Jay Feldman 0:12
Welcome to Episode 46 of the energy balance podcast, where we teach you how to live without constant hunger and cravings, fatigue, brain fog, poor sleep and other low energy symptoms by maximizing your cellular energy. I'm Jay Feldman. I'm a health coach and independent health researcher, and joining me again today is my good friend Mike Fave. Mike and I have been studying health and nutrition together for a long time now, and Mike also draws on his experiences from working within the healthcare industry. Today's episode is a q&a episode where we'll be going over the truth about the supposed benefits and antioxidant effects of herbs and spices. We'll be talking about why many herbal supplements are not benign, even though they're natural, and we'll be talking about whether supplements can make up for a lack of nutrition when it makes sense to use supplements, and also how to use appetite as an indicator of metabolic health. If you have a question that you'd like us to answer on a future q&a episode, you can send those into Jay Feldman wellness.com that's j, A, y, at Jay Feldman wellness.com, or if you're watching on YouTube, feel free to leave those questions in the comments. If you are new to the podcast, I'd highly recommend that after listening through today's episode, you go back and listen to episodes one through seven, where we took some time to build a foundation as far as the bioenergetic view of health goes. To check out the show notes for today's episode, head over to Jay Feldman wellness.com/podcast where you can take a look at the studies and articles and anything else that we referenced throughout today's episode, and if you are looking to improve various low energy symptoms, whether that's chronic cravings and hunger or a low appetite or a lack of energy, chronic pain, weight gain, digestive symptoms, hormonal imbalances, brain fog, poor sleep or any chronic health conditions. Then head over to Jay Feldman wellness.com/energy where you can sign up for free energy balance mini course where I will explain why these symptoms and conditions really come down to a lack of energy in their root and I'll also be discussing what you can do to restore your cellular energy so that you can resolve these symptoms and chronic health conditions. And before we start today's episode, I did want to mention that in the first question that we answer in regard to herbs and spices, I talked about how herbal supplements are often used is basically band aids, where they're used as anti inflammatories or antioxidants, or that different ones are used to support all sorts of different organs, and people end up taking a ton of different herbal supplements all at once, and normally in this case, they they're used in a way that doesn't tend to fix the root issue of whatever's going on. But I did want to clarify also that herbal supplements can help to fix root issues if they are used properly, and also depending on the particular herb. So I just wanted to make that clarification before we get into that first question. And with that, let's get started. Oscar asks about ideal spices and herbs. And so I figured we'll talk just about which ones we like, and amounts and all of that. And I want to start off by just mentioning that there was a period of time when we were more in our paleo days, where we used a ton of herbs and spices, you especially. And, you know, we would add a ton of turmeric to everything. All of our food was orange, and we would add a ton of herbs. And you know, it's because you read about all these beneficial properties to them, and there is some legitimacy there, but I think that it's also a little bit skewed from what's ideal. So what I would say, just kind of in general, is that, for the most part, herbs and spices, I think, are better viewed as in at least in high doses, are better viewed as basically like medications or something that we're using for an acute issue. I think it's totally fine to use them in moderate amounts when cooking, flavoring, flavor, yeah, exactly, but not in huge amounts, as if you're trying to get x 100 milligrams for, you know, whatever condition, in general, if we're using them for that, it's more of a band aid, if anything. And it tends to come at a cost. It's not really addressing what's actually the issue. I think that it's fine, like it's a fine Band Aid, as far as band aids go, depending on what herbs and spices you're using, but it's, I think it's important to consider that it's not solving an issue. And, you know, in a lot of the alternative herbal medicine situations, you'll see people taking, like, tons of herbal. Uh, compounds or supplements, you know, handfuls of them throughout the day. And so I think that that's less than ideal. And again, it's like, if you're needing that, you're definitely not, you know, the underlying issue is definitely not being resolved. Yeah, I would say also, in general, I think it could sometimes be helpful to draw a line between as far as where the spices and herbs are coming from, when the plant is concerned, where, when we're looking at herbs and spices that are coming from leaves, for example, we know just when looking at foods that anything coming from the seeds or the leaves are going to have more anti nutrients, more semi toxic compounds that can be problematic, especially in high doses, whereas the ones that might be coming from like bark or root or fruit are going to be much better and generally more protective, even in those higher doses. It's also worth mentioning that those compounds that are in the seeds and leaves and whatnot are one of their main components tends to be that they are antimicrobial and that they're preventing any sort of microbes, bacteria or fungus or parasite or whatever, from consuming that part of the plant, which, when it comes to our gut, for example, that can be helpful to have those antimicrobial effects, but we don't want to be taking such high amounts that they're affecting us more than just an in our doubt, we don't really want to be having those effects systemically, because there are, there are, they typically tend to come with some harmful other effects. So as far as I guess kind of what I would say here is that I think using moderate amounts for taste in food is great, using them as a band aid occasionally for certain symptoms, is fine, as long as the underlying issues are being addressed. In general, I tend to be more on the cautious side when it comes to these things, again, not in moderate amounts for food, but just when using them in high amounts for food or as like a supplement or medication. Yeah.

Mike 6:59
I think it's just important to recognize that if something is good in certain amounts, it doesn't mean that it's better in higher amounts always. And a lot of these things have a dose. And specifically for herbs and spices and the past, I think it was recognized that they were medicine. And yes, they also have, they also impart a taste on food. So that's, you know, I think that's great. I think, I think cooking with spices is pretty great. My family, half my family's Italian, the other half is Filipino, and then part of it's Puerto Rican. So they, they enjoy all the different herbs and spices that they put in their food. And it's fine. A lot of times they don't use high amounts. They use just like when, when my dad cooks with garlic. He just gonna crush one clove and then fry it in the brown it in the pan, basically, and then, depending on how much he's cooking, then, you know, put the food on top. So he's it's, again, it was never recognized to be doing tons and tons of these things. It was more just for flavoring. And then, I think in the past, for a lot of different cultures, the spices did have anti microbial, anti fungal, anti parasitic properties, and a lot of times they were added for to foods for that. And I've seen some, you know, different tribes talk about it adding these different spices to meats and different things like that. So that's important to recognize. But again, I, as you said, I think that they are, they are should be considered medicines. I know that it's not the people don't think of them the same as pharmaceuticals, but if you start reading a lot of the research, you'll start to see that a lot of them do have pharmaceutical like effects, and sometimes they're even more potent than pharmaceutical drugs, and that's because and something to point out here is a lot of pharmaceutical Drugs are extracted from things that were supplements or spices or herbs at one point in time, for example, red yeast rice was something that was pretty prominent in China for dealing with heart disease, and it has some it has some anti inflammatory properties, but it also contains statins and the drug The FDA, I think, at one point, tried to regulate red yeast rice as a statin be so that they could control it, because people were using that instead of using things like Lipitor. So it's just important to understand that a lot of these, like even mushrooms, have statin components in them. It doesn't make them terrible. Obviously, it's in much smaller amounts, but a lot of these different components, or these different foods, these different herbs, these different spices, have very potent pharmaceutical effects. And it's important to recognize that to use them is to use them for those effects, and not to just take high doses indiscriminately. So that's, I think it's really important to point that out. And again, where they come from, can dictate some of their effects. And it's and again to also look into what their effects are, to indiscriminately go and take high amounts of red clover because someone said it was good, and then not realize that it has estrogenic properties, or like lavender or even high amounts of even licorice, I think, liquor. Root, or is has some pretty potent effects on raising cortisol. So they really do have and this is shown in the research, and while it's not recognized by mainstream doctors, because that's not what they're educated in at all. They don't go over herbs. They don't go over spices. Most of them just get straight pharmacology. So it's very, again, it's very reductionistic understanding of things. And you can even see that with how the pharmaceutical drugs are, are, are promoted. It's just one pathway. But a lot of times, even with the herbs and spices, they say, Oh, it's this one pathway. No, it affects many, many things. So if you if you do want to get a good insight into what some of these herbs or spices or different plant compounds can do. You can look at sites like examiner cell packed and they can give you an idea, or just some overview in different areas of what the different components do. But again, overall, I think it's really important to use them just for those their specific effects. So for example, say, you wake up in the morning and you're not feeling so hot. Some people like the mood lifting effect of something like black seed, which has a quinone in it, thymoquino. Now I'm not recommending everybody go and use it. I'm just using as an example. Or if somebody, you know, they're constipated or they're they ate something that really irritated their bowels, using something like Cascara can be helpful. So, yeah, just to keep those in mind, or again, even something like aspirin, which I think was originally, they say, or the rumor is that originally came from white willow bark, which has some has, I think, salicylic acid, so that has the anti inflammatory, inflammatory components. And in the past, things were used this way. They were not used as I'm just going to dump a boatload of turmeric in all my food because it's good for me, or I'm just going to eat unlimited amounts of rosemary because it's an antioxidant. So and even for you and I know that we use, for example, I've used oregano oil myself, and I've used it with other people to help them deal with some gut issues that they had going on that were suggestive of some type of small intestine bacterial overgrowth. And it is pretty potent, and it does, I have seen it work with quite a few people so, and I have seen it work better than than drugs like Rifaximin, which is specifically used as a antibiotic for the small intestine. So just important to keep that in mind with herbs and spices. I guess a good recap is small amounts for flavor and food fine, taking high amounts indiscriminately over time without knowing their effects and what they're used for on multiple different levels, probably a bad idea.

Jay Feldman 12:37
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that's that's fine. And again, for the average person, like normal use in food is not something I'd be real concerned about. It's only if you're doing it, like, as people have done this, like doing it intentionally to get all those antioxidant effects or whatever else. We're told that is something that I would be cautioning against. But if you're just using them normally for cooking, I wouldn't even think about it. You know, that's fine.

Mike 13:02
Well, it's important to recognize that they are defense a lot of them are defensive compounds. The reason that barks are used and and roots are used and and leaves are used is because those areas have when they when studies say they have the highest amount, highest amount of antioxidants, you can almost always assume that that's the highest amount of defensive compounds. Yeah, yeah. So and think, for example, things like resveratrol are technically a pesticide produced by the grape. It's not because the grape wants you to live to 120 it's it's concentrated in this, in the seeds, in the skin, because the grape doesn't want fungus and bacteria and and microorganisms to come along and get the grape before the mammals can so that the mammals can deposit the seeds somewhere else. And most of the time the seeds in the skin are not digested by us, and most of the time the antioxidant compounds are passed directly to our colon and excreted. I think it's something like 90 or 95% and that's because they heard defensive compounds, and a lot of times they do have benefits in the gut, but we don't want you know, and that's why I think there's been issues sometimes with taking really high doses of supplements, like resveratrol, like, like, but I think hate talks about it, or Georgie talks about it all the Time. The studies basically where or where. I think David Sinclair sold, uh, his resveratrol stuff to one of the pharmaceutical companies, and then it never panned out, because they didn't perform well in in the research. So it because it's a defensive compound. You don't need to take ridiculously high doses of it. Yeah.

Jay Feldman 14:40
I mean, Resveratrol is a good example where, again, the moderate amounts you might be getting in food are is mostly going to remain in the intestine, have those antimicrobial effects, probably not net benefit. If anything taking large amounts or any amounts as a supplement that are going to be absorbed systemically, then you have a problem, basically directly inhibits mitochondrial respiration. If. Electron transport chain, and is...

Mike 15:02
Up regulates defensive compounds like sirtuins, right?

Jay Feldman 15:05
Yeah, yeah, which is a pretty harmful thing, and it's purported to be a life, lifespan inducing or supporting supplement, which we would argue it's not, you know, through the the hormone, yeah, it's one of, like, the poster children of hormesis. And I'll, I'll reference some some articles that I wrote talking about that and why. You know, when you look into the mechanisms of what's going on with resveratrol, it's pretty clear that it's not a good, not a good compound to be having systemically, yeah.

Mike 15:34
Especially in high doses, yeah, like just if you're having grape juice, fine, if you're having grapes fine, you know? And they talk about it, red wine is good for you, for resveratrol. And then the first, the first, like, gripe that some blogger has about is like, well, you'd need to have X number of glasses of red wine to meet your your certain reservoir trawl requirement. And it's like, there's a reason you you don't want to have that resveratrol requirement. Just stick with your red wine, stick with your grape juice. Avoid taking the little pill with a couple. What's the I don't know what the dose that's run for visveratrol. That's a couple 100 milligrams. Yeah, yeah, maybe certain number of grams of resveratrol. Yeah. So. And just to point people out, even some foods, like, for example, things like broccoli, or some of these vegetables, which would technically almost fall into the herb or spice area, because it is a lot of vegetables aren't actually the the fruit of the plant. It's more like the body of the plant. Like broccoli is the is the flower and stem. They do have protective compounds as well. And in studies, in when they feed animals large amount of uncooked broccoli, they develop signs and symptoms of hype, of hypothyroidism, right? So then that's that's sort of the basis for cooking it to inactivate a lot of these, a lot of these different defensive compounds. Obviously, there's some benefit to some of these foods as well, but it's just important to recognize that plants have to defend themselves, and a lot of the purported benefits are from these defensive compounds. So the dose is important.

Jay Feldman 17:07
Yep, yeah, all right, ready to move on?

Mike 17:13
Yep.

Jay Feldman 17:14
So Katie asks, can we access all of our basic nutrients through food. And she was asking about, you know, basically food versus supplements here. And this is a pretty common question that I get in different forms. And, you know, you and I do talk about how it's important to be getting our nutrients from food. We also talk about why certain supplements can be beneficial. And so I think that there are some, some good principles to outline here, which basically would, you know, I think when we're cautioning about supplementing too much versus getting things from your diet, the concern is that in, you know, throughout the, I mean, throughout the mainstream, throughout the Alternative sphere as well, oftentimes supplements are used to basically make up for a poor diet or lifestyle, and in general, I would say that that it's not a good replacement for a bad diet or a bad lifestyle, and but considering that, that doesn't mean that We need to avoid supplements altogether, where, if we are having a good, you know, a really good diet that does get us, you know, allow us to meet our nutrient requirements, and there are certain instances where we'd want to supplement. On top of that, supplements can help to further support, you know, our diet and lifestyle. So there's, you know, drawing that line can kind of be subjective, but it just, you know, I think in general, when looking at supplements versus food, we want to be careful with supplementation. We want to definitely be considering risks and drawbacks, especially to higher doses. But that's not to say that there aren't, there isn't a place for those things, just again as support to already having diet lifestyle, which lifestyle includes stress, includes movement, includes getting out in the sun, all those things, as opposed to kind of replacing those things, which is in many ways. I mean, you can maybe make up for some of the harm that comes from having a, you know, a pretty poor diet and lifestyle, but in reality, you know, supplementation can often make that worse. Anyway.

Mike 19:29
I think it's important for people to realize too that, and this is specifically from the perspective of a bad diet, that a lot of times things in the diet. It's about avoiding things as much as it is about getting adequate nutrients. There's a lot of things that can cause issues, especially in our modern day, diets that whether you have all your nutrients and whatnot, it that doesn't protect you from some of the ills of for example, eating high amounts of polyunsaturated particularly. Be linoleic acid filled vegetable oils that are cooked at high temperatures. There's no amount of vitamin E and vitamin C that is going to protect against that, or aspirin. It's still a problem regardless of how much aspirin, vitamin C, vitamin E, pregnant alone, DHEA, fat soluble vitamins, antibiotics, whatever you use that those will those aren't going to mitigate all the damages from the from having your body loaded up on that type of stuff. So and or even four to five grain products would that are, you know, cooked at particularly high temperatures or extruded, or whatever it is that's that doesn't solve that problem. Or, for example, taking in copious amounts of alcohol and while trying to, you know, I eat really well, and I and I take all these supplements, but I drink five nights a week until I'm absolutely wasted. It's, that's not going to be helpful. And I know I would assume a lot of our audience is not, probably not doing that, but it's, it's about avoiding the toxic stuff while also getting adequate nutrition. So if avoiding the toxics, avoiding the toxic stuff, I'd say is probably priority to start and then getting that out of adequate nutrition is it's still a priority. I mean, they still they go hand in hand together, because you have to basically replace one with the other. But yeah, you can get a lot of your with that said, you can get a lot of your your nutrition through food. You can for a lot of people, especially if they don't have some large problem yet, in autoimmune disease or heart disease or cancer or whatever it is, whatever, whatever the disease is, you can probably be fine with just food and then using certain foods to meet certain requirements, like using oysters for your zinc and copper and some of the minerals liver for vitamin A copper, some of the B vitamins. Eating adequate amounts of red meat and seafood for some of the minerals from seafood and having adequate protein and some of the vitamins from the red meat, staying away from toxic foods like the polyunsaturated fats and the some of the refined grain products, and with all the additives and whatnot, eating adequate vitamins and minerals from juice, like potassium, adequate sugar from juices and from whole fruits. So all that's you can and the way we do this is we use an app called chronometer, in case anyone's interested. And it will tell you all your micros, your micronutrients, all your macronutrients. It'll tell you, if you if you set it up correctly, how much polyunsaturated fat you're eating, Omega three, Omega six, trans fat. It can show you how much protein you're eating, the different amino acid balances. So I know some people like to look at their glycine to methionine ratios and things like that. So you can really do a lot with food and then the supplements eat. The supplements doesn't only have to be nutrients, like for example, you can have a solid diet. Everything's in place, but your temps still aren't up. Using something like thyroid, it can almost be considered, especially if it's like a desiccated thyroid, be considered a food. And that's something that Pete talks about. Ray Pete talks about, specifically with the fish head soups or chicken necks, or people used to eat beef organs. So those are all things that are that can be considered foods, and then using the different herbs, like Cascara, or, I don't know, the some people like black seed. I talked about that earlier. These can all be considered foods as well. So again, it depends on how you want to define the different things. And then the other thing to add, besides that, is, even if it's not a food, even if it's a supplement, but it offers some type of benefit with very minimal risk or toxicity, and you can use it in certain situations. Why would you not? You know, if you can use taurine and glycine at night to help you sleep and, you know, optimize your liver function and help with fat soluble vitamin absorption and utilization, why would you not use it, especially if there's minimal toxicity and side effect from it, and has, like, a very large net beneficial effect. So, so can you do with all the food? Sure, it takes depending on the situation. Well, yeah, well, yeah, depending on the situation, depending on your context. But I mean, if you have other modalities at your disposal, I mean, my perspective is, why not use them, especially if they like. For example, if I had a really poor night sleeping, and I'm feeling pretty bad and I have to go work my 1213, hour shift, sometimes I take an aspirin.

Jay Feldman 24:35
Yeah, yeah. Just to clarify what I was saying there too. I mean, you were saying that basically what I was getting at was that, depending on your situation, there might be a place where you have to address more than just diet. You know, in the same way that you can't out supplement a poor diet, you also can't out diet a really poor lifestyle. If you're getting four hours of sleep per night, you're incredibly stressed on. From there. I mean, it's, regardless of how good your diet is, you're probably still going to be struggling, at least someone health wise. Again, all that depends on the context and where you've been and all of that. But, you know, I think that's worth touching on. I also think you know this idea of food versus supplements and what counts as what you know, there are certain you were talking about certain supplements that could be considered food, like, like, desiccated thyroid, which, as you said, people used to get in their diets in some amount, whether it was from like, fish, as you mentioned, or chicken neck, or for a long time, the thyroid was included in ground beef hot dogs and stuff. Yeah, yeah. I think it was all the way through the 1950s and then there was some situation where they somebody supposedly had a like thyrotoxicosis from it, and they prevent, you know, they've created some law that said that you can't do that anymore. But people were getting, you know, certain amounts of thyroid in their diet, quite a bit..

Mike 25:56
And liver and blood, and all the different sausages that in the old times were, or the different meat pies in England, like sweet breads were known, were organs, and now it's like, oh, the thymus and thyroid, or Oh, those are supplements. Is well, that used to be the diet, right?

Jay Feldman 26:15
Yeah. So, so what you're saying is, like, desiccated liver, desiccated thymus or or thyroid...

Mike 26:21
Or even getting it whole from from a farmer and cooking yourself, or making sausage yourself, if you have time to do that, that's those are supplements, but also food. So it's right, what are your definition like? Where are you putting? And this is not to attack the person asking the question, but it's just like to stimulate a response around definitions.

Jay Feldman 26:40
Yeah. And, you know, liver and oysters are, you know, typically considered food. But again, I think that consider those supplements with how dense they are nutritionally, along with that, also just in the whole food versus supplement idea, you know, I think another, there's always such a focus on vitamins and minerals when it comes to nutrition. And so you'll have, again, this is more in the mainstream or in a lot of the alternative spheres too. I mean, it's pretty common in paleo and like functional medicine type approaches, where you have this huge emphasis on antioxidants and vitamins and minerals, but not so much on how much food you're eating and how much of the macronutrients you're getting. And if you are only taking in 1000 calories, but you're meeting or doubling or tripling all of your nutritional requirements, you're still going to end up with a lack of energy and excessive stress and deterioration and all sorts of problems. So, you know, that's one thing that's I mean, again, it depends on what you call supplement or food, but getting enough carbs, fats and protein are all going to be pretty important.

Mike 27:41
Those are nutrients

Jay Feldman 27:42
Right. Yes.

Mike 27:43
They are called, they are macronutrients, right? I think it's important for people that, because with nutrients, is about macro and micro So, and I, we've said, talked about this before, but the entire idea is to get all of your macro and micro nutrient needs from a combination of diet supplements, and however you want to define any other compound that you're going to use, or food that you're going to use, and with the limited amount of toxicity and and digestive and nutrient inhibitors and any of those components. And that's the principle of what our the diet and supplement strategy is based around, obviously, with also inhibiting or also elevating metabolism, so with metabolism supporting components. So that's the that's the basis that includes supplements, that includes foods, that includes food supplements, nutraceuticals is, I think, the term that they have now. But at the end of the day, it's just what? What's the strategy that we can to that we can to do that? How can we raise metabolism through dietary and lifestyle choices, with optimizing nutrient intake, whether that's macros or micros and supportive protective compounds, while minimizing harmful compounds, poisons, toxins and limiting factors or different foods or compounds that increase toxin production within the own body and anything along those lines. So that's the basic strategy and and so that's why we're not really married to this idea of we need to meet all of our micronutrients and ridiculous amounts. And it's like the diet just focuses only on, well, all I eat is organ meats and shellfish and leafy greens. And like, I'm set. And that's because, from our perspective, you also need adequate fat and carbohydrate around your metabolism as well, and protein and, well, yeah, and protein so you're not well usually, with those diets, is like a high protein diet, right, right, right, yeah, yeah. And you see that that was a thing for a while within, I think, the Paleo spheres like nutrient density, and it's like, okay, you have all these nutrients and cofactors, but you're not using them. It's like your car is constantly topped off with oil, but it has no gas, right?

Jay Feldman 29:49
No, it's a great comparison. And yeah, the whole point, I mean, not the only it's not the only purpose, but the whole point, or one of the main points, of having vitamins and minerals, is so that you can use them to help prevent. Lose energy. But as you're saying, if there's no fuel, you can't produce that energy anyway. Yeah.

Mike 30:05
Exactly. So it's important to have everything all together. And can her question, can you access all your basic nutrients through food? Yes, you can. Are there going to be some things that you would consider supplements or nutraceuticals, or whatever you want to call it, of course, yeah. But can you also use other substances that might be helpful? Yeah? If you have a woman and her using progesterone helps her sleep better and improves her mood, on top of a solid diet or someone, it helps them get pregnant or whatever, why not use it? Yeah? So it get depends on context.

Jay Feldman 30:40
Right. You know. And there's other nutrients beyond vitamins and minerals that can also be beneficial. I mean, you mentioned taurine, for example, which I think it's also point it's also good to point out that things like amino acids can have protective effects, even if you're getting enough protein, making sure you're balancing that with the amino acids from connective tissue, the glycine and proline. And you know, so in that case, using a collagen supplement if you don't have, if you can't get meat that already has that connective tissue in it, for example, there's a place for that. You know. I think it's also worth mentioning that sometimes high doses of certain vitamins and minerals can be extremely therapeutic. B vitamins are one of the common ones, where that can be the case, but also fat soluble vitamins, and again, if they're used in the right context, they can be really beneficial, very helpful. You can also, you just want to be wary, because you can also create imbalances if you're getting a lot of 1b vitamin and not others, if you're getting a lot of one fat soluble vitamin and not others, or if it's for too extended of a period of time, I've seen that happen all with in both of those situations, especially with fat solubles, where they are building up over time too. So you want to consider that as well. Whereas B vitamins excessive amounts, you'll urinate out. So that's slightly less of a concern, but you can still cause imbalances. So those are some important things to consider there. I think it's also worth mentioning just the idea of using a multivitamin is still really popular, surprisingly, and most multivitamins are pretty awful and don't include relevant amounts of various nutrients. Include way too much or micronutrients, I should say they include way too much of some not enough others. The forms are very often pretty bad, pretty poor, yeah.

Mike 32:23
Especially like your centrome, it's just like, that is the most crap vitamin ever constructed yet it's sold, is like this expensive, important stuff. It's like, there's the usable forms of everything is not available there.

Jay Feldman 32:37
Right? Yeah. And so just a couple examples there. I mean, you have the inactive forms of the inactive forms of the fat soluble vitamins. You have beta carotene as vitamin A and k1. Is vitamin K. You have folic acid instead of folate, which is a B vitamin. And I mean, these things are given, like, almost like prescribed, required for pregnant..

Mike 32:56
They are prescribed, yeah, well, they're even prescribed for patients in the hospitals too, right? They give them, like, whatever the pharmaceutical companies vitamin is, and it's just, I mean, the thing is that a lot of times it has an effect, but a lot of these people is just like, any sort of vitamin or nutrient will have an effect, because they've been living off alcohol and Burger King for a long time.

Jay Feldman 33:19
Sure, but, uh, yeah. But then, you know, you can also definitely have negative effects over time too, from from all those things.

Mike 33:26
And I think for some people within, like, suit like, very strong deficiency states, high doses are actually warranted. Yeah, you know, I just had a patient recently who that I was working with in the hospital who was, uh, drank a decent amount of alcohol on a regular basis, and his diet legitimately consisted of Burger King, and that was like, once or twice a day. And, you know, he had, he come to the hospital with a lot of neurologic symptoms, and what turned him around was B vitamins literally turned his the symptoms right around. So, for a lot of people, I think it's helpful, yeah, just it, especially depending on where you're coming from, and depending on your context, some things may need to be replaced. For people who are severely vitamin D deficient because they live up north and their job consists of eight hours, five days a week inside an office. And I'm not talking bad about that or anything, whatever it is, it's not optimal for vitamin D status. So in those cases, when you have extremely low vitamin D, it, you know, there is, there are risks, or there are problems associated with that. So whether you use a vitamin D lamp, or you supplement with vitamin D, coming back up into normal ranges can be very helpful.

Jay Feldman 34:39
Yeah, you, I think you might have mentioned earlier too, the, you know, a lot of use of protective hormones like thyroid or pregnant alone, progesterone, for women. And I think it's worth mentioning too, that, again, these things are can be so beneficial, but I'll often see people who might have excessive amounts of stress or not getting enough sleep, not eating very much, and. And then trying to use those things to bridge the gaps, or to, you know, make up for some of the symptoms that they're experiencing. And again, in certain contexts, that might work. But again, I think that's a typical example, especially in this, this sphere of trying to out supplement a diet that is not, in a way, that's not going to be functional. It's not going to, yeah, we're lifestyle, but it's not going to work. So.

Mike 35:22
Yeah, they can help. It's just their their band aids. They're not long term solutions.

Jay Feldman 35:27
Well, sometimes they can make it worse too, if, if you're not eating enough, for example.

Mike 35:31
Oh yeah, if you're going to push, if you're going to push the gas pedal on metabolism and use all these hormones and then not eat, it's not good. But I also think they can be helped, like I'm and I say this just from my own personal perspective, that using some of these things sometimes in situations where it's like, I just worked the night before, the day before, had a really long day. I was only able to get like, six or five or four hours of sleep because whatever happened at work, and then have to go back early the next day, and just, just like, I don't have control over that, then it's those days are helpful for trying to use some substances to help mitigate the stress from that, but this is again, on top of trying not to do that on a regular basis and eating well and making sure everything on the other end is taken care of.

Jay Feldman 36:14
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I definitely think they can be helpful for those acutely stressful situations. Again, whether it's something like aspirin or extra B vitamins or those protective steroid hormones or thyroid, for sure, again, on top of a of a already pretty decent Foundation, yeah, of course. So Tara asks, usually, I did not have much of an appetite when I was following a low carb diet. My appetite has increased tremendously since adding sugar back in. Is this a sign of returning metabolic health? So in general, I would say Yeah, and that was part of why I like this question is just that it's a symptom that I don't think we've talked about quite as much, but appetite can be a really good indicator of how much fuel we're using and how much and basically how our fuel needs are changing, which is a good indicator of our metabolic function. So in general, when we're seeing a major shift in appetite towards an increase that, in general, tends to mean an increase in metabolism, and then vice versa. So sometimes low appetite can be pretty common, or kind of moderate appetite, where you notice that if you start eating more eating more carbs, doing things that are supportive, metabolically, you actually find that you're even more hungry. And to some people who might be hearing that, especially if they're coming from the dieting mindset, that's a little scary,

Mike 37:33
Because sugar is as addictive as cocaine, right?

Jay Feldman 37:37
Yeah, and it's also worth saying too that there is a point where even if your appetite is higher, there's much fewer cravings. It's much more stable. It's not the feeling of of basically feeling out of control and needing to binge that's that's not really what I'm talking about, more more talking about increased baseline need for food, which also this to be clear, eating more food, in this case, does not mean gaining body fat. So in general, when I see somebody, and this happens often with clients, where they're doing there's some intervention, whether it's a change of diet or supplement or other lifestyle factor that leads to an increase in appetite, and then they eat enough to balance that out, to make up for that increase in appetite, most of the time, that doesn't result in any sort of weight gain, because normally that increase in appetite is coming from some sort of block, like a removal of some blockage of energy production. So we talk, we talk all the time about how various things can block our ability to produce energy, whether it's a lack of nutrients, presence of PUFA, presence of heavy metals, or presence of endotoxin. So the removal or reduction in those things can help to support energy production and increase appetite, or it can be a situation of lowered stress hormones, for example, either by decreasing an external stressor, or by having more carbs throughout the day and keeping blood sugar steadier and keeping the stress hormones down. So those are things that I've seen increase appetite, and then I've seen being able to eat more without any gain in weight, which, of course, is one of the primary goals as far as raising your metabolism. And then if somebody is looking for weight loss, that would tend to come after that point.

Mike 39:13
Yeah, and just anecdotally, that when we got off our low carb diets, we went through a period where we were extremely hungry for a while. The other thing I want to point out is, I think, I think it also for a lot of people, when they go on keto or they go on these lower carb diets, they eliminate a lot of starches and grain products, and they lose a lot of weight, and then they conflate that with this idea that it's that it's carbs in general, and that's because I think the hypotheses within that sphere is that carbs and insulin are driving all modern diseases. I don't think, I don't think it's just carbs. I think a lot of that has to do specifically with grains. And for the money, of the different grains and starches in general, for many of the different reasons we touched upon them, and it. Uh, but it really depends. Again, it depends on what starch but at least in my experience, I found for people that when they go to sugar and overall, so whether that's that's your fruit juices, your whole fruit, or any sort of carb source like that, you people tend to increase their appetite pretty drastically, and they don't get they don't get the highs and lows, especially if they're eating enough fat and enough protein, and they're also able to maintain their weight just fine. And then for certain other people, the sugar and fruit does work well. But some people do seem to do well with starches, like plantains, bananas, yams, potatoes, some of the more nutrient dense, and I guess what you would consider paleo or non grain based starches. And then some people do do well with white rice, although I tend not to recommend that as a priority, because compared to the other ones that I just listed or mentioned, that has very little nutrient quality. But the the common denominator with all the different starches is that they have higher amounts of nutrients than the grains and much less anti nutrients and toxic components or immune stimulating components. And so I think a lot of the weight gain that people are associate with the carbs in general is usually with a lot of industrial grain products, and then the whole grains diet in general, and not necessarily eating, because people find on once they go paleo, usually this is the progression I see people go keto, keto, paleo, and they lose all this weight, and then they start to realize, wow, my sleep is not that well, my workouts aren't going so great. My thyroid labs aren't looking so good anymore. If I had thyroid problems before, but I'm still lean, and overall I feel a little bit better, and my joints aren't hurting me as much. So then they're then they sort of move into the next year where it's like, I want to add in some carbs, and then they they find, I think, perfect health diet. And some of the other practitioners talk about, well, if you have like, 150 grams of carbs a day from starchy, paleo or approved or safe starch components, whether that's what I mentioned, the sweet potatoes, yams, plantains, bananas, squashes, then they find, oh, wow, I can eat carbs and I'm not gaining weight. And you know, I still feel pretty great. And my sleep's improving, my workouts are improving, and my thyroid labs are coming back, and my testosterone is raising, or my my my progesterone on, my labs looks better, whatever the deal is. And then, and then eventually, I think some people, they they move even more to higher carb, and then they start to realize, oh, fructose and and and sucrose aren't the devil. I can eat fruit just fine. I actually feel better when I have more fruit in the diet. And it's like, well, I can have juice too and all these things. And they Oh, wow, it's not carbs. And I think that's because and the thing is, when people add carbs in from the low carb community that that I that I tend to see, they tend to have massive increases in appetite. And I think that is from the hormonal profile shifting from having a higher amount of cortisol, and I think for depending on how especially with carnivore, I think there might be some nutrient deficiencies that build up over time. I know there's some sort of justification where, if you're only running on protein and meat, and you don't use these nutrients or this or that, but I think the hormone profile shifts with carbs, and we've talked about it before, signaling like abundance in the environment with adequate carbohydrate access. So I think the increase in metabolism and increase the appetite is great. I've seen this progression happen before. I would just recommend that with carb sources, when getting into things, I know there's a tendency for people to move into the peat sphere and like, oh, I can have cokes and I can have tons and tons of ice cream when they first come off low carb. I think it'd probably be best to stick with, you know, whole fruits, fruit juice, if some of those, the safer, starchy sources, don't bother you, to stick with those first, and to experiment with those first, and then move so that there's not this. For some people, they can gain a lot of weight, especially if they have a lot of nutrient deficiencies, or their hormonal profiles in the dirt to start. Or they don't realize that they have intolerances to certain foods like dairy, or they develop gut issues while being on low carb, which I've seen happen to quite a few people. And then they eat a lot of refined granulated sugar, and they start to realize that they have some type of small bacterial issue, or they're just not digesting as well because energy was lower for a long period of time, or they developed nutrient deficiencies and they couldn't use the sugar, whatever, whatever is that they're taking in now. So I think it's a good sign overall, and I would just recommend to the experiment with those sources first and and move from there and and move one at a time and slowly and see how the body adjusts and overall appetite. Having an appetite is is pretty great. I see people on heavy starch diets tending to have actually lower appetite. I see a lot of the sick people that I work with having zero appetite, eating like nine. Minimal. I see a lot of older people now eating very minimally. I don't know how they're surviving. I see a lot of people in our generation now with eating. I just had a friend. He's over 200 pounds. He's subsisting just fine on 1800 calories. I've seen quite a few people like that. And are they a little bit overweight? Yeah, but they still have a decent amount of lean mass, even when you account for high body fat percentage, that would mean that their basal metabolic rate should be much higher. So having an appetite, I think, is a great sign. And having an appetite consistently for three, four meals a day, I think, is also a great sign. And being hungry, I think, is being able to be hungry is a great sign, because I see quite a lot of people without hunger signals at all, and they're telling they're trying to manage their weight, and I need to eat less, and they're eating less, and the weight is not coming off, and then they're not hungry, and then they're really not eating anything. So that hunger is a great sign overall. Yeah.

Jay Feldman 45:54
Yeah. I agree. Decreased appetite is, in general, a pretty good sign of excessive amounts of stress. It can also be a sign of high serotonin. And so, yeah, I mean, some of the more important things that would be keeping the stress hormones down, relieving any gut issues, things that would be increasing serotonin, sometimes B vitamins can be helpful if someone's dealing with a low appetite and they're not seeing an increase. But more than anything, I see eating more improving the quality of foods, and, you know, helping to rebalance the gut and hormones being the main things that help to stimulate appetite, especially in the morning. You know, it's very common, especially coming from low carb or low calorie, to not have much of an appetite in the morning, in which case, sometimes also just a small amount of of sugar in the form of fruit or fruit juice can help to stimulate it by keeping bringing the stress hormones down, but also, in general, you it's a good sign to be hungry in the morning, and that should tend to happen with time as your metabolism increases. You know, the as you said, I think a lot of people do tend to notice that when they're coming from lower carb to higher carb. I also hope that a lot of people are making that journey that you described to hope that we're helping more people make that journey. I think I see the vast majority of people, more being stuck in in those earlier parts the lower carbon fasting and low calorie, which is understandable.

Mike 47:08
But hopefully solve so many problems initially...

Jay Feldman 47:12
Right, you see initial benefits and long term costs for sure. Yeah, yeah. All right. I hope you enjoyed that episode. I did want to mention before we wrap up, that I did take a look at when thyroid gland was actually prohibited from being included in ground beef, and it actually wasn't until 1988 which is just interesting to note that for quite a long time, people have been eating thyroid gland in ground beef, just in their typical foods that would have ground beef. If you did enjoy today's episode, please leave a like or comment if you're watching on YouTube and if you're listening elsewhere, and could leave a five star review on iTunes or a review. Those things all do a lot to help support the podcast, and I really appreciate it. If you have any questions you'd like us to answer on a future Q A episode, you can send those in to Jay at Jay Feldman wellness.com that's j, A, y at Jay Feldman wellness.com where you can leave those in the comments if you're watching on YouTube. To check out the show notes for today's episode, head over to Jay Feldman wellness.com/podcast where you can take a look at these studies and articles and anything else that we referenced throughout today's episode, and if you are dealing with any low energy symptoms, whether that is a low appetite or chronic cravings and hunger or a lack of energy, chronic pain, poor sleep, hormonal imbalances, digestive symptoms or brain fog, or any other low energy symptoms or chronic health conditions. Then head over to Jay Feldman wellness.com/energy, where you can sign up for a free energy balance mini course, where I'll explain how these symptoms and conditions really come down to a lack of energy, and also walk you through the main things that you'll want to do to restore your cellular energy using diet and lifestyle. So to sign up for that free energy balance mini course, head over to Jay Feldman wellness.com/energy, and with that, I will see you in the next episode.