Functional Nutrition – The Important Stuff No One Tells You

If you’re concerned about adrenal health, digestion issues, or simply want to learn more about the body, this episode of the Enterprise Fitness podcast is for you!

Today, our guest speaker is Michael McEvoy, a Certified Nutritional Consultant through the American Association of Nutritional Consultants. Michael is a Certified Metabolic Typing Advisor through William Wolcott’s Metabolic Typing Institute. He is also a Functional Diagnostic Nutritionist through the Functional Diagnostic Nutrition Institute.

In this interview we cover:

  • The differences between functional health care and allopathic health care
  • Adrenal health and how to maximize it
  • Gut and digestion function (and what supplements to take)
  • How caffeine affects adrenal health and digestion
  • What fast and slow oxidators are
  • The Myth of Acid and Alkaline Nutrition exposed
  • Action steps to take to maximize your health scientifically

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The following is a transcription taken from an interview with Dr. John Demartini and Mark Ottobre on the body, mind and emotional connection of health and disease.

Due to the nature of transcriptions we cannot guarantee accuracy, spelling or grammar. We think we’re doing pretty well to bring you both audio interviews and transcriptions with world leading authority on health and fitness free of charge. If you’re able to edit transcriptions free of charge, we would love to hear from you.

Mark: This podcast is brought to you by Enterprise Fitness.

Hi folks, it’s Mark! Ottobre (And) welcome to the show that punches you right in the face with information but in a good way. Today I’ll be speaking with Michael McEvoy from metabolic healing. 

I’ve got a number of health issues including gut and digestion health, adrenal health, the myth of acid and alkaline nutrition and a whole bunch of other stuff that you probably never thought of when it comes to getting sick. We are also going to look at the steps that you can take today towards diagnosing, healing and supporting those functions. 

Michael is a certified nutrition consultant through the American Association of Nutritional Consultants. Michael is a certified metabolic topic adviser through the William Wolcott’s Metabolic Typing Institute. He’s also a functional diagnostic nutritionist through Functional Diagnostic Nutrition Institute. I am super psyched about sharing today’s show with you. So Michael, welcome to the show!

Michael: Thank you Mark for having me. It’s great to be here.

Mark: You’re most welcome. So, I guess the first of the most obvious question is tell me how you get started as a health care practitioner?

Michael: Well, I’ve been involved in the healing arts all of my adult life back. In the year 2000/2001, I was actively involved in fitness and strength, and cardio and weight training and then I got really turned on by yoga and I began to study yoga and meditation and spirituality and death. 

(And) it culminated with a trip of me going to the east to go and study in India and as many people go to India, they get very sick with parasites and digestive illnesses and exposed to a whole variety of different problems, and so this was the case for me. 

So, when I went to India, I had an amazing experience, I learned so much, and I intensified my yoga practice but at the same time I got very violently ill, I came back to the States. (And) I was a hundred and twenty-five pounds, I was jaundice, my digestive system was a wreck, I was in a very sad state of health and I was very scared. (And) at the time, there was a certain degree of distrust for conventional medicine and I didn’t want to go that route and having known very little on health at that time, compared to what I know now, I knew enough to take the all the available advise that I was given in my hometown of Chicago by some friends who had recommended that I go see some alternative health practitioners in my area. 

So, I did that and within a very short period of time, within a few months, my health was able to recover. (But) I was so amazed with how quickly my efforts had been applied, how quickly my health has improved. At that point in time, I made a vow to myself to try to learn as much as I possible could about health and nutrition and fitness that I could possibly learn. 

(And) so, over the next several years, I began pursuing radical dietary changes in my own body, radical detoxification protocols. I began reading as many books, and articles in websites, about nutrition that I can find anywhere. (And) at a certain point, I got to the point where I realized I want to do this professionally. 

I want to start teaching other people about ways to improve their health and my intense curiosity, it kind of led me this path of having studied and having worked with a number of the world’s, the United States top nutritionists, and alternative health care practitioners that I’ve been able to find. So, it’s now my profession to help other people into trying to achieve a higher state of health.

Mark: Excellent. So, is there any other advice you can give someone who’s going to India?

Michael: Yes! Well, there’s a lot of advices. First of all, you should always be prepared. (And) a lot of people attribute getting sick in foreign countries, in third world countries to parasites and things like that. Certainly, pathogens and bacteria and viruses, all can definitely have complications inside the body. But I think that it’s important to realize that germs are not the cause of disease. 

(And) there’s actually been a lot written about this over the past hundred and fifty years. Third world countries certainly can have a lot of foreign bacteria that we’re not exposed to in the first world, that certainly can be a problem if we go and visit. 

But I think that one of the first things to consider is what you’re actually eating when you’re going to a third world country. When you go to India, for example, if you go to another third world country, what most people are consuming is white rice, sugar, and foods that basically create the breeding ground for illness, for disease, and create the environment for which how pathogens and bacteria and parasites can thrive. 

So, the first thing I would tell a person is to always make sure that they really, really, that their nutritional practice, that the practice of eating high quality foods is readily available, or atleast is more available than it wouldn’t be.

Mark: It’s a problem, sourcing quality food in India?

Michael: I think it certainly is. Absolutely. It’s hard sourcing quality food everywhere in the world. 

Mark: Yes, true. I meant that. What is it that you specialize in?

Michael: Well, that’s an excellent question Mark. I’ll answer that by saying that what’s really important to look at, is what we see today, is that basically when you look at the health care systems that exist, there are predominantly two systems of health care that we are familiar with or maybe most of us are really familiar with one of these model health cares. 

But as we know or most of us know, that the predominant model of health care is called Allopathy or Allopathic Western Based Medical Practice. (And) then you have another system of health care called Functional Health Care and this is a new and emerging field, something that has been around for a while but has been kind of overshadowed by the culture of drugs and pharmacology and allopathic medicine. 

There’s a very distinct difference between these two models of health cares and it’s imperative to understand the differences. In the first model of health care, you have a symptom-based model and what I mean by symptom-based model of health care is that let’s say you have a particular health issue that you have. Let’s say you have cancer or even better, let’s say you have something more basic, more fundamental. 

Let’s say you have a chronic pain, or a chronic fatigue, or you have adrenal fatigue or something like this, or you have PMS, so you go to your doctor, and the doctor is very likely going to see you for 10 minutes, they’re going to spend, maybe at the most, 5 to 10 minutes with a patient if they run any kind of laboratory test, they’re going to do a very brief overview, they’re not going to be looking into details or what not, but then what’s likely to happen is the doctor’s going to prescribe either a drug or a series of drugs to treat those symptoms that that patient has presented. 

Now, this is obviously the most predominant model of health care that exists. You have a large percentage of people that want to seek alternatives, so they’ll go to a nutritionist or a registered dietician or they’ll go to even an organic food store of some sort, seeking out advice, seeking out alternative advice for their particular symptoms. 

(And) so, in the same way, just like how a doctor throws pharmaceutical drugs at a patient’s symptom in the same way most nutritionists in nutritional oriented dieticians will recommend nutritional supplements in a very same way. So, whereas the doctor may be recommending penicillin or pharmaceutical drug, which certainly can be very harmful to the body, obviously in a number of ways, in the same kind of way, same kind of methodology, the nutritionist who is also allopathically oriented is recommending nutritional supplements for the symptoms. 

So, if you have chronic fatigue, let’s say you go to a nutritionists who’ll say, “Oh here take some ginseng, that’s going to give you a little bit more energy,” or “Here take some Vitamin B12. Let’s give you a shot of Vitamin B12,” but the problem with that entire model of health care is whether you’re dealing with symptoms from an alternative nutrition standpoint or from a medical pharmacological standpoint, the problem with that system of health care is that the root cause of the patient’s problem never gets addressed. 

The reason why that patient developed that symptom in the first place is always overlooked, is always almost overlooked model of health care. (And) so, the person may continue to experience some symptomatic benefit or symptomatic relief from taking the drug or from taking the ginseng, or taking the supplement but the problem will continue to persist unless the underlying cause that precipitated the actual symptom is uprooted and revealed and eradicated. 

So, that’s one model of health care, that’s Allopathy. That’s the most prevalent kind of health care that people have and people are aware of. There’s an entirely different model of health care that exists, that is emerging, that addresses causation at the root of a person’s problem. 

It may certainly be necessary to address a person’s symptom but it’s even more important to address what’s really going on with that person’s problem, and so, that’s where practitioner like myself comes in. I would then be presented by a number of symptoms but then I will throw back at the client or the patient saying, “Okay, so you’re symptoms tell me that you likely have an imbalance in your hormonal system or digestive system or you may have a heavy metal toxicity, you may have a certain degree of mercury that’s interfering with various bodily processes. 

So, what we need to do is we need to run some functional lab tests that actually identify the root of the problem.” (And) then from that particular perspective, once we have all these highly individualized data that’s been tailored for the individual, then we have a model of health care that is addressing the individual’s necessities through diet, through supplementation, through vitamin and mineral therapy, through number of other methods, through fitness, through lifestyle, through exercise, through the right kinds of exercise, all of these things are very highly tailored to the individual needs of a person. 

So this model of health care, this functional model of health care is the new paradigm, is the new paradigm, I have to repeat that this is a new paradigm because of the fact that we are all biologically unique and this needs to be addressed in order for health to really be met. Let’s face it, that in the current model of health care, Allopathic model of health care, pharmacological medical model of health care, this model of health care is significantly flawed, and it’s flawed for a number of different reasons. Not only because our people are being poisoned by pharmaceutical drugs, but the underlying causes of people’s problems are never being addressed and more importantly, I would not even give it recognition to call that particular model of health care, health care at all. 

Mark: Yeah. I remember reading a while ago, I’m not sure if you’re familiar with Randy Roach. Randy Roach we had him on the show a little while ago and he spoke about how the dominant model of health care was actually chiropractic, neuropathy and homeopathy ends in 1916 the Rockefeller Institute obviously gave a lot of money to start up the ??? Institute and because of all those money in Allopathy, means there’s more money in selling more pharmaceutical drugs and there wasn’t actually healing someone. Everything you’re saying there is definitely has a lot of merit.

So, if we move on, let’s talk adrenal health. How do you diagnose someone who has poor adrenal health?

Michael: So, good question Mark. Adrenal function has adrenal fatigue, chronic fatigue syndrome has become very widely recognized condition atleast by alternative health care practitioners. 

Mark: It’s getting more prevalent now?

Michael: It certainly is getting a little bit more prevalent. People start looking at these things a little bit more understanding, starting to see that a lot of the symptoms that people are experiencing are definitely a lot more prevalent these days than they ever have been. But you know the problem is with the current model of health care that exists in Allopathy, there is not the identification of what is really the cause of the problem. 

(And) in addition to that, in complication to that, in Allopathic medicine there is not a correct method of identifying the problem. For example, one of the best ways to assess a person’s adrenal status is not by looking at blood hormone levels, if you go to a medical doctor and they’re going to run a blood panel. 

If the medical doctor is even versed in identifying hormonal imbalances and adrenal fatigue at all which is not very common any way, but if they will, they’ll probably going to run an adrenal panel through the blood hormones. The problem with that testing is that the blood steroid hormones are not the best way to identify adrenal status. You have to look at saliva hormones in order to do that. (And) so, very few medical doctors are aware of that, that the free fraction hormones are really the ones to look at. 

What I always recommend if the person has chronic fatigue or adrenal fatigue or they feel like in the opposite end of inspection, if the person suffers from adrenal hyper function, they’re hyperactive. You may have a child, 8-year old child who has extreme hyperactivity or attention deficit disorder or any other disease label you want to give somebody, then the best thing to do is to address their individual concerns and to really look at the individual biochemical and genetic makeup of that person and to run certain functional lab tests are going to help you do that. 

Giving you an example, I worked with a 9-year old child not too recently, the parents had wanted me to work with this child and I said, “Okay. Well it’s important that we run an adrenal stress profile to see what this child’s adrenal status is. (And) in addition to that, I also wanted to run a gut function protocol to compliment that because I felt that those two tests were necessary to run for this particular child.” (And) so parents said, “Okay. That sounds good to me. Let’s go ahead and do the tests,” and so okay, send out the test kits to them out in the mail and they completed it. (And) the good thing is, I’ve worked with clients all over the world, not only in the Unites States but I have a full time nutrition practice for clients all over the world and it’s simple as sending a test kit to the client, they complete the test kit and they send it directly back to the laboratory.

Michael: (And) then the test results come back to me. So, I get the test results back in my laboratory, in my office, and I take a look at the test results. (And) my God! This child is in a deep stage 2 adrenal fatigue close to stage 3, something you wouldn’t expect to see in somebody so young. In addition to this, had multiple gut function complications, there was definitely liver stress, there was definitely problem with the child’s breaking down protein in the gut, and so, the child had multiple complications. (And) so, this is something that was completely overlooked by this child’s primary caring position. Is that there are multiple underlying issues that were going on, so what I recommended, I recommended to support adrenal function based upon the laboratory test results. The child started to feel better. (And) the good thing with working with children is that they’re still growing, still healing in a much faster process, usually in many cases. So, to answer the question, I would say that it’s important to really address the needs of the individual. I cannot emphasize that enough. Is that the functional model of health care is the one addresses the individual needs. The only way to really do that is by looking at certain laboratory tests and identify functionality in the body or dysfunction that’s happening in the body, strengths and weaknesses that a person has and then cultivating and putting together an entire nutritional strategy based on diet, supplements, exercise and fitness, it’s all tailored around the individual needs.

Mark: So you do use saliva test, and then from the saliva test you go from there but that’s the diagnose method ways?

Michael: Yes, the best way to address adrenal hormones and all the steroid hormones, whether it’s estrogen, estriol, estrodial, testosterone, melatone and cortisol, progesterone, DHEA, the androgens, the best way to assess those particular hormones is from the saliva hormones because the saliva hormones are the free fraction live hormones whereas the blood values are not necessarily the best thing to use. 

Mark: Alright. Can you tell me a little bit more about the stages of the adrenal health?

Michael: Sure. When you’re looking at functional medicine, functional nutrition, specifically it’s related to hormone function in the body. First, let me say this, about all hormones, bioidentical hormones, this is a big thing that people really want to get in, menopausal women are really wanting to get involved in this, weightlifters… I know Charles Pollock, I was watching a video when Pollock gave recently about ways to identify if a person is more androgenic or less androgenic by identifying triceps measurements and things like this, and all that’s very interesting. What’s important to realize and I should always say that bioidentical hormones replace therapy if done correctly, if done with the correct laboratory results by a practitioner such as myself who is capable of putting into practice for the individual the right methodology, and the right practice, but bioidentical hormones can be an excellent way to help improve upon somebody’s health in a number of different ways. What I want to say is this, is that all of the steroidal hormones, this is very important, all of the steroidal hormones in the body are all derived from cholesterol. Why is this important? Because if you look what’s out there in the mainstream, almost all mainstream doctors are telling you, “Watch your cholesterol,” or “We’ll put you in a drug.” (And) so what you’re not seeing is that the reality of the situation is that cortisol, all of the adrenal hormones, all of the sex hormones, estrogen, testosterone, cortisol, DHEA, they’re all derived from cholesterol. I’ll give you another example, a client comes into my office with stage 3 adrenal fatigue, cortisol level very low, and I take a look at what this person’s consuming, they’re underconsuming, they’re not nourishing their bodies properly, they’re not consuming the right fuel for their body unique biological engines for their unique biological needs. (And) I also see that they’re on statine drug, a drug that’s lowering their total cholesterol level. Well, what they don’t tell you is, in the doctor’s office, is that statine drug is inhibiting hormone production. (And) how is it doing that? Because cholesterol is the primary, precursor to all the steroid hormones. So just to lower cholesterol levels, to tell a patient to lower their cholesterol levels, could be a very, very dangerous thing, because of the fact that cholesterol is essential for all the steroidal hormones. I see this all the time. 

So, basically, there are 3 stages of adrenal fatigue, you can categorize this however you want. You have stage 1 adrenal fatigue is usually when a patient is pumping out high amounts of cortisol, and this is usually categorized, from a physiological perspective, as being adrenal hyperfunction, when the adrenal glands are working too hard, there’s too much cortisol being produced. (And) that can cause a lot of problems by the way. 

Mark: (And) they actually feel good at this stage because there’s so much cortisol?

Michael: A lot of times people feel really good when they have high cortisol levels. They may have incredible physical performance. They may be a really, really intense athlete. They may have endurance. They may be only needing 4 or 5 hours sleep at night. But the problem is that at a certain point, that high amount of cortisol that they’re pumping out is going to start to diminish or the high amount of cortisol that’s being pumped out by the adrenal glands can actually inhibit the conversion of the thyroid hormones. (And) they may start seeing at the blood tests, they may start feeling let’s say abdominal weight gain or suddenly they may start crashing, their appetite might increase intensely, something like this because of the fact that, not going too deeply in the chemistry here for the people, but the glucocorticord hormone can inhibit the conversion of certain thyroid hormones. So, there’s a big disadvantage to thinking that your high cortisol level is a good thing, that it is not only a good thing, but at a certain point, you might crash and you might burn. That’s stage 1 adrenal fatigue, it’s adrenal hyperfunction.

Stage 2 is kind of this in between phase, where a person is starting to slope they may be at stage 1and now they’re starting to slope into a stage 2. (And) what you commonly see in stage 2, any stage of adrenal fatigue in that matter, but what you commonly see in a stage 2 adrenal fatigue is also a DHEA level that’s either depressed or very elevated. In stage 2, you start to see imbalances with other hormones in the body. DHEA being the primary counterbalancing hormone that’s also produced by the adrenal glands, this is also very important androgenic hormone. (And) so when DHEA is either depressed or elevated, this is also going to cause some symptoms, and this is also going to interfere with how cortisol’s being used in the body. So, when a person’s a stage 2 and they’re starting to slope, the lower the cortisol level and the lower it gets, the more you see the symptoms, more complicated, more complex, and more deep. (And) by the time you see a person in stage 3 adrenal fatigue, they’re already in an exhaustive stage, they’re already in an exhaustive state of stress. They’ve probably been in an exhaustive state of stress for a long period of time. They’ve likely got multiple issues going on besides just adrenal fatigue, they probably got multiple gut issues. They probably got all kinds of toxicity that the body’s incapable of detoxifying, probably problems with the liver, probably problems with converting certain hormones, and other ones, usually some of the people in most chronic stage of stress is in stage 3 adrenal fatigue. What’s important to realize though is rather than labeling them as stage 1, stage 2, whatever it is you want to call this, whatever you want, the most important thing really is to support and maintain normal body function in the body, and that’s a powerful thing. When you really, really understand that you’re body is unique to you, that your body is biologically made unique to you, and the fuel that it needs, the nutrients that it needs is very individual to your own body, once you get that concept and you start applying that concept, real healing takes place. 

Mark: Alright. I’m going to ask you about TSH, thyroid stimulating hormone, what’s your take on that? Because the Western medicine there, their range is 0.05 to 4 thyroid stimulating hormone, what do you do with the thyroid if that’s diagnosed as low? Do you have T3, T4 test or is there another way?  

Michael: I’ll say this, that diagnosing a thyroid condition is a complex thing. It’s a very, very complex thing. You cannot diagnose hypothyroidism by looking at the TSH level by itself, you cannot do it. You always have to run T4, T3, as well as negative T3 values, and even then, you’ll likely going to see, if you see a high TSH, you might see T3 and T4 normal. (Or) if you see a low TSH, you might see a T3 or T4 out of balance. Hypothyroid conditions are not very easy to diagnose. I’m aware of a number of people that suffer from all the classical symptoms of hypothyroidism, all of them. (And) their blood tests all looked fine, by conventional standards, it looked fine.  I personally know many medical doctors that treat hypothyroidism without having any laboratory test verify it and the patients get better. All of these things really come back to the individual. They all come back to supporting and maintaining biological function. The thyroid gland is controlled largely and influenced largely by the parasympathetic nervous system. (And) so it’s very common that people that have a high thyroid or underactive thyroid issues which is now, by current estimates alone, they’re saying that about 40% of the population has some degree of hypothyroidism. Forty percent or more, that’s unbelievable! 

Mark: Do you usually see thyroid dysfunction with toxicity or is there a link between adrenal fatigue and thyroid dysfunction?

Michael: I’ve never seen a hypothyroid condition or even an autoimmune thyroid condition like Hashimoto, I have never seen a thyroid condition that does not have underlying heavy metal and/or chemical toxicity. I’ve never seen it. Every single person I’ve ever viewed that has had so-called hypothyroidism has had major heavy metal toxicity, from mercury, from amalgam dental filings, from aluminum, from arsenic, from cadmium, from nickel, from chemicals, from dioxines and PCD’s, everybody that I’ve seen has had these complications. 

Mark: (And) is there any link with adrenal fatigue and thyroid issues?

Michael: Absolutely. There’s a number of studies, a number of medical studies, that have shown… if you look at a lot of medical literature regarding adrenal function, there’s a number of different pathways, you got all this whole symphony of different hormones in the body, all these hormones are interacting, the master hormone is ??? alone gets converted into DHEA and in another part it gets converted into progesterone and in the other end, that gets used and converted into cortisol. So you got this whole symphony of hormones going on. But you’ve also got things that will interfere with these conversion processes in the body, enzyme reactions taking place. Mercury from silver amalgam dental fillings, which is still widely used today by many conventional dentists, mercury will outcast from your silver amalgam dental fillings and will make their way into not only to the endocrine glands, not only the thyroid, and not only will they interfere with the conversion of progesterone and the cortisol, but they’ll get into the brain, they’ll get into the nervous system, they’ll going to start interfering will all biological processes in the body. So heavy metal toxicity is one of the primary, heavy metal and chemical toxicity, are 2 of the primary underlying causes of all health issues from what I’ve seen.

Mark: Just a quick question on detoxifying mercury, do you ever use chlorella to detoxify mercury?

Michael: Yes. There’s many different kinds of chlorella that you can use, some is more potent than others. Some cheap brand of chlorella actually contain heavy metals in them ‘cause they’re so cheaply made, but there are certain companies that manufacture highly colloidal concentrated chlorella supplements, they’re very powerful at pulling heavy metals out of the body.

Mark: There’s the argument that they also move mercury, but they move mercury to the brain which is much worse, do you find any of that to be true?

Michael: Well, what I’ll say about chorella it can be very beneficial but it should be done under close supervision and it should be done with adjacent protocols that are more powerful. The body has a couple of different processes that it can detoxify biotics and heavy metals.  The body will excrete heavy metals and chemicals through the feces, through the urine, through the hair, through the sweat glands. The kidneys are a primary organ that heavy metals can filter through, and ureas created and excreted through the urine, but the kidney cells, the glomeriular cells of the kidneys can be permanently damaged by the amount of heavy metals that are coming through it. My preferred method of recessing, of helping a person to detoxify heavy metals is the liver and bowel pathway and by enhancing the liver’s ability to detoxify, through the glutathione conjunction, a person is able to safely eliminate heavy metals better. So, if you’re going to use chlorella, it should only be done in combination with other protocols. I’m a big proponent of the things that will help the body produce glutathione, glutathione being the most important indigenous antioxidant that the body produces. It’s one of the most important antioxidants for detoxifying heavy metals and chemicals, and when toxicity is prevalent, glutathione levels tend to be decreased and this is especially true as we age. 

Mark: Well, I’ve got a Facebook question here, actually 2 Facebook questions. The first one is, Trevor asks, “How does caffeine adrenal health?”

Michael: Well, that’s an excellent question. I’ll say this about caffeine, because of the fact that everybody’s body is biologically unique, remembering I was talking about that functional model of health care, in that functional model of health care, what’s the most important thing to realize is your own biological individuality. Not one nutrient, food, drug, vitamin or mineral will behave exactly the same way in everybody’s body. That’s a critical point to understand. That means that caffeine will tend to behave very differently in a person’s body as oppose to somebody else. Now take for an example, if an individual is let’s call a fast oxidizer, if their cells are converting sugars and carbohydrates into energy very quickly, in that process, the drinking coffee is only going to speed up that process even more. It’s going to make them even more of a fast oxidizer and guess what that’s going to do to the adrenal function. It’s going to cause them to pump out even more cortisol, and it’s going to cause blood sugars to go up. But take example in the opposite end though, this is a common reaction that happens to fast oxidizers, but somebody who’s a slow oxidizer, who has a very different metabolism, somebody who is a slow  oxidizer is actually burning fuel and carbohydrates too slowly and so actually for a slow oxidizer, caffeine will tend to have a more of a waking up effect meaning that it’s not going to cause, there’s going to be such a high release of cortisol, it’s not going to cause that high of a spike in blood sugar as it is with the fast oxidizer. So, to answer that question, how will caffeine affect adrenal function, it certainly can negatively affect adrenal function. But it can affect adrenal function worse to certain individuals and less so to other individuals. So, in order to understand how caffeine affects you, you’re going to have to really understand your own biochemical individuality, the speed that your cells are making energy and how quickly the energy is being converted iside of the cells, whether you’re cells are more designed to assimilate and digest fat and protein or you’re cells are more designed to assimilate carbohydrates. (And) certainly there can be tremendous variations within that spectrum. 

Mark: So a fast oxidizer would be a typical carbohydrate type?

Michael: No. A fast oxidizer would be a typical protein type, somebody who needs more protein and fat. A fast oxidizer is one who has what’s called glucogenic imbalance that they’re overly relying on the process of glycolysis, on the process of sugar and carbohydrate metabolism. (And) they’re not using fat well enough, so what a fast oxidizer actually needs is more fat and protein to stimulate the underactive aspect of metabolism and to slow down the overactive aspect of their carbohydrate metabolism.

So a fast oxidizer and a slow oxidizer need diets that are very opposite, very different and the wrong diet for the individual causes havoc in the body, and I see this all day long, day in and day out. So, it’s imperative to address the needs of the individual. I don’t recommend coffee in general for people, for anybody, because coffee is more or less a drug. (But) there can be some apparent benefit from it if a person is a carbo type, but again, if you’re doing anything in excess, if you’re carbo type, even if coffee is not going to be that destructive to your body, it will still cause a physical addiction because it is a drug. (And) so, that’s why people that try to stop drinking coffee they have withdraw symptoms, they have headaches, because the body has kind of created a dependency on it.

Mark: Yes, for sure. Emma asks, “Does caffeine affect the gut?”

Michael: Well, again, it certainly can and it goes back to the issues of the individual. A lot of people say that when they drink coffee, they have a bowel movement or coffee will induce peristaltic function. I’m sure it can for many people because the fact that coffee is a stimulant, and anything that stimulates the bowels is going to cause the bowels to release. But coffee is also a diuretic, coffee will also cause the excretion of numerous minerals and this is not necessarily a good thing. I’ve heard studies before that caffeine, specifically from coffee, will actually cause a doubling loss of your calcium everyday, in some occasions. (And) so, this is not a good thing if a person, especially, if a person has a greater need for calcium. Take for example if a fast oxidizing protein type who has an increase need for calcium is not getting enough calcium, is eating a very poor diet and is drinking coffee on top of that, that’s a recipe for disaster, I guarantee it. (And) at this point and stage of the game, there’s going to be significant mineral loss, there’s going to be mineral deficiencies, why is it that so many fast oxidizers complain of drinking coffee makes them jittery, anxious, nervous, it gives them a migraine, it gives them heart palpitations it’s because their metabolism is not designed for that type of a food. But other people have a totally different reaction to coffee. I guarantee you, everybody that’s listening to this call, do an interview of 10 different people and ask them what effect coffee has on their body, I guarantee you that you’re going to get very different reactions from people, in regards to how coffee affects them. How is that possible? It all goes back to the fact that everybody’s biologically unique. If a person has a fast oxidative metabolism, coffee’s going to destroy their metabolism, it’s going to enhance symptoms and can actually make their gut functions worse. But other people is not as bad because of the fact that coffee doesn’t have the same effect.

Mark: Wow, cool. But that’s a pretty good answer. (And) just to remember, a fast metabolizer is a protein type and a slow metabolizer is a carbo type, correct?

Michael: Correct.

Mark: Yes, and the other thing I would just like to get your thoughts on, get the full inspection of the issue, there have been some studies, I know Charles Pollock once talked about this a little bit, coffee drinkers live 5 years longer that non-coffee drinkers because the average person eating a western diet, it’s actually the only source of antioxidants that they can get. Obviously, I’m in total agree that we should fix the diet first and not rely on something like coffee for antioxidants but do you think there is any value as an antioxidant for coffee?

Michael: Well. there certainly are a lot of antioxidants in coffee. There’s a lot of antioxidants in chocolate. There’s actually more antioxidants in raw chocolate than there is in almost any other food. Raw chocolate has the highest ORAC value, which stands for Oxygen Rated Antioxidant Capacity. There’s something like, I don’t even know, 4500 ORAC per serving of raw chocolate. I want to talk about antioxidants for a moment, what is an antioxidant? Antioxidant is any type of a nutritional mineral, vitamin, substance, phytonutrient that prevents oxidative damage in the body. I don’t know personally the word antioxidant, there’s a better term that some doctors use antioxidants and this is anti-free radicals as a better term than antioxidant, because what antioxidants are really doing is that they are neutralizing the potentially damaging effect of free radicals in the body. Well, what is a free radical? A free radical is any atom or molecule with unpaired electron, right? So, what does that mean? That means that free radicals are everywhere. In fact, your body is incapable of living without free radicals. Your metabolism makes free radicals, it’s a necessary part of your metabolism, of cell function. You got to have a certain amount of free radicals. But the problem is if oxidation is out of control, if a person is an extreme fast oxidizer or an extreme low oxidizer, the likelihood that they have free radicals activity ensuing their tissues is going to be greater because of the fact that they’re cellular oxidation is out of control. So the most common and powerful antioxidants are the ones that maintain and support cell membrane structure such as Vitamin C, Vitamin E, selenium, those are the most essential antioxidants. Vitamin E particularly is the primary constituent of cell ??? but did you know that actually, probably the biggest antioxidant of them all is, that gets demonized by just about everybody, cholesterol. Cholesterol is an antioxidant and free radical scavenger. Cholesterol comprises all of the cell membranes of the body, meaning that it prevents the breakdown of those cell membranes. Visualize a cell. What is a cell? A cell is, draw a blubber in a piece of paper, that cell has a membrane, it has an outside wall, and then you got the nucleus, you got the mitochondria inside of the cell. So that cell membrane, that outer wall that cell needs to maintain a certain balance between permeability and stiffness. Cholesterol maintains the integrity of that cell membrane. So, if you got fatty acids, if you got free radicals ensuing in the body, oxidation out of control, cholesterol is going to be a powerful nutrient to protect the cell membrane from collapsing and from producing excess free radicals. That’s a powerful concept and it needs to be understood. So, the idea that you should drink coffee to get antioxidants from it, that’s a tertiary argument for the promotion of coffee when in fact that all foods that are found in their natural state contain significant amounts of antioxidants in them. Every vegetable contains large amounts of Vitamin C. Some vegetables even contain Vitamin E. High quality grass-fed beef is going to contain tremendous amounts of zinc and selenium and nutrients that are going to support maintain biological functions. So to say that we should be getting antioxidants from coffee, I mean, that’s a real stretch. Just because there’s antioxidants in coffee doesn’t necessarily mean that’s the best way to get it. But again, it all goes back to the individual, because how any nutrient, how any food behaves in the body is all dependent upon each individual’s metabolism.

Mark: Right, that’s a good answer. So, continue.

Michael: Well antioxidants are certainly very important and for some people, they’re more important than others. But understand that the function of antioxidants… there’s two kinds of antioxidants. Whoever’s listening here, you can start taking notes ‘cause this is good stuff. You have exogenous types of antioxidants which are all the food kind of antioxidants, Vitamin C, Vitamin E, selenium, cholesterol, zinc, you keep naming those phytonutrients, all the trace oxidants that we don’t even have names for, corseline, ???, polyphenols, adakins, all of those things, all have antioxidant capabilities. So all found in foods, those are exogenous forms of antioxidants. Then you have what we call indigenous antioxidants, and indigenous antioxidants are antioxidants that get produced by the body, the cells make 5 indigenous antioxidants and these are made by the body. These 5 antioxidants are glutathione, superoxide dismutate SOD, catalaze, alpha like folic acid, and the fifth one is coenzyme Q10.

Mark: (And) is there any link with adrenal fatigue and thyroid issues?

Michael: Absolutely. There’s a number of studies, a number of medical studies, that have shown… if you look at a lot of medical literature regarding adrenal function, there’s a number of different pathways, you got all this whole symphony of different hormones in the body, all these hormones are interacting, the master hormone is ??? alone gets converted into DHEA and in another part it gets converted into progesterone and in the other end, that gets used and converted into cortisol. So you got this whole symphony of hormones going on. But you’ve also got things that will interfere with these conversion processes in the body, enzyme reactions taking place. Mercury from silver amalgam dental fillings, which is still widely used today by many conventional dentists, mercury will outcast from your silver amalgam dental fillings and will make their way into not only to the endocrine glands, not only the thyroid, and not only will they interfere with the conversion of progesterone and the cortisol, but they’ll get into the brain, they’ll get into the nervous system, they’ll going to start interfering will all biological processes in the body. So heavy metal toxicity is one of the primary, heavy metal and chemical toxicity, are 2 of the primary underlying causes of all health issues from what I’ve seen.

Mark: Just a quick question on detoxifying mercury, do you ever use chlorella to detoxify mercury?

Michael: Yes. There’s many different kinds of chlorella that you can use, some is more potent than others. Some cheap brand of chlorella actually contain heavy metals in them ‘cause they’re so cheaply made, but there are certain companies that manufacture highly colloidal concentrated chlorella supplements, they’re very powerful at pulling heavy metals out of the body.

Mark: There’s the argument that they also move mercury, but they move mercury to the brain which is much worse, do you find any of that to be true?

Michael: Well, what I’ll say about chorella it can be very beneficial but it should be done under close supervision and it should be done with adjacent protocols that are more powerful. The body has a couple of different processes that it can detoxify biotics and heavy metals.  The body will excrete heavy metals and chemicals through the feces, through the urine, through the hair, through the sweat glands. The kidneys are a primary organ that heavy metals can filter through, and ureas created and excreted through the urine, but the kidney cells, the glomeriular cells of the kidneys can be permanently damaged by the amount of heavy metals that are coming through it. My preferred method of recessing, of helping a person to detoxify heavy metals is the liver and bowel pathway and by enhancing the liver’s ability to detoxify, through the glutathione conjunction, a person is able to safely eliminate heavy metals better. So, if you’re going to use chlorella, it should only be done in combination with other protocols. I’m a big proponent of the things that will help the body produce glutathione, glutathione being the most important indigenous antioxidant that the body produces. It’s one of the most important antioxidants for detoxifying heavy metals and chemicals, and when toxicity is prevalent, glutathione levels tend to be decreased and this is especially true as we age. 

Mark: Well, I’ve got a Facebook question here, actually 2 Facebook questions. The first one is, Trevor asks, “How does caffeine adrenal health?”

Michael: Well, that’s an excellent question. I’ll say this about caffeine, because of the fact that everybody’s body is biologically unique, remembering I was talking about that functional model of health care, in that functional model of health care, what’s the most important thing to realize is your own biological individuality. Not one nutrient, food, drug, vitamin or mineral will behave exactly the same way in everybody’s body. That’s a critical point to understand. That means that caffeine will tend to behave very differently in a person’s body as oppose to somebody else. Now take for an example, if an individual is let’s call a fast oxidizer, if their cells are converting sugars and carbohydrates into energy very quickly, in that process, the drinking coffee is only going to speed up that process even more. It’s going to make them even more of a fast oxidizer and guess what that’s going to do to the adrenal function. It’s going to cause them to pump out even more cortisol, and it’s going to cause blood sugars to go up. But take example in the opposite end though, this is a common reaction that happens to fast oxidizers, but somebody who’s a slow oxidizer, who has a very different metabolism, somebody who is a slow  oxidizer is actually burning fuel and carbohydrates too slowly and so actually for a slow oxidizer, caffeine will tend to have a more of a waking up effect meaning that it’s not going to cause, there’s going to be such a high release of cortisol, it’s not going to cause that high of a spike in blood sugar as it is with the fast oxidizer. So, to answer that question, how will caffeine affect adrenal function, it certainly can negatively affect adrenal function. But it can affect adrenal function worse to certain individuals and less so to other individuals. So, in order to understand how caffeine affects you, you’re going to have to really understand your own biochemical individuality, the speed that your cells are making energy and how quickly the energy is being converted iside of the cells, whether you’re cells are more designed to assimilate and digest fat and protein or you’re cells are more designed to assimilate carbohydrates. (And) certainly there can be tremendous variations within that spectrum. 

Mark: So a fast oxidizer would be a typical carbohydrate type?

Michael: No. A fast oxidizer would be a typical protein type, somebody who needs more protein and fat. A fast oxidizer is one who has what’s called glucogenic imbalance that they’re overly relying on the process of glycolysis, on the process of sugar and carbohydrate metabolism. (And) they’re not using fat well enough, so what a fast oxidizer actually needs is more fat and protein to stimulate the underactive aspect of metabolism and to slow down the overactive aspect of their carbohydrate metabolism.

So a fast oxidizer and a slow oxidizer need diets that are very opposite, very different and the wrong diet for the individual causes havoc in the body, and I see this all day long, day in and day out. So, it’s imperative to address the needs of the individual. I don’t recommend coffee in general for people, for anybody, because coffee is more or less a drug. (But) there can be some apparent benefit from it if a person is a carbo type, but again, if you’re doing anything in excess, if you’re carbo type, even if coffee is not going to be that destructive to your body, it will still cause a physical addiction because it is a drug. (And) so, that’s why people that try to stop drinking coffee they have withdraw symptoms, they have headaches, because the body has kind of created a dependency on it.

Mark: Yes, for sure. Emma asks, “Does caffeine affect the gut?”

Michael: Well, again, it certainly can and it goes back to the issues of the individual. A lot of people say that when they drink coffee, they have a bowel movement or coffee will induce peristaltic function. I’m sure it can for many people because the fact that coffee is a stimulant, and anything that stimulates the bowels is going to cause the bowels to release. But coffee is also a diuretic, coffee will also cause the excretion of numerous minerals and this is not necessarily a good thing. I’ve heard studies before that caffeine, specifically from coffee, will actually cause a doubling loss of your calcium everyday, in some occasions. (And) so, this is not a good thing if a person, especially, if a person has a greater need for calcium. Take for example if a fast oxidizing protein type who has an increase need for calcium is not getting enough calcium, is eating a very poor diet and is drinking coffee on top of that, that’s a recipe for disaster, I guarantee it. (And) at this point and stage of the game, there’s going to be significant mineral loss, there’s going to be mineral deficiencies, why is it that so many fast oxidizers complain of drinking coffee makes them jittery, anxious, nervous, it gives them a migraine, it gives them heart palpitations it’s because their metabolism is not designed for that type of a food. But other people have a totally different reaction to coffee. I guarantee you, everybody that’s listening to this call, do an interview of 10 different people and ask them what effect coffee has on their body, I guarantee you that you’re going to get very different reactions from people, in regards to how coffee affects them. How is that possible? It all goes back to the fact that everybody’s biologically unique. If a person has a fast oxidative metabolism, coffee’s going to destroy their metabolism, it’s going to enhance symptoms and can actually make their gut functions worse. But other people is not as bad because of the fact that coffee doesn’t have the same effect.

Mark: Wow, cool. But that’s a pretty good answer. (And) just to remember, a fast metabolizer is a protein type and a slow metabolizer is a carbo type, correct?

Michael: Correct.

Mark: Yes, and the other thing I would just like to get your thoughts on, get the full inspection of the issue, there have been some studies, I know Charles Pollock once talked about this a little bit, coffee drinkers live 5 years longer that non-coffee drinkers because the average person eating a western diet, it’s actually the only source of antioxidants that they can get. Obviously, I’m in total agree that we should fix the diet first and not rely on something like coffee for antioxidants but do you think there is any value as an antioxidant for coffee?

Michael: Well. there certainly are a lot of antioxidants in coffee. There’s a lot of antioxidants in chocolate. There’s actually more antioxidants in raw chocolate than there is in almost any other food. Raw chocolate has the highest ORAC value, which stands for Oxygen Rated Antioxidant Capacity. There’s something like, I don’t even know, 4500 ORAC per serving of raw chocolate. I want to talk about antioxidants for a moment, what is an antioxidant? Antioxidant is any type of a nutritional mineral, vitamin, substance, phytonutrient that prevents oxidative damage in the body. I don’t know personally the word antioxidant, there’s a better term that some doctors use antioxidants and this is anti-free radicals as a better term than antioxidant, because what antioxidants are really doing is that they are neutralizing the potentially damaging effect of free radicals in the body. Well, what is a free radical? A free radical is any atom or molecule with unpaired electron, right? So, what does that mean? That means that free radicals are everywhere. In fact, your body is incapable of living without free radicals. Your metabolism makes free radicals, it’s a necessary part of your metabolism, of cell function. You got to have a certain amount of free radicals. But the problem is if oxidation is out of control, if a person is an extreme fast oxidizer or an extreme low oxidizer, the likelihood that they have free radicals activity ensuing their tissues is going to be greater because of the fact that they’re cellular oxidation is out of control. So the most common and powerful antioxidants are the ones that maintain and support cell membrane structure such as Vitamin C, Vitamin E, selenium, those are the most essential antioxidants. Vitamin E particularly is the primary constituent of cell ??? but did you know that actually, probably the biggest antioxidant of them all is, that gets demonized by just about everybody, cholesterol. Cholesterol is an antioxidant and free radical scavenger. Cholesterol comprises all of the cell membranes of the body, meaning that it prevents the breakdown of those cell membranes. Visualize a cell. What is a cell? A cell is, draw a blubber in a piece of paper, that cell has a membrane, it has an outside wall, and then you got the nucleus, you got the mitochondria inside of the cell. So that cell membrane, that outer wall that cell needs to maintain a certain balance between permeability and stiffness. Cholesterol maintains the integrity of that cell membrane. So, if you got fatty acids, if you got free radicals ensuing in the body, oxidation out of control, cholesterol is going to be a powerful nutrient to protect the cell membrane from collapsing and from producing excess free radicals. That’s a powerful concept and it needs to be understood. So, the idea that you should drink coffee to get antioxidants from it, that’s a tertiary argument for the promotion of coffee when in fact that all foods that are found in their natural state contain significant amounts of antioxidants in them. Every vegetable contains large amounts of Vitamin C. Some vegetables even contain Vitamin E. High quality grass-fed beef is going to contain tremendous amounts of zinc and selenium and nutrients that are going to support maintain biological functions. So to say that we should be getting antioxidants from coffee, I mean, that’s a real stretch. Just because there’s antioxidants in coffee doesn’t necessarily mean that’s the best way to get it. But again, it all goes back to the individual, because how any nutrient, how any food behaves in the body is all dependent upon each individual’s metabolism.

Mark: Right, that’s a good answer. So, continue.

Michael: Well antioxidants are certainly very important and for some people, they’re more important than others. But understand that the function of antioxidants… there’s two kinds of antioxidants. Whoever’s listening here, you can start taking notes ‘cause this is good stuff. You have exogenous types of antioxidants which are all the food kind of antioxidants, Vitamin C, Vitamin E, selenium, cholesterol, zinc, you keep naming those phytonutrients, all the trace oxidants that we don’t even have names for, corseline, ???, polyphenols, adakins, all of those things, all have antioxidant capabilities. So all found in foods, those are exogenous forms of antioxidants. Then you have what we call indigenous antioxidants, and indigenous antioxidants are antioxidants that get produced by the body, the cells make 5 indigenous antioxidants and these are made by the body. These 5 antioxidants are glutathione, superoxide dismutate SOD, catalaze, alpha like folic acid, and the fifth one is coenzyme Q10. These antioxidants are what your cells make to protect yourselves from the harmful effects of heavy metals, chemicals, environmental pollutants, free radicals in the tissues, from the damage and destruction of all these carcinogens and from the destruction and breakdown of these carcinogens and free radicals can have on cell membranes. These five antioxidants are critical for maintaining health in every level in every stage of the game. Guess what?

Mark: I was going to say, just so like, a nutshell kind of statement on something like glutathione. This is an analogy given to me, I just want to see how it fits with you. It’s that for example free radicals, Vitamin C basically works one molecule of Vitamin C and one free radical they basically cancel each other out. But when you have something like glutathione, one molecule of glutathione will eradicate a thousand free radicals. So, like glutathione is a thousand times more potent if you can stimulate glutathione than something like Vitamin C. Is that analogy apt or does It need tweaking?

Michael: Well, it needs a little tweaking. Because the reality is no one nutrient or antioxidant exists independently in the body. Where is glutathione conjugated? It’s conjugated in the liver. It’s conjugated in the Phase 1 liver detoxification. But there’s other nutrients in Phase 1 liver detoxification that is essential as well in order for glutathione to be conjugated through the ??? P450. Vitamin C is actually a major constituent of liver detoxification Stage 1 and 2. And then you’ve got glutathione use in the Phase 2 pathway. (And) its conjugated with Methelation, Selenium in the Thianine, and Sulfur Neoacids are essential there. You’ve got all these different nutrients that are combining to basically enhance the liver’s ability to deliver cell’s ability to detoxify and to make glutathione more potent.  But in order to stimulate glutathione, you need Vitamin C. And you also need a whole variety of other nutrients as well. You can certainly take a ??? glutathione and slap it on your skin.  Or you can take another form of glutathione product. ???, glutathione patch or gel. It’s not necessarily helping your body to make more glutathione but it is certainly helping elevate the glutathione levels. But you should also be aware that your fundamental nutrition should also be intact. You should definitely be ramping up other nutrients as well if that’s your strategy. But it all goes back to the individual because the key thing to remember is it’s the tied all back together with the biochemical individuality and how we’re all unique. Certain individuals are weaker with their Phase 1 liver detoxification. (And) other individuals are weaker with their Phase 2 and stronger with their Phase 1. So that means certain individuals need a different nutritional protocol just to conjugated glutathione than other individuals do. That is something that you cannot get from a one size fits all nutrition plan. That is only something you can get from somebody who really knows the subject well enough to help you improve your health from a functional perspective.

Mark: Alright. Let me ask you this. How would you rectify adrenal health to someone? Would you give them certain supplements or would it mainly be down to nutrition?

Michael: It depends on the level of adrenal fatigue particularly. In order to assess if a person has adrenal fatigue to begin with or what stage of adrenal fatigue they’re in, it is essential to run a saliva-steroid hormone test to really gauge that information. That is the most effective way to get the actual numbers. (And) the protocol for somebody is very different among the population. The protocol for stage 1, 2 and 3 can be very different and there are individual considerations to be given within that. So I’m not just going to tell a person to take some bio identical ??? and progesterone and preg??? and tell them “Take this and then call me in the morning”, that’s not what you want to do. Again, that’s the same thing as going to a doctor and saying I’ve got a headache, here were going to throw this at you. Or I’ve got this particular symptom here I’m going to throw this drug at you. If you go to health store, I have this symptom and throw that at you. I’m looking at the ratio of progesterone and estrogen. I’m looking at all the hormone numbers to find out exactly what the precise number should be of bio identical hormones for each person. I might not even use the bio identical hormones with some people. I might completely negate it all together. (But) bio identical can certainly be of value; can certainly be very beneficial with some individuals with chronic states. But there are other things that could be of value as well. Such as certain glandular supplements can be of value, not only adrenal glandular but also other glandular as well that enhance different glands of the body. Because remember, the adrenal glands are being ??? signals in the body. The adrenal glands are under control by the sympathetic nervous system. (And) then you’ve got the HPA axis and HPT axis and all these different systems that all regulate the adrenal functions. You got also the pituitary, thyroid, the hypothalamus all these different things. (But) I tell you what, to make everything much simpler than that, to simplify everything. By understanding your fundamental type of metabolism, the rate with which your cells are making energy. The process of energy production in the cell is the only way that human body can make energy for all its biological functions. ATP, Adenosine triphosphate, the energy distribution, fat protein and carbohydrate is the strata for all biological functions, all biological energy in the body, including the adrenal gland, the thyroid, the brain, the nervous system. All of it is dependent on how is energy is being produced inside of the cell. If that energy is not being produced efficiently within the cell it is impossible for all the hormones in all the glands in the body to be succinctly working into doing what they should be doing. To simplify, you want a plan that’s tailored for each individual, looking into each their specific tendencies. I’m not going to make any recommendations based upon a one size fits all to anybody. It’s all going to be tailor made for each individual. For example working with somebody with deep stage 3 adrenal fatigue some cortisol level of 16 or very deep, also, extreme amount toxicity. ??? liver dysfunction, gut dysfunction. The adrenal’s not the only thing we’re going to look at.  We’re going to look at the whole spectrum of this person. We’re going to look at what they’re eating, their exercise routine, the supplements they’re body is in most need for. (And) then cutting out the things that aren’t making any sense and aren’t working for this person. To save this person some money from wasting their money on all these junk supplements that have no value to this person. So it all comes back to a functional model health care.

Mark: So let’s switch gears for a sec and talk about digestion. Poor digestion would often go undiagnosed. Would you agree with that statement?

Michael: Absolutely, without a doubt. Leaky gut is undiagnosed.

Mark: How would you diagnose someone with poor digestion?

Michael: First of all, when you’re talking about digestion, what is it that we’re talking about? What are the fundamental processes of digestion? Okay, so you’re looking at bacterial imbalance first of all. You’re looking at a number of factors; you’re looking at the stomach’s ability to produce hydrochloric acid. You’re looking at the liver’s ability to produce bile and bile acids. The third you’re looking at digestive enzymes being used to breakdown food and fourth you’re looking at the actual intestinal immunal globulance. You’re looking at the actual mucosal barrier itself. Whether or not that there is integrity in that mucosal barrier, the actual gut bacteria in all of that mucosal barrier that comprises all that bacteria. One thing I want to throw something at the listeners. Did you know that 80% of your immune system is found inside of the gastro intestinal tract? Your intestinal mucosa is actually the body’s number one line first defense against all pathogens. When you have any bacteria or pathogens that enter into the body, it is the intestinal immune system found in the mucosal barrier in the guts that lines the mouth to the anus, that is protecting the rest of the body from the potential harm that can be caused by the pathogen, by that bacteria. So, if a person has damaged to the intestinal mucosal barrier, or they have insufficient levels of hydrochloric acid being produced, or liver toxicity which is contributing to either very high levels of bile acids or very low bile acids being produced, their gut is going to shut down and they’re going to have multiple problems. And what they’re going to see is, and this something we’re seeing a lot with children today; were seeing intestinal bio???, we’re seeing extremely leaky gut. There are been medical studies that correlate directly with brain and cognitive function and gut health. 

Mark: Could you define leaky?

Michael: Leaky gut is basically when there in an insufficient amount of lacto bacteria inside of the gut which is the healthy bacteria, the benign and the essential part of the immune system. When that bacteria is either not present in high enough amounts or the actual mucous that is the barrier that holds all that stuff together, when that’s not working properly, you have toxins leaking back into the blood stream wreaking havoc in the cells of the body. That is, basically, in a nutshell a leaky gut. Basically, that can contribute to so many different problems. 

Mark: Are you leaning to selling this before?

Michael: There is a major connection between the gut and the brain. When you see all these children that are vaccinated with high amounts of mercury containing vaccination, I think the conventional medicine is recommending 16 vaccinations for the first 20 months of the child’s life. It’s unbelievable like that. I just worked with a client the other day, with her 3 year old son within the first 6 months of the child’s life; the child’s getting 16 vaccinations. And this child with an entire panel of doctor of GMPS heavy metal test to identify heavy metal. It was off the charts high level of mercury in this child. And this child has all kinds intestinal leaky gut symptoms as well as what you see a lot with children that are autistic. Folks, the rate of autism have reached epidemic proportions. One out of every 110 is autistic. This is a disease that did not exist 50 years ago and is primarily caused by the amount of poisons that we’re exposed to on a daily basis. From the amounts of heavy metal were either being injecting or ingesting and poor diet and poor lifestyle factors. There’s a correlations; in fact, you cannot separate the fact that leaky gut and autism spectrum disorder and attention deficit disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder and all these cognitive function type issues are so heavily caused by a very compromised intestinal mucosal immune system. (And) So by enhancing the intestinal mucosal barrier by supporting the normal intestinal immune function, there can be lot of good things that can happen. There’s a lot of healing that can be done. 

I’ll give you another example. So I work with a mother on Facebook, as I said I do have clients that I consult with all over the world. People that I work with are all over Australia, Europe, United Kingdom, here in the States, all over the world. The woman, from the United States contacted me in Facebook, I have a lot of clients that I work with on Facebook, contacted me wanting to do consultations. (And) she said, “My son, he’s 16 years old, he has intense intestinal cramping. He’s got to go home from school every day. In addition to this he has extreme anxiety and nervousness. His body temperature is very cold and he seems not to be gaining weight. And it seems to be always related to his intestinal cramps and anxiety.” So this whole picture put this think together for me. 

Michael: Well, I said, “Okay, I think what we need to do is we need to run laboratory tests to find out what’s really going on with your son.” (And) so, that’s what we did. We ran an intestinal mucosal barrier test and that revealed that his immunoglobulance, his gut, was really in bad shape. He had all kinds of pathogenic infections, he had Candida albakins, that’s another big one that you hear “everyone’s got Candida”, all kinds of gut hip symptoms coming out. (And) so, we ran a basic nutrition protocol for him, for 12-month protocol and then three months later I got a call from his mother and he is doing great. He never has cramps anymore, he’s gained some weight. He’s got more color in his face, he’s doing a heck of a lot better just three months. So, there’s a lot of great healing that can be done. But again it has to be tailored for each individual to really get a sense of what you’re doing, ‘cause you know what? You can spend thousands and thousands of dollars on nutritional supplements and you’ll never get any real progress or very minimal progress you’ll get, you’ll be lucky to get, to reverse the particular condition that you have by just going with random nutritional supplements randomly. But I’ll tell you this that if you do a protocol with me, if you run a series of tests, and actually get to the root of the problem, I’ll be able to eliminate for you wasting so much money on so many useless things and useless supplements that aren’t going to work for you just by simply identifying, “Hey, the cause of the problem is this, this or this. (And) if we address this, yes, you’re going to spend a little bit amount of money now but thinking three years from now, you’re not going to spend this money at all.” 

Mark: I’m actually going to ask you, is there a general supplement that you do recommend or is there a general supplements that you do give to people to support digestion?

Michael: Well, yes. I always recommend a good, very high quality therapeutic rate probiotic supplements for people with digestive problems, and that’s always something that has to be addressed. Even with probiotics, certain probiotics will tend to work better for some people not as well with other people. (And) so, if you go to a health food store, get a good 40$ or 50$ probiotic whatever you’re paying, you know, it may work, it may not actually work though, because your body may need more of those kind of probio strains and less you may need more ???, you may need more ???, or lactobifidus. So, there are a few probiotics that I’ve been working with really chronic cases that seem to be working well with everybody. One of the things is that getting them on a really high quality therapeutic strain, therapeutic great probiotic. That’s always something that’s going to be a benefit to somebody with intestinal issues. But there’s other thing as well, I’m not going to give this out because of the fact that the protocol really depends on certain results on a test but I will say that, the other thing that you could get somebody would be like a really good quality of multivitamin could be very beneficial. There’s definitely something  said about multivitamins, this could really help improve a person’s health in a number of different ways. The other thing I’d say is just supplementally, drinking high quality water. Just by getting water, this could be a huge improvement on your cells’ ability to hydrate. So many people are dehydrated. I’m going to jump around a little bit, I’m going to talk about hypertension, high blood pressure for a moment. 

People that have high blood pressure, often, almost all the time, they have fluid retention in their tissues, they got excess water retention. But guess what. These people are actually dehydrated, they don’t actually have enough water in their cells, they got too much water in their tissues, so, the water that were exposed on a daily basis, most of us is still drinking tap water which is poison or chlorinated municipally treated water which is really, really dangerous to the body and in no way supports gut health and in no way supports any human functions. I always recommend that everybody start consuming really high quality water. So those three things – high quality probiotic, really high quality multivitamins, high quality water – are three things I recommend everybody consume. In addition to high quality food that’s right for their type of metabolism that’s been tailored to their body’s unique biological needs. 

Mark: Excellent. Cool. 

The other question I have for you is can you tell me about the myth of acid versus alkaline nutrition?

Michael: All of us in the health world, and I’m sure you’re can to attest to this as well, there’s so many different myths out there that exists, not only about acid-alkaline nutrition but about so many different things in general. All of these information that we hear about in the health world seems to be so conflicting, so much of the information that we receive through the media, through medical studies, through nutritional schools of thought, all the thousands and thousands of different nutritional books that has been written over the past hundred years, so much of these information seems to be conflicting. This is exactly the case for acid-alkaline debate. One of the things I want to address particularly is that almost all schools of nutrition think that it’s good to be alkaline, it’s bad to be acidic. I can absolutely assure you, with certainty, that it’s absolutely not good to be too alkaline, just that it’s not good to be too acidic either. Both of those are pathological states, alkalosis and acidosis are both imbalances. When you’re in homeostasis, when you really achieve a high level, a high state of health, your body’s pH, you fluctuate very, very slightly, there’s very little movement. Your body is more or less at 7.46 range, but the more deregulated a person’s health, the more you see alkaline imbalances, the more you see acid imbalances. So to say that it is good to be alkaline, that’s a complete pile of hogwash. It is not good to be too alkaline. In fact, most people are too alkaline, and that’s their problem. (And) in fact, I’m also going to say that the relative ash of a food itself, the pH of the food itself, will not necessarily behave the same way inside of your body. Wow! That’s an important point isn’t it? Most nutritional schools of thought tell you that vegetables are alkalinizing, potassium-rich vegetables are alkalinizing. Nonsense, absolute nonsense. (And) the other thing that they’ll say is the best way to test your pH is by your saliva pH and your urine pH. I’ll tell you right now that your urine, your saliva pH are two of the least effective ways to identify you actual blood pH.

First of all, your urine and saliva pH contain the residue of your metabolism. Urine and saliva pH don’t reflect the actual cellular level in your blood when the cells uptook the nutrients and make energy and the pH in your blood. In fact, oftentimes, it is inversely related to that, some high alkaline saliva pH but actually be too acid. The blood could actually be too acid and conversely, could be the other way around. Plant foods that contain potassium, when you talk about acid and alkaline, what do you exactly talking about? I’ll tell you this, the more you start looking at this issue, the deeper you look at biochemistry. I spent hundreds of hours researching, understanding blood chemistry and the effect of how nutrients behave in the body. What I could tell you is this, is that there are numerous levels of pH in the body. You have intracellular pH, you have an extracellular pH, you have a tissue pH, you have a blood pH, you have a veinus blood pH, you have an arterial blood pH, you have a large intestine pH, you got a small intestine pH, you have a stomach pH, you’ve got all these different pH’s in the body and they all need to exist in some kind of range, differently. It’s neither desirable to be too acid or too alkaline. It is desirable to be pH balanced. Now how a food or a nutrient behaves in the body? Let’s say a person consumes a huge garden salad that’s very rich in the minerals potassium and magnesium. If that person is a fast oxidizer, they’ll already going to have a blood that tend to be too acidic. Meaning that, if they eat a high potassium meal, that is only going to contribute to higher levels of blood acidity. Wow! Isn’t that unbelievable? But it’s true. High levels of potassium in a glucogenic fast oxidizer will actually cause their blood to be even more acidic. But for other people, those potassium-rich vegetables will create an alkaline response. But again, it all depends on the individual. 

Mark: It’s very interesting that you bring out those points there. I didn’t know that the difference between a fast oxidizer and slow oxidizer, the different vegetables can obviously have different effect so that’s very interesting.

Michael: The thing is, again, all nutrients will behave differently in the body. When you eat a vegetable, it gets broken down into various vitamins and minerals but how those vitamins and minerals behave in the body is going to be dependent upon each individual. That’s basically what it comes down to.

Mark: For sure. What is the best way to develop an effective nutrition system for any person?

Michael: Well, the best way to identify what nutritional strategy a person needs, whether your health goal is to lose weight, to have more energy, to recover from an existing health condition, to prevent any type of health condition from arising in the future, if you want to practice preventive medicine, preventive health care, preventive nutrition or even if you have fitness routine or exercise routine, you want to improve your cardiovascular function, you want to improve your weight training, you want to be a better distance runner or better sprinter, the best thing to do, is to understand, first of all, that your body is unique to you and it operates in a way that is highly individual, and because of that, it requires very different nutrients in order to function at its peak. (And) a person will need a very, very different set of nutrients in order to achieve optimal health. What I strongly recommend everybody do is to consider that their body is unique to them and to look at their type of metabolism, how their cells are actually functioning. (And) it may as well be very important to look at other laboratory tests such as what we discussed today, certain hormone tests, certain blood function tests, maybe heavy metal tests and even interpreting blood chemistry in depth, looking all of these things pinpoint exactly what’s going on in the body and what foods, what nutrients that person needs in any given point in time. 

Mark: So do you have any final thoughts?

Michael: I would definitely suggest to people to nourish themselves properly and to really understand the profound effect and the profound impact that food and nutrients have inside of the body. Actually if you realize that the foods that you put in the body is actually biochemical fuel for how the systems in your body operate and function, if you can understand that, you can understand the importance of food specifically.

Mark: For sure. Finally, how can people get in touch with you?

Michael: I am based at Santa Cruz, California in the United States, living in sunny Santa Cruz, right off the Pacific Ocean, but I have clients that I work with because of the access of internet and Skype. Mark, I’m really thankful that we were able to do this call through Skype today and you interviewed me, thank you.

Mark: Thank you. Thank you so much. I know I’m going to get good feedbacks from this because you’ve definitely dropped some bombs today and providing people with information that what I say all about this show is,  about no nonsense and you definitely done that today so from me and all my listeners we thank you.

Michael: My pleasure. I really enjoyed the call today. If people want to get in touch with me, they can either view my website, www.metabolichealing.com and you can also find me through Facebook, I’m very active, I post daily, I have a daily blog that I post through Facebook with, you can find me through Michael McEvoy Nutrition through Facebook. I would actually like to extend an offer to all of your listeners Mark, that if any of your listeners are interested in consultation work with me, whatever they decide to do, I’ll knock 10% off at whatever services that they chose to do as a discount just for being listeners of yours. 

Mark: That’s a very good deal. I’ll definitely jump on that because you’ll going to find out a lot of things and as I’ve said before, it’s going to save you a lot of time and effort in the long run because you will not be getting a shotgun approach to nutrition, you’ll get it done the right way, first off.

Well, thanks again Michael. I look forward to seeing your ventures in the future.

Michael: Thanks for the call. Talk to you soon.

Mark: For more information, check out www.maximusmark.com. For information about Michael, go to www.metabolichealing.com.

Thanks for listening.

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