Real stories from the gut-brain frontier
First-hand accounts of engineering the gut-brain axis. Moderated, human, honest. Not medical advice.
The 'low-mood signature' made me rethink my plate
I'd read that people with low mood tend to be depleted in butyrate-producing bugs like Coprococcus and Dialister. A fermented drink is not a…
Chasing butyrate: what happened when I fed the fiber-fermenters
My report was low on the fiber-fermenting, butyrate-making crowd. Butyrate is the short-chain fatty acid that feeds the gut lining and shows…
Testing a two-strain pairing against my own morning log
My stress system runs hot — I'm the classic reactive type who wakes up already braced. I found a trial that paired Lactobacillus helveticus …
Rebuilding after antibiotics — the gut and the head
After a rough course of antibiotics for a sinus infection, my gut went sideways and — the part nobody warned me about — so did my head. Flat…
The GABA angle: fermented foods and a calmer baseline
I went down the rabbit hole on GABA — the brain's main 'calm down' signal — and learned certain gut bacteria like Bacteroides actually produ…
The two-way street: tracking mood and gut together
IBS is classified as a disorder of gut-brain interaction, and once I stopped thinking of it as purely a gut problem, things moved. There's a…