Episode 391: Special Guest Masey Hammons, The Fasting Evolution Journey, Balanced Diets, Fasting On The Road, Biohacking, Protein Sparing Modified Fasts, Mounjaro, And More!

Intermittent Fasting

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Oct 14

Welcome to Episode 391 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

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Masey's background, personal story

Finding fasting, then clean fasting

The evolution of Masey's fasting journey

The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast Episode #138 - Maria Emmerich

Go to Melanieavalon.com/ketoadapted and use the coupon code MELANIEAVALON to get 10% off Site Wide!

Alcohol with a fasting lifestyle

LMNT: Go to drinklmnt.com/ifpodcast to get a free sample pack with any purchase!

Being on the road in a healthy way

Changing lives

Mounjaro (GLP-1 agonist)

Episode 388: Special Guest: Dr. Naomi Parrella, Weight Loss, Fat Loss, Semaglutide And GLP-1 Inhibitors, Fasting With An App, Muscle Loss, High Protein Diets, And More!

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 391 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 391 of the intermittent fasting podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon, and I have a very special guest here today. Friends, I am so excited about this. So we're going to try something new on this show where we start interviewing you guys about your intermittent fasting journeys. The idea came up because we get just such incredible questions. And honestly, a lot of times, the questions that I gravitate towards are where people are sharing a lot about their life. And so I was thinking, you know what, we should just have some listeners on so we can hear all about their stories, their journeys with intermittent fasting, their challenges, their unique approaches. So I'm really excited for this. I'm actually nervous because it's like the first time I've done this format. But if you're interested, definitely email us if you would like to be on the show. And for that, just email questions at ifpodcast.com. And then I think we also have a submission link form as well that I can put the show notes. But in any case, so today's guest, the first in this lineup, I am here with Masey Hammons. And friends, she submitted her story to us. And I have a lot of questions because I don't even know where to start. First of all, Masey, you have like a really cool job. Can I just say that? Yes, absolutely. So I'm dying to hear all about that and how you integrate intermittent fasting into all of that before that. So we were just talking offline. And so you live in Louisiana.

Masey Hammons:
Yes, that's correct.

Melanie Avalon:
A few hours from New Orleans.

Masey Hammons:
Yeah, so I'm about two and a half hours away from New Orleans, an hour from Baton Rouge. So I live in a smaller university town in Louisiana.

Melanie Avalon:
Super cool. Would you believe I actually haven't been to New Orleans ever?

Masey Hammons:
Based on the way that you talk about travel, I feel like New Orleans would be like extra anxiety for you. But if you ever come, I will be your tour guide.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh yay, I feel so seen and understood. Do you go much, being sort of close-ish?

Masey Hammons:
So my future husband, his family is actually from New Orleans. So we go to visit them and my father lived in New Orleans growing up as well. So we take our time to go to the city, but we usually do the non touristy things.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, I was going to ask because like when I think New Orleans, I think I think two things I think maybe I think three things I think partying. I think drinking like outside. Absolutely. And I think ghosts like haunted stuff.

Masey Hammons:
Oh, okay, so this is a first because you didn't save Mardi Gras.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, that too. My runner-up was going to be like something related to food. Yeah, no, Mardi Gras, that too. Non-touristy stuff. Is that just like restaurants? Or like, what is the non-tourist version?

Masey Hammons:
So there are actually a lot of really cool places in New Orleans that are very historical, being like a southern portion of the US. We're so intertwined of Spanish and French culture because we were kind of flipped back and forth. So there's tons of properties that you can see. We have a rich museum district downtown. And I really just like being in the French quarter. It's so old and it kind of feels like home and special when you're there. So you can find anything you want downtown New Orleans.

Melanie Avalon:
I love it. Okay. So maybe, maybe I will go sometime and we're going to have to circle back later. I'm really curious in your eating window what you would eat in New Orleans. Okay. But in any case, so I mentioned your job. So you are, you're a director of forensics for a university speech and debate team.

Masey Hammons:
Yes.

Melanie Avalon:
What does that even mean?

Masey Hammons:
my students compete in competitive performance and debate events. So think about speeches that they would give poetry, prose performances, dramatic monologues, and they also do debate styles. So I got involved when I was in high school. I really found myself, my voice, my advocacy. I had an amazing female coach who just taught me that I could be anything in the world, regardless of where I came from. And so when I went to college, I thought I want to do that too. So I got my master's, started coaching a collegiate team. And then when I finished my doctorate, I was coaching again. I took a little break, and then I've been back for a couple of years now. And I have to say, it's one of the most rewarding jobs to see young people being advocates every single weekend and really standing up for the things that they believe in and spreading the message that they feel like is most important to them.

Melanie Avalon:
I am so fascinated by this and in particular because I feel like when it comes to language and grammar and things like that, you know, there are certain paradigms and structures and you don't see them until you learn them and then you see them everywhere. So I'm super curious, like, do you filter the world and conversations that people have? Do you see them differently through kind of like a debate lens, especially in today's culture where people are like arguing about everything all the time?

Masey Hammons:
Oh, definitely. You could not imagine the number of people who find out what I do and say, well, I want to debate you. My whole platform is, I really don't mind wherever you land on the spectrum, you know, the political spectrum, religious spectrum, any of those things. It's really about we should all learn to be able to communicate with each other in a way that's fact based, that's ethical. And, you know, with social media and all of those things, we don't get a lot of that anymore. So that's really what I teach my students to do on the team and in my university classes. And that's the kind of person that I try to be so that my students see an example of what it looks like to be able to talk with people who don't necessarily believe the same things that you do.

Melanie Avalon:
That's so incredible, because I think, at least for me, I think the first thing I think when I think debate is I think, oh, trying to win an argument. But hearing what you're saying, it's more about, like you said, finding the facts and actually communicating about what you believe in. I guess being, well, that's a question. Is it also about being open to change if you realize the other person is correct or do you stick to whatever you're trying to debate when you're having the debate?

Masey Hammons:
Inside of the debate round, you stick to it, but outside of the debate round, of course, we change our mind when we're presented with the right kind of evidence.

Melanie Avalon:
Love that, okay. And the actual topics, how often, what do they involve and how often do they involve health-related topics?

Masey Hammons:
actually quite a bit. So the type of debate we do, it's called IPDA. And our students get five topics on a slip of paper 30 minutes before the round. And they go through a procedure called striking. And so between the two competitors, they end up with one topic, it could be a metaphor like the grass is greener on the other side. It could be something like football, like pop culture, anything that's happening. It could also be like environmental health care based policy. So it's like a very broad range. And it's up to the student to try to steer the debate towards their strengths. So that way they can come out with the win.

Melanie Avalon:
That is so cool. Okay. I love this. I'll probably circle back to it a little bit more, but getting into your personal story. So we have a little bit of a color picture of your life with what you wanted to do with your passions and all of those things. What was your health journey like during that, especially when it comes to weight and dieting? What was the journey there?

Masey Hammons:
Kind of like you mentioned, when people think about the South, they think about food, right? So for my whole life, everything that I did, my culture and my community was all about food and drinks. At breakfast, we talked about lunch. At lunch, we talked about dinner. It's this entire social experience surrounded by your family and friends. And in this culture, we don't always think about what is healthy or what we should be doing. And that gets away from you very quickly. And so as a kid, you can keep up with it, right? You're active. You're doing other things. But as you become older, you realize that, hey, maybe I don't really know what healthy eating looks like. And maybe I haven't learned enough about what my particular body needs. So I started on the journey, like most of us, in college. But I found that no matter how much I exercised or changed my diet, things just weren't working for me. And so it got to a point where I ended up meeting a fabulous endocrinologist. And his dietician gave me some homework. And that homework was to listen to your podcast.

Melanie Avalon:
This is crazy. That's crazy to me.

Masey Hammons:
Oh my goodness. Me being the studious person that I am, I went home and I started listening from number one and I listened until I caught all the way up. And that's when it really hit me, like maybe I'm thinking about this the wrong way. And so working with that endocrinologist and starting intermittent fasting, and just as that developed into some keto strategies, sometimes I do PSMF, it just, it really changed my life. So in 2022, when I met the endocrinologist, I was about 260 pounds. And when I went to the doctor yesterday, I was about 174.

Melanie Avalon:
That's amazing. Congratulations. Thank you. Do you still work with that dietician?

Masey Hammons:
So they're still at the office. I don't have to see them anymore because I got a gold star, but I still do see the endocrinologist every few months just to monitor because I have some things going on in my body that were really holding me back. And then once we identified those like PCOS and metabolic syndrome, then that's when we were able to really like start moving the needle forward.

Melanie Avalon:
You were talking in your form about how you also have been able to go off of some of your medications as well?

Masey Hammons:
Yes. So I have been on high blood pressure medicine since I was 22. My dad had his heart attack when he was 40. His mother, his father both had heart attacks very early on as well. And so that's been a fear my entire life that that's in my future. And I was able to go entirely off of the medication. And ever since then, so about a year and a half now, I've been rock solid. I've also been able to get rid of some of the other medication for like fatty liver disease and other things. So it's been really exciting.

Melanie Avalon:
So when you first, I'm really curious if you remember, so you went in, you got your homework about listening to our show, which, oh my goodness. I can't even imagine what our episodes were like in the beginning. It was so long ago. That was like 2017 or 18. I'm curious, how long did it take you to decide to try intermittent fasting? And like, was there any one thing that made you decide to try it? And was it like a quick decision or did you have to think it over? Do you remember, you might not remember.

Masey Hammons:
Totally do.

Melanie Avalon:
Okay, so what was that like?

Masey Hammons:
I saw the endocrinologist and then two weeks later, I saw his dietician. So the endocrinologist said, you're going to do intermittent fasting. But like most doctors, he just said, you're going to fast. I want you to fast for 16 hours, eat for eight. And that's it. That's all he gave me. And then I went to the dietician after trying to fast for two weeks. And as you can imagine, I was doing it terribly. I was having bone broth. I was doing, yeah, I was doing all the things that are like not allowed. And so then they gave me the podcast and I listened to those episodes where you and Jen were like, this is how you do it. And after that, I was like, this is amazing. It fits so well into my lifestyle and it wasn't a struggle anymore. And to this day, I mean, we bop around, you know, flexible based on what I'm doing, if I'm traveling. But most days we're fasting 16 to 20 hours a day still, even when we're doing other styles like PSMF.

Melanie Avalon:
Wow, and by we, you mean you and your fiance? Oh!

Masey Hammons:
Oh, yes. Oh, so he's doing it too? Oh, yeah. So I will say, so for him, he doesn't have any medical conditions, but just regular fasting for him, like it was a struggle because we had to figure out what fit. And then once we started trying PSMF three days a week, that was like worked for his body. So he was not really overweight. So he didn't have a lot of weight to lose, but he's lost about 20 pounds.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh my goodness, so many keywords, I'm so excited. There's so much to talk about here. I find it so interesting that the doctor, on the one hand, it's really nice that he's recommending fasting. That's really nice. It's also really interesting. It never really occurred to me. Honestly, I don't think in the entirety of this show, I haven't contemplated how a doctor might recommend it but not give any context really. And you're kind of just on your own. Yeah, that would be really confusing, I imagine. And just for listeners, I mean, listeners are probably familiar, but when you said you were doing all the things wrong, so like bone broth, were you having, what else were you having during the, quote, fast?

Masey Hammons:
So at the time, I was a high school teacher, so I had to be at work for about 620. So at 620, I would get to work. I would make a cup of bone broth, and I would drink that until it was time to eat lunch. But also, we didn't even think about things like gum or mints or other stuff like that. I was like, oh, no calories. It's totally fine. I was drinking tea that had things in it, like natural flavors. All the things that you do to get you through the fast before you know that it could be easy if you just didn't do those things.

Melanie Avalon:
It's interesting because I feel like in the evolution of this show, I've had three co-hosts now and everybody has their own passion. So I feel like when I was with Jen, she's all about the clean fast, so we were talking about that all the time. And I'm just thinking right now how we haven't talked about that a lot recently. Vanessa is more about the protein, and so that's a common topic. And then with Cynthia, it was a lot about, well, she loves protein too, but that was a lot about hormones. So I'm just thinking about how with the clean fast concept, how we used to talk about it all the time and don't that much anymore. So I'm glad we're talking about it now. It's interesting because for me, and I've talked about this on the show before, but I didn't start with clean fasting for a long time either, and it did work for me. And so I know for some people, it's hard for me because I know it can sometimes work as a training wheel for people getting their way in, but then I just know it's so much easier when you do the clean fasting. And for some people like you, it sounds like it was just not working. Do you remember like, were you pretty hungry?

Masey Hammons:
Oh, I was white knuckling it the whole time.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, so it's so interesting, you know, with different people how, again, I, but I wasn't doing bone broth. I think that would, that would probably really kept me hungry. I mean, that's literally like nutrients, literally food. Okay. So once you finally got into the groove of the fasting approach that worked for you, you mentioned, I definitely want to talk about PSMF, but you mentioned keto. So your food choices surrounding this, did you make what, what were, and you also talked about, oh wait, I want to comment on that really quickly. The South, I also am from the South as you know, and yes, the food here is just, it's just not the best for health. It's like kind of shocking. I, like when I see it, I'm like, it's not surprising to me that we have, you know, so many challenges today with, you know, weight and the obesity epidemic and everything. Just like, look at the food that we're surrounded by. So your food choices, did you make any changes to what you were eating before that? So like, what were you eating then when you first started?

Masey Hammons:
So the weird thing about this is that I was one of those people who was already eating the balanced diet per se, making sure that I was having the protein, the healthy carb, and the vegetable. I was doing all the things right, but I wasn't seeing any difference. And I think that had a lot to do with the fact that we don't understand a lot about calories in, calories out, or all those things that we tell people to do and they'll be fine. And so my journey sort of changed as the evolution of your show happened, because I was listening to three or four episodes a day to catch up. So in the gin era, I focused on the clean fast. And so I stuck to the things that I was already eating, a balanced diet, making sure we were reducing things that we shouldn't have. And then when we got into the Cynthia era, I found a functional practitioner and added them to my team. Oh, wow. Wow. Yeah. And so that really changed the way I started thinking about supplements and my insulin resistance. And that's when we had more of a focus on what was actually happening metabolically in my body. And so then we did Cynthia's 45 day transformation. Oh, you did. We did. And we loved the food and it was, it's more of a focus on higher protein and just better complex carbs if you have them. And then as we got into the Vanessa era, which now I just feel like I'm hanging out with my girlfriends, right? Because you and Vanessa are like my age. So now I'm like, Oh my gosh, all this information about protein. And then that's how we found PSMF. So my diet never really was terrible to begin with. But if I look at the beginning to now, like we mostly focus on our protein goals. Now we don't eat a ton of fruit or any of those things that we were considering was okay before. And we've had some real conversations with ourself about whether or not like alcohol is worthwhile, you know, especially here in the South, you could drink every day if you wanted to, you definitely have the opportunity with all the social occasions. And so we started asking ourselves what kind of life we wanted and what we wanted our longevity to look like. And so now I'm in the era of body composition and just doing the things that are going to keep me here and healthy the longest.

Melanie Avalon:
This is awesome. I'm going to text Cynthia after this and tell her about that. That's so great.

Masey Hammons:
Oh, yes, please.

Melanie Avalon:
Okay, I'll tell her hi from you. That's amazing. And when you're talking about the eras, I'm like, I need to have like, it's like the Taylor Swift eras tour. I need to have like the eras of the show. That's so funny. Clarifying question about your fiance because you talked about him doing it. What made him first decide to do it? Did he see your success and just want to like, try it to come along? Or what was our conversation there? Did you want him to do it?

Masey Hammons:
So he is one of those people that will not let you go through any journey alone. And so when I came home from the doctor, the first question he said was, what do we need to do? And this was before we had, you know, this was the beginning. And so every single time that I have had something change for me, he's been 100% on board. And he says, okay, let's, let's meal plan and let's go to the grocery store. And he's always in. So I think that's probably why I decided to marry him.

Melanie Avalon:
I'm curious, when he started doing it, did he expect one thing and then it was another thing or did he expect for it to be, you know, great for him?

Masey Hammons:
I don't know what he really expected, but he also kind of was like, I'm a little bit older and I want to be around for my kids, for you. And so he really got into the biohacking aspect of it because also I started reading Dave's books and all of that stuff. So he got more into the heat cold plunges on a pretty regular basis. And so we found a gym that offers a lot of that stuff. And so he got into that aspect. Like we bought a vagus nerve stimulator last night because functional practitioner recommended it. So yeah, so he's just, he's always willing to try and he's just happy to be along for the ride.

Melanie Avalon:
So cute, when's your wedding? Do you have it planned?

Masey Hammons:
Oh, I do. It's December 14th. I actually just took my bridles.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh my goodness, that's so exciting. Wow, that's coming up.

Masey Hammons:
Oh, I'm definitely going to send you a photo because I'm a non-traditional bride. I don't want to give any secrets away, but I'm going to send you and Vanessa the photos so that you can see. It's going to sound weird, but my wedding is actually dinosaur themed.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh my goodness. Wait, this is so cool. Okay. That's cool. I love that. I love when people do things like, cause everything, I mean, I love weddings in general, but dinosaur themed. So is your dress going to evoke that a little bit?

Masey Hammons:
It does, and I took my bridal photos in a paleontology exhibit at a museum.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, oh my goodness, I want to see these pictures. Yes. Are the bridesmaids, do they have outfits?

Masey Hammons:
So we decided to go with greens. So we have a spectrum. So yeah, they all got to pick their own green and they all picked their own dress that they loved. I only have four of them, plus my stepdaughter, my niece, is our little flower girl. And she's going to be wearing this cute little golden ball gown.

Melanie Avalon:
Have you always loved dinosaurs? Is that like your thing? Oh yes.

Masey Hammons:
I also love, like, I don't want to say cult classics because I don't think anybody else loves Lake Placid as much as I do, except for my sister, but those are the movies that I like. Anaconda, Lake Placid, there's like six of them. If you didn't know that, look them up.

Melanie Avalon:
Wait, what's in like, okay, that's ringing a bell. Is that like a Loch Ness Monster thing or?

Masey Hammons:
It's an alligator.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, it's an alligator. Okay.

Masey Hammons:
Yes. But they have about six of them. It's the only movie that I think rivals the land before time for a number of sequels.

Melanie Avalon:
Do you know my land before time story?

Masey Hammons:
that you watched number two or like number three instead of number one.

Melanie Avalon:
We had lamb before time two. So I just literally thought it was lamb before time two. Like, like, like that's the movie. I didn't realize there was a one.

Masey Hammons:
I thought to myself I wonder which one I watched because I would always watch it at a friend's house because she had it.

Melanie Avalon:
She probably had lamb before time too, if we're the same age, honestly.

Masey Hammons:
We're close. I think I'm older than you, but only by a little bit.

Melanie Avalon:
Okay, so okay, so might have been before we might have been number one. That's so funny. I also have this and I won't go on this tangent forever. But speaking of alligators, I saw this movie when I was little, I don't think I was supposed to be watching it, but I did and it scarred me for life and I had an alligator and I always thought it was alligator, but like the movie alligator, but maybe it was like placid. You'll probably know the answer in the beginning, the way the alligator got where it got was because the kid flushed it down the toilet.

Masey Hammons:
Oh no, so that one is actually when the alligator lives in the sewers.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Is that alligator? Is that just like the movie alligator?

Masey Hammons:
It's something like that.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, I just have I should not have been watching that movie when I was like four or five. Okay, that's awesome So is your fiancee down with I mean i'm guessing he's down. He's down with this dinosaur themed wedding

Masey Hammons:
Yes, he loves dinosaurs just as much as I do. He actually is his very next tattoo. I told him no tattoos, any more tattoos until after the wedding. But his next tattoo is going to be a velociraptor, and it's going to say, clever girl. And that's for me, because I'm his clever girl.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh my goodness. That's so, that's so cute. That's amazing. Look at you guys. You would have been great in the stone age doing your fasting. You're like hunter gathering, you're existing with the dinosaurs. Wow. Okay. So back to speaking of fasting and the protein. Okay. So you mentioned that you're not doing fruit and such. So when it does come to the carbs and the keto, what has been your evolution with your relationship to low carb versus not low carb versus keto? What has that been like?

Masey Hammons:
Yeah, so I kind of got to a point where I realized that I was doing more strength training and other things. And I started to not feel my best when I added that in. And so that's when I really started honing in and listening to Vanessa's other podcast. And that's when I realized that maybe we're just not getting enough protein on a weekly basis. So that's when I started reading PSMF. And then she had Maria Emmerich on one of them. And so we picked up her book and we followed the recipes in the book. And that's when I was like, oh my gosh, I feel so much better. And so pretty much in a day for us, we'll do two meals. So we open up our fast anytime after two o 'clock usually. And that's pretty much just like chicken sausage. We do a lot of shrimp, scallops, or steak. And then for dinner, we'll do the same thing. But sometimes for dinner, if it's not a PSMF day, we'll add like the asparagus. So vegetables that are low carb vegetables. But then on PSMF days, it's mostly just the meat. And I was surprised because I didn't think I would like it so much. But that's what I find myself craving all the time now.

Melanie Avalon:
some clarification and definitions for listeners. PSMF refers to protein sparing modified fast. In the clinical literature historically, and I'm guessing it probably, I should know this, I feel like historically it probably first was a clinical studied dietary approach. It's historically very calorie restricted. You're eating, I don't know how many, like 500, 600, 700 calories of basically just pure protein. Maria, who's a wonderful soul, and I've had her on my show as well. I'll put a link to it in the show notes. I should have her back on this show actually. I think I'll reach out to her. She has kind of taken the PSMF and taken tenets from it and made it her own thing, which is basically just eating tons of lean protein. Because correct me if I'm wrong, you don't count calories with that approach, right? You just eat the PSMF foods essentially. Yeah, she has so many recipe books. So actually, if listeners go to melanieavalon.com/ketoadapted, you can use the coupon code MelanieAvalon that will get you 10% off site wide. And she does have, like we're talking about so many recipe books, it's really amazing. And she has a lot of really amazing like Instagram content and YouTube. So if this approach resonates with you, I definitely recommend checking out her work. So when you started implementing those those days, how did that move the needle in your personal goals? Like what did you see happen with that?

Masey Hammons:
So really, that's what got me over my last plateau. So I've never really been a person to focus on the number because I always feel like I have weighed a lot in the grand scheme compared to other people. And so when I was doing lifting two days a week or sometimes even more than that, depending on what my schedule looks like, I realized that I was getting stronger and I was really able to start increasing the amount of weight that I was lifting. And I'm not like a crazy gym person. I do body pump at my gym. It's a 50 minute class. It's a full body workout, which thanks to Vanessa, I now know is totally cool because she just did a study about that on one of her episodes. So I was like, yeah, I'm doing something right. But yeah, like that's what got me from just losing weight to actually focusing on body re-composition and making progress in the gym strength-wise.

Melanie Avalon:
I love this. I will also text Vanessa after this and tell her that. All the texts are incoming. Yeah, it's really interesting with the PSMF because as I'm sure you're familiar with since I've talked about this so much, but my first dietary hack, well, my first like kind of rogue crazy dietary hack that I tried myself was when I had the epiphany like a decade ago, I was like, oh, I could basically eat just lean protein and not probably gain any weight and probably lose weight and feel really full. And that's why I went through this period of time, which I'm not recommending. This is like an ongoing dietary approach, but it's basically the PSMF approach. I kind of like found it on my own just like by thinking about it, just thinking like, okay, all the options of what we can eat, like what would the metabolic effects be? Oh, let me try eating just tons of lean protein. And I do think so again, that's it's not sustainable. It's not meant to be an ongoing, like a daily thing. But as you experienced, there's a lot of metabolic magic to it. And it's, you know, super protective of muscle. So I think it can be a great hack and a great way like you said to break through plateaus, speed up weight loss, you know, depending on where you are at your journey, I think it's a really nice tool to have. And what I love is this approach because a lot of people when they hear it, they might think severely calorie restricted PSMF because historically, like I said, that is what it is. But when you take this Maria Emmerich approach, you don't even have that with it. You get to just eat all the things. Pretty much. What's your favorite PSMF food to start with that?

Masey Hammons:
This one surprised me, but I make Maria's bread, so it's... Yeah. Her cloud bread? Yes. I make it by the loaf every other week. So every other week, that's our food prep for the three days that we do it. And I'm not a huge bread person, like a sandwich bread, but I would eat that bread every single day of my life, whether I was doing PSMF or not. It's delicious.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh my goodness. And how do you make it again? I've watched, I've looked at the recipe a lot, I've watched her make it. It's like egg whites, right?

Masey Hammons:
So it's really easy. It's egg whites. And then if you live somewhere like us where it's humid, you should use the cream of tartar. But if you live somewhere less humid, you might not have to use it. And then egg white protein powder. And that's pretty much it. You let it whip. And then you put it in your loaf pans. You bake it in the oven for 45 minutes, and then you let it sit for like an hour. Then when you take it out of the oven, you let it sit for a couple more hours. And then after that, it slices like regular bread. And we keep ours in the refrigerator. So we slice two slices and pack it in parchment paper. And then in a separate container, we pack our ham and our cheese, whatever we're having with the sandwich. And then that's it. It's the easiest meal prep for three lunches in a week.

Melanie Avalon:
That's amazing and I'm actually surprised I haven't made it does it taste like bread it does

Masey Hammons:
And we've even, so we made it cinnamon rolls out of it. We watched a video and I was like, I don't think it's going to work, but we did that. We've also turned it into croutons. We've made the flatbread and the hot dog buns. It's more versatile than you would think. And like, again, I thought it was going to be disgusting, but it's wonderful. I love eating it.

Melanie Avalon:
You mentioned the cinnamon rolls. Do you ever make dessert-y type things?

Masey Hammons:
Sometimes we so the one thing about forest is he's a snacker. Oh his name is

Melanie Avalon:
forest I love that and he loves the dinosaurs and you guys this is amazing

Masey Hammons:
Yeah. So if I make anything like that, we'll eat it too quickly. So a small serving of something that's sweet, it's not going to happen. So we try not to do things like that, just for special occasions, especially when we have our kids over. Well, our kids, they're forest kids, but they've been troopers because they come over and they eat the food that we make, and they are excited to try things. So our sweet little Luna, she came over when we made the cinnamon rolls, she helped me make them. And then I think she ended up having three servings of them because she loved them so much.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh my goodness. That's amazing. I love it. I love it. Well, again, so for listeners, definitely go to Melanie Avalon dot com/keto adapted use the coupon code Melanie Avalon. That's where all of Maria's recipe books are. And I'm pretty sure she has like dessert recipe, like she has a lot of different books with different, you know, topics depending on what you want to be cooking or baking. So the alcohol piece, I'm curious what type of drinks do you gravitate towards? And have you ever tried a clean alcohol approach?

Masey Hammons:
We are the kind of Southerners that have a full-on bar in our house, so it's in our parlor, we call it the parlor, and it's got just about everything. Forrest was in the restaurant industry for a long time. He was a bartender. So when we drink, it's typically cocktails. Those are the things that we gravitate towards. My favorite drink is like an espresso martini. I love coffee, and so the two pairing together is my favorite. And so one of the things that we started substituting were easy things. So instead of making a regular margarita, we were using the element and sparkling water.

Melanie Avalon:
I interrupted you so do you for that it's is it the lime element that you use we actually like the

Masey Hammons:
mango chili one.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, okay. That's cool. That makes sense.

Masey Hammons:
Yeah, so we've tried the lime before, but the mango chili, because it makes like a spicy, especially if you like mezcal or something like smokier. Yeah, but we also like, we'll do the watermelon flavors during the summer with sparkling water, and then maybe like vodka. But yeah, so when we were going to friends houses, that's what we started packing. So instead of bringing things with lots of sugar, we were still drinking the alcohol, but substituting. And then now at this point, we are pretty much just, we're going to have the beverage that we want. We're just going to do it less often.

Melanie Avalon:
Okay, so for you, at this point in your life, you would rather have, yeah, like I said, like you literally just said, so rather than like an ongoing making these adjustments, you'd rather have like the like the add espresso martini that you really enjoy and having it less. Yeah, I love hearing people's different approaches to alcohol and how it affects their weight loss journey or not or their health or not. And I was actually literally talking about it yesterday and I was getting interviewed on a podcast and we were talking about it. Like, have you noticed an impact on your health and weight loss journey with it?

Masey Hammons:
I really have, and it's not even just about how I feel long term. It's about how I feel in the short term after that happens because that alcohol can affect you for like two or three days. And so if we were drinking and then I had something important the next week, I would realize like, hey, I don't quite feel like myself. I have a little bit of the brain fog. I don't have as much energy. And so I really started adjusting when I was going to have a drink and what was after that and whether or not that was worth it.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, that that completely makes sense. And like for me, I can't have any of and I've talked about this at length on both shows, but I I know it works for me, which is just basically like dry firm wine. So low alcohol, low sugar, organic wines. I mean, basically, that's that's all I drink. And then when I go out, I try to find the comparable as close as possible to that that I can. If I were to drink, I don't remember the last time I had a mixed drink. I think if I had like an espresso martini, that would probably just wipe me out. Like I don't even know. I don't remember every now and then I'll like taste if my if I'm with somebody out and they have something. But yeah, and generally stick to the wine. So oh, and for listeners, if they're interested in element, you can get a free sample pack and it will include I believe it includes all of the current flavors. So you'll get to try that. What was the what was it a chili flavor that you have mango chili, mango chili, and it should include mango chili, it should include watermelon, lime, all the things. The only one that's clean, fast friendly. So to have during the fast is the raw unflavored. But this is my favorite electrolyte drink mix ever. You can go to drinklmnt.com/ifpodcast use the actually no, I think it's automatic. So drinklmnt.com/ifpodcasts and that will get you a free sample pack with any order, I believe. Okay, other things. So so that's the food stuff. As far as the actual challenges with intermittent fasting, because it sounds like you've really settled into, you know, an approach that really works for you. A few questions there. One, how often do you switch it up the the time windows and historically, how much have you switched it up?

Masey Hammons:
So we're probably switching it up. So the three days a week that we do PSMF, we're breaking our fast probably around noon. And then we have dinner around 6. And then on the days that I'm not doing PSMF, I'm fasting longer. And on those days, I might actually only do oat mad because I may not be hungry or I'm comfortable just getting the amount of protein that I want that day in the one meal. It's a lot harder to get more protein in that one meal for me anyway. And then when I'm traveling, so with speech and debate, we travel from a Friday through a Sunday. So we compete on Saturday and Sunday, primarily sometimes Friday, Saturday, Sunday. So what I'll do is when we leave Louisiana, we compete mostly in Texas, we have a rule. How far is that? So like this weekend, we're going to Texas State. So it's about six hours.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, wow. How big is the team?

Masey Hammons:
So my team has about 15 kids, but I travel with just a van full at a time. So we try to make it so that everybody can travel to at least one tournament a month. But I travel to all of the tournaments each month.

Melanie Avalon:
Wow.

Masey Hammons:
Yeah, so I'm about I'm heading into my streak. I'll be gone this weekend next weekend and the next weekend all in Texas

Melanie Avalon:
What? You're going to go back and forth? Yes. Does it feel the more you do it to take less time to get there? Like, or does it still take seem to take a really long time?

Masey Hammons:
My team has a really good routine. So they know that once we get in the car, we're not going to stop until we get to Bucky's, which is like in the Baytown, Houston area. And so that's when so we fast until that point. And then that's when I have a meal because Bucky's has this like everybody fast the kids to some of my kids, they do because on the way we listen to your show. Oh my goodness. That's crazy.

Melanie Avalon:
That gives me like a new perspective of who I'm speaking to sometimes.

Masey Hammons:
It's become a joke and so the kids try to see how many times they can get me to say intermittent fasting in a weekend. So now a lot of times I say I F and I'm like tricked you. But yeah, we either listen to your show or Vanessa's show. Then when we get to Bucky's, we have our snacks at Bucky's and Bucky's is if you've ever been to one, you can actually eat pretty well at a Bucky's and not have a ton of stuff. Like they even make zero sugar beef jerky.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, wow. So what is it? Is it a steakhouse? It's a gas station. Oh, okay. Yes. Yes.

Masey Hammons:
It's a social phenomenon. Their mascot is a beaver. I've heard of this.

Melanie Avalon:
I've probably been, oh, but O-B-U-C dash E-E. Yes. Okay. And it's like massive. I've probably been to one.

Masey Hammons:
Yeah so we spend about thirty minutes there everybody gets something to eat and then that's it we get our gas we get our food and then we had to our location and then we have a nice dinner and our team has a rule that we can't eat dinner anywhere that we can eat at home.

Melanie Avalon:
Mmm, that's cute. I like that. That's a good rule.

Masey Hammons:
Yeah, it's worked out for us and so because of that, my kids do a great job. I say kids, they're young adults, but they're kids to me. They will always find these really great like farm to table options. We always try to find somewhere that also has like gluten free options for some of our students. My kids are, they're really progressive eaters, much more than you would think of a normal college kid. And so because of them, like we've had some amazing meals while traveling. And then on Saturday and Sunday, I'll do sparkling water with instant coffee, which sounds terrible, but it's really delicious. And that I will pretty much fast until the end of the tournament that day, which is around five or six o 'clock. Then we do our award ceremony and then we go to dinner and we same thing. We try to find something that is quick, but also has a ton of options. So we'll usually end up at like a waffle house or something where you can just get eggs. And then we do it all over again the next day.

Melanie Avalon:
I just had like a meta moment realizing are you going to play this episode on one of the trips?

Masey Hammons:
Yes, I am. Hi, guys. Oh, no, no, we have a group chat. And as soon as I got your email, they were the first people like I didn't even tell forest first, I told my kids. So they all know that they're not allowed to text me right now, because this is I'm, I'm in the dark zone, but that I'll be back with them this afternoon. So yes, we have a full plan to have a listen party once this comes out.

Melanie Avalon:
Well, I hope the listen party for everybody, for you guys listening right now is going really great. Thank you. That's awesome. I'm speaking to your future self. A fun fact about Waffle House, apparently, did you know they are the number one producer or seller of steak?

Masey Hammons:
I can buy that because when I go, I get steak and eggs there.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, who knew like most people would think it'd be like a chain steakhouse, but nope waffle house That's so amazing. So do you anticipate changing your window? Have you kind of settled into this routine?

Masey Hammons:
I think at this point, it really depends on like summer versus winter, like if you're a teacher, that's kind of the thing. So during the winter or the academic season, I have pretty much the same routine. So Monday through Wednesdays, PSMF, Thursday and Friday's regular intermittent fasting, and then Saturday, Sunday, just depends on whether or not I'm traveling. And then during the summer, when we're more social, we're spending more time at the gym, at the pool, those things. That's when we're more like we're just going to go with the flow of the day and figure it out as we go.

Melanie Avalon:
Do you find being the debate teacher, do people want to debate you about fasting?

Masey Hammons:
all the time.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh man.

Masey Hammons:
do you sometimes yes so the the wonderful thing about this is you have this whole extra following of people who've never heard your show and it's just because i will text people and be like oh you asked me about something and they talked about it on the podcast today here's the information and i do that all the time so i have all of these friends who either engage in some sort of fasting or have increased their protein based off of the studies we've been hearing about on Vanessa's show it's really trickled to so many aspects of my life and i find that even the people who aren't listening with me like you're changing their life too so i hope you know that

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, thank you. And thank you for sharing it with people. That's really amazing. Yeah, I just imagine people probably want to engage with you on the debate side a lot. So one other thing that I'd love to touch on, and we talked about this before and you talked about it in like the submission form, but so you are currently on Manjaro, right? Yes. And for listeners, that is a GLP1 inhibitor that people talk about a lot. So why did you first go on it?

Masey Hammons:
So when I was meeting with the endocrinologist, one of the things that we learned and the functional practitioner really helped with this too, is that I have PCOS and with that comes metabolic syndrome. And then I had already previously been diagnosed with fatty liver disease. So in the genetic lottery, I like hit the lottery in a bad way. It was really, my body has been working against me for a long time. After doing just intermittent fasting for a long time, my doctor was still seeing that my numbers just weren't where we needed them to be. So we kind of started with metformin. And then once I started that, we noticed that it started to get better, but again, still we weren't seeing the kind of results that you would expect for somebody who is fasting and is taking metformin. So the first one we actually tried was Ozimpic. And it worked okay, but I will tell you of the two, Ozimpic kind of makes you not feel great. And for me, Monjoro just sort of slides into my daily life. I don't really notice the difference. And so once I started on the Monjoro and I've been on that for about a year, my fatty liver went from a stage five to a stage zero one. Wow. Yeah, so, and that's like one of the things that I think people don't realize is there are a lot of things that these GLP ones can do in a body that's not metabolically functioning well. And there are so many things about it, like the wellness clinics, all that stuff. So I know it's controversial, but I try to set that aside and remind people that we don't always get the bodies we want. So we have to work with the bodies that we have. Once that became a part of my life, it didn't even really change the pace that I lost weight because I was losing weight just doing the intermittent fasting alone. I lost probably about 35 pounds before I ever started a GLP one, but it changed the way that my body could function. And when I went off of the GLP one, switching from Ozimpic to Monjoro, I didn't change my diet. I didn't change my fasting pattern. I was still going to the gym and I gained 15 pounds in three weeks.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh wow, from Osundweg to Manjaro.

Masey Hammons:
Yes, and it was purely because whatever the GLP-1 does in my body, it helped it maintain the weight loss. So really for me, the GLP-1 is about my insulin resistance and my fatty liver disease, but it makes my body function on just a better level.

Melanie Avalon:
I'm really excited to talk about this and I called it a GLP-1 inhibitor. I mean, GLP-1 agonist, what I find really interesting about it is a few things. It's really nice to hear that you have had really beneficial effects on the fatty liver and such from it. I like hearing that because I think they get kind of demonized a bit because of how people are abusing them sometimes for weight loss. What I find really interesting about it is they are such effective pharmaceuticals. They seem to be the first thing that has come out where people are actually losing weight and making changes. And at the same time, I have all of these concerns because people do seem to be losing muscle and things like that. But my biggest question is, I don't know. And I did recently, I'm not sure which episode, I'll put a link in the show notes, I had on the doctor who is the head of the Zero app right now. And we talked a lot about this, listeners can check out that episode. But I think a lot of people lose muscle. And I do wonder how much of that is the actual drug versus they're just not eating. Because if you're just not eating, especially not eating a lot of protein, you're definitely going to lose muscle. So it's nice to talk to you and hear your experience. So even with any appetite effects from it, it sounds like you always are really focusing on protein. Is that the case, like with what you're eating?

Masey Hammons:
Yes. So even part of my routine, I have Vanessa's protein in my coffee cup right now. So I have that and I have a chocolate caramel element in there and then my coffee. So for me, one of the things that I talk about a lot, listen, in my life I could think about 10 people off the top of my head that I know that go to a wellness clinic and get an injection. And I think the hard part of and it's the thing that most people worry about, especially people like you and I who know a lot of the research is what happens when you have to get off of it and you haven't been given the tools to make a lifestyle change. Like if my endocrinologist had put me on it and never sent me to the dietician, I would have never found this podcast and other ones that have taught me how to live a healthy lifestyle. I hope that one day my body can figure it out and I don't have to be on it forever. But when that day comes, I want to know that I have all the tools to continue living my life in a healthy way with everything that my body needs. And I think that's the struggle because not a lot of people are getting that in these wellness clinics. They get the, here's the thing. They eat less, but they don't stop drinking or they don't realize that they need more protein. They're not working out because they're tired because they're not getting enough protein. So it's this really strange cycle, but I think it's indicative of our pharmaceutical industry and our medical industry, which is like a whole other conversation. But it's definitely interesting because a lot of times I will have friends reach out and ask questions like, Oh, I know that you are on Monjuro. I need some help. What should I be eating? What should I be doing? And again, like that is also how you and Vanessa are affecting so many people in my life because I'm sharing the information that you guys are giving me. So that way I could try to help people make healthier choices and transition a little bit better.

Melanie Avalon:
I do think that that transition period when people are going off of it is probably so key, and I'll be really curious. You'll have to keep us updated if you do ever go off of them, you know, what that experience is like for you and what you what you do experience. We're seeing so many beneficial effects with weight loss with people on them. It would be so amazing if everybody could approach it the way you're approaching it, because I think that's the closest we could get to getting, you know, the most benefits with the least side effects that might be problematic. So yeah, exciting. Oh my goodness. Is there anything else in your fasting journey that you would like to share with listeners, anything that you think people should know about intermittent fasting from your experience?

Masey Hammons:
I think the number one thing from my experience is that we call it a journey because that's really what it is. You know, and other people know, we all start our health journey a long, long time before we ever find intermittent fasting. Once you get there, you're so fatigued from doing all the other things, from following all the other diets and whatever's popular at the time that if you're not careful, intermittent fasting can feel like one of those things too, like a fad. And if you only give it a couple weeks or even just a couple months, you might not really ever get there. So I would encourage people to really stick it out and, you know, read the information and figure out how to do it correctly and what works for their body. Because once you do and once it clicks, I can't imagine living my life any other way than this. And just a silly little thing that happened today. My mom called me before this, she wanted me to meet her and my aunt at the store to go shopping for some clothes for the wedding. And we saw this beautiful dress and my hair is purple right now. Oh, cool. Yeah, it's always some color, it's purple right now. And we saw this beautiful plum dress and it is a size six. And I said to my mom, I cannot fit into that. I will never fit into that, like that's not my size. And she said, go try it on anyway. And I tried it on and that little baby fit. And I think I almost cried in the fitting room because it's not really about the size, but it's about the fact that I could have never imagined feeling this healthy and fit in my life ever. And that's coming from a person who was an athlete in high school who has always gone to the gym and done all the right things. And when you get to this point, the excitement, the new things that you get to experience, like buying a size you've never bought before, it's joyous. And if you could see me right now, there are tears in my eyes talking about this because this is the journey that will change your life if you let it.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, my goodness. Well, that is such a beautiful way to end this. And thank you for sharing your story because your story has changed. You are changing so many people's lives, honestly, like, you know, like, thank you for what you're well, first of all, thank you for having the courage that you've had in your journey and for keep on keeping on and sharing this with so many people. I'm just so grateful. And it's so, so inspiring. I so enjoyed this conversation. I can't wait for people to hear it. This is absolutely amazing. Like, just seriously, thank you.

Masey Hammons:
No, thank you.

Melanie Avalon:
Awesome. Well, I'm trying to say I feel like I should have I'm deciding this in real time I feel like I should have like a certain way that I you know, I'll end this the way that I end My other show because I think it's so important So the last question that I ask every single guests on my other show which is the Melanie Avalon biohacking podcast And it's just because I realize more and more each day how important mindset is. So what is something that you're grateful for?

Masey Hammons:
I think today, more than any other day, I am grateful for the community that I have, because in this journey, it's hard to find people that are willing to go along with all the crazy things. And my parents and Forest have watched me just dive right in, and they've never once made fun of me. They've never once criticized me. They have been okay to let me just figure it out on my own. And so because of them, I was able to stick to it. So I'm really grateful for my community.

Melanie Avalon:
I love that so much community is so so important and I think that's one of the ways and reasons that things like podcasts and Facebook groups and all of that can be so amazing in the intermittent fasting world because like social support can be a game changer into you know whether or not you can actually implement and stick to something so that's amazing about your personal community. So for listeners we will put in the show notes which will be at ifpodcast.com/episode391. There will be a full transcript, there will be links to everything that we talked about and there will be before and after pictures of Masey. So you can check those out and if you would like to be a guest like this on the show definitely submit your story. For that just go to ifpodcast.com/submit S-U-B-M-I-T and I think that is all the things. Thank you so much for your time Masey this was so so amazing definitely keep us updated on your journey and also I can't wait to see your wedding pictures and congrats in advance.

Masey Hammons:
Thank you so much. I'm so excited. This was amazing. Have a good rest of your day. You too 

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. Editing by Podcast Doctors, show notes and artwork by Brianna Joyner, and original theme composed by Leland Cox and recomposed by Steve Saunders.

Check out the Stuff We Like page for links to any of the books/supplements/products etc. mentioned on the podcast that we like!

More on Melanie: MelanieAvalon.com 

More on Vanessa: ketogenicgirl.com

Original theme composed by Leland Cox and recomposed by Steve Saunders.

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