Welcome to Episode 377 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast, hosted by Melanie Avalon, author of What When Wine Diet: Lose Weight And Feel Great With Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, And Wine and Vanessa Spina, author of Keto Essentials: 150 Ketogenic Recipes to Revitalize, Heal, and Shed Weight.
Today's episode of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast is brought to you by:
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SHOW NOTES
BUTCHERBOX: For a limited time go to butcherbox.com/ifpodcast and get bone-in chicken thighs, top sirloins, or salmon—for free in every order for a whole year! Plus, get $20 off your first order!
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Listener Q&A: Wendy - Does [IF] work? I tried it and never lost anything - may not work for everyone.
Our content does not constitute an attempt to practice medicine and does not establish a doctor-patient relationship. Please consult a qualified healthcare provider for medical advice and answers to personal health questions.
TRANSCRIPT
(Note: This is generated by AI with 98% accuracy. However, any errors may cause unintended changes in meaning.)
Melanie Avalon:
Welcome to Episode 377 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. If you want to burn fat, gain energy, and enhance your health by changing when you eat, not what you eat with no calorie counting, then this show is for you. I'm Melanie Avalon, biohacker, author of "What, When, Wine" and creator of the supplement line AvalonX. And I'm here with my co-host, Vanessa Spina, sports nutrition specialist, author of "Keto Essentials" and creator of the Tone Breath Ketone Analyzer and Tone Lux Red Light Therapy Panels. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and ketogenicgirl.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this show do not constitute medical advice or treatment. To be featured on the show, email us your questions to questions@ifpodcast.com. We would love to hear from you. So pour yourself a mug of black coffee, a cup of tea, or even a glass of wine, if it's that time, and get ready for The Intermittent Fasting Podcast.
Melanie Avalon:
Hi, everybody, and welcome. This is episode number 377 of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon, and I'm here with Vanessa Spina. Hi, everybody. How are you today, Vanessa? I'm doing great. How are you? I'm good. I was telling you before this, I'm really excited because literally, I just read it, another Fox article came out. She heavily featured me. I'm really honored. The article is called Three Women, Ages 41, 55, and 64, Share Their Secrets to Better Health and Longevity. And the subtitle is, For Women's Health Month, Three Mothers and Grandmothers Revealed How They're Defying Their Chronological Ages. And then it goes through the stories of the three women. So it goes through the stories of three different women, and it tells about the things that they're doing for healthy aging, which is, of course, right up my alley. But then, so that's like the whole first part of the article. And then the second part of the article, it says, A Biohackers Five Quick Tips for Healthy Aging. And then it says, Melanie Avalon, health influencer, entrepreneur, and host of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast, where we are right now. And the Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcasts agree that women can take proactive steps to slow their pace of aging. And then I go through five different ways that women can help optimize their aging and try to decide if we should play the guessing game here. What's kind of funny is, so the way this went down is yesterday, the Fox editor, Melissa, she reached out and said she was writing a story and would love some of my quotes. And so I wrote out all of my answers. And then after curiosity, I was like, I'm going to ask chat GPT what it thinks I would say. So I said, I was like, is Melanie Avalon, can you like answer this, you know, prompt? And it literally, it was so scary. It listed, I mean, it listed everything I said, almost in the exact same order. So the first thing I put in my answer was prioritized protein. And then chat GPT was like, prioritized protein. I was like, oh my gosh. And then I talked in my answer to her about leucine specifically prioritizing leucine. And then chat GPT included that as well. Literally everything I'd said, it gave a list and then some and that actually gave me further inspiration because it listed a few things. I was like, oh yeah, that's true. So I like added those in my own words. I didn't like just copy and paste. But yeah, so the the five ones that are in the article number one is optimize sleep. So I talk about how to, you know, create a sleep sanctuary to support restorative night tangent. By the way, when you were pregnant with your kids and everything, like how do you, well, a historically, are you a good sleeper? And then did that change with motherhood?
Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, I sleep pretty well. Pregnancy, you start waking up a lot throughout the night. So I haven't had uninterrupted sleep for three years. I looked it up once and it's akin to night shift workers almost when you're up for periods of the night because then you're also waking up to breastfeed once the baby comes. But before the baby comes, most pregnant women have issues like heartburn and all kinds of stuff, being uncomfortable on their side. I luckily did not, but I did have to just wake up to pee a lot. And then I feel like that kind of starts preparing you for them when the baby comes because then you have to wake up a lot to nurse. So actually when we were at the hospital over Christmas, when Damien was in the NICU, it was the only time I had uninterrupted sleep because he was in the NICU all night. And I was sleeping at the hospital for about two weeks and I actually had uninterrupted sleep for like six hours each night. And I felt Pete and I would wake up and be like, Oh my God, I feel so good because the sleep was so amazing. But yeah, your sleep just isn't the same and it's a season of life where it's very different. But I feel like I'm lucky. I'm getting pretty decent sleep for what, for where we're at right now. And I know it's like a temporary thing, but yeah, why do you ask?
Melanie Avalon:
I'm just super curious whenever I think of like young mothers and things. It just seems like the sleep would be like madness. I just, I cannot. I cannot.
Vanessa Spina:
It's not that bad. I was really... We were both really scared of it. It was one of the reasons I think we held off on having kids for a while because we were scared of the sleep deprivation because of the way people talk about it. But it's weird how your brain adjusts. It really does because if you even get two hours of sleep early in the morning, your brain right away goes into the deepest state of sleep. So you can catch up. So you, instead of going into it more gradually, you adapt and then you actually feel pretty good. I feel great most days. I'm on very limited sleep. Your body adjusts and you adapt and then it's a temporary phase of life, but it's so worth it. Everything else makes it so worth it.
Melanie Avalon:
That's actually really interesting because I was listening to a, an interview with Matthew Walker, which I would love to try to get him on the show. I really, really need to, but he was talking about different studies where people are deprived of certain versions of sleep. And when they get so deprived like that, when they actually do fall asleep, they immediately jump into that stage that they needed. So I think it was mostly like with people who are deprived of REM sleep, for example, like severely deprived of it. And then when they actually did get a chance to sleep, it was like, not the same thing as what you were saying, where you jumped right in, but, but sort of, we said it happens actually with people who, I don't have it, I don't want to misquote this, I think he was saying how like C or like marijuana can affect, can make you get less REM sleep. And then when people come off it, they're probably like preferentially prefer REM sleep, so they'll have like crazy dreams because they're like restocking up on the REM stages. It's pretty interesting. The tips I gave in this were to implement a sleep sanctuary to best support a restorative night, including sticking to a consistent wind down routine and sleep schedule in a cool, dark environment, using a cooling mattress, avoiding late night, blue light exposure, and finding the optimal sleep position are some ways women can achieve better sleep quality. I got inspired by the sleep position because I just did a whole interview on that last week. That was number one. Number two, I said to seek hormonal support as needed. And I talked about the importance of micronutrient rich whole foods in your menopausal years, and at the same time also getting sleep and addressing your stress and reducing your toxic exposure. And then I did say, have you and I talked about our thoughts on hormone replacement therapy? So I did say, my answer I gave her was longer than this. What she kept from it was for some women, hormone replacement therapy may be an option, and then the quote is many women may find that the benefits outweigh their risks. Do you have thoughts on the women's health initiative and hormone replacement therapy? I feel like it comes up a lot in podcasts and interviews I have, like the drama surrounding it, basically.
Vanessa Spina:
I've done maybe five or six episodes in the last year just on HRT because it's so fascinating to me. And also because the data in the Women's Health Initiative has recently been reassessed and they found that actually it was bioidentical hormones were actually protective against breast cancer in women. And it's really important to have the progesterone balancing out the estrogen. But I've had some amazing guests, Dr. Sarah Gottfried. I've had several hormone specialists on the podcast because I wanted to learn about it for understanding perimenopause because it can start as early as a decade before menopause. And the average age for menopause is 50. But for women who have it younger, like 45, that means like 35, you could start having symptoms of perimenopause. And women seem to be having it more and more now, perimenopause. So I wanted to really educate myself on it and I feel like I've learned so much just from – actually, it was just in the last two months most of those episodes came out. So that's kind of been a big topic and I feel very empowered by the information that I've been learning and very – yeah, I would say empowered and excited to have this understanding for that when that time comes for me when I'm not cycling anymore. What about you?
Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, really really similar. It's really interesting because I mentioned it before but and you mentioned it what you were talking about But basically the the women's health initiative was this massive study That it was actually stopped Early the takeaway they were giving was that hormone replacement therapy was causing cancer in women and I know like Peter T. I feels very strongly about it. He actually has a really good interview With the main woman who did the study and I mean he completely deconstructs it me more deconstructs it I mean he deconstructs it when he taught when he's talking to her But he deconstructs it more when he's not talking to her It's quite possible that the way it was presented about the the risks of the cancer rates They're like tiny but they were like presented differently like relative versus absolute risk I don't think they even I could be wrong but I'm pretty sure they didn't even really correlate to Mortality like it was just a couple more a handful more cases of cancer But not even mortality related to that and compared to like the benefits of women feeling like their lives are being changed With menopausal symptoms or preparing menopausal symptoms being on hormone replacement therapy I find it really interesting too because like you said a lot of the people that we interview do have this opinion But people they take the other of you which is what the women health initiative put out there actually the book I'm reading right now the Michael Greger book. He just had a whole long section on it about The way it was presented as a major negative. So I just think there's a lot of nuance there. I find it really interesting
Vanessa Spina:
Why am I not surprised? My goodness, and he's a man. Sorry, but.
Melanie Avalon:
Well, you know, it's funny. So I was thinking about that, you know, it's so funny because the way he presents it is like he presents it like, you know, that like the system is making these hormones that are like patronizing women, like taking control of women. So he comes off as like, it's like he's freeing women by saying they don't have to take on the risks of hormone replacement therapy. But I just want to be like,
Vanessa Spina:
Literally, the sound of his book hitting the bottom of my garbage can, if I would read that part. I mean, I can't even begin to... What I've been learning specifically from these experts, which a lot of it is new to me, is how bad that viewpoint is for women and how damaging it's been for women. Because women have been afraid of HRT. They're not taking it. They're dealing with all the symptoms when they don't need to be. One of the biggest symptoms is having poor body composition changes, so losing their bone mass and muscle mass. The doctors who are not really very well trained on these aspects of HRT and how it's changed and these different approaches are just giving women the same options. I think ablation is one of the options and going on birth control. Even though birth control has synthetic progesterone, which is the problematic one, they're telling women to go on birth control when they're in perimenopause to deal with the symptoms instead of just offering them bioidentical HRT, which can help most of those symptoms go away. That kind of rhetoric, to me, is really not of service to women, and the fact that it's from a man's perspective, all the podcasts lately, I feel like I'm raging against some just being honest with my thoughts.
Melanie Avalon:
I will say, you know, what's really interesting about it is, well, first of all, stepping back. So I have read other books from other guests, not Michael Greger, who have said similar things and some of them are women. So I don't think it's always necessarily just like the male, you know, view of that. And again, Peter is a male and he's saying the opposite. All of that said, I find it really interesting that, well, especially with Michael Greger, because he's all about like the science and the data. I don't know why he didn't go in and actually analyze the data the way Peter does, if what he does is really analyze data. Oh my goodness, wait, just really quick tangent. I'm so excited when I interviewed him. I'm trying to decide if I should bring this up. I was waiting for, I was like waiting the whole book with bated breath and it's a long book. I'm like halfway through. But I remember, do you remember when I interviewed, I think I told you about it, like Dr. Neil Bernard about his soy study, his soy vegan menopause study.
Vanessa Spina:
I can't remember exactly what it was.
Melanie Avalon:
about. So basically I had him on my show because he actually pitched to come on the show because he did a study on, speaking of menopause, looking at menopausal symptoms in women on a standard diet or a vegan diet with added soy. And they found that the vegan diet with added soy massively affected, beneficially, the women's hormonal symptoms during menopause. So the conclusion was that the soy, that adding soy to your diet, did this. But the setup of the study only compared a vegan diet with soy to a normal diet. There was no vegan diet without soy. So how did you know it was the soy? Like literally the soy could have been making it worse and they could have done better on just a straight up vegan diet, you know? Like you literally cannot make that conclusion.
Vanessa Spina:
at all. Yeah, that's bizarre.
Melanie Avalon:
seems really bizarre. So I was like waiting with beta breath during Michael's book because I was like, I was like, I'm going to be ready for it. I know he's going to bring up this study and I'm going to be ready for it. And then he did bring it up. He was like, in the soy chapter, he was like, this one study found that adding soy, he didn't mention the study, but he's like, this one study found that adding soy to your diet, you know, did blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I was like, this is the Bernard study. I know it. And I went and looked at the references and it was, I was so excited. So I'm like, but it's things like that where because he has hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of references. Actually, I just knew to wait, look for that because I had so extensively read an interview about that study. So I'm just like, I don't have time though to go check every single reference that he references to make sure it's not that situation with anybody really. It's just hard. There's just like so much information out there and opinions. And it's really hard to get to the truth of the matter, you know?
Vanessa Spina:
know, at the end of the day, you have to, I think, you know, do your own due diligence, draw your own conclusions, you know, I mean, everyone has different interpretations of the data. Sometimes I like to look at the person who's giving me the information and ask myself also, you know, is this someone that I want to emulate? Or like, is there does this person seem like they are healthy? Does this person seem like they have a young biological age or, you know, whatever it is, like, we all have our different criteria. But yeah, it is, it is hard sometimes when people give such opposing opinions on things, I totally get it. And I feel like a lot of listeners could relate to that as well. It's part of why I went back to school because I was like, I just can't, I don't know who to trust, I have to go back and educate myself more so that I can draw my own conclusions and understand how to read studies and do all this because it was so frustrating dealing with all the opposing opinions. It's so true.
Melanie Avalon:
And, and I thought not to go on an AI tangent, but I, I honestly thought when I started using chat GPT that it was going to make this better because I thought it was going to, um, like, just objectively look at studies and things. I think out of all the things I use it for, the worst thing to use it for is finding studies. Every single time I have asked it for studies, it makes up studies or quote studies, but it's not, it's not in there. I don't think it's set up to like go through the journals correctly on the internet because, and then I was listening to an interview about this and they were saying how like some lawyers were using it for a court case and it literally just like made up studies that did not exist, which is really scary.
Vanessa Spina:
Modely concerning. I know.
Melanie Avalon:
I know, just a little bit. I had to do a math problem the other day and it gave me the answer. I was trying to calculate what I had paid somebody over a certain amount of months taking into account like certain days. So I was like, I paid this person this amount for five months and this amount of days starting on, you know, like all these parameters. I was like, how much did I pay her? And it was like, you paid her and gave me a number. And I was like, great. Can you give me the breakdown of how you came up with that? And I was like, sure. And then I gave a breakdown and it equaled a different number. And I was like, so wait, so what's the answer? And I was like, you just gave me two different numbers. It was like, oh, you're right. Let's do this again to make sure we get it right. I was like, okay, this is like not, this is very concerning.
Vanessa Spina:
How can you make so many mistakes? That's wild. I mean, from all of it, I've barely used it at all. And every time you talk about it, it makes me want to use it less, so.
Melanie Avalon:
Well, to answer your question about how it makes so many mistakes, I think there's two main reasons it does. One is what I mentioned before is that it hallucinates. So if it doesn't know the answer, it can't not know the answer. So it just makes up an answer. That is a problem. Number two, it uses predictive, like I was just listening to a podcast about this, like predictive analysis to come up with things. So it's always, it's not necessarily hardcore. I mean, it is looking at the current data, but it's also predicting. And so to come up with its information. And so when it goes on these trades where it's predicting, then it's just predicting the wrong things. But it thinks it's, it thinks it's coming up with the right thing based on what it just did. If that makes sense. Yes, it's very concerning. So back to the study. Number three, this is the one that I gave her as number one. And this is something I know that you feel very passionate about. Let me know if you agree with everything I said, Vanessa, I was actually thinking about you when I was writing this because I was like, wait, am I like, am I recommending the right thing? I was like, I need Vanessa, like in my head right now to answer this question. Okay. Number three, optimize muscle mass. Okay. Please fact check me. Okay. So I said, maintaining muscle mass is crucial for healthy aging, according to Avalon declines in muscle mass and strength are intrinsically tied to mortality, playing a causative role in falls and metabolic issues. She said, I don't think I said causative role in metabolic issues, but oh well. Okay. Here's where I had a question. I said aging typically leads to reduce muscle protein synthesis. Women should pay careful attention to getting ample protein as they age with a particular focus on the amino acid leucine, which stimulates muscle protein synthesis. That's all good, right?
Vanessa Spina:
I think so, yeah, I think I usually say that muscle protein breakdown rates are higher, but I guess you could say it as muscle proteins of this goes down, but I guess it's like six of one, half dozen, the other, whatever hour that's...
Melanie Avalon:
That's so true. That's such a good perspective. Yeah, I gave her more information, but it didn't make it into here. But I was talking about the, like the leucine threshold. And I said, I recommended, I was googling and like in clinical journals, I found three grams for the leucine protein threshold. But then my interview with Dr. Gabrielle Lye, she said 2 .5 grams. So I said 2 .5 to three grams. What do you think is the threshold?
Vanessa Spina:
Yeah. So Don usually heard Dr. Gabrielle Alliance mentor and they worked on a lot of this research together. He says two and a half to three grams, but he says three grams maxes it out. But I really want to talk to Don again, because now that this new study came out with no upper limit on muscle protein synthesis, I don't think he'll revise any of his statements or opinions, but I'm just so curious what he thinks about it. I should text Gabrielle and ask her because I know she talks to him like every day. But yeah, I think the leucine threshold would still be the same, even if there's no upper limit. But I'm not sure if the concept of maxing it out.
Melanie Avalon:
changes is different based on that information. Yeah. You have to let me know if she, what she says. Definitely. I said aging women should aim for a gram of protein per pound of body weight. So do we feel good about that recommendation?
Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, I think that's, that's a good number for like the mass population. Cause it's, it's usually, I usually say 1 .6 to 2 .2 grams per kg, which is like 0 .8. If you're more sedentary, but if you're a woman who's, you know, doing any kind of resistance training or activity, then that works out to like one gram per pound. But it's like, I think one gram per pound is a good target because a lot of people don't get there anyway, so it's better to overshoot.
Melanie Avalon:
Okay. Awesome. Yeah. Cause I was, I was torn answering it because I know what the official, you know, dietary recommendations are, which are in my opinion, tragically low. I was like, do I need to like go and explain this? And I was like, I'll just throw it in there and hopefully she'll just put it in. And then I said, women can also engage in strength training to further support muscle growth and maintenance. So that was my, my protein one. I'm really happy though, that she included the, uh, the leucine. I thought she, she might cut that out cause I thought she might think that it was too nuanced for the, uh, general population of Fox news. But, um, and then number four, there's only five, so we're almost on number four was monitor essential markers. So I said, what aging women should embrace the agency to take their health into their own hands. And I recommended working with conventional doctors to regularly check key health metrics, such as blood pressure, blood sugar levels, cholesterol, and bone density, along with other markers of disease. What she did not include is my second paragraph also talked about DIY, blood work and genetic testing through online platforms that did not make it into the cut. So now it sounds like I'm saying just talk with conventional doctors. It's so interesting to see how the, uh, you know, how the editing process can like change kind of what you're saying. I mean, I do recommend that, but I didn't just recommend working with conventional doctors. And then number five is something we talk about on this show all the time. It's not intermittent fasting, which actually was one of my points. And she did not include that, but I said, number five, achieve proper glycemic control. So I said that poor glycemic control is linked to a myriad of degenerative diseases from prediabetes and diabetes to cardiovascular disease and cognitive decline. I said that aging women can implement an unprocessed whole foods based diet, low to moderate and carbs, depending on their tolerance. And then the last quote of the article is women can also opt to wear a continuous glucose monitor CGM to monitor their blood sugar levels. So get in the word of CGM out there. That was a lot. It was a nice little, it was a nice surprise because whenever she asks for quotes, I, I never know if it's going to be just like a quote or like what it's going to be. And so to have it be kind of, I mean, this was amazing for it to be like an entire, I mean, it's basically just what I said in a list. So, so yes. Oh my gosh, it's been half an hour. How did I do that? Okay. What's new in your world?
Vanessa Spina:
I tried to make the sugar -free marshmallows. Oh, you did?
Melanie Avalon:
How did it go? Wait, you said you tried to. You tried to.
Vanessa Spina:
Try this afternoon and they make recipes I followed made it seem super easy I always thought that marshmallows are made of egg whites They're not It's mostly water. Okay. What do you think it is? What do you think they're made out of?
Melanie Avalon:
Gelatin and water and like vanilla and shh
Vanessa Spina:
sugar. Okay, you knew. I didn't know. I had no idea. I thought it was like egg whites or something. I had no idea. So that's exactly what it is. So if you make sugar free ones, you basically just do it instead with a sugar free, you know, alternative. So I used a wreath you taught, which is swerve, like basically the confectioners version of it, which I made in my blender and I got it started. And then we really had to go put the babies down for a nap. So you have to froth like whip it up in the mixer. So I had it in the stand mixer and I was like, well, it says it needs to mix for like five to 10 minutes. So I'll just get them to bed and then I'll come back and, you know, put it in. So it was taking a long time to get them to sleep. So my husband, Pete, I was like, can you just go check on it? And then I sent him like the recipe, I sent him some screenshots. I'm like, if it looks like this, then just like take it out, pour it in the pan. Cause I already had the pan set up. Okay.
Melanie Avalon:
important question, where are Pete's skills on the cooking?
Vanessa Spina:
Oh boy. Like, non -existent. Oh. Not existent. Like, he just doesn't cook at all. I mean, he can, because we always tease him. We were dating. He made me like ex -Benedict, and he made all these things, but then, like, he's never entered the kitchen again, so. But he grills. He grills, right? He grills. So right now, I have, I have him, you know, doing all the dinners, which is awesome. Wait.
Melanie Avalon:
Can we do a shout out? Yes. If he was in the US, what grill would he be grilling on?
Vanessa Spina:
probably a schwank grill because that one everyone is talking about it right now and you basically can grill your meat and everything your steaks burgers shrimp everything like restaurant quality so I would love to get one of those when we're back in the US
Melanie Avalon:
He uses infrared heat to get the the perfect crisp char. I'm actually going to um, I'm trying to you said you did in a re -doctor. What's his name? Chafney?
Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, I'm interviewing him on Thursday.
Melanie Avalon:
Oh, you are? Oh, you're interviewing him. Oh, it's upcoming. That was just a coincidence. I haven't actually like dived into his work. All I know is he's a carnivore doctor. Yeah. Isn't his podcast, is it the plant free? Maybe he was on that podcast. What is his podcast? He has a podcast, right?
Vanessa Spina:
All I know is he is a carnivore doctor, and I'm pretty sure he was raised that way without really eating plant food. So that's what I'm really curious about. But my team booked the episode, so I have to do some prep on it, and I haven't done it yet because I have someone else that I'm interviewing tomorrow, one of my favorite protein scientists, Dr. Jose Antonio. So I'm really excited. He just published a new paper on protein, so I've been preparing for that. And then once that is done, I will switch over to Dr. Chaffee, but I know he loves that grill also. And being a carnivore, when you're a carnivore, you really become all about the cooking methods and the different ways to make your steak taste amazing because it's the main thing that you eat. So I think carnivores could do really well investing in some kind of grill like that because then you could basically have restaurant quality steak at home every day.
Melanie Avalon:
His podcast is the plant free MD podcast. Yes. So if listeners are interested, they can go to schwinkgrills.com and use the promo code I have podcast to get $150 off. So that's S C H W A N K grills.com with the code I have podcasts for $150 off. And I think I've asked like an influencer person, right? No, that was pre
Vanessa Spina:
I think I remember posting our engagement on my Instagram as an influencer. I shared like when Pete proposed and pictures of it and stuff. So it was around, it was sort of like maybe a year, but I had already been with Pete for a long time. So yeah, I was not single or anything.
Melanie Avalon:
Okay, although actually it doesn't have to be dating, but I always just think it's funny because like dating or just meeting people, I'm always talking about all these things. And then I always feel like at the end, I'll want to give them the codes because I have codes for all the things I talk about and I want to give them a discount. But then I feel like, especially when it's like a new person you just met and you're like going on about like the continuous glucose monitors and all the things. And then at the end, you want to be like, oh, and you can go to neutrascents .io and use the coupon code.
Vanessa Spina:
You just want to share the wealth, yeah.
Melanie Avalon:
I do. So what I do now, I don't do this with strangers really, but if I were to go on a date or something, I usually tell the person at the beginning, I'm like, listen, anything I talk about, I probably have codes for. So just prepare yourself for that.
Vanessa Spina:
Get ready to enjoy the world. Yeah, I love it.
Melanie Avalon:
oh my gosh okay wait i completely interrupted what were we talking oh yeah pete not the best in the kitchen would love the showing grill if he was in the us what happened with the marshmallows
Vanessa Spina:
Yes, so I'm texting him pictures. I'm like, okay, it should look like this picture, step four, which is basically the stand mixer just filled with like a frothy white, you know, as if you were making meringue or something like just filled with like white frothy marshmallow. And then once it gets to that stage, which I assumed it was by that point, because I'd been in the room with them for like 20 minutes trying to get both of them down. And he's like, sends me this picture and it looks like it's kind of what it should be. And then he sends me another picture and it just looks like this, like a bunch of gravel like spread out parchment. So I came out and I'm like, what is this? Like, I guess it just ran for too long. And even if it got to the right point, you're supposed to move pretty fast from getting it out of the bowl and spreading it out. It says that in most of the recipes, but I think it was mixing for too long because it basically just, I tasted it and it just tasted like, uh, like the taste, especially the aftertaste was marshmallow, but the texture and everything was like all wrong. So I have to try again tomorrow and we'll see. But in the meantime, I reordered the truck zero ones because they're so good. They are exactly like actual marshmallows. And until I get my marshmallow skills, marshmallow making skills up to par, I don't know, it's going to take a little while. And they tasted very strongly of a wreath through tall. So which has a very strong minty aftertaste that I don't love, I'm not a bigger wreath through tall person, but that's the one like powdered sweetener thing that I have access to here. So I might try it with xylitol. I might have to play around with like a combination of stevia and something, you know, unless I can find something else, but the person who wrote the blog on it, I think I got it from food dreamer. She has a blog all day. I dream about food and she has a lot of cookbooks out and stuff. I love her blog. Yeah. She's got wonderful recipes and she said, don't try it with other lows. She said, try it with the best she found was Swerve and this other sweetener I had never heard of before. Oh, really? What was it? Do you remember? It was something with a B. I had just never heard of it. So I'm not sure what it is made of exactly, but the Chalk Zero ones are made of resistant dextrin. So I don't think that that's something that I could find. I think it's more of a manufacturer, like confectioners product. But anyway, I'm trying. I will report back and if I do it successfully, I will definitely share the recipe, whatever one that I end up using or playing with, or if I make my own version, if anyone else wants to try them. The other thing is I was like, maybe cause I like putting them in my element of hot chocolate. That's what I have after dinner. It's like a kind of nice like dessert treat. And so I was like, maybe if I just put them in my hot chocolate, I'll just get the taste of it. And then I put them in my, my element caramel chocolate, which I whip makeup with unsweetened almond milk. And I made it for the start of our podcast. And like, I looked down two seconds later and they were gone. Like they just dissolved into nothing. So I just have a very, very sweet chocolate caramel drink, which is fine. But yeah, no floating, no like slow melting marshmallows in my coffee. But it's funny because I don't really, I haven't had sweets or things like that, even like dark chocolate or anything in so long. And I was really surprised as I was testing with my CGM that they do not bump up my blood glucose at all. The Chalk Zero ones, I think partly because I'm quite active during the day, but they don't bump it up barely at all. And then last night I was like, maybe I should test this dark chocolate. I have, I have some dark chocolate, like smarties kind of things in dark chocolate bars that I have for Luca, because if we go to birthday parties or things like that, where the other kids are having treats, like I'll usually bring something for him. So I decided to try two pieces of the dark chocolate. And it was very good. Surprisingly, I was not tempted to have more, which is weird for me because I've always been more of an abstainer versus moderator, but I was fine. I think it's because I was after dinner, I had like, you know, enough protein. I was fully satisfied, but it did make my blood sugar go up. And then when I was reading, I mean, it was fine. It was like a normal reaction, but the truck zero ones didn't. So I was reading on Carolyn's blog about the marshmallows, her recipe. She said, don't use maltitol in the marshmallows because it makes your blood sugar go up. So I didn't know that about maltitol. And that's what I discovered myself yesterday when I tried it. So I'm still having so much fun with the CGM and testing things. I just tried a new sensor. I put one on on Sunday and I'm just going to keep rolling with it. Cause it's been so much fun. I'm learning so much about how my body works. And I'm just been so surprised at the things that I thought I just assumed. I'm like, this is probably spiking my blood sugar. And they weren't at all. And you know, it's, it's really cool to see when you have built up that insulin sensitivity and you are an active person. And, you know, I think I've got a lot of people now doing this, you know, 10 squats every hour since I, I posted about that study. And then I did a podcast episode about it last week. And I've had so many people commenting and damning me that they're doing squats all day long, every hour. So every time I do them, I think of everyone else who's also doing 10 squats and for listeners, this, we talked about it, I think last episode, but this study came out showing that doing 10 body weight squats every 45 minutes in this new study was better for blood sugar control than a half hour walk. And it turns out because you're activating the glute muscles and the quadriceps and producing lactate and the lactic acid is making the glucose transporters of glute glut four glucose transporters go to the surface of cells. So they can take up glucose. So that's what lowers the blood sugar, but by activating the glutes and quadricep muscles, you get this great blood sugar control. So it's, it's way better than doing a 30 minute walk. Because that takes time. Whereas just like dropping down and doing 10 squats. I've been doing it on the hour, just for fun also to test and I'm getting lower average blood sugar scores too. So having so much fun with the, this new Nutrisense CGM. If
Melanie Avalon:
If listeners would like their own Nutrisense CGM, they can go to Nutrisense.com/ifpodcast and use the coupon code ifpodcast and that will get them $50 off a continuous glucose monitor. And if they'd like to try element for free, they can go to drinklmnt.com/ifpodcast and try it for free. See all the codes, all the abundance. Have you tried the new sparkling element? No, I don't think they
Vanessa Spina:
can ship to Europe yet. I don't think that actually will happen anytime soon. So next time I'm in the US, I'm definitely going to make a beeline to either get some or have some shipped to our place because I can't wait to try it. Have you tried them?
Melanie Avalon:
I haven't tried it, they sent it, so they sent the original box and then they just sent a whole new shipment and it's massive. It's crazy how heavy that stuff is.
Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, you have to let us know when you try it.
Melanie Avalon:
I will. And speaking of going back to the glutes thing, a big change I personally implemented, I don't know when I started doing this, but I feel like it really makes a difference. And it's something you actually mentioned when you first talked about the glute study, you talked about the importance of like being consciously involved in it. I started a habit where because I used to like when I would pick up something I would bend over at the waist, you know, and like, I would just like lean down and pick up things. Now I typically always like squat to get down. So then you just are like throwing in squats without even thinking about it.
Vanessa Spina:
Yes, yes, I do the same thing like when I'm picking up Lucas toys.
Melanie Avalon:
like squat to get down and then you can like really like consciously squat up like you know like consciously like push yourself back up again from your legs without using your arms basically
Vanessa Spina:
Yes. And I think that's something I also learned a little bit in yoga is just being able to stand up from a sitting position without using my arms. And I think that that's a really good, I think that it's also a longevity test or something is like, if you are sitting, I think Dr. Peter talks about if you're sitting on the ground, how quickly can you get up? And like, how easily can you get up from, from being on the floor? Yeah, he does talk about that. I think it is a name, but I can't think of it right now.
Melanie Avalon:
Yes. So little hacks for listeners for their blood sugar and their health and their longevity and all the things. Just quick comment on the marshmallows. I'm really fascinated by – my one and only time I think I attempted making marshmallows was also a fail. I just remember they didn't – like you said, they didn't feel like marshmallows. Like they kind of turned into just – I don't remember, but it was like sludge or something. But I'm always really fascinated by food things that require both – where there's a big emphasis on time and – or like it'll often be like time and temperature. Like you have to move it from here to here at this time, at this temperature. Like it's basically like marshmallows, cheese, candy. It's like a science. I went down the rabbit hole of the cheese making world. It's crazy. Have you looked at cheese making recipes? Like how to make cheddar?
Vanessa Spina:
I have never attempted it. I have done candy though. I had a candy thermometer. We have one in Denver, and I made peanut brittle, but I made a keto version of it, and it's like macadamia nut brittle. It's one of my favorite holiday recipes, but I had to do that with the marshmallows. You have to get the syrup to a certain temperature, and yeah, it's involved. But it's simple. It's one of those recipes that's so simple. It's like four ingredients, but there's something about it that the recipe, when you read the blog, you're like, this looks so easy. It's not.
Melanie Avalon:
It's kind of like, I feel like I was ahead of the time with my cottage cheese obsession. Like I went through a cottage cheese making obsession and then literally like the next year, do you remember like there was that time period where everybody was making cottage cheese? Mm -mm. Okay, maybe not. And maybe I missed that one. Well, it happened and I was there before it happened. I'm thinking I should repurpose my cottage cheese making video now. It would probably do better.
Vanessa Spina:
I think a lot of people in Europe make more stuff like that at home, I've noticed. But in the US, you're probably the only one who doesn't, unless you have a homestead. Maybe... Wait, you make out of shoes? No, but I see it like people in Italy are just making their mozzarella and they're doing all this kind of stuff at home. But maybe in the US, it's more like homesteaders who are doing stuff like that.
Melanie Avalon:
and tick -tockers when it becomes a trend.
Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, but like most people probably don't have time because it's like you could just buy it at the store very easily, I guess.
Melanie Avalon:
I made my cottage cheese because I wanted to make fat -free cottage cheese without additives. And it actually worked. All the recipes were saying, don't use fat -free milk, it's not going to work. I was like, I think it's going to work. It worked enough for me. It probably, I mean, it wasn't like restaurant quality, nobody would have, or even grocery store quality, but it worked for me. Point being though, I did that and it was like magical. I was like, wow. You literally watch it transform in front of your eyes and cottage cheese is mind -blowing. And then I was like, I want to make other cheeses. And that's when I went down the rabbit hole of looking at the recipes and I was like, oh, we're not going to do this. Like the mozzarella recipe, it's like, you know, when it's exactly this temperature, then keep it for this minutes and then stir it and then like let it sit and then think about it and then watch it and then this temperature and then that temperature and then move it. And then like, I cannot, it's like potions glass. It's like Harry Potter. So I don't know how they figured that stuff out originally. Okay. Tangents. So shall we end the show with a question? Yes, let's do it. Okay. I'll read this. So we have a question from Wendy. This was on Facebook and it was to a prompt where I asked people, did they have questions about intermittent fasting? She said, does it work? I tried it and never lost anything. Maybe it doesn't work for everybody. And then somebody asked her and they said, what did you try? And she said, quote, everything. Karen commented on that and said, I've only done totally clean fasting. I am post menopause, but stuck with it. I read Jen Stevens book and listened to her podcast, interviewing people fasting while I was getting started. I just stuck with it, hoping it was cleaning up my insights before I would see benefits on the outside. I truly believe it did. My benefits over three to five years have been better digestion, weight loss, not huge amounts, but decent eyesight has improved. Yay. Skin cleared and just feel better overall. I started 16 eight, then moved to 18 six some days and I'm back to 16 eight. Keep at it. So I noticed like a very, well, first of all, love the feedback, Karen. I'm so excited for you and all the things that you've experienced for Wendy's question. So this is more just like a general question. I guess there's a few questions here. One is like, because she said it maybe it doesn't work for everybody. Vanessa, do you think there are some people that fasting just doesn't work for? And also, you know, what about people who feel like they're just trying everything? Like how can they find what does work for them?
Vanessa Spina:
Oh, I just did an episode that came out yesterday on my podcast, which is May 20th and it was with a hormone doctor, Dr. Amy, and it's specifically about that. Like basically when people have tried everything that it could actually be a hormone issue, which is what she found herself. She was a physique competitor and she was about to step on stage for one of her competitions and she gained 25 pounds and she was doing prep. So she was basically doing cardio twice a day and eating like steamed fish and broccoli, and she was, she gained 25 pounds and she went to see seven doctors and every single one of them told her that she was fine and she should eat less and move more. And then she finally saw a functional doctor who tested her and found that she had Hashimoto's. She had basically thyroid disease and she then changed her whole career path and became a functional medicine practitioner herself so that she could help women who have this issue. So sometimes it's, it's not, you know, like if you're, I think if you're trying everything and nothing is working, that may be the time when you would want to go see someone, get labs done, see someone who's perhaps a functional practitioner who can look at hormones and give you a lot of undivided time. She said her, the doctor that eventually became her mentor spent 90 minutes with her going over everything, you know, and trying to, and he was able to figure out what was going on with her. And, you know, you don't know if it could be an underlying physiological thing. If you have really tried every diet, every approach, and you're not getting results, there could be something going on hormoneally that you don't know about that, you know, you maybe just need some support with, right? So I think that's, could be a situation where you want to get some testing done potentially, you know, if you're feeling frustrated and that nothing is working with intermittent fasting. I do think that my opinion on it in general is that it is a stressor to fast during the day and for some people, it makes them feel great because it has a hormetic effect. So that little bit of stress produces like great energy, focus, you know, all the things that people talk about when they love intermittent fasting. But for other people who already have sort of their cup full of stress, that extra stress could be too much and not the right thing. So I do think there are situations when, you know, it's not the right fit for that person, or maybe that person is more sensitive to stressors either at that time or just in general overall. What do you think?
Melanie Avalon:
That was an incredible answer. Perfect timing with your interview about that. I historically felt like my body always really reacted a certain way once I really found the intermittent fasting pattern that worked for me. And then there was a time and point where I was on a certain medication and it literally, like I didn't change anything and the effects from it were so apparent and obvious. Like I feel like it really made me realize, oh, like certain medications, which would create a certain hormonal state presumably can really be a, you know, they can have a major effect where you can feel like you're doing everything and it's not working. And that was a medication, again, not, not hormones per se, but I think it's probably the hormonal effects of the medications. I love that you went there with the, you know, there could be something going on that you just are up against hormonal in your body that is not going to be fixed overnight with what it seems like you're actually doing. As far as I would want to know more from Wendy about what she actually is trying. I would especially like to know, I don't know if Wendy is this type of person, but I do think there, I think some people, especially the people who say like, I've tried everything. I have one friend who's like, really acts like this, where they don't give any one thing enough time before moving on to the next thing, or they don't commit to it enough. I think some people always just, they try something for a little bit doesn't work. So they try something else. It doesn't work. They try something else. It doesn't work without ever a sort of isolating a certain variable that they're testing and or be, like I said, not giving something enough time. So make sure you're giving whatever you're trying enough time. And I also will look at ephemeral fasting in particular does not working for you and you are, you know, giving it time and you are trying things that you think would work. There is a lot of magic in looking at the food choices as well. I think some people think they can just do intermittent fasting without necessarily changing what they eat, which is one of the magics of intermittent fasting is that it does often work for people regardless of their dietary choices. But there's a lot of magic that can happen and potential that can happen if you also look at the dietary choices. And there's so many really simple things you can try, especially paired with an intermittent fasting thing, especially if you haven't made dietary choices before. So it could be as simple as just switching to only whole foods like that can have a massive effect if you're eating processed foods, if you've never worked on changed macros up before. So trying a low carb approach or even trying a low fat approach, which I say hesitantly because I don't want to create like a low fat zeitgeist here. But by that, I just mean a more protein centric, not adding a ton of fat, you know, to your meals. I'm focusing on protein, you know, that's another really huge one. So basically looking at what you eat within the context of intermittent fasting can I think have a big effect for a lot of people. And then like you said, with the, you know, the stress and where people are in their life and like end point in time, I do think okay, so I do think intermittent fasting can work for most people. I do think it probably works better and easier for certain people than others. Like some people just seem to be much more like their body is much more, I guess, open to it and adapted to it and does well with it. Whereas other people, it just doesn't quite fit them as much, even though I think it probably still would work for most people. But for example, like I think it works really well for people like, like me and you Vanessa, because you mentioned earlier in the show how you are a an abstainer, not a moderator. So like, we like, you know, we like food and we like eating when we're eating. And we don't like having just like, and I don't want to put words in your mouth, so you can correct me if I'm wrong. But at least for me, I don't like, it's like miserable to me to do like have like just like a little bit and then like stop like that's just so miserable to me. So the idea of like small little meals throughout the day, just not that just doesn't, it makes me feel so hungry, so unsatisfied. So something like fasting where I'm having all my meals in a shortened time period is glorious for me because I can eat all I want. And then when I'm not eating, I'm not eating and it's just fantastic. Some people do love the more moderationist approach and eating smaller meals. And for them, you know, they might benefit actually from a longer eating window where they eat smaller meals throughout that longer window. So I think really paying attention to, you know, what you like and who you are, I wouldn't want to create like this blanket statement of it just doesn't work for some people because while I'm sure there are some people it doesn't work for. my personal opinion, I think that's a very small percentage of people. I do think most people can find something that works for them. So I just want to dispel the idea that like, oh, like, I don't think it's like 50 -50 that like half the people it doesn't work for and half the people it does. I think most people it can really work for. So for Wendy, yeah, maybe some of that will help. So maybe Wendy can work with a practitioner to look at her hormonal levels, look at what else might be going on in her body, you know, making sure she's giving it enough time. And also looking at food choices within the eating window. Yeah, many other.
Vanessa Spina:
thoughts about that? I think you answered it really thoroughly and yeah I don't have anything else to add but I just want to say you know I relate and I know the feeling of frustration, of feeling like you're trying everything and nothing is working and you know I don't want you to give up hope hopefully you'll be able to you know find a solution and figure out you know what it is sometimes it takes the help of working with with someone you know potentially who can help guide you and figure on figuring out what the source of it is so let us know if you if you do end up working with maybe a functional practitioner or someone else and if you do find something that works for you.
Melanie Avalon:
Yes, yes, please do. Awesome, okay, well, this was absolutely wonderful. So a few things for listeners before we go. If you would like to submit your own questions for the show, you can directly email questions at ifpodcast.com or you can go to ifpodcast.com and you can submit questions there. These show notes will be at ifpodcast.com/episode 377 and they will have a full transcript as well as links to everything that we talked about. So definitely check that out. And then you can follow us on Instagram. We are iapodcast, I am Melanie Avalon and Vanessa is ketogenic girl. So I think that is all the things. Anything from you, Vanessa, before we go?
Vanessa Spina:
I had so much fun with you and congrats again on your Fox article and I'm looking forward to the next episode.
Melanie Avalon:
Thank you so much, you were so kind. I had so much fun as well, and I can't wait to talk to you next week.
Vanessa Spina:
Okay, talk to you then. Bye. Bye.
Melanie Avalon:
Thank you so much for listening to the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. Please remember, everything we discussed on this show does not constitute medical advice and no patient-doctor relationship is formed. If you enjoyed the show, please consider writing a review on iTunes. We couldn't do this without our amazing team. Administration by Sharon Merriman, editing by Podcast Doctors, show notes and artwork by Brianna Joyner, and original theme composed by Leland Cox and recomposed by Steve Saunders.
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Melanie's What When Wine Diet: Lose Weight And Feel Great With Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, And Wine
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The Tone Device Breath Ketone Analyzer
The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast
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