What's Poppin everybody? Welcome to episode 176 of the genius life.
What's going on everybody? Welcome to another episode of the show. I'm your host Max Luke of your FileMaker Health Science, journalist, and author of The New York Times best-selling book, genius foods, and the genius life. Hope everybody had a fantastic Father's Day a meditative Juneteenth and that you are ready for today's episode of the show, because my guest is mr. Mike muscle, and he really brings it, he's a good friend of mine, he is
Super smart, dude. Well-versed in all things Healthy Living. He earned his bachelor's in biology from Western Washington University in 2006 and completed his Master's in clinical nutrition from the University of Bridgeport in 2015. He's a graduate of the institute for functional medicine, supplying functional medicine and clinical practice. He hosts high-intensity Health podcast and he's the author of the belly fat. Affect the real secret about how your diet, intestinal health and gut, bacteria, help you burn fat.
Guys, today's episode is packed with actionable information. He really brings leading-edge science to the table in a concise format that can be easily utilized for the prevention of chronic disease among the many things that we're going to cover. We discuss the New Frontier of personalized nutrition. And why neither Mike nor I promote calorie counting even though it can work we'll do a deep dive into the science of saunas for better brain and cardiovascular health. And my cancers the
Age old question, which is better, infrared, or hot sauna. And finally we discuss mouth taping at night. As a means to not only improve overall Sleep Quality, but to treat sleep disorder breathing, which many people suffer from. So, listen through all the way to the end. Again Mike brings the knowledge and getting together with him was like getting to jam out with a musician that you've long admired, so strap on your seatbelts and get ready for the ride, this episode of the show.
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That's spelled Jo o VV dot coms, genius life, and apply my code genius, live to your qualifying order, exclusions. Apply apply limited time only, but check them out and let me know what you think. All right guys, we're seconds away from my chat with the one and only Mike muscle. He's amazing before we get into it. A little housekeeping guys. We have a YouTube channel youtube.com Max Luke of ear. We're putting up content three to four days a week clips from past episodes mashups with some of our most fascinating.
And new episodes every Wednesday. So make sure you head over to youtube.com Max Luca Veer and hit that subscribe button. Again that is youtube.com slash maxilla Vivir. We are going Full Speed Ahead, full steam ahead with our video content, so make sure that you're subscribed to us over at YouTube and I'll see you over there. And now, without further Ado, here is my chat with the brilliant. Mike muscle. Here we go, Mike muscle, welcome to the show.
Go, brother. How's it going? It's great great
to be in LA with you. It's been a while since I've been down here. But good to connect, man.
I know I just want to thank you off the top because you you've sort of you've supported me from very early on you've had me on your show. High intensity, Health twice. Yeah and I was just getting started the first time I came on right? And and yeah, so it's been really fun to, you know, have made friends with you. Become your become your homie really early on, and just want to say, I appreciate all the support that you've given me.
Over here is my pleasure. You share, great info. People love that. I think that show Even though we'd like kind of it was older cameras and everything like that in 2015. I mean, I think it's at like 80 thousand views or something. That's doing well. So yeah sure. Great information man. So I love to connect and clap and talk science and talk shop and help people out. Yeah,
I think I might have told you this, but the reason I think I initially reached out to you because I was, I was actually, I became a fan of yours because I saw the way that you articulated something very technical and you had such a Grace
Ace and you had such great verbal fluency in the way that you articulated. I think it was. I think I remember what it was. It was about how coconut oil or saturated fat can help sometimes fairy lipopolysaccharide, right? Endotoxin directly across the gut wall. I saw you like art saying that, like, in a conference video or something, and I was just like this guy, knows what's up, and I reached out and yeah. And so, that's cool. That's awesome. What have you been up to? You know what, I
made a lot of different things.
But yeah, we can talk about the lip a polysaccharide, I think that's interesting because that was kind of this purported mechanism by which eating processed food, especially highly, processed carbs, and fats together, kind of causes this. Chronic low-grade inflammation, that's characteristic of obesity and metabolic disease. But it's interesting that research has been kind of quiet. So I want to ask you like have you been following that story? Because this guy patchers candy out of Belgium or Brussels really kind of pioneer that and then it sort of went dark. I haven't heard much about it and we hear more now about think about Tyrion presidency.
Hi and ackerman's IAM using a philia. And these kind of, you know, these keystone species, that help stabilize the diversity and therefore the, the stability of the ecosystem. But yeah, that that LPS research is kind of interesting and I don't know, I just got so infatuated with it, I wrote a book about it and all that, but I haven't even like last four years. I haven't heard anything about it. So I don't.
Yeah. What is what is lipopolysaccharide for listeners? Who are hearing that? I mean, that's a mouthful rights, but in a nutshell. What is that? Yeah,
so in short, it's LPS. So this is a, this is an appendage. So, if
Think about a dog, you know, dog has a tail. There's different tail lengths, all bacteria have these different appendages and gram-negative bacteria which are one way to characterize our cell membrane. Have this lip a polysaccharide appendage and that tends to really ignite our innate immune system. So, when that comes across are selectively permeable, one cell thick, you know, endothelial later in the gut epithelial layer, that ignites our innate immune system. And this is a problem in many different chronic, diseases is chronic low-grade inflammation.
We see it now. It's talked about in the media, a lot with regards to susceptibility to covid. Because the more chronically inflamed you are, the more stimulated this innate immune system is the the more sort of susceptible you are to Chronic inflammatory diseases or acute infections. So yeah, LPS. And it's used in various studies to to actually induce depression to induce mild cognitive impairment and memory loss and that feeling of like when you feel sick, you know, part of that is the common cold.
You know more porous barriers and and the ensuing innate immune system activation so different. Cytokines, these are kind of chemical Messengers. I'm sure you've talked about these on the show but things like tnf-alpha and interleukin 6 AR Rahman stably increased right after LPS whether you get it because we all have LPS in our guts about 5 grams enough to kill us. And so if we were to get stabbed in our small intestine, we would get sepsis and died, right? But a lot the so that's the extreme end of this spectrum but a lot of people are sort of on the other
Other side and getting low-grade sepsis by going to McDonald's by buying processed food, right? So if you eat something with a lot of processed carbs and processed fats together, think of all the bad foods I like pizza too, but right like pizza. And they do studies with this french fries Donuts. You think about all these things, carbs and fats together is a recipe to induce this low-grade sepsis which causes people to feel crappy and, you know, exacerbate, chronic inflammation.
So these are these are the kinds of foods that people are eating all the
time and they're
Sixty percent of the calories that your average American consumes on a daily basis comes from fast, food pizza, frozen dinners things like
that, right bread? Cookies, bread
cookie fans. Yeah, it's
crazy. Yeah, so it's frightening to think about, but it's not just food to alcohol as much as I think you and I both share an affinity for red wine. I love red wine but that feeling of having a hangover is actually endotoxemia low-grade endotoxemia. Wow! There was a imagine being a student for one of their was
One study where they recruited college kids and said, okay, have three to five shots in a short period of time and they measured blood alcohol levels and it was parallel to increase in blood, alcohol paralleled, the levels of gram-negative bacteria in their bloodstream and then there was a subsequent inflammatory response. So you think like there's these anti hangover remedies that are like taurine and you know, electrolytes, it's also inflammatory. So if you know that feeling where we've all drinking too much, most people listening, have you just feel like crap? You can't think you can't process that is
Actually Pro. And that's inflammation from partly, from the ethanol, poisoning, and acetaldehyde and all that. But also from endotoxin. So,
well, is there a safe way to drink like is there anything that you can drink concurrently with the alcohol or eat, you know, with the alcohol so that you don't
get that. So yes, I think red wine because this is where the polyphenols kind of come in and I know these are contested right? Because if you talk to anyone and I like the carnivore diet to but people will say polyphenols don't do anything there.
Not necessary, but they help mitigate this endotoxemia. So I'm partial to red wine personally, but I think if you just binge drink, it's just it comes with the territory, right? So if you're going to binge drink, then prioritize got Health. Maybe take some probiotics, maybe take some L-glutamine when you get home some glutathione things like that. But if you're feeling really buzzed, just know that you're going to pay the price, maybe you can exercise or go for a walk, you know, the next day maybe go in the sauna things like that
to just sort of quell that inflammation. Have you ever tried?
Liposomal glutathione. I have yeah stuff works but it's it would maybe it works but it also it definitely it wakes you up because of the smell and The Taste. It's a very pungent, got a very soft, very tall furry kind of kind of smell.
That's interesting. I mean glutathione, it's pretty fascinating and just NAC, you know, there's some good research on that, it's really affordable. You know, a couple grams you can do pretty well with that.
Yeah, and I see is what the precursor to
glutathione. Yeah, an asset sale system. So it's just an amino acid but the
Glutathione tripeptide is is glutamine, Glycine and cysteine. So and the rate-limiting steps in making glutathione is the cysteine moiety. So that's why sulfur containing foods, you know, if you think garlic onions things like that they can help facilitate glutathione your action. Yeah,
I love that and glutathione the mother of all antioxidants, the your body's Master detoxifier, you make it in your own body, but there probably are some indications and I'm sure, you know, better than I that might warrant inclusion of exogenous.
I'll go to Taiwan in your in your diet.
Yeah, I mean, just things like we're here in La if we were to, you know, I don't want to discourage outdoor activity whatsoever, but people that run near freeways, it's a stress and a burden, due to diesel fuel exhaust and all of these different chemicals in the environment. So if you can and again, I don't want to discourage people because I love exercise and it's so beneficial for many physiologic functions, but exercising near a freeway, for example, will deplete glutathione excessive alcohol consumption, things like that. There's genetic testing you can do to look at the rate, limiting step.
Oops and glutathione as transferase and these different enzymes that you can do seeking Health offers a good one, so you can check that out and it's called the strategy and test. Yeah, so that's interesting. So yeah, but a simple test actually have you reviewed Labs on your podcast before and kind of talked about what work.
My owns. No never know. I'd be interested in doing that
though. That'd be kind of cool. Well, I mean, one simple test that a lot of people can do or go back and look at their blood work. Last time they had it, it's part of the so-called liver function tests lfts,
There's a St. Alt + GT. So, GT, is the rate limiting step that kind of helps with that, we talked about liposomal glutathione and n-acetyl cysteine, which is the amino acid, cysteine, ggt helps catalyze. That cysteine moiety onto make glutathione. So, when that starts to creep up, it's a, it's a surrogate sort of proxy to suggest that. Hey, your body. It doesn't mean you're deficient. It just means that you, you have increased demand for glutathione so you have to figure out what it was. That is that mold, is that heavy metals is?
That cadmium unfiltered water or like, we talked about air pollution, things like that. So and a lot of people, a lot of doctors actually don't even run, GG T because there are taught in their training. So if you're not an alcoholic, we don't need to run this. But GT is a really, really important. There's been a lot of different scientists were all throughout the world that have found. This correlates with total body, heavy metal accumulation, persistent organic pollutants. All the flame returns that are in our couches bedding. Pillows and all that stuff and clothing. So yeah, it's
Important thing and I think an affordable way for people to surrogate. Lessee hate, you know, should I be investing? $40 in liposomal glutathione? Do I need an AC, a lot of people though. They have liver enzymes that are increasing
very interesting. I had a headache. The other day that I just couldn't shake, I was like, you know, Downing turmeric capsules and fish oil and all the things that I knew had a, you know, up an anti-inflammatory effect, but it just wouldn't go away. So, I ended up popping some Acetaminophen which I rarely do. I rarely
You know, like, I've got to be in pretty severe pain for me too or or, you know, it's got to be warranted. Yeah, for me to, like, reach for a pharmaceutical, typically, it's got to be warranted, you know? Like I'm very hesitant to, and, of course, no Stigma on people who require them. But just for me, generally, for, like a headache, I wouldn't typically bother, you know, using a, even an over over-the-counter drug, but I took an acetaminophen and because of course I know that acetaminophen depletes liver glutathione, I then took a pact.
Of the liposomal smart go to town. I have no idea to what degree the dose of acetaminophen that I took would do that to me, but just to sort of like by myself, added Insurance. Totally. Yeah,
yeah. I mean it's scary how many people take Tylenol and and don't think about that they drink with Tylenol but it's really really bad, you know. I don't know the molecular mechanisms as do I, but it is pretty hepatotoxic.
Yeah, so yeah, that's a good. Like
if you need to take Tylenol for whatever reason, you definitely should take Nico glutathione.
For
sure. Well, the issue with acetaminophen is that if I recall correctly, the therapeutic dose and the toxic dose are are actually pretty close together like dangerously close together and acetaminophen overdoses are actually a significant cause of people visiting the emergency room and so, yeah, it is definitely a drug that you want to be that you want to be careful with cautious have.
Yeah, but it's funny. It's like some of our friends that aren't as in tune with natural health like they poppies.
All the time. Like I go, skiing everywhere was some friends, who are all Physicians, by the way, and at the end of the ski day, they're popping Tylenol and ibuprofen and I'm like, and they're drinking. And I'm like, you know, I'm not going to say any names but I'm like you guys like this. You shouldn't be doing this like even if it's an NSAID like say ibuprofen or Advil things like that like those are challenging for the GI barrier, right? Those induce intestinal permeability low-grade sepsis like we were just talking about with LPS. So yeah and all these things around exercise because we were like, oh yeah,
You just take them after skiing, your legs are sore, but you're you're sort of blunting that post-exercise response and you're so you're going to be maybe worse than x. A, we're not recovered but it's amazing and I feel for these people and I just don't know, was it? An education issue is an awareness issue where they don't understand that this connection between sort of over the counter medicines in, you know, harming our health. Yeah, it's
crazy. Yeah. Well, this is your first time on my, on my show, which is kind of mind-blowing, because we've been friends for such a long time, and I've been in
Admirer of your work but for listeners who are not familiar with you and your backstory, let's go into that a little bit. So yeah. What are what? You know, what's your educational background? I know you've got, you know, Advanced like credentials and stuff which, you know, I don't have. But, but yeah, I appreciate those. And also like what are the kinds of things that you like to focus on in with high intensity Health?
Sure, yeah. Great question. So I have a bachelor's degree in biology and
And I wanted to go to med school, but I didn't believe in myself. Like, when I was going through for well, like before undergrad, not to get to back into all this. Like I didn't pay attention in school and I was into cars and motorcycles and all that. So I got, I love to figure out how things work and then one school started clicking in college. I want to know how the body works. So that's just kind of where I come from. But yeah, it's interesting like, like are so, you know, I just love building things and all that, like I built a sauna we can talk about that later, you know. Yeah, traditional Finnish sauna with a wood buyer.
Wood-Fired stoves that gets up like 230 degrees but anyway, then I went on and got a master's degree in nutrition and I started selling supplements to doctors so a lot of people don't realize that there's this practitioner Channel. That's a billion dollar annual industry where, as you know, for compounding pharmacist for example, that sell bioidentical hormones or integrative or holistic, or functional medicine, oriented medical doctors, they sell supplements. So, I started working, when I didn't know what the hell I was talking about at age 24, after I got my bachelor's.
Agree. So that's why I learned. A lot of stuff is just like, literally having customers doctors that are customers doing really cool stuff, taught me. Lab work in different things. And yeah. So that's where it came from and then I started high-intensity health because I realized that as great as doctors are at working with patients, they kind of suck at marketing and I was like, if I bring you on my show and I can mark it, you better than you can mark it you with all due respect, then you will be a better customer of mine and that's kind of how it started actually, which is kind of crazy smart and then, I just, you know, can I just
These conversations, like we're having right here and people need them because they're, they get, like, 10 minutes were there their Primary Care? Doc, nowadays, unfortunately. So, anyway, that's how it started. But yeah, Sookie do fasting at Ava G sauna, you know, anything regarding immune health. So that's what we share on our Channel.
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You have a great now back to my chat with Mike sometimes I see you online, butting heads with the like the fitness Community which you know it's kind of fun because we're definitely into fitness but there's like a whole community that I think is somewhat at odds with like the more longevity focused, holistic, health focused, philosophy that guides I think that primarily is what guide our work, right? But yeah, like the calories in calories out like I call him.
Lets you know like those kinds of guys and you kind of butt heads with them. What's that? What is that
about? Yeah, it's a good question. I mean, like you said, there's kind of I think it's a mindset that the book mindset by Carol dweck from Stanford, have you heard about that? So, you know, people that have an open mindset where as you know they're open to new ideas and learning information and challenging their own beliefs and I think you and I do a good job of that. We all have biases and that's just part of Being Human. But then you have people who and if you look at their training. So so in
School. I mean we're taught you know, fat loss is very it's a very simple mathematical calculation but what the backstory was what you're not really taught about is adaptive thermogenesis. So if you and I go on an intermittent fast or prolong fast, we know energy, our immune. Sorry, our metabolism is going to slow down like thyroid hormone. Adrenaline noradrenaline will decrease or resting metabolic rate is going to change and that happens in this short acute term situation. If we fast or we cut calories, or if we go on a 12-week, low calorie.
Like our metabolism will change. And so you have these people that are constantly count, you know, Lorraine their calories, they're over-exercising and they still. Now they have like 800 calories a day and they're gaining weight. Like, what the hell is going on? So that a lot of people that have degrees in, you know, base in nutritional Sciences, dietetics things like that. They're sort of its indelibly Inked in their thought processes because their professors, in this professor of the conference. And all of that, it's really geared towards this energy, balance model of obesity.
And they sort of make fun of people like you and I who believed in hormones in the idea that if you and I a tart, the same Foods we've been eating and someone gives us exogenous insulin or corticosteroids we will gain weight, right? It's not like we are re partitioning, those hormones will redirect where that energy is being stored and so they kind of make fun of people like you and us and call us like you know Ki Tardes for be like and ketogenic diets were things like that. So I don't know. I I don't know how it started online.
On Instagram and everything and I kind of backed out of that a little bit. But yeah, there is definitely two schools of thought and I think like anything in life, like some of the calories obviously matter, right? But we can't eat 7,000 calories a day and not exercising and lose weight,
right? And you can gain weight on a ketogenic diet. If you're consuming more calories than you're burning every day, right? The calories out side of the
equation, a lot of people do because they think, oh, it's Quito. So there's this natural sort of human fallacy. So if I tell you that that this these cookies are gluten free and organic guess.
You're going to eat more of them F in less, you know, if you these two and Studies have actually looked at this University of Michigan, when people we label thing as something as keto or paleo or gluten-free, we didn't we more because we make this concession that all this food. It doesn't count as much or I already exercise today or things like that. So I can understand where people are coming with that. But, you know, there's, there's a happy medium here between what's going on metabolically or monali. And I've seen many physician friends for example, that
On a medication. For whether it's psoriasis, a relation, whatever gain weight, due to the hormone changes of that medication. Yeah, there's this, happy medium. But what I found is is a lot of people in this mainstream nutrition research, the generally appeal to Authority a lot, and they refer to, will this study this meta-analysis showed. Now, a lot of these studies, you know, tracking exactly how much people eat in a given day unless you're in, you know, a tank not, you know,
There where they account for every little movement and every little, you know, crumb that you eat. It's hard to sort of do these real world studies. And that's why I think what we see in the real world, where people say, I start intermittent fasting a cut out my carbs and I lose weight. You see that a lot and they don't necessarily those people don't always count calories, they're just eating less processed crap. So anyway I think there's a happy balance between the two but yeah. It is contentious you know people in the calorie Camp. Don't don't like people to talk about their hormonal model in the sort of insulin glucose media.
Obesity model. Yeah. I think the problem is that what people like us like to do is to offer strategies to real people and of course, you know, strategies are you know we write books about them, we make Instagram posts about them. I think the fallacy is that these calories Outlets as I like to refer to them, they make the mistake of of
Assuming that calories in calories out is a strategy and it's not a strategy, you know? It's not it's like it's as much of a strategy to weight loss as saying to get rich earn more than you spend every month and that's not a strategy that's like the mathematical truth. And I'm not I'm not refuting that. So that's why, you know, I don't necessarily disagree with the people who tend to focus more on calories is that I think they're putting their focus on the wrong place in the wrong place.
People need more guidance, right? Because
Guidance, what I see, you know, because I followed all sorts of people on social right and you get to see me to sort of, with Instagram stories, what they're doing behind the scenes of the groceries and, and people that sort of follow these calories, sort of think macros. They think that they can afford the 400 calorie muffin or the web. So it creates this weird mindset where, oh, I've I haven't hit my target of macros today, so therefore I'm going to go get a doughnut, go get a Twinkie or whatever. And I think that just like you said, it's not, it's not really a good strategy and
And whereas if you just make some and I think the 80/20 principle is great, you know, when it come like you can still have a donut periodically, but it's every single day because it affords, your Macros. I don't think that's a long-term solution for health, right? And and the other challenge with with some of those calories Ellis's, they sort of assume because you have a low body fat that therefore you're also healthy whereas where our message is like, okay, you know, low body fat and muscle tone is it's just part. It's a proxy like it is good but that's just one piece of the puzzle.
What about chronological age versus biological age? We talk about telomeres and, you know, Horvath clocks and things like that. So, that's the other part of it, whereas people that focus on looking at their Labs, you know, maybe start fasting things like that. They're not only improving their body composition but they're improving their health which would reduce risk of disease or optimize their brain functioning things like that. Yeah. And to
their credit, there are probably people and I'm not, you know, I'm not I guess I'm not familiar with them but there probably are people in the in the keto.
Oh space that are highly dogmatic you know that probably do at times imply that calories don't matter as long as you're on a ketogenic diet. Yeah and say egregious things yes I agree just think so there there's that too. Right. Yeah I think the I mean one of the things that I really appreciate about you and which is what I also try to embody in my work is a message of balance and reason and practicality. You know, you don't have to be on a low-carb diet. You can be on a low fat diet but the problem with that, in my view is that
What low-fat means
in the United States of America is snot is the snackwell's diet. You know, it's low fat, Uber processed grain products with the red heart healthy logo on them. And so, I think that that's just, that can be a recipe for disaster. I think it's a lot easier and more practical. And this is, this might be my bias coming out, right? But from my own personal experience in the experience, you know, from from those that I've interacted with, who have also, you know, told me that it works from. And, of course, the thousands of messages that over time having put out a book,
Look. And, you know, the book is gone out, you know, to the corners of the world, you know, I get messages from people, so I'm not a clinician, but I do have that kind of experience, where, you know, it's worked for others out there that say that logo, you know, when they eat low carb, they're able to cut out, you know, pretty nutrient-poor Foods, energy, rich, rich foods and, and they focus on real fat containing Whole Foods and, and yeah, that it checks all the other boxes of being just generally good for your health as well. And it's more satiating,
that leads. It's
Like, if you're eating avocados, nuts eggs, you know, you put a little butter in your coffee, like you're just not snacking like you're a full and that that's what I think is nice, especially with so many people working from home right now. The refrigerator's just like two steps away. For a lot of people write in, and we've seen the data now coming out with lockdowns and all that. A lot of people gained weight, you know, and in the overweight and obese gained more weight than the people who weren't overweight and obese Studies have shown that, right? So that's for me like you said, you can do low fat for sure.
Like, you can do vegan, you can you can figure out, healthy ways to construct your eating program, and for the most part, hit your health goals and body composition goals. But there's, I think additional benefits to say doing it low-carbon. Again, that's probably my bias coming out, but cognitively preserving the brain. We know that ketones. Like you talked about many times in the Studies have shown, you know, this really help prevent mild cognitive impairment and age-related cognitive decline from the energetic standpoint. And I think from a longevity standpoint to you know, and it lends itself
To making fasting easier. So, if you're on a low fat diet, good luck fasting like you don't. Yeah, that's just my personal experience. And I've heard that from many peoples of like, if I go without food for more than 12 hours, like I start to shake, I start like, I need food, I'm like hangry, where as you or I you know, like yesterday I basically didn't eat anything until 7 p.m. right now. I was fine. Like I was on an airplane, talking to people with my daughter. Like, you know, it wasn't a wreck whereas ten years ago, I couldn't have done that when I was, you know, eating more of kind of a low carb, high protein, bodybuilding Style,
Diet, there was a study that just came out. Did you catch it? Where it found that glycemic, dips postprandial, glycemic, dips, or correlated to increased calorie consumption throughout the day which is a, you know, which which I think offers a rationale to minimize glycemic variability in your diet again, this doesn't refute calories in calories out but it does provide a rationale that suggest you know that eating high carb irrespective of calories might actually
Cause us to eat more calories. It's
interesting. Yeah, I didn't see that. Ought to check
that out. Yeah, it was isn't it just came out over the past week and yeah? And you know, it's also important to say that people have differing glycemic. Even even people that are metabolically healthy have differing glycemic responses to a given food, right? There, was that microbiome study a couple of years ago. That found that white bread or I forget what it was bananas. Or something like that into healthy people, depending on their micro might be. They're gonna
Gut microbiota composition had completely different glycemic responses with the same bolus of carbohydrate, isn't that fascinating? And so interesting. Yeah,
even with with lean versus obese twins, like similar foods
will cause different changes
based upon, you know, how diverse were lack of diversity. They have in their microbiome from say antibiotic use for breastfeeding duration. There were several studies on that, but that to me is fascinating and that's, and you bring up a great point, you know, talking about glycemic variability, I don't see anyone in this Eco space. Like you call him calorie zealot.
Talking about looking at post-meal glucose talking about measuring ketones or anything like that. Whereas once you start fasting and intermittent fasting or eating a low carb diet, you start to become curious, like okay well what is my glucose and continuous glucose monitor utilization which is now you know a lot of people have access to this with levels or nutria sensing. There's so many different tools so it opens up your door to really sort of personalizing your diet and and that's what you hit on. You know, with centrally prescriptive, like, okay, just eat less calories than you burn your
Like okay, well, how can I personalize it more? Like what if that doesn't work or what if that stops working because, you know, our metabolism today, you know, in April probably will change seasonally like it's going to be different in the fall animals. Model Studies have shown that, like with bears, they start to accumulate more body fat and hormonal e things shift. So, I think that's just another thing to consider.
Well, because I think that when that, when that advice falls on the ears of somebody who's consuming the standard American diet to just that, it's all just about
Calories in calories out and to just moderate your portions they're going to moderate their portions, they're going to moderate what they're already eating. They're going to eat smaller portions of what they're already eating and what they're already eating is 60% ultra-processed foods and so with that is to me as a just a recipe for hunger and misery. Yeah. Right. I've done posts on Instagram, which I'm sure you've seen where I'm comparing the calorie density of ultra-processed foods versus high volume Whole Foods. And so if you're if all if you're a fitness influencer and you're just
Saying to mind your calories and that advice falls on the ears of somebody who's just eating fast food all day long,
and they are going to
fail, and they're going to their, then they're going to have, you know, that that sort of moral and it's a moral failure that they couldn't do it, you know, maybe that they're destined to be overweight for life and I think it just does a lot of harm and it's a huge disservice to people. Now, if you're an obsessive Fitness junkie, then yeah, count your calories,
Get you know use one of those apps or Google Docs spreadsheet or whatever to like and so there's obviously a demographic for whom that works bodybuilders. You know I'm sure like if you wanted to get to 4% body fat tracking would be maybe do it somewhat helpful. Yeah but I don't think that's a goal for your average person. The goal for your average person who is overweight is to just get down to a healthy weight
which they don't really understand, you know, like you said beyond the calorie counting and all that, but I think you hit on something great. Is that that belief that
That I've always been fat, I will always be fat. And if I have all these failures, with these different dietary strategies, it just like, well I must be broken and so I just need to accept this reality that like, well, my parents were overweight. My you know, all my friends are. So I'm just must be like this and then you start to believe in in that determinism which I think is a scary place to come from and you know, the body so malleable, right? I mean you have people that have had horrific injuries that have recovered from that if you look at Drew Manning, have you followed his
Work like he's gained weight on
purpose that to fit to or fit to Fat to fit, exactly.
He did that twice now and so yeah, he has the history of like being metabolically healthy and then going unhealthy, where he just stopped exercising in a crap. But he wanted to do it to show people like hey, this is possible like the body, really a response to change. So I think it's to me, it's fascinating. But yeah, you know, anything you do in life where you get failure, I think sucks because then you lose motivation and you need to sort of get these
He's small wins, you know, like you and I over the years I love like becoming more healthy because I I process crab growing up. I'm sure you did too. You know you start with these small little steps and it's iterative you be get more and more progress and that's why I think things like exercise like fasting and then pairing these things together. It's it's not just additive it's additional, you know? So it's yeah, I think it's a interesting to sort of open your mind up to Beyond just the calories.
Yeah, it's such an important conversation to be, had to be had. I'm glad we're talking.
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And five free travel packs of athletic Greens in doing. So. And I'm back to the remainder of my chat with Mike, you've recently been really into saunas. Yeah. Yeah. Which I love. I'm a huge sauna fanatic. So really excited to talk to you about Saint. Is what's what's your, what's your regiment look
like? Yeah, well I mean, it started because if I mean, so I started to get into sauna therapy in 2013 because there's one at our gym in Seattle, and when gyms closed, and then reopened and all that sort of stuff, they didn't reopen the sauna, and I've been wanting to build my own
Anna. And we've had an infrared sauna to maybe we can talk about the different types of scheme of up, big picture here. So I've been doing it for almost eight years now and I just got used to it and then when the gyms closed, I got really frustrated because we have this inference on. I made by this company high-tech health. I know there's all these different brands, the infrared sauna, I think a lot of people have this perception that it's somehow better than say, the sauna that you were, I have that get, but really the mechanism of sauna therapy is the heat like this. What makes this room different from Asana is there's no heater, right? So really, that's the mechanism of action.
Action. And the Adaptive response that you get when you were in the sauna from a cardiovascular standpoint, from a detoxification standpoint is heat mediated. So I like to tell people get this on on that. You can afford like if you have a small one-bedroom condo like, you're not going to have a classic finish on it. Sorry, like get a small infrared sauna, but just realize that to get your body hot enough, you're gonna have to stay in longer. So the these infrared sauna that we had, I loved using it, my wife, and I would go in there. But it only got up to like a hundred sixty degrees, which after having
Years of going in the sauna in our gym it just wasn't enough. So I was like, all right, I'm going to build my own. I want to be like the most badass on of it. People have been in because it's a it's a, it's part of life. Like in Nordic countries, you know, in Scandinavian countries and and also in Russia, right? Like this is like kids are born in the sauna, they when people die, they clean the bodies in the sauna, like, in Finland. So this is just part of life and and what's cool about the sauna and what's cool about getting us on on it and you've experienced this, is it something to do alcohol for your
Ugh, free with other people like hey come over let's do a sauna and you're there there you're kind of vulnerable a towel wrapped around you, maybe a swimsuit, and you can have these cool conversations and so that's what inspired me to build this on a. But most importantly the what the reason why I think everyone should get one is the health benefits are just phenomenal from the cardiovascular system from the immune system from the Sleep enhancement, stress reduction. I mean it goes on and we can pick apart those those different mechanisms. But I think that the for also the
Toxification so just the act of sweating, whether you go to hot because a lot of people are like, dude, okay, I can't afford a sauna, like I live with my family. What can I do hot yoga, or sweating or a sun, a blanket, anything that gets your body temperature up is going to improve, cardiovascular? Fitness will help to excrete heavy metals, particularly lead cadmium Mercury, things like that, the persistent organic pollutants that were getting in our water and Plastics. Those are a little bit harder to get out, but the heavy metals that were all exposed to and probably have high levels of red.
Ali, get out and sweat, which is really cool. Yeah, it's I think and I really attribute my quick recovery to covid-19
I'm therapy. Why are we closing the saunas? When we know that this virus is susceptible to heat and so forth? And so it's really good for the immune system. One study that has actually shown looking at athletes, where they went, they measured various immune cells, macrophages, monocytes T helper cells before this on and after and there was massive like orders of magnitude higher activity and phagocytic capacity after the sauna. So it's a great way to support. I mean system Health.
How hot does your song get? So it
gets so hot.
That that when I so basically, let me just give you the back story, okay? So the summer that you have is a barrel sauna, which is great, right? And you have like, probably a harvey of stove, which is like made by a Finnish company. So that's an electric stove, The Challenge and I love that. So you can turn it on. We can go in whatever. So there's a rate limiting step to how hot, the electric stoves can get, because the elements, the electric chips, and think, they'll melt right. So I built this. It's a classic Finnish sauna and it has a Wood-Fired stoves, so it's a, the woods.
Was like from its 18 by 36 inches. So it gets it's pretty hot and then on top of these rocks and so you pour water on the rocks and that's part of it, is the humidity that you get is really, really cool, but it gets so hot to answer your question. It gets so hot. Like if I'm on the top bench and I pour water on the Rocks, I have to put and I don't really like because it's uncomfortable. I have to cover to breathe. I have to cover my hands and slowly breathe through my nose or else they're like burn. Whoa and that so but that's like the like a
if my wife puts too many logs in or if I'm like okay I'm feeling tired or I really want to go to bed or whatever I normally don't like to roll so that's like 220 230. So yeah and it and you know, so I can stay in most honest for at least 25 30 minutes when it's that hot in like five minutes. And I'm like, I can't even go anymore. I got to go out and then part of that too. Is the not only just the heating, but the cooling down. So what's really interesting is when the body gets really hot, your body's trying to adapt and deal with the heat, so it's sending heat and blood away.
From the core with them from the periphery to or towards the periphery. So you get a lot of vasodilation and that endothelium of the blood vessel the vest vasculature is getting this exercise without moving your muscles. So a lot of people that have limited joint issues and inability to exercise sauna is great because it's actually like, working your heart and your cardiovascular system without you having to go exercise. So that's what's really great about that. But then the magic kind of happens when you cool down. So then when you take a cold plunge, or you go take a shower,
A shower or a lot of people in Finland. They just go jump in a cold lake or a river. And so you're taken when you're when you get cold, your blood goes to the core. So it's like this elastic response. And so it's a great way to sort of stress test your cardiovascular system. But in that elasticity, it's not just one in done, so your blood vessels will get this. It's called as hunting responses. Really interesting. There's a bunch of data on this, which is how contrast therapy is so beneficial for not. We hear a lot about Brown, adipose tissue. We can talk about that, but the
System is due to this sort of rubber band like effect that goes in waves and Cycles. So you go in the sauna then you go in the ocean for example for like an hour afterwards, your cardiovascular system is going to like send Blood Out to the periphery and pull it back and in. So doing, it's just that Recycling and its really good for the good exercise for your. For this organ called, the endothelium endothelial dysfunction, is linked with heart disease. Hypertension, severe covid outcomes. Edie endothelial dysfunction is linked with Edie erectile dysfunction, so men that can't.
Get it up and things like that, there's challenges there. Yeah. So, yeah, to me, I mean, it's just it's an amazing tool. It's part of what humans have been doing for hundreds of years. I mean, you know, thousands and thousands probably I mean flick that sweat lodges and you know, Native Americans used and all that. So this is, you know, a consistent theme throughout cultures and so I think it comes back to, you know what, what did humans do before the Advent of technology that made them healthy and part of it is the community and and socialization of that. Yeah. So
You know, a lot of people talk about heat, shock proteins with saunas. And I think that's cool. But it's how do you measure heat shot? What is it? Heat, shock protein. So I just like the fact that when you come out, your veins are popping. Like you just did a hard work out and I've noticed because I couldn't, I sold my infrared sauna to buy the stove for this one. So I went with no sauna for the first time in like eight years from the three months as I was building this and honestly like I noticed the changes like a dearth of sauna bathing and then once we started to go into it, I started to notice like my veins, not that I really care that much. But I'm like, you
In see them more, they're more visible and my wife and I, she notices her skin right away and people were her patients because she's a chiropractor were noticing right away. Like your skin looks more vibrant. Like, what are you doing differently? And it was right after, you know, months of yeah. Took a break from Sanaa and then starting it over again so
it's amazing. Yeah, I think that the heat shock protein story is actually like very minor in terms of the benefit that we get from saunas, compared to the vascular benefits that you just described and like, you know, I feel like what
Heat shock how he Chuck engages these proteins he's like scaffolding proteins you know for people who have written about you Chuck proteins I'm sure you have as well that they help protect the Misfits. They help guard against them is folding of proteins and when you look at prodi APA 'they pretty obvious he's like Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease. I mean that is a very useful, it's very useful. It's a very potentially useful mechanism but it is at the end of the day, mechanistic speculation I think you know
Because vascular like vascular dysfunction really, I think is like one of the earliest problems. You know, in terms of the etiology of these conditions I think that's where the real money is when it comes to sitting in sitting in a sauna totally and they've shown University of Eastern Finland, right. Like all the risk reduction, you know, such robust risk reduction, with regular sauna use for stroke for hypertension for cardiovascular disease, all-cause mortality. And of course, dementia and Alzheimer's disease, which was huge.
I
mean, yeah, that's I think the risk reduction for dementia and Alzheimer's was like in the 60s, mid 60 percent. She like, this is, this is something that most people should be able to access, right? I mean, that's the downside is like, we're spending trillions of dollars. Our government is like, why public saunas would be amazing? I mean, imagine if you could go into a public sauna and if you, I know you've traveled, like, you go to different countries. Like, for example, I've been to South Korea and in other parts of the world, Sana bathing is like a thing. Like, this is what people do and relax on the weekends and there's bath houses and all that and
And we're so sort of in our boxes here. You know, as Americans where we don't like to talk to other people, we don't like to go, you know, be in the same room but I was in Chile. Actually last November of 2019 and there was just a bunch of people in the sauna like it. We went to a multiple different saunas, in different gyms and stuff like that. All throughout, like Santiago and and South Chile, and it was just part of the culture there. And it's, we don't have that here or people say, I don't want to sit near someone else's sweat or have these weird sort of germophobic you know, irrational fears.
About it because you know, you're killing microbes. You don't need to sanitize. The sauna me, the heat is going to do the job for you, you know. But yeah, I mean those studies that you mentioned, Jonas, lung command. I think it is his name, I mean, these are 26-year perspective studies where they've been tracking this cohort of individuals, and if you could encapsulate, the benefits of a sauna into a pill, people would it would be the best selling drug there is but you're like, oh, you have to go sit in the heat people like? Yeah, no, I'm not gonna do that. I'd rather just watch Netflix or whatever. I mean, it's just insane but I think so that the cardiovascular
Benefits are huge, heat shock proteins, big sweating all of that. But for me the deep and sleep is just another like sort of something we don't really talk about but that to me because I mean as you know circadian clock dysfunction sleep issues, sleep disorder, breathing really sort of exacerbates, all these different conditions and what a great way without alcohol or sleeping pills. A lot of people have trouble sleeping as like you will sleep like a baby. I've had many friends that since I finished the construction come over and they're like they text me the morning like
Dude, I slept like a baby like I normally get up to p 2 or 3 times and like every single person has slept amazingly so that I think is huge because especially women around menopause. Yeah, I'm sure you've heard gotten messages, they for whatever reason, sleep can become a challenge for them.
What's the mechanism by which saunas help with sleep? Or is it just like, anecdotally use you just find that it
works? Yeah, I'm not sure mechanistically, I think it's just you're just relaxed, you know? And if you do it at night, you're on your phone. You're not.
On a screen. So I think there's some of that too. But I think it's just the relaxation that that parasympathetic because it is stressful, it's like post-workout you feel amazing. It feels so calm. There is some sort of, you know, central nervous system stimulation. Adrenaline noradrenaline when you're actually in a sauna, this is transient and then afterwards, you're really calm. So that's what I think mechanistically is going on. But maybe someone
knows, I love it. Yeah, infrared sauna. So I actually have I have a sauna a barrel son on the roof and it doesn't I love
But it doesn't quite get.
It doesn't quite
reach. The level of heat that like you're talking about. Yeah. Which, you know, I'm kind of sad about I wish. I feel like we're I to rebuild a sauna in a new in a new place. I would want to make sure that it was like a heat, a Wood-Fired sauna, but my brother has a small infrared sauna from Clear light, actually, they've offered a discount for my listeners. If you guys go to my website magicbyleah.com and hit store, you can go to clear light, there's like a link there or something like that.
That. But but I actually find it to be great. Like I actually I love sitting in there because it's in his bedroom. It's like so small and Compact and he's got a TV. You could like watch stuff on YouTube while you're in the sauna. Yeah, yeah, it's
amazing. So you prefer that over your Barrel sauna. I wouldn't say
that I prefer it but it's definitely a it's a much more streamlined experience and the other the other problem. So I'm sure you know this but technically like the way that if the waist
Are built in Finland. You are supposed to sit at the your feet should be at the level of the heat emission so that the heat is everything. He does everything, right? So in my Barrel sauna and I think this is probably how all Barrel saunas are designed. It's a flaw in the design of barrel saunas but you know if it's all you have access to that it's great nonetheless but mine it the top gets really hot and and it doesn't do as good of a job of hitting the bottom. It takes a long time for that heat for it to get hot enough where you're
Your lower body, right? You know, starts to heat up the infrared, saunas different, the infrared sauna, the whole thing gets hot. Yes, those heat exchangers are like they're gonna die or yeah.
Yes, that's a good point. I haven't thought of that, that's a great point because a lot of people that have diabetes or pre-diabetes or high blood pressure have peripheral vascular disease. There you go. So they're not getting you know they're not getting that. So yeah you'd have to like put your feet up if you like for you and your Barrel you have to raise your feet. Yeah. And then they can kind of burn a little bit you know you got to put them down.
Yeah but it's but it's but it's impractical. And so I think that for that population
And it might make more sense to and also from a just a space standpoint, you know, to go the infrared route total, unless you're able to get like a legitimate sauna that, you know, and with all those considerations. Yeah. But I do think it's funny to note that the international sauna Association, I believe it is a Finnish organization, they don't actually consider infrared saunas to be saunas, right? They think it's a Americanized. Yeah, and aberration of the term sauna misuse of the word
sauna, they're really sort of
Traditional like I've listened there's the sauna times podcast. I listened to Glenn our bond, a few other ones and they do not like infrared saunas and I interviewed him and he was just trash and infrared saunas. And I had to pause and be like, okay look, you know, they are a tool, right? I don't I want people to get started and get some benefits but they may not be the crème de creme but there's still a tool like that you can still get great benefit from them. So yeah. I never want people to like it's like saying oh well if you only exercise only do high-intensity exercise like you can if
You
can do is walk, then please by all means, just walk or do push-ups whatever. Like any exercise is good but I'm with you and but what's interesting about that is, if you look at where infrared, saunas came from studying in Japan there, it's kind of the jargon is wound wound therapy and that's been used for diabetes for other other medical conditions. So they are medically validated like there is Western you know hard science looking at in people that have peripheral vascular disease, for example, in other challenges like in
Ed has data right? But they're that being said, there's this illusion because the heat is from infrared that they're magical and they get sued. I just think maybe maybe but it's really just heat mediated at the end of the day as far as I understand it. So you know as long as you can get it, pretty hot. And like you said, if you can get your whole body hop and that's
awesome. Yeah. Do you have any concerns about like emfs, anything like that? Is that at all on your
radar a little bit, you know, but most of these infrared sauna companies have tested for that and they have low EMF output and everything so
What I do have a consideration for is in public saunas. People going in with our shoes, they're wearing their cologne and stuff like this. Like, you have some people that they'll go to the gym before they work out. They'll walk into this honor with their shoes on and so poor ventilation can be a major problem. So there's if you if you want to narrow down on it, I doubt anyone would want to actually do this but there's all this research on ventilate, how to properly vent your sauna and because you need that airflow and what can happen is especially if you have a Wood-Fired stove, it can suck out a lot of the oxygen so you can
get high levels of CO2 and you can feel light-headed and dizzy and all that. So venting Asana and there's a lot of like Physicians, sorry, physicist who have been looking at this and how air circulates and what's cool about the barrels of the heat comes up and then it comes back down in the circular effect. But the venting is really important. So if you just go to a gym sauna this not vented properly, you can have mold and challenges there. And again, I don't want to discourage people from going to the sauna, it's probably better than nothing but just understand that like you can get super nuanced with venting and
It did you follow a guide when building yours?
Yeah. So this guy, Glenn Arbok, who's been doing this for like 35 years, like he's been doing sauna traditional finished on us. I can't remember his backstory, he was working in Europe and then went to Finland to do something and was exposed to sauna therapy. There came back and in the Upper Midwest and parts of like Michigan and Minnesota. There's a lot of Finnish Norwegian type, you know, folks their Scandinavian countries and it's huge so that you'll see, you know, there are all these different lakes. I've never
Been to Minnesota but it's a huge thing. So anyway, he has this ebook is 25 bucks and it gave me a guide as to like, you know, there were some customization that I'd along the way and in there was a big section on his website is good to on venting and how to properly vent. And it's interesting because my daughter who's only eight, she'll go in there with us, but on the lower bench and she has a little vent that she can use, but it's cool, it's kind of like on a cold day, you know, when the wind is blowing, it feels cooler. But so when it's hot from the stove and you vented actually feels hotter
Because you have more air coming in and a circulating and all that. So, yeah, it's good. And that's what I worry about. The only downside to the to the infrared at home is, you can create a mold issue in your home and in vertically. So, I would encourage people like if they have an infrared in their bedroom, make sure that you're opening up a window or a door and airing things out. Because we notice that in our master bedroom, when we had the infrared we got it in 2016 also said there was these little Speckles of mold randomly appearing and we would open the door my wife and I and like all this steam comes out.
Out and we didn't think to crack the window, like maybe after month. We like, oh maybe we should start crying the window but you know that you got mold can be very problematic for your health.
So wow, super interesting, where you living these days Seattle here in
Seattle. Yeah, doesn't get gloomy up there. You know what I mean? I've never been but God come up man. If you need to interview someone and we'll sauna and I'll take you through the experience but the weather has changed since I was a kid. Like it's it's, it's def. Like we've had an amazing March, but, yeah, I mean, it's definitely interesting.
I do like it. I would say that the covid, paranoia up there. I mean, you see so many people double and triple masking with face Shields walking their dog. And it's just like, I wish I could just say to them. Like the risk of outdoor transmission is like 1 in 3000, man. Like just read. Some are like the stress has to bike manifest in other ways unintended leave. So
yeah, I definitely feel sad inside when I see people walking outside by themselves with a man with even one mask on. Yeah.
And I dutifully will wear masks indoors. I you know I'm you know I'm part of society, right? Like I don't I want to be a team player and yes and you know I think the sooner we can get back to normal.
The better but but yeah, I it is very sad. I think when you see people that have just been so overcome by the fear and the Panic porn pervaded by the media and you know, it's just not it's I wish there was another way I was in San Francisco recently with a friend and we took a walk and he told me that I should probably put a mask on because people are very vocal. There are a lot more vocal there and they'll say something to you, shame. Yeah, they'll shame you. Yeah, that's all right. So, you just went with it and said, fine.
Yeah yeah I just went with it. I mean I pick my battles. Yeah. But I mean
We're we're I not with my friend, you know, I probably wouldn't have worn a mask but I did because, you know, he just says, there was a Stranger in a Strange Land. It was his neighborhood and so, I was like, okay, fine, you know, I never wear masks outside,
right? Yeah, I noticed that that. So I've spent some time in Venezuela this morning and all that and a lot of people are exercising outdoor. Thankfully are not wearing masks out here, and I know that might irritate some of your listeners, but again, the risk of outdoor transmission. It's been. There's been many scientists have looked
This very, very low. So where is the risk of always wearing a mask? I mean these Mass, you know, they're not a side effect free. I mean, especially these surgical face coverings. They have a lot of plastic and chemicals and things like that, where you're breathing that all the time. And what's the unintended harm of constantly inhaling that? So, yeah. But I've noticed how the mass culture is definitely its there's pockets of it. Now would say that San Francisco and Seattle are very similar because the tech areas. Yeah, it seems like whether it's an obedience thing, we're looking at the studies or whatever. But
yeah, I found that out here, even elderly people on the beach just running with no mask. And that gives me some hope, you know, because it's like, okay, you should be enjoying, you know, as long as you're spaced out like not in a race with thousands of people, like, you're probably good, you know, to to enjoy the fresh air,
a hundred percent, I find that the one major difference in me and my own physiology when I'm wearing a mask is that I tend to breathe less out of my nose and my mouth. I become a mouth breather saying. When am I going to ask? Because the pressure that puts on your, the bridge of your
NOS. Yeah, I've noticed that a lot too. Yeah, yeah.
It's not a joke. Like I become a mouth breather, one in the mask is on and we know that that's not. I mean, why is that not good for us by the way? I should also mention that I've started when I couple years ago, I tape my mouth for the first time because of you, nice and I fell off the wagon, and I've been doing it since like, recently over the past couple of months. I've been taping my mouth and I'm like hooked, dude. It's so hot when I sleep. Yeah, yeah. So what what? Got you off? You
just like lost it one day. And then you said, okay, I'll
just well, I
I discovered, I started, which I don't know if you do this, but I've been using nasal strips of Guam like, Breathe, Right? Certain, not Breathe, Right Strips, I don't, she liked as much, I'd get the CVS ones, they don't leave a residue on my nose. Um, and so I use those that so they really open up your nasal passageways, your nasal Airways and then because I just feel so good breathing out of my nose with those things on. I have been taping my mouth and yeah, it's just great man. It's like definitely like a big
Mark a difference in my sleep sleep quality. It was already good. Right. But it's next level. Yeah,
I mean a lot of people think that you're kidding were joking. When you say you tape your mouth because you're like well why would I want to do that? But it is catching on. Thankfully. I think more and more people are catching on to it. But yeah, I mean, just the physiology of it, I'm sure. Have. You had Mark banana on yet? No. Okay. I'll link you up with him. But so, he's a, he's a dentist in the San Francisco, Bay Area, interviewed him in 2015 and he was the one that turned me on to it. So the idea is, when you're breathing through your mouth while
You're sleeping, you go through many periods of paralysis as your bodies were pairing. So neurologically, you're not sending signals to your tongue and then so your tongue will collapse on your Airway and you'll have hypoxic events and those are called apneas. And some people have more apneas or depending upon their neck size and how much body fat they have in all of that. And so mouth taping can help sort of overcome that. But I'm with you, I do the cheap, the nose tape, you know what, the Breathe Right, knockoffs, you know, CVS and Walgreens, they all have a knockoff version.
I do worry that I started to worry about I'm doing this all the time, right? You're all this adhesive like what is this stuff doing to me? I kind of worry about that but I just rinse my face off in the morning and try not to sweat it but yeah, it's completely changed my life. I mean, every night I do it. I usually have at least three to four like vivid dreams. I can recall and write down if I miss it, like last night's sleep wasn't very good traveling in different place and all that and of course, but anyway, it's a game changer and especially for women to is a age. So dr. Brenda has shared with me that women when they
Go through menopause, the estrogen effects sort of the collagen production in their Airway and that can exacerbate sleep disorder breathing. So we hear about sleep apnea. We hear about like diabetes and insulin resistance, so, sleep disordered breathing is Alma, sleep apnea Spectrum. So a lot of people have some form of sleep disorder breathing and they don't know it and so if they are doing that I mean it's linked with hyperlipidemia and elevated levels of leptin stress, oxidative stress. All of this even more severe outcomes for
One study showed that sleep apnea was linked with poor covid. Wow. So yeah, I mean, this is something people should do and I think it starts like you said during the day, you know, so just you can mouth tape during, you know, you're watching a movie or reading a book just try during the day and then it's easier to actually get into the habit of doing it at night. Once you're more comfortable with breathing through your nose during the day,
didn't you cause a stir couple years back by showing a picture on Instagram if you taping your kids mouths?
Yeah. Yeah people got ya, there were so many
more like you child abuser. Yeah,
I'm
I'm going to report you and all this. And you know it and I share I've shared many times the before and after pictures, so I started Mount, she's eight years old, I started melting her when she was four and so there was all these irrational responses of what if she throws up? What if she does this and all that? And my daughter's never thrown up it while she's sleeping, right? So I wasn't too worried about that and she slept in our bed. So that was the other thing. It's like, she's right? I'm going to hear her like vomiting if she does vomit but it changed for the better. The shape of her mouth and her face.
Well and she's now no longer a mouth breather so because I got to it early why wait until they're 17. And you know because as when you and I were growing up the the solution to our small mouths was like just rip out all the teeth, right? And and give kids headgear and expand the mouth. And now the thinking is like, will just get kids to breathe properly and get their tongue in the right position in the the face will shape itself like, nature had intended. And so we got for her the myobrace, which is a way to just reinforce tongue position and in
Train nasal breathing, but she had already been mouth taping and so she may never have to have braces or anything like that. Wears. A lot of the kids that she goes to school with and Friends. Their teeth are all over the place and they're happy, they have headgear and braces and like all these interventions. And we started early with this horrific mouth taping Clarity, there was abusive, and yeah, but people just get super emotional and charged and yeah,
especially out of context when they see like, just a photo that looks crazy on their explore feed. They come over and they right.
Leave hate. What's the kind of tape that people can use? I mean, I buy this. I just go on Amazon. I look for math tape and there's like, you can find really cheap versions but what is that what's the name of that like poorest
tape in the 3M micropore tape? Is that what it is? Yeah, you can just
find that you can find that anywhere. Most
drugstores, I mean even Canada. I found it in South Korea. Yeah. So instead most drugs force, it is expensive. It's become it's like nine dollars. So I'm sure you can find deals like buy 3, get 1 free or whatever on Amazon. But yeah, most CVS
Green's Rite Aids, they have it, but you can use any. I'm in a pinch. I've used a Band-Aid, you know, like, you just need a little something right there to sort of discourage your mouth from. Hanging out wide open. Yeah,
dude, I love that. So cool. Well, I feel like we could there's we can keep going for hours and hours and hours. Love having you here. This has been so fun. I feel like we've covered a lot of ground.
Absolutely. Appreciate you having me on. It's good to catch up and talk shop. Yeah,
likewise, I've got one last question for you, but before we get to that, where can people find you on social media?
And yeah, what do you you promoting anything or you just here to hang? I'm here to hang out. I mean, I am working
on a book about the immune system function to talk more about how people can be proactive about their health with regards to covid risk. Because again, I see so much figure out there and the media hasn't really. There's a lot of studies that have looked at his say exercise tolerance, Exercise capacity fasting, and all that. So just want to make that data available for people. But yeah, my main I'm active on Instagram and YouTube so it's metabolic Mike on Instagram and high-intensity health on YouTube.
Love that.
Well, the last question that gets asked everyone in the show, what does it mean to you to live a genius life? That's a great question,
I think, being proactive and in terms of about your health and also your your knowledge, you know, a lot of people we get into these sort of information silos and we only consume content from say, NPR or CNN or Breitbart, whatever. I think people should always be learning and I like to actively go out and learn. I don't like some of the views that I hear on say, CNN, for example, was
Things. But I like to know what they're saying to challenge my own belief systems because it's so easy to get biased and and all that and I don't consider myself a genius at all. But once you start to see where people are coming from a different talking points, you can have more intelligent conversations that are going to be less reactive for certain people. You know, certain people disagree with you on masking or whatever. If you know, where they're coming from, you can sort of, we all can generally meet in the middle, right? And I think that's the problem is, we're so polarized in our societies of our thinking, it's like defund the
cut the police. Like there's like, there's got to be a happy medium here with training or this where we can sort of come to a conclusion instead of having these real sort of polarized ideology. So yeah, proactively learn from people who you disagree with because you'll learn something number one and you'll challenge your own beliefs which is
cool. Yeah, I do that all the time, especially in the health and fitness World. I'd I routinely go to the peoples pages that I disagree with and I, you know, just to just to get a sense of like, what kind of information?
Nation advice is getting out there that might need to be either countered in some way or what can I learn from? You know, what can what, you know, maybe they're sharing some new science that I'm not that I haven't been privy to and that, you know, I can use to update my own thinking about a certain about a given topic, so, that's really great advice. And yeah, man, this was a treat. Thanks for coming out. Thank you to all you guys out there in podcast land. Share this episode of the show. Make sure you follow, Mike. Share this episode text me. Let me know what you thought about it.
310 2999 401 also join my new community at locals. Max eluga, veered out locals.com. No haters, no trolls. It's a, it's almost like a Utopia. If I met if I might call it that on social media and I'll catch you on the next episode, please.
