The Digestion Process

Enzymes and Digestion
    Digestion in the Mouth
Food is chewed in the mouth and saliva is mixed with the food.  The saliva is made up of mucus that serves as a lubricant, an alkaline electrolyte solution that moistens the food, amylase, an enzyme that initiates the digestion of starch, lingual lipase, an enzyme that begins the digestion of fat and protease, which digests protean.

Most carbohydrates are broken down here by the process of chewing the food that hopefully had its own viable enzymes to be mixed with the enzymes mentioned above.  

Enzymes:
Without enzymes we could not digest food, could not breath, could not think; enzymes sustain our life.  There are hundreds of thousands of biochemical reactions that take place in our bodies that use enzymes as a catalyst.  Without enzymes these reactions would move to slowly to sustain life.   The food we eat contains enzymes that assist our digestive processes when we eat that particular food.  When you see food decomposing (a banana turning brown) it is the work of the enzymes contained in the food plus those that are brought to the food by insects or air born spores.

Enzymes in our bodies are divided into two groups and created by our cells: digestive enzymes and metabolic enzymes.  There are three types of digestive enzymes amylase, protease and lipase.  Amylase, found in saliva, pancreatic and intestinal juices; breaks down carbohydrates (sugars).  Protease, found in stomach, pancreatic and intestinal juices; helps digest proteins.  Lipase, found in stomach and pancreatic juices also enters the body via food we eat; breaks down fats.

Lipase: Is an enzyme that digests fats, helping to maintain correct gall bladder function.   Protease: Is a digestive enzyme that digests proteins and may be helpful for people with food allergies.  Amylase: Works great for digesting starches and carbohydrates and may be useful for people with gluten sensitivities.

Metabolic enzymes catalyze chemical reactions within the cells of the body providing us with energy production and detoxification.  These enzymes run all the bodies’ organs, tissues and cells.  They build the body from proteins, carbohydrates and fats. 

The main areas we need to concern ourselves with are digestive enzymes.  We produce less of these enzymes as we get older, plus cooking (over 118 degrees F) pasteurization and irradiation destroy enzymes that come to us in our foods.  This is why it is so important that we eat a diet that contains 75% fruit and vegetables (the majority of these should be raw) and about 25% high protein meat, dairy, and whole grain products.

You can also find digestive enzyme complex products that can help you get full nutritional value from the food you eat.  Be cautious, some of these can contain products from slaughtered animals that will bring toxins with them, read the label look for the word bovine.   Ask the person at the health food store for plant enzymes I have found these to be the best.  

 From Mouth to Esophagus to Stomach

The food is chewed in the mouth and saliva is mixed with this food.  Saliva is made up of an alkaline electrolyte solution that moistens the food, mucus that serves as a lubricant, amylase, an enzyme that initiates the digestion of starch, lipase, an enzyme that begins the digestion of fat, and protease, which digests protean, and.

Most carbohydrates are broken down by the process of chewing the food and mixing it with enzymes.   Hopefully that food had viable enzymes to mix with the enzymes supplied by the mouth.  

Pre-digestion in the Stomach
After swallowing the food, it moves down the esophagus, which is 18 to 24 inches long.   The esophagus moves through the warm core of the body and is responsible for warming the food to close to body temperature, which is ideally 98.6.   This is very important as enzymes digest food best at between 94 and 104 degrees.   So, if the ideal situation exists in the esophagus (ice water is not added to the food) the food is warmed to somewhere between 96 and 98 degrees before it enters the stomach. 

This food enters the stomach through the cardiac sphincter, which is where the esophagus and the stomach meet.   An empty stomach is like a flattened balloon until food enters it.   As the food enters upper part of the stomach, it stretches and enlarges to accommodate the food.   In fact, the stomach will enlarge beyond the size of the meal until it is fully inflated.   While the stomach is inflating to its full size which takes somewhere between 40 to 60 minutes, pre-digestion takes place.   Pre-digestion, is the food sitting in the stomach being digested by the enzymes that came with it.   The ideal ph here is about seven, very alkaline.   This pre-digestion is considered by many nutritionists to be the most important stage of digestion.   This is where the enzymes from our food and mouth digest and prepare the food for absorption.               

Once the stomach completes the pre-digestive process, the food than undergoes chemical and mechanical digestion.  Herein the lower part of the stomach, peristaltic contractions (mechanical digestion) churn the bolus, which mixes with strong digestive juices.  These juices include powerful hydrochloric acid, which helps break down the bolus into a liquid called chyme.  In addition, enzymes called pepsin and cathepsin are added to the juice in the stomach to brake down most of the protein in the food.  This process can take several hours depending on the meal eaten.   The ideal ph here is about three, very acidic.

Hydrochloric acid has three purposes.   First, to break down mineral bonds from our diet.  Now as they pass through our intestines they are small enough to pass through the wall to be used by the body.   Second, clean the food of pathogens by creating an acidic environment that will clean the food of these pathogens.   Third, change pepsinogen into pepsin, which breaks down the long protein strings that are the essential and non-essential amino acids in the food.   These are broken down by pepsin into polypeptides, peptides and tri-peptides so they can be utilized by our body.

Once the food is broken down, it has the consistency of cake batter.   This is called chime and is released into the duodenum by the pyloric sphincter.

From the Stomach to the Duodenum

                                                      The Duodenum (Probably one of the most significant keys to health in the human body)
Next, the chyme is slowly transported from the pylorus (a valve at the end portion of the stomach) through the pyloric sphincter into the first part of the small intestine called the duodenum where further digestion occurs.   The duodenum, just eight to nine inches long is where more chemicals of digestion are added.    The Ampule of Papilla (Ampulla of Vater above) is located in the duodenum wall.  This is an opening where, bile from the gallbladder and enzymes and bicarbonate from the pancreas enter the duodenum.   They combine with the chyme to begin the final part of digestion in the small intestines.  Enzymes are also excreted through the walls of the duodenum to assist with this digestion.  The inside wall of the duodenum has a smooth surface like the skin on your face.   It is at this point that the acidic chime must be alkalized so the assimilation of this nutrient filled liquid is as complete as possible.  In addition, this alkalization is very important so that the acid from the stomach is neutralized and will not burn the walls of the small intestine. 

What Does this Mean to Your Health
Your body is aware of what you have eaten (there are sensors in the duodenum) and it calls on your liver, gallbladder, pancreas and other avenues of digestive chemicals to assist in the breakdown and assimilation of nutrients and protection of the digestive tract.   Your body expects you to bring in live enzymes (uncooked foods such as produce) to assist in this digestive process.  If you do not bring in enough live enzymes with the food you have eaten you may expect to have acid indigestion (undigested food), acid reflux, ulcers and constipation all caused by food improperly prepared at your mouth (no live enzymes).   As this improperly prepared food enters the duodenum, your digestive awareness will call on the pancreas and gallbladder to do the job you did not do.   Your pancreas and gallbladder will then strain to prepare this acidic chime for release into the small intestine.  Allow this to happen enough times and you will get sick (for instance, straining the pancreas enough times could cause diabetes; an epidemic in country.   Constantly releasing acidic unprepared chime from the duodenum to the small intestine, can lead to such diseases as crohn’s disease, inflammatory bowel disease and leaky gut (see From Duodenum to Small Intestine).  These in turn can lead to diabetes, heart disease, cancer, autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis, muscular dystrophy, etc.   

A Note about bile from the gallbladder and enzymes plus bicarbonate from the pancreas:
Bile liquid is created in the liver and stored in the gallbladder. Bile emulsifies (breaks into small particles) lipids (fat), which aids in the mechanical digestion of fats. The pancreas secretes digestive enzymes that chemically break down complex food molecules into simpler ones.   These enzymes include trypsin (for protein digestion), amylase (for carbohydrate digestion), and lipase (for the digestion of fats).   Epithelial cells in pancreatic ducts are the source of  bicarbonate and water secreted by the pancreas   Bicarbonate is a base and critical to neutralizing the acid coming into the small intestine from the stomach.

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