Jay Feldman  0:05  
Should you use Berberine and Urolithin A for weight loss? Do you always need to have protein when you eat carbohydrates? And are there any benefits to using a sauna? We'll be answering these questions in today's episode of the energy balance podcast, a Podcast where we explore health and nutrition from the bioenergetic view, and teach you how to maximize your cellular energy, to maximize your health. Today's episode, we'll be going over whether Berberine and urolithin A are good options for weight loss. We'll also discuss how Berberine lowers your blood sugar and whether this is really a good thing. We'll also discuss the effects of Berberine and urolithin A under gut. We'll also discuss whether you always need to have protein alongside your carbohydrates, as always. To check out the show notes for today's episode, where we'll link to the articles, studies and anything else that we reference, you can head over to Jay Feldman wellness.com/podcast, and with that, let's get started. You

all right, so the first question on today's Q A episode is from Brenda, and she asks, What is your opinion of urolithin A and Berberine for weight loss. So both of these supplements have been used for or are used for a number of different reasons. And we've talked a bit about Berberine before. We haven't talked much about your lithium a so we'll, uh, we'll definitely kind of start from the beginning here and explain what each of these are, and then general physiological effects, and then we'll talk about whether each of them are a good option, or are a good solution for losing weight. So just kind of big picture wise, each of these are polyphenols, or polyphenol derivatives. So Berberine is a polyphenol found in a number of different herbs. One of the main ones is goldenseal. And then urolithin, A is a polyphenol metabolite, where, basically, it's produced from bacteria when they metabolize certain polyphenols that are found in a number of different foods. And each of these are used as supplements to help with a number of things. You know, they're said to help with mitochondrial function, they're said to help with blood sugar regulation. They're said to help with, in this case, weight loss and a number of other things. So we'll kind of be digging into that. And I guess we'll start with with Berberine first, and then we'll dig into your lithium after. Mike. Do you want to go ahead and and start us off there?

Mike  2:32  
Sure. So for me, both these compounds are kind of a mixed bag. And what I mean by this is that they're often touted in the mainstream as these really or not even the mainstream, but the alternative health spheres, these really great options that people can use and solve all these problems, and a lot of the drawbacks aren't discussed. So there is actual benefits to some of these components, but there's also negatives, and we want to be aware of both. So I want to actually talk about these components from their pros and their cons. So with Berberine, the first thing let's actually talk about is pros, because there are pros to it and when it can be used possibly, and we can talk about what the cons are. So the first pro is that Berberine, like urolithin, a which we'll talk about in a second, isn't really absorbed well. So they're even trying to structurally modify the Berberine now to make dihydroberine so that it's more absorbable. But regular Berberine isn't absorbed quite quite well. And this is good, because when we talk about the cons, we'll see that has some toxicity for the liver. And so the next thing is the benefits of Berberine inside diabetes. Specifically, the main one, at least from my perspective, is that it does decrease gluconeogenesis by impairing pyruvate carboxylation, so basically it impairs the process of producing glucose from amino acids and differing components, which can be helpful in diabetes, because gluconeogenesis, as we talked about in multiple episodes, is upregulated, and the process of having an upregulated gluconeogenesis at the liver can start to lead to insulin resistance and other problems with pancreatic beta cells and things like this over time. So lowering that can be helpful, but at the same time, how we're lowering that is really important to actually understand. And Berberine isn't doing it by lowering glucagon or lowering stress. It's just going in and impairing mitochondrial function, which, again, I'll talk about in a second. So separate from that. And the other thing is, again, since Berberine is not really well absorbed, it may not make it in large amounts to the liver to have this effect, although only micromolar concentrations are required. So the next thing is, Berberine does have some antimicrobial effects, and it does have anti inflammatory effects, and it does have microbiome, microbiome shifting effects, and it can possibly function as a endotoxin antagonist in the intestine. So traditionally, a lot of cultures, a lot of alternative medicine healers, over time, have used Berberine to treat diarrheal disorders, and I think in the sense of treating the gut. Berberine actually has a bunch of benefits and can be used in short courses to help clear out the gut, however, long term utilization, I would say, is problematic because of the toxicity components from it. So overall, in the studies, Berberine triggers mucus production, which can help trigger the growth of a bacteria called akermansia mucinophila, which also helps improve gut integrity and lower the leakage of endotoxin across the intestine. So if you're dealing with significant gut issues, you can use Berberine in conjunction with other components. These are things that I run in what I call gut protocol to help minimize people's digestive issues over time. So in that sense, from a weight loss perspective, if you're dealing with digestive issues and LPs and LPs and these different components, endotoxin are blocking your ability to lose weight and shifting hormones. Running a short course of Berberine in this context may be helpful to help minimize the block on metabolism and on the shift in the hormones. But as a long term solution, I don't think that it's, you know, the best thing ever. Now the reason why, and let's get into the cons. First of all, a lot of the beneficial studies on Berberine where we see some benefit are in cell culture studies or in very specific contexts and circumstances. So it's important to understand, when you're looking at different studies, that showing that something is beneficial is how is that working? So we do want to understand that when we're looking at Berberine, but when we look in there's a study where they perfuse rat livers with Berberine. What we see is that it actually decreases the ability of the liver to detoxify ammonia, which, long term, is not good, because ammonia is toxic. It also we see that Berberine can increase glycolysis, and it's increasing glycolysis because actually decreases mitochondrial function and actually negatively impacts ATP production. So the bot the liver is basically saying, hey, we need to upregulate glycolysis. We need to use this less efficient, less beneficial way of producing energy, which is glycolysis, because the mitochondrial metabolism is impaired. With Berberine, we all see shifts in favor of NADH over NAD plus by with Berberine utilization, which actually not good. We want to see an increase in NAD plus in ratio to NADH and we all see increased lactate to pyruvate ratios. So all of this is indicating that Berberine is negatively impacting the mitochondrial function of the liver. So it's essentially to it is an alkaloid compound from plants. It's meant to be a defensive compound. It's meant to have antimicrobial properties, and it's also meant to deter animals from eating these particular types of plants, but the different portions of the plants, whether that's the leaves, whether that's the roots, whether that's the stems, etc, etc, etc. So Berberine is a defensive compound, and it shows defensive, pesticidal effects, including towards mammals. So from a gut perspective, can be helpful. From an energy metabolism perspective, not so helpful. It can lower blood glucose values, and it can shift hemoglobin a 1c values by blocking gluconeogenesis. But the mechanism by which it does that probably isn't the most ideal, and there's probably better ways to go about it. In terms of use cases, I think short term utilization to clear out the gut could be helpful. Long term use probably not ideal overall, although it's not highly absorbed. So I think that the risk of toxicity is decreased if you're using regular Berberine dihydro Berberine may be a little bit different because it's modification allows to be more absorbed and in terms of the overall picture, the context for weight loss, I don't really think that it's gonna make a massive difference in somebody's weight loss, besides, like, getting your foundation right with diet, movement, sleep, dialing hormones and things like that, that in my experience with all the clients that I've worked with, hands down, the most effective way to dial in Weight Loss. These little niche things that we see on from podcasters and health gurus of Oh Berberine, you're a lithon A these are the things that are going to make a difference to your weight loss. You need to supplement this. Now I haven't seen that make a massive difference to people's weight loss. I it's mostly foundational stuff, and these things are maybe helpful for very specific use cases, like gut problems,

Jay Feldman  9:03  
yeah. And I think that's, that's definitely a great summary overall. I think even to zoom out a little bit, you were kind of alluding to this when we're talking about polyphenols. Most of them serve a purpose as defense chemicals, and so what that means is they tend to kill pests and microbes, you know, bacteria and fungus. But a lot of them can also be there through the same mechanisms, toxic to us. And as we're saying, that's essentially what we're seeing with this toxicity. And you see it play out in a handful of different places. See it play out in the liver. We also see it play out in the most basic of of our functions and needs, which is energy production. So Berberine is well known as a mitochondrial toxin, where it has a pretty strong inhibition at complex one of the electron transport chain, which basically means that any food that you're taking in, you're not going to be inverting it to energy as effectively. This is all assuming, as you were saying, this is all assuming that it's getting absorbed. So this is when you're looking at her brain inside the. Human body, not in the gut, although it does have similar effects in the gut too, just against bacteria and microbes. But so so when it's absorbed, her brain has these effects. And as you were saying, that's how it can help, so to speak, with lowering blood sugar, you there's some inhibition of gluconeogenesis, and there's also basically a wasting of glucose that happens because when you're not able to run that glucose all the way through mitochondria respiration, you're forced to rely on glycolysis to produce energy, and that causes us to use up a ton of glucose and produce more lactate, as you were saying, while also lowering that ad 10 ADH ratio. And then what you know, what we're left with is less energy, but less glucose. And so, yes, you can see that work by basically poisoning the mitochondria. But that is not the way that we want to be lowering our blood sugar, right? We want to lower our blood sugar by actually improving our utilization of it, improving our insulin sensitivity, as opposed to just poisoning, basically our engines so that we're wasting the glucose so when absorbed, Berberine has this, this toxic effect, and so because of that, as you're saying, not really a great idea in most cases, except for if you're using it to improve gut health, where it has material to have various benefits, and the main ones are by reducing fungus and bacteria. And those are not small, you know, those are not insignificant effects. You know those, those can dramatically impact other areas. You know, whether we're talking liver function, brain function, immune function or weight loss. So by improving the state of the gut, Berberine can be helpful. Part of the part of the issue, as you were saying, with with supplementing is now people are supplementing with incredibly high doses and also trying to convert it into forms that are more absorbable, as if that's where the benefit is coming from, but really, that's where the harm is coming from from. Something like Berberine, if you're just using it for the gut effects, then you know, as you were saying, Mike, using it short or moderate term could be fine, especially in more moderate doses, and especially not in the forms that are absorbed more effectively, because we actually don't want it to be absorbed. And this is something we've talked about in the hormesis series. We've talked about in a few different gut episodes, where the benefit of polyphenols, in general, in most foods is that they are toxic to microbes, and they help to keep the bacterial population down or fungal population down, and they also tend to be selective, right? They tend to selectively affect the more harmful microbes. And so that's really where their benefit is coming from. And there's so much confusion in the research, especially with hormesis, where these things that are toxic, like known to be mitochondrially toxic and then cause all these defensive reactions are said to be beneficial because they're supposed to make you stronger, and they create new mitochondria, and they increase autophagy. And in reality, these are just defensive reactions to something that's that's toxic or poisonous and not actually a way to improve our health. And this has all gotten conflated to where now people are trying to take massive doses of polyphenols to do something like lose weight, when, in reality, the benefit is mostly just through supporting gut health. And we really want to minimize how much is being absorbed in that mitochondrially toxic effect. And so that would be, you know, it's kind of the big picture thoughts with Berberine and urethina really is pretty parallel in terms of its effects. So there's a little bit less identified as far as its toxicity, so to speak, in terms of the mitochondria, but there's definitely some indication of impairment in electron transport chain function. So impairment in energy production, lowering of ATP and increasing in things like amp, kinase, NRF, two you know, all of the same hormetic pathways that not only does Berberine activate, but so does cigarette smoke. So does mercury, so does any sort of intense stress and and these are the things that are supposed to be beneficial. You know, people will point to these things as as if this is a reason to consume these compounds at high doses. But in reality, as we're getting to these are just toxic effects here. And so, you know, the very kind of brief situation with your little DNA is similar, where we're having some mitochondrial toxicity and some beneficial gut effects at the same time, antimicrobial effects, anti inflammatory effects in the gut, improving the the integrity of the gut barrier, reducing endotoxin release from bacteria. So there's a number of benefits in the gut for for your low DNA, but again, we're having those mitochondrial toxic effects. And there are some other ones that I'll get to in a moment. But the kind of, the kind of summary here is this is not really something that we want to be getting in large doses, but Michael, that you go ahead and dig in further, and then we'll discuss other effects.

Mike  14:36  
That's great. Jay, those points were all pretty good. What I what I would add here, and I want to set some context for a lot of these different compounds before I jump into your Lith a pretty much all of these plant compounds and these different components are a mixed bag. And the reason why is because they don't just have one unifying effect. They have multiple different effects on multiple different pathways across the body. And it's important to understand. Are they absorbed? Are they not absorbed? Are they modified by the microbiome? Do they shift the microbiome? What's their effect on inflammatory pathways? What's their effect on mitochondria? What's their effect on hormones? What's their effect on enzymatic systems? And so you can have a compound like urolithon, a or Berberine that have beneficial effects in some contexts because of their mechanisms in different areas, but then have problematic effects in other areas because of how they affect these systems. So if you're looking at Berberine or urolithin, a on some inflammatory enzymes and signaling and things like this, maybe it has some benefit, or maybe in the microbiome, it has some benefit, but then when you see its effects in the mitochondria, it's different. So it's not a lot of times compounds are promoted in a black and white circumstance of this is either good or this is either bad, and what winds up happening, what you need to understand is, what is its effect in these different contexts? What's it being used for? What's that individual's context, and what are the risk versus reward of the compounds based on all these different factors? And so that's why it's not it's not such a cut and dry answer as this is either a good thing or a bad thing. And a lot of times, the component here that I think is important, that we're trying to add is just some nuance to the picture, so that people can understand that, like, there actually is some negative effects to some of these compounds. And even though they're not pharmaceuticals, they actually do have side effects, and they can have some negative downstream effects because of how they're working. So it's just because it's natural doesn't necessarily mean it's good. I think that natural fallacy is present here. So we really want to understand the specific effects of each compound in different circumstances. And also, a lot of these compounds are being tested in animal studies and in cell culture studies, which can give you a little bit of or give you quite interesting interpretations if you don't fully understand what's being done inside those studies. So for example, some of the studies with the effects on Berberine or even urolithini that we're going to cover are changing or using different mitochondrial poisons and then adding urolithin A to see what happens. They're saying, Oh, look, if we block this complex we add urolithin A, we minimize oxidative stress. And it's like, yes, that's happening for a very specific reason, because you're blocking this specific complex in the mitochondria, which you wouldn't see under normal circumstances. And so that brings me into urolithin A. First things first is, not everybody produces urolithin A. I think it's only like 40% of people, at least, from what we understand now, actually produce urolithin A, and this is urolithini is produced from tannins, specifically elagitannins And ellagic acid from foods in our diet. So this is things like raspberries, pomegranate, which is one of the highest sources of the elagitannins and blackberries. And then basically, the bacteria convert one of the these, these lagitanns, into urolithin A. But then there's also urolithon B and urolithin C. And conversion to urolithin A is microbiome specific, which means it's person, person specific. So most people, a lot the majority of people, are not necessarily converting your to urolithin a. The next thing is like Berberine urolithin A is the some of the different urolithins are not super absorbable. And then the urolithin A gets absorbed through the intestinal tract and immediately sulfated and glucuronidated, which means it's getting marked for detoxification to pass in the urine. So the body is already trying to minimize some of these different components. Now, the effects of urolithin A are varied. So in some of the rat studies, which I think is where the the the hype around the weight loss came from was like, Oh, it increases brown adipose tissue and energy expenditure and uncoupling and this and that, because it increases conversion of t4 to t3 however, this is in mice studies or rat studies. And the as we talked about in other areas, human and rat brown adipose tissue concentrations and the energy expended through brown adipose tissue is very different. So this may not necessarily directly apply to humans because of the change in brown adipose tissue. The next thing is, there is a study in humans showing benefits in skeletal muscle mitochondrial function, although the ATP production was insignificantly different. The major difference was the change in walking distance in this study, and then some of the skeletal muscle function, which was determined through indirect metrics. But the study was also funded by a supplement manufacturer, so it's a little bit questionable around the objectivity of the study. The next thing is, there does seem to be some specific studies where we see benefits for mitophagy, which is basically repair of mitochondria through an autophagic process, where the damaged portion of mitochondria get degraded by different components in the cell. And also we see increases mitochondrial biogenesis and increased production of mitochondrial proteins in response to your lithium a however, the question is, how is this working? Is extremely important, because if you're damaging mitochondrial function and you're creating a response from that, it may not necessarily always be a good thing. The other thing is, urolithini does seem to lower some inflammatory values in humans. That was in one of these studies promoted by a supplement company where we saw lowered CRP values and adjustments in reactive oxygen species. So I would say overall, we have some. Studies where we see some negative effects in the mitochondria, and we have other studies where we see some beneficial effects. Some of them may have some bias, and then some of them are in animal studies. So overall, I think Ural with an A it's kind of a mixed bag, and it's really going to depend on what what area you're specifically looking at. What I would say, though, is I think that raspberries, pomegranates and blackberries are great things to incorporate in the diet, from a carbohydrate perspective, and from providing different vitamins and minerals and also shifting the microbiome in a beneficial way. As an example, one of the lagitanans in pomegranate punicolagin increases an enzyme called perioxidase, one that can have some benefits inside the arteries. So again, this is one of those things where some of these compounds have off target benefits that aren't being discussed, that may, may like have a significant effect in these very specific circumstances and areas. So I look at things in this fashion, what's the effect of this compound in this particular area, and then look across multiple areas to get an overarching picture. As far as self bending urolithin A for weight loss. I'm doubtful that it's going to make a massive shift in somebody's weight loss more than what you would do with getting diet under control, getting lifestyle factors under control. So again, am I with clients saying, hey, you need to go on this stack of Euro, lithon A and ginger and and Berberine and all these components that you can use late weight so that you can lose weight. No, what I'm saying is, let's get your diet under control. Let's dial in your calories, your macronutrients, the food sources, the micronutrients, and then see what's going on with hormones and fix those things. And then that's how I'm moving the needle over people's weight, not with these compounds. If I wanted to shift somebody's gut microbiome, then maybe I would use your Lithuanian and and Berberine. But at this point in time, I probably just have some pomegranate juice, or ask eat some pomegranates, or add some pomegranate powder extract into your orange juice if you really want to do something like this, instead of just take this like high dose urolithin, a supplement, sure,

Jay Feldman  21:59  
and when it comes to manipulating the microbiome, sometimes we do need things that are stronger than than just pomegranate juice, but and so these might fall into that category. I think what's what you're kind of getting at with zooming out, and whether it's talking weight loss or any other effect, is that there is a an inherent reductionism that always goes on when people point to the effects of these compounds, it's Hey. This compound induces autophagy. And we know autophagy is good. This compound is good. Or let's look at it in this area. Let's look at it in the blood vessels. Let's look at it in the liver. Let's look at it and the gut. And what there isn't is a is a cohesive understanding of recognizing the interaction between the entire organism and the compound. It's not a situation where it just has a bunch of random effects that are totally unrelated. The effects are all directly related, right? There are, there are certain functions of of this compound, and interactions chemically and and physically that lead to certain effects. So the effects in the gut, and this is again, the same with nearly all, or the vast majority, of polyphenols and a lot of plant compounds, is the effects on the gut are beneficial because it's toxic to certain bacteria. Those same toxic effects are generally why we don't want to be consuming large amounts and absorbing these. And so it's, it's it's not like it's having a random effect on the gut and a random effect in the mitochondria. These are both directly related in terms of how, in terms of the impact of these compounds. So I think that's worth mentioning. Of course, there are some other specific things too, right? You know, for example, when it comes to your late DNA, there's some suggestion that as estrogenic effects, which, of course, would be concerning something we wouldn't want to support. There are some other studies showing mild anti estrogenic effects. So there are some unique pathways that need to be considered. But on the whole, it's, you know, we're talking about a mixed bag of research. It's really a mixed bag of interpretation and not putting those things together, right? We can see a drop in CRP and reactive oxygen species from urolithin A consumption, and that can be all mediated by benefits at the gut, which is something we see all the time with berberine, and it's something we've talked about with metformin as well, and it was a good example. You know, you were saying just because these things are natural doesn't mean that they're devoid of side effects. Doesn't mean that they're that we shouldn't consider them like a pharmaceutical. And that's a really important point, because so many pharmaceuticals are derived from plant compounds, or are very, very similar. Metformin and Berberine are well known to be very, very parallel, like, you know, we're operating in the nearly the exact same ways where their benefits, and this is our perspective, not the general perspective, but our perspective is that generally, the benefits are coming from lowering bacterial count, lowering endotoxin by beneficial effects at the gut, despite the fact that they're mitochondrially toxic, as opposed to their mitochondrial toxicity being somehow responsible for their benefits. So when we're looking at, you know, coming back, when we're looking at something like CRP decreasing or ROS decreasing when consuming urolithin, a that could be mediated by its effects on the gut and not be respond, you know, not be due to its. Sick effects in the mitochondria when it's being absorbed. And you see those same things with berberine research or or Metformin research. But that's why it's important to have the larger context so you can evaluate if I'm trying to lose weight or if I'm trying to improve my blood sugar. Is this the solution is just blocking effective glucose respiration so we waste all of our glucose? Is that how we want to fix our blood sugar is creating mitochondrial toxicity the way, you know, and so that we're wasting all of our fuel. Is that the way that we want to cause weight loss? You know? Generally, I hope the answer would be no. Of course, there can be a benefit here, as you were saying, through the gut, and that could lead to weight loss. But that's why we need to consider all these factors when it comes to weight loss. Weight loss is not a situation where it's one particular compound is going to be the answer, and instead, it's understanding how each of these things are working. And if there's an endotoxin problem, that's something we need to address. If there's a glucose metabolism issue, that's something we need to address, right? If we have high blood sugar, we don't just stop eating the sugar. We fix our ability to utilize it. We don't just take Berberine so we waste it all, we fix our ability to utilize it effectively, as opposed to impairing mitochondrial respiration even further. So, you know, and and along with that, how's our sleep, how's our our movement? You know, there's so many factors to consider. And in either case, even if we did, you know, if there was a place where something like Berberine or urolithin a fit, it would be maybe in modulating the gut microbiome. Aside from that, not really something that that either of us would be utilizing to improve someone's health as a whole, let alone specifically weight loss.

Mike  26:30  
Yep, I want to add a couple points there, Jay, and I just to give people some context. And also I want to say that I agree with your points, and I think that they are, they're they're good points there. The in my experience, just so people can understand, just changing people's diets around and having them just walk, not hardcore exercise, running, cold exposure, sauna, whatever the thing is, just changing the diet around so that they're everything's dialed in appropriately, and having them walk, I've seen them lose 5060, 7080, 100 pounds while having carbs in the diet. And they were type two diabetics, that or severely obese, or whatever that every component is, those are the biggest needle movers. So it's we, if we rank things we want to understand, like, what is the number one most important, low hanging fruit, things that I need to focus on to lose weight. It is, what is your foundation? What are you doing with your diet? What are you doing with your movement, your sleep, this type of stuff. If there's hormonal stuff going on that needs to be addressed. Of course, that's very important as well. That's person specific you want. We take that case by case. But I have clients who over 300 pounds, over 400 pounds. Just get the diet under control. Just have them go for walks, as long as they're consistent, they follow through. They lose significant amounts of weight. They don't feel bad, they don't sleep bad. All this stuff is dialed in. If they want to do some resistance training or something like this, maintain muscle mass. These are the prime movers. These are the priorities. This other stuff over here, Berberine, urolithin, a all this type of stuff that is, like little cherries on top, sprinkles on the ice cream, the full ice cream, the full dessert there, the meal is, diet, movement, sleep, this type of stuff. These make the biggest difference overall, as well as if there's some, you know, somebody's super hypothyroid, or if they have something seriously going on as like a insulin dependent type, two diabetic. Those things need to be managed as well, of course. But it's really the diet and the movement stuff, because the foundation needs to be set up before you get to any of this other nuanced stuff, hormones, urolithin, a different random, obscure drugs, rapamycin, whatever else that that we see inside these fears,

Jay Feldman  28:44  
if we were even wanting to do that anyway, right? And that's, that's a separate and also important question, right? If, if you have those foundations in place, which is not necessarily a small feat, like that's, it's extremely important, and where most people it's like the thing that most people skip over, and it's by far and away the most important, and it's by far and it's by far and away, the thing that leads to the most benefits, the most major changes. But when that's in place, and then you're looking to more advanced things, even then, would we want to look to these? And I think still, the answer is most of the time, no, except for if we're looking to really support gut health more than anything, I think that would probably be really the central the central one for both of these compounds.

Mike  29:23  
 I'm saying I wouldn't even ask the question about some of these compounds until the foundation is dialed in totally. I think it's great to be interested in all these different components. But I think the you know, after you have these other things, right, it's like, it's like, What am I, what's my stock trading strategy going to be when I'm 40 years old and I have a million dollars in the bank when? But right now, you're 18 years old and you haven't even had your first job. Like, that's kind of what it's like, how you're how people think about some of this stuff is like, what's this really niche selling going to use? And they're not, they don't have any of this other stuff, right? And so it's like, let's focus. Like, where were we going to prioritize our time and our energy? Because we have lit these are limited resources. So let's put it in the areas that make the most difference. And that's going to be the foundation, hands down, in my experience, at least every time,

Jay Feldman  30:11  
Right. Yeah, of course. Yeah, of course. And if you are interested in losing weight in a healthy way without driving stress or decreasing your metabolism, or if you're looking for other strategies to improve your gun health, rebalance your microbiome, get amazing sleep, rebalance your hormones, boost your energy and so much more, with clear action steps and strategies alongside personalized guidance for me, head over to Jay Feldman wellness.com/solution where you can find all of the information for the energy balance Solution Program. This program includes customized health coaching, a video library with videos on how to restore gut health, how to regulate your blood sugar, how to lose weight without destroying your metabolism, how to rebalance your hormones, and tons more. It also includes resources like sample meal plans and a supplement guide, as well as a private community so head over to Jay Feldman wellness.com/solution to check out all the details. All right, so next up, Patricia asks. I am curious if eating carbs like fruit, whether you always need to have protein with it in order, in order to prevent your blood sugar from dropping. I've experienced blood sugar drops previously when I was eating poorly, and I want to maximize my system by balancing what my body wants and needs in order to be efficient. I've been following carnivore, but now I'm reducing my consumption of grains, and I feel a lot better without the grains. I just don't want to cause the fluctuations in blood sugar as they're not comfortable or good for humans, at least, that's what I think. Thanks. All right, so a number of things to kind of discuss here. One is blood sugar fluctuations, and they're whether they are actually concerned, and then the other being, in order to maintain stable blood sugar, should we always be consuming protein alongside carbohydrates? And I think the short of it here, so she's talking about blood sugar lows, and that they don't feel good. And the reason they don't feel good is typically, when your blood sugar drops, it causes the release of stress hormones, this includes glucagon, adrenaline and cortisol. And these hormones do make us feel bad. They generally cause us to feel hangry, you know, hungry and angry. They lower our mood. They make us feel feel irritable. You might experience like restlessness, discomfort and low energy, and it's generally something we want to be avoiding. So in that regard, I think this is, you know, she's asking the right question here, which is, how do we avoid feeling that way? And also, how do we avoid, avoid the increases in stress hormones? And of course, we talked about this quite, you know, we've talked about this quite a bit in terms of how we manage to have stable blood sugar and there's a number of considerations, but even before we get there's one other thing I want to mention, which is that our just because we want to minimize blood sugar lows and the stress hormones that get produced does not mean we want to have a flat blood sugar curve. We've talked about this before as well, and I'll link to those episodes. But it is normal to have fluctuation in blood sugar, and that's okay, you know, within a quote, healthy range. That's fine. That's normal when you're consuming carbohydrates, they get absorbed, they go into the bloodstream, and you see those carbohydrates in the bloodstream during the time that it takes for your tissues to take them up. The time when that's concerning. Concerning is when the amount of sugar in your blood is staying there because your tissues aren't using it, but the fact that it goes up at some point is just normal. That's how our bodies function. That's how you get the nutrient from your food into the tissues. The same thing happens with fat as well. You know, if you consume a meal with fat, your triglycerides go up. Having chronically high triglycerides is not a good thing. It's a sign of its own resistance. It's a sign of basically excessive lipid where your body isn't using as much lipid as it has available. Often, you might be gaining weight in a situation like that. So that's not something that's good but that doesn't mean we never want to consume fat. It's just that is the transport system of how we get fat from the food into the tissues, or at least a part of it, and that's that's fine, as long as our tissues are using it well. So again, something that comes back to the context of what's happening behind the numbers that you might be seeing on a CGM or on a blood test, and that's really important, as opposed to just the kind of innate fear that any increase in blood sugar or triglycerides, which that one's always skipped over. Everyone's only focused on blood sugar. You know, any increase in blood sugar is is going to be driving any issue that you could be experiencing, and that's what causes its own resistance. That perspective is way off base. Talked about it before, so I'll link to the episodes where we discussed in more detail. But what I'm getting at here is it's normal to have fluctuation of blood sugar. It's normal for it to increase after eating, and then, you know, kind of stay stabilize over time until you're going to eat again. That's that's typical, and that's fine, but we do want to avoid large spikes or crashes, and as long as we're in so insensitive and eating, you know, kind of a well balanced diet. Diet, so to speak, which obviously, you know, we can get to those details, or I'll point to, you know, we did a couple of episodes talking specifically about those things, so I'll point to that. And we talked about macro balance for a, quote, bioenergetic diet. But that shouldn't be an issue, right? Eating carbohydrates in an insulin sensitive person, meaning that we're we have good glucose metabolism, will lead to a healthy, you know, relatively small increase in blood sugar, and then it'll come back down, and that'll be fine if somebody is struggling with their glucose metabolism. If they're dealing with then some resistance, they might have to be more careful here. And this is a situation where it might be better to make sure you're having protein alongside the carbohydrates to help slow the digestion a little bit, slow the absorption a little bit, and then also the protein itself, the amino acids in there help to minimize the the blood sugar spikes, essentially. And so there's, there can be benefit to consuming protein along with the carbs. It's not necessary in all cases. You know, if your glucose metabolism is good, you should be able to have brooder juice on its own and not have much of a spike and definitely not have a crash. But if you're dealing with if that's not happening for you, then definitely make sure to include some protein and maybe a bit of fat as well, to slow down the absorption of the carbohydrates and that, yeah? I mean, you would know if that's happening either typically, by how you feel. I think that's that's the easiest way to do it. And if that's not happening, then it's totally fine to be having the carbohydrates on their own. I think that would be the kind of short of it. But Mike, feel free to chime in. Yeah.

Mike  36:37  
I mean, I think those are all pretty great points there. So it's true that adding protein to answer this question directly can help to balance out the blood sugar, but I think there's multiple factors that you can incorporate simultaneously to actually manage and balance out the blood sugar when you're starting to add in carbs, if you are coming from low carb, where you are physiologically air quotes, insulin resistant, and also, if you are pathologically insulin resistant, if you have type two diabetes. And again, I have clients who are type two diabetic who, like are using insulin, like severe type two diabetics, who are able to lose weight and drastically lower their insulin usage and improve their blood Google's values adding in a bunch of carbs because and the reason I bring this up is I hear this all the time. I see this in comment sections and all type of stuff where people are saying, well, I'm metabolically unhealthy, so I can't have carbs, so I need to get metabolically healthy by using low carb to then have carbs. And it's like you can actually get metabolically healthy. And it may be arguable that having carbohydrates in the diet would make that processor amplify that process, or improve that process. And getting metabolically healthy so that you can have carbs. It's like you can use carbs to actually get metabolically healthy. You don't have to get metabolically healthy and then add carbs on board. They're not they're not mutually exclusive things. So what am I doing with clients who are carnivore to help them to bring carbs on board, or if they were keto or low carb, whatever the deal is. So a couple things. One, I'm trying to figure out, how does this person respond to starches versus sugars? Now, in this specific circumstance, in this question, the individual mentions that they don't do well with grain based starches. I personally know this because I do not do well with starches overall. I do much better with fruits and much better with sugars. I digest them better. My blood glucose is more stable. However, I have had clients who don't do as well with sugars and do better with starches. And so in that circumstance, there can be a variety of reasons why that occurs. I will have them use starches. So they could use yams, they could use white potatoes, they could use rice. If they do okay with a bit of oats. They could do some oats. Some people do okay with a bit of properly prepared sourdough bread. And in those circumstances, they run with more starch based diet, and that's what works for them. And that's that's great, whereas in other circumstances, I have clients who don't do well with starches. I'm one of those people who doesn't do as well as starches, and I use mostly sugars from fruit based sources. Mainly, I'm not really doing much added sugars. There's some problems with those in the microbiome, with oral health, with nutrient density, etc. We've talked about this in the past. Now, the difference here, there's, there's some key differences between the starches and sugars. The starch structure is more complex than sugar structure. You have a bunch of glucose bonded together in multiple chains, takes a little bit longer to break down. Now, people said, Well, you said that it actually boosts blood glucose faster so, but you're saying it takes longer to break down, and the reason why is pure glucose hits blood glucose harder and faster than sucrose, which is glucose and fructose, because fructose effect on the blood sugar is different than glucose. Even though starches take a little bit longer to break down because they have more they may have a more difficult food matrix, and they may have they have more chains of glucose together, whether amylopectin or amylose, with amylose being a little bit more difficult to digest, they take longer to break down, but because it's pure glucose, you get a higher spike. And so some people don't do that well with that, whereas other people do better with. The starches, and the response to starches, they feel like their blood sugar is more stable. And again, this is very person specific. And a lot of dietary interventions in my experience, have to be person specific. You can't just there's not a blanket recommendation that everybody needs to do starches or everybody needs to do sugars. You need to find out what works for you. And that happens despite all the theories that I can tell you here on amylase gene copy and this and that and why it works, or why this person does better with glucose or starches versus sugars. You have to just test it out in real life and see what works. You and I, from when I work with clients, to do this in a systematic fashion. And again, I'm trying to use Whole Foods. I'm trying to use whole fruits. I'm trying to use tubers and things like this to hit potassium intake so you have a dialed in sodium, potassium ratio and things like this, which also can further lower other stress systems besides glucagon, adrenaline and cortisol. You can manage the RAS system. The next thing is, fiber is extremely important for people who are dealing with blood glucose swings, because the fiber induces something in the intestine called the ileal break. So what is the ileal break. The ileal break basically is a slowing of the transit of food through the small intestine, so that you basically are able to get absorb more of your food, but also lowers the blood glucose spikes. And we do see this with fiber and also smooth out those blood glucose curves. So if you were to just slam a bunch of juice in one meal, yeah, you'd probably get a blood Google spike, especially if you're coming from low carb. But if you had juice with some fruit and then you had some protein with that, maybe you put some collagen in your juice and you had a bit of beef jerky on the side, your blood glucose values and your spikes and your curves are probably gonna be much better than if you just smashed a bunch of juice. And so in this circumstance, you probably are going to want to do that versus just applying juice. Now, once you become way more insulin sensitive, you know, when I did low carb, I couldn't drink tons of juice when I came off, I was feeling weird and foggy and stuff after meals. Now, could I smash a bunch of juice after a workout and not get massive blood glucose dips and spikes and feel completely fine for like, an hour two hours after, yeah, no problem. I'll feel fine. I'll function fine. I'll probably get hungry a little bit later, because it's not enough to overall, but at the same time, I'm not getting those same highs and lows that I was when I came off low carb. The next one is fat, and fat is often underrated for satiety and for blood glucose curves, because the fat can slow gastric emptying. And so what this does is it decreases the rate that food leaves the stomach and goes into the small intestine. And so this can actually lower that blood glucose spike and also help people to stay fuller for longer, which is why people on low carb are like, Oh, I can last for hours between meals. It's like, yeah, because you have a really high fat and a really high protein intake when you when, when you go into a higher carb diet, and it doesn't have to be low fat, but more moderate fat, you're going to get hungrier more frequently, because you don't have all these satiety mechanisms. The next one is the protein. As I mentioned, the protein benefit is that the amino acids can actually stimulate insulin signaling. So it can help you to actually use the carbohydrate a bit, but the protein also stimulates gluconeogenesis. The amino acids stimulate gluconeogenesis, which can also help manage that blood glucose curve. So you have a bunch of the components gathered together, the protein, the carbs, the fat, the fiber, and the last thing I'll mention here is polyphenols. So the polyphenols inside the fruits and the polyphenol components inside the tubers, the white even white potatoes, purple potatoes, yams, etc, have benefits in the microbiome, which can shift what's going on with blood glucose utilization, and also can have some benefits on metabolisms, especially at certain doses and certain types. So having those polyphenol compounds and also the vitamins and minerals from these foods in the meal can help improve blood loose utilization. So it's about tweaking the components in the meal to the individual's context with these principles in mind, so that they can get the outcome. And that's how I'd be adjusting the dietary components. Again, like if you have somebody who just worked out, you probably don't want to give them a bunch of fat and fiber and all this type of stuff. You probably want to give them juice and a rapidly digesting protein with not so much fat, so you can get the insulin spike and you can get those the amino acids and glucose into the system. But if so, but if you have somebody who's a type two diabetic and having huge excursions are coming off low carb, you probably don't want to set up a diet like that. And so context is important, and understanding how the principles work is important, and then applying them from there, just

Jay Feldman  44:26  
to touch on that last example a little bit further. With the post workout, there's not gonna be any negative to having a full meal, right? If you've, like, if you're, you know, obviously, if you just finished an intense workout and like, you know, but your blood, your stress hormones, are high, or something like that, you might want to just have some juice, but once you've calmed down a bit, it's totally fine to have a meal. It's not, you know, the the kind of old idea that you need to have super quick digesting carbs and fats, right, or carbs and protein right after a workout in order to, you know, to take advantage of that window has largely not been supported, right, as long as you're getting enough carbs, fat and protein. And overall, and we do want to get carbs in relatively quickly after a workout, to drop the stress hormones provide some fuel. But that can be in a in a full meal, you know, as well. Obviously, the the intensity of the workout would would also make a difference, you know, as to what you what you would need and what you would want to what you able to tolerate in that case, yeah. And you know, when it comes to blood sugar regulation, on the whole, there's a ton of other factors that come into how well we're going to use the glucose, right? You mentioned things like polyphenols, of course, vitamins and minerals that are inside of the types of carbohydrates that you have are going to be necessary for the actual utilization of those carbohydrates, whether we're talking grains and their potential for irritation in the gut, which can cause all sorts of kind of inflammatory reactions that are totally independent of blood sugar, but then could cause, you know, a stress response that can then happen even if your blood sugar is okay, so to speak. I mean, there's, there's a lot of factors to to consider when it comes to kind of constructing diet snacks or meals, you know that all are going to have an impact here when it comes to minimizing lows and minimizing stress hormone production and improving our glucose metabolism, I think that pretty well covers the question here, as far as you know, consuming those carbs with or without a protein source, obviously, when it comes to the grains, that this person mentioned, that they feel a lot better without the grains. That's something that you know most of the time is going to be the case. And we've talked about many of those issues with the grains, many of the anti nutrients in prior episodes and their impacts on gut health. So generally, not carb sources that we're favoring unless they're really, you know, traditionally prepared, and you tolerate them well individually, which can also vary. But if we're talking about a fermented wheat, you know, in a sourdough, some people do fine with that, still kind of in that iffy category where we'd want to test it individually and see how we respond. You might do fine with, you know, sprouted oats or nixtamalized corn. You know, those are things that that can fit in, but for the most part, when we're talking about carb sources, you know, generally, we would favor you would favor fruit or root vegetables. You know, the the sugar versus starch side, you know, maybe some white rice, which, of course, is a grain, but one that tends to it doesn't have anywhere near the concern in terms of anti nutrients. Some people do still have bad reactions to it, though, of course, along with other starches. So these are certainly all variables to consider when it comes to carb sources and pairing them with with different different other macronutrients for blood sugar regulation. You have anything else you want to add in there, Mike,

Mike  47:35  
I just have one thing that I want to add. I want to say your those are all great points, but what I want to specifically hone in on that you touched on is the grain, the grains directly. So when I first went low carb, as an example, I felt immensely better because my diet before I was low carb, my carb sources were grain based. I was having English muffins for breakfast and oatmeal for a snack and pasta for dinner, and rice for lunch and potatoes for dinner the next day. And since I don't tolerate starch as well, and I also don't do well with grains, when I took those out of my diet, my sleep was better. I didn't have brain fog anymore. I wasn't getting sleepy after meals. I was less bloated, I was less gassy. I immediately lost a bunch of weight, so I felt infinitely better without those foods. But that didn't mean that carbs were my problem. What was my problem? Was the grain based carbs for the variety of reasons that we've touched on before, the opiate peptides, some of the anti nutrients, the lectins, the starches, the digestibility, etc, etc, etc, what I needed to do is switch towards fruit sources and juice sources. Because once I did that, I felt infinitely better. So my diet wound up being what I was doing on low carb. So meat, seafood, some of the cooked vegetables, the fat sources that we all know and love at this point, avocados, olive oil, macadamia nuts, chocolate. I don't do I personally don't do super well dairy fats, but I still will do beef fat and things like this. But I also now just have fruits in my diet. So I have whole fruits, I have fruit juices, I do frozen fruits, I do shakes. These are the things. These are the carb sources that I found I functioned significantly better on and so it wasn't a function of carbs or no carbs, it was which carb sources work the best for me, and then basically running the diet from there and setting things up from that perspective. So I think a lot of people, and I see this with my clients, they go into low carb and they feel infinitely better, and I felt infinitely better as well. And at first for and both of you, both you and I were in this camp, you're like, Yeah, low carb is the way we're feel so much better. We're super lean. All these types of things improved mental function, whatever the deal is, nutrient density. There's a variety of reasons why it worked, but there's also problems with it. That, for example. I eventually ran into I couldn't sleep at night. My workout performance was terrible. I started to feel stressed. I was having anxiety my OCD, which I have a tendency for in terms of cognitive symptoms, it's not necessarily depression or anxiety, as much as his OCD, was super amplified when I was low carb and fasting and adding in carbs, not to mention the constant cravings for foods. But adding in carbs in the forms of fruits and juices was a, was a game changer for me. So it was first eliminate the grains and starch that a problem with, feel way better. And then it was like, okay, add some problems there, then add in the fruits and juices, and then feel even better after that. So again, there's, it's, I want to move it away from carbs or no carbs, it's what carbs work for your system. How much do you need? How are you building them into your diet? And start to change the questions to these away from this black and white and more into like, what are the shades of gray for your personal context, for these things to work and take it away from these tribal wars of I'm low carb, I'm high carb, I'm bioenergetic, I'm keto, I'm carnivore, whatever the thing is. And start to bring this into a perspective of, what is the personal diet that you need to hit your outcomes and improve your health? What are the principles that you need to set these components up? For me, that's what I'm most interested in, is what are the principles and how do I apply them to people? Not what is your tribe that you're a part of? That is irrelevant in my perspective, because there's benefits to all of the different tribes, and there's also cons all the different tribes, and it's more about figuring out what those things are, delineating the principles and applying it to that that individual in their unique context. And I want to bring that home here, because I see based on the comments I see on some of the videos and even some of the recent questions. Recent questions I've gone from clients and all this big this transition that's happening, from people from the low carb community into bioenergetic trying to figure out what the deal is. It's like, the question isn't carb or no carb anymore, it's what carb source, how much, and how do you set up these other factors in your diets, and what are the specific problems that you have in for your specific health context that won't be discussed on this, like on in every guru's podcast or paradigm, whatever the thing is,

Jay Feldman  52:09  
yeah, for sure. And I'll, I'll link back to a couple of relevant episodes here. We have one talking about exactly how to transition from coming, you know, coming from low carb, carnivore, keto. And I'll also link to the couple of episodes we did on our own health journeys, so people can hear a bit about our experiences with those kinds of diets and fasting and how it went all right at first, or even pretty well at first, until it didn't the experience that a lot of people have. You know, the experience that I think we're seeing in a ton of different clients who are coming from that space, and then over time, seeing more and more issues, dealing with insomnia and anxiety and digestive issues, and libido, testosterone, thyroid tanking, all sorts of things. And yeah, then playing, playing the the, you know, going down the path of reversing those things. And so we go through in those episodes, you know, some good starting places, or in the transitioning from low carb episode. So I'll link back to that one, and we'll wrap up there. Mike, do you want to share where listeners can find you?

Mike  53:07  
So you can find me on my website, mikefave.com and you can also find me on my YouTube, Mike fave. It's just Mike Fave YouTube. And if you're interested in learning how to use some of the principles that I was just mentioning beforehand, you can check out my nutrition blueprint on my website, mikefave.com It goes through how to set up some of these different dietary components, calories, macros, meal timing, etc, that can help you manage blood sugar and also help you with your weight loss. So you can check that out on my website again@mikefave.com

Jay Feldman  53:36  
Awesome. All right. If you did enjoy this episode, please leave a like or comment if you're watching on YouTube, if you're listening elsewhere, please leave a review or five star rating. All those things really do a lot to help support the podcast, and are very much appreciated. To check out these show notes for today's episode. We're a link to the studies articles and anything else we referenced. As always, head over to Jay Feldman wellness.com/podcast and of course, as we've been discussing, there's a lot of conflicting information out there when it comes to creating a diet to maximize your cellular energy. That's why I've created the energy balance Food Guide. This food guide helps you determine exactly what to eat to optimally support your metabolism and to help you lose weight, improve your digestion, get amazing sleep, boost your energy and so much more. The Food Guide is a one page infographic that organizes foods on a spectrum based on how effectively they support your metabolism, and it also has a separate spectrum that adjusts the scale for you. In the case that you're dealing with various digestive symptoms, the energy balance Food Guide makes it extremely easy to get started with a bioenergetic approach to optimizing your health. So head over to Jay Feldman wellness.com/guide to download your free energy balance Food Guide, and with that, I'll see you on the next episode.