Why should I take probiotics?

It’s all about your flora, or in scientific terms, your microbiota. Your flora consists of microorganisms that reside mainly in your gut, but also in your skin, mouth, female reproductive tract… And so on. A balanced and healthy flora is essential to your well-being. When your flora is unbalanced, it can affect many parts of your body and can cause illness, chronic inflammation, poor nutrition, yeast infections, bloating, mental health problems, digestive issues, immune system breakdown, autoimmune disorders, overgrowth of bad bacteria,absorption of toxins into your bloodstream,skin conditions, cognitive problems… and the list goes on.

Did you know?

The concept of beneficial bacteria was introduced when a scientist named Eli Metchnikoff was examining the lifespan of Bulgarian peasants. He noticed that they lived a lot longer than the average person. He studied and examined their lifestyles and noticed one significant difference. They were consuming a lot of fermented milk which contains a large amount of probiotics. He concluded that this milk helped seed the intestines with good bacteria which improved the health of the host and suppressed the growth of harmful bacteria.

So what is your Flora?
What can cause an imbalance in Flora?
How do you keep an optimal flora balance?

What is your Flora

Your flora (microbiota) consists of about 100 trillion microorganisms. 80% of them reside in your intestines. They actually outnumber the cells in your body by 10 to 1, and can weigh about 5 pounds in total. That’s more than you heart and liver combined. So in a sense, your probiotic flora can almost act like an organ. When it is damaged, it can damage your immune system, cause digestive disorders, and affect other parts of your body in many ways.90% of your immune system resides in your gut, and it is home to over 500 different species of bacteria.

So now we know that a host of beneficial bacteria exist in our body, and we coexist with them. But what exactly do they do and why does it cause illness when they are damaged?

The good bacteria play many beneficial roles in our body. It’s important to understand that we coexist with these good bacteria. Many people think bacteria can only be harmful because we are prescribed antibiotics when we have a bad bacterial infection. But probiotics are different, they are helpful bacteria. They help improve the digestive process, produce digestive enzymes, help absorb vital nutrients, stimulate the immune system, but also compete with bad bacteria in your system.

The last point is very important. There are always some bad bacteria in your system. If you don’t have enough good bacteria, the bad bacteria can proliferate and grow. This can cause many types of illnesses, such as Candida, H. Pylori, etc. Also, the good bacteria compete for space along your intestinal lining. They decide what gets absorbed into your bloodstream from your gut. If there is not enough, there is no guidance for what is absorbed. Or even worse the bad bacteria might stick to your intestinal lining instead. These scenarios can cause major health problems because instead of absorbing the right nutrients, your body will absorb toxins into your bloodstream. This can cause all kinds of problems to the rest of your body.It is known in the medical field as leaky gut syndrome. Research has found that this is also a leading cause of skin conditions, such as eczema.

So as you can see, your flora is essential to your wellbeing, and not all bacteria are bad. All you have to do is take a look at our testimonials to see the impact they are having on people lives.

What can cause an imbalance

Now that we understand what probiotics are and how important they are to the human body, let’s explore how our flora can be damaged, or how an imbalance can occur.

Through our research and studies for over 15 years, we have concluded that an unhealthy or imbalanced flora can be caused by, but not limited to, the following factors.

Antibiotics
Stress
Aging
Bad diet
Born by C section
Genetic predisposition

Using Antibiotics – Antibiotics help prevent many diseases and kill infections. But they also kill the good bacteria in our system as they cannot distinguish between the good and bad bacteria. It kills all of it. So what happens if the microflora in our system doesn’t recover? Well, the results could be disastrous to your health. In fact, many of the illnesses we encounter with our clients occur after taking a large amount of antibiotics. This is why doctors now adviseusing a probiotic 2 hours after taking an antibiotic.
Stress – We all know too much stress can be bad for your body. But research is now showing that it can have an effect on your gut flora as well. Prolonged periods of stress can disrupt your gut flora, and can cause many symptoms such as inflammation, bloating, digestive upset, or any of the disorders caused by imbalanced micro flora.
Aging – With age, your gut flora will decrease. This is a normal part of the aging process like the rest of your body. Fortunately though, in this matter you can take probiotics to help reverse the process.
Bad Diet – We cannot emphasize the importance of a proper diet to help keep a balanced Flora. Unfortunate in North American culture, we consume a lot of processed, genetically modified, and high in sugar foods we consume on a daily basis. This type of diet is very harmful to your good bacteria and very helpful to your bad bacteria. As time passes, you can cause irreversible damage to your gut flora by consuming an unhealthy diet. Things that can be bad for your flora are alcohol, coffee, sugars, processed foods, meat, etc.
Birth by C-section –Thegastrointestinal tract of human beings is sterile and free of bacteria before birth. It is during birth that babies swallow the bacteria in the birth canal and over days, these bacteria colonize and grow in the intestines. This is why babies born by C-section may have a deficiency in intestinal micro flora. They must acquire the good bacteria from the environment instead. Breastfeeding may help improve this situation.
Genetics – Unfortunately, we can’t run from our genetic predispositions. If you are genetically predisposed to having a weak gut flora, problems may arise or accelerate because of this.People who have a family history of digestive disorders such as IBS and IBD are more likely to experience these problems.

How do you keep an optimal flora balance

Considering you have over 100 trillion microbes contributing to your flora, a damaged or aging one is sometimes hard to fix or maintain. This is why we have found through years of research and testing that a high potency probiotic supplement is necessary to reach a balanced flora. Most people think yogurt when they hear the word probiotics, but yogurt usually doesn’t contain enough probiotics to make a big difference in your gut flora. A high potency probiotic could be equivalent to eating 10 to 30 yogurt servings depending on the products. So you need a lot more than yogurt, and the only way to take it is in supplement form.

But be careful, there are many low potency and low quality probiotic supplements available in the market. Most of what’s out there won’t even make an impact on your gut flora,as it will die in your stomach acid before it gets to your gut.

So how do you know how much to take?

Well, everyone’s digestive system is different. Your flora composition is unique like a fingerprint, no two are alike. So this question is a little tricky to answer.

We have clients that take one of our capsules a day (60 Billion CFU) and do well with that, and we have some that take up to 8 adult powder scoops a day and do fine with that. That’s about 2 trillion bacteria a day!

So it all depends on why you are taking probiotics. If your flora is balanced and you are completely healthy, than taking 60 billion live cultures a day should be fine to maintain that balance. If you have a chronic problem and your flora is damaged, 60 billion may not make a big difference. This is why we suggest starting with a low dosage and moving up until you see a difference and feel better.

Another important factor would be the quality of the probiotic. A poor quality probiotic will not colonize properly in your gut and will just pass through your system. Also, most of it will be killed by the acid in your stomach when passing through your GI tract. In contrast, a good quality probiotic will reach your gut, and colonize so that it can benefit the host.

In addition to taking a good probiotic, a healthy diet is also very important. You should follow a balanced diet and stay away from too much sugar, fried foods, coffee or alcohol. We recommend that you consult with a doctor to discuss a healthy customized diet tailored to your condition.

After 15 years of specializing in the probiotic field we have concluded that a good probiotic must have the following properties:

High in potency
High in quality and purity
Of human origin
Be nonpathogenic and nontoxic
Must not contain artificial substances or preservatives

Custom Probioticformulations contain all of these essential properties. We provide the highest quality and potency probiotic supplements in the market today. All of our products are independent laboratory tested to certify the potency and quality of our products. Our products range from capsules to powder formulations to suit your personal needs. We have formulations that range from 3 strains, all the way up to 11 strains. You can even order single strains if you’d like.

Many products on the market today not only start off at a low potency and quality, but based on our testing, don’t even contain what they claim on the label. This is one of the reasons why customers are so satisfied when they switch over from other brands. But we’d rather you try and see for yourself.

Did you know?

Custom Probiotics 100g powder products have about 47 trillion live bacteria cultures in every bottle!

Taking a good probiotic is essential to your health. There has been a lot of research in this field over the past 10 years and it is only growing at an increasing rate. This is because scientists and doctors have now realized all the benefits of having a balanced flora. Here at Custom Probiotics we have known the benefits from our own studies and customer feedback. But now there is so much focus on the subject by professionals, companies, and universities all over the world. All their studies are proving how beneficial probiotics are. We know probiotics are good for the gut, but studies are now showing they are also good for mood and anxiety, diarrhea, Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD),Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), Autoimmune disorders, Cancer, Lactose Intolerance, Peptic Ulcers, Allergies, Asthma, Eczema, Lime disease, Candida, Autism and much more…