Don’t let irregularity scare you into taking laxatives with any frequency.  You can become dependent on these medications, and they don’t solve the underlying cause.

Try these home remedies:

Eat breakfast.
After waking, colon activity increases threefold, and eating a meal doubles that rate.  In fact, eat right after waking and you’ll create a 2-hour window in which your chances for a bowel movement are optimized.

Eat more roughage.
Roughage is what fiber used to be called in great-great grandmother’s day.  This is nature’s way to get better bowel movements.

Today you would call it fiber, both soluble and insoluble.  When you consume the recommended range of 25 or more grams of fiber a day, you will get bowel movements.

However, if you are constipated, you haven’t been doing that and you don’t just leap into a huge nutritional change.  Increase your fiber (roughage) gradually.

Read our article about fiber under the heading Nutrition, to learn what foods are best for you.

Get moving.
Studies suggest that sedentary people are 50% more likely to suffer from constipation than those who exercise regularly.

Honey and warm water.
If nature doesn’t call, mix one to three tablespoons of honey into a glass of warm water and drink.  It tastes good and it’s an age-old remedy that can’t hurt you.

Hydrate.
Drinking water won’t necessarily relieve constipation, but avoiding hydration may help you prevent it in the first place.

Psyllium seed.
You can buy it in bulk at a health food store or packaged as Metamucil.  This type of fiber is effective in treating the initial onset of a blocked bowel.  The downside is that research shows this strategy is hit or miss for chronic constipation.  Try one teaspoon a day.  If that doesn’t work go to a tablespoon.
Your next option is an over-the–counter laxative like Miralax.  This helps soften your stool with water, provoking the muscles in your colon to move things along.

Resistance training:
This may surprise you.  A recent study reports that resistance training (also called strength training) accelerates the movement of food through your large intestine by as much as 56%.

NIH (National Institutes on Health) Solution

We listed the causes of blockage as listed by the NIH at Constipation 101.  An answer is to simply reverse the causes.  Any of them are things you can do for yourself.

Popularity: 2% [?]