continually eating foods that don't love you back is like staying in a toxic relationship and wondering why you're still miserable but avoiding foods that don't love you back isn't restrictive it's self-respect the best-selling author and host the number one Health and Wellness podcast on purpose with Jay Shetty hey everyone welcome back to on purpose the number one Health podcast in the world thanks to each and every single
one of you that come back every week to listen learn and grow now if you've been listening lately you've been hearing me repeat this Mantra happy healthy and healing this is something I've been repeating to myself a lot recently I'm happy I'm healthy I'm healing it's been making a big difference in my life and I know that you're here because you want to be happy you want to be healthy and you want to heal now today's guest is
someone who talks about that in such a phenomenal way and everything from the gut to the brain to what we digest every day to our feelings and our traumas and how they affect the chemicals inside of our body and our mind I'm talking about
doctor will call a leading functional medicine expert who consults people around the globe starting one of the first functional medicine Telehealth centers in the world over a decade ago named one of the top 50 functional and
integrative doctors in the nation Dr will call provides a functional medicine approach for thyroid issues autoimmune conditions hormonal imbalances digestive disorders and brain problems Dr will call is also the host of the popular the art of being well podcast make sure you check it out and the New York New York Times best-selling author of intuitive fasting the inflammation spectrum and the brand new book gut feelings healing
the shame-fueled relationship between what you eat and how you feel if you don't have that book yeah I want you to go in order right now gut feelings we are going to put the link in the show notes make sure you grab a copy as you're listening right now or watching uh Dr will call thank you for being here I need you to be my hype man everybody that's a great way to start your day oh thank you man thank you well well you I
always say to my guests I'm like you had to live all of that so you actually had to do it thanks uh but I also can I call you will of course yeah I just want to say for everyone who's watching will took a flight this morning from
Pittsburgh to New York City to be on the show I appreciate him so much for doing that I really really value that I love connecting with people in person yeah I'm happy to be here yeah I and I can't wait to dive in that's good I was just
saying to you earlier that our community our audience here on purpose really loves learning and really loves getting really practical applicable tools when it comes to their health uh I think one of the things that I by the way I love the name of the new book like gut feelings I think the gut has often been so ignored in the conversation yeah we often talk about how do you feel up here what's your head saying yeah and then we
feel about the heart versus the head and I feel like the gut was forgotten for so long why is the gut so important in that conversation and why should it not be ignored you're right and even I think we've come a long way in the past 12
years since I've been in functional medicine people growing awareness but we're still scratching the surface I realize I'm probably talking to more of the health nerds and it's definitely not the general population so we have a far
way to go and our gut is a major part of our health but you don't necessarily have to have extreme digestive symptoms to have underlying gut components to why you feel the way that you do so your gut and brain are actually formed from the same fetal tissue so when babies are growing in their mother's womb they're formed from that same fetal tissue and they're inextricably linked for the rest of our lives through what's known as the
gut brain Axis or the connection between the gut and the Brain 95 of Serotonin are happy neurotransmitter it's made in the gut stored in the gut fifty percent of dopamine is made in the gut stored in the gut if you think about it the
intestines kind of even resemble the brain and the vagus nerve is what really innervates and connects both the gut and the Brain researchers call the gut the second brain we have to understand to understand so much of what ales modern
society we have to understand gut health and it's no coincidence that most of probably your listeners would know Hippocrates the father of modern medicine he said all disease begins in the gut well if disease begins in the gut then so does healing begin in the gut and it's also home to 75 percent of the immune system inflammation is a product of the immune system and you look at the epidemic rise of autoimmune
problems and really inflammation is the commonality between just about every health problem autoimmune issues metabolic issues hormonal problems to re really research looking at what's known as the cytokine model of cognitive
function how inflammation impacts how our brains work so things like anxiety and depression fatigue all have the roots in not only inflammation but also the gut brain connection so it is the far-reaching implications of this is
vast we have to understand it to deal with it and what are some of the biggest mistakes we're making when it comes to our gut like what are the things that I think you would say that we're just so unaware of or unsure about that are causing gut challenges I think the interesting thing about gut issues is that when you figure out that you have something you're concerned about yeah and you start talking to your friend or
someone you realize everyone has it but no one talks about it right right it's not like one of those things that people share very openly right but you start recognizing wow everyone has digestive issues everyone's having some sort of
inflammation everyone's having this kind of thing so what are some of the habits traits that you think have kind of become widespread that is actually taking us down this road that maybe we're just not aware of enough I'm
always telling my patients is just because something's common doesn't necessarily mean it's normal just because it's your everyday doesn't mean you should settle for it and I really can't tell you how many times when I'm talking to somebody online and we're going through their systems of their body and they have these aha moments of whoa I thought that was just me I thought that was just my lot in life because I have it every day but I think
they need to we as a human race need to take inventory and kind of get in our bodies or know that you teach about this so eloquently of just being aware and mindful of how our body works because it maybe you're every day but it doesn't
mean to be normalized so I mean we could talk about digestion and you're right people don't want to talk about it it's very normal for me to talk about poop at my office it's like and then I look across the Telehealth across the the
internet and I realize it's not as normal as I think it is I see their partner like uh we've never talked about this before you know uh we get real real fast but it's important because it's a window into probably lots of other
things in your body but it's normal to have one to two we say snakes a day as far as bowel movements are concerned on the Bristol chart many people go two three days without a normal bowel movement or it's always loose or always
really strained and like pebbles that's not normal your bowel movements are a window into your overall health so we start there but then we look at energy levels throughout your day do you need lots of you know sugar and caffeine to get through the day that's not normal but that's a lot of people's everyday certainly uh do you have ravenous Cravings of food do you have trouble losing weight do you have hair loss do
you have skin problems these are all like we call in functional medicine these are like check engine lights check engine lights on but why the body's telling us something we have to go upstream or get to the root cause of why you have the problem in the first place yeah and I think for a lot of people it becomes hard because I found for a long time as well that as I became more aware of these things yeah and as I sort off to help
it was really difficult to find good personalized advice because you see everyone say well you have to drink this one thing you have to do this one thing right it becomes this fad and something's helping some things don't
and you don't know how they're all interconnected and I feel like people get quite stuck and that's why I love books like yours and podcasts like yours because people can kind of follow along and go okay I'm dealing with this challenge
um one of the things that I love that you talked about was the process you call shameflammation and I wanted to talk about how can one begin to confront that so she inflammation I you know you know this as writing books
and educating people and speaking you'll wake up in the middle of the night like oh that's a good way of conveying what I'm trying to say because you see it play out in people's lives all the time I see it on an hourly basis when I'm
Consulting patients people that eat really clean they are working out they're doing all the wellness stuff they go to erwan they they do all the things you're supposed to do that's me by the way so I'm one of those people that I'm like I eat cleaner than 99 of my friends I work out I stay healthy I don't drink alcohol I don't smoke like I have a very clean life and I still had high forms of information I work with Mona Sharma
identity yeah Simone is my health card I love her and so and my wife is my health coach too she's been a dietitian and nutritionist and ayurvedic uh Health practitioner so my wife and Mona kind of tag team on my life you're a good hands
I'm very fortunate but you know so yeah let's talk about that because I'm actually that person I'm that person who's I'm like guys I pretty much don't have any bad habits yeah so that's why shamefulness yeah so that's 99 of my
patients as well you're not alone is it you have very erudite people that are trying to do the best things that are probably most of them better off than they would be if they weren't doing these things but there's these missing pieces and what I explore with my patients and what I get to talk about in gut feelings is these missing physiological and psychological missing links to what is keeping you stuck at that Plateau what is keeping you back
from leveling up how you want to feel so shameflammation is the is Convergence of the mental emotional and the physical and really the conversation that I get to have with patients and I also get to have in this book and gut feelings is the fact that mental health is not separate from physical health mental health is physical health and our brain is a part of our body just as much as anything else is and as I mentioned
earlier the implications of the vagus nerve the gut brain axis and inflammation and its role in our health but our thoughts and emotions on one end of that coin stress shame trauma even intergenerational trauma that esoteric non-measurable stuff impacts the measurable meaning it will Spike inflammation levels it'll impact how your Vegas new work when our neighbors vagus nerve Works it'll impact how your hormones are expressed so we have to
look at what I call for my patients shameflammation and what is our relationship with food what is our relationship with our body what is our relationship ship with ourselves and start shifting paradigms around how we live life because you could you could be doing amazing things for your health eating good foods working out but if you're going into it with such a sense of dread and Obsession and you know something that I say in the book is you
can't heal a body you hate you cannot shame your way into Health many people try to and they're doing good things that even makes sense on paper but they're going into it with such a Negative sense of intention and yeah intention it's sabotaging it's producing a completely opposite result so I want to bring good things but let's do it with a good intention and that's what shameflammation that concept is all about yeah understood what are some of
the quick things that if anyone's thinking I'm feeling inflammation what are some of the things in our physical like things that we're consuming that are likely to cause inflammation yeah so there's the physiological and the psychological again so the physiological let's go on that side yes so that it starts the foods that we eat I mean every food we eat either feeds inflammation or or fights it there's there's no neutral food there's no
Switzerland meal it's it's serving your physiology it's doing something it's maybe in incremental waste maybe in negligible ways but it's some in very major ways so we have to take inventory of every food we eat other every meal is another opportunity to bring inflammation up or bring inflammation levels down so what I call the inflammatory core four are the four Foods or food ingredients that are most likely to disrupt that gut microbiome
all the trillions of bacteria in our gut that that regulate our inflammation levels regulate hormones regulate our brain and neurotransmitters so that's going to be gluten containing grains would be number one and I have a nuanced conversation about this there are better versions of gluten you can get Ancient Grains you can get sourdough bread to ferments some of this a lot of the foods that I'm going to be talking about here
are what we've done to the food not necessarily the food in and of itself but for the sake of Simplicity gluten containing grains looking at that in your life number two would be industrial seed oils things like soybean oil
vegetable oil canola oil palm oil palm oil exactly yeah I've just been taking off a lot of those because that was somewhere where we hadn't got to yet so I'm off palm oil canola oil I can only eat things in olive oil avocado oil at
the moment love it yeah thanks Mona yeah yeah yeah thanks for that conventional Dairy I would say that and added sugar which is no surprise I'm short of people but even the nice sounding euphemisms for sugar you know that are hidden very
cleverly on labels that they may be better for you options and I'm not demonizing this entire sugar industry but I'm saying look at the amount of added grams of sugar you're consuming in a day you may be surprised so decreasing
that and if I could make the core for a plus one I would add alcohol to that list is people oftentimes they eat cleaner they clean up their diet they know about the inflammatory core4 but they keep in alcohol in their life as like oh that's my one Vice but they are kept back their guts are still struggling their mental health is still struggling their energy levels their weight loss resistance still struggling so I would at least
look at alcohol as a role into these as well because it's becoming quite normalized within the wellness world specifically and at the end of the day there's no healthy amount of alcohol there are better for you options certainly and I have to be pragmatic but it's something that I would take into consideration yeah I know that's great I mean that's so practical and I think everyone is listening to that I think we've all
heard about a friend I'm gluten-free too but I've heard about friends being gluten-free and this and that and we often laugh about these things yeah but it's it's interesting to hear just how simple it can be right these are not
huge changes none of these changes are like hard to find necessarily these things are becoming more and more common at least at a grocery store yeah and we can start making healthier choices in a simple way uh let's talk a big bit about
gut microbiome because so I recently had a surgery and I had to take uh Tramadol and a bunch of other stuff to like painkillers to try and deal with the pain and and Mona was like all right we're gonna have to start with your
microbiome all over again after this is all over what is that relationship between uh painkillers and all of that with our gut microbiome as well like where's the connection there well I mean your gut is just a major regulator of so many
different Pathways in the body so it is such a central role but when you're taking either NSAIDs or antibiotics or other pain medications they could really do a number on your gut uh they it can really impact the gut lining as well as the microbiome Metropolis this got Garden within within our gastrointestinal system so that doesn't mean we shouldn't be on those medications when they're properly prescribed there's surgeries where you
need to be on things like that but just as Modena said what are we going to do afterwards what's sort of the long game here to start supporting gut health again because pragmatically those medications just like certain foods and
either everything we do in life influences this gut Garden so there's some things that hurt it more than others and especially people that are on medication some medications long term specifically antibiotics and some pain
pills as well they really can do quite good damage on the gut that we have to work on rehabilitating over time yeah and so that's just something to be conscious of as well it's something to be conscious of talk with your doctor about because oftentimes there isn't a conversation about gut health when it's no take this see later but I would just want to be empowered as a patient and be informed as to your options and have
Choice yeah and you've talked a bit about how the connection between alcohol and intuition and I was intrigued by that like what what have you seen as the connection there that you well well I think again as I mentioned earlier I
think alcohol people don't want to go there right that's how they socialize that's how they hang out with their friends that's how they wind down they say they deal with the background anxiousness and they don't really want
to see how this drink can impact how they feel and how they truly can know what their body loves when their body doesn't love so alcohol can impact both you your body on both the physiological and the psychological level it's going to impact your gut microbiome certainly what's it doing what's happening it can do a few things it's going to disrupt the microbiomes the microbiome is depending on the study that you look at
it's upwards of 100 trillion bacteria and we have about 10 trillion human cells so we are all about 10 times more bacteria than human and when we drink alcohol it is really especially people that are consistently drinking it is quite disruptive to this microbiome balance and it can breed things like bacterial overgrowth people a lot of the times people that I that I talk to they have something called sibo small intestinal bacterial overgrowth and
alcohol is a component certainly not the only driver of that but it is a disrupter and breeder of bacterial overgrowth by messing up the balance the of this microbiome component and it also can increase intestinal permeability or
a increase what they call leaky gut syndrome it's uh when the things are passing through the gut that shouldn't be able to pass through the gut like undigested food proteins bacterial toxins called lipopolysaccharides and
then that's the seminal event that a lot of things when the immune system sees undigested food and bacterial toxins in the bloodstream then there's something called molecular mimicry it's sort of the the case of mistaken identity when the immune system starts this Cascade of inflammation and that's what can trigger autoimmunity when the immune system loses recognition of self which I think that's happening on a physical level but
then you think about what's happening on a mental emotional spiritual level with so many people of losing recognition of self and we have this epidemic rise of autoimmune conditions 50 million Americans at very least have an autoimmune disease Millions more are somewhere on that autoimmune inflammation Spectrum so alcohol is implication in that is it really is something that allows it can be a trigger for a lot of people not only on
a mental emotional level we know but I think people's relationship with alcohol exists on a spectrum um and you may not be a full-blown alcoholic people need to look at themselves and say how am I using this tool in my life and is it in alignment with how I want to live my life is it in alignment with how I want to feel yeah that's that's a great message to to get people to reflect on yeah uh what that was the physiological what are some of
the psychological things to be aware of yeah well I think the research around stress is very fascinating I mean we know when your body is in a state of stress and look the stress is normal it is good in measured amounts what I'm
talking about here is chronic stress it's that I'm being chased by this Tiger but there's no tiger many people are stuck in various degrees of sympathetic fight-or-flight stressed State and their bodies in overdrive all the time and we
need a balance we need the sympathetic nervous system just as much as we need the parasympathetic the resting the digesting mechanism but many people are just an over accentuation of a sympathetic nervous system response and
cortisol levels coming up because their body is in that fight or flight mode cortisol is not inherently bad just like inflammation is not inherently bad we need inflammation to fight off viruses and bacteria and heal wounds but it's
the chronic inflammation that's a problem same with chronic stress cortisol being high for too long is not good that is cortisol by itself is an endogenous immunosuppressant which means it's a natural anti-inflammatory so
inflammation comes up cortisol comes up to try to Abate and attenuate the higher inflammation levels and to help you to actually get you out of that stressed state but it's just unsustainable because there's no real threat for many
people but they're not sleeping well they are eating out of alignment with what's working for their body and they are I would say unhealthy relationships with technology and all of this will be what researchers call an evolutionary
mismatch there's a genetic epigenetic mismatch our genetics haven't changed in 10 000 years but yeah our world has changed very dramatically in a very finite period of time when you're putting that into context with the
totality of human history so if our genetics haven't changed in 10 000 years just think of how much how world has changed in a few Generations whether it's the foods we eat or the foods we're not eating our stress levels our exposure to toxins Collective and individual trauma all of these things are the Confluence of factors The Perfect Storm of variables that are giving rise to these inflammatory autoimmune brain health
mental health problems so the psychological side of how I see these stressors play out in people's lives is chronic stress but it's a lot more nebulous right it's a lot more Insidious because it's easy to say Don't eat those four Foods because they're going to spike inflammation it's another thing to say well don't stress and then they're stressing about not stressing so yeah you have to really like bring context and practical tools and what I
call them in the book is metaphysical meals because you need to treat these acts of Stillness just like you would Meal Time yes which I know we're on the same page here it's like you have to just like you show up for breakfast lunch and dinner and or you show up to the gym you need to start feeding your head in your heart just as much as you feed your body and it's very much a part of healing and you have to deal with
both sides of the coin both the physiological and the psychological so stress and whether that be bringing healthy boundaries in or having a better relationship with technology or prioritizing your asleep or bringing in
self-care practices in your life that are nourishing to you that are feeding you on a mental emotional level yeah that's just one but there are you know many levels to that but we have to look at both sides yeah no definitely thank
you so much for walking us through those and when if anyone's like me while I'm listening to that whenever I sit down with someone who's an X-Men this space I'm like there's a part of you that just gets more stressed because you go oh God I'm doing all the wrong things right like and I'm sure people are listening or watching right at home or at work or if you're traveling and you're going of course I need to change so much and I
think that's kind of where our problems perpetuate because we go okay I need to change everything and then we end up changing nothing and I think that's always the issue right when you feel you want to change everything you end up changing nothing and as people are listening to this like where's a good place for someone to start like and I'm sure you you work with so many people on this journey and I always say to people like I don't
think we have the real crisis we have in the world today is a crisis of habits and conditioning because most people I know know what they want to change or know who they want to be or how they want to change they just can't make it through that path right they can't stick with it so where's a good place for someone to strive they're listening right now and they're saying Dr will call I can hear that I have a ton of those physiological and
psychological challenges I need to figure this out where does someone stop I would first start with your headspace because it is you do not have to be perfect quote unquote you don't have to have it all together to start making positive action in your life and if you're waiting for the right time it's now because there's always going to be some reason why we should put it off because there's a vacation a holiday around the corner
there's a birthday party there's a whatever holiday around the corner and that is many people have that paralysis of analysis oh I'll start at the New Year oh I'll start at this date but the reality is I find that there's
exceptions to that rule of maybe there's a certain date within the next few weeks that's bet that's practical for you but if you're looking at really putting it out in the calendar I very rarely see people need to do that because I need
you to realize that how are we going to navigate through those times because there's always going to be something yes yeah and I would really what I say is just lean into it yeah you don't have to have it all figure it out because what I find is when you get the ball rolling and people get their head a little bit above water they want to keep doing the things that make them feel good yeah and they start to realize what I call in the book and
for my patients I call it food piece and body piece because I want people to not come into this Wellness thing whether improve their energy or improve their digestion or improve their brain health I want them to see this as a form
of self-respect using self-care as a form of self-respect because it's the sort of toxic dieting culture that tells us well you can't have that there's a lot of Shame around that right that's like very much breeding ground for
inflammation that's the antithesis of sustainable Wellness the Genesis of sustainable Wellness is really realizing that you get to do things that make you feel good yeah and I said recently on social media that I think I think is the paradigm
shift that I want to say here is that the continually eating foods that don't love you back is like staying in a toxic relationship and wondering why you're still miserable but avoiding foods that don't love you
back isn't restrictive it's self-respect and that's the if you want to talk about the first thing it's having that pivotal paradigm shift to say look Oh I thought it was about all these things I can't have no have whatever you want but I want people to love feeling great more than they thought they were going to miss something that dimmed their light so from that place of self-respect I find people make better choices for
their life because if they you know the analogy that I use in the book is like if you realized you were a Lamborghini and not an old beat up jalopy how would that impact how you fueled yourself owners of luxury Vehicles know how to take care of their car they don't need to be taught that they're parking it way in the back they are cleaning it they're fueling it appropriately many people see themselves as the old lemon and not the
luxury car and that's the paradigm shift that I want people to have because then all the rest falls into place they don't have to be perfect because they just want to continue to pick themselves up and they have their why is bigger than
their excuses that is such a good point I'm so glad that you went there because there were a few points that I just want to unpack for everyone the first was you said to start with the headspace and I think that's really powerful and
everyone who's listened on purpose right now is already naturally doing that by being here is because if you're stressed you eat badly and when you eat badly you get more stressed and you get inflamed and then everything else that you're saying then you get more stress and it's just this never-ending cycle and so when you figure out what's going on up here and then you can start changing what's happening here it's it's a great way so
I think that was a fantastic point the second thing that I really took away from that is this idea of self-respect and how we see ourselves and it took me a long time to recognize what that really meant personally so I grew up addicted to chocolate I I ate and sugar obviously so I ate a chocolate bar a chocolate biscuit a chocolate yogurt and a chocolate ice cream pretty much every day while I was a kid up until when I went to University where I
would eat a chocolate bar and a like a liter of sprite every single day like that got me through University and I was healthy and I was lean and you know whatever that meant and he thought I'm fine and then you start to see things not catch up with you but you start to see the impact of certain things and I think people still have this in there well I just want to have fun I just want to enjoy life and I don't have to think
about this and I think what's so interesting is what you're saying is that that actually isn't enjoyment because it's damaging and when you start realizing that the fun you're having is actually not fun genuinely for what's happening inside you just can't see that yeah and I think that took me a long time to connect that it's not like starving yourself from what you want it's actually like your body doesn't actually want that yeah which takes so
long to kind of fix our mind because we're so conditioned to believe that oh I love pizza and I love this and I love them it's like well you don't you've just been conditioned through your tastes like I always talk about one of my friends uh their kids look forward to blueberries and grapes as their reward because that's how they've been brought up like for them like blueberries are like Sour Patch Kids right right like that's their
Sour Patch Kid was for me it was Sour Patch Kids which are terrible for me and I still love them and when I go to the theaters my wife really has to like and so my wife was the one who helped me change my habits when she met me she goes you can't eat chocolate every day like you can't have that she was like once a week you can't have every day and and it took me ages and then and then we got there and then she replaced it with monk fruit
and I used to eat these cacao nibs sweetened with monk for and now I've got to a point where if I'm if I'm at home I'm barely I don't remove refined sugars from my diet and it took a long process and now I found actually when I go back and have an indulgent dessert it doesn't taste as good to me and that was a huge Jennifer I was like oh wow it's not and sometimes I'll still crave like a burger a really like juicy Friedberg and I'm plant-based
so I'm talking about plant-based burgers and when I have it I'll actually not enjoy the feeling afterwards I'm like I actually didn't miss that at all yeah and so I don't know if that aligns with what you've been saying but I was just trying to give a very genuine reflection of dealing with a lot of these vices myself absolutely and I think a lot of people can resonate with that and like that's that repairing that gut feelings
connection that I'm talking about you know the gut and the feelings there's things that were changing on a physiological level when you start cleaning up your diet eating nutrient dense foods regulating your blood sugar lowering inflammation levels supporting your gut health and then also when you make that connection you go back to those foods and you may not like them at all I hear that many times for patients and they're
shocked like these things that they loved things that they thought they couldn't live without they could they say I could take it or leave it yeah yeah that's food peace it's like that you're not bound by that food if you
want to have it have it but I would just say use all food as a mindfulness tool yeah eat it consciously did it love you back maybe it didn't love you back but you love socializing with your friends or it brought you some enjoyment in the
moment and it was worth the payoff of maybe the bloating or the inflammation then eat it and move on shame is worse than any food yeah but maybe you take it and eat it mindfully and realize afterwards no it actually wasn't worth
it so maybe next time I'll have less of it or I won't have it at all because like you said like cacao nibs and monk fruit there's so many better options that taste really freaking amazing absolutely yeah you don't have to eat
like a boring rabbit to be healthy absolutely yeah I've been loving like the who kitchen bars as well so good so good like that's one of my the sad parts of New York City is Hugh kitchen closed down I mean yeah remember that place yeah the pandemic took it out oh wow their bars yeah they're still alive and strong with the chocolate bars yeah yeah they're talking about it's great but yeah I feel like they're you're so right
that there are so many other Alternatives so many other places that that you can discover new things and even spending time with friends like recently I've been trying to and of course there's there's access here and things that are in your city but I found like like my wife she'll go to a workout class with a lot of her friends and that's like their way of socializing together or me and my wife will go to a cold plunge together or go find an
infrared sauna together or something like that where even doing health and wellness with friends has actually become a fun way of socializing where it was easier to be like oh let's just talk out for dinner which by the way I still
love to do and it's not that we don't do it but it's the idea of there are so many alternative ways to spend time together where your friendship actually improves too oh yeah because now you're not just doing dinner in a movie every
time so yeah I I think there's I just think the idea of experimenting is healthy yeah whether you went to a cold lunch and enjoyed it or not that's up to you but the idea that you went and tried something new with your friends yeah I promise you whatever you do trying something new with the people you love is going to be a Winnie the way yeah right absolutely and I think that that's uh key Point too when people want to
start making healthy choices they're afraid of it changing their what they do for fun yeah or changing their relationships like you mentioned alcohol well everything I do with my friends is centered around unhealthy food and
alcohol what's that going to look like look if they're your true friends they're going to be there for you and I've seen so many people start bringing the healthy food to the party and really being a light it's my wife how are you
basically describing my life and people are like wait what this is healthy what the heck because it it really shifts hearts and Minds around this or maybe you go to the cold plunge and they never they thought it was weird at first yeah right now they all want to do it people want to feel good it's just just because it's been done over and over again doesn't mean you have to keep doing it like start leveling up and be the leader
for your friend group yeah because it really everyone thanked you in the long term it for sure for sure and I've seen whole family and friend groups change because of one person deciding I want to live a different way I want to start
doing things that love me back yeah trust me in the beginning my male ego with my wife telling me like my wife would see me like grab a chocolate by putting my mouth just give me the look and everyone will be like Jay you are
you literally gonna let her do that I'm like she's actually doing it for my own good like I feel so much happier yeah since I've let go you know of refined sugar like it's made such a big difference in my life and I've still got a long way to go I'm working on lots of different things but yeah no I I love that I wanted to ask you because I feel like you're one of the few people actually talks about this connection how are hormones the internal
communication system for the body because I feel like hormones are not talked about enough and there's not enough of a conversation about them but that's been something you've been leading sure and that's part of the the
psychological so sorry the physiological side of things that the psychological impact so hormones are kind of akin to biochemical emails and if you look at your body as this sort of Corporation the different systems of the body are
not always communicating appropriately they're either communicating too much because the body's in that sympathetic nervous system overdrive whereas cortisol levels is being really secreted quite a bit you have we have What's called the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal axis so this is something that we can quantify on with patients via labs and see cortisol levels and cortisol circadian rhythm issues cortisol is too high when it should be
low it should be a nice s-shaped curve or it's always low or it's always high and it's that imbalance that breaking of the Goldilocks principle it's homeostasis it's you don't want hormones too high you don't want hormones too low but you want them High when they should be High when they should be low just like our gut microbiome bacteria just like inflammation levels it's all subject to this law of the of Goldilocks principle so it's really
um hormones are a major influencer in how we want to feel but both the physiological and the psychological impact how hormones are expressed so if somebody has an unhealthy gut if they have things like chronic infections I
deal a lot with people that have chronic lyme disease and people that have mold toxicity uh quite often because they have different genetic variants that make them more sensitive to things like autoimmune problems so we can find and
measure this on Labs higher levels of mold toxins Lyme bacteria different environmental toxins like glyphosate in the body that's shifting their nervous system in that stress State as well that's going to really impact hormones tremendously so that I could measure hormones on a hormonal test which I would and you'll see cortisol levels all off you'll see typically estrogen progesterone testosterone very low sometimes estrogen will be high with
estrogen dominance but for the most part when you're in a sympathetic fight or flight stressed say most hormones will be sluggish they'll be on the low end of normal or really low but then if you just saw the hormones happening in a
vacuum you'd think well it's a hormonal problem well no there's a bigger context as to why the hormones were off in the first place so that's why context matters when it comes to all these different aspects of Health but
supporting hormones are certainly imperative when you're talking about somebody's mood when you talk about somebody's gut feelings hormones are those biochemical emails so I have to measure them I have to optimize them thyroid is another major player too because many people they're just getting basic thyroid Labs they're not really getting complex thyroid Labs so we have to really look at the complexity of thyroid hormone
metabolism but is this something that like at least and I'm asking is someone who was born and raised in London obviously like how much of this is accessible in the United States or across the world like how do people ask for these Labs where do they get them because I was one of those people for years that got checkups done and got my blood tests done and things like that and they'd always be like Jay you're fine and I was like but
I don't feel fine like yeah I know something's going on and they'll be like no you maybe you're a bit stressed and I'm like yeah I'm sure I am but it's more that like I can feel something and it took till I started working with
darshan at next health I don't know if you know next Health I've heard of them yeah next out to the incredible facility in LA but again it's it's something that requires like access and it's expensive and it's not you know it's not easy it's
in La it's in Miami it's not something that everyone can access and so I go well how does someone get those tests and the same as me I was just told for ages I was told oh maybe you're stressed you know just just relax a little bit
and I'm like no I don't feel right so how yeah how does someone get those tests how does someone get that detail I know volume is a great source the gut test that they send to your house and you do the stool test but yeah how do
people get access to that yeah I think we're living in a time where there's still a massive Gap but to democratize this where it should be but in the past 12 plus years I've seen a lot improving then and the reality is most of the thyroid labs and the hormonal tests actually are conventional tests meaning they're mainstream tests that if you ask your doctor your conventional pcpg they will do it they have to do it they can
do it they can decline doing it but if you have a decent relationship with your doctor and if it's clinically appropriate they should be able to run this panel even if it's slightly outside of what their routine Labs because look the conventional model of care is largely trained to diagnose the disease and match it with the medication so it's the extra Labs the other labs that we run in functional medicine is slightly
Superfluous to a conventional medicine doctor because if it's not going to change the treatment why would they run it the for example to use the thyroid as an example they just need a TSH a thyroid stimulating hormone and maybe a
T4 to give the person that levothyroxine that Synthroid that pharmaceutical thyroid replacement hormone okay so that's all that they need so if we want to look at all the other conventional thyroid labs they are available but if
the end result's still going to be that medication then why would they run it so I understand it from a model side of things but these are conventional tests most of the ones that I'm talking about are a very widely accessible and offset
through insurance or completely covered by insurance they just have to be ran and coded appropriately and be clinically appropriate for you so full thyroid panel something called thyroid stimulating hormone like I mentioned T4
but then what we would add in functional medicine is total T3 something called free T3 free t for and then what are called thyroid antibodies the leading drivers of low thyroid function in the west are autoimmune in nature Hashimoto's disease or autoimmune thyroiditis is the most common autoimmune disease as a whole let alone the most common driver of low thyroid function so you have to run thyroid peroxidase and thyroglobulin to see
because it's in that case it's not truly a primary thyroid problem the thyroid problem is because the immune system has lost recognition of self again and is attacking it so and Graves disease is the other type of autoimmune thyroid problem and then I have to run what's called reverse T3 which in states of inflammation your body can make these basically thyroid break molecules that slow down thyroid function so the point
being it's a lot more complex than just a TSH and to make it more accessible and you know I mean that's what we've done for the past 12 years is try to make this as democratized as it can be to decentralize this so people can have
agency over their health and be empowered with this information it's their body they have a right to know so we have different Telehealth models to make it accessible for people and there's a lot of direct to Consumer labs
to be honest with you even if you don't have access to a functional medicine doctor or if you don't want a functional medicine doctor there are great Labs there's one called inside tracker I have no connection to these Brands inside tracker and base are two that I'm I've had them on my podcast before they are brilliant and you don't need a doctor for for it so you could just order it yourself I think it's just good to know
right this is so useful because I think it's good to a know what to ask for what to look for I think as someone I consider myself someone who's fairly uneducated uh as a recipient as a patient of these things yeah because
until you study yourself I would say until I started studying myself and reading myself and interviewing people that I wanted to learn from I had a very limited understanding because that's how I grew up and so I think for me at least
I find it very interesting to be like okay well these are the tests I need to ask for these are the tests I can do because even the other thing I want to ask you is what are the most missed healthy food intolerances because that's a whole nother thing that I think we're not aware of so the the inflammatory core4 that I mentioned that's an obvious one but I wouldn't even call those healthy foods right I mean most of them
are really processed refined boxed foods but I would say the healthy food sensitivities or food intolerance is the food reactions and this is really pertinent to most of the people that I talk to because they are eating better
than most people but they're still struggling so the number one and let me bring a caveat to all of these Foods it's not necessarily these Foods fault the heart of what I do in functional medicine is bio-individuality and even
healthy foods what works for one person may not be right for you and I would say also what serves you today and what your body loves now if we're actually fixing the problem of why you had the problem in the first case then over time you'll be able to do more things so I'm going to say these foods with that preface because don't be fearful of these Foods don't become orthorexic but just a massive problem within Wellness that's orthorexia sort
of disordered eating around healthy foods that is not what I'm trying to convey here so that's important to know but also for the people that are struggling with these issues it could be a massive game changer for them because
they may be thinking oh I've been doing what I thought was healthy but I was unintentionally sabotaging my health so number one people that have sibo small intestinal bacterial overgrowth that I mentioned it's linked to things like
anxiety and depression it's linked with other autoimmune problems it's also the leading cause of things like IBS irritable bowel syndrome it's linked to bloating like uncomfortable bloating people will tell me they feel like they're nine months pregnant even though they're not pregnant as far as uncomfortable bloating and things like acid reflux and GERD so there are there's a class of foods that are known as higher FODMAP Foods fodmaps is an
acronym that stands for uh fermentable oligosaccharides disaccharides monosaccharides and polyolys which is just a verbose way of saying fermentable sugars so things like onions and garlic really healthy foods right cruciferous vegetables like broccoli uh asparagus brussels sprouts really healthy foods but they're all higher in these fermentable sugars so people that are thinking they're doing the good things with sibo I've done that for so long
yeah onions and garlic and they're getting so bloated they're getting so much gastrointestinal upset so look is the problem you get to heal the sibo so you can bring those high fodmaps in yes so fodmaps would be a lot for our people that are probably a lot of our listeners right now it's just people that are very well read but they're still struggling with these problems they're eating healthier but they're still struggling
so look at higher fodmaps and potentially look at sibo as the driver of that FODMAP intolerance and then I mentioning a lot of uh people that have mold toxicity mycotoxins is what they're called higher mold foods can perpetuate
flare-ups too so a lot of grains even you know healthy grains like gluten can beam and gluten-free grains can be higher in mold coffee can be hiring mode wine other alcohols can be higher in mold and people that have a sensitized
immune system should look if they have a mold problem look at foods that could potentially contain mold and then another one that I see are higher histamines foods that are higher histamines or histamine liberators or
histamine releasing foods can definitely be problematic for people that have sibo these gastrointestinal gut problems and people that have I mean there's other symptoms of histamine intolerance like anxiety because your gut and brain this
gut feelings connection again here people that have lots of Kombucha people that have lots of bone broth people have lots of fermented pickled foods even avocados can be higher in histamines so these are the gray areas that we need to look at because that's why you need to diagnose yourself effectively because yeah and or if you're doing all the things and still struggling these are the areas you need to look at to say
what are these check engine lights in my life why is my body reacting to kombucha it's not kombucha's fault but is it the body telling me that this is releasing histamines right now and then I have to ask the question why do I have histamine
intolerance in the first place which unsolved trauma can be part of that sibo mold toxins can be a part of that chronic lyme the psychological and the physiological so this is what I see sadly play out in people's lives but
it's only sad until you find out and give it when you give them answers then it's anything but sad because then it says aha Mona like wow I can do something about it I mean that's exactly how I feel like everything you'd be talking about like this is the journey I've been on because it's it's that feeling of I feel healthy to that feeling of recognizing wow there's so much about health that I did not understand then getting accurate tests that
actually tell you what's going on because I think there's a lot of like oh you just need a bit of this so you need a bit of that and that doesn't work like the accurate testing is such an important part of this because then the recommendations can be healthier yeah I think a lot of recommendations are just based on basic symptoms and that doesn't necessarily always go the right way and then of course consistency in the
recommendation that feels like the the full Journey absolutely and I think look if what you're doing is working for you and you feel great don't look for problems where there isn't any of course but I think we have an epidemic rise of
people that are doing all the things that are really compliant people that are doing things that doctors are telling them to do but they're still spinning their wheels that's what I'm talking about here we have to do better
here so I think that these These are what I find clinically to be missing links for people then they fix a few things and it really kind of allows their body to take their health to the next level and and start feeling the way
they want to feel and when you start repairing these things whether it's repairing their gut health or regulating their nervous system or whatever we're talking about here all of those Foods I just made mentioned almost all of them
can be reintroduced so temporarily maybe avoid them but longer term let's fix the problem that drove it in the first place yeah everyone make sure that you grab the book gut feelings and subscribe to the art of being well podcast uh by will uh Dr Wilco I was just wanted to ask you is there anything that you haven't shared on today or something that is on your heart your mind or in your gut that you feel like you need to you need to
share that we haven't touched a point no man I really appreciate the opportunity it's been great we'll have to have you on the art of being well I'd love to I'd love to but no this has been so useful because I think you've given us a very 360 degree approach of so many different aspects of our health of course everyone can read the book got feelings to go in depth on all of this and listen to the podcast to understand more about
everything we've discussed today and I hope this is the first of many times we'll sit down and get to do this but thank you so much we end every episode with a final five which are the fast five rounds so you have to answer these
in one word or one sentence or maximum so you can do one sentence all right one word in one sentence kind of nervous let's go let's go for it okay uh question number one what's the best health advice you've ever received or
heard it's what I actually said earlier it's one that I always telling myself and I'm telling my patients is you can't heal a body you hate it's a pointer to work that we need to do as reframing our relationship with our body and with food and with Wellness itself love that question number two what's the worst piece of Health advice you've ever heard or received well the antithesis of that that somehow you're going to shame your
way into wellness it's not going to work yeah okay uh question number three something you used to value for your health but you don't anymore probably taking tons of supplements I have a simplified version I know what I feel the best on
um so I to me food is first supplements are a great bonus targeted 100 but food is primary so I think streamlining and figuring what are the biggest needle movers for myself is definitely that for me that's a great answer uh question
number four what's your current purpose in life it's hopefully being a light for God and it is and what that means for me is just hopefully staying in my Lane in the best of ways and just enabling me to bring hope to people that are really struggling with silent health problems and I get to see it play out all the time this is more than a sentence but yeah I love what they get to do that's beautiful uh Fifth and final question if you could create
one law that everyone in the world had to follow what would it be kind and think before you speak a health law have any health nurse that will help people as social diseases right a social relationship disorders bring about physical disorders too but if you want something a little bit more on a micro level I would say Allah you said Allah to to people should live by uh I would say use food eat foods that love you back and find out what they are
be curious about what they are because when you focus on that the rest of the stuff kind of is put into perspective yeah I love that Dr will call everyone the book is called gut feelings the podcast is called the art of being well uh Dr will call on Instagram as well make sure you follow him everyone who's been watching or listening make sure that you tag me and Dr willcole on Instagram on tick tock on Twitter let us
know what resonated with you what you're going to try what you're going to try and shift remember you don't have to change everything all at once she's going to try to put one thing into practice and watch how your life changes uh thank you so much for being here so grateful for you and I love this conversation likewise if you love this episode you'll enjoy my interview with Dr Daniel Layman on how to change your life by changing your brain