Diverticulitis

This is a disease where the walls of the colon, for one reason or another, become weakened. One of the most obvious causes is long term constipation. When waste matter hangs around too long in your large bowel, it becomes drier and this makes your stools hard and more difficult to evacuate. This is why constipation is a vicious circle. The worse it gets the harder your stools get and the more difficult they become to expel. The muscles in the wall of your colon are responsible for the peristalsis action of pushing waste matter through your system. If your stools don’t hang around too long and are nice and moist because your diet has lots of good, soluble fibre in it, then the peristalsis action of your colon is extremely effective and everything works without any straining. However, if your colon wall has to continually contract against increasingly dry and hardened faeces, then, over time, it can become weakened. Eventually, if this is allowed to continue, the weakened colon wall will be unable to resist the continued outward pressure of hardened waste matter and small pockets will develop. Haemorrhoids are caused by downward pressure in the same way. The development of these small pockets can happen very gradually, so the first time you know anything about it might be when you start to get abdominal pain or tummy ‘upsets’ or even the passing of blood. The symptoms of diverticulitis can often be confused with irritable bowel syndrome Not going for two or three days might be the norm for some people but if you are one of these, you cannot expect this to continue without some sort of consequence. The pockets that are formed are known as ‘diverticula.’ If there is just one pocket then this is called diverticulum. Good if you remember your Latin! Pockets that have been formed for some time have the potential to become infected and inflamed by waste matter accumulating. This can adversely effect the delicate bacterial balance in your colon which can become inflamed as a result with diarrhoea being one of the consequences. When infection takes place, this condition is then referred to as diverticulitis. Eventually, if not treated, these pockets can actually perforate your bowel wall and cause the life threatening condition known as peritonitis. Dietary recommendations In the early stages of diverticular disease, symptoms can be kept in check and prevented from becoming worse by some sensible diet choices. Naturally, a diet which is high in organic fresh fruit and vegetables will help cleanse the system and prevent waste matter from hanging around for too long. Anything you can do in your diet to cleanse your bowels can only help this condition. Also, reduce foods that clog and ‘fur up’ your digestive tract. The main culprits are all dairy products and wheat. It is recommended that anyone with bowel problems should remove those foods from their diet which are potentially irritating. In simple terms you need to reduce your red meat, bran fibre and wheat products and increase your salad foods, vegetables and fruit. The importance of water cannot be emphasised enough and this is particularly important if you have diverticular disease. It is vital to get a good ‘flush through’ with plenty of water throughout the day – try and drink at least an extra 2 to 3 litres to what you would normally. Your bowels are part of your digestive system and they do not operate in isolation. This means that you should do everything that you possibly can to ensure that your food, from the time it goes into your mouth, is digested effectively. Food that is broken down properly, earlier on in the digestive process, will be far easier for the bowels to handle later on. Therefore, the one thing you can do to get the whole digestive process off to a really good start is to chew your food effectively. This means that instead of gulping it down, you should be chewing each mouthful between 30 to 40 times, liquidising the contents before swallowing. This makes it easier for the stomach, small intestine and also your bowels to perform their task in the digestive process more efficiently.