Dr. Carolyn Dean said:
The most important factor in digestion is proper food selection,
avoiding non-nutritive junk foods, and choosing foods that provide
the building blocks your body needs. It's obvious your body won't
digest food that's not in its best interest!
The second most important aspect of digestion is proper chewing. If
you chew each mouthful of food thirty to forty times, this
stimulates the salivary amylase enzyme in the mouth and one-third
of the digestion will be done there. If you gently chew and hold
cooked grain (which you should not be eating!!) in your mouth long enough,
it will become sweet. This is the action of the amylase breaking down the
starchy carbohydrateinto glucose.
The action of chewing also stimulates stomach acid production. If
you are under stress or are generally tense, the stomach muscle,
like any other body muscle, can go into spasm. This spasm can cut
off blood circulation in the stomach and inhibit the production of
stomach acid. This reduction in stomach acid can lead to improper
or incomplete breakdown of stomach contents, especially protein. If
incompletely digested food finds its way into the intestines, the
intestinal flora (bacteria and yeast) will feed on this food and
create gas and bloating.
The third most important aspect of digestion is to avoid drinking
water with a meal, especially ice water. Washing down each bite of
food with water dilutes stomach acid and leads to incomplete
digestion, washing food out of the stomach too soon. Cold water
also causes fats and oils in the food to cling together, which
impedes their absorption. You may drink water up to ten minutes
before or two to three hours after eating.
