Good quality fats are essential for optimal life. But in today’s diet, we are ingesting poor quality, rancid fats, or we are trying to eat a low-fat diet because we think it’s healthy. Fast food, processed food, fake food and microwaved foods make life easier, but is it worth the price of our health? When we eat low fat diets or diets with large amounts of bad fats, we end up with gallbladder dysfunction with can lead to a downward spiral of other health and digestive issues.

Fats are supposed to be digested by bile salts and pancreatic lipase in the duodenum, which is the top part of the small intestine right after food (chyme) leaves the stomach. Fat in the chyme stimulates the release of CCK, which stimulates the gallbladder to release bile. When we have poor quality fats in our diets, the bile becomes viscous. With a low-fat diet, the release of bile is not stimulated which causes the bile to become old and viscous. The gallbladder tries to release bile, but is unable to. Without bile, there is no absorption of fats. So, what happens to the body when there is excess fat that can’t be absorbed?

Undigested food, including fat, impacts the villi and the microvilli in the small intestine. The lining of the small intestine becomes leaky and allows the undigested fat particles to pass though the gut, called leaky gut syndrome, and overwhelms the immune system and causes food allergies. Even if a person starts to eat a healthy diet, these healthy foods are now seen as a foreign invader and act as an attack on the immune system.

These larger particles of undigested foods are full of parasites, microorganisms and undigested fats  when they reach the large intestine and cause further damage and can actually cause the ileocecal valve to get clogged or stuck open. The undigested fats rancidify in the colon and put stress on the liver, leaving you fatty acid deficient. It can also cause dysbiosis and disrupt the healthy flora of the large intestine. When healthy flora is disrupted, butyric acid is not produced, weakening the cells of the colon and causing inflammation, diverticula, loss of tone and can lead to Irritable Bowel Syndrome, Crohn’s Disease, Colitis and Celiac disease.

With all the different diseases that can occur due to undigested fats, you can see how easy it is to become nutrient deficient, which can lead to other illnesses, or end up with food allergies due to leaky gut syndrome. It can take a very long time to heal the gut and return your digestive systems to its regular function. Digestion is a north to south process and should be healed in the same manner with proper nutrition and supplements. To reduce the risk of undigested fats in your system, toxic fats, such as trans fats, hydrogenated fats, highly processed vegetable oils and fried foods should always be avoided. Maintaining proper stomach acid during digestion will help with the digestion of the healthy fats we should be eating.