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Dec 08

Episode 399: Special Guest Megan Ramos, Therapeutic Fasting for Women, Holiday Eating Tips, GLP-1 Medications, PCOS and Insulin Resistance, Pregnancy and Fasting, Longer Fasting Protocols, and More!

Intermittent Fasting

Welcome to Episode 399 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast, hosted by Melanie Avalon, author of What When Wine Diet: Lose Weight And Feel Great With Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, And Wine, and Vanessa Spina, author of Keto Essentials: 150 Ketogenic Recipes to Revitalize, Heal, and Shed Weight.


SHOW NOTES

SPECIAL GUEST:

Megan Ramos is a Canadian clinical educator and expert on therapeutic fasting and low-carbohydrate diets, having guided more than 14,000 people worldwide. She is the co-author of the New York Times Bestseller Life in the Fasting Lane and The Essential Guide to Intermittent Fasting for Women.

Website | IG (Fasting Method) |  IG (Megan Ramos)


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Our content does not constitute an attempt to practice medicine and does not establish a doctor-patient relationship. Please consult a qualified healthcare provider for medical advice and answers to personal health questions.

TRANSCRIPT

(Note: This is generated by AI with 98% accuracy. However, any errors may cause unintended changes in meaning.) 


Melanie Avalon

Welcome to Episode 399 of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. If you want to burn fat, gain energy, and enhance your health by changing when you eat, not what you eat, with no calorie counting, then this show is for you. I'm Melanie Avalon, biohacker, author of What, When, Wine, and creator of the supplement line, AvalonX.  And I'm here with my co-host, Vanessa Spina, sports nutrition specialist, author of Keto Essentials, and creator of the Tone Breath Ketone Analyzer and Tone Luxe Red Light Therapy Panels. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and ketogenicgirl.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this show do not constitute medical advice or treatment.  To be featured on the show, email us your questions to questions at ifpodcast.com. We would love to hear from you. So pour yourself a mug of black coffee, a cup of tea, or even a glass of wine if it's that time, and get ready for the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. Hi, friends. Welcome back to the show. I am so incredibly excited about the conversation I am about to have.  It is with a very, very popular guest. So I've had today's guest on the show before. And I often ask for questions in my Facebook group for guests. And whenever I even remotely mention this beautiful person, I'm here with Megan Ramos, I get inundated with optimism and excitement and enthusiasm because people love what you're doing, Megan.  And so many people say that, you know, they're the reason that they found fasting and, you know, change their lives and things like that. So I get so much gratitude. And then I also get so many questions for you. And I had you on the show before.  And that was before you had released or yeah, I'm pretty sure that was before you had released your newest book, which is The Essential Guide to Intermittent Fasting for Women, Balance Your Hormones to Lose Weight, Lower Stress and Optimize Health. That book honestly is absolutely incredible when it comes to just being a I mean, it's in the title, An Essential Guide to Intermittent Fasting.  And what I also loved, there's an endorsement on it by Cynthia Thurlow, who my audience will be very, very familiar with since she was a former co host as well. Megan has a lot of her background working with Dr. Jason Fung, who is a legend in the fasting world. And she wrote the New York Times bestseller book with him life in the fasting lane. So Megan, thank you so much in advance for being here.  And also I know it's been a while, but last time we had you on that was pre pregnancy and baby and this is post pregnancy and baby. So congrats on that. How old now is your who's it a boy or girl?

Megan Ramos

I have a son. His name is Marcus, and he's just about 13 months old. So it's pretty wild. I don't think I've slept since I was last on your podcast. It's all been kind of a blur. Pregnancy was a bit rough. And then this last year has been crazy.  I appreciate your very kind intro though, Melanie, I feel like for the last year, I've just been known as my son's cow and the lady who doesn't sleep at the end of the street. So it's good to hear that makes me feel a little bit more like myself, and like all these long hours are worthwhile and hopefully we're helping a lot of people out there.

Melanie Avalon

No, I literally have so much gratitude. And I talk about this on the show a lot. I personally don't anticipate having kids. I just don't really see it as part of my life. And so I am, I am so I don't know how you guys do it. And I am so grateful to moms like you for, you know, taking one for the team. They're like, I could not, I could not, not do it.  And I'm going to ask a listener question right off the bat because something relates to this. Teresa, she said she wanted to know, she said, I know pregnant women aren't supposed to fast. So I'm curious what Megan's eating patterns were when she was pregnant. What times and what types of food did she have? So yeah, I'm curious about that as well. Did you get create?  Well, first of all, did you get weird cravings during pregnancy?

Megan Ramos

I did not have any weird cravings at all during pregnancy. I didn't really change my diet. The weird thing about my pregnancy was that I ended up having two placentas. And I didn't know this. And it kind of explained why my pregnancy was so awful at the very end. But I had these two placentas, the one my son's main placenta, and then I had this accessory placenta.  And they caught it at the last minute, which is great, because we both got to live. And it was actually a pretty serious condition called type two of azaprivia. It got caught by a real fluke. So I mean, all the stars align there to keep us alive and healthy. But I was super sick.  And I had all these dreams and plans of eating and how I was going to structure everything and make everything as nutrient dense as humanly possible going into pregnancy. And I was barely alive for the eight months that I was pregnant before I was born. He ended up having to come early because of the placenta issue. And I was amazed that I like he was growing and that I didn't end up in the hospital.  But I'll say like during my pregnancy, whatever food I could tolerate, I just like ate and ate and ate. And that changed as my symptoms change. But I stuck very true to like a real whole food kind of principle, I guess, sort of paleo. But I did do things like drinking raw goat milk from a farmer that I knew was very comfortable with. And you know, eating a two sheep yogurt.  So I did have some, you know, type of dairy sources as well. But yeah, just kind of stuck to my regular I really prioritize protein. Fortunately, I could eat beef, but I couldn't like tolerate like a New York strip for some reason. But I could tolerate fillets like wrapped in bacon. So I think like for like two months, like that's all I ate for like dinner.  And my vegetables, I just try to cycle through and I did eat some carbs, you know, I usually would have some berries at lunchtime. And then I would have like some sweet potato or some root vegetable at dinner time as well. And you know, I did gain 26 pounds by the time he was born. And he was born at five pounds, eight ounces a month early.  So you know, it was enough, at least to keep him going and thriving. But all of my plans for like a real, you know, like ultra nutrient dense pregnancy kind of went out the window. And I just had to go with what my body let me eat. But I know I didn't have fast food, I didn't have junk food once, you know, I we ate at home, pretty much we did take a trip early on in our pregnancy to lanai.  And we were fortunate they had like things like grass said beef and avocados actually really helped with my early nausea. And they're high in B6, which I kind of knew but then really became aware of once I was pregnant. So I pretty much ate grass said beef and avocados the entire time we were in lanai. And I could eat eggs, eggs didn't seem to bother me.  So just yeah, just trying to get in when I could tolerate within my own dietary principles. But I didn't shift anything. Prior to pregnancy, I you know, I did eat some carbs, I ate berries, I did eat root vegetables and smaller portions.

Megan Ramos

They're not things I ate when I was struggling with insulin resistance. But they were things that I strategically added into my diet afterwards. And I continued to consume those throughout pregnancy to tolerance.

Melanie Avalon

Wow. Okay. So many questions. Well, I love how you were saying that you had these dreams of eating nutrient rich and then it sounds like what you ate was really nutrient rich to me. Sounds like you did pretty good.

Megan Ramos

I think I thought I was going to eat like liver like a few times a week.

Melanie Avalon

the organ meats and all the things. Okay, I hear you. Did you change your eating windows?

Megan Ramos

Yeah, I did. And I actually banked embryos, I went into mommyhood, actually a little bit late in life. So a lot of your listeners know, and for those of you who don't, I was diagnosed with PCOS when I was 14. I was actually kind of amnoxiously skinny preteen. And I had PCOS and it was kind of weird, like I didn't have acne, I actually had regular periods.  But I started cycling, you know, just before my 10th birthday, like really kind of abnormal PCOS stuff. You know, I have been able to correct that later on in life, but it didn't undo some of the damage that happened earlier. So when a woman has PCOS, they burn through a lot of follicles early on in life. And we're only born with so many eggs.  Like we don't have an infinite supply of eggs that we can generate over time and genetics, you know, plays a big role in dictating how many eggs we have at the start. And then things like PCOS, you know, plays a role kind of in the life, like the longevity, like how often, you know, or how long we have those eggs for. If you have PCOS, she'll burn through a lot earlier on.  So when I was older, and we decided it was time to start a family, I wasn't that old. I mean, I just turned 40 and my sons one, I had low ovarian reserves because of my past. So I we decided to bank embryos, because we would like to have a second kid. So I did the whole IVF thing. I was very fortunate, though, because of my lifestyle, I had really high quality eggs.  So even though I didn't have like a ton, because of my history of PCOS, I had some really good raw materials to work with. And that gave us an amazing baby boy very easily from IVF. So we were very fortunate in that respect.

Melanie Avalon

Well, I didn't know that about PCOS and the eggs and IVF. That's amazing. And the high quality eggs with the fasting, how did you change it?

Megan Ramos

Yeah, my mommy brain here. I'm so sorry. Yeah, so pretty much like my maintenance plan, because you know, I've, I've improved a lot of health markers, like reversing type two diabetes, and my PCOS and fatty liver, and I lost a lot of weight and kept it off for a long time. And pretty much since I hit my goals, I've really like eaten two meals a day.  And then as my schedules just kind of dictated it, I've done fasting. So like, prior to pregnancy, I had a class every Wednesday evening. So I just ended up doing 24s, a 24 hour fast every Wednesday, I had a long flight, which I often did, you know, I would cycle in some even longer fasts.  And then I would strategically plan a few extended fasts a year just for longevity, health improved health span reasons. But you know, going into pregnancy, sorry, going into my IVF journey is where I got lost my tangent there. I started doing 14 hour window only, and having three smaller meals throughout the day.  And I'll say like with all my symptoms, it was the only way I was able to get in I think enough food at the end of the day to keep a healthy pregnancy without having to go into the hospital or something like TPO and just I wouldn't want that for my son's development. And I could avoid it.  So having the three smaller meals throughout the day did help quell a lot of my side effects and enable me to get in a good I guess a good low love like low diet of nutrient density throughout the day enough to have an optimal healthy baby at the end.

Melanie Avalon

So you were still, because I think people get really nervous with pregnancy and everything, and we get lots of questions about breastfeeding as well, but you were still eating in a slightly restricted window.

Megan Ramos

Yeah, you know, I still got in 14 hours a day. It was pretty easy. I never snacked unless like, I really felt kind of like I needed to. During pregnancy, my whole thing was like, if I if I felt hungry, like I wasn't going to say, Okay, you know, have some sparkling water and just try to suck it up. Pregnancy is a time for growth. And it's not a time for for fasting.  So I just made sure to listen to my cues. I think I was so fortunate. By the time I did get pregnant, I'm like incredibly in tuned to my body and its needs. I know when I'm thirsty versus hungry, and vice versa. So I never really withheld but I found like I was able to maintain, you know, three smaller meals a day, and sort of a 14 hour window pretty easily, you know, throughout my journey.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, awesome. Yeah, so I have more questions about the windows and fasting and everything, but while we were talking about PCOS, I did have a good question about that. It was from Leah, and she wanted to know if someone is a type 2 diabetic and has PCOS, did one lead to another?  Are they both just caused by high insulin or is there some other component that influences which way this insulin resistance manifests? Would you treat the two the same with diet and fasting or should one thing be taken into consideration with PCOS?

Megan Ramos

Yeah, lots of really good questions. PCOS is essentially like diabetes of the ovaries. So PCOS and type 2 diabetes are both caused by insulin resistance. Genetics sort of can play a role too as to what of these expressions of insulin resistance, like which of these diseases you're likely to develop to over time, although I think I was actually like the first person in my family to have PCOS.  There's a whole bunch of them, like I had fatty liver, PCOS, and then eventually type 2 diabetes. As the insulin resistance becomes more severe, the more expressions and diseases related to it, you're going to accumulate over time.  And unfortunately, due to all of the dietary crazy changes that happened in the late 70s, a lot of women in my age group and younger women are struggling with multiple metabolic diseases as they've gotten older. So it's really common to see PCOS and type 2 diabetes come hand in hand. I had actually a lot of women that come to us with PCOS that was established when they were younger.  When we do look at their diabetes markers, sure, they're not classically abnormal by like tradition Western medical standards, but by functional integrative standards, like they're not good. And the person is usually on the cusp of being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes as well.  You know, it's sort of a bit controversial, I think, and even in the fasting space, how we treat this, a lot of my colleagues outside of the fasting method and Jason, who work with women with PCOS, they always kind of like try to treat the PCOS and the sex hormones and get those balance first, and then, you know, sort of tackle the diabetes.  What Jason and I have always done at the fasting method is treat the insulin first, we end up sort of, you know, knocking down two birds with one stone. But really that the insulin resistance is what's causing the sex hormone issues that's leading to the PCOS. And it's just it's a perpetual cycle.  And, you know, sometimes I think just treating the hormones, especially in severe cases where someone also has something like type 2 diabetes, we know the insulin resistance is on really bad. So really trying to target the sex hormones is just kind of, it's frustrating, it's a long lengthy process. And when there's type 2 diabetes parallel, it doesn't always work.  So in if we have a woman, say a 27 year old woman came to me, she's a newly diagnosed type 2 diabetes, she's known since her teen years, she had PCOS, she's looking, you know, to maybe want to have the possibility of conceiving down the road, she just wants it to be an option. So she does want to tackle the PCOS.  And she's struggling with the symptoms of PCOS, like acne, facial hair, but we don't want those symptoms if you know, we can avoid it. So what do we do? And I would treat them like a diabetic first and foremost, in the sense like, you know, we're treating the insulin resistance. And that's kind of what we say.  But I mean, the if you you just rephrase the PCOS is that's diabetes of the ovaries, we're treating the insulin resistance, the diabetes of everything kind of first.

Megan Ramos

And then once we have regained insulin sensitivity in the body, then we really focus on trying to optimize the sex hormones, like, you know, where they're still in balances, where they're still, you know, low levels of progesterone, or the issues with androgens, like, how do we optimize those down the road? And we found it to be, you know, very, very effective.  You know, fortunately, we've helped a lot of women, you know, with PCOS, who wanted to be moms become moms, which has been really great, you know, they told me at 14 that I would probably never be a mom. And here I was, you know, like, I, I got pregnant, first embryo transfer, no issues right off the bat, you know, and, and had a lot of luck.  And there's just there's so many opportunities for these these women. So it's been grateful to be part of these journeys. But even if motherhood is not something of interest, like we still want to treat the PCOS because it is like type two diabetes, but of the ovaries.  So we want to fix that get rid of the potential side effects that someone might be experiencing as well, and just improve their overall health outcomes. And we treat everybody like a diabetic in terms of fasting protocols at the start.

Melanie Avalon

That's incredible. And so when you say doing that first and then potentially treating the sex hormone issues, is that with like bioidentical hormones or HRT?

Megan Ramos

We don't do that at the FASTA method, but if there's things that we can do, we would recommend it in certain cases if needed. Or if there's just things that we can do nutritionally to boost things like progesterone levels.  You know, when someone's a type two diabetic and it's causing these other issues, and there's like PCOS and insulin resistance is causing the imbalances, we will, for example, you know, in a cycling woman, fast them fairly aggressively throughout the duration of their cycle. But once we've tackled the insulin resistance, then we want to optimize the hormones in each part of the cycle.  So once we've sort of tackled the insulin resistance, something that we would do to help optimize the hormones then is sort of more fasting. And the beginning of the cycle, less fasting in the second half of the cycle, more structured carbohydrate intake in the second half of the cycle to support progesterone production, for example.  So there's hacks that we would do nutritionally to see if we can optimize things first. We're fortunate, like for certain age demographics, we've had a lot of great benefits doing that. Generally, as women get older, like taking bioidentical hormones does have a lot of longevity benefits.  I chose my own will and accord as a 38, 39 year old woman pregnant to take bioidentical progesterone throughout my pregnancy. And then to take it after I knew my breast milk was established with my son to just kind of optimize my hormones, because that just declines naturally with age. And I will gladly take estradiol as from the time comes.  So we are a big fan of bioidentical hormones for the right demographic who does need it. But for younger women, we can often optimize a lot of things nutritionally and perhaps postpone the need for those hormones a little bit down the road.

Melanie Avalon

Is there a reason the progesterone is after the breast milk is established?

Megan Ramos

Taking progesterone might interfere with prolactin levels. So they're kind of contradictory to one another. So elevated prolactin suppresses progesterone levels and elevated progesterone will suppress prolactin levels. So I just wanted to make sure. I unfortunately, due to my weird placenta situation, had to have a C-section. That was not the dream. And my son was born early.  So it was really important to, I worked really hard to establish my milk. Just wanted to make sure that was solid. And once that was solid and my son was growing like a weed, then I was happy to take the progesterone. And it was such a great thing to add in because of all the postpartum anxiety and all that stuff.  And the progesterone really, it's amazing how much hormonal support helps with things like that.

Melanie Avalon

Awesome, okay. By the way, how rare is that double placenta situation?

Megan Ramos

Oh, it's super rare. And it's like 2% of the population. It is more common in women who have done IVF just because of the embryos are like implanted kind of artificially, right? Like it's not just something that spontaneously happens in the uterus. So I guess you're just a little bit more prone to some placenta issues. And of course, I didn't know that.  And then they don't tell you that till after the fact.

Melanie Avalon

man, crazy, crazy, crazy. And also at your clinic, how many patients have you guys treated or how many do you deal with ongoing? Like how many I'm just curious, like trying to get like an idea of like the numbers.

Megan Ramos

Yeah, so we're now entirely online. I was actually just asking for this data for email that I was working on. I think in the last 12 years, we have worked with either between our Toronto Clinic and law online. We've worked with close to 100,000 individuals worldwide.

Melanie Avalon

That's amazing. That explains a lot why you can have so much knowledge, you know, especially when writing your book and a question about your book, there's a lot of debate out there with fasting definitions. I don't know if you saw the study that came out a couple months ago where they tried to have an official like establishment of what the different fasting definitions mean.  I've found it really interesting. So what do you consider intermittent fasting in your book? I found it really interesting that I think what you were calling intermittent fasting may not be what a lot of people refer to it as basically what constitutes a fast, an intermittent fast.

Megan Ramos

We at the fasting method classify things like 12, 14, 16, 18 hours of fasting, especially when done daily. We consider that to be just good time restricted eating. Why? Well, following these strategies, you know, we don't often see things like PCOS or type 2 diabetes reverse like at all, maybe very mild issues of insulin resistance are resolved.  Maybe, you know, if you're early on in your journey and you it's been just a few years of you carrying that freshman 15 still, it can easily be lost with those journeys. But unfortunately, we have a very sick North American and sort of, you know, global population, severe type 2 diabetes, severe insulin resistance and metabolic health problems. And those just don't cut it for fasting strategies.  So we classify those as just good eating days, how you should eat in between fasts to maintain the progress that you've made with your fasting, and how you should just eat for optimal health and longevity and just sort of good daily shorter fasting practices that we do know have disease preventing benefits down the road.  So like something like 14 hours of fasting has some really great benefits of preventing metabolic related breast cancer and woman. These are great things that we should be doing all of the time to sort of maintain good health and free disease prevention.  But for actual disease reversal, and especially when we've got a lot of that body fat that's super stubborn, and there's a lot of insulin resistance, they're keeping it on, we don't find those to be effective strategies. So those are those time restricted eating protocols, you know, they're daily fasting protocols for for maintaining health and for disease prevention, once you are healthy.  Now, what we focus on is fasting protocols that really target the insulin resistance. And in an insulin resistant individual, we really don't see those insulin levels fall enough for healing and some sensitivity to begin to develop until we approach the 24 hour mark.  So people that we work with and how we define fasting is we call it therapeutic fasting, we're fasting to treat condition we're fasting to treat insulin resistance. So we do combinations of 24, 36, 42, 48 hours of fasting, and then occasionally some extended fast.  So sometimes, you know, it's funny, because like I see all of the same stuff as you and your listeners, and like an extended fast is 24 hours, I actually just had someone the other day tell me they did an extended fast or 24 hours. By definition, though, an extended fast, you know, for us is 72 hours or longer. And these are the therapeutic strategies we help to reverse disease.  Now when someone's disease is reversed, we don't keep up with therapeutic strategies. I mean, you do a therapy to treat a condition and hopefully you can alleviate that condition and go to maintenance. And then we switch to time restricted eating protocols to maintain after that.

Melanie Avalon

It's definitely a slightly different view than I think a lot of people have. We had a question about the 72-hour fasting. Sherry said, I heard her say on one podcast that 72-hour fasting is easier for menopausal women. Can you ask her about it and what that looks like? For example, is that three fasting days and then four days with two meals?  I will say for listeners, get the book because it will go through, it goes through all the protocols and what this actually looks like. Just to briefly answer, when people are doing those extended fasts, are they fasting completely for 72 hours and then eating regularly the other days or what does it look like?

Megan Ramos

Yeah, for individuals who want to do 72 hour fast. So for like cycling woman, we would do it in the first half of the cycle in that follicular phase before ovulation. And then in menopausal, post-menopausal woman, there's a lot more flexibility. You can do it any time. That feels good. We would have people do three days consecutively, like say from Sunday dinner to Wednesday dinner.  And then that ends up with four consecutive days of eating, usually two to three meals a day, often though people will break it up with a 24 hour fast somewhere in the middle. So we commonly see people fasting, say from Sunday dinner to Wednesday dinner, and then maybe doing a 24 hour fast on Friday until from Thursday dinner to Friday dinner, just to kind of break up those four days of eating.  I know this sounds really intensive, and it has been a common comment since my book came out, is that I'm the crazy fasting lady. And these are intensive strategies. And they're really only meant for short term treating a condition and then moving on from it. And I'm all about the minimal effective dosage. For those of you who are listening, you might be a little bit scared of these things.  We always start someone off slowly and work our way up. And we always see what is the minimal effective dosage of fasting required for them. And I hate to say it, but unfortunately, in cases of severe metabolic disease, severe insulin resistance, we often do need to do some of these therapeutic fasts. Now, I would say there's never really a need to do a 72 hour fast.  You can do one if you want to do one. Sometimes people really like packing all their three days of fasting back to back. You know, we used to have women do a Monday, Wednesday, Friday fast in our clinic.  And they would come in and say, can we please just do them all in one day, because or sorry, an all in one stretch, because once we get into a fastest state, it's easier to stay there than to have to bounce back and forth throughout the week. Whatever is most sustainable, sure. But we do these therapeutic strategies, hopefully, you know, not longer for than six months.  If someone's able to be consistent with them, you know, before we start to turn down the fasting dial. And if someone's making great progress, you know, doing 24s, then like, hey, if it's not broken, don't fix it. And we definitely work to keep them there.  But there are people who do need to do longer fast, there is definitely a time and a place, you know, for doing something like 248 hour fast, and maybe occasionally, you know, doing a 72 if that's easier for you. And there's a time and a place for that. And I feel like there's not a ton of resources out there.  So I think sometimes I get labeled the crazy fasting lady, with these long protocols, but there is a time and a place. And I wanted to make sure we could provide a voice for all women, we a woman who have great success with 24s, but for the woman that just find it easier to do some little longer fast to get to their goals as well.

Melanie Avalon

A question about the mechanisms of action there with the longer fasting. How much of it is just due to the low insulin versus other things that are happening with fasting?  And my follow-up question would be, can you sort of hack it by doing like a 36-hour fast and then a super low insulin meal, you know, and like, so sort of like maintaining that low insulin but not fasting as long, or is it really about the fasting hours?

Megan Ramos

A bit of both. Someone's looking for weight loss. Jason actually just interviewed me. It was the funniest thing. We spent 20 years just talking, and it was just weird to be talking on camera with him, interviewing me. I know that interview's not going to air well into next year, but he shared on the interview that he recently... It was just going to work out in his schedule to do a three-day fast.  He wanted to do one before seven, the holiday hoopla. He took a very tiny, next-to-no insulin-producing meal every single day during that fast. You can absolutely do that. For women, if I was someone who wants to do a five-day fast and I need something like a slice of avocado in the middle of that fast to be successful, then do it.  If they're really looking to knock down the insulin and suppress it for a long period of time and to try to burn as much fat, do it. Absolutely. Go for it. There are some other health benefits.  In certain cases, like if someone was a cancer patient, we would probably want to do three days to focus on water and electrolytes because we would really want to optimize the cellular recycling process called autophagy. Autophagy is this physiological cellular recycling process that can be activated by nutrient suppression in the body. That is beneficial.  A lot of cancer patients seek it out as just one of the tools in their toolbox of therapies that they're using in conjunction with regular medicine. We tend to really try to optimize that autophagy process. We would try to minimize nutrients being added to that particular time and just stick close to water and salts and some Epsom salt baths.  Sometimes people feel too like when they are losing weight, they're starting to get a little bit excess skin accumulation and they want to try to minimize that. That's another instance where we'd see someone really want to optimize autophagy happening in the body so we can get that breakdown of the connective tissue happening there.  If that was the goal, then we would say, okay, autophagy really peaks at the 72-hour marker into a fast. We would want to do a three-day fast then if that was someone's goal and we would try to minimize nutrient intake during that particular time. There's really no black or white answer. There's really no wrong or right way. It just depends on what that particular goal is of that specific fast.  Sometimes there's a time and a place. I think Jason's like he had some broccoli and green vegetables. Nothing that sounded appealing for me even on an eating day, but I don't like broccoli, but I'm pretty sure that's what he ate. That's fine. People have avocado slices here or dill pickle there.  That's also fine if they're just trying to lose weight, but otherwise it depends on what their goals are, how we would guide them on that.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so actually the second part of Sherry's question, she was the one asking about the 72-hour fast. She said, can a salad with oil and vinegar be a fasting aid? And she also said, I'm so glad you were interviewing her.

Megan Ramos

So Jason, yeah, but it can be but it is it is a fasting aid. So, you know, I'm not going to say that you're in the fastest state for that entire duration, you are going to be removed from the fastest state for a period of time.  But if it's something small, if it's something that you know, if you're having something like leafy greens, and it's there's not going to be that insulin response is just so minimal. And you add a little bit of olive oil, for example, but not a lot, just like a little bit.  It's not a ton of fat, you know, it's really not any different than adding a little bit of something like heavy whipping cream to your coffee during a fast. So it is fairly equivalent in that sense of someone needed something.

Melanie Avalon

And so, to clarify, we're talking about people using this to do those longer fasts, not like their daily fasting window, just for super clarity there. Speaking of daily fasting, you mentioned this in the book, but how do you feel about people doing one meal a day every day?

Megan Ramos

No, I hate it with a fiery, fierce passion. And I'm fortunate that there's a lot of wonderful female fasting advocates out there who also feel the same. It is just such a detriment we've seen to women's metabolism over time. We run into nutrient issues over time, and then women are feeling like garbage, they're starting to gain weight. So with one meal a day, these are kind of the big issues.  So you're doing the same thing day in and day out. There's really not that much intermittent with it, and the body does begin to adapt versus doing three 24-hour fasts a week. So if you're doing just one meal on Monday, Wednesdays, and Fridays, it's intermittent. One day is one meal, the next day is two meals. You know, then one meal, two meals, one meal, two meals.  So there's change, there's variety there. Your metabolism is getting fed different amounts of metabolic energy every other day, and it keeps it guessing, and it keeps your metabolism running well. But when you do the same thing every single day, your body adapts, and it slows down your metabolic rate. So I always talk about, you know, you have a house, we all have household incomes, right?  So if your household income is reduced by 40 percent for whatever reason, at first you would overspend, likely. If it was abruptly reduced by 40 percent, I mean, you would still maybe have expensive car bills and other luxuries, like gym memberships and things that you might not be able to afford afterwards. And so you might go into a bit of debt.  And then over time, you learn how to avoid accumulating debt month in and month out. And you cut back, you know, you might cut back on groceries. You might sell one of your two cars and get a public transport pass. You might get a Netflix subscription instead of going to the movies. You might just stream stuff versus paying for cable, like that type of thing.  Like you figure out how to cut corners and avoid going into debt every month because your monthly income has been reduced and you learn to adapt over time. And so our bodies are we feed our bodies and we give it, you know, metabolic dollars every day in those meals.  And when you reduce it every day, just to sort of one meal and say you you're still eating a very colorically dense meal at that one meal, but you're still reducing it, say, by about 40 percent day in and day out. And your body over time will overspend metabolic dollars and you will see some weight loss happening. But then it says, OK, you know, this is becoming consistent now.  And I know how to plan and I'm going to cut costs and reproductive function. And you're going to cut costs from cognitive function, cardiovascular function. And I'm going to adapt to this new budget and then your body adapts to that new budget by slowing down your metabolic rate to match your new metabolic intake.

Megan Ramos

And that's what we see happening when people do one meal a day. Also, it's just not enough protein. It's pretty much the bottom line.  And, you know, too, is that a woman, especially as we get older, our protein demands increase and it's so important, you know, to have good protein intake because it plays a huge role in maintaining really good hormonal health, not just, you know, when I talk a lot about insulin hormone, but sex hormones and we need the protein.  The protein is really an important building block along with dietary fat as well for good hormonal health as we get older. So our demand for it actually increases, decreases as we age.

Melanie Avalon

I'm a huge fan of protein. It's ironic. I'm airing the week that we're recording, not that this is coming out. An episode with Dr. Michael Greger, who's very, very big in the vegan sphere. And he was talking about how the one thing correlated to longevity consistently is a low protein diet. And I think it's really confusing to people when they get completely different perspectives on that.  It's interesting. I feel like I'm a unique unicorn in a one experiment with this because I have been doing one meal a day for, man, over a decade. I eat super high protein though, like pounds and pounds of meat and fish and seafood at night. And then I tend to alternate between higher carb days versus low carb days.  I don't know if maybe that is enough to keep my body guessing or keep my metabolism going. I mean, it's worked for me so far, but I also realized that I'm very unique in that. Like the amount of protein I eat in my window is like a shocking amount. So I don't know if you've worked with any unicorns like that.

Megan Ramos

No, there are definitely unicorns out there. I'd say it's not like the bulk of individuals, though. But I love your strategy of changing up your macros. Often, you know, there are times where people cannot fast for whatever reasons.  You know, like we won't necessarily fast somebody that's going under evaluation for an unknown medical condition, because then they always just kind of like blame the fasting, even if it would be helpful. If there's these instances that pop up or someone just, you know, they're going through a stressful time and, you know, they haven't combated stress eating yet.  But, you know, they can make the commitment to eat healthier. And we'll change up their macros. So weeks of higher protein, then weeks of higher carb, weeks of higher fat, and more moderate protein and carbohydrates, which is mixing up those macros. And it's been incredibly beneficial in their health journeys.  And it has made an improvement in their insulin resistance levels as well, in sort of the absence of doing longer fast. I don't necessarily know if it would take like an insulin dependent diabetic off of insulin. I don't believe so. But, you know, there's always going to be a unicorn in every case. But it is a it is a great strategy.  We are big believers in our program of just kind of rolling with the seasons. And some seasons will be higher carbs, some will be higher protein, some, you know, will be higher fat, and just kind of really making sure that you're prioritizing what you're eating locally, because it's going to be more nutrient dense, and just kind of embracing those changes in macros as the seasons change as well.  So there's a lot of, you know, Davis and Claire, I know he can be controversial too, like Michael Greger and these other guys, but he's got some interesting data on the benefits of changing sort of macro ratios for a longevity. And when we've put that into clinical practice, we've seen some really interesting outcomes and improving health span as well.

Melanie Avalon

I've had them on the show twice so I'll put links to that for listeners. How do you feel about and have you seen a change in your patient population either by numbers or by just their condition they're coming in with due to JLP ones?

Megan Ramos

We usually, it's very common for someone on our team to tell me that they had a consultation with someone and they said, I must be the only person that this didn't work for. And if I had like a quarter for every time I heard that, all of us pastors would be like living up on a Hawaiian Island. So there's that.  So one thing, you know, it goes to show that we've got to really sort of fix our relationship, our food choices, the frequency that we eat, our behavioral aspects around food. There isn't a magic bullet, especially that one that will work for everybody. So some people can continue to snack all day long on process, they refine foods and they might get some weight loss from these GLP ones.  But we do see a substantial number of individuals that say, Hey, you know, this doesn't work for me. I must be the only one because that's kind of what the media has a believing right now. It's just like, no, like welcome to like 10,000 people who are just just like you.  The other thing we see is nice people that have taken them have had some positive experiences with fat loss, but then have developed some side of effects, have had to stop taking it and then have regained the weight because they didn't change how they ate the frequency that they ate or their behaviors around food. So it's definitely not a miracle bullet.  There's a time and a place for them though, you know, when they did come out, I know Jason would put people on them short term, that would be the goal just to help get kind of appetite under control, but we would never want them to be on them long term where they might experience some problems down the road. We again, don't think it's a magic bullet.  I will never forget it was the start of COVID lockdown in Toronto at the time Toronto was really kind of crazy with it. My dad is a very social outgoing lawyer and he was then just home alone and isolated and he was eating his feelings. Sorry, dad, I'm sharing this with everyone and he had made such great progress with his diabetes through fasting. He had lost tons of weight.  He was off all his medications and A1C was like moving in the great direction, but this COVID just kind of sent him like so many other people into like a loop of poor habits and eating and his numbers all slid and Jason called me and he's like, I'm seeing your dad this afternoon and he's like in a telehealth appointment and he's like, what do you want me to do?  These are his numbers and he's like, I imagine, you know, you're aware of what's going on with his eating as well. And I said, just put him on a was epic for three months, like just give him three months to get it together, to get him to acclimate to what's going on, give him a little bit more control over his appetite at this particular time.  And Jason said he agreed, but he wanted to make sure that I was on the same page and that's exactly what it did. You know, it helps suppress things a bit, you know, for him to kind of, you know, get used to what was going on, make a new health plan to get back into action.

Megan Ramos

And after that three months, he didn't need it anymore. And he was rolling along and doing just fine and was able to maintain, you know, good habits and eating and fasting afterwards and get back his numbers. So, you know, we don't say never, you know, in our program, there is a time and a place.  I know clinically when we're working with someone in the clinic, you know, we try to make it not as long term as possible. It's not a magic bullet. That's for sure what we've seen as well.

Melanie Avalon

I really love and appreciate that perspective. And yeah, I think they're clearly there can be very powerful and potentially therapeutic if used correctly. I feel like they're just a severe lack of education and correct implementation. And yeah, so that that's fascinating. Another question. So with the holidays and everything, do you have tips or tricks for people?  Should they consciously try to be more restrictive? Should they use that as a time where it's seasonal and that's a time to boost their metabolism? And we've mentioned avocados a lot in this interview. And I keep getting flashbacks to something that you share in your book, which is your 90 minute hack where you can determine if you're actually hungry and then you think about an avocado or something.  Yeah. So what are some tips and tricks for holidays and approaching them? And what is this 90 minute hack thing that you have?

Megan Ramos

Yeah, so you know, when it comes to the holiday season, there's there's all different kinds of things like, you know, trying to be the one that hosts it so you can play on the menu or offer to bring like charcuterie or different side dishes so you do know that there's something that you can have. I know here in the I live in the Bay Area now and we always go to our friends on Thanksgiving.  And I just know now to offer to bring my own side dishes and I make amazing brussel sprouts with pancetta and they love it. So everybody's excited. And then I'm mostly excited because I know there's a side dish there that I can really lean into. And I'm not stuck with bad options. So and most people who are hosting don't mind if you offer to help because it is a lot.  So I mean, there's things like that. In general, I do recommend eating and prioritizing, you know, some good fatty protein or fatty fiber source depending on where you lean more plant based and more animal based fatty protein or fatty plant or fiber source before you go. So you're nice and satiated before you show up to the party.  We do have a 90 minute hack to help you reach satiation at the start of your journey. But we have a 90 minute holiday hack is that when you show up, I know I'm unfortunately won't be home for Christmas this year. But when we are, you know, we show up at my mom's super early. So you can do like the presents, the old school presents, they get to be kids again, even like the age of 40 and 37.  And then we're just there for the whole day. And there's like food being put out after food being put out. But like the real main meals, not, you know, coming to like five o'clock, you know, you get there early, and there's all these appetizers and hors d'oeuvres. And I encourage people, you know, treat them like a mini meal.  So you're showing up, you know, dinner is still going to be a few hours away. Eat for 90 minutes, but cut it off. So like you're not grazing, you know, for three hours, you get to participate, you can focus on the foods that align with your sister or with your principles and food values. And then everybody thinks you're participating, and then you cut it off. And then you wait until mealtime.  And during that time, you know, enjoy different herbal teas, like mint tea that might suppress your appetite carbonated waters, flavored carbonated waters, just to help what we often see so much as people say, no, I'm going to fast to dinner, I'm going to show up at my sister's house at noon, and dinner is not going to be to six. And I'm going to avoid all of the pastries.  And I'm going to do a 24 hour fast. Don't do that. Please don't do that. Like wake up that day, have breakfast, prioritize the foods that make you feel satiated for that meal.

Megan Ramos

You know, so for like my family, we might have like bacon, eggs and avocado, you know, for for that meal.  And then we show up and we do enjoy some appetizers and dessert orders, like we don't shoot ourselves in the foot, and then spend, you know, six hours debating with people that you know, why we're fasting, and why we need to fast and why they should be fasting, like no one wants to get into that over the holidays. And so we show up, you know, we give by giving ourselves permission.  So this whole concept of food freedom that Melissa urban sort of coined, to a certain extent, you know, you're giving yourself permission to have something that way, you don't go overboard with it, right? When we show up with the attitude, we're not going to eat anything.  And we're going to fast into dinner, almost every single time, you know, the patient or client would come back and say, Well, I ended up eating everything. But when you show up and say, No, I'm going to eat the foods that align with my values, and I'm going to eat them for 90 minutes, and then cut off the timer. At that point, people then do stick to the foods that resonate with their values.  And they do cut off the timer, and then they avoid all of this family conflict. They are feeling satiated then because they stuck with the foods with their values. So that's a sort of the 90 minute recommendation. And a lot of our communities found that to be helpful.  And then if you are going to have, you know, something a little bit special at your at your meals, I do know, like whenever we're in Florida for Thanksgiving, my husband loves his godmother's like sweet potato casserole, and he will have it.  But he will eat everything else first, all of the other protein, fiber and fat sources that he's going to have, he will eat all of those first, and already feel pretty satiated before having any of that sweet potato. And then he's able to control his portion size. What we found was on, you know, all the days like that.  And this happened to me, I remember it was like my first Christmas, and I was going to eat my mom's roasted potatoes. And I was like a little four year old, I put all the food on my plate, and they went for the roasted potatoes first. But I ate roasted potatoes on a mostly empty stomach, my insulin spiked, my glucose was spiked, my appetite was spiked.  And then I was like a bottomless pit and like people stared at me. And then I knew for the next holiday, wait, no, the great fatty protein and fiber. And I went to have some of her special roasted potatoes, I could only eat a small portion of them because I was full. My appetite was suppressed, meaning all the other good foods.  So save any indulgent items that you have for last, fill up on the good fatty fiber protein sources first. And if you can use something like vinegar, so if you can appropriately add it to a particular carb dish, like if you are having potatoes, for example, maybe not sweet potato, casserole, but something else add some vinegar can make a big difference as well.

Melanie Avalon

Wow, that's so cool that you intuitively figured that out as a kid. You know, that's amazing with the potatoes.

Megan Ramos

I was like 27 at the time, but I felt like a kid the first time. I'm like, oh, I'm going to eat all of this. This is my Christmas present, potatoes. And it just went horribly wrong very quickly. I didn't have any self-restraint. And the next time, I'm like, no, I'm going to treat them like dessert on my plate, and I'm going to eat them last. And I had a lot more control that way.

Melanie Avalon

I love that. A final question about your book. So you were mentioning earlier how some people interpreted the book a certain way with what you're prescribing when it comes to fasting. So I'm curious, since releasing the book, also since having your pregnancy and everything, is there anything that you would go back and change or adjust with what you wrote, or do you want to write another book?  Have your thoughts evolved.

Megan Ramos

I would love to write a book on perimenopause and strategies. I think the essential guide to intermittent fasting for women, there was some information there for perimenopausal women, but I think it's such a unique time in a woman's life where there's so many hormonal changes going on. And there's a whole different game set of strategies.  And we gave some of the basic ones, the common ones in the book for effectiveness, but perimenopausal women trying to lose weight and treat or prevent insulin resistance from developing, they deserve their own book. There's a lot there. Of course, I would also love to write one for women who are struggling with PCOS geared towards fertility and positive fertility outcomes as well.  So we tried to make the essential guide to intermittent fasting for women with key pieces of information for women across the whole adult hormonal landscape and spectrum there. So there's definitely something for everyone, but I feel like those were two demographics where there could be whole books just dedicated to those particular things.  And then of course, the post-menopausal women, I think, have so much freedom and liberty with fasting and even some nutritional choices to a certain extent. And I wish if there was a second version, I could have highlighted that a little bit more.  So I know when we do our book club at the fasting method and we go through the book, we really try to highlight that so that the post-menopausal women really feel heard and seen. So those are some reflections now that it's been over a year. Those are some of my hopeful goals for the future, once I've slept for a few consecutive nights at some point, things that I'd like to work on.

Melanie Avalon

And to clarify with the perimenopausal woman, is that the category of woman that needs to be more, I guess, concerned about overfasting? It's interesting because a Megan, another Megan, she said that she really appreciates you. She said she heard you. She said hearing her on a podcast changed the way I think about my health and has helped me enormously.  And then she wanted to know, for a woman approaching perimenopause, how can they make sure they're not fasting excessively? So my question there is just, is perimenopause where that is more of an issue?

Megan Ramos

It can be, absolutely. Sometimes less fasting is definitely more in terms of results. And when we work with a perimenopausal woman, we need to see the labs and we really customize it. We really want to make sure we're being ultra sensitive to thyroid. When you're younger or even a bit older, you can beat up your thyroid a little bit, but we don't want that to happen during that time.  We really want to make sure we're loving and nurturing our thyroid. I know at adrenal glands, there's so many that's so important for just overall sex hormone balance. Taking a look at the different sex hormone balance, taking a look at their cortisol, and really planning their particular fasting and eating strategies around that.  Even from when we would work, have someone do an intensive workout, changes if they're having cortisol issues, especially going through perimenopause. There's a lot of stuff that we, I think it's the most time in a person's life where fasting really needs to be personalized based on a whole handful of hormones. Often less fasting is more and being really creative about how you structure it.  I think maybe millions of people have heard both Jason and I say, breakfast. But a lot of the times, we make breakfast one of the staple meals for the perimenopausal women. Especially when cortisol is high, we want to optimize the conversion of Friti 4 to Friti 3 in the morning rather than reverse C3. We see all these reverse C3 issues. We want to optimize that.  We don't want to make it worse throughout the day or in general. We often will implement breakfast, whether we're doing some shorter fast or are still doing some longer therapeutic fast. It's very personalized and we do tend to turn the fasting pile down a bit during this particular stage in life.

Melanie Avalon

I, and I'm sure others will eagerly await hopefully that book when you get some more sleep in you. Thank you so much, Megan. I really cannot express enough my gratitude I have for everything that you're doing. And literally, you are so wildly popular with my audience. It's insane.  And even having co-hosted the Intermittent Fasting Podcast with both Cynthia Thurlow and Vanessa Spina, they both say the same thing that just, you know, whenever they have you on their shows, it's just everybody is obsessed. So, um, thank you so much for what you're doing, friends, definitely get the essential guide to intermittent fasting for women.  I will hopefully can have you back in the future when you have a new book and some sleep in you and all the things.

Megan Ramos

Yes. Thank you, Melanie. And thanks to all of your listeners for everyone's support. And I will keep putting information out there, sleepless or not so sleepless. We will keep getting stuff out there, helping just real practical strategies, you know, because fasting is super doable for everybody, but it is a little bit nuanced, especially for us ladies.  So just keep getting the information out there so women know that it is safe for them, but I feel confident that the strategies that they're doing are safe for them. So thanks everyone for listening to my rambles and happy fasting and we'll see you soon.

Melanie Avalon

Yes, no, thank you. And I almost forgot last question. It's so easy. What is something you're grateful for?

Megan Ramos

Right now, I'm so grateful for everything I've learned about nutrition, because my my son was born early, and he was 1.6 percentile for weight. And it has been a journey, but he is absolutely thriving. And if I hadn't been through all of this, like he's going to have such a completely different life than I have. So grateful. Sorry. Anyways, he's a cool guy.  So he's not going to be part of the puffs generation. That is for sure. And I'm happy for for it. So we can make we can start making changes for the kids to come.

Melanie Avalon

Thank you so much. That is so powerful. I am overwhelmingly grateful. Congratulations to you and your beautiful boy, and have a wonderful year. We'll talk again soon. Thanks, Melanie. Thanks, everyone. Thank you. Thank you so much for listening to the Intermittent Fasting podcast.  Please remember, everything we discussed on this show does not constitute medical advice, and no patient-doctor relationship is formed. If you enjoyed the show, please consider writing a review on iTunes. We couldn't do this without our amazing team. Editing by podcast doctors, show notes and artwork by Brianna Joyner, and original theme composed by Leland Cox and recomposed by Steve Saunders.  See you next week.

Jan 26

Episode 406 – Eating Socially With IF, Brain Benefits Of Fasting, Whether Or Not To Weigh Yourself, Happy Scale App, Tracking The Fast Hours, And More!

Intermittent Fasting

Welcome to Episode 406 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast, hosted by Melanie Avalon, biohacker, founder of AvalonX, and author of What When Wine Diet: Lose Weight And Feel Great With Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, And Wine, and Barry Conrad, actor, singer-songwriter, and creator and host of Banter with BC


SHOW NOTES

SPONSORS & DISCOUNTS

PIQUE FASTING TEAS: Need the perfect drink for your fast? Fasting just got way easier with Pique tea! Created with Dr. Jason Fung, Pique's organic, toxin-free fasting teas curb your appetite, boost your metabolism, and keep you going strong. Get up to 20% off plus a free beaker at piquelife.com/ifpodcast.

LINKS:

Melanie's Podcast: The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast

More on Melanie: MelanieAvalon.com 

Barry's Podcast: Banter with BC

More on Barry: barryconradofficial.com

Featured Restaurant: Barmilano

Episode 388 with Dr. Naomi Parrella

Episode 399 with Megan Ramos


If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving us a review in Apple Podcasts!


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


Our content does not constitute an attempt to practice medicine and does not establish a doctor-patient relationship. Please consult a qualified healthcare provider for medical advice and answers to personal health questions.


TRANSCRIPT

(Note: This is generated by AI with 98% accuracy. However, any errors may cause unintended changes in meaning.)


Melanie Avalon

Welcome to episode 406 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, founder of AvalonX and author of What, When, Wine. Lose weight and feel great with paleo style meals, intermittent fasting and wine. And I'm joined by my co-hosts, Barry Conrad, actor, singer, songwriter, and creator and host of Banter with BC. For more on us, check out MelanieAvalon.com and BarryConradOfficial.com. You can submit questions for the show by emailing questions at iapodcast.com or by going to iapodcast.com. We would love to hear from you. Please remember the thoughts and opinions on this show do not constitute medical advice or treatment. 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 everybody and welcome. This is episode number 406 of the intermittent fasting podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon and I'm here with my co-host Barry Conrad. Barry, how are you today?

Barry Conrad

I'm doing really good actually i'm in beautiful melbourne australia for people who don't know australia melbourne's, really i said it's got lots of vibe good restaurants bars you love it but i'm doing really good it's a sunny day with a bit of a chill in the air which melanie would appreciate.

Melanie Avalon

we were talking earlier, I really should just live like half of the year in the US and half of the year in Australia.

Barry Conrad

I don't know how you go with the flying situation though, because it's like you'll be there for more than a day. You know that, right?

Melanie Avalon

I know, but like if I can set up my whole living situation, then it's okay. It's like the living out of hotels part that is not the best for me. But if I like lived there, yeah.

Barry Conrad

I'm in an apartment at the moment for a job but then straight after this i go to a hotel so i'm trying to copy and paste that to how you would handle that you in apartment for like three days and then change the hotel for like four days like you be like what was almost.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, that's see that's rough. Oh and don't downplay it. You're there for an awesome play that you're gonna be in

Barry Conrad

I'm so excited. It's called Destiny, and it comes out. Well, we start doing it next year, but we've started preparing here in Melbourne. So, I'm stoked.  If you ever come to Australia, come and check it out, guys. Anyway, how are you? How are you doing?

Melanie Avalon

role in the play.

Barry Conrad

I have played the male lead called his name's as returns and he's like an activist he's so much fun he's a young guy who comes back into the picture of a formal love and checks up world it's a story about loyalty family and it's set in the apartment in south africa so really intense and dramatic but also very funny and really harkens from my background i'm so that we can too so it's even more meaningful to be part of.

Melanie Avalon

Sounds so amazing. Have you met your, I guess obviously you've met your fellow cast members. Are you getting along with them?

Barry Conrad

It's kind of a blind date. I don't know. You'd probably know this as well, Melanie, as like, you know, when you meet people for the first time, it could kind of have a vibe or no vibe. But all of us are heading it off. So it's really good.  Any intermittent fasteners?

Melanie Avalon

You got to start pulling everybody you meet now that you're the co-host. I'm like, not really, but you don't have to do that.

Barry Conrad

That's really, that made me laugh. Not that I know of yet because everyone ate during lunch break yesterday. So maybe that was their window. I don't know.

Melanie Avalon

Did you eat during the lunch break?

Barry Conrad

I timed my windows so that I could have a meal with everyone for the first day just to be a team, you know, like be a team player, so I did time it so that I could have something.

Melanie Avalon

So you're like, you're going to ease them in to you, like, to your lifestyle habits. Situation, yeah, exactly.  That's like what I do. It's like if I'm meeting somebody new, I might, well, I guess I do tell them about my intermittent fasting, but I like try to set up the first things where it's not a situation where I'm just like not eating at the thing they're eating at. I like have my system down, my easing people in system.

Barry Conrad

So give me an example. If I was like a newbie, you were meeting me for the first time like a work colleague or whatever, and you knew this was coming up like in two days, what would you do?

Melanie Avalon

And I knew that I was like meeting people and like meeting you in two days.

Barry Conrad

And we will be like at a restaurant all kind of getting together here.

Melanie Avalon

Right. Yeah. So I would move gently the meeting towards drinks or drinks. I don't really do daytime meetings with people in real life.  I do a lot of virtual meetings, but yeah. Or I move it towards when you can get drinks or eat type situation thing where you do what you want. So not like a dinner dinner. That works too. Yeah.

Barry Conrad

This, this, I can't, you know, listeners, I can't wait to have a meal with Melanie in person because it's just going to be entertaining. I can't wait just to see, you know, I'm not going to say anymore.

Melanie Avalon

It's gonna be so fun, I'm so excited. Which speaking of, you have a restaurant for us today?

Barry Conrad

I do have a worship, but I still haven't asked you how you're doing. How are you doing?

Melanie Avalon

I am doing, thank you. You're so kind. I'm doing really well.  So this airs, this episode airs like end of January. So things I talk about right now will be in the past. But regardless, I am about to go this week to host on the red carpet for the biohack yourself premiere, which listeners may have, may be familiar with, but it has, has so many people in it. So many guests I've had on my show, like Dave Asprey and Aggie, and there's like a whole laundry list of people and then even RFK is in it. So I'm excited. I'm going to be traveling to Vegas. I already told you this, but I'm going to go for one day, host the carpet and go back. So that'll be fun. There's a few people there that I've been dying to meet in real life that I haven't met. So Ben Greenfield is going to be there. I have yet to meet Ben Azati in real life and I adore him. So yeah, there's like a quite a few people I'm excited to actually meet in person. It's always, it's always really exciting to meet people. I mean, you and I have not met in person. It's always so excited, like meet somebody finally in person that you know, virtually, you know.

Barry Conrad

Yeah i agree i think as well melt it's amazing what that opportunity that's gonna be good i think you're perfect for so i can't wait to see all the clips in the footage and make sure you post so we can keep up.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, thank you. I will. I'll be doing all the stories. Have you been to Vegas before? I'm sure you have.

Barry Conrad

I've been to vegas but not really be on the airport that much so i don't really have i don't know enough to have like a proper opinion about it but it seems like a pretty pretty fun city have you.

Melanie Avalon

I'm just reflecting on how that was such a wonderful perspective of the world to say you don't know enough to have a proper opinion. If everybody could realize that about so many things, I feel like we would be a better society.

Barry Conrad

It's like you talk to someone it's like what do you think of i hate america so when did you go well i haven't been but i just i just don't like it.

Melanie Avalon

Exactly. It's like, okay. So in college, my roommate actually was from Vegas. And that was a moment I was like, Oh, you can actually like be from Vegas. You know, you don't really think of people like living there. I actually only went it's very close to LA, but I only went once, I think. And it was for a convention. So it was not I like didn't do the Vegas thing, you know, and I'm not doing it now either.  I don't know. Am I? I'm going to be at like the Venetian hotel, which is nice. There won't be time to like gamble or anything. Do you gamble?

Barry Conrad

I mean, I have on a TV show that I was on, but I don't really do it in real life, but I have to learn for that reason. But I think, I mean, what about after the situation? When you're done with your work, you've done the whole situation, you've met everyone, done the hosting.  What about going out that night and just going out on the town with some of the peeps? Well, but...

Melanie Avalon

agenda, it goes until really, really late. It's like a, it's like an all night thing. Like they start the screening and it's not a full screening. It's just like trailers because I think it's like a whole docu-series, but I think that starts at like 10. I don't know. I think it's going to be over, that part will probably be over at like 1am.  So I don't think I'm going to, yeah. We'll see. We'll see where the night goes.

Barry Conrad

It's just you getting started though, like you wake up at like what so late anyway, right?

Melanie Avalon

This is true. Although the time difference and with me not getting there any earlier, it's a three-hour time difference. So 1 a.m. there is like 4 a.m. here. It's gonna be fun.  You should come. Do you want to come?

Barry Conrad

I'd love to come, but yeah, I'd probably be trying to pull you into the festivities afterwards like let's go out. Let's check out the city Blackberry. I can't. I'm too tired.

Melanie Avalon

I wouldn't it's not that I'm tired. It's that I have to like go to bed. Those are two different things. Yeah, next time next time

Barry Conrad

And you can try the food while you're there, and speaking of food, we have a restaurant.

Melanie Avalon

Yes, so a little tradition, tradition, I guess so. Something that Barry and I are starting where every episode we're gonna profile just quickly a restaurant and we're gonna tell you guys what we would personally order during our eating window from the menu.  What restaurant do you have for us today?

Barry Conrad

So today, I've got a restaurant called Bar Milano on Maroubra Beach in beautiful Sydney. It happens to be the resident venue where I film Bent with BC, but there's not an ad. This is only because I love it so much.  It was founded by Patrick, Georgette, and the team. It's a fusion of the best Northern Italian food you can think of with Australia's coastline. So it's this really awesome concoction of flavor culture heritage. So I think you'd love it, Mel. You wouldn't want to leave. You'd be dining and whining and dining and whining for hours, I reckon.

Melanie Avalon

I did not realize that this was the restaurant where you filmed that show. Awesome. That's amazing.

Barry Conrad

And you've seen stuff before, so you know it looks good.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, so I'm looking at the okay, so it's a it's an a la carte menu it says

Barry Conrad

Yeah, so you go. So basically, you can see see there's some starters. Okay, we got to talk about this. So starters, main dish, and dessert. Is that what we said?

Melanie Avalon

Yes, we had to come up with the terminology. Yes. So what would you get for the starter?

Barry Conrad

love calamari so i would definitely get calamari with the rocket and the aioli there i love i love the arancini arancini balls they're so good i'll get that and burrata which you know like the cheese yeah that's me

Melanie Avalon

Okay, I would probably get the cold cuts and cheese, but only eat the cold cuts. Oh, and the prawns. That's shrimp, right? Prawns are shrimp or no?

Barry Conrad

Melanie, they're really good, really good.

Melanie Avalon

Is it different than shrimp? No.  It's the same thing. Yes, and that. Yeah, prawns and cold cuts. I'm going to be really predictable by the time we've done this a few times. I couldn't order the same thing everywhere.

Barry Conrad

people, listeners will be like, I know Melanie and Zoda, like give me any restaurant, I could just choose.

Melanie Avalon

Pretty much. How about for your main meal?

Barry Conrad

The main dish situation, this was a really hard choice, but I'm gonna have to go with the pappardelle, the pasta, because I love that beef ragu, that's my jam. It's gotta be me.

Melanie Avalon

Pasta is one of my favorite things that I don't eat.

Barry Conrad

That's the sound butt of this episode, the intro.

Melanie Avalon

Like, on my deathbed, I am just eating fettuccine alfredo, like, on repeat. Oh, so good. And so I would get the pork cutlet.

Barry Conrad

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. For sure. What about – would you have anything with that, like a side or anything? Like, would you just have that?

Melanie Avalon

if they have like, I don't, I'm seeing, I'm trying to see, oh, here's a little fun fact for listeners. It's not too annoying for the kitchen, but you can usually get sides that are not listed if you see them somewhere else with something else.  So like right now I'm looking to see if they have spinach on anything because I would see if they had like steam spinach, but I don't see that anywhere. Yeah. Typically, I just see if they have like steam spinach.

Barry Conrad

Sell it? Like, cost letters and soft herbs?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I really like the meat a lot.

Barry Conrad

That's your thing.

Melanie Avalon

And then for dessert, what would you get?

Barry Conrad

You know I like to get two of things too.

Melanie Avalon

Yes, like I sometimes I usually get two entrees, but not this time.

Barry Conrad

Do you really? I have to go with the tiramisu and the gelato and the crosstata, diperia, poached pear, tart, and mascarpone. So those three, I have to do it. It just all looks too good doing it. I support it.

Melanie Avalon

I probably get more prawns.

Barry Conrad

But like, would you guys like some dessert? I'm like, I'll have this, this, this, this, and I'll, can I have some more prawns, please?

Melanie Avalon

I'm just prepping you for when we get our meal together for the first time. You're going to be so ready. I'm going to do this. I'm not kidding.  Like this is not a joke. Really? No, this is no, this is not completely serious. It's called a savory dessert. People do it. And I learned that term because a waiter said that to me because I, one time I ordered the salmon for dessert. He's like, Oh, I asked him, I was like, do other people do this? He's like, yeah, sometimes people get savory desserts. And I was like, Oh, see, it's a thing. It's a rare thing, but it's a thing.

Barry Conrad

I think I might just try just to see how I go like if my system freaks out that I'm not having a sweet treat or if it's all good maybe I should try it.

Melanie Avalon

It's definitely awesome to get in even more protein. People say you can't get enough protein in one meal. Try me.

Barry Conrad

You can, trust me.

Melanie Avalon

You can. Okay. Well, that was fun. We will put a link in the show notes to your show so people can see Bancer with BC so people can see this restaurant.

Barry Conrad

see the food more importantly and the amazing guests but the food too. You're so funny. What did you say? Fettuccine is like pasta is one of my favorite dishes that I don't eat.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, that and Funfetti. Okay, well, on that note, so we have some questions for Barry, although, okay, so Barry, the context of this, these are questions for you, and the people who asked them actually don't know it's you yet.  Because I asked question, because while we're recording this, we have not yet aired your first episode, so it's still a secret. I think in this post, people knew that you're a male co-host, but they don't know who it is. But here's some listener questions for you, and some we kind of touched on like two weeks ago, so we can like briefly recap those. So Michelle, for example, I'm actually gonna combine these two different ones, because you can answer both together. So Michelle wants to know what brought you to IF, and Andrea wants to know how long have you been intermittent fasting? And then Andrea has another question, but yeah, so when did you start again, and so how long has it been?

Barry Conrad

started around late 2018, late 2018, beginning of 2019. So it's been a few years now.  And, you know, I started hearing about it at that time. And that's how I found this podcast cue. And, you know, how I could potentially, you know, help with my body composition and muscle that really attracted me to it. I heard about the energy and the focus that you can get, which was like, tada, there was like a bulb in my mind that went off. So went straight in, I dove straight into that, and have been sort of hooked ever since.

Melanie Avalon

The energy and focus is so incredible. It's like something you just don't know until you experience it, in my opinion.

Barry Conrad

You're right. It's like a razor sharp focus that you get listeners.  You have to like, you'll know what we mean if you're already an intermittent faster. And if you're not yet, it's definitely something that you will experience.

Melanie Avalon

The thing it reminds me of is I remember before I was fasting, there would be times that I would be like really excited about something or like in the zone. And I would just have this feeling of like, Oh, this is like the feeling of, of just energy and focus and like dopamine, but it was rare. It would really only happen and like highlight key moments of my life.  And then I started fasting. I was like, Oh, you can feel like this every day. This is so great.

Barry Conrad

Who knew? She's not wrong. It's true. You do.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. And then Andrea also wants to know, do you have any particular diet that you follow?  And I don't, I actually don't think I asked you that two episodes ago. So do you have any particular diet that you follow?

Barry Conrad

Andrew, that's a great question. You know what? I used to follow a paleo style approach back in the day. Then after I started fasting, I gravitated more towards just prioritizing my protein, making sure it's high protein meals and having carbs in there. But depending on what I'm preparing for, if it's a shoot or performance or whatnot, I'll tweak the carb limitations, like how much carbs I have, if that makes sense. It's about staying flexible for me and intentional about keeping that focus on the high protein. That's a big deal for me.  Does that answer your question?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I think it does. So so basically, here's my question, my follow up question.  So are any foods off limits for you? Or is it more about, you know, the protein, the macros, things like that? And how strict were you when you were doing paleo? Were you like really strict?

Barry Conrad

I was really strict during Paleo, actually. I'd go out to eat with people and just have, for example, if I'm going to a breakfast spot, I would order a big breakfast always, and I'd just lose the bread, lose the hash brown, which is a potato fried situation, lose any of that stuff, and just have the poached eggs, bacon. I would have the halloumi cheese, tomato, mushroom, spinach. I was pretty strict with that.  And I would just never have bread, pretty much, ever. But now I definitely have rice, lots of rice. I don't have still as much bread, because it bloats me, depending on what kind of bread it is. But I don't steer away. I'm not as strict. But yeah, in terms of ultra-processed, it's like a no zone for me until I'm unless I planned it most of the time.

Melanie Avalon

Do you find that since you started fasting that you can quote, get away with more with what you eat compared to before you were doing that?

Barry Conrad

I definitely think that I can and I try I sometimes it's kind of cheeky because I'll play with that and and sometimes I've tipped it too far admittedly like let me just have a little something more but I usually just pull it straight back in again because I know what effect it has on me and and not just to look how I feel. You just feel that there's you know what I mean Melanie like having the ultra processed all that sugar and whatnot you just don't feel as good but yeah I can get away with a lot more which is interesting because before fasting I didn't eat as much and I would gain like a lot of body fat for example or look a lot more bloated now I can I actually eat more every day and I can incorporate like some trinkets here and there and be fine you know.

Melanie Avalon

That's definitely my experience as well, which I just really really really appreciate and love.  Okay, well actually speaking of because Jackie has two questions and I'm gonna read them in reverse order. She says have you ever had a weight problem?

Barry Conrad

Hi, Jackie. What's up? How's it going? Hope you're having a good day.  I've never had a weight issue per se, but I would definitely say before fasting, I looked stockier. I don't know how you would say that in America, kind of like more full-faced, a bit more bulky. Puffier? Maybe a bit puffier, like holding a bit more water. Only in hindsight, I can say that now, looking back. But I definitely was a bit more puffy, holding a bit more water weight and I found that harder to shift. So in terms of like a weight issue, it wasn't really an issue, but that's the difference. But yeah, there's a noticeable difference now for me.

Melanie Avalon

And then her second question was, why are you qualified to co-host an intermittent fasting podcast? It's like you're in a job interview. Did I even ask you this? I don't think so.

Barry Conrad

It's like, Barry, why are you qualified? Like, what makes you here for this position? I would say my qualification, it comes from experience. I've been living this intimate and fasting, like lifestyle consistently now for a few years, I've, I've gotten results from it. I've, I've learned what sort of works for me and also what doesn't work for me. So I feel like I can comment on that. People that follow me will also say that's something that, you know, Barry's done consistently. Like we would trust his opinion, what he has to say, cause he hasn't deviated from that. So that's, I mean, that's what I would say. That's what qualifies me.  What do you think, Melody? Do you think that qualifies me?

Melanie Avalon

I think it qualifies you. I am super excited having you here because you walk the walk, not just talk the talk.  Like you were saying, and I'm saying now, you've been doing the intermittent fasting, you see how it works, and you really understand the importance of protein. And I think we are two good examples of how you can embrace an intermittent fasting lifestyle with different levels of intensity and strictness, like with the food and everything. So for me, I'm like really crazy. But I like it. I'm not doing it out of fear or because I feel like I have to. I just like it. It makes me feel good. And then you know what works for you. We just talked about it, the protein and adjusting the carbs if needed, but then also having that flexibility. And then I also love that you do exercise and weightlifting and things like that because that's a whole another perspective that you can touch on.

Barry Conrad

I was going to add, thank you so much for saying that, by the way, Mel really appreciate that I was going to add as well, I feel like what I bring what I can bring to this is, you know, a perspective that other people can relate to particularly guys because I am really into my resistance training and I'm not like a gym bro, but I go to the gym a lot, you know, and so that's a big part of my life and a lot of guys might have the misconception that fasting is going to make me lose my gains here to tell you guys. That's not the case and I'm super excited for just more guys to hear that.  So that's a huge thing for me. I'm really excited.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I'm super excited about that. And we actually have a good question next week where we're going to talk about a lot of muscle stuff and science on it. So listeners get excited for that.  And you're you're very like smart and intelligent. And so I'm really excited. You know, because we get a lot of questions that require doing research and things like that. And I'm really excited to see where we go down the research rabbit holes. It's gonna be fun.

Barry Conrad

I'm stoked i'm so excited about that i love researching so let's go coming.

Melanie Avalon

fun. Okay, Kyoko says I like this one. Do you have it is very cool name. Do you have any disagreements with Melanie about certain IF or biohacking protocols?

Barry Conrad

all the time, all the time. Just before this episode, we had a huge fight. It was so hard to...

Melanie Avalon

argument. I was crying. It was...

Barry Conrad

No, not yet. Not yet. Right. Well, but I mean, honestly, no.  And I know a lot of people like lie about stuff like that. But Melanie, you're incredibly knowledgeable about intermittent fasting and biohacking and what you know what you're talking about. And so far, we've been on the same page about most of that. And I love I also love that we can have open conversations and never never feels like anything's out of bounds. When we talk about this, we can share different approaches. But at some point, at some point, we'll find things that we probably see differently. But I'm here for that because I feel I feel like it would be boring if we saw things exactly the same way. What do you think?

Melanie Avalon

I feel the same way. I'm really excited.  I'm excited to see where it goes and what things we do find that we have differing opinions on. And something I think that is so important just in general is I really value having an open mindset, an open perspective. I love when you can engage with somebody and you don't have to worry about offending them or having differing opinions because I just think differing opinions and opinions in general are just important. So yeah, I'm excited to see where it goes. We'll have to see.

Barry Conrad

Well, we'll see. Watch the space listeners if we have any fights or anything.

Melanie Avalon

Oh my gosh. Nydia wants to know what are his non-scale victories. Do you know that term?

Barry Conrad

I do know that term through this podcast, actually.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, yay. So people often abbreviate them NSVs, which, so for listeners, basically non-weight related benefits that you've experienced from intermittent fasting.

Barry Conrad

It's a good question. I have so many and listeners, if you check out, was it episode four or five, Melanie? We actually, Melanie and I actually go through our top I have benefits, which it's a really, really good episode, really good takeaways. So I won't go through all of them, but I can't get past the energy and the focus.  Like it's such a huge thing for me because my days, they fall on. So that razor sharp focus, I can't get past that. It's one of the most attractive things for me. And second of all, I'll just say that eliminates a lot of decisions around food and takes, I have enough decisions to make on the daily. I don't need to be thinking all day, what do I eat? What do I eat? So probably those two things I'll mention now, but definitely go back to that episode and have a listen to both of our benefits.

Melanie Avalon

And some of the reason, like some of the science behind the focus, I mean, it's quite a few different things, but when you're in the fasted state, you're just running off the body fat, you're generating ketones. So you have a really stable energy supply and our brain is a very energy hungry organ in our body. You know, it's responsible for so much of our daily metabolism and it constantly needs fuel. And so when we're in the fed state and living from snack to snack, meal to meal, our insulin is going up and down, our energy levels are going up and down. So it's not giving the brain that, you know, consistent energy stream that it gets when you're fasted.  And then fasting also does things like bumps up BDNF, which is a neurotropic factor in the brain that's kind of like miracle growth for the brain. It really helps support the brain's performance and it's anti-aging. And so that's a big deal. And then just like the neurotransmitters in general that are released by fasting are often even things like adrenaline and norepinephrine, epinephrine are very stimulating for the brain. So there's lots of, lots of benefits.  I love it.

Barry Conrad

Same and you know what is there is the scale I don't often wear myself because Melanie correct me if I'm wrong it can be really deceiving it just a regular scale because muscle weighs more than fat a and it's just. If from even throughout the day you can have like a couple drinks of water and then your weight on the scale will change so I kind of don't really go by scales anyway.

Melanie Avalon

Scales are interesting. I feel like there's a lot of different opinions. Like some people will say, I think, I think it depends on your goals. It depends on you, like different opinions out there.  Like some people say don't weigh yourself. Like because of a lot of the reasons you just mentioned, some people will say, just go off of like body measurements and things like that. Then on the weighing front, some people will say you should weigh every single day at the same time because you want to capture all those little fluctuations. And then some people will say, no, you should weigh like once a week at the same time. I have my thoughts, but so for you, you don't weigh.

Barry Conrad

Well, let me zoom out for a second. I don't not weigh, but I don't own a scale. And that's also in part due to past issues with body image stuff. But at the gym, there's scale there.  So what I will do, if I can control this variable, is if I've fasted consistently the same window in a given week and ate relatively the same foods, and I'm going to the gym always in the fastest state in the morning, I've used the restroom, blah, blah, blah. Then I'll jump on the scale before anything else. That is a more accurate representation of what's happening in terms of my weight if I kind of average that out over the week. But if I can't control those variables, it's going to be different for me anyway. I could be wrong, but yeah.

Melanie Avalon

I love that. The most variables that you could control to make it as consistent from that data, I think is so important.  So like everything you said, like before you're eating in the morning, there's actually an app I really, really like. It's called Happy Scale. Have you heard of it? What is it? Tell me that. It's really great. Well, first of all, before I talk about Happy Scale, because that's just an app. We talked about this a lot when Jen was the co-host because she was obsessed with her shape of scale. That's a scale that is an actual scale, but it doesn't actually show you a weight number. It just shows you a color and the color lets you know if you're like maintaining, gaining or losing. So some people like that. They don't want to actually see the number. Happy Scale. I love this app. So it's an app on your phone. You put in your weight, ideally like you were saying at the same time, every day. And what it does, it takes into account, I don't know how its algorithms work. And obviously, it's better the more you use it, but it takes into account fluctuations and your overall trend. And so it tells you, it really creates graphs and it really shows you, are you actually losing or gaining fat? So you might find that you put in a number that is the same as yesterday, but it'll be like, oh, you actually lost weight. Or you might put in a number that's higher than yesterday and it'll say that it could be different than what you thought. You might put in a number lower than yesterday and it doesn't say that you lost weight because it takes into account all of the data. I really recommend it. It's called Happy Scale.

Barry Conrad

That's really cool. I actually really like that.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, you can put in your goal weight and it'll tell you like you made progress and it never will tell you that you backtracked the purpose of it is to make you always feel like you're moving forward while giving you very clear honest data.

Barry Conrad

Yeah. I love that. I think I'm going to check that out. Thanks for the rec, Mel.  I mean, for example, I'm here in Melbourne right now, a city that's vibrant with food and restaurants and trinkets and all the stuff I love. After this podcast, if I went out and indulged in all the foods I wanted, I'm sitting around 80 kgs at the moment. I know that because it's been consistent. But if I smash all that food, I know confidently tomorrow I'll be up maybe 83, 84, but I wouldn't freak out because I know it's not just fat. It's just the effects that you cannot outrun that food have in your body. So it's just about having perspective on that, knowing your body, knowing what food does to it, and then not freaking out if there's a fluctuation in a day.

Melanie Avalon

Exactly. And like, if you think about it, the human body, like our body is around like 60% water anyways, and it can fluctuate, you know, different numbers, that's a lot of water to fluctuate around numbers, you know, there's just so many different factors that can, that can change. And then the fact that carbs are so worth water or not, the role of burning fat versus muscle versus losing carbs, there's just, there's so many things factors that come into play.  So you have to check out Happy Scale. Let me know what you think. And check it out. I'll make a note and actually related because you and I had talked about talking about this. We're talking about tracking weight right now. How do you feel about tracking the fast?

Barry Conrad

Ah, okay. Well, it's really cool because when I first started fasting, I love data. I don't know the email, so I just I loved the idea of getting an app and tracking. I think out of necessity at first, like, am I sticking to this properly? Because I dozed right into like 19 hours. And I just wanted to, I was kind of watching the clock tick to be honest at first, like, as soon as it went 19, I got the food, I had the food in front of me ready to go.  But funnily enough, just a couple weeks ago, and I think I even mentioned this to you, Mel, I got rid of it, I got rid of the app. And I, I decided it's time to trust myself and that'll be consistent and build a routine that works long term rather than freak out and have the training wheels sort of quote unquote on the whole time because I've done it long enough now. I haven't looked at any clocks and I feel amazing. And I'm just trusting the process rather than keeping an eye on it. But to be honest, I think it's really helpful in the beginning for people starting out. That's my take. What about you?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I have a really similar take. And I remember because I think because we were talking and I said, I don't ever track and you're like, Oh, I think I'm going to try that.  So yeah, I think, I think definitely in the beginning, I think it'd be really important to help people adopt to the intermittent fasting lifestyle. I know for me, I when I first started, I was tracking, I was tracking like the minimum amount of fasted hours, like I wanted to fast a minimum amount of hours. And I always made sure that I went that number. And I don't even remember what that number was. I don't remember.

Barry Conrad

Look, 16.

Melanie Avalon

I want to say 16, but that doesn't actually make sense based on what I was eating. So it probably was like 18 or 19 or 20. I think having that accountability and something you can track in the beginning is really, really important, like I said, because especially a lot of people have to adapt, their metabolism has to learn to be flexible and switch into the fat burning state. So having a tracker of sorts can just make you commit to it and then let your body figure it out and adapt from there.  And then I think after that, it's really what makes you happy. And I know for me, I really like not tracking now. So I don't ever track anything. I just do my one meal day in the evening and that's what I do. I don't count hours. I don't track. I think the only time I would track is if I were wanting to do a longer fast, then I would probably do it for that. But that's what works for me.  And some people might, I don't know. I'd be curious, listeners, do any of you guys perpetually track for years and years and years?

Barry Conrad

Yeah, we should put up a poll on the Instagram and see where people and also ask on the Facebook.

Melanie Avalon

about that? That's a really good question.  I'm actually really curious. I'd be curious because I know we've had, we'll put a link in the show notes, we interviewed one of the head people of the Xero app, Dr. Naomi Parela. She was incredible. I really loved interviewing her. Her specialty, her background is really helping, she has like a clinical background helping people lose weight. We actually talked a lot about wasympic and things like that as well, but that's your app. It's probably like the go-to fasting app. Is that the one that you use, Xero?

Barry Conrad

That's the one that I used. I didn't want to say like, it's not an ad. We're not sponsored by this, but yeah, that's the one that I definitely used and stuck with that the whole time.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so that's a really great app. I think it helps so many people and it's evolved a lot.  Because when I first used it, I used it like in the beginning that it was created and it couldn't do that much stuff. And then I was revisiting it, interviewing her. Yeah, I can do a lot. So I think it's a great motivational tool for a lot of people, definitely a great accountability tool. So I think you just have to know what works for you. But I think if there's a lot of freedom and knowing that you can use it or you cannot use it, but like not feeling like you have to use it or you're tied to it or a fear based mindset, I would never want that with it.

Barry Conrad

If you had to guess roughly what your average would be like in a week, like how many hours minimum do you think that you'd probably follow generally? Yeah, what would you say? Do you know?

Melanie Avalon

I kind of would have to look at it backwards, which is how long do I usually eat every day? And that's usually probably like four hours.  So I probably fast around 20, if I were to guess. Yeah, how about you?

Barry Conrad

generally like my average is always been well in the beginning was nineteen then i went to then i tried eighteen didn't love that went back to nineteen then went up to twenty twenty one that went back to twenty and i told between nineteen and twenty for ages and i just said you know what let me set it at nineteen on the app. Because then i always over like i always got twenty twenty one rather than trying to meet that twenty you know it's just psychologically always work that way.

Melanie Avalon

That's a nice little psychological trick.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, because otherwise, like it's kind of like watching a kettle boil or like watching the clock when you're trying to wait for, you know, it just feels like forever when you do that.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so we probably fast around the same ish. I think so.

Barry Conrad

Although, I will say I eat pretty quickly, which I'm trying to work on as well, just enjoy it, take my time. So I feel like, generally speaking, I eat in a very short window, but then I just kind of would count from then onwards rather than, you know, because I'm not eating for four hours, quote unquote, but it's still 20 hours fast, so I just start 20 hours from when I finish eating.  Does that make sense?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, but then there must be like a catch up day where, well, I guess because you change around the meal timing of your meal, things kind of like even out and settle.

Barry Conrad

through for work and stuff as well, like I'll eat. Some days will be a completely different time and I'm not freaked out about that.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, that makes sense. When you eat at restaurants, do you eat fast?

Barry Conrad

I'm more mindful that I'm with other human beings and that I don't want to look like a pig, so I try to take my time more, but people genuinely will be like, man, you inhaled that or whatnot. I think with you, I'll probably just be myself and just eat the way I eat, but if I'm at a business meeting or something like that or meeting people the first time, I'm like, I try not to just eat, try to talk maybe a bit, drink a little something, eat, you know what I mean?  What about you?

Melanie Avalon

So funny. Yeah, we're different. I'm a slow eater. I'm like the girl at the restaurant. I'm like the last person to finish my plate. Always.  I like dragging it out. A, I eat that way anyways. And then B, I just like milking the experience, like dragging it out. And yeah, it's also like, I find it difficult to eat and talk. I mean, like, that's another reason I like eating slow. I feel like it's easier to engage socially if you're eating really slow.

Barry Conrad

I think so too. You know what, Melanie, you've inspired me not just to try a savory dessert, but to really, mindfully, I'm going to try it just to go slower than what I normally do.  It'd probably drive me crazy, but let me just try to slow it down, smaller bites, chill, see what happens. I don't know if I want to go.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. Let me know. You can work on that muscle so then when we get our dinner, because it's going to be a long dinner, so prepare yourself.

Barry Conrad

No, well, I know it's going to be a long, but that also means I'm going to go in. I'm going to order more and more food while I wait for you to have your one situation.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, you could just like eat more. While I'm going slow, slow, slow.

Barry Conrad

Are you going to judge me? I'm kind of like.

Melanie Avalon

I don't judge. You do you. I want everybody to do themselves. I want everybody to do what makes them happy.

Barry Conrad

I still really am determined to one day guess what I'm gonna say has to do with you.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, it could be a few different things. Is it to have me like eat cake or something?

Barry Conrad

Yes, that was the first thing. Yeah. Was that it? And watch you do it and like fill it like, you know, be so fun just to see your reaction.

Melanie Avalon

What's funny is i was like starting to answer it but then i was like what he said something that he's doing and i'm answering about me i was like no i think this is a pretty sure this is it.

Barry Conrad

the cake.

Melanie Avalon

You want to, like, be present there.

Barry Conrad

just like one bite of like, well, you don't like chocolate. So you'd probably like a vanilla cake or something like that.  Cause I don't know if there's a fun study, unless it's the thing in restaurants in America, it's not a thing here in restaurants. So I don't know.

Melanie Avalon

They do have it at some restaurants, but it's not like what you make at home. But it is at some places.

Barry Conrad

That's happening, I'm going to try even if I attempt and fail, I just want to see what your actions like very stop.

Melanie Avalon

you know, forcing me to eat this. It's funny because I like to encourage people to like follow their dreams and succeed, like you're going to fail. I'm just telling you it's funny, like, like, I just know myself so well. Like I, I won't eat it. Like, I don't know what you could do it unless you literally like forced it down my throat to like make me eat it.

Barry Conrad

We'll do like a scenario at some point. I think we're going to go on too long if I keep talking about this, but we'll throw some scenarios at you in the future and see if it'll change your mind.  Like if this happened, would you do it?

Melanie Avalon

Okay. Yeah, that's, yeah, we should do that. Yeah. Okay. We'll see.  We'll see. All right. So turning the tables, do you have any questions for me about podcasting? I've been asking you a lot of questions these past few episodes.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, you know what? And I feel kind of greedy about that. You've been asking me all the questions. So I've got a few that I'd like to ask you.

Melanie Avalon

All righty, and you are not greedy. I've been here for like seven years, so I'm excited to hear your questions.

Barry Conrad

Should we dive in? So what originally inspired you to get so deep into the world of intermittent fasting and make it such a sensual part of your life and career?

Melanie Avalon

I tried it for a week as a diet experiment amidst all the other diet experiments and the shocking amount of effectiveness it had, not only for weight loss, which you can't really realize that right away in a few days, but just everything we've been talking about, like the way it made me feel, the energy, the focus, the time, getting that, I think getting that time back might have been one of the main things in the beginning. I was like, whoa, I don't have to be, because this is when I was in college and I was literally like, because I had my classes throughout the day and I would like go to class like feverishly bike to my apartment to like, I mean Barry style, like cram down a meal, then like feverishly bike back to class, like it was so stressful, like having to plan that all out and I was like, whoa, I could just not do that. I could literally just not worry about it until dinner and then at dinner I could eat like all I want, which was so exciting because I've always been the type of person that, I feel like there are different people when it comes to like food and like some people I've never been my entire life. Like whenever you go to like speaking of being at a restaurant, like I feel like there are two main types of people. Like there are people who finish their plate always and people who don't. And it like always blew my mind that people, I mean, I wish I was this type, but like don't eat all their food. Like, like for me, I like just, I could always just keep eating always since I was little. That's how I feel. So I was never the type that I would like leave food on the plate. So the point of that is it was really exciting to be able to just like feast at night and eat all I want and then go to bed and not have to always be set.  Literally it's like when I would start eating, it's like, oh, I love this food, but I have to stop soon. Like, and I know that maybe that makes me sound, I don't know, like disordered, but I do think there were some people that really just like eating more than others. So fasting lets me like do all of that and not have the negative ramifications. And on the flip side actually have health benefits. It became more part of my life, like with what I'm doing here, because I was doing it before it was popular, like colloquially in the, in the social world. So I needed, I wanted to have like resources for people because I knew it was going to become more popular and I knew people would be like wanting to learn about it. So you know, that's why I wanted to podcast and I wrote my book originally because people thought it was so weird and I was like, I just got to have some sort of resource I can give to people so they'll know the science behind it. So yeah, it was like good timing, no pun intended for everything.

Barry Conrad

So good. And you've been really open about your journey with food sensitivities. Has fasting helped you manage those better? And if so, how? Oh, yeah.

Melanie Avalon

Yes, for sure, because it's really hard to, well, A, I guess making concentrated specific dietary choices is helpful for that as well, but in addition, when you are fasting and you go into the fastest state, it's very anti-inflammatory, your system clears out from all the food. And then when you eat the food, you really can tell, at least for me, how you're reacting to it.  And so I can tell, it just gives me a lot more clarity. It's like a flashlight or a mirror on how I'm reacting to food. And then on top of that, it's really healing for the gut and all the things. And I know, I've been talking about this for seven years, but I know it sounds crazy how plain I eat and simple, but I just genuinely, I found that when I cut out all the other food, I just genuinely love the taste of plain food. So yeah, but no, it's definitely really helpful for me for the sensitivities, for sure.

Barry Conrad

And is there, is this something you're still experimenting with in your own fasting?

Melanie Avalon

Oh, more so maybe with food things, but with the fasting, I so it's interesting because a lot of people will change around their fasting. I mean, you know, you change yours around with like the time that you eat and things like that. And a lot of people, especially women, find that they need to change it up.  I know like I, we recently had Megan Ramos on the show around a month ago. We'll I think she said this on the show that like she thinks it's a bad idea to eat, you know, the same window every day, or like one meal a day every day. And a lot of people do think that and I do think that's probably the case for a lot of people. It's often hard, especially for women to get enough protein in that eating window. But for me, like I've been very consistent for years and years and years, like over a decade. And the only really experimentations I've done, I've tried a couple times longer fast, I have tried eating earlier, and that does not work for me. So I'm pretty settled in what I do. I don't foresee many experiments. I kind of tried those and like didn't like them.

Barry Conrad

Okay. Has your, like, has your personal approach to intermittent fasting changed over the years?  And what's one thing you've learned from hosting this podcast that's changed your personal approach to fasting?

Melanie Avalon

There's a lot of change with my food choices, but with the fasting, not really, just those brief experiments with like, I've tried fasting mimicking diet before, I've tried longer fasts. Like I said, I've tried eating earlier occasionally, but I don't like it. So there hasn't been a lot of change or experimentation on my part for fasting.  Things I've learned from this show so, like honestly so much because we've been getting so, when we get so many questions and it's so many things I would never even think of to research or look up. So it's a ton. I'm trying to think of something that I've learned from this show that I like implemented in my life. I have done, oh, well, that would be something that I've experimented with with fasting. In the past, I did try like Bulletproof coffee, you know, putting like butter in your, not the brand, but like Dave's concept of like putting, you know, butter in your coffee and MCT oil in your coffee. I've experimented with that. I definitely experimented with the MCT oil in the coffee during the course of this show and learning more about it and things like that. It doesn't work for me.  It actually makes me like hungrier. Yeah, especially the MCT oil, but it's just interesting because yeah, the majority of my experiments have been food related. And I feel like, so if we go through like the history of the coho, so like Jen, she was pretty consistent with doing one meal a day, you know, every day, but she would eat all different things. Cynthia, she had a pretty consistent window, but much earlier than mine. And I also think she would like change it up a little bit. And then Vanessa would change things up a lot, like experiment with a lot of different things. And then I feel like you are the most varied in that I feel like when Vanessa's doing, like Vanessa changes around a lot, but when she changes, she's pretty consistent with the new thing she's doing, if that makes sense. Whereas I feel like with you, your schedule, with your fasting, like you're kind of like a puzzle where it's like shifting around, but you're mostly getting in that 20 hours. Does that make sense? Like yours seems to be more changing daily than the other cohosts. Those are good questions.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, well, I've got another one for you. Do you have time for one more? Yeah. So you've talked a lot about biohacking, of course. That's a massive part of your life.  You've talked a lot about biohacking in relation to fasting. So do you have any biohacking protocols that you think pair really well with intermittent fasting for maximum results?

Melanie Avalon

So I was looking to see if I had let, cause I know we had gotten a question about biohacking and I thought it was here, but I don't see it now. I thought somebody had asked us what was our, oh, maybe that's next week.  Okay. So teaser for next week. That's why teaser. Okay. Biohacking protocols that pair well with fasting. Well, so many things. So, well, first of all, like I love my infrared sauna, my sunlight and solo sauna that I use every night in my life. I, do you do sauna sessions?

Barry Conrad

I haven't done sauna sessions yet, but I've done one. And then I have a red light therapy device, devices.

Melanie Avalon

I would be excited for you to try so you kind of like how we're talking about with fasting like you don't really know what it feels like until you do it. I feel like Barry, you're going to be so hooked.  You're gonna be like, really? Yeah, I literally can't imagine my life not doing them now.

Barry Conrad

Why, tell me.

Melanie Avalon

because you feel so, well, there's so many benefits to it. I mean, it's great cardiovascular benefits, arguably comparable to the cardiovascular benefits of exercise, like cardio. And then it's great for pain relief. Like when you get in the sauna, it just feels like, oh, like a sigh of relief. But the main thing for me is the detoxing effect.  So like sweating out all of that sweat every day, you feel so, you feel like clean from the inside out. Like it makes me, it makes me feel so clean. And I originally started doing it because I was trying to detox heavy metals. It's kind of like if you had an apartment and you keep it clean, but then you realize that you could get like a deep clean and you could actually do that like every day. It's like that, it's just wonderful. The reason I thought of it is I would never want to do a sauna session like on a full stomach. That would just feel so uncomfortable. So I love pairing fasting with, like I love being in the fastest state and doing a sauna session.

Barry Conrad

Well, sounds like I need to try that because I definitely have tried like an infrared sauna session and I felt amazing afterwards, but just one time. So I've got to I've got to keep going back.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, you I think you would love it. I think you would love it.

Barry Conrad

Because that would have benefits for muscle recovery too, right?

Melanie Avalon

Oh, yes. Yeah, it's great for that.  It actually, did you know, okay, what is this fact? So, for example, when I interviewed Wendy Myers, I learned that heat is actually required for human growth hormone release from exercise. So like, if you're exercising and you're not actually getting hot, which you are like on a cellular level, typically, even if you're not, you know, feeling hot, but there's something about that heat that is actually involved in the human growth hormone release. And so it's really the sauna can help benefit that as well, releasing human growth hormone and helping support muscle. And then also, yes, recovery in general. Yes, it's great for that.

Barry Conrad

Well, guess who's signing up for more sessions than me.

Melanie Avalon

Very Conrad. Yeah, so awesome.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, it's the end of my session, my questions for putting you in the hot seat. Then this is a taste of things to come, there'll be more to come.

Melanie Avalon

I know so many more things. Well, this was so, so fun listeners. Check out these show notes.  They will be at ifodcast.com slash episode 406. They'll have a full transcript. They'll have links to everything that we talked about. You can submit your own questions by emailing questions at ifodcast.com or you can go to ifodcast.com and you can submit questions there. You can follow us on Instagram. I'm Melanie Avalon. Barry is, I've got it. Barry underscore Conrad, right? That's right. Yeah. And the show is I have podcast and I think that's all the things.  So anything from you, Barry, before we go?

Barry Conrad

This is a really, really fun episode. I don't know how we're going to just keep topping it. I love it.

Melanie Avalon

I'm excited. Next week, we're going to start on answering the listener questions in the normal format of, you know, fasting questions. So it'll be fun.  It's going to be good. I will talk to you next week.

Barry Conrad

We'll talk to you next week. 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. Editing by podcast doctors, show notes and artwork by Brianna Joyner, and original theme composed by Leland Cox and recomposed by Steve Saunders. See you next week!

Dec 16

Episode 400: Special Listener Guest Andrea Miles, Fasting And The Holidays, Gaining Muscle With Just Protein, The Clean Fast, Raising Kids With A Healthy Food Mindset, SIBO And The Elemental Diet, Healing Leaky Gut, Intuitive Eating, And More!

Intermittent Fasting

Welcome to Episode 400 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast, hosted by Melanie Avalon, author of What When Wine Diet: Lose Weight And Feel Great With Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, And Wine, and Vanessa Spina, author of Keto Essentials: 150 Ketogenic Recipes to Revitalize, Heal, and Shed Weight.


SHOW NOTES

SPONSORS & DISCOUNTS:

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APOLLO NEURO: Get 20% off with code ifpodcast at apolloneuro.com/avalon


FOOD SENSE GUIDE: 

Get Melanie's app to tackle your food sensitivities. Food Sense includes a searchable catalog of 300+ foods, revealing their gluten, FODMAP, lectin, histamine, amine, glutamate, oxalate, salicylate, sulfite, and thiol status. It also includes compound overviews, reactions to look for, lists of foods high and low in these compounds, the ability to create your own personal lists, and more.


STUFF WE LIKE: 

Visit ifpodcast.com/stuffwelike for all the stuff we like!


LINKS:

Zero App Episode on the IF Podcast

Interview with Megan Ramos

Vanessa's Tone Device: The Tone Device Breath Ketone Analyzer

Melanie's podcast: The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast

Vanessa's podcast: The Optimal Protein Podcast

More on Melanie: MelanieAvalon.com 

More on Vanessa: ketogenicgirl.com


If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving us a review in Apple Podcasts!


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


Our content does not constitute an attempt to practice medicine and does not establish a doctor-patient relationship. Please consult a qualified healthcare provider for medical advice and answers to personal health questions.

TRANSCRIPT

(Note: This is generated by AI with 98% accuracy. However, any errors may cause unintended changes in meaning.) 

Melanie Avalon

Welcome to episode 400 of the intermittent fasting podcast. If you want to burn fat, gain energy, and enhance your health by changing when you eat, not what you eat with no calorie counting, then this show is for you. I'm Melanie Avalon, biohacker, author of What, When, Wine, and creator of the supplement line, Avalon X.  And I'm here with my co-host, Vanessa Spina, sports nutrition specialist, author of Keto Essentials, and creator of the Tone Breath ketone analyzer and Tone Lux red light therapy panels. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and ketogenicgirl.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this show do not constitute medical advice or treatment.  To be featured on the show, email us your questions to questions at ifpodcast.com. We would love to hear from you. So pour yourself a mug of black coffee, a cup of tea, or even a glass of wine if it's that time and get ready for the intermittent fasting podcast. Hi everybody and welcome. This is episode number 400 of the intermittent fasting podcast.  I'm Melanie Avalon and I am here today with a very, very special guest. This is going to be a special listener story episode. We've been doing a few of these episodes and they have been honestly so fun, so enlightening. It's been incredible to talk to you guys and hear about everybody's intermittent fasting journeys because there's a lot of similarities. There's a lot of differences.  I'm just having so much fun doing this type of episode. It's also special because it's episode 400. Oh, hello. And then on top of that, so this listener, I'm here today with Andrea Miles and I was telling her beforehand, like I've seen your name like Facebook group and emails and things like that for a long time. You've been in this community for a while, right?  So when did you first start listening to this show?

Andrea Miles

I would say probably it was it was during COVID. So maybe spring of 2020, I'm guessing. Okay.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so a good solid four years or so. Yeah. I feel like I know you just from seeing you around all the places, and now we're connecting in real life. Oh, that's sweet, that's awesome. And I'm also really excited because when we bring listeners on this show, which by the way, listeners, if you'd like to come on, definitely submit, we would love to have you on the show as well.  So for that, just go to ifpodcast.com, slash submit, and then there's a form there where you can submit to be on the show as well. And in any case, when you do that, we ask a lot of questions. And Andrea, you provided so much information, so many topics to dive into. I am just, I'm really looking forward to this. So foundational question, how did you first get exposed to or into intermittent fasting?

Andrea Miles

Well, I had been complaining to my doctor that I was doing all the right things, I was eating right, I was working out, I was really probably over-restricting on calories, and the scale was going up, it was not going down. I was getting very frustrated. And he suggested that I read the obesity code. That was all, just read it. But it made so much sense to me once I did the science behind it.  And it kind of snowballed from there. Then I read Jen's book, and then your book, and started listening to the podcast, and I just got really into it from there, I suppose.

Melanie Avalon

So for listeners, I've had Jason Fung on the Melanie Avalon biohacking podcast. The ironic thing is I have never interviewed him specifically about fasting. I actually interviewed him. He wrote a book called The Cancer Code that came out during COVID. So that interview was pretty much all about cancer.  So I've never actually, I mean, I think I probably asked him a few intermittent fasting questions, but barely any. But I have had his partner, Megan Ramos, like his fasting business partner in the clinic on the show a few times. And she's actually going to be on this show, I think like in a few episodes. So listeners can look forward to that as well. That book is amazing.  It dives so deep into, I mean, from what I remember, because it's been so long that I read it, but I remember it really, really went into like the insulin obesity hypothesis and awesome, awesome. Okay. So I also love that your doc, that's amazing. So this was a conventional doctor that recommended it to you or was it a functional medical practitioner?

Andrea Miles

a regular medical doctor. He's an internal, internal med doctor. And yeah, I also thought it was kind of insightful of him, I should say, because a lot of doctors don't think along those lines, I suppose. And I think he knew that I was probably smart enough to pick up on the hints he was laying down with that book.  The approach that Dr. Feng takes is maybe a little extreme, but I understood where he was coming from and what he was trying to say, and kind of adapted that to my own life and how I could approach it and get the benefits of intermittent fasting without maybe the super extreme fast that he was taking his patients on in the book.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I definitely want to dive into that specifically, your approach to things, because that's a lot of what you were saying in your answers that I really, really liked. It seems like you have a very healthy approach and mindset when it comes to fasting, just from what I read from your answers. I'm curious. Okay, I have a lot of questions. Question one, did you have a moment that you remember?  Okay, wait, first of all, when was this? This was before the pandemic?

Andrea Miles

I think it was probably, I'm going to say spring of 2020. It was right before I started listening to your podcast.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, do you remember a when you decided to just try it? And do you remember when you actually like first started like the first day? And if you don't, that's totally fine.

Andrea Miles

I don't remember the exact day. I remember I started with skipping breakfast and lunch and my goal was 16 hours and I did 16 hours every day for two weeks and I patted myself on the back. I white knuckled it and I had some headaches and it was tough but also at that time I hadn't read Jin's book and I was putting lemon in my water. Once I stopped doing that, fasting became a lot easier.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, wow. Okay, so the queen fast super important for you. Were you doing coffee and tea or?

Andrea Miles

I am all about coffee and tea now I always I've always enjoyed those black without any creamer or sugar or anything like that so that was never a problem I suppose to to still enjoy those without really feeling like I was giving anything up.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I think people, people when they're coming from the the creamer sugar aspect, people struggle with that one switching over. I actually, you probably heard me talk about this before, but I, I was doing like, tea and coffee and, and sweeteners. Honestly, for a long time, I don't actually remember when I switched over to the clean fast perspective.  Yeah, so always interesting to me how that works for people. And did you, because you said you were white knuckling it in the beginning, did you were you seeing beneficial effects pretty quickly? Or how long did it take to, you know, start experiencing changes physically?

Andrea Miles

I would say probably after about a month, maybe five to six weeks, I started to see changes in my body. Like I wasn't feeling as inflamed, if that makes any sense. I just, I was, before I started fasting, I felt puffy in all ways. Like everything about my body just, I was not comfortable in my own skin.  And once some of that internal inflammation, at least I assume that's what was going on, went down, everything got a lot easier and I felt a lot more comfortable just overall on a day-to-day basis.

Melanie Avalon

I love that the the inflammation thing is one of my favorite benefits and like how you're struggling a little bit to describe it. I feel like you you don't really understand until you've had it and then had it go away and then you're like oh okay that's what that was. Yes. Yeah it's one of my favorites. Did you go back to that doctor after you started?

Andrea Miles

Yes, absolutely. I see him every year. And I actually in 2022 asked him to test my fasting insulin level. And he actually had to go over to the lab to explain what the test was. They didn't mess it up because nobody ever orders it. He said patients are never fasted long enough to actually take it. So he got pretty excited about that. And so I asked for that every year.

Melanie Avalon

That's amazing. And you said you're fasting. It's been going down, right? Every time you test it.

Andrea Miles

It has started at nine, then it was six, and then this last year it was four.

Melanie Avalon

That's amazing. Amazing. And the diet you're eating on all of this. So what's your what's your diet history? Like growing up, what type of foods did you like? How has it evolved through the years?

Andrea Miles

Well, I am a Gen X-er. My parents were always very health conscious in our house. My mom never fried anything. I kind of grew up in the low-fat revolution, so everything in the pantry was kind of geared towards the low-fat sort of paradigm, I suppose. And that worked well when I was young, but I'm 47 now.  Once that metabolism starts slowing down a little bit and the muscle isn't as easy to keep on your body, you need to start opening up different macros, I suppose.

Melanie Avalon

I mean, that's something I was really excited to see you talking about was how you prioritize protein. Is that still a thing for you?

Andrea Miles

Absolutely, absolutely. If I have learned nothing in probably the past year, it has been the importance of protein and that macro balance. When I started intermittent fasting, I didn't watch calories anymore. I let my body tell me when I was full and when I was satisfied and when I was done eating, and I learned to listen to those hunger cues again.  And that has been really eye-opening, I suppose, in so many ways, when you don't let food control your life anymore.

Melanie Avalon

I cannot agree anymore.  I think honestly, that's another one of my I think we have this a lot of the same, you know, favorite benefits of fasting is that I just love food and I love that for so long, I was stressing about calories and what I was eating and all the things and now I eat all the things I love and I don't even think about calories and I do it in my eating window and it's like all good like it's so, so magical and and it sounds like we have similar so you eat, you're an evening eater.  I am. Yes. And you have a family, right?

Andrea Miles

Yes, yes. I've been married for 24 years. We have 18-year-old twin daughters and a 13-year-old son. Oh, wow.

Melanie Avalon

twins oh my goodness is it is it true that twins like are not psychic but they like with each other

Andrea Miles

There is definitely some sort of connection there that is odd.

Melanie Avalon

I've always wondered what that would be like to have a twin. Are they identical? They're fraternal. They're fraternal. So have they dabbled in anything like this? No.

Andrea Miles

Although when I was growing up, my breakfast was the most important meal of the day, and I didn't always like eating breakfast. So when I was out on my own, off at college, that was the first thing to go in my life, was breakfast. I didn't like the way it made me feel in the mornings, I just didn't like eating breakfast. And so I decided as a parent, I wasn't going to put my kids through that.  But once they were old enough to decide, if they knew how long it was till lunch, once they were 10, 11, I let them decide if they wanted breakfast that morning. In that way, yes, I guess I've let them experiment a little bit. They're both very active. One is in cheer and dance in college, and the other does track in cross-country in college.  Yeah, as collegiate athletes, they eat quite a bit, actually, and pretty often.

Melanie Avalon

Wow, that's super cool. I love that. How about on the flip side when you were raising them? Did you make them finish their meals?

Andrea Miles

No, they had to try everything on their plate because, as you may or may not have heard, your taste buds change over time. So I would never let them get away with saying, I already tried that and I don't like it. That's what's for dinner tonight. You need to at least try one or two bites. And if you don't like it, that's fair. I'll let you find something else to eat. But I'm not a short order cook.  So you either need to prepare yourself or find some leftovers in the fridge.

Melanie Avalon

That's awesome. That sounds like a very healthy, solid approach to parenting with the food stuff. Thank you. And wait, how about your son? Were any of them picky eaters? Yeah.

Andrea Miles

Two of the three were pretty picky, and one, he's, my son, he's really just, now that he's gotten into running himself, he's starting to make healthier food choices and be less picky. So I think just natural maturing and changing of interests has led them to be less picky, too.

Melanie Avalon

Were you a runner or are you a runner? Are you athletic?

Andrea Miles

I really enjoy exercise, but no, I'm not a runner.

Melanie Avalon

I mean, it sounds like you like spawned all these like athletic, you know, children. And I had another question about that. Oh, I loved the story you told about candy and Easter candy.

Andrea Miles

Could you tell that? Sure, sure. So when when my girls were young, I'm going to say maybe kindergarten age, they they wanted to eat candy in their Easter basket. And it was early morning. I mean, we hadn't even been to church for the day yet. And I decided, you know what? This is a good, good opportunity, a good learning lesson. And I said, you can have anything you want to eat today.  If you want candy for breakfast, fine. You can have anything you want to eat all day long, whatever. But you can not complain to me about a stomachache. They got a stomachache. I didn't hear complaining, but they learned that lesson. And they never they never binged on the candy again because they knew how it would make them feel.

Melanie Avalon

That's really amazing. That was also a gamble on your part. Were you like, were you praying? Like, please let them get a stomachache.

Andrea Miles

I kind of was, but it also worked out too with my son because I thought, well, it worked out with the girls. I'll let, I'll do the same thing with him. Well, they had told him how miserable it made them feel. And he was really shy about it for the first couple of years. He didn't, he didn't binge.  And it wasn't until like the third year of him being allowed to do that that he finally got us a mild tummy ache.

Melanie Avalon

That's so funny, I love it. I'm gonna, I don't think I'll ever have kids, but I'm gonna keep that in my back pocket, if I ever do. Okay, so going back to your food choices now, so you said you focus on protein. I think something that, well, I know something a lot of listeners struggle with is how to get enough protein, honestly, that might be one of the most common questions we get.  So for you, well, first of all, so you're eating windows. So you're eating dinner, right? So you said you eat dinner and then kind of like another snack later, is that?

Andrea Miles

Yeah, I eat dinner with the family. I'll clean up from dinner, clean up the kitchen, do a few other things around the house, and then I'll sit down and relax for the night with a snack. I'll just keep eating, whether that be popcorn, my ninja creamy, nice cream, or some other somewhat healthy snack. I just keep eating until I decide I'm full and satisfied.  Usually that's about an hour and a half to two hour eating window each day. Okay.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, so that's shorter, actually, than I was picturing when I was envisioning your schedule. I got to get one of these ninja things. Vanessa talks about it all the time, all the time. I see it on the web. People love it. That's where you make the protein ice cream, right? Yes. It seems like a really good way to get in. Because basically the ice cream you make, can it be almost pure protein, almost-ish?

Andrea Miles

I've used like the protein shakes and just added a scoop or two of sugar-free pudding mix to kind of give it a little extra flavor or thicken it a little bit and so yeah that's pretty much protein I suppose but.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, nice. So you're in your actual dinner. So again, going back to this protein question, we always get is your dinner that you have with your family? I'm assuming are you the one typically cooking dinner or just your husband?

Andrea Miles

Oh, I am the one cooking dinner. So no, yeah, I try to provide like a well-rounded balanced dinner for everybody. Not everybody's going to choose the vegetable that night. And that's fine. Not everybody's going to choose the fruit that night. That's okay. Whatever. After dinner, usually my dinner is pretty heavy with protein, a little bit of carbs, some fat.  It'll be heavier and carbs if we have quite a bit of fruit that day, I suppose.

Melanie Avalon

So you don't personally you're not really existing in either low carb or low fat or high carb you're not any mention this earlier but you're you're just more eating intuitively and focusing on protein.

Andrea Miles

Correct, yes. I do try to balance, like the protein goal is always the main goal. And then interestingly, the other two sort of fall in line as well. Once I meet that protein goal, I think my natural tendencies just kind of balance that out, I suppose.

Melanie Avalon

I love that. That is, that's, it sounds like the perfect like intuitive approach to eating. What's your, okay, wait, two questions. One, what is your favorite meal in general? And also what would be your last meal where it's like anything goes?

Andrea Miles

Oh, well, I don't have a super sophisticated taste. I love pizza. I would probably pick pizza for my last meal with mint chip ice cream.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, you're a mint girl, mint ice cream girl. That's like very polarizing, the mint ice cream, I think.

Andrea Miles

It is, and oh, it's always been my favorite.

Melanie Avalon

Like when it's green?

Andrea Miles

Yes, and I'm very picky about ... This is going to sound so crazy, but I'm very picky about the chocolate in it. I specifically like chocolate chunks, not chocolate flakes.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, that's important. You got to know. You got to know exactly what you like. Is there a brand you like?

Andrea Miles

It's probably very local, but it's good, rich dairy. Good, rich. OK, I've never heard of that. Yeah, I think they're proud. I mean, I live in Nebraska, so I think they're probably, I'm sure they were bought out. But that was what I always had as a little girl.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, that'll do it. Like what you had when you were a kid, those emotional, nostalgic ties. Yeah. So what, and what is your favorite go-to meal in general? Like if you're going to a restaurant.

Andrea Miles

You know, that's what's so interesting, is since I've been intermittent fasting, I always kind of went towards the sandwiches and maybe even the pastas before, like the high carb, not good for you things.  Now when I go to restaurants, I'll look for crazy things that I would have never thought to order before, like meatloaf or a grilled pork chop or, you know, just, I don't know, I'm failing to come up with good examples right now, but.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I know you're talking about like that actually first happened to me when I probably first went low carb, but I it's like my taste buds had a new eye perspective. Like they wanted to explore new things. It's like I had like, it's like I've been given a new taste bud experience and I wanted to try new things that I hadn't before.

Andrea Miles

Instead of going for the tried and true favorites, I expanded my palette a little bit. So now it's, who knows? Maybe I'll get the special. Who knows? It just depends on what I'm feeling that day.

Melanie Avalon

When you do eat at restaurants, do you eat more because it's a one meal a day type situation or do you just eat more later when you get home?

Andrea Miles

It kind of depends on what our plans are later that evening because I don't want to under eat either. Because I understand the risk that can come from that, doing that on a repeated basis too. If we aren't doing anything later and I'm gonna have the opportunity to come home and eat some more, then I will probably eat a little bit less at the restaurant.  If I'm not going to, then I will make sure that I have quite a bit to eat at my dinner.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, that's smart. Yeah, I literally have just embraced getting usually two entrees now. That's smart, though. It's really fun. I love it, especially because I'm normally there's two entrees I want to try because I normally really want like a steak, but I'll also want to fish. So I remember I had like this moment where I was like, Oh, wait, I don't have to order just one entree. I can order two.  Absolutely. Okay, yeah, no, I love that. So this episode actually airs mid December. So we are, you know, right in the holidays and all those things. Do you adjust your eating window or anything like that for the holidays? And like, I know for you and I recording right now, it's before Thanksgiving. So like, do you adjust for that? What do you do with holidays?

Andrea Miles

I try to keep my minimum fast to 16 hours. So for example, with Thanksgiving, I just recognize that I'm going to be breaking it earlier than I normally would and try to get at least 16 hours in. Now there's no rules. If I don't, okay, maybe I fall a little short of that goal. It's not the end of the world. It's just a new day tomorrow and you pick up and move on. But yeah, I shorten it.  But also the thing that's kind of fun about shortening your window and eating one meal a day is I'm shifting that Thanksgiving meal in this example to earlier in the day at lunchtime when I would normally eat at dinner. So I'm also going to be closing my window earlier, which means the following day I often have a longer fast. Longer fast.

Melanie Avalon

Mm-hmm. That's super cool

Andrea Miles

If I'm ever kind of quote unquote beating myself up for for falling a little short of a goal. I always remind myself that hey tomorrow's even probably going to be better than far better than today was so

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so it sounds like because you talked about it just now you talked about it in the answers you gave me, but the how you deal with your internal thoughts surrounding everything. So have you what are some examples of the evolution of your internal thoughts that you've had with, you know, dealing with cravings and food and all the things.

Andrea Miles

Yeah, it's been a learning journey too. I've always been a glass half full person. It's amazing how much your gut health matters to your emotional and mental well-being. Once my gut health started to get more in check, my mental clarity became so much better and those positive thoughts and feelings were a lot more frequent.  And that was really, it was indescribable because you don't, like we were saying earlier, you don't realize how far you've maybe slipped kind of like with the inflammation until you start feeling better again. But yeah, I was really hard on myself in the beginning.  But yeah, once I started to realize that I'm doing this and I'm actually pretty darn good at this, you gain a new perspective on your whole self.

Melanie Avalon

I love all of that so much. And yeah, with the gut health stuff, so you and I both, we struggled with SIBO. Did you get diagnosed with that officially?

Andrea Miles

I did through process of elimination because it was right at the height of COVID, and so they didn't want to do the breath tests for obvious reasons. And the gastroenterologist too, she said that she personally didn't like to rely too much on them anyway and preferred a process of elimination in terms of a diagnosis. So I did all the things.  I had eight vials of blood drawn and provided stool sample and all the things and everything was negative. She called. She said that's the only other thing it could be.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, wow. Did she prescribe like Rifaximin or anything like that for you?

Andrea Miles

Yeah, she did Zafaxin. I did two rounds of that. And then in an elemental diet as well. I paired that with an elemental diet. That was my own choice, not her recommendation. I am glad I did that. That was very difficult, but I think it was very important to healing my stomach.

Melanie Avalon

What version of the elemental diet did you do? Like did you do because I was in that rabbit hole and there's like there's like the official shakes you can get and like people would do their di diy ones and for diy some people would do like a high carb version where they made it with like just all honey basically and then some people would do like low carb like bone broth. What did you do?

Andrea Miles

I did a commercial brand, it was a powder mix, but it had nothing in it in terms of no sugar, no additives like that. And it tasted really, really bad. But it helped. I relapsed with the SIBO after about 40, 45 days. And that was when the realization came to me that I can't continue with antibiotics. I mean, that's not a good future course to handle that, just to continue to take antibiotics.  So I needed to find a different road.

Melanie Avalon

Wow. Yeah. So many people, I'm getting so many flashbacks when you said about the powder, because I think I ordered, I ordered some sort of elemental diet mix. And it was basically like the mix is just like the protein, essentially. And it tasted horrible. And then I mixed up myself and I don't, I think I gave up. I think I tried it for like a day and I was like, I'm not doing this.  Um, so I failed at that. But I also did there was a vaccine, Rifaximin, whatever, whatever it's called. It actually, I feel like it made me worse. Like it didn't help me. I know it helps so many people, but for me, it was not a good fit. Yeah. Okay. So, and then were you doing, because I know you mentioned you were using my app a little bit for food, food sense guide.  Did you ever do like a low FODMAT diet or anything like that?

Andrea Miles

I didn't, because some of the things that were on that list that should have been on the OK for the low FODMAP diet were some of my trigger foods. So I thought, well, this is not going to work. And so that's where your app was really helpful. I could just choose the specific foods that bothered me and make notes about them and and add them to my little list.  And it was really helpful to go back and say, oh, yeah, I remember I didn't do so well with grapes that last time I had those. Wow. OK, maybe I'll I'll try those again and see if that happens.

Melanie Avalon

Awesome, yeah, so for listeners, FoodSense Guide, it's over 300 foods and it includes all of these different compounds that you might be reacting to in foods. So we were just talking about FODMAPs, which I should probably define there.  I always forget what it stands for, but it's basically fermentable, these different potentially fermentable substrates in foods and every letter in FODMAP stands for one of those compounds. Then there's other things like histamine and glutamate and lectins and sulfites. And so that's all in that app.  Something I would like to do actually, in like in all my free time, you're talking about how some of the low FODMAP foods were triggers for you. I think it would be cool if either in my app, probably in my app, if I could break it down into, cause like I said, each letter is a different compound.  Some like high FODMAP foods or low FODMAP foods are, it's not necessarily like, like so FODMAPs is not like one thing, it's like these different things. So it could be possible that maybe one part of the FODMAPs is what is bothersome for you and not the others. Like I think it'd be cool if it could be like broken down even further is the point. Oh yeah, for sure.  But it sounds like, so it sounds like now, so you made changes and do you struggle with gut issues now?

Andrea Miles

I don't. I can eat all the things. Leaky gut is a very real thing. I feel for anybody struggling with that, but you can come back from it. You can heal your gut and everything will be okay.

Melanie Avalon

Have you found fasting helped heal your gut as well?

Andrea Miles

Absolutely, absolutely. I think it even longer fasts, like if I'm really kind of going through a period of inflammation, I try to get a longer fast in there because I know that will happen.

Melanie Avalon

help. What constitutes a longer fast for you?

Andrea Miles

24 hours, I suppose, I have done longer, but yeah, about 24 hours I would say would be a long fast. Do you track the fast with apps? I do, I use the Zero app, I love it.

Melanie Avalon

love that we will have to put a link in the show notes we've had. I think it's the current she was not the founder, but she came in recently and now is one of the head people at zero. Dr. Naomi Parela I think is her name. We'll put a link in the show notes if people want to learn more about the zero app because that was that was an incredible episode actually. It was.  Yeah, I really had a fun time interviewing them. Okay, so what are some of your other favorite benefits? Like we've talked a lot about the physical stuff. What about life benefits that come from fasting?

Andrea Miles

Oh, there's so much less planning, I suppose, and time spent in the kitchen. You just don't have to dedicate the time to planning, and it's so flexible that you can not worry about making sure you are near food for lunch, or make sure there's breakfast nearby, or to choose to just live your life and not be tied down by the fact that it's mealtime for some.

Melanie Avalon

It's another thing where you have to experience it to really realize it but like you're saying the amount of time you get back like you don't realize when you're eating constantly throughout the day just how much time that is because it's just so normal like it's what everybody does but then when you get back all that time it's like wow like for me it's amazing it's a I can't yeah it's it's again it's something that you have to have done I think to realize just how beneficial it is true and then have you found because you said something in one of your answers about how you can if you're creative you can make intermittent fasting work for most situations so like do you encounter challenges with making it work in certain situations and how do you deal with that. 

Andrea Miles

only sometimes it's like I've said I I'm an evening eater so there would be times when maybe I'm invited to an event in the afternoon where you know maybe I just don't really care to eat with their serving and and that's okay you don't need to feel like you have to eat just because you are attending an event like that everybody there is excited that you're there and wants to see you not necessarily see you eating. 

Melanie Avalon

I agree so much, because I honestly do think that oftentimes the hardest thing for people is what you just touched on, which is it's not so... Well, people will say things. I'm not saying they won't, but there's a lot of internal anxiety people can have about worrying about what people are thinking.  And so it takes, at least for me, it definitely took building up that muscle to realize, oh, I can go and just be me and not eat if I don't want to, and that's okay. And people are not going to freak out on me unless they do. In the past, some of my family used to freak out on me once I got through that. But yeah, it definitely takes...  Honestly, it takes practice just as much as the fasting takes practice, because it can really break from social norms. And especially, it's getting a lot better now. I think because intermittent fasting is becoming so much more well known. But when I started, it was so long ago, and nobody was really doing it. And yeah.

Andrea Miles

So then it was you were the person that stood out in the room because you were the only one not eating. Yeah, I understand that.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, but now like people know about like if I like meant say it say it people know like they're like, oh like they're familiar.

Andrea Miles

Yes, yes, it just takes a certain level of confidence to be okay with explaining why you're not eating too when asked.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, exactly. Exactly. So I found one of my hacks is I will especially if it's like a long, like a holiday long get together thing where people are going to be there for hours and hours. If it's one of those, and there's a meal at the beginning, I will just kind of come at the end of the meal. And that kind of addresses that. So yeah, there's a lot of a lot of different things that you can do.  Do you anticipate, because you mentioned earlier, how you find like naturally with your with the quote macros and such that you kind of naturally adapt to what you need. Do you anticipate changing things up in the future, especially like with the evening window that you're doing? Do you anticipate much change? Or do you think you've kind of found your pattern?

Andrea Miles

I think I've kind of found my niche. I don't at least at least right now in my life this is working really well. I work full-time and you know my son's still in school on a you know day-to-day basis so the schedule works well I suppose.  Now maybe later in life I would shift that but right now it's it's going well and we were planning a vacation for earlier this spring and last fall I had lost all of the weight I was probably going to lose with intermittent fasting but I was not toned really and so I decided to focus on protein and since then I have seen muscle gains and I have started people have started to ask me if I've lost weight well I haven't lost weight in in a year now but people are starting to notice and I can only attribute that to the increased protein and and focus on my protein intake so I don't see that changing because obviously that part is going well. 

Melanie Avalon

I love that, especially because a lot of people worry or say you can't build muscle while fasting. And it's just not true because people, people do it. Like we see it all the time. So that is amazing to hear. Did you, so you added in protein, you focused, so did you at the same time you're adding a protein and focusing on strength training together?

Andrea Miles

I have always done strength training with cardio on the off days, I suppose. So I didn't really change anything with what I was doing in terms of exercise. Oh wow, you just added more protein.

Melanie Avalon

Shifted protein. Yeah, that's amazing. That's awesome to hear you mentioned your job. Do you do you work from home? Or what do you what do you do?

Andrea Miles

I do work from home. I'm an underwriter. So when COVID hit, they closed our office and sold the building. So I work from home permanently. It's not for everybody. Personally, I love it. It just works really well for me. I can control the lighting, for example, my surroundings. I can get little chores done by taking quick breaks in my day, which you should do anyway.  When they did change to working from home full time, I got really nervous about being inactive. The office, the physical office that we were located in was quite large. It had an exercise room. So you could go down there on your lunch break and just walk on the treadmill if you wanted, which was fabulous. And you know, I find long routes to the bathroom during my day and things like that.  So that made me really nervous coming home and lopping that square footage off. We are fortunate we have quite a few exercise machines and things in our basement that I can take advantage of, but I still was going to need to be in front of my computer eight hours a day. So I got an under desk elliptical, a cubie. And I pedal, and I pedal, and I pedal five to seven miles a day.

Melanie Avalon

That's amazing I love that so so that one that you're talking about is it is it electric.

Andrea Miles

Yes, yes, it's it runs through Bluetooth on my phone, actually. So. Oh, wow. Yeah. So I can keep track of how far I've gone just by looking at my phone. But yeah, it's.

Melanie Avalon

It's cool. And you have a standing desk that goes with it.

Andrea Miles

I do. Um, I also decided that, okay, well, if I'm coming home to work, I am going to make my quote unquote office exactly the way I want it. So I got a desk that I can sit or stand in three monitors.

Melanie Avalon

I love that. Yeah, I was already working from home primarily before the pandemic and I had a serving job. So I lost that with COVID. And it was actually really amazing because I think I was holding on to it like a security blanket. So it forced me to just go full time with you know, podcasting and all of that stuff.  But that's something I was really worried about actually was because I kind of saw my serving job as my exercise because it's a really those jobs are really movement intense. So I had to really, I really had to make sure to, you know, make sure I'm not being sedentary all day. And I so for example, like zoom calls, I rarely do video, I pretty much always call in or do audio.  So then I can like walk around during them. That's like just like a little small hack that works really well for me like you don't have to be chained to your computer all day with a lot of things. I love that. I did get I got one of those treadmills. And it didn't I should probably look into it again. It didn't like really work with my setup. But it was it was really big. Is this one that you have?  Was it big? It's probably

Andrea Miles

two feet long by a foot and a half wide okay that's way better so yeah i do have to i used an old luggage strap to strap my chair to it because otherwise it tends to creep away from me oh that's funny oh my god

Melanie Avalon

Oh my goodness. I love that small hack for you there of the hacks. Oh, and speaking of cool machines. So can you tell what you experienced with your vibration?

Andrea Miles

Yes, so I have osteopenia, so I wanted a vibration plate to help my bone density. After about 18 months of using this vibration plate for 20 minutes a day, almost every day, I went in for my normal routine checkup, and she measured me, and she measured me at 5'2.25". Now, I have never in my entire adult life measured higher than 5'1.75", so I told her she must have mismeasured, and could she please do it again? She repeated, and same result. That is really weird. So, I came home, and our family has the trusty marks on the wall on the wall, and so I had myself re-measured, and sure enough, I have grown half an inch. That's crazy. Yeah, just my spine decompressing, I'm sure, but how cool. Now I can actually say I'm 5'2 in my life.

Melanie Avalon

That's amazing. So how often do you do the vibration?

Andrea Miles

I do it every morning for 20 minutes in the day before I log on my computer to work. And you sit on it, stand on it? I stand on it with my knees just slightly bent. And that's when I kind of get my social media time in on my phone.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I need to start. Okay, because I have one of those and I never use it. I used to. I used to use it all the time. I need to start doing that I read that and I was like, Whoa, I need to. I gotta get on that. That's amazing. That's, that's incredible.

Andrea Miles

I used the highest level for 20 minutes.

Melanie Avalon

Have you seen any effects on your bone density from it?

Andrea Miles

So, my DEXA scan, I just had one recently and I still have osteopenia, but my one prior to that was 12 years earlier.

Melanie Avalon

so oh wow wow it's like hard to make any

Andrea Miles

Yeah, it's not a real good comparison, honestly.

Melanie Avalon

No, not at all. Wow. Okay. That's so cool. You talked about how you got into someone like the biohacking type stuff. What other stuff do you like?

Andrea Miles

or a ring. I use Lumen as well. So I like that. I have an Apollo neuro. Really like that as well. I love my Apollo so much. Yes, I do too. I do too. It's so comforting.

Melanie Avalon

It's a game changer for me. I'm actually getting one for my brother for Christmas and I use it every single night of my life.  So for listeners, it uses sound vibration but it's just like gentle vibrations and you can wear it on your wrist or your ankle or you can clip it to your shirt and it helps automatically turn on your body's parasympathetic nervous system so your rest and digest and calming state. You're literally turning that on basically with the touch of a button.  So rather than having to get there through meditation or things like that, which are great, this also really helps and just turns off the stress in a way and can actually enhance meditation. They actually just did a study on that. I recently had Dr. Dave Rabin, the founder back on the Melanie Avalon biohacking podcast so people can check that out.

Andrea Miles

out. Yeah, you can use it to for things like a little burst of energy because there's different modes for that as well.

Melanie Avalon

Yes, and they just added like a hug thing that's super cute. So yeah, I love it. Would you ever go to any of the conferences?

Andrea Miles

Oh, I would love to, that'd be so much fun.

Melanie Avalon

There's so much fun to meet all these guests and see all these people and all the brands. We just, yeah, it's so, so fun. So fun. Speaking of, do you travel? I mean, you mentioned about traveling in the spring. Does your family travel much?

Andrea Miles

Yeah, we do. We like to travel. We try to go somewhere about once a year or so. Sometimes it works out, sometimes it doesn't. We just recently went to Hilton Head this last spring to celebrate my parents' 50th wedding anniversary. They renewed their vows on the beach. It was sweet.

Melanie Avalon

Have you found fasting helps with travel? It does.

Andrea Miles

is because everybody else in our party was, are we gonna have time to grab food in between flights? Does anybody have snacks in their bag? And okay, where do I need to be and when? I mean, yeah, it was just, it was a lot less stressful, I suppose, not to have to worry about food.  And then, you know, we landed and everybody's starving and can't get their luggage fast enough and find food fast enough and yeah.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. It's so nice. It is. Does your husband...

Andrea Miles

been fast? He does not, no. Hasn't trickled over. No, it hasn't. He probably thinks it's kind of my superpower because I think it's kind of amazing to him. He doesn't quite grasp how how I'm not hungry and

Melanie Avalon

Mm-hmm. Yeah, I don't think it hasn't really rubbed off on any of my family. Nope. Just me. Yeah, agreed. What would you tell people who may be nervous about starting or on the fence about starting fasting? What would your go-to advice be for people with fasting?

Andrea Miles

Try it and don't get discouraged if you don't succeed or what you deem as success. Keep at it because like I said, it took four to six weeks before I thought, I really have the hang of this now. So stick with it, be patient with yourself. It's a long journey and it winds.  You're gonna sometimes feel like you're not making any ground so I would recommend definitely some sort of a progress, whether that be pictures, measurements, honesty pants, all of the above, do all of the things so that you can see, look back and see, wow, look what I've done. I am better than I was on that day because I've been doing this.

Melanie Avalon

I love that. And you had a moment with your trying on jeans.

Andrea Miles

I did, yeah. I took one of my daughter's jeans shopping with me and I've always carried my weight in my hips and my thighs and my rear end. So I was always looking for ways to cover those areas. And now I buy clothes that fit. And when I went jean shopping recently, my daughter said, I don't, I don't like those jeans on you mom. I said, well, why not? They fit.  And she said, they make you look like you don't have any butt. She was right. It's kind of disappeared. So those were no, and I had to find some different jeans, but never has that ever been a problem in my life.

Melanie Avalon

Wow. And what I love about that, though, is not only are you losing the weight, but we've talked about it all throughout this episode, your focus now on your protein and coupled with the training, you know, you're also building muscle with all of this. So seems to be the ideal changes in body composition that people are hoping for.

Andrea Miles

My body's never gonna be perfect. It is what it is. That's not my ultimate goal. My ultimate goal is just to be comfortable with myself again, and I am. I'm happy with that.

Melanie Avalon

I love it. Well, thank you so much for joining us for episode 400. Oh, my goodness. Such a special moment. Was there anything else you wanted to touch on about your journey or share with listeners?

Andrea Miles

I came across this quote when I was preparing for this podcast and Maya Angelou said, nothing will work unless you do. And that really resonated with me. If you put in the work, you

Melanie Avalon

you will see the payoff. I love that so much. Well, thank you, Andrea. This has been such a lovely, wonderful time. Everything you said has been so inspiring. And I love how you were saying earlier how you're like a glass half full person, like that your mindset and approach to life really, like I can feel it. It's like very, very positive and like high vibration. And I just, I'm just smiling.  And I was during this whole interview. So thank you. Thank you so much for your time. And maybe the last question I'll ask you, it's the last question that I ask on my other show on the Biohacking podcast, but it's always a nice way to round things out, which is what is something that you're grateful for?

Andrea Miles

I am grateful for diversity in this world. I think it provides such a fabulous opportunity for us to learn from each other. We have all these different platforms now to make that so much easier. It's one of the things I'm grateful for, in addition to my health, because I understand how important that is as well.

Melanie Avalon

That's an incredible answer. Nobody has ever given me that answer before. I love that. I'm always so curious what people are going to say. That's so wonderful. Well, thank you, Andrea. I am so grateful for you. I'm grateful that you've been here all this time and that I got to talk to you now about your journey and keep me updated.  I'll see you around the Facebook group and all the things and just thank you and have the happiest of holidays.

Andrea Miles

Thank you so much, Melanie. This was such an honor. I really, really appreciate it.

Melanie Avalon

Well, yeah, well, I will talk to you later. All right. Bye. 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.  Editing by podcast doctors, show notes and artwork by Brianna Joyner, and original theme composed by Leland Cox, and recomposed by Steve Saunders. See you next week.

Jun 09

Episode 373: Spirulina & Chlorella, Long Fasts & Cortisol, Fasting Over 40, Resistance Training, Fasting Definitions, Glutathione, And More!

Intermittent Fasting

Welcome to Episode 373 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast, hosted by Melanie Avalon, author of What When Wine Diet: Lose Weight And Feel Great With Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, And Wine and Vanessa Spina, author of Keto Essentials: 150 Ketogenic Recipes to Revitalize, Heal, and Shed Weight.

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

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 bone-in chicken thighs, top sirloins, or salmon—for free in every order for a whole year! Plus, get $20 off your first order!

Schwank Grill: We love protein, and you can achieve the best grilling with Schwank Grills, featuring state-of-the-art infrared technology used in the world's best steakhouses (including Ruths' Chris and Morton's)! These grill create perfectly seared, steakhouse-worthy results every time. Make every cookout a special occasion with this ultimate grilling experience! Visit schwankgrills.com and use promo code IFPODCAST to get $150 OFF a Schwank Grill!

LUMEN: Lumen is the world’s first handheld metabolic coach: a device that measures your metabolism through your breath, to let you instantly find out if you're burning carbs or fat! The Lumen app also gives you tailored guidance to improve your nutrition, workouts, sleep, and even stress management! If you want to take the next step in improving your health, go to lumen.me and use code IFPODCAST to get 15% off your Lumen!

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

SHOW NOTES

BUTCHERBOX: For a limited time go to butcherbox.com/ifpodcast and get bone-in chicken thighs, top sirloins, or salmon—for free in every order for a whole year! Plus, get $20 off your first order!

SCHWANK GRILL: Visit schwankgrills.com and use promo code IFPODCAST to get $150 OFF a Schwank Grill!

LUMEN: If you want to take the next step in improving your health, go to lumen.me and use code IFPODCAST to get 15% off your Lumen!

Listener Q&A: Andrea - What’s the truth about occasional long fasts (36hrs-48hrs)?

The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast Episode #126 - Azure Grant

Listener Q&A: Michelle - Does taking glutathione break a fast?

The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast Episode #171 - Dr. Nayan Patel

Visit MelanieAvalon.com/auro and use the code MelanieAvalon, for 5% off. Also add the code Auro10, for an additional 10% off! 

Our content does not constitute an attempt to practice medicine and does not establish a doctor-patient relationship. Please consult a qualified healthcare provider for medical advice and answers to personal health questions.

TRANSCRIPT

(Note: This is generated by AI with 98% accuracy. However, any errors may cause unintended changes in meaning.) 

Melanie Avalon:
Welcome to Episode 373 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. If you want to burn fat, gain energy, and enhance your health by changing when you eat, not what you eat with no calorie counting, then this show is for you. I'm Melanie Avalon, biohacker, author of "What, When, Wine" and creator of the supplement line AvalonX. And I'm here with my co-host, Vanessa Spina, sports nutrition specialist, author of "Keto Essentials" and creator of the Tone Breath Ketone Analyzer and Tone Lux Red Light Therapy Panels. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and ketogenicgirl.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this show do not constitute medical advice or treatment. To be featured on the show, email us your questions to questions@ifpodcast.com. We would love to hear from you. So pour yourself a mug of black coffee, a cup of tea, or even a glass of wine, if it's that time, and get ready for The Intermittent Fasting Podcast.

Melanie Avalon:
Hi, everybody, and welcome. This is Episode 373 of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon, and I'm here with Vanessa Spina. Hi, everyone. What is new in your life, Vanessa? Well,

Vanessa Spina:
I've been on this high from doing OMAD again, intermittent fasting. That's sort of been the biggest thing. And I'm also excited about some new testing I've been doing on my blood sugar. Those are like the things that excite me right now, but we're going on a fun getaway this weekend with two of my girlfriends here and their husbands and their kids who are the same age as Luca and Damian. We're going to this little, I think I told you about it last summer. We go every summer. It's this little fairy tale place. Yes, with the castles. Yes, it's a UNESCO heritage site and you don't really drive cars in there. So like you can spend the whole weekend there. So we're going with some friends. I'm so excited. And Luca is so excited because he gets to go with like basically his two of his best little buddies here. It was funny because you were asking me, you know, what, like, what did Luca and their friends, you know, what language they speak. And I was going to text you and be like, all my friends here are Americans. All of their kids speak English. Some of them speak like a bit of Czech as well. Like they know some of them no more than others. But yeah, all of my friend group here is pretty much they're all American expats. And then one of them is Australian. All my girlfriends are American. They're just living over here as like expats. So yeah, they all speak English with each other.

Melanie Avalon:
I know by the time this airs, it'll be way in the past, but I'm dying to know, was Luca, so he wasn't scared of the dinosaurs in the dina, in the dino.

Vanessa Spina:
No, it's funny. I was wondering if he was going to be scared. We went to this amazing dino park with all of our friends here and all their kids and the kids had the best time. And it was just, it was a lot of fun. Some of the kids are trying to get into like dinosaurs and stuff. But I thought he might be scared, but he wasn't. And there were a couple of parts. I was like, I'm kind of scared. He wasn't, you know, because they're, you know, huge animatronic dinosaurs and they were moving and like, it was so realistic. But yeah, they weren't scared. And then kind of remembered, like kids don't really have much fear, like maybe when they're older. But at this point, like they don't really, I don't think he really, I was saying to Pete, like, later that day, I was like, I don't think he knows what scared means. No, like, I don't think we've ever talked about that word or I don't think he's had an experience of that yet. So

Melanie Avalon:
That's so interesting. I only have like a few memories of being really scared as a child. The reason I was thinking about it is because I remember, I think my mom took me, do you know Six Flags? I've heard of it. I think my mom took me to Six Flags and I was really, really little. And I think it was around Halloween time and people were dressed up. And apparently I remember like freaking out and I remember us leaving like right at the beginning. So, and I have a distinct memory of being, do you remember when you were taught how to swim? I don't. I have a distinct memory of being taught how to swim and that did not go well. I remember they had to like, they like let us loose. They were like, do the spider crawl and like cling to the, yeah, I just remember thinking I was gonna die. Like my life flashed before my eyes. Yeah, that's really interesting. It makes me wonder what role does fear and parenting and nurture versus nature and, you know, how you react to your kids crying. And I don't know anything about parenting. So this is all me just like mumbling, but I'm really interested in what creates our perspectives of the world and how that is involved in parenting when you're young. Like does Luca cry a lot?

Vanessa Spina:
He has like a lack of emotional regulation, you know, for sure, at some point, but he's a very calm child. And I think a lot of it has to do with his diet and lifestyle. He only eats whole foods, he's never like consumed sugar, he doesn't eat any processed food. And, you know, I think it really contributes a lot to his stable mood, because I know he has very stable blood sugars. From what he eats, so he and we also don't do a lot of screen time. We noticed that screen time and consuming a lot of processed food, I think they both can cause a lot of issues with like tantrums and meltdowns and then combine together, they can also do that. So we just we don't do like restaurants and things like that. The only time that he's allowed to have screen time is if we have a long haul flight, like if we go on the airplane for like a long, like a, you know, 10 hour kind of situation. But otherwise, we just don't give him that. So I think it helps him be quite calm. And that's sort of what people say a lot about him. In general, he's just like an extremely calm child. So hopefully, the same thing will be the same thing with Damien.

Melanie Avalon:
And then you probably have the added benefit, so like on the long flights and stuff, so most kids if they've been consuming that content all the time, it's nothing really special for them. You can't like, you know, give it to them as like a special treat, but for Luca, like he doesn't normally get to do it as much, so I'm guessing that really helps with the long flights.

Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, but in general, like we we tend to just like do a lot of sticker books and activities even on the plane and he'll sleep.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh my goodness, sticker books. I lived. I lived for sticker books.

Vanessa Spina:
Did you have a sticker album?

Melanie Avalon:
Do you remember the company Clutz Kids by chance? I think it was called Clutz. Clutz, they had all these different books. They had like science books and like craft books and all these books. They would always be at the grocery store on like a turning, like a, what's it called? The things that like twist around, kind of like when you're getting birthday cards. Like when you're getting birthday cards and they're on the thing that twists. I think it's called a turnstile.

Vanessa Spina:
Turnstile in Canada anyway

Melanie Avalon:
I loved those books and they had this big sticker book and I think I had three three like three or four and like years in a row from traveling like we would get that sticker book and man fun times it would just be like these big crazy things with stickers and you would just create things so much fun. What's new with you? Well related to that a little bit because I'm just thinking how much gratitude I have for people like you raising kids with that diet and you know the effects that it has on their health and the health of our future and I'm reading right now Dr. Michael Greger's book newest book are you familiar with dr. Greger? Yeah

Vanessa Spina:
Yes, but I haven't heard the most flattering things, probably from Dr. Sean Baker, and I think they kind of have a bit of an antagonistic...

Melanie Avalon:
situation? Yeah. So, um, he's probably one of the most famous vegan researcher advocates. I mean, he's up there. I'm like, I've been reading his work for, I mean, years and years. His books are so long, but what's interesting about it is he does so much research. So it's very persuasive, everything he says, because there are so many studies and I really respect him for that. I know it takes a lot of time. I'm very, I mean, I'm kind of mind blown that I'm going to be interviewing him because I've been following his work for so long, but there are so many questions I want to ask him when I interview him. I just want to ask him all the counter arguments to the typical vegan arguments about the role of animal protein and stuff and diet. And the way this all relates to what we were just talking about is because he makes so many arguments that the majority of health issues and problems are because of animal protein intake or meat, dairy, things like that. I just find it so interesting that if you look at the history of us, like humans, and even relatively recent, I'm just thinking like pre, so like pre -processed food industry, like we were eating meat, so that's not what changed. What changed was these processed foods, like that's what changed. And I find it really interesting that meat, especially in the vegan world, gets so demonized as the problem when maybe it's not that, like maybe it's the processed foods. And the reason I was thinking about it was what you're talking about with not giving, you know, not feeding your kids all these processed foods. Yeah, this interview, that was going to be really intense. Oh my goodness.

Vanessa Spina:
I just interviewed Dr. Vera Tarmen. I was mentioning it last episode, but I absolutely love her. And she's, you know, a medical doctor who's specialized in addictions. And she wrote Food Junkies. I don't know if you read that book. I haven't. It's amazing. She talks about how these ultra -processed foods, they generate levels of dopamine. And she talks about the units of dopamine that they release. And she talks about, like, how our physiology is adapted to having, say, like, 100, 200 units of dopamine, maybe 250 on, like, your wedding day or graduation, like, these special peak events where you have just such ecstatic feelings. And the processed foods give us these units of dopamine, like, cocaine, where you get, like, 400, 300, 400 units of dopamine. And it's so much that your body's not designed to be able to cope with that. And she talks about what happens to the receptors, and you get this up -regulation, down -regulation of the receptor sites. And basically how this processed food is, it's like any other drug, and how we have to start thinking of it as drug -like food. And I was talking to her about children, and I told her about what we do with our kids. And I'm like, sometimes I worry that I'm being too strict about it. And she said, but if you were talking about cigarettes, would you be like, I'm worried I'm being too strict by not letting Luca have cigarettes or not letting him have cocaine? I'm like, yeah, it sounds insane, right? But we do have to start reclassifying some of these foods because of the way they act on our body. Our bodies is so physiologically, you can actually measure it, what's happening, you know, to the body and how it affects the brain and how it creates this addictive pattern. And I also asked her, do you think that the standard American diet is basically creating food addicts? And she said, absolutely, because there's no way that you can meet those carb requirements without eating processed food. And that was my experience when I was vegetarian and vegan. In order for me to feel satisfied at the end of the day, I had to eat some processed food. You just can't only eat so much broccoli and cucumbers and whatever if you're not eating protein, like meat based protein, you can only eat so much tofu, like, eventually, you're gonna have to have some highly processed food. I do think we need to think of that food differently. And it would be very hard for me to interview someone like him because I feel like they're putting out harmful information. But I have to admire the fact that you're able to talk to people like that, who have such opposing points of view. And, you know, be able to admire their research and their work and everything. I remember Dr. Ted Neiman always says that there's like this U -shaped curve, where you really do well with, you know, optimal protein. And on the other side, eating very, very, very low protein can create also like a lot of I guess he was talking about maybe in the context of fat loss or something. But based on everything I've learned about body composition, and how I was when I was eating that way, like, I think you can lose a lot of weight, but I don't think it's all necessarily high quality weight loss.

Melanie Avalon:
I mean, I feel obviously very similar and part of me wonders because I've made a really conscious decision with the show to bring on people of completely different opinions. And I do because you were mentioning about him putting out false information and stuff and I do think about that sometimes and like am I like giving a platform to things I don't agree with? So it's like a fine line of, I think about this a lot, but I really do want to bring on people like that because I really want to hear what they have to say to what I am wondering or curious about or questioning about what they say. Like I want to know like what their answer is respectfully. So it's an exciting opportunity to interview them. It's going to be intense though. If I ever finish the book, the audiobook is like 20 hours, which is a long time, so we shall see. Okay. I will just give one little quick update. Hopefully by the time this comes out, hopefully, I think my third podcast should have launched because we're planning to launch it at the beginning of June. So hopefully the Mind Blown podcast is out there, friends and listeners. So check that out. As well, hopefully the spirit, my spirulina supplement should be coming out. We're figuring out the launch date right now. So we're hoping for beginning of July. So those are my updates. Any other updates or shall we jump into some things?

Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, that sounds very exciting. I'm really excited to try your spirulina because I'm obsessed with it. I got Luca taking it every day with me. Yeah. And it's so cute because I call it the medicine because he had this whole thing where like Damien was getting medicine and he wanted medicines. I was like, you can have some medicine too. So every night, usually before I go to bed, I have chlorella and he's like, I want some medicine. So he comes, like sits on the counter with me and I usually give him two. So Catherine Anderson said, you can give them one tablet for every year of how old they are. So soon he'll be able to have three, but he has two spirulina tablets and he just crunches them up and he just eats them and he loves it. And it's so, it's great because I know he's getting, you know, such incredible nourishment from that in terms of the plant foods that we don't eat as much of, which is like also what makes me feel really good about taking it. And I know he doesn't need all the antioxidants as much, but he's just getting so much from it. And I just love like, it's our thing at the end of the day, like after this podcast, you know, I'll probably go and we'll go have our medicine. It's so cute. And she said, you know, one tablet is equivalent to the nutrients in one pound of vegetables or something. So, you know, as a parent, it makes me feel so good that he's having it.

Melanie Avalon:
Okay, first of all, that's like the cutest thing ever, the medicine, that's so cute. I was just sitting here smiling, oh my, giving him his medicine. Oh my goodness, that's adorable. I wonder why Catherine says there's a limit for that amount. I'm actually right now, we're signing off on the bag and everything. So I got the, I was like looking at the supplement facts on the back of the bag. It's shocking, the amount of nutrition and spirulina. So I'll just like tell listeners really quickly, for us, 30 tablets is a serving. I think energy, but that's the same serving size for them. So it's like, if you know energy bits, it's one of their single serving packets. That's what's considered a serving. So just that, well, it has four grams of protein, but it's a complete amino acid profile. So it has a hundred percent of your vitamin K, 27% of your B2, let's see, 3% B1, 6% B3, 3% B6, 625% of your B12, which is amazing, especially for people on plant -based diets, because those are typically lacking B12, but you can get that from spirulina and chlorella, has 53% of your iron, which is crazy to me. And chlorella, I think has even more. We will be launching a chlorella as well. But some other ones, like 86% of your chromium, has 8% of your magnesium, 8% selenium. It's just, it's crazy how rich it is. And then it also has, like you mentioned the antioxidants, it has these like random things like superoxide dismutase and has glutathione in it and GLA. So it really is like, I don't like the term superfood, but if I were to nominate a superfood for the superfood awards, I'd probably nominate spirulina, chlorella, they'd be up there. So yeah, it's exciting. I can't wait to send it to you.

Vanessa Spina:
you I can't wait to try yours and yeah I'd specifically take the chlorella because it has the K2 and I was low on K2 postpartum and also it helps boost Damien's K2 through breast milk because I have to give him K vitamin K drops every week so you have to do that for newborns if you choose not to get the shot after they're born so I always take the chlorella at night also because Katherine said it was amazing for detoxification and so I usually take the I take the spirulina when I open my fasting window I don't have it during the day because I don't consider it to be clean fast friendly even though that's been said but it has protein in it so I treat it as a superfood as you have protein superfood so I always have the spirulina at the start of my window and I have the chlorella right before bed and it helps a lot with detoxification pulling toxins out of your stored tissues and helping you excrete them by binding to them because of that hard cell wall

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, it's amazing for that. Now I'm, because I'm looking at our supplement facts, so like I said, it has 100% of vitamin K. I'll have to check if that's the K2 form. I'm assuming it is.

Vanessa Spina:
The spirulina has K, but the chlorella has a K2 from energy bits, but I'm not sure what it is with yours.

Melanie Avalon:
I'm making a note of this to research this so thank you because that's something I really I want to know personally so thank you

Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, K2 really helps with blood clotting, which can be an issue postpartum, and it's a vitamin that I was lower in. You can also get it from an egg, just like you can get the B12 and choline and stuff. But if you're vegan, you're not getting eggs, or if you're not eating eggs every day, then it's really helpful. But for me, it's replaced, spirulina and chlorella have replaced my multivitamin. I mean, you look at the breakdown like it really can. It's not just a multivitamin, it also replaced my cookie tin. It also replaced something else, the fish oil, because it has an omega -6 that is considered. It acts in the body like an omega -3. And I think there's one other thing. So you can really save a lot by switching out several supplements for spirulina and chlorella. And I'm not someone who likes to take a lot of stuff. So for me, just taking one thing, I like to just take one or two things. And I feel like everyone in the world should be taking spirulina and chlorella daily.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh my goodness, I need a sound clip of that.

Vanessa Spina:
Especially because of the phycocyanin, it kills cancer cells in in petri dishes and it's what's used in chemotherapy. They use phycocyanin and it's basically found in really high concentration in, I think it's in the spirulina, not the chlorella, I think it's in the spirulina. But they're both so amazing to take. I really feel like everyone in the world should be taking it. I'm trying to get my parents to take it next.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh my goodness, I can't wait to send you mine. And what I love about it as well is you're getting all of these vitamins and these nutrients in their real food form, like not synthetic. I just feel like they're so much better absorbed by the body. Yeah, and yours is raw, I'm assuming. Yes, it's not, yeah, heat treated.

Vanessa Spina:
I think you said last time you were taking, I was mentioning I take about seven grams of each, which is about 30 tablets of each, and you said you were doing like double that.

Melanie Avalon:
Mm -hmm. I usually do about double that.

Vanessa Spina:
Is it just like for just getting more?

Melanie Avalon:
I just love it. It's like that time. I just love eating it and that's like intuitively what feels like the right amount for me in my big, you know, one meal a day situation. Obviously you have it in your eating window.

Vanessa Spina:
Mmhmm.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah. And I'm excited because I like the way, I know some people don't like the taste. If so, you can swallow it. You can crush it and add it to foods. I just put it in my smoothie.

Vanessa Spina:
sometimes.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, yeah, that's a great way to do it

Vanessa Spina:
Oh, it also replaces a green. Sorry, if you're someone who has traditionally taken like a greens supplement, it also replaces your greens. Yes.

Melanie Avalon:
It's so amazing. I'm so happy you understand.

Vanessa Spina:
It's like mana from heaven. It doesn't even make sense that this exists and that when you actually look at the breakdown of what's in it, it looks like it was godsend. It's incredible.

Melanie Avalon:
No, it's so funny because like, that's the way I've been feeling about it. But then when I finally got back the supplement fact label for our bag, I was on the phone with Scott and I was looking at it. I was like, is this right? I was like 625% of your B12, 53% of your iron. So then I was like going to chat GPT and I was like fact checking everything. And yep, it's accurate.

Vanessa Spina:
And the superoxide dismutase, I mean, there's lots of antioxidants and there's glutathione. I think there's superoxide dismutase and there's one other with the C. What is it?

Melanie Avalon:
Would it have been the, in chlorella there's nucleic acids? Yes. Was that the one? No.

Vanessa Spina:
Okay. There's chlorophyll. Maybe it's chlorophyll I'm thinking of. Because chlorophyll, I think there's one, no, it's one other antioxidant. Superoxide is glutathione and it's probably going to come to me later. But what's amazing is, you know, our, we make superoxide dismutase in our bodies. Like my children make it. And we make it, I think, until the age of 30. And then our endogenous supply of antioxidants goes way down after the age of 30, which explains why people start really aging after the age of 30. So if I could go back in time, I would have been starting to take this when I turned 29. But I love taking it now because I know that it's like, it's helping support so much free radical damage and buffer that, but superoxide is a crazy free radical. It's like got three unpaired electrons and causes so much damage to your mitochondria. I think it's one of the only antioxidants that gets inside the inner membrane of the mitochondria and helps protect it.

Melanie Avalon:
This is so amazing. I really can't wait to send it to you. Oh my goodness.

Vanessa Spina:
I can't wait to try yours and I can't wait to see the packaging, the mermaid.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, the mermaid essence. She came together, she pulled through. Yeah, I'm really, really excited about it. And it took us so long to find a source. And I'm obsessed with the source where we found. It's in Hawaii and they only use like the best practices and they're really sustainable. And I'm just really, really excited about it. And then we third party tested it ourselves to make sure it's completely free of pesticides. And we tested for heavy metals and all the things. So because it doesn't have an organic certification, but that's a label that means certain things. So I know that if I can go and check all the things that organic would mean, I feel good about it, if that makes sense. So like I know the raising practices and then I went and tested for all the toxins and things that the organic labels should supposedly protect against. So I know it's up to those standards. So I'm really, really excited about it. So for listeners, if you'd like to get the special launch special, cause we're gonna do a really great launch special for it, definitely make sure you're on my email list. So that is at avalonx.us/emaillist. And you can also get text updates. If you text AVALONX to 877 -861 -8318, that's Avalonx and I'm gonna spell it because all the texts we get are often not this A -V -A -L -O -N -X. We get everything and I'm like, nope, that's not. And I can't like add people. So you have to text that keyword to get added to that list. So yeah, very, very excited. Shall we jump into some fasting things? Sounds great. So to start things off, we have some great questions about longer fasts. We're excited about this because I have some studies and some thoughts and then it's gonna tie into something that we teased about last week if you listened to that episode. So this should be fun. So we have a question from Andrea. This is actually from my Facebook group. So you can join my Facebook group. It's called IF Biohackers and I often will ask for questions in there. And so Andrea asked, what's the truth about occasional long fasts like 36 to 48 hours? I've heard it's great for you if you're fat adapted, keep electrolytes up and eat hearty following the fast. I've also heard it's terrible because it stresses your body too much. I go with what feels good to me, but what are the real facts? And then some other people chimed into that. So Maris said, I would like to know this as well because I do two of them each week. And Kimmy said, I'd like to know more about this also. I've been fasting almost four years and have only done a few 24 hour fasts. I can go longer with no problem at all, but is it too much stress on my 55 year old body?

Vanessa Spina:
It is true that fasting can raise cortisol levels in many people. And so in terms of what we hear of it stressing the body too much, I think that it can be one of those things where if someone already has a very high stress load and maybe already high cortisol, that could be a situation where it could be adding potentially too much stress. However, I think that intermittent fasting and fasting in general also has a hermetic effect, which is similar to the hormesis that we have when we build muscles, we stress our muscles. And that stress is a eustress, it's a positive stress because it makes our muscles stronger when they recover and repair and it makes them bigger and we build stronger, better muscles. So in that same sense, intermittent fasting and even longer fasting, I think can also provide some hormesis where it can actually make us stronger. You know, it can help us sometimes deal with other stresses in our life. And that's sort of a very inter, like person bio individual thing, I would say. Some people may have, you know, the feeling that it stresses them out too much. There's also psychological aspects to it. Whereas if you believe it's gonna stress you or stress your body then, and you firmly believe that, then it's gonna be a stressful experience. You might be white knuckling it through it. You really have to check in with yourself and see how you feel personally. Doing it, do you feel? Like I was talking about the last episode, when I got back into doing it, I felt boundless energy. I felt my little sparks of joy coming back throughout the day. I felt like myself again, I felt like I had way more time way more energy to go do things. I found myself with much enhanced cognition, wanting to listen to more interesting complex things instead of just sort of feeling more sluggish and lethargic when I'm in that fed state, more of the day and wanting more entertainment and less sort of cognitively stimulating things. So for me, I notice right now in my life, it's a really good thing. Maybe at other times it would be more of a stressor. So it's bio individual. It also depends on what's going on currently in your life. And we do know physiologically it can raise cortisol levels in people it tends to, but that can either be a good or a bad thing for you. So I just wanted to make that comment before you talked about the research. And then I have another comment later about the effect on muscle.

Melanie Avalon:
Awesome. Thank you. And yeah, I agree so much. I mean, it's a theme of the show is that it's very, you have to find what works for you, especially when it comes to these longer fasts, like they're asking about. I do think I don't want to make blanket statements, but in general, I think with time restricted eating, intermittent fasting that's happening within a day, so not longer than a day, I really think most people can adapt to that and find a pattern that will work for them. With these longer fasts, Andre, I was asking about 36 to 48 hours and I know people often wonder about even longer fasts than that. I definitely think some intuition comes into play and you have to find what works for you. And I did find a really interesting review article. This is actually from May 2024, although it was originally published June 2023, but still for the public, I guess, May 2024, which is very recent. And it's called efficacy and safety of prolonged water fasting, a narrative review of human trials. So it was actually looking to summarize the effects of these longer fasts in people. And so these fasts were five days or more, which is longer than what the listeners were asking about. But I do think it can look at a lot of good mechanisms and definitely things that people might experience in longer fasting, like when you're really getting there, like the five days. And so for that, they found that five to 20 days of fasting increased circulating ketones. It led to mild to moderate weight loss of two to 10%. But that approximately two -thirds of that weight loss was muscle and only one -third was fat. But again, this is a five -day water fast or longer. They said the excessive lean mass loss, I'm quoting from the study, suggests that prolonged fasting may increase the breakdown of muscle proteins, which is a concern. For other health benefits, they found that blood pressure consistently decreased with the fasting. There was mixed findings on cholesterol panels and plasma lipid panels. So they found decreases in cholesterol and triglycerides in some studies, but others didn't find that. As far as their fasting glucose, fasting insulin, insulin resistance, and HbA1c, which is considered to be a marker of longer -term blood sugar based on glycated hemoglobin from high blood sugar levels. And hemoglobin has a turnover rate half -life of three months. So it's typically seen as a three -month marker of your blood sugar status. So that was in people with normal blood sugar levels. Interestingly, for people who had type 1 or type 2 diabetes, they didn't find those changes. I thought that was really interesting. They also looked at the effects of refeeding in a few of the trials, and they found this is also really interesting. So three to four months after people did these longer fasts, the metabolic benefits, so the weight loss could have, like, in some of the trials and some of the people was maintained, but the metabolic benefits weren't. And that actually doesn't surprise me, I can circle back to that. As far as negative side effects they found, they found metabolic acidosis, and this is not in everybody, but they just found these metabolic acidosis, headaches, insomnia, and hunger in some studies. Their conclusion was that prolonged fasting appears to be a moderately safe dietary therapy that can produce clinically significant weight loss over a few days or weeks. However, the ability of these protocols to produce sustained improvements and metabolic markers warrants further investigation. So a few comments I will have there, and again, I want to clarify, super clarify, because I know the question was about shorter fasts in this, and this is talking about five to 20 day fasts. The point about the metabolic benefits not being maintained, I find really interesting but not surprising. So basically what it says to me is, you know, the weight loss can be maintained because you literally lost weight. But these metabolic states that we're in, it's because things that they're measuring, like ketones, blood sugar, insulin resistance, cholesterol, triglycerides, that's not something where you can like set it up and then be good to go if you don't maintain a lifestyle that's supporting that. Like those markers change very fast. Even the cholesterol panels, so even when I interviewed Azure Grant, she was a researcher and she did a lot of work on trials that were involved with ORA ring. I actually was introduced to her through the former CEO at ORA, his name was Harpreet. One of the studies she was on was so fascinating to me and it was they basically checked people's cholesterol panels, like consistently throughout the day for a few days. And the amount of change that they saw, like even within a day, was so interesting. And it really made me like think differently about when you get your cholesterol panels done at, you know, on a blood drop because it's just a transient moment in time. And I remember there was a sentence in that paper saying that for every single participant, at least one marker of their lipid panel went out of range or went into like a problematic range at some point during the day, which is like, and again, that's, you know, that population study. it just goes to show the point of it and how it relates to the study I'm talking about right now is that these things change so fast. And so it's not surprising to me that, you know, you go on this extended water fast and then you see all these beneficial changes. And then if you check three to four months later, really not surprising to me that people don't have those effects anymore, especially if they're not continuing their, any sort of fasting protocol. I find it really interesting though, that even with all of everything that they found on these super long fasts that are longer than these questions that we got asked about, they still concluded with all of that, that it's a moderately safe diet therapy. So if you're looking at fasting even less than that, like 36 to 48 hours, I think the same conclusion would obviously apply to that as well. I will just speak a little bit more to my own thoughts on it. A lot of the fasting proponents and researchers out there, like recently I've been interviewing both Dr. Mindy big advocates of having these longer fasts within a person's protocol, especially for women. I know Dr. Peltz in particular really likes fasting for older women and menopausal women in particular. She thinks it pairs really well with that. And you can check out past episodes because recently we talked a lot about that. We talked a lot about sinking fasting to your cycle, whether or not you should do that. Vanessa and I personally don't really change surrounding our cycles. Well, I do think it can work for a lot of people if that's their cup of tea and works for them. So long story short, my thoughts on this, my thoughts on occasional long fasts. I agree with Andrea. She said, I heard it's great for you if you're fat adapted, keep electrolytes up and eat hearty following the fast. I agree 100% with that. And then her comment about she's heard it's terrible because it stresses your body too much. I think Vanessa did a really good job talking about that, what our perception is surrounding stress. That was a really great analysis what Vanessa gave. And the role of cortisol and a hermetic beneficial stress versus too much stress. And like Vanessa was saying, I think you have to look at your overall dietary stress load bucket. And it's very possible that something that is technically or normally would be a hermetic beneficial stress. If your stress bucket is full to the brim and you're just running on stress hormones and you're emotionally stressed and maybe even under eating or all of the different things, then too much fasting might be too much stress. Because in that context, it's no longer hermetic. It's too much for your body. But then I love what Andrea said. She said she goes with what feels good to her. I agree. Listen to your body. Your body can speak to you about what works best. And so like for Maurice, for example, who's she does two of them each week, if that's working for you and like you're feeling good. I mean, keep on keeping on. And so for Kimmy, for example, who she's been fasting almost four years and she's only done a few 24 hour fasts and she felt like she could go longer with no problem. But she's worried about it being too much stress on her 55 year old body. I personally, again, I'm not a doctor, but I feel like if you feel like you keep going longer with no problem, like try it. And you might see a lot of benefits from it. So Vanessa, what are your thoughts?

Vanessa Spina:
I wanted to comment on the concept of fasting being bad for muscle after the age of 40 because Dr. Don Lehman is someone who you know I really look to for a lot of these recommendations and he said if you're past 40 he really doesn't recommend it because he said it can cause too much lean body mass loss or muscle loss and usually it's too difficult at that point to put it back on especially past the age of 40 we don't have the same hormones that we have when we're younger when it's a lot easier to put muscle on and so you know he said it's sort of like you know every day you're losing bricks from a wall you know if you fast you're gonna accelerate that process and then you're not gonna get them back but I heard him say that he considers extended fasting to be over 48 hours and I didn't realize before when he was just talking about fasting that that's what he was qualifying it as so it's interesting because usually when you look at some of the charts you know on on extended fasting you see that it's after three days that the proteolysis or the lysis or breakdown of protein goes way down and you're mostly burning fat after those first three days you actually do break down a lot of protein but some of that is autophagy in the first three days but he says that up to 48 hours he doesn't really consider extended fasting so that means he's saying that up to 48 hours fast are probably fine on your muscle if you're even if you're over 40 so it was a little clarification point I wanted to mention because I think a lot of people have questions about that it's really important I think to do resistance training if maintaining your lean body mass is really important to you and you want to make sure that you're still offering a stimulus to muscle protein synthesis without ingesting protein because that's the other like like you can lift weights or you can eat protein both of those stimulant muscle protein synthesis but if you're not eating and you're doing a fast say up to 48 hours then you want to do some resistance training if you are concerned about not being able to signal muscle protein synthesis that can definitely help with it but I just thought it was interesting I didn't realize that that was what he considered to be sort of that threshold for when you get into the danger zone for losing muscles so seems that under 48 hours is fine according to him if you're over 40 and you don't want to lose muscle mass

Melanie Avalon:
I think one of the primary issues we have in the intermittent fasting world is just how many different words there are for different things and the lack of consensus surrounding definitions. Yes. Especially even intermittent fasting, we call it so many different things, like intermittent fasting, time -restricted eating, time -restricted feeding. And what's really interesting, I find this interesting, because I'll read a lot of books and sometimes they'll go through and they'll define each one of those. And sometimes it'll be a very specific definition. And I'm like, where did that come from? Is that like your definition of that word, you know? Like for example, Megan Ramos in her book, I'd have to look at my notes, but she defined intermittent fasting as I really would have to look. Basically the definitions were just not, they were not what I would have called intermittent fasting or time -restricted feeding. And it was all, I'm really happy that she defined it because that's really helpful for reading her book. It's like, okay, so when I read her book and I hear what she says, I'll know what she's referring to. So I think it's great that she does that. And she's definitely has her definition for it. I just think it's a big problem for the intermittent fasting world at large that we don't agree on these definitions. Like somebody needs to like step up and like, I don't know, to find them.

Vanessa Spina:
It's one of my biggest frustrations, especially when you're reading research. And you and I have talked about that, the study will say intermittent fasting and it's not, it's something completely different. And just the fact that there is no consensus is, I think it, yeah, it's definitely needs some clarification. Although it's interesting, when I was interviewing Dr. Sachin Panda who basically put time restricted feeding on the map, he says they're basically the same, like he had a definition for it. You could do intermittent fasting in some ways without having the same like time restricted eating pattern. Like for him, it's really about the patterns, but yeah, it would really serve us to have just a little bit more consensus on these definitions.

Melanie Avalon:
or even like ADF, for example, alternate day fasting, I feel like there's two pretty accepted versions of that. And in one version, you don't need anything on the fasting day. And in the other version, you eat like up to 500 calories, which I just feel like is very different signaling if you're not eating at all versus eating some. Or for example, like the ones where it's intermittent fasting but then they're like consuming stuff, but it's fasting.

Vanessa Spina:
That drives me crazy. That's what I was thinking of when we were, you know, talking, you know, because I mean, people get excited about like new studies, you know, in this area. And then even when you talk to the study author and you're like, why did you call this intermittent fasting when it's caloric restriction? And it seems like some people, even though they've been working in the field for a long time, they don't really either they, they don't know there's a difference, which is concerning, or they do know, and they don't care, which is like also

Melanie Avalon:
It's just confusing. So I'm looking through my Megan Ramos notes to see what... Yeah, I want to know what the definition was. My notes that I have, so she considered time -restricted eating is certain hours. It's not intermittent fasting. They're different things. Like she recommends time -restricted eating on days that you're not fasting. So they're like completely different. And I'm trying to remember what she said about what intermittent fasting was, but I don't think I have it in my notes. But yeah, so definitions friends, definitions. Yeah. Do you think we adequately answered that question?

Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, I think so from all angles. I think from the stress perspective, you know, and that bio individuality and then the length of the fast and then concerns with muscle loss. And I think that that's probably a lot of what our listeners in this community are concerned with. So yeah, I think so.

Melanie Avalon:
Awesome, I think we can briefly answer one last question. Super short, and it's from Michelle. She wants to know, does taking glutathione break a fast? I can answer this, or do you have thoughts?

Vanessa Spina:
My answer is yes. I mean, because it is basically made up of three different amino acids, so I would definitely keep it in the eating window.

Melanie Avalon:
Yes. Okay. So my thoughts, I would agree. I will say though to comment on this, because I think a lot of people take oral glutathione. And ever since I interviewed Dr. Nayan Patel, he has a company called Auro Wellness. He has a really fascinating book about glutathione, like I learned more about glutathione than I ever thought I could learn. And he makes a really good case that taking oral glutathione supplements, they realistically do not get into your cells. It just goes through your bloodstream. Even IV glutathione doesn't get into your cells. It just goes through your bloodstream. So I really encourage people not to take oral glutathione supplements anyways. I know they're expensive, and I encourage people not to take IV glutathione. It's very, very temporary and transient. And I also talked to my friend James Clement about that, because I really, really trust him. He does a lot of longevity -related lab work. I had him on my show for a book called The Switch years and years ago, and we became buddies. I love him. I'm just laughing, because I tried to convince him to go with me to the Veronica's concert, because he loves the Veronica's. But in any case, back to the glutathione. So Dr. Patel makes a transdermal glutathione, and they have studies showing that it actually gets into the cell. I love this stuff. I use it all the time, especially after a night out, you know, drinking a bit of wine. So for that, you can go to MelanieAvalon.com/auro. So A -U -R -O. And you can actually bulk up their, I didn't realize this until, because I post about them all the time on Instagram, and they sent me a DM this week. And they said, you guys can actually be doubling up your coupon codes, which is amazing. So you can get 15% off if you double up the codes. So use the code MelanieAvalon, that will get you 5%. And then also add the code Auro10, A -U -R -O -10, that will get you 10%. So then you'll get 15% off. So definitely take advantage of that. And the reason I love this is because it completely avoids the question of does it break your fast, because you are doing it transdermally, you're putting it on your skin. So there's not even the worry of it breaking your fast. So that is my answer to that question. All right, anything else, Vanessa?

Vanessa Spina:
I loved all of these topics on this episode on the last one. I can't wait for more. I just love all the great questions that we get and it's so much fun to chat about these studies with you.

Melanie Avalon:
Me too. I really I love that we love all the same things. It's so amazing. So thank you to all the listeners for being here. 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. You can submit questions there. You can get the show notes at ifpodcast.com/episode373. Those show notes will have a full transcript and have links to everything that we talked about. So that will be super helpful. And you can follow us on Instagram. We are @ifpodcast. I am @MelanieAvalon. Vanessa is @ketogenicgirl. I think that is all the things. Anything from you, Vanessa, before we go?

Vanessa Spina:
I don't think so. I had such a great time and can't wait to record with you next week.

Melanie Avalon:
Me too. Thank you so much. I will talk to you next week. Talk to you then. Bye. Bye. 

Melanie Avalon:
Thank you so much for listening to the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. Please remember, everything we discussed on this show does not constitute medical advice and no patient-doctor relationship is formed. If you enjoyed the show, please consider writing a review on iTunes. We couldn't do this without our amazing team. Administration by Sharon Merriman, editing by Podcast Doctors, show notes and artwork by Brianna Joyner, and original theme composed by Leland Cox and recomposed by Steve Saunders.

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!

More on Vanessa: ketogenicgirl.com

Theme Music Composed By Leland Cox: LelandCox.com

If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving us a review in Apple Podcasts - it helps more than you know! 

 

 

Apr 29

Episode 367: Changing Up Your Fast, The Best IF Benefits, Anti-Inflammatory, Longevity, Alzheimer’s Prevention, Time Savings, Fast Cycling And More!

Intermittent Fasting

Welcome to Episode 367 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast, hosted by Melanie Avalon, author of What When Wine Diet: Lose Weight And Feel Great With Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, And Wine and Vanessa Spina, author of Keto Essentials: 150 Ketogenic Recipes to Revitalize, Heal, and Shed Weight.

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

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 2 lbs of ground beef for life! Plus, get $20 off your first order!

COZY EARTH: Cozy Earth provides luxurious, temperature regulating, sustainable bath and bedding products made from viscose from bamboo. Go to cozyearth.com and use promo code "IFPODCAST" for an exclusive 35% off!

LUMEN: Lumen is the world’s first handheld metabolic coach: a device that measures your metabolism through your breath, to let you instantly find out if you're burning carbs or fat! The Lumen app also gives you tailored guidance to improve your nutrition, workouts, sleep, and even stress management! If you want to take the next step in improving your health, go to lumen.me and use code IFPODCAST to get $100 off your Lumen!

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

SHOW NOTES

Beautycounter: Keep your fast clean inside and out with safe skincare! Shop with us at melanieavalon.com/beautycounter 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!

BUTCHERBOX: For a limited time go to butcherbox.com/ifpodcast and get 2 lbs of ground beef for life! Plus, get $20 off your first order!

COZY EARTH: Go to cozyearth.com and use promo code "IFPODCAST" for an exclusive 35% off!

LUMEN: If you want to take the next step in improving your health, go to lumen.me and use code IFPODCAST to get $100 off your Lumen!

Listener Q&A: Nicole - Should you cycle your length? I go from 12-20 depending on my days.

Effect of intermittent fasting on reproductive hormone levels in females and males: a review of human trials

Basal serum prolactin levels in obesity--unrelated to parameters of the metabolic syndrome and unchanged after massive weight loss

The effects of intermittent or continuous energy restriction on weight loss and metabolic disease risk markers: a randomized trial in young overweight women 

The effect of intermittent energy restriction on weight loss and diabetes risk markers in women with a history of gestational diabetes: a 12-month randomized control trial

Our content does not constitute an attempt to practice medicine and does not establish a doctor-patient relationship. Please consult a qualified healthcare provider for medical advice and answers to personal health questions.

TRANSCRIPT

(Note: This is generated by AI with 98% accuracy. However, any errors may cause unintended changes in meaning.) 

Melanie Avalon:
Welcome to Episode 367 of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. If you want to burn fat, gain energy, and enhance your health by changing when you eat, not what you eat with no calorie counting, then this show is for you. I'm Melanie Avalon, biohacker, author of "What, When, Wine" and creator of the supplement line AvalonX. And I'm here with my co-host, Vanessa Spina, sports nutrition specialist, author of "Keto Essentials" and creator of the Tone Breath Ketone Analyzer and Tone Lux Red Light Therapy Panels. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and ketogenicgirl.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this show do not constitute medical advice or treatment. To be featured on the show, email us your questions to questions@ifpodcast.com. We would love to hear from you. So pour yourself a mug of black coffee, a cup of tea, or even a glass of wine, if it's that time, and get ready for the Intermittent Fasting Podcast.

Melanie Avalon:
Hi everybody and welcome. This is episode number 367 of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon and I'm here with Vanessa Spina. Hi everyone. How are you today, Vanessa? Has the weather changed in Prague? Is it warm?

Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, we had this amazing heat wave. It was like a summer preview for the last few weeks and it was amazing. We were like just doing all the things outside and doing picnics and, but it's only April.

Vanessa Spina:
So it's like very bizarre and now it's back to cold, which I know you love, but I don't, so I'm like, I really, please come back. I really want the summer weather to come back, but it was a nice little preview of what's to come.

Melanie Avalon:
How about you? How cold is it right now?

Vanessa Spina:
cold right now it's just like cool like a cool day like a windy day like you need a jacket kind of thing like a fall day but yeah how about you

Melanie Avalon:
It's warm, I'm not about it. My air conditioner already broke once, that was not good.

Vanessa Spina:
Why don't you move somewhere cold for the summer, like Iceland?

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, I'm like, I'm like weighing the energetic mental emotional stress cost of the heat versus of moving.

Vanessa Spina:
because you've moved around a lot.

Melanie Avalon:
growing up yeah yeah actually i don't know what is a lot you know that's a good question i guess i feel like

Vanessa Spina:
you've been back and forth with LA and Atlanta and there was somewhere else, I think.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, back and forth between LA and Atlanta, mostly.

Vanessa Spina:
cleaning going to Austin, I think I've decided it's too hot. Okay. I thought it was really hot for you. That's what I said when he first mentioned it. But yeah, I thought you must have had a good other good reasons to go there.

Melanie Avalon:
It's just like the biohacking podcasting place, I feel like everybody lives there, all the people. We'll see. We'll see how the life continues to unfold. When are you coming back to the US to hang out with me?

Vanessa Spina:
Oh, next visit is probably going to be, we're thinking about Christmas time and Damien will be around one then. So that's what we're talking about right now planning. But yeah, right now I'm looking forward to not traveling anywhere for at least like three, four months, except for local things.

Vanessa Spina:
And then in the fall, we'll probably go back to our favorite place in Greece. But I just like really don't want to go anywhere for a bit. And we have a lot of family visiting like all summer pretty much.

Vanessa Spina:
So I just want to be like not doing any packing, just like enjoying still like somewhat of the newborn phase, like with Damien and just like being here. Like I really just want that. It's funny, like how you get these like cravings, you know, for travel or you get cravings for just being at home.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, actually, yes. I do understand that a little bit. Do you think you'll move back to the US at all?

Vanessa Spina:
You know, we talk about it all the time, like we were just talking about it this weekend about like where we want to go and we have so many different like ideas and plans and, you know, we we'd like to be closer to friends and family.

Vanessa Spina:
That's the main thing. But otherwise, I think we prefer the lifestyle in Europe. So it's going to be like both have so many pros and cons, you know, we're constantly like talking about what we want to do, but we really don't know yet.

Vanessa Spina:
Like that's it's kind of a question mark right now. It's kind of a mystery.

Melanie Avalon:
Well, I learned yesterday where you should not move. Oh, where's that? This actually blew my mind. This was something I was just, I had no idea about. I was so wrong, so wrong. So Rob Wolf, who we both love, have you met the people at Rome Free Ranch in Montana?

Vanessa Spina:
I haven't, but that's where he's building his campus, right? The new kind of... Oh, is he building something there? Didn't he build a... Isn't he building an element campus there?

Melanie Avalon:
Well, he's in Montana and they're building something element related. I don't know how close it is. Oh, is it at the ranch? No, I just did Montana. Oh, Montana. Oh, yes, yes, yes. The state, correct.

Melanie Avalon:
Apparently, Montana is beautiful. Have not been. But so yesterday I was interviewing. He introduced me to them. They raise regenerative bison. I learned so much about bison. Who knew there was so much to learn about bison.

Melanie Avalon:
But in any case, I learned that. So I guess there's like this trend of like farmers and stuff in Montana or places like that, like having a lot of farmland and then they'll like not want to farm anymore and then they'll sell their farmland to people who will be like, I want to like own a farm.

Melanie Avalon:
And then people will like buy the land and just like casually like, I don't know, raise a goat or something. A hobby farm. Yes, yes. Gentlemen's farm. Yes. So like prior to this conversation yesterday, I'd be like, oh, yeah, that's great, like regenerative agriculture for the everyday person, like supporting the environment.

Melanie Avalon:
Apparently, you're like apparently don't do that. That's what I learned because apparently it takes the land because you're not going to do it right. Like you're you're not going to. Apparently, it's like actually do it right.

Melanie Avalon:
It needs to be done by like farmers. And so they said doing that actually takes away from the land that is needed for, you know, changing everything in this sphere. So they were like, if that's what you want to do, it's really better that you like stay more in a city and like greenify your land or enter like a co -op situation or enter just like a really nice country, you know, place, but like taking like the ex farmer land and turning it into your own farmer land is a no, which I did not know.

Vanessa Spina:
It makes sense. Yeah. I mean, I don't know how many people are probably doing that, but just from like the small amount of people that I know who've done it and like seen it on Instagram. I still think it's probably like a small number, but I totally understand that if that's a trend, it's probably something that's, you know, not great for the land, but what's the alternative?

Vanessa Spina:
Like it just gets abandoned.

Melanie Avalon:
The alternative, I think, would be people like John and Brittany, who I interviewed, who are actually having these regenerative farms. So selling it to, not to like big corporations or anything, but to farmers.

Melanie Avalon:
From farmers to farmers.

Vanessa Spina:
Right, yeah, that makes more sense.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, so they were so cool. I learned so much about bison. Do you like bison? Like eating it?

Vanessa Spina:
Yes. My husband, I used to always get bison burgers and grill them when we were in the US. It's not something that I get so much when we're in Europe, but it's a great, extremely nutrient dense meat and super lean.

Vanessa Spina:
So it's right up my alley. And I would probably eat it every day if it was available in Europe, but we do when we're in the US for sure.

Melanie Avalon:
Well, I also learned bison and buffalo are the same thing. Yeah, I was learning all about the nutrient profile and I was like, this is, sounds like one of the most perfect red meats. Like you said, it's super lean.

Melanie Avalon:
It actually has, the fat is intramuscular rather than outside of the muscle, like in cows. Like, so like in a ribeye where there's like all that fat around the edges, like for the bison, it's all inside of the muscle.

Melanie Avalon:
And they said that it cooks out actually easier. So it gets even leaner when you cook it. The nutrient profile just sounds amazing. And fun fact, at one point, there was only 300 bison left in the 1870s, I think.

Melanie Avalon:
Isn't that crazy? 300. Yeah.

Vanessa Spina:
I thought they almost went extinct. I remember that. But I know two people, two very prominent people in our space, who are women, who are extremely fit. And both of them mostly just eat bison.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh really? Like they're like carnivore and they eat like bison? Yeah.

Speaker 3
That's a Colby.

Vanessa Spina:
I want to try that. It made me think of you until I was saying it. I'm like, it sounds like something you would tell you. One woman I interviewed last year and she said it's like the best meat and also like the safest and for so many different reasons, like she was like, I don't eat poultry anymore and I don't eat this and that and she's like, I don't need advice.

Vanessa Spina:
And then the other is someone that we both know in the space who's like very prominent. I don't know. She doesn't really talk about like her diet that much, but I know that she personally like that's all she eats.

Vanessa Spina:
And then when I talked to the other woman, she kind of explained to me why and it is just like the perfect food. So are there numbers a lot larger now? Like what is it at now?

Melanie Avalon:
Mm -hmm. I think they said it's at, oh wait, I had it written down. There's a big difference between half a million and 50 million. That's a big difference.

Vanessa Spina:
We were watching this show last night with Luca about our great national parks, great national parks. It's like on Netflix, probably a lot of people have seen it. Obama narrates it and Oh, he does. Yeah, the Buffalo in Yellowstone.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, there's approximately 20 ,500 on the plains and oh, yeah, this is what I learned. So 420 ,000 and commercial herds apparently eating. I mean, this sounds a little bit contrainduitive, but raising bison is what's keeping them alive.

Melanie Avalon:
Like if, if we weren't doing that, they probably would go extinct.

Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, that's really, really interesting. Yeah, if you're in the US, probably should take advantage. I remember we used to get it like at our local health food store. We'd just get bison burgers and they were really delicious.

Vanessa Spina:
It was, yeah, it was great. I almost, I wish I could have more access to it, but I know.

Melanie Avalon:
I don't think we should have some right now. Wait, what did you learn in that documentary? Sorry, I interrupted.

Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, no, we were just watching it with Luca because we watched a lot of nature shows now, like we've always have, but especially like with kids, it's like it's just a great thing to watch because there's like lots of animals and something we can all enjoy together and it's like quality programming.

Vanessa Spina:
But yeah, I just remember they were like in Yellowstone and Obama's like, I remember the first time I saw a bison, it was magical or something like that. We were just laughing about it. They're like kind of a mythical, but like, what's the word for it?

Melanie Avalon:
like prehistoric feeling yeah like there's an effort I think he said they're they're the oldest mammal on the US continent is that correct yeah there's something

Vanessa Spina:
Um, not magical, but just special about them that yeah, probably takes you to another era or yeah.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah. Like a bygone era. Mm -hmm. Yep. How romantic. That's really cool you learned all about them. I know. So now listeners know. Last two fun facts, then we can get into questions. One, I grew up in Memphis, Tennessee, and there was like a random, like when I would drive to school, there was this like patch of land and I had my son on it.

Melanie Avalon:
I always thought that was so random. They're just everywhere. And not everywhere. Second thing was, oh, and they went on a tangent. Oh, they don't have Costco in Europe, right? That's just a US thing.

Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, definitely not here.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, GMS Costco.

Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, especially when my cookbook was like, in Costco, I wanted to go

Melanie Avalon:
your cookbook was in Costco did we talk about this I don't think I don't know did we talk about this oh my goodness yeah

Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, it was there and so like I was always asking my family and my friends who went to Costco all the time, they would go and they would like take videos from me all the time. And they would be like, here we are, like here's Vanessa, send me these videos.

Vanessa Spina:
Like, I just want to go to Costco. Every time we were home, I was like, I can we just go to Costco so I can see my book there please, even though I saw it at Barnes and Nobles and chapters and like all over the US when I went on my book tour and blah, blah, blah, like I saw it everywhere, but I wanted to see it in Costco for some reason, it was like, maybe because there'd be like a lot of them.

Vanessa Spina:
I don't know what it was. I just like, there was I was just dying and I never got to actually see it there because like we were always traveling and so I just have a bunch of videos and like, you know, being tagged on social media, like when people would go there and get the book and stuff.

Vanessa Spina:
But I love Costco. I love how keto, like pro keto they are like there's so many pro keto keto foods. I've done, sorry, I've done interviews with different publications that are just like all the keto finds at Tesco, sorry, there's Tesco is what we have here.

Vanessa Spina:
It sounds very similar, but it's a British supermarket. And that's where we were today, actually. But Costco is very low carb and keto friendly to like, I really love that about them. Now they're selling gold bars, which is something exciting, like in our family, because it's like my husband's involved in like the gold market.

Vanessa Spina:
That's how he originally met. And they're also now selling those them big, like it's like, what do they not do? They have wedding rings, they have like, they literally have everything. So I can only imagine in the future, it's going to be like maybe just Costco is going to run the world.

Vanessa Spina:
I don't know.

Melanie Avalon:
Well, I will say apparently it's the other thing I learned because they have their bison in Costco as well, their products, and more of like the Pacific Northwest, but also down to like some more Southern states.

Melanie Avalon:
Apparently Costco is like an amazing corporation, just in general with everything they do as far as like the margins they take from brands and like their principles and ethics. And so I felt really, and this was coming from, you know, Brittany and John at Rome Free who were very, they were very like revealing and it was very eye opening talking to them about, you know, greenwashing and human washing versus what's actually real and sustainable and happening.

Melanie Avalon:
And they were big Costco fans. So awesome that you had your book there. That's amazing.

Vanessa Spina:
Yeah I love Costco. I'm so glad to know that about them too.

Melanie Avalon:
Me too. Me too. And I feel like the three places that are like a moment for having your book would be Costco, Target, and an airport.

Vanessa Spina:
I never got the airport one. I was yours in target. No, no. I just mean the airport one was like one that was sort of always, yeah. It may have ended up in one. I just don't know, but definitely wasn't in target, but yeah, big fan of Costco.

Vanessa Spina:
Shout out to Costco.

Melanie Avalon:
I actually have a story. Maybe I'll save it for next time. You weren't here during the Whole Foods Guy era. That was in the Gen era. Listeners know about my crush on the guy who worked at Whole Foods.

Melanie Avalon:
I have a story that relates to this and books and Whole Foods. Maybe I'll just put a teaser there. Friends will probably like to hear again about Whole Foods Guy.

Vanessa Spina:
Yes, I think I know about Whole Foods Guy.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, you might've been listening to the show then.

Vanessa Spina:
Oh, it's like some guy that you either always saw there or did he work there?

Melanie Avalon:
he worked there and I had a major crush and I would like get dressed up when you go. I would like pretend that I was going in to get wine on like a Friday night and dress up and like go in and like okay did you ever oh I did I did awful I did embarrassing things like I yes I talked to him yes I walked up and was like do you have a girlfriend I did so much I'm so embarrassed

Vanessa Spina:
Like what happened? Like did you actually, did you guys ever go on a date? Like I never heard.

Melanie Avalon:
No, he had a girlfriend, yep. Long story short, I'll just close out that loop. Basically, when he finally left, once we got over the awkward time of me like attacking him in the parking lot, not attacking him, but like, you know, forwardly approaching him in my car to inquire about his relationship status.

Melanie Avalon:
Once we got past that,

Speaker 3
I can't do it anymore, it's hard!

Melanie Avalon:
I did. It was so bad. It was one of the nights that I went in, all dressed up. Then I went out and I was sitting in my car. Then he left and I saw him in the parking lot. I was like, oh, I cannot. I cannot not go up to him in my car at this moment.

Melanie Avalon:
I do crazy things. Long story short, when he was leaving, I gave him a copy of my book. And then I will never know. I don't know to this day, did he accidentally leave it there or did he on purpose leave it there?

Melanie Avalon:
But in any case, he left it at Whole Foods. My sister on another day finds it in the book section, texts me a picture and is like, Melanie, your book is in Whole Foods. And I was like, I was like, I know what this is.

Melanie Avalon:
I ran to Whole Foods, found the book, opened it because I had signed it. I was like, oh crap. And I awkwardly grabbed it. I'm like, they're gonna think I'm stealing, but I put it in my bag and walked out.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, so embarrassing.

Vanessa Spina:
It's kind of funny. I wonder now if anyone's ever done that, like gone into a store that they wanted their book and then just like put a buzz. Like, it's like that guy last week who put his art in some major gallery.

Vanessa Spina:
Oh, he did. He worked there and he, he switched out one of the paintings with his own.

Melanie Avalon:
Did he get away with it for a while?

Speaker 3
No, he's like, it's like a, it's like a, yeah, a huge no -no, like, it goes a lot, basically, like doing that. Yeah, it's just kind of.

Melanie Avalon:
cute story. Like what if somebody tried to buy it, you know, like would it scan? I don't know what they do. So yeah, that's that saga flashback for all the listeners. I've totally forgot about that experience.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh my goodness.

Vanessa Spina:
I'm glad I got closure on that story, because I just remember you talking one day about how there was a cute guy at Whole Foods. And I was like, she's gonna get him like, they're gonna talk like they both like, they're both at Whole Foods, you know, they're probably into the same stuff, like, you know, they're gonna date.

Melanie Avalon:
Well, there was a guy I like met I did tell a story on the show once about I met like my perfect man at Whole Foods But it was a story of like I thought I met my perfect man And he was gonna come back into my life when we were gonna have a romance, but that never happened.

Melanie Avalon:
So I Just met him once and that's it He like knew by optimizers and like commented on my blue white blocking glasses and like knew all the things and he was beautiful

Vanessa Spina:
That was the one I heard. That was the one because I heard that and I was like, oh, they're going to date. Like he's still out there. He never, like you just never saw him again.

Melanie Avalon:
No, it was at a different whole foods location that I normally go to, I think that's...

Vanessa Spina:
That's the one I heard and I was like, that's such a cute, like meet cute.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, it's things like that where I'm like, maybe there's not some like overarching great purpose to everything. Maybe everything is just random Ever gonna see him again No, not to be like a downer I believe in magic Okay Should we talk about fasting?

Melanie Avalon:
Yes, really quick announcement listeners. So this is the 29th of April you have two more days To enter our fabulous giveaway. If you are enjoying this show go to Apple podcasts If you write a review a new review and or update your old review Take a screenshot of that review and send it to questions at I have podcasts calm We will enter you to win the entire avionics line.

Melanie Avalon:
That's my supplement line So that includes my sera peptase a proteolytic enzyme which breaks down problematic proteins in your body and helps Inflammation and brain fog and allergies and all the things.

Melanie Avalon:
It's a really nice catalyst of fasting You'll get my magnesium 8 which is a full -spectrum magnesium blend for your body you'll get my magnesium night cap, which is a special type of magnesium that Crosses the blood -brain barrier to support mood and relaxation and memory and you'll get my berberine, which is epic for blood sugar control So if you're fasting you can take it before meals to help reduce your blood sugar response to meals And or if you take it during your fast, it will help lower your blood sugar during your fast You'll get all of those you'll also get Vanessa's tone protein.

Melanie Avalon:
Would you like to tell them about your tone protein Vanessa?

Vanessa Spina:
I would love to. I mean, I take it every single day. It tastes absolutely delicious, but it's also scientifically formulated to help you build muscle because it is enhanced with leucine, which is the main branched -chain amino acid that helps you to initiate muscle protein synthesis.

Vanessa Spina:
So you'll always get enough leucine in every serving to help you to build muscle and get lean and strong in it. It's also vanilla bean flavored. It tastes delicious, and you can go see some of the ratings and reviews, but everybody loves it and looks forward to having it every day as a treat and part of their day.

Vanessa Spina:
So yeah, it is really, really amazing.

Melanie Avalon:
So you'll get that and you'll get a special surprise from IndiLogic. So I actually haven't calculated up how much this is worth, but I mean, that's probably over $300 worth of product. Super awesome, super easy to enter.

Melanie Avalon:
Just go to Apple Podcasts, again, write a new review for this show and or actually that's just an or, or update your old review to, you know, update for your latest thoughts. Take a screenshot, send it to questions at ipodcast .com and we will enter you.

Melanie Avalon:
You have two more days or today and tomorrow, so send that in if you like. Okay, fasting -related things. So I thought something fun we could do on this show, we can just try this out, see how it lands.

Melanie Avalon:
I've been asking some fasting -related questions in the Facebook group and I love hearing people answers and seeing like, I don't know, I just thought we could read people's answers and see what we feel, how we feel about their answers.

Melanie Avalon:
So a question I asked in this Facebook group, by the way, is IF biohackers, intermittent fasting plus real foods plus life. You can come in there and hang out with us. So I asked friends, what is your favorite intermittent fasting benefit?

Melanie Avalon:
Before I do that, Vanessa, should we share ours or should we read theirs first? Yeah, share yours. Oh, wow, on the spot, okay.

Vanessa Spina:
I was like, sure, you're a second, the other one.

Melanie Avalon:
I think mine, honestly, oh man, there's so many. Wow, this is a really hard question. Okay, I'm torn between, I love, it finally helped me find this pattern of eating. I mean, before intermittent fasting, I was so like on the diet roller coaster and the blood sugar roller coaster, and I was always thinking about food and I was just obnoxious.

Melanie Avalon:
Like it was not a fun time. I mean, it was a really fun time, but that aspect was not fun. And now it's like I can just, I get to eat all I want, like this luscious feast every night, and it's so delicious and I never feel deprived and then I'm not hungry during the day, and it helps you maintain like a nice body weight.

Melanie Avalon:
So I'm torn between that and the time, I think, that you get back. Like the time and mental energy of just not having to deal with food all day. It makes you so much more productive, I think. How about you?

Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, there's there's so many things that come to mind. But recently, you know, I've been kind of switching back and forth a little bit between doing like two meals. And some days I do one meal. And when I do the one meal a day, like I have to say that I feel amazing.

Vanessa Spina:
I don't have to think about food all day. I don't really want to have two meals either. But there's definitely like more prep and thought that goes into it. So I feel really energized, really clear. Like I just had my main meal right before we started recording.

Vanessa Spina:
And I was like, man, I wish I was fasted, because I think so much more quickly. And I'm just way better at podcasting when I'm fasted. I'm way better at everything fasted, which is like probably not the case for everyone.

Vanessa Spina:
But personally, and I think you're like that too, you just are able to like, you're really in this fat field state, I feel like I'm when I'm in a fat field state, I'm in my best state, like, I think that's how we were kind of designed to be a lot of the time, like just add sessually to so I like I feel like I'm thriving for sure when I am fasted.

Vanessa Spina:
I love doing my workouts fasted. I love how little meal prep there is how little like work goes into it. I would say also it helped with like just food and everything. But for me, that's like really the protein piece that did it.

Vanessa Spina:
And just like feeling satiated, but it's like the two together that synergistically work together. It's like the high protein, the keto, the ketones, the fasting, I feel like they all work together so well, that I feel amazing all throughout the day.

Vanessa Spina:
And very energized, don't have to think about food, like all those things. And just being able to maintain the same size all the time, like I just have one, pretty much like the way my body is now is just how it is all the time, as opposed to like fluctuating and going up and down or that kind of thing.

Vanessa Spina:
So I think that that also is like one thing I really love.

Melanie Avalon:
I love that. Everything you said, I feel the same way.

Vanessa Spina:
I had to stop myself because I could probably talk about it right now.

Melanie Avalon:
I know. I know. I start talking. I was like, I'm gonna start crying. It's like the reason I love. No, I feel the exact same way. Let's hear what other people say. Okay. So Annette said energy, clear thinking, hopefully dementia prevention.

Melanie Avalon:
I actually have a really intense interview tomorrow. It's like, you know, it's crazy to think not to go to tangent, but it's crazy to think that the invention of DNA was not in our lifetime, but in the lifetime of people who are alive right now.

Melanie Avalon:
Like it's crazy how much we've learned the discovery. Mm hmm. Yeah. Like so the guy I'm interviewing tomorrow, it's two people. It's Lee price and Nathan hood. They have a book out called the age of scientific wellness.

Melanie Avalon:
It's crazy because Lee hood, one of the authors, he's like, he's like an original like he, so he literally talks about remembering when they discovered DNA. And then he, he did so much work developing a lot of the technologies that we use to sequence DNA and stuff like that today.

Melanie Avalon:
Why am I talking about this? Oh, he has a whole chapter about Alzheimer's and dementia. And it's really, really interesting to see the history of that and how little we seem to know in the scientific history of it and you know, what might help what might be preventative.

Melanie Avalon:
He doesn't, I don't think he talks about fasting. We do know fasting has a lot of support for the brain. It helps produce brain drive, neuro topic factor, ketones, which are protected for the brain. The autophagy process is likely helpful.

Melanie Avalon:
So I do think there's brain benefits. Hopefully, like she said, hopefully helping prevent things like dementia with fasting. I'm not making like a medical statement, but okay. Alice said so many less brain fog, more energy, better skin, no joint pain, and it's so freeing, less time spent thinking and planning meals, no counting points or calories.

Melanie Avalon:
It makes life less complicated. She said two years ago, I was having severe knee pain and the doctor talked about doing a partial or full knee replacement. I decided not to go back and instead took up spin classes three times a week and quit wearing heels.

Melanie Avalon:
Oh, no. But ultimately, I believe that I have helped to fight off the inflammation in my knee. And today, I relatively know knee issues. Kimmi said she had a similar story that her doc said she needed a knee replacement.

Melanie Avalon:
She did extended fast 24 and 48 hours. She had stem cell therapy, physical therapy, and now she can walk with no issues and the swelling is down 96%. And she says if she eats poorly for a few days, she feels it in her knees.

Melanie Avalon:
And then Sheila said feeling absolutely amazing all the time for four years and two months never stopping. Heather likes that it's flexible, yet it satisfies her controlling nature to be time restricted.

Melanie Avalon:
That's funny. I like that. Stephanie said it makes her morning easy. She doesn't have to worry about what she's eating or what she needs to bring with her. She eats when she gets home. And that's something because we get a lot of questions or we have in the past about people trying to make eating work with work, fasting work with work.

Melanie Avalon:
Some people, I don't know what Stephanie's work schedule is, but it sounds like she eats afterwards. Kenna says weight management and the health benefit of autophagy. Laura said clear brain power and thinking and energy.

Melanie Avalon:
Meghan said she used to stress about eating a healthy breakfast, so she appreciates the permission to just not eat one. She also likes the black and white of IF, she's either not eating or eating. She doesn't have to stress about making healthy choices all the time.

Melanie Avalon:
And she likes that if the situation wasn't convenient for eating, like a night class or traveling, she could just not eat. Chrissy likes less to think about, no lunch to pack. Oh, so here's another one where she had an issue.

Melanie Avalon:
This is a recurring theme. She said she had a trigger thumb in her left hand and two rounds of cortisone shots. My orthopedic surgeon said the next step would be surgery. I started intermittent fasting and within a very short time, my symptoms subsided.

Melanie Avalon:
I added Melanie Avalon's Sera Peptace, yay, that supplement you can win, and now have no symptoms at all. Oh, wow. My skin looks better and skin tacks I had are gone. A1C levels are greatly improved.

Melanie Avalon:
That's really exciting, Kelly. Thank you for sharing that. Laura said less digestive issues. Mary, it's the most effective method for her arthritis, inflammation, constants, energy, less food prep, great food, healthy relationship with food, stable weight.

Melanie Avalon:
She feels healthy. Amber, she's flexible, better sleep, less meal planning, using maintenance of a healthy weight. Stacey, she says she wants her brain, this is like what Vanessa was saying, she wants her brain to be clear, no fog, the energy is amazing, and the weight loss.

Melanie Avalon:
Joanne says mental clarity. Carly says realizing that hunger is not an emergency, it's okay to be hungry. David, less inflammation, Christine, weight management, it's the only thing that's worked. Kathleen says A1C and insulin levels are now in the optimal range.

Melanie Avalon:
That reminds me of a tangent about insulin. Teresa, not having to make breakfast. Nydia, she says she's not sure. She's been fasting on and off. She did it for two years without stopping, didn't really see any difference except the loss of weight that she gained back, then she stopped for a while, but now she's back at it, so she's going to see, oh, well, welcome back, Nydia.

Melanie Avalon:
Randy says appetite correction. Shannon, it simplifies her life. Kimberly, grocery store savings and her joints feel better. Deborah says she aged backwards. I love that. She says her face doesn't sag so much as before with intermittent fasting.

Melanie Avalon:
She just looks and feels younger. And Joan says sugar control to prevent diabetes. That was a lot of benefits. Do you have thoughts about the benefits?

Vanessa Spina:
I just love hearing them. You know, I think that's one of the reasons that I first started listening to this podcast back when Jen was your co -host was I just loved talking and hearing other people talk about the benefits because it's so nice when you're doing something, but maybe you don't know a lot of people around you who do it too.

Vanessa Spina:
And then sometimes you feel like awkward about it. You're like, you know, everyone else lives their life so differently than I do. I mean, I know a lot of people professionally or in our community that do, but I don't know a lot of people in my actual day -to -day life, although there's more and more lately.

Vanessa Spina:
Something's been happening. I saw it with intermittent fasting. Like my mom was just doing it when we were in Spain. And then we went to brunch with some friends on the weekend. And so my husband's best friend's partner was saying that she started doing intermittent fasting.

Vanessa Spina:
Like I feel like it's getting maybe it's like starting to hit more of like the mainstream, like people who don't, who aren't necessarily in these communities. But anyway, it's just nice to hear other people doing it.

Vanessa Spina:
I loved listening to you and Jen answer the questions that people have and just relating to either the benefits of it or the questions that people have about it. So it's really fun to hear all the benefits that people experience because every like pretty much, you know, like half of the things that you just read, I was like, yep, yep, yep, me too.

Vanessa Spina:
And that's why we're all here is because we've like found this lifestyle hack that is so amazing. And you know, once you do it and you live it and you know, you experience the benefits of it, I think it's just like, you don't really want to live any other way.

Vanessa Spina:
So yeah, it's just really fun to hear everyone's, you know, comments and such well thought out replies.

Melanie Avalon:
I agree so much, so thank you everybody for sharing. It was really interesting how so many people talked about the surgeries. That was really interesting, I thought.

Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, it's it I have heard that as a recurring theme, like over the years, and also, you know, in the it's a lot of similar things to that I hear about like keto, I think, you know, a lot of these lifestyles and approaches, like they tend to bring us back to our homeostasis, like we get out of the way of our bodies, incredible intelligence and natural healing.

Vanessa Spina:
That's what I love the most, I think about fasting. Last thing I'll say is that it like, you get out of the way of your own body's incredible, powerful ability to heal and just thrive. And you're like, wow, my I am meant to thrive.

Vanessa Spina:
I meant to feel amazing in my body when I stopped doing things that prevent it, you know, eating too much parsley.

Melanie Avalon:
Do what? Sorry, I broke up.

Vanessa Spina:
Like a lot of our modern lifestyle, like I always say, it's like you wake up and you're either, you know, eating or drinking something every hour of the day and that that definitely gets in the way of our bodies like natural ability to thrive and feel amazing.

Vanessa Spina:
So when we get rid of that, or we do something different, you realize like, wow, I really can feel amazing all the time. I don't have to deal with all these issues or, you know, like I used to think like every day I would wake up and there would be something, something in my body.

Vanessa Spina:
That like hurt or wasn't right. And now it's like the opposite. It's, it's weird when I wake up and something is off. You know what I mean?

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, same here. And going back to like the eating, the eating thing, I think it's really, really telling or interesting because I think maybe people have never tried intermittent fasting. It might sound really scary or you think that you'll be like really hungry or like you can seem very foreign and you might not be able to imagine yourself enjoying it or that it would be something that would actually feel good and be quote easy.

Melanie Avalon:
I find it so interesting just how much your paradigm can shift completely because once you experience it, it's just so much easier at least for me personally. And I was just thinking about how much my paradigm has shifted and maybe when I say this, some people will probably be like, well, I really like that.

Melanie Avalon:
So I don't want that to change and in which case more power to you. But for example, something like going to a brunch I used to love, like I would love to go to a brunch and just like pig out and everything, right upon awakening, which now I like shudder.

Melanie Avalon:
Now when I see brunches, I just, you cannot pay me to go to a brunch. Again, some people will love that and they might not want that to change.

Speaker 3
hahaha

Vanessa Spina:
We went to brunch on Saturday and on Sunday this weekend, but Monday to Friday, like this is kind of what I've been doing the last few weeks, Monday to Friday, I've been doing one meal a day at dinner, and I've been feeling great doing that.

Vanessa Spina:
And it hasn't been affecting like my breast milk supply or anything like that, although I did go back for like about a month to doing two meals a day. And then on Saturday and Sunday, we had brunch and then we had dinner.

Vanessa Spina:
So that was again, back to my other pattern of like breakfast and dinner, and just like not snacking in between. So I know that's like a variation of intermittent fasting that I kind of, I call it like circadian rhythm fasting is a little bit different.

Vanessa Spina:
But I love like one of the listeners said the flexibility of it. And that's how I feel is like, you know, I can adjust or like some days we'll have a big lunch and then I'm not hungry for dinner. So that'll be my main meal of the day.

Vanessa Spina:
Like it just, it's adaptable, it's flexible, you know, you can work around it, but I love brunch. So I'm one of the people who loves going to brunch. I find it's like such a fun social activity. I usually don't have a huge meal there.

Vanessa Spina:
Like I used to have a huge meal when we would go for brunch. Now I usually just have like a small protein basting, like some eggs and I'll bring some protein bread with me. And it's like a relatively smaller protein meal for me compared to what I would have at my one meal or, or what I would have at home.

Vanessa Spina:
And I like the flexibility of that, but I feel like you can kind of still fit in things like that into your life if you want to, and you don't have to totally let go of intermittent fasting. You should still make it work for you.

Melanie Avalon:
I'm really glad you shared that and have that experience, because I think that covers like all the options that it can manifest, you know, there is a path for everybody. I don't know, I sort of maybe I wish I was like that.

Melanie Avalon:
For me, if I break from my normal pattern, it just messes up everything for me, like circadian rhythm wise and like hunger wise, it just throws me for a loop.

Vanessa Spina:
I mean, Dr. Sachin Panda is very strict about like, you should have, he says the research is like the best when you do your time restricted eating, you have the same window every day and you eat at the same time every day, like, I'm like, there's no way I'm eating at the same time every day, like, maybe when I'm much older, I could have some kind of program like that, or maybe you or other people listening could eat at the same time, but like for us, there's like a target, you know, and it happens like every day is different, like, especially with two little ones.

Vanessa Spina:
So like, when I hear him say that, or when I interviewed him, like, and I read his book, I'm like, I know he says you should eat at the same time every day, but there's like, there's no way that could ever happen for me.

Vanessa Spina:
But I know if you can, like what you do, that it's very beneficial.

Melanie Avalon:
Well, okay, so I'm so glad you said that I was not aware that he that that was his belief system. I mean, I like hearing it just because I feel like I so often hear the opposite, which I'm all about find what works for you.

Melanie Avalon:
I've been reading a lot of Mindy Peltz's books right now because I'm interviewing her soon. Did you have her on your show? No, so she's more about like cycling different types of fasts. And actually, we have a question.

Melanie Avalon:
I'll go in and read it because it relates to what we're talking about. Nicole wanted to know, should you cycle your length? I go from 12 to 20 depending on my days. So okay. So like, so like we were saying, lots of different opinions and perspectives here.

Melanie Avalon:
And before even you and I right now had this conversation about Dr. Panda, when I was just thinking about this question, I was thinking about how I really feel like it's more intuitive than not. And by intuitive, I mean, once you have your fasting muscle and know what fasting feels like, and know what feels good for your body, I like a more intuitive approach.

Melanie Avalon:
So like, for me intuitively, I feel the best doing the same thing, the same window ish every day, whereas Vanessa feels best changing it up, like she was talking about, I think it gets confusing, because there are people who have very specific protocols.

Melanie Avalon:
So like, Dr. Peltz, who I'm going to interview, she'll be on the Melanie Avalon biohacking podcast. She's like very specific and like fasting according to your cycle. And, you know, you fast less right before your period and right before ovulation and you fast longer.

Melanie Avalon:
I'm trying to remember when you fast longer.

Vanessa Spina:
First 10 goes your cycle, probably.

Melanie Avalon:
Okay, actually, yeah, that does make sense. So a lot of people will have that approach, but then we have Dr. Panda, who's saying, you know, do the same thing every day. I'll just talk about the reason I like fasting the same every day.

Melanie Avalon:
Maybe Vanessa can talk more, a little bit more about what she was just talking about with what she does. For me, I like it because I do find that my, my hunger hormones like ghrelin and leptin, ooleptin is a satiety hormone, but we have seen in studies that they tend to follow like a circadian pattern.

Melanie Avalon:
And so like with ghrelin, it gets released based on your anticipated meal times. So it's one of the reasons that if you have been eating constantly or say you've been eating breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and then you switch to like dinner only, you're probably going to get hungry at breakfast and dinner.

Melanie Avalon:
Part of that could be because your ghrelin pattern is still going. And so I think there is a benefit to sticking to something where you will wipe out that cue, that hunger cue, which might be happening at a different time.

Melanie Avalon:
That could be a thing. That's something I experienced. And then on the other hand, some people will make the argument that it's nice to vary things up because you keep your body guessing, which I do agree with that.

Melanie Avalon:
I guess for me, what I would probably do, I don't know, for me, I'm just so like, I just so enjoy the pattern that I have that it's hard for me to really diverge from it. I think if I were to do anything, I would just fast, like do a longer fast.

Melanie Avalon:
But I really think people in the end should be intuitive. And maybe that's too much of a casual approach. But Vanessa, do you have any more thoughts about it?

Vanessa Spina:
Definitely. So I think one of my really good friends, she works with Dr. Jason Fong, Megan Ramos, and she has always advocated switching up your fasting when you want to lose weight. So your goal is fat loss.

Vanessa Spina:
She definitely believes what you just said, that if you do the same thing every single day, like she says, do OMAD if you have like 10 to 20 pounds to lose. If you have more than that to lose, it's not a good idea, it's just do OMAD every single day because eventually your body will adjust.

Vanessa Spina:
So she talks a lot about switching things up. She usually recommends that people do like two 36 hour fasts a week, she's got all these different permutations and like different approaches and recommends that people switch it up so that your body doesn't get used to it.

Vanessa Spina:
Just like with exercise, like our bodies are adaptation machines, like they do adapt to what we do on a regular basis. So I think that there's definitely a case to be made for that, like if you are doing fat loss, like I just had a baby, I didn't really gain a ton of weight, but I didn't actually gain much weight at all during this second pregnancy.

Vanessa Spina:
The first one I did gain a little bit. But this most recent one, I didn't gain, but I don't feel as like toned as I was before because I wasn't like able to do the same kind of like amount of activity.

Vanessa Spina:
I tried to, like I just feel like a little softer. Like I don't know how to explain how to explain exactly, like I don't think that I necessarily have gained weight, but I don't just don't feel as like my body says like, what's the word for it?

Vanessa Spina:
Like tone, I guess maybe tone. So I've been switching it up a little bit and I am noticing like things feeling like more toned since I started doing the one meal a day again. For me though, long term, I probably will switch back and forth between doing two meals and one meal a day because like once I'm back at like my like whatever body composition that I feel my best at, I'm just going to want to be maintaining there.

Vanessa Spina:
And so I'm not too worried about having to switch it up all the time. It's just that more like social things will come up or like, you know, we'll be going out for branches on the weekend or we'll be going on vacation when like there's a breakfast buffet and a dinner buffet.

Vanessa Spina:
Like there's things like that that I'll be switching up for. But that's kind of the way that I look at it is like, what are you optimizing for? What are your goals? If it's just to enjoy the benefits of intermittent fasting overall, and you're not necessarily like looking to lose weight, then I don't think you need to switch it up all the time.

Vanessa Spina:
But I do think that if you want to switch it up, you can. Like there's no hard and set rules. Like that's one of the things we've kind of been the theme of today's podcast is like, that's what's so great about intermittent fasting is it's like this ability to not snack between meals and to feel this food freedom and to really enjoy your meals when you have them.

Vanessa Spina:
But you don't have to do the same thing every single day. So you know, there's kind of a few different like thoughts there. And you know, I think it just comes down to like what you're primarily optimizing for.

Vanessa Spina:
And if it's just for the benefits that come with intermittent fasting, I would say like you could do different windows, but you don't have to like it sounds like in your question, you're asking if you need to be switching it up.

Vanessa Spina:
And I don't think like that's a requirement.

Melanie Avalon:
That was so helpful. Yeah, I really like that. I really like Megan Ramos's perspective. I'm actually I'm interviewing her again as well. We had to keep pushing it back a little bit. Did she just wait?

Melanie Avalon:
Did she just have a baby? Yes. Okay. Yeah. Because I was going to interview her right around, I think when she had the baby. So that's awesome. Love it. Love it. Love it. I did want to comment as well on something that the breastfeeding part, because I found this, I was doing a lot of prep because this week I was on, not this week, last week, last week I recorded for an upcoming menopause summit where I talk about, so I talked about intermittent fasting for menopause.

Melanie Avalon:
So it was really fun. Actually, it has not aired yet. So I think you can still sign up and it's completely free. So definitely, so definitely sign up. I'm a speaker. JJ Virgin is in it. My friend, Catherine Arnston at energy bits, and then a lot of other really fabulous women as well as some men.

Melanie Avalon:
So you can go to Melanie Avalon .com slash menopause summit, and it's called the over 40 and fabulous women's summit. So I talked about intermittent fasting for menopause while doing research for that and trying to find the studies.

Melanie Avalon:
I did come across a study relevant to what Vanessa was talking about, which was it was looking at prolactin, which is a hormone responsible for milk production and mammary gland development. And it did a review of that for diet and fasting and how things might affect it.

Melanie Avalon:
And so it said that accumulating evidence suggests that weight loss diets, sorry, that weight loss through dietary interventions does not significantly affect prolactin levels. So just in general, that's just dieting.

Melanie Avalon:
At the point that this article was written, there had only been one study on intermittent fasting and prolactin, but it was in, it was a five to approach. So that's where you're eating normally for five days and fasting for two of the days.

Melanie Avalon:
And this was for 24 weeks. And it was in premenopausal women who were overweight and obese. And there was not any effect on their prolactin levels. So they said that this route, the results, although very limited, suggest that intermittent fasting may be safe for lactating females.

Melanie Avalon:
There was also another study on the effect of a five to diet on weight loss and just gestational diabetes risk reduction and breastfeeding women. And that study also showed that intermittent fasting was safe and that population group was well tolerated and led to no adverse changes in their milk production.

Melanie Avalon:
So they said that the findings warranted that basically they need more studies, but the studies to date did not show any adverse effects. So I just wanted to comment on that.

Vanessa Spina:
Yes, I thought you were going to be talking about this because I did a couple of episodes, I think it was like a year ago, just on how intermittent fasting affects women's hormones. And one of the, I think we probably were talking about the same paper and it found that it had no effect on prolactin, which I thought was really cool.

Vanessa Spina:
And it only had beneficial effects on all of the other female hormones. So that was really cool.

Melanie Avalon:
We can put links in the show notes. You said those were episodes on your show.

Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, it was about like, I remember it was right when you and I first started recording. Oh my God, we're coming up on a year.

Melanie Avalon:
I was thinking about that yesterday somebody asked me how long we've been recording together and I was like, I was like, um, I was like, I think a year. And then I was like, wait, Vanessa literally went from like, not pregnant to like, carrying a child to like delivering a child.

Melanie Avalon:
So it was at least

Vanessa Spina:
Yeah, we started recording last May. So yeah, we're coming up on a year already or anniversary. But I remember when we first started recording together last May, I had just been doing a bunch of episodes on the optimal protein podcast about how intermittent fasting affects women's hormones, because it's a question that we both get all the time.

Vanessa Spina:
And it I think at the time, it had been getting some negative headlines about that. So I purposely dedicated some full episodes just to going through the research and showing that in most cases, what's happening is like beneficial effects on sex hormone finding globulin on estrogen levels on all of the androgens, like reducing androgens and all of those hormones that you know, levels that you don't want to have the bad estrogens and everything I was going through all of that.

Vanessa Spina:
And I remember seeing that more research was being called for, but that it did show that it didn't have not have an adverse effect on prolactin, which I saw with both times that I did, you know, breastfeeding with Luca.

Vanessa Spina:
And now with Damien, like it didn't affect the levels at all. And I think I was saying on one other episode that we had that I was like scared to try to go back to doing OMAD, even though I was like feeling called to it like longing for that like, not eating all day, like feeling the freedom and the time to, you know, actually get other things done.

Vanessa Spina:
And I was a little bit nervous too, but then I got like the stomach flu for two days. So I couldn't eat for two days. And I totally lost my appetite. And my breast milk was great. So there was it didn't affect it at all.

Vanessa Spina:
And I'm not saying that's going to be the case for everyone. But it's good to know that there is research actually supporting that it doesn't have any adverse effects on prolactin.

Melanie Avalon:
Yeah, no, that's amazing. We'll put links in the show notes to those episodes that you did so people can dive in deep. I redived in for that menopause summit, although I was looking specifically for studies on menopausal women and there was less than in pre -menopausal women.

Melanie Avalon:
But in general, it seems to be that there's not like there's either not an effect or there's a beneficial effect or there's like slight, I couldn't find anything that was like that showed a really detrimental effect.

Melanie Avalon:
And there's all this fear surrounding it and maybe we can talk about this more in a future episode.

Speaker 3
I'd love to.

Melanie Avalon:
So, yeah, awesome. Awesome. Awesome. Well, listeners, friends, thank you so much for all of your comments and questions and all the things we so so appreciate it. If you would like to submit your own questions for the show, you can directly go to questions at I have podcast .com or you can go to I have podcast .com and you can submit questions there.

Melanie Avalon:
Reminder about our giveaway today and tomorrow is your last day to do this your last days. So go to Apple podcast, write a new review or update your old review for this show. Take a screenshot, email it to us at questions at I have podcast .com and we will submit you to enter to win the entire avallonix line, which includes my Sarah peptase, which like Kelly commented on earlier in the show really, really helped her her inflammation and her symptoms when she was needing surgery.

Melanie Avalon:
And she didn't actually even end up having surgery. So you'll win that as well as my magnesium eight full spectrum magnesium blend magnesium nightcap for your brain. Burberry for blood sugar control, Vanessa's tone protein, which has the perfect amount of focus of losing that you need, which is so important for muscle building and maintenance and all the things.

Melanie Avalon:
And you'll win a special supplement surprise from MD logic over $300 worth of product all for you. Just write a review or update yours screenshot, send it to questions at I have podcast .com and in the show notes for today's episode, there will be a full transcript as well as links to everything that we talked about for that.

Melanie Avalon:
Go to I have podcast .com slash episode three 67. Okay. I think that's all the things. Anything from you, Vanessa, before we go.

Vanessa Spina:
Oh, this is just such a fun episode and just hearing all the positive benefits of intermittent fasting just always puts me in a really good state. So thank you to everyone who shared all of those amazing benefits of intermittent fasting.

Melanie Avalon:
Same. Although teaser, the next question I have for next week is, I think it's like, what is everybody's biggest challenge or it's the flip side question. So I'm excited to hear. Yeah, same. The other side of the coin.

Melanie Avalon:
No, this has been absolutely wonderful. And I can't wait to talk to you next week. Me too. Bye. Bye.

Melanie Avalon:
See you next week.

Melanie Avalon:
Thank you so much for listening to the Intimation Fasting Podcast. Please remember, everything we discussed on this show does not constitute medical advice and no patient-doctor relationship is formed. If you enjoyed the show, please consider writing a review on iTunes. We couldn't do this without our amazing team. Administration by Sharon Merriman, editing by Podcast Doctors, show notes and artwork by Brianna Joyner, and original theme composed by Leland Cox and recomposed by Steve Saunders.

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!

More on Vanessa: ketogenicgirl.com

Theme Music Composed By Leland Cox: LelandCox.com

If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving us a review in Apple Podcasts - it helps more than you know! 

 

 

Jul 23

Episode 327: Binge Eating, Protein & Satiety, Slow Eaters, Disordered Eating, Mental Health, Biohacking Conference, Denver, Brisket, Birthday Cake, OMAD, And More!

Intermittent Fasting

Welcome to Episode 327 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast, hosted by Melanie Avalon, author of What When Wine Diet: Lose Weight And Feel Great With Paleo-Style Meals, Intermittent Fasting, And Wine and Vanessa Spina, author of Keto Essentials: 150 Ketogenic Recipes to Revitalize, Heal, and Shed Weight.

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

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

SHOW NOTES

BEAUTYCOUNTER: Keep Your Fast Clean Inside And Out With Safe Skincare! Shop With Us At melanieavalon.com/beautycounter 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!

BUTCHERBOX: For A Limited Time Go To butcherbox.com/ifpodcast And Get 2 Packs of Bacon Free for a Year plus $20 off your first order!

AG1: Get A FREE 1 Year Supply Of Immune-Supporting Vitamin D AND 5 FREE Travel Packs With Your First Purchase At drinkAG1.com/ifpodcast!

DANGER COFFEE: Get 10% Off At melaneavalon.com/dangercoffee With The Code Melanieavalon!

Luca’s Keto Birthday Cake

Episode 324: Air Purification, Biking, Protein Intake & Exercise, Bolus Intake Of Protein, Allulose, Monk Fruit, Erythritol, Stevia, Hormones, Blood Sugar, And More!

Go To Toneprotein.Com To Get The Vanessa's New Protein Supplement With An Exclusive Pre-Launch Discount!

join me next year at the 10th annual biohacking conference! go to melanieavalon.com/biohackingconference for more information.

Stay Up To Date With All The News On The New EMF Collaboration With R Blank And Get The Launch Specials Exclusively At melanieavalon.com/emfemaillist!

Listener Q&A: Kimberly - What Is The Difference Between Omad And Binge Eating? My Doctor Seems To Think These Are Synonyms And I Can’t Disagree More.

Characteristics of binge eating disorder in relation to diagnostic criteria

The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast Episode #166 - Megan Ramos

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 327 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. If you want to burn fat, gain energy, and enhance your health by changing when you eat not what you eat, with no calorie counting, then this show is for you. I'm Melanie Avalon, biohacker, author of What When Wine, and creator of the supplement line AvalonX. And I'm here with my cohost, Vanessa Spina, sports nutrition specialist, author of Keto Essentials, and creator of the Tone breath ketone analyzer and Tone Lux red light therapy panels. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and ketogenicgirl.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this show do not constitute medical advice or treatment. To be featured on the show, email us your questions to questions@ifpodcast.com. We would love to hear from you. So, pour yourself a mug of black coffee, a cup of tea, or even a glass of wine if it's that time and get ready for The Intermittent Fasting Podcast.

Hi everybody and welcome. This is Episode number 327 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon and I'm here with Vanessa Spina. 

Vanessa Spina: Hello everyone. 

Melanie Avalon: And Vanessa, how is life in Colorado? 

Vanessa Spina: It's just so amazing and awesome to be podcasting with you during the day [laughs] feels so good. For both of us, it's much better times. It's early afternoon for me, midafternoon for you. So, it just feels really good that I'm looking out the window. There're blue skies, it's bright and sunny, [giggles] it's not dark outside. It just feels really good. So, yeah, coming to you from the Mile High city. 

Melanie Avalon: Which city are you in? 

Vanessa Spina: So, we're just in Denver, a little bit outside Denver. So, I'm looking at the beautiful Rocky Mountains from the view of the office here. It's beautiful. It's just amazing here. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I was looking at pictures on your Instagram. First of all, the house looks really beautiful. And you could see out through the window, it seems like elevated. The room that you were in with the birthday party dinner?

Vanessa Spina: Yeah, we're a little bit elevated up here. Yeah, it's really nice views all around. Colorado is so open. It's so different from Prague, I guess, because we're more in the city, but everywhere you look, everything's just like wide open. Like, big spaces, everything's big, everyone has huge homes. We call them like little castles, because in Czech, everyone lives in smaller spaces, because there's way less space. Everything's just like on steroids here. It's just the contrast. You don't really realize it until you leave, and then you haven't been back in a couple of years, and then you're like, "Wow, [giggles] everything is so different here." It's another world. 

Melanie Avalon: I love it. And I was listening to one of your episodes, and I heard your story about craving brisket. 

Vanessa Spina: Oh, my gosh, [laughs] yes. It's number one on my list when we're back in the US. 

Melanie Avalon: It's so good. And Luca was not so much a fan?

Vanessa Spina: Yeah, he loves brisket, like smoked meat and especially beef. It's pretty easy to chew for him as well, like, much easier than steak because it's broken down. But my number one thing, whenever we were at KetoCon would be to go to Terry Black's, which is across from the place where they host the conference. They have the most amazing brisket there. We have barbecue, American style barbecue places in Prague. But there's nothing like the real thing. So, I was really excited to get to have some while we were here. Yeah, it was a huge treat. 

Melanie Avalon: Another question for you, because I think this will relate to a lot of listeners. So, you had an adorable birthday party for Luca.

Vanessa Spina: Just this weekend. Yeah, a couple of days ago. 

Melanie Avalon: Okay. Well, first of all, what did he think about the cake? 

Vanessa Spina: Yeah, it was so much fun. So, he's turning two and we did a blend for themes. We had Choo Choo Train because he's obsessed with Choo Choo's and that was his main gift, was a train set. And also, Cocomelon. He loves Cocomelon, which is this character on YouTube that plays songs like the Wheels on the Bus. And so, he's obsessed with school buses because of Cocomelon. So, we had a hybrid, like Cocomelon school bus, Choo Choo Train theme, and it was awesome. Everyone had so much fun. I made him this cake, which I was sending you pictures of. I don't bake a lot. Like, I literally only bake once a year, usually, for a special occasion. So, last year was his birthday. And this year, because I want him to be able to enjoy a birthday cake and have it not have all kinds of weird stuff in it. So, I made him Luca's birthday cake. The recipe is on my website, if you want to check it out. But it's basically a layer of vanilla, a layer of chocolate, and a layer of strawberry. This year, I just did vanilla and chocolate with a vanilla frosting. Everything sugar free and gluten free. 

This year, I ordered keto sugar free sprinkles that I found on Amazon. So, I covered the whole cake around the sides in the sprinkles, and then I had these cake toppers of a little Choo Choo Train, and a big 2 that was dipped in gold. It was so cute. We brought the cake out. He was just mesmerized by it. [laughs] Last year, when he had a bite of it, he clapped. It was the first time he ever clapped. So, he was so excited. It was really cute, because we were all singing him Happy Birthday, and he was just like, "What is happening right now?" [laughs] 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, my goodness. How did you respond to eating it? 

Vanessa Spina: Yeah, he liked it a lot. The cool thing is, the people who are here, half of them are into actually keto and low carb. They're the only people in my family that do like low carb. Not full keto, but low-carb paleo, really big into paleo, low carb. And so, they totally appreciate having a gluten free, sugar free cake. The other half are not at all, but they all enjoyed it. Everyone thought the cake was delicious. I know they weren't just saying it like they all really enjoyed it. So, it's fun when you can make stuff that's healthy. This cool thing about the sprinkles, they were sugar free. And instead of having all these dyes in it, they colored the sprinkles with turmeric, with, I think, a couple of other-- [crosstalk] 

Melanie Avalon: I've seen those sprinkles. 

Vanessa Spina: Yeah, it was like turmeric, paprika, and something else. And so, they were really colorful, but they weren't neon like bright neon because of using artificial dyes. So, even if you're not doing keto or sugar free, if you're serving something to your kids, you want it to have all natural ingredients. So, it's fun that we could all enjoy something like a healthy-ish treat. Yeah, it was really fun to make, and everyone really enjoyed it. 

Melanie Avalon: I think you can actually-- because I have gone down the sprinkle rabbit hole. 

Vanessa Spina: That's why I was sending you pictures. I was like, "I know she loves sprinkles too."

Melanie Avalon: I've actually ordered, I think, the same ones that you have. I recognize them. I was like, "Oh, I have those sprinkles." I've seen recipes though to make your own. I haven't done it. I know you can order dragon fruit powder, which is neon pink. You can order there's a blueberry powder that's like neon blue, like, think if you actually wanted to make it like neon. 

Vanessa Spina: That'd be fun. Yeah, and I know, I think is it [unintelligible [00:07:28] powder, is like bright pink, and it's vitamin C. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. Oh, it's pink?

Vanessa Spina: Yeah, it's bright pink. Pink, pink. Super pink. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, my goodness. 

Vanessa Spina: That's what I thought they were going to use. So, when I saw turmeric and paprika, I was like, "Oh, wow, that's really interesting that they use that."

Melanie Avalon: Then chlorophyll is neon green. We should make a sprinkle line. 

Vanessa Spina: Totally. I actually have a friend from growing up who started a sprinkles company, and she sold it. Yeah, it was really cute. She had a really fun Instagram. Because of course, if you're doing an Instagram account for that, it would just be really fun of confetti and sparkles and all our favorite things. 

Melanie Avalon: That's amazing. What flour did you use in the cake? We can put a link to the recipe in the show notes. 

Vanessa Spina: Yeah. So, I just used two flours, which is mostly almond flour, and then one part coconut flour, because coconut absorbs so well. It's really mainly just those two for the flours. And then there's butter and vanilla. It's very simple, but really delicious.

Melanie Avalon: Which sweetener did you use? 

Vanessa Spina: So, I wanted to try allulose. 

Melanie Avalon: I thought you might. Okay.

Vanessa Spina: Yeah, we've been talking about it. So, I actually did a combination, because I wanted to test allulose for my protein powder, and just see how I liked it. I hadn't really tested it anything, I'm like, "This is a perfect test." So, for the cakes, I used mostly allulose and a little bit of monk fruit. And then for the icing, I used powdered erythritol, because I already had it in the powdered form, like the confectioner's form. Otherwise, if I was home, I would just put the granulated form of the allulose in the blender for 30 seconds, and it would make it into the super fine powder one for the icing, because you need the powdered one, I use that. The allulose was good. I think that everyone was surprised by how much it tasted like actual sugar, especially the people who don't eat keto or don't really like those kinds of sweeteners. At one point, even one of our guests was like, "You know, it's probably better to just use sugar or a little bit less sugar than artificial sweeteners." And I was like, "Wait till you try this one." So, I think it tasted very similar to sugar. 

Melanie Avalon: That's awesome. I really feel like allulose is the big thing now and we'll continue to-- I don't think I've used it before, but just from everything that I read, people seem to say that it doesn't have weird funky aftertaste and tastes very similar to sugar. And then when we talked about it-- We can put a link in the show notes of the episode where we talked about it extensively, but the studies are really interesting on it. So, potential health benefits. 

Vanessa Spina: I think that's really interesting, the fact that it has potential health benefits as well. And also, I think the thing with Europe was that-- At first, I was like, "Oh, I think it's not allowed yet in Europe." When I was looking into it more, it seems that it's just because there hasn't been enough research done on it yet. But some German scientists recently submitted some research studies that they did about allulose. So, it's possible now that they'll have enough research done on it that they will approve it there. So, just side note for anyone who's in Europe listening. 

Melanie Avalon: Awesome, awesome. Are you actively formulating your protein powder right now? 

Vanessa Spina: Yes, I actually just got the first sample today, like, an hour ago from Scott. 

Melanie Avalon: It's so exciting. 

Vanessa Spina: I know. He sent me the sample to test, and just make sure that we're on the right track with the first flavor, which is going to be vanilla. Pretty much after we're done podcasting, I'm going to make a protein shake and try it out. I smelled it and it smelled really good. So, it's got stevia in it, because that's what we've decided to use for now. It's vanilla flavored and it has this special formulation which is unlike anything else, anything else that exists on the market in terms of protein to really optimize it for building lean mass in the most efficient way possible. So, I'm really excited. It's really exciting to be making something that just doesn't exist really on the market yet. 

Melanie Avalon: I am so excited for you. That's so cool, because there are so many protein powders on the market. It's so true though that I haven't seen any-- because basically, you're tailoring which amino acids are in it, right? 

Vanessa Spina: Yes, exactly. I'll be sharing more and more on the exact formulation in the coming weeks. But yeah, there is a lot of competition in the space, and I think that's why I've always been drawn more to biotech, because making something like the Tone, like the breath ketone analyzer, it's something super unique, whereas a market like protein powder is a lot more saturated until it became the right time, because I really figured out and zoned in on what kind of formulation would make it unique to anything else. That part's super exciting. 

Melanie Avalon: Not just unique for the sake of being unique, but unique because it's what needs to be done in a way. Nobody has done this and it's what you would want, presumably, to be using or will be using. I'm so excited for you. Okay, so how can people get on your email list for updates for it? 

Vanessa Spina: Yes, thank you. So, I wanted to offer an amazing launch discount for anyone who is a part of this community or who listens over to the Optimal Protein podcast, and to offer the biggest discount that'll ever be offered on Tone Protein, and that is by signing up at toneprotein.com, you'll be added to the list. And if you sign up with your name and email address, you'll receive an email where you can double opt in, and you'll basically be the first to know when it's available to order, and you will also get that exclusive launch discount if you are interested in checking it out. So, yeah, hopefully, in the next couple of months, it'll be out and available to order. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, my goodness. So exciting. 

Vanessa Spina: Scott and I were talking this morning about shipping products to Europe, because I'm setting up a warehouse there, and so that would potentially open it up to shipping other products at MD Logic to Europe too. So, yeah, [laughs] it could be exciting. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, that would be so exciting.

Vanessa Spina: We're also talking about Australia, because Australia is a huge wellness market-- I have a warehouse set up there, so we could potentially start shipping out to new markets also for your supplements. 

Melanie Avalon: That would be exciting. Especially, with Australia, they are really hard to ship to. If I want to independently ship something to them, it's really hard with their customs and everything-

Vanessa Spina: Yes. 

Melanie Avalon: -to get stuff in there, because I have tried. 

Vanessa Spina: Yes. 

Melanie Avalon: Awesome. Well, we will put links to all of that in the show notes. And again, the show notes will be at ifpodcast.com/episode327. So, we haven't talked since I went to the biohacking conference. 

Vanessa Spina: I know. Tell me everything. You've given me some updates, but obviously, we all want to know how it all went. 

Melanie Avalon: Yes. Oh, my goodness-- This was my first conference. It was my first conference in this sphere. As listeners know, unlike Vanessa, traveling is not my forte. So, I was a little bit stressed about the whole concept. But it was so amazing. I really, really highly recommend going to it next year. Next year, it's in Dallas, but it's basically-- So, next year will be the 10th annual biohacking conference. It's Dave Asprey's conference, whose side note will be coming on this show soon, hopefully. We're trying to lock him down. But it was really exciting, because it was the first time meeting all of these people I know through the podcast and including guests who have been on this show in real life. It was so weird. I got to meet Matt and Wade from BiOptimizers. They've been on the shows. I just feel like I know them. They've been on the shows, I think, five times total. So, I met them. 

I met Catharine Arnston with ENERGYbits. I met, oh, Dr. Patel. I did an episode on glutathione with him. Of course, I met Dave Asprey, which was a very surreal, mind-blowing experience because I've been following him. Basically, him and Robb Wolf are the two people that really informed my-- I'm going to start crying with gratitude. [laughs] My journey in this world. It's like when I interviewed Robb and I almost started crying. It's just really surreal to be so affected, so influenced by people for the better in health and wellness and everything that I'm doing today. And then to get to meet them in person is, I'm really grateful for that. Why am I crying? Okay, so, I really highly recommend people attend. And also, I actually sprained my ankle the first day. 

Vanessa Spina: Okay. I need to know what happened. This is the thing I wanted to ask you about, because you mentioned it and I was like, "What happened?"

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. Okay. So, I went two days before it started. So, the night before, I was just walking back to my hotel, and I just stepped off of a curb, and I twisted it. Have you twisted ankle before or sprained an ankle? 

Vanessa Spina: I haven't, no.

Melanie Avalon: I haven't either. It's really bad. [laughs] It's funny, because it didn't hurt when it happened. I was fine, and I went to Whole Foods, and I was carrying gallons of water, and everything was fine. I was in high heels. And then I went to bed, and then I woke up in the middle of the night, and it was the worst pain I have ever felt. I had to crawl on hands and knees to the bathroom. And then I was really stressed, because it was, like I said, the night before the conference started, I was like, "What do I do? I can't go to the biohacking conference like this." I went back to bed. I went to urgent care the next day. It wasn't broken, it was just sprained. But this was interesting and this could be a whole tangent. 

I don’t ever-- Well, I don't want to say ever. I very rarely take pain medications. I try to stay away from pharmaceuticals as much as possible. And no judgment to pharmaceuticals, but they have a lot of side effects. So, I don't take pain medications is the point. I was in so much pain, and I was assuming they would prescribe me pain medications and they would not. They were like, "Not legally allowed to." I was just reflecting. And then I started crying in the urgent care. I was like, "But I'm in so much pain." So, opioids, because of everything that's happened historically in this country now, there's a lot of laws in place about prescribing them because of the opioid epidemic crisis that we've had. 

Vanessa Spina: So, some people could be faking an injury to get them. 

Melanie Avalon: Mm-hmm. I was just reflecting on the sad state of affairs with the pharmaceutical industry, and that A, the pain medication is being over prescribed in the first place, and all the problems with addiction, that's just such a problem and such an issue. But then when you actually are, like, you do need it, I couldn't get it. I was like, "Who can I call?" I called my dentist, [giggles] but he didn't answer. I called my psychologist friend, but he wasn't able to prescribe. But interestingly, I don't even normally take Advil. So, I took Advil and I had no pain. So, yeah, and I got crutches, and I learned a new skill of using crutches. 

Vanessa Spina: That's so crazy. This happened the night before the conference started? 

Melanie Avalon: I know. And then this was a huge step for me, personally. So, that whole day was basically gone. I was at urgent care, but I had to go get my media pass for the conference, and it closed at 05:00. So, I was like, "I'll just sneak in." I had no makeup on, I was in crutches, and I have a lot of insecurities surrounding my physical presentation. So, I was like, "I'll just sneak in, grab my media pass and leave." But of course, I was running into everybody. So, by that point, I was just like, "Okay, I'll just be here like this," which was a big step for me. My therapist is proud. [laughs] It's funny. Actually, the first listener that walked up to me recognized me like that and I was shocked. I was like, "You recognize me?" I don't look like my Instagram right now. 

Then just as a side note, I barely was at-- the whole first day was mostly lost, and I didn't go to everything that I could have. But even then, so many listeners came up to me, and it was so exciting, and it was so nice to connect with people, like listeners from this show in real life, and see how the content is resonating and how they're into this stuff now from listening to the show. So, friends, go next year. I will definitely be there in Dallas. And please come up to me. Oh, because multiple people told me they were nervous about coming up. Please come up to me and say hi, and we can be friends. I will have a discount code for the conference. I don't have it yet, but the link is melanieavalon.com/biohackingconference. So, you can go ahead and go there and see all the details about next year. Then once I have the code, I will share it. 

Yeah, and then just lastly though, I didn't even get to go to the-- I haven't talked to you about the content of it. So, there're so many speakers, including so many guests I've had on the show. So, speakers for my show like, Mercola was there, Max Lugavere, the BiOptimizers guys, of course, Dave Asprey, tons of people. And then there's this expo with all of these brands, like, hundred brands. They have their supplements, and their things, and there's stuff you can try. It's so cool. It's like going to a Disney World mall, but biohacking. Highly recommend. Well, next year, any chance we'll be in Dallas? 

Vanessa Spina: Who knows? Yeah, maybe at that point, it would be so much fun. Just hearing you talk about it, it reminds me so much of the fun that I would have at KetoCon, when I went there-- It was just so amazing, like you said, to get to meet so many people in person or when I went on my book tour, just people showing up for you and wanting to meet you in person is just really it's just so humbling. Like, you really want to come meet me. It's just such an amazing feeling, and just getting to hug people and take photos together and talk about what it is, like you said, that resonated with them. That's what makes all of this so meaningful and special and worthwhile that we get to do what we love. We get to podcast and also share information in different platforms. But it's also that it's so meaningful because people will come up to you and be like, "You inspired me to start a podcast or to start this or to change my approach to protein or change my fasting or whatever, and it did this for me and I feel so good." And you're like, "Oh, my gosh." I just wanted to share what made me happy and feel good, but then you get so excited when you genuinely hear from people that it impacted them in some way too. It just makes it all so worthwhile. 

Melanie Avalon: It is so true. Yeah, I think next year, maybe I'll try to organize a meet up or something for-- 

Vanessa Spina: Oh, that would be so fun. 

Melanie Avalon: For the listeners, that would be really, really fun. 

Vanessa Spina: That's such a great idea. Didn't Gin do some cruise or something? 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, they did like a Delay, Don't Deny cruise. I don't know how many times they did it. They did it at least once. So, it's awesome. And then just one really quick. I know, it's a long intro, but one really quick announcement. I am getting closer and closer to releasing my EMF blocking product line today. Hopefully, I think I got the final packaging. I love designing packaging. Do you like designing packaging?

Vanessa Spina: The absolute favorite part of the process for me. [laughs] 

Melanie Avalon: It is so fun. I have to send you what I'm designing right now because it's so beautiful. So, the IARC, which is the International Agency for Research on Cancer, they classify EMFs as group 2B, which means possibly carcinogenic to humans. So, basically, there's ample evidence to suggest that EMFs are quite likely carcinogenic to humans. And we see this in a lot of studies, they basically affect the calcium channels in our cells. I just think it's a major issue with all of our Bluetooth and our wi-fi and friends, I shudder when I see people putting their phones up to their ears. Don't do that. There's a lot of interesting studies on men having phones in their pockets and how it affects sperm quality. And also, the potential for women keeping phones in their bras, for example, and how it might affect breast cancer. 

So, in any case, I am creating a line of EMF-free/EMF-blocking products. I am partnering with R Blank, who has been on the Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast. So, the brand is going to be AvalonX, powered by SYB. His brand is Shield Your Body. So, there's a lot of things I want to make, but we are launching with air tubes, headphones. So, again, when it comes to your phone, friends, please, please don't use Bluetooth AirPods. Please, I'm begging you. Speakerphone is great and corded earphones like you might get from Apple. But even those, release some EMF. So, that's why we're launching with EMF-free air tubes, and they're going to come in pink and black. I'm really excited about it. So, you can get on my email list to get all of the launch specials, all the details, the announcements, for right now, I have it at melanievalon.com/emfemaillist. I do have a website for it, but I haven't set it up yet. So, I think that's all the things. Should we jump into some questions for today? 

Vanessa Spina: Yes, I would absolutely love to. Oh, and we have new artwork. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, yes. [laughs] Happy new artwork day. 

Vanessa Spina: Yay. I've been waiting and so excited for this. 

Melanie Avalon: We have been working on this for months, listeners. The attention to detail is a little bit intense. We kept getting drafts back and I'd be like, "I think the heel needs to be adjusted to properly represent our heights.' Our artist, Barbara, was amazing in all the adjustments because we asked for a lot of them. I think it looks really amazing. What do you think? 

Vanessa Spina: I absolutely love it, and I love that you hired an actual artist to do it, because I always found the artwork on the podcast to be really interesting and unique. I can see why now, because you were working with an actual print artist, and she was painting this. I think it's important for people to know she wasn't just creating a caricature or something in paint. This is legit. She was painting this. And then when she had to do revisions, she would put these overlays on top. That's why it took so long. It wasn't just because we were being specific, but also because it's like real art. It's just incredible. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, it's like actual art. [giggles] Actual. Yeah, and I told you about how I know her, right? Did I tell you? 

Vanessa Spina: No. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, okay. So, when I published my book in stores, the original concept, they hired her for the original concept art. So, my Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast, that logo, that was the original book cover for my book. I loved it. I was obsessed with it. And then we were actually going to go with it, and then when Barnes & Noble signed on the book for one of their features, Barnes & Noble was like, "You have to change the cover." Isn't that interesting? So, we changed the cover, which I love the cover. Now I do. But I was so sad. I asked them, I was like, "Can I just buy the artwork from her because I want it for myself?" And then that's when I started working with her. So, she did the artwork. Actually, originally for my biohacking podcast, I used to get art done for each episode for the guest. So, she did that. She did Cynthia and I's artwork, and then she did you and me. 

Vanessa Spina: It's really amazing. Yeah, I'm really happy with how it turned out. That funny story for listeners, Melanie knows this, but I was just looking over the artwork one night. I think it was a month ago or something like that. And my husband, Pete, walked in, and he didn't know what I was doing or anything, and he glanced over at my phone, and he was like, "Oh, look, it's you." And I was like, "Do you really think it's me?" And he's like, "Yeah, it's you." And I'm like, "That's amazing." He had no idea what it was, or I could have just been looking at like a cartoon or a different podcast or anything, but he right away recognized it. So, this artist, last thing I'll say on it is, she took multiple photos of both of us, and then created the art based on our likeness from these actual photographs. So, I just thought it was so cool that he walked in and said that. My husband's very direct. He never says anything he doesn't mean. So, I was like, "Wow, that's so neat that you really think so." 

Melanie Avalon: I love that story. That makes me so happy. So, awesome. 

Vanessa Spina: All right, enough, enough.

Melanie Avalon: [laughs] Okay. So, would you like to read the first question? 

Vanessa Spina: Yes. So, our first question is from Kimberly and the question comes to us on Facebook. And the question is, "What is the difference between OMAD or one meal a day and binge eating? My doctor seems to think that these are synonymous and I can't disagree more." 

Melanie Avalon: Okay. I am very excited about this question. And before that, like Vanessa said, this was from Facebook. So, you can submit questions to the show to questions@ifppodcast.com or on Ifpodcast.com. I also am going to start asking for questions more in Facebook, because when I did that, we got so many questions. Vanessa and I were talking about it, it feels very fresh getting them right away. So, definitely join my Facebook group, IF Biohackers. I'm going to start asking more for questions in there, so that if you want to get your question put to the front of the line, that might be a good way to make that possibly happen. So, okay, I'm really excited to talk about this because I think there is and I'll be curious your thoughts on this, Vanessa. I just feel like there's so much with intermittent fasting. There's a lot of skepticism and confusion as far as the mindset behind it and people thinking that it is disordered eating. So, I actually really wanted to go look at the DSM criteria for binge eating. We can just go through it and we can see, is it binge eating? And then I went down the rabbit hole after doing that because it's very interesting to me. So, shall we go through the criteria together? 

Vanessa Spina: Yes, that sounds perfect. 

Melanie Avalon: Okay. So, in order to qualify as binge eating disorder-- Oh, and a little bit of a backstory. So, binge eating was actually recognized as a clinical condition as early as 1959, but it did not appear in the DSM until May 2013. So, that's when they came up with this criteria. There are five criterion, I learned a new word, that must be met. So, the first one is there has to be recurrent episodes of binge eating. In order to qualify as binge eating, it has to be two things. One, it has to be eating in a discrete period of time. For example, within any two-hour period. An amount of food that is definitely larger than most people would eat in a similar period of time under similar circumstances. Okay, I want to zone in on that. But the number two is the sense of lack of control overeating during the episode. For example, a feeling that one cannot stop eating, or control what or how much one is eating. 

Then I found this really interesting review of this. It was looking at the criteria, what does it mean? What can we learn from it? Should it be updated? That article is a journal article and it's called Characteristics of binge eating disorder in relation to diagnostic criteria. We'll put a link to it in the show notes. It was actually calling out some of the issues with this first statement, which is, it's very subjective. So, it basically says, an amount of food that is definitely larger than most people would eat in a similar period of time under similar circumstances. That is not very definitive, even though it has the word definitely in it. So, when we look at fasting-- And she was asking about one meal a day, right, specifically?

Vanessa Spina: Yes, the difference between one meal a day and binge eating. 

Melanie Avalon: And binge eating. Okay, with one meal a day, what do you think most, like, time wise, most people are eating in? That would actually be a really good poll to do. Do you think it's like two hours, three hours, four hours?

Vanessa Spina: For the intermittent fasting like one meal a day.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah.

Vanessa Spina: From personal experience, when I would do one meal a day, it would usually be like a standard meal within an hour. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, okay. So, you would have an entire-- Yeah, I think some people do it like they do have an entire meal in a short amount of time. For me, this goes back to the great one meal a day debate that Gin and I used to have, because I eat over four hours or five hours. It's a very long one meal a day. But let's say two hours, for example, especially since that's the criteria that they give. So, you could look at this two ways. You could say, people doing one meal a day in two hours that they are eating larger than what most people would eat in a similar period of time under similar circumstances. Okay. I think if you stopped at a similar period of time, that would be true for a lot of people because when you're doing one meal a day, you're getting your entire amount's worth of calories in this small meal, which would be more than most people. But I think the key here is under similar circumstances. So, if we take into account that the circumstances are one meal a day, as practiced for intermittent fasting, where you need to get all of your calories in that one meal, then I think most people doing one meal a day, they're not eating a lot larger than people would eat in a similar period of time under similar circumstances, because the circumstances are one meal a day. How do you feel about that? 

Vanessa Spina: For me, I would say the thing that stands out for me is not so much the period of time, if we can maybe go in a different direction with it a little bit, just in terms of my thoughts. For me, when I looked up the definition, it said that person feels a lack of control when they're having that meal. I think that is a big distinction. There's lots of distinctions between one meal a day, which to me is just a definition, like, eating one meal a day versus binging, which is associated with having an eating disorder or associated with disordered eating and feeling like there's no control. It's like a primal or like and. I know you've done episodes with experts on binge eating. I think I did one on my podcast years ago. But I know you had an author on-- [crosstalk]

Melanie Avalon: With Glen?

Vanessa Spina: Yeah. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, wait. Okay, so fun fact. So, Glen is one of my best friends in the entire world. He's one of the people I called when I was in the urgent care. He's the psychologist. I called Glen. I was like, "Glen, can you prescribe me pain medications?" [laughs] Yeah, for listeners, he wrote a book-- Well, multiple books. He wrote Never Binge Again, which I highly recommend it, not even just if you identify as binge eating, it's really about just that lack of control and feeling like you don't have control around your eating, and that you're not when you are feeling controlled by your eating. It's really amazing. His whole philosophy uses this thing called the pig and you identify this voice in your head as not you, as this pig, and you talk to your pig and you just basically say no. It sounds really simple to say that you just don't, but you basically are just like, "No, I'm not listening to you right now." Sorry, that was a tangent. Yes. 

Vanessa Spina: Yeah. So, for me, the period of time seems, I don't know, ambiguous. For me, it was the fact that it is in the definition of what binge eating is. And forgive me, because I don't know a lot about it, but just looking at the definition that it is eating with a sense of not having any control. I think that that's the big difference that stands out for me the most, and also, obviously, the association with having disordered eating. I think to just to classify one meal a day and the definition of that as how people who do intermittent fasting approach it and just say, "Well, there's some overlap, so that means they're the same thing." It doesn't really hold up for me. The overlap being, like you said, the time period depending on how people do that, because it does seem to be part of that definition. 

Whenever I do like OMAD or one meal a day, especially since I changed my macros over the years and really healed my relationship with food, I always feel a sense of control because it's really hard to overeat protein. I have to invoke the protein leverage concept by Drs. Raubenheimer and Simpson, these scientists who studied insects and primates and humans on protein leverage, and they found that we, as humans and animals and insects as well, tend to overeat energy calories when we don't get our protein needs met. I think that when I look back at my younger self, when I maybe did have situations where say, I would do a really restricted diet, and then I would feel like I couldn't wait for the diet to be done. And then when the diet was done, I would over consume, maybe at a meal. Maybe that could be considered a binge feeling. At the time, maybe I didn't fully have control. And again, I don't know that much about it, but I'm just relating it back to my own experience. It was because I wasn't prioritizing protein. It was because I was doing vegetarian/vegan diet at the time, and I was super under muscled and not getting my protein needs met. 

That protein drive is so high that when I corrected my protein intake and started prioritizing it, I found actually the opposite happens where it's very hard to overeat protein because protein is so extremely satiating on multiple levels in terms of the hormones that are released in the gastrointestinal tract, in the brain or and that communicate with the brain, and just in terms of the overall satiety signaling that you get when you consume the right amount of protein. I've always felt totally in control of all my meals, whether it's OMAD or whether I'm eating three times a day or whether I'm on holiday at a buffet, I always feel like as long as I get the protein in that I feel satisfied and full. 

So, I think in terms of being classified as binge eating, it would need to be assessed by a professional if that's something that someone is experiencing, maybe something in this definition resonates, to have it professionally diagnosed or professionally assessed. Because I think disordered eating is very serious and is something that definitely needs to be addressed if it's a problem because it can cause a lot of distress for people. But that's the key part that stands out for me is the fact that there's a lack of control. I think that probably characterizes it the most stories that I've heard from people experiencing that kind of sensation of like they just can't feel satiated. It's like this feeling of being a bottomless pit where just no amount is enough kind of thing. So, that's what stands out for me the most. 

Melanie Avalon: I could not agree more, so that second criteria B for criteria one, which is the sense of lack of control overeating during the episode, feeling that one cannot stop eating or control what or how much one is eating. I echo back everything that you were saying. There's such a different feeling between feeling this need to just keep eating. And sometimes, it's satiety. I know people have all different experiences of it, but I think for a lot of people, it's like the dopamine hit that you keep getting. Some people might even feel full, but they just have to keep eating, and they feel like they have no control over compared to when people are in a one meal a day pattern, intermittent fasting, getting the protein they need, getting the nutrients they need, and it's working for them and their body. I think a lot of people feel completely in control. 

I do just love that nuance of the first one about eating larger than most people would in a similar period of time under similar circumstances. That definition is assuming that you're comparing a one-meal-a -day situation to a normal dinner, which would not be the same circumstance. [giggles] You would need to compare like a one meal a day to a one meal a day and are you eating definitely larger than other one meal a dayers? I guess, that's the way that it would be looked at. 

Vanessa Spina: It's a really good point. It's a really good point, the context of it. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, that's criteria one. Criteria two is binge-eating episodes. You have to have three or more of five different things, so it's eating much more rapidly than normal. So, I guess you can look at yourself when you're eating that. Two, eating until feeling uncomfortably full. This will be really interesting polling information to see if most people who do one meal a day if they feel uncomfortably full or not. I don't when I do my one meal a day. 

Vanessa Spina: Yeah, me neither. 

Melanie Avalon: I feel satisfied. C, eating large amounts of food when not feeling physically hungry. Oh, I'm always hungry for my [laughs] one meal a day. Eating alone because of being embarrassed by how much one is eating. So, interestingly, I do get embarrassed by-- Still all of these years later, I do get embarrassed by the idea or how much I'm eating. I guess, it depends on the context. But even when I go to dinners though, I'll sometimes get double entrees, which is fine. 

Vanessa Spina: I feel like sometimes, I have the issue, which is like, I'm such a slow eater because I like to chew everything a lot. [giggles] It really helps with digestion. I'm a really slow eater, and sometimes I'll feel subconscious, because I feel like everyone around me eats fast. And then I'm especially right now, we're visiting families of lots of experiences, eating with lots of groups of people, and I feel like everyone has done really fast, and I'm just slowly [giggles] making my way through chewing everything. I'm like, "I'm still eating like that." Sometimes, I get subconscious about that. But yeah, if anything, I'm the opposite. [laughs] I'm eating at a slower rate than everyone else. 

Melanie Avalon: I'm the same. We would do so well together at a restaurant. And then I told you I'll get sashimi dessert, like, savory desserts at restaurants. 

Vanessa Spina: Oh, same. 

Melanie Avalon: So, you do do that?

Vanessa Spina: In Europe, they have a lot of cheese for dessert. So, that's always a great option like a nice-- if you still feel like having something. Or sometimes if we're at a restaurant, I'll just be like-- Last night, Pete and I had a date night, and they had all these desserts on the menu. I was like, "I'll just have dessert when I get home." So, I usually make some yogurt dessert for myself when I get home or I'll have like a piece or two of LILY'S dark chocolate or something like that. And that definitely makes it feel like I'm still getting some kind of sweet, finish to the meal, which is always nice. But yeah, if I'm at the restaurant and everyone else is getting dessert, I think it's nice to still participate in that. And so, if there is something savory, that's always what I'll get as well. 

Melanie Avalon: So, I remember my last birthday dinner that I went to with my family. Everybody ordered dessert, and I literally ordered another entree for dessert. I had more fish. It was so exciting because it was the other entree I wanted to try. 

Vanessa Spina: That's really smart. I'm actually going to bookmark that mentally to do sometimes. 

Melanie Avalon: But then as a note, and I think I've said this before, but let the kitchen know ahead of time because they usually can't make a-- It's hard for them to make another entree. 

Vanessa Spina: Yeah, you would need to do that. 

Melanie Avalon: Give them a heads up. And then the last criteria is feeling disgusted with oneself, depressed or guilty after overeating. I think that goes into what we were talking about earlier about the mindset, and the control, and how you're feeling surrounding the food. So, you have to meet both the first two criteria of the first thing we talked about, and you have to meet three of those.

Vanessa Spina: So, that's the time eating it. 

Melanie Avalon: So, for criteria one, you have to have both these things. One, the discrete period of time, eating more than most people would eat in the same circumstances in the same amount of time. And you have to have a lack of control overeating while doing so. So, you have to have both of those. Then you have to have three of these five things, eating more rapidly than normal, eating until feeling uncomfortably full, eating large amounts of food when not hungry, eating alone because of being embarrassed by how much you're eating, and feeling disgusted with oneself depressed or very guilty. You have to have three of those. 

Vanessa Spina: Yeah, if you, at first glance, maybe are someone who's just hearing about the concept of one meal a day, maybe for the first time or something like that, I could see how maybe you might go like, "Oh, how does that compare to this," which is like you were saying, "How does this compare with this other concept of binge eating?" I think especially when people hear like, "Oh, well, you're only eating once a day," someone might jump to conclusions that it could be similar, whereas when you really look at everything in terms of the definitions. When I see the comparison, my mind goes like, "What?" [giggles] Because I know that intermittent fasting is a pattern of eating, and we're really well informed on what that means. But then you could see how someone might jump to conclusions if they don't have all the information. So, I love that you really looked at all the different aspects of what characterizes that kind of style of binge eating. Especially for Kimberly to be able to do the research herself and maybe talk to her doctor about it if she wants to and just say, "Well, this is actually what OMAD is, this is actually what binge eating is, and this is how they're different." Like, this is how they're not the same. 

Melanie Avalon: Exactly. And there's actually going to be a twist ending to this because we're not even done yet. 

Vanessa Spina: Ooh, I love a twist. 

Melanie Avalon: I know. Okay, so, criteria number three. So, we're not even done yet. You have to have those two. Criteria number three, you have to have marked distress regarding binge eating. So, you have to be distressed about the whole concept. Number four, it has to occur, on average, at least two days a week for six months, or one day a week for three months, which if people are doing one meal a day. That's probably the one criteria out of all of this that people are meeting. 

Vanessa Spina: See, now, I actually think it's a bit irresponsible of a care provider to just casually throw it out there. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. Sorry. I'm getting so excited. I know.

Vanessa Spina: Yeah. Based on everything that you presented, it's saying like, "Oh, maybe that person's bipolar because they cut you off in traffic." It's such a leap and it could cause a patient, like, Kimberly distress in terms of something that makes no sense at all to what she's actually doing and that it should actually-- I was saying earlier, it should actually be diagnosed and assessed by an expert who knows the DSM-5, who knows these categorizations who would sit down with you and say, "Well, look, obviously that's not what this is." So, don't stress yourself out about it. 

Melanie Avalon: I'm so glad you said that. I think that's why I got so into this, because I started reading it and I was like, "Oh, there needs to be education surrounding this." I think we just so casually throw around labels today, like, labeling people with disorders, and it doesn't speak to the whole person, and I think it can be very damaging. 

Vanessa Spina: Yeah, it almost feels sometimes like a lot of terms from therapy have made their way into our language in a new way, where people use terms that typically would have just been reserved for people who are experts or clinicians or psychiatrists. Now people are just using these terms very casually, and I think it does have a harmful effect when someone throws up. I hear all the time, people say, "Well, that's gaslighting, that's narcissism." These terms have actual definitions to them. They need to be diagnosed by a professional and to just casually throw them around. I think, yeah, it can cause damage. 

Melanie Avalon: I could not agree more. I'm actually prepping right now to interview-- Have you interviewed Dr. Caroline Leaf?

Vanessa Spina: No, but I feel like I heard of her book maybe. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, she has so many books. She's incredible. She's a cognitive neuroscientist, and her new book coming out is called How to Help Your Child Clean Up Their Mental Mess. It's really wonderful. But she actually has a chapter on the over diagnosis of ADHD. The stats on it are shocking. I wish I had them in front of me, but basically, there's only really small percentage that we think probably actually do have ADHD, but the percentages that are diagnosed are so high. She also talks about how the DSM criteria is determined, especially for something like ADHD. There's not really a lot of science behind it. It's very subjective. So, yeah, that's a tangent. Are you ready for the twist ending? 

Vanessa Spina: Yeah. 

Melanie Avalon: So, criteria number five, the binge eating is not associated, not associated with the regular use of inappropriate compensatory behavior, such as purging, fasting, excessive exercise, and does not occur exclusively during the course of anorexia nervosa or bulimia nervosa. The caveat is that they're calling it inappropriate, so maybe it doesn't exactly relate. But basically, if you're fasting, it's not binge eating. If you're considering the fasting inappropriate, which we could argue that fasting is part of your daily lifestyle, so maybe this criteria would fit. But my takeaway, so, if you're making the case that one meal a day is disordered eating in its approach and it's binging, then you would be assuming probably that the fasting is an appropriate compensatory behavior as well. I think you would make that association if you're making that assumption about the binge eating, which means it's not binge eating, it's actually bulimia, which is a whole another set of criteria. Isn't that interesting? 

Vanessa Spina: Wow. Yeah, I didn't think about that aspect at all. 

Melanie Avalon: The only way it would still be binge eating would be, if you think the binging is inappropriate, but the fasting is appropriate. So, if you saw it that way, you're like, "Oh, the fasting is fine, but they're binging," then you could say it's binging. But if you're saying, they're binging and the fasting is compensating for that, it's not binging. It would be bulimia. Probably bulimia, because bulimia actually requires additional criteria. Isn't that crazy? 

Vanessa Spina: Yeah, there's just so much to learn. I don't know a lot about disordered eating, and I'm learning a lot from this episode. I think it's interesting that, yeah, they definitely have different definitions and classifications. I just think that going back again to people throwing terms around too loosely or easily casually, I see that all the time with any kind of approach that I consider to be healthy lifestyle approach or intervention. With keto, it's like ketoacidosis, which has absolutely nothing to do with ketogenesis, but because ketosis is a shortened term for ketogenesis and sounds like ketoacidosis, which is a condition that only type 1 diabetics experience for the most part when they're having massive dehydration issues, and extremely high uncontrolled ketones, and extremely high blood glucose. 

Several years ago, although thankfully, it's changed now through education, which you were talking about the importance of education. Thankfully, people now recognize, especially physicians that those are two separate things. I love physicians. Some of my best friends are physicians. So many of my friends are doctors, and I respect and admire them so much. But there was a time maybe like six years, seven years ago where a lot of physicians would just say, "Oh, keto, don't do that. That's ketoacidosis. That's the lack of education and understanding that there was." So, that's what it reminds me of a little bit is just like, "Oh, fasting or intermittent fasting, that's an eating disorder." These kinds of things are thrown around really casually without actually looking at what the definitions of each are. Again, it's really important that we educate everyone on what these things actually mean and the distinctions between them. 

Melanie Avalon: I think that's a brilliant analogy, and so true. That's bothered me as well so much. It's so frustrating, especially when you see it happen and you're just like, "Oh my goodness." And it's less now. Like you said, it used to be a little bit worse. It still happens. So, people are curious. For bulimia, it's pretty similar. You have to have recurrent episodes of binge eating just by the first two criteria that we talked about, so the discrete period of time and the lack of control. And then you have to have compensatory behavior that's inappropriate. So, that's where the fasting comes in, but vomiting, laxatives, diuretics, exercise. And then has to occur on average at least once a week for three months. And then here's the big criteria that's different for bulimia versus binge eating, or one of them is you have to be unduly influenced by body shape and weight. It also cannot occur while--

So, the binging and purging cannot happen if you have anorexia. So, it's really, like you said, and I sound like a broken record, but I really do think it's irresponsible for people, especially doctors, to throw around these labels without looking at what the actual criteria is. And then I'll just throw on just some very last quick other things that go beyond the DSM for binge eating. So, interestingly, so there's actually studies that indicate that binge eating is probably heritable. So, it clusters in families independent of obesity, and families with a history of binge eating are at a greater risk of obesity. I don't think we would say that one meal a day is heritable. [laughs] I think people make the decision to do it independent of their genetics or their family history. 

Then binge eating is highly associated with psychiatric and medical comorbidities, functional disability, and impaired quality of life. So, when people engage in this behavior, it really negatively can affect their life. They've even done studies where it affected all criteria for negative quality of life. Compared to fasting, I feel like people do one meal a day and it changes their life for the better. That's a big difference there. 

Vanessa Spina: Megan Ramos and I just had a really interesting discussion on my most recent interview with her on the Optimal Protein podcast, because she just came out with her new book all about intermittent fasting for women. That was one of the topics that we really talked about was like, what is the messaging that you want to get out there with your work and your book? It's basically that women get such bad messaging about how we're all doomed to basically just get uglier and fatter as we get older. And she's like, "No, you can be empowered. You can control your metabolic health and your waistline. There are tools out there that you can use." These tools are not the same thing as having problematic or disordered eating patterns. They're not the same thing. It's weird that they're often lumped together, because there's some maybe association with the word, fasting. But she really helps clarify in her book. I highly recommend her book as a resource for anyone who's interested in that. 

But I also highly recommend that anyone who listening to the definitions and the criteria that you presented so eloquently, if any of those really resonated for you know, I would definitely recommend speaking to a clinician, someone who can assess you, especially if you're feeling distressed, because that was one of the criteria. If any of this resonates with you, if it feels familiar to you, if you think you may be experiencing some of it, and you are feeling distressed, definitely seek professional help because eating disorders are very serious things. I think that it's very important to reach out either to a friend or to someone who can give you a professional assessment if it's something that is causing you any kind of distress. I think that's definitely something that we both want to underline. 

Melanie Avalon: I am so, so glad you ended with that. Yes, the purpose with this was twofold. One, to dismantle some of the myths about labeling people who are doing fasting in a healthy way for themselves mentally and physically, putting some clarity that that is not binge eating for them. But then on the flipside, people who are experiencing these issues with eating disorders or binge eating, and might be hiding that with fasting or fasting might be exacerbating that, hopefully, this is helpful for them to find a mental health practitioner to work with for that. So, awesome. Well, this has been absolutely wonderful. 

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@ifppodcast.com or you can go to ifpodcast.com and submit questions there, or join our Facebook group or my Facebook group which is IF Biohackers. I'm going to start asking more for questions in that group. So, look for the posts about that. You can just post questions in that group as well if you like. The show notes for today's episode will be at ifpodcast.com/episode327. We talked about a lot of things, so there will be lots of links, and there will be a full transcript, which I know is very helpful. And then you can follow us on Instagram. We are @ifpodcast. I am @melanieavalon and Vanessa is @ketogenicgirl. I think that is all the things. Anything from you, Vanessa, before we go? 

Vanessa Spina: Oh, I really enjoyed the question from Kimberly, and the whole episode, and getting to catch up with you, and I'm excited to record the next one with you. 

Melanie Avalon: Me too. I will talk to you next week. 

Vanessa Spina: Okay, talk to you soon. 

Melanie Avalon: Bye.

Vanessa Spina: 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 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!

More on Vanessa: ketogenicgirl.com

Theme Music Composed By Leland Cox: LelandCox.com

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Apr 30

Episode 315: The Oldest Cure In The World, The Fascinating Fasting History, The Subjugation Of Women, Religious Fasting, Bernarr Macfadden & The Body Beautiful, Starving Cancer Cells, Fasting Clinics, And More!

Intermittent Fasting

Welcome to Episode 315 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:

NUTRISENSE: Get Your Own Personal Continuous Glucose Monitor (CGM) To See How Your Blood Sugar Responds 24/7 To Your Food, Fasting, And Exercise! The Nutrisense CGM Program Helps You Interpret The Data And Take Charge Of Your Metabolic Health! Get $30 Off A CGM Program And 1 Month Of
Free Dietitian Support At 
nutrisense.io/ifpodcast With The Code IFPODCAST!

Athletic Greens: 75 high-quality vitamins, minerals, whole-food sourced ingredients, probiotics, and adaptogens in one delicious scoop! Get A FREE 1 year supply of immune-supporting Vitamin D AND 5 FREE travel packs with your first purchase at athleticgreens.com/ifpodcast

AVALONX Magnesium 8: Get Melanie’s Broad Spectrum Complex Featuring 8 Forms Of Magnesium, To Support Stress, Muscle Recovery, Cardiovascular Health, GI Motility, Blood Sugar Control, Mood, Sleep, And More! Tested For Purity & Potency. No Toxic Fillers. Glass Bottle. 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!

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

SHOW NOTES

1:10 - NUTRISENSE: Get $30 Off A CGM Program And 1 Month Of
Free Dietitian Support At 
Nutrisense.Io/Ifpodcast With The Code IFPODCAST!

3:50 - 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!

The Oldest Cure in the World: Adventures in the Art and Science of Fasting

10:05 - The Research That Went Into The Book

13:00 - Steve's Personal Story

The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast Episode #87 - Dr. Alan Goldhamer

18:00 - Dr. Henry Tanner, The Father Of Fasting

25:55 - Why Don't Doctors Believe In The Power Of Fasting?

31:20 - Heroic Medicine

35:15 - Historical Theories About Endogenous Energy Sources During Fasting

37:30 - Why Didn't People Notice It Was Fat That Was Being Burnt For Energy?

39:30 - Fasting In Greek History

45:45 - Fasting In Religion

49:10 - Women Taking On The Role Of Fasting 

55:10 - catherine of siena

54:00 - 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

55:00 - The Oppression Of Women Through Diet Control

1:00:45 - Jainism

1:04:50 - The Loss Of Fasting In Christianity And The Creation Of Lent

1:12:15 - Bernarr Macfadden

1:19:00 - Upton Sinclair

1:26:10 - The Dismissal Of Fasting In  Fasting In Modern Medicine

1:28:20 - "Tricking" People Into Fasting

1:30:05 - Valter Longo And Fasting Mimicking Diet

The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast Episode #115 - Valter Longo, Ph.D.

1:35:35 - 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!

1:39:20 - Fasting Clinics

1:42:05 - Alan Goldhamer's Data On Blood Pressure 

1:46:30 - Steve's Experience At The Clinic

1:49:40 - The Future Of Fasting

1:53:15 - Steve's Fasting Practices

Early Vs Late-Night Eating: Contradictions, Confusions, And Clarity

TRANSCRIPT

Melanie Avalon: Welcome to Episode 315 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. If you want to burn fat, gain energy, and enhance your health by changing when you eat not what you eat, with no calorie counting, then this show is for you. I'm Melanie Avalon, biohacker, author of What When Wine and creator of the supplement line AvalonX. I'm here with my co-host, Vanessa Spina, sports nutrition specialist, author of Keto Essentials and creator of the TONE breath ketone analyzer and Tone LUX red light therapy panels. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanievalon.com and ketogenicgirl.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this show do not constitute medical advice or treatment. To be featured on the show, email us your questions to questions@ifpodcast.com. We would love to hear from you. 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. Have you ever felt ashamed or guilty when you eat certain foods. These are likely the, “forbidden foods” that you can't touch and you stay away from them. We are constantly faced with societal pressure and judgment around what we eat and how we look. So, we often feel guilty when we eat something that we think is bad for us. Instead of falling for this, we need to shift our focus to thoughtful nourishment where we are giving our body what it needs. You guys know we are obsessed with continuous glucose monitors, also known as CGMs. NutriSense can help you identify which foods are good for you and what you should eat less of. They provide continuous glucose monitors, which track your glucose levels in real time. So basically, you're able to see, “Okay, I just ate this, and this is what happened to my blood sugar.” Once you're able to see the real impact of certain foods on your body, you can start making better food choices guilt free. 

The CGM is an objective tool through which you can see how your body reacts to different food. This is so important, not subjective, objective, and to make sense of all the data, because it can be a lot. NutriSense pairs you with an expert dietitian who will help you with personalized diet and lifestyle changes that are based on what works best for you. You just might be surprised to find that something you used to feel guilty about does not trigger blood sugar spikes after all. You can actually enjoy it in moderation. Maybe you don't need to avoid certain foods or feel guilty about it. Just sign up for the NutriSense program and start making correct food choices today. 

Curious how it works? A continuous glucose monitor is a small device that tracks your glucose levels in real time. The application is so easy, so painless. Check out my Instagram, I post videos all the time of putting it on. Then there's the NutriSense app, with that you can use the app to scan your CGM, visualize data, log meals, run experiments, and so much more. And then, of course, you get that expert dietitian guidance. Each subscription plan includes one month of free dietitian support. Your dietitian will help you interpret the data and will help you build sustainable healthy habits to achieve your goals. They'll guide you in creating a meal plan that suits your unique lifestyle and needs. I get so much feedback about how people love this aspect of the program. It's really personalized and it really helps you make sense of everything. 

Go to nutrisense.io/ifpodcast and use IFPODCAST to save $30 and get one month of free dietitian support. That is nutrisense.io/ifpodcast with the code IFPODCAST to save $30 and get one month of free dietitian support. I will 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.

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Hi, friends. Welcome back to the show. We have a super special episode today. This is going to be a little bit different from our normal show. I interviewed Steve Hendricks on my other show, the Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast. He is the author of an incredible book called The Oldest Cure in the World: Adventures in the Art and Science of Fasting. Friends, that book blew my mind when I was reading it. I was just like, anybody who's even remotely interested in fasting or even if you're not, needs to read this book because it is that fascinating. So, when I aired it on that other show, I immediately knew I needed to air it on this show as well. 

We talk about so many things, like the role of fasting in historical cultures. Did the Greeks actually fast? We talk about fraud in fasting. Yes, that is a real thing. We talk about how fasting might have actually been used to control women historically in the Christian church. That's interesting. We talk about Valter Longo and the fasting mimicking diet, Dr. Alan Goldhamer and TrueNorth Health Center. We talk about some pretty crazy, more modern people in fasting. Really just be prepared to have your mind blown when it comes to all things fasting. So, I really hope you guys enjoy this episode. 

This is also serving as a transition episode between co-hosts. So, Cynthia Thurlow has been the co-host of this show for about the past year and we talked about this in episodes leading up to this, but she is actually leaving the show. And so, next week we have our new co-host, Vanessa Spina, also known as Ketogenic Girl and host of the Optimal Protein Podcast. Friends, you are going to love her. I am so excited about this. So, get excited for that. Take this moment as a sort of intermission and definitely let me know what you guys think.

By the way, if you enjoy this show, you'll probably really like my other show, the Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast, because it's basically like this show. I interview so many people, the world's top doctors, authors, and researchers on all things health and wellness. We're talking physical health and diet and exercise and mental health and wellness. I bring on people from all different perspectives. So, the best of the best in the keto and carnivore sphere, the best of the best in the vegan world. I've interviews with companies for products that you guys love. So, Joovv, red light therapy, Dry Farm Wines, NutriSense CGM, Tim Spector with the ZOE program. Of course, I've also interviewed figures that you guys hear a lot about, like Valter Longo, Jason Fung, Megan Ramos, so many things. So, definitely check out that show. In the meantime, enjoy this fabulous conversation with Steve Hendricks. 

Steve, thank you so much for your time and thank you for being here. 

Steve Hendricks: Oh, it's great to be with you, Melanie. I hope I can live up to that fantastic and very kind introduction. Thanks a million.

Melanie Avalon: I have so many questions for you. I want to hear your personal story, but just a question to start off because I'm so curious. I mean, this book is like a textbook and it's like all of this history. How do you find all of this information? Do you look at Wikipedia? Where does one go to collect all of this information? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, I mean, the difficulty is that it's not in any one place, but that's of course, what makes I think the book very valuable. What I wanted it to be was to be both super comprehensive and it sounds like I checked that box for you, which is great. But I also wanted it to be lively. I wanted it to be a more vivid with characters and stories, a very relatable chronicle that people could-- you wouldn't think of a fasting book as a page turner, but that was my aim. My aim was to have the pages just fly by even though there was a lot of information. Now where do you go to find it? The book is sort of divided into three sections that are all sort of intertwined and overlapping. But as you said, it's the history of fasting and the science of fasting and my own experiences with fasting.

So, for the science of fasting, I go exactly where you go, which is reading those scientific studies and interviewing the most prominent researchers who have something interesting to say. The history was the trickier thing because there's so much written about the history of fasting, and unfortunately, a ton of it is wrong. So, you really have to dig pretty deep. And quite often there was an academic at some point will have written a book about fasting for a certain 500-year period in the Middle Ages, okay, awesome, great. So, I've got that period covered. Now what do I do about the other, like 2000 years of history before that and it's a real mix. 

Sometimes I'm reading academics books, sometimes I'm reading their studies. In a few cases, I'm going to the actual Greek or Latin or whatever sources, and I'm trying to find someone on social media who will be kind enough to translate sentences that I'm having trouble figuring out. But most of the time I'm relying on-- I'm a reporter, so I'm reporting on the work of academics. Unfortunately, while there's not as much out there about fasting as we'd like, there is a ton out there if you just uncover all the stones. That's what added up to the book. 

Melanie Avalon: I'm just blown away. I can't even imagine how much you had to read to get to it. I will say so you check the box about the comprehensive history. You definitely check the box, the second one about being lively and creating characters and page turner. There were literally times my mouth dropped open when I read parts about some of these things happening, which we can get into in this show. 

Steve Hendricks: If you could see me blushing now, don't stop, don't stop. 

Melanie Avalon: No, some of the stuff about the females fasting and the religious aspect of all of that. There're so many things. We can circle back to all that. Before that, your personal story, obviously, this is in the book. I'll just say, friends, listeners, we're not even going to remotely touch on everything in this book, so just get it now and you can hear everything. But you do share a lot about your personal fasting experience. So, could you tell listeners a little bit about that? You're a reporter, why did you become interested in fasting? Why are you writing about it now? I know you tried to write about it earlier and things happened with that, so why are you where you are today? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, so I first started writing about fasting in an article that I published for Harper's Magazine about 10 years ago. That was back in a time where there weren't a lot of people fasting as there are today. And so, it was viewed with a lot of skepticism. I wrote that article because I had come to become fascinated with fasting myself and I had practiced it myself. The center piece of the article was this 20-day fast that I had done. At that time, I was about 40 years old, maybe in my late 30s when I did this. 

I fasted for two reasons, one of which was the one that so many people come to fasting for. I just wanted to lose weight like a lot of people. I had put on a pound or two every year in my 20s and 30s and I'm 5'9" on a good day and I was weighing close to 170 pounds, whereas when I was at my lean in college I'd weigh 140. Partly I just wanted to lose weight. But I'd gotten interested in fasting and learned about fasting in the first place because I also was very interested in fasting for longevity.

I had originally started with caloric restriction, which as most of your listeners probably know, just means sharply limiting how many calories you're getting every day while still getting all your necessary nutrients. The problem with CR - caloric restriction is it is just fiendishly hard to do. It is just impossible. You're walking around hungry all the time and if you're a mere mortal like me, you're not some superhuman person. You just can't stick with caloric restriction. But the irony, well, of course, is that you can get many of the exact same benefits from a prolonged fast as you do in caloric restriction, yet you don't feel hunger. The irony is by doing the most calorically restricting thing of all just simply not eating, your hunger actually gets suppressed and so it becomes a much more doable thing. 

So, this was very appealing to me. So, someone who weighed too much and wanted to weigh less and was curious because I'd read these historic accounts of people who'd done long fasts. I wanted to see what it was like. Now I'll caution and say, knowing what I know now, I would not undertake a 20-day fast on my own without some kind of medical supervision because there are too many things that can go wrong. I'm not telling the audience what to do or what not to do, but I want to caution that fasting doctors have very good reason for saying you don't really want to be doing really long fasts on your own because some things could go wrong. But with that caveat, I did that 20-day fast. It went fantastic. I had a lot of ups and downs that a lot of other people have described when fasting, but ultimately found it to be a very satisfying experience and I lost all the weight that I wanted to lose. 

So, it was fantastic and I wrote this article and I'd like to tell you that in the 10 years since I wrote that article, it's all been a carpet of rose petals in my path, but that has not been the case. We can talk about that, but my health actually deteriorated over the years throughout my 40s, I'm 52 now, and it was eventually fasting and I believe dietary change that have rescued me. 

Melanie Avalon: That was something that I loved was that you've had so many experiences with fasting. Like, for me, I started doing intermittent fasting in college and I did the type I'm still doing today, which is one meal a day, eating at night. I haven't done a long, extended fast like you. I haven't done-- you've tried ADF, you've gone to fasting clinics. I was really thrilled because in the opening of the book, you talk about and throughout the book, Alan Goldhamer, who I've had on the show at TrueNorth and I was super excited to hear your experience there.

So, it's super valuable, I think that you have had experience with all of these different fasts. There's something I wanted to comment on really quickly. I love the distinction that you have between fasting and calorie restriction. For example, you talk in the book about people looking at World War II and starvation and saying, “Well, if fasting has all these health benefits, why did people not get really healthy from starvation in World War II.” And it's the subtle nuance of having just enough calories to not let you actually be fasting. And then they're also malnourished not having enough food so, there's so much complexity, and I'm so happy that you tackle all of it. There're so many directions I want to go with this. You talked about the colorful characters in the history of fasting. I imagine because there were so many different people, why did you settle on Dr. Henry Tanner as the father of modern fasting and why did you choose to open the book with his story and everything that he did? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, great question. So, Henry Tanner was this doctor who was born in the 1830s, say he was a doctor. He was indeed a doctor, but not a medical doctor. He was what was then called an eclectic doctor, which is something like a naturopath today. So, he was an alternative medicine practitioner and somewhere along the way he had picked up fasting, short fasts, a couple of days here, three days there as a useful tool. Well, it turned out in 1877, he had fallen on hard times. He had just lost his wife. He was living in Twin Cities of Minnesota then and he had all kinds of ailments. He had a stomach condition that may have been a stomach flu. He had basically something that sounded like a nervous breakdown. He had heart problems and so on. He decides then that he's going to fast long enough to either cure himself or by one account kill himself and he didn't care what the difference was. 

So, I started with him in part because he's such a quirky character. I'm not very good at remembering my own quotations and so on, but some of the things that he said were just out of left field, but also because he was the first person who in a scientific kind of way-- in a case study, scientific kind of way, sat down and said, “Well, I'm going to fast, and I'm going to see if fasting cures me and see what happens.” And he did it, there had been previous doctors along the way who had been noticing these cures and trying to write about it, but he did it in a way that got the message out to the entire world. What happens is he does this fast. At this time, it was expected-- people thought at this time you could not go longer than 8 to 10 days without food or you would die. 

What Tanner found is when he reached 8 to 10 days, not only had all of his problems started falling away and all of them eventually got cured in the accounts that we have of this fast, but he felt even better, he felt even stronger than he ever had before. And so, he ended up finding out on day 20 something or whatever of his fast, because he just kept going and going because he was curious to see how long this fast could go without his suffering. He would find himself walking 10, 15, 20 miles a day, which is vigorous exercise for 1877. That could be a lot of exercise today. So, he does this fast, he cures himself, he breaks his fast after 41 days, and he had no intention of advertising it, but a friend of his, another doctor who had helped sort of supervise him during his fast, reported it in a medical journal in Chicago. 

It got out to the world and everyone just completely ridiculed him, said, "He must be lying. There's no way that you could fast this long." Through series of other events, he's wanting to prove himself to redeem his name and an opportunity arises for him to go to New York City three years later in 1880, and there to repeat his fast of 40 days on a stage in front of people in New York. He was completely ridiculed at first, but there was this prurient interest in his fast because, oh, my gosh, he's going to fast beyond perhaps 8 to 10 days. What's going to happen? Is he going to die on stage? Interest grew and grew. This was a presidential election year. He was getting more coverage than the presidential contenders. His feat was being recorded all over the world. He went through the 8 to 10 days with no problem and kept fasting for 20 days and then 30, and eventually broke his fast at 40 days. 

What happened with this, unfortunately, when he was in New York, he didn't have anything wrong with him. He wanted to prove that fasting could cure, he didn't have anything to be cured, so it didn't make the splash that he wanted it to make. But because it was reported in every newspaper in the United States and most of the newspapers in Europe and even some in Africa and Asia, he got the message out, the idea out that fasting might just be curative. And from that point on, that's really where we see this more scientific interest in fasting for health taking off in a way that it never had before, because it's fasting and it's counterintuitive and people don't want to do it. It was a very, very slow growth to get from there to where we are today. But without Henry Tanner, we wouldn't be where we are today. 

Melanie Avalon: It sounds like social media, like the first-time fasting was in the eye of the public, and everybody was paying attention. So, on this stage, he literally just sat on the stage? 

Steve Hendricks: It was a very barren stage because they wanted to make sure that there wasn't any hidden food and that no one would sneak food into him. He had a cot and he had a chair, and people could bring him reading material if it had been searched before. It got to the extent that if people were sort of reaching up and shaking a hand with him, they would inspect his hands to make sure that there wasn't food being passed to him, being palmed off to him or something. So, yeah, it was just sitting there and talking with people for 40 days. Newspaper editors sent over teams of reporters to watch him for 24 hours a day. He also had his own sort of core of watchers drawn from medical students and other doctors and so on. But, yeah, it was just sitting there doing nothing but not eating. 

Melanie Avalon: What was the significance of his show off with Dr. Hammond?

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, so, Dr. Hammond, who was a former surgeon general of the United States, he was part of the occasion that gave Tanner the reason to go to New York to fast, and that's that Dr. Hammond was extremely skeptical of a group of women who were called the fasting maids. These were women who usually actually girls more than women, but young women and girls who had claimed a fasting power. They would claim that they could go months or in some cases even years without eating or with barely eating. And it was completely fraudulent. Not a bit of it was true. He had made it his mission to unmask these fasting maids. He'd even written a book doing his best to unmask them. It happened that there was one in Brooklyn in 1879, 1880, who had claimed to go, “I forget forever, basically, with hardly eating anything.” 

He had challenged her. Her name was Mollie Fancher to fast in public under the watchful eye of doctors round the clock. She said no, she could not be examined by male doctors. Her feminine honor would have been impugned and so on. That was the point at which Henry Tanner in Minneapolis, because all this was being reported in the newspapers around the country, Henry Tanner said, “Well, I'll come to New York and I will fast in her place.” 

Melanie Avalon: Hmm, got you. 

Steve Hendricks: I'm sorry you asked, so, what became of the standoff? Well, eventually, Hammond had to admit that people could, in fact, go longer than he had ever expected without food. He still, of course, rightly, thought that the fasting maids were a croc, but he had to revamp and revisit his ideas about just how people could survive in the absence of calories. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. Something I liked about that, like I called it a show off was. It felt like an analogy for a theme throughout the history of fasting with conventional medicine. People positing this other idea of fasting because it seemed like you're talking about how Hammond was a very respected conventional doctor and Tanner was of a different, I don't know what the word would be like woo-woo or alternative. So, it seems like that was a theme throughout, especially later in the fasting history, I think, there were so many forces against fasting. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, emphatically so, conventional doctors have always had a hard time accepting fasting and even today, it's the rare conventional doctor who will look at the science. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, yeah. Why do you think if you had to pick one, well, you don't have to pick one, but if you had to why do you think that is? 

Steve Hendricks: Sure. No, that's a great question. That's one I've been wrestling with for about 15 years. I think the biggest reason is simply this. Fasting is premised on the idea that the body can heal itself. If we get out of its way, it knows what to do. Now, it's not a cure all. I'm not saying it's going to fix every single disease, but my goodness, it can reverse cardiovascular disease and arthritis and diabetes and even one form of cancer, at least. I could go down a list of 50 diseases that we have good evidence that fasting, prolonged fasting in particular, can reverse. That is not something that doctors have been very good at hearing. 

Certainly, and I make this case throughout history, there was a period, even in the early 19th century, where the form of medicine that was most widely practiced by conventional doctors was called heroic medicine and it was horrible. The whole premise of it was, the doctor is going to be the hero. He's going to come in and save the day, and he's going to do this by bleeding the patient of-- leaders of his blood, of making him vomit, of making her have diarrhea with a purgative, of blistering the skin and all this that we're going to just whip the disease out of people, and it undoubtedly killed more people than it helped. 

But that mentality, of course, doctors aren't doing that badly today, but they still have this mentality that disease is something that we have to conquer with technology, with our know how, with our fancy medical degrees and all the stuff that we've learned in medical school and our residencies and so on, and letting that go and saying, “You know what?” If you just back off and monitor these people, make sure they stay healthy while they do their fasting, their bodies can actually do the healing without you. It's that without you part that's very threatening to conventional doctors. I'll just close this little sermon by saying, “Look, I've gotten a lot of benefit out of Western medicine. I think conventional medicine has a lot of amazing points to it.” So, I'm not trying to condemn all of conventional medicine. It has saved me more than once. However, this is an enormous oversight and I think that's where doctors fall down. 

Melanie Avalon: I'm so glad you brought up the heroic medicine. I was saying in the beginning how I'd have moments where my jaw dropped open hearing the things that people would go through with that. I just kept asking myself, “Why did people let these doctors do this to them?” To that question, was it a cultural zeitgeist of just believing the system that these things were helping? Was it ironically enough, the fact that because the body can heal itself that if people survived the heroic medicine and then the body healed themselves, then they would just credit the heroic medicine? How did this go on for so long? And relatively recently, if you think about it wasn't that long ago that this was happening relative to humanity. 

Steve Hendricks: True. Some iterations of this were continuing into the 20th century, for sure. It's some of all of what you say. So, yes, every time you tortured someone [laughs] who was sick and that person didn't die, well, gosh, if you were the doctor, you could claim that your heroic medicine saved them. And so, in the absence of the scientific method existed, but it was really rudimentary back then, and in the absence of any real science, it was just impossible for people to prove. You could discount it. You could say, oh, I doubt that, or something, but you couldn't prove that the heroic medicine had been more harmful than helpful. But I think the other piece of it that you hit on as well is it is an extremely counterintuitive thing for all people, not just doctors, to accept that if we leave our body alone, it wants to heal itself. 

So, you find these accounts when you go back and look through the history of medicine, of doesn't matter where it is. It could be the US, it could be Germany, France, Russia, you find these accounts from 100, 200, 500 years ago where a doctor writes something along the lines of, “It seems that if I leave my patients alone, some of them actually do better than when I give them the medicines.” That was emphatically true back then, the medicines of the day were almost all quackery, unless, by luck, they happened onto some herbal remedy of some kind. They seem to get better. But here's the problem. When a patient is sick, they call me to their bedside and what they want is a cure. They want a pill. They want a potion. It's very much like today. They don't want to hear, “Go home and don't eat for three days and see if that makes your fever better.” 

It's an extremely hard thing for people to hear and you can understand why. I mean, when you have all the science, it just seems ridiculous, like you want to just shake these people. But in the absence of the science, what people are left with are their own impressions. Well, what do we feel like when we don't eat well? We feel weak. Our minds quite often slow down. We're not able quite often to do the same amount of work as we did before. Everything in our own experience tells us that not eating does not make us feel better. I think when a doctor comes along and says try this, it's an extremely hard thing to accept on both sides of that picture, both for the skeptical doctors who doubt this remedy and for patients who are equally skeptical throughout history. 

Melanie Avalon: Chronologically, it's hard prescribing fasting for all the reasons that you just mentioned, and then retroactively, if the person does heal, there are so many examples in the book where fasting won't even be credited. You talk about the woman at TrueNorth Health Clinic and her spontaneous remission. They wouldn't say it was the fasting that did it, it was just spontaneous remission. Or you talked about, I think, a study looking at or I don't know if it was a study, but it was something looking at keto versus fasting-mimicking diet and fasting for epilepsy. And they didn't credit the fasting. They credit the diet aspects. So, even when fasting does work, it's like we can't give it the credit for what it did. 

But another thought that this made me think of was there were so many moments in the book where it was things I just took for granted that it had never occurred to me that people historically were not aware or saw things completely differently. So, for example, the idea that what we burn when we're fasting, could you talk a little bit about theories that people had about what we were running off of energy wise? 

Steve Hendricks: Isn't that incredible? We all know that we run on our fat, at least for most of the time. Yeah, we burn a little bit of protein and so on, but it's basically our fat. But no, people didn't know that, even as late as Henry Tanner's day. So, again, we're talking 1880. There were scientific journals about, there were scientific studies of nutrition and body composition and things like this. People debated endlessly what he was surviving on. Some of the theories were that the water that he was drinking had what were called animalcule, which was just these fancy word for just tiny, tiny organisms in his water, and that his body was surviving off of digesting those organisms. Other people believed that the air contained nutrients and the more people who were around then the more nutrients were being-- In theory, the nutrients were expelled by people who were breathing them out of their bodies, and then other people could breathe them in.

If you weren't eating, you could be nourished by breathing in these nutrients. There was one person who accused Henry Tanner of doing this fast in New York, because there were millions of people there. So, far more people breathing into the air. Other people would claim, of course, fasting has mostly throughout history been used for religious purposes, so people would claim divine assistance of some kind. That was, of course, the mechanism was never stated, but basically you didn't need to eat because your stomach was filled by the Holy Ghost or Jesus or whoever it was you were crediting that to. So, yeah, it was a quite a while, really, until the 20th century before people were-- science had settled the question of what do you burn when you're not eating, you burn your fat.

Melanie Avalon: I think one of the other ones was like, women burning their menstrual cycle or living off of that. 

Steve Hendricks: Oh, right. [laughs] 

Melanie Avalon: Crazy. Do you think if we had had the obesity epidemic earlier so if people were overweight-- When people lose weight from fasting or calorie restriction today, people can lose a lot of weight, and you can clearly tell something left their body, so it seems more obvious that you burned something away. But do you think because people weren't-- we didn't have obesity to the extent that we did today, it wasn't as noticeable that people were losing fat? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, that's quite probable. Another piece of it is, in order to lose a whole bunch of fat, you have to fast for a very long time. Although fasting has been around for a very long time throughout most of history, most people when they fasted were fasting for only a few days. There were a few people who fasted weeks or months, but they were very, very rare. So, even if you were obese, let's say you're my height, 5'9", you weighed 300 pounds, you fast for three days, you're not going to notice any fat loss. It's going to be very, very subtle. So, I think that was a piece of and that also changed after Tanner's fast. Once people realized in the late 19th century. "Oh, my gosh, you can fast 40 days and survive." Then you got people who were doctors, who were occasionally fasting patients as long as 50, 60, 75 days. And then, of course, it would have been extremely noticeable at that point whether the person was overweight or not, that they were losing their fat. But that didn't happen throughout most of history. So, that's probably a piece of it. 

Melanie Avalon: And so, you touched on this little bit just now with the types of fast that people were doing. You touched on it in the beginning about what was or was not true. So, something that really blew me away was, I think, for most people, if they think about the history of fasting and what they think they know about it, there's just this idea, like with the Greeks, for example, we think Hippocrates was all about "Let food be thy medicine." I guess we can question if he even said that. But there is this idea that, “Oh, the old ancient people knew what they were doing, and the Greeks were fasting.” And were the Greeks really fasting? What was happening there? What was the role of fraud in the history of fasting? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah. So, I first started fasting, I was greatly relieved to hear that fasting was this ancient practice. If you're into fasting, you've all seen these quotes. Supposedly Plato had written, “I fast for greater physical and mental efficiency.” Plutarch said, “Instead of medicine, fast a day.” Hippocrates said, “To eat when you are sick is to feed your sickness.” There are all these quotations and stories out there and it turned out on examining them, one or two of which I had even related myself from what seemed like reliable sources when I first wrote about fasting a decade ago. When I dug deeper and really looked at the sources, it turns out, no. Almost none of that. All those quotations I just said, all bogus, every one of them. 

Melanie Avalon: It's crazy. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah. And they're repeated, I mean, some of them were created pretty recently, within the last few decades. Some of them, there's a story about Pythagoras who was said to have fasted, was made to fast, before he became a student in Egypt for 40 days. Didn't like it, but he did it, fell in love with it, and made all of his students fast for 40 days as well, before they started studying with him. Well, it turns out that's not true. It wasn't something that was developed yesterday. That was developed by people who were trying to glorify Pythagoras and associate him through the 40-day fast with the 40-day fasting of Elijah and Moses and whoever else. So, anyway, these stories are told for various reasons, but the reason they persist today is because they are extremely comforting to people who are doing this weird thing that, until very recently, no one else was doing. They provide this kind of sense of, “Oh, you are part of this long worthy tradition with these noble people who came up with mathematical theorems and so on. So, it must be a good thing.” 

In fact, the truth is, while it's true that we owe probably the first really deep signs anyway of therapeutic fasting to the ancient Greeks and to people around the time of Hippocrates, they had no idea what to do with it. The reason they had and they had no idea what to do with just about anything to do with medicine. The reason is because there was a taboo on dissecting bodies. You couldn't look inside the body, you couldn't see what was going on, so, they made up these cockamamie theories. The one that eventually won out was called humoralism. It held that if you keep your body's four humors in balance, those were black bile, yellow bile, phlegm, and blood. So, they believed if you kept them in balance, then you would be healthy. When they got out of balance, then you would be unhealthy. That's why you get to such things as bleeding people, is that's to try to get their blood amount back in balance. Well, it was all completely nonsense, but all of medicine was based on that. 

The few things that have come out about fasting from this time are just useless, almost all of them. So, for instance, a writer in the Hip-- I should say, we don't know if Hippocrates wrote any of the works that are ascribed to him. There are about 60 works in the Hippocratic corpus. They were probably mostly written by family disciples, whatever, some by impostors. But anyway, within the Hippocratic corpus, one of these Hippocratic writers will say something like, “When you have hiccups or you have muscle spasms, you should either fast or overeat.” And it's like, “Well, which one?” Those are opposites. It was full of this kind of nonsensical stuff. 

Now, all that being said, the Greeks did because they were open to fasting and because their big contribution, big contribution that Hippocrates and his colleagues made was that previously medicine was just seen as something that happened by divine fate or something. They said, “No, there are actual causes to diseases. We can learn to understand what those are, and sometimes we may be able to treat them.” Now, the fact that their treatments ended up being wacky doesn't discredit this enormous advance they gave us. And because of that advance, people over the centuries started experimenting with fasting. Eventually they got around to just through random chance practically stumbling on some things that did seem to work here and there. They weren't very prominent, they didn't last super long, but you could see these kinds of bubbling up of fasting intelligence over the years. 

One of the reasons I went into kind of what you're calling them fasting fraud of these ancient quotations and stories and so on is because I just don't think that they're so widespread, they're everywhere, they're unfortunately, every health website and anyone who talks about fasting usually resorts to one or two of them. What you find is I don't think that helps us. What helps us is not sort of covering ancient fasting in a glory that it doesn't deserve, but actually understanding where fasting came from, being humble about what things we did know and didn't know when as a species and therefore treating fasting with a lot more care, I hope. 

Melanie Avalon: I feel like now I need to go through all my blogs and my book and my podcast. I'm sure I've been sharing some of this misinformation. This is just a random tangent. The thing you were saying about how the cure for what was it for hiccups was either to fast or to overeat. I actually was reading a study about fasting the other day. I was researching fasting's effect on pain because of a listener question for The Intermittent Fasting Podcast, and I found a really interesting study, and it was all about how both fasting and eating can relieve pain. Super random tangent. [laughs] So, maybe there was something with the hiccups, I don't know. 

Steve Hendricks: Right. I mean, well, there could have been something there. Had there been a more scientific way of parsing through the various evidence, something might have grown out of that, but they just didn't have that at the time. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. You mentioned it in the book, but when we're looking at these quotes, how do we figure out that these sentences weren't uttered by these people? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, so the first clue is, if someone's not offering a citation, don't trust them. [laughs] They may well be right, of course, not everything has citations. But the simple thing to do is to go and look, to see who is making those quotations with citations and then just keep following them back like you'll find that I don't know that this quotation say, “Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food,” from Hippocrates, which you see everywhere and no Hippocratic writer ever wrote that. What happens is if you start chasing it back, one article will cite another article, which will cite another article, and often this is in the scholarly literature, but no one will be citing an ancient Greek source. Once you get back to the very earliest one of these, that's maybe in 1910 or maybe it's in 1842 or whatever, and you found that on Google Books or somewhere like that, if you go as far back as you can and there's nothing more beyond that, [laughs] then you have to conclude that it's probably made up. You can check some of these by, if you want, emailing your favorite, I don't know, Hippocrates scholar and saying this quotation seems to be completely bogus. Are you familiar with this in any of the Hippocratic writings, nope. They'll usually be able to help you out in such a straight.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, it's so interesting. It speaks to a broader problem of that just happening in general, I imagine, in the scientific literature, because all it takes is some idea to slip into some journal somewhere, and then that's quoted, and then that’s quoted and then we're lost with it. I know that happened with, I think with the quote about how many top soils generations we have left. I know there was something about that. Like somebody said a quote about that at some conference without a citation, and then it made its way into some literature, and then it just kept getting quoted. But I imagine it happens with a lot of things. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah. Once it makes it into an academic publication, whether it's a peer reviewed scientific journal or a book by an academic, forget it. Then everyone in the world will cite it, and it's just a lost cause. 

Melanie Avalon: Well, you mentioned 40 days a lot and I think probably a lot of people when they think of 40-day fast, they might think of Jesus' 40-day fasts. I was super fascinated by the history of fasting in different religions. Okay, so to start, here's a quote people will say all the time, they'll say that, “Fasting appears in every major religion.” Does it appear in every major religion? 

Steve Hendricks: It appears in almost every major religion. Now, you could split hairs over what's a major religion, but yes, in virtually every major religion. The one exception is Zoroastrianism, which is in Persia, modern day Iran, Zoroaster, the founder of Zoroastrianism. Almost all religions experimented, and some wildly adopted some form of asceticism just being really savage to your body. One form that was available to everyone was fasting. 

So, every religion, practically, certainly every major religion that has evolved has had to wrestle with what is the place for asceticism in our religion. Zoroaster, after experimenting with it, eventually decided that it was extremely harmful. He thought that fasting in particular would leave you too weak to farm, too weak to create productive and strong offspring. He chose a kind of more hedonistic almost view of the world and said, “No, we're not going to fast.” What's curious about this is that it's basically, as I say, a slightly hedonistic religion telling people that this is not a sin and that is not a sin, and you can do a bunch of things that these other religions won't. 

Well, today Zoroastrianism has 200,000 followers, and that's it in the entire world. Meanwhile, the religion, it mostly lost out to is Islam, which in some forms is very strict about what you can and can't do. And there are a billion Muslims. So, I don't know what the heck that says about human psychology, but that's a long way of saying that with the exception of Zoroastrianism, virtually all other religions, certainly the religions most of us have heard of had some place for fasting, but it varied enormously. Some places, some religions, it was a very small role. In other religions, it practically took over the whole religion. 

Melanie Avalon: In Hinduism, because I think that was one of the first religions you talked about that was primarily for enlightenment, was the purpose of fasting? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, I mean, the idea was that if you could eliminate desire, you could reach nirvana. So, they would do all kinds of ascetic practices. They would deny themselves sleep, shelter, clothing, family. This is the first time you really get into really ascetic monks who are doing an almost athletic like training for the soul. One of the ways was fasting, this idea that it was a way of renouncing desire, which Hinduism at that time certainly saw as a holy path. Early Hinduism is one place where fasting just grew and grew and grew. And you can see how it happens. If a little bit of fasting makes you holy, then a whole lot of fasting--

Melanie Avalon: Really holy.

Steve Hendricks: Exactly and that's exactly what happens. So, you eventually get to a point where there are Hindu calendars in ancient Hinduism that have 140 days of the year set aside for fasting. The sad part of it is, eventually the men who ran the religion decided that the people most in need of fasting were women. So, the fasting burden fell very heavily on women, very lightly on men. It took a reaction many years later to sort of tamp that down. But even today, if you speak to Hindu families and say, “Who in your family fasts?” You are much more likely to find women who fast than men do. And this is not an uncommon theme. This is exactly what happened in Christianity as well. 

Melanie Avalon: No. So, I think this was my favorite theme [chuckles] in the book. I was blown away by how often it occurred and what happened when it occurred. So, even with the Greeks, I think you said that when there was fasting, it was more with women, I don't know, that just never occurred to me. I don't remember which culture or time it was, but there was one example where women could fast because it was the one thing they could do. Like, men would go on vagabond things and they could do all this other stuff, but the only thing women could do was fast. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, during the Middle Ages, fasting really took hold in Christianity probably 100, 200 years or so after the death of Jesus, who didn't have much at all to say about fasting. Like most Jews who fasted him, he surely fasted, but he didn't have much to do with it. Early Christians didn't have much to do with it. But eventually Christians decided that the church fathers who ran Christianity at the time, that fasting could basically be used to subjugate women. The problem was that men were these very holy, devout creatures. But, yeah, they were little bit weak. They were tempted by this temptress woman who God had just put down here to torment male Christians was almost the view. And so, the idea was that you could neutralize female sexuality by getting women to fast. Sexuality was important, because by this time in Christianity, the sexual being had come to be seen as impure and tainting and so on. 

Fasting was supposed to dry up the moist humors. Remember the crazy humoralism we talked about earlier was predominating. Dry up the moist humors in women that were supposed to behind female lust. If you took fasting far enough, it could obliterate womanhood. It could pare the hips, get rid of breasts and buttocks, it could end menstruation. This wasn't supposed to be a punishment, so the church father said anyway, this was supposed to be something to aim for, to make yourself more holy, and your reward would be becoming a bride of Christ. This was quite literally meant some of the creepiest erotic writings of late antiquity.

Melanie Avalon: It's so creepy. 

Steve Hendricks: Isn't it? Are these scenes where Christ is uniting with his virgin brides in the heavenly bridal chamber or something? It's just obscene. It's not to say that every woman in Christianity fasted herself to this near starvation, but that was certainly the ideal that was held out. And so, you find by the time you get to the Middle Ages in the Renaissance, the vast majority of saints who are women in the Catholic hierarchy, who have been sainted, are these fasting saints. They have these very anorexic traits. Some of them literally starve themselves to death. Most of them just starve themselves into illness and probably an early death because of it, though, of course, we can't say for sure. That brings us to what you just referred to. 

Devout Christians were supposed to be practicing some form of asceticism. It didn't have to be as crazy as what the saints were doing and so on, but it needed to be something. Lots of forums were open to men, and one of the biggest ones of the day was called mendicancy, which is just going around homeless from town to town, begging, saying, “I'm a monk, I'm a brother of Christ, please give me food, or whatever." Your penance was to have or not penance, but your sort of duty was to have a life with few possessions and to live on the goodness of others. When women tried that, there were a few who did, the most famous is known as Clare of Assisi. When she tried it, she was told, “Well, this homeless vagabonding is not in keeping with pure womanhood, so get back into your abbey and forget this kind of thing.” And so, what was open to her was the power over her own body? 

So, on the one hand, while it was a very misogynistic, very horrible set of doctrine that were being handed to girls and women throughout Europe of this time. On the other hand, some of them did this kind of reclaiming thing. Well, okay, all you're going to give me is the power over my own body, I'm going to use it to starve my way to heaven, they would basically think. So, you have one theory anyways to how you got so many of these fasting saints. There was just nothing else or very little else left over that they could do that would achieve for them the equivalent amount of holiness as the men were achieving through their asceticism. 

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Melanie Avalon: Yeah. That was such a crazy ironic dichotomy that on the one hand fasting was used to really oppress these women and repress their sexuality and control them. And then on the other hand, it was like the one thing the women could do to assert themselves. [laughs] It's so ironic. My sister came over the other night and I was telling her about the book and about all of this and I was telling her about these saints who actually were probably anorexic and died from that, and then they were canonized as saints. I found the page in the book that you mentioned with those passages of the bride of Christ stuff, and I was like, “You have to read this.” It's just fascinating. You talk about Catherine of Siena, who is one of the probably anorexic saints that died. You can still see her body, like parts of her body at places. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah. There's this creepy thing in Catholicism where they have, in churches and cathedrals, these reliquaries and the relics that are in the reliquaries are often the body parts of saints. So, when a saint would die, sometimes it's a whole body. But people everywhere wanted a little bit of something, so they might chop off a finger and send that to one town, chop off a foot and send that to another town. So, anyway, her body is scattered around Italy. Catherine of Siena was perhaps, no doubt about it, was the greatest, most powerful fasting saint. She had an influence over the popes of the time. She had an influence over various princes and so on and their political dealings. She helped propagate one of the crusades that was happening in her era. 

She died very early, almost certainly because she had weakened herself too much through too much fasting. So, she died in her early 30s. She died in Rome. She was from Siena and someone chopped off her head at some point and brought her head back to Siena. If you go into the Cathedral in Siena, you will see her head still there. You can google it. It's online. It's shocking how well preserved it is, given that we're talking about something kind of forget the dates, but six or seven centuries ago. But yes, it's this creepy thing that is done in a lot of Catholic churches to take these various body parts. 

Melanie Avalon: Because I think we like to think that we're beyond this, but do you think this theme has kind of continued with maybe not as much today with the health at every size movement, but, like, Parisian fashion and runway models. Is that a continuation of that theme? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, it's a very good question, Melanie. And I'm not sure. I went into such detail about how fasting has been used to oppress women, because food and how much you should and shouldn't eat is, of course, still being used to just ruin women's lives, even if it's in a much more secular way of, say, Paris Fashion Week than a dictum from the Roman Catholic Church. I don't know. I never found a scholarly article or report or something that drew a very clear line and said, this is why we're having trouble today. The parallels to what was going on in the past and what is going on today with women's bodies were strong enough that I just wanted to lay that out there. You're astute to notice that, to ask whether there's a connection. In the book, I don't say and that I don't say because I don't have answer. So, possibly yes, possibly no.

Regardless of whether there's a straight connection, I think we can learn from it. It's not a super sophisticated message here. It's just that women have been screwed over by usually men telling them what the hell to do with their bodies. And I especially wanted to be sensitive to that because I tell you, when I talk about-- I mean, I've been talking about fasting with people for 15 years hands down. The ones who resist it far more. The gender that resists it are women more than men. Well, it definitely has to do with some of these themes. Whether it's directly linked to what happened in history, who knows. I think we need to recognize that and understand it and be sympathetic to it. 

Melanie Avalon: It's such a complex and complicated topic, and you're talking about women being resistant to fasting. I definitely see it, just especially with The Intermittent Fasting Podcast and all the questions we get, because there are a lot of studies on the science of the health benefits of fasting, particularly in women and particularly for hormonal issues, PCOS, a lot of benefits that can be had. There's also a huge concern that women shouldn't be fasting. It's hard to piece out how much of that is from themes we all just talked about societal issues of women and eating or how much it's just that women might tend to over restrict and be too restrictive in diet and lifestyle and fasting. I don't know, it's just a very complex topic, and another reason I love your book so much. I hadn't considered the history of fasting in women at all as a piece in it. So, it's really interesting. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, I would love it if someone could come up with answer to that question. Hopefully some scholar will turn to that someday. 

Melanie Avalon: Another religion that was super interesting, Jainism. What happens with fasting there and there's suicide fasting?

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, it's really something. Jainism probably took fasting to an even greater extreme than Christianity did. So, Jainism, certainly at that time, the belief Jainism, Hinduism, and Buddhism all kind of grew out of the same, they're called Vedic religions in ancient India, and they've interpreted them different ways and often in reaction to each other. Partly because Hinduism, even as crazy as it was with fasting, and Buddhism, which was much more moderate with fasting, because they were both kind of on the slightly more moderate side than Jainism. Jainism reacted by taking fasting to quite an extreme and they took a lot of dogma to extreme. Their main view is that life is either suffering or it's causing suffering. Even grass is alive, so if you walk across the grass, you're causing suffering. The problem with that is that all organisms are composed of karma, which they've conceived of as these sort of literal bits, sort of like atoms. 

Your karma are mostly bad deeds and they keep the soul from soaring to heaven. They literally weigh your soul down so that it can't soar to heaven. Fasting, they decided, burned off bad karma. So, they would take fasting to some very extreme practices. One of them was this year long thing that they called Varsha Thapa which, if I remember it correctly, you eat nothing from sunrise until sunset 36 hours later. Then you eat after sunset. Once you've done that, you start all over again. At sunrise, fast another 36 hours till sunset. Eat a little more, do it again at sunrise. You do this for an entire year, which is just insane. So, they had all these practices, but the one that has gotten the most attention is this suicidal one you referred to. That was called Sallekhana and Sallekhana was simply starvation unto death. The original idea was that if you were as enlightened as you could possibly be, you had nothing more to achieve in this life. You had burned off as much karma as you could. Well, what was the point in continuing to live? If you continue to live, you might just rack up some more bad karma. You might inflict suffering. You could starve yourself to death.

Very, very devout Jains did this. We don't have an idea as to how many people did this over time. We're not talking millions here. We're talking probably well, today we think that there are probably a couple of hundred people a year who are doing this. Now, in modern times, it's been modified somewhat, so you don't have to be near enlightenment and so on. If you have a terminal illness, you've got a terminal diagnosis, there's no hope for you, you can starve yourself to death rather than suffering. 

There are cases in the west, of course, not just in Jainism, where people have done this, not a ton, but a few, who I speak of a writer, Sue Hubbell, who in 2018 got a dementia diagnosis and it was getting worse and worse and worse. And she essentially practiced Sallekhana. She starved herself to death for about 34 days. And so, people report that this is not a completely painless death, but it is much more painless than many other ways to go, and that the pain is very manageable and that all in all, it's kind of a peaceful death. So, who knows. I don't have much else to say in favor of Jainism, but it seems like an interesting thing to consider for those who are terminally ill. 

Melanie Avalon: Jainism, when I was reading about it, literally, it sounds like the definition of you just can't win. You just can't win. [chuckles] Everything you do is not good. How do you think that compares to somebody dying on their deathbed and then they stop eating and that's how they die? That seems to be very common or more common. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah. There's quite often in the last stages of death, if you have a cancer or something, then it's just one of these lingering things where you've been dying of the cancer for six months. Quite often, in the last two days, three days, seven days, maybe you'll just lose your appetite and that's your body shutting down and basically preparing for death, as I have had it explained to me anyway. And I think that makes sense. This is a different category of thing, this is-- I have cancer, it's a terminal diagnosis, I could linger for six months and deal with the pain, the medication, the whatever else or I could starve myself to death and be dead in 30 days. In the Sue Hubbell's case, she had dementia. Heck, she was only, I think, in her 60s. She might have lived another 25 years. The difference is it's consciously seizing the opportunity to shorten that period of what for a lot of people would be hell. 

Melanie Avalon: Something I would love to know. I've never thought about this. I'd be super curious because we know of all of the processes that are activated by fasting and cellular renewal and all of the benefits. I wonder when a person is on their deathbed and then they do enter that state where their body is shutting down and they stop eating, I wonder if they still activate all those processes or if it's different. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, that would be really interesting to know because the reason that most of us, well, many of us fast is because it initiates all these repair mechanisms. If your body kind of has some inkling, I assume that it's going to die-

Melanie Avalon: Like nose.

Steve Hendricks: -right, [laughs] would it bother with the repairs? I have no idea. I don't think it's ever been studied anywhere. 

Melanie Avalon: It would be a sad and a morbid study. I would be very curious, though. Just before we leave the religious aspect because I think people, especially since Christian is such a large religion, they might have been surprised to hear that fasting wasn't as prominent or as big as a part as maybe we have thought it might have been, especially with Jesus and the 40-day fast and everything. You talk about how-- I think when Jesus talks about fasting, he talks more about doing it in private rather than public. So, like, Lent, what's going on there?

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, so that's a really good question. What happened was, after Jesus, we have what we think is a pretty good record of what he probably said. But He didn't lay out how to build an entire society and how to do everything. The church fathers had to come up with a lot of doctrine. Although the early church fathers sort of heeded Jesus-- Jesus had come and basically said all these silly dietary laws and everything else that the Jews are doing, you don't need to mess with that. Like, just, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” If you obey that golden rule, then the rest will fall into place. Just don't get bogged down with 3000 laws. So, one of those things that people assumed that he was talking about was don't get bogged down with fasting. In the first century or so after his death, there was not much fasting in Christianity. I mean, some of them had just-- they had been many of them, most of them, probably Jews. Jews fasted, so they'd probably done some fasting and so on. 

But then, what happened was that the church fathers found that they could make fasting into something extremely useful to them. I've discussed the importance of subjugating women in order to keep them in their place and not tempt men. It wasn't all just that. I mean, that was a huge part of what was going on. But there was also, for instance, there came to be an idea that evolved a century or two after Jesus' death that was called the [unintelligible [01:07:58] angelicus, the life of the angels. The idea was that you should try to be on earth as much as you would be when you become angel or a deceased or whatever they thought they would be in Heaven. And angels were obviously incorporeal. They didn't have bodies, so they didn't eat. So, to the extent that you were able to model that here on earth, by not eating, by starving yourself, you could achieve this life of the angels here on earth or as close to it as you could possibly get. So, for reasons like this fasting took on a life of its own and it just grew.

Most people probably heard of the Desert Fathers and Desert Mothers, these monks in antiquity who would go out into the desert and do all these kinds of ascetic feats. One of their ascetic feats was to fast for days or weeks or months. And so, fasting kind of gained a momentum of its own. Remember how I said before that in Hinduism, there were eventually as many as 140 days or something like that of fasting on Hindu calendars. On Christian calendars, it expanded so much that by the Middle Ages and Renaissance, some places in Europe had 220 or 240 days of fasting throughout the year. I mean, it was just overwhelming how it grew to this proportion. So, Lent grew from that just same general expansion. It had eventually been Easter. Easter originally was the holiest day of the Christian calendar. It was also the saddest. It was occasioned for mourning because Christ had been killed, he'd come down to save us, and then there was the joyous resurrection. It ended kind of joyfully, but it was a very mournful period. 

The Church Fathers found that if you wanted to emphasize to people just how mournful they should be, how sober and how contemplative that they should be, you should make them fast. So, Easter got preceded by depending upon where this was enacted a day, maybe two days, eventually maybe three or four days or a week of fasting, which eventually, over time because again, same thing as what we were talking about with the Hindus and the Jains of a little fasting makes you holy, a lot of fasting makes you holier. It eventually grew to this 40-day famine before Easter and it was honored in different ways. 

Some people just sort of famously, as we know today, they just give up one thing. I should say more commonly among the more devout, it was a partial day of fasting each day. So, you might fast until 03:00 PM in the afternoon, have a light meal, maybe a dinner, and then you do it all over again the next day. It wasn't 40 days without food for most people. So that's how Lent grew. It was the way that fasting tended to grow throughout the more primitive parts of human history, which is just this simple idea of, well, gosh, maybe more fasting is even better for us. 

Melanie Avalon: Those fasting days, like you mentioned in Lent, were those the type of fasting days like in Hinduism, when they would have all those days on the calendar? Would they complete fasts or were they just eating lightly? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, so for most of those, when I say 220 or 240 days on some of these medieval European calendars, most people observe those by eating lightly. Some people would just observe them by giving up desserts or maybe they would give up meat. So, it was a partial fast for most people. For the most devout people who really honored it, they tended to give up all food until mid-afternoon and then they tended to eat lightly for the rest of the day. One would assume they gorged the next non-fasting day that they had in order to make up the calories, because otherwise they would have been in quite a caloric deficit. But that seems to be what happened. 

Melanie Avalon: Little ADF action going on. 

Steve Hendricks: Right, something like that. 

Melanie Avalon: So, I think when people think back through the history of Christianity, they think of the moment of challenging all of this dogma and doctrines would be with Martin Luther and the Reformation. So, did that affect fasting in any way? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, I mean, absolutely it did. It probably wasn't as big a deal with Martin Luther as people thought when he nailed his-- well, he probably didn't, another myth of history. Yeah, he didn't nail his thesis to the door of the church, but when he published his thesis, he was upset about fasting. At that time, what had happened was at the same time that there was this one poll of fasting, which was this crazy, over the top, extreme fasting that led to the fasting saints and some of the stuff we've talked about. There was also this other poll in which ordinary people were trying desperately to get out of fasting any way they could because they hated it. So, particularly if it's on the calendar a couple of hundred days a year. 

The church had eventually gotten around to letting the rich buy their way out of fasting by making donations to the church. These were called dispensations and you could buy a dispensation to let you drink milk or eat butter or something during your days when you were supposed to be fasting. There's even one of the Cathedrals in France in Normandy has a Butter Tower. It's called the Butter Tower because this gorgeous Gothic tower was built on the money from the dispensations for laypeople to eat butter during Lent and other fasting days. So, Martin Luther didn't like all that, but he didn't make a huge deal out of it right there and then in his original protests. But he eventually became much more vocal as he was criticizing the pope in Rome and other members of the hierarchy of the church. He eventually went after them for these dispensations. 

Not only were they unfair to people who couldn't afford them, but who were these humans in Rome to be selling off something that was supposedly God's right to tell us to do or not to do? And so, from there in the Reformation, fasting played a pretty large role in getting people to revolt against the church, because fasting was something that was hated. The church was corrupt, it had tons of money, and rich people could get out of it. So, you had a lot of very ordinary people who were very primed by fasting to revolt against the church, which eventually led to the establishment of all these Protestant churches in countries across Europe. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, one of themes I found so interesting is the backlash and the responses surrounding fasting and especially politically or even with the government and things like that. And so, in the US, there were quite a few interesting people. I was wondering if we could talk about Bernarr Macfadden. I was so fascinated by him and what he did and this idea of the cult of the Body Beautiful and everything that happened with him. So, how does he relate to the fasting world? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah. Bernarr Macfadden stumbles onto the scene about 20 years after Henry Tanner's fast in 1880. Macfadden was perhaps one of the greatest showmen in America. And I don't mean that literally. Well, he did do some shows on stage, but I mean just sort of as a carnival like media figure. He came along and in 1899 established a journal called Physical Culture, which by the time it was done with its first year, had 100,000 subscribers, which made it one of the biggest subscribed journals in the country and would just keep growing and growing. I think the number between the two world wars was that it sold 50 million copies. What Physical Culture was, was this Body Beautiful magazine. It showed people who exercise, exercise wasn't huge back then and lifted weights, which was even less huge, and he would show them what they could make of their own bodies and that was its power. 

It was like everyone has the power to be as beautiful and handsome as these models, who, not incidentally, he showed wearing next to nothing, sometimes wearing absolutely nothing. With the genitals artfully concealed behind a literal fig leaf or something. And so, he gained this enormous enormous following. He created one publication after another. It was kind of the beginning of this confessional, first person, lurid stories that played fast and loose with the truth form of so-called journalism. Some of his other publications were like, True Detective, True Romance and stuff. Supposedly the stories were true, but of course they weren't. At the height of his powers, with all of his journals and he owned a newspaper or two. He had a circulation of 200 million copies a year in a country that didn't have anywhere near the number of people who we have today, of course. 

He made all kinds of fantastic health claims. Like he had a way of regrowing bald heads, regrowing the hair on the heads. He had a way of one of the most famous was a thing that he called the penis scope, which was this, like, glass tube and a vacuum pump. It was supposed to give these middle-aged men with erectile dysfunctions like firmer erections. I mean, just crazy, quackery, nonsense stuff. But in the midst of all this, he also put out some really useful information about fasting, because he had discovered fasting when he was a child, probably had heard about Tanner's fasts and so on. But he had noticed, working on a farm that farm animals, when they got sick, stopped eating. So, one time when he got pneumonia, he tried it and believed that it had helped him. He did all of these very important things, but very poorly respected things because of who he was to promote fasting. 

He wrote books and there were articles in his magazines about fasting and he supported various fasting doctors and so on. It didn't take because he was such a quack on so many other things that the medical establishment absolutely wanted nothing to do with him, and he just blasted them left, right, and center in his publications. But it had so very little effect. What he did do, however, was to carry forward and not just carry forward, but expand on Henry Tanner's bringing of fasting into the public consciousness because what Macfadden did was he actually showed-- I'm not talking in any scientific way, but he would report cases of people who claimed to have been cured of their diseases by fasting. People who had skin diseases, headache, constipation, kidney diseases, on and on and on. It's a very long list. This sparked the curiosity of a very small number of doctors and scientists and sort of more judicious reporters than he was, who took fasting to the next step. But he's an enormously important transition figure. 

Melanie Avalon: So, fascinating, it just makes you realize you just don't know what's going to have an effect. I'm blown away. You said 200 million copies a year. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah. 

Melanie Avalon: And today, there's only like 300 million, I think, citizens. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, we've got, I don't know, 330 and 340 million people here. So, yeah, these were-- one person might be getting five of his journals. It's not like it was going to 200 million people. That figure was in 1929 right before the Great Depression struck. He went downhill from there. But even as late as oh, I forget what the year was, early 1950s, let's say. There was this famous show, TV show, where you had to guess a famous person based on just a sentence that they read or something like that. I'm forgetting what the name of it was. It was really catchy, but anyway, 30 years after his peak, 20 years at least, he could appear on this TV show without his face showing, just his voice reading one line or whatever it was, and people could guess who he was. He had that much influence over the culture. 

Melanie Avalon: And he started his own religion. 

Steve Hendricks: He did. [laughs] He started it, had to be one of the shortest-lived religions in history. He started something called Cosmotarianism and Cosmotarianism was just a blend of Macfadden health doctrine and kind of some parts he had stolen from Christianity. It must have lasted six months or something. 

Melanie Avalon: Speaking of Cosmo, I learned about, I guess Cosmopolitan magazine used to be different than it is today. 

Steve Hendricks: Indeed, it was a serious journal that talked about, I don't know, gosh, the economy or the state of the French Army or what have you. It was not a sex tips and blemish free skin kind of journal. 

Melanie Avalon: There's another theme there that I think we see today, not specifically fasting, but even today, you just don't know what's going to take off, what's going to become popular, even with people who might have celebrity attached to them. You don't know if what they promote will be successful. So, I was super interested to learn that, like, Upton Sinclair, for example, who most people have heard of and are familiar with, that he wrote about fasting. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah. He was really the next, I think, most important person after Macfadden. Upton Sinclair is the famous muckraking journalist, who when he was in his late 20s, wrote a book called The Jungle and was about the atrocious treatment of workers in Chicago meat packing plants and also about the completely unsanitary conditions there. But he had a much lesser known side to him and that was that he wrote a book called The Fasting Cure, which grew out of a couple of long articles that he had written for Cosmopolitan magazine back in 1910 and 1911. What Sinclair had a story about, like, a lot of people who come to fasting, which is, “I had all these illnesses. I couldn't shake them. I went to doctor after doctor after doctor.” I mean, he spent gosh, I think, translated into today's money something like $500,000 on doctors and sanitariums and retreats and so on, trying to cure himself of what sounds like a really unshakable fatigue, constantly upset stomach, headaches that would strike him out of nowhere and no one had any cure. 

Then he stumbles on some of this crazy stuff from Bernarr Macfadden and he tries fasting. To make a long story short, it cures him. All of his ailments go away. He is able to write more prolifically than ever, and he says, “Well, I got to tell the world about this. I've got a platform, so let's get the news out.” What he did that was very, very useful. In addition to writing these two articles for Cosmopolitan, he also put out a survey. I think it was at the end of one article and said, “Hey, if you have fasted, if you're reading this, would you please write and tell me whether you had a good response, bad response. Tell me if you were fasting to cure something. Did you cure whatever it was?” So, he did the first really sort of systemic attempt, and he's a layperson. He's not a scientist. He's publishing in something that ordinary people need to be able to read or his publisher will not sell it. 

As good as a layperson could do a very good job of assembling a whole bunch of case studies of people who said, “Yeah, I had a stomach ulcer, I fasted for 35 days, it went away, or, yeah, I had thus and such wrong with my liver or thus and such had a carbuncle on my toe. After a fast of 20 days, it went away.” What he was doing was he was saying, “Look, you don't have to take my word for it.” He provided the names and addresses of these or at least the cities that they lived in, which back then was good enough. He would provide information about these people and just say, “I just want men of science.” They were almost all men back then, of course. “I just want men of science to look at this seriously. It surely cannot be that we have all this evidence of all these people, more than 100, 90% of them, who said they got better when they fasted. It surely cannot be that we have all this evidence and scientists will not take a look at it, particularly because at that time medicine could not cure most diseases. It was really still a very impotent form of medicine back then. But of course, as you might have guessed, that did not happen. Scientists generally looked away. Most men of medicine looked away. 

Melanie Avalon: That's something I found so interesting. You talked about how when they really first started studying fasting for longevity, and it was a lot in rodent studies, I think, probably in the 1980s, but I think you made a comment about how there was all this really fascinating research on longevity and telomeres and shrinking organs and nuclei and stuff, but it took so long for people to apply that to humans, like to do human studies. Why do you think that is? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, again, it just goes back to how counterintuitive fasting is. It is just very hard for people to accept that not eating can make you stronger, that it can heal you. If we have it our sort of textbook ideal version of what a scientist or doctor is, as someone who's entirely dispassionate and doesn't have any biases and can look at things completely fresh every time, “That's not what's going on.” Doctors bring their biases. Scientists bring their biases just like the rest of us. Boy, I mean, I'm telling you, it's still a hard sell today, trying to convince doctors about this. In 1950, oh, my gosh even harder. 

To the point where I tell the story of this one study that this pair of scientists, this odd couple of scientists at the University of Chicago does about that time. It's somewhere in the ballpark of 1950. I don't remember the exact year. They find that when they fast rodents, they live vastly longer and they almost completely eliminate, I believe it was breast cancer was the one that they were looking at in these rodents. They had various groups of rodents and I'm saying rodents because I don't remember off the top of my head whether it's mice or rats, but they had various groups.

One, they fasted every other day. The other group, they fasted every second day. Another group, they fasted every third day. Then there was a control group that ate normally. Well, the one that did the best was the one that fasted the most. All right, but it turns out that those mice ended up being much smaller. They didn't grow to full size. Now, we now have the science to know that's because our growth hormones and our growth mechanisms are intricately involved in our longevity markers. You can grow more slowly and be smaller and live longer, or you can grow fully and eat as much as you want and stimulate your growth hormones and not live as long seems to be the message. But they didn't know that then. So, what did they see? They saw, “Well, hey, look, fasting seems to be able-- well, it certainly makes these guys live longer, almost practically eliminates one of the most dreaded forms of cancer.” 

But guess what? There's a problem here. They don't grow to full size. And they could not reconcile that. They could not recommend to people, “Hey, we might have a cure for cancer here or something close to it, but you're not going to be as huge and big and vigorous and so on as you might be.” So, they played down their own finding and played up one of the other lesser fasting groups who fasted less often and got fewer benefits and so on, because you wouldn't be hale and hearty and strapping if you've-- and I'm like, I shoot, I would trade two inches for 20 years of life. [laughs] It's not even a question for me, but it's a very, very difficult thing for people to accept. Again, just another aspect of it being so very counterintuitive. 

Melanie Avalon: It's also similar to this idea about the assumptions that they make on the findings and what people would want or willing or not willing to do. You talk about the role of advances in epilepsy and the keto diet and fasting, and then this recurring theme where basically, I'm going to say they say but they say that it's too hard to fast to address epilepsy. So, it's not even presented as an option to patients or to parents who have kids who are epileptic. They aren't even exposed to this thing that could possibly really help their children because it's just assumed it would be too difficult, which is very, I don't know. It's frustrating. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah. You can understand where it stems from. I mean, you have doctors who have a very short amount of time with each patient, and they're supposed to tell them what exactly in their eight minutes of contact with the patient, “Hey, guess what? Your diet is terrible, so you need to completely overhaul your entire diet if you want to live longer.” The few times that they try to do that or you've got eight minutes with a smoker and you're trying to tell them how to quit smoking. That smoker has 25 years of smoking behind her, and she is not going to hear what you have to say in eight minutes. So, they get this impression that's not completely undeserved of. Look, when we give some kind of advice, not all advice, but when we give some advice, it is very hard to get people to follow it. 

It's hard enough when it's like, you could try eating less processed food or you could try stopping smoking, which everyone agrees with. Gosh, if you're telling them something crazy like, “Hey, how about fasting?” [laughs] What are the odds that they're going to be able to adopt it? I think it is true that if you only have a few minutes with a patient, the odds are very, very slim. However, that's the problem of the medical model. It's not a problem with fasting and it's not a problem with patients because there are a lot of patients who, if you said in those seven minutes or whatever, “Hey, I think you should really try fasting, I don't have time to go into it all with you. Here's what I can tell you in five minutes, and here are some books and websites and so on that you can go and look at, podcasts you can listen to,” and that might actually have some kind of effect, but most doctors aren't thinking that way. They're thinking very, very short term.

Melanie Avalon: Something I wish we could do. There's an issue surrounding it because I don't know if it requires deception, maybe it doesn't. I wish there could be a system where there could be a pill that's a placebo pill and it's a fasting pill. And the directions for taking it is you take this pill, but you can't eat a certain amount of time before or after. So then, you can give them the pill, but really you're just forcing them into a fast. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, that's great. You have hit upon exactly what some of the United States is anyway, earliest fasting doctors came up with in the early 19th century. One of the doctors I write about, Isaac Jennings, who was this doctor in Connecticut, noticed that people seemed to get better when they stopped eating and noticed that they did better than with the so-called medicines that he was giving them, which were just almost completely useless. So, he did that. He tried an experiment where he created bread pills. He just made pills himself out of flour and water, colored them to make them look like the pills that you would buy from the apothecary and so on, gave them to people and said, your instruction is to take this pill, drink nothing but water, and I'll see you in three days. The results were convincing enough to him that he simply stopped prescribing medicines about 98% of the time and simply prescribed these placebos and then eventually felt bad about it and told his patients about it. He thought for sure that they would run him out of town. So, he had set up. 

Melanie Avalon: But they did it, right? 

Steve Hendricks: No, they didn't. They took it really well and he stayed there in Connecticut for another several years and then eventually went off and practiced in Ohio. But, yeah, it seemed to have worked. 

Melanie Avalon: How do you feel about Valter Longo and his approach to fasting and his choice to go the fasting mimicking diet route? I think a lot of it probably involves a lot of these reasons and forces at play as to what you can actually do and get funding for and prescribe to people and make actionable. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah. So, I think, Valter Longo, who's a professor scientist at the University of Southern California, I think he's fantastic. He has done some outstanding work. I do have some criticisms which I mentioned in the book, but I understand why he's gone the way he's gone. His big breakthrough, he's had a lot of big breakthroughs. There are people who are pushing him for a Nobel Prize, and he would certainly have my vote if I were on the committee. But one of his big breakthroughs was in fasting for cancer treatment, and he had this terrible experience. What he basically found is that fasting can weaken cancer cells and it can protect healthy cells. So, it weakens the cancer by starving it out of its preferred fuel glucose and shutting down the growth factors that cancer hijacks to spread and divide and increasing the immune cell activity of these cells that go around and zap our cancer cells. 

Meanwhile, the healthy cells bunker down. They go into a protect and repair mode. So, when you give chemo or radiation and you fast people during that, the healthy cells either ignore it or if they get dinged up a little bit, they're great at making repairs. So, in human trials, he found that people had less nausea, less vomiting, less headache, less fatigue if they fasted during their chemotherapy. We know that's for sure in humans and then in mice what he has seen is that the cancer cells that are weakened, more of them are killed by the chemo or the radiation, so more of it dies. And because the healthy cells are protected, you can ratchet up the chemo and the radiation, you can kill more of the cancer. There are human trials going on now to see if that part of killing more cancer is also true in humans. We know that the protecting you from chemo side effects is true in humans. Okay, so I go into all that to say that's amazing.

Melanie Avalon: Right. [laughs] 

Steve Hendricks: He has found a way to make chemotherapy less miserable and to make it more potent. So, he takes his findings, which at that point had been in mice, to oncologists at these various hospitals that participate in research studies all over the country and says, “Hey, would you enroll your patients in my fasting trial? Here's what I got. It seems extremely promising,” and it should have taken them about two years to get all the people do the trial, get the data written up and all that. It took them like, five years, and the main reason was because oncologists said no. Many of them just wouldn't take calls from his lab because they thought this was just sheer quackery. They didn't want their patients fasting because patients lose weight on chemotherapy, and so they were afraid that they were going to get too skinny. 

Okay, that makes total sense. What Longo told them was, like, “Look, in my mice and in these human anecdotes that we have, people actually don't lose much weight because they're not as nauseated from the chemo. But even the ones who lose weight, they gain it right back in two or three days when they refeed. This is not a problem.” But oncologists could not hear it, and so Longo decides, “Ah, crap, fasting is just a dead end. I'm not going to spend my whole career beating my head against the wall. I'm going to instead try to see if we can come up with a diet that mimics fasting.” I'm sure you've discussed this on your podcast more than once, but so his fasting-mimicking diet, he actually came up with two.

One for kind of more healthy people to use and one for chemo patients to use. Oncologists have, in fact, proven much more willing to use that. And for that matter, for the healthier people who don't have cancer, but maybe they have prediabetes or high blood pressure or whatever, other doctors have been very excited to do that. They say, “Oh, so we can give our patient a little bit of food and still get most of the benefits of fasting.” Probably not all of them, but most of the benefits, great. So, that's really good. I think that's fantastic. 

Here's the problem. My problem is that in a world where science wasn't controlled by what you can sell and instead was controlled by what's best for the patient, we would have trials that put the fasting-mimicking diet head-to-head against water-only fasting. And we would see which one does best and then people could have a choice. Look, not everyone wants to fast, even when threatened with death from cancer. But if you knew let's just speculate here that if you did the fasting-mimicking diet during your chemo for your cancer, your odds of survival jumped from 3 years to 15 years. If you did water only fasting, they jumped from 3 years to 25 years. Well, you could make an educated choice about what you wanted to do. 

Unfortunately, no one's going to pay for a randomized controlled trial to compare fasting with a fasting-mimicking diet, because you just can't make much money off of fasting. Fasting-mimicking diet is something you can sell. They go for about 200 bucks or so for a five-day package. It's not like a ton of money, but that's money that people, investors can invest in and so, we're getting trials on the fasting-mimicking diet, which are great, but they're not being compared for the most part maybe at all, to fasting, which I think is a real shame. 

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I would hypothesize if they suspected that the fasting-mimicking diet would outperform fasting, that they might.

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, I mean, absolutely. What is their incentive to prove that there might be something better out there than the FMD, right? 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. Have you done ProLon?

Steve Hendricks: I have not. I've been curious about it, but I have never done it. 

Melanie Avalon: I ordered it. I was going to do it. It was a no go for me. When I'm just doing water fasting, like, not eating, I'm good, but having to eat like a tiny small amount of food, it just makes me ravenous. I think I tried like one day I was like, “no.” 

Steve Hendricks: [laughs] Yeah. People tell me that you get used to it, but yeah, I have wondered the same thing as to what it does for your hunger. Doesn't seem likely to be great. On the other hand, it's only four or five days. 

Melanie Avalon: Have you watched, was it Gwyneth Paltrow's Goop Lab on Netflix? 

Steve Hendricks: I have not watched it. 

Melanie Avalon: She has an episode. One episode is with Dr. Valter Longo and she does ProLon. And then one episode-- was it the same episode? I think she also interviews Dr. Alan Goldhamer, I think. So, fasting clinics today, what was your experience at TrueNorth Health Center like? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, so TrueNorth in Santa Rosa, California, which is about an hour North of San Francisco, is America's oldest and largest fasting clinic. There are only like three in the entire country. The other two are just kind of sole practitioners or in one case a husband-and-wife team who see a handful of patients a year. At TrueNorth, they've got 70 rooms, they're seeing 1500 people. Inpatient who are coming there to fast or to eat a vastly reduced diet all year long. They have an enormous amount of experience. I will say, as positive and glowing things about Alan Goldhamer as I said about Valter Longo. He has been a pioneer. He, for the longest time, was the only place you could fast under medical supervision in the United States. He kept fasting alive in this country at a time when it probably should have died, but for his persistence. 

Best of all is that unlike previous fasting doctors, Herbert Shelton, who did an awful lot of good, a fasting doctor of the 20th century, the most prominent American fasting doctor until Goldhamer. Shelton was not very scientific and didn't have much interest in having anything to do with science because researchers had so strongly rejected everything that he practiced and preached. So, what Alan Goldhamer said, however, was very early on in his career, he's been fasting people since 1984, I think he's 62 or 63 now. He said, “Look, if fasting is ever to achieve widespread acceptance, we have to put it on a scientific basis.” 

And so, from very early on, he was collecting data from his patients about how they improved on fasting. He eventually, probably about 15 years ago or so, founded a foundation to undertake research on fasting. What he'll tell you is if you go to TrueNorth, he'll say this looks like a fasting clinic. But in fact, what we are is a research center disguised as a fasting clinic. He keeps the rates there extremely low so that he can get people who will come and fast long enough to get well. He has, for the last 20 years been publishing little by little, little more each year, these scientific studies that document and validate some of the reversals of disease that he and his staff have achieved through fasting. 

Melanie Avalon: Doesn't he have the largest documented drop in blood pressure? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, that's truly the-- if you want both a very heartening and very sad snapshot of fasting and science today, it's that. So, yeah, his first study was one that he co-wrote with T. Colin Campbell, who is the author of The China Study, a very respected Cornell nutritional biochemist. What they found in Goldhamer's data-- So, what they did was they took, I believe it was 174 consecutive patients. There was no cherry picking. Every patient who walked in the door at TrueNorth who had high blood pressure and fasted was enrolled in this study. What they found was every single one of those people on high blood pressure, their blood pressure dropped remarkably. All of them were able to go off their high blood pressure medication if they were on it. And those who had the worst high blood pressure did the best. Those in stage 3 hypertension had a drop of 60 points in their systolic pressure. That's the top number 60 overall.

Among all their patients with high blood pressure, the average drop was 37/13 points, which, as you say, is the largest drop ever reported for any therapy in the peer-reviewed scientific literature. Anti-hypertension pill doctors are happy, you get a 10-point drop. These drops of, on average, 37 points, that's just completely off the charts. The need for this is dire because we have gosh, what is it. I think it's 500,000 Americans every year are going to die of at least high blood pressure being one of the contributing causes to their death, and sometimes the cause outright. Half of all Americans get high blood pressure. American adults, and I think it's like three quarters of us by the time we're in our 70s. 

The American Heart Association says still to this day that there's no cure. Yet we have studies going back more than 20 years showing that, in fact, you can completely reverse high blood pressure. One of the great contributions of Alan Goldhamer was-- so scientists have known casually for about the last, oh, I don't know, 80 or 90, maybe 100 years that you could reverse high blood pressure when you fast. However, when people go back to eating, their high blood pressure always went back up. So, it was kind of thought of as a party trick or something. But what Goldhamer did was-- what a bunch of other fasting doctors did, which was just to ask the simple question, “Well, if the disease goes away when we take the food away, was there maybe something in the food that was contributing to the disease?” Like so many other doctors, fasting doctors throughout history, he read the science and experimented with what kept his patients' diseases away. 

He settled on a practically unprocessed, certainly minimally processed vegan diet. It's so unprocessed, he doesn't even use added oil, salt, or sugar. But by doing this, he did something that no previous doctor had ever achieved, which was keeping his patient's high blood pressure away when they went back to eating. So, we have what seems to be a cure for high blood pressure. There have been multiple follow-up studies that Goldhamer has done. The most recent one was done with a researcher at the Mayo Clinic and it was published in a fairly well recognized and prestigious journal. The catch is these studies are not randomized controlled trials. Now, you could conduct a randomized controlled trial, I don't think you'd find anything different. I think you'd find the exact same thing. There's almost nothing in these studies that suggests that these are anything other than legitimate findings, but you can't be 100% certain with something like this unless you do an RCT. 

The problem is those are extremely expensive to conduct. And so, TrueNorth hasn't conducted any randomized controlled trials because they can't afford them. The government's not giving money to people like TrueNorth to do fasting research. Of course, who else is funding it? Big Pharma, big medical device companies, so on. They're not putting forward any money for fasting because they can't make any money off it. So, sadly, although this cure possible, probable I would say cure is out there and known in the scientific literature, it's been almost universally ignored.

Melanie Avalon: It's crazy because not only is it ignored and there's all these forces keeping it from being studied and happening, on top of that, you talk about the issues he's encountered, which people trying to shut him down and the authorities, and that happened a lot historically with a lot of these different people. So, it's just very interesting. How was your experience? How long did you go there for? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, my wife and I, in I believe it was June of 2021, we went there for two weeks. So, when you fast at a fasting clinic, they typically will fast you for however many number of days, and then you need to stay there while you re-feed because your re-feeding needs to be carefully calibrated and supervised. You stay there half the number of days you fasted. I think we fasted nine and a half days and re-fed for four and a half days. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. Speaking of that, I love how you hacked the German clinic situation by-- didn't you fast before so that you could get a longer fast there? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, so I went there in part because I was having some health struggles that I hoped to correct. What almost all fasting doctors have found for the last, let's say, 200 years, is that longer fasts tend to better than a series of shorter fasts. However, if you don't have the time or you don't have the money, because some of these places can be quite expensive, they say, well, the next best thing would be to do a shorter fast. So, actually, before both of those, before I went to TrueNorth and before I went to the Buchinger Wilhelmi Clinic in Germany, fasted for I think it was maybe five days or so on my own water only, and then re-fed for a week or something, and then went to the clinic and fasted there for 9 or 10 days. 

Melanie Avalon: Just speaking of listeners are going to have to get your book and hear your experience, particularly at that German clinic and like with the enemas and colonics and things like that. It's really funny. It's really funny. You tell the story really well, your experience there. So, wow. Well, this has been so amazing for listeners. We only barely touched on everything that is in this book. There's so much more. I will just direct them to the book. Things like we didn't even talk about circadian rhythm and a lot of the studies today and things like that. So, listeners definitely have to check it out. The artwork on the book, why did you choose the leaf? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, so I didn't choose it, but I did approve it. It was something that the graphic designer came up with. But the reason that it was chosen and the reason that I like it is it's symbolic of fasting. It's a leaf for people who haven't seen the cover. It's a leaf that has, a fall leaf. It's changing colors. So, you have in this fasting, some symbolic kind of almost like dying, where we're not eating, we're not getting nourishment, our body is bunkering down in a way that's not part of our normal go getter active kind of life. But from this comes a rebirth. We don't have the whole tree here and we're not seeing that eventually it's going to grow new leaves having shed this old leaf. But I think that's why the artist chose it and certainly why I like it. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, I love it. I knew there was something behind it. It's a beautiful book, by the way. I have it right here in front of me. 

Steve Hendricks: I think they did a very nice job with the design. 

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, it's amazing and very substantial [laughs] as listeners have not figured that up by now. So, maybe one last question about everything. This book and this work was the history of fasting up until now. What do you think the future of fasting will look like? 

Steve Hendricks: That's a really good question and I'm not sure. One of the biggest discoveries to me-- I got really deeply interested in fasting. I mentioned coming to fasting to lose weight and so on, but I've stuck with fasting and I'm most interested in it because of its ability to heal, its ability to reverse diseases that we do have and prevent diseases that we don't yet have. What I have found in the couple of months since the book has been out and talking with people is most people just aren't interested in that, which really surprises me. Most people are either-- the two biggest reasons I get are one, I want to lose weight, which is great. Nothing wrong if you have excess weight. You will be healthier and less disease prone if you do not have excess weight. We know that. 

But on the other hand, and the other thing that people tell me is I want to fast in order to be kind of more efficient. I want to be able to be, whatever, a better CEO or a better capitalist in some way so I can go out and crush my opposition or something. But fasting can make you more efficient, it can make the mind in some cases work better and so on. It's not to diminish either of those reasons terribly. But when I try to tell people, are you interested in maybe not getting cancer or something. The interest level drops quite a bit. Going into all this, because I sort of assumed because where the research is going is for this longer-term health. The research is heading in the direction of more disease prevention and more disease reversal. That is, I think, almost certainly where the science is going. It's looking at how can we use fasting to stay healthier, not just lose weight or be mentally tougher or whatever it is. 

However, that's not where I at least so far, I'm finding that a lot of the public are and I'm talking about people who are interested in fasting and are perhaps fasting themselves. This junction between where the science is and where the sort of public mood is, it will be curious to see how that plays out. I kind of hope that the science-- well, I definitely hope that the science sort of pulls more people along and more people learn that, like, “Look, fasting is a long-term health-giving thing and can add years to our life if we do it right.” But whether that will happen, who knows? 

Melanie Avalon: I mean, it kind of speaks to human nature, I think, as humans we focus on what we can experience now. That would be lose the weight, feel the productivity, but we're not so good at looking at the long-term benefits. 

Steve Hendricks: Absolutely. We are very short-term thinkers, it would seem. But what surprised me is, as I say, I got into it for the losing weight thing. I don't think there's anything wrong with that. I think it's fantastic if you have some extra weight you want to shed and so on. What surprises me is that once you're in it for that then trying to say, “Hey, so now that you've done it and seen that it's doable doing this somewhat periodically, whether daily intermittent fasting or whether prolonged multi-day fasting, it could help you.” Yeah, I've yet to see an overwhelming interest in that. Maybe my book will be a small nudge for some people in that direction. 

Melanie Avalon: I mean, longevity science is what I'm obsessed with. I would say I do fasting for the longevity benefits primarily, but it even for me comes back to now. I think I do it now because I want to feel younger now. I think it makes me-- the focus is always on the present, I think. So, yeah, it's really interesting. So how do you practice fasting now? Do you do it daily? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, so they're basically speaking two types of fasting. There's the prolonged multi-day fasting, which is mostly what we've talked about, and I do a fast of about one week twice a year. But I think the most important one is actually the daily fasting. And I do, do that. It was not something that I did before doing the research on this book, but I became extremely interested in it. We're probably running out of time here, but I'll just tease your listeners with the surprising thing that the research has found is about daily fasting. I mean, just in the last like three, four years, this is really new stuff. 

One piece of it is not news at all. It's that if we eat in a shorter window each day and we fast for longer each night, we increase the amount of repairs. A lot of people know this. That's why you have these 16:8 eating patterns and so on, where you're eating in an 8-hour window and you're fasting for 16 hours a night or whatever, that's great. What a lot of people don't know is they tend to usually do that by skipping breakfast and then they put all their food in the afternoon and the evening. It turns out that our circadian rhythms have just hardwired us and there is virtually nothing, it seems that we can do to change this. 

We process nutrients far better and we end up being far healthier if our window is in the morning, if our eating window starts an hour or two after we wake up. For a lot of people, where the science is pointed is it seems like the healthiest eating window out there is probably from, let's say 08:00 AM or so to 02:00 PM. And the thing that I always hasten to add after that because that completely freaks people out. I mean, I hated hearing it. I was a late-night eater. I was a breakfast skipper before working on this book. I just thought this was the worst news in the world that I had come across. I've actually found that it's just really not at all difficult for me to do. I have more energy. I would not go back to eating the way that I did before. Now that I'm eating one of these sorts of 8 to 2, 9 to 3 eating windows every day.

But there is a compromise for people who still want to eat dinner. It seems the science seems to be pointing to the fact that if you put most of your calories in the day in that early window, so that means a bigger breakfast, bigger lunch, and then keep dinner light and early, you can probably get most of the same benefits as someone who's eating just entirely within that window. So, it turns out that the adage that was coined in the last century to eat breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, and dinner like a pauper actually turns out to be pretty good advice. There's a whole chapter on how the science came to this and hopefully I've presented it in a convincing way because I think it's very good science. It's very convincing, it is extremely counterintuitive, but that could be contributing to a lot of our bad health. The fact that so many of us are eating late and eating big late. 

Melanie Avalon: I was really excited to read that chapter, especially because I am haunted by this question. Well, first of all, just my own biases. I gravitate towards eating late at night as like a person, historically, I always have been. I get so many questions from listeners all the time about this, about early versus late eating. And so, a few months ago, it was longer than that. I was like, I'm going to try to just read everything I can read and be as unbiased as I can and see what I think it shows about early versus late night eating. I thought it was going to be hands down. Early eating was the way to go. What I felt looking at everything and I mean, we could talk about this for hours and there're so many studies, but I felt like from what I saw that probably late afternoon to early evening might be the most beneficial window just hormonally if looking at the hormonal profiles. 

But some of my concerns or my things I'm curious about is the role of bias in breakfast eating studies and then the healthy user bias that we've been told for so long that eating breakfast is healthy. It's hard to separate that. So, the people who eat breakfast are probably more often doing healthy lifestyle habits. And then a third piece was the lack-- I wish there were more studies directly comparing because there aren't many. I tried to find as many as I could, but there aren't that many that directly compare an early window to an evening window, both completely fasted and a short window. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, I agree with you. There's definitely a shortage of studies out there. And you're right, breakfast skippers, I was a breakfast skipper for 50 years, [laughs] lumping myself in this category, but breakfast skippers tend to be less healthy. I mean, I'm not talking necessarily about people like you and me, Melanie, but I'm talking about alcoholics will skip breakfast because they're sleeping through breakfast. Smokers will skip breakfast because the cigarette suppresses their appetite. People who are overweight and obese and therefore less healthy, by definition are often skipping breakfast because they're trying to lose weight and some of them binge later in the day. And that's all to say. There are all these confounding factors that scientists try to control for, but there's no perfect study out there that controls for all those perfectly and ends up with the conclusion, yeah, breakfast skipping is unhealthy. 

But I try to present what I feel is the preponderance of the evidence that is saying basically breakfast skipping is unhealthy and with enough detail that the reader can make up her mind about that herself. The one thing that I would say is I don't know a single researcher who has looked at these early time restricted feeding windows. So, you're eating whatever from 08:00 AM to 02:00 PM, rather than eating from noon to 06:00 PM or 04:00 PM to 10:00 PM or whatever it is. I don't know a single person researching the field who wanted to find the answer, “Oh yeah, dinner is bad for you.” [laughs] So, the fact that they have consistently found this answer and there aren't like a thousand studies on here, we're talking a dozen or something, that they've consistently found this. You're right, there haven't been perfect head to heads on all of these, but I think the balance of the evidence has really shifted. 

If you go to my website, which is stevehendricks.org, there's a Frequently Asked Questions page, and I focus in that chapter on one really, really very well-done study by a researcher at the University of Alabama, Birmingham named Courtney Peterson. A question that I've gotten since then is, “Do you have anything other than just Peterson's studies? Are you just relying on her two, three studies that you talk about in the book?” At the time that I wrote about it, I didn't feel that there was a lot of fantastic science out there that was as good as hers that merited taking up the space. But on my website, on that Frequently Asked Question page, I discussed three or four other studies. Most of them have taken place in China. They seem to me, anyway, to be very well conducted and very well controlled. They do do some head-to-head stuff. 

If we have someone eating from, let's say, 07:00 AM to 03:00 PM or something and then we have another group of people eating from noon to 08:00 PM. Who does better? And they're tracking longevity biomarkers and they're tracking disease biomarkers, everything you would expect, cholesterol and blood sugar and things like that. It's just to me, anyway, it just reads really overwhelmingly in favor of these morning eating windows. But having said that, the science is still young. Who knows what we'll find? What does seem more and more clear, though, is when they compare to really late eating windows, like the one meal a day, just being dinner. You're eating from, let's say, 06:00 to 08:00 PM or something. Those really seem not to pan out on a great many of the longevity markers. You might look into some of those and see what you think. Shoot me an email, tell me if you agree or disagree. 

Melanie Avalon: Just some brief comments. One, I think you did a really excellent job of, like you said, laying out all these different studies and acknowledging when there are conflicting findings. It was a very, very valuable chapter, and I think everybody should read it. I know so, what I don't think that's ideal at all. I wish I wasn't like this. I do think, though, if it's between eating all day, if you are a late-night eater and you had to choose between eating all day or having a late-night window. 

I mean, I know you had the Matson study that compared like a 5 to 9 window to an all-day eating and didn't seem to find benefits. What I'm trying to say is I think finding the fasting window that you can stick to and do consistently might outweigh forcing yourself into a different eating window that is not as enjoyable or that you can't stick to as easily because it's not what you thrive on. 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, I think we don't have enough studies to say for sure, but I think what you're proposing there is entirely possible. It could be that, yeah, it's healthier to do a long fast each night but eat in the morning and early afternoon. But compared to eating all day, it may in fact be pretty healthy by comparison to do what you're talking about doing. So, that's entirely possible. I don't think we have enough research to prove it or disprove it. The one thing that I will say is, again, I was one of these people who I mean, my favorite countries in the world are like to visit are Spain and Italy. That's because they eat and drink till all hours of the night. That's my preferred lifestyle. I have always been a nighttime person. I did not want to make this change, but I thought I would make the experiment. 

I was just stunned in three days, all of a sudden, this 50-year-old habit of mine of eating dinner at night and eating well late into the night with bedtime snacks and so on, it just vanished. It just absolutely went away as though my body had been, as I say in the book, waiting for me to do this all along. It just felt so natural. The research shows if that is in fact something like what's going on, it's probably because I'm eating now more in sync with what my circadian rhythms are asking me to do. So, the one thing I would say is, try it for a week, see what you think. If you get a week where you can do it, try amending it, try playing with it. And you're right. Like, different people will come to different conclusions and they'll have different things that they feel comfortable with and different things that they can do with their work schedule and not do. But you might just experiment with shifting some of your calories earlier in the day, see what you think yourself. 

Melanie Avalon: I am all about self-experimentation finding what works for you. Before, when you're eating a dinner, were you doing intermittent fasting with that or were you just eating throughout the day and eating more at night.

Steve Hendricks: There was a period before I-- as I was starting research on this book, where I had shifted to this daily intermittent fasting and my eating window was exactly the one that I just criticized, which was I skipped breakfast. I would have my first meal around 11:00 AM or noon and try to have my last food by about 08:00 or so at night. I'd say the calories were about evenly divided between sort of lunchtime and dinnertime. 

Melanie Avalon: Okay, got you. Yeah. So, well, listeners get the book, read it, read all the chapters, and I can't wait to hear what people think. The last question that I ask every single guest on this show, and it's just because I realize more and more each day how important mindset is. We didn't even talk about you have a whole fascinating chapter on Russia and fasting for mental health and the effects on the brain and fascinating things people with psychiatric disorders have experienced historically with fasting. So, listeners will just have to get the book to read that. But what is something that you're grateful for? 

Steve Hendricks: Well, as we're recording this, Thanksgiving has just happened and more than anything else, I've been thinking over the Thanksgiving long weekend that I am grateful that I have had the opportunity to share this information with people. We didn't talk much about my own health struggles, but I really do credit some of the information that I found in this book with basically having saved my life. I'm in an awfully privileged, fortunate position that I'm able to write a book and share these ideas and hopefully help some other people the way that some of these ideas helped me. So, I'm most grateful at this moment for the opportunity to get to do that. 

Melanie Avalon: I cannot thank you enough for what you're doing because nobody has done this. I kept thinking so much when I was reading the book. I was like, I can't believe that I have been writing, thinking, talking about fasting for so long, and this is all just completely new information to me. My mind was being blown. I think you've done a huge service to humanity to compile all this information in a really wonderful read. I can't thank you enough. It's amazing. I look forward to your future book. Are you writing one now? 

Steve Hendricks: No, I'm busy with podcasts. 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, yes, all the interviews. [laughs] 

Steve Hendricks: Which is fantastic, I'm very happy to have them, but no, I've got some ideas floating around in my head, but nothing concrete. 

Melanie Avalon: Awesome. Well, I will eagerly look forward to your future work and hopefully we can connect again in the future. Again, thank you so much for everything that you're doing. Oh, yeah. How can people best follow your work? What links? 

Steve Hendricks: Yeah, so I'm not huge on social media. I am on Instagram. I think it's @stevehendricks99 is my handle. But best way to stay in touch is through my website, which is just stevehendricks.org. As I mentioned, the book is not a prescriptive book. It's not a how to about fasting, though you can certainly glean a lot of how to information from it. But I've gotten a zillion questions about how do I do this, how do I do that. My Frequently Asked Questions page probably has, I don't know, 10,000 words of answers to the most common questions I get. So, a lot of people have found that useful. If you want to get in touch, just shoot me an email. It's on my contact page. 

Melanie Avalon: Awesome. Well, I will put links to all of that in the show notes. Thank you so much again for your time. I treasure it. I do not take it for granted. And again, thank you for everything that you're doing and hopefully we can talk again in the future. 

Steve Hendricks: Thanks, Melanie. It's been a great pleasure. 

Melanie Avalon: Thanks, Steve.

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 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!

More on Cynthia: cynthiathurlow.com

Theme Music Composed By Leland Cox: LelandCox.com

If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving us a review in iTunes - it helps more than you know! 

 

 

Jan 08

Episode 299: Cynthia Thurlow: Intermittent Fasting Transformation, The Monthly Hormonal Cycle, Hormonal Dysregulation, Extended Fasting, PCOS & Thyroid Dysregulation, Getting Enough Oxytocin, And More!

Intermittent Fasting

Welcome to Episode 299 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!

mANUKORA: Support optimal immune and digestive health with Manukora. delicious, raw, sustainable, traceable Manuka honey from New Zealand. Manukora superpower honey is high in antioxidants, prebiotics, and the natural antibacterial MGO compound. Go to manukora.com/ifpodcast for a FREE pack of honey sticks with your order!

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

SHOW NOTES

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!

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!

The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast Episode #59 - Cynthia Thurlow 

Intermittent Fasting Transformation: The 45-Day Program For Women To Lose Stubborn Weight, Improve Hormonal Health, And Slow Aging

Everyday Wellness Podcast 

Cynthia's Personal Journey With Fasting

Intermittent Fasting: Transformational Technique | Cynthia Thurlow | TEDxGreenville

Best Practices For Fasting For Women?

OMAD

Fasting And Feeding For Your Cycle; Is It Intuitive?

The First Two Weeks Of Your Cycle

Nutrition For Your Cycle

The Lack Of Research On Cycling Women

Ep. 188 – Troubleshooting Your Fasting Method With Megan Ramos

Extended Fasting

What Can Effect Our Cycles The Most?

MANUKORA: Go to manukora.com/ifpodcast for a FREE pack of honey sticks with your order!

Amenorrhea

Hormonal Dysregulation

The Effect Of Fasting On Hormones; PCOS & Thyroid Regulation

Weight Loss And Adipose Tissue

Autoimmunity

Carbohydrate Intake, Low Carb Diets

The Melanie Avalon Podcast Episode #75 - Joel Greene (Part 1)

The Melanie Avalon Podcast Episode #88 - Joel Greene (Part 2)

Cortisol

Testing Cortisol

What Should We Be Testing?

Oxytocin

NUTRISENSE: Get $30 Off A CGM At Nutrisense.Io/Ifpodcast With The Code IFPODCAST

Clean Fasting, Breaking Your Fast

Coffee

Using A Glucometer

DHEA

Having Your Sleep And Stress Dialed In Before Beginning Fasting

Melatonin

The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast Episode #112 - Dr. John Lieurance

CBD

Perimenopause

Mindset

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 299 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.

Hi everybody, and welcome. This is episode number 299 of the Intermittent Fasting podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon, and we have a special episode for you today. We are actually going to air an episode from 2022 when Cynthia Thurlow came on my other show, the Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast, to talk about her book Intermittent Fasting Transformation. I was recently looking at the downloads, all from 2022, and this episode was actually one of my most popular episodes of last year. It's a really great deep dive into all things fasting, especially for women. I really think you guys will enjoy this. These show notes for the episode will be at ifpodcast.com/episode299. Of course, we are normally a listener, Q&A format style show. 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. You can also follow us on Instagram. We are @ifpodcast, I am @melanieavalon, Cynthia is @cynthia_thurlow_. Without further ado, please enjoy this wonderful conversation with me and Cynthia Thurlow.

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It is 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. LMNT is a tasty electrolyte drink mix with everything you need and nothing you don't. That's a science-packed electrolyte ratio 1000 mg of sodium, 200 mg of potassium, and 60 mg of magnesium with none of the junk. No sugar, no coloring, no artificial ingredients, no gluten, no fillers, no BS, because we don't have time for that. You guys know I'm obsessed with purity and quality of supplements. LMNT is the electrolyte supplement that I recommend. When you sweat, the primary electrolyte lost is sodium. When sodium is not replaced, a common side effect is muscle cramps and fatigue. LMNT is used by everyone, including NBA, NFL, and NHL players, Olympic athletes, Navy SEALS, and of course, everyday moms and dads, those practicing intermittent fasting, the keto or paleo diet, and exercise enthusiasts.

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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 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 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. 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, friends. Welcome back to the show. I am so incredibly excited about the conversation that I am about to have. It is with, first of all, a repeat guest, which I guess that my audience absolutely loved the first episode that we did. But not only that, this guest is such a good friend of mine. I was actually thinking about this right before starting, how there are some people in your life that it's weird to think of a time when you didn't know them or when they weren't in their life because I'm here with Cynthia Thurlow and Cynthia, I was thinking back to when we first met and how did we get connected originally?

Cynthia Thurlow: I think you had reached out after that second TED Talk. I just recall it was like summer of 2019, 2020.

Melanie Avalon: It might have been through Gin, maybe, Is that possible?

Cynthia Thurlow: Could have been, absolutely. I just remember how polite you were.

[laughter]

Melanie Avalon: Oh, my goodness. Good times. In any case, I'm here with Cynthia Thurlow, she is a nurse practitioner, CEO, and founder of the Everyday Wellness Project. Like she just mentioned, she has two TED Talks on Intermittent Fasting, which kind of really catapulted her into the intermittent fasting fame world. She has a new book coming out, which is so exciting. That's why we're bringing her back on the show. I had her on the show earlier. I'll put a link to that in the show notes, and it was just intermittent fasting and women and female and hormones and all the things. Her new book coming out is called Intermittent Fasting Transformation: The 45-Day Program for Women to Lose Stubborn Weight, Improve Hormonal Health, and Slow Aging. I will say this book, listeners, as you may be familiar, I'm also the host of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast.

I'm thinking about intermittent fasting all the time, I'm talking about it all the time. I'm always really curious when a new book comes out that's focusing on it because I'm always just wondering, what approach are they going to take? What am I going to learn? What type of information will be in this book? Friends, listeners I cannot encourage you enough. Men and women, but especially women out there, get this book. It is so comprehensive, so amazing. It covers everything about intermittent fasting, how to do it, a really wonderful approach, in my opinion, to the role of diet and diet quality and macronutrients and what to focus on with all of that. A deep deep dive into hormones, into women's cycles. It's just such an incredible resource. I'm grateful, Cynthia, that you wrote this book, and I'm thrilled for it to release. I'm really excited for you. So, listeners, I will put a link to that in the show notes, Cynthia, thank you so much for being here.

Cynthia Thurlow: No, thank you for having me in. That of course, wonderful introduction. For listeners that are listening to this, as I tell everyone, I'm just a shy introvert who did a talk that really changed the trajectory of everything I was doing. I feel really committed to helping women navigate irrespective of their age or their stage of life they're in, to be able to make decisions and new strategies that can allow them to live their best lives.

Melanie Avalon: You are definitely doing that. I will also put a plug; you also host the Everyday Wellness Podcast, if listeners are not listening to that podcast as well. Really, really awesome podcast. A lot of overlap, a lot of the guests that I've had on my show as well, a nice focus on, again, women, hormones, all of that. So, definitely check out that podcast. I actually have a question about your personal story to start things off, and you talk about your personal story in the book, which is really valuable, about the intermittent fasting. Did you anticipate I think about this with my own journey because when I first wrote my book, it was intermittent fasting, paleo, and wine, I didn't anticipate that intermittent fasting was going to become like the thing. I know your TED Talk was about it, but prior to that, did you anticipate that it was going to become the sensation that it is today? How much of a role does it actually play in your day-to-day practice with patients?

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, that's a great question. I myself fell down the intermittent fasting rabbit hole in 2015. Initially, it was just something I did. It was something I did to help support my health. I was in a position where I was stuck with a weight loss issue relevant to perimenopause. It just started to literally bleed into the work I was doing with women. Of course, I left clinical medicine in 2016 and really became part of nearly every program I worked in with women. The irony is, in 2018, I decided to do a TED Talk. I thought that would be a challenging thing to do as an introvert, a safe thing to do. Initially, my first talk was on perimenopause and around the time that I accepted that talk, I was approached about doing another one in the state that I was born in, which was really special to me, largely because South Carolina, I have so many wonderful memories from spending my summers with my grandmother in South Carolina.

Obviously, you can't do a second TED Talk that is even vaguely reminiscent to your first. I looked at my husband and this is probably December of 2018, and said, what do I know a lot about? He said intermittent fasting. I told the organizers; I'm going to talk about intermittent fasting. It was that easy of a decision. No, I never would have guessed that would have been a strategy that I would be really well known for. I can tell you I just about fell over when that talk started going viral, largely because I had gotten so sick prior to giving it. I love the fact that as a traditional allopathic trained nurse practitioner, I can empower men and women to embrace a strategy that really isn't new or novel. I think on so many levels, individuals really believe that it's something new. I just remind them as I'm sure you and Gin do on your own podcasts, that are specific to fasting, that it really dates back to biblical times.

It was just as much a surprise to my family as it was to me that this is now what I'm known for. The irony is, this book really came out of the work I was doing with women. The IF:45 plan that is depicted in the book was what came out of all of a sudden, I had to scramble to try to create things to meet the needs of people that were coming to me saying, "Hey, if you're someone that really knows how to strategize about fasting, can you help me?" This has really become three years' worth of work to be able to then share the programs that I've created with the masses. Some more people, maybe not everyone, can work with me personally, but they now can have some insights into my background and methodologies for this program that I created.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, that was actually a huge question I had about the programs and the book and everything because there are so many different intermittent fasting approaches. Obviously one of the biggest questions we get on the Intermittent Fasting Podcast and just in general, is fasting is safe for women and how should women approach be fasting. In your experience working with women, like the IF:45 plan, did that precede the book? What IF windows did you ultimately find work best for women? Should there be concerns about fasting for women? Like, what are your thoughts on that? Like 16:8 versus one meal a day? Oh, all the plans?

Cynthia Thurlow: I think it gets so much more confusing with women because I would say postmenopausal women and men have a much easier time making fasting work for themselves. I think the beauty of women that are still in their reproductive years, that are still getting their menstrual cycle, there are a couple of extra steps you have to think about. To answer your initial question, I think an 18:6 is a good starting point for women. I think overall, obviously, each woman is her own individual. You have to look at a lot of different factors to determine what is the best way to proceed. Let's be clear, there are times when we shouldn't fast as women, and then there are times it's completely reasonable. What I don't like is when men try to tell women that fasting is unsafe. That actually makes me a little bit upset and cranky, I have to be honest with you because it's very reductionist.

I think we as a culture we want to boil everything down that there's this one size fits all. I would argue that an 18:6 is a good starting point. I'm not a huge fan of OMAD for women, largely because I feel as if most women can't get enough macronutrients in that feeding window. Now, I know there are men out there on, Twitter is a good example. There're a lot of men on Twitter that fast, and they'll say, "OMAD, I get 2000 calories in a meal." I just think to myself, there's just no way in heck that could ever happen for me. There's no way I could get 2000 calories into one meal. I wouldn't be able to move. I would probably vomit. I think I like OMAD if it's around a holiday or maybe you've overindulged the day before, but I think it can set women up in a cycle where they're just not going to get enough macronutrients, not enough protein, not enough healthy fats, and certainly not enough healthy carbohydrates.

I think that when people talk about OMAD for women, I always want to put an asterisk to say, let's clarify that. Is that something you can do as needed? Sure, it's probably okay. Do I occasionally do it? Yes. It is not something I do on a day-to-day basis. I think the big thing about this book in particular is that I want people to have a starting point like here's a reasonable starting point to navigate success with this as a strategy that is specific to where you are in your menstrual cycle that is specific to where you are lifestyle wise and that even includes this nebulous period of perimenopause that a lot of people, including myself, had never been aware of. No one had ever talked to me about it until I literally fell into it. I think that's really a good starting place for people to say, this is what we're going to work you towards.

Once you have success with that, then there's all these other options. It's almost like, and this is a terrible example, it's almost like you go to a buffet, and the buffet for fasting, you get lots of different options. As you're moving towards that buffet, you have a starting point. You need to be able to succeed with this basic 18:6 before you open up into a lot of more challenging fasts or varying your fast significantly. It's like I always say, we want to start with the basics. We want to ensure that we have great success with those before we start entering more advanced strategies.

Melanie Avalon: Funny that you started saying the thing about what frustrates you. I was like, I know what she's going to say. Also, I'm really glad that you clarified about defining one meal a day. Like, for example, I always say that I do one meal a day but I'm not eating that one meal a day for me is a minimum usually 4 hours. It's actually more like 20:4 and sometimes it's even longer. I think that's actually really important to clarify. Something I love you open up the book talking about the differences between men and women and I learned so much about how women are different biologically. Like, you pointed out that our brains are actually younger than men and you point out how we actually need more sleep because our brains are more complicated than men, which works for me, just in the differences between men and women.

When it comes to fasting and eating and just for listeners, again, I'm going to refer you to this book because it goes into the details of the actual plan and what to do and the recommendations and there is a path to follow. Definitely get the book because the path is not going to be all in today's conversation. But that said, how intuitive? Because you talk, for example, about how to eat according to your cycle or you just talked about right now about fasting, how it might change based on your age and where you are in your life cycle, how intuitive is that? Do we need a plan? Or like when it comes to food and exercise and fasting for your cycle, for example, do we need an actual plan on paper that we implement, or could we just be really intuitive? Like I'm craving these types of foods now and I want to fast like this now. Like how intuitive can we be versus needing a plan?

Cynthia Thurlow: I think that's a really great distinction. I feel like many women are not intuitive or they're not connected to their intuition and that's not a criticism. I think we've gotten to the point with our patient population that we've been telling people what to think, what to do for such a long period of time that women's intuition that we should lean into, we have largely gotten disconnected from it. I would love if every woman that I worked with would really lean into their intuition. I do find that there are people who don't trust their intuition. They're not ready to do that. This is a perfect example of why having something on paper can provide the reinforcement, the encouragement, the support that they may need because maybe they're not at a point where they feel they may not lean into what foods make them feel good. They may be on synthetic hormones that make it more challenging for them to acknowledge that there's a follicular cycle, there's an ovulatory cycle, there's a luteal phase in our menstrual cycle, or there could be in this, as I refer to effectually the nebulous period of perimenopause five to ten years prior to going through menopause.

I think on so many levels it has been more my experience working with females that they initially want the structure and accountability of a plan as opposed to just barreling forward and saying, "Okay, today I'm craving meat, so I'm going to have more meat, or I'm noticing I'm craving more starchy carbohydrates, I might be close to my menstrual cycle, so let me lean into that." I think it's a good starting point to say that having a plan available to people can be very reassuring and also the knowledge and recognition that on so many levels, having that information is really validating to say, "Hey, no one ever told me that I needed to look out for these things." Let me just give you a heads up because as an example the first two weeks from the day we start bleeding till right before ovulation, that's when estrogen predominates in our menstrual cycle.

That's the time that we can push the lever on a lot of things. We can do harder workouts; we can do longer fast once we've gotten the basics. It's a time when sleep, I don't want to say sleep isn't important, we may not need as much sleep, we might have more energy. Really leaning into the fact that this menstrual cycle or this infradian rhythm, this 28-day period of time when we are having this menstrual cycle, is really a time to just acknowledge that through different phases, we have to honor our bodies in different ways. I think that it's probably more the minority of women that don't feel like they need as much structure. It's been my experience, especially when trying a new strategy, especially with a lot of misinformation that's out there. I'm sure you would agree with me, there's a lot of misinformation, fear-mongering, et cetera, about women in fasting, really acknowledging our own unique needs and our own bio-individuality so that we can ensure that we're getting the best results, we're getting the best feedback from our bodies. Eventually we'll get to a point where we can lean into that intuition confidently as opposed to leaning into it skeptically.

Melanie Avalon: I agree. Even for myself, when I started intermittent fasting, I started with a regimented plan that I stuck to. When I first started, I mean, paleo, for example, I was following more of a regimen than I do now. And now it is "More intuitive." Eating for your cycle, because you dive deep into the book again, it's very laid out and you talk about the specific nutrients and the different foods to focus on for the different parts of your cycle. So, two-part question, one just for listeners who are not familiar. Could we have a little educational moment where you just briefly outline the four phases of the cycle and then two, finding the foods that work for the different phases? What is that based on? Is that in the clinical literature, is that based on working with your patients? I'm just curious where that knowledge comes from.

Cynthia Thurlow: First and foremost, there's not enough research on cycling women. I think this is something that I'm sure you have found to be the case as well. And, for me, after working with thousands of women so let me just back up. My whole background is in ER medicine and cardiology. Over the last six years, having the opportunity to use a lot of trial and error, but also leaning into looking to see what my peers, other healthcare professionals, MDs, NPs, nurses, et cetera, that are working with women and seeing what works successfully for them. It could be an end of a couple of thousand, but it hasn't necessarily been done in clinical research. There is good information about the infradian rhythm, there is good information about ways to honor where we are in our menstrual cycle, there is good information on what happens to our bodies as we go through our menstrual cycle.

The concept of lifestyle medicine, the concept of marrying, stress management, sleep quality, nutrition, exercise, etc., that is a newer kind of methodology, that's a newer perspective on how to honor our bodies as women. I do think research opportunities will be forthcoming. I think, unfortunately, there isn't enough research done on cycling women. I think there's been for many years, a fear of it's too complicated, there's too much to it. I mean, there are researchers out there. I can think of one in particular. She's a female Ph.D., she works with female athletes and she is not pro-fasting. I do respect the work that she's doing and we do acknowledge that during the menstrual cycle, a lot of her work is what I kind of leaned into looking at how do we support our bodies at different phases exercise-wise throughout our cycle. There's good research there in terms of exercise in women's physiology, but certainly not enough and not enough done on humans versus lab animals like you and I both know, and probably many of the listeners do as well because they listen to the high-quality podcasts that you have that you can't compare per se, lab animals, ovulatory cycles, lactation and pregnancy to humans.

That's where the waters get a little muddied. I always say anecdotal evidence is not inferior in the sense that it's not a randomized controlled trial, but it's a good starting point. To say this is information that we should be taking to, whether it's a research institution or a research facility. Saying we really think this is information that needs to be followed up on. Like, here's my hypothesis and let's see if we can create a research model around this that might be able to yield and validate the findings that many of us are experiencing. It's interesting. I recently had a great podcast with Megan Ramos, who works with Dr. Jason Fung, and she and I were both talking about the fact that it's upsetting that so many women are fearful to fast even in a small amount of time because of bad information that's out there.

I think that if we were in a position where we had really good research done on women throughout their lifetime, not just obese postmenopausal women, which there's plenty of research there, I think that would put some of these fears to rest. I do want to believe that they're well-meaning individuals that are out their fear-mongering. I do have moments where I just kind of shake my head and I think to myself if we look at the lack of metabolic flexibility, how incredibly unhealthy we are as Americans, we should be doing everything we can to find strategies to help men and women become healthier. And so, what's the harm in trying? That's kind of where I come from. I think the other piece of that is I've just watched people get sicker over the last 20 years. That to me is so disheartening as a nurse practitioner that clinically don't do a very good job with prevention.

If there's a strategy that women can utilize that can help them become healthier, and more metabolically flexible, I'm all for it. But I think that's a great question. It really speaks to the fact that we need to be demanding more, we as women need to be demanding more of the research community, asking them to not be fearful to utilize women at peak fertility years and even beyond for research purposes. Don't just use it on lab animals, which I know that can be helpful, it's a good starting point. There are plenty of clinicians like myself that have just seen such significant changes in people's health. Not only that, their biophysical markers and their sleep quality and so many things that are so important in terms of lifestyle medicine.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, just speaking to that with the rodent studies, and we might have talked about this last time you came on, but I think it's very valuable to have animal studies and you have to start somewhere. If you're studying something like longevity and rodents, that would be easier to study because you could see how things just affect longevity. It's a broader thing that's not affected by "Let me further clarify, I'm not clarifying myself here." Let's compare studying longevity and a rodent to like fertility. Longevity is more a broader thing you could see is the rodent living longer, but then when it comes to fertility, so like a rodent fertility cycle, they're reproducing all the time, and so they're much more sensitive to things that would throw that off. And then on top of that, fasting. this is the thing that gets me the most, is that when they test fasting in a rodent, it'll be like a normal fast for us, like 24-hour fast, that's the equivalent of days in a rodent. Basically, the majority of the literature, I believe, on fertility in rodents and fasting is not intermittent fasting. It's like the equivalent of extended fasting. I just think that's really important to point out, which actually, speaking of extended fasting, what do you qualify as extended fasting?

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, I was about to say what, in your vernacular, is extended fasting. I think when we're talking about 24 hours or longer, I know that there's a lot of interest in people doing three to five-day fast. And it was interesting. I was listening to Dr. Ted Naiman and Maria Emmerich having a conversation about this, and Ted, who's an engineer and also a physician, said there's this law of diminishing returns when people are already lean and they want to fast for a really long periods of time. I thought to myself that really makes sense. I think if someone is obese, metabolically unhealthy, I think longer fast can be a springboard into a consistent fasting regimen. I, per se, am not a huge fan of long fasts. I think it has something to do with the fact that in 2019, I wasn't able to eat for 13 days involuntarily because I was so sick.

Since that time, I haven't done anything more than 24- or 30-hour fast. I think it can be helpful for specific purposes. A lot of people talk about and I know you've had Valter Longo on stem cell activation when you're getting to that three to five-day period, wanting to kind of improve gut health and change the composition of the gut microbiome. I'm not a huge fan of people doing consistent long fasts and I do have women I always say they are the overachievers and I value that and I'm not being critical at all. The women who start right out of the gate and they're like, "I want to do a 48-hour fast, I want to do a 36-hour fast, I want to do a 24-hour fast. "I'm like, okay, let's ensure we can get through the basics first, and then as you have success, yes, opening that up for some people that are plateau-busting, it can be a great opportunity for people to do a 24-hour fast every week.

I think it really ultimately depends on where are you in your menstrual cycle, what are your goals, what are you hoping to achieve. I think the more metabolically flexible you are-- this is my personal, my N of a couple thousand. The more metabolically flexible you are, I think it becomes this law of diminishing returns in terms of what are you looking to obtain from doing longer fasts. We know that digestive rest, bumps in autophagy, growth hormone, etc., I mean, those are all wonderful things to want to focus on, but I think you have to be careful. Especially if someone's peak fertility years and I say 35 and under predominantly, and especially if you're very lean, I just think those longer fasts can set your body up for putting you into this feast-famine mindset. We know that the hypothalamus-pituitary is very sensitive to nutrient depletion.

I really think you have to be careful in that age range. I know we could springboard into a thousand different conversations from here. I'm not opposed to prolonged fasting, but I do think people have to be very clear about their goals. I think they have to be very transparent about where they are in their life cycle. Are you peak fertility years, perimenopause, menopause? Menopausal women can generally get away with as much as men. Our hormones are a little more stable. But being really honest and transparent about where you are, I think is really critically important.

Melanie Avalon: I'm really glad that you touched on the potential sensitivity of women to fasting. Working with all of your patients that you've worked with as far as, like, things that affect a woman's cycle, so fasting, calories, overexercising, undernutrition, maybe stress, lack of sleep, is there one that tends to cause problems more for women when it comes to cycle issues or being too, "Restrictive?" Or is it really an individual case-by-case basis?

Cynthia Thurlow: There're definitely factors that I think are bigger insults to the body than others and so stress and sleep, like how many women don't sleep well and they think it's no big deal? Well, what you get away with in your 20s and 30, you oftentimes can't in your 40s and 50s. A lot of that's just the changes that occur physiologically. I would say the people I get most concerned about are the over-exercisers who under nourish their bodies and then they don't have proper mechanisms to address sleep and they sure as heck don't manage their stress properly. I would say those are probably the four big things that I look at. Obviously, it's a case-by-case basis, but I think on so many levels we have primed our patients to think this way. We tell them calories in, calories out. We tell them you have to overexercise to deal with the surplus of calories you just took in.

We've been giving bad information out to our patients for a long period of time. Of course, in their minds it makes sense. I'm just going to do 2 hours of cardio to counteract the deluge of crap I ate when I went out last night. It's this concept of punishing our bodies, the self-flagellatory mindset that is so toxic. Like I would say it's that toxic mentality that we have unfortunately ingrained not only with our patient population but also in our culture. What's the newest box of crap that's out there or potion or powder that's somehow going to magically make everything work? We want fast results. We don't want anything that's going to take a long period of time. We've, unfortunately, and I say we as clinicians contributed to this. Melanie, I think that's such a great question and I think bio-individuality rules. You'll hear me use that term a lot in the book.

Ultimately, it's really dependent on who we are as individuals. I could also add into there like "How lean are you?" I have a lot of women who are very lean. Like their body fat is nearly nonexistent. They might also be on the precipice of amenorrhea where they're not even getting their menstrual cycles, or they could even be in their 30s and 40s and they're skipping cycles regularly. One thing I want to emphasize is that I want women to use their menstrual cycle as a barometer for how much stress they are putting themselves under, whether it's physiologic, physical, etc. Because if you are getting your menstrual cycle every month, great. If you start fasting or you're already not regularly getting your menstrual cycle and you don't know why and you add in fasting, that might be the tipping point for your body to say, time out, you're not taking care of me.

Therefore, I'm going to put the brakes on everything because I'm thinking that there's not enough sleep, there's not enough stress management, there's not enough nutrition coming into this body. I want to make sure that there's no way I have to support the potential pregnancy. I think that really adding in to that equation is learning and being honest and saying what's my menstrual cycle like? Because when a woman tells me she starts menstruating or she starts fasting and loses her menstrual cycle, that's like a danger sign. To me that's like we got to back up the bus. We need to look at everything you're doing. We need to work on making sure your body is properly nourished on every level. I don't want to sound woo-woo, but on so many levels it's not just the food we put in our mouth, it's like the toxicities in our environment, and are we being kind to ourselves?

I think on many levels people come to fasting, women in particular because they want to change their body composition. They want to lose weight and that becomes their very myopic view of that's health is looking at the number on the scale. I think that can be profoundly unhealthy. It's like, "Okay, let's make sure we get healthy to lose weight," that needs to be the mentality as opposed to intermittent fasting isn't working for me because I am not losing weight. It's like, wait, no. We have to kind of reframe these thoughts so that we can put ourselves in a healthier state of mind before attempting to do any of that.

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Yeah, that was one of the things I loved about your book so much, is just how comprehensive it is on the full picture of everything. It's not just the fasting, it's the mindset, it's the diet, the sleep, it's all the things. It's interesting that you were saying about how some of your patients are really lean and the factor that that might play because I was actually reading a study and it was looking at the effects on women's cycles in-- I'd have to find it. I think it was endurance athletes. What was really interesting was getting amenorrhea did not relate to the amount of exercise. It correlated instead to their body weight. If they were too low of weight, the level of exercise, it was a problem compared to women that had much more ample fat, they could exercise a lot more and it not affect the cycle.

I almost didn't want to mention that study, though, because then that makes it sound like it's a blanket statement, but when it's going to be individual. Yeah, I thought that was really interesting. Speaking of hormonal issues with women and I'd love to go into perimenopause and menopause and all of that, but just in general. You dive deep, deep, deep into all of the hormones, which made me so excited because I love learning. Like when I was reading the part of the book that was going over insulin, cortisol, estrogen, progesterone, testosterone, DHEA and all the things, I was just loving it. I was like this is amazing, so comprehensive, I learned so much. Okay, hormonal issues. There are so many hormonal issues out there, PMS, PMDD, PCOS, I'm sure we'll go into perimenopause and things like that. Are hormonal issues inevitable? Do all women experience them? How common are they? With your patients, do you see that they necessarily do correlate to lifestyle? Or can some women be doing all the things and still experience hormonal issues?

Cynthia Thurlow: I think that's a great question, Melanie. I think in our increasingly kind of toxic world that we live in, when I say toxic, I'm talking about things we're exposed to in our environment, our personal care products, and our nutrition, we're bombarded by toxins that can influence our hormones, how they're balanced, adding in the volume of individuals that are on synthetic hormones. I mean, I'll be the first person to say I was put on synthetic hormones in early adulthood because I had amenorrheic cycles, probably because I had very mild PCOS, which is a whole separate conversation. I think being on oral contraceptives as an example didn't allow me to ever deal with what was really the issue for me as an individual. I think that it is a byproduct of our westernized lifestyle that most, if not all individuals and again, we've touched on a little bit about metabolic flexibility, that most, if not all of us are not as hormonally balanced as we should be.

Many people assume whatever symptoms they're experiencing, bad PMS, even more, significant PMDD or having luteal phase defects where they have this significant precipitous drop in progesterone during their luteal phase that begets the PMS, the PMDD, also can create some menstrual regularities, can create this estrogen dominance where people have very heavy cycles and weight gain and breast tenderness, etc. We're just talking about people still at their peak fertile years, so I do think it's a byproduct of the environment that we live in in this kind of traditional westernized society. Not to mention the fact that most people are not eating to nourish their bodies. Again, it's not because they don't want to. It's they've been conditioned that everything in the supermarket is healthy, everything that is in a box, a bag, or a can is nourishment. I know you and I would argue against that, but it's also the information that we get from the FDA, the USDA, the food guide pyramid is now kind of spawned into my plate.

It's the imbalanced macros where people are encouraged to eat heart healthy grains or they're encouraged to eat what I think is dessert for breakfast. These are further contributing to this hormonal dysregulation. We're like a hedonistic culture where we have accessibility to information 24/7. It's very different than when I was growing up. The TV went off at like 01:00 in the morning, and there was no cable TV when I was really young. Now we could be on our computers or iPad or iPhones or social media all the time. Our bodies are just inundated with artificial light and all of these factors disrupt this orchestration between all these hormones, which are governed by our brain and the endocrine system. That's kind of an overly simplistic way of saying I think most, if not all of us are navigating our 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s, and beyond with some degree of hormonal imbalances.

It may not be until we find a symptom that's particularly troubling, for a lot of women it's the weight gain piece. Like when you have what I call weight loss resistance when that happens, then people start digging, they're like, this is not acceptable, something must be off. They're told maybe they've got a thyroid problem or again synthetic hormones are offered, or surgical interventions. I mean that certainly was the case with me and perimenopause. I think on so many levels it doesn't have to be that way, but it would not be the norm for women who I work with. Again, I'm in a niche within my industry. It would not be the norm that women wouldn't be coming to me with specific problems, like sleep problems, you know waking up in the middle of the night. They've got really heavy periods, they have stubborn weight gain, they have energy issues, and those are all a sign of hormonal imbalances.

On every level that I can think of, I think our modern-day lifestyle is creating, "The perfect environment for these hormonal imbalances." I think it's more the norm that we are conditioned to believe whether it's the limiting belief of "Oh, this is just the way things are because I'm X age, whether it's 35, 40, 45, 50 or beyond, or this is just the way things are because now I'm a parent, or this is just the way things are because I have a very demanding job and a travel schedule. Don't even mention the fact we're all in year two of a global pandemic. And so we're in unprecedented times. I do think our lifestyle is a reflection of the fact that we are so far off base as a culture in terms of really honoring the way that our bodies are designed to thrive and not just survive.

That is a huge distinction for me. I feel like on every level I've been able to see it from being a clinician in a broken medical system to being a clinician that's an entrepreneur and seeing things from a different angle. In many ways, we have created this environment that our patients are living in, and they're not thriving in, most of them are not they're feeling stuck. It's an unfortunate situation, but I think as more of us become educated and obviously, you have such a great platform for this as well, Melanie, being able to help educate people about all the things in their environment and things that we can be doing to making ourselves healthier. We're starting to slowly kind of turn the corner on this. I think in years to come, women are going to be better educated about the changes that are going to occur and be able to do more to support themselves.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, the nuance of that answer that I love is that it's both, in a way, inevitable. Like you just said, our environment is so toxic. I mean, even like, we're born into this because we know now that the stress and the lifestyles of our mom and even prior generations carries through to future generations. On the one hand, it's like we're in this inevitable soup of toxicity, but at the same time, there's great agency, and we're not destined to that like, we can make changes. So, I love that so much. One of my favorite things about your book that I'm sure listeners will love, love, love, is that in the book, Cynthia goes through all of these different hormones, how they affect the body, and then she actually talks about how fasting affects those hormones, which was just so incredible. A question about fasting and affecting hormonal issues, because there are so many, like I said, so many different things that women experience, but I think there are two that I'd love to touch on, two things that I think a lot of women experience.

One of them, it's generally accepted that intermittent fasting helps it and the other, it's generally accepted that intermittent fasting might hurt it. I'd love to hear your thoughts on both of those. One would be PCOS and the other would be thyroid issues. I'm just using that as an example for those issues, for example, what are your thoughts on fasting and those?

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, great question. PCOS is something that I unknowingly had, even though I'm a thin phenotype, so I'm a thin woman probably contributed to why I struggled with infertility getting pregnant with my children. I especially feel this in my heart. The basis of PCOS or polycystic ovarian syndrome is the fact that most women are insulin resistant or have some degree of insulin resistance. We know that changing our diet, not only changing our diet, going to a more nutrient-dense, whole-food diet, focusing on animal-based protein and non-starchy vegetables and healthy fats along with periods of eating less often, can be hugely instrumental in rebalancing insulin. It's just one. The more common phenotype with PCOS is to have someone who's obese or someone who's overweight. I've had such incredible success working with women who were at this unique situation and my heart goes out to them because I know what that was like, that impacted my fertility.

That's really how it manifested and why I was on oral contraceptives for 1000 years, because it was, "Fixing the problem." Not really, was putting a Band-Aid on it. I do feel that in particular when you're looking at PCOS, where typically you've got insulin resistance, you generally-- a lot of people, your androgen levels, your testosterone levels are higher than normal. I do see some resolution, especially with weight loss, that you are. Let me back up a little bit, when we're looking at adipose tissue, which is in and of itself its own organ in the body, it's so sophisticated, it's not just fat, it has so much signaling that goes on in inflammatory markers. We know that many women when they lose weight, they're priming this estrogen pump. What ends up happening with PCOS oftentimes is you have this aromatization. You have all this testosterone that is going from being testosterone aromatized into estrogen and you can get this relative estrogen dominance.

With weight loss, you are getting this net resultant lowered levels of estradiol, the predominant form of estrogen in our bodies prior to going through menopause. I think that it is critically important when someone has PCOS to consider looking very closely at nutrition, looking very closely at weight reduction. One of the ways you can do that is by intermittent fasting. It doesn't have to be done excessively. You could even just start with 12 and 10 or 12 and 14, 12 hours fast with a 12-hour eating window just as a starter, just kind of meandering to that. Now, coincidentally I also have an underactive thyroid, which I think is a byproduct of the age and stage of life that I'm in. It's much more common as women are navigating perimenopause five to ten years to see episodes of underactive thyroid. The predominant reason why women will develop hypothyroidism in any age group is related to an autoimmune issue called Hashimoto's thyroiditis.

In fact, it's very few people, it's like one to 2% of people with hypothyroidism don't have Hashimoto's, even if you've had negative antibodies like me. I was about 44, that's when I was diagnosed. People ask me all the time; do you think that fasting-- Do you think that's what drove the hypothyroidism? I always say no, because autoimmune issues are almost always driven by gut health issues and I've had two other autoimmune issues. Once you have one, you just are more prone to others, which is unfortunate, but that's even based on research. I think that the average person who has an underactive thyroid or an overactive thyroid like Graves' disease, you can successfully navigate fasting. It always goes back to those pillars that we've talked about earlier, stress management, sleep quality, nutrition, really looking not overexercising, because you can have hypothyroidism and still exercise, still get high-quality sleep, still manage your stress properly and you can do beautifully.

If you have hypothyroidism and you get less than 6 hours a night of sleep and your stress is out of control and you're the CrossFit or Orangetheory bunny and you're doing that five days a week and there are plenty of women doing it and you over restrict your macros then you are setting yourself up for tanking or thyroid. Tanking obviously is not a clinical term, but you're not going to do your thyroid any favors. I really want women to understand that the endocrine system in the body really is this complex interaction between our body's perception of stressors, sleep, stress, management, nutrition, exercise, and our response to it. You can successfully navigate fasting with hypothyroidism or thyroid disorders where you could also make it harder on your body. The other thing to touch on is that there's a lot of misinformation about you need so much carbohydrate in order to go from inactive to active thyroid hormone.

I really don't necessarily believe that it has to be that you have to have so much carbohydrate in order to have this proper conversion. I think it's more a reflection of your degree of metabolic flexibility, so let me be clear about this. When you are obese or overweight, you're not as metabolically flexible. The choice of carbohydrates for you, it's going to be very focused on portion and the quality, even more so than for anyone else. It's not to suggest that you can't be lower carb or even ketogenic and also fast and also do all these other things, but a lot of its bio-individual. You also have to be very very attuned to how flexible is your body. Because what I might be able to get away with as a middle-aged woman might be very different than someone else at the same age stage who maybe hasn't taken as good care of themselves.

It's really getting very honest with yourself about what's the lifestyle pieces, how well are you taking care of yourself before you add in another stressor. We have to really define intermittent fasting as a hormetic stress. The beneficial stress in the right amount at the right time can be beautiful for honoring our bodies. If it's not the right time, if it's too much stress, if our body perceives that it's under threat, it is not going to do well with that type of stress. Really being very clear, but I do think both PCOS and thyroid issues can do beautifully with fasting, but you have to look at all those other pieces of the puzzle as well.

Melanie Avalon: It is really interesting that at least when I would review the clinical literature on fasting and women that there were a lot of studies on PCOS and women, which I always thought was really interesting and they're pretty much favorable for it. I have some more questions about the hormones. Since you did touch on the macros just now and the carb intake and all of that, what are your thoughts on a low-carb diet? In your IF:45 plan which includes three phases, like the induction phase that you have, what is the role of carbs and low carbs?

Cynthia Thurlow: It's a good question. I do think so if we look statistically, I think it's a 2018 study from UNC. At that time, this is pre-pandemic, it was 88.2% of Americans are not metabolically healthy. When people come to IF:45, the first thing I say is, listen, if the average American is consuming 200 to 300 g of carbs and that's conservatively per day, if we really want to get our bodies primed to be able to fast, there are a couple of things we need to do, and one of them is reducing our carbohydrate intake and really focusing on whole carbohydrates. And that means the unprocessed varieties. I'm not anti-carb, I do eat carbohydrates, I want to be really clear about that, but in that induction phase, it's really to get people ready so that when they start fasting, they're going to have better success.

And so I'm not anti-carb. I do think low carbohydrate diets can be very helpful for women, especially if they're wanting to change body composition, wanting to lose weight. For a lot of people, unfortunately, they've had the complete opposite. For most of their adult life they've sat down with a big plate of pasta, they've had bread with every meal, they've had rice or grains with every meal, or they've had unfettered access to tropical fruit. It's just an example and it's never a judgment. I'm just being observational and I find that women that are able to limit or moderate their carbohydrates and really focus on animal-based protein and healthy fats are going to have much more satiety. They're going to be much more satiated. They are going to be much more successful by readjusting those macros. For a lot of people that's why we have a whole week of induction because it can be very, very challenging.

There are a lot of people that are really emotional eaters. Again, not a criticism, just an observation. I think on many levels it gets people really ready to understand like we are going to learn how to fuel our bodies in a way that we are going to feel full, satisfied, and be able to step away from the table as opposed to feeling like we have to constantly snack. Because I'm sure you see this with the women that you interact with as well, that we've been conditioned that we need to have three meals a day and snacks and we have to, like, rip the Band-Aid off and start with the basics. So, I get very granular like these are the things we need to do. We have to limit our carbs. We need to stop snacking. I want you to adjust your macros because I want people to have a lifelong strategy that they can embrace as opposed to this. Unfortunately, it's huge here in the United States. The latest, greatest thing that's going to help them lose weight really fast and they're not going to be able to sustain their results because yo-yo dieting as you and I both know is detrimental metabolically to our bodies.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, I think it is so detrimental. It reminds me of Joel Greene's work. I know you interviewed him as well and his book is like mind-blown moment after mind-blown moment, but he talks about the actual-- and I'll put a link in the show notes to the two-part episode that I did with him. After reading his book, I finally understood why yo-yo dieting makes it harder and harder to lose weight. It basically has to do with how it affects something called the extracellular matrix surrounding fat cells, and they become stiffer the more that you lose and regain and lose and regain and it's just really fascinating.

Cynthia Thurlow: I think when I read his book, Melanie, I literally, like, my chin was on the table, and I remember saying to you, now I'm sure everyone that listens to you knows that you are like a copious researcher. I think I told you, I think I went through 20 pages of a legal notepad taking notes, and my husband was like, what are you doing? I said, "This man has written this book and it's completely blowing my mind." Like, it's so different than anything I've heard anywhere else. Yeah, he's just exceptional and I love that there are people out there that I would call disruptors who are not embracing this mindset of cognitive dissonance and are willing to think outside the box because that's really what we want people to do is really find something that works for you to keep you as healthy as possible.

Melanie Avalon: It's so funny. He's the only time that I emailed ahead of time, and I said, can we record for 4 hours so that I can make it a two-part episode? He was so kind and agreed, and I think we had, like, technical difficulties at the beginning, so I think it was like a five-hour experience. I'll put a link to that in the show notes. Going back to the hormones, there were some that I want to touch on specifically. Cortisol is a big one, and I think cortisol is one of the ones-- I think cortisol and Insulin are probably the two that well-- there might be more, but maybe the two that I see the most as far as people being really aware of them and thinking, even if they haven't tested thinking in their head, I have high insulin or I have high cortisol.

One thing I love is when you talk about cortisol, you actually start by talking about the benefits of cortisol, and you kind of dismantle the idea out there that cortisol is just a bad hormone. So, could you talk a little bit about cortisol, why it actually is beneficial, but then the problems when it goes awry, specifically how it can encourage visceral fat storage and things like that, so cortisol?

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, cortisol, I feel like cortisol is the bully on the block, meaning it's gotten such bad press, it needs a good PR group to come in and sweep in and help it out. I think when we think about cortisol, cortisol is designed to be an emergency backup system in the body. We talk about the sympathetic nervous system, which is part of the autonomic nervous system, and just acknowledging that cortisol's role predominantly is to be part of that fight or flight. You're being chased by a saber-toothed tiger. It makes you be able to focus. It shuts down digestion. You can't stop to poop. You aren't going to stop to have sex. Your body is being fueled with the energy to get away from this threat. The common misunderstanding about cortisol, though, is that in our over-harried, overstressed lives, very westernized lives, we're constantly in this hedonistic culture where we're just inundated by information 24/7.

Our bodies can no longer differentiate between acute stress on being chased by a rabid animal versus chronic stress. That's the first tipping point that is problematic about cortisol. Cortisol does a lot of things. It frees up glucose so that we can be fueled. When I tell people when they're dealing with chronic stress, the things that will show up for them, they're not going to sleep as well. Because think about it physiologically. If you're fleeing danger, your body is not going to allow you to fall asleep properly. You're not going to digest your food. You can't properly detoxify. You're not going to poop. You're going to deal with that as well. That's a whole separate conversation that we could have because the whole constipation thing is fascinating. We think about the fact that chronic stress is going to impact the reproductive system because our bodies are going to perceive that we're under this surveillance of threat.

I also think about the fact that as an example, people talk about the cortisol belly. Why do I have abdominal fat? I just remind them that we have 40 times more receptors in the abdomen for cortisol. If you're really chronically stressed and chronically dealing with high cortisol levels, at least initially, you may see some abdominal issues. You may be more prone to leaky gut. You may be more prone to sleep disturbances like I talked about. You may really struggle with infertility. The initial phase with cortisol is heightened, so it becomes elevated and then over time, if we're chronically debilitated by stress, we will have the opposite. Our body is trying and trying and trying to keep up, and then over time, we'll have lower cortisol levels, which can show up as fatigue. Like, you have no energy and you develop gastrointestinal problems, you develop a leaky gut. You're prone to developing opportunistic infections in the gut.

You may deal with digestive problems beyond that, again, reproductive issues. You can have brain fog, and there's this downstream effect because what people don't realize is that cortisol impacts estrogen and testosterone, it impacts DHEA, all these sex hormones that are designed to kind of reflect and manifest not only an outward appearance but our menstrual cycle, our libido, etc., can all take a massive hit. Cortisol is beneficial, but cortisol can also be a sign when our body is under constant stress. It's important to interject in here that if you are someone who's not sleeping well, who's chronically overstressed, we don't want to add more stressors. This is where fasting can be beneficial versus detrimental. If you're someone that is going through a divorce, has had a significant life stressor, you've lost a job, you've been in the hospital, this is a good time to indicate that your body is still recovering from this significant stressor.

Right now, let's be honest, we have macro stressors and micro stressors. There's a lot going on in the world. You better believe in 2019, when I was in the hospital for 13 days, I didn't fast for months because my body was just wrecked from being so sick. Cortisol, I think, Teri Cochrane calls it the dirty cupcake, but it's really kind of emphasizing for people that when your cortisol is properly balanced, you're going to be able to sleep and manage your stress. Your blood sugar is going to be better controlled. That's one thing I forgot to mention. If you're chronically stressed, you're going to have blood sugar dysregulation, which can manifest as insulin resistance. This is where we get this tie-in with insulin. It's really all about mastering these key hormones so that we can put ourselves in an advantageous position.

I talk quite a bit in the book about the things that you need to do to balance the body. Bring yourself back into the autonomic nervous system, where you're not so focused on the sympathetic, but you're focused on this rest and repose side. That's one of the key aspects of helping to properly balance cortisol, is to ensure that your body doesn't think you're running a marathon every day and that you're not being chased by a saber-toothed tiger. Let me just lastly interject that stress can show up in weird ways. I know you had David Perlmutter on and in his last book, he talked about how when we're really stressed, we override the prefrontal cortex and we can't make executive decisions. You're not going to sit down and do calculus; you're probably only going to manage being able to get out the door because you just can't sit down and do advanced level thinking because your body is just flooded with cortisol and the amygdala overrides that prefrontal cortex. You're not able to make really good decisions. It's when people make impulsive decisions that's when people do things that are, I hate to say this word stupid sometimes because they aren't able to really think through their decision-making processes. Certainly, the last couple of years have shown us that there's a lot of that going on.

Melanie Avalon: Question about cortisol because it is something that women can test or they can do like a urine test. How beneficial do you think that is actually testing cortisol? Or should women just assume that their cortisol is high? So, when it comes to actually testing.

Cynthia Thurlow: Oh, I love to test it's like one of my favorite things to talk about. I always say test, don't guess. That is my standard mantra. You can test cortisol levels with a couple of different substances. You can do it with saliva, you can do it with urine, you can do it with blood. I like a combination of all of the above. I think serum is helpful, it just gives you that snapshot. So, a serum is blood. Immediately at that point in time when your blood is drawn that's exactly what your levels are. I do like the DUTCH test, which is a dried urine and saliva testing, depending on which kit you get. That can be hugely beneficial because it can plot out your circadian rhythm. Cortisol follows a rhythm in the body kind of like the infrared rhythm, but it follows-- melatonin suppression is when cortisol is highest. We would expect cortisol to be highest in the morning.

It ebbs and flows throughout the day and is lowest at night, which tells our body to go to bed. The DUTCH is really helpful because it will plot it out throughout the day and it gives you controls like high and low and so you can see for yourself how is your body metabolizing cortisol? Does your body not make enough cortisone, which is the inactive form of cortisol to convert to cortisol? Do you not have enough circulating cortisol? Do you have too much-circulating cortisol? It maps out your sex hormones, your melatonin, all of these things are interrelated and so it can be hugely beneficial. I'm an enormous fan of the DUTCH in particular because it gives us a very unique way of looking at our hormones. The caveat for anyone that's listening is you have to work with someone who's looked at hundreds of them.

I say this with love, but there are a lot of people who end up becoming either they're in our groups or they're working with me one on one. They've had a well-meaning clinician order these tests, they are not inexpensive and then it's not properly interpreted. The caveat I would say is if you're going to do the testing, make sure the person you're working with has looked at hundreds of them. The DUTCH is a complicated test. I actually took a whole class to be able to interpret it. I have a binder that's gosh it's probably six inches thick. I'm not exaggerating. It took probably looking at 100 of them to feel comfortable/confident to be able to use that information. Because in the functional medicine, integrative medicine world, there're a lot of great tests that are available, but they're only as valuable as the person that knows how to interpret them. That's an important distinction that I think, certainly your listeners, they want to just make sure that whoever they're working with, it's someone that's worked with a lot of these so that they can provide the best advice.

Melanie Avalon: I'm really glad that you touched on that because I've done a cortisol DUTCH test once and I remember getting the results because I'm a self-researcher and I like to try to interpret things. I just remember looking at this and thinking how important it was to work with somebody knowledgeable who actually could interpret it. Hearing what you just said about all of the research and the binder and all the things that you definitely need to be working with a practitioner on that. The other hormones-- since you love testing, not guessing, out of all the hormones and all the things that can be tested with that, what can you test? Do you do insulin tests? What about estrogen levels? I know estrogen dominance is a problem today. Can that be tested?

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah. Are you asking specifically to the DUTCH or just in general?

Melanie Avalon: Just in general, with women, do you do a full hormonal panel? When you do, what does that cover? Like, what should women be testing?

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, I think at a minimum, so we know progesterone as one example is better tested with blood as opposed to the DUTCH. Because when you do the DUTCH as an example, it's just a test between days 19 through 22 in your cycles to during your luteal phase, I do think testing for-- there're three predominant forms of estrogen. There's estriol, estrone, and estradiol. Estradiol is the predominant form of estrogen prior to going through menopause. Estrone is the predominant weaker form of estrogen that most women produce in fat tissue in menopause, kind of a bummer because that's when women really don't want to be adding to their fat stores. I think it's important to do a free and total testosterone, so really looking at that is very helpful. On the other side of that, I like to look at DHEA. I definitely like to look at fasting insulin.

I know that a lot of well-meaning healthcare professionals will do like a complete blood count. They'll do a CMP, which is a comprehensive metabolic panel, which just looks at fasting glucose. We know that your fasting insulin can dysregulate, sometimes five to ten years, way before the glucose and hemoglobin A1c start becoming abnormal. Fasting insulin is, for me, the biomarker that I will look at. You can look at fasting leptin, which is oftentimes absolutely fascinating, although you'll oftentimes see abnormal fasting insulin as well as fasting leptin. This is when people say this is hedonistic, they can't stop eating. There's all this miscommunication between their brains and their stomach. Other things that I like to think about, I mentioned progesterone. I do like to look at a full thyroid panel, so TSH, free and total T3 and T4, reverse T3, looking at antibodies, I'm a huge fan of looking at iron panels, so total iron, TIBC, percent sat, ferritin, which is oftentimes a better marker of iron storage.

I do like to look at inflammatory markers, so a high-sensitivity CRP, I do like to look at homocysteine. This is just like a baseline. I'll look at like an RBC or red blood cell, magnesium, and zinc, iodine, folate, B12. That's a starting point. Obviously, each person is an individual, but I think it's a good place to start from so that you have a good sense of what's going on with your body. Now, obviously, a DUTCH is not covered by insurance, but I think doing those serum blood markers and urinary iodine can be very, very helpful.

Melanie Avalon: Awesome. Again, listeners, there is a full transcript in the show notes, so have no fear. If you get Cynthia's book, you'll have all the resources. Another hormone I'd love to briefly ask you about, you talk about oxytocin in the book. All of the things that can benefit that hormone, I did not realize. Well, first of all, you talk about oxytocin. Is oxytocin on or off or is it more like a dimmer switch? Also, you talk about how it lasts three to five minutes. Do we need to be doing oxytocin-stimulating things all the time? And what is the role of oxytocin?

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, so it's this amazing hormone that is secreted by the hypothalamus-pituitary gland. Think about it like when a woman is bonding with her baby, if she's breastfeeding her baby, it can be secreted by the uterus and the placenta, and so it can create this amazing bonding experience. It's why like hugging your pets, I'm laughing because one of my dogs is walking over to get his back scratched right now. It's this amazing hormone that when we're tapped into it and again you can't be in the super overly stressed environment 24/7 and think that you're going to get any good feelings from oxytocin. You get it from sexual intimacy, you can get it from hugs with your loved ones, and you can get it from rubbing your dog. It also contributes to staying full and having satiety. I remind people there's more to this hormone.

We kind of think of it as the mother hormone. It's the hormone that kind of begets all other hormones, how critically important it is to nourish it. And you're right, it doesn't last. That's why you need those. I love that I have dogs because now I have teenagers who are much less interested in being snuggly with their mom like they were when they were younger. Getting those little hits of oxytocin throughout the day can be super helpful, but it doesn't necessarily have to involve you being around other people. I mean, just even laughing, just having levity like watching something that makes you happy, doing something that brings you joy. I always get questions like; do I have to be around other people? No, not necessarily. If you love to garden, if you love to get out in nature, if getting on a bicycle or exercising brings you joy, I mean, there're other ways that we can stimulate this hormone.

It's really important to understand that it is critically important for staying full. Like, we have receptors all placed in our body, in our brain, in our uterus, our placenta, our ovaries. Our body is constantly taking information from the outside and kind of deciding, like, are we nourishing our bodies or are we depleting our bodies? This is a poorly understood, poorly appreciated hormone, but one that I think is so, so important.

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 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.

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Yeah, I love you talk about the study in the book about, I think it was overweight men looking at delicious food and oxytocin reduced their appetite or their cravings, which is so cool. Again, listeners, all of the hormones are in the book. So some more fasting-related questions. I love to touch on a few of the things that I feel like at least on the Intermittent Fasting Podcast, we don't really talk about that much, or it's not something of a focus of ours that you do touch on because I think listeners would love to hear about it. As far as things, okay, I just laugh about this question because it's such a question on the other podcast. As far as what breaks a fast, what are your thoughts on what breaks a fast and the idea of clean fasting? In particular, I'd love to hear your thoughts on medicinal mushrooms because that's not something that I really play around with and Gin doesn't either. So, I'd love to hear about those. 

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah. I think all of us are very aligned about the concept of clean fasting. I do like people to understand why when you're learning the basics it's important to distinguish between what will or will not break your fast. In my mind, and there are a lot of, again, well-meaning fit pros out there, and they'll say, "Oh, if it's under 50 calories, it doesn't count. I'm like, okay, well, the grapes that you just told someone to eat are definitely going to break their fast. I think about how certain supplements can break your fast, like branched-chain amino acids, flavored electrolytes. I think about the fact that-- this is just my personal feeling, we know that dairy products are insulinemic, and so when people think it's no big deal to put heavy cream in their coffee, and they're being very purposeful, like, what is your purpose of fasting?

Like, if you're trying to change body composition or lose weight, then those little things can add up. One of the funny things that my interview with Vinnie Tortorich on the podcast, and he was saying, when people tell you that they're putting healthy fats into their diet, always clarify. I always do that now, but what might be cream in my coffee might be half cream, half coffee, so those things can certainly add up fast. But I think about bone broth. I think about distinguishing between proteins we know will break a fast, being really clear about the fact that anything that is going to stimulate an insulin response and I know I was laughing a couple of days ago. I was watching something on YouTube and the concept of cephalic phase insulin response, which I know you all talk about as well. There were people that were fighting like they were splitting hairs over what would do that.

I thought it might be helpful just to say when we talk about that, it's the sight, smell, or taste of food that will secrete some insulin. We know it increases salivation, we know that it increases bile secretion, all because your body thinks food is coming, it increases gastric juices, it increases gut motility, and that alone can last eight to ten minutes. When people think it's no big deal to smell like grandma's apple pie, but I don't want anyone getting paranoid feeling like they can't enjoy being in a fasted state and smelling food. Just to understand, our bodies are very attuned to the environments we're in. When it comes to breaking your fast, I tend to be very much aligned with you and Jen. It's bitter teas, bitter being bitter, not meant to be sweet, plain coffee, filtered water, I think are absolutely fine, unfavored electrolytes are absolutely fine. The things that will break a fast are the things that are construed as food. Whether it's chewing gum, whether it is sucking on a mint, I've had people that get really upset. They don't like their keto breath and so they're always frustrated. I'm like, "Well, I guess you could chew on some fennel, but technically your body is going to think food is coming." I think it's important for people to understand there are things that can kind of amplify fast, things that can be beneficial, and I dove deep into the research on this. Things like-- think about Chaga or Reishi mushrooms. This is something that Siim Land talks quite a bit about as well. He's super well versed in the literature. I'm not sure if interviewed him on the podcast before.

Sulforaphanes like broccoli sprouts, just to potentiate autophagy, which is that waste and recycling process in the body. Turmeric and ginger, things that are certainly not sweet, but based on research can potentiate autophagy. There are also other things that can potentiate those things as well. I'm hoping I answered your question because I know that the concept of a clean fast is something that not necessarily everyone embraces. I know we both have had individuals on our podcast who feel differently. Like, you can have fiber and you can have all the fat you want. Yes, maybe fat may not be processed differently in the body, but I do like people to learn the basics so that they can have success. If you then go on and you're going to do a bone broth fast, but you're doing a different type of fasting, then that's a differentiator but when people are learning how to fast, I want them to learn how to do it clean so that they'll get the best results.

Melanie Avalon: Yes, exactly. One thing I love is you dive deep into coffee and the cost-benefit of coffee, especially because I think with coffee, it can be a really great aid for fasting, encourage fat burning and energy and reduce cravings, but then on the flipside, I think probably for some women that they might get too much of a cortisol response to it. What do you find with all the women that you've worked with as far as coffee goes? Do some women, it's just they can't do coffee because of the cortisol? Is tea a better option? What are your thoughts on coffee?

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, great question. When I think about coffee, there're two things. First, exposure to mycotoxin so if anyone's listening and the concept of mold, so making sure you use a clean brand, I think is the first thing. If someone suspects that they're either getting an exaggerated response, they feel jittery, they don't feel good, I encourage them to use a glucometer, like check your blood sugar before and check your blood sugar after because that can be very insightful. Sometimes people don't realize that their body gets stressed when they consume this coffee product. Maybe it's the caffeine. It may not even be the coffee per se, maybe it's the mycotoxin. Really getting granular if they really love coffee. Trying to figure out is it that brand of coffee, is it you're sensitive to caffeine. What can we do to try to honor your desire to have the therapeutic benefits from the polyphenols and other things?

Can you try green tea? What I do find for a lot of women is it's very insightful when they start using the glucometers to be able to determine what's their net impact. If their blood sugar goes from 70 to 100, it's like, okay, well, this might be something that's stressing your body. This might be unique to you. This could be a temporary blip. This might be that you've got too much stress going on and this is another stress or your body is just saying time out. Or maybe you need to consume a better-quality brand coffee, that is tested for mycotoxins. I know you probably have talked about this on your podcast quite a bit. I'm surprised at how many people have a genetic susceptibility, I'm one of them, that I'm very sensitive to mold exposure, whether it's in my environment or in my food.

Sometimes you have to take those extra steps. Either find a manufacturer that screens for mold or perhaps you need to try something else like green tea or black tea, a bitter tea that might work better for you, or take a break entirely to see how your N of 1. I always say the N of 1 is important, but it may be that for right now that's not the right substance for you to consume. That might be hugely impactful.

Melanie Avalon: So, another question, just because like I said, you talk about things that I don't personally really talk about on the other show and I think it's so important. So, the hormone DHEA, I remember forever ago before I was really into all of this stuff, I was reading about DHEA and I was like, "Oh, I'm going to supplement with DHEA. And then that did not go well. Since then I supplemented with something called 7-keto-DHEA. I was wondering what your thoughts are on DHEA.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, I always like to look at a DUTCH before I render an opinion because the lifestyle piece always plays a role if DHEA is suppressed. Just to give an overview, like DHEA is another very important hormone downstream that effect is DHEA will cleave off and create testosterone and androgen metabolites. It's also supposed to work in conjunction with cortisol. They're just kind of balance one another out. If you have someone that is really depleted, your body will preferentially fuel production of cortisol over DHEA. It's the vitality hormone, it's a hormone that's important for energy. Obviously, if your DHEA is low, your libido may have gone poof. And so, I think supplementation is reasonable. 7-keto-DHEA I have used, the thought process is it's less likely to be aromatized into estrogen. That can be a huge problem with DHEA.

You don't know how the body is going to use it. It going to aromatize estrogen or is your body going to use it to kind of fuel those testosterone pathways? I think it's highly bio-individual. I like to do the DUTCH specifically to look at that. If testosterone levels are low, sometimes I want to look at serum testing to corroborate that. I do think it can be helpful, and I think for a lot of people, especially as they're getting closer to like middle age, like 40-ish and above, more often than not, we will supplement with some DHEA. Although what's interesting to me is that I see clinicians doing really high doses of DHEA, and I don't think I've seen enough research to suggest that they should be supplementing with like, 100 mg of DHA. I generally start pretty low because, for some people, it's very stimulating.

I take DHEA as does my husband and oftentimes it can be helpful for kind of priming the pumps, like, as our bodies are making less of these hormones as we're getting closer to menopause and andropause it can beneficial to help replete them. The foundational work always needs to be on the sleep, the stress, the not overexercising, etc. One thing that I think is really important for people to understand is that supplements are great. Supplements can be so beneficial on so many levels. Obviously, I talk about them in the book, but the real foundational approaches to health or what we have to do first before we start adding in supplements, because I think it's so easy to say, "Oh, I don't want to work on the sleep piece. I'm just going to take in supplements to help my sleep". I'm like, "You got to work on the sleep first and start adding supplements," as just one example. I'm sure, Melanie, you see quite a bit of that as well.

Melanie Avalon: That was something I highlighted in your book where you were saying "Starting intermittent fasting. I think you said that if your sleep is not in line or your stress, that's got to be dealt with first."

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, because I cannot tell you how many women and I don't fault them for this because I think this is human nature. They want to lose weight; they want to fast. I'm like, okay, let's back up the bus. We got to make sure we've got your sleep dialed in, because if your sleep and stress are out of control, your body is going to perceive we're heaping on another layer of stress, it's not going to be as amenable. Again, much like the menstrual cycle, I use sleep as a barometer for how well people are managing and mitigating their health, and what's their hormone balance like and I'm oversimplifying, of course there's far more to it than that. I know when my sleep is bad. I'm obsessed with my Oura Ring. Every day I look at my REM sleep and my deep sleep, and I tell my husband, like, I'll be darned. I don't want to be tethered to this thing, but I love it because I get up in the morning and the days I feel great, my data always correlates. It always-- The same thing if I have a crappy night of sleep, it's like my REM and my deep sleep are down. I'm like, "Ah, it's just validation."

Melanie Avalon: I love the Oura Ring and I talked about this on the other show and on my Instagram, but I recently had COVID and the effects it had on my Oura Ring because I didn't feel that bad, so I'm not sure that I would have thought necessarily it was COVID. My Oura Ring was like you're dying. Not really, but it gave me-- the scores were so fascinating and this is really interesting. Since then, I've been taking some medications for COVID and I think they've been affecting my sleep. But interestingly, I don't feel like I'm sleeping as well, but my Oura Ring has actually said that my sleep has been fine and I haven't been tired during the day. I think there's just something changing, this is completely N of 1 and probably not helpful for anybody, but it's like my experience of my sleep at night has been changing, and I don't really know what that means. Oh, another tangent. You talk about melatonin in the book, so have you interviewed John Lieurance?

Cynthia Thurlow: He is coming on next month. I cannot wait.

Melanie Avalon: Okay, so for listeners, he is the melatonin guy, and he's all about high-dose melatonin. This is so funny Cynthia, so I think two nights ago so I've been taking melatonin in part for COVID. It's the same brand as my digestive enzymes. I currently get Pure Encapsulations. The actual pills look the exact same. The bottle looks almost the exact same. I realized last night when I was pulling out my digestive enzymes, that I had thought the night before my melatonin bottle was my digestive enzyme bottle. I take a lot of digestive enzymes. So, I counted the pills out, I think I took like 15 melatonins the prior night.

Cynthia Thurlow: What was the amount that you took?

Melanie Avalon: Maybe 20, 3 mg. So, it probably ended up being somewhere, it might have been like 60 mg of melatonin.

Cynthia Thurlow: You know what's funny is that I've completely nerded out on sleep and melatonin in the last, like two months. I'm so glad you're asking me about this because now it's like bleeding into my work like every group person I'm talking about melatonin all the time. Probably a month ago, I decided I was going to step up my sleep game. I'm like you, I'm very conscientious about what I take when I take it. I started with the consent of my integrative medicine doc and started doing high-dose melatonin. His feeling was, let's do this to kind of replenish because after the age of 40, we don't make as much. I was doing 18 mg every night and it was like I went from having good sleep to great sleep. Like every night my REM and deep sleep were doubled. I mean, it was unbelievable. I'm doing all the other things and then I got the SandMan.

Melanie Avalon: Which is in my refrigerator, by the way.

Cynthia Thurlow: Oh my God. If you can get beyond the fact, yeah, so if you can get beyond putting it in your rectum because I know like, my whole family, I don't tell my whole family, but I was telling my husband. He was like, I don't even want to know. Don't even tell me. He's like but here's the thing. It's a very vascular part of your body. It's actually a really good place as an ER nurse, we used to put a lot of things, medications in the rectum. You have to put it in the rectum. Oh my God, you wake up the next morning, you're like, I had the most delicious, amazing night of sleep. I cannot wait to bring him on and pick his brain. I am all about the net impact of what melatonin does in the body. That's the thing that I've completely started really nerding out on is like the antioxidant benefits, especially we know with COVID that it's very helpful for healing COVID.

It's one of those things, like, I was trying to explain to someone that we think of melatonin just as a hormone. Like we think it's your sleep hormone. It works in opposition to cortisol and it gets suppressed in the morning when we get up and get light exposure. The antioxidant net impact of melatonin impacts every part of our bodies. We've got clocks, these suprachiasmatic clocks I don't know why I'm struggling to say that today, but we have these clocks in our gut, all over our body. Having melatonin healthy dose also has this net impact on serotonin and estrogen and it's amazing. Don't be afraid that you took that much because when you have the SandMan on board, I forget it's like 100 or 200 mg of melatonin. But I've been taking I did 18 mg and 12, now I'm down to six every night and it's almost like it's reset those melatonin receptors. It's really been fascinating.

Melanie Avalon: It was definitely a moment I was like, "Oh, my goodness." [laughs] And it's so interesting, like I said, I have the SandMan in my fridge, and I've been very open about this. I do all the things, like, I do colonics, I do coffee enemas. I don't know why I can't do the suppositories.

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, you know what's funny? I had to laugh. There's a woman on my team who's another advanced practice nurse, and so she got SandMan first. She's a fellow nurse. The two of us laughed on the phone when she told me all about her experience. She just said, I think nurses just have terrible potty humor because we just giggled like schoolgirls laughing about it. I think once you get over the fact that you're putting it in your bottom, it's like, not a big deal, but like, the net impact. I think the other thing is it's also expensive. Let me be clear, I'm not using this every night. I'm using it like once a week just because it's not inexpensive. But I cannot wait to interview him. Have you interviewed him yet?

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I've become pretty good friends with him, so I'm probably going to text him after this and say that were fangirling over his work. Another suppository that just came in the mail, because this is the type of things that people send to me, a CBD suppository I just got in the mail. Do you take CBD, do you use it?

Cynthia Thurlow: Not regularly. I mean, I went through this period of time where I had a lot of either podcast sponsors or people who wanted to sponsor Instagram content. I was getting a lot of CBD products, and it became a running joke. Like, I had so much, I couldn't use it all. So now that is all slowed down. I think for me, I initially used it for sleep, but then I started feeling like there were other supplements that for me personally were more beneficial. So, I kind of let that go. I know the whole physiology behind, I think, CBD, if it's a good quality product, which I'm sure you received in the mail. It's all fascinating, but I've just found other things that are more beneficial for me for sleep or if I want an anti-anxiety thing, I'll grab GABA. That's just worked well for me.

Melanie Avalon: Because I found that CBD is definitely very individual. For me, it's a game changer.

Cynthia Thurlow: Really, that's awesome.

Melanie Avalon: Once I found my dosing, so I take it every single night. And it's just really amazing for me. I work historically with one brand because the problem is there're so many CBDs on the market now, and there's just no regulation and it's really a problem. I found Feals, and I love Feals and take Feals all the time. This company that reached out for you because I literally get approached by CBD companies probably weekly. It's crazy, but they reached out and this relates actually to everything we're talking about. They make lubricants and oils and a lot of that stuff and it's so hard to find.

Cynthia Thurlow: Clean stuff. I have some other stuff. It's good.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah. So, I was very excited about that. There's so much more that we could touch on, but there's one big topic that I did want to circle back to that we kept approaching but we didn't actually really discuss, and that is the perimenopause transition to menopause. Do all women go through perimenopause? I didn't realize, for example, that there's five phases. I learned that in your book, like with your patients, how many women struggle with it. Something I thought that was really interesting was you mentioned that for smokers and for women without kids that it might come earlier. Do you know why that is? Do you have any idea?

Cynthia Thurlow: I don't know. The smoking piece. I think just in general smokers tend to embrace less healthy habits. I think that's probably what it's based off of in terms of being we use the term nulliparous as you haven't had children, I'm not entirely sure. What I have seen clinically is that thinner women are going into menopause earlier. Like 47, 48. Average American is 51. So, does everyone go through perimenopause? Yes, if they live long enough. Hopefully, everyone listening is going to live long enough to go into perimenopause. For some people, it could be five to ten years preceding menopause. I think that the women that do best making that transition are the ones that are doing the work. You can get away with a lot in your 20s and 30s. I can officially say this as a middle-aged woman you can get away with a lot.

Like what I got away with in my 20s and 30s in terms of what I ate and how little I slept and not managing my stress. I have a super stressful job. Forty was definitely leveling the playing field. If you are not over-exercising, you've got an anti-inflammatory diet, you have a job that brings you tremendous joy, you have great relationships, you're getting good quality sleep, you're not over-exercising. You're going to have an easier transition than someone who's doing the opposite, standard American diet, very sedentary, smoking. Doesn't have a job that they love. Maybe they have a lot of significant financial and other types of stress in their lives, doesn't have a support system. Your perimenopausal transition is really a barometer of how well you're taking care of yourself. We as women tend to do a really great job of taking care of everyone but ourselves.

It's no surprise that this is the time when a lot of women start advocating. It's also the time a lot of women have children at home and maybe their parents are aging. It can be a very stressful time period. The women that I see that aren't riddled with horrible hot flashes and tremendous weight gain are the ones that are doing the work. I think that obviously I had that blip when I hit the wall of perimenopause but then I straightened everything out. I stopped doing 5:30 AM conditioning classes, I slept more, I didn't have such a-- I didn't perceive it was a restrictive diet, but probably too low carb for me. Managed my stress better, really took better care of myself. I do think women can get through that time period. That research that I found there's not a lot of great research on perimenopause because it's this nebulous time. For some people that might only have five years in perimenopause and then boom, their period stops and it's all over.

It's certainly been my experience that we recognize that hormones like estrogen, so obviously, at the beginning stages of perimenopause, you're going to have this relative estrogen dominance because progesterone is starting to wax and wane. The ovaries, you may not be ovulating every month, and you may not even be cognizant of it. Your symptoms might be as benign as you're waking up in the middle of the night. Maybe you have more anxiety and depression because progesterone is that kind of buffering mellow sister hormone. And you've got this relative estrogen dominance. So, you're gaining weight, you've got fibrocystic breasts, you got very heavy crime scene periods, as I affectionately used to refer to them. That can be kind of the beginning stages, but a lot of the rest of it can be very bio-individual. Something that's important for people to understand is the weight gain piece, which can be so distressing, especially when you're doing all the things that you should be doing to help maintain your weight.

It can really be a byproduct of cortisol being up. Remember we talked about these cortisol receptors? We've got 40 times more cortisol receptors on our abdomen. It can also be a byproduct of the fact that we lose the buffering effects of estrogen. So, estrogen is an insulin-sensitizing hormone. Meaning as you are getting closer to the end of your menstrual cycle for the rest of your life, you are going to be more prone to insulin resistance. Add in poor dietary choices, stress, sleep disturbances, it's like the perfect storm. It's really just kind of cruel. I look at my teenagers and they're hitting puberty, and mine was starting to peter off. The lens with which I look at perimenopause as a transitional point is that women do have control over a lot of things. And so that's always that reframe. What do you have control over? It goes back to those pillars that I've talked about throughout our conversation.

In my book, Intermittent Fasting Transformation is really honoring sleep quality, stress management, anti-inflammatory nutrition, not over-exercising, connecting with people, and doing things that you love as opposed to forcing yourself, doing things that you don't enjoy. Perimenopause can be a wonderful time for women. It can also be a harrowing stressful time. What I do find is for a lot of women that when they finally go 12 months without a cycle, it's a big sigh of relief. It's like one less thing to have to worry about. For a lot of people, there's a tremendous amount of shame and embarrassment with no longer being fertile, which I think really is a detriment as women that we really need to reframe it. We spend 40% of our lifetime in menopause. Why not make it wonderful? It's a time when people can have tremendous creative purposes. Their children may be grown, or they may be at a different point in their career, or they may be able to travel. 

There can be just a lot of wonderful things that come out of no longer having a menstrual cycle every month. Certainly, I'm an example of someone that made that transition pretty effortlessly. I think a lot of women can. They shouldn't look at it as something to fear. That's what I get DMs about, "Oh my God, what am I going to do?" I just say, "Hey, it's part of life. If we live long enough, it's going to happen." If it makes anyone feel better, men go through andropause it's just a little less dramatic.

Melanie Avalon: That is a beautiful reframe, which appropriately enough is one of the topics that is near the end of the book and also typically tends to be near the end of my episodes. But that is the role of mindset. You talk a lot about mindset. One thing I love in particular that you talk about is reframing limiting beliefs. One of the things I love about your book and talking about limiting beliefs is there are a lot of limiting beliefs surrounding dieting and fasting specifically. You talk about how to reframe them, but you would need the knowledge in order to properly reframe them, especially when it comes to concerns surrounding fasting like it's unsafe or I'll be hungry. You really do need that knowledge to know why that's not true. What are some of the mindset practices that you find really can benefit women? Limiting beliefs, gratitude. Oh, I love your good, better, best. I've talked about that on an episode of IF podcast for so long because I had never heard of that before, like that concept. It's the perfect solution for people like me and a lot of listeners who might be perfectionists. They're really intimidated by making changes or doing things because they think they have to be perfect. So, I just said a lot. But yeah, mindset, the role of mindset.

Cynthia Thurlow: Yeah, I think mindset is everything. I say that to my kids that probably makes them grow to hear their mother saying that ad nauseam. I really do think that whatever challenges we're presented with in our lifetime, it's all about the reframe. It's all about the mindset shift. It's all about finding the good, through adversity comes opportunity, which my kids here all the time. Even if you're having a crappy day, like finding one thing to be really grateful for. I think starting your day with gratitude, getting really granular, it could be as silly as "I'm grateful for day I woke up before my alarm clock." It could be that simple. But we know that it helps. It changes the physiology in the brain. We recognize how critically important it is to just look at life. It's not being pollyannaish, it's just acknowledging that there are going to be bumps in the road.

You're going to have a time when maybe you're traveling. This is an example of the good, better, best. Especially for, as Melanie said, those of you that are more perfectionistic, you're in a store or you're in a restaurant, and you can't get grass-fed, pastured anything. And so, it's good, better, best. It's like, what is the best option I can make at this restaurant? I'm going to eat it, I'm going to enjoy it, I'm going to let it go. Just giving yourself grace, that's another aspect that I would say for me, where I am in my lifetime is, I'm a reform people pleaser and I'm a reform perfectionist. I say this from the heart, is giving myself grace. Like, not every day is going to work out the way I wanted it to. Not everything is going to work out the way that I wanted to and I think it's so important as women that we acknowledge our uniqueness and how special we are, but also acknowledge that sometimes things just don't go the way we want, and that's okay, we can just roll with it.

I always say to my kids, there was something that happened professionally this week that was a total bummer, but I reframed it and said, okay, this is the way things are going to be at this time with this particular class. It's totally okay. We're going to work through it. It's that constant acknowledgment of looking at the good in your life, reframing things, expressing gratitude, understanding, like something as simple as learning something new. It doesn't have to be complicated. I've been nerding out on audiobooks recently, which I go through periods of time where I've fixated on one thing or another. I was saying to my husband, like, just being in my car, because every woman that's listening probably spends too much time in their cars, I was able to get through 15 hours of an audiobook, and it brought me so much joy because every time I got in my car, I could listen to the audiobook again.

Just acknowledging, like, learning something new can create more synapses is this concept of neuroplasticity, how critically important it is for us as women to make sure we've got, like, a healthy dialogue in our brains, because we can what wires together, fires together. I tell people all the time that your thoughts become your actions. So, again, that neuroplasticity piece is so important. I think far too many people think terrible things in their head and maybe they say nice things out of their mouths but your brain hears everything that you're thinking. It's really important that we're very dedicated to making sure that we're just as healthy-minded as we can be. I think, again, the past two years have taught us a lot, and I think at many levels, really were to celebrate that we're making it like, on the other side, we're all better for these past years what we've been through.

Just really acknowledging that creating a practice of proper mindset is something you work on every day. It's not like I wake up every day and I'm thinking everything is going to fall into place. There are days where I just happen to stumble across something. Mel Robbins, who I think is brilliant, has written and I'm like, "Oh my gosh, how did she know, this is exactly what I needed to see this morning to put a smile on my face." Just surrounding yourself with positive messaging people who are encouraging, creating boundaries, that's one other thing I probably didn't talk a lot about in the book. Creating boundaries for individuals, making sure the people that you spend time with you interact with are healthy, well-adjusted humans and not toxic people that take your energy from you.

Melanie Avalon: I could not agree more. I just think it's so important and I love how you're talking about trying new things and learning new things. Perhaps my favorite benefit about intermittent fasting is definitely up there, but it's one that's not quite anticipated by a lot of people, and it's just how much time you get back. At least for me, it opens up so much time and opportunity because you're not focused on eating 24/7, I love that. Well, this has been absolutely amazing. Listeners there is so much information in this book, you've got to get it, so many things we didn't even touch on, gut health and muscle and Cynthia dives deep into really specifics of all the different fears surrounding fasting and what to eat and traveling and prepping and just so many things. We'll put a link to in the show notes. Definitely get the book. The last question that I ask every single guest on this show. I asked you last time, but I will ask you it again, and it relates to everything that were just talking about. What is something that you're grateful for?

Cynthia Thurlow: Well, I would say one of the things that I posted on Instagram today is that one of the really cool things about my job is that I have opportunities to connect with amazing people in the health and wellness space. I'm so very grateful that we connected and we became friends and so on so many levels Melanie has added so much to my own podcasting journey and my own kind of perspectives on life. Right now, I'm grateful for your friendship, Melanie. So thank you for that.

Melanie Avalon: Aww, I am so grateful as well. I really, really, really am. You're one of the people that I'll just have moments randomly. Maybe it's when we're talking, maybe not, but I'm just like I'm just so grateful for Cynthia. Yeah. This has been so wonderful. I'm really excited because normally I record episodes and then they air months from now. We're going to time this around your book release so listeners get to hear it sooner rather than later. And I'm so excited. During this whole conversation, I've just been thinking, wow, listeners are going to love this. Thank you so much for all that you're doing. I am forever grateful for you and our friendship and your work and everything that you're doing, and I can't wait to see where it all goes from here.

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]

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!

More on Cynthia: cynthiathurlow.com

Theme Music Composed By Leland Cox: LelandCox.com

If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving us a review in iTunes - it helps more than you know! 

 

 

Dec 18

Episode 296: Berberine, Insulin Sensitivity, Glucose Control, Gut Health, Liver Health, Body Recomposition, AMPK Activation, Cholesterol Control, And More!

Intermittent Fasting

Welcome to Episode 296 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:

 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!

AVALONX MAGNESIUM 8Get Melanie’s Broad Spectrum Complex Featuring 8 Forms Of Magnesium, To Support Stress, Muscle Recovery, Cardiovascular Health, GI Motility, Blood Sugar Control, Mood, Sleep, And More! Tested For Purity & Potency. No Toxic Fillers. Glass Bottle. Avalonx Supplements Are Free Of Toxic Fillers, Common Allergens, Heavy Metals,  Mold, And Triple Tested For Purity And Potency. 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!

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!

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

SHOW NOTES

JOOVV: For A Limited Time Go To joovv.com/ifpodcast And Use The Code IFPODCAST For An Exclusive Discount!

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!

scotts backstory

GMP certified

Episode 265: All About Supplements With Scott Emmens, The Supplement Industry, Purity, Potency, Testing, Toxins, Authenticity, Organics, Common Additives, And More!

Continuous glucose monitos

Go To melanieavalon.com/nutrisensecgm And Use Coupon Code MelanieAvalon For $30 Off!

metformin

combining berberine with metformin

the types of anti-diabetic medications

the benefits of berberine

what is berberine?

AVALON MAGNESIUM 8: Use The Code Melanieavalon For 10% On Any Order At Avalonx.Us And MDlogichealth.Com!

the history of berberine

the effect on the GI tract

dosing

The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast Episode #93 - Shawn Wells

The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast Episode #166 - Megan Ramos

the contraindications

meal timing

body Composition

AMPK activation

positive effects on the liver

dihydroberberine

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!

the journey of creating the supplement

purity testing

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 296 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.

Hi friends, you guys know how seriously I take my health routine. That is probably the understatement of the year. One of my literal non-negotiables that I talk about all the time that I use every single day of my life is getting my daily dose of red-light therapy. For years now, yes years, I've been using Joovv and I love it because it is so relaxing and so easy to use. You've probably heard me talk about Joovv before that's J-O-O-V-V. I use my devices daily to support healthy cellular function, which is the literal foundation of our health. If you've heard any of my episodes on mitochondrial health you know this is true. Having healthy cellular function helps give me peace of mind that my body is working efficiently and has the energy that it needs to get through the day. There are so many clinically proven benefits from red light therapy and I have personally so experienced many of them. I use the red light to naturally regulate my circadian rhythm. I wind down with it at night and wake up in the morning with it. Whenever I have any muscle pain or soreness. I shine my Joovv red light on it and the pain instantly goes away. It's actually shocking. I love it for skin health, it makes my skin glow. And you can also use it for things that I originally got into red light therapy for which was supporting my thyroid. Yes, I struggle with hypothyroidism and supporting hair growth. Aside from the benefits, I've been recommending Joovv for years because the quality of their devices is simply the best. Their modular design allows for a variety of setup options that gives you flexibility plus the treatments are easy and can be done in as little as 10 minutes. Although I tend to run mine all day as ambient light. All you have to do is relax and let your body take in the light. Joovv offers several different size options including a wireless handheld device called the Joovv Go. That is amazing for targeting specific areas around your body like hurting joints or sore muscles.

When I traveled recently and had torn something in my knee, I brought my Joovv Go with me, game changer, I don't know how I would have survived the trip without it. Health doesn't have to be complicated and Joovv makes it simple by helping what matters most, our cells. So, go check out the Joovv today and while you're there, Joovv is offering all our listeners an exclusive discount on their first order. Just go to joovv.com/ifpodcast and apply the coupon code, IFPODCAST to your qualifying order. Again, that's joovv.com/ifpodcast with the coupon code IFPODCAST. Pick up a Joovv today, some exclusions do apply and we will put all of 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 future generations. That's because ladies when we have babies, a huge percentage 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 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. 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 296 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon and I am here with a very special guest today, quickly becoming a crowd favorite. I am here with Scott Emmens. He is the chief operating officer and cofounder of MD Logic Health, which is an incredible supplement company that you guys are quickly becoming very familiar with because they are actually my partner in bringing you AvalonX. So, serrapeptase and magnesium that we've had and Scott is back here today. Well, first of all, because he's basically one of my favorite people in the entire world and I mean that from the bottom of my heart. But secondly, I am thrilled that we are about to launch-- actually when this comes out, we will have just launched my third AvalonX supplement. And it is something that I already personally had been taking every day in my life. Not only that, but it's something I've talked about on this show so, so much. Since this show is The Intermittent Fasting Podcast, it is something that really relates to metabolic health, blood sugar levels, how well you can do your fast, and then on top of that so many other health benefits that I actually didn't even really realize until sitting down to make my own version of this supplement. And that is berberine. I've been looking forward to this episode for a long. Scott, thank you so much for being here.

Scott Emmens: Hi, Melanie, thank you for having me on the show. I'm thrilled to be on and even more excited that we're you're finally launching berberine.

Melanie Avalon: I know, I feel like this has been such a long time coming. Okay, a lot of our audience is probably familiar with you because you've actually been on the show twice before you came on. We did a whole episode on magnesium with Cynthia. And then more recently, you did an episode with Cynthia for her creatine supplement because Scott also partners with Cynthia for her supplement line. Basically, we just really love Scott. But for those who are not familiar, Scott, super briefly, could you tell your backstory?

Scott Emmens: Sure, for those folks who may not have heard the first podcast when we went through that. I was in the biotech and pharmaceutical space for 25 years in a variety of positions, in marketing, sales, and sales leadership. I eventually got out to manage market side as well as operations and operational side. I really basically worked at some of the biggest pharma companies that people have heard of Takeda Pharmaceuticals, AstraZeneca pharmaceuticals, which was at the time part of Merck, Shire, and then became a startup expert, and worked my way into the C-suite of multiple pharmaceutical companies. And I really kind of around 2018 decided I was going to start my own biotech company and did that, very successful and literally right around 2020, when the pandemic first started, I'd decided that I really wanted to get into the wellness space. And we had sold our biotech company and I had three partners. And we decided, my partner and I, at the time thought, "Let's do a wellness line, make a wellness company." We had a connection with one of the largest US manufacturers. He is a partner in MD Logic as well. And we really just both believed in making people and keeping people well and letting them optimize their life through supplemental nutrition.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, that's something that I really, really love working with you is you have seen the industry side of things. You know what you're doing. I have learned much and creating the supplement line, just what goes on in the supplement creation world, and how creating our own supplement line that is not a pharmaceutical, how it compares to that. And also, all of the crazy practices that go on in this industry it's a little bit shocking.

Scott Emmens: Yeah, it can be and I think that's where my pharmaceutical background really helps is making sure that we're going to do everything by the book. And by the book meaning people often see GMP on their label, it'll say GMP or GMP certified. And what that stands for is "Good Manufacturing Process." That's a compiled document from the FDA of very specific things you need to do, both in terms of the manufacturing of the product, the storage of the product, the cleanliness of the machines, the raw ingredients, the testing of the raw ingredients, as well as a number of other things including how you label even down to the font size of the label. And then including, of course, what you say about the product and how you make claims and that's where people tend to get in trouble.

We try to make the absolute best product we can. We have a great process for GMP. We have been audited by the FDA as most GMP companies are about every other year or so, and have a pristine track record and I am here to make sure that your supplements and MD Logic health supplements maintain that pristine record of both incredible quality, testing, and maintain the highest standards of GMP or above.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I am do grateful for this because honestly my goal in making supplements was, I knew I wanted to make the very best on the market. And it has been so refreshing to have a partner like you who is in line with that. And even every time I send my emails or I'm creating my content to promote the different supplements, I've come up with my list of basically the qualities about the AvalonX supplements. I say at the beginning that these are the only supplements on the market that are all of these things. And to my best of my knowledge, that's true. They're the only ones that are tested multiple times for purity and potency, free of all allergens. Scott and I have gone to great lengths to get rid of problematic fillers from the supplements, which has been a whole journey on its own, especially revisit, I'll put a link to it in the show notes the episode that we did on--. No, wait, "We haven't done the episode and serrapeptase yet, did we?" I think we talked about it though.

Scott Emmens: I think we did talk about it? But I've to go back into my memory log. But I believe we did talk about the serrapeptase, yeah.

Melanie Avalon: Did you come on this show for serrapeptase?

Scott Emmens: I think this might be my third appearance. I think I did do the serrapeptase first, then the magnesium, and then creatine. Yeah, I think serrapeptase was the very first one.

Melanie Avalon: My bad. So, this is your fourth time back?

Scott Emmens: Oh my goodness, how time flies. [laughs] 

Melanie Avalon: Oh, and you're having fun. [laughs] Okay, wait. In any case, listen to the serrapeptase episode if you want to hear the craziness with the fillers and the lubrication agents and also something that's incredible that really I think makes us stand apart is they are in glass bottles, which is very rare and unique in the supplement world. It's just been an amazing journey. "Shall we talk about our berberine journey?"

Scott Emmens: Let's talk a little bit about the berberine journey, I think the audience would love to hear what transpired? Why did it take us so long? And yeah, why don't you kick it off now?

Melanie Avalon: Okay, I started taking berberine when I started wearing something that our listeners are probably pretty familiar with which is the continuous glucose monitor. Just briefly a continuous glucose monitor is you put it on your arm, and it gives you a basically 24/7 look at your blood sugar levels. It is so eye-opening, so fascinating. Because when you're getting just doing a finger prick or yeah, a finger prick or blood draw for your blood glucose that's really just a snapshot in time. And it's not very telling of what is happening consistently. If listeners who like to get a continuous glucose monitor, you can go to nutrisense.io/ifpodcast and the promo code IFPODCAST will get you $30 off any subscription program to a NutriSense CGM, so definitely check that out. But in any case, doing a CGM really made me look more at my blood sugar levels and that's when I wanted to see what I could do to help lower it.

Berberine is considered to be the go-to "Natural Supplement" to address blood sugar levels. The go-to pharmaceutical to address blood sugar levels is metformin. There have been multiple studies comparing metformin to berberine and finding similar effects, which is incredible. So basically, berberine can be comparable to metformin in lowering blood sugar, lowering HbA1c, which is a longer term picture of your blood sugar levels and also lowering insulin without any of the potential side effects of metformin or the other negative side effects that can come with other metabolic health blood sugar controlling agents.

Scott Emmens: Certainly, I think that's absolutely correct. One thing we want to caution and make certain that we're not giving medical advice nor are we suggesting that anyone replace their metformin with berberine, not at all. What we are saying is that berberine has some remarkable properties and there's a lot of data, in fact, it's one of the most studied herbs or alkaloids out there. And we really feel passionate about all the benefits. In fact, I was stunned to see how many benefits there are with berberine as we really dug into the research, but again, we just want to caution, never add anything or take anything away, especially metformin for diabetic patients. So, just want to make sure that that's perfectly clear.

Melanie Avalon: Oh, yeah, I'm so glad you said that. And that's actually really appropriate because we got a lot of questions about that, Karina said, "How is it different than metformin?" Marie said, "Can you take it while taking metformin?" and Lea said, "Can it be taken if one is already on metformin, can it be taken instead of metformin?" So, just to dive deeper into all of that and to what Scott just said? Metformin as well as some other drugs that are used for similar purposes can have side effects. Metformin notoriously has gastrointestinal discomfort. Metformin cannot be used by diabetics or liver disease, renal impairment or cardiopulmonary insufficiency, and then some other related drugs like I don't even know how you say it. Is it pio?

Scott Emmens: Pioglitazone. I know that one because I sold it.

Melanie Avalon: I was like "Scott probably knows it."

Scott Emmens: Pioglitazone or pioglitazone.

Melanie Avalon: So, that one can increase the risks of distal bone fractures, bladder cancer, and edema. Here's another one Scott, sulfonylur--

Scott Emmens: Sulfonylureas?

Melanie Avalon: Yes, yeah, that was linked to hypoglycemia, weight gain, and cardiovascular damage. When we compare this to berberine, very little if any side effects, some people do have some GI issues potentially in the beginning, which we can talk about. But we can definitely dive into that. Because ironically, even with GI issues, berberine has a ton of potential benefits for GI Health. But besides that, you basically get all of the benefits of blood sugar control with a myriad of other benefits that we're going to talk about without the potential negative side effects of these pharmaceuticals. And there have been like Scott said, "We are not saying to stop your medications. We're not saying to even add this to your medications, that's something you would want to talk with your doctor about." Anything that you're doing, playing with your medications, definitely work with your doctor. That said, there's actually been quite a few studies looking at berberine in combination with metformin and finding beneficial effects, potentially that it might be a better approach, not saying to do this, work with your doctor. But potentially that combination therapy might be better than metformin alone because you can get more of the benefits with less of side effects.

Scott Emmens: Just going to add to that to just make sure that people make certain that if you add berberine to an antidiabetic, it can cause hypoglycemia. That's something you want to be cautious. Whatever the side effects of your prescription medication are, you want to let your physician know that you're going to take berberine and get their permission, make sure that the drugs you're on are not going to interfere with it because some drugs can have hypoglycemia on their own, when you add something like berberine, it can increase that potential. That's something people have to be very cautious of. Hypoglycemia can be a life-threatening condition as those folks who've had it know. It's interesting Melanie, the three drugs you mentioned, metformin which is sort of the gold standard, about 80% of diabetics are taking metformin or what used to be called Glucophage, the brand name, pioglitazone or TZD as they're known, which is an insulin resistance molecule, works on PPARalpha and PPARgamma. And then you mentioned was sulfonylurea which actually works on the pancreas to secrete more insulin. So, each one of those works differently. Metformin primarily works on the liver preventing gluconeogenesis and a little bit of insulin resistance. Then there's a TZD class pioglitazone, that works primarily on insulin resistance. And then there is some sulfonylurea class which increases your pancreas' output of insulin. They all work in different ways and they can all have different interactions with berberine, so again always talk to your physician. I think the real benefit Melanie is that berberine doesn't-- you don't have to have high blood sugar or you don't have to have diabetes to benefit, in fact, the real benefit we want to talk about today is what is the benefit for just people in general that want to optimize their health and optimize their cellular function and their energy. And that is where berberine shines.

Melanie Avalon: First of all, that was highly impressive, that you knew all of that. [chuckles] "I'm so impressed." Okay. Yeah, I'm so glad you said that because that is the exact same page that I'm on. And like I said, I came to it originally for blood sugar control and I think that's why most people think about it and it's a great reason to take it, but there are so many other benefits like whole body benefits. So, the questions we had, very simple, Kersey said, "Why do I need it?" Jennifer said, "What are all the benefits that come from taking it?" Amy said, "Will it help with insulin resistance?" And then what we will also get into Paul said, "Wondering what other health benefits it offers besides blood sugar regulation?" Andrea said, "Does it have any other benefits besides preventing lessening glucose spikes." So, we can dive deep into all of that. But to start off, I would like to give an overview of how it does work for blood sugar control because I think that really speaks to why it can be really beneficial to take when you understand that it's not like a pharmaceutical where-- With the pharmaceuticals they typically have a more singular approach to why they're working, compared to berberine that has all of these effects that can create this metabolic health.

For the blood glucose control, like Scott had mentioned it can be used for addressing insulin sensitivity and reducing blood sugar. It's so interesting because there are many studies. I had much fun preparing for this because there are many different hypotheses for how it's doing that. One of the main mechanisms and Scott mentioned this is that directly in the liver, it actually can reduce the liver's ability to actually create glucose or like create glucose and release it into the bloodstream. Because a mind-blowing fact-- I remember when I first learned this and it blew my mind because I think most people don't realize this, is that when people have high blood sugar levels most people think it is from what they're eating, which it is, but the actual, like 24/7 higher blood sugar levels, that's mostly being controlled by your liver. So, it's your liver creating glucose and releasing glucose.

Berberine actually inhibits that, it reduces enzymes directly in the liver that do that process, so then it can't happen. And interestingly, they have found that even though it helps insulin sensitivity, it doesn't seem to actually affect insulin production in the liver, so it's working independently of that which is really interesting. It can actually be directly in the gut reduce intestinal glucose absorption. So, just starting at the very beginning, it can stop the glucose from actually entering the body in the first place and that's by inhibiting a specific enzyme called a glucosidase activity. And that's an intestinal enzyme that actually digests carbs and converts them into more simpler sugars. Stopping that keeps you from actually absorbing some of those carbs in the first place. And then, beyond all of those enzymes and such it also can actually affect the transport of glucose throughout the body. And then on top of that, we can talk about the gut health potential of it. But a lot of researchers have hypothesized that its beneficial effects on the gut microbiome actually have a secondary effect of blood sugar control by the metabolic health state that is created from that so the anti-inflammatory state, the encouraging of short-chain fatty acid butyrate-producing bacteria when butyrate is created and gets into the bloodstream, it actually can help with glycemic control and the reduction of inflammation in the gut from endotoxin and LPS and the recruitment of macrophages and I realized I say all these words really fast and I know what they mean, but people might not know what they mean, so that's basically like the toxic byproducts that are created from "bad bacteria," because I realized saying good and bad bacteria can be a little bit simplistic. It reduces the inflammatory potential of the gut and inflammation is a key driver in metabolic issues. I can stop there a little bit. So, you want to jump in at all, Scott?

Scott Emmens: Well, first of all, great, I think it's a fantastic overview. And you can see how many different complex mechanisms berberine appears to have and why it has a broad base of positive impact across a number of organs and organ systems and then in particular blood sugar. I think we're going to learn a lot more as this molecule is again becoming, I shouldn't say molecule, this plant alkaloid is becoming hot on people's radar again. And I think at the end of the day, insulin is such a powerful hormone that when you can maintain blood glucose, which your audience is all about, the intermittent fasting audience really understands what blood glucose is about. But I don't know that we talk about the power of insulin and how powerful it is. I don't know if berberine lowers your fasting insulin and/or postprandial insulin meaning after a meal. My guess would be yes because it's lowering blood glucose with people that are already in normal ranges, well, then it's going to probably lower your insulin.

And we know in the presence of insulin, it's more difficult to burn fat, so it's all these different ways in which it slows the breakdown of glucose, it slows the liver's export or gluconeogenesis creating new sugar to push out into the bloodstream. All of the different mechanisms I think are fascinating and the more we learn about it, I think the more we're going to realize that this compound is going to have some very significant overall benefits for your wellbeing on a number of different organ systems.

Melanie Avalon: I'm glad you said that. Two things to comment on, the insulin piece. I did find studies showing a reduction in insulin. It was once where they were comparing it to metformin and they were looking at the long-term effects of that. And then there are so many studies talking about how it increases insulin sensitivity, that is definitely happening. But I'm so glad you said that because we probably should start with a really important question or we should get to a really important question. Jennifer said, "What is it? Is it a plant, a fruit, etc.?" April said, "I know serrapeptase comes from silkworms, but where does berberine come from? When did people start using it?" I realized we were saying like we haven't really defined what it is. So, it is a plant alkaloid and Scott, would you like to talk about the plant that it comes from? And why we chose the one that we chose?

Scott Emmens: There are different forms of berberine based on the plant source that it comes from. The one that's being used in our Vedic Medicine in India and is usually the form that is used in most of the studies you're going to see and I hope I pronounce this right, but it's Berberis Aristata I believe and that's spelled B-E-R-B-E-R-I-S A-R-I-S-T-A-T-A and that is the form that we've used and that comes from the Indian barberry tree or shrub and it is a shrub that belongs to the genus Berberis and it is found specifically in India. And there are many different species of this shrub. And it's typically found in the Himalaya area of India and Nepal as well as other places in Sri Lanka and that is the form that we’ve utilized.

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Do you know when they started using berberine?

Scott Emmens: I'm going to take an educated guess-- Because our Vedic Medicine goes back a while, I'm going to take an educated guess and say 1500 years ago.

Melanie Avalon: 3000 BC.

Scott Emmens: Wow.

Melanie Avalon: To treat diarrhea and dysentery. That's like when I very first started, isn't that crazy? That has a long safety record, I will say [chuckles] which we can circle back to.

Scott Emmens: So, I was only off by 4000 years, not bad. [chuckles]

Melanie Avalon: It probably got upregulated more little bit later when it first appeared. And like I said, that was to treat diarrhea and dysentery. And just to circle back a little bit to the GI Health aspect to really fill that out. There's been many studies on berberine and its effect on gut bacteria. And actually, we have a question about this, so I'll just tie that in right now. For example, Nikki said, "I've heard people say not to take it daily because it changes your gut bacteria, what are your thoughts on that?" Morris said, "This would be my question. I always cycle on and off of it, but I know Melanie does not?" And then Karen said, "Berberine is used as an herbal antibacterial/antimicrobial, which I was going to get to, so I'm glad she said that." She said, "In addition to the blood sugar lowering properties that you are focusing on, I'm concerned about negative effects on beneficial gut bacteria with regular use of this product, can you speak to that?" I'm super happy that people were asking me about that. There have been a lot of studies looking at its effect on gut bacteria populations, and across the board it tends to increase the "Positive good bacteria, specifically Bacteroides and decrease the more inflammatory bacteria specifically Firmicutes." Because those are the two that if you know about gut microbiome, you might have heard of them before, but there's been a lot of other studies, for example, it's directly antibacterial against E. coli and clostridium difficile. It can increase, I mentioned this earlier, the short-chain fatty acid-producing bacteria, specifically and I don't know if I'm going to say these right. Phascolarctobacterium, Anaerotruncus, and Acidobacteria, those are all short-chain fatty acid-producing bacteria that can help with intestinal integrity. And it also may inhibit a certain type of bacteria that has been connected to obesity, which is super cool. And we can actually get into the obesity, body fat bit in a little bit. Basically, it seems to have a very beneficial effect on gut bacteria. I would not be personally and again you can make your own decisions and choices, but I personally am not concerned about the effect because it seems to have a very beneficial effect. I actually wonder, Scott, I'd be curious about your thoughts on this, I hypothesize that people who might sometimes be experiencing negative side effects in the beginning, it might be because they are playing with the populations of their bacteria and are experiencing a die-off effect because whenever you go after the bad guys, you can get negative side effects from that. It's a good thing because you are moving the needle towards more beneficial population. There might be some side effects in the interim. And, for example, I found there was one study looking at berberine compared to metformin and it found that all of the side effects only happened in the very beginning of the trial, and there's a longer-term trial. if you are experiencing gut issues in the beginning, I would suggest maybe lowering your dose so we can talk about this later and maybe sticking it out a little bit. But Scott, what are your thoughts?

Scott Emmens: I think your hypothesis is a pretty good one. Meaning anytime you're detoxing the body even if detoxing is a "Good Thing, " you know that you're killing off a lot of bad bacteria, and maybe you're not using a binding agent or you've got a lot of bad bacteria in your gut that could cause inflammation, the destruction of those can release toxins. Yeah, that could very well be, I think, that's a little speculative, but it's a reasonable theory. But what is pretty consistent is that the metformin side effects and the berberine side effects both seem to happen upfront. And the solution to that in the Glucophage world, is what doctors will say and many patients have probably heard this wording "Start low and go slow." if you are sensitive, you've never taken berberine before or you take two pills on day one and you feel a little bit of GI upset then back down to one capsule 500 mg once a day, kind of stabilize yourself and then you can work your way up. And that's really, I think, always goes for any medication or supplement, you always want the lowest effective dose. Now, we came out with the 500 mg, had a lot of discussion about what to recommend in terms of dosing, one to three capsules a day is where it landed because the majority of the data suggests that on the low end, 500 mg is right. On the higher end, 15 mg is correct. Many of the studies have been done with 500 mg three times a day, I don't think you want to take 1500 in one shot, really, you want to break that up over three doses. But that's where we found the sweet spot was. So, if people are experiencing side effects, I would say start with 500 and just slowly work your way up.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I'm so glad you said that because we had had obviously a lot of questions about dosaging, like Jennifer said, "How much can or should I take?" Claudia said, "How much to take? What's the dosage?" Anna Maria, "When is the best time to take it to optimize results?" Amy, "Is it best to cycle it or take it every day? Should one take it at the same time every day or time it more specifically to be ingested before you eat a potentially glucose-spiking meal?" Cheryl wanted to know "Do you take it with food or on an empty stomach?" And Nydia wanted to know "Does it break the fast?" Teresa also wanted to know "Is it something that you can take daily? I know Shawn Wells listed as one of his most recommended supplements. But I've heard Cynthia Thurlow say that she has people cycle it. I will put a link in the show notes, by the way to an episode I had with Shawn Wells on the Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast. I adore Shawn and he is one of the go-to people in the supplement world, he's just a phenom when it comes to that, but yeah, to answer all of those questions, Scott just gave a really nice overview of the dosage and we thought long and hard about what dosage to do for it more. Again, going back to what we talked about in the beginning about the craziness with regulations. It's crazy how you have to like figure out what you can actually say on the label to get the dosage that you want. It's hard to describe. But basically, I had a very clear idea of what I wanted to say. And it had to go through Scott and like the legal team to get it on the label the way I wanted it.

Scott Emmens: That is correct. And I think, that's why we take those precautions because it's important for the public to make sure that what we're saying is in line with what is appropriate, but also to make sure that we're following all of the guidelines, guidance, and making sure that we are in compliance to that. That comes from 25 years of pharmaceutical lawyers pounding into me what I can't say. I want to make sure we do that, but on the other side, it's also what is it that we can say that will really make sure we're giving a clear specific guidance that is in the best alignment with what the data and the research suggest. And I think we got there and I think to your frustration, Melanie, I think a lot of people assume that the supplement world is a free cowboy world. But there are very stringent guidelines on labeling, claim that you make on that label, what you can say, what you can name it. And even down to like, the font size and how you list the ingredients and what size, certain ingredients have to be in the font size. I mean it gets very particular. So, again, going back to this, "What is GMP?" If you're following CFR 21, which is the regulations on how you label a supplement properly along with what this GMP mean, it's extensive and I think that's been one of the learning lessons that you have come across as well. How many things you have to do to make sure you've done it? But then again, how many other companies want to escape that edge that goes 75 and a 65 and make sure they don't get a ticket. And we'd rather go 65 and 65, then do the 75. And I think that is an interesting learning from a lot of people that we work with in this space, physicians [unintelligible [00:39:42] and so forth.

Melanie Avalon: Again, just another reason I've been grateful to work with you because you get all of this and I have learned so much, and it's just really been a really amazing incredible experience. So yeah, the dosage we landed on that we mentioned is based on the majority of the study. Probably the majority of the studies are 0.5 g or 500 mg, those are comfortable three times a day. But it ranges from, actually in the studies it's not normally on the lower end, but it can be, so I wanted it to have it, a minimum of like 500 mg up to 2 g, which seems to be the upper limit. That's the way we had it working on the bottle so that it could cover that range. I will say-- because we got a question because I had Megan Ramos on the Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast, she's amazing, definitely listen to that interview with her. She shared a negative experience she had with berberine experimenting with it during pregnancy, I think.

Scott Emmens: Yeah, that's a no, no.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, and she was taking 2 g which again is the upper limit of that. For example, Lucy said, "Megan Ramos mentioned a few times that she was very sick with a negative reaction to berberine when she was on the Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast. I would like to know the main contraindications for berberine and how to avoid similar situations." Again, in that situation, revisiting that episode, Megan was taking the upper limit and while she was pregnant, I would start not at the upper limit, not take it during pregnancy or work with your doctor. So, definitely, you just want to be aware of all factors involved.

Scott Emmens: So, here are the contraindications, there're a few but they're fairly rare except for pregnancies. The first one is, if you're on Cyclosporin-A, you do not want to take berberine because it can have an interaction with the CYP43A for enzyme in the liver. Then you also do not want to take berberine with warfarin or thiopental, I think I'm saying that right, thiopental or tolbutamide because it can displace them from increasing the blood and increase the blood toxicity of those particular drugs. Warfarin has what's called the very narrow therapeutic index. Some of these other drugs do as well. If you increase just their bioavailability a tad or decrease it a tad it either will become toxic or can become ineffective. Those are contraindications. And then macrolide antibiotics such as azithromycin and clarithromycin may also interact, they're not contraindicated, but they are certainly something that you do not want to take berberine with unless you absolutely had to, based on a physician recommendation. And lastly, we do not want to take berberine if you are pregnant, that's contraindicated as well.

Melanie Avalon: Yes, I'm glad we could speak to that as far as does it break a fast? No, it will support your fast if anything. I actually don't take it the way most people take it. Well, first of all, I'm not eating three times a day. I'm not taking it three times a day before meals, I actually take it in the morning in the fasted state. And then I actually don't take it later before my meal. Although I probably should experiment with doing that come to think of it that would probably be beneficial. The reason I was doing that was I was just seeing the biggest spike in my blood sugar in the early part of the day, but you can really experiment and find what works for you. But typically, people are taking it before meals. Yeah, do you have any thoughts about that, Scott?

Scott Emmens: If you have a CGM, you want to experiment with that or if you take your blood sugar through another means, I think you want to experiment with that. For me, personally, I'm going to take one probably on an empty stomach starting when I start my new regime in January. Typically, when I take berberine, it's going to be about an hour to an hour and a half before my meal because I want to get the berberine inside my intestines, I want it to be metabolized and we're talking a little bit about the metabolites and the active metabolites of berberine. I think about an hour to an hour and a half prior to my meal to ensure that the maximum blood plasma level is there and that the metabolites are beginning to get into my system. That to me seems reasonable. Now, if you have GI upset, it's probably going to be the best to take it closer to your meal. I think you want to experiment with that both from a what's most comfortable for you? And then if you have the ability to measure your blood glucose, what's working best for you? For example, there's someone who owns a CGM company, he has a podcast. I've just listened to his podcast in preparation for the show and he had some limited success with berberine pre-meals. 

Now keep in mind, this is someone who is on a very restricted diet, he understands insulin, he's probably already in a low-insulin, low-glycemic state to begin with. He didn't see a lot of change with berberine before meals, but when he took it for the fasting insulin in the evening, he noticed dramatic decrease in his fasting insulin in the mornings. And that speaks to the liver part of gluconeogenesis because your liver's job with gluconeogenesis is to keep you from going into hypoglycemia while you sleep. And when you are diabetic or you have blood sugar issues that are beginning, your liver might be getting the wrong signal thinking, "Hey, we don't have enough glucose." So, it's pushing glucose out even though your glucose is already very high. So, based on the various ways that seems berberine works, I think each person's body type and where they're at, it's going to have a different impact, my personal recommendation for me is going to be to try to start taking it on an empty stomach, hour and a half before meals is what I currently do. And then I might experiment with a pre-evening dose.

Melanie Avalon: I'm so glad that you mentioned body fat. I know you're talking about it in a little bit different context. But I do want to talk briefly about the super cool effect that berberine can potentially have on body composition especially because I know a lot of people-- one of their main goals, possibly why they're listening to this podcast is for body composition effects. And there's been a lot of studies looking at berberine's effect on body re-composition with or without weight loss. So, it seems that in particular berberine can actually reduce the levels of inflammatory fat specifically, so visceral fat is a type of fat that is found surrounding the organs. And it's actually the type of fat linked to metabolic health issues compared to like subcutaneous fat, which is found underneath the skin and which is considered to actually be more benign when it comes to health issues. So, berberine has been found in some studies, it leads to weight loss specifically reducing visceral fat and in some studies, there's actually not weight loss, but there is a shift in the type of body fat, which is super cool. Basically, it's making your body more healthy when it comes to fat. Mice treated with berberine have actually been found to have shrunken adipocytes. Basically, their fat cells are smaller which is super cool. Other studies basically propose that the anti-obesity activity of berberine can involve in part not only decreased size of lipid droplets but actually also the number of lipid droplets. There's a study suggesting that berberine actually increases thermogenesis in brown and white tissue.

Scott Emmens: Yeah, that was very interesting to me.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, basically increasing burning calories in your fat tissue, which is very cool, because you really want to stack especially with our modern diet environment, you want to do everything you can to stack the cards in your favor, to have a healthy metabolic profile when it comes to body fat. And it can be hard to do that, especially when there are cellular mechanisms involved. And anything that can really affect that, like berberine, can definitely be something to try. It can also discourage the creation of new fat cells "super cool." And that's actually by affecting transcripts and factors that are involved in creating fat cells in the first place. And then, for example, a review of five studies that encompassed 1078 women and you know I love when we got studies in women, found that it did indeed induce a redistribution of fat tissue, specifically reducing that inflammatory visceral fat that I spoke of. And speaking of the inflammatory potential, not only is it reducing the amount of inflammatory fat, it actually may make fat in general less inflammatory by reducing the recruitment of macrophages to fatty tissue. So, macrophages are basically-- for these things that go in-- and you can think of them like Pac-Man, they go and gobble up things. They're good, we want them in our bodies. They deal with getting rid of waste and fighting pathogens and things like that. But when you have an overabundance of them, it can be a very inflammatory state. And a lot of people's resistant fat, when people really just struggle to burn fat. It can be because the fat itself has become inflammatory, and it becomes resistant to fat burning.

Scott Emmens: Are you referring to brown fat versus white fat in adipose tissue?

Melanie Avalon: It found that it activated thermogenesis in both of them which is super cool. Did you find one showing that it increased brown?

Scott Emmens: Yes, I found a few studies that say that berberine promotes the recruitment and activation of brown adipose tissue in mice and in humans, which was pretty interesting. There was another study about berberine-activated thermogenesis in both white and brown adipose tissue, but one of the things I thought was so interesting was that it does seem it can help your body promote brown fat, thus thermogenesis and brown fat is packed with mitochondria. It keeps you from shivering, that's why babies have a lot of brown fat versus white fat, white fat that being the inflammatory version, brown fat being more of what they call an activated fat which has its own mitochondria in it and really actually is more of a positive energy-burning fat than white fat is. So, that I found really interesting. And even so to get to your point, if you don't lose weight, if you're just shifting that fat from the more inflammatory to the less inflammatory, more highly energetic fat, I think you're going to reap a lot of benefits.

Melanie Avalon: I'm so glad you said that, you really revealed that you haven't a grasp of what's going on because brown fat and white fat like Scott mentioned, brown fat is really high in mitochondria, it's activated by cold is something that activates it, it actually helps you lose weight which is ironic because it is fat, but it creates heat. And it basically wastes energy. But the thing that you said, Scott that I mean, I already knew this, but maybe made it aware that you actually really know what you're talking about. I think a lot of people think brown fat and because they associate it with cold, they think "Oh, that's like shivering," but it's not, it actually keeps you from shivering because the alternative to brown fat is to shiver, basically.

Scott Emmens: Exactly, and do you know how I know that, Melanie?

Melanie Avalon:  No.

Scott Emmens: Ice baths have taught me that. [laughs]

Melanie Avalon: I was going to say cryotherapy.

Scott Emmens: Yes, I am an ice bath guy. And I'm about to embark on a January 1 through February Polar Plunge for mental health benefits. I am currently back in training filling my tub up with giant hunks of ice and getting in there for 10 minutes or so to adapt. And I discovered the benefit of brown fat as I was really-- This goes back to 2016 when I first began doing ice bath, which by the way changed my life in so many ways. But that's when I discovered what brown fat was, why it was important and how I adapted to the cold over time by creating more of this brown fat. I mean, the first time I got in an ice bath, it was 60 seconds of pure shivering and agony. Three months later, I could sit in there for 8, 10 minutes at 40 degrees temperature of Fahrenheit and not shiver at all. In fact, one time I stayed in long because I hadn't shivered. I did get a little hypothermic, so that's how I learned about brown fat and white fat was through ice bath.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, that's super cool. I remember Scott and I met. When did we meet? Spring of 2021?

Scott Emmens: I think you're right. I think it was April of 2021.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, because we launched serrapeptase in 2021.

Scott Emmens: November. Yeah.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, I think that was one of our first conversations way back in the day.

Scott Emmens: First conversation was ice bath and then followed by a lot of discussion on infrared, near-infrared and therapy and saunas, which I'm also a huge fan of, by the way.

Melanie Avalon: Yes, so many things. One last health benefit-related thing I think we should talk about, especially with this show one of the reasons people often do fasting, well, it's not the reason, but something we've talk about a lot with the benefits of fasting is how fasting stimulates something called an AMPK, which is basically a fuel sensing enzyme. It plays a key role in how our bodies use energy and it's activated by stressors like calorie restriction, fasting, and exercise. It is associated with so many health benefits like you want AMPK activation, it helps with longevity, metabolic health, inflammation, so many things. Berberine has found to be a very potent stimulator of AMPK, which is awesome. And then another fasting-related thing we talk all the time on here about autophagy which is activated by fasting as well. And it's where the body actually goes down and breaks down problematic proteins and recycles them. It's like a cleanse on the cellular level. It's very, very important for metabolic health and longevity. And berberine has also been found to be a stimulator of autophagy, so that is awesome.

Scott Emmens: People underestimate the importance of healthy autophagy getting rid of cells or what they might call zombie cells or mitochondria that need to go because they'll contaminate the other healthy mitochondria around it. I think autophagy is a tremendous benefit. And obviously, the AMPK there's a plethora of data on all the various things that impacts across your longevity and health span. One of the things that I don't think we touched on but, I know came up in literature quite a bit, is the positive benefits of berberine on the liver. And I'm a big guy on liver. I think if your liver is not functioning right, if it's not making bile, if it's not digesting your toxins properly, you're going to end up in trouble. And so, to me, I think that the liver benefits of berberine have probably underestimated at this point. There's not as much data and studies as I'd like to see. But there is definitely data to suggest that it works to support liver enzyme health, liver function in the presence of toxins, and I think that is really important. When you look at the overall effect of what berberine is doing to your point earlier, it's working on AMPK, it's working on glucose, it's working on your gut microbiome, it's working on your liver and your liver's function. And I think all of these things combined lead to, in my mind, one conclusion which is, there's something about this particular product that allows your body to function in an optimal level while keeping the blood glucose down, supporting mitochondria, supporting liver health and I think it all ties back to, if blood glucose and insulin are lower, then you're going to have a cascade of positive effects across your body. And I think that is why CGMs have become so popular as people realize that if they can keep their blood glucose at a reasonably modest normal level without having huge spikes throughout the day, that overall is going to lead to a longer and healthier lifespan. The data on that is pretty convincing. That's where I think berberine shines as this molecule plant alkaloid that just has so many benefits. So back to the liver, there is a couple of studies on liver enzymes and also on liver function. I would encourage people to take a look at that research. Again, of course, always speak to your doctor if you're taking anything for liver disease.

Melanie Avalon: I'm so glad you mentioned that as well because that actually goes really well with one other health benefit I want to touch on and it also involves the liver, so glad we're talking about it. And that is the role of berberine on cholesterol levels and lipid panels. Margaret said for example, "Is it okay to take it long term to help lower cholesterol" and we can speak to the long-term aspect in a bit but just as far as the cholesterol side of things. Not only does it directly reduces the absorption of lipids into circulation from your gut, because the whole caveat there is dietary cholesterol is not necessarily the primary driver of problematic cholesterol levels. It's more at least in my opinion, the creation of endogenous cholesterol and what's happening with that. And the effects in the liver on cholesterol and lipids is-- I mean, there's so many so.

It can promote the liver's LDL receptor mRNA expression to beneficially modulate LDL levels, it can directly inhibit the creation of cholesterol and triglycerides in liver cells. In rodent trials it's been found to inhibit NAFLD, nonalcoholic fatty liver disease in mice fed a high-fat diet, which is huge and in human trials have actually found that berberine supplementation can reduce liver enzymes in patients with type 2 diabetes and so going back to what Scott was saying about liver health and it can also reduce fatty acid synthesis directly in the liver and a lot of transcripts and factors related to fatty liver. And for example, there was one study in humans and not only did they find decreased body weight and BMI in those on berberine, but what was super cool about the study is it had people do berberine and then have a washout period where they were not taking the berberine and then go back on the berberine. And they found that their triglycerides, their cholesterol, their LDL, and their HDL all improved based on when they were like taking the berberine. When they were on the berberine, it improved. When they went off, it went away. And then when they went on again, it approved again. Lots of potential benefits there with cholesterol and lipids.

Scott Emmens: Yeah, I totally agree. And the one part I'd like to focus on that is with triglycerides. Having been in the diabetes universe for 15 years or so, one of the things that I spoke with when I worked with endocrinologists, those are the specialists that treat diabetes, the thing that the cutting-edge endocrinologist would tell you is if you see someone that has a relatively high fasting glucose, but they are not diabetic, but their triglycerides are above normal. He's like that person is going to have diabetes if they don't change their lifestyle in a few years. Triglycerides are the leading indicator like "Hey, you're on your way to diabetes if you don't change this." Your body is basically taking this sugar and trying to figure out what it's going to do with it because it can't do something. This isn't the scientific way to say this, but basically, your triglycerides are this canary in the coal mine, that if they're high, but your blood glucose hasn't quite broken, technically the diabetic limit, you're probably on your way there. That's something you really want to look out for [the fact that it does have these studies that show that it can have a positive impact and support the body's ability to reduce triglycerides really says something to me about the way that it's working for blood glucose.

Melanie Avalon: And I think that actually ties in nicely to something that I want to talk about, which is this specific form that we chose because we got a lot of questions about dihydroberberine. for example, Teresa said, "She wants to know the difference between berberine versus dihydroberberine." Erin said, the same thing, "What's the difference between those two?" Suzie said, "What is the difference between them and what is the best?" Paul said that "He actually did better taking dihydroberberine that he didn't have the bloatation and the gassy issues?" And then Amanda said that --Oh, this is something that we can speak to the absorption levels. Amanda said, "Mike Mutzel talks about not using the highly absorbable kind," which presumably, I'm assuming is the dihydroberberine, as that's how berberine is effective in the gut by not being highly absorbable. Just speaking to what you were just talking about Scott with all of these over-encompassing effects and many things that are going on, shall we talk about? Because we debated for a long time about? Well, more so in the beginning, I think once we got to an understanding about it, we felt pretty good. But we were looking at? Should we do a berberine or should we do a dihydroberberine? Dihydroberberine is a newer form of berberine, at least from being like sold and marketed, which is said to be more absorbable and said to have a more potent effect on lowering blood sugar? We chose not to do that. Scott, would you like to explain a little bit why?

Scott Emmens: At first, it was two things. I think this goes back to my experience with prodrugs and metabolites prodrugs and then also looking at the data. Of the 30 years' worth of research that we have a good grasp on and there's a ton in the last 15 years, all of it is on berberine or the vast, vast majority I should say. There is very little data on dihydroberberine beyond just either its increase of "plasma level," but plasma level is not really what separates Berberine from the pack. I'll give you an analogy and tell me if it's apt Melanie. But with CBD, for example, "If you get a pure 100% isolated CBD, you may have no effect from it because it's not just the CBD, it's the CBD, CBG, it's the other cannabinoids inside that product that give it an entourage effect along with terpenes and other things that create that. Then if you add the other factor into metabolites from a prodrug is a drug that goes in as an inactive substance. And then your liver converts it into an active substance. Well, berberine happens to have no less than four active metabolites and as many, in some reports as 17 metabolites. And we don't know what those metabolites do, but it's pretty clear, and here's a direct quote from an article. Let me just make sure I get the title. "This is the metabolism of berberine and its contribution to the pharmacological effects." 

And then let me read this quote because this wasn't something we had focused on a ton in the beginning, but we discussed it, but the more we did the research, the more evident it became that there's something unique about it. "Even though berberine possesses a low oral bioavailability, it has exhibited marked biological activities in vivo which is in people and concentrations of its major metabolites such as berberrubine, thalifendine, I'm going to say these wrong, I'll butcher these names, demethyleneberberine, and jatrorrhizine, that is butcher of those names, but they are relatively high. And then it says, "These reports indicate that the metabolites of berberine may be active constituents which are representative of the biological activities of berberine in vivo and I mean that sums it up that there is something unique about berberine despite this, "Low bioavailability." Study after study shows that it works and then now we're getting more and more studies that are coming in. And our ability to measure these metabolites that are coming in active tablets, meaning your livers convert it into a new active form of berberine. They are actually also stored in your various organs, like your liver, in your kidneys, in your brain and other places that allow for these other properties of berberine or that we suspect based on the data allow for these other properties of berberine. By isolating one particular compound, yes, you may get less side effects, but you may not get all of the benefits of berberine. And I think between that and the fact that the data is very consistent on berberine, says berberine is the way to go. Now, we might decide to do a dihydroberberine in the future for some other specific reason, but if we're looking to get the maximum benefit across the spectrum of berberine, then we wanted to use the whole berberine plant.

Melanie Avalon: I think it's so interesting, Scott found, I don't know if it's the one that you were just speaking about, or if it was a different one. But you found this really great article, which basically speaks to this issue that people will say about berberine, which I find really ironic because people will say it's not very absorbable, like an issue basically, and that we need to fix it. But it's just really ironic, because all of the studies for so long and then it's been used for thousands of years, have been working with it in this form, so clearly, it's working in this form.

Scott Emmens: And then all of the data is in this form. When they saw the studies we read to you today, all of the data we've read to you today is from berberine. And so, you could take a chance that yes because it's more "Absorbable" and less impactful in your gut. Well, okay, maybe that works, maybe that doesn't just because it's higher in your plasma doesn't mean that it's high or concentrated in your organs, which may be the very benefit we're getting. I think you're right, it is ironic that we think we have to fix a product.

Melanie Avalon: It's pretentious.

Scott Emmens: Yeah, we have to fix a product or a natural alkaloid that has decades, in fact, let's go back to your earlier number of 4500 years of use. So yeah, I'm pretty confident berberine is the way to go. And for those folks that do have jabs and again, I would say, take it closer with your meal at first, start low and go slow. So, try one, just take one a day for a while, get your body used to it. You had mentioned maybe it's a detoxification process, go low and start slow. But yeah, I think you're exactly right. To say that this other form is better with no real data, I don't think is the right way to go. Is dihydroberberine, does it have some advantages? It very well could. But when we're talking about all of the data, and all of the studies, and these active metabolites, this is the product that I feel most comfortable taking.

Melanie Avalon: I think that's the key thing to focus on, which I'm not saying at all, that creating an isolated form of anything might have more of a benefit for maybe a certain goal in mind, like you might be able to finesse it to, have a specific intended effect. And maybe with dihydroberberine, maybe people, but again I would just need to see more literature and experience with people. But maybe it does work better for some people, which is great. But what's interesting is often rather than saying-- when people pause at dihydroberberine, for example, often rather than saying, this is another form of berberine that may be more beneficial for certain people for certain goals. It's positive, like berberine isn't very absorbable, they are like discard. They discard the entirety of the berberine literature, which makes no sense. And we do this with other things. We do this with turmeric and curcumin. People will say that we need to take our curcumin supplement because it's not very bioavailable in turmeric, when people have been using turmeric for the benefits for so long, people do it with resveratrol and wine. It's a very common thing that people do.

Scott Emmens: Or like a polyphenol versus an individual phenol. And that's why I love this one specific sentence, which is even though berberine possesses a relatively low oral bioavailability, it has exhibited marked biological activity in vivo. And the concentrations of its metabolites such as I butchered those, indicate the metabolites have an active constituent that represents significant biological activities of berberine. And in fact, berberine studies have revealed metabolites have shown similar bioactivity and it goes on and on. And there is something unique about it, the way that it is absorbed is not directly correlated to plasma. And in fact, it might be within this article or the other one that I had sent you, it says that, "Part of the reason that the plasma levels in berberine aren't high is because it's getting pushed into the organs where it needs to be and that was mind-blowing to me.

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Also related to our whole creation process. We had that question at the beginning about dihydroberberine versus berberine. And then when we decided on berberine, it was time to actually create it and Scott. Shall we tell listeners a little bit about our journey? [chuckles] 

Scott Emmens: Journey is a good way to put it, [chuckles] would you like me to start?

Melanie Avalon: Sure.

Scott Emmens: So, breaking the fourth wall a little bit, Melanie had some very specific criteria, as usual, all legitimate. And we began this pursuit for the perfect berberine. And one of the berberines that we looked at that had this really great story in this great, it's organic from the Himalayan Mountains. And then there was another one from the western part of the country, yada-yada, handpicked, etc. However, when we tested those berberines, they came back with both impurities and their potency level was remarkably low. And then I did a little more research and found that these companies also had some FDA warnings. There's a thing in the FDA when you have a GMP-certified facility, it's not just about the source of where you get the product. The most important thing is, have you done the four critical components of testing, which is strength, identity, purity, and compliance composition? And what we do at MD Logic Health and this is why I think we are so selective about who we partner with in terms of suppliers and also co-branding partners such as Melanie is, we want to be the best of the best, just like Melanie. What we discovered was that these other berberines not only failed to meet the specifications that were required but that also did not meet GMP, meaning the facilities themselves had multiple 43 notices or 402 requirements, which basically means that they were citation with significant issues in terms of their facilities GMP. Some folks, well where's it sourced from?

Well, that's important except the most important thing is have you done the correct analysis to protect yourself against heavy metals, purity, identity, strength, toxins, etc. And when we get a product, in this case, berberine, we quarantine everything that comes into our facility. It has been tested before it is allowed to come in for those four things back to what is the identity? What is the strength? Or the amount of active ingredients? What is purity? Meaning, are there toxic metals? Does it meet all of the standards that we're referring to? And is it meeting all of the compliant FDA requirements for purity, potency, etc. Those four things are done before that product even comes into our doors. Unfortunately, two of those products failed to meet our standards, which obviously disappointed us, but we were not going to allow faulty product or subpar product into the process. And when I went to look back at the companies that were utilizing these products, what I discovered is they had multiple 43s including but not limited to various toxins, lack of doing the standard studies, and in shocking fashion rat feces in a number of their herbs.

Melanie Avalon: Was it in the herbs or in the facility?

Scott Emmens: It was in the facility. I don't know whether it was in the herb or whether it was contaminated in the facility, or how but it was tested and found in the facility, meaning that multiple of their herbs had rat feces in them. And this is a pretty well-known brand, which we're not going to mention. But the fact of the matter is that they had obviously either not quarantined it and brought it in with the feces or the feces was in the facility and they hadn't done their due diligence on making sure that the facility was properly protected against those types of things. When a company says they're GMP certified that's one thing. But they need to be following all of those GMP tests. The reason that we quarantine the product before we bring it in, is if that product is contaminated you run the risk of contaminating your entire line. That's why it is quarantined and tested prior to its entry into our facility. 

Once it's tested and it passes all of those tests, we then bring it into the facility and then we do again, what's called batch testing. And we retest that same product after it's been manufactured to make sure it still meets all those specifications and has the amount of milligrams we'd say it has, it has the proper ingredients, and it still meets all of the same parameters to make sure that it didn't get infected or contaminated along the way. it's not just important to do it after you've created it, it's important to do it before it enters the facility. It's important to make sure you follow all of the criteria that GMP lays out in terms of where you store your product, how high you store it, what temperature you store it at, all of these things add up to what's called good manufacturing process. It's more than just testing for purity, strength, identity, and compliance. It's also, "Did you do the proper testing on how long it's going to last on the shelf, for example? What temperature did you expose it to? Did you have a CoA from the supplier of the ingredient and then did you also subsequently test it?" Some people will take the CoA from the supplier as the gold standard and then not do their own testing. That's not the way to go, because they may have gotten one sample to pass that test. But they can give you a different version or a different sample or a different supplier. And sometimes companies will change suppliers without then doing a retest of the ingredient. And then of course is not kosher either. You've got to make sure that you're doing GMP, the way GMP is written. And that is why there's a difference between us and folks that aren't following those same procedures.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, so I actually just pulled up the warning letter that you had found about that company because I wanted to see exactly what it had said. And this wasn't for their actual berberine, it was for the company in general but their manufacturing plant basically. And for example, this is direct from the FDA warning letter. It says, "Tree nut shells, peanut shell, corn, rodent feces, and seed foreign material were detected in their ashwagandha." "Tree nut shells, glass, hard plastic, and rodent feces were detected in their bilberry fruit." And there are a lot of other things as well. Scott, this is so shocking, so like ashwagandha that they're talking about, they had rodent feces in it as well as all of these allergens. If you go to their Amazon page, there ashwagandha has 506 ratings, 4.5 stars, it says that it's organic, it says it's free from gluten, dairy, and soy. The other pieces in this warning letter say that they found wheat in some of their other-- "Wait, wait, wait, sorry, I missed that." Wheat and rock were also found in their ashwagandha. So, "Ah", listeners, literally, so like you can go to Amazon and get this ashwagandha 506 ratings, 4.5 stars, it says "It's organic," it says "It's gluten, dairy and soy free." And when they tested this, when the FDA tested this, they found gluten, rat feces, and a myriad of other things. This is just so problematic. This is so problematic.

Scott Emmens: It is. I want to make the statement that I think this is the more rare companies, but it does happen, it does exist that you can have a GMP facility with great ratings and a decent brand name and still have-- I mean, I think those are pretty significant issues.

Melanie Avalon: And this isn't like some small-- like they have a lot of reviews on Amazon and a lot of products.

Scott Emmens: Correct? So, bigger doesn't mean better. What means better is, "Did you follow GMP and what is your track record with the FDA?" And we have an immaculate track record. And I think that speaks volumes. But the reason we have it is we just believe in following the procedure to make sure that like our families take our products, I take AvalonX products, I take MD Logic products, I give my family MD Logic products, I would never want to have skipped a process or a step. Because those processes are put in place for very good reasons. And most people aren't aware of those because they're not readily public-- it's not readily public information. But I think I remember I got a five shock emoji face from you when I sent you that link.

Melanie Avalon: Listeners, friends, do your due diligence when you choose the supplements that you choose to put in your body. We found a source that we felt really good about with the testing and we tested it for purity and potency. But then we wanted to go one step further because this was my first supplement that was an herb. My previous supplements have been serrapeptase and magnesium. We had the certification from the source that it was free of pesticides. But it was really, really important to me that we do third-party testing on that, just like we did the third-party testing for the purity and the potency because again it's an herb, it's being grown. That took a while because it took a while to find, what was the word like a company that would do the test?

Scott Emmens: It was a third-party laboratory that would do pesticide testing as well as other testing. But we chose at that point, we had all the other testing, we had done internal heavy metal testing twice, internal purity, internal identification and compliance, so at that point we really just wanted to make sure is this was pesticide-free by all the definitions that are set by the US Government and then some. And we set that out for a third-party pesticide test.

Melanie Avalon: Yes, and I'm so happy we found a company that we really like to do that and it came back all clean, all good. And I should tell them the nuance of it. Another reason it took so long to find a company is most of the companies would just give you a blanket, like a yes/no about whether or not it was below a certain level. But I wanted it to be quantified. [chuckles] I wanted to know if it was there, like how much was it there? It took a while to find a company that could work with us to do that, but we did. And we got the green light, it's all good, no pesticides.

Scott Emmens: It really is. And I'll tell you, I would not take any other berberine than this one based on the fact that we know the source is good. We've triple-tested it in-house for the four cores, which is purity, heavy metals, etc., identity, purity, strength, and potency. So, at this point, we feel like we've got a great berberine that's pesticide free, heavy metal free, toxin free, mold free at the right dosage, and in a glass bottle and on top of that with no stearates, palmitates, or other heavy chemical anticaking or filling agents. It's the purest best berberine I think that you're going to find in terms of literal testing and its final ingredients.

Melanie Avalon: I always have to ask you Scott, its filler and lubrication agent?

Scott Emmens: Yes. there are two things that people should be familiar with it. There's what they call lubrication or anticaking. Because when you put these products through these machines to put them in little tiny capsules, it requires some lubrication agent. And that's typically a magnesium stearate, silicon dioxide, or they'll call it silicon, which is silicon dioxide because that FDA allows you to say silicon versus silicon dioxide, little euphemism or a calcium palmitate. I'm okay, I take products with magnesium stearate. I don't think it's the end of the world. But if you're taking 15 capsules a day, you want to get it as pure as possible. And I think in this day and age, we're already exposed to so many things, we want to make sure that it's as clean as it can be. So yes, this product is free of magnesium stearates, that is an anti-caking agent which means it prevents it from blocking up the machines, which is also why we have to do small batches and why it's a little pricier because in order to shut down an entire line or have a dedicated line that has no lubricant or non-magnesium stearate/palmitate lubricant, you've got to have these smaller batches or a dedicated machine. And that's anti-caking. They're called lubricants and then there're fillers which are typically rice or cellulose or something else that you may or may not want. So typically, when we do a filler and we only do that when we have to whether that's an AvalonX product or MD Logic product, we use most benign possible filler there is which is methylcellulose, organic grown, human use, basically methylcellulose, which is like tree bark or fiber. And the only reason you do it is that the capsule doesn't shake loose. In other words, if the capsule size is-- you've got to get the capsule full, otherwise it's going to shake loose and the capsule doesn't feel right or fit right.

The anti-caking agents prevent the product from blocking up the machine, clogging up the machine, and keeping the product flowing into the capsules properly. But a lot of folks don't want magnesium stearate, hence why we go the extra mile to do two things which is A, use either no anti-caking or a natural anti-caking agent that is either beneficial for you or neutral or none. And then on the filler, we use either no filler or we use a filler that is methylcellulose or something super benign or beneficial rather than things like rice flour or other things that people can be allergic to.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, so the berberine containing a very small amount of monolaurin, which is exciting because people will actually take monolaurin for its health benefits. But I don't like to emphasize it because it's not like-- it's barely in there. But yeah, so it's nice to have something that could be potentially beneficial in there as well.

Scott Emmens: And the monolaurin, in this case, would be the anti-caking agent. But to your point, some people take monolaurin as an actual supplement for health, for digestive health. And I think it pairs really well with berberine as I take it for digestive health in terms of its benefits.

Melanie Avalon: Yes. But I really want to emphasize, it's not like monolaurin is in there as a supplement like you're barely getting it. It's more just to point out that it's benign, like it's nontoxic.

Scott Emmens: Exactly, you're talking about a minuscule amount of monolaurin, so it's [unintelligible [01:28:27] supplementation of it. It's really just because this is either beneficial or neutral versus some people who feel that the stearates can be negative.

Melanie Avalon: Exactly, so yeah, I'm so excited because it's almost here. No, no, no, no when this releases it will have just launched. So friends, if you want to get this berberine we are having an amazing launch special that is through the holidays, through December 31 right like through the--

Scott Emmens: Correct, it starts on December 16 and goes all the way through the holidays through December 31. Perfect time for your January 1st New Year's resolutions and there's a tremendous discount that Melanie will have on her website. So, Melanie, I'll let you take it from there.

Melanie Avalon: During this launch special, you can get 15% off of one bottle or 25% which is amazing, off of two or more bottles. And that is just during the special and/or while supplies last. Stock up now. That we'll be at avalonx.us. Again, avalonx.us, 15% off of one bottle, 25% off of two or more bottles through the end of 2022. Beyond that, some other resources, if you want to stock up or get my other supplements, serrapeptase and magnesium, you can use the coupon code MELANIEAVALON that will get you 10% off or if you would like 20% off code, you can text AVALONX, just the word AVALONX, you will not believe how many people text, not AVALONX. They text like, they're like, "Hi, give me the 20% off code?" Like no, no, no that's not how this works, the computer can only read AVALONX.

Scott Emmens: It's a computer. Yes.

Melanie Avalon: It's a computer. So, text AVALONX To 877-861-8318 that will sign you up for text updates and will give you a 20% off code. You can also get email updates at avalonx.us/emaillist. And then both that 20% off code and the 10% off code MELANIEAVALON are also good at MD Logic Health, Scott's main company, they have an array of-- how many products do you have, Scott?

Scott Emmens: Right now, we have about 40-something skews and products. And we are probably going to have somewhere closer to 65 mid 2023, we got a very aggressive pipeline of either cutting-edge and/or newly formed versions of products that we feel like it would be beneficial.

Melanie Avalon: Yes, so that's super, super exciting. So, definitely check them out. I know one of the supplements we've talked about a lot on this show is your melatonin. I know people are really liking that one.

Scott Emmens: Fanfare for sure.

Melanie Avalon: Yeah, as well as Scott's collagen.

Scott Emmens: Thanks for mentioning both. The melatonin we reformulated by the way which is the exact same melatonin formulation, but we took out the rice and we took out-- I think it had a little mag stearate, so we removed that. So now that is an even more pure, more clean version of our Melatonin Max. And yes, our Marine Collagen is doing really well. People love it because you are getting 13 g of collagen plus you are getting what they call co-factors to create collagen or collagen synthesis in your body. People underestimate that part because you can take as much collagen as you want without vitamin C, manganese, zinc, vitamin A, and vitamin C. You cannot convert those amino acids into collagens. So, you can drink collagen all day, sort of making a cake with a ton of powder, but if you don’t use a little bit of sugar and butter, you are just going to have a giant flour cake.

Melanie Avalon: Yes, so I can guarantee you this collagen was Scott's baby, kind of like the way I am with my supplements. If you are looking for collagen supplement. This is the one that you want for sure. If you want to go through my site to get that, the link is melanieavalon.com/mdlogic and again the coupon code MELANIEAVALON will get you 10% off sitewide. As well as that 20% off coupon code that you by texting AVALONX To 877-861-8318. And again, stock up on berberine before the special ends.

Scott Emmens: Well Melanie, I've never been so excited for one of your launches as I am for berberine. I feel like your audience is going to love this. I feel like this is going to be a tremendous product for your fan base but most importantly, I think now having done three products with you and having had multiple discussions on your future products I feel like I need to assure your fans that you do not let a single thing go. Every single thing that goes into this product and does not go into this product. You have your eyes on, the research on, and I think together we are making a fantastic team and even more importantly great products that are really healthy and great for people and I couldn’t be more thrilled to launch berberine with you, so this is fantastic.

Melanie Avalon: I am just so thrilled and honored and excited and grateful as well. Listeners, working with Scott has been the dream partnership and I am just so grateful that I can finally do exactly what I wanted to do with the supplements and make them for myself and for everybody else, so I am so happy. Actually, this is a good way to end literally just right now Scott, you know how you were mentioning earlier the person at the CGM company who was sharing his experience on the podcast. He actually literally just emailed me because I had emailed him to tell him I was making a berberine. Would you like to hear what he said about berberine?

Scott Emmens: I would love to hear what he said. This is like serendipity.

Melanie Avalon: I know this is like in real life like real-time. [chuckles]

Scott Emmens: It's real-time and it's happening at the moment.

Melanie Avalon: Complete third party. All I did was I told him I was making a berberine supplement. So, he said, "Berberine is a great idea of all the supplements I've tested for glucose regulation, berberine has had the most significant impact and our internal staff experiments confirmed my anecdotal observations." One cool thing to test with berberine would be proper dosing. Most use berberine as a pre-prandial taking 500 to 1000 mg 20 minutes before meals. I tried that and it didn’t work for me." That's what he was saying, Scott. "A smaller camp including myself takes 500 mg twice daily morning and evening. While it did take a few weeks to see results, I saw an overall decrease in my own fasting glucose on that regimen." So that's a nice little testimonial and I think it really speaks to when you guys get your berberine you are going to need to find the way it works for you specifically.

Scott Emmens: That is a great way to end. I think that's serendipity.

Melanie Avalon: I think so. Well, this has been absolutely amazing and Scott you are going to have to come back for all of our future product launches. I hope you are down with that.

Scott Emmens: I can't wait. I look forward to any questions, comments from the fans. I'm starting to feel like a fan and a welcome member of the family of the IF Podcast. So, thank you so much for having me again, Melanie, I look forward to us speaking again.

Melanie Avalon: You too and this will have already happened, but have a Happy Thanksgiving.

Scott Emmens: That's right, you too.

Melanie Avalon: Bye.

Scott Emmens: Bye, bye.

Melanie Avalon: Thank you so much for listening to The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. Please remember, everything we discussed on this show does not constitute medical advice, and no patient-doctor relationship is formed. If you enjoyed the show, please consider writing 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]

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!

More on Cynthia: cynthiathurlow.com

Theme Music Composed By Leland Cox: LelandCox.com

If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving us a review in iTunes - it helps more than you know! 

 

 

Nov 06

Episode 290: Creatine, Vitamin E, Safe Tanning, Slow Weight Loss, Cheating On Your Diet, Toothpaste, Digestive Enzymes, Leaky Gut, And More!

Intermittent Fasting

Welcome to Episode 290 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!

NUTRISENSE: Get Your Own Personal Continuous Glucose Monitor (CGM) To See How Your Blood Sugar Responds 24/7 To Your Food, Fasting, And Exercise! The Nutrisense CGM Program Helps You Interpret The Data And Take Charge Of Your Metabolic Health! Get $30 Off A CGM Subscription At Nutrisense.Io/Ifpodcast With The Code IFPODCAST

AVALONX Magnesium 8: Get Melanie’s Broad Spectrum Complex Featuring 8 Forms Of Magnesium, To Support Stress, Muscle Recovery, Cardiovascular Health, GI Motility, Blood Sugar Control, Mood, Sleep, And More! Tested For Purity & Potency. No Toxic Fillers. Glass Bottle.  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!

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

SHOW NOTES

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!

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!

Introducing... Creatine by Cynthia Thurlow

Ep. 234 Metabolic Longevity and Vitamin E with Dr. Barrie Tan

NUTRISENSE: Get $30 Off A CGM At Nutrisense.Io/Ifpodcast With The Code IFPODCAST

Listener Q&A: Charles - Safe Tanning Bed

For A Limited Time Go To joovv.com/ifpodcast And Use The Code IFPODCAST For An Exclusive Discount!

Carex Day-Light Classic Plus Bright Light Therapy Lamp

Listener Q&A: Rachel - Weight loss too slow

Listener Q&A: Darcy - Diet Cheating

Listener Q&A: Deborah - What about Toothpaste?

Primal Life Organics

Ep. 153 – Fix Your Mouth/Fix Your Health: Reversing Tooth Decay Naturally with Trina Felber

Listener Q&A: Ann - Digestive Enzymes

AVALONX MAGNESIUM 8: Use The Code Melanieavalon For 10% On Any Order At Avalonx.Us And MDlogichealth.Com!

Listener Q&A: Alyssa - IF and digestive changes

Gut Assist - Leaky Gut Repair Supplement Powder

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 290 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.

Hi, friends, I'm about to tell you how you can get my favorite electrolytes for free. Yes, completely free. And the feedback we have received about LMNT electrolytes from our audience is overwhelming. You guys love LMNT and I'm so excited because our new offer allows new and returning customers to get free LMNT. On top of that, they're super popular. Grapefruit flavor is back. If you've been having issues with intermittent fasting, electrolytes may just be the thing that you need and/or have you heard of something called the keto flu? Here's the thing. The keto flu is not actually a condition. Keto flu just refers to a bundle of symptoms, headaches, fatigue, muscle cramps, and insomnia that people experience in the early stages of keto dieting. Here's what's going on. When you eat a low-carb diet, your insulin levels drop. Low insulin in turn lowers the production of the hormone aldosterone. Now, aldosterone is made in the kidneys and it helps you retain sodium. So, low aldosterone on a keto diet makes you lose sodium at a rapid rate. Even if you are consciously consuming electrolytes, you might not be getting enough. In particular, you need electrolytes, especially sodium and potassium in order for nerve impulses to properly fire. Electrolytes can easily be depleted while intermittent fasting.

Robb Wolf, who as you guys know is my hero in the holistic health world, worked with the guys at Ketogains to get the exact formulation for electrolyte supplements to formulate LMNT Recharge, so you can maintain ketosis and feel your best. LMNT Recharge has no sugar, no coloring, no artificial ingredients, no junk. They're used by three Navy SEALs teams, they are the official hydration partner to Team USA weightlifting, they're used by multiple NFL teams, and so much more. We have an incredible offer just for our listeners. You can get a free LMNT sample pack that includes all eight flavors. Citrus, watermelon, orange, raspberry, mango chili, lemon, habanero, chocolate, and raw unflavored, and the raw unflavored by the way is clean fast friendly. You can try them all completely free when you make a purchase at our link, drinklmnt.com/ifpodcast. You can get this offer as a first time and as a returning LMNT customer. I know there are a lot of returning LMNT customers. The feedback I hear from you guys, "loving LMNT" is amazing. LMNT offers no questions asked about refunds on all orders. You won't even have to send it back. And this offer is exclusively available only through VIP LMNT partners. You won't find this offer publicly anywhere else. So, again, the link is drinklmnt.com/ifpodcast. And 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 percentage 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 290 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'm good, I started the last podcast off with a question. But I have another question for you for this podcast. How is your creatine going?

Cynthia Thurlow: Good, we're officially told that it will be out before Thanksgiving. I keep getting these vague ideas and we'll make sure we link up the waitlist for creatine so that we can ensure people that are most interested in receiving it. But yes, things are moving forward in a quick direction. I'm hopeful that everything will be