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Welcome to Episode 409 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.

SPECIAL GUEST

Kara Collier is the co-founder and VP of Clinical Operations at Nutrisense, one of America’s fastest-growing wellness-tech startups. She is a Forbes 30 under 30 recipient, frequent podcast guest & conference speaker. Kara has made it her mission to help others reach optimal health using modern technology & expert coaching. Kara is a leading authority on continuous glucose monitoring (CGM) technology, particularly in non-diabetics, for health optimization, disease prevention, and reversing metabolic dysfunction. Kara is a Registered Dietitian Nutritionist (RDN), Licensed Dietitian/Nutritionist (LDN), and Certified Nutrition Support Clinician (CNSC).

Website | Nutrisense IG | Kara Collier IG

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

TRANSCRIPT

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

Melanie Avalon

Welcome to Episode 409 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 409 of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I am here today with a very special guest. It's somebody who's been on the show before, and it's for a topic that we talk about all the time and which has a radical effect on people's health and wellness and fasting and all the things. And so that topic is continuous glucose monitors, also known as CGMs. And friends, like I was saying, you're probably familiar because I talk about them all the time, but continuous glucose monitors, which we will talk about, actually give you a picture of your blood sugar levels on a sort of like a 24-7 basis for quite a few days when you do a session of one. And it is so eye-opening because it actually gives you an in-real-time picture of how your food is affecting you, how your fasting is affecting you, all the things. It can be a game changer, especially if you're trying to just figure out where you're at with your health or if you're trying to break through a weight loss plateau or just really optimize everything you're doing when it comes to food and diet and lifestyle. So I am here with Kara Collier. She is a fabulous human being and the co-founder of Nutrasense, which is a platform which makes CGMs accessible to everyday people. And by everyday people, I mean you don't need a doctor's prescription in order to get one. And then Nutrasense also comes with an app which helps you actually analyze and understand the data and it is just so empowering, so helpful. And so Kara, thank you so much for being here.

Kara Collier

Yeah, absolutely. I'm excited to chat.

Melanie Avalon

So, I was telling you before, I have quite a few listener questions for you, but before diving into those, I actually have a personal question because I think last time we came on the show was a while ago and I feel like within that, well, it wasn't that long ago, but in any case, in that time period, I feel AI really like took off, like chat GBT, because I feel like there was like a pre-AI time, I mean, AI's been around for a while, but like it like rapidly escalated. And so I was just thinking before we started recording with Nutrisense and everything you're doing with CGMs, like the future of it and what you're doing now, has that had a big effect on the company and the future and everything that you want to do with CGMs?

Kara Collier

Yeah, that's a great question. So much has changed. I think we spoke maybe like a little over a year ago, when you reflect back of like all the things that change in a year, both in terms of technology advancements, but also just the industry, like a lot has changed within cgms and within our company. But with AI specifically, yeah, it is going to make analyzing, I mean, it already is making analyzing large amounts of data, super simple and easy, which is great for both businesses that function on data as kind of the main component. So now instead of just having maybe cgm data, it's going to be a lot easier for us to plug and play other forms of data and put it all together and give you something meaningful. And then it's also going to make it easier for the user, you know, we have the easy ability for you to export every single data point in that kind of like five minute intervals. And then you can kind of if you're savvy enough, you can use simple free AI tools to manipulate that data if you have certain things you want to look for or see that we aren't necessarily providing for you. So I think it just makes it a lot easier to use data for answers, because you don't have to be an analyst anymore to be able to kind of use these tools. So as a company, it's kind of helping us make it easier for making things digestible for people. And it's also helping us to make sure that our human support, which we're actually leaning on even more now in the forefront of AI is still having that human component, but it's helping to kind of augment them and give them the tools and support they need to do their job well.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, that's really interesting. So do you think you're temporarily leaning on them more or do you think ultimately, you know, it'll be all AI providing that support?

Kara Collier

Yeah, it's hard to predict what exactly will happen and what the gaps are going to be and how much adoption there will be across the board. You know, you still ask the average person on the street if they use chat GBT on a daily basis and most people actually are not. Like it's still really underutilized on just like an average person, but we've actually leaned more on the human component because of a demand from customers. Recently, you know, we used to just provide chat support access to our dietitian so that you could ask questions. And now we do kind of our long telehealth sessions that are reimbursed by insurance. And that really came from the demand of people wanting to turn these data insights into real behavior change. So it's kind of connecting that dot of how do I now turn this into a habit I can stick to? How do I, you know, adjust things when my routine is different? And for some people, I think it just depends on your personality type AI might solve that problem for you. And we're happy to kind of support that person in that way, where I think there is a whole separate group of people that need that human connection in order to reach their goals. So I think it really just depends on your personality type and like what motivates you.

Melanie Avalon

I'm so interested by this, and it's also interesting that you point that out about, you know, not everybody using chat GPT and things like that. Actually, yesterday, the guest I had on the show, I just like brought up chat GPT, I was talking about it, and they actually hadn't, like, they didn't know what I was talking about. And I was like, Oh, like, because I'm so saturated in it, it's like, I use it so much. I forget that everybody's not using it all the time.

Kara Collier

I know I'm currently trying to get my mom to use it more for like basic things. And it's, it's an interesting experience to walk through somebody who's like the learning curve is like, it's not intuitive to them in the same way of like how I would use it for all these different applications. But as soon as like I pointed out, she's like, Oh, that's amazing, but wouldn't have thought of it herself. So I think there's a lot of people like her.

Melanie Avalon

I use it for for everything. It's so it's so helpful. It expands beyond just things like this, but the entirety of health care like will we always want a final human, you know, overseeing everything, especially like surgeries and procedures and records. Do you think there's a future where we're comfortable? I know you're talking about personality types, but do you think there's a future where it's all just automated?

Kara Collier

I think so. I think a lot is going to change. I think we're at the start of exponential change, you know, where it's, we're at that bottom of that exponential curve where I think it's going to be almost, it's going to be very challenging to even imagine what things are going to look like 10 years from now. Cause I think they're going to be so different than even what has changed, you know, in the past 10 years. So I think everything is going to look different eventually. I just don't know when that will happen. Like what is the pace of which this is going to occur in a, which we're all very like normalized and we trust some of these systems. Cause the other thing is, you know, right now there's still the issue of kind of the quality of data you put in is what you get out, but it's, that's going to be less of an issue as things just get more and more intelligent. I think there's going to be time where we trust data a lot more than humans.

Melanie Avalon

It's so interesting. And on a similar note, so the actual technology itself, and it's interesting when I was asking for questions, one of the first comments I got, it actually wasn't a question, but it was a clarification, which I find really helpful from Lisa Marie. And she said that she's a type one diabetic here. She said, please know that CGM tests the interstitial fluid and not the actual blood like blood glucose monitors do. I've heard other podcasts mistake this. It will be interesting to see what questions pop up here. And then Stacy wanted to know how accurate are CGM's. And the reason I'm leaning off of both of those is kind of tying it into this concept of the evolution of everything in the future. So the actual technology of the CGM, because like Lisa Marie was saying, it's not actually measuring our blood sugar levels. It's measuring this interstitial fluid. Is the technology itself, like has it evolved or changed? Is that still how it works? Do you think it will change? And then as far as the accuracy, like how does that tie into the evolution and how the technology might be changing?

Kara Collier

The, that is correct. So the, the CGM they are measuring your glucose in your interstitial fluid, which is just kind of like the fluid in between your cells. So you can think of it as kind of like classic diffusion that we learned in science class. So when your glucose changes first in the bloodstream and then diffuses into the interstitial fluid. So the biggest difference between the values in your blood glucose level and your interstitial fluid is that there's usually a little bit of a delay as it diffuses and the more intense the change. So if you suddenly dump in a ton of glucose into your bloodstream, the faster it's going to diffuse into the interstitial fluid. So the more rapidly it's changing kind of the quicker you're going to see that appear, but if it's a slow change, it will diffuse slowly. So it is an, and one thing that is important to think about though, is that that glucose in our interstitial fluid is still like, you know, it's a part of our body. Like that is like real glucose that is also important to know. So it's not that it's irrelevant. It's just that it's a slight difference from your blood levels. This is especially important for type one diabetics, which are the, you know, the patient population, the audience that these CGM were first created for, and that they're most critical for this audience because they cannot, you know, they type one, type one diabetics do not make insulin. And so they rely on exogenous, you know, injected insulin in order to maintain glucose levels and to live and survive. So those minor fluctuations are really important to be on top of in a type one diabetic. And their glucose swings are much more dramatic typically because, you know, that normal process that a non-type one diabetic kind of naturally has. So their swings might go from 200 to 50 in the matter of, you know, 30 minutes. It's especially important in that group, whereas if you're a non-diabetic, the minor differences, it is important to kind of know that absolute value, but it's the trends and information that you're gaining from like the way your glucose is changing. And that is most useful. So coming to the question then of accuracy and precision, what tends to be very correct, so to speak with the CGM is the precision. So the amount that glucose is fluctuating at different times. So if you compare your overnight average on your Sunday versus Monday, kind of how you're seeing how much those are different between two days is very accurate in that precision. But what might be off is the absolute number. So it could be reading that your glucose is 90 right now, and then jumped up to 120 when in reality it was 80 and jumped up to 110. So we do allow people to calibrate in our app, which means if you know your glucose at that moment, because you recently got a fasted glucose level or your finger pricking is 80, you can adjust it to match that. And then you can kind of see that in real time, a little bit more accurately. But if you don't have that number and you aren't calibrating, you can see that my glucose jumped 30 points and it took four hours for it to come back down to what it was before I ate.

Kara Collier

You can see those trends and variability in your glucose levels, whether the number is exactly on or not.

Melanie Avalon

Oh my goodness. Okay. So many, I have so many thoughts and questions. I'm just trying to think in all the conversations I've had about CGM's. I don't remember learning that about if it's a bigger change or a faster change that you see it faster on the CGM. That's, that's really, that makes sense though. Okay. Some, some questions there. Well you mentioned just to provide some clarity for listeners about the numbers they actually should be looking for. Andrea had a really good question. She said, what is the optimal blood sugar spike for a given meal? Should your blood sugar never go over X amount or is it more about how quickly your blood sugar returns to normal? I heard someone say your blood sugar should basically stay between 80 to 130 no matter what you've eaten. So can we, um, just kind of clarify for listeners, what numbers they actually should be looking for?

Kara Collier

Yeah, absolutely. And I love this question because I think there is a lot of misinformation around this. The first myth I always like to point out that I think we've discussed is that like an absolutely flat glucose line is not necessarily the end goal. Like zero variability in your glucose is not superior to normal amount of variability. So if your glucose moves because you just ate, that is normal physiological response to eating. But we want to make sure that it's moving in a way that is not too high and it doesn't take too long to get back to normal. And then we also want to put it into context. And this is where kind of either AI detection to put it into context for you or a human to kind of point this out and talk through it is important. Because if you eat something that is just protein and fat, I'm not expecting your glucose to go up too much if there isn't any carbohydrates in it. So it might be ideal if your glucose was starting at 80, if it goes up to a 90 or 100, and then comes back down to 80 within two hours, that's pretty expected. But if you have some carbohydrates, let's say you have half a cup of sweet potato with that same meal, it might be completely normal for it to go up to 120, 130, but then come back down within two hours still. So you do want to take into context like what did I eat to make sure that it's an expected response. But at a high level, we really don't want glucose to go above 140 in an optimal manner. And we want it to kind of come back down to those pre-meal values within two hours of eating. But as I mentioned, if you're following a low carbohydrate diet, if it's just kind of mostly protein and fats, then I really don't expect it to go much above 120, kind of at any point in time with meals. But one last clarification I'll point out is that there's a difference between what is optimal for good long-term health and kind of what is the goal range, which is below that 140, and being metabolically unhealthy. So there are responses when I look at someone's meal response that I would say, this concerns me that maybe there's some metabolic dysfunction, potentially some insulin resistance. And then there are responses where I'm like, this makes sense given the context, but it's not a healthy or ideal response. So to give two examples, you might eat a piece of steak and half of a sweet potato, and your glucose goes up to 140. It takes four hours to come back down to normal. And it's like, I wouldn't have expected it to go that high, and I would have expected it to come back down sooner. This could be something to look into, get your insulin level tested, kind of try some other foods. It might not be a good sign of normal metabolic response. And then there's somebody who maybe drinks an entire Gatorade and their glucose spikes up to 150 and comes back down in an hour. And that response doesn't indicate to me that you have metabolic dysfunction, but it doesn't mean we want to see that response because it's not necessarily good for your body. Does that make sense?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, no, that completely does. And actually, so to that point, and so this is me asking, and then Andrea actually had a follow-up question that is kind of similar. But my question would be, if we're not expecting to see that many fluctuations on like a low-carb diet, a keto diet, maybe even a carnivore diet, is there benefit to using a CGM on that sort of diets? Or is it really just for people who are eating carbs? And then I can tie in Andrea's second question, but maybe I'll start with that.

Kara Collier

Yeah. I definitely think there is still benefit. Usually people who are following a lower carbohydrate diet don't need to wear them for as long to get some insights, but some examples of things you might learn are the impact of meal timing. So sometimes everyone kind of responds differently, but eating later at night versus earlier in the morning, like how does your glucose respond? And then there's also giving you a better picture of what your average glucose levels are because a hemoglobin A1C, which is trying to capture your average glucose, isn't always super accurate. And so this wearing a CGM is another way to kind of see at a broader view, what are your average glucose levels overall, which is really important for overall health. I mean, kind of seeing like, does it come back down to lower values while I'm sleeping when I'm fasted? And then that's kind of the third component is seeing the fluctuations in your fasted glucose levels, which can be impacted by a lot of factors outside of nutrition and carbohydrates. So often we'll see people who are under a lot of stress and those fasted glucose levels are really high, which brings their average glucose levels up and they're not eating any carbohydrates. And the thing they really have to work on is stress management. That could be a similar type of thing for sleep quality or sleep quantity. So there's all these other variables that can impact your glucose levels that a CGM just provides much quicker and more meaningful insight into that are worth at least assessing, even if you're following a low carbohydrate diet. So maybe you wear one sensor for 14 days and everything looks good. You might be good to go and maybe you only wear one once a year to kind of check in where somebody with more of a variability in their diet might need to wear them a couple more to even kind of understand that baseline.

Melanie Avalon

So that actually does tie in really well to Andrea's second question because, so basically she's trying to figure out why her fasting blood sugar is consistently around 100, whereas like she said two years ago, it was always low around in the 80s. And she says she's been taking berberine for a long time. She says she's tried eating higher protein. She avoids processed foods, seed oils, refined sugars and grains. She takes a bajillion supplements. And so she's struggling to figure out why her fasting blood sugar is high. And her two questions here are, one, can high protein cause a higher fasting blood sugar somehow? She said she feels healthy otherwise. Good energy, good muscle mass, very little visceral fat. And then her second question, it's not really a question, but I'm turning it into a question. She said, I'm considering getting a CGM again, but I, oh, this is just a note. She says she thought that the numbers were consistently about 15 millimole difference compared to her finger stick. And since her main concern is now her fasting blood sugar and not the spikes, will it be helpful? So, and her fasting insulin was 4.7 and she's considering metformin. But to recap the questions here, so I guess there's three questions. One, which is what is similar to what we were just talking about, if she's just concerned about her fasting blood sugar, not the spikes per se, would a CGM be helpful there? Maybe we can start with that question.

Kara Collier

Yeah, I still think it's very insightful because you can start to see trends a little bit easier than the finger pricks. And like I said, in our app and in some apps, you can calibrate and some you cannot. So it sort of depends. But if you know, okay, it's consistently 15 points higher, you can kind of just do that mental math in your head that, okay, it's reading 115, but it's actually 100. But it's useful to get that sense of what days are my fasting glucose even higher or lower and like what is driving those changes potentially. Typically, we don't see people have the same exact pattern every single day. And to that point, then kind of bleeding into potentially a second question, is there are other variables that we tend to look at really closely if it seems like the fasting glucose is the thing that is driving up. So I mentioned stress tends to be the top thing for people usually if they have a higher fasting glucose level, but everything else looks good, because that kind of chronic cortisol pulsing that chronic elevated cortisol is going to stimulate the liver to be making glucose. And that tends to drive up our fasted glucose levels. So sort of assessing stress levels, and kind of any form of stress is a good place to start. The second thing tends to be sleep quality and quantity. So kind of looking at that and making sure that you're getting adequate sleep, because that can definitely impact your fasted glucose level. And lastly, in terms of just really common factors for people is the timing of your last meal. Some people seem to be much more sensitive to this than others. There seems to be like a genetic variance to how sensitive you are. But for some people, if you eat later at night, it will bleed all the way into kind of the next day, next morning and impact your fasted glucose levels. So that's another thing to play around with. And as we've kind of mentioned, the benefit of the CGM is that you can experiment with something and get insight quickly. So you could try adjusting that meal timing and see what happens and pretty much assess within one day, if that is making any difference or not. Similarly with adding in a walk before bed or in the evening or after your dinner, you can have a very quick yes or no of what type of impact that had, which I think is one of the main benefits of the CGM is just that quicker learning feedback.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I could not agree more and it's hard to really emphasize just how profound it is until somebody's actually done it, but that in real time data and that really ability to see quick changes, I just think is so, so powerful. So her question about the protein, actually before that, I want to comment on the liver piece. I also love that you brought that up because I think a lot of people think fasting, you know, their fasted blood sugar level is primarily driven by like the food they just ate. But so much of it is the liver actually, you know, producing this glucose, which I think a lot of people don't realize. So her question about can high protein cause fasting blood sugar to be higher? Have you seen that with CGM's?

Kara Collier

Yeah. And to touch on the liver piece, just to emphasize that more, like your liver has unlimited ability to keep making glucose. Like there, there is no upper limit, you know, it's like you can keep making it and making it. Because I think a lot of people under emphasize the amount of stress they're under and how much of an impact that has, but related to protein. So this is something that I get asked quite often. And I have very rarely been able to see a direct link between, okay, we really increased your protein and we saw that fasted glucose go up or we really decreased your protein and we saw fasted, flat, fasted glucose levels drop. So I can't say with certainty, because I haven't done like a, you know, completely randomized controlled trial. But anecdotally, I haven't seen this to make a big impact. I think that the upper threshold of how much protein you have to eat in order for that to start impacting your glucose levels is pretty high and higher than what most people are doing. So it's not to say I don't think it exists. I just don't think it's a common variable that most people are probably needing to deal with. It can, you know, provide the substrates for your liver to make more glucose, as we've mentioned. But again, most of the time I don't, see this direct correlation and it's not usually something that I'm having people worry about too much. Usually I'm having people eat more protein than what they're currently doing.

Melanie Avalon

I tend to err on the side of encouraging more protein rather than less. And we've actually, especially when we have a new co-host now, but Vanessa Spina was our prior co-host and we talked about protein all the time on the show and it's still an ongoing debate. Like it's weird to me that we still don't know that there are still conflicting opinions about if you're eating excess protein, whether or not it becomes glucose or not. Like there's people still debate that.

Kara Collier

Yeah, they do.

Melanie Avalon

I'm like, how do we not know? I feel like this is testable.

Kara Collier

Yeah, I feel pretty good about recommending like higher protein is typically better. And there's like very rare instances where I'm like, that's a lot of protein you're eating. Like usually I'm like, yeah, more protein, please.

Melanie Avalon

It's shocking the amount of protein I eat, but I also don't add a lot to it. I don't think I could eat the amount of protein I eat and also have a ton of carbs or fat as well. This is a random question I just thought of. Have you seen, I'm trying to remember, I don't remember the brand or what it was called, but a company reached out to me and they were making an app that was supposed to show you your blood sugar levels, but it didn't actually test them. Do you have thoughts on that concept? I was very hesitant. I immediately just said no, because I was like, how does it know? Like you could be telling people wrong information.

Kara Collier

Yeah, I would definitely be skeptical of that. And that, that brings to a question I think you had earlier that I might not have finished with just like new technology with measuring glucose levels. What is being tested and I think has a lot of potential, but is not ready for like full market adoption consumer use is kind of detecting your glucose values through like optics and lasers. So, you know, similarly to kind of how we're detecting heart rates from like a wearable or like a watch. I think that there will certainly be a possibility where we'll be able to wear something like that, that is kind of able to detect the glucose levels like in from your, you know, your veins and your, your blood vessels. There's also the ability potentially to detect it in like your eyes. So the small amount of those tiny blood vessels that are in your eyes and kind of similar type of functionality. I haven't seen anything yet that has been that is credible and verified and ready for like market use. So I would say if you have something right now, like anybody out there, like they're seeing an ad for something, I would be skeptical, but I definitely think we're going to have much better technology in the future.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I was going to circle back to that. I'm so glad you brought that up again at Nutrisense. Are you actively looking at expanding if there is new technology like that in the future, or I'm just curious about like the company in general. And actually related to that, Anna said, are they available over the counter yet? I had heard a like a rumor or a whisper that maybe that barrier was going to be broken anyways with CGMs. Do you know about all of that?

Kara Collier

Yeah, absolutely. So from a company perspective, we don't make the hardware. We work with the companies who do make it. And then we do the software. So the app and then the services, the nutrition dietitian support on top of it. So we're always looking for like what, and we're not hardware specific, where we only work with, you know, one person, one type, we work with several different ones. And now we also have a better related to the over-the-counter option. We have a better what we call like BYOS, bring your own sensor, because they are available over the counter now. Oh, are they?

Melanie Avalon

Did I miss that?

Kara Collier

Yeah, so it's very recent change. So yes, they're available over the counter, which is a huge change in making them more affordable, more accessible. So we're working directly with those companies as well, to kind of integrate those sensors into our ecosystem to make it even cheaper to our customers as well. And from their perspective, they are still hardware manufacturers that don't really want to play too much in like the consumer side, even though now it's direct to consumer or the software side. So, you know, they're, they want to kind of like stick in that wheelhouse. So it works well to be able to either you can get the sensors directly from them and then use just our app in our dietitian services or kind of still get it through us, but using their hardware because it's continuing to make it cheaper and easier for everybody.

Melanie Avalon

Wow, when did that happen? Do you know?

Kara Collier

I think it was August or September.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, in the fall. Okay. I find it really interesting in the medical community in general, where the barriers are, and where they aren't. Like what we're like allowed access to, and what we're not. I just, I'm, I find it intriguing.

Kara Collier

It is. The whole thing has been interesting because, you know, it's in Europe, they've always been over the counter, same companies, same, you know, manufacturers are allowed to sell them in Europe over the counter. And then in the US, we just kind of, you know, had like an arbitrary rule, but they are still their cgms that they make for so like, you know, the Libre you're familiar with is still a prescription device for diabetics, technically. And then they have their over the counter variation, which has like certain, it has to be like a different sensor, technically, in order to get that approval. So there's still some weird rules and like, things that we're having to go through. But I think the whole landscape is changing. And we're only going to move towards more accessibility, cheaper prices, better technology as things continue to change.

Melanie Avalon

Awesome. Wow. That's really interesting about the, like the lasers or the eye. And I want to say non-invasive, but putting a CGM on for friends, if you've probably heard me talk about this before, some people can be intimidated because it, there is like a needle that sticks to your skin, but I promise you, you don't, you like don't even feel it. It's so easy to put on.

Kara Collier

Yeah, it's so easy. And if you do any sort of at home finger pricks, that's way worse just like to put it into context way worse.

Melanie Avalon

There's like no comparison.

Kara Collier

Yeah, I hate finger picking now.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, as far as actually lowering blood sugar levels, Amy had some good questions. She wanted to know about some specific different things. So she wanted to know, to help regulate blood sugar, is it better to go on a walk right after a meal? Or if the morning blood sugar is high, is it better to walk before the first meal? So that's the first one she asks about. So walking, and you mentioned walking earlier, so I'm glad she's talking about it. Is the timing of it, do you see a difference?

Kara Collier

Yeah, in general, walking is a great tool. The more you can do it and the more you can kind of get these like micro walks in. So 10 minutes here, five minutes there versus like a really long walk is better. So if you have the ability to do a 10 minute walk in the morning when you wake up and the ability to do 10 minutes walking after each meal, like that's ideal. But if you're like, I'm only going to do it once, I would say right after a meal is the best.

Melanie Avalon

And then another one she asked about when is the best time to take berberine?

Kara Collier

Yeah, I'm also curious to see if you if you have a preferred time, but in general, I see it best with meals. So I tend to recommend if you're kind of splitting it up, like if you're taking it twice a day, kind of taking it with with your biggest meals as the most optimal time, but I recommend taking it consistently. So as opposed to kind of taking it here and there, the more consistent you are, we see I see better benefits, but curious your, your thoughts. 1

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. Well, first of all, have I sent you my berberine?

Kara Collier

I think last time you did, yes, yes, you did, because it's in the beautiful glass bottle. I love when they're glass bottles and not plastic.

Melanie Avalon

Me too. Yeah, no, huge Burberry fan here. It's interesting and I'm glad you asked that question because the majority of the research I've seen on Burberry does dose it around meals. That said, I do a daily fast. I fast every day and I eat one meal a day at night. So I actually just personally, I do take it in the morning and then I take it before my meal as well. I just, that's the way I do it.

Kara Collier

Yeah, makes sense. And I think the main recommendation from my awareness of taking it with meals is because sometimes people have GI side effects and they tend to be lessened with with meals, less so of like effectiveness. So if you don't have any sort of, you know, GI issues with it, then I don't think it matters as much.

Melanie Avalon

That's a good point. Yeah. It's also astounding because I think a lot of people think about berberine and they focus on the blood sugar control aspect, but there are so many studies on the other benefits of it beyond that. So helping with cholesterol, it actually, there's a study on showing how it activates AMPK, also microbiome effects. That's why I thought about it. So yeah, it has a lot of potential good benefits, which I love.

Kara Collier

Yeah, absolutely. And just like general like suppression of chronic inflammation, those like natural stress pathways. Yeah, absolutely. And it's so low risk, like we don't really see any sort of issues with it.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, it's great. How about fasting? So I'm going to modify her question a little bit because she's wanting to know, actually before that, since we're talking about blood sugar levels, she wants to know what is the best time to drink apple cider vinegar for blood sugar. She said she's seen 15 minutes before a meal and also right after a meal, does it matter? Do you have thoughts on apple cider vinegar?

Kara Collier

Yeah, I typically see the best benefit with this if it's right before a meal. So just drinking a little bit, diluting it with water if you want to. I know there are also apple cider vinegar supplements, but honestly, just kind of drinking it, taking a quick shot, diluting it into a beverage. A lot of people will dilute it into a plain sparkling water if that's your preference and kind of drinking it right before the meal, I tend to see the best, best impact.

Melanie Avalon

Awesome. Do you personally use any? Well, I know we're brain. Do you use apple cider vinegar?

Kara Collier

I don't use it consistently. I have used it in Burberry or not Burberry apple cider vinegar is one of those that you can sort of use more randomly and see just as much of an impact versus like needing consistent use to see the benefit. So if I know like I have maybe an abnormal meal coming up that's like higher carbohydrate or kind of something going on, like I'll try to incorporate it. Like I'm like, Oh, a mental note to do it, but it's not a part of my daily routine.

Melanie Avalon

And then Amy's last question was the fasting schedule. She wants to know for blood sugar, is it better to do a long fast or to fast daily for X amount of hours? What might people find with fasting and CGM?

Kara Collier

Yeah, and this is one of those topics where I think wearing the CGM and experimenting is going to be your best option because I see so much variability between people of what what is kind of their optimal sweet spot for fasting. Like as I mentioned, I think there's some good general rules of thumb of like, you know, don't be grazing all day, like make sure you have at least, you know, a little bit of time between your last meal and going to bed, having some sort of fasting window throughout the day. And then beyond sort of the basics, I just, I just see so much variability between what works for people. What you're kind of looking for is what does your glucose look like when you break a fast, so kind of just being mindful of what is the first few bites of food you put in your mouth, please don't start straight with carbohydrates, you'll probably especially the longer you've been fasting, the more important this is of like how you're breaking that fast. And then kind of when it comes to the right timing, you just sort of experiment with different times. And then that fasting window, I think also experiment. I know you you mentioned you do OMAD, and I think it works really well for some people. And then for some people, it doesn't. So I think just kind of testing that out for yourself. And usually the factor that I see of when it doesn't work is if they have a lot of other stressors stacked up in their life. And there's one too many stressors happening. So if you have a very stressful job, and you don't have your stress management under control, and you kind of are doing other things that are putting stress on your body, sometimes the positive stress of fasting and some of these other things like, you know, sauna cold plunge can tip that scale into too much stress. And then we see glucose levels go up fasting glucose levels, postprandial responses, average glucose levels. And so usually it's kind of what which of those things can we adjust so that we can normalize. And then with some people, we see their glucose levels dramatically appear dramatically improve when we add in more fasting than what they're currently doing. So again, I think it's contextual. And I think you have to experiment. But you know, I do recommend kind of the basics of doing some type of fasting window. So you're not eating 24 seven and trying not to eat like right before you go to bed. And then being mindful of how you're breaking that fast is super important.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I just like you're saying, it's so individual. And it also can change, you know, through time, like one thing that's working for you now might be different later. Like I know for me in the past, I went through a period of time where I was very low carb, almost carnivore, and I would have higher fasting blood sugar levels doing that. And then when I actually added in some carbs, I actually started having lower fasting blood sugar levels. And so my theory there is that, you know, my liver was probably like overcompensating, putting out glucose, and then it's actually just brought in, you know, endogenous or exogenous carbs. I feel like it wasn't keeping my levels high all the time. Things just can really change. So if you had to, well, Susan wanted to know what's the best way to lower blood sugar, and we literally just went through so many different ones. But so maybe I'll modify her question a little bit. If you had to, you know, have somebody start somewhere, because that's so many lifestyle factors, like where should somebody like, where should they start? Because it can be a little bit overwhelming, I think.

Kara Collier

Yeah, it definitely can be. And that's again, why I think a CGM can be helpful is because you can kind of identify like, oh, this one meal is like really not working for me. Let me just adjust this thing versus kind of you get a high A1C and you're like, what do I need to do to bring this down? Like what do I, like it feels overwhelming. So it can be helpful to have just like more information so you can pick one thing at a time that you know is working. But if you don't have that, you're like not really sure and you know, your, your glucose is elevated. I would start with just being mindful of your carbohydrate intake. You know, it sounds simple, but that's a good place to start. I think one of the biggest myths out there that I'm sure your audience is a little bit more aware of than maybe the average person is just that like half of your calories should come from carbohydrates. And that's a lot. And like for 98% of people, it's too much. Sometimes I see it work fine for people if they're like athletes usually is pretty much the only bucket that, that amount tends to be okay. And so really just being kind of mindful of that total carbohydrate amount and prioritizing your plate to be more about protein, non-starchy vegetables, if you tolerate those well, and then kind of the carbohydrates are more of a nice to have small amount. So that can make a big difference. And then if you're consuming any form of like liquid carbohydrates, try, try to cut those out and that, cause that makes a big impact. You know, even if it's sort of quote unquote natural juices, that's still a very concentrated form of carbohydrates, any sort of sweetened beverage, sweetened coffees, Gatorade, you know, checking the sugar content of like electrolytes. So trying to just be mindful of that liquid sugar is another really kind of like big place to start kind of auditing your sugar intake.

Melanie Avalon

I'm pretty sure I think we talked about this before. I'm so fascinated by this question. So I'll re-ask it. How do you feel about the recommendation people make to add fat to your carbs to slow down the absorption of the carbs?

Kara Collier

Yeah. So it is this concept of kind of like no naked carbs, which I do think has validity to it. But what I see work a lot better than just kind of coding carbohydrates and fat is eating some protein before you have any form of carbohydrate. So back to that kind of point of how you break a fast, if you are in a fasted state and your first bite of food is like a banana, you're probably a piece of steak and then some non-starchy vegetables, like you're doing Brussels sprouts or whatever it is, and then like banana is your dessert or whatever, however you're arranging that. It's probably going to be a much more blunted glucose response, which is going to have a less of an impact directly on kind of your blood vessel health and that endothelial tissue and those things that kind of cascade from a dramatic glucose spike. So it is beneficial to first prioritize eating protein before you have carbohydrates and not eating them by themselves. But that doesn't mean that trying to think of a good example. If you're eating potatoes, that putting a bunch of olive oil on top of them makes them significantly better. That's kind of where we're headed. Instead, I would say eat a piece of fish and then have a few bites of potatoes if you want them and see what your glucose does.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I feel like my take on it is a little controversial, but I actually, I don't know. I just feel like if you're having carbs, adding fat to that just seems like a bad idea to me. Because then you're, I love the idea, basically for carbs, I would say add what you just said, protein or like green veggies. Because then you're gonna slow the absorption, but you're not gonna be adding in a competing fuel source. Because when you're adding in the fat, then you're just encouraging a situation, in my opinion, of energy toxicity. Because now you have like, you're adding a lot of calories, you're adding two fuel sources of fat versus carbs. It just seems, I don't know, compared to if you add in the protein or the veggies, but not adding in the fat, you can still be using that glucose and those carbs as fuel, the protein will be slowing everything down. I don't think it'll be running into this like conflicting fuel option.

Kara Collier

I agree. And I think volume matters. Like what the quantity of food definitely makes an impact. So it's like, you know, if we start to get where the quantity of food is more than your body needs, then it's it is going to start kind of kicking that in. But if it's like smaller amounts, it doesn't matter as much. But what I always recommend is that focusing on protein versus fat, because I also don't see fat blunt the glucose response nearly as well as protein or fiber does anyway. So it doesn't seem to have as powerful of an effect in that. And it is like, fat is extremely calorically dense. I am not fat phobic. I'm pro fat. But that doesn't mean that we want to like I maybe this is controversial, but I am not in the camp of add more fat to everything. Like the butter coffee is not my vibe. Because what I see often of what this actually turns into of people what people actually do with that is they're eating carbohydrates and they're putting butter in their coffee. And now we've just added 300 calories of butter for no reason. And like they're not any more satiated. They're not eating any less. They're not in ketosis. They're just adding more fat in random places. And that's not helpful.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I actually I'm on I'm on the same page there, because I feel like that's such a common recommendation. Add fat to your carbs. And it really should be add protein to your carbs. Like that would just be such a better recommendation, I think for for people.

Kara Collier

And usually the fat source people are adding that situation isn't necessarily like nutrient dense either, it's not like adding a lot of value.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. Yeah. So true. So we're talking a lot about using a continuous glucose monitor for blood sugar levels. And I think we're kind of focusing on, well, actually we haven't even really defined this. So blood sugar levels and how it does relate to metabolic health in general. So that's me asking you, like, what are your thoughts there? Stephanie wanted to know, does glucose have any relation to heart health or cholesterol? Would her general practitioner give her a prescription if she asked? That's a good second question. Okay. So a few different things there. So general health, do the blood sugar levels, how do they affect our metabolic health? Does it relate to heart health? What are your thoughts there?

Kara Collier

Yeah, absolutely. So metabolic health and metabolism in general, I think of as like this whole bucket of all the processes our body is doing in order to turn food into usable fuels. So thinking about digesting, absorbing, processing, transporting, excreting, it's all of the different processes required to utilize the energy that we're putting into our system and the energy that we've stored in our system. So that's like metabolic health and metabolism as a whole. And then glucose is one of those main fuel points, right? So we have glucose, we have fats and fatty acids, and those are our two main fuel sources. Of course, there's also ketones. And so by monitoring that, we have a good idea of kind of how that metabolic system is working. And typically you don't have glucose. It's not usually like if you keep going down a certain path of metabolic dysfunction, that you're only going to have one issue, that you're just going to have glucose issues and never lipid issues, or you're just going to have lipid issues and never glucose issues. So typically, like if we have metabolic dysfunction, that means our energy processing, transporting, all of those different systems are not working as they're designed to be working. And so you can kind of see that by watching how your glucose levels change and react and how they fluctuate. There's definitely a correlation with glucose levels and cardiovascular health, heart disease risk. And that's where tracking glucose levels tends to be easier than tracking lipids because we have the technology to monitor it in this 24 seven way. So usually when we improve glucose levels, we tend to kind of improve metabolic health as a whole, which then has that kind of ripple effect bleeding into improving lipid levels and kind of those other areas. But it doesn't just start with cardiovascular health. One thing I always like pointing out is that it also has a direct impact on kind of the sort of brain function side of things. So both risk for conditions like Alzheimer's and dementia, but also kind of your day to day ability to concentrate cognitive function memory, because that, you know, our brain is very glucose dependent and very insulin sensitive organ. So that's kind of another major area that by monitoring glucose levels and optimizing them kind of having that big impact on long term and short term health.

Melanie Avalon

Awesome, yeah. When she asked about would her general practitioner give her a prescription, if she asked, I'm curious if she's asking about like for her blood sugar levels or if if he would give it to her based on her cholesterol. But either way, do you find doctors are open to prescribing them to people?

Kara Collier

Yeah, historically, not so much, which is why we decided to do it ourselves. You started your company. Yeah, so we traditionally know, and I think part of the resistance here is that they're not trained on what to do with the information. It's like, okay, if I give this to a non-diabetic, and they come back and tell me, look at my glucose levels, how was it? They don't know because the only... And I really can't blame them for that because the only thing they've been trained on is maybe managing the diabetics levels, which is honestly very, very different. So part of it is, how do they help somebody if they do give it to them? And then the other is, it's not anywhere in traditional guidelines that this is a use case. So traditional medical triaging, an intervention for somebody, this is nowhere in the standard recommendations that it might be a useful tool. So unless you get somebody who's maybe more of in the functional medicine space, it's probably unlikely that they're going to, unfortunately. But yeah, that's sort of why we exist. And now that things are moving a little bit more over the counter, you can kind of bypass that all in general. So I would kind of go around them if they're resistant.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. And I don't know the, obviously I don't know the technicalities of the medical system and how it works, but I would imagine, I know for doctors, there's a lot of pressure about what they can and can't prescribe and there's codes they have to follow. And so I would imagine it's probably not the easiest for them to prescribe a CGM without like a verified you are diabetic or pre-diabetic like code to put in the system.

Kara Collier

Definitely like insurance won't cover it and so usually weren't they're not typically thinking about things if it's not in a classic like insurance coverage route

Melanie Avalon

And so, glad we're talking about this, to clarify, so when people use Nutrisense, what is the setup? How many CGM's do they get? How does it work with the app? What is that experience like?

Kara Collier

Yeah. So each CGM lasts 14 days. So kind of our minimum order is to do two CGM's or like a month supply. And that's a great place to start if you're not really sure, if you just kind of want to check it out, or if you're generally healthy and just want to see some of these additional like insights that we talked about. So if you were to just do the one month, then you would get those two CGM's shipped to your door. You just kind of sign up on our website online. It's super simple. You fill out a quick health questionnaire, and then we'll ship it to your door. And then you have access to the app, which is where you'll see your glucose data. Once you put the sensor on, you can log your meals, you can kind of sync with your wearables. So any data from like your Apple watch or your or ring will sync on there. And that's also where you can schedule and book calls with our nutritionists and where you can kind of connect with them. Like I mentioned, now we offer full video consults, which again, for some people using the app, looking at the data, reading our blogs, talking to our kind of like chatbot that has all of our information might be enough. But then for other people, there was this big issue of kind of like what now or what does this mean, or what's most important to take away from here. Being able to kind of connect with that human helps people really turn the data into actions and change. And so then we also offer three months, six months and 12 months subscriptions. So you can change to those plans at any time, but it gets cheaper, kind of the longer the commitment term.

Melanie Avalon

Awesome. And yeah, this will be a good time. So I will give listeners a link, because we do have a discount code for you guys. So thank you so much for that Kara. So people can go to Nutrisense.com slash if podcast. So that's n u t r i s e n s e comm slash if podcast and use the code I have podcast that will get you $30 off and one month of free nutritionist support. So definitely check that out. I'm super curious just like a day in your life, Kara at Nutrisense. Like what's a day in the life? I mean, I know we're like podcasting right now. But you know, where's your focus? What are you doing? Like was what's it like being at the company?

Kara Collier

Yeah, that's a great question. It's all over the place. I would say one thing that is always true is that a one day never looks the same as another day. But largely, so I'm responsible, really paying attention to our dietitian services. So everything that our dietitians touch and making sure that they are, you know, adequately staffed, trained, supporting our customers in the right appropriate way. And then anything that kind of requires knowing anything subject matter expertise. So I'm working with product a lot to make sure our product is really good, and scientifically sound and also useful and actionable. And then kind of external facing activities like this that require some of that more knowledge about kind of the nitty gritty of what it all means.

Melanie Avalon

And two more personal questions. One, how often do you wear a CGM?

Kara Collier

Well, I'm actually wearing one right now. So pretty often, I think when I first started wearing them, I wore them pretty much 24 seven, where now I probably tend to put one on every, I don't know, maybe two or three months, sometimes I'll wear them more often, if just there's like something happening in my life that I'm trying to pay more attention to. But in my normal routine, it's it's Yeah, maybe once every quarter. So

Melanie Avalon

This is actually really inspiring me because I haven't worn one in a while and I have one. So for me guys, so I'm going to I'm going to put that on like really soon. And what are you most excited about in the future with all of this?

Kara Collier

Yeah, similarly to what we've talked about, I think we're really at a cusp of a lot of positive change happening. So I'm excited about all of the technology advancements that are going to be coming, but I'm also really excited in terms of kind of the switch to the over-the-counter sensors. Because I think they're going to become more normalized. More people are going to be wearing these. They're going to be cheaper, which is going to make it easier for a lot more people to use them. And they're just going to become better technology that are easy to understand, easy to wear. They're going to last longer. And just like my personal goal, the reason I got in this in the first place is because I really, truly believe that if everybody wears even just one CGM, we will be healthier as a nation. So that is my big picture, moonshot goal, is that everybody wears at least one. Honestly, we still have a lot of improvement to make in our health as a society, but I'm optimistic that we'll at least be heading in the right direction, hopefully.

Melanie Avalon

Oh my goodness. Now I feel like I'm plagiarizing because literally that is how I open my conversations of CGMs. I always just say, especially for people who aren't familiar, I'm like, if everybody could just wear a CGM, like once, even just once, it would change the metabolic health of our nation. Like, hands down. Hands down. That's incredible. And it's really good to hear because I was curious when I first heard that, yeah, CGMs are going to become more accessible or maybe not require prescription. I was wondering how it was going to affect companies like you. Like, would you see that as, you know, a threat because you're providing CGMs, you know, and now people can get them over the counter. It's good to hear that you're all about the more access and the abundance. Because even if you get one over the counter, that is not going to help you analyze that data, make sense of it. I think so many people, you know, they get a CGM and then it's like, now what? You need something that helps you to understand everything. And Nutrisense, the app, and everything that you're doing is just so, so valuable for that. So, like, thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Kara Collier

Yeah, absolutely. And it's definitely synergistic. You know, if I love that they're going to be, you know, cheaper and easier, but it's also they are not they're not good at making apps or accessible data. So it's definitely synergistic of what we do and what the hardware manufacturers do.

Melanie Avalon

So again, for listeners, cannot recommend enough getting a CGM, go to Nutrisense.com slash I have podcast use the code I have podcast to save $30 and get one month of free nutrition and support. So well, this was awesome. I would love to just keep having you on annually if you're down because I, I just think this is so so helpful for people and I just can't thank you enough for all you're doing. So so thank you so much for everything that you're doing.

Kara Collier

Yeah, absolutely. I would be thrilled to make it an annual change and honestly, so much changes in a year would be fun to kind of do at that cadence.

Melanie Avalon

I know. It's really exciting, especially like going back to what we were talking about in the beginning. Like just so much has changed even from last time we talked, so. Awesome. Well, thank you so much. Enjoy the rest of your day and we will have to talk again soon.

Kara Collier

Yeah, absolutely. Thanks Melanie. 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!

Feb 09

Episode 408 – Does MCT Oil Break The Fast?, GMO Probiotics To Break Down Alcohol, Fasting Tea And Coffee, Fasting For Colonoscopy Prep, Habits And Planning, Our Favorite Biohacks, Infrared Saunas And Red Light Therapy, And More!

Welcome to Episode 408 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.

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

TRANSCRIPT

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

Melanie Avalon

Welcome to episode 408 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 408 of the intermittent fasting podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon. I'm here with Barry Conrad. Barry, how are you today?

Barry Conrad

I'm good i'm really really good actually i feel super rested recharged how you feeling today.

Melanie Avalon

I'm glad you're feeling that way. I'm hoping that like comes over to me because I love energy. And so the more, the merrier.

Barry Conrad

I'm sending it to you right now through the computer. Take it, take it, take it.

Melanie Avalon

Normally this is my vibe, like 8 o'clock PM my time, but yeah, I'm a little bit on the struggle bus. But last night I went to a restaurant which was South African.

Barry Conrad

Wow. Where was it? What was it called? What kind of food? What was the situation like?

Melanie Avalon

It's called Yibo Beach House, spelled like H-A-U-S, I think, in Buckhead in Atlanta. I only realized it was South African because like half of the wines were, it was a lot of South African wines. Which, do you like South African wine? Have we talked about this?

Barry Conrad

We haven't talked about this, but they, I was about to say they know we, I should say, because I'm South African, we know how to do wines. It's it's really, really easy to drink. It's paired well with like meats, especially like Springbok, Budovos, Biltong, all that.

Melanie Avalon

That was a lot of words that I don't think I, what was the first one?

Barry Conrad

Springbok.

Melanie Avalon

spring, bok, buck, like a deer.

Barry Conrad

Like yeah, exactly. So spring book is

Melanie Avalon

ringed deer.

Barry Conrad

Yeah it's actually ends but we call it like for example like a rugby team is the spring box or would like to call them the book like the book.

Melanie Avalon

And it's deer, venison.

Barry Conrad

You can eat it yeah and it's it's honestly amazing like the springbok lamb shanks wow incredible.

Melanie Avalon

Wait, wait, but that would be lamb. Now I'm confused.

Barry Conrad

Like Springbok Shanks, I should say. Kind of like Springbok. I went to South Africa a couple of years ago on a trip, listeners, and we got to stay at the safari, and they fed us like Springbok Shanks, Boudevoirs, amazing chicken paired with ones. Boudevoirs? Boudevoirs. Can you try to say it? Boudevoirs? Almost, yeah. You got to roll the R.

Melanie Avalon

I can't do that. Can you do that? I've heard if you don't learn how to do it, you can't ever do it.

Barry Conrad

Maybe you can go Brouwars? It's not quite the same.

Melanie Avalon

I'm not saying it again. I'm not saying it. I'm tapping out. So what is that? That word I will not say.

Barry Conrad

So the boudevoirs, the word that you are tapping out of, it's sausage. So African sausage, we have it on, you know, like people call the barbecue, like a barbecue, we call it a braai, B-R-A-A-I, and it's like a barbecue, but way better, and we have boudevoirs on the braai, it's the best sausage you'll ever have, it's amazing, not just saying it, we have to try it together.

Melanie Avalon

I wonder if that was on the menu, I should have looked at the menu more.

Barry Conrad

What did you have then? Just the wines?

Melanie Avalon

I just drank wine. So they had a lot of South African wines, but none of them were organic. And South African wines, because of the hotter climate, I'm assuming would be higher alcohol, higher sugar. So yeah, they had one organic wine and it was my favorite white varietal. So I was a long day. I don't even know how to say it. Milan de Bourgogne from France. It was

Barry Conrad

Like a peanut, what kind of, what does it taste similar to, like a peanut grease you?

Melanie Avalon

It tastes like melon, honestly, which I love. It's really light, fruity, melony. Melony, not Melanie. Melony. But and something I had before, which I'm dying to tell listeners about. I literally did not plan this, but perfect segue. I interviewed recently Zach Abbott. He is the founder of a company called Zebiotics. Have you heard of this company? I haven't told me. So he made the world's first genetically modified probiotic. So the probiotic is genetically engineered. And we had a whole side topic discussion about the like the misperception of GMOs. Like they're not necessarily bad. Like the concept of like genetically engineering something or modifying something. They modify this probiotic to create the enzyme which breaks down diacetaldehyde, the toxic byproduct of alcohol metabolism. Oh, wow. Yeah. So your liver is really good at breaking that down, but the stomach cannot doesn't really have that enzyme. So according to him, a lot of like the negative effects from drinking come from the diacetaldehyde that is in the stomach because there's no enzyme to break it down because it doesn't all make its way to the liver. So this probiotic is engineered to create that enzyme. So you take it before drinking. It's called Zebiotics. It's like in a little, it's a liquid in a little like shot. You take a shot of it before drinking and it breaks down that, that toxic byproduct. So it is amazing for, if you're drinking a lot or moderately.

Barry Conrad

We need that, Mel. We need to try that. I think that's for us.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, I'm using it now, like on the regular. And now every time I go out, I take it before hand. I'm obsessed. It's like part of my protocol.

Barry Conrad

How long before you drink do you have to take the shot is it like a half an hour is like faster an hour?

Melanie Avalon

Like right before you start drinking, but it also lasts 24 hours, which is cool. And he said it produces more, like more enzyme than you could ever drink enough to, like it's enough to cover however much you're drinking, essentially. I'm noticing a difference. Like it really works. And I posted about it in my Facebook group and so many people commented saying that they've tried it and it really, they really noticed a difference.

Barry Conrad

So you feel, what do you feel when you have it compared to before when you weren't trying it?

Melanie Avalon

I just, well, I do so many other things in my like drinking protocol. So I don't really get intense hangover-y type symptoms ever. Cause I'm like so intense with everything, but I just notice, so it's comparing it, I don't know. I drank a lot for new years.

Barry Conrad

like what

Melanie Avalon

will dry farm wines, but then they had like cheap champagne and I had some of that and it was like way too much. And I definitely noticed the next day, like not, I just would have felt that a lot more, I think, if I hadn't had that before. So I highly recommend it. He also has one that I have not tried that turns some sugar into fiber. It like converts sugar into fiber. I have not tried that one yet.

Barry Conrad

like commercially where like people need these things because this is going to just help like your everyday life. I need to try these both of those.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, no, it's it's super cool. So if listeners are interested, I wonder if they ship to Australia.

Barry Conrad

Australia was about to ask.

Melanie Avalon

Probably not. But maybe. Actually, I don't know. I feel like with their regulations and stuff, we should check.

Barry Conrad

Does it come like refrigerated in the start of the year? Probably, I don't know if it would.

Melanie Avalon

it's not refrigerated, it's shelf stable. Yeah. But in any case, listeners, if they would like to try it, they can go to Melanie Avalon.com slash Z Biotics. So it's Z B I O T I C S. Use the coupon code Melanie Avalon to get 10% off. Definitely check that out. Literally, like I said, it is part of my protocol now, not every night because of the cost of it, but on nights that go out for sure.

Barry Conrad

Okay, well, I'm gonna have to jump on that train. It's super cool.

Melanie Avalon

Anything new in your life before we jump into topics?

Barry Conrad

Yeah, I've I've actually been revisiting like a book that I have read before it's called atomic habits. Have you heard of that book?

Melanie Avalon

Yes, that's one of my favorite books. It's shocking how long that book was on the New York Times bestseller list. It just never left the list. It just stayed there.

Barry Conrad

Yeah. And listeners, if you don't know about this book, it's by James Clear. And it's basically about habits, but not just a generic way of explaining it. It's about small, consistent daily habits over time, rather than a big, dramatic one. I'm going to do this. I'm going to do that. And making it easy and more identity based. So for example, rather than saying, I can't have that to eat. It's like, well, I'm a healthy person kind of a thing. So basically, creating more of a structure around your life. So you don't need the self control, basically making it hacking your habits in a way. And so I think it's super cool. Because, I mean, Mel, you and I talked about this a while ago, how, like, there's more freedom and structure. I really think that I've always lived that way. And this book is all about that. And even if you were to tie it back to, like, even like intermittent fasting, it's the same sort of thing. Like the structure of having a fasting or eating window. And just remember the decision fatigue. And we're not making choices all day. So I think it's such a good book. I love it. It's a really, really good book for any time of year. So I highly recommend that. Listeners, please check it out, Atomic Habits by James Clear.

Melanie Avalon

I love that so much. I actually, I think that's the one that I, wait, is that the one that I cried at the end? Wait, have you finished it?

Barry Conrad

I've read it once before, but I'm going through it again, yeah.

Melanie Avalon

Do you remember at the end, does he talk about mindfulness and stuff? Is that how it ends? Okay. Yeah. I cried. How are you consuming it? I usually...

Barry Conrad

Consuming having it with like a knife and fork no I usually I usually listen audiobook for nonfiction but this one I kind of wanted to sit down and read something because it was getting distracted a lot and I wanted to kind of block things out some reading it the paperback.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, I listened to it and him reading the ending. I was crying. I was like, what am I doing?

Barry Conrad

What about the ending made you cry? Like, why, what do you think? That was probably.

Melanie Avalon

probably like 2018, it's probably like six or seven years ago, something about just how motivating it was. It was really inspiring. Yeah, I love what you said about it's really great for something like working on habits surrounding fasting and things like that. It's funny, I actually thought about you last night because I was talking with one of the girls and we were talking about, because you just mentioned the freedom and structure concept, and we were talking about making plans. And I was talking about how I feel safe when there were plans. I need plans to feel in control of life and feel safe and feel good and have freedom. And she was saying that the idea of planning something is horrible. It makes her feel constricted and horrible and want to run away. And it's so interesting that people can have completely different feelings about that.

Barry Conrad

I'm with you. There's more freedom in that because you can always divert from the plan, but not having a plan is kind of like, Oh, what's going to happen? Okay, let me zoom out for a second. I think in certain situations, not all situations, if you're hanging out with people on the day and you're kind of just having a day all day, like I'd go with the floor and whatnot. But if I'm scheduling a specific time or whatever, I'd love to just schedule that.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, same. We were talking about the example of like, I love making future plans. Like I have, you know, my guests are scheduled out through 2026. I have like theater shows scheduled out to go to through like the whole year. And she was saying that the idea of like making a plan to see a show in May is just like the worst, you know, like really, she does not like that concept. And I

Barry Conrad

That is really interesting. And that's actually so far in the future. I don't think I'm that, I don't know if I'm that well versed in the planning, but I think, you know, maybe it's going to inspire me to do that more. Because sometimes I can see if something's so far in the future, I'm like, am I going to be around? And you kind of get like trepidation or fear about like, what if I'm going to miss out on something else? But sometimes it's good just to be, well, it is good just to be certain and just, you know, decisive and just plan it.

Melanie Avalon

Well, it's kind of like what you said. You don't have, you know, once the time comes, things can change. But if I don't plan it, then, and it's something I want to do, then I don't know that I actually might be able to do it unless I put it down on my calendar. Yep.

Barry Conrad

I'd love to see your calendar. It's probably like so crazy, like just dates everywhere, writing everywhere, right? Yeah, pretty much.

Melanie Avalon

It makes me happy. It's my favorite thing. Okay. Shall we jump into some intermittent fasting related things?

Barry Conrad

Julian on Facebook says, I just recently started implementing black coffee with MCT oil in the morning during a fasted state. I usually also take seropeptase during that time as well. Would it be fine to take both MCT oil and seropeptase simultaneously? I want to make sure the MCT oil didn't interfere with the seropeptase since it's helped my sinuses drastically. Also, if I'm having black coffee with MCT oil, would I still be in the fasted state? Thank you.

Melanie Avalon

Thank you. All right, Julian, thank you so much for your question. So it's a pretty simple answer. Well, first of all, about being in the fastest state with the MCT oil, this is heavily debated as it has been for eons and eons. On this show, consistently, we do believe, well, actually, Barry, I would love to hear your thoughts on this. Historically, we believe that having anything caloric, especially something like MCT oil, like fat, would, quote, break the fast, because you're taking in calories. People say that MCT oil doesn't break the fast because it's a type of fat that's immediately, essentially, shuttled to the liver for energy, and it supports the production of ketones. So people will say that it's supporting the fasted state because it's just creating more ketones and running on fat. I believe, though, you're taking in calories, it is a food, so I do not consider black coffee with MCT oil still being in the fastest state. I would see it as being in a state fed on MCT oil and still producing ketones like the fasted state, but not actually being fasted. What are your thoughts on that, Barry?

Barry Conrad

I 100% agree. I mean, it has calories, so that technically it's going to break your fast. So, you know, if you're wanting to do, if you're someone that subscribes to like a modified fast approach, which some people say, because you want mental clarity or energy without spiking insulin too much, go ahead. But I personally, and I know that you feel the same way, it's not really the clean fast. It's going to break your fast. Do you know what I mean? So I'm on that team for sure. I'd skip the MCT all and just, you know, just have it during the faster window. I mean, just, just have it during eating. We know, I should say, let's do that.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, and when I add MCT oil it actually for me would always make me hungrier when I would experiment with that I don't know. Have you experimented with adding MCT oil to your coffee ever?

Barry Conrad

You know, during the bulletproof craze, I've introduced butter and whatnot, but not MCT oil so much. Is it much different? Like the feeling or the taste or the effect, having a bit of butter?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, it is. It is pretty different because the butter is a long chain triglyceride. So it's like a saturated fat that has to be broken down, digested, you know, turned into energy. And then like I was saying before, MCT oil, especially there's like, there's the C8 and the C10 version, and I would always get the C8 version, which is even quicker in how it is metabolized and turned into ketones. So it does provide like much faster energy. The taste is different because butter has like a buttery taste, MCT oil tastes. I love the way it tastes. I actually used to put in my food sometimes. It's a very neutral taste.

Barry Conrad

your food.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah when i was doing like low carb for a while i would just add a lot of empty oil so i feel like it really makes the food i don't know i love it i love the taste of it.

Barry Conrad

Is this kind of like when you would have the rotisserie chicken that phase? Like when you put the amputee over that or not really?

Melanie Avalon

Not that they actually back then I was doing a lot of coconut oil, which has MCTs in it, but it's primarily that that's a misconception. People think coconut oil is like all MCTs. It's not. It's like a small, a little bit of it is MCTs, but the majority of it is actually lauric acid. A majority of it is lauric acid, which is a long chain fatty acid. No, this was after, after that phase. But when I would do like, I just went through a stint where I was doing like low carb, quote, high fat, but it was high MCT oil fat. I actually think that's a good hack for people if what they're doing isn't working and they're doing low carb, but they still want to do low carb and they don't want to try like a carb approach. I think switching out all your fats for MCT oil or even just like removing your fats and just adding a little bit of MCT oil can actually be a way to try to break a plateau or get weight loss going again.

Barry Conrad

Right. Julian, if you're in doubt, the rule of thumb, the best way to approach it is black coffee, water, black tea. If you're having to flirt with anything else, if it has calories, it's going to break your fast. Just keep that in mind.

Melanie Avalon

I agree with you Barry so much like people stress a lot about all the different things to like the perfect, you know, fasting supporting drink or supplement or do you want to add amino acids? Do you want to add these different pre-workout things and really friends like coffee and tea are just like the work so well. Yeah, we love peak tea around here. They actually have a fasting tea that they made in collaboration with Dr. Jason Fung. The bergamot one is just pure organic black tea. And so again, Dr. Jason Fung helped formulate that to help support fasting. So listeners can actually get 10% off when you go to peaklife.com slash IF podcast, that's P-I-Q-U-E-L-I-F-E.com slash IF podcast. That's on the tea front. And then hopefully we're recording a little bit in advance, but hopefully by the time this comes out, my glow coffee will be hopefully on its way. So plug for that. We're creating that to be the highest CGA content coffee possible and CGA is the antioxidant, which is one of the main antioxidants that gives coffee all of its health benefits. So we specifically searched and sought out beans that are high naturally in CGA. And then we roast them, especially to be high in CGA. And then we third party lab test the coffee to make sure it's free of toxins and mold and pesticides and all the things. And actually over the holidays, Barry, I wish you could have been there. This was so fun. We did a blind taste test with like six of my friends and we tasted it against two other coffee brands that are similar to see what people liked the most. I was happy with the results. We tasted three coffees. It was neck and neck with one of them for being the crowd favorite. And then the other one people did not like as much.

Barry Conrad

That's amazing. That's awesome.

Melanie Avalon

Is there like a profile of coffee that you like?

Barry Conrad

Not too bitter, but I don't love too light. It's got to still give me that kick. Like I love actually tasting the coffee. So somewhere probably profile wise, mid to strong, I would say. Yeah. I need to try some of it when it comes out when it's ready. I can't wait.

Melanie Avalon

or like wrapping up right now, like the art and yes. And I love the way it tastes. It's lighter to medium. It does have like some fruity notes and acidity to it, but it does have like a nutty flavorful finish as well. It tastes really good. It was half of the people's favorite out of all the three.

Barry Conrad

It's so exciting, I can't wait to try it.

Melanie Avalon

I'm excited too. You and I were talking offline, just while we're talking about drinks and pre-workouts breaking the fast. What did you get asked recently from somebody about a drink breaking the fast?

Barry Conrad

somebody asked me the other day, they were like, if I drink this, I'm not going to say the brand, this zero sugar energy drink, will that break my fast? Because, bro, it's like, it's energy. So, and it has no sugar. So, surely, that'll be fine. I'm like, bro, it's not fine. It's going to break too fast. It has calories. It's besides the point. Do you get asked that?

Melanie Avalon

Yes. And there's just so many, I like shutter when I look at those drinks, like all the ingredients in them and things. Like you could just get, like I was saying before, you could get health benefits and support your metabolism and all the things with, you know, a really good organic tea or coffee. That'll do it.

Barry Conrad

So you need, just get that glow. Get it. Yep. So we have a question from Jill and she asked, how to incorporate fasting into colonoscopy prep?

Melanie Avalon

Okay, so Jill, I'm so, I'm actually surprised in the seven years or so that I've done this podcast that I don't think we've been asked this. And what's interesting about it, Well, Barry, have you had a colonoscopy?

Barry Conrad

This is very tasty conversation and I have not yet, but I actually am totally keen to try one because I heard it has so many benefits, right? Clearing out your system.

Melanie Avalon

Well, so Australia, they must have different. So like here in the US, I think you like are supposed to get one. Okay. So actually I just checked the rules. I guess I thought, I thought it was like in your thirties that you were supposed to get one in the US, but in the US it's, they recommend at 45. And then earlier, if you have a family history of colorectal cancer. Yeah. So I've actually had three, three already. Yeah. That's why I have so many thoughts. That's about this question.

Barry Conrad

I, Melanie, I have not had one, I can safely say, but I definitely, even though I did confuse it with something else before, it's very important to get one because of, especially have family history, and I am due to get one, so.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, Barry was confusing it with colonics, which I love colonics do not get me started on colonics. We actually have talked about those on the show, but for the colonoscopy, so I didn't ever have it. I didn't have it for like, I don't have a genetic risk for cancer or anything. I just had it because of my, because of my anemia, actually they were trying to see, which I don't have anymore, but they were trying to see if I had internal bleeding or something like that. So the prep for it, because she says, how do you incorporate fasting into colonoscopy prep, you actually drink, it's, it's not fun. You have to, I'm like having flashbacks. You have to drink this like liquid laxative, like we're talking like a gallon of it. Like it is so much that you have to drink. I think it changes the different times I've done it, but I started an amount of time before you stop eating and then you just start drinking and drinking this stuff. Yeah. It's funny though. This is what's funny about it. So one of the times I did it, I was actually in the hospital for anemia. So I didn't have the, I wasn't able to kind of like make it my own. Like if I, cause when I did it at a later time, they just gave me the powder to make the drink and then you could like flavor it with the flavors they gave you. But I wanted to make it as like clean as possible. So I didn't do that, which I will circle back to you about how to incorporate fasting. But when I was in the hospital, I had to just drink, they already pre-mixed it. I had to drink it. It had like, we were talking earlier about flavors and stuff. It had all this like horrible stuff in it, like probably Stevia sweetened. I hadn't had anything like flavored and fake tasting in forever that literally when I started drinking it, I was like, this tastes amazing. Cause it tastes like candy cause I hadn't had like, you know, I hadn't had like that fake flavor-y stuff in years. I was like, this is great. It's like drinking Pez. Do they have Pez in Australia?

Barry Conrad

We don't have Pez. What is that similar to? Is it like a sugary drink? What is it?

Melanie Avalon

And no, no, no, it's like, it's like Pez dispensers, like these little like, it's like all the different, they're like different cartoon characters and then they dispense these little like sugar tablets that are flavored.

Barry Conrad

I feel like I feel like I can see what you're talking about and that's that's pretty delicious but drinking it. Yeah, I can see that.

Melanie Avalon

it literally tastes like that. But then by the end, I was like, Oh my gosh, this is like horrible. I can't not drink another sip. But in any case, so my reframe for colonoscopy prep as a expert colonoscopy undergoer is it is a nice chance to do an extended fast because you do have to stop eating a certain amount of time before the surgery. It's not, I said surgery before the procedure. You have to be drinking this stuff, which even though it's, if you do like the flavored stuff, it does quote break the fast, but it isn't any calories. So you're not taking in any calories and then you like clean everything out. And then if you try to think if I like did not eat that, basically I was able to incorporate it and have a, an extended fast. All right, because the night before I didn't eat the night before cause I was doing the prep. So it was kind of a nice way to get in like a lot longer fasting hours and you actually can drink bone broth. So the most recent time I did it, I drank bone broth. So that actually was like food. So that time I kind of saw it as like an extended fast with a bone broth fast added on or like my normal fasting with like a bone broth fast. If you have to do a colonoscopy prep, I would try to make the actual stuff that you drink as benign as possible. So if you can get the version, cause it's usually covered by insurance, you can get a version where you're flavoring it yourself. Then you can just not use those flavor packets and you can flavor it with more helpful options. So I went to the store and I bought cause what it comes with is like is flavored with artificial sweeteners that are not good and you know, stuff you don't want. So I would, I went and found these like stevia flavored things at the store, which were a little bit more benign to flavor it. So I would recommend doing that. And then if you actually want to have food as well, you can do bone broth. So you can see it as like a way to have a bone broth thing. And then you have the procedure, which is actually, you know, you're under anesthesia. So it's quick from your perception.

Barry Conrad

You had the bone broth and you're just awake in two seconds.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, you'll have to report back, Mary, if you do this.

Barry Conrad

So clear, non-caloric liquids, what I'm hearing is non-caloric liquids like water, bone broth, if allowed by your doctor, if they prescribe that, make sure you're hydrated beforehand, but also adjusting your fasting ahead of time. How did you approach your fasting maybe the day, two days beforehand?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so I did completely normal up until the day before. And then the day before was the day where I had to start the prep. So that's where I got in my longer fast because normally I would have eaten that night but I didn't I for the first two I didn't have anything caloric I just had those drinks and then the third time I did it I had bone broth. Yeah, so basically the day before is where I didn't have a one meal a day meal like I normally do so I got in a longer fasting period of time and then had the procedure the next day and then you can eat well, I don't know if they recommend like go I think they do recommend like going slow but I'm so used to that's one thing I've noticed like I'm so used to fasting during the day and then eating a massive meal at night that I don't have to make any special like adjustment I don't need to like ease into my big meal again I'm like good to go. Yeah, you're good to go. Yeah, but I've been doing one meal a day.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, it's the same thing where doctors always say ease into it after any kind of a surgery or procedure, but I think the great thing about fasting is you already are having that long time of not eating, so your body's really primed for that. Just go back to your eating. You don't have to try to ease into having three gentle meals or five gentle meals, you know what I mean? So that's great. There's another benefit of IF.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, actually, and similar with like when I get the thing, you confused it with a colonic. Sometimes if I go to a new place, they'll give you all the material where they're like, you know, ease into foods after I'm like, I'm good. Like, like, I am totally good. I literally, I don't ever need it. I think even if I did like, I mean, I haven't, but I think even if I did like a five day extended fast, I literally probably could just like feast after and be fine. I'm not saying to do that. Ease in if you need to.

Barry Conrad

We're not endorsing, but we're just saying if you're used to that, then you know what you do you.

Melanie Avalon

We're just being real. So yeah, but on the flip side of not eating, speaking of food, Barry, you have a restaurant to explore?

Barry Conrad

I have a restaurant to explore and let me tell you this is one that I hunted down because one of my favorite cuisines is Greek food and the restaurant is called The Bright Star. The Bright Star is actually based in Alabama and it's the oldest continuously operating restaurant in Alabama. It started as this 25-cafe catering to local workers and it's grown into this 330-seat iconic landmark. It survived the Great Depression, stayed open to serve the community through that time. Oh, wow. Yeah, it was featured in the 100 dishes to eat in Alabama before you die. Yes!

Melanie Avalon

We love that.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, and it's a family run establishment, so it's got lots of history. I love that it wasn't featured in that hundred dishes to eat in Alabama for you because I'm all about that final meals and whatnot. So should we dive in? Let's do it. Should we look at the menu?

Melanie Avalon

And first of all, I have to say I love places with like I love finding restaurants with history that have been around for so long. That's why for the first time we did this, I picked one that was like one of the oldest restaurants in America. I just it's so cool to think I just love like history of places. It's cool to think about. So for listeners, every episode we like to feature a cool restaurant that we found and say what we would order from the menu in our breaking of our fast because fasting one of the awesome things about fasting is the feasting on the other side.

Barry Conrad

Let's go to the dinner section and then, so we'll go look at the dinner section after choosing all of our food, then there's wine and beer and cocktail. So I think after dessert, even we might have to even check that out a drink of some sort, you're down.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. Okay. Well, this menu is massive. So, and they have a quick menu. I wonder what that's. Okay. You know, it's a massive menu when they start with their quote quick menu and the quick menu is, is larger than most menus. Very confusing. I'm confused. I'm confused. So what would you get for appetizer? Oh my gosh. There's so many things.

Barry Conrad

So I'm going down right now. Let me have a look. I'm gonna go for the appetizer.

Melanie Avalon

We have appetizers and then we have appetizer as entree.

Barry Conrad

When I saw that initially, I thought of, it's not the same thing, but when you said, I'll have my mains for dessert. But one thing that jumped out of me straight away was remember how I said I hadn't had. There's one thing on here, Mel, that I've told you that I haven't had before and you were really shocked. Can you guess what it is? It begins with an S, it's two words.

Melanie Avalon

I mean is it shrimp related? No because you like shrimp. Yeah. What was the shellfish that you... Oh right, shrimp cocktail.

Barry Conrad

I've never had a shrimp cocktail listeners ever I love shrimp I eat it normally but I just assume cocktail is not really a thing that you typically get in Australia at restaurants so that's definitely going to be on my starter situation. What is spag spag spag it sounds like is that spaghetti because we called spat like a spag bowl like a spaghetti bowl here in Australia.

Melanie Avalon

Really? It looks like it's an animal.

Barry Conrad

a spag.

Melanie Avalon

Well, it's definitely, okay, Chad GPT says it's a small particle aerosol generator. I don't think it's that. Oh yeah, you're right. They're saying spaghetti.

Barry Conrad

Slickest bag, yeah.

Melanie Avalon

Hm, I've never heard it called that. Interesting.

Barry Conrad

Okay, so I'm going to tell you my status first. I have a few. I'm going to do the shrimp cocktail, the entree baked mushrooms, and the entree bowl gumbo because I love gumbo. I tried it in New Orleans and it was game changing. So I'd love to try a Greek styled version. So that's my starters plural. What would you have?

Melanie Avalon

I would probably, I would maybe have lobster and crab. Oh my goodness. I can have so many things. Lobster and crab and salmon and shrimp. What is snap throat? Oh, snapper throat. Maybe they seem to like snapper here. I think I would get lobster, crab, shrimp, salmon. Let's just get all of it.

Barry Conrad

All of it. I feel like when we find the listeners, when we finally eat together, we probably need two tables put together because we want to have like taste little bits of everything, I reckon.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. I'd be down. I would be down. What would you get as your main thing?

Barry Conrad

I would get the lobster and we get the fried chicken I love fried chicken with the passion and I love lobster as well so both of those for the manes for me.

Melanie Avalon

I feel like apparently snapper is their thing. I feel like I need to get snapper. I'm a little bit curious though about the mercury levels and snapper. So I probably wouldn't get the snapper. Now that I say that I probably look it up and see if I could find mercury levels in it. But from my memory, I don't think it's I don't think it's low.

Barry Conrad

I forgot to add that one of the signature dishes is the Greek style snapper.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. So you might be missing out. I don't think, yeah, I would want it, but I don't think I would get it because of the mercury. So I probably get filet mignon. Yes.

Barry Conrad

Okay, and for dessert, are you going to get just the one or are you going to get another one?

Melanie Avalon

Oh, right. I think because I got so many appetizers that I can just have the filet. Oh, they have a veal steak. Hmm. I changed my mind. I'm like, I'm gonna get the veal steak.

Barry Conrad

Big, it's a big menu. I'm very impressed this place.

Melanie Avalon

I am too. And then they have a ton of dessert, what would you get for dessert?

Barry Conrad

Okay, I'm looking at it now.

Melanie Avalon

Can you get the birthday pie so I can look at it?

Barry Conrad

Okay, I've got a few choices. I'm going to I'm going to do the because you know, I love chocolate. It's my favorite. I'm going to do the whole chocolate pie, the peanut butter slice with vanilla ice cream on the side, and then the birthday cake. I'll order as well, but I'm not going to have all of it. I'll just have it for you to a look at and for me to like taste. How's that?

Melanie Avalon

perfect. And I would just watch and get some more, probably some more salmon, maybe probably whatever appetizer, like the best out of the salmon shrimp lobster, grab more of whatever I liked the most.

Barry Conrad

What about a drink? A beverage? What would you like to have? There's wine there, there's beer there, there's cocktails. I'm eyeing the cocktails, just FYI.

Melanie Avalon

I don't know I'd have to look I don't know if there's a wine I'd have to look up all the wines and there's a lot and I'm not sure if there are any that are organic low alcohol European so yeah what would you get?

Barry Conrad

I'm going to go, you know, I love a margarita meal, so I'm going to go for their blueberry lemonade margarita. Something different. I usually get a spicy, but I'm all about trying different margaritas, so that's my choice.

Melanie Avalon

Nice. Oh wait, actually they have lovey bunches. I think that's actually, wait, oh my goodness, wait a minute. Actually, they have one of my favorite organic wines. It's not European. It's, I'm assuming it's a typo on their website because it says love you bumches, but I think it's, if it's love you bunches, if that's supposed to be an N, that I love that wine. It doesn't say which a varietal it is, but they have a rosé that's organic, low alcohol. They also have a red. It's by Staltman Vineyards. Yeah, I really love them. They have really nice organic practices as well. And they're like light, low alcohol. Oh, I'm happy. Yay. Okay. Awesome.

Barry Conrad

I don't think we've had one in our very few restaurants we've done so far where you've pointed out like a wine that's organic, so that's pretty good. That's awesome. Thanks, Brightstar.

Melanie Avalon

I haven't looked at the wine list before this. Going forward, I will for sure. Well, a shout out again to the Bright Star Restaurant.

Barry Conrad

Shout out to Bart star when we're in Alabama next we'll have to check you out we have to make a list of all these restaurants by the way by the end of at the end of each year and sort of like okay when when we're going to be there let's just go through list and just do a tour of all the places.

Melanie Avalon

Sounds like a plan in my dream mind.

Barry Conrad

I don't think you're going to do that because you want to travel for a day.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, you can do it. I'll watch. I'll come to one of them.

Barry Conrad

That's so funny.

Melanie Avalon

Shall we answer one more question? Let's do it. Jennifer would like to know, if you could only have one biohack in your life, what would it be?

Barry Conrad

Okay, that's that is a tough one. But for me, I would probably say real life therapy for me, because the benefits next level, you know, it boosts my collagen and production, which means smoother, firmer skin for me, which is great for what I do. So I'm not going to be mad at that. It's it's great for also even more importantly, recovery muscle recovery, because I work out a lot. I work out at least three times a week doing resistance training. So that's usually beneficial for me. So red light therapy has already helped. I've found I've got a device or two devices actually that I use already and that has made a difference. So use that on the daily. It also helps with inflammation and pain and even with hair growth. And you know, it's not just about looking good for me. It's about feeling great. And I definitely feel like even having that Melanie, how you say you have the ambient sort of red light on while you're working away that I feel the same way. Like I just have it like playing. It only goes for 10 minutes at a time though. So I have to like time it and then put it on again. But that's part of my daily. I love it. That's probably the one hack that I would choose so far. Watch the space is probably going to be more to come. What about you?

Melanie Avalon

Well, that's a really good choice. That's definitely in my, my running. This question is so hard and I'm so glad I don't ever have to actually do this. Like just picking one would be so I would be so hard. So thinking about it, I'm obsessed with my cryotherapy, but if I could only have one, then I could, I could like not go to cryotherapy every day and just do like a cold shower. Am I allowed to like, like tweak this? So like, basically I could, I could get it, you know, without the actual biohack form, which is like going into a cold chamber, but I would really miss it. Red light, that's really up there. The one thing that I like blue light walking glasses at night, but it's like, okay, well then I could just force myself to not look at screens at night. But one of the ones where like I travel and I just, it's really hard to not have that is my daily infrared sauna session. It's so profound the way it makes me feel. And I feel you go in, it feels so good and relaxing. You sweat, you sweat out all these toxins and you just feel cleansed on an internal cellular level after it. And when I travel, I'm like, Oh, I needed sauna sessions. So bad. So, and that's not something where I can, I guess you could sweat by like working out of the gym, but this I don't, I'm not going to do that. So it would be my sunlight in infrared sauna and for listeners. So I have the solo unit, which is where you lay down inside of it and your head is outside of it. So you can like do your work while you're in it or read or something like that. But they also have cabin units as well. Literally one of my favorite things in my entire life. And if you tell them I sent you Melanie Avalon, they'll give you a major discount. So sunlight in infrared sauna is my choice.

Barry Conrad

I've only done one infrared sauna before and that was last year at like a like a health and fitness joint nearby and it was it was amazing like it's different to it's so different to a regular like steam sauna like because you do feel like it's from the inside out and you do feel refreshed and you're sweating you know your butt off as well so it's it's quite a unique experience so I can see why you would go for that I actually forgot about that that's that's a really good one

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. Did you feel like you wanted to get one of your own integrated into your life daily?

Barry Conrad

I did actually feel that and then I just and I made a note to like do it again and I just haven't but I think it would definitely be really relaxing too because I like I actually like the feeling of being hot when it's for a purpose I don't like feeling hot when I'm just you know at home that's why I like being cold just like you but it's a really it's a really good feeling isn't it?

Melanie Avalon

Wait, that is so true. So I do not like being hot. The only time is when I'm in a sauna because it's like a controlled environment for a purpose. You're, you're not sweating over yourself because you're like, it's, I don't like, I don't like sweating with clothes on. It's like, I don't like textures of that.

Barry Conrad

In the gym, you do that, though, so...

Melanie Avalon

Right, but I don't go to the gym. You don't do the gym, yeah. I don't like it. I'm thinking about it right now. It feels so disgusting. I think I'm like texture, but I don't like the texture of certain things on my body. I'm very sensitive to that.

Barry Conrad

What do you mean? Like, give me an example.

Melanie Avalon

like clothing and like sweat and not about it.

Barry Conrad

Do you like black, you know those black dresses that you wear to these awesome letouts, does that count?

Melanie Avalon

So dresses, I don't like pants because I don't like all that constrictive clothing on my body. So dresses are great because they're very flowy. They're maybe tight at top, but you know, or maybe they could be, they're not as constrictive. I could not be a man and wear pants all the time.

Barry Conrad

You know, now that you mentioned, I've actually never seen you wear pants in like in any post ever. Like, that's such a good point. Like, never seen you wear jeans, pants. Do you wear jeans?

Melanie Avalon

I do not like jeans. The last time I wore jeans was, so every year I post my annual Christmas tree getting video. One of the times I went, I was like, I'm gonna dress up like rustic to get this Christmas tree. So I wore jeans.

Barry Conrad

I actually can't picture it now. I actually can't picture you in like jeans and boots. I mean, jeans. Yeah. That's so interesting. Wow. There you go.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, you're missing out Barry with the dresses.

Barry Conrad

Well, I feel it could be too breezy for me. I mean, it's, yeah, let's not keep going down that path. I'm just going to pass now.

Melanie Avalon

So, at any point, that's why I love the sauna because it's like you sweat and like this sweat immediately is, you know, you're naked, it's like whisked away onto towels. And then you're like out, you shower, it's all contained.

Barry Conrad

How many showers do you have a day like two three.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, that's such a good question. It depends how many sauna sessions I do in a day. How many do you do in a day? Well, I always do at least one long one, but sometimes I do two, sometimes I do three. I like taking sauna naps. That's a hack. That's a good biohack. So you can sleep. Yeah, because then you literally sleep and get a cardiovascular workout at the same time. Like what?

Barry Conrad

So cool. I'm trying to picture this device. I need to... Is this... Is it like a chamber? What is it?

Melanie Avalon

It's like a dome. So again, so Sunline makes cabin units like the stereotypical cabin units, but they make this solo unit. It's like a dome that you slide into.

Barry Conrad

Wow, that sounds awesome, actually.

Melanie Avalon

So yeah, I like, I've like set it up with my hulk and trap. So I put it on top of a twin bed, a twin bed frame that I got on Amazon, like a metal twin bed frame. So it's on top of that. So then I can store stuff underneath it. I got a little arm thing that I attached to it that holds my iPhone above my head to do like work. And then I got a standup fan. So I put a fan on my face. So then I don't even feel that hot cause I have the fan on my face. And if you want to take a nap, if you're like really exhausted, you can take a nap in there and you wake up and it's like you worked out. That's.

Barry Conrad

wild. You never told me this before until now in terms of the whole setup. That's crazy.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, it's really cool. So to answer your question, I take a shower in the morning and then however many sauna sessions, I take a shower after every one of those. So the most hours I take would be four, I guess, in a day.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, I love showers.

Melanie Avalon

Do you end with a cold blast?

Barry Conrad

You know what? I've definitely started introducing that more because it's kind of my way of doing the cryotherapy, but it's not really. It's just more cold water therapy. Because cryo, from what I understand, is freezing. Freezing, freezing, freezing. But it definitely refreshes me doing it. I had a cold water shower today before doing the podcast after the gym. It wakes you up. Yeah. Didn't you hear it? I'm peppy. Yeah.

Melanie Avalon

So awesome. Okay. Well, Jennifer, thank you for the question and thank you everybody else for your questions. If you would like to submit your own questions for the show, you can directly email questions at ipodcast.com and can go to ipodcast.com and submit questions there. And you can get all of the stuff that we like at ipodcast.com slash stuff we like. Definitely follow us on Instagram. I'm Melanie Avalon. Barry is okay. Ready? Barry underscore Conrad, right? You got it. Yes. And on Instagram, our show is IF Podcast. So yeah, I think that's all the things. Anything from you, Barry, before we go?

Barry Conrad

I hope you all have an awesome day and something really great to break your fast and we'll talk to you next time.

Melanie Avalon

Awesome! I will talk to you next week!

Barry Conrad

See you later!

Melanie Avalon

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!

Feb 03

Episode 407 – Long-Term Fasting And Muscle Maintenance, Making Life Heavy Physically Not Emotionally, Feeling Tired In The Morning, Circadian Rhythms, Supporting Sleep, The Ideal Coffee To Drink, And More!

Episode 118 with Dr. Michael Breus (Part 1)

Welcome to Episode 407 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:

Featured Restaurant: Hobbit Cafe

Meditation

Plainclothes

Episode 148 with Dr. Michael Breus (Part 2)

Michael Breus's book The Power of When: Discover Your Chronotype--and the Best Time to Eat Lunch, Ask for a Raise, Have Sex, Write a Novel, Take Your Meds, and More

Studies:

Intermittent Fasting: Does It Affect Sports Performance? A Systematic Review

Intermittent fasting reduces mouse body fat while maintaining muscle mass

Is muscle and protein loss relevant in long‐term fasting in healthy men?

The Effects of Intermittent Fasting Combined with Resistance Training on Lean Body Mass

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.

TRANSCRIPT

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

Melanie Avalon

Welcome to episode 407 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 407 of the intermittent fasting podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon. I'm here with Barry Conrad. Barry, how are you today?

Barry Conrad

I'm doing really good. How are you doing?

Melanie Avalon

I had a really exciting meeting today for something that I think by the time this airs will be like public knowledge. So I'm going to talk about it and I'm going to make a note that I talked about it. So well, I've been having a lot of meetings about this, but we had our first meeting with like six or seven people, like all of the team involved in making this come to fruition. Did I tell you I'm going to be launching a coffee line?

Barry Conrad

Yeah, this is about that. You did mention it to me. Yeah. Thank you.

Melanie Avalon

So I think by February, at the very least, I'm sure it'll be, I'll be talking about it. So are you a coffee drinker?

Barry Conrad

I'm obsessed with coffee, like I have at least like three a day long black all the way for me in the morning before my workout in between during work, the whole thing.

Melanie Avalon

You know what's gonna be the problem with us co-hosting? Now I don't remember if we talked about things on the show or like in real life.

Barry Conrad

I know, it's like, did we mention that?

Melanie Avalon

Because I know that you sucked it up and you started drinking it in Italy, Italian coffee and didn't even like the taste, but did it anyways, like the bitterness.

Barry Conrad

Yes well i listen as i actually hated coffee is like why would anyone want to put them through this experience and then i started acquiring the taste and now. I can't get enough of it i have to kind of covered sometimes the most i've had is like maybe five a day but that's not a regular occurrence long black no sugar no milk nothing.

Melanie Avalon

So here's so many so many coffee thoughts. Do you take into account like the quality or if it's organic or mold free or anything like that or is it more about the flavor profile like how do you choose coffee.

Barry Conrad

If I'm being honest, which I will be, I don't typically research all of the four. I go, usually, whether it's recommended by friends and the flavor profile so far. But now that I know that you start, you're starting this line, I'm going to be educated and I get to make better choices when it comes to coffee.

Melanie Avalon

Well, yeah, so a little fun fact, a reason that people really like Dave Asprey's coffee lines that he's had, like Bulletproof and Danger Coffee, which I love, I love Danger Coffee. I loved Bulletproof too. He's just not at the company anymore. Coffee beans are so susceptible to mold, like so much. So moldy coffee is like a big problem. And then coffee is also often high in pesticides. So you could be drinking this coffee that's supposed to be great for your health and making you feel good, but it can have all these things in it that could be doing actually damage to your health. And so a lot of people find that when they drink organic or mold free or toxin free coffee that they have a different experience. They don't get the crashes as much, that it's like a cleaner feeling. So yeah, I do think it's, for me, it's like really important. The focus that we're going to do in my brand, which I'm trying to decide if I should, you know what, I will, because I'll at least have a landing page up for it by then. So we can, I'll put the website and people can go there to learn more. Maybe we'll probably have like an email list grab or something, but it's going to be called Glow Coffee. And so do you, do you like that name?

Barry Conrad

I do like that name actually, what inspired you to choose that name? How'd you come up with that?

Melanie Avalon

It's because I wanted something that shows how coffee should ultimately, I think, make you feel, which is like full of energy and life and vitality. So basically all the benefits of coffee. I wanted to like capture an award and I really love the concept of things that are like luminous and ethereal and light and so like glow. I just that's what I want this coffee to do is help people glow from the inside out or outside inside out. Yeah, like just be glowing. And right now we're still in the process of finding our beans and everything, but we've been testing our beans and they're going to be like free of toxins, free of mold, all the things and a lot of the health benefits of coffee. And by the way, coffee is obviously a wonderful fasting aid, black coffee. Probably honestly, one of the best fasting aids, I would maybe say the best thing to just like catalyze your fast. If you're looking for like energy and fat burning, it's so supportive of metabolism, helps you burn fat, provides energy. Like it's a really great drink for fasting. It's one of the only things you can drink that doesn't break the fast, like black coffee and tea and water essentially. A lot of the health benefits of coffee are because of its antioxidants and coffee contains something called CGA. People don't realize this, but you can actually get certain beans and roast them a certain way to increase the CGA content. So our coffee is going to be super high in CGA content. So it's basically going to be the most antioxidant rich health promoting coffee that you can drink. I'm really excited.

Barry Conrad

Wow. Well, I can't wait to try it. I want to.

Melanie Avalon

try it. Oh, you will. You will. Once I, once I get it myself.

Barry Conrad

So exciting.

Melanie Avalon

Actually, you can help me decide this. I'm trying to side right now I'm gonna get have both websites, but I'm trying to side if it should be glow coffee co.com or glow coffee co. Do you like one better? I kind of like it

Barry Conrad

like clubcoffeeco.co.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. I'm going to have to pull people. They'll both work. So go to like glocoffee.co or glocoffeeco.com.

Barry Conrad

Actually, I'll take that back. I'll take that. I like the GlueCoffeeCode.com bidder.

Melanie Avalon

I feel like it just kind of like rolls off the tongue.

Barry Conrad

Roles of Your Tongue has a bit of a catch to it and I like the .com as well. It's a bit more, even though co is trusted as well, like there's nothing against co, a lot of people just probably will feel a bit more safe. Oh, it's a .com. Let's go with that.

Melanie Avalon

That's what I feel. I actually, that's what I was going with. But then we had, you know, like I said, this really big meeting today with lots of people. And they were saying that maybe it was easier to remember, remember glow coffee.co. I don't know. They were like fans of.co. But I was like, I think I like glow coffee.com.

Barry Conrad

I like it too. It sounds cool too to say, cloakofico.com

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I like glow coffee co like saying it that way sounds sounds cool. So yeah, listeners friends get excited. I'm sure we'll be doing some sort of launch special. Again, this is so much in the future, but go to glow coffee co.com. And definitely get on the email list there so that you don't miss the special and the launch and the discounts and all the things

Barry Conrad

That's so exciting. Congratulations. That's amazing.

Melanie Avalon

Thank you, knock on wood. But yeah, no, thank you. Anything else new in your life?

Barry Conrad

Yeah, by the time this airs, I'll be back in New Zealand, actually. My family live in New Zealand for listeners who don't know that yet. So I don't get to see them a whole lot. So I'm excited to spend Christmas with them, news with them. It's going to be amazing. I can't wait for that, actually.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, we were talking about it. I so value family and it's just so wonderful when you can spend the holidays with family, especially with how crazy the world is with, at least for me, like work and everything. It's nice to slow down for a second.

Barry Conrad

What about you? Are you doing anything for the holidays? Are you going away anyway? Are you staying put?

Melanie Avalon

Again, this will be quite in the past by the time this comes out, but I will have gone to Florida for Christmas. And then in the new year, January, I do have some travel planned for January. Actually, when this comes out, I might be traveling when this comes out.

Barry Conrad

To Australia.

Melanie Avalon

No, to Sundance.

Barry Conrad

Wow would be just sundance that's amazing what's the like what made you want to go who did someone invite you to check something out specifically have you been sundance i'd never been yet i really want to.

Melanie Avalon

you should come when I go for listeners to Sundance. It's the biggest festival in the US for independent films and it's probably the most in the US the most respected film festival I would say. It's kind of like when you think of like film festivals, you think of like Cannes in France and you think of like Sundance, at least for me. Those are the two I think of. Does Australia have an equivalent?

Barry Conrad

Not really, like we have the Australian Film Festival, which happens every year and that's pretty procedures pretty great, but I mean nothing beats, you know, Khan or Sundance. Is there a film or project that you really want to, you're excited to see there or did someone say let's go and you just decided to just do it? Like what, what made you want to go?

Melanie Avalon

So in usual Melanie fashion, I am just going to go for one film.

Barry Conrad

Oh, that's so funny.

Melanie Avalon

I'm gonna go, go to the film, come home. My best friend from college, like in the entire world, he directed his first feature, I'm just so proud of him. He directed, he wrote his own movie. He wrote the screenplay. He was working on it for years and years. I was like there like reading the screenplay for like the past like three or four years. And he got it picked up. He got a major casting director. He got like for the casting, like one of the main guys from the Hunger Games and he got into Sundance, which is like shocking. I mean, not shocking, not shocking for him. Like I knew it was gonna happen, but the fact that this is his first thing, like it's crazy. Yeah, so I have to go. And what's crazy is I haven't seen him since college. I mean, I have not seen him since college. We do monthly like catch up Epic long calls every month. And I haven't seen him in person and since college. So I'm so excited.

Barry Conrad

Oh, that's special. I'm stoked that you get to celebrate that with him. That that's meaningful and fun and amazing, like props to him. What's his name? Can you shout out?

Melanie Avalon

The reason I'm pausing is I'm not supposed to tell anybody up, but it should be announced in a few days. So, don't tell anybody, okay? Don't tell anyone. Shh. Don't say anything. They really should be announced really soon.

Barry Conrad

It's actually so, that's so wild though. That's amazing. Like it's not.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, it's it's literally it's I'm like mind blown by I mean, it's a mate I knew it was gonna happen, but it's just literally like all your dreams coming true type situation. Yeah, so it's Carmen and me and the movie is plain clothes. It's about in the 1990s, like true story. It's not a true story, but it's set in a true story environment, which is like in the 1990s, there'd be cops that would go into malls and set up to catch gay people. And then arrest them. And so it's about that. And it's about one of the undercover cops who's played by Tom Blythe. So I say his last name. He's the one from the Hunger Games. Yeah, I think it's Blythe. Yeah, so he is the main lead and he actually like, he's closeted. And so he actually falls in love with one of the people he's supposed to arrest one of the guys.

Barry Conrad

Wow. It's heavy. It sounds heavy. And also, I feel very, probably, universal for a lot of people out there, you know, feeling that going through. Yeah. Wow.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, definitely. So, yeah, so it should be around this time when this airs.

Barry Conrad

We'll get the Sundance content from Mel.

Melanie Avalon

If you want to come to a screening, Oh, that would be so great. We could go. It would be epic.

Barry Conrad

Listen, it's really funny because whenever Melanie has something exciting, she's like, so I'm doing this this weekend. Do you want to come? It's like, Melanie, she always does that.

Melanie Avalon

I want to keep inviting you until you come. On that note, before we jump in, would you like to go over the restaurant that I picked for today?

Barry Conrad

Yeah, should we go to a new restaurant? Let's go.

Melanie Avalon

listeners the purpose of this is to around here we're all about intermittent fasting and we're also all about what you eat in your eating window. So we love celebrating food and we love finding really cool restaurants in the world. So we profile a restaurant every single week and the one I picked for this week it's called the Hobbit Cafe. Good name. I know it's it was this what's crazy it was started in 1972 to honor Tolkien's Hobbit world for all the Lord of the Rings fans out there. So it's all like themed according to the Hobbit they've had a lot of celebrity guests there so on their website they said they've had like Neil Young, Jack Nicholson, Leonard Skinner a lot of other people yeah and it's like it looks like a whole like vibe so it's a cafe it's not like you know fine dining. Are you a Lord of the Rings fan Barry?

Barry Conrad

I'm a Lord of the Rings fan for sure and this food, it's almost like now I want to put it on Netflix while ordering this for real and having it delivered because this food looks really good.

Melanie Avalon

Yes, yes, the thing about Lord of the Rings, it like holds up, you know?

Barry Conrad

That actually does.

Melanie Avalon

It's from when I was in, ah, man, middle school and high school, and it still looks incredible.

Barry Conrad

Do you ever rewatch the films or have you actually, actually, wait, have you read the books and then watch the films and also do you ever rewatch the films like when you get.

Melanie Avalon

My favorite movie of all time is The Fellowship of the Ring, the first one. Of all time. And like Lord of the Rings in general is just my favorite. Yeah. So I have seen that movie, I don't even know how many times. I haven't seen it recently though. I haven't, I have not rewatched it recently. I have read all the books. I probably read, I think I read The Hobbit maybe, maybe like five times. And the Lord of the Rings, I probably read all of it twice.

Barry Conrad

Wow, that's impressive.

Melanie Avalon

But here's a little confession. I actually don't like the books that much.

Barry Conrad

Don't don't even be mad at me. I don't even read the books. I just watched the films and people get so offended like if the diehard fans I'm like, why are you watching the film without reading the books first? I'm like, is that the rule? I don't know. I'm glad that it's not. They're not as good though.

Melanie Avalon

And like Two Towers is like so long and like not a lot happens. Kind of like the Two Towers movie, which I still love, but it's like just a lot of like fighting, a lot of like walking. It's like a lot of fighting, a lot of walking.

Barry Conrad

You say these things with legs that just sound so like, you know, like dead pen, like dry look. It's just really funny.

Melanie Avalon

But I mean, things catch up with Return of the King and yeah, I love this movie.

Barry Conrad

Do you have a favourite character? Oh, do I?

Melanie Avalon

I was obsessed with Legolas, obsessed.

Barry Conrad

How did I know you were going to say that?

Melanie Avalon

Did you know that? Did you guess that? I did. The level of obsession I had with that man, Elf, Orlando, Legolas, Bloom, crazy. Crazy. Like the background of my computer, like posters, dreams, yes, I was obsessed.

Barry Conrad

Is it because he's blonde or is it because, like, what made you try to do?

Melanie Avalon

Going back to that glow coffee thing, I love elves. I love etherealness and beauty and light, and then you put that into a man who happens to be Orlando Bloom, very attractive. It's just my cup of tea, my cup of coffee.

Barry Conrad

Key glows, so you probably drink glow. Coffee co.

Melanie Avalon

He does glow. I did see him in a Q&A. I'm also a major Pives of the Caribbean fan.

Barry Conrad

They're fun. I like the products that grew in movies. They're really funny. I'm trying to end up.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. What was the Q&A? It was for Pirates, I don't know. It was just, it was Pirates Q&A. It was when I was living in LA and it was at the Pantages Theater. Good times.

Barry Conrad

I wonder what would happen if you, how do you think you'd react if you were out and about and you bumped into Orlando Bloom? Would you freak out?

Melanie Avalon

I don't get starstruck anymore for two reasons. One, living in LA is really helpful for that because there's so many celebrities everywhere. And then B, having this podcast, I get to interview all these incredible people I've looked up to for so long. I think it's made me more used to seeing somebody that I really idolize or engaging with them. Johnny Depp, though, I would probably freak out.

Barry Conrad

Thank you.

Melanie Avalon

Barry Conrad

Taylor Swift. Yeah, I was going to guess Taylor Swift because you love, I mean that's because of that saying like you love T Swift. So if you met her, or you bumped into me, really.

Melanie Avalon

I think I could keep it together and play it cool, but I'd be like inside freaking out. I don't think I would have like, you know the people who like meet the celebrities and they literally like panic because they're so like in shock and they like can't function. I don't think I would have that experience. And cry. Yeah and cry. Yeah, how about you? Is there anybody that you would be like superstar struck with?

Barry Conrad

I actually don't, I don't actually think so now that I can think of, but I mean, Denzel Washington's my favorite actor of all time. So I'd probably still like more, not freak out, but I'd be pretty more like out of just like respect and that's so cool, but I probably wouldn't freak out.

Melanie Avalon

I didn't know that. I'm surprised we haven't discussed this. Denzel Washington. Awesome. Well, so back to this Hobbit menu, what would you order?

Barry Conrad

This is, I'm looking at it right now and this looks amazing. And listen, I hope that you're checking it out with us as well. Can you see all this crazy food? Okay, I have to definitely go with the dragon wings for sure, but that's not the only starter I'm having. So the dragon wings always got to do a guacamole because it's just light and easy to eat. And then I'm going to also go for the all poppers. So that's my starter.

Melanie Avalon

And the pork poppers, they're jalapenos stuffed with cream cheese, lightly fried and served with salsa.

Barry Conrad

Have I asked you, have you said before if you like spice? You've said, you talked about this before.

Melanie Avalon

I'm not. Yeah, I'm not a huge spice fan. I don't get the dopamine hit from it.

Barry Conrad

So you wouldn't share the old copies with me? You wouldn't have it if I like have some of this.

Melanie Avalon

though yeah those would wipe me out fried jalapenos and cheese not will not do well with that

Barry Conrad

Would you have one of the dragon wings?

Melanie Avalon

Are those, I'm trying to say, oh, chicken wings, I, you know.

Barry Conrad

Okay. Okay. You go. Tell us your status. This would be interesting.

Melanie Avalon

I would probably pass on the starters. I might have a little bit of guacamole. Okay. Yeah. Guacamole, I think. And then, yeah, what would you get for your main? So they, they have a big focus on burgers. They have a ton of burgers, all, all like named like Aragorn's burger or Aragorn's avocado burger, Boromir's Boudin burger. I don't know what that is. Balrog burger. There's so many burgers. Fire's a Mount Doom burger.

Barry Conrad

So good, Melanie. I haven't actually, I don't know if I've told you this, but burgers are actually one of my favorite. It's not even a guilty plate. It's just a pleasure. Like, and I, and I always get a beef and a chicken. That's like a two burger minimum. My friends all know that it's like burial, get two burgers. So I'm going to have to go with the bell rock because it's a double meat patty, which is my jam. And then is there a chicken one?

Melanie Avalon

Trying to see they have a whole sandwich section. This is a massive menu friends It like keeps going. I keep thinking I'm at the end They do have a chicken breast. Where's that Rivendell chicken? You got to go down to like the south of the border

Barry Conrad

Where's the sandwiches this is a mess this is a lot of

Melanie Avalon

food. It just like keeps going. Second breakfast. Oh my goodness.

Barry Conrad

Okay, I'm going to do the for something different because I can't find a chicken burger. I'm going to go with a smorg's delight, which is a smoked turkey topped with avocado, tomato and melted Jack cheese. That's my main dish is dishes.

Melanie Avalon

choice. I think I would get, in the spirit of all the burgers they have, I would get the Eowyn's elk burger, which is elk, ghost pepper, cheddar, fig jam, caramelized onions, and arugula. I would edit that and just get the elk burger and no bun.

Barry Conrad

I was gonna ask that next, like, are you gonna have the bun?

Melanie Avalon

No, so I'd have a rare out aowans elk burger and I might add on if we're doing if we're doing well Yeah, we're doing like dinner then I would probably also get So gotta have two entrees might get some rippendell chicken or some rippendell salmon. I gotta have something from rippendell It's got to represent my favorite town

Barry Conrad

And then can I have like a morsel of your chicken? Yes, of course.

Melanie Avalon

Of course you can.

Barry Conrad

And you can have a morsel of the bun of my burger? Nope. I knew the answer for that. Okay. Where's the dessert? I'm trying to scroll down to find it. There's like.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, smoothies and desserts are at the end.

Barry Conrad

They do. Oh, wow. This looks amazing.

Melanie Avalon

There's so many.

Barry Conrad

I know what I'm getting what Nutella pancakes

Melanie Avalon

Oh, Nutella Pancakes, ah, smart choice.

Barry Conrad

Which is, do you say Natalo and Nutella?

Melanie Avalon

Nutella and I feel like there or is it Nutella maybe I'm not a Nutella person

Barry Conrad

All that tracks, because you prefer...

Melanie Avalon

the hazelnut.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, that's true.

Melanie Avalon

Like, you know, people like people love it. I had friends growing up who like were obsessed and I did not love it. Oh, my gosh, they have a legolas. What is it?

Barry Conrad

Oh, it's a smoothie. Can I take that back because I didn't see the bottom beneath that? I'll give the chocolate chip pancake because that's more true to me. And then I'll also add two scoops of vanilla ice cream to that.

Melanie Avalon

Nice. Okay, that's what I do. So for my meal, I would get the elk burger with the Rivendell chicken. And then for dessert, I want the Rivendell salmon.

Barry Conrad

Savory dessert. Yep. That's so good.

Melanie Avalon

So friends, check out, we'll have to see if they have an Instagram. We'll put a link to all of that in the show notes. But Hobbit Cafe in Houston, their menu is so big.

Barry Conrad

I would actually, I was thinking this. I would actually, I want to go there. When I go to Houston next, I need to hit these guys up because I.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, you should. Let me know. Take pictures.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, I'll do like a whole thing like a tasting situation and have all you

Melanie Avalon

Awesome. Shall we jump into some questions for today?

Barry Conrad

Let's jump in.

Melanie Avalon

All right, would you like to read the first question? This is the first time I think I'd be reading a listener question, right?

Barry Conrad

Yeah, I think so too, which is really exciting.

Melanie Avalon

Oh my goodness, moment.

Barry Conrad

Here we go. Take it in. OK, so Christine asks, are there any long term studies on IF and muscle retention?

Melanie Avalon

All right, Christine, thank you so much for your question. So I actually wanted to start with this question because I wanted to do some research on it, provide some sources and then also want to talk to Barry about it. So it's perfect. Here's the thing, I could not find any super long term studies on this. That said, I found a lot of studies on like decent size, like one or two months of fasting and its effect on muscle and just what happens, like what it does. And I think presumably that what we can learn from that, in theory, should continue on. And I also found a study that looked at 10 days of just straight fasting, which to me seems much more extreme for its ability to affect muscle than daily fasting. And so we can kind of take away what happens to muscle during that. Well, first of all, there are some there's rodent studies. For example, there was a 2023 mouse study. It was called intermittent fasting reduces mouse body fat while maintaining muscle mass by regulating protein synthesis and autophagy. So basically, they wanted to look at intermittent fasting and how it affects skeletal muscle protein metabolism. And they found they found that the fasting group had better insulin that they had lower body fat, lower body and fat weights, and that they maintained the skeletal muscle mass the same amount as the mouse group that was eating ad libitum. They found that a reason for this was because of the role of autophagy, which is something we've talked about a lot during this show, which is where the body actually goes down and breaks down old and dysfunctional proteins in the body and reuses them. So basically, while you're fasting, you may not be taking in protein, but the body actually can go and, for lack of a better word, create new protein from old and broken protein in your body, which is super cool. So their conclusion was our findings suggest that adaptation to IF regulates protein synthesis and breakdown, leading to the maintenance of skeletal muscle mass while reducing body fat, which is another cool thing because they often say, Oh, you can't lose fat and, you know, maintain muscle at the same time, you know, this shows something different. Again, that was in a mouse though. So let's move to humans. We have, I'm trying to say where to go first. So there was a review, and I love reviews because it looks at a lot of studies and helps to find, you know, what is the data at large saying. So it was called intermittent fasting. Does it affect sports performance? A systematic review. This was published in January of 2024. It looked at 25 studies. And after looking at those studies, it concluded that intermittent fasting could be considered an adequate nutritional strategy to reduce body fat to an adequate number for the athlete and maintain lean mass or muscle mass. So basically they looked at a lot of athletic people practicing fasting, and they found that fasting helped them reduce fat and that it maintained muscle mass. Super important. And then, so this is the one that, let's see, this is the one that looked at a 10-day fast.

Melanie Avalon

It was called, is muscle and protein loss relevant in long-term fasting in healthy men, a prospective trial on physiological adaptations? So this study actually looked at a 10-day fast coupled with physical activity in men, in 16 men. And they found that, let's see, they found that the men decreased their body weight by 7% and that their metabolism went down by 12% and that their fat, okay, so their fat mass and their lean soft tissue accounted for about 40% and 60% of the weight loss. So like 40% of that was from fat, 60% of their weight loss was from muscle. All that said, the muscle loss was explained by losing water. There was a lot of that. So 44% was water extracellular, so like basically like bloat inflammation like under your skin. And then 14% of that was muscle and liver glycogen associated with water. And then the remaining 42% of that was actually tissue. So only 42% of the 60% was actual muscle loss. All of that said, as far as like what they actually did during this, they were walking. So they increased their walking by 60% while fasting. They did strength training. And the ultimate conclusion was that a 10-day fast appears safe in healthy humans. Protein loss occurs in the early fast but decreases as ketogenesis increases. Fasting combined with physical activity does not negatively impact muscle function. And then they said future studies will need to confirm these first findings. So the reason I'm talking about this one is, like I said before, 10 days straight. I think that's where you're really going to see, like if you're going to be like losing muscle, that's where you're going to see it. And I find it interesting that they did lose muscle, but they also lost fat. And it didn't affect their muscle function. And the longer they fasted, the less muscle they lost going into the fast, which kind of indicates that there must be protective mechanisms that start up as you get like longer and longer into the fast. I think that's so fascinating. One more thing kind of going out of order, but this is the one I really like. So this is called the effects of intermittent fasting combined with resistance training on lean body mass, a systematic review of human studies. And so this also looks at intermittent fasting combined with training. And I'll circle back to this, but I think a huge key for maintaining muscle while fasting, definitely from what we're seeing in this literature, is doing muscle training and doing resistance training. So giving your muscle a stimulus and a motivation to stay there and not waste away. And then also eating a lot of protein in your eating window to support that. So this 2020 review, it looked at eight studies, and they found that for these people who were fasting and doing resistance training, that lean body mass was generally maintained. They did find in one study that they actually increased their lean body mass, and they also lost body fat at the same time. So they maintain their muscle, but they lost fat. And so they said that results suggest that IF paired with resistance training generally maintains lean body mass and can also promote fat loss.

Melanie Avalon

Future research should examine longer term effects of various forms of IF combined with resistance training compared to traditional forms of energy restriction. And so I mean, on the one hand, they say at the end that we need more studies on longer term, which I realize is Christine's question. But just my reading of literature and data, it really seems to show to me that things happen during fasting that actively you know, maintain and protect muscle. So I couldn't find any super long term ones. But those are my thoughts on the mechanisms at play, assuming you're giving them a stimulus, you know, training those muscles and having enough protein. So that was a lot. What are your thoughts?

Barry Conrad

One of the biggest things is, as we know, intermittent fasting does promote autophagy, which helps that repair and the regeneration of cells. As Mel was saying, the human growth hormone, which is such a magical thing that happens during the fasted state. It was interesting, the study that you talked about, the deeper these guys went into the fast that the muscle loss stopped, which is really fascinating, and also telling that it's protective. I will say that, again, taking in enough protein is really important as well. We know that the FDA currently suggests a daily intake of 0.8 grams per kilogram body weight. For someone like myself, for example, I will often have about 160 grams of protein a day, which is more than double of the FDA. I think to build muscle, it's important to not just have that base level intake, but to even double or even by 1.5 to take in to build muscle and to stimulate muscle growth. Pairing that with resistance training with intermittent fasting, I think, is a recipe for success in terms of not just retaining muscle, but building muscle as well. I think I mentioned this to Melanie before. When I broke my ankle, I was on bed rest for maybe five or six weeks without being in the gym, and I was in bed rest for a large amount of time. I did not significantly lose muscle. The only thing that's changed was the intermittent fasting. I kept my protocol up, and I kept on taking in that protein. It's great.

Melanie Avalon

That's so telling about the bed rest and you're, you know, not losing muscle. Yeah, I think, I just really think the importance here, like we keep harping on, but eating enough protein in the eating window, doing that resistance training, because when you're doing that training, that's telling the muscle, even though it's breaking down, like it's catabolic and breaking down muscle, you're then building it back up and it's signaling to the body to keep that muscle around. It's like needs to keep it. So I think that that communication is so, so important.

Barry Conrad

Because Melanie, what do you think when people say, if I fast, I'm going to lose my muscle? Do you think that with intermittent fasting, even the body just in general, the preferential thing to burn first is not going to be muscle when you go with that food, right?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, that's what Jason Fung talks about a lot. He's like he talks about how like evolutionarily it doesn't make sense. Muscle is so important. So it doesn't make sense the body would want to burn muscle first compared to though an example. So here's a good example. So if you're in the facet state and you're burning fuel, and we just looked at all those studies that show that you can burn fat but maintain muscle, that makes sense because your body is since a starvation, it needs energy. So it makes the most sense to burn fat and maintain muscle, especially if you're using that muscle and you're telling your body you want to keep it. Compare this to something like chronic cardio and like marathon runners, they actually benefit from losing muscle because their body needs to be lighter to be doing that endurance sport. So that's an example of like communicating a different message to your body where the body needs fuel, what is it going to choose. So I think like being in the facet state during resistance training, you're signaling to your body to keep the muscle compared to like trying to lose weight by running it off, you might actually be telling your body to burn muscle.

Barry Conrad

Right and even conversely interestingly when people just count calories to lose weight what happens to the muscle versus when the intermittent fasting and taking enough protein.

Melanie Avalon

I think because there seems to be something really magical about this signaling with the facet state that's really protective. And so I feel much more comfortable actually maintaining muscle with a fasting approach compared to like a calorie restriction all throughout the day approach.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, same. Definitely. It's such a flex as well to be able to say to guys that are intermittent fast because they're like, really? They genuinely shocked that I'm not eating all day.

Melanie Avalon

They're shocked that you are not eating all day.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, they're not that I'm eating all day like still like the general consensus is like, particularly weightlifters or whatnot. They're just like, what? So do you how do you keep your muscle? How do you build muscle? So I just love that reaction.

Melanie Avalon

I love knowing people like you because I can be like, well, see, because although I think I do, I don't know. I'm toned. I have muscle. People comment. It's funny. When I go on my Costco hauls, which I was going to right before this, people are like shocked at everything I carry at the store. You're pretty strong? I think so. Literally today, like right before this, I was at Costco, she was like, you're like really strong. I was like, it's my workout. And that's something I really like, is like turning life into a workout, like carrying. It is a lot. I want to show you everything I carry at Costco is a lot of stuff.

Barry Conrad

You also said like you wear like weights and stuff like you wear body weights and stuff.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, like I wear weights around the apartment. I never use a cart and I carry a ton. Like we're talking, I mean, it's, I should actually weigh how much it is the two bags I carry. It's a lot. And then I do M sculpt still. I love M sculpt.

Barry Conrad

The scallops man, they they're heavy and the cucumbers, you know, and what Melanie saying as well is as funny as it is, like, that's still stimulus, like, people can often get the misconception or the conception that stimulus or muscle building, you need to be in a gym lifting a dumbbell, that's not necessarily the case, it's any resistance, that's still stimulating the muscle, right, Melanie?

Melanie Avalon

pick up heavy things. And I'm actually, I'm really excited. I'm prepping right now. The episode will have already aired when this comes out. I will have aired an episode with Mark Sisson. I'm actually right now in my current present time finishing up that book to prep to interview him. But his newest book is called Born to Walk. It's incredible. He did it with Brad Kearns and it's all about the myth of chronic cardio and marathon training and endurance running and how what we're naturally made to do is like move, you know, move naturally walk, lift heavy things, do more ancestral movement in that way. And he's a big fan of like non-structured play and exercise. I mean, if you love the gym and like more power to you, but you can get a lot of support of the body and you know, muscle support even just like living your life. If you do it on purpose, like if you purposely try to make your life heavy physically, not emotionally.

Barry Conrad

That's a great thought. Even just that, make your life heavy, physically and unemotionally. I love that.

Melanie Avalon

Wait, we should like, we should do something with that.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, that's really good. That's like a slogan. That's a good slogan. Write it down. I'm going to write it down right now actually. Make your life heavy physically. That's like a tagline for like a book. Book title then underneath. Make your life. Yeah, that's great. That's awesome.

Melanie Avalon

I love that. OK, shall we go on to our next question?

Barry Conrad

I feel like we should.

Melanie Avalon

So our next question comes from Jennifer and she says is there anything you might recommend for a person like me who faces a general feeling of tiredness in the morning? I work in a typical office environment 8 to 5 Monday through Thursday. I also pick up a few shifts at a local coffee shop on the weekends to keep me young and active. I'm doing roughly 16 8 clean fasting for the past 13 months. I drink water, 1 to 2 cups of black coffee during the early and mid morning and occasional cups of hot water. I notice that once noon rolls around I start to feel like myself and the energy level increases. What might you suggest I tweak or adjust? And I will say before we answer this, I so am jealous of Barry's circadian rhythm.

Barry Conrad

Okay, why? Tell us again, why?

Melanie Avalon

Mr. Morning Person, Mr. Wake up, bright eyed, ready to go, hit the day.

Barry Conrad

I love it. It's just like, I feel like I can dive straight into anything that I need to do with efficiency, focus, strength, determination, no like feeling sloppy or slouchy at all.

Melanie Avalon

So, and you've always, because we're trying to help out Jennifer here, like have you always felt that way? Like, because Jennifer wants what you have, like I do too.

Barry Conrad

I feel like it's becoming more and more of a morning, quote unquote, morning person. I'm traveling at the moment as well, and wherever I am, I just wake up at 6.30. I don't know what, I'll look at my phone, and 6.30 seems to be the time that my body's starting to wake up now normally. And I've decided, just go with it, don't think it's too early, just have a sleep in. Granted, if I am tired, I'll have a lay-in, but 6.30 seems to be that little magic number for me. Jump out of bed, for me it's straight to the gym, straight into the day.

Melanie Avalon

So here's my question, I guess, what would make, cause then we can like, we can reverse engineer. What would make you not feel that way? What would make you feel tired in the morning?

Barry Conrad

Having too much of a late night than I before could be one thing. Another thing could be my food choices the day before, which a lot of people might not think about that could also make me feel sluggish and stowshy and lack energy, not having enough water throughout the day. Because for example, I've seen here, Jennifer, that you have your one to two cups of black coffee, all about the black coffee. And also, I would also point out that coffee is deodorating. So you want to make sure that when you are drinking other water, stay hydrated. So a hack could even be adding electrolytes to your water. That could help when you do open your window to eat, making sure that you're taking in nutrient-stance foods and knowing what your body's good at processing because you might not process certain macronutrient as efficiently as others. So maybe some will make you feel more sluggish or maybe looking at what you're eating could be a tweak, even increasing your fasting window could be a tweak or a hack because I know for me, and we've talked about this before, Melanie and I, that you just get that energy and that focus. And I find that for me, that kicks in like around the 18-hour mark for me. So not 16. So that's another thing that you could possibly look at. What do you think, Melanie?

Melanie Avalon

Okay, you hit on so many good things and so many of my own thoughts as well. We don't know when she's actually eating. So she works from eight to five. We know she's doing 16, eight, but we don't know. Well, I guess she's drinking coffee in the morning, early mid-morning, around noon. She tries to feel like herself. So I'm wondering when she's actually eating. So I would have a lot of different questions. One would be, well, okay, well, first of all, the very first thing I think, and it's something that you touched on, Barry, sleep, like looking at your sleep. Can you optimize your sleep? Out of all the things like diet, fitness, food, sleep, I just think sleep is so, so important. And if you're feeling tired, I would definitely start there. There's so many things you can do to help optimize your sleep, having a sleep sanctuary of sorts. So having a really specific wind down routine where you're not exposing yourself to blue light. So you're wearing blue light blocking glasses, using red light in your apartment. It doesn't necessarily have to be like red light devices, but just not lighting your apartment with like bright light in the evening is really important. On YouTube, there's a lot of these different like Zen music frequencies that can really help you wind down. Like I use one called like love frequency, but it's like a certain hurts that is very calming. And if you're into like sound therapy, it relates to that. That's what I'm always playing in the background of my phone. What I was asking you if you could hear the music. No, I couldn't hear it. I'm gonna blast it next time. Blast it next time. I'll put a link in the show notes to my favorite one that I have. That's like a game changer for me. And then having your sleep environment, keeping it cool is really important. I use a cooling mattress. I turn down the air. Sorry. I'm laughing because I turned down the air really cold and my AC like a few days ago, I think it ran out of Freon, but it was like really cold here. It was like in the twenties, which I don't know the equivalent for Celsius.

Barry Conrad

God, that's... no, that's freezing.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, it was like really cold. But my air conditioner was broken because that was what it was outside, but inside it's not that cold and I needed it to be cold and so it broke. And so the maintenance guy called and he was like, are you sure? He was like, is it the heater broken? I was like, no, it's the AC. And he was like, are you sure it's not the heater? I was like, no, it's the AC. And he was so confused.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, because it's cold outside.

Melanie Avalon

And he was like, why? And I was like, I was like, it's broken.

Barry Conrad

Solaris, he's like confused

Melanie Avalon

I know he was really confused. So yeah, keeping your sleep environment cold is really important. And what else using like, you know, blackout curtains, earplugs, a mask, all the things. So looking at your sleep and then supplement wise, I really benefit from CBD. I really love Dr. Kirk Parsley sleep remedy. That works really well. I will use melatonin at night. Oh, my Avalon X magnesium three and eight. Amazing. It's a magnesium that crosses the blood brain barrier, helps support mood and rest and relaxation. You can get that at Avalon X dot us and the coupon code Melanie Avalon will get you 10% off. Okay, so that's sleep. And then moving on beyond that, and a lot of this is going to overlap with what Barry said, I would ask yourself, Jennifer, when did this start? Because you say that you start to feel like yourself around noon. Have you always been that way? And it's kind of like what I was asking Barry, like, have you have you always been the type that you don't really start to, you know, perk up until noon, which is me? Hello. Or did you used to like wake up early and feel energetic? And now this is a new change. And was that did that change with the fasting? Because it could be a lot of things if you haven't always been if you've always been that way, you probably have a circadian rhythm that's like me check out the work of Dr. Michael Bruce, who Okay, he's the sleep doctor. He wrote the four chronotypes book about the different sleep chronotypes. And I got to meet I've had him on the show twice. I got to meet him in person and hang out with him recently. Really? Yeah, I went to the Unimonia conference and West Palm and I met him in person. He was so nice. And then he actually he was able to take me like as his plus one to like this networking party for the conference. So that was great. So I got to like meet all these people. In any case, he's amazing. His book is really great for helping to understand the different sleep chronotypes. And the point of that is that he understands that some people just are not morning people, which I really appreciate because I am not one. But that said, if you were not really experiencing this before, and it's a new thing, I would definitely look more at everything. For the fasting, like Barry was saying, either increasing the fasting or like changing around when you're eating window is that might play a role. I definitely agree with what Barry said about the food choices. Like do not underestimate the impact of food on, you know, how you feel the next day, I would really look at hormones and you could work with a practitioner and get a Dutch test. And they'll be able to look at your, your cortisol levels throughout the day. And you can kind of see what's going on there. Oh, and then also coffee to bring everything full circle with how we started this episode. So it's ironic because like I said, I'm really passionate about coffee, I think has a lot of benefits. I actually don't drink a ton of coffee. So I've gone through periods where like in college, I would drink like so much coffee.

Melanie Avalon

I don't know how I survived that. And then after college, I drank coffee. Now I just have like a little bit every morning. Like I found like the perfect dose and it's just like a little bit every morning. And it kind of like gives me a, it's like a hormetic stressor to me. And, but I don't have a ton of coffee. And I guess what I would be curious about is there can be a substantial amount of difference of caffeine and like between one and two cups of coffee. So like, what is your relationship to that caffeine and the coffee? And is it like, are you needing it to wake up? And then, although ironically, you're not really waking up until around noon, this is interesting. So Dr. Michael Bruce believes, and I've read this from other people as well, that you actually shouldn't have the coffee right in the morning because you naturally in theory should have a cortisol spike then anyways. So you actually would have it a little bit later when you have like a lull, although that's reverse of what Jennifer's experiencing. But that's more just like a little fun fact about coffee, coffee timing. Interesting. Yeah. Cause you said you have it Barry, right? When you wake up.

Barry Conrad

Like, not right, right, but I'll usually have it maybe around seven-ish, like I'll head to a cafe and grab a coffee or two right before the gym. That's like my pre-workout.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, yeah. So he's a well that makes sense because you would for you want to do it before working out. I guess if you weren't working out right away, it would be interesting to experiment. But if you're working out right away, you definitely want to take it before. But yeah, so Jennifer, you could also look at your stress levels surrounding your job. And maybe how is that coming into play? Yeah, I'm just trying to like like the one I mean, I would really, really look at the sleep food choices. Like are you eating foods inflammatory for your body? Because if you are, then you might especially, especially if you have like a later eating window, you might be eating foods that are actually having a, like a delayed response inflammatory effect where you're like kind of recovering from that in the morning. So I would look at the foods that you're eating, your sleep choices, your relationship with coffee, and maybe work with a doctor who can give you a more enlightened view of your hormones.

Barry Conrad

I think as well I think the eating the eating window could also be key you mentioned that before we don't actually know when she doesn't say when she's actually eating.

Melanie Avalon

So she's probably eating for eight hours. Sounds like she drinks coffee mid-morning, noon, she starts to feel like herself. Yeah, I don't know. I'm guessing, yeah, I don't know. I would maybe start with sleep and start there, like the window.

Barry Conrad

because you're right. There's so much that we can say. And also, one of the most basic, necessary, important things is just sleep. It's an electro. You feel much better the next morning. If we don't get enough sleep a couple nights in a row, it has a domino effect and you get into sleep debt. It's really important for recovery, for keeping your circadian rhythm well, making sure that you digest food properly. Everything just has an effect on everything. So that's different grade of our smell.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I think it's literally so important. And it's interesting or funny to me because people wear lack of sleep, like a badge of honor. They'll be like, Oh, you know, I, you know, I only got four hours of sleep. And it's like, you're kind of proud of it, because it shows that you're like working and doing all the things. And I'm like, I'm like, I am not proud of that. I want all the sleep. And I protect my sleep, like nothing else. That is the reason that, like we talked about last week, if I'm out late at the Biohack Yourself premiere in Vegas, I will be going back after that. Even though what's crazy to me is my circadian rhythm is so late that it will be very late that I'm up, but it's on my timing, you know, it's like on my circadian rhythm, I don't stay up, I try not to stay up past my natural rhythm.

Barry Conrad

Here's a question about sleep. If you, for example, you had to do something that fell outside of your sleeping time, for example, and then you got the same number of hours of sleep, but at a different time, would you feel different?

Melanie Avalon

So I love this question and I have an answer that makes me so happy because I had heard, maybe there's conflicting research on this as I'm saying it, I'm like listening to myself. They say, they say that going to sleep, okay, there is research showing that going to sleep earlier and waking up earlier is better sleep for you. Matt Walker, I think, has done research on that and I'm using that as an example because you're saying if I were to change my sleeping hours at a different time, basically.

Barry Conrad

window, I guess.

Melanie Avalon

I've got to find like the original study about this. Somebody was talking about this and there was research showing that so for people who are like night owls versus like early birds. So if an early bird person goes to bed later and wakes up later but it's the same amount of sleep as their normal sleep they will actually be more tired. On the flip side a late night owl person like me if I go to bed earlier and wake up earlier same hours of sleep I'll be more tired which I love. I find that so validating for my experience because to answer your question personally I do find that if I because there are occasions where I have to get up like super you know well early for me I can get the same amount of sleep and I will be tired I'll be more tired the next day even if it's the same amount of sleep.

Barry Conrad

It's just interesting how that works. How about you? Yeah, I agree. As soon as you said that about the later sleeping later, waking up later, I a hundred percent agree with that. I don't know why it just happens. I feel sluggish and lethargic.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, and that's the way I would feel about the reverse. So I'm all about finding what works for you personally.

Barry Conrad

Almost like how is that set how is that even determined within each person that this this is your sort of window of sleep this is when you should go to sleep and you'll feel amazing waking up and if you don't even if you get the same number of hours of sleep you'll feel bad it's just interesting.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so definitely you would love Dr. Bruce's work. One of his books is The Power of Wind. This is the chronotype guy. It's genetic. The thought of it, like why that evolved that way? The theory is that historically when we were like hunter-gatherers, somebody had to be awake all the time to protect the group. Everybody couldn't be sleeping at the same time because then we were in the wilderness, enemies, animals. So people developed different circadian rhythms so that somebody could always be awake, keeping watch. So the night owls, like me, we were the night guards. We were keeping you guys. Actually, I'm actually a dolphin.

Barry Conrad

The track is you so strong you said you're strong and your cost current stuff so that.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, although actually I'm not so that's actually the wolf his wolf chronotype. I'm actually not that I'm the dolphin the dolphin has just like a really messed up circadian rhythm. We're basically like We're basically I think he like it's one who like found this in the literature and then like kind of popularized it so so most people's like cortisol rhythms, it should spike in the morning and then like Goes down a little bit until noon and then it's like up a little bit and then it's like going down until the evening The dolphin type like me we get this random cortisol spike in the evening like regardless of context. So Doesn't matter like how much I slept or I always come nighttime. I'm like I'm ready

Barry Conrad

Maybe that's why you always like you love your your one night out like you know how you go to events and shows and stuff like you love

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. So hopefully, Jennifer, that was helpful. Listeners, please submit questions, especially now that I feel like listeners are probably getting to know you, Barry. Submit questions for both of us, but questions, you know, with Barry on board, we would love to have some more around in that context, especially since he brings a lot of experience that we haven't really had on this show before, which is A, a man.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, it's a very important factor, yeah.

Melanie Avalon

Be like your routine and your work ethic at the gym and all of that stuff. Any topics in particular you love talking about?

Barry Conrad

Well, I love, I do love talking about, you know, working out and the relation of muscle to fasting protein and whatnot. I also do like talking about dietary choices as well, but I'm open to everything. I'm, I'm happy to take in any questions that you guys have. If, if there's something that I don't feel that I'm experienced in, I'll just pass it on to Mel because for example, like female hormonal questions or something like that, I'd probably pass the buck. I'd do my best to answer, but then I definitely, what do you think, Melanie?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, very. And in our prep doc, I will make sure to give you a question that's like all about just like the female experience of hormones and you can answer it.

Barry Conrad

metaphors and the

Melanie Avalon

What happens when I have

Barry Conrad

Yeah. I'm gonna stop talking there. Yeah.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, oh my gosh, so amazing. Well, this has been so, so fun. Listeners, you can submit questions by emailing questions at ifodcast.com. You can also go to ifodcast.com and submit questions there. The show notes for today's episode will be at ifodcast.com slash episode 407. Those show notes will have a full transcript and they will also have links to everything that we talked about. So definitely check that out. And I think that's all the things. Oh, you can follow us on Instagram. I am Melanie Avalon. Barry is Barry underscore Conrad. And we are, I have podcasts on Instagram and yeah, anything from you, Barry, before we go.

Barry Conrad

I hope that you all have an amazing week, rest of your week, and this has been fun.

Melanie Avalon

Yes, this has been so fun and I will talk to you next week.

Barry Conrad

I'll talk to you next week.

Melanie Avalon

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! you

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!

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

LINKS:

Melanie's Podcast: The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast

More on Melanie: MelanieAvalon.com

Barry's Podcast: Banter with BC

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!

Jan 20

Episode 405 – Our Favorite IF Podcast Benefits, America’s Oldest Restaurant, Losing Water Weight Fast, Reducing Inflammation, Societal Pressures, Decision Fatigue, Enhancing Mood, Supporting Longevity, Toxic Skincare, And More!

Welcome to Episode 405 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

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LINKS:

Melanie's Podcast: The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast

More on Melanie: MelanieAvalon.com

Barry's Podcast: Banter with BC

TRANSCRIPT

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

Melanie Avalon

Welcome to episode 405 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 Avalon X 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 Melanie Avalon.com and Barry Conrad official.com. You can submit questions for the show by emailing questions at I have podcast.com or by going to I have podcast.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 405 of the intermittent fasting podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon and I'm here with our still new co-host Barry Conrad.

Barry Conrad

Hey everyone, how's it going?

Melanie Avalon

How are you today?

Barry Conrad

I'm great, how are you?

Melanie Avalon

actually that's something I wanted to comment on this is a new experience for me with this show because like I'm saying how are you today because of the time difference between Australia and Atlanta I don't even know how many hours it is so like what time is it for you right now for me it's 9 26 p.m.

Barry Conrad

It's 1.26pm on Wednesday. Yeah, it's tomorrow. Isn't that crazy?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, you live in the future. The future is pretty good. I live in the past.

Barry Conrad

It's okay here. It'll be good. It'll be fine. You'll like it.

Melanie Avalon

It's exciting, though, because as listeners know, I am a night owl. It's my vibe, my jam, and I get to record now at night this show. Historically, I've always recorded in the morning.

Barry Conrad

How does it make you feel?

Melanie Avalon

Feels awesome. Feels exciting. It's like a really nice new, because it's like, you know, we're welcoming this new era on the show. So it's like a nice fitting environmental experience that makes it feel even more like a new, exciting thing, adventure to be on, basically.

Barry Conrad

Can I ask, have you had your, what did you have for your meal or have you started having your meal yet? Have you started opening your window?

Melanie Avalon

Well, like we talked about last time, everybody check out last week's episode where we introduced Barry and heard all about his personal story and how he came to fasting and we got his opinion on all of the most common questions that we get on this show and then we did some rapid fire at the end as well. It was really fun. Oh, oh, and I even mentioned the main thing. We had our, we revisited the great one meal a day debate that I historically had with Jen Stevens on, let's see what, I need to fix this on our website because it doesn't give the year. So that was July 7th, but I don't know what year many years ago.

Barry Conrad

Was it 2019 or 2018?

Melanie Avalon

It was probably, if it was episode 116, and we launched and I think, I don't know, I can't do math. It was a while ago, it's probably 2019-ish or 18.

Barry Conrad

Because you know what, that would give context to ish when I started listening, do you know what I mean? Like the year.

Melanie Avalon

I could kind of figure this out quickly okay so there's 52 weeks in a year right so oh so that's two years into the show ish and we started in 20 when did we start did we start like 2015 or 16

Barry Conrad

I think you did.

Melanie Avalon

while. Okay. It's horrible that I don't even know. I think we started in 2016 or 15 around there. So it would have been earlier. It would have been at least like probably like 2017 or 2018 ish.

Barry Conrad

Mmm, wow.

Melanie Avalon

So you've been around for a while.

Barry Conrad

I've been around listening to this show for a while and now I'm the co-host of the show. I feel super excited about that.

Melanie Avalon

Here we are, crazy. Here we are again, me in the evening, you during the day. Oh, to answer your question, have I opened my eating window? So like I was mentioning in last week's episode, I have to do all work before I start my eating window. Because once I start my eating window, I'm in, well, research mode, that's when I read a lot of my books, but I'm not in like work mode. So I don't do emails, I don't do, I just focus on like eating and like nourishing and like feasting and then I go to bed.

Barry Conrad

Have I asked you before, do you like to watch stuff when you're like, you watch Netflix or watch a show while you're eating or not really? Is that your thing?

Melanie Avalon

No, I on purpose don't. I find it, I've thought about this a lot. I find it really interesting because I know what they say. They say when you eat, you should just eat, not multitask. I find that I can do passive consumption of things, although watching TV seems passive. Let me further clarify. I could read a book to prep for the biohacking podcast. And doing that doesn't feel like it's taking away energy from my eating and my digestion because I'm just reading and taking notes. I'm not creating new theories or thoughts or anything like that. It's not overly stimulating to me, is the point. While TV is passive consumption as well, it's very stimulating. And I find that I want to be when I'm eating in a parasympathetic state, so a rest and digest mode. And I don't want to do anything that's going to be very sympathetic, so something that's going to be making me really alert because all of those physiological processes are contrary to digestion. So I don't watch, I don't watch anything while eating.

Barry Conrad

Wow, you know what, I've actually never heard that put that way before and that's interesting because I, in the opposite way, not maybe opposite but different, I like to put something on in the background while I cook because I like to cook and then I'll sit down and depending on my mood, it could just be something kind of mindless. I won't like watch something that I'm trying to focus on while I'm eating, it's more just something fun just to kind of unwind, you know what I mean?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. And that's while you're preparing the food or while you're actually eating as well? Both.

Barry Conrad

But it's not something well when i think about it or be you know focus more just are just here it's kinda like having a podcast on music on why you doing running around and stuff you know i mean that kind of vibe.

Melanie Avalon

Well, actually, yeah, I do I listen to podcasts as well, not while I'm eating, but while I'm because I like cook in batches. So I like eat a lot of scallops, and then I cook more scallops, and then I cook more scallops. So like in the end, while I'm cooking the next round, I listen to podcasts.

Barry Conrad

I can't wait to come over for dinner so you can need to try these scallops and see how you prepare them and season them and stuff.

Melanie Avalon

Do you want to come?

Barry Conrad

Yeah, I'll be I'll bring the wine. Welcome Friday. Yeah, I'll come Friday. I'll bring wine. I'll bring some trinkets. You'll have the scallops. You'll have cucumbers be great.

Melanie Avalon

All the things. Yes, okay, so that, I don't even know where I was going with all of that. Here we are, episode number two. So yeah, so how are you? What is happening in your life?

Barry Conrad

I'm doing really great. I actually have a photoshoot tomorrow morning. I was going to ask you if it was you. If you had a photoshoot tomorrow, just say you were 1 p.m. your time right now, for example. Would you eat in a different way or any kinds of food that you'd prioritize over others to make you like look as leaner kind of thing or have less bloat? I mean, what are your thoughts on that? I have my own thoughts, but I'd love to hear what you would do, dietary wise, like a hack. Thank you for watching.

Melanie Avalon

You know? This is a great question. First of all, congrats on the photo shoot. You do a lot of photo shoots. How many, how often do you do photo shoots?

Barry Conrad

I do shoots quite often. I haven't done one like this in a while, but you know, it's like a promo shoot. So we're going to be out in the Aussie sun. It's going to be amazing. It's in the morning first thing while the sun rises, but I'm on camera a lot. And often I like, I know what I need to do to manipulate, I guess, to, to look a certain way for, to be camera ready, but that, that takes discipline. But I want to know what you would recommend. I mean, just for me, maybe you can give me some new tips that I don't already know.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. Okay. I'm so excited about this question. One comment beforehand. Something else that I always forget. I forget that you are at the opposite, like you're the opposite season. Is it summer for you right now?

Barry Conrad

It's so hot right now.

Melanie Avalon

This is blowing my mind. It's winter here. And it got really cold this week, finally. It's like in the 20s, which I don't know what that is in Celsius. But.

Barry Conrad

Select minus 10. Yeah. But you love that, you love the cold.

Melanie Avalon

I do. I'm so happy. It was like warm, warm, warm. And then it got cold and I'm all about it. It's incredible. It's literally like, yeah, twenties for the next, which twenties is low for yeah, twenties is low actually anywhere in the US. So well, not anywhere, but most places.

Barry Conrad

Mel I actually also have to do this thing tonight where I need to be doing it's on camera where I have to pretend I'm in winter on a lake and be rugged up quote unquote rugged up so

Melanie Avalon

Oh my gosh, you have to do that today.

Barry Conrad

And there's no AC because either you can't fly the AC during filming. So I have to.

Melanie Avalon

I'm so stressed, I'm so stressed, that sounds horrible, that sounds horrible.

Barry Conrad

You'd love that, right?

Melanie Avalon

And like, Australian, how hot is it there? Like, what is it? Do you know in Fahrenheit what it is? I don't speak Australian.

Barry Conrad

It is right now, Fahrenheit 74. Well, it's not too bad today, but the humidity is like 71% today.

Melanie Avalon

and you're going to be in a winter scene.

Barry Conrad

All rogged up in like a jacket on a lake kind of vibe so i have to let pretend it's really cold i kinda vibes.

Melanie Avalon

So yes, to answer your question, well, first of all, I think one of the biggest epiphanies I had in my life ever in my relationship with food was, because for the longest time, and we'll, I'll actually talk about this a little bit more when we talk about the meat of today's topic, but I was always looking at food as a way to like lose weight or not, or gain weight. Like that was basically what it meant to me. Like, well, it meant energy and it meant, do you gain weight or lose weight? It was so crazy to realize that the foods I was eating would have an effect on my inflammation levels. And I noticed that a little bit when I started changing the, like what I was eating when I went low carb, but when I first started doing fasting, that's when I went into this fasted state every day without food and the anti-inflammatory potential of it was so incredible. And it's something that it's hard to understand unless you've done it, but then you really start realizing, Oh, when I eat this food, it has this effect on me, like inflammation and things like that, and like swelling and water retention. So I, in general now, like in general, what I eat is very anti-inflammatory for me. And I think that's where it starts is you have to find out which foods are inflammatory or not for your body. And, you know, really the way to do that is with fasting and then, you know, some people will do like elimination diets and they'll eat certain foods and they'll like reintroduce foods and find what works for them. So the point of that is that what I eat in general, I feel like with what I eat in general, I could have a photo shoot the next day and I would feel good with my choices and how it manifests in my body. That said, there are certain things you can do that might even enhance that even more. So, you know, if you are, I mean, it depends what you're eating normally. Some people, if they're, you know, eating carbs normally, they might do like a low carb night and then they'll probably lose a lot of like water retention from that. So that's something that they can do. I mean, I would not eat or going like with the salt, the sodium. So like question, when you eat normally, do you eat, how much processed foods do you eat versus real foods?

Barry Conrad

Okay, great question. On the daily, most of the week, I'm keeping it pretty basic and pretty clean. By clean, I mean no ultra-processed foods. That's very rare that I'll have that. If I'm at an event or whatnot, I may indulge in what's there, but that's very rare that I'll do that. So maybe one occasion a week, one day a week, I'll have my trinkets, my chips, and my chocolate and stuff, and I won't regret it at all. But that's only because of my goals and my job. And having to stay in a certain condition because I know my body. Some people can have that stuff and look amazing. For me, I do that and I just know I'll hold more water the next day. And that's just, it is what it is. So I won't have that today, obviously, before I shoot. But normally, what I'll do is I'll just cut carbs is the fastest way for me to do it the day before.

Melanie Avalon

to that point, the nice thing about cutting the carbs is that I feel like it can have a really pretty quick turnaround effect compared to, I found for me, because there's been times where I have experimented with certain foods that had a higher sodium content, like I went through a phase where I was like, oh, I really like having, I was trying to experiment with like low fat cheese, a fat free cheese, and it was like had a lot of sodium in it.

Barry Conrad

Does that sound good? Does it taste good?

Melanie Avalon

I was craving cheese and I tend to, I like to do either high carb, low fat or low carb, higher fat. So I wanted to try it still in my low fat approach to eating. So I was like, I'm just going to try this. And I found like the version that had like the most minimal added ingredients and everything like that, but it had a lot of sodium added to it. And what was interesting for me was I find for me, it takes a couple days to like your aldosterone levels to adjust and your kidneys to excrete sodium. So like if I'm on a certain like a, if I'm having more salt intake in my diet, I don't think, I don't know how much of an effect it would have just one night cutting it out. I mean, I mean, sure it has an effect, but I think it takes a little bit longer compared to like that carb, like going low carb than I before I think can have a really big effect or like something I've done in the past is like just to have for me, like meat is very anti-inflammatory for me. So if I eat, like if I do a carnivore night, like just meat the next day that will have a profound effect for me.

Barry Conrad

That's so interesting because I actually don't know if there's one animal protein source that's less inflammatory than another. I just categorize. If I'm having protein and cutting carbs the night before, I'm usually pretty good. But if there's a way for me to more specifically know that, then I can always aim for that rather than guessing. You know what I mean?

Melanie Avalon

Exactly. And so, and that's for like your specific response. And so if listeners are interested, they can go to Melanie Avalon.com slash Victus 88. That's B I C T U S eight eight. And you can get $55 off with the code Melanie Avalon. And what's amazing is when you take the test and then you get this, like I said, this overwhelmingly comprehensive review of they have so many foods on the list and a lot of different meat and seafood options, then they provide different options of elimination diets to temporarily try because these markers can actually change. So like your immune system can change and you can, you know, if you, if you cut out inflammatory foods that you didn't realize you were eating, you can really heal your gut from that and lose some of these responses to foods. So that's one option. But two, I do think that said, I do think there are certain types of meat and seafood that are more or less inflammatory fish because of the omega three content has an anti-inflammatory profile that's well has an anti-inflammatory amino acid profile. And then on top of that, it has this omega three content that is really good for inflammation levels with the exception of you want to be eating low mercury fish. Oh, that's a question for you, Barry. So because we're foodies here, do you eat, so when you eat fish, do you take into account mercury content?

Barry Conrad

If I'm going to give the honest answer, no, so I should. So tell me, which fish?

Melanie Avalon

So historically, once I became aware about this, I would choose low mercury fish, but I didn't think it was that big of a deal if I occasionally ate higher mercury fish. A, I got mercury toxicity, which was not good. B, I went through and looked through all the data of mercury levels in fish, and I didn't realize this is what made it so mind-blowing to me. You could, in theory, if you compare a piece of tilapia with the lowest mercury content possible in that tilapia, and I realize this is too extreme, but it's just to create a point. If you were to compare on a dinner plate a piece of tilapia with a low mercury content compared to a piece of swordfish, for example, the swordfish can have 300 times the amount of mercury as the piece of tilapia, which is mind-blowing. You would think, oh, I can just have a bite, it's not that bad. It can be that bad, especially if you, because I had mercury toxicity, and I didn't have mercury fillings, I didn't have any other exposure, I was just eating a lot of fish.

Barry Conrad

So I eat a lot of smoked salmon, what is it? How is that and your.

Melanie Avalon

So salmon is, yeah. So basically, the lowest mercury options are salmon is low mercury, farm salmon actually tends to be lower in mercury than wild salmon. So I actually tend to choose responsibly farmed farm salmon over wild salmon. That's just because of the mercury in my, my personal, you know, history. But in salmon in general is usually okay. Shellfish, so shrimp, scallops, those are very low, tilapia tends to be low, like trout tends to be low. But then after that, a lot of the fit, like tuna is all over the place. Like it can be low or it can be like pretty high. Really? Yeah. And it's hard to know.

Barry Conrad

That's good for me, though, because I have a lot of smoked salmon, so I'm fine there. And I do eat prawns, which you call shrimp, same same. So I have a lot of prawns as well. So those two I have mainly tuna I have sometimes, but not a whole lot.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so just because tuna, there's so many different options, I just err on the side of not. But going back to the inflammatory profile, so the omega-3, omega-6 ratio of fish is just really wonderful. So I would eat fish, I would eat, yeah, I would eat fish. For me personally, I would either do the low carb approach or if I want to do still like a carb approach the night before, I would make it like as minimal fat as possible because I find that I process the food better. And just for me, again, this is just me personally, that has like a pretty anti-inflammatory effect on me. But it's all very personal. People just need to like experiment with what works for them. Like have you intuitively found certain foods make you feel a certain way with inflammation and water retention and all the things?

Barry Conrad

When I have chicken breast, like prepared super boring and plain, just chicken breast, I'll air fry it or bake it. Amazing for me the next day. Like I drop all this water and it's super lean just like that. It's quite dramatic. When I have ground beef with... The trick about beef in general is you got to season it because it loses a lot of that salt when you cook it. So, I guess based on what you're...

Melanie Avalon

You gotta season it!

Barry Conrad

You don't, okay, you don't got to, but you know.

Melanie Avalon

No, no, no, no, no, I hear you.

Barry Conrad

You know what I mean? So unless I just had a pretty plane, I could do that. But that's pretty good for me as well. I find, but if I'm going to have some bread, give me two slices of bread, even like it just, I blow up. I don't know why I just, yeah. So I do know what works for me. What about alcohol the day before? And if so, are there certain types of alcohol that would blow you the day before and how much? Very specific.

Melanie Avalon

So again, it depends a lot on how you process alcohol. It depends a lot on the context of the drink. Most, I mean, I talk about this all the time, but I think most people lump alcohol all into one category and they don't take into account the fact that a lot of drinks, well, A, like mixed drinks, you're having them with like sugar and flavors and all these things. And then with wine, conventional wine often has all of these additives that you don't even realize because the label doesn't say anything. So it can have, there's like over 70 additives approved for addition to wine, especially in the U.S. So I always drink dry farm wines, which listeners know about. And that's, you know, it's organic, low alcohol, low sugar. And I drink that every night. And it does not, for me, does not create any inflammation. And if anything, it probably helps with like water retention. I don't change anything with my wine drinking habits for things like that. And for listeners, they can go to dryfarmwines.com slash I have podcast and get a bottle for a penny. If you have not consciously ongoing how to healthy, taken a consciously healthy approach to your drinking habits, I definitely would not like drink the night before. If you're not like, like for me, it's like just part of my evening every night, like a glass or two of dry farm wines. So I'm not like changing anything compared to like, if you're not doing that normally, I would not, you know, have a lot of the night before. Oh, and one more thing. So you were talking about the bread making you blowed up. I have found for me. So there's a difference between the different types of carbs. So fructose versus sucrose versus glucose and glucose preferentially fills muscles versus fructose, which is like processed by the liver. If I were to eat starches, I, this is just me personally, but it sounds like you might have the same experience as well. If I eat starches, that makes me like blow up like a balloon compared to like fruit that doesn't have that effect on me. So I think you need to know like you were having carbs, what type of effect of effect they have on you.

Barry Conrad

Although I have actually shared with Melanie before listeners that I will often have like a whole cup of white rice boiled, which is a lot of rice after it's boiled and that's worked for me. It's it's a lot, but it's actually not that many carbs. Surprisingly, if you looked it up, there's not a lot of carbs in one cup of rice boiled. It's not fried or anything like that. So that has worked for me, but people might go rice, you're probably going to gain weight, doesn't do that for me. So that's one thing that I can have, carb wise and definitely vegetables and whatnot.

Melanie Avalon

What's really interesting is I as well have had so if I were to have a starchy carb, I can have white rice. I think because it's I think it's a few things. One, it's like basically fat free. So you're not getting all of this other stuff with it. B, it's very benign and its potential for anti nutrients and things like that. It's basically just like almost pure glucose. So I've experimented with rice before and I've had that effect as well. So that's interesting. But if I were to eat like a potato, not good.

Barry Conrad

So basically I can't cook my special sorted potatoes at your place with the scallops can't do that you can.

Melanie Avalon

For you

Barry Conrad

And you can live vicariously through my joy of consuming it, right?

Melanie Avalon

Yes. But honestly, just to bring it back to the fasting and everything, there's this magic power, I think, to doing a fasting window every day, and then, you know, having your your food in a certain time, like in a certain eating window. It's so great because like in the past, I remember before I was doing intermittent fasting, like I felt like if I had some because I was, you know, pursuing acting and things like that as well and on camera stuff. And so I felt like if I had an on camera thing coming up, I had to like really for days, like change my eating habits and do things. Compared to now, I'm just living an anti inflammatory diet with intermittent fasting and my food choices, which is really great. That's awesome.

Barry Conrad

And now going back to you, you've asked me what I'm up to and I just went on this whole tangent. What have you been up to, Melanie? How's your week been?

Melanie Avalon

I'm good. There's a lot, there's a lot of like, a lot of really fun potential projects, well not potential layer projects, there's a lot of really fun projects in the works that I'm really excited about and seeing that this airs mid-January, I think there's a lot coming this quarter project-wise and I'm curious what will come out first because there's like three big things I'm working, uh, four big things I'm working on. So we shall see, but I have the creative spark and it kind of relates to when we actually talk about our main topic, one of the things. Before that, so here we are half an hour in, which is a good problem to have. We've decided we want to have on this show a new tradition, which is because we so want to communicate how much we love food and how intermittent fasting is so incredible because you do your fast and then you get to have your incredible meal and it's all amazing and we just love all of it. So we thought we could just really quickly, every episode, we're going to both find independently a restaurant that we, that's like cool. So there's going to be like something cool about the restaurant. Like there's a reason we're picking this restaurant and then we're going to say what we would pick from the menu. So shall we do this?

Barry Conrad

Let's do it. You want to go. You want to go first jump on in.

Melanie Avalon

Sure. Okay. So I picked the 76 house. It is located in Tappan, New York. And they claim to be the oldest restaurant in the US. And I like kind of looked into that further because other people made that claim. So they're not the oldest continuously operating restaurant. They have had like moments where they were not in operation. So like there's other restaurants who are like, Oh, this is the continuously longest operating restaurant. But they're the oldest like established restaurant. And they were a tavern originally as early as 1668 is when they were founded. And they were like a big deal during the American Revolution. They served as a meeting place for local patriots. They were the like a prison detention site for Major John Andre, who was a British spy involved in Benedict Arnold's conspiracy to surrender West Point. And they've housed like so many presidents and all the things. So there's an operation today. You can go there now. So I thought yeah, I thought it was like a cool way to start off our restaurant thing. So their website is 76 house.com. I'm looking at the picture now looks like a vibe. There's like a lot of flags on the the outdoors. So looking at the menu, and we have to like come up with our our universal terminology, because in the US, we have an appetizer. But you call an appetizer an entree.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, so like an entree or an appetizer.

Melanie Avalon

What about starter? Do you call it a starter ever?

Barry Conrad

Yeah, we do. So maybe we should do starter.

Melanie Avalon

like starter and then like, but you don't, Entrez is different for you, right? So.

Barry Conrad

We don't often say on trails like the main event.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, so like a starter and then the main meal.

Barry Conrad

startup main meal and then like a dessert and then dessert

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. Okay. Starter, main meal, dessert. So Barry Conrad, looking at the menu of the 76 house, what would be your starter, your main meal, and your dessert?

Barry Conrad

Are we looking at the lunch, the dinner, or which one would you like me to?

Melanie Avalon

I'm looking at dinner.

Barry Conrad

Okay, this is exciting by the way listeners we decided to do this and yet to celebrate our love of food and I'm actually getting excited looking at this menu, I'm so hungry.

Melanie Avalon

We came up with this like on a call one night. We're like, we have to do this. So here we are doing it.

Barry Conrad

All right, for my starter, definitely the main muscles, because I love muscles, like a muscle part, muscle situation was good for me. I've never had muscles.

Melanie Avalon

What do they taste like? I saw that on the menu and I was like maybe I should get that because I don't know what those would taste like.

Barry Conrad

You eat scallops, you'll love mussels. Are they sweet like scallops? They're often prepared in like a butter, like a sort of like a butter garlic, a wine based sauce. That's really, it's delicious. They're fresh. They're really easy to eat. I think they're very similar to scallops. You like them. You love them actually.

Melanie Avalon

Okay. Well, that's the other thing. I, when I get stuff repaired at restaurants, I'm not crazy, but I get everything like very plain, but I get everything on the side so other people can, you know, enjoy it.

Barry Conrad

Okay, Melanie, I have to order two starters because guess what we talked about this before I've never had a shrimp cocktail ever.

Melanie Avalon

Wait, no, because you, because you like convinced yourself to like shrimp.

Barry Conrad

I like shrimp, but I never had a shrimp cocktail.

Melanie Avalon

You have not had a shrimp cocktail?

Barry Conrad

Not in life, never.

Melanie Avalon

Oh my goodness, we got to change. We got to go there. We got to go here. Can we go?

Barry Conrad

We can go. Okay. Those are my two starters. What are your, what's your starter or starters?

Melanie Avalon

Well, I would have, oh, we can just pretend like we're at the restaurant together because I would have gotten the shrimp cocktail as well. So we can get that. And then I, well, it's funny because I have never had muscles. So it looks like we're getting the same thing. So we can just get that.

Barry Conrad

You're going to love that.

Melanie Avalon

Awesome, okay.

Barry Conrad

Oh, Black Angus, New York, so long, baby, that's me doing that.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, how are you getting it prepared?

Barry Conrad

medium rare i know you like rare you're more like on the right side right.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I'm like a blue. Blue? Yeah. They use that word in Australia.

Barry Conrad

Just just basically raw. Just put it on the pan for like 10 seconds. Basically.

Melanie Avalon

I would get, so I like to get two entrees, I would get the trout and then I like to get like a fish, like something light and then something else. So I think I would get the venison medallions because you don't often see venison on menus.

Barry Conrad

You actually don't, you're right.

Melanie Avalon

So it's wild American access red deer. And then dessert. Do they have a dessert menu? They might not.

Barry Conrad

Maybe they don't. There's a cell of them. Maybe we'll go for the cell.

Melanie Avalon

Oh wait, after dinner, after dinner delights, they do. Okay, they do. I think when I answer this question, I'll answer it as if I were eating dessert, what would I get? But normally for dessert, I get another appetizer. So I probably get like another shrimp cocktail.

Barry Conrad

That's so funny.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so I would get other shrimp cocktail, but like if I could eat any of this and not feel really bad the next day.

Barry Conrad

They all look pretty good, and it's hard to choose for me.

Melanie Avalon

What is salted caramel boudino? What is boudino? Do you know? I don't know what boudino is. Oh, I think I know what I want. I want the Choco peanut butter pie, which is an individual pie with chocolate crust, decadent peanut butter filling and tempered chocolate. That sounds good.

Barry Conrad

That sounds pretty good. And by the way, Boudinha is like a Italian pantry dessert. It's like you eat it out of a cup Italian sweet sort of situation.

Melanie Avalon

what would you get for your dessert?

Barry Conrad

Okay. I'm going to go for two here. You in for two for the main situation. I have to do the, because of the restaurant where it is, New York cheesecake, because I want to see how they throw down and prepare. And then I'm going to go for the creme brulee. I love creme brulee.

Melanie Avalon

I like creme brulee. It's like very like and it's very like vanilla focus like classic clean. Yeah, call out to last week's episode Okay, so friends check out the 76 house if you've been let us know now today's topic Is we decided to before we start answering listener questions, which listeners send your questions to? Questions at if podcast.com or you can go to if podcast.com and you can submit questions there Before that today what we're gonna do is we came up with our individual top five intermittent fasting Benefits that we most adore and love in order. So we're gonna go back and forth and see what our lists are and Yeah, it's gonna be a thing Barry what is your favorite intermittent fasting?

Barry Conrad

The very top one is energy and focus because the deeper I get into the faster state, the sharper and more unstoppable and driven I feel for the day.

Melanie Avalon

It's so true. It's so interesting because it's something that you experienced that you didn't realize you could experience until you experience it. And then it's so addictive, at least for me. It's like, ah.

Barry Conrad

It's like having coffee, black coffee without having it. You really do feel this. It's intense. It's like a razor sharp focus. I love it. I love it too. Okay, you. Your turn.

Melanie Avalon

My number one is for the longest time before doing intermittent fasting, I was so fixated on food, not in a good way. It was always like dieting mindset and then be literally not like, not so present that I, it was like at the front of my mind, but it was always like on the back burner, like, when am I going to eat next? And then, you know, I was always like, like thinking about during the day, when could I stop what I was doing and eat? And then once you eat, it was kind of like this sadness because it was like, oh, like I got to stop, like, and then I have to like stop again. It was like just a roller coaster of cravings and wanting to eat. And then once you eat, like knowing you need to stop because you're like trying to control how much you're eating, that's like gone. It's just gone. I don't even think about food during the day unless we're like talking right now. And well, it's like nighttime. But then when I do eat, I get, I never ever have to think about stopping myself. Like I'm not like going, it's not like a, like a binge type situation, but I just get to like feast and eat the food and it's nourishing. And then when I wake up, I'm not hungry. I do my day. Like it's just, it's freedom from something that was very nagging for a long time that was not pleasant. And it's, I'm so happy that that's gone.

Barry Conrad

That's a great one. Similar to your first one, my second one is just fewer decisions, like no decision fatigue where you're thinking all day, what am I going to eat for breakfast? What am I going to eat for lunch? What am I going to have for a snack? What am I going to have for just one meal a day for me? I just get to do my day, as you were saying, get everything done, and then when I do sit down, I can enjoy it. I can feast. So decision fatigue wiped out for me.

Melanie Avalon

I love that. And what people might not realize is that decisions are very taxing on willpower. So the more decisions you make, the less you or the more you pull from your willpower bucket in any given day. So that's why like in the beginning of the day, you can have all the willpower in the world and like make good decisions. But by the end, it's like just whatever and those little decisions add up. And they've done studies and they found that people have to make around 200 food-related decisions daily, often without even realizing it. Yeah. So it's like choices about what you're eating, when are you eating, where are you eating, how much are you eating, and then also like grocery, meal preparation, snacking. And a lot of these are actually subconscious. So we don't, again, we don't really realize that we're making them, but that's like 200 decisions that are like just draining your willpower.

Barry Conrad

That's 200 more decisions I could use for things that are actually important, you know, exactly.

Melanie Avalon

Yes, so it's so freeing. Yeah, I love that.

Barry Conrad

What's your second?

Melanie Avalon

My second one is actually kind of similar to yours. So mine is the time that you get back. And it relates to that because, well, first of all, like stopping your productivity flow and your life and everything to eat constantly or to snack constantly takes away a lot of time. And then all the decisions about like what to eat, when to eat, where to eat, should I keep working? Should I not? Like it just, it's a lot of time. And we know that like interrupting your flow, it takes a long time to get back to that flow. And so when food is not even just an option during your fasting window. And again, I need to like clarify because I do a eating window at night. So some people are eating earlier, so it's gonna manifest differently. But regardless, either way, when you're in your fasting window, you're not making those decisions, you're not stopping what you're doing to eat. So the amount of time I get back is just incredible.

Barry Conrad

for me. Isn't it crazy that so far all of our benefits, it's just related to that window of just giving you some time to rest. It just frees up all this other time, gives you so much more energy. I'm loving where this is going. This is exciting.

Melanie Avalon

Same page. So what's your number three?

Barry Conrad

I used to eat six meals a day. I did that whole thing, six meals a day, and guess what came with that? Constant crashes. Energy slumps, so no more energy crashes for me, no sugar crashes for me, because there's not grazing all day throughout the day. Six meals a day with snacks? That's a lot of up, down, up, down, up, down in the name of, bro, you need to get enough meals to build muscle. Wrong. So, there you go.

Melanie Avalon

It's so true. It's crazy to think, like when I was eating constantly throughout the day, that energy crash situation where you're, quote, hangry and you're, you know, almost like upset and you're like, you have to have food and you can't focus and you're like not emotionally like a good person to be around. And that's just, that's just gone. I just don't have that anymore.

Barry Conrad

And then you then you need like another, oh, I need a snack because I feel sluggish. So it's just like a cycle, right?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. So being off the roller coaster and the science behind it, like in a sentence is that when you actually go into the fastest state, you're tapping into your body fat stores, your body like basically decides that like it's okay to run off of this other fuel source, like not your carbs, not your last meal, but actually body fat. And once you're releasing body fat, your insulin levels are low. Your body stores so much energy, like even like a normal person could walk, it's like a shocking amount of miles just on their body fat. So like you have a lot of energy in you. It's just locked up so often because when we eat, we release insulin and insulin stops that fat from being released. So when you're in the fastest state, you're tapping into that body fat and now you have endless energy, but you can just keep going.

Barry Conrad

It's like that Jason Fong, have you heard that analogy that he talks about, about the freezer and the fridge? Yeah, yeah. Same thing, right?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so like if you're constantly just fueling yourself from your refrigerator and never actually going into the freezer, fasting is like going into that deep freezer.

Barry Conrad

It's so good, just the energy on tap and people panic. It's like, oh no, if I don't eat, it's like an emergency. It's not an emergency if you don't eat, you know?

Melanie Avalon

And it gets easy, like once your body, your body has to make metabolic adaptations to want to willingly do that, and that's like anthropomorphizing it, but to like, actually, you know, easily do those processes. But once you, the more you build that fasting muscle, the easier it gets. My, my third one is actually pretty similar mine. It's the mood kind of similar to that roller coaster ride of the cravings and everything. I used to, my mood used to fluctuate a lot based on my food situation. So was I hungry and then eating foods? How did it make me feel? Like mood fluctuations were just normal. And when I started fasting, my mood's like pretty, like pretty stable. Like I feel pretty good. Like it just feels good. I feel good. I feel like my mood changes now are just based on around life events. They're not around this foundational food thing that was an issue for a while. That's awesome.

Barry Conrad

I feel the same way. I get that.

Melanie Avalon

I think we're both probably glass half full type of people in general though.

Barry Conrad

I think so. I think we are. We're pretty positive. We like to see the best outcome, but, you know, look at things from the best point of view. Do you think?

Melanie Avalon

I think so, yeah.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, my fourth one would would be I can actually listen to my my hunger singles, you know, I can actually pay attention to when I'm full, when I'm actually hungry or when I'm bored. There's a difference between being bored and like, it's two o'clock. I should probably eat or it's 10 a.m. I should probably eat because people around me in this cafe eating, you know, or maybe I should just keep eating because it's here. That's another thing. The chips are here. Someone will eat it. So paying attention to satiety, your hunger, hunger signals and being more intuitive that way. I think fasting and giving your gut a chance to actually rest, you actually know what you're hungry for, what your body craves more when you're actually satisfied when you can stop.

Melanie Avalon

I love that so much. I'm having flashbacks too. Like it's mind blowing to me that I existed at a place at one point in my life. And this is just normal. Like I feel like this is the way most people are. Like somebody will, if you're not fasting and you're just doing like a normal eating pattern, somebody could come up to you and they'll be like, do you want to get lunch? Or do you want to, you know, do you want to go get a bite? And your answer could be like, well, like I could eat like, like the fact, you know, like that's what I used to be like, like, well, yeah, I could like today. I'm like, no, like when I eat, I'm like ready to eat. Like I'm hungry, but I don't have like cravings before that. So every time I'm eating, it feels, my body feels so intuitive with what is good for it. Because I found that when you do the fasting, you crave at that quote, crave, but your body desires at that moment what it needs. Like I found that personally. I don't know. I don't know if you've experienced that, but like I will, you know, like I'll crave like a certain type of protein or like it's just, it's very like intuitive.

Barry Conrad

And it might sound boo-boo, but Melanie's exactly right. Like off, I was going to say the same thing. I'd be going in my fast throughout the day. And then it's like, today I need some chicken today. Or today I need some red meat today. You, you feel it, what your body is actually, what it needs rather than, Oh, I could, I could do that. I guess, yeah, why not? It's not a why not. It's like you actually can hear and feel that.

Melanie Avalon

Exactly. Exactly. Oh my goodness. I love it. I love that we don't. I was like, are we going to have the exact same list? But this is like so interesting because it's like all similar world, but so far it's like different things. So my fourth one was body composition and maintenance. So doing intermittent fasting. Well, doing low carb was the first time I started actually felt like I was seeing the changes I wanted to see in my body. But then implementing intermittent fasting was the first time that I, it became seemingly quote effortless in comparison to what I've been doing before with like dieting and all the craziness to get to a weight that I loved a muscle composition that I loved. And then it's so amazing that intermittent fasting is amazing for maintenance. So like you can reach this body point that your body's happy at and keep continuing on and you don't have to, you don't have to like with dieting, it's like, oh, am I, am I just going to diet for the rest of my life? Like I feel ravenous and hungry and all the things, but this like maintains a body composition really well, including muscle. If you're eating a lot of protein.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, I love that. And you actually copying my fifth because that's my fifth one.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, is that your fifth?

Barry Conrad

Yeah, so we have one that's the same. If I look back 10 years, compared to now, like, my body's changed so much, my face has changed so much, and I can only put that down again to intermittent fasting, because a lot of people would say, as you age, you should gain weight. You should get fatter or more frumpy or whatever. Intimidant fasting definitely does not agree with that sentiment at all. Like, it definitely proves that's not the case. You don't have to do that. You don't have to gain weight. And just like Melanie said as well, is you reach this point where you kind of settle, like, this is sort of like where you hover and you don't really change that much. Yeah, if you intentionally do for whatever reason, like, if I'm training for something or whatnot, but I'm generally in the same spot, I don't really change that much, but the composition just keeps improving. And the only thing, again, that's really significantly in change is the intermittent fasting.

Melanie Avalon

Exactly. Like before intermittent fasting, when I was doing all these different diets, I had this massive fear about, you know, even if I get to what I want to be at, then I have to like stress about maintaining it 24 seven. And like you just said, and I said, it's, it just maintains, you know, like it just like it just does. And if it doesn't, because we do get questions about people experiencing sudden weight gain that they weren't experiencing or hitting plateaus, you can troubleshoot that. So intermittent fasting, you're just affecting the time that you're eating. So there's all these other things you can play with. If you need to further tweak or fine tune or address a plateau or any issues you might be having, then you can actually look at like your food choices, which I would encourage doing anyways. But the exciting thing is like, it's not even like intermittent fasting is like everything. There's still things beyond that that you can play with in your eating window. So

Barry Conrad

Yeah. And one thing that we want to make clear as well, it's not a quick fix, it's not a magic pill that you take. It's definitely a tool, but you still, it's not about just eating everything you want because I don't think that would be effective. So you still need to tweak what's right for your body, what you actually need, what's inflammatory, what's non-inflammatory, you know what I mean? So yeah, tweaking the diet within that window.

Melanie Avalon

Exactly. Okay. My fifth one are the longevity benefits. So, you know, my other show is the Melanie Avalon biohacking podcast. I'm very much haunted by the concept of longevity. A lot of what I do is based on what will encourage longevity and healthy aging. And so the benefits of intermittent fasting and people will debate, maybe we can talk about this in the future episode, people debate calorie restriction versus intermittent fasting. Are the benefits of intermittent fasting just due to calorie restriction? But regardless, we do know that out of all the diets and things studied that calorie restriction is the one thing consistently shown in all species to increase lifespan. And now we're seeing more and more that intermittent fasting seems to have the same effects. And then again, the argument or the question is like, Oh, is it just due to calorie restriction? I don't think it is. But so yeah, the potential longevity benefits of intermittent fasting, I'm like all on board. And I think there's a lot of reasons for that. So it's really beneficial metabolically. And we know that metabolic health is so important for lifespan, the effect on your blood sugar levels, fasting releases, promotes AMPK, which is a longevity promoting pathway in the body where you're going into like cellular cleanup, you're getting rid of dysfunctional cells with a process called autophagy. There's just a lot of epigenetic pathways that are activated with fasting that are great for longevity. So that one's kind of more like esoteric. But in theory, in theory,

Barry Conrad

Still though, you know, I'd rather do something to potentially live longer than not, you know.

Melanie Avalon

Actually, that's a question for you. Have I asked you this before, Barry? Have I asked? I don't know. I don't know if I've asked you this before. It's one of my favorite questions. Would you want to live forever?

Barry Conrad

No, I actually wouldn't.

Melanie Avalon

That's what most people say and this like blows my mind because I for the longest time I thought everybody was like me and then I was like, oh most people don't want to live forever. Do you want to live forever? Yeah, why life is amazing and there's so much I want to do. I just want to keep doing it

Barry Conrad

I'd like to live longer, like for sure, like if I could like have, but not forever, like maybe like a couple hundred years or something like that or like 150 years, but not like forever because I feel like there's beauty and value in like a finite journey and making the most of it and not just thinking, oh, I just have all the time just to, I don't know, there's something about that. And maybe because I also have a thing about deadlines and being like good under pressure, like I have, I like a challenge. If I feel like I have all the time, that's not necessarily helpful for me too. So maybe that's partly why.

Melanie Avalon

So that's a very salient point and it relates to my perspective on life because I think like the thing I'm haunted by is that there's so much I want to do and I feel like there's a ticking clock all the time and it's like it's like I just gotta like do everything. I think it's hard to know but I think if I knew I could live forever I still think I would pursue everything. I think I would like I think it's hard to know but I don't think I would lose any of that drive.

Barry Conrad

Okay, another thing, if you could live forever, would you want to live forever in the version that you are right now? Or do you mean like an older version of yourself or a younger version of yourself?

Melanie Avalon

That's a great question. And actually, so they've, they've done like polls and things. And when, when they ask that question about, do you want to live forever? Most people say they don't, which again was like mind blowing to me. Cause I thought everybody wants to live forever, but apparently not. But then if they change the question and they say, would you want to live forever with like a good health span? So like you're still young and vibrant and can do all the things, then a lot of more people want to live forever. So actually I, okay, you know what, if I was in a body that would not function to let me pursue my passions in life, like it couldn't do that. No, I would not, I would not want to live forever in a state where I couldn't pursue my, my life's passions. I would not want to know, but if I could be vibrant and healthy and all the things, then yeah, I think I would.

Barry Conrad

You're definitely able to pursue everything, which is an exciting and enticing thing, because you would you would you do everything because you have the time, right?

Melanie Avalon

I mean, yeah, I mean, I just think it would be, there's just so much I want to do. I'm like haunted by this ticking time clock. Really? Yeah. I have been since 13.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, because nothing's guaranteed and you never know when your time's up as well. I mean, it's just a fact, I guess, right? And you just want to get everything done that you're passionate about. I understand that.

Melanie Avalon

And I'm like super haunted by aging.

Barry Conrad

Really? Yeah. What about it? Like looking old or just a process of aging and declining in your function?

Melanie Avalon

I think there's a lot of, like for a woman, there's a lot of, and this is me ascribing that worth to myself, accepting it from society, but there's a lot of like worth around beauty and youth. And I feel like for women, it's like when you lose that, you lose something really valuable for society to like appreciate you as a human being. Something I work on with my therapist all the time, but compared to like men who I, who also age obviously, but I feel like men as they age, they kind of get better with age. Oftentimes.

Barry Conrad

get better with age. I think it's ridiculous that that is described and that that's put on to women a lot of the time. I would also say we guys feel it as well in today's day and age, like social media. Honestly, Mel, it's the struggle is real. And I know so many guys who struggle with that. Like you would never expect like, ah, I want to try to look younger and and also nothing against cosmetic procedures or any I'm all for whatever makes you happy. But it's so much more talked about now and because people just want to look like what they're seeing online. And what is the ideal of being desirable or young or hot or fit or jacked or whatever it is,

Melanie Avalon

No and see and like like thank you for sharing that it's interesting because I'm so aware of this concept and that this is something like I shouldn't I don't think I should and I don't even like use the word shoulds but ideally I would not care about this it's a really hard thing like it's it's like a hard thing to to deal with and let go up. Interestingly just a quick shout out I interviewed this week but actually when this airs it should have aired so I interviewed on the Melanie Avalon biohacking podcast Brian Vasely he's the founder of Purity Woods they are a organic skincare line but in any case we talked I like I came up with a theory in real time while we were recording and it was a good moment because he was like this is what I think about like he agreed and it was that we both feel that and this is a whole tangent but women use so many self-care products every day that men don't use and they're conventional skincare products so they're high in like endocrine disruptors and toxins and so women are often putting on all these things on their skin that are actually aging them faster which is like the biggest irony of ironies because you know it's supposed to be anti-aging and there's this whole idea so we were talking about how like do women often look like 10 years older because I was saying that women have a longer lifespan than men so in theory you would think that they would age slower but people seem to think that women look older earlier than men and we're like is it the skincare makeup I don't know maybe

Barry Conrad

Interesting. That's super interesting. Check out that episode. Yeah, and a lot more to come in that realm. That's a teaser as well from me.

Melanie Avalon

I know I was thinking that while I was saying it, not before, but like while I was like, oh, this is a so.

Barry Conrad

But I've actually never melt I've never heard that put that way as well like that's that is the greatest irony like using all these potions and lotions and then it's actually aging you faster.

Melanie Avalon

Because in theory that, like I just said, women have longer lifespans than men, so that would insinuate that they're aging at a slower rate. So they should look younger at the identical age to a man, but I think most people would agree that women seem to show their age quicker than men. So how much of that is due to slathering our face in these products every day that are toxic?

Barry Conrad

Makeup as well, right? Not just skincare stuff.

Melanie Avalon

It's so often so toxic and it's so ironic like you just like highlighted that it's supposed to make you like you look younger but could be aging you in the long run.

Barry Conrad

It would be really interesting to do research in different parts of the world if populations look younger.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, where they don't wear makeup and stuff?

Barry Conrad

Exactly, yeah.

Melanie Avalon

I that would be interesting. Yeah, cuz I was asking him I was like, what do you think that like hunter gatherer people like before we had all this like what do they look like, you know, like, did they look a lot younger, maybe I think

Barry Conrad

Also, did you see that thing on TikTok where they were demanding, why do like 30 year olds now look way older than 30 year olds before, like, do you know what I'm saying?

Melanie Avalon

No. Did they show like, like pictures, like comparison pictures?

Barry Conrad

Yeah, there was like a girl that came on a video saying, oh, you look great for like, I thought you were like 36 and she's like 22, just like how people are just looking older within the generation before at the same age. It's really wild to me.

Melanie Avalon

I think it's two main, I think it's three things. I think it's our diet, like our processed diet. I think it's our maybe stress levels, like with everything and our skincare and makeup and just environmental exposure to toxins in general. Like there's a lot that we're exposed to. We're like putting a lot on our bodies, in our bodies and in our minds. It's very like toxic and aging.

Barry Conrad

And without even realizing a lot of the time, a lot of it's just habitual.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so teaser. Fun fact though, Barry and I both appreciate skincare, which is so exciting.

Barry Conrad

We do yeah, you know, I'm all about it as well. There's nothing I like to take care of myself as well. And I think all guys do. There's nothing girly or wrong or weird about that. So I'm here for it. Thank you.

Melanie Avalon

Yes, I could not agree more. And I think the third thing was the whole aging concept and that I was talking about how my experience as a female, that there's all this fixation on aging and women and stress and everything in society, but men experienced that as well. So thank you so much for drawing attention to that. I'm excited for this show. You know, it's exciting. So listeners, friends, thank you so much for being here with us. Please submit your questions and your feedback and all the things you can directly, as in we will read the emails, email us at questions at ifodcast.com. You can also go to ifpodcast.com and you can submit questions there. These show notes will be at ifpodcast.com slash episode 405. Those show notes will have a full transcript and links to everything that we talked about. So definitely check that out. And then you can follow us on Instagram. I am Melanie Avalon. Barry is, I'm still learning. Barry is Barry, B-A-R-R-Y, underscore, Conrad. And also we have, I have podcasts, Instagram. So check that out. Yeah, I think that's all the things. Anything from you, Barry, before we go?

Barry Conrad

We hope that you loved this episode as much as we did, and we'll see you next time.

Melanie Avalon

I know, me too. I will talk to you next week.

Barry Conrad

I'll talk to you next week.

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!

Jan 13

Episode 404: Welcome Barry Conrad, The Great OMAD Event Revisited, The Clean Fast, Coffee, Getting Enough Protein, Fasting And Muscle Building, Fasting And Body Dysmorphia, Supplements While Fasting, And More!

Welcome to Episode 404 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.

ABOUT CO-HOST, BARRY CONROD:

Barry Conrad’s multifaceted career spans screen, stage, and music. He’s worked with an array of artists, clients, and brands both locally and internationally. Landing a role on FOX’s ‘Power Rangers: Ninja Storm,’ his first feature film was the box office hit ‘The Sapphires.’ His theatre debut was in the Australian premiere of Broadway’s ‘Violet,’ followed by an unbroken streak of roles, including the Helpmann Award-winning ‘Beautiful: The Carole King Musical.’
Barry originated the role of Kane Jones on the iconic Aussie TV show ‘Neighbours,’ starred in the Tony Award-winning ‘In The Heights’ (by Lin-Manuel Miranda) at Sydney Opera House, booked the male lead in ‘Destiny’ for Melbourne Theatre Company, and is the creator of series ‘Banter with BC.’
Away from the spotlight, Conrad is an ambassador for Panasonic, Kawai and R U OK?

Website | IG | FB | X | YouTube

Podcast: Banter with BC

SHOW NOTES

SPONSORS & DISCOUNTS

PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT SCHOOL: Transform your relationships through changing your attachment style: the most powerful and influential driving force behind your beliefs and behaviors and the ultimate predictor of success in your relationships! The Personal Development School’s All-Access Pass is an immersive platform that offers tailor-made on-demand courses and programs, daily live webinars and Q&A sessions (with founder and author Thais Gibson herself), study groups, and much more that help you heal your attachment style! Get 50% off a Monthly Membership of the All-Access Pass with code IFPODCAST at ifpodcast.com/development.

LINKS:

Melanie's Podcast: The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast

More on Melanie: MelanieAvalon.com

Barry's Podcast: Banter with BC

TRANSCRIPT

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

Melanie Avalon

Welcome to episode 404 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-host, 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 404 of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon, and I am here with somebody very special. This is the beginning of a new era for this show, and we've been teasing it for quite a while, and nobody knows the answer to what I'm about to say until now, which I am here with the new co-host of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. Please, everybody, say welcome to Barry Conrad.

Barry Conrad

Hey!

Melanie Avalon

Welcome. I'm giving you like a, I'm the audience for you right now. I'm like, yay.

Barry Conrad

I'm so excited to be here. I'm so, I feel welcomed. I feel excited. It's a new era.

Melanie Avalon

It's so exciting. And I was just thinking, so you've been a guest on this show twice before, right?

Barry Conrad

Yeah, twice.

Melanie Avalon

Third time is the charm that keeps on giving so friends so Barry has been on the show like we just said twice before He is an incredible actor singer songwriter from Australia Who he just does like all the incredible cool things so we will put links in the show notes to the prior episodes He's been on if people want to get a really deep dive into his background and his story Which we are going to briefly touch on as well in today's episode But Barry so highlights from your career. You were on Australia's longest running soap opera neighbors for how long were you on that show?

Barry Conrad

A couple of years, 2019 to 2021.

Melanie Avalon

pretty awesome. Recently, you were in The Heights at Australia Sydney Opera House, which is like, if somebody were to come up to somebody and be like, name, you know, the top theaters ever in the world. I mean, that's top five for sure.

Barry Conrad

It's definitely one of the most iconic landmarks in Australia and definitely recognised in the world that's felt incredible to be performing there. It's just such an honour. You got to come, by the way, Melanie. Where were you during the show? Anyway, more of that later.

Melanie Avalon

where was I? I was here. No, no, no. True story for listeners, and maybe I mentioned this before, but I did have a brief moment where I was like, I'm gonna go, me and my sister, we're like, we're just gonna show up in Australia and see the show. We didn't do that, but we thought about it.

Barry Conrad

And didn't you say like, you know, because listeners, you know, Melanie travels for like a day, she doesn't like long trips. So she would have come for a day.

Melanie Avalon

I was going to come for a day and my sister was going to like stay on and like see Australia and I was going to head home. So that was going to be the game plan. Other highlights from your career. So wait, were you on Australia's Got Talent? I was an ex-factor. Ex-factor. I know it's one of those shows. OK, ex-factor. I don't think I've ever talked to you about that. What was that like?

Barry Conrad

It's such a long time ago and there was a period was like x factor but it really gave me. It opened everything up for me the reason why i'm talking to you now as well i could open up all my opportunities gave me such a massive platform i learned so much about the industry made amazing friends was incredible exposure i loved it.

Melanie Avalon

Wait so that when you say like for a moment you are you are not about it for a little bit.

Barry Conrad

Well, I wasn't even going to audition. I was actually coaching and mentoring a group that went on the show. So I accidentally, so I wasn't even meant to do is here. So it almost didn't happen at the very last minute.

Melanie Avalon

So you went with them and you were there and then what happened? You accidentally auditioned? you

Barry Conrad

So, I went there with the group and then one of my friends who talked to the producers and whatnot, he dealt with them. He was like, this is my friend Barry, he's an amazing singer. I'm like, ah, bro, don't do this. I'm not here for me, I'm here for this group. And so, I sang live on the spot for the producer and I'm like, you have to audition? I'm like, ah, I don't know if this is for me. And I actually didn't turn up to my first audition, I actually just didn't show up.

Melanie Avalon

And Barry, wait, Barry, you're not a no-show type person.

Barry Conrad

I'm definitely not.

Melanie Avalon

That's a statement.

Barry Conrad

It's a statement and I know we were actually, you'll love this Mel, I was eating steak in Darling Harbour in Sydney with some of my friends and they're like, Barry, isn't your addition now? I'm like, yeah, I'm not doing it. And anyway, long story short, I lost my second mom to cancer at the time. It was a really hard time. And that inspired me to she pushed me to go she like you have to do this. So that was the turning point for me. I humbled myself, emailed them and I said, is this still a chance that I can still audition? They flew me out to Melbourne on the very last day of auditions of the whole tour. And I got in. So, you know, it was a one of those moments, definitely a life moment, you know?

Melanie Avalon

I bet everybody wants to know, did the group that you were coaching get in?

Barry Conrad

No, which is which is which is kind of which is kind of not like they kind of went through some preliminary rounds, but then they got axed.

Melanie Avalon

Wow. Okay. Sorry. I want to touch on the cancer thing because I think we talked about that the first episode you're on. But also before we do that, to wrap up the other highlights from your career, what's been your favorite thing? Or like thing that you're like most proud of? Or

Barry Conrad

I think that I'll have to go with one of the most recent things, which is in the Heights, because it had come at the right time, it was a role that really encompasses everything that I can do. It's at one of the most incredible places in the world. My mom and my brother got to surprise me there as well. It just allowed me to just really enjoy the moment because I think a lot of the time, I can't speak for everyone, but sometimes you can get in your head as an actor and as a performer. And this moment, particularly for me, I could just enjoy it. I really felt like I could be more present and take it in rather than just overthink everything. So it was such a triumph. And I also had broken my ankle last year. So this was like a return to the stage. So as you know,

Melanie Avalon

I mean, that is absolutely incredible. I forgot about that with the cancer.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, so my second mom, she was the manager of a dance group. I used to be in a singing dance group, and she was the most fit person, vivacious, energetic, and she got cancer really bad. And during her decline, I would say, she said, Barry, you have to go for this opportunity. So if not for her, I probably would not have gone back to this producer saying, hey, can you guys give me another shot? So it was a huge turning point in my life. Who knows where it would be if I hadn't done that.

Melanie Avalon

Wow, the lung happened right before that.

Barry Conrad

The long situation happened after that actually, that happened in 2017, 2016, 2017.

Melanie Avalon

And how long was that?

Barry Conrad

That as well, wow, Molly, you're really diving. We're really diving in for listeners out there. I had a blood clot that shot to my right lung and killed off half of my lung. So I've got one and a half lungs. And for, for a second there, I actually couldn't speak without gasping for air, let alone sing, let alone workout, train, dance, act. So I actually thought, you know, my career's got to change now. I have to do something else because I can't even talk. So it was a huge, one of those milestones I had to work through. And it definitely makes you realize that life is unpredictable and that life is a gift because I was this close to dying. Sorry to be morbid, but the doctor said, if you weren't as fit as you are, you would not have survived the episode that I had, which is like an embolism. So I had like a lung equivalent of a heart attack in a cafe and that's how it happened.

Melanie Avalon

My goodness, could you not breathe all of a sudden?

Barry Conrad

I went to stand up and I felt like someone was stabbing me in the back of my right lung with each breath in, and so I thought, I'm going to die, I'm dying. It was just pretty terrifying.

Melanie Avalon

And that is so incredible. Wow, so now you have one and a half lungs and you do all these things. And I mean, listen to you, you sound amazing.

Barry Conrad

Thanks, you know, I think as well the body is pretty resilient, you know, I've definitely improved, as you know, and I think while we're here as well, I definitely believe intermittent fasting has had a massive, it's been a massive contributor towards me recovering as well and healing. So that's been great.

Melanie Avalon

I was literally just going there. I was like, oh, this is a segue. So wait, were you fasting at that time? When did you start fasting?

Barry Conrad

I actually started shortly after that episode.

Melanie Avalon

Okay. I know I've asked you that a lot. I always forget. Yes. So for listeners who are just now meeting Barry for the first time, there are many reasons that I'm so excited about having him as the co-host on this show. And a huge one, like you just mentioned, is that he is a huge fan of intermittent fasting. He actually found kind of like how Vanessa was a listener of the show first. You are a listener of the show first.

Barry Conrad

I was, it's so again, like five years back, at least it's so crazy and just think that I'm sitting here talking to you right now as the new co-host of the Intimidative Fasting podcast is wild.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, because you were listening when Jen was the co-host. Like, that's when he started.

Barry Conrad

Yeah and listeners you have to realize like i was looking for all the hacks i need all the information when i found this new like this discovery of intimate fasting. How can i find out about it what is it do what am i doing it right and so this is the podcast that. Tell me everything that i knew to begin with.

Melanie Avalon

Do you remember how you very first discovered it? Like heard about it, thought about doing it, decided to do it.

Barry Conrad

I want to say it was just online because remember you've asked me this before and it's a mystery. It's like a Mandela effect. I don't even know. It's something. I don't know.

Melanie Avalon

It's funny because I so clearly remember my inception, but some people don't.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, I was paleo before, just beforehand, and I'm pretty sure I saw it online if you wait for a period of time and then eat. And I just tried it out. I went straight to 19 hours and tried that.

Melanie Avalon

That's like me, just jump all in, go extreme. Go big or go home. But understanding, of course, that everybody has their different approach. You might be the most, no, no, no, wait, no, wait. No, because you eat earlier. Everything's running together in my head. I was thinking about my, well, okay, your typical eating window. When is it again?

Barry Conrad

If I'm not on set or doing something where it's on someone else's schedule, if I'm working from home or something like that, I like to open my window maybe around five, six-ish, you know, but if not, it's like later.

Melanie Avalon

Actually, that's very in character with actually a lot of, I think, prior guests or co-hosts. I'm just the one that eats like crazy late at night. Okay, so I have a lot of things I want to talk to you about in today's episode. One of the things I was thinking was I could get your opinion on some of the most common questions we get on this show. And it doesn't have to be like a massively like long answer, but just so people can get like a feel for what you think about fasting, especially a lot of these questions that we get a lot. Shall I hit you with some of them? Okay, so how do you feel about the Clean Fast?

Barry Conrad

I feel great about the Clean and Fast, and I actually learned about it by listening to this show in particular, because Jen Stevens and Melanie, as I'm talking to right now, really talked about the importance of that and not taking in anything other than black coffee, black tea, sparkling water, and just letting your gut have a moment to breathe, to digest, and just to heal the body as well. So I've never actually diverted from that. I've always just stuck to that. I don't do any cream in my coffee or anything like that. It's just black coffee. Don't really have to eat water, and when I break my fast, I might have a drink of wine or something like that with my food, but other than that, clean fast for me all the way.

Melanie Avalon

So were you ever a creaming or coffee person in the past?

Barry Conrad

It's not my thing, no. Not yet, no. Are you?

Melanie Avalon

I feel like I was a late bloomer with drinking coffee. Do you remember when you first started drinking coffee?

Barry Conrad

I was a late bloomer too. I think when I started was when I was doing a lot of touring internationally, singing for other bands and whatnot, and we went to Italy and places like that. I'm like, this does not taste great, but eventually it became one of my favorite things and I have about maybe four a day now.

Melanie Avalon

How about you? Oh my goodness, so many thoughts. It's interesting that you didn't really like the way it tasted and you didn't wean yourself in there with like cream and sugar.

Barry Conrad

No way.

Melanie Avalon

You're like I'm doing this like the real way

Barry Conrad

I'm a purist when it comes to stuff like that.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, that makes sense. I started, actually, when did I first? I just know that people were drinking coffee. I discovered coffee in college. Or that's when I started drinking it. I think so. Like, I don't think I was doing it in high school.

Barry Conrad

Are you like a Starbucks girl? Is that your situation?

Melanie Avalon

I was. I went through that period of time in my life where I was... It's shocking to me now to think how much coffee I drink in college. I was doing papers and drinking like the... I don't even know what the biggest size is, but the biggest size... The grande. Yeah. Venti? Is Venti bigger than grande? I don't know. I don't speak Starbucks anymore.

Barry Conrad

sound bite of the episode. I don't speak Starbucks.

Melanie Avalon

I don't, I feel like though, had I, okay, here, here are my thoughts about this. You know how there's like all the secret menus with like Starbucks and drinks and stuff and people will like make these seek, do you know what I'm talking about? Like the secret menus, like people come up with their own recipes. I was doing that like at the beginning. Like I remember I realized that if you put certain syrups together in it, it would taste like a, like a cookie. And I would like do that. So I feel like if I had been like a different, like, I feel like if social media had been a thing back then, and I had had this moment, I could have like helped originate the secret menu concept, but too late now.

Barry Conrad

Well, I do like cookies, just not in my coffee.

Melanie Avalon

Yes. And we should circle back to that, to the food. But to answer your question, I, right now I currently have, we've talked about this, but like just like a sip in the morning of coffee.

Barry Conrad

like a teaspoon.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, like a tablespoon, like, mm-hmm.

Barry Conrad

I just feel like I want to make it last. The experience is so heavenly, you want to just keep drinking it like a mug or two.

Melanie Avalon

It is so good. I think, well, here's the thing. I think coffee is so good. It has so many health benefits. I actually wish that I drank more. The problem with me is that it's for me, it's a slippery slope. I'm not good at like moderation. So I would, I would like overdrink coffee. Even though, so I wish I, I wish I could like drink like a cup every morning. I actually think that would be the best for health and longevity.

Barry Conrad

I also think it's such and will be such a melony thing because you're so driven you're so focused and coffee with like amp that up even more you don't think.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, it does. It does. That's for sure. The nice thing about it is if you don't drink coffee and then you have some situation where you are so sleep-deprived and have to have energy and it's just not going to happen and you don't drink coffee normally and then you have a cup of coffee, insane. It just like completely kills the exhaustion and you feel like you can climb out at first. So yeah. Okay. So you are team clean fast. Next one. Can you get enough protein in a one meal a day situation? And also how do you?

Barry Conrad

You can.

Melanie Avalon

and how people want to know how Barry they want to know how to get enough they struggle.

Barry Conrad

I am a volume eater, so for anyone meeting me for the first time, if you don't follow me already on social media or whatnot, you know that I like to eat and a lot at one time. So for example, I'll give you a situation that I do on the daily. I'll have maybe 500 grams of ground beef. I'll have two cups of Greek yogurt with a scoop of protein powder mixed in there and some frozen berries on top of that. And then I might have six eggs. So that's a lot of protein in one sitting, and that's over 100 grams. I'm 80 kgs, just under 80 kgs, six foot tall, and I'm having plenty of protein to meet my needs, actually more than the recommended amount. So I'm eating also to build muscle. You don't need to have as much as I am, but you can get enough protein. You just have to be smarter about it and know yourself.

Melanie Avalon

How long does it take you to eat all of that, like how long is your window normally.

Barry Conrad

It's I fast for 20 hours a day on average, but I only eat like maybe within a half an hour I eat pretty quickly as well

Melanie Avalon

Oh, wow. Yeah, you're like, okay. Yeah, we're different that way. I'm like a long take my time feast mode. Read my books. It's a whole thing.

Barry Conrad

Okay, to let me interject, I don't always do that. I like, I do prefer to take my time, but a lot of the time I have other things to do. So let me just get this done. Let me just smash it and I just, I just love food so much. So good.

Melanie Avalon

Me too. That's why I like having my eating window as the last thing of the day, because then I don't have to wrap it up for anything. Yeah. I've tried that other approach. It does not work for me. I'm jealous of people who it works for because I actually feel like it's probably more in line with the way we should be eating, but who will?

Barry Conrad

I will say though, Mel, I do find it harder to get back to tasks after that meal, quote unquote meal, because, you know, you start processing the food and you start feeling a bit more lethargic. I go into sort of unwinding mode. So I do find it harder to focus on like admin-y things or if I'm learning lines. So I prefer to get my work done before I have that one big meal. And that's like my prize. Do you know what I mean?

Melanie Avalon

Yes do i do do you remember the great one mill a day debate. From when jen was here i can recap it if not i have one.

Barry Conrad

meal. It's like I actually, I still remember this.

Melanie Avalon

It's one meal and a snack.

Barry Conrad

Listen as i put for the last said one of the most entertaining things and i even re listened to just for that part just to have a laugh. Was there to buy it so hilarious like they had such different ideas of what that meant and i was like what that would be a snack and it's a meal and snacks no if you're at a restaurant like you have an appetizer and you have to do so funny.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, because Jen's argument was that, okay, my argument against Jen's argument. Jen, from what I remember, it's been a while, but I remember Jen would open her eating window with something and then like not eat. Like there was like a not eating period and then there was the eating. So that's why I was like, you're having a snack, then you're like not eating, then you're having your meal compared to eating continuously ongoing. So where do you fall on the Great One Mill a Day debate? It's okay, you won't offend me.

Barry Conrad

Shout out to Jen Stevens, you're awesome. What I will say was, well, how long did you wait between having, let's try to get real technical here. How long did you wait between the snack, quote unquote, snack and then the big.

Melanie Avalon

The thing is, I don't remember knowing me and my logic, it must have been long enough for me to make this argument, you know? It was substantial enough that it wasn't like eat it and then immediately eat, there was like time in between.

Barry Conrad

When I'm at a restaurant, or even if I'm at home, let's not use that 30-minute eating situation that I said before, I'm not going to go straight in. I'll have my little appetizer, maybe have some wine, maybe even pause for a second. Even at a restaurant, sometimes your manes may take a while to come out. I don't know if you call it. Do you call the manes there?

Melanie Avalon

Listeners. We're gonna have filthy moments where we're gonna learn new words. Australian words. I have learned so much. And then also, well, okay, it's a two, it's two parts. One, Barry has Australian words that we don't have. Two, Barry also has Barry words that aren't necessarily Australian words.

Barry Conrad

Barriisms.

Melanie Avalon

Yes, exactly, like trinkets, right? That's not like an Australian word.

Barry Conrad

It's not it will it's in the dictionary but not for the way it's supposed to be but for example that's a perfect example what are trinkets or trinkets for me like snacks like chocolate chips could be like a cheeseboard like trinkets you bring some trinkets and wine like trinkets. Yeah trinkets segueing back into the question if i'm having trinkets to start with like a couple trinkets and i wait for maybe. If i wait for ten minutes before having savory savory would you call that a meal in a snack or would you call that one meal.

Melanie Avalon

10 minutes. I would call still a meal like one meal. What if it's like half an hour 30 minutes? I Really wish I really wish I could remember how long Jen waited in between the two, but I'll just answer it now Okay, 30 minutes. Let me think about that eating something Waiting half an hour. Okay, so like in this waiting situation. This is why okay. I think this is important in the waiting situation What are you doing like at a restaurant? You're still at the Restaurant you're still like in the eating vibe, but I think if you like eat Something and then you go and like do other things and then you come back and eat I feel like that would be one meal a day and a snack before

Barry Conrad

Okay, let me throw this at you. What if different destinations, different environments, but the same thing. So if you had a restaurant, you just had your trinket and you, you're talking, talking, talking, talking for half an hour, then eat, and you did exactly the same thing at home, like you ate your trinkets and then you made a phone call for half an hour, then you came and ate. Would that be different because of the environment?

Melanie Avalon

feel like it's important that the environment of the restaurant is the environment is a meal. So it's like you're locked in to a meal experience compared to it's a great, it's a great logical point that you bring up compared to if you're at home and then you go and do like a work call or like talk to other people. Maybe it matters and depends if you are like having the trinket snack and then if you like go do a work call and then come back versus you're like talking to people in the kitchen making dinner. I mean maybe that could still be a one meal a day situation.

Barry Conrad

Well, what if you called me and you interrupted my meal, so I had my trigger and then I just stopped eating for a second to talk to you, Mel, and then, but I'm still intending that's my meal.

Melanie Avalon

I think it's the intention. Yeah, like the intention. It's kind of like the observer effect. Like we create our own reality by rendering what we see. So like quantum physics. So like the intention behind what you're doing renders it a meal.

Barry Conrad

This is so funny because we're doing like a two point, like a reloaded, you know, one meal a day, great debate.

Melanie Avalon

I'm going to title this The Great Mule Date, Part 2, or Revisited, Welcoming Barry Codrat, The Great Mule Date Revisited. That's the title. That's the title.

Barry Conrad

Although I don't think that we're debating, I feel like we're more just going, Oh, well, it actually could be depends which way you look at it, I guess.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I want to know how much time I do think if it's a solid hour between the appetizer trinket snack and the Entree main wait, wait, wait, wait. I forgot is a main the entree or is the main the appetizer?

Barry Conrad

Okay, our main is like the main like meal. So is that what you call the appetizer?

Melanie Avalon

Okay, no, that's our entree. What is your entree?

Barry Conrad

Our entrees are like appetizer or entree.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, that's where it gets confusing. That's confusing. This is going to be confusing for listeners get excited for next week because we have a new tradition. We're going to start on this show teaser and this term and we're going to have to figure out this terminology situation.

Barry Conrad

We'll have to decide on like, a uniformed, like, yeah, we gotta do it, we gotta do that.

Melanie Avalon

So what's your what's your final like

Barry Conrad

Well, if we actually go by, for example, I do 24, so 20 hours of fasting and meant to eat within a four-hour window. If we went by that, would my meal just be whatever I consume within that quote-unquote four-hour period? Because now we're getting really into semantics of that too, so do you know what I mean? Like does that still count as my, do you know what I mean?

Melanie Avalon

Yes, that I think that was part of what we were talking about with Jen, I think it's been so long. But yeah, because I for me, I'm I feel like you can eat in a four hour window. And it could be one meal a day or could be two meals in a four hour window, or it could be one meal and a snack in a four hour window. So I don't think like a four hour window automatically means one meal a day for me, that's this is all my perspective.

Barry Conrad

Okay, so I think if it's going to be like an hour or so for me that's you're having like you're having a snack and then you're having a meal, you know.

Melanie Avalon

What about 30 minutes?

Barry Conrad

I feel like that's if I go by restaurant logic I feel like sometimes meals come out that late if it's busy so it's like it's still part of the experience you still there if I'm if I'm taking that as a barometer you know what I mean yeah wow this is this is interesting though what do you think.

Melanie Avalon

Well, I think for me, I think it's one meal a day if it is a continuous eating experience where you are continuously eating and you're not stopping to do something else. I think once you stop to do something else, unless the exception would be, actually I'll finish that first thought, I think if you stop to do something else, then it makes it no longer one meal a day. Now it's one meal and a snack that you had before and you did something in between. The exception would be something you mentioned, which is if I'm having my one meal a day and then you called and then I go have a call with you for an hour and then I come back, I would still consider it one meal a day because I had the intention of it being one meal. I just got interrupted.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, because there is something to the situation where you're intending to eat, so you start salivating, you start getting hungry, because this is what you're doing right now. You focus on this meal rather than having a snack, going for a ride to the store, doing that, printing things off. It's different. You're just having a snack and then eating later again.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I'm so glad I asked about that.

Barry Conrad

That was fun. Also, listeners, tell us what you think. Come to the Instagram, let us know, drop in, comment, let us know what you think.

Melanie Avalon

Yes, we're going to try to start doing more with like Instagram and social media and stuff. So oh, we should post about this like a poll.

Barry Conrad

Definitely that's happening

Melanie Avalon

Yes, okay. Just before we leave the topic of protein, I do have a few more nuanced questions there just because we get so many questions. And actually what's interesting, and this will relate to a question I'm going to ask you in a bit, I feel like each co-host that has been on the show, which just as like a note to everybody I've had about the time of my life on the show, I'm so grateful for it. And it's been so fun to do it with different people and have different perspectives and focus on different topics. And so it's been really interesting to see based on the co-host kind of the topics we gravitate towards and talk about the most. So I feel like with Jen, well, we talked a lot about the clean fast, so lots of clean fasting, lots of like, I'm having problems with fasting, I'm having a stall, what do I do? Lots of those questions, lots of like practical questions about fasting. And then with Cynthia Thurlow, we talked a lot about women's hormones, which was really great because just as like a fun fact for listeners, when Jen was hosting, we would get a lot of questions about that. And we would answer some of them, but we didn't really feel comfortable. Like, you know, we're not doctors. And so having Cynthia, I was like, yes, I can like go through all these, this backlog of questions. And then Vanessa Spina came on, she's, you know, very much about protein. So, you know, we focus heavily on the importance of protein. And that that's why it's like really heavy on my mind right now, no pun intended, because like, we've been getting so many questions about that recently, I think, because we've been talking about it so much. So all that all that protein that you eat, so like you said, you're a volume eater, the feedback we get from listeners is that they get full too early eating that much protein, like do you get full or

Barry Conrad

What I will definitely say is, first of all, two parts. I like how each of those co-hosts had different focuses and different preferences of what they like to talk about. For me, you'll discover that I'm big on protein. I'm team protein. Even with my family and friends, I try to slip on in there, you know, you're eating enough protein, if they're feeling tired, if they're feeling weak, and they're like, actually, no, I don't actually eat as much as I should be, because we should be having .8 grams of protein per kg of weight. So for me, that's 64 grams of protein per day. I have over 100, usually, grams of protein a day. So that's the second part. Do I feel full? I have a big appetite, and protein is very satiating. And also, not really. Like, I don't get too full too quickly. I think this is gonna be very specific to people, because not everyone can eat as much as, you know, me in one sitting. So that, for example, might look like two meals within your eating window. But it's so important to have enough protein, because we're declining all the time, and we lose muscle. It's just we can't avoid that, so we need to keep on eating enough protein to meet that.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, and to touch on all of that, I am so excited because clearly you're the first male co-host we've had on the show. And A, I just feel like that's a massive gap in this show throughout the years in that we haven't had the male perspective on things. So this is beyond exciting. B, to tie into all this protein stuff, there's a lot of skepticism out there that you can build muscle, maintain muscle while doing intermittent fasting. And so what has your experience been? Because friends, check out Barry's Instagram. The muscles are looking good. You look good. So pre-intermittent fasting, what was your experience with building muscle and body composition? And then post-intermittent fasting, what was that experience like?

Barry Conrad

I can honestly say that I feel like I'm in the best shape now than I've ever been, and the only thing that's significantly changed between now and 10 years ago, for example, is intermittent fasting and not intermittent fasting. Before that, I was a lot more stocky, meaning how can I say it in a way that you can understand maybe more puffy or bloated or not as lean, not as much lean muscle definition. Now, there's just, I think because of having that extended amount of rest where we're able to dip into those fat stores, really burn fat effectively, and also with the human growth hormone and autophagy, it's really my muscle is in the best condition it's been. My experience, I can't speak highly enough of intermittent fasting now. No one would ever say to me, you're looking gaunt, or you're looking too skinny, or you shouldn't be fasting. Do you know what I mean? It's more like, oh, you look really big. It's like, well, I don't eat for 20 hours a day, and so is it the fasting that's making me look big, or you tell me?

Melanie Avalon

It's exciting because there will be statements out there that you can't build muscle while fasting. And it's like, well, clearly that's not true because people are doing it. And so it's really exciting to hear your experience with all of that.

Barry Conrad

Another thing I'll add is during, for example, when I broke my ankle, I could not go to the gym. So, I did not lose muscle during that six-week period where I was in bed, in bedrest, I could not go to the gym. If you were to go to a gym bro or personal trainers, some personal trainers out there, you'd be like, well, you're not training enough, you're not doing this, you're not doing that. Well, I actually couldn't even train. The only thing that I could control was my fasting and my protein intake.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. And to harp again on the protein intake, I think if you're doing the fasting and not having the protein, it would be a very different situation. Okay. And then something you said reminded me of this. I think we talked about this on the first time you were on. I don't think we revisited it last time, which was how did fasting play into your personal diet history and concerns about your body image and your own body and how you fit in your skin. Another question that we get a lot is, is fasting an eating disorder? Does it encourage disordered eating? Is it unhealthy from a mental perspective in that regard? So how has fasting affected your mental health when it comes to your relationship with your body?

Barry Conrad

That's a really good question. I really want to trade carefully here and say that there are definitely people out there who struggle with body image and I certainly have. I used to have body dysmorphia. I would lie about what I was doing so that I could over train and I saw myself in a completely different way than what I really looked like. I think if I did fasting during that time of my life, it would be very different and have a negative impact on my mental health. I'm not in that space right now. When I do eat, I'm not having a carrot. I'm definitely, as you can hear, eating enough food. I think it's so important to realize if you are dealing with these issues to please get help. I would not necessarily recommend to someone if I knew that they were struggling. I don't want to give people a hack to, oh, it's another way to not eat. It's a tricky thing to answer, but I feel amazing. I'm in a way better mental state now. I don't struggle with the same things anymore. It's enriching for my life. I find it really valuable. I feel amazing. I have a lot of energy. I don't feel weak. I don't feel like it magnifies those issues. I think if I did it at that time, though, it might be a very different situation. What do you think?

Melanie Avalon

I feel you nailed it. Like you said it so well. I do think it can encourage and relate to disordered eating and, you know, be a negative, but it really depends on what your relationship is with it. Like intermittent fasting in and of itself is not that, but it can. If you already are struggling with that, and then like you said, you kind of use it as a way to do that and be okay with it by society's standards by calling it intermittent fasting. That's very different than the way we're talking about it, where you're just choosing this eating window. And like we said, focusing on getting all of your nutrients, all of the protein, all the things. And similar to you, like me, once I started doing intermittent fasting, that was one of the first times I was freed from this obsessive dieting, just obsession that was not fun. And finally, yeah, broke me out of that.

Barry Conrad

It can be a really, and this is something that I think that we'll probably talk about again in the future. And please, if you have any questions about it, please hit us. I think that people can easily see fasting as, oh, you're just not eating. And that's what a lot of people just think it is. You're just starving yourself. And to that, for someone that maybe has anorexia or bulimia or disordered eating, that is a way to hide behind that disorder, maybe. So I don't, I wouldn't recommend it. But I think if you don't struggle with that, then highly recommend it.

Melanie Avalon

Same. And what I also appreciate, because I feel like we talk about it so much in the female community, but I feel like men don't really talk about it, that they can struggle with, you know, body dysmorphia or body image issues. So thank you for sharing that. Because I think people don't talk about it. Okay, another thing that we get asked a lot about is, what are your thoughts on supplements while, or I guess while fasting and just in general? Do you, actually, I don't know if I know this answer. Do you take a lot of supplements?

Barry Conrad

I'm going to do a shameless plug right now, and I do take the Melanie Evelon magnesium. But other than that, I don't really, I'm not a big supplementer. If anything, I take protein powder just to help supplement the protein if I'm on the go, just to get that extra boost. But other than that, I don't have a lot of supplements, to be honest. Maybe I should. I'm definitely open to it. I just have never been really versed in that whole world, just supplements. What's your view on that? Because obviously, you develop supplements as well. Do you supplement a lot on the daily or just sometimes?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I think in our dream environment, like dream world, we would get everything we needed from food and we wouldn't need any supplements. So I'm kind of like a maximization, the minimalist supplement person. I like to take the supplements nutritionally that I think people need. So like you mentioned the magnesium, most people are deficient in magnesium. That's why I have two different versions by Avalon X, the 8-blend magnesium 8 and the magnesium NiCAP for the brain. So I think that's like a solid thing that most people can benefit from. And then a lot of people are deficient in vitamin D. So that's one that people often benefit from supplementing. And then if people have like MTHFR mutations, they might benefit from methyl folate to help with conversion of B vitamins and things like that. And then beyond that, I think there's like different categories. So there's like the nutritionals, there's that. Then there's the like digestion aid. So some people really benefit from digestive support. Like that's, I do. So like they might benefit from HCL or digestive enzymes. So that's another category. And then a third category, I think it's just optimization of things. So like my seropeptase that I take every morning of my life, and that's, you know, proteolytic enzyme that you take it fasted and it breaks down problematic proteins in your body. And it really helps with inflammation and wound healing and cholesterol levels and just so many things in the body. It clears my sinuses. So that's just like, I take that because it just optimizes everything that I'm doing and makes me feel good. I'll take, I'll do like NAD or, you know, in the past, like NMN. So there's different supplements I'll take for longevity purposes. But I'm not, like I said, in the dream world, I think we would just get what we need from food. But we're not in a dream world.

Barry Conrad

When you shared that, I would say one thing that I do know based on feedback before is, if anything, I need more vitamin D because I try to avoid this on where I can. The sun's pretty harsh and I'm mindful of that. So when I have gotten checked up before, doctors are like, everything's great. You could probably just use a bit more vitamin D. So that's something that maybe I should look into then, getting a supplement for that, if you can recommend something.

Melanie Avalon

If you're testing your levels and it's low, I would definitely suggest a supplement and or, yeah, because I don't even know. So in Australia, is it just like blazing sun like intensity? I'm thinking of all the cliches of Australia.

Barry Conrad

That's a cliche. You know, that's very true. It's that it's very harsh. It's very intense here. So it's important to, as we like to say, slip, slop, slap, put that sunscreen on. But that's not enough to protect you from the harsh effects of the sun. So yeah, it's it's crazy here. Really, really bad.

Melanie Avalon

Was that an Australian phrase that you guys use? You're like, as we say, we slip. Is that a thing? Slip. What is that? Slip, what slip, slop, slap.

Barry Conrad

Slap, slap, there you go.

Melanie Avalon

That's a thing, like you guys say that.

Barry Conrad

That's the thing.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, see?

Barry Conrad

You can start saying that now.

Melanie Avalon

Do I never say that? I guess, wait, I feel like, do I never say things and you're like, I've never heard that before?

Barry Conrad

I did. Yeah, you definitely do.

Melanie Avalon

I do. Yeah. Well, I was going to say, so vitamin, yeah, I would look at supplements or like in the winter here, I will do, it's a little bit controversial, but I'll do like a minute in a UVB tanning bed, which is basically the, the ray that gives you the vitamin D production. I do think the vitamin D creation from like naturally if your body creates it is probably more beneficial, but yeah, I do take a supplement every day. I want to make one in the future. AMD logic has a great vitamin DK too. That's awesome. Check it out. And friends can use the code I have podcast for a discount on that. Oh, so how do you feel about extended fasting? Do you ever fast longer than what's the longest that you fast?

Barry Conrad

The longest that I have fasted is probably maybe 36 hours, but that was intentional just to see if I could do it. But that's not something that I'd often do. I will, though, and I'm really busy sometimes, easily go over 24 hours sometimes. And I'm just so focused in the fasted state. I'm alert. I've got all this energy. I don't even know. But yeah, generally, it's 20 to 22 hours.

Melanie Avalon

Okay. Yeah. So do you ever set out, you know, so it sounds like you don't really set out to do like a longer multi-day fast.

Barry Conrad

I mean, maybe I will for its benefits later on down the track, but I feel like I just I like eating. I don't want to go a day or too many days without eating.

Melanie Avalon

You know? Same. That is how I feel. That's how I feel. In general. Okay. Wait. Actually, here's some really quick rapid fire questions. Ready? What's your favorite meal?

Barry Conrad

If I had one last meal ever, it would be soul food. So fried chicken, candied yams, waffles, collard greens, mac and cheese, if I had to choose one ever.

Melanie Avalon

Barry, I've been trying to get you to move to Atlanta. That's basically like all they eat here. You'd be in heaven. Okay, what's your favorite guilty pleasure snacker meal that you eat like on the regular or would eat on the regular?

Barry Conrad

Okay, if I've just finished filming something, or I've done like a shoot, whatever, I'll always treat myself to a massive block of chocolate, and it's gotta be like a caramelo or like a top deck, milk chocolate. I'll have that, I'll smash that.

Melanie Avalon

Chocolate has a lot of health benefits. So that's in your favor. Are those brands?

Barry Conrad

Yeah, like Cadbury and Whittaker's. Guys, you have to look this up. Whittaker's in New Zealand. Best chocolate you'll ever have. It's gonna change your life. This is not an ad. It's really good.

Melanie Avalon

Oh my goodness. Here's my new rapid fire, so I already know the answer. Chocolate or vanilla? Chocolate all day. Yeah, I like vanilla. Really? Mm-hmm. Yeah, it's like so clean and pure.

Barry Conrad

Okay let me I'm not gonna change my answer but what I will say is when I have like a cake like a chocolate cake I have a scoop of vanilla ice cream with that I can't have chocolate ice cream with chocolate cake.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, yeah, I actually, I want to do a poll so bad. I've been wanting to do this for so long, but I'm like, nobody cares except me. I want to know between the four options, like rank them in order, chocolate cake, chocolate icing, vanilla cake, chocolate icing, vanilla cake, vanilla icing, vanilla cake, chocolate icing.

Barry Conrad

chocolate cake chocolate icing all the way.

Melanie Avalon

How would you order those those four in order?

Barry Conrad

chocolate cake, chocolate icing first, vanilla cake, chocolate ice cream second, chocolate cake, vanilla icing. And what's the last one? Vanilla and vanilla. Yeah, that's my least favorite.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, we might be reversed. I would be, well, I would be, I'm not sure. Too much for me to think at one time. I would be vanilla cake, vanilla icing, vanilla cake, chocolate icing, chocolate cake, vanilla icing, chocolate cake, chocolate icing. There you go. I think that might've been the reverse, possibly. Are you an early bird or night owl?

Barry Conrad

early bird we've talked about this too like i wish i could stay up super late and i can but i just feel like amazing first thing in the morning.

Melanie Avalon

Yep, and I want to be an early bird, and I can't. So grass is always greener on the other side. What's your favorite workout?

Barry Conrad

I do a full body situation, so I get in for 35 minutes, chest, bias, tries, glutes, hammies, calves. I know it sounds like a lot to cram in, but it works for me. Do that three times a week. Done.

Melanie Avalon

I am so excited to start answering more workout-related questions on this show because I feel like we've been not doing those questions. They're due diligence, and I feel like you're going to help out there. Important. Taylor Swift, how do you feel?

Barry Conrad

It's really sunny outside today here in Sydney.

Melanie Avalon

Are we not answering?

Barry Conrad

No, no, no, no, I have it answered.

Melanie Avalon

Are we avoiding?

Barry Conrad

No, I was just doing that to be cheeky. I think she's an incredible businesswoman. She really knows that I connect with her fans. She's a great songwriter. Yeah, she's dominating. I think she's great. What's her head about her? I agree. Favorite drink? It's got to be a whiskey sour or a margarita. Spicy margarita. And if it's wine, a Pinot Grigio is first and then a Tempranillo when it comes to red.

Melanie Avalon

I was going to say, how do you feel about red wine? And do you believe in its health benefits?

Barry Conrad

Absolutely. It's definitely got a ton of health benefits and I do love my red wine. I love having it with a steak that I base in butter and season real well with salt and pepper. Bon appetit. Delicious.

Melanie Avalon

Yes, I can't wait to... Something I'm excited about, again, having you here, is you are a big foodie. Oh, shout out to your banter with BC. Barry has an entire show where he eats meals with awesome people and interviews them. And yeah, so people should check it out. Yeah, what I'm excited about, one of the many things, is I think with fasting, like we're both such fans of fasting and we get to talk all about fasting. And also one of the biggest benefits, at least for me, for fasting is it's like you get to enjoy food because you're not in this restrictive mindset and you get to finally really enjoy it. And I think a lot of people see fasting and they think it's restriction and deprivation. And so I'm excited for us to explore all the benefits of food in the eating window while fasting. It's going to be a good vibe.

Barry Conrad

100%. I don't think it gets talked about enough. We love food. We want to celebrate eating when we eat. We're not deprived. We're enjoying life, people.

Melanie Avalon

that we are. So, well, this has been amazing. To wrap things up, what are you most excited about being the new co-host of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast?

Barry Conrad

I, first of all, just feel super honored, really excited to be here to bring a new perspective, bring a fresh perspective. And as you said, even for people that are interested in exercise and working out and protein, even the guys out there, let's get them on board too. So I'm really excited to open things up and just, yeah, I'm something fresh. And to be here with you, Mel, just talking about fasting and everything and talking about food and connecting with you guys listening. So yeah.

Melanie Avalon

I am literally, I am so thrilled. I am so grateful. And little insider story for listeners. So when Vanessa and I realized that it wasn't going to work out anymore with her new child and homeschooling and everything, I was like, you know what, maybe I'll just go solo for a little bit, like bring on guest hosts and all the things. And so I talked to Barry and I was like, do you want to be like a guest host every now and then with this new transition? He was like, I should just be the co-host. I mean, it didn't exactly go down that way. But basically, before that, literally, I was not. I was going to pause. I was going to not pause the show, but I was going to do it on my own and interview people and have guest co-hosts. And then talking to you, I was like, oh, A, you're just perfect for this. I'm so excited that you're here. And B, I was like, he's really passionate about this. He's so perfect for this. So I'm really excited. It's a whole new era.

Barry Conrad

It's a whole new era, and you know what, Melanie was on the fence, guys, and she just needed a bit of push. She was like, no, we're just like, do you want to guess? No, I'll just do it. It's like, okay.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, I know, then I was all in, once you, I was like, okay, I'm sold. I'm like very much, I think we're both very similar this way. I'm very intuitive with things and I just go all in. Like once I decide to do something, I just do it. And I don't really second guess myself. I just kind of go on with the vibe. So friends, hope you enjoyed this new adventure journey that we're on with Barry Conrad. The show notes for today's episode will be at iapodcast.com slash episode 404. That link will have a full transcript as well as links to everything that we talked about. So definitely check that out and definitely submit your questions for the show. You can email questions at iapodcast.com or you can go to iapodcast.com and you can submit questions there. And then you can follow us on Instagram. I'm Melanie Avalon. Barry, what, are you just Barry Conrad?

Barry Conrad

and Barry underscore Conrad. Are we talking about the website? Are we talking about Instagram?

Melanie Avalon

Cynthia with Cynthia underscore, Thurlow underscore. She had two underscores. You've got one.

Barry Conrad

Yeah, just one. Parry on Discord, Conrad.

Melanie Avalon

Barry underscore Conrad and follow us on Instagram. I have podcast, which like I said, we're going to start doing more content with that. Thanks mostly in part to Barry being here. So well, anything else from you before we go? How are you feeling? First one in the can.

Barry Conrad

I'm feeling excited. Let's go. We got the first one in the can and only upwards from here. I'm so excited.

Melanie Avalon

I know. Me too. Well, I will talk to you next week.

Barry Conrad

Talk to you next week, bye!

Melanie Avalon

Hi! 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 06

Episode 403: Special Guest Scott Emmens, The IF Podcast Evolution, Melanie’s OMAD Journey, Podcasting Challenges, Social Dynamics Of Fasting, Biohacking Focus, Supplement Line Creation, The Mind Blown Podcast, A Future Vision, And More!

Welcome to Episode 403 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

Behind The Mic Podcast | IG | MD Logic Website

SPONSORS & DISCOUNTS:

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:

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

TRANSCRIPT

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

Melanie Avalon

Welcome to episode 403 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 friends. So today we have a very special episode for you guys. It's actually a podcast swap. So Scott Emmons is going to be interviewing me all about my podcasting life and the history of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast and all the things. You'll be listening to that episode now. And it also will be airing on Scott's incredible podcast called Behind the Mic. So definitely check out that show. If you like this format on that show, Scott engages in super dynamic discussions across a wide range of topics with all different podcasters. He's had on crowd favorites like Ben Azati and Liz Wolf and many more. And they really dive deep into their expertise and their experiences and their insights, because so often in the podcasting world, especially the health world, we interview these incredible guests and the focus is on their topic. So on Scott's show Behind the Mic, you actually get to know the person behind the mic of some of your favorite podcasts. So definitely check that show out. All right, now enjoy the show. Hi everybody and welcome. This is episode number 403 of the Intermittent Fasting Podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon and I am here with a very special guest today on today's show. It is somebody that you guys are probably very familiar with because he has been on this show so many times. Actually, Scott, do you know how many times you've been on the Intermittent Fasting Podcast?

Scott Emmens

I think this is gonna make seven. Seven? Seven. I think I'd lucky number seven.

Melanie Avalon

Awesome. Yes. So, the backstory on what we're doing right now, we recently aired our final goodbye episode with Vanessa Spina, which was very sentimental and bittersweet. We adore each other. We adored podcasting together and her life and everything with her kids and homeschooling and all the things just wasn't going to work out anymore doing this show. So, I wish Vanessa nothing but the best and maybe actually we'll have to bring her back in the future for some special guest episodes. So, now we are in the in-between because we do have a new co-host joining the show very soon. So, while we're in the in-between, with Scott Emmons, Scott has been on the show multiple times. He is my fantastic, incredible partner at IndiLogic Health, helping me create my Avalonix supplement line. Scott and I also have a third podcast together, a third for me, a second for Scott, which I will explain in a minute, called the Mind Blown podcast, which we just absolutely adore doing that. So, friends, definitely check that out. And Scott recently launched a new podcast called Behind the Mic, where he actually interviews podcasters, which is such a cool format and so, so fun. It's actually a ton of guests that I've had on my shows as well. So, a lot of people you're probably familiar with. So, we thought we would do a fun mashup episode here, where Scott is actually going to interview me about my podcasting experience, I mean, just in general, but in particular, the intermittent fasting podcast with you guys. So, this episode is going to be a little bit of a personal episode for me, with Scott taking the reins. Yeah, it's going to work so well, because we're going to air it on his Behind the Mic show as well. So, yeah, Scott, I'm excited for this. Thank you.

Scott Emmens

Behind the Mic Wellness launched November 11th. I am super excited about it. It is exactly what you said. Really, we take a deep dive into podcasters people already know. And then you get to meet some new voices that you probably haven't heard of before. So the whole objective is to spread the good word of podcasters in the health and wellness space doing great things for other people.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so it's an awesome show. Definitely check it out and you'll actually get a sneak peek of it right now because this episode is going to air on that show as well. So Scott, I'm just going to, I'm going to let you take over and do your thing.

Scott Emmens

Awesome. Well, so, you know, Melanie, you've done so many things in the podcast world, intermittent fasting world, the biohacking world. So I want to take us back, though, to sort of pre-IF podcast, Melanie. And I guess what led you into intermittent fasting? Was there a defining moment that you said, this is it for me? Or was there something else that came before intermittent fasting?

Melanie Avalon

Yes, so great question. It was both a defining moment, epiphany moment, like singular acute moment that I remember, and an evolution leading up to it, which was basically that growing up, I was always trying different diets all the time, just to lose mostly vanity pounds, and nothing really ever stuck or worked. I mean, there were things like calorie counting, and I tried really silly crazy diets in college, like the cookie diet where you eat all these cookies instead of real food. And it wasn't until I discovered low carb in college that I realized what I was eating not only could be effective in helping me lose weight, but also had all these other health benefits as well. And I will say I'm no longer low carb, at least not, well, I do low carb nights, but I'm not currently low carb in general. But that really opened my eyes because from there I discovered the science of diet and the science of fat burning. I discovered keto, it was a whole thing. And this was over a decade ago, I was often in the internet web spheres, forums and message boards, trying to learn more about how to further optimize everything I was doing. And that's where I found this blog post because this was back in the days where blog posts were still the place to be. Because before, now it's all Instagram that they and people still do blogs.

Scott Emmens

Vlogs had a moment there. They were they were the thing

Melanie Avalon

Like you were a blogger, you know, like today you, you don't, people don't really identify as a blogger. I mean, you can, if you want to, and you might be one, I'm not trying to offend bloggers, but like they were like a thing for a while. So there was this one blog post by this guy, Rusty Wayne, I think, and the title was eat one meal. I think, I think it said like eat one meal a day to lose weight or something like that. And it basically made the case for OMAD one meal a day, which is the intermittent fasting protocol that I followed for years and years and years. And a lot of our listeners do as well. And I remember this blog post had like hundreds of comments and all these people saying how incredible it was. And the idea was like really, it's so interesting to me because now it's literally what I do. It's so second nature. I can't imagine being any other way. So it's weird to me that there was a point in time where this concept of eating one meal a day was kind of shocking to me. I decided to do it. I had like a diet buddy in college, shout out to Ben and P. We would always do our crazy diets together. Like he did the cookie diet with me and the Apple fast and all the things.

Scott Emmens

Did he want to do the cookie diet, or did you arm wrestle him into the cookie diet?

Melanie Avalon

No, he was all about the different diet. Actually, did he actually do the cookie diet? Oh, he did the HCG drops. We did those. Yeah, so he was my diet buddy. And so we decided to do the one meal a day thing together. It was called the, I was calling it the warrior diet, which is Ori Hofmeckler. I think I found the warrior diet Ori Hofmeckler's thing through after finding this one blog post. In any case, I decided to do it for a week while in film school. And I never stopped.

Scott Emmens

So you went to OMAD and are you still doing OMAD or have you kind of loosened that up? No.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I'm still doing it. No loosening. Well, I have actually... Wait, let me... That was the incorrect answer. I have loosened in that when I first started, I was very much driven by the clock. So it was like, I am not eating until I have fasted a minimum amount of hours until this time. It was very intense about that. Now, I don't think about that at all. I just eat every night. I don't really stress about it.

Scott Emmens

like I did. Yeah, timing. And I think, you know, everyone's unique and individual in that way, and timing probably doesn't matter as much as just getting the right amount of nutrients at the right, you know, in the one meal a day.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I think some people like me, when starting, you need a very specific plan and protocol like time wise that you're sticking to to get into the habit. And then you can be more flexible, as you know, as it were.

Scott Emmens

I completely relate. As a former bodybuilder, at first, you read all the magazines, did all the form properly, did the basic routines and sets that they described. Then over time, you become in touch with your muscles and your body and you learn how to do things a little differently and then you start adding things. I think it's very similar when you're doing a diet or intermittent fasting. You've got to go through some kind of scheduled program to learn your body and then you can start to tweak it based on how you're responding as you get to know your body. Exactly. Yep. So you mentioned the warrior diet. Is that one meal a day or was that something with a slightly different concept?

Melanie Avalon

That's Ori Hofmeckler's work. I've actually had him on the Intermittent Passing podcast, which blows my mind, A, that I forget that he's been on the show, and B, that he was such a key figure for me, and then I eventually was interviewing him. Actually, that's just the way I feel all the time with all the people I interview. But his approach is based on, I think, the ancient Romans. And it's like the idea of being a warrior, and so you eat your big meal in the evening, but he does allow for during the day, you're allowed to have slight munching on salad greens and stuff like that. That's really the only really big difference between that and a traditional one meal a day approach that we talk about on here. Got it.

Scott Emmens

So, I mean, obviously, you know, you did the OMAD, you started intermittent fasting. What was some of the really difficult challenges you faced early on when you were experimenting with intermittent fasting in OMAD?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so what's really interesting is, so I had been low carb already. So I was pretty fat adapted, because a lot of people, they have to gain this metabolic flexibility where their body more easily taps into using their fat stores, because it can be pretty resistant in the beginning, especially if you've been eating a high carb diet, eating constantly, eating the standard American diet. So I didn't have that issue jumping into intermittent fasting, because I was already pretty good at burning fat. So honestly, I remember the first day, very clearly, because it was on my friend's film set. On the film set, there's these craft services, which is like the snacks and the food. And I was so conditioned to just snacking all the time. And I was like, Oh, I can't snack, I can just drink tea now. So I distinctly remember that. After that, though, it was very easy for me. That's the reason I kept going, like I just never stopped. I didn't have a lot of challenges physically with appetite or cravings. That said, the social challenges were intense.

Scott Emmens

I was just going to ask about the social challenges because, you know, it's so often like, let's have lunch together, let's have breakfast together, it becomes part of your social fabric.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, exactly. And the good thing about doing if you do a one meal a day evening situation like me is the most communal meal does tend to be dinner. So that's not an issue. But things like lunch and breakfast and yeah, just all of that. And this was before because now intermittent fasting is very well known. It was going to be anyways, but maybe our podcast contributed a tiny tiny bit to that. Back then people weren't talking about it or doing it as like a thing. So people thought if you said you were fasting, it was like people thought you were, I don't know, had disordered eating.

Scott Emmens

I have personal experience in two things. One, relating to that, so in 2015 or 16, one of my coworkers asked me, well, how are you staying fit? And I'm like, well, I do a lot of intermittent fasting. And he just literally burst out laughing, like, you think that actually works? There's no science to that at all. I'm like, actually, there's a ton of science and you haven't read it, so you think I'm crazy. But in 2016, it was definitely not mainstream. That same person today now is convinced that I have podcast or intermittent fasting is the way to go, which is kind of funny. But the other thing you mentioned, like, did your show contribute to it? Well, just an anecdote. The first time I was on your show, I got a phone call from three or four of my friends and colleagues from, like, that I either was really good friends with or knew pretty well in the work situation or just really good friends with. At least three, I think four people either called or texted me. Was that you on I Have Podcast? Oh my God, I've been listening to that for years. So just within my small circle of friends, not all of whom are health nuts or biohackers or fasters, I had four different people reach out to me on the very first time I was on your show. So you definitely made an impact.

Melanie Avalon

Was it really that many, really three or four?

Scott Emmens

My best friend, his wife, Kate, her friend, another colleague, Ann, and a colleague in the health and wellness space named Dawn. So that's the ones I can remember, but there's probably more.

Melanie Avalon

That's so crazy to me. And you know what else is also really interesting? So aside from when I'm at a conference where a lot of people I meet know who I am, in my entire seven or so years of podcasting, I don't think I yet have met a random stranger who knows me from my podcast, even though I hear so many stories like that, where like other people's friends listen, or like my mom. My mom moved into, my parents moved into a townhome and like their neighbor listens to my show. So like it happens to other people, but I don't think it's ever happened to me. Like I've never met a random person and then they're like, what do you do? And I say podcasting and then what are your shows? And I tell them, and then they've heard of it. Like, I don't think that's ever happened. Isn't that weird? You'd think that would have happened at least once.

Scott Emmens

Well, I think as you continue to go to more conferences and travel more, I think that's going to become commonplace for you.

Melanie Avalon

Conferences don't count, Scott. That's what I just said. Conferences, like everybody at conferences knows me. I'm sorry, this is like.

Scott Emmens

Just walking to the airport or at the grocery store. Yeah, I hear you.

Melanie Avalon

It's just weird because it happens to people, you know, like you just shared that story.

Scott Emmens

It's coming, I feel it. So, you also wrote a book. Now, did the book come before I Have Podcasts or did I Have Podcasts come before the book? What, when, why?

Melanie Avalon

some listeners have heard this story. Okay. I was working on, I had my agent backtrack. I still published the book in 2014, I think. So that was pre-podcasting completely. I got an agent, a publisher. So that was like 2017. I was working on the book to re-release it in stores. And that's when I started trying to find a co-host. And so that's how I found Jen Stevens. You know the story, Scott, of what happened?

Scott Emmens

Vaguely, I think we've talked about it in the past, but my listeners won't know.

Melanie Avalon

I knew I wanted to do a podcast on intermittent fasting. I knew I needed a co-host. I had not done a podcast before. So I was like, how do I find a co-host? And I was like, well, I'll just like look for intermittent fasting Facebook groups. And then I'll ask in there if anybody wants to co-host. So I found the biggest intermittent fasting Facebook group I could find, which was Jen Stevens's group. I went in there, I posted, I said, I wanted to make it super clear. I was not trying to pitch my book at the same time. I wanted to give myself credibility so people would know like, oh, this is like a legit person. She's writing a book about fasting. She wants to do a podcast. So I said in the post, I was like, I have a book coming out. I didn't mention the name or anything. I was like, I have a book coming out and I really want to do a podcast on intermittent fasting. Would anybody like to co-host with me? And the group freaked out on me, like flipped. Like all these comments about how horrible of a person I was to come in Jen's group and promote my stuff.

Scott Emmens

How dare you promote yourself?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. So I was like, Oh, okay. And then they blocked me from the group. So I was like, Oh, well, that's not going to happen. Okay, moving on. And then Jen herself, who I didn't even know at the time, messaged me and said, Hey, she said she had been thinking of starting a podcast. So did we want to maybe discuss doing it together? So yeah, we did a phone call and

Scott Emmens

That's a cool story.

Melanie Avalon

We did a phone call off to the races and we podcasted together for five years or so.

Scott Emmens

ish. It's funny how, you know, the person that is running the group or the person that's superstitious, they'll find you, you know, if you put it out there, someone will find you and, you know, kudos to you for putting it out there. It takes a lot of bravery to do that.

Melanie Avalon

Well, thank you. And I'm so grateful to Jen because I'm so grateful because she had such a huge audience. So once we did launch the show, we immediately had an audience which is not common in the podcasting world at all.

Scott Emmens

You decide you're going to do the intermittent fasting podcast. You now have a partner, but you alluded to earlier that there was like a distinct moment when you knew you were going to do a podcast on intermittent fasting. What was that moment? What went through your mind when you made that decision? Like, I know I want to do a podcast.

Melanie Avalon

So there wasn't a distinct moment for the podcast that was for that was

Scott Emmens

for intermittent fasting itself.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, the podcast, I just knew I wanted to do but I didn't know how or when. So, yeah. But then once Jen sent me that message, we locked it in. We're off to the races. And I had to figure it all out myself. Actually, the guy I was dating at the time, who was also my mentor for my book, because he was an author and a podcaster, among other things. And he actually told me what to do with podcasting. So that was helpful. It's always helpful to have a...

Scott Emmens

somebody tell you what to do. Absolutely, and I think that's been an advantage I've had working with you and other podcasters is kind of learning some of the things to do and some of the things not to do. So thank you for that. But you did so much of it on your own. I mean, you really had to learn from the ground up. Plus you had a co-host that you were also supporting and you were, I think, weren't you even doing the editing yourself at one point?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, it almost broke me like it literally almost in the beginning. I was doing everything editing. Yeah, I was edited. I would upload it. I would do all the, all the graphics, all the campaigns. I was prepping that it was, it was a lot. It was exhausting.

Scott Emmens

If there was if you could go back and tell yourself something as that podcast was beginning like advice you would give yourself When when I have to launch what would it be about? Would it be about the podcast would it be something else? What would be the advice you'd give yourself right as you were launching that and doing all of this work that almost broke you?

Melanie Avalon

My first immediate thought was, oh, well, I would tell myself, outsource some of that and take it from sponsor money at the beginning, but then I'm like, Oh, wait, you don't have sponsor money in the beginning. So, you know, at the beginning, it's all, you're paying for everything. If I could have afforded it, I would have still said, outsource. Although I do like what I learned, I think I would have done it on my own for like a month, not for as long as I did, which was a long, maybe a year. So that's thing one, there's been so many changes in the podcasting world over the past almost decade. So it's interesting because the way things are done now, a lot of it isn't even remotely how it was done back then. So I can't really, I was gonna give myself advice about that. But it's like that wasn't the way it was back then. So it doesn't really apply.

Scott Emmens

That is a great segue into the next topic, which is...

Melanie Avalon

Very vague answer, but.

Scott Emmens

Well, I think it's a legitimate answer, right? The podcast world has changed in so many ways. I mean it's become Really? I think the go-to place people look for you know People in the know and so many people are turning to podcasts for all types of information because the long form allows you to do So many things and so it's become a really sort of mainstream but also the industry who's a part of it Like who you have to be partnered with there's so many things that have changed but to that point You're making a slight change in I have podcast you're having a new co-host that's going to be joining you But you also mentioned to me that the format might be tweaked a little bit Do you want to talk about like your vision for the future and where you see I have podcasts going in this new podcast world?

Melanie Avalon

I thought of another thing I would have given myself advice about, it literally could have been a TV show. We had a situation at one point where we got involved with people and there was so much drama, like podcast world drama, that was shocking, like it literally could be a TV show. However, a lot of good things came from it and we got out of it. Just looking back, I would have like told myself to be ready and to do things a little bit differently. As for the future, yeah, so a few different things, one, well, I don't know if I'll ever be able to do this. I know I should be doing video podcasts, like I know, is behind the mic video?

Scott Emmens

It is primarily audio, but I am recording it via video and using the clips to sort of get people attracted to the audio, but eventually it will probably be partial video or whole video and audio, but it's primary mode is audio.

Melanie Avalon

I just realized the irony of asking that question when I know you're going to air this on it. So clearly it doesn't have to be video, but I'm just laughing because I was going to say how video is draining for me and you have to get ready. And I'm like, but you're a Scott, Scott, you're a man. You don't understand. But now I'm thinking about Scott having to pluck his eyebrows.

Scott Emmens

Trust me, there's plenty of prep and it has to go into the on-camera.

Melanie Avalon

Can I tell this story?

Scott Emmens

Yes, you can.

Melanie Avalon

literally, I mean, it's not really a story, but literally, at one point, I was lamenting about all the prep that's required to get ready for video calls or podcasts or whatever. And Scott, like so sincerely, which I know you're still sincere about it. So I'm not making fun. I'm laughing with you. But you were like, you're like, I know, like, there's so much to get ready. And I was like, Scott, what do you what do you have to get ready? Like, well, you know, I have to like pluck my eyebrows. I am like,

Scott Emmens

got to put a little gray cover up on the roots. So I've switched over to just going with a baseball cap now. That's made it a little easier. But I'm about to say I'm not a huge fan of the video because it distracts me from the conversation. I find myself, like, am I looking in the camera? Does it look like I'm looking at the person? So while I see the value of it, because a lot of people like to watch things and listen, it doesn't allow me to be completely engaged in the conversation. And also, I'm an auditory learner. So to me, the video is a bit distracting, and I'm still getting used to it.

Melanie Avalon

What's interesting, I'm not an auditory learner, although I wonder if that can be gained as a skill. Like now that I listen to so many audio books and podcasts 24 seven, I feel like maybe I have gained that skill a little bit more than I would have been historically, but basically everything that you just said is exactly how I feel. I get very, I can't focus with the video. There's mostly because I get stressed about how I look on the video and it's just, it's not good. Whereas like audio only, all you can do is listen to the other person, you know, you have to like be there.

Scott Emmens

I do think listening is a skill. For me, it was a natural thing because I was always an auditory learner from the time I can remember. I didn't recognize that until I was older, but then once I started podcasting and listening to podcasts and audiobooks was my first foray into it. So back in the day, you had cassette audiobooks and CD audiobooks. And that's when I realized, holy crap, I learned so much better through listening than reading. But I do think it's something like anything that you can definitely enhance. And I think years of podcasting forces you to become a really good listener.

Melanie Avalon

Yes, for sure. I think, honestly, I think the best skill gained from podcasting is learning how to listen to somebody and not interrupt them. Yes.

Scott Emmens

because if you're interrupting a podcast it's just crosstalk and so you really have to wait for the person to finish their thought and not be thinking about what you're gonna say but really absorb what they're saying and then you know refocus yourself on what it is you how you want to respond or if you're gonna respond

Melanie Avalon

Exactly, like I feel it in real life when I talk to people like you feel this you feel it like jump in like that podcasting Muscle, although I probably interrupt you a lot Scott. So I apologize like in general

Scott Emmens

Check us out on Mindblown, you tell us. So once you started IF Podcast, I'm imagining you started learning a lot more about intermittent fasting. Are there some moments of clarity or moments where you specifically recall like, wow, I thought I knew a lot about fasting. And all of a sudden, you have this level-up jump in your knowledge of intermittent fasting.

Melanie Avalon

Probably. Well, first of all, I try to maintain a perspective where I understand that I don't know anything and that I'm always learning. So I really try to maintain that moments where I have probably learned a ton and felt like there was like a jump in knowledge probably were when people would release certain, like, for example, reading like Dr. Walter Longo's work, like reading his books and reading about his studies or like reading David Sinclair's stuff and learning about sirtuins activated by fasting, although apparently people debate that now. I don't know. That's what that's what I was listening to on Peter Tia recently. Yeah, I was probably being exposed to people's work where they really, you know, provided a lot of science or different perspectives. So like reading about like in the women's world of fasting, reading about like fasting for your cycle and things like that, different concepts. Like with Cynthia, when I brought Cynthia on, I think each co-host brought something. I mean, they all brought wonderful things, but they brought, you know, new perspectives to fasting. So, you know, with Jen and I, it was a lot about being really relatable and like, does this break my fast and, you know, what to eat in your one meal a day. So that was like the Jen vibe. And then Cynthia, it was wonderful because she knows so much about, you know, she's a nurse practitioner, she knows so much about women's hormones. So we, there was a lot of women's hormones and fasting topics. So I learned a lot with her. And then Vanessa's, you know, super big on the protein. So there was a lot in the science of protein and, and Vanessa was, she's not super intense, like athlete. I don't think she would identify as an athlete is my point. She though was the most, she's the most exercisey of like everybody I've had on the show. So, you know, we got to tackle more of those topics. And then I don't know if I will have announced the new co-host. So get excited listeners, because it's a whole new vibe and perspective. I'm excited. That also answers your question a little bit about the future changing co-hosts. So

Scott Emmens

I Have Podcast in particular has like a delicate balance between sort of guests, questions, storytelling, and science. Is it just natural conversation or are you consciously trying to balance the science with the empathy and the stories?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. So it's interesting because I have the Melanie Avalon biohacking podcast as well. And that one is very formulaic in the meaning of it's an interview show. I am very intensely it's about the science, you know, I'm very intensely studying their book or their work or whatever they do for, I mean, hours and hours and hours. And then when I'm interviewing them, I'm trying to create a connection with them personally and make them feel comfortable. And honestly, all my best friends now are often from the podcasting world. The focus is, you know, the interview and the science and their work. With the intermittent fasting podcast. Yeah, it's it's hard. Hey, it's hard to know like what the people want, like, and I think people want different things. So like if you make it more if you make some episodes more sciency, some people love that, but then other people don't. And then if you make the episode more personal, some people love that other people don't. So I honestly, I did have this is a moment I had, there have been like different defining moments while podcasting where I made personal decisions about things. And I did have a moment where I was like, you know what, I'm going to take into account, obviously, what the audience wants. And I'm going to do all I can to make a show that people love. And also, I'm not going to super stress out if I can't make everybody happy, basically. So what do I most enjoy talking about with the fasting and what vibe feels most, you know, like fun and like being at home. So I think that's this show, the intermittent fasting show is, it's more of a, like a home vibe than, you know,

Scott Emmens

Yeah, like hanging out with your friends who are giving you good information and good science, but it's also just a casual conversation. Exactly. I think that's what attracts a lot of people to it is you get to the science, but you really do it in a way that makes people feel like they're sitting in your living room having a cup of coffee chatting with you.

Melanie Avalon

Yes, and also shout out again to our Mind Blown podcast because the way Scott and I are talking right now is it's more interview-y. On that one, we just tackle random, super cool topics like the Mandela Effect and things that have vanished that people don't realize anymore and catacombs, so many things. And we're very like, we're our true selves, I feel. Do you feel like we're our true selves?

Scott Emmens

Yeah, we get to let our hair down on that one and really just just have a blast with it and be just be us and it's a ton of fun. My favorite was the Titanic. We got a lot of Titanic one and two. We got a lot of praise on that dual part episode. I love doing that podcast. It's just so much fun.

Melanie Avalon

It is so fun, and this is fun too. I'm just saying like, because I remember the, actually this is another defining moment. I remember, so Stephanie Rupper and Noelle Tarr, if people know them, they have the Paleo women podcast. Oh, sorry. Wow, wow, well-fed women. You know what's crazy is I've, the reason I said Paleo women is I'm going back to the story from when I was listening to it back then. That's what used to be called, I know it's called well-fed women. And Scott, you've had Noelle on, have you had her on behind the mic?

Scott Emmens

She is scheduled to record soon and I have been on her podcast about four times.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, awesome. Well, love Noelle. The story I'm telling here, what I'm thinking of is, so her co-host is Stephanie Rupor. And I remember, I love Stephanie as well. I remember the first time I ever listened to Stephanie's stuff was before. She briefly had her own podcast, I think, before she did Wealthhead Women with Noelle. And I remember her vibe was like a very specific vibe, like a very serious and I don't know. And then I heard her with Noelle. And I was like, Oh, this is like a completely different person to me. I mean, I know it's all the same person. But that's the thing I'm emphasizing about I find it really interesting dynamics between people and how it can be like very different in different situations, even though it's all like true to yourself.

Scott Emmens

I know Stephanie a little bit on a personal level and she is a little bit more on the serious side, but when they're together, they blend the chemistry really well. Yeah, I love them. So then you make this shift into biohacking. That's a huge shift because biohacking encompasses so many things, right? So you made the Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast, which I loved. That was, I think, the way I found you was through your biohacking podcast and we connected through Instagram. But I love that podcast as well because I love the science stuff and you do such a thorough job of interviewing people. So tell us a little bit about how you made that decision to shift into biohacking. What was that about and why? And then a little bit about the biohacking podcast, you mentioned it a little bit, but I'd love to dig into it some more. But let's start with, what was the moment you said, I'm doing a biohacking podcast on my own. Yeah, let's start there.

Melanie Avalon

The biohacking journey was happening adjacent to okay, like a year after starting intermittent fasting probably ish I started intermittent fasting When I was a junior in college And when I graduated is when I started getting into quote biohacking But I wasn't calling it biohacking at the time because it wasn't really a thing But everything I was doing ended up becoming what biohacking is today and my entrance into that was Dave Asprey who? I've had on this show Two times and I think he's been on two times on the Melanie Avalon or three He's been on a lot. The point is I was following a lot of his work doing things like blue light blocking glasses and Red light therapy and all the things so that was all happening alongside my intermittent fasting journey and Then it was definitely happening once I started the intermittent fasting podcast and I was getting more and more into it And I knew I wanted to have my own show and interview these people But I was kind of intimidated by the the concept and then I read the secret You know the book the secret

Scott Emmens

Of course I know the book. Manifesting.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, and I don't know how much I believe 100% in everything it says. That said, it's such a short read and it's very inspirational and you read it and you just feel like I'm just gonna do it. So like I read that and I was like, I'm doing a podcast, like I'm doing a biohacking podcast. I remember standing in my kitchen finishing that book, having that moment and then I started it probably a few months later. It was crazy because I decided to start it while I was moving from back from LA to Atlanta. What was scary about it and it's so ironic because right now when I book guests, like if you book to come on that show right now, we're booking 14 months out and then it airs a couple months after that. So almost a year and a half like leader, your episode will air if you book with me right now, which is an incredible, amazing problem to have. But when I first started, it was stressful because I was like, I have to have enough guests in the can because I have to keep finding guests. So like what if I can't find guests and there will be no show. So it was stressful to think about how am I going to get so many high caliber people. And it's also hard to get people to come on when you don't have the show yet.

Scott Emmens

Yeah, so I had this conversation with Benazai. He was one of my very first interviews for Behind the Mic Wellness. He's like, I'm never going to get this person on. And then he's like, but then I would, you know, email them and surprisingly, they said yes. And he's like the power of the podcast. And I was nervous too, to like, reach out to people and be like, Hey, you want to be on the podcast? But I got about a 75%, you know, initially positive response. And I was like, wow, that's great. And now that the podcast is launched in a lot of episodes, I feel like, to your point, it'll become easier and easier. But yeah, that pressing that send button to invite somebody sort of, it's almost as scary as you know, hitting the submit button to drop your episode, you know, because you're just speaking into the ether.

Melanie Avalon

Exactly. I think I've shared the story before. I think the most shocking one for me in the early days was when I invited David Sinclair on, because I didn't barely even have the show yet. He was a legend at Harvard, and I just found his Harvard email. I sent him an email and invited him on. Literally, he emailed back and was like, sure. That blew my mind. It was crazy to me.

Scott Emmens

it was a mind blowing moment. That is, I mean, that's what, you know, that's really what it is. Ben made this sort of funny comment on that podcast. He said, you know, like, if I just emailed Davidson Claire and said, Hey, you want to have a discussion with me about, you know, your research and your work, you know, he's probably gonna say no. But the fact that I had a podcast on a platform made it interesting for him as well. Like, he can get his message out to thousands of people. And I get a great guess. And, you know, everybody gets to win the audience wins I win and, and Dr. Sinclair wins. So there is, if you're doing your job well, but you do an amazing job of interviewing folks, you know, you're gonna get guests, just it's persistence and belief. And just to circle back on the secret, you know, I don't know if you ever read Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. Is it

Melanie Avalon

Short as well? No, I might have. It's not.

Scott Emmens

Super short, but it was Napoleon Hill and Rosalie Beeland. It was released in 1937. The basic of my point is, it's like the more complete version of the secret, right? It's like, it gives you the secret behind the secret. The secret is like the cliff notes that think and grow rich. So if you haven't read it, I strongly encourage you to do so for the listeners and melt you.

Melanie Avalon

I read either that or something very similar similar to it. Yes. I'll have to check it out. Wait is it an old?

Scott Emmens

book 1937 yeah okay oh so you might have you might be thinking of how to win friends and influence people that's sort of in the same I know that one yeah it's worth it thinking grow rich it's basically the secret but but a lot more in-depth like what would it really takes I should read it

Melanie Avalon

If I have not already, thank you.

Scott Emmens

So with the biohacking podcast, you said you're booked out a year and a half. That's incredible. Do you have thoughts about how that might more forechange or is that format really solid for you right now?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, the actual format, I don't see much change coming. It would really just be if I ever do more and more video interviews. Or I mean, I would love to have like a TV show or a documentary or something. Or so if it could somehow evolve into that, that'd be amazing.

Scott Emmens

Have you ever had an interview like we were going in one direction and then it took like a hard left turn and you're like, whoa, and you had to either rain it in or it was almost became adversarial has that has ever happened or something similar.

Melanie Avalon

I have the majority. Okay. I will say one thing. I don't think I have with the exception of one episode way in the beginning before I had even launched and I was just you know trying to book guess and somebody reached out and wanted to be on it and I recorded that episode. It was mostly the sound quality just wasn't good so I didn't use it. So with that one aside I have aired every episode that I recorded I think and I don't have I've been very happy and grateful and love essentially all of the guests that I've had on because I remember one of my co-hosts would often ask me you know did I ever have experiences of dud episodes or episodes where you know you just couldn't air it based on you know the the content and it didn't end up being what you thought that actually doesn't really has not happened to me. There have been times where I don't know maybe there've been a few episodes where I feel like somebody was getting a little bit argumentative or abrasive but never anything crazy. I very rarely censor any of the content like pretty much everything that we record goes out there as well. There was a little bit of nervousness in the beginning of the pandemic with saying certain words and worrying about getting things censored so you kind of had to like censor yourself in a way which I think is unfortunate. Yeah I've been very very happy with with all of the interviews if that makes sense.

Scott Emmens

I think everyone has those those moments where it gets a little tense or a little maybe miss something got maybe misconstrued in the question But typically, you know, you're a pro you get it right back online I've you know, obviously only done about 20 in the can so far and I think there's only one that's probably not gonna make the air It might maybe the way it's editable. We'll see Yeah, you do such a thorough job, you know reading your guest books preparing the questions I think that really serves you well and probably why you haven't had to not air anything And I really love the fact that you don't do a lot of editing or censoring You just sort of like hey, it is what it is We're gonna put it out there, but I do remember the COVID times and I'm still sensitive to that You know people start going off too much about that I'll I'll try to steer the conversation away just because there's so much sensitivity about it still today to this day

Melanie Avalon

agreed. And that made me remember the thing I was going to say, which is, and you kind of touched on this, but I think I so intensely vet who I'm bringing on that it's typically ends up manifesting the way I would love it to manifest. There have been a few times where I was going to have somebody on and then getting closer and learning more about the work, I uninvited them. I prematurely addressed issues, if that makes sense.

Scott Emmens

Free intervention. Yes. What are some of the things that are so positive about podcasting that you sort of never anticipated when you started IF Podcast, something that you would have never guessed would have come to fruition or that would have occurred through podcasting? Whether it's just skill sets that you've acquired that have helped you in life or things that you would not have been able to accomplish, anything that's substantial.

Melanie Avalon

I definitely had no idea how incredibly, insanely profound and incredible, and I don't like this word. I don't like the word networking, but what it would do for networking. Like I sensed that, you know, that that would be a thing, but it's literally like people, you know, people spend so much time and energy trying to quote network and like learn how to network and go to networking events. And it's like, which is all great if it works for you. So that always was intimidating to me and not my cup of tea. I also don't like the concept of networking. Like it sounds like you're like using people or something. I just don't like it. I just like meeting people and talking to them. And the amazing thing about podcasting is I get to sit down with these incredible people who I would die to network with. And I get to actually talk to them for a long time about their work. So it's something they're passionate about. I get to really listen to them. I get to like the connections I have made and friends is just overwhelming. It's literally a job where you are meeting people constantly all the time on a deep level, not a superficial level. And like I keep saying it, but like all of my really, really good friends now are really all came from this world. I mean, I know you and I, well, I guess you did too, because you found me through my podcast. So yeah, that's true. Although we debate the origin story.

Scott Emmens

Yes, if you want to hear about that weekend, you can go to Mindblown and you can hear all about how we debate the origin story of our meeting. I think we've talked about that on I have podcast once. Yeah, I probably have. So if there was one thing about the podcasting industry as a whole, that you would like to see changed or improved, what would that

Melanie Avalon

be? Okay, well, I have a very technical answer that's boring, but it's true. We'll take the technical answer. Podcasting sponsors are like rates are determined by downloads. And in the seven-ish years that I've been podcasting, there have been quite a few times where Apple podcasts will make a change in how they log downloads in a way. Like there's been changes where, like in the very beginning, it was like, every time you like play the podcast, it's like a download. And then if you stop and you come back, it's another download. And if you, I don't know, skip around, it's another down, like it was like a certain system. And then they like stopped doing that. So then what would happen essentially is everybody's downloads across the board, like drastically dropped. Like another recent one they did was they used to auto download. Like when people were subscribed to shows or something, I probably get this a little bit wrong, but they would like auto, it would auto download to their phone and like count as a download or something like that. And then they stopped doing that. So that was like another moment where the downloads dropped. And what's been difficult during that is because sponsorships are based on rates with downloads. So like the rates aren't changing, but the downloads are changing, but the listeners aren't actually changing. It's just how they're monitoring it differently. And what's so weird to me is that that's like not accounted for and hasn't been, it's been weird. So that's a very technical, boring answer was what would you ask about what would be changed?

Scott Emmens

Yeah, well, if you could change something about the industry, but I think that's a very real thing that I mean, because a lot of like YouTube algorithm will change and suddenly you go to find your favorite YouTube show and it's either gone or the lost 10,000 subscribers or so I and you're exactly right. I was talking to some people about the podcast, you know, ranking systems and what you just said is they used to have if you were following the show, it would automatically download like the most recent 10 episodes. I want to say. And now I think it's just like the most recent episode and you have to download the rest on your own. It might have actually even downloaded all the episodes, but for whatever reason, I think Apple thought that was too much Wi Fi bandwidth or something, you know, a brand within the system. I'm not sure what the reasoning for that is. But every time they change the goal post, you know, it sends the ripple wave through the whole industry. It's not just your podcast is all the podcast and then the sponsors have to figure out, well, what does this mean? And so it's confusing for everybody. So I think that's a great answer.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, exactly. And I remember, I remember when the big change happened where they stopped counting down when they stopped the whole downloads counting multiple times if you stopped and restarted. And we were with the network at the time. I remember saying like, so the downloads are lower, but it's the same number of listeners. So how is the industry adjusting? And there like wasn't really an answer. Like it was really mind blowing to me. Yeah, so it's been the that whole world. And I think that's something really interesting that people wouldn't realize as much is that there's this whole world of like media buyers and agencies. And like, there's a whole world of like podcasting business. So you know, that's not that you're talking about things I've learned, you know, I learned a lot of business skills from from podcasting, which I didn't anticipate.

Scott Emmens

Yeah, I didn't anticipate that either, you know, I came from a long line of business knowledge, executive, etc. But I'm learning keep on learning.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. And it's really funny. Like I've also realized like a lot of people think a lot of people don't read contracts that they sign.

Scott Emmens

It's almost like the terms of service, they just sort of...

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, because I like meticulously read all contracts I sign and there's been so many times where I'm like, who is signing these contracts? And I'll push back and we'll, you know, we'll get it fixed. But it just blows my mind. I'm like, somebody signing this? Like, as it is?

Scott Emmens

I think sometimes people feel like, you know, well, they're the whoever, so I don't have a, you know, I don't have a choice, but you always, if you're, if you're one of those people signing a contract, you always have a choice. And usually the people, if they really want to partner with you, they'll listen to what you have to say, and they'll make adjustments to the agreement.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so oftentimes it's just like their stereotypical legal document they're giving everybody, so it's not personal.

Scott Emmens

Yeah, so it's what they call the boiler plate contract. It's their template. They send everybody the template. And then if you don't choose to redline anything, then it is what it is.

Melanie Avalon

Exactly. Because I know we've had that before with brands and like one brand, the contract literally said I couldn't, like it implied based on the way it was worded that I couldn't promote my own products on the show. And I was like, that's a problem. What? We're not? No.

Scott Emmens

Yeah, that's not gonna work, which I definitely want to get into next as we wrap up our last 10 minutes here. But I you do have a third podcast that you and I are co hosts on and I love what we mentioned earlier, we both love doing that podcast, which is mind blown. And I honest to God, I remember us having sort of this text frenzy, and discussion slash then texting, but I don't remember like, what the impetus was like, what was the moment when we were talking about something? I think we were talking about some sort of esoteric Mandela was always the Mandela. And that I think the Mandela effects, that was it, we were talking about the Mandela effect, and we were giving each other our theories and thoughts, right? And then I think was it I can't remember who's you or me that said, Well, we should do a podcast about this. Do you remember how that went exactly?

Melanie Avalon

Well, I mean, because I know listeners check out the Mind Blown podcast, especially the episode one and two, that's where we share the major, major epiphany we had about the Mandela effect, which by the way, Scott, my sister was listening and her mind was completely blown by that and you know what she asked me? And this is what I still wonder. She's like, are people talking about this online? Like, is this a theory? And I was like, no, like Scott and I came up with this theory and then like, it's not anywhere online, at least not yet. Point being though, I think we were so, it was just around that time. Is that when we, maybe we just said, we just got to make a podcast about this?

Scott Emmens

You know what, as you're saying it, I think it was when we came up with that unique theory that we both like, like almost in unison, like, wait, this is a podcast. And then I think I said, this is a podcast. And then you said, well, we should do a podcast. And I was like, we should? I think that's basically how it took off. And then we just put our mind to it and we did it. Turned out to be awesome. But yeah, I think you're right. I think it was the epiphany moment came as we were digging so deep into this Mandela effect. And we came up with this unique theory. And I think that was sort of what pushed us over the edge to say, let's do a podcast about all these cool subjects. And we'll start with the Mandela effect.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah.

Scott Emmens

Yeah, I'm glad you reminded me that I kind of I totally forgot the origin story. So now it's a documented here for life on behind the mic wellness and I have podcast, the next evolution. So you did the biohacking, you did the podcast, and the next evolution was your own product line. Like, what point did you know, you wanted to make your own product line, and what gaps were in the market for you that you said, I think I can do better.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so something about my life, the way I live, and it literally keeps happening over and over, which is that there's a lot of things I want to do in life. And I, for a lot of those ideas, I just know that, like, it'll come to me. They're like, I just know there are things I want to do, I will do them. And I just need to, like, wait. And it's not like I'm being lazy and, like, waiting around because I'm doing a lot of stuff. But I just wait for that right person to come into my life. And I'll just know that it's, like, the thing, like, this is the thing. And that has happened so many times. But honestly, the best example and, you know, one of the longest and most treasured is I always wanted to, I think I was always, ever since I got into health and wellness and started taking supplements, I probably was alert by the idea of having my own line. I'm so neurotic with what I put in my body. And it is really hard to find supplements that match my criteria. I literally think I'm, like, the most intense of anybody. I don't meet as many people who are as intense as me. I can attest to that. And Scott is a treasure in helping us with formulations and things. So I was very interested in the idea. I actually, for quite a while, was dating somebody who had his own supplement line. And he was saying that I should do it on my own because he did it on his own. And so he was saying, you know, I'll connect you to producers. He's like, I'll connect you to everybody and you can just do it. And I didn't want to do that. I knew that would wreck me. I knew energetically, I didn't want to be doing the actual production, you know, order fulfillment, all that stuff, just timewise. So I was like, I'm just going to wait. But I also didn't want to just, like, white label because I wanted to create my own products. So when Scott popped into my life, slid into my DMs on Instagram,

Scott Emmens

Yes, that was it, red light therapy, I slid in on red light therapy.

Melanie Avalon

We debate it a little bit, but we debate the first conversation. But when I first talked to you on the phone for a long time, we talked for like an hour, an hour and a half or something, I immediately just knew I wanted to do it with you. And what's funny about it is I knew from that moment and I didn't, I didn't think twice about it. I wasn't looking back. And apparently Scott was like white knuckling it, thinking that I was going to give up, you know, or not be sold.

Scott Emmens

Well, I was white duckling it for a few reasons. One was, yeah, like I didn't know if you were really gonna pull the trigger, right? And then two was, you were so specific on how you wanted to make seropeptase because you have been talking about it on your podcast for, you know, years. And you had very stringent criteria that with that particular molecule, we had to like, actually create a new type of manufacturing process to make it without fillers and no anti-caking agents and no magnesium stearate and no plastic in the delayed release capsule. So we like, like made the perfect seropeptase. And once I got that down, I felt better about it. I'm like, I think she's really gonna like this. And then we were off from there. So yeah, I mean, kudos to you for like putting seropeptase on the map.

Melanie Avalon

Well, I could not have done it without you. And yeah, Scott was so amazing and just he kept bringing me options. And I would not be about it and not because it was bad, just because I was so, so intense with my, you know, everything.

Scott Emmens

Well, one of the ones I was like, I figured a way to do it with just like rice hucks and you're like no rice. I'm like, oh

Melanie Avalon

No rice. And then you said acacia fiber.

Scott Emmens

Yeah. And then finally we landed on creating this new formulation process with the MCT oils. And you were like, yeah, perfect. I was like, all right. And that was it.

Melanie Avalon

And it was so exciting because it was my first product and I'd been taking seropeptase for so long. I thought I was just used to taking seropeptase and it feeling harsh on my stomach. I was just used to that and I thought it was the seropeptase doing that, but we made our version and that doesn't happen at all. And on top of that, it works so much better. It's incredible. It's like the perfect seropeptase.

Scott Emmens

Yeah, I literally won't, but never can even consider taking any other seropeptase. And then mag eight, which was another huge hit, then the berberine, which you went to the utmost extremes, you you actually requested that we had it double tested and third party tested, not just for all the things we already test for, which is heavy metals, toxins, mold, identity, specificity, you know, we do do laboratory analysis before the ingredients even walk in the door, but then on top of it, you you said, Well, I want to go one level above that. And for the berberine, because it's a root, you wanted to make sure there are no pesticide residues in there. So we put it through the pesticide residue test and it passed the California stringency test of all the pesticide residues and we're like, Okay, now we can launch it.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I did not trust using the source's own COA, yeah.

Scott Emmens

And we don't either, right? So we trust, but verify, right? So we always verify that C of A. So that's amazing. The Parkline has been a huge hit. Avalonix, I'm sure everyone knows that. But yeah, I'm super proud to have been part of that with you and continue to be. And we've got other products coming down the line. So I'm excited for you for that. I can't wait to see what you do with that.

Melanie Avalon

Although we say it a little bit different, I say, although I think I said Avalon X earlier, but I mostly say Avalon X.

Scott Emmens

Oh, you know, I didn't pick up on that.

Melanie Avalon

Yes. Wait, Scott, I have told you this so many times. Okay, well. Because you'll say Avalon X and then I'm like Avalon X.

Scott Emmens

All right, Avalon X, I will get it down now. That's like us with MD logic. I'm like, no, it's MD logic health. You have to put the health.

Melanie Avalon

I'll trade you. I'll say immunologic health if you say Avalon X.

Scott Emmens

Deal. Sold. Avalon X.

Melanie Avalon

IndiLogic Health.

Scott Emmens

Speaking of, I'm Dan and Kate May and I am literally five miles from Avalon, New Jersey.

Melanie Avalon

Oh, hey, I got, I use that bag you give me all the time. Scott sent me a bag that says Avalon on it.

Scott Emmens

Not Avalon X, but just Avalon. Yeah. I saw that bag, I'm like, oh, she'll love this.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. You know what else I use that you gave me all the time? Two things.

Scott Emmens

I don't know. You have to tell me.

Melanie Avalon

You gave me a coaster that says, what does it say? Something about kindness.

Scott Emmens

Oh yeah, I can't remember the quote, but I remember getting that.

Melanie Avalon

It says kindness and ambition are not mutually exclusive.

Scott Emmens

Yes, I saw that and I was like, that's Melanie.

Melanie Avalon

It's so great. And that's Scott too. And then you gave me some Star Trek sticky notes.

Scott Emmens

Oh, I forgot about the Star Trek sticky notes. Yeah, that was another thing we bonded over, is that there's not many Trekkies out there. And you're like, I love Star Trek. I'm like, oh my god, I quizzed you, and you got every question right. I couldn't believe it. That was crazy. Love me some Star Trek. Really, one last question, then I want to turn it over to you. So since launching the supplement line, how has it changed the way you perceive your brand, your mission, your podcasting? Any ways that it's impacted you in ways you didn't think it would, and maybe ways that you hoped it would?

Melanie Avalon

kind of similar to the earlier thing I was talking about where I knew networking would come from podcasting, but I just didn't appreciate the extent to which that would happen. I knew having a product line would, you know, expand my brand, provide a nice foundation for doing even more things, but I really didn't realize just how huge it would be for that. It was the first time. It's funny because I remember being featured, I was in Entrepreneur Magazine, I think, or something. I think this was before I had the supplement line, I think. Something happened with that. And I was like, I don't really feel like an entrepreneur. And then once I actually had a supplement line, I was like, Oh, okay, I guess I am an entrepreneur, even though I was before, I think. But having a product line, especially something I feel so strongly about, it's, well, A, it's amazing to see the response and to see how much it helps, not only me, because literally this is the supplements I want to be taking. It's amazing to see how it resonates with people. And like hearing people's testimonials that people share with me is just the most beautiful, wonderful thing. I'm so grateful for it. It's literally just all wonderful, beautiful things. And I think it really inspired me. It gave me courage to do other things that I think I would have been hesitant about doing, like launching other product lines and other things that happen in the works.

Scott Emmens

Yeah, it's interesting. Life is like that when you start getting a positive things happening, it sort of gives you that boost in confidence to say, well, I did that. So you know what, maybe I can also do this. And then you branch out into other things.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I just remember like, when we first launched the first product probably, and I was like, okay, I was like, now I understand I want to make all the things. Now I already wanted to, but now I really do. Let's go.

Scott Emmens

Yeah, and I'll tell you that Syrupect taste lunch was something we sold out of the first batch in, like, what was it, eight hours or something?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah. And we didn't say what it is, what seropeptase is. I realize that I probably need to define that more for people. If people are not familiar, it's an enzyme created by the Japanese silkworm. When you take it in the fasted state, it breaks down problematic proteins in your body. And a lot of challenges people face have to do with the body reacting to problematic proteins. So inflammation and brain fog and problems with wound healing, like seropeptase and scar tissue, seropeptase breaks that all down. Oh, allergies. That's why I started taking it originally. It clears your sinuses like none other. So it's incredible for, it's just amazing. Like whole body benefits, clear your allergies, get rid of your brain fog, help with your inflammation. Studies have even shown it can break down amyloid plaque and reduce cholesterol. So I love it.

Scott Emmens

And I told you this is a personal testimonial and I don't recommend anyone do this. This is not a recommendation. Just what I did, I had some pretty severe keloid scars on my nose and my forehead. And I used it with a coconut oil and just mixed it together. And I would put a little bit on my forehead and a little bit on that keloid scar. And it shrunk them topically by like 50%. It was amazing.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, it's really incredible.

Scott Emmens

now I take it mostly orally. Well, Melanie, thank you so much for letting me pull you behind the mic on Behind the Mic Wellness on your IF podcast. I'm so grateful for that. You can find me on the podcast Behind the Mic Wellness, Scott Emmons, E-M-M-E-N-S. And Melanie, let's wrap it up with you. Like, what do you have coming out? What things do you want people to know? And where can they find you?

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, well, first of all, congrats to you on the show. I'm so happy for and proud of and excited for you.

Scott Emmens

Thank you. I couldn't have done it without you. Thank you.

Melanie Avalon

No, but really. And you're a really great interviewer and you ask amazing questions. You really make the guests feel heard and seen and understood. And so I'm so excited for you on that show. And I have the time of my life doing Mind Blown and also creating all of our supplements. So, yes. Well, things coming, one that Scott is also involved in. I've been teasing it here and there, so I will say it. We are working on a dating app, so that's very, very exciting. Also a massive project. Oh, my goodness. I am also working on a EMF blocking product line that is coming out, so that's exciting. And there's a few other projects in the works. I'm also really, really excited about, okay, well, in the podcasting sphere. So on Biohacking Podcast, like I said, booking six months out, there's an incredible lineup. There's so many people coming that I'm so excited to interview, so that's really exciting. I'm just excited about all the stuff I haven't even learned yet with that show and the people I haven't even met yet. And then on this show, I'm very excited for the new co-host. Like I said, it's still going to be very much about intermittent fasting a lot, obviously. But it's definitely going to be a completely, completely new vibe, like so new. And I'm really excited about that.

Scott Emmens

Well, that's awesome. I cannot wait to hear how the podcast evolves for IF Podcast. That's going to be great. And if you have not checked out Melanie on Melanie biohacking, I strongly urge you to do so. Really deep dive with great questions, with amazing guests. That was one of my first and favorite podcasts that got me more into biohacking. I was already a quasi biohacker, but that really kind of threw me into it. So if you haven't heard Melanie on Melanie biohacking, you should definitely check her out there. Melanie, thanks so much. And so websites, they can reach you at an Instagram handles.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, so it's Melanie Avalon pretty much everywhere. I'm most active in my Facebook group, I have biohackers, intermittent fasting plus real foods plus life is the subtitle. I also have a clean beauty Facebook group and a group for like cgms and or rings and lumen and biosense and all of those. So if you just search for Melanie Avalon and Facebook, you can find my groups, my main websites, Melanie Avalon calm, you can get the supplements at Avalon x dot us. Yeah, and then the shows for everything. So yeah.

Scott Emmens

Outstanding. Melanie, thank you so much for letting me come on I have podcast and do a behind the mic wellness interview with you. I hope your audience enjoys it as much as I did. Yeah.

Melanie Avalon

Yes, thank you, Scott. This was really amazing. And I can't wait to record with you tomorrow for Mindblown.

Scott Emmens

That's right, pyramids, right? Here we come, pyramids.

Melanie Avalon

Pyramids, here we come!

Scott Emmens

Have a great night, Mel, and I'll talk to you tomorrow.

Melanie Avalon

too. Thanks, Scott.

Scott Emmens

Alright, thanks everybody. Bye-bye.

Melanie Avalon

Bye. Thank you so much for listening to the Intermittent Fasting podcast. Please remember, everything we discussed on this show does not constitute medical advice, 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 29

Episode 402: Special Guest Mark Sisson, Born To Walk, Why You Should Stop Running, Peluva Barefoot Shoes, The Myth of Marathons, Fasting Weight Loss Benefits, The Problems With Shoes, How To Exercise, And More!

Welcome to Episode 402 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.

SPECIAL GUEST MARK SISSON

Mark Sisson is widely regarded as the founding father of the ancestral health movement. His number-one-ranked blog and Primal Health Coach Institute have paved the way for primal enthusiasts to take personal responsibility for their health. Known as a market-disrupting, innovative entrepreneur, Mark’s Primal Kitchen enterprise introduced healthy condiments to the marketplace for the first time, and was acquired by Kraft-Heinz in 2018. As one of the earliest proponents of barefoot-inspired living, Mark proceeded to launch Peluva five-toe minimalist footwear company (with his son Kyle) in 2021, and is now busy “changing the way the world walks.”

Mark, 71, has a BA in biology from Williams College and is a former world-class endurance athlete, with a 2:18 marathon and a fourth-place finish in the Hawaii Ironman World Triathlon Championships to his credit. Mark lives in Miami Beach, Florida, where enjoys Ultimate Frisbee, standup paddling, fat-tire beach bike rides, and a walking-oriented lifestyle.

Website | IG | Book: Born To Walk

SHOW NOTES

SPONSORS & DISCOUNTS

PELUVA: Get 10% off with code IFPODCAST at peluva.com/ifpodcast.

IHERB: iHerb is your easy, affordable, one-stop shop for wellness products across supplements, sports nutrition, groceries, beauty, baby, pets, and more! With over 50,000 products available, iHerb uses NO third-party sellers and ensures that what’s inside every bottle is tested and verified for quality. Plus, their climate-controlled shipping keeps everything fresh! Get 22% off your first order with code IFPODCAST at iherb.com/shop/ifpodcast. Existing customers get 15% off!

LINKS:

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

TRANSCRIPT

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

Melanie Avalon

Welcome to episode 402 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. Oh, my goodness. I am so excited about today's interview. We have a very, very special guest on today's show. It is a legend. He almost needs no introduction, but I will give him an introduction anyways. And he has a new book coming out, which honestly was a complete paradigm shift for me personally, and I think is going to affect so many lives. So I am here with Mark Sisson. Friends, I know you know who Mark Sisson is, but he is a legend in the primal sphere world. So he actually came up with the company, the Primal Kitchen Enterprise, which was acquired by Kraft Heinz, but people are probably pretty familiar with those products. He's a multiple New York Times bestselling author, the Primal Blueprint, Two Meals a Day that I had him on recently, or a while ago for Primal Endurance, so many incredible different books. And his newest book is called Born to Walk, the Broken Promises of the Running Boom and How to Slow Down and Get Healthy One Step at a Time. And okay, friends. So this book, I was really excited to read just based on the title alone. My personal history with running and listeners might have gathered this over the many years of me doing this show. But I am, I am not a runner. It's never really appealed to me. It doesn't make me feel good. And I always sort of felt a little guilty about that, especially when I would, you know, I see people who are really into running, which I think is amazing. Well, I guess we can talk about that. I think it's amazing if it makes people feel good, and it has a healthy place in their life. So I've always admired and respected that I've been really intrigued by things like people doing marathons. And at the same time, I was always a little bit suspicious about the health effects of things like marathons. All of that said, I also was a little bit aware of the barefoot movement and the minimalist shoe movement, but I really had no idea about the actual reasoning or science behind that. So friends, born to walk is going to completely answer all of your questions and give you a complete paradigm shift with all of this.

Melanie Avalon

Should you actually be running? We're going to talk about that. So Mark, thank you for all that you're doing and thank you so much for being here.

Mark Sisson

Thanks for having me, Melanie. What an introduction. I love it. So let's get into it.

Melanie Avalon

Literally, I've been wanting and needing to read your books since I'm having flashbacks now to like, what was it like when they would make us run the mile when you were in elementary school? I honestly think that was my least favorite day of school every single year. It just felt wrong doing it for me, even though ironically, I was one of the fastest students. But in any case, enough about me, you, your background with running. So you used to be a runner. Could you tell listeners a little bit about your background? Also, I am dying to know when was the last time you ran a mile?

Mark Sisson

Well, so, yeah, I was a runner. I was one of those people who gravitated toward running in the late 1960s, early 70s. Not because it was a fad, but because it was the only sport available to me. I was a skinny, scrawny kid, too small for basketball or football or baseball or hockey. I grew up in Maine. I actually wound up jogging to and from school every day for years just as a way to get home before the bus could ever get me there. So it was a form of transportation early on. When I was in high school, as a freshman, I went out for the track team, and I found myself able to win both the mile and the two-mile event in most of the track meets I entered as a result of my lifestyle, which was running to and from school, like some Rift Valley East African story you might hear. Over the years, I developed this ability. I was a runner. I was somebody, one of the very few, it turns out, genetically gifted to be able to handle that amount of mileage in minimalist shoes. Because in those days, in the late 60s and early 70s, there were no cushioned running shoes. They were just Chuck Taylors. And eventually, there was a Japanese shoe called the Onitsuka Tiger, which was a very minimalist shoe. It had a quarter-inch thick sole, and so you felt the ground every time your foot landed. There was no cushioning. There was no, you know, rear foot motion control, mid-foot stabilizers, or any of the stuff that they claimed to be beneficial in today's running shoes. So I was a runner, and I was one of many runners in the 70s who self-selected to be runners. And I turned into a pretty decent marathoner. I finished fifth in the U.S. National Championships in 1980. I went on to compete in the Ironman Triathlon. But eventually, I had to retire because of injuries. I was injured largely as a result of the excess mileage I was doing, largely as a result of the shoes that I was wearing. These cushioned, eventually, I started wearing these big thick cushioned shoes that Nike was developing. Those caused problems. And I got to the point where I could no longer train at an elite level, and I turned my attention to other things in life, like figuring out how everyone could be strong and lean and fit with the least amount of pain and suffering and sacrifice and all of the negative words that we use to describe what we think it takes to become fit. And that's what started me down this path of the Primal Blueprint and Primal Kitchen and writing books, you know, across the sphere of health and wellness. But I was, and to answer your question, I haven't run a mile in 30 years. And it was a recognition that humans are not really born to run, we are born to walk. And so much of my strategy, my anti-aging strategy, my fitness strategy, certainly my health strategy over the past few decades has focused on lots of vigorous, robust walking, some time spent in the gym lifting weights, a little bit of time sprinting once in a while, and I will differentiate the concept of sprinting from regular running.

Mark Sisson

Running is a, you know, we're certainly born to be able to run, Melanie, but we're not born to run metronomically day in and day out at an eight or a nine or a 10 minute per mile pace over a lifetime. The book sort of was born out of this recognition that there are so many frustrated people who took on running because they heard it was the best way to improve cardiovascular health or the best way to live longer or the best way to lose weight. And it's not any of those, it's a horrible way to lose weight. There are 50 different ways, better ways to achieve cardiovascular fitness without the injury tendency that runners get. And there's a hundred different activities that are much more fun. And your experience, which was one of, I think, a very common one, which was, gosh, I think I should be running because people around me are running and there's all sorts of hype surrounding running and how it's supposed to be this great activity. And yet you found yourself kind of second guessing it every time you went out the door. And I, you know, I think a lot of people share this feeling like, okay, I'll do it. If I have to struggle and I have to suffer, I'll do it, but I don't really want to do it. There are things I'd rather do. And I'm here to give everybody permission to walk again. Walking is the quintessential human movement. It's what everybody should be doing as much as possible, as often as possible. Anybody can do it from the least healthy, most pain-ridden person right up into an elite athlete. Everybody can walk and should walk.

Melanie Avalon

I was actually reflecting on walking yesterday because I was flying back from Vegas, so I was sitting for four and a half hours on a plane and then I was in the airport and I was just walking through the terminal and I was like walking feels so good. It was just like this intuitive moment where I was like it is doing so much good for my body right now. So question about our evolution and the genetics and all the things because, and you mentioned this a second ago, but so we do have adaptations for running and you talked about this in the book. So we have like an upright stature ability. We have long limbs, narrow pelvis, slender frame, efficient thermoregulatory potential, lots of other things, powerful glutes, short toes. So clearly evolution takes a long time to happen and presumably you have to be doing a lot for us to evolve certain features. So like you said, we did evolve with the ability to run. Why were we not doing it more than it sounds like we were doing it? And then for people like you who you said you did have this genetic tendency to run. So is there a certain subtype of humans who were running more evolutionarily?

Mark Sisson

Yeah, so that's a great question. So a lot of the hype around running and humans being, quote, born to run, there was a book came out in 2010 by Chris McDougall that posited that humans are born to run and described persistence hunters in the early days of Africa, these early humans who would track a beast for an hour or two hours or three hours and outlast the beast in the heat of the desert and then be able to walk up and stick a spear in them at the end of this long tracking expedition. But bear in mind, number one, those individuals weren't running seven minute miles for three hours. They were walking and hiding and crouching and jogging a little bit and tracking and sprinting and combining all these methods that require a large human brain and opposable thumbs to make the tools to create the spears to be able to do this. So that they could kill a beast and have food for a couple of days. They didn't do this every day. In fact, it was antithetical to life until about a hundred years ago that you would go out and run mileage every single day for no reason whatsoever. These were individual pre-humans and early humans who by virtue of their lifestyle, which comprised walking a lot. But no chairs, no couches, no sofas, no TVs, they walked a lot. And that's what gave them the capacity between the walking and the lifting of heavy things. They carried stones, they carried logs, they built things, they climbed up things to look out and see what was going on. They carried babies, they lugged carcasses back to camp. They were always lifting heavy things and they sprinted once in a while. Now when they sprinted, it was typically a life or death situation. It was like, oh my God, there's something trying to kill me. I better run away. That's so that this combination of lifestyle where there was a lot of low level activity, a lot of walking around like literally minute by minute, day by day, that kept an aerobic capacity. Then lifting heavy things, which was the compliment today is go to the gym and lift weights twice a week and sprinting once in a while, not every day, but once in a while they had to ramp their effort up to 100% of max to continue to live and pass the genes along to the next generation. So the idea that we're persistence hunters has been sort of glorified. And I think the anthropological evidence has been misconstrued to suggest that we are born to run. We're born to walk clearly and we're born to sprint a little bit, but we're born to be able to run, but not run metronomically day in and day out and certainly not given the shape of 75% of this country, which is overweight. Now my own genetic capabilities. So one of the things I say in the book is that probably only five or 2% of the population is even genetically capable of being able to run day in and day out as a form of, quote, recreation, end quote. But until 100 years ago, no one would have chosen to do that. Even the fittest and skinniest humans would not have said, oh, I'm just gonna go run 10 miles for no reason whatsoever because I feel like it's gonna make me healthy.

Mark Sisson

It was the exact opposite. Expending that amount of energy in a world where energy food was scarce was completely antithetical to health and to survival. So this idea that we can use running as a means of raising our heart rate and try to offset the lifestyle that we've created for ourselves, which has a lot of leisure time, a lot of sitting in chairs at desks, sitting on couches, watching TV, doing all these things that we tend to do, I guess it served a purpose in getting people off the couches. But over the past 50 years, what's happened is, and I'll tell you, it's just a really interesting, perfect storm of events that happened to create this running boom in the first place. As I said, in the 1970s, the only people who ran were runners, were people who were, like me, genetically gifted, skinny, ectomorphs, great lungs, a propensity to manage discomfort well, because running is managing discomfort. and they're basically masochists, it was almost always in pursuit of some goal like winning a race. So, up until the mid-70s, the only runners were people who were runners. The only people who ran or trained or jogged were people who were actually trying to race and attract meat or had selected that as their sport. Now, this is where it gets interesting. In the early 70s, Bill Bowerman, who's the coach of the Oregon Track Club and Olympic trials team coach, realizes that many of the skinny American runners who are trying to compete on the world scene are getting injured because the shoes they're wearing are not built for 80 or 90 miles a week of training, and that was what it was determined you needed to do in order to compete on the world scene. So, Bill Bowerman and Phil Knight, who eventually founded Nike, became the CEO of Nike, created a specific, very thick, sold shoe that would allow skinny runners with good form to be able to run more miles in their training so that they could compete on the world circuit. Okay, that's point number one. Point number two is around that time, Bill Bowerman had gone to New Zealand. He had seen that the fit people in New Zealand were doing this thing they were calling jogging. They were going out and running miles for no particular purpose. So, Bowerman wrote a book called Jogging. Then in 1968, Ken Cooper revolutionized the concept of cardiovascular health by writing a book called Aerobics, and the book Aerobics, which has sold, I think, 30 million copies to date, it posited that the more of an activity that you did that raised your heart rate, the better it would be for your heart's strength and the longer you would live. And so, people started thinking, okay, I'm going to start doing this aerobic activity, and the easiest way to do this was running. So now, along comes, now we have the thick shoes, which are enabling people to run and not have their feet tell them that's way too many miles, because these thick cushioned shoes are absorbing some of the shock.

Mark Sisson

We've got books, and eventually Jim Ficks writes a book called The Book of Running, and he popularizes running. And the next thing you know, Frank Shorter wins a gold medal in Munich. Bill Rogers sets an American record in the Boston Marathon, and now everybody's excited about running as this new health pursuit. And remember, the 70s and into the late 70s and early 80s was the me decade. It came after the counterculture of the 60s. It was now the me decade. It's all about me. It's all about trying to self-help and all the things that accompany that. So this cultural zeitgeist pushed everybody into running. But even in the 80s, we still didn't have the rates of obesity and overweight that we do today. So even in the 80s, more people started running. These new shoes came on the scene. They started to allow people to put in more miles. It seemed like a good idea. I was one of them. It seemed like a good idea to me. I was still racing at a high level. But more and more people would started taking up this nascent sport in the interest of losing weight, improving cardiovascular health, some meditative aspects that were discussed. They were all manner of purported health benefits to doing this. And yet, the number of running injuries increased. Why did it increase? Because people were running with bad form, and they were using these cushioned shoes to enable their bad form. When you run barefoot, Melanie, when you run down the sidewalk barefoot, I don't care how untrained you are, how overweight you are, your feet automatically tell your entire kinetic chain exactly how to absorb the shock. And when you're running barefoot, you don't heel strike. If you're running barefoot, you're running with a well-defined midfoot gait and doesn't last very long because you're not trained to do it, but if you were to take shoes off any untrained person, have them run down the sidewalk, they would run with pretty good form, barefoot. Put some shoes on those people and all of a sudden you see the heel striking, the slapping of the pavement, the plotting, the noise and that's where you start to get the injuries. So running, even to this day, now we fast forward to today where we have these thick, thick, thick, cushioned, pillowy running shoes, there's no decrease in the amount of running injuries. 50% of everyone who calls themselves a runner is injured every year. And at any one point in time, 25% of all runners are injured. It's a worse injury record than ENFL. So when we're talking about injuries, we're talking about bone bruises, we're talking about Achilles tendon issues, we're talking about plantar fasciitis, we're talking about chondromalacia of the knees, we're talking about tendonitis throughout the hips. All of these are almost like, I would say almost all if not all, are related to the shoes they're wearing, the bad form and the tendency to overdo it because the mind goes, I'm a runner, I have to get out and do my three miles or my five miles or my six miles.

Mark Sisson

So now we have the spate of injuries. Then we also can talk about running as a weight loss strategy. It's horrible. Most, if you go to a marathon, which is the quintessential bucket list item for a lot of people, and you look at a marathon like Los Angeles or Chicago or Boston, you see 40 or 50,000 people lined up in the starting line, 80% of them are overweight. I got a question for you. If you claim to be a marathoner and you've been training for this 26.2 mile event, why are you overweight? Why are you still overweight? Because the type of training you're undergoing is causing your body to burn mostly sugar and hold on to its fat stores so that when you finish a workout, your brain goes, we have to eat. We don't know how to burn fat. We've gone out and we've trained too hard for the fitness level that we're at. And now the brain says we have to compensate by overeating calories. And so somebody might go out and run seven miles and burn off 750 calories in that workout. But the body and the brain immediately goes, oh, we're gonna make up for that. We're gonna consume 800 calories because if this fool's gonna do it again tomorrow, we have to be ready. So over time, you will see people who have been running for a long time and still have the same 10 or 30 pounds to lose. I mean, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result, right? So those are two examples. I've got many more in the book of all of the reasons that running has a spate of broken promises, unfulfilled expectations, left people feeling guilty because they tried it, they thought they could do it, they didn't have what it took, and they moped away thinking they'd failed when in fact, if they had engaged in a well-thought-out robust walking program, they would have lost the weight, they would have felt better about themselves, their mood would have been elevated, their digestion would have improved, their mental clarity would be better. I mean, all of the things that we sought from a running program and didn't get were always available from a well-thought running program that certainly combined two days a week in the gym lifting weights and a little bit of sprinting.

Melanie Avalon

So in the book you go through the entire history of running like you touched on there and there's also the myth of the of the marathon.

Mark Sisson

Oh, that's a great one. Yeah.

Melanie Avalon

Can you tell listeners a little bit about that?

Mark Sisson

You know, this is the, again, it's the metric a lot of people use. It's the bucket list item. There are people who, you know, have their marathon finisher medals, hanging at their desk at work. They're so proud of the achievement. And they should be it's an amazing achievement. But it was fabricated out of thin air. So the original story, as was told, inappropriately by the industry in the late in the late 70s, early 70s, was that there's this guy Fadipides, and he was a hemorrhodromae, which was a messenger for the army. And when Athens, you know, there was a there was a the battle of Athens had happened in marathon. And he had to run to Sparta to announce, well, the original story was that he, they had this huge battle. And after fighting for three days, he ran to Athens, 25 miles to Athens, and collapsed in the middle of the town square after saying, Rejoice, rejoice, we've won. And so the original story was this guy ran, he fought for three days, he, he ran 25 miles, he collapsed in the square. And, and so that was the, that was the the heroics of the original story of Fadipides. The problem was that was taken from a poem by Robert Browning, who used a tremendous amount of poetic license to describe this hero and create a myth around him. The fact is that this guy ran from the battlefield, 103 miles to ask for assistance, the town that he was at was having a that he ran into to ask for assistance was having some feast and they said, Well, we we can't go we can't we can't help you because we're in the middle of a festival. And we have to, you know, we have to wait three days, and it's going to take us then four days to get there. So he has to take this guy, Fadipides has to take a nap and run all the way back to the battlefield to announce to the generals, yeah, these guys can't show up, they can't, they're not going to help us. So we're on our own. Now, they, they wound up winning the battle, but the guy ran 306 miles in 36 hours. That's the real history of Fadipides. So if you really want to honor this guy, you would you would not be running 26.2 miles, you'd be running 306 miles. But then it gets it gets a little even weirder. So because of the original myth, the original Olympic Games in 1996 Olympic Games in Greece said, we should have a marathon run. And so they had a 26.2 mile, sorry, a 25 mile marathon run. And that was that was the marathon distance, until the Olympics was held in London a few years later, and they wanted the event to finish in front of Windsor Castle. And in order to do that, they had to extend the race to 26.2 miles. So that's how the that's how the distance came to be 26.2 is because a queen wanted to see the finish, not because of the distance from from the planes of marathon to Athens, and not because of anything that this heroic guy Fadipides did. The point being that the entire distance is just a fabrication. It's it's drawn out of thin air, based on a poem by a 19th century poet, who wanted to honor this guy with his poetry. And yet, millions of people every year, pay their 300 bucks to enter this race, beat themselves up horribly.

Mark Sisson

And then, you know, take their finishers medal because they're they think they're honoring this this feat by this one guy. Anyway, this, we have a lot of these stories in the book about how, how the assumptions about what went before us created this running boom, that really ultimately was based on fabrications. And I think, you know, later on, again, that the running shoe industry, marketing these thick, sold, cushioned running shoes as being better for you, may be the worst thing that happened to running because more injuries as a result of these bad shoes, encouraging bad form. So anyway, we're back to walking is the quintessential human movement is the best thing we can do. It's the cornerstone of anybody's longevity program, for sure. I mean, even if you look at my friend, Dan Buettner, who I don't know if you know, Dan, but he's the author of The Blue Zones. Dan's my downstairs neighbor in my building.

Melanie Avalon

Oh really? What a building to live in.

Mark Sisson

Yeah, it's amazing. It's amazing. Yeah, and Dan and I talk, you know, we talk a lot about it. But, you know, we argue over things like meat versus, you know, beans at the as the center piece of the diet. But we certainly agree that walking and outdoor activity is that is this probably the single greatest determinant of people living to 100 years old. So if you're thinking about longevity, walking is a far better choice than running. We have a whole chapter in the book about how really good runners tend to get into cardiovascular problems after decades of running as a result of running too hard, too long, too far, you know, too often and raising their heart rate too much. So running is not even a great longevity strategy for most people. And again, when I talk about most people, I'm saying there are some people like me and even I was on the cusp of being genetically appropriate for running. Most of your elite runners. Look, here's the thing, running is catabolic running tears muscle tissue down. That's why even in the 10,000 years ago, 100,000 years ago, even in the endurance persistence hunting group, they recognize that it was catabolic that it would that it would tear you down and you could only do it once in a while in search of sustenance of food, a protein that would build you back up. So the idea that early humans would go out and, you know, we killed an animal yesterday. Our bellies are full. I know let's go out and run six miles. No, they never would have done that.

Melanie Avalon

It's really crazy hearing that marathon story. It's crazy just as a general theme in life, how many things we do today are based on really arbitrary, like random things. And it just becomes so important. And if we look back to the origin, it's not what we thought. And I just feel like I like learn more about that every day. We just was so many things in life. So yeah, no, that's completely crazy.

Mark Sisson

Well you and I have bumped up against this in the community that we're in right now, in the diet and nutrition community. Go back to the 1980s when fat was the enemy, eating fat made you fat, and that the best possible meal you could eat was boneless, skinless chicken breast. You know, and all of a sudden cut to today when, nah, I need the skin on the chicken because I want the collagen, I need the fat on the meat, I need, you know, it's like but we assumed that fat made you fat and that assumption carried for 20 years even though there was no basis at all in fact on that. So you're right, so many of our cultural norms are based on myths, it's bizarre.

Melanie Avalon

Here's one for you, not related at all to health and wellness, but do you know why we have margins on paper? This blew my mind.

Mark Sisson

to be able to make notes. Not why.

Melanie Avalon

No. So like back in the day, living conditions were so horrible, it was completely normal to just have rats in your house. So rats would like chew at people's paper at night and like take away the words. So they started putting margins on paper so you could allow space for the rats to chew the paper.

Mark Sisson

That's pretty interesting. Isn't that crazy? That's crazy. But it makes total sense, yeah. Now it meant you connect the dots in reverse, right?

Melanie Avalon

You know, I've never looked at paper the same way again. Something else interesting about, just speaking about this evolution of humans, I was really interested to learn in the book that going back to when we were hunter-gatherers and you talk about the Hadza tribe that are still around today, apparently they burn the same amount of energy as like sedentary people do here. And it's because we burn, you talk about this like inflammatory energy that people who are sedentary burn. Yeah, so what's happening with that?

Mark Sisson

Well, there's a couple of things happening with that. Number one, the Hadza spend a lot of their time not doing much, right? Low level activity. When I say not doing much, they're still walking around, but they're resting and sitting and walking. And then they do their persistence hunt, but they don't do the hunt every day, right? So their average energy output isn't that much greater than an athlete training today or a sedentary person today. Meanwhile, and we know this, you and I know this from the intermittent fasting community, from the metabolic flexibility community, that when you eat appropriately, you become more metabolically flexible, you become metabolically efficient, and you don't need as many calories to maintain muscle mass, build muscle mass, never get sick, have all the energy you need all the time, and most importantly, not be hungry. So the converse of that is the people around us who go through life with this idea that I'm gonna see how much food I can eat and not gain weight. What's the most amount of food I can eat and not gain weight? And so people tend to overeat in a way that their bodies respond to in one of two ways. Either they eventually gain weight, or in many cases, the body says, I'm not prepared to store this as fat, but I don't wanna, this is too much energy, and so I'm just gonna rev higher all day long. I'm going to increase the metabolism, whether it's the thermic-effective food, or whether it's just increasing basal metabolic rate to burn off the excess calories that I'm taking in. And so these people can take in 3,500 or 4,000 calories a day, maintain body weight for a while, not be that active. And it's pretty much on the equivalent of what the Hadza would eat in a very otherwise active day. Humans do have sort of a shared baseline set point, but they can manipulate it somewhat with exercise. But what we see with even elite athletes is that there's this compensatory mechanism where, yes, I'm gonna go out and I'm gonna run for two hours, and in those two hours, I'm gonna burn 2,000 extra calories, but then I'm gonna get home, and I'm not gonna do much for the rest of the day. So my body's gonna cut back on its energy expenditure so that at the end of the day, I haven't really burned that many more calories than a sedentary person, which is another reason why this concept of weight loss, running for weight loss, doesn't really work, because, as I said, you go out, you burn the calories, and typically the calories you burn as a non-elite runner, as an avid jogger or a person who just incorporates running into their lifestyle, you go out and you burn calories, but most of them are sugar calories, most of them are glycogen stored in your muscles. And so you get home, and not only do you tend to overcompensate by overeating and consuming carbs, you actually carbolode on a regular basis as a result of that, but then you compensate throughout the rest of the day by doing less.

Mark Sisson

Maybe you choose not to go outside and rake the leaves, or you choose to not walk your dog the mile that you normally walk the dog, but now you walk them down to the mailbox and back. Or your kids say, hey, dad, let's go out and throw the football, and you go, eh, not right now, I gotta rest up for tomorrow's run. So there's all these compensatory mechanisms that, in many cases, they're not even conscious decisions, they're unconscious choices that we find ourselves making that ultimately wind up having us expending really, at the end of the day, no more energy than the average couch potato might expend.

Melanie Avalon

It's so crazy. And I think it really speaks to the power of the input side of things. So what you're eating, which especially I think we see that effect with intermittent fasting, how powerful it is compared to the trying to burn off the calories with exercise and things like that. And also even with like, GLP ones, regardless of the controversy around them, I think they do show one thing they show that people eating less seems to be effective for weight loss.

Mark Sisson

Go figure, right? Yeah, but I think that's the greatest thing I learned from initially from Primal Blueprint and then from Keto and now from Accommodation of Keto and IF is that I don't need that much in the way of energy. Like I surprise myself on how robust I am and how much muscle mass I maintain on 30 or 40% fewer calories than I consumed even as recently as 15 years ago. And it's just a testament to a couple of things. Number one, the quality of food you eat, the quality of the calories, the amount of protein you take in, but also the ability of your body to access stored body fat on a regular basis without skipping a beat, not noticing that you're hungry or hangry. I mean, that's one of the most magical feelings there is, is to not be tethered to hunger, appetite and cravings. It is the best. It is, yeah, it is the best. And I wish I could give that to people. That's the superpower I wish I could give to people because it's so freeing, yeah. And, and, and, so now let's tie that in with walking. So walking is an energy efficient exercise. It is 100% fat burning for almost everybody unless you walk so fast with a weight vest on uphill that you, you know, you start burning glycogen. But anybody who goes out for a walk is burning mostly fat. And in the book, we give a number of metrics on how to determine what your fat max heart rate is. Like what's the heart rate? The maximum heart rate below which you are burning 90% of your calories are coming from your stored body fat. And, and, and in that regard, one of the reasons that walking works so well for people trying to lose weight is whenever you do encounter a hunger episode rather than walk to the refrigerator to grab a snack, go outside and walk 15 minutes and feel your body releasing its adipose tissue and combusting it as fuel. And you will come back from that walk a little bit more energized and less hungry. So it's an amazing hack, if you will, I hate that word but it's amazing hack for, for hunger.

Melanie Avalon

I have a two-part intuition question related to this. So one relates to this and one relates to the shoes, but they're both intuition. So you do talk extensively in the book about this Fat Max concept, and listeners definitely get the book. There's so much information in it that we're not even remotely touching on, but there's a lot of ways to determine your level and measuring it, and there's all these things. And so my question is, because you do say in the book that even you emphasize the importance of really monitoring that number so that you don't go above it in your training, and you say that even going above it like a little bit can undo the benefits you were looking for, I think. I might be paraphrasing a little bit. But so my question is, how intuitive, if we want to embrace this type of movement that will best burn fat, and we are going a little bit faster than walking, because I'm assuming walking will keep us in the okay zone, how intuitive can we be with that? Do we actually really need to monitor everything, or can we be intuitive?

Mark Sisson

Great question. So one example would be, if you're jogging, if you think that you like to run, you want to run, you're defending your right to run, and you want to go out once in a while and run, and you want to stay within that fat max fat burning zone, one way to do it is to go with a friend and carry on a conversation. And as long as you can carry on a conversation, you're probably at or below fat max. Once you are huffing and puffing and unable to carry on a conversation, that's an indication that your oxygen consumption has increased, and now you're into burning glycogen and getting away from the fat burning zone. Now, I don't want to tell people that you've completely negated all of the benefits of a workout. What I'm saying is it compromises that training effort at staying in the fat burning zone. It doesn't negate, it doesn't destroy it doesn't oh my god, I screwed up and now I have to go back to square one. No, it's just the more time you can spend at that in a particular workout staying at or below that fat max heart rate, chalk that whole workout up, or that long walk or whatever it is to okay, today I just worked on fat burning, then when you go do your high intensity stuff, which I do recommend, then you can go all out. And you'll that now that's the time where you can really like hit it hard and nail it. The problem with almost every runner and I was one of the worst. And if we first talked about this in primal endurance, I don't know if you read that book, Melanie, but that came out a bunch of years ago, a while ago, like when it came out. And the problem is that people wind up training in what we call the black hole of training or the no man's land, where their heart rate is is too high to be promoting aerobic capacity, capillary perfusion, fat mobilization and fat burning too high for that, but too low to be really focusing on VO two max and power and strength and speed. So all you're doing is practicing hurting. And so, and it just makes me want to cry. Because I see these people who are out there huffing and puffing every single day. And they never get better. They never improve. And you'd say, well, you know, at some point, you stop improving. Well, look, if you're, if you're that slower runner, two things are going on. Number one, you better improve. Because theoretically, you're doing this because you want to get better at your life, you want to run faster times in your 10 k's, your marathons. And if your whole life is based around, well, I do, and I hear this a lot, I do six marathons a year, I'm like, okay, that's interesting. You know, what, what's your personal best? Well, I've run 345, 344, 342, 346. And my thought process is, first of all, I was a career runner, I ran 100 miles a week for seven years, I've never run that long in my life, I never spent that much time running in my life. So God bless you for hurting that much. And number two, if you're not getting better, something isn't working in your program, why would you go repeat, no offense, a bad performance over and over again, just what to collect more hardware? I mean, it just doesn't make any sense.

Mark Sisson

And in the meantime, you're getting injured, injured, you're courting injury, you're not losing the the body fat you wanted to lose. In fact, what happens with a lot of these types of runners is they, they shift their body mass from they decrease their, their muscle mass, and they increase their fat, even though their weight stays the same, they become what we call skinny fat. Running is catabolic running tears you up. There's no question about it. So every workout you do running, running tears you up. Yeah. Now you go to the gym and you can build some of that weight back. But walking is anabolic walking is at the very least anti catabolic walking does not tear you down, it builds you up. So you'll even see the best bodybuilders in the world who are very careful about not losing a single bit of muscle like this, they work so hard to put their muscle on. They'll walk after a workout to burn fat, they won't run. No way they won't run, but they will walk after workout because they know that it's not catabolic. It is, it's at the very least anabolic at the very least it's preserving muscle tissue while they're burning fat.

Melanie Avalon

And to that point of people putting themselves into this seemingly unnecessary suffering, we do know there's this endorphin high and you talk about the different neurotransmitters in the book and it reminds me of the work of, I don't know if you know Dr. Loretta Bruning, but she's done a lot of work and I've had her on the show a few times about the different neurotransmitters and why we have them and like, but basically their beneficial role like serotonin and dopamine oxytocin. She doesn't even talk about endorphins in her books because she emphasizes that the point of them is they're in a response to like pain and a problem. So they're not something we should be like seeking to increase.

Mark Sisson

So, you know, how did we animals in general evolve endorphin? Well it's probably to maintain a calm, peaceful attitude in the face of death or in the face of a life or death moment. So you know, you've tracked a beast through the heat of the desert all day for three and a half hours and you failed to kill the beast, endorphins. Rather than lie down and wallow and die, the endorphins give you a little bit of sense of hope, a little bit of peace and calm, like okay, you know, try again tomorrow. Endorphins are released when, I hate to say it, but you see these nature shows where the lion is eating the zebra while the zebra is still alive, endorphins. That's what endorphins are keeping the zebra from, you know, eventually the zebra says, alright, it's over, I'm going to die a peaceful death, endorphins. So the seeking of these endorphins is a, again, a false promise. It's like trying to recreate, chasing the high as they say, right? So the first couple of times it's like, oh my God, it felt so good after the run and eventually you chase that high and the next thing you know is I was chasing the high and I got injured because I, I mean this is, this is, I didn't talk about it in the book, but this is what happened to me at the end of my running career. I was so high on endorphins. I had five days in a row in 1980 when I ran 20 miles each day and each day I ran 20 miles faster than a previous day and I was so in the zone and so high and I wasn't recognizing that I was in a life or death situation and I wound up getting injured to the point I got hip tendonitis that never, it didn't resolve until probably 30 years later and that was the end of my, my, my elite running career. Now, when I say elite running career, I could, I could still run really well as a human being, but I couldn't participate at a world-class level anymore and I couldn't train that hard because of what I'd done to myself and part of it was a result of the, not just the endorphins, but it was the injury that I got from the shoes that were, here's a story for you. I'll take a side step here and say, when I first got my thick cushioned running shoes, they felt great. I ran a lot in them and I got severe chondromalacia, severe knee pains and I sat my senior year of college out cross-country season, walked around campus with a cane until I got orthotics. I was a miracle cure with orthotics, okay, so I get these orthotics and now the orthotics are raising my arches up enough that the overpronation that I was experiencing from the shoes without the arches, that was prevented and so I ran for a few more years with orthotics until my hip gave out because what had happened was the cushioning and the lack of proprioception and input to the bottom of my feet,

Mark Sisson

the initial problem went all the way up to my knees. I fixed that by putting a wedge in my shoes and then when I wedge my shoes and it bypassed my knees, it went up to the hip and this is what we see and this is part of the, one of the chapters has to do with footwear and why we get injured and why modern running footwear is so bad for people and it's definitely, and it's even bad for people who are walking and we'll talk about that. Your foot needs to feel the ground, it needs, the foot needs to sense the texture and the tilt of the ground underneath in order to inform the brain of exactly how to orchestrate the kinetic chain from the bottoms of the feet to the point where the brain now says, okay, here's how much we scrunch the arch around that rock or here's how much we bend the toes over that stick we're walking on. Here's how much we roll the ankle out a little bit to take pressure off the knees from having to bend sideways. Here's how much we bend the knee and it's normal, Sagittario plane forward and back. Here's how much we rotate the hip to absorb the shock. Here's how deep we bend the knee in order to absorb the shock of this jump. All of this information comes from bare feet, from these perfectly formed organs that we have at the end of our legs, these feet that are our main contact with the universe. They're our main contact with the ground, with the universe and our feet want to feel everything underneath in order to orchestrate this perfect kinetic chain. You put thick cushioned stiff sole shoes that enclose the feet and scrunch the big toe against all the other toes instead of allowing it to splay outward which is what it really wants to do and the next thing you know you you you bypass all that important information and the brain has to guess okay I guess I bend the knee sideways I don't know I guess I you know tilt the hip a little bit to absorb the shock but without that important sensory information people get injured you know an injury it's an injury is your body's way of saying you're doing it wrong so if 50% of runners get injured every year they're doing it wrong something's happening but that they're doing it wrong and I'm here to say nobody gets injured walking like unless you're you know hiking on a on a rocky path and you slip on a whatever but but generally walking nobody gets injured in fact when you're injured running how do you recover from your running injury you walk

Melanie Avalon

I'm having a flashback now, and I will say, the section in the book about the shoes, I don't even, okay, I don't like wearing shoes, I don't ever wear now, I don't ever wear running type shoes. I don't like my foot to feel constricted, so I mostly wear sandals, so we can talk about that. But I'm having flashbacks to high school or college, and I wore these shoes, I think they were Skechers, and they were called Tone Ups, and they were supposed to like make you, they're unstable I think, so they're supposed to make your muscles better, but they actually really hurt my knees. I was getting flashbacks to that.

Mark Sisson

example of of a marketing hype that now here's how those came about this is really interesting so in the early 2000s there was a movement toward minimalist footwear I was an early adopter of minimalist footwear I was the original one of the original guys wearing the five toed shoes the Vibram five fingers I had 20 pair of them in my closet I had different colors and different styles I wore them everywhere to my wife's chagrin weddings and funerals you name it I was this is what I wore a lot of people were like-minded a book came out that year called born to run and that's where I got my title born to walk because I'm trying to refute what Chris McDougal wrote in born to run he's a great author and he's a great storyteller and much of what he writes about the book is accurate and one of the things he writes about is that modern footwear modern shoes are too thick and they are causing runners injuries so a lot of people went to to buy minimalist footwear there were several companies startup companies in the 2008 910 era and minimalist shoes were all of a sudden really big and people read his book and they they said wow I'm a good runner I'll go out and run seven miles my first run in these thin thin thin flat flexible shoes well people got injured they got injured at alarming rates because they've been spending decades running in thick cushioned shoes with their toes and feet atrophied and all of the work being done from their ankles up and now they put on these minimalist shoes expecting their arches to work in a way without any arch support that they've never done before expecting their toes to work in a way they hadn't really worked out and so people got injured and so there was a there was a point here where there was a backlash against minimalist footwear and people said well you know it's just it seems like it's not working well it didn't work because it wasn't sold appropriately should have been sold okay walking these shoes a lot if you're gonna run in them run a quarter mile the first day a half a mile the next time you run but do not under any circumstances go out and run hard in these until you have spent a year training your feet what happened was there was a backlash against the minimalist shoe movement and because footwear is such a huge industry a number of people said oh here's our chance if minimalist footwear doesn't work we're gonna make maximalist footwear and that's where MBT Maasai basic training shoes came in that's where Hoka got started that's where you know Nike and New Balance and Adidas and they all started making thick thick thick cushioned running shoes as as literally a knee-jerk reaction to the minimalist footwear movement having been inappropriately sold at the wrong time so Skechers comes along and they say okay if the concept of the minimalist footwear movement was legit which was we want to work your feet more we want the muscles of your feet to be working more and so we're gonna put them in a thin shoe with lots of room for the toes to move around and that'll strengthen your feet Skechers said what if we put your feet on a Bosu ball and now we don't now you're working the muscles of your feet but you're working them in a different way so it was a interesting idea but the execution was horrible and like you said so many people got lower back pains they got because again you remove all of the haptic sensory input to the bottoms of feet now you really remove it now it's really thick and rocker and now the shoe is forcing you to walk in a certain way and your brain has to guess like okay how much you know how much do I roll my ankle or how much do I have to bend my knee sideways to absorb the shock of this or or my lower back is is is hurting because my stabilizer muscles are overworking because I've scrunched my big toe against the other the other toes in the shoe and I've disengaged my big toe from my glute let's take a sidebar here Melanie let's talk about the big toe or what we call the great toe and the glute bodybuilders have recognized this for a long time there's a direct connection between activating fully activating the glutes and having your big toe be able to abduct to pull itself away from your feet So in the gym,

Mark Sisson

they will say, the saying goes, great toe, great ass. And what that means is, that's why you see bodybuilders and weight lifters and really serious people about lifting, taking their shoes off on days they do deadlifts and squats and lunges and things like that, because they want to engage, they want the big toe to splay outwardly in order to fully engage the glute. They want to build the glute, the glute's one of the largest, strongest muscles in the body. You want to engage it. And if you're wearing shoes when you do this activity and you're compressing the big toe against the other toes, squeezing it against the other toes in a shoe or even in a tight sock for that matter, you are not able to fully engage the glute. And then what happens is, when you do the work, when you do the heavy work of a squat or a deadlift even or any of these other lower body focused movements, when you do that, you disengage the big toe from the glute. And now the stabilizer muscles near around the glute have to take on some of the work. And that's where you start injuries there and you start to get problems. So the big toe needs to splay outwardly. It needs to be able to what we call abduct. Abduct is taking it away from the body. Adduct, ADD, is pushing it into the body. Toes need to, they want to splay outward. They should splay outward. So barefoot is always the best way to go. But in the absence of barefoot, having a five-toed minimalist shoe is the second best choice.

Melanie Avalon

Speaking of the shoes and constricting the toe, that was another completely, I think, arbitrary thing. You talk in the book about the narrow shoes going back to peasant times and being rich or not.

Mark Sisson

Yes. So in the days of old where there were caste systems and there were peasants and there were nobility, peasants wore wide toed shoes. They wore wide toes because they were out in the fields working. They needed their feet to do work. The foot was critical to any movement they did, whether you're plowing a field, mowing a field, gathering wood, chopping trees, whatever it was, you need a wide base to initiate whatever action it is. Meanwhile, the nobility wore thin, tight, pointy shoes for no other reason than a fashion statement to tell the world that they were nobility, that they didn't have to work, that they were not peasants. And that's kind of how this, I mean, you go back to the Ming Dynasty and they were binding feet. I mean, you've probably seen some of the horrible photographs of women's feet who were bound from birth and wind up looking like pointy triangles with no toes at all. That's the worst and highest iteration of binding feet together. But shoes do that. Bunions. People come to me all the time, oh my gosh, Mark, I'd love to wear your shoes, but I have bunions. And I'm like, well, okay, I have a lot of people who wear my shoes whose bunions no longer bother them, like at all. They've regained function in their feet. One of those people is my daughter-in-law who at 19 had bunion surgery on one of her feet, didn't have it on the other one. And now she's the marketing director for Palluva and she's kicking herself forever having had bunion surgery because her other non-surgical foot is completely fixed. So bunions, and people will say, well, but Mark, you know, bunions are, they're genetic. They run in my family.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, that's what I was going to ask.

Mark Sisson

bad fashion choices run in your family or good fashion choices depending on if you get wearing Jimmy Choo's or Manolo's. But bunions are a result of bad footwear. Everybody is born with perfect feet. I don't care what they look like. I don't care if they're flat or whatever. Everybody's born with a perfect foot and a perfect kinetic chain, birth defects notwithstanding. And this perfect kinetic chain works for you. So you may say, well, I have flat arches, I have duck feet, I have knock knees, I have wide hips. I don't care. As long as your feet can sense the ground underneath you, your brain knows exactly how to orchestrate your kinetic chain to absorb shock and impact trauma and ground forces perfectly every time you walk. But it has to have access to that information without having that input from the bottoms of the feet to tell what you're walking on, whether it's cobblestones or dirt or grass or a rocky trail or sticks, whatever, the brain has to have that information in order to inform your particular kinetic chain how much to scrunch the arch, how much to bend the toes, how to roll the ankle, how deeply to bend the knees, how much to rotate the hip. All of these things, they work perfectly. And you look at babies, babies have perfect feet, right? They're almost V-shaped, right? You look at the bottom of the heels, the bottom of the V, and then they go outward. Like, oh my God, they're so cute and they're so perfect. Well, we put them in cute little Mary Janes or cute little Nikes. And the next thing you know, kids have foot problems and have shoe problems. Well, bunions as a result of a lifetime and not even that much time. I mean, when my daughter-in-law had her first bunion surgery, she was 19. She already had bad bunions at the age of 19 from footwear, not from genetics. You know, you'll get a genetic predisposition. We talk about this in the intermittent fasting world a lot, right? You have a predisposition to storing some amount of body fat, maybe a little bit more than other people. So you have to be cognizant of that. But in general, your body works the same way everyone else's body works. And so in terms of intermittent fasting, it'll work for you. It might not shed, it may not get you down to, you know, 4% body fat like it would someone else. But it'll definitely work for you if you tweak the knobs right. Same with footwear. If you are able to encourage good foot health, good foot form, resilience, strength, realignment at an early age, your feet will serve you for a lifetime. And when we talk about feet serving you for a lifetime, one of the reasons people die, and this is a typical scenario, you know, somebody is 80 years old, they get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom and they trip over the cat, and they fall and break your hip. And that's the beginning of a cascade of bad events, right? They go to the hospital, they get pneumonia, and they die. All of these things happened initially, because maybe the foot wasn't strong enough to withstand, to catch yourself from tripping.

Mark Sisson

And maybe your balance was off because you hadn't done enough footwork in terms of the realm of balance to be able to even maintain good balance. Maybe you hadn't done enough outside work, footwork, walking, and lifting weights, so your bone density was compromised because you didn't do that work. And there your bones, which would not have otherwise broken in that fall, now were so brittle because of lack of activity, that you broke the hip when you fell. It's this chain of events that starts with the feet. And my message, you know, my new mantra, my new mission is to change the way the world looks at foot health as being critical to overall health.

Melanie Avalon

I'm so glad. I was going to ask you about the slipping and falling. So I'm so glad we touched on that. I'm just so happy right now, Mark. OK, for a few reasons. One, the bunions thing, my dad had surgery for it. My grandmother had surgery. I was always told it was genetic. So I was like, am I just waiting? Like, is it going to pop up in my feet? So that's good to hear. And then two, just to touch back on the tone up Skechers thing. One of my favorite things about having like podcasting and having this show is when I have an epiphany from something that I was wondering, you know, like decades ago forever. And and then like I'm who would have thought like two decades later, I'd be talking about toneups right now. And now I understand why I was experiencing that. Another another shoe question. So the reason I was coming back from Vegas was I was hosting on the red carpet. Actually, no, last night, no night before. Wait, was it last night? Oh, biohack yourself. Yeah, yeah. Were you there at a forum? No. OK, it was fun. But I was I was hosting on the red carpet and all the things. And we were there all day. And we were talking about shoes and when to put our heels on. And I was making a comment that I I actually love heels. I either want to be barefoot or wearing high heels, but are high heels horrible?

Mark Sisson

You're horrible, but Melanie, don't stop wearing them. They look fabulous.

Melanie Avalon

That's what Brad said.

Mark Sisson

He was like, they look fabulous. But yeah, they're the worst thing for your feet. So you earn the right to wear them if you spend a lot of time with either going barefoot or wearing toe spacers or going barefoot, walking around with toe spacers, or even better, getting yourself a pair of peluvas and walking around in those. Because the difference, you talked a little bit about sandals. Do you wear the thong kind with the division between the big toe and the second toe? Yes. Okay, see, those are not great. So yeah, those are not helping you at all. You're better off going barefoot. What you want is, because what happens is you sort of have to scrunch your toes a little bit to keep them on under certain circumstances. You know, they're not, I mean, they're better than, if they're wide enough, they're better than wearing, you know, regular restrictive shoes. Let me ask you a question. Did you see Ben Greenfield there?

Melanie Avalon

I so funny thing is he's coming on the show soon. We've had so many email exchanges. Yes. I met him for the first time in person

Mark Sisson

Was he wearing, was he wearing a paloubas?

Melanie Avalon

I didn't look at his feet. I wish we had done this conversation before. I would have been, like, staring.

Mark Sisson

He's so on board, he's so on board with Palouis. And I heard he was wearing him at the premier, but.

Melanie Avalon

He probably was.

Mark Sisson

Yeah, because we have, you know, great looking leather lace up Napa leather lace ups that look just like stylish shoes, you might find at Wolf and Shepherd or something like that. Because we recognize pretty early on that once you understand not just the importance of toe freedom and and relaxing and realigning your strength at your feet, but once you get the feeling the comfort of this, you will not want to wear other shoes again, high heels accepted. But actually, a lot of women who are who are wearing Palooas now are shying away from even wearing high heels because they just they recognize that the comfort, the discomfort of the high heels is so great that they're not willing to put themselves through that. So keep that in mind.

Melanie Avalon

Are any of the palubas, and this actually kind of expands on the flip-flop question, so you guys sent me a pair and it is enclosed. Are they all enclosed shoes?

Mark Sisson

Yeah. Do you know which ones we sent you? I'd have to check. And what do you think? What's your first impression?

Melanie Avalon

I don't normally put my feet except for heels into enclosed spaces. So it was a completely, it feels completely different.

Mark Sisson

Yeah, it's a novel experience for I get it. It's like, no, it's the difference between a mitten, a mitten and a glove.

Melanie Avalon

Yeah, I was like, this is a new, this is a new experience.

Mark Sisson

Yeah, these are gloves for your feet. These are gloves for your feet. So they take a little bit of getting used to for some people. Some people take to them immediately and go, oh my god, this is the best thing I've ever done. Other people say, they feel a little weird. And then, you know, two days later, like, okay, I need to buy another pair because, you know, I needed another color and another style. So I think one of our sales objectives is to have people give them a day or two trial and, you know, before you say, it just still doesn't feel right. Or whatever. Because, you know, most people are okay with gloves, right? I mean, most people would would put on gloves and say, yeah, I like gloves. Maybe even better than mittens for some certainly for some activities. Anyway, I'm just riffing here. We have a lot of styles and a lot of different uses for them, too. We've got we just introduced a trail shoe. I've got a lot of off-road UTMB racing guys who are training in the shoe and loving it because normal racing shoes of that type are too thick and they can't feel the trail. They can't feel the rocks they're stepping on. And so they tend to twist an ankle, partly because their shoes are too stiff and they haven't spent the time strengthening their ankle and partly because they can't feel what's going on underneath. So when they train with the peluevus, they feel what's going on underneath. And now when the ankle rolls, it rolls just enough, but also the knee bends just a little bit more to offset the forces. And it's a great training tool for somebody who's doing that sort of thing. We tell people, you know, don't run in pelueus. Wear your running shoes when you go run, but train. Spend your day walking around in peluevus. Go to the gym in peluevus. Work. Spend the day working in peluevus if you're having to wear shoes at work. And then when it's time to do your sport, put on your basketball shoes or put on your hockey skates or whatever it is you're putting on. And your feet will be stronger, more resilient, and they will thank you for having done that.

Melanie Avalon

No, I am so excited because I think so the order of my experience with the Paluvas and your book is you guys sent me the Paluvas because when did you launch the company?

Mark Sisson

Oh, it's been a year and a half.

Melanie Avalon

Okay, so I think it was around the time you launched. It was a while ago. And I hadn't read this book yet. I didn't have any of this education. And like I said, I don't even normally wear, like I pretty much just wear sandals and high heels. So I didn't understand, I did not understand until I read your book and talking to you now and all the things, I'm just like, wow. Anytime it's applicable to my life, I need to be wearing these. And there are so many people in my life who just need these, like this could change the world.

Mark Sisson

No, I think you change the world. And now these are walking shoes. And, and, you know, again, I was the it's not a coincidence that I wrote the book born to walk on the heels pun intended of the shoe company because I'm so adamant about people walking but I'm adamant about them people about people walking well, walking with good form. Now I will share with you today is day 14 of a total hip replacement for me. I had my hip replaced 14 days ago. I am I'm going to say 95% recovered. I thought it was going to take six weeks or eight weeks. I am 95% recovered two weeks into this. I did 40 minutes on the elliptical last night. I did yesterday morning. I did three miles uphill on a treadmill. I'm wearing the peluvus. Now here's the important part of this. You know, I had a traumatic surgery, right? If they cut my the side of my hip open, they yanked my hip bone out, sawed the end of it off, put a medical metal L piece on it, reamed out my hip socket, put a ceramic cup in there, stuck it back together and sewed me back up. The next day I was I walked about a half a mile a day later. I walked about a half a mile in peluvus in downtown Vail, Colorado. The next day I walked a mile in peluvus and I've been I've been increasing my output. But the important thing is with the peluvus, I am able to execute a perfect gate almost immediately because I'm waiting the heel and then rolling off the big toe. We talked earlier about this big toe abduction, this ability of the big toe to splay outwardly. A perfect gate really requires that you roll off the big toe. And I'm I guaranteed my quick recovery. And I'm going to I've already talked to my doctors about this is is in part due to the fact that my walk is not compromised by a restrictive shoe that is squishing my big toe against the other toes and causing me to over pronate and roll sideways off the shoe. As happens in so many cases, you know, when you you angle your foot outward 15 degrees and then you kind of when you walk through it, you roll off the front instead of pushing off directly off the big toe. So I'm I'm really thrilled about and by the way, when I when I wrote to my surgeon and I said, I think we're going to revolutionize THA, which is total hip arthro arthroplasty. He said, Why stop there? Why not? Why not knees and ankles and everything else? And I'm like, You're right. Exactly. So I think I think we're really I know we're really on to something here. I mean, we, you know, we already have tens of thousands, many tens of thousands of customers who are extremely satisfied, who buy multiple pairs, whose lives have changed, who are. And in your case, Melanie, if you like to walk outside, that's the best use of palovas for you. And I have, I live in a building in South Florida, I told you Dan Buettner lives in my building, but there's a lot of sort of accomplished individuals that live in my building.

Mark Sisson

My wife has probably 15 friends that are between the age of 60 and 70. Many of them walk six to eight miles a day. All of them are walking in palovas. And all of them at this point would not have another shoe to walk in because the the ground feel the the engagement of the full leg engagement, not just a glute, but every muscle up the leg as a result of this ground feel as a result of this toe splay as a result of this minimalist notion of the of the footwear. The ability to articulate toes. I mean, we walk on cobblestones here and we call it foot candy. It's like it's it feels so cool to walk in cobblestones and and have it be put a put a smile on your face. You know, when you walk outside and you've had shoes on all day and you take your shoes off and you walk in grass and you can't not smile, right? Like you step in grass and all of a sudden the world is wonderful, right? If you're barefoot, that's sort of the feeling we wanted to recreate with with palovas. We wanted to get this sense of when I'm walking, I want to experience the universe. I don't want to necessarily. I mean, I sometimes I'll listen to a podcast, but most of the time when I'm walking, I'm experiencing the wind on my face, the sounds around me, conversations going back and forth, smiling at people as they walk by. This is this is real world, real time, real life experience. You know, all we have in this life is now. Yesterday didn't really exist. It happened, but I only remember it. And tomorrow's not here yet. All we have is now. And so the more amount of time you can spend sensing the moment and appreciating the moment as a result of your tactile communication with Earth, I think the better off you'll be and the happier you'll be.

Melanie Avalon

This is so incredible. I have decided I am giving these to everybody for holidays. Yeah, this is absolutely incredible. And I just I found the one that you guys sent me and now I just lost it. It was the the women's it's one that came in all pink. Oh, the women's strand trainer. Yes. Wow. Okay. So quick question about when people so people order palubas for themselves, a few quick questions about practically implementing these and a clarification question about the intuition. So, so if people were in palubas, do they have to worry about concentrating at all on their walking form? Or is this going to make them intuitively walk correctly?

Mark Sisson

I think that's it. I think you intuitively walk better. Think about your walking form. And if you've had, if your form has been compromised by years of wearing bad shoes and your feet are deformed, take it easy. Obviously, you know, walk around the house a little bit the first day, keep them on for an hour, see what you think, notice how your feet feel. In many cases, what we tell people is if your feet slide right into your pelubas, you want these shoes. If your feet don't slide right into these pelubas, you need these shoes. So many people's feet are deformed from years of wearing narrow restrictive shoes or from the bunions or from, you know, loss of communication with their feet. I mean, sometimes it takes people 10 minutes to get their pelubas on the first time to get each toe into the appropriate socket. That's an example of complete loss of toe awareness. Like you've like the fact that you can't tell me that your toes are in each individual socket tells me you've lost communication with this most important, one of the most important organs in your body that is your main connection with the universe. So many people have tiny small toes, right? Their little toe, their pinky toe looks like a vestigial organ that's going to shrivel up and fall off. It's been so, it's been so relegated to being squished against the next toe. No, you want to, you want to articulate that you want to, you want to separate it, you want to get it out there. I mean, there's a reason that 20 million pairs of toe separators have been sold in the last couple of years, the toe spacers. I think women in general know that their feet are messed up. And so lots of women take their shoes off at the end of the day, they put on their toe spacers, they watch Netflix, you know, for two hours, and then they go to sleep. Well, that's a great start. But I'm saying what if you lived during the daytime, you walked and you ran errands and you dropped the kids off at school and you went to work or whatever you do, you did the laundry, you did your, and the whole time you're wearing either barefoot or you're wearing pelubas. So every step you take, you are reinforcing this positive realignment and strengthening and increasing the mobility and the resilience of your foot passively. Like you're not running, you're not doing specific exercises. You're just living your life, walking around a lot in pelubas or barefoot. Like I said, I'd rather people go barefoot, but it's just, if you're outside, it's just impractical. You know, so much of our environment is hardwood, floors, marble floors, tile floors, pavement, concrete, things like that. We designed the pelubas to be, to give you the sensation of walking barefoot on a putting green when you're walking on a sidewalk, right? So it's not as squishy squishy at all, but it's also not thin, thin, thin.

Mark Sisson

So you feel everything and you're calling upon your metatarsal head and your fat pads to absorb all the shock. No, just a tiny bit of, just enough protection and cushion so that you could walk. And this was my, by the way, this was my litmus test so that I could walk 10 to 12 miles a day in Europe on concrete with these shoes on and feel better as a result of having done it. Not get bone bruises, not, because the old shoes, the old five-toed shoes, the ones that I originally talked about that I wore, I couldn't walk two or three miles without getting bone bruises and then really having my feet suffer. So that was one of the first things I did when I reinvented, redesigned this concept from the ground up.

Melanie Avalon

Oh my goodness. Okay, that explains a lot. So the first time I put it on, yeah, I had issues like getting my toes in and I thought I needed a bigger size. So I did get a bigger size. I don't know if it was both things happening there. Like I need a bigger size and I've lost intuition of my toes and my little toes gonna fall off.

Mark Sisson

Don't let that happen.

Melanie Avalon

Okay. Oh my goodness. And what about socks? Do people wear socks with these?

Mark Sisson

Absolutely we make socks we make a different size of socks and different we have a no show sock for people who don't want to have people see their socks we make an ankle sock and crew sock. They're all five toed of course you can't wear regular socks with these. That wasn't your problem no no okay yeah yeah but but having said that i don't i don't wear socks at all and so i made we made the shoes we made the shoes for people like me who don't wear socks prefer not to wear socks so all of the shoes are. available to be worn without socks it's just that some people insist on wearing socks and and you know, sometimes we have these try on events where people we will bring. You know, a full kit of every size that people are gonna try on the shoes and then see if they like them, but if multiple people are going to try on the same shoe we we bring socks for everybody to try on that's just a sanitary thing but. You know, some people absolutely want socks when I was in veil it was zero degrees when I was rehabbing my hip day one I had socks I wore socks underneath regular shoe and walking through. The little town of veil on the cobblestones in zero degree temperature was fantastic it felt great they gave me crutches they told me you're going to need these crutches for a week at least i'm like don't tell anybody I throw them away after the first day i'm like nope. Don't need crutches sorry this is not happening just further evidence to me of how critical the big toe is and toe splay and toe articulation is to orchestrating a good walking gate and then once you have that the more you walk the more you reinforce. That upright stature that good posture that good mood that you know everything coming full circle back to the concept of walking born to walk, we are born to walk and I want people to walk as much as they can with good form with good footwear and you know extract the greatest amount of contentment enjoyment fulfillment and pleasure out of life as possible.

Melanie Avalon

Well, I am so excited right now. I think my game plan, now I'm looking at your shoes and you have so many more since when I first ordered. So you had this one at the time, but I think what I'm gonna get is the Miami casual loafer for women's for the day, like when I'm outside. And then you have a slip on. What does it mean that the heel goes down?

Mark Sisson

Yeah, you can either put the, you can, I have two of them, I'm wearing one of them right now. I just had to drop a package off down at the front desk in my building. And I didn't want to go down barefoot, I would, but it's, you know, not allowed, it's inappropriate here. So I jammed into my, my zen, these are my zen slip-ons zen, zen, they're quilted. And they have a flexible back. So you can either pull the back up and keep them cinched and on. Or you can, it's a collapsible back, you could just step on it as if they're, I don't know what the, what the other term is, like more like a sandal. Like you don't, you don't have any, any back support or anything around it, but it goes both ways. And when I was, this is the shoe I wore in Aspen, when I, in Aspen, in Vale, when I was, I'm going to Aspen next week, when I was in Vale, when it was cold. And because I, I just come out of surgery, I mean, I couldn't really bend over to tie my shoes or to, or to cinch my shoes on, but I could step into them and step on the collapsed heel and walk around town with the collapsed heel and socks on, it was, it was great.

Melanie Avalon

Oh my goodness. This is my shoe. Okay. I'm excited. I'm so excited.

Mark Sisson

Yeah, so I want you to keep me posted because you're someone I need to have, understand the concept, embrace it, love it, and promote it. Because I think you get, not just the science, but you get the sociology behind it, the anthropology behind it, and it's concurrent with an intermittent fasting-type lifestyle.

Melanie Avalon

I'm just so grateful and so excited because literally, I was thinking about this like today with your book. I'm like, nobody's talking about this. Like I know there are other companies making like minimalist shoes and things like that, but like this book that you have, this education, it's absolutely mind blowing and then people can, well, A, read the book and make lifestyle changes, but then you have a practical solution where it's not like we're gonna have to, like we just talked about, people can just start wearing palubas and it's gonna really like help change things. It's ironic because you're talking in the book about one of the problems with running being the low barrier to entry. So anybody can do it, but we shouldn't be doing it. And it's a lot of problems. This is low barrier to entry in the best way.

Mark Sisson

Absolutely. We had a team meeting today. In that meeting, I reinforced to my team that we are an education company that sells shoes.

Melanie Avalon

I love it. Well, listeners are probably dying to get a pair for themselves and for their whole family like I want to do now. So you're so kind. Listeners can go to paluba.com. That's P-E-L-U-V-A.com and use the code IAPODCAST to get a discount on your order. So definitely take advantage of that. That's the code IAPODCAST at paluba.com. Oh, by the way, where does the name come from?

Mark Sisson

Oh, so, you know, I've been very adamant about the word primal. I have 20 trademarks. Primal Kitchen, Primal Blueprint, Primal Health Coach Institute, Primal Fuel, Primal Fitness, boom, boom, boom, all down the line. I went to get primal footwear and somebody had carved out the word primal and there was no other iteration. So we had to make a word up. So we looked through all of the languages and come to find out, and I have no affinity for Portuguese, but in Portuguese, PE is foot and luva is glove and you put them together and it's pe luva.

Melanie Avalon

That's amazing!

Mark Sisson

And it sounds cool, doesn't it, I mean, you got to admit it's a great it's kind of a luxury sounding name and we really like it.

Melanie Avalon

Well, you did a good job because a lot of times like made up words or vague words, they're hard to remember. Like ever since I learned about it from Brad, originally, I've never like, I've never like had to scratch my mind to like remember what it's called. Well, thank you so much, Mark. I appreciate your time so much. I was sad. I heard that you were at the, uh, eudaimonia conference briefly. I was there too, but I did not see you.

Mark Sisson

No, I just I came down. I literally drove drove up from Miami Beach for the afternoon to just check it out. We were thinking about maybe exhibiting there next year. So I wanted to get just sort of the layout.

Melanie Avalon

I'm definitely gonna go next year. So hopefully I will see you there. And thank you again so much. Literally, you're like one of my favorite people. You're honestly one of the reasons I'm doing what I'm doing today. I've been following your work since forever. Like the early blog days. And I just can't express enough gratitude for everything that you do. So thank you.

Mark Sisson

It's my pleasure and thank you so much for that acknowledgement. That's really important to me to hear that people took the message and are, you know, the term paying it forward doesn't do it justice, but I appreciate the fact that you do what you do.

Melanie Avalon

Well, thank you so much. Enjoy the rest of your day. Enjoy Aspen, and I will talk to you soon. All right. Thanks, Melanie. 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.

Dec 23

Episode 401: Vanessa’s Last Episode, Special AMA, Have Our Thoughts On IF Changed, Does Protein Become Glucose, Keto Vs High Carb, Accurately Measuring Protein, Protein For Vegetarians, Helping Teens With Weight Loss, Red Light Therapy Protocols, Vanessa’s New Book, And More!