How to Support your Liver and Gallbladder for Better Digestion
Did you know that our liver and gallbladder play uber-important roles in our gut health and digestion?
The liver and gallbladder are two organs that tend to be forgotten when we think about our digestive system, and good digestive function.
While these “accessory” organs tend to be less in the spotlight as far as our digestion goes, they play critical roles in our ability to digest, absorb and assimilate nutrients, detoxify and remove waste, movement throughout the digestive tract, microbial balance, and more.
In this article, we’re going to dig specifically into the liver and gallbladder, and why it’s important for you to make sure you’re giving them some TLC on the daily!
Let’s dive in ↓
The Liver and your Gut
Our liver has some 500+ jobs to do for our body — it’s a powerhouse, supporting us across many bodily systems 👏
Obvi, our digestion and gut health included.
One of the ways it supports good digestion is through the production of bile. Bile is a substance that’s produced by the liver and stored in the gallbladder. It’s important for the digestion of fats, among many other things (which we’ll dive deeper into below).
Our liver is the first place that nutrients get sent to, after they’ve been absorbed into the bloodstream through the gut lining. Being our major detoxifier, the liver is able to filter through the raw materials sent over from the gut, to ensure they’re safe, and toxin-free before being sent to general circulation so our cells can use them.
Taking good care of our liver should be a priority for all of us because it has so many important roles in keeping us healthy!
The Gallbladder and your Gut
The gallbladder, a muuuuch smaller organ, is nestled right beside our liver. Its main function is to act as a storage container **for bile.
When we enjoy a meal containing fats (like your fav greek yogurt bowl, or burger 🍔), the gallbladder will release bile into the upper part of the small intestine, to continue with the fat digestion process.
Think of bile as the “dish soap” of our GI 🧼
You know how we use dish soap to help break down grease on our dishes? Bile works similarly on fats, breaking them down into smaller and smaller parts, so our fat-digesting enzymes can then takeover the role of fat digestion.
Bile doesn’t JUST help us break down and digest fats though. It has a ton of other important roles to play both in our digestion, and otherwise:
Bile is highly antimicrobial
This means it can help protect us from harmful bugs that could harm microbiome, and lead to digestive issues.
Bile helps to break down and emulsify fats
This breakdown process creates smaller fat particles, allowing them to be absorbed easier.
Bile plays a key role in the absorption of fat-soluble vitamins like (A, D, E, K)
These vitamins require fat in order to be absorbed properly. Vitamin A is important for the health of mucosal barriers, vision, immune function, cell growth. Vitamin D is important for immune function, and bone health. Vitamin E is an antioxidant, that helps to protect our cells from damage. Vitamin K is important for bone health, and blood clotting.
Bile helps to eliminate excess cholesterol in the body
Cholesterol is transported to the liver to be processed, and then is sent to the gallbladder to be removed of via bile, and ultimately we rid of it through our poop! This is an important process that helps maintain cholesterol balance in the body.
Bile can impact movement in the gut — it acts almost like a natural “laxative”
Bile salts (one of the components of bile), can increase movement and soften stool, making it easier to pass. This helps reduce constipation and stuff hanging around in the colon for too long.
If we aren’t making and release enough bile, we can see poor fat digestion occur (thus poor absorption of vitamins that require fats to be absorbed, like A, D, E, and K). It can also lead to imbalances in the gut microbiome, and potentially symptoms like slowed movement through the digestive tract, bloating and constipation (due to its natural laxative-like effects).
How to Support Good Liver and Gallbladder Health, and Healthy Bile Flow:
Incorporate liver-and-gallbladder-supportive foods.
Bitter foods (like arugula, radicchio, dandelion greens, beet greens), beets, citrus (like lemon, lime, orange, grapefruit), garlic, and sulfurous veggies (like broccoli, brussels, cauli, asparagus), are all great for supporting good liver function, gallbladder health, and bile flow.
Protein is also incredibly important for liver function (we need the amino acids from proteins for liver detoxification!), as well as antioxidants to protect our liver cells while it’s working hard for us (ie. eat all the colourful produce to protect your liver!)Drink liver-supportive teas, like dandelion root, milkthistle, green, burdock root.
These bitter herbs are hepatoprotective (help support liver health), and encourage bile flow and production. Enjoy these on rotation, on a daily and weekly basis!
My personal favourite is dandelion root tea. I recommend having it twice a day, steeped for 20 minutes to love on your liver and gallbladder! Enjoy 🫖Be mindful of things that stress out your liver.
Excess coffee and alcohol intake, medications, etc., require the liver to process and metabolize them so that they can be excreted from the body. Excessive intake of these substances can add additional work to the liver’s never-ending to-do list, potentially taking energy away from its other jobs! Being mindful of your intake of these can help the liver to focus on other things (like producing bile!).Try digestive bitters!
Digestive bitters are a great way to bring in some supplemental support for your liver and gallbladder. This is a tincture, derived from bitter herbs (perhaps some of them that I’ve mentioned above, depending on which formula you go with!), that can be taken directly on the tongue, or in a small glass of water 15-30 minutes before meals.
It helps to stimulate gastric juices (so we can digest better), including the secretion of bile from the gallbladder! It’s bitter constituents (hence the name), support both liver and gallbladder health.
Some brands and products I love for bitters: St. Francis Herb Farm, Herb Pharm, Urban Moonshine, Dr. Shades, Organic Olivia (likewise you can always look into a local herbalist, which I highly recommend!)
If you’re currently on a gut-healing journey or are generally looking to support good gut health — this is your sign to love on your liver and gallbladder daily!
If you’d like to get started right away on supporting both your liver and gallbladder via nutrition, you can download the free guide below that includes some tips and tools, as well at 15 recipes to get those liver-and-gallbladder-supportive nutrients in 👋
