Cha-cha-kombu-cha: The Way to Happiness Could be Through the Stomach

Research shows the little lives of the bacteria in your gut could be one of the biggest keys to your happiness.   So, let’s raise a glass to them and let’s make it a glass of kombucha!

Some things just feel plain old happy making.  Thoughts of snow-capped mountains, pure air and new buds of life unfurling are usually somewhere in our psyche’s list of happiness triggers.  We also admire when care and attention is paid to the crafting of food and drink, that makes us happy too, especially when we get to savour it on our tongues.  If we help others, that can give us a dopamine surge, too.  Yippee!  Add all  those happiness triggers up and you might well arrive at some of the reasons we blended our Fresh, Warm and Light kombuchas, which, alongside other WillPowders Way tools, might just stimulate your happiness centres, particularly your gut-brain axis.  Because, as it turns out, there is growing evidence to suggest that what we put in our tummies also plays a role in the way our mood might swing.  Yes, the organ that has gut instinct and gut feelings also enjoys a bidirectional relationship with our brains and happy good gut bacteria makes for a happy human.   

The microbiome-gut-brain axis is of interest to scientists, particularly since some statistics suggest that, by 2030, depression could be the most prevalent disease globally amongst humans, which is a depressing thought in itself.  What has happened to us all?  Well, scientists tell us, ‘Preliminary evidence from observational studies has demonstrated that patients with depression and anxiety disorders have significantly different gut microbiome profiles compared to healthy individuals [*]’.   And, it doesn’t just end there because anxiety and stress co-exist in around 75% of cases of depression amongst children and adults alike.  So, it’s not just the doldrums that plenty of us are experiencing, but the heebie jeebies as well, all wrapped up in the World of Stressed Eric and Erica.  No wonder so many of us are muttering, this is no way to live.  The most consistent findings in science so far regarding gut bacteria and depression are that if the pro-inflammatory bacteria are enriched and anti-inflammatory bacteria depleted, then depression is likely to arise [*]. 

Let’s take a look at your gut microbiome - now that’s a sentence we’ve never heard uttered in any medical consultation on low mood.   This is despite the fact that, second only to the brain, the gut is the organ in your body that contains the second highest number of neurons.  Whereas the brain sits nicely protected from the outside world inside the skull and encased in the dura mater, the Hard Mother,  sipping its super filtered blood through the blood-brain-barrier, the gut has to literally brush up against the outside world and get its villi dirty testing to see what’s going on and if it needs to alert the brain.  And yet, it's our brains we think we are taking to the doctor for extra care when we have anxiety or depression and the doctor isn’t divesting us of that thinking anytime soon.   Don’t get us wrong - with mental health, we need multi-faceted approaches and consulting with a doctor is important.  What we are saying is that, meanwhile, eating our way to happy (but we don’t mean by scoffing cake, so put that down!) might be a versatile tool in our toolbox if we’re trying to combat low mood, anxiety or depression.   And it might well kick in before the obligatory eight weeks of a serotonin reuptake inhibitor with suggestions of as little as two weeks to improve the gut microbiome being suggested for dysbiosis (when your gut microbiota is off kilter) [*].  

These can help us with cognitive understanding of our predicament but they won’t cure an underlying cause if it’s your gut that’s off - unless the therapist happens to offer you a live yoghurt!  But that’s rare, let’s face it.  After the pharma and the talk, for the day to day trudge, it can feel like you’re pretty much on your own.  Which is where no one with depression, low mood or anxiety should be.  

On top of this, unfortunately, beyond the doctors and the therapists, we live in times where ‘received wisdom’ in regard to low mood prevails.  These ‘priceless’ nuggets are wrapped up in the outdated idea that, at best, we should feel and think our way out of it and, at worst, snap out of it.  Recall for a moment those strangers who, out of the blue, tell you, cheer up - it might never happen - and you are expected to laugh jovially.  Thank goodness they told us!  Add to this things like the ubiquitous gratitude journal ‘remedy’ - yet another example of how the discourse around mental health thinks we’ve merely got stuck in our own head.  If we see another gratitude journal, we might scream the whole stationery shop down.  Equally, suggestions to drop down into your heart chakra can feel like being invited to descend into the lion’s den - it doesn’t feel safe.   So, Yogi, begone!  Besides, stopping at the heart means we simply haven’t dropped down far enough - science increasingly understands we need to drop our attention to the colonies of bacteria in our gut, shepherd some good ones into the hood then make them feel like royalty by throwing them a banquet.  Hoping and wishing we can think, feel or snap our way out of the mental health cul de sac is, at best, only one spoke of the wheel and, at worst, hopeless.  

Firstly, simple, pleasurable modifications to our eating could be a first step to combating low mood and raising our chances of living with moods that we equate with health and happiness.  Hell, after a bout of depression or anxiety, living in neutral, never mind contentment would be an improvement.  Secondly, knowing that pleasurable steps are achievable helps us to feel empowered that our health is in our hands and stomachs.  That, in itself, might begin to interrupt cortisol levels enough to create a gap in the bleak curtain where the light can get in, so to speak.   

WillPowders kombuchas contain the probiotic lactobacillus paracasei Lpc-37 which has ‘proven effective in preventing chronic stress-associated behaviours from developing in two recent preclinical experiments of the same model (Stenman et al., 2020)’.   It was found that ‘Lpc-37 could reduce the expected increase in physiological markers of stress such as heart rate and blood pressure in response to an acute stress’ and furthermore it was able ‘to normalise the cortisol awakening response and evening cortisol levels, improve psychological test scores both in response to the Trier Social Stress Test and over the study’.  Plus, those all important things to help move you towards a happier you, it also demonstrated it could help ‘improve sleep, productivity and overall well-being following a five-week intervention compared to placebo’ [*].  So, all in all, quite good, then! 

Since our kombucha powder is encapsulated in fibre, it also acts as a prebiotic to feed the lactobacillus paracasei and the other good bacteria you’ve already got.  Additionally, the polyphenols from the oolong and green tea will also act as prebiotics.  Since we have pre- and pro- biotic elements in our kombucha, it enters the realm of synbiotics, which is fab because the ‘simultaneous administration of probiotics and prebiotics is believed to improve the activity of beneficial gut bacteria’ [*].  

Postbiotics are the molecules that are left after probiotics have been ultra heat treated.  We do this at the end of the fermentation process.  But, don’t worry, after that, we add in the Lpc-37!  But, while it might seem like sacrilege to kill off probiotics, there is increasing evidence that postbiotics might even serve you at least as well, if not better than, probiotics themselves: ‘nonviable bacteria and associated fractions could better traverse through or around mucus and stimulate several cells more consistently than live cells of the same type while also exhibiting similar potential to positively impact health when compared to live cells’ [*].  Equally, as far as The Lancet is concerned, ‘postbiotics offer a promising approach to utilising microbial therapeutics’ for depression.