Questions & Answers

Is Coffee Okay for SIBO?

Eric Bakker, the naturopath. Thanks for coming back. Is coffee okay for SIBO? Can you drink coffee? Well, I’ve just been reading some interesting websites. I take 50-50. 50% of experts say it’s crap. 50% say the jury’s out that it’s okay. It’s a personal thing. If you were an Avast, the average naturopath 10-20 years ago what they thought coffee was, they would have walked away, thought you said that you were going to a brothel or something like that. That you were going to a bad place. But now people are thinking different.

Why? Why all of a sudden is coffee not a four letter word anymore? Well probably because science is validating coffee now to be actually a high in antioxidant food, anti inflammatory food. It is acidic. Yes, but then again, living in general is acidic. Walking in Los Angeles in the middle of the days are highly acidic. Everything we do is acidic. We can’t stop those sort of things.

Remember one thing in life, it’s all about we’ve only got a short amount of time on this planet, and it’s what we do and how we enjoy ourselves that makes the difference. And one cup of really good coffee a day for me… If you took that away from me, that’d be like saying, “Well, you’re going to the electric chair in 12 months.” It’s not a nice thing, is it? The thing is coffee doesn’t kill people nor do guns. But people who use guns in appropriately killed people. Just like people who drink 25 to 30 cups of coffee a day can end up killing themselves and that’s no crap. I have actually had a patient that drunk 30 cups of instant coffee a day. Ridiculous but true. One or two cups of coffee a day for most people is perfectly fine, especially if it’s well-made.

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I’ve got a nice espresso machine. Tracy and I really enjoy a nice coffee in the morning, usually around 8:30 AM, 9:00 AM. It’s freshly ground beans, really good quality non-homogenized, Jersey milk, full cream cow’s milk made with zero total dissolved solids in the water. Zero TDS or ultra pure water, high quality milk. Superb coffee made well. You cannot beat it. There’s no way you can beat that. You go to Starbucks or crappy joints like this where they put chemicals or they probably spray crappy chemicals in the air there. They’ve got chemicals in their food, they’ve got chemicals in their coffee. The last time I had a coffee at Starbucks, I took it to the laboratory and tipped it out. It was crap. I’ve yet to find a place in America-this is going to sound rich-particularly Los Angeles, where they actually make really good coffee. Haven’t found it yet.

So good coffee is one of the joys in life for many people, and when you take that away, it can affect the quality of that person’s life. Now I’m not talking excess coffee, I’m talking small amounts. Caffeine has a stimulatory effect. It needs to be used with caution with people with adrenal fatigue, especially extreme adrenal fatigue when they’re in the advanced stages. But many people with very light adrenal fatigue or who get affected by stress actually get a little buzz out of caffeine and it can help them. But when you use caffeine or alcohol, coffee, like you do alcohol in excess and because you want to stay up all night because you’re developing some new video game or something, that’s starting to get into murky water. You’re going to start wrecking your sleep cycles and create gastric problems from all the acidity. That’s when you get problems.

And I see no problem at all for SIBO, for a person having a coffee, a shot of coffee at all. But again, remember it’s person’s specific. One person, the SIBO may feel perfectly fine with a coffee and other person with non-SIBO may be sick on a cup of coffee. So it’s something you need to try. And does coffee wake you up at three o’clock in the morning one cup? I doubt it. Not for most people. So remember if you don’t want your sleep cycle affected by caffeine, have it in the morning and don’t have it after lunchtime, especially if you’re a person who wakes between two to four. Don’t really have any caffeinated foods or beverages after lunchtime if you are a person who suffers a lot from broken sleep.

If you’re a person who has serious adrenal problem, you definitely need to keep away from caffeine for some period of time. I’d probably say go more into a green tea or something with extremely low levels of caffeine will be more beneficial for you. But I don’t see coffee really having a problem with SIBO. Many people I’ve worked with over the years, in fact, enjoyed a cup of coffee when they have constipation because they find that really improves that. So it’s up to you. You need to try it.

But here’s one thing. If you’re going to have coffee try and have nice coffee and good coffee, quality coffee, not something out of a tin that’s been processed. You throw it in a cup, then cut two spoons of white sugar in that and a bit of hot water. That’s not coffee. That’s crap. Real coffee smells amazing and tastes even better and it’s good for your soul. It’s good for your spirit. And I think it’s a fantastic part of the day. And it also connects people. It’s a social thing.

So remember, I’ll finish a video like I started it. We’re here for short time. We’ve got to enjoy ourselves. If we start listening to every single squeak and sentence online saying, this is bad and that’s bad, I mean, we’ve always all jump off the Empire State Building right now. So just tune out on a lot of the negativity out there and enjoy that cup of coffee. Thanks for tuning in.