00:00:00
What's a fecal transplant? You take a healthy person's poop and you transfer
00:00:03
it into the person who's sick. For example, a patient of mine took an antibiotic which wipes out your gut,
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which became life-threatening. Our choices were to remove the colon or to give her a fecal transplant. And so, I
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delivered the fecal transplant to her. By the next day, the entire infectious issue got shut down. So, this is a great
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example to show how important our gut microbiome is because 60% of the weight of your stool is your microbiome.
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Really? Yes. but it's not getting enough attention and we need to talk about
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that. >> Worldrenowned gastroenterenterologist Dr. Will Bolich is back. >> This time he's sharing brand new
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information regarding the gut microbiome >> and how poo might actually be the key to
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your health. >> 60% of people that listen are currently struggling with some kind of gut problem
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and it manifests in these subtle ways like bloating, increased fatigue, difficulty concentrating, you don't
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sleep well at night, skin issues. So it flies under the radar but ultimately leads to other health related problems
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afterwards. >> So I've got so many questions. >> Totally. >> What's the cause of bloating?
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>> So constipation is the number one cause. But people who are bloated, please don't
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sip through straws, drink carbonated drinks, chew on gum, because you just make it worse.
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>> Next. Are there decisions that you make as a parent that will have a lasting
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impact on a kid's gut function? >> Yeah. By 3 years of age, you are basically fully adult-sized in terms of
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your microbiome. But antibiotics, bottle feeding, and birth by cescareian section
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are associated with an impact on the microbiome, such as an increased risk of allergic, autoimmune, and metabolic
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diseases. And I'll explain why. >> And then, can I repair the gut? >> Yeah, 100%. And every 3 to 5 days, you
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build a new gut barrier. And so, I've identified four things missing in our diet, as well as a daily routine that
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can optimize our microbiome. And when you do these, you will thrive and you will live longer and you will have less
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disease. And I'm going to take you through all of these steps right now. >> I see messages all the time in the
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comments section that some of you didn't realize you didn't subscribe. So, if you
00:01:54
could do me a favor and double check if you're a subscriber to this channel,
00:01:57
that would be tremendously appreciated. It's the simple, it's the free thing
00:02:01
that anybody that watches this show frequently can do to help us here to keep everything going in this show in
00:02:05
the trajectory it's on. So please do double check if you've subscribed and uh
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thank you so much because in a strange way you are you're part of our history
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and you're on this journey with us and I appreciate you for that. So yeah thank
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you Dr. Will. Before we started the recording I asked you about this new book that you've written and the way
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that you spoke about it was incredibly passionate. Why? I I sincerely believe that if
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people take the advice that's in this book and they actually follow it, which
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is the hardest part. I'm completely convinced it will transform your life. And that's because we all are struggling
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with the same problem. We manifest it in different ways, but there's this common
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issue which is inflammation. And it's the health story of our time. It's not getting enough attention. And
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this book is not only about shining the light on that. It's about providing people with the evidence-based tools
00:03:06
that they need in order to be successful and to live an anti-inflammatory life. And when you do that, you will thrive
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and you will live longer and you will have less disease. >> Can you explain inflammation to me like
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I'm a 10-year-old? >> Steve, you have an immune system that protects your body. Mhm.
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>> And inflammation is when we turn that immune system on and we make it active.
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And sometimes that's a good thing, right? If you had a if you had a tummy bug, you want to clear that infection,
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right? If you hurt yourself, you want to heal that wound. That's when your immune
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system is really good. It's working for you. But the problem that we have these
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days is that we're turning on the immune system when we don't need to. And it's
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staying on 24 hours a day, seven days a week. And that ultimately creates problems
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because it leads to new issues, new health conditions. >> The word inflammation sounds like
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something has inflated or become swollen. >> Yeah. >> Well, that is a part of the process. For
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example, if you hurt your knee, right, there there will be inflammation in your knee and it will get red, it will get
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swollen, it will become tender and like those are the typical characteristics of
00:04:16
inflammation when it arrives. But what we're talking about is chronic low-grade
00:04:21
inflammation. And this is a tricky thing because it can fly below the radar. It can fly below the radar where you don't
00:04:27
realize that it's there. Your doctor may not realize that it's there. And it's
00:04:31
and it manifests in these subtle ways where it's like you have increased fatigue. You have difficulty
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concentrating. You don't sleep well at night. You wake up with aches and pains
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or you have joints that hurt a little bit or you've had skin issues, right? And it's like, well, we all have those
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problems, but that's inflammation. Inflammation is driving many of those issues. And so, it's important for
00:04:56
people to be aware that, you know, you may like these. There's so many patients
00:05:01
that go to their doctor complaining of these symptoms. And the doctor's kind of
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not really sure what to do about that. And I think it's time for us to like open our mind and bring awareness to the
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possibility that there is this issue inflammation that's driving that problem, the symptoms, the health
00:05:18
conditions of which there are many. And ultimately, we need a plan to address that.
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>> And is can you be like skinny and in shape and still have inflammation?
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>> 100%. >> So it's not just a a weight thing. No, it's not just a weight thing because if
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you if you think about, you know, people who are competitive bodybuilders, they look amazing on the outside and they're
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falling apart on the inside. And these people often suffer with digestive health problems. I know because they
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reach out to me, including many people that are wellknown who look incredible and they're suffering with gut issues
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and then ultimately they're at risk for other health related problems afterwards. So on this point of
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inflammation is when your immune system kind of stays on. Why does it stay on and uh I mean how do I turn it off?
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>> Well, we we have to start with uh acknowledging that the reason why this
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causes problems is that it let's like sort of use an analogy of the immune system is your small army and they're
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there to defend you. And when we activate the army and they're actually going to war, you have to expect that
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there's going to be damage to the surrounding areas, >> right? Like if people if if there's a
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war occurring, of course there's decimation and damage that occurs and it's brutal. And the problem is that if
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we're activating the immune system, the the areas that are surrounding it, that's your body, right? And the
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decimation and destruction that's occurring is within your own tissues, within your organs. As I was researching
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this book, I I I actually took three years to understand this topic. And what I discovered is a connection between
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your immune system and your gut that is undeniable. And that connection becomes the powerful
00:07:03
fa factor that allows you to understand why it happens and how we can fix it. We
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have uh our gut microbiome and there are 38 trillion microbes that live inside of
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our large intestine and they include bacteria and yeasts and and archa which are these things that
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have been on the planet for 4 billion years and possibly parasites. And so in this entire community of microorganisms,
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they're there with a purpose and that is to support you and your physiology. One
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of their key jobs is actually to uh basically feed the gut barrier that lines your entire intestines.
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>> Do you want to show me on using this? >> Sure. >> Is this a the right part of the body?
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>> So now the large intestine um is the home to your microbiome. So these 38 trillion microbes this is their
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this is their residence. This is their domain where they live. Now this entire system which is like on the order of 20
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or 25 feet so like something on the range of 6 to 8 mters it's coated with a single layer of cells
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which we call the epithelial layer and that is your gut barrier and it's a quite fascinating part of your body
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because this is like the castle wall and keeps the bad stuff out but simultaneously needs to allow the good
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stuff in and These cells they turn over every 3 to 5 days. So it's a beautiful
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thing actually because every 3 to 5 days you have an opportunity to create a brand new gut barrier. So within the
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system the microbes that live inside your colon their job is to basically repair and restore the gut barrier. And
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when the gut barrier is intact it's going to do its job of protecting the immune system.
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And when the gut barrier starts to break down, then things can sneak across which we would refer to as increased
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intestinal permeability, but the common language is leaky gut. The immune system
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will see and recognize things that aren't supposed to be there. And so the immune system then steps up and wants to
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take it out. And that basically means it needs to get activated and attack. And that is inflammation.
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So the breakdown of these three systems that start with the microbes, microbes are actually your first layer of defense
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and then leading to the breakdown of the gut barrier is what ultimately activates
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the immune system when we have things that are sneaking across that are not supposed to be there. the reverse can
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also be true. And that to me is where the exciting opportunity exists is that if you can heal the gut microbes, then
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the gut microbes can get back to work and do their job of repairing and restoring the gut barrier. And when you
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create a strong gut barrier, then basically you're protecting the immune system. And then what you see actually
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is the immune system cools off and it becomes more tactical and capable of doing its job.
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>> Okay? And when we're eating lots of bad stuff and you know many of the things
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we're going to talk about today are causing a breakdown in those microbes which is causing the gut barrier to
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worsen which is causing the immune system to kick in which is causing the inflammation and the inflammation is
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therefore causing our cells to be damaged. What's the immune system overfunctioning causing?
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Like you you're talking about the army analogy where there's an army and
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they're at war and some of them are damaging the surroundings. >> How is it damaging my surroundings? My
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immune system being on all the time. Well, so what ends up happening is it sets off this sort of chain reaction
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which can have an effect throughout your entire body where the immune cells, it's
00:11:02
not just a couple of immune cells, they start to basically send out signals and these signals we call them cytoines. So
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you can measure those cytoines and those are basically communication tools that the immune cells are using with each
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other to basically call for help. So and as they get revved up these cytoines start to go out and then this leads to a
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cascade of even more immune cells releasing even more cytoines. And so and then kick off this wave and this is what
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ultimately you can feel throughout your entire body. um and it and it has these consequences of basically causing damage
00:11:38
to these individual tissues. So it depends on which tissue we're referring to. Inflammation in the liver we would
00:11:43
call hepatitis, right? But at the same time we have overwhelming evidence at this point that inflammation in the
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brain which we call neuroinflammation has been associated with mood disorders. So like major depression inflammation in
00:11:58
the brain has been associated with cognitive disorders like Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease. So, and
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it's not to claim it's not to claim that all disease literally is related or caused by the
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gut microbiome. That's not the call. It's more so to say that we need to
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understand that our immune system is so powerfully connected to our microbiome that you cannot separate the two. And
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there's evidence to suggest that we can we can manipulate. So whether it be antibiotics which decimate the gut or
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the alternative the the opposite would be a fecal transplant which rapidly reinvigorates the gut and restores that
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gut architecture and ecosystem. >> What's a fecal transplant? >> So fecal transplant is where you take a
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healthy person's poop and you transfer it into the person who's sick. >> And where are they administering it?
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>> The way that I've always done the fecal transplant because I've done many
00:12:52
throughout my career is during a colonoscopy. So if in theory >> colonoscopy what's a colonoscopy?
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>> Yeah. So colonoscopy is is a medical procedure where typically you would be
00:13:06
asleep and while you're asleep I take a long flexible tube that is about the
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size of my index finger and I can pass that with control all the way through the entirety of your
00:13:20
large intestine which is about five or six feet long. And I can actually dip into the last part of the small
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intestine which we call the terminal illium which is down here in the right the right lower part of the abdomen.
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You're administering the fecal transplant because they they have this vicious infection called CDEF
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and and again those infections this infection can be life-threatening. And you're administering the fecal
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transplant because the antibiotics are not working. So you need an alternative where the idea and goal is to restore
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balance within the gut ecosystem. >> Yeah. You're putting good bacteria in,
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not taking bad bacteria. Yeah. >> Not taking all bacteria out, I guess. >> So you put and you put the good bacteria
00:14:03
in and when this happens, you're actually all at once reinstalling potentially hundreds of species
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in balance in the right amounts. So, it's like an entire ecosystem transplant. It would be like us being
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like, "Okay, uh here's this forest that's not doing well. We're going to
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take the Amazon and we're going to transplant it into the space." And now
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that we have all these animals that like do well in the space, the forest is washing. It's vibrant again. So, going
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back to our point about the immune system, the reason why the immune system is staying on is because I have damaged
00:14:40
my gut and it's essentially trying to repair my gut. And so if I live in a permanent state of a damaged gut because
00:14:46
of what I'm consuming, then I'm going to live in a permanent state theoretically
00:14:50
of inflammation. The thesis from my perspective is that the modern world and the way in which we live is damaging our
00:14:59
gut, damaging our microbiome, and then we're suffering the consequence of that
00:15:04
which is disruption of our gut barrier and ultimately the activation of our immune system in this forever war, which
00:15:11
is chronic great inflammation. How was cancer associated with this? We you talked about 130 different diseases
00:15:17
and in your book I think it's around page 22 you mentioned I think it's chemotherapy where you're making an
00:15:24
analogy between how chemotherapy kind of wipes everything out and how a poorly kept gut is associated with an increase
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in cancer likelihoods. Let's start with this. Your body produces 3.8 million cells every second.
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Your immune system has the responsibility of identifying where there's a problem and taking it out. You
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can't possibly create 3.8 million new cells and not have some genetic abnormality that could turn into cancer.
00:15:56
Right? So, the responsibility of the immune system is to basically be perfect every day of your life and remove those
00:16:03
problematic cells before they turn into something bigger and better. It's an impossible task. There's an
00:16:10
entire story that's unfolding now in this conversation about how the gut microbiome is connected to our immune
00:16:17
system and the way in which we treat cancer and it's it started really in melanoma. We have been using sort of
00:16:25
immune manipulations for a very long time to treat melanoma. But what changed is they were using these things called
00:16:33
amunotherapy. To be more specific, immune checkpoint inhibitors. So it turns out that your
00:16:41
immune cells have like basically a kill switch. If there was a problem, you could like flip it off immediately.
00:16:48
And that specific receptor is called PD1. And the tumors, they're so nasty because they produce
00:16:57
this protein that basically activates the kill switch, >> turns off your immune system,
00:17:01
>> and it turns off your immune system. So the immune checkpoint inhibitor, the
00:17:06
idea is to basically flip that switch back on. And by flipping it on, activate your immune system, which will then wake
00:17:15
up, see this cancer, be like, okay, that needs to be taken out, and go after it.
00:17:21
If someone received antibiotics before the immune checkpoint inhibitor, they didn't do well. So then it raised the
00:17:27
question, maybe this is a microbiome thing. So they said, okay, well, if antibiotics do this, what happens if we
00:17:32
move in the opposite direction and basically act like restore the microbiome with a fecal transplant? And
00:17:39
what they discovered was incredible results. There's now multiple studies in
00:17:43
melanoma where they take people and they give them a fecal transplant from someone who was a responder
00:17:50
and give it to the person who's about to go get treated. And that's what they
00:17:54
did. And and with incredible results, like literally twice as many people were beating cancer relative to the
00:18:04
expectation. The fascinating thing about that is that it's not just a cancer
00:18:10
story. There's research now in Parkinson's disease. So Parkinson's disease is a neurocognitive disorder. So
00:18:18
that means basically it's a it's a brain condition. >> Mhm. >> Well, it turns out
00:18:24
that Parkinson's probably starts in the gut and this is actually a disorder of the gut brain
00:18:33
connection because both parts are involved. It's not just the brain condition. The brain condition is
00:18:40
actually the more severe part. So for the people who are listening at home, we have a model out and I have
00:18:52
just lifted their skull like uh Hannibal Lectar and exposed their brain tissue. And what we want to talk about is the
00:18:58
brain gut connection, the connections between the brain and their intestines. And so we have classically thought of
00:19:05
Parkinson's disease as being a brain a brain health problem. But I'm here to
00:19:09
tell you that this problem begins down here in the gut and involves the connections between the two because
00:19:15
every single person that I've ever seen with Parkinson's disease, they're
00:19:19
constipated. All of them. And what's interesting is that they've now shown that the constipation
00:19:29
comes before the Parkinson's disease. So now this doesn't mean for people who are
00:19:35
constipated, there's a lot of you out there. This doesn't mean that if you're
00:19:38
constipated, you're going to develop Parkinson's disease. There's a very
00:19:41
small percentage of people, but it's important to understand that the the manifestations of this health condition
00:19:47
actually start in the digestive system before they actually transfer up to the brain. And so now in this study, Steve,
00:19:54
what they did is they took these people who have Parkinson's disease. They gave
00:19:57
them a fecal transplant. >> They gave them a poo transplant. >> They gave them a poo transplant. And
00:20:04
what they found was a year later they had a durable continued benefit in terms of their movement issues.
00:20:16
There are now other studies with Parkinson's disease that are showing benefit both for the brain and the
00:20:23
symptoms of Parkinson's disease, but also for the gut in terms of that constipation that I was talking about. I
00:20:28
mean, it begs the question, these poo transplants sound great. >> Can the average person go and get one?
00:20:33
>> I think we need to talk about that. >> Yeah, we need to talk about that because
00:20:36
there was a Netflix special where they made it sound like uh you should just do it at home. Do not do that. Please do
00:20:43
not do that. So, number one, we need to study and adequately understand what the
00:20:49
risks are. The the fecal transplant makes it sound like this is like the quick easy thing that you do and you fix
00:20:55
your entire life, but that's not the same as rebuilding your microbiome using
00:21:01
the lifestyle and diet tools that actually are going to give you the meaningful health impact that you're
00:21:07
searching for >> over the long term. >> Over the long term, a huge percentage of
00:21:10
the population struggle with gut problems. We asked the D of aio audience and uh roughly it was over 60% of people
00:21:19
that listen said that they're currently struggling with some kind of gut problem
00:21:22
whether it's bloating or some kind of discomfort or just digestion issues generally.
00:21:29
Now that's 61% of people responding to those three words bloating, discomfort,
00:21:32
irregular digestion. Then about 15% of people said that they have IBS. Like 14 15% of people said self diagnose that
00:21:40
they think they have irritable bowel syndrome. Am I right in thinking the causes of what they're saying they
00:21:50
have are wildly different potentially? Or is it like one or two things? Cuz I'm
00:21:55
trying to figure out how I help those 61% of people that like me have eat something sometimes and then feel
00:22:02
and then not really sure what it is, feel a little bit bloated, might feel a bit gassy, um might have strange
00:22:08
digestion, but not necessarily sure what's causing it and when. Yeah, I mean
00:22:12
this is the same issue that I struggle with, right? So I I I write a book with the goal of trying to help as many
00:22:17
people as possible knowing that you can't there's no one-sizefits-all, right? So ultimately it's about
00:22:23
empowering people with the right information and helping them to identify. I literally wrote about this
00:22:28
in my author's note right in the front of the book, which is basically to say
00:22:31
you're all going to read the same book, but the way in which this book touches
00:22:35
you is going to be unique to you. There's going to be something in there that you're going to find that you're
00:22:40
like, that's my moment. That's my aha moment, right? And for many people, like
00:22:44
just looking statistically, looking at the average American diet, there's a huge opportunity when it comes to diet.
00:22:50
And that is where I put a lot of energy and attention because I just I know what
00:22:54
the stats say. So, I know America needs this. But at the same time, there's a
00:22:59
conversation that gets into other topics that look, the way that we live is different than the way that our
00:23:06
grandparents grew up when they were kids. >> Mhm. To me, it's more about like helping
00:23:10
people to see like what is that one thing for them. There's some people who are going to be listening to this that
00:23:15
it's not their diet, it's not sleep, it's not circadian rhythm, it's trauma.
00:23:20
And I think that these are things that need to like we need to shine a light on that. We'll do all of that. On this
00:23:24
point about bloating, discomfort, irregular digestion, if I have one of those things, does that theoretically
00:23:30
mean that something is not right? >> Everyone gets bloated once in a while.
00:23:35
So, I think I think it would be unfair to make it sound like you should never have any adverse symptoms at all.
00:23:40
>> Right. >> But if it's prolonged, >> but if it's prolonged, if it's a chronic
00:23:43
health issue, if you're the type of person who you wake up in the morning and you say, "I hope today is going to
00:23:48
be a good day. I hope I don't have to deal with that specific issue." You you
00:23:51
have a problem like we already know. And then we have to work on that to address
00:23:56
that issue. And how we go about that, I think needs to be on some level personalized.
00:24:02
But the tools that are at our disposal remain the same. So it's just a matter
00:24:07
of like let's put it on the table. Here are your choices. You pick which ones
00:24:12
are most applicable to you. Where are the opportunities for you? And I I can't
00:24:16
tell you that without knowing more about you. >> What about this issue of people getting
00:24:18
gassy like farting a lot? >> Yeah. >> Is that typically associated with one
00:24:22
particular gut issue or is that again could that be a plethora of issues? >> So it could be it could be a plethora of
00:24:28
issues. This is this is a common problem. If I have to like start with what is my number one thing, it's
00:24:34
constipation for sure. 100%. There are so many people who are listening right now that are constipated and they don't
00:24:42
even know it because they poop every day and they think that how often they poop
00:24:47
is the definition. And that's not true. So constipation is what happens when
00:24:53
you're not adequately emptying your bowels. And that could be a frequency problem,
00:25:00
but it could also be that it's a partial poop. >> Oh, okay. Cuz I thought constipation was
00:25:06
if you just haven't been you can't go you go to the toilet and nothing comes
00:25:09
out. >> Look, don't get me wrong. If you if you don't poop for a week, I know you're
00:25:12
constipated. I don't need to ask any more questions. If you go a week, but if
00:25:15
it's there are people who they poop every other day. That's their normal.
00:25:20
They feel fine. They don't have any gut symptoms. They don't have a constipation
00:25:23
problem. We're okay. >> Right? Right. So frequency is not the be all and end all.
00:25:28
>> It's part of the it's part of the equation, right? But there's also people
00:25:32
who they poop and I I want to sort of paint the picture and forgive me like I feel very comfortable talking about
00:25:38
poop. This is what I've done for a living. >> But they they go to the bathroom in the
00:25:44
morning. They struggle. It's not satisfying. They had to work really hard to get a little nugget to
00:25:50
come out. And then they feel like they still have to go. and maybe 45 minutes later they poop
00:25:58
again. Okay, that's not a new poop. You're doing partial poops. You're
00:26:02
probably doing a 20 or 25% poop. So, you could poop three, four times during the
00:26:07
day. You might not still be fully emptying your bowels, right? And so that so that's an example of a person who can
00:26:15
actually be struggling with bloating and constipation and not think because they're like, "Doc, I'm pooping three
00:26:20
times a day." >> Where is the gas coming from in that? Why why do people you eat something and
00:26:25
then you fart a lot? What's going on? >> So gas so gas travels with poop. Um uh
00:26:31
you may I don't mean you specifically, Steve, people listening may notice this
00:26:36
that you wake up in the morning and you're farting like crazy. And that farting continues until you actually
00:26:45
have your morning bowel movement. And then once you have your good, healthy morning bowel movement, you feel solid
00:26:50
and you're not farting anymore, right? the gas travels with the poop. So, and
00:26:54
the reason why this happens is because first of all, your poop is not just the leftover remains of your food. Actually,
00:27:01
your poop is predominantly your microbiome. 60% of the weight of your stool is microbial.
00:27:10
>> Really? >> Yes. >> When you say microbial, you mean like the bacteria?
00:27:14
>> The bacteria. >> 60% of it. >> Let me give you an example. If I took
00:27:17
your drink and I added some soluble fiber, which is prebiotic, into your drink. >> Yeah.
00:27:24
>> There's no grit, there's no roughage, you don't even know it's there. And
00:27:29
you're going to have a bigger, healthier bowel movement tomorrow as a result of
00:27:32
what I just did. Why? Because I fed your microbes and they grow stronger and then
00:27:37
they multiply. And because they multiplied, you have a bigger bowel movement, >> right? That's the way that that works.
00:27:44
Now, don't get me wrong. You eat, you know, a salad, you're going to end up
00:27:48
with a bigger bowel movement as well, but a big part of that is the fiber within that salad that's feeding these
00:27:54
microbes. They multiply, they grow, and you have a big bowel movement. >> So, if that was my if that was my my
00:27:59
store, my poop, I'm holding a chocolate bar here. 60% of that would be the microbes.
00:28:04
>> 60% of that would be the microbes. Yes. So for that person when the poop is in
00:28:11
gridlock and it's not moving through then those microbes are basically sitting there with unlimited time to
00:28:20
ferment and produce gas. >> Okay? >> So anything they come into contact with,
00:28:25
they're just going to start working on it. So and it's not just like a fiber
00:28:28
thing. Anything they come into contact with, it could be protein, they will ferment it. They will produce gas. So,
00:28:34
this is a big part of the reason why constipation is so strongly associated with gas and bloating.
00:28:39
>> When people eat dairy and things like that, and I think some people that have
00:28:42
gluten, they they often tend to get a little bit gassy. >> Yeah. >> Is that constipation?
00:28:48
>> Gas and bloating is not just a constipation issue. I would argue that constipation is the number one cause of
00:28:54
that particular issue, but there's many potential causes. Number one could be
00:28:57
motility. That's constipation. >> What's motility? >> Motility is the way in which your
00:29:01
intestines move. So if the intestines move too fast and out of rhythm, you get diarrhea. If the intestines slow down
00:29:09
too much, sluggish, you get constipation. We want the intestines in a rhythm because when they're in a
00:29:16
rhythm, just like your heart, that's when they perform their best. So in a rhythm basically means predictable,
00:29:23
consistent daily bowel movements. That's ultimately where we would love to be,
00:29:28
right? And that in a way taps into like an entire circadian conversation that we
00:29:32
can have later. This is a part of your circadian rhythm is a fantastic morning bowel movement. Motility is just one of
00:29:40
the causes of gas and bloating. The second is the microbiome. If you have a microbiome that's damaged and
00:29:46
struggling, it's not going to be able to do its job the way it's supposed to. And
00:29:51
part of its job is processing and breaking down fiber. Because the fiber in our diet, we don't have the enzymes
00:29:58
to digest it. So, it works its way through the intestines, comes into contact with the microbes, and the
00:30:03
microbes, they have literally 60,000 enzymes that we don't have as humans. They go to work as teams. Fiber stops
00:30:14
being fiber, produces short- chain fatty acids. This is the way that it's supposed to work.
00:30:20
When your gut is not happy, they're weak. the microbes are weak and you're
00:30:25
asking them to do work and they can't handle that and you end up with sloppy
00:30:30
digestion and that's gas and bloating. The third thing can be your diet. So you
00:30:36
just mentioned dairy which contains lactose. Lactose can be easily fermented to produce gas.
00:30:44
You mentioned gluten. Gluten itself is a protein. So can gluten technically be fermented? Yes, it
00:30:51
could be technically fermented, but that's not really the that's not really
00:30:53
what's going on. What's happening is that gluten containing foods, which are
00:30:59
wheat, barley, and rye, also contain these carbohydrates called fruans. And fruans are actually really good for
00:31:09
our microbes. They're prebiotic. But if you consume a very large amount of them and you're not used to eating
00:31:16
these foods, it can cause gas and bloating. these days. When I was younger, if I had uh if
00:31:22
I had pasta, I was fine. If I have pasta these days, I'm going to feel it for the
00:31:26
next like two two days. >> Really? >> Yeah. I don't know. And I don't even
00:31:29
know what's going on. But then other people can eat pasta as much as they want, it seems.
00:31:34
>> Out of curiosity, can you go to Italy and eat pasta and be okay or no? Same
00:31:37
thing. >> I haven't really not really tried. Um, >> anecdotally, I think when I remove when
00:31:44
I have like nongluten bread or non-gluten pasta, I I think I'm I feel much better. But I but I'm well
00:31:52
aware from speaking to people like yourself that such a small percentage of the population is actually gluten
00:31:57
intolerant, but we all kind of think we are to some degree. I think it's was
00:32:01
what's the the numbers? Is it like 20% of people think they are or something?
00:32:04
So, like here in Los Angeles, it's um like probably 80% of people >> think that
00:32:10
>> well like almost everyone's gluten-free. Yeah. Right. >> Which
00:32:13
>> they don't need to be. And and actually it can cause problems. It can it can
00:32:17
cause problems to be gluten-free unless you know what adaptations to make. >> So, what are you when you ask that
00:32:24
question about Italy, what are you getting at? There's a processing issue in the United States involving wheat,
00:32:32
which is that they allow the wheat to be sprayed with glyphosate, which is Roundup. It's a weed killer.
00:32:40
And you they do that to basically dry it out as quickly as possible. So, imagine
00:32:44
for a moment that you're a farmer, and you have this this field of wheat. You
00:32:48
harvest it. Okay, here are your choices, Steve. You can wait a couple weeks and let it dry out naturally in the air and
00:32:55
and store it somewhere or you can spray it with this chemical and it will be dry
00:32:59
by tomorrow and then you can chip it up. >> Yeah. >> Right. And the problem is that
00:33:03
glyphosate is not on the label. You would never know whether it's sprayed or
00:33:08
not sprayed unless you're buying organic. If you buy organic, then by definition they're not allowed to spray
00:33:12
it. You would never know if it's there. The the the thing about glyphosate is that
00:33:20
it's been approved to exist in our food system under the assumption of safety
00:33:28
because what it does is it shuts down this thing called the Schikim pathway and that kills weeds or it kills plants
00:33:38
and we have a workaround and it has to do with basically amino acids. We have a workaround where we can basically create
00:33:44
those amino acids as humans, but the plants can't. So the plants die, we live. But there's a problem, which is
00:33:53
that the microbes that live inside of our large intestine, they don't have the workaround.
00:34:02
So that microscopic amount of glyphosate, you would say, well, us big humans, that's so small. Yeah. But what
00:34:10
do you think happens when it comes into contact with them? We know that glyphosate disrupts the
00:34:17
microbiome, that it depletes the beneficial bacteria, and the ones that tolerate it the best
00:34:23
are the inflammatory ones, >> the bad bacteria. >> The bad bacteria. So, you're shifting
00:34:27
the balance. And this is this is a small thing, but I hear from people, Steve, that go to Italy, they say, "I can't eat
00:34:34
wheat in the United States." And then they go to Italy and they're fine. And
00:34:39
you think it's that glyphosate. >> Yeah. They don't do that there.
00:34:41
>> So if I tried I'll try organic pasta tonight and maybe that'll be better.
00:34:47
>> Yes. And then like the alternative choice is how do you do with bread? Are
00:34:52
you okay? >> Uh not all bread. My my generally I stay away from bread. >> Okay. Do you ever eat sourdough?
00:35:00
>> Yeah. >> Do you do okay with sourdough? >> Yeah. >> There we go. So here's here's the second
00:35:05
part of this equation. Put the glyphosate. Put that to the side for a moment. Let's talk about the fruans that
00:35:09
we were talking about a moment ago. >> When you ferment your uh your wheat,
00:35:15
when you ferment your dough, you actually reduce the frucan content. >> What's fru?
00:35:21
>> So these are the the longchain carbohydrates that exist in wheat, barley, and rice.
00:35:26
So if it contains gluten, it also contains these fruans. Like gluten is not the only thing in wheat, right? And
00:35:32
these fruans, again, they're good for you. They're good for your microbiome.
00:35:37
But people who have a slightly damaged gut, they struggle to process and digest them. So this would explain why some
00:35:45
people they eat they eat, you know, wheat containing, gluten containing foods and they struggle, but they do
00:35:51
okay with sourdough because if you ferment the the bread, it takes it reduces the frucine content and actually
00:35:57
then you can tolerate it. >> Oh, okay. So you think it might be the fruine in the bread that I have an issue
00:36:01
with and sourdough doesn't have fruine in it. Yeah, there was there was a study
00:36:05
that was in gastronurology a few years ago. G gastronurology is the top journal in my field where basically they they
00:36:11
sent people home with a bunch of breakfast bars. All right, not chocolate, but nonetheless, they sent
00:36:17
people home with a bunch of breakfast bars, three of them. One of them was a placebo bar, so they didn't add anything
00:36:22
special. One of them contained a very large concentration of gluten and then the third one contained the
00:36:30
frucans. And the placebo is our standard. We're going to compare to that. When people
00:36:36
ate the gluten containing bar, and these were, by the way, people that um they did not have celiac disease, they did
00:36:43
have gluten problems according to them, right? So like this is like the 20% of people that you mentioned a moment ago
00:36:49
who think they might have a gluten problem. When they ate the gluten containing bar,
00:36:54
they actually had less symptoms than the placebo. So in other words, the gluten is not the
00:37:03
problem. But when they ate the fruc containing bar, they were triggered. So basically what this said is that we
00:37:14
have been taking this concept of gluten intolerance and we've we've misnamed it.
00:37:19
It's not a gluten intolerance, it's a fruine intolerance. These are people who
00:37:22
are tending to struggle with these particular parts of that food. What foods contain fruine? So, uh, wheat,
00:37:28
barley, and rye, >> okay? >> And different there's there's many
00:37:33
different types of fruans, by the way. So, you may not react to all of them. You may react to just some of them,
00:37:42
>> but like garlic and onions are also classic. So, you hear people who are
00:37:46
like, I can't eat garlic. I feel it's horrible. Right? That's a that can be a
00:37:49
fru issue. Te, amaranth, sorghum, um, quinoa. These are these are whole grains that don't contain gluten and
00:38:00
they also don't contain frucans. >> How long does it take to repair the gut
00:38:08
when you have done damage to it? That's a very broad question intentionally, but
00:38:13
generally for the average person who's done who sort of irritated their gut,
00:38:17
how long does it take to restore and for those microbes to go back? It really depends. You have to start with, okay,
00:38:24
what's your starting point, right? Like how deep is the damage? How bad is it?
00:38:28
Because for the people who have ulcerative colitis or Crohn's disease, those are forms of inflammatory bowel
00:38:33
disease. Those people have the deepest dis dispiosis. Dispiosis is the word that we
00:38:39
use for a damaged gut. Is it possible to reverse that? >> Um, it's possible to put them into
00:38:45
remission so deeply that they don't have a flare. >> Is that what the flare looks like on
00:38:52
this little model that I have in front of me? >> Yes. So, so going back for the people
00:38:56
who are listening and not on YouTube, you can flip over to YouTube if you're
00:38:59
interested. But what I'm showing here is the model of the large intestine. And
00:39:04
the model includes a little area that it looks raw, >> ulcerated, it's bleeding. It if you if
00:39:11
you were to bump up against it, it's going to start to you'll start to see
00:39:15
blood coming out. So, it's like a it's a very vulnerable sensitive uh area. Now,
00:39:20
these inflammatory bowel diseases, Steve, I have an interesting study on this topic. They are to me the classic
00:39:27
gut inflammatory health condition. And what's happening is the immune system is attacking the microbiome.
00:39:37
So technically, it's not actually autoimmune because autoimmune would be you're
00:39:42
attacking your own body. The immune system is not attacking your intestines. The immune system is attacking your
00:39:47
microbiome and rejecting it. And because that's happening, your intestines are stuck in the middle.
00:39:54
>> So this here is the immune system attacking the microbiome. It's attacking
00:39:59
the microbiome which is in the tube of the large intestine and the immune system is trying to get at it and kill
00:40:05
it. >> Why? >> And because it's decided that it's the enemy. So the immune system is confused
00:40:11
because when we're born, we don't have much of a microbiome at birth. It's the closest that we will get
00:40:17
to not really having anything. And then during the first three years of life, you build your microbiome through your
00:40:25
life experience. And by three years of age, you are basically fully adult-sized in terms of your microbiome. During this
00:40:31
time, your immune system is learning from and with those microbes. So, there's this interplay between the two
00:40:41
that is undeniable where when the microbiome is healthy during childhood, during those first
00:40:46
three years, it results in a healthier immune system. >> So, what's going on here? The immune
00:40:52
system is supposed to acknowledge your microbiome as being friendly and it does not. It decides that your microbiome is
00:41:00
the enemy and so it's taking it out. So what what what do you think is for someone that has like irritable bowel
00:41:06
syndrome or Crohn's disease and they or they you know they have one of these big
00:41:10
sort of ulcers in their small or large intestine. Is it because of their lifestyle typically a lifestyle change
00:41:18
or >> or is it lots of things? What's the number one perpetrator? >> Okay. There's clearly a genetic
00:41:24
component. >> Okay. >> Okay. So, we have to we have to be upfront about that. Like these are these
00:41:28
are things that are not necessarily within a person's control entirely >> because I mean there's no evolutionary
00:41:34
reason why this would happen. >> Like there's no evolutionary reason why
00:41:37
you'd have severe gut digestion problems. >> No, it's not to there's no advantage to
00:41:41
it at all. And and these things that uh that occur, they were quite rare years ago. In fact, in third world countries
00:41:52
today, there's not much inflammatory bowel disease. There's not a lot of
00:41:56
Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis in third world countries. If you go to
00:41:58
Africa, there's very little. And what then what you see though is as countries
00:42:03
industrialize, there's a takeoff and they start ramping up. So within the United States over the course of 40
00:42:09
years from 1970 to 2010, ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease cases were increasing by up to 55%.
00:42:17
And you can get that at any age. >> You can get that at any age. Yeah. >> So even if I'm healthy right now, I
00:42:23
could do a set of things that would give me this. >> Yes. In fact, if you take So back to our
00:42:28
conversation about antibiotics, if you take antibiotics, your risk of developing an inflammatory bowel disease
00:42:34
in the next year just doubled. >> Oh gosh. >> If you disrupt the gut with antibiotics,
00:42:39
which the antibiotics do, there's nothing that will basically like decimate the gut faster. Reducing gut
00:42:45
diversity. disrupting the gut barrier by 50% during a course of antibiotics and activating the immune system. It really
00:42:53
speaks to that like if you take antibiotics, these risks of inflammatory health conditions really start to go up.
00:42:59
We see this in both adults and kids. >> You had a patient of yours called Michelle who took antibiotics and had a
00:43:07
life-threatening swelling of her colon. This is this is the colon, right? >> Uh
00:43:13
>> show me where the colon is. >> So the colon is the large intestine.
00:43:16
>> Okay, fine. Yeah. Yeah. >> And so she took an antibiotic and had a
00:43:18
life-threatening swelling of the of her large intestine. >> So she took an antibiotic. She took
00:43:23
clintomy which is a classic skin antibiotic. >> Okay. >> And the problem is that clintomyosin
00:43:31
wipes out your gut like hard. And when that happens, there's a risk that this pathogenic like bad bacteria
00:43:40
called CIFF, if it's in there, it can multiply and then you get this infection, the C diff
00:43:47
infection that causes inflammation of the entire colon. So this patient, Michelle, what happens, I was on call
00:43:54
and I get this text and they say, "You got to come to this room right now. This
00:43:58
patient is sick." And she had just been transferred in from an outside hospital.
00:44:02
So, I was in the middle of typing up a consultation. Drop that, run through the hospital, walk into the room. She's
00:44:09
clutch clutching her belly and she's moaning and groaning and she has no clue
00:44:15
where she is. She's sweaty. She's pale. Her vital signs are completely out of
00:44:20
whack. Her heart is racing. She's breathing really fast. And um and I did a little test which is that I gently
00:44:31
bumped her bed just like that. And if a person has severe inflammation of their intestines,
00:44:40
they will jump if you do that because they have peritonitis, right? Or you could call it an acute
00:44:47
abdomen. So just by bumping the bed like that was ENOUGH FOR HER TO AND SHE'S SCREAMING,
00:44:54
RIGHT? And clutching her belly and she has no clue where she is or what is going on. She's completely delirious.
00:45:01
Uh she was maxed out on antibiotics. Our choices were to rush her to surgery, remove the colon, or alternatively to
00:45:11
give her a fecal transplant and give her a shot at keeping her colon. So, I take her down to the operating
00:45:17
room and I actually um used a I mean, I won't bore you with the details, but I
00:45:22
used a special technique that's atypical for what I would normally do because the
00:45:26
inflammation was so severe to pass a scope. So, this scope that I used was a smaller
00:45:33
scope to be more gentle. >> A scope being a tube. >> A scope is a tube. And I mentioned that
00:45:38
if you get a colonoscopy, it's the size of my index finger. So that's like
00:45:42
probably about a centimeter across. But I I instead went with a smaller scope that's more like 5 millime 6 millimeters
00:45:49
across. It's more gentle and it just makes it harder to do. But I I basically
00:45:54
passed the scope through her rectum and all the way through her intestines to get it over here on the right side. So
00:46:02
that's basically like I have now passed all the way through her large intestine.
00:46:06
And in that location, I delivered the fecal transplant to her. And so the amazing thing is that number
00:46:15
one, that procedure went really well. By the next day, she was a normal human being. She was laying in bed. She was
00:46:24
able to have a conversation. And after 2 days, she was so normal that we were able to send her home.
00:46:32
So the entire severe infectious issue that she was facing got shut down and corrected by restoring
00:46:43
her microbiome. And then when you restore the microbiome, the C diff basically gets suppressed and the immune
00:46:50
system falls back into balance. The inflammation washed away. >> So do you have like a like a fridge full
00:46:56
of these fecal matters that you can just tap into when when you need it? No, but
00:47:00
there is a company in in Massachusetts that does. >> Um, and so and that's what most
00:47:05
hospitals use is they'll basically have this sent in. But it's actually kind of
00:47:08
interesting because there's there's new development in this space where for the
00:47:13
first time drug companies are actually identifying how to manipulate the microbiome using things that are not
00:47:21
actually a fecal transplant but sort of derived from the idea. M >> now what they're developing is a way to
00:47:28
rebuild the gut and protect it during this period of vulnerability. So that's
00:47:32
the new thing that's coming. >> You must hear about so many different types of diets and juice cleanses and
00:47:40
whatever else that influencers and podcasters promote that you absolutely hate because you
00:47:48
have a deeper understanding of the consequences on the gut. What are some of the biggest diets or I don't know
00:47:54
these sort of trends that you absolutely despise because they are misinforming people about how to create a healthy
00:48:00
gut? >> Well, I think the thing from my perspective is that um uh trends fluctuate hard.
00:48:07
>> Yeah. >> Right. In 2020, it was like the vegan diet was in. >> In 2023, it was the carnivore diet. You
00:48:16
couldn't have more diametrically opposed diets. >> Yeah. >> Right. And and so the problem is that to
00:48:22
the person who's at home and they're trying to get this figured out, it's
00:48:25
very easy to get sucked into whatever the trend is because that's what you're
00:48:28
hearing about when you open up your social media, right? Whereas as I sit here, the science has not changed that
00:48:36
dramatically in the last 5 years. We are working on this, but these are small fluctuations in terms of our
00:48:42
understanding of things. It's not a radical. We don't whiplash like that,
00:48:46
>> right? So nor has your biology. you have the same biology five years ago. So this
00:48:50
entire concept of like whipping people over the place is total from my perspective. I want to start by saying
00:48:58
that any person who has the audacity to change their diet in the interest of their health,
00:49:05
like I actually I actually think that's incredible and it doesn't matter what
00:49:09
your choice is because you're just trying to figure it out. And ultimately I just want people to be better. But the
00:49:15
problem is that there's a lot of dietary advice that's insane and it comes on
00:49:20
both sides, Steve. So, absolutely, I don't believe that a 100% meat or organ
00:49:26
diet is imbalance or the optimal solution for longevity. But on the flip side, like a fruit only
00:49:35
diet, I would never support or recommend either. That's completely insane. What
00:49:38
are we doing? So I think that like these highly the more restrictive that you get
00:49:43
the more that I think you're drifting away from what is quite simple which is
00:49:47
whole food in balance. >> What about these like juice diets and stuff like that? People do people do
00:49:54
like a 7-day juice diet or water diet or whatever. >> So you will you will often feel better
00:50:03
if you have gut issues and you take away the stuff that's irritating your gut.
00:50:09
And so simplifying your diet and doing something like that, you can make yourself feel better on a temporary
00:50:14
basis and think that you did something, generally speaking, that's not really
00:50:18
doing much of anything at all. >> How long does it take to both kill and then create new new gut microbes?
00:50:24
>> Well, so the beauty of it is that your gut is very forgiving. So the choices
00:50:28
that you make today will be reflected in your microbiome by tomorrow. The beauty
00:50:33
of it is that these microbes like their superpower is that they are able to procreate so
00:50:39
fast. >> Procreate meaning making babies. So they can make they can create new generations
00:50:45
like estimates are potentially as quick as 20 minutes. And so we can use that to
00:50:50
our advantage because if we actually support them with what they need, change can come real quick. And you know, I get
00:50:57
back to every 3 to 5 days. You build a new gut barrier. So, there's an amazing opportunity that
00:51:06
we have to actually see some quick health effects. Are there any big sort of health myths or diet myths that
00:51:13
you're concerned about that people are currently following or believe in particular? Is there anything you look
00:51:18
out into the world and think, "Oh god, that's going to be awful for the gut."
00:51:21
Oh gosh. It's not something that I pay a ton of attention to because I'm not on
00:51:25
TikTok to be honest with you. >> So, um it's I find it interesting that
00:51:30
actually like Tik Tok some of the trends that have come more recently are actually on point.
00:51:35
>> So, which feels great because I love it when like people are getting excited
00:51:39
about stuff that's good. The like the fiber maxing trend. >> I'm not hiding about them. So fiber
00:51:44
maxing, it feels like after not really talking about fiber for a really long time, people are starting
00:51:53
to come around to the benefits that come from fiber. And this was really exemplified on Tik
00:52:00
Tok with this fiber maxing trend where people are basically trying to increase their fiber profoundly.
00:52:07
So the issue though is that you have to ease your body into it. So, I think the idea is the right idea of where people
00:52:12
are trying to go, but the execution, I just want people to do it in a way where they feel okay. Cuz if they don't feel
00:52:18
well, they're going to bail and then they're going to think, well, fiber is
00:52:22
not for me. >> And what was this trend? It was people trying to just get above their up and
00:52:26
above their daily recommended dose of fiber by eating high fiber foods. >> Yes. And acknowledging that 95% of
00:52:33
people in the United States and 90% of people in the UK are deficient in fiber as we sit here right now. And what
00:52:39
complications or implications does that have for one's gut microbiome? >> Massive.
00:52:44
>> Because fiber is feeding the good bacteria. >> Fiber is the principal food for the good
00:52:49
bacteria. And it is the precursor to short- chain fatty acids. So the short- chain fatty acids are what we create
00:52:57
when fiber comes into contact with microbes. Short chain fatty acids are the thing we create when fiber comes in
00:53:03
contact with the gut microbiome. >> Yes. >> Bacteria. Okay. And the short- chain fat
00:53:09
fatty acids are really good. >> They're so good. In fact, of all of the
00:53:13
things that I've studi studied and learned about, these are the most anti-inflammatory thing that I've ever
00:53:18
come across. So, there's three of them, three main ones. Acetate, propriionate, and butyrate. They all
00:53:27
have their own distinct effects within the body. They have effects right there in the gut, on the microbes, on the gut
00:53:35
barrier, on the immune system. >> And these are produced, these three things you just named are produced when
00:53:40
fiber comes in contact with the gut microbiome. >> Yeah. So, like if you were sterile, if
00:53:43
you didn't have, if you were born without a microbiome >> um like you ever hear about Bubble Boy?
00:53:48
>> Oh, yeah. There was a film or TV show, wasn't there? >> Yeah. It was like a documentary in the
00:53:52
70s of this kid who was he was born with this rare genetic immune disorder. And so his family in order to try to protect
00:54:00
him, they isolated him thinking if if no bad stuff can get in, then he would be fine, right? So like he lived in a
00:54:08
sterile bubble. So in theory, if you were sterile, you would never get the benefits of these short- chain fatty
00:54:14
acids >> because you'd never have bacteria. >> Because you don't have bacteria.
00:54:18
>> Okay? >> So we have the the opposite of that problem, which is that we have bacteria,
00:54:23
but we don't feed them. We don't give them fiber. You can't create something
00:54:26
from nothing. So you have to give them the fiber in order to allow them to create the short- chain fatty acids from
00:54:32
it. >> And these short- chain fatty acut microbiome in my gut here. I put fiber
00:54:38
in there in the form of what foods are the best foods for fiber. >> Okay. So what we have here is an entire
00:54:46
array of choices. >> And the beauty of it is that there's only one thing that I can spot on these
00:54:54
two plates that does not contain fiber. Do you want to guess? I guess that it is.
00:55:01
>> Okay. >> You want me to give it to you? >> It does. >> Is it the It's not the turmeric, is it?
00:55:06
>> No, but the turmeric probably doesn't have very much. >> Okay.
00:55:09
>> No, it's the oil because the issue is that this is 100% fat. So, you by
00:55:16
definition cannot have any fiber inside of an oil. >> Okay. Sorry. >> It's like sunflower oil, olive oil.
00:55:23
>> So, yeah, whatever whatever type. Now, it could have polyphenols, like extravirgin olive oil has polyphenols
00:55:28
that are really good for the microbiome. >> Extravirgin olive oil is actually
00:55:32
incredibly good for the microbiome, but it doesn't have fiber. Everything else
00:55:36
has fiber. So, we have all these different plant-based foods. And the beauty of it is that it doesn't have to
00:55:41
be complicated. Fruits, vegetables, whole grains, seeds, nuts, and legumes, they all have fiber.
00:55:48
>> Meat, anything that's not a plant does not have fiber. Oh, >> okay. So, if it grows in the ground, it
00:55:53
has fiber. So if it comes if it comes from a plant, it has fiber and that includes, by the way, the mushrooms. So
00:55:59
the mushrooms are technically fungi. Um, but they share a lot of the same characteristics that the plant-based
00:56:06
foods do. So there's fiber, there's polyphenols, all of these things we want
00:56:10
to include in a healthful diet. So if I eat these high-fiber foods, they go into
00:56:14
my gut, the microbiomes produce this thing called short- chain fatty acids. And the short chain fatty acids, they
00:56:20
produce more good bacteria, but also they help my immune system calm down. Yes. So, if you think about, let's go
00:56:28
back to the model that we led off with, which is that there's these three parts
00:56:32
to your immune system or actually your I should call it your defense system because your gut microbes are the first
00:56:39
layer of defense, right? That was what was broken down by the antibiotics and Michelle.
00:56:42
>> Mhm. The second layer of defense is your gut barrier, which is the lining of your
00:56:47
gut that protects the immune system. >> And then the third part is the actual
00:56:50
immune system itself. We don't even want to have to activate that. We'd rather
00:56:54
the first two parts take care of it for us. Right? So the beauty of this is that
00:56:59
you eat, you consume these high-fiber foods. They come into contact with your microbes right here in the large
00:57:05
intestine. Specifically, the right colon is the classic spot. and they they unpack them and they
00:57:13
release the acetate, propriionate and butyrate. And those three things impact your
00:57:19
microbes, impact your gut barrier, impact your immune system. Now, of the three, my favorite is butyrate because
00:57:29
it's the butyrate that has the biggest effect on the microbes, on the gut barrier. like you literally need
00:57:34
butyrate in order to produce the proteins that hold your uh your gut lining together. Um and the butyrate has
00:57:43
a direct effect on our immune cells. So these are again the most anti-inflammatory thing that I've come
00:57:49
across and part of why we're suffering with these going back to the original
00:57:53
conversation about these chronic inflammatory health conditions and you asked me where do they come from? We
00:57:58
live in an industrial world where 95% of us at a minimum 90% of us are not getting even close to the amount of
00:58:06
fiber that we need. And when we compare this to other places, so there was an interesting study that came out recently
00:58:16
where they looked at the microbiome of people in Italy, Singapore, and then they had native tribal people in the
00:58:26
Bolivian Amazon and native tribal people in Malaysia. So two indigenous tribes living a you know
00:58:36
hunter gatherer lifestyle. against Italy and Singapore. And what they discovered is that there's
00:58:43
this radical difference in terms of the diversity of the microbiome. There's a
00:58:47
difference in terms of um their their ability to produce short- chain fatty acids.
00:58:54
And there's this question that comes up about aging because as we age, inflammation increases.
00:59:03
Is that inevitable? Are we stuck in a position where like based upon our age we should just expect
00:59:11
that we're going to have more inflammatory issues? What they found in the tribal populations is that actually
00:59:18
that's not true at all. So they were protected against inflammation regardless of their age because of their
00:59:26
lifestyle. But they were living and it's not just what they eat. It's they they wake up
00:59:31
when the sun comes up. They sleep when the sun goes down. They're connected to
00:59:35
their tribe. They're not looking at Instagram. Like there's so much to that
00:59:41
story. The point being though that in the industrial world like we're not consuming a sufficient amount of these
00:59:47
types of foods. I guess they're not also drinking alcohol and vaping. >> No.
00:59:53
>> Which we, you know, do a lot more in the Western world. >> Yeah, we do.
00:59:57
>> What impact does that have on the gut microbiome? Because I don't typically
01:00:00
hear people talking about alcohol in the gut microbiome. What we know is that it
01:00:05
definitely affects the gut barrier. >> I guess total clarity wiping up my my
01:00:09
oral microbiome as well to some degree if I'm pouring vodka. >> And it would be the same as it would be
01:00:13
the same as using an alcohol-based mouthwash, >> right? Which which now we don't
01:00:18
recommend anymore. And so yeah, so alcohol, there was a study actually that changed my mind when
01:00:25
it comes to alcohol. So I actually don't drink hardly at all anymore. like very
01:00:30
rarely I'll have a glass or two with my wife if we're on a special dinner. And
01:00:34
in this study they they basically gave people a significant amount of alcohol and then they tracked every 30 minutes
01:00:44
the measure of their blood alcohol level and simultaneously the measure of what's
01:00:50
called lipopolysaccharide. So it's it comes from the inflammatory bacteria that live inside of our
01:00:56
microbiome. It's not supposed to be in your bloodstream. If it's in your bloodstream, that
01:01:02
generally indicates that your gut barrier is insufficient and weak because it's able to get across. And the problem
01:01:11
is that the immune system has been trained to identify that lipopolysaccharide as the enemy and so it gets activated.
01:01:25
So, and this is where inflammation comes from. So, in this study, they had people
01:01:30
have a number of drinks and they start tracking every 30 minutes. And what you saw
01:01:36
was that as the blood alcohol level goes up in parallel, the lipopolysaccharide goes up. When the alcohol peaks, so did
01:01:49
the lipopolyaccharide. There was this weird thing that happened. I don't I can't explain why,
01:01:54
but the alcohol level peaked. It started to come down and then actually bumped back up. And when that happened, the
01:02:00
lipopolysaccharide followed the exact same pattern. And the lipopolysaccharide did not return to normal until the
01:02:11
alcohol level was zero. So when I saw this from my perspective, to be clear, it wasn't a study of one
01:02:20
drink, although we do know that one drink is sufficient to disrupt your sleep and cause other health issues. But
01:02:28
when I saw this, I saw enough to say I don't think there's any amount of
01:02:32
alcohol that's safe. To summarize what's going on there, the alcohol is coming
01:02:36
into the body. It is impacting the gut in some way which is making the gut go into dysfunction and that dysfunction
01:02:47
lasts for a little while cuz I'm trying to understand why you you looked at that
01:02:51
and thought do you know what absolutely not I'm not going to drink as much as I
01:02:55
was. >> Yeah. So basically alcohol was causing leaky gut. >> Oh leaky gut. Okay.
01:03:00
>> Yeah. So alcohol was causing leaky gut. That's what that's what we saw in that
01:03:03
study. And the fact that the amount of leaky gut was proportional to the amount of alcohol in the blood and that the
01:03:12
leaky gut did not return to normal until the alcohol level was zero says to me that any amount of alcohol
01:03:21
that's detectable in the bloodstream can create this problem which is going to
01:03:24
cause inflammation which is going to cause inflammation. We know with total clarity that people who are heavy
01:03:30
drinkers, their gut is totally destroyed and that that's actually a requisite
01:03:36
step on the pathway towards developing cerosis and alcoholic liver disease. So there are some people who seem to get
01:03:44
away with it where they can be a heavy drinker and they never actually get cerosis.
01:03:49
And it >> cerosis is >> cerosis is the so the liver sits in your right upper abdomen and its job is to
01:04:00
detoxify your bloodstream. And all of the blood that goes to your gut, the first place that it goes after your
01:04:09
gut as it returns to the heart is your liver. And it's actually a smart setup
01:04:15
anatomically because we don't want toxic blood to get access to the heart and
01:04:21
then circulate and ultimately get back to the brain. So we allow the liver to protect and defend it. But the cerosis
01:04:30
what's happening is that basically the liver which is soft and spongy like imagine a sponge that you can put it
01:04:37
under a faucet. The water goes in one end, wiggles its way through, comes out the other end. Okay? Instead of that,
01:04:44
it's just a piece of plastic, right? It's hard. It's not letting anything
01:04:50
through. That's what that's what happens when a person develops cerosis.
01:04:54
>> So, and there's many causes of cerosis. Cerosis comes from inflammation. So all
01:04:58
serot all cerosis health conditions ultimately are inflammatory health conditions. They're all part of the 130
01:05:05
health conditions associated with inflammation. But in this particular setting what we're talking about is
01:05:11
alcohol. And what I'm saying is that to create that inflammation in the liver
01:05:16
based upon the available data it seems that you have to disrupt the gut microbiome in order to get there. So
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01:07:13
chemical on the uh plate over there. Turmeric. People talk about turmeric a lot when they're speaking about
01:07:20
inflammation. >> Yeah. >> I'm not really sure what the truth is on
01:07:24
turmeric and inflammation. >> Yeah. >> You have to be a little bit careful
01:07:28
because you could easily overdo it. >> Oh, really? So, well, so we just have to
01:07:33
be smart with the way that we approach because the turmeric that we're really
01:07:37
talking about is if you were to take it on a consistent daily basis, which actually from my perspective makes a ton
01:07:44
of sense for people that have chronic inflammatory health issues. >> So, turmeric is helping inflammation go
01:07:50
down somehow. >> It turmeric is helping inflammation to go down because it blocks another one of
01:07:55
the cytoines. So, in the same way we're talking about those walkie-talkies and
01:07:59
basically pulling the batteries out, >> turmeric helps to accomplish that.
01:08:03
>> So, there's a specific cytoine that that turmeric has that effect. And so, it's
01:08:07
the you mentioned curcumin. So, curcumin is the phytochemical found in turmeric. Turmeric is the root.
01:08:15
>> Okay. >> Curcumin is the chemical, >> okay, >> that actually does the thing. And it
01:08:21
turns out that kurcumin is what we call a polyphenol. So polyphenols, as we sit here and we look at this beautiful array
01:08:29
of all these colors, every single one of these foods contains polyphenols that define the color
01:08:38
and that impact the gut. Like the onion here would have keretin and many people have heard of keretin as being
01:08:44
beneficial for longevity. Same would be true for the garlic. So there's different polyphenols for different
01:08:50
colored foods and 95% of them require our gut microbes in order to be activated.
01:09:00
So with turmeric, you just need to be careful with supplements because if you overdo it, if you take too much, that
01:09:05
could create an issue, though. Here in front of me, I have a I guess I guess this is a perfect gut day. Have you seen
01:09:13
this? >> Yeah. I wanted you to explain to me step by step how to have a perfect gut day.
01:09:22
Nice. All right. So, I'm going to I'm going to define for people the way that I would approach the
01:09:30
perfect 24-hour rhythm. We have an innate circadian rhythm. Circadian rhythm basically means that our body
01:09:37
functions on a 24-hour clock. Why? Because we evolved with the sun. The sun goes up and it comes down. And that is
01:09:45
one of the most powerful things that defines everything that exists both for us as humans and in our entire
01:09:52
environment. Right? So everything around us also evolved with the sun and is connected to it. Around 50% of our genes
01:10:01
are turned off or on at specific times of day based upon our circadian rhythm. More than 50% of our microbes rise and
01:10:11
fall during the course of our day to meet the moment. Our body thrives on consistency. So, what I want to talk
01:10:19
about is how do we create a consistent daily routine that can optimize our microbiome. And
01:10:26
I'm going to take you through all the different all the different steps. Let's
01:10:29
imagine that the sun comes up and it's 7 in the morning. >> Yeah. >> All right. and you naturally wake up and
01:10:35
you are consistent about it, you're off to a great start. Consistency with the
01:10:39
time that you wake up is a fantastic way to start your day. And what I want you to do in the first 5 minutes of your day
01:10:47
is I want you to initially just focus on um waking up and thinking about your day and how you're
01:10:57
going to approach it. Because starting at 7:05, you're going to wake up your microbes.
01:11:03
You're going to wake up your body with hydration. So, we're going to opt for water.
01:11:11
And in a perfect world, I would love to add a prebiotic fiber supplement to that
01:11:17
water. So, like our company is called 38 Terra. You could add that there or you can add an alternative.
01:11:24
This is the hydration. The water turns on your gut, turns on your brain, turns on your
01:11:31
kidneys. >> So, not coffee straight away. >> No. So, pause the coffee.
01:11:37
Start with hydration. And we're waking up your gut with the water and also with
01:11:42
the prebiotic fiber that's going to feed those microbes in your gut. Okay. So,
01:11:45
that's at 7:05. And let's pretend that takes you 10 minutes. And so now it's
01:11:51
7:15 and we're going to basically flip the switch to tell your body it's time to go
01:11:59
that we're starting a new day. And this is actually the most powerful moment. So
01:12:04
if there's only one thing that everyone takes away, I want it to be this because
01:12:08
I'm giving you the two most powerful levers in terms of activating your circadian rhythm. Number one, sunlight
01:12:17
or at a minimum bright light exposure. So what happens is that light passes through our our eye and hits the
01:12:28
retina in the back of the eye, enters into the body detects this and it enters into the optic nerve. And right
01:12:36
at the very first spot where you could collect information from both your left eye and your right eye sits this part of
01:12:43
your brain called the supra kaismatic nucleus, the SCN. And the SCN is the orchestrator. That is
01:12:52
the master clock of your circadian rhythm. So like I would think about it like school. So when we were kids and we
01:12:59
went to school, we might have all been wearing a watch. And that watch gives us a general idea of where we are in our
01:13:05
day. All your organs, all your tissues, more than half your microbes, they have their watch. They have a feel for where
01:13:12
they are in the day. But it's the alarm that goes off between classes that ultimately is what matters the most.
01:13:19
That's the central clock. >> That's your SCEN. Your SCEN is basically
01:13:23
managing all of that. And there's an entire cascade of things that follows from when you tell the SCEN today
01:13:31
started. So that light exposure is what basically activates the SCN to release cortisol
01:13:39
through a through a series of events. It releases cortisol. All right. Cortisol is the morning hormone.
01:13:47
It is it it allows us to get activated. It makes protein and and uh energy available to our cells. It makes us
01:13:56
focused. It actually suppresses our immune system. In that moment, you want more cortisol.
01:14:03
And by getting morning light exposure, you can bump it by 50%. >> So, we're off to a good start. The
01:14:10
second lever that we can pull with our outdoor time is exercise. You don't need to do like a full scale
01:14:19
workout. I'm not talking about the most vigorous exercise of your day. I'm
01:14:22
talking about light exercise. But if you just move your body, right, which during the summertime,
01:14:30
what you would do is like you might go outside and you might have a ruck fest and you take a walk, right? When the
01:14:35
weather is good. And when it's January and the weather isn't so hot, you might
01:14:42
actually have a light box. The light box allows you to stay inside. You just got to make sure it's 10,000
01:14:48
lux is what you're looking for. So the light box is the substitute for the sun.
01:14:55
And then you could do any form of exercise. You could do squats, you could do lunges, push-ups, whatever it may be.
01:15:00
You could do jumping jacks, >> do yoga. >> Right? So during this period of time, if
01:15:05
you get light exposure and you exercise, the exercise can add another 25 to 50%.
01:15:14
This is a compounding effect that's going to give you the ultimate morning cortisol peak. And this is essential to
01:15:22
propel your day because by getting this, you will be more focused. You will be able to do more from a cognitive
01:15:29
perspective like your endurance will be enhanced. Um, you also will uh sleep better
01:15:35
tonight and you will you will notice this on day one. I promise you. So, all right. So, and you're going to do that
01:15:42
for about 20 minutes. So, from 7:15 until 7:35, you're going to be doing your light and exercise. Okay? Ideally,
01:15:51
outdoor light whenever possible. If you wear glasses, by the way, take off your glasses. You don't have to look directly
01:15:56
at the sun. At 7:35, we're going to basically come back in and this is a time for us to now have
01:16:04
our coffee and also quiet time. So, like to me, we don't have enough time in our day. The day is so
01:16:13
fast-paced, right? We need to be intentional about creating opportunities to like activate
01:16:21
our parasympathetic nervous system >> which is >> so there's two sides to our autonomic
01:16:26
nervous system. Autonomic is just like you have like you you can't totally control it. It's just going
01:16:33
one side is sympathetic. Sympathetic is the part that gets you going fast. Like this is your accelerator. All right? And
01:16:40
the other side is your parasympathetic which is your break. It's your rest and
01:16:45
recovery. So, now that you've done your outdoor time and your exercise, you come in and
01:16:51
we want to give you 10 minutes of just like quiet, low-key, sympathetic time. So, that could be meditation,
01:16:59
breath work, could be reading your Bible, could be journaling, right? Whatever it is that works for you. So,
01:17:08
you do that with your coffee for 10 minutes and that brings us to 7:45. And now you have breakfast. All right.
01:17:17
So, and breakfast um is the perfect opportunity to take your supplements. >> Okay. So, what breakfast? What
01:17:23
supplements? >> Okay. So, your breakfast and >> what is my breakfast strategy? Am I
01:17:27
going for a lot of food? Do I need to have breakfast? Why do I need to have breakfast?
01:17:30
>> You should have breakfast. You should definitely have breakfast. Yeah. So, um
01:17:36
your metabolism changes during the course of the day. your strongest metabolism is first thing
01:17:43
in the morning. And so what that means is that you could literally eat the exact same food at
01:17:51
7:45 or at 3:00 in the afternoon. And when you eat it at 7:45, you will get better
01:17:58
blood sugar control. You will get better blood fat control. So those are those are manifestations of our metabolism.
01:18:06
And when they're under control, that's actually really good for our body.
01:18:11
So whenever possible, we want to shift our food towards earlier in the day. >> And what kind of foods?
01:18:17
>> I would argue that we go high fiber and moderate protein. >> Low sugar.
01:18:23
>> No sugar. Yeah. Low low sugar, right? >> Low or no sugar. >> Refined carbohydrates should get left
01:18:29
out as much as possible. >> What's a refined carbohydrate? Give me >> flour or sugar.
01:18:34
>> Okay. So no >> no baked goods, >> no eggs benedict. Uh, so the exception
01:18:40
from my perspective would be if you're going if you want to have avocado toast
01:18:44
than a sourdough. >> Awesome. Prefer not. They're delicious. >> But no, I prefer not because ultimately
01:18:53
what we want is we want we want high fiber and moderate protein. And by doing that combination, it's maximum
01:19:00
satiation. So you're going to feel full. You're giving your body what it needs
01:19:05
from a protein perspective. and you're simultaneously giving your gut what it
01:19:09
needs from a fiber perspective. >> Oats. >> So, I mean, you could do oats do for the
01:19:14
reasons that we were discussing glyphosate earlier, the oats should be organic. And if you were to do them, do them as
01:19:22
minimally processed. So, like I don't really love instant oats. What about for
01:19:26
kids? If I'm, you know, giving my kids a breakfast, should I be thinking about
01:19:30
anything in particular? cuz you know a lot of a lot of parents um I've talked
01:19:34
about this quite a few times before but when I was younger I'd get a lot of orange juice and I didn't realize that
01:19:38
orange juice was just like sugar water. >> Yeah. >> Is there anything that parents should be
01:19:43
thinking about when they're giving kids their breakfasts? >> Of course. Um and I think that the most
01:19:48
important thing is that you need to model for your kids what a healthy breakfast looks like
01:19:52
>> by having it yourself. >> By eating it yourself >> because if you don't do that then
01:19:57
they're you can't expect them to. So, um, healthy breakfast. My kids, I have
01:20:02
four kids, so my kids love avocado toast. They love avocado toast. Um, you could absolutely do yogurt with berries,
01:20:11
right? You could do berries and nuts. There's a lot of different choices in that regard. So, overnight oats, chia
01:20:16
pudding, these are different choices that you could do for sure. On this point of kids, before we carry on with
01:20:21
our perfect morning and day routine, are there decisions that you make as a parent to give your kids certain things
01:20:28
that will have a lasting impact on their immune and gut function? >> 100%.
01:20:35
Yes. And the I think it opens up a discussion about where the connection between our gut and immune system
01:20:42
starts. It starts before birth. The first three years are critical. So, let me unpack that just a little
01:20:52
bit, Steve. They have studies where they look at mom's microbiome during pregnancy.
01:21:00
All right? So, like mom poops, they analyze her poop and they're able to basically identify
01:21:08
patterns that are associated with the kid developing allergic diseases later on.
01:21:15
>> Oh, okay. They also have studies where moms who increase their fiber intake
01:21:20
during pregnancy reduce the likelihood of their kids developing allergic diseases later on as
01:21:26
well. >> What about kids taking antibiotics? Does that have a when you're forming your gut
01:21:31
microbiome at a young age? Does that have a consequential impact? >> 100%. Antibiotics,
01:21:37
uh, bottle feeding and birth by cescareian section. And by the way, all of my kids were born by C-section. It's
01:21:44
not what we wanted, but it's what happened. But those three things are associated with an impact on the
01:21:50
microbiome and the immune system. And if you look downstream over the course of the first 5 years, increased risk of
01:21:57
allergic diseases, increased risk of autoimmune diseases, increased risk of metabolic diseases
01:22:04
>> because in a C-section, it the baby didn't pass through >> the birth canal.
01:22:08
>> The birth canal and the birth canal would have given the baby some of the
01:22:11
mother's microbiome. >> Yes. So, >> and then breastfeeding does the same. It
01:22:14
gives the baby microbiome. >> Breastfeeding gives them access to mom's
01:22:18
skin microbiome. >> Okay. >> But also breast milk contains these things called HMOs, human milk
01:22:24
oligosaccharides. It's quite fascinating to consider this. We evolved where mom's breast milk
01:22:31
contains these things, human milkosaccharides. There's over 200 varieties. They have no nutritional
01:22:38
value to the child directly. So why do we why do we have them? Because they're
01:22:43
prebiotic. So these human milk oligosaccharides in breast milk were basically designed to feed the
01:22:50
developing baby microbiome. >> So and this is part of why we get into some challenges where when you replace
01:22:56
it with with the bottle the formula you might put fiber in there but it's like a
01:23:01
mono fiber. It's not the same as the 200 plus varieties of human milkosaccharides.
01:23:08
So there was a study that was done out of Finland where they looked at roughly,00 kids and they tracked them
01:23:16
for 5 years and during this time 5 years they got a microbiome specimen poop specimen from
01:23:23
the kid at 3 months and 12 months of age and they looked at okay so some of these
01:23:31
kids develop allergic diseases so eczema, food allergies asthma, um, rhinitis, allergic rhinitis.
01:23:43
All right, those are the classic allergic diseases. And what they found is, okay, there were
01:23:50
certain factors that predicted who was going to develop allergic diseases by the age of five. Number one, exposure to
01:23:59
antibiotics in the first year of life. Number two, being bottlefed. All right. Then they looked at the
01:24:07
microbiome at 12 months. So, and just to be clear, these kids, they they had not
01:24:14
developed the allergic disease yet. That comes later, but they looked at the microbiome at 12 months and they could
01:24:24
tell who was going to develop the allergic diseases later on because there was a specific pattern.
01:24:31
What was missing were the bacteria that produce short- chain fatty acids. >> And the short- chain fatty acids are
01:24:36
that chemical we talked about earlier on that >> that you get from fiber >> which produces those three things. Yes.
01:24:42
>> But butyrate >> butyrate, acetate and propriionate. >> And and in in fact when they checked the
01:24:48
poop for butyrate levels, the butyrate levels were low. So in essence what they discovered in
01:24:54
this study that was quite fascinating is that you can look at the microbiome and
01:24:59
predict who will later on go on to develop these confu the confused immune system
01:25:06
with these allergic diseases. >> So going back to our daily routine. >> Yep.
01:25:11
>> Where are we to? >> Yes. Yes, we're at 7:45 and you So, you want your high fiber, moderate protein,
01:25:18
as little sugar as possible, breakfast, and this is the perfect time to take your morning supplements because the
01:25:24
morning supplements, the ones that I recommend that are evidence-based are vitamin D, omega-3s, and turmeric.
01:25:32
>> That's for inflammation. >> So, these are for inflammation. >> Okay.
01:25:36
>> Yeah. So, now I also believe that we should test whenever possible. There's a
01:25:41
test for vitamin D. There's a test for omega-3s. If you have enough, you don't
01:25:46
need to take the supplement. But if you're deficient, that's where supplements play an important role. So,
01:25:52
I believe that that supplements should be taken consistently in a circadian fashion.
01:25:58
So, that means that we take our morning supplements at the same time every day. >> Why?
01:26:03
Because basically everything about our microbes and our body and the way that it works thrives on consistency. So
01:26:11
supplements would be the same. >> And when we do this, so it's been 7:45.
01:26:16
We've had our breakfast. We've taken our morning supplement stack and now it's been an hour since we woke
01:26:22
up and it's time for a fantastic bowel movement. And that is the manifestation
01:26:29
of all the work that you've done. Because when you get your morning light exposure, that helps to contribute to
01:26:34
that bowel movement. When you exercise, that contributes to that bowel movement.
01:26:39
When you drink your coffee, that contributes to that bowel movement. All these different things ultimately lead
01:26:43
to this to this place where you're having that good healthy bowel movement. And that's indicative
01:26:49
of a gut that's in rhythm and doing well. So that's your morning. Now you're
01:26:54
going to go to work. And I want to circle back to roughly the lunchtime hour. So you it gets to be lunchtime
01:27:02
and it's 12:00 noon and basically I would advocate for people to have lunch with another person like the way
01:27:10
that you and I are sitting here at this table right now. So because we don't do
01:27:14
that enough like way too much we're on our phone like this and eating at the
01:27:19
same time that we're flipping and scrolling. >> How is that good for my gut and
01:27:22
inflammation though? So feeling socially bonded to another person 50% this is by the way statistics that
01:27:30
come from before the pandemic right so the pandemic made this worse 50% of people in America were lonely
01:27:39
before the pandemic even started loneliness is the equ loneliness will destroy your longevity faster than just
01:27:48
about anything loneliness is has been shown to be on par with smoking cigarettes on a routine basis in terms
01:27:56
of the impact that it has on your health and your longevity. >> And you're quite clear there that you
01:27:59
define loneliness as the feeling of disconnection versus being alone, >> right? Yes.
01:28:06
>> Okay. >> So, but being alone there, you have to think about where we came from.
01:28:11
So, we um are tribal by our nature. Like you have to understand that for millions of
01:28:20
years, humans lived the specific lifestyle of being hunter's gatherers in our tribe.
01:28:27
There was no money. The currency of wealth was your bonds to other people. That's what allowed you to
01:28:36
survive and thrive. Your family was like basically the the measure of wealth. The bigger the
01:28:44
family, the more wealthy you were because you would work together to support one another and take care of
01:28:48
each other. But then the broader tribe, which is not 300 people, let alone hundreds of thousands on social media.
01:28:55
The broader tribe, which was this like family of families, we were in it together. If you and I were in the same
01:29:01
tribe, if someone attacked us, I know that you would step up to defend me and I would do the same for you. So this is
01:29:07
causing some kind of cortisol issue, stress issue that's then impacting the gut microbiome and causing inflammation.
01:29:13
>> If we want to torture a person, like literally the easiest way to do it is to
01:29:19
put them in solitary isolation. That's literally torture. We're so social that we need that. And it's the
01:29:26
cortisol response that that's going to cause that. That's that then causes
01:29:29
inflammation. >> That is correct. So ultimately that is a manifestation of the brain gut
01:29:33
connection. >> Okay. We have a we have an innate need of human bonding and when that innate
01:29:39
need is not met then it's actually quite stressful for us because we feel vulnerable and unsafe.
01:29:45
>> Mhm. We sleep worse as well. I was reading about some stuff around um when
01:29:49
people feel lonely they go into self-preservation which is kind of like I guess the the analogy would be if you
01:29:53
drifted off from your tribe. >> Yeah. >> You would have to be a bit more alert.
01:29:57
You'd have to be on edge. You'd have to be wait you know you couldn't sleep for
01:30:00
8 hours in peace because you you're in danger now. Yeah, >> you don't have that sort of insulating
01:30:05
factor of a group of people. >> It's it's so interesting to think about
01:30:07
like there's a condition called Stockholm syndrome and Stockholm syndrome is what happens if you take a
01:30:13
person hostage and in that scenario you're the person who's taken hostage.
01:30:18
You have a choice. You can reject the person who's taken you or you can actually find the good in them and bond
01:30:25
with them. Mhm. >> And it's actually a survival mechanism that within that context of being taken
01:30:30
hostage, people have a tendency to bond with their captor and have sympathy for them.
01:30:37
>> And that's and we think that's a defense mechanism because we're so social. We
01:30:41
need that as opposed to like being alone and being held captive. >> Okay. So, so we socialize at lunch. We
01:30:47
have dinner with other people. >> Yes. So, I want people to socialize at lunch to address this epidemic of
01:30:51
loneliness that I think is highly problematic and not and not to be underrated because again, that's like
01:30:56
smoking a pack of cigarettes. So, let's imagine that we have a nice lunch time.
01:31:01
We're not talking about 10 minutes. We're talking about 45 minutes that includes conversation, right? And we get
01:31:07
to the end. And now, what I would encourage people to do before you go back to work is to get outside and take
01:31:13
a walk. So, there's two advantages to this. We talked earlier about the benefits of sunlight in the morning and
01:31:20
also the benefits of exercise in the morning. We're circling back to that. But things are a little bit different
01:31:26
this time. By getting outside, you're getting different rays of sun. So the actually the types of rays that we get
01:31:33
from the sun are slightly different and they're more likely to boost our serotonin
01:31:38
later in the day. And that serotonin is what lifts our mood, gives us focus, helps us to get to to get things done.
01:31:48
So this reinforces our circadian rhythm when we take a walk and we get outside a
01:31:52
second time. Also, the exercise, a 10-minute walk, just 10 minutes of simple walking is
01:32:00
enough to get 30 to 40% improvement in your blood sugar control. Because when you activate the big
01:32:07
muscles in your leg, it helps to draw the blood sugar out of your bloodstream. So like it's uh the messaging there is
01:32:17
if you just ate too much and you don't feel well, force yourself to take a walk.
01:32:22
>> Mhm. >> As opposed to laying on the couch. >> Mhm. >> All right. So um and the outdoor walk
01:32:27
also activates our gut and helps our gut to get into rhythm and that reduces bloating after a meal. Okay. So, and
01:32:36
then you do that for 15 minutes. It's one o'clock. You're back to work. I
01:32:42
encourage people to have a matcha green tea. Um, I'm a big matcha believer. This
01:32:47
is the of all the teas that exist. It has the highest polyphenol content and it's phenomenal for the microbiome.
01:32:56
So, and it gives you a nice boost to your afternoon. Okay, let's accelerate to 4:00.
01:33:04
I saw you um I think was it in your book that I read this? Yeah. In your book it
01:33:08
talks about how the gap between sort of 3 and 6 is the optimal time to exercise.
01:33:13
That's right. Yeah. So 3 and 6 p.m. The reason for that has to do with our core
01:33:19
body temperature. So our temperature cools off at night. Our body temperature lowers at night and then during the day
01:33:26
it starts to rise in the morning. Exercise by the way in the morning helps to accelerate that. But our peak is 3 to
01:33:33
6 pm. >> I felt attacked on page 159 of your book where you said, "My one request is that
01:33:39
you do not have heavy exercise late in the evening as this activates the par sorry, the sympathetic nervous system
01:33:45
and can negatively affect your ability to quickly fall asleep." >> Yeah. What What time are you working
01:33:49
out? >> I mean, last night it was like bloody god 11 till midnight. >> Oh no.
01:33:53
>> That's like quite typical though because I don't know. I just It's when I get my
01:33:56
time. >> How's your sleep >> last night? feel great. But I mean like
01:34:00
a series of issues took place. >> Two hours. So, okay, fair enough. >> Yeah, like a series of like my other
01:34:05
issues. >> The time I ate was bad and >> the time I went to the gym was bad and
01:34:10
so was was a mess. >> Yeah. Well, ideally 2 hours before bedtime. >> Okay.
01:34:16
>> At least two hours before bedtime. So, and like especially when it's vigorous
01:34:20
exercise. If it's light exercise, it's not a big deal. >> But vigorous exercise is a different
01:34:24
story. >> Okay. >> So, yeah. So, three three to six. This is more from like an exercise
01:34:27
performance perspective. Like that's the best time if you want to lift heavy
01:34:31
weight, >> okay? >> 3 to 6 p.m. So, let's imagine that we go and we get we smash a workout at 4:00,
01:34:37
right? And so, I'm going to give us an hour to smash that wonderful workout and
01:34:41
then now is 5:00 and it's the perfect time for dinner. I want to point something out real quick. I we had
01:34:46
breakfast around 8 and we had lunch around noon and we had dinner around 5. We've spaced things out by about four
01:34:54
hours. And that's actually the perfect time from from the perspective of your
01:34:59
digestive rhythm. So there's this thing this this concept within the the gut that many people
01:35:06
haven't heard of called the migrating motor complex where between meals your
01:35:12
gut has this entire thing that it does and it basically is like sweeping through and reorganizing itself.
01:35:22
But it gets disrupted if you eat. >> Okay? >> So it's ideal to give a 4hour space
01:35:28
between these meals and that if you do that you will actually notice a difference in terms of how you feel with
01:35:34
your digestion. So because you've allowed your gut to fall into a rhythm. All right. So we have our dinner. It's
01:35:42
5:00. We're moving into the evening and now it's going to be 7:00 at night.
01:35:48
And let's imagine, I know this time of year the sun is going down much earlier
01:35:52
than this in most places. Um, but imagine that it's 7 o'clock. Look, when
01:35:58
the sun goes down, you want to start to dim the lights in your house. You want to start to reduce
01:36:05
your personal light exposure because light exposure, just casual lights within your home can cut your
01:36:13
melatonin down by 30%. Melatonin is the sleepy time hormone. So in the morning it's cortisol
01:36:24
and in the evening it's melatonin. And it's interesting because what we did in the morning with both
01:36:32
exercise and with light exposure, it was designed not only to enhance that that cortisol peak, but it also increases our
01:36:40
serotonin. Serotonin, the happy hormone that keeps us focused. Well, serotonin is actually
01:36:47
the precursor to melatonin. So, when you make the investment of morning light, morning exercise, you're
01:36:54
setting yourself up for excellent sleep in 14 hours. So, and we want to protect that.
01:37:02
Melatonin is going to start to rise when it gets dark outside. And so, we want to
01:37:07
dim the lights within our home. And we want to really be cautious as we move towards 8:00. If our bedtime is going to
01:37:15
be 10:00, forgive me if that's too early for some people, but I think it's like nice to
01:37:20
have a consistent bedtime. If our bedtime is 10, then by 8:00, like we want to be sort of dialing back on our
01:37:27
devices or wearing blue light blocking glasses. The blue light blocking glasses can help
01:37:34
to protect us. And then roughly 8:30, take your evening supplements. So, we had our morning supplements, which were
01:37:41
vitamin D, omega-3s, and turmeric. Now, we want to take our evening supplements,
01:37:46
which are zinc, and magnesium. And if you take melatonin, that would be the time to do it. Or if you take a
01:37:51
different sleepy time supplement, that would be the time to do it. Roughly 8:30 to 9, somewhere in that range. So,
01:37:58
because it's going to take about 60 to 90 minutes to really kick in around nine o'clock, we want to activate
01:38:07
our evening ritual. And so, in the morning, we had our quiet time. We should have a quiet time in the
01:38:14
evening too to intentionally activate our parasympathetic nervous system and get like relaxed before bedtime
01:38:23
so that at 9:30 we uh basically are preparing for bedtime and that might mean a hot shower
01:38:30
like actually like heat at night hot shower sauna is perfect because actually it cools off your inner core temperature
01:38:40
believe it or not. So, and that's exactly what we want. We want a cool room. We want a dark room and that will
01:38:47
help us to sleep better because then at 10:00 we want to go to bed and 10:00 like it could be whatever time. But I
01:38:53
would argue that we should be consistent. It could be 10:30, it could be 11. Whatever time you choose, adapt
01:38:57
to it. But the point from my perspective is not so much 10 is the magic number. It's more so that 10 is the magic number
01:39:03
if you always do 10. 10:30 is the magic number if you always do 10:30. Consistency is key.
01:39:08
>> And you would recommend three three meals a day. >> I think that you could do three meals. I
01:39:11
think that like the the way that we structured this is that if you were done eating at 6:00
01:39:17
at night and then you're having breakfast around 8, you have a 14-hour fast.
01:39:22
>> Do you think that fasting window matters? >> That specific number 14 or
01:39:26
>> Yeah, just like generally generally having sort of a big intermittent fasting window where you you haven't
01:39:31
eaten for 16 hours, whatever it might be. >> I think that there's so I think that
01:39:34
there there's two parts to the value that we get from timerestricted eating.
01:39:38
So the first is we give our gut a time to rest. >> So when you when you particularly eating
01:39:44
late at night, like I honestly the timing of it all could be debated. The one spot where it's a total
01:39:50
non-negotiable from my perspective is late night eating. So I mean no offense, like sometimes we're busy, right?
01:39:57
>> But when you eat late at night, it hits you different metabolically >> and then it carries and it lingers into
01:40:05
the next day >> and it will affect your sleep. Yeah. >> So, we really as much as possible want
01:40:11
to opt for early dinner time and then shut it down for the evening as much as possible.
01:40:17
>> People will be saying, "Yes, but I'm hungry." >> And I think part of the reason that
01:40:21
they're hungry from what you've explained is probably because they didn't have breakfast.
01:40:24
>> Yeah. >> They like started eating later. That's what typically what I find is if I have
01:40:27
breakfast, I I'm typically not hungry late at night. >> Yeah. Yeah. I think that I think that
01:40:31
breakfast helps to sort of set the tone for the rest of the day in a in a specific way. So the two the two
01:40:36
advantages of timerestricted eating are that you get that you get that gut rest which anything over 12 hours is good for
01:40:43
the gut and then the second part is I think it just the underrated thing that no one talks about is it helps us to get
01:40:52
more consistent with our meal times. So this entire conversation about circadian
01:40:56
rhythm can be summarized in one word consistency. If you ate at the same time every single
01:41:03
day, you would feel the difference in terms of your digestion. I promise you. And so the advantage of timerestricted
01:41:08
eating is it brings attention to what time am I eating dinner? What time am I eating breakfast? And then you end up
01:41:14
being a lot more consistent about it as opposed to just flying by the seat of your pants.
01:41:17
>> Do you fast ever? Do you try and >> like long fast? >> Long fast or just sort of more
01:41:23
timerestricted eating self? >> I do. I do time restricted eating all the time. In fact, I most days like I uh
01:41:29
first of all um I'm imperfect. >> And so what that means is I don't
01:41:34
perfectly follow all the advice I give. So like I don't eat breakfast most days.
01:41:37
>> Yeah. >> Cuz I'm going hard. So like I wake up, I do my morning routine, I get I get to
01:41:42
the coffee stage and then I jump into work. >> Same. >> So but on today
01:41:47
>> today I did. Yeah. Yeah. Today I had my breakfast because I wanted to be okay
01:41:51
>> on my game. But on the weekend I I have my breakfast. I noticed the difference
01:41:55
actually. like I'm I'm less hungry during the day when I have that breakfast that sort of just keeps it
01:42:01
balanced. Um so yeah, I sometimes I do one meal a day. Last month I told you about a
01:42:10
challenge that I'd set our internal flightex team. Flightex team is our innovation team internally here. I tked
01:42:14
them with seeing how much time they could unlock for the company by creating something that would help us filter new
01:42:20
AI tools to see which ones were worth pursuing. And I thought that our sponsor Fiverr Pro might have the talent on
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01:42:32
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01:42:39
with the help of my team, we've been able to create a brand new tool which automatically scans, scores, and
01:42:44
prioritizes different emerging AI tools for us. Its impact has been huge. And within a couple of weeks, this tool has
01:42:50
already been saving us hours triing and testing new AI systems. Instead of shifting through lots of noise, my team
01:42:56
Flight X has been able to focus on developing even more AI tools, ones that really move the needle in our business,
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thanks to the talent on Fiverr Pro. So, if you've got a complex problem and you
01:43:07
need help solving it, make sure you check out Fiverr Pro at fiverr.com/diary. If there's anything we need, it is
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connection, especially in the world we're living in today. And that is exactly why we created these
01:43:19
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01:43:26
this remarkable thing happens time and time again. We feel deeply connected to each other. At the end of every episode,
01:43:32
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01:43:58
cards. So get yours now before the limited edition gold cards are all gone. Head to the link in the description
01:44:03
below. One of the things you we touched on briefly at the beginning was this concept that trauma is linked to gut
01:44:11
function. >> Powerfully. >> In what way? We we were talking a moment
01:44:15
ago about the autonomic nervous system which is sympathetic versus parasympathetic.
01:44:20
We live our lives on sympathetic overdrive which basically is the equivalent of constantly feeling
01:44:26
threatened, right? Heart rate heart rate pumping, blood pressure up, more focused,
01:44:35
but then you suffer the consequences within your gut. The gut gets sacrificed when we are activating our sympathetic
01:44:41
nervous system. We don't do enough to do the opposite which is the parasympathetic nervous
01:44:47
system which is what happens with when we slow down conversations holding hands hugs uh
01:44:55
prayer journaling meditation sauna that's parasympathetic. Okay. So to the trauma question,
01:45:06
it's been shown that and this is something that I had to learn not only myself but I had to see that
01:45:15
I always thought that kids if they were young enough they wouldn't remember. And what I've realized is
01:45:22
actually this idea of like the body keeps the score is so well said. It's so
01:45:27
true. >> The body does keep the score. You can have trauma that occurs before the age
01:45:31
of two. There's no way you remember that. And yet it will manifest later on in adults. And this has been shown
01:45:38
actually in kids that are um adopted and like have an unstable first two years of
01:45:46
life. They are more likely to suffer with health related issues later on. this this issue of trauma what happens
01:45:54
is that it restructures the brain and how your brain functions >> and it keeps you sort of trapped in that
01:46:01
fight or flight state >> keeps you trapped. Yeah. So, there's a part of our brain called the amygdala.
01:46:07
>> And the amygdala is what gets activated if you like uh go to a haunted house,
01:46:12
you know, like if you get scared of something, >> right? Or like uh it's the middle of the
01:46:16
night and you hear something creepy in the bushes and you're not sure what's
01:46:20
going on. Okay, so that's the activation of your amydala. Well, the the issue for
01:46:25
people that suffer from trauma is that they live with the amygdala perpetually turned on. So, if something's happened
01:46:32
to me in my life that's caused some form of trauma, there's an increased
01:46:36
probability that I'm going to be in a more sympathetic state in terms of my nervous system, which is going to
01:46:41
activate a hormone, which is then going to disrupt my gut motility and all the other things we talked about, um,
01:46:50
like the gut barrier and other dysfunction across the gut. What is the link there? Is it is it the
01:46:58
hormone that's produced when I'm in that stress state that is impacting my immune
01:47:02
system which is then having the impact on my gut? >> Yes. So this is all a manifestation of
01:47:06
the brain of the brain gut connection. So the what's happening is that your brain has
01:47:16
the ability to release a hormone corticotropen releasing hormone >> CR and CR is this that's effectively
01:47:25
your sympathetic nervous system getting activated turned on. >> Mhm. >> In a person who's had trauma and to be
01:47:32
clear like not everything that's bad is trauma, right? It's possible to have
01:47:36
things that are bad that are not actual trauma. Trauma is the thing that sticks with you. It's it's when you have
01:47:42
something occur that overwhelms your ability to cope with it. >> And so and then it has this lasting
01:47:48
effect. I was thinking as you're speaking about some of my friends that have had some bad diagnosis recently.
01:47:54
Got a friend that got diagnosed with something very very serious. And what I then noticed is after that diagnosis,
01:48:00
they had lots of other health related issues that seem to be unconnected. >> Mhm. But the doctors associated with
01:48:06
stress. >> Yeah. >> And maybe the traumatic news of that one thing has caused this cascade of other
01:48:11
issues downstream. >> Yeah. 100%. And and that's all a manifestation of the of the brain gut
01:48:16
axis. So the brain gut axis is how we think about the brain being connected to our gut and how they're in communication
01:48:22
with one another. And within that context, the brain releases this hormone, the CR, corticotropen releasing
01:48:28
hormone that has an effect throughout the entire body. It puts them on edge. Mhm.
01:48:34
>> And the consequence is that that CR that's like um so this is a bit nuanced
01:48:41
but let me clarify something about cortisol. Cortisol is the morning hormone. When you get that spike in the morning
01:48:48
it's perfect. It's exactly what your body needs. What you don't need is you
01:48:54
don't need cortisol to still be elevated at 10 o'clock, 11 o'clock, midnight, 1
01:48:59
in the morning. Cortisol is the get up and go hormone. Right now it's disrupting your sleep. Now it's actually
01:49:06
the adversary of your of your circadian rhythm. And that's what's happening in
01:49:10
these people is that through that the brain gut access they're activating the
01:49:15
cortisol. And the cortisol then disrupts their gut barrier and leads to inflammation.
01:49:20
>> Where does healing from that trauma start in your view? If a patient were to
01:49:24
come to you >> Yeah. >> and they were they had loads of complications with their gut. Yeah. But
01:49:29
you were able to identify that trauma was playing a role. Where would you start with with their healing journey?
01:49:34
>> The most important thing is to is to and I think this is the the moment that will
01:49:39
be most impactful for some of the listeners, not all but some. The most important thing is to understand that
01:49:45
the trauma is the root of the issue because most people the way that we react to trauma it's the part that we
01:49:52
don't want to talk about, >> right? So we push it into the corner and we pretend that it's not there. We're
01:49:59
not like we know it's there but we're not going to even look at it. And so the
01:50:04
solution is to accept and acknowledge that the trauma is the root of the problem because then you need to
01:50:10
actually turn towards it. And that's under professional that's with professional help.
01:50:14
>> So there's different things that you can do different approaches including
01:50:18
cognitive behavioral therapy. They're all administered by trained health professionals. That's not what I do. But
01:50:24
step one is the acknowledgement and understanding that's the problem. >> You remember last time we made lots of
01:50:29
uh different shapes of poop. I think we were using what's the the Bristol stool? There we go.
01:50:36
>> Yeah, >> we have this Bristol stool thing here which is the different types of poop
01:50:39
that people produce. Um and on this table I think we have a variety of different styles.
01:50:45
Just to remind me once again, if I was guessing, I would assume that maybe this one is healthy or this
01:50:55
one. >> Yeah. >> Which one is healthy? >> The chocolate bar is your is your So,
01:51:01
this sweet chocolate bar right here is your glorious Bristol 4. >> What's a Bristol?
01:51:07
>> Right. A Bristol four. So, the Bristol stool scale is seven unique types of
01:51:12
poop. And you can tell by looking in the toilet bowl. We have been told, "Don't
01:51:18
look. There's nothing to see there." But what I'm saying is, and we discussed
01:51:21
this, that 60% of the weight of your stool is your microbiome. That's the microbiome story right there in the
01:51:28
toilet bowl. And so the Bristol 4 is the normal bowel movement. And it should be
01:51:35
it's it shouldn't be a rectangle, but um it's soft but formed like a sausage. And
01:51:43
the word Bristol is coming from this thing called the Bristol stool chart. >> Yeah. So the Bristol stool chart
01:51:49
actually comes from Bristol in the UK, right? The city of Bristol. Um where they did a study in the early '9s and
01:51:57
what came of that study was the discovery of these seven unique stool types. So and four is normal and three
01:52:05
many people would consider normal. Three is just sort of lumpy bumpy like this. Um but and many people would consider
01:52:11
that to be normal. But type one and two are constipation and uh types six and six and seven are
01:52:22
diarrhea. Now what's interesting is that the Bristol study was one location in
01:52:28
the UK 2,000 people. Actually at Zoey we did a a nationwide survey in the UK and
01:52:35
we had 140,000 people tell us about their poop. So, we actually have we're working on publishing the papers that
01:52:42
came from this, but we have the largest survey on bowel habits that's ever been
01:52:48
done in the world. >> And how many people's people is healthy? >> Well, based upon this, actually, it was
01:52:54
interesting because the results were about what you expect. There's a disproportionate number of people that
01:53:00
are struggling with bowel rellated issues. So, it's probably about 40% of people that are struggling with bowel
01:53:04
rellated issues. Of all the different types of poop one could have, is there any that I should be most concerned
01:53:11
about? >> If you have these like little pellets, >> rabbit pellets, that's severe constipation.
01:53:18
>> And is that a lack of something? A lack of fiber. >> It can be a lack of fiber for sure.
01:53:22
Okay. >> But sometimes it's a stool softening issue, too. So like for people that have
01:53:26
severe constipation, fiber is more nuanced than than people are willing to discuss on social media.
01:53:34
Everyone makes it sound like the simple solution is just increase your fiber. It's not necessarily that simple. So
01:53:39
sometimes you have to add magnesium. Magnesium supplements are great with fiber.
01:53:45
>> What do they do? >> So they help to draw water into the intestine
01:53:49
>> and that water softens up the stool. So if you have the fiber for the form and
01:53:54
you have the magnesium to make it soft, this is how you get a soft formed bowel movement. We talked a moment ago about
01:54:00
taking a nighttime magnesium supplement. Okay. If your goal is to sleep or to relax, magnesium glycinate is a
01:54:09
phenomenal choice. But if you're constipated, that's not going to do anything. So, don't don't do that. Uh,
01:54:16
for constipation, magnesium oxide is the one that I would typically go with, but
01:54:21
there's also magnesium sulfate, magnesium citrate. Those are the choices. >> Okay.
01:54:26
>> Yeah. And if you get to a Bristol 7, which is just >> like diarrhea or something,
01:54:31
>> that's just Yeah. It's just liquid. um you're not in a good place. And so
01:54:37
obviously that needs to be addressed as well. And be aware of what we talked about earlier, which is that there are
01:54:42
some people who suffer from chronic constipation and then they start having diarrhea and actually that's overflow.
01:54:48
>> Dr. Will, what's the most important thing we haven't talked about as it
01:54:52
relates to all that is in your new book um that you think we should have talked about? I mean, we've probably covered a
01:54:57
tiny tiny tiny fraction of all the things in there, but it gives people a flavor. Is there one other thing that
01:55:03
you think is the most important thing that we haven't talked about? >> Here's what I really feel compelled to
01:55:07
say to be totally honest with you. You're holding the book. The book is called Plantpowered Plus. I don't want
01:55:13
people to be intimidated by the title of my book. Let me explain this. I believe
01:55:19
that there are many paths to healing. There are many different dietary patterns. The one that's going to work
01:55:25
the best for you is the one that you're actually willing to do. Right? So, this
01:55:30
book is not about a one-sizefits-all approach, nor is it 100% plants. That's
01:55:35
not what the book is about. So, instead, the conversation and what we haven't
01:55:39
discussed is what's missing in our diet that we really need. And we've kind of
01:55:46
started to touch on this. I've identified four things. And these four things you find in all of the healthy
01:55:52
dietary patterns. So whether it's Mediterranean, pescatarian, flexitarian, if you do it right, you're going to have
01:56:00
these four things. Number one, fiber. Number two, polyphenols. Number three, healthy fat.
01:56:09
>> So healthy fat is the extra virgin olive oil. Healthy fat is this avocado right
01:56:14
here. Healthy fat are these seeds and nuts right here. Okay? They all have healthy fat. and and in whole form, you
01:56:24
should consume these whole form foods without restriction. If you are obese and you're trying to lose weight, the
01:56:31
problem with any oil, not just not just seed oils, also including extravirgin olive oil, is that this is the highest
01:56:39
calorie thing that exists on the entire planet. You cannot create something with
01:56:43
a higher calorie content than oil. So, it's not to your advantage to really focus on oil. If anything, you should be
01:56:53
limiting your oil intake. But these healthy fats, the monounsaturated fats that you get from nuts, from avocado, if
01:57:00
we had fish like a salmon or shellfish, the omega-3s that you get from those things, there's tremendous benefit to
01:57:07
those healthy fats. >> That was the third one. >> And then the fourth is fermented food.
01:57:11
>> Okay, which >> so which we don't actually see. We kind of see here we got the pickles. All
01:57:16
right, we got some pickles here. Um, but the thing about fermented food is most of us are not eating fermented food. So,
01:57:24
the average intake of fermented food in the United States is zero. And if any, maybe once in a while, yogurt. That's
01:57:31
it. We have tons of choices that are available to us. And the key that people need to know is a Stanford study done by
01:57:39
some of my friends Christopher Gardner and um Justin and Erica Sonnenberg. And what they showed is that in just
01:57:49
eight weeks by adding fermented food to their diet, people could increase the diversity of their gut microbiome.
01:57:56
That means a healthier gut. And they lowered inflammation. So as the gut gets healthier, inflammation goes down. And
01:58:03
they did that just by adding fermented food. So Steve, the these four things, fiber, 95% of Americans are deficient.
01:58:11
Polyphenols, almost no one is getting the recommended amount of fruits and vegetables. Healthy fats, we're not
01:58:18
opting for the types of fats that we're talking about right now. I want people
01:58:21
to get more omega-3s and more monounsaturated fat. And finally, fermented food. No one's really
01:58:25
consuming. If you think about your diet, this shouldn't be an exercise in more of
01:58:30
the thing that you already have. this should be an exercise of what is the thing that's missing that we could add
01:58:36
that could transform our health because that's the real opportunity. So that's
01:58:40
what the nutrition program is about. >> When I look at these uh this photo of
01:58:44
you before and after I think this one's probably sort of during med medical school was it or just after medical
01:58:50
school? >> No. So I was actually that's in my early 30s on the left. >> Yeah.
01:58:54
>> And then this photo here which I'll put up on the screen is you at what age?
01:58:58
>> Yeah. About 40. >> Okay. Well, 10 years has passed and you look 10 years younger.
01:59:02
>> Yeah. >> And you look pretty ripped. >> Yeah. >> What changed in your life between these
01:59:09
two photos? What what was different in one's mind? Knowledge, mentality, psychology. What was different?
01:59:16
So the the easy answer is I changed my diet. I changed my lifestyle. I grew up eating junk food. I grew up eating fast
01:59:24
food. We celebrated that sort of diet and I shifted towards eating the way that I'm describing to you today, right?
01:59:32
I obviously started going to the gym and working out. I think everyone should be
01:59:35
going to the gym and working out. I don't think that's to be underestimated.
01:59:37
That's an important part of the program that I'm proposing for people, right?
01:59:41
So, there's those things, but the part that you don't get on the surface that I
01:59:45
don't really talk about that much is I also need to heal on the inside. So, I
01:59:51
was in a dark place and I wasn't in a dark place just because of my diet. There were issues that existed within
01:59:58
our family. I had issues with my dad and I needed to resolve those. And what happened, a few things. One, literally
02:00:10
an angel came into my life. That's my wife, right? She came into my life in 20
02:00:15
in 2012. And she never pushed anything on me. But just seeing her and having her as a
02:00:23
presence in my life was what I really needed to change myself in terms of my diet, in terms of my lifestyle, but also
02:00:30
to pick up the phone and call my dad who I hadn't talked to in 10 years. You'd
02:00:34
fallen out. >> Totally fallen out. And there's an entire story that goes
02:00:39
into that. and I have to own my own mistakes because I'm as guilty as anyone
02:00:46
for the issues that existed between us. But I picked up the phone and I called him. And you the other thing that
02:00:55
happened in my life that really changed everything was the birth of my daughter.
02:00:58
So my oldest I have four kids. My oldest is now 11. And when you hold that child in your
02:01:06
hands, you're a different person instantly. And I can't describe this to a person to to
02:01:12
someone who's never experienced this, but you have a purpose that you didn't
02:01:15
have prior to that day. You've experienced love that you never understood. And the love that I had for
02:01:22
my daughter helped me to understand the love that my own dad had for me. But I could never
02:01:29
accept that. And so the complexity of it all is yes, I changed my diet, my lifestyle. Yes, I
02:01:36
started working out. But I also needed to forgive my dad for the things that happened when I was a kid.
02:01:46
And reconnecting with my dad was actually one of the most important and powerful things that happened for me.
02:01:51
>> He was vacant. He was absent. Or was it something? >> No. My when I So this is something that
02:01:58
um chapter 8 of my new book to me is my masterpiece. Um, of all the chapters, this is my
02:02:07
third book. Of all the chapters I've written, it's the one that I'm most
02:02:09
proud of by far. And if you if people get the audio book, they're going to hear it in my voice.
02:02:16
So, there were some things that I needed to talk about, and you'll find them in
02:02:20
that chapter. And basically the story is that our family we went through a really
02:02:27
hard time and um my parents got divorced and I was seven and I was the oldest of
02:02:35
three boys. It was not a nice divorce. And when that happens, you feel like you have to choose a side.
02:02:46
And from my perspective, again, like, you know, I was a kid, but there was a part of me that
02:02:55
said, "Dad, you're a man. Why did you allow this to happen? Why did you allow this to happen to our
02:03:10
family? Why didn't you fix this? And eventually I stopped talking to him. And that was around the time that I
02:03:20
graduated from college. And so for 10 years, I was uh like I went to medical school at
02:03:30
Georgetown. I went to Northwestern. I was the chief medical resident there. I won the highest award in my residency
02:03:36
class. I was fully accomplished. I was like accomplishing everything. Um I was very very sad inside. And what
02:03:45
was missing was my dad and I needed him there. And so having my daughter and feeling uh the love that I felt
02:03:57
instantly for my daughter helped me to understand the love that my dad had for me. And ultimately what I realized,
02:04:05
Steve, is that cuz the thing you have to know that's hard to explain in short
02:04:11
order is that we had I had two brothers. My dad used to take us camping. Three boys, no one
02:04:19
else, just him. He'd take us camping all the time. He took us to on vacation all the time. If
02:04:27
there was a sporting event, he was always there, right? But I wasn't able to see that all that was really an act
02:04:32
of love. And now having kids myself and understanding how hard it is to be a parent and raise these kids, the idea of
02:04:42
taking three boys camping by yourself is insane to me. I now understand how hard
02:04:47
my dad was trying. And in your book published in um 2020, I believed 2020. You you wrote this thing.
02:04:56
Could you read that in your own voice? Cuz I was going to read it, but it's very personal.
02:05:01
>> You wrote this in the front of the book. >> Yeah. I lost my dad during the
02:05:04
preparation of this book. It was sudden and completely unexpected. I couldn't wait to share this book with
02:05:12
him. It would have been easy to just send an electric electronic copy, but I really wanted his first read to be a
02:05:18
physical book with the hard cover, all the pages, and his son's name on the front.
02:05:25
Over the past few months, my dad repeatedly told me how proud he was of me. He told me that my grandparents,
02:05:32
John and Helen Bolawitz, would have been so proud of the work I was doing in the
02:05:35
name of our family. I can't tell you how much it means to me that he said all that.
02:05:42
It breaks my heart that he's not here anymore. I am who I am because of him.
02:05:48
But I will forever be grateful for the special times that we shared. Love you, Dad.
02:05:55
We'll always be thinking of you. This book is for you. You know, we're all susceptible for
02:06:10
letting a relationship sour and then losing a lot of time. And I think that's
02:06:14
why your story is so inspiring because it reminds us that I guess what matters most in the end. And sometimes we can
02:06:20
lose, I don't know, decades, years because of grudges or because of misunderstandings that have never been
02:06:24
addressed. So, I mean, it's a huge compliment to your wife that she had the wherewithal to to try and get you guys
02:06:30
to reconnect so that you could reform that relationship before he did pass away. And I'm no doubt that he was would
02:06:37
be incredibly proud if he's if he was uh watching over us now and had seen what's
02:06:41
happened in the in the last 5 years in your life because it's been incredible.
02:06:46
Absolutely incredible. Healing comes in many forms and sometimes it's the changes that we
02:06:53
make to our diet and sometimes it's the changes we make in our relationships with other people.
02:07:01
>> There's different opportunities. You and I talked about like what is the thing
02:07:05
for every person is something different. And it's funny how they're both
02:07:09
extrically linked because when one gets right with themselves and others, they often find it much easier to get control
02:07:16
of their diet and their lifestyle >> and then it all clicks. >> I highly recommend everybody goes and
02:07:22
gets this book. It's um it's going to be published in the US here on the 13th of
02:07:25
January and in the UK on the 15th. >> That's right. Yeah. Tuesday in the US,
02:07:29
Thursday in the UK. >> So, I'm going to link it below. Um we just touched on a fraction of it. We
02:07:34
haven't gone into much of the details, but if you are someone that is struggling with your gut, you know, one
02:07:39
of the 61% or 70% of people that told me ahead of this conversation that you were, I highly recommend this book
02:07:45
because it's incredibly accessible in the way that it's written, but also it's
02:07:49
incredibly comprehensive and up to date and as you said, the science on the gut and all of the related gut related sort
02:07:55
of issues and symptoms that we have is always evolving. So I I love having these conversations as almost refreshes
02:08:01
and updates to me because every single time I learn something new and I get more of the sort of jigsaw puzzle of my
02:08:08
gut health and as it relates to like my brain and my immune system filled in and
02:08:12
it's having it's really remarkable how much of a real world impact these
02:08:15
conversations have had on me. I don't think people know this enough but they
02:08:19
often ask me like which conversations had an impact on you. The way that I view it is it's almost it is like a
02:08:23
jigsaw puzzle. And each conversation is adding a piece. And I can see since we had that last conversation about poop
02:08:29
and the gut and the microbiome and all those things, there's been radical changes I've made to my life that have
02:08:34
had a radical impact. It's like the lights have been turned on. And that's a
02:08:37
really good example of what this book does when you read it. It turns on the lights. So, highly recommend people go
02:08:41
check it out. You are launching a YouTube channel, you said. >> Yeah, I'm launching a I'm launching a
02:08:44
YouTube channel. It's um the gut health MD and that's also my social hashtag my
02:08:50
social handle. So you can find me on those locations, but my home base is my website, the gotalthmd.com. And if you
02:08:58
come there, I highly encourage people to register for my email newsletter because
02:09:02
it's a completely free resource, basically a Substack for free >> that's designed, this is where I love to
02:09:08
like really have these conversations with people about, hey, there's this new
02:09:11
study, let's talk about it. Hey, there's this thing that I'm seeing, let's talk
02:09:15
about it, right? Hey, this is what I'm doing right now. >> Right? So, it's it's an opportunity for
02:09:19
sharing that goes beyond like the limitations of social. >> I'll link all of that below, everything
02:09:23
we've mentioned in the last 30 seconds, so everyone can check you out. We do
02:09:26
have a closing tradition where the last guest leaves a question for the next. And the question that has been left for
02:09:32
you is, what is one thing you could do today to help rectify your life's biggest regret?
02:09:42
Isn't that funny? Um, well, I think that the good news, this is to me, uh, if anything, a story of of
02:09:55
hope and optimism because on many levels I did. >> Um, so reconnecting with my dad was key.
02:10:05
But I think that the other piece is when you when you lose a person the way that
02:10:09
we lost my dad, he's gone, right? And it happened real fast and I didn't get to
02:10:13
say goodbye. I will say it's my faith that allows me to know like not to pretend to know to
02:10:24
actually know that these things that I need to say to him that I never actually got a chance to say that I wish I did.
02:10:34
I'll have a chance to do that >> and I look forward to the day when I see
02:10:38
him again. What would you say? >> I would tell him that I hate the fact that it took me so long
02:10:48
to figure out that he was a great dad. And you know, adults may have conflict. That's what the divorce was.
02:11:00
But he was a phenomenal dad. And I didn't see that or get that until I had my own kids.
02:11:09
Dr. Bill, thank you.