Have you noticed that there are people who belch all the time? Right in the midst of conversations, they’d burp repeatedly like overfed baby – a situation that can be as embarrassing and as it could be uncomfortable for anyone concerned.
Physicians say ordinarily, burping, belching and farting could be the result of the digestive processes or you may experience any of them when you swallow air. However, they warn, when they become your experience for the better part of the day, it may be due to discomfort in the abdomen.
If you are the type that gulps your food or drinks too rapidly, or if you are a lover of carbonated beverages, physicians say you may expect belching and burping all the time.
Though experts say the maximum number of farts for a normal person is 20 per day, you’d agree that you don’t want to be caught in the act, hence the need to modify your dietary habits and escape being a social nuisance.
Of course, if your physician reviews your case and feels that the cause of your flatulence and repeated belching or farting has underlying medical cause, he may prescribe medications that will reduce the production of gas or medications that will stimulate the muscles of the small intestine.
For one, nutritionist, Dr. Remi Omotunde, says flatulence results from the production of gas by bacteria within the intestines when they digest sugars and polysaccharides; especially when there is bacterial overgrowth in the small intestine.
Gynaecologists also say that pregnancy can increase the number of times you belch or pass gas daily. Indeed, experts at babycenter.com say the primary reason you burp or belch during pregnancy is because you have much higher levels of progesterone, a hormone that relaxes smooth muscle tissue throughout your body, including your gastrointestinal tract.
“This relaxation slows down your digestion, which can lead to gas, bloating, burping, and flatulence and generally create miserable sensations in your gut, especially after a big meal,” the experts say.
They add that in later pregnancy, your growing uterus crowds your abdominal cavity, further slowing digestion, and pushes on your stomach, making you feel even more bloated after eating.
Just as there are foods that can reduce flatulence and aid digestion, so also are there foods that contribute immensely to the problems, hence the need to know them and decide how to eat them and when. What are these foods? Read on.
Beans
No doubt, beans is one of the healthiest foods anyone can eat; but as healthy as it is, you cannot divorce it from the fact that it causes bloating, and makes you to gas and burp!
Omotunde says the reason is because beans contains a triple sugar, stachyose; a quadruple sugar, raffinose; and a five sugar, verbascose that we cannot digest because the human body does not produce the enzyme that is required to break down these sugars.
The nutritionist avers, “These sugars make it all the way through the gastro-intestinal tract to the large intestine, intact. The bacteria that live in the small intestine break down the oligosaccharides – an activity that produces the gas that must eventually come out of the rectum.”
What to do? The Medical Director of Mart Life Detox Centre, Prof. Oladapo Ashiru, advises us to chew our food slowly and very well before swallowing. That way, he says, the process of digestion will be less cumbersome, as food digestion starts in the mouth.
Again, Omotunde counsels that if you must eat beans, you should eat fruit about two or three hours before your bean meal, and that you should not combine it with other protein-rich foods such as egg or potato.
Carbonated beverage
Many people cannot do without carbonated drinks. They may be soft drinks or beer, but they contain abundant air because of their chemistry.
Experts warn that if you are prone to farting, bloating or belching, reduce your intake of carbonated drinks. “Drinking any carbonated drink releases carbon dioxide bubbles into the stomach and intestine, and they can cause gas, bloating and belching,” Omotunde warns.
He says it is one of the reasons you feel the impact of a sip of carbonated drink in your nostril within seconds, while your eyes also water immediately after you take a gulp. Both are uncomfortable feelings, you’d agree.
Fatty foods
Omotunde says eating fatty foods such as French fries and other fast foods can lead to belching and being bloated. The reason, he says, is because fats slow down the rate at which the stomach empties into the small intestine; and while the sluggish process drags on, it’s not uncommon to gas, fart or belch as the case may be.
Dairy products
Those who nurse babies can attest to the fact that babies fart endlessly. The reason is not far-fetched: it’s due to their meals that are milk-based, if not milk, outright.
“That is why some adults feel bloated and fart all the time when they take too much of dairy products such as milk, cheese, yoghurt and such like,” Omotunde notes.
He adds that the situation is more prevalent among those who suffer from lactose intolerance – that is the inability to digest milk sugar (lactose). He counsels those in that category to opt for lactose-free milk as much as possible
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