Restorative Nutrition: Digestion & Health

Frankie Newot for Yoga Medicine shares how fall can be a great time to explore restorative nutrition, and how the digestive system impacts health and relaxation. Next, explore the restorative yoga routine for your digestive system.

Fall in Love with Your Digestive System: Exploring Restorative Nutrition

The transition into fall is strong on the senses. Those first evenings where the light starts to drop its angle and the first mornings that feel a little crisper. The heat of summer is cooling off, preparing our bodies for a shift inside. Done with the sweat and the go-go-go of summer. We cut our winter squash, clip the last of the cayenne peppers for fermented hot sauce and eat Caprese salads like they are going out of style.

It was this season, a few years back that inspired my exploration of Restorative Nutrition. It was the idea that sometimes our diet seems to move as fast as our busy schedules and the hectic to do lists. Ate breakfast – check; made sure I packed protein snacks – check; rushed home in time to get a decent meal put together for the loves – check; drank water and didn’t overdo the caffeine – check; tried not to get hangry – check.

Relaxation and Digestion

In my practice as a functional nutritionist, relaxation is a part of digestion. Period. For a lot of folks, the parasympathetic nervous system is a foreign and unknown destination. We spend our days planning, doing and for a lot of us … stressing about what is ahead and what is behind us. This rev of the nervous system day after day never allows us to explore the “rest and digest” side of ourselves. So, it is easy to believe that most people struggle with some part of digestion though, for each person, there can be a unique batch of signs and symptoms.

I am a believer that for a lot of us, it is difficult to care for what we do not know. Restorative Nutrition gives people an entry point to get to know their digestion and care for it deeply. As we cruise into fall, carve out some time to lie on the floor with your hands on your belly.

Take a trip inside to imagine your digestion, to give thanks when it works well and love it deeply for the energy it brings. Downregulate long enough to explore. I think this is where are our relationship to our food can flourish, where we start to make decisions that soothe and heal us. It isn’t about the merry-go-round of good camp/bad camp or the willpower to stay away from the sweets as much as it is getting to know our inner body. Care for it like the precious resource that it is and enjoy, deeply.

Digestive System Restoration Practice

Here is a 10 minute, 360 degree routine to restore your digestive system this fall: