Here is your weekly dose of Sunday sunshine. And a bunch of actionable tips, tools and information to help you become your own health boss.
When it comes to gut health, most people today focus on probiotics - thinking one pill a day will save them - but the truth is far deeper. Today's dive into gut health may rewire how you see your body, your food, and your future.
TODAY AT A GLANCE....
⭐Why you should care about your microbiome ⭐30 fascinating gut microbiome facts ⭐Every disease starts with a gut problem ⭐3 ways to restore your gut microbiome ⭐16 everyday things that destroy your gut microbiome ⭐A tale of two terrains
Thank you so much for being here. 🙏 I hope you have a wonderful week and as always, from my heart to yours, much love.
This week I’ve been deep in the gut. Not literally (gross), but metaphorically - learning all about the microbial magic that is the human microbiome and gut health.
You've probably heard this before, “Just take a probiotic—it’ll sort your gut out.”
But what if it’s not that simple?
What if the bugs in your belly hold the key to everything from your mood to your immune system… and what if, what you’re doing now might not be helping at all?
Enter Dr Sabine Hazan. A gut genius and microbiome madam. And the woman who’s shaking up everything we think we know about gut health.
Who Is Dr Sabine Hazan?
Dr Sabine Hazan is one of the world’s leading experts on the microbiome—and she’s got the credentials to back it up.
She was the first woman ever accepted into the University of Florida’s Clinical Gastroenterology Fellowship, and has spent over three decades as a trailblazer in medicine and research. She’s the founder of ProgenaBiome, a cutting-edge genetic sequencing lab, decoding the mysteries of our inner ecosystem, and heads up Ventura Clinical Trials, where she’s overseen more than 300 clinical studies on everything from gut health to infectious disease. She's a gut author, gut publications editor and an international gut speaker.
In short? Dr Hazan knows her sh*t. Literally.
And what she’s discovered is… alarming.
Why You Should Care About Your Microbiome
Your gut isn’t just where food goes.
It’s where healing begins. And where energy is made.
It’s where brain fog, anxiety, inflammation, immune problems, even chronic disease can end—or begin.
Studies have linked a disrupted gut microbiome to everything from Alzheimer’s and autism to depression, cancer, autoimmune conditions, and yep—even plain old exhaustion.
You’re not just what you eat. You’re what you absorb.
And you can’t absorb anything if your gut is broken.
The truth? Most of us are walking around with microbiomes that are depleted, damaged, or downright dysfunctional. And popping a probiotic isn’t going to save you.
As Dr Hazan puts it:
“It’s not about adding more bugs. It’s about protecting the ones you were born with.”
So this week I’ve been asking myself:
What am I doing each day that feeds my microbiome?
And what might be silently wiping it out?
Stay tuned—because what Dr Hazan's uncovered in her latest research might just change everything you thought you knew about gut health too.
30 Things I’ve Learnt
This week I didn’t just learn two things—I learnt a whopping 30!
And yes, it’s all about bugs and poop. But more importantly, it’s about your gut microbiome—and how it's quietly slipping into extinction while we’re busy chasing green smoothies and probiotic capsules.
I fell down a rabbit hole of Dr Sabine Hazan podcasts, and what I learnt has completely changed what I thought I knew.
Here are just some of the fascinating, confronting, and “holy crap, why didn’t I know this?” facts I learnt:
30 Fascinating Gut Microbiome Facts from Dr Sabine Hazan
Dr Sabine has sequenced over 15,000 poop samples from all over the world.
Less than 5% of people have detectable bifidobacteria.
The first bacteria to disappear in disease is bifidobacteria.
A healthy gut has around 50% bifidobacteria.
People with Alzheimer’s, autism, depression, or cancer have zero bifidobacteria.
Babies are born with bifidobacteria—they get it from the vaginal canal and breastfeeding.
Formula-fed babies have almost no bifidobacteria.
Antibiotics, steroids, and acid blockers destroy bifidobacteria.
One course of antibiotics can take six months to repair in the gut.
Oral methylene blue completely wipes out bifidobacteria.
Sunshine on the abdomen stimulates bifidobacteria growth.
People with the most sun exposure had the healthiest microbiomes.
Microbes emit and communicate via light—prokaryotes (bacteria and archaea) emit 5,000x more light than human cells.
The microbiome is like a fingerprint—unique to every individual.
Transplanting the wrong fecal matter can lead to psychosis or suicidal thoughts.
Stress kills beneficial microbes.
Every disease starts with the gut being out of balance.
Diversity of microbes is the key to immune resilience.
Fecalibacterium is another critical gut bacteria that often disappears early in disease.
Bifidobacteria helps protect against viral infections including COVID.
People who never got sick during COVID had high bifidobacteria levels.
People with long COVID had zero bifidobacteria.
Microbiome damage is not just local—it affects the brain, mood, immunity, and even fertility.
Oral supplements often don’t reach the right place or survive long enough to repopulate the gut.
Taking a daily probiotic is not enough to restore the microbiome.
The gut and brain are connected electrically, chemically, and via microbial signals.
Certain bacteria, when missing, can lead to neurological diseases.
We are witnessing a microbial extinction event—and most people don’t know it.
We’re losing something critical, and we barely realise it’s happening.
This isn’t just a digestion issue. It’s an everything issue.
Your energy, mood, immunity - even your risk of chronic disease.
And while everyone’s busy looking for the next magic pill or probiotic blend, the truth is simpler (and scarier): you can’t supplement your way out of microbiome collapse.
✔️ Action Item - Today, do one small thing to support your gut bugs. Get sunlight on your belly. Eat real, diverse, unprocessed food. Take 10 minutes to breathe and de-stress. Avoid unnecessary antibiotics or meds that disrupt your gut. And remember, your bugs need to eat, too.
3 Things To Explore
Every Disease Starts With a Gut Problem
Dr Sabine Hazan doesn’t mince words:
“Every disease starts with the gut being off balance.”
And with rising links between gut dysfunction, metabolic disorders, autoimmune conditions, cancers, and even neurodegenerative diseases—it's no wonder the gut is being called the second brain (and possibly the first line of defence).
This isn’t fringe thinking anymore.
The gut is ground zero.
So the question becomes: what are you doing to protect it?
3 Ways to Restore Your Gut Microbiome
A resilient gut isn’t built with pills—it’s built with light, rhythm, and real nourishment.
Here’s where to start:
🥦 Feed Your Gut the Right Microbes
Say no to sugar, ultra-processed carbs, and gut-empty calories.
Say yes to fibre rich veggies, fermented foods (like kimchi, kefir, and sauerkraut), and a rainbow of real, seasonal food. It’s about feeding the bugs you want to keep.
☀️ Let the Sun In
Morning sunlight has been shown to increase bifidobacteria (the superheroes of your microbiome). And as for that bikini? It’s time to bring it out and get some sun on that tummy of yours.
Dr Sabine Hazan’s research shows that morning sunlight, especially on the abdomen, boosts the growth of bifidobacteria—those all-important microbes linked to immune strength, mood regulation, and resilience to disease.
When your body sees the morning sun, your gut starts waking up too—regulating hormones like serotonin and melatonin, which are both closely tied to microbial activity. So yes, a little belly sun might just be the cheapest and most overlooked gut support ritual you can add to your routine.
🚫 Pause the Destroyers
Your microbiome is under daily assault.
Blue light at night, chronic stress, seed oils, over-sanitising, unnecessary antibiotics… these aren’t minor irritants—they’re microbial wrecking balls. Start cutting these sabotages out and it won’t just be your gut bugs that will thank you.
You don’t need a magic supplement to heal your gut health. You need rhythm, sunshine, and real food.
16 Everyday Things That Destroy Your Gut Microbiome
We’ve been sold the idea that gut health is a product you can buy. But taking probiotics into a damaged gut is like planting flowers in a swamp. It’s not about adding more bugs. It’s about fixing the terrain—the soil they need to survive. That’s the foundation of Terrain Theory, a once-dismissed idea that’s proving to be more accurate than Germ Theory in today’s chronic disease landscape.
Dr Hazan warns that no supplement will save your microbiome if you’re still assaulting it daily with antibiotics, sugar, stress, blue light, and processed seed oils. Healing begins with removing the destroyers and re-establishing a nurturing rhythm—sunrise light, circadian eating, diverse whole foods, and stress relief. When the terrain is healthy, the right bugs show up and thrive. And when the bugs thrive, so do you.
PS - This could be the most important “what not to do” list for your long-term health.
A Tale of Two Theories
"The microbe is nothing. The terrain is everything."
- Louis Pasteur (on his deathbed reportedly conceding to Béchamp)
In the 19th century, two scientists, Louis Pasteur and Antoine Béchamp presented very different ideas about the origins of disease.
Pasteur, a chemist and microbiologist and the father of Germ Theory, believed that external microbes (germs, viruses, bacteria) were the primary cause of disease. Kill the microbe, and you eliminate the illness.
Béchamp, a lesser known doctor, biologist, and chemist, proposed Terrain Theory. He argued that microbes are opportunistic, and that disease occurs when the internal environment (the "terrain") is imbalanced or weakened. In other words, the health of the host determines the outcome.
Pasteur’s germ-focused model won out—shaping the entire pharmaceutical, antibiotic, and vaccine industries. Béchamp was mostly forgotten.
Did the right man win?
Pasteur died at the age of 72. Béchamp was 91.
Perhaps terrain does matter after all. 😉
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