Acidity is more common than you think—especially for women

It usually starts as a small discomfort. An invisible heaviness behind the ribs, a faint sour taste creeping up the throat or that dull, ballooned feeling that makes you unbutton your jeans at the end of the day. For most of us, acidity and bloating are so routine that they’ve become background noise, never getting the attention that they should.

When lockdown first crept up on us, I blamed my recurring acidity on the food experimentation I partook in. But even on days I ate clean, the burn would return like clockwork around 11 pm, when my laptop light was the only one still on. Turns out, it wasn’t just the food. It was everything else.

“Acidity and bloating are almost always the result of disrupted rhythms,” explains Nicole Linhares Kedia, sports nutritionist and integrated health coach. “Overeating, excessive caffeine, poor sleep. All of these confuse the body’s internal clock.”

It’s a distinctly Indian storm, too. While acidity and bloating are universal, Kedia says she sees it far more here than overseas. “We’ve normalised irregularity. Late dinners, skipping breakfast, long commutes and constant stress. Combine that with our love for fried, spicy carbs and unwalkable cities and you’ve got the perfect storm.”

Even culturally, food is celebration, comfort and a lot of times, coping. But our plates have evolved faster than our lifestyles. The post-dinner walk has been replaced by screens and a ‘home-cooked’ meal by delivery apps. We’re a generation living in constant low-grade digestive distress.

The real culprit

A lot is going on beneath the surface that we need to educate ourselves on. Neha Ranglani, integrative nutritionist, points to a deeper, often-misunderstood root: low stomach acid.

“Most people assume acidity means too much acid. In reality, it’s often the opposite. When stomach acid is low, food doesn’t digest properly, it ferments. That creates gas, bloating and pressure, which pushes acid upward, causing reflux.”

Many of us pop antacids at the first sign of discomfort, unknowingly worsening the problem by neutralising what little acid we have left. A 2023 study published in the Indian Journal of Gastroenterology by Ghoshal et al. found a high prevalence of gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) among Indian adults and a growing dependence on antacids in urban populations.

Why women feel it more

“Hormonal fluctuations during PMS, pregnancy or menopause directly affect gut motility,” says Kedia. “The mental load of juggling work, home and emotional labour add up to a demographic that’s both chronically stressed and rarely on schedule.”

There’s also the quiet cultural layer. Indian women are often the last to sit down to eat, sometimes skipping meals or reheating leftovers after everyone else is done. “You can’t separate digestion from lifestyle,” Ranglani adds. “Stress, sleep, hydration, movement, they all play a role in how food moves through you.”

A case of the city stomach

If you live in an Indian city, you can probably picture it: an overworked stomach processing a late dinner of butter chicken at 10 pm, followed by two hours of scrolling under blue light, and a non-negotiable 7 am alarm. Your gut doesn’t get rest, it just negotiates survival.