Honey is a common name in every household. It has been used as a natural sweetener from ancient times. It has plenty of antioxidants, vitamins, and other nutrients that make it extremely useful for your overall health.
Honey, because of its laxative benefits, is often used to help constipation. With many different enzymes and probiotic composition, it provides your gut with a healthy balance of good bacteria. Honey is proven to boost metabolism and digestion.
In this article, we will discuss the benefits of honey in treating constipation and improving bowel movement.
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Is honey a laxative?
Laxatives are substances that somehow help you pass stool easily. These make bowel movements easy and loosen the stool. Honey is known for such laxative properties.
Honey has a naturally sweet taste with many medicinal properties. It helps prevent bacterial growth and reduce oxidative stress.
There are many ways honey helps better digestive health. Research conducted by NCBI found that honey makes you poop by drawing more water in the stool. It loosens up the stool and makes it soft to pass through your colon. Besides that, honey also contributes to balancing good bacteria in your gut, making better digestion and bowel movement.
Another reason for honey being a laxative is that it is a high FODMAP food.
FODMAP is a special group of carbs that are not absorbed by our body properly. The bacteria generally ferment these foods in our gut.
Honey contains a high amount of fructose, a type of sugar classified as high FODMAP. Different people show different tolerance towards fructose. However, incomplete fructose absorption from honey does help in easy stool passing.
Is honey good for constipation?
Constipation could be very frustrating. It makes you try so hard for a satisfying poop. Although there could be several reasons for your constipation, one of the very common reasons underneath is poor digestion. Poor digestion makes it difficult for your colon to push out the stool easily.
Honey is well known for its natural laxative effect. Apart from being a laxative, it also has several enzymes and prebiotics. It makes your digestion easy, resulting in ease while passing poop.
Raw honey contains oligosaccharides, a type of sugar that is known for its prebiotic nature. Prebiotics serves numerous benefits for good bacteria in our gut. Oligosaccharides travel through the stomach to the large intestine without being broken by digestive enzymes. Prebiotics in your large intestine helps good bacteria, results in stool consistency and better bowel movement.
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Probiotics in honey and constipation
Honey is not only prebiotic, but it is also a good non-dairy probiotic product. Probiotics are good bacterias found in food. It helps enhance the gut microbiome- the collection of good bacteria in your digestive tract. The increase in the good bacteria population in your stomach eventually improves your immunity and digestion.
As being a good probiotic, honey helps in digestive disorders too. It is often linked with better bowel regularity and stool consistency. Daily consumption of honey could help you with increased stool frequency and constipation.
The effect of honey as a probiotic is still not very much studied. There needs to be more research to understand how much quantity is required to improve healthy bacterias in our gut.
Honey contains potassium
As all honey can not be treated the same, their potassium content may vary depending on the plants the hive’s bees have been collecting nectar from. Honey does not contain too much potassium content, but it does contribute a good chunk if you are potassium deficient.
Potassium is very important for your body. It helps in muscle movements. When your body is not taking the required potassium intake, you might have difficulty passing poop. As being a source of potassium, Honey helps your intestine with improved muscle contraction. The contraction in your intestinal muscles leads to better passage of food and waste.
Can you get diarrhea from honey?
Honey does offer many health benefits. It helps make your gut healthy, relieving you from constipation, and a lot more than that. But with tons of benefits, it has some cons too.
One of the major side effects of honey is that it can cause diarrhea. Honey is an excellent laxative. It also contains fructose which our body is not able to digest properly. This incomplete digestion of fructose in some cases may cause diarrhea.
Honey contains microbes naturally. These come from bees’ digestive tract, dust, air, dirt, and flowers. However, these do not cause any harm to your body, but in some cases, they also can upset your stomach resulting in diarrhea or loose stool.
Conclusion
Honey is very effective in constipation. It is a natural laxative and also contains prebiotic/probiotic properties. Taking honey regularly helps improve your digestion and bowel movements. To enjoy its maximum benefits in constipation, mix few tablespoons of honey with a cup of warm water and a few drops of lemon. However, be cautious as honey could cause diarrhea in some individuals.
