Dr. Tom O'Bryan, a functional medicine expert, joins host Myrna Young to discuss reducing exposure to environmental toxins at home. They explore the impact of toxins on fertility, brain health, and overall well-being. Dr. O'Bryan emphasizes the importance of understanding the hidden dangers of everyday items like food, cleaning supplies, and personal care products. He offers practical tips, such as drinking more water and incorporating houseplants, to help listeners take small steps towards reducing their toxic load. This eye-opening conversation provides valuable insights for anyone looking to improve their health and create a toxin-free environment at home.
Dr. O'Bryan emphasizes that chronic inflammatory diseases, such as Alzheimer's, heart disease, and diabetes, are largely caused by inflammation. Inflammation occurs when our immune system fights against toxins in our body. Surprisingly, many people are unaware that the foods they eat can contribute to inflammation, even if they don't experience immediate digestive symptoms.
For example, a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association found that women with infertility problems who consumed higher amounts of fruits and vegetables had a higher likelihood of unsuccessful implantation and more miscarriages and stillbirths. However, when these women consumed organic fruits and vegetables, the outcomes were significantly better. This highlights the importance of choosing organic produce to minimize exposure to harmful chemicals.
Dr Obryan's Infertility Story
Dr O'Bryan what inspired you to focus on, environmental toxins?
I was an intern in my education in Chicago and my ex and I could not get pregnant. So I called the seven most famous holistic doctors I'd ever heard of and asked them all what do you do for infertility. They all told me what they do and I put a program together and we were pregnant in six weeks. My neighbors in married housing had been through artificial insemination and nothing had worked and they asked if I'd work with them.
I said well you know I don't really know what I'm doing but I don't think it'll hurt you. They were pregnant in three months so we're now four months pregnant and just hot to trot to tell the world of what we were learning. Our friends in Chicago had a sister who had two miscarriages that lived in Wisconsin and she would drive down and ask please can I talk to you. So people started coming to see me and and I was treating people out of my dormatory room.
I realize is that there's not much in medicine that's all or every, but this was every couple that had any infertility problems with hormones, reproductive issues, recurrent miscarriages, premature ejaculations, low testosterone, low progesterone, it didn't matter every couple had as a contributing component to their problem.
Foods that cause inflammation and infertility
They were eating foods that they didn't know were a problem for them causing inflammation. Because we think if we eat something and if we don't feel bad after we eat it it's okay for us; but we know in the science the ratio is 8 to one. For every one person that gets, gut symptoms, with a problem with wheat for example there are eight people that don't they get brain symptoms or skin symptoms.
They've got psoriasis or they've got acne or they've got rheumatoid arthritis or they've got thyroid disease, they don't get gut symptoms so if you think that you have to have gut symptoms before you suspect of food is not good for you.
To reduce your exposure to environmental toxins, Dr. O'Bryan recommends taking small steps towards detoxing your body and home. One of the most crucial steps is to increase your water intake. Dehydration can hinder your body's ability to flush out toxins, so aim to drink a third of an ounce of water per pound of body weight each day. This simple habit can have a significant impact on your overall health.
Additionally, consider incorporating houseplants into your home. NASA studies have shown that certain houseplants can absorb up to 74% of toxins in the air. By placing houseplants in various rooms, you can improve the air quality and reduce your exposure to harmful chemicals.
Another important aspect of detoxing is choosing non-toxic household products. Many cleaning supplies, cosmetics, and personal care products contain chemicals that can be harmful to your health. Look for organic alternatives and avoid products that contain phthalates, parabens, and other toxic ingredients.
Phthalates are a group of chemicals used to make plastics more durable and as solvents and stabilizers in cosmetics and other products. They are also known as “plasticizers”. Phthalates are found in hundreds of products, including lubricating oils.
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Dr. O'Bryan emphasizes that implementing these changes doesn't have to be overwhelming. By dedicating just one hour each week to learning and implementing new habits, you can gradually reduce your exposure to environmental toxins. Start by replacing plastic storage containers with glass ones, incorporating houseplants into your home, and choosing organic products whenever possible.
Over time, these small steps will add up, and you will notice improvements in your overall health and well-being. By treating your body and home like a temple, as Fran Drescher, the founder of Cancer Schmancer, suggests, you can take control of your health and reduce your risk of chronic inflammatory diseases.
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Conclusion
Reducing your exposure to environmental toxins is a crucial step towards improving your overall health. By implementing the recommendations shared by Dr. Tom O'Bryan, you can take proactive steps towards detoxing your body and home. Remember, it's not about making drastic changes overnight but rather taking small, consistent steps towards a healthier lifestyle. By treating your body like a temple and being mindful of the products you use, you can significantly reduce your risk of chronic inflammatory diseases and improve your overall well-being.
In this podcast episode, I'm talking with Dr. Will Cole about the, gut brain connection, and how your gut feelings, can affect your brain. Dr. Cole is a world-renowned functional medicine practitioner and health advisor to Gwyneth Paltrow. He is an expert in the field of, cellular health, and inflammation, and he has some amazing insights to share with you about the connection between how you eat and how you feel. If you're curious about the, gut brain connection, and how your, gut feelings, can affect your overall health, then this podcast episode is for you! Dr. Cole discusses the relationship between your gut and brain in detail and explains how you can use this knowledge to improve your health and well-being.
Dr Will Cole Health advisor to Gwyneth Paltrow top functional medicine practitioner in New York Times best-selling author has dedicated his career to teaching people to apply skepticism to National Trends and instead pay closer attention to their own intuition his new book “Gut Feelings Healing the Shame Fueled Relationship Between What you Eat and What you Feel” and how you feel sorry demystifies the gut brain connection and provides a framework to prepare the relationship between what you eat and how you feel .
Named one of the top 50 functional and integrated doctors in the nation Dr Will Cole provides a functional medicine approach for thyroid issues, autoimmune conditions, hormonal imbalances ,digestive disorders, and brain problems. He's the host of “Art of the Being Well” podcast and the author of ” Ketotarian the Information Spectrum” and the New York Times bestseller “Intuitive Fasting”
Myrna: I have followed you for years on Instagram and Facebook but a few months ago you know I'm always on YouTube I have a YouTube channel so I saw your Ad about, cellular health, and I thought it was so great that I wanted to sign up for the webinar on autoimmune conditions and cellular inflammation. I signed up for your, health assessment, where they sent me a kit to check my inflammation levels.
Can you introduce yourself by telling our audience um you know how you became to be one of the top 50 functional medicine doctors the doctor of Gwyneth Paltrow and maybe you can introduce us to what you do with helping clients get rid of their, cellular inflammation.
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Dr Cole: we've been in Telehealth for the 13 for 13 plus years like that's been our day job and my passion and my heart is to really be a part of people's Health journey and figure out why they're struggling with their health issues right so that's our main focus and from that the passion and that sacred responsibility that I hold for our Telehealth patients comes the books in the podcast like all of that Springs from that so thank you for I honor I'm honestly honored that you have to be a part of your health journey and I take that extremely seriously and as I mentioned like we've we started within the first functional medicine Telehealth centers 13 plus years ago
We have several ways that we serve Telehealth patients we have our one-on-one Telehealth concierge which is one-on-one private sessions, and then we have the, autoimmune Health reset, that we launched years ago like three years ago at this point to enhance or level up the amount of people we can support. The urine test reveals inflammation which is the commonality between just about every health problem Under the Sun.
Inflammation and insulin resistance
I mean autoimmune problems are inflammatory metabolic issues like trouble losing weight, insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes, PCOS polycystic ovarian syndrome, which is driven by, insulin resistance, and other hormonal problems to digestive problems you mentioned musculoskeletal inflammation issues to even things like fatigue and anxiety and depression are all inflammatory there's a whole field of research called the cytokine model of cognitive function cytokines are pro-inflammatory cells.
Researchers exploring in the scientific literature how does inflammation impact how our brain works. How does inflammation impact mental health so what one of the ways we measure inflammation is that urine tests, but we also run blood tests like high sensitivity C-reactive protein homocysteine levels. These are just objective data points to show people their Baseline. What's driving the inflammation in both physiological and psychological components is underlying, gut health.
75 percent of your, immune system, resides so there's a lot of gut-centric components to inflammation that could impact your joints, going to impact your mental health it could impact your hormones and impact your blood sugar that we need to calm down so what you embarked on through that group Telehealth model was us to calm down these root causes of inflammation so people can live the life they were created for.
Also natural medicines biohacking different tools mind-body practices trauma work to really deal with what's causing that dysregulation of their immune system which is what chronic inflammation is. Inflammation is not inherently bad, it's a product of the immune system.
Gut brain connection and the vagus nerve
Myrna: I've always known about the, gut brain connection, and the, leaky gut, but I've been learning specifically about you know things getting through the lining and causing inflammation and and I see now where you know the gut is the main resource which is mitochondria and all these different things. Can you talk about the, gut brain connection.
Dr Cole: I mentioned that inflammation is a product of the immune system 75 % to about two-thirds of the immune system resides in the gut or originates in the gut so to understand inflammation you want to look at where the predominance of the immune system resides. But not just from an immune inflammatory standpoint, but also from a, brain health ,standpoint. The gut and brain are actually formed from the same fetal tissue so when babies are growing in their mother's womb the gut and brain are formed .
Serotonin a neurotransmitter is made in the gut and stored in the gut. Fifty percent of dopamine, the pleasure neurotransmitter is made and stored in the gut. The vagus nerve which is the largest cranial nerve in the body these neurotransmitters as we understand it today are made in the gut don't pass through the blood-brain barrier but what they do is crosstalk to the brain through the vagus nerve.
Parasympathetic response and the vagus nerve
So when you hear these conversations that are happening more and more around a dysregulated nervous system what we're actually talking about here is an overactive sympathetic state of that fight, flight or freeze stressed inflamed State and an under active parasympathetic that resting digesting hormone balance date both are important just like inflammation there's nothing inherently wrong with the sympathetic response it's meant to protect that us and it does protect us but it's meant to come up and overact and then calm down when the threat is removed.
Most people are in a state of nervous system dysregulation that it's just always on the sympathetic response is always on to varying degrees and that as you're an underactive resting digesting meaning calm anti-anxiety normal, gut health, normal digestive response. This has to do with what's called the nervous system it's the neuro-aminoendocrine axis so the intersection between our nervous system the endocrine system.
Myrna: How does the gut influence your hormone production or depression? Can you bridge the gap on inflammation as the commonality between all these health problems?
Dr Cole: But the word there the key word is commonality meaning it's the common link but something's causing the inflammation so what's Upstream to the inflammation because if inflammation's not inherently bad we're just talking about dysregulated chronic inflammation, that forest fire that's burning perpetuity for people that's impacting their mental health and their physical health and their hormones and their digestion and their pain levels and their energy levels.
We look at what's causing the inflammation. It's like the check engine light, so if the check engine light's on in your car you don't just keep under driving and cover up the check engine light and act like it's not on. Let's do some Diagnostics to see why that check engine light is on, so that's what we do in functional medicine. So I talk about this in the book at both physiological and psychological drivers of inflammation, so both approaches have to be looked at.
Gut Feelings: The gut brain connection
So underlying gut problems nutrient deficiencies chronic infections like we deal with mold toxicity or chronic lyme disease or environmental toxins those physiological things will impact inflammation, impact our mood and all that stuff it can impact the anxiety depression automate everything on the psychological side. The Chronic infections environmental toxins will can trigger that for some people that have genetic predispositions for autoimmunity, but on a psychological thing side of things.
That's why in part why I called the book, gut feelings, it's gut and feelings it's a physiological and the psychological the physical and the mental emotional spiritual. Those things can trigger the, gut brain connection, things like unresolved trauma and chronic stress and something that I call in the book shame formation. Because our body is a cellular library and our thoughts and our words our emotions our experiences will impact the expression of our biochemistry.
Myrna: I've had several um people on the show talk about childhood trauma results in autoimmune conditions so I'm getting the connection now so that's amazing.
Alcohol and the gut brain connection
Myrna: You say that alcohol affects our, gut brain connection. Are you including red wine as alcohol?
Dr Cole: I'm including red wine in this bucket, so you could make the argument that there's some Redemptive qualities for wine right because it has it Resveratrol which is like antioxidant yeah so you know and it has like polyphenols like other antioxidants in it because it's from like the grapes that is true but actually this compelling amount of data that shows you need to drink an obscene amount of wine to get like to a great therapeutic dose.
Now you can make the other argument towards alcohol and say well couldn't it be alcohol is a hormetic effect in the body it's like a hormesis is a term that means like a good stressor on the body that makes the cells more resilient so fasting is a harmonic effect high intensity interval training is a hermetic effect cold therapy sauna these are all hormatic effects in the body. Let's do some high intention interval training, that's healthier forms of hermesis than this alcohol . Then supplement with Resveratrol or drink some eat some fruits and vegetables.
Myrna: I've heard time and time again about the benefits of red wine my husband is an avid Red Wine Drinker and I just picked it up again like a couple weeks ago because because I heard about the benefits of red wine.
Dr Cole: I need to talk to your husband .
Myrna: So you have a 21 day gut feeling plan designed to help your clients heal can you talk to us about that what's in that plan.
Dr Cole: I adapted the plan in the book based off of different tools that we Implement into our Telehealth patients lives into their protocols so for this book every day of the 21 days there's a gut and a Feeling tool. So there's a physiological and a psychological gut day. We could do a little bit of what you did during that autoimmune Health reset, we focus on soups and stews which is a great way to support that ,gut brain access, that microbiome mood axis to also lower inflammations, which is where two-thirds of the immune system resides.
So this is nothing new to our Landscapes humans right you look at any traditional Society they use soups and stews lots of times right I mean just every day let alone when somebody's sick or therapeutically you know that cliche of chicken noodle soup it's not the noodles that we're helping people it was the broths and the vegetables that were cooked down it was the proteins that were cooked and easy to digest so there's something healing about that on many levels for people.
So it's born as a protocol that we we modify for patients based on what's relevant to them we modify what's called a gaps protocol a it's an acronym gaps it stands for gut and psychology syndrome or gut and Physiology syndrome which is the gut brain Axis or the gut immune Axis or like chronic autoimmune problems so it's used clinically with different applications for different purposes. So I give soup recipes and broth recipes in the book to support that, gut brain immune access, over the course of the 21 days.
On the feelings side, my favorite science back tools that I've seen really work in patients lives also the research is so exciting so things like breath work and the history of breath work and breath work practices that helps to regulate the nervous system, strengthening the vagal tone. A lot of the plan is actually improving vagal tone, most people have a weak vagus nerve they're resting digesting the system is weak they have anxiety inflammation and poor digestion.
We're actually helping to support and strengthen so food on the physiological side on the gut side of that, gut feeling, crosstalk will help to improve vagal tone because the more you lower inflammation the more you support gut from gut health from a nutrition standpoint will improve vagal tone but on a psychological side we need to implement things like breath work to strengthen the vagus nerve to regulate that nervous system.
Strengthening the vagus nerve
Myrna: I do a lot of meditation on the vagus nerve because everything happens when you relax and that is one way I help myself relax and I do you know breath work meditation, I wasn't aware that you can strengthen the vagus nerve so this is new information for me.
Myrna: Your book Gut Feelings: Healing the Shame-Fueled Relationship Between What You Eat and How You Feel is on Amazon so tell us how people can get in contact with you your website social media
Dr Cole: Everything's at Drwillcole.com all the links to everything we talked about in today's conversation are there, so are the links to the Telehealth Center. We have new Telehealth patient options now open a the autoimmune Health reset is one of them but lab information people can run Labs. The links to the books are there Gut Feelings, Intuitive fasting, The inflammation spectrum and Ketotarian the links to the podcast The Art of Being Well. I have a new episode every week. I'm on Instagram @Drwillcole same with Facebook Tic Tock.
Dr William Li, author of Eat To beat Your Diet, shares the fat burning foods we should add to our diet, to be able to burn away harmful, body fat. The fat that is wrapping around your blood vessels serves as fuel tanks for the energy that we eat in our food. You do not have to go on a restrictive elimination deprivation diet, all you have to do is to add certain foods to your diet, to be able to burn away harmful, body fat.
Brown fat, burns down, white fat, it fights bad fat. Eating food can help your good fat, fight bad fat. That's kind of a mind-blowing concept. You can eat foods to, burn fat.
Dr. William Li is an internationally renowned physician, scientist, and author of the New York Times bestseller, Eat to Beat Disease: The New Science of How Your Body Can Heal Itself. His groundbreaking research has led to the development of more than 30 new medical treatments that impact care for more than 70 diseases, including diabetes, blindness, heart disease, and obesity.
Myrna: Dr Li, I heard that our digestive system is unique, like our fingerprints so is that why each person responds differently to food?
Book: Eat to Beat Your Diet
We all come out of the box with the same amount of fat cells
Dr Li: What a great question Myrna, so basically, here's what we know from the latest research. Our bodies are hardwired to work in a certain way, our heart beats in a certain way, our digestive systems work in a certain way, our brains, our eyes, our fingers and toes were all engineered to work in a specific way, it's largely the same for everyone. Our fat cells all function a certain way. And I'll give you an example of what I mean by largely the same.
If you and I went to our own respective computer stores to buy a laptop, the same laptop. All right, and we pulled it out of the box in our own homes, and we plugged it in booted it up. Okay the operating system of that laptop, if you've got the same model, should work exactly the same way as mine. But over time, I'm slaving away at my computer or you're slaving away at yours. The way that our laptop functions, how efficiently and the speed is going to change.
I download a lot of stuff. I have a lot of documents, so I'm sure my computer is going to be slower than yours. But my point is that we all come out of the box the same way. But then individually we develop our own thing. So, our, digestive system, is hardwired to digest the food we put into our mouth. Our brain senses the food, our pancreas, one of our endocrine organs releases insulin. Insulin helps us draw energy out of our food. The energy is packed into our cells, including our, fat cells, and then the food trickles down through our small intestines.
We absorb all the nutrients; it keeps on tumbling further down. And guess what, it feeds our healthy gut bacteria, in our gut. Healthy gut bacteria are very important for overall health. And then finally, you know, we eliminate everything else, we put the poop everything else out. And that's really how we're generally hardwired. So, any deviation from that general pathway winds up being largely the result of who we are, how we live, things we are exposed to. And that's the individualization. So, I'm telling you that we all actually are designed to work the same way, but we are all also individuals.
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Are tomatoes good for us
Myrna: In your book summary, you list probably about a dozen, fat burning foods, that we're supposed to eat to burn fat, Eat to beat our diet. And right at the top there you've got, tomatoes, but Dr. Stephen Gundry says that tomatoes is not a vegetable. It's a fruit and it is bad for us because it's a lectin. So, tell us why did you put tomatoes at the top of your list?
Dr Li: Listen, I love tomatoes. First of all, my work is really focused on what are the foods that we should Add to our lifestyle to enhance our health. There's a lot of people out there who are very well intentioned and very smart, but they focus on things to cut out of your life. Tomatoes are not one of them. That is why I wrote the book “Eat to Beat Your Diet.”
There was a study called the Harvard health professional study that looked at 35,000 men over 25 years. And what they found when they measured tomatoes that people were eating, they found that men who he ate cooked tomatoes, two to three times a week, lowered the risk of, prostate cancer, by about 30%. So, tomatoes are one of the, foods that prevent cancer.
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The reason is because tomatoes contain a natural chemical found in nature called, lycopene. Lycopene, naturally, is very beneficial because when we eat it, it goes into our body. And one of the things that lycopene does in our body is it prevents cancer cells from being able to get its own blood supply. So, it literally cuts off the blood flow that might be feeding a cancer. So, you'd starve the cancer by eating tomatoes.
Okay. Lots of plants have hundreds of, lectins. And it’s true, some that are extremely poisonous, but none of those poisonous ones are in, tomatoes.
Myrna: Wow, that is why tomatoes are at the top of your list. It is one of the, foods that prevent cancer. I have sautéed tomatoes with onions and chickpeas in my fridge right now!
Dr Li: By the way, chickpeas, which are also incredibly nutritious, a good source of protein, good source of dietary fibers, that's a good polyphenol in it are another metabolism activating food that is really healthy. So, when you talk about you know putting tomatoes with chickpeas and onions, that is really healthy. Onions have a natural substance in it called quercetin. Quercetin activates your metabolism it helps burn harmful body fat as well.
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Myrna; I absolutely love it. I heard you talk about Fat. Should we fear fat?
Dr Li: So, all of us have stepped out of the shower in the morning, looked out of the corner of our eye in the mirror and you see a lump of fat or a bump that you don't want to be there, right. So, what do you do immediately? You're like, Oh, I gotta work out. I gotta eat better. I got to do it. The next thing you do you step on a scale. Right? And if that number isn't the exact number you're hoping for, it makes you mad. Now, it's not just in the shower, but in the grocery store at the meat counter. If you see a big thick rind of fat around a steak or something you go I am not going to eat that.
Myrna: So even if you buy it, you cut it out.
Dr Li: But here's the bottom line. This is our adult reaction effect, but you know there's another adult reaction effect. What happens when we see a baby we smile, we love seeing fat babies.
Myrna: That is exactly where I am right now. My daughter just had a preemie baby. And I would love for her to be fat!
Dr Li: Well, wait a minute, obviously fat cannot be all bad, maybe the adult reaction is just the wrong instinct. It turns out, our, body fat, was created when we were still in our mom's womb. One of the first tissues that form is our blood vessels, and that's what I studied blood vessels. Why? Because every organ and every cell in the body requires blood flow, needs nutrients. Okay, that makes a lot of sense the next tissue that forms is our nerves, and the reason is that every organ ultimately would need instructions and nerves. The next tissue is our, Fat cells, called, adipose tissue, or adipose cells.
Fat cells, that form in the womb resemble a piece of bubble wrap. Every little bubble in bubble wrap is a, fat cell, and this fat is around blood vessels. The fat is wrapping around because it serves as fuel tanks for the energy that we eat in our food. So, let's park the fuel tanks of fat right next to where the fuel is coming from and our blood.
Here's exactly how our body works. This is a simple way for everyone to understand, metabolism. Our metabolism is how our body that gets fuel from into our, fat cells. And the fuel that we have comes from food. We eat the food there's fuel our metabolism picks up fuel puts it into the fuel tank and when our fuel tank starts running on empty, we pull over to the dinner table.
We pull over to the refrigerator or to the restaurant or the pantry. Okay, and what we're doing like choosing the food that we eat, we're actually giving ourselves energy and filling up our tanks. Now two things. Know that you can actually fill your car your engine with better quality gas versus really poor-quality gas.
When you use high quality gas, you know that your car is going to run longer and better more efficiently over a long haul. That is basically the same analogy as food when we choose a good quality fuel food. It's good quality fuel for our body, our engine is going to run better, if you deliberately choose poor quality foods our body will not run as good. So again, the quality of the of the fuel of the food that we eat makes a big difference.
Your metabolism is derived from the quality of your food
You’ve also got to make sure you don’t overeat. You're filling up your fuel tank and there is no clicker like at the gas station. When you overeat, inflammation sets in and now you've got inflamed fat that's on the fire and that inflammation leaks out and it's all over your body. Now your whole body's inflamed and that's what sets us up for chronic disease.
So, the good news, I kind of just giving you some bad news, fat burning foods, will help us burn down the extra fuel stored in our fuel tank. And that is really why I call my latest book “Eat to Beat your diet.” You do not have to go on a restrictive elimination deprivation diet to add to your diet to be able to, burn fat, away harmful, Right? It's more joyful to know what are the foods that, burn fat, that you should add to your diet?
Myrna: How does, intermittent fasting, play into this fat burning system? I had two or three guests on the show, talk about, intermittent fasting. I am doing it myself right now. And I'm working with a 15-hour, intermittent fast. My question is that I heard you say a 12 hour fast is almost as beneficial as a 15,16, 24 hours fast. Can you explain why that is?
Dr Li: Well, look I mean the there's a new scientific metabolism that helps explain why, intermittent fasting, is beneficial. Intermittent fasting, isn't just sort of this newfangled fad or trend that somebody came up with that lots of people are following now. It's the most natural thing and who we are as a people. If we fast for 16 hours and eat for 8 hours, we will lose weight, our body will reset, our metabolic markers will improve. All of that, but since 16 hours without food is so hard for everyone to do, I say a 12 hour fast is more manageable and give you the same benefits.
Myrna: Tell us about your book “Eat to Beat your You Diet: Burn Fat, Heal Your Metabolism, and Live Longer. We talked about everything except living longer. But we know that when we put good fuel in our body, then we live longer. So why did you write the book? Tell us what you want readers to walk away with after reading, your website, your social media handles, etc.
Di Li: Thank you very much for that for allowing me talk about my book. So, we already talked a lot about the things that are in my book, but I'll explain. When you get my book, It’s in three parts. The first part tells you these amazing jaw dropping things, that caused my jaw to drop, and my eyes to open about our metabolism. So, here's just a couple of teasers for you. We are not born with different metabolisms; we're not born with a faster or slower metabolism. Turns out our metabolism doesn't automatically slow when we hit our 40s and 50s and 60s. Amazingly, our metabolism from the age of 20 to 60 is rock able.
That's how we're designed, our operating system is designed in our adult life to be completely stable. And so, what happens is that not that a slow metabolism causes us to gain weight. It's gaining weight and growing extra, body fat, slows down our metabolism. You're not cursed with this. You have a tendency to make a decision to use food, use fasting, use your lifestyle to, burn fat. When you burn away the extra fat, you lighten up your body. What happens is your natural operating system your metabolism naturally rises to the surface.
You are in charge of your metabolism because it's hardwired. It's like putting an anti-virus program into your computer so that your operating system can work again. That's powerful. That's very, empowering. And that's a section in my book and then talking about some really interesting parts of that.
Did you know that fat comes in different colors? Fat is brown or fat is white. Those are the two colors. White fat, is lumpy, bumpy, wiggly, jiggly. It's the stuff on your arms, under your chin. White fat is the muffin top. Okay, it's on your thighs. It's on your butt. That's the stuff that most people see. Because it's under the skin, subcutaneous tissue.
But the stuff you can't see, that's also, white fat, and some stuff that's packed into your body. This fat is called, visceral fat, visceral meaning gut, gut fat. And that's why when you actually gain weight, your waist size increases. That's a lot of, gut fat, but you can burn it off it with foods I talk about in my book.
The other kind of fat, the good kind of fat is not lumpy, bumpy wiggly, generally. It's called, brown fat. And in this case, Brown fat, is the kind that you want because it is paper thin. And you're like, What? What are you talking about? Fat is thin? Yes, It is like a piece of paper and it's not close to the skin. It is close to the bone. All right, and where is it located? It is plastered on the side of your neck. It's underneath your breastbone. It's around under your arms like a girdle and a little bit behind your back, and a little bit in your belly. And what, brown fat, does is ignites; it lights up fat like a space heater.
But so will foods like, chili peppers, tomatoes, pomegranate juice, avocados, beans, chickpeas, all these foods I talk about in my book. Brown fat, burns down, white fat, it fights bad fat. Eating food can help your good fat fight bad fat. That is that's kind of a mind-blowing concept. You can eat foods to fight fat. So, this is why I called my book “Eat to Beat Your Diet.
Now the middle of the book is actually me taking you grocery shopping. And the way that I wrote is, I imagined you the reader sitting in my grocery cart, the way you used to sit in your mom's grocery cart as a kid. In this case, I'm pushing you in my grocery cart and I'm whispering in your ear as we go around the grocery store. What's good for your metabolism, what, foods burn fat. We go through to the produce section. We pick up the avocados, and bell peppers we pick up the Bok choy, we pick up the onions etc. I write about 150 foods you can find in the grocery store at any budget.
The last section of my book, the third part is really me coaching you how to adapt this to your everyday life. I give you kind of guidelines and some tips on how to do it and the most important thing is to personalize it for yourself make it work for you.
You can pick up a copy of my book in any book store or on my web site www.drwilliamli.com all my social media handles is @drwilliamli. If you head to my website, you can sign up for my free newsletter where I give you tips about food and recipes and any research that I'm doing.
Almost everybody should be eating a, Paleo diet, It's very safe and you could do it long term. It's how I eat and really it goes down to the Paleolithic times. With the, Paleo diet, you can have unlimited vegetables. And so, you're eating the philosophy of when we were created.
The, keto diet, stands for, ketogenic, and it's basically getting the body in the state of, ketosis. When we are in the state of, ketosis, it basically changes our fuel source from carbohydrates to fat.
Risa Groux, CN is a Functional Nutritionist and Certified Autoimmune Coach and author of FOODFRAME: Diet is a Four-Letter Word . She has always been passionate about nutrition and good health. Risa was so concerned about purity that she made her children’s baby food from scratch. Today she is passionate about cooking and creating healthy, nutritious food. She works with a wide array of clients from professional athletes, adults, and kids to the Biggest Loser from season four.
Risa works with issues like diabetes, autoimmune disease, cancer, digestion, thyroid, and hormone imbalances, to name a few. Risa firmly believes that the body can heal itself with whole foods we obtain from the earth and sees living proof of that in her office each day. She looks at root causes using functional nutrition guidelines, blood and stool tests, and knows that, weight loss, is a side effect of wellness.
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Diet and weight loss
We have to understand the root causes of, weight loss. Why is it that we have headaches, right? It's not because we have a deficiency in Tylenol, right? Why do we have high cholesterol? Why do we have constipation? Why do we have depression, whatever it is anxiety, there's a root cause to that it's not because we have this deficiency and mitigation. We're born with that.
Myrna: Are you saying that, weight loss, can always be linked back to our, diet, and what we are eating?
Risa: Not necessarily always what you're eating, but what you're eating is definitely hindering or helping, okay? So, if there could be a pathogen in your gut, there could be blood sugar dysregulation, there could be, low thyroid, all of these things. Where food absolutely is contributing to the growth of it or to the reverse of it. I'm always looking at those root causes. That's why I do extensive blood tests and stool tests, because I want to know what's going on. I'm not really good at guessing. I don’t play darts with the lights off.
That's what we they do in conventional medicine, not, functional nutrition. So, we're looking at, in addition to root causes, we're looking for prevention, because in allopathic medicine, we look at our reference ranges, they get wider and wider and wider. I say to people all the time, you've got this raging fire in the basement, your doctor might give you a little squirt gun or you might be trying it with a squirt gun yourself, but I've had to bring in the hose and get that fire out because if we have a fire in the basement, we're gonna hold on to all of our resources.
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What we eat is either helping or hindering weight loss
The body is not going to give it up because it may need it in the future. Right? It's like I always say to people, you've got a raging fire in the basement, but somebody is on the second floor saying can you help me change the light bulb? Why I got this fire and you're happy to change the light bulb once again. That's another consideration is how much of a fire do you have? Right? What is making you not lose the, weight. So those are what we look at and, in my office.
I look at two foundational issues. One is, systemic inflammation. As I mentioned, that is the driver of disease we know that for sure with COVID people going into third stage, inflammation. The second is, gut health, and, gut health, is extraordinarily important.
In addition to some, inflammation, one is blood sugar dysregulation which we you know, I test for, insulin resistance, and most allopathic doctors do not test for that. So, I'm looking at a C peptide and a fasting insulin in addition to the C and glucose. So that's number one is if you have insulin resistance, it's very difficult for, weight loss. Number two thyroid dysregulation that is our metabolism. Our temperature gauge, it's how we burn up fat and tells me why you are not able to lose weight.
The third marker for, weight loss, is cortisol, that is the stress hormone, right. So, stress really does drive up, cortisol, we will not lose weight when we have high, cortisol, or really low, cortisol, for that matter, either. And then for you've just named it, sex hormone, imbalance. That's a huge reason why we can't, lose weight.
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The fifth we can’t, lose weight, is an overload of, toxins. So that's why I'm big on, detoxing. I do a detox all the time. I just had a detox shake just now. I'm always, detoxing, and it's really important because we are inundated with chemicals. The FDA in America. This is a brand-new number. I hate to report it. We have been approved for 86,000 chemicals.
Myrna: Well, let's spend a little time there. So how do you, detox, or how do you suggest that people, detox?
Risa: So, let me just give you some more stats there that 86,000, toxins. Over 3000 of which are foods that we can eat right? And let me just tell you that Europe just came out with a list of 1600 chemicals that they banned just for their cosmetics. At the same time, the US banded 11, so we have, toxins, everywhere. They're in our makeup, they're in our clothes, they're in our paint. They're in our furniture, they're in our food. They're in our cosmetics, they're in our sunscreen in our shampoos or conditioners, our Perfume is, toxins.
But, detoxing, the right way is really important when, toxins, come into the system, the liver kind of deciphers. If it is an enzyme, typically even if it's a, toxin, that goes to an enzyme, it goes out that's great, but if it isn't, it gets stored in fat tissues and fat cells. This is why we, lose weight, when we, detox. But, toxins, do a tremendous amount of damage. It stays in the intestinal lining, where they get reabsorbed all day over and over and over again. And one of the markers that we look for on blood tests is called the homocysteine and that tells us if you're able to, detoxify, your own heavy metals and your own, toxins, so really important to look at that marker as well.
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But I, detox, probably three times a year. I have a lot of people in my office who do it four times a year even if you just did it twice here, you'd be way better off than not doing it at all. But I have my own, detox products, which your listeners have 10% off the detox for three months after it drops. Use coupon code Transform10 at Functional Certified Nutritionist | Risa Groux NutritionYou're drinking collagen shakes filled with amino acids and antioxidants that help open up pathways one and two. And then you're eating real foods, you're eating animal protein, you're eating unlimited vegetables, sweet potatoes, yams, and some good fats, eggs, nuts, seeds, olives, avocados.
Myrna: Okay, so that's awesome. But yeah, you probably hit the nail on the head regarding my, weight loss, issues. I haven't detoxed in a long time.
Risa: So yeah, let me tell you the philosophy that drove me to write this book. I've been doing what I do for many years. And I started to do their blood labs. And I realized that everybody is different. If you have low blood sugar, you're going to eat very differently than somebody who has high blood sugar. If you have thyroid, you're going to eat very different than somebody who doesn't have your autoimmune same thing. So, what I started to gather is that we should all be eating according to our health status.
Lot of books come out and tells us this is what to eat, some say go on the, low lectin diet, it works for a lot of people, but it doesn't work for everybody. And same thing with, keto diet. Keto, is great for a lot of people, but not everybody. I personally couldn't get into the state of, ketosis. I kept trying and trying and I just couldn't get into, ketosis, without exogenous health. So, I didn't want to do that. People who don't have gallbladders should not be doing, keto. People who have a lot of adrenals cortisol production stress do not do well on, keto.
Women typically don't do well on, keto. So, I'll start with, keto. I broke this down and created my, Foodframe method. And that is why I wrote the book, because I think it's so important that not one size fits all. Keto, is not this new diet type that is going to be the miracle. It might be for some but not for everybody.
Myrna: Well, let me ask your question right there because, I wasn't aware that, nutritionists, take blood. So, you're testing your clients, and then you're deciding on a nutritional plan for them. Is that only with, functional nutritionists, or, nutritionists?
Risa: I don't know other conventional nutritionists or dietitians who take blood, but I do I order blood labs and stool tests because I don’t like guessing.
So, then I know right? I know if you have H Pylori, or if you have Giardia or you have Candida or you have parasites, how do we know that we've got a fire in the basement ongoing? So, keto, stands for, ketogenic, and it's basically getting the body in the state of, ketosis. When we are in the state of, ketosis, it basically changes our fuel source. Everybody is born to have a fuel source from carbohydrates, sugar, carbs are turned into sugar and the pancreas to pumps that insulin. It creates that insulin and that insulin converts that sugar or carbohydrate and puts it into converts into glycogen puts it in the cell and it's used for energy.
ATP is what we make from the, mitochondria, within the cell. This is difficult for people who have insulin resistance. I mean, it's good for people who have blood sugar issues, because it helps, but when you go into the state of, ketosis, you're changing that fuel source from a carbohydrate to fat. So, you have very, little carbohydrates and I mean less than 20 net carbs in a day, which is low, and maybe 5% of your diet is in carbohydrates. All foods have carbohydrates except for animal protein and fats like oils. Olives are really low. And so, what happens is your fuel source, you're starting to create, ketones, we would see, ketones, in your urine. That means you're burning fat for fuel, and it's great for that person. Most men do really well with, keto, not all women do well with, keto.
Myrna: My husband does, ketosis, with intermittent fasting. He has lost over 30 lbs on this, keto diet.
Risa: Yeah, so that's a perfect person for the, keto diet. Women don't do as well. But again, this is not something I would recommend if you don't have a gallbladder and don’t any fat malabsorption issues. If you have a lot of stress, it may not work for you either, but I would recommend getting a, urine stick, so you can check it every morning to see if you're in the, state of ketosis.
Myrna: And let's stop there for a minute. So, you can get a, urine stick, and check for, ketosis?
Risa: Yep, at Walgreens or CVS? That's what I did is, I would pee on the, urine stick, every morning to see if I'm in the, state of ketosis.
Myrna: Yeah, that's beautiful. That's a great tip. Thank you.
Risa: So almost everybody should be doing, Paleo, rather and you can be doing it. It's very safe. You could do it long term. It's how I eat and really it goes down to the Paleolithic times. And so, you're eating the philosophy of when we were created. We ate animal protein as clean quality as possible because there's another source of, toxins. We have a lot of, growth hormones, and antibiotics in our meats. And then our chickens are just eating just grains and things that they're not supposed to be eating and they weren't born to eat, and our fish is farmed and filled with chemicals also.
So, it's really important to eat good quality. With the, Paleo diet, you can have unlimited vegetables. Any way you want them except for deep fried. We make a couple exceptions like no corns, peas or string beans really very often. We take out legumes, we take out grains, we take out dairy, we take out sugar and processed foods. So, you're having sweet potato, yams, good fats very similar to my, detox. My detox is very, Paleo. It's really the easiest one to do. You can stay on it long term, and you're really removing the high carb foods and the inflammatory foods, bread, sugar, dairy, alcohol, you can have a little bit of alcohol on, Paleo diet, like tequila, gin, vodka, things like that. No beer.
Myrna: One of my sponsors Greenchef set me up with, Paleo recipes. And I've been I've been cooking, Paleo, but I don't know much about the, Paleo diet.
Risa: Benefits of, Paleo diet, is to decrease that, systemic inflammation, and increase good, gut health. So, it has a lot of fiber, which is really good for the microbiome. For general good diversity and, gut health. We're removing the sugar are the dairy, the grains and the legumes. I'll get into that a little later. We talked about, lectins, but they're hard to digest.
If you don't have enough digestive enzymes in the system, you're gonna have a hard time breaking down, and they're also filled with tons of carbohydrates. I am a former, vegan, myself and I lived on beans, specifically a little bit of grains but not much and my blood sugars I just watched it go through the roof. I was almost pre diabetic. And it was just because I was eating so many beans at every meal. Lentils and garbanzo beans and hummus and black beans.
Myrna: I gained 3 lbs in the last 2 weeks because I was eating beans and oats!
In my book, I go in great detail with this such different types of, vegetarians and the, vegan, diet. Vegetarians, are eating Bread and Oreos, French fries, Cokes. You know, these are all vegetarian foods, but they are not good for us. They're processed foods, so you can fall into that trap of processed diet. And occasionally I do meet a real, vegetarian, who actually eats vegetables, but they have to have some protein soy. So again, there's the beans and the grains, nuts and the seeds. So, vegan, is not something I recommend for everyone. I really don't recommend eating vegetarian or, vegan, for most people. But I do recommend eating a lot of plants food no matter what, because we were born to eat plants.
Autoimmune Protocol Diet is Paleo without nightshade
The, autoimmune protocol diet, is fairly restrictive. It's an elimination diet. So, it's 30 to 90 days and I wouldn't recommend if you have one or two or more autoimmune, you go for 90 days as best you can. It's very restrictive. It's the, paleo diet, however we're removing, nightshade vegetables. So that's tomatoes, potatoes, opportunities except for sweet potato and yams, eggplant and peppers of any kind.
So, anything but black pepper, soy, paprika, red peppers, and you know jalapenos and then and goji berries and then we're moving on nuts, seeds, eggs, so it is very restrictive. They bring it a little bit of fruit, but very little berries a little bit of apple things like that. But it's pretty restrictive. And the whole point is to quell the, inflammation, that's driving these antibodies that are causing that cytokine storm.
Myrna: I'll circle back, so you're saying that the foods that you remove are foods that contribute to, inflammation?
Risa: if you have, autoimmune disease, nightshade vegetables, are foods that are high in, lectins, which we'll get to next. But, lectins, can cause inflammation. Yes.
Myrna; Dr. Steven Gundry has been talking about, lectins, and how these things go through your intestinal lining of your stomach, and you shouldn't eat them? And I listen and I'm thinking why are tomatoes bad? But you're just saying exactly the same thing, I don't eat eggplant. I'm allergic to it. What are some of the, nightshade vegetables, again, I know there's tomatoes what else?
Risa: Tomatoes, all kinds of potatoes except sweet potato and yams, different family eggplant, and peppers, any kind of pepper except for black pepper. So, Gundry he endorsed my book. He's on the cover of my book. I'm doing his podcast actually in a couple of weeks. But he is actually right and all the research he did about, lectins. Lectins, basically, you know we all as human living organisms, we all have a defense mechanism, right?
If we're being attacked, humans, we can kick bite, scream, flee, call 911 right plants don't have that ability. So, what they have is what I call a hard candy around them and it's around the germ or the seed. So, they say, I want to just survive and procreate, just like humans, right? Those are two main goals for the organisms. And so, they have this protective coating.
Now if you have a very acidic stomach, you have enough digestive enzymes in your gut, you're going to be able to break, lectins, down. But even if you break those down, those, lectins, can cause a lot of, inflammation, especially somebody with a, leaky gut. So, Dr Gundry talks about a lot about, leaky gut, and I'm trying to I always try to explain it to people because we only have one layer of epithelial cells in the intestinal lining, just one and we have some villi there protecting it. But once you damage that layer, we have poke holes called tight junctions. And Gluten is a great helper to open up those tight junctions causing, leaky gut, and then next thing we've got food intolerances and, inflammation.
Myrna: Can you explain what's bad about a, leaky gut.
Risa: So, you don't want a, leaky gut, because things are going through stress, toxins, food particles, organ malfunctions, bread, sugar, dairy and alcohol are all going through and causing your body to go in the state of, inflammation, and cause food sensitivities not food allergies, but food sensitivities. And if you do that long enough, you'll create an, autoimmune disease, right? The antibodies are created so it's got a place to it's got to park itself, organ gland or tissue. So, for fibromyalgia, it's your muscles. If it's rheumatoid arthritis, it's your joints.
So, you don't want antibodies passing through your gut, you don't want, autoimmune diseases. So that's why you don't want a, leaky gut. Also, it just impairs everything, brain fog, I mean, it goes on and on digestive issues, things like that.
Your FODMAP is an acronym and it stands for fermentable, oligo, saccharides, disaccharide, disaccharides, monosaccharides and polyols. And in plain English, that means different types of carbohydrates that cause a lot of gas production. This is what happens if you have, IBS irritable bowel syndrome, which is basically a non-diagnosis for some, inflammation. I find out on the stool tests how much you have, but if you have inflammation in the intestinal lining, you either have IBS or IBD irritable bowel disease, or SIBO, which I test people for which is small intestinal bacterial overgrowth and that is constant chronic bloating, and it's paired with either chronic diarrhea or chronic constipation.
The FODMAP diet
So we'll have either of those three, that is something that I recommend doing low, FODMAP, so these are carbohydrates that absorb water, and they tend to make you bloat and they create a in house, cellulite. It helps muscle it helps on hair, skin and nails. It helps joint pain. I have probably two servings of collagen every single day. It's really good. It's a great protein source and very low in carb, protein, fat and fiber. I started with coconut milk; I had coconut cream. I used it today, I had my chocolate collagen plus, which has the amino acids and antioxidants to help open up those detox pathways. And then I put some fiber in so I put in today I put in hemp seeds and spinach. So usually, I do a seed and a green and it is very, very filling, takes through the distance, your body doesn't need anything else.
Myrna: Where can we pick up a copy of Foodframe: Diet is a Four-Letter Word? Your website, your Instagram handle and how people can get a hold of you for this amazing information that you're given.
Book: FoodFrame Diet is a Four-Letter Word
Conclusion
Risa: Thank you. I recommend everybody find out what their foodframe is and you can take the quizzes, only 12 questions on my website risagrousnutrition.com. There you will find my book, there you will find my course, how to achieve optimal thyroid health, there you will find tons of articles and my product line, my detox, my collagen, and collagen plus that's more the detox collagen. After you're done with the, detox, you can stay on that for more liver detoxification. And then a plethora of other supplements. I have I have these amazing collagen bars that are delicious chocolate bars that are only eight net carbs and they're great. I have one almost every day.
My Instagram is @risagrouxnutrition. My tick tock and Facebook are the same. I work with people all over the world. We do advise on zoom. So, anybody's welcome to make an appointment. And we'll order labs. We'll send you a stool test at your home and then we'll have you go to your local lab for blood work and then we'll just watch you heal and, lose weight.
I made the connection in my mind between unresolved, childhood trauma, and these, autoimmune, problems. What I mean by unresolved is that the, trauma, is continuing to loop. The people are continuing to experience it as when the, trauma, was active, that creates, inflammation, in the body. The, inflammation, then compromises your, immune system, and your, neurotransmitters. If your, immune system, is compromised like it was with my daughter, the, inflammation, stays active. Inflammation, is basically a temporary pause in the system to protect the system against a threat.
Listen to the Full Interview Here
Introduction to Childhood Trauma and Autoimmune Disease
Bio
Dr. Don Wood, PhD developed the TIPP method after spending years researching how atmospheric conditions™ affect our minds and impact our lives. He went back to school later in life to get his PhD in clinical counseling and psychology, to learn how to heal his daughter’s Crohn’s disease and his wife’s autoimmune disease. Dr Wood says Both my wife and daughter experienced childhood trauma and I saw how it affected their life, including their health. They both had developed autoimmune disorders.” The TIPP program developed by Dr. Wood has benefited individuals all over the world. “ Dr. Wood is the author two books “You Must be out of your Mind” and “Emotional Concussions”, are focused on how we can all make the desired changes by allowing our mind to reset and reboot.
Dr Don Wood Childhood Trauma and Autoimmune Disease
Myrna: I just finished reading the book “What Happened to You” by Dr Perry and Oprah Winfrey. It is a profound book on, childhood trauma, which is where we're going to be spending some time on today. That book focused on the results of, childhood trauma, on, mental health, and relationships. I don't think I've ever read a book that so clearly links what happened to us as children to how we live life as adults. I've had a lot of guests on the Transform Your Mind talk show, talk about, trauma, and it's link to substance abuse and drug use etc., but this is the first time I am hearing a connection of, childhood trauma, to, autoimmune disorders and, Crohn's disease.
So, I want to start off by putting a pin on something you said in your bio. You said that you went back to school later in life to get your PhD in Clinical Counseling and Psychology, to learn how to heal your daughter's, Crohn's disease, and your wife's, autoimmune disease. You also said that, childhood trauma, were the causes for both, inflammation. Can you share what you found is the connection between, childhood trauma, and, autoimmune disease?
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Dr Wood: Absolutely! It was really because of my daughter. My wife, when I met her, I realized she was living in a very different household than I grew up in. She had a very traumatic childhood with a very disruptive father, and so she developed Hashimoto’s (which is a thyroid disorder). She was in a constant state of, fight or flight, and it wasn't until my daughter was diagnosed with, Crohn’s disease, at age 14 that we then started to look for answers for her.
She was just basically told to get rid of gluten and dairy and change her diet, they really had no answer. When she was 16, she disclosed to us some, childhood trauma, that she'd experienced between the ages of six and eight that we were unaware of. I usually sometimes don't talk about this, but she actually had a second, autoimmune disorder, called Idiopathic Pulmonary Hemosiderosis; which is just a long form. It's a long name. Basically, it's another, autoimmune disease, that affects the lungs and the iron in the lungs. It causes the lungs to bleed out and basically that could be a death sentence. One out of 1.2 million people get it and a fair percentage of them die from it within five years.
That is really what started me looking for answers. I made the connection in my mind between unresolved, childhood trauma and these, autoimmune, problems. What I mean by unresolved is that the, childhood trauma, is continuing to loop. The people are continuing to experience it as when the, trauma, was active, that creates, inflammation, in the body. The, inflammation, then compromises your, immune system, and your, neurotransmitters. If your, immune system, is compromised like it was with my daughters, the, inflammation, stays active. Inflammation, is basically a temporary pause in the system to protect the system against a threat.
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If Childhood Trauma is not addressed it becomes inflammation
The problem for my daughter was that the threat continued because the memory of her, childhood trauma, was looping and continued to stay active. What I believe is the connection between these, autoimmune, issues is if you don't resolve that, trauma, it just continues. The, inflammation, for my daughter showed up in her intestinal area. There are a lot of people who have ended up with, Crohn’s disease, colitis, and, IBD, because of, inflammation, from, trauma. The cells go into a cell danger response, so they basically become hardened, enlarged and inflamed to protect the system temporarily until the danger passes. Then the, immune system, comes in, cleans up and takes over.
For my daughter, it didn't fix because she constantly was feeling the experiences from the result of her, childhood trauma. It stayed in this active cell danger response, but after we got the, trauma, resolved for my daughter, she hasn't had a, Crohn’s, flare-up. There's no other explanation in my mind that why her, Crohn’s, would stop and her idiopathic pulmonary issues also stopped. There was where I made the connection between the two.
Myrna: The connection between the, Crohn’s disease, I understand, because a lot of times when we're in, fight or flight, or when we're nervous or anything, we feel it in our gut, so that's definitely understandable.
Dr Wood: Crohn’s disease, can be sometimes called Creatural Bowel Syndrome, you feel it in your gut. I understand that part because you're always tense, and you’re always nervous.
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Autoimmune Disease and the Fight or Flight Response
Myrna: That's definitely a, fight or flight, response. Now, did you understand why your wife's, autoimmune disorder, showed up in her lungs which a a weird place to get it? What does the breath, the lungs and the iron in the lungs has to do with your, autoimmune? Tell us what's going on there again.
Dr Wood: I just believe it's coming down to, inflammation, so it shows up genetically different in different people. For my daughter, it ended up in her lower intestinal area. She also ended up with, inflammation, in her lungs as well. My wife ended up with a, thyroid disorder. I think it just shows up depending on where your weakest link is in your system. That's why it shows up in different places for different people.
Myrna: Now, you mentioned specifically that your daughter's, childhood trauma, happened between the ages of six and eight. Did you adopt her or something?
Dr Wood: No, she is our biological child. There was another young girl in the neighborhood that was a little older that had been abusing her. We were unaware. We thought she was just like a big sister and so she had been abusing her and we didn't know about it, and then we moved. The abuse stopped obviously because we moved, and then when she was 16, my daughter disclosed it to us and then by now she's got, Crohn’s disease. Again, we hadn't quite made that connection yet, because we were told by the doctors that, she's just have to learn to live with, Crohn’s disease. She'd eventually have to have four surgeries done where they had to literally go in and cut out pieces.
She really suffered and they said eventually she'll just end up with a colostomy bag. That's why my wife did all kinds of research and everything that she was learning was teaching people to live, manage and cope with, Crohn's, but not fix it, because they say there's no cure for, Crohn’s.
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Myrna: If you're having, autoimmune disorders, then you might want to look at the fact that you might have unresolved, childhood trauma. There is a host of people that has unresolved, childhood trauma.
Dr Wood: My wife didn't have a safe place and there was no safe landing place. So, she constantly stayed in this state of fear so she couldn't, regulate.
Myrna: Regulate, that's Dr. Perry's favorite word. Regulate, is new word for me.
Dr Wood: Yes, we all need to, regulate. We need to find a way to cope either by listening to music or something else.
Myrna: Yes. I mean, I didn't understand what that meant, but now it's one of my new words in my vocabulary. I understand what, regulate, means, but maybe you might want to explain it to our listeners and readers.
Dr Wood: Sure. I know you had mentioned the, Vagus nerve. The, Vagus nerve, is either going to activate your, sympathetic nervous system, or, parasympathetic nervous system. Your, sympathetic nervous system, is your, fight or flight, and your, parasympathetic nervous system, is your rest and digest. The idea behind it is, if there's a constant threat going on your mind (like feeling unsafe), your, sympathetic nervous system, is going to be constantly activated. Eighty percent of the messaging from the, Vagus nerve, comes from the stomach, where all that, inflammation, starts coming in. They say your, gut, is your second brain and is sending information to the brain that there's something wrong and we're in stress all day long. Then the, inflammation, comes in and the rest and digest goes out the door. The, parasympathetic nervous system, is now turned off and is responding from the, sympathetic nervous system.
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The Parasympathetic Nervous System and Childhood Trauma
The idea behind it is when you're in, regulation, that, sympathetic, responds to a threat that is current and, parasympathetic, is what you're supposed to be in most of the time. The problem coming is that, childhood trauma, continues to activate that, Vagus nerve, sympathetic nervous system, because the mind glitches. Actually, I call it an error message. Your mind thinks the memory is still real, because it sees it in real time and so it's activating that system to try to protect you even though there's nothing happening. It's just information about something that happened in your past.
Myrna: That's why we develop, autoimmune disorder, because we are constantly in, fight or flight, mode.
Dr Wood: One of the things that was difficult for my wife, I couldn't understand why. Even though, she was living in my world now, we were doing well, we had a beautiful home with three beautiful children; yet she wasn't enjoying it. She couldn't relax and enjoy it, she was constantly preparing for the trouble to come. As a child her father would always cause her pain.
She learned that good times end and they end really quickly. She never wanted to get into that position of getting her hopes up that things were going to be okay, because her experiences which I call her ‘atmospheric conditions’ had been very dark and stormy. So, she's expecting the storm and don't want to start feeling safe. It was the loops our program can fix. We don't need to live and manage with it, we can actually fix it.
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Myrna: You said that people that experience symptoms from unresolved, childhood trauma, such as, addiction, PTSD, anxiety, achieving peak performance of the sport, business center, relationships. You say to think of those unresolved, childhood trauma, as rust and you said that most programs and therapies solution is to paint a cover over the rust whereas your program; the, TIPP program, removes the rust altogether. Now, this is your opportunity to tell us. What does, Tipp, stand for and what does it do?
Dr Wood: Tipp, stands for The, Inspired Performance Program. The reason we called it performance and not ‘trauma therapy’ was because I start off with the premise that there's nothing wrong with anybody. There's nothing wrong with anybody's mind. Your mind is filtering through your unique set of experiences to respond to your current present situation and so when you talked about the rust, what I say is, if you just paint over the rust, the rust will bubble up through the paint.
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Eventually, the key is to sit it down, prime it and then paint it and then the rust is gone. That's what we do. What we do with, TIPP. I take you through a process. It's a four hour process that we basically reboot and refresh that old traumatic memory. The best way to explain it to you and people who are listening to this is that you can do this along with this, is I'll say can you remember what you ate for dinner last night? So, I ask you Myrna, can you remember what you ate for dinner last night?
Myrna: Yes. I had rice and beans with something that we call tripe.
Dr Wood: Okay. When you're looking at this, you'll notice that you looked up and when you looked up you saw pictures of what you ate, right? That's how you stored the information about dinner last night. No other animal does that, only humans store that kind of explicit detail about events and experiences. Now your survival brain is operating about 95 of everything for you. Your survival brain is fully present and in the moment now, when we have a traumatic event all your senses are heightened, sight, smell and hearing.
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How's it going to record that very bright and very intense with a tremendous amount of data brought in? Can you see where this glitch is going to come in now? If for some reason your mind accesses that memory that was traumatic and it sees all that intensity and high definition to it, what does it think it's happening? Right now. If you're in a threatening situation, doesn't it make sense that all of a sudden your, sympathetic nervous system, would engage your heart, your heart would start racing and you would go into that kind of a response. Even though there's no threat, it's just information about a threat that's, post traumatic stress. The person is constantly reliving through that memory and experiencing, PTSD.
What we do in our program is we're going to take that high definition traumatic memory and get your mind to reprocess that into the same format as to what you ate for dinner last night and takes a lot of that intensity out of it. Now, when you recall it, your mind doesn't call for the action, because when you have an emotion, the purpose of an emotion is a call for an action. The purpose of fear is to escape a threat and the purpose of anger is to attack a threat.
Myrna: Your, Tipp program, also helps people by rebooting, panic attacks, and anxiety.
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Dr Wood: It works the same way. If I can think, it will be the panic attack and anxiety, is the, fight-or-flight, response to this memory, right? So, panic attacks, are actually a combination of the emotional and physical. The mind is feeling threatened for some reason, but it can't find the danger and then what happens is it starts to activate your nervous system.
Now, your brain starts getting messages from the, Vagus nerve, from the system saying we're running low on oxygen, the brain is like there's going to be a lion around here, but I can't see the lion. Then the body starts sending messages like our Co2 has changed, our oxygen level has changed and so all of those signals come into the brain when the brain is already feeling a stress response; it then goes into a, panic attack.
So, I wrote a patent for a band that you can wear on your wrist to detect a, panic attack, coming up to an hour before the, panic attack, start. The mind is doing this constant search looking for a problem that it can't find, starts to activate the nervous system which then starts sending messages to the brain and it's happening up to an hour before the, panic attack, happens.
But, people think the, panic attack, can come on suddenly, but it is starting an hour before. The idea behind this band is that, the band will detect when the mind is starting to do that thing and then what I teach you in our, TIPP program, is how to shut it down.
Myrna: I love our conversation. I now see why you're a podcast favorite, because this is good Stuff.
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Dr Wood: The second book I wrote was called “Emotional Concussions”. Exactly those kinds of things that are not the big “T” traumas.
They're like that coach that told you you're never going to be good enough.
The teacher that told you you're not smart enough,
the parent that said you'll never make it give that whole plan up, you're not going to make it.
Those are, emotional concussions, that can keep looping for 40 years.
Myrna: Your new book is called “You must be out of your mind, we all need a Reboot”, so tell us about your book. Why you wrote the book and what's basically the message that you're sending out?
Dr Wood: The first book was written really about the, Tipp program, and how it was developed. I talked about how my daughter and my wife were living this life. The only solution had been medical, give them prescriptions and medications and that led me on the search to try to find what I discovered – that this, childhood trauma, is what was continually activating their nervous system which was then creating their issues. So, that's why I said we all need to reboot, we got to get you out of that mind, we've got to reboot that mind and reset it to its original manufacture settings.
Everybody can benefit from this reboot, because like I said, the highest performing people when we have this unresolved, trauma, not only does it affect the mind, it affects the body and it actually affects our energy.
Myrna: Tell our listeners how they can connect with you and pick up copies your books.
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Conclusion to Childhood Trauma and Autoimmune Disease
Dr Wood: They can either do it two different ways: go to get the, Tipp program, at gettipp.com . You'll get the information on the program. You can either do it digitally online or in person. I take you through the whole four hour program online or you can come and personally see me for a one-on-one experience.
Myrna: Everybody has been talking about mindfulness and meditation and I'm not sure how that relates to, trauma.
I know that's how I find my peace, but whatever, trauma, I had, if I had any it's been long removed, but I do practice my self-care meditation. I, regulate, myself, I didn't even know that's what I was doing, but I, regulate, myself by walking 5k every day. You know what I mean, that's all part of, regulation, so absolutely yes a lot of those things that you can do to sort of help as well.
Thank you guys for tuning in to the Transform Your Mind to Transform Real Life Radio podcast and television show. If you have not done so and you're listening to this on iTunes, please subscribe and leave a review. I bring you great quality guests like Dr. Wood every week as we try to transform your mind so that you can transform your life.
Until next time, blessings.
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