Episode 338: (PSMF) Protein Sparing Modified Fast, Fasting For Fat Loss, HGC Injections, Ozempic, Lectins, Inflammation, Chronic Pain, And More!
Welcome to Episode 338 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.
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Listener Q&A: Jakie - What are your thoughts on Protein Sparing Modified fast (PSMF)?
Listener Q&A: Tara - What do you guys think of lectins?
FOOD SENSE GUIDE: Get Melanie's App To Tackle Your Food Sensitivities! Food Sense Includes A Searchable Catalogue of 300+ Foods, Revealing Their Gluten, FODMAP, Lectin, histamine, Amine, glutamate, oxalate, salicylate, sulfite, and thiol Status. Food Sense Also Includes Compound Overviews, reactions To Look For, lists of foods high and low in them, the ability to create your own personal lists, And More!
Antinutrients: Lectins, goitrogens, phytates and oxalates, friends or foe?
The Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast Episode #104 - Sally Norton (Oxalates)
Our content does not constitute an attempt to practice medicine and does not establish a doctor-patient relationship. Please consult a qualified healthcare provider for medical advice and answers to personal health questions.
TRANSCRIPT
Melanie Avalon: Welcome to Episode 338 of The Intermittent Fasting Podcast. If you want to burn fat, gain energy, and enhance your health by changing when you eat not what you eat, with no calorie counting, then this show is for you. I'm Melanie Avalon, biohacker, author of What When Wine and creator of the supplement line AvalonX. I'm here with my cohost, Vanessa Spina, sports nutrition specialist, author of Keto Essentials, and creator of the Tone breath ketone analyzer and Tone LUX red light therapy panels. For more on us, check out ifpodcast.com, melanieavalon.com, and ketogenicgirl.com. Please remember, the thoughts and opinions on this show do not constitute medical advice or treatment. To be featured on the show, email us your questions to questions@ifpodcast.com. We would love to hear from you. So, pour yourself a mug of black coffee, a cup of tea, or even a glass of wine if it's that time and get ready for The Intermittent Fasting Podcast.
Hi, everybody, and welcome. This is episode number 338 of the Intermittent Fasting podcast. I'm Melanie Avalon, I'm here with Vanessa Spina.
Vanessa Spina: Hello, everyone.
Melanie Avalon: How are you today, Vanessa?
Vanessa Spina: I'm doing fantastic. How are you?
Melanie Avalon: I'm good. I have two book comments I would like to share. One, I finally started reading Peter Attia's book Outlive. Have you read it?
Vanessa Spina: I haven't, but my husband's cousin was just here and she just finished reading it and she was saying she really liked it.
Melanie Avalon: I'm really enjoying it. It is very long. I'm reading it right now on Kindle. I actually just ordered it physically, just to see visually how long it is because it's one of those books where I'm really enjoying reading it. I read every night while eating my one-meal-a-day for hours. I'll read it for what feels like a really long time, and then I look down, I like to read and not look at how much progress I've made, and then look down and see how much progress I've made. Do you use Kindle where it's like you've read 1%, 2%, 3%?
Vanessa Spina: I do and it's hard for me. I much prefer to hold, like, an actual book, and I recently ordered one because I heard that it's really good for reading in bed, which I'm doing a lot more of now that I have Luca. But yeah, I much prefer the physical sensation of holding the book and turning the pages and even the smell of the books I love. But I think the Kindle is interesting as well. And yeah, I guess you have to glance down at the percentage to see where you are.
Melanie Avalon: I read on my phone and the Kindle app. I do also really love physical books as well though, just to comment on that. But I will read for what seems like half an hour, and then I'll look down it's like hasn't moved. I'll still be like [laughs] 10% and then I'll be like, "Okay, now it's going to be 15%." And then it's still 10%, so I'm actually really surprised the editors didn't cut it down a little bit. But I'm excited because the chapter I started last night is all about the discovery of rapamycin. The chapter of the title is Chapter 5, Eat Less, Live Longer? And then The Science of Hunger and Health.
Vanessa Spina: So, my favorite interviews of all time of Dr. Peter Attia's are the ones that he did on rapamycin, and I have all of them saved and bookmarked. And I think it was last summer, I was going for long walks, and I would listen over and over to them. And there was-- so obviously he had David Sinclair on, but then he had this other scientist I can't remember his name right now, who worked in the same lab as David Sinclair and was also working on some really interesting discoveries. And they were talking about a lot of the differences in the rodent studies between NMN and NAD. And they're some of my favorite episodes, and I just listen to them over and over again. So, it sounds like [chuckles] I really need to read this book.
Melanie Avalon: I think you like it. It feels very personal. He weaves a lot of his personal story and life into it, so it's very narrative driven while also being about the science.
Vanessa Spina: I think you were saying that to me that you were surprised, like, how much of himself he included in the book.
Melanie Avalon: Yeah. I think that was probably when I listened to an interview he did where he was talking about that and he was talking about how he shares, like, a really personal story at the end that I'm excited to get to. But, yeah, he definitely really does. And so how do I interview this man is the question. [laughs] I'm taking so many notes. Someday, Peter, I promise I will not waste your time, I promise. I only need like 30 minutes, I promise. So, I actually have a document in my Evernote app, and it's titled Peter Attia. And every time I hear him say something that makes me think of a question, I want to ask him, I write it in there. So, I have this ongoing list that I've had for months and months and months of things I want to ask him that are very random and very specific, so someday.
Vanessa Spina: One day, you will land it.
Melanie Avalon: I know. The other book, okay, so this is a moment, Vanessa, where my mouth literally dropped open when I read this. And I am not going to say the name of the book or the authors because I don't want to say negative things about them, and I am going to be interviewing them. However, I would like to hear your thoughts about this concept. Are you ready?
Vanessa Spina: Yes.
Melanie Avalon: They're having a chapter on mental health and wellness and how it relates to physical health and wellness. And they said that today we live in a society where we think our happiness is in things and we need more things. And we have a scarcity mindset, not a mindset of abundance and how problematic that is, which I am, like, agree with so much, so much. So, they said-- And the next sentence, they said that an analogy of this mindset where we feel like we need to have more things to feel complete and feel whole and feel happy also happens with food because we have a scarcity mindset surrounding protein and that we think we need more protein and everybody's worried about not getting enough protein, but really that's a scarcity mindset and we need to realize we have plenty of protein already.
Vanessa Spina: [laughs] Has he or she heard of the nine essential amino acids that the body cannot synthesize?
Melanie Avalon: I think so. I think they think we get that enough, that this protein fear is yeah, that it's like a fear-based scarcity mindset thing.
Vanessa Spina: Okay. Yeah, I mean, the protein wars, like the diet wars and stuff, I just find it so yawn, [chuckles] I'm just so over it. Because what's interesting to me is-- obviously my podcast is called Optimal Protein podcast, and I focus on optimal protein intake. For me, that means not too little, not too much, optimal. And I think that the levels of protein that I talk about, that you talk about, that a lot of guests that I have on my show who are protein scientists and actual experts on protein talk about, they appear high in relation to what we have been taught is like the recommended daily amount. But most people don't know that those recommendations are based on outdated wartime rationing. So, wartime rationing is something that's put in place because you're literally in a state of scarcity because you're at war. And so, we're trying to figure out what's the minimum amount that we can get away with getting into our population for them to avoid disease and death. So, we're obviously not in that kind of scenario anymore, at least in most of the world, in Western world, we're not in a dire wartime situation.
So, the fact that we're still treating those minimal recommendations as the actual recommendations that should be considered optimal are the problem. So then when you look at an optimal protein intake, it seems like it's very high compared to that extremely low bar. When we're not actually talking about very high numbers, we're just talking about numbers that are perceived to be high because of that extremely low amount that we're still using for some reason, even though so many scientists have written letters showing, like, this is the research. This is actually how much nitrogen we need to avoid sarcopenic obesity, and it's way higher. But in relation to that low number, it seems like people always think, like, "Oh, this is a high-protein diet," and I have to use the word high-protein sometimes to distinguish it from the low-protein levels. But if everyone was using a better bar as where we should be at, then it wouldn't actually seem high if that makes sense.
Melanie Avalon: That's crazy. It's so interesting how the foundation of these ideas and how hard and long it is to change them, once something becomes ingrained, it just is.
Vanessa Spina: That's so true. And I really think that if you look at the state of our metabolic health, like, as a nation, and I'm considering all of North America, part of that definitely parts of Europe as well, and even Asia now is starting to deal with these metabolic crises. When you have research showing 88% of the population is not metabolically healthy, that's a problem. And I think that a big, big, big part of it is the protein question. It's one of the reasons I'm so passionate about it is like because of concepts like protein leverage, which explain why people are overeating because they're suppressing the protein intake that they need, and that once you prioritize protein and you get the protein that your body physiologically needs, then you don't overeat energy calories. And I really think it's a huge part of solving obesity, metabolic syndrome, sarcopenic obesity, epidemic that we're facing, and there's not really enough alarm raised about it. So many people are dealing with the complications and the downstream repercussions of having poor metabolic health, and it's killing a lot of people. And yet we don't really look at it as a crisis. Some of us do, but in general, we kind of minimize food and nutrition and lifestyle, and we also dismiss the connection between nutrition, lifestyle, and our metabolic health and our overall health.
Melanie Avalon: I agree so much. It's kind of like we're saying last show. I think if everybody wore a CGM for two weeks, [laughter] go to nutrisense.io/ifpodcast with the code IFPODCAST to get $30 off, and focused on protein and ate just like real food, it would revolutionize everything.
Vanessa Spina: Yes.
Melanie Avalon: [sigh] Someday, someday.
Vanessa Spina: That's an interesting book.
Melanie Avalon: What was fascinating to me was I was, like, nodding my head. I was like, "Yes." Like, mindset of abundance, no scarcity mindset. And then they were like, "Protein." I was like, "Whoa." [laughs] I was not expecting that twist ending.
Vanessa Spina: Yeah. It's really funny sometimes too, when you're reading a book about health and nutrition and suddenly there's all these politics coming into it, and you're like, for me, I'm like, "Why is this in here? Why does it have to permeate everything? Why does everything have to be politicized?" Okay, as an author, you may have certain views, but can we exist in a space that's outside of politics and just talk about certain things without politicizing them? Sometimes that'll just hit you out of left field and you're like, "Whoa," [laughs] that was a comment to drop. It kind of took me back. But yeah, that's really funny and unexpected.
Melanie Avalon: So that'll be a fun interview. I probably will bring it up.
Vanessa Spina: Knowing you, you'll challenge them and yeah, bring the questions we all want to hear. [laughs]
Melanie Avalon: Nicely, though.
Vanessa Spina: Yes, of course.
Melanie Avalon: Always nicely. Anything new with you before we jump in?
Vanessa Spina: Anything new? I guess it's like we're kind of winding things down with summer. We just had our family visiting here for two weeks, which is absolutely amazing. All of Luca's little cousins were here, and we just spent two weeks just enjoying really hot weather here, taking all the kids to the pool. And there's this amazing pool here. It's actually on the riverbank and it's like this huge zone for kids and it's all just like these shallow pools with waterfalls and these slides that are waterfalls, and there're fountains everywhere, which are, like, my favorite thing. And I was like, "I feel like I'm in Vegas right now." [laughs] It was just so nice, so relaxing, a huge highlight. And went to so many restaurants while they were here, which is fun because we don't usually do a ton of eating out. Like, maybe we'll eat out once a week, usually, we cook most of our meals at home. So, it's kind of fun though, like, when friends or people are visiting or family and you go and try new places. So, we found this incredible new restaurant, a couple of them, actually, that we had never tried before.
And there're so many amazing restaurants in Prague. But, yeah, we found two that one specialized in duck, which is like a big food here. And it was, like, incredible. It was mind blowing. I actually haven't stopped thinking about it since were there on the weekend and I really want to go back. And then we found this incredible brunch place, which is also near the river, so we had a really good time. Luca had so much fun with all his little cousins. So, yeah, we're kind of winding things down, but just had a really wonderful visit. And we have some upcoming travel, which I'm excited about. We're going back to Greece in a couple weeks, back to our favorite spot there, and it'll be kind of like a babymoon, but with Luca, like our last family trip, the three of us, just the three of us. So, it'll be special.
Melanie Avalon: A babymoon? Is that a phrase?
Vanessa Spina: Yeah, babymoon usually means, like, when you go as a couple on a holiday before your baby comes, because it's your last time to be just the two of you. But this time, it's like the last time to be just the three of us on a holiday together. And as excited as we are to welcome another baby, there's just something also that's been so special and magical about the last two years [unintelligible 00:15:42] just the three of us. So, we just kind of want to celebrate that too. And I love being there at the beach and getting up and going down to the beach with Luca for sunrise, it's like the best, the best. [chuckles] Just like being on the beach with him as the sun is coming up and it's like those moments in life that you just live for. So those are the things I'm excited about.
Vanessa Spina: What about you?
Melanie Avalon: I did have a really fun time going to another escape room with my family. Have you done escape rooms?
Vanessa Spina: So, I haven't. Pete took some of our nieces when they were here, and there's like a really funny story [laughs] from it. But yeah, they kind of freaked me out. The thought of them kind of freaked me out.
Melanie Avalon: The doors aren't actually locked.
Vanessa Spina: Okay.
Melanie Avalon: I mean, at least where we go, you can just walk out if you want. Kind of like that happened once my mom was not about it and she just left the room.
Vanessa Spina: [laughter] That sounds like something I would do. I'd be like, "Yeah, no." [laughs]
Melanie Avalon: When she did that there was this one moment where they can see you and there's like a microphone and they can talk to you if they want. And something happened and we felt like were getting a sign from the microphone. And I remember somebody, I think my sister was like, "Oh, it's mom. She's like, watching. She's like, giving us the sign." And were like, "Yeah, she's watching." And then we walked out at the end. She was not watching. She was like, "Not about it." [laughter] I'm going to send you the picture. It's on Instagram. It's hysterical. We're all like, smiling. We're like laughing. And then my mom is like, "Not," that was the Egyptian themed one. I always dress up, so that was Egyptian themed.
Vanessa Spina: Oh, that sounds amazing. Actually, I'm obsessed with Egyptian stuffs. That would be amazing.
Melanie Avalon: So, you and I could have dressed up. I dressed up like Cleopatra.
Vanessa Spina: That was my Halloween costume one year.
Melanie Avalon: Oh, I even bought the wig. But then I was like, "No, I'm just going to be blonde."
Vanessa Spina: That's awesome. I love Egyptian culture. That's so cool.
Melanie Avalon: Oh, my goodness. The one we just did was saloon themed. My mom did not attend this time. [laughter] I dressed up like a saloon girl. Everybody sort of had like, hats or something, but my brother didn't. So, he was just "in character the whole time." [Vanessa laughs] And it was like the funniest thing, he was so funny, [laughs] and it was our first time not getting out, which was very sad. I've done like five of them and we did not escape.
Vanessa Spina: Oh, no.
Melanie Avalon: I know, I know. It's okay though, next time.
Vanessa Spina: That sounds fun though to do with your family.
Melanie Avalon: It was really, I highly recommend escape rooms as an activity for people. And here in Atlanta, at least, there're so many different ones. So, I also highly recommend if you can find one, if you are a fan of drinking. The one we go to, they let us drink, so it just adds even more fun. So yeah, and then I also went to a fashion show, so that was fun.
Vanessa Spina: Ooh, that sounds really fun.
Melanie Avalon: I want to go to more fashion shows, I decided. But on that note oh, and I will just do one quick plug. Listeners, get on my email list for my EMF-blocking product line because that should be coming out soon. And that will be at melanieavalon.com/emfemaillist, we're launching with air tubes.
Vanessa Spina: So exciting.
Melanie Avalon: Shall we jump into some questions?
Vanessa Spina: Yes, that sounds great.
Melanie Avalon: Okay. So, to start things off, we have a question from Jackie. She actually has two questions, so let's do her first one first, which is, "What are your thoughts on protein-sparing modified fast, which is PSMF, is it the best diet for fast and healthy weight loss?"
Vanessa Spina: So, I've talked about protein-sparing modified fast a lot, really focused in on them, interviewed some experts on them on my podcast. And so, this is kind of what I tend to my overall thoughts on them are in terms of looking at the research and sort of comparing them to other approaches. So, in the obesity research, protein-sparing modified fast have been proven to be extremely effective for people, especially who are morbidly obese. They tend to be recommended, actually, for people who are preparing to go into major surgery, like even weight loss surgery, in order to help them lose weight before the surgery. And that's a situation where they're doing a protein-sparing modified fast every single day of the week, and it's for a period of time and they're being monitored by a physician. And the standard approach with it is usually for people to be consuming around 650 to 800 calories, and it's mostly lean protein.
And the benefit of it is that you are really cutting out the energy macros as much as possible, but you're still providing your body with enough protein so that you protect your lean body mass. So, I would say that when you compare it, for example, to a water fast, which some people do for weight loss, for fat loss, a protein-sparing modified fast, in my opinion, is a dominant alternative to water fasting because you're protecting your lean body mass and you could stand to lose some lean body mass and muscle tissue if you're just doing water fasting. I don't like fasting in general, water fasting for fat loss. I like it for autophagy, cellular rejuvenation, immunity reset, doing that, say, one, two, three, four times a year. But I don't like it when I see people doing it for protracted periods of time in order to get down to a certain weight because I think that you do compromise some lean body mass, especially if you're over the age of 40 it's really not recommended because it's much harder to retain and gain lean body mass because your hormone levels start to go down even after the age of 30.
So, I think it depends what you're comparing it to. Now, what I have seen be effective for people and an approach that I personally like and have done myself and recommended actually to clients that I've worked with, is doing one, two, or three days a week of a protein-sparing modified fast. So, you have like, for example, if you were doing caloric restriction where you're cutting your calories by about 25%, you could do that by cutting 25% of your calories every single day or you could do it by sort of eating healthy like four days out of the week and then three days out of the week or two days out of the week you do a protein-sparing modified fast day. And so, on those days you just eat one or two meals of mostly lean protein. People approach it differently, some people have like a little bit of fat with it, a little bit of carb. I think you're not supposed to go over 30 grams of fat typically and mostly be eating lean protein, but you don't want to go under 30 grams of fat and it's actually hard to do that unless you're doing like just whey protein isolate or something because most proteins have a little bit of fat in them. So, I have seen that be effective for people who are stuck in a stall, especially if they are just wanting to do it for like two to three weeks.
I wouldn't say it's necessarily like the best diet for fast and healthy weight loss because I personally think that if someone's losing more than two pounds a week, some of that is lean body mass. So, you really want to protect your lean body mass, especially when you're doing fat loss. And that's when high-protein diets really, really shine is whenever you're doing any kind of fat loss or weight loss protocol. And I think that the average person can probably do a couple of days a week with it if they want to break a stall, but don't do it for too long of a time. And if you are in the situation where you're obese or morbidly obese and you want to approach it every single day, I think it's a better alternative to water fasting. But you should be working with a doctor usually who can help supervise or has some experience with protein-sparing modified fasting. What are your thoughts on protein-sparing modified fasting?
Melanie Avalon: Yeah. I have really similar thoughts. And for listeners who aren't familiar, I mean there are quite a few Facebook groups like PSMF Facebook groups and they're like a place. They are a place.
Vanessa Spina: Really? I had no idea.
Melanie Avalon: Oh, yes. Oh, yes. There're, like, two really big ones because I was always really fascinated with PSMF for the reasons that Jackie said and things you touched on like this idea of basically being similar to fasting in regards to the potential for the weight loss and the metabolic effects, but also providing enough protein to hopefully at least maintain your muscle. Even though, I know you were talking about there is the potential for muscle loss there, but the Facebook groups that people are in, it's like all these recipes. I mean there's like the recipe rabbit hole of PSMF is a lot. I think Maria Emmerich, even has a book of recipes for PSMF, I believe.
Vanessa Spina: She does. And they also recommend it two to three days a week.
Melanie Avalon: Okay. She does, okay. Although the drama in those groups, it's interesting because there's a few, like I said, a few groups with a lot of people, and they don't like Maria's approach. And I'm not quite sure why? but that's like a whole thing. But in any case, to get to the actual question and my personal thoughts, I do think-- I remember I think Gary Taubes talks about this in one of his books. I think in the newer book that he released. He talks about how they-- I don't want to get it wrong. I think there was like, a situation where they were doing some sort of experiment and they just so happened to use PSMF as they weren't doing it to test PSMF. They were using it as like a control or a comparison or something. The effects they found were incredible as far as, like, weight loss and the maintenance of muscle. I do think as far as the question about fast and healthy, if your goal-- so people like-- and this kind of ties into her next question as well.
People often want to lose weight really fast. And I see this all the times, and they want to do PSMF or they want to do what her next question about, which is hCG, which actually, maybe I'll go ahead and read her next question because I'll tie it all into this. Because her next question is, "What are your thoughts on hCG? Could it be the fastest, healthiest way to lose weight?" So, people are always looking for this magic bullet to be the fastest, healthiest way to lose weight and they'll try things like these things. I do think they're very effective. So, I actually do think [chuckles] well, hCG I'll talk about, but for PSMF, I do think say you're on a crunch, you have a wedding, you really want to lean out, and you have like, two weeks. PSMF might work for you. And you'll probably see benefits. And studies have shown that because often we're taught or there's this idea that you need to approach weight loss slow and steady. So, you need to just make a tiny change and cut out like a little bit of calories every day and then you'll lose the weight. People get a little bit fatigued by the thought of chronic dieting for a long time, which is why I just love intermittent fasting, which is a whole another option and solution entirely.
There's been really interesting studies that have shown that doing a, "extreme diet" for a short amount of time can actually be very effective because people can stick to it short term and they're motivated and that can be easier for people. And again, it depends on your mindset and how you approach things. But that for some people, can be easier than the longer, slower approach. So, I'm actually all fine with a smart approach that's PSMF inclusive for a short-term goal. It's not meant to be for life. People are in these PSMF groups and they're there for years and it's like I don't think you should-- it's like the purpose of this was not to be here for years. So, all of that to say, I do think it's great because it supports, because it is high protein, it is severely calorie restricted, you will get the weight loss. I don't think it's a long-term solution. And I think for most people, assuming you don't have like a two-week goal for something, I would just jump into intermittent fasting.
And actually, I was just having an email conversation yesterday with somebody who was going to do hCG and she was saying that she was going to do intermittent-- She wanted to do hCG now and she's like on the yo-yo dieting train that she's been on for years. And then she was saying that she's interested in intermittent fasting and she's going to bring that in for maintenance after she loses the weight. And my initial thought is, I just want to say or you could just do intermittent fasting now. That could be the path to weight loss and the path to maintenance. And you don't have to include this really intense thing in the beginning just because I think when people find the fasting window that works for them, that can work so, so well. And then we don't have the issues with the potential muscle loss because you can't get adequate protein. Another option to consider, you could do kind of a hybrid PSMF approach. This is what I would do back when I played around with PSMF, which was I would basically eat PSMF foods, but I wouldn't restrict the calories. It also worked really well. Then I didn't feel restricted at all and I did it in an intermittent fasting pattern.
So basically, what I did was I would say I'm doing this PSMF for like two weeks. I would do like a one-meal-a-day situation still, but I would only eat PSMF foods. So, it's basically like just lean protein and I wouldn't calorie count. And I found that to be really effective, I got to have tons of protein and then I also still had the severe calorie restriction from it and the protective mechanisms of the fasted period. Because with normal PSMF, you are eating still like two or three meals. So, I think there is something protective to entering into a full-blown fasted state that's a little bit controversial, but those are my thoughts on that. And then with the hCG, I definitely went down that rabbit hole in college. I did the drops. Have you ever done hCG?
Vanessa Spina: No. I've only heard really bad things about it, like that it really tanks people's metabolism because it's like 500 calories a day. I'm not sure what the macros are like, but I've heard that people really can dig themselves into pretty deep holes metabolically because then the metabolism slows so much that it's really hard to not regain weight after. But that's about all that I know of it.
Melanie Avalon: Yeah. What's interesting about it, so you can't even get it anymore now? It's been I mean, you probably can, but it got cracked down on I think it's banned now, technically. I know there was some change that happened with it. It's human-- what does it stand for?
Vanessa Spina: I think it's like human gonadotropin. Like it's a hormone that you get when you're pregnant.
Melanie Avalon: Yes, human chorionic gonadotropin hormone and it's produced during pregnancy. And the theory behind it is that it tells your body that it's pregnant. That's like what it's telling the body. So, when you go into this severe calorie restriction mode, the body's, like, must protect the baby and willingly burns fat rather than entering, "starvation mode." That's the theory. I went down the rabbit hole back in the day looking for clinical studies on it and there aren't really, I couldn't barely find anything. I think I found like a few there's not good literature to back it up, is the point. I think what it boils down to, because you said you didn't know the macros. The interesting thing is a lot, it does end up sort of resembling protein-sparing modified fast because the recommendations are basically very similar to that as far as like lean protein. So, I think it works because it's such a severe calorie restriction. I would not put it in the healthy category and I'd be really concerned about it, especially with the effect on people's hormones, like you were saying.
I think it definitely maybe the hormone is doing something. I think it also has-- even if the hormone is doing something, it probably also has the placebo effect, which can be a real thing. But because you're taking these drops or doing these injections, it has like a physical thing that you're doing with it that really, I think, makes people stick to it more and feel like it's doing something which could be having an effect just from their mind. I do remember when I tried it in college because I was on the fence as to whether those drops were even real or could do anything. But what was interesting was I started taking the drops and it actually changed my cycle. And I was like, "Oh," it came early or something. And I was like, "Oh, maybe I guess there is something hormonal probably going on in here." But yes, I do not [unintelligible 00:33:30] suggest going the hCG route. Any other comments about it?
Vanessa Spina: Yeah. I definitely don't think-- I'd have to look at the macros, it would be interesting if it was really similar to protein-sparing modified fast like it was mostly lean protein. But the injection thing is kind of creepy. [laughs] And I'm sure there are a lot of listeners who've tried it like you do and I don't mean any offense by it. I just mean the concept of it is a little bit strange. I think anytime people are injecting things in their body like people are doing with Ozempic now, it's a little bit scary. There're a lot of physicians out there who think it's great, it's a great tool. And then now they're finding all these people have major issues with their digestion because it basically paralyzes your stomach. So, they found all these people who've been taking these kinds of semaglutide drugs like Ozempic, and there's a couple other names, their stomachs were paralyzed, so they had just all this food in their stomach.
Melanie Avalon: That's literally my worst fear and I'm not kidding when I say that, that's what I'm in therapy for is like-- [laughs]
Vanessa Spina: When I started reading about some of them, yeah, I was like physically ill from reading what was happening. And of course, it's going to have bad side effects like that. It's not affecting everyone who's taking it, but shortcuts are always going to come at some kind of cost. It's never free. It's like, yeah, you could just stop eating for a year. Like that one guy did, he was morbidly obese. So, most of his weight that was lost was fat because he was like almost 400 pounds. But I think people who take shortcuts will inevitably have to pay in some way. And one of the worst things you can do, I think, is really downregulate or slow down your metabolism because weight loss, people forget, is like two parts. It's like the fat loss period and then the maintenance period. So, successful weight loss is both sides to it, it's like losing it and then keeping it off. So, if you lose it and then you regain it and your body composition is worse because you've lost fat and muscle and now you've just gained fat back, you're better off never even doing that in the first place. So, I'm very wary of things that are like a gimmick.
So again, no offense to anyone who's done it in the past, I'm not sure what your results were. Most of the people I hear from are unhappy with their results over time from doing it and the after effects on their metabolic rate. So, if you're comparing, for example, protein-sparing modified fast with hCG, I would definitely opt for the first for the protein-sparing modified fast. If it needs to be doctor supervised, like, if you're doing it every day or if you're doing it, like, two, three days a week and then eating at maintenance calories the other days, then you're going to offset that, slowdown in the metabolic rate in a couple of ways because you're going to maintain lean mass and you're also not going to be doing that extreme caloric deficit every single day, which can slow your metabolic rate down.
Melanie Avalon: Yeah, like I said, I love just having not for me right now, but for people if they're doing a daily intermittent fasting lifestyle, already having a few, "PSMF days," where the approach I did, like I said, was I didn't actually count the calories. I just ate PSMF foods that day. So, it's basically a day of just lean protein. And I think that integrated into an otherwise intermittent fasting pattern where you are having more nutrition and the macros, those days of just protein, you can support the muscle, the protein is very thermogenic, and you can drop some weight. I like that approach. That's probably what I would do if I wanted to speed up the weight loss with intermittent fasting.
Vanessa Spina: I've totally done the exact same thing. And I would just do that lean protein approach but without worrying too much about how much lean protein I'm getting and knowing that having a little bit of salad or greens with it is very low calorie and just mostly keeping the fat to a minimum but not necessarily counting it. The other thing too is you get this 20% to 30% thermogenic effect from the protein. So, it's a huge amount of those calories is actually being burned off. So even if you go above, they say I think certain people advocate, like, no more than 800 calories in the day of lean protein. But if you go above that, there's so much research showing people who eat more protein lose more fat, and it's because you have that amazing thermogenic effect. So, I actually prefer that approach. And it's something that I've done myself when I wanted to cut a little bit of fat without having to count up all the protein grams and really worry too much about it. But just focus on, like, I'm just going to eat lean proteins and avoid fat [chuckles] and have some carbs with it if needed, some low glycemic carbs. Yeah, I've done the exact same thing.
Melanie Avalon: We literally were doing the same thing.
Vanessa Spina: Yeah. Way less stressful than being like, "Did I get over 800 calories?" because it's self-regulating. You'll only be able to eat so much lean protein before you're just like you're done.
Melanie Avalon: I found that when I would do that in a one-meal-a-day pattern, it worked really well because then you really could eat all this really satiating lean protein in a really big meal and not count the calories. And you probably won't even go that much over 800 anyways, even if you went crazy. If it's literally just the lean protein. And then, like we just said It's very supportive of the metabolism that big, huge protein bolus, so. Shall we go on to our next question?
Vanessa Spina: Yes. So, Tara from Facebook asked, "What do you guys think of lectins for yourself and then for others?
Melanie Avalon: Okay, lectins. So, lectins became quite popular with Dr. Steven Gundry with his book, The Plant Paradox. I've had him on the Melanie Avalon Biohacking Podcast twice, I think. Have you had him on your show?
Vanessa Spina: Yes. And I remember one of our conversations, I think it was last summer, and we're talking about how we both initially had this impression that he was maybe a little gimmicky, but then we met him and were like, "This person is gem of a human [laughs] and we both really like him."
Melanie Avalon: He is the definition of-- because he comes off as-- just because of all the-- like, The Plant Paradox, The Longevity Paradox, and don't eat the lectins. And he has a massive press and image and he blew my expectations out of the water. He's very kind, very smart and I had really great conversations with him.
Vanessa Spina: Same.
Melanie Avalon: So, love that. So, he did really popularize this idea of lectins. And so, lectins, they are one of the many types of antinutrients naturally found in plants. They are part of the plant's natural defense mechanism and they preferentially bind to carbohydrates or like carbohydrate-type substrates. Although this is what's interesting, people think they're just some plants, they're in everything. So, animals make lectins, plants make lectins, bacteria make lectins, fungi make lectins. When you eat animal products, you actually are eating lectins, which kind of goes in the face of this idea that lectins are straight up bad. And so, like I said, the way they work is that they bind to this complex carbon, actually they're hydrocarbon complex structures. And the theory is that they and this has been shown in vitro in a lab situation, they can make red blood cells agglutinate, so basically like stick together. And so, there's this idea that when we take in plant lectins that they might be having a negative effect, like clumping up our blood and creating health issues. And then they also are very resistant to digestive enzymes, so they can interact with our intestinal cells and potentially increase gut the permeability. And so that has been shown in vitro.
So, like putting lectins on intestinal cells can create intestinal permeability. That's been shown. What's interesting about all of this is that most of these studies are just in vitro, like I said, and then a lot of them are animals. There aren't really like a lot of human in vivo. So human studies looking at lectins and finding super intense negative effects. So, some things to keep in mind if you cook your food certain ways, it can dramatically reduce lectins. So, for example, one study found oh, where are they primarily found? So, they are in all plants. They're all in all plants. Oh, you can get-- and I do think they can be a problem for people. And you can get my app Food Sense Guide, which is a comprehensive catalog of over 300 foods for 11 different compounds that might be problems for people and it does include lectins. So, you can look up a food. So, for example, Vanessa, pick a food.
Vanessa Spina: Umm. Like any food, [laughs] red bell peppers.
Melanie Avalon: So, it is for lectins, it's high. It's like, in the red. And I have a curiosity so, like, for other things, its low FODMAP, low gluten, low thiols, low oxalate, low sulfites, medium for glutamates, medium high for amines and histamine, and then high for lectins and salicylates. It is not AIP friendly, and it is a nightshade. That's what you can learn from my app, Food Sense Guide, which you can get at melanieavalon.com/foodsenseguide on the Apple Store.
Vanessa Spina: Such an amazing app.
Melanie Avalon: Well, thank you. I really loved creating it. And friends, you might want to get it now, like, get it now because I want to update it substantially, like, make it the app I always wanted it to be. And when I do that, I'm probably going to switch it to subscription, but I'm going to do some sort of-- for people who already have it, I'm going to grandfather them in to some extent. So definitely get it now is my point, because it's not very expensive, and it's in the Apple Store, and it's often in the top 10 for Apple food & drinks, which is just crazy to me. And I don't say that to brag, I say that because that just blows my mind. Like, it just blows my mind.
Vanessa Spina: That is so cool and huge.
Melanie Avalon: Thank you. Okay. So like right now, for example, it's number 23 in the food & drinks charts. It plays around in the charts, which is precious. It feels like my little baby. So, in any case, back to lectins. So, I clearly do think they can be an issue for people. Oh, and you can learn about the compounds in the app as well. But cooking can substantially reduce lectins. One study found that boiling pulses for 1 hour at 95 degrees Celsius actually reduced the-- so they don't say the lectins, but they say the hemagglutinating activity. So basically, what the lectins are doing between 94% to 100% from boiling, the plant types they're most high in typically are nuts, cereals, and seeds. Another study found that germination and fermentation can reduce lectins and cooking in general. And it makes sense that there's a reason we cook our food. We like to think it's because it makes it taste really good, which it does, but a lot of it has to do with reducing these problematic plant compounds. So, all of that is to say, so as for Dr. Gundry, he says that in his work, because he's a doctor and he's worked with a lot of people, and he really believes that the lectins are the source of a lot of issues for people as far as, like, health conditions, autoimmune conditions, people who can't lose weight. So, he puts people on these. What's interesting is it's kind of positive as like a lectin-free diet. But like I just said, "Lectins are in everything."
The reason, I think his approach, because his approach works for a lot of people, his plant paradox approach. And he does have very easy to read guides to foods to eat and not to eat in his books. And I do recommend that if that's of interest to you. The reason I think it's probably working is because when you go onto his plan, it's sneakily switching you into eating whole foods and cutting out processed foods. And it's also removing a lot of foods that I think are often inflammatory for people. Maybe it's the lectins, but maybe it's other things in those foods. So, I think just naturally, his diet works really well for a lot of people. So, the lectins could be involved. They probably are involved to some extent. I don't know that they are the be all end all reason that his diet works so well for a lot of people. I'll put a link in the show notes to a study that was really good about this.
It's called Antinutrients: Lectins, goitrogens, phytates and oxalates, friends or foe? I love when the clinical journals have like fun titles and it's really recent. It was February 2022 and they talk all about this and their conclusion at the end-- Oh, on top of that, to make things even further confusing. So, some isolated compounds of lectins have actually been studied for their health benefits. So, some lectins might be anticancer. They have potentially antiangiogenic, antimetastatic, and antiproliferative activity both in vitro and in vivo. For cancer, some studies have looked at lectin compounds. This one was from lectin-rich extract from mistletoe, which makes me happy, mistletoe, but they found that it had antitumor properties. They've also looked at isolated compounds for diabetes. They found that some have antidiabetic properties and they've also looked at things for immunomodulatory potential in a good way, and that they potentially can be antimicrobial, antibacterial, antifungal, antiviral. And this is also with isolated lectins. And again, this is more using lectins, kind of like a drug in a way, like kind of a pharmacological approach to lectins. So, the whole thing is very convoluted.
I think the takeaway is that and I'll just tell you what the conclusion of this article says. They say that it can be observed that foods basically without culinary treatment can cause negative effects on human health. However, they say in the context of a regular diet, when they are consumed in a food matrix and with culinary treatment like germination, fermentation or milling, they are found in reduced concentration or they are found in synergy with other compounds beneficial to health and the food. And so, the negative effects are minimized. So, translation in whole foods cooked form with the other beneficial effects of foods, and especially like fruits and vegetables, maybe it's not that much of an issue. Then they say purified molecules seem to have beneficial effects on some pathological conditions. They say there are issues because a lot of the studies are carried out in animal models and we're not sure how much that applies to humans. They also said that epidemiological studies show promising results, but the design makes it difficult to discern if it's from the actual compounds or if it's from molecules in the entire matrix of the food.
And then lastly, they say there are few human clinical trials that evaluate these effects if future research is required. So basically, takeaway intuitively. If you feel like you have sensitivities to certain foods, honor that, go with that. If you feel like you have a problem with lectins, try a lectin-free diet. I'm totally fine with that. [laughs] That's primary reason I have an app partly for it. I do think, though-- I don't want people to have food fear. And I do think when we cook our food, it can have a profound effect. And I think it's hard to apply the theory of lectins to the context of cooked vegetables and a whole foods diet, that was very long. Vanessa, what are your thoughts?
Vanessa Spina: Wow, that was amazing, so comprehensive. I really don't have much to add. The only thing that I would say is just like, my personal experience with it is that I try to avoid a lot of foods that have lectins in them, mostly because of the research that I've seen on how they can act as antinutrient and interfere with the absorption of other nutrients. And so, I personally, I think it's ever since I first started carnivore many years ago, I kind of eliminated a lot of superfluous things from my diet. So, I just stuck with like, "Okay, what's the most nutrient dense food for me that often looks like animal protein, high quality protein, a lot of eggs, a lot of berries, low glycemic fruit." That's mostly what I eat and some salad. And I have the occasional, like, veggies that I have are mostly salad. I am very sensitive to nightshades, especially peppers, which is why I asked you about bell peppers. And I had done this experiment many times, and every time I do it, the same thing happens. Every time, I have a lot of cooked bell peppers. Even though they're cooked, actually, it's worse for me when they're cooked for some reason. And I know they're nightshades they're not lectins. So, I know we're talking about two different things.
Melanie Avalon: It did say they were high in lectins too.
Vanessa Spina: Ah, okay. Well, anytime I eat peppers, I wake up the next day with extremely sore back. I can feel it from the moment I wake up. And for me, it's really unusual because I don't have any pain in my body on most days. I would say 99% of the time I don't have pain in my body at all. So, when I do wake up with pain, I'm like, "Oh, my gosh, what did I have?" And it actually happened two weeks ago. And I was like, "I cooked all those red and yellow bell peppers, and I grilled them in the oven, and sometimes you just forget." I'm like, "I haven't had bell peppers in a while. Let's have some." Or I'll make things for Pete and Luca and then I end up having some. And I repeated the experiment the night before last and woke up again with so much pain in my back and it's gone within usually 24 hours, thankfully.
So, I don't know, maybe it's like the nightshades plus lectin, but that's maybe the only lectin food that I have. So, I would say it depends on how sensitive you are as an individual. You can test different things and see, especially if you do an elimination diet like carnivore for a few weeks and then reintroduce foods. It's a great way to figure out what you may be sensitive to. Like, I learned that cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower for the most part bloats me really bad, and then when I cut those foods out, I didn't have to deal with bloating anymore. So, for me, learning that the most nutrient dense foods are more so, like proteins and organ meats and things like low-glycemic berries and those kinds of things. And like cucumber, we eat very similarly too, which is really funny because we both research so much on food. And I think that to me, those things are just unnecessary. But not everyone is like me. And if you like having a lot of foods that have lectins in them, just test different things and see how does it actually make you feel in your body when you go a long period of time or even like two, three weeks without it and then test it. Test one food at a time and see if you notice. Do you notice any pain? Do you notice any inflammation? Do you notice any bloating or any uncomfortable symptoms? And I just think everyone should do an elimination diet at some point and then just reintroduce different foods. And then you learn so much about how your body responds to different foods. It's very similar to wearing a Nutrisense CGM, because you also learn about how your blood sugar responds to food, which is kind of slightly different response to food. I think it's invaluable information.
And people have bio-individuality and they do have different responses to things. So, you may be able to eat tons of bell peppers, tons of nightshades, tons of lectins, and have no reaction whatsoever. So, in that case, I would just caution against cutting out foods that you don't need to if they have no effect on you. But the final caveat there is that there is research showing that they can act as antinutrients and interfere with the absorption of other foods. There's, like, a really popular one where I think oysters, the lectins, interfered with the absorption of the zinc when they were consumed at the same time. I think one strategy would be to, like, if you're eating a really nutrient dense food, like organ meats or oysters or something like that. Just don't eat them with lectins. Maybe that could help as well. But you answered the question so comprehensively. I'm just, like, throwing in a little bit of personal experience here and sort of what I've personally done, and I'm just not someone who feels the need to have that much variety in my diet. But some people find that limiting, so I completely understand that perspective as well.
Melanie Avalon: No, that was so wonderful. And it's interesting because now I'm just looking through my app more, and with the nightshades, I have the exact same experience. Like, I don't normally have any pain in my body.
Vanessa Spina: Really.
Melanie Avalon: Mm-hmm. And then on the few times when I've tried something like that, I wake up the next day and it's like, "Whoa." I did an experiment where I tried white potatoes, and I woke up the next day and I felt like I got hit by a bus. I was like, "Oh." And they're a nightshade.
Vanessa Spina: Yeah. It's like eggplant, peppers, potatoes. I love eggplant. It's like [chuckles] maybe my favorite vegetable, but I don't consume it that often. It's one of the foods that I consume a lot when we're in Greece and it doesn't seem to bother me there. And I think it might be one of those things too, with the buckets, like how full your bucket is. For some reason, I'm okay with eggplants. So maybe it is lectins thing, but it's really interesting how you can be more sensitive to certain ones or how amazing is it to notice that? Because what if you just lived your whole life with some kind of pain in your body that you didn't need to have? And I learned that from gluten. I was having pain that was so severe that I would be doubled over, and I cut out gluten, and within two weeks, the pain disappeared completely from my life. So, I could have continued living that way if I hadn't have gotten that knowledge and information about gluten. And the same thing with the back pain. I could just be one of those people who's like, "I just have back pain. My dad had back pain." [laughs]
Melanie Avalon: I know. Sorry, I'm like because my mom always has chronic pain. I'm just like, "If she just tried," I mean, maybe not but she always says, "It's genetics, I was born with it." I'm like, "Have you just tried. If you just tried, it might blow your mind."
Vanessa Spina: Yeah. You kind of know it's never going to happen also.
Melanie Avalon: For people who have the app, because there're a lot of little treasures in the app, I think people don't quite realize. So, if you go to compound info, then you can look at the compounds and learn about them, and then you can see a list where you click, like, foods high in it. So, like, for example, for nightshades, the nightshades in my app are eggplant, goji berries, tomato juice, paprika, bell, sweet pepper, white potato, and tomato. And then it was funny, I was looking up meat. I was trying to see, like, beef, for example. Literally everything is green except for glutamates, but there's, like, so little that people potentially react to compared to the bell pepper we did where there's a lot. It's definitely very individual.
Vanessa Spina: And that's last thing I just want to say, that's such a good point that you just brought up. It's the same for foods with oxalates. People who have kidney stones, a lot of times they don't realize it could be connected to oxalates. And my rule of thumb with things like this is don't go out and cut out every single food that has oxalates in it. Just look up the list and cut out the top five. Because with oxalates, if you look at the top five, they have 1000 times more than some of the other ones. So, it's just the same as I know you always talk about with mercury in the fish, there's some fish, I think there's four or five of them especially, that have such high amounts in them that if you just avoid those, you're probably fine consuming all the other fish at a moderate level. Whereas there's definitely foods I know with oxalates that there's some of them that are off the charts high in them.
Melanie Avalon: Yeah, spinach is really high.
Vanessa Spina: Yeah, exactly. I never eat spinach. And I'm always telling-- there's a couple of people I know who have issues with kidney stones all the time and bladder issues. And I'm like, "You got to look up what oxalates look like under the microscope. They're like these pointy shards, [chuckles] and they bind with calcium and they create kidney stones and other urinary issues." And I'm like, "Just avoid the foods that have the four or five ones that have the most density of them." And I think that's what I did in the past, definitely with oxalates, lectins. Now I want to go back and look at nightshades and compare, because the peppers, if they have nightshades and lectins, maybe it's like a lot more density of those than the other ones. But yeah, just one last point there. It was like, "You don't have to cut out everything. Just cut out the most dense ones and then you'll probably be fine just having the rest in limited amount."
Melanie Avalon: No, I'm so glad you brought that up. And oxalates are in the app as well. I'll send it to you.
Vanessa Spina: I can't believe I haven't downloaded. I've heard you talk about it before, and I always thought, what an amazing idea for an app, that sounds incredible. So, yeah, I'm definitely going to download it and do some digging, and it'll probably help me understand why it's the peppers and, for example, not the eggplant.
Melanie Avalon: It's super helpful. And that's the feature I do want to add like when I talk about optimizing it, I want to add some AI to it that will help people, people could put in the foods they're eating and then it'll look for the trends. So that's on the to-do list. And just one last quick note. Some people say with carnivore that they think some of the detox or negative effects people might have in the beginning is like dumping oxalates, but they have, like, oxalates built up and then they cut them all out and then they basically start eliminating them and they're coming out of the tissues. And I actually interviewed on the Melanie Avalon Biohacking podcast, Sally Norton, and we did a whole episode on oxalates, which blew my mind.
Vanessa Spina: Same.
Melanie Avalon: They're scary when you hear what they are, they're like spiky-- They're like spiky little things like shards. They're like shards of glass.
Vanessa Spina: If you look up the photos of what they look like under a microscope, it's crazy, and it completely makes sense. And when you hear Sally Norton talking about it, you're just like, "Oh, my gosh, why is this not more known and accepted?" Because a lot of people deal with things like kidney stones and other issues that are related to it, and it seems like there's definitely research on it. And there's like one case I think she always talks about where this one guy--
Melanie Avalon: Died.
Vanessa Spina: --yeah, he died from having like, pea soup or something at a restaurant because it was so high in oxalate. So, again, it's those few foods that are extremely concentrated in them that you want to avoid, but it doesn't mean you should avoid all of them unless you have some kind of condition or health issue where you're extremely sensitive to all of those various compounds.
Melanie Avalon: Craziness. So again, melanieavalon.com/foodsenseguide, just might help you a little bit. Well, this has been absolutely wonderful. So, a few things for listeners before we go. if you would like to submit your own questions for the show, you can directly email questions@ifodcast.com or you can go to ifpodcast.com and you can submit questions there. These show notes will have links to everything that we talked about as well as a full transcript. That will be @ifpodcast.com/episode338 and then you can follow us on Instagram. We are @ifpodcast. I am @melanieavalon, and Vanessa is @ketogenicgirl. Okay, I think that is all of the things. Anything from you, Vanessa, before we go.
Vanessa Spina: Another super fun episode with you. I love your amazing questions. Keep them coming. And we'll keep the episodes [chuckles] coming because we're having a blast. And yeah, I can't wait to record the next one with you.
Melanie Avalon: I know, I just have so much fun. They're like just so fun. All right, well, I will talk to you next week.
Vanessa Spina: Sounds good. Talk to you next week, Melanie. 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, administration by Sharon Merriman, editing by Podcast Doctors, show notes and artwork by Brianna Joyner, transcripts by SpeechDocs, and original theme composed by Leland Cox and recomposed by Steve Saunders. See you next week.
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