Are you doing everything you could be to make sure your immune system is working at it’s best? I’m joined by Dr. David Jockers to talk about what we can do to improve our immune system and overall health and well-being.
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About Dr. David Jockers
Dr. David Jockers is a doctor of natural medicine, a functional nutritionist, and a corrective care chiropractor. He runs one of the hottest natural health websites in DrJockers.com which has gotten over 1 million monthly visitors and his work has been on popular media such as the Dr. Oz show and Hallmark Home and Family.
Dr. Jockers is the author of the best-selling book “The Keto Metabolic Breakthrough” by Victory Belt publishing and is a world-renowned expert in the area of ketosis, fasting, and the ketogenic diet. He is also the host of the popular Dr Jockers Functional Nutrition podcast.
On this episode of The Girlfriend Doctor, David explains how going to bed early and avoiding overstimulation in the evening is one of the easiest things you can do to improve your immune system. In the same vein, David talks about why we actually shouldn’t be working on anything other than relaxing after 9 pm.
We talk about why our bodies release more glucose when we’re exercising and how this can mimic a rise in blood sugar. But actually, this is a way better way to feed your body the glucose and energy it needs. David shares how the modern American diet is actually very bad for our immune system as it raises the artificial glucose levels in our bodies.
David tells us what we can first thing in the morning to help improve our digestion and ignite that inner fire. He also explains how eating or drinking bitter food can improve our digestion throughout the day.
David shares some of his favorite supplements to take for an improved immune system and digestion. He tells us exactly how much Vitamin D3 we should be taking every single day, whether we’re spending time in the sun or not, as Vitamin D3 is one of the most vital vitamins our bodies need for optimal health - and it’s one that we don’t get nearly enough of.
David explains how we can become Keto-adapted over a period of weeks which helps avoid that dreaded keto-flu we all fear. He also talks about the role of bile in our digestion and why so many women tend to have gallbladder problems as they age.
Finally, David gives us some wonderful tips on how we can self-diagnose our stomach issues at home. Not only this, but he also shares a recipe for how to naturally reduce gallstones with his all-natural drink.
How are you taking steps to improve your immune system during this health crisis? Have you adopted a keto-green way of eating for your overall health and longevity? As always, you can ask me anything and let me hear your thoughts in the comments below. If you have questions, email team@drannacabeca.com
In This Episode:
- How going to bed early and prioritizing good sleep will improve your immune system
- Why our bodies release more glucose when we’re exercising
- How the modern American diet can reduce your immune system
- Why you shouldn’t have goals after 9 pm
- What some things you can first thing in the morning to improve your digestion
- Why you should eat or drink bitter-tasting food every single day
- What supplements you can take to improve your immune system
- What the ideal range of Vitamin D3 is
- How you can get Keto-adapted
- What role bile has in your digestion
- What are some ways we can self-diagnose our stomach issues
Quotes:
“Your brain and your heart are the two most saturated organs with mitochondria so they need that CoQ10.” (32:31)
“If we’re not producing stomach acid, effectively, then we’re not going to get a good bile release. That can be a big issue.” (49:58)
“Take some activated charcoal. Take 500-1000mL of activated charcoal about 30 minutes before a meal, particularly high-fat meals, and it will get in the gut and sit in the gut. It’s like a catcher’s mitt, it will grab up excess toxic bile. If we don’t get rid of the toxic bile, our body will actually recycle and reuse it. So we actually need to get the bile out through the feces and charcoal will help grab and bind to it.” (55:24)
Resources Mentioned
How to beat gallstones naturally with the all-natural bile flush drink!
Find Dr. David Jockers on Facebook | Pinterest | YouTube | Instagram
Join the KetoGreen Community on Facebook
Buy Keto-Green 16
Transcript:
Dr. David:
Any sort of diet change, whether it's fasting or if you're used to fasting and you feel good fasting, when you eat breakfast one day, that's actually a stress on your body. If you're used to eating breakfast and you don't eat breakfast, that's a stress on your body. So any sort of variation is a stressor and too much stress can cause problems, particularly when it comes to female sex hormones, so we got to be careful with that.
Dr. Anna:
Hi everyone. It's Dr. Anna Cabeca, I'm The Girlfriend Doctor. It is my mission and my passion to help you live better lives before, during, and after menopause. So welcome to The Girlfriend Doctor Podcast. It is an intimate place for intimate conversation. And hey, I am here for you, you can ask or tell me anything, no shame, no guilt, no apologies. We pull back the curtain on all things related to sexual health, libido, PMS, weight management, and menopause. You name it, we talk about it. Our goal is to shine a light on your overall wellness, mind, body, and spirit.
Dr. Anna:
So let's get started. Today, my guest comes from Georgia, a fellow Georgian, which I'm so excited to share his information with you. This is David Jockers. Dr. David Jockers is a chiropractic physician and doctor of natural medicine and functional nutritionist in an area in North Georgia and Canton, Georgia. He lives with his beautiful wife and their twin boys and his daughter named Joyful. I love everything he's about. He has a really popular website, DrJockers.com, and he has over a million monthly visitors. He has been on Dr. Oz and Hallmark Home & Family Show.
Dr. Anna:
His new book is called the Keto Metabolic Breakthrough, and we're going to be sharing some pearls during this podcast, including what's happening to your gallbladder with all this fat. So many women have had gallbladder issues and struggled with their gallbladder, and what that really means to your health and how we can circumvent, especially if you have any gallbladder issues, what can we do? We've got a great hack to share as well as if you don't have a gallbladder any longer. And talking about boosting your immune system during this season of coronavirus.
Dr. Anna:
He is so in line in with my recommendations and gives some additional insight too, into watching the keto curve, so to speak, watching that blood sugar and how important it is. As well, he gives the touchdown tips on living a healthy lifestyle. And also we talk deep about getting fat-adapted, definitely, you want to get fat adapted. And another cool thing about Dr. Jockers is he loves bitters as much as I do if not more, he's really big on bitters and adding those to your foods and how much a difference that makes. So join me and welcome Dr. Jockers.
Dr. Anna:
Hey everyone, Dr. Anna Cabeca here, your Girlfriend Doctor. I am excited to bring to you Dr. David Jockers. He has been a pioneer in keto, and his new book out right behind him is just doing fabulous, an amazing resource for individuals. And he entered the keto space, well, I'm going to let him tell you, but he entered the keto space as a pioneer in this journey and into his clinic, seeing clients and seeing the transformation, not just in his own life, but in thousands and thousands of patient's lives. So, David, it's great to have you here on the show with me.
Dr. David:
Thank you, Anna. Always great to be talking with you. I really look up to you as one of the great thought leaders and a great mentor in this field. So thanks for having me on.
Dr. Anna:
Oh, you're making me blush. Thank you. Well, I appreciate that. And we were just talking of, here we are in the middle of the coronavirus epidemic, and I wanted to bring you to talk about this too, because creating insulin sensitivity is more important now than ever, and I definitely want to hit on that and just talk about the coronavirus, but I'm like sopping up, spill tea right now because I am displaced from my home office, I'm in my bedroom actually recording this. My daughter, Amira, who is 20, was doing college in the Netherlands. And so with all of this, we just brought her home just a few days, six days ago, because we're counting down quarantine. She's quarantined in my office. She's having a ball, she's got the best place in the house.
Dr. David:
That's hilarious. We've all had to take new measures. It's a new way of life now. And unprecedented what's going on with the coronavirus. But our message about a ketogenic lifestyle and optimizing our hormones, optimizing our insulin sensitivity, couldn't be more important than right now because we know how sugar impacts the immune system and how good nutrition, healthy lifestyle, positive mentality, good sleep, all these things that we have been teaching plays such an important role in our ability to fend off the virus and stay healthy and strong. So I'm really glad we're able to do this interview.
Dr. Anna:
Yeah, me too. Let's talk more on boosting our immune system at this time. So what are you telling your patients? What are you doing with them?
Dr. David:
Basically, we've got to take control of what we can control. And so there's a lot of levers we have when it comes to our immune system. Number one is good sleep. Most people in our society, especially when things get stressful, we're staying up late at night, looking at our phone, more people are on social media, like Facebook has had a huge growth just because everybody's trying to figure out what's going on and a lot of people are doing this at night, and that's not what we want to do. We want to really try to prioritize good sleep. When we sleep, we secrete melatonin, we get a good boost of human growth hormone, especially when we're going to bed earlier, like before midnight, ideally, I try to be in bed by 10:00.
Dr. David:
Every hour of sleep before midnight is equivalent to three hours of the regenerative capacity after midnight, we get a better melatonin release, better human growth hormone release. And those are just so important for the immune system. So really prioritizing good sleep, trying to stay in a positive, grateful mentality. Obviously, anytime we have change, it's always big stress and there's a lot that we have to adjust in our life, but the more that we can stay grateful, that's going to play a big role in our immune system. People who are positive and grateful tend to have a better, more accurate immune response.
Dr. David:
We end up having better immune tolerance and better T helper cell activity. As well as cytotoxic T cells, which are the ones that are really good for breaking down viruses. So good, positive attitude, so important. And then with nutrition, I mean, we want a nutrient-dense diet. We want to keep our blood sugar and our insulin stable and level so we know that when we have a blood sugar of 120, that actually reduces our immune system's ability to destroy bacteria and viruses, something called our phagocytic index, so the ability of the white blood cell, particularly the macrophage to go in and basically chew up like Pac-Man chewing up pathogens.
Dr. David:
We reduce it by 75% when we have a blood sugar of 120. Now, you and I both know if we see a fasting blood sugar of 120, that's pre-diabetic and almost diabetic. The Diabetic would be 126. There's actually a lot of people out there with prediabetes, is one of the fastest-growing conditions, but there's also going to be a lot of people out there that may have recently got blood work and your blood sugar was 95, 100 something along those lines, which is a much better measurement. I usually like to see it roughly around 80 to 90, somewhere in that range, but what I'm more concerned about...
Dr. David:
Even though fasting blood sugar, morning fasting blood sugar is a really good measurement, and if it is high, that can definitely be a concern, I get more concerned about what's happening after meals because a lot of people they'll eat a meal, like a bowl of cereal or something like that in the morning and their blood sugar jumps up to 180, 200 and it takes three hours for it to get under 120. So for those three hours, you're inhibiting your immune system, you're crippling your immune system. And obviously, that's making you much more susceptible to getting an infection.
Dr. David:
So we've got to keep that blood sugar under control, and you and I both love a low carb, nutrient-dense, alkaline, ketogenic style diet, and that's really the best diet for that. And then on top of that regular exercise. Exercise is going to help keep your blood sugar stable, keep your insulin levels balanced. Insulin is another important thing to measure because you might have good blood sugar, but you might be overproducing insulin. And if you're doing that that's also going to affect the immune system in a negative way as well.
Dr. Anna:
Sorry, I'm talking, but I muted myself because you're homeschooling. There's some homeschooling partying going on. I can hear it, even though they were duly warned. One of the things that I did too in creating Keto-Green 16 is continuous blood sugar. So this is the FreeStyle Libre. But just to show you what you're talking about, show our audience, if you're listening and not watching, I post these videos on YouTube, come to my Girlfriend Doctor Podcast page on my website where you can see this, but what I'm showing is this is a graph of blood sugar. This is a graph of carb loading.
Dr. Anna:
This is some carbs in here because typically, I stay in the green, which is about... Because this is intended for diabetics, the range here that I said is 75 to 115, that's the narrowest range the system will let me set. So predominantly in 115, but here at this peak, you see where that went up to 160 and that's at... Oh, that's at 9:00 AM. So actually this was not. This was, let me see what day of the week. Oh yeah. That's my Monday. Actually, this is so fascinating. Because that peak you think that was, I initially thought it was my eating something with carbs, but that is actually my boxing workout day.
Dr. Anna:
So I am fasting. That's just that high-intensity interval training, which is good because we're getting it up increasing, just our natural products, not ingesting glucose, but our natural production of glucose. And it comes right back down, right back down. And then there's my after workout meal. And then this was dinner down here. So just staying in the zone, but even working out will raise your blood sugar. But I did want to show because I did have dates one day. Typically, my blood sugar is like that, just staying keto, Keto-Green, staying really stable.
Dr. David:
Yeah, nice and flat.
Dr. Anna:
But there was one day I came home from travel and I had some dates and it took my blood sugar really high. It was like at 200, it was very fascinating. So it's interesting to see what happens.
Dr. David:
Yeah. That's really, really fascinating. A continuous blood glucose meter is so good because it gives you that instant feedback that you're able to see on a regular basis, and that is interesting that we engage in that high-intensity exercise, our body's naturally going to release more stress hormone. And those are glucocorticoids where their job is to actually metabolize, basically breakdown glycogen and increase our blood sugar. And that's because in order to produce energy very, very quickly, we need the sugar available in our bloodstreams, so your body was adapting the way it was exactly designed. And that's when we should have that elevated level of blood sugar.
Dr. David:
Now, what happens a lot of times too, is a lot of people have noticed with continuous blood glucose when they have a lot of stress that their blood sugar goes up too.
Dr. Anna:
Oh, absolutely. And I got on stage to speak, fasting and my blood sugar went up to 150 and stayed up at 150 for like 40 minutes.
Dr. David:
Yeah, absolutely. And that happens. Now, short bouts of elevated blood glucose when we are doing a stressful activity, no problem with that, our body will adapt to it. And it's actually part of the variation of life. We need those momentary stressors that make us more resilient, we adapt to it, but it's when we're continuous, throughout the day, boosting that blood sugar and then we get this resulting increase in insulin, that's when we're going to have the problems. And that's your typical modern American, like for me growing up, I had cereal in the morning for breakfast. For lunch, it was like peanut butter and jelly and pretzels or something like that.
Dr. David:
My mom was health-conscious, so we had like Cheerios. We never got what I wanted when I was a kid, which was like Fruit Loops or whatever I saw on TV. We got Cheerios, we put a banana in there, some skim milk because we didn't want the fat, and we had orange juice for breakfast, because of the vitamin C, the problem is all those things spiked my blood sugar. And then two hours later, I was fatigued, I would be sleeping in class. I remember I was always so thirsty because when you consume sugar, you need water as well, you need hydration. And your body will oftentimes urinate it out or try to put it in the muscles in the liver and it takes water with it, so you get thirsty, you get tired, you get fatigued.
Dr. David:
Then for lunch, I was having peanut butter and jelly sandwich and pretzels, which a lot of people still think is healthy, and I'd oftentimes have fruit with it, like an apple. And then for dinner, it was like whole-grain pasta with sauce or whatever it was, or I don't know, pizza or whatever, something that was oftentimes potatoes, a lot of starches. And so my blood sugar was just constantly on the rise. And then that can because a lot of immune susceptibilities. I remember growing up, I would always get probably three or four colds, fevers, or flues every single year doing that.
Dr. David:
And this is what most Americans are doing, and that is going to make you more susceptible to getting a virus, whether it's the flu, whether it's COVID-19 or it's seasonal allergy season two. So it's going to make you more susceptible to allergies as well.
Dr. Anna:
Yeah. I couldn't agree more. We were never designed to have cereal for breakfast, a sandwich for lunch and bread with dinner, and it's just way too much on our system. And that also is difficult to digest, can also create some mechanical problems. And that's important to recognize too. We talk about the bloating belly. I grew up hearing my dad say, "I've got my bloated belly." And it was just like, "Okay, this is just a way of life." And versus that was probably early of small intestinal bowel overgrowth, later ended up with diabetes and everything else, cardiovascular disease and the list goes on from there.
Dr. Anna:
So that's why this like more than ever like understanding keto, understanding the importance of blood sugar stability, and intermittent fasting, and extended fasting during this time is so beneficial. I am doing a stent of Keto-Green challenge in my Keto-Green community group to just extend some intermittent fasting even more and just some extended fasting too during this time, because we know it boosts our immune system, it's going to help us with growth hormone. It's going to help us with our T helper cells, our T cell immunity, for sure. And then general autophagy, getting into the state of autophagy. And I'd love for you to explain that and how you've incorporated that into your life too, these practices.
Dr. David:
Yeah, for sure. Well, autophagy is one of my favorite topics because it's really the way the body naturally heals itself, in fact, is actually the way the body naturally gets rid of viruses. If you think about it, when you get the flu, you typically have no appetite at all, you just want to curl up somewhere. And in most animals, when they get sick, that's what they do, they almost go into a hibernation mode. And when you stop eating, your body needs to create energy in some way. So what it does is it will actually go into the cells and break down the different organelles. So within every cell, we have things like mitochondria.
Dr. David:
The mitochondria, the powerhouse of the cell, it produces all the ATP, all the cellular energy. We also have things like endoplasmic reticulum. We have all these different key organelles, kind of like in our body we have organs like our heart and our liver. Well, the body will actually go inside the cell and it has these compounds, they're called lysosomes, which will break down the mitochondria, and it goes for the dysfunctional organelles. So our body's not going to break down healthy cells, it's going to break down the dysfunctional, the bad cells. And that's because we have this innate intelligence that knows what it's doing, and it knows it needs to get rid of these bad cells in order to make room for good, healthy, strong cellular organelles.
Dr. David:
So it breaks down the bad, rebuilds anew. It's like cell recycling. So we rebuild new, healthy mitochondria that give us greater energy that is better at using fat for fuel. A lot of mitochondria, in fact, a lot of people when they have trouble adapting, getting keto-adapted it's because they have so many bad dysfunctional mitochondria that are just not able to use fat for fuel because they're damaged.
Dr. Anna:
Ooh, this is such good stuff. David, this is such good stuff. We're going to keep going, but I want you to go back and explain the mitochondria to my audience in this time.
Dr. David:
Yeah, absolutely. So the mitochondria, we have roughly about 1,000 mitochondria within every muscle cell, somewhere between one to 2,000 within our liver, we have two to 3,000 within our heart, we have 5,000 mitochondria per cell. And in our brain, we have 10,000 mitochondria per cell. They're producing rampant amounts of cellular energy. And these mitochondria can become poisoned by environmental toxins, by chronic stress, by different things that cause, just on a regular basis, even if you're living a healthy lifestyle, you're going to produce oxidative stress, and the oxidative stress rusts the mitochondria. So it's not necessarily, in some ways we do want to reduce the stressors that damage the mitochondria, but it's really about being able to replace the mitochondria on a regular basis.
Dr. David:
And things that help induce autophagy, when we talk about mitochondria, call it mitophagy, where the body's actually eating the bad mitochondria and rebuilding new ones, things that improve that are exercise. Regular exercise, particularly higher-intensity exercise, whether it's a high-intensity interval training or resistance training, really good for autophagy. Good sleep is so important for autophagy, particularly for autophagy in the brain, that's really where the brain breaks down and gets rid of all the junk when we're sleeping. So sleep is so important.
Dr. Anna:
So how many hours for that autophagy to take place typically?
Dr. David:
We should definitely be getting a minimum of six, and ideally seven to nine hours of sleep. I think each individual is going to be a little bit different depending on the amount of stress that you're under, your age, what time you're going to sleep, your sleep hygiene, all of that's going to make a difference, and also the quality of your sleep. So if somebody is getting in six, seven hours, two hours of deep sleep and an hour of REM sleep, they're going to be a lot better than somebody that... There's other people that will sleep eight hours, but they'll only get an hour of deep and 30 minutes of REM, so we want to optimize the higher quality stages of sleep, which are your deep sleep.
Dr. David:
You have light sleep, which has benefits, but it's benefits are a lot less than deep sleep and REM sleep, particularly when it comes to brain autophagy. So optimizing our sleep, and that starts with just good sleep hygiene, winding down. I always tell people, you should not have goals after 9:00 PM. You can be up later than that, but if your goal is, "I got to do the laundry. I do the dishes. I really want to watch this show. Or I want to get on my computer and do work." It's not a good idea because then you're going to release more stress hormones, you're going to deplete your melatonin and you're not going to sleep as well. You should dim all your lights after nine. Really after sunset, you should dim all your lights.
Dr. David:
You can watch casual shows. I wouldn't recommend really invigorating types of things, at least not on a regular basis, maybe once a week, like a movie night, but don't make it a regular thing. You can have a chat with your spouse as long as it's not like real stressful talk, that would actually be better for the morning, the stressful talks because that's when you naturally have more stress hormones. Reading a light book, something along those lines will help as far as helping you get deeper sleep. And you can wear a blue light blocking glasses also to help block out if you're on your device.
Dr. Anna:
Show everyone mine.
Dr. David:
Yeah, there you go. You got it. Exactly.
Dr. Anna:
My Defender Shields.
Dr. David:
That's right. That's right. Block out those bad rays. So that can be really helpful getting out in the morning sunshine, you're getting some morning sunshine, actually is really good. Regular exercise, really good for good sleep. Not eating too late at night is also important. You should eat basically at least give yourself at least three hours, ideally, between your last meal and going to bed. Now, if you're not able to, because you get home from work at 7:00, I understand that, do the best you can, but that's the ideal. So those are all great tactics. I wear a sleep mask at night to try to block out as much ambient light that might come in and try to keep your room as dark as possible.
Dr. David:
Keep your room really cool. I actually sleep best when my room's like 64, 65 degrees, got a fan on. the air conditioning. I sleep a lot better that way, so that can really help. So good quality sleep. Fasting, from a nutritional perspective, fasting is the best way to get autophagy, particularly water fasting. So there's a lot of people that will do MCT oil or coconut oil in their coffee in the morning, which is fine. If you feel good about that, that's totally fine. But if you want to really maximize your autophagy, what you want to do is you get your body fat-adapted, where you're good at using ketones for fuel, and then basically do something like a 16 to 18-hour fast on a regular basis. And one day a week, do a 24 hour fast. And that will really ramp up the autophagy.
Dr. David:
Now, for some women, and I know you know this Dr. Anna, if you're a really lean active woman, doing intermittent fasting like that may not work as good for you, I've seen mixed results. I see so many women when they stop, they stop menstruating and have issues. So what I'll often recommend for them is every other day, fasting, intermittent fasting, or what we call crescendo fasting, where you do it two days a week non-consecutive days. So like a Monday, Thursday, Monday, Friday, because you don't want to overwhelm your system with stress. And any diet change, whether it's fasting or if you're used to fasting and you feel good fasting, when you eat breakfast one day, that's actually stress on your body.
Dr. David:
If you're used to eating breakfast and you don't eat breakfast, that's a stress on your body. So any sort of variation is a stressor, and too much stress can because problems, particularly when it comes to female sex hormones. So we've be careful with that.
Dr. Anna:
Yeah. So true. And in general, like I think what you mentioned getting fat-adapted, like really exercising that fasting muscle over time. So for me and my audience and what I've been playing with now for five years and those of us over 40, over 50, there's some metabolic restrengthening that we have to do and it can take us a little bit longer to get there, but also with the concept of fasting, I really have my alkalized. And we definitely do extended fasting, extended water fasting, and optimize our lab work, optimize our numbers, definitely monitor and discern how we feel, but I am big on just alkalinize or a shot of Mighty Maca, maybe a half a teaspoon of apple cider vinegar with water, first thing in the morning to hydrate and flush toxins and get those out, and then continue fasting until you break fast with a fat, healthy, have a good Keto-Green meal.
Dr. Anna:
And we're online, we just think alike in all of these things, which is so good to hear you talk to them about this. Dr. Jockers, I'm just telling you, this is so important, good for us to hear. And you've been exercising this fasting muscle of yours for a long time now. What is the best way to get fat adapted?
Dr. David:
Yeah. And I actually want to want to comment too on what you were saying there. So all those things, Mighty Maca, all the herbs that you have in there, as well as apple cider vinegar in the morning helps really open up those bile ducts. And if we're going to be able to metabolize and utilize fat for fuel, we need really good bile flow. And it also helps activate stomach acid, and so we need that in order to optimize our digestion so it's just so good. Warm lemon water, or apple cider vinegar and water. a lot of times I'll have a lot of my clients do apple cider vinegar, and then there's cinnamon Stevia. You put a little bit of that in there, it's like a little apple cinnamon apple drink that you can try.
Dr. Anna:
That sounds good.
Dr. David:
And warm water, also really good for the liver. Really good for the liver, also antiviral. So doing it warm can be really helpful in the morning, get your whole system moving and working right.
Dr. Anna:
You also talk about bitters a lot. So let's talk about bitters now. Do you ever do them in the morning when you wake up or just with your meals or how are you doing there?
Dr. David:
Well, I'll do like lemon or apple cider vinegar. So I think lemon water, apple cider vinegar, that doesn't break a fast, there's little to no calories in those. If you look at a jar of apple cider vinegar-
Dr. Anna:
I'm with you 100% on that.
Dr. David:
Yeah. They don't break fast. And those sorts of compounds that are in there actually helps stimulate autophagy. So bioflavonoids are an autophagy stimulator and also the acidic and Malic acid actually help with stimulating autophagy, that's what's in the apple cider vinegar. So doing that in the morning, really good idea. And then with meals, I always try to have some sort of bitter, so whether it's dandelion, artichokes, I love artichokes, so I use those a lot. Parsley, easy to put parsley on meat dishes, vegetable dishes. Ginger is another really good one. You can drink ginger tea or you can grate a little bit of ginger. A lot of times, I'll have people take an inch of ginger root, just an inch and chew that like 10 minutes before their meal.
Dr. David:
Now, it's really pungent, but that the vagus nerve and gets the stomach acid, bile going and gets your pancreatic enzymes, gets your digestive system warmed up, which is really helpful. Celery, cucumbers, radishes. I love radishes, I just love the crunch and the flavor of them, so I have them almost every day for lunch as part of my lunch and just munch on some radishes. Garlic would be another one. Onions. These things are all bitter herbs that help stimulate better bile flow and better digestive juice function. So try to get those in your meal in some way. So again, you can easily put them on a salad. Some of them you can put in smoothies or a shake. You can have ginger tea if you wanted to, or dandelion tea.
Dr. David:
And then, of course, you can put them on meat dishes as well, rosemary, oregano, all your Mediterranean herbs. Like a Mediterranean diet, one of the benefits of that is, that Mediterranean diet, not only are they using olive oil, but they're also using a lot of herbs. Everything smells good, that basil, oregano, thyme. Those are all those bitters carminative herbs that help stimulate good digestion.
Dr. Anna:
Love it. All right. Yeah, I'm with you too. And I think of the Mediterranean lifestyle I'm thinking of Italy, and oh my gosh, how much they're going through right now. A big reason they had such a rapid spread is their social. So social. Like they eat in big groups, they celebrate everything, parties together. There is so much that's Immuno protecting about that, but the elderly and it is an elderly population, it got really hit hard despite all the good lifestyle habits and nutritional patterns and lifestyle patterns that they have adapted to over all these years. So I know, because my daughter, she was studying in the Netherlands and she has this lovely friend who's went back at the end of December to Italy, they've been essentially on house arrest in the dorms all this time or in the university all this time.
Dr. Anna:
And I have a dear friend, Dr. Francesco Marotta, who was the president of ReGenera Scientific European Medical Society and in constant contact with him. And he said that, "Really, it was so hard because we're so social. We do so much together that it just spread so quickly." So when we think about the quarantine that you and your family are experiencing right now, I and my family are experiencing and everyone listening is experiencing, my heart goes out to each and every one of you that it is this time were in a way isolating, but hopefully, we are continuing, whether it's virtually or in person, connecting on a regular basis with those that we love because that increases oxytocin, the most powerful hormone in our body.
Dr. Anna:
So if we can't do it in person right now, let's keep reaching out, keep connecting, keep having conversations and checking in with each other so that we are able to help each other out in this way, and that certainly boosts our immune system as well.
Dr. David:
Yeah, absolutely. So important. That's for sure. Being connected with people. And even if you're self-quarantined, if you have a family around you, being able to have physical touch with them, I think is so important, even if it's just your close, immediate family that you're with, because again, boosts that oxytocin. And from my understanding in Italy, they've one of the highest percentages of smokers out there too. And we know smoking damages the lung epithelium, and we know that COVID-19 is damaging the lungs, so it's a virus that gets into the lungs. So there's a lot of people that had basically had a big predisposition to have problems with that.
Dr. David:
So if you are a smoker, that's another warning right there that, "Hey, these kinds of things, whether it's the flu or COVID-19 can be a major danger." Now, there are things that can help support lung epithelium. Like I know you have a lot of these in your Mighty Maca like green tea extract can be really helpful, resveratrol. And these things also help stimulate autophagy too. So things that you could do, especially if you've had issues in the past, possibly with asthma, or you've had really bad flu's that have damaged maybe some of your lungs, or if you've smoked in the past, or are currently smoking, taking something like your Mighty Maca, drinking, green tea, taking maybe resveratrol and quercetin.
Dr. David:
I know I saw one that's got Resveratrol and quercetin together, which is really good for lung health, breathing. Those can be phenomenal compounds.
Dr. Anna:
There is quercetin in Mighty Maca too as well.
Dr. David:
Yeah, exactly.
Dr. Anna:
But I agree with you extra is beneficial in CoQ10 for mitochondria. Because of my strong family history of diabetes, one of the things in functional medicine testing I identified right away when looking at urinary organic acids is that they have significant CoQ10 insufficiency. So some enzyme breakdown, which makes sense, because, on both sides of my family, there's significant coronary vascular disease. And as you said, there's what? 5,000 mitochondria?
Dr. David:
Yeah. In your heart, exactly, in every cell.
Dr. Anna:
In every cell of your heart. 5,000 mitochondria in every cell of your heart. Imagine that. So that extra CoQ10, I'm just stocking up, I'm not running out a CoQ10.
Dr. David:
Exactly. So important when people take CoQ10, oftentimes they feel like that they can think sharper and clearer, that they have better cardiovascular endurance. They just notice that they don't fatigue as much. And again, that's because it's helping support all those mitochondria. And again, your brain and your heart are the two most saturated organs with mitochondria, they need that CoQ10 and there are so many things that damage the mitochondria; pesticides, herbicides, we're all exposed to this, smoke, whether it's secondhand smoke, different environmental toxins, different things in our home.
Dr. David:
The EPA says an average house is two to five times more toxic, has more chemicals in it than the outdoor air. So a lot of things in our home, furniture off-gassing, we're constantly breathing in things and consuming things, especially if we're not paying attention to our diet that are damaging our mitochondria, especially as you age, taking some extra CoQ10 can be extremely helpful and beneficial. When we're talking about protecting the lungs, CoQ10 would be a very important one. And then there are other things too, so vitamin C, another great one most people know about that for the immune system, those white blood cells need vitamin C.
Dr. David:
And keeping our blood sugar stable like we talked about earlier is very important for them to be able to soak up vitamin C because when our blood sugar is elevated, basically, insulin is what brings vitamin C into the white blood cell, but the thing is that the white blood cell insulin will grab glucose. Glucose and vitamin C have a similar molecular structure.
Dr. Anna:
Oh, wait. I want to just emphasize that point because this is so fascinating. I was in Swiss Mountain Clinic with my dear friend, Magdalena Wszelaki this summer. It's a clinic that Robyn Openshaw... It started up with a beautiful German doctor there. And so we got this high dose vitamin C. My blood sugar, well, technically not my blood sugar, but my 24-hour continuous glucose monitor picked up a blood sugar of nearly 400, meaning that we have adequate vitamin C because you actually want to see that. But I was like, "How did this happen?" And then I had to dig into the research. So that was so exciting to figure out. So tell us more, vitamin C looks like glucose, who knew?
Dr. David:
It does exactly. So I'm sure your continuous blood glucose meter was actually thinking it was glucose, but it was picking up all that extra vitamin C. And so basically, the vitamin C competes with glucose to get into the white blood cell, and glucose, because it's an immediate energy source, has a greater affinity to get in. So in order for vitamin C to be effective, we really need to keep that blood glucose under control. And then we're able to get the vitamin C in the white blood cell, which allows it to have a greater, what we call phagocytic index or ability to break down and destroy pathogens. So vitamin C's important.
Dr. David:
Zinc. Zinc is another really important one. A lot of people are deficient in zinc. And I know you talk a lot about that with progesterone and different issues with hormones. Zinc is a very important one for our immune system as well. Vitamin D. So many people are deficient in vitamin D. So we really want to optimize our vitamin D, and taking some extra vitamin C, zinc, and vitamin D right now to help prevent coronavirus, really great idea. And you know they say, the cold and flu season gets at its worst, it peaks February through April. And when you think about it, most people just by going outside or if they're not supplementing will have their highest vitamin D usually around September and then by March, it's at its lowest.
Dr. David:
And so we know that colds, fevers, flu's, they peak at that time. One hypothesis is because our vitamin D levels are at their lowest unless we're supplementing. So taking vitamin D I think is a really important idea. You're looking for vitamin D3, and I always recommend a good maintenance dose of about 1,000 international units per 25 pounds of body weight. Now, depending on how well your body, what your genes look like, and how well you absorb it, you may need a little bit more or less. And so you can get your vitamin D levels tested. And I always see the ideal range is somewhere around 50 to 100, somewhere in that range, then you're in a pretty good zone.
Dr. David:
So that can be really, really helpful, some herbs. So if you do those basics, you're taking really good care of your body, you're prioritizing sleep, keeping your stress under control, focusing on a good diet, doing some intermittent fasting, exercise, taking your vitamin C vitamin D zinc, maybe some vitamin A also can be helpful, drinking your Mighty Maca, you're probably got it covered. However, if you want some extra things, you can keep some, for example, a colloidal or nanosilver on hand. Silver can be great for fevers, flu's, different things like that, viruses, a lot of antiviral activity. You can keep some herbs like astragalus, elderberry, wild cherry, beta-glucan is another great compound that we find that in medicinal mushrooms, that's really good for helping support the immune system.
Dr. David:
All your medicinal mushrooms. So you've got reishi, you've got maitake. Do you have any of those in your Mighty Maca?
Dr. Anna:
No. I have beta-glucan.
Dr. David:
But you have beta-glucan. Exactly. So beta-glucans, great support for the immune system. And all those types of things, we were talking about drinking green tea. So if you're doing these things, you're going to keep your body strong and healthy. And I would try to do as much as possible if you're over 60 and you've got some preexisting health condition, whether it's diabetes, heart disease, maybe you've had cancer in the past. Those COPD or any sort of lung issue, asthma, allergies, then definitely trying to do as much of these things as possible will be important. If you're younger, no preexisting health conditions, taking a few of these supplements, and really dialing in the lifestyle, I think will keep you healthy and strong.
Dr. Anna:
I agree. And all of this improves the health of our mitochondria, improves the health, our body's ability to bump into autophagy. So it does its own dusting and cleaning. And damage cells are just energy socks, if you think of metastatic cells, they just suck up glucose so much. So restricting also where extended fasting comes into play is just restricting their fuel supply and switching from using glucose to ketones on a regular basis. So we want to talk about getting keto-adapted or fat-adapted.
Dr. Anna:
This is Dr. Anna Cabeca, the Girlfriend Doctor, author of bestselling books, Keto-Green 16, and The Hormone Fix. I quickly wanted to share with you that my new book, Keto-Green 16 is finally available. Look inside these pages, beautiful recipes, a 16 day clinically proven effective fat loss, adrenaline-boosting, an anti-inflammatory plan that will make you feel great quickly. We have used this plan in clients in post-menopause, menopause, and post-menopause as well as some gentlemen that have joined us along the way. I love it when men are joining alongside their ladies and taking part. And what we found is an increase in fat loss, a decrease in symptom score, and a decrease in waste.
Dr. Anna:
So we'd like to see these changes. In fact, we have one client who's a 67-year-old woman who has tried many things. She was diagnosed in the past with breast cancer and had felt that she had hit a wall and she was just going to have to power through or struggle for the rest of her life. Just within one cycle of Keto-Green 16, she not only felt tremendous, but she said she was happier than she's been in forever, that she could remember. And she was no longer feeling like when is the next shoe going to drop as far as waiting for another diagnosis, she felt empowered over her own body and that she has taken this control back. Not to mention losing some weight, improving her blood sugar with a decrease in hemoglobin A1c, as well as some other really important health markers.
Dr. Anna:
Now, we've had a gentleman in the plan, his name is Daniel, a 57-years-old with 80 pounds to lose on blood pressure medicine, at risk for starting blood sugar medicine. He did one cycle of Keto-Green 16 with his beautiful wife and within 16 days, his symptoms dropped tremendously, his blood pressure improved so much that he has to be weaned off his blood pressure medicine. And he lost 30 pounds. I know, crazy, right? And what other clients have told me, especially during the quarantine is that they felt like they were doing something good for their body, they could focus on their health and their resilience, which made them feel much stronger and healthier. And so I encourage you to check it out, Keto-Green 16, and I am pleased to be on this journey with you.
Dr. David:
Getting keto-adapted, fat-adapted, basically what you want to do is take out the sugar and the starch. Here are your basic rules. Take out sugar starch, take out processed vegetable oils, take out most fruit except for lemons, limes. We want to use a lot of those and avocados and olives, maybe a little bit of berries. So you're trying to get into a ketogenic state. I know you love to get alkaline first, which I think is a really good idea, take a few weeks, really focus on plant-based foods, getting into an alkaline state, using a lot of those bitters and then really dialing down those total carbs, getting your total carbs down under 50 grams, roughly in that range. Net carbs under 20 grams.
Dr. David:
So net carbs would be your total carbs minus fiber, trying to get some good exercise, really prioritizing sleep, using salt liberally, meaning when your insulin goes down, you're going to excrete more sodium. So you want to make sure that you're using salt, not over-salting, but salting to taste. And when you're eating good foods, trace mineral-rich foods like wild-caught salmon, these sorts of sea vegetables, you'll get a lot of trace minerals in that, which is great, grass-fed meat, different things like that. So that will get your body into that state of ketosis. And if you're measuring on blood, you're looking at, your range should be roughly somewhere between 0.5 millimoles up to roughly around three or four.
Dr. David:
You're really not going to get up above three unless you are doing some an extended fast. Once you get up above as your 0.5, you're technically in nutritional ketosis. And one thing you'll notice, even if you're not testing, is that your cravings will reduce significantly. You'll be able to go much longer periods of time without food and not feel dizzy, lightheaded, things like that. You'll actually feel really energized when you're in your fast. And that's one, just a biofeedback way of knowing that you're in that state of ketosis. And for different people, it can take different amounts of time. So if you're very active, you're living a healthy lifestyle already, it probably will take less time, maybe two, three weeks to get keto-adapted.
Dr. David:
If you're not, if you have diabetes or some preexisting condition, you're not very active, it may take six weeks, it may take two months, to get keto-adapted. So you just got to stick with it. And there are different ways to troubleshoot challenges, a lot of times people have challenges because they're not getting enough electrolytes in. So that can be a big factor. Sometimes you're not hydrating well and they get constipated and that can be a factor as well, so we want to address that. And sometimes you're not eating enough food. Sometimes your cravings go down and you're just not eating enough. So make sure you're eating enough, I think that's super important.
Dr. David:
And sometimes you got to shift around. Some people do a little bit better with more protein, some people do a little bit better with less protein. So you have to troubleshoot it a little bit. I would say about two-thirds of the people when they start on a ketogenic diet, within a month they feel pretty darn good. But then there's that one third that may have challenges with it, they may have a really bad experience. A lot of times I find that these are people that may have a tremendous amount of stress already going on in their life, and oftentimes, I see that their liver and their bile ducts in general in their liver and their gallbladder, sometimes they don't even have a gallbladder, but a lot of times their bile ducts in their liver are really blocked up.
Dr. David:
So they're not getting the bile secretions that they need to be able to emulsify the fats. And so now those fats end up going rancid and creating more inflammation in the system and they feel really, really bad. So sometimes getting the bile flow working well, first is really important. I think that's why you've had so much success with your alkaline first approach because that's what that naturally does is help support the bile's ability to produce that bile. And then you're going to be able to emulsify those fats and actually use the fatty acids for fuel. And that's what we're trying to do, getting fat adapted.
Dr. Anna:
That is what's so fascinating is that you're talking always about clearing those bile ducts. And so for those clients, we'll talk about what the bile ducts are doing and then also for clients without a gallbladder, I'm curious to hear your recommendations as well.
Dr. David:
Yeah, absolutely. So bile basically, think about it like soap. So if you have a greasy pan and you just put water on it, you're not going to get the grease off, so it's the same thing. If you don't have bile, you're not going to be able to break down the fatty acids that you're eating. So bile is basically more or less, it's bilirubin, or it's a byproduct of your red blood cells and it's cholesterol, and it's actually one of the... Cholesterol is so important for the body and one of the reasons is for bile. And then it has a salt compound, which is basically an amino acid, like Choline, taurine is some of the main ones that are used. And that basically gets in and emulsifies the fats, breaks them down into much smaller particles that can then be used for fuel.
Dr. David:
And so bile though, unfortunately, if you've been on, for example, a low-fat diet for a long time, sometimes the bile just doesn't flow well out of the liver. Also, if you've had small intestinal bacterial overgrowth or some bacterial overgrowth parasites or things like that, they can get in those bile ducts and cause inflammation in there and cause a lot of different issues. Also eating your seed oils, your industrial seed oils, like corn oil, soybean oil, and things like that, really create a lot of inflammation in the liver and damage those bile ducts. And a lot of exposure to environmental toxins or heavy alcohol consumption, things like that, all those things damage the bile ducts.
Dr. David:
And so at anything really that would damage the liver is going to damage those bile ducts and cause poor flow. Also, hormones play a role too, because if you're not producing enough thyroid hormone, the thyroid hormone is really big for good bile flow. Also, estrogen, if you're estrogen dominant, then that causes more sluggish bile like heavy cholesterol, less bile salts, and very sluggish flow of that bile. And that creates an environment for crystallization of the bile which can create gallstones. We think about gallstones in the gallbladder, but you can also get stones in your liver as well. And then that obviously impedes the flow.
Dr. David:
And so for a lot of women, women a lot more so than men, end up getting their gallbladder taken out. And again think about it, why is it women more than men? Because women's hormones are more susceptible and the estrogen plays a big role, the thyroid hormone plays a big role. So if you don't have a gallbladder, I've seen some women without gallbladders be able to consume larger meals, larger fatty meals and do fine, but I would say that's more of the exception. In general, what you want to do is smaller meals. You can still do some intermittent fasting, but let's say you have an eight-hour eating window, you want to do three small meals in an eight-hour eating window, as opposed to somebody that has good bile flow, they'll do two meals in that eight-hour eating window and just have a little bit larger amount of food in those meals.
Dr. David:
So the other big thing is there's a big correlation between low stomach acid and poor bile flow. The reason why is that stomach acid normally in order to digest protein, we need our stomach acid, the pH in our stomach to be between 1.5 and 2.2. At rest, our stomach acid is roughly between three and 3.5 pH. Now, if anybody remembers from chemistry, that's a big jump to drop from three to 3.5 down to 1.8 to 2.2, it takes a lot of energy to produce stomach acid. And so for a lot of people, when we're eating under stress, when you think about that concept of fast food, so many people are eating on the go, we need our parasympathetic tone, good parasympathetic tone to our vagus nerve stimulates that stomach acid production.
Dr. David:
So if we're eating stress, eating on the go, we're not going to be able to produce that effectively. And then on top of that, as we age, or if we have certain nutrient deficiencies or infections like H. pylori infection or stomach or SIBO in our small intestine, those can all block our ability to produce enough stomach acid. And we need good acid to flow into the small intestines, we need a really good bolus. Bolus would be digested food with stomach acid all around it. And then as it leaves the stomach and moves into the small intestine, there's receptors right on the top of the small intestine that sense the acidity of what's coming in.
Dr. David:
And when it's really acidic, bile is actually alkaline, so the really good strong acids stimulates a great release of bile and now that bile starts flowing out. So we're not producing stomach acid effectively, then we're not going to get a good bile release. And so that can be a big issue as well. And then it's always what came first, the chicken or the egg, because if let's say we produce enough stomach acid, but we've got issues that have caused damage in our liver, we're not producing enough bile, bile is also a sterilizing agent in the small intestine. So most people that have bacterial overgrowth in their small intestine, one of the reasons would be poor bile flow because bile should come in there and really sterilize that and keep the bacterial population under control and down.
Dr. David:
So it's like what came first? The good news is the same strategies that help improve bile flow also improves stomach acid. So we don't necessarily need to do anything additional. In some cases, we may need to take supplemental stomach acid. In fact, oftentimes what I'll recommend is a supplemental hydrochloric acid that also has ox-bile and bile salts and pancreatic enzymes altogether. And that could be a great supplemental combination to help support somebody that doesn't have a gallbladder, maybe he has poor stomach acid, different things like that.
Dr. David:
And one way you know you have poor stomach acid is if you just eat a steak, nothing else, you eat a steak and then you just feel like you've got acid reflux, it just sits in your stomach, it doesn't leave, you feel nauseous, you just don't feel good. That would be a sign you don't have good stomach acid. If you don't have good bile flow, which you could try to do is have like a fatty coffee. I've had a lot of people where they put the butter in their coffee, they drink it and they feel nauseous, they get diarrhea, they feel really bad. That's a sign that they're just not able to produce the bile oftentimes. If you can handle black coffee, but you can't do the butter coffee, probably not producing bile well.
Dr. David:
And then for people that are not producing pancreatic enzymes, or maybe they have overgrowth to bacteria in their small intestine, try just eating a bowl of steamed broccoli, just a big bowl of steamed broccoli, you should normally feel good, it's good healthy food. If you notice you're bloated, cramping, you just don't feel good after that, it's a sign of bacterial overgrowth. So these are ways that you can self-diagnose what's going on and try to address those things.
Dr. Anna:
I love the self-diagnosis tips, and one thing that I've done a little bit is the liver gallbladder cleanse just with a shot of olive oil and squirt of lemon juice first thing in the morning for a few days. How do you recommend doing that, liver gallbladder cleanse?
Dr. David:
There's a number of different ways. There is one strategy that I've had a lot of people do, and I've written about it a lot on my website, where you're taking Epsom salts, you're drinking a little bit of Epsom salt and water, it's kind of laxative. And then at night, before you go to bed, you drink roughly about a half a cup of olive oil with three-quarters cup of lemon juice, it's a powerful drink. You go right to sleep and in the morning you wake up and you drink a little bit more Epsom salt and water, and you'll actually poop out green stones. And these are-
Dr. Anna:
Wait, start this again, I'm writing it down. So the night before you drink-
Dr. David:
You stop eating roughly before 1:00 PM. So you have lunch, you don't need anything after that, and ideally leading up to it, you're drinking a lot of water with lemon or water with apple cider vinegar, because those things actually dilate the bile ducts. So you're doing that to help dilate the bile ducts. And then this is almost like giving yourself surgery basically to some degree. So around 6:00 PM, you drink water with Epsom salt, a tablespoon of Epsom salt in four to eight ounces of water. And then you do the same thing at 8:00 PM.
Dr. David:
And then at let's say 10:00 PM, you drink olive oil, I believe it's a half a cup of olive oil with three-quarters cup of lemon juice, might be the inverse, something like that. And then you go to sleep right away, you sleep on your right side. And what happens is that gets in there and your bile ducts are already dilated, the Epsom salts oftentimes will sweep you out. So you've probably had one or two bowel movements beforehand, then that will help your liver and your gallbladder would just pump out bile and then they'll shoot out bile stones. So you wake up in the morning, you drink another glass of water with Epsom salt, and then you do another one about two hours later.
Dr. David:
Now, you've got to give yourself time in the morning because you're going to spend a lot of time in the bathroom. Now, it's not painful, I've done this several times, I've had other people that have had gallstones that have done this, diagnosed gallstones, done this. They said no pain, they had no pain at all. Basically what you will notice is, you'll notice green stones, a ton of them, you can count them. I've had people count out 150 stones that have come out.
Dr. Anna:
It's terrible, but that's so good. I'm going to get people... You have this book, we'll put the link in the show notes too, this recipe.
Dr. David:
Exactly. And you can do some things to help, for example, leading up, drink your Mighty Maca, things that are going to help to dilate those bile ducts will be helpful. You could even take bile salts like Choline, taurine and things like that to help, but that really works, it works really, really well. Another strategy you could do, this is more of a longer strategy, takes a bit longer, but take some activated charcoal, take 500 to 1,000 milligrams of activated charcoal, about 30 minutes before a meal, particularly high-fat meals. And it will get in the gut and sit in the gut. And it's like a catcher's mitt, it helps grab up excess toxic bile. So if we don't get rid of the toxic bile, our body will actually recycle it and reuse it.
Dr. David:
So we actually need to get the bile out through the feces and charcoal will help grab and bind to it. So getting that charcoal in there beforehand, then having your Keto meal and then especially doing that with maybe some supplement that can help with bile flow. So there are different supplements out there, I have one called Bile Flow Support, which has got bile salts and dandelion and things like that in there, that can really help thin the bile and get it going, and charcoal will help grab it and pull it out of the system. So you can do that. And for some people, the charcoal can be a little bit constipating, so maybe taking a little magnesium between meals, calcium-magnesium or just magnesium citrate or something like that, it can also help. So those are just strategies to help clear that stuff out.
Dr. Anna:
And so important to do. That's where the toxin is, that's how we have to get rid of the toxins and also digest our food well.
Dr. David:
So important. And for some individuals, they just need that extra support. They need to do the cleansing, they need to throw the charcoal in there just because they just have so many stones. And try to remove those things can take time, and just doing a food-based only approach, oftentimes it's going to take years, to really get it down. So I can shorten that time period.
Dr. Anna:
Yeah. I know. I love that. Tell us about your book, Keto Metabolic Breakthrough, because it's color and it's beautiful. My publisher gave me 19 pages of color, I'm so excited, it's amazing.
Dr. David:
Breakthrough, yes.
Dr. Anna:
Yes, But you've got it. You've got this, so talk about your life.
Dr. David:
I wanted to create a book that people would just open up and be like, "Wow, this is amazing." And so really everything that we've been talking about. I actually talk about, we call it the bile sludge protocol with the charcoal, that's in there. So I talk about that in the book. It's basically, I think of a ketogenic diet and lifestyle as a tool, in my tool belt to help people. And it happens to help a lot of people, but really this book is all about functional medicine. It's about how to improve your adrenals, your thyroid, how to reduce inflammation in your body, how to support your digestive system, optimize your stomach acid, bile flow, digestive enzyme release, optimizing your microbiome.
Dr. David:
And obviously, we talk a lot about the ketogenic benefits, ketogenic diet, and lifestyle, a lot of myths that are involved in that. And I take you through an approach as well that's very similar to what you talk about with your keto alkaline diet in the sense that the approach I take in a book is not to just go from eating 500 grams standard American diet, and then immediately the next day going on a ketogenic diet, it can be very extreme on the body. So I take a gradual approach where you start gradually reducing your carbohydrate levels, roughly 50 to 100 grams per day, depending on where your starting point was or 50 to 100 grams per week, I should say, depending on where your starting point was and start increasing the amount of nutrient-dense foods in your diet.
Dr. David:
So you start a gradual approach. So depending on where you started from, you might not even be on a ketogenic diet for three or four weeks, and then you dial in and go into ketosis. And people tend to have a lot better results and a better experience, and I know you've experienced that as well. If you just go keto again, maybe two thirds, I would say, 50 to 65% will have good results. And then that other third will think the ketogenic diet is the worst thing in the world. And I know you talk about keto crazy. And so they'll have a really bad experience and they'll tell all their friends about this terrible experience. And I wanted to make sure that anybody who read my book realizes exactly how to do it the right way so they don't have that experience
Dr. Anna:
Plus the pearls on the bio, and then adrenal support and really putting it into a medicinal essence as well as a plan. And I think that that's what I love about you and your work is that you, first of all, you bring it into a really easy way to understand it. It's clear and it's cutting edge and it's science-based, and you've seen the clinical benefits, I love it, I think it's fabulous. And so I want to tell our audience, I'm definitely in the show notes, we'll put links, you can get Keto Metabolic Breakthrough anywhere books are sold, Amazon, your website. Tell us about your website, and we'll put the link for the bio and the book in the show notes.
Dr. David:
Yeah. The website is just drjockers.com and the book's at Barnes & Noble, all those places. And you can follow me on my YouTube and my podcast as well. In fact, I interviewed you on my podcast as well about Keto-Green. So check that out, Dr. Jockers Functional Nutrition Podcast.
Dr. Anna:
Well, thank you for being on My Girlfriend Doctor Podcast today. And it's great having you always, always on the show and also collaborating with you in so many things. I want to thank you for being here and encourage our listeners to get your book, Keto Metabolic Breakthrough, and keep doing what you're doing. I just love all you're doing in this world. So thank you and I look forward to having you back on this podcast in the near future as well. David, Thanks.
Dr. David:
Great. Thanks so much, Anna.
Dr. Anna:
That was a fascinating interview and I'm so happy to be able to share it with all of you in my community. Really one thing that we agree on, we agree on so much Dr. Jockers and I, but certainly, making Keto work in a way that's really healthy for us, especially as we get older and understand the differences and nuances. And for me, it's all about Keto-Green, getting alkaline, supporting the body with those adaptogens and Mighty Maca Plus. It's essential and there's reasons for the intricacies of our programs. And I love how he brings up again, the importance of bitters to improve digestion and help the gallbladder so we can emulsify fats.
Dr. Anna:
Oftentimes, when we're not succeeding the way we want to be, we need to look, "Hmm, why? What's going on with my body? What do we need to do?" So I'm going to challenge you all, I may be doing it too, I will be doing it too, but a little bit of that gallbladder cleanse and share with me your results. Check out Dr. Jockers’ book, and don't forget your copy of Keto-Green 16 with your Keto-Green road map that I've prepared for all of you as a bonus and other great bonuses when we get the book. And I'm so excited to share this with you in this season because I know without a doubt, it will improve your immune system, improve your hormonal balance and improve your energy and clarity. And we certainly, we certainly need this during this time more than ever.
Dr. Anna:
When you have your health, you have 8,000 wishes, when you don't have your health, you have, but one. So on that note, I am here for you and so happy to be your Girlfriend Doctor. Bye. Till next time.
