Not medical advice. Speak to a qualified professional before making changes. Published 2023-11-15.

Stop Eating While Stressed, Wrecks Gut

Most of us eat like this. Laptop open. Inbox screaming. Fork in hand. Then we wonder why our gut turns on us. If you run a serious business in London, your digestion might be the canary in the coal mine for how you work. This clip with Benjamin explains what happens when you eat in fight or flight mode, and two quick fixes that actually work.

Why This Matters If You Run A Serious Business

• You avoid the 2pm brain fog that kills momentum on calls and decisions
• You stop bloating after lunch, which means better performance in the afternoon
• You reduce IBS symptoms that distract you from what matters
• You build a simple system that works without adding complexity to your day
• You protect your nervous system so you can stay calm under pressure

Key Ideas In This Video

• Around two million people in the UK live with digestive issues triggered by stress eating patterns
• Eating while stressed puts your body in fight or flight mode, shutting down proper digestion
• IBS is not actually a diagnosis, it is a label for when your gut reacts to how you eat under pressure
• Quick bites between meetings or during meetings can trigger bloating and brain fog, even with healthy food
• Benjamin explains that your gut needs your nervous system to be in rest mode to digest properly
• One practical fix: take two minutes before eating to breathe out longer than you breathe in
• Another fix: put away the laptop, sit down, and give your meal full attention for just ten minutes
• This simple nervous system reset can reduce symptoms faster than changing what you eat

The Real Cost Of Eating Under Stress

When you eat lunch over emails, your body thinks it is running from something. Blood moves away from digestion and towards your muscles. Your stomach acid production drops. Enzymes do not fire properly. The food sits there, half processed, fermenting. That is where the bloating starts. That is where the brain fog comes from. That is why you feel heavy and slow by 3pm.

Most founders do not connect the dots. They think IBS is just bad luck or genetics. They try cutting out gluten or dairy or caffeine. Sometimes that helps a bit. But if you are still eating in a stressed state, you are fighting the wrong battle. The issue is not always what you eat. It is how your nervous system treats the food when it arrives.

Benjamin, a trauma and addiction therapist who understands nervous system regulation, breaks this down clearly. He explains that your gut and your brain are in constant conversation. When your brain is in fight or flight, your gut gets the message to shut down non essential systems. Digestion is non essential when you are being chased by a tiger, or a deadline, or a difficult client email. Your body does not know the difference.

Two Simple Fixes You Can Use Today

Fix one: breathe out longer before you eat. Take two minutes before your meal. Breathe in for four counts, out for six. Do this five times. It signals to your nervous system that you are safe. It flips the switch from fight or flight to rest and digest. This is not meditation. This is not woo. This is physiology. It works.

Fix two: close the laptop for ten minutes. Put the phone face down. Sit somewhere you can see daylight if possible. Eat slowly. Chew properly. Let your body know this is a meal, not a fuel stop. You do not need to eat mindfully for every bite. Just give your nervous system a clear signal that this is not an emergency.

These two changes cost nothing. They take less than fifteen minutes combined. But they reset how your gut processes food. Most people notice a difference within a week. Less bloating. Clearer thinking. Better energy in the afternoon. All because they stopped treating lunch like a pit stop.

Why Busy Founders Ignore This

The pushback is always the same: I do not have time. Meetings run back to back. Clients need answers. The inbox never stops. Fair enough. But if you are spending two hours every afternoon fighting brain fog and gut discomfort, you already lost the time. You just lost it in the worst way possible, feeling awful while trying to perform.

The other pushback: this feels too simple. Surely the fix has to be more complex. A special diet. Expensive supplements. Tests and protocols. Sometimes, yes. But most of the time, the issue is simpler than that. Your body needs to feel safe to digest. That is it. You can give it that signal in two minutes. Or you can spend years trying to outthink a nervous system problem with a food problem.

What This Looks Like In Practice

Picture this. You finish a call at 1pm. You are about to grab lunch at your desk. Instead, you take two minutes to breathe out slowly. Then you walk to the kitchen, or the cafe, or wherever your food is. You sit down. No laptop. No phone. Just you and the meal. You eat for ten minutes. Then you go back to work.

That is the whole system. No apps. No tracking. No complicated rules. Just a clear boundary between work mode and digestion mode. Your gut will thank you. Your focus will improve. Your energy will stabilise. And you will stop wondering why healthy food makes you feel terrible.

Less Stress In The Gut, More Authority In The Room

When your digestion works, you feel better. When you feel better, you show up calmer. When you show up calmer, people trust you more. That is the chain. It starts with something as simple as breathing before eating. It ends with you holding the room without effort.

Serious businesses are built by people who manage their state. Not just their strategy. Not just their systems. Their state. How they feel in their body. How they regulate their nervous system. How they show up when it matters. Gut health is not separate from leadership. It is part of the foundation.

If you want a quiet system running in the background that builds authority without the noise, book a Reputation Review with LPV.Agency.