Uploaded May 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
TREAT DIGESTION NATURALLY! To find out more see our bookings page here: https://www.byronherbalist.com.au/appointments/
My name is Todd Mansfield and I’m a clinical herbalist dedicated to digestive health. Every week I treat Australian and New Zealand patients with IBS, IBD, SIBO, reflux, indigestion, bloating, loose bowel movements and constipation.
Follow my work here: instagram.com/byron.herbalist
For everyone else, I’m passionate about supporting you so follow along with this free content to support your digestion naturally!
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Most people treat SIBO, feel better and then it comes back and they blame the treatment. But the treatment usually worked and what failed was everything that came after.
I've watched patients run the same antimicrobial protocol two, three, four times, not because the bugs didn't clear, but because nobody ever addressed why the small bowel let them grow in the first place.
Remember that SIBO is a symptom. Your body is not supposed to let bacteria colonise the small bowel and overgrow and when it does that's something not working upstream. The system doesn't fix itself just because you finished a course of treatment.
So you clear the SIBO, your labs normalise, you feel better but the root cause driver is still there be it the slow motility, low stomach acid, nervous system dysregulation from chronic stress. The environment that caused SIBO the first time around is still running in the background and eventually, the bugs just come back.
This is where the maintenance phase comes in. Not more antimicrobials. Not stronger herbs. It's keeping pressure on whichever root cause set the stage, motility, acid output, bile flow, gut lining, large bowel function. Whatever got you better is almost always what's going to keep you better, just on a quieter, more manageable version of the same plan.
The biggest mistake I see is when patients feel well, life gets busy, they slack on the one thing that was working and then symptoms creep back.
The most important thing to leave you with is not to wait until you're symptomatic but to act! The sooner you catch the slide, the easier the recovery.
TREAT DIGESTION NATURALLY! To find out more see our bookings page here: https://www.byronherbalist.com.au/appointments/
My name is Todd Mansfield and I’m a clinical herbalist dedicated to digestive health. Every week I treat Australian and New Zealand patients with IBS, IBD, SIBO, reflux, indigestion, bloating, loose bowel movements and constipation.
Follow my work here: instagram.com/byron.herbalist
For everyone else, I’m passionate about supporting you so follow along with this free content to support your digestion naturally!
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Most people treat SIBO, feel better and then it comes back and they blame the treatment. But the treatment usually worked and what failed was everything that came after.
I've watched patients run the same antimicrobial protocol two, three, four times, not because the bugs didn't clear, but because nobody ever addressed why the small bowel let them grow in the first place.
Remember that SIBO is a symptom. Your body is not supposed to let bacteria colonise the small bowel and overgrow and when it does that's something not working upstream. The system doesn't fix itself just because you finished a course of treatment.
So you clear the SIBO, your labs normalise, you feel better but the root cause driver is still there be it the slow motility, low stomach acid, nervous system dysregulation from chronic stress. The environment that caused SIBO the first time around is still running in the background and eventually, the bugs just come back.
This is where the maintenance phase comes in. Not more antimicrobials. Not stronger herbs. It's keeping pressure on whichever root cause set the stage, motility, acid output, bile flow, gut lining, large bowel function. Whatever got you better is almost always what's going to keep you better, just on a quieter, more manageable version of the same plan.
The biggest mistake I see is when patients feel well, life gets busy, they slack on the one thing that was working and then symptoms creep back.
The most important thing to leave you with is not to wait until you're symptomatic but to act! The sooner you catch the slide, the easier the recovery.
