After what feels like months of short, dark, rainy days, the first shoots of spring are finally on the way. Chances are you’re delighted to put away your winter woollies and sit out in the evenings. But have you also noticed a change in your digestion? If you find bloating and constipation are less of an issue as spring comes around, you’re not alone.
It’s well known that energy levels and mood can fluctuate with the seasons. Most of us have heard of Seasonal Affective Disorder or SAD, a condition that affects at least 1 in 20, and possible as many as 1 in 10 people in the UK. It’s a condition that causes symptoms similar to depression, usually worst in the depths of winter and lifting every spring. ‘Winter blues’ – a less severe version of SAD – affects as many as 1 in 5 people in the winter.
But much else changes over the winter months. As winter draws in, your diet and activity levels often change – even without taking into account the excesses of the Christmas period. These, along with lower levels of daylight, can all contribute to a change in how efficiently your digestive system functions.
Does digestion change with the seasons?
You may not have given much thought to the link between your digestion and the seasons. But the way food is propelled through your gut is profoundly influenced by many behaviours that can alter during winter.
What you eat is fundamental to your digestive health. For instance, getting enough dietary fibre reduces the risk of constipation. Ultra-processed foods by contrast – low in nutrients and often high in additives, sugar, fat and salt – are low in fibre, lead to short-term sugar spikes (and the energy-sapping lows that follow them) and promote chronic inflammation.
Exercise too is important for gut motility – and long nights and cold rainy weather are often a disincentive to get out and active. Importantly, both a poor diet and lack of exercise can have a negative impact on your gut microbiome – the huge community of bacteria and viruses that live in your bowels – which also contribute to sluggish digestion, bloating and inflammation.
On the plus side, if your digestion struggles in the winter months, there’s a good chance that things will improve as your lifestyle shifts with the advent of spring. But there are also lots of changes you can make to guard against a return to bloating and sluggishness before the end of the year.
Why digestion often slows down in winter
Let’s drill down into some of the major seasonal factors affecting digestive health. You may be falling into common negative habits in winter even without realising it.
Lower physical activity
Being active is about more than just exercising the muscles of your limbs – it also helps your gut propel food along your digestive tract in wave-like contractions, a process known as peristalsis. Not only does this process progress digested food from your stomach to your small and then your large intestine to be excreted – it also assists with the process of mixing food with your digestive juices and enzymes, assisting in nutrient absorption.
Reduced activity can also decrease blood flow to the digestive system and alter hormone signals that support bowel movements. Food sitting in your stomach and small intestine, bacterial overgrowth can cause food to ferment early and release gas. And the longer digested food sits in your colon, the more water is absorbed, leading to harder, drier stools.
Heavier, comfort foods
In winter, your appetite-related hormones change. salads all too often lose their appeal – instead, we are conditioned to want warm, rich ‘comfort foods’. While for some of us, this means thick vegetable soups and bean stews, for many it translates into highly processed, carb-heavy foods. These are often high in unhealthy saturated fat and refined carbohydrates – bad for your bowels and for your gut microbiome. Perhaps not surprisingly, this change in diet also means average cholesterol and fasting blood sugar levels rise in winter as well.
Winter mood and food
Depression can affect your appetite in many ways: some people go off food completely, while others crave it, with changes in the brain affecting how pleasant food tastes and how it lights up reward centres in the brain.
If you suffer from SAD or winter blues, you may experience many of the typical symptoms of depression – sadness, loss of enjoyment, excess sleepiness, irritability etc. But classically, SAD is linked to an increase in appetite and specifically to cravings for carbohydrate-rich foods and binge eating. Interestingly, while ‘carbs’ include both starchy (bread, pasta, pastry etc) and sugary (including sugary drinks and sweets) as well as a mix (cakes, biscuits etc) the main increase is in starchy carbs, with no change in protein intake.
Reduced hydration
While you may have heard a lot about the dangers of dehydration in summer, on average you’re likely to drink less water in winter. A significant proportion of fluid intake comes from food – and fruit and vegetables, often passed over in winter in favour of high-carb, refined foods – is lower in water as well as fibre.
What’s more, central heating can have a significant effect on the atmosphere around you, drying out the air. This combination of lower fluid from food and drink with a dry atmosphere can make you prone to dehydration.
Changes in light exposure and routine
Your internal body clock – known as your circadian rhythm – is significantly affected by the seasons, specifically by daylight and sunlight exposure. And that same circadian rhythm plays a key part in regulating gut motility, digestion, absorption of food and the balance of salts in your system. It’s hardly surprising, then, that a disrupted body clock can affect your digestive health.
Why spring can help restore digestive balance
Here’s the good news. As spring comes around, bringing longer days and some much-needed sunshine, many of the behaviours and lifestyle factors that contribute so much to poor gut function melt away.
Increased physical activity
Who hasn’t looked out of the window at the lashing rain and decided that brisk walk or cycle ride – or even trip to the gym – can be put off for now? By contrast, who hasn’t opened their eyes to glorious spring sunshine and reached for a light jacket and some walking shoes?
Just as lack of activity makes you prone to constipation and bloating, getting out and about in the warmer weather stimulates digestion.
More fresh, fibre-rich foods
As spring approaches, you may find those urges for carbohydrate-rich refined foods melt into the background. Hopefully you’ll be replacing them with some of spring’s new crop of gut-friendly fruit and veg, as well as other high fibre foods.
The best food advice for good gut health is to ‘eat a rainbow’. Different fruit and vegetables contain different vitamins and micronutrients, each of which has a role in your body. Whether it’s fresh spring greens, spinach, radishes, watercress, rhubarb or even fresh herbs, spring produce supports gut health.
Improved hydration
It’s important to consider your fluid intake regardless of the time of year. Your body may naturally be sending you more signals to drink in spring and summer. Water is ideal but any non-alcoholic fluid counts towards your daily intake. This includes moderate caffeine-containing fluids (up to 400mg caffeine a day – about 4 cups of coffee or 8 cups of tea) – although you should limit your total caffeine intake to 200mg a day if you’re pregnant.
Resetting daily routines
Longer daylight hours help regulate your sleep patterns and daily habits. Getting back into a regular sleep routine can help reset your circadian clock – and this in turn reduces your exposure to the stress hormone cortisol. It also helps your gut and digestion get back on track.
6 tips to support digestion through seasonal changes
-
Prioritise fibre-rich foods. As well as plentiful fruit and veg, make some simple switches from refined (white) to unrefined starchy carbohydrates. Easy swaps include wholemeal and wholegrain bread, pasta and flour – and adding beans, lentils and pulses to any dishes you’re making is a cheap and tasty way to boost your fibre intake.
-
Stay well hydrated. Do keep a supply of non-alcoholic liquid – ideally water – close to hand. If you’re busy, it makes it easier to act on any thirst signals from your body. You should be aiming for 6-8 cups of fluid (between 1.5 and 2.5 litres) a day – although you may need more if it’s very hot or you’re exercising heavily. Keep an eye on your urine – it should be pale straw coloured.
-
Maintain regular mealtimes. If you’re rushing around, it can be easy to rely on snacks picked up on the move. These are more likely to be low in nutrients and fibre.
-
Include daily movement. The best type of exercise is the kind you’ll stick to. Aerobic exercise – the kind that gets your heart pumping a little faster and makes you mildly out of puff – is ideal for your gut as well as your heart and lungs. You may want to combine this with a form of exercise like yoga, which counts as a muscle-strengthening form of exercise, but which can also reduce stress.
-
Eat slowly and mindfully. By sitting down and concentrating on your food, you give your body time to recognise ‘satiety signals’ (telling you that you’ve had enough) and avoid overeating. If you’re eating in a rush, you’re also more likely to chew less thoroughly and swallow air, which can contribute to bloating.
-
Incorporate fermented foods. Fermented foods such as live yoghurt, kefir and kombucha contain natural probiotics – friendly bacteria to top up the good bacteria in your gut microbiome.
When to speak to a healthcare professional
While many gut-related symptoms don’t signify a potential serious underlying problem, there are some red flags which always warrant contacting your doctor.
These include:
- Being off your food for no obvious reason
- Losing weight without an obvious cause
- Food ‘sticking’ behind your breastbone when you swallow
- Severe or rapidly worsening abdominal pain
- Persistent vomiting (for more than 2-3 days) or diarrhoea for more than 7 days
- Persistent or recurring bloating that doesn’t get better by the next morning
- Vomiting blood or black ‘coffee grounds’
- Black, tarry poos or bright or dark red blood in your poos
- A persistent change in bowel habit with no obvious cause.
Summary
Seasonal digestive changes are common and usually normal. Unless you have any red flags, which might indicate there could be an underlying cause that needs looking into, you can often manage them with simple lifestyle adjustments. Your diet, exercise patterns, hydration and sleep pattern can all influence bowel health. A few healthy tweaks to your diet and lifestyle during winter and spring can support healthy digestion and overall wellbeing.
To learn more about other gut health topics, visit Symprove’s Gut Hub.
Sources
Prevalence and correlates of binge eating in seasonal affective disorder. Psychiatry Res. (2014). Link.
Factors explaining seasonal variation in energy intake: a review. Front Nutr. (2023). Link.
The four seasons: food intake frequency in seasonal affective disorder in the course of a year. Psychiatry Res. (1988). Link.
Dependence of Seasonal Dynamics in Healthy People’s Circulating Lipids and Carbohydrates on Regional Climate: Meta-Analysis. Indian J Clin Biochem. (2022). Link.
Seasonality Affects Fluid Intake Behaviors among Young Adults in Hebei, China. Nutrients. (2024). Link.
Seasonal Affective Disorder: An Overview of Assessment and Treatment Approaches. Depress Res Treat. (2015). Link.
Sleep and Circadian Regulation of Cortisol: A Short Review. Curr Opin Endocr Metab Res. (2021). Link.
Depression-Related Increases and Decreases in Appetite: Dissociable Patterns of Aberrant Activity in Reward and Interoceptive Neurocircuitry. Am J Psychiatry. (2016). Link.
Prevalence of seasonal affective disorder in primary care; a comparison of the seasonal health questionnaire and the seasonal pattern assessment questionnaire. J Affect Disord. (2004). Link.
Circadian rhythms: a regulator of gastrointestinal health and dysfunction. Expert Rev Gastroenterol Hepatol. (2019). Link.
