Brain-Gut Circuit Lets Microbiota Directly Affect the Sympathetic Nervous System
The brain gut connection is incredible. For years I suffered with terrible IBS where I would almost always get nauseous after eating and would often need to immediately go to the bathroom.  I also had a very difficult time gaining weight.  I tried all kinds of drugs - prescriptions to treat nausea, malabsorption, even gastroparesis (slow emptying of the stomach).  Nothing worked and a few of the prescriptions were nerve wracking.  One was the original synthetic THC medicines that came out in the 80’s.   Another one called reglan can give you something called Tardive dyskinesia which is horrible and incurable.  All to just be able to eat normally and go to a movie afterwards.<p>I saw a doctor at one of the major medical centers and he knew my issue immediately.  After ruling out a few things via tests, he started me on a small dose of very old tricyclic antidepressant called Nortriptyline.  25mg vs the therapeutic dose of ~150-200mg.  It almost instantly stopped my issues.  They cannot explain why it works, but he says it helps 2/3 of his fast gut patients without the mood effects or other bad side effects that have made them fall out of favor for newer drugs.<p>Just the idea that a simple pill can affect the gut by affecting the brain (or is it vice versa?) is really profound and tells us how much more we need to understand in the brain gut relationship.