The 5 Unsexy Foundations of Gut Health

While finishing college, Meg Gerber received a diagnosis that would completely upend her world: Celiac disease. Following the typical advice to "go gluten-free and you'll be fine" didn't resolve the symptoms that were significantly impacting her life. Meg discovered that conventional medicine's approach to her chronic gut issues, IBS, constipation, and acid reflux only scratched the surface of what her body needed to heal.

Today, Meg is a registered dietitian who has built her practice around helping the most desperate cases—people who've seen multiple practitioners without finding real relief. Her clients typically struggle with chronic digestive issues, autoimmune conditions, and hormonal imbalances that conventional approaches haven't been able to resolve. But what sets Meg apart isn't just her clinical expertise; it's her focus on what she calls the "unsexy foundations" of gut health.

While social media floods us with the latest gut health trends—from expensive probiotic cocktails to extreme elimination diets—Meg has learned that sustainable healing comes from something far less glamorous: addressing the basic physiological foundations that allow your gut to actually function properly.

The problem? Most people are skipping these fundamentals entirely, chasing quick fixes that often make their symptoms worse. If you've ever wondered why that trendy gut supplement didn't work, or why your restrictive diet left you feeling more confused than healed, you're not alone. The real work of gut health happens in the basics—and it's time we started paying attention to what actually works.

Foundation #1: Abundance Mindset Approach to Food

In a world obsessed with elimination diets and food restrictions, Meg takes a radically different approach. "I take an abundance mindset approach to food," she explains.

This philosophy stems from a crucial insight that most people miss: the food itself usually isn't the main culprit. "I always want people to expand their diets and recognize that typically the food isn't the main problem. There's usually a gut terrain problem, digestive insufficiency, gut-brain disconnection, macro and micro nutrient imbalances, etc, versus just something wrong with the food alone," Meg notes.

Moving Away from Restriction-Based Eating

The abundance mindset represents a fundamental shift from the fear-based approach that dominates gut health conversations. Instead of asking "What else do I need to eliminate?" Meg focuses on, "How can we heal the underlying terrain so you can eat a normal variety of foods again?"

This doesn't mean therapeutic elimination diets never have their place. But when they're used, they come with a crucial component many people skip: a clear exit strategy.

"There's a time and place for certain therapeutic diets, but they should always be guided by a dietitian, have an end in mind, and a reintroduction of food," Meg emphasizes. She sees too many people stuck eating impossibly restrictive diets with no plan for expanding their options (like never-ending low FODMAP diets for example).

The goal isn't permanent restriction—it's temporary healing that allows for long-term food freedom. "No one should ever be eating only five or even ten foods. I always want people to be expanded," she says, because living on a handful of "safe" foods isn't actually living at all.

Expanding Food Variety as the Ultimate Goal

The abundance mindset recognizes that a diverse, varied diet isn't just more enjoyable—it's actually better for your gut microbiome. Rather than viewing foods as potential threats, this approach sees them as opportunities to feed and diversify the beneficial bacteria in your gut.

The end game isn't finding the perfect restrictive diet you can follow forever. It's healing your gut terrain so thoroughly that you can "live a life where you feel like a normal human" and enjoy the full spectrum of nourishing foods without fear or symptoms.

Foundation #2: Circadian Rhythm Regulation

Most people think of circadian rhythms as something that only affects sleep, but Meg reveals a deeper truth: your gut operates on its own internal clock that's intimately connected to your body's master timekeeper.

Your Gut Has Its Own Internal Clock

"You can think of your circadian rhythm as your total body clock," Meg explains. "There are times of day where your body feels more awake. There are times of the day where your body likes to poop. There are times of day where your body feels hungry or satiated, where it feels tired, where it pumps out more stomach acid."

Your digestive system also operates on a schedule, with different functions ramping up and down throughout a 24-hour cycle. There's even a fascinating detail Meg shares: "We actually get a little rush of stomach acid around bedtime to kind of sweep up and clean up additional food residue so that you can have a gut rest and repair period overnight."

Factors That Impact Your Gut Circadian Rhythm

The connection between your overall circadian rhythm and gut function runs deeper than most realize. "Our gut body clock is directly synced up with our total body clock," Meg notes. This means that when you disrupt one, you disrupt the other.

The culprits that can cause disruptions? "If we fast for long periods of time. If we overeat. If we're on blue light most of the time. All of these things can throw off your total body clock and then have a direct impact on your gut circadian rhythm."

Simple Strategies for Circadian Rhythm Regulation

The fix isn't complicated, but it does require consistency. To regulate your circadian rhythm, remove the common disruptors from your habits.

This means paying attention to when you eat, optimizing how much natural light you're exposed to during the day, limiting blue light in the evening, and maintaining consistent sleep and wake times. It's not glamorous, but it's foundational—and when your gut clock is running smoothly, everything else becomes easier to address.

Foundation #3: Address Mineral Depletion

While everyone's focused on probiotics and fiber, Meg points to a less obvious but crucial foundation: minerals.

How Modern Soil Depletion Affects Gut Function

The mineral crisis starts in the ground. "We used to consume plenty of minerals directly from our food as the soil used to contain a robust microbiome network that resulted in mineral-rich soil. Due to modern monocrop agriculture, the soil is now less mineral dense," Meg explains.

The result? "Our food supply is now more depleted than ever in minerals."

The impact on digestion is profound because "minerals are like the spark plugs that turn on numerous bodily reactions. Magnesium alone is involved in over 300 bodily processes." When we think about metabolism, hormone production, detoxification, making digestive enzymes, and producing stomach acid—all things that affect why people are bloated and why people can't go to the bathroom—minerals play a starring role.

Stress as a Mineral Depleter

Here's the double whammy: not only are we getting fewer minerals from food, but "we're using up more minerals than ever due to chronic stress," Meg explains.

This creates a vicious cycle where stress depletes minerals, which impairs digestive function, which can create more stress and further mineral depletion.

Key Minerals for Digestive Health

Meg focuses on several key players, each with specific digestive roles:

Potassium is crucial for gut motility. "What I see really commonly in my constipated clients is potassium deficiency. Potassium supports the muscle contractions of the gut and therefore helps move things along"

Magnesium is involved in hundreds of processes, but "almost everybody needs to be supplementing in some form" because it's simply not bioavailable enough in our food supply. It's significant for stress, sleep, relaxation and also supports bowel regularity.

Sodium might surprise you, but Meg notes: "I've seen insufficient sodium as a big reason behind why someone's bloated. Without sufficient quality sodium, they can't make adequate stomach acid."

Food vs. Supplement Approaches for Different Minerals

Some mineral deficiencies are best addressed through food, while others require supplementation.

For potassium, Meg loves food-first approaches: "I really like for people to think about 'fruits and roots' for potassium sources. These are foods like white potatoes, starchy veggies, sweet potatoes, watermelon, cantaloupe, and tropical fruits like banana and coconut". But magnesium is different: "Some minerals, like magnesium, really just aren't bioavailable in the food supply. So addressing magnesium depletion requires supplementation in some form - I usually start people on topical sources."

It's key to understand that "all minerals are synergistic and affect one another." Over-supplementing one mineral can deplete others, which is why Meg uses hair tissue mineral analysis testing to get a complete picture of minerals inside the cell rather than relying on standard serum blood panels - like serum magnesium - that only show, for example "1% of your total bodily magnesium."

It's this whole-system approach that prevents the common mistake she sees: "A lot of people are taking large amounts of one or two minerals because that's what their doctors focused on, and they're missing other minerals and/or forgetting to build a foundation with the key 4 macro minerals - sodium, potassium, magnesium and calcium first."

Foundation #4: Diversity of Plant Fibers

When it comes to feeding your gut microbiome, keep in mind this powerful principle: your gut microbiome loves diversity.

Why Variety Trumps Quantity for Gut Microbiome

Most people approach fiber with a "more is better" mentality, loading up on the same vegetables week after week. But Meg encourages a different approach. Instead of eating massive amounts of one or two vegetables, she encourages people to branch out: "This could also show up in the form of just choosing a different vegetable than you would normally go for. If you usually eat broccoli every week, maybe try out asparagus and Brussels sprouts."

The reason? Your gut bacteria thrive on variety. Different plant fibers feed different strains of beneficial bacteria, creating a more robust and diverse microbiome ecosystem.

The Digestive and Metabolic Benefits of Bitter Plant Foods

Looking for an easy way to increase the variety in your diet? Incorporate bitter plant foods like radicchio, endive, arugula, and raw cacao.

Since many people don't naturally gravitate toward bitter options, adding them into your diet likely means introducing new plant foods.

As an added bonus, bitter foods simultaneously enhance your body's ability to digest whatever you're eating. "Bitter foods naturally enhance digestive juice output; meaning, they support your own ability to output stomach acid, bile acids and digestive enzymes to help you better digest your food," Meg explains.

Bitter foods are also truly impressive from a metabolic standpoint. Beyond their digestive benefits, "they also are great for blood sugar. Bitters are research-supported as a mild GLP-1, meaning they can help with increasing insulin sensitivity."

Meg explains it simply: "Think of them as like a mild, mild Ozempic in the sense that they help your body better respond to glucose by using it for fuel and lowering blood sugar levels.

The takeaway? Stop focusing on eating more of the same vegetables and start exploring the bitter, diverse world of plant foods that can transform both your digestion and your metabolic health.

Foundation #5: Stress Management for Digestive Health

The connection between your mental state and your gut goes far deeper than "butterflies in your stomach." Chronic stress literally rewires your digestive system—which makes managing it a non-negotiable for gut healing.

Fight-or-Flight vs. Rest-and-Digest States

"Stress is an important part of life," Meg acknowledges. "We don't want to necessarily say all stress is bad and it has to go away." The problem isn't stress itself—it's living in a constant state of perceived threat.

Meg explains the two key nervous system states: "A lot of people are living in more of a high sympathetic tone, fight, flight, freeze or fawn response of the nervous system. Many people live in this state all day long, even when they're not actually threatened."

The alternative is the parasympathetic state—"the calm state where we recognize we're safe, calm, we're supported. Your body optimizes digesting your food, absorbing your food, moving your food along, having a bowel movement, recovering and repairing the gut in that state."

How Chronic Stress Shuts Down Digestive Function

When you're stuck in fight-or-flight mode, your body makes a logical but problematic choice. "In the sympathetic state, there's often a big burst of cortisol and catecholamines and a spike in blood sugar. Your body is also flooding blood flow to its extremities."

Why? "Primally, in states of stress, your body thinks 'this person has to run from a tiger,' which means flooding all the blood to the stomach to digest and absorb food isn't efficient."

Therefore, in states of chronic stress, digestion is shut down. We tend to have slower, sluggish digestion, less efficient absorption, and slowed gut motility" We also have a higher chance of damage to the gut lining as the increased output of stress hormones over time can result in gut permeability aka leaky gut.

The Parasympathetic Nervous System's Role in Gut Healing

The parasympathetic nervous system is where the magic happens for gut healing. This is your "rest and digest" state, where your body prioritizes repair, recovery, and optimal digestive function.

In this state, blood flows to your digestive organs, stomach acid production normalizes, digestive enzymes flow freely, and gut motility improves. It's not just about feeling calmer—it's about creating the physiological conditions your gut needs to heal and function properly.

Moving from Survival Mode to Thriving Digestion

The goal isn't to eliminate all stress, but to spend more time in the parasympathetic state than the sympathetic one. "More times than not, people who struggle with constipation have chronic stress," Meg notes, because chronic stress literally slows down gut motility.

The solution involves recognizing when you're in survival mode and actively cultivating safety signals for your nervous system—whether through breathwork, meditation, yoga, or simply creating consistent routines that signal to your body that you're safe and supported - like eating enough food, consistently throughout the day.

Building Your Gut Health Foundation

Over years of working with clients who've tried everything, Meg has shared a fundamental truth: sustainable gut healing doesn't come from the latest supplement or trendy elimination diet. It comes from addressing the basic physiological foundations that allow your digestive system to actually work.

The foundations of an abundance food mindset, circadian rhythm regulation, mineral repletion, diverse plant fibers, and stress management don't feel as fun and sexy as a cool new supplement, but they work because they address the root cause issues rather than just masking symptoms.

The beauty of foundational work is that you don't need to overhaul your entire life overnight. Pick one foundation that resonates most with your current situation. Maybe it's adding bitter foods to diversify your fiber intake, or perhaps it's establishing a consistent sleep schedule to support your circadian rhythm.

Each foundation supports the others—better sleep improves stress management, which enhances digestion, which improves nutrient absorption, which supports better sleep. It's a positive feedback loop that builds momentum over time.

It's time to invest in what actually works.

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Meg Gerber RD, LDN, IFNCP, CGN is the founder of Grounded Nourishment and cofounder of JÜJ digestive bitters. She guides & empowers women who struggle with ongoing bloat, IBS & frustration via a curated holistic toolkit to regain trust in their body, relieve symptoms & reclaim their life.