The Gut-Brain Misdirection

In our quick-fix world today, we are often presented with treatment options that seem easy but can be filled with challenging repercussions that are not often comprehensively discussed. True, there are oftentimes we have very few options, but the effects can still be devastating. To illustrate, I’d like to share a recent case study that, unfortunately, required our treatment assistance.
The patient in question was a 25-year-old female who was slightly overweight, but not out of the realm of weight loss the old fashion way – altering dietary and lifestyle habits as well as exercise. She and her mother (who was also overweight) decided to both get bariatric surgery for weight loss purposes together, both to link their weight loss journey and as a sort of “bonding” process. To look at them, no one would call either mom or daughter morbidly obese and in need of such an extreme measure. Tragically, no one shared the potentially devastating consequences of what is typically considered a good starter program for obese individuals to stimulate the weight loss process.
Initially, all seemed well. Both mother and daughter came out of surgery without any problems, or so it seemed. Before long the daughter noticed that she was losing far more weight than had been anticipated. Her primary care physician also began to notice. During this course, the once vibrant young lady began to become more isolated, less joyful, and emotionally challenging to be around. She began to be tearful and withdrawn. Her mother noticed these changes and took the daughter to see her own doctor. The daughter was diagnosed with depression and put on traditional antidepressants. Not much later, the young lady started having difficulty walking significant distances and often needed wheelchair assistance. She had developed peripheral neuropathy and decreased sensorial capacity in her lower extremities. Additionally, with a failure to tolerate solid food consumption, this young, once vibrant lady with a promising future, experienced chronic diarrhea and was forced to use adult diapers. The changes were now dramatic and the once proud mother felt helpless in the face of her daughter’s rapidly declining condition.
How did this happen? As a result of surgery, the young lady became malabsorptive. The surgery decreased her capacity to absorb the nutrients she needed to maintain both physical and mental health. In medical terms, she experienced a loss of Intrinsic Factor, which is produced in the stomach and is needed to carry Vitamin B-12 to the terminal ileum of her bowel for absorption. A lack of B-12 can also affect the methylation cycle. Not only can this cause Pernicious Anemia, but it can also cause Peripheral Neuropathy. Several people mistakenly subscribe to the belief that Vitamin B-6, in treatment dosages, causes neuropathy. They fail to realize that Vitamin B-12 deficiency, which is far more common, is more likely the cause of such challenges. Both Vitamin B-12 deficiency as well as excess, for that matter, can cause neuropathy.
We also recognize that with challenged methylation, individuals can fall into anxiety, depression, OCD tendencies, and may even develop psychosis-type symptoms. Getting back to our case study, the young woman could no longer create the balanced neurotransmitter picture necessary to allow for appropriate brain function and cognition. She was being given Ensure in an attempt to stave off severe malnutrition. Nutrients like Zinc, vitamin B-6, calcium, magnesium, and vitamins C and D, were no longer dietary forgone conclusions. She was now being continually deprived of the very life-saving and neurotransmitter-producing nutrients that so many of us take for granted.
This brings to mind another set of patients who suffer similar challenges as the woman in our case study. In the case of necessary bowel resections such as with severe Crohn’s disease or colitis, where much of the bowel may require removal, similar processes may also occur. Often times there is more insidious worsening slowly over the course of years. Some individuals become symptomatically psychotic or schizophrenic, with delusions, thought disorders, erratic behaviors, and turning on family members with accusations of persecution and collusion against them. The additional challenge here is that many develop paranoia and refuse to accept help from even a spouse, children, or hospital institutions. This is often devastating to family members and loved ones. One final, important point to be made here. It is quite possible, given the processed foods that are available to us in this day and age, to have a high-caloric diet that is so devoid of nutrients that we may become functionally malabsorptive. Much of the food we eat in our Western, “modern” society, is not recognized by our bodies as food. With this in mind, let’s also pay attention to what we feed our children. We often wonder why so many of our children are moody, anxious, depressed, can’t pay attention, have poor memory, and in general may not be thriving as we had hoped. If we take a closer look at what we are feeding our children, the answers just might surprise us. The Gut-Brain connection is far more vulnerable than we think.