In this post I’ll discuss the connection between the gut and skin conditions. I am often asked ‘can IBS cause acne?‘, and even though I’m not a scientist or doctor, I will do my best to answer it through my own research and experiences.
My symptoms of IBS
For the past few years I’ve had bouts of really painful bloating and abdominal pain (IBS symptoms), and there have been no correlation between certain foods and these flare ups. I’ve been dairy and gluten free for a couple of years already, because I believe it is better for skin health in the long term. This is especially true if you have PCOS like me.
Many people (and doctors) will say this is classic IBS, however personally I reject that diagnosis because it doesn’t really mean anything. The exact cause of IBS is unknown, and that speaks volumes to me. It means we just don’t understand it at all. I’m sorry if that offends, but I believe it to be true.
We don’t really understand the stomach very well, and therefore anything we don’t understand has just been labelled ‘IBS‘. This is because the digestive tract, immune system and gut microbiome are all super interlinked. If one of them is out of balance, it causes a cascade of symptoms throughout the body:
- Hormonal imbalances
- Leaky gut (I’ll get into what this is later)
- Low stomach acid
- Severe acne or random development of acne in adults
- Low mood
- Brain fog
The gut-skin axis
Specialists have now document something they call the ‘gut-skin axis‘ which describes the relationship the gut and the skin have. Often when the gut isn’t functioning well it appears in the skin. We also know that a lot of hormones and mood changes are dictated by the health of the gut, but if you see a doctor about anxiety they will not consider evaluating digestive issues.
The problem is that in modern medicine we tend to treat stomach problems as if they are involving the stomach only. Doctors rarely look at how other parts of the body are co-operating with it, and therein lies the problem – the irritable bowel syndrome is not the root cause of the issues, but we’re treating it as if it is and getting nowhere.
I don’t mean to slam doctors with this, the reason they don’t evaluate these things is because it’s not what has been taught to them. It’s also because there’s still so much we don’t know about the gut, there aren’t enough studies for doctors to be able to action anything.
All we know for sure is that the digestive system, skin hormones and mood are very closely linked. If you’re starting to get a feel for the original question ‘can IBS cause acne?’, you are probably on the right track.
Signs of poor gut health
If you’re wondering whether you might have IBS, I’ve rounded up some symptoms that might help you evaluate your gut health. It’s important you remember that IBS is a syndrome that can’t really be ‘tested’ for. No-one can tell you whether you have it or not. Having poor gut health is basically the same as having IBS, so try not to get hung up on whether you do or don’t.
If you have a few of these symptoms and they’ve persisted for a few months or years, that is a sign of poor gut health:
- Newly developed acne in adulthood (past early twenties)
- Skin problems in general – eczema, flareups
- Regular bloating, either after eating or in general
- The feeling that food ‘just sits’ in your stomach and doesn’t digest very well
- A lot of gas or trapped wind
- Loose stools or constipation, or both
- Newly developed food intolerances you didn’t have before
- Floating stools or undigested food in your stool
I sought medical advice
These are symptoms that people have come to believe are normal to live with, day in and day out. I was one of those people, convinced that my gut health must be great because I didn’t have acne, but I was just bloated all the time.
I put so much effort into eating a balanced diet that I thought there’s no way I couldn’t have good gut health. What I didn’t realise is that sometimes a combination of factors outside of your control can impact your gut, beyond your own ability to repair it.
Antibiotics and gut health
Things like… the multiple rounds of antibiotics I’d taken when I was a child. I refused to drink anything but lemon squash (ha) so I got a lot of UTIs because I was dehydrated. Into adulthood I then continued to have multiple rounds of antibiotics for UTIs, sepsis and sinusitis. I was also born via Caesarean section, and there is evidence to suggest that c-section babies tend to have worse gut health.
Working with a naturopath
In the past 6 months I decided to seek professional help, after realising that simply changing my diet to being as close to ‘perfect’ wasn’t helping enough. The final straw for me were the weddings abroad I attended in Europe during the summer of 2023. I couldn’t enjoy a single second of them because my stomach was so bloated and uncomfortable, no matter what I ate or drank.
In September 2023 I decided to contact a naturopathic doctor, sometimes called a functional medicine doctor. The rest of the blog post will be a summary of information she shared with me, in the hopes it might help you.
Intestinal permeability and leaky gut
The first condition she brought up was leaky gut. She told me that pretty much everyone she sees has this to some degree, and it is very common. It is basically a very thin, damaged and ‘leaky’ gut lining. When you eat food, the stomach breaks it down and it enters the small intestine.
If you have leaky gut, your intestinal lining ‘leaks’ small food particles outside of your intestine and into places it shouldn’t be. Because this is alarming to the body and puts it under strain, the body creates inflammatory responses.
Inflammation and acne
Inflammation is at the heart of pretty much all of the negative symptoms we see in our skin, gut and overall health. The aim of the game is to reduce inflammation as much as possible. With reduced inflammation you could see anything from better periods, to reduced acne and bloating. I would list out some symptoms of inflammation, but they are basically all the same as the list above of poor gut health symptoms! That is how interlinked they are.
Here are some tips to reduce inflammation as a whole, then I will go deeper into most of them:
- Improve your sleep hygiene. You should be sleeping through the night for roughly 6-8 hours every day at a similar time.
- Get some stress management techniques. My gut health has never been worse than when I’m stressed!
- Find a regular exercise that you can stick to and enjoy, even if it’s just walking every day.
You’ll see that you aren’t able to buy a product for any of these lifestyle changes, and that is one of the lessons I’ve learned while trying to heal my gut. Supplements can help, but if you’re living a fundamentally pro-inflammatory lifestyle, it’s going to be an uphill battle. You need to be committed to long term health and lifestyle changes. If you don’t, you will probably not move the needle much and keep relapsing.
Don’t expect results too soon, improvement with skin issues and bowel movements takes time. Make these changes and aim for at least 6 months of consistency, keep going.
Stress management techniques
I know that managing your stress can be really hard to tackle, and so many people just try and skip over this one, hoping if they do everything else they’ll be fine. I’m sorry to tell you that if you don’t develop some techniques to cope, you might never get rid of your “IBS” and adult acne.
Here are some ways I like to de-stress (I appreciate it’s a lot easier when you don’t have kids):
- Regular exercise
- A walk every day at lunch or after work
- A 5-10 min meditation when I wake up
- Yoga every Friday night at my favourite class
- Saying no to social events I don’t really want to go to – people pleasing will not help your stress
- Creating a bed time routine I enjoy: red light at night, reading, acupressure mat
I even quit my job because I wasn’t enjoying it. I’m not saying you have to quit your job, I understand not everyone can do that, but try to eliminate the largest causes of stress from your life if it’s at all possible. If you hate your job don’t underestimate how much it’s affecting your health – make a plan to leave in your own time.
Gut bacteria and acne breakouts
You’re probably wondering whether IBS can be pinned down as your exact cause of acne. The truth is it’s probably a multitude of factors. If your gut is out of whack, it’s probably affecting your hormones too, resulting in acne symptoms. All of the advice above is perfect for getting started with hormonal imbalances, but why not check out my blog on 10 foods for hormonal acne, too?
If you want to see clearer skin you may need to make a diet change that can positively impact the gut microbiome. The gut microbiome is basically the colony of bacteria that live in your gut. Contrary to popular belief, there is no such thing as beneficial bacteria or bad bacteria. All bacteria is necessary (apart from things like candida overgrowth) but we want to make sure it’s balanced.
As an example, there is a condition called SIBO (small intestinal bacterial overgrowth) that describes an overgrowth of bacteria. The problem is not that there’s ‘bad’ or ‘good’ bacteria, there’s simply too much of some, and too little of others. When the bacteria is imbalanced it’s called dysbiosis.
Here are some tips for a healthy diet that can help to balance your microbiome:
- Eat 2-3 servings of cooked vegetables per day
- Mix up the variety of vegetables you eat, as they’ll contain different bacterias
- Include fruit as a dessert, but overall vegetables are a little more important
- Consider eating oatmeal on a semi regular basis, organic if you can
- Avoid artificial sweeteners as these can harm your bacteria
The best route for long term IBS sufferers
My best advice for long term sufferers of digestive issues and acne vulgaris is to see a naturopathic doctor if you can. It is expensive, but for me it got to the point where I wasn’t enjoying my daily life. If you can’t do this and still suffer with acne, I believe all of the advice above can help with acne as I managed to reverse some of mine this way.
However, in the end I did need to see somebody about my digestive problems. So far so good, but as always I’ll keep you updated on this blog or TikTok.
