IgE), and chocolate), detoxification is our biggest issue.

I think the more the list of foods grows, and the more it contains things that are less common to be intolerant of (asparagus or sweet potatoes or beef for example), then I'd think leaky gut is becoming a larger part of the issue. Detoxification could still be involved, but I'd think happy-gut measures would be important as well.

That's my best guess anyway.

For me, I found a lot of clarity by looking at my health, and both the kids all as one problem with different manifestations. It provides more clues than any single one of us would otherwise have to work with. My family health history also helped in understanding that we've got a significant, long-term detoxification problem.

[lil_miss_understood]

this post may be helpful.
You can address both simultaneously, but if I had to choose just one to start, it would be leaky gut.

[mamafish9]

We had both. Low zinc created undigested food, which caused gut inflammation and leaky gut. I believe the inflammation also impacted a lot of the enzymes in the gut that digest carbs and sugars, since we also had issues with those when his digestion was at it's worst. We also had sals and probably histamine sensitivity, which were detox pathway issues (along with a building metals load).

I don't know that we would have made a huge amount of progress on either one alone. For us, they both tied back to basic nutrient deficiencies - zinc, mag, and b6 were our primary ones. So I think of it all as balancing nutrients now - and if I get the balance right, the body can heal itself (leaky guts and detox pathways being two things that needed healing for us).

ETA: As a practical measure, foods we lost because of leaky gut took 6+ months to get back (and some still aren't back). Foods that I think were just impacted by detox pathway issues we got some back fairly quickly (1-2 months), but still have to be careful not to overdo those buckets.

[beadmama]

Thank you for your responses they will help me make a plan. We were doing GAPS which does a good job addressing the gut health but not our detox pathways. I need to work on both.

Thanks for the time line for introducing foods, I was wondering about that.

[deditus]

Originally Posted by beadmama

Foods high in sulfur give her slap you in the face ammonia smelling poo. So that says detox pathway to me.

Any advice?

Originally Posted by beadmama

Thank you for your responses they will help me make a plan. We were doing GAPS which does a good job addressing the gut health but not our detox pathways. I need to work on both.

Actually, the ammonia smelling poop could be a few things:
bacterial imbalance-bacteria in the intestines that break down urea or sulfate into toxic products (many of which are resorbed and then have to be detoxed again, using up nutrients in the process), poor protein digestion leading to undigested protein being fermented in the intestines, urea cycle defect, overwhelmed detox pathways, or methyl cycle defect (CBS upregulation). So if your GAPS diet is high protein, that could make things worse.