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Melanie Avalon: Welcome to Episode 256 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, author of What When Wine: Lose Weight and Feel Great with Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, and Wine. And I'm here with my cohost, Gin Stephens, author of Fast. Feast. Repeat.: The Comprehensive Guide to Delay, Don't Deny Intermittent Fasting. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and ginstephens.com. Please remember the thoughts and opinions on this podcast do not constitute medical advice or treatment. So, pour yourself a cup of black coffee, a mug of tea, or even a glass of wine if it's that time, and get ready for The Intermittent Fasting Podcast.

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One more thing before we jump in. Are you fasting clean inside and out? Did that one of our largest exposures to toxic compounds, including endocrine disrupters, which mess with our hormones, obesogens, which literally cause our body to store and gain weight, as well as carcinogens linked to cancer is actually through our skincare? Europe has banned thousands of these compounds for being toxic, and the US has only banned around 10. It's honestly shocking. When you're putting on your conventional skincare makeup, you're likely putting toxic compounds directly into your body. These compounds can make you feel bad, can make it really hard to lose weight, can affect your hormones, your mood, your health. And ladies, if you're thinking of having kids, when you have a child, these compounds actually go directly through the placenta into the newborn. That means your skincare makeup that you're putting on today actually affects the health of future generations. 

Did you know that conventional lipstick, for example often tests high for lead and the half-life of lead can be up to 30 years in your bones? That means when you put on your lipstick, 30 years later, half of that lead might still be in your body. Thankfully, there's an easy, easy solution to this. There's a company called Beautycounter and they were founded on a mission to change this. Every single ingredient and their products is extensively tested to be safe for your skin. You can actually feel good about what you put on. And on top of that, their products actually work. That's because they're not “all natural.” They actually combine the best of both worlds, both synthetic and natural ingredients to create products that actually support the health of your skin and make your skin look amazing. They have skincare lines for all your skin types, deodorant, shampoo and conditioner that I love, anti-aging and brightening peels, and vitamin C serums, and incredible makeup. If you see my makeup on Instagram, that's all Beautycounter. You can shop with us at melanieavalon.com/beautycounter. 

And if you're thinking of making safe skincare a part of your future like we have, we definitely suggest becoming a Band of Beauty member. It's sort of like the Amazon Prime for clean beauty. You get 10% back in product credit, free shipping on qualifying orders, and a welcome gift that is worth way more than the price of the yearlong membership, totally, completely worth it. Also, definitely join my clean beauty email list at melanieavalon.com/cleanbeauty, I give away a lot of free things on that list and join me on my Facebook group, Clean Beauty and Safe Skincare with Melanie Avalon. I do a weekly giveaway every single week for Beautycounter, people share their experience and product reviews, and so much more. And again, the link to shop with us is melanieavalon.com/beautycounter. All right, now, enjoy the show.

Melanie Avalon: Hi, everybody and welcome. This is Episode number 256 of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon and I'm here with Gin Stephens.

Gin Stephens: Hi, everybody.

Melanie Avalon: How are you today, Gin?

Gin Stephens: Well, I'm cold. Yesterday, the weather was perfect, and I went and sat in the Sun, and it was beautiful, and I wore flipflops and today I'm back in UGGs holding a mug of warm water.

Melanie Avalon: It's cold where you are?

Gin Stephens: I'm cold. Yeah, it's all. Yeah, it's rainy.

Melanie Avalon: Well, I was excited when it was cold here, but I feel it's been getting warm, which has been disheartening.

Gin Stephens: Have you been outside today? 

Melanie Avalon: No. 

Gin Stephens: It's 51 degrees and raining.

Melanie Avalon: Wonderful.

Gin Stephens: No, it's not wonderful. I'm freezing. Yesterday, it was 70. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, that was a problem.

Gin Stephens: It was beautiful. You don't like 70? Come on, now. I can't imagine you wouldn't like 70.

Melanie Avalon: No. I get sad when I look at the weather forecast when it says 70. I want it to be in the 40s.

Gin Stephens: Okay, well, then you probably should not live in Georgia. 

Melanie Avalon: I know. 

Gin Stephens: You need to go to, I don’t know, the Arctic, where we never get to the 70s. I don't know. [laughs] 

Melanie Avalon: Basically, I like the 70s in LA, because it gets cool in the evening still. 

Gin Stephens: Okay.

Melanie Avalon: I have a random question. 

Gin Stephens: Okay. 

Melanie Avalon: Did you ever get night terrors?

Gin Stephens: Night terrors as a kid? 

Melanie Avalon: Yes. 

Gin Stephens: I don't know. I know, I always was like-- I don't think I had really what you would call night terrors. I remember being very anxious as a child. It had to do with us moving, and my parents got divorced, and then we moved to another state, and I remember being very anxious, and high strung at night when it would be time to go to bed, but I don't think I had night terrors. 

Melanie Avalon: Have you ever had the experience where you wake up, but you're still asleep, so, you're interpreting your environment incorrectly? 

Gin Stephens: Like a dream. 

Melanie Avalon: But you're awake. 

Gin Stephens: But you're awake, but you feel you're still in your dream. 

Melanie Avalon: No. 

Gin Stephens: Okay, then. No, I don't know what you're talking about.

Melanie Avalon: I used to get night terrors. I don't anymore, but I had something happen last night that reminds me of night terrors, but it wasn't the same thing. But it's the concept of waking up, and being awake, and knowing your environment. But for some reason, part of your brain is still asleep, so you're interpreting your environment incorrectly. So, with night terrors you see scary things in your environment that aren't there. That's what night terrors are.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, I don't think so. I don't know. It wouldn't surprise me if I did or didn't. I was a high-strung little kid. I don't have memories of having night terrors, but that doesn't mean I didn't because [laughs] I would have to ask my mom. 

Melanie Avalon: I definitely had them and I remember them. 

Gin Stephens: Then, I probably didn't. I do remember being very emotional at bedtime and hysterical about not wanting to go to bed and be left alone. I didn't want to be left alone. But I don't know if I had nightmares or I don't have any memory of them.

Melanie Avalon: You didn't probably remember them? 

Gin Stephens: Probably, so.

Melanie Avalon: I would always see spiders. I'd wake up and see spiders. Then I would have to look for the spider, because every single time I would wake up and see it, and it would take me a while to convince myself that it wasn't real this time. It would happen all the time. So, I'd like turn the lights on-- This happened in high school, too. I turn the lights on and look for the spider.

Gin Stephens: Oh no, I didn't have that. 

Melanie Avalon: Okay. Last night what happened, this was so weird. I'm just fascinated by the brain states. Last night I woke up, and looked at the ceiling, and the lighting from the window was making a perfect arrow pointing to the window. It's hard to describe, but basically, there was an arrow made of light on the wall, on the ceiling pointing to the window. It was real. I wasn't making it up. But my brain, I spent five minutes staring at it, thinking it was-- I was terrified. I was like that's a sign that there's something outside. I could not convince myself that it was just a light. I thought it was a sign. And then every time I woke up, it was still there. It was weird, but literally, five minutes laying there awake staring at it, contemplating it, thinking that the world was ending, 

Gin Stephens: Oh, gosh. No, I have woken up in an anxious state with weird thoughts in my head that suddenly feel really the world is ending, that kind of waking up. I don't know if it was a dream or just being anxious.

Melanie Avalon: Brain is just really interesting. 

Gin Stephens: It is. 

Melanie Avalon: So, that's my random thing. The other random thing is I interviewed Dr. Gundry again.

Gin Stephens: Oh, how'd that go? 

Melanie Avalon: It went very well. 

Gin Stephens: And what's his new book? I forgot.

Melanie Avalon: Unlocking the Keto Code. 

Gin Stephens: Okay.

Melanie Avalon: It was perfect timing, because I had interviewed Dom D'Agostino a few days prior all about ketones, and then I interviewed Dr. Gundry all about ketones and they had different opinions.

Gin Stephens: That's the way so many people are, which is almost why I'm like, "Y'all, Fast. Feast. Repeat. That's it. It doesn't matter all those other little things. We don't have to tell you exactly what is happening behind the scenes, but your body knows, and it's doing it, and you don't have to know,

Melanie Avalon: That's why I'm the complete opposite. That's why I'm like, "I want to hear every perspective."

Gin Stephens: But when they disagree, that's where I am at this point in my life at the age of 52. I like to hear it. It's interesting, but when experts who are very, very smart have wildly different opinions, I'm like, " what? It doesn't even really matter. It doesn't matter." All I know is my body knows what to do. That's literally where I am. I like to understand what's happening and I feel I do, but maybe I don't. [giggles] Maybe we've got it all wrong. [laughs] 

Melanie Avalon: I want to know everything.

Gin Stephens: I'm at the point where I feel even the things we think we know we might not really know, so it really doesn't matter. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, I see. 

Gin Stephens: That's what I'm saying. I'm like, "We might think this is all what's happening," and then in five years, we'll think it's something completely different. So, really it doesn't matter. I do like to know. Don't get me wrong. I like to know the science behind how things work, but only to a certain point, because then when we start getting deeper, and deeper, and deeper, we realize how many things are unknown. For example, going back to elementary science teaching, we teach even right this minute, if you go into an elementary classroom, teaching about the structure of an atom, they're teaching it wrong. That's not true what they're teaching. It's not even close to what an atom really is like. I just didn't like we're learning all this stuff. I don't know what is true and what [laughs] we just think, anyway.

Melanie Avalon: I literally think I know nothing. That's why I want to hear everything, because I have no idea and I don't know if anybody has any idea. But that's where we can all keep searching and try to get closer.

Gin Stephens: I do love science. Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that I don't. I just am like, "I don't need to know all how that's doing it in the background." I know, autophagy is doing something great. I don't need to know the minute that it's doing whatever it's doing. I know ketosis has been official. [laughs] I know that I'm having it. [laughs] Anyway. 

Melanie Avalon: Well, yes, yes. 

Gin Stephens: I'm glad you had a good interview with him. 

Melanie Avalon: It was good. Is anything else new with you? 

Gin Stephens: Well, no. I do have some new interesting things that I'm not ready to share yet, but some really things that are interesting. We're not quite ready like I said to share. So, it's exciting. I can't wait to be able to share, because I like to [giggles] say what I'm doing. Just not quite there yet. I'm just going to tease it. It's personal life, not professional life. 

Melanie Avalon: Awesome. 

Gin Stephens: That's it. 

Melanie Avalon: Shall we jump into everything for today? 

Gin Stephens: Absolutely. 

Melanie Avalon: All right, so, to start things off, we have a question from Melissa. The subject is: "history of overeating and IF." Melissa says, "I've been doing IF for eight months. I'm 5'5" and 138 pounds. When I started this, I lost a few pounds and it was great, but I'm back to where I started with those stubborn 10 pounds. Recently, I've been listening to the Brain Over Binge Podcast." Side note: I booked that author which is very exciting. She has a new book coming out. Wait, wait. Was it her? No, no, no, no. I get them confused. It's the Bright Line Eating woman? 

Gin Stephens: Oh, okay. Her new book's already out.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, well, she's coming on for it. [giggles] Both of them have a similar perspective, I think.

Gin Stephens: No sugar, no flour. Bright Line Eating is no sugar, no flour.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, I thought Bright Line Eating is about like bright lines. No sugar no flour, but basically saying no. I think that's what Brain Over Binge is about too.

Gin Stephens: Maybe it's just saying no, but you can never have sugar and you can never have flour on Bright Line, never and also, I think she hates intermittent fasting.

Melanie Avalon: What is her new book?

Gin Stephens: I can't remember the name of it, but I keep my eye on the-- It popped up in the weight loss arena when it first came out. That's how I know what's coming out, because I do keep my eye, I like to see how Fast. Feast. Repeat. is doing and Clean(ish). Well, just FYI like I said, I don't think she likes intermittent fasting at all and she's like, "No sugar, no flour ever." I know some people really do feel that their brains can't tolerate sugar and flour. It might be something that works for them and they need to avoid those things. Someone, the same parts of the brain that light up with drugs, for example. I don't know. For me, that's not the case. I can have a little bit of sugar, I can have flour, I don't feel I'm just a drug addict for it at all. But I know that some people do describe it that way and I believe them that that's how they feel.

Melanie Avalon: That's the way I feel more so. Maybe not quite to that extent, but--

Gin Stephens: It feels that way to you when you consume it. Is that what I'm asking? 

Melanie Avalon: Mm-hmm. 

Gin Stephens: See, I don't.

Melanie Avalon: Her new book is Rezoom. It came out in December. Rezoom: The Powerful Reframe to End the Crash-and-Burn Cycle of Food Addiction.

Gin Stephens: Yep. She's very much, "Here's the things. Never, never have these things. Like I said, for the people who need that kind of approach, I know some people in my Delay, Don't Deny community, who follow her work and find that they can't do sugar and flour personally. Interestingly, one of them, she's an intermittent fasting coach. She's lovely. I actually met her. We had dinner together in Myrtle Beach. She happened to be there one time when I was there and we met, and she's been on my podcast. She does intermittent fasting, she also can't have the sugar and the flour, but she was a drug addict. Now, she tells her story on the podcast. I'm telling things about her I shouldn't tell, but she was a drug addict and gave up the drug. So, I think certain brains are more likely to light up from certain stimuli.

Melanie Avalon: That's interesting, because I'm prepping to interview Chris Masterjohn, which is exciting. I'm actually going to talk about him a little bit in our next question assuming we get to it. But I was listening to him on Peter Attia, and they were discussing the COMT gene, the worrier versus warrior.

Gin Stephens: Worrying versus fighting? 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah.

Gin Stephens: Do you worry or fight, right?

Melanie Avalon: How it related to addiction. They were talking about was, okay, see if I get this right. The worrier, so the person, who worries, their gene does not break down dopamine that fast. You have a lot of dopamine that sticks around, you get really fixated, you ruminate, but you can be really laser focused. Both traits have good and bad to them. The warrior, the fighter breaks down dopamine really fast. They're more flexible and don't get as fixated on things, but the addiction aspect was, I think that types are more likely to get addicted, because they go through dopamine so quick. You constantly need more. 

Gin Stephens: Well, that's interesting. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, a dopamine releasing substance. You would need to keep pressing the lever, because the dopamine is going away, basically. 

Gin Stephens: I guess, probably, most of us are somewhere along the continuum. We're not on one end or the other. We're somewhere in the middle. I really do believe that our brain chemistries are different. So, I can have sugar, flour, or whatever, take it or leave it. I like it, but I'm not looking for my next fix kind of a thing, and it doesn't make me binge. But I know that some people do.

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Melanie Avalon: Anyways, so, she's been listening to Brain Over Binge Podcast, which, again, is somebody different, but I think it's a similar concept with the Bright Lines. It's just saying no, I think. She said, "I've realized that I have an issue with overeating. I've tried a few different IF patterns. I shoot for 18 to 20 fast hours a day." This is pretty easy at this point. "I exercise five to six days a week, 30 to 60 minutes at varied intensities, ADF doesn't really interest me, here's my question. After eight months, I don't feel I really had appetite correction and I still have the tendency to overeat in my window. I don't always make the best food choices, but I do strive to make healthier choices. My food choices have been worse with this home isolation and stress is not helping. I feel I can't get the mental game under control to make IF a long-term success. What can I do to get my mind in the right spot for this to work long term?" 

Gin Stephens: All right, that's a great question. It's easy to say just get your mind right. [giggles] But I can't tell you how to get your mind in the right spot. I don't think either of us can. You've got to get your mind in the right spot. You can reread the "Mindset" chapter of Fast. Feast. Repeat. where I talk about the importance of mindset. But I can't tell you how to get there. You've got to flip that switch yourself. For me, it helps me to know why I'm doing intermittent fasting. I want to go back to your weight and height. You're 5'5", 138 pounds. That is a very healthy weight for your height. You're not overweight, you're not even close to overweight. You're right in the middle of that healthy weight range. I do understand that you would like to lose 10 pounds and I get it. If I gained 10 pounds from where I am right now, I would want to lose them too. 10 pounds, you have the right to want to lose 10 pounds, but you are at a very healthy weight. I just wanted to put that out there. 

But when I disconnect, why I'm doing intermittent fasting now, like if I got on the scale, I'm 5'5", if I got on the scale and I weighed 138 pounds right this minute, I would still keep doing intermittent fasting even if I never got below 138 again for the rest of my life. Because now, I do intermittent fasting long-term not so the scale will change. I do intermittent fasting now, because it's a healthy way to live. That mindset shift is really the one that was most powerful for me. I guess, even though, I can't tell you how to get your mind in the right spot, if you shift from, "I have to lose these 10 pounds to I am going to do intermittent fasting for the rest of my life, because it's a healthy way to live," that might be the thing that flips that switch and makes it a long-term success for you. That's certainly what did it for me. So, let's talk about those stubborn 10 pounds that you would like to lose and why you didn't have appetite correction. 

I really feel it has to do with that one sentence that you said, "I don't always make the best food choices, but I do strive to make healthier choices." For me, food quality and appetite correction go hand in hand. I tell the story in Fast. Feast. Repeat. about the day that I had McDonas ld's. I had a Big Mac and fries and a Coke. That was plenty of calories, plenty of fuel. I fueled my body with lots of energy. It wasn't good quality, but it was plenty. I didn't need more fuel, but I was so unsatisfied and I was still "hungry." I absolutely did not have appetite correction from a McDonald's Big Mac and fries and a Coke. But when I eat really, highly nutritious foods that are nutrient dense, lots of vegetables, good protein, beans, eggs, avocado, things like that, I could eat the calorie equivalent, of course, I don't count calories, but I have to get that out there. I could eat the calorie equivalent of that Big Mac fries and Coke meal, and have amazing appetite correction, food quality makes all the difference in the world for me. 

If you feel you're not making the best food choices, start with really highly nutritious foods. There's a term in the nutrition space called "crowding out." You crowd out the things that are not the best with things that are the best and you're not going to have as much room for them. If you start with highly nutritious foods, you tell yourself, "You know what, I've got some ice cream, I want to have that later." But really nourish your body well. Then later, if you want to add in a little bit of that, whatever it was, ice cream for me would be the one, then add it in. That's how I'm Cleanish. But if I start with nutritious foods, I don't really want that much ice cream. A little bit is fine. If I started with ice cream, hello, I could see all the ice cream in the world and still not probably be full and satisfied. I really think that might be what you're missing out on. Also, you are doing a good bit of exercising and that makes you hungry. For me, how they call it working up a good appetite? You said that you have the tendency to overeat. You might not be "overeating" to the point that you think you are. I think we've been trained, especially as women to think we're supposed to have dainty appetites. Especially, if you're in the paradigm of eating five, six small meals a day that sort of thing, then you might really need to eat tiny little amounts. But if you're having a 20-hour fast and a four-hour window and you've exercised for 60 minutes at high intensity, you need to have a lot of fuel and your body is going to tell you that. So, it might feel you're overeating when really, it's exactly the amount of food you're supposed to have. But you're thinking, you're supposed to be eating this little diet amount, but your body's like, "No, we worked out hard today, give us more food." 

By combining high-quality food choices to open your window, our bodies don't count calories, they count nutrients like my Big Mac story illustrates, by having the high-quality foods understanding that you might need to eat more than you think you do, and also realizing you're at a really healthy weight for your height, and really just changing the quality of your food, it might really get that needle going down a little bit. Put all those things together and I definitely don't think you need to do ADF, unless you're really want to. But again, I want to reiterate from what I said before. If you shift that mental game from, "I am doing intermittent fasting to lose 10 pounds to I am doing intermittent fasting because it's the healthiest way I can live my life, and I can do some tweaks to see if I can lose those 10 pounds or not," I think that might flip that switch to make it feel a long-term lifestyle. I've just said a lot of things.

Melanie Avalon: Awesome. You said a lot of things that I was going to touch on. So, that is excellent. I actually just finished a book by Nir Eyal all called Indistractable, bringing him on the show as well. It wasn't about eating or anything like that. It was about not being distracted in our environment. But one of the things that he talks about that this made me think of was when there's something like a trigger or a habit that we're trying to break, there's basically internal and external triggers. He goes through four different things, but two of them, one is an internal trigger, and one is an external trigger that could be prompting that. The internal trigger would be probably stuff that she talks about in the Brain Over Binge Podcast. But I really like this process that he talks about. I've started to do it with my own self. Basically, when there's something you don't want to do or don't want to engage in, you notice the feeling that happened right before that. So, it's an internal feeling and it usually will always be there. 

He talks more about how to actually deal with it, or replace it, or what you do with that. But I do think it's really fascinating, because it can make you realize with your overeating experience, for example, or your cravings, or your lack of appetite correction. Is that coming from a place of needing more nutrients like Gin was talking about or is it coming more from a place of unsatisfied craving for whatever reason? Noticing the feeling right before that might be pretty telling. There's so much you could do on the mindset side of things. We're talking about earlier, more of an addiction type thing rather than a nutrition type thing. Either way, really focusing like Gin said on your nutrition quality is going to be huge. I think a lot of people find that if they make their meals centered around a moderate to higher protein meal, that can really, really help with cravings. I also think it goes back to the sentence that Gin said, and that's what I'm going to bring in the external triggers. The sentence, "I don't always make the best food choices but I do strive to make healthier choices." First of all, I applaud you for striving to make healthier choices. That is amazing and it can be really hard to do with our processed food environment today, and things that we're exposed to. Gin, do you feel we get this sentience from a lot of people struggling with this issue? 

Gin Stephens: They're trying to make healthier choices? 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, we did that a lot. That's such an interesting phrase. I'm striving to make healthier choices, because if went out on the street and asked a hundred people, "What's a healthy way to eat?" We'd get a hundred different answers.

Melanie Avalon: The perspective I was taking from it is, it's often the focus on the-- 

Gin Stephens: Oh, the intermittent fasting? 

Melanie Avalon: No, no. The focus is on like, "I'll try to do that rather than that's what I do." This actually goes into something else, which he talks about these-- and I'm going go back to the external triggers as well. I'm all over the place. But he talks about the different ways that people can make habit change and what is most effective. One of the most effective ways to make habit change is to have an identity change. Not become an entirely new person, but to have an identity change around the issue. They did a study that was on voting. I don't remember the exact numbers. I can look them up, but it was a striking difference between people, who actually voted based on the initial criteria was, there're people who said they were going to vote in the poll. They responded by saying, they were going to vote. Then they did a poll, where they asked people if they were voters. The people who said they were voters were way more likely to vote than people who literally said they were going to vote. It goes into this whole identity thing.

The analogy here is, we can say we're going to vote and try to vote and do all this and that's good, because it's an intention and something you want to do, so that's great. But we're actually much more likely to vote if we just say I'm a voter. The way this all ties into this is, maybe instead of striving to make healthier choices, you could try adopting or trying on an identity of just saying, you make healthy choices rather than trying to or striving to. And then, you can make it even easier for yourself so that the identity barrier is one thing that helps-- or boundaries, I think they're called boundaries. But having actual boundaries can help that, because it's hard to combat what's right in your face. If you're trying to make healthier choices, you could just make healthier choices and those foods that you know are problem foods for you just don't have them in the house. That would be getting rid of external triggers creating an actual boundary to engaging in whatever habit you're trying not to engage with.

Gin Stephens: Can I pop in something there that just came to my mind? It's Yoda. "Do or do not. There is no try." That's one of my favorite Yoda quotes. 

Melanie Avalon: I thought about that so long and I put that in my What When Wine book, because I talk about in What When Wine how I never really understood that phrase until I did intermittent fasting, and then it made perfect sense, because you don't try to do intermittent fasting. You either do or you don't. There is no try. You do or you don't. 

Gin Stephens: Well, exactly, right. 

Melanie Avalon: Same thing here. Again, I don't want to discount or not be encouraging, because it is amazing to strive to make healthier choices. I'm not trying to downplay that. I'm just saying a slight shift, where you just make healthier choices, you get rid of all those things that are causing the problems. Just don't have them in the house. 

Gin Stephens: Or, be cleanish. Don't start with them.

Melanie Avalon: Do you want elaborate on that, because I don't think people might not know what you're saying, exactly?

Gin Stephens: I've said it a minute ago. I said how I start with things that are nutritious, and then I crowd out, and then I might have the ice cream, and I'm cleanish. 

Melanie Avalon: So, yes. I think there's a lot that can be done there. Especially, if you feel you can't get the mental game under control, stack the cards in your favor, do everything you can to stack the cards in your favor. It can sound scary to make things seemingly more intense in your approach, but can actually give you freedom because you're not fighting all of these temptations and things like that. Yes, that was all over the place. That book, Indistractable, it's actually really short. So, it might be something to listen to. Again, it's not really about food specifically, but it's got a lot of really fascinating information in it. Anything else?

Gin Stephens: Nope. I think we've said a lot of things. I hope that it helps Melissa.

Melanie Avalon: I like what you said, too, about focusing on the nutrient fulfilling foods would probably really help.

Gin Stephens: You know how you said she should tell herself, I eat healthy foods. She should also say, I am an intermittent faster. 

Melanie Avalon: Yes, exactly. 

Gin Stephens: Because then, that's who I am. I am an intermittent faster. So, that is my identity. I don't have to get up every day and decide if I'm going to do intermittent fasting. That's just what I do. It's who I am.

Melanie Avalon: And another one is saying, I don't instead of I can't. Instead of saying, "I can't have those foods, I don't have those foods," making it a choice. 

Gin Stephens: Yeah. I don't use artificial sweeteners. If you offer me something that it has artificial sweeteners, I will not eat it. [laughs] Also, I could say, I can't, because that would not upset me, because I just really don't want to and I don't like them. But anyway, same, same kind of thing.

Melanie Avalon: So, shall we go on to our next question?

Gin Stephens: Yes. We have a question from Nancy and the subject is: "Iron." She says, "first, love the podcast, love the books, love you guys." Thank you, Nancy. She says, "I always learn a lot and my own journey is crazy. IF does not work for me for anything other than feeling I don't have to focus on food all day. But I love that in terms of weight loss or anything like that. This is not my jam. Never worked for me and I've been doing this almost since you guys started this podcast. Thanks to my daughter. However, that is not what this email is about." Now, I got to stop there, Melanie. When she says, "IF does not work for me for anything," I have to dig into that a little bit, just because it's not working for weight loss, Nancy, it doesn't mean it's not doing amazing other things. That's the thing. Okay, so, you haven't lost any weight, but I bet it's done a lot of amazing things inside your body that you can't identify. It's like when people ask me, "What has your vibration plate done for you? How has it helped you?" I say, "Well, I don't know because there's no path I've been on where I didn't use it." I have used it. So, I'm not sure how much muscle mass it's helped me maintain. Because I don't have a study where the Gin didn't do it. [laughs] Here's the Gin who did it, here's the Gin who didn't. I only know the one who did it. 

For Nancy saying that intermittent fasting hasn't worked for her, well, who knows what have happened if she hadn't done intermittent fasting? Does that make sense? Am I making myself clear? I think that it might not have given you weight loss, Nancy, but I want you to tell yourself like what you just were talking about with Melissa. What you tell yourself, change what you're saying and say, intermittent fasting is my secret to living a healthy life. Because I really think that it's a healthy way to live even in the absence of weight loss, it is doing something for you. I had to throw that out there. Chad does it, didn't need to lose weight, didn't want to lose weight, doesn't want. He would be upset if he lost weight. Mark Mattson of Johns Hopkins, he's been doing intermittent fasting since I think the 80s. They don't do it for weight loss. They do it for the health benefits. So, never, never, never lose sight of that. So, do you have anything you want to add? 

Melanie Avalon: Just that I agree completely. 

Gin Stephens: Okay. So, anyway, I'm glad you're doing it, Nancy. I'm glad you're a listener. I'm glad that you're still enjoying doing it and that it gives you freedom from that focus on food, because even if that was all that it did really, that's huge. I mean that is huge. All right, so, she says, "Okay, so, I have something a little bit weird for you guys. I've been playing with Wim Hof breathing for around two years and cold showers for about six months. I've tried to give blood for a couple of years and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't, because my iron numbers are not high enough, and they can't take your blood unless your iron is at a certain level. I went to give blood a couple of months ago and I wasn't sure if I'd be able to or not. But after they did my finger prick, the tech said, "Your blood numbers are great, perfect. You're doing great." My numbers were usually just over the line in the past when I could give blood. The only thing I did differently was cold showers and sometimes putting my feet in ice and water. Ever since then and it's only been twice. So, this isn't a study. But ever since then I've been able to go in and just give blood, no problem. 

Before that, I tried different iron supplements, liquid iron, which only turned my teeth black, which I stopped immediately and brush crazy till the stains went away. But this cold-water stuff, I have a feeling that cold water really helps with iron. I looked it up just on Google not PubMed or anything and there was something about it. Not anything that was earth shattering, but I thought, "Well, this could be a thing." I know you are both into research to a level that I will never be and have resources that I don't have. So, I thought I would just throw this out after listening to the podcast, where you talked about the woman, who could be low iron. I thought I would share my crazy experience. Sincerely," Nancy.

Melanie Avalon: All right, Nancy. Thank you so much for your question. Really, quick thing. I don't really think I have that many more resources than other people as far as research goes. It's actually very easy in our world today to access research and information. There are books, that's where I get a lot of my information. Google Scholar is my favorite place to be. There're so many studies. You can't always read the full study, but you often can. If you sign up for a ResearchGate account, you can often get the full study through that platform. 

Gin Stephens: Or, if you're married to a college professor. He can get you anything.

Melanie Avalon: Or, if you went to college anywhere, you often as an alumni can have access to their library system. I guess the one resource I have that most people don't is, I can often directly ask questions to some of the authors I've had on the show. But beyond that, it's really all just self-study. Just want to point that out. It's funny, Nancy, about this question. We've had it in the lineup for a long time, because I was waiting because I thought the information was going to organically come to me at some point. I feel it did this week. I was like once it comes to me, I'm going to wait till it comes to me and then I'm going to talk about it and it came to me this week. I've mentioned this earlier, but I am prepping to interview Chris Masterjohn. He doesn't have a book or anything, but he has been in the sphere for a long time and he writes very epic blog posts, and he does have eBook type things you can buy but he really researches nutrients and metabolic health, and what's the word for metabolic systems in the body?

Gin Stephens: Metabolic systems really just sums it up.

Melanie Avalon: It's funny, Gin, because prepping to interview him, because normally I'm focusing on a book. But there's just so much. He's covered everything. 

Gin Stephens: Oh, he's written about everything. Yeah, he's brilliant. I've been reading his stuff for, well, before I wrote my first book.

Melanie Avalon: it's not he just writes about everything. He goes really deep in everything, in all the different topics and he gives a perspective that nobody else usually is talking about. We're talking earlier about not knowing what do we know, what do we not know. He always gives a new perspective and I'm like, "Why have I never heard that before?" That sounds right [laughs] if that makes sense. Prepping to interview him. I'm like, "What do I talk to him about?" I think I'm just going to talk to him about all the things presently I'm very fascinated with and would like to know his thoughts on. But in any case, he has been writing a lot actually, recently about iron status because he's been looking at a lot of the studies about how COVID affects iron status. He talks about the mechanisms of action and what is going on there. I think I got a lot of clarity reading it about what might be going on with you, Nancy. Before I answer that, the first resource I went to--

Gin Stephens: I have a question. Does he say that it's better, because I think I remember reading some stuff about this early, early on in the pandemic. For COVID, is it better to have high iron or low iron?

Melanie Avalon: I didn't read about better to, the stuff I was reading. I'm sure he's probably written on it. That's a good question and I should check it before I interview him. The stuff I was reading was, how does COVID affect iron status? So, that's a good question, though.

Gin Stephens: For some reason, I seem to-- I don't know. We've had so much over the past few years. For some reason in my head, I feel I read something early on, I mean, really early on 2020 early, early, early that was correlating low iron with better outcomes. I don't know. Because I usually have had low iron like Nancy. For some reason, that stuck in my head, because I'm like, "Oh, maybe having low iron is good." I don't know for COVID.

Melanie Avalon: Well, yeah. What he talks about is how people think that the inflammatory state of COVID would deplete iron being an inflammatory state. But actually, and this relates to Nancy's question. Inflammation raises a hormone called hepcidin, which is the insulin for blood sugar, but it's a regulator of iron status.

Gin Stephens: I did find a couple of things. The U-shaped association of serum iron level with disease severity and adult hospitalized patients with COVID-19. A U-shaped curve is interesting. Too high is not good, too low is no-- 

Melanie Avalon: Too low is not good. 

Gin Stephens: Right. That's interesting. Again, so much stuff we still don't even know. So, I'm not giving medical advice about this. 

Melanie Avalon: This answer is not to speak to COVID, specifically. It's to speak to the inflammatory state. In the inflammatory state, hepcidin goes up, hepcidin decreases. I don't know if it's a hormone as well. I guess so called ferroportin. Ferroportin is the transporter responsible for transporting iron both from our food into our bodies, and then also in and out of cells. What happens when we get inflamed, hepcidin goes up, ferroportin goes down, we no longer easily absorb iron from our food. In an inflamed state, it's likely that we'll have low iron. But what's interesting and this is what he talks about. This is the how it gets more nuanced. When you get a full iron panel, you measure basically, your free iron, your iron saturation, your hemoglobin, which is your iron-containing oxygen transport, metalloprotein in red blood cells, and then your ferritin, which is actually your storage form of iron. 

What's interesting is that when your inflammation is up, your hepcidin is up and your ferroportin transporter is down. Not only do you not absorb iron from your food, but you stop moving iron around. It can get locked in your ferritin, which is your storage form, especially if you're in an inflammatory state, The macrophages in the inflammatory state might actually grab the iron and put it into ferritin, because iron is actually very inflammatory. It can create oxidative stress. You don't want a lot of iron. 

Gin Stephens: You don't want to have too much. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. That's why it's such a complicated thing. Your body really has to regulate it and a lot of people for whatever reason things get wonky on either side.

Gin Stephens: Yep. There's that U-shaped curve. By the way, I did find something that sounds like the opposite of what I said before. It just said that severe COVID-19 appears to be characterized by high hepcidin. I don't know how to say that and marked functional iron deficiency. So, you don't want to have iron that's too low.

Melanie Avalon: Right. What you just said is what I was literally just saying. 

Gin Stephens: The reason I'm saying it is because what I said seems to be the opposite of the truth. So, I wanted to correct it. I just remember reading something early. Lord knows what it was. It was two years ago. I remember reading something that made me think, "Oh, maybe low iron isn't bad. Maybe it's protective." 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. Again, I don't really want to speak to COVID, but I'm really glad you read that sentence, because that actually describes what I was just saying. Basically, an inflammatory state, COVID would be an inflammatory state. Hepcidin is going up, so you're going to stop absorbing iron. You're more likely to get deficient. But then what's interesting and what he talks about is, like I said, you stop absorbing, but you also trap iron where it is, so people can actually present with having low iron, but high ferritin, because the iron is all trapped in their storage form because their body was like, "Oh, we got to get rid of this. So, let's put it into ferritin." 

Gin Stephens: It's there. It's just stuck. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. Then you have to deal with getting it out in a healthy way because too much iron is inflammatory. So, the point of all of that and I think when I talk to him-- Oh, this was really interesting. So, do the way how we get rid of the iron and ferritin?

Gin Stephens: I do not. [laughs] Leeches? Is it leeches? No, I'm kidding.

Melanie Avalon: I know. Well, probably that might do it. [laughs] 

Gin Stephens: Wait, I feel I might, give me a minute. I feel I read something.

Melanie Avalon: It's something we talk about a lot sort of.

Gin Stephens: Go ahead. 

Melanie Avalon: It's called ferritinophagy. 

Gin Stephens: Is it autophagy? Is it part of autophagy? Is it linked to autophagy?

Melanie Avalon: When the cell runs low in iron, it sends ferritin that storage form of iron into the general autophagy system. So, then it breaks down the ferritin in the autophagy system and freeze the iron. Isn't that cool?

Gin Stephens: It is very cool. You know how at the beginning of the podcast, where we were like, "Yeah, that's more than I needed to know about stuff. That's where [laughs] iron." [laughs] 

Melanie Avalon: It hits home to me because I have had severe anemia in the past, severe. 

Gin Stephens: But you're good now there, right? 

Melanie Avalon: I am. Actually, I'm posting about it today on my InsideTracker. But it's a struggle. For people who struggle with iron issues on either side, it's a struggle. If you have iron overload, really the only solution is donating blood.

Gin Stephens: That's what it was. Donating blood, I knew there was something when I said leeches. It's donating blood for real. That is what you do. I was like, "I feel I know it. What is it?" Yes, it's donating blood. Dah. I can't [laughs] believe I didn't think of that. That's practically the same thing as leeches.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, yeah. That's why when you said that I was like, "Basically." [giggles] 

Gin Stephens: That's funny. Okay. I knew I knew it. I just couldn't remember that I knew it.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, yeah. Then on the flip side, the anemia side and this is something I really want to talk to him about, because there're just so many reasons and things that could happen. The thing I want to talk to him about for me is the way I tend to present now, because I've been supplementing with grass-fed spleen, which does keep my iron up. But my ferritin, my storage form tends to always be low, but my iron saturation will go up really high. I feel I'm not converting iron to ferritin. I'm going to ask him about that. Oh, to clarify, I do want to clarify, even though, I know Gin mentioned that we're over a lot of heads right now. But this is important to point out, because I did say that ferritinophagy, so, autophagy is what digest ferritin. That is not regulated by autophagy. What I mean by that is, it's not like you if you're in a high autophagy state. They are automatically going to do that process, it's regulated completely by cellular iron status. What that means is, it only does that process when you need to do that process. It's not like, "Oh, I'm in a high autophagy state. Let's break down all the ferritin." It would do that if you needed iron. 

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Melanie Avalon: In any case, how this all relates to Nancy's question? It was interesting because I pulled up Wim Hof's book, because she was talking about doing Wim Hof breathing and the cold showers. I have had Wim Hof on the Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast. I will put a link to that in the show notes. Honestly, listeners, if you want an inspiring episode, that was my most inspiring episode of all time. 

Gin Stephens: Wim Hoff? 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, followed by Farmer Lee Jones. I looked at his book to see if he talked about iron status and anemia. I know she didn't mention anemia, but she mentioned low iron. Interestingly, he didn't really talk about it. But the weird thing is there is one sentence about it, but I don't know why he didn't expand on it, because the only sentence in the book that mentions anemia is "the connection between tinnitus and the Wim Hof Method has various possible causes," because he talks about how the Wim Hof Method can help tinnitus. He says, "Medical research shows a direct link between pulsatile tinnitus and anemia, which the Wim Hof Method may ameliorate through the elevated oxygen intake." It's really interesting. Basically, he's hinting that the Wim Hof Method may help anemia. I don't know why he doesn't expand on it. But the reason I think that, Nancy, this is possibly what might be going on is all Chris Masterjohn's work. He talks about how to increase iron status when you are in an iron deficient state for whatever reason and the answer is cooling inflammation. He literally uses that phrase. 

Combating inflammation is a key to helping iron status, helping your iron numbers. The Wim Hof Method, the breathing, the cold showers, one of the main things that is doing in your body is combating system wide inflammation. That's the reason I do cold therapy like cryotherapy. The anti-inflammatory benefits are incredible. It could have something to do with the oxygen content, which is in the Wim Hof what he says in his book. In addition to that, I would really think there could be something going on with it helping your inflammatory status and not helping your iron status. Again, I'm not a doctor, but those are my thoughts.

Gin Stephens: In summary, yes. [laughs] 

Melanie Avalon: Possibly, possibly.

Gin Stephens: Well, she said, "Could it be." She said, "Could it be." The answer is yes, it could be. 

Melanie Avalon: Yes. Very cool. 

Gin Stephens: But yes. We don't want to be too low, we don't want to be too high, we want to be just right like Goldilocks, when it comes to really almost everything.

Melanie Avalon: For supporting your body's, handling of iron and having a healthy iron profile. an anti-inflammatory lifestyle is really key for that. Cold exposure, Wim Hof breathing would be great tools for that. All right, shall we do one more question? 

Gin Stephens: All righty. 

Melanie Avalon: All right. We have one more question. This is from Kathy. The subject is: "Bone broth, collagen, and ketosis complete." Kathy says, "Hi. I've been doing the IF Fast. Feast. Repeat. for several weeks. Before then, I was doing a keto-type program avoiding sugar and other things. I was drinking a shake with collagen, bone broth, and the ketosis complete." I looked this up. I think I found it because I found a product called ketosis complete that did have-- She says, "It has BHB, beta hydroxybutyrate and a healthy fats blend." But what I was looking at just had BHB. It didn't have healthy fats blend. So, I'm not sure if that was the same thing. 

Gin Stephens: Well, maybe just it's her collagen and her bone broth, and added some fats. Maybe, she was putting in healthy fats in addition. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, that's possible. 

Gin Stephens: Adding fat, yeah. 

Melanie Avalon: She says, "I have been fasting clean averaging 16 to 20 hours per day and I would like to know if I can have a shake made with these things after I break my fast or do I have to wait until I have done the full 28 days. Thank you," Kathy.

Gin Stephens: All right. Here's the thing about your eating window. You can have whatever you want in your eating window. There is no need to wait any time to have anything in your eating window. Here's what you can't have in your eating window during the first 28 days and here's what you can have after that. If you have something you would like to enjoy in your eating window, you can do it at any point along the way of your intermittent fasting journey. Now, let's talk about the shake and what you need out of that shake. Interesting about collagen, I'm not convinced that we need to ingest collagen. I was having a conversation with someone on the Delay, Don’t Deny community about this recently. She's a doctor. I am not a doctor, she is a doctor, talking about collagen and she's somebody, who I really respect, but she is not a big fan of most of these "products that are out there with all the health claims." She's not a health claims fan because so many of them are made without any good backing. Collagen is one of those things. 

When we ingest collagen, our body breaks it down into the different building blocks. Like, it does with any protein. It's not ingesting collagen and then it's used as collagen. Your body loses the ability to create collagen as you get older. But ingesting collagen, it is not like take the collagen and then stick it places where collagen would be. Am I explaining that well, Melanie? It breaks it down.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. Actually, it has probably more to do with something else Chris Masterjohn talks about, the amino acid profile ratio found in collagen versus muscle meats. 

Gin Stephens: Well, my point being that, I'm not convinced that we need to supplement with collagen. That's all I'm saying. I've looked at it all sorts of ways, because people are talking about collagen all the time, and they want to have collagen, and I am not convinced that there's a role for me. Let me just say, for me. I'm not convinced that supplementing with collagen is going to do anything for me. Really, if you're having trouble with a saggy skin, and you think that having collagen will help with that, really, if your body's not good at using collagen, or building collagen, or whatever the wording really would be, I think I just didn't say it very well but that's the issue. Something like red light therapy, it can help your body better than drinking collagen. There're other ways to get your body to be better at maintaining collagen levels versus intaking it. Does that make sense, Melanie? 

Melanie Avalon: Mm-hmm. 

Gin Stephens: Anyway, so, if you love the collagen, have the collagen. Bone broth has a lot of healing benefits. I think you would agree with that. Have the bone broth. Definitely, bone broth is a great thing. Ketosis complete, any kind of ketone product, I really can't think of any reason why you would have that in your eating window honestly. I remember reading something Mark Mattson-- I was listening to him on a podcast. It was Mark Mattson, the guy mentioned earlier, he was from Johns Hopkins. He was talking about taking in ketones, that was back when exogenous ketones were all the rage and your body was making all these claims about them. In the interview, he said, he could imagine-- I'm paraphrasing and it's been years since I heard this. I could be getting something wrong. But it was something along the lines of he could see a mechanism of action, where it would actually be detrimental to have ketones-- to take in ketones during in the presence of food. Because that's not how our bodies naturally are. I can't remember the mechanism of action he was talking about because shoot I'm not a scientist like he is, but our bodies never have lots of food coming in and ketosis going on. So, that's not really a natural state. 

Ketosis is absence of food our bodies get into ketosis. I just can't think of any reason why you'd want to have that in your eating window. Collagen, up to you. If you feel it's giving you benefits, you certainly can. Bone broth, I could totally see that. A ketosis product, no. I just wouldn't. You can if you really want to. I can't think of a reason why I would, unless you have Alzheimer's or seizures, and you're having a therapeutic kind of ketone experience. But for the rest of us who are just, no. Anyway, that's how I feel. Let your body make ketones for free during the fast. That's it. 

Melanie Avalon: First of all, just to discuss a little bit more the collagen versus the bone broth thing. The benefits people turn to collagen for, I think it can often be got from a more whole foods synergistic form of bone broth. Actually, today's episode is sponsored in part by Beauty & the Broth, which is one of my favorite bone broth companies. Check out the spot in today's show to get the details about that. We have a code for I think 15% off. But her bone broth is, it comes in concentrated form. It ships straight to your door and then you reconstitute it to whatever strength you like with water, it has no added salt, which is huge. It's organic, delicious. So, that might be something to try to if you want to open your window with something rather than this shake of collagen and exogenous ketones like Gin was talking about. I would just have some bone broth.

Gin Stephens: And some food. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, which bone broth in a way is a food.

Gin Stephens: And some food along with it, but not-- Yeah, bone broth is a food. Yeah.

Melanie Avalon: I think what Kathy is touching on is, I don't know how common this confusion is out there, but what I'm getting from her question and possibly there are other people who think this. I think they think they're doing a keto diet and fasting is creating ketosis. That means, it goes together still. They think they still have to do a keto diet with fasting, which is not the case. So, intermittent fasting does not mandate a keto diet in your eating window. You can do one. You don't have to. 

Gin Stephens: Yep, but you don't have to-- There was a period of time where people were really saying that like, "If you're not doing intermittent fasting with keto, you're wasting your time." I'm like, "Really? Okay. Well, I guess tell that to my 80 pounds that I lost." 

Melanie Avalon: That's funny. [laughs] 

Gin Stephens: Oh, and when this episode comes out, Melanie, it will be almost exactly my seven-year maintenance anniversary. Seven years of maintaining my weight. In that seven years was I keto for any of the days? No.

Melanie Avalon: Wow. Yeah. Point being Kathy is, you don't have to be keto in the eating window and for the BHB exogenous ketones, well like I said, I did interview Dom D'Agostino and we went into the deepest of deepest dives into ketones. Of course, he is more pro-exogenous ketones.

Gin Stephens: Is he?

Melanie Avalon: Mm-hmm.

Gin Stephens: He thinks you should. 

Melanie Avalon: Well, no, no, sorry. That's a blanket statement. His work in part is clinically studying exogenous ketones, and the signaling effects they have, and their effects in different therapeutic states. You were saying differently for therapeutic diet addressing a specific issue.

Gin Stephens: There are definitely roles for exogenous ketones, but not for most of us, I think. That's what I really think.

Melanie Avalon: I think if you listen to the episode, which again, it's not out yet. We'll put a link to it in the show notes. I think listening to my conversation with him, he is very pro-exogenous ketones, but for specific situations, and I think listening to it, you don't walk away thinking I need exogenous ketones. That's not what you walk away thinking.

Gin Stephens: Good. I actually walked away from that Mark Mattson interview. He's a neurological guy that's his expertise. I walked away thinking, "Yeah, we really don't want to have that with food [laughs] for whatever reason." Again, whatever his mechanism was that he talked about. Nobody please ask me to find that, because I swear, it was 2017 or something, and people were just starting to talk about exogenous ketones, and I heard him talking about on our podcast, and I don't even remember who.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, So, I'm really excited to air that. That was a moment, because I've been following him for so long. So very long. We've talked for two hours.

Gin Stephens: That's when I interviewed Mark Mattson for Intermittent Fasting Stories. It was surreal. I was so excited. That one hasn't come out yet. By the time people are listening to this, it hasn't come out yet, but it was so exciting to talk to him because he knows his stuff.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. I already told you this, Gin, but he was like, "Yeah, I'm going in few days to stay with Rhonda Patrick." I was like, "Oh, my goodness." [laughs] So close. But in any case, Kathy, I hope that helped with your question.

Gin Stephens: But just to go back to it again, like I said, you can have whatever you want in your eating window, and if that shake is something you want, and you love it, and you want to keep having it, because you feel it's giving you benefits, have it. Go for it. We're not telling you not to. I just would hesitate on feeling like you needed exogenous ketones, especially in your eating window. That's all. 

Melanie Avalon: Agreed. All right. Well, this has been absolutely wonderful. So, a few things for listeners before we go. If you would like to submit your own question for the show, you can directly email questions@ifpodcast.com or you can go to ifpodcast.com and you can submit questions there. The show notes for today's episode will be at ifpodcast.com/episode256. Those show notes will have a full transcript. So, definitely check that out. And then, you can follow us on Instagram. I am @melanieavalon, Gin is @ginstephens, and I think that is all things. All righty. I just want to say, I'm so happy we got to the iron question. It's been hanging over me for months. I was like, "It'll come to me."

Gin Stephens: Awesome. I'm glad we talked about it. I'm glad I was able to research and find more answers, because [laughs] it was so long ago that I read that article. I was like, "I got to look this up a little bit more."

Melanie Avalon: All right. Well, anything from you, Gin, before we go? 

Gin Stephens: No. I think that's it. Talk to you soon. 

Melanie Avalon: Talk to you next week. Bye.

Gin Stephens: 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. We're not doctors. If you enjoyed the show, please consider writing your 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, transcripts by SpeechDocs, theme music by Leland Cox. See you next week.

STUFF WE LIKE

TRANSCRIPT

Melanie Avalon: Welcome to Episode 254 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, author of What When Wine: Lose Weight and Feel Great with Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, and Wine. And I'm here with my cohost, Gin Stephens, author of Fast. Feast. Repeat.: The Comprehensive Guide to Delay, Don't Deny Intermittent Fasting. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and ginstephens.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this podcast do not constitute medical advice or treatment. So, pour yourself a cup of black coffee, a mug of tea, or even a glass of wine, if it's that time, and get ready for The Intermittent Fasting Podcast.

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And one more thing before we jump in. Are you fasting clean inside and out? Did you know that one of our largest exposures to toxic compounds, including endocrine disrupters, which mess with our hormones, obesogens which literally cause our body to store and gain weight, as well as carcinogens linked to cancer is actually through our skincare? Europe has banned thousands of these compounds for being toxic, and the US has only banned around 10. It's honestly shocking. When you're putting on your conventional skincare makeup, you're likely putting toxic compounds directly into your body. These compounds can make you feel bad, can make it really hard to lose weight, can affect your hormones, your mood, your health. And ladies, if you're thinking of having kids, when you have a child, these compounds actually go directly through the placenta into the newborn. That means your skincare makeup that you're putting on today actually affects the health of future generations. 

Did you know that conventional lipstick for example often tests high for lead, and the half-life of lead can be up to 30 years in your bones? That means when you put on your lipstick, 30 years later, half of that lead might still be in your body. Thankfully, there's an easy, easy solution to this. There's a company called Beautycounter and they were founded on a mission to change this. Every single ingredient and their products is extensively tested to be safe for your skin. You can actually feel good about what you put on. And on top of that, their products actually work. That's because they're not “all natural.” They actually combine the best of both worlds, both synthetic and natural ingredients to create products that actually support the health of your skin and make your skin look amazing. They have skincare lines for all your skin types, deodorant, shampoo and conditioner that I love, anti-aging and brightening peels, and vitamin C serums, and incredible makeup. If you see my makeup on Instagram, that's all Beautycounter. You can shop with us at melanieavalon.com/beautycounter. 

And if you're thinking of making safe skincare a part of your future like we have, we definitely suggest becoming a Band of Beauty member. It's sort of like the Amazon Prime for clean beauty. You get 10% back in product credit, free shipping on qualifying orders and a welcome gift that is worth way more than the price of the yearlong membership, totally completely worth it. Also, definitely join my clean beauty email list at melanieavalon.com/cleanbeauty, I give away a lot of free things on that list and join me on my Facebook group, Clean Beauty and Safe Skincare with Melanie Avalon. I do a weekly giveaway every single week for Beautycounter, people share their experience and product reviews, and so much more. And again, the link to shop with us is melanieavalon.com/beautycounter. All right now enjoy the show.

Melanie Avalon: Hi, everybody and welcome. This is Episode number 254 of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon and I'm here with Gin Stephens.

Gin Stephens: Hi, everybody.

Melanie Avalon: How are you today, Gin?

Gin Stephens: Doing great. Coming to you from the beach cottage looking at the ocean. So, that's always good.

Melanie Avalon: It's so funny to me that you made a last-minute trip there with the amount of time that it gets to get there. By this time, I wouldn't have been able to answer like a last-minute email and you made an entire trip to the beach.

Gin Stephens: Oh, by this time of the day? 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. 

Gin Stephens: Oh, no. [laughs] Yeah, we decided yesterday, we would come down Will and I. Will came with me and we decided, and I'm like, "All right, we have to leave at 9:30." 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, wait, you decided last night. Okay. Never mind, this will be different. I thought you decided today. 

Gin Stephens: Well, we decided last night that we would get up and come. 

Melanie Avalon: That I could do, because I would have planned. 

Gin Stephens: I didn't have to do anything. The thing about coming to the beach, it's so easy. All you have to do is throw clothes in a bag and go, because I have everything I need here, including my toothbrush. I don't need to bring any of that. All I need is clothes. We literally just threw our clothes and bags, hopped in the car, and came down. It takes about four hours to get here with stops, and they're always bathroom, and get more coffee stops for me, but Will is a frequent eater. So, we had to get him food.

Melanie Avalon: Can I ask you a question? 

Gin Stephens: Yeah. 

Melanie Avalon: Both at your house and at the beach house, what is on your nightstand?

Gin Stephens: Okay, well, at my regular house, I have a really good sized, a big nightstand that's like drawers. It's bigger than a normal nightstand. It's almost a small chest of drawers. We have one on each side of the bed. They're the same. I have a lamp, and I have a book, and I just chose it because it's Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, and I didn't choose that especially, but it's a southern book. But that's just the one I happen to have, because it's just a black, simple, and I like the name of it. On top of that, I have a vase. Well, it's a blue and white like urn kind of a thing with some dried roses in it. I had the blue and white vase, whatever it is, bowl, it's a bowl. But my neighbor, when we moved in gave me these flowers. They're roses that she dehydrates, and they're white, and they're sitting in. Anyway, that's what I have. 

Melanie Avalon: That's all you have? There's nothing else?

Gin Stephens: Well, I have a coaster, in case I want to sit something on. But at the beach, it's a tiny, tiny little bedroom, because this whole house is just under thousand square feet. It's really a tiny little cottage, and it's three bedrooms, two baths, and just under a thousand square feet. That tells you how little it is. The bedside table is literally 12/12, it's tiny. So, nothing sits on that. I have a floor lamp that I turn off and on that's behind it. I have room for a floor lamp, and in that tiny little table and at night I do put my phone on it to charge. Is that what you're going to ask me? 

Melanie Avalon: Yes. 

Gin Stephens: Yes, I do sleep with my phone beside the bed. 

Melanie Avalon: Yes, I've been brainstorming and gathering data. Have I mentioned on this show about how I went to develop the line of EMF-blocking products?

Gin Stephens: I think you did. Yeah, because we talked about how I have all that electrical stuff coming into my house.

Melanie Avalon: Yes, yes. I've been polling in my Facebook group what people have on their nightstand, because I really want to create something that goes on your phone, so that you can use your phone on your nightstand at night, and be protected from those EMFs. Most people are sleeping, phone is on their nightstand very near to their head. So, I really think that can affect a lot of people's sleep and health.

Gin Stephens: It would not surprise me. I actually started plugging it in the bathroom for a few weeks, and that just lasted a few weeks and I brought it back. [laughs] 

Melanie Avalon: The way that they finagled the studies, it is stuff that happens in the processed food industry and a lot of industries. The way they set up the studies to establish safety for EMFs, especially with things like phones, it's not any way you'd be using it in real life. It just is not. But when I did my poll about 80 people answered, what do you think was the number one thing and it was open ended. I just said, "What's in your nightstand?" and then I made an Excel doc.

Gin Stephens: A lamp or did they say their cell phone? 

Melanie Avalon: Lamp was number two, phone was number three, what do you think number one was? Oh, no, books were number two. Water.

Gin Stephens: Oh, that's interesting. I do not sleep with water beside my bed.

Melanie Avalon: I do. 

Gin Stephens: Do you? 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. 

Gin Stephens: You're waking up drinking water in the bed? 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, just in case. I'm thirsty in the middle of the night.

Gin Stephens: Nope. I've never once been like, "Man, I'm thirsty in the middle of the night." I think I'll [laughs] some water. Unless I'm in the past days of when I was super hungover, I might would get up and go drink water but that's not something that's typical now at this stage of my life.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. So, water was number one, then lamp, then book, and then phone.

Gin Stephens: See, I didn't even say phone because it doesn't sit there all the time. That's not a part of my nightstand, it's just there while I'm sleeping. If you'd said, "What's on your nightstand while you're sleeping?" Phone would have made it. But if I just walked into the bedroom, the phone is not on my nightstand.

Melanie Avalon: Very, very true. Other things were like lotion, that had a lot. Phone charger, glasses.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, I've got my phone charger. This is how I've made it pretty, so, you don't have to see it. I took one of those Command adhesive hooks and Command adhesived it to the back of the dresser, the bedside table, and then I have the phone charger tied in a knot around that hook. So, I just pull it up to charge, and I throw it back there, so you don't see it during the day.

Melanie Avalon: If I made something for you to put on your phone, when your phone is on your nightstand at night, how would you want it? Would you want it really minimal, would you want it to hold something? What features would you want? What do you want it to have a way that you put your charger? 

Gin Stephens: That's super tricky. Could it be also integrated with the charger?

Melanie Avalon: Yes, yes, it could. 

Gin Stephens: See, I'm very into aesthetics and minimal clutter. If it's not pretty and minimal clutter, I'm not going to use it. 

Melanie Avalon: That's why my initial feeling was just a very minimalistic box that maybe was a tray on top, but very minimal, and then you put your phone underneath. The cool thing is the blocking. It does not have to go 360 cover completely. It just has to go vertically between you and the phone. Does that make sense? There just has to be like a vertical wall of protection between you and the phone. So, it could be one sided or it could be on a swivel, so, you can turn it around. This is way harder to brainstorm for than I thought. [laughs] 

Gin Stephens: Yeah, I can imagine. That does sound hard. Plus, everyone has such a different aesthetic.

Melanie Avalon: I know. I was thinking very minimal for the beginning, and then if it goes well make options for different more elaborate things. So, you vote minimal?

Gin Stephens: Well, I do. Just because I'm not going to put something that's bulky or whatever. That's just not my aesthetic. 

Melanie Avalon: Well, listeners, if you have ideas or if there are other EMF blocking products you would like, let me know. 

Gin Stephens: I was imagining just you slipped it into this little sleeve or something.

Melanie Avalon: That was my initial thought. Now, I'm thinking, but people do really like the charging option. What I really wanted to do was a wireless charging option. So, you're putting it in and it is wireless charging. But that actually itself emits EMF.

Gin Stephens: Yeah. See, it would have to be have cords, extra cords. I try to minimize the number of cords that are stretching all around when I can.

Melanie Avalon: Same, same, same. Yeah, maybe it just has a slot for the cord. I wish all phones had a universal charger, because then it can be integrated. 

Gin Stephens: You wouldn't want it to just have a USB port, because I think all of them plug into that.

Melanie Avalon: Well, the thing about the USB port, because it's due to the USB port that makes it more integrated and easier, then there's the clutter of the cord. Because then you put the phone in, and you plug the phone into your cord, and the cord to the USB.

Gin Stephens: Well, then, I think you just want something with a slot that they put their charger cord that they already have through.

Melanie Avalon: Exactly. The life of brainstorming. Did you see, I wanted to talk about intermittent fasting study that came out recently?

Gin Stephens: I might have seen it. I don't remember. I see a lot of things people share them with me obviously as you know. I think I did see something recently. What was it?

Melanie Avalon: It was January 11th. 

Gin Stephens: Oh, yeah, I saw that.

Melanie Avalon: Differential effects of one meal per day in the evening- 

Gin Stephens: Wait, then maybe I didn't. 

Melanie Avalon: -on metabolic health and physical performance in lean individuals.

Gin Stephens: They didn't compare it to other meal timing there right. 

Melanie Avalon: They compared a single meal and a 22:2 split, which is very cool, because normally I feel it's rare that these studies actually look at one meal a day in two hours versus three meals per day. It was only 13 participants.

Gin Stephens: I'm not sure if I saw that. Actually, I can't remember. January 11th is a million years ago. [laughs] 

Melanie Avalon: Yes, I know. 

Gin Stephens: When I was also-- those were the days when I was hot and heavy recording all the time because Clean(ish) had just come out. 

Melanie Avalon: Yes. They consumed the same amount of calories. 

Gin Stephens: Okay, yeah, I have not seen this one.

Melanie Avalon: I'll put a link to it in the show notes, but the findings were very favorable. The conclusion was that a single meal per day in the evening lowers body weight and adapts metabolic flexibility during exercise via increased fat oxidation, whereas physical performance was not affected. 

Gin Stephens: How long did they do it for?

Melanie Avalon: They did it for 11 days. 

Gin Stephens: If I were designing an intermittent fasting study, it would certainly not be for 11 days. It needs to be longer, so that they really have time to develop their metabolic flexibility. It almost seems to me like that's just way too short. I'm happy they found positive things, but knowing what we know about how long it takes your body to adjust, 11 days is nothing.

Melanie Avalon: It was a randomized crossover. They did one of the options, then two weeks washout, and then the other option. What they were focusing on was athletic performance. Oh, and they were wearing a continuous glucose monitor, which is very cool and they did a lot of testing of different athletic performance tests. Like a cycle test, where they check their fat oxidation, and their maximum oxygen uptake, they did a strength test.

Gin Stephens: And again, I think that it would make so much sense to give them time to really adapt, because I bet and on a 11 day, I know that a lot of people, obviously, the group that they used was athletic lean males, so, they probably adapt more quickly than someone maybe a 45-year-old woman, who's been struggling with her weight for decades. It's a different group of people. But I could imagine for someone like that in the second group, someone who's metabolically not healthy. They could actually have reduced performance during the first 11 days. I would actually predict that instead of improved performance.

Melanie Avalon: These people were healthy, they were trainers-- Well, not trainers, they had training experience. Their BMI was between 20 and 30, their fat was between 12% and 30%. They were likely already a more metabolically healthy population. it was a small study, very small. It's only 13 people.

Gin Stephens: Anybody who's listening, we would love to have some studies where people have time to become really adapted before we see how their body change. Or, maybe you could check them all throughout as they adapt to. That would be fascinating. See how the body changes every day as you're going through the adaptation period and we certainly know anecdotally from people who go through it, it's very common to feel good, and then you feel terrible, and then you feel better, and there's a lot that our bodies have to go through as we're adapting. I would not judge intermittent fasting on what happens in the first month to your body is all I'm saying.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I think it's a little bit better just based on, this wasn't like menopausal women who are sedentary. This was like active, young, healthy people. Well, there was one really interesting finding. They actually found lower blood sugar levels during the second half of the day in the one meal per day group. Isn't that interesting?

Gin Stephens: Well, it echoes what I find in my experience. When I was wearing the CGM, my blood glucose went down and stayed down after my body flipped that metabolic switch every day. That's exactly what my body did. So, I'm not surprised at that at all. 

Melanie Avalon: They ate between 5 PM and 7 PM for the one meal a day. 

Gin Stephens: That's a cool study. 

Melanie Avalon: So, we will put a link to that in the show notes.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, I had not seen that one. I saw something. I can't remember what I saw. Something came out recently and I don't remember a thing about it, except that it was positive. But it definitely wasn't that. Unless someone shared, and all I did was read the abstract, and didn't dig in, it is possible, and it didn't register. I know there was something that came out, but my brain is full. [laughs] Stuffs falling out right now actively. 

Melanie Avalon: It's interesting. It was funded by a diabetes foundation.

Gin Stephens: Well, I definitely think that this is a great protocol for fasting for anyone who has diabetes as we know from The Diabetes Code.

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Melanie Avalon: Shall we jump into some listener questions for today? 

Gin Stephens: Yes. 

Melanie Avalon: All right. To start things off, we have a question from Shay and the subject is: "2.5 years of IF." Shay says, "I started IF in August 2019 at 125 pounds after hearing about the health benefits. I am 39 years old, five feet 4.75 inches tall." 4.75 that is very specific. She says, "I started with 16:8 and worked my way up to 20:4 within a few weeks as that felt good. I do not restrict anything in my window but aim to eat mostly Whole Foods. I am moderately active. I do Pilates two times a week and walk a few miles each day. I also take a few HIIT classes or HIIT classes here and there. I manage to maintain my 125 pounds, but I started mixing in two full down days when the pandemic hit and I started working from home. I enjoyed the way I felt doing the full down days. How long should we spend on a new method of IF if we decide to switch it up? 

Within the past few months, I have gained some weight and now I'm at 133 to 135 pounds depending on the day. My pants are definitely showing the tightness as well. I'm not happy with how I feel or how my clothes are fitting. I played around with a modified ADF with two 500 calorie days a week. I'm not sure if I like the full down days or the modified down days better. I've been able to do both with no issue. I have blood work down with my doctor and everything came back great. I'm feeling very discouraged with IF and the fact that I've gained around 10 pounds. I believe that I am just able to eat a lot more than I should be in my eating window. This is where it would be helpful to have a guideline of how many calories, etc., I should be consuming per day, but I know we want to avoid a diet mindset. Help, I have no idea what IF schedule I should be following, or what type of diet I should be eating, or does IF no longer work for me. But I do know is that I'm 10 pounds up and I do not want to give up the health benefits of IF." frowny emoji.

Gin Stephens: Well, there's a lot in there, Shay, and I know it's super frustrating to be gaining weight, and not understanding why. I can remember this is before I was doing intermittent fasting, I gained 50 pounds in 18 months. I was not doing intermittent fasting at the time, but I gained 50 pounds in 18 months, and I did not change what I was eating or doing during that period of time. Well, okay, I say that. I did stop taking diet pills. [laughs] That was that period of time in my life when I stopped taking the diet pills. Other than that, though, I didn't change what I was eating or doing. But I was no longer taking diet pills and I gained 50 pounds in 18 months. I remember talking to the doctor, I'm like, "I don't know what's happening. I'm not eating more," but I probably was. I was under a lot of stress, I'd probably messed up my body in many, many ways, I had some hormonal changes going on, I had used one form of birth control and switched to a different one. There were so many variables going on at the time. 

But something changed in what I was doing or in my body and the weight just piled on. It certainly didn't seem I was eating so much food that I should be gaining 50 pounds. But I tell that story to say that the body is really, really complicated and there are so many factors. So, let's unpack what's happened. You are between 133 to 135 right now, and you're almost 5'5". You and I are about the same height. You are in a healthy weight range, because the last time I got on the scale-- I'm 5'5". The last time I got on the scale back in 2017, I saw a weight of I think it was 130. We're a very, very similar size. I know that is no comfort if you feel you're fluffier than you want to be. It doesn't matter. Well, I don't care that Gin and I are the same size. I want to be leaner and I get it. But I'm telling you that you are in a healthy weight for your body. Now, if you are slowly gaining and you're going to keep gaining, that's definitely not okay. Now, if your body is just come to a new point where it's settling, that's different. Maybe this is the way your body wants to be right now at this stage of your life. Our bodies do change over time for whatever reason. 

But I would ask you to look back and think, you've been doing intermittent fasting for two and a half years, and it sounds like for two years of it, your weight was stable or even just over two years, because it was only recently that you started to gain weight. Something changed. Something in your body has changed. When I look back to me at that time, when I rapidly gained 50 pounds in 18 months, there were several things that changed. I stopped taking diet pills, I moved, I was under a great deal of stress, my birth control was changing. All those factors, I can't put my finger on-- Well, it was the quitting the diet pills, that probably was a huge factor. Oh, it was the birth control change. Actually, my weight started to go up before I stopped taking the diet pills when I changed my birth control that really felt it was a factor at the time. All that again to say, our bodies are really, really complicated. You asked, does IF no longer work for me? Well, of course, IF still "works for you," because intermittent fasting is a very healthy way to live. Of course, IF is working for you. It's a very healthy way to live. We're talking about the weight gain. 

Intermittent fasting itself does not "cause" weight gain. You haven't been doing this approach for all these years, and maintaining your weight, and all of a sudden, intermittent fasting broke, right? That isn't what happens. But something in your body has changed and I would see if I could figure out what that might be. It could be the stress, it could be a new medication, it could be maybe you were sick. I know, I've talked before. I don't know if on this podcast if I have, I probably have. I have a friend that got food poisoning, and it changed her gut dramatically, and it took her over a year to get back to health from that. So, see if you can go back and see what might have changed at the time. Intermittent fasting doesn't "stop working," but there's something you're going to have to dig into more deeply. I don't know what you said. Your very last sentence was, I do not want to give up the health benefits of IF. I don't know why you would. To me, if you quit intermittent fasting and went to an all-day eating paradigm, I can't imagine that causing more weight loss or health benefits than sticking to intermittent fasting. Does that make sense, Melanie? 

Melanie Avalon: Mm-hmm.

Gin Stephens: Like quitting intermittent fasting, I feel you might would see really rapid weight gain at that point if your body's already having some weight gain. I don't feel that would be the answer, but I would try to figure out, what could it have been? What could have changed in my body, what happened right before the weight gain started, have I been under a lot of stress? Maybe your body doesn't like the down days, because you talked about how you're very, very active. You do Pilates, you walk every day, you do high intensity interval training here and there, you were maintaining, then you started doing two full down days, and you were working from home. Maybe that feels too much for your body. Maybe you need to go back to a daily eating window approach and see. I don't think that more fasting is always the answer. It could feel too much to your body, but that also might not be it. It could be something else. It could be something that's changed with your gut or something that's changed with your health. Something that's changed hormonally. Maybe you're like, "Oh, that's when I started taking-."

Melanie Avalon: Or, a medication. 

Gin Stephens: -such and such medication. Exactly. "Oh, that's when such and such happened, that's when I had this illness and I'm still inflamed from that." For example, I'm just going to say COVID. We don't talk a lot about COVID on here, because that's not our expertise, and the science is unfolding. But COVID causes a great deal of inflammation in the body. Anecdotally from people that are in the Delay, Don't Deny community, we're seeing a lot of people, who after going through COVID have a lot of inflammation that sticks around for a really, really long time. What comes along with inflammation, weight gain. That's just an anecdotal kind of a thing, but that's a factor. We're still learning, of course, what the long-term effects of COVID might be on the body, but how long does the inflammation go on, long COVID, I don't know. 

You didn't mention whether you had COVID or not, but I'm just throwing that out there. Maybe somebody is listening and they're now they're having the ding, ding, ding going off in their head of, "Oh, my gosh, I did start having increased inflammation after COVID, and my weight went up, and I had been stable before that." Does that mean intermittent fasting has stopped working? I would say in that case, that means your body probably needs it more than ever, because we know intermittent fasting tends to decrease inflammation. Anything you could do to decrease inflammation would be a good thing. I know I talked all around in circles. [laughs] I hope that this is just a temporary little blip weight gain and you're not just going to keep going up and up like I said, because really 133 to 135 is a healthy weight. I know if we've been 125 for two years, we feel really good at that. It doesn't feel good to go up at all, and then stabilize at a new spot. I know that's frustrating. So, hopefully some of what I said will help somebody. Hopefully, you. Hopefully, it'll help you go, "Oh, it's got to be this, and then you can start thinking about what to do next." But as far as the part about us telling you how many calories to eat, that wouldn't make any sense at all just because our bodies are all so different. 

Calories in, you can only adjust calories in so much, but then it's the calories out that makes all the difference what your body does. If your body slows your metabolic rate, you can have the same exact amount of calories you've always had, and now, you're gaining weight, because your body has allowed your metabolic rate for whatever reason. There isn't going to be a calories formula we could give you, because our bodies are too different. I know I went all around, and around, and around on that answer, but there's just a lot going on in there, and it's hard to know. So, what do you think, Melanie?

Melanie Avalon: I thought those were all fantastic thoughts as per usual. I actually had some follow up questions for you. It's such a perfect question she asked, because we were just talking about this with that other study. So, how would you answer her question about how long should we spend on a new method of IF if we decide to switch it up?

Gin Stephens: I think you need to give yourself time to see what happens. I can't give you a number of that as well. If you don't like it, then you can stop. You don't have to give it time. I say that, but with ADF, for example, some people might not like it the first day, but after they've done it for a week, they settle in. Maybe give yourself a week to see if you like it. Then two or three weeks, at least, minimum to see if anything changes or at least even a month. The longer you give it the more you'll know if it's suiting you. If you absolutely hate it, let's say you try a down day with full fast, no calories, zero calorie, clean fast down day for 36-hour fast, and then a 12-hour up day, for example. Let's say, you feel miserable and you hate it. You might be like, "Oh, I felt shaky, I felt terrible, I don't like that." You might want to try it one more time a couple weeks later just to see if that was just a one off or if really, "Okay, I feel the same way again, I don't like it." Then you have permission to never try that again if you hate it.

Melanie Avalon: And then second related question, because I find with ADF, I feel like most people are pretty aware of if they like it, don't like it, and then if they modified or just complete, like a full down day, she says that she doesn't know which one she likes better is one better, if they can do either one.

Gin Stephens: Here's some interesting stuff about the research. People actually lost more weight when they had the 500-calorie down day. There's this mistaken-- Oh, the full fast is "better," but they actually had better weight loss results or I think even fat loss results on the 500-calorie down day. Now, we don't recommend that you like to snack on the 500 calories all day long. Keep it in a really short eating window at whatever time of the day works better for you. For that, you're doing a clean fast, then you have the meal, then you have a second clean fast. Sometimes, people get really confused. They're like, "Doesn't food break a fast? So, why am I eating a meal?" Well, yes, it breaks the fast. It does break the fast. You're not fasting during the part of it where you're eating the 500-calorie meal. Because some people get really confused. They're like, "I did a 42-hour fast and I had the meal." I'm like, "Well, you didn't do it 42-hour fast with a 500-calorie meal in the middle of it. What you did was maybe a 21 hour fast and then the 500-calorie meal, and then you did a second fast that might have been 20 hours and a half or something. So, that's not a 42-hour fast. 

Eating a 500-calorie meal does break the fast? Yes, but it is a well-researched ADF approach, and it was great at giving the participants the metabolic benefits because of the up day, they had great fat loss. So, there is no "better." It's all what feels good to you. You don't have to do it the same way every time. There are some people who just say, "You know what? I'm going to do a full fast if it feels right." If maybe around the time I normally eat dinner, I'm really, really struggling, I'll eat a 500-calorie meal, and then have the second fast, and that's perfectly fine. It doesn't have to be the same way every time, and it isn't always going to be one versus the other.

Melanie Avalon: You have good answers for both of those. Yes, so, going back to everything that Gin originally said about Shay's question, I agree 100% that there are so many factors that could have changed that would lead to this. It's not necessarily the fasting. There could be a big change that happened, so, revisiting all of that. Something I wanted to touch on was, she asked us a guideline of calories and Gin was saying that there's not one answer for people, which I agree with as well. But I wanted to touch on, you're saying that we don't give a guideline of calories because we want to avoid a diet mindset. I believe it is possible to live in a paradigm of what you're eating that does influence what you're eating without being a diet mindset. The calorie counting, that's where I feel it is becoming restrictive, because when you are calorie counting, you're putting an end point to, "I cannot have any more food after this point even if I'm still hungry." It's automatically being restrictive, because it's saying that you cannot have more food after a certain point in time when the eating period should be a time when you're eating to satiety till you're full, not to some imaginary finish line that you can't cross. 

On the flipside, you can make conscious choices I believe about what you're eating and I don't consider that to be a diet mindset or even restrictive. It's just because you're choosing what foods you are choosing to eat. If you're making certain choices in that food realm, it can encourage in a way automatic calorie restriction potentially based on the foods that you're eating. I don't know what you're eating Shay, which actually-- 

Gin Stephens: Well, she said mostly wholefoods. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, wholefoods, okay. Shay is eating mostly wholefoods. But just to expand the question a little bit beyond Shay and then I will come back to Shay specifically, if a person is eating more on the processed food realm just switching to wholefoods, for example, it could make a massive, massive difference, and their satiety, and the level of calories they consume to reach that satiety. I don't consider that a diet mindset. It could become a diet mindset, but I don't think it has to be. For Shay, mostly wholefoods is still vague. You could keep playing around and trying different fasting things or you could look at what you're eating, and maybe play around, and make tweaks there. That might have a pretty measurable effect. I don't know, if you have tried low carb, that might be something to try. I don't know if you've tried lower fat from wholefoods. That could be something to try. But there's a lot that could possibly be done there in regards to what you're eating. Then the mostly part, maybe it is really mostly wholefoods or maybe it's mostly wholefoods, but then enough of non-mostly wholefoods that create a state where you're not losing weight, that's a possibility as well.

Gin Stephens: The part that really strikes me is just that she was weight stable with what she was doing for over two years and then all of a sudden, bam, up 10 pounds.

Melanie Avalon: How did it align with a pandemic? So, she started working from home? 

Gin Stephens: Yep, and then she started switching up to the down days, and I'm not really sure when the weight gain began. Yeah, I just don't know. I don't know when the weight gain started. That's the question that I'm not really sure about. But she's been doing it for two and a half years overall and she said that she's gained the 10 pounds. It sounded pretty quickly and recently. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, in a few months, basically.

Gin Stephens: It sounds like the pandemics been going on for a long time. So, it seems it just all of a sudden has happened even as the pandemic has been going on.

Melanie Avalon: As far as guidelines of how to help this, something else we could try. I recently interviewed Maria Emmerich. I have not aired the show yet. She talks a lot about the protein-sparing modified fast approach. The interesting thing about her approach, so the protein-sparing modified fast approach is, while there are a lot of definitions to it, but I think the clinical definition, like, when they would use it in the studies is, its calorie restricted and its basically just protein. It is very calorie restricted. It actually could fall into a modified ADF approach.

Gin Stephens: Is it down day? It's a down day, a protein down day.

Melanie Avalon: Basically, only protein and then weighing chicken breasts, and egg whites, and stuff like that. Then you can maybe add lettuce and I think broccoli, like, some greens. I do actually think so just stepping aside if one is doing some severe calorie restriction, making it mostly protein in my opinion is the way to go to maximize muscle mass preservation and overall health and wellness. Maria Emmerich's approach, though, is not calorie restricted at all. She advocates for having a couple days a week of PSMF day, and basically on that day you just eat PSMF foods. So, it's not calorie restricted, but the effect of it, and she has all of these recipe books. She gave me a discount code. So, I'll put a link to that in the show notes. She has amazing recipe books. But basically, you can eat these really delicious meals. I'm in shock with all the recipes she's come up with, but they're basically just protein. That for a lot of people can be the thing that can really jumpstart this whole process. That's something you could try, basically, keep doing-- Is she doing one meal a day? 20:4, yes.

Gin Stephens: Well, it's hard to know what she's doing exactly right now, because she said she's doing some down days with ADF. I don't really know exactly what she's doing this minute. She was doing a couple down days. I don't know if she still is.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. Okay. That is something you could try where a few days a week you do a one-meal-a-day type approach in your 20:4 window and you eat these PSMF foods. I actually think that that might especially since ADF in the past has- 

Gin Stephens: Been something that she enjoyed? 

Melanie Avalon: -enjoyed. Yes. I think that might really, really work for you. Then I also just reread the sentence, because all I was saying that she eats mostly wholefoods. I didn't read the part before that. I do not restrict anything in my window, but aim to eat mostly wholefoods. There might be things slipping in there that because of whatever they are, are going to make it difficult to lose weight. Those are my two suggestions. Looking at what you're eating anyways, and then possibly trying this PSMF days approach.

Gin Stephens: All right, well, let us know, Shay, and really, really do that deep dive into what changed. What change, what was different? Were you sick, was it a medication, something like that? If you can think of something, then let us know.

Melanie Avalon: Yes. The medication for example, that could be something that you might not notice it until you notice it, and then it's made metabolic changes that have encouraged your body to be at this new setpoint. I don't want to make a sound hopeless, but it's medications can make your body, and your hypothalamus, and everything slowly come to a different weight, and really want to stay there. 

Gin Stephens: That's really my whole journey to when I gained all that weight. It was really I had been taking the doctor prescribed diet pills off and one to maintain my weight for several years and maintaining no problem. I wasn't taking them every single day of my life. There were periods of time when I would take them and then not take them. But as I took them from the doctor, like I said, but then I changed my birth control and then all of a sudden, I gained the first 10 pounds, but I was still doing the diet pills, and not changing what I was eating. Then, shortly after that I was like, "Well, I got to stop taking these diet pills. These are awful for me." I feel terrible. But then the weight gain just escalated. The weight gain began just from when I changed my birth control. There're just so many factors in there, it was hard to know. 

We also moved and so that was another reason why I stopped taking the diet pills, because I didn't have the same doctor anymore. I don't know. I've never really made that connection, but that was a big part of it. I'm sure I could have gotten them, and we had been living in Carrollton, and then I moved to Augusta. I'm sure I could have gotten them somewhere in Augusta, but I was like, "Well, we've moved, and I don't have any more, and I don't like the way I feel. So, I'm going to stop now."

Melanie Avalon: I went on birth control in high school for acne. Relatively, rapidly to my life gained a decent amount of weight pretty fast, but you don't really like, you're not expecting it. Because you're not doing anything different besides the medication. 

Gin Stephens: Well, see, I had been on birth control. I had two children, I didn't want to have any more at that point I didn't think, but I was on birth control regularly, but then I just switched to a new one. That's when my weight started picking up. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. All righty, well, let us know, Shay. 

Gin Stephens: We have a question from Gin and the subject is: "bone broth collagen peptide timing, serrapeptase timing." She says, "Hi, ladies. Love the podcast, and all the great information, and recommendations you both have shared over the years. A bit about me. I've always been normal BMI and have been doing one meal a day IF with clean fasting for about two years now, typically, around 20 to 22 hours of fasting with a three-hour eating window. I'll also usually do a 40 to 44-hour fasts about once a week with a longer eating window the next day." As you want to pop in there, Gin, we recommend make sure you have what we would call an up day. I know you said a longer eating window. The recommendation is at least six to eight hours with at least two meals. Three meals would also be fine. All right, so, she said, "I'm omnivorous and typically eat a more wholefood-based diet, but still enjoy some processed snacky type foods and desserts. 

My first question is about opening my window with collagen peptides or bone broth with my one-meal-a-day lifestyle. How long after collagen peptides or bone broth should I wait before eating my actual meal? Melanie has mentioned multiple times how breaking the fast with collagen peptides or bone broth can be very nourishing, especially since the gut has been rested and is primed and ready to receive these rich nutrients. That makes sense to me especially since I've heard how collagen can possibly help heal leaky gut. Of note, I don't have any digestive issues that I'm aware of and can eat pretty much anything comfortably, though my gut microbiome was rated as bad when I took the ZOE test. I want to maximize the benefits of opening my window with collagen peptides or bone broth and don't want to rush the process, but I also don't want to extend my eating window longer than necessary. Not because I'm trying to restrict my window, but because if I wait too long, I find I'm too full to eat as much of the actual solid food I was looking forward to having and/or I finished eating too late in the day and end up uncomfortable sleeping poorly and feeling sluggish the next day. I find I just naturally want to stop eating for the day after about three hours."

Melanie Avalon: All right, so that is a great first question. I love, love, love having bone broth on an empty stomach as a way to open your fast because like Gin said, bone broth is really, really rich in collagen and amino acids that can directly really help heal your gut lining. Actually, today's episode, we have Beauty & the Broth as one of the sponsors. That company makes wonderful concentrated bone broth, so you reconstitute it with water. We do have a coupon code. If you go to melanieavalon.com/broth and use the coupon code MELANIEAVALON, you can get a discount, and you can listen to the ad about it to learn more about their practices. But it's organic, free of added salt, which is really, really hard to find and it's just delicious. I don't know if it's out yet, but she's launching a mushroom vegan version soon, which is exciting. Again, that one's not going to be as rich in the nutrients for healing the gut lining with bone broth. 

That to say, I don't think there's a scientific answer to this question. I will just say anecdotally for me what I do is, I typically when I am opening it with a broth, you know how if you have a liquid meal, or a soup, or something, I think it's just intuitive how long you might need to wait before eating. You're not going to like chug a whole thing of liquid, and then want to eat right away with that dilution of your digestive juices, and HCl, and things like that. When I was doing it, I usually would just have some and then probably, because I tend to do it while I'm making the dinner, I'd be sipping on it. By the time I actually eat, it's probably about 15 minutes later, 20 minutes later. I like to think about it, like, if you were at a restaurant, you're having a soup course to start your meal. 

Basically, I wouldn't stress about it too much. I would just have it probably minimum 10 minutes, again there's nothing scientific behind that, just intuitively what feels best. Then, that all said, I would not sacrifice because you talked about how if you eat too long or if your window doesn't end up being around three hours that it can interfere with your sleep and feeling sluggish. So, depending on your schedule and that night and what's happening, I would choose the overall eating window timing honoring your sleep rather than stressing about the amount of time after the bone broth. You're going to get the nutrients either way. It's not if you don't have it to open your window and you have it with your window that you're not going to get the benefits, you're still going to get the benefits. Basically, I would have it, maybe wait 10 minutes, maybe a little bit longer, but I would honor the overall eating window and how it aligns with your sleep most importantly. 

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Gin Stephens: All right, so we have the second part of her question, and it says, "somewhat related, I started taking the Avalon X serrapeptase supplement about a month ago." Congrats, Melanie. "I don't have a specific goal in mind, though, I'm hoping it will help with some scar tissue I have. The directions say to take it on an empty stomach. Number one, how far in the fasted state do I need to wait until I can take it? And two, how long after taking it should I wait before opening my eating window? As with the collagen peptides or bone broth, I want to maximize the benefits of serrapeptase. Would it be reasonable to take it at bedtime about five to six hours into my fast, but wouldn't I still be in the fed state? Since serrapeptase somewhat mimics autophagy, I imagine I also want to wait a good while after taking it before I break my fast, so it can work. Its magic. Thank you, ladies. I appreciate the time you both take for your listeners," Gin.

Melanie Avalon: All right, Gin. Wonderful questions. I have answers for you. The serrapeptase for listeners, who are not familiar, it is a supplement created by the Japanese silkworm, but now we culture it in a lab. It is vegan. When you take it in the fasted state, which I will elaborate on for Gin's question, it goes into your bloodstream and it can break down problematic proteins that your body may be reacting to. It can really help with things like allergies, and inflammation, and brain fog. It's amazing for that. Then studies have shown that it can help enhance wound healing, actually reduce cholesterol, break down amyloid plaque, do so many things. As far as when to take it, she mentioned that it somewhat mimics autophagy. Autophagy is a process that happens in our body during the fasted state. It actually happens 24/7, but it's ramped up in the fasted state. When our body starts breaking down old and problematic proteins in our body to recycle, and reuse, and just clean up shop, the thing about autophagy is like a concept that our body is engaging in is it is influenced by-- 

If we're eating, that's going to ramp down autophagy, if we're fasting, it's going to ramp it up, if we exercise, it ramps it up, coffee can ramp it up. There are signals that turn it up and down. The way that's different from serrapeptase, once you get the serrapeptase enzyme into your system, it's not ramping up and down as activity based on other signals. It's just doing what it's doing because it's an actual enzyme doing stuff compared to your body deciding to do autophagy if that makes sense. Now, getting it into the bloodstream is why there are so many things you need to follow to take it to make sure that happens, because it is a proteolytic enzyme breaking down proteins. If you have it, it's absorbed in the small intestine, not the gut. It passes through your stomach into the small intestine, which by the way, this is a reason. The serrapeptase is on the market have to have some enteric coating or some sort of protection of the serrapeptase to make sure that it reaches the intestine. If the capsule opens in your stomach, it'll just get degraded. It's actually pretty sensitive enzyme. If it opens in your stomach, you won't get it in your body because it won't make it into your bloodstream. So, it's got to make it to your small intestine. 

We've done some tests where we have ordered a lot of our competitor brands and put them in capsules of vinegar, because vinegar mimics the condition of your stomach. Many other brands, they open up really fast, which means they're not even getting to your small intestine. Ours does, which is amazing. All of that to say, if you have it when you have lots of food and in the small intestine, the serrapeptase enzyme can open up in the small intestine, and then instead of making it across your gut lining into your bloodstream, the enzymes will break down the food, the protein, and they won't be active to happen in your body. That's why they need to be taken in a very fasted state. The recommendation is to take it in the morning because then your fasted probably at least eight hours. The more fasted you are when you take it likely the better. But the good thing is, there's less of that window on the other side, because you just need it to be before the food, not after. 

It's not like you take it and then you need to fast five more hours to get the effects. You just need to take it on empty stomach, so that it gets into your body. Then once it's in your bloodstream, it's not getting affected by what you're eating. All of that to say, I would recommend taking it in the morning. If you're only taking one and you want to up your dose, I would-- rather than taking it again later, I would try just upping your dose in the morning. But you could try taking it later as well, especially if it is at bedtime, you've been fasted five or six hours, that might be enough time, so that if you wanted to be having a higher dose, you could try that as well, but morning is probably what works best for most people.

Gin Stephens: All right, yep, [laughs] I don't know how to add anything to that. When I took serrapeptase in the past or when I've taken it, I would just take it first thing in the morning after brushing my teeth and then I don't have to think about it. Habit stacking, put things in together, then you won't forget. Brush my teeth, took my serrapeptase, moved on. That was how I did it. Then it was so far away from any eating that I knew it wasn't going to be a problem, perfect.

Melanie Avalon: Of course, to get my serrapeptase, it is at avalonx.us. You can also get on my email list for the whole Avalon X brand, because I will be releasing a magnesium soon. Super exciting. That email list is at melanieavalon.com/avalonx.

Gin Stephens: Well, I'd love to try your magnesium when it comes out.

Melanie Avalon: I know. I will send it to you. 

Gin Stephens: I would love it. [laughs] 

Melanie Avalon: I want to try it. 

Gin Stephens: Yeah. 

Melanie Avalon: It's very exciting to be in the final steps of formulating and all of that. 

Gin Stephens: Definitely. It seems like now it's going a lot quicker than the first one did, because now you know what you're doing. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, quick point to that and this relates to the serrapeptase question. I was so, so committed to finding a filler lubrication option for my supplements that's not toxic or even potentially toxic, because what I realized, I think people have an idea that magnesium stearates, they're cautious about them, but there's a lot of "fillers" that they make it look like it's something else. They make it look like it's vitamin C, but really, it's vitamin C like a palmitate. It's basically like a stearate, a fatty acid ester of these different things or calcium. They do with calcium. They try to make it look like, "Oh, it's calcium that's added, oh, it's vitamin C, when really it's basically a stearate or palmitate." Some supplements don't require any fillers, which is great, but some do. 

That's why we came up with this MCT production process. It's a very, very, very small amount. There's a lot of studies on helping absorption of certain things, especially if they're in a liposomal format or-- actually some specifically say with MCTs. It's not liposomal, but it is more emulsified. I know I'm using a lot of supplement words. But the point of it is that we had to develop a whole production process to create this. That was a big hurdle for the first one, but now that we have that in place, we can use that for my other supplements if it requires it. It's definitely an easier step, and yeah, we have more of the parameters down, and working with the formulation, [unintelligible [01:02:54]. So, it's all been really, really wonderful.

Gin Stephens: I'm glad. 

Melanie Avalon: I'm learning so much. 

Gin Stephens: Yeah. It's fun to create things. It's all just a very exciting process to accomplish new things that you haven't done before. It's fun to watch you doing something that I have no desire to do. I told Chad, I was like, "I'm never going to have a supplement." He's like, "What?" Because he's a medicinal chemist, drug design is his-- [laughs] Honestly, if I said, "Chad, I'd like to start developing supplements," he would probably get super excited. But I don't have any desire to. So, I'm not going to, but you can be the supplement guru, [laughs] and I'll just take the ones of yours that I want, and that'll be good. I'll know that they're good, because you designed them, but I don't have to do my own.

Melanie Avalon: I'm so excited to just eventually make everything that I take currently, because then I will just feel so good about taking it. Because I know what's in it. I put it there. I wish there was a way to get rid of, I don't know, I feel there's such a stigma surrounding supplements, because the industry is so unregulated and often scammy, and I don't want to be associated with any of that. But I'm trying to change that in any case.

Gin Stephens: Well, I'm glad, because I think it is important to have good stuff going on. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, that's what people are putting into their bodies. 

Gin Stephens: You'll never sell yours on Amazon or will you?

Melanie Avalon: I'm not sure that. It's funny because I have a lot of friends in the supplement world and I get advice different ways based on that. Some have told me, "Oh, it's the best thing ever." Some have told me, "No, don't do it." We haven't talked about it recently with my partner but I'm not sure.

Gin Stephens: Well, I just know here's a story of a well-known supplement brand that we have endorsed before [laughs] and I still do, and I take their magnesium. Let me just put it that way. A friend of mine uses their magnesium, and instead of ordering it directly from them, decided to order it from Amazon, but she got a copycat that was not them that was pretending to be them, but wasn't. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, wow. Really? 

Gin Stephens: Yeah. You know how I feel about buying supplements on Amazon?

Melanie Avalon: I noticed they were on Amazon and then I'm like not, were they ever legitimately on?

Gin Stephens: I don't know. I don't know if they ever were, but she was like, "Oh, I found it on Amazon and it was less expensive, because it was the free shipping with Prime or something." But then, it was not really them. It was a copycat knockoff. She thought she was getting their brand of magnesium, but it wasn't.

Melanie Avalon: A benefit to not being on Amazon is you can say, I'm not on Amazon. So, if you're buying it on Amazon, it's not me. 

Gin Stephens: Well, exactly. That is a good point. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. It's so nice to have one source.

Gin Stephens: You could actually say, "I don't sell it on Amazon, because I'm concerned that you might get a counterfeit, because you could." That's the thing because what I learned about the way the buy box works, and the way that whoever selling it for the cheapest price, if they were wanted to buy Delay, Don't Deny from Bob's booksellers, if Bob was selling it for $5, it would pop it in the buy box, and they would get Bob's booksellers counterfeit version, not the real one. For months-- we know back in what was it 2018, for months when I noticed my sales were way down, and it was crazy, and I couldn't understand why until I realized what was happening, but people were just clicking "Add to Cart," and they were getting the counterfeit, literally, a counterfeit version. With supplements, if that happened, you would be devastated that people are getting a counterfeit version. You'd have to look at it every single day, multiple times of the day, because see who's in the buy box. 

Melanie Avalon: Wow, I hadn't really thought about it to that extent. 

Gin Stephens: I like to put everything through the lens of, what if a counterfeiter stole the buy box? 

Melanie Avalon: That would be really awful. 

Gin Stephens: Exactly. And also, two or three times, one of those crazy Fast. Feast. Repeat. cookbook books that if you go look Fast. Feast. Repeat. on Amazon, there's a Fast. Feast. Repeat. cookbook or something. It's obviously not by me, it might be by Stephen Gin or [laughs] something crazy. You can't copyright a title. They have some crazy book that's just a blank book or something and you're charging $9.99 for it. But more than one time, that book has gotten linked to mine on Amazon. People are thinking they're buying Fast. Feast. Repeat. and it's that crazy one linked to mine. We've had to have it unlinked. It's not exactly the same thing, because it's not a counterfeit, but you know how when you go to a book, and it has the audible version, and the Kindle version, and the paperback version? You can click on the different versions, one of the versions was that crazy one that had gotten linked to mine, because it had the same title. There're just so many things you have to be careful of on Amazon.

Melanie Avalon: I don't know, but I wonder if my supplement being in a glass bottle with slightly deter counterfeit people, because it would be a little bit harder to counterfeit. 

Gin Stephens: Maybe. 

Melanie Avalon: That's another thing that really sets our line apart. It's hard to find supplements in glass bottles, but yes, all very good points. Things I will think about. Thank you.

Gin Stephens: You got to think about that. What if someone counterfeited it, and it got in your buy box, and people were thinking they were getting yours, but they got the other one, then they're going to try to return it to you, then what do you do? You're like, "Well, I don't have a record of selling it to you." But they're like, "Here it is." It would just be so many can of worms. I would like to be able to say that Amazon is a perfectly great place to buy things and you don't have to worry about all that. But I think Amazon could do a better job, frankly. And I love Amazon. I love Amazon. So, anyone from Amazon who's listening, I'm not criticizing you, I'm just saying you could do better and shoot. I'd be on a committee for free to help you do better. I'm a teacher, I could be on a committee. [laughs] I will give you advice on how to make it better. That's all I have to say about that. They could totally make it better.

Melanie Avalon: It's like one of my best friends from college and I, we wanted to have a little committee, it'll be both of us, and we want final approval or we want final checks on all of the Disney films that come out because we can tell you if this Disney film was going to do too well or not. 

Gin Stephens: That's so funny. You're going to be on their advisory committee. 

Melanie Avalon: Yes, like, I promise you, I can help you. 

Gin Stephens: Right. Well, that's me. Amazon, I can help you. I can help you with how to clean up your book section. For example, Fast. Feast. Repeat. is a New York Times bestseller. So, to have a freaky version Fast. Feast. Repeat. blank cookbook published by Stephen Gin makes your site look trashy, Amazon. I'm sorry, but it does. Do you agree with that, Melanie? It's a self-published book. I could right this minute go to Amazon and put up some blank book that I run through their self-publishing arm and sell it in five minutes. You just have to have a cover design, you put it up, you call it a blank cookbook or whatever, bam, it's out there. I could make a book called What When Wine, blank journal, give myself a pseudonym, and sell it. But Amazon should have a quality control. They're like, "Oh, ooh, red flag. There's a real book called What When Wine. That's actually a real book. This is clearly trying to copycat on that." I think that would be a very easy thing to do to fix that problem. 

Melanie Avalon: I agree. 

Gin Stephens: I've actually had people email me and say, "I bought Fast. Feast. Repeat. on Amazon, and it came, and it was blank. Is it supposed to be blank?" I'm like, "No, it's not supposed to be blank. You bought the cookbook, didn't you? The cookbook or whatever." I would not put a book like that out there in the world. Anyway, Amazon could fix it.

Melanie Avalon: Well, Amazon, if you'd like to email questions@ifpodcast.com. 

Gin Stephens: [laughs] You could just email me directly at gin@ifpodcast.com. I would just love to help them, because I have so much love for Amazon in the point that they-- I wouldn't have had a book if it wasn't for their self-publishing. I think their self-publishing is amazing and it changed my life. I love Amazon for that and being able to get Delay, Don't Deny out into the world, no publisher would have let me publish that. It was only because I could self-publish it, and I was able to get it out there, and Amazon allowed me to do that at no charge. But I hate to see Amazon tarnished by the fraud that's going on and I know they could they could spot, especially just if we only talk about within the self-publishing part. If they just had a little more quality control about what gets out there, it would make such a difference. There was one book one time it was some kind of Intermittent Fasting book and it was by Gin Fung. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. 

Gin Stephens: Okay. Gin Fung is not a person. [laughs] That's all I had to say about that.

Melanie Avalon: In any case, the show notes for today's episode will be at ifpodcast.com/episode254. If you would like to submit your own questions for the show or deliver feedback, you can email questions@ifpodcast.com, where you can go to ifpodcast.com and you can submit questions there. You can follow us on Instagram. I am @melanieavalon, Gin is @ginstephens, and yes, I think that is everything. Anything from you, Gin, before we go? 

Gin Stephens: No, I think that's it. 

Melanie Avalon: All righty, well, this has been absolutely wonderful and I will talk to you next week. 

Gin Stephens: All right, talk to you then. Bye.

Melanie Avalon: Bye.

Thank you so much for listening to the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. Please remember, everything we discussed on this show does not constitute medical advice. We're not doctors. If you enjoyed the show, please consider writing your 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, transcripts by SpeechDocs, theme music by Leland Cox. See you next week.

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TRANSCRIPT

Melanie Avalon: Welcome to Episode 207 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, author of What When Wine: Lose Weight and Feel Great with Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, and Wine. And I’m here with my cohost, Gin Stephens, author of Delay, Don't Deny: Living an Intermittent Fasting Lifestyle. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and ginstephens.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this podcast do not constitute medical advice or treatment. So, pour yourself a cup of black coffee, a mug of tea or even a glass of wine, if it's that time, and get ready for The Intermittent Fasting Podcast.

Hi friends, Gin and I talk about the importance of gut health all the time on this show. You guys know we are obsessed with the gut microbiome. There's also a lot of confusion out there surrounding probiotics. There are so many different probiotics. It can be so hard to know what to take. I personally have actually experimented with a lot of probiotics over the years. A lot. You guys know me. Did you know there's only one probiotic that I have consistently taken almost every single day, since I found it? It's a nonnegotiable. I see, such radical improvements in my gut health, when I take this probiotic, and it's not just me, you guys, and my audience tell me all the time about how you feel this way as well. That is P3-OM. What is P3-OM? It's a patented probiotic that actually eats up excess sugar, eliminates bad bacteria fast, and protects your gut from inflammation and viruses. What initially made me so intrigued by this probiotic is that it is proteolytic meaning it can actually digest protein. I even saw a video on the BiOptimizers website of the probiotic digesting a steak. Yes, a steak.

P3-OM has also been shown to improve digestion, speed up metabolism, and increase energy throughout the day. What also makes it unique is that it can survive the gastrointestinal tract, and it goes through your whole body to support both your gut and your entire immune response. It's a secret weapon for reducing or eliminating bad gas and upgrading your immunity and protection against bad bacteria. It's personally one of my go-to tools in my biohacking arsenal. I have some fantastic news for you guys. You can get 10% off P3-OM right now, when you go to p3om.com/ifpodcast and type in the coupon code, IFPODCAST10. By the way, if you order it and it's not everything you hoped for, the BiOptimizers support team will give you all your money back, no questions asked. To get that discount, just go to p3om.com/ifpodcast to get a 10% discount on one of my favorite probiotics P3-OM with the coupon code, IFPODCAST10. We'll put all this information in the show notes. One more thing before we jump in.

Are you concerned about aging? Well, thankfully, fasting is super incredible for its anti-aging benefits. It activates genes in your body called sirtuins, which repair your body and help extend lifespan. Also, during the fast, your body can clean up a lot of harmful chemicals which may be taxing your detoxification systems. In fact, the reason people go gray is because their detox systems start producing a lot of hydrogen peroxide when dealing with toxins. Do you know where a lot of those chemicals come from? Your skincare and makeup. As it turns out, there are thousands of compounds found in conventional skincare and makeup that Europe has banned due to their toxic nature and the US has banned less than 10. When you put these on your skin every single day through your skincare and makeup, you're adding to your body's burden and likely aging your skin faster.

Thankfully, you can easily clean up your skincare with a company called Beautycounter. They make incredible products that are extensively tested to be safe for your skin. You can feel good about every single ingredient that you put on. They also have an amazing anti-aging line called Countertime. Friends, this is a game-changer. It's full of active ingredients which nourish and support your skin, reduce fine lines and wrinkles, and support a beautiful glow. It also has a safe alternative to retinol, so you can get all of the anti-aging benefits of retinol without any of the toxic effects of retinol, because yes, that stuff is toxic. Guys, put it away now.

You can shop with us at melanieavalon.com/beautycounter. If you use that link, something really special and magical might happen after you place your first order. Also definitely get on my clean beauty email list that's at melanieavalon.com/cleanbeauty. I give away so many free things on that list. So definitely check it out.

Lastly, if you anticipate making safe skincare a part of your future, just like Gin and I do, definitely become a Band of Beauty member. It's sort of like the Amazon Prime for safe skincare. You get 10% back on all of your purchases, free shipping on qualifying orders, and a welcome gift, that costs way more than the price of the membership. It's completely worth it. Friends, are you fasting clean inside and out? You can with Beautycounter. Again, that link is melanieavalon.com/beautycounter. And we'll put all this information in the show notes. All right, now back to the show.

Hi, everybody and welcome. This is Episode number 207 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I’m Melanie Avalon, and I’m here with Gin Stephens.

Gin Stephens: Hi, everybody.

Melanie Avalon: How are you today, Gin?

Gin Stephens: I am worn out. I am riding high on a bunch of emotions, good emotions, scary emotions, all sorts of emotions.

Melanie Avalon: That's good.

Gin Stephens: [laughs] Do you want me to elaborate a little bit?

Melanie Avalon: Yes, would you like to elaborate?

Gin Stephens: Well, we're recording this in mid-March. Yesterday, I finally announced to the public in the advanced group on Facebook, the project that I’m working on since the beginning of the year, and that was, I have launched Delay, Don’t Deny social network off of Facebook. It's a membership-based platform. Yes, members do need to pay to join. It's $4.99 a month. If you, what's the word, amortize your membership, it's $59.95 a year, and you join and that works out to $4.99 a month, if you join for the year as a founding member. Yes, it's a membership site. Now, we're all together, I have all the spinoff groups going on. It's hard to explain. I was letting people start spinoff groups. We had one spinoff group over there, and another spin off group over there, and I felt like I was losing touch with the community. Does that make sense?

Melanie Avalon: Mm-hmm.

Gin Stephens: I didn't have time to manage-- Facebook takes a lot to manage groups. You have membership requests, you have posts to approve, you have people coming in, they don't know who you are, why they're there. It takes a lot of work to manage it. We've got over 100 groups on the new platform. The address is dddsocialnetwork.com. DDD for Delay, Don’t-Deny. dddsocialnetwork.com. Like I said, we have over 100 groups, and they're not all intermittent fasting. We've got groups for different fasting styles, one meal a day, alternate daily fasting, the hybrid approach, but we also have a paleo group, Melanie. We have a vegetarian group. No matter how anybody eats, we've got a group for it. We've got hobbies, we've got different exercise styles. We've got a group for people who are interested in starting podcasts and writers, because a lot of people in my community have started podcasts and written books, which is one of the things, I’m a teacher, nothing makes me prouder than seeing other people create content. Does that make sense? Like inspired, they're like, “Well, Gin did a podcast, I can do a podcast,” or, “Gin wrote a book and self-published it. Melanie wrote a book and self-published it, and I can do that too.”

I feel like in a way the Delay, Don’t Deny community has been an incubator for some of these amazing people that I've connected with in the groups. Graeme Currie, he's got a great podcast called The Fasting Highway, and he started off just in my group. He's written a book. He's from Australia. We'll have a group for people who want to do stuff like that, so they can connect and talk about platforms and the process. We even have a group about dogs and cats if you're a pet lover. [laughs] The tag line is we want to be your favorite social network, because we really do. We were on Facebook, we've been on it for so long, but it's gotten a little harder to navigate, and the artificial intelligence has gotten a little weird lately. Like over Christmas in the Life Lessons group, we had some weird, we got something that Facebook was like, “This post does not-- it goes against community standards. Please review it.” I’m like, “Oh, my God, that sounds so scary.” I went to review it, it was covered up with a mask and how Facebook will cover something. Have you ever seen that?

Melanie Avalon: No.

Gin Stephens: Well, if they think it might be questionable, they're like, “Click on it on your own risk.” I’m like, “What was someone trying to post?” I clicked on it to see what it was that was so questionable and objectionable. It was a Christmas bow tutorial.

Melanie Avalon: That’s strange.

Gin Stephens: The artificial intelligence called it drug paraphernalia, but it was bows made of raffia. The artificial intelligence is also picking up on certain words as hate speech and bullying, like one of the moderators got put in Facebook Jail for clicking on something incorrectly, and then she said, “Oops, I apologize. I must have fat thumbs.” They put on Facebook Jail and said it was hate speech. Clearly, it wasn't, fat thumbs is a saying.

Melanie Avalon: I didn't know there was a Facebook Jail.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, I've been In Facebook Jail before. I liked too many things too quickly?

Melanie Avalon: Okay, yes.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, the artificial intelligence--

Melanie Avalon: I've commented too much before.

Gin Stephens: Yes, the artificial intelligence looks for people who are doing things too rapidly. You have to take things slowly on Facebook. So, ever since then if I'd make a post and 100 people comment, I just want to go like, like, like, like, like, no, you cannot do that. I lost the ability to post for 24 hours, when I was in Facebook Jail that time. [laughs]

Melanie Avalon: It's weird when it happens in your own group, like it's your group, because it's done that to me, I’m like, “Wait, but this is my group. I should be able to post whenever I want.”

Gin Stephens: You can't though. It's just a million little things like that. You hear stories. My friend Sheri that does the Life Lessons podcast with me. She has a friend, who was running a cooking group. It had like 10,000 members, was a cooking group. She woke up one morning, and her cooking group had been removed from Facebook, and she had been blocked from Facebook, like her account was deactivated, based on something that had happened in the cooking group overnight. I realized that we're at the whim of a platform. Now, I’m not knocking Facebook, because we have enjoyed being there for years and it has helped us grow this wonderful community. I will always have love for that platform, and what it allowed us to build. But at the same time, that terrified me that, I have that one group, the 300,000 plus member group that if something went really terribly wrong-

Melanie Avalon: Right, it could just disappear.

Gin Stephens: -it could disappear and I wouldn't be able to contact those 300,000 people at all. I don't have their email addresses, I don't know, would they ever find me again? I don't know. I’m one of those worst-case scenario people, like what could go wrong, always think about that. I’m like. “I don't want to lose this community that I've built.” We started the new platform, launched it yesterday-- Yeah, there's been some positives and some growing pains with it, not everyone was thrilled that I was starting a membership site, because people say-- well, rightly so, intermittent fasting is free and intermittent fasting continues to be free. However, starting a paid platform is very, very expensive, and Facebook is free, but why is it free?

Melanie Avalon: Ads.

Gin Stephens: It's got ads, they're selling you data, you're the product honestly. If you're on Facebook, you're the product and I’ve been okay with that for myself personally for all these years knowing that Facebook was looking at my data, and whatever, showing me ads, I lived with that for the free platform. But for me to have a platform, it is most certainly not free, because I’m not going to be selling your data and showing you ads, and there's a lot of costs involved in it, so it has to be paid. Anyway, I’m sad about any pushback, because I just made this fabulous community and I want everyone to be like, “Oh my God, I love it.” [laughs] So far, positive people are in there. We've got almost 1000 members on day two. It's just so exciting watching people find their community. Also, some of people that I know that had left Facebook for whatever reason, one of my trusted moderators who I love so much, he's a comedian, people may remember him, John McDonald from the Intermittent Fasting Stories Podcast. He left Facebook completely for personal reasons with his family, but he's joined the new platform. It's so good to reconnect with people that I had lost touch with, it feels amazing.

Melanie Avalon: I made a profile. I’m going to come in.

Gin Stephens: Well, people are waiting for you, because we made a Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast group.

Melanie Avalon: Group.

Gin Stephens: Yes. There's a group that you're in.

Melanie Avalon: Are there people in it?

Gin Stephens: Yeah, you want to know how many members are in, I can tell you right now.

Melanie Avalon: How many?

Gin Stephens: How many people have joined it? Hold on, I got to pull up the-- We're also going to have an app. The app is not out yet. Right now, I'm on my iPhone looking at it. Let's see Melanie. but right now, it's pretty easy to use in mobile on the iPhone. Melanie Avalon, you've got 63 members.

Melanie Avalon: Oh. Okay, now I am very much alert. I mean I was already alert, but let me go see.

Gin Stephens: Let’s see how many are on the Intermittent-- we have an Intermittent Fasting podcast group. Let me search for that one. Anyway, what I’m saying is, I’m certain that we probably have listeners, who are not on Facebook for whatever reason. Not everybody's on Facebook. My sister for example never joined Facebook ever, like ever, in her whole entire life never joined Facebook. From day one, she's like, “For some reason, I don't like that,” so she didn't join. People, that just never joined or didn't want to, we have a place for you now. We have 77 members right now in the Intermittent Fasting Podcast group. We can all get together there, and we also have something called the Podcast Enthusiasts Lounge, where you can go and talk about any podcast you want. If you say, “Oops, fat thumbs, I didn't mean to click that,” we don't even care. If you like things really quickly, go for it, like them as fast as you want.

Melanie Avalon: It's very exciting. Congratulations.

Gin Stephens: It is very exciting. Thank you. I didn't sleep last night, I tossed and turned, I thought, “Have I ruined-- Did I mess up? Is this wrong?” Like I said, I’m very much a people pleaser. I want to do things that make people happy. I’m like, “Look what I created for you. Aren't y'all excited?” “No, no, we're not excited. We hate it. Don't create this thing.” Anyway, ah, now I can take a breath, and the people that are there are very happy to be there, and the people who don't want to join, don't have to join. That's the thing,

Melanie Avalon: Listeners, friends, you can all join, we can put links to it in the show notes. That's very exciting.

Gin Stephens: That'd be awesome. dddsocialnetwork.com. It is very exciting.

Melanie Avalon: I can't even imagine, the logistics and everything that you have to go through to do that, so it's very exciting.

Gin Stephens: Well, setting up those groups was a lot. We thought about what would someone want? What could people want? We actually had a little survey and like, “If you were wanting to join a group, what would you want it to be?” I didn't tell anybody what it was. We got the ideas from members, and then we thought of more just on our own. We've got about 55 moderators/facilitators in there, plus a whole lot of members growing by the minute. I’m just very excited, because I love community. That's really it. The whole reason I started this with my first Facebook group back in 2015, before I'd even written a book, I didn't have a master plan, I’m going to write books, I’m going to have podcasts. No. I started a community, and that was the whole point of it. That's what I’m doing here. Everybody, you're welcome to join my community, I'd love to have you or don't join the community. Intermittent Fasting is still free. If you want to be with us on the platform, join us. I’m not closing down the Facebook groups, though I am going to be very busy with the new platform. The Facebook groups are still going. If you're a member, I’m not going to lock you out. [laughs]

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I was going to ask you that if you're keeping--

Gin Stephens: I might not answer all as much, because I’m going to be on this new place, because these people have joined and I can just take a deep breath, I don't have to approve posts, I don't have to approve members. You just join, there you are, you can do what you want, you can come and go. You can join 100 groups if you want to.

Melanie Avalon: That's exciting.

Gin Stephens: It is very exciting. You don't have to see what you don't want to see. In the advanced group, we've been talking a lot about Zoe, the Zoe app with the personalized nutrition and the gut microbiome testing and the CGM. Some people don't want to see that. They're like, “I’m really frustrated seeing all this talk about Zoe, because I just want to keep it simple.” Well, now you don't have to see it. You don't go to the Zoe group, but we have a Zoe group for people who do.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, that makes sense.

Gin Stephens: It does. I think it's nice. I’m so excited. Scared, yes, and excited. All the feels. I have all the feels. I have cried, I have laughed, I have cheered. I didn't sleep at all last night.

Melanie Avalon: Another reason, you know what happened last night?

Gin Stephens: The time change?

Melanie Avalon: Yes. That's when you realize you really are a night person. When you don't know the time change is going to happen, and then you get really confused, because all of a sudden, I was like, “Wow, that hour went by so fast.”

Gin Stephens: Oh, because you were awake?

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I looked at the clock and it was 3:00, I was like, “What happened?” [laughs] Yeah, not a fan.

Gin Stephens: I really tossed and turn, because I started having doubts. Do you ever do that? Do you have doubts? I’m like lying on the bed, we had 400 and something members join yesterday, and I was having these doubts. I was like, “What have I done? What if everyone hates it? What if no one is there?” Anyway, but I woke up today, got refreshed, and I started reading what people had been posting, and seeing how they were joining the groups, and everyone was excited, and then people were coming in that I hadn't seen in a long time. It felt like a big party, that I’m like, “Okay, now I can relax,” except I had this book deadline. Why did I do this at the same time that I have a book deadline? I don't know, I might be crazy.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I have no comment. That was some [laughs] interesting choice of timing.

Gin Stephens: Well, all of a sudden, I had that thought in my head that something could happen to my group. I was panicked. I was like, “I got to protect these groups,” so that move to the front burner. Honestly, I really was like, “I've got to do this now,” because it's too late. If I don't, and then something happened, something's probably not going to happen. I know that it probably won't, but it could. Did you know they shut down a bunch of essential oil groups?

Melanie Avalon: Mm-hmm.

Gin Stephens: Like all in one fell swoop. One of my members was telling me about it. When somebody like, “Nobody's shutting down groups, unless they're bad, dangerous groups.” This girl was like, “Well, I was on a bunch of essential oil groups, and they all got shut down because Facebook decided essential oils were dangerous,” and maybe they are, if you use them incorrectly, but isn't fasting, kind of like that, too? Couldn't fasting be dangerous if you use it incorrectly?

Melanie Avalon: Mm-hmm.

Gin Stephens: The answer is yes. Google restricts what it shows you now when you search, it has chosen which health people they're going to show you in, which health people they're not going to show you based on certain criteria. I felt like we might have a tenuous existence on a platform, that we couldn't 100% count on tomorrow, I’m going to wake up and my groups are going to be there. I’m 99.99% sure tomorrow I’m going to wake up and my groups will be there. But once I had in my mind that maybe they wouldn't be, I’m sure the essential oil people didn't know they were all going to be gone. It's almost like I wish they had told them, “Hey, we're going to remove your groups and one month, you have one month to figure something else out,” that would have been a good thing. I would have-- if only.

Melanie Avalon: Actually, that reminds me of a fun little fact I learned by listening to a podcast.

Gin Stephens: What is that?

Melanie Avalon: Do you know what the difference is between fear and anxiety?

Gin Stephens: Well, no.

Melanie Avalon: As it relates to this conversation?

Gin Stephens: I can't wait to hear though, because I think I have felt fear and anxiety.

Melanie Avalon: Fear is when you are aware of something bad happening, and you have the fear response. Anxiety is not knowing what is going to happen, and having the response, but then it's like, chronic, because--

Gin Stephens: I did have both.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah.

Gin Stephens: I had fear because I saw people who were not happy with me. They were not happy that I would do this, and that really hurt my feelings, because I’m like, “Look, number one, it came from the place of, I don't want to lose our community, how am I going to keep that from happening, just in case,” but nobody's making anybody join it. I didn't click archive group on Facebook nearby, come over here. Didn't close the group. My wording may be when I announced it, gave people some things to worry about, because I said, “We're not sure the future of how these groups are going to work on Facebook,” because clearly, I’m one person. I can't be here and there and everywhere all over the place. [laughs] Sometimes, I have to eat, and sleep, and take a shower. We're not closing the groups down, but, yeah, I had fear from backlash, like I made a huge mistake. But then, I saw the love. There was so much love. This morning, I woke up to so much love and there's so much positivity surrounding the new community that I can just let the rest go. The fear is gone. I still have some anxiety, but no more fear.

Melanie Avalon: That is fabulous.

Gin Stephens: Yes. Anything new with you? I’m sorry. I just rambled for 18 minutes, but-- [laughs]

Melanie Avalon: The only thing is I never travel ever, and I travelled somewhere, and I lost my Oura ring.

Gin Stephens: Oh, no. 

Melanie Avalon: I’m so sad. I'm so sad. I did something that I never do, because I don't-- We talked about this. You like jewelry, right?

Gin Stephens: Yeah, I wear earrings every day, and I have on my wedding ring every day.

Melanie Avalon: Yes, I don't ever really wear jewelry. They have an Oura ring that has diamonds in it. I was like, “If I’m going to get one piece of nice jewelry that I wear every day of my life,” so I upgraded, and I got that.

Gin Stephens: Oh, no, and you lost it.

Melanie Avalon: No, I didn't lose that one. I lost the one I had. I decided to buy a new one, because--

Gin Stephens: I thought you upgraded to the really expensive one and then lost it.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, no, no, no, no, no. Oh, I would be crushed.

Gin Stephens: That's what I thought you did.

Melanie Avalon: They're already pretty expensive normally, but yes. I think listeners think we get all the things for free all the time, but we don't. I have to purchase things. But that's how much I love it. I was like, it's not a question I’m buying a new one right now, and then I realized, I really want the one with the diamonds. I learned don't wear it on your ring finger, because then you look married or it looks like a wedding ring.

Gin Stephens: I probably would agree with that. I mean, unless who cares? Why do you care if people think you're married, right? That could be a plus.

Melanie Avalon: True.

Gin Stephens: Keep in mind. I've been wearing a ring on my wedding ring finger since I was 21. It's been a long time. 30 years I've had this ring on my finger.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, my goodness. It's ironic. I lost it, and I actually interviewed the CEO, again for Part Two episode a few days later. I’m airing it very soon, because I wanted it to be timely. If listeners are interested in Oura ring and learning more, I'll put a link in the show notes to that second interview that I just did with him.

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Melanie Avalon: Shall we jump into everything fasting related?

Gin Stephens: Yes.

Melanie Avalon: To start things off, we have a question from Jamie. The subject is “Whoosh.” Jamie says, “When on average does someone, women get the whoosh effect, losing a bunch of weight at once, two weeks in and I've only lost one pound, where my husband has lost 17 pounds.”

Gin Stephens: All right. That's a great question. First of all, let's talk about what is the whoosh? We've talked about it before, but I want to talk about it again. The whoosh effect is when-- let's think about in our bodies biologically, we lose fat at a pretty slow rate, even if you're doing a complete fast, or you're eating nothing, your body probably is only going to lose about half a pound of fat a day max really for fat burning. Keep that in mind. That's like we're not usually losing about half a pound of fat a day with doing an intermittent fasting lifestyle. Let's say, you get on the scale and you don't see your weight change, you don't see your weight change, you don't see your weight change, you don't see your weight change, and then you get on one day and it's down five pounds. Did you just lose five pounds of fat overnight? No, you did not. You had a whoosh.

You had lost fat slowly, but something was hiding that fat loss. We were pretty sure that your body does something with water during the fat loss process, but not everybody has the same experience. Some people never whoosh. They just have a slow and steady down, down, down over time. They have this nice little graph, they're pretty linearly down. Most people don't, but some people do. Whereas someone who whooshes might look more like a stair step, where you have it's just the same, the same, the same, the same and then down. Then the same, the same, and same and then down, like that. I mean, you might zigzag up and down. I tended to have the pattern where I would go way down, and then I would go back up a little and stay there for a while, then I would go way down, then I would go up a little. Mine’s like the stock market's going down a little bit. Why does this happen?

As I said, we have the theory that it's something to do with water balance, because people will notice, maybe they have to get up in the middle the night to go to the bathroom a lot, and then the next morning they're lower. The water is coming from somewhere. There's one theory that I don't think is true, and that theory is that the body is actually putting water in your fat cells. I haven't been able to find any scientific basis for that, and I've heard scientists who are smarter about the body than me saying, “No, that's not what's happening.” Could they be wrong? Could that be what's happening? I don't know.

Melanie Avalon: One of the ones that sounded plausible to me was I think the glycerol. One thing I was reading online, his theory was that fat when we break it down, it breaks it down into glycerol. Is it fatty acids and glycerol? I think so. He says it takes a while for the body to process glycerol and glycerol attracts water.

Gin Stephens: Oh, that makes sense.

Melanie Avalon: It's like you burning the fat, you burn the fatty acid part of the fat-- and I might be wrong with a fatty acid is the other component, I think it is. Then the glycerol takes backlogs and as we process, in the meantime, it's stored with water or attracts water.

Gin Stephens: It's not happening in the fat cell, right?

Melanie Avalon: I’m not sure where the glycerol is?

Gin Stephens: Something's happening with water, we know that. [chuckles] It's somewhere. I also have talked about it before here, I have a hunch. It could be in your lymphatic system, which is the body's sewage system, because as you're clearing out a fat cell, fats not the only stuff that's in there, you've also got a lot of toxins and weird stuff that your body shoved in there. You shove junk under your bed, your body shoves junk into your fat cells when it doesn't know what else to do with it. Toxins do come out, and your body has all that going around in your lymphatic system, and then it can flush it out all at once. You may have puffy fingers, we've all experienced this, puffy ankles, your face might be puffy. That's water retention happening in your tissues, and then whoosh, you wake up and that's gone.

Jamie, not everyone gets a whoosh. Don't expect you're going to get one. But let's address the fact that you're two weeks in and you've only lost one pound. If you think back to the 28-Day FAST Start-- if you read Fast. Feast. Repeat, in the 28-Day FAST Start, I’m very, very emphatic about do not expect any weight loss for the first 28 days, because the first 28 days are the time for your body to adjust to the clean fast, and that's it, your body's not great at tapping into fat stores yet. It may lose a great deal of inflammation, like with your husband with 17 pounds in two weeks. He did not lose 17 pounds of fat in two weeks. I know that we would like to, we don't lose fat that quickly. But even if that's a lot of that's inflammation of water weight, 17 pounds is a lot of mass. Imagine how good it would feel to lose 17 pounds, whatever it is, water weight, inflammation, I know he feels better, but we don't lose fat that quickly.

Just understand that your body is doing what it's doing behind the scenes, and the scale doesn't always reflect that. The scale can go up because of water, it can go down because of water. It can go up if you're gaining fat, but it can go down if you're losing fat, but it can also stay the same while you're losing fat because you're also regaining water. The scale can really just confuse you.

Melanie Avalon: Yes, 100%. Did you read Gary Taubes, The Case for Keto?

Gin Stephens: No, I read Marty Kendall’s critique of it. I really like Marty Kendall. By the way, Marty, we talked about him on the podcast. I think that came out maybe last week, we're recording. It's several weeks ago in podcast world land, but in the real world, it was like last week. Marty listened and he was like, “Oh, thank y’all for talking about me.” Anyway.

Melanie Avalon: On our show?

Gin Stephens: Yeah, when we talked about Marty Kendall and his Optimising Nutrition site, but I read Marty Kendall’s blog post about The Case for Keto.

Melanie Avalon: I finished his book about it. So good. So good. I'm like three fourths of the way through, Gary Taubes.

Gin Stephens: He's coming on your podcast, right?

Melanie Avalon: Mm-hmm. I’m so excited. I want to air them back-to-back, like air Marty's and Gary's. I don't know what order I put them-- I guess it depends how that conversation goes.

Gin Stephens: I’m going to tell you Marty Kendall is brilliant, and you would think by reading-- he has a book called Keto Myths or something. You would think by reading the title of whatever, I can't remember the name of--

Melanie Avalon: Big Fat Keto Lies.

Gin Stephens: Yes, Big Fat Keto Lies, you would think by reading it, he was anti-keto, and he's not. He is busting some keto myths, like if you're having trouble losing fat, eat a lot more fat. He's saying some things that need to be heard in the keto community. I actually think some people are listening. One of the big guys, I can't remember which one of my moderators showed me one of the big keto people, might have been the Diet Doctor guy, the guy who runs Diet Doctor. He was somebody really big, well known. I just can't remember, my brain is full. Made some post, I don’t know if it was a tweet, I don't know where it was, but she showed me a screenshot of it, where he said that, he had lowered his fat intake or something and increased his protein. He was getting leaner than ever, he’d stopped eating so much fat. I’m like, “That's huge.”

Melanie Avalon: I think it's one of the biggest misconceptions. This is something I’m going to ask Gary, this is the question I want to ask him, because it's probably the biggest takeaway I took from Marty. It’s the biggest paradigm shift I had about insulin after reading Marty's book, and now reading Gary's book. He talks about this completely, but he doesn't draw the same conclusion and it's really haunting me, and it's the fact that this has made me completely rethink insulin, its main purpose is not to store fat. Marty talks about this, which I'd never realized before.

Gin Stephens: Well, it's antilipolytic, which means if you have high insulin, you're going to have a hard time burning fat.

Melanie Avalon: Its main purpose is not to store fat. Its main purpose is to stop fat from being released. It's putting on the brakes--

Gin Stephens: To fat release. It's putting the brakes rather than shoving it in. That's a very good point. We read so many times that people are saying insulin is shoving the fat in or shoving sugar in something.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, it could because its main purpose-- and this is something that Marty pointed out that I hadn't really thought of. Fat doesn't elicit at all or barely any of an insulin release, and so they reached the conclusion that because it doesn't release insulin that it's not easily stored as fat. What Marty argues is the reason it doesn't release insulin is, because it doesn't need insulin to be stored as fat. It was just the complete opposite idea of what people are drawing the conclusion from. They're saying, “Oh, unlimited fat because it doesn't require insulin.” Right, it doesn't require insulin because it just gets stored without it, which is huge. Basically, insulin’s purpose is to deal with the toxicity of sugar in the bloodstream. If insulin wasn't there, we would just be burning fat and then we'd have an overload of fuel in our bloodstream, and so when we eat carbs, the body needs to burn it immediately, because too much sugar glycates and is toxic. It needs to shut down all other potential sources of fuel going into the bloodstream, which is from our fat cells and from the storage of carbs. Insulin is just closing the doors.

Gin Stephens: The traffic cop saying no.

Melanie Avalon: I've been thinking about it. It's like if you live in an apartment, I've been thinking about this, and the hallway is your bloodstream and then the doors to all the apartments are your fat cells and normally the doors are open and stuff is going in and out of the rooms, but once carbohydrates enter the bloodstream, insulin is like, “Nope, shut all the doors so that nothing else can come out and we can just deal with this these carbs right now.” What I want to ask Gary, and it helps me articulate this, because I've been thinking about this, but I haven't said it out loud and I want to like--

Gin Stephens: Well, it's also very interesting.

Melanie Avalon: The thing that I want to ask him about is, I mean, he gives that length-- It's basically, if anybody's read any of his books--

Gin Stephens: They're long.

Melanie Avalon: [laughs] Like, I said, I went on a trip this week, it was a four-hour drive both ways, I listened to the audiobook as much as I could both ways, and I was like, “I filled my Gary Taubes quota for quite a while.”

Gin Stephens: Does he read it himself?

Melanie Avalon: No, he doesn't. He's an investigative journalist. He's not a scientist. He's rather telling the history of all of these things. He makes a very good point that actual scientists-- and now I’m going on tangents, but scientists and nutritionists and doctors don't normally ever study the history of everything in detail, because they don't have time, they don't think it's relevant, but he's saying that, “You can't really understand a subject until you know the history of how it got there,” so, that's what he's doing. In any case, with the insulin, he [unintelligible [00:38:32] idea that it stops fat cells from releasing their fuel, but he'll also say a lot throughout the book that the misconceptions we have and how we've oversimplified calories in, calories out, and we say it's just about calories and really it's about insulin, it's really complicated, it's really nuanced, but I feel the simplistic statement he still continues to make is that insulin leads to fat storage. I'm not articulating this well. The insulin is required for fat storage, like that idea still comes through.

Gin Stephens: Okay, yeah, insulin is antilipolytic. It's anti-fat burning. If you want to tap into your fat stores, you don't want to have high insulin, but that doesn't mean you're storing, you're just not burning.

Melanie Avalon: I need to relisten or reread one part, because there's one part where he specifically says this, but I don't know if he's saying it or he was quoting somebody else, but it was the theory that you can't store fat in the absence of insulin, which just seems to not be true. The takeaway that I’m having right now is-- I don't even know if this is worth pondering, but, because he's trying to deconstruct the calories in, calories out model, I don't know if you are at a genuine calorie deficit even with high insulin. Do you think you can gain weight? Maybe you can't ever burn weight.

Gin Stephens: If nothing is coming in, what are you storing the fat--? What's it being made of? We don't create fat out of thin air. Our bodies don't just create fat out of thin air, It's something comes in, our bodies do something with it and store that as fat. Maybe it was fat already, and we just shoved it away.

Melanie Avalon: What I’m thinking is it seems like insulin could make it impossible to burn fat, so you could not possibly lose weight at a calorie deficit, because of high insulin. But I don't know if you could gain weight at a calorie deficit and high insulin, because if you are literally taking in less energy than you're burning, I don't know how you can have a net gain, even if-- I don't know.

Gin Stephens: You were talking about based on what the metabolism is doing. You couldn't.

Melanie Avalon: I mean, your metabolism could slow down.

Gin Stephens: Right, but if you're still burning more than that slowed metabolic rate, I don't think it's possible. No, I don't think so, that wouldn't make sense. The one thing to keep in mind though, let’s think thing about type 1 diabetics. Their bodies are not making insulin, they were unable to gain weight at all. Low insulin, because they're not making it, unable to gain weight. See, that's one of the big examples Fung uses, I think I used it, you hear it so much. That's why we know that high insulin is related to storing. It's a storage hormone.

Melanie Avalon: To clarify, it definitely encourages the storage of carbs as glycogen.

Gin Stephens: People who had type 1 diabetes before anybody knew what type 1 diabetes was, they would just waste away and die because they didn't have enough insulin. Because they could not, no matter how much they ate, their bodies couldn't store anything away. So many questions, so many complicated things going on. Here's what we need to know. The takeaway is we want to keep our insulin low. That's good, but also fat is not free.

Melanie Avalon: So far what I've read, that’s his thesis.

Gin Stephens: His takeaway is fat is free?

Melanie Avalon: Well, I haven't gotten to that yet, if he does say that. His takeaway is that-- I really like this idea, that everybody has a personal insulin threshold, and that if you're at that insulin threshold or below it, you'll be able to burn fat, but if you're above it, you won't be able to.

Gin Stephens: Oh, yeah, I 100% can buy into that theory, because I don't even know if that's like a-- I think that's true. I don't think it's under question. I think that is a fact. It explains-- I’m sure that I had really high insulin for so many years when I was overweight and having trouble gaining weight, and then, Chad, my husband always been slim, I’m sure he's always had low insulin. We had our insulin tested last year. Mine is low now, thanks to fasting, but Chad's was slow. His was lower than mine. I’m like, “Well, no wonder he never gained weight.” His body just makes less insulin. He's not like diabetic, but his body makes less insulin than me. We all have a different threshold with what our body's going to do based on the amount of insulin we have in our fasted insulin level.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, he talks about while fasted, if you release insulin, and how one person, they can think about something really delicious and yummy, and they don't get ravenously hungry, it doesn't make them-- they can handle it, they don't feel they have to have it and they're not craving and shaky and another person does have that response. He was saying that it's from this cephalic insulin, basically in our brain, and depending on your basal insulin, that may or may not be enough insulin release to put you over your personal insulin threshold. If you're wavering around your personal insulin threshold or if you're already past it, and then you think of something really delicious, then your brain releases cephalic insulin, which is basically some insulin that's primed and ready just to be released, and that might be an--

Gin Stephens: It's anticipating food’s coming in.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, exactly. Then it releases that, and then that puts your personal insulin threshold high enough that, it just shuts off the fat cells’ ability to release fat, so then you're not giving any fatty acid fuel. It's really interesting. I’m really excited to interview him.

Gin Stephens: One thing that Marty really helped me understand-- also with Zoe, if I put together Marty and Zoe, it really helps me understand a lot about my body. Marty talks about energy toxicity and having too much energy in your blood, whether it's fat or ketones or glucose. You're having a lot of energy in your bloodstream from any source is not good. I never did feel well when I did keto, that summer of 2014. I felt awful the whole time. I also felt very inflamed and puffy, and I just didn't feel good. Zoe taught me, when I did the study with them, that my body doesn't clear fat quickly. They tell you that if your body doesn't clear fat quickly, then too much fat is inflammatory for your body. I’m like, “Well, that makes perfect sense.” It explains why I didn't feel well when I was doing keto, because I was taking in a whole lot of energy, my body didn't clear it very quickly, and so I’m sure I had a ton of fat circulating in my bloodstream that I was taking in, and I wasn't clearing it. Of course, I also didn't release any fat. I didn't lose any weight. All those butter coffees I was chugging, they were keeping my energy levels topped up in my bloodstream, my body had no need to release any fat.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, wait, speaking of, since we recorded last, I did release that episode with Dave Asprey speaking of butter coffee. Listeners, I’ll put a link to it in the show notes. You can check that out. I think my favorite chart-- because Marty has a lot of really great charts in his book, my favorite one is the one that shows “preferred order of burning different fuels.”

Gin Stephens: By the way, I like Marty so very much that even in the new platform, the DDD Social Network, I have a data-driven fasting group over there. For anybody who's following Marty, because a lot of my people have followed Marty, especially since I interviewed somebody on the podcast that talked about him, and then I interviewed Marty. It hasn't come out yet. A lot of people were like, “Hey, I want to learn about that.” Anyway, so data driven-fasting in the DDD Social Network.

Melanie Avalon: This is not the full chart. The full chart is on a different page. The full chart that I saw included alcohol and ketones, I think the order was-- when alcohol and ketones were included, I think it was alcohol and ketones, and then, which is the order of that the body preferentially burns the fuel substrates in our body. I think it was alcohol and ketones, and then glucose in your blood, and then liver and muscle glycogen. I have to ask him about that, because I don't think muscle glycogen would be right there. I think that's incorrect. Then, free fatty acids in your blood and then body fat. So, body fat is basically at the very, very, very last resort.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, our body doesn't want to dig in. I love Jason Fung’s analogy that it's in the freezer in the basement. I’m not going to go down to that basement freezer unless I have to. That's the body to not wanting to-- but it's there, we can get to it if we have to. We just have to give the right environment for the body to tap into your fat.

Melanie Avalon: 100%.

Gin Stephens: Not as easy as it sounds though. [laughs] Ready for the next one?

Melanie Avalon: Sorry for the tangents. Mm-hmm.

Gin Stephens: No, it was good. I think it's all been very interesting. We have a question from Daniella. The subject is “Collagen/Vitamins.” She says, “When breaking a 19- to 20-hour fast, can I start with my collagen supplement which is powder in water, and gummy vitamins? Please don't judge a grown woman taking gummy vitamins, laugh emoji.” [laughs] I will not. No judging.

Melanie Avalon: Great question, Daniella. The very short and simple answer is yes. The longer answer is, it's a good thing to clarify. I think collagen is something, especially people that are new to fasting, think that it might be something that they can take, while fasting especially, because it's often, “prescribed” to take it the way she's taking it like in water. Collagen is definitely something that’s not fast and friendly. It's a protein, and amino acid, it's going to definitely, definitely break your fast.

Gin Stephens: People like to start in coffee. I don't know why.

Melanie Avalon: Mm-hmm. I think Dave started that.

Gin Stephens: Oh, did he?

Melanie Avalon: Mm-hmm. I think way back in the day, because I remember reading him writing about it and he was saying for women in particular it was a good thing.

Gin Stephens: Well, I don't know. It's like, “Why’s everybody wanted to put this in their coffee?”

Melanie Avalon: The good thing about collagen though is, it's very nourishing to your gut. It's actually a really wonderful time to take it right when you're breaking your fast, like Daniella is, and then same, it's fine to take the gummy vitamin. I’m not a huge fan of multivitamins in general. I think, it's better to target specific nutrients. There's so much complexities to vitamins that-- it's hard to find a vitamin that you know is actually doing what you want it to be doing, but that aside, it's fine. Yes, Gin, thoughts?

Gin Stephens: Oh, no. I was just thinking, I’m really hungry and I was like, “Why am I so hungry?” Then, I realized it's 3 PM but my body-- Wait, we sprung forward. See, I get so confused with the time change.

Melanie Avalon: Me too.

Gin Stephens: It's only 2 PM to my body. Then why am I so hungry? Okay, sorry. I just got really hungry.

Melanie Avalon: All the emotions, or all of our talk?

Gin Stephens: Maybe, the stress. I also didn't eat a lot yesterday that must be why. My body might need two meals today. I’m just all of a sudden really starving. All that delicious collagen discussion.

Melanie Avalon: Might have been that cephalic insulin response.

Gin Stephens: I don't know, but all of a sudden, I was like, “I need to eat some food right now.” Anyway, I’m going to go eat some eggs on toast, that sounds delicious.

Melanie Avalon: All right. Next question or do you have thoughts about--

Gin Stephens: No, I really think that's it. I don't take collagen. I sometimes wondered if I’m missing out, because so many people take it, but I don't know.

Melanie Avalon: It can do really wonderful things, especially if you are trying to grow your nails and hair, and then heal your gut lining. It can be really great.

Gin Stephens: Well, I’m of the age where collagen production in our skin goes down, and we start to look saggy. I mean, that's just part of the hormonal changes of being in the postmenopausal years. We've all seen those amazing grandmas on the beach rocking their bikinis, but they're all saggy. I’m like, “Okay, I’m going to have to start to get some collagen maybe,” or I'll just embrace the sag, I don't care.

Melanie Avalon: Well, I think the probably the most important thing about collagen is, it's really important the amino acid balance of the meat that we eat. Today, we tend to eat basically muscle meat, so chicken breasts and lean steak, or even fattier steaks, if it's not shank or something like that. Historically, we probably would have been eating more of the whole animal and getting collagen, which is really important for an anti-inflammatory/amino acid ratio, and building your gut like I said.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, it may be time, but I will keep it in my window. I don't know why I just can't think of the idea of powder and water. Can you take it in like a pill? That's what I’m going to look for. I don't know. I don't want to dissolve anything in water.

Melanie Avalon: When I took it, of course, I just would eat it with my food, I thought it tasted really good. It’s really important in my opinion to get grass-fed collagen. We can put the link in the show notes to some brands that I like.

Gin Stephens: I don't know why, I have a mental thing against it, like I feel it's going to be gross. I don't know why.

Melanie Avalon: It's funny. I love the way it tastes, but I’m weird.

Gin Stephens: I did eat bone marrow, when I was in Charleston.

Melanie Avalon: Was it delicious?

Gin Stephens: Oh, my Lord. It was good. It was at this little restaurant on King Street in Charleston. Man, it was good.

Melanie Avalon: It's one of those things where if you haven't tried it, it might sound gross, or it might sound like, why would you want to eat that?

Gin Stephens: Yeah, I was scared of it, but everybody raved about it on all the reviews.

Melanie Avalon: It tastes like heaven.

Gin Stephens: It was so good.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, well, we agree on a food. [laughs] It's hard to describe the taste. It just tastes like-

Gin Stephens: This is some kind of bone marrow pudding. It was like a bread pudding made of bone marrow.

Melanie Avalon: If you go to Whole Foods or something you can get--

Gin Stephens: Can't.

Melanie Avalon: I was going to say, you can get bones or you can get cuts that have the bone in it, like a shank cut and it'll have that marrow and if you cook it like normal, then you could just eat them marrow plain. It just tastes, oh, my goodness, amazing.

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All right, now back to the show. Shall we go on to our next question?

Gin Stephens: Yes.

Melanie Avalon: This comes from Elizabeth, and the subject is “Starting IF After HCG.” Elizabeth says, “I've read both Delay, Don't Deny and Fast. Feast. Repeat. I discovered you while in the midst of a round of HCG. I am sure IF is for me. My HCG ends this week. My question is, do I need to do the follow-up protein diet and reintroduce carbs, before starting IF, or can I go right to IF after my three days after HCG?”

Gin Stephens: Yeah, that's a great question, and I do want to say, I’m really glad, Elizabeth, that you found us even in the middle of HCG, but I do not recommend HCG. I mean, honestly, you didn't know that because you were already doing it before you found us. I’m not saying, you shouldn't have done it, because you can't go back in time. Does that make sense? [laughs] For anyone who has not done HCG, I highly, highly would not recommend that you do it. I certainly tried it back in my diet days. I didn't do the drops, I did the “Go to the doctor, get the prescription, take the injections,” because the theory made so much sense. It was you're going to tap into your fat stores, because you're using this pregnancy hormone, your body thinks you're pregnant, so that it's going to help you tap into your fat stores better and it does something to your hypothalamus. That's the theory. Keep in mind, this was a long time ago that I was doing this. I was desperate to lose the weight. I was obese, so I get it.

Everyone who has tried these things like HCG, I tried them. I've done them. I lost a lot of weight doing it. Then, that was when I really started the diet yo-yo after that. The diet pills really got me, and I got those from my doctor too. The doctor prescribed diet pills, regained the weight, then I did HCG, got that from a doctor, lost a lot of weight, regained the weight, but then I was really like obese and struggling. It's not supposed to damage your metabolism, but I don't agree with that. I don't think that's true. I think that theory, just on my own personal response, I don't think that it's true. I think it tanked my metabolism, because suddenly, I gained way past any setpoint I'd ever had before, and I was over 200 pounds for the first time ever. Before all the crazy diets, I was hanging out around 160s as my upper limit. Then, I did all these crazy diets with the diet pills and the HCG, and then all of a sudden, my setpoint is now 200 or 180, in that range.

It definitely harmed my body long term. Thank goodness, I think intermittent fasting helped me reverse it. If it were me, Elizabeth, if I were finishing HCG right now today, and discovered intermittent fasting in the middle of it, I think I would go straight into the eating window approach, because you've already been eating practically nothing. Gosh, actually see, I don't know, because I’m thinking maybe the alternate-day fasting approach would be a good one for her, because her metabolism is probably slow. So you want to boost it again. I would probably, I don't know, you've already been eating a very tiny amount. Those are down days. I might would do alternate daily fasting. Down day, up day, down day, up day. As far as are you're going to reintroduce carbs, I don't know. The original doctor that created this protocol, Dr. Simeons, did have you restrict carbs, but I don't know that was like the magic. I think that just kept you from “regaining” that water weight because you lose a lot of water when you're doing a really restrictive diet like HCG. Then carbs, you eat carbs, and it causes your body to retain water. It's like rapid weight gain, but really, it's like a lot of water. Restricting the carbs as you ease back into eating would keep that from happening, which is what he wanted you to do.

Then, he wanted you to crash diet if your weight went up, like eat a tomato or something or have a tomato and steak day or some crazy nonsense like that. If your weight went up, you're supposed to have a steak day. Eat tomatoes all day and need a big steak or fast all day and then eat a steak, I can't even remember.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I think it's a one meal a day steak.

Gin Stephens: With just a steak.

Melanie Avalon: It's like carnivore one meal a day.

Gin Stephens: Maybe, that could be it. I think that actually is, but that's the super-duper crash diet. I am not judging anybody who does it, because I did it. I’m just going back and giving my back in the past self, giving her a hug.

Melanie Avalon: The interesting thing about HCGs, the macros of it are very similar to protein-sparing modified fast, which Gary actually talks about in his book about basically being the only “crash diet” that actually pretty much consistently always works because I think HCG is, isn't it like 500 calories of basically protein?

Gin Stephens: A day, yep.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. If it were me, I would probably just jump into IF, but maybe start with a longer eating window and making sure that you're eating a lot.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, maybe so, because I was thinking about that too. I almost went that direction. It's hard to know either way, coming from the perspective of your metabolism slowed after all that crash dieting.

Melanie Avalon: I just feel I need to be saying this more when we're getting questions especially from people who are hungry or trying to boost their metabolism, focusing on protein I think is so, so important. That's another one of the Big Fat Keto Lies that Marty talks about, is people think fat is satiating, protein is the macronutrient that is most satiating. I think focusing on protein can be really, really important for boosting metabolism and for weight loss, because it's the best of both worlds in that regard, and that it fills you up the most of any food, but it's not very likely to be stored as fat like we don't preferentially store protein as fat. Oh, actually, I don't know if it was in Marty's book. I think it was Marty's book. He mentioned a study about whey, and even in a study where they added in excess calories through processed whey protein, excess calories, the participants did not gain weight from it which I actually would have thought maybe they would when it's fat processed.

Gin Stephens: Because it was whey.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, and it's whey, which is very--

Gin Stephens: Dairy droved.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, it's growth promoting. Protein is a really good macronutrient to focus on if you're trying to lose weight, trying to be full. It's probably why I’ve been eating such a high-- I eat such a high protein diet for so long. But yeah, I will probably just jump into IF with a longer eating window. Especially if you're worried about gaining back a lot of weight after that, that's another reason I would really focus on protein. So, I would encourage you, Elizabeth, not to go crazy, and if you're eating tons of carbs and tons of fat, it's very likely that you might gain back a large part of-- not just water, you might gain back in fat a large part of what you lost. If you want to maintain whatever you did lose, I would really focus on protein and then looking at your macros.

Gin Stephens: I wouldn't just reintroduce all the things. That's a tricky one.

Melanie Avalon: I know.

Gin Stephens: I’m glad that you found us, Elizabeth, that makes me really-- or Beth. She goes by Beth. I’m glad you found us, Beth, and don't be scared if your weight goes back up a little bit, don't blame the intermittent fasting. Blame the HCG and know that it's going to go back up a little bit, and then it might take a little while longer for you to actually start burning fat well and start really losing more weight, just because your body's got to learn to trust you again. You definitely don't want to do intermittent fasting in a way that's also overly restrictive. That won't be helpful. Can I get something off my chest real quick?

Melanie Avalon: Sure.

Gin Stephens: I’m so frustrated by the whole women shouldn't do intermittent fasting at certain times of the month or we’re too fragile a flower to do intermittent fasting. That is really becoming more and more out there as just common knowledge, but I don't think it's true. I think women should not be overly restrictive with their diet. The fact that all of a sudden, we're like, “Well that means intermittent fasting is out,” intermittent fasting that is overly restrictive is the problem, but that doesn't mean no woman should ever do intermittent fasting during our cycles. I don't know. Maybe they haven't eaten with me. I eat a lot of food. [laughs] Nobody's telling those women not to do a 1200 calorie a day diet. That's overly restrictive, a traditional diet.

Melanie Avalon: I agree as well. I was also just thinking one of the other things people say. People say it's too hard for women especially to eat enough protein. I was just thinking about. It's probably really hard if you're not focusing on protein and so you're eating a lot of fat with it, or a lot of-- carbs might make it easier to a lot protein, but I think people focus so much on fat a lot of the times that that would make it harder to eat a lot of protein.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, just over-restriction is really hard on a woman's body. Over-restriction is hard on our body. But to then say, “Well, then women shouldn't fast certain times of the month,” I don't buy that argument. Even though some really well-known voices that I respect are starting to say that more it's common knowledge, I disagree. Anyway.

Melanie Avalon: I don't feel good when I’m not doing my fasting. This is me personally. I don't feel it helps my hormones. I feel much better hormonally during my fasting window, like hands down. But everybody's individual, that said, I do think there might be some women who do better with--

Gin Stephens: Yep. Particularly if they struggle with eating sufficiently, because they've trained themselves to be a dieter for example, and they're a restrained eater. If someone eats like a bird, tiny little amounts of it, maybe they just naturally can't eat a lot at one time. Okay, then they might need a longer window. It's not the fasting that's the problem, it's the fact that you can't eat enough food within your eating window, like that person shouldn't then try to do one meal a day in a one-hour window. I wouldn't recommend that. If you're eating this tiny little amount of food, that's not good for you, it's over-restriction. We don't want to over-restrict our bodies, women.

Melanie Avalon: Exactly.

Gin Stephens: But that doesn't mean that fasting is over-restriction. That's the part that I keep getting frustrated about. Assuming that fasting means over-restricting, and it does not to me.

Melanie Avalon: They're not synonyms.

Gin Stephens: Right.

Melanie Avalon: They are often posited as such.

Gin Stephens: Well, they are. There's this whole complicated graphic that people are now sharing that came from somewhere, and I know where it came from, not going to say, but it's like, “Here's how you fast every week of your cycle.” I’m like, “No, you might have a hungrier day. Listen to your body, do it.”

Melanie Avalon: That sounds really complicated.

Gin Stephens: It does. I don't know that there's solid science of why you would do that. Other than, yeah, your body might need more nutrients at a certain time of your cycle. My body was always good at telling me that, I can remember-- back earlier and before I got on this side of menopause, I remember, when I was doing intermittent fasting and losing weight, there'd be a day and I'd be like, “Oh my God, I’m so hungry today. What's wrong? I just ate and ate and ate and ate and ate and why am I so hungry and then?” Then, boom, the next day, I would have the reason why I would know. Every time it was a mystery. [laughs] Every month, I was surprised that I was so hungry. My body really communicated that well to me and I listened. I didn't try to diet through it. I didn't punish myself.

Melanie Avalon: You still ate what you wanted.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, I ate more. My body pretty much commanded me to. I've always had a hard time-- Even though I did those crazy restrictive diets, they weren't easy for me. When I’m hungry, I want to eat. My body's like, “Eat.” I’m like, “Okay.”

Melanie Avalon: Me too. [laughs] That's why we're both here.

Gin Stephens: I think so.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah.

Gin Stephens: Gin can eat, y'all.

Melanie Avalon: So can Melanie, so much. I've already said this. It's a dead horse, but the amount of protein I eat every day is, I mean, it's pounds.

Gin Stephens: That's so funny, not me. Nope, not pounds of protein.

Melanie Avalon: It's so good. [laughs] Well, this has been absolutely wonderful. A few things for listeners before we go. If you would like to submit your own questions to the show, you can directly email questions@ifpodcast.com, or you can go to ifpodcast.com, and you can submit questions there. The show notes for today's episode will be at ifpodcast.com/episode207. You can get all the stuff that we like at ifpodcast.com/stuffwelike. You can follow us on Instagram. My Instagram is-- Gin, it's going really well-

Gin Stephens: Oh, good.

Melanie Avalon: -recently. Follow us. How's your Instagram?

Gin Stephens: I've decided I’m just going to live my life on Instagram. I’m just going to be Gin Stephens’ person on Instagram. If you want to come to Instagram and see what Gin Stephens’ person is doing, I don't need to be Gin Stephens. Argh. [laughs] I've just feeling very much like I just want to get back to basics. Maybe that's why I’m doing this new web platform. Just because I’m like-- I don't want to be, “Here's my dinner. Woo.” Maybe, “Here I am, everybody, come sit by me.”

Melanie Avalon: I think I really like Instagram-- well, besides the fact that selfies really stress me out, I like it, because I really like creating-- my background is film and theater, so I love creating visual content. It's combines my love for visual content with words because you-- I never thought about this until right now. You write as well, so I think that's me probably why I really like it. It's like creating little artwork.

Gin Stephens: Not me. I’m like, “Here's my backyard remodel.” Did you see that picture?

Melanie Avalon: I did. No, okay, I saw it really briefly, and I just saw wreckage and I was like, “Oh my gosh, was there is--" no, I was like, “Was there a storm in Augusta, is her house gone?”

Gin Stephens: Can I just tell you how crazy I am right now? I’m going through so many things, the book, and the website launch, and also our backyard remodel that we tried to start in the fall, but we're demoing everything. Well, it's halfway done, but the wood was rotten on the decks that were on the back, plus there was an arbor, all rotten, all needed to go. We knew it needed to be replaced when we bought the house. We got a great deal on this house, it needed some work. The pool though, huge pool from the 80s, it's full of cracks, a tree fell in it in 2014. They had an ice storm. Well, we had ice storm, and it cracked the pool, and so we were going to have to put all this money into fixing it. They're going to dig it all up. All that concrete is cracked, it has to go. The whole surround. So, I have a bobcat, one of those digger things, is in my front yard right now and they have to get it into the backyard. They're going to take down a fence. I think they start doing that tomorrow. They're going to start digging up all that-- it’s a 10-foot-deep pool.

Melanie Avalon: That's intense.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, fixing it was going to cost more than just digging it up. That sounds crazy, but we're starting over, we're going to put in a screened porch, because I really missed having the screen porch. We're putting in a small pool, like a dunk pool.

Melanie Avalon: You have a real bobcat in the picture. Does Ellie not have a tail?

Gin Stephens: That's Ellie. You remember she got hit by the car, and then her tail had to be amputated. She's just my little cutie, but, yeah, in that picture, she's got a face on it, doesn’t she? She's got some attitude. I love that cat.

Melanie Avalon: It's really funny. I’m looking at it right now.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, anyway, that's what I’m going to put on Instagram. I’m not going to try to influence you at all. I am not an influencer. I’m an anti-influencer.

Melanie Avalon: I’m an anti-influencer, who became an influencer. I give away a lot of free stuff.

Gin Stephens: Oh, I’m not anti-influencers. Let me just say that. I am an anti-influencer, but I’m not anti-influencers.

Melanie Avalon: Yes, exactly.

Gin Stephens: I’m just the anti-influencer. I’m not giving you anything. I’m not giving anything away.

Melanie Avalon: I give away a lot of stuff, listeners, so follow me. I usually give away every week something.

Gin Stephens: Well, follow me to see a very interesting backyard remodel.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, my gosh.

Gin Stephens: I can't wait though, because I really want to be able to enjoy the yard, and I like to go outside and sit on a screened porch. The mosquitoes here are tragic.

Melanie Avalon: I feel remodeling for you is therapeutic or something. You're always remodeling something.

Gin Stephens: Well, we bought this house that was built in the 80s, and needed to be-- it’s built in 1979, I said that wrong. It was built in 1979. The people who bought it from moved in 1984. The pool was built in the 80s. It just needed some work. When you have a house, there's always something that has to be done.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah.

Gin Stephens: This one needed some stuff. Bathroom, that's all finally done, thank you. The backyard. But it's very stressful.

Melanie Avalon: I can't wait to finally have a house, sometime.

Gin Stephens: I can't wait for it to be done. I told Chad, because I’m so busy. He likes to spend 100 years looking at stuff. “Look, you just pick two things and say which one, this one or that and I'll tell you.”

Melanie Avalon: Oh, so he picks. Okay. Yeah, that's good plan.

Gin Stephens: Well, in this case, I like to pick stuff. I don't have time right now to go to Lowe's, and then Home Depot, and then the other place, and then all the places, then back to Lowe's, because that's the way Chad shops. Sorry. [laughs] I’m like, “Hmm, that one.”

Melanie Avalon: He can do that, and pick two and then you pick one?

Gin Stephens: Yeah.

Melanie Avalon: That works well.

Gin Stephens: I’m very decisive.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah.

Gin Stephens: The one I'd say that one too is always the one we end up going with. Even if we've been to 100 places, we always get back to the one that I liked immediately. [laughs]

Melanie Avalon: Wait, can I share really quick one last thing that relates?

Gin Stephens: Yes.

Melanie Avalon: It goes with being decisive. Listeners, fun fact, if you're trying to throw away things, like clean out your apartment, throw away clothes, but you want to hold on to it for whatever reason, just do it when you're completely sleep deprived. It's like when I got back from the trip, and I was completely sleep deprived, I was like must throw away everything. I throw away so much stuff. That's the key.

Gin Stephens: It feels so good, doesn't it?

Melanie Avalon: That's the key. Next time, you're sleep deprived, which is not a good thing, turn it into a good thing. Use the decision fatigue and the exhaustion to throw away all these things that you were having trouble letting go of, like old clothes and stuff, shoes.

Gin Stephens: Very nice. I need to do that. I've got clothes that are no longer in style. Isn't that amazing? I've been the same weight for so long, that my clothes have gone out of style, that I bought.

Melanie Avalon: I think, I must not buy many clothes. I hold on to my outfits for a long time.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, because you always wear the same thing.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, pretty much during the day.

Gin Stephens: That's funny. Oh, by the way, I didn't tell you this. Today is the day, the day that we're recording this, today is the day that six years ago today I hit my initial goal weight.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, wow.

Gin Stephens: Today is the day. March 14th, 2015. I was 75 pounds down.

Melanie Avalon: Happy six-year anniversary.

Gin Stephens: Thank you. I've maintained for six years. Oh, also one more funny story. My Shapa was acting super wacky. I was like my age was going up, I was gray, gray, gray, gray, gray. I’m like, “That's not right.” It did that for three weeks. I changed the batteries. [laughs] It needed the batteries to be changed. People, if your Shapa is acting wacky, change the batteries. Got on it. I was 24 again instead of-- [laughs]

Melanie Avalon:  Oh, wow. That's really interesting.

Gin Stephens: It was interesting. No scales, when they lose-- It was also taking it a long time to take a reading. I would stand on it, and it took forever.

Melanie Avalon: I still want to reach out to the founder. Gin, I am so overwhelmed with guests. I have interviews scheduled for episodes airing through November. They're all people I have to read like-- [laughs] people keep coming to me and being like, “Oh, you should have this person on your show.” I’m like, “Nope, [laughs] the door is closed.” Unless you’re a New York Times bestseller, that'll get you in the door.

Gin Stephens: That's nice to be able to have options that people want to come on your show. I know that you're proud of that.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, oh, sorry, yeah, that came off as ungrateful. I’m really grateful for it.

Gin Stephens: It did not come off as ungrateful.

Melanie Avalon: I’m just really overwhelmed when people come to, especially because sometimes, like some well-known people in the biohacking sphere will try to recommend their friends and stuff and, I'm like, “I could circle back in a few months.”

Gin Stephens: That does make it hard. Same with me, I've got so many people that want to come on Intermittent Fasting Stories that I keep pushing them back, and I feel bad because I know they have a good story. I would like to tell it, but there's one a week.

Melanie Avalon: It's hard to know too-- I don't want the content to be too old. It's something I’m trying to figure out right now. At what point is that way too far in advance? Typically, it's books, so the content is pretty relevant.

Gin Stephens: But people want to come on right when it's launched. Yeah.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, it's hard to know.

Gin Stephens: All right, we’ll come to dddsocialnetwork.com and visit the Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast group.

Melanie Avalon: Another social group.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, you're going to love it though.

Melanie Avalon: I know. I will.

Gin Stephens: Everybody there came there specifically because they like the community. That is what is so exciting. It's not like Facebook where people are just there already, and they're like, “Well, I'll come over here if I want to, but I might not like you, and I’m going to tell you.” [laughs] Everybody who's on the DDD Social Network came there on purpose. It is just so exciting to be there with them. I love them all so much. I love the people on Facebook too. Facebook people, do not feel unloved, but sometimes, somebody will wander in that might not be as good of a fit. Anyway, that's all I’m going to say.

Melanie Avalon: I’m really shocked-- this is the last thing, I know we've said that like a million times. I recently started my Clean Beauty and Safe Skincare Facebook group. I’m really shocked. My IF Biohackers Facebook group, which is my main hub, I don't ever get spammers in that group ever, like ever. I don't get people trying to join who are spammers. I don't get spam posts.

Gin Stephens: We get them in the Life Lessons. We do. They try to join.

Melanie Avalon: My Clean Beauty one, like half of the requests are spam requests. I don't know if it has something to do with the keywords like people are searching-- This group has around almost 900 members. Yeah, everyday, half of the requests are spam.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, and it's really hard. I feel like people coming to the DDD Social Network and paying a membership fee are not going to be spammers.

Melanie Avalon: Right, that's going to filter that out.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, so I’m not going to have to worry about that. People would join the regular group before we changed the way it posts now. People would join it, and then they would get a post approved, through post approval. Then they would edit their post to some crazy spam posts, even post approval didn't fix it. It'll be some crazy spam post. They had this order, they would do it and it'd be called it getting pancaked, but we couldn't talk about it because we didn't want to teach people you could edit your posts. Someone would come in and they'd post something. They started copying and pasting old posts. There was one of our Hashimoto’s that they would use. Then we started to recognize them, we’d just block them straight from there, but they would copy this Hashimoto’s post, and then they would change it to, “Today, I’m five years sober.” Which, do you know why they would do that?

Melanie Avalon: No.

Gin Stephens: Because that drives a lot of engagement quickly, because everybody's like, “Oh, my God, congratulations. Thank you for sharing that. I support you.” Then they would have a million. Then they would change it to, “The admins of this group are about to start dropping inactive members, please comment me if you want to stay.” Then people would go, “Me, me, me.” I mean, you could just see. Then they would change it to, “These are the best pancakes I've ever had.”

Melanie Avalon: Oh, that's why you called it pancake.

Gin Stephens: Pancaking. Yes. It was always this pancake, and I’m like, “I don't know what happens if you click that pancake link,” but something bad is going to happen if you click it, but we called it getting pancaked, and somebody would post on there, like, “I think we're about to get pancaked,” and we'd be like, “Yeah, that looks like one,” and then we would keep our eye on it, and then sure enough, then we would block them. Now, Facebook has changed it. If you have post approval turned on, it sends edits back through the approval process. So, hallelujah. But now, they're just putting the spam in the comments.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I’m really grateful. Hopefully it won't change. My main hub is much smaller than yours. I think it's almost 8000 or 9000, but I don't know, we don't really get spam.

Gin Stephens: We don't get a lot of spam in the advanced group.

Melanie Avalon: Maybe, spammers are not searching out Biohacking groups compared to-- I don't know, it's weird. Well, okay. This has been absolutely wonderful.

Gin Stephens: It's been a lot of fun. I needed it. Lord, I have so much to do. I have so much to do, Melanie. Anyway, send me positive productive thoughts.

Melanie Avalon: Sending you sane, productive, wonderful vibes. Take some Feals CBD.

Gin Stephens: Oh, that's a good idea.

Melanie Avalon: Well, this has been absolutely wonderful. I will talk to you next week.

Gin Stephens: All right, talk to you then. Bye.

Melanie Avalon: Bye.

Thank you so much for listening to The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. Please remember that everything discussed on the show is not medical advice. We're not doctors. You can also check out our other podcasts, Intermittent Fasting Stories, and the Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast. Theme music was composed by Leland Cox. See you next week.

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TRANSCRIPT

Melanie Avalon: Welcome to Episode 187 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, author of What When Wine: Lose Weight and Feel Great with Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, and Wine. And I'm here with my cohost, Gin Stephens, author of Delay, Don't Deny: Living an Intermittent Fasting Lifestyle. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and ginstephens.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this podcast do not constitute medical advice or treatment. So, pour yourself a cup of black coffee, a mug of tea, or even a glass of wine, if it's that time, and get ready for The Intermittent Fasting Podcast.

Friends, Black Friday is coming up and I'm about to tell you how you can get early access to ButcherBox’s free steak sampler. We're talking two free grass-fed New York strips and four grass-fed top sirloins. Do not miss this. We are huge fans around here of ButcherBox. They make it easy to get high-quality humanely raised meat that you can trust shipped straight to your door. I hardcore research their practices, you guys know I do my research, and what they're doing is incredible. Their beef is 100% grass fed and grass finished. Their chicken is free range and organic. Their pork is heritage breed. And super importantly, they are all about caring for the lives of both their animals and the livelihoods of their farmers, treating our planet with respect and allowing us to enjoy better meals together.

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To get early access to Butcherbox’s insane Black Friday special, just go to butcherbox.com/ifpodcast or enter the promo code, IFPODCAST, at checkout, that will get you two free grass-fed New York strips and four free grass-fed top sirloins all in your first box. This is an insane offer. Again, that's butcherbox.com/podcast for early access to ButcherBox’s Black Friday steak sampler.

And one more thing before we jump in. Are you looking for the perfect gifts this holiday season for yourself and others? Well, the average male uses 6 skincare products per day, the average female uses 12. And as it turns out, conventional skincare and makeup is full of toxins. We're talking things like endocrine disrupters, obesogens, meaning they literally cause your body to store and gain weight, and even carcinogens linked to cancer. So, while you may be fasting clean, you may be putting compounds directly into your body during the fast that can be affecting both your health and weight loss. Thankfully, there's an easy solution.

There's a company called Beautycounter and they make an array of skincare makeup products that are extensively tested to be safe for your skin. You can feel good about all of the ingredients that you put on. Their products are even tested multiple times for heavy metals. And for the holiday season, Beautycounter has so many amazing gift sets. These are bundled products at a discount, and they make incredible gifts. Think about it. You can get the products for yourself or for your friends and family and help clean up their skincare, all in disguise of gift-giving. Works pretty well!

You can shop with us at melanieavalon.com/beautycounter. And if you use that link, something really special and magical might happen after you place your first order. If you're trying to figure out exactly which products to get, check out my beauty counter quiz, that's at melanieavalon.com/beautycounterquiz. And for the latest discounts and giveaways from me, definitely get on my clean beauty email list. That's at melanieavalon.com/cleanbeauty. All right, now back to the show.

Hi everybody, and welcome. This is episode number 187 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon and I'm here with Gin Stephens.

Gin Stephens: Hi, everybody.

Melanie Avalon: How are you today, Gin?

Gin Stephens: I am good. Can I tell you that my bathroom is almost done?

Melanie Avalon: Oh, like finally?

Gin Stephens: Yeah, we've had the plumbing, the lighting was done yesterday. And so, all we need now is the towel bars-- oh, and the medicine cabinet and the mirror have to be hung, then we will be finished. But you could actually go in there and do everything a bathroom is supposed to do. Just you can't look in the mirror or hang anything up.

Melanie Avalon: That is a plus.

Gin Stephens: I know, it is very exciting.

Melanie Avalon: And then, is it just the yard that you're working on?

Gin Stephens: Yeah, we're going to be working on a backyard remodel. That's going to be huge. Huh!

Melanie Avalon: To your tropical oasis with Paris?

Gin Stephens: Will see. Yeah, I'm excited. I can't wait. I miss my screened porch. I looked at my Facebook memories today, and one year ago today I was sitting on the floor in my old house with workmen. We were getting ready. It was under contract and we were getting ready to close at the end of the month. So, gosh, so many memories from that. But I haven't had a screened porch since we left that house.

Melanie Avalon: I didn't realize you had a screened porch.

Gin Stephens: At my other house? Oh yeah, I loved it. I sat out there all the time.

Melanie Avalon: I would not sit up there all the time. Actually, I would during the winter.

Gin Stephens: Mainly, I'm out there in the summer, in the spring, in the fall. When it's cold, no. But I like it the rest of the time.

Melanie Avalon: Speaking of the cold, guess what showed up at my door yesterday and made my life?

Gin Stephens: Well, I don't know, unless it was a chest freezer.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, that would really make my life. You know I had Wim Hof on the show recently? It was a celebratory Wim Hof giftbox with the official-- Oh, it's so exciting. I had a galley of the book. So, I had a pre-release, not finalized version. So, it was like the hardcover actual version, like a Wim Hof towel that says, “Breathe mother F,” because he always says that, that's his phrase. And then, an ice cube tray and a motivational magnet. Oh, my goodness.

Gin Stephens: That's so fun!

Melanie Avalon: My day was made. So, I have a CGM update.

Gin Stephens: Oh, okay, how's that going?

Melanie Avalon: It's going well. I don't know-- today might be the last day. I'm actually interviewing Levels tomorrow. And then, I'm interviewing Nutrisense in a month, but I had a huge epiphany. So, we were talking just a second ago, you and I. I recently did the-- so InsideTracker, which is a David Sinclair affiliated company. They do a lot of genetic testing and blood testing and things like that. And they have a new InnerAge thing. They test, I don't know, it's like 12 key biomarkers to determine your “biological” or your real age. The good thing was that said I was younger than I am. So, I was like, “Okay, that's a plus.” But what was really interesting was I measured my blood sugar on it, and I guess just because of the timing of it-- and it matched my CGM for the time that I got it, but the timing of it, my blood sugar was 79, or something, which is my good number. Historically, I always feel really good in the high 70s.

But looking at my CGM over the past few weeks-- we talked about this last show, it fluctuates so much, even during the fast. If I hadn't been doing the CGM and I just done that one blood test, I would have been like, “Oh, I'm sure my blood sugar is always in the 70s then.” It made me realize getting a blood test and checking your blood sugar, you have no idea. You've no idea what that even means.

Gin Stephens: You don't know where you are on the curve exactly. It could be on the way up, on the way down. That could be your peak, that could be your valley. It's so interesting.

Melanie Avalon: It is. I'm just looking back at all the blood tests I've done historically and how I would so judge myself almost based on what the blood sugar was. Now, I've realized literally, depending on which minute I went in, it could have been--

Gin Stephens: I mean, 10 points higher. Yeah, it's crazy. That was the most eye-opening thing for me.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. And then, the other thing was, how high would your blood sugar go after meals? After your curvy meals?

Gin Stephens: Gosh, I'm trying to remember. It's been over a month. I don't know, like 130 normally? That’s how it would go.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, because I've been in 120s.

Gin Stephens: 120s, 130. One time, it went up a little higher than that, but I don't think it ever went out of the 130s. I don't know. I don't know where that data. I had it somewhere downloaded, but--

Melanie Avalon: Was it just through the FreeStyle Libre app or was it--?

Gin Stephens: It was, but then I found a website that you could sync it with. Let me see, I might have some notes.

Melanie Avalon: While you're looking, the interesting thing that I realized was eating lower carb meals or even fruit meals, my blood sugar, it would spike, but it would go like 110, highest like 120 and then pretty quickly go down, and then it would go down too far. But last night, I ate way more carbs than normal and, oh my goodness, it went up to like 200 something.

Gin Stephens: Oh my gosh. Okay, see, I found some of my data. This is just some very early data that I-- I went up to 135 one time. But normally, like after dinner, I would go up like 112. After pasta, I went up to 121.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, because the highest I would really ever go when eating my normal foods was 120. But it would normally go to 110-ish, between 110 and 120.

Gin Stephens: Here's some data that I had. I had two pieces of toast and two eggs on top, and my blood glucose went up to 109 after two pieces of toast with eggs.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, so last night, I ate some-- it's like Rice Krispies but there's no additives or anything like that. And it shot up to 200.

Gin Stephens: Wow, yeah, I never saw anything above-- Really, maybe 140 at one time. I never saw anything above, and I was like, “Oh my God, what's happened?”

Melanie Avalon: 217!

Gin Stephens: Yeah. I wish I had all that data. Even after the muffins, it didn't go up all that much.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, it never really dropped hypoglycemic, did you, after meals?

Gin Stephens: No, not after meals. In the middle of the night, it got down in the tiny little red. I can't remember what the boundary was. Was it, like 69 was the boundary? It turns red. I can't remember. But I got down there just a couple times. But mostly it was not there.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, mine would always draw pretty well, although I was talking with Levels about it and they said a few things. And I'm excited because I'm interviewing them tomorrow, so I have so many questions for them. But they said that, A, if you sleep on the sensor, that can cut off circulation, like if it's on your arm, so that can lead to false like--

Gin Stephens: The middle of the night readings can be weird.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, it could be that. And then, he also said that they never really test like historically people's blood sugar levels all night. So, we don't have a lot of data in general about what's normal for--

Gin Stephens: That's a good point.

Melanie Avalon: --nighttime, so yeah. Oh, and for listeners. A CGM is a continuous glucose monitor. I've just assumed that everybody knows what you're talking about. But it's basically a little thing that you put on your skin and it measures your-- What is it, interstitial fluid? To give you a sense of your blood sugar levels throughout the day constantly.

Gin Stephens: And it really is fascinating data and I really hope that it becomes more mainstream for people to use as a preventative health measure. It's not a trinket, it's not a fun toy. It's not something like, “Oh, look at this!” It's something that is powerful data. Yes, it's fun to see, it's interesting to see, but it's powerful data about how your body responds to these foods. And so, it can really make a difference when you choose. You're probably not going to choose that Rice Krispy thing again, right?

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, no.

Gin Stephens: For me, though, when my blood glucose went up to 135, that was after coconut water, which really surprised me. I mean, I love coconut water.

Melanie Avalon: It's really interesting. It did make me feel better though about the fruit because I was stressing about the fruit. But now it's like, “Oh, well, compared to that.” So, maybe it was a good thing to experience.

Gin Stephens: I made sure to eat the way I normally eat when I was using it. I didn't test things in isolation. When I had the toast with eggs, that's how I would normally have it because I wanted to get a picture of how it looked with my normal day. My normal day really made me happy. My normal day, my blood glucose is within a tight little range and it goes up, but then it goes down. And it's a nice little gentle-- It looked good. It made me feel really good about it.

Melanie Avalon: I'm still a little bit sad because it seems that if I do my keto-ish like approach, it's pretty good, and the Levels app gives me a good metabolic score and it stays within the target range, but I would still in general like it like a little bit lower and then I would also like to be eating more fruit, but goals. The good thing is because it comes in two weeks cycles, the sensors, and I have Levels send me too. So, I have another one I can use. I have to try out Nutrisense and then Levels said they're going to start trialing other brand. So, I think I'll probably trial that as well. So, I think I have like-- what is that? 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, that's like 6 more weeks' worth of sensors that I can potentially play with. And then, I'm going to be like never again, not really.

Gin Stephens: It's just so interesting. I really think that people who are concerned about long-term health, before you start having prediabetes, that's when you would know, you could really dial in what works for you and then prevent. If health insurance companies were smart, they would let everybody have a trial of these to see what foods-- anyone who's interested. Maybe not everybody, not everybody cares. But for anyone who did, it shouldn't be so hard to get them. They should pay you to do them. It should be like, “We'll give you $250 if you wear this for two weeks and learn from your data.” I mean that would be a wellness strategy for these insurance companies and it would prevent them from paying out thousands of dollars later for sickness. Anyway, I'm not in charge of that. Nobody has to be!

Melanie Avalon: So, listeners, stay tuned, though, because I will be having two interviews with both companies, and I'll probably have discounts or some sort of offer. So, exciting! Shall we jump into everything for today?

Gin Stephens: Yes. We have some listener feedback, which is answer to "Paige’s Flexibility Question From 173," and it's from Miranda. She says, “Hello, Gin and Melanie. I've been listening to your podcast for two years now and I love all the great information you have to offer and your willingness to entertain so many questions from your listeners. I'm happy to be part of such a valued community. I'm just getting caught up on some older podcasts and have some answers for a question you had from Paige from Australia in episode 173 - does IF increase your flexibility? You weren't able to fully answer this, and I am happy to fill in some blanks for you.

I have been practicing yin yoga for over 10 years and teaching it for over six years. Yin yoga is a style of yoga that focuses on purposefully stressing our connective tissue to increase elasticity and ease of movement. It is thought to have been discovered by monks thousands of years ago to help them sit more comfortably during hours of meditation. Connective tissues are the plastic-like tissues in the body, the fascia, ligaments, tendons, etc., that wrap around and connect muscles and bones. And now, they're discovering it runs like a web through muscle and bone. With stress, injury, dehydration, and life, the connective tissue gets tangled, sticky, and begins to shrink wrap our bodies restricting movement. In order to "untangle" and rehydrate that connective tissue, it needs to be purposely stressed. This is what we do in yin yoga. Stressing muscle is done through resistance movement, with or without weight. We're all very familiar with this.

Stressing connective tissue requires consistent tension and/or compression. Usually, both are happening concurrently with minimal muscular effort for a period of time, usually four to six minutes. It takes an average of two to three minutes for the muscles in the area to let go so that the stress can be focused on the connective tissue. During this time, the area being stressed sends a message out, “here's where the work needs to be done.” And the fibroblasts know where to go to start untangling those bunched and knotted-up collagen and elastin fibers and start laying them out in nice, neat, stretchy layers.” And then she adds a little note, this is a very simplified explanation. “This works similarly to acupuncture, but on a wider scale and not literally a pinpoint. Think of a big knotted-up ball of yarn. You have both loose ends in hand, but when you pull, they don't go far. If you take the time, you can untangle the ball of yarn and then layer it back and forth into a nice, neat skein. Now, when you pull on the loose ends, you can pull for miles.

The answer to Paige’s question is twofold. First, Melanie, you are on the right track looking for studies about the effects on cartilage. And Gin, you were partway there when talking about being as flexible at 50 as you were when you were a teen dancer. I believe a lot of that can be attributed to IF and increased autophagy. When our bodies have the time, as they do with IF, they get to go around and clean up the broken-down proteins, i.e., collagen and elastin, which tends to get deprioritized as we age. So, you have less tangled messes that can get taken care of without a practice like yin yoga or acupuncture, although either or both would still be very beneficial.

The second part of the answer, and what I think Paige is experiencing as she was pretty recent in her IF journey, is looking at our flexibility and asking, ‘What's stopping us?’ That answer is either tension or compression or a combination. It's different for all of us in different positions or poses. An easy way to experience this is to stand up, bend over, and try to touch your toes. Can you do it? If not, what's stopping you? Is it the tight sensation you feel in your lower back or in your hamstrings or calves? That's tension. That can be worked through over time with consistent practice. Are you able to touch your toes? Yes. Can you fold completely in half with your head between your knees, your knees on your ears? Why not, what's stopping you? Now, you're likely experiencing compression.

Compression comes in three major forms. Soft, medium, and hard. Soft compression is how it sounds, soft tissue meeting soft tissues, big fat. Using the same example as above, envision an obese person doing the same exercise. Let's pretend they don't have too much tension stopping them from doing that forward fold. They will likely be stopped by the compression of their belly pressing against their thighs. They may still be able to touch their toes or the floor because that can somewhat displace and make space for that to happen. With IF, as we lose this thigh and belly fat, we can increase flexibility. This position in particular will feel a little more comfortable, at least from the compression side of things. And we may start to meet our tension threshold in our lower back and our hamstrings now that we have more flexibility/range of motion. This sensation will likely change as our bodies change.”

Melanie Avalon: Can I interject really quick? So, is she saying that literally losing the weight, it's like a physical barrier that's creating?

Gin Stephens: Yes. When I was obese, I couldn't reach down and paint my toenails. My belly got in the way. 100%.

Melanie Avalon: That is so interesting. I mean, it makes complete sense. I just never really thought about it that way.

Gin Stephens: Yep, I've been there. It's true. I had to sit differently. I couldn't sit cross-legged. And there are a lot of ways I couldn't move. I mean shaving your legs, things like that just were so different to do. It's hard to even remember.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah.

Gin Stephens: Putting on shoes, all those things. But, yeah, and now I appreciate being able to just do whatever, use my body however I want to. All right, back to her comments. “Medium compression is interesting and what we often experience in our joints. This is a bone-flesh-bone sandwich. Try sitting on the floor cross-legged style. Do you feel a pinching in your leg creases? This is medium compression. It often feels pinchy. If that position feels completely comfortable to you, great.” It does, by the way, I can sit like that. Can you sit cross-legged comfortably, Melanie?

Melanie Avalon: Pretty sure.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, I do all the time. “But I'm sure you've experienced the same sensation in other positions at some point in time. Medium compression often doesn't change in people unless they have “fat show” or “deposits” around the tissues of the joints, most likely in someone more obese. Again, as those fat stores are being used for energy and decreasing in size, there is more space for movement, which equals more flexibility. IF for the win again.

And finally, hard compression. This is bone-to-bone compression. Think of trying to do side splits. Many people can do front to back splits.” Yep, that's the only kind I could do. “But several of those still cannot do side splits.” Yep, I could not do those ever. “Why? Hard compression. They can spread their feet from side to side, have zero tension in their inner thighs, slide down and down, close to the ground and then stuck. What's stopping them? Their hip sockets. The head and neck of their femur fitting into the cup of their pelvis does not have the optimal sizes and angles to make this happen. In yin, we say this person doesn't have skeletal permission to go any further. There is no amount of yoga or stretching that will make this happen for them. Even IF will not change this. This is where we learn to accept our limitations. So, yes, IF can increase your flexibility and I hope this will help people have a little better understanding of their functional anatomy.

If you notice changes in flexibility and increases in the range of motion in your body, please be aware that it's critical to also strengthen the muscles in these areas to prevent injury. We need to have the strength to support the range of motion. Of course, I recommend yoga for this, more flow styles as they strengthen and lengthen muscles at the same time. If you do resistance training, it's very important that you have a great stretching routine on your rest days or at the end of your workouts. Try to hold your stretches with minimal muscular effort for three to four minutes instead of the likely 20 to 30 seconds you're used to. Thank you for listening to this long answer. But I know how much you both dig into research and I didn't want to sell you short.” That was great. Thank you, Miranda.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I learned so much. Who knew?

Gin Stephens: I did not know.

Melanie Avalon: I liked her part about this-- What did she say about the skeletal--?

Gin Stephens: Limitations. It's true. Yeah. I was never going to be able to do a side split no matter how hard I tries.

Melanie Avalon: It's good to know that that was not in the cards. Yeah, good to know that with IF and the weight loss and everything, that it can definitely affect our flexibility. All right, shall we move on to our questions?

Gin Stephens: Yes.

Melanie Avalon: All right. So, to start things off. We have a question from Katie. The subject is, “Second try has been brutal.” And Katie says, “I sometimes wonder if my metabolism is irreparably damaged. I'm so discouraged and ready to give up and regain, no pun intended, that unfortunate fat girl mindset that Gin has often described as accepting that you're just going to get fatter and fatter.”

Gin Stephens: I want to interject there. I felt that way for a time. So, for people who haven't heard me say that, there was a time in my life I gave up, and it was sometime around 2012 to 2014 when I just got bigger and bigger, no matter what I did, I couldn't stick to anything. And I just said, “You know what? This is just me. I'm going to be in this big body.” I gave up. But not forever. I didn't give up forever. Thank goodness. All right. Back to you, Melanie.

Melanie Avalon: That's so surreal to me. Till 2014, you were still--?

Gin Stephens: Yeah, 2014 is when I was 210 pounds.

Melanie Avalon: I know we talked about this a lot but the reason that's so mind blowing to me is that-- because I so associate us meeting the first time that I moved to Atlanta, and I moved to Atlanta first time in 2014.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, we didn't meet till 2017.

Melanie Avalon: Was it '17?

Gin Stephens: It was '17. It was early in 17 because the podcasts-- and my book had come out already by the time we met. Yeah.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. So, I guess it was like the tail end of when I was in Atlanta the first time but it's just really surreal to me that time in Atlanta the first time around seems so short. So, the fact that all of that transformation happened all during when I was in Atlanta, and we still met when I was in Atlanta--like, that's a really quick turnaround all things considered.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, it really was because I really just was like, “This is it. This is going to happen.” And it did. Yeah, it was. I'm really, really, really proud of that. Looking back, it's hard to remember, I was just talking about how hard it was to paint my toenails and bend around and move. But you just feel hopeless because you've tried so hard. I tried so hard. I talk about this a lot for people who listen to intermittent fasting stories. This theme comes up again and again. And that's my other podcast, Intermittent Fasting Stories, for people who have not listened to that one. But people over and over share how they were successful in so many areas of their life, good at things, smart, well educated, but could not get a handle on the weight. It's really frustrating.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, inspiring, though. Very inspiring.

Gin Stephens: It is, but it's not you, it's biology, it's your body. I wrote this in Fast. Feast. Repeat. It's not that you have failed diets, diets failed you.

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Melanie Avalon: So, back to our question. She says, “I don't want to be back in that place, but I'm starting to feel like I don't have a choice. Not to say bad things about body positivity, but I don't feel positive or healthy in the current permutation of my body, no matter how much I try to regurgitate the mantras of health at all sizes, and it's the size of your heart that matters, not the size of your waist. Tell that to an obese person with an enlarged heart. Originally, I started IF 16:8 in 2017. It worked marvelously. I lost 30 pounds in less than two months without even really thinking about it. I took it very naturally. I figured I'd found the magic formula that would finally work for me after literal decades of failed diets. Naturally, I plateaued but stuck with the process. My doctor even told me how proud she was of me.

Then, my personal life kind of imploded. Last year, my father passed away less than two years after my mother did. Plus, the stress of an estate sale, the holidays, putting the house on the market, and trying to find a place to live. Needless to say, my discipline with food went straight down the toilet. I regained most of the weight I had lost.

Fast forward a year, I'm finally mostly settled. I'm in a new house, I have a decent nest egg. I'm generally in a good place emotionally. For once in my life, I feel fairly secure. I decided it was time to start fasting again. I thought I could slip right back in no problem since the first time it came naturally and worked marvelously. Boy, was I wrong. I've been at it about a month and the only way I can describe it is agonizing. Just as agonizing as all the other diets I did in the past and eventually failed it. It's 100% stagnation and frustration. Before, I ate whatever, and the weight dropped off. Now, no matter what I eat, it stays put. Before, it was easy for me to wait until 2 or 3 PM to eat and stop at 10 or 11. Now, I feel hungry all the time, regardless of how nutritious my meals are. I know, I know. I can already hear you both saying it's only been a month, but what a terrible month it has been, especially contrasted with how easily I fell into it before. What is happening?

I'm 39, so it's a little early for menopause, though it's not totally out of question. I don't have any other symptoms of early menopause though. Does my body need longer to recalibrate the second time or something? I thought once your body learned to be fat-adapted, it remembered. That seems to not be the case with me. Is this a common problem? Help. I love you guys so much. I'm a fan of this podcast and your individual podcast too. Thank you for all your help and advice.” And then, I sent her an email and I asked her what she was eating. She said, “It depends on the day. Sometimes, it's an Impossible Whopper with onion rings. Sometimes it's nutritious Poke Bowl filled with vegetables, beans, and tofu. Sometimes, it's Taco Bell. Sometimes, it's [unintelligible [00:32:42] stir fry with garlic, onions, peppers, snap peas, spinach, mushrooms, and baby corn. Sometimes, it's protein shakes and bars, which I don't necessarily think are the best. But I found that if I have them around, I will have fewer Burger King and Taco Bell days. I also started adding maca root to my protein shakes as suggested by Anna Cabeca on your show, since I also have hormone balance and energy issues. Katie.”

Gin Stephens: That’s a lot. And I see that the shift happened when you had the very stressful time of your life. You were having a lot of trouble in your personal life. Your father passed away, you recently had lost your mother, lot of stress, the holidays. And then, we've had a pandemic. So, I don't want to make light of that. But even people who did not have all the other stresses that you're going through, people have had trouble this year just because of the stress that the pandemic and all of that-- I mean, even if you had been safe at home and you haven't had any thing that is really gone wrong for you, still, the word 'pandemic,' the way that everything is set uncertain, watching the news, it has been a terribly, terribly stressful year. So, I want you to not discount all of that. The fact that it seems like you're wanting to eat, it's very likely to have something to do with the stress response, like you are just in-- you're craving food early in the day. You can't wait till 2 or 3 to eat. You’re also only a month in, which I know you said that we would say, but it is true. So, think about this. A lot of stress. You've been through a lot. You're hungry, hungry, hungry. You're fighting with it, and it's only a month in.

So, I want you to think back to when you first started in 2017. I bet you approached it with a different kind of mindset. I bet you were just trying it, you were excited, you were eased in, you let it unfold. You felt great. But right now, it feels like you're starting in a different mental place. I would encourage you if you don't have Fast. Feast. Repeat., get it. If you do have it or once you get it flip to the Mindset chapter. That is a really, really important chapter that I think could make a difference for you. Start working on changing yourself talk.

You may also want to kind of ease back a little bit. It sounds like you're really trying. Sometimes, when you try, try, try that makes it actually even harder. Maybe you're forgetting that it was a little challenging at the beginning when you first started, and you've forgotten what it was like in 2017. And you're expecting to just all of a sudden be able to wait till 2 or 3, when really, maybe it took you a while. I also want you to really examine your fast and make sure you're fasting completely clean. You didn't mention that at all. You also said you started intermittent fasting in 2017. That was a long time ago. That was before-- my guidelines for the clean fast have certainly evolved, the more I've learned and the more people I have worked with over the years since 2017. So, I really want you to examine what you're drinking. Are you putting lemon in your water? Are you putting a little splash of something in your coffee or sweeteners? That sort of thing. Is it having a little apple cider vinegar? Really, really think to anything that you're having. Stick to plain water, no flavors, nothing added. Sparkling water, no flavors, nothing added. Black coffee, plain tea, avoid all those fancy herbal teas with the fancy names. Just stick to tea, actual tea, and see if that helps.

Instead of forcing yourself to wait till 2 or 3, maybe say, “Alright, I'm going to open at noon. And I'm going to have a high-quality lunch. And then later, I'm going to have a high-quality dinner.” And you could probably fit in a six-hour window with a lunch and a dinner that are not giant lunch, giant dinner, but a satisfying lunch, satisfying dinner, within six hours. If you're white knuckling it, I want you to switch things up and try them, do different things, and see until it feels good again.

Also, work to de-stress. Anything that makes you feel good and helps you relax, add those things in, whether it's a hot bath, a sauna, working out, reading a book, anything. Listening to music, anything that helps you de-stress and feel better. What would you say, Melanie?

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I think you said a lot of great things. I recently interviewed the Caltons, they wrote a book called Rebuild Your Bones. It's about osteoporosis and bone health. But it's really about the role of micronutrients in our health and how our modern diets, it's hard to supply enough nutrients and how things like stress, really, really deplete a lot of our nutrients and our bodies aren't getting all the nutrients they need. It's very likely that we won't ever feel satisfied or full. And you went through such, such an intense stressful period that I feel probably when you first started IF, it was working for you, there wasn't this whole stress aspect. And then, this is what Gin was talking about, going through that really, really stressful time, it can really, really deplete a lot of nutrients in our body can be really taxing on our body and have a lasting effect. And I think when a lot of us go through that, it can make everything harder, including fasting, including adhering to a diet and everything.

And I say that to encourage you because I think focusing on nutrition could be really, really huge. Originally, she didn't say what she was eating, and if we just had that question without knowing what she was eating-- because you were saying that when you first did IF, you ate whatever you wanted, and the weight just dropped off. And now, it doesn't seem to matter how nutritious your meals are. What I'm wondering is because just hearing your meals, it sounds like you do alternate between meals that are potentially more on the nutritious side, like whole foods based meals, and then a lot of fast food. While a lot of people can do IF and eat fast food and see weight loss and experience the benefits, I still think food choices are really, really huge. So, I think it can be hard to know if you're doing well regardless of what you're eating, if you're not eating a certain way for a long enough period of time. So, what I mean by that is, say one day you eat more on the nutritious side. But then, the next day, it's more fast food and then it's back and forth.

Unless you're eating really nutritious meals for a longer period of time, it might be hard to know if you really are feeling this way regardless of what you eat. If you're open to not eating the fast food and focusing more on like whole foods-- and when I say whole foods, I don't mean store, I mean whole foods, especially that the foods that really appeal to you and that are really high in nutrition. I would give that a try. I would almost say in the situation that it might even be better if you're open to it. If you're really struggling with hunger, I would almost say try a spiel of-- because what windows she's doing?

Gin Stephens: She didn't say. She said she's having a hard time getting to 2 or 3, which is why I suggest, don't force it, if you're not feeling good yet. Even though before you eat-- but right now is different.

Melanie Avalon: It was easy for me to wait until 2 or 3 and stop at 10 or 11. So, she was eating like an eight-hour window from 2 to 10. So, I would almost suggest-- I don't know why I say almost. I would actually suggest that you maybe consider trying a not a fasting approach right now and actually just a food approach and eat when you're hungry, but eat whole foods and see if you can get more in touch with your satiety signals and how you're reacting to food without the fast food and things like that that might be hacking your cravings and making you want more. And then, after cleaning that up for a little bit, then move into the eating window and you might find that it's a lot easier to have a fasting window. I just really think the food choices are really huge. I think a lot of people think that when they do IF that it means they can eat whatever they want during the window. And that doesn't always work, especially if it's meals that are not that nutritionally supportive.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, I have a section in Fast. Feast. Repeat. about the phrase, “Eat whatever you want” and that people misunderstand it. When we say eat whatever you want, we mean eat whatever you want. We're not going to say this is the style you must eat to do intermittent fasting. But it doesn't mean eat whatever you want! Like, often use the analogy, you're a college freshman with your first meal plan and mom's not there. That happens for a lot of people. They've been careful eaters and then they start intermittent fasting, that is portrayed as eat whatever you want and then they throw all the other out the window. I was already eating like a college freshman before I started intermittent fasting. I did not have good nutritional habits. Over time, my tastes did change. I've talked about that a lot. But most of us are going to find, we feel better when we eat nutritious foods. That's just a fact and that's what our bodies need. So, really keep in mind that, yes, you can eat whatever you want, but that's not permission to eat whatever you want.

Melanie Avalon: Few other things, she says that she has protein shakes and bars, which she doesn't think are the best. But if she has them, she's less likely to eat Burger King or Taco Bell. What other foods could you keep on hand, whole foods that would also if you eat them, make you less likely to eat Burger King or Taco Bell? You're the one in control, you're the one in charge here, you're the one choosing what you want to buy what you keep in your house what you have access to. So, I'm sure there are foods you can find that you do think are the best and that you can keep on hand and that you could eat and have fewer of the fast-food days. Also, if you're drinking protein shakes, that's something actually, for example, that I would suggest switching that to whole foods protein. Instead of a protein shake, have chicken breast or steak or something because it's going to be much more satiating. I don't see really any reason to, especially if you're struggling to lose weight, to make all of these calories so easily assimilated.

Gin Stephens: Can I tell you what I found recently that has been just amazing for opening my window? I don't have an official affiliate relationship with them, although I'd love to. Hello, Daily Harvest, send me an email. Daily Harvest, I've been using them after I saw several people recommend them. And, yes, gin@intermittentfastingstories.com, Daily Harvest, I would love to hear from you. But I can't figure out how to contact them because I would love to have them sponsor my podcast.

Melanie Avalon: Wait, what did they do?

Gin Stephens: They have food, it is-- I mean, I know it's not all-- it's a lot of grain in there, some grain, not all grains, but it's some things you probably wouldn't eat, but it's whole foods and it comes frozen. And they have bowls, and they have flat-breads, and they have smoothies, but the ingredients list is so clean and good.

Melanie Avalon: Are they plant based?

Gin Stephens: Yes.

Melanie Avalon: I think they might have emailed us before.

Gin Stephens: Well, see if you could find that email because I just found them as a person. Gin Stephens, the person. And I have been opening my window every single day with one of their soups or one of their bowls. My husband and I will split one of their smoothies after dinner as a dessert. They don't work well for me on an empty stomach, but they work great as a dessert. We'll just share one. They are so good. If you go to ginstephens.com on the Favorite Things tab, I do have a link there that you can use to save money. It's not official, like sponsorship or anything. It's just like any person could share their link. That's what I'm doing. But it's on the Favorite Things tab at ginstephens.com. But it's also really, really tasty, and I'm not plant based. So, I might have one of their bowls and it might have lentils in there plus a ton of veggies, maybe kale. But it's so quick, you can just pop it in the microwave.

I'm going to cook a big dinner later and I cook it and prepare it, but I don't want to also fuss around with something to open my window. So, their lentil bowl with all the veggies that I can pop in the microwave, maybe I'll throw a little sour cream on there. Yes, that flavor profile that would do well with some sour cream. And I am just so satisfied. Instead of grabbing the cheese and crackers again, I'm having this really nutritious food. So, I'm just a fan. I'm really excited and recommend it. The food is so good. And my husband loves it, I love it. And it's quick. See, that's the thing. I'm busy, I'm working during the day and then I'm going to cook a full meal later for dinner, I don't also really have the time to-- and I was finding myself always grabbing broccoli and hummus or cheese and crackers. And I was in a rut just because I could grab that.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I think that's a great suggestion. I would really focus on the food choices if it was me.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, I think that's good advice. All right. We have a question from Amanda. Amanda says, “I started listening to the podcast last week on episode 41 now. I remember you mentioned berberine and I want to know if I can still take it without a meal because I've tried to do one or two 40-hour fast a week. Bottle says once daily with meal or as directed by a healthcare professional. I typically have a window later in the day for regular days, just not sure about taking it on 40-hour fast days. I just bought it today. So, I want to know the best way to take it before I start. I've been intermittent fasting since February of 2020.”

Melanie Avalon: All right, berberine. So, this would actually be a really good situation to have a CGM to see how you react to berberine during the fast. So, for listeners berberine is-- Well, okay. So, there's a drug called metformin that a lot of listeners are probably familiar with. It's often prescribed for diabetes, but it can have really remarkable effects on lowering blood glucose levels, lowering HbA1c, discouraging the liver from producing glucose, things like that. Oh, and activating ANPK, which is one of the main genes that we activate during fasting that has a lot of the beneficial effects of fasting.

So, the reason I say all that is berberine is a natural plant compound that has been found in studies to have very comparable effects to metformin without a lot of the potential side effects of the pharmaceutical. Studies have found that by taking berberine, that it can decrease insulin resistance, just in general can make the insulin in your body be more effective. It can help your cells break down sugars, so use sugar more effectively.

Like I said, it does decrease sugar production in the liver, and I mentioned this before, but one of the most mind-blowing things to me is that in diabetes, the majority of the elevated blood sugar is actually not coming from the diet, it's coming from the liver producing sugar. Do, berberine can interfere with that process, and it might actually even support beneficial gut bacteria, which is really interesting. So, point being, I actually ordered some berberine after doing all this research. It's usually suggested that you take it right before meals, like three times a day. I assume you could take it during that long fast but my only concern would be, depending on how you're reacting to it-- Did she say she started taking it already?

Gin Stephens: No, she wanted to wait.

Melanie Avalon: And she's going to do a 40-hour fast. You might find-- if your blood sugar is already low, on that long fast, the only thing I would be worried about would be if it dropped you too low and then you got symptoms of hypoglycemia. So, that would be something that you'd have to experiment with.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, I probably would just follow the directions of the bottle and not try to take it in a long fast. I just wouldn't. I would just take it once a day with the meal, like it says, or if you're not having a meal, don't take it.

Melanie Avalon: If you are measuring your blood sugar-- although we just talked to the beginning about how that might be all over the place. But that might be a situation where if you're long into your fast and you measure your blood sugar, and it's good, I probably wouldn't take berberine at that moment because probably just going to drop it lower. On the flip side, if you're long into your fast and your blood sugar's high, then you might want to take it and see what happens. I'm really excited now because I just ordered some and I want to see how it affects my CGM.

Gin Stephens: Well, definitely share that after you've tried it for a while and let us know what happens.

Melanie Avalon: I will. I do take oftentimes Keto Before 6, which is my Quicksilver Scientific, and it has a lot of ANPK activators. So, I just mentioned that ANPK is genetic pathways that are activated while we're fasting and is responsible for a lot of the benefits of fasting. And so Keto Before 6 contains-- it's different compounds that all activate ANPK. So, it contains berberine. It also has quercetin and I think resveratrol and milk thistle and a few other things. I've been taking a little bit of berberine via that, but I haven't taken like just berberine. So, I have to report back. But I'm a fan of the concept of berberine. I'm not a fan of most pharmaceuticals, but I don't really know how I feel about metformin. I'm very intrigued by metformin. I think if I ever were to experiment with a pharmaceutical, I would experiment with metformin out of curiosity.

Gin Stephens: Yeah, because a lot of people just take it for health benefits.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. I know David Sinclair talks about it a lot. Peter Attia, I think, talks about it. It's one pharmaceutical that often comes up in discussion on a lot of the podcasts that I listened to about the potential benefits. Some people will pretty much take it for life, kind of like aspirin. It doesn't do the same thing as aspirin but as far as “pharmaceuticals” that potentially might have more health benefits than not.

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We have a question from Heather. Subject is "Transition Period." And Heather says, “Hi, guys. I just started IF five days ago. I'm currently doing a six-hour eating window. My husband and I decided to start a healthier lifestyle and we each chose our own method. He is counting calories and I am attempting IF. I've absolutely loved IF so far. I'm the type of person that has in the past claimed to need food every 10 minutes. I truly didn't know that I would be able to maintain this lifestyle for more than one hour. I know, I'm crazy. Anyway, this week has been wonderful. I feel more energy throughout the day. I've not felt deprived at all, and I am enjoying my food so much more than I did when I was eating all day. I'm currently going through your podcast from the beginning and I'm on episode 11.” I hear you meant 11, that’s so long time ago.

Gin Stephens: I'm sorry if we gave bad advice on episode 11.

Melanie Avalon: Sometime, I'm going to have to go back and listen to just like a random episode from that time period. I might do that. She says, “I hear you mentioned the transition phase or period, and I'm curious how long that usually lasts. I've had moments in my fasting period where I'm tempted to reach for food out of sheer habit or quick moments where I feel hungry because my body is used to eating very often. Does this go away? I thought I would add that I've only lost about one pound so far. I would have been discouraged by this if it were not for your podcast. I'm trusting the method and I'm waiting for more results. Thanks so much.” All right.

Gin Stephens: All right, Heather is on day five. So, Heather, I hope that you fast forward to this new episode and hear it now. I really don't want you to expect any weight loss in the first 28 days. That's what I've got in my 28-Day FAST Start of Fast. Feast. Repeat. So, a pound and five days is actually really good. Remember, also, I don't want you to weigh every day and think of the fluctuations. I mean I do want you to weigh every day, but I don't want you to get caught up on the daily fluctuations. I want you to weigh daily and then once a week, calculate your weekly average. So, if you're on day five, you don't even have a week yet to have a weekly average. And, of course, I don't want you to do that till after your first 28 days.

So, on day 29, I'd like you to weigh again, and then weigh daily and once a week, calculate your weekly average because really, it's only the overall trend that matters. So, as far as the adjustment period, that really varies for everybody. Bert Herring talks in his book about three weeks. Three weeks to adjust. And I think that is actually overly optimistic. And maybe now with how everyone seems to have metabolic syndrome, prediabetes, people are just not in great shape starting out. I sure wasn't. When I started out, I wasn't in great shape, physically, I was obese. And so, three weeks is a little bit optimistic. So really, some people find it takes as long as 8 weeks, 12 weeks even, depending on you and your body, to really feel like you're starting to adjust to intermittent fasting.

And if someone's been obese or overweight for a long time, it can take even longer. A lot of that has to do with what your fasting insulin level is, and you're not going to know what that is unless you've had a test, and most people haven't. Melanie, someone was talking recently in the Facebook groups about trying to get a fasting insulin test, and her doctor's like, “That's not what you mean. You want to get a blood glucose test.” And she's like, “No, I want fasting insulin,” he's like, “No,” [gasps] And the doctor could not understand why someone would want a fasting insulin test, or couldn't figure out how to write it on the forum, didn't know what she was talking about. I'm not saying that to say bad things about doctors, because there's a lot of doctors who are using them and understand them and all of that. So, you probably don't have your fasting insulin levels. But if your fasting insulin levels are high, it's going to take time for that to come down and that's part of your body's adjustment before you'll see the benefits of fasting.

Long story short, we really could say three to eight weeks for the adjustment period, but it really can vary wildly. If you were someone who was eating keto prior to starting intermittent fasting, your body may already be fat adapted, and so your adjustment period might be very brief. I mentioned before on the podcast, in 2014, when I finally was able to start intermittent fasting and finally stick to it for the first time ever, I had been trying keto that whole summer, failing at keto. I mean I was doing it, I didn't lose any weight. I did it 100%, didn't lose a single pound. Now, I know that's not how my body feels best. But I probably became fat adapted, and I was definitely in ketosis. Wasn't losing body fat, probably because I was eating a lot. Eating a lot of fat, not having any need to tap into my body fat. But as soon as I switched to intermittent fasting and added that carbs, I felt immediately better, and I started losing weight right away. I didn't have to have an adjustment period. So, all that to be said, it really, really varies.

Melanie Avalon: I think that's great. I think you covered it.

Gin Stephens: Yeah. It's going to be months before Heather gets to this episode if she's listening from episode 11.

Melanie Avalon: Good times. Okie-dokie. Well, this has been absolutely wonderful. If you'd like to submit your own questions for the podcast, you can directly email questions@ifpodcast.com or you can go to ifpodcast.com and you can submit questions there. The show notes for today's episode will be at ifpodcast.com/episode187. Those show notes we'll have a full transcript, so definitely check that out. You can join our Facebook groups. I have IF Biohackers: Intermittent Fasting + Real Foods + Life. Are we plugging your new Facebook group, Gin?

Gin Stephens: Well, I do have a new Facebook group if anyone is interested in things outside of intermittent fasting because I talked about that I've started a third podcast. We've actually recorded episode 0, which is our trailer episode and also episode 1. The Facebook group is Life Lessons with Gin and Sheri. The podcast will come out-- we're hoping for Episode 1, December 2nd is our target release date. And our first episode is all about sleep.

Melanie Avalon: I just recorded two back-to-back part one and part two episodes again with Dr. Kirk Parsley, listener Q&A on sleep and both of them are almost three hours.

Gin Stephens: We talk about Dr. Kirk Parsley and his Sleep Remedy on the podcast, but we also talk about the sleep chronotypes. You and I've talked about that before, right? I'm a lion, you're a--

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. What was it, a wolf or something?

Gin Stephens: Yeah, I think you're a wolf. Sheri is also a wolf, my friend Sheri. Late at night, yeah, Sheri’s a wolf. My cohost on the other podcast is a wolf, just like you. That'll be coming out December 2nd. The reason we decided to start with sleep is because we asked people what they were interested and hearing and that came up over and over. People are struggling with sleep.

Melanie Avalon: I know. I emailed the first heart one episode to my assistant and it was three hours. She was like, “I didn't realize there was so much to know about sleep.” And I was like, “This is just part one. There's a part two coming.” There's so many questions. There's so much. That was one of the good takeaways. Because so many people will say that we all are naturally early birds, and I asked him about that, and he was like, it's not really debated in the scientific literature about there being different circadian rhythms for people.

Gin Stephens: It's known that it's true, right? Yeah.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. He was like, it's not really controversial. And I was like, "Oh, okay. Then, why is everybody saying that we're all early birds."

Gin Stephens: I know. The early birds started that. People who are one way, really, really assume that everyone else should be like that.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. Kind of like with food and diet and everything.

Gin Stephens: I mean, I really think they're like, “Well, I wake up really early, and I feel great and I get a lot done. So, you should do that, too. And if you can't, you must be super lazy.” And that's how these things get started. And, no, it's not that you're super lazy or even lazy at all. You just have a different rhythm. You're more productive later in the day, and you could feel like a loser and a failure because you're fighting against your body.

Melanie Avalon: Yep. 100%. All right. Well, this has been absolutely wonderful. And I will talk to you next week.

Gin Stephens: All right. I look forward to it.

Melanie Avalon: Bye.

Gin Stephens: Bye.

Melanie Avalon: Thank you so much for listening to The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. Please remember that everything discussed on the show is not medical advice. We're not doctors. You can also check out our other podcasts, Intermittent Fasting Stories and the Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast. Theme music was composed by Leland Cox. See you next week.

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Welcome to Episode 310 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 Cynthia Thurlow, author of Intermittent Fasting Transformation: The 45-Day Program for Women to Lose Stubborn Weight, Improve Hormonal Health, and Slow Aging.

Today's episode of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast is brought to you by:

LMNT: For Fasting Or Low-Carb Diets Electrolytes Are Key For Relieving Hunger, Cramps, Headaches, Tiredness, And Dizziness. With No Sugar, Artificial Ingredients, Coloring, And Only 2 Grams Of Carbs Per Packet, Try LMNT For Complete And Total Hydration. For A Limited Time Go To drinklmnt.com/ifpodcast To Get A FREE Sample Pack With Any Purchase!

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To submit your own questions, email questions@IFpodcast.com, or submit your questions here!! 

SHOW NOTES

1:10 - LMNT: For A Limited Time Go To drinklmnt.com/ifpodcast To Get A FREE Sample Pack With Any Purchase! Learn All About Electrolytes In Episode 237 - Our Interview With Robb Wolf!

3:45 - BEAUTYCOUNTER: Keep Your Fast Clean Inside And Out With Safe Skincare! Shop With Us At melanieavalon.com/beautycounter or beautycounter.com/cynthiathurlow And Use The Code CLEANFORALL20 For 20% Off PLUS Something Magical Might Happen After Your First Order! Find Your Perfect Beautycounter Products With Melanie's Quiz: Melanieavalon.Com/Beautycounterquiz
Join Melanie's Facebook Group Clean Beauty And Safe Skincare With Melanie Avalon To Discuss And Learn About All The Things Clean Beauty, Beautycounter And Safe Skincare!

8:10 - what is inositol?

11:25 - sugar alcohol

13:05 - does it break a fast?

18:05 - NUTRISENSE: Get $30 Off A CGM Program And 1 Month Of
Free Dietitian Support At Nutrisense.Io/Ifpodcast With The Code IFPODCAST!

20:50 - the importance of sleep

23:00 - DNA repair and cell metabolism; Nerve Health

29:20 - choline

31:45 - Brain health, Dopamine, Serotonin

35:00 - insulin resistance in the brain

38:30 - exogenous sources of inositol

40:45 - magnesium and electrolyte balance

44:35 - AVALONX MAGNESIUM 8: Get On The Email List To Stay Up To Date With All The Special Offers And News About Melanie's New Supplements At avalonx.us/emaillist, And Use The Code Melanieavalon For 10% On Any Order At Avalonx.Us And MDlogichealth.Com!

47:15 - why this supplement? why now?

52:40 - L-Theonine and anxiety

53:20 - Metabolic Health

55:00 - MD Logic

Get 25% off during the Presale 03/11-03-19 or 15% off between 03/20-03/31 at cynthiathurlow.com/insolitol!

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

Melanie Avalon: Welcome to Episode 310 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 and author of What When Wine: Lose Weight and Feel Great with Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, and Wine. I’m here with my cohost, Cynthia Thurlow, Nurse Practitioner and author of Intermittent Fasting Transformation: A 45-Day Program for Women to Lose Stubborn Weight, Improve Hormonal Health, and Slow Aging. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and cynthiathurlow.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this show do not constitute medical advice or treatment and no doctor-patient relationship is formed. 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.

Hi, friends. I'm about to tell you how to get my favorite electrolytes for free. Yes, completely free. The more I do research, the more health books I read, the more people I interview something keeps coming up again and again and that is the importance of electrolytes. Electrolytes facilitate hundreds of functions in the body. This includes the conduction of nerve impulses, hormonal regulation, nutrient absorption, and fluid balance. If you don't have your electrolytes in line, best case scenario, you're not going to perform at your best. Worst case scenario, you're going to feel pretty awful. When your electrolytes are out of balance, you can experience things like headaches, muscle cramps, fatigue, sleeplessness, and many other unpleasant symptoms. How do we lose electrolytes? Well, when you sweat, the primary electrolyte lost is sodium. Athletes can lose up to 7 grams per day. Also, when people go on keto diets, that also often results in depleted electrolytes, and may be responsible for something called the, "keto flu."

Also, if you're not feeling well while fasting, that could be a problem with electrolytes. But here's the other problem on top of the electrolyte problem. Most of the electrolyte mixes on the market are nothing I would personally want to put in my body. Thankfully, I found LMNT. LMNT has none of the junk, no sugar, no coloring, no artificial ingredients, no gluten, no fillers, no BS. It contains a science-packed electrolyte ratio of 1000 mg of sodium, 200 mg of potassium, 60 mg of magnesium. LMNT is used by everyone from NBA, NFL, and NHL players to Olympic athletes to Navy SEALS to exercise enthusiasts to everyday moms and dads to people like me, and potentially you. The experience I've had of being electrolyte depleted and then having an LMNT packet was like the feeling of coming alive. Like, "Oh, the lights just turned on." It truly is incredible.

Friends, I work with a lot of brands. LMNT is one of the brands where people randomly just tell me all the time how obsessed they are. LMNT offers no questions asked refunds, so you can try it totally risk free. If you don't like it, share it with a salty friend and they will give your money back, no questions asked. You have nothing to lose. Right now, LMNT is offering our listeners a free sample pack with any purchase. That's eight single-serving packets free with any LMNT order. This is a great way to try all eight flavors or share LMNT with a salty friend. Get yours at drinklmnt.com/ifpodcast. That's D-R-I-N-K-L-M-N-T dotcom slash ifpodcast. Stay salty.

And one more thing before we jump in, are you fasting clean inside and out? When it comes to weight loss, we focus a lot on what and when we eat. It makes sense because these foods affect our hormones and how our bodies store and burn fat. But do you know what is possibly one of the most influential factors in weight gain? It's not your food and it's not fasting, it's actually our skincare and makeup. As it turns out, Europe has banned over a thousand compounds found in conventional skincare and makeup in the US due to their toxicity. These include endocrine disrupters, which mess with your hormones, carcinogens linked to cancer, and obesogens which literally can cause your body to store and gain weight. Basically, when we're using conventional skincare and makeup, we are giving these obesogenic compounds direct access to our bloodstream.

And then in our bodies, studies have shown they do things like reduce our satiety hormones, increase our hunger hormones, make fat cells more likely to store fat, and more resistant to burning fat, and so much more. If you have stubborn fat, friends, your skincare and makeup maybe playing a role in that. Beyond weight gain and weight loss, these compounds have very detrimental effects on our health and they affect the health of our future generations. That's because ladies when we have babies, a huge percent of those toxic compounds go through the placenta into the newborn. It is so, so shocking and the effects last for years.

Conventional lipstick, for example, often tests high in lead and the half-life of lead is up to 30 years. That means when you put on some conventional lipstick, 30 years later maybe half of that lead has left your bones. On top of that, there is essentially no regulation of these products on the shelves. That’s why it’s up to us to choose brands that are changing this. The brand that is working the hardest to do this is Beautycounter. They were founded on a mission to change this. Every single ingredient is extensively tested to be safe for your skin, so you can truly feel good about what you put on. And friends, these products really, really work. They are incredible. They have counter time for anti-aging, counter match for normal skin, counter control for acne and oily prone, and counter start for sensitive. I use their Overnight Resurfacing Peel and vitamin C serum every single night of my life and their makeup is amazing. Check out my Instagram to see what it looks like. Tina Fey, even wore all Beautycounter makeup when she hosted The Golden Globes. So, yes, it is high-definition camera ready. They have so many other products, deodorant, shampoo and conditioner that I love, products for babies and so much more.

You can shop with us at beautycounter.com/melanieavalon or beautycounter.com/cynthiathurlow and use the coupon code CLEANFORALL20 to get 20% off your first order. Also, make sure to get on my Clean Beauty email list. That’s at melanieavalon.com/cleanbeauty. I give away a lot of free things on that list, so definitely check it out. You can join me in my Facebook group, Clean Beauty and Safe Skincare with Melanie Avalon. People share their experiences, ask questions, give product reviews, and I do a giveaway every single week in that group as well.

And lastly, if you’re thinking of making Clean Beauty and Safe Skincare a part of your future like we have, we definitely recommend becoming a Band of Beauty member. It’s sort of like Amazon Prime for Clean Beauty. You get 10% back in product credit, free shipping on qualifying orders, and a welcome gift that is worth way more than the price of the yearlong membership. It is totally, completely worth it. So, again to shop with us, go to beautycounter.com/melanieavalon or beautycounter.com/cynthiathurlow and use the coupon code CLEANFORALL20 to get 20% off your first order. And we’ll put all this information in the show notes. All right, now back to the show.

Cynthia Thurlow: Welcome back to The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. Today I am joined by my dear friend Scott Emmens. Scott is the CEO and founder of MD Logic Health and today we are going to discuss my latest supplement Myo-inositol. Scott, I'm really excited to have this conversation today about Inositol.

Scott Emmens: I am too, Cynthia. I have to say, this molecule, although I've known about it for quite some time. As I did the research for this, really opened my eyes up to it. So, I'm thrilled to have it. My first question for you is when you decided to make your next supplement, Inositol, what was it that made you choose Inositol? For the audience, what is Inositol?

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, that's a great question. I think it's important to be fully transparent and share with everyone that sleep over the last eight to ten years has been elusive in many instances. And so, I'm always looking for ways to improve my quality of sleep to ensure that I am getting restful sleep. I mean, now I track my metrics on my Oura Ring. But about a year and a half ago, I was already aware of Myo-inositol, which is a specific type of Inositol, which we'll talk about in a second, and I decided to just guinea pig. I was like, "Okay, I'm going to take this before bed. I'm going to see what net impact it has on my sleep." This is the experimentation of the N of 1, the power of how important that is, and what I found is when I woke up in the morning, I didn't just feel more rested. My sleep metrics absolutely recorded deeper and longer deep sleep. For anyone that is familiarized with deep and REM sleep, they both have different purposes. One is really focused on brain health, the other one is really focused on bodily health. But as we are getting older, it sometimes can be more challenging to get high-quality deep and REM sleep. Over the course of about six months, I was able to adjust dosages, timing. I started including it in a lot of my treatment protocols, with my own patients and clients. Happily, the N of 1 became N of 20 or 30. From there I started talking more about it.

If we're talking specifically about this particular form of Inositol, Myo-inositol is a type of sugar alcohol. It's actually the most abundant Inositol in the body making up 95% of free Inositol. It's found within cell membranes. It's sometimes referred to as a vitamin although that's really a misnomer, vitamin B8. It's not a true vitamin because our bodies can actually make Myo-inositol and we can sometimes get it from foods in our diets, whether it's fruits and nuts and grains and beans. But we'll discuss later why some people may not be able to extract a lot of inositol from their foods.

We know that it acts as a signaling agent. It's not just about brain health. We know it can actually help with blood sugar, which for most of our listeners, talking about metabolic health is obviously a huge focus of my work. And then, interestingly enough, it's also a nootropic agent. It helps the brain with cell signaling. To me, the more I learned about it was not just a supplement for women with PCOS, polycystic ovarian syndrome, although the research is really solid in that area. But it's a supplement that I've seen really compelling clinical results from patients not just with improvement in blood sugar, but also improvement in cognition and sleep quality. That's really the basis of the supplements that we're working on together, is to make sure that they are focused in these areas, which are the areas I think most of our listeners are concerned about as well.

Scott Emmens: That alone is quite a list of things that [Cynthia laughs] this particular supplement can address. But there are more, which is interesting. To take a step back, you mentioned that it's a sugar alcohol. For our keto friends and people that are wondering, well, how does something that has sugar alcohol in it, how does that support metabolic health? Articulate or walk the audience through how that works.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, so it's not the sugar alcohol that we're thinking of that's contrived in a lab per se, that we're trying to increase the sweetness of a product and make it keto friendly. This is really speaking to the ability to move glucose into the cell so intracellularly and the stimulation of specific mechanisms in the cell, there's this GLUT4 translocation, which is a fancy way of saying "It's going to make it much more readily accepted into the cell." We know if only 7% of the population right now is metabolically flexible, this is something that most if not all of us want to be concerned about.

The other thing that's interesting is it can actually play a role in regulating the release of free fatty acids from adipose tissue. This can be impactful if we are fasting and in a fasted state, we are trying to utilize either stored sugar or stored free fatty acids as a fuel source, it's going to help facilitate that by keeping our insulin levels a bit lower. Then, interestingly enough, it can actually promote the conversion from glucose to glycogen. Glycogen is stored sugar and so we store glycogen in our skeletal muscle and our livers, hopefully not too much of it, so that we end up developing something called NAFLD or nonalcoholic fatty liver disease. But there're several different mechanisms that can help with insulin sensitivity that are of particular interest to me. For those of us that are out there that are metabolically flexible, it can be very effective to help with maintaining insulin sensitivity. For those that are actively working on improving their metabolic health can be useful as well.

Scott Emmens: A couple of things there that I just wanted to circle back on. First is when we talk about sugar and the fasting, we're going to get questions on, does this break my fast? So, I guess that's question one. Would Inositol technically break your fast given that it is actually working to pull in the sugar? What are your thoughts there? 

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, it's interesting. I think it's always in the context of what is the greatest value. From my perspective, if we are going from maybe let's say our blood sugar is within a healthy range and we take Inositol in a fasted state, I'm more concerned about making sure that you are maintaining this insulin sensitivity than I am about-- the concerns and I know it gets very granular, very nuanced. I know that I would say 50% of the questions that my team and I field on social media on a given day is related to does X break my fast? Typically, I take Inositol in the evening, usually at the tail end of my feeding window. That's when I will take it. But I have plenty of patients as an example that have PCOS, polycystic ovarian syndrome and if you look at the clinical research the recommendation is usually 2 grams twice a day. So, very likely they are taking their Inositol in a fasted state and in a fed state. I think it really comes down to what are your goals.

From my perspective, this is one of those gray areas. I'm completely comfortable with my patients taking this in a fasted state and not worrying about whether or not this is breaking a clean fast. This is very different than someone taking, let's just say, one of the keto sweeteners in something in a fasted state and wondering what's going on. This is actually helping to improve that insulin sensitivity. So, for me, I'm less concerned about it.

Scott Emmens: Yeah, I completely agree. I think that's the perfect response for folks to make it clear that this is an individual need. What are you taking it for specifically? What's the core reason you're taking it? And then you can determine when you're taking it. But I think the benefit of when you take it in a fasted state, given, let's use the PCOS example, might be a fasted state is a perfectly valid and more important reason to take it than worry about whether it's going to have a minor impact on your fast or not. I think it really does come down to individual choices, individual specific goals.

Cynthia Thurlow: I think for a lot of people when they're getting nuanced about does X item beverage supplement break my fast? The bigger question is, are you insulin sensitive? Are you metabolically healthy? If you are, I'm less concerned about what you are. These little tiny little choices that you're making as opposed to someone who may be new to intermittent fasting, maybe new to these kinds of products, maybe has been quite sedentary, has 25, 50 pounds to lose? Then we have to get much more deliberate. These are individuals that likely would benefit from a bit more than opposed to a little bit less. But with that being said, it's always in the context of what are your goals, what are your metabolic health threshold at this point in time and you can make adjustments.

Scott Emmens: I think the key there is if metabolic health is what you're seeking, then that is the key. If you are metabolically flexible and healthy, breaking the fast with minor things here and there are not going to make much of a difference. But what will make it much more, in my opinion you could disagree, is that your metabolic health and overall flexibility is going to be a much more important factor long term than whether you're stuck to your fast precisely or not.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, and I think this is a good time to just interject that sometimes we get caught up in the little details when in essence we should be flying at 30,000 feet or we're kind of looking down on collectively, what are all the choices we're making throughout the day, throughout the week and what net impact? How is your sleep? How are you managing your stress? Are you lifting weights? Are you eating a nutrient-dense, whole-food diet, which could look a little different for everyone? Are you eating enough protein? Are you satiated? Those things to me as a rule are, they take precedence over one supplement? It's not to ignore the questions that I know will be forthcoming with regard to this. But just keeping your eye on the big picture as opposed to worrying about little bits of minutiae. Sometimes we'll get questions on social media about a particular type of tea or a particular type of coffee, and we'll say. let's look at the ingredient list, let's educate ourselves, what could be contributing to what your concern is about? but I think sometimes people get fixated on one thing and they're not looking at the big picture.

Scott Emmens: Agreed. And sleep is a great example. If you don't get sufficient sleep, you are going to have metabolic insufficiencies or perhaps your blood sugar will spike. And you'll crave sweet food and that's been proven time and time again. If you're sleep deprived, especially over a long period of time, even one day, frankly, but you go less than 6 hours of sleep, you're going to have impacts on your blood sugar that are not going to be positive. So, everything matters. All of those things combined to your point, I think, is really where the rubber meets the road in terms of your metabolic flexibility and health.

Melanie Avalon: Hi friends. I'm about to tell you how to get $30 off one of my favorite tools to help people lose weight. So, losing weight involves your body going through changes. If you want to do it the right way, you need to be able to see exactly what is happening inside your body. NutriSense lets you do that. NutriSense provides access to continuous glucose monitors, also known as CGMs. I know you guys have heard us talk about CGMs all the time. They give you 24/7 real-time glucose data aka blood sugar. So, you can see how your body responds to different foods, as well as exercise, stress, and sleep. The NutriSense program can help you lose weight without making you feel like you have to make sacrifices. That's because once you're able to see the real impact that certain foods have on your body, you'll be empowered to make better choices and have more control over what you eat.

With NutriSense, you also get access to a registered dietitian who can help you interpret your data and come up with a personalized plan that's based on your data that will really work for you. The dietitian support and community of members will keep you motivated and accountable in your journey. Over time, you will start to see a noticeable difference in how you look and feel. Your clothes will feel better, you'll feel more active throughout the day, and feel confident when you look in the mirror. People who have spent years feeling frustrated because they weren't able to lose weight are now on their journey towards healthy and sustainable weight loss with NutriSense. If you're trying to lose weight and overcome your plateau in a healthy way, this is the program for you. If you're curious how it works, a continuous glucose monitor is a small device that tracks your glucose levels in real time. Application is easy and painless.

Friends, just look at my Instagram, I have done so many videos showing how to put them on. You really, really don't feel it. Then there's the NutriSense app. You can use the app to scan your CGM, visualize data, log meals, run experiences, and so much more. You get expert dietitian guidance. Your dietitian will help you interpret the data and will help you build sustainable healthy habits to achieve your goals. They will guide you in creating a meal plan that suits your unique lifestyle and needs including fasting. Visit nutrisense.io/ifpodcast and use code IFPODCAST to save $30 and get one month of free dietitian support. That's nutrisense.io/ifpodcast with the code IFPODCAST to save $30 and get one month of free dietitian support. Every single person I personally introduced to using a NutriSense CGM has inevitably come back and told me just how cool it is, how incredibly eye opening, and how it is truly changing the way they view food and their health. You guys will love it.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah. I think it goes without saying that when we're talking about sleep, I always like to mention sleep is foundational to our health. If you're not getting a quality sleep, everything else is secondary to that. Don't overfast or don't fast at all if you can't figure out why you're not sleeping well. There're so many women, in particular, I don't want to pick on women, but I know for myself, the first couple of years I was in perimenopause, my sleep, it was like an art form. I had to figure out the right things I needed to do to get myself to sleep through the night. But to your point, we know even one night of sleep can be detrimental to our metabolic health, can contribute to insulin resistance, will raise cortisol, will cause us to want to eat junk and not broccoli and chicken. Just understanding that if you're not sleeping well, that's the first thing to work on before you even worry about anything else get your sleep dialed in, figure out why you're not sleeping, and then fit all the other pieces into the puzzle.

Scott Emmens: One of the things I like about Inositol is not only that it helps with your deep sleep, but it helps with your entire sleep structure, meaning each phase, you'd mentioned the various phases and it helps with structuring that sleep so that you get a perfect balance. I shouldn't say perfect, but a better balance, an improved balance that was really interesting to me. I guess we could move on into mechanisms of action into the cell.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, absolutely. When we're talking about how Myo-inositol and I know that's a bit of a mouthful, so maybe for listeners I'm going to just say Inositol. But the product that we are talking about is Myo-inositol.

Scott Emmens: In the supplement world, if you see Inositol, that is Myo-inositol.

Cynthia Thurlow: Generally, yes.

Scott Emmens: 99% of the time if it says just Inositol, that's going to be Myo-inositol. The other most common is D-chiro-inositol, and there's reasons that you don't necessarily want to use it, and if you do it has to be in a very precise amount and it's probably best off to start with Myo-inositol, just by itself for a lot of clinical reasons, but Inositol pretty much means Myo-inositol unless it says D-chiro and that's a totally different [unintelligible [00:22:53], which you got to be very careful with.

Cynthia Thurlow: Absolutely, so, such a good point. When we're talking about our cells, we know that it plays a role in DNA repair. As we're getting older, we are more likely to be having issues with our mitochondria which are effectively the powerhouses of our cells. DNA repair, it's absolutely essential for that. It helps regulate cell metabolism. Again, these are kind of nerdy little caveats but really important to understand that this supplement in particular is working at the cellular level and not just kind of these extraneous topics. We know it's very important for the component of the cell membrane. Our cell membranes are important for communication between cells and so understanding that as we are getting older, as things are maybe not working as efficiently. This is why I really like the idea of using Inositol in conjunction with fasting whether you're taking this at the tail end of your feeding window or incorporating it throughout your day, understanding that at a very basic level, this can help your cells become more efficient, have more energy, be able to improve communication between cells, which, the older I get, the more I think about things on a bit more detailed level because I realize how humbling is to understand how our bodies work effectively.

Scott Emmens: Truly. I mean our bodies are a miracle if you think about it. How many different things have to go right for your body to work? It's amazing we can get up in the morning sometimes.

[laughter]

Cynthia Thurlow: True, very true. [laughs]

Scott Emmens: Component of the cell membrane and the cell membrane is typically like the fatty layer around that and mitochondria have their own cell membrane as well, correct?

Cynthia Thurlow: They do, they do. So, this phospholipid bi-layering and this is why things that we're exposed to our environment, our personal care products, our food, can all impact this in positive or negative ways. Understanding that we are contributing to components that are going to make this protective layer more effective and allow it to be optimized is certainly very exciting.

Scott Emmens: Absolutely. We know that mitochondrial health leads to so many other things too including brain health, so, excellent. Now, the number of things that Inositol, Myo-inositol we're speaking about in particular, and we'll just say Inositol to keep it easy [Cynthia laughs] but it's all when we say Inositol, we're saying Myo-inositol. The amount of things that this product has been clinically studied for in the brain and then the amount of new and upcoming research really blew me away.

I had known about Inositol for many years. I've known many people that have taken it, but when I started to get into the research, as you and I were preparing the product and preparing this podcast, I just was really blown away by the amount of influence this could have on your mood, on your cognition, on the speed of your brain, on your sleep architecture. Let's talk about the things in the brain and why do you think it works there and why that's so important, and what are the core key things that are provable that we can stand behind the clinical data on?

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, we know Inositol is very effective with brain signaling. Again, as we've already talked about, it's a component of our cellular membranes. Starting with protection of the blood-brain barrier being a previous ER nurse, there are specific substances that can cross the blood-brain barrier and others that cannot. Now that we understand a whole lot more about the gut microbiome and the interrelationship between leaky gut, leaky brain, understanding that Inositol can beneficial in helping to strengthen that blood-brain barrier.

The blood-brain barrier is designed to protect us, but in many instances, due to lifestyle, personal care choices, etc., can weaken this and can allow us to absorb substances into the brain that do not belong. I also think about neuroplasticity, which is this concept where it allows us to create new neural pathways. But it's also particularly beneficial with commonly recognized neurotransmitters like dopamine, acetylcholine, GABA, and serotonin, understanding that it can strengthen and improve these specific neurotransmitter pathways as well as communication between the neurotransmitters.

I think about glutamic acid or glutamate and GABA. GABA is this inhibitory neurotransmitter, and glutamate is this excitatory neurotransmitter and making sure that we're influencing the right neurotransmitter at the right time. You don't want to be stimulated when you're trying to go to bed. You want to have this inhibitory communication with GABA in particular. I also think about assisting and regulating sodium levels. We talk a lot about electrolytes on this podcast and how important they are knowing that Inositol is involved in the regulation of sodium. There's a sodium-potassium pump in the body across these cellular membranes and this in and of itself helps with maintenance of myelin sheaths that protect our neurons. Down to regulating electrolytes, but also protecting the fatty myelin sheath that allows for proper transmission impulses in between different brain cells I found particularly interesting.

Scott Emmens: I would have to agree. I'll start there but there were a lot of things I want to unpack with that one. So, the myelin sheaths to bring it into layman's terms are like the rubber around an electric cord and that rubber around electric cords keeps other electric cords from touching each other and shorting out. I think it was ALD, which was a nerve disease. The movie Lorenzo's Oil, do you remember that movie?

Cynthia Thurlow: I do.

Scott Emmens: And his son had that disease. I might be getting the acronyms wrong or the verbiage wrong, but it was basically a disease of the myelin sheaths not being properly built. So, your myelin sheaths are so important because if they're not created well in your brain, then your neurons don't-- even if you have the neurons, but the myelin sheaths are brittle or not connected, you can have little shorts, little skips, and your cognition can decline.

That goes for all of your nerves, right? You've got to have really good myelin sheaths, which also goes back to the point on that bilipid layer that protects the cell. That's like a myelin sheath for the cell, different mechanism, but you've got to prevent those short circuits. That's really important for brain health and overall function cognition. So, I found that fascinating. The other thing, just to tap into it, as you had mentioned how it works with choline, etc. There was a study I read that choline in combination with Myo-inositol, is also beneficial.

Now, choline in itself is really good for your brain if you're not getting enough in your diet, so that's something we can talk about down the road. I do take choline every day with Myo-inositol, with my black coffee. By the way, it does sweeten my coffee just the smidge. it's not like sugar, but just a tiny little sweet taste. It's really made my black coffee more pleasurable.

[laughter]

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, it's funny, after I was hospitalized four years ago, I remember I got out of the hospital and I craved red meat and I craved eggs. Eggs are rich in choline and I have eggs every single day, sometimes four or five at a time. I love that you're seeing this improvement in taking choline on a daily basis. The interrelationship with Inositol makes a great deal of sense. I also think about how Inositol can reduce inflammation by actually reducing pro-inflammatory cytokines. These inflammatory substances that we find in the body, some of which are inflammatory in terms of cytokines, others are not. And then also impacts thought processing. This was something that I tried to get really detailed about because I found this particularly interesting as we are getting older, especially women in particular, as we're losing estradiol, testosterone, and progesterone signaling in the brain that can impact how-- do we have brain fog, are we struggling with trying to find the words, understanding that thought processing as we're getting older can sometimes be mitigated by hormonal fluctuations? But understanding that there are things that we can include into our diet or supplement regimen that can help improve this. It's interesting that this one research article that I looked at, it was talking about how when serotonin and dopamine levels are not optimized, so these are two neurotransmitters. As these are not optimized, it can actually make anxiety and depression worse. This alone can impact cognition, memory and can contribute to some of the age-related decline that we see, but how the introduction of some of these lifestyle measures can make a huge net impact. Now I know for myself personally, I always say that I can accept a lot of things that are changing in my body as I'm getting older, but the brain piece I'm not willing to accept. So, I'm always trying to optimize and make sure I stay sharp. I have teenagers I have to stay on top of and running a business and just being a good human. And I'm curious for you, when you were doing your own research, what did you see that was specific to the neurotransmitter processing in the brain? Anything that you could add to that particular research that I had mentioned?

Scott Emmens: What I saw was similar to what you saw that it does enhance the brain's ability to maintain both the amount of dopamine and serotonin. But also, this part that you had mentioned, the neural pathways helping to support the growth of neural pathways. Well, if you can grow neural pathways faster when you're learning something new, to me that is a massive advantage because as we age, growing new neural pathways becomes pretty challenging. If you can do anything to help support that and I think that's why I like to take the choline with it along with other things that I think support that ability to grow neural pathways. I take a lot of things that have BDNF in them such as Lion's Mane, ginkgo biloba. They don't have BDNF in them. They help the body support its own BDNF.

Exercise, particularly aerobic exercise helps with BDNF, which is brain-derived neurotropic factor. Basically, that's your fertilizer for your brain to grow new neurons. That to me was a big one. But also, the speed with which and the balance which with the dopamine, serotonin and I think might have mentioned GABA in there as well. That sort of perfect balance, again, I use the word perfect. That improved balance to me was really the way that I was like, this is something I really feel like is going to be important for my long-term brain health. Because just like you, I can take-- I'm 52, my body's not going to bench press 300 pounds anymore. I'm okay with that. But I don't want my brain to decline to the point where I'm just two steps behind or feeling like I'm not 100%. I want my brain to get as healthy as it possibly can be because by the time I'm 80, right, whatever my baseline is now, it's not going to get better at 80. But If I can maintain it or make it a little better over the next couple of years and then maintain that for a while, I'm going to have a little bit more capacity as I age. To me, I think of all the things I worry about from a longevity health standpoint, it is 100% brain.

Cynthia Thurlow: One of the other really important/interesting distinctions about brain health as we are getting older is the potentiality of loss of insulin sensitivity and poor metabolic health. That understanding that at the basis of insulin resistance or hyperinsulinemia is an upregulation and inflammation and oxidative stress which we know goes on to actually damage our neurons and our brains. Unfortunately, I think for many people, they don't understand the interrelationship that our brains in the latter stages of our lives 60s, 70s, 80s, and beyond are made in our 40s and 50s. So, understanding how critically important metabolic health is not just to our bodies but also to our brains is so, so important.

Understanding that also maintaining insulin sensitivity can help with buffering these hormonal changes that are happening in women's brains and frankly men's brains as well. The number one reason why men are dealing with lowered testosterone levels is this loss of insulin sensitivity and also exposure to estrogen-mimicking chemicals as well as women as they're transitioning from perimenopause into menopause, they're losing estradiol signaling, progesterone signaling, testosterone signaling in the brain that can actually exacerbate underlying insulin resistance.

Scott Emmens: That's a serious problem. I have heard the type 3 diabetes analogy fairly often, actually came out of the diabetes world and at that point they were starting to use things like metformin and TZDs, which are insulin sensitizers for clinical trials and Alzheimer's. Now, I don't think those drugs were the right kind of drugs because they don't cross the blood-brain barrier. So, that's probably something to think about. But speaking of crossing the blood-brain barrier and these issues with keeping the cell structure intact, chemicals in our diet can actually make your blood-brain barrier more permeable and not in a good way. You want to make sure that you've got this, your blood-brain barrier, you're doing everything you can do to protect it because if it breaks down and negative chemicals get into the brain, you're going to have more death of neurons and keep your body in this constant state of inflammation that you just spoke about. That's another thing that in our diets there're a lot of different chemicals and additives and food additives that you don't even necessarily know are letting things penetrate your blood-brain barrier whether you're aware of that or not.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, just even thinking, I did a great podcast with Jeffrey Smith, who's this incredible advocate that's doing amazing work educating people about the dangers of certain types of pesticides and herbicides like glyphosate. And understanding that glyphosate creates small intestine hyperpermeability aka leaky gut. Guess what? When you get a leaky gut, you got a leaky brain. Understanding that these things aren't entirely benign and just being conscientious, not feeling like you have to be fearful about your environment but just being informed, and understanding that things like grains, where you can get some exogenous sources of Inositol can also be challenging for the body to break down. I'm sure we'll probably talk about this, the role of phytic acid and exposure to these pesticides and herbicides that are designed to make, "Healthier crops," can actually lead to mineral issues, not being able to absorb as much minerals from the foods that we think we are, but also deal with some of the health implications of exposure to said herbicides and pesticides.

Scott Emmens: Yeah, we definitely have to talk about the phytic acid and natural exogenous sources of Inositol. Now, again, we had mentioned that the kidney and the liver make about 2 grams in the kidney and about a gram in liver. One of the studies I read, despite where it's made, the most concentration of Inositol is in your brain. Obviously, there's something that your brain needs with this natural body-producing compound that's critically important. Maybe it is time to get into the natural sources and why there are some issues there or did we skip something along the way?

Cynthia Thurlow: It's interesting, we touched on the fact that you can get some exogenous, which means outside the body, sources from nuts and grains and beans and fruit. What's interesting, though, is that in particular to grains, phytic acid is a component of a cell wall of plant-based food that can actually impair mineral absorption in the body. You may ingest said food, but your body may not be able to fully optimize. The statistic I read last night was that the average diet allows for 720 milligrams a day found in grains and seeds, but can be as low as 250 milligrams or as high as 1600 milligrams depending on the foods consumed.

It's interesting because as I was looking at different philosophies of research, organ meats can be a great source. I know that organ meats for many people are either things they don't like the taste of, the flavor profile, the texture, trying to get these into the diet. But I thought it would be interesting to kind of identify some of the things that can reduce our ability to be able to extract Inositol from food. Number one was insulin resistance or hyperinsulinemia. That was number one and again only 7% of the population actually is metabolically flexible, so that's important.

Low salt intake, we unfortunately have conditioned an entire generation of clinicians and humans that you want to have a low-sodium diet. It's really that you want a less processed diet. Most of the salt that people are consuming is iodized salt, which is a low-quality type of salt. It's not per se that we shouldn't have salts in our diet because I'll be the first person to say we need high-quality salt, but it's the quality of salt that we're consuming. Antibiotic use, I mean, how many people listening have been on multiple rounds of antibiotics? I certainly have had the benefits of needing to take antibiotics, but then understanding that that's largely impacted my entire body diffusely. Then, interestingly enough, caffeine intake, so especially coffee can reduce your endogenous stores of Myo-inositol which I thought was really interesting.

Scott Emmens: You're bumming me out.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, exactly and low magnesium. I'm always talking about magnesium anyway, but magnesium is critically important for the biosynthesis of Myo-inositol. Just get another reason why we need more magnesium replacement in our lives. You just can't get enough from eating organic foods or using a whiff of magnesium every day. I could go off on a whole magnesium tangent and my listeners know this, but those are just some of the ways that our modern-day lifestyles can impact our ability to create endogenous Myo-inositol and actually make it harder for us to keep our levels optimized in the body.

Scott Emmens: Absolutely. I read the same thing and it was kind of shocking to me because, again, I've done a lot of research on magnesium. When I read that magnesium was essential, "What is magnesium not essential to?" It seems to be essential to just about everything in the body. To your point, magnesium is drawn out of you for so many different reasons. Sodium, same thing, sodium is drawn out of you. I hear in the summer, you're going to need a lot of sodium. Because you're going to sweat out a lot of sodium. If you're a completely sedentary person or you don't-- hot sports or saunas are not your thing, or you're not a big sweater. maybe you only need 2000 milligrams a day. If you're an athlete especially a competitive athlete, you're going to need probably a lot more than 2000 milligrams of, to your point, quality sodium not processed sodium that's put into your processed pizza or from the old-fashioned little blue bottle there. It's iodized salt. You want a good quality, high mineral, high-quality mixture salt. And there're lots available. Yes, those are two critically important things.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, and it's interesting, there're over 300 enzymatic reactions in the body that utilize magnesium. This is just one of many examples of why low magnesium is going to impact all of these other processes. I'm the first person to say that when I was working in clinical cardiology, we would recommend transdermal. So, skin-absorbed magnesium and oral magnesium to be able to optimize levels. Just understanding that most magnesiums are not going to get you to where you need to be. More often than not, most people need two different ways of getting the magnesium in through the skin and then also orally.

Scott Emmens: I'm pretty tolerant of magnesium. I take a number of different kinds of magnesiums, different forms. One form I'm actually looking into a little bit more is magnesium chloride because it's already converted into an electrolyte. Whereas the other magnesium your body has to take it and convert it into magnesium chloride essentially to make it an "Electrolyte." I'm really looking at that as maybe the next thing I add to my diet. But magnesium in general, I take a lot of in a lot of different forms. I'll mix them up, but I want to get one foundational magnesium, which I take on a regular basis. I usually add a threonate or a gluconate or bisglycinate and I'm looking into actually two new kinds to potentially launch in the next few months. You can't get enough and there're all different forms.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, absolutely. It's interesting because listeners will ask. I use Ancient Minerals. They have a spray that you can use, a spray oil, and also a lotion very efficacious. That's what we used in electrophysiology, which is a subsect of cardiology. Typically, you spray into two cupped hands, you rub on your trunk and your arms and legs, leave on for 20 minutes and shower off, very cost effective. You can get it on the Ancient Minerals website or even probably Amazon.

The other magnesium that I think is most efficacious for me personally is magnesium L-threonate. I take that in powdered formulation usually before bed. That is one of the very few formulations that will cross the blood-brain barrier. For me, it's all about relaxation, sleep support and those are probably the two I use the most of. I would say if anyone listening has magnesium oxide in their medicine cabinet, in their supplement drawer, you only absorb about 11%, it is worth throwing in the garbage. It is so poorly absorbed by the body. That was what we used to use in the hospital a lot until I knew better. I always like to share that as a pearl. If you have it, toss it, you don't get much out of it, and you're essentially creating expensive urine.

Scott Emmens: Yeah. The reason that-- So, almost every magnesium you see at Walgreens or your Rite Aid or your general pharmacy, 95% of those are going to be magnesium oxide.

Cynthia Thurlow: Which is crap.

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Cynthia Thurlow: Inevitably, there'll be lots of questions about why this supplement at this time. I think I've been very transparent that my focus for our collaborative work together is metabolic health, brain health, and certainly sleep support  because that's such a pain point for so many. I thought we could talk about a little bit of the indications for why this is the supplement that we chose to do now and then talk about dosing, and then talk about why MD Logic's standards are so high and how that has impacted the decision to kind of collaborate together. Just from a high-level perspective, 40% to 60% of perimenopausal and menopausal women have differing issues surrounding insomnia. Those are not my statistics, that's just statistics that I read. Overall, 10% to 30% of the overall population, both men and women, some as high as 50% to 60% by the second study I looked at. We know it's more commonly seen in women and I think a large amount of that is the fluctuations in progesterone, which oftentimes helps us fall asleep, and changes in estradiol, predominant form of estrogen as we're transitioning out of our cycling years into perimenopause helps us stay asleep.

There was an article, meta-analysis in Frontiers in Psychiatry that talked about in observational studies, there's a higher prevalence in women than men. I don't think we needed a study to confirm that just from talking to patients over the years. Certainly, a greater issue for women than men. And then understanding that Inositol helps us fall asleep and then if we wake up in the middle of the night, will allow us to fall asleep more easily. Even Huberman Lab talks about how Myo-inositol is part of his sleep stack. He uses it several times a week, just makes it part of his sleep stack. I love my own sleep stack, but this is an absolutely integral part of it. We know that Myo-inositol impacts serotonin levels which induces a sense of peace and calm, certainly the way that you want to be thinking as you're kind of heading off to bed, and then it also has direct communication with GABA. GABA is this inhibitory neurotransmitter that we find in the brain and can help support healthy function of the receptors there. Again, inhibitory neurotransmitter that we are positively impacting by the utilization and supplementation of Myo-inositol.

Scott Emmens: Yeah, the number of things that it does for sleep is really remarkable as we talked about the faster onset of sleep, the higher quality of sleep, the sleep architecture, the ability to fall asleep if you wake up. And that's my problem. I can fall asleep, but I will inevitably wake up at 1 in the morning, thoughts racing, and 2 hours later I'm still looking at a podcast or something and I can't fall asleep. Now, I try not to take my phone to bed, but when I wake up at 1 in the morning, I'm like I need something to kind of soothe my brain back to sleep, so that's great. I have a sleep stack too, which now includes Myo-inositol and I also do my melatonin with that as well as I'm just recently experimenting with L-theanine, which I'm really liking. I haven't quite dialed in the right dosage yet or like timing, but I really like L-theanine both during the day as a cognitive enhancer with my coffee. It keeps me from getting jittery and kind of balance that caffeine out. I take one of our products along with it, which is a choline, Alpha GPC, acetyl-L-carnitine, and phosphatidylserine blend. I take that along with L-theanine in the morning and then I take the L-theanine, the Inositol, and the melatonin at night. With that combo, I've been sleeping really well.

Cynthia Thurlow: That's great. It's interesting because I have found that if I take the Inositol every night it works better than just using it as needed. I do think there's some degree of cumulative effect. The therapeutic dose that I have found is 1 gram in the evening is very effective. If you look at research on polycystic ovarian syndrome or PCOS, you can definitely see therapeutic benefit from 2 grams twice a day. But obviously, if you're working with someone on your PCOS, an endocrinologist, a GYN, an integrative trained healthcare practitioner, they may have you on other items as well. So, definitely worth discussing with them. It's interesting, there was one research article that talked about dosing in menopause is 3 grams a night. I haven't experimented with that. But having said that, I think the nice thing is you can adjust. If I'm having a particularly stressful day, I may take 2 grams at night as opposed to 1 gram. I think a nice starting point is 1 gram. I do find that most of my patients do really well at that dose.

Scott Emmens: I've been doing about 3 grams and that's been the perfect amount.

Cynthia Thurlow: Sweet spot.

Scott Emmens: I take 1 gram in the day, 2 grams before bed. That seems to be my sweet spot, 4 grams seems a bit much, so I've kind of been balancing around 2 to 3 grams. One of the other things I wonder if it helps with sleep is and maybe this is because of the GABA, but it has been shown to reduce cravings for binge eating disorder. It's been shown to help in panic disorders. It's been shown to help with certain anxieties and OCDs. I just wonder if all of these also are contributing to the overall ability to sleep. If you have less anxiety, you're going to sleep better, or is that you're getting sleep, thus your anxiety is lower. Chicken and egg sort of thing. It just seems to be working across the spectrum of things that disrupt sleep.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, I think it's important just to understand that, as you mentioned the chicken or the egg, looking at it as what is contributing to the changes in sleep, for a lot of people, they're anxious by nature. It's hard to shut their brain off. Things like L-theanine as you mentioned and alluded to is a really nice amino acid. It's interesting we have components of L-theanine in green tea. We'd have to drink quite a bit to get enough L-theanine on board. That calming effect that you get from L-theanine that can be a nice adjunct to other types of sleep support. It would be remiss if we didn't at least touch quickly on metabolic health, I know we've talked a bit about it. We know only 7% of adults in the United States are metabolically healthy and fewer than one in 15 have optimal metabolic health. That means that you're not being treated for high blood pressure or elevated triglycerides. You don't have a waist circumference greater than 45 inches if you're a male, greater than 35 inches if you're a female. Means your fasting blood sugar is optimized, I like to say between 75 and 90, and you have appropriate levels of HDL. For women greater than 55, men greater than 45. Technically, the metabolic syndrome diagnosis is made when you have 3/5 of those.

We know that Myo-inositol can be helpful for insulin sensitizing. Then there's solid randomized controlled trials on this. We're not just sharing cherry-picking research. We're really looking at the research. It can effectively help to promote weight loss in conjunction with that. What I liked was there was one study that was talking about it can be used in conjunction with other medications like Glucophage, magnesium, progesterone in particular. You can utilize these concurrently. Again, if you're on any of these medications, talk to your prescribing provider. We're not providing medical advice. We're just providing guidance in terms of what the research is showing and it was interesting there was one article that talked about how utilizing Inositol with whey protein will help for better absorption. If you're not dairy intolerant like I am for a lot of other people, you could probably throw it in with a shake or make a protein pudding and know that you'll get better absorption from the whey utilization.

Scott Emmens: I did not read about that. But it's Interesting but now that I know coffee decreases Myo-inositol, I'm going to put 2 grams in my coffee in the morning.

[laughter]

Cynthia Thurlow: I think something that I think would be super helpful is to explain to listeners. We have this partnership together that we are co-collaborating on supplements. What is it about MD Logic that distinguishes your company from other companies on the market?

Scott Emmens: I think there're a couple of things. The first is what we've tried to do is a partner with people like yourself that have extremely high standards of what they are looking for. We don't do white label, which is private labeling, a product that you already make and then just putting someone else's name on it. That's not what we're about. We're about clinicians or people that are in the know that understand what they want in their supplement, what their customers want. That's the place we first start is who are the people we want to work with because we want to make sure that they are as committed to the quality as we are, that they're trying to do the best possible thing for their clients and patients because otherwise it would reflect negatively on us. So, that's where we start. It starts with the quality of who the client is that wants to create a supplement with us and then It goes through what we consider the gold standard of GMP.

Now, GMP has its baseline standards and many companies are GMP certified, but that doesn't mean they are GMP compliant. Meaning you can have a GMP facility that's had multiple violations over three to five years. I'm not suggesting that every company has to have a zero, never has had a GMP violation because they'll give you a violation for small things, potentially. When I say they that's the FDA. So, what we do is we start the process by looking at the ingredient itself, making sure that the ingredient itself, before it even comes onto the factory floor. Now, this is not necessarily what most companies do because you only legally have to test it at the end of the process. But we don't even want to bring the product into the door, into the quarantine facility where we make the products because if it's infected with mold or toxins, it could spill over to other things, so every product is tested for toxins, mold, heavy metals, purity, strength, and identity before it even gets into the facility.

Then what we do is we take that product and we create it in the perfect GMP process, which is, you have to make sure that the product is stored at a certain temperature. You have to make sure that you use certain specification sheets so even the documentation to make the product is important. We make sure that if we make what's called a variation from time to time or standard operating procedure that every one of those is filled out, that each process is followed, that the person in charge of the facility is following that SOP to the letter of the law, meaning if they say it has to be 6 inches above the ground, the product has to be stored 6 inches above the ground. All of our products are then stored and climate controlled. Then we send them out for testing. Some products we send out for third-party testing, but we do two in-house tests, which is, again we do all of those same things again at the end of the product. So, let's say we're making a combination product and we use seven ingredients. Well, after it goes through the whole process, you want to make sure of a couple of things. One, is it still as pure and clean as the day it arrived? And all of the strengths, purity and potency, and identity of those products what we said is in there.

So, if we said there's 100 milligrams of vitamin C, there's 100 milligrams of vitamin C. If we said there's 200 milligrams of astragalus, there's 200 milligrams of astragalus, and then is it pure? Does it still have the same levels of heavy metal as when it came into the factory? Or did it get exposed to something? So, it gets tested before it comes in. We follow all of those other regulations because if you leave something on the floor, it could get wet and it gets moldy. So, what came in as clean is now on your floor. It gets moist because it's on the concrete slab, and then it might create mold. We do the testing at the very beginning, all four of the GMP plus heavy metals.

For certain products, we'll send out for additional testing, such as enzyme products. We'll test out to make sure that the SPUs of an enzyme are active that there's what we say, how many-- 125,000 for our serrapeptase for example. We send that out for third-party testing to make sure that's how many active enzymes are in each of those capsules. It's not just an internal test, it's also external. Now, some folks say, "Oh, we third party test, but that also means that they third party, they're paying another client and another entity that they don't know this facility and they don't know if they're doing their job correctly. It sounds great to do third-party testing, but unless you know that third party really well and you know they're following all GMP, you really want to have your own ownership and oversight to make sure that the lab assistants are doing that job properly.

So, we do both an internal and [unintelligible [00:59:35] we need to we'll send things out for third party, on occasion we'll send things out if we're like questioning the potential toxins of something. We'll send it out for additional screening for pesticides, for example. We go through a very rigorous process. At then at the end, we also test it for shelf stability. Every single step along the way before it gets into the consumer's hand, it's been a chain of custody tested across the board for strength, compliance, identity, toxins, heavy mold, etc. At the beginning, at the end and it's climate stored from that process from the beginning to the end.

The only part of that process we can't control is if it's in a UPS truck in California. There might be a couple of hours, but we test things to make sure that they can withstand that kind of temperature for a couple of hours. Whereas when you go to a mega warehouse, let's just say box stores and shipping stores, for example, you have no idea how long it's been sitting there. You have no idea if GMP has been filed through that process. We feel really good about the products we send out because the ingredients are what we say, the purity is what we say, the heavy metals are what we say. We pass all of those tests on the front and the backend. That's what we feel really good about.

And then we work really hard to make sure that the product we're delivering has the least amount of toxic things in it and is the best for the environment it can possibly be, and we're working more and more towards that with each new product. Now, we're a young company, so we inherited some of the products we have, but each time we [unintelligible [01:01:11] a product, we're taking out the steroids and the palmitates, making it in a glass bottle to reduce phthalates in the world and plastics in general. You and I could talk about plastics forever. We're really taking extraordinary efforts to make sure that the product that shows up at your door is the best possible quality you can get.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, and I'm so grateful for that. I talk all the time about how most pharmaceutical grade companies don't third-party source to Amazon. I think a lot of individuals are surprised to know that buying pharmaceutical grade supplements is really the way to go if you're going to choose to take a supplement, making sure that you're purchasing from a company that has such a rigorous set of standards for evaluation, transportation, and preservation of their products. Now, for listeners that are still listening and tuning in, want to be fully transparent and share that the presale for Myo-inositol or Inositol starts on March 11th through the 19th. You can get 25% off and you can go to www.cynthiathurlow.com/inositol. That's I-N-O-S-I-T-O-L, little bit of a mouthful. From March 20th to the 31st, you can get 15% off. So, obviously, you want to jump on board when it goes on sale and then understanding that you don't need a code for the presale that will get you directly to the discounted price. Again. www. cynthiathurlow.com/inositol I-N-O-S-I-T-O-L, little bit of a mouthful but it's fully worth it. Scott, always a pleasure to connect with you. Let my listeners how to connect with you outside of the podcast, how to reach you on social media or your website.

Scott Emmens: The best place to reach me is @longevityprotocol on Instagram or #collagenguru on TikTok if that's your thing. But primarily I don't do Facebook, so you won't find me there. If you would like to get a hold of me directly to talk to me specifically about anything, you can reach out to, let me be specific, mdlogichealth.com is our website. Reach out to us there, just say, "Hey, I'd like to speak to Scott Emmens" and our assistant will get you in touch with me.

Cynthia Thurlow: Great. Thanks so much again, Scott. It's always a pleasure connecting with you.

Scott Emmens: Cynthia, pleasure as always. Thank you so much.

Cynthia Thurlow: Thanks again for a wonderful podcast, Scott. Listeners can look for the show notes @ifpodcast.com/episode310 and submit questions to questions@ifpodcast.com or @ifpodcast.com. You can connect with us on social media. I am @cynthia_thurlow_ on Instagram or through my website, www.cynthiathurlow.com. And Scott may be reached at mdlogicwellness.com.

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, transcripts by SpeechDocs, and original theme composed by Leland Cox and re-composed by Steve Saunders. See you next week.

[Transcript provided by SpeechDocs Podcast Transcription]

STUFF WE LIKE

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

LINKS

BUY:
Melanie's What When Wine Diet: Lose Weight And Feel Great With Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, And Wine
Cynthia's Intermittent Fasting Transformation: The 45-Day Program for Women to Lose Stubborn Weight, Improve Hormonal Health, and Slow Aging

The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast

Everyday Wellness

More on Melanie: MelanieAvalon.com 

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Welcome to Episode 307 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 Cynthia Thurlow, author of Intermittent Fasting Transformation: The 45-Day Program for Women to Lose Stubborn Weight, Improve Hormonal Health, and Slow Aging.

Today's episode of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast is brought to you by:

BUTCHERBOX: Grass-Fed Beef, Organic Chicken, Heritage Pork, Wild-Caught Seafood: Nutrient-Rich, Raised Sustainably The Way Nature Intended, And Shipped Straight To Your Door! For A Limited Time Go To butcherbox.com/ifpodcast And Get free Chicken Nuggets for a Year and $20 off!

JOOVV: Like Intermittent Fasting, Red Light Therapy Can Benefit The Body On So Many Levels! It Literally Works On The Mitochondrial Level To Help Your Cells Generate More Energy! Red Light Can Help You Burn Fat (Including Targeted Fat Burning And Stubborn Fat!), Contour Your Body, Reduce Fine Lines And Wrinkles, Produce Collagen For Epic Skin, Support Muscle Recovery, Reduce Joint Pain And Inflammation, Combat Fatigue, Help You Sleep Better, Improve Mood, And So Much More!! These Devices Are Literally LIFE CHANGING!! For A Limited Time Go To joovv.com/ifpodcast And Use The Code IFPODCAST For An Exclusive Discount!

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To submit your own questions, email questions@IFpodcast.com, or submit your questions here!! 

SHOW NOTES

1:10 - BUTCHERBOX: For A Limited Time Go To butcherbox.com/ifpodcast And Get Free Chicken Nuggets For A Year And $20 Off!

3:30 - BEAUTYCOUNTER: Keep Your Fast Clean Inside And Out With Safe Skincare! Shop With Us At melanieavalon.com/beautycounter or beautycounter.com/cynthiathurlow And Use The Code CLEANFORALL20 For 20% Off PLUS Something Magical Might Happen After Your First Order! Find Your Perfect Beautycounter Products With Melanie's Quiz: Melanieavalon.Com/Beautycounterquiz
Join Melanie's Facebook Group Clean Beauty And Safe Skincare With Melanie Avalon To Discuss And Learn About All The Things Clean Beauty, Beautycounter And Safe Skincare!

SAFECATCH: Go to www.safecatch.com To Get 20% Off With Code MELANIEAVAON Through The End Of March!

20:25 - JOOVV: For A Limited Time Go To joovv.com/ifpodcast And Use The Code IFPODCAST For An Exclusive Discount!

22:30 - Listener Q&A: chris - Circadian rhythm

Early Vs Late-Night Eating: Contradictions, Confusions, And Clarity

32:10 - Listener Q&A: Amy - AMA Question

38:40 - Listener Q&A: Chrissy - IF and Surgical Recovery

45:00 - ATHLETIC GREENS: Get A FREE 1 Year Supply Of Immune-Supporting Vitamin D AND 5 FREE Travel Packs With Your First Purchase At athleticgreens.com/ifpodcast!

46:30 - Listener Q&A: Ann - Autophagy question

The effect of fasting or calorie restriction on autophagy induction: A review of the literature

Training state and skeletal muscle autophagy in response to 36 h of fasting

Physiological responses to acute fasting: implications for intermittent fasting programs

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

Melanie Avalon: Welcome to Episode 307 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 and author of What When Wine: Lose Weight and Feel Great with Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting and Wine. I’m here with my cohost, Cynthia Thurlow, Nurse Practitioner and author of Intermittent Fasting Transformation: A 45-Day Program for Women to Lose Stubborn Weight, Improve Hormonal Health, and Slow Aging. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and cynthiathurlow.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this show do not constitute medical advice or treatment and no doctor- patient relationship is formed. 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.

Hi friends, I'm about to tell you how you can get free organic free-range, gluten-free chicken nuggets for a year and $20 off. That's right. Free organic free-range, gluten-free chicken nuggets for a year plus $20 off. So, we are a little bit obsessed with a company called ButcherBox. When you think high quality meals, what do you think? For me, I think of the actual source ingredients. It's a little bit ironic because I do love eating out at restaurants, but I honestly think that I can get better high-quality meat and seafood right in my own home. That's because ButcherBox takes the guesswork out of finding high quality meat and seafood and makes it so easy, so accessible, and so affordable. I love this company. They make 100% grass-fed, grass-finished beef, free-range organic chicken, heritage-breed pork that is raised crate free, and wild caught seafood. Everything is humanely raised and there are no antibiotics or added hormones. You can get a variety of high-quality cuts that are hard to come by at the grocery store at an amazing value. 

Friends, I did a lot of research on ButcherBox. I wrote an entire blog post about it, and I was so, so impressed with their practices. And they make it so easy. They have free shipping for the continental US and no surprise fees and you can really make the boxes be exactly what you want. They have quite a few options including curated options and customized options, and you can change your plan whenever you want. I recently ate both a ButcherBox grass-fed steak and some of their heritage-breed pork chop. Both of them were so incredible. I was eating it and just thinking this is the most delicious thing ever. People go to restaurants and spend so much money on meals when they could be eating something that is more delicious, probably more sustainable and better for you and the planet all at home.

ButcherBox has an incredible offer for our audience. You can get free chicken nuggets for a year and $20 off your first box when you sign up today. That's a 22-ounce bag of gluten-free chicken nuggets in every order for a year plus $20 off when you sign up at butcherbox.com/ifpodcast and use code IFPODCAST. Claim this deal at butcherbox.com/ifpodcast and use code IFPODCAST and we'll put all this information in the show notes.

One more thing before we jump in, are you fasting clean inside and out. So, when it comes to weight loss, we focus a lot on what and when we eat. It makes sense because these foods affect our hormones and how our bodies store and burn fat. But do you what is possibly one of the most influential factors in weight gain. It’s not your food and it’s not fasting. It’s actually our skincare and makeup. So, as it turns out, Europe has banned over a thousand compounds found in conventional skincare and makeup in the US due to their toxicity. These include endocrine disruptors, which mess with your hormones, carcinogens linked to cancer, and obesogens which literally can cause your body to store and gain weight. Basically, when we’re using conventional skincare and makeup, we are giving these obesogenic compounds direct access to our bloodstream.

And then in our bodies, studies have shown they do things like reduce our satiety hormones, increase our hunger hormones, make fat cells more likely to store fat, and more resistant to burning fat, and so much more. If you have stubborn fat, friends, your skincare and makeup may be playing a role in that. Beyond weight gain and weight loss, these compounds have very detrimental effects on our health and they affect the health of our future generations. That’s because ladies when we have babies, a huge percent of those toxic compounds go through the placenta into the newborn. It is so, so shocking. And the effects last for years.

Conventional lipstick, for example, often tests high in lead and the half-life of lead is up to 30 years. That means when you put on some conventional lipstick 30 years later maybe half of that lead has left your bones. On top of that, there is essentially no regulation of these products on the shelves. That’s why it’s up to us to choose brands that are changing this. The brand that is working the hardest to do this is Beautycounter. They were founded on a mission to change this. Every single ingredient is extensively tested to be safe for your skin, so you can truly feel good about what you put on. And friends, these products really, really work. They are incredible. They have counter time for anti-aging, counter match for normal skin, counter control for acne and oily prone, and counter start for sensitive. I use their Overnight Resurfacing Peel and vitamin C serum every single night of my life. And their makeup is amazing. Check out my Instagram to see what it looks like. Tina Fey, even wore all Beautycounter makeup when she hosted The Golden Globes. So, yes, it is high-definition camera ready. They have so many other products, deodorant, shampoo and conditioner that I love, products for babies and so much more.

You can shop with us at beautycounter.com/melanieavalon or beautycounter.com/cynthiathurlow and use the coupon code CLEANFORALL20 to get 20% off your first order. Also, make sure to get on my Clean Beauty email list. That’s at melanieavalon.com/cleanbeauty. I give away a lot of free things on that list, so definitely check it out. You can join me in my Facebook group Clean Beauty and Safe Skincare with Melanie Avalon. People share their experiences, ask questions, give product reviews, and I do a giveaway every single week in that group as well.

And lastly, if you’re thinking of making Clean Beauty and Safe Skincare a part of your future like we have, we definitely recommend becoming a Band of Beauty member. It’s sort of like Amazon Prime for Clean Beauty. You get 10% back in product credit, free shipping on qualifying orders, and a welcome gift that is worth way more than the price of the yearlong membership. It is totally, completely worth it. So, again, to shop with us, go to beautycounter.com/melanieavalon or beautycounter.com/cynthiathurlow and use the coupon code CLEANFORALL20 to get 20% off your first order. And we’ll put all this information in the show notes. All right, now back to the show.

Hi, everybody, and welcome. This is episode number 307 of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon and I'm here with Cynthia Thurlow.

Cynthia Thurlow: Hi, Melanie. How are you?

Melanie Avalon: I am good. Are you struggling with jet lag? 

Cynthia Thurlow: [laughs] I actually felt great yesterday, but because my youngest was up multiple times last night with a GI bug, I think that's actually why I don't feel great this morning. I don't think it's as much jet lag as much as it's just interrupted sleep multiple times at night is never good for feeling as mentally sharp as you normally are. I can't even string my words together properly. 

Melanie Avalon: I'm grateful for this. I feel like the more and more interviews I do, I feel like more and more people are focusing on the importance of sleep. I feel like every interview I do, if the question comes up of, like, what is the most important thing, it's often sleep. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Oh, absolutely. And it's funny, I got back from London on Sunday and the first thing I did was I ate a good-sized dinner and literally two hours later just did an early bedtime and I felt great on Monday. I got light exposure, I went to the gym. I think it's a combination of solo parenting and then my older son and I were both up dealing with my younger son not feeling so great last night. My kids are pretty independent as teenagers, but when they're making a lot of noise it's hard to ignore them. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I can imagine. I cannot be a parent. That's my thoughts on that. I have two really random things to talk about. One is, have you heard of a brand called Safe Catch? 

Cynthia Thurlow: Yes. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, you have? Nice. They reached out to me just randomly. They wanted to send me some samples. I'm so obsessed. I wanted to share them with listeners. So, for listeners, they are a brand that makes canned and those little packet-- I don't know what they're called. The packets that are flexible, like packets, I guess, bags of both tuna and salmon. And their main thing is that they extensively test for mercury levels, which I just think is so important because I'm really concerned about the levels of mercury in fish that we're eating, especially as a huge fish lover. It's great for the salmon, which salmon does tend to be lower in mercury anyways. But with tuna, I think it's like a really big problem because the levels in tuna can vary so wildly. So, this is a way for you to get your tuna and not worry about mercury. 

I'm looking at their website and they said that their Elite Wild Tuna is 10 times stricter levels than the FDA mercury limit. Their Wild Albacore Tuna is two and a half times stricter than the FDA mercury limit, and then their salmon is below the mercury limit as well. I'm not finding where they said how far below, but I will have to find some literature about it and put it in the show notes. But in any case, so I just wanted to share that with listeners as a nice resource. So, that is @safecatch.com and it's funny, they told me about this, like, back in October or November. I haven't shared it yet and so my coupon had expired, but I got them to reactivate it. That's why I have to share this now because it only goes through the end of March, but the code MELANIE AVALON will get you 20% off, which is amazing, so stock up. Again, this is something that you could really stock up on because it's cans and those little pouch things. The word is escaping me. Do you eat canned tuna or salmon?

Cynthia Thurlow: Not a ton and I'll be completely transparent. I think after my high mercury levels, probably seven, eight years ago, the one thing that my functional medicine team and I have talked about is to eat less fish. And so, for me, I eat fish but very sparingly. I may only eat fish once or twice a month for full disclosure. But it's not that I don't like fish. I just don't want to expose myself to the amount of mercury that I was before. And even in our house, we do have some canned tuna if there's no other protein options, but it's never really my favorite.

If I'm going to have fish now, I'll usually pick the less predatory fish, that it's less of a concern. But I certainly, I mean, I love tuna. I'll be completely transparent, but I think it's allowed me to have more of a Wildatarian diet, to have a more variety of proteins and I think that's probably been beneficial for me. Our family, we definitely, during the pandemic, realized that we could lean into some Wildatarian meats and we found several that we really enjoyed, so more variety with land animals than water fish.

Melanie Avalon: I'm happy to hear you say that. I'm not happy that you went through the mercury experience, but I'm happy that you understand the issues with it. I really think it's a really big problem that most people are just not aware of. That's why I'm really excited about this brand, especially with so many people eating canned tuna and like I said tuna in particular because there's like, the list of fish that tend to be low mercury, which is-- so shellfish, tend to be the lowest. So that's like scallops and salmon. That's one of the reasons I eat so many scallops. And then after that, I mean, it's really like salmon. And actually, farm salmon tends to be lower than wild salmon, that I actually don't eat wild salmon for that reason. Tilapia tends to be low and then rainbow trout tends to be low, but beyond that, there really aren't. I get really nervous about fish, so I think this is a great resource for people. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, absolutely. I think that it's nice that there are companies that are becoming more savvy because there are marketing opportunities to connect with individuals that are going to go the extra mile. I know for us if we're going to buy fish, we usually will swing through Whole Foods or there's a fishmonger in the area that I live in, so we'll usually go through there. My husband's super picky and I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that one of his hobbies is deep sea fishing. So, he's really picky, we have to buy the day off if we're going to eat it and therefore, we don't eat it often because it tends to be a little more high maintenance. And for me, I'm no longer in Washington DC, so things aren't as close. So, having to plan the extra amount of time in the car to go get fish, I'm like, I have to really really want it. 

And generally, that's become less and less common, especially because my kids, with the exception of shrimp, they really don't love shellfish or seafood, maybe other than lobster tails. For them, they're not big fish people. We've gotten to the point where we've made it so many times and they're picking at it, and then they're not finishing it, and then they're destroying the refrigerator after dinner because they're still looking for more food. And it's just made it so much easier. So, I tend to order it when I'm out if I know that I'm in a restaurant where I'm going to get high quality. 

Melanie Avalon: Nice. Yeah, that's a whole tangent. If you go down the research rabbit hole about fish fraud, it is shocking, it's shocking. They've done tests and the amount of fish that's just not what it says it is at normal stores, like, at normal supermarkets, is shocking, like mislabeled. So, even then, you can't. You don't even know if you're getting what you're getting. I did just check and the Safe Catch fish is wild caught. So, that would be some wild caught salmon. Yeah, that was my tangent on fish. I had something else, but I can save it. I can save it for next time. Anything from you before we jump in? 

Cynthia Thurlow: No, other than there are many reasons why London is one of my favorite cities and the food is definitely part of that. By far one of my favorite foodie cities. I think a lot of people don't realize the diversity in the food options that are there. My cousin, I jokingly told her that she needs to be my wife because everything, every restaurant she picked out, that we ate out for lunch and dinner was amazing. And we even had Russian food, we had Indian food. I mean, we had dim sum and we had everything you could imagine. And we did not have one less than stellar meal. It was pretty awesome. 

Melanie Avalon: Wow. I feel like that's something you don't normally hear about London or England.

Cynthia Thurlow: Oh, London shopping is, like, second. I mean, I tell people all the time there's nothing in the United States. It's as good as some places in Europe. And, well, technically, that's the UK. But yeah, I mean, it's next level. I just think it's a huge financial economy and it just reminds me of why I love being there on multiple levels. I love the architecture, I love the food, and I just love everything about London. It's a great city. 

Melanie Avalon: What was your favorite thing that you did tourist wise?

Cynthia Thurlow: Because I've been there so many times as has my cousin, for us it was more about just spending time together and so every day it was kind of a similar thing. We allowed ourselves to kind of sleep in, which is easy given the fact there's a five-hour time difference and our bodies thought it was the middle of the night and we were getting up. But I would say experiencing definitely the food, the cuisine, I would say being able to shop with another woman as opposed to shopping with my husband and kids where no one wants to go shopping. Let me be clear, I did not buy anything for myself while I was there. 

I was definitely kind of gaming the ideas of, “Okay, when I come back to Europe or when I go to Europe later in the year, I'm going to make some purchases, but trying to kind of price things out.” Because whether people know this or not, sometimes the exchange rate works in your favor and it makes sense to purchase some things and sometimes it does not. And so, it didn't make sense to buy things there. I can wait till I'm in Portugal in April.

So, I would say the favorite things we did was just connecting and just exercising and just being outside. It was 50 degrees. It was super warm for that time of year. All the sightseeing we've done, all the big sites before. Westminster Abbey is probably one of my favorite things to do in London. Just having the opportunity to know that we didn't have to rush from one historical place to another because we've been there enough. I have a favorite hotel that I stay in and actually ironically enough her and her family prefer staying there. And so, it's a great part of the city where you can just walk around and everyone's very nice.

And then, ironically, I was watching a movie on the way home and it was set in the same hotel we stayed in. I was like, “Oh, my gosh, that's total validation that we stayed in the right place.” 

Melanie Avalon: What movie? 

Cynthia Thurlow: It's called Burnt, has Bradley Cooper in it. 

Melanie Avalon: Is he a chef? 

Cynthia Thurlow: Yes. Okay. Yeah, I saw that, but it's set in the same hotel we're in. I didn't even realize that until I started watching. I was like, “Oh, my God, that's our hotel.” [laughs] I was like, “What a coincidence.” But it was wonderful. It's just nice. I mean, for anyone that's listening that has kids and people you're responsible for, it's just nice to have, like, four days where you just do what you want to do and just enjoy the company of someone that you love. And my cousin is like the sister I never had, so we can talk about all the things and enjoy each other's company. And the irony is, we brought some of the same clothes. We didn't even realize that we have similar taste, which we knew. But as she was pulling stuff out and hanging in the closet, I was like, “Oh, my God, I have that same sweater with me. Oh, my gosh, I have that same jacket.” I'm not even realizing it. Just togetherness and time away from the family was a lot of fun. 

Melanie Avalon: Nice. One of the books I'm reading right now is called The Fun Habit. I'm really excited to interview the author, but he talks all about this, the importance of having fun [chuckles] for the actual life and health benefits, how we disregard it as something that adults don't do or isn't important. But he makes the case it's just as important as so many other things in life. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Absolutely. And I think a lot of people travel. There are vacations like this and then there are vacations where you're only in a place for a certain amount of time. You've never been there, you want to see this attraction and that attraction and eat this place and not eat that place. For us, it was like we saw a play, we went out for a fabulous dinner, we had an amazing lunch. I mean Book of Mormon. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, the musical?

Cynthia Thurlow: Yes. I've never seen that before and it was quite funny. So, if listeners are not familiar with that, it was created by the same people that did South Park, which explains the humor in the movie. And I didn't actually realize that until right before we’re leaving and my 15-year-old shared that with me and I actually was like, thank you for sharing that with me because the whole time I was like, “Oh my God, this is like a South Park episode," little outrageous. 

Melanie Avalon: I listened to it when it came out, so I was young and it kind of scandalized me. I thought was very-- It's like "Oh."

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, it's a little raunchy. My kids were like, “Well, what does that word mean?” And I was like, “Well, a little, if I were of that religion, I would be definitely offended, but I'm not Mormon.” But it was entertaining, and I love going to theater, and it was just nice to be in the London theater district and enjoy a really nice dinner and just all that togetherness. And I agree with you, I think a lot of times people feel like they have to plan out every single minute of a vacation. I'm a huge advocate of some things being planned and then other things not being planned.

Melanie Avalon: Yes. 

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So, to start things off, we have a question from Chris and the subject is circadian rhythm and Chris says, “Hi, I'm listening to you and Cynthia in your latest podcast. It's always refreshing to listen to you both answer a reader's question. I just finished reading the Circadian Code by Dr. Satchin Panda. I was thinking I came onto it via one of your earlier podcasts. Anyway, I'm hoping that you and Cynthia have either read or will read this book. I feel like he really advocates for everybody to eat early in the day. And I know you say you like to eat later. My mom is like this. She works best at night, she's 86 and still cooks everything three times a day for her and my father, he has Alzheimer's. I keep wanting to tell her to stop eating at a certain time, but I know we're probably all different with cortisol. The point I want to make is I'd love to hear you do a podcast about their circadian code ideology. Maybe you have and I just haven't come across it yet. He makes a strong case for everyone to time their meals early in the day. I've been doing it for a week now and I noticed my hunger levels have definitely dropped off like you said they would. I was rather surprised. I have been intermittent fasting for five years now and I stalled out on weight loss, especially because of COVID. But since I have been following his ideology of having breakfast as the main meal and my last meal at seven or eight hours later, I've had way more energy on way less food. I don't snack between my two meals and I've been realizing how much better this works for me. I'm used to waiting until 12 or 1 to have my first meal.

Now I make sure I have a high protein breakfast with salmon and eggs or whatever meat I have around, and I always like to do a protein shake then, but I up my protein since I work out. I've noticed I don't need to worry as much as I have more energy. I'm still doing protein shakes now and then, but not like I was. I'm also noticing that I am intuitively eating more now. And I also noticed that when I finally have a piece of fruit like the typical blueberries or kiwi, it tastes like candy. It seems like my eating is way more intuitive now. I'd love to hear your thoughts. Keep up the good work with Cynthia. You guys are awesome.” 

He or she because Chris could be either way also says “Since reading his book, I am now more focused on time-restricted eating with a window of seven to eight hours. I love cutting my eating time off at 05:00 PM. And he also advocates making the same meal times, but sometimes that just doesn't work. So, I try to focus on my eating window and my non-snacking in between my two meals. I just can't believe how eating this big breakfast first thing when I get up in the morning has given me way more energy and then my second meal is way lighter what I eat because I'm just not as hungry. Again, I'm looking forward to hearing your thoughts and Cynthia's thoughts.”

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, Chris, thank you for your question. I am very familiar with this book. In fact, I'm sitting at my desk in my office and I can see it. Literally it's across from my vision. I'm a huge fan of eating aligned with our chronobiology, and for most people, obviously there are exceptions, most people actually do better with insulin sensitivity earlier in the day. I would imagine if you have parents that are in their 80s that you are at a minimum middle aged. And so, I do encourage individuals that are middle aged to really lean into eating when we are most insulin sensitive and the average middle-aged person is losing insulin sensitivity as they are aging. I'm not at all surprised that you feel great really having a larger breakfast and then eating a second meal seven to eight hours later. I think you're really harnessing the power of your circadian rhythms and circadian biology.

This is actually something that, from my perspective, I may not eat eight hours after my first meal, but I'm definitely closing my feeding window before dark and that really works well for me. Ironically enough, my cousin who was with me who's also a middle-aged person, we were laughing about the fact that we stopped eating by 5 or 6 o'clock at night. That has worked really well for us. I just want to encourage you to continue to leaning into things that make you feel good and as it pertains to your parents, the adage of the old, you can't teach an old dog new tricks. That applies in many ways, I think for some people it becomes very much a social opportunity for them if they're eating three times a day and sitting down with their loved ones. 

I think sometimes it's been my experience and most of my elderly patients and clients really aren't eating a lot of food. She may not be eating large boluses of food, but may just enjoy the social aspects. But if she's not open or receptive to eating less frequently, I think you just have to respect what works for them at this time in their lives. I do know that when my grandmother was getting older, she got to a point where she said that she just ate two small meals a day. That's really all she was hungry for. So much of this is really honoring our own biology and physiology and bio individuality. What do you think, Melanie?

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I agree with all of that, obviously. So, you've read the book. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Mm-hmm.

Melanie Avalon: I'm actually really surprised that I haven't read this book. I've listened to a lot of interviews that he's done. Have you had him on your show? 

Cynthia Thurlow: I have not, I have not. It's funny, I think because he's really like a true researcher. I always feel like the researchers are the ones that are sometimes harder to get on podcasts. I think about Lisa Mosconi is a good example of that. I keep saying eventually I'm going to have her on the podcast. She wrote XX Brain in case listeners are not familiar with her. But yeah, I actually was talking about some of his most recent research in two medical conferences I spoke at last week. That was really validating, eating less frequently and so I'm definitely pretty aligned with a lot of his methodology and research. Obviously, bio individuality really plays in a lot here. I think if you're a younger individual and you have more insulin sensitivity, you can probably eat later into the day. But I find that most of my female patients and clients don't do well if they have a large bolus of food and then try to go to bed two hours later. 

Melanie Avalon: I really want to try to reach out to him. I really like his research as well. And I agree with everything that you said. Again, I've talked about this at length before. I wish I was an earlier eating person. I wish that worked for me, I really, really do. It just doesn't for me personally. I do think there is an aspect of individuality. So, I do think some people naturally do better eating earlier and some people naturally do better eating later. When I say later, I don't mean necessarily what I do, which is really late. I've talked about this a lot as well. I wrote a long blog post about this. If you go to melanieavalon.com/eatingtiming, I tried to really look at all the studies and see what the takeaway was for me about when it seemed like objectively people should be eating and it did seem to be eating during--

For me, this was just my perspective. It did seem to be eating during daytime hours and my takeaway was probably more later afternoon to early evening just based on pure hormonal release of insulin, ghrelin, leptin. That's what I was mostly looking at. So, like hormones related to eating and hunger, when were they naturally ebbing and flowing just based on the time. What I think is really amazing about this Chris is that it sounds like you were doing something different. And I think it's super awesome that you were open to trying this and that it did work for you. That's super amazing. It seems like it was the thing that you were talking about being on a weight stall, and this was something that helped you push through a plateau that you were on. It sounds like you're assimilating food better probably since you're feeling the need for less protein even. Not to say that we should focus on less protein, but it sounds like you eating this way is probably helping you better assimilate and utilize the food.

I do encourage people to find the rhythm that works for them. For a lot of people, it possibly is earlier. If people find a rhythm that really does work for them and it is later and they're happy and it's working in their life and they're sleeping and they're working and it's working with their weight and their health. I also don't want people to completely over freak out and think they have to be eating earlier as well. But yes, so, to do list, to read that book and reach out to him. 

Cynthia Thurlow: It's a good book and it's not very thick. Right now, I'm trying to get through Ari Whitten's book, Eat for Energy and then I have to get through Dave Asprey's because I'm interviewing both of them next week. I'm like, “All right.” It's Super Bowl weekend this weekend, and I think I will be by myself because my husband's going on a snowboarding trip with his buddies, and I think my teenagers are both going to friends' houses. This is going to be a first. I'm reframing this, Melanie, as the universe is giving me an opportunity to do more prep for the week. I'm like, “Okay, I'm not going to look at this negatively. This is all a positive. My kids are in a good place. My husband's going away with his friends. I just got back from a trip. This is all good.” 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, wow. Does Dave have a new book coming out or is this for his other book? 

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, yeah, he has a new book. I think he's on the every other year plan, which is pretty prolific when you think about it. I'm still mulling additional book ideas run in my head, but yeah, he's like a workhorse. [laughs] He manages to do that because as you know the book writing process is not like instantaneous. It takes time and I think he must be working on the next book, when the next book comes out it's amazing.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, wow. That's really exciting. I really liked Ari's book as well. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Oh, good to know. It's literally sitting underneath my phone to remind me that that's the next thing to work on. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, he was great too. So, well, very exciting. Shall we go on to our next question, which is a lingering question from our AMAs. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Yes. This is from Amy. Amy says, “Can you use the Joovv for 10 minutes all over your body or only 10 minutes a day on a part of your body?” This is a very good question for Melanie. 

Melanie Avalon: Awesome. I did specifically put this in today's episode because we are sponsored in part today by Joovv, so I thought we might as well answer a question related to it. So, for people who are not familiar, Joovv makes red and near infrared light therapy devices. I've been using mine for years. I really don't know what I would do without it. So, a few different things. One, it's funny because they sort of made a mode for this when they released the newer version, but I've been doing this from the beginning, which is I actually use it for ambient light. I have it on pretty much 24/7, but not super close. Well, when I'm at my desk, it is little bit close to me, but I just find that the red light really helps counteract a lot of the blue light that we're exposed to. It's wonderful waking up in the morning and then in the evening I use it to light my whole apartment at night. 

So, speaking of circadian rhythm and sleep, I find it so helpful for that. But the main reason people are using it is for targeted treatment. It helps with inflammation, muscle soreness, skin, so many things. Her question is basically, can you use it for 10 minutes all over your body or only a part of your body? You can do your whole body in a day. So, the answer would be you could do 10 minutes all over your body and if you have one of the larger units, like the Solo, then you could do more of a full body treatment at once. I do have the Solo, but then I have the Mini, which would be more like your face or a smaller area. They have the Go, which is like very small areas that's handheld. I take that while traveling, which is awesome, but it's really a good investment, especially if you're going, like I go to Restore Hyper Wellness. That's where I do my cryotherapy.

I have a daily membership there which, by the way, I really recommend Restore. They're getting bigger and bigger, so they're in a lot of cities and they have cryotherapy, they have sauna, and they have red light. That would be a good way to try red light to see if you like it. They have compression suits for your legs. And I think the daily membership, if you're going every day, is definitely worth it. But what I was going to say is, time wise, it's just so much more cost effective and time effective for me to have the devices at home. It really does pay for itself. I'm just thinking about that phrase, "It really does pay for itself." Like, is that actually a true statement ever if you pay for something, [chuckles] can it actually ever pay for itself? I don't know. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, I think it depends on what it is. I sometimes and this drives my husband crazy. So, this is like triggering when I'll say, “Oh, cost per wear.” Like, if I buy a pair of jeans or a nice handbag or a nice pair of shoes, I'm like but if I'm going to wear this every day or three or four times a week and I'm going to wear it for years, then the cost per wear makes sense versus something you wear once and it sits in your closet. So, I think it's the same thing, as an example, I use my PEMF mat every single day and love it. But if I bought something like that and only used it occasionally, then it might not make sense. So, I think it really depends on the individual. Like, I love, we have Restore Hyper Wellness too, and I think they do a fantastic job. 

I use them for IVs in particular around travel because the hydration, you just can't stay hydrated enough when you're traveling, I don't care how much water and electrolytes you consume. But, Melanie, this is a great question for Melanie, because I don't have a Joovv device, but I keep saying I'm going to buy one, so maybe this now the impetus to go buy one. 

Melanie Avalon: You should definitely get, like I literally can't understand my life without it. I mean, I can, but so the red light in the morning and the evening is a game changer for me. And then the light is so therapeutic. Like, when I'm sitting at my desk, it just feels good, like it just feels good. And then with a targeted treatment, I find it very, very effective with muscle pain and things like that. So, yeah, big fan. And I will agree with the cost per wear thing.

I interviewed Matt Simon for his book A Poison Like No Other, all about microplastics and he talks all about the role of plastics in our clothing, which blew my mind. I didn't realize that most clothing is largely plastic. I didn't realize just how pervasive plastic is. I think I had way too much of-- it was in a box in my head that only stuff that was obviously plastic was plastic. I didn't realize that basically everything has plastic. I mean most things have plastic. And so, clothing actually sheds a ton of plastic. And so, you can tell your husband this. He makes the case that one of the best things we can do for clothing is to buy really high-quality outfits and wear them a lot. They stop shedding plastic. So, the more you wear them, the less plastic you're shedding. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, and it's interesting. My cousin was saying that she wants to have a capsule wardrobe and so I was reminding her that one thing I've made a very deliberate effort in the past 6 to 12 months is to be ruthless about not buying things I don't need. So, as an example, I'm a sweater wearer, I love sweaters, I love to be warm in the winter and I literally have bought no sweaters this year. So, it's like I'm definitely curtailing what I'm wearing. The thing I was most surprised about was that a lot of athletic wear, like, Athleta as an example, I don't have a lot of Athleta in my wardrobe, but a lot of those athletic companies, most of what you're wearing is plastics, which is disturbing because you're thinking about, you're sweating in athletic wear, those sports bras and other things. I was like, “Oh, that's a bummer.” 

Melanie Avalon: It's really, really, crazy, the percentage of and it's even like normal clothes that you wouldn't think are plastic. It made me feel a lot better because I really do wear almost the same thing every day. So, I was like, well, doing something good for the environment. So, that whole tangent, but yeah, to answer the question, Amy, you can use it all over your body and you can listen to the ad in today's show about Joovv. But we do have a coupon. It gives you a discount if you go to joovv.com/ifpodcast and use the coupon code IFPODCAST. So yeah, okie dokie. Shall we go on to our next question? 

Cynthia Thurlow: Sure. 

Melanie Avalon: So, we have a question from Chrissy. The subject is IF and surgical recovery. And Chrissy says, Hi ladies, I've listened to every show and I finally have a question. I've been practicing IF with a Whole Foods diet for one year now. I've seen so many improvements including elimination of daily headaches, insomnia, joint pain, and even anxiety. The most surprising improvement was my asthma. Before IF, I took eight inhalations of steroids daily along with frequent use of my rescue inhaler and nebulizer. This year I only needed one daily puff of steroid during peak allergy season in July and August and I never need rescue meds anymore. I made this change to lose weight and was shocked with all the improvements. I've sustained a 35-pound weight loss for the first time ever and I'm thrilled to be back in size 4 pants at 44 years of age. 

Now, for my question, "I've been experiencing a lot of pelvic pain over the last six months and ultrasound shows fibroids and a potentially suspicious uterine growth. I'll have a DNC.” What is a DNC?

Cynthia Thurlow: Dilation and curettage. Usually, they go in and they scrape the inside of the uterus, take a biopsy. It's a very routine procedure, but still scary because you're having a minor medical procedure.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, wow. Is that similar to a I cannot say the word, a col-- 

Cynthia Thurlow: Colposcopy, that's different. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, it's different, okay. “So, I'll have a DNC with biopsy next month and if it's at all worrisome, I will likely opt for a hysterectomy. With all of the improvements I've seen, I truly believe diet can heal. What is the best way to use nutrition and fasting to help myself heal quickly if I do need the surgery? I used ADF to lose the weight and one or two meals a day to maintain depending on my hunger cues. Thank you and much love.” 

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, Chrissy, thank you so much for sharing all of the success you've had. And really, this is a great example of the reduction in inflammation that you experienced with fasting versus the eat to stoke your metabolism, eat multiple snacks and many meals a day. I'm sorry to hear that you've been experiencing some pelvic pain and hopefully this will turn out to be no issues. Just have your DNC and a biopsy that will end up being benign. I would say that from my perspective, the best way to use nutrition and fasting to help heal from surgery is first and foremost an anti-inflammatory diet. So, really removing the most inflammatory foods, which are gluten grains, dairy, sugar, alcohol at least for the short term, something that's a Whole30 evoking process and a Whole30 for anyone that's listening is really not designed to be done in perpetuity. It really is just a 30-day anti-inflammatory diet. 

It makes it easy because unlike years ago when I used to recommend it to patients, there are now Whole30-approved barbecue sauce and other things that just make your life so much easier. So, it's really just eating protein, healthy vegetables, fruit, and then just cutting out the most inflammatory foods. The other thing is, I'm not a huge fan of over fasting, especially because it sounds, like now you're at a happy place in terms of your weight. So, I would say if you're doing fasting, I would still try to get in two meals a day so that you're hitting your protein macros. Protein is certainly going to be important in a postoperative period, even in a minor surgery. Hopefully you won't need a hysterectomy. From my perspective, it sounds like you really laid the foundation to be able to heal. And I would say the additional things that I would consider doing is removing additional inflammatory foods if they're even still part of your diet and then also considering making sure you're getting your protein needs met on a daily basis. And so, I would say at least 40 to 50 g of protein in a meal, so close to 100 grams of protein a day would be a good starting point. Melanie, what are your thoughts? 

Melanie Avalon: I think we've talked about this on the show before. I had gone and looked at all the studies that I could find on fasting and surgery and there were some pretty interesting ones about the benefits of fasting, more so leading up to surgery and then affecting, it was more stuff like post operative nausea and stuff like that it was looking at. I agree with what you were saying about, it sounds like she's at a good place right now with her fasting and so, I wouldn't overdo the fasting just because of the surgery and everything. You definitely-- I mean Cynthia, hit on all the points. Like you want to make sure with surgery that you have adequate nutrition for your body to recover and heal and the anti-inflammatory aspect of that is so, so important. I would immediately, surrounding the surgery, make sure you're getting the meals to recover and making sure that they are the anti-inflammatory meals and just doing what's been working, not going overly crazy.

So, separate from probably not surrounding the surgery because there are contraindications with surgery. But when you're beyond all of this, I was just thinking while reading this, if you do still have allergy issues and you've had things like fibroids, so serrapeptase that I take, that is amazing for allergies that personally for me makes allergy season-- For me it's not summer, it's spring. I just react to all the grass, just wipes me out and I don't have any issues when I take serrapeptase. So, that might be something that you want to try Chrissy, so that's my, again, not immediately surrounding the surgery, because I think there're often contraindications for that. But when you are on the other side of it, so you can get that @avalonx.us and the coupon code MELANIE AVALON will get you 10% off or you can get a 20% off code if you text AVALONX to 877-861-8318. So that's AVALONX to 877-861-8318. But either way, wishing you the best with your surgery. Normally we have a date. I'm not sure when this came in, but I am sure it will all go wonderfully. And it's really great that you are super aware of the role of diet in all this because so many people just are not. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Our next podcast sponsor is Athletic Greens. I take AG1 by Athletic Greens most days of the week. I initially gave it a try because I wanted to simplify my supplement regimen, and quite frankly, I probably have tried every product on the market. And AG1’s taste is amazing. I take it typically in the morning, after working out, and when I'm getting ready to break my fast. Very quickly, I noticed that it helped me with improved digestion, made my hair and skin look even better, and helped support my sleep. I do consider it to be one of my absolutely essential supplements I take most days of the week. 

With just one scoop I get the nutrients and gut health support that helps my whole body thrive and cover my nutritional bases. As I mentioned, it's really important to me that I keep my regimen as simple as possible. An AG1 is one of those supplements that really helps me thrive. It's also a Climate Neutral Certified company. That means they are a fully carbon neutral business. They've also designed a carbon reduction plan designed to reduce overall environmental impact, which is really important to me. So, if you want to take ownership of your health, today is a good time to start. Athletic Greens is giving you a free one-year supply of vitamin D and five free travel packs with your first purchase, go to athleticgreens.com/ifpodcast. That's athleticgreens.com/ifpodcast and check it out. 

Melanie Avalon: Shall we go on to our next question? 

Cynthia Thurlow: Absolutely. This is from Anne and this is an autophagy question. “Hi, I've read that autophagy doesn't begin until one reaches a 24 to 48-hour fast. I cannot go that long. I've been doing 19:5 or 20:4 meaning fasting for 19 to 20 hours with a four or five-hour feeding window. I wanted to know if you believe that we reach autophagy in those fasting hours. Thank you," Anne. 

Melanie Avalon: All right, Anne, thank you so much for your question. I might reserve the right to have a part one and then I'm going to do some more research for a part two because honestly, when I sat down to research this, I was like, “Oh, I'll find some information pretty quickly. Not so much. So, this was something I'd been wanting to look into especially because Peter Attia talks about this a lot and he's the last that I heard. He thinks that you don't really get any measurable bump in autophagy with just general everyday fasting. I found one pretty good review, but it was from 2018 and it's called The effect of fasting or calorie restriction on autophagy induction: A review of the literature. That was a review up until 2018. Just a little fun fact really quickly. That one I could only find the abstract. 

If that happens to you, search for the name of the title-- Well, A, if that happens to you, ResearchGate often has the full studies. I love that website. If they don't have it, which they didn't, if you search for the title and then add PDF to it, you can sometimes find, well, A, the actual study or B, the submitted manuscript. So that's what I found. That's how I was able to read the whole thing. But in any case, what was really interesting about that review, and again this was 2018, so about five years ago, it went deep into autophagy. 

There're actually three main types of autophagy. For example, there's macroautophagy, microautophagy, and chaperone-mediated autophagy and basically what they have to do is just how that process actually happens, but macroautophagy is the one we most often think of and it was nice to read it because I feel like I've been talking too casually about autophagy. Like whenever I talk about it, I'm like, “Oh yeah, it's like a cellular renewal process, it breaks down old proteins,” and I kind of stop there. But reading this through made me realize again just how important this process is. So, it helps with so many health-related issues. It's necessary for cellular function.

The reason I think it's important to draw attention to that is I think people sometimes think that we only get this autophagy process when we're fasting, which is not the case. It's literally happening 24/7, literally on some level. I mean if you think about it, when cells create, they get broken and they have waste products and our body has to get rid of that. Now, the level to which you get rid of it and the level to which you get proper autophagy levels might affect how good you are at that process and how much recovery you get from that. So, it's nice to do things that can support autophagy, but it is happening all the time. So that's a little myth to dispel. 

What's really interesting is a lot of cellular states can create it. That includes calorie restriction and fasting which are two ways that can potentially potently activate it, that also have health benefits beyond that compared to things like, so even like infection can create it, oxidative stress can encourage it. So, I found that really, really interesting. But in any case, one of the main benefits for autophagy is the effects on neurodegenerative diseases because it can help with that protein build up that can affect our neurons and create neurodegenerative issues.

Here's the thing that study with the review, the majority of the studies I was looking at and there were a lot, but they were all in rodents and I honestly don't know how that correlates to humans for autophagy just because of how the circadian rhythm of a rodent compares to a human. I don't know if we see the same activation, especially since a 24-hour fast in a rodent is like a huge fast in a human. So, the studies in autophagy in humans are actually pretty hard to find.

The majority of the ones I could find were in muscle autophagy in humans and one of the main ones I was looking at was called Training state and skeletal muscle autophagy in response to 36 h of fasting. It did look at fasting up to 36 hours. So, 2 hours, 12 hours, 24 hours, 36 hours and what was interesting is it actually depended on whether or not the person was trained or not. It had different responses. So, on top of just you as a person fasting whether or not you're trained might affect your autophagy response. But one of the main things that encourages autophagy is the activation of AMPK and the downregulation of mTOR. 

So, mTOR is activated by food and nutrition and protein. It's a growth stimulus. And then the AMPK pathway is activated from fasting and calorie restriction and it activates longevity pathways and so it helps activate autophagy. So, even if there's not a lot of studies on autophagy, there are a lot of studies on AMPK activation, which does seem to happen while fasting and a dose response curve.

So, I also found a newer study, a journal article called Physiological responses to acute fasting: implications for intermittent fasting programs. And I'm really sad because I could not find the full article. All I could do was the abstract and this was a November 2021 study. But something important to note was that the end of it says that a single fast demonstrated the ability to alter glucose, so that's blood sugar and lipid, that's fat metabolism within the initial 24 hours. But variations in protein metabolism appear to be minimal within this time frame and then here comes the key. The ability of an acute fast to elicit significant increases in autophagy is still unknown. That was really what I walked away with. Going back to that earlier review I talked about, I found it so interesting and actually a little bit frustrating because it was a very very deep dive, like a very deep dive. It's very long. 

It goes into autophagy for all the different individual areas like autophagy in the kidneys, autophagy in the muscle, autophagy in the heart. The majority of the studies are rodent studies. And then at the end, it makes the conclusion that fasting does upregulate autophagy. They're kind of saying that the way it reads is that that applies to humans. But then the confusing thing is the majority of the studies are looking at are rodents. I don't really know how that extends to humans. And so, it's hard to reach to the conclusion that it's a very vague conclusion. I think it's a very vague idea that a lot of people have about fasting and autophagy and I think we just don't know. 

Like, I think this 2021 study, which was actually published in 2022, I guess it was published online in 2021 and in the journal in 2022, I think their summary about it's unknown. That's what I came away with. We don't actually know with fasting, in humans how much it's increasing autophagy. All of that said, I'll go back to what I said earlier about we do know autophagy is linked to AMPK. We know that AMPK is activated by fasting and that the longer you fast, you're probably getting more of that stimulus. So, I would say that probably the longer you fast, you're getting more autophagy. All of that to say, I wouldn't stress about it too much. I would just know that fasting is creating these beneficial health effects. But I wouldn't do fasting specifically to activate autophagy if that makes sense. If that's the case, I don't know, but you might need to do a longer fast to get like really deep autophagy, kind of like Peter Attia says. That was a long answer. What are your thoughts, Cynthia? 

Cynthia Thurlow: No, thank you for that beautiful explanation. I just want to take that and just say that there are other ways to induce autophagy in the body that are not just related to fasting because I think oftentimes people forget that there are other ways to upregulate autophagy and one of those is exercise. And I think a lot about high intensity interval training as being one. I think about low-carb diets which can be helpful. I think about hot and cold exposure. I know we spoke earlier about Joovv and that's a different type of red light therapy, but I always say exposure to extreme, so extremes of temperature can be very helpful. I remind people that it's funny, there's one podcast that I really like. It's always like short little 15, 20-minute clips. And so, Mike Mutzel whose High Intensity Health and he was talking about would you rather fast really long or just do HIIT or just do these other things. So, just something to consider that there are other ways to upregulate this process beyond fasting. Even hyperbaric oxygen therapy has been shown to induce autophagy and there're even foods that can help induce autophagy, like in the brain. I think about things that are polyphenol rich, so coffee and green tea. I also think about MCT oil, ginger and turmeric, even sulforaphane, there's good research on that as well, so just something to consider. 

Obviously, I'm coming at it from a different direction, but I know that for myself, I don't like really long fasts and I think after my experience, it's almost four years ago now and it's getting less and less triggered by this. But doing long fast is just not going to be part of my fasting practice given how long I was unable to eat. So, from my perspective, if you feel like you really struggled to get to 18, 19, 20 hours, don't white-knuckle it, like no one listening to this podcast, that is never the message that we are trying to send. We want there to be common sense. We want you to have success with using this strategy or other types of strategies, but we definitely want you to be cognizant of where you feel like your limitations are and there's no shame in that whatsoever. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I'm so glad you said that. Yeah, even coffee, oh my goodness. Even coffee has been shown to upregulate it and can't believe I forgot berberine. How did I forget that. So, my most recent supplement berberine, it's actually a potent activator of both AMPK and autophagy, which is super awesome. So, its main benefit that people take berberine for is blood sugar control. So, it can rival the effects of metformin for its blood sugar lowing potential and its ability to reduce HbA1c. It can help with the gut microbiome. There’s actually, I found, an entire paper dedicated to its effect on AMPK, which was an autophagy, which is super awesome. So, you can also get that @avalonx.us and those coupon codes will work as well. 

But yeah, I'm glad, Cynthia, that you drew attention to that there are a lot of ways to stimulate it, and I wish I could find it, but literally there's a study and I just loved it because it literally said, autophagy is a process happening 24/7 in the body, which I think a lot of people don't quite realize.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, and I think it's interesting because both Thomas DeLauer and Mike speak about this a lot. So, even with my team, I've reminded them that we need to make sure that we're offering different options because there are some people that they would have to white-knuckle it to get to a 24-hour fast. There're other ways to evoke these processes in the body without having to white-knuckle it. I'll be completely transparent and say that I loathe being cold, but that just tells me that I need to be cold more often. So, [laughs] you're doing cryotherapy has become something I do once or twice a week because that's obviously what my body needs. If it's the thing I don't want to be doing, it's generally the thing I need to be doing. 

Melanie Avalon: That's something that happened since we've talked. I interviewed Thomas DeLauer.

Cynthia Thurlow: I love Thomas. He's so smart. 

Melanie Avalon: He was really, really great. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Super smart. He's such a smart guy. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. He likes [chuckles] kind of what I just did with the studies. He loves diving. He really follows the literature. I was really impressed. Like, I asked him questions and he just had all these studies ready and waiting. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, I'm excited. I'll see him in less than two weeks. We're both speaking at the same event. He's speaking on Friday, I'm speaking on Saturday, but I'll be able to see him again. He's incredibly-- I think it's a really good example of a guy who's really well respected in the space and so knowledgeable. And I tell him all the time, he'll pull a study that I hadn't even seen and I'm like, “Oh, I'm down a rabbit hole,” because [laughs] Thomas did a video on it and now I need to know more about it. So, he does create his great content on YouTube. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I thought it was really great. What's interesting is when I had asked for questions from listeners, a lot of the main questions I got, they actually wanted to know about his family and his wife. So, that's how I started off the show and I thought it was-- I think it was a nice way to start because he was able to speak too like his wife's experience with social media and it was a really fun conversation. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, I spoke at an event with him, so I met him in October of 2021, and he is as nice and down to earth as they could be. It was kind of Ben Azadi and I and Anna Cabeca and some other people spoke at this event, and he was just so gracious. He's actually little bit shy, which I was surprised by. I think people are surprised to learn that I'm shy, but he's really shy, but could not have been nicer. Really nice guy. He seems like a very devoted husband and parent to his kids. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, and actually that's how I ended it, was asking him about how he deals with diet and nutrition and all of that with his kids. So, yeah, I really enjoyed it. So where are you speaking? 

Cynthia Thurlow: I'm speaking at Low Carb Denver and this is probably the event I've been most excited to speak at because so many of my friends are speaking at it. It's going to be like a big reunion, [laughs] which will be a lot of fun. Some of my team is coming, and it's in Denver, and we have family in Denver, and so for me it's always a special place to fly to. And I can fly direct, Melanie, that's huge. [laughs] Where I live in the United States nothing flies direct. So, if I can fly direct, it's a win-win. 

Melanie Avalon: That's awesome. Awesome, awesome. Well, this has been absolutely wonderful. So, a few things for listeners before we go. If you would like to submit your own questions for this show, you can directly email questions@ifpodcast.com or you can go to ifpodcast.com and you can submit questions there. You can get all the stuff that we like at ifpodcast.com/stuffwelike. I'm just thinking about how I need to update that page. If anybody is looking for an internship, I should probably start, like, publicizing this. I haven't actually listed. Have you had an intern before? 

Cynthia Thurlow: No, not yet. 

Melanie Avalon: I need to list this. I just need to take the step to put the listing up, but I should probably start putting that out to the universe. If anybody's in school and would like to do an internship, I just would love to bring on an intern tangents. And you can follow us on Instagram, we are @ifpodcast, Cynthia is @cynthia_ thurlow_. The show notes for today's episode that will have a full transcript as well as links to everything that we talked about, because we talked about a lot of stuff. So, the Safe Catch coupon, Joovv, all the studies, the AvalonX supplements, all the things that will be at ifpodcast.com/episode307. All righty, anything from you, Cynthia, before we go? 

Cynthia Thurlow: No, this has been great. 

Melanie Avalon: Likewise, and I will talk to you next week. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Sounds good. 

Melanie Avalon: Bye. 

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, transcripts by SpeechDocs, and original theme composed by Leland Cox and recomposed by Steve Saunders. See you next week. 

[Transcript provided by SpeechDocs Podcast Transcription]

STUFF WE LIKE

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Welcome to Episode 304 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 Cynthia Thurlow, author of Intermittent Fasting Transformation: The 45-Day Program for Women to Lose Stubborn Weight, Improve Hormonal Health, and Slow Aging.

Today's episode of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast is brought to you by:

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SHOW NOTES

1:10 - LMNT: For A Limited Time Go To drinklmnt.com/ifpodcast To Get A FREE Sample Pack With Any Purchase! Learn All About Electrolytes In Episode 237 - Our Interview With Robb Wolf!

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13:15 - Listener Q&A: Celia - New to keto and IF(6 months in) and I am SOOOO thirsty ALL NIGHT LONG! Up 3 & 4 times, drinking LMNT, and going to the bathroom and having a hot flash. HELLLPPPPPPP

Hormonal Changes During Menopause and the Impact on Fluid Regulation

24:45 - BEAUTY AND THE BROTH: Go To melanieavalon.com/broth To Get 15% Off Any Order With The Code MelanieAvalon!

27:00 - Listener Q&A: Lynn - Is high cholesterol bloodwork common with intermittent fasting?

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Ep. 196 – Alternative Tools to Optimize Your Health

Ep. 128 – Cholesterol Obsession: Why It’s the Intellectual Property of the Animal Kingdom with Dave Feldman

36:15 - Listener Q&A: Kim - Hi! Would you recommend fasting longer and then have a 3-4 hour eating window or fasting shorter but having 2 meals, no snacks in a longer eating window, say a 6-7 hour eating window? 53year old female, post menopause, exercises daily with walking and lifting, tries to eat real Whole Foods and wants to lose another 5-10 pounds then enter maintenance. Thanks so much! Love your podcasts and the fantastic info you both share

39:45 - Listener Q&A: Laura - What’s the worst job that you have had? If you weren’t doing what you are what would you be doing?

47:45 - Listener Q&A: Kimberly - What is your favorite dinner?

53:45 - ATHLETIC GREENS: Get A FREE 1 Year Supply Of Immune-Supporting Vitamin D AND 5 FREE Travel Packs With Your First Purchase At athleticgreens.com/ifpodcast.

55:10 - Listener Q&A: Mary Jane - What are some health related things you’ve tried that you really didn’t like or had bad side effects to?

1:00:00 - Listener Q&A: Nicole - What’s one beauty or health product/fad that didn’t work for you? 

Go to melanieavalon.com/dime and use the code MELANIEAVALON for an exclusive discount.

Our content does not constitute an attempt to practice medicine, and does not establish a doctor-patient relationship. Please consult a qualified health care provider for medical advice and answers to personal health questions.

TRANSCRIPT

Melanie Avalon: Welcome to Episode 304 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 and author of What When Wine: Lose Weight and Feel Great with Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, and Wine. I’m here with my cohost, Cynthia Thurlow, Nurse Practitioner and author of Intermittent Fasting Transformation: A 45-Day Program for Women to Lose Stubborn Weight, Improve Hormonal Health, and Slow Aging. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and cynthiathurlow.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this show do not constitute medical advice or treatment and no doctor-patient relationship is formed. 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.

Hi, friends. I'm about to tell you how to get my favorite electrolytes, including clean fast-friendly electrolytes for free. Yes, for free. I talk about a lot of products on these shows. When it comes to supporting fasting and/or the ketogenic diet, there is a supplement which is a game changer. I cannot tell you how many times I get feedback from my audience about how this was the key to addressing issues that people often experience with keto or fasting.

It is so, so important to replenish electrolytes if you want to have energy and an active lifestyle. A lot of people experience the keto flu or issues while fasting, like headaches, muscle cramps, fatigue, sleeplessness. These are all common symptoms of electrolyte deficiency. You might think you’re not doing well with fasting or that the keto diet isn’t for you, when really, you just need electrolytes. Electrolytes facilitate hundreds of functions in the body, including the conduction of nerve impulses, hormonal regulation, nutrient absorption, and fluid balance. If you’d like to learn all about the science of electrolytes and get answers to commonly asked questions, definitely check out the interview I did with my hero, Robb Wolf, on this show. He’s also one of the co-founders of LMNT.

There have been moments in my life where I needed electrolytes and drinking some LMNT took me from a state of fatigue to feeling like my body was actually alive. Of course, it can be hard to find electrolytes, which are clean and good to put in your body. That’s why I adore LMNT.

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Right now, LMNT has a fantastic offer for our audience. You can get a free sample pack with any purchase. That’s eight single-serving packets of eight different flavors for free with any LMNT order. Yes, the raw unfavored version is clean fast friendly. This is a great way to try all eight flavors or share LMNT with a salty friend. Get yours at drinklmnt.com/ifpodcast. That’s D-R-I-N-K-L-M-N-T dotcom/ifpodcast. Try it totally risk-free. If you don’t like it, share it with a salty friend and they will give you your money back, no questions asked. You literally have nothing to lose. We’ll put all this information in the show notes.

One more thing before we jump in, are you fasting clean inside and out? When it comes to weight loss, we focus a lot on what and when we eat. It makes sense because these foods affect our hormones and how our bodies store and burn fat. But do you know what is possibly one of the most influential factors in weight gain. It’s not your food and it’s not fasting. It’s actually our skincare and makeup. So, as it turns out, Europe has banned over a thousand compounds found in conventional skincare and makeup in the US due to their toxicity. These include endocrine disruptors, which mess with your hormones, carcinogens linked to cancer, and obesogens, which literally can cause your body to store and gain weight.

Basically, when we’re using conventional skincare and makeup, we are giving these obesogenic compounds direct access to our bloodstream. And then in our bodies, studies have shown they do things like reduce our satiety hormones, increase our hunger hormones, make fat cells more likely to store fat, and more resistant to burning fat, and so much more. If you have stubborn fat, friends, your skincare and makeup may be playing a role in that. Beyond weight gain and weight loss, these compounds have very detrimental effects on our health and they affect the health of our future generations. That’s because, ladies, when we have babies, a huge percent of those toxic compounds go through the placenta into the newborn. It is so, so shocking. And the effects last for years.

Conventional lipstick, for example, often tests high in lead and the half-life of lead is up to 30 years. That means when you put on some conventional lipstick, 30 years later, maybe half of that lead has left your bones. On top of that, there is essentially no regulation of these products on the shelves. That’s why it’s up to us to choose brands that are changing this. 

The brand that is working the hardest to do this is Beautycounter. They were founded on a mission to change this. Every single ingredient is extensively tested to be safe for your skin, so you can truly feel good about what you put on. And friends, these products really, really work. They are incredible. They have Countertime for anti-aging, Countermatch for normal skin, Countercontrol for acne and oily prone, and Counterstart for sensitive. I use their Overnight Resurfacing Peel and vitamin C serum every single night of my life. And their makeup is amazing. Check out my Instagram to see what it looks like. Tina Fey even wore all Beautycounter makeup when she hosted the Golden Globes. So, yes, it is high-definition camera ready. They have so many other products, deodorant, shampoo and conditioner that I love, products for babies, and so much more.

You can shop with us at beautycounter.com/melanieavalon or beautycounter.com/cynthiathurlow and use the coupon code, CLEANFORALL20, to get 20% off your first order. Also, make sure to get on my Clean Beauty email list. That’s at melanieavalon.com/cleanbeauty. I give away a lot of free things on that list, so definitely check it out. You can join me in my Facebook group, Clean Beauty and Safe Skincare with Melanie Avalon. People share their experiences, ask questions, give product reviews, and I do a giveaway every single week in that group as well.

And lastly, if you’re thinking of making Clean Beauty and Safe Skincare a part of your future like we have, we definitely recommend becoming a Band of Beauty member. It’s sort of like Amazon Prime for Clean Beauty. You get 10% back in product credit, free shipping on qualifying orders, and a welcome gift that is worth way more than the price of the yearlong membership. It is totally, completely worth it. So, again, to shop with us, go to beautycounter.com/melanieavalon or beautycounter.com/cynthiathurlow and use the coupon code, CLEANFORALL20, to get 20% off your first order. And we’ll put all this information in the show notes. All right, now back to the show.

Hi, everybody, and welcome. This is episode number 304 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon, and I'm here with Cynthia Thurlow.

Cynthia Thurlow: Hey, Melanie. How are you?

Melanie Avalon: I am good. I'm excited to ask you. This actually airs the day before Valentine's Day. How do you feel about Valentine's Day? 

Cynthia Thurlow: [laughs] I'm laughing because my team just sent me a message and said, "How do you want us to address Valentine's Day on social media?", which I thought was humorous. I think it's one of those contrived holidays that, for a lot of people, makes them feel badly about themselves. Obviously, I've been married for almost 20 years. I've been with my husband for almost 21 years. So, from my perspective, irrespective of where I was in life stage throughout my lifetime, I always spent it with people that I loved. And so, whether it was girlfriends getting together or whether it was who I was dating or my husband, I think Valentine's Day is one of those days that feels very contrived, and it's far more important how you treat your loved ones for the other 364 days out of the year. I don't put a lot of emphasis on it. 

It was always a fun thing to do with the kids when they were younger. Maybe we got them something fun, or maybe we had like a Valentine's Day themed breakfast or dinner. I mean, something that was fun. I don't put a lot of effort, not that I don't put an effort, but it's not something that to me is representative of a whole lot of anything other than a contrived holiday. I don't know if you feel similarly or are you all in on Valentine's Day and go bananas?

Melanie Avalon: Well, I have a question. When you were like in elementary school-- I'm just wondering how long they've been doing, because when I was in elementary school, would you guys do the Valentines that you would give to everybody?

Cynthia Thurlow: Yes. 

Melanie Avalon: [chuckles] I was just reflecting on that recently because it's really a little bit traumatic for kids, I think, because I don't know, at least for me, when I was giving the Valentine, you get the cards with all the different ones, and you give your favorite cards to your favorite people. The guy you like, you give the one that's trying to send a secret message to him. I don't know, it's just like a lot. [laughs] It's like a lot for little kids, and then there's candy on top of that. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, it's interesting because my kids grew up in the age where you give a card to everyone, which is fine. But to me, as a parent, it was trying to get creative with cards and get your kids to sit down and sign their name and their friend's name. It just became this very large project. And yes, the candy thing. It's like I remember before we'd even gotten to Christmas, the grocery store started putting out Valentine's Day candy. And I was just thinking to myself, processed food industry just has a field day but these kinds of contrived holidays. I'm all about spending time with people you love. And if you can't spend time with people you love, don't make a big deal about it. I don't think anyone should feel badly about Valentine's Day. 

I think when I was in college, I was in a big sorority, and I just remember people felt so left out if they weren't coupled on these holidays. And yet, the way I look at it is that's not what it's about. It's like, how do you treat the people that you love 364 days out of the year? On this one day, maybe you do something special, but it shouldn't put you into debt. It shouldn't stress you out. It shouldn't mean that you have to spend $150 on a super overpriced bunch of roses. I think sometimes people lose sight of what's most important is the point I'm trying to make. 

Melanie Avalon: I find it really interesting because I've never had-- I don't know if I did in high school, I've never really had FOMO about being in a relationship. I just love being single all about it. Valentine's has never really distressed me in any way. It didn't bother me that I didn't have somebody to do it with. It was just like another day. I do remember though it's funny how you'll have certain memories that really stick with you. I remember when I was in college or-- I think I was in college, and I was dating somebody and I thought were dating pretty regularly. I just really casually asked, “What do you want to do for Valentine's Day?” He was like, “Oh, well, should we do something for Valentine's Day?” I was like, “Oh, okay, never mind.” That was not the question to ask. This Valentine's Day actually, I'm doing something. So, I'm excited about it. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, for full disclosure, my husband's going to be on a snowboarding trip with his buddies and I'm totally okay with that for a variety of reasons. Admittedly, for our anniversary last year, I was out in LA, doing press. So, [laughs] we talk about these things ahead of time. I think if you're separated from your significant other, that's okay too. You just set aside time to spend time together and do something that you enjoy together as well. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, the other thing that stresses me out about it is because I was a server for so long and fine dining, so I know what Valentine's Day is like. It's like the craziest day [laughs] for being a server. Like this year, I do want to go to a restaurant on Valentine's Day. But then, I know what's going on in the server's head, so I don't want to go. But then again, well, you can make a lot of money on Valentine's Day as a server.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yep, I remember those days. I used to always say, like New Year's Eve, like any of the big holidays, you don't always get a great meal and everything's just chaotic. But yes, you can definitely do well as a server. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, it's like the craziest day. So Happy Valentine's Day or Single Awareness Day or whatever you want to call it. Today's episode, we are continuing from all the AMA questions that we got. And last episode, we did all fasting related ones, and we have a few more of those, so we're going to start with those. May or may not take up the whole episode, and if they don't, we will go to some of our other random AMAs that we still have. So, lots of fun stuff. So, to start things off, we have a question from Celia. She says, “I am new to Keto and IF. I'm six months in and I am so thirsty all night long,” and there's a lot of caps with that. She says, “I'm up three and four times drinking LMNT and going to the bathroom and having a hot flash. Help.” Lots of caps with that too. 

Cynthia Thurlow: I'm glad that you read this and not me because I could not have done-- 

Melanie Avalon: Help. [laughs] 

Cynthia Thurlow: [laughs] Well, Celia, a couple of things. First and foremost, when patients tell me that they're up urinating multiple times a night, I have to ask when do you stop drinking water or start/stop drinking liquids because that's very important. Some people have a propensity for an overactive bladder. Drinking or limiting your fluids after 6:00 PM is certainly going to be important. You mentioned hot flashes, so I have to believe you're at least in the perimenopause, menopause realm and I found a really interesting paper that I was discussing with Melanie before we started recording. This is from Reproductive Sciences, Hormonal Changes During Menopause and the Impact on Fluid Regulation. So, the big takeaway for everyone, without me diving deep into this paper, is talking about the net impact of fluid regulation in the body for women as they are transitioning into perimenopause and menopause. 

And so, big takeaway is we are not as good about recognizing when we get thirsty. Sometimes people are not realizing that they're actually dehydrated and by the time they get thirsty, they're really dehydrated. So, they spend all this time catching up. This is actually a byproduct of the loss of estrogen. So, perimenopause is this time where there's dynamic fluctuations in estrogen, sometimes even much higher than they are when we're at peak fertile years. We're losing progesterone, our ovaries are producing less, our adrenals are trying to pick up the slack, and then we have these wild fluctuations in estrogen. And so, we know that estrogen in particular is very important for regulating fluid balance in the body. So, this can directly impact our ability to recognize when we are thirsty and can also impact some of these key mechanisms in the body, like hormones, like the renin-angiotensin, aldosterone system, atrial natriuretic peptide secretion, which all impact regulation in the kidneys and then these fluid responses. 

So, big takeaway is first and foremost, make sure that you're not drinking too much water after 6 o'clock at night. Number two, make sure you're using electrolytes during the day, throughout the day. The other thing that's interesting, and we'll link this study up so people can take a look at it. There's actually a figure here about osmotic regulation in women during different phases of the menstrual cycle and in men. So, it's a superimposition of the men, it's very consistent in terms of where they are. For women, you can actually see that there are changes when they have more estrogen in their bodies versus less. And so, I really think that this speaks to a couple of things both behavioral. Making sure you're hydrating enough during the day period, and then also understanding that there is some hormonal fluctuation with the loss of estrogen that is probably exacerbating this. And like I said, we will tack this along into the show notes that you'll have it available to reference as well. 

Melanie Avalon: Wow, that was so helpful. I learned so much. 

Cynthia Thurlow: There is too much information that is so helpful. The other thing that I just wanted to mention before is there's something called anti-diuretic hormone. And when women are getting up at night to pee or urinate a lot, we call that nocturia. You're getting up at night to pee, so nocturia is urinating at night. You start thinking about, is your anti-diuretic hormone which is what concentrates your urine at night. Is that not working properly? Sometimes that can also be a byproduct of things like sleep apnea. There's a lot that can impact ADH secretion. Just something to consider and a way to think about this is, sometimes ADH secretion gets dysregulated when we drink alcohol, which is why sometimes people will feel like when they're drinking alcohol, they're urinating a lot. It's because you get this dysregulation of this key hormone. It's a couple of different variables that may be at play. 

The last thing I would mention is the hot flashes. That could be blood sugar mediated or that could also be your brain sending an SOS to your ovaries like release some estrogen. So, this is another component. There's a lot of different things that could be going on but be reassured that this is something we have to be very conscientious about. Like, I can tell you that on days I travel and I cannot drink enough water, I am really, really thirsty at night. The other piece of that is I'm always thinking to myself personally, “Is there an insulin issue? Am I becoming insulin resistant? Why am I thirsty?” I think a lot of it has to do with if you're not drinking enough water during the day, your body is trying to play catch up and you start to lose those mechanisms to remind you that you need to drink. That was long. 

Melanie Avalon: No, that was great. It was very, very helpful. Do you find with most of your female patients who are having all these experiences that IF and fasting, what do you normally see? Does it normally help? Make it worse? 

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, I think most people that are fasting are just more attuned to their bodies in general. So, I think they start to try to figure out what's contributing to this. Because if this is a change, then what's mitigating it? So, I always say, let's work with the most benign things first. Let's make sure you're not drinking too many fluids after 6 o'clock at night. Let's make sure you're getting plenty of electrolytes throughout the day. Let's make sure you're not insulin resistant because that nocturia piece can be problematic. And then, you kind of work backwards. I would say pick the low-lying fruit first and then work backwards. But I do find most women in particular that are intermittent fasters are leaning into what their body is trying to communicate to them. So, I think they tend to stay on top of these kinds of symptoms. Like, whereas someone else might just say, “Oh, I wake up three or four times a night to sleep.” 

The other thing I would say is, and I want to make sure I emphasize this, if your sleep quality is eroded because you are fasting, or you can't get your fluids in during the day, then you need to make some changes because sleep is foundational to our health. So, if you can't sleep through the night, we have to fix that first. So, if you are new to fasting and you're finding it's really challenging to be able to sleep properly through the night, we need to work on that. That is the number one priority. It could be that maybe you back off and you're just doing a 12- or 13-hour window of digestive rest as a way to make sure we can dial in on the sleep piece, because if you're not sleeping through the night, that's a disqualifier. I always say that's super important and it's interesting. 

I'm getting ready to interview Louisa Nicola. I'm not sure if you're familiar with her work, but she's a brain health researcher. One of the things I want to talk to her about is that interrelationship between poor quality sleep and weight loss resistance because that is such a big, huge problem for so many people. 

Melanie Avalon: Does she have a book? 

Cynthia Thurlow: She does not have a book, but she has one of my favorite, favorite podcasts. So, her podcast is The Neuro Experience. 

Melanie Avalon: Okay. Very cool. 

Cynthia Thurlow: She's getting her PhD. No book yet, but she has a really great she has great content. 

Melanie Avalon: Awesome. I think that's a pretty comprehensive answer. Thank you. I'm always really curious about people's electrolytes because she says she's drinking LMNT. I just find it so interesting, the actual sodium and aldosterone system and all of that. I think for some people, it can be like they got to find what works for them to where they're staying hydrated and not fluctuating between releasing water, thirsty, retaining water. A lot of people get in their groove with LMNT and they're good to go, but maybe that might be something to dose around. I don't know if she needs more or less, but I'd be curious, especially when it's coupled with keto and low-carb.

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, and I start to think it because she's six months in, like she's beyond she's at a stage where she has a lot of glycogen depletion and a lot of serum sodium loss. That might be exacerbating some things, but I agree with you that this is a degree of experimentation that's going to be important and for many people. I used to be this person when I was rounding on patients, I didn't want to be having to run to the restroom every hour to urinate. I was clinically dehydrated probably 80% of the time I was working in the hospital or in the clinic, and so I was able to weather that when I was younger. But now when I travel, I have to be really diligent. I'm the person that fills up 2 meters worth of water and tries to get that consumed while I'm traveling just to stay hydrated, because it becomes such a big problem. 

Melanie Avalon: What's really interesting for me, just historically with my experience, because I've done bouts of low-carb versus high-carb, and when I was low-carb, that's when I would struggle with dehydration and also needing to urinate more and stuff like that. But what I do now, which is what I've been doing for a long time, which is like a very high-carb approach, but all fruit interestingly, I actually don't have that issue anymore. I always feel pretty hydrated, but I'm an N of one. So, I just think it's really interesting that people can react differently. But if I were to have high carb from like starches, for example, I would retain water. I would have issues with probably actually feeling hydrated. It's just interesting how I react to different carbs and water storage and everything. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Which she describes as having to get up three or four times a night. That's like an active diuresis. That's the technical terminology of your body trying to get rid of excess fluid. You just start to think about the value of the N of one as you stated. And I can tell for me, if I'm carb cycling the days I go low-carb, I know I'm going to urinate more than the days when I'm higher carbohydrate, which mine are never all that high, like maybe a 100 and 125. But cycling from 50 to 125 over a series of days, it's okay for me because I work from home, so I can manage that. But again, for some people it could be the case of Celia, if she's got a job where she can't be getting up every hour to be able to run to the restroom, it may be that she's really pushing the fluids when she gets off of work, or at the latter stage of the day. That could be why she's getting up multiple times a night as well. 

Melanie Avalon: Hi, friends. One of my favorite foods for gut health, skin cravings, energy, and immunity is definitely bone broth. I and so many of my listeners love bone broth, but it can also be intimidating because it can be hard to find a bone broth that is all natural, organic, free of preservatives, and especially no salt added. Of course, you can always make your own, which I love but that can be of a cumbersome process.

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A lot of the broths on the market are also kettle or pressure cooked, which breaks down ingredient nutrients and reduces their integrity and potency. Beauty & the Broth doesn't do that. They let all of those amazing ingredients slowly simmer for up to 24 hours to create a broth that is super high in naturally occurring collagen and nutrients. Your gut will thank you, I promise. We often get questions about the best way to open your eating window. This is an incredible way to do that. Especially when you're in the fasted state, your gut is super ready to absorb these nutrients. Bone broth contains the specific nutrients needed to heal your gut, help with leaky gut, support digestion, and so much more. And when it's cold in the winter months, what tastes better than a warm cup of bone broth? You will notice it in your nails, in your gut health, in your hair, in your improved recovery, increased energy, and did I mention, it's so convenient and so easy to use. They've also got a vegan mushroom broth, which is super rich in umami and delicious for all of you vegans out there.

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Melanie Avalon: We have a question from Lynn. “Is high cholesterol blood work common with intermittent fasting?” 

Cynthia Thurlow: I would say no. I think there's a lot of different factors. Melanie, I know that you did a bunch of reading and researching on this in particular, but I think for a lot of people, when you're talking about total cholesterol, you can be this. Well, Dave Feldman is the gentleman who's really changing the narrative for clinicians in terms of the way that we look at lipids overall in terms of vis-à-vis diet. And there are certain people that are called lean mass hyperresponders. I am one of them. My body just in relationship to eating a higher protein, lower carbohydrate diet will create more. He usually uses the analogy of boats, like more boats to transport these lipids, but it's not actually pathogenic.

I'm just going to very basically say I don't think there's a direct correlation with fasting and changes in lipids per se, but I think it's largely a reflection of nutritional choices and not per se all pathologic. Like, I don't even worry about the total cholesterol number unless it's low, because that can be a predictor of morbidity and mortality. So, there were a lot of patients that I used to stop their statins for this reason. Melanie, I'm curious, you mentioned that you read some really good research in this area in particular. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, there's actually a ton of studies on this and I got the sense pretty quickly that I didn't need to read like millions more because the takeaway was the same, which was that people seem to respond all differently, but that it is actually pretty common to see increased cholesterol levels transiently while fasting. And I should clarify, it's funny, ever since, just like we always mentioned Peter Attia, on almost every episode. He had an episode all on cholesterol. He went on a monologue about how because LDL and HDL aren't actually cholesterol. They're the carriers, like Cynthia just said. And he made a comment about how if anybody ever says LDL cholesterol, he basically not immediately dismisses them, but [laughs] questions what they know. I've just kept that in my mind. I've been like, if I ever interview him, like, “Do not say LDL cholesterol.” Do not say, [laughs] like, “Do not say HDL cholesterol.” 

But the point of that is Lynn's question was, “Is high cholesterol blood work--?" So, high cholesterol. That's a big blanket statement that has a lot of factors that are going into that. So, you have your total serum cholesterol, you have your LDL and HDL, which are carriers of cholesterol kind of what Cynthia was just saying. It's like the boat analogy. And then, you have your triglycerides. This is not meant to be a cholesterol entire episode, but there's different implications for what that all means. So, in the studies, literally, I found things showing all different things like in a 2020 trial, I found they found that in Fasting patients with low HDL, they saw that it improved their HDL and it did significantly affect their total cholesterol and their LDL as well. 

And another study, this is of an older study, but it was called Fasting increases serum total cholesterol, LDL and Apo B in healthy, nonobese humans. In their study, they found that fasting increased total cholesterol and LDL cholesterol. I liked this article because it actually went into the mechanisms behind it. They found that the increase in serum cholesterol, LDL and Apo B were all associated with weight loss. They found that fasting did not affect serum concentrations of triglycerol and HDL, which is the opposite of what that other study found. In that study, they actually did a review of a lot of other studies and literally they found all different things. It seemed to really depend on the population, on the sex, on the weight loss or not. So, their mechanisms, they say that these contradictory reports may be explained by sex and or age difference and then some of the things that might be going on is that fasting, especially if it's resulting in weight loss, that is lipolysis, so breaking down and releasing fats. 

They said that could be a reason that people see an increase in LDL. And then on top of that, with fasting, it's possible that the liver actually decreases its LDL uptake so that further can contribute to higher LDL while fasting. Basically, if you go to Google Scholar and just type in cholesterol or whatever one that you want to look at in fasting, there's so many studies, and like I said, it's really all over the place. The important takeaway from it is that long term, it seems to have a beneficial effect on people's lipid panels. So, regardless of the transitory moment, while you're fasting, that might release, break down more fat and result in more cholesterol in the bloodstream, but long term it seems to really help with lipid panels, help with your risk for cardio events. So, yes, that's my thought, is that you might see higher levels, but you're probably having a benefit in the end. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, it's really interesting because when I reflect back on when I started in medicine over 25 years ago, the way that we look at lipids has really started to shift, thankfully. Looking at these different particle sizes and the inflammatory responses of certain types of densities of LDL and LP(a) and Apo B, and all these metrics that people weren't per se, really looking at so many years ago. I think that fortunately, there are many people that are evolving the way that we look at lipids and benefits to metrics that we look at in blood work for patients. But there are equally just as many individuals that are still, like, practicing the mindset of total cholesterol has to be a certain amount and understanding the cholesterol goes on to be intricately involved in creating hormones. Obviously, we don't want our total cholesterol to be too low. But yeah, it's interesting that there's more and more research being done in this area. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, and just a comment, I'm really excited because I love a company called InsideTracker and I haven't done this yet, but they just updated their panel that you get with them to include Apo B. So, I am so excited to get that tested. I'm like so excited. If people would like to get their Apo B tested, as well as a lot of other markers related to their “biological age.” They can go to insidetracker.com/melanie and use the code, MELANIE, to get 20% off. So, I will definitely be reporting back about that and posting about it on my Instagram because I don't think I've ever tested my Apo B. Do you test it regularly, Cynthia? 

Cynthia Thurlow: No. It's interesting. I have intermittently had it tested over the past probably a few years. I find functional medicine, they're usually the ones that are looking at that, but especially because without oversharing, if you were to just look at a traditional lipid panel of mine, my LDL would look very high, my total cholesterol would look very high, my HDL would look very high, my triglycerides are low. And over many years of having different internists, sometimes the concept of a statin would come up and I knew enough to ask for these advanced lipid analysis and these other metrics. When you would look at, as an example the particle size of my LDL, it was like all light and fluffy. It's the less atherogenic stuff. 

And so, to answer your question, yes, I do episodically get it checked. What I'm encouraging people to do is if your traditional lipid panel looks abnormal, don't settle for that being the one and done. There's more to it than that. I like that there are companies out here now that are allowing people to get that information without having to, per se, have to go through their provider. Even if it comes back and it's abnormal and you still need to bring it to them, that's totally fine. Or if it's completely normal, then it's something that you can look at as a metric to look to determine. Where are you on this metabolic health journey? Are you doing better than the last time? Are you starting to veer off course? What can you do to course correct and keep yourself healthy and vital? 

Melanie Avalon: It is really interesting because I've been tracking my cholesterol, my full cholesterol panel, historically with InsideTracker, so I have a lot of data on it. It's really interesting how it correlates to my diet. So, like, when I'm low-carb, everything is high. I mean, not in a bad way, the nuance that you were just talking about, but the levels of everything is substantially raised compared to when I do my high protein, low-fat, high-carb, everything's lower. It's just really interesting and it's so complicated and so nuanced. I think it's probably one of the most complicated things in health as far as there just being so many different opinions on it. 

Cynthia Thurlow: No, I couldn't agree with you more and it's interesting. We'll link up another podcast I did with Dr. Bret Scher. He's a preventative cardiologist, but also as a functional integrative approach. We talked quite a bit about these advanced lipid metrics. We'll link that in the show notes so that listeners can take a listen to that as well. 

Melanie Avalon: Awesome, awesome, awesome. Okay, now we have a question from Kim. She says, “Hi. Would you recommend fasting longer and then have a three- to four-hour eating window or fasting shorter, but having two meals, no snacks, and a longer eating window, say, a six- to seven-hour eating window? I'm a 53-year-old female post menopause, exercise daily with walking and lifting. I try to eat real whole foods and want to lose another 5 to 10 pounds than inter maintenance. Thanks so much. Love your podcast and the fantastic info you both share.” 

Cynthia Thurlow: Thanks, Kim. It sounds like you're doing a lot of great things already. I think this will be no surprise for listeners to hear me suggest that you have two meals to be able to get in a minimum of 100 grams of protein daily. I would also suggest tracking your macros to know where you are. I just find that most people really are optimized if they're getting two boluses of protein in per day. The other thing that I think is really important is especially because your menopausal getting a really good sense of what your hormones are doing. I'm not sure if you have had your baseline sex hormones, thyroid, leptin, ghrelin, all these hormones that we can have fasting insulin that we can have tested. I'm really looking at those to see if they're fully optimized, because some degree of weight loss resistance can be related to poor quality sleep, inflammatory nutrition. I know that you're strength training, so that sounds like that's really dialed in, but I think for a lot of women, it's looking at the basics and then looking at gut health and looking at things that can be cleaned up in terms of toxin exposure, your personal care products, your environment, your food. 

I know Melanie and I have talked a lot about that, in particular over the last several podcasts, and then also thinking about just the emotional component. I'm in the midst of getting ready to submit a second book proposal, and one of the things I've been really amazed, there's a lot of really good research in this that early childhood trauma, so they call it an ANA score. So, adverse childhood events, if you are at risk for having been through quite a few adverse childhood events, that can put you at risk as an adult for not auto, also autoimmune disorders like Hashimoto, celiac, etc., but can also put you at risk for weight loss resistance. So, recognizing there's a significant emotional component to some of the struggles that we have when we have weight loss plateaus, I think all those things are certainly important. Absolutely two meals in a wider feeding window I think is really helpful. How about you, Melanie?

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I thought that was really comprehensive, and I really like that stuff about the adverse childhood events. So, [laughs] it's what we always say, the importance of protein and everything being so important. Really, Cynthia, it's really been our relationship on this show that's made me pay more attention to that and that a lot of people might need longer windows to get all of that in. So, yes, I would err on the side of eating the window that will allow you to get in all of that protein rather than stressing about having the smaller window per se. Really, when it comes to the food aspect, I think there's so much magic that can happen with your actual food choices, which sounds like you're doing great, you're trying to eat real, whole foods. But I just think there's a lot of magic that can happen with that. Focus on what you're eating in that eating window rather than getting caught up in the nuance of a few more hours here or there. That’s my thoughts on that. Shall we go to some other random AMA questions? 

Cynthia Thurlow: Sure. 

Melanie Avalon: Okay, these are leftover AMA questions that are just kind of all over the place. Here's a really random question from Laura. She wants to know, what's the worst job that you have had? She wants to know, if you weren't doing what you're doing now, what would you be doing? 

Cynthia Thurlow: Okay, worst job I've ever had was my first job. Many of you probably know I grew up on the Jersey Shore, and working at the boardwalk seemed to be a really awesome job. But I worked at an ice cream place, and so imagine humid, hot weather, and you were scooping ice cream. This is before there was like a lot of soft serve, so it was like getting-- you're literally-- me being five foot three, half my body was practically in this pit of ice cream to scoop it up. I spent the entire summer smelling like ice cream, and I was sticky from my armpits, honest to God, even though I had a uniform on all the way to my hand. I remember I don't think I ate ice cream for several years after that, but I hated that job. [laughs] I really did not like that job. It was very reinforcing, like, “Okay, if I'm going to be working hard and sweating, I want to be making more money.” So I started waiting tables after that.

But if I weren't doing what I'm doing now, I think I honestly would have ended up either this is kind of funny. Originally, I thought I was going to be an attorney, and I realized now I don't like to argue, so I would have been a terrible attorney. I think I honestly would have ended up in the media realm, whether it would have been behind the scenes or being a reporter. I like getting the scoop, I like getting information, which is probably why podcasting appeals to me so much that I get to ask people all the questions that I'm curious about, but that's probably what I would have done. I'm an introvert, so being in front of the camera might not have been where I would have been, but I probably would have enjoyed being a reporter or being a journalist. 

Melanie Avalon: Awesome. That job does sound pretty miserable. Have I shared with you before my background horror stories? 

Cynthia Thurlow: No. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, so I've only cried from misery three times in my life and they were all while doing background on TV shows and movies and so the worst experience of my life, I might have shared this story before on the podcast. Do you know the movie, Sharknado? 

Cynthia Thurlow: Yes. 

Melanie Avalon: Okay, [chuckles] so in the acting world, there's union acting. SAG-AFTRA that people might be familiar with, like the SAG Awards. And then, there's nonunion. Well, when you're a background “actor,” so when you're a person in the background of a TV show or movie, you're like the lowest of low on the totem pole. If you ever want to see social hierarchies devoid of empathy, [chuckles] where people are just so blunt about the hierarchy that it's almost shocking, just go to a film set and look at how extras are treated.

But in any case, when I was nonunion, it can be pretty bad. I got a call for this movie and it was a low budget sci-fi film. They didn't tell us what it was or the name or anything. We were shooting in downtown LA. It was in the winter, which I know it's not that cold in LA. But it was like 40 degrees that day and were in like a tunnel. I think it was like a tunnel without a roof. So, it was like a valley thing. It's hard to describe. It was down, so it created like a wind tunnel. Wind was rushing through it and so they put us down there and then they were like yelling at us from like way up high and then they were like, “Okay, so when we call action, we're going to do the rain and then there are sharks and just run away from the sharks.” We're like [laughs] because it ended up being Sharknado. So, they would say like, “cue rain.” And they do “Action,” it would be like a torrential downpour. We had to just like run from imaginary sharks, like over cars, but for 6 hours, like in 40 degrees with wind and rain like soaked to the bone. I was so miserable. I was bawling. They would say run and I was like tears were like streaming down my face. 

And then finally, they pulled out some of us because like a PA came over and was like, I think they might get hypothermia. [laughs] They took some of us and put us into a tent. It was the worst day of my life. And then, what's really funny is then later I realized it was Sharknado. And I was like, “Oh.”

And then, what's even funnier is I became SAG later. When you're SAG, they treat you a lot better. I got a call for Sharknado 2, and I was like, “I can't do this movie again.” But the second time around, [laughs] I was SAG. I was a flight attendant and it was really cool. It was on a plane, a fake plane. The other flight attendant was Kelly Osbourne. [laughs] It was really fun. It was really funny too, because it was the same thing. They'd be like, “Action,” and they'd be like “Sharks.” And we all had to be like screaming. Oh, man, good times.

And then, the other two times I cried. One was doing background on some TV show and I had to swim in a pool for hours. It was also freezing, and I was just like holding the side and like crying to myself. The third time I was crying was I was on Fast and the Furious 7, out in the desert and it was 110 degrees and I literally thought I was going to die. That's the only time I left the set earlier, I went up to the medic and I was like, “I have to leave. I can't do this anymore.” 

Cynthia Thurlow: But I think for a lot like those of us who are not in that industry or never worked in that industry, I think there's this perception that it's all glamorous and you have definitely reaffirmed that it is not all glamorous. So, kudos to you for being wet and cold and pretending to run from whatever Sharknado thing was going on. But how cool about Kelly Osbourne. Was she nice? Like friendly?

Melanie Avalon: She seemed nice. Yeah, I think I didn't really talk to her, but I actually have a really cool video way back on my Instagram because I think for that scene I was in the back of the plane. So, I was like just with my little cart and not actually going into the scene, so it looked like I was in a plane. But you would just hear action and then you just people screaming like sharks, like the lights flickering. I've had so many experiences on movies and TV shows, it's crazy. Like, I've probably been on every TV show. 

Cynthia Thurlow: That's so funny. Yeah, I've been on sets, but it's been like news environments and so that's totally different. It's a little more like serious. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, well, what's really funny is some of the experiences are so surreal and it's funny because when you're doing background acting, half the time you really just don't want to be there. Some of the experiences are really cool. People would probably pay thousands of dollars for that. When it's happening for me, I'm like, "I just want to go home." I remember I did a concert scene for CSI and it was actually Ozzy Osbourne and I was like in the front row. So, I got to stand in front of Ozzy Osbourne for like hours while he was doing a fake concert. The whole time I was like, "I just want to leave." I knew that people would probably pay like thousands of dollars for that experience. But for me, it was like $8 an hour. So, [laughs] good times. 

Cynthia Thurlow: The glamorous life. 

Melanie Avalon: I know, I know, I know. What would I be doing if I wasn't doing this? So funny, like you growing up, I thought I was going to be a lawyer. I still think I could be a good lawyer, but I don't think I'd be happy doing it because I think it would make me upset. So, like Morgan Levine kind of embodies-- She wrote the book True Age, and I had her on my show, and she kind of embodies what I would want to be if I was a scientist, because she's-- not to be stereotypical, but I don't know how to say this all being stereotypical. She doesn't look like your typical scientist. She looks like if I were a scientist, what I think I would like the vibe that it would be. She's brilliant and studies aging. So, when I interviewed David Sinclair the first time, he made a comment about how I should come be a student in his lab at Harvard, and I wanted to just die when he said that. I think that's what I would be doing would be, like a scientist and studying longevity and aging, and the goal would be to get a Nobel Prize. [laughter] Aim high. 

Cynthia Thurlow: I think that's exciting. 

Melanie Avalon: So, here's one. Heidi wants to know, what does a day of eating look like for you? Kim really wants to know what is your favorite dinner? So, those two.

Cynthia Thurlow: Okay, so we'll start with favorite dinner, because that's easy. Like a big filet and probably either asparagus or broccolini and maybe some mushrooms. I keep things pretty simple. We grill a lot of meat and a lot of fish, and that's my happy place. Give me some healthy fats and some meat and some non-starchy vegetables, and that's like a perfect meal for me. I would say that today is a good example of what I eat in a day. I broke my fast this morning with-- gosh, it was like two bison burgers and some hard-boiled eggs, because it just depends on the day. I was hungry, and so I had that along with some cut-up cucumbers that were salted. I go through phases where I like certain foods, and cucumbers are super hydrating, as Melanie and I both know, and they're just easy to put together. 

And I don't necessarily have to do a lot of food prep. And then tonight, we're having short ribs. So, my goal is always to hit 50 to 60 grams of protein in each meal. Today, I was way more than 60 grams with what I eat because I had two burgers and two eggs. So yeah, I had way over that. And then, dinner is going to be short ribs, and I haven't yet consumed that. My kids will probably-- I think they're asking already for some type of a starch with that, I'll probably have asparagus. I mean, for me, there's probably four or five vegetables that I choose between for big meals and then salad whenever I want it. But that's in a given day. That's what I'm going to have. Today has been busy getting taxes prepared and then podcast recording, doing some couple of podcasts of Melanie. How about you, Melanie? What's your favorite dinner? 

Melanie Avalon: So, it's interesting, I have two answers because there's my favorite dinner that I eat, and then there's like if it was my last meal type thing, which would be completely different. Would your last meal be completely different? 

Cynthia Thurlow: No, because I would say my go-to is usually steak or like a bison steak or like a fatty fish, like maybe salmon, like a good-sized salmon steak. For me, it's so satiating that I definitely hit those protein thresholds where I'm like totally satiated and done. Maybe if you're asking if I'd have dessert, then it might be something chocolatey, because I love chocolate, dark chocolate. 

Melanie Avalon: It's interesting. I love what I eat. When I answer my Cynthia answer, which is it's what I would often eat, like at a restaurant or something. And I do love it. So, when I say my other answer, it's not that I don't love what I'm normally eating, because I do, but it's very similar to what Cynthia said. It really would depend on what I'm personally craving that night, protein wise. It would be like if it's a steak, a bone and filet is my favorite cut. If it's fish, I love going out when they have whole branzino. I love that. I love chilling sea bass, but it's too high in mercury. That would be my favorite fish. But the mercury is an issue. Yeah, it would be that with steamed spinach or something and then red wine, and then probably lots of fruit, lots of blueberries. If it was like a last meal situation, that's when I would eat all the things. 

So, it would definitely be Cajun chicken pasta from Chili’s, which I haven't had since probably high school. Funfetti cake, just all the Funfetti and lots of cheese. I mean, alfredo-- oh, yeah, Cajun chicken pasta is alfredo. Yeah. I love all these things. The day in the life, I think listeners are overwhelmingly familiar. I just eat the one meal day thing, and I eat tons and tons of lean protein, whatever I'm craving, tons of scallops. So, it's usually scallops and then either some chicken or some fish. Lots of cucumbers, and I love lots of blueberries and wine and rinse and repeat. It's pretty much just whatever I'm craving. Then the scallops are with, like, mushrooms and cilantro and chives, ginger, turmeric. 

Cynthia Thurlow: It's funny, I hadn't had scallops in a while, and I just had scallops recently, and it's interesting. It's one of the few things my husband doesn't like, so if I get them, it's usually at a restaurant. And I ate them and I was like, “Okay I think I'm okay eating scallops.” Again, I won't eat them again for six months. But I definitely love lobster and shellfish. Yeah, there's a lot of good things, but my kind of methodology for everyone that's listening, it's usually heavy on the protein. If there's not fat in the protein, then I'm adding some fats and then some type of a non-starchy vegetable, and I'm very happy. Like, broccolini is my current obsession, especially if it's sautéed with garlic and red pepper. It's really good and just superfast and easy. 

Melanie Avalon: Actually, that made me think I'll clarify. So, my ideal favorite meal that I actually eat, I love at restaurants when they have tartar or carpaccio, it's like some rare meat appetizer or sashimi if it's salmon. And I'm excited, speaking of Valentine's Day, the restaurant we're going to, I think, has a seafood tower. The thing I love about seafood towers is those tend to all be low mercury things like lobster, shrimp, like shellfish and stuff. So, crab. 

Cynthia Thurlow: It's all good. Someone was making fun of me the other day because I went into our grocery store and they had lobster that had been deconstructed that day. And so, I bought myself half a pound of lobster tail and claw and just put it on top of a salad and ate that for lunch. And it was amazing. My kids were like, “I cannot believe you bought that for yourself.” I was like, “Yes, I did, and I feel zero guilt.” 

Melanie Avalon: That's totally what I would do. Oh, I love going to-- Fun fact, I might have shared this. If you go to Whole Foods and they have the whole fish, they will debone it for you if you ask. So, I love going-- I went on a kick after I had, like I said, the full branzino at some restaurants. I was like, “I got to start doing this myself.” So, I go and get an entire fish for myself and cook it. It's really fun. It's yummy. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Our next sponsor is Athletic Greens. I take AG1 by Athletic Greens most days of the week. I initially tried it because I travel so frequently, and it just makes my life so much easier to have a convenient, healthy option. I typically will take it in the morning after working out or after my morning tea, and it makes me feel like I have so much more energy/ For me, it's all about convenience. I can take my travel packs with me, whether I'm traveling for business, whether I'm traveling for pleasure, I can throw it in my bag, and I know I can make it through security without any issues. AG1 has been part of millions of mornings since 2010 and a part of my morning for the last three to four years. It's made with 75 super high-quality vitamins and minerals, as well as whole food sourced ingredients that positively benefit my energy and sleep.

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Melanie Avalon: Okay, here's a really fun one from Mary Jane, “What are some health-related things you've tried that you really didn't like or had bad side effects to?” I tried like all the diets back in the day before finding low-carb and paleo. So, all of those, like, the cookie diet, just not a fan of that. I tried being vegan for like a week, did not work.

Cynthia Thurlow: How did that go? 

Melanie Avalon: It was like [chuckles] I remember I did it for, like, a week in college, and I was really excited because I went to a restaurant and was trying to find something, and they had something with Green Goddess dressing, and I was like, “This is so thematic. I'm being so vegetarian right now.” I was starving for protein. I was like, “I need meat.” It was very clear that it was not for me. The cookie diet, as well, was not for me. [laughs] Calorie counting, not for me. I need to feast. Like, I'm such a feaster. Also, so getting up early does not work for me. Like, as much as I want to be a morning person, going back and trying to widen my eating window and doing daytime eating after having done intermittent fasting, nope, not a good idea. Then, lastly, pets are so amazing for health. So incredible but I am not meant to, at least right now, have a pet. It's a lot to take care of, [chuckles] but I love when other people have pets. Oh, yeah and iodine. Iodine, I reacted to that supplement so bad. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Did you? Was it oral iodine or just putting it on, like Lugol’s solution on your skin? 

Melanie Avalon: I was doing the skin, and then I took some orally, and it's the only time that I so obviously reacted to a supplement. Like, my eyes got bloodshot red. I was like, “I can't go to work.” It's when I was a server, I look like I'm hungover or something. Yeah, it scared me. I think it's probably because it made me probably flush out like bromides and things. Did that spark your memory for any of yours? 

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, I think the things that I've learned about myself that a lot of other people have been able to do effortlessly that have not worked for me. I would say working night shifts never agreed with me. I'm not someone that does well, staying up late at night and not going to bed when it's dark outside. To the point where I think most of the time that I worked nights as a nurse and an NP, I felt like how you feel when you're, I don't want to say the word hungover, but when you're so tired, you just can't function. Like, I would function in the emergencies, but I would then walk around like a zombie on the days I was off or when I was trying to go to bed when it was light outside. So, say that. Certainly, the things that really didn't agree with me was when probably in the early 1990s when were still bastardizing fat and I just got out of college. 

When you take fat out, you're never satiated and you add a lot of processed crap back in there. So, when you're eating a lot of carbs, you're never satisfied. You're overeating carbs, not eating enough protein, eating fake fats. And I would say that definitely, although I was able to pretty quickly figure out that I do better eating more protein, but certainly not as much as I consume now. I would say that and the other thing that I've figured out doesn't suit me well. As I've never been a drinker, I was never someone that did well. I could have a drink or two, but I was never someone who ever felt good if they drank a lot. So, finally feeling like I'm at a stage in my life where I can effectively say I just choose not to drink because for me it doesn't make me feel good and my sleep is far too important. So, I would say those are probably the three things that I think about that for other people might work fine, but don't for me. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I mean, the night shift is interesting because I think it's really interesting how much clinical literature there is on night shift workers and how bad it is for our health. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, it's interesting as I'm kind of navigating writing this book proposal. It's interesting to me that when you look at the research on metabolic health, the disadvantage people are at that work contrary to the way our circadian biology is designed to thrive. So, if you're not going to bed at all when it's dark outside, that's a problem. And so, you look at the rates of cancer and poor metabolic health and Alzheimer's and all these things, it's pretty solid research. I think about how many of my peers and colleagues like that was the only option they had, either because they had to work when their kids were asleep and then come home and take care of their kids or whatever their circumstances were. Those are hard decisions to make, but the research is certainly leaning in the direction that it's really profoundly detrimental to your health long term. Like, if you do it for a couple of years, that's different, but if you do that for 20, 30 years, definitely problematic. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. Here's a sort of related one. What's a beauty or health product or fat that didn't work for you? I have one for that. Do you have one? 

Cynthia Thurlow: Oh, you go first. I'll have to think.

Melanie Avalon: Eyelash extensions. Have you done them before? 

Cynthia Thurlow: No, the only time I -- Well, I wouldn't-- it's just when they add a little-- like if you get your makeup done, I think that's different.

Melanie Avalon: Okay. Yeah, yeah, not like the temporary falsies. I got them done and I mean, they look amazing. They make your makeup routine cut down so much time getting ready. So, that was all great. And for a while I was like, “Oh, this is worth it for the time alone,” because I can just get ready faster. But they're so obnoxious to take care of like, when you're sleeping, I wear an eye mask. You're not supposed to do that. You can't really, like, wash them. I found the whole experience to be very stressful, [laughs] and then I took them off and I felt like I had lost so many eyelashes, and it's hard to know if I actually did or if it just looked I was used to seeing them. But the good thing that came out of that was after that started using DIME Beauty, they make an eyelash growth serum, and it's amazing. And I chose it because it's nontoxic. I can't recommend this eyelash serum enough. It has made my eyelashes grow so long now, like, I think probably better than before the eyelash extension. So, everybody get it. You can get a discount at melanieavalon.com/dime and use the code MELANIEAVALON. It's just their eyelash growth serum. So, I really recommend that. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, I'm going to share what is relevant because I have a troll on YouTube who's been making completely non-factual statements about me. So, I'm going to just call it out because just like I responded to this person. All of us have facial asymmetry. Everyone has-- like the right side of your face is not perfectly symmetrical to your left. As we get older, sometimes one side of your face may be more expressive than the other. You may have stronger muscles one side than the other. So, I have a very full mouth. I have had that my entire life. 

The reason why I'm sharing this story is to preemptively tell you what one thing I did that I didn't like. I've never had filler in my lips, but I have tried filler in other parts of my face. And so, about 12 years ago, there's this “famous" facial plastic surgeon in the Northern Virginia area, and I was like, “Oh, this is the person I need to go to.” They put some filler underneath my tear trough, so like underneath your eye. I guess he put so much filler there that I got horrible bruising. It made me look like I had perhaps been assaulted. I had to live with my face looking like that for like two weeks, and then it settled down. But for some people, you can get something called the Tyndall effect, which means when the filler is placed under the skin, you get a blue glow hue. And so, I had to have it all reversed. This is why I let the buyer beware. And so, I had it all reversed. And the irony is this troll kept saying, “Oh, you can tell she's had a ton of fillers.” I was like, “Dude, let me explain something to you.” After that experience, it was so negative. I was like, if I ever choose to do this again, I'm going to go to the best of the best, which is who I go to. 

This troll the other day was commenting that, “Oh, I'd had a ton of filler in my lips.” I was like, “No.” If you looked at photos of me, I was made fun of growing up because I had such full lips. The irony is I get accused of something I actually haven't done in a place I haven't done it. For me, the thing that I would caution everyone is if you choose to do anything to yourself, just make sure it's something you can reverse. That's the reason why I was comfortable saying, “Okay, this didn't work for me,” and you can reverse filler very easily. But a lot of people overdo it with filler, and it can migrate, so you have to be really, really careful. So, that would be my thing that I've done that I didn't love. 

Melanie Avalon: Well, thank you for sharing that and that sounds really intense. Just to discuss really briefly, the troll thing this weekend actually has been really hard for me because I posted a picture of when I went to see Hadestown, which is a Broadway musical, and all it took was like, one person commenting on my weight, which-- that's a whole tangent about. I don't know, I find it really interesting that the body shaming, there's like a double standard as far as what is acceptable and what's not. For some reason, it's okay to comment on people if you think they're underweight, and I know people are. They try to say it supportively, or most people do, but it just led to a torrential downpour of people commenting on my Instagram and then supportive people were there as well, but just stuff that's very not supportive and very negative. 

What's really interesting is I've been eating the same for like a decade, and it's so funny, like, one person called me that they were like, “I just went back through her pictures from ten years ago, and she looks the same as she did ten years ago.” But I just find it really interesting how people interact with people on social media. It's like because you're behind a screen, I don't know that people would say things to people's face in real life that they would say on social media and then just it's really ironic to me that there's a whole body acceptance movement, but it only goes one way. Like it goes for being overweight, but not if you look thin. And I also think we maybe have a warped perspective because I feel like the baseline weight is so high now that if you are thin or underweight, it looks even worse because we're used to seeing, I think, a higher resting weight. So, I've been having a lot of-- I got to see my therapist this week. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, no, no and it's interesting because I think that anytime you put yourself out there, you are going to get people who are keyboard warriors. They would never say something like that to your face, but they feel empowered because you can't find them. What's interesting is it was a physician who couldn't who kept making these comments, and people were defending me, but it was also one of the things I was saying to my husband. I was like I was shocked because generally I try to not interject, but I interacted with this individual saying, “No, you're actually incorrect. You don't know what you're talking about,” because someone said, “Oh, it looks like you're having a stroke.” I was like, “No, you can actually have stronger muscles one side of your face than the other. That's normal asymmetry,” and it's just interesting how the people who put themselves out there are the ones oftentimes that are at greater risk for having people make comments. 

But I think energetically, it's like you just don't engage with people like that because you're not going to change their belief system. They want to believe what they want to believe, and it also invites all of us to rise above that and to just not interact. Like, to me, the adage of, “If you have nothing nice to say, don't say anything at all.” I think about my mother said that to me growing up. I always think, like, I don't ever want my comments to be perceived as negative. It's like if I have something negative to say, I'm not going to say it. It just isn't worth it. but if you have something positive to say or something that's going to be helpful or beneficial, I think that's great. Just like it seems like over the last couple of days, there's been an uptick in people making comments and my DMs on Instagram and my team trying to make sense of some of these things. 

The point of why I'm sharing all this is if you don't have anything nice to say, just keep it to yourself. I think that's a much healthier way to be. If there's something constructive, if someone and it's something helpful and constructive, that's very different. I think all of us welcome feedback, but people to be mean and self-righteous just for the sake of being mean, that’s no one needs that. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, it's really interesting. The way I reacted was I tried to answer every person and just with kindness and not defensiveness, just hearts and kindness. It's really interesting exercise, I think, for everybody. It's interesting for me to see how I react and what does that say about my feelings. And then for people, if they do take a lens at why they're saying these things, why, because I think often it does come from personal insecurities and things like that, but I was super grateful for the people who are supportive. I got a lot more supportive DMs because I think people, they like to support that way. Yeah, it's interesting and I don't know, I just find it so interesting how thin shaming is totally okay, [laughs] or seemingly okay. Yeah, so, fun times. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, I love all these questions. I think they're really, I mean, in some instances I really have to think hard. [laughs] Like I'll say to Melanie, you answer it first and while you're answering, I'll think of my answer. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. I think next week maybe we still have some good ones, so we might do one more of these episodes. But this has been 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@ifpodcast.com or you can go to ifpodcast.com and you can submit questions there. The show notes will be @ifpodcast.com/episode304. They will have a full transcript as well as links to everything that we talked about. I know we talked about a lot of studies, a lot of things, so definitely check that out. And then if you want to [laughs] join us on Instagram, we are @ifpodcast. I am @melanieavalon and Cynthia is @cynthia_thurlow_. So, I think that is all the things and yeah anything else for me, Cynthia, before we go?

Cynthia Thurlow: No. By the time this episode comes out, we will have the creatine subscriptions up, so we'll definitely be keeping everyone post about that. 

Melanie Avalon: Awesome, awesome, awesome. Yeah, and I'll have the switch to more sustainable subscriptions the week after this. So, the links to learn more about all of that is cynthiathurlow.com/supplements for her line and avalonx.us/emaillist for my line and that's to get updates. So, okie-dokie. Well, have a wonderful Valentine's Day tomorrow [[chuckles] and I will talk to you later. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Sounds good, 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. Transcripts by SpeechDocs. And original theme composed by Leland Cox and recomposed by Steve Saunders. See you next week. 

[Transcript provided by SpeechDocs Podcast Transcription] 

STUFF WE LIKE

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

LINKS

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Melanie's What When Wine Diet: Lose Weight And Feel Great With Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, And Wine
Cynthia's Intermittent Fasting Transformation: The 45-Day Program for Women to Lose Stubborn Weight, Improve Hormonal Health, and Slow Aging

The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast

Everyday Wellness

More on Melanie: MelanieAvalon.com 

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Welcome to Episode 303 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 Cynthia Thurlow, author of Intermittent Fasting Transformation: The 45-Day Program for Women to Lose Stubborn Weight, Improve Hormonal Health, and Slow Aging.

Today's episode of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast is brought to you by:

BUTCHERBOX: Grass-Fed Beef, Organic Chicken, Heritage Pork, Wild-Caught Seafood: Nutrient-Rich, Raised Sustainably The Way Nature Intended, And Shipped Straight To Your Door! For A Limited Time Go To butcherbox.com/ifpodcast And Get Chuck Roast and a Whole Chicken plus $10 off!

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JOOVV: Like intermittent fasting, red light therapy can benefit the body on so many levels! It literally works on the mitochondrial level to help your cells generate more energy! Red light can help you burn fat (including targeted fat burning and stubborn fat!), contour your body, reduce fine lines and wrinkles, produce collagen for epic skin, support muscle recovery, reduce joint pain and inflammation, combat fatigue, help you sleep better, improve mood, and so much more!! These devices are literally LIFE CHANGING!! For A Limited Time Go To Joovv.com/ifpodcast And Use The Code IFPODCAST For An Exclusive Discount!

To submit your own questions, email questions@IFpodcast.com, or submit your questions here!! 

SHOW NOTES

1:10 - BUTCHERBOX: For A Limited Time Go To butcherbox.com/ifpodcast And Get Chuck Roast And A Whole Chicken Plus $10 Off!

3:30 - BEAUTYCOUNTER: Keep Your Fast Clean Inside And Out With Safe Skincare! Shop With Us At melanieavalon.com/beautycounter or beautycounter.com/cynthiathurlow And Use The Code CLEANFORALL20 For 20% Off PLUS Something Magical Might Happen After Your First Order! Find Your Perfect Beautycounter Products With Melanie's Quiz: Melanieavalon.Com/Beautycounterquiz
Join Melanie's Facebook Group Clean Beauty And Safe Skincare With Melanie Avalon To Discuss And Learn About All The Things Clean Beauty, Beautycounter And Safe Skincare!

MANUKORA: Go To manukora.com/ifpodcast For A FREE Pack Of Honey Sticks With Your Order!

15:30 - NUTRISENSE: Get $30 and get 1 month of free dietitian support At nutrisense.io/ifpodcast With The Code IFPODCAST

19:10 - Listener Q&A: Neva - I’ve been dying to ask, any suggestions on balancing the Fung community perspective of “longer fasts needed to get insulin resistance reversed and for the autophagy needed to reduce excess skin” vs Cynthia’s concerns about longer fasts and especially getting enough protein? This conundrum has been a problem for me.

28:05 - Listener Q&A: Nicole - Is it ok to cycle your fasting times. Anywhere from 14-18
If you consume 10 calories via electrolytes (LMNT) are you still fasting?
Is coffee ok to have while fasting?

For A Limited Time Go To drinklmnt.com/ifpodcast To Get A FREE Sample Pack With Any Purchase! 

43:45 - Listener Q&A: Sarah - Help! My fasting glucose is going up! I have been intermittent fasting for over 2 years. I usually eat lunch and dinner and I am low carb. I have been doing my best to eat 100 grams or more of protein daily. I’m 40, haven’t made any huge changes lately. My fasting glucose has been staying over 100 even after 18 hours. In March I had my insulin checked and it was 2, 3 and 5 within two weeks on 3 separate occasions. I would love any advice!

53:20 - JOOVV: For A Limited Time Go To joovv.com/ifpodcast And Use The Code IFPODCAST For An Exclusive Discount!

56:40 - Listener Q&A: Natalie - How come some times it’s easy to fast and other times I can barely make it 16 hours. Does age? Cycle? Does/ should Perimenopause change anything about the way we fast. How can we get comfortable fluctuating between 3-5 lbs knowing we didn’t eat that much, yes water weight and bloating, but how can we not let it ruin our vibe. Lol! Random thoughts by a 40-something.

Our content does not constitute an attempt to practice medicine, and does not establish a doctor-patient relationship. Please consult a qualified health care provider for medical advice and answers to personal health questions.

TRANSCRIPT

Melanie Avalon: Welcome to Episode 303 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 and author of What When Wine: Lose Weight and Feel Great with Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, and Wine. And I'm here with my cohost, Cynthia Thurlow, Nurse Practitioner and author of Intermittent Fasting Transformation: A 45-Day Program for Women to Lose Stubborn Weight, Improve Hormonal Health, and Slow Aging. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and cynthiathurlow.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this show do not constitute medical advice or treatment and no doctor-patient relationship is formed. 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.

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And one more thing before we jump in, are you fasting clean inside and out? When it comes to weight loss, we focus a lot on what and when we eat. It makes sense because these foods affect our hormones and how our bodies store and burn fat. But do you know what is possibly one of the most influential factors in weight gain? It's not your food and it's not fasting, it's actually our skincare and makeup. As it turns out, Europe has banned over a thousand compounds found in conventional skincare and makeup in the US due to their toxicity. These include endocrine disrupters, which mess with your hormones, carcinogens linked to cancer, and obesogens, which literally can cause your body to store and gain weight. Basically, when we're using conventional skincare and makeup, we are giving these obesogenic compounds direct access to our bloodstream. And then in our bodies, studies have shown they do things like reduce our satiety hormones, increase our hunger hormones, make fat cells more likely to store fat, and more resistant to burning fat, and so much more. If you have stubborn fat, friends, your skincare and makeup may be playing a role in that. Beyond weight gain and weight loss, these compounds have very detrimental effects on our health and they affect the health of our future generations. That's because ladies when we have babies, a huge percent of those toxic compounds go through the placenta into the newborn. It is so, so shocking and the effects last for years.

Conventional lipstick, for example, often tests high in lead and the half-life of lead is up to 30 years. That means when you put on some conventional lipstick, 30 years later maybe half of that lead has left your bones. On top of that, there is essentially no regulation of these products on the shelves. That's why it's up to us to choose brands that are changing this. The brand that is working the hardest to do this is Beautycounter. They were founded on a mission to change this. Every single ingredient is extensively tested to be safe for your skin, so you can truly feel good about what you put on. And friends, these products really, really work. They are incredible. They have counter time for anti-aging, counter match for normal skin, counter control for acne and oily prone, and counter start for sensitive. I use their Overnight Resurfacing Peel and vitamin C serum every single night of my life and their makeup is amazing. Check out my Instagram to see what it looks like. Tina Fey even wore all Beautycounter makeup when she hosted The Golden Globes. So, yes, it is high-definition camera ready. They have so many other products, deodorant, shampoo and conditioner that I love, products for babies, and so much more. You can shop with us at beautycounter.com/melanieavalon or beautycounter.com/cynthiathurlow and use the coupon code CLEANFORALL20 to get 20% off your first order. Also, make sure to get on my clean beauty email list. That's at melanieavalon.com/cleanbeauty. I give away a lot of free things on that list. So, definitely check it out. You can join me in my Facebook group, Clean Beauty and Safe Skincare with Melanie Avalon. People share their experiences, ask questions, give product reviews, and I do a giveaway every single week in that group as well. 

And lastly, if you're thinking of making clean beauty and safe skincare a part of your future like we have, we definitely recommend becoming a band of beauty member. It's sort of like Amazon Prime for clean beauty. You get 10% back in product credit, free shipping on qualifying orders, and a welcome gift that is worth way more than the price of the yearlong membership. It is totally completely worth it. So, again to shop with us go to beautycounter.com/melanieavalon or beautycounter.com/cynthiathurlow and use the coupon code, CLEANFORALL20 to get 20% off your first order. And we'll put all this information in the show notes. All right, now, back to the show.

Hi everybody and welcome, this is episode number 303 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon and I'm here with Cynthia Thurlow.

Cynthia Thurlow: Hi, Melanie, how are you?

Melanie Avalon: I'm doing very well. I actually have a question for you. It relates to, so I have an announcement and I have something that I wanted to share and it relates to a question for you as well. I interviewed a guy named Matt Simon for his book A Poison Like No Other, which was all about microplastics corrupting our planet. And it was mind-blowing and shocking. But in any case, it just made me more and more aware of the importance of sustainability and not creating waste and all of this stuff. I have an announcement about how we're going to change and adjust how we offer subscriptions for AvalonX products. But I was wondering-- do you have subscriptions for your products?

Cynthia Thurlow: The subscription will start on February 10th and we're really excited since there's been such a tremendous response to the creatine. I don't know if we told you that Mark Hyman featured my creatine in his newsletter last week.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, wow. Did you send it to him?

Cynthia Thurlow: No. I had my second podcast with Drew [unintelligible [00:08:20] last month, and when I was out, I brought some with me just to kind of have in case I was going to give it to someone that I thought would enjoy it. And when we were having an off-camera discussion, he mentioned he had just started-- he had been working diligently on strength training and fat loss. I said to him, have you looked at the research on creatine? He's like, I absolutely have. And so, I said, I brought a product of mine, there's absolutely no obligation. He loved it. He gave it to his sister, bought some, and then they featured it in Mark Hyman's newsletter. I was really surprised and very grateful for that opportunity because it led to quite a bit of people purchasing the creatine. So, yes, our subscriptions are going to start on February 10th and it's really going to be a great way to save on a product that I think nearly every person, irrespective of life, age, and stage can benefit from.

Melanie Avalon: Wow. That's amazing. Have you had Mark on your show?

Cynthia Thurlow: I have not. He is kind of one of those elusive characters that doesn't do a lot of guest podcasting. I guess you get to a point in your business I know JJ Virgin and I talk about this that people will get to a point in their business where they just don't do a lot of guest podcasting anymore. And I think that's where he is. And so, to answer your question, no, but it doesn't mean that it won't happen, I'm going to cross my fingers and put that intention out there into the universe.

Melanie Avalon: Wow. I will as well. That's amazing. That's super cool. The subscriptions are great because they make it easy for people, but then as far as it's less shipping, it's more sustainable. The change that we're making, which we're still locking down the details, but it should be hopefully around February 20th, I think. We're hoping to switch to right now, people get multiple bottles, so we're hoping to switch to a one-large bottle option. Hopefully, that will be live so people can get the updates at avalonx.us/emaillist. And how can people get updates for your products? 

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, so the easy thing to do is to go to www.cynthiathurlow.com/supplements and you'll be able to get information on creatine as well as a little teaser about what the next supplement will be. I'm technically not allowed to talk about it yet, but we're super excited because it's going to be helpful for brain health, metabolic health, and there's a lot of solid research on sleep support as well.

Melanie Avalon: Awesome, awesome, awesome. Just as a cap to all of that, I read that book A Poison Like No Other, which I actually really recommend reading the book or checking out my interview when it comes out because it really is upsetting. I didn't really realize the extent that I knew plastics were bad, but he just has all the stats about really what they're doing, but then what's really crazy and this kind of blew my mind. He danced around this but I was listening to an interview last night that made it even more firm. He talks in his book about how recycling is misleading. It's not really doing what we think it's doing and the majority of recycled products just end up in landfills anyway. Last night I was listening to an interview on Rich Roll with Seth Godin and he just outright said that recycling was created by like that it's just a lie. It was created by industry to make us feel better about plastic. He literally says recycling things into blue plastic bins does nothing. Like it's literally created. Again, I got to research this, but he says it was created by the industry so people would feel better about purchasing plastic because they could recycle it.

Cynthia Thurlow: That would make sense, although very disturbing because I think so many of us have been led to believe that if we can recycle it, then it's not so bad. To your point, I was listening to a podcast of Shawn Stevenson's recently and he was connected with Metabolic Mike, who is the podcast host of High-Intensity Health, which is one of my favorite podcasts to listen to because he really provides research and makes it short and relevant so that people can have some takeaways. They were talking about the contamination theory of obesity as a means for why so many people are struggling with weight loss resistance and why we're seeing such a net impact on fertility rates and miscarriages and changes in endogenous testosterone levels. I think for a long time I was always like, "Oh, it's related to insulin resistance, we're such an unhealthy population." It's really the exposure to these endocrine-mimicking chemicals that is so profound. I really look forward to checking that book out and of course, listening to your interview.

Melanie Avalon: Yes, I find it all just so fascinating and things that people just don't really think about, but I'm happy that people are taking it more seriously now. It's funny though, I read that book. I'm so happy, my supplements are in glass bottles, but they have plastic caps. I was reading it and I was like texting or calling Scott, our partner at MD Logic. I was like, we have to get rid of plastic caps. I don't know what the alternative is, but yeah, so we'll work on that.

Cynthia Thurlow: I love how thoughtful you've been. I mean, thus far, I think my second product will also be in a pouch. We're trying to navigate healthier options as opposed to a lot of the plastics that most supplements are contained in. There's a lot of nuances and I think that we just try to do the best that we can, but obviously understanding that we don't know at all and that we have to continue to do the work and to learn from experts that know more than we do. Because I certainly feel like it's not a race, it's a journey to make better choices in things we're exposed to in our environment, personal care products and food, and plastics are everywhere. I mean, if you really just sit back and think about it is everywhere. We just think about it as being normal.

Melanie Avalon: So, fun fact, it's literally everywhere. They're on the top of Mount Everest. According to that book, they're at the top of Mount Everest and they're also at the bottoms of the ocean. So, they're literally everywhere. So, yeah, fun times, fun times. I did get really excited because one of our new sponsors, Manukora Honey, which is delicious, it's manuka honey from New Zealand. When I did the call with them because they have individual packets that they send, I was little bit concerned because I was like that doesn't sound very sustainable. But when I did the call with them, they said they actually had completely 100% compostable packaging for those. So, that was super exciting. People can actually get those free if they go to manukora.com/ifpodcast. So, get some manuka honey sticks to try in completely compostable packaging.

Cynthia Thurlow: That's awesome.

Melanie Avalon: Hi, friends, we talk all the time on this show about the beneficial effects of intermittent fasting and especially how it can affect your blood sugar levels. How much do we talk about this? How diet affects them? How exercise affects them? How fasting affects them? But how do you actually know what your blood sugar levels are? Besides when you go to the doctor and get a snapshot of that one moment in time, or give yourself a finger prick, which again is a snapshot of that one moment in time. What if you could know what your blood sugar was all the time? That would be a revolutionary insight that could really help you meet your health and wellness goals. Guess what? You can do that now. I'm going to tell you how to save $30 off while doing it. We are obsessed with a company called NutriSense. They provide access to and interpretations of the data from the biosensors known as Continuous Glucose Monitors aka CGMs. Your blood sugar level can significantly impact how your body feels and functions. NutriSense lets you analyze in real time how your glucose levels respond to food, exercise, sleep, and stress. How does that work? Well, a CGM is a small device that tracks your glucose levels in real time. The application is easy and painless. I promise, promise, promise. Check out my Instagram. I have so many videos of putting them on so you can see what that process is like. It's actually really fun.

You can use the NutriSense app to scan your CGM, visualize data, log your meals, run experiments, and so much more. And you get expert dietitian guidance. Each subscription plan includes one month free of dietitian support. One of my friends recently got a CGM, and she was going on and on about how cool it was to talk one on one with a dietitian who could help her interpret her results. Your dietitian will help you interpret the data and provide suggestions based on your goals. Of course, if you're already super knowledgeable in this space, they will still be able to provide you more advanced tips and recommendations. Friends, seeing this data in real time is what makes it easy to identify what you're doing well and where there's room for improvement. Some benefits and outcomes that you can experience weight loss, stable energy throughout the day, better sleep, understanding which foods are good for you, controlling your cravings, seeing how you're responding to fasting and so much more.

Each device lasts for 14 days and of course lasting sustainable change takes time and that can be achieved with a longer-term subscription. We definitely encourage you to choose a six or 12-month subscription which are cheaper per month and allow you to not only achieve your goals but also ensure that you stick to your healthy lifestyle for the long term. You can go to nutrisense.io/ifpodcast and use the code, IFPODCAST to save $30 and get one month of free dietitian support. That's nutrisense.io/ifpodcast and use the code IFPODCAST to save $30 and get one month of free dietitian support. Friends, do you want to be in the world of CGMs? It is such a cool experience and you will learn so much. So, definitely check it out and we'll put all this information in the show notes.

So, today's episode, Cynthia and I have been doing our episode 300 became multiple episodes because we got so many amazing AMA questions and we want to keep doing them because they're so fun and awesome and so many topics. We also realized that I think in the past two or three episodes, we haven't done that many fasting-specific questions. What we're going to do today is we're still doing AMA, but these are the fasting AMA questions we got because when we asked for the questions, we asked for I mean were hoping for non-fasting related questions, but we still got a lot of fasting-related questions, so this actually works out very well. To start things off, we have a question from Neva, and she says, I've been dying to ask any suggestions on balancing the Fung community perspective of, "Longer fast needed to get insulin resistance reversed, and for the autophagy needed to reduce excess skin versus Cynthia's concerns about longer fast and especially getting enough protein. This conundrum has been a problem for me."

Cynthia Thurlow: This is a great question, Neva. I think a lot of this really depends on you as an individual. If you are already metabolically healthy and at a healthy weight, then I don't think really long fasts need to be something that you need to focus on over time. However, if you're someone that is not metabolically healthy, that is insulin resistant, I think that doing longer fasts can be helpful for breaking through plateaus. I think that longer fasts can beneficial for helping with cravings. I think it can be helpful for reducing inflammation and upregulating autophagy. I think there're many, many things that we have to consider when we're trying to balance longer fasts and being able to hit our protein macros. I think that when you look at the science of poor metabolic health and you're looking at sarcopenia and you're understanding that insulin resistance actually starts in your muscles, it's important to then also understand that one of the ways that you are going to help with reversing insulin resistance is reallocating those macros, becoming more physically active, and this is a really good example of the need to experiment depending on where you are in your fasting journey. I've started to speak more openly about this that a lot of times people think fasting has to be the answer for everything. Fasting is but one strategy of many that we can utilize to ensure that we have our health and longevity kind of railed in. When people ask me questions like this, it's always in the context of, I need to know more. Are you at a healthy weight? Are you sleeping well? Do you eat an anti-inflammatory diet? Are you menopausal? Are you perimenopausal? Are you still in your peak fertile years? I really would say that the average woman under the age of 35 shouldn't be doing these really long fasts. Our bodies are just so exquisitely attuned to this kind of methodology or really understanding that our bodies are so sensitive to cues that we take from our environment when we talk about stress.

Unfortunately, I think fasting for many people has now become a strategy that they're really leaning into and doing the extremes. They want to do really long fasts, they want to over-restrict macros in some capacity or another, they don't want to sleep, they want to overexercise, and so the way to answer that question is to say, I would need to know more about your personal circumstances to make suggestions. In terms of wide overreaching comments, I would say it's really dependent on, are you metabolically flexible, what life stage are you in, and what are your goals? So, Dr. Fung and I overlap quite a bit on what we lean into. But obviously, for me, I am all about protein and maintaining muscle mass because that will help in insulin sensitivity and I don't per se see that talked about a great deal. Although most of the insulin researchers, including Ben Bikman will talk about this loss of muscle signaling, loss of insulin sensitivity as being the first site in the body of where we become insulin resistant. Melanie, what are your thoughts?

Melanie Avalon: First of all, I thought that was an incredibly comprehensive answer. I'm so happy that you pointed out the bit about the insulin resistance starting at the state of the muscle, because that's, like, one of my favorites. I have, like, a list of fun facts about metabolic health. That's one of my favorites because I think a lot of people don't realize that they probably think it starts, I don't know where, they probably don't think about where it starts, but it's really interesting that it does start at the muscle. So, yeah, I just echo everything that you said, which I think is just a slight paradigm shift, and I like how you use the word strategy. Basically, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but I think we don't see longer fasts as the day-to-day habit lifestyle pathway. Like, longer fasting is not your daily life.

It's a strategy to use with specific goals in mind and keeping in mind the context of everything. Your diet, your current weight, what you're looking for, how much other stress you have. Right now, I'm reading Ben Azadi's book because he's coming on my show in a few weeks. He quoted, I think, some research by Thomas Seyfried, who said, for example, that he thinks if you do, like one long, I think he said seven days fast once per year, that it would reduce your cancer risk by 95%. Again, I don't know. I think that was just his thoughts on it. Basically, it's the idea that you could use longer fasts very specifically with specific goals in mind. I think it can have a lot of benefits. But I also think people can go way overboard and in day-to-day practice, yes, getting enough protein is so, so important. While I'm able to get all the protein in a very short amount of time, a lot of people just aren't able to do that. So, I don't think they're in conflict. I think they're actually just separate goals and intentions and uses.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah. I think it's important for people to really understand at a very basic level. We're not asking anyone to have to go out and feel like you've got to research all of these different points. I can tell you, as Melanie can after talking to the experts, it's very apparent that if we really understand where insulin resistance starts from, it just starts to make sense about why it's important to as an example, like, "If you're insulin resistant, walk after a meal that really doesn't require you to do anything special. It's just understanding that with each muscle contraction, your body is using up extra glucose. When people say, I'm insulin resistant, I'm really struggling with this. What's going on? It's like, okay, we have to get back to basics. Let's not make it complicated. I think, unfortunately, what happens is that, well-meaning people sometimes make things so complicated. People don't even know where to start. Ben does a great job making things, making more complicated subjects or concepts, making them very accessible for people, so they can then take action. That's really what it comes down to. We want to be able to provide information so that people can make informed decisions and they can make those changes that are going to have a huge impact on their health.

Melanie Avalon: It's interesting because there's so much information and then there's so much information and context, and yet we still make these blanket binary statements. I don't know if Jason Fung actually said this, but in her quote that, "Longer fasts are needed to get insulin resistance reversed." I'm saying I'm pretty sure you can reverse insulin resistance without ever doing a "Longer fast." That would help, but it's not the only way.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, and it's interesting because someone on Twitter today posted, what's the longest fast you've ever done? My joking response is always 13 days, but not because I wanted to. I think it also speaks to the fact that finding that happy medium like a lot of people in the health and wellness space are starting to discourage these really long fasts because putting in the wrong individual can really put additional stress and strain on your HPA access and cortisol and other things. Understanding that you can get a lot of benefits from shorter fasts and shorter meaning, like less than 20 hours or less than 18 hours. Actually, the longer I fast, the longer I've been fasting, the less I do really long fasts because I just don't feel like I need to do it. 

If you look at, I always think of Ted Naiman as a good example. He's, I think, roughly my age, very lean, and he talks about this diminishing law of returns after 24 hours. I don't disagree with him because you start to think about what are the net benefits and am I losing muscle. Especially if you're north of like 40, 45, it becomes more challenging to maintain muscle mass as you get older if you're not actively working against that. Why would you do all these long fasts if you're putting yourself at risk for losing exactly the organ that is going to help you maintain one of many, help you maintain insulin sensitivity. Ss you can see, I could talk about this for hours.

Melanie Avalon: No, I love it. I'm all about it. Okay, so some more AMAs. We got some three quick ones from Nicole. One, "Is it okay to cycle your fasting times anywhere from 14 to 18 hours?"

Cynthia Thurlow: Yes, and I encourage women in particular to adjust their fasting based on where they are in their menstrual cycle and I do like variety. Just like we don't eat the same foods every day, we don't do the same types of exercise every day, I do genuinely believe that there is a benefit from keeping your body guessing, not torturing yourself. I'm not asking anyone to white-knuckle it through fasting. That is not what we are trying to suggest, but I do like moderation. How about you?

Melanie Avalon: I agree 100%. Some people do really well with I mean, like me, I tend to do really well with more consistent-- I know I do well with a consistent schedule. Although I was thinking about it, actually, I do naturally fluctuate my window. It's always an evening eating window. Like, last night, for example, I went to a comedy show, actually. Do you know Taylor Tomlinson?

Cynthia Thurlow: I don't.

Melanie Avalon: She's a Netflix special and I actually wasn't familiar with her, but my friend had tickets and then couldn't go, so she just gave them to me. It's like okay, sure, I'll go. Do you like comedy shows?

Cynthia Thurlow: I do.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I think I should probably go to them more. There's definitely a lot of health benefits to laughing, but in any case, it started early. I open my window with wine way earlier than I normally do, and that kind of bumped everything up earlier. But then I realized I still went to bed late. I was just thinking about last night that my window was open almost double of what it normally is. I'm not super rigid. Like, it has to be these hours between these times. I just go with the flow if things are changing. In general, beyond that, I agree with what you were saying about a lot of people, especially women can benefit a lot from really changing things up and listening to themselves and the effects of their cycle and hormones. So, yes, definitely. The only caveat I would have is, I think some people and I think we talked about this on a recent episode. I do think for some people who are just starting fasting and they've never fasted before, if they're not adapted to fat burning, depending on what personality type they are, they might do better.

And actually, maybe regardless of personality type, there is a benefit to, I think for a lot of people committing to a window in the beginning because you're making those adaptations. If instead just like go with the flow, it's going to be hard to be intuitive. If you're not a fat burner yet and you're not adjusted to fasting. I think having that regulation in the beginning to become metabolically flexible and understand how you should feel when you're in the fat-burning state and while fasting, I think that's when it can be helpful to be more rigid.

Cynthia Thurlow: Absolutely. Just like, when I'm teaching women, like, I have IF:45 that I run four times a year. We have a group that they're just in their second week of fasting. I always tell them, until you've got the basics down, I don't mind if you are fairly consistent with what you were doing, but when you get to a point where your body is able to utilize either glucose or fats as a fuel substrate, then you're in a position where you can start varying things. People will know that they're at that point when they don't feel like they're white knuckling through the process like they feel comfortable, they are not having headaches, they have plenty of energy. They're not feeling like they have a slump after a meal. Most people will notice that if they're kind of struggling with weight loss resistance or they've been struggling with cravings, all of the sudden things start to kind of even out for them. So, I 100% agree with you, Melanie. You definitely want to make sure you're fat-adapted.

Melanie Avalon: Awesome. She has two other quick questions. One is "If you consume 10 calories via electrolytes LMNT, are you still fasting? I'll just comment on that because I just looked up LMNTs, like their line. The flavored ones are the ones that have calories. For example, their watermelon has five calories in a stick, their chocolate has five calories, but their lemon habanero, for example, has 10 calories, it's really interesting, and I'm assuming that is coming from whatever flavoring they're using. Like with lemon habanero, they're using natural habanero flavor, but then their raw unflavored has no calories. So, I do have thoughts on this. Do you have thoughts on this, Cynthia? 

Cynthia Thurlow: This is one of those nuances that if you are someone who's metabolically flexible, you're at a healthy weight. Taking in calories during a fast technically is breaking a clean fast. But if you are otherwise metabolically healthy and flexible, I don't think this is something people should stress and worry about. I do find for a lot of women as an example, because I work almost exquisitely with women that this is the type of stuff that can add up. When someone says to me, I'm weight loss resistant, I'm doing all the right things, and we start looking at a daily recall and they don't realize that they've got I mean, five calories-- 10 calories is not going to be the impetus for being weight loss resistant, but not understanding that cumulatively over time, these can be some of the things that add up that could be contributing to weight loss resistance.

It's the 50 grams or 50 calories of grapes that they eat while they're fasted or they're having like a fatty coffee or just these things can add up over time. A clean fast definition of a clean fast, if you're ingesting electrolytes that are flavored with sugars or flavored with nonnutritive sweeteners, technically that breaks a clean fast. Again, it goes back to are you metabolically flexible? If it is, I'm not stressing about that nor should you. If you are weight loss resistant, it's something to consider.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I agree with that. I actually think with the flavors, the issue more for people would be having those flavors during the fast, even if it was zero calories because that signals to the body food type stuff, so I think it can mess with appetite regulation. That's why we've always said on this show, historically, as long as we've been working with LMNT, that the raw unflavored, so the one that I said was zero calories and that's one that has no flavors, that's the one that is clean fast friendly. The other ones we would advocate for within your eating window. And so, this is really interesting. I don't know if this is true. I think I mentioned on this show before, I interviewed Steve Hendricks for his book called The Oldest Cure in the World, and it was the history of fasting, and I talked about it.

We're actually probably going to air that episode on this show because it was just mind blowing. I just want to air it first on my Biohacking Podcast. He talks a lot about the work of Satchin Panda in his book. Satchin Panda does a lot of work on time-restricted eating and in particular circadian rhythms of it and things like that. I'm just going to read what he says because I find this really interesting. Satchin Panda, one of the things he did was he had an app where he had people logging their food intake all throughout the day, and he found out what people were actually eating. One of the takeaways was that people think they're eating way less than they are, not amount wise like time wise. People don't realize, most people are literally having some food enough that they're pretty much in the fed state the majority of the time.

He says most people eating and drinking their last calories at 10:00 or 11:00 PM, this is what Satchin Panda found. "Weren't entering fat-burning mode and repair mode until 04:00 or 05:00 AM and never reached anything like exponential burn or repair before they took their morning coffee with cream at 07:00 AM. Panda has found that just five calories, one and a half grapes are enough to keep us in a fat-making mode for six more hours. Which, I find that I don't know that's a big statement.

Cynthia Thurlow: Big statement. It's interesting because there are, I have to believe, well-meaning individuals who tell people on social media that's okay if they consume a bunch of grapes, it's okay if they have copious amounts of fat, it's okay to do all these things. I just remind people that if the average person out there is not going more than 8 to 10 hours without eating during the day, to Melanie's point, you're losing out on opportunities to use up some of the stored fuel. Just to kind of keep that in mind that cephalic phase insulin response is a real physiologic response to things that are sweet on our tongue or if our body anticipates we're going to be eating food. Really thinking thoughtfully about what position are you in? If you're really trying to get a hold of insulin resistance or you're really trying to become more metabolically healthy that you want to lean into unflavored element or save those electrolytes that are sweetened, save them for your feeding window, that's going to be a much better option.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, and I think it goes both ways. One, what you just said, where people put this magical calorie like ceiling and say that if you're below that, it doesn't break your fast, which I don't know where that came from. But then on the flipside, I guess I would need the context of what this research was. It's hard for me to think that if somebody is fasted in the fat-burning state and maybe he's talking about they're not yet in the fat-burning state, but if they're deep in the fat-burning state and then they have five calories, I don't know how that would keep them out of fat burning for six more hours. I just want to know what that research was like what was he measuring?

I think it's safe to say that flavors and such are not going to help you with your fasting experience most likely and there's not some magical like if it's below these calories, it doesn't matter. If listeners would like to get LMNT and get that raw unflavored, they can actually get all the flavors free with their order. Just go to drinklmnt.com/ifpodcast so, remember the flavored ones in your eating window, the raw unflavored in your fasting. Okay, Nicole has one more super quick rapid-fire question. "Is coffee okay to have while fasting?" I'm guessing Nicole's probably new to our community.

Cynthia Thurlow: Here are my thoughts. If you have healthy adrenals and you're sleeping and you're not super stressed out, I think coffee is incredibly beneficial. We know there are polyphenols in coffee that can upregulate lipolysis and fat burning and fat oxidation. Someone who is not completely stressed out is sleeping well and is not in. Now, I'm going to put this out there. I interviewed Dr. Kyle Gillett for my podcast and he talked about andropause, so andropause is when men go through what's equivalent to menopause. But there's also adrenal pause. Our adrenals are not as stress resilient as we are getting older and so coffee in the right person is a wonderful thing to consume in a fasted state. If you're someone who's super stressed out and drinking that coffee overtaxes your adrenals and it pushes your cortisol up, which sends your blood glucose up, that's not a good thing.

I think it's really always in the context of you as an individual. As an overall recommendation, we do recommend bitter teas and coffee as a great option. Now, again, not coffee with cream in it. We're going to recommend black coffee, bitter teas because those are the things that are going to be beneficial. If you don't love plain coffee, you can add cinnamon which will help with insulin sensitivity. You can also add, like, high-quality salt, like Redmond, that can help with the bitterness. Those are two tips, even though I'm not a coffee drinker that I've learned along the way. What are your thoughts, Melanie?

Melanie Avalon: I'm glad you answered it from that perspective. In my head, I was thinking about it literally just from the breaking or not breaking the fast. I'm really glad that you went there. I agree exactly with what you said. I'll just expand a little bit on the coffee and the clean fast or not. Plain black coffee would be, "Clean fast friendly." Coffee with cream? No. Coffee with added sugar? No. Even coffee with sweeteners. It goes back to what were just talking about giving your body mixed messages during the fast. Yes, I think that context is really important with what Cynthia said about your adrenals and where your stress levels are. Do you drink coffee, Cynthia? I know we've talked about this.

Cynthia Thurlow: I do not. Neither does my husband. The only person in my house that drinks coffee is my 15-year-old who loves espresso.

Melanie Avalon: Do you have caffeine at all?

Cynthia Thurlow: Not a lot. It's something that for me, like, I can drink green tea a couple of days a week, and I do make an effort to do that, but I ice it. I actually brew it and then I ice it and then I drink it with a straw. I've just never been someone that loves caffeinated beverages. I think it can be very overstimulating for me although it's interesting, when I did a biogenomics test over the summer, they're like, "Oh, you're very caffeine tolerant. I was like, really? Because I don't feel super caffeine tolerant. Yeah no, I'm one of those strange adults that does not love coffee. How about you?

Melanie Avalon: Well, I'm very as alcohol tolerant, literally, but literally in the genes. Caffeine, not so much. I actually was reflecting on this yesterday with gratitude. Like, I was having so much gratitude for this because historically in college I don't even know how much coffee I drank. I shudder thinking about it. I think listeners know this because I say it a lot, but I just have a spoonful of coffee every morning, literally a spoonful of liquid coffee. I was reflecting with gratitude that I'm not addicted right now to coffee or caffeine. I was like, "Oh, I was thinking about it." I was like, I just wake up and I don't really have caffeine. All my energy is pretty much not from a stimulant, which is a nice thought.

Cynthia Thurlow: I think it's become normal for people to be really dependent on stimulants to get their day going. I think for me, years ago, everyone knows this, I was an ER nurse, and I had to work nights, and I would drink Diet Pepsi, which all it did was upset my stomach. I've just learned that for me, I do better just with water, a lot of water, and I stay really well hydrated. There's a lot of other things I do to kind of get me going in the morning, as opposed to being dependent on a stimulant, which there's no judgment. It's just not the way I like to feel in the morning. It's not my happy place. But you will see me drinking green tea at least four days a week because there're a lot of health benefits from it.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, and there are a lot of health benefits to moderate coffee drinkers. I think if I was the type that could do that and didn't struggle with my sleep, I probably would but like I said, I don't process caffeine that fast, and so it's just not ideal for me. I do like it kind of relates to what we were talking about earlier with longer fasts. It's nice to have it in your back pocket. Like the night when I got up really early for Taylor Swift tickets and was sleep deprived, and I had coffee that day and I was good. It's nice to have it to pull out when you desperately need it, so, yup.

Okay. Another AMA fasting question. This is from Sarah. She says, "Help, my fasting glucose is going up." Oh, and by the way, we really need to answer Sarah's question because I think she posted this in the AMA. I think she posted it on her own in the group. She DMed me about this. She was like, "Please help." So, Sarah, we're going to try to help you. She said, "My fasting glucose is going up. I have been intermittent fasting for over two years. I usually eat lunch and dinner and I am low carb. I've been doing my best to eat 100 grams or more of protein daily. I'm 40.I haven't made any huge changes lately. My fasting glucose has been staying over 100, even after 18 hours. In March, I had my insulin checked and it was 2, 3, and 5 within two weeks on three separate occasions. I would love any advice.

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, Sarah, this is a great question. I would say without having more information, you're perimenopausal because you're 40. This is when we start becoming less insulin sensitive. That doesn't mean that you are insulin resistant per se, but you are becoming less insulin sensitive. I start thinking about, are you sleeping enough? Is it high-quality sleep? Are you lifting weights? Are you consuming an anti-inflammatory diet? I can't necessarily tell from what you're sharing here. Gut health is really important. I see a lot of interrelationships with really looking at the gut microbiome as something that can impact blood sugar levels. I also think about you know Melanie, I started off the podcast talking about toxins in your personal care products, Food and Environment is another one that podcast that I mentioned was Shawn Stevenson, the Model Health Show, and it was him and Mike Mutzel talking about metabolic health and also changes in fertility and the contamination theory of obesity.

I just think about other things like are you exposed to mold? Are you exposed to mycotoxins? Are you leptin resistant? I mean, there's a lot of different things that can impact what's going on. Just looking at overall labs, like what's your progesterone doing, what's your estrogen doing. There're a lot of different things that can look at this. When you say that you've been checking your blood sugar, it could be as granular as, has your glucometer been titrated? Do you need to have it looked at to see? Do you need to change your strips? There're so many things that can impact why your blood sugar is not optimal. I would say those are good things to look at and just understanding in the context of other questions we've answered on this podcast today, muscle mass is really important. Understanding that insulin resistance actually starts in the muscle.

So, are you doing resistance training? Because I still think a lot of women heading to their 40s are still doing, like, "I've got to go run 5 miles every day." I'm like, you would be better served by getting in the gym and lifting weights three days a week than doing these really long runs. The other thing to think about is we're coming off the tail end of this pandemic, and I see a lot of women who are stressed, and the stress is bumping their cortisol up, and accordingly, your glucose will go up. Really getting granular and honest with yourself about what your stress management style is like, and it's not five minutes of meditation. It really needs to be practice. Things that you do every day, as an example, I get out in nature every single day, walk my dogs, no sunglasses. When I'm done exercising, I get on my PMF mat and that is part of time that I a lot every morning to do those two things in the context of everything else that I do because it brings me so much joy. It's such something I really look forward to because it helps quiet that sympathetic nervous system. So, those are my thoughts. Just based on what you've shared, Melanie, what are your insights?

Melanie Avalon: So, where I would start, and really this is for anybody who's having this issue. What Cynthia was saying about the glucometer, it can be really hard if you're just looking at a single snapshot of a blood test at the doctor, or even if you have a glucometer where you can prick your finger. That's just one moment in time. Like Cynthia said, so many things can affect it. If anybody's struggling to figure out their blood sugar levels, I would 100% recommend doing at least a two-week round of a CGM. It's the most eye-opening thing. I honestly think everybody should feel like mandatory, like life required, that everybody does two weeks of CGM at some point because what it does is it's a device that you wear on your arm, it's painless to put on, and it measures your blood sugar via your interstitial fluid, and it gives you a picture of your blood sugar. Is it every five minutes? Regardless, it shows you how your blood sugar is changing.

With that, you can actually find patterns and you can see is your fasting blood sugar actually high. It staying high or is it dropping and dipping and then going up? What's actually happening? It gives so much clarity to what might be the cause. We love a company called NutriSense and they're actually a sponsor on today's episode. You can listen to that ad for more information, but you can get $30 off and one month of free support from a dietitian because something that's really cool is you can actually, through the app, talk to somebody who will talk to you about your findings. So that can be actually pretty helpful. Just go to nutrisense.io/ifpodcast and use the code, IFPODCAST and that will get you $30 off and one month of free dietitian support.

If it is something where a lot of people do benefit from getting a subscription with that because it can be really helpful to go longer than two weeks to really get a good picture. That's where I would start, just to see what the actual data is and then see what might be the factors that are causing it to be high. Because her insulin, how do you feel about her insulin being 2 is low and 3 is low?

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, my general recommendation is between 2 to 5. It could be impacted by where she was in her menstrual cycle or a lot of different factors. I love that you brought up the CGM because that can give a much more complete picture. For me, it's like glucometers, just like blood pressure cuffs are super helpful, but it's like at that one specific time, that's when you're getting that metric. I do agree fervently that having a continuous glucose monitor is an even better option because you can then see the real net impact of sleep, stress, exercise, etc., on your blood sugar in real-time, as opposed to having to prick yourself 10 times a day. And some people prefer that. I personally don't like that at all. I'll be totally transparent.

Melanie Avalon: And this is like a really good case study example. I don't know how often Sarah was checking, but for example, she's saying my fasting glucose has been over 100 after 18 hours. Some people will find when they're using a CGM, that when they're fasting, like 12 hours and 13 hours and 14 hours and 15 hours that it's low, and then when they get even longer into the fast because of their stress hormones from the fast, that it actually starts going up again. So that might be a pattern. I'm not saying that's what's happening with Sarah, but I know that's a pattern that people often experience, and that's something where that would be something to address and fine tune and try to make that not be the case. It might be something where you think if you just checked it at 18 hours that it's been high that whole time when actually it hasn't. That's why CGM can just be a game changer. Are you wearing one right now, Cynthia?

Cynthia Thurlow: I am not. I'm taking a break. I used one gosh 18 months straight. I just got to a point where I'm very aware of the things that will raise my blood sugar. There're things I do conscientiously throughout my day to make sure that I can manage and mitigate a blood sugar response. The foods that did for me cause blood sugar rises that were beyond my norm, like plantains, which is so sad because I love plantains or whether it's gluten-free flowers and a cookie or cake. I just don't eat those things very often. For me, it just has created an awareness of the net impact of taking a walk after exercise. I don't necessarily feel like I need to wear them all the time. How about you?

Melanie Avalon: I'm glad you said that because that made me think of another benefit or something that people can troubleshoot with a CGM as somebody DMed me about this the other day on Instagram. Some people will be fasting and randomly get cravings, like sugar cravings or hungry, and they don't know why. That can be really beneficial to be wearing a CGM because you can see if when you get those cravings, are you having a blood sugar drop or are you not. That can help you kind of figure out what might be going on there. I haven't worn one in a while, actually, I have it in my calendar. I want to put one on pretty soon. It's on my to-do list. I have to put one on when. I actually am dressed up and going out so I can make a reel from it. That's what's been keeping me from doing it. Do you switch arms when you do it that long?

Cynthia Thurlow: I do. Left is my preference because I'm right-hand dominant, but I do switch off. And it's funny. I have one more and I've been trying to decide when I want to put my last one on, so I've been debating. I'm like I don't want it to be when I'm away on vacation or if I'm traveling. I want it to be when I'm home so I can kind of get a really good sense of all the things that I do during the day to stay as metabolically healthy as possible.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, that's the timing of it. Got to figure that out.

Cynthia Thurlow: Mm-hmm.

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Okay, I think we have time for one more question. Lastly, we have a question from Natalie. She says, "How come sometimes it's easy to fast and other times I can barely make it 16 hours?" Does age, cycle, or perimenopause changes have anything to do with the way we fast? How can we get comfortable fluctuating between 3 to 5 pounds knowing we didn't eat that much? But we have water weight and bloating, so how can we not let it ruin our vibe? Random thoughts by a 40-something.

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, Natalie, this is a great question, and yes, this is the blessing/curse of perimenopause the 10 to 15 years preceding menopause. So, from my perspective, there are reasons why it is harder to fast in the luteal phase when progesterone predominates versus the follicular phase, which is right after you've had your menstrual cycle, and the time preceding when you ovulate. It's much easier to fast in the follicular phase when the estrogen predominates, you're more insulin sensitive. You can go away with harder workouts, you can likely last longer. I spend a lot of time talking about this in my book and on a lot of podcasts, including this one that I'm really a fan of women being very cognizant of where they are in their menstrual cycle in order to ensure that they have a lot of success with fasting or taking a break from fasting.

I'm not a fan of fasting five to seven days preceding your menstrual cycle. You can definitely do 12 hours or 13 hours of digestive rest without any issues. And, yeah, this is why I don't recommend people weigh themselves every day. You can have fluctuations of 3 to 5 pounds due to water, due to macro changes. Did you have more carbs? Did you have less carbs? Have you been exercising? What's your sleep like? What's your stress management like? The last little tidbit that I'll add is that perimenopause is when sleep becomes more important, stress management becomes more important. Lifting weights becomes more important. It also becomes more important that we're leaning into anti-inflammatory nutrition. If you're not already doing some of those things and you're looking to kind of change things up, I would encourage you to lean into those. Melanie, what are your thoughts? 

Melanie Avalon: This is so interesting. I almost have the opposite advice, which works well because I think different things work for different people. Because you were saying don't weigh yourself every day.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yes. I think it's like a once-a-week thing. And this is what I can tell you after working with thousands and thousands of men and women over the past 20 years, there are people who have a personality type that they can weigh themselves once a week as a check in. I always encourage people to be very mindful of how do your clothes fit, how do you feel? But there are certain types of personalities. It's not specific to a gender, that it's a control mechanism. Their whole day is they're either having a good day or a bad day based on what that number is when they step on their scale. There're so many things that can impact that number that I always say if you're that type of person and your entire day is a win or a loss based on what that number is, and you're not going to have a good day if you've gained 1 pound, that's not a healthy mindset. So that's where my concern stems from, is do you have a healthy relationship with the scale? Because affectionately, I always say the scale is a liar. It is not a reflection of a lot of other metrics. This is where I will tell people to get their body fat measured, like doing a Bod Pod, which if anyone's not familiar with that, it's a little egg-shaped device, but it'll actually measure how much muscle mass to body fat you have. And that's a much more accurate metric. Actually, my trainer, that's what she uses and that's what I use, I probably do it twice a year. That actually gives me better information than just simply stepping on a scale. Unless you have a scale that is giving you a metric about body fat percentages.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. So, my answer it actually is similar. It just has a slightly different manifestation because I agree 100% with everything that you just said that the weight fluctuates. There're so many factors that go into it. People can get caught up in this granular number, kind of like the CGM. They see this one number at this one time and they attach all of this meaning to it when it might not be an accurate picture of what's actually happening. I think for some people there actually is a benefit to weighing every single day. The interesting thing is you have to do it for a little bit to start seeing the trend. For some people, if they weigh every single day, tracking it in an app, there's an app called Happy Scale that's really awesome. If you weigh it every single day, it'll show your actual weekly average. You can see your trends over time and you can see what's actually happening. And so, it kind of shows you what your "True weight likely is?" And it requires a bit of data. That's why I'm saying it takes little bit to actually get the benefit from this and kind of change your mindset surrounding it, because when you actually commit and I'm not saying everybody should wear every day, but I'm saying this might help some people, if you do something like use Happy Scale, weigh every single day, after a few weeks, you'll actually be able to see that those numbers that look like you gained weight actually don't mean anything. It'll make like graphs so you can see over time what's actually happening. I think for some people that can really help. Other people might not be able to get beyond what Cynthia was saying, where regardless of knowing the overall trend, they just get caught up in that number. In that case, I don't think they should be weighing every day. I think you just really need to know yourself where you are. I know Gin was obsessed with the Shapa scale. Shapa, have you used that?

Cynthia Thurlow: I have not.

Melanie Avalon: It's the one that gives you a color rather than a number. It's grays to greens. The color indicates if you've, like, stayed the same, if you've lost weight or if you've gained weight. It also uses a similar to Happy Scale, it's going based on your average, not on that weight right at the moment. A lot of people really like that. But yeah, I think just knowing that there're a lot of factors going in can be really, really helpful. She says she's low carb and eating lunch and dinner, but not what she's eating. What you're eating can have a huge effect as well. Even things like sodium content in food and processed foods versus not. If some foods are inflammatory for you that might have an effect. There're just a lot of factors that go into it. I just think having kindness for yourself and this is where working with a therapist can be really helpful as well. I don't know what I would do without seeing my therapist every week.

Cynthia Thurlow: I love that you brought up the mental health piece because I think women as and we're all guilty of this, I'm by no means am I perfect at all. I do think that there is a certain amount of grace that we need to give ourselves. I think for women, in particular, women that are in perimenopause and menopause, when all the things that we used to do no longer work well, it can be a huge mindset shift. Like, I'm in a good place now, but 10 years ago or even eight years ago, I definitely was and I was like, what's going on? Understanding that with these changes in our bodies, we just have to make some adjustments in order to optimize our health and wellness. I wasn't even aware of that type of scale that you mentioned Gin liked so much that whether it's red light, green light, or yellow light, I think that's a better alternative to just one metric as a number.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, 100%. So, okay, well, we did not get through all of our fasting AMA questions, so we will pick that up next week, and then if we get through them, then we can do some fun AMAs as well after that. Not that these aren't fun, but some other topics. So, this has been absolutely wonderful. If listeners would like to submit their own questions for the show, they can directly email questions@ifpodcast.com or they can go to ifpodcast.com they can submit questions there. The show notes for today's episode will be at ifpodcast.com/episode303. Those show notes 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 @ifpodcast, I am @melanieavalon, and Cynthia is @cynthia_thurlow_ and I think that is all things.

Cynthia Thurlow: It sounds good. For the listeners who've been sending me DMs, we will definitely be answering some hormone questions. We got such a wonderful array of topics to go over. We've been just trying to keep them really well organized, but we will definitely be answering some of those hormone questions too.

Melanie Avalon: Awesome, awesome. All right, well, this has been absolutely wonderful and I will talk to you next week.

Cynthia Thurlow: Sounds good.

Melanie Avalon: Bye.

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 your 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, transcripts by SpeechDocs, and original theme composed by Leland Cox and re-composed by Steve Saunders. See you next week.

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Welcome to Episode 302 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 Cynthia Thurlow, author of Intermittent Fasting Transformation: The 45-Day Program for Women to Lose Stubborn Weight, Improve Hormonal Health, and Slow Aging.

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25:00 - Listener Q&A: EIleen - What would consider your best life hack?

The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast Episode #175 - Seth Stephens-Davidowitz

29:00 - Listener Q&A: Mary Jane - What are some of the other habits or things do you do you’ve maybe never talked about on the pod? Like infrared saunas, ankle/wrist weights, etc. but new ones.

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51:30 - ATHLETIC GREENS: Get A FREE 1 Year Supply Of Immune-Supporting Vitamin D AND 5 FREE Travel Packs With Your First Purchase At athleticgreens.com/ifpodcast.

53:15 - Listener Q&A: Laura - What is your favorite vacation and or what’s your bucket list trip?

1:00:25 - Listener Q&A: Danielle - Given the opportunity to go to space, would you go? What would you want to study there?

1:05:15 - Listener Q&A: Danielle - Do you listen to any non health related podcasts?

Our content does not constitute an attempt to practice medicine, and does not establish a doctor-patient relationship. Please consult a qualified health care provider for medical advice and answers to personal health questions.

TRANSCRIPT

Melanie Avalon: Welcome to Episode 302 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 and author of What When Wine: Lose Weight and Feel Great with Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, and Wine. And I'm here with my cohost, Cynthia Thurlow, Nurse Practitioner and author of Intermittent Fasting Transformation: A 45-Day Program for Women to Lose Stubborn Weight, Improve Hormonal Health, and Slow Aging. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and cynthiathurlow.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this show do not constitute medical advice or treatment and no doctor-patient relationship is formed. 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.

Friends, I am so excited to tell you about one of my new favoritest things ever. Okay, so you guys know I eat a lot of cucumbers. I don't think that this is any secret and I find myself throwing away pounds, yes, pounds of cucumber peels every single night. I felt so awful just throwing it in the trash. It seemed like such a waste. I'd always wanted to try composting, aka a sustainable approach to turning food waste into healthy dirt, but it seemed really intimidating and not very practical. So, it was on the to-do list for quite a while so you can imagine how thrilled I was, when a company called Lomi by Pela, reached out to me wanting to sponsor the show. Normally, I have to think a little bit about all the brands that reach out to me. I was an immediate yes. I was so excited. I got my Lomi device. It is incredible. Lomi allows me to turn my food scraps into dirt with the push of a button. Lomi is a countertop electric composter that turns scraps to dirt in under 4 hours. By comparison, if you were to compost naturally, it would probably take at the shortest around 6-8 weeks and maybe even up to a year. But nope, with Lomi, I can literally do it in 4 hours. There is no smell when it runs and it is super quiet. I've been using Lomi for a few months now. It is substantially reducing my waste. I was taking out garbage bags all the time. It's probably cut that down by about 30% to 50%. In fact, I love it so much that I bought another Lomi for my parents for Christmas. Now with my Lomi, I throw out weightless garbage. That means that waste is not going to landfills and producing methane. Instead, I turn my waste into nutrient-rich dirt that you can actually use to feed your plants.

Lomi is super cool. It has three different settings. It has the Eco-Express setting, which is low energy consumption, provides the fastest results, and is good for your food waste. It has the Lomi Approved setting that's 5 to 8 hours and you can actually put in Lomi Approved bioplastics and other compostable commercial goods, and packaging that are Lomi Approved. There's the Grow mode that's 24 hours. It's low heat with a longer duration and that actually preserves the microorganisms the most to help the soil and promote carbon storage in the soil. I am all about regenerative agriculture, so the fact that we can help put carbon back into the soil is so, so incredible. Lomi is something I have instantly fallen in love with and if you guys are anything like me, I know you will as well, turn your food waste into dirt with the press of a button with Lomi. Use the code IFPODCAST to save $50 at lomi.com/ifpodcast. That's L-O-M-I dotcom slash ifpodcast with the promo code IFPODCAST to save $50. We'll put all this information in the show notes.

And one more thing before we jump in, are you fasting clean inside and out? When it comes to weight loss, we focus a lot on what and when we eat. It makes sense because these foods affect our hormones and how our bodies store and burn fat. But do you know what is possibly one of the most influential factors in weight gain? It's not your food and it's not fasting, it's actually our skincare and makeup. As it turns out, Europe has banned over a thousand compounds found in conventional skincare and makeup in the US due to their toxicity. These include endocrine disrupters, which mess with your hormones, carcinogens linked to cancer, and obesogens, which literally can cause your body to store and gain weight. Basically, when we're using conventional skincare and makeup, we are giving these obesogenic compounds direct access to our bloodstream. And then in our bodies, studies have shown they do things, like reduce our satiety hormones, increase our hunger hormones, make fat cells more likely to store fat, and more resistant to burning fat, and so much more. If you have stubborn fat, friends, your skincare and makeup may be playing a role in that. Beyond weight gain and weight loss, these compounds have very detrimental effects on our health and they affect the health of our future generations. That's because ladies when we have babies, a huge percent of those toxic compounds go through the placenta into the new born. It is so, so shocking and the effects last for years.

Conventional lipstick, for example, often tests high in lead and the half-life of lead is up to 30 years. That means when you put on some conventional lipstick, 30 years later maybe half of that lead has left your bones. On top of that, there is essentially no regulation of these products on the shelves. That's why it's up to us to choose brands that are changing this. The brand that is working the hardest to do this is Beautycounter. They were founded on a mission to change this. Every single ingredient is extensively tested to be safe for your skin, so you can truly feel good about what you put on. And friends, these products really, really work. They are incredible. They have counter time for anti-aging, counter match for normal skin, counter control for acne and oily prone, and counter start for sensitive. I use their Overnight Resurfacing Peel and vitamin C serum every single night of my life. And their makeup is amazing. Check out my Instagram to see what it looks like. Tina Fey, even wore all Beautycounter makeup when she hosted The Golden Globes. So, yes, it is high-definition camera ready. They have so many other products, deodorant, shampoo and conditioner that I love, products for babies, and so much more. You can shop with us at beautycounter.com/melanieavalon or beautycounter.com/cynthiathurlow and use the coupon code, CLEANFORALL20 to get 20% off your first order. Also make sure to get on my clean beauty email list. That's at melanieavalon.com/cleanbeauty. I give away a lot of free things on that list. So, definitely check it out. You can join me in my Facebook Group, Clean Beauty and Safe Skincare with Melanie Avalon. People share their experiences, ask questions, give product reviews, and I do a giveaway every single week in that group as well.

Lastly, if you're thinking of making Clean Beauty and Safe Skincare a part of your future we have, we definitely recommend becoming a Band of Beauty member. It's sort of Amazon Prime for clean beauty. You get 10% back in product credit, free shipping on qualifying orders, and a welcome gift that is worth way more than the price of the yearlong membership. It is totally completely worth it. So, again, to shop with us, go to beautycounter.com/melanieavalon or beautycounter.com/cynthiathurlow and use the coupon code, CLEANFORALL20 to get 20% off your first order. And we'll put all this information in the show notes. All right, now back to the show.

Hi, everybody and welcome. This is episode number 302 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon and I'm here with Cynthia Thurlow.

Cynthia Thurlow: Hi, Melanie. How are you?

Melanie Avalon: I'm good. I feel like it's been so long since we've talked.

Cynthia Thurlow: I know. [laughs] I was about to say during the holidays, appropriately so we all take a break from things we do within our business. I was texting with Melanie before I got on, and I was like, we're doing this episode, and this is the format. It's amazing how just a couple of weeks, you kind of feel like you're getting out of practice.

Melanie Avalon: Well, this episode airs end of January, but for us recording, we just started January. How was your New Year's Eve?

Cynthia Thurlow: Very low key. I'll be completely transparent with you and with listeners that last year we were in Costa Rica, which was wonderful. But my boys were pretty adamant that they did not want to travel for Christmas. Because of poor weather, my mom was not able to come as early as she had wanted to and had to leave a little bit early as well. She lives in a rural part of the East Coast, and so they always get more snow and ice. We, the four of us, I mean, I have teenagers, we all stayed in, we had an amazing dinner and then we watched movies and I was asleep before the ball dropped. With the exception of my teenagers, of course, they go to bed. They're like nocturnal animals, they're up really late and they sleep in every day. My husband and I were in bed before the ball dropped, and we've had so many years of really late New Year's Eve parties and it was really nice to just go to bed and have a really nice meal and just have it be low key. Like we didn't have a lot on the calendar and after the book launch and how busy 2022 was and all the travel that I did, even in December, it was just nice to slow down. How about you?

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, mine was really good. My sister and I went to a really fun party at the Waldorf Astoria. I love any chance to dress up really fancy, so if there's ever a situation where I can maybe find something to do that, I'm all about it. So, I don't like being out crazy and I don't like loud and I don't like crowds, and I actually don't like-- Even though I'm a crazy late night owl, I don't like being out at midnight. Like, I don't want to be not at my home. It's not normally something I would gravitate towards, but we had a blast. It was good.

Cynthia Thurlow: I'm good. I think that's what we all want is if we're going to start celebrating the last day of the year into the first day of the new year, celebrating it, however, makes us happy. I think that's really important. Like, when we lived in Northern Virginia, there was another family, probably our closest friends from our old neighborhood, and for years we would just have New Year's Eve at each other's houses and we would make these incredible dinners. Our boys were all about the same age and we had years where all of us were up till 02:00 or 03:00 AM in the morning just having fun amongst ourselves and so, I agree with you. In my 20s and probably into my early 30s and my teens, I did a lot of late-night parties. I agree with you, as an introvert, I'm completely happy with less people and less noise, and just kind of eating a really good meal and just being around people that I really like.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. Very excited for this year and all the things. I feel like there are great things in store.

Cynthia Thurlow: Absolutely, absolutely. By the time this episode comes out, I think we're going to have the announcements for my next supplement, which is exciting. I know for you, you just had a new supplement that came out. How are things going with berberine?

Melanie Avalon: So, well. I'm just so grateful and so excited that it's really resonating with listeners and I think it's doing a lot of good and oh yeah, that was something that was really exciting. There were a few different articles that came out over the holidays and one was in Yahoo News. It was like a countdown of wellness products for 2023. It's really exciting to see things like that. I mean, it makes me feel like a real entrepreneur. I don't really feel like a real business woman, but then when things like that happen, I'm like, "Okay, maybe." [chuckles] In a line up next to other, "real things." So, I'm excited. I don't think I know your next supplement.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah. It's myo-inositol. So, for listeners, if they're familiar with that. It is a supplement that is very well researched and one that typically we see associated with metabolic inflexibility, insulin issues, insulin resistance, polycystic ovarian syndrome. There's a lot of really good research about sleep and brain health and in keeping with my theme, which is related to metabolic flexibility and brain health, that is the next supplement. I've been taking myo-inositol, it's a bit of a tongue twister to say it, so we're trying to come up with ways to make it a little more approachable inositol. It's one form of inositol. We're coming up with ways to make it easier for people to say, but I've been taking it every single night to help with sleep and I've been recommending it to most if not all of my patients and clients. There's been some pretty incredible breakthroughs not only with reduction in insulin resistance, but also sleep latency, so able to fall asleep faster. If they're waking up in the middle of the night, it's able to help with that as well. That will be the next product that's coming out. It's probably going to be another powder. I'm kind of a sleep stacker. There's usually a couple of products that I will take together and I put this in my water at the tail end of my feeding window and sip on that along with some magnesium L-threonate along with my other sleep stack. This is the first of several products. There will be another one coming out fairly soon after that's going to tie into that sleep thing that I'm really excited about.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, wow. Okay, that's really cool. I was familiar with inositol., but if you had asked me, I would not have been able to tell you the benefits at all. So, I learned a lot just now and then I wasn't familiar at all with that version of it, myo-inositol.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah. It's interesting because most of what people think about when they consider that particular supplement is, "Oh, it's great for PCOS" And it is indeed, but it's inflammation reduction and I think for the bulk of our population, which we know only 7% to 8% of our population, and I'm so speaking way outside the context of just this podcast, is not metabolically healthy. This is one of many aspects and strategies that can be utilized and it's really well tolerated. I think that's really important because there are certainly some big gun supplements that are out there where people, they may move the needle a bit faster, but they may also have the issue related to side effects. This is gentle and to me it's cumulative use that will help with sleep. So many middle-aged women really struggle with sleep and it's not just about replacing hormones. There're other ways to kind of layer in support so I'm really excited.

For listeners, you probably don't get the opportunity to read all of the behind-the-scenes stuff that goes on with supplement creation, but Melanie has been a huge supporter and has given lots of objective, which is what real friends do. Objective input with regard to product launches and messaging. So, thank you again for convincing me this is the right direction to go in, as opposed to white labelling, which for listeners means for a long time I was white labelling supplements created by Designs for Health as my own. Which you can do legally, but this allows me to completely tailor everything to my specifications. I would imagine that your specifications and mine are superior to a lot of other products that are on the market in terms of what we want or don't want in our supplement line or powders.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, no. Like 100%. It's so funny because I honestly can say the versions of the supplements that I've made, there's not anything else on the market that I would trust. I wouldn't even take like with serrapeptase in particular, I wouldn't take any of the alternatives on the market. There's some magnesiums and some berberine that I would but it's so nice just with the craziness of the supplement industry to finally be able to make exactly what we want to make, and also to educate listeners about these things. So, I'm just really, really grateful. It's amazing.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah. It's interesting to me. I have always been a proponent of talking to patients about quality of supplements and why it's important to do your due diligence. Even if you go into Whole Foods, which is not a knock-on Whole Foods, you can find good quality things. You can also find a lot of junk. As an example, there was a product that I had sent my husband to Whole Foods to pick up and he's very diligent about checking food labels, but got home and we realized the product had soybean oil in it, back to the store it went. The point I'm making is that you have to be really diligent. What's added to the supplements? What types of oils are they using, if at all, getting really granular and clear. For me, and I know we're in alignment in this, I would rather stack one supplement at a time than have combinations of supplements. There're a lot of good products that are out there that are different types of adaptogens and different types of products, but then you don't know what actually works. Whereas if you're stacking one product at a time, you can determine how do you react to that product, how do you feel with that product before you layer in something else and I think that's very insightful.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. I could not agree more. That's actually one of my main things as well. It's so cool that we're both aligned with that, the single ingredient thing. Not to say that I wouldn't make blends and like, the magnesium is a blend, for example, but it's all magnesiums. There's so many longevity blends and it's like all these different things or digestive blends and it's all different things. Like you said, "How do what's doing what? And then you can't tailor accordingly. Some of the ingredients might be working for you and some might not and yeah, I'm just like control freak.

Cynthia Thurlow: [laughs] Well. I think it's also my clinician background because I learned that certain drugs were really efficacious and very effective. Sometimes when there're a lot of medications on the market, as an example, sometimes you can get a blood pressure medication with a cholesterol medicine at the same time, they put them together. Yes, that means someone's taking one less pill, but then if they have a side effect, we didn't always know what was driving it. We had indicators based on what the side effects were, but it sometimes got it harder to tease out. I would drive my drug reps crazy because I was the person that would use single drug agents instead of using the "newest and latest."

I would tell them, well, show me the data that this is more efficacious because this drug cost my patient $5 and what you're recommending is a drug that's going to cost them $50 out of pocket every month and they're on a fixed income. They're retired. For the same purposes, I try to be mindful and thoughtful about what the next needle mover is going to be. What are things people can use throughout the day? Like, as an example, for people that have polycystic ovarian syndrome, the indications for inositol, as an example, are twice daily dosing versus someone that is just using it for sleep properties. So, we're giving people parameters with which to move within, but also giving them, for the most part, single supplement options at a time just so that it makes it easier to add things together. That's just I think ease of use is huge for me.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. I think that's so important. I'm glad you mentioned the threonate because that will probably be my next release, which a lot of listeners, actually, who bought Magnesium 8 when it launched. The launch special included a special code for the magnesium threonate. That's a situation where I wanted to separate it out by itself because of its specific benefits for that type of magnesium. Which is, as you're familiar with it, crosses the blood-brain barrier and can really help with sleep and relaxation. That's a situation where it's like, we really want to have that as a standalone so, yeah. For listeners to get updates for both of us, if they want updates for AvalonX supplements, which are mine. They can go to avalonx.us/emaillist or they can text AVALONX to 877-861-8318. And when you text that number AVALONX, you will get a 20% off one-time use code, which is awesome. How can people get updates for yours, Cynthia?

Cynthia Thurlow: We decided to make it easy because no one knows how to pronounce or even spell myo-inositol, we're doing www.cynthiathurlow/supplement so that people can get on those lists. We're just trying to make it as easy as possible because for this creatine launch that came out, which has been great. Well, by the time this comes out, we'll be talking about where people can buy into monthly subscriptions or every-couple-of-month subscriptions trying to keep it as simple as possible. So that no one's navigating, trying to find it on a website, which we live and learn. We are learning more with each launch. What not to do and what works and what doesn't work.

Melanie Avalon: Hi, friends. I'm about to tell you how to get free manuka honey. If you know what that means, then you know what that means. If you don't know what that means, I'm about to tell you what that means. So, back in the darkest days of my digestive issues and chronic fatigue and all the things, I was researching anything and everything to try and get my health back. That's when I first came across the concept of manuka honey. I knew honey was supposed to have health benefits, but there was something special about manuka honey in particular. It is a special type of honey only found in the remote and magical forests of New Zealand. The bees actually feed on the highly active nectar of the manuka tea tree, and they make super honey that is honestly unlike anything you have ever seen or tasted before. Manuka honey is a super honey because of its unique antioxidant and prebiotic properties.

Honey in general has those properties. Honey also has hydrogen peroxide activity which can have a beneficial effect on your gut and health, but manuka honey in particular has a different natural antibacterial compound called MGO that only comes from the nectar of this manuka tea tree. They actually measure it. I think it's really funny. They call it non-peroxide activity. The nutrients in manuka honey can help support optimal immune and digestive health. I personally found that when I was using manuka honey, it had an incredible effect on my gut. I became really obsessed with finding the best of the best because there is a lot of controversy out there about manuka honey, and it can be difficult to make sure that you're getting a certified verified source that is actually the stuff that you want.

That's why I was so, so thrilled when Manukora reached out to me. They make manuka honey and what I'm really excited about is they have all of the transparency that I'm looking for. When I did the onboarding call with the brand, I was so impressed with their story, their authenticity, their knowledge, and their mission with manuka honey. Their honey can be traced back to a single origin through a unique QR authenticity platform, I love that. The honey is free from environmental toxins, free of glyphosate residue, non-GMO, gluten free. It's raw and like I said, 100% traceable. They're also a Certified B Corp and something super important to me, they really take care of their bees. The beekeepers actually manage the hive numbers to ensure that the bees have access to diverse pollen sources and plenty of nectar to feed on to avoid any risk of overstocking the bees. They're never fed refined sugar. There's no excessive hive transportation.

The hives don't need to be shifted around for pollination practices. They also help support local communities. Like, I said, I've been a fan of manuka honey for so long, so it's really exciting to partner with this company. Plus, the honey tastes delicious. You can incorporate Manukora into your food choices, into your diet, or you can use it as a supplement taking some of it daily to help support your immunity, your GI health and so much more. Manukora's super honey is available in a range of easy-to-use formats including jars, squeeze bottles, and 100% completely compostable packets. Friends, that is so hard to find so you can eat it straight or add it to your favorite food or beverage. If you head to manukora.com/ifpodcast you'll automatically get a free pack of honey sticks with your order that is of $15 value. That's M-A-N-U-K-O-R-A dotcom slash ifpodcast to get a free pack of honey sticks with your order. Friends. It's called honey with superpowers for good reason. Get on it and try this delicious creamy caramel honey and you won't look back with Manukora. That's manukora.com/ifpodcast for free manuka honey sticks and we'll put all this information in the show notes.

Okie Dokie. Shall we jump into everything for today?

Cynthia Thurlow: Absolutely.

Melanie Avalon: So, for listeners we got so many amazing questions when we asked for AMA. So, we're just continuing in this vein. Probably going to do this one and maybe one more episode just for a grab bag of goodies of topics, health and personal and all the things. So, to start things off. Okay, this is from Eileen. "What would you consider your best lifehack?"

Cynthia Thurlow: Okay. I'm going to not say fasting [laughs] because that would be expected, "High quality sleep." It's not a sexy answer, but I fervently believe if you are getting high quality sleep, everything else falls into place. Your blood sugar, better hormonal regulation, better food choices, ability to exercise and have great mentation. I would say high quality sleep is probably the one thing that is foundational to our health and really important. I think that I didn't fully appreciate until I really got into the research, why sleep is so critically important? Actually, as a healthcare provider, it's disturbing that so many healthcare providers are expected to skimp on sleep in order to take care of patients. I say this lovingly, we do it without question when we need to, but when we're telling our patients to get high quality sleep and to go to bed earlier and not be on screens until 02:00 in the morning and we're doing exactly the opposite. We're not mimicking good behavior for our patients, but that's probably my number one foundational element to anything that I do. How about you?

Melanie Avalon: That's a really great answer and it's really interesting that I think we frame the question differently. I didn't even think about diet or fitness or physical. I was thinking more in like mental side of things, so that's really interesting. Although intermittent fasting would be a really good answer, I think. Because of just, I mean it really is the ultimate lifehack in a way, because not only does it address the dietary issues that we face today with metabolic syndrome and the obesity epidemic and all these things, but on top of that you also get back time, you lose your anxiety surrounding eating. However, that is not what I chose. [chuckles] I picked gratitude, actually, because I think we have so much fear and anxiety today and stress. I love the concept that you can't be in a state of gratitude and a state of fear at the same time. I really just think it's the ultimate hack for immediately changing your mindset. Like literally, if you're stressed, think of something you're grateful for and at that moment you will not, at least at that literal moment, be stressed and then on top of that just the benefits surrounding it health wise are incredible. Even things like loving, kindness, meditations. I was reading about that in a book that I'm reading right now about the brain actually, and studies they've done on that and its effect on health biomarkers and mental health and wellness and brain health. So, yeah, I pick gratitude as a lifehack.

Cynthia Thurlow: I think that's really important. Ben Azadi is a good friend and he talks about vitamin G as a way to be thinking about gratitude every day. I agree with you that it is an underappreciated lifehack. It is certainly something that has been played out in my life over the past four years. Anytime I think things are getting tough, I have to remind myself that I have so much to be grateful for and it always allows me to kind of pass-through whatever discomfort I'm experiencing emotionally or otherwise. Definitely something, if you're not practicing that regularly, definitely give that a consideration.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. I think also linked to it the focus on the present moment that it causes. I was reading about I might have mentioned this on the show before when I interviewed Seth Stephens-Davidowitz, who wrote the book Don't Trust Your Gut, all about data and not him, but there was a study where they had people do an app and it checked in randomly all throughout the day and asked them what were they doing and were they happy. They found that people-- this is really interesting, you're happier thinking about something neutral in the present moment. It might have even been bad. I have to double check. It was definitely neutral then you are thinking about something happy in the future. Basically, focusing on the present moment can just have an incredible effect. I like tying that in as well.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yes. It's all good.

Melanie Avalon: It is. Actually, since sort of related, since we're talking about hacks, Mary Jane said, "What are some of the other habits or things you do that you've maybe never talked about on the podcast? Like infrared saunas, ankle and wrist weights, etc., but new ones.

Cynthia Thurlow: I think Zone 2 training is something that I've been very focused on probably the past year in conjunction with regular strength training and then doing Pilates or Solidcore. Zone 2 training, I have to fully admit that my functional medicine doc and my trainer both are really into Zone 2 training. Keeping your heart rate, for me being 51, that means my heart rate is under 129 while I'm exercising. Enough that you can comfortably have a conversation, but you're still exercising. For me, a lot of what I do is walking. I know exactly what cadence, if the weather is bad outside or raining, I can walk on my treadmill inside, and I know exactly where my heart rate is. If I'm walking too fast, I can slow my pace down. Same thing with walking hills in my neighborhood. I'm in a very hilly part of Virginia that, for me, I think has really been very impactful. I probably haven't talked about it because it doesn't sound like a particularly sexy topic. But one that I think most people, if they've been conditioned to believe that doing a lot of HIIT, which HIIT should be brief, like 10 minutes long or if they're doing chronic cardio and they're wondering why it's not working for them physiologically or in terms of body composition whatever it is they're trying to improve. Zone 2 training for both my physician and my trainer is very important, especially for where I am life stage wise. Actually, Peter Attia talks about it quite a bit as well.

Melanie Avalon: It's funny you're talking about that. I was just getting hit with all of these things I've heard Peter Attia talk about who I'm still trying to book for the show because he has a new book coming out.

Cynthia Thurlow: I tried pitching him. They responded to me. I was really excited. I tried very hard because I was like, “I am a Hopkins alumn, I was there when he was training. Although he was in the bowels of the hospital and I was in the ER, but you know what? I just wanted to interject. If you haven't already listened to the latest podcast with him, with the neurocognitive, it's like a 2 hour and 40 minutes podcast, which is super long. I've listened to it twice. I've recommended it to nearly every person I know, non-clinician and otherwise. Really superlative podcast, it completely blew my mind about different types of proteins and how we approach neurocognitive disorders. Really smart female physician whose name evades me because I'm terrible with names.

Melanie Avalon: I did listen. I didn't realize until the very end that she's in his practice. I don't think he mentioned that in the beginning. He might have, I'm so annoyed at myself. I had pitched them early December. And so, when I'm writing an email that I want to be the perfect email, I put in my email address so that I don't accidentally send it soon to somebody else. I realized when I sent it to them, I didn't actually send it to them because I was going back to follow up. I was like, I haven't heard back. I went to follow up and I was like, "Oh, so that explains a lot." So, I just resent it. Did they book you?

Cynthia Thurlow: Well. What they said was a very nice gentleman actually apologized for not answering for nine days, which I was like, that's a good sign. I explained the podcast reach and who I am and my background, and how we both shared time at Hopkins and how I was a huge proponent. I said, if there's any way I can support his book launch, that's kind of how I left it. [laughs] They said, "This all looks really good. We'll be back in touch." This is my thinking process, I would imagine when you're at that level, like Peter Attia level, I'm assuming he's not going to be doing tons and tons of press. I think he's going to be selective. Even if I don't get him as a guest, I will still be super, super supportive of the launch. I'm just kind of leaving it out there in the universe that I'm completely open to the possibility. But I will not be disappointed if I am not one of the people that interviews him. I'll just be super excited to listen to him on other people's podcasts. I know he was not wanting to do the audiobook. [laughs] He wanted to have someone else narrate it. I was cracking up listening to him explain that he actually did narrate the book. I was like, "I'm really glad that you did that." But it is, as you as a trained thespian, I'm sure you probably can't appreciate this, but I had no idea how much work goes into an audiobook in terms of just the degree of proper alliteration of words and diction. I actually said to the producer, because my producer was particularly picky, which is her job. I was like, "What do people do that don't articulate or don't have good diction?" And she just laughed. She was like, "They do a lot more recording than you will be doing." And I was like, oh my gosh. So, yeah, very humbly. I just say I'm not a thespian anyway. I'm down a rabbit hole, but I hope that you get to interview him. I will certainly be super supportive if that happens, but I'm kind of, like, cautiously optimistic.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. I have no idea if this is going to manifest. It's like my dream, we shall see.

Cynthia Thurlow: I'll try not to fan geek too much if I get to talk to him.

Melanie Avalon: I'm always prepping shows all the time. I have this one evergreen document called Peter Attia, because I'm listening to him all the time. Anytime he says something where I can tell it's a subject that's really random, that he's really interested in and I'm also interested in. And he has, like, an interesting thought, I write it down. [laughs] I have, like, two years' worth of random insight from him that I can tie into the interview.

Cynthia Thurlow: I think that's awesome. No, I think he's intense and brilliant, and just very intense. Like, my husband now listens to Peter Attia. My husband's an engineer, it gives you an idea of how his brain works. Sometimes he walks around and he's like, "Whoa, that guy's intense." I'm like, "Yup." [laughs] That's who you want as your physician. You want someone who's intense and methodical, it's all good.

Melanie Avalon: I know. So someday, someday. So, my answer is for the hacks. It's interesting, a lot of them I have talked about in the show. I guess I shouldn't say, though, I mean, my exercise related one, or it's not hacks, it habits and things that you do. My exercise one is Emsculpt, but I've talked about that all the time, the muscle building. I can comment on it, that I have started doing different body areas with it and I've seen really incredible effects. I started doing inner and outer thigh and it's kind of profound how it-- I think it does things to you and your legs that you would have to do, I think very specific exercises for a long time to see benefits. I'm loving that.

Cynthia Thurlow: Does it hurt?

Melanie Avalon: It doesn't hurt. You pick the intensity so you can work your way up and you get used to it. It's unpleasant and depending on which area it is, some are worse than others. Like the glutes, those are the easiest. I've been doing those most recently and those are pretty easy. Inner and outer thigh actually are not that bad. The outer thigh a little bit, it's more unpleasant, but they can adjust the intensity and you work your way up.

Cynthia Thurlow: It's all very interesting. I know very little about that.

Melanie Avalon: It's incredible. [chuckles] It literally builds muscle, like literally and burns fat and I really see the difference. Actually, that reminds me of something I hadn't written down for this, but I started doing of peptides, which I had not done before, so injections of peptides. I think that's something that's pretty cool because I was having some knee pain. Okay, and then another one. This is so funny. I had this on the list and I couldn't even remember if we had booked them for this show, but I just realized they are actually sponsoring this episode. I did not plan this. I couldn't even remember if they were sponsoring this show or not in comparison to my other Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast. I am obsessed with my Lomi. Do you have one, Cynthia? Did they send you one?

Cynthia Thurlow: They did not send me one.

Melanie Avalon: Okay. I'll have to email them. Friends listen to the ad that we're running for them. I'm obsessed. I bought one all by myself for my parents for Christmas. That's how much I love it. It's a composter and I've been wanting to compost for a long time, but it seemed very intimidating and complicated and I didn't want to get into that. When they reached out, I was really excited. This is revolutionizing my experience of my food and of my trash waste habit because I eat so many cucumbers as listeners know. I would fill up these trash bags all the time with all these scraps and everything. Now I just put them in my Lomi every night. You run it overnight, it's dirt in the morning, it's mind blowing. You can use that dirt outside. You can grow with it. They come with these little pellet things that you can put in to make it more microbial rich. Yeah, I'm like all about the composting and it's so quiet, you don't even hear it and it's easy to clean up. You don't even have to clean it that much. I don't clean it in between cycles I clean it, like, once a week, so composting, Lomi.

Cynthia Thurlow: Well. It's interesting. So, the neighborhood we lived in in Northern Virginia, was very strict. They wouldn't allow us, my husband likes to garden, so Todd is like this renaissance man. He kind of does a lot of different things, and he really wanted a composting area in the backyard, and they wouldn't allow us to do that. Now we're in a different neighborhood. They're strict about some things and not about others. I think having a compost, he would be so happy.

Melanie Avalon: It goes inside in your kitchen, and it's like the size of maybe two Instapots together. If you could take the Instapots and make it little bigger or Crockpot and make it twice the size. It's sleek looking, so you can compost without doing everything outside.

Cynthia Thurlow: That's so cool.

Melanie Avalon: Our offer is you can go to lomi.com/ifpodcast and use the promo code IFPODCAST that will get you $50 off. Cannot recommend this thing enough. I'm obsessed. So, yes. That's something new. I think I had one that I talked about before in the show, but I just want to emphasize it because I upgraded my version of it a little bit. One last one, it's funny because you were saying that your answer, Cynthia, was not a sexy answer. I have a sexy answer for this question. I don't know if I've shared this on the show or if I should.

Cynthia Thurlow: I was going to share my V Fit, but I'm still in the beginning stages.

Melanie Avalon: Your what?

Cynthia Thurlow: It's called a V-Fit.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, what is that?

Cynthia Thurlow: It is essentially a device with red light therapy that's supposed to help build up collagen and elastin in your vagina.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, nice.

Cynthia Thurlow: I just got it. I've used it twice, but Mindy Pelz has been suggesting I do this for a year, and I bought it, and my husband was like, "Oh, my God, you've got to be kidding me."[laughs]

Melanie Avalon: Do you stick it in like a tampon?

Cynthia Thurlow: It looks like a dildo.

Melanie Avalon: Oh.

Cynthia Thurlow: I'll take a picture of it for you.

Melanie Avalon: Large.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yes.

Melanie Avalon: And it has red light.

Cynthia Thurlow: But, like it's only probably, like, four inches that's inserted inside. It's just designed to be comfortable to hold.

Melanie Avalon: Wow. [laughs] That's cool. I support that.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yes. I was going to say, if we're going to talk about that's, probably the most interesting thing that I have recently started trying. But I haven't been using it long enough to be able to give a full report, but I have friends that swear by it.

Melanie Avalon: Wow. We should try to get them as a sponsor. [chuckles]

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah. That would be nice. Right?

Melanie Avalon: I'll reach out to them. My related answer, if kids are listening, maybe pause for a second [laughs] for the moms because I know they're listening with families sometimes with their kids in the car. Mine would be ever since, I interviewed Dr. Stephanie Estima, she had her seven-day orgasm challenge that she said would have a profound effect on your health. And I started that, I mean, that was a while ago. That was probably a year ago. I just kept it up as an everyday orgasm challenge. It's literally because how much I'm a planner and a scheduler, it's literally, like, scheduled in to my life, my daily life.

Cynthia Thurlow: I think that's important, but nothing else. One of the things that I think we've talked about tangentially on the podcast is my PMF mat. It's like I crave it in the morning and now I crave it in the evening. My husband walks in and just laughs at me because I'm lying on this mat and I'm usually got, like, a blanket on top of me and I'm just so relaxing and he just laughs at me. I'm like, "I need 30 minutes of this in the morning." He was like, "Whatever makes you happy."[laughs] I try to do it at night because it's a time that I'm not doing anything else. I'm kind of gearing down, it's so relaxing, and good for your mitochondrial health.

Melanie Avalon: I love it, all the things. Okay, so I had another one, but I think I'll use it in part to answer this next question. This is the lifehack episode. Mary Jane said, like, "Switching to Redmond's or more natural salts or single source olive oil, what are some other relatively inexpensive and accessible changes people can make for the better"? I will say really quickly, "Thank you, Cynthia, so much." Cynthia sent me some wonderful olive oil for Christmas, so thank you. [chuckles]

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah. No, I think for me, I'd like to keep it really simple. Like Melanie, mentioned, I sent her olive oil. Let me be clear, it is hard to send Melanie gifts because she has so many cool gadgets, and I couldn't send her scallops. It was literally impossible to do. That was high on the list, and that just wasn't feasible and cucumbers.

Melanie Avalon: So adorable that you were going to do-- just that you thought about that?

Cynthia Thurlow: Yes. So, high quality olive oil I think is really helpful. I do like Redmond's, and for full transparency that's the only salt we use in our home. I also think about using like I'm a fan of make some things from scratch and if you find a brand of product, whether it's a dressing or ketchup that you like, there's this company called Primal Keto. I have no affiliation with them. It's a women-owned business, and they have this spicy barbecue sauce that I use instead of ketchup. For me, that bottle will last months because no one in my house wants it. It's just I like it and so I use that in lieu of making my own barbecue sauce or Chosen brand avocado oil. They do have dressings, which I occasionally will use when I'm lazy. I know you don't like olives. I love really high-quality olives. I am a little bit of an olive snob. Sometimes I'll buy hearts of palm that are already done, same thing with roasted red peppers. Again, like a high-quality brand that doesn't have any chunk in it. Those are the kinds of things I'll lean into like salted macadamia nuts, just things that are easy, single ingredient or little-to-no ingredients that make my life a whole lot easier that are fairly inexpensive. Like nuts are not inexpensive, but if you portion them out and you go to Costco, they have salted macadamia nuts with no junk oils and they are amazing. How about you?

Melanie Avalon: I love that. To stay in the food realm, this is a hack I've done for a while, which is especially if you can't afford or if it's hard on your budget to have higher quality meats, I like getting the leaner cuts of meats and then making the fat come from olive oil or coconut oil or MCT oil. You can kind of get the best of both worlds because at least for me, I feel like the majority of the issues with conventional agriculture for livestock, a lot of those toxins are in the fat of the animal. So, if you get just really lean meat, then you can add organic olive oil or organic coconut oil and things like that where that will last longer. I kind of like that little hack. Also, for organic produce, the Environmental Working Group and looking at their Dirty Dozen and Clean Fifteen. So, if you can only afford organic for some fruits and vegetables, then you can choose the nonorganic for the ones that are on their Clean Fifteen and then get organic for their Dirty Dozen. So, I think that's helpful. Also, food still, because she's asking what are some easy, inexpensive accessible things you can do to feel better? I don't think people realize, especially going out when they eat at restaurants, how once you learn how to order, to make it healthier, it's really not that hard. I think people think it's picky and difficult, and you're not going to be able to find something at restaurants. Once you get the system down because it's a very easy system, you can make most restaurants provide a dish for you that will be healthier for you and make you feel better the next day.

The first step is just like for all the meat dishes and entrees. If you're getting steak, salmon, fish, asking that it's not cooked either not in oil at all, or if it is that they use olive oil. Because a lot of them, a lot of the restaurants use vegetable oils and seed oils. That's like a really easy swap that you can make. I always just ask for plain and then you can add salt and pepper, but I tend to go really extreme with that. Also at restaurants, I always just ask for the vegetables that I want and they usually have it even if it's not on the menu. Like spinach, for example. I'll ask for like steamed spinach and even if it's not one of the side dishes they have, usually they can modify. Like restaurants are pretty good at that, so I think that's a hack.

Also, when you're getting wine, when you're out at restaurants, look up all of the wines. I know we're a big fan of Dry Farm Wines around here and really Dry Farm Wines I feel so different drinking it because it's low sugar, low alcohol, tested to be organic, free of pesticides, molds, toxins, all the things. It's the only thing I drink at home. If listeners want a bottle for a penny, they can go to dryfarmwines.com/ifpodcast and that will give them a bottle for a penny. However, when you are out at restaurants and bars, look up the wines, just type in the winery and then type in organic and Google and you'll find immediately which ones are organic or not. And you'd be surprised, there're a lot of wineries that are practicing organic practices. They just don't have organic certification because of all the hassles and everything with that. That would be like USDA Organic, so backtracking with the wines. If you want to get as close to Dry Farm Wines as possible when you're ordering out, pick European. I usually favor like French and Italian and then look up the winery, type in organic, see if it says that they're practicing organic. If you want to go one step further beyond that to really try to mimic Dry Farm Wines, look up a picture of the label. We'll type in the actual wine and type in ABV, and it might come up with the alcohol by volume.

Dry Farm Wines are all 12.5% or less, so look for ones that are 12.5% or 13% wine. If you can't find it that way, look up the label, you can usually see the alcohol on the label. If you want to go the final step, you can get the Vivino App and look up the wine and see if people are ranking it as dry or not, just taste wise, the you can find ones with low sugar. I've been so impressed with myself. I've gone on quite a few dinners recently where we bought a really nice bottle of wine. It was really up to me to just research and try to figure out which one I thought would be very Dry Farm Wines-esque. Every time it tasted like Dry Farm Wines and I felt good the next day. So, that was a long education about how to order wine at restaurants.

Cynthia Thurlow: No, that's so helpful. The one thing that I would encourage everyone to not feel any sense of guilt. I think we as women more often than not feel guilty when we're advocating for ourselves in restaurants. I actually tell people, I have a seed oil allergy, so they take it really seriously. And it's surprising like you can get your steak or your chicken, or your fish or whatever you're having. I have colleagues in the health and wellness space that do the same. Generally, if I tell people that, they take it pretty seriously. I think seed oils are one of the easiest things to try to avoid or just ask like what is the dressing made with, what are they cooking your meat in or your fish in? It's not surprising that more often than not, they're happy to cook it in butter or they're happy to find an alternative and as Melanie suggested, more often than not they have more vegetables than what's on the menu. So those are great suggestions.

Melanie Avalon: Thank you for saying that. About the-- not that it's like standing up for yourself, but it can be intimidating. The main pushback I usually get from servers is they just don't believe me that I'm going to like the way it tastes if I order it that way. I'm like, "Listen, this is what I like. Trust me, I will love it." Oh, here's a hack you can do if you are low carb. We talked about this on the show already. I think you can order an appetizer as a savory dessert. Get like another round of salmon or something. Just let the kitchen know early on. and then just two more quick things

One, Castile Soap. I use Cove Unscented Castile Soap from Amazon. You can use it for so many things. I use it to clean my face, for the dishes. You can make laundry detergent out of it. You can make washing machine stuff with it. But yeah, Castile Soap is incredible. And then very last thing. I've talked about this on the show as well, but I am doing it more and making more and more adjustments. If you replace all of your plates and bowls and stuff with very heavy alternatives, you get a nice little workout every night when you are moving your stuff around. So, I use like, cast iron bowls. I got this cast iron Le Creuset, Harry Potter Casserole dish that I keep my cilantro in because I eat a lot of cilantro. It is the heaviest thing. It is so heavy. It is overwhelmingly heavy. I get cilantro out back and forth multiple times throughout the evening. It integrates some physical movement into your daily life. So, I'm all about the heavy things.

Cynthia Thurlow: I take AG1 several times a week after working out and when I'm ready to break my fast and it really makes me feel unstoppable. I love to add it to a protein smoothie, or actually we'll drink it with filtered water and I love both variations. My 17-year-old also enjoys AG1 after a workout to ensure he stays really well hydrated. A great deal of what I focus on in my personal life is ongoing gut health improvement. I do feel fundamentally that AG1 has contributed significantly to improvements in my gut health over the last three years. I feel as if the key health benefits from multivitamins, minerals, pre and postbiotics all work together synergistically to improve my gut microbiome. AG1 is way more than just greens. It's important to note that it's made with 75 super high-quality vitamins, minerals, and whole food source ingredients that deliver incredible benefits to the gut microbiome as well as sleep support, assistance with energy, and so much more.

So, if you want to take full ownership of your health, today is a good time to start. Athletic Greens is giving you a free one-year supply of vitamin D and five free travel packs with your first purchase. I find that these five free travel packs are so convenient when you're traveling. In fact, I was in Los Angeles last week and I used one each day that I was away. Go to athleticgreens.com/ifpodcast that's athleticgreens.com/ifpodcast and check it out.

Melanie Avalon: Now we have a question from Laura. This is of a different topic and she says, "What is your favorite vacation and/or what's your bucket list trip?"

Cynthia Thurlow: Okay, this is probably one of my favorite questions and anyone that knows me knows that I live to travel. It is one of my favorite, favorite things to do in the world, and I hope my children develop a love and appreciation for travel. I've been fortunate to have been a lot of places. I would say my favorite vacation I've taken with my husband was Rwanda. We've been to Africa several times and I was surprised at how much, I mean, I knew I was going to love it, but Rwanda was so clean, the people were so gracious. Seeing the apes up close was life changing. It was just like one of my favorite vacations.

And then I would say with my kids and my husband, Eastern Europe this past summer. I know Melanie and I have talked a lot about this. Vanessa lives in Prague. I was humbly stunned at how much we loved Prague. We loved Eastern Europe. We were just awed by how wonderful the people were. It was beautiful. The food was great. In terms of what's on my bucket list, I've got a lot of things, and there are going to be trips that we're going to take, my husband and I will take when the kids are in college. We've just decided that some of these trips are just too far and I need to know my kids are in a safe place before I leave. Because it would be too much to ask a family member to be at our home for a couple of weeks. I would say probably top of the list is New Zealand and Australia. My husband did a lot of Asia travel when we were first married, and I wasn't able to go because I was working as an NP back then. We started having a family very soon into our marriage.

I would say, for me, really seeing the highlights of Asia, I'd like to go to Southeast Asia. I'd love to see Singapore and Hong Kong and then go to Cambodia and Vietnam. Those are probably towards the very top of the list. Beyond that, like, Argentina and Chile are definitely up there as well. Those are the ones that the Asia, New Zealand, Australia trips are going to be longer trips so they're also in there. As well as Botswana and Namibia, which are parts of Africa that I've not yet seen but we really want to go to. How about you? I know you're not as much of an avid traveler [chuckles] as I am, but that was one of my favorite questions.

Melanie Avalon: Well, it's funny. Growing up I travelled a ton and my family still travels because we have family in Germany, and so we would go to Germany and then we would go to another country. Yeah, now I get it's like my Achilles heel, honestly, I get anxiety surrounding travel, and I'm a lot better now. I'm making baby steps, but it's not my favorite thing. If I could just pop up somewhere and then pop up back in my apartment and go to sleep at night, of course I would. It's the whole everything. Like how it affects your sleep and your digestion and all of that. It's something I'm working on all the time, especially with my therapist. My favorite place, this is even with all of the places we've been internationally, I am obsessed with EPCOT and Disney World. I'm really, really obsessed.

Cynthia Thurlow: It's a happy place.

Melanie Avalon: It's so happy. Disney World in general, I'm just obsessed. I would actually just love to go back there. Interestingly, New Zealand actually would be that's the first thing I thought of. I would love to go back to Paris. This is such a weird reason. Well, A, I loved it when went, and I loved seeing the Catacombs, and I loved just St. Paris. I want to go back now when I'm not as intimidated by the world. When I went, I was in high school and I was very much intimidated by like social clicks and things like that. Paris is just the cool place. I would like to go now where like that stuff doesn't matter to me. I just feel that would not be a thing in my head, if that makes sense, I felt intimidated by the city.

Cynthia Thurlow: It's funny how for me, I didn't grow up with parents that were able to take us on big vacations outside the United States. The first time I left the United States was when I was 25, so certainly old enough to be able to do that. I feel like every decade of my life, I get different things out of travel, whether it's in the United States or outside the United States. Now, I'm at a point in my life where I just notice a lot more things. I'm much more sensitive and attuned to what's going on than I probably was when I was younger, when it was just like, "Oh, I want to go here, and I want to go there, and I want to do this." I definitely savor more when I travel irrespective of where I'm going. I may really sit and pay attention to the flowers and the trees and be less focused on the big things. It's like, suddenly the little things have become the big things.

I hope that you go back to Paris. It's such an amazing city. I always say, I'm such a Francophile. I love the architecture, and I've never experienced Parisians being rude to me, but there's just something very cool about the culture. And to me, I just kind of savor how differently different cultures or different countries live their lives. The Parisians are just much like New Yorkers. There's just a certain je ne sais quoi. There's just such a unique way that they appreciate the way that they live their lives, and the way that they focus in on certain metrics over other things. The other thing that I think I really appreciate when I travel is a lot of the way Americans live is a byproduct of, they have to live in a big house, they have to have a big yard, they have to have a big car. When I travel internationally, I'm like, "I could be happy with a lot less and just do more with my life." So, obviously, that's a very personal decision, and there's no judgment on what I'm saying. When I travel to other countries, I realize most people don't live amongst a lot of stuff. They're just very grateful for the things that they have and that can be very transformative.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. I love that. You would love my sister. She's a minimalist and she goes everywhere, like everywhere. She's always traveling. She travels everywhere with a tiny suitcase for weeks. How do you do that?

Cynthia Thurlow: You do laundry in your hotel room. We've started doing that, actually. I'm going to London with my cousin, who's one of my favorite people in the world in early February. She's a big fashionista and I told her I was like, "I'm bringing a carry on." That's all I'm bringing. I'm like, whatever I wear, I'm wearing. I'm not stressing about it because checking bags when you travel can be a little dicey. And sometimes it's easier to travel with less and just get your laundry done at the hotel, or wash it in your hotel room so you don't have to worry about bringing too much stuff. That's why I always believe, like, the capsule wardrobe is a thing when you travel. So super helpful. So, yeah, your sister is definitely ahead of the game.

Melanie Avalon: I literally will. If I have to go stay at a hotel downtown overnight, I bring a massive suitcase, so I have work to do there. Actually, speaking of my sister, this is not my sister, but it's the same name. Danielle said, "Given the opportunity to go to space, would you go? What would you want to study there?"

Cynthia Thurlow: Oh, God. I would not want to go to space. I'm admittedly one of those people, I grew up in New Jersey and Great Adventure was very close to where I grew up. If anyone's familiar with Central New Jersey, I grew up at the shore. I did the rollercoasters. I did every probably unsafe, so imagine in the 1980s and 90s, probably not the safest amusement park to go to. I've done it all, but I've learned I actually don't like being that out of control. For me, I would not enjoy not being in control of what was going on. I will leave that to the astronauts and the people that are interested in space travel. I am terribly claustrophobic, although I deal with it. I would not want to study anything. I don't mind studying things here on Earth, but I would not want to go study other people, or planets or things. Because the claustrophobia would be a big issue for me, which probably I haven't talked about on this. I get into elevators and I have to really do a lot of mindset work to not get uncomfortable and sweat because I just don't like having a lot of people in my space. Have I ever talked about that before.

Melanie Avalon: About the claustrophobia.

Cynthia Thurlow: My weird quirkiness about, yeah claustrophobia.

Melanie Avalon: I'm claustrophobic. I don't think we've talked about it.

Cynthia Thurlow: I would not be a good space person. I will leave that to the experts.

Melanie Avalon: Have you taken the test? It's like the phobia test. There're two types of claustrophobia. Did you know that? It'll tell you which one you have.

Cynthia Thurlow: I did not.

Melanie Avalon: Oh. So, would you like to know the two types? Because okay, this made me so excited because I was taking the test, and there were these things that would list that freak me out, and I was so happy because I was like, oh, my goodness, this is like a thing. It's not just me panicking about this. In the claustrophobia one, it's things like in an elevator, which actually doesn't bother me. Are you bothered by an elevator.

Cynthia Thurlow: If there're too many people in the elevator? Yes.

Melanie Avalon: Okay, see, so that actually doesn't bother me. We probably have the two different types. Then there're things like in a straitjacket, would that bother you?

Cynthia Thurlow: No.

Melanie Avalon: Oh. Okay, so we have the two different types. This one that was on there was made me so happy. Something that will make me panic, like panic is if I am trying on clothes in the dressing room and I can't get the shirt off. Do you have that experience?

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah. I don't think that would bother me. It's definitely, I think to me it's a personal space thing too. I'm definitely very cognizant of personal space again, because I was in patients spaces all the time. So, I was always very cognizant of being in people's spaces. Yeah, when people are too close to me, I'm like strangers. I should specify friends and family different, but strangers in my personal space on an elevator, I don't love that.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, you probably have the conventional form of claustrophobia. What people think of with claustrophobia, which is being in small spaces. Mine, which I thought was claustrophobia, they still said it is, but then they have like a subtype. It's actually fear of suffocation.

Cynthia Thurlow: Oh. I don't have that problem, thankfully.

Melanie Avalon: So, all the things that I thought were claustrophobia, like getting stuck in an outfit or being in a straitjacket, things like that or actually it goes back to the suffocation fear. Isn't that so interesting?

Cynthia Thurlow: That is very interesting. I did not know there was a distinction.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, me neither. So, to answer the space question for me. In theory, I would love to go getting there that moment going up, I feel like I don't think I'd be down for that so much. I'm really stressed out by two things. One, the bathroom situation. I just don't think I can do it. I realized I'd have to be carnivore. I'd have to just get rid of bowel movements mostly, and I would not want the effects on my muscles, the lack of weight bearing exercise. I got to wait until we got like a gravity thing going on up there. I would want to study the aliens for sure.

Cynthia Thurlow: [laughs] Of course, you would.

Melanie Avalon: One last thing. This is actually very interesting health fact that I just learnt. Did you know when astronauts go to space, they often get sick? Like viruses and things like that, which doesn't make sense because they're not exposed to other people and viruses. They think it's probably because when people go to space, their immune system goes down for a lot of reasons. Likely a major part of it might be the social isolation and that makes these dormant viruses that we all naturally have in us that our immune system normally suppresses, flare up. Astronauts often get sick from viruses already inside of them when they go to space. Isn't that interesting?

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, they get a reactivation of the virus. Interesting.

Melanie Avalon: So, yeah, fun times. I guess neither of us will be going to space then.

Cynthia Thurlow: No, never.

Melanie Avalon: Here's one last fun one to end on. Do you listen to any nonhealth-related podcasts?

Cynthia Thurlow: I do. Although, admittedly not a lot. Actually, when I saw this question, I immediately went to my library to see what are the nonhealth-related podcasts I listen to and so I listen to-- so I guess it depends. Like, there's a continuum. Jenna Kutcher's Podcast, which is The Gold Digger and then Amy Porterfield's Podcast, the name of which evades me, and Mel Robbins, which is more mindset, but I just find for me at the stage of life I'm in, I want to learn so much that I would be lying if I said I listen to those podcasts on the regular.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah.

Cynthia Thurlow: That's kind of where I am. I have four or five that I never miss. There are others that I'll kind of bounce around, like, listening to them. I would be lying if I were to say and it's not that I don't work on mindset. I do, but I'm usually listening to a book, like the mindset books I listen to, and I lean more into those than listening to a podcast around, like, mindset or nonhealthcare-related stuff. How about you?

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, most of mine are health and wellness. Although, interestingly, I've been listening to podcasts since middle school, and I got hooked on podcasts when I started listening. I don't listen to it anymore, but it was called WDW Today. It was all about Walt Disney World. I lived for that podcast. I would listen to it every single day. I was obsessed with Disney World like obsessed. Now, really the only one is I listen to Joe Rogan and half the time I listen to guests, where it is health and wellness, but sometimes it's not. Like, I listened to one the other night with the beekeeper woman, Erika Thompson. I think it was 3 hours about bees. It was so fascinating. I learned so much.

Cynthia Thurlow: I mean, I think for both of us, we're very cerebral and we love to learn. I always jokingly tell my husband that if I took out the household responsibilities, the kids, the dogs, and I could just learn, I would just nerd out all day long. He sometimes will say to me, "Can't you just unplug your brain?" [laughs] Just read for pleasure and I'm like, I have one book I've read in the last year for pleasure, really just like a nonfiction book, but I really enjoy learning that actually brings me joy.

Melanie Avalon: I do, too, and that's why I love podcasts. I love learning just random stuff. Did you know, you've probably never seen a male bee?

Cynthia Thurlow: I did not know that. Aren't they the workers.

Melanie Avalon: The workers are females.

Cynthia Thurlow: Really? Where are the male bees? See, I don't know anything about this obviously.

Melanie Avalon: They're just there for basically reproduction and when they're doing their thing they have this reproduction swarm hub thing and it's way up in the sky [laughs] and the queen goes up there, it's crazy. I learned so much about bees. Yeah, so all the worker bees and the ones out with the flowers and doing their stuff, those are females.

Cynthia Thurlow: Wow.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. The book I'm reading right now is so interesting. It's called The Status Games. I just thought about it because it's about how we really judge wanting to have status or wanting to be in a social hierarchy, and we think it's bad. But basically, she makes the case that it's all evolutionary and the reason we have serotonin has to do with hierarchies and social dominance. Oh, that's why I thought about it because she talks about the hierarchies of different species and matriarchies versus patriarchies and it is fascinating.

Cynthia Thurlow: It is. Melanie and I are well suited for one another. We're at different life stages, but I jokingly told my husband the other day, to his horror, I was like, maybe when the kids are done with college, I'll just go back and when I'm retired and get a PhD and he was like, why? I was like, because I would just love to continue to learn. Now I'm saying that and I may decide I don't want to do that, but just like, from the perspective of continuing to learn. I always love learning, but now people have so many options. They don't necessarily have to go back to school. You could just do continuing education. Like, I thought a bunch of classes. There's a yearlong class with [unintelligible [01:09:27] that I signed up for because they were having a big sale. This is one of the big functional medicine schools and I signed up for it and I was like, okay, this is going to make sure I'm getting my continuing medical education. It means I'm learning new things. I'll be able to share with our listeners, all the extraneous things that are floating around.

Melanie Avalon: No. I love it. I love that we have that in common. Well, so much for getting through half of what we had left.

Cynthia Thurlow: [laughs] Just know there are so many good questions. I have to tell you that there is one person in particular, is it Danielle.

Melanie Avalon: Who asked like a million questions?

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, but they're good questions. I was like, wow.

Melanie Avalon: We had a lot of really good questions. I posted again because I wanted to get a few more and I was like and were getting a lot of fasting-specific questions, which I actually kept and saved for another episode. Maybe next week we'll do those and then we'll come back to this. In any case, so I asked for some more nonfasting-related questions and this girl Danielle and the group shoutout, she gave us 20. They were amazing.

Cynthia Thurlow: Really good questions. I think she said she was a teacher, so bravo. They were some obviously all great questions. When I read through these, I was like, oh, I've never talked about this on the podcast or a podcast. This is a fun question to be asked.

Melanie Avalon: It's funny because I'm looking at our line-up and most of them are not Danielle, but the last two we did were Danielle. Okie Dokie. Well, this has been absolutely wonderful. Oh, I should mention this was not on purpose. I was talking about the bees. I just realized that another sponsor on today's show besides Lomi, the composter, is Manukora honey, which makes manuka honey. So, listen to that ad as well. So, manuka honey, I first found it when I was having a lot of digestive issues. Honey by itself has a lot of health benefits, has good effects on the gut due to its hydrogen peroxide potential, which is very cool. Manuka honey actually has other compounds that are different from normal honey. Actually, when they measure it, they call it non-hydrogen peroxide activity or something like that. It can have profound effects on GI health, on the immune system.

I've been researching manuka honey for a long time. A company, Manukora, reached out to us about partnering, and I was really excited because I love manuka honey. I had a call with them last week. It was interesting because there's a lot of controversy surrounding manuka honey because people think that some of its fake and there's all these different rating systems, and how do you're getting what you're getting? So, when we met the brand, I was just thinking, please let them be legit and real. I met the founder and talked with their company, and they're so amazing. They're doing incredible things. They're sustainable. They're really passionate about the bees and the honey, and the health benefits. They're just now expanding to the US market. They actually got an Erewhon, which is cool. So, if you live in LA, you can check them out there. Definitely, listen to our ad for them because you can get free honey sticks. You just go to manukora.com/ifpodcast. That's M-A-N-U-K-O-R-A dotcom slash ifpodcast, definitely don't eat the conventional honey. There are some good honeys in the grocery store, but like, the cheap stuff, just don't eat that. I learned a lot in the episode with Joe Rogan about how adulterated conventional honey can be in the grocery store and how it's basically just like sugar, water, and additives and not what you want. So manuka honey, Manukora [unintelligible [01:12:58].

Cynthia Thurlow: As soon as it arrived, my 15-year-old took it out and tried it immediately and gave it a thumbs up.

Melanie Avalon: Awesome. It's like a honey that you've never experienced. It's so good. Okay, well, this was absolutely wonderful.

If you would like to submit your own questions for the show, just directly email questions@ifpodcast.com or you can go to ifpodcast.com and you can submit questions there. These show notes will be at ifpodcast.com/episode302. They'll have a full transcript so definitely check that out and also links to everything we talked about. Because I know we talked about a lot of products and things like that, so that will be helpful. And then You can follow us on Instagram. We are @ifpodcast, I'm @melanieavalon. Cynthia is @cynthia_thurlow_. I think that is all the things.

Cynthia Thurlow: I love this format. I look forward to doing this a couple of times a year.

Melanie Avalon: I know. Super fun. Yeah. we'll have to decide if we're going to try to speed through the rest of them next time or alternate or we'll decide. This has been great and I will talk to you next week.

Cynthia Thurlow: Sounds good.

Melanie Avalon: Bye.

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 your 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, transcripts by SpeechDocs, and original theme composed by Leland Cox and re-composed by Steve Saunders. See you next week.

[Transcript provided by SpeechDocs Podcast Transcription]

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