IBS Could Be a Form of 'Gravity Intolerance'
Wild New Hypothesis Suggests IBS Could Be a Form of 'Gravity Intolerance'
02 December 2022
By Carly Cassella
Hmm ...
And given my 40-some year history with IBS, it is of interest.
Saw it just now in a post in Space Colonization Discussion group, of all places.
https://www.sciencealert.com/wild-new-h ... ntolerance
No one really knows how or why irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) develops, but gastroenterologist Brennan Spiegel from Cedars-Sinai hospital in Los Angeles has outlined a weighty new hypothesis.
In a paper (https://journals.lww.com/ajg/Fulltext/2 ... le.15.aspx) published in The American Journal of Gastroenterology, Spiegel argues IBS is triggered by the body's inability to manage gravity.
Our bowels, Spiegel explains, are like a big sack of potatoes that we have to carry around our whole lives.
If our body's usual management of gravity fails for whatever reason, our diaphragm can slip down and compress our intestines, possibly causing motility issues and bacterial overgrowth.
"Our nervous system also evolved in a world of gravity, and that might explain why many people feel abdominal 'butterflies' when anxious," says Spiegel.
...
Under Spiegel's framework, a disordered response to gravity might also trigger a gut-to-brain interaction disorder. By squashing the intestines, it might even impact the gut microbiome, causing hypersensitivity, inflammation, or discomfort.
"There's such a variety of explanations that I wondered if they could all be simultaneously true," says Spiegel.
"As I thought about each theory, from those involving motility, to bacteria, to the neuropsychology of IBS, I realized they might all point back to gravity as a unifying factor. It seemed pretty strange at first, no doubt, but as I developed the idea and ran it by colleagues, it started to make sense."
If IBS is caused by the body struggling to grapple with gravity, then it could explain why physical therapy and exercise can prove so beneficial in relieving its symptoms.
...
Other symptoms that cross over with IBS include lower back pain, headaches, dizziness and postural tachycardia syndrome (POTS), which is when blood pressure plummets after a person rises.
All of these conditions could be explained by the body's inability to properly manage the force of gravity.
Without direct research, Siegel says the gravity hypothesis is just a "thought experiment". But he hopes it encourages new ways of researching and treating IBS in the future.
That bit about ME/CFS is of great interest since my Dad was one of US Navy's first medical retirements, and maybe even the literal first, in middle 1980s with ME/CFS.
And then about 20 years later it got me one Christmas while I was working retail and hasn't yet been persuaded to go away ...
And I had been diagnosed with IBS in late 1970s or beginning of 1980s.
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I often say, "well it looks like gravity is winning today," when I'm exhausted.
Another reason for dizziness etc when standing up can be POTS. I've noticed on ME/CFS a lot of people have POTS diagnosis.
What is POTS
Good point and it brings to mind that I had low blood pressure in 5th through 12th grade & sometimes my vision did go grey or dark if I stood too fast.
Then in my 20s blood pressure went textbook normal.
Then in my early 40s blood pressure changed to high instead of low.
Also in early 40s was when ME/CFS was diagnosed.
I don't know what to make of those changes.
But it brings to mind Dad whose eyesight changed from normal as a child to farsighted then back to normal in high school then nearsighted while in college and through now.
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"There are a thousand things that can happen when you go light a rocket engine, and only one of them is good."
Tom Mueller of SpaceX, in Air and Space, Jan. 2011
That seems right in my case.
Just less about gut but more about my whole body. I usually have low blood pressure. More so whenever I try to fall asleep.
I keep calling it 'heaviness' and 'weight' as if it's a type of sense, they call it 'gravity intolerance'.
Not diagnosed of anything related to it yet.
The only signs I have is this constant low blood pressure, occasional blood pressure fluctuations and symptoms due to sudden movements, consistent cold intolerance and the 'heaviness' in general.
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Probably because stomach is the word for a specific distinct component organ of a system comprised of several organs and gut refers to the whole system.
Given the history of the word gut it makes perfect sense,
https://www.etymonline.com/search?q=gut
Old English guttas (plural) "bowels, entrails," literally "a channel," related to geotan "to pour," from Proto-Germanic *gut-, from PIE root *gheu- "to pour." Related to Middle Dutch gote, Dutch goot, German Gosse "gutter, drain," Middle English gote "channel, stream." Meaning "abdomen, belly" is from late 14c.
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"There are a thousand things that can happen when you go light a rocket engine, and only one of them is good."
Tom Mueller of SpaceX, in Air and Space, Jan. 2011
Probably because stomach is the word for a specific distinct component organ of a system comprised of several organs and gut refers to the whole system.
I thought the word "gut" referred specifically to the intestines, not the entire digestive system.
My mother didn't like the word "gut" either. She always preferred the word "intestines" (when referring to the specific organs of the body) or "abdomen" (when referring to the general region), but not "stomach" (which refers to a different organ within the digestive system).
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