https://www.greenhomesolutions.com
For questions reach out to David Bloom via email:
davidb@greenhomesolutions.com
For the Free Jar of Magnesium Muscle Cream use coupon code LTH, Add the Magnesium Jug to your cart, and the free muscle cream will be added automatically as well as the 10% discount. https://livingthegoodlifenaturally.com/product/magnesium-jug
To join IIN and enroll in their Health Coach Training Program, 25% off with zero down, call (844) 315-8547 (U.S.) or +1 (212) 730-5433 (International).
In support of the show please join Ashley's fun kid's book party! https://kidsbook.party
https://www.learntruehealth.com/how-to-prevent-and-treat-mold-naturally
Highlights
Welcome to the Learn True Health Podcast. I’m your host, Ashley James.
This is Episode 364.
We have a very interesting guest for today’s show, David Bloom. I’m so excited to finally have you on the show. I’ve been a really big fan of Green Home Solutions which has created a revolutionary technique for removing mold that is both non-toxic and permanent. It’s something that no other company has. I have personally experienced the benefits of what you’ve created. I had black mold in our bathroom and it was making sick. I didn’t even know it was making me sick. It basically shot my immune system and I was catching everything, and then I finally used your services and it removed the mold, and I stopped catching the germs. I thought this is amazing. I spent probably a year just catching every single cold and flu and just feeling like my immune system had hit rock bottom and it was because of the mold in our house that I was being exposed to everytime I went to our bathroom which is right off our bedroom. So I was basically breathing in these mold spores all the time.
Other companies will use harsh chemicals. They won’t actually get rid of 100% of the mold, and I’m really looking forward to you teaching us today more about how to create indoor air quality; what to look for and the science behind this technology that you’ve developed. So welcome to the show.
0:01:56.0 David Bloom: Thank you very much for having me, Ashley. It’s a privilege to be with you. You’ve done some great work. I’ve listened to several of your podcasts. Just to give you an idea of how this all got started. About late 90’s to early 2000, I had just completed finishing my basement turning it into a living space. We had had a sewage backup or a blockage and the plumber came out with the septic system. He was running a snake from the tank back towards the house to clear the blockage. What I forgot was above the ceiling in that newly finished basement space was a standpipe for water [inaudible 0:02:36.1]. So everytime the plumber is pushing the snake there is ethylic coming over that pipe into the basement which had just been completed into a living space.
So I started to freak out and called my local DP and they said get rid of everything, get somebody in there. Called environmental protection with the same issue. But I remember meeting a gentleman at the Atlanta airport who had created a particular product that was rather unique. Back at that time, I live in Connecticut northeast, and most homes or a lot of the homes up here are heated using heating oil. And the oil tanks had historically always been buried in the ground. They found that around that time that most of these tanks started leaking. And if you had a tank in the ground you couldn’t sell your house. You would have to remove it first, and if you removed it and they found any evidence of leakage that was considered hazardous waste – that had to be hold away.
So he had come up with a combination of microbes that would be injected into the ground prior to the tanks being dug up a few days ahead of time. And these microbes would actually digest the oil in the ground and then when you dig the tank up there’s no hazardous waste left. It was brilliant. So I got his card and I said, “Stephen, will this stuff work with what I’m doing?” He said, “I have no idea, but why don’t you try it.” So we did. We dried the space out ourselves, we used his product as a spray, we used it on the carpet, we used it as a wipe down. We used it for everything. Now, it wasn’t a big mess. It came in a quarter, maybe a 6 by 6 area, but it was a carpeted space. They told us we’d have to get rid of all that and everything. Bottomline was we spent a couple of days playing around with the stuff. I had somebody come in and test my house and there was no evidence of mold and there was no evidence of bacteria.
That actually stayed that way. The only thing we got rid of – there was a wood bookcase that had a particleboard core. So that swelled up a little bit. I got rid of that. Everything else stayed there until about two years ago when we finally re-did the space. I test my house regularly, usually about every six months. Never have had an issue. So, Steve and I got together and we formed the company and we started looking at other alternatives. So we worked on this particular product for mold remediation specifically because at that time they’re a good industry to get into and we expanded it off of that with other cleaning products. We have odor neutralization technologies we developed, we do biogas desulfurization for anaerobic digesters which is to clean the gas up so it can be burned in a generator from plants or using a fuel cell.
So what happened was I went back to school at roughly 50 years old for microbiology because I had to know what I was talking about and everything took off from there. I come from a family of scientists. I actually took a wrong turn when I went to college and thought that law looked pretty good. My uncle is a very well-known research chemist in the Boston area. I used to work for him during the summer. As a matter of fact, I had a better chemistry set in my house when I was a teenager than my highschool had. It just thrilled me to death to get back and become a scientist. My daughter is finishing up her PhD in neuroscience. I mean we’re a science type of family. We love what we do because we’re helping people. We’re not breaking things down. We’re just helping people get healthy the best way we can.
It took us a couple of years to get the formula perfected and it needed to get through an EPA registration which is not an easy process. You have to prove your efficacy, you have to prove the safety. it really comes down to having a registered product means that the EPA has looked at our data which is generated from third-party laboratories and it matched what we say it does. So, it does what we say it does. It’s the safest we say it is. That’s a big deal. In the mold remediation industry there’s a lot of cowboys out there. We call them “spray and pray.” They go in to somebody’s house with God knows what? I mean they’re gonna tell you, “Oh it’s all natural. It’s safe. Everything’s fine.” But if it’s not EPA registered, there’s no way of verifying that and you just really don’t know what you’re getting. Unfortunately it’s giving the industry a pretty bad rep.
With Green Home, I got involved with them 2015. They have an exclusive – mostly the products that I make now. We have a couple of things we do for the industry but most of the products we make. I had been responsible for training their remediators. They all have to get accredited by the American Council for Accredited Certification whose own programs are created by the council of engineering and scientific specialty branch which is the only one like it. There’s a lot of people that have [inaudible 0:08:03.0] after their name in the mold industry, but usually it’s a paid up plaque. You pay them a fee, you answer some questions and you get a certification. ACAC does not offer any kind of training. All they do is they do proctored exams. So it’s really a great way to do it and it puts us ahead of a lot of the other people that are out there and much more reputable.
We’re actually getting into a lot more things than just mold. In fact, I’m not sure if you’re aware, but the two most common indoor pollutants are VOCs and particulates. People don’t realize it. There is an article recently in one of the journals where they analyze the air in a home after they had cooked the roast in their oven. It was a gas oven, I think that would probably make a little bit of a difference. The air quality was equal to New Delhi India which is about the 6th most polluted air in the world – off from that roast.
0:09:05.9 Ashley James: Yeah. I believe that. I had a doctor on who wrote the book Dirty Genes and his whole thing is teaching people how to help their body through epigenetics. Because when we’re exposed to different chemicals, it can actually trigger genes to turn on and off – basically genes to be suppressed or expressed themselves. And when we are cooking with gas, when we’re breathing and we don’t have the hood on to suck all the byproduct or the waste of burning gas away from us, it can change our genetics. Because there are chemicals like formaldehyde in the gas that comes to our stove and so people often will turn the oven on and not think to turn the hood on and their whole house is being filled with formaldehyde.
0:10:01.5 David Bloom: Yes. The electric stove still have the issue from the particulates from the cooking process itself, but obviously not from the gas. And while we’re talking about gas, one of the other major pollutants are the pilot lights that are in gas fireplaces. A lot of people still have pilot lights instead of electronic ignition. Those are very inefficient – they way they burn. They let something that’s not used very often. When it’s on it gets complete combustion. You don’t get the same particulate matter, but when it’s not operating and just the pilot light is on – then you’re putting particulates in. And along those same things, the next one that everybody should be avoiding is burning candles. Candles are atrocious for putting particulates into the air, especially paraffin candles. Soy-based candles are better, and if you had to burn a candle and you could keep your wick short under about half an inch – that’s even better.
We did a test where we hooked up a sort of like a radon fan in a filtration system. We burn a single candle for 20 minutes, the filter was as black as black could be from that one candle. Nobody realizes it and then you go into somebody’s home and they can’t understand why they don’t feel well and they got 25 candles burning everywhere – not a good idea.
0:11:28.4 Ashley James: Wow. We have one air filter that we keep running in our bedroom. I turn it on a few hours before we go into the bedroom to sleep. I turn it on high and when I walk in there, it is like I’m walking into a fresh forest. The air smells amazing. Not that our house smells bad, but it’s just there’s something totally different about the quality of the air. It smells clean and fresh and it feels different when I walk into our bedroom after having turn the air filter on high and we have it running all night long with us. I just notice a difference. I thought that was really interesting that the rest of our house is so different from this one room that has an air filter in it.
0:12:18.6 David Bloom: I’m guessing you have charcoal filter in that filter also. Activated charcoal is unbelievably good at absorbing some VOCs and gasses. So typically the best combination that I would ever recommend is a HEPA filter with an activated charcoal pre-filter and that will take care of a lot of the pollutants that we would normally see. A HEPA filter is down to .3 microns so you’re getting most anything that could get down deeper, you’re not getting really tiny stuff, but you’re getting a good portion of it.
0:12:51.3 Ashley James: Is Green Home Solutions planning on designing and providing air filters that are effective?
0:13:03.4 David Bloom: Actually we’re in the middle of looking at that now. There’s a lot of them out in the market. There’s a big discrepancy between what the lab results on a lot of these filters are versus what you actually get in real life. In fact, Wire Cutter which is a division of the New York Times published an article just recently where they did real life experiences with a bunch of different air filters and made some strong recommendations. There’s some really good ones. So we’re not necessarily to re-invent, we’re looking to see if we can find the one that does what we want. If we had to, we will. But I think we’re gonna find a manufactured product that we can recommend based on the design and how it works.
0:13:43.8 Ashley James: Very cool.
0:13:46.1 David Bloom: But I would recommend that article for your listeners.
0:13:48.5 Ashley James: Great. I will make sure that we link it. Is there a particular brand that you have in your home right now that you like?
0:13:56.4 David Bloom: No. [Laughter]
0:13:59.1 Ashley James: The jury is still out?
0:14:01.0 David Bloom: I actually have a commercial unit that I was still learning remediation business for a number of years before I decided I didn’t wanna do the work anymore and just make the stuff that other people use and train people how to do it. So I’ve got air scrubbers that will move anywhere between 500 and 2000 cubic feet of air per minute.
0:14:19.7 Ashley James: I bet your house smells amazing.
0:14:22.0 David Bloom: Well, we’ve got dogs and cats. So, got to take that into consideration. But I’ll run those periodically for a couple of hours especially if we’re not home during the day, I’ll let it run. I have activated carbon pre-filters on those also. So that’s what I do use.
Getting back to the VOCs, what a lot of people don’t realize, I mean formaldehyde is bigger. Formaldehyde can come from building materials, particle boards, new carpet smells – typically formaldehyde. But most of the VOCs that we find when we test homes are actually from personal care and cleaning products. So the typical house if you open a cabinet under the sink is just a zestful of VOC producing chemicals and people don’t realize that that could be affecting your health in the home.
Personal care products – I had a client that I was visiting and she was undergoing chemotherapy. She thought she had mold in the house and it tested negative for that. So we looked for bacteria, we didn’t find anything. So we did the VOC test and there was some sort of a funny smell and I couldn’t quite put my finger on it when I was in there. So when the test results came back, she had two major sources – one was under her sink and the other was she had a perfume that she would put on when people are coming over. It was a very light scent, it had a perfumey type of smell but I didn’t really detect it on her, but that was putting a tremendous amount of VOCs into the air. And so here she is sitting getting chemotherapy but she is making herself ill. So once we got her to change, things got better of course.
The other thing that people don’t realize is when they store – if you have an attached garage and you store chemicals, pesticides, gasoline. All of those things can generate gasses that then can get sucked in to the house. Most homes are under a slight negative pressure. Ideally we’d have them under positive pressure, but most are under negative pressure and that comes back to what’s called the [inaudible 0:16:42.0]. Assuming you’re in the basement or crawlspace, air will flow from that cooler space below all the way up through the attic. One of the things just on a side note is if I walked into somebody’s attic and I see that they’ve got mold there, the first thing I would look for is a wet base in their crawl space because that’s typically where it comes from. Second would be lack of ventilation.
0:17:07.0 Ashley James: So an attic can have mold because there’s like a leak in some other part of the house but that the moisture is travelling upwards into the attic.
0:17:17.0 David Bloom: That’s correct. So if moisture generates below is always gonna go up and you reach middle pressure, somewhere towards the top of the house and then you get a little bit of negative pressure in the attic. So it is all going in that one flow. It’s a very common known issue. Nowadays they typically try to air seal attics from the rest of the house so that you don’t get anything going up and then if you can condition your house to take care of that moisture, you’re fine. But here in New England we typically all have basements here, but if you don’t have a dehumidifier in your basement, you’re gonna have a mold issue. Because in the summer time it gets very hot and humid and you get a tremendous amount of moisture because that cooler space down below, you get hot air infiltrating into the house reaches that cools space and you get moisture. Ventilated crawl spaces are a big issue. Same thing, you have hot humid air coming in, it gets the cooler surface of the dirt or the floor in the crawl space and it condenses and you end up with a moisture problem.
In fact some people would fans in there because they think if they move more air through their crawl space it makes sense, but the reality is you’re really just bringing in more moisture and allowing it to condense. So I’d like to say, seal the crawl spaces.
0:18:45.1 Ashley James: Oh okay. I was gonna say what the solution? So the solution is to seal them.
0:18:48.1 David Bloom: Yeah. That’s the best thing you can do. Seal it. If you don’t have combustion appliances in the crawl space then we would actually recommend sealing the entire thing. You should probably put a dehumidifier in there, but you’d seal between the crawl space and the living space and obviously you’re gonna seal between the outside and the crawl space itself in the ground. If you do have combustion appliances, you have to be careful because those typically require either a draft for the gas to get up the chimney plus the air for combustion. So there you have to have some alternative ways to doing it.
Modern day furnaces, condensing furnaces, gas units have their own air supply. For other types of units – oil; here they do something where they bring in we call a fan in a can, but it’s a little fan that turns on when your furnace turns on. So it has enough air for combustion. But sealing them up is one of the best things they could do. It improves the whole indoor air quality of the house.
0:19:50.4 Ashley James: So Green Home Solutions franchises. So you teach, you’re one of the main educators at Green Home Solutions and you teach these franchisees how to do these things and I know they go through extensive education with you. Do you teach them how to detect these kinds of problems? Sort of beyond mold, but looking at what should be – like where the VOCs and particulates are coming from, what should be sealed off, is this something that if one of our listeners called Green Home Solutions and have one of their local people come out to their house they could inspect this and see if they could find these problems?
0:20:35.4 David Bloom: Yes. We spend several days just teaching building sciences. So we teach them about proper construction techniques to manage moisture so that when they go to look at a property and if it doesn’t look like they way it’s supposed to look, you know you’ve got a potential issue there. As far as testing for these, we’re just really getting into it. I’ve been doing it for a while. I’ve got several franchisees that are preferably qualified and we’re slowly getting everybody.
So originally we go in and test for mold. If that came back negative, then we’re sort of out of luck because we’re not helping anybody. We just tell them they don’t have mold issue, they have some other issue. And actually mold is really isn’t the problem. Mold is a symptom of a problem. Moisture is the issue. So mold is just a symptom of a moisture problem. That’s why we spend so much time at the building sciences is because they have to be able to identify where the source of moisture is coming from. And we do that, we use thermal imaging, moisture meters, we have[ inaudible 0:21:40.9] so they can look inside walls. We have a number of tools available to help us do these inspections, but there’s really no substitute for your eyes and your nose actually – of just looking around.
We can test for molds, we’ll test for bacteria, we can test for VOCs, formaldehyde – we test for separately because it doesn’t always show up on a standard VOC test. If there were spray foam insulation, we’ll do a different type of aldehyde test. Spray foam – if it isn’t put in perfectly, it can off-gas and the half-life is like 50 years. It never goes away.
0:22:16.7 Ashley James: Oh my gosh. I know so many people who thought they were really smart to use spray foam for insulation. They do it themselves.
0:22:24.3 David Bloom: I used to recommend it. I don’t any longer. Although in some situations it’s okay, and if they’re doing it themselves and they’re using a single-part system, that’s okay too. But when it’s done professionally, there’s two separate components to it that get mixed together, and if everything is not perfect it doesn’t cure properly and then it has the potential to off-gas for an extended period of time. But in some areas you have to do it, we talked to some people up in Boston that had bought a new condo and they’re renovating it and they only had about nine inches of sealing space, but Boston requires an R60 I think it was for insulation in the roof. The only way you can get that level is with spray foam. So if it’s done properly – somebody described it to me as this, somebody smarter than I. He said it’s like playing Russian Roulette with a revolver that’s got 50 chambers. 49 out of 50 times it’s gonna be fine, but when it’s not, it’s catastrophic.
I did several spray foam insulation remediation projects or managed them a few years back and I couldn’t do it anymore.It was just awful. The first one, we literally cut the roof off the people’s house. Cut it off where the rafters meet the ceiling bush. Take it with a crane, we built them a new roof.
Second one I did, they tore the house down because there’s no way to fix it. If it’s a mild issue, you can bring in more fresh air. I did one where we put in something that brought in an extra 7,000 cubic feet of fresh air, conditioned it and it kept the house in a positive pressure so it held the gas in the wall. That’s why positive pressure is always good. When you end up at negative pressure you can suck pollutants in places you didn’t even know you had.
0:24:23.3 Ashley James: I need to unpack that. My mind is about to explode. So many people have homes that have this spray foam. Maybe they moved in to a house and someone else had done the spray foam and they’re sitting here going, “Oh my gosh I have spray foam in my attic. I have no idea whether my house is positive or negative.” Or whether the draft is coming down from the attic and I don’t know whether it’s off-gassing. Can we talk a bit about what are the symptoms, what’s the harm in having the spray foam off-gas for 50 years to our whole family in our house?
0:24:58.7 David Bloom: If it’s off-gassing, that’s a big if. Like I said 49 out of 50 times it’s probably just fine. If it’s off-gassing, there’s usually a little bit of an odor that you detect, but not everybody is sensitive to it. That first house I mentioned where we took the roof off, the two other people that live there had no symptoms at all and one of them is actually one of their children couldn’t stay there. He just would get headaches, migraines, he’d feel awful and as soon as he left the house he felt better. So obviously there’s some sort of a correlation there.
Now, if somebody wanted to check and see if it’s cured properly, you could actually cut a little sample out. Put it in a mason jar and set it out in the sun for a little bit, then open it up and take up and take a big whiff. If it has sort of a sweet fishy smell, that would be an aldehyde – one of the gasses that’s pretty common that’s not right. Formaldehyde is an aldehyde. There are other aldehydes – glutaraldehyde, formaldehyde, but they’re aldehydes. Often you have acetic acid which is like a vinegary kind of smell. This is not a scientific test by any way, but it is simple that somebody could do. To do it properly you would have to have sorbent tubes in a pump it runs for about 24 hours and that then gets analyzed specifically for gasses that could be present in spray foam.
There’s not a lot of places that do that. In fact, I’m only aware of one laboratory that does that kind of analysis specifically for spray foam. There’s a lot of really good labs that can test for various VOCs, but they have a very nice panel of all the potential gasses that could come out of spray foam insulation.
0:26:59.9 Ashley James: We didn’t define VOCs. So for those who don’t know what VOCs are, can you just define it and explain why they’re harmful?
0:27:10.4 David Bloom: VOCs are Volatile Organic Compounds. They’re essentially gasses that are given off by various organics through their life cycle so to speak. Now, a lot of them will off-gas fairly quickly and dissipate quite quick. We had new carpet put in as I mentioned when I redid my basement living space not long ago and that stunk. It was awful and I have a way of getting rid of it, but I wanted to see how long it would take to actually dissipate on its own using. We weren’t using the space, so I figured it would fine. And it took almost four weeks before it completely off-gassed. So it’s just such an off-gassing from a chemical compound. It usually gets more intense when it’s heated. So that actually is one of the methods of trying to get rid of VOCs in the house. You could turn your heat up as high as it’ll go. Let it run that way for eight or nine hours and then ventilate the heck out of it. So the idea is to get as much of that gas you can into the air and then get it out of the house.
0:28:21.8 Ashley James: And don’t stay in the house while it’s happening. [Laughter]
0:28:26.0 David Bloom: No, because you’re gonna put more of it into the air. The other thing that people forget about is just open your windows. I mean this is gonna sound silly but I tell people this all the time. Dilution can be the solution for pollution. Just diluting that air, so the concentration now is lower makes a big difference. And as houses get build tighter and tighter and tighter for energy efficiency, if there’s not enough fresh air make-up, you’re carbon dioxide levels go way up because as humans are exhaling a lot of carbon dioxide. The moisture levels go up because we as humans have a lot of moisture and it’s got nowhere to go which is also why we see more instances of mold growth nowadays than we did in the older homes.
0:29:16.9 Ashley James: Right.
0:29:18.3 David Bloom: My first house I bought was built in 1865 I think. It leaked like a sieve but I never had a mold issue because it could breathe. It had the ability to dry if it got wet. It could dry to the exterior. It could dry to the interior. Now, when we build these things so tight, there’s no ability for them to breath. So there are units that are either energy recovery ventilators or heat recovery ventilators – ERVs or HRVs. Those are pretty standard issue today in modern homes. What they do is they take and equal amount of outdoor air and exit an equal amount of indoor air. So you always have some fresh air coming in. The problem I see is they don’t seem to be enough in a lot of cases. The house is really tight but just not enough of it, and it needs to be increases. There are ways to doing that, but as I mentioned open your windows and take a deep breath.
Now, granted you’re exposed to a lot more mold outside than you are inside normally, but getting that air diluted especially for any of these other things we’re talking about particular to VOCs – let’s dilute it and make it not such a big deal. Getting back to the things that we test for, we can also test for settled allergen. We’ll take a dust sample and have it analyzed for pet dander, dog and cat dander, dust mite matter, rodent excrement – there’s a lot of things they can look for and they can actually look for actual particles too. I had an instance where an old woman wasn’t feeling well in her home and she said that she’s had an abnormal amount of dust lately. We had the dust analyzed and it was silica. So I took a drive around, in about a mile away from her home, there was a place that they were demolishing a building and they were generating a lot of silica dust and that was carrying into her home and that’s what was causing the issue.
So it really becomes sort of an investigation. It’s a lot of fun actually. The other thing too is radon – is the second leading cause of lung cancer after cigarettes in this country. People would test for radon when they buy their home and never think of it again. it really should be tested every three or four years. It’s a simple test, non-invasive. And your water should be tested on a regular basis, especially if you’re on a well system.
0:31:59.3 Ashley James: Oh absolutely. I want to talk about the radon for second. What in the home could generate radon?
0:32:05.9 David Bloom: Radon is a naturally occurring gas from the ground. It comes from rocks similar to uranium actually. It’s naturally occurring. It’s much stronger in certain parts of the country. The northeast has pretty high radon because we have a lot of rock and that tends to be where it is coming from.
0:32:29.0 Ashley James: Because of the bedrock, the Precambrian Shield, I think it’s what’s called.
0:32:34.1 David Bloom: Yeah. Other parts of the country, it’s not nearly as big of a deal, but certain parts on the East Coast is pretty good. Getting down south, we don’t see it as much because the sand is more sandier and it’s not anywhere near as much rock. But the EPA has a map on their website that shows where the highest instances of radon are. I would certainly recommend to your listeners that they take a look at that and if they’re in one of the red areas, get it checked if you hadn’t done it in a couple of years. It’s odorless, colorless gas. you’ll never know if you have it.
0:33:09.5 Ashley James: But it can cause lung cancer.
0:33:12.4 David Bloom: It can cause lung cancer.
0:33:13.4 Ashley James: Very interesting. Yeah because we’re always thinking that these things in our home might be from like you said, carpet or a mattress off-gassing, or mold – but we don’t think that something totally natural coming from the ground would be harmful. So remember to test radon. It can shift, so when you first buy your home radon might not be present, but five years in the future it could start happening. Like shifts in the earth and then it just starts off-gassing?
0:33:48.3 David Bloom: A construction project can do it. Our well water has always been perfect. I was in a fairly rural area. They were building a new house maybe a quarter mile from me on my street and all of a sudden I started getting iron in my water and it came from the construction that they were doing and when they had a blast because again, we have so much bedrock – they had a blast to actually get their well dug drilled, it disturbed the aquifer and all of a sudden it started with a relatively high iron content. We had to put a fairly sophisticated filter system to take care of that.
0:34:36.2 Ashley James: I just had the exact same thing happened. We’re on a well and we’ve been living here for five years, the water has been perfect. We were joking about bottling it in glass bottles and selling it to Europe or something. I mean it’s just like the best water. We have friends come from all around to bottle out water and take it home with them and all of a sudden our water become murky, it taste like heavy metal, it taste very metallic and it had an odor to it. Out of nowhere, just one day it’s fine next day it’s not and we got a water filter, but we’re waiting back from the lab right now. They said it will take like 10 days because they’re testing all these things. It feels like it’s taking a million years to get these results back because I wanna know with our water. Is it even safe to bathe in it. We were like bathing in a friend’s house. But yeah, that made me realize that I hadn’t actually had our well water tested since our son was born because we had it tested to see if the nitrates were high – that’s one thing because we had to substitute with some formula and I didn’t wanna make the formula with water that’s high in nitrates because it can cause blue baby syndrome. For adults too, it makes our red blood cell not be able to carry oxygen, and so people can feel really lethargic and sort of just down if their drinking well water that’s high in nitrates, and most filters cannot filter out nitrates. I discovered this, that most filters in the market – you have to get a specific filter that filters nitrates.
So really being careful if we have a well and making sure that we test our water every year is really important. Time just flew by and I’m like, “Oh my gosh. What are we doing to drink this water that we don’t test every year.” So yeah, being really careful testing for radon every few years. if you have a well, most people don’t, but if you do – get that water tested.
You mentioned that one of the things that your franchisees do with Green home solutions is test the home for bacteria. Why test the home for bacteria? Is bacteria growing inside the home?
0:37:08.7 David Bloom: bacteria is growing everywhere. There’s a book by a guy named Rob Dunn called “Never Home Alone” and it’s about the microbial bio [inaudible 0:37:17.2] all the time. It’s creepy, but it exists. We need them. Most of the bacteria is healthy and it’s fine, but we just don’t need bacteria. So when I was back there before I got involved with Green Home, we found a number of instances where we would test for mold and it would come back negative. So we would test for airborne bacteria levels and if those were elevated, we would take care of it in the same way because the product works equally as well in bacteria as it does in mold. Bacteria is actually much easier to get rid off. Bacteria just have a single cell wall whereas mold spores can have two or three membranes you have to get through before you can get to the nucleus, and I’ll get into that in a minute.
So airborne bacteria levels which a lot people take slobs on the surface. It’s [inaudible 0:38:08.3] bacteria when it should in most cases. But elevated airborne bacteria levels sometimes could be an issue. It’s not as common, we don’t do airborne bacteria very often but it is a test that’s available.
Now, for surface – one of the things we do we’re using something that’s out of the food service industry which is called and ATP test. This is used to determine cleanliness. ATP is a particular enzyme that is present in all organic matter, and this is an instant test. We do it with a meter and a slob. I can take samples in numerous locations around the house ad if the levels are elevated, I don’t necessarily know that it’s bacteria, but it does indicate a general level of uncleanliness I guess, which could easily be bacteria. It could be peanut butter for all I know, but there’s something. So it’s just an overall level of cleanliness, but if you have a clean home you typically don’t have much of these other issues with bacteria that you don’t want in particular.
0:39:23.4 Ashley James: So when you met Steve at the Atlanta airport, I think that’s such divine intervention to have the two of you meet with your love of science and that problem that you had in your home. Did you look back at your life and see how, it’s sort of like all the stars were aligned. You had to have that bad thing happened to you in your home in order to be intrigued. So when you met Steve you had this problem to solve and then that led you to want to solve this problem for other people.
0:39:54.6 David Bloom: Yes. That was life-changing for me. I switched careers. I was a small business owner for a number of years. I completely switched careers in the middle of my life and I just fell in love with the fact that I was able to help people. I like the fact that Green Home being a relatively new company, a lot of people that I work with are half my age which is terrific. I love it. And I love sort of getting the next generation involved in the same kind of work. I’ve never been happier. I can’t imagine why I would ever want to retire. I love what I’m doing.
0:40:41.8 Ashley James: Yes. That’s exactly it. You know you’re doing what you should do when you don’t wanna retire. Like when I interviewed Dr. Esselstyn, he’s in his 80s. I think he’s 87, and he still is an active cardiologist at the Cleveland Clinic and he still takes phone calls. If you call him up, he’ll answer the phone. He talks to people all day long for free. He’s amazing. but he’s the kind of person that he’s gonna be like 110 years old and he’s still gonna be a cardiologist helping people. So, when you find your life’s calling, you find your purpose in life, you do it for free – you know when you absolutely love what you do, especially when it comes to helping people.
David, I know you’re passionate about what you do, but you’re also really helping people. You’re helping the business owners, those who choose to be a franchisee of Green Home Solutions – you’re helping them to help other people and then ultimately you’re helping all these homeowners through what you’re doing as the Chief Science Officer at Green Home Solutions.
When you met Steve and he talked about this enzyme that he created to breakdown the oil, how did you figure out that it could also be effective at basically destroying and demolishing mold? Can you take us back to that moment, that conversation you were first having with Steve, was it a light bulb moment? How did you come to that conclusion?
0:42:19.2 David Bloom: It’s actually by chance because I’d met him and learned a little bit about what he was doing with the oil stuff. So I had enzymes in my brain to start with, and when you look at what enzymes do, enzymes can either break things apart or they can build things up. We have about 3,000 different kind of enzymes in our bodies. We would not be alive without them, because what they do is the speed up the reactions that are required to keep us alive, and the reactions wouldn’t occur fast enough without them. They are in our RNA and DNA and various enzymes in there. They’re in almost everything. So when he was talking about using the enzymes to essentially digest the oil molecules I said, “Why couldn’t we do this…” And then of course when I tried it, we had no idea whether it would do anything or not. It did actually worked pretty good. Not as good as what we have now, but it did work pretty good.
The concept of breaking something down by using itself so to speak, so the enzymes that are present in our mold product are actually from molds. They are harvested from other molds. So molds have a very very strong protective mechanism and they have these things we call acceptors that open and close. They are like channels that allow material to get in. That’s how they get their food, energy, and moisture. When they come in contact with something that’s foreign, they typically sort of like close up and don’t allow anything to enter. When we attack the mold spore with our product, it’s like a homecoming and they welcome it with open arms. So it actually gets in and destroy the mold spores from the inside out.
0:44:10.8 Ashley James: That’s so cool.
0:44:12.9 David Bloom: And then the enzymes themselves are specific types to breakdown various parts of the mold spores. So there would be one type that would go after the membranes, one type that goes after the fatty lipid layer between the membranes. The nucleus is typically a protein, so we use a protease which breaks the bond. Proteins are just strings of amino acids held together by a peptide bond. By breaking the protease, it breaks that bond and actually digest it. So all that’s left is amino acids, and typically when most people have a reaction to molds, your typical reaction – I’m not talking about people that have very serious diseases, but just your typical sort of sinus type reactions. That’s a reaction to the proteins. So by breaking down the protein’s amino acids – there’s no protein, there’s no allergy. So mold is essentially a histamine, that’s why if you get a cold or a stuffy head, you’re gonna take an antihistamine to try to get rid of that. So molds has the same symptoms as histamine, that’s the trigger. So by breaking down the components so that you don’t have an allergen left makes all the difference in the world.
0:45:23.6 Ashley James: Does inhaling mold or mold spores increase histamine in the body?
0:45:30.5 David Bloom: I don’t know, to be honest. I’m not a medical professional. That would be a question sure I could find out. It’s just nobody asked me that question before. [Laughter]
0:45:45.3 Ashley James: If in itself is a histamine, is it as we’re inhaling it, is it the same as our own histamines? I know our bodies react to it. It is like breathing in pollen and their histamine levels go up. Or someone eating a food they’re allergic to and their histamine levels go up or even under stress our histamine levels go up.
0:46:08.2 David Bloom: I would assume it’s the same kind of trigger.
0:46:10.7 Ashley James: This is so fascinating. One thing that was explained to me – I had a health coach on the show and she’s the one that introduced me to you guys, and it was life changing for her to have find your company. She bought a home with her family in California and for six months she could not live in their new home. She had to live at a tent in the backyard because she was sick everytime she went into their new home, because it had mold. And they finally found your company and so they went in and they sprayed everything. And she said it was like a miracle, she was able to live in their home after that. She’s had a lot of her clients use the Green Home Solutions services very successfully. When I interviewed her she told me about it, because at the time I was telling her about my immune system was shot and I didn’t know why because I eat super healthy, I have a really healthy lifestyle, like what’s going on. And something that you wrote to me that basically health requires three things; it requires that we take into account – lifestyle, genetics, and our environment. She pointed out that my environment probably had mold in it and told me about you guys.
How she explained how it works – she basically said a lot of companies will say they’re mold remediators and they go ahead and just use something like bleach which just kills the molds but does not get rid of the mold spores. So even though it’s “dead” is actually now more toxic because now it releases these mold spores and it can still harm your body. Is that an accurate description? Like if I went to Home Depot and bought some kind of natural mold remediator or bleach which is so common. I’ve heard landlords use bleach all the time. The different between those chemicals and the enzymes that you use, can you explain the difference?
0:48:22.5 David Bloom: Sure. It’s actually pretty simple. Most of those products – a lot of them are oxidizers, and oxidizers can work a couple of different ways. An oxidizer can literally shake a molecule to break it apart and then essentially the guts leak out, it’s dead, but you still have the residual. Others are DNA disruptors – they actually don’t kill the spore, they just make it so it can’t reproduce. So you still have the spore left, it’s still intact and could still trigger an allergic reaction which is the most common response.
Bleach is a really good example of this. If you have mold on a wall in our home, the roots of the molds are into the paper. What you see on the surface is topical. So bleach let’s say it reacts with that mold. It’s what we call a stoichiometric reaction, it’s a one on one reaction and all the energy in that chemical is consumed instantly. It’s used up instantly. So even if it kills the mold on the surface, the byproduct of that reaction is water, and water is now gonna feed the roots that are still in the wall. So that’s why, often when people use bleach – it looks like they got rid of it for a short period of time, but it comes back because they actually fed the roots.
Enzymes on the other hand are catalyst. So a catalyst enables a reaction to occur but it’s not consumed in the reaction, so it will continue working as long as there’s something for it to work on. The best analogy I can give you is men’s facial hair. If I were to shave, that’s sort of like using a bleach. if I would have laser hair removal, that’s using our product.
0:50:10.0 Ashley James: Because you’re getting the root.
0:50:13.9 David Bloom: We’re getting the root. That’s what makes the difference.
0:50:15.0 Ashley James: It’s so fascinating.
0:50:17.1 David Bloom: It’s not an exact salience, but there is some evidence that molds, when it’s killed or reactions occur – some molds can give off toxins, they’re known as mycotoxins which can be harmful. The problem is that not all molds produce mycotoxins and even the ones that do, don’t do it all the time and there’s no real easy way to measure for them. A lot of people will test for mycotoxins in their urine, but I would challenge that everyone of us has evidence of mycotoxins in our urine because it’s on our foods. If you are to open your refrigerator door and close it because you had somebody take an air sample for mold, you would dramatically skew those results even though you have no visible mold in your refrigerator. Trust me, there’s mold on your food. So that’s where it comes from.
So, it makes it a little bit difficult. Going back to your air filtration – activated carbon is pretty good at working with mycotoxins. So that’s why I talk about activated carbon a lot. You can even buy these bags now that you just sit out and they absorb some odors and things like that. That kind of stuff could be helpful for someone.
The other thing that we found when we started working with doctors, and that’s where that whole three-part thing was. It was to try to convince a doctor that, “Look, if you’re looking at genetics lifestyle and environment, if we can take your environment on the picture, even if it’s not the problem, at least we eliminated one leg. Now, it makes it easier for you to do your diagnosis.” Several of the doctors we worked with did discover a correlation between a treatment for lyme disease and moldy homes. So what they’re trying to use the normal treatments they would do for lyme weren’t working on a number of their patients. When we got them to look at the environment then we cleaned up the environment, all of a sudden they started responding to their treatment.
0:52:37.7 Ashley James: Yes. So What kind of things were common? Did you find that everyone that had lyme also had mold in their home? Or was there some kind of commonality?
0:52:47.6 David Bloom: The commonality for us was the particular practice that started us on this path because they had a lot of lyme patients, and they were trying to figure out what could it be, why are these people not reacting. The commonality was the fact that had mold in their homes.
0:53:03.4 Ashley James: Ok. That’s what I meant. So, you had all these lyme patients given to you by this practice and you went into their homes and all of them had mold in their homes?
0:53:11.7 David Bloom: All the ones that weren’t reacting to the treatment. Yes.
0:53:16.3 Ashley James: That’s what I meant.
0:53:17.9 David Bloom: Yeah.
0:53:18.5 Ashley James: So all the lyme patients who weren’t reacting to the treatment, all of them had mold in their homes.
0:53:23.5 David Bloom: That’s correct.
0:53:24.2 Ashley James: And when the mold was removed all of them started responding to the treatment?
0:53:29.7 David Bloom: I can’t say that every single one is good because I didn’t know.
0:53:36.1 Ashley James: You didn’t stick around to follow up with the doctor.
0:53:38.6 David Bloom: Yeah. I didn’t stick around to follow up long enough, but this particular practice in Virginia have us referred to patients. And that has actually spread, so we’ve made some really strong inroads. And that what’s made us get into all those additional testing things because we’re gonna look at the environment home, we decided that mold is one piece of the puzzle, but look at all of these other potentials. The downside is lab fees can add up quickly. So when we go in to look at a home, we wanna know what we’re looking for. I don’t wanna just go in and test. I want to get a hypothesis and device a testing strategy that will either prove or disprove that hypothesis. So often, we’ll do a couple of basic test first to rule out the most obvious and then. it gets a little bit more detailed if that’s not the answer.
And I have to admit, there are some times when we’ve been stumped. I have one of Green Home franchisees not far from me has a particular client that we just can’t figure it out. I’ve done a fair amount of testing and all kinds of different things. His doctors don’t have any clue. Occasionally there is some syndrome and for the life of me I can’t remember where your brain gets wired a little bit differently. It’s not a hypochondriac because the symptoms are real, but they’re caused by the brain not necessarily by an external force. There is an actual name for it. I just can’t recall what it was.
There’s other people out there that do mold remediation in a number of different ways. The old way was just what we call “Bash and Trash.” You go in, you just physically remove everything. Now, we do follow IICRC S520 standards – that’s the Institute of Inspection, Cleaning and Restoration certification. They came up with a guideline on basic standards. So they have five specific principles that we follow as part of what we do. So to say that we don’t remove building materials would be a missed number, we do. We just try to preserve as much as possible because of our method. We’re typically able to preserve more which makes it a more economical project instead of just going in and just ripping everything out and putting it all back together.
So there’s a lot of that going on there. We had a client that I got a wonderful letter from just recently where she was in the Atlanta area and they found mold in her home and her doctor told her she had to leave the house and get rid of all her possessions and she did. She moved into an apartment. She had Green Home test the apartment, it had mold. So then, they said, “Well, we gotta get out of here.” So they looked at four or five different other places and they all had mold. It’s in the south, it’s humid, it’s hot, there’s mold. So, when I talked to her I said, “Look, why don’t you let us see if we can get you back into your home. There’s a number of things that we can do and if it doesn’t work, don’t pay.”
0:57:11.7 Ashley James: That’s nice.
0:57:11.9 David Bloom: Let’s give it a shot. So we did. We went it. We treated it for mold. We have a device that uses a very low level of hydrogen peroxide but yet gets a 99.999% kill. Which is a lot of reduction on bacteria. And we did that in a couple of areas that were problematic just sort of her insurance and I believe you are aware that we also have this probiotic treatment. We put that back in there. They moved back into the house and she said it was like the place is brand new. So the letter I got said that I saved her marriage, I saved her life, I saved her kids happiness, I saved their dog. It’s just crazy but we got her back into her own house because all the properties are gonna have an issue, let’s just fix the one we’ve got. But I fear that happening time and time again. I was meeting with a doctor in Peabody Massachusetts who had a client that had just built a $5 million dream home on a lake and the same thing, whoever her prior doctor was told her, “You’re house is killing you. You gotta leave.” She got out of the house, went somewhere else and she didn’t get any better. So it wasn’t necessarily the home and that’s what we try to avoid.
There is a lot of testing that’s being done now called ERMI – Environmental Relative Moldiness Index. ERMI was developed in early 2000 to be used as a research tool to see if there was any correlation between water-damaged properties in the Detroit area and childhood asthma. So they came up with. It’s actually PCR testing which is measuring DNA. So it had a very specific design. We took a 6 by 3 area in the main living room and we vacuum that with a special attachment for exactly five minutes. We repeated the same thing in the main bedroom. And then it gets analyzed for mold DNA and what they did is they had a list of 36 molds; 26 that were potential water damage indicators and 10 that were typical environmental molds. They subtract the environmental molds from the water damage molds and it come up with a score.
What the score shows is sort of a history of that building, that’s why they did it on carpeting. Carpet is designed to hide dirt. So it traps stuff deep down, and that’s how they look clean. So it’s getting that stuff, but you don’t know if it’s something, and as I mentioned mold is a symptom, moisture is the issue. We don’t know if there was a moisture problem in that property 25 years ago or yesterday. So what happens is nowadays there’s a lot of people recommending that particular type of testing and it does serve its purpose. Don’t get me wrong, not that I don’t like it. But they’re making decisions on whether they should remediate or not based on it and they’re not following the test, but most of these are getting advise and take a swiffer cloth and just go pick up some settled dust that are on there. But that’s not how the test was designed, it was never meant to be done that way. So they’re not sampling properly and then they come back with a high score and they’ll spend thousands and thousands of dollars chasing something that doesn’t exist because there is no moisture issue – it’s really at that point housekeeping. Getting rid of all that dust.
1:00:40.9 Ashley James: So just to elaborate on what you said earlier on, mold is a problem. Mold is dangerous for our health, we should not live in a home with mold. But it’s not the root cause, and you don’t chase symptoms. So if you go to an MD with a headache they might chase symptoms and prescribe something instead of asking deeper questions. Where you go to a naturopath, they’re gonna go, “Ok. What’s going on? Let’s find out what the root cause is because a headache is a symptom.” So you’re saying mold in a house is a symptom of a problem. Moisture and looking at whether you need to make the house pressurized, whether you need to ventilate properly, or whether you need to seal off certain areas, but when you solve the root cause and of course take care of the mold. You solve the root cause, the mold doesn’t come back.
1:01:35.0 David Bloom: Correct.
1:01:37.3 Ashley James: So if other companies test incorrectly, they could be testing for a mold problem that no longer exist and then paying thousands of dollars to treat something that’s not there.
1:01:50.3 David Bloom: Correct.
1:01:51.7 Ashley James: Got it.
1:01:51.8 David Bloom: So the Inspector General of EPA came out with a position statement a couple of years ago and said exactly that, that this was designed solely as a research tool. It was never intended to be used to determine whether a property needed remediation nor should it be used to determine if remediation was done properly.
One of the more interesting things thought, if you look at the numbers – so if I had an individual that was mold sensitive, I would think the overall mold exposure is gonna be very important. We wanna limit that as much as we can. Let’s say you had a very small amount of the water damage indicator molds, but you had a ton of environmental molds, you’re overall exposure would be quite high, but your ERMI score is gonna be very low and vice versa if it’s true. So if you really cleaned the place well so that there’s absolute, almost none of the environmental molds but there’s a couple of fragments of the other ones, you can have high ERMI score because there’s nothing to subtract from it.
So, when we see people using ERMI to confirm remediation, typically they’ve got to wait 30 to 45 days to let that house settle down and equalize and then ERMI is where it comes down. But instead they’ll spend, again they sometimes get into that trap of spending thousands and thousands of dollars. It kills me when I see that happen.
One of more interesting things thought, if you look at the numbers – so if I had an individual that was mold sensitive, I would think the overall mold exposure is gonna be very important. We wanna limit that as much as we can. Let’s say you had a very small amount of the water damage indicator molds, but you had a ton of environmental molds, you’re overall exposure would be quite high, but your ERMI score is gonna be very low and vice versa if it’s true. So if you really cleaned the place well so that there’s absolute, almost none of the environmental molds but there’s a couple of fragments of the other ones, you can have high ERMI score because there’s nothing to subtract from it.
So, when we see people using ERMI to confirm remediation, typically they’ve got to wait 30 to 45 days to let that house settle down and equalize and then ERMI is where it comes down. But instead they’ll spend, again they sometimes get into that trap of spending thousands and thousands of dollars. It kills me when I see that happen.
1:03:25.5 Ashley James: Thank you for warning us about that. I know that Green Home Solutions is in a lot of places, but it’s not everywhere. So if someone’s in an area where Green Home Solutions just isn’t there and they have to use a different company, it’s really good to know to make sure you don’t use the company that uses the ERMI score to test your mold.
1:03:46.8 David Bloom: Again, don’t get me wrong. ERMI does have a place and it could be a very useful tool especially if you’re looking for historical idea of what’s going on in the property. It just shouldn’t be the only thing used to determine if you need remediation. You could get a false positive. Fortunately a lot of the medical community has gotten involved. I mean the idea of having a standardized test is brilliant because the other types of testing for mold, either air sampling or surface sampling – it’s not an exact science. Typically we look to compare suspect areas to non-suspect areas. So if you tell me that you feel okay in the bedroom but you don’t feel good in the living room, I’m gonna sample both and see what the difference is.
If it’s not that situation, typically we look and see what the outdoors is, because once you open your windows or your door, you’re gonna start to equalize whatever you have outside. We’re never gonna make the house completely mold-free. What we’re looking for is just to make sure that there’s nothing actively growing in the home.
1:04:49.1 Ashley James: I was about to ask, you mentioned environmental molds versus the sort of the black mold growing in my bathroom. So. environmental molds, maybe someone walks into the house after going for a walk and they don’t take their shoes off and they’re tracking something to the house or our groceries come into the house or a dog walks into the house and the dog tracks in something. So environmental molds are just things that would come from outside from nature?
1:05:19.9 David Bloom: Yes. If you’re sensitive to molds, any kind of mold could bother you potentially, but these are molds that we would commonly see in our everyday life and you don’t even have to bring it in with you, just open the door and you feel that little breeze? Yup, that’s all coming inside. So we can’t escape it, but we try to keep the house as clean as it can and make sure that it’s not actively growing.
1:05:51.4 Ashley James: So environmental mold comes from the outside, it’s not growing, it’s not taking hold of the wood or the drywall and like replicating itself.
1:06:05.0 David Bloom: Well, it could if you had a food source which is complex polysaccharides – is what they love which is like paper cellulose and a moisture source. So yeah, it could grow.
Often you’ll see windows that get condensation, you will see a little bit of black mold all the way around them? That’s actually cladosporium – is the king of leaves and grass. It’s a very common outdoor mold and it’s probably the most common mold there is. That you can just wipe off. It’s coming because your windows have condensation on. You see in southern areas particularly because a lot of times they have metal window frames, you have hot humid weather outdoors so they keep the inside really cold, and that temperature difference will cause condensation. Just like if you take a bottle of water outside in the summer and it starts to sweat, that’s the same reaction. And then you’re getting your typical environmental mold growing on it.
A lot of molds are black by the way. When people talk about the black mold, they’re usually talking about a species of stachybotrys chartarum which happens to be a particularly nasty mold to a lot of people. Which brings me to another thing, I just want to mention why mold testing can be valuable. If I got called into a home and there’s some mold growing because the washing machine hose broke two weeks ago. And I look at that with blinders on and got rid of it. I may be doing that client a disservice. If we take samples for examples, and I see that there’s chaetomium or stachybotrys – those are what we call tertiary molds. So you have three classes of molds essentially; primary, secondary, and tertiary.
Primary molds will show first after a water event and sometimes it’s fast as 24 to 48 hours. Penicillium is a good example of a primary mold. Secondary molds typically take three or four weeks of that moisture exposure before they grow. And then your tertiary molds can take months. So if I’d look at this damage that occurred two weeks ago but I picked up stachybotrys or I find some stachybotrys, I know that something else is going in that property, it’s been going on for a long time. And I would be doing them a disservice if we don’t try to track down what that long term even was. Often, it’s just chronic high humidity. That’s a big cause of a lot of issues. People just don’t seen to dehumidify. And again, in the southern half, often the air conditioning system weren’t sized properly, so they’ll cool a place down before it gets the chance to fry itself out and that’s the recipe for mold growth.
So there’s a lot of things that can contribute to that, but chronic humidity is a big one which is why you see mold in the bathroom. Again, one of the things that’s out of sequence, but we were talking about mold in an attic. In this area, I’m not sure if it’s the same all over the country, a lot of people have pull-down stairways to get up into their attic, and they’re typically located in the hallway, and that hallway is typically pretty close to a bathroom. So, if somebody get out of the shower and let’s assume you have an exhaust fan, not everybody’s fat. Assuming there’s an exhaust fan in the bathroom, they shut it off and leave the door open as soon as they leave. All that moisture is gonna get sucked right up through where that stairway is because they’re not sealed. It’s on top of the attic side that keeps a tight air seal, but sometimes they’re called blankets. There’s a number of different ways of doing that, but the normal thing for a shower is when you take a shower, the door should be closed, the fan should be on, the fan should stay on for about 10 minutes with the door closed after you vacate it. That’s what it takes to get rid of that moisture, but when you open it and release it, now you’re dumping moisture into the house.
1:10:14.1 Ashley James: And it’ll go where the air in the house is pushing. Like you said, into the crawl space, up in the attic, down in the crawl space. It’s gonna push somewhere in that airway.
1:10:28.3 David Bloom: It’s typically gonna go up.
1:10:30.4 Ashley James: It’s gonna go up and push. The hot air rises, cold air falls and so the moisture is gonna go with the hot air up into the attic and create the mold and we’re not looking. So we don’t really know. We’re just experiencing the spores which can really harm our immune system, seriously.
1:10:56.1 David Bloom: One of the other things that is typically is often we’ll see bathroom vents vented into the attic space itself which should always go up to the roof. Or we see multiple vents connected to each other and then they go up. So what happens is when one vent is running and the other isn’t, you’re actually pulling air from one bathroom to the other bathroom as opposed to get rid of it.
1:11:20.8 Ashley James: I interviewed a woman in the last few months who’s a health coach who is in Florida and had to have their home mold remediated and it was a major deal. Apparently it’s only in the bathroom, so they have to seal off the whole house and they said, “Okay. We’ll work on it in the bathroom, but it’s totally sealed off while we’re spraying. You guys just hang out in the living room.” So she’s in her living room with her young kids and it definitely affected her health living in a home with mold, and as she’s sitting there and they’re doing all this work on the bathroom she’s starts smelling the chemicals. So she’s like, “What’s going on?” And she comes in and said, “Hey. I thought you guys sealed this off? Is it okay for us inhaling this? And we’re now inhaling the mold because they are doing construction to remove it.” It turns out how the house was built – the venting for the bathroom went into the living room. It’s the most ridiculous thing. So now they’re sitting there and the first company she hired was just a complete joke – ended up causing them to be exposed to more mold and the chemicals which were not safe. So they breathe them in and they started to feel sick. So they ended up having to get another company to come in and they had to do construction and make proper venting for the bathroom and it was just this whole ordeal, but the first company was so irresponsible with their health.
It’s just amazing that a house would be built in Florida where the bathroom would vent into the living room – it’s just beyond me. Just like we have to advocate for our own health, we really need to advocate for ourselves and look into how our home is built whether we’re renting or we own it. We need to know, what’s the ventilation system like, have we had our ducts cleaned properly, do we have mold, let’s test for radon, let’s look at the insulation – make sure it cured properly, let’s test the VOCs and make sure we’re not being exposed to particulates and off-gassing that’s harming us. We need to take our home environment into our own hands. I love that you’ve mentioned that when a family cooks a turkey in the oven, that the pollution inside the home is like being in New Delhi, like breathing in the air of New Delhi. And we are sitting here thinking that, “I live in such a wonderful neighborhood where the air quality is so clean.” Or like, “Here I am living in Washington state where it rains so often and that we always feel like the air is really clean here.” But not inside the house, because these newer homes are designed to be energy efficient, so the more energy efficient the home is, the more it becomes like a balloon where the air is trapped inside and it traps all of these VOCs, particulates, mold. It traps everything inside and so our home air can become toxic over time.
I had a woman on the show who said she had this machine, it’s like a little box, and she leaves it in a home for 24 hours. I’m sure you probably heard of them, and then it captures all the VOCs and then she tests it. And she said that she could tell you what brand of cleaners you have in your home. There’s this one Mr. Clean Wipes – because of the specific carcinogenic chemicals that she would see on this list that was captured from the air quality in the home, because she said everything under your sink off-gasses including all your cosmetics. And we think that we’re safe because they’re in a metal container, if it’s a spray – like Lysol or something. “Well, it’s in a metal container. What do you mean?” Or if it’s in a plastic container, we’re safe it’s in a plastic container. But all these things off-gas even through their containers and pollute over time the air we breathe. So we have to look at every single thing and create a home environment that supports our immune system, our overall health.
Just like you said with the lyme patients, they were responding to the treatments after the mold was remediated. They weren’t responding to their treatments because they all had mold. I mean, that is right there a big wake up call for people who are listening to the show going, “I’ve tried everything. I don’t know why I’m still sick.” Just like me with catching every cold when I know I eat really healthy. It was because my home environment was destroying my immune system.
1:16:22.2 David Bloom: I’ll tell you an amazing story. I got called into a job where somebody went in and did some mold testing and it came back negative. They guy didn’t believe him. So I went down to take a look at the property. The house was pretty clean. It did have a little bit of an odor to it. The wife has been horribly sick. She swore that they had tons of mold. I went down to the basement and there’s a 6 by 3 shelving rack and it is 5 or 6 shelves. Everyone of the shelves was stocked with Lysol floral scent something. And I said, “What is all these for?” He said, “My wife sprays it everyday, everywhere because she thinks she’s got mold.” But what she was doing was contaminating the environment because there’s a lot of chemicals in propellants – number one, depending on what they’re using. it could be bad for you. Who knows what other additives are there. I mean the active ingredients they have to list, but you don’t know what else is in there. She was using so much of it, that’s what was making her sick, and after she stopped using it, within a week or two she felt fine.
1:17:29.4 Ashley James: Oh my gosh. She thought she had a mold problem and she was causing her health problems with the Lysol.
1:17:38.1 David Bloom: Yup. Too much of a good thing just doesn’t work.
1:17:42.4 Ashley James: We need to be really careful with those chemical cleaners and also really careful with those things that “Kills 99.99% of germs.” It’s like we do actually need, like you said there are beneficial bacteria in our environment and we don’t want to live in a sterile environment. We need to have the good bacteria, the good microbiome. I know everyone in the last 18 years has been talking about the microbiome of the gut. You know, “Eat yogurt because it’s good for your gut.” Or. “Eat fermented food because it’s good for your gut.” And now in the last few years, everyone’s raving about that there’s a microbiome on our skin and on every surface of our body and in so many more areas of our body than we knew and it’s beneficial bacteria. And so, we’re home which I find fascinating also has beneficial bacteria.
Tell us a bit about this device that you guys created to spray, to spread beneficial beneficial bacteria into the home. Why did you guys create it and what are the positive results of it?
1:18:48.1 David Bloom: Actually we can’t take credit for creating it. Environmental probiotics have been around for a while. There is several companies in Europe that have been on to this technology for quite some time. The device is designed to spray every 30 minutes for 20 seconds. Essentially it’s fermented bacillus and what that does is it’s very unfriendly to the bacteria we don’t want and much more friendly to the bacteria that you do want. So the way that it works essentially is, a lot of bacteria is transferred on skin cells. We all shed thousands and thousands of skin cells everyday. If you ever used a facial scrub, part of that uses a keratinase which is a particular enzyme that’s formed when bacillus is fermented. And keratinase is present in our nails, our skin, animal clubs, horns, and things like that. But the keratinase sort of softens up that piece so that it’s not conducive for bad bacteria to attach to, and it’s also slightly acidic which makes it much more unfriendly to bad bacteria while encouraging the growth of good bacteria. So it’s sort of like probiotic and people take probiotics as a supplement. If you’re taking antibiotics, they typically tell you to take a probiotic so that you can keep that balance going as the antibiotics are not selective of what they’re getting rid of.
So the idea is just a sort of filling the environment with bacteria that’s not harmful. Bacillus is the same bacteria that if you are a kid playing in the dirt, that’s what you would get that on you, which is one of the other interesting things I have too. If little kids nowadays will spend more time outside and eat a little dirt once in a while, they’d be a lot healthier as when they’re grow up. But they’re just not exposed to it, well certainly like I was or people my generation anyway, and so this is a sort of supplementing that. So it’s not an air purifier – it doesn’t filter anything out. The idea is just to get a healthier biome. Results on that have been pretty good. I have one on my bedroom. I don’t really notice much of a difference, but I also have a 70 pound dog that sleeps between my wife. Wonderful birth control by the way. [Laughter] And we don’t seem to have had any issues. So I’m guessing it’s helping, but a lot of the people that we put it in especially the ones that have had serious mold swear by. The pricing on the units has come down, it’s not as expensive than it used to be. But it’s an interesting concept. Because it doesn’t get rid of any particulates, it’s not a replacement for a good air filter.
1:22:02.6 Ashley James: Yeah, it’s just designed to support the microbiome of the home and discourage bad bacteria, encourage good bacteria. Can you share any of the anecdotal testimonials from using that?
1:22:19.7 David Bloom: Yeah. But one thing I did fail to mention, the one thing that it does do and this is pure review literature on this. There are two particular enzymes on dust mite matter that are very strong allergen triggers. And the bacillus neutralizes those two enzymes. So dust mite matter is a huge allergen trigger. It’s a little bit different bow because mattresses aren’t quite made the same. But years ago, your mattress could gain half of its weight again after 10 years and that was all because of bugs so to speak, from dust mites. So that’s a very very strong environmental trigger and it does definitely negates that along with helping crowd out that bacteria and provide a healthier biome.
We had one woman here in Connecticut. She had very severe mold illnesses. We went through the whole situation and we treated her house, we put in the better air units and she was feeling pretty good. Then she would leave and go visit, I don’t know if it was her son or daughter, and say that she just didn’t feel well. So the second time she took the machine with her – it’s only the size of a half loaf of bread. She took the machine with her and she was fine. So is it in her head or did it really make that much of a difference? I can’t answer that, but it seems to work very well for her.
The people who have them like them because they have to replace the cartridge every three months. So we certainly would know if they stopped replacing cartridges. They love them. There are some units actually go into an HVAC system and treat the whole house as opposed to the unit but they’re considerably more expensive.
1:24:14.7 Ashley James: My son is allergic to dust mites and it causes him to have asthma. And we again, eat super clean. he doesn’t eat processed foods, no sugar. Like we eat so clean so when he was getting asthma, I’m like what’s going on? He doesn’t have nutrient deficiencies, he eats super healthy, he gets outside, you know everything. His health is perfect and then all of a sudden he was just getting this asthma. And we finally did all these allergy tests and we figured out he was allergic or sensitive to about five different foods that would increase his histamine, but that dust mites was through the roof. Like he was really really allergic to dust mites. So of course, we’re vacuuming like crazy and we have the special dust mite covers on the mattresses and we’re washing all everything really often. I even saw this really cool study where they’re able to kill most of the dust mites, it was something like 96.7% something like that with washing and soaking linens, blankets, and pillows with eucalyptus oil. And we’re just going like gang-busters, washing everything with eucalyptus oil like crazy. And so he doesn’t have his asthma right now, but if he goes to a friend’s house and he plays in their playroom on the floor for half an hour, he comes home and has an asthma attack. So we really noticed that when he is at other people’s homes and they might not vacuum as diligently as we do, he’ll have asthma attacks from being around dust mites for even half an hour.
So we’re looking for anything we can do to mitigate dust mights. And what you’re saying is that this device that you have that releases the bacteria healthy microbiome into the bedroom, that it somehow neutralizes dust mites?
1:26:26.4 David Bloom: It neutralizes the two allergenic triggers that dust mites have. The reaction that you have to dust mites is as an allergen and that allergen is caused by I think it’s an F1 or F2 enzyme – it totally neutralizes that so that you shouldn’t have that allergen. You could also use that in a spray, a personal spray and spray some of it on his clothes before he goes to play somewhere and see if it makes a difference for him. I don’t know if it would or not honestly, but it might.
1:27:02.1 Ashley James: Or bring the small box, because you said it is very reasonable, I could travel with it to a friend’s home and plug it in their playroom. Does it act that fast or does it take time?
1:27:17.3 David Bloom: No. It takes a little bit of time to build up. When we install these, typically what we’ll do is we’ll actually spray just like we would for mold. We’ll spray all the surfaces with sort of a boost to give it a head start and then it starts working from day one, but otherwise, it can take a week or two before it builds up enough where you would notice a difference.
1:27:40.4 Ashley James: Interesting. And what about the enzyme that Steve brought to you that breaks down mold, and of course he was using it to break down the oil in the soil. Do these enzymes also destroy dust mites or kill them? Do you have any experience with that?
1:28:06.5 David Bloom: No. Again, we’d have to be very careful because when you start to make claims, your product has to be registered for that purpose. So these enzymes are different than the ones that are digesting oil. The concept is the same, but the enzymes are much different. But even if it did, I couldn’t say it does because the registration is not one of the intended uses when we registered the product. So we’ve never actually done that same rigorous amount of testing on bugs as we did with bacteria and molds.
We did come up with something for bed bugs that we developed, would have been what’s called the 25 B Exempt Pesticide. 25 Bs were very limited and what you could use for the ingredients is very select list. But if you stay within that list, it doesn’t require a federal registration. Although it typically does in the States, because that’s what we are trying to do – to get something really really safe that would help bed bugs. it worked terrific, but the problem is it didn’t have any walk-over kill. So in other words, if I sprayed at bed bugs, it would kill them. If I sprayed a surface and a bed bug walked over it, the kill rates are very low. So we just couldn’t decide and just forget it about it at that time because it was too difficult.
1:29:36.3 Ashley James: Got it.
1:29:36.7 David Bloom: But that’s the difference. I mean most soaps will work. Because if you spray something in a soap, you’re gonna suffocate it essentially. Or in cases like with ants for example, the way that ant’s circulatory system works – there’s no actual vein system, but it sort of breaks the bond and literally their guts leak out. But a soap could do that because it’s a surfactant. It’s more slippery than water and so by decreasing the surface tension, it can kill bugs. So that’s why people use it on plants for small bugs all the time and they’re pretty harmless.
1:30:18.6 Ashley James: Right. And that’s a natural way to go about it.
1:30:25.1 David Bloom: So that won’t work with dust mites, it would have to be a direct contact. That’s the difference.
1:30:34.2 Ashley James: I just love it. Now what about cat or dog urine. The smell – I’ve heard of people using sprays that have enzymes that break it down. Does Green Home Solutions have a solution that helps to breakdown the smell of cat urine?
1:30:54.6 David Bloom: Yes. Cat urine and tobacco are the two worst odors to try to get rid off. Green Homes’ order technique and it incorporates a product that I made, that is an actual odor neutralizer. So most of the things you have, air fresheners and things like that mess with the receptors in your nose. So it’s not that the odor necessarily went away, it’s just you can’t smell it anymore. Either that or it substitutes a different fragrance for the fragrance that exited. A lot of times the use of molecule called cyclodextrin which is sort of like a seashell shape and it typically have a lot of solvents in the product and you gotta break it up into small pieces and it gets trapped in that molecule and that molecule would be coated with a masking odor. So again, the odor is still there, you just can’t tell because it’s being masked and it tricks your nose.
Neutralization, we actually change the physical characteristics of the odor molecule so it no longer has an odor. Most [inaudible 1:31:58.9] have a charge to it and the product has the opposite charge, it becomes neutral. Once it’s neutral it has no odor. So it works really well. Dog urine is not a problem, dogs are fine. Cat urine though. Cat urine is made up of several different things. Initially when the urine is fresh it’s a bacterial odor. So at that point, anything that’s antibacterial would actually get rid of the odor because you’d kill the bacteria, you’ll get rid of the odor, but it has to be relatively fresh. But when you come into a home that had cats for a long time and it’s old, eventually the urine will form uric acid crystals and uric acid crystals are not water soluble. It takes about 15,000 grams of water to breakdown one gram of uric acid. So that’s where the enzymes come in, but when you do add that water, it actually releases more of the odor. So everytime you try to clean up with something that’s water-based it seems like it’s getting stronger. So enzymes will breakdown that particular odor. But you gotta be able to get to the source and that sometimes is tough because it soaks into things quite deeply.
So we have a procedure that takes a number of steps. It’s a little bit time consuming but it’s been proven to work. We do use a little bit of hydrogen peroxide and depending on the situation, I mean if there’s a carpet, the carpet is gonna have to go. Unless you want to keep cleaning the same spot over and over again which would be somewhat labor intensive and too expensive. It really has to go. Because then you can get to see if it got into the sub floor and a lot of times on a real estate job that we do a lot of work with realtors from the house they’re changing hands and the owner will say, “Well my cat only messes this one room.” And then you’ll pull out a black light and you see this orange and greenish blotches everywhere – that’s where all the cat pee is. And if they’re male cats, they spray – you’re talking about going up about two feet on the drywall. Source revealing is the best think you can do. We can neutralize it once we get the source of it. If it’s on concrete in a basement for example, often we can get rid of it but then we have to seal it. Because you’re not gonna necessarily get down far enough into that concrete. Concretes are very porous to be able to pull everything out, but there is a process for it.
Tobacco, it’s the same thing. If you are in a room and somebody smoked in the room, we could spray that room to go away instantly. But if somebody has been smoking for 20 years, there is what we call third hand smoke which is everything that builds up on the walls There are 4,000 different chemical compounds in tobacco smoke. The problem with neutralization technology is the chemistry is different depending on what you’re trying to neutralize. So we came up with a formula that works on most everything. There’s no way I’m gonna cover 4,000 different chemicals, but if the smoke is new, it’s fine.
There is a study in [inaudible 1:35:14.0]? they had people smoke in a room for four hours. They measured the gas level. They went back and 10 hours later and measured the gas, then they went back 10 hours after that which is 24 hours later and measured the gas levels. The gas levels were high at the 24 hour period. So that was because everything that got onto the walls was giving back. So in a tobacco remediation, those walls, ceilings, floors, all have to be physically cleaned first. You got to get rid of that source. Again, if I just sprayed it I would neutralize what’s on the surface but eventually whatever is buried in the paper is gonna emanate back up. So you’ve got to clean that all off first and then you treat it and it will work fine. We’ve been very successful. But it’s not as simple as we’d like. But it’s really only those two odors that cause that issue.
1:36:04.2 Ashley James: It’s amazing to think about like if someone buys a home from a smoker, they’re being exposed to 4,000 chemicals that’s off-gassing out of the walls.
1:36:14.4 David Bloom: Yes. They may not all be there but they are going to be exposed to a significant amount. I’ve gone into homes were the person moved out and the walls were yellow and when all the pictures are gone, you could see that the walls are really white and the difference is dramatic. I mean it looks like there’s a ghost in there because that’s how heavy it got built up.
1:36:41.1 Ashley James: Amazing. I like talking about these different things your company does. I mean obviously removing cat urine is not gonna be sort of life changing to someone who has health issues. But it is the reality of being a homeowner and also being a pet owner and your company can save people a lot of headaches.
1:37:02.4 David Bloom: Yeah.
1:37:03.8 Ashley James: And save money – I like that your company tries to do it the smartest way instead of like, “Ok we have to tear out everything.” You’re gonna do it the smartest way and try to save the homeowner money.
1:37:19.8 David Bloom: 90% of the work that we on those two in particular – cat urine and tobacco, are done because of a real estate transaction. Somebody wants to sell their house, they have an open house, people walk in the door, turn around and walk out if the house smells like smoke – that kind of thing. Most of the time the people that have the cats don’t necessarily realize that there’s an odor and maybe there is. I mean I’ve got cats, I don’t think my house smells. Typically if you’re trying to sell your house, you’re looking to buy a house that has that type of an issue, that’s when we can really make a difference.
1:37:59.7 Ashley James: So a lot of real estate agents use your services?
1:38:04.4 David Bloom: Correct. For a number of reasons, number one – we’re pretty quick. We’re really good at what we do. But because we can preserve most of the building materials or certainly more than conventional remediation, the turnaround is much quicker. So often we can be done in a house in a day, but it really depends on the extent of it. In the northeast, I’d say a good 75% of their real estate work is just attics because they all have problems. The probably 15% is basements and 10% is somewhere else in the house. Our whole goal is to help them preserve their deal, not waste a sale. And they are excellent referral source of course.
1:38:53.3 Ashley James: Speaking of preserving, I know that your company also works with a lot of victims of floods. We’ve had some really crazy floods the last two years. I’m just remembering hurricane Harvey, I had friends in it and their house was so damaged. And so I’m just thinking about the floods we’ve had and are currently having now in the United States, tell me about how Green Home Solutions helps people who have just had a flood to basically preserve their home.
1:39:36.1 David Bloom: Floods are different and the reason they’re different is the water – when you get rising water like that, you don’t know where it came from, you don’t know what it traveled through. So it’s considered category 3 water. Anytime you have category 3 water, anything that touches has to be physically removed, unless it can be cleaned. So drywall has to go. Normally we can clean drywall and preserve it, but in case of a flood you can’t. Because you can’t be 100% sure that there’s not something in the middle of that drywall that could kill you and you just can’t take that risk. So any kind of rising water, flood waters, sideways rain is considered category 3 water – so if you get a tornado type of thing or you get the wind whipping the rain around sideways, again, you don’t know what that water could have gone through before it reached you.
Normally, our work is done with either category 1 or 2 which is category 1 is potable water and category 2 is, I wanna say gray water, but it’s water that isn’t perfect, you wouldn’t wanna drink it, but if you did, you’re not gonna die. Category 3, you could die. So that has to be treated considerably different. Not all of our franchisees do water dry outs. A number of them do, especially the ones on the West Coast and we do have a group in Houston that got started in Harvey. They preserve as much as they can, but you’re gonna lose a lot because you just can’t. It’s not worth the risk in those kind of situations.
1:41:19.2 Ashley James: And so, can you walk us through. Let’s say someone has just gone through a flood, can you walk us through, like what are the steps that Green Home Solution takes to ensure that, that home is gonna be safe to live in.
1:41:34.0 David Bloom: First thing you’re gonna do is you’re gonna get rid of the water – that’s gonna get pumped out. You’re gonna dry everything as fast as you can, because you can dry it quick enough using commercial dehumidifiers, a lot of air movers – you can at least limit any kind of mold growth. And then often if there’s a lot of debris left behind, you have muddy things – there’s a piece of equipment that’s almost like a carpet steam cleaner that it’s made to clean this type of work – to clean all those surfaces off and getting down to where there’s no contaminated materials. Normally you’re gonna have to test it, make sure there’s no bacteria, make sure there’s no mold growth.
1:42:21.8 Ashley James: Is that where you use the ATP device?
1:42:25.5 David Bloom: No. It would that as a screen, but if it came back positive, you would definitely check and make sure it’s bacteria. You’d wanna know what was going on in there.
Like I said, not a lot of our franchisees get involved in the heavy flood stuff. There are some decent water restoration companies. It takes a lot of equipment. The capital investment to be in that end of the business is substantial and you also have to be on-call 24 hours a day. Not everybody who gets involved in the business wants to be a 24 hour a day business, they like their 9 to 5.
1:43:14.3 Ashley James: Sure. That makes sense.
1:43:17.4 David Bloom: So we don’t do a lot of that, except most of the guys in California and the ones in Texas do water restoration.
1:43:25.3 Ashley James: Got it. So let’s say someone has done the water restoration side, could they have Green Home Solutions come in and just test to make sure that there’s no mold?
1:43:41.4 David Bloom: Yeah. We actually work with some of the water restoration companies where they’ll go in. They’ll do the demo, whatever needs to be taken out. They’ll get the place dry and we go in and we’ll typically treat it even if it’s just preventative to make sure that there’s not gonna be any bacterial growth or mold growth, but it’s after it’s been dried out. So we let them do the heavy lifting and then we go in and take care of the house like we normally do.
1:44:08.8 Ashley James: So the enzymes that you have that you use to kill mold, it can also be used preventively?
1:44:15.9 David Bloom: Yeah. It can. It’s sort of an insurance policy. So it’s really prophylactic to try and prevent growth by making sure there’s nothing there that can grow. So if the house sits for a couple of days or something and it’s humid, we’re hoping to run and prevent that growth from occurring. Ideally we would do it again when all the walls that are up in the house is in back condition. We do a lot of work with Habitat for Humanity, we’re one of their major sponsors. And in their situation, a lot of times they build a home, it doesn’t get occupied for maybe three or four weeks and it sits there and they have the potential for mold growth. So for them, we go in and test. If it’s not obvious, we can’t say anything, then we’ll test. We’re gonna clean the house, if they feel comfortable turning a house over to their [inaudible 1:45:14.8] So it would be something similar to that.
1:45:20.3 Ashley James: Ok. I was curious whether the enzymes that you spray to kill the mold, if you spray an area, let’s say a bathroom, it doesn’t have mold but you sprayed it. Do the enzymes stick around and then if mold were to enter the area kill it later on? Like does it have a half-life or shelf life that it kills what enters the area for a certain period of time?
1:45:51.3 David Bloom: You know I get asked that question quite often and to be honest, I don’t know. Because we’ve never been able to get a scenario where we could actually test that. That being said, if you go and treat an area, obviously it’s gonna kill anything that’s there, so you’re not gonna have any mold. And if you did that in some sort of a reoccuring timeframe, then you’re never gonna allow it to grow. By the time you can see it, you’ve got a lot of it. So when you have a square inch of moldy wall board for example, that could be anywhere between 10,000 and a million spores. So you can’t see it until it’s already got its little fragments that are gonna start to grow into things. So spraying periodically would be helpful to keep it away. Now, can I tell you how long in between? No, I really don’t know.
We got a school that we did in West Virginia that was sitting in a flood plain. So they would get water under the building quite frequently and there is a lot of mold growth under the building. We treated the school, we actually broke through the foundation to treat in there one time. And then the idea was that we would come back, they would have the school tested every three months, I think it was. And we had figured that we’d probably have to come back about every six months and re-treat it. They ended up closing the school. I mean they kept it for that school year and then close it. So we actually never did go back, but it did keep it away for nine months or so.
1:47:38.1 Ashley James: And I like that your whole philosophy as a company is to get to the root anyway. Your philosophy isn’t let’s just spray all the time and keep coming back and spraying, let’s try to prevent it. In the school’s case, you couldn’t prevent the recurrence of flooding.
1:47:57.0 David Bloom: Correct.
1:47:58.4 Ashley James: But in most residential areas, your company looks for the root cause and make sure – whether it’s putting a dehumidifier in and making sure the bathroom is ventilating correctly or the other steps you take. You’re making sure that the home doesn’t have sort of that perfect environment to create mold and then you spray to kill it. But you’re not necessarily spraying – coming back and spraying preventively because there would be no need if you got rid of the moisture problem.
1:48:27.2 David Bloom: Right. If we can get the homeowner to address the moisture issue or at least we’ll do it. Somebody’s got to address it. If we can do that and we get rid of the mold that they have now, they should never need us again. Because without the moisture, you shouldn’t have a mold issue. Now, at some places there are areas that you can’t just avoid it, but there’s a lot of things that can be done. When I look at a property, when I approach a client’s property, I’ll look at the outside of the building first and I’m saying, “Ok. If I’m a raindrop, where am I going?” Are there gutters that are gonna take the water away from the foundation? Or is it dumping it straight down along the foundation? Is the grading such so that water is gonna drain towards the house or drain away from the house?
Because when you think about it, it’s really pretty simple. There’s only four places that water can from from. It’s either gonna come down from the top, it’s gonna come up from the bottom, it’s gonna be a pipe leak or some sort of a leak, or it’s gonna be high humidity. So when you break into those simple things and look at what you’re dealing with, it’s not that complicated. Sometimes you have buildings that have a convolution of factors. One in particular was in the clubhouse for an over 55 housing community and the exercise room – the pictures in the room started falling off the walls because they’re are so wet. This was in Maryland, and what happened here was a whole bunch of different things. So for example Maryland for some reason, they love their mulch and they mount everything up really high. In fact a couple of trees were dying because they were drowning, they were just holding so much moisture. So because they love their mulch, they had splash blocks which is a gutter comes down, goes into a splash bx and lead their water away from the building – turned around backwards because they didn’t want it to wash the mulch away. So the water is just going back towards the building. They had sprinkler heads that had a 360 degrees spray pattern, six inches away from the building which had a brick facade and brick is very porous. The rest of the building was vinyl sided and there was no vapor barrier.
In Maryland that’s not uncommon because half the year the vapor barrier would be in the wrong side anyway, pretty much even heating included. But the inside of that exercise room which was kept cold had vinyl wallpaper which is a vapor barrier. So now, vapor pressure is driving moisture in the humid summers into that room, and it’s going from hot to cold, and it hits that cold paper, condenses in the vinyl wallpaper but it can’t get out because it can’t get through the vinyl. Vinyls are impervious, so it just collected in the wall. And it was all of those things together that caused that problem we had.
That’s why you can’t just look at the obvious and a good visual inspection is the best thing you could do. Your eyes and your nose are far better than any testing. Testing can confirm, but your eyes and your nose are really what you need. That’s why we have to train our people so well.
1:51:54.7 Ashley James: And I love that because these tests were really expensive and if someone just comes in and doesn’t take the time to look at the outside of the house. What happens if they came in the winter, they may not think to think about the sprinkler system in the summer for example, or if they came during the dry season they might not be thinking about the gutters of the house. In Canada we call them eavestrough, but here in the States you call them gutters. But basically to see the water coming off of the roof and where does it go and what’s the gradient of the landscape. There’s this one corner of our house where it kind of floods outside and we have a pump underneath the house pumping water out, but that failed one year. It didn’t get in our house but it was underneath our house – there was water. And just to think about, like wow. That could be mold under our house you know, coming up like you said. In our bedroom, in our walk-in closet we have a trap door with stairs going down into the crawl space underneath which is is just dirt and that was flooded a few years ago until the pump was replaced. I haven’t even been down there, but it’s not a vapor barrier, so mold could be down there coming up potentially. So having the visual, looking around and see where is it coming from, what’s going on in this home inside and outside before you even spend thousands of dollars testing, because then now, like you said, you know what to test. Your company really helps people save a lot of money. Whereas another company might wanna come in and just start testing mully nelly and wracking up that bill.
1:53:43.5 David Bloom: Well basic mold testing is not that expensive, depending on how many samples you have to take. It could be $300 to $400 maybe.
1:53:56.8 Ashley James: Ok. That’s reasonable.
1:53:58.2 David Bloom: It’s when you start going into all those other types of tests. The VOC testing is a little bit pricey. The lab fees on that are pricey because you’re using a $3,000 piece of equipment. But yeah, testing for the sake of testing makes no sense. I mean you really need to get an idea what’s going on. So if they go up in an attic, they know how to check and make sure there’s enough ventilation. It’s very simple for limited use, they’d make sure that they have ventilation. And again in the Northeast you get a lot of ice in the winter. If your ventilation is improper, you don’t have enough insulation in your attic and that could be like a waterfall coming into the house. It’s a very ugly situation, but they’re not uncommon. So it’s those kind of things we look for and you know we certainly don’t want to scare anybody. We try to put everybody at ease like, “You know, it’s not as bad as you think and we’ll take care of it. Don’t worry about it.”
1:54:59.0 Ashley James: We need to advocate. We need to look into these things to make sure that our home environment is as important as our diet and exercise and reducing stress like that is really important. There’s this hot yoga studio that went out of business or moved or something out of this building in Woodinville which I live close to and we watched them moved into the building, start their business and a few years later they moved out and for weeks there was construction. So we went by just out of curiosity and I looked inside and I couldn’t believe that the construction workers all had masks on and they were removing the drywall and they were removing the insulation. They had to gut the entire building that the hot yoga studio had been renting. They had to gut it and as I looked in the entire building was black, I mean black mold. And the light bulb went off my head, I’m like, “Oh my gosh. How many people do hot yoga and not realize that it is behind the walls, it’s all black mold.” They’re breathing in and they’re going into a sanctuary where they think they’re getting healthier or like you said into a gym – someone thinks they’re getting healthier in this room for an hour a day and they’re actually being exposed to toxins that are making their health worse.
1:56:25.5 David Bloom: There’s that. I mean how many times you would drive by a site where they’re building a house and the lumber sits outside for a couple of weeks in the rain?
1:56:32.5 Ashley James: Yeah. In the rain.
1:56:35.9 David Bloom: That’s not uncommon. Lumber yards typically, a lot of their lumbers are stored outdoors anyway, they’re covered but it’s outdoors. When we first started making our product, we did some testing to determine long term efficacy. We bought sheetrock and plywood off the shelf at Home Depot and some of the samples we inoculated with molds and then treat it. Some of them inoculated and didn’t treat and then we had our controls which we didn’t do anything to. The control pieces which were just the way it came from the store under the same humid conditions that we created for this test actually grew more mold than the stuff we put mold on.
1:57:17.7 Ashley James: Oh my gosh.
1:57:19.9 David Bloom: Because it came that way, and you’ve got to be aware of this kind of stuff But I’ll tell you one thing though. The most satisfying thing that we can do from Green Homes perspective, and this is part of our culture – is go into a property, do an investigation and tell them they don’t need us. It is the best feeling in the world to do that and it’s worth so much in goodwill. The industry itself doesn’t have a good reputation, we really pride ourselves on that and if you don’t need us, we’re gonna tell you, you don’t need us. Nobody in this company needs money bad enough that they would do work that wasn’t necessary.
1:57:59.4 Ashley James: And then they’ve earned the trust of that customer, that customer’s gonna refer to them or maybe use them in the future. It’s so good to do a relationship with a company that we can trust. That’s why I love you guys and I want my listeners to know about your services because I want my listeners to live in healthy homes and have a healthy air quality and to know the things that you’ve shared today. You’ve given us a lot of really great tips that we can all apply today – to our living space, including something as simple as have a dehumidifier, turn the fan on in the bathroom and leave it on, make sure that it vents out correctly outside of the home. You know these kind of things that we can test for.
It’s been wonderful having you on the show and having you share all these great information. Before we wrap up, there’s one last thing that I wanted to ask. Would you like to explain a bit about a bit about Green Home Solutions franchise. Maybe there’s someone listening how has been looking for another career or wants to help people in some way and wants to stop being an employee and own their own business. Can you tell us a bit about the business side of it?
1:59:17.9 David Bloom: The business is actually pretty simple. It’s really about establishing relationships. Most of our work comes from referrals. Initially when a new franchisee gets started, we typically have them visit with their local real estate agents, go to some of their real estate sales meetings, make a presentation in front of them, start joining some networking groups, and just make sure that people know that you’re there. We cannot create a demand for our service. It’s sort of like, I’m liking it to a Funeral Director.
1:59:56.6 Ashley James: [Laughter] You’re good at murdering people?
1:59:59.7 David Bloom: [Laughter] No. But you wanna make sure that everybody knows what you do because when they time comes you want them to come to you. So it’s really a lot of just building relationships. I don’t know all that much on the franchise side, I mean I know the franchisees individually because I work with them everyday and train them. I don’t know as much about that side of the business as I do with the science and the actual work that we do. But we’ve had people from all walks of life. We’ve had numerous people that change careers. I had one recently, I think it’s a couple of years I guess. He was a highschool music teacher and he just saw that were numbered because the school budgets are getting lower and lower and they’re cutting out some of the arts and music programs, and he has a very successful franchise. Well it takes a little while to get going, but it doesn’t require a big capital investment, obviously there is some franchise fees and there’s equipment that you need to buy. But if somebody likes to work, it’s not easy work. I mean that much I have to say, there’s some hard labor involved especially if you’re working in attics and basements. But the thing that I can emphasize enough it’s in incredibly satisfying because when you do this work for somebody, I mean they wholeheartedly thank you and you’ve got a friend for life.
2:01:27.0 Ashley James: I bet. You had mentioned that making connections with never can groups and real estate agents and I would say you should add to the list since you know all the franchisees, that they should really connect with health coaches, naturopathic physicians, chiropractors, like all kinds of healthcare professionals in the holistic field that are aware that mold is a big problem and that’s exactly how I found out about you guys. So I love it.
2:01:55.1 David Bloom: Actually that is one of our focuses now. We’ve been gearing more towards it. I do speak to doctors groups periodically because if I can get them to listen and I’ll make sense to them, they at least would give us a shot and all we got to take is one patient that’s feeling better and it works out terrific and they’re great people to work with. Some of the people that they have – patients are a little bit more needy, we had them take their time, but it’s a wonderful feeling when you see somebody who was absolutely miserable and all of a sudden feeling better.
2:02:30.6 Ashley James: I bet it is. David, it’s been so lovely having you on the show. Is there anything you’d like to share or say to wrap up today’s interview. Was there any story left unsaid or any of your bullet points that really wanted to cover?
2:02:43.8 David Bloom: Well I think we’ve covered probably more than expected.
2:02:47.5 Ashley James: I know. Right at the beginning before we hit record you’re like, “I don’t know what we’re gonna talk about.” And I was like, “You just leave it to me.” [Laughter]
2:02:55.8 David Bloom: I do wanna thank you for providing the platform and from what you’re doing for the same type of people that we are helping, which is absolutely tremendous. I was unaware of who you were until I believe it was after you’re meeting with Jeff and started looking into it and I’m just astounded at some of the guests you’ve had. I mean it’s a treasure trove of good information for a healthy lifestyle.
2:03:24.0 Ashley James Thank you so much. This is just like you are doing what you do that you’ll never wanna retire because you love what you do. I love what I do and I love learning from these guests like yourself and also helping all my listeners and my listeners love sharing these episodes with their friends and family. So we can spread this information and help as many people as possible to learn how to develop true health. It’s where the name came from, Learn True Health. So we’re all in this together. We’re all becoming healthier and healthier together.
David, it’s been such a pleasure having you on the show. You are welcome back anytime you wanna come and teach more. I love that you’re constantly striving – you’re a scientist and you’re curious and you want to help people, so you’re in a really good space where you can take that science and apply it to real life situations. And if you guys come up with anything new that’s groundbreaking that’s really helping people, I’d love for you to come back and share it with us.
2:04:20.6 David Bloom: Thank you very much and again, if your listeners have questions that are appropriate for what we discussed today, I’d be happy for you to share my contact information with them.
2:04:32.9 Ashley James: Great. I will make sure I put it in the show notes to today’s podcast at www.learntruehealth.com so that people can reach David Bloom and also they can go to www.greenhomesolutions.com to check out more about the services and see if there’s a local franchisee in their area that they could get in contact with, but I’ll make sure that your email address is in the show notes as well.
2:04:55.2 David Bloom: Thank you very much, Ashley.
2:04:56.4 Ashley James: Thank you.
—
Outro: Hello, true health seeker. Have you ever thought about becoming a health coach? Do you love learning about nutrition and how we can shift our lifestyle and our diet so that we can gain optimal health and happiness and longevity? Do you love helping your friends and family to solve their health problems and to figure out what they can do to eat healthier? Are you interested in becoming someone who can grow their own business, support people in their success? Do you love helping people?
You might be the perfect candidate to become a health coach. I highly recommend checking out The Institute for Integrative Nutrition.
I just spent the last year in their health coaching certification program and it really blew me away. It was so amazing. I learned over a hundred dietary theories. I learned all about nutrition, but from a standpoint of how we can help people to shift their lives and shift their lifestyle to gain true holistic health, I definitely recommend you check them out.
You can Google, Institute for Integrative Nutrition or IIN and give them a call or you can go to www.learntruehealth.com/coach and you can receive a free module of their training to check it out and see if it’s something that you’d be interested in.
Be sure to mention my name Ashley James and the Learn True Health Podcast because I made a deal with them that they will give you the best price possible.
I highly recommend checking it out. It really changed my life to be in their program and I’m such a big advocate that I wanted to spread this information. We need more health coaches. In fact, health coaching is the largest growing career right now in the health field. So many health coaches are. getting in and helping people because you can work in chiropractic office, doctors offices.you can work in hospitals, you can work online through Skype and help people around the world. you can become an author. You can go into the school system and help your local schools shift their programs to help children be healthier. you can go into senior centers and help them to shift their diet and lifestyle to best support them in their success and their health goals.
There’s so many different available options for you when you become a certified health coach.
So check out IIN. Check out the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. Mention my name, get the best deal. Give them a call and they;ll give you lots of free information and help you to see if this is the right move for you.
Classes are starting soon. The next round of classes are starting at the end of the month. So you’re gonna wanna call them and check it out.
And if you know anyone in your life who would be an amazing coach, please tell them about it. Being a health coach is so rewarding and you get to help so many people.
—
Are you looking to get the best supplements at the lowest price?
For high quality supplements and to talk to someone about what supplements are best for you, go to www.takeyoursupplements.com and one of our fantastic true health coaches will help you pick out the right supplements for you that are the highest quality and the best price.
That’s www.takeyoursupplements.com
Be sure to ask about free shipping and our awesome referral program
Get Dr. Z's free videos and his book:
https://learntruehealth.com/oilsdiet
For the Free Jar of Magnesium Muscle Cream use coupon code LTH, Add the Magnesium Jug to your cart, and the free muscle cream will be added automatically as well as the 10% discount. https://livingthegoodlifenaturally.com/product/magnesium-jug
To join IIN and enroll in their Health Coach Training Program, 25% off with zero down, call (844) 315-8547 (U.S.) or +1 (212) 730-5433 (International).
Join Ashley's fun book party! https://kidsbook.party
https://www.learntruehealth.com/essential-oils-diet
Highlights:
Hello, true health seeker!
Welcome to another exciting episode of Learn True Health Podcast. I’ve got an awesome interview for you today. But first, before we jump into it, I’m really excited to share three pieces of news with you. Awesome information, so just listen to the next few minutes and I will jump into the interview.
The first piece of news is my favorite magnesium soak, if you’ve listened to the show for a while, you’ve heard me talk about it. You probably heard Kristen Bowen, the founder of Living the Good Life Naturally. The website is www.livingthegoodlifenaturally.comand the coupon code is LTH. She’s hosting this week a special just for Learn True Health listeners. I pulled the listeners in the Facebook group. So if you’re not in the Facebook group, come join us. Go to Facebook and search Learn True Health or you can go www.learntruehealth.com/group and it will redirect you to the group. But I pulled the listeners and asked them because Kristen gave me a choice. She said, “Listen, I’d love to throw on a summer sale for the Learn True Health listeners.” And she offered us either a free jar of the magnesium muscle cream or a free jar of acerola cherry powder. Now, acerola cherry powder, I love it. It is a vitamin C powder, but it’s whole food plant-basedvitamin C powder. So it actually has all the other cofactors. It tastes really good. Listeners have been noticing that their skin gets healthier, that they’re faster from cuts, that their bleeding gums go away. You know, if you brush your teeth and you have a bit of bleeding gums, that’s a vitamin C deficiency. And so, lots of listeners have said they really enjoy it. Some people find that it helps them with their parasite protocols to rid their body of parasites, they add it to their parasite protocol and they find that it kicks it up and really helps.
So I pulled the listeners, and you guys decided that you wanted a free jar of the muscle cream. People were raving about it in the Facebook group. They said it really helped to lessen the tension in muscles. They’d rub it on sore, tight muscles and they noticed that the muscle relaxed because it delivered that magnesium straight to the localized area. So, that’s really cool. So, when you order a jug of the magnesium soak from www.livingthegoodlifenaturally.com, it is gonna automatically add a free jar and then they’re gonna give you free shipping for the jar as well. All you have to do is buy the jug, you’re still gonna receive 10% off as part of the Learn True Health code. So, just go to www.livingthegoodlifenaturally.com, click on their magnesium section and grab that jug of magnesium soak, they’ll add the magnesium muscle cream for free, and that magnesium soak is amazing. I’ve shared about it before on the show and I’ve shared about it several times in the Facebook group. We actually have a post with over 200 different comments of people sharing their experience about this magnesium soak. It has been life-changing for our family, our young son was always fighting sleep until we started adding it to his bath and now, he is calmer and wants to go to sleep at night. So, we also have noticed that we felt better rested at night, we slept deeper, and it also felt like my muscle tension went away because I’m holding a lot of stress in my shoulders and my back. So, the magnesium soak is amazing and then the magnesium muscle cream is awesome for those local areas and that’s gonna come for free, and that’s this week only.
If you have any friends who you know are magnesium deficient, and there’s over 200 symptoms of magnesium deficiency. But the common ones are pain, stiffness, sore muscles, sleep problems, twitching or spasms or cramps, restless legs is a really big one – that people notice they get a lot of relief from doing the magnesium soak. The instructions come with the jug when you buy it. It explains exactly how to soak in it to maximize your results and of course, you can go to www.learntruehealth.com and in the search box, search “magnesium” and listen to my episodes with Kristen, she shares her story. She actually was 70 pounds. I think she was 78 or 79 pounds in a wheelchair and having 30 seizures a day. That’s how sick she was and the magnesium soak is the key thing. She was doing a lot of stuff to get her health back, but that was they key thing that helped her to recover from her seizures and get herself back online. And so that’s why she made it a business. She started out as a customer and then she ended up creating the business to make sure that she could deliver not only to herself and her family, but to everyone that she came in contact with. The highest quality, purest form of concentrated magnesium with all the co-factors in it. So our skin, our body actually absorbs it readily and you can prove it with blood test. So she talks all about that in our interview, so definitely go back and check that out.
So, www.livingthegoodlifenaturally.com coupon code LTH. Grab your free jar of the magnesium muscle cream when you buy a jug of the magnesium soak this week only. So, that’s news number 1.
News number 2 is the Institute for Integrative Nutrition and I’ve saved the best for last by the way so, keep listening. The IIN is hosting a fantastic sale. So if you’ve been thinking about becoming a health coach like me and you’d love to take their online training, it’s designed for busy people, specifically Joshua Rosenthal designed the course for busy stay at home moms or busy career moms basically the busiest people on the world. So, anyone can take it and men also take it as well, not to exclude anyone. But if you’re busy in life, yes you can take this program. It’s designed for you to be able to do it, you know, you can do it in 20-minute increments, you can do it a little every day and a lot of it is audios and videos. Not a ton of reading because it’s easier to consume that content and people learn better through listening and through watching. There is reading that you can do, but my learning style is listening. I read very little and I listen to everything and that really helped me. So, some people learn better through reading and they provide everything written as well. So, they hit all of the learning style. So, if you’re concerned like you want to become a health coach, but you’re concern that you won’t learn as well as others because maybe you learn better at watching and engaging, they actually have us engage, watch, listen, read. You can learn in these different ways. So, they make sure they hit all the learning styles. I love their program, it was life-changing for me to go through it.
Now, they have their program and a year long program, they also offer a condensed 6-month program for people who want to be full-time students. This week only for the Learn True Health listeners, they’re offering 25% off their payment plan and completely zero down. Meaning, you can call them, you sign up and for 30 days you are not paying them, and if you don’t like it, then just call them up and say, “Hey you know, it wasn’t for me.” And there’s no risk to you, so you could join IIN right now and start taking their training, and that is so cool. So, there’s no risk. You can jump right in. It’s really exciting news actually. And the first 35 people that join and take advantage of this sale right now, they’re going to gift you it’s worth almost $1,000. They’re gonna gift you one of their advanced courses. The advance course which I really want to take this course. It teaches you how to become a successful author and create and publish your own dream book.
So, this is wonderful news. You can go ahead and Google “IIN” to get their phone number. Give them a call, tell them that Ashley James James from the Learn True Health podcast sent you so that you will get this special. I definitely recommend them. I’m a big fan of IIN. And hey, if you do join please reach out to me. You can email me, support@learntruehealth.com or you can find me on Facebook in the Learn True Health Facebook group and please reach out to me. I love mentoring my fellow health coaches, and if you do join and you want help with promoting your business or growing your business, becoming a successful health coach and helping other people, I would love to help you. So, I’m here as a resource for you. Take advantage of IIN sale right now.
All right. Now, we’re almost done.
News piece number 3 and you’re gonna jump right in to the interview. Thank you for hanging on. I know this is a long promotional spiel. I get it. I’m really excited to share all these info I didn’t want you to miss out on these sales. So here’s the thing, this doesn’t have to do with health, but it does have to do with helping to support the Learn True Health podcast. So my husband and I have this wonderful 4-year old son, and if you don’t know my story, I was infertile since I was 19 years old. I was told I would never have kids and I used natural medicine to conceive naturally and to have a healthy boy. And now he’s 4 years old and he’s wonderful and it’s all from natural medicine. We would’ve never had him had we not found natural medicine. So that’s one of the reasons why I do this podcast because it gave us our son. We’ve been helping him learn how to read and in doing so, I discovered a company that I am in love with. It is called Usborne Books & More and they hire child education and development specialist and these wonderful people work alongside designers and illustrators to create these beautiful books that engage children and make them want to learn. In fact my son, and we do very little screen time. We offered him the choice of playing with his Usborne Books & More stuff or watching some TV and he chose to play with his activity book. And I was like, “Yes! This is so awesome.” It has increased his confidence in reading. I love it. I’m really in love with this stuff.
They have over 2,000 different kinds of books to choose from. It’s so not what a library has and we’ve been going to the library since he could sit on our laps as we read him night time stories. So, it’s completely different stuff. So if you have any kids in your life at all, they develop special books for infants, toddlers, school aged children, teenagers, they even have some really fun stuff for adults as well like adult coloring books. It’s all based on making reading fun and engaging and making learning fun. So, if you have kids or grandkids or nieces or nephews, I’d love for you to join my Facebook party. We’re hosting it next Sunday evening and it starts next Sunday evening, so you just join it and then you watch it at your convenience. I’m gonna post some videos and I’m going to go live in that Facebook group and share my favorite Usborne Books & More books and answer any questions you have. Most of these books by the way are under $9.00, they’re really well-priced. But anything you do purchase, the proceeds will go to support the Learn True Health podcast. It’s going to help pay for the transcriptions, help pay for our hosting, help pay for my assistant that helps me stay on top of everything and get these great guests. So, if you love the show and you have children in your life and you want to support them and increase their love of learning and love of reading, how you do this is you go to their website www.kidsbook.party. There’s two buttons there, it’s super easy. Either click on the Join the Party button or you click on the Shop Now button.
If you have questions, please reach out to me. I’d love to help you.
Thank you so much for being a listener.
Thank you so much for sticking around and hearing all the specials. I hope you take advantage of them. I hope you join my Usborne Books & More Facebook party. Even if you just come to support me in my little launch that I’m doing on Sunday, I’d love to see you there. And if you have anything at all that you guys need, please reach out to me, come join the Facebook group and ask questions. It’s such an active wonderful community that loves to help each other and I’d love to see you there.
Enjoy today’s interview.
Intro: Welcome to the Learn True Health podcast. I’m your host, Ashley James James. This is episode 363.
0:13:40.7 Ashley James: I am so excited to have back on the show with us, Dr. Eric Zielinski who is the leading expert in essential oils. He was originally back on our show in episode 302 and now, he’s come back to teach us about his new book “The Essential Oils Diet.” I know you talked a little bit about it in our first interview and it was so intriguing because there’s so much controversy around ingesting oils and a lot of concern that some essential oil companies are not of good quality and some essential oils would be contraindicated to ingest. And so, because you are a doctor and you really know your stuff, you’ve been able to create the Essential Oils Diet book helping people to understand how they can incorporate these healing extracts, these healing essences of plants to help our body. Not only to detox, lose weight, to have more energy, to help the body come back into balance. I’m very excited to learn more about the essential oils diet today. Welcome to the show.
0:14:57.1 Dr. Eric Zielinski: Well, thank you for having me back. I’ll take that as a sign that I didn’t bummed the first interview, I didn’t scare you or your listeners away and your awesome blog followers. I love you. I really do, Ash. I really appreciate all that you do and your awesome questions and your show. I’m really excited about sharing this for a number of reasons because we’ve gotten a lot of slack for this, by the way. And when you start talking about essential oils, for sure you’re putting yourself out on the chopping block and then when you start going against conventional recommendations – yes you can consume them, but the right way. You really get out there, so we’ve been flogged 40 lashes minus one a couple of times already online and so I’d love to kind of set the record straight and help people.
0:15:41.0 Ashley James: Absolutely. I’m definitely excited to dive in to all that. My personal story of essential oils that I’ve shared on the show before is when I was a teenager. I was about 15 and I was really sick. I stayed home from my summer job at an all natural spa that happen to also sell essential oils and the owner who was an aesthetician and really, really into essential oils. She gave my mom a bottle of lavender and peppermint and sent her home to take care of me. I must have picked up some stomach flu basically. I had a fever, I was throwing up, I felt so nauseous and so sick and I’m lying there in bed just feeling miserable and my mom comes in and she was told to take the lavender and make it with some carrier oil. The only thing we had in the house was olive oil, so she put a couple of drops of lavender and some olive oil and she was told to rub it on my chest and my tummy and she was told to take one drop of peppermint oil put it in some hot water and let me sip it, and I did that. I sipped the peppermint and she put the lavender oil on my chest and tummy and the moment I started I started sipping that peppermint, I was also told to inhale the peppermint as I sip it. But the moment I sipped it, the nausea went away, I lay back down, I fell asleep – I slept for a really long time and when I woke up, my fever broke in and I was no longer sick. That was my introduction to the power or essential oils. And so, I was just a raving fan and I consumed all the books and all the information I could. I just loved it. Because of how much I loved essential oils, I became the number one salesperson at the spa because every person that walked through the door I wanted to tell them about how great essential oils were. So they are, they’re wonderful, but we have to learn how to use them correctly.
And so, of course you’ve created all these resources online and now on your books to help people to do just that. And what I really like about your approach is that you don’t align yourself with any one company because you want to just teach people how to use them and how to find the right company for them or the right brand for them. I guess people might say if you have aligned yourself with a brand, then maybe they would say you’re bias in some ways. So, you’re just here to educate us which is wonderful
I’d like to know what inspired you to write The Essential Oils Diet?
0:18:26.3 Dr. Eric Zielinski: You know Ashley James, my first book published last year, “The Healing Power of Essential Oils” it was an instant best-seller. It actually flew up the shelves in a way that no one really was expecting because no one was working on essential oil books at the scale that this was published by a major publisher. My publisher is Penguin Random House, and you haven’t seen a major publisher pick up a book on aromatherapy in quite a while like this. Since then, it’s become an international best-seller in seven different languages in multiple continents and countries. And so what happened was, my publisher being in the business of selling books came up to me and like, “Hey, what’s the next book?” And I’m like, “Well, they want a second.” And you know, my wife called some Irish twins, like here I am we just kind of delivered birth to this baby which takes a lot of time and effort and now you wanted me to get pregnant again? Like, hold on.
But anyway, I did what most do. I dealt with pregnant amnesia and I’m like, okay let’s do it again. And so, I did some soul searching. I did some data research and I contacted our community. We have a pretty thriving group on Facebook, you know, just ways that we reach out to the followers that we have online and I started asking, “What do you all need?” You already know how to use essential oils. What is it that you want help with? In my though was the main diseases in the world – cancer, autoimmunity, diabetes. So I just started surveying people and asking people and ultimately, yes people did have those issues, but that happened was a light bulb went up in my mind. When I started connecting the dots I realized, you know what a commonality is between all of these diseases? It’s weight gain, obesity. Having that inflammatory response, never having a chance to soothe in someone’s body because of what they’re doing to their lifestyle, because of the foods of that they’re eating, the products that they’re putting on their skin.
And so, my thought was this, the biggest bank for someone’s buck is to lose weight. If there’s one thing everyone on the planet can do, if someone is trying to prevent disease and treat disease, you can’t do that if you’re overweight. And the thing is that obesity, not just obesity but even just being 10 pounds overweight is so fundamental to every fundamental to every aspect of your health. It’s like you really can’t truly fight cancer if your body’s metabolism is burdened with excess fat. You can’t really prevent autoimmune conditions or anything. And then of course you think about diabetes and pre-diabetes, and musculoskeletal issues – everything keep going back to weight. And then obviously the statistics show were getting fatter as a group all around the world. And then kids – this what really got me. Kids, never before has a life expectancy been predicted to be less than their parents and primarily it’s because of obesity.
At the end of the day if we were to pinpoint one factor that is attributed to all chronic disease right now that is 100% preventable, and that’s something I really stress that it’s preventable, regardless of hormonal imbalance, regardless of thyroid conditions, and we talked about that in the book and that’s become a scapegoat – regardless ofmetabolism, it’s weight loss. And that’s something that we actively have an ability to control.
0:22:04.6 Ashley James: And some people may not feel or look like they’re overweight, but we’ve heard of people who are skinny but have fat on the inside and skinny on the outside. So, when they do scans of their body, I mean they might be a size 10 or size 8 and they think, “I’m good. I don’t have fat to lose.” And I’m not saying that people who are skinny should become anorexic or unhealthy, but there’s something where this fat can accumulate in the organs and around the organs, and that fat is actually more dangerous than the fat on their thighs, for example.
0:22:49.0 Dr. Eric Zielinski: You know, the underlying discussion you’re talking about highlights the notion of fatty liver. I was just featured on a documentary regarding that. That is non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, it’s affecting upwards up to 25% of all Americans. That’s 100 million Americans are being affected by fatty liver and non-alcoholic because we know that alcoholism has a direct impact on the liver and develops fatty liver which is almost insurmountable among the symptoms. And a lot of people, we could blame candida, stress – like what are these symptoms coming from? And it’s hard, it’s really hard to determine, like, why do you feel the way you do? Where the brain fog come from? Why the sluggish libido out of nowhere? Why can’t you sleep anymore? The indigestion and the anger, the anxiety – all these things that just seem to happen and then you go online, this gets really confusing, by the way. You go online, you type up like, “Why am I feeling this way?” And you start researching and now, people are becoming hypochondriacs, self-diagnosing themselves with everything. Now everyone has leaky gut, everyone has candida overgrowth, everyone has this, everyone has that, and so people are freaked out.
Rightfully so, because you’re sick and you don’t know why. And so, your can’t help you because your doctor hasn’t been trained in advanced diagnostic procedures to really figure out what’s wrong with you. And a lot of folks are suffering from fatty liver, and they don’t even realize it because of lack of exercise, their diet, and just because their body cannot process this amount of fat that they’re consuming. So, there are some valid concerns with that in relation to the other organ issues that people are dealing with.
I’m really glad you mentioned that because people aren’t talking enough about fatty liver and the testing of fatty liver isn’t too difficult. A good diagnostician and a functional medicine doctor will know what to do. But here’s the problem, it’s not on most medical doctors radars. They’re not like thinking, “Oh, you have all these symptoms, maybe it’s fatty liver.” They’re not thinking that, what they think is, “Oh, you’re depressed. Okay, here’s an antidepressant.” “Oh, you’re dealing with nausea, well here’s something to help with your stomach.” “Oh, you can’t sleep, here’s Ambien.” And that’s the problem, is when we’re treating symptoms and we’re not looking at why? You shouldn’t be feeling this way. You’re 45, 50, or 60 years old – you really shouldn’t be going through this and it might be fatty liver.
0:25:41.1 Ashley James: I just interviewed a guy on nootropics. These herbs and supplements that all help the brain to have less inflammation, to work better, to have a balanced serotonin and GABA and dopamine and all those good chemicals. And we talked about inflammation, and it’s amazing just inflammation alone can cause so many issues, and then again we’re left treating symptoms and we think that we’re treating the root cause, but the root cause is inflammation and what’s causing the inflammation? We have to back up, so brain fog is one of the symptoms of inflammation or even being tired, or stiff joints, or even just being cranky, or just feeling off and not being to point your finger on it, but just feeling off. That kind of inflammation can affect the dopamine or serotonin and you just end up feeling a little off and you can’t figure out why or you can feel a lot off and be really cranky and the root cause is coming back to seeing that it’s the systemic inflammation. And what’s causing inflammation and we got to go deeper, and it’s that stress, lifestyle, the foods were eating, the foods we’re not eating. But we have to stop it, we have to have that break state where we can help the body to stop the inflammation. Even taking NSAIDS like Advil for headache, I thought this was really interesting that we think it’s an anti-inflammatory as a drug, but it inhibits our own natural body’s mechanism to fight inflammation. So, by taking it we maybe have a temporary artificial decrease in inflammation from the NSAID, but then we end up having this much more inflammation after it wears off because now our body’s ability to handle inflammation has been dampened.
0:27:53.3 Dr. Eric Zielinski: Writing this book, we’re talking about a diet book. Okay, how many more diet books can we have? We’re talking about essential oils, like what does that mean? Can you love an essential oil? The name of the book and all of these things, I was trying to wrap it all together in a package that would really educate and empower people.
Inflammation was a big part of my first book and it kind of blend into the next book and led into a deeper discussion of what really is inflammation and what is the proper way of viewing inflammation? I think it’s important for us to realize that inflammation isn’t bad. Inflammation is a God given response to our body to heal. So, if you cut yourself in the kitchen, if you’re like me in the kitchen and I have a tendency to be quick in the kitchen, and I need to get slower, I need to use my cutting board. I’m the guy with a mango on my hand with my knife cutting it. [Laughter] So what happens when you cut your finger? You cut your finger and you stop, whatever, you hurt yourself. The body’s natural healing mechanism starts. First of all, pain, and that’s a good thing. Pain is actually a good sign, because if you don’t hurt yourself, you’re not gonna realize there’s damage, you could end up hurting and re-injuring that same part of your body which can cause permanent damage. So pain is a good thing, and then blood rushes into that area and it starts getting hot.
What are the cardinal signs of inflammation? Pain, blood rushing, heat, swelling, loss of function. These are not bad things, but this is again the body’s response to heal. The problem is we are not designed and we shouldn’t be in a constant state of inflammation and that’s it. Again, if you cut your finger over and over and over again, thank God for bandaids, but if you’re gonna cut yourself in the same spot, non-stop, that’s gonna cause significant problems. And you think, “Yeah, okay. Dr. Eric Zielinski that’s stupid simple. Are you saving that?” Of course I’m not gonna cut myself on the same area or my finger all day long every day. That’s exactly what we’re doing to our bodies, by this low dose – this low-grade inflammatory response from the products that we put on our skin to the air that we’re breathing, the water that we’re drinking, the food that we’re eating, the thoughts that we have. You know, stress isn’t bad. Even stress is a good thing, but we’re not supposed to be. chronically stressed. Exercising and tearing your muscles and “stressing” your muscles, but you can’t live at the gym. You got to take a break, a day or two off between you go back.
And so, when you think of it in these terms, the light bulb went up in my mind. “What then is causing this low-grade inflammatory response that I can’t directly feel that is happening at the cellular level?” A lot of people are just into that, I actually can feel more inflamed now than I used to. You could test it, you can look at your C-reactive protein levels. You could see your inflammatory levels, it could be tested and the local lab down the street. The stuff is kind of cheap, $50 to $60.
You’ll see, your eyes get a little puffy, I mean you kind of get puffy, like there’s puffiness. So you’ll wonder why can’t you fit in your pants? Well, that’s maybe inflammation. You’ll see your brain can’t function as well. You’ll be on the edge. Like for me, inflammation manifest through anxiety, a little bit of stress – my body is not able to completely deal with what I’m going through at that time, even if it’s just a little something simple happens at work and it sets me off. That’s a sign of inflammation. That’s a sign that my body is not being able to respond properly to an insult, and that’s it.
And guess, why is this even important? Because when something happens, like you’re exposed to a virus and you’re exposed to bacteria or you’re exposed to something else, let’s say cancer starts to slowly develop – your body’s metabolism cannot properly keep you healthy because it’s barely keeping you alive, and that’s why metabolism is not a scapegoat for weight gain and research has shown this. And even in the Mayo Clinic and UK’s National Services, they’ve gone to record that says, “Hey, a small metabolism is not and has not been linked to weight gain. In fact, overweight people have a faster metabolism because their metabolism is on overdrive just to keep them alive because they’re so overweight.”
So, when you have this low dose inflammatory response happening throughout the day all day long, no wonder you’re dealing with so many different symptoms because your body is just barely in survival mode.
0:32:55.2 Ashley James: Fascinating. I have heard that for longevity you actually want a slower metabolism because we only have so many cells. The theory is we only have so many cell replicas that the body’s gonna make and so once we ran out, we ran out. And that was the idea that this part of the DNA that gets shorter and shorter showing that they can see someone age over time. So, you really don’t want your cells to be damaged enough to turnover and create new cells quickly and it gets damaged again and it has to turnover quickly. We want to have a slower metabolism and that we want the whole body to just be healthy and not have damage at the cellular level and none of the inflammation, unless we need it to repair and be able to survive on less calories that are more nutrient dense. The blue zones, older people that when they live in those areas and they eat the way people eat to live to be 100. They’re actually eating less than 1400 calories a day, but it’s more nutrient dense food and their metabolisms are slower and they definitely don’t have inflammation.
So that’s really interesting. This idea that we shouldn’t blame our thyroid or metabolism and then use that as a scapegoat to not take action. But that the symptoms that we might be experiencing could definitely be caused by inflammation. This is such a huge topic. How do we incorporate essential oils into our diet to decrease inflammation?
0:34:46.4 Dr. Eric Zielinski: Before we even touch on essential oils, it’s the lifestyle and it’s something that we try people with. You could use essential oils all day long, but if you are on this fast food lifestyle and if you’re eating a diet depleted of nutrition, it’s like one step forward three steps back. And that’s what we get and I’ve got to say, I’ve been at the largest essential oil company conventions and I’ve signed books at retailers and things and I’ve been very much shocked. It’s not a judgement call, please don’t be emailing me hate mail. I was shocked to see so many over weight people at these conventions, clinically obese, morbidly obese, and this is supposed to be a health conference of health advocates and people that want to sell essential oils to teach you how to be healthy. And so, you compare that to these other conferences I’ve been to that are “health conferences” and everyone kind of looks relatively healthy. But I have never seen such a disparity in health before going to an essential oil conference, because a lot of people, all they do is just essential oils. They eat the same junk, they are not exercising, and they use essential oils to help them get through, and that is a concern that I have in the aromatherapy industry. Because I’m not hearing enough from an aromatherapist and essential oil distributors really talking about wholeness and holistic care. Because the body cannot even respond to the essential oil if it’s in such a toxic state and if its metabolism is compromised by what we’re doing.
So, that what’s in the book. We cover this concept of bioactivity and why and how to consume food that are rich in bioactive compounds. When you look at bioactivity, these are the plan-based chemicals that are non-nutritive. You don’t need these to live. You need fats, carbs, calories, and proteins, vitamins and minerals to live or you’re gonna die due to deficiency. But researchers have shown that a diet replete in bioactive components will lead to suboptimal health, so you’ll never really be healthy and this is my biggest issue with the fad diets out there; low carb, high fat diets. It’s completely focused on quantity not quality of food at the core.
What are the list of bioactive compounds?
Fiber. It is key. Eating a good amount of fiber can actually replace your probiotic supplement because fiber is prebiotics. They feed the probiotics. A lot of people are literally wasting money, and research has shown that consuming probiotic supplements actually cause drugs like immunotherapy to be less effective. I mean, throw it out there, a lot of people are on drugs and we’re trying to teach integrative healthcare. So, fiber is key to have good bowel function.
Antioxidants. Those aren’t nutrition like polyphenols. Over 8,000 different plant-based chemicals known as polyphenols that are rich in antioxidants. What about carotenoids, the pigments that you get in your oranges and your g rapefruits, and your peppers. The reds, oranges, yellows – these are foods that are good, healthy, immune-boosting components and essential oils. See, that’s what really all pulled it together because essential oils are bioactive compounds. They’re non-nutrition, non-nutritive substances in plants that give you robust health.
So, the whole purpose of the book is too get people back to quality not quantity. If you really wanna boost your health profile, consider using essential oils in your food in addition to the topical remedies that we have to soothe inflammation and balance blood sugar. I mean flat out, this will blow people’s minds like using essential oils can actually help you burn fat. Research have shown inhaling grapefruit and inhaling lime will stimulate lipolysis, proven and we’ve seen it. It’s not gonna help you 50 lose 50 pounds in a week, but for a lot of people they’re out of crocks, a lot of people have plateaued, a lot people are just hitting a wall. Especially for those dieters out there who have gone through the different plans and they’re back to where they’re at, that yo yo effect. Maybe essential oils might be that thing to help you over that hump to get you that next level. And that’s what really we’re trying to help people. To put things into perspective when it comes to just the whole essential oil discussion.
0:39:30.3 Ashley James: Yeah, the idea that there’s a thousand different nutrients in broccoli, those nutrients that help our body fight cancer, detox, create healthy cells. We can’t get that eating the standard American diet and we definitely can’t get it in a pill and I am a believer in supplements. Supplements changed my life because I did have a nutrient deficiency. They really changed my life and I have their place but you cannot ought supplement a bad diet and you can’t ought exercise a bad diet.
0:40:06.9 Dr. Eric Zielinski: Yes.
0:40:10.6 Ashley James: Diet is first and we need to look at that and I love that you’re pointing out stop counting calories and start counting nutrients, because the most nutrient dense foods are actually low in calories.
0:40:24.4 Dr. Eric Zielinski: That’s why nutrition labels are useless because they’re not telling you how many antioxidants are on the food. Beside fiber, that is probably the most valuable thing on the nutrition label next to the ingredients. You don’t know. Just because it has “Vitamin C” doesn’t really mean anything. It’s just one component, just one little aspect of immune boosting quality in food, but it really doesn’t matter. I would even say it doesn’t even matter – the caloric intake. Because here’s the problem with looking at calories, there is no way to determine your caloric need on a daily basis. To say you need to be within this range is ludacris because it all depends on the exact moment and what your body needs and that depends on your activity level, how much you slept, how much stress you’re dealing with, that depends on whether you’re fighting some kind of illness or virus, or you’re sick, or you’re on drugs like narcotics, drinking alcohol, smoking, are you on pharmaceuticals?
To determine someone’s caloric need on a daily basis is impossible, and so that’s where you mentioned the blue zones, in Okinawa they have a proverb that says, “Hey, stop eating when you’re 70 – 80% full.” And we talk about that in the book, we actually cover the blue zones a lot, because you don’t know, they’re not counting calories. They have no idea, they don’t even know the concept of what a calorie is. They’re just eating, and they’re eating good nutritious food that’s available in the land and most of it by the way is plant-based, and that’s interesting when you really think about it. What are they doing? They’re not gorging, and just like a dog – you give the dog food in a bowl that’s a certain size, the dog will eat until the bowl is gone. That’s kind of how dogs are really wired. Humans are wired the same way. Like the clean plate club is pretty much the most dangerous things in the planet, but that’s learned. You don’t see that as a baby. Like my kids, “I’m done.” You could put cake, you could put straight up sugar on their plate and my kids are like, “I’m done.” Like my baby, my 2, 3 year old – I see this in my kid, but it’s later, “I’m gonna be a part of the clean plate club.” And that’s something like a learned behavior, we got to unlearn that and get back like, “Okay, I’m happy. My tummy is good.”
That’s another thing, how do you know when you’re tummy is good when you’re overweight? Your leptin and ghrelin, the hormones that tell you when you’re full are out of balance, and that’s a concern with over weight obese people – is they’re leptin resistant. They don’t feel full. So they’re having three, four plates of food at the buffet and they’re like, “I want more. I need more.” And next thing you know they’re gorging, they’re loosening up their buttons on their belts and all the things on their pants just fit another plate in. That’s real and I know what that’s like because I experienced that in my own right. I never became obese, but I gained weight at one point and I had to enlarge all my pants and I call them fat pants. I have my fat pants story, I actually talked about that on my podcast a few couple of months ago.
I remember what that was like and never feeling truly satisfied with my food, regardless of what I ate. That’s a dangerous place to be, but you have to train yourself and we cover that. Little strategies. These are little strategies. How do you know when you’re full? Well, you’ll start to feel your tummy slowly distended and remember it takes 15, 20 minutes or so for your body to even react and respond to the food that you’re eating now. So, the stomach has to distend a little bit, give it some time, eat slower. When your food doesn’t taste as good, typically speaking the last bite of cake isn’t as good as the first bite of cake, think about that. Like, “Okay, I’m done.” And also you start to feel a little sluggish, you shouldn’t be tired after eating a meal. That’s a big sign that you overate, a big sign because your body is just like, “Okay, I’m overloaded. Stop. I gotta manage this stuff.” And now metabolism just gets compromised and over burden.
0:44:48.0 Ashley James: You mentioned that the last bite not tasting as good as the first. I would say that if we are noticing that, we’re actually following the dopamine high that were caught in the pleasure trap of wanting those highly palatable foods with salt, sugar, and oil that stimulate those brain chemicals. The same brain chemicals are stimulated if one were to do street drugs like cocaine, that there are those parts of the brain that go, “Woah, this is amazing. I have to have more.” And that happens when we go to Dairy Queen and have that piece of cake and have some kind of fatty food. I’ve done the ketogenic diet a few times in my past. I’ve done pretty much every diet. I’ve experimented. I love learning and experiencing things first hand, but man I have learned so much and the ketogenic diet is incredibly dangerous. In fact it harmed my husband’s kidneys, it damaged my liver. It took as a year of eating plant based to recover and we had to do blood work and everything, but it took us a year to recover from the damage it did. And yet when were doing the ketogenic diet, I want to say the more like Atkin’s way. Either people think the ketogenic diet is a bunch of ghee or butter or cheese on top of a steak, and there’s virtually no vegetables, all these thousands of phytonutrients and antioxidants and all the fiber – they don’t eat that. They just go for the steak and the butter, the fat, and the coffee, and whatever.
So many people are going down that rabbit hole because they’re hearing that the ketogenic diet is really good for weight loss. Yeah, you could lose 10 or 20 pounds on any diet because it’s mixing it up, but what the damage you’re doing, it’s gonna last years and I’d found that the hard way. I’ve interviewed some people that talked about this idea of doing a plant based ketogenic diet.
0:47:13.0 Dr. Eric Zielinski: That’s a lot of avocados.
0:47:14.2 Ashley James: Yeah.
0:47:14.8 Dr. Eric Zielinski: What are you gonna eat? I mean, you got a food selection of 20 foods.
0:47:20.6 Ashley James: Right. And so there’s this idea of that. There’s a hundred dietsout there and people are chasing what’s the best diet for weight loss. We need to go deeper. We need to look at what’s the most healing diet. Skip this idea of diet – what’s the most healing lifestyle that’s gonna make me live to 120 and optimize my brain health, my liver health – just optimize everything. And in doing so, my body’s gonna correct itself and it’s gonna lose the weight it doesn’t need and it’s gonna be healthy and have balanced hormones. We want to stop thinking about “What’s some kind of fad I’m gonna do for three months to lose some weight.” And start thinking about “What can I do for the rest of my life.”
So, your book isn’t like, “20 days to a flat belly” or something, your book is how do we get to a point where we’re supporting the body in optimal health.
0:48:24.1 Dr. Eric Zielinski: Yeah. It has to be a lifestyle. Well a couple of things I want to unpack there because you just shared something so valuable and my heart goes out to all the people out there that are following a health celebrity or a health influencer and they are really pushing the ketogenic diet right now. It is a pied piper type of experience, where you have a couple well-known famous leaders in the health space and a lot of folks are following them. It’s just like whatever, and that’s the problem with blogging, that’s a problem with podcasts. A lot of this is none of this is regulated. Most people aren’t really qualified. And I say that very humbly, but it’s hard to say most bloggers and Pinterest pinners and Facebook celebrities, these people aren’t qualified. They don’t really understand even physiology. They haven’t been taught toxicology, and they don’t know nutrition. And when a leader says, “Hey, this is it.” Everyone’s like, “Okay, that’s great. Dr. So and so says that.” Or, “Mommy blogger says this.”
And the ketogenic diet is one of the most pervasive dangerous lies out in the market today. We need to unpack that for a second because it is “the diet,” just like Atkin’s was “the diet.” And it’s something to think about that this diet was formulated to help epileptic children stop seizing in 1920’s. Think of that, why would you as a normal, let’s say you’re overweight but you’re still relatively healthy, like neurologically healthy – why would a relatively healthy person goes on a diet that’s designed to stop seizures? Just let that sink in like, “Oh yeah, this kind of seem odd.”
Number two. Why are we trying to adapt the lifestyle that has not been proven long term? This is a really important point. You mentioned the blue zones, that’s thousands of years of research there. I mean really, even before research was known as research, people have lived this way. We see, we looked at this group of people around the world, we see their ancestors and their great ancestors, their traditions, and now science is finally catching up to the reality of a lifestyle that’s very much life-giving.
There are zero longitudinal studies evaluating what the ketogenic diet does for a normal, healthy adult. We have longitudinal studies on what the ketogenic diet does for children that are epileptic. We’re finding that these kids that are now adults and been on keto, they’re dealing with heart disease, stroke, fatty liver issues, and disease. But we don’t know what the ketogenic diet looks like for people losing weight as a lifestyle. Zero studies we could see after 12 months, so yeah, you’re right, we could argue ketogenic is great to reset some things if you want. Like shock the body, flood the body with “healthy fats,” minimize sugar so maybe you’ll lose some quick pounds. Essentially it’s a starvation diet. It’s a carbohydrate starvation diet which gives you immediate, quick whens, but what does that do to the body long term. And we don’t know, that’s a big fat question mark, kind of like 5G – like Luxemburg, the country just banned 5G and they said publicly, we’re not gonna let our people be science experiments. “You’re in America? If you want to screw around with your people, do it, but we’re not letting 5G in our country.” That’s what the ketogenic diet is, it’s just like 5G. We have no idea what’s gonna happen to people on keto, and that’s a concern, and then just the quality food that you’re eating.
And so, we have a big concern in our household, in our circle with meat. And just the sheer volume of toxins that are in most meat products and it’s getting really really hard to find good clean meat, even “grass-fed organic meat.” It has no guarantee that the meat is good and healthy and pure, and then how it’s process – and then milk and dairy, it gets scary. And again, we’re not vegan, but we are probably 95% plant based and every once in a while, personally I’ll crave a little red meat. I like icelandic grass-fed lamb, like that’s my little thing, and on Thanksgiving we have a turkey. We don’t eat meat much at all and we found that we feel a lot better.
So, anyway I know a lot of people swear about the ketogenic diet like, “It saved my life.. You know I don’t want to take that away from you all, but all I’m trying to say is you need to come up with a better system if you want to live for something for the rest of your life. But like you, I can’t tell you how many people have come up to us and said the ketogenic diet almost killed me, because we just shouldn’t be consuming that sheer amount of fat. Because again, we need to focus on quality not quantity, and to say that you need to restrict your diet to any percentage of anything doesn’t make sense.
So, that’s why our diet book or plan, like it tells you, “Hey, it’s okay to eat apples. You’re not gonna die.” I mean you’re not gonna hurt yourself eating fruit again. We are preaching food freedom and that’s where life opens up. Now don’t fall into the trap of all things in moderation. Like man, as a recovering drug addict, as an alcoholic; I can’t go back to a little bit of cocaine, I can’t go back to black out bender, I can’t go back to a little bit of smoking cigarettes. All things in moderation is a life from the pit of hell. It’s a license to do things that will hurt you.
Let me just give you one word to help that. All good things in moderation – that’s the key. A little bit of honey, the bible says. And it’s good, but too much we’ll get sick and vomit. Like that’s in the book of Proverbs, right? Ancient Jewish wisdom for thousands of years, look at ancient text and they recognize moderation of good things. You don’t have a little bit of adultery, little bit theft, little bit of killing. Think of it in terms like that because we know, you know, I know – and we know we preach to the choir for the brave soul who has listened this long. It was never heard of you or me like, bust your heart, but we know what sugar does to the body. It’s more addictive than cocaine. It’s by far the number 1 link to disease because it triggers inflammation which we’ve already talked about. It’s the cause of most diseases right now that we deal with. So, you can’t have a little bit of sugar, process white sugar is poison.
So, how do you live without sugar? We teach you. How do you live without your microwave? We’ll teach you. How do you incorporate essential oils into your life to make life more enjoyable? We’ll teach you. And hopefully before we get off we can give them maybe some practical tips because I love giving recipes and little hacks along the way.
All that from the keto diet, you know. And so, thank you for mentioning that.
0:55:45.0 Ashley James: Absolutely. I remember a Naturopath that I was seeing was getting every single person in her clinic that got in and she said we’re seeing amazing results, in one month people’s inflammation is down, like she’s looking at blood work. I am convinced now the reason why people have these good results, if they do keto for short term – one to three months maximum, the have some really good results. And I’m convinced it’s because they had to cut out crappy food. It has nothing to do with eating 70, 90% fat. It’s in order to eat that much fat, it crowded out, it pushed churros off their plate, it pushed Oreos off their plate, it pushed pizza off their plate. Whatever foods that were filled with sugar had to go, and so of course inflammation came down because they stopped eating processed sugar, you don’t need to be in ketosis or be on the ketogenic diet or put butter on your steak in order to gain the benefits of not eating sugar. So, looking at how can we gain the benefits that people are claiming they have from the ketogenic diet, well, also eating in a way that’s sustainable and that is looking at filling your plate with fruits and vegetables as much as possible and even some starchy root vegetables – have a sweet potato everyday or a baked potato, that kind of thing, and you don’t need to slather anything in oil or butter. In fact people find that when they whole food fat, so no oil, but instead eat what the oil came from – so eat an olive, or avocado, or sprinkle some flax meal, or chia seeds, or have some hemp hearts – whole plant fats, but avoid anything that’s been processed. So looking at eating foods that have been very minimally if not, zero processed, and that way your body recognizes what it is, it’s able to get the nutrients out of it and you’ll feel better.
I was a type 2 diabetic and so I was very afraid of eating fruit, I was very afraid of eating root vegetables. I thought potatoes were the worst thing you could eat, so I’ve spent years being afraid of carbohydrates, and years being afraid of even vegetables. And I kept constantly went back to this sort of Atkins or keto way of eating because I had a fear of carbohydrates. Then when I went whole foods plant based and removing oil for example, there’s this philosophy that the amount of fat the people are now consuming is actually gumming up the works and making us insulin resistant, and I thought this is so stupid. This just sounds like the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard because here I am coming from a lifetime of if I eat an apple, my blood sugar goes to the roof, so why would I trust that eating a bunch of fruit and vegetables would be good for me? And I’ve been told my whole life that all these fats are really good, right? So, that just seems totally opposite, but I tried it because again, I’m willing to experiment and try anything.
I remember taking my blood sugar and I just started crying. I couldn’t believe that I had stopped all the oil and all the processed fats, and all the meat, and I was eating just vegetables, fruit, nuts, seeds, beans, legumes, and that’s it. That’s all I was eating and fill my plate up as much as I want until I feed good, three times a day. And my blood sugar, I remember an hour or an hour and a half after eating was 89 – I’d never seen that number before and I felt amazing. I felt on top of the world. I had so much energy. It was really the first time in my life that I noticed no inflammation. Like I just woke up clear headed, jumped on the bed. There were no barriers to entry, there were no symptoms, and that’s what it really sold me. And I know it seems like we should know all this, but you mean eating unadulterated foods from the earth and just filling my plate with that, that would be the healthiest way to eat, and just listening to my intuition and doing that. But I did have to battle the cravings and the triggers, seeing and smelling all the wonderful processed foods out there, we need to battle those little addictions as they come up and this idea of falling off the bandwagon. So, let’s say we do fall off and eat a burger or whatever right? And this idea of, “Oh, well I guess I’ll get on the diet again next week and I’ll just eat this bad way for the next few days.” Right? That’s our justification. It’s kind of like having one flat tire and getting over the car and shooting the other three tires. So we need to catch ourselves. I needed to keep catching myself if I ever “fell off the bandwagon” to go, “You know what? My next choice is gonna be a good one.” Not, “My next choice next week.” Or, “I’ve fallen off. So I can keep eating this way.” Because we are led by our dopamine. we are led by the desire to have those hyper-palatable foods.
But my understanding is that essential oils can really help us curb those cravings and maybe have that break state to just stop our brain from telling us that it really really wants that whatever its craving, and instead allows to have a bit of a break state.
What kind of essential oils can we use, either by smelling it, or applying it topically, or by ingesting it that will help us to stay on track and stop those cravings, or at least allow us to calm down so that we can make better choices.
1:02:24.2 Dr. Eric Zielinski: That is key, because if our cravings are going to drive us to do something unhealthy, then we want to satisfy them. So one thing, using essential oils like cinnamon bark, black pepper, and peppermint can actually help. There’s research to suggest why. Like black pepper, it’s actually been shown to help reverse the addiction cascade in people that are quitting smoking, so the withdrawal. I get it, I tried to quit smoking multiple times falling flat on my face. And so, that drive, that addiction like I need that hit, I need that high – black pepper can soothe and ease and lessen those withdrawal symptoms. Addiction is addiction and that’s something that you learn. Just like basics are basics. So whether it’s addiction to sex or drugs or food or sugar or alcohol – it’s the same cascade that happens in the brain. So, black pepper can help with that.
Cinnamon bark is fantastic for balancing blood sugar and that is probably the number 1 cause that is most easily remedied through exercise and diet is rampant blood sugar. We’re just overdosing on sugar. Like you mentioned before, you just stop eating sugar A.K.A. the ketogenic diet, you’re just gonna lose weight. We find that typically 15 to 20 pounds are really easy to lose in the first month just by cutting out sugar alone. And so, when are diets are filled with sugar and processed forms of sugar like, processed wheat flour and things that are metabolized like sugar – essentially has caused insulin receptors not respond well to the insulin that’s out in the bloodstream and basically, the body doesn’t know what to do. So you’re consuming sugar all day long and the body’s like, “Ok. Obviously you’re a diabetic.” But most people don’t get that using certain things can help insulin sensitivity – can reverse the problem, and that’s what cinnamon bark does. So cinnamon bark can actually help your body not only produce more insulin but help your insulin receptors and increase sensitivity. So, that can help with the sugar cravings, because if insulin can do its job, you’re not gonna crave sugar anymore, because your body doesn’t crave it anymore, because your body got it.
Peppermint is one that is very good for satiety and natural energy booster. It helps you feel full and it’s also good for athletic performance, which kind of all place into each other. You really want to incorporate this lifestyle of activity, a lifestyle of healthy behaviors, and that’s why when it comes to cravings too, we want to make people feel better. I don’t know about you, but I’ve been a comfort eater in the past and I know what it’s like being down in the dumps and battling with clinical depression and I find that food because food gives you that immediate predictable high, especially if it’s sugar. Like, boom I get a little sugar high. If you’re not depressed, if you’re happy, the bible talks about joy is medicine – happy heart does better than medicine. It’s something to be said like diffusing and using topically citrus essential oils which are proven antidepressants. Proven to help with anxiety and panic attacks – that could help you too. It’s a roundabout way, you don’t think about it but you feel better. You’re not gonna be tempted to eat that second pint of Ben & Jerry’s and maybe even that first pint.
And what we wanna do is help people feel better about themselves and there is an aspect where we talk a lot about in the book is emotional detoxification, like falling in love with yourself again, doing what you know is right. And essential oils if used well and properly can help you get in that meditative state, can again help naturally produced serotonin and dopamine, can help deal with some of the issues of life in a way that maybe, you can’t do it alone.
1:06:13.8 Ashley James: Are there essential oils that help the liver. I know that when it comes to weight loss the liver has to metabolize that fat.
1:06:30.5 Dr. Eric Zielinski: Not directly. So, we don’t have any research to suggest that essential oils can help liver function, but we do know that abuse of essential oils can actually cause liver and kidney toxicity, because they still are chemicals. That’s something to realize. As natural as they are, you’re not gonna walk into a lavender field and see a pool of lavender, these flowers and blossoms need to be distilled and takes about roughly 30 to 35 pounds of lavender flowers to get one itty bitty bottle of lavender. So for sure, don’t take 15 drops in your mouth and call it a day. That’s the danger of a lot of misguided folks in using essential oils – it’s to overdo it. Like a little goes a long way.
When it comes to liver function going back to fatty liver, using the essential oils we’ve already talked about and especially the citrus oils – we’ll go back to lime and grapefruit helping the body produce what’s known as lipolysis, the burning down of fat – triggers fat burning and fat breakdown. That will actually help aiding the body in losing weight. So again, it’s a roundabout way, but if you wanna support your liver function, you just got to lose weight. I mean you really need to lose weight to support your liver function, but do it gradually. And you know what’s something too, it’s as important, I just want to add and I don’t want to name a magazine but the tabloids, and you all know what it is. The ones at the counter right when you’re about to check out the grocery store, you see that woman 60 pounds – that’s dangerous. I’ve known a man, he went to the hospital, he almost had his gallbladder removed because he was fasting doing a flush and he was essentially starving himself and he lost 50 pounds in 3, 4 weeks and he put such a strain on his gallbladder that he almost had it get removed. He almost blocked his ducts – gallstones. To the point where it was a bad deal, his body couldn’t process the amount of fat. it couldn’t metabolize the amount of fat that was being processed through his system.
You want slow, gradual, consistent, sustainable weight loss, and you know 15, 20 pounds is really sustainable for almost anyone – they could lose that. You can get up a little bit, but I get concerned. I don’t want people lose 40 pounds in a month, that’s way too much too quick. You want to get that over the course of months and that’s why our program, we have the 60-day challenge we call it. The first 30 days is really designed to help reset metabolism, balance hormones and also reset and retrain your taste buds. So, now when you consume food you’re not like loading up with sugar, you know you’re not putting sugar on your Cheerios or some people not putting Cheerios on your sugar. You’re not like just automatically reaching for the salt shaker at dinner before tasting food. You’re gonna taste it first then. So, it takes time. It takes about a month and women know this, obviously you’re on a monthly cycle. Men too, we’re on a monthly cycle. Our skin regenerates itself every month, our hormones balance, so give us month just to kind of reset things.
Then another month to kind of really establish lifestyle behaviors because research has shown it takes up to 66 days on average, this is so interesting – 66 days on average to develop a habit. Now, that takes into account everyone like me, I can develop a habit in two hours, I’m really extreme. My wife probably takes two, three years to develop a habit because she’s not the extremist as I am. But on average, so do you want to change your life forever to establish habits where you’re not tempted versus no? I’ve not had a McDonalds burger in 16 years, I haven’t had a Coke in 16 years, I haven’t had a cigarette in 16 years. It’s been 16 years since my “health transformation.” I have options for everything that I want. So, if I want a pumpkin pie, we know how to do it the right way, if I want a soda, I make my own with a little bit of essential oils and stevia or I like Virgil’s which is sweetened from stevia and that’s our quick one that you can get at the store. I love their root beer by the way.
We have solutions to the things, and so you come up with these systems that guarantee your success and that’s something that all of you can do. If you’re listening and if you’re on the ketogenic diet, because we’re picking on keto today. If you’re willing to starve yourself of carbohydrates and go through that extreme planning and expense and all those things to just load up on fats and stay away from all those carbs, that’s a lot of effort. Just give me part of that effort, just a portion of that to start thinking about a more holistic kind of approach. An approach that satisfies your palate, an approach that gives your body time to adapt and to respond and to truly heal, and that really is the one thing I love about what you do. It’s all about healing from the inside out; emotional, spiritual, mental, and of course physical.
1:11:41.4 Ashley James: Yes. Absolutely. We have to look at every aspect of our life and lifestyle in order to heal because something like emotional stress can cause physical inflammation at the cellular level. Speaking of inflammation, what do you teach in your book for decreasing inflammation?
1:12:03.3: Dr. Eric Zielinski: There’s a lot of essential oils that can help soothe inflammation. We have a couple recipes that you can in the book, and I ‘ll share a couple with you.
For one, if you want to ingest essential oils, that’s very safe. Make sure that the oils are 100% pure. Not adulterated, no fillers, no additives. You got to do a little research, make sure the company is transparent with their sourcing, transparent with their – I call it the blood panel, the GC-MS; Gas chromatography–mass spectrometry – basically it just tells you what’s in the oil and it should have “executive. summary,” like you get from a blood panel like, “Hey, your numbers are within normal limits or they’re without. So you want to look at the report, you really do. You wanna do a little bit of research especially if you’re gonna use essential oils to treat a disease like most people do right now using oils. So if you’re gonna ingest them, they have to be pure.
A good recipe that we found that really helps people is getting a size 00 which typically most people can swallow that, a 00 vegan gel cap. You can get gel caps on Amazon really cheap, and you get one drop of copaiba, one drop of orange, and one drop of peppermint. It could be a sweet, bitter orange, wild orange, I don’t care orange in a nutshell is very similar depending on the species. So you can just get orange oil, one drop copaiba, one drop peppermint. You put them in the capsule and you fill the capsule up with a good vegetable oil like coconut oil, or grapeseed oil, or olive oil type of thing, not Canola. And you take that as a pill, you could take that up to twice a day and then just kind of monitor your results for about two weeks. And that’s what we do, take it twice daily for two weeks and see how you respond. And you might find that certain symptoms just kind of go away, like bloating and we’ve already mentioned a bunch of them; nausea, bloating, libido, energy, and brain fog.
There are other techniques while you’re doing that, you can apply a roll-on. Same oils, or if you want to use different ones, we have found that ginger, lemon, spearmint, peppermint comes up a lot because it’s traditional soothing oil – anti inflammatory. But a roll-on recipe you could use, get a 10ml glass roller bottle, 4 drops of ginger, 2 drops of lemon, 2 drops of peppermint, and 2 drops of spearmint. And you could try different ones out and that’s one thing we try and incorporate and educate people, “Hey, if you don’t have spearmint just use a couple extra drops of peppermint.” It’s not gonna make too much of a difference. We’re just trying to get people a variety especially those people who have a robust medicine cabinet.
A nice inhaler or diffuser recipe is equal mixtures of clove, eucalyptus, and orange. Eucalyptus is rich in a chemical known as 1,8-cineole which is exceptionally anti inflammatory. And so, that is something you want to incorporate. It can be eucalyptus radiata or eucalyptus globulus. I personally have no preference, they both have a similar effect on inflammation. So again, whatever your favorite company uses or sells, you’re good to go.
Same thing with clove oil. Typically there aren’t many different varieties of clove oil, it’s just clove oil. But clove oil is extremely rich in antioxidants and can soothe inflammation, there’s so many more. Once you kind of get into the world of essential oils, you find that all of them have this somewhat minor to significant inflammatory response to it and that’s why you apply them topically, inhale them, and if you really want an impact you ingest them.
1:15:52.7 Ashley James: Could you do damage to the liver just by inhaling too much essential oils or by applying too many topically or is it only when you ingest them?
1:16:03.4 Dr. Eric Zielinski: Yeah, typically ingestion. You have to apply an extreme amount on your skin because the skin even though we all hear that the skin is the proverbial sponge, the largest organ on your body – the researches suggest that only 50 to 60% that are applied on the skin penetrate the bloodstream. So, the skin does have a direct barrier fact, there’s only so much that will get into the bloodstream. So, skin is very safe. And inhalation, I have not seen any research that really substantiates that inhaling essential oils can cause any organ toxicity. Of course overdosing is one thing, like a nebulizer is a potentially dangerous apparatus. I’ve got myself near fainting; vertigo – dizzy with using a nebulizer incorrectly, a nebulizer that is straight essential oil, not mixed or not part of a water diffuser. So, when you have this ultrasonic water diffuser that most people think of as diffusers, there’s a vibrating disc at the bottom of a water tank that vibrates at such a high speed. It breaks up the water compounds and the essential compounds and then emit steam, so there’s no heating, it’s just super high vibration that breaks things up and emits mist.
There is a similar apparatus out there called the nebulizer, but there’s no water. So, you’re putting 40, 50 drops of essential oil, pure true oil, and then there’s a vibrating mechanism in there that emits pure essential oil that is super concentrated – you do not want to use that for more than 10 to 15 minutes at a time and of course in a well ventilated room. So, if someone is being on whys and if they’re just using oils in a way where they can cause an overdose response, yes that’s possible, but that’s rare, but the caution is there though. Because you know, that’s what you’re taught, you’re not gonna follow instructions, you’re not gonna know what to do. That’s why a lot of these companies sell a nebulizer straight all diffuser that has automatic shut off at 5, 10 minutes. But most people like me just put it back on because we like the smell, well no – what are you doing to your body? [Laughter] There’s a reason it shuts off automatically 5 or 10 minutes.
So please, please, you waste so much on oils when you’re using a nebulizer if you’re not doing it for true disease management. Like if you want to stop a panic attack, nebulizer is the way to go, but most people should not be messing with that. 99% of us should be using these water diffusers because they’re the safest sustainable way. And we also got to think about a lot of waste, you could easily go through a bottle of oil in a week and that’s 35 pounds of lavender gone. It’s a lot of lavender. That’s as much as my wife and I can grow in a year. Like we just consumed that in a week because we misuse the oil. So I want that put that healthy caution to everyone because I want kids and my grandkids to be able to use essential oils and we just don’t wanna consumerize them to death.
1:19:16.7 Ashley James: Are there essential oils that should not ingested? Like I’ve always heard don’t ingest tea tree oil. Are there ones that absolutely you should not swallow?
1:19:28.3 Dr. Eric Zielinski: Ultimately it’s dosing. It’s not an easy answer because wintergreen is one that all aromatherapists recommend. Wintergreen can cause toxicity if ingested but what do you think flavors your root beer? I mean that’s the concern that I have with throwing the baby out of the bath water – it’s dosing. And so, if you’re using a culinary dose, if you want to make homemade root beer and you have a batch of a gallon and you put a drop of wintergreen – and again, what do you think flavors your Coca Cola, your food products? And so, by enlarge, if you’re using essential oils for culinary purposes and if you’re following the recipe like in my book – go add it. But if you’re using oils for medicinal purposes, you need to take a little more consideration because there are known drug interactions. And again wintergreen, yeah I’m not gonna ingest in a medicinal dose. So, that’s the confusion.
There are contraindications for a medicinal dose versus a culinary dose, like huge, because we’re talking parts per billion. Like one drop in a gallon, that’s parts per billion, because there’s how many billions of drops are in a gallon? So, that’s something to think about. So yeah, there are lists; tea tree – personally I’ve ingested tea tree in a capsule or some way that’s safe. Oregano, tea tree, cloves oils that could be caustic, but none are “toxic” in the sense that a drop of oil and the capsule and the capsule is gonna cause any sort of damage. There’s no research, trust me, at all to prove that or to suggest that. But in my aromatherapy text and I’m looking at the guidelines and our “work manual” type of text, there are max oil dosages for all oils and there are really few like bitter almond. Who’s gonna buy that, wormwood, rue? Who has rue? And so, there are certain oils that are definitely contraindicated to consume, but no one’s buying them. The oils that you’re getting, your lemons, your lavenders, your eucalyptuses and stuff, people consume them on a regular basis all the time.
But we want to put a healthy caution out there. So this is where I get a little criticism from the aromatherapy community because I try to get people licensed in a sense, empowerment to do this, but we always have to have that caution.
1:21:54.6 Ashley James: Right, absolutely. Do we have to do the capsule or could we just put it in a glass of water or stick it on our tongue? Why the capsule just the taste or is there is a medicinal reason?
1:22:08.5 Dr. Eric Zielinski: Really to protect the mucous membranes in your throat and in your esophagus. They’re super concentrated. I mean they’re very much concentrated to the point where they’re caustic, they could burn. And I would argue and research has suggested that diluting actually helps the body absorb better, for one. That’s why you just don’t wanna apply undiluted oils on your skin, it’s hard for the body completely metabolize and absorb that because again, they’re just pure chemicals. That’s what essential oils are. They’re pure plant based chemicals. So when you dilute them with a carrier oil, it actually helps the body absorb and metabolize them better. So that’s one thing, but also protection. I mean nothing will burn your mouth like from a drop of oregano, and water doesn’t dilute them – water and oil don’t mix. So, you could put a drop of oil on your water and mix it up, but the oil suspends on top. You either need to get an emulsifier or something or if you really wanna drink them like me, I love my matcha green tea in the morning – that’s my thing that help me quit the coffee habit, it gives me a nice little energy boost and I love the benefits I get from them. I’ll put a drop of cinnamon bark and a drop of peppermint in that, but because I have a fatty oil or a fatty substance like coconut milk in it, it helps dilute that.
So, always ingest essential oils with some sort of fatty carrier and/or the safest way, if you’re doing it for medicinal purposes is through a capsule. You could also just put a teaspoon of olive oil or coconut oil in a bowl and mix it with a drop of oil and eat it like that, but you know there is that taste aspect to it, but that’s much more safe. It’s infinitely more safe if you’d just put a drop.
Sublingual use, I don’t know. That’s a tough one. I see more harm than good. There’s no research to suggest that sublingual – putting a drop under your tongue is gonna help your body assimilating and absorbing it any better than using a gel capsule or another way.
1:24:17.2 Ashley James: Essential oils are antimicrobials. So, what about the good bacteria in the gut, do they harm the good bacteria while killing the bad?
1:24:28.4 Dr. Eric Zielinski: That’s a fantastic question, because we’ve seen through the studies that essential oils have what’s known as cell selectivity. Because again they’re from nature, they’re of the earth, and I don’t want to use the word innate because they’re not alive, they’re not intelligent. But there is this somewhat innate intelligence we seen in these inanimate objects that they know how to interact with the body. The body knows how to interact with that. I mean we’re all of the earth if you look at it, and so whether it’s cancer, whether it’s healthy cells, cancer cells, good bacteria, bad bacteria – you see that essential oils actually target pathogens and they leave the healthy alone. So, there’s no research at all to suggest that oregano oil will the probiotics or the good bacteria in your gut, but we do know that it will definitely kill the back bacteria. Same thing with our skin and that’s the key about why using essential oils topically is infinitely more better than like, hand sanitizer or antibacterial products. It’s because it allows and fosters good healthy bacterial growth versus just annihilating everything.
So, they’re not like antibiotics because antibiotics are very much, I don’t know what to say, I hate to use the use the word intelligent, but they’re so synthetic that the body can’t react to it. It’s like this nuclear bomb approach, but that’s the wonderful thing about nature, that’s the wonderful thing about God’s design. It blows my mind, I can’t explain it more than just what I just did. But again, the technical term in the research is cell selectivity. So, that’s pretty cool, especially when you’re trying to cure cancer cells and you see that certain essential oil chemicals can do that, but they’re not killing the healthy cells. I was like, “Wow. Interesting.”
1:26:07.4 Ashley James: What about those who know that they have candida or they know they have small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, yeast problems, that kind of thing. What kind of essential oils should they ingest to help the body to fight those infections?
1:26:33.8 Dr. Eric Zielinski: Well, if that’s your issue, get my first book “The Healing Power of Essential Oils” because I have a whole chapter on candida. The issue with candida primarily is diet related to a large extent. And so, if you tightened up your diet and then if you’re really focusing on good, balanced, healthy carbs, not being afraid of sugar, but if you’re someone who has candida you really should not be consuming honey, maple syrup, even the natural sugars; agave or the coconut sugar – you really wanna limit that stuff. But using essential oils like lavender, caraway, clove is exceptionally potent against candida. I have candida roll-ons and capsules. I wrote the recipes in my first book, that stuff is there. You’ll find that one issue about candida that really blew my mind when I was writing my first book, was the use of antibiotics and how that has been linked to candida overgrowth. Because especially women that have UTIs which is somewhat common in women – you get a UTI, you get on an antibiotic and that ultimately produces candida vaginal infection. And then you get an antifungal which then leads into a UTI and then it leads into resistance, It’s like this vicious cycle where women often times from UTI, vaginal infection, to candida overgrowth. To stop the onslaught first is to try to find the solution to stop overdosing and taking antibiotics as much as possible and that in it of itself can help regulate and bring healing.
One thing about essential oils is we have no research to suggest that the thyme, oregano, and the clove that are extremely antifungal that fungi would become resistant to them. And that’s an issue with candida, it is antifungal resistant fungus. That’s scary because we’re creating superbugs, bacteria that are resistant to antibiotics, fungus that are resistant to these solutions. Again, essential oils can really help a lot.
We have like gentele tampon, tea tree tampon. That’s the other thing. Tea tree is another good one that’s a traditional one. But you know, when you think of candida, we oftentimes think of vaginal infection which is a known issue, but men deal with them too and we are finding that people that are doing systemic candida overgrowth, it’s definitely approachable and you could beat this thing.
1:29:16.9 Ashley James: And so, you’re saying get the first book because you talked about fight it. Do you talk about oils to ingest in your first book for candida?
1:29:29.8 Dr. Eric Zielinski: Yeah.
1:29:32.0 Ashley James: We’ll make sure the link to your first book is also in the show notes as well.
What about parasites? You know, getting on the idea of using essential oils which are herbs, they’re just concentrated extracts from plants. So this is botanical medicine. Are there essential oils we can consume to help kill parasites?
1:29:55.9 Dr. Z Dr. Eric Zielinski: Yeah. You know, the thing about parasites is there’s not much research and we see the herb, actually we see a lot of wormwood which we don’t wanna be using wormwood essential oil internally. That is a known toxic oil, it’s just too concentrated versus the herbal or the dried form. Clove is one that comes up a lot, but other than that, I haven’t looked too deep into it because what I see essentially, I don’t know, I see a lot of the supplement solutions out there are very much whole form base and people aren’t messing with essential oils at that level. And we have some anecdotal evidence out there which might be good, but the only thing I could really come up with is clove. That is like the consistent one overall. But yeah, there’s nothing and that’s a shame because I’m sure there are solutions out there, it’s just we don’t have the research and that’s where the funding is desperately needed and the Natural Health Community start funding this stuff, but our pockets are quite shallow compared to big pharma so, we’re getting by.
1:31:08.7 Ashley James: So I’ve got a little quiz for you. Say, I’m gonna take you and fly you to some island where there’s no stores and you are gonna help that population there and you can only bring three oils, and these people are suffering from the common, everyday illnesses that we’re suffering from. Apparently they’re eating McDonalds, but there’s no shop, you can’t buy any more oils. You could only bring three. What three oils do you bring to help this people?
1:31:46.2 Dr. Eric Zielinski: You know, I’ll choose three out of the four that I focus on the book. I’ll choose lime, cinnamon bark, and peppermint and between those three, whether we’re fighting a pathogen, boosting mood, whether we’re trying to lose weight, it balance blood sugar – you could do a lot of things with those and they mix well together surprisingly enough. And so, lime which is one of my favorites – very tasty. By the way, if you’ve never had guacamole without a drop of lime and a drop of cilantro, you haven’t lived. It’s yum and so we try to enjoy that as well. Cinnamon bark and peppermint for sure.
1:32:23.3 Ashley James: I love it. Tell us a bit about cooking with essential oils versus putting them in a capsule and consuming them. They’re obviously being more diluted, because if you’re putting one drop of lime, one drop of cilantro, and whole bowl of guacamole and then sharing it with other people, so you’re not consuming an entire drop like you would if you used the capsule. But you’re still getting some medicinal benefits and then the idea also, the question is – because you’re mixing it with food, do essential oils interact with foods to create a synergistic effect. So, is there a benefit to cooking with them?
1:33:10.0 Dr. Eric Zielinski: Yeah. You know, you get that minor culinary dose and that’s something that we’re trying to incorporate with people is you don’t have to take a garlic supplement to get the benefits of garlic, just add a clove of garlic to your food and have a nice medicinal dose, like constant dose throughout your day with your different food items. And so, that’s something that we’re really trying to encourage people to do. There are virtually no contraindications when you’re doing that, especially because the therapeutic effect is minor. So that is the key though, it’s minor negligible therapeutic effect. Again, we’re not like balancing blood sugar by putting a drop of cinnamon in huge pumpkin pie. So you put things in a perspective like that. So, it’s very safe, it’s a great way for people to ease in and feel comfortable with ingesting oils, but also it enhances the flavor. It really makes food just taste better in a lot of different ways.
So, that is the main difference. Follow the recipes in the book when it comes to the capsules, like there are 2, 3, 4, sometimes 5, 6 drops at the most – drops in a capsule. Like that’s getting up to max oral dose limits. So, you want to be careful if you’re doing that; you are under the guidance of a healthcare professional if you’re on drugs because there known drug interactions, and that’s something they have to consider. But going back to the culinary use, unless they are on a heart disease medication and they’ve been told by their doctor not to eat grapefruit, most people don’t have nutritional contraindications for their pharmaceuticals. And so, that’s another way that we can get people to use essential oils.
I really like the culinary low dose aspect of using essential oils. It’s the same thing that you get when you’re diffusing. Diffusing essential oils and inhaling those microparticles in the air isn’t gonna instantly shift your whole physiology. It’s very minor, very subtle, but that’s good though for people. You don’t want those dramatic changes like taking an NSAID and your body’s physiology changes within minutes and it’s like, “Woah. What did I do?” We’re trying to make things more gradual and this is sustainable long term health and healing. This isn’t like “Hey. I wanna get fixed.”
1:35:29.2 Ashley James: Right.
1:35:31.0 Dr. Eric Zielinski: Because a concept that we gotta remember you all, especially for people that are overweight, is it took you awhile to get into this mess, I’ll testify. When I gained my 10, 15 pounds when I got into my “fat pants” it didn’t happen overnight. It was months up to a year worth of neglecting my body, not exercising, eating foods I shouldn’t be, and chronically stressed – it just didn’t happen. You can’t gain 10 pounds in a day or two or a week or sometimes a month – it takes time. And so, it will take time to reverse and sometimes it might take longer to reverse depending on how long you’ve been in that state. It took you five months to get into the mess, you’ve been in this mess for 10 years, you know, you gotta give yourself a year. But, you got to think about that – a year, for the rest of your life especially for people that really need to lose some serious weight. They want to get off their drugs. They want to really get control of their life again, that’s when things change.
1:36:31.8 Ashley James: I love it. There’s definitely a link between inflammation and allergies and the histamine response. And you’ve already talked about how to help the body to lower inflammation, but is there anything specifically about helping people cope with allergies or lower histamine that you can provide.
1:36:52.6 Dr. Eric Zielinski: No. That is one thing that when it comes to histamine, I have not focused a lot on the histamine triggers when it comes to food. Allergies, there’s a lot you could do with essential oils as a whole. Lemon, lavender, and peppermint is the typical allergy blend. Very detoxifying, helps open up the airways, very cleansing and soothing, calming – that’s what the lavender does. So we’ve recommended that to thousands of people and you can ingest that in a gel capsule, you can topically apply that over your chest and the back of your neck, you can inhale that through your diffuser. But lemon, lavender, peppermint – really good for allergies and seasonal allergies especially.
But one thing about allergies though I want to caution you all is, allergies sort of become normal. Allergies are not normal. This is really important – you should not have seasonal allergies for more than two years at the most. If your body’s working, your immune system has an adaptive response. Unless something dramatically changes, like you completely changed the landscaping of your home and you have completely different flowers and plants and shrubs, or something and now you have different pollen to adapt to, your body should be adapting to its environment relatively quickly. And so, for people that deal with chronic, year after year seasonal allergies – that is a huge trigger and that’s a red flag. I would say that is an early stage autoimmune condition because your body is just in such override. You’re immune system is so much on edge that it cannot even handle the slightest of toxin. It’s basically saying you’re immune system isn’t properly adapting to its environment. It’s not functioning properly. I’ll testify. I’ve been there.
Mold toxicity is the number one cause of seasonal allergies. And when I was dealing with mold toxicity – black mold in my home, I never suffered through seasonal allergies like that in my life; but now that we have a home that’s pure, clean – we just went through the allergy season. Yeah a little bit or runny nose and sneezing because there’s like a ton of pollen in here, well yeah. About the same thing with sneezing there’s a dog nearby with a lot of dander, that’s normal. But these people suffering through days and weeks, that’s not good. So, I want to put that out there – it’s a sign, it’s a chronic inflammatory that is a pre-autoimmune condition that can be solved.
1:39:22.3 Ashley James: Exactly. Absolutely. I’ve had clients who when we’ve cleaned up their diet and they were on years and years of Claritin or something like that. But cleaning up the diet, getting rid of gluten for a lot of people getting rid of grains, or the gluten grains – helping heal the gut that they no longer have those allergies or seasonal allergies. And it is the subtle symptoms of the body. If we have chronic symptoms that we need to run to over the counter meds for, we need to stop and take a deep dive out and look at what’s going on because if we treat symptoms, even with natural stuff – if you’re just treating symptoms all the time, then there’s damage being done deeper. So we have to get to the root and we’ve got to clean up the diet, we wanna use essential oils to support us, we wanna use supplements to support us, we have to have a diet that’s healing and then create a lifestyle that is healing. And so, we’re gonna do it one step at a time, right? We’re just gonna take one step at a time and if we get overwhelmed, we’re gonna get inhale some lavender and lime and peppermint and we’re just gonna take one baby step at a time, but we’re gonna get there..
It was 10,11 years ago that I was really really sick. Coming up 11 years ago when my husband and I decided to eat organic and then shop [inaudible 1:40:53.9] store and then one thing led to another. One baby step after another. So, it does take time, but you can do things like cut out the sugar and do 30 days with no processed sugar and just see what happens and then use essential oils to help you overcome those sugar cravings and help you stay focused and help you love yourself and increase the love in your body and for your body while you’re going through that change and then try another challenge and try going dairy-free for a month or trying going meat-free for a month, then try adding two cups of vegetables at each meal. And these are fun challenges and then you get to see after 30 days, do i feel better, the same, or worse? You’ll know what’s going on. Give it a good amount of time to see how you feel and then one step at a time you’re gonna get there.
Dr. Z you have a whole bunch of resources for us and we’ve made an easy link for everyone, it’s: www.learntruehealth.com/oilsdiet
Listeners can go to www.learntruehealth.com/oilsdiet
And you’ve provided us with a whole bunch of really cool trainings. Can you let us know what that is?
1:42:16.2 Dr. Eric Zielinski: You mentioned the word challenge a lot. One thing that we offer is we call our 60-day challenge, It’s free group coaching program that walks you through those 60, you can just us two months – even though the research suggest it takes 66 days to develop a habit. We’ll walk you through our initial 30-day we call a little fast track and we’ll walk you through the next 30 days which will hopefully set you up forever. We have nearly 2,000 people on this group right now and it’s open enrollment. So whether you’re listening early, whenever this is gonna air in 2019 or 2020 and beyond, this group is gonna be available. We have mentors and people that have gone through the program. So that’s what I want to encourage you all, you’re not gonna do this alone and that’s the number one thing. Again, the recipes are good, essential oils are fun, people love feeling better, but it’s the camaraderie.
One lady just really touched my heart. This is on the Facebook group. One person just wrote, “You know, I’ve never had a lot of friends in my life and this group, if I didn’t get anything else from just meeting and being able to chat with and talk to some people and have “online friends” that’s been worth this more than anything.” That’s someone of an extreme case, but you know, maybe you do have a lot of friends and family that love you, but maybe they don’t live the way you wanna live, and maybe they couldn’t truly support your lifestyle, maybe it’s hard for you to go out at the church, socials, or family functions because of all the tempting things and bad stuff that people are eating and doing.
Imagine being a part of a group of people that will help you just share how they’re over coming and posting recipes like, “Hey. I just made this.” Or “I just did this with my family.” That’s important and that’s why we changed the name of our website to Natural Living Family because it’s kinda been what we’ve done and we’ve been blessed to start and develop a natural living family. So, that is of itself invaluable. And then mama Z, my wife has created hours of videos on how to perform, literally do, demonstrate all of the exercises because we have an exercise program too, a home exercise program, regardless of your athletic level or your fitness level, or you weight – she’ll help you do it. And so she walk you through our fun little shopping tour, we’ll go to a natural health food store and we spent about and hour and a half with our natural living family answering questions and walk through every isle and then mama Z walks you through how to make some of our favorite recipes from the book. So, you get all that stuff plus ebooks. It’s a really really cool package because you can get the book on Amazon for $17 then what? And we don’t want this to be just another book that you get on the shelf and just ends up collecting dust on our bookshelf. That would be a travesty to me. We have seen of course the 45 pounds and 45 inches loss story, that’s like normal if you need to lose that weight. But we’ve also seen people gained weight that need to gain weight and people get off medications. That one lady, she lost a little bit of weight, but the most important thing for her was to get off of her anxiety medications. Wow, like really? And other people getting off their thyroid medications, so many fun stories. If you’re willing to do the soul searching and if you’re willing to put in the effort, and a lot of the time is spent on your needs, a lot of the time is spent meditating, alone – really reflecting on you and who you are.
You know, if you wanna fall in love with yourself again, if you wanna enjoy your life again and if you wanna be a light to the world, that’s our invitation. You’re the person that we want in our world because we could help you with that. If you just want a quick fix, you just want to lose 20, 30 pounds in a week, that can’t help you because that’s not safe. That’s not healthy and we wanna get you out of that mentality because we don’t do cheat days, it doesn’t even exist. And we’re gonna walk you through how to completely eradicate temptation, so you’re never tempted again. That will blow our mind.
1:46:40.2 Ashley James: I love it. So they go to www.learntruehealth.com/oilsdiet and when they get to join the group, they have access to videos as well. Can you tell us a bit about the videos that they have access to in addition to the group which is the biggest thing of course.
1:46:59.9 Dr. Eric Zielinski: Yeah. My wife Sabrina makes six of her favorite recipes. Everything from a treat to our lemon buns, tea bread, crockpot lasagna for people that are at that stage of the diet program to simulate other kinds of tasties. But you know the key is just to show you how to do the exercises that we talk about. Because a lot of people go how do I really do this? So, it’s a full exercise demo class and also that shopping tour I mentioned where my wife and I are with a group of 10, 15 local natural living family members at a local health food store and we just took over the store, and we just talk, they ask questions and we answer them, we went through every isle and just kinda help them navigate what to look for and what not to look for, and not lose your wallet over being a healthy eater because being healthy does not have to be more expensive and we explain how.
1:47:56.2 Ashley James: I love it. That’s awesome. There’s so many wonderful things that your are providing and I’ve really enjoyed all the training that you provide. Our first interview episode 302 you gave some great info and I love the recipe that you gave in that episode for making your own hand sanitizer. That really stuck with me. Listeners you got to go back and also check out episode 302 after this to hear Dr. Z’s great tips and we dive more into what are essential oils and how to use them. So we talked more about that in 302.
I love this idea of really incorporating them throughout the diet. Making sure the diet is rich in those nutrients. Is there anything left unsaid, is there anything that we haven’t covered that you really wanted to make sure we covered today?
1:48:50.5 Dr. Eric Zielinski: You know, just this concept that diets not work, but transformation does. A diet by definition is a collection of foods that you eat. I mean my diet is different than your diet which different than your son’s or daughter’s and my son’s and daughter’s diet. So diets are relative. And so, the essential oils diet is really a transformation program to help you look and transform from the inside out. From personal experience and from actually helping thousands of people, we’ve been very blessed to say that helping thousands of people go through their metamorphosis, it’s like a caterpillar becoming a butterfly. Just be patient with yourself and fall in love with yourself and know that you’re worth it. Don’t look back, don’t beat yourself up. Look over and think what do I need to do? What can I do? And like you mentioned, Ashley, focus on the low hanging foot and baby steps and build off of that and never forget those things to be grateful for because those are the things that are really gonna help you when things get tough, and things will get tough. Life happens. But you know, we have what it takes to overcome that.
And so, that’s my encouragement and my challenge to everybody is to do your best and never look back and realize that you can enjoy a truly healthy abundant life.
1:50:19.1 Ashley James: Wonderful. Beautiful. Beautifully said. Thank you so much, Dr. Z for coming today and sharing. This time has just flown by and I am really looking forward to cooking with some essential oils. You’ve given me some great ideas and I can’t wait to dive in to your book and go further into these recipes integrating essential oils even more into my life.
It’s been such a pleasure having you here and I can’t wait to have you back on the show. So, thank you.
1:50:47.0 Dr. Eric Zielinski: Well, thank you for having me and bless everyone listening. Talk soon.
—
Outro: Hello, true health seeker. Have you ever thought about becoming a health coach? Do you love learning about nutrition and how we can shift our lifestyle and our diet so that we can gain optimal health and happiness and longevity? Do you love helping your friends and family to solve their health problems and to figure out what they can do to eat healthier? Are you interested in becoming someone who can grow their own business, support people in their success? Do you love helping people?
You might be the perfect candidate to become a health coach. I highly recommend checking out The Institute for Integrative Nutrition.
I just spent the last year in their health coaching certification program and it really blew me away. It was so amazing. I learned over a hundred dietary theories. I learned all about nutrition, but from a standpoint of how we can help people to shift their lives and shift their lifestyle to gain true holistic health, I definitely recommend you check them out.
You can Google, Institute for Integrative Nutrition or IIN and give them a call or you can go to www.learntruehealth.com/coach and you can receive a free module of their training to check it out and see if it’s something that you’d be interested in.
Be sure to mention my name Ashley James and the Learn True Health Podcast because I made a deal with them that they will give you the best price possible.
I highly recommend checking it out. It really changed my life to be in their program and I’m such a big advocate that I wanted to spread this information. We need more health coaches. In fact, health coaching is the largest growing career right now in the health field. So many health coaches are. getting in and helping people because you can work in chiropractic office, doctors offices.you can work in hospitals, you can work online through Skype and help people around the world. you can become an author. You can go into the school system and help your local schools shift their programs to help children be healthier. you can go into senior centers and help them to shift their diet and lifestyle to best support them in their success and their health goals.
There’s so many different available options for you when you become a certified health coach.
So check out IIN. Check out the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. Mention my name, get the best deal. Give them a call and they;ll give you lots of free information and help you to see if this is the right move for you.
Classes are starting soon. The next round of classes are starting at the end of the month. So you’re gonna wanna call them and check it out.
And if you know anyone in your life who would be an amazing coach, please tell them about it. Being a health coach is so rewarding and you get to help so many people.
—
Are you looking to get the best supplements at the lowest price?
For high quality supplements and to talk to someone about what supplements are best for you, go to www.takeyoursupplements.com and one of our fantastic true health coaches will help you pick out the right supplements for you that are the highest quality and the best price.
That’s www.takeyoursupplements.com
Be sure to ask about free shipping and our awesome referral program.
Facebook – The Essential Oils Revolution
Using God’s Medicine For The Abundant Life
https://nootropicsexpert.com - A free copy of David Tomen's book "Secrets of the Optimized Brain" by entering your email address and subscribe to the weekly Nootropics Expert newsletter.
https://www.youtube.com/c/nootropicsexpert
Highlights:
Intro:
Eyeing to optimize your health? Are you looking to get the best supplements at the lowest price?
For high-quality supplements and to talk to someone about what supplements are best for you, go to www.takeyoursupplements.com, and one of our fantastic true health coaches will help you pick out the right supplements for you that are the highest quality and the best price.
That’s www.takeyoursupplements.com
Be sure to ask about free shipping and our awesome referral program.
—
Welcome to the Learn True Health podcast. I’m your host, Ashley James.
This is Episode 362.
0:00:51.5 Ashley James: I’m very excited to have on the show today a Nootropics expert. His website is www.nootropicsexpert.com. His name is David Tomen.
David, we’re finally getting you on the show.
0:01:06.6 David Tomen: Finally, hi Ashley.
0:01:08.0 Ashley James: Hi. It’s been quite a ride. David and I have been going back and forth and every time, either he was in a car accident, and then I had some crazy flu, and then something else happened. I don’t know. So we finally have you on the show. I think the universe is conspiring and now is the right time.
So I’ve been fascinated and intrigued for months to finally get to talk you about what Nootropics are. We’re definitely getting into that. My very limited understanding is from hearing about certain herbs that will be really good for the brain, or I hear in Silicon Valley how they’ll microdose LSD or mushrooms to try to get the cutting edge on their brain firing and their intelligence and their creativity. So there’s this big weird world out there of neuroscience when it comes to supplements that support the brain. I really enjoyed going to your website, which we’re going to make sure all the links to everything David Tomen does is in the show notes of today’s podcast at www.learntruehealth.com.
And your website list about 90 different neuro tropics and how they work, but we’re going to get into the most interesting ones. Before we do and I definitely want to dive into your story. Can you define what Nootropics are? Can you give us an understanding about what they are and then I’d love to go into your story and learn why you became an expert in them.
0:02:56.1 David Tomen: Generally, like the 30,000 Nootropics are a class of substances that improve brain function. That’s the big picture of it, but the term nootropic is relatively new. There’s a Romanian psychologist and chemist named Dr. Cornelio Gurghiu. He synthesized Piracetam back in 1963, and he coined the term nootropic in 1972 after he invented this new class of substances. And the word nootropic is derived from the Greek “nous” for the mind and “tropein” to bend, so to bend the mind. And then Dr. Ghurghiu went on to define what he thought a true nootropic is, and this is what he said, “A nootropic enhances memory and the ability to learn. It assists brain function under disruptive conditions such as the lack of oxygen, and after convulsive shock, it protects the brain from chemical and physical toxins like anticholinergic drugs and barbiturates, it increases natural cognitive processes, and it must be non-toxic to humans or stimulate or depress the brain.” That’s officially what a nootropic is.
Now since then, every person has been calling everything that affects the brain one way or another nootropic. And we make a very strong distinction between Nootropics and smart drugs. To my mind, Nootropics are natural substances, sometimes synthetic but mostly synthetic made from a natural substance. It does not include things like Adderall or Ritalin or Modafinil or microdosing LSD. Those aren’t considered Nootropics in my opinion, but you’ll see headlines every week of somebody referring to something like Ritalin is a nootropic, and it’s not. I consider it a smart drug. A nootropic that you do not need a prescription from your doctor to buy. You can get it at Whole Foods at the vitamin shop or your local vitamin store, but you don’t need a prescription.
0:05:28.6 Ashley James: I really like that the distinction is that it actually protects the brain.
0:05:35.3 David Tomen: Yes.
0:05:36.6 Ashley James: And it doesn’t stimulate, so we’re not talking about caffeine. It doesn’t stimulate or depress the brain. So it’s not affecting the serotonin or dopamine. It’s not causing that kind of shift in the chemistry of the brain. It protects the brain, it doesn’t stimulate or depress, and it helps with memory and learning even in adverse conditions.
0:06:06.1 David Tomen: Well, a lot of these substances though do directly affect things like serotonin and dopamine and norepinephrine and epinephrine, and they help lower things like cortisol and stuff. Because some of these things are actually the precursor to dopamine or the precursor to serotonin or the precursor to melatonin, so I would classify those as Nootropics, so some of them naturally are natural stimulants to the brain. So we take a little bit of license on what Dr. Ghurgiu’s original. He was referring specifically to the Racetams that he was inventing. And so we have taken a little bit of license since then. In a general sense, some of these things do stimulate the brain to a certain degree, or they depress the brain to a certain degree. When you look at the neurochemistry of how something like gabba works. Gabba is an inhibitor, right? So theoretically, it kind of like depresses the brain but it doesn’t depress the brain like an SSRI would or something like that. Does that make sense?
0:07:22.8 Ashley James: So we want the brain to be in balance.
0:07:25.8 David Tomen: That brain has to be in balance, yes.
0:07:28.3 Ashley James: So you’re saying that Nootropics are more like adaptogenic and that they’re not going to over stimulate or under stimulate, but they’re going to help because they’re precursors to these neurochemicals. Are they going to help the brain to be more in balance? Is that correct?
0:07:44.9 David Tomen: That’s correct to a certain degree. Anyone of these substances you can use too much of it or for somebody that shouldn’t be using a particular substance. It could do something bad to their brain. So you’ve gotta use intelligence and wisdom when it comes to using some of these things, or you could really, really mess yourself up. But the bottom line is that the fully optimized brain, the brain that’s firing on all cylinders has got to be in balance.
0:08:12.6 Ashley James: I like that you brought up this warning. Since we can go to Whole Foods or The Vitamin Shop or wherever to buy these substances, people could be misusing them currently.
0:08:24.7 David Tomen: Yes, and that’s the reason why. I think I reviewed 90 individual substances so far somewhere around that, maybe a little bit more, and I’ve include dosage recommendations which are based on clinical studies and user experience. And often the dosages are different than what’s on the bottle from the manufacturer. It also includes side effects, and I tell people what types to buy too because there are oftentimes different forms like when it comes to extracts and stuff. There’s a specific warning, for example, something like St. John’s Wort, do not use St. John’s Wort if you’re on any kind of an antidepressant or anti-anxiety medication or you will cause serotonin syndrome that could very likely kill you.
0:09:18.7 Ashley James: Oh my gosh.
0:09:21.7 David Tomen: So yeah.
0:09:23.1 Ashley James: Do you ever contact these manufacturers and let them know about the clinical studies that you’ve found?
0:09:29.9 David Tomen: They know it. The bigger manufacturers, the legitimate ones – the ones that have been around for a long time that really know what they’re doing have got the science to back up their products, and oftentimes they’ll publish it. A lot of the stuff that I’ve been doing is cutting edge research though because I just dug in a lot deeper than even the manufacturers have done. But you’ll oftentimes see warnings on the labels of certain supplements that you pick up. Talk to your doctor before you use this or if you are on any medication, do not use this before you talk to your doctor.
0:10:12.0 Ashley James: But they weren’t really putting it on the doctor to know everything.
0:10:16.4 David Tomen: That’s a problem because most doctors don’t know anything about this stuff.
0:10:21.7 Ashley James: Right. I want to talk to you about this all day. So let’s get into your story. What happened in your life, David Tomen, that made you want to get interested and then eventually become an expert in Nootropics?
0:10:34.8 David Tomen: Like everybody else, I just never ever thought about my brain up until about 12 or 13 years ago and I’ve lived an interesting life. I lived all over the world, I’ve helped run companies, but I always had a problem with focus. Every time I had a management review of whatever country I happened to be living in and what company happened to help to run, I was fantastic as an Executive, as a Manager, I was great with people, but you got to learn how to focus. And so I bought the books, and I thought it was a moral feeling that I couldn’t focus. And then 13 years ago, I met this beautiful girl in North Miami Beach, and we ended up getting married. Within a year of us being together, she noticed what was going on and she suggested that I see a psychiatrist that she really respected up in Palm Beach. So I went in to see this guy, and he sat me down, and within 10 minutes he says, “You’re adult ADD and PTSD.” The PTSD part took me 10 years to figure out where that came from but the adult ADD, he put on Ritalin. As soon as I started taking Ritalin, it was like somebody turned the lights onto my brain.
0:12:03.9 Ashley James: Wow.
0:12:04.9 David Tomen: It was like a miracle, and I went, “Oh wow.” But within a couple of years, I started growing a tolerance to Ritalin, and it wasn’t working as well, and I’m going, “No, this ain’t happening. This was working too well.” So I started researching to find out how it worked and I found out that it was a dopamine reuptake inhibitor which means that it blocks the dopamine transporters in your brain so that theoretically it provides more dopamine in your brain which in the truly clinically ADD or ADHD brain, it helps your brain work better, and you can focus better. So I figured, “Ok, I’m lacking dopamine.” So I’ve discovered L-tyrosine. L-tyrosine is a precursor to dopamine, and I started taking that along with acetyl L-carnitine, L-carnitine which helps in the synthesis of acetylcholine. Acetylcholine is necessary for brain cell signaling, and all of a sudden, I wasn’t tolerant to Ritalin anymore. It started working again, and it was working fine. So every day I would take my Ritalin, and I would take L-Tyrosine and acetyl L-carnitine, and it kept on working.
Then about 6 years ago or so I got really, really, really sick. My wife took me to the ER. She thought I was having a heart attack, and it turns out my heart was fine, but I was for some reasons severely hypothyroid all of a sudden. And you’ve seen the symptoms of hypothyroidism. It’s 2 columns of symptoms on a page. I had about three-quarters of those symptoms, and one of them was severe brain fog and memory loss.
0:14:04.2 Ashley James: Oh my gosh.
0:14:05.6 David Tomen: Ashley, I mean complete memory loss. I lost my memory. It was so bad that I ended up seeing 2 different neurologists and they tested me for Alzheimer’s, and it turns out, it wasn’t Alzheimer’s, it wasn’t dementia. They couldn’t tell, they couldn’t figure out what was wrong. And it was because I was hypothyroid and my thyroid had stopped working and thyroid hormones which I understand now but at that time they couldn’t help, and I was desperate. I mean, my marriage was falling apart; we were broke because my business was failing. My life which was completely upside down. And I figured if I’m going to survive this, I got to figure something out. One thing I did remember was my experience with Nootropics and Ritalin and AD. So I just started experimenting with different things, and it took me about 2 and a half years to 3 years, and I finally got my brain working again and that it’s working better than it ever has in my adult life. I was desperate. I had to start experimenting with a bunch of different things until I finally found a protocol that worked for me that healed my brain and I got things running again the way they were supposed to be.
0:15:31.9 Ashley James: Did you heal your thyroid? What happened there?
0:15:35.4 David Tomen: Well, I healed my thyroid. You know what, the funny thing about the thyroid is that every endocrinologist look at TSH and started me on Synthroid which is synthetic T4 and it wasn’t working for me. So again, I started doing some research, and I discovered natural desiccated thyroid. My brother’s a doctor up north, and I had him send me some because I couldn’t find anybody around here to prescribe it for me and I started taking it and all of a sudden I started feeling better. And I finally found a naturopath here in North Miami Beach that would prescribe natural desiccated thyroid for me which is what I’ve been using since. And so, I got the thyroid hormones back to the levels within the range of where they’re supposed to be, and I took the right supplements to finally heal my brain. So it was working again.
After I started feeling better, I decided to shift my marketing focus so that I was just working on one thing, and I started copywriting, and I started writing for natural health companies. There was a guy in England, and he had a nootropic stack that he wanted me to write some advertorials for him. And when I was researching, I wrote 5 advertorials for him and his company which he thought he loved; he thought they were great. But what I discovered when I was researching for writing that sales copy was that the information for Nootropics was scattered all over the place. There was no one central place that I can go to for information; there were no books on it. The last book that was published on this subject was 1992, and so I thought, “Hah! The world needs an authority for Nootropics.” It needs one place for somebody that’s got any kind of a problem with their brain to be able to, and that was the birth of Nootropics Expert.
0:17:52.3 Ashley James: [Laughter] Awesome. Hearing your story, right when you first told me about being rushed to the hospital, I thought, oh no, all the herbs he was taking caused his hypothyroidism.
0:18:09.0 David Tomen: The only thing I was taking at that time was L-tyrosine and acetyl L-carnitine.
0:18:14.0 Ashley James: Right. I just pulled up my phone then the next thing I thought was, what about Ritalin? And it says that one of the side effects of long-term use of Ritalin can be hypothyroidism. Have you considered that maybe that’s what caused your hypothyroidism to become so severe?
0:18:32.7 David Tomen: No. I didn’t because I did an extensive amount of research on methylphenidate which is the chemical term for Ritalin and they’ve been using it since the 1950s, and I looked at tons of clinical studies, and of all the drugs used to treat ADD and ADHD, it’s the safest one out there. You know it’s neither here nor there. Even if it did cause hypothyroidism, that never occurred to me because it wasn’t significant enough to come up in my research.
0:19:10.8 Ashley James: Right.
0:19:11.2 David Tomen: But it doesn’t matter because I discovered that the only way that my brain can work is with some that kind of help.
0:19:18.9 Ashley James: Oh, absolutely. Right.
0:19:22.0 David Tomen: And it needs that kind of help. It’s my job to be able to support it so that it doesn’t get into any other kind of trouble.
0:19:30.3 Ashley James: Right. No, I’m not questioning your past decisions. My belief is if we can find something natural and that looks even better than drugs, then awesome. But if we come up against something, you know drugs are a tool in our tool belt.
0:19:46.5 David Tomen: Yeah.
0:19:47.8 Ashley James: But there are tools because they’re synthetic, there’s a tool that can have a set of side effects.
0:19:54.5 David Tomen: Absolutely.
0:19:55.0 Ashley James: And so we need to just be really responsible and do our research. Dr. Klinghardt who I interviewed, he’s been an MD for 40 years and really interesting guy. I interviewed him, and he became a surgeon and an MD, he received his training in a part of Germany where all doctors also become homeopaths and acupuncturists at the same time as becoming surgeons. So very different kind of training that we get here and his philosophy has been his whole career that he wants to find an herb or a supplement or some kind of a natural remedy that is even better than a drug and he looks to that but if he can’t then he goes to the drug.
So, I’m not questioning that you ever took Ritalin, it’s just more of the – I get curious, and when this body has a symptom, I want to know what happened? So that you can prevent it, right? It’s part of helping your body so I think it’s actually a little comforting to know that the Ritalin might have been the cause of your hypothyroid and that your body left to its own devices without the Ritalin wouldn’t have gone there or wouldn’t have created the hypothyroidism. So I mean just looking at that, but it’s wonderful that the Ritalin helped you find Nootropics so that you could support your brain. And what it actually really was missing along which was dopamine, right? We don’t have a Ritalin deficiency, but it was the gateway that allowed you to discover Nootropics.
0:21:35.4 David Tomen: That’s absolutely true.
0:21:36.5 Ashley James: So we can be grateful for them. But those who have taken ADD medication and have really enjoyed the benefits of it, cannot know that there is a natural way and it’s to help the body have enough dopamine and which is what you were saying. So you just dived into Nootropics, and you became the Nootropics expert. Now, tell me about this thing about drawing a clock. What’s up with that?
0:22:10.6 David Tomen: There’s a couple of different tests they use early on to evaluate to find out if you’ve got Alzheimers or dementia. And one of them is drawing a clock, and then I’m going to give you a time, and I want you to put the time on it, and somebody who has got Alzheimer’s or even early onset Alzheimers has got trouble drawing a clock. They can’t draw the clock properly and can’t put the time in the proper place, but I drew a perfect clock. And then there’s another test that they do; I forgot what the name of the test is called. I think it’s on the website. But they ask you a series of questions, and you have to be able to remember. They test your memory basically, and I came up with top scores on that too. So they knew that it wasn’t Alzheimer’s or dementia.
0:23:14.2 Ashley James: Got it.
0:23:16.7 David Tomen: But it was scary. [Laughter]
0:23:17.9 Ashley James: When you had those symptoms, that was what everyone thought it was going. But because it came so suddenly, dementia doesn’t hit so suddenly. Isn’t it more gradual?
0:23:29.6 David Tomen: Right.
0:23:29.8 Ashley James: Right.
0:23:31.7 David Tomen: I was desperate. I mean, what are you going to do? [Laughter] Your life is completely [inaudible 0:23:38.2] and you’re so, so sick that you can’t make any money to support your family. I mean, you’re desperate. You run to anybody you think of that can help you, and it turns out that nobody could help me. I had to help myself.
0:23:52.8 Ashley James: How did you discover that it was hypothyroidism? Like was it you or did they do tests?
0:23:58.3 David Tomen: In the hospital, they ran a full thyroid lab.
0:24:05.0 Ashley James: And did they go, “Oh, this is what’s causing your memory loss.” Right away or did they just say, “Oh and you have hypothyroidism” then you discovered that hypothyroidism was causing your memory loss?
0:24:19.6 David Tomen: I was the one to discover that.
0:24:22.7 Ashley James: This is what we have to advocate for ourselves, you know? We really need to. Amazing. So what happened then? So there you are, you’re doing copywriting for this man in the UK, and you are really excited about Nootropics, what happened then?
0:24:40.1 David Tomen: I just decided to put up a website and started writing about the stuff that I was learning so that everybody else can learn what I was learning along with me. And I started Nootropics Expert – I don’t know, it was about 3 years ago now. Maybe a little over 3 years ago, 2016 I think the dates on some of the stuff. I didn’t realize that it was that long when I looked and I just started writing and I kept on writing for these companies and doing sales copy for them. I kept on writing this, and one thing just led to another, and I’ve got a YouTube channel now with over 30,000 subscribers and a big email list. I’ve get tens and tens and tens of thousands of people all over the world coming to Nootropics Experts for help.
0:25:32.0 Ashley James: That’s very cool. What do you offer, like you sell them? How do you make money with Nootropics Expert?
0:25:42.8 David Tomen: Good question. I’m an affiliate for some companies. For the guy that I was originally working for, I’m an affiliate for 2 of his lines of supplements, and then I’m an affiliate for other companies for stuff that he doesn’t carry like CBD oil and a couple of other things. I can’t remember right off the top of my head. So I have links on the website, and I get a commission when people buy through the website. I do coaching now, people that can’t figure this stuff out on their own or people that can figure out on their own but they just want help tweaking whatever they’re doing. I offer personal consulting for half an hour or an hour via Skype or phone, depending on where they are in the world. And I have a book, “Head First” that’s been selling really well. I mentioned earlier that the last book on the subject was published in 1992, and it’s called “Smart Drugs II.” That was the last book that was published on Nootropics.
0:26:57.8 Ashley James: Wow.
0:26:58.1 David Tomen: Yeah. So I wrote a book, and it’s almost 600 pages, and I’ve got doctors and naturopaths and nurses and holistic practitioners and all kinds of people including just the [inaudible 0:27:16.8] on the street buying Head First and using it as a guide to help fix whatever their problem is.
0:27:25.4 Ashley James: Now, you had mentioned that your marriage was really upside down during that time when you had dementia and the thyroid.
0:27:32.1 David Tomen: Yeah.
0:27:34.0 Ashley James: Hos is it now? I’m left hanging. How are you guys now?
0:27:39.0 David Tomen: It’s better now. We’re more in love today than we were the day we got married.
0:27:45.8 Ashley James: Did you sneak some kind of Nootropics in her orange juice every morning? [Laughter]
0:27:50.3 David Tomen: No. She’s allergic to this stuff.
0:27:53.3 Ashley James: Oh, that’s funny.
0:27:54.9 David Tomen: I give her a choline supplement and she just goes crazy. So nope. [Laughter]
0:28:02.2 Ashley James: That’s interesting. I have actually had allergic reactions to some adaptogenic herbs. They make my heart race. We have to try it with caution. They can be absolutely amazing. They can be wonderful and life-changing, and we can sometimes have allergic reactions to them, so it’s good to test them a little bit at a time. Maybe you could walk us through some precautions and teach us some of the more common ones and how to take them and what to look for, the ones that people might be accidentally taking because they bought it from Whole Foods, that kind of thing.
0:28:42.6 David Tomen: I get this question often like, what do I do? How do I use Nootropics? And my first question is, what do you wanna fix? Like what’s your problem? Because you’ve got so many options available to you, but unless you can tell me exactly what you’re trying to fix, I can’t really help you. So for example, if you have got a problem with learning and memory, you want to take a look at like Aniracetam and Bacopa Monnieri and CDP choline and L-theanine and DHA. On the other hand if you have a problem with anxiety and depression, you can use some of those same things for anxiety and depression, but you also probably wanna look at things like lithium orotate and sibutramine and Rhodiola Rosea, or if you got a problem with energy and motivation, you wanna look at things like acetyl L-carnitine and alpha lipoic acid and CoQ10 and PQQ. So it depends on what you’re trying to fix. That’s the starting point.
Another thing that I find out from people is like if you’re dealing with depression, are you on medication? If you are on medication, what are you using, and is it working for you? And if the answer is I’m on SSRI, then we find out exactly what’s the mechanism of action of that SSRI, how exactly does it work in your brain and let’s find a natural substance that does exactly the same thing on your brain. So that people can start lessening their dependence on that prescription drug. The same thing with ADHD and ADD, you don’t have to use stimulants. A lot of people can get away with not using them. I came up with an ADHD protocol, and I actually tested it for a year on myself, not using Ritalin, just using the stack I put together, and it worked. Under normal circumstances, I could’ve just used the things that I’ve got 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 things in my stack. I used those for a year, and I was fine, but I found that my workload and at my age, I just found that I couldn’t handle my everyday workload without the help of the stimulants, so I started using Ritalin again, but I still use the stack. I know that there are tens of thousands of people managing their ADHD and ADD just with this protocol I put together.
0:31:36.9 Ashley James: Love it, very cool. I recently saw an article that said that if someone has been on an antidepressant, that their brain chemistry will never be the same again and that they’ll need to be on it for the rest of their life because it forever alters their brain chemistry. has that happened in your experience or if someone has been on an antidepressant in their past, is there a way through Nootropics to support the brain and having healthy levels of serotonin and dopamine and all those chemicals?
0:32:12.0 David Tomen: Well the thing about antidepressants is most of the time it’s difficult to stop them because these things, a lot of antidepressant drugs and anti-anxiety drugs are more addictive than heroin and cocaine and oxycodone. I mean they’re that addictive, and it’s extremely, extremely difficult to wean yourself off of them, and I’m not an expert on that. One person that is is Dr. Kelly Brogan who helps people wean off of antidepressants and anti-anxiety drugs and give them the natural route, but it is a rough, rough road. But there are certain Nootropics that you can use to support some antidepressants and anti-anxiety medications, and they help them work better, but they’re very few, and far between because of the time they will cause more problems than they will help.
If somebody has got depression for example and their doctor wants to put them on an antidepressant of some kind, but they’re reluctant to do that, and they come to me and say, “I’m dealing with depression, please help me.” We have to start digging in to what’s causing the depression in the first place because what the big pharmaceutical companies tell you is not a lack of serotonin in your brain, it could be a problem with dopamine, it could be a problem with neurogenesis, it could be a problem with stress, it could be a problem with inflammation. For example, the primary neurotransmitters play a role in depression, get this, acetylcholine, dopamine, glutamate, gabba, norepinephrine, and serotonin – where do you start?
0:34:18.4 Ashley James: Right.
0:34:19.3 David Tomen: Right? And so if a person hasn’t got a clue, if they’ve never used any prescription medication before, so they haven’t got anything to kind of like look at saying, “Yeah this kind of worked.” If they’re starting from scratch, I have them go through this list one at a time and try different nootropic supplements until they find something that works. And this can be a long process, but it’s worth it because you’ll finally get or leave. For example, acetylcholine, the precursors to acetylcholine are alpha GPC or CDP choline, so you can try something like CDP choline or acetylcholine for a little while and see if that helps. If that doesn’t help, then let’s move on dopamine. So you try something else – tyrosine, or N-acetyl L-tyrosine and try that for a few days and see if that helps. Well if that didn’t work, then let’s move onto gabba and let’s try supplementing with GABA for a few days and see if that helps.
Sooner or later you’re gonna get through this list. If nothing helps in supporting these neurotransmitters, then we know that it’s not a neurotransmitter problem. Then it could be an inflammation problem, so then we start looking at different things that take care of the inflammation. Things like turmeric or curcumin and there are a few other ones that help tame inflammation – pine bark extract or an antioxidant. So, these are the kinds of approaches that we take. It depends on our starting point and what our knowledge level is and what we know about our own body. And one of the reasons why I’ve consulting business too because you can get stressed out just trying to figure this thing out.
0:36:16.7 Ashley James: Yeah, right. What about this idea like a person has enough GABA but there’s something going on with their receptors. How do we resensitize the receptors to uptake the GABA or the serotonin or dopamine?
0:36:34.5 David Tomen: There are some Nootropics that help repair receptors and help in neurogenesis, aniracetam for example, which is one or the racetams that I use every day and it’s one of my favorites. It helps heal dopamine 2 and dopamine 3 receptors. Pine bark extract helps heal receptors, and it helps with neurogenesis, and it helps with cerebral blood flow. So those are just 2 examples. If somebody is looking for this kind of information, they just go to Nootropics Expert and type into the search bar “synapses” and see what turns up or “receptors” and see what turns up.
0:37:23.1 Ashley James: You mentioned blood flow, and that’s really interesting because they’re finding that dementia is basically caused by the vascular flow being cut off and they’re saying that there’s plaque, but a lot of doctors in the holistic space are saying that it’s basically dysregulated blood sugar over many years. Not enough to be diabetes, but you know the state of American diet is way high in sugar and when we can consume, let’s say we go and have ice cream with our family, we have way more blood sugar than our body knows what to do with and if someone regardless whether they’re diabetic or not diabetic, they have higher blood sugar that’s not healthy and this causes systemic inflammation to the whole circulatory system including the brain and we do that enough and the brain ends up being like Swiss cheese in these brain scans where they’re seeing areas of the brain that have such disruption from the vascular flow being harmed from our diet that eventually the brain becomes like Swiss cheese. And so they’re saying that dementia is like a form of diabetes. And you’re saying that you have Nootropics or these supplements that support the brain that increases vascular flow and the health of our vascular system, the circulatory system to the brain – not that we should take that and go eat ice cream, we have to make sure our diet is healthy for our brain as well.
But tell me a bit about these supplements that support the vasculature in the brain.
0:39:11.2 David Tomen: Ok. Let’s just talk about the aging brain in general, and we’ll touch on each of these. We’re talking about prolongs with free radicals in the oxidative stress, and you’re talking about synapses that you already mentioned, and then Alzheimer’s and dementia, and vascular dementia and cerebral circulation and neurotransmitter decline. I actually wrote a post on this that takes a deep dive into how each of these works in the aging brain. What I mean by the aging brain is anybody after 20 has got an aging brain because there are certain neurotransmitters that begin to decline after the age of 20. So everybody can use this help.
For example, free radicals in brain aging, free radicals are when your brain is firing, and it’s doing these tens of thousands of times. You got 10,000 oxidative interactions between DNA and free radicals in each one of your brain cells that occur every day and every minute of every day. But if you have an unhealthy diet particularly, these free radicals can get out of hand, and it causes oxidative stress, and your body tries to cope with it because it’s got a built-in anti-oxidant system. So you’ve got things like vitamin C and vitamin E and CoQ10 already naturally in your body, but it hasn’t got enough to be able to cope with the workload. So we can use things like alpha lipoic acid which is a naturally occurring fatty acid that is both fat and water soluble, and it has a unique ability to neutralize free radicals in all cellular environments, and it helps boost the synthesis of acetylcholine, and it increases glucose uptake in brain cells. It also helps regenerate other depleted antioxidants like vitamin C, E, and glutathione and it recycles CoQ10 that’s already in your body, and it gets rid of heavy metals. So you can start supplementing with alpha lipoic acid, CoQ10 is a natural antioxidant that’s synthesized in every single cell on your body and your brain, and it helps adenosine triphosphate which is the fuel that the mitochondria use in your brain cells. So we just supplement with extra CoQ10 to help support what’s already gone in our mitochondria.
Creatine. People in athletic circles use creatine to help them, but it’s an essential amino acid that’s synthesized in your liver that your body uses to recharge adenosine triphosphate to fuel mitochondria. So we can add creatine to our diet. Creatine that we’re not already getting from food that boosts cellular metabolism and helps protect neurons from damage caused by toxins. And I can go on about just free radicals.
And then we get into synapses like we talked about earlier. Ashwagandha is an old ayurvedic remedy that recent researches found regenerates axons and dendrites and it helps reconstruct synapses. Artichoke extract is a natural PDE4 inhibitor which supports the cAMP, which is a secondary messenger, and it stimulates the production of CREB. The CREB is cAMP’s response element-binding protein. It’s a protein needed for new neuron synthesis in synapse growth, and it increases long term potentiation which is needed for encoding long term memories.
Berberine is an amazing supplement. It enhances synaptic plasticity, it reduces the aggregation of amyloid B protein that leads to Alzheimer’s, and it helps reduce the protein Tau, which is associated with Alzheimer’s, and it works as in antioxidant. And I use it because my naturopath says I’m insulin resistant. It works as well as metformin, but it doesn’t have the side effects. So I use berberine. So that’s synapses.
For cerebral circulation, if you wanna get more blood flow moving in your brain. I find the 2 most effective supplements are one, pine bark extract – it’s used primarily on nootropic circles to increase cerebral blood flow, but we’ve also found that it’s a very, very potent antioxidant and anti-inflammatory. And the other one that I love is vinpocetine, which is a semi-synthetic derivative of the Lesser Periwinkle plant, and I use that every day.
0:45:00.1 Ashley James: Can you say it again?
0:45:04.3 David Tomen: Vinpocetine.
0:45:04.8 Ashely James: And it’s a semi-synthetic, can you explain what that means?
0:45:09.0 David Tomen: It’s derived from the Lesser Periwinkle plant in the lab. It’s an alkaloid that’s derived from the Lesser Periwinkle plant. It’s used as a prescription drug in a lot of countries, but here you can still get it as a supplement, and I use it just increase blood flow. It’s amazing.
0:45:34.0 Ashley James: In the countries that it is a drug, what is it prescribed for?
0:45:38.3 David Tomen: Blood flow. It’s prescribed for things like Alzheimer’s.
0:45:43.0 Ashley James: Interesting.
0:45:44.4 David Tomen: And stroke patients.
0:45:49.6 Ashley James: Really cool. So you must have a protocol for those who are recovering from stroke?
0:46:01.5 David Tomen: Kind of like what we just talked about because a stroke wreaks havoc on your brain and one of the problems with stroke is that your antioxidant system cannot keep up with the oxidative damage that’s been going on. So some of the stuff that we just talked about and a dozen other supplements that I’ve got in the same list. Somebody that’s dealing with stroke, I had encouraged them to put together at least half a dozen of these and start taking them right away.
I also have written about PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) and TBI (traumatic brain injury). Treating TBI is like treating stroke because TBI causes the same kind of problems in the brain, and you’re dealing with axon injury, and you’re dealing with problems of the cerebral circulation, glutamate overload, and you’re dealing with glucose and mitochondria getting out of whack and you’re dealing with an NMDA receptors that are not working properly. Then I’ve got a list of about 12 supplements for dealing with concussion or TBI. And I actually wrote this particular post after one of the hurricanes because a lot of people that survive a hurricane or any kind of a natural disaster like that are dealing with PTSD and they don’t even realize it or TBI when they get knocked in the head by something.
0:48:06.9 Ashley James: Absolutely and concussions are so common, and there’s no treatment for them. They just say stay awake and go home and rest. Rest but don’t fall asleep and that’s it.
0:48:18.1 David Tomen: That’s just not true. You can do real things to help your brain, but there are no prescription drugs that I know of that can help heal your brain, but you can use things like creatine and DHA which is an omega 3 and green tea and N-acetyl L-cysteine, or NAC, resveratrol, turmeric, the B vitamins. All of these things can help you recover from that kind of brain injury.
0:48:51.3 Ashley James: What about helping the body heal like a motor neuron lesion or a spinal cord injury? I have a friend in the hospital right now who had an operation from stenosis and now they’re paralyzed, and the doctor believes that they will regain. It will probably take 4 years, but they’ll regain the ability to walk again. How can we support the nervous system in healing from that kind of trauma?
0:49:20.3 David Tomen: Some of the things that I just talked about for concussion and TBI, but I would also use lion’s mane mushroom. Lion’s mane mushroom is an amazing supplement if you’ve ever seen a picture of it, it looks like a lion’s mane. It’s the strangest looking mushroom. But the lion’s mane helps better than anything in neurogenesis, and there was one study done, and I think this study was done in Malaysia where they used lab rats, and they were mean to these rats. They crushed their gluteal nerves so they couldn’t walk which kind of breaks my heart but then the next thing that happened was they gave them lion’s mane laced water to drink. Within 2 weeks, their gluteal nerves have healed, and the rats were walking again.
0:50:19.5 Ashley James: Did they have a group of rats they did not give the lion’s mane too?
0:50:25.5 David Tomen: Yup.
0:50:26.4 Ashley James: Were they able to walk again?
0:50:28.7 David Tomen: No, they weren’t. They are permanently crippled.
0:50:31.9 Ashley James: Amazing. I mean sad for the rats, I don’t like hearing that kind of experiment to any animal but also very amazing that lion’s manes can help people that well.
0:50:44.9 David Tomen: It’s incredible.
0:50:47.3 Ashley James: How much would one need to take? What are the doses of these kinds of things?
0:50:51.1 David Tomen: A lion’s mane is anywhere from 400mg to up to some people take 1200mg a day. Something like that is perfectly safe to take in really, really big doses. You don’t have to worry about overdosing on it. Some of these things, they won’t hurt you other than give you like an upset stomach, if you take too much of it or take too much of it at once. Oftentimes when you’re taking bigger doses of some of these things, it’s better to split your dose into 2 or 3 doses per day. So you take 1 in the morning, 1 at noon, 1 in the afternoon. But yeah lion’s mane, absolutely.
0:51:34.1 Ashley James: Very interesting. I have a friend who was on the street at some point and was addicted to meth, and she has since recovered, but she says that it’s as if there’s no happiness in her life. That’s just in her brain, right? And the only way to get back to normal, or to get back to just like how you and I would feel on an average day – that level of happiness would take meth. Not even to get her to feel high or overly happy, but just to feel normal.
0:52:17.5 David Tomen: I understand. You’re dealing with a TBI, you really are. Now I am no doctor, I don’t even play one on TV, but it’s common sense to me that the same things that work for somebody with a concussion or TBI, somebody in that kind of a situation, I would encourage them to use the same types of supplements, but the thing is there’s no one pill solution. There just isn’t. We’ve been conditioned to think that there’s a one pill solution, but there’s not. It’s gonna take at least a half a dozen supplements and taking it for a long time until you start feeling some relief. Because the brain, how long it’d take to damage the brain – you know it took you years. So, fortunately, it doesn’t take years to help the brain recover. You can do it in a few months, but you’ve got to be diligent and stick to it and religiously take this stuff every single day until you start feeling some relief.
0:53:26.5 Ashley James: What about addiction? What about like someone who is addicted – alcohol, or maybe even food addiction, or porn addiction. Is there a protocol that helps people to balance their brains, so they don’t have the compulsion or that addiction?
0:53:42.8 David Tomen: You know there’s not really a protocol, and I haven’t looked into in that deeply but there are a couple of supplements that I had reviewed that I remember seeing either anecdotal evidence or clinical studies showing that people were not as prone to addiction when they were using it, and I cannot remember off the top of my head what they were. You know what Ashley, I just don’t remember what they are but I know that they exist. It’s not a miracle cure by any stretch, and it’s not gonna make you stop drinking by taking it, but it reduces the tendency to want to do that. I think that possibly Mucuna Pruriens L-dopa may be one of them.
0:54:49.0 Ashley James: And someone could book a consultation with you, and you can go dive into the research?
0:54:55.1 David Tomen: That’s exactly what I do.
0:54:57.9 Ashley James: Right. What about 5 HTP, is that a nootropic?
0:55:04.2 David Tomen: I can say that it’s a nootropic, but you got to be super careful with it.
0:55:07.8 Ashley James: Why is that?
0:55:08.7 David Tomen: Because people take too high overdosing themselves from their trouble. You got to understand the serotonin pathway. It goes L-tryptophan to 5 HTP to serotonin to melatonin. So somebody is depressed, and they feel like they need to boost serotonin, the first thing they do is they grab 5 HTP and 500mg of HTP, and they overdose which is an overdose, and they feel like crap the next day, and they don’t know what went wrong. It’s a lot safer to do something like L-tryptophan and take 500mg or 750mg before you go to sleep and you’ll feel better the next day. 5 HTP you dose like 25mg at a time, but you can’t find a 25mg of 5 HTP supplement. The lowest dose I’ve been able to find is 100mg.
0:56:14.4 Ashley James: Right. Yeah.
0:56:16.4 David Tomen: So what I do is because I use so much to boost dopamine, I have to keep serotonin in balance. I use L-tryptophan before I go to sleep, but during the day I also use 5 HTP, but I get a 100mg lozenge, and I use a pill splitter, and I cut it in quarters. And when I feel like my serotonin is a little bit out of whack compared to dopamine, I just put 25mg under my tongue
0:56:50.0 Ashley James: How does one know?
0:56:52.2 David Tomen: You just feel it
0:56:53.5 Ashley James: How do you feel? Like for someone who has never distinguished what serotonin versus dopamine feels, what are the symptoms of too much serotonin versus too little?
0:57:06.5 David Tomen: I can tell you more with too much dopamine than serotonin. Too much dopamine – because dopamine turns into norepinephrine and turns to epinephrine which is you fight or flight hormone, you get really irritable and sharp with people and antsy, your dopamine system is out of whack. Too much serotonin is you just feel like you’re sick. But it’s unlike sick that I can describe because it’s unlike anything else I’ve ever felt, it just feels really weird. I can’t even describe the feeling, Ashley. I just know that feeling. [Laughter]
0:57:57.2 Ashley James: So how do you bring dopamine down then, if you have too much of it?
0:58:03.9 David Tomen: Boost serotonin. Dopamine and serotonin play off of each other.
0:58:09.9 Ashley James: Got it.
0:58:10.6 David Tomen: They have to be in balance. If dopamine is too high, you suppress serotonin or serotonin is too high. You depress dopamine.
0:58:18.0 Ashley James: So if you’re antsy, irritable, and kind of short-tempered with people then take some l-tryptophan at night and see if that does the job. Taking at night, that does that then help boost serotonin all day long the next day?
0:58:33.5 David Tomen: It does, and it helps you sleep because it eventually turns into melatonin.
0:58:38.4 Ashley James: And is that a supplement that someone can take over the counter?
0:58:41.8 David Tomen: Yes.
0:58:43.2 Ashley James: It’s still available?
0:58:45.5 David Tomen: The L-tryptophan is readily available.
0:58:48.1 Ashley James: Okay, great. I don’t know. I heard something about it being taken off the counter.
0:58:54.1 David Tomen: I heard that too, and I have no idea where people got that information from.
0:59:00.1 Ashley James: But it’s a naturally occurring amino acid in Turkey.
0:59:03.8 David Tomen: Yeah. I know, I looked into this one time when somebody else mentioned that. There was a problem with one particular manufacturer of L-tryptophan.
0:59:15.0 Ashley James: Oh, right.
0:59:17.5 David: They were putting out an adulterated supplement or something. I don’t remember exactly what the story was, but it was a bad batch, and it made headlines, and it was taken off the market, and everybody said L-tryptophan has been taken off the market. That’s not true. It was taken off the market from this one particular manufacturer because they had a bad batch that went out.
0:59:42.0 Ashley James: Ok.
0:59:43.1 David Tomen: And that happened years ago.
0:59:44.6 Ashley James: Yeah a long time ago.
0:59:46.1 David Tomen: And people are still talking about it. It’s amazing.
0:59:48.4 Ashley James: Right. Let’s bust that myth. It’s available. We can get it. You don’t need to get to Turkey to get your L-tryptophan. [Laughter]
0:59:55.6 David Tomen: The last one I got was from Amazon.
0:59:59.3 Ashley James: Interesting. I mean really buy or beware in the supplement space. I know that you are an affiliate of some brands that you like. Do you have any advice for watching out, like what kind of companies shouldn’t one buy from?
1:00:19.0 David Tomen: That’s a really good question. I wrote a post called “7 Tips for Choosing the Highest Quality of Nootropics Supplements,” and I went through how I think about this. The first thing to look for is brand names. And by brand names I don’t mean like Walgreens or CVS or GNC or Target, that’s not what I mean by brand names. By brand names, I mean like Gaia Herbs, Doctor’s Best, Nature’s Way, Irwin Naturals – those kinds of brand names. That’s the first thing that I look at. The next thing I look at is if they’ve got any kind of quality assurance, and the way to find out about this is to go to their website. The first thing you can find out is if it makes sense. If it’s natural, is it USDA organic, right? Has it got the seal on it? The other thing to look for is the certificate of analysis, and some of these manufacturers will actually put a certificate of analysis for each batch that they put on their website.
1:01:44.7 Ashley James: Nice.
1:01:46.4 David Tomen: So you can use the batch code on the supplement and go to their website and download the certificate of analysis. The certificate of analysis tells you exactly what a third party testing lab found in that capsule or tablet, including how much of the supplement that the manufacturer claimed was there. Is it really in there and is there anything else in there? Are there heavy metals in there? Is there something that’s should not be in there completely?
A couple of years ago the New York Attorney General sent letters to places like Target and Walgreens and GNC and some other big retailers that had private label supplements on the shelf that they had tested the supplements for things like ginkgo biloba and Rhodiola and found there was nothing in the capsule but wheatgrass. Right? So that’s why I say, do not buy a private label from any of these retailers, unless they can prove what’s in their capsule or tablet.
1:03:01.3 Ashley James: Right.
1:03:01.7 David Tomen: The other thing to look for is the US Pharmacopeia. If it’s USP verified, that can be good and bad. That can be good because somebody went into that facility and tested their products and verified that what’s in the capsule or tablet is really in there and they have the USP stamp of approval on it. Where this does not help is when it comes to things like vitamins and minerals because you don’t really want a USP Pharmacopoeia stamp of approval on vitamins and minerals because the minerals are ground up rock and something that your body can’t use.
NSF International is an independent non-profit organization that provides certification for dietary supplements. You can look for their seal. Lab Door is an international and independent company who buys products off of retail shelves and online, and then they test them for active ingredients and potential contaminants and publish it on their website.
Consumer Lab has got a similar kind of deal. It’s an independent subscription-based service that tests dietary supplements to see what’s in the capsule or tablet. But a word of caution about Consumer Lab, because the company doesn’t disclose the brand names of supplements that fail their testing.
1:04:45.7 Ashley James: Ew.
1:04:46.7 David Tomen: If the manufacturer has paid them their $4,000 yearly fee.
1:04:52.6 Ashley James: Ew. So basically what they publish is safe, but they don’t publish anything that it might not be safe?
1:05:03.8 David Tomen: Right, yeah. I don’t completely trust Consumer Lab.
1:05:11.0 Ashley James: Well, if you can pay them off to have them not be a whistleblower then, yeah.
1:05:17.9 David Tomen: The other thing to look for is therapeutic dosages. The thing is that there is no therapeutic dosage. So if somebody says in their advertising or on the label that this has got a therapeutic dosage in it, for individual dietary supplements, there is no established therapeutic dosage. There is the dosage that we found through clinical studies and actual user experience to find out what works.
1:05:47.2 Ashley James: Right.
1:05:49.4 David Tomen: So it’s [inaudible 1:05:49.2] It is not true.
The other thing to look for and this is extremely important, are the other ingredients. If you take a look at the back of a supplement bottle on the bottom of the list of ingredients, there is a thing called “other ingredients.” And under other ingredients are things to help increase shelf life, to bind tablets together, to improve consistency, to improve moisture resistance, to help stabilize ingredients, to add bulk like to fill a capsule, and to add color and flavor – all the stuff that you don’t really need. Right?
Some of this stuff could be really bad for you.
Cellulose is a binding or a thickening agent that you’ll see on a lot of supplements. It’s cellulose. It doesn’t do anything. It’s not good for you. It’s not bad for you. It just shouldn’t be in there.
Magnesium stearate or vegetable stearate or stearic acid is a flow agent or a lubricant that speeds up their manufacturing process. So it stops the ingredients from sticking to the mechanical equipment, and it’s also added to tablets to make it easier to swallow. The problem with magnesium stearate is it suppresses your natural killer T-cells.
1:07:20.7 Ashley James: Oh no.
1:07:24.3 David Tomen: And you can see magnesium stearate in a lot of supplements, even big brand names that you would otherwise trust.
Titanium dioxide is a pigment used to provide color. The problem with titanium dioxide is that it leads to mitochondrial dysfunction. It damages astrocyte cells, which leaves them unable to absorb glutamate and it induces potent oxidative stress and mitochondrial damage in luteal cells.
Silica is an anti-clumping agent that stops ingredients to mechanical equipment that you see in a lot of supplements.
Probably the safest one that you’ll see there is rice flour. It’s used as a filler.
I look for supplements that have as few as or no extra ingredients. The companies that I mentioned that I’m an affiliate for on Nootropics Expert – Performance Lab and Mind Lab Pro, there is zero other ingredients in their products.
1:08:31.8 Ashley James: Very cool.
1:08:33.3 David Tomen: Zero. Nothing. Zip.
The other thing that you want to look for is bio availability, which is really important when it comes to things like turmeric because turmeric is really poorly absorbed. So you want to find a turmeric supplement that the manufacturer has – you’ll see patented turmeric or curcumin ingredients that manufacturers have found some way to make them more bioavailable. One way to make turmeric more bioavailable is to take with Bioperine or piperine. Clinical studies show that it increases absorption by 2,000%.
1:09:17.1 Ashley James: Wow.
1:09:18.8 David Tomen: Another example is L-tyrosine, which is the amino acid that is directly involved in the synthesis of dopamine, norepinephrine, and epinephrine. The problem is that it’s not very bioavailable and it’s not officially absorbed when it’s taken as a nootropic supplement for some people. So to boost the bioavailability of L-tyrosine, they add an acetyl group to it, so it’s called N-acetyl L-tyrosine or NALT. And that seems to boost availability. I find that my body can use either one or the other, but some people can only use L-tyrosine. Some people can only use NALT.
You want to make sure they’re in the right form and that when they’re stacked with other ingredients that they’re working synergistically together and not working against each other. And that is a completely other subject, that’s for a whole other podcast because there’s too much to talk about there. But you’ve got have the right ingredients put together and the right dosages for the thing to work.
And the last thing is extracts versus the whole herb. Sometimes an extract will work better than a whole herb. Lion’s mane mushroom, for example, some people will argue that the whole fruit works better than an extract, but there are other products were the extract, like an extract of turmeric or curcumin for example that works better for some things. So, just be aware of that. One particular supplement could be more effective if it’s in an extract and another supplement could be more effective if you’re using the whole herb.
So, that’s it. I got a little checklist and I kind of like do this automatically while I’m looking. Brand name; quality which includes country of origin and certificate of analysis or certified organic; certification which includes certificate of analysis, bioavailability, other ingredients, and extracts. I go through that in my head before I choose something.
1:11:58.0 Ashley James: Very good. I like that it was thorough. I really like that.
1:12:05.4 David Tomen: Because there’s so much garbage out there.
1:12:07.9 Ashley James: Oh yeah, totally. I had a guy on the show all about mushrooms, and he has been in the mushroom industry for over 30 years. He was a farmer of mushrooms and then got into medicinal mushrooms, and now he has a company that grows them organically in China, and he talked about how most mushrooms, and he talked about the difference between myceliated mushroom and the actual whole mushroom. Micilianated means that the farmer here, let’s say in the U.S., you get this lion’s mane supplement and you’re all excited because it says, “grown organically in the U.S.” And you think, “Excellent, what’s grown in the U.S. must be better than what’s grown in China.” And you take it, and nothing happens because it’s myceliated which means that took a bunch of rice and then they put lion’s mane to grow in it as like a mushroom and the lion’s mane made little sort of mushroom roots, the mycelia. And then they took the entire batch including all mostly rice and grounded up and popped it into a capsule, and then they say, “You know there’s some rice in there for whatever filler.” I don’t even know if they have to declare that the rice is there because it’s part of the farming practice, but that it’s 90% rice and only 10% lion’s mane and you take 2 a day thinking you’re getting 2 full capsules of lion’s mane when you’re not. And he has little experiment; he said go get some iodine which you can get at a drugstore and take it 2 capsules of your mushroom supplement and dump it into a little glass of water and mix it up and then put a few drops of iodine. If it turns black, then it is myceliated. It’s 90% rice or some kind of cornstarch or something – you know if it’s not rice, then it’s corn. But they grow it in basically a grain, and so your mushroom supplement is not pure if the water turns black because iodine reacts to the starch.
1:14:20.9 David Tomen: What color does it turn up, if it’s real mushroom?
1:14:25.4 Ashley James: I think it doesn’t react. It’s just iodine color.
1:14:32.6 David Tomen: What a great idea.
1:14:33.6 Ashley James: Because iodine turns black when exposed to starch. I mean you could take cornstarch and put iodine in it, it’s gonna turn into a really dark color. It’s gonna change color.
1:14:42.5 David Tomen: They used to call it black porridge in Russia. The iodine in potato starch, anyway that’s a whole other story. There’s a supplement company that I just started working with that came over from Kazakhstan that based all of their research off of this guy in Russia who ended up in the goo log and saved the entire goo log from dying of dysentery with black porridge, and it was iodine and potato starch.
1:15:14.2 Ashley James: Very interesting. Yeah, it turned black exactly. So that what happens. You can use iodine to basically test the purity of your mushroom supplement. But just to complement your elaborate checklist of what to go through when looking for quality, it’s not necessarily where a supplement is created. I guess I just had a bit of ignorance around that. I thought if it’s from the U.S. or if it’s from Canada, then it must be the best or much better than if it’s from Asia – it’s just not true. That yes, Asia can have contaminated water, contaminated air just like we can, but that this one man that I had on the show, he said that his mushroom farms are in this part of China that’s on the mountains where the cleaner air and the mountain water and he has all of his stuff tested in China, and then he comes back and has it tested again for heavy metals and all that kind of stuff.
We want to go through your checklist to make sure that the lab tests are available or the company is willing to share it and that it’s off that batch, not just from any batch and that they’re comfortable with things being certified organic and having third-party lab tests to prove that they’re safe. And so, we just want to be diligent when going through these supplements.
I really like your tip on taking 750mg of L-tryptophan at night. if someone feels that their serotonin might be low, my naturopath put me on serotonin because I eat a really clean diet and I was noticing that – and what I mean by really clean is no processed sugar, no junk food, plant-based, and I was having these cravings at night and I was feeling sort of a little bit down. I would not say depressed by any means, but just a little bit low, and she thought this might be serotonin. I also told her that I take melatonin at night to fall asleep. So she gave me 100mg of 5 HTP to take in the morning, and I started digging into all the studies and I saw that there were studies were they did 500mg in short term, 2 and 4 week increments and the people that they did it are people who were obese and had cravings and that those people after taking 500mg a day of 5 HTP would naturally just didn’t want to consume as much carbohydrates and so they lost weight.
1:18:17.9 David Tomen: Interesting.
1:18:18.8 Ashley James: Yeah. I thought that was interesting. So I decided to do a plain experiment on myself, and I doubled the those that my naturopath gave me. I did 100 in the morning and 100 at night, and I promptly began to feel horrible and had to run to the bathroom. It actually gave 3 days of diarrhea, that’s the only change I did. And so, of course, I love experimenting on myself. So I did this experiment a few times just to prove that yes, increasing it was not great, but I also noticed that I felt kind of airy like in a really happy way. I mean I don’t drink, but it was almost like my brain just felt a little fuzzy, but in a spacey – I just want to space out and watch cartoons kind of way. So it was definitely doing something, altering my chemistry but in going too far in one direction, I’d say.
Actually what’s really interesting I think is that for the first few days of taking 5 HTP, I noticed a huge increase in cravings and I thought, what is going on? [Laughter]
I since stopped taking it, but I did take it for a few months, and I feel as though my body then just adapted to it, and I started to feel normal again. And now that I’m off it, I don’t really feel any different. I do have a listener who told me that she found herself one morning inconsolably crying in her kitchen, I think she said. And she couldn’t figure out why she was so depressed until she realized she had ran out of 5 HTP 3 or 4 days prior. So she got back on it and promptly began to feel like her wonderful self again. And so she says anytime she runs out of it she just feels horrible, and when she gets on it, she feels amazing.
So for some people, these Nootropics are quite life changing.
1:20:20.5 David Tomen: For a lot of people they’re really life-changing, but every single body is unique and different. And how you react is oftentimes completely different to how I’m gonna react to something.
1:20:37.0 Ashley James: Right.
1:20:38.6 David Tomen: You mentioned too about food and your diet. One of the things that I did when I got really sick about 6 years ago, hypothyroid and stuff, I really cleaned up my diet. But one of the things that I discovered since is that you can clean up your diet so that you’ve got the cleanest diet on earth and you’re eating the best food that man produces on earth, and you’re still lacking in certain vitamins and minerals. You just are, because our food supply cannot provide the nutrients that our body and brain needs to function properly anymore.
1:21:19.9 Ashley James: Yeah, it’s amazing.
1:21:23.6 David Tomen: There was a randomized placebo-controlled trial at North 1:21:28.0?? University with 215 health men aged 30 to 55. These guys were given a multivitamin or a placebo for 33 days. These guys were tested at the beginning of the study and then again at the end of the study for mood, stress, memory, and general health. After 33 days of using a daily multivitamin, the researchers reported a significant improvement in general mental health, reduced stress, increased vigor, and overall improvement in mood. And the men who used multivitamins during the trial also showed improved memory and reduced mental fatigue. The placebo group experienced no significant changes.
1:22:11.7 Ashley James: Amazing.
1:22:13.2 David Tomen: Now, why is this? It’s a problem with our food supply. A lot of the reasons why we’re sick with one thing or another is because we’re not getting the nutrients that we need. There was a study in 2004 on fruits and vegetables, and they found that everything from protein, iron, vitamin C significantly declined since 1950 and they looked at the data for 13 nutrients across 43 vegetable crops. And research of fruits and vegetables show that minerals, vitamins, and protein content has dropped significantly over the last 15 to 70 years. But the problem is not just big agra, right? And problem with the depleting soil, there’s also a problem with our air.
There’s a guy named Irakli Loladze who’s a mathematician by training, and he studied nutrient and vitamin levels in plants for 15 years. And Loladze found that the earth’s atmosphere had 200 parts per million of carbon dioxide before the industrial revolution and last year they’re playing across over 400 parts per million for carbon dioxide. Now, that might seem like a good thing because plants thrive on carbon dioxide. Higher carbon dioxide levels aid in photosynthesis which means that increased plant growth and more food, but the problem is that this increase in rapid growth also leads to plants that are creating more carbohydrates like glucose instead of other nutrients that our bodies and brains need like protein, iron, and zinc.
1:23:58.6 Ashley James: Oh my gosh.
1:24:01.5 David Tomen: Yeah, it’s just the air. And so everybody that I talked to, I say, “Are you using a multivitamin?” Because you have to, it is the simplest, simplest thing that you can do for your health. But the problem also is choosing the wrong multivitamin, because you can go to the drugstore or into your supermarket and you can see Centrum and One a Day, and you look at the label, and you have no idea what you’re looking at. What you’re looking at is you’re looking at vitamin B1 that exist in food in the form of thiamine pyrophosphate, the vitamin B1 in that Centrum multivitamin is thiamine mononitrate which is a coal tar derivative.
1:24:55.9 Ashley James: A coal tar derivative.
1:24:59.5 David Tomen: Yeah.
1:25:00.2 Ashley James: You’ve got to be kidding me.
1:25:01.6 David Tomen: No. you can go through the whole list of vitamins, and then you go through the list of minerals. And the minerals are basically and literally ground up rock.
1:25:14.7 Ashley James: Well iron, is it like iron oxide or something which is basically rust?
1:25:19.4 David Tomen: No.
1:25:21.0 Ashley James: It’s not bioavailable.
1:25:23.1 David Tomen: Iron is very bioavailable if it comes from a plant.
1:25:26.6 Ashley James: Right.
1:25:28.9 David Tomen: So what you want to do is you want to find a whole food or a raw food multivitamin that has been grown from something like yeast. They grow it from other things like brewer’s yeast that has the same cofactors. It’s exactly the same thing that you get from food. But you gotta be careful because when you’re looking at these labels, if it says, “No USP nutrients” or “100% food” or “No synthetic nutrients,” you know that it’s artificial.
1:26:07.1 Ashley James: Why?
1:26:11.2 David Tomen: 100% food-based vitamins are grown in yeast culture. So you’ll something that has 16 natural capsules, and it says, “Yeast free” that’s a big dangerous signal right there. Because if it says yeast free on the label, you know that it’s synthetic. A really good multivitamin, if you open it up and it smells like yeast – like what you find in the kitchen, it’s good.
So Performance Lab, the company that I am an affiliate for came up with a multivitamin that’s got just nutrients, just the vitamins and minerals and nothing else. There’s no other added ingredients or anything, and everything is grown from yeast, and it’s the first time that I’ve actually taken a multivitamin that I actually felt the difference.
1:27:06.6 Ashley James: Very cool.
1:27:09.6 David Tomen: I felt better using this thing. I wrote an article about this, and I’ve got pictures of the labels in this post, about what you typically find on these multivitamins and it’s just scary. It’s scary, and when you see headlines like “Experts say that taking multivitamins a waste of time because all you’re doing is you’re peeing the stuff out.” Well yeah, it’s true you’re peeing it out because it’s inorganic and your body isn’t using it.
1:27:53.3 Ashley James: But also in order for you to even to get to your kidneys, you absorbed it and went into your bloodstream and bathe every cell in your body.
1:28:04.7 David Tomen: Yeah. You did some kind of damage. [Laughter]
1:28:08.9 Ashley James: So are you saying that niacin or the B vitamins that are grown in yeast don’t change the color or urine at all?
1:28:20.1 David Tomen: Yeah, they will.
1:28:21.4 Ashley James: They do change the color of urine?
1:28:24.8 David Tomen: Sure, they can.
1:28:25.6 Ashley James: Right. But when someone starts peeing more fluorescent yellow and then someone says, “Well, you’re just peeing out your vitamins.” So let’s assume that what they took was a healthy multivitamin that was plant-derived, their body absorbed it into their bloodstream and bathe every cell in their body, their cells were able to utilize it and because they’re water soluble the kidneys immediately start to remove any excess but at least it got to every cell in the body and usually what happens between 2 and 4 weeks of taking a really good quality of multivitamin that the color of their urine will go back to normal, also presuming that they’re drinking enough water. The body then becomes better at utilizing all the nutrients that it’s being given. You brought up Centrum. People don’t even absorb it. There’s a man I met who owns a company in Florida, a porta potty business and there’s a catch that catches things and then when they go to clean them, it catches like it’s associated through a stone in there. The catch would catch these hard objects, so when they’re cleaning them, they can tell you which Centrum the person took because it still says Centrum Silver on it after it’s been sitting in a porta potty.
1:30:01.7 David Tomen: That’s amazing.
1:30:04.1 Ashley James: And gone through someone’s digestive tract. We don’t even digest or absorb these over the counter.
1:30:12.4 David Tomen: And people don’t know.
1:30:13.4 Ashley James: Right.
1:30:15.3 David Tomen: They don’t know that when they take a multivitamin, it should make them feel better. [Laughter] It really should. They should actually feel the difference.
1:30:25.3 Ashley James: Right. Yeah.
1:30:27.1 David Tomen: I do, and I eat well too.
1:30:31.6 Ashley James: Right. And I wanted to ask you what your thoughts were on a healthy diet for the brain. Are there foods that are known to support brain health? Or just a general diet overall, what foods are best for brain health?
1:30:46.9 David Tomen: The nutrients that you get from fruits and vegetables and healthy fats. Healthy fats are really important because you gotta think that your brain is 60% fat, right? Most of that fat in your brain is DHA. So eating good grass-fed meats, for example, or wild seafood like wild salmon – is the best brain health and for overall health, but you still need a multivitamin on top of that.
1:31:32.6 Ashley James: You know I was really sick about 8 years ago. I had type 2 diabetes, chronic fatigue, and chronic infections. I was told I’d never have kids since I was 19 seeing an endocrinologist. They told me I’d never have kids and I had polycystic ovarian syndrome and infertility. My husband turned on some random podcast interview. This was 9 years ago with a naturopath who was talking about just like what you’re talking about how as a society we are completely deficient, especially in 60 minerals. But we’re completely deficient because we can. no longer get all the nutrients, all the 16 vitamins, the 12 amino acids, the 2 fatty acids, the 60 minerals – we can’t them in the quantities we need anymore for multiple reasons like you’ve mentioned – the higher levels of carbon dioxide. If that’s higher, then the plant is just gonna grab it more which is we want plants to do that to filter the air, but it’s gonna end up creating more sugar, more carbohydrates, and less of everything else in each plant. So even if we’re just eating a vegan diet, we’re still not getting what we got 100 years ago. But the farming practices in the last 150 years, the farmers have not re-mineralized their soil, they only put an NPK back in, and if you go to an organic farm, they put compost in, but we’re not re-mineralizing soil. And so if spinach isn’t grown in iron-rich soil, it’s not going to be a good source of spinach. I love it when people say, “I eat 3 Brazil nuts a day for my selenium.” And my question to them is how do you know they were grown in selenium-rich soil because plants do not make minerals. And so this naturopath was going on about this, and by the end of the interview I called him up because I was so intrigued. My husband actually urged me, too; please call this guy. We were suffering. We got to do something about this. I switched my diet around; within days, I started to feel better. I could not believe. Actually, within 24 hours, my constant hunger went away because I had these horrible blood sugar swings. Within 5 days, my energy came back, it’s like I got my brain back, and within 3 months, I was no longer diabetic. My chronic adrenal fatigue subsided. it took us just a few years, but we conceived naturally without doing anything else other than cleaning our diet and taking supplements.
1:34:25.6 David Tomen: Isn’t it amazing?
1:34:26.1 Ashley James: Yeah and we have a healthy, wonderful 4-year-old boy and none of these would have been possible had it not been for hearing a naturopath. See, the things you’re saying today which is we need these nutrients. Now, maybe someone’s motivation is they want Nootropics because they need to be sharper at work or they’re sick of being tired and unmotivated or depressed or whatever’s going on or they want to prevent dementia because it’s in their family history.
So these are all great motivations to explore Nootropics and what I’m hearing you say is that you can’t just take a Nootropic and go to McDonalds and not take a multivitamin. We need to do everything. We need to have a healthy lifestyle. And in the Nootropics with our healthy lifestyle is going to support us overall.
1:35:22.9 David Tomen: Another example is L-tyrosine will not turn into dopamine without the B vitamins. It just won’t.
1:35:38.2 Ashley James: Right. So it’s cofactors. The body needs everything so we gotta do it. You mentioned some foods that are really good. What foods are really bad for brain health?
1:35:50.7 David Tomen: Processed food because the junk in processed food and the way it’s processed just causes so much inflammation that things are breaking down in your brain and in your body.
1:36:02.9 Ashley James: Right. There’s one naturopath that says that oil in a bottle, any kind of oil – cooking oil, don’t do it. It damages the circulatory system. He says don’t eat nitrates or nitrites which are in a lot of deli meats. Now you can get at Applegate organic, no nitrates or nitrites.
This naturopath was a pathologist before he became a naturopath, so he had an intimate understanding of how this stuff works. Nitrates and nitrites will cross the blood-brain barrier and damage it and get clogged there, and they also will clog the kidneys and further exacerbate kidney damage. He takes people who are on dialysis and gets them off of these processed food and off of deli meats and of course get some multivitamin and minerals, but their kidney function improved greatly and even to the point of getting off of dialysis, but that they can seriously damage their kidneys by eating bacon for example, or deli meats with nitrates and nitrites. I thought that was fascinating.
Then he also talked about foods that are burnt and fried cause [inaudible 1:37:23.0] which again cause oxidative damage to the circulation, the circulatory system of the brain. So inflammation in the brain like you talked about. Yeah, pretty much if we avoid processed foods or avoiding all the foods that he warns people against. If we lived a lifestyle to make our brain healthy, then everything else seems to fall in place, doesn’t it?
1:37:53.6 David Tomen: That’s the reason why I called my book “Head First,” because if you take care of your head first, then other things seem to fall into place.
1:38:03.6 Ashley James: I love it. Do you have any stories of success after publish your book and people reading it and applying everything you teach to their life, do you have any stories success or memorable that you’d like to share?
1:38:18.1 David Tomen: Nothing that I really can share because if somebody can take a look at the comments section on Nootropics Expert and look at the testimonials, and if somebody published their name, then I generally don’t talk about stuff like that because you’re talking about stuff that I treat as confidential. I know that sounds like I’m skirting around it, but that’s just kind of like the way I look at this. This is other people’s business if they want to tell their story. They do tell their stories in the comments section because I see over and over again, “Thank you, David, so much for providing this information. You changed my life.” But there’s nothing that I would want to broadcast in a podcast necessarily.
1:39:14.3 Ashley James: Ok. Awesome. This has been really informative, and I definitely want to have you on the show to dive deeper because there’s so much more that we can explore.
1:39:30.1 David Tomen: We can dive into depression, anxiety, ADHD, anti-aging, TBI, PTSD.
1:39:44.0 Ashley James: I’ll leave it up to the listeners. So after I post this episode, I’ll ask our Facebook group. Those who are listening can go to www.learntruehalth.com/Group or search Learn True Health on Facebook and join the group and comment. I’ll make a post that’s an announcement and comment on it what you would like David to elaborate on or explore, what additional questions you have for him and we’ll make sure we cover those in our next interview with him.
Well, thank you so much, David for coming on the show.
Is there anything left unsaid? Is there anything that you’d like to say to wrap up today’s interview
1:40:19.3 David Tomen: If you have an issue with your brain, please go to www.nootropicsexpert.com
And to get you started, there’s a free book that you can download called “Secrets of the Optimized Brain.” It’s about 75 pages and all it is, is page after page of nootropic supplements, it gives you a brief explanation of that, and how much to take. Then there’s my book “Head First” which is nearly 600 pages, and that’s like a manual on your brain. The first chapter is kind of like my story. The second chapter is how your brain works, which kind of like supports everything that I talk about and then the bulk of the book is individual supplements that I reviewed – what they are, where they come from, why we use them, how much to take effect, and the types to buy. And then the last 2 chapters are suggested stacks, best Nootropics for ADHD, depression, anxiety, learning, and memory that kind of thing. So you can get that at Nootropics Expert. I’ve also got close to a hundred videos now on the YouTube channel that’s turned out to be very, very popular. So please visit me on YouTube and just please visit Nootropics Expert, I’d love to help you out if I can.
1:41:44.3 Ashley James: Absolutely. I’m curious. So far it sounds like everything’s for adults, do you have any information for children or teenagers, is the dosing different or have you looked into sort of the pediatric application?
1:41:58.6 David Tomen: I’m starting to take a deep dive into the pediatric thing for a client in India, but there are some things that I just warn people don’t use if you’re a teenager or younger than 21 and other things, just be careful of the dosage. But I’m doing a deep-dive now into pediatric, and I should have more in the next month or two.
1:42:25.9 Ashley James: Very cool. Excellent.
Thank you so much, David Tomen. It’s been wonderful having you on the show. Can’t wait to have you back.
1:42:31.7 David Tomen: Absolutely, my pleasure. Ashley, thank you for having me.
—
Outro: Hello, true health seeker. Have you ever thought about becoming a health coach? Do you love learning about nutrition and how we can shift our lifestyle and our diet so that we can gain optimal health and happiness and longevity? Do you love helping your friends and family to solve their health problems and to figure out what they can do to eat healthier? Are you interested in becoming someone who can grow their own business, support people in their success? Do you love helping people?
You might be the perfect candidate to become a health coach. I highly recommend checking out The Institute for Integrative Nutrition.
I just spent the last year in their health coaching certification program, and it really blew me away. It was so amazing. I learned over a hundred dietary theories. I learned all about nutrition, but from a standpoint of how we can help people to shift their lives and shift their lifestyle to gain true holistic health, I definitely recommend you check them out.
You can Google, Institute for Integrative Nutrition or IIN and give them a call or you can go to www.learntruehealth.com/coach, and you can receive a free module of their training to check it out and see if it’s something that you’d be interested in.
Be sure to mention my name Ashley James and the Learn True Health Podcast because I made a deal with them that they will give you the best price possible.
I highly recommend checking it out. It really changed my life to be in their program, and I’m such a big advocate that I wanted to spread this information. We need more health coaches. In fact, health coaching is the largest growing career right now in the health field. So many health coaches are. getting in and helping people because you can work in chiropractic office, doctors offices.you can work in hospitals. You can work online through Skype and help people around the world. you can become an author. You can go into the school system and help your local schools shift their programs to help children be healthier. you can go into senior centers and help them to shift their diet and lifestyle to best support them in their success and their health goals.
There’s so many different available options for you when you become a certified health coach.
So check out IIN. Check out the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. Mention my name, get the best deal. Give them a call, and they’ll give you lots of free information and help you to see if this is the right move for you.
Classes are starting soon. The next round of classes are starting at the end of the month. So you’re gonna wanna call them and check it out.
And if you know anyone in your life who would be an amazing coach, please tell them about it. Being a health coach is so rewarding, and you get to help so many people.
—
Are you looking to get the best supplements at the lowest price?
For high-quality supplements and to talk to someone about what supplements are best for you, go to www.takeyoursupplements.com, and one of our fantastic true health coaches will help you pick out the right supplements for you that are the highest quality and the best price.
That’s www.takeyoursupplements.com
Be sure to ask about free shipping and our awesome referral program.
www.DrRachnaPatel.com
Visit learntruehealth.com/eva and use coupon code LTH for 20% off Eva CBD Whole Hemp Plant Supplements!
Listen to my interview with a founder of Eva CBD and how they formulated their potent whole plant supplements: https://www.learntruehealth.com/phytocannabinoid
Jay Hartenbach, a founder of Medterra CBD, is giving Learn True Health listeners 15% off on his CBD products, so be sure to type in the discount code LTH at checkout.
http://www.medterracbd.com
You can listen to my interview with Jay about the hemp farming and supplement industry here: https://www.learntruehealth.com/cbd
Song: Del - Tropical Love (Vlog No Copyright Music) Music provided by Vlog No Copyright Music. Video Link: https://youtu.be/k-4zY7Ri2Po
https://www.learntruehealth.com/medical-cannabis
Have you ever had pains you can’t describe where and what to do? So painful it’s already giving you anxieties or worse, sleepless nights? It pays to take care of our body so opting for going for all natural remedies would be a good investment in the long run. Check out today’s podcast to learn more about going “Au Naturale” when dealing with pain issues in your body.
[00:00] Ashley James: Hello, true health seekers and welcome to another exciting episode of Learn True health podcast. We have a wonderful interview for you today with Doctor Rachna Patel, who’s a medical doctor that specializes in helping patients around the world to transition into using either medical cannabis or using CBD products in order to help them, sometimes even get off of pain medications but a lot of people that come to see her have complicated issues like parents who have children with autism who’s also experiencing anxiety. They found that CBD has been very effective at helping these children lower their anxiety. Those who have complicated chronic pain issues like fibromyalgia and they’re finding that even on multiple opioid medications that they’re having a very difficult time managing their pain. They come to Doctor Patel and they have found great success in using her expertise. Now, I thought it was pretty easy. Just if you have pain just start using CBD or if you have pain just start using medical cannabis, no big deal. You know dear, what I’ve found really interesting is that there’s a bit more finesse to it that if you really want to use hemp and cannabis products as in a medical herb. That you want to know somethings first. You know how to ingest it? How to get it in your system? You want to know the measurement of how much you are ingesting. We also want to know the contraindications and the side effects of if you have taken too much. It’s not dangerous but you should know the side effects. Who wants to experience side effects anyway? From natural or man-made drugs. We want to make sure that we are taking something safely and effectively. We can easily overdo some CBD products. Now there is also a concern about quality in the supplement industry.
Since a lot of CBD products are expensive, we really want to make sure that our money’s going towards products that are good quality and provide us exactly what we are looking for and the dose we’re looking for. I had a really interesting thing happen a few days before the interview, which I found to be just perfect timing. How the universe lines up to help us. One Sunday I was roughhousing with our son. We are playing together, building forts, laughing and tickling. I injured my back. I don’t remember quite what happened but I injured my back. I don’t remember it quite what happened but I injured my back and Monday morning I went to the chiropractor and he said, “Yes, you did quite a doozy.” I had basically torqued and twisted my pelvis. He said it’s going to take a few days to recover. I was very sore. Instead of reaching for the Advil or for something stronger, I went for the supplement that’s been sitting on my shelf from EVA CBD. I interviewed the founder of EVA CBD. It’s a whole hemp plant supplement company. I interviewed Nicole back in episode 337. She has a wonderful story including curing her dog’s cancer using a whole hemp juice. That was very interesting. She also cured her – I believed she had a form of IBS and it was very painful for her and she was able to reverse her inflammatory bowel issues using medical cannabis. What I love about her story is that they really apply their lessons personally to their own health. Then they look to create a supplement to help others.
She had sent me a bottle of her supplement called – I have it right here called, the EVA Better Relief. I hadn’t been in pain when I interviewed her and so I kept it thinking “Well, I’m glad I have it. Hopefully, I don’t ever need it but if I’m in pain, I’ll use it.” I came home from the chiropractor in tremendous amount of pain. Almost unable to walk, kind of a nine out 10. I took two, I drank some water, and of course, this is hemp so it doesn’t make you high or anything. It took about 20 minutes for it to kick in and I noticed that it really bought down the pain. I was able to relax. I had some pain cream I tried using but it really didn’t feel like it was doing the job because this is a pretty deep joint pain that I was experiencing. About 20 minutes after I took the EVA product, the whole hemp plant supplement for pain, it kicked in. It started to go down. I was able to rest. My back started to relax a bit and the pain went all the way down to zero. I noticed that if I get up and walk around a lot, it would get agitated but it wouldn’t get sharp. It was really dulled. It felt almost that I’ve taken some Advil. It was that effective for me so I took it twice a day every day. I still have back injury. It’s still healing but today’s better than the day before. It’s been five days and every day I’ve taken the EVA batter relief. Each time, I go from a lot of pain to very little pain to almost no pain and then I have to rest then I could come all the way down. That for me sells it because I think I would have had taken a lot of Advil to have gotten that results. I don’t want to take Advil. The end sets are dangerous for our liver. They actually inhibit the body’s ability to further decrease inflammation. Having said that, I know a lot of listeners have told me they love the EVA CBD products.
I wanted to let you know that you could definitely go to the show notes of this episode because I’m going to link my other interviews about CBD which I think really compliment this interview. If you’re interested in trying the EVA products, they have one for brain health, they have one for nerve health, they have one for emotions and mood, they have one like I said, for pain. They have about six different kinds. They mix herbs along with the whole hemp plant supplement. You can get 20% off when you go to learntruehealth.com/EVA and then you put on the coupon code LTH. Thank you so much for being a listener. For sharing these episodes with those who love especially if that someone’s in pain. I can tell you, they’ll be very happy to learn about this supplement. I have never used a supplement for pain that worked this well, so I’m really happy about that. The other CBD interview that I did that I think is really interesting to listen to in addition to listening to today’s episode is my interview with the founder of Medterra CBD, Jay Hartenbach. He actually also gives us a discount. He has a totally different product. Doctor Patel actually sells a CBD product and she talks about it in this interview that you’re about to listen to. Each of these are different. Doctor Patel has one that’s a whole plant CBD tincture. Then the EVA CBD is actually the entire hemp plant but in powder form so its’ less adultered. It’s a bit different. I think you’re going to get different experiences from each one. Then Jay Hartenbach’s supplement which is Medterra CBD, they guarantee that there’s no THCs. They have a process and he explains it. I think it’s fascinating to listen to this one, which is episode 300. Of course, I’m going to have the link to this episode as well on the show notes on today’s podcast. What I think is very interesting is that’s he talks about the farming industry for hemp and the different qualities of plant and how they manufacture it to make sure that it is clean. Because as Doctor Patel talks about it in today’s interview, buyer beware there are some CBD oils out there that are filled with molds, fungus, pesticides and heavy metals. Some of them contain very low amounts of CBDs, so you’re just basically taking a poison instead of a medicine. Jay talks about that in our interview episode 300. For his discount, you can go to MedterraCBD.com, use coupon code LTH and he gives 15% off. Excellent. Well, enjoy today’s interview, I know you will. Please share it with those of your friends who are in pain, have anxiety, have problems sleeping. All these conditions benefit from medical hemp and medical cannabis. Excellent. Thank you so much. Have a wonderful day and enjoy today’s episode.
[09:31] Ashley James: Welcome to the Learn True Health Podcast! I’m your host, Ashley James. This is episode 361. We are back on the show with Doctor Rachna Patel. Who we had all the way back on episode 49. It’s been a long time. I can’t believe it. now, we’re in the 360’s and going strong. Welcome back to the show.
[10:02] Rachna Patel: Thank you. Thank you for having me.
[10:05] Ashley James: Absolutely. You just shared with me that when you came in at episode 49, it was your first podcast interview.
[10:13] Rachna Patel: Very first and I was really, really nervous.
[10:16] Ashley James: Well, you did not come across as nervous. I thought you came across as memorable because it was a really interesting interview about how you help your patients as a medical doctor, helping them to relieve anxiety and post-traumatic stress, pain, chronic pain using properly administer medical marijuana. Now, you are here today to talk about CBD, which is much more widely accepted than medical marijuana considering people don’t get high from it. Yet people are seeing great results with pain management and anxiety and sleep. I myself right now, currently on a CBD from a whole plant, a whole hemp plant medicine because I hurt my back on Sunday roughhousing with our four-year-old. I went to the chiropractor and he said, “Yes. You are really messed up.” My pelvis was torqued. I just did a number on myself. Now, I’m just recovering but I’ve been in pain. I am really surprised at how this has been more effective than if I took an over-the-counter medication. I don’t feel dopey and I know I’m not hurting my liver. I’m really relieved. I’m glad I had some in stock because I’m not normally in pain and the fact that I went to it first instead of Advil. I’ve had some really great results managing my pain while my back gets better. I’m really a big believer in hemp, using hemp as medicine. The extract CBD as medicine. I’m really excited to learn more from you today. Since you’ve been on the show on episode 49. A lot has happened in your career as a doctor and a healer. Tell us about what’s happened since and why you’re so passionate about CBD.
[12:12] Rachna Patel: When we last spoke, I was still in my Brock and Morten practice in California. Since then, I had transitioned to an online practice because I was getting phone call upon phone call from people all over the world who were basically like, “Teach me how to use this.” Mainly CBD oral because that’s what most people have access to. I transitioned to online practice. I’ve written a book in that time as well. The following on my YouTube channel has exploded. Tons that has happened.
[12:56] Ashley James: Awesome. Very cool. Now, you can work from wherever you want. You were just mentioning to me that some of your recruiting crew was in New Jersey. I don’t even know, where are you right now?
[13:08] Rachna Patel: I’m actually in Austin, Texas right now.
[13:10] Ashley James: Awesome. Very cool. You get to travel and help people all around the world. Tell us a bit about that. About helping people online around the world versus one on one in person in your clinic. What’s the difference that you’ve found?
[13:27] Rachna Patel: I’m still doing consults online. There’s still one on one consults. The only difference is that rather than just working with people locally in the San Francisco Bay area, I’m now working with people from England and South Africa, in Indonesia and Canada. All over the world. What’s interesting about that is that I have to customize and tailor the treatment options based on what’s available in those particular countries, right? In a way, it’s a challenge but in a way, it’s also learning experience. You have to figure out how to be very – just basically think on your feet and figure out, “Okay, well, this is not available to them” so, “This is something that could work instead”. Yes, that’s what the experience has essentially been like.
[14:30] Ashley James: Awesome. Very cool. Can you share without obviously saying anyone’s name, can you share some stories of success in the last year working online with people around the world?
[14:40] Rachna Patel: Yes. I have helped a lot of parents of children with Autism. A lot of times these children, they tend to struggle with anxiety. A lot of that anxiety is triggered when there is a change in routine. Any sort of change in routine triggers this anxiety. In the worst case of scenarios, it can be aggressive behavior. It can manifest as aggressive behavior. Oftentimes even physical. With the help of CBD, these patients have, we’ve been able to manage the anxiety that these children experience and therefore just to crawl up of that anxiety that manifests. Working with that, working with severe pain as well. A lot of back pain. A lot of these things like anxiety, chronic pain, insomnia. They’re common to people all over the world, right? Because the human body’s a human body and the human experience is the human experience. There’s a lot of commonalities there that this one medication can benefit.
[16:01] Ashley James: Now, what point did you start to really use CBDs? When we spoke, I felt like you weren’t talking about CBDs as much as you’re talking about medical cannabis, medical marijuana. Using the difference strains to get different results. Then how to use it was really important like not just sitting there and smoking it was actually harmful but there’s ways to use it that’s less harmful and actually can be a benefit. That was more of what you’re talking about. Now you’re talking about CBDs. What happened in your journey that made you want to use CBD more?
[16:43] Rachna Patel: The thing is that, actually I was always talking about CBD. When I would talk to patients even in the context of marijuana, in terms of what combination of cannabinoids. You know what combinations of CBD and THC they should be using. I was still talking about amounts of CBD and amounts of THC. Then you have Farmville 2014 come along which made CBD even more accessible. CBD derived from hemp even more accessible. Overall, if I had to breakdown the benefits of CBD and THC in terms of percentages, I would say that about 80% of conditions benefited from high amounts of CBD. Whether that high amount of CBD comes from marijuana or if it comes from hemp. Then about 20% of medical conditions benefited from high amounts of THC. Of course, there are conditions in between that do need both CBD and THC to effectively treat the conditions. It’s something that I’ve always been talking about. Like I said, in the context of marijuana but with the regulations changing and CBD becoming more accessible, it was basically more that I just started to focus more on CBD. People still come to me with conditions where CBD doesn’t benefit their conditions. So I outright tell them that, “Hey, you know you’re better off using a marijuana based product because you are getting that high amounts of THC and CBD.” That’s really the context in which I speak. Even in the book that I’ve written. Which conditions could benefit from high amounts of CBD, which conditions for high amounts of THC and which conditions benefit from both CBD and THC.
[18:39] Ashley James: Very cool. Can you illustrate those points to us now? I’m pretty sure most listeners will have an understanding that like CBD doesn’t make you high. Medical marijuana when it’s activated, like the THCs activated it’s heated up, it goes from THCA to just THC. That’s’ what makes people experience the high. For people who don’t want to experience the high and just want the medicinal herb then that’s the CBD. Can you go into more details and explain what CBDs really good for? Versus medical marijuana?
[19:21] Rachna Patel: Yes, sure. I just want to touch very briefly on the concept of the high. Mainly, there’s two things that cause it, right? One is that the THC is of a significant potency in the product itself and two, is that you’re consuming a certain dose in order for it to actually get you high. You’re consuming excess amounts. If you don’t consume excess amounts of the THC then you’re not going to get a high of it. If the CBD is a lot higher than the THC, then you’re not going to get a high off of it. In terms of conditions that are benefited by high amounts of CBD, these are the most common conditions that I’ve encountered in my clinical practice. They include things like migraines and headaches, muscle pain. Also we’re talking about things like spasms, spasticity. Then there’s nerve pain. For instance, back pain caused by sciatica, neuropathy that’s caused by diabetes or chemotherapy. Even trigeminal neuralgia. Then we have anxiety. The umbrella of anxiety covers all sorts of different conditions. We’re talking about obsessive-compulsive disorder, PTSG, ADD, ADHD, panic disorder and also mild to moderate insomnia. Now, conditions that need in addition to the CBDs, some amount of THC include nausea and vomiting, lack of appetite, autoimmune conditions, right? These include conditions like psoriasis, rheumatoid arthritis, Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, lupus. Severe nerve pain, this is pain that’s caused by conditions such as shingles, spinal stenosis and then finally, severe insomnia as well. This is specifically where the person cannot sleep unless they actually take some sort of heavy-duty medication or a high dose of medication as well. That I would say, in a nutshell covers the conditions that are benefited by high amounts of CBD and then conditions in which you do need some amount of THC as well.
[21:45] Ashley James: Thank you for that explanation. Now we’ve got some great questions in the Facebook group. I want to make sure we get to all of them. Yesterday, I posted in the Facebook group asking if anyone had any questions for you. All listeners who aren’t in the Facebook group, please come join us. It’s a great community. Just search Learn True Health in Facebook. I know you’ve got the list of questions pulled up. Do you want to run through them?
[22:09] Rachna Patel: Yes, sure. Let’s see. First question comes in from Jenna and Jenna is asking what form of CBD is best for anxiety and depression. I’m thinking of trying the pill form. Would this be effective? What dosage? Okay, there’s a couple different things I want to touch on here. First of all, let’s look at anxiety and depression separately. Anxiety like I mentioned, is one of the conditions that benefits from high amounts of CBD. Depression on the other hand benefits from THC. That is because of the chemical pathways that these chemicals impact. CBD tends to have an impact on Serotonin which is what impacts anxiety. Oftentimes, what’s prescribed for anxiety are what are called SSRI. Selected serotonin reuptake inhibitors. Basically, these medications up the levels of serotonin in your body. That’s what’s helping the anxieties, it’s high amounts of CBD. However, depression is typically helped by high amounts of THC because tends to impact Dopamine, right? And dopamine is one of those feel-good chemicals. The important thing to know here is that, that impact of THC on depression is very transient, lasts for couple of hours or so and then it dissipates. Overall, I would say when it comes to anxiety, CBD is a lot more effective than pharmaceutical medications. What I found with depression clinically is that, the pharmaceutical medications tend to have a better longer lasting effect than the THC. Now you’re talking about form, okay? There are a lot of different forms in which you can consume CBD. There are edibles, there are tinctures, which are drops that you put under the tongue. You can also inhale it as well. A lot of this comes down to in terms of what’s the best method to use comes down to your medical history. Let me give you an example. I’ve had patients who’ve had gastric surgeries. For instance, gastric bypass surgery. In their case, they’re not able to absorb edibles as well. They’re not absorbing the CBD as well. It sort of just passes right through them. In their case, what works better, what’s more effective is inhalation or using drops with the tongue. That’s what I’m going to tell you about that. Now when it comes to dosage, what I’ve find is it’s a very individual process. Just to give you an example, this is an example having to do with insomnia but can also apply to anxiety as well. I have two patients, they both struggled with insomnia. They were otherwise healthy. No other medical diagnosis that they had. They were of similar body size and body shape. They had similar BMIs. Both patients tried the exact same CBD product. One patient ended up needing just 2.5mg of CBD to sleep better whereas the other patient needed 15mg of CBD to sleep better. I’ve seen this be the case with anxiety as well. Now there’s a couple different components that come to play when it comes to using the right amount of CBD. First and foremost, you want to take the strength of the CBD product into account. What I’m going to tell right now is, on the market, in an ounce whether it’s an edible or tincture, you’re going to find anywhere from about 250mg of CBD up to a thousand milligrams of CBD. That’s highly variable in terms of strength. Then the next job then is to figure out dosing. Then also taking the right frequency of CBD as well. You don’t want to overdo it because you can develop a tolerance to it. Again, let me walk you into an example. I’ve had patients with severe back pain and nothing’s really worked for them. They finally turn to CBD ad it does actually work for them and they get overzealous. They overdo it. [Laughter] Then two to three weeks later, I’ll get a phone call saying, “Hey Doc, this worked great and now it’s not working anymore.” That’s because you can develop a tolerance to it. Basically, you know you develop a tolerance when you’re, number one, you’re having to take higher and higher doses to get the same effect and then you reach a plateau where no matter how much you take, it’s having no effect on you. Those are some general basic guidelines that I would give you in terms of answering this particular question. Should I just roll through the next couple of questions?
[27:09] Ashley James: Actually, I’d like to stop in between I’ve got some questions. CBD, is that fat-soluble? Do we need a gallbladder to properly digest it to the point where we can absorb the CBD?
[27:27] Rachna Patel: No, not necessarily. Enzymes that the gallbladder release are not necessarily needed to digest CBD but here’s what I’m going to tell you. The CBD does get stored in the fat cells in the body. What I want you think of it as is as Vitamin D. Some people can be deficient in vitamin D, you know, when you test your blood levels. Some people can be normal. Basically, the people who tend to hold on to fat better have basically an advantage because they’re holding on to more of the CBD. Therefore, often times they need to take lower doses and need to take a rest frequently. Whereas the people to tend to metabolize their fat quicker may need to take higher doses and take it more frequently as well. Does that how to answer your questions?
[28:29] Ashley James: Yes. You mentioned that those with gastric bypass for example, just they have less intestines so there’s less of a chance of them to actually digest and absorb the nutrition fully. As a result, those who’ve had gastric bypass can develop deficiencies like B12 is very common. They need to be on supplements. What you’re saying is, they shouldn’t take an edible, either CBD edible or medical marijuana edible simply because they won’t digest it enough to absorb the medicine but you are saying that those with digestive issues like let’s say Crohn’s or IBS, or any kind of absorption issues. Someone knows that they have gotten an inflammation and dysbiosis and they’ve got issues with absorption. That edibles out but that tincture out of the tongue is still okay and we can absorb it fully even with a compromised digestive system.
[29:28] Rachna Patel: Yes, because it’s a different route. Rather than being absorb through the gastrointestinal tract the tincture gets absorb through – if you’ve ever taken a look under your tongue, you’ll see all of these blue lines, those are all blood vessels, that’s where the cannabinoids are being absorbed. It’s through those blood vessels. Inhalation is being absorbed through your lungs. In both situations you’re bypassing the gastrointestinal tract and it’s still getting into your bloodstream. Here’s what I would tell you. To touch on Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, which are inflammatory gut conditions. I haven’t found absorption of edibles to be as much of an issue as for someone who has for instance, gastric bypass surgery or even ostomy. The people with the inflammatory bowel diseases still tend to absorb edibles fairly well.
[30:32] Ashley James: Okay. Very cool. You mentioned being dosed by weed. Someone is a 100 pounds versus 300 pounds, would they increase their dose of CBD to get the full effect?
[30:47] Rachna Patel: It’s actually not by weight because it actually has to do with the turnover of your fat cells. You know how some people can be fat on the inside, thin on the outside and vice versa. Fat on the outside and thin on the inside. So-
[31:10] Ashley James: Meaning the fat surrounding the organs?
[31:11] Rachna Patel: Right. Basically overall, the turnover rate of your fat cells. That can vary from person to person. How much a person weighs doesn’t necessarily contribute to that turnover. I’ve had small people need small doses and large people need large doses and vice versa. Large people need smaller doses and smaller people need larger doses. It ultimately comes down to metabolism in general. It comes down to metabolism of fats and then finally, it comes down also to what sort of machinery you have in your liver to break down chemicals because these chemical are broken down in the liver. Several different factors that come into effect there. Direct correlations make it easy, right? For X do Y and for Y do Z but I haven’t found that to be the case with CBD. It’s very individual in terms of what dose someone ends up needing.
[38:29] Ashley James: Got it. What happens when you overdose? I mean, we can keep talking about dose. What if we take too much? What happens when we take too much CBD?
[32:40] Rachna Patel: Couple different settings. One is the most common side effect is you’ll start to auto reject or fatigued. It’s almost like a hangover feeling. You know, when you’re dragging. Next most common side effect is you can get diarrhea. Third most common side effect and this is more or even long term, you can get changes in your weight and appetite but that is typically I could say, rare.
[33:08] Ashley James: The appetite increases or decreases, weight increase or decrease, or is it both?
[33:13] Rachna Patel: Typically, there’s a decrease in the appetite and the weight.
[33:20] Ashley James: Okay. So overdosing is not harmful but there are known side effects that are manageable.
[33:29] Rachna Patel: Yes, exactly.
[33:31] Ashley James: Got it. If you’re trying to figure out your dose and also you feel lethargic then you just took too much and then the next day take less.
[33:39] Rachna Patel: Yes. As a general guideline. Yes, correct.
[33:41] Ashley James: Yes. What do you recommend for people starting? What’s a starting level for a dose? Just to see is it different for pain versus anxiety? Or just, you tell everyone to start with half a drop or full and then go up from there?
[33:57] Rachna Patel: Everybody does start at the same dose. I’ve had a wide variety of ranges in which I’ve had patients start and a lot of it depends on their history. How they’ve reacted to medications, how they’ve reacted to what other medications they’re on also matters. What their medical history is. The starting dose varies from person to person and the increment in which they increase the CBD also varies from person to person. A lot of it also depends on the severity of their condition as well. How severe for instance, their pain level is or how severe their anxiety is. Those are all very different factors that I’m basing starting dose and incremental doses off of.
[34:49] Ashley James: Got it. Are there any interactions or contraindications like you mentioned interactions with drugs? Are there any known interactions with drugs? Or there any contraindications that would say that we shouldn’t do CBD?
[35:04] Rachna Patel: Yes. In terms of drug interactions, there have been two drugs that have been studied in conjunction with CBD. One is called the ASM which is the Anti-seizure medication typically used in children. What they found was that, when Clobazam was administered with CBD, the levels of Clobazam stayed elevated far longer. The danger in that is that, you can build up a toxic level of the prescription medication. In this particular case, the study the level of doses of the Clobazam had to be reduced. That was actually a good thing because the patients we experiencing pure side effects of the prescription medication. That’s one. Second thing is when they were studying Epidiolex. Epidiolex is basically a prescription version of the CBD. It was approved sometime about in the summer of 2018. When they were starting this medication which is essentially CBD, again, they were studying it in a some set of types of epilepsy in children particularly. A lot of this children were on Valproic acid otherwise known as Valproate which is also an anti-seizure medication. What they found was that when patients take Valproate with CBD, their liver enzyme levels tended to go up. It cause a mild liver injury. Typically, they did a couple different things. They either eliminated or reduced the CBD or they eliminated or reduced the Valproic acids and then the liver enzymes went back to normal. That’s what’s known, right? But in the study what they said was that, we would extend our conclusions to any medication that causes what’s known as Hapado cellular injury. Basically, any prescription medication that tends to cause liver damage or elevate liver enzymes. When these medications are used in combination with CBD there has to be a lot of monitoring that has to be done. A lot of precautions that have to be taken. That’s pretty much what I would tell you. Now on my YouTube channel, I do have a video specifically on CBD and drug interaction where I list medications that a person should use with caution in conjunction with CBD.
[37:42] Ashley James: I was at the grocery store a month ago and talking to the lady that was checking out my groceries about melatonin. My melatonin over the counter, it’s safe. They have melatonin gummies for children and for adults. To me it’s a safe, obviously, use everything responsibly but it’s a safe alternative to prescription medications for sleep. She started saying, “You know, I should really look into melatonin because,” and then she lists one of the most common drugs for sleep, Lunesta or something like that. You know the side effects, pretty crazy. She said that she’s on a few medications to help her, calm her down anxiety and go to sleep at night. So the checker was – here she is complaining about the side effects of the medications she’s on. Then there’s a natural remedy like CBD. There’s a natural remedy that helps people to sleep, Melatonin. She wouldn’t try it because she’s worried that the melatonin would interact with her medications. I was like, “This is the weirdest thinking.” I’m coming from the point of, “I don’t want the side effects of the medications.” Right? She’s thinking, “I don’t want the side effects of a natural substance to interfere with my medications”. She didn’t want to be on those medications. If she could work with her doctor and try CBD and Melatonin and like magnesium soak bath every night. She could try these things which when she described her situation, she just went straight for the drugs. I know over 70% of adults in the United States were on at least one prescription medication. It’s the norm. Her experience is the norm and my experience of not wanting to be on many medications and looking for alternatives is not the norm. We‘re all swimming upstream. We’re going go against the green here and I know my listeners are as well. Looking to do everything we can to be as natural and healthy as possible. There are going to be times when someone wants to use medications and use natural medication together in harmony. So I’m glad that you cover where CBD might entrap with the medication and how we can go about adjusting those things. In terms of contraindications, is CBD safe for everyone? Or are there times when it’s not?
[40:21] Rachna Patel: Yes. I would say it’s definitely contraindicated in women who are pregnant and breastfeeding. The reason I say this, it is a conservative recommendation. Reason being, when cannabinoids in general, CBD and THC have been studied in the context of marijuana. What’s been found is that they can lead to low birth weight and they can also lead to pre-term labor and delivery as well. I don’t know if I would feel comfortable as the doctor taking that risk on a person who is pregnant and breastfeeding. It’s important to know that when you are breastfeeding, these cannabinoids do get passed through that breastmilk.
[41:09] Ashley James: Are those studies only for medical marijuana? Or they’re also for CBD? Exclusively?
[41:18] Rachna Patel: They’re on medical marijuana. They’re not on CBD. It could be marijuana and likely these women are obtaining marijuana off the streets, it could’ve been marijuana that is high in THC or it could’ve also be marijuana that is high in CBD. That distinction has not been made. Whether it was the THC, CBD or even something else, we don’t know. It’s just at this point in general category of cannabinoids is what I would tell you.
[41:50] Ashley James: Right. There’s so many other factors to that. I mean, just to play the devil’s advocate, we don’t know what kind of the group of women that they chose to study whether they were – what was their socio-economic position and if that played a role. If they were all unable to eat three meals a day or do they have the means to. Were they studying people who are in shelters or homeless or were they studying people like at what age. I can understand low birth weight if you’re just stoned all the time and don’t want to eat or if you’re stoned all the time on the streets and don’t have access to food, is much different, right? What would it be like if it was women in their 20’s who had a house and a job and they chose to use medical marijuana while pregnant. Would it be the same? Are those other factors taken into consideration?
[42:51] Rachna Patel: Yes. I could tell you even one factor the use of other drugs was not taken into consideration. Then the other thing is that, one of the other scenarios could’ve been that a lot of women get what’s called hyperemesis gravidarum. You get a lot of nausea and vomiting especially in the first trimester of pregnancy. Oftentimes can be difficult to control with prescription medications so out of desperation these women could’ve been turning to marijuana off the streets. I highly don’t recommend that but that could’ve been another scenario that played out as well. We don’t know, right? CBD hasn’t been as well studied. I would tell you overall as THC. It’s now being more and more studied. You have to realize up until just recently, because marijuana’s only been very recently accepted. CBD has only be very recently been accepted. These substances, these chemicals we studied as drugs of abuse. You’re looking at it a certain perspective. That has shifted now, we’re now looking at the medical value of it. Things are studied differently as I would tell you.
[44:18] Ashley James: Right. They wouldn’t turn around and the positive benefits of heroin use during pregnancy. That’s how they saw it. They wouldn’t turn around start telling like the benefits. In that study, they would’ve been like, the women who used medical marijuana or street marijuana while pregnant saw a reduction in their nausea and were in less on or something. They wouldn’t talk about that. They’re addressing those issues, low birth weight and early labor. Interesting. We’re just pioneers right now. In a few years, we’ll definitely see more studies come out. Outlining whether or not CBD is safe for the baby during pregnancy or breastfeeding. I imagine what’s interesting is the endocannabinoid system, our body makes and uses these chemicals. Anyway, can we talk about that before our next question? What is CBD attaching to in our nervous system and why does it complement our body so much?
[45:25] Rachna Patel: Yes. Sure. Basically, you have receptors. You can think of receptors as locks. Now think of these round circular cell. It has itsy bitsy locks on it and those locks only accepts certain types of keys. Now, within endocannabinoid locks, you have CBD one. You have even more specific type of locks, you have CBD 1, you have CBD 2. Then a group of other receptors, which haven’t been clearly defined as a part of the endocannabinoid system but you have CB1 and CB2. CB1 and CB2 are not just actually located at the bottom of the nervous system, they’re located throughout the body. Even including on your immune cells. These locks reacts to certain types of keys and our bodies make these certain types of keys and they’re known as endocannabinoids. If you break that worked down, there’s two parts to it. Endo and cannabinoids. Endo means within and cannabinoids are these specific types of chemical that interact with the cannabinoid reactors. The two most common endocannabinoids are anandamide and 2-AG. Very similar in structure to the endocannabinoids are the phytocannabinoids. If we break that word down we have phyto and we have cannabinoids. Phyto means plant, cannabinoids again, these are chemicals that interact with the cannabinoid receptors. The phytocannabinoids include chemicals like CBD and THC. They also interact with these locks because their structure is very similar to the endocannabinoids that we naturally make. Finally, they are what are known as synthetic cannabinoids. Synthetic basically means fake. These are chemicals that appear like cannabinoids but are made in a lab. We have all these different types of cannabinoids that interact with the body and when that key enters that lock, it triggers a series of chemical reactions. Going back to the serotonin impacting anxiety and the dopamine impacting depression, that’s what going on. It’s impacting all these other chemical levels in our body. Then having an impact like relieving anxiety. Putting you in a little bit of a good mood. Helping to relieve your pain. That’s what’s pretty much what’s going on. The system was very fairly recently discovered. We’re talking about basically the 60’s is when these whole system was discovered. We don’t know as much about it as other systems in the body. For instance, the opioid system. We know quite a bit about that but we don’t know as much about the endocannabinoid system but what we do know is that it’s significant. It’s a significant system in the body otherwise it would not be having these clinical results that I’ve been seeing in patients.
[48:53] Ashley James: Very cool. Yes, I found it fascinating learning about the endocannabinoid system. We have one guest that talked about how when people are deficient in their fatty acids. The omega 3, 6 and 9, if they’re deficient in them. That the body also becomes deficient in the cannabinoids that it makes. He sees that when people use CBD oil who are deficient their EFAs, they see a really positive result. It’s like giving someone a fish oil and you can also get them from algae. Doesn’t have to be from fish but in EFA, essential fatty acid supplement because the body can become deficient in CBD. It’s thought of more like a nutrient. Like you said, vitamin D or vitamin C. It’s a nutrient the body can become deficient in and I had a friend tell me recently, it’s either a guest or a friend, talk about how we used it, how cannabis in our diet. Hemp hundred years ago or 200 years ago, even 300 years ago was grown here, we use it. We put it to our food. We fed it to our animals so that even the milk from the cows would contain some of these cannabinoids. They would eat it, they give it to the chickens, they’ll be in the eggs. We’d have it in our food because you can use hemp, there’s all kinds of ways to eat it. Also, we would then make ropes, clothing, linen out of it and the sails from ropes from ships. The fact that we sort of have it more from our diet back then than we do now. I thought that was really interesting. Have you heard about that? Or seeing that we are more deficient in CBD now as a society than we were in the past?
[51:03] Rachna Patel: No. The fact that it was in the food supply is actually new to me. That’s something I’d have to look into but in terms of deficiency, I would say the most objective measure of that is to measure the cannabinoid levels. Just to see whether or not we’re deficient. Also, what we don’t have right now is what’s normal for an individual. How much cannabinoid should a person have? I wouldn’t use the word deficient because I feel like then people would start using the cannabinoids as a vitamin on a regular basis. As I’ve mentioned before, taking too much of it and taking it too often does lead to tolerance. Taking too much of it can lead to side effects as well. I wouldn’t say deficient but we need more information like I said, in terms of the baseline of what’s normal and also, measuring these amounts in people.
[52:05] Ashley James: As I’m sitting, realizing I don’t have any back pain at all from taking – I took the Eva product which I’ve had her on the show and it was a whole plant, hemp plant. There’s CBD in there but it’s a whole plant. Basically, I took two capsules and I’m sitting here not in pain anymore. I woke up, walked around, I woke up with no pain and as when I start standing and I’m moving around, I’ve got to bed around 6 or 7 and at ten in pain was just pretty bad for me and I took two. Now, I’m just sitting here and all the pain has subsided. It’s amazing. I would’ve been on Advil all day long and maybe even a muscle relaxant if I wasn’t into holistic health. I didn’t know that there were these options. If I only knew what the pharmacy had. I wouldn’t be taking this natural route. It really does work to relieve pain. I know we have a question in the group about using it topically. How effective is that to use like hemp oil or CBD oil on a joint? Let’s say the wrist or hand that a person has an injury or has arthritis?
[53:29] Rachna Patel: Yes. So we do have receptors for cannabinoids in our skin. In terms of types of conditions that I’ve seen topicals benefit, they include skin conditions. Any sort of inflammatory skin conditions like psoriasis for instance, eczema, it’s effective for. I’ve also seen it be effective for very localized muscle pain. If you have spasm, it’s effective for that. What I have not seen it be as effective for is joint pain. With joint pain specifically, what I find is most effective is both CBD and THC because there’s a large inflammatory component there. What’s going on with inflammation? Remember the autoimmune conditions that I’ve talked about there’s a large inflammatory component there as well. You have CBD and THC, they both have anti-inflammatory properties when you combine them together there’s an even greater anti-inflammatory effect because you have these phenomena known as the entourage effect or synergistic effect would’ve otherwise known as what’s going on. One chemical is enhancing the effect the other chemical, there’s even more anti-inflammatory effect. I would say if there’s mild joint pain then yes, the CBD alone can be effective but if it gets into the realm of being moderate or severe then you do need some amount of THC in the form of a topical to effectively treat joint pain such as arthritis.
[55:00] Ashley James: Very cool. It’s okay to mix and match like someone uses a topical and takes the tincture and or uses the vapor and uses the tincture uses the vapor and uses the topical or is it okay to mix and match or should they just stick with one?
[55:16] Rachna Patel: It’s okay to mix the topical with other delivery methods but other internal delivery methods but I would not mix and match multiple internal delivery methods because there’s a cumulative effect. These chemicals are getting stored in the fat cells in your body, right? So you can overdo it if you use too many of the internal methods at once but combining a topical with an internal method should be fine.
[55:45] Ashley James: When you count, let’s say someone goes, “Okay, I’m doing 100mg a day”. I don’t even know, is that how you measure it? By milligrams?
[55:54] Rachna Patel: Typically yes.
[55:55] Ashley James: Yes. Okay. That’s what I thought. 100mg per day is my dose. I’m going to do 50mg of topical or 50 of oral? Is that how it works? Or do you only count the oral and then topical is just bonus?
[56:10] Rachna Patel: I just count the internal and then the external is just bonus. The thing with the external, the topical is that it’s very local absorption. You’re not absorbing enough of it into your bloodstream. What goes into the bloodstream can pretty much be considered negligible. Unless, you like big CBD oil, [inaudible] [laughter] you put on some music, some candles and you pour a lot of CBD in your bathtub then you know you can get quite a lot of stomach absorption.
[56:55] Ashley James: I think I’m going to come out with that line of CBD bath bombs, to bathe in CBD. [Laughter] That’ll be pretty cool. Awesome. All right, next question.
[56:57] Rachna Patel: Why do some people use high quality CBD oil and feel no difference at all? Okay. It could be that the CBD oil has no CBD in it. The fact of the matter is that it’s an unregulated industry. So pretty much anything goes. Really, the most important thing that you can do as a consumer is look at the laboratory test results before you purchase a product. You go look at the laboratory tests result for the particular batch, the batch from which the product was made because every batch has different amount of CBD and THC. With the amount of the CBD on a laboratory test result, you want to look at the total amount of CBD and with the amount of THC, you want to ensure that it’s less than .20% which is the legal requirement. That’s what I’m going to tell you based on that. Honestly, I don’t rely on any of the marking, on any of the labelling. If I have to judge a product, the first thing that I ask for are the laboratory test results. The fact that for that particular batch one of the things I’m looking at is the total amount of CBD and the amount of THC. Let’s see here. This next question is actually a really good question. “My husband is a DOT driver. He would like to try for anxiety but is concerned it would show up in a drug test on the same spectrum THC/marijuana does? Is this true? Does having higher grades of CBD matter with this? Thank you.” Here’s how I want you to think of it. The difference between hemp and marijuana comes down to the amount of THC. By law, hemp has less than .3% THC. Marijuana has more than .3% THC. They both have THC. There a greater likelihood of the THC being detected with the marijuana product but there’s less of a likelihood but there’s still likelihood of the THC being detected with a hemp product. One of things I want to touch on here are ice split CBD oils. The general perception is that, they just take out the CBD from the hemp plant and they do but this is done using a series of chemical process. The types of chemical that they’re using are pentane, hexane. One of the drawback of these is that you don’t know how much of these potentially toxic chemicals get left behind. No one’s testing for them and you certainly don’t want toxic levels of pentane or hexane on your body. At the very least, it can cause a lot of inflammation. That’s one of the drawback of the ice split CBD oils. It’s usually ice split CBD oils that have typically little to no THC in them. It can even more significantly reduce the likelihood of the THC showing up. However, that’s not to say that there have been products on the market that have been marketed as ice split CBD oils which are otherwise known as pure CBD oils but when lo and behold when people get drug tested there has been THC that’s shown up. Again, what I would recommend is go based on laboratory test results. If you’re going to purchase an ice spilt CBD oil, what you need to specifically look for are amounts of residual solvents and you want to make sure that they’re non-toxic. That the solvents that were used to extract just the CBD have been cleaned out of that final product.
[01:01:04] Ashley James: Got it. That makes a lot of sense. You don’t want those solvents and chemicals in your tincture that’s for sure. I know that you sell a CBD. How do you ensure that it is clean? Is your CBD that you sell going to show up in a drug test?
[01:01:29] Rachna Patel: Yes. I drive my farmer crazy. It’s what I do. Basically the way it works is that, I don’t bottle up a product until I approve of the laboratory test results. There’s a couple different things that I check for. Number one are the amounts of CBD and THC. Now that particular product that I’ve created, it has less than .3% THC. It’s what’s known as the full spectrum CBD oil, which basically means you’re getting the full spectrum of cannabinoids that are in the plant. It’s not just the CBD. Yes, the THC can be detected with a line of product that I’m selling. In addition to testing from the amount of CBD and the amount of THC, I’m also testing for pesticide levels. Two pesticides in particular that you absolutely want to make sure your CBD oil has been tested for is bifenazate and myclobutanil. These are the most commonly used pesticides on hemp plants. Again, it’s an unregulated industry so there’s no control over what can and cannot be used in terms of pesticide in hemp plants. The other thing is, I also test for fungus and bacteria this is because this is especially important in people with compromised immune system. This can include anybody who’s undergoing chemotherapy for cancer for instance. Anybody who’s HIV-AIDS, anybody who’s had an organ transplant but also for people who have auto-immune conditions and are on drugs that suppress the immune system. Basically, a hemp is a plant. It’s just like romaine lettuce. It can have e-coli, it can have salmonella. It can even have a fungus known as Aspergillus. The people who are most vulnerable to these bugs are the people who has compromised immune system. That’s another thing I make sure of. The other thing is heavy metals. This is important because the hemp plant and even the marijuana plant, they’re known as bio-accumulators. They just soak up heavy metals in their environment. Those heavy metals can seep into your CBD oils. They have toxic levels of lead for instance found in CBD oils. Now, before heavy metals in particular that you want to make sure your CBD oil has been tested for include arsenic, cadmium, lead and mercury. Then finally the other thing is which I touched on before are residual solvents. There’s unsafe solvents which I touched on and they fall under the category of hydrocarbons. We’re talking about things like pentane, hexane, butane, propane and if some of these chemicals sounds familiar it’s because they’re used for everyday things. Like propane for instance, is used to fire up your barbeque grill. Butane is what’s in lighter fluid. Any of these chemicals are used, like I said they’re more commonly used in ice split CBD oils, we want to make sure there’s none toxic levels left behind. They’ve been cleaned out. Now the safer solvents on the market that are being used more and more, carbon dioxide, CO2, the gas that we breathe in and out everyday. Also, alcohol. Those are the safer solvents that are used to make CBD oils. Those five things at a minimum, when I was creating my line of CBD oils I was asking farmers all sorts of questions like what sort of growing you are using. Where are hemp plants being grown? For me, I wanted to ensure that they’re grown in the United States specifically in Colorado because that’s the one state where there’s some control in terms of regulation on the production and cultivation of hemp. There’s a variety of different factors but these five that I walked you through you especially want to make sure with any brand of CBD that you’re buying.
[01:05:49] Ashley James: I’ve heard maybe you can clarify that, I know with medical marijuana there’s indica and sativa. They’re these different sort of strains of it, that are instead of thinking of it as one plant, we think of it like mushrooms where there’s shitake mushrooms and reishi mushrooms. Many different kinds of mushrooms and each can have a different medicinal quality to it. Same with the cannabis and the hemp plant that they have sort of different strains that provide different benefits. Is that true with hemp as it is with cannabis? Is there like a sativa or indica of hemp to get different kinds of THC? Or sorry, different kinds of CBD?
[01:06:40] Rachna Patel: Yes, here’s what I would tell you. I don’t actually go by the names of different strains, indica or sativa, I don’t care about all that. As a doctor, what I care about is objective data. All I care about are the amounts of THC and CBD. When you’re looking at marijuana products, what you want to look at is the amount of CBD relative to THC or the amount of THC relative to CBD. Plain and simple. When it comes to hemp-based products, you’re looking at the total amount of CBD. Number one, you’re making sure that the amount of THC is less than that .3%. Then you’re going to look at the amount of CBD and look at what the total strength is in that one ounce. Remember, you want to compare equivalent amounts. An ounce to an ounce. Not an ounce to 2 ounces for instance. I’ve mentioned this before but I want to emphasize it again, typically what you’re going to find in the market is anywhere from 250mg of CBD to a 100mg of CBD in a one ounce bottle. When it comes at hemp-based products you’re looking at strengths. More is not always better. Like I mentioned before, optimal is what you’re aiming for. The strength that’s right for you. Just to give you an example that relatable, lets’ take ibuprofen. Ibuprofen is used for headaches oftentimes. You have the person where they come in 200mg tablets, you have the person where 200mg does the job of reliving their headache but then you will have other patients that’ll need hundreds of milligrams that comes in the form of prescription strength to help relieve their headache. The person where 200mg does it of ibuprofen, you’re not going to have to take hundreds of milligrams to help relieve your pain. Same thing with CBD, for one person the 250mg strength does the job. You don’t need to go all the way to the other end of the thousand milligrams to relieve whatever symptom you’re experiencing. Does that help in terms of – so it’s not strains but it’s strength of CBD that you’re looking at.
[01:08:59] Ashley James: Don’t be worried about the strain of the plant, we‘re just looking at the amount of CBD. Your CBD oil is whole plant. Meaning it’s whole plant extract so there’s actually more than just CBD in there? There’s terpenes. I don’t even know these words but do you ever look into sort of the medicinal benefits of the other compounds that come from the hemp plant?
[01:19:026] Rachna Patel: Here’s the interesting thing with terpenes. Terpenes were highly in volatile compounds, that why whenever you’re near a lemon grove, what you’re smelling is lemony floating around in the air. When you’re near pine trees, you’re smelling the piney that’s floating around in the air. They’re highly volatile compounds and when CBD oils are made the heat process is high enough where these chemical evaporate. Oftentimes really what’s going on with the manufacturing process is that these terpenes are added back in after the CBD oil was made. Finally, laboratory testing goes through several phases. One, you test the plant. Second, you test the extract. Third, you test the final CBD oil. Let me simplify this for you. General perception is that it’s just the CBD extracted in the oil like the kitchen grade oil, the coconut oil or the olive oil. That’s not the case, what’s going on is that the CBD is extracted in the solvent. One of the solvents that I’ve mentioned, CO2, ethanol are one of the hydrocarbons and then once it’s extracted in that then it’s being mixed up in the oil. The plant is tested because if the plant is not good like if it’s infested with fungus, e-coli, salmonella then you can’t use it. Then the extract is tested because you want to know, make sure that in the heating process you’re getting the right amounts of CBD and THC. Finally, once it’s dissolved in the oil, you’re testing it again for amounts of CBD and amounts of THC as well. Once the CBD oil is made, put into that oil then typically the terpenes are added back in. You can buy terpenes online in powder form and it’s mixed back in. That’s what’s typically what happens. It’s interesting because there’s research done on this too where they just took a little bud of marijuana because marijuana has terpenes as well. They put it in boiling water. They test it for terpenes before they boil it and then after they boil it most of the terpenes disappear after putting it in boiling water. Like I said, they’re highly volatile compounds and they just very easily, any amount of heat that touches them they’re sort of are in the air.
[01:12:12] Ashley James: What are their medicinal benefits?
[01:12:013] Rachna Patel: The main medicinal benefits as far as I know come for the cannabinoids themselves because that’s what’s interacting with the cannabinoids system. The terpenes could be interacting with other systems in the body but the two combined I haven’t found much in a way of research so it’s difficult for me to say.
[01:12:37] Ashley James: You know what I found really interesting about CBD is that if someone smoke too much pot and they’re too high that they can use CBD to bring them down really quick because the CBD floods the receptors and blocks the THC receptors. If someone did too much pot like maybe medical marijuana patient for the first time and they’re going through chemotherapy or they’re in a lot of pain and they’re looking to relieve themselves and they’re okay with getting high because whenever they’re at home. Then they feel too high maybe they get paranoid or scared if they take some CBD then all of a sudden will bring them back to reality much faster. We don’t have that with alcohol. The old saying is drink some coffee but now you’re just drunk and awake. It doesn’t actually speed up your liver and metabolize the alcohol much faster. When you drink, you’re just going to be drunk for the next four hours. If you’re high, you can just be high for the next four hours but with CBD it can actually can bring people down faster. I thought that was really interesting. I did not know that when I was younger and might have benefit from that information. [Laughter]
[01:13:53] Rachna Patel: Yes, all the college students, some high school students. Yes, probably. [Crosstalk]
[01:13:57] Ashley James: I don’t know if it’s anecdotal but I heard that EMTs will have CBD in their kit to help patients who are – the people they’re helping that might have eaten too many pot brownies then called 911. Have you heard of that? That EMTs would travel in their ambulance with CBD oil?
[01:14:23] Rachna Patel: I have not actually heard of that. Do you know which country this is in? [Crosstalk]
[01:14:26] Ashley James: It was anecdotal. I don’t know If it’s true or not. It’ll really be interesting to find out but I heard that because CBD is so effective at bringing people down that EMTs have been using it. I don’t know if it’s true or not but it’s interesting to consider that it has that effect. Now, you said that during the testing that three times you test. You’re testing at the farm basically you take the plant itself and have it tested. You’re testing for mold, the CBD level of the plant and pesticides, is that correct?
[01:15:03] Rachna Patel: Yes. You’re testing for the bugs, the pesticides and also you’re testing for the amount of CBD and THC. Actually, at that point the amount of CBD and THC does not really matter. Not the CBD but the THC. You want to make sure it’s less than a certain amount. During the extraction process based on the heeding, you can actually use a heeding process to change the amounts of the CBD and the THC.
[01:15:37] Ashley James: Okay, so that’s not as important. The first time you test, it’s more about whether this plant is even worth taking it to the factory to make it into a tincture, to make it into medicine. You want to make sure there’s no mold, you want to make sure there’s no pesticides or that they’re below the limit that you’re looking for. Then after you had it made in the lab is when you test it again for the CBD levels and the THC levels and then you said there’s a third time you test it, can you clarify that?
[01:16:12] Rachna Patel: Yes. Just to go through the whole process, you’re testing the plant mainly for things like pesticides, fungus and bacteria and heavy metals. Then you’re going to extract mainly for the amounts of CBD and THC. Lastly, you’re going to test the final product for amounts of CBD and THC and then also like residual solvents, heavy metals, pesticides and then you don’t really have to do fungus and bacteria at that point. Those are the main things that you’re testing for at the third stage of it. Now, this is how I do it. Ideally, how it should be done but is this how everyone does it? No, because again, there’s no regulations in the industry. I just tend to be very, very tight and use the knowledge that I have very strictly but yes, this is how I’ve worked with my farmer and done it.
[01:17:11] Ashley James: Very cool. A question just came in from Jodi. They say, “I’ve been seeing citrus forms of CBD with zero THC. How well do these work? If you have zero THC in your body, how well is it going to react with your system? Or what would you do when you’re body builds up a tolerance?” There’s some few questions in there. One is, what are citrus forms of CBD?
[01:17:41] Rachna Patel: I don’t know actually. I was going to ask you the same question.
[01:17:44] Ashley James: Maybe it’s the edibles or maybe it’s like citrus flavored tincture. Okay, they say it has zero THC, which means the manufacturer had to have used all those solvents to remove it. How well do this work? In your experience, how well do the ones that have solvents that have removed THC compared to the whole plant CBD?
[01:18:12] Rachna Patel: It’s going to depend on the symptoms that you’re experiencing, right? If it’s a condition that really doesn’t necessitate any amount of THC and really is benefited by high amounts of CBD then it’s going to benefit you but if there something where you do need some amount of THC, then it’s not going to benefit you. It really depends on the combination of symptoms that you have. As in the example of joint pain that I’ve gave you, if you have mild joint pain for arthritis then yes, it could help but anything more than that marches severe then in all likelihood it’s probably not going to help. What would do when your body builds up a tolerance? You scale back, that’s pretty much the simple solution to it
[01:19:01] Ashley James: Got it. Very cool. Yes, a friend once told me that he found – he was doing medical marijuana and he found that when he added CBD that he needed to do less medical marijuana to get the same results. He found it actually made his body seem more efficient with it. Have you heard of that?
[01:19:22] Rachna Patel: Yes. If you think about if that’s a product that has high amounts of THC, it still does have some amount of CBD and if your body is benefiting for the CBD you’re going to have to use more of it to accumulate more of the CBD. The smaller amount of CBD you’re going to have to take more of in order to accumulate some of that but then if you’re adding the CBD, then you’re not going to have to take much of the high THC low CBD product. Does this make any sense? Hopefully, I don’t confuse you.
[01:19:59] Ashley James: I think so.
[01:20:00] Rachna Patel: Let’s put numbers to it. You’re using a marijuana product that has 10mg of THC and only 2mg of CBD. Say, your body really needs 10mg of CBD for it to be effective. You’re going to have to take a lot of that to accumulate 10mg but if you add in a CBD product that has 8mg of CBD in it and then you add it with the 2mg that’s already there, you’re obviously not going to need a much as the other product.
[01:20:35] Ashley James: Yes. That makes sense because what the body actually was really benefitting from as what you’re saying is, when people use medical marijuana what they’re really benefiting from is the CBD in the medical marijuana plant.
[01:20:50] Rachna Patel: Right, for certain conditions. If that’s what you’re body really needs, it’s going to keep on asking for more until it gets enough but if you give it the high CBD product that has the right amount then it’s not going to ask for more. It’s going to do the job.
[01:21:07] Ashley James: I know someone. Actually, I think I know of a few people because I heard this more than once but I know of someone. I’ve watched them do it, they use CBD, pure CBD to quit using marijuana. That they have been using it recreationally and they found that they use it for four years non-stop every day and every time they want to stop, they didn’t want to stop. They felt as if there was an addiction there. I know it doesn’t have the same, it’s all addictive like cigarettes or heroine I get it but for people who are doing it every day, they’re seeing some relief in their own life especially if they have anxiety and when they go to stop, they feel compelled to keep doing it. I’ve talked to people who feel like medical marijuana has that addictive nature for some people just like chocolate bonbons would. It can be helpful but it also some people can find that they don’t want to quit. I know someone, watched them do it where they used the CBD extract and it helped them to want to quit. They used it and obviously had to do the work so they need to face life, face life sober. But that’s when they used the CBD that it brought on all the same positive benefits like the lower anxiety, the better sleep, all that. They found it much easier to not feel like they wanted pot anymore so it gave them a relief from the craving. Have you ever heard people using CBD to help quit using marijuana as a recreational drug?
[01:22:58] Rachna Patel: Yes. I want to put it into context here. Sounds like the person you’re talking about over did marijuana use.
[01:23:10] Ashley James: Right, yes.
[01:23:11] Rachna Patel: Quite a bit. Just like any other drug if you abuse it, yes, there’s potential for addiction. That’s important to know. Chemically speaking, CBD is what’s known as an inhibitor of THC. The CB1 receptor that I was talking about, CBD attaches to it, it changes the shape of the place where THC attaches so the body no longer gets any sort of effect from the THC anymore. That is potentially something that could be going on in terms of reducing the effect of the THC and therefore the need for it as well.
[01:24:00] Ashley James: Very interesting. Okay. Anything else that you want to make sure that we cover?
[01:24:06] Rachna Patel: No, we covered quite a bit. I would say that for those who want more information, I am constantly answering questions on my YouTube channel. Actually, starting next week what I’m going to do is I going to try to go live everyday on the various different platforms and just answer questions for people because people want answers. They can post their questions on YouTube, on any of my social media platforms, on Facebook. I’ll select them because I do get a lot of questions so I’ll select them and try to answer them. There’s more information on my book as well. Some of the things that I mentioned, I go into it in a lot more depth in the book and that’s available on Amazon. It’s titled “The CBD oil solution” and then subtitle is, “Treat chronic pain, insomnia and more without the high.”
[01:25:06] Ashley James: Got it. I’m going to make sure that the links to everything that you do is in the show notes of today’s podcast to learntruehealth.com. I am currently on your website and looking at your hemp oil and the CBD oil solution book, we’ll make sure the link to that is also in the show notes. People can join your email list and immediately give some great information. Then of course follow you on Facebook. You and I have been, I’ve been following you on Facebook since episode 49 when you’re first on the show and I see you posting all the time and on Instagram I see you posting all the time pictures of lectures that you’re giving and slides and all kinds of interesting stories as you navigate this world educating people on the benefits of CBD. It’s been a lot of fun actually following you and seeing how you progress and how you’ve been really shining a light on this great information because if we can use CBD instead of or use it to reduce pain medication. Right now, in opioid epidemic that we’re in, if we can use anything natural just to help people either prevent ever needing to get opioids or help them to get off of it or help them to reduce it. All of that is a benefit. Just like my experience. Sitting here, I am so grateful I’m not in pain right now. Sitting here, like I said I injured my back. I’m just thinking about I would’ve absolutely taken over the counter drugs or prescription drug had that been offered to me if I didn’t know of the benefits of using hemp for pain reduction. It works which is great.
[01:27:05] Rachna Patel: I would say that if we’re going to talk about the opioid epidemic in the context of the solution when I think CBD oil is that –
[01:27:17] Ashley James: Absolutely. Well, you’ve been helping people both in a clinical setting one on one as with doctor-patient experience. Consulting people around the world so you’ve had that experience of working with people, helping them to use CBD and use medical marijuana to get off of drugs, the help of prescription medications to lower prescription medications. Also, with their medications. You’ve actually seen hundreds of people be successful using these methods. Do you have any success stories that you would like to share specifically that comes to mind in terms of using CBD and getting off of pain medication or reducing pain medication?
[01:28:03] Rachna Patel: So many, thousands of stories but specifically what comes to mind are my patients with fibromyalgia because that’s a condition that tends to be very resistant to conventional medications. These patients, the medications are just piled up on top of them to that point where they taking like essentially a cocktail of prescription meds. A lot of times they’ll go back to their doctors and complain that, “This isn’t working” or “That isn’t working”. These patients they’re dismissed that they’re told that it’s all in your head. The pain that you’re experiencing is in your head. When these patients have come to me, I put them on a regimen of CBD and or THC. They’re in tears. They’re saying “You know doctor Patel, nobody’s believed me. For the longest time I’ve been trying drug upon drug upon drug and now I’m at a point where I can manage my pain with just the form of cannabis that I’m using”. I think that’s tremendous. Both on the patients end and on my end to be able to witness that. To be actually be able to solve someone’s problem from my end but for the patient to experience that sort of relief because they’re prisoners of their medications. Medications that aren’t working for them and now they’re using these medication on an as-needed basis to help manage their pain. It’s a lot of freedom that comes with it.
[01:29:46] Ashley James: Absolutely. I’m so excited to hear that. That’s phenomenal. Well, I’ll continue to look forward to learning more from you, following you on Facebook, watching your live Facebook and Instagram videos, seeing all the questions come out of the woodwork and seeing what happen in this industry over the next few years. Like I said, we’re pioneers. It’s all just starting. It’s all just starting out since it’s legal now and we can see the studies start to come in and the result starts to come in terms of all the benefits that CBD can provide us. It’s very exciting. Now I do have a question, would like to participate, I can edit this out if not but would you like to participate in providing something like a drawing for the Facebook group?
[01:30:44] Rachna Patel: Yes. We could do a free drawing for a book. What I can do is I could put up a post. Do you have a group? I think you have the group, don’t you? Facebook group?
[01:30:53] Ashley James: Yes. Learn True Health Facebook group.
[01:30:56] Rachna Patel: Yes. I think I’m actually a part of it. What I can do is out a post, I’ll share a post through my page and that can just be shared. It’s worked for me before but basically whoever shares it, likes it, tags other people will end up running a book.
[01:31:17] Ashley James: Awesome. That’ll be great. Normally, I do the post in the Facebook group but you can do the post. It’s totally fine. So listeners just jump in to the Facebook group after listening to this. Go to Learn True Health in Facebook, find the group or you can go to learntruehealth.com/group that’ll redirect you to the group. Look for Doctor Patel’s post and we’ll have it up for about a week after we publish this episode and comment in order to enter to win her book, to win it for free.
[01:31:51] Rachna Patel: Okay. Awesome.
[01:31:52] Ashley James: All right. Fantastic. It’s been wonderful having you back on the show. Is there anything that you would like to say to wrap up today’s interview or anything left unsaid?
[01:32:03] Rachna Patel: No. I would just tell your listeners just to tune in on my YouTube channel and I’ll continue to answer more questions on there.
[01:32:10] Ashley James: All right. Fantastic. Well, it’s been great having you back on the show.
[01:32:14] Rachna Patel: Thank you for having me. I appreciate it.
Hello, true health seeker. Have you ever thought about becoming a health coach? Do you love learning about nutrition and how we can shift our lifestyle and our diet so that we can gain optimal health and happiness and longevity? Do you love helping your friends and family to solve their health problems and figure out what they can do to eat healthier? Are you interested in becoming someone who can grow their own business, support people in their success? Do you love helping people? You might be the perfect candidate to become a health coach. I highly recommend checking out the Institute for Integrated Nutrition. I just spent the last year in their health-coaching sort of vacation program and it really blew me away. It was so amazing. I learned over a hundred dietary theories. I learned all about nutrition but from the standpoint on how we can help people to shift their life, to shift their lifestyle to gain true holistic health. I definitely recommend you check them out. You can google Institute for Integrated Nutrition or IIN, or give them a call or you can go to learntruehealth.com/coach and you can receive a free module of their training. So check it out and see if it’s something that you’d be interested in. Be sure to mention my name, Ashley James and the Learn True Health podcast because I made a deal with them that they would give you the best price possible. I highly recommend checking it out. It really changed my life to be in their program. I’m such a big advocate that I wanted to spread this information. We need more health coaches. In fact, health coaching is the largest growing career right now in the health field. So many health coaches are getting in and helping people because you can work in chiropractic offices, doctor’s offices, you can work in hospitals. You can work online through Skype and help people around the world. You can become an author. You can go into the school system and help with your local schools shift their programs to help children be healthier. You can go into senior centers and help them to shift their diet and lifestyle to best support them and their success and their health goals. There’s so many different available options for you when you become a certified health coach. So check out IIN. Check out the Institute for Integrated Nutrition. Mention my name. Get the best deal. Give them a call and they’ll give you lots of free information and help you to see if this is the right move for you. Classes are starting soon. The next round of classes are starting at the end of the month, so you’re going to want to call them now and check it out. If you know anyone in your life who would be an amazing coach, please tell them about it. Being a health coach is so rewarding and you get to help so many people.
Are you looking to get the best supplements at the lowest price? For high-quality supplements and to talk to someone about what supplements are best for you, go to takeyoursupplements.com and one of our fantastic true health coaches will help you pick out the right supplements for you that are highest quality and the best price. That’s takeyoursupplements.com. Be sure to ask about free shipping and our awesome referral program.
https://www.skinterrupt.com
http://www.healthyskinshow.com
https://www.learntruehealth.com/ways-to-make-healthy-skin
Discover how Jennifer Fugo, a Clinical Nutritionist embarked her journey on finding out the various root causes of different skin conditions like eczema and psoriasis. Be inspired as she narrates how she overcame her painful experience of having skin condition called Dyshidrotic eczema. Moreover, know whether topical treatment really work as well as the do’s and don’ts of treating skin conditions.
Are you looking to optimize your health? Are you looking to get the best supplements at the lowest price? For high quality supplements and to talk to someone about what supplements are best for you, go to takeyoursupplements.com and one of our fantastic true health coaches will help you pick out the right supplements for you that are the highest quality and the best price– that’s takeyoursupplements.com Be sure to ask about free shipping and our awesome referral program.
[00:43:00] Ashley James: Welcome to the Learn true health podcast. I’m your host Ashley James. This is Episode 360.
We’re in for such a treat today. We have back on the show with us Jennifer Fugo, she was with us on Episode 198. That’s a lot of episodes between when we last had you on, we talked about your gluten free school which is now transitioning to have your gluten free school be underneath your umbrella of Jenniferfugo.com but that’s not what we’re here to talk about today but listeners can definitely go back to Episode 198 and listen to your story and great advice around going gluten free.
Today’s episode is all about skin health. I hear almost weekly from my listeners about rashes, skin irritation and hives– histamine issue. The list goes on and on. Some people have skin issues that they have been diagnosed like eczema or psoriasis and others just have these rashes pop up and they’re itchy and or scaly skin and or acne. All these skin issues on the outside, wearing our illness on the outside, we become so self-conscious because everyone can see what’s going on. We really want to get to the root of it. You’re here today to share with us how we can interrupt those old patterns and create wonderful skin health. Jennifer’s podcast is called the Healthy Skin Show and her website is skinterrupt.com— combinations of the words skin and interrupt which is really cool. Jennifer, welcome back to the show.
[02:38:00] Jennifer Fugo: Thank you so much for having me, Ashley. I have to tell you, this is one of the podcasts that I feel deeply honored to be back because you are an amazing person and you’ve led the charge in helping so many people change their lives. You just got such a great audience as well. It’s just a deep honor to be here for the second time. Thank you for having me back.
[03:01:00] Ashley James: Well, thank you. I’m really excited for you to help all of our listeners who have skin issues to resolve them today. For those who didn’t get to hear you in Episode 198, can you take us back? Share a bit about your story and what led you to want to work with people in order to correct their health and heal their skin.
[03:25:00] Jennifer Fugo: Yes. What was interesting when we talked in the previous episode it was mostly about the Gut issues that I had struggled with. If we fast forward a bunch, I went to Grad School to become a Clinical Nutritionist because while I had loved working with people from the food perspective I really wanted to dive deeper into underlying reasons that were driving Autoimmune Disease and inflammatory conditions. I love biochemistry. I learned that I love it however, in the process of going to Grad School and being under an enormous amount of stress. I started to develop these– I don’t know how to describe them other than it would look like these little crystals, like little balls underneath my skin on my fingers. I was like, “What is that?” It looked almost like a white head but it wasn’t. I couldn’t figure out what it was, I couldn’t get them. I didn’t feel anything just under my skin and I never noticed them before.
As the summer kind of went into full force, the area became increasingly red and itchy then eventually, those little pustules burst. I thought, “Did I get poison ivy?” I’m like, trying to figure out what it is. I’ve never had that in my life. I went to my dad who’s a doctor and he’s like, “Oh, it’s some sort of dermatitis.” I was like, “Dermatitis? What is that?” It turns out that I did not have some random dermatitis. I had developed a condition called Dyshidrotic eczema, it’s a type of eczema but it affects the hands and the feet. Fortunately, it only affected my hands which has this good positive benefits because I didn’t have a problem walking but in the same respect affecting the palms of your hands can have a major detriment upon your life.
That summer I watched as what became these little rashes turn into massive patches of red skin that cover the palms of my hands up to the sides and the webbing of my fingers down the tops of the fingers and even started to destroy the nails themselves.
You might say like, “That stinks. Your hands are itchy.” Let me just tell you that if you’ve never had eczema on your hands, I’m not saying that it’s any better or worse than anybody else’s different types of eczema, they have but it’s a real challenge to open doorknobs. I couldn’t exercise anymore. I had a really hard time holding anything. I had to wear these blue gloves that I bought at a Home Depot because I couldn’t touch anything. I couldn’t wash my hands anymore because water burns so badly. I couldn’t wash my hair or take a shower.
It really impacts your life a lot. If you have rashes elsewhere, you can cover them up a lot of times with clothing but when it’s the palms of your hands and it’s the middle of summer it’s very difficult to avoid when you meet a new person to not shake their hand. When people see that your hands look all red, rashy, and oozy, you have some sort of infection, they don’t want to touch your hands to shake it. I was in so much physical discomfort and also this horrible sense of being dirty or disgusting. Almost like you’re a leper in modern day and there was no way for me to hide it. You walk around with baby blue gloves on, everybody can see that and like “Why are you wearing those?”
I went to a dermatologist. They basically said steroid creams and Vaseline to keep the moisture. I’m like “Vaseline, like how impractical and I wouldn’t want to put a petroleum-based derivative on my skin that’s all open and whatnot.” As the winter came around, those red burning, oozing, itchy rashes turned into incredibly fragile dry skin. Remember, it’s all on my hands, every time I would bend my fingers, it would break. I ended up with what felt like 1000 paper cuts all over my hand.
I’ve tried all sorts of stabs. I used to wear gloves to bed to try and keep the moisture in these fabric gloves. I was just desperate for relief and it would come and go. Finally, I just had enough. I was a nutritionist at this point and I felt ashamed, to be honest with you. I thought that I’m supposed to be this pinnacle of health and here I am having this really serious condition. People don’t even want to touch me; they don’t want to shake my hand. How can I go give a talk with blue gloves on? I had to stop taking cooking classes and whatnot. My husband, I have to credit him with being the inspiration for writing my attitude and showing me that this could be an opportunity for me to look at myself as a client and say, “What would you do to help yourself if you walked into your office?” That was what set me down the path of thinking, maybe there is something else that I can do while Google hadn’t turned up very much that was helpful. Maybe I need to think about this from a different perspective and that’s really where my journey began. I can tell you that I have been completely 100% in remission for at least the last year and a half.
No more flares. I’ve been really appreciative of all the connections that I’ve made and I’m very passionate now about sharing everything that I learned with people who are stuck in this boat of suffering from skin rashes.
[09:34:00] Ashley James: When we were talking before we hit record, you said that since we last spoke, you are going in a new direction that is so authentic to who you are. Now having heard this side of your story, I can really hear the authenticity in your voice that this is your calling although the gluten-free school was definitely mission-driven. You were definitely out to help people to heal at the root level their skin is your calling. I can definitely hear that passion in your voice and it’s very exciting because I’ve known many people with skin issues that were suffering like you were for years and all they were given from medical doctors was steroids.
I knew one woman who was in her early 20s. She had been on the steroids since she was six years old. It was $700 a month. If she wasn’t on it, she couldn’t leave the house. She was in agony. Her entire body from head to toe was covered in eczema so bad that her whole body would burn. One year someone stole her purse and she didn’t have an extra $700 to buy the cream and so she suffered for a whole month until she could get the money together to buy an extra tube. I had said to her, “Have you ever read the side effects?” She came back almost crying because it said do not take for more than two weeks. She was about 21 at the time and she’d been on it since she was six. This meets the number one side effect and concern– the reason why they say discontinue after two weeks is that it causes cancer.
[11:30:00] Jennifer Fugo: The other piece too is one side effect– it’s a major problem known by different names. It’s called Red Burning Skin Syndrome. It’s also called Topical Steroid Addiction or Topical Steroid Withdrawal. When you are constantly on topical steroids your skin essentially develops an addiction to the steroid cream because the steroids are a pot of water that’s boiling over except you put a lid on it and the steroid cream is the lid. You’re keeping the inflammation that’s bubbling up under the surface but there’s still something going on. You take that steroid cream away and all of a sudden the symptom goes completely haywire. For example, you have eczema on the front of your thighs, you’ve been using a steroid cream for a really long time but you decide, “I’m going to go cold turkey. I’m just going to get rid of it, not going to use it anymore.” What can happen if you develop this condition? Now, the steroid creams are gone, the rash will get worse. Not only will it get worse but it will spread and alert many cases where it spreads to your entire body. It creates such a level of pain and suffering that is horrific for many people.
It’s flaky skin, red, itchy stinging rashes that are all over. Not just in the original place where the eczema or the rash was. You can end up with swelling, fatigue, infections, increased skin sensitivity and this can take up to a year to go away. There is a real concern that there is a lack of coaching amongst dermatologists and primary care doctors who are just saying “Oh, we’ll use a steroid cream.” Additionally, the other issue is that while you are putting this on the skin, it can thin the skin as well. It’s another long term problem. You can end up with discoloration and scarring but it also can affect your adrenal because you’re putting a steroid cream on your skin that is absorbed into the body.
There is really fascinating yet sad research demonstrating that the start long term steroid cream use does impact adrenal gland function. It’s even worse in children and babies because they’re so small and so young. I’m not saying anyone listening to this should stop using their steroid creams or throw them away. I think there’s a way to use them responsibly while you’re trying to do other things. I certainly did use it on my journey which I’m happy to talk about to how I made my shift. I wanted just caution anyone listening “Oh, my gosh. It’s like poison. I have to throw it away.” Don’t do that.
[14:44:00] Ashley James: Right. Neither one of us is a doctor. We cannot prescribe drugs. We cannot tell people to get off of a prescription. You definitely want to work with your dermatologist when tight trading off of medication or off of a skin cream that is medicated.
I like your idea of why don’t we come in and work on the root cause. Nitrify the body, correct the diet and lifestyle, figure out what happened that created this illness in the first place. Heal the body that way and get the body so strong that we can come off of the steroid cream, slowly while we’re bolstering the body and then we can have a smoother transition. Is that what you did? Did you have a smooth transition?
[15:34:00] Jennifer Fugo: No.
[15:39:00] Ashley James: Did you just throw your cream and go cold turkey?
[15:42:00] Jennifer Fugo: No. I was having trouble sleeping through the night. I would wake up sometimes and had discovered that I was scratching my hands in the middle of the night and then rip gashes in my skin. Discuss it with your doctor but the goal is to use the steroid cream as little as possible and as least frequent as possible. There are different theories like you’re on for so long and then you go off of it and you sort of alternate back and forth. I would just try to use it as sparingly as possible. In actuality, it’s interesting because there’s a lot of root causes. Right now I’m up to 16. There’s overlap amongst a few of them. It was 15, I recently added 16th, which is actually drug reactions.
A lot of people don’t realize that there are very common medications that can trigger your skin rashes and even things like psoriasis.
There are actual medications with psoriasis that can trigger problems. It’s important to understand that it’s not just a skin problem. I think that’s an important place to preface this conversation. I like to think of the body like ancient technology. The way it tells us things, communicates and sends us messages is sort of like through smoke signals. I wish it was computer technology but it’s not. We would be like, “Oh, yes. My vitamin A is low.” We would just know that right off the bat but we don’t instead, we have to get all of these random symptoms. The other piece to this is that the skin as far as priorities of Oregon systems are concerned is the lowest on the totem pole. You could walk around with gashes and wounds due to rashes that will not heal but if God forbid something happens to your heart or your brain or your lungs, you will die because those organs are more important. You can’t survive if your thyroid function is non-existent or if you don’t have any function in your mitochondria. That underscores the importance of saying, “What type of skin rash condition I have? What if the symptoms themselves are actually symptoms of something else going on deeper in the body?” Take a look and say, “What can we ask our team from within and outside to help us put the pieces together?” There are a lot of root causes. Typically, in my experience, people have a combination of about three to five which is why, unfortunately what may work for one person, may not work for another person.
Do you want me to just share quickly what my list is?
[19:05:00] Ashley James: Yeah. I’ve got a pen and paper here. I’ve already written down number one which is drug reactions and waiting to write down the next 15.
[19:14:00] Jennifer Fugo: All right. We’ve got number two which is Mitochondrial Dysfunction — poor energy generation at the cellular level and we’re not efficiently producing ATP. We’ve got Hormone imbalances, Unmanaged stress, Heavy metals, Environmental toxins –that could even include like paint fumes, raid on, off gassing, new carpeting or paints—
[19:45:00] Ashley James: Mattresses, Memory Foam, off gases. I think there are eight carcinogens in memory foam.
[19:50:00] Jennifer Fugo: Exactly. Your jeans certainly play a role in some of this and we can talk more about that if you’d like. Diet and Food reactions are a piece of it but they are not as big of a piece as a lot of people think. Microbiome Dysbiosis is another one however when I say this, I want to clarify that this includes not just the gut microbiome but also the microbiome that lives on the skin and they are different, however, they communicate with one another.
[20:23:00] Ashley James: Can I just rub yogurt on my face? Would that help the microbiome on the skin?
[20:32:00] Jennifer Fugo: For some people, they might find that works. I know that people who don’t really have horrible skin conditions and maybe they’ve just got some dry skin may find that helpful. For a lot of people that do have skin rash conditions, there’s usually a lot more involved than just a yogurt mask.
I wish it was that easy but not always. Environmental allergies are another piece to that– like pollen, dogs, cats, horses, cockroaches. There are also a lot of chemicals in our environment that I personally never even knew about until I started really digging into this. These are formaldehyde– all sorts of things that are coding. Very common substances or items that we use in our daily life that you wouldn’t think had any chemical sprayed on them and they do. You can even have an allergy to your shoes. Some people who have rashes, severe cracking and pain with their feet can have Shoe Allergy. There are definite environmental allergies that have to be identified and looked at.
Nutritional deficiencies certainly play a role in skin rash conditions. Autoimmunity and Autoinflammation, I consider those to be sort of in the same bucket. Gut Dysfunction and Liver Detox Challenges. We’ve also got trauma. Maybe your father died at a very young age and obviously, as a child that was traumatic for you. Maybe you were in a bad marriage or you went through a period of time where you lost your home or one of the crashes and whatnot. It could be anything from a really big trauma to little tiny trauma. I’ve even had some people discuss sexual assault in the past and whatnot. And then last but not least, thyroid dysfunction.
[22: 42:00] Ashley James: I think I wrote down 17. We’ve got the Environmental Allergens and the Environmental Toxins which were different. I wrote down 17. You got 17 root causes now.
[23:06:00] Jennifer Fugo: Maybe I do.
[23: 11:00] Ashley James: It totally makes sense. A few of them relate to histamine. When you say Diet reactions and Environmental Allergens both would trigger histamine. Is histamine the root cause? Is histamine what’s causing the skin issue?
[23:36:00] Jennifer Fugo: What’s interesting is that not everybody has an issue with histamine. When it comes to eczema, some people can have more histamine present. They have chronic urticaria or hives that can also certainly be a concern. There’s too much histamine in their system or they’re consuming foods– lots of fermented foods are not always good for people with chronic skin issues. One of the first questions I asked someone on the phone is “Oh, well, I have ecz.” I go, “Okay, can you please tell me the symptoms of your experience of that particular skin condition?” They sometimes pause and they’re like “Why? That’s what I have.” I’m like, “I understand but your symptoms are going to be different than someone else’s. You can’t assume that because you have eczema or you have psoriasis. It’s the same exact problem that’s triggered this issue.”
I have had clients who some have histamine issues and I’m part of their eczema issue. I have other clients with eczema who have no issues with histamine at all.
[24: 48:00] Ashley James: Very cool. So, histamine isn’t at the root cause but it can be sort of the trigger.
[24:56:00] Jennifer Fugo: Exactly.
[24: 59:00] Ashley James: How do you feel about going through each one and unpacking them?
[25:03:00] Jennifer Fugo: I don’t know if we have time for all of that. We can certainly talk about a few of them.
The one that we started with number one, the drug reactions piece was the most shocking to me because a lot of people assume that over the counter drugs are safe. Again, this conversation is not meant to at all demonize medication because my dad’s a doctor and a surgeon and frankly, I don’t necessarily think with skin issues, we should throw the baby out with the bathwater and say, “Oh, we don’t need any of the medications that are available.” I don’t actually think that’s entirely true. I think there are a time and a place and whatever you choose to do you should jump in with your eyes wide open. The biggest piece people are promised is “Oh, if you take this pill or you get the shots, you’re going to be better.”
I literally had a conversation with a woman this morning that has horrible full-body eczema. She has been on Dupixent which is one of the biologic drugs that is supposed to be the spike Godsend to completely cure your eczema so you no longer have it and you walk around eczema free. She said it makes her living experience more tolerable however, she still has incredible itching; her face looks like it’s constantly burnt. The Dupixent has not fully addressed her issue and she’s like, “I can’t live like this. I need to find out what is driving the inflammation underneath the whole thing!”
With psoriasis, there were some really surprising drugs and I only found this out because a woman who tuned in to my Eczema and Psoriasis Awareness Week last year had rung me and said, “Did you know that a blood pressure medication could actually cause your psoriasis.” I was like, “Excuse me.” It turns out that these very common medications are called Beta-blockers as well as Ace inhibitors. Those are two classes and there are also Angiotensin Receptor Blockers. All three of those have the potential to trigger or worsen psoriasis for people.
Other ones that you might also be surprised about are like Lithium. If you’ve been taking Lithium to help with your mood, you can have skin-related side effects. We see that for about up to 45% of people who take them and who take those supplements.
Anti-infection medications– one very common is Plaquenil. There are people who take that that can cause flares on about 31% of people who have psoriasis. Plaquenil is considered an Immunosuppressant drug. The other class of medications which maybe you’ve talked about on your show is the Fluoroquinolones which are a class of antibiotics that actually in at least in the United States has a warning placed on it by the FDA because of so many problems with it. The most popular drugs that people probably know is Cipro. Aside from the fact that there are potential issues with how it can damage mitochondrial function, this is one of those drug classes that can actually cause problems for people with psoriasis and other skin issues. Tetracycline, interferon, and TNF or tumor necrosis factor alpha-inhibitors medication can do this. A lot of these are biologic medications which shockingly are medications that are prescribed to people with psoriasis and psoriatic arthritis like Remicade and Humira. I’m not trying to scare people. The point is to say, “Hey, I really actually should read what the side effects could be.” While the 2% doesn’t seem like a lot, what happens if you are the 2%?
I’ve talked about with the Gut stuff and said drugs– non-steroidal anti-inflammatories like ibuprofen but that can also trigger or worsen psoriasis as well. There’s a lot of gut involvement with enzymes that can increase gut permeability, as well as the risk of Gut bleeding throughout either the stomach or the GI system. It’s important, as far as drugs are concerned, to just take a look at all the medications that you’re on and double-check that they aren’t maybe the reason for why this happened. Think back to the time around when the rashes started in. Did you start medication? You know, it’s important to think about these types of things.
The most common piece to a lot of this that I see is typically Gut Dysfunction. When I say dysfunction, I actually include Gut infections or Dysbiosis and the NutritionalDeficiencies piece– those two are huge problems.
[30: 08:00] Ashley James: Let’s get into those then. I do have a question about drugs. Have you seen that some people have their skin problem because it was triggered by a drug that they were on? Let’s say a course of antibiotics like the tetracycline. Or they were on a blood pressure medication and now they’re no longer taking it, the drugs are no longer in their system but the skin issues still there? Is the drug what triggered it and turned it on? They have four or five other things all contributing to their inflammation now, those other issues are continuing it. Do you see the drugs kind of like start the fire? Or do you find that when drugs are the reason why that they have a skin problem, that when they switch their medication or get off of a drug that the skin issue goes away?
[31:04:00] Jennifer Fugo: That’s really complicated because if you took one of these antibiotics, it’s like dropping a bomb in your gut. At that point, whether you stay on that antibiotic or not, you’ve now dramatically impacted the makeup of your microbiome. You allow for opportunistic bugs to go crazy; yeast and fungal organisms. If you inhale, swallow or eat contaminated foods that get through your stomach, you can end up with infections. That’s a tricky question. I don’t know that I actually have the answer to that. A lot of people have these things in their past. That’s a bigger problem from what I see on my end.
Gut is one piece to this however, new research is telling us that there are very distinct communication conduit, so to speak between the microbiome in the gut and the microbiome that is on the skin. To be clear in case anybody’s thinking, “Oh, well, the bugs must be the same.” They’re not. There are similar classes of bacteria or phyla of bacteria but they’re not the same exact types because the bacteria on the skin eat lipids, it’s called a Lipid dome. Whereas the bugs that live in the digestive system really prefer to eat fiber. We know about FodMap foods and fermented foods.
Researchers showing us that when you have a healthy microbiome and you’re eating plenty of fermented fibers, they will produce their waste products called Short Chain Fatty Acids. Those Short Chain Fatty Acids are really important for the acidification of the gut microbiome because you actually want a more acidic colon. You don’t want an alkaline colon but you don’t want it to be too acidic.
The body regions, as far as pH is concerned need to be within very specific ranges in order to maintain a certain level of health. Part of the reasons why it’s too crowd out is there are bugs that shouldn’t be there. What research is telling us now about Short Chain Fatty Acids is that they actually communicate – that is the communication device of how the bugs in your gut are then establishing a healthy microbiome balance on the skin and butyrate which is one of the three. There are actually three short chain fatty acids but butyrate is one of the most important ones. When we have enough butyrate that can really help rebalance the microbiome of the skin — it’s not to say it’s going to fix all of your problems but you have to ask yourself, “Why don’t I have enough butyrate? Why don’t I have enough acetate or propionate? Why don’t I have enough of these?” It’s like an onion, you’re peeling back the layers. Do I have an infection? Do I have Gut Dysbiosis? What’s going on in the Gut? Am I not eating enough fiber? You have to really take a look at what’s under the hood so to speak. What is going on in the gut can show up on the skin.
I’m currently working with a boy whose 13 years old and unfortunately when we did stool test on him he came back having the most Gut infections I have ever had a client have. It was no wonder that nothing they did topically would work because it was so many problems underneath the surface and as a result the gut is no longer in a state where it wants to invite in nutrients because it’s leaky.
You don’t have to have gut symptoms to have Gut infections or dysbiosis. I have clients who have really messed up skin and they swear to me up and down, “I poop like a champ, poop 123 times a day. I’m really good. No problems, there are no gas, no bloating, no nothing.” They’re still tests come back with dysbiosis, too much yeast or infections. It just so happens that it manifest on the skin in that particular case. Don’t write off a Gut issue just because you don’t have any gas or bloating or you poop normal. It’s really important to look at the puzzle without judgment and take a look from the very basic things. I’m sure you know too, you do that with your clients. It’s always like, what’s going on with digestive function? Are we eating good quality food? Are we bringing in enough nutrients? That’s a big piece to this puzzle.
[36: 30:00] Ashley James: You mentioned a stool test, do you look at parasites? In some way, we could consider yeast, Candida as a parasite. Parasites don’t have to all be worms. It could be worms and flukes. Looking at parasites, is that something you’d add to your list as potentially causes for skin problems?
[36:57:00] Jennifer Fugo: Yes, absolutely. You’re looking at anything that shouldn’t or either shouldn’t be in the gut or isn’t too high of a proportion. Everybody under the sun has Candida in their gut. You should actually have it. It’s actually a normal commensal organism. You just shouldn’t have it in excessive amounts. We’re looking for fungal organisms and all different types. It doesn’t necessarily have to be Candida Albicans, Giardia– anything that really shouldn’t be there. There are certainly ways if we suspect for example that somebody who’s traveled extensively overseas. I have one client that did many tours over in Africa while he was working for a nonprofit. He’s living in the villages and eating their food and I was like, “You got to get checked for worms. You have to.” You have worms and parasites because you have a level of potential exposure that most people don’t have. A dermatologist can’t figure out what’s going on. It’s also Gut function making sure that you have enough stomach acid, that you’ve got enough digestive enzymes being produced by your pancreas and have enough bile. If you don’t have your gallbladder anymore, you’re not able to absorb fats. Nutritional deficiencies are a big piece to this if you don’t have enough vitamin A and vitamin D, which are both fat soluble or if your gut is just super leaky you have a higher incidence of fats being lost out of the stool.
If the gut is super leaky and unhappy, you can end up with Keratosis Pilari. That’s a very common sign of vitamin A deficiency where you get those little like chicken skin bumps on the back of the arms and whatnot. Vitamin D is also very important for the skin as well. The Gut is a big first piece to consider.
[39: 04:00] Ashley James: I love that you pointed that out. I was getting on the Examination Table when I was pregnant, my naturopath held my arm to help me—a giant pregnant lady trying to get on the examination table and her hand touched my elbow and she went, “Oh, you’re vitamin D deficient. We need to increase your vitamin D.” I’m looking at her like “What are you, psychic? You just touched me and you know I’m vitamin D deficient.” She goes, “No, you’ve got these dry patches on your elbow.” I’d never had them and I reached over and touch my elbow like “What is going on?” I could like sand wood with this skin around my arm. All the skin around my elbow was like sandpaper and she said, “Yeah, that’s typical vitamin D deficiency.” Sure enough, increase my vitamin D went away. I was like,” What? How can that does so cool?”
You’re right. If someone doesn’t have their gallbladder, their diet and digestion isn’t allowing them to take in the fat soluble vitamins, digest them and absorb them and utilize them then we can end up with skin problems because those are the raw building blocks the body needs to create skin. What’s amazing about skin is that it is the reflection of our internal health and it’s the early warning system– it’s the canary in the coal mine. Instead of being upset when we have a skin problem, we can take on this level of excitement, “Oh, great. My body is telling me something’s wrong. There’s something that I can correct now, way before it becomes disease in the body.”
I only have so much vitamin C and the skin needs it but the body is so intelligent that it’ll take the nutrients we give it and it’ll give it to the organs that are most important first. That’s why when we get thin hair, our skin starts to suffer and our nails start to become brittle. These lesser important systems of the body will see the effects of Nutrient Deficiency first before the heart and the liver does so we can correct it. The good news is it’s on our body where we can clearly see there’s something wrong.
[41:31:00] Jennifer Fugo: It is. One piece of this which is worth mentioning because it’s a term that has become more popular is Leaky Gut. A lot of people haven’t yet or are just hearing about a term called Leaky Skin. It actually doesn’t sound that lovely and it sounds awful.
[42: 01:00] Ashley James: It sounds like a zombie show.
[42:04:00] Jennifer Fugo: Yeah, it’s just not good. Leaky Skin is essentially where there’s so much inflammation happening within the body and at the level of the skin. It’s both internal and the outside. I think we have to look outside in and inside out– that’s really the two directions we need to look with skin.
Let me just break this down a little bit for people. How do I end up with inflammation on the outside? Yes, it could certainly be due to a microbiome imbalance. You could have staph infection or overgrowth of any number of things but also just itching– itching in and of itself increases the inflammation in the skin which is another reason why I said don’t just throw out your steroid creams because you do to some degree have to try as you’re working on the “alternative and natural stuff”. You have to maintain some level of not just sanity but to decrease the amount of gashing that you’re doing to your skin trying to stop or quell that itch.
When we think about what the skin really is– it’s like a bunch of bricks or the shingles of a house. We start to see a breakdown of the glue that holds the shingles together in one nice pattern that will help A. retain moisture within the skin but also B. keep things very smooth and lovely looking.
What’s really fascinating is that there is this gene called Filaggrin. We see that there is an increased rate of Filaggrin dysfunction. Filaggrin is a gene but it also codes for a very specific protein called Filaggrin that helps keep the skin barrier nice and tight. When we start to see when inflammation elevates, it disrupts the way that the gene is coded and you start getting funky filaggrin that can’t really operate correctly.
A lot of the research and the interviews that I’ve done show that people who have hand eczema have a higher increased risk of having just an actual genetic snip in Filaggrin. You don’t necessarily need to have a snip in it to have an issue with the way your body produces Filaggrin. I talked to Dr. Peter Leo who’s a very well respected and brilliant dermatologist. He had said that just any level of inflammation, whether it’s from scratching or its internal will cause a disruption in the way the body produces Filaggrin. It’s critical to try to reduce the inflammation no matter what you need to do because that is really a big deal. I just want to also specify that this isn’t just affecting people with eczema, it also affects people with psoriasis and I would likely assume that it probably affects people with other chronic skin rash conditions as well. There are other genes out there that we should be aware of per se but if you’ve got an autoimmune condition like psoriasis or scleroderma there are typically genes associated with those conditions. There is some level of genetic susceptibility. Filaggrin is probably the number one to really pay attention to but there’s no way inexpensively to get tested for this. I don’t know if you can find out from 23andMe test. At the end of the day, I’m not really sure what value would do if you even found out you had a snip on it but genes certainly play a role.
When you have this Leaky Skin condition which most people have when they have skin issues, it’s really important to be judicious about what you’re putting on your skin and what you are eating. I don’t want to make people crazy with their diet— that’s always my fear. I don’t want to instill food fear in people because you’re always going, “What’s the next thing we can take out? What’s the next thing we should avoid? What’s bad for us?” We are oftentimes kind of get lost amongst the trees. I always think, “Let’s try and eat the most nutrient-rich diet humanly possible.” Cut out the junk, just cut it out– that’s the first step. Cut it out because if you came to see me, that’s the first thing that I’m going to tell you to do. We’ve got to make sure that its nutrient rich because that way we’re not just supporting the skin but our thyroid and liver. We’re supporting many different areas that require nutrients in order to function properly.
Coconut oil is not something that anyone with skin rashes should put on their skin. I even am at a point where I’m starting to wonder if it’s not the greatest idea for people who have perfectly clear skin as well. You’ve got to be really judicious about what you put on your skin. There are a lot of products at grocery stores and pharmacies that are geared toward super dry skin and their eczema formulas — those things are formulated in such a way that you constantly require the use of them. They actually dry your skin out so you keep using them. We go to the natural stuff and the first thing people read about online is coconut oil and it’s really not a good idea for rashes.
[48:27:00] Ashley James: Why is that?
[48:30:00] Jennifer Fugo: Remember how I was telling you that the colon is an actually an acidic environment, the skin is as well. Your skin ideally should have a pH between 4.5 and five, maybe 5.5. It’s a tight little slice of the pH scale and that’s healthy. For those who think like everything’s got to be alkaline. It is actually healthy for certain areas to be acidic.
Coconut oil– first of all, it’s way too alkaline. It comes in and around a pH of eight. When I said that it is important that the colon is acidic because if it gets imbalanced and the pH goes high or low, it invites in organisms that shouldn’t live there and the same happens with the skin– that’s number one. You might be thinking, “What if you have like bad bugs living on your skin? Wouldn’t you want it because it’s really antimicrobial?” It makes complete sense– that’s what I used to think but unfortunately, coconut oil is so incredibly anti-microbial that it decimates the microbiome on the skin leaving it wide open for opportunistic bugs to take up residence, which is not what you want.
If you got the skin rashes, we know right there you’ve got some state of Leaky Skin. You’ve also likely got Dysbiosis on the skin. Is it really smart? Think about it. If you know you’ve got Dysbiosis, would you just throw antibiotics? You’d be like, “No, that doesn’t make any sense.” I’m not saying Coconut oil is an antibiotic but you have to understand that the level of anti-microbial capacity of coconut oil is way too high for your skin.
Oftentimes, people just put oil on the skin. The bugs don’t just like magically repack back up. They don’t reappear because it takes time to reestablish a microbiome. The last big problem is that the molecules are so saturated and the molecules of coconut oil are so large. It’s very difficult for them to actually penetrate into the skin which is why it oftentimes feels that coconut oil will stay on the surface of the skin. It does not absorb in and sometimes it causes hot situation on the skin which is very uncomfortable for people. It makes it difficult for the skin to breathe.
I’ve even had a few people describe it to me as kind of felt almost like I had saran wrap around my arm or whatever. I just didn’t put two and two together. I will say just from a clinical perspective, I have had more and more clients who have discovered that it was actually causing almost like an allergic reaction. I have one client that had severe swelling across her face and her eyes were all red and super itchy. She already had a rash there and read online on someone’s website that you should use coconut oil. She started using coconut oil and it was getting worse and worst. She couldn’t figure out what the problem was and finally came across this article that’s on my website about the issues with coconut oil. I advised her to stop within about a week; she noticed such a significant improvement. She’s like, “I have almost no rash on my face anymore. I had no idea that it was actually the coconut oil.”
We have a ton of comments from people who have acknowledged that coconut oil either made their skin rashes worse. I have one woman– a massage therapist that commented that she would always use coconut oil on clients and massage table. Her hands as a result have gotten so bad from using coconut oil. I love coconut oil. It’s not to demonize it or to say that it is bad but I think maybe we’ve gone a little too foreign assuming that it’s good for everything.
I have talked with experts who have done testing on the antimicrobial capacity of coconut oil and they advised me that it was not a good option. I have also talked to aestheticians who have a lot of experience in formulation and working with people with chronic skin conditions. They too also said it is really one of the worst choices. You need to look at your skincare products with skincare ingredient labels, the same applies as food. The first ingredients are the highest concentration and the lower ones are the least if it’s really in. I would say the top two thirds in the ingredients are probably not a good product for you to be using.
There are some instances where it may be okay for me, I wouldn’t mind if it’s one of the probably top two thirds. I wouldn’t use it if it was the first at all. I don’t have skin rashes anymore and I don’t use a whole lot of oils anymore on my skin aside from Ahava. If you have got skin Dysbiosis you should not go anywhere near coconut oil.
[54:14:00] Ashley James: I know everyone’s different because someone might react and the other person thinks it’s wonderful. There’s no blanket statement, we all have to do trial and error. What are your favorite ingredients that are helpful for supporting skin health when they’re also working on healing themselves internally?
[54:38:00] Jennifer Fugo: I love Ahava oil because it is the closest to the human sebum. It’s just very nice and inexpensive as well. Sesame seed oil, not the stuff you cook with but the actual stuff made for body care can be great. I find that if you’re in a cold environment or winter time it’s great because it’s very warming. In the summertime, it’s probably too heavy and it also has a really intense smell so you might not want to put that on as your daily oil. Avocado oil and Olive oil are really good options as well. There’s also some really interesting good research on sunflower oil and eczema.
As far as herbs are concerned, Calendula is amazing. Assuming, you don’t have an allergy to the daisy family since it is a part of the daisy family. Just make sure if you’ve got outdoor pollen allergy issues, you just want to make sure that that’s not one. I love stinging nettles but more so to support the liver. Stinging nettles and Quercetin together can be a really amazing support for histamine. It’s a great antioxidant as well.
As far as the skin is concerned, I think one of the biggest things is to stop showering every day. I know that sounds very simplistic but we oftentimes over shower and over sudsing. You do not need to suds your entire body– it is absolutely unnecessary unless you’re really filthy. A lot of times the water is enough and you should only be sudsing the armpits, groin and rear end. Showering every day can be really tough. Again, I’m not a doctor but my suggestion is to see if you can get down to showering every other day or every three days that way we’re just reducing the depletion of the healthy flora. Don’t be afraid to get outside and be in the dirt. There’s some incredible research that’s coming out about the circadian rhythm and being out in the sun assuming you can tolerate it, getting your hands in the dirt assuming you didn’t have some sort of hand eczema issue but exposing yourself to healthy bacteria. It can be super important and a lot of times the disconnection with the outdoor environment and excessive amounts of stressors in your life certainly play a role.
[58:04:00] Ashley James: Absolutely. Stress is huge. I like that you said to get out in nature. You’re getting vitamin D from the sun and you’re decreasing stress from bathing in nature. For example, digging in the dirt gardening– is there a link between interacting with the healthy bacteria in nature such as gardening and our skin’s bacteria?
[58:33:00] Jennifer Fugo: Absolutely. The more fascinating pieces that I’m constantly reading upon is the Microbiome and the Skin. One big problem is that we’ve reached over sanitizing everything. Everything is like kills 99.999% of bacteria. Why do we need to assume that all bacteria are going to kill us? It doesn’t mean they’re necessarily bad. There are not friendly bugs out there but we used to have an abundant population of what are known as Ammonia-Oxidizing Bacteria on the skin. They were considered the Peacekeepers of the skin.
We’re now seeing this rise within the skincare industry of companies that are essentially engineering probiotic-based skincare products to help reestablish that microbiome. I know that Mother Dirt is one company that specifically uses those ammonia-oxidizing bacteria. I’ve come across a number of other companies as well that are integrating probiotics into their product. I think Skin Probiotics is one company that’s specifically all the formulas are generated around probiotics. The big companies, I think it is L’Oreal– I don’t remember which big company but they’re coming out with now ways to test the acidity of your skin. I wouldn’t be surprised within the next probably two to five years we will eventually have a really easy at-home test for you to check the microbiome of your skin since the ones for the Gut have done so well.
Being outside is a critical piece. It can be hard for people who have a lot of environmental allergies, I do understand that. This is general advice and it may not work for everyone. You’re going to have to pick and choose what you can do and what will work for you.
Stress reduction is important not just for the body as a whole but stress can be a major trigger for so many things. There are a lot of people that have found the connection between stressors and their skin rash flares. Even with psoriasis, there’s some interesting research showing that there’s a real decrease in serum melatonin in people who have psoriasis. When we have low melatonin it can make it very difficult to sleep at night. When you’re not sleeping well or you’re just so uncomfortable and you’re itching like mad because your cortisol has gone high in the evening. As a result, there’s this really cool correlation between elevated cortisol and increased itching at night. We’re just not regenerating within our body the way we should and it’s incredibly stressful. It depletes our micronutrients. It depletes antioxidants. It really wears down your mitochondria and taxes your liver tremendously and it makes it a lot easier for your gut to become leaky.
We can argue that Leaky Gut comes from enzymes or gut infections or too much yeast. Stress plays a huge role in what happens in your Gut. It affects everything. We have to take that seriously and consider the solutions. “The solutions for stress reduction” as seriously as say the supplements you might want to go by because oftentimes what I find and I don’t know if this has been your experience as well Ashley, but a lot of times people are like, “Can I just take a supplement?” I’ll say, “Could you sit for two minutes a day and breathe? I’m really busy. I’ll try.” We’ll talk a month later I’m like, “So, how did the breathing exercises go?” “I do not like once and then I kind of forgot.”
I assure you, they’ve taken all their supplements just fine. I’m not laughing at anyone, it just makes me chuckle that the thing that’s free, oftentimes tends to be the hardest things for us to comply with because we don’t perceive the value of them to be as great as something that maybe cost you 3995.
[01:03:27] Ashley James: Anyone who’s listening, I will charge you 3995 and I’ll sit with you for two minutes a day. We’ll get on the phone, you’ll breathe and you can just pay me. I’ll just sit on the phone and we’ll breathe then you will value reducing your stress. People can pay to go to meditation classes and Yoga classes. You can pay for apps. There’s Calm Beats or something– they can pay for the pro version. There are things that we could pay to perceived more value. You’re right. The best ways of reducing stress are free– walking, journaling, breathing, hugging, laughing–.
[01:04:10] Jennifer Fugo: Put on your favorite music, sing and dance in the comforts of your own home. Dance like nobody’s watching you– there is something so freeing and uplifting to that. Prayer, mantras, whatever faith you are, there are prayers and there are ways to meditate in any religion.
If you’re really also feeling very down and out, reach out to someone who’s a professional and talk to them because the other piece to this is that these skin conditions are incredibly debilitating. They can be at times very painful. They are very embarrassing. They cause a tremendous amount of shame and there is a really sad increase risk of suicide associated with many of them.
I’m on these Facebook groups and people say, “I know this sounds so stupid but I don’t know where else to say this and I just need to say it. My mother in law keeps picking on me about my skin or this friend of mine made some nasty comment.” Those are not little things when you’re in the midst of suffering and the people around you go about it because they can’t relate to what someone’s going through. It really isn’t helpful.
For anyone listening to this too, if you’re like, “Oh, my sister has eczema or my husband has psoriasis.” If you’re listening to this, just understand that sometimes we just want someone to be present for us. We don’t necessarily want a solution or you to tell us how we don’t know to wash our hands or we don’t know what type of soap to use. It’s not really helpful. Oftentimes, you just want somebody to hear you and listen to you. You don’t necessarily want advice but if you’re really feeling very sad, one of the biggest pieces if you’re really feeling hopeless, go talk to somebody because there are people out there who understand. I think living with skin rashes which I did for about three years is really living in hell so I understand so acutely all the pain that people go through every day. On top of it, I work with clients now so I am privy to a lot of the things that they’re going through that I maybe didn’t.
Stress and Traumas are big pieces to this. There is actual scientific research to back that up. Understand that all the times we have to go out in public and you’ve got rashes everywhere is traumatizing. Every time people make comments or they just have that stare and they won’t stop staring at you. They are not really looking at you. They’re looking at your skin trying to figure out whether they want to be near you. It is traumatizing and stressful. We just want to feel accepted. I’m not comparing it at all to people who have those more like hidden diseases like Hashimoto where people think you are lazy because you are tired but you are not. It’s just a different type of hell that people go through. Know that no matter where you are on your journey there are people that understand you and you don’t necessarily have to go it alone. There are other things that you can do even if you feel like you’ve hit a wall and the doctor or dermatologists just shrug and don’t know what else to tell you. There are other options out there.
The big reason why I started Skinterrupt is that I felt that the way we were addressing these issues is so failed. It lacks empathy and understanding of the daily struggles that people go through. At this point, I cannot understand why it is acceptable to allow people to walk out of someone’s medical office time and time again in so much suffering and pain. That’s why I started Skinterrupt, I want to pull the curtain back and not just to help people find the alternatives that may work for them but to also say, “Hey, dermatology, we need to get with a program. This is not acceptable anymore. We need better options. You also have an obligation to tell your patients about all these other things that you’re not telling them.” What is cool about The Healthy Skin Show is that it is the opportunity that I have. We’re connecting with researchers, doctors, nutritionists, dietitians and even people who have gone through it. You can talk about their story in an empowering and uplifting way.
I’m sharing all of that with people because I don’t know what exactly your three to five root causes may be. I want to make sure that there is no excuse anymore and the research that’s out there doesn’t ever see the light of day. All of us deserve to know that there is incredible research going on that could impact our health. There are ways to do things that can dramatically change your daily experience living with skin rashes and maybe even help rebuild skin that’s healthy but we’re just not getting it from our doctors. Don’t get me wrong, we need them and I wish I would love to bring them into the fold. I’m collaborating with doctors right now who are working in a more integrative way and want to see this get out there. We as patients, we also need to demand better. What I’m just hoping is to not see another person suffer– that’s my goal. If I can just help one person I’d be happy today and I’ll be happy tomorrow. That’s why I’m doing this is because we deserve better.
[01:10:25] Ashley James: Yes, doctors have their place. Allopathic medicine has its place. We need to stop putting them on a pedestal and treat them like they are on our team of health professionals. They are not. We hire them not the other way around. We hire them as professionals and we need to make sure we find a doctor that doesn’t have hubris, doesn’t put their ego first, isn’t upset that we do our own research and doesn’t feel challenged when we advocate for ourselves. We need to find doctors and put them on our team and we need to make sure we have a team of professionals. We don’t just have one doctor, we have a team of professionals that we work with that advice, guide and help us. We’re the experts of our own body because we’re the ones living in it. We listen to our symptoms, we may not understand what the symptoms be that’s why we go to our experts for the tests and for the information just like people can go to you and work with you to do tests or you can go to your doctor and you and in naturopath. We can have multiple health professionals on our team. Let them know all what’s going on, get all of their input and do all of the tests we want to do. I want people to be empowered to know that we should never put a doctor on a pedestal.
They are not the end-all. They get almost no training in nutrition and a lot of doctors have been brainwashed in a sense to believe that food and nutrition are not really important. Now, a lot of doctors are waking up. They are getting more education outside of the mainstream MD Education. They are going towards integrative or functional medicine which is fantastic. We can also see professionals like naturopaths who always want to be on the cutting edge of the research and studies around how we can heal the body at the root level which is exactly what you’re doing. I love the list you outlined today. I think we have 18 things now because we included parasites. Your list keeps growing. It is important to see that it is not just cut out the gluten although that really helps. I recently had a naturopathic dermatologist in from Toronto on the show and she did say that she has never helped someone heal their skin if they stayed on gluten.
[01:13:05] Jennifer Fugo: I agree.
[01:13:07] Ashley James: There are certain things you need to stop eating like fried food. You can’t heal the body if you’re eating fries every day because the oils are horribly damaging. Gluten is damaging. People say, “Well, I got tested and I’m not celiac. I’m not allergic to gluten.” Our body can’t digests the proteins. They’re mechanically torn through the Gut and rip apart the microbiome, increase the leaky gut and do damage to the microbial. I know you’re absolutely in agreement that there are certain foods that we need to be diligent about when healing our body, our gut, and our skin.
In case someone’s listening to this and never considered cutting out junk food. I honor everyone listening wherever they are on their journey because I was there too, so was Jen. We’ve all been there and we’re all going to be on our healing journey together. What are the top junk foods that everyone benefits from removing? What are the top healing foods that everyone within reason benefits from because of the nutrient density of those foods?
[01:14:37] Jennifer Fugo: As far as junk foods, definitely fried, fast foods, and lots of packaged and refined. The standard diet here is pretty much not going to work. If you can get more healthy whole foods into your diet that will certainly help. It is just to crowd things out instead of being like, “Oh, my gosh. If you take everything away from me, what am I going to eat?” Super high sugar, sodas and fried foods are not great. Cured products like hot dogs and things. I’m not anti-hotdog. I eat meat but we have to look for better quality. We are looking at price over quality and then we’re over eating as a result. We’re taking in and consuming a ton of really refined junky inflammatory foods as a result.
I’m not trying to make any health claims about this. These are just foods that I find that a lot of people can be helped with as far as skin issues. As far as something that is healthy to add in, Ground flax can be really helpful however with a caveat. If you have diarrhea, it will probably not going to work for you and might make things worse. Avoid ground flax if you have diarrhea but if you don’t, one to two tablespoons a day is great. You can add it into a protein shake or your oatmeal or whatever it is that you’re consuming.
[01:16:25] Ashley James: Drink lots of water and get ready to poop.
[01:16:28] Jennifer Fugo: Yes. Oats are great for the skin. A lot has to do with the Beta-glucans that are associated with oats but just get certified gluten-free oats. Oats are contaminated with gluten as a result of the way that they are harvested and processed on machinery. It increases gut permeability which we don’t certainly want when we’re dealing with gut issues.
I love collagen. For people who do eat meat, or at least open to the idea of consuming collagen look specifically for types one and three. Those are the most beneficial for the skin as well as for your Gut. There’s some great research on that. I just want to specify that there is no such thing as a vegan or plant based version of collagen, even if you see that– that’s not collagen. They basically put together the raw ingredients like vitamin C and glycine and a bunch of other things and say hope that your body will remake collagen. I have yet to see research that those vegan collagens actually really make a big dent on the areas that we’re looking for. You can typically find beef, sometimes chicken but mostly beef and fish derived collagen products are what are on the market these days.
The other one is Ghee– believe it or not, is a really great skin food. Not to apply topically but to eat because it is pretty high in butyrate. We had talked about the butyrate being really important for your Gut and Ghee is high in butyrate. If you have a dairy allergy, that’s a completely different story. I would probably avoid Ghee if you have an allergy to dairy but if you just have sensitivity to dairy, or you’re lactose intolerant, Ghee will probably be okay because the milk proteins and the sugars are removed. I love adding Ghee to my food anywhere from one to four teaspoons of Ghee a day can be really great.
Beats are also amazing because they have a lot of vitamin C. Beats have high levels of salicylates and if you have problem processing salicylates rich foods that would be an issue. It’s not a food problem but a liver detoxification issue. If you’re finding that beats and other high salicylate foods, trigger flares then you may need to increase the amount of glycine and B6 in your diet and even some magnesium to help your liver process the salicylates which are phytochemicals naturally occurring in these foods. If you’re on methotrexate because you have psoriasis, beats may be something best to avoid because it actually can interact with the medication.
Last but not least, salmon. I love salmon. It’s a really great option because of the omega 3. I would encourage you to get wild caught salmon as opposed to the Alantic salmon simply because wild caught is typically better and has more omega 3s than farm raised salmon. Those would be my go-to as far as superfood for skin.
[01:20:0] Ashley James: My husband I have been allergic to dairy but we cannot tolerate dairy because it is hidden in food. I am in massive pain. We don’t eat it anymore but when we did, everything was fine. It was really cool because you can get Ghee that says does not have any lactose.
[01:20:34] Jennifer Fugo: Yeah. What’s really funny is that I recently discovered that there’s such a thing as Goat and Yak ghee– it doesn’t have to just be from cows. You can order it online and it actually tastes very good. It’s not quite the same taste as cow’s milk but it does taste like ghee. It was just different. If you’re afraid of cow’s milk, you could certainly try those versions as well.
[01:21:00] Ashley James: What about the Gaps diet? It’s meant to heal the Gut that has really high in collagen and lots of bone broth. Are you in alignment to the Gaps diet if someone wants to heal their gut?
[01:21:14] Jennifer Fugo: I’ll be honest with you. The only problem with diets to heal the gut is if you have infections they are not going to do much. I just see such a high incidence of infections and the same goes with AIP. It’s great but if you’re not seeing results after three months, you have something else going on.
I’ve talked to Mickey and she’s like, “People keep pressing on and on, hoping that something’s going to change.” In reality, the whole time they have had gut infections and the diet is not going to fix that. We have to put some practical cut-offs here saying that maybe there’s so much I can do and try up front. If I’m really not seeing results or I’m getting worse, I actually need to reach out for health because it’s more complicated, to be honest with you and to be entirely transparent.
If you would ask me to tell you all of this stuff three years ago, even five years ago before I started my master’s program, there’s no way I could have rattled all of this stuff off. I have learned so much about biochemistry and the way the body works. I’m not saying I am the smartest person out there. There are some people out there in the world that are brilliant people and I love listening to them. You can’t expect to be an expert in every single thing. I’m not messing around with my pipes If I think I got a leak or if I think there’s a problem with my electricity in my house, I’m calling electrician and so there’s no shame in reaching out and asking for help.
Be careful if you start eliminating a lot of food from your diet and you don’t know what you’re deficient in. You’re not bringing those specific nutrients back, you just dig the hole deeper and it takes a lot longer to dig yourself back out. Sometimes if you’re just like “I don’t know what to do, I’m overwhelmed.” It’s good to ask for help and know too that there are psoriasis diet and eczema diet. I know many people who have been on them that I worked with and they’ve changed their diet. They’ve done all sorts of low salicylates, no histamine, low histamine, and gluten-free, dairy-free, egg-free, sugar-free, whatever. They’re on such little foods and they’re not getting any better. I’m not saying that food doesn’t have power but because sometimes the chronic skin issues are so complicated. You can’t just assume that food will fix them all. If it does for you that is awesome and kudos to you but it does not for everyone.
[01:23:51] Ashley James: Right and that’s why there’s 18 things that we need to look at. We have to look at all them and like you said, most people have four or five or six issues at once. Everyone is stressed. We just have to go through the list and go, “How can I support? How can we all support our liver?” I think we could all benefit from liver support. “How can we support detoxifying? How can we support the diet in a way that’s the most nutrient dense? How can we support getting the good bacteria back in alignment on our skin and in our gut and get the parasites out and heal the gaps so that we don’t have the leaky gut or the leaky skin? It’s everything; it’s a holistic.
I have a friend and I’ve mentioned this story before on my show so listeners have listened to a bunch of episodes might have heard it. I have a best friend in Toronto, she’s in her 60s and she was born with Ichthyosis. It’s a very rare skin condition where 70 or 80% of her skin was covered in very thick scales. Chunks of skin would fall off her and bleed. It was sort of piles of what looks like sandpaper around because they would fall off of her. She’s such a wonderful woman but she was born with this and her father had it. If you look at the old textbooks on Ichthyosis, all the pictures of the condition are her father because in Canada they studied him. They took pictures of him and put them all the textbooks. They said it’s genetic, there’s nothing you can do. She’s always been into health so she eats healthy as she could. She’s been taking supplements for over 30 years, probably over 40 years. She noticed that she could kind of calm down a bit and she had to do a morning and a night routine. She would make her own topical agents and rub herself from head to toe at morning and night. If she didn’t do this then she would not be able to walk. It would be so horrible to her hands or feet and she couldn’t move her hands.
Back about eight years ago, I had met one of the naturopaths that trained me that I mentored under and he was actually in intro of the time giving a lecture. I called her up and said, “You have to go see him and suck his brain out and just absorb as much as you can. This guy’s amazing.” She raised her hand when it came to question time and said, “I have Ichthyosis.” He stopped her and said, “It’s not genetic. Don’t listen to them. Here’s what you need to do. You need to stop eating gluten.” He gave a list of about 12 foods just actually the same he tells everyone to avoid. They’re generally unhealthy which you pretty much went through the list. Then he says, “Here are the good things you can eat. You need to take very high doses of all the fat soluble vitamins.” She had her gallbladder taken out in her 20s . “We need to help your body digest fat.” He gave her the rundown.
She’d already done years and years of research on her own and health stuff. It was under control and was managed but it was still there. About five years of doing his program because it’s something that takes time, she’s been totally 100% of remission for a few years. It took about four or five years but she saw that slowly the Ichthyosis crept away and new healthy skin grew where she had never seen healthy skin grow before. Now, the only thing she has is some dry skin in some places and that’s it. She still eats incredibly healthy, takes her supplements, takes her digestive enzymes and manages her stress– she definitely seen that that’s an issue, and exercises. At Morning and night she covers herself from head to toe in the things that she created in her home.
You would look at her hands and they look like everyone else’s hands. When I first met her it was not the case. It was very similar to what you described where she’d move her hands and they crack and bleed and fall like pieces of her would fall off. To see that transformation it took about four to five years of doing the the right program.
They say that every year you’ve had the problem, you need a month to work through the issues. She had the problem for 40 years, you got to give yourself 40 months. Anyway, it was like watching Ice Melt in the springtime. When you look at it every day, it doesn’t feel like it’s melting but eventually it melts away. The message I want to leave is that when we’re giving the body everything it needs, it does definitely feel miraculous at how it heals. It takes time. We need to be patient and stick to our program. If we’re getting no results at all or if it’s worsening, we need to work with a professional like you said work with you.
To make sure we are on the right path, we need to stick to it because the body takes time. Other naturopath say that the body does triage work. If you’re Vitamin C deficient, it’s going to take the vitamin C and put it to your heart, liver, kidneys and everything else that’s more important than skin first. Sometimes, taking in nutrients, nutrient dense foods and supplements, you’re eating healthy, you’re doing everything right and you might not see results for three months because the body’s healing internally. We also have to look at how we feel and the other parts that make up our quality of life to make sure we’re going in the right direction.
I’m very inspired by the work you’re doing and I really feel that you are on you’re calling, on your path. I’m really looking forward to hearing back from the listeners how much this has made a difference for them. I know that my listeners are going to jump over and listen to you on The Healthy Skin Show. There wouldn’t want to check out your website skinterrupt.com. Everything you do is going to be in the show notes of today’s podcast learntruehealth.com
Tell us about your services, about everything so that listeners who want to connect with you know how they can.
[01:31:08] Jennifer Fugo: Absolutely. The best way to get in touch with me is to go to skinterrupt.com From there if you’re interested in learning more about me, you can either read my about page to get a sense of what I’m about and it’s more than just my skin condition. When you are interested in working with someone; you should try to get to know who they are and what their values are. If that does resonate with you either get Help page where it describes how I work wit clients. I do one on one consultation. I also have some group programs that we’re working on but we also have some really great incredible resources as well for people to check out that you can utilize them in your own home.
If you’re looking for protein shakes that are really great for soothing skin conditions, we have a really great download for that or if you’re looking for the best tests to ask your doctor for, we’ve got resources for that. Looking at supporting you in any way shape humanly possible and if anybody has any questions, I’m happy Ashley, if you want to let me know or wherever the post is, I’m happy to come back and answer questions. I have blogs that are really extrapolate upon what we’ve talked about even further, just so that people have an opportunity to really dive deeper into these topics on the Healthy Skin Show. If anybody has specific questions, they can submit those questions to the podcast and actually get them answered on the show which is really cool. It’s just part of my commitment to make sure that people in this community feel heard and that they have ways not only to help themselves in their daily life but also to get that added support should they need it.
I have a virtual practice. While I live in the US, I see clients worldwide and I work with clients over the phone or by Skype to be able to support them.
[01:33:05] Ashley James: Excellent. We’re going to make sure that once this is up, I’m going to make a post in the Facebook group The Learn True Health Facebook group and so we can all jump in there and chat with you. We just started transcribing all of our interviews at LearnTrueHealth.com so this interview is going to be fully transcribed so people can go back and see the full list of 18 things and counting of the different areas they need to focus on. Can see everything that you said today in the show notes because it’s all transcribed there and all the links to everything you do.
Listeners can come to the Facebook group and chat with Jennifer. Check out the first episode where we had Jennifer on which is Episode 198. I know on your website skinterrupt.com you also have a fun quiz that people can take?
[01:34:04] Jennifer Fugo: Yes. Actually, it’s not a quiz, there are a couple of things you can do. As I was saying, you can find out what are triggers for your skin rashes and that you can do through testing. I’m a really big proponent of doing a low stomach acid test at home because as I said, having enough stomach acid is the second point of the digestive process and it’s critical. I find that a lot of my skin clients actually have low stomach acid. We’ve got a great download to walk you through how to do that. It doesn’t cost anything except for some water and some baking soda. It can really give you a lot of fast information in about 10 or 15 minutes. We’ve got a lot of great resources over on the website that will help you dive deeper.
[01:34:55] Ashley James: Very cool. Awesome. Thank you so much for coming on the show. Is there anything you would like to say to wrap up today’s interview?
[01:35:03] Jennifer Fugo: I would just like to say that wherever you are right now and whatever you choose to do is entirely up to you. It’s okay if you choose to stay and do the conventional route of addressing your skin. It’s also okay if you choose to start integrating in some more natural or alternative options. Whatever you choose to do, don’t let anybody make you feel bad about it. It’s ultimately your choice. It’s based upon your health values. The goal is always to figure out a way to help your body rebuild healthier skin by rebalancing yourself from the inside and the outside. I hope that this is a really great jumping off point for some people and just know that it is possible to support your skin better. There are more resources out there and I hope that I can be a co-pilot with you on that journey and I just appreciate you for tuning in and also being a part of Ashley’s tribe because I know how passionate you all are about living your best lives. I’m appreciative for the invitation to be here.
[01:36:09] Ashley James: Wonderful. Thank you so much.
Hello, true health seeker. Have you ever thought about becoming a health coach? Do you love learning about nutrition? How we can shift our lifestyle and our diet so that we can gain optimal health and happiness and longevity? Do you love helping your friends and family to solve their health problems and to figure out what they can do to eat healthier?
Are you interested in becoming someone who can grow their own business, support people in their success? Do you love helping people? You might be the perfect candidate to become a health coach. I highly recommend checking out the Institute for integrative nutrition. I just spent the last year in their Health Coaching Certification Program. It really blew me away. It was so amazing. I learned over 100 dietary theories. I learned all about nutrition but from a standpoint of how we can help people to shift their life and shift their lifestyle to gain true holistic health. I definitely recommend you check them out. You can Google Institute for Integrative Nutrition or IIN and give them a call or you can go to LearnTrueHealth.com/coach and you can receive a free module of their training to check it out and see if it is something that you would be interested in. Be sure to mention my name Ashley James and the Learn True Health podcast because I made a deal with them that they will give you the best price possible. I highly recommend checking it out. It really changed my life to be in their program and I’m such a big advocate that I wanted to spread this information. We need more health coaches. In fact, Health Coaching is the largest growing career right now in the health field. So many health coaches are getting in and helping people because you can work in chiropractic offices, doctor’s offices, you can work in hospitals, and you can work online through Skype and help people around the world. You can become an author, you can go into the school system and help your local schools shift their programs to help children be healthier. You can go into senior centers and and help them to shift their diet and lifestyle to best support them in their success in their health goals. There are so many different available options for you when you become a Certified Health Coach. Check out IIN. Check out the Institute for Integrative Nutrition, mention my name, get the best deal, give them a call and they’ll give you lots of free information and help you to see if this is the right move for you.
Classes are starting soon. The next round of classes is starting at the end of the month. So, you’re going to want to call them now and check it out. And if you know anyone in your life who would be an amazing coach, please tell them about it. Being a health coach is so rewarding and you get to help so many people.
The Savvy Gluten-Free Shopper Book
https://ericthorton.com/happiness-is-a-choice
Lives Of Discovery
https://www.learntruehealth.com/lives-of-discovery-eric-thorton
Highlights:
Welcome to the Learn True Health Podcast. I’m your host, Ashley James James. This is Episode 359.
0:00:14.1 Ashley James: Well here we are again with Eric Thorton. We’re here live in his healing studio. Welcome back to the show.
0:00:21.6 Eric Thorton: Well thank you. It’s great to be here.
0:00:23.2 Ashley James: Yeah, we’ve had quite a lot of listeners giving me feedback on our last (few) interviews, all good information. They all love you. I haven’t gotten one complaint, so we’re having you back.
0:00:38.7 Eric Thorton: That’s great. What can I say?
0:00:43.0 Ashley James: And even several listeners have hired you and worked with you.
0:00:48.1 Eric Thorton: That’s correct. I think about 10, 15 now. Quite a few from all over the world. I’m working with someone in Singapore, someone from China, a lot from Canada, and from Eastern United States. So that’s pretty good.
0:01:13.8 Ashley James: That’s really neat. So for the listeners who haven’t listened to our past episodes, I definitely encourage them to go back and listen to our past interviews because they were enlightening, but I’ve gotten a lot of great feedback. A few listeners told me that listening to our interviews was life – changing for them. It helped them to understand parts of their lives and who they are in a whole new way and it really gave them clarity. So thank you.
0:01:42.8 Eric Thorton: That’s terrific. That’s why I’m here. I don’t do my work for any other reason except to help people and that’s why I love to share. I don’t try to keep exclusives on any of the processes we do and I look at everything, when we teach people something, we look at it as universal wisdom and we hold up their ability to look at themselves from their guide’s point of view. And so, any of the processes we talk about are (to) design(ed )to get people to think and incorporate the other things they’ve learned as well and it’s very inclusive to work. So it really seems to their past experiences been to people are very easily incorporated in to their lives and that’s one of our intents, is to take away the mystery of spiritual work and make it something we do everyday all over the world. (I) instead of just from information from the Middle East or India or something like that. God works the same day all over the world.
0:02:55.7 Ashley James: Instead of just doing it on Sunday.
0:02:57.8 Eric Thorton: Instead of just doing it on Sunday or with special words. Special words that are hard for people to understand take away the knowledge they need which makes it very difficult to become enlightened. It’s almost like you’re chasing someone else’s tail and they’re like, “Oh well you can’t quite know what this means.” And so, because really from my clients, and this is quite a broad statement I’m gonna make. They meditate, they do all these procedures and they really can’t own it because they’re told things that they don’t understand. And so, I’m giving information in sessions from people’s guides that explain what’s going on in their lives, how they’re sitting in their lives. How to stop comparing culture, what we were just talking about; cultures, thought forms, the cultural thought forms that keep us locked in patterns that don’t fit most over souls and so it causes stress in their lives. So we were talking earlier about happiness, intent versus enlightenment. And that’s a big deal on how the information, if the information is convoluted, how are you going to find that? How are you gonna understand who you are?
So with every person that comes in for a session, we’re always unveiling who they are so they can start to realize the difficulty they have is because of the culture that’s built around younger souls versus the culture that older souls have to be in. They don’t have a choice and it causes people to feel inadequate. It causes the older souls to feel inadequate and to be stressed. So our job, most of the people I see are older souls, in what we call the lives of discovery and they are very confused and stressed by what they’re supposed to be doing by the cultures versus what they need to be doing for them to uncover their happiness and joy.
0:05:23.1 Ashley James: You said lives of discovery. What does that mean?
0:05:26.5 Eric Thorton: The human existence is a series of lives. Life, death, reincarnation, becoming godlike. Well, bear with me with this demonstration. We’ll kind of explain that to you. If you take a timeline of the human soul on the planet earth, we call each life a form that we come in to a karmic cycle. Meaning that we’re here to learn and to grow in what it’s like to be in that body type and what it offers for the growth of the soul. So we start out maybe you take a timeline on the far left. You have what we call a new soul coming in to a physical body for the first time, so the soul doesn’t have physical experience yet and it comes in to a human body. Those people tend to be very radical and when you imprint some way of anything, whether it’s science, whether it’s religion, culture. You imprint it. The first imprint, they’re gonna defend that imprint until the day they die and they’re gonna be very radical about it. Those are quite young souls and they’ll live life after life after life with that gaining wisdom from those separate points of view. And then as you have more and more time, you gain more and more wisdom time embodies.
And about the middle point of this timeline, we call it the point of mastery. Everyone to the left, we call younger souls and that’s our main cultures. There are many cultures within that, religious, political, et cetera. And they come from people that are intelligent. They have emotions the same as (everybody else) [inaudible] does and they create all these cultures and then you hit this point of mastery and you’re there. You’re wise, you’re good, you’ve learned a lot but you still follow this cultures. So you have presidents, world leaders over there. They follow within these cultures. You have someone that people who might be familiar with is Mark, Margaret Thatcher, or George Patton, or Winston Churchill, or the leader of Brazil years ago – a very old soul but not quite an old soul yet. They still would be politically in the limelight and such. So they’re (still) supporting the old cultures.
You make this leap past the point of mastery, you’re leaping in to what we call the lives of discovery. These lives, if this change happens usually in the life between lives and sometimes it happens during a life and it’s earth-shaking. Because what happens is you understand all these cultures innately inside but, you can no longer quite do it. So to be the mean girl or the bully doesn’t work anymore, to go along with these clips (cliques) in school or in business cultures and things like that. It doesn’t quite work and you see the problem with it and how limiting these cultures are. In these lives you understand it but you don’t’ want to participate in these cultures, but you do because you wanna run with the rest of the kids or the rest of the adults and you feel guilty for it or bored or frustrated. So it’s like, “Come on guys, understand this.” So they’re going because you’re this old soul that is in the lives of discovery, they’re looking at you like, “What’s wrong with you?”, “Why don’t you do the 9 to 5 job?”, “Why don’t you do the 2.5 kids in minivan?”, “Why don’t you fall in to your position?”. Well after that point of mastery, you can’t anymore. It just doesn’t work and we continue living life after life gaining knowledge from that perspective now through discovery. And we are supposed to be discovering during these lives. We discover gifts during those lives – partial gifts, we never have them fully. We discussed that a little bit before, but the person will literally have sight or have a second knowing, really super vivid intuition or second sight but, it won’t be a full on. The use of acupuncture, reiki, all kinds of it because they conceal energy and experience it but the full picture is not there yet.
So you’ll live these lives. You can be a doctor and a nurse. They’re good people with good intent. We can even have some lawyers with it. They’re intelligent. They don’t quite fit in that factory worker thing. They’re not gonna do the same thing throughout life but, our cultures say do different.
0:10:57.8 Ashley James: So you’re saying they’re not gonna do the same things. What you mean is like, they don’t wanna work at one job for 40 years and then retire. Which is sort of what society says is good to do and or maybe the parents are saying, “Why don’t you just get a stable job and work there until you retire?” And there’s an expectation, a cultural expectation to do this and yet those who are in the lives of discovery will go from job to job or career to career or school to school and they can’t do anything for more than 3 or 5 or 7 years before feeling like they need to do something more, something different.
0:11:37.8 Eric Thorton: Exactly.
0:11:38.7 Ashley James: And sometimes they feel lost or they feel like they’re broken or there’s something wrong with them.
0:11:43.8 Eric Thorton: They feel there’s no life purpose because their life purposecomes from the main cultures and they don’t fit that life purpose. So they come to a guy like me or they seek other people. What’s my purpose in life? I’m not meant to dig ditches or I’m not meant to stand in the factory or to sell real estate probably it’s not fulfilling. For someone in these younger cultures, “Yeah, that’s great. I’ve arrived. I’m earning a million dollars a year. I’ve arrived.” Whereas someone that’s an old soul can earn a million dollars a year doesn’t mean anything to them because they haven’t found their purpose because their soul’s personality hasn’t come out yet, hasn’t been fully discovered. So they innately feel dissatisfied with the cultures they’d be.
0:12:34.8 Ashley James: So how do they then uncover their purpose and discover who they are?
0:12:39.4 Eric Thorton: The first step is to discover that their barking up the wrong tree. If they try to be in these cultures and get everything from these cultures, they’re not going to be happy. So that’s the first thing they have to look at like we did with you because well, you don’t fit.
0:13:04.0 Ashley James: We can’t see Eric. He’s pointing at my husband. My husband is now quietly waving at the microphone. You guys, they can’t see you.
0:13:13.8 Eric Thorton: Sorry.
0:13:15.3 Duffy James: I’m here.
0:13:19.1 Eric Thorton: Sometimes we just hold this up that they’re trying to put a square peg in a round hole and that’s the first step and it has to absorb, We remove the energy or the thought forms and predatory energies that have to do with trying to put a square peg in a round hole. have the frustration, the anger, the situation from mom and dad trying to get this kid to fit in and around a certain pathway and that all adds up in a person’s crown and it can eventually take on predatory energy like we explained. The more you get, the more likely you’re gonna draw too. You’re like a magnet. Well it happens. We remove that, we bring this up to the person and we’d look at it and we go, “Okay so, you’re a square peg in a round hole. So why don’t we hang around with square pegs instead of trying to identify with the round pegs?” So by doing this, you sit here and you start to look at it and we start giving you the individual reasons that are there. Like with you, we looked at some past life. By the way we do have permission from Duffy James to talk about him even if it’s in the third person. Sorry.
So we have to look at this and we have to go, “Okay why did you come to the parents you came to?” “What is it you’re supposed to be learning?” Oftentimes old souls come into parents that are younger souls but it’s not by happenstance. We choose to make this happen. So we’re gonna have a certain set of genetics at a certain time period being male, female, whatever it is so that we can learn from this set of genetics and this set of traumas that happen. When you’re raised by younger souls, they older soul is traumatized because they can’t be recognized. They can’t be heard. They can’t be embraced for who they are. Instead with younger souled parents, they try to fit this old soul into these virtues and choose that they can’t fit into and that equals stress. And apparently they parents sit there and scratch their head and they don’t know why this kid won’t do it. So that equals frustration and the kids try to compensate for it and they feel guilty, they pull it in they blame themselves. They feel guilty.
And this is one of the main things with people on the lives of discovery is removing this guilt from this child that’s still there so that in the current life, similar situations come up and they’re maybe being heard. But because a certain feeling or thought came up, they feel completely unheard by their spouse and it doesn’t have anything to do with your spouse. It has something to do with their past lives and the reason they came to the parents they did. So sometimes we’re answering the other side of the learning curve of karma. We look at karma like we explain that it’s a wonderful thing. It’s learning.
With some people we have a past life where we caused similar situations that they were raised in. So now they learned from it and so now it will come into that themselves and see if they can rise above it. So, what was your past life? What was that?
0:16:46.0 Duffy James: An industrial chemical worker.
0:16:49.1 Eric Thorton: Oh, that’s right. So unbeknownst to you, you were an industrial, was it a supervisor type thing? Something up in it and that you were in-charge of how things were produced like gears and motors and things like that which had a lot of chemicals in it and a lot of people got sick but nobody knew. So there’s no harm, no foul, it didn’t create karma but it did create a situation in your body. Now, was your grandparents something like that too?
0:17:29.8 Duffy James: My grandfather was a chemist.
0:17:32.1 Eric Thorton: Yeah, your grandfather was a chemist too which brought in a chemical predisposition to your body. And so between the two of these, your body doesn’t get rid of toxicity very well. So when we worked with you we worked from the backside releasing the reason you hold toxicity and heavy metals and things like that so that your body could start dumping them slowly. And we told you you would feel kind of odd for about 10 days to 2 weeks while your body dumps a lot of this stuff. I am sure enough today you’re telling me you don’t feel very well and you haven’t felt very well and it’s because you’re dumping toxins now because you release the reason your body wouldn’t let go of them.
Like we told you, you’re vegetarian and I said eat greens because chlorophyll pulls out toxins that are in your blood. It doesn’t pull it out of your tendons, that does pull it from your blood. The minerals in veggies and fruits help also pull out the other toxins. So it’s a great time to have a really clean life and of course, I don’t think we mentioned, but drinking plenty of water works too.
0:18:53.3 Ashley James: My husband gave me a knowing look because every 5 minutes I’m like,” Are you drinking your water?” So Duffy James had a session 2 days ago and he comes home and he’s like, “Eric warned me I’m gonna feel a little tired as my body’shealing.” And true enough Duffy James’s been totally wiped out more than any other healing more than acupuncture or massage or anything. He’s been pretty wiped out.
0:19:21.6 Duffy James: I have been, yeah.
0:19:24.8 Eric Thorton: You know I tell people when they have these effects, you know you expect to come away from a healing and feeling good, some people do. It’s actually a good side. You’re feeling bad, if they’re working on your toxicity. In the main cultures of the society, they want a cause and effect immediately and they want to control these things and you can’t get the body to release toxins that it’s emotionally hooked to. Nothing’s gonna release if you’re emotionally hooked to it. it simply will not happen. We mentioned it before, I have a client that’s grandfather had a heavy metal poisoning. her body wasn’t gonna release it because of grandpa’s love. Well, you had it from past life and we have to teach the body, “Okay we can do this.” Then it starts to happen and then other people works better.
So if you’re going to a Naturopath, the medicines from the Naturopath would work better because [inaudible] make you more toxic. Or from an allopathic, it would work better. If you’re detoxed at a great level, then the medicines gonna work right. Western medicine will even work better because you have a clearer past life. Or you mix some Western medicine or any chemicals with a bunch other chemicals, you’re gonna have a disastrous outcome. Or if you clean them up, you will have a good outcome. So that’s why we say the work isn’t inclusive because it makes everybody’s work work better. It makes your brain clearer so you can actually have a conversation. It’s a big deal.
So anyway in this process, I literally set up the session. We talk for an hour to 2 hours and we talk during the session. This is very important for people to understand and you’ve experienced it now. We talk about it because it lights up the neural pathways in your brain much like brain surgery. The brain surgeon put you under, draw the holes in your head or however they’re gonna get in there, put you in the halo and then they will wake you up and they talk you through the surgery. So it lights up different neural pathways so they can see not to cut those and it’s the same way here. We’re not cutting anything of course but we talk about things and some people think, “Well we talk too much.” Well no, this is a different type of healing. It lights up the neural pathways specifically because we have millions of them and the guides go, “Okay there it is. Let’s give that better neural plasticity.”
In your session Duffy, the neural pathways were influenced by the past life and this life and so those get lit up so that they can change, give it better neural plasticity and then the process of changing the body starts with you in your case. And the brain goes, “Oh, ok can do this instead of this old pattern.” But if you don’t soften those up, that’s not gonna happen. They just keep going back to the default setting subconsciously and consciously. So that’s why we do a lot of talking during the process – to light those up, to get them to better neural plasticity, get them open to change. With you, we didn’t give you specific exercises to do, as of yet. But some people depending of who they are or what the situation is, we will give them specific things to do. Specific books to read, sometimes very specific diet for short periods of time or long periods of time. We talked about allergens, we also gave you specific to your guides – they will literally give me a spiritual exercise for that person to do and oftentimes it’s different from everybody else. There are some certain things we can all do like we’ve talked about the energy exchange but other than that, it’s more of an individual thing.
0:23:51.6 Ashley James: So you’re talking to your client’s guides. What’s the difference between guides and angels?
0:23:57.9 Eric Thorton: Angels are what we call non-evolutionary souls. They are angels. They are never going to embody. They are spiritual beings given a specific job with quite broad spectrum but still very specific. We are evolutionary souls. So we start our with very little knowledge, gaining knowledge with life after life after life after life and gaining new wisdom. Angels, they have specific jobs for eternity and they’re perfectly happy with that. They’re designed to do that. They learn within their job boundaries and if they need to go beyond their boundaries, they call another angel with the next set of knowledge. Where evolutionary souls go, “Oh, well let’s look at that” and gain the knowledge themselves. So it’s a very different perspective as well.
So we gain knowledge life after life after life and we’ll continue on this timeline we were talking about. So at the end of the lives of discovery we are born with the gifts on – that’s a master. Then there’s levels of mastery to where we become the ascending master. The ascending masters are amazing, they are good at everything. I’m not there yet. I was born with the gifts on, but I can see through a wall for example, but I can float through a wall. I still have a little fear about hard objects appearing in the middle of my body. So they’ve entered a point where they’re now proving all the things the things they’ve learned in all of their past lives. Clear back to when they first came in to the planet and if they came from another planet. Well anyway it’s called star traveler and you can draw in anyone of them as you’re used to work on.
So people who are amazing seekers, when I work on them – they’ll see a part of me shape shift into those past lives. So I will look like a slightly different person because I enter this meditative state when I work on anybody and they look at me like, “Who are you now?” and then “Okay, I’m from this past life.” Because I’m able to tap in to each past life at this point and some of them can even describe me and they’re accurate and I’m always not real tall. Come one I’m working on that. [Laughter] Come on 5 more inches please. [Laughter] But anyway, I’ve been on the planet for a long time and people didn’t used to be real tall and it seems to be locked in. I’m still the average height of a person 150 years ago. 5’6″ right?
I use a lot of humor. [Laughter]
Anyway, so we have these past lives to grow and learn and become this master and then we have the levels of mastery. As we become the ascending master, when we pass, we become a guide if we want to or we move on to another part of the universe. Buddhism calls that Nirvana. You’re not ceasing to exist, you’re ceasing to exist here on this place, you’ll go to another one and you’ll more. You don’t start as a newbie or as young soul anymore. You’re starting off as an old soul in any life form because universal wisdom applies everywhere.
0:28:00.2 Ashley James: So a guide is someone who has been through the whole cycle and now chooses to be a guide rather come into a physical body?
0:28:09.0 Eric Thorton: Correct.
0:28:09.8 Ashley James: Can a guide choose to have an incarnation in physical body or they are done with the physicality?
0:28:14.6 Eric Thorton: They can choose to do it again but they generally wants your guide, it’s a lot of time that passes by because you’re a guide with the same soul, it’s not the body. So you may be with someone in various bodies for 10 or 15 lives while they’re learning your specific expertise as the guide.
0:28:37.6 Ashley James: That sounds like fun.
0:28:37.9 Eric Thorton: It is and remember time only means something to the body. It doesn’t mean anything to the soul. So if you spend a thousand years with someone, it doesn’t mean anything. And so guides know us really, really well. Way better than we’ll ever know ourselves and it’s fascinating. They have wicked senses of humor too – not work it as in evil, but work it as in funny because they’ve been there and they have done that and they’ve been all the different choices we have with our bodies and preferences and things like that. They get it and they don’t care.
0:29:18.6 Ashley James: So you can hear guides and angels talk to you? How do you know the difference between the two?
0:29:25.0 Eric Thorton: Angels are very distinctive because they don’t have the same frequency because they’ve never been embodied. So it’s really easy for me to tell the difference. It’s kind of like meeting someone who is [inaudible] versus someone who’s Robin Williams. Not all guides are Robin Williams of course but it’s like, they’ll have that presence about them that just fits with you because they’ve done it. Where angels, they literally don’t give off that frequency at all. They have senses of humor, but they just aren’t that been there done that sense of humor. So it’s a very different frequency.
Now we all have what has been termed in some groups The Guardian Angel because their job is mainly to keep us alive. Where guides job is to help us with the stress of being an old soul. So I was explaining it to Duffy and I finally got to explain it. We’ve talked about the size of the radar dishes and the old souls have these giant radar dishes that taken a hundred thousand gigabytes of information for everyone than a younger soul takes it and it overwhelms the older soul, but those are the lessons.
0:30:51.7 Ashley James: You talked about how some people who are you calling sensitives or those who are older souls can become exhausted from doing things like going to a mall or going grocery shopping because they’re taking in all the energies from other people.
0:31:04.9 Eric Thorton: They are perceiving it and where someone else has no perception of it. So they get exhausted and they need to learn and be guided to people that can hopefully help them learn about this radar dish or these perspectives that have might the m very sensitive. They’re sensitive in the amount of knowledge coming in, but the stress of this massive knowledge has made their bodies very sensitive.
0:31:31.3 Ashley James: You say you work with a lot of healers. You like to heal healers. Help healers heal themselves so they can go on to be better healers for other people. Are all healers older souls that are more sensitive with the bigger radar dish because older souls are drawn to becoming healers or they have some of their gifts on or can younger souls also be healers?
0:31:58.3 Eric Thorton: Younger souls can be healers in a mechanical way. They can’t be healers in an intuitive way. Old souls have that ability to feel energy and that sensitivity that is supposed to happen that physiologically changes as we get damaged as the change that takes place. We have the classic wounded healer. So if you’re an old soul and you have this giant radar dish, it’s too much information for the body. The body is made to take the small radar dish. We have the exact same body says younger souls in other words. But we got this huge perception problem and that we take in so much information. We become very, very, very physically and mentally stressed and it wounds us and it starts at birth or even before birth. And it starts wounding and when we get wounded slowly or suddenly, we go into what’s called a hyper alert position and the amygdala, which is a gland above your both ears which joins at the frontal lobe, starts to work extremely fast. It already works extremely ast, it’s the gland that’s connected to the digestive brain, and you can look that up. The digestive brain uses the sense of touch only. The main brain uses the sense of touch, taste, sound – the 6 senses. The digestive brain is only touch. So if someone’s staring at you with malintent, you need to know. Essentially the amygdala was formed and the digestive was formed for safety.
I was listening to Oprah at one time and what she said was the research on it, so I’m just quoting her, “That the amygdala can tell friend or foe in 30 millionth of a second.” When you get wounded and you go on hyper alert, that particular aspect can speed up to a hundred millionth of a second. And it is in that if you think of millionths of a second, it’s pure frequency. So if you can pick up frequency of friend or foe between 1 second and a 30 millionth of a second and you have that turned on, now to pick it up to a hundred millionths of second? That’s where the gifts are – between 30 millionth to a hundred millionths of a second and even beyond that. That’s where you start picking up the frequency of sound that’s not in our physical word or in the 3D. You’re gonna pick up guides, you’re gonna pick up guardinals, you’re gonna see things moving around you. We all do, but you’re gonna see them more and you’re gonna start seeing figures or something to help somebody with, may be an argument with a parent or something when they were young when you’re working on their leg.
That information is there, but if your radar dish is picking it up at 30 millionths of a second, you won’t be able to see it as a therapist. But an old soul therapist, then you’re gonna pick that up and you’re gonna go to a totally different type of session. So again, we’re talking about stress and cultures.
So then you got someone we’ll say as a massage therapist and they’re working with someone that is a younger soul. What are they gonna do for that massage? Versus someone who’s an older soul that’s a massage therapist? What can be the difference in their techniques? The one from the old soul is gonna be much deeper because they can perceive what’s going on and move to the places without even being told.
0:35:55.2 Ashley James: So we have this amazing chiropractor and we totally love him and just as a side note and I got to tell about this mattress. But since we got our new bed 35 days ago, we actually haven’t needed to go back to our chiropractor.
0:36:12.0 Duffy James: Great bed.
0:36:13.2 Ashley James: I know. It’s so amazing. We used to go almost weekly. Sometimes twice a week because I’d wake up with injuries and I’m not that old. Why am I waking up with a neck injury, right, or a lower back? And he thinks like a mechanic. I mean he doesn’t follow intuition but he’s amazing and we love him. I mean if we could adopt him, we wanna keep him, we love him. He’s semi-retired right now so we’re a little bit sad about that. He’s gonna go into retirement soon, but he brought in a chiropractor to by his clinic and she is wonderful but doesn’t do his same techniques and we kept asking why isn’t she learning from you? You’re almost 40 years in the business, what’s goin on? He goes, “You know she has this intuition.” And I keep asking her, “Why did you adjust that? Why did you do this?” And she goes, “I just know to go there.” And he goes, “I don’t understand her process. She just have this intuition, I don’t have that.” And he respects it which is great, then he’s like going to a mechanic. He looks at your body and he goes, “Okay this muscle group is causing this but it’s coming from here and it’s this never bundle and this is why I’m gonna adjust this.” And he can explain everything and you might come in with neck pain and he’ll adjust your ankle and everything will come back into alignment because he thinks like a mechanic. So it’s that possibly, he’s a younger soul thinking more like a mechanic. It’s a great adjustment. The other chiropractor who’s taking over the clinic, pure intuition. She comes up and she just feels and knows where to adjust and she can explain why.
0:37:54.9 Eric Thorton: Well they might be old souls. One of them is taking the mechanics that all chiropractors learn and they learn themselves the order of it. Where in the chiropractic it’s just you learn this move one day, this move another day, and this move another day. You learn that someone’s need might affect their shoulder, but how do you assemble that as an individual and your practice? I’ll be honest, the guy who’s mechanical with it I can say is probably an older soul. He’s learned the technique. He’s taken this information and made his own technique with it and would tell that he works on people differently, individually.
0:38:37.6 Ashley James: He’s pretty amazing. I think you’re right.
0:38:40.2 Eric Thorton: He’s looking at series of sequences that he’s learned or intuited and he can plug that into this person, this person, and this person. Where the other one is more of an emotional thinker. So then she’s taking her own soul status and using it to really feel the manusia in the body and different parts of it that are connecting these mechanical sequences because she’s also moving the body mechanically. So it’s just 2 different approaches to this massive knowledge that they’re getting. So I wouldn’t say either one of them is a young soul, unless I met them, then I could tell you. The young soul can do that but they’re not gonna have the magic from it.
0:39:20.3 Ashley James: So I was a massage therapist in Canada and I was taking a course on craniosacral therapy and I had almost no experience with craniosacral other than I was told it was really cool to add to my tool belt.
0:39:37.6 Eric Thorton: And you have one of each.
0:39:40.2 Ashley James: I have a cranium and sacrum. Yes, yes.
0:39:43.9 Eric Thorton: So you have experience with it.
0:39:44.4 Ashley James: I do. I physically have those. I was in the course and working on a woman doing that basically. They taught the technique. My hands are on her and I’m doing the technique and I’m seeing and it really shocked me. I thought craniosacral was just manipulation of the body. I had no idea that there was a spiritual component to it. Lo and behold.
0:40:13.3 Eric Thorton: Yeah. Everything you have to do with humans has a spiritual component to it.
0:40:16.6 Ashley James: Yes right. We’re learners now. And so I’m working on her and I can see trauma and abuse and what the abuse was and where it was still being held in her body. Sort of like I could see like in the CSI TV show how they put a blue light over someone and they can see old scars or old bruises. I could see them and I could see sort of which ones she’s worked on healing wise and so I felt compelled to talk to her about it but I also felt really weird like, “Hey by the way while I was working on you, I saw that you were molested.” And you know it’s sort of a weird conversation. So I brought it up with her and I said what I saw these 2 areas. One that you’ve worked on this area and described another area that was still very raw emotionally, because she was very experienced with craniosacral, so I guess she knew that this is something that happens. And she goes, “Oh yeah, you’re right. 30 years ago… such and such happened and I’ve worked on it and you’re right those are old wounds but I’ve done on healing.” It’s sort of like the scar tissues are left behind but I’ve done the work and she acknowledged that what I saw – the new wounds that hadn’t healed yet were emotional wounds that are still being held I think around the diaphragm area. That to me was amazing, when you can touch someone and actually get visions and see what’s going on in their body on an emotional level – the emotions are being held in injuries in the body.
0:41:56.3 Eric Thorton: Right. That’s why we heal healers. You have that ability and yet that was one of the first times you used it maybe. I don’t know.
0:42:06.6 Ashley James: Yeah.
0:42:07.0 Eric Thorton: And so, if you took that person with these traumas held in her body and you released it and she’s done with it, it’s out of her body. It’s done. If the practitioner releases it and they’re still learning to do it, it doesn’t go away. It will release it, the muscles will relax, you get some benefit from it and 2 weeks later it’s right back. That’s telling us there is a spiritual component to itself. So if that person that you’ve discovered that with still had the predatory energy from her attackers or molesters, if she still had the [inaudible 0:42:44.5], if she still had all these things going there, you would go to release the muscles then because you saw why they were tight but she maybe hasn’t finished learning from it yet. So then a guy like me would take that and we would go through and see who, what, where, and why?
What you’re supposed to be learning from coming to parents or people like this or having been involved in your life in some way and then we take that and we learn from it. We don’t look at anything as positive or negative even that. What are we supposed to be learning from it? Yeah, do I think it’s tragic? Oh heaven, yes. It’s one of the worst things that can happen to a human is being molested when you’re young because it changes your emotional status for the rest of your life. But that being said, if you turn it into a learning process, you can heal from it and we cannot just be a survivor, but become the person you’re supposed to become because of it and then you are healed, and then you will find your pathway. Then you will find your meaning in life.
In the meantime on a major thing like that, you won’t find it. It can stare you in the face and you’ll think it’s trauma. We call those cross wires. And someone associates love with being abused, manipulated, et cetera then out in the world, they’re gonna look at jobs, they’re gonna look at people for love equals abuse, manipulation, et cetera and so they’re never gonna find what they’re supposed to be doing. They can’t ever see it until this work is done. And then they’ll be out there doing something, it’s like a new sense of smell like, “Oh that looks good.” And they start to find their purpose or they start to discover they’re actually doing their purpose but they could never settle into it because of these contrasts of what love or friendship or work means that has to do with people that they can’t aligned with – the younger soul parents.
0:44:46.6 Ashley James: I like that you’ve mentioned in the past that, people who come too often have had health issues that they’ve seen everyone for and that it’s only when they do the spiritual and emotional work with you that it’s finally – it’s just that last sort of pin that needed to be pulled out.
0:45:06.9 Eric Thorton: To make everything work. To make all their efforts work. It’s so important to include everything people have done prior to seeing me. That is so absolutely important and it’s mechanically important as well as spiritually and physically. You can even literally have mechanical work done on you 5 years before you see me and it won’t take effect until the day we do the work. And then also they’ll go home and they’ll roll over and their whole back will realign, where it wouldn’t it. You’ve mentioned the chiropractors. They’d do it, they keep going in and going in and it won’t hold and they’ve done all of this work. I’m usually, unfortunately the last resort. [Laughter] It’s too bad, because when you’re the first resort you get things done a lot faster. You don’t have to suffer as long, but we’re stubborn. We don’t wanna go into something that’s the unknown or the mystery.
0:46:04.2 Ashley James: A question that come to mind that I wanted to ask you. This might be too generalized because I know each individual has their own reasoning. Tell us about autoimmune disease. Is there a common thread as to the cause and the common way to heal it or is it really individualistic?
0:46:27.1 Eric Thorton: It’s very individual. It’s very, very individual. Because like, we’re talking about Duffy here. His immune system are coming from past lives that he’s had and also his grandparents and what they did as individuals, those people did. That doesn’t apply to other people with autoimmune systems today. So I don’t have any precognition as far as, it’s not the right word, but I go into the session innocently. Because we have a certain amount of symptoms. I think we have 280 something symptoms and we have 10,000 or 15,000 different diseases and abnormalities and things like that the human body can have, but only 280 symptoms. So if you go in there thinking that these symptoms specifically means this, you have missed the boat. So I go at it very innocently so it always gives me the perspective from the guides that the person needs right now.
So with someone like you Duffy, this was a huge anchor for some of your issues. So we released the anchor. You still have the issues, but the body’s got to get used to not having that anchor, then we can start on the specifics. I tell people first sessions are very different than ongoing sessions because first sessions we gotta release the main bulk that you’re carrying around. The body got to learn to that we’re not gonna hurt it subconsciously and consciously and then it will let us in toward a much deeper level to where we get specifically you versus the effects of other people on you. What’s actually happened to you specifically? Those come in generally, sometimes a little bit in the first session, but more in the ongoing sessions. And sometimes people just need 1 or 2 sessions or 3. Some people want ongoing. They want to really get their lives cleaned up but it’s like, “Okay so we dig in” and each time I might have to see people for years because this is what they’ve worked with. And they’re always get in to the next huge level and their bodies changed dramatically after each session. Very, very dramatically. They become completely different personalities because they’re becoming their soul’s personality instead of the injured personality. And that’s where things come up like enlightenment.
0:49:22.0 Duffy James: Didn’t you notice that my voice lowered, almost right away?
0:49:25.0 Ashley James: Yeah. That was something I wanted to say. So I wasn’t allowed to be in the room when Duffy James was getting his session. I was all ready to come sit in the corner and be a fly on the wall. When I picked him up after his session, he comes out and I noticed that his voice had dropped I don’t know how many octaves. I don’t know what an octave sounds like but his voice dropped noticeably. Not fake, it wasn’t forced but it was his real voice. I know when he’s in his in a state of stress, his voice becomes higher, I mean within the male range of voice but his voice becomes sort of stressed and higher pitched and I hadn’t heard that relaxed, deep voice for a long time. So I just noticed that that was a shift. I mean his energy shifted but his voice physically shifted.
0:50:18.8 Eric Thorton: Which shows the release of stress. Subconscious stress. When the body can acknowledge this, that’s when it knows we’re not gonna hurt it and then we start going in there. And we start getting these very specific cross wires. Most people want you to bring it up. They can go, “Oh yeah.” And they can look at it then and they can change it. So like if love equals being highly critical, for example. Love is cross wire with all kinds of things, it’s not always love but that’s a real common one. And so if love equals highly critical, then you’re on hyper alert to be critical because you love everybody and so you’re stressed. And if you can release that, but love equals because you breathe which is what we ultimately want, your stress levels drop down. But that’s a lot distance between love equals being critical and love equals because your present – I love your presence when you’re breathing. I have no judgement. Those are a long, long distance away and we have to go in and get the specific cross wires that come up with love equals being critical. And then all of a sudden their voice changes, their being changes, their tones change and they may be very intelligent but they’ve realized that, “Oh, just because I know something doesn’t mean I need to say it.” And so the critical part goes away. [Laughter]
You’ve recognized that one? You’re giggling. [Laughter]
0:51:57.3 Ashley James: Yeah, certain relatives of mine matched that. Can you remember that quote and we can read it back to certain relatives that shall not be named? [Laughter]
0:52:09.3 Eric Thorton: It’s better that way. [Laughter] But you know, when you can change that, then people’s perception of you completely changes too and you’ve changed complete frequencies. And so you don’t even wanna hang out sometimes with some of the people that were hanging with you because of the negative interaction. You changed to a more positive outcome, a more positive being, a more enlightened point of view and all of a sudden these people don’t wanna be around you anymore because they’re still stuck in the negative points of view.
So when people do this work, I also sometimes we have to say you’re gonna change enough now that friends aren’t gonna like you anymore – certain friends, because you’re no longer in alignment with them. You know people that have anger, hang out with people that are angry and so you’re not angry anymore and you’re gone. “I got this to do. sorry guys.” And so it changes who you hang out with too.
So these perspectives are what vary between happiness and enlightenment. Happiness is a joke, it’s a laugh. Enlightenment is joy and that you still have stress, you still have the human problems when you’re in enlightenment, but you move to the place of joyvery quickly. Instead of staying in this anger or frustration for years on and destroying families and things like that. So as you go through the process, our goal is enlightenment for people. Enlightenment being like we discussed on the last session. Enlightenment being a very simple definition – of being able to move through the problems in life instead of being stuck on them. So you have time left over just to exist and enjoy it and when you’re enjoying it, you feel joy. It just comes to you and every person, how they get there is different. And that’s why if somebody is a mechanical type, spiritual things don’t work because it’s the same practice for everybody. Just like aspirin, it affects everybody differently. So people got stuck in a practice and they’re stuck, they’re not enlightened.
So individually, we have to learn our own path to go into that place of joy and enlightenment and it’s a choice. All of it is a choice. We can choose to be happy but we have to make choices consciously with intent to become enlightened where you find that joy, even when in the middle of an argument. We have to make those choices but like we talked about in the beginning of this, spirituality is so confused. The cultures are so confused – religious, spiritual, scientific et cetera and it just keeps people from actually getting there and you can apply that to many cultures. You apply it to the political realm, which we’re not gonna get in to today but in the politics world, those cultures, if you confused the people, you got control over. It’s the same thing spiritually. You confuse people and they can’t get there, so you’re controlling the enlightenment process.
0:55:42.7 Ashley James: You remind me of up until very recently in the Catholic church, I mean in history up until, I don’t know exactly 100 years ago, 200 years ago, 300 years ago, whatever it was, that the bible was not printed in English and most people didn’t know how to read. There was a considerable amount of people that didn’t know how to read and that it wasn’t written in English and so they trusted that the priest would give them the word of God which allowed – like it’s that disconnect that they were reading for the spirituality we get fed to them and it kept them confused enough, because if they couldn’t read it, they couldn’t memorize passages, they couldn’t be empowered by it.
0:56:31.8 Eric Thorton: Couldn’t call the church on the crap. If you don’t know what they’re saying, you can’t go. You can’t raise your hand and go. You’re taking that one a little too far. There’s a lot of humanity in that instead of just the word and then they build on the humanity.
0:56:50.6 Ashley James: Right.
0:56:51.5 Eric Thorton: And it becomes this big political trademark instead of from the original information. And it’s so very much on purpose.
0:57:01.6 Ashley James: In Quebec which is a province in Canada, the French saw that they were far outnumbered from the English. And so politically they told the churches to tell all the people that came that it was God’s will that they need to have very large families.
0:57:25.7 Eric Thorton: [Laughter] Big Catholic family huh?
0:57:28.2 Ashley James: Right. So still to this day in Canada it’s very typical to see a family of 12 children, if they’re in or from Quebec or Catholic and that it is all politics. Right?
0:57:44.4 Eric Thorton: Right.
0:57:44.9 Ashley James: But this is just an example of how politics uses religion in the past to control the population and that’s just an interesting example that because of that, Quebec was able to populate themselves very quickly enough to take over that region and it’s still in control of the region to this day.
0:58:07.4 Eric Thorton: We have this same thing here with these abortion sites. We have work shortage, we have a labor shortage of people that can do that type of thing and we can limit our growth to 1 or 2 children, so that population isn’t feeding itself. Population has to grow an economy to feed itself and so politically, they’ve politicized women’s birth rights so that they can control the population. They did the same thing in China. They have too many people. “You women, you get pregnant. You’re either gonna have an abortion because you only have 1 child. If you don’t, you gotta pay us 20 grand or 30 grand or whatever it is, the government.” And that’s how they control the population because their’s was too many. So it is, it is very politicized in these cultures and it’s confusing and it keeps the spiritual growth from happening.
How did we get into this? [Laughter] Do you want to get in that?
0:59:15.8 Ashley James: Either way.
0:59:16.3 Eric Thorton: The abortion stuff or the political things?
0:59:19.7 Ashley James: I was more thinking about going down the road of how to help people find clarity in their spirituality even though there is a cultural intent to keep them away from it.
0:59:33.0 Eric Thorton: Okay. So to finish up the abortion issue, if you think for a moment that God doesn’t know abortions happen or miscarriages, you’re crazy. There’s huge lessons from either one for both parents and those lessons are only good. Now, should abortion and my opinion be used for birth control? No. But there’s huge lessons and women that have had it and the men that I’ve provided have worked with them, they have enormous gifts come from these things and yet our political system takes that knowledge and confuses it and makes people very guilty for doing this and it stalls their walk. Because the cultures have made them feel so bad that they die with guilt instead of joy.
So there’s an extreme of everything that’s human. I’m human too, I get it. But there’s also a point to doing things correctly, in the right timing, and everything else. And if things are settled, then the couple or the woman alone can make a proper decision for themselves that they are at pace with and it’s done and they don’t have to carry this burden around their whole life that stops their spiritual growth.
1:01:09.6 Ashley James: I talked about this in a past episode but I worked with a woman which was back in 2005, 2006. It was right around New Year so I can’t remember whether it was in 2005 or 2006, right around there. And this woman had had chronic pain – massive. She was on Tylenol 3 everyday for years, I think for over 10 years she was on this pain medication and she was a long distance runner and the doctors kept saying to her, “It’s because you have arthritis from long distance running.” And I knew it wasn’t. I palpated her back, we did an 8-hour breakthrough session using NLP and timeline therapy and so I palpated her back and I felt her quadratus lumborum on one side – this is a square shaped muscle on the back, was cold and hard. Meaning there was no circulation there and then on the other side it was nice, malleable and warm. And I know that when we have unresolved emotions and we’re not facing them, our body will manifest in the muscles.
We actually squeeze the muscles so tight it creates pain so that we listen, so that we pay attention. And as we were working through it took a few hours of talking like you do in your sessions to finally come upon the secret she never told anyone that she had an abortion. She was Catholic and she felt incredibly guilty. I had her tell me the whole story and she went into the session and the nurse came to give her the pain medication before the abortion happened she said, “No, I’m not taking any pain medication.” And the nurse is concerned, the doctor came in and said, “There’s really uncomfortable. You’re gonna want to take it.” And she said, “I have to pay for this guilt in pain.” I nearly felt my tears, “Did you hear what you said?” I said, “You have been experiencing physical pain every day since your abortion because you’re still holding on to the guilt of it and she said, “No, no I paid for it that day.” I said, “Listen to your body. Where is your guilt right now and where is your pain?” And so she finally, like the light bulb went off and she realized that she was.
Everytime she felt guilt her back pain would flare up to 10 out of 10 and she’d take a pain med to numb it because she was stuffing down those emotions and so we did the emotional work and release the guilt. Her pain went to zero. I touched her back and the quadratus lumborum that had been previously hard and cold was red. It was like the circulation came back.
1:03:55.3 Eric Thorton: It’s the circulation coming back.
1:03:55.7 Ashley James: Yeah.
1:03:57.5 Eric Thorton: And that’s induced by culture.
1:04:00.4 Ashley James: The religious culture.
1:04:03.3 Eric Thorton: That’s induced by man saying what God thinks.
1:04:06.3 Ashley James: We’re not condoning. We’re not saying, “Yay! Everyone should go get abortion.”
1:04:11.8 Eric Thorton: No. No.
1:04:12.4 Ashley James: We wouldn’t wanna use it as a birth control.
1:04:19.2 Eric Thorton: It’s very hard for the female’s body, physically hard. If you have so many abortions, then you can’t carry children anymore.
1:04:26.7 Ashley James: There’s a heartbeat, it’s a human being that we’re killing.
1:04:33.0 Eric Thorton: Right, at some point. This is where our discovery hasn’t gotten there yet. A soul doesn’t necessarily hooked to the body at physical conception. There can be a heartbeat, there can be brain waves and that soul is still not hooked to that body and that’s not a viable egg yet. And there’s many things that happen that people don’t understand that has to do with karma, and souls, processes and things like that.
1:05:00.0 Ashley James: I think we have to go here now.
1:05:01.4 Eric Thorton: Okay. I’m gonna give an example. I know a lady, Catholic and in her 50s she got pregnant. Well the doctor said, “If you carry this, you’re going to die.” Because she was too old and she had too many children before and it just wasn’t gonna work and so she reluctantly had an abortion and she felt guilty of it for years and years and years. And she had children and grandchildren born and she found out that one of those grandchildren was in fact hooked to the fetus that she had aborted. Because this isn’t a waste. Souls wanna come into a family, genetics and if it doesn’t happen here, it’s gonna happen over here.
I have another client who’s she miscarried her stillborn and that child, that soul that was hooked and went to full term and there was something that went wrong. Horrible, awful, and I’m not just counting any of the pain and suffering. But her second child, she had another one and then the next one is the same soul that was hooked to the one that was still birth. So see, God knows what’s going on here, if you reason the word God. And it’s ok, but man in their ignorance sets up rules that become part of our culture that make it so people can’t grow spiritually. They have to stay as the follower, the sheep if you will, instead of becoming the shepherd. Because if they become the shepherd, they’ll look at governments and go, “Uh-uh honey.” [Laughter] And they vote for what’s right instead of the latest cultural trend.
And so the cultures like these points of control and they keep people in the lives of discovery from finding who they are and being able to help the rest of population towards enlightenment.
1:07:24.5 Ashley James: So let’s help those that are listening that are in their lives of discovery. Let’s help them to gain clarity so they can find their spiritual path clearly without having cultural intent blind them or muddy the water. So what advice or what tools, what kind of homework can you give those listening who want to gain more clarity and freedom around their spiritual path?
1:07:58.9 Eric Thorton: Well we all have our soul’s personality and our default personality which is the personality that’s formed in childhood and our current personality. The current personality is actually a combination of both – the soul’s personality or the soul’s history and the default personality. And so within each person, there’s a fight between the two, and old souls distinctly know it. So they go and they do this X,Y, and Z for a living or they get in these routines and habits wherever they are but something in them tells them it’s not enough, it’s not right, it’s not this and so – and our culture say, “No, you have to do this.” Well, pay attention to what something in you innately is going. This isn’t enough, this isn’t right. And then we throw in from our cultures the idea of success and what we’re supposed to be doing bringing success.
Success to an old soul is joy. It’s not cash. Yes, we have to have cash to live in the world but if you’re doing something that’s not at all going to bring joy in an old soul, or something if you’re in the lives of discovery, it will bring you joy for a while and then the old soul will need to move on, so it stops bringing you joy. Well, that’s a sign of your soul’s personality – to pay attention to these things and go okay instead of fighting it because the old the old culture says stick with it, go, “Oh okay, this is coming to a close now.” So I’m opening my eyes up. What’s gonna show up and have me naturally easily gravitate over there instead of me having a big eruption and, “Oh my god, I lost my job and all of the stuff.” Because you didn’t pay attention to when it was telling you, “Okay, I need to move on.” And then if you pay attention, you just naturally start opening your eyes up and you let the world manifest for you. If you get to the critical point where we discussed that you can’t stand it, you can’t recognize what the world is manifesting for you because you are too under the frustration.
1:10:21.7 Ashley James: That kind of sounds like being stuck in victimhood.
1:10:25.5 Eric Thorton: Oh yeah, that’s part of our culture. Victim is an award in our culture and in the largest percentage or our culture. And because then, that’s who you are, you become a victim. That’s what we’re taught we have to be and they keep changing the rules to keep us victims where old souls go, “Nope.” But we need to pay attention to it early on. If you’re an old soul and you have an obligation, like let’s say, you have a family, as an old soul you can go, “Okay, I know everything that’s gonna lead to something new and I can go get a job where I’m doing the mechanics to bring home a paycheck. And because I’m an old soul and relaxed, I can keep my eyes open from all the networking that’s gonna happen in this job that I manifested.”
If you keep going “I hate this job. I can’t stand it but I’m doing it to support my family”, you will never discover the networking that your guides will give you to find the next thing to do that’s in your pathway. But our cultures say, “Stick with it no matter what” and then you missed the boat.
1:11:42.5 Ashley James: That’s the golden handcuffs.
1:11:45.1 Eric Thorton: Totally, completely that.
1:11:47.4 Ashley James: This reminds me of a story my dad told me. My dad was the kind of person that had over 200 employees and he just would kind of fall in love with them and after they left, you know he wished then well and he’d like to stay in touch with them. He loved reaching out to people and help people with a really big heart and there’s one guy who had worked for him for a while called him up crying and freaking out. He wasn’t employed by my dad anymore and he said, “I don’t know what to do. We just lost our house. I’m sitting in our car. I got my kids and my wife and we’re homeless right now and I don’t know what to do.” My dad described him as being really stuck in that victim mentality unable to see, like you said unable to see the opportunities because he was so bought into the woes, “I can’t get a job. I can’t get a house, oh my gosh. We’re gonna be homeless.” He just kept focusing on the negative and not seeing the opportunity. And my dad said, “Didn’t you tell me you had an aunt in the other part of the province 4 or 5 hours way who wanted to come live with her and be her caretaker so that she didn’t have to go to an old folks home and she said that if you did this when she die, she’d leave you her house?” His friend had forgotten this opportunity because he was so wrapped up in the victimhood, he couldn’t see something right in front of his face that when we’re in victim mentality, we can’t see opportunities.
1:13:34.5 Eric Thorton: That’s very true. Guides understand our anthropology. So if you take the limited information I have in psychology because I didn’t graduate with it. I didn’t graduate with a master’s. But it’s about what we call anthropological psychology. In anthropological psychology they look at the entire human being through anthropology instead of through cultures. The guides don’t care about cultures, they’ll point it out to you – what in the culture is upsetting your anthropology. So in anthropological psychology, they break down the human existence to very simple, non-complex features. So in anthropological psychology you have the family group, the friends group, and the trading group. And if anything in those 3 groups is upset, you become obsessed and causing you mental stress. Victim is going to either take away your trading group, your family group and or your friend group and if he gets all 3, he lost his house, friend group goes away, he’s got his family in a car – family group went away. And it started with the trading group. So that person had hit all 3 and your father found a way to bring him back to realize he was ok. He had someone to trade with – aunt. He had friends still – your dad was his friend to help him to keep his family safe. And all of a sudden you go, “Oh, my gosh.” And if you can keep any of those 3 upset, you can control the entire person.
This is one thing they’ve learned with mass media. Last time we talked about energetic PTSD. Well, by keeping the political upset it keeps your trading group upset. It keeps it all in discourse and depending on your history, past life and current life is how much upset that is and then they can control the friends group and the family group. And that’s one of the big ways they’ve learned to control populations – is by messing with those 3 groups.
1:16:14.6 Ashley James: Yeah. You’ve brought up based on this interview and also in past ones about there’s a cultural meme that can control us, right? And so we as individuals would like to learn how to separate ourselves from the manipulation of the greater intent that’s trying to keep us unconscious?
1:16:44.7 Eric Thorton: In the work we do, when we find the soul’s personality and you start to recognize it in yourself, then you are automatically not affected nearly as much from these other groups that are trying to control cultures. So like with me, I do get a little upset because of our political situation because it’s throwing everything into an odd place that we’re not used to. I said if the current situation happened before Trump was elected, that was gonna be an interesting ride I didn’t say he wasn’t gonna be elected because there was a high chance he was gonna be elected and sure enough we are having an interesting ride. And it is a ride that we need unfortunately, because it has revealed a whole bunch of stuff in the under current that isn’t okay and we just were ignoring it.
And so, you can look at it from the perspective of the soul and what the planet is learning from it or you can come back down and be a victim to it. That’s up to you. That’s a choice.
1:17:57.0 Ashley James: So to come back to the abortion discussion, a woman can be a victim of the abortion and hold on to the guilt and be stuck possibly holding on to a physical illness. Holding on to the emotions like my example with my client, so in any situation where something negative, bad, harmful has happened to us in our past – and it could be a natural disaster, it doesn’t have to be someone doing to us or something that we chose to do ourselves, it could be something negative has happened. We can perceive it as negative and hold on to victimhood around it which not allowing us to learn, not allowing us to get to the [inaudible 1:18:48.3] not allowing us to heal our body.
1:18:51.9 Eric Thorton: It’s a cascade of effects and it’s not just one. So let’s say the emotion, if you feel guilty, it damages parts of your body. What it’s doing to the brain? Because the brain controls part of the body and that’s one. Put the muscle on that lady you’re talking about and it’s like, “Well why is the brain feeding that to the body?” What is it that’s there. So some of them maybe the Catholic yelt, but where has it caused problems all the way through their life that led up the need for the abortion? That’s what we have to get to – it’s what’s leading up to that? So that you have to have the abortion, you manifest, that’s a big deal. So that’s a manifestation and what are you learning from it? How are you going from it? Let’s remove the cultures and look at it for what it is and the benefits that you got or other family got. Maybe that the body that was aborted, the soul that might have been hooked to it is gonna go on to another family person or be yours again in a better situation.
Since we’re talking about that, sometimes people will feel the need the need for an abortion because it’s gonna be a defective fetus and they don’t know that but they feel a need to have an abortion. This isn’t the right timing because their guides are going, “Nope this isn’t right.” In other words, there are many reasons for things that our cultures overlook.
1:20:33.0 Ashley James: And again, I wanna say that we’re being neutral. We’re not being pro-choice or pro-life. We’re not taking a stance in this because I want both sides. People who subscribe to either side and I think like you said, as we become older souls we have a problem with staying in that one box that holding on to a radical being in one position, right? Because we see can see it from so many angles.
1:21:06.8 Eric Thorton: And there’s always tons of angles for everything and the cultures can’t incorporate all of those.
1:21:13.4 Ashley James: So we’re not being on either side, but we are saying for those women who’ve had that happen in the past that if they’re holding on to the guilt and not gaining the positive learnings like you said.
1:21:31.5 Eric Thorton: Exactly.
1:21:32.6 Ashley James: Because in any bad experience, whether it’s a tornado or an earthquake, it doesn’t have to be abortion, any negative experience to which we’re holding negative emotions, we can find positive learnings in order to let go, in order to learn or to grow, and in order to gain more spiritual health.
1:21:55.0 Eric Thorton: Well, just from someone going through a medical thing like an abortion or anything else, you gain a massive amount of compassion for it, if you’re not a victim to it. And then you can actually help someone else who’s going through something similar. If you’re a victim, you can’t. You’d try to help someone else, your victim energy is gonna come out and give them victim energy. Or if you come through it with no victim, then you can have that Godlike peer compassion that’s not judgmental.
1:22:28.2 Ashley James: Just like abortion is a very hot topic, miscarriages are very, very common and yet it is so painful to talk about. Women feel shame and guilt, they blame themselves, they feel like they’re broken or something’s wrong them.
1:22:48.6 Eric Thorton: Again, culture is victimizing those women.
1:22:54.8 Ashley James: What could you say to the women who’ve had those experiences in their past and maybe it’s still raw or still hurts or they’re still holding on to negative emotions? What could you say to help them to heal?
1:23:06.6 Eric Thorton: First of all if they didn’t have those emotions, why exist? The fact that they’re good people, they have emotions and you need to embrace that emotion without the guilt or the fear. That’s the very first step. It’s realizing how wonderful a person you are because you can feel that and then be with it. It’s like anyone died in the family, you don’t get over it, you have to place it. If you go into the cultures that have to do around a miscarriage or an abortion, you’re never going to find the value in the human being that you are that feels the things they feel because they are good, wonderful person. If someone has a miscarriage or an abortion and they feel nothing, what’s wrong? If they feel, that’s wonderful and they have to. And if they feel outside the culture, it can turn to compassion and love and turn to kind support for other women that are going through that and you can be an ear, you can be a therapist for them just in any given moment. If you truly embrace this good person that has these feelings, then you come to peace with it and then you can be used as a tool. If you’re in the victimhood, if you’re in the culture that keeps you from coming peace with it, it keeps you from learning them, then the guides cannot use you for your gift of compassion and love that you gain from these experiences. It never becomes that gift.
So that is the first and primary step. It’s seeing what a wonderful person you are for having that, for missing the opportunity of this fetus. And the reason we feel so guilty is because we don’t know that that fetus is probably gonna be born at some time down the line or that soul is still gonna come to you. But the soul is gonna come in an another fetus, that one more suited to that soul. Miscarriages and like I said earlier, abortions can be the impetus because it’s not at an effective body for what that sould needs and it knows it will come in to give like this lady I talked to you about that was in her 50s. She had great learning from it. And when she learned that she didn’t kill anybody, it will bring their life up to help others. That fetus wasn’t meant to come to [1:26:02.8 inaudible] it was meant to teach her that this isn’t a horrible thing. It took a number of years after the fetus for this to be revealed that it was her grandchild but it was like this is what was supposed to happen. It was a lesson in all of this then she realized, “Oh my gosh.” The church doesn’t actually know everything.
1:26:27.8 Ashley James: So is there free will? I mean could she have said no and move forward and had that child and this soul come in to, you know.
1:26:39.1 Eric Thorton: Of course and she might become very naive from it or died and those are valuable lessons as well.
1:26:45.7 Ashley James: So there’s freewill at each step in the road, there are valuable lessons from our choices.
1:26:51.6 Eric Thorton: I look at it this way, this is what I’ve been taught. We have certain things we’re going to do. Certain major blocks in your life much like in astrology, the major tangents. We’re gonna do them, there’s no choice and so everything’s gonna lead to these moments. But the guides will use anything that comes up along the way to teach you. So if you make a choice, you have 2 choices like with that lady – either have an abortion and possibly remain healthy for the rest of her life or not and possibly dying and how it might affect is she lived and things like that. She’s making a choice. The fact that the choice is there is what would be part of the Akashic record, karma, whatever words you might wanna use. Which choice she makes, then the guides will use that. The one that was supposed to which was the abortion and the other was, well, you have it you’re gonna be sick and on and on or die and then the child’s gonna be raised in these set of circumstances and probably if she would have had it, maybe that same son that that fetus was going to be born to would be raising that child from that point on.
We don’t know these things and when we try to legislate them, it doesn’t work. We mess it up. That’s why it’s not the fight for abortions, it’s the fight for women’s rights because that’s the fight. You can have the choice to have the lessons from the choice versus having it governed. Since we’re on the subject, that’s what our forefathers put into our constitution – was the choices so that things could work out. Not according to a tyrannical government but according to freedom of choice. It makes them confusing, it makes it all muffled up. It’s not clean, and nice and defined, but it still keeps free choice. So we have our lessons not something to dictated by somebody else because the lessons are much sweeter when they come from ourselves. When we can get in that soul’s personality, it’s amazing what you can do. The most tragic things can become the sweetest things that ever worked.
And just because the child might be born into another body – the soul, it doesn’t mean you still won’t mourn the one that disappeared for whatever reason. It was because you’re a good person. Again back to that. That’s a wonderful gift but they take it away with our culture so it keeps us from the enlightenment, from finding the joy. So it’s a sad state of affairs for this occurred in my book, “The Removing of Freedom” our personal choices. Again, we had to look at that and that’s why the current administration is in about what was happening underneath, it’s that we’re slowly taken away our freedom from both sides and we had to look at that and establish the things be well established of the next 10 or 15 years. A whole new way of existing in our country and it’s gonna be with free rights. It will be with women’s rights because we’ve realized that all rights – we’ve realized that this in the background is being eroded, taken away. And now everyone’s going, “Oh heck. We don’t know what we’re doing ye but something is really wrong and we’re gonna change it.” And so it’s gonna be changed. That’s why I said it’s gonna be interesting. [Laughter] And it continues that way.
1:31:01.2 Ashley James: What can we do to open our perception to hear advice from our guides?
1:31:11.2 Eric Thorton: It’s that timeline, first of all. Everyone has things they can learn in each life. So by remaining in free will, by remaining and valuing who we are, we become a better tool for where our gifts are currently in our current life. So let’s say we have people in the lives of discovery, these are the people I see most and they have what in some circles, we call it totem. The totem is a symbolic gesture that talks about maybe you have these different animals on the totem or an object on the totem and it’s telling you that these gifts are available in this life. They’ve already done it in past life, they’ve earned it and they are available. When we’re caught in our cultures, the negative cultures we’ve developed, you can’t use the gifts well. When we come to the place of no judgement, that’s the place of joy. When you look at things from that moderate point of view you can find the full value, then can those totem animals come to you because you’re not caught in your pain and suffering. You’re in joy and then you can look at things through those gifts from a neutral place.
If you’re caught in pain and suffering, that is going to influence what we call the cognitive biases. So for example I worked with a lady, I’ll just use her first name Lara for a couple for years side by side in tandem with clients, but only the female clients. She could not work with the male clients. Now she was a master but very injured and she works through it. So she saw everything in the male clients as something – because men have testosterone, so she saw testosterone as a very, very negative thing even though she had it to. So the male libido and the male imagination is governed by testosterone supposedly when you’re young. And so men’s psyche goes all over the place. You know they talk about boys and school about every 2 seconds, they gotta think about testosterone related things and she would see that in the man’s energy filed and feel threatened by it. So these aspects of her totem could come out but a whole bunch more couldn’t because of her own fears.
Well if we’re asking to use our gifts, how can we do that coming from a negative victim place? Can’t do it. You put cognitive bias to everything the guides say instead of being neutral.
1:34:24.6 Ashley James: That reminds me in Huna which is the spirituality that comes from ancient Polynesian and Hawaii. They have this image of 3 points – the higher self, the conscious mind, and the unconscious mind and it’s like a vesica piscis where each one has a circle. So where the heart is the unconscious mind in this drawing and the one in the middle is the conscious mind and then one up above the head is the higher self where the information from guides would come from. And in this drawing in ancient Hawaii they would say that the information comes from the higher self into the unconscious and then the unconscious then gives it to the conscious. So kind of like eyesight of hearing, it is – all information to our 5 senses is filtered first through our unconscious mind and through the reticular activating system of the brain before it is filtered highly.
We think we’re always aware of everything that our senses have, but we’re not. Like you’re not aware of the feeling of your feet in your sandals or your shoes until I mention it because your brain deleted that information because it wasn’t relevant to right now. So our brains our always deleting or distorting information that’s coming in to our 5 senses or unconscious brain, right? And what we don’t think about often but what they illustrated in Huna is that the unconscious bias that filters the unconscious mind also filter the spiritual information coming through our intuition or our guides. And so if we have negative beliefs, our guides could be giving us really great information but because it’s coming through the filter of our unconscious first, that it can be distorted. So I think that’s what you’re describing.
1:36:36.9 Eric Thorton: Exactly. It’s very powerful. It has to do with your intent. So you sit here and if you are in fear on a subject matter, you cannot be clear about it. That’s why people masters are all moderates. Yes I have my biases, I can’t help it because I’m living a human existence. That’s why the work is inclusive because I can’t be used for everything. I have biases. I was born in the United States – that’s a bias compared to being born in South Africa. And so it truly takes a village because of those very biases. It’s like I can see the future through my biases, but you can’t be predicting the future like Nostradamus by himself. You have to predict the future, people that can all do this come together in a group to get the full perspective around one subject. So someone may be over it at 10 degree perspective, some may be at 30 degrees, someone at 36 degree, et cetera looking at the same subject matter and then you get a full picture. Instead of like Nostradamus, the pictures were very vague and you could apply it to many things. Yes he was good, no question about that but it wasn’t a full picture so we don’t know what he meant. Now if you’re working with clients everyday, you can’t go into the don’t know what you meant by your own cognitive biases. So it limits your healing ability to be used as a healer.
Now if you take the human subject as well just our who we are as humans, we’re not satisfied with who we are for various reasons, injuries usually. We always want to be somebody else. So there’s many healers we call wannabe because they want to be a healer because they grande sized that he’s being someone important. Where are true healer, true master feel none of that. They literally feel like the most normal person on the planet. Or people who want to be and they seek out, much like becoming a doctor. They seek out these spiritual things, it’s because we are spiritual beings we’re curious about it. But a lot of times, I’m sure you’ve seen it, is it’s the impetus for injury. And if that’s the impetus, that limits extremely what your guides can use you for.
1:39:23.1Ashley James: Until you heal that injury.
1:39:24.6 Eric Thorton: Until you heal that injury then it expands automatically. I have many clients who have gone on to become spiritual powerhouses that you’ve heard of in our area and around the world because we’ve cleared up all these other stuff through their processes here and other people they’ve gone to and all of a sudden their past doesn’t matter. There’s a very well-known hypnotist and an animal talk person around in the areas and I’ve worked with them both before they even started the businesses up. They couldn’t figure out what to do. They had these little gifts but it wouldn’t come together and we found out who, what, when, were, and why and all of a sudden it starts manifesting for them. But without that healing maybe the animal talk person couldn’t look through the innocent, it only looked through the injury and the fact that she loved animals and only animals because she couldn’t trust humans. Then you’re hearing from the animals all the negative things about humans and that’s not useful to a guide. So she gets through the injury and all of a sudden she takes that same gift and can now expand it because you’re coming through perspective. And she finds out all these wonderful things about animals now. She travels all over the world and we just solidified it for her.
Same with the hypnotist, she travels all over the world now doing things with people all over the world. She’s amazing now. I get her newsletters and all that other stuff and it’s someone you know. [Laughter] And I just solidified it for her. So I look at that and go, I was a little bitty part of her healing group that allowed her – and I don’t take credit for it. It’s just my little part to guide her to be able to go whack – there it is, her guides can then use her. And I know my part was just a little one but it’s part of her village and I’d love to know the rest of the parts of her village. [Laughter] Because it’s amazing what she’s able to do.
So that’s how you start using those gifts with totem. Then once you’re using them all or a large portion of them, then you have demonstrated your spiritual growth and then new gifts start showing up. All of a sudden the clarity becomes solid or all of a sudden you’re able to work with people that you’ve never ever dreamed of working with. A whole different direction to your human practice because you have gotten your psychology – has become healthy. So it’s one step ahead of your gifts. If your psychology is behind you gifts, you’re doing it out of ego. And we talked about that earlier, that’s called a sorcerer or a sorceress. You’re working out of ego and they have the same gifts as a healer. The healer probably has been a sorcerer at one time because they’ve learned that using things and doing things out of ego and desire can make you very vulnerable and go into areas of ego and desire.
It’s very real. I’ve worked on a number of people – with local and distant sorcerers that are very serious. One time I’ve got into someone’s energy and literally my legs were not under me. I could not stand as if my legs were gone and I collapsed to the floor and the person on the table jumped up, “Oh my god, are you okay?” “Yeah, I am. I just learned something.” [Laughter] And sorcerers are the same as a healer, they’re just using it as an ego. I mean I could technically do all those same things but I would never do it. I’ve entered mastery so that can’t happen. Do I make mistakes? Oh, sure. But I don’t do my work from a place of ego. I have to reckon with that as far as doing public work too. Just being on a radio show, is it coming from a place of ego or coming from a place of healer? And I had to think about it and work with it various times throughout my career.
1:44:00.3 Ashley James: But just the fact that you’re asking yourself, I mean someone who comes from ego doesn’t sit there to contemplate. Is this really coming from ego or this is you know?
1:44:09.5 Eric Thorton: They don’t and that’s what I had to reckon with because just getting to talking on your blog here, it could be an egoic thing or it could be a thing for healing and supporting other people. And that’s where I have to learn to keep it there, if at all possible. Do I have opinions? Yes and it was like any other human. Do some of them stink? Oh you betcha. But the intent is to not create karma and just to remain integrity. And I have never sought any of this, it’s just there. So yeah, I want people to understand what I’m talking here.
When people are egoically seeking to their healing that is also a good thing, it’s just not mastery. When you seek to become a Reiki master, you are literally redefining by going to the process of how you feel energy and it’s bringing it to you so that in the future lives, you can use that. So these processes are very important of ego seeking and trying to be a healer because you wanna be – it’s an important part of it. Because you’re discovering the various ways that God reveals itself to the world. It’s just not a neutral thing that the master has. It’s an ego driven thing. So in the lives of discovery, you maybe want to learn Reiki, you maybe wanna learn herbology, you want to do this and you have to apply it to make a living. So I’m not finding any fault with any of that. It’s just not a master yet or you come in having access to all that information in a neutral way.
Great masters all have agreement set up that they do not create karma at all cost and how do you negotiate that is what the individual has to figure out because that’s part of the lesson. So how I negotiate doing public work is an important lesson for me in how to so that. The ascending masters are amazing at it. They’re great in the public, they’re great in everything. They’re just good at everything. They remain in that neutral spot. I’m learning that. I’m not there yet so I’ve had to find it within myself. And without wanting to do that, I would never have the experience of try it and finding those places. So I never preprove these things, when they take that and say that’s it and that’s end all for everything? That’s when I find a problem because that’s very high ego. So like Reiki, it’s not the end all. You can’t do everything being a chiropractor. You can’t fix everything. You being an herb person or a Naturopath, you can’t fix everything. And if so your ego drive to do that, and the ones I like are the ones that are open, they’re amazing people. And the ones that are closed with it, they’re not amazing. They still do good work, but they’re not amazing.
So perspective and intent is everything and we have to have intent. And so with my guides I have set up situations with them and no matter what, I don’t want to create karma and they literally cut me off, if I start to do that. Sometimes I have to do that in my life. I have to have my lessons too but they let those ones go buy. But the ones that I can screw up, they stop me from doing it so I don’t create more karma.
1:48:20.4 Ashley James: So as our gifts come into fruition, our guides can help us.
1:48:26.5 Eric Thorton: Very much so.
1:48:27.5 Ashley James: And we can ask our guides to also help us not use our gift to disrupt karma or to create karma.
1:48:37.0 Eric Thorton: Right. Damage on a spiritual level. Because remember the bodies, they’re wanting to play a lot but they are vessels for it. We’re grateful for them, we need to love them. we need to respect them, we need to give them hugs, we need to say I’m sorry. Because of you spiritual pathway it causes strain to the body. We need to do all those things, they have to be very, very valuable and held very tightly but they are secondary compared to soul’s pathway. And there’s a convoluted pattern that takes place. You might say a series of venn diagrams where the cultural laws and the spiritual laws crossover and one creates spiritual growth and the other creates physical growth in these common areas. So spiritual pathways create human evolution. Human evolution in the form of all these laws and cultures create the incidences for spiritual growth. If it was legal to kill people, there would be no lessons if you are involved in a killing of another human being.
So we have to have those cultural laws to provide the spiritual growth. When you start giving the extremes, it’s out of balance and that’s in all directions. That’s why healers or masters will always be in that neutral plays. Always, when they’re working with people.
1:50:16.0 Ashley James: Yeah an idea came to mind when we’re talking about needing to maintain women’s rights and free will to choose to have an abortion or not. The idea came to my mind, what about laws like DUI or murder, why should we have laws to prevent us from doing other things that would take away a free will? So when one choose to drink and drive or choose to murder someone, those laws are imposing free will right? Just like abortion, to take it away would be kind of like taking away the free will. But what you’re saying is that we need some laws and balance – we need balance. I’m talking very extremes here. We need the balance and the laws in order for us to create circumstances to learn from.
1:51:16.2 Eric Thorton: Correct. So like someone you mentioned, drunk driver. Well, we think it’s wrong and it is. It’s really wrong for the human body and I won’t go there period. It’s wrong. But is that drunk driver creating karma or is he playing a part in the drama in the karma that a van full of people half of them dying from an accident from the drunk driver hitting them or getting in the way? We say the drunk driver needs to be punished and it’s all karmic or sin and this is that and the other. Well maybe they’re playing a part that says, I have to hit this car so this many people die so that karma between them takes place and you’re just a role. So then the person does have to be punished because he’s driving drunk and because not every drunk driver is fulfilling the karmic role. And we also have to love the drunk driver because he may be playing a role that is fulfilling someone else’s karma or it sets up in motion his or her karma.
1:52:34.2 Ashley James: And the circumstances allow these people to learn from to gain spiritual growth.
1:52:41.0 Eric Thorton: Right. The circumstances are the laws that say no and then it puts a punch into the growth. It shoves it over the edge. And if so you’re a drunk driver, you will go to jail. You feel guilty maybe you killed 10 or 15 people on a bus or something like that but it was something you had to do but you feel so guilty about it because of our cultures that you go to jail and you learn all sorts of new things. And you feel guilty so you’re interested in learning, maybe you get some psychotherapy, maybe you’ll find Jesus or Mohammad or something in jail and you learn a whole different new way of existing. It would never have happened if you didn’t drive drunk and kill a bunch of people.
1:53:27.9 Ashley James: I know 2 people, fortunately didn’t kill anyone but I know 2 people who had DUIs who – that was the event that had them completely changed their life.
1:53:41.6 Eric Thorton: Exactly. Without the laws it would never have listed them into that. And then if you expand the picture, if they didn’t have that event, it would have to amp up to get them to change and grow and their life. Then it may have been far more tragic.
1:54:01.0 Ashley James: This sounds a lot like in naturopathic medicine. We’ve had many naturopaths on the show even from day 1. The first episode of this show over 3 years ago, when we talk about physical health, the body speaks to us in symptoms and the symptoms start off as whisper. So maybe you have a little shoulder tension or a little tiny headache. Like really small, easy, manageable symptoms – the body is whispering. And if we ignore it or we self medicate, we take Tylenol or Advil or we drink coffee or whatever we do, over the counter or prescription wise, we look to self medicate, we look to push down the symptoms. We’re not listening to the body or we don’t realize that the body has this language is trying to communicate something. The more we not listen to the symptoms and keep going, the symptoms get stronger and stronger and stronger and also we’re gonna get hit by the cosmic 2 by 4 and that’s the body yelling at us. So if we can catch ourselves when the symptoms are small, correct something really soon. Like you catch something in pre-diabetes, type 2 diabetes is easy to correct anyway but by the time you are full blown diabetic, you’ve done damage to your eyesight, your circulation, to your heart, you may not realize it. So it’s best to catch something when you notice a few weird symptoms like, “I’m waking up in the middle of the night to pee.” Or, “Why am I angry and kind of hungry 45 minutes after eating?” Or, “Why am I really sleepy in the afternoon?”
You catch those symptoms early on, you can correct it. And what you’re describing is like spiritual symptoms that if we don’t learn and we ignore, it’s kind of like the lesson comes harder and harder and harder until we do.
1:55:48.3 Eric Thorton: it completely amplifies. We do that, we talked about magnets in one of the previous talks where each incident around the wound, you main wound is your main magnet stuck to your belly and each incident is another magnet. And we will keep getting magnets until we get a huge pile of magnets that forces us to our homework or we can look at it when we start collecting the magnets. And they’re designed to get us to search, search for growth, search for wisdom, search for God. It’s a perfect system, if you’re stubborn, you’re gonna get a lot more magnets. You’re gonna get a lot bigger and bigger drama and that’s not enlightened. Enlightened is looking at each high and low of the day and go, “Okay what am I learning from that?”
Sometimes it takes a day or 2 or 3 to do that but not a year or 2 or 10 or 15. And when you get this huge pile, if you have a pile of magnets and you kept adding to it, pretty soon you’re looking at apile of magnets. And if someone says boo to you, you look through the magnets and why the hell did you say boo to me? Instead of interesting.
So yes, very much so. We’re designed to amped up in everything until we finally tell whatever happens that it’s necessary. That goes back to the guides will use whatever happens to bring you to your lesson. And it’s not all planned. The major things are planned, but the rest of them which can become major are not planned.
1:57:42.4 Ashley James: What kind of introspection or what kind of questions can we ask ourselves in order to gain the positive learnings?
1:57:51.3 Eric Thorton: “What is it that’s giving me question?” So when a person’s stuck for example, why? Let’s say you want to break up with break up with someone you’ve been living with and or someone you have a romantic relationship with, you just want to break up when you think it’s over. You know, “We’re not married so it’s an easy thing to do” for example. And you’re stuck, you don’t know whether to stay with him or not stay with him. Well, if there wasn’t a problem, I mean you weren’t afraid of being a victim and you weren’t afraid of all the cultural things of being alone and all these different things. The fact that you’re having a fight in you, is in fact your old soul going, “This person isn’t for you.” But the self, the one that wants to be with someone because of culture, security, money, whatever it is, it’s going, “No. No. No.” Well if your soul guides guides weren’t telling you, you wouldn’t have the controversy in you. So if you got the controversy in you and you have the thing tearing you apart, it’s tearing the default personality from the soul’s personality. You’d better pay attention because the soul’s not gonna tell you to break up with someone, if it’s meant to be. It will have you keep working through the problems that develop 2 people being together naturally are there. If the guides are telling you no, well don’t pay attention to it.
We don’t pay attention. If you’re in the lives of discovery, our guides are constantly telling us what’s going on by those knowings. But again, our cultures keep us stuck – being alone, being whatever it is. It keeps us totally stuck in every way. So listen to the truth no matter how painful it is. If you listen to it in the beginning, it is easy to work your way through it. If you pull in the cultures of “no I must do it this way”, then it amps up and it becomes a very difficult thing to do. So, listen. That’s how i told my kids the same thing. If it’s just not there, listen to it. And if it is there, it will work out. So that’s where we fight it.
2:00:37.8 Ashley James: Thank you so much. My last question, I think I asked this last time, but I really like this question. Is there a message that – because all the people who are now listening, in the future because there’s no time to guides and angels. All the people are listening, their guides know that they’re listening. Do any of them have a message that wants to come through or is there a message for all the listeners or a message for some of the listeners, is there anything that they would like come through that’s important?
2:01:10.7 Eric Thorton: Well we talked about what to do today. The guides are big on this, we wrote the newsletter I’m recalling it.
2:01:19.4: Ashley James: Happiness is a choice. Enlightenment is deeper.
2:01:23.4 Eric Thorton: Happiness is a choice. You can go to a party, you can go to whatever but it is the intent that we have to have to go deeper to find who we are. We have to have the intent of not listening to cultures but listening to our souls knowledge that is coming through at all times. And it’s very deep and it will keep you moving on in life. In the lives of discovery, that’s the only way we’re gonna be happy. So it’s like in you, if you’re supposed to do the radio show for the next 40 years, it will keep coming and there will be new things to keep you growing. If you’re not supposed to, you’ll find things that becomes redundant and you keep trying but the world won’t won’t be manifesting for you if that were the case. And you have to look at the writing on the wall. Okay what is it then? That if you do it early, you could either adjust your media access or change it, whatever it needs to be done and it’s easy.
if you realize and you keep hanging on and trying and struggling, it’s gonna become very difficult when the world slaps you in the face versus evolution. Guides will always, and this is something that the new age I don’t think acknowledges real well. They will turn anything into development. So nothing is right or wrong and there’s that takeaway today is to get to that place of the soul’s personality where it looks at everything. It’s not or right or wrong but as in what we’re learning from it so that we can, yes choose to be happy but we can also choose to evolve with intent and then you have joy and then happiness becomes important but takes a secondary role. Because it is the joy that’s 24/7.
So that’s maybe a message for your clients today. It’s learning to look at that intuition early on so the guides can help you.
2:03:44.1 Ashley James: Yeah. Listen to the whispers instead of waiting for it. If there’s a bunch of drama happening in your life, it’s possible that you haven’t been listening to the whispers.
2:03:54.8 Eric Thorton: Just slightly possible, like huge. [Laughter]
I mean sometimes drama is part of our karma. Sometimes it’s part of raising kids, it’s part of your process. If you don’t have the drama, you’re not being a good parent, so you’d actually create karma. But where we take it like with the kids, if we take them, we resent our kids for creating drama, you’re not in enlightenment, you’re not there. If you think, “Okay this is the moment. This is the teaching moment.” And 5 seconds later, you’re in the next thing. I found it really fascinating with my kids because I’m not perfect but I have an interesting point of view in life. I would be sitting there having to have to discipline my boys or 1 of them and the others would come up to me and, “Are you done yet?” Right in the middle of it because they know I don’t pull from one into another.
I can literally be disciplining and teaching this kid how to live in the world as best I can demonstrate to him and not be really happy and the next I can, “Oh so you wanted to play baseball? Okay good.” Because I’m not carrying it.
2:05:16.8 Ashley James: You’re not spilling anger at all of your kids because you’re disciplining onw of them.
2:05:21.1 Eric Thorton: Right. I’m just disciplining one of them. Teaching them how to get along in the world from a perspective which teaches them to take in more perspectives and learn their own space. And if you don’t, then your kid isn’t gonna learn to so that. So you do that, but how carry that to the next? At least once in a while I’ll go, “Nope I gotta be pulled away.” It’s like, “I’ll answer that later.” And end up that I’m right there. I can take each one of my kids on that day. Did I do it perfectly? No. Do I do it better than most? Hopefully. So far it seems to be working out that way.
Anyway, we have to look at the highs and lows in order to find the ego, in order to come to that place with neutrality in the center and then the guides literally could start opening up. How you get there is different for everybody. Do we help with that? Yes. Am I the one and only? No, not by any means.
2:06:30.0 Ashley James: Thank you so much, Eric Thorton. Listeners can check out www.ericthorton.com.Of course the links to everything that Eric Thorton does is gonna be in the show notes of today’s podcast at www.learntruehealth.com. Definitely check out all the other episodes that Eric Thorton’s been on. I’ll make sure that we have that all listed and linked in the show notes of today’s podcast. It’s been a pleasure having you back on the show.
2:06:50.4 Eric Thorton: Thank you very much. It’s been a pleasure being here. It’s always fun.
2:06:54 Ashley James: Hello, true health seeker. Have you ever thought about becoming a health coach? Do you love learning about nutrition and how we can shift our lifestyle and our diet so that we can gain optimal health and happiness and longevity? Do you love helping your friends and family to solve their health problems and to figure out what they can do to eat healthier? Are you interested in becoming someone who can grow their own business, support people in their success? Do you love helping people?
You might be the perfect candidate to become a health coach. I highly recommend checking out The Institute for Integrative Nutrition.
I just spent the last year in their health coaching certification program and it really blew me away. It was so amazing. I learned over a hundred dietary theories. I learned all about nutrition, but from a standpoint of how we can help people to shift their lives and shift their lifestyle to gain true holistic health, I definitely recommend you check them out.
You can Google, Insttute for Integrative Nutrition or IIN and give them a call or you can go to www.learntruehealth.com/coach and you can receive a free module of their training to check it out and see if it’s something that you’d be interested in.
Be sure to mention my name Ashley James James and the Learn True Health Podcast because I made a deal with them that they will give you the best price possible.
I highly recommend checking it out. It really changed my life to be in their program and I’m such a big advocate that I wanted to spread this information. We need more health coaches. In fact, health coaching is the largest growing career right now in the health filed. So many health coaches are. getting in and helping people because you can work in chiropractic office, doctors offices.you can work in hospitals, you can work online through Skype and help people around the world. you can become an author. You can go into the school system and help your local schools shift their programs to help children be healthier. you can go into senior centers and help them to shift their diet and lifestyle to best support them in their success and their health goals.
There’s so many different available options for you when you become a certified health coach.
So check out IIN. Check out the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. Mention my name, get the best deal. Give them a call and they’ll give you lots of free information and help you to see if this is the right move for you.
Classes are starting soon. The next round of classes are starting at the end of the month. So you’re gonna wanna call them now and check it out.
And if you know anyone in your life who would be an amazing coach, please tell them about it. Being a health coach is so rewarding and you get to help so many people.
—
Are you looking to get the best supplements at the lowest price?
For high quality supplements and to talk to someone about what supplements are best for you, go to www.takeyoursupplements.com and one of our fantastic true health coaches will help you pick out the right supplements for you that are the highest quality and the best price.
That’s www.takeyoursupplements.com
Be sure to ask about free shipping and our awesome referral program.
Educating the Souls, Spiritual Healing and our Eternal Psychology
Episode 327 – Spiritual Healing
Episode 335 – Energetic Boundaries
Episode 336 – Energetic Boundaries (Part II)
https://www.learntruehealth.com/emf
https://www.learntruehealth.com/emf-electromagnetic-fields
Have you heard about Electromagnetic Field (EMF), its sources and how it affects our health? Don’t you know that Wifi is one of the worst sources of EMF? In this episode, you’ll learn more about EMF and how to minimize your exposures to it with the help of GreenSmoothieGirl, Robyn Openshaw.
[00:00:03] Ashley James: Welcome to The Learn True Health Podcast. I’m your host Ashley James. This is episode 358. I am so excited to have back on the show, Green Smoothie Girl, Robyn Openshaw. She was on the show in episode 178, where she launched her amazing book called “Vibe”, where she illustrated 200 high-frequency foods and I was blown away. In fact, that interview was the straw that broke the camel’s back that made my husband go vegan and he was the biggest meat eater. He only ate meat. He almost never eats vegetables and after our interview, he just went, “I’m never eating meat again.” That was almost a year and a half ago and he never touched a piec e of meat and he feels amazing and within days of not eating meat he went, “I didn’t know that vegetables taste so good! This is amazing! Why didn’t you tell me? I can’t believe it!” He’s so happy. I just have to thank you for transforming our family’s health! It’s been wonderful.
[00:01:16] Robyn Openshaw: Well, that’s pretty funny because that’s what not at all the intention of writing the book “Vibe” but I have been eating plant-based myself for 25 years, not entirely vegan, not 100% vegan, but probably 98 to 99% vegan for decades now and you certainly can’t avoid the issue of food. If you’re really going to look at your own vibrational frequency and whether you’re vibrating at higher or lower frequencies and why, you cannot avoid the fact that the plant foods are high-frequency foods and the animal products and the processed foods are extremely low frequency, like close to zero.
[00:01:54] Ashley James: Right. That really surprised me because I grew up in a household that believed you needed meat for strength. You needed meat for energy and if you didn’t eat meat, you’d feel fatigued and that was the belief system that I was raised in. And so, this idea of eating only plants was like, “Where are you going to get your energy from?” And it’s so funny because it’s totally the opposite. Meat makes me feel sluggish, slow and even when they do live blood cell an ounce, you see after eating a burger or something, a bloodstream is slow down to almost like sludge. Whereas, when we eat mostly plant-based or all plant-based that we have more energy, more vibrance but you and your book in our interview, you talked about how there are scientist who can now with all these equipment can now prove that our bodies will vibrate at higher frequency when we are feeding it the foods that also have high frequency. And that really leads into what we are going to talk about today because of this concept of, “How can we protect all of our 37.2 trillion cells in our body from all the frequencies that we’re being bombarded by?” I know that since you came out with your book you’ve really dived into this topic. I’d love for you to share with us what’s happening last almost a year and a half since you wrote your book? What kind of things have you been researching and discovering?
[00:03:24] Robyn Openshaw: The book “Vibe” talked about a variety of things that we can do to be grounded and to discharge negative energies and a sort of a side topic or part of that you’ve (alluded) to hear and that’s pretty cool that your husband is now eating a lot more plant foods and letting go of dead low-frequency foods. We can talk about the positive side of that which is the things we can do to ground ourselves and discharge. I’ve really been taking a look at energetic (solution) that’s why you’re having me on to talk about today is, what are the things that we’re doing that inadvertently, they’re not even all that hard to get rid of or to mitigate, but what are some of the things that we’re doing because we live in this electronic age that is accidentally zapping our energy? Because as you (alluded) to, you’ve been raised to think that you got to have enough protein to have energy. Well, first of all, there’s protein in plant foods and we don’t need as much protein as many of us have been led to believe. Most marketers in certain parts of the food industry who led us to believe that we got to have these quantities of animal products to survive and most people throughout history have had very little animal products. In fact, they go whole entire seasons where they have no animal products if they are living close to the land and they’re not getting their food in the grocery store. They actually have to grow it or hunt it. Energy is really a different construct, especially when you go to more quantum energy studies and so, you’re now super clear on the fact that you want those 37 trillion cells to be vibrating. Even the slightly higher frequency can mean a massive difference in how you feel.
So, what we’re talking about today are electromagnetic frequencies. These are these chaotic and even radioactive frequencies that interrupt the high, normal, healthy frequency of human organisms overall but also if you get down to granular level, each of those cells they can’t really feel the measure of their creation if they are giving zapped all the time. I’ve been really researching this idea of energetic pollution or what they call in Europe “Electrosmog” and they are way ahead of us. In many other countries, I mean a lot of the publish researchers, there are over 8,000 published studies now of the negative health effects on human beings and other life of these chaotic frequencies.
Russia and Europe are way ahead of us in acknowledging the problem, in documenting it and in protecting their citizens from it. In Europe, they are sometimes referred to as EMF refugees. There are lots of them here in the U.S. too that haven’t yet figured out that their problem is that they’re really tripped over by these chaotic frequencies. Some of us can be in a yoga room where there are 40 people with their phones on, with WIFI emitting and they feel fine. They don’t feel different but there are a lot of people, a significant minority of people who don’t feel well when they’re in these high-risk situations or we could talk about SMART meters. We can talk about the kinds of light bulbs that you have in your house. We can talk about how much dirty electricity your outlets in your home office or in your bedroom are emitting and each one of these uses a pretty easy fix for all of this cause there’s now an industry coming out saying “Okay, we got to protect people from these.”
We put people in this situation. We’re about to be in 5G and when we go from 4G to 5G, and by the way what your phone says that you’re on 5G? That’s actually just marketing. That’s a misnomer. Some of the cellphone companies, I think Verizon and maybe T-Mobile say that on your phone, that does not mean that you yet have 5G. Almost nobody has 5G but when 5G rolls out in every 3 to 4 homes in the neighborhood have one of these transmitters, we’re going to multiply the amount of EMF that we are exposed to by 100 times. Those are the kinds of things that I’m having conversations with people about now and with my own audience about now because more and more people are becoming aware of it. I don’t feel good when WIFI is on in my office. I don’t feel good when I haven’t filtered the bleeding electricity in my bedroom. I don’t sleep as well. I don’t feel so good when I am interacting with blue light and devices all the way until I go to bed at night or I don’t fall asleep, things like that. That’s where I’ve been in the last year and a half, Ashley.
[00:08:41] Ashley James: Figuring it out. Well, what I think is interesting is the healthier we eat, the healthier we clean up. We clean up our lifestyle. Some people are complaining because they’re now more sensitive. It’s like when I ate basically 10 years ago, I was eating from the dollar menu at whatever fast food joint and this is a big transformation last 10 years for me. But when I ate that way, if I had one clean meal, I wouldn’t have felt a difference. I always felt bad. Right? And then all of a sudden I made that shift, I cut out gluten, dairy and switch to organic food and one are changed at a time, I noticed that I was having this huge shift in feeling better and better. If I’d have a day where I went back and ate something that was one of the foods that I’ve cut out in the past, I just feel bad all the time so, I was habituated. But now that I’m eating clean, if I eat one meal that’s not clean, I really feel it. I just feel horrible. I feel more horrible than I did in the past and I think it’s because we get so sensitive, we get so clean. It’s actually a good thing because our body we’re now listening to the symptoms of our body. Our body’s having an easier time telling us, “This is good, this is bad. Go this direction, don’t go that direction.” When we start to get really sensitive and realized, “Hey, when I turn the WIFI off, I feel better.” When I’m in an office building and I look at my phone and there are 50 WIFI signals, I’m feeling like off. It’s when we start to notice, we realized that we’ve spent so long becoming in tune and in touch with our body and becoming cleaner and cleaner with our health, then our body will start saying “Hey, EMF is affecting me.”
I didn’t think I was ever sensitive to EMF until I started interviewing a few people about it. Sal La Duca is one of the first people I interviewed about EMF. He is an electrician. There’ll be clients of his who have insomnia. He’ll come in and he’ll look around their bedroom and say, “No wonder you have insomnia, you have all these things plugged in by your bed. You’re basically living on and you’re sleeping on a giant electromagnetic coil.” He unplugs everything from the bed and for the first time in 20 years, they can sleep. And it’s just like, “My gosh!” Because it’s invincible.
When I went to your website, which we have an easy link: learntruehealth.com/emf, you have a video where it talks about how sunlight. We experienced its warmth to our skin, it’s wonderful and then we get a sunburn. A sunburn is like our body reacting to this radiation but we don’t really see, we see everything well-lit from the sun but we don’t see it as a danger until we start getting sunburns. So, everyone’s walking around with cellphones. If we got sunburns from cellphones, it would be so much easier to go, “Okay! The EMFs’ affecting me.” But the sunburn we’re getting from all the electromagnetic radiation on the devices we’re carrying around, it is leading to a lowered immune system, cancer, causing the mitochondria to not produce energy properly and so it’s affecting us negatively on a cellular level. I almost wished it was a little more blatant. I wished people would go like, “Wow! I got a sunburn.” I wish people would go like, “Wow! I really noticed a difference” because then it would be easier, but I guess people have to just lower EMF exposure and then realize like, “Wow, I am sleeping better or I have more energy, I have more mental clarity.” When you started lowering EMF in your space, what kind of health benefits did you notice?
[00:12:55] Robyn Openshaw: I cannot say that I’m a particularly energetically sensitive person but I will say that I had a similar experience to what you said Sal has talked about. I like to think of in terms of a metaphor for what you were saying earlier. About how the more you cleaned up your diet and lifestyle, the more finely tuned you became where very minor things that you would’ve never notice back when you ate a CRAP diet, now you do notice. I like to think of it as, “That’s because you’re a Ferrari now. You used to be a Hugo.” you know? A Ferrari is a more sophisticated instrument and you’re going to notice those minor changes in the environment. I also think though on the flip side that people who are energetically sensitive. A lot of Functional Medicine doctors are theorizing this because I asked this question every time I interact with one of them and I know lots of them, like you, I interview them constantly, that people who are energetically sensitive may be people who have an immune system that’s pretty tacks and they just can’t take the additional insults or the additional impact of energetic pollution on top of everything else they’re dealing with. Maybe they have had a lot of heavy metals exposure in the past? Maybe they ate a lot of foods containing glyphosatebecause they haven’t been eating organic? Their genetics combined with high levels of glyphosate in their bloodstream, in their organs and it’s a bad mix for them. But for me, one thing that I did notice even though I don’t think that I personally am very energetically sensitive. And then, I have another one with my child, it’s when I took my TriField Meter in or actually my Greenwave Meter in and the free EMF action plan that you mentioned, we’ve set that up on Ashley’s site, learntruehealth.com/emf.
Here are the top 10 things that I think you should address, that I think you’ll see a significant impact on your health, your quality of life, your energy, your ability to sleep, there’s the top 10. And then, there’s another 6 that would be okay. Most of them are inexpensive, some of them are even free. Then go on to do this next 6, because you never know which one is really bugging you until you addressed them one at a time but it kind of let you just trip away at the problem. When I plugged in my Greenwave filter into each electrical outlet, I found that my office was over 150 and keep in mind that anything over 50 is in the dangerous zone. No, I’m sorry. My office was over 400. My bedroom and my son’s bedroom in the basement, where we had tested everything in my whole house from where the sources of dirty electricity and chaotic frequencies or EMF (Electromagnetic Frequencies) were coming from and I could tell you some of the surprising sources of EMF that we had to address. I stuck this Greenwave filter into the wall and found that my son and I were living with more than 3 times of safe limit of EMF and when I got those then filtered. The outlets that were over 50, I put a filter in.
Greenwave also sells filters and on the EMF action plan that you can get at learntruehealth.com/emf. I’ll link you to where they have a discount to get packs of them because I wanted to filter my whole house and I had a larger home. When I plugged those into the outlets that measured over 50, I slept all the way through the night for the first time. I think I that was 3 or 4 nights in a row. I slept all the way through the night and I had not done that once a year for decades. I don’t have terrible sleep problems. I was really kind of solve my sleep problems years ago in terms of can’t fall asleep, can’t stay asleep but I would just wake up during the night. I’ll wake up and I might be awake for 5 minutes, might get up and go to the bathroom. I might be awake for 15 minutes but I do that once or twice a night and once I got the dirty electricity in my room cleaned up, I slept straight through the night regularly. But I did it like 3 – 4 nights in a row and I was like, “Oh my gosh!” This has never happened to me in my adult life.
When I filter it in my son’s room, he told me he was able to focus in school better. He was an A student but he struggled. He would tell me, “Mom, I can’t focus.” He was very clearly ADHD and his older brother was too. I’m sure there’s some kind of biological component there. I don’t know where he got it because his father isn’t ADD or ADHD. I’m not ADD or ADHD. I don’t have any trouble focusing, but all four of my kids. My girls are ADD, my boys are ADHD. He told me he was able to focus in school better. He didn’t feel like his brain was scrambled eggs anymore, so that was really nice. And it was such a simple fix too, to test the outlets using a meter and we’ll tell you how in the free guide, and then, to just put a filter in and clean up the ones that were bleeding too much dirty electricity.
[00:18:31] Ashley James: Can you explain, like you said it was 400 coming out of your outlets and your office, how far out is that field? Like if you’re sitting 2 feet away or sitting 5 feet away? Or is that like 400 volts? So, the 400, that dirty electricity that’s coming out, is it amplified by everything that is plugged into the outlet so that the field expands the room? How far away you have to be to not experience the dirty electricity? Can you just explain a bit more or paint that picture?
[00:19:08] Robyn Openshaw: First of all, I see different experts who’ve tested this, saying different things about keeping things plugged in all the time. You should just unplug your flat iron, ladies. You should unplug things that might sit there plugged into the wall. I see people contradicting each other on that, so I can’t be super definitive about whether it’s worth your time to keep things unplugged. However, I think it’s really clear that some of the electricity is coming out into the room and getting in the way. Now, what the radius is with your cellphone, you don’t want your cellphone in your energy field and consider your energy field about 8 feet away from you. So, you do not want to have your emitting devices like a cellphone or a tablet or whatever, unless it’s on airplane mode. If you turn on airplane mode and you only turn airplane mode off when you need to be actually transmitting data when you need to be making a phone call or sending and receiving texts. We have to get in the habit of either turning airplane mode on while we have it on our body.
So many women are sticking their cellphone in their bra going for a jog like that, going shopping like that. You are putting radiation right next to very sensitive breast tissue and we have to stop doing that. There are case studies and I think it’s going to be emerging whether this is really a thing or not, but there are case studies where there are brain tumors as the actual size and shape of a cellphone, right where the person holding it against their head. See, we’ve only been carrying cellphones for like 15 years and it’s starting to become epidemic that the more interaction you have with emitting devices, the higher brain cancer. That’s really clear now. As for cellphones that emitting devices, you don’t want to be carrying them in your bras, ladies.
And guys listening, you don’t want to be carrying them in your pocket right next to your little swimmers. We are talking about not just your reproductive health here, also talking about your sexual health. Even if you are not super interested in making babies, you want to keep your sexual health vital until you’re dead, right? And then other things like the bleeding electricity, it’s probably like 6 or 8 feet that it’s affecting you, maybe more, but the really bad one is actually the WIFI. You want that off even if it’s the floor below you and maybe your bedroom is on the top floor. That radiation can be detected on a floor above, even 2 floors above.
The biggest shocker when I tested everything in my house and I flew out Dr. Libby Darnell. I did a video, a masterclass with her. You can take a look at that in the free guide that we give you. I did a video masterclass with her, she flew out from Chicago and she had her big fancy equipment that I would never necessarily buy this, like 2 to 3 thousand-dollar meters and we have tested what kind of EMF I’m getting from the nearest cellphone tower, go outside and measure that. We took a look at what kind of metering the electric company is using. Luckily, I didn’t have a SMART meter in my house. We need to talk about that. Make sure we talk about that, Ashley, about what you can do. This is in the free guide but we should mention that because that’s another one that will radiate you at very high levels, almost relentlessly and sometimes they can triangulate. There’s one across the street, there’s one right by your house, there’s one somewhere else. When they triangulate, there are very terrible things that can happen to people’s health. If you’re unlucky enough to have three SMART meters triangulating in your bedroom, right where you sleep, for instance. But anyway, WIFI is very important. Here’s the big shocker for me, is that my son’s gaming system was so high emitting that you could literally detect it. You can detect it even two floors above where the kid is using it. It actually pegged out Dr. Libby Darnell’s meter when it wasn’t even on. It was just plugged into the wall and she had warned me about that but I was like, “That seems strange.” What we found is that my son actually had a second gaming system. They’re both plugged into the wall and he is not a huge gamer. He might go weeks at a time where he was in school. He was at the time we did all this measuring I think he was a junior in high school, now he is a freshman in college and gone from home, but I didn’t know he had a second one. I don’t know if he bought it from a friend or what, but that was one of the worst sources of EMF in my house.
We did a bunch of the things that we put in this free EMF action plan. We were able to bring the chaotic frequencies in my home way down and that’s what I’m hoping to educate your audience about, Ashley, is that when you bring it way down, we may not be able to bring it to zero but not only are we then getting a lot less exposure to radiation, which we all know that is very disorganizing for our cells, right? It’s causing protons and electrons to malfunction, to not do what they’re supposed to do in our cells. We’re picking up electrons and protons that we don’t need. Cells are not able to transact business with each other as they normally would. But in addition to reducing radiation, we also then have a home that’s more like the calming peaceful place that we want it to be. We want our homes to be like a safe haven, a place where we can calm down, rest and relax after work. That’s part of the goal here too.
[00:25:09] Ashley James: I love it. I had Dr. Klinghardt on my show, who actually is a local to me, just about 15 minutes away at the Sophia Health Institute. He’s internationally known and in his 40 years of practicing, many parents have brought their children who been diagnosed or misdiagnosed with being on the spectrum have come to him and the first thing he has them do is remove exposure to WIFI. He absolutely sees a huge difference in children who are autistic or have sensory processing issues, that their symptoms are magnified by being around WIFI and that’s when he removes devices from their environment. He has the parents turn off WIFI and hopefully live in a home that’s not like an apartment where you’re exposed no matter what but at a home that can be far enough away from neighbor’s WIFI. That they calm down, that they have less ticks and less outbursts. And then, he explains that glyphosate being a big part of this because glyphosate is a chelator and doctors definitely said that’s been on the show, talked about us too that glyphosate will grab heavy metals like aluminum, will deposit them in our kidneys and deposit them in our brain.
Even in utero, this is happening because it crosses the blood-brain barrier, crosses the placental barrier. So, heavy metal is a bit accumulating in their nervous tissue and then, when we turn on the WIFI, which is 60 Hertz I believe, it’s vibrating then metal in this tiny microscopic metal that’s in our brain. It’s vibrating that which is heating up because when you vibrate a metal, it’s going to heat up. It’s like putting your head in the microwave. It’s the WIFI that is making the heavy metal in your body vibrate which is creating heat and that, of course, is going to damage us. And they’re seeing that it affects the mitochondria negatively.
[00:27:20] Robyn Openshaw: We should talk about that because there are other things people don’t think about with metals. You’re talking about actual heavy metals that are trapped in tissues, organs, and cells, but what about the fact that we wear metal jewelry, ladies? And then we sit in our cars, and we text, we’re literally making ourselves an antenna in a microwave. That might be kind of extreme. Let’s not create panic because people will say, “I do it and I don’t feel like I fried myself when I get out of the car and walk away.” That’s true, but can we just acknowledge this simple fact? That reminds me when we go through the scanner, the TSA scanner when we go to get on a flight and the TSA agent will tell you when you say, “I want to opt out, I don’t want to go. I don’t want to get radiated in your scanner.” And they’re like, “It’s just like being in the sun for 10 minutes.” Well, it’s not a single exposure. It’s the accumulative effect of the many exposures that we have. Like you said before, you almost wish that we had a violent reaction to these exposures so that we were motivated to bring the level down. We do need to acknowledge that there’s an insidious process that’s taking place from accumulative exposures and going through the checkpoint to get on a flight is just one of them than being on the flight, actually exposes you to quite a big radiation. But that’s why it’s a really multifactorial problem and we need to just be aware.
That’s why I love to do shows like yours where you’re super interested in educating all the health coaches and other people who follow you about this because there’s a lot of little, small, not-difficult-at-all things that you can do and you’re chipping away that exposure. And if you can decrease that exposure by 3 floors and it’s easy and cheap to do so, why would you not do that? It’s not even changing your lifestyle. We’re not saying you have to drink a quart of green smoothie a day to bring your exposure down. That’s like actually a significant change that I always try to get people to make. By bringing your EMF level down, does it decrease your enjoyment of your life? I’m not asking you to give up your Cheetos to bring your EMF down or whatever is like this pleasure thing that you have in your life. You don’t have to give up pleasure in your life to bring EMF down. It’s just being aware and it’s making some really simple changes. You don’t have to go out of your way to bring your EMFs’ level down. Does that make sense?
[00:29:53] Ashley James: Yeah, I think people might go, “Woah! But I’m addicted to my phone? I look at it all the time. I don’t want to put it in airplane mode because I want to know when I get a text.” What about those people that want to lower their EMFs’ but they don’t want to interrupt their phone addiction?
[00:30:09] Robyn Openshaw: Yeah, you know what? I am finding that fewer people are saying that because they know they have a problem. They know they are addicted. Now our phones are telling us how much time we spent online and the amount of time I spent looking at my phone is a full-time job. Now, granted I have a full-time job that is online, but I shouldn’t be spending 8 hours a day on social media, texting, phone etcetera but that’s what my phone tells me. What I’m finding is that people aren’t saying that they’re like, “No, I want to be addicted to my phone. I want to look at my phone all day, every day.” I’m finding that we are totally in hammered in our phones and our devices that we are super excited about and now people are going “Oh, my gosh! What could I be doing with this time that I spent staring at a device?” I’m not saying it’s completely easy to say I’m going to have my phone in airplane mode a lot more than I do. I mean at a minimum, put your phone on airplane mode at night and you might think of “Oh well. My phone is charging 6 feet away from me or whatever.” This has been a hard one for me to get my kids who sleep with their cellphone next to their head. I don’t. I put it in the bathroom around the corner from me but I always turn airplane mode on.
There’s turning airplane mode on which eliminates all emissions from your phone. There’s no transmitting from your phone at all when the airplane mode is on. But here’s the thing, if you’re a person who constantly has a WIFI on on your phone, then instead of your phone pinging the towers every few minutes, it’s doing it every few seconds. That’s another thing. All of this is incremental and every little bit helps. So, not having your WIFI on all the time. Some people want to have the most inexpensive cellphone plan they can until they really rely on WIFI. I would just challenge anybody who’s like, “No. I wanted to look at my phone all day, every day.” I think people are really saying that they’re trying to see the cost of that, not just the cost in terms of the amount, that might be new information and for some people listening, I think your audience was pretty educated and must probably be aware of the amount even though I would say probably 98% of the population isn’t, but they’re also starting to become aware of the cost in terms of their social life and how meaningful their interactions with other people are and their productivity. When you put in an eight-hour per day at work but two and a half hours of it is being hijacked by your phone in texting people and looking at Facebook and whatever, how are we getting ahead of our careers when we’re doing that? So, there’s another benefit to decreasing your screen time. There’s more benefit than you’re getting less exposure to radiation.
[00:33:08] Ashley James: I don’t remember the exact study but it was very interesting [inaudible] talked about it that they did a study where they put a cellphone up to brains to a certain amount of time, 2 minutes, 2 hours whatever it was and then, they looked at the mitochondria. The mitochondria, the powerhouses of the cells for those who don’t know, they could produce ATP, which is the S-cellular energy. There are some doctors that say that all diseases are diseases of the mitochondria. That they basically can look back and say that where disease starts, is when the mitochondria are damaged or can’t work properly then that’s the beginning of any disease, that’s kind of the root cause. Some people believed it’s the root cause because what they found is that the mitochondria go to sleep and when they would be directly beside a cellphone, a phone call or a smartphone, the mitochondria for a certain amount of time, go to sleep. The mitochondria of the nervous tissues, of the brain cells. That is really scary. The idea that our exposures constantly dampening the mitochondria from functioning but the mitochondria of our brain, of our nervous tissue are being dampened. They can see that with all their $20,000 scientific tools. They can see that and we don’t feel it. You don’t feel it. Besides feeling maybe brain fog or fatigue or not having a good sleep, we don’t feel the EMF but if we keep going the way we’re going, we’re going to create disease.
[00:34:53] Robyn Openshaw: Yes and you know, we don’t know yet what the long-term impact would be with so much radiation we’re not exposed to especially in the last 15 years since cellphone become ubiquitous. What will be the long-term impact on the neurological disease? We know that neurological disease is sky-rocketing. We know that Parkinson, ELS, MS, dementia, Alzheimer’s are sky-rocketing and when we’re shooting a stun gun, like you said our neurological function, I have to wonder if there’s going to be a long-term negative effect on the neurological health of the people using all these technologies all the time and not mitigating it because right now, I’m talking to you, I’m obviously seating in front of the computer and I’m aware that I have some exposure right now. But my cellphone is not in the room with me and when I go get it later and checked it, I’ll either put it back where it was and leave it out of the room with me where it doesn’t tempt me to pick it up and check it three times an hour, or if I bring it back in here, I will turn it on airplane mode. So, I know we hit that one hard and there are other things that we can look at, but each one of these things does make a difference, so don’t feel overwhelmed, just chip away at it.
[00:36:22] Ashley James: I can attest to the fact that you don’t have your cellphone with you. So, I tried calling you right before interviewing, you didn’t answer so I’m like, “She doesn’t have her cellphone with her.” She’s walking the talk. She must be decreasing her EMF exposure. Yes, I caught you. I caught you doing exactly what you say you do, which is awesome. Very cool. So, any of the outlets in our home or office can be just spewing dirty electricity. We can think of the Fukushima leaking radiation. Our house could be leaking electromagnetic radiation at us and disrupting our overall health. We can easily fix that. We’ll use your free guide and it talks about the steps we can take to, first of all, to test our meters, to test our outlets and then fix our outlets. Should they’d be above 50, which you say is the number that you want to be below and that’s at learntruehealth.com/emf, as the Free guide. Okay, so that’s taking care of. Let’s talk about SMART meter because I first heard about SMART meters, I feel maybe about 7 years ago and they sounded really crazy. So, I might not have a full understanding about SMART meters but are they like these big white boxes that are outside your home that are having their own version of WIFI? And they talked to your house or they measure the amount of energy and they actually emit the frequency just like WIFI, is that correct?
[00:38:02] Robyn Openshaw: Kind of it. And we’ll tell you what you need to know in the free guide in the learntruehealth.com/emf. But here’s the thing, the electric company doesn’t want to come out and read your meter anymore. Obviously, as technologies advanced, they wanted to get people out of it and automate just like every else does. We’re now in the age where a lot of people refer to this as the age of the internet-of-things and 5G is accommodating. The rollout of 5G that is on its way to select American cities and probably everywhere, where there’s any population density, is to accommodate the internet-of-things. Where now your refrigerator will be attached to an app and will be emitting and your thermostats and so many other things and we’ve already seen these. There’s a medicine cabinet that has Bluetooth in it.
When I was moving last year, I saw it. This is it. These are the internet-of-things. Everything’s going to be emitting and nobody’s really counting the cost and saying, “Well, I don’t think we should sell a bathroom medicine cabinet?” They’re emitting chaotic radiation that our family is exposed to. Nobody’s going to say that because they just want the high-tech thing that’s what’s really hot right now. So, of course, the electric company doesn’t want to meter you by sending a guy out, that’s really expensive. So, there are analog meters that ping or send data about your electric usage to the electric company whether it’s 5 miles away or 50 miles away. In the house I just moved away from and in this one that I just moved up here to Park City, Utah 9 months ago, I have an analog meter and it’ll ping the electric company a couple of times a month. No big deal, you shouldn’t worry about that. That’s just not going to rate on my top 10 things for you to worry about. However, take a look at the free guide so you can figure out whether you have a SMART meter. I started talking about SMART meters 12 years ago on greensmoothiegirl.com and I had my own style. I was saying you’re not going to talk about that because you sound like a crazy tinfoil hot lady because that’s weird. You shouldn’t talk about these stories about people who live in a place where three SMART meters are triangulating, that their [inaudible] ruptured, because you sound like a crazy person. I’m like, “Well, okay.“ But I think this is a real thing and this is why I think it’s a real thing and it’s measurable. This is not hocus-pocus anymore. We’ve come a long way in the last 12 years since I started writing about that and I think more people are taking it seriously. It’s more established science whereas back then, it was mostly just testimonials of people saying, “Hey, these SMART meters are scary.” But the thing of these SMART meter is that it’s attached to maybe the side of your house or condo or whatever and it’s literally pinging the electric company every few seconds and it’s a very, very strong signal. Now, why would this matter? What if it’s right outside your child’s bedroom?
What if it’s right below your condo? Now, I have an employee and this is in the free guide, I have an employee, who went to the electric company, she’s a North Carolina. She said, “My Function Medicine Doctor said that I am made very ill by electromagnetic frequencies, and I can’t be near a SMART meter.” Sometimes we talk about negative things. This is kind of exciting because 10 or 12 years ago, people were going out in the middle of the night and smashing the meter, and then, the electrical company comes out and would fix it, and they would go out and smashed it again. So basically, subtle disobedience or people were going out putting aluminum foil on it, and there were companies who were developing shields so that the in the inside of your wall, if you have a SMART meter that you could try to shield your house and that’s a whole rub at all, we won’t go down. But these are the kinds of things people are doing 12 years ago is accessible disobedience. It’s like the Boston Tea Party, let’s all throw the tea in the ocean or in the harbor. Here’s the thing, my employee in North Carolina told the electrical company that she would be made very ill by having a SMART meter and not only did they opt her out of the SMART meter, but they didn’t charge her to put in an analog meter instead.
[00:42:44] Ashley James: Wow.
[00:42:45] Robyn Openshaw: And I think this is exciting because it sets a president if they’re going to let her do it. Now granted she got a letter from a Functional Medicine Doctor and, “Hey maybe you have a neighbor who’s willing to do it for you, who’s a doctor and we’ll write you this letter or whatever. “But we’re going to attach this and we’re going to link in the free guide that’s on learntruehealth.com/emf, we’re going to put on there, we’re going to scratch out her name and we’re going to put a link to it so you could see exactly what her Function Medicine Doctor said, that created a liability issue for the power company, the form that she filled out and they got her off the hook. So, 10 to 12 years ago, my own employees were telling me that I was a lunatic for even talking about these issues. Five years ago, we were able to opt out but only after a big fight and we have done then pay 20 to 30 bucks a month for them to come out and read it to be able to get out of the SMART meter. Now, these power companies are accepting that it does harm people and are waiving the fee if you could say that it harms you.
[00:43:58] Ashley James: How do you know if you have a SMART meter?
[00:44:01] Robyn Openshaw: Go take a look because it is sort of a visual thing and they do look different. But in the video masterclass, I did with Dr. Libby, it’s in the free guide that we’re sharing with you. But there is a video about that where Libby goes out and we show what my analog meter on the side of my house looks like. We show photos of what SMART meters looked like and we show the ones that the guys would come around and take a look at. So, it’s more of a show than a tell because they do look different but we are clear about that and we show in the video masterclass that you can see in the guide.
[00:44:46] Ashley James: So, the SMART meter attached to your house is sending a signal every few seconds to a receiver somewhere in the street, somewhere on a pole and that receiver is receiving the SMART meter readings from the neighborhood, and then, sending it to the electric company? But because signal like a WIFI or a Bluetooth, all these signals don’t beam directly they go out like a sphere and so the signal, it’s trying to get to the street. The SMART meter has to be strong enough to send the data all the way maybe on a block down or wherever the reader is. So, the signal has to be incredibly strong and every time it pulses to send out that information that’s like a sphere wave that’s pulsing through your entire house and penetrating everyone in it.
[00:45:48] Robyn Openshaw: Yes, and I would say there are transmitters and receivers. When we have 5G, I am going to stay in touch with you Ashley and I am going to share a solution for 5G, like a whole home solution that I think you’ll be super interested in and I think that you’ll want to tell your followers about it because those of us who know 5G is coming and is like, “Okay, what are we going to do when 5G comes?” Because we’re not going to opt out of WIFI. I mean, it’s just the way the world works. I’m not going to buy a refrigerator as long as I have other options. I’m not going to buy a refrigerator that I operate by app and my thermostat isn’t controlled by an app. I got a litter robot for my cat and the next thing I know, there’s an app on my phone. I don’t know if whoever set it up for me. I don’t think they put it on my phone. Why is there a litter robot for my cat on my phone? When I say internet-of-things, I mean it’s proliferating in a quantum way. I’m really excited about the fact that there are companies developing solutions for this. And unfortunately, 99 point something percent of us are going to be asleep in the wheel, but not your followers.
They’re going to stay close to you, you’re paying, you have your ear at the ground, you’re going to pay attention and the solutions that actually worked. They’re actually proven to work. I am right now following a company that I think they have the solution and I’ll be introducing you to them. I have been talking to them very extensively. In the meantime, there are multiple solutions if you want to screen blue light, then you’re going to have to maybe the last couple hours of the day. If you’re going to be working on your PC or looking at your phone or watching TV, maybe wear blue light blockers. We have in the free guide our favorite blue blockers stuff like that, or you’re going to keep your kid’s gaming stations unplugged. That was a rule from that time forward when I found out that Tennyson’s gaming systems even when they weren’t in use, were one of the biggest sources in my house. You’re going to have your WIFI turned off. You’re not going to have your WIFI in the room where you work, if possible. These are the kinds of things that you’re going to do to bring this down but SMART meters are one of your worst sources, WIFI in your home is one of your worst sources and your kid’s gaming system is one of your worst sources. Hope that’s helpful.
[00:48:17] Ashley James: Absolutely helpful. I’m going to have to run around my house and see if I have a SMART meter now. I have a modem or router that I can turn off, that has an on-off switch. Once I don’t have an on-off switch, it’s like a pain in the butt to turn off if you unplug it and plug it back in. Sometimes you have to reboot the system and their software. So, get one that has an on-off switch. I’ll see if I can give the info about mine in the show notes of the podcast learntruehealth.com. It’s so easy. We only turn our WIFI on when we absolutely need it. Like I’m sitting in the sauna and there’s a tablet in there and I want to stream some music or watch something. I turn on the WIFI then and when I get off the sauna, I immediately turn it off. I only use it when I need it, otherwise, we hardwired all of our computers directly to the modem, so that we don’t need to have that bombardment frequency.
What’s really interesting is that I can tell when the WIFI is on. I got to be in the bedroom and my husband will turn it off and then, come into the bedroom to go to bed and then I’ll say, “Did you just turn it off?” Like I can feel it. It’s like being agitated and then all of a sudden not being agitated. It’s really weird like it was on all the time, it’s like a one percent agitation I feel like that’s kind of my norm, but when I turn it off all of a sudden it just feels like a little bit less agitation. It’s interesting that now that I turn it off most of the time and then when I turn on, I can actually feel it. But at first, if I go to someone else’s house, I don’t notice it. It’s very slight but it’s really interesting. So, it’s fun to play with to turn it off. It’s also cool to turn it off because it gets the whole household sort of like winding down for bedtime instead of playing on their tablets until 11 at night. But I love your idea for wearing the blue-blocking glasses, having the WIFI off as much as possible, checking for SMART meters and opting out in SMART meters when possible. 5G is really scary. We’ve talked about it on the show before. I am kind of terrified and I’m thinking I’m going to move to the middle of nowhere if 5G comes to my neighborhood. So, I’m really glad that you have a word with a company to bring us some solutions.
I look forward to having you back on the show to talk about that. You mentioned light bulbs. It’s funny because my husband just replaced all the light bulbs in our kitchen and I think we spent half an hour at home depot. He was going for light bulbs and I’m like, “No! That’s a bad light bulb. That’s a dirty light bulb.” So, we spent half an hour trying to pick the cleanest light bulbs. I’d love to talk about light bulbs, what are the bad ones and what are the good ones?
[00:51:05] Robyn Openshaw: Okay. The worst ones, these are the light bulbs that kind of came out when people became more aware of global warming and then, after a few years of them being out on the market, people are like, “Wait a minute, this has mercuryin it.” It’s off-gassing mercury. The ones to categorically avoid are called CFLs’. Those are swirly bulbs, don’t buy them. If you have them in your house, you have to get rid of them. I hate to say it because that means mercury is going to go in the landfill but I care more about the bad beam. You don’t want to have it in your house. Now, when you put those CFLs’ in, they are doing most of their off-gassing like 70 percent of it within the first few days after installing it, so they’re just terrible in those early days. They put out a lot of EMF and they’re emitting mercury. So, please stop buying those CFLs’. Those were sold to us as a global warming solution and they’re just not a solution for anything good.
You have to replace them with incandescent bulbs. Those are the old school ones. Those are the ones you grew up with and they’re cheap. We linked you to them on Amazon. Those were good, dependable, cheap incandescent bulbs, but you can get them at Home Depot too, whatever you want to do. Probably your second best, the third category of bulbs is the LED bulbs. Those are probably about 20 bucks for an 8 pack. Those are more expensive than incandescent. So, don’t you love the good ones are the cheap ones here? Going back to the cheap bulbs, the ones that we had when we were kids. LEDs’ are the second best but I’ve tested some that are pretty high EMF and some that are pretty low. If you have a choice just go with incandescent, right?
[00:52:56] Ashley James: My understanding with the LEDs’ that they have a flash like a flicker rate? That is not very healthy. Have you heard of that?
[00:53:05] Robyn Openshaw: Well, yes. It may be affecting your pineal gland. We don’t really know yet what impact LED bulbs are having. They’re being sold as being useful for our health in some ways. Other data suggest that LEDs’ in at least some applications, in some products, are a problem. So, if you have your choice and you don’t have a reason to be using LED, just go with the incandescent. So, the pineal gland and the blue light thing just to barely touch on that to give you the very basic nutshell here, is that your pineal gland used to produce melatonin starting about 9 or 10 o’clock at night, after the sun went down because your body’s signal went came through your eyes in to your pineal gland in the brain and melatonin was produced to calm you down and allow you to sleep.
Well, the problem now is everybody’s looking at screens all the way until bedtime and that blue light spectrum is telling your pineal gland, “Hey! It’s still daytime.” So, it’s confusing your brain. Your pineal gland is not necessarily producing melatonin or not enough to calm you down and lets you sleep. You can wear blue blockers or you can just stop interacting with screens at night and decide, “No, we’re going to enjoy each other. Enjoy your husband. Enjoy your kids. Read a book.” Something like that.
[00:54:35] Ashley James: My husband just mouths to me. We have a SMART meter.
[00:54:40] Robyn Openshaw: He probably googled it.
[00:54:44] Ashley James: He’s looking at me. He’s in the office but he knows not to make any noise. So, I’m going to follow your free guide, to opt out of my SMART meter. I’m so glad I’m learning from you today and I’m glad my listeners are learning from you today. Ryan Sternagel, who I’ve had on the show and I know you are friends with him because he’s local to you.
[00:55:04] Robyn Openshaw: Yup.
[00:55:06] Ashley James: He is now called the Stern Method, before it was My Kid Cures Cancer, that was the name of the show. He talks about the new house he built, which is now completed, but he built the entire house after they helped their son who no longer have cancer. They decide to live the lowest EMF, the lowest toxicity light possible and they built a house out from scratch, out of all non-toxic materials, which is really interesting. But he talks about how he has light bulbs in his house that are red. So, at night they turn on those lights and he says it’s kind of funny. The neighbors probably think they’re like satanic worshippers. The whole house is like lit red but that is to lower the blue light. Do you have any thoughts in choosing incandescent bulbs for their color spectrum?
[00:56:01] Robyn Openshaw: You can but you know the very best thing is that we live as close to nature as possible. We just have as few electronics at night in our energy field as possible and we’re looking at blue light as little as possible. You could go to the links that Ryan and Teddy have. I just had dinner with them on Friday night, and the things that they have done to help Ryder, I mean, he still has the tumor but they rested the growth of it and it isn’t growing. They were able to get out of some of the chemotherapy that the doctors wanted for him. The things that they’ve done have been nothing sort of heroic. I’m not sure but most people are going to put the red lights spectrum to kind of go the other direction and compensate for the blue light, but you can do that if you want.
I think if we’re really getting back to nature and we’re getting back to normal circadian rhythms and the normal biorhythms of the earth. We want to just think, “What did our ancestors do?” What were our great grandparents doing? Because there wasn’t insomnia back then. There wasn’t ADD, there was very little autism. Our grandparents didn’t even know the word autism. Now, we all know lots of autistic kids. I know a pediatrician who was told when they were in medical school, “You’ll see this a couple of times in your career.” That’s how fast this whole autism thing has come on but I think it can be simpler than that. I don’t think we necessarily have to go retrofit our house with the red lights at night. What we can do though is leave the lights off. I’m not saying you have to light up a candle either. Most people are going to be just fine with turning the lamp next to your bed and reading a book as your mind and your neurological system shut down for the night. I do not find it difficult to go to sleep after watching TV on my wall in front of my bed, that’s 12 feet away. But if I sit there and look at my phone until I go to bed, I can’t go to sleep. You got to know yourself.
[00:58:19] Ashley James: Yeah, exactly. When I first heard about blue-blocking glasses, I really thought it was a total first. So, the guest that I’d hunt on who sold them said, “Well, let me send you a pair.” I had them on for a totally different reason, nothing to do with blue-blocking. We just kind of got on the subject and he said, “Let me send you a pair.” And I’m like, “Yeah, whatever.” I put them on when the sun sets and by 9 at night, I could not keep my eyes open. I’m like, “Okay, I’m going to bed.” Like I was exhausted, my body was like out. That was such a big difference because I’m one of those night owls. I can just be up until 2:00 in the morning and what happens is if we stay up past 10:00, our body gets the second wind. The brain goes “Okay, I guess we got to stay up. Stop making melatonin, okay? Start making some stress hormones. Let’s stay awake. Let’s push through and just pull up all night.”
That’s why then if we’re watching TV until 11:00, a lot of people then really have problems falling asleep, and then they don’t have deep quality sleep. So, wearing the blue-blocking glasses or putting the apps on your phone that block or lower the blue light can make a really big difference to melatonin production. This is all in the realm of our devices which we’ve only have on this one generation. Our parents didn’t grow up with these. I didn’t have a cellphone until I was 19 and that was pretty early on to have a cellphone at ‘99. But I didn’t have a smartphone until 2010, I think? It’s really recent. We have to remember what life was like 30 years ago. The technology has completely changed our habits and these habits have led to poor health, and so, we need to come back to nature. We talked about 5G, light bulbs, SMART meters, making sure that we don’t have dirty electricity coming out of our outlets. Is there anything else about EMF that we want to be aware of?
[01:00:30] Robyn Openshaw: I think one subject that we should touch on is that most of us are in contact with earth like we were for thousands of years. So, if you’re having a stressful day and there’s a lot of negative energy going on, maybe you have some problems with a colleague, or your boss or some partner that you work with or in your own personal life.
A lot of times we can feel a lot better by going outside and getting as much of your body in contact with the earth as possible. Or you can hug a tree, that might sound like very tree hugger but here’s the thing, when we do that, we are in contact with a very high-frequency source and we’re going to discharge electrons we don’t need and protons onto the ground and we’re going to pick up others that we do need. The body knows. Your molecules know what atoms they need. So, you’re going to be able to ground yourself, most people aren’t doing that. They don’t ground themselves at all. If you get off on an airplane and you get to your hotel and you feel sort of fragmented, or like Ashley was talking about, how she can tell when the WIFI is on and when it’s not because she just feels kind of unsettled or wired. I’m sort of putting my own words on it, but if you get off on an airplane and you feel like that you’re not alone, lots of people feel like that and it’s that exposure to radiation.
Take your shoes off on the airplane and put with your socks on the floor of the airplane, that’ll help a little bit. And then, when you get to your hotel or to your friend’s house or wherever you’re going, go outside and sit on the ground for 5 minutes. It is absolutely amazing, especially if it’s a sunny day and you can go outside and put your hands, your legs, and your feet, just sit on the ground or lie on the ground if it’s appropriate. On dirt, on the sand, if it’s a beach, on the grass even better, just lie on the ground. You’re going to be discharging a lot of dirty, chaotic energies and you’re going to be picking up electrons that you need but also if you’re lying there in the sun, guess what? You are an electrical being and you are charging in the sun, you are picking up energies that you need doing that. If you drink a glass of water before you go outside to do that, even better.
Now, your electrical system can work better because it’s hydrated. We know that the electrical system needs water to be conductive. Don’t take your cellphone with you rather than go outside with your cellphones in the grass, leave it, get away from the house. These are the kind of simple things that we can do and it gives us back what we used to have. We are talking about circadian rhythms and what our ancestors used to go back before there were all these people complaining of brain fog, ADD and we have all these sensory processing disorders. Let’s just go back to basics and maybe that doesn’t solve every problem that you’ve ever had to go out and ground yourself, but I do it every single day that I get the chance during the spring, summer and fall. That’s probably something that I would want to mention. That’s really simple that we all forget to do. If you’re not in contact with the earth, at least get in the sun.
[01:03:58] Ashley James: I like this idea of earthing. I had an HPAT talked about it and she recommends everyone have a grounding mat. So, my husband built one. He’s very hands-on, he went online, looked up some guides, went to home depot and bought all these materials and he built a grounding mat. This guide said you can put the metal rod in the earth and have the copper wire coming from the rod all the way through. You have to move your screen and your window to have a come through and then, come into the metal mat that you’ll put at the base of your bed so your feet are on the metal mat. Or if you’re on an apartment or too far away from a window, you could plug it into the grounding part of the outlet. So, my husband didn’t tell me he did this which is a great double-blind study for our bedroom because I didn’t know what’s going on. I knew he was building but I didn’t know that he had actually plugged it into the grounding outlet and put it on our bed. I was lying there the entire night. I could not sleep. I felt like I had drink coffee all day long and I was so upset.
[01:05:19] Robyn Openshaw: Okay, let me say something about that because my legs tingled the whole time when I had a grounding mat on my bed and I did not notice at that time, but now I do. But you have to filter the electricity in your bedroom first.
[01:05:32] Ashley James: Right. That’s why I’m getting that. He plugged it into the ground and thinking that was safe, but if you have dirty electricity in your bedroom, it’s just amplifying it. And so, I felt horrible and I was like, “What did you do to me? This is torture.” So, the next night he plugged it outside and it was a much different experience. There wasn’t any agitation but it energized me so it was a different feeling. It was a different feeling having it plugged outside. We decided it wasn’t best to be in our bedroom probably because of what you’re saying. We need to clean up the energy or electricity in our bedroom. We ended up plugging it and putting it on the sofa in the living room, but we found that and of course, we couldn’t just go outside and freaking sat in the ground. We had to create some kind of way to ground inside for fun just to experiment with it. I noticed every time I sat on it, I was energized and I felt clear-headed.
[01:06:31] Robyn Openshaw: That’s good.
[01:06:32] Ashley James: I just felt more energized and more clear-headed which was really interesting but I could have probably had the same wonderful benefits if I just went and lay down on the backyard, but I loved that concepts of grounding that we are releasing these electrons. We’re releasing those extra electrons and we’re connecting with the energy that our body needs. That makes so much sense.
[01:06:59] Robyn Openshaw: Yeah. And everyone should have if they’re going to make an investment in ongoing testing. Don’t buy an infrared sauna unless you know it’s low EMF. It’s one of the things that you’re going to consider. Different things in the future, to tell you one more thing, make sure you have a TriField Meter and a Greenwave Meter, they’re doing two different things and we linked you to them in the free guide. One more time, it’s at learntruehealth.com/emf. But I linked you to the meter that I liked for testing hotspots so you can test, “What’s my home office like? What’s my bedroom like in an area? Or what’s the inside of my infrared sauna-like? Or near my son’s gaming system when it’s plugged in? What’s that like?” But then, the other one is the one that you plugged into the wall and so we linked you to that. Those are two very important things so that you’re not just guessing, okay? You need to know where are the risk factors in your home. And you know, if your refrigerator is emitting then that doesn’t mean you’re going to get rid of your refrigerator. Just make sure you don’t stand by your refrigerator necessarily all the time.
[01:08:07] Ashley James: Well, they emit through WIFI, so we turn off the WIFI or maybe there’s a way to turn it off? To opt off the emitting either the Bluetooth or the WIFI, whatever it’s emitting, maybe there’s a way to turn it off? But if you’re turning off, hopefully turning off its WIFI, it could lower that. Now, what about these devices that we’ve seen people buy? They put on the back their cellphone or put on their laptops to help lower EMF?
[01:08:39] Robyn Openshaw: I linked you to the one that I like and it’s not actually lowering down EMF, it’s protecting human cells from chaotic frequencies. It’s a patent device and this is one of the really simple and inexpensive solutions and I keep some in my purse, a 5 pack. We have negotiated a 40% discount so it’s like 5 of them for 60 bucks. It’s a really inexpensive fix and you put it on your device and what it is? It’s 3 layers of paramagnetic materials. We have crystalline structures in our pineal gland and so, for instance, homing pigeons, hawk and whales that can travel thousands of miles to get back home. They are grounding these crystalline structures and what these paramagnetic materials are doing is protecting human cells from chaotic radiations. It’s not getting in the way of signal, it’s not decreasing the actual emissions but putting one of this on your devices is not the only thing that we are talking about today but it’s one of the easiest things and it’s my first priority. I carry them in my purse so that if I meet a child who’s carrying a cellphone, I put it on there. I don’t ask their parents for any money for it. I just put it on their child’s cellphone because I’ve tested this. I’ve done this in one of my followers and was like, “Green Smoothie Girl did this. “ We actually had a living house plant with the same phone next to the house plant. One of them protected by this device which is called the xZubi device on the cellphone, one of them unprotected and the unprotected phone killed the house plant. We’ve actually done this little experiment multiple times.
The first time I did it was with one of my kids for a science fair project and this made it very visual so the other kids would see, “No, you don’t want to carry your cellphone while it’s transmitting in your pocket all day, every day.” I wish every kid in America knew this and the reason I’ll stick it on the cellphone of a child I barely know. First of all, I’ll explain to them what I’m doing and I’ll muscle test them and some people say all muscle testing isn’t real but I think your audience can understand kinesiology a little bit and how there are certain things that affect our overall energy. I have to blind-tested many people who don’t even know what I’m doing to their cellphone as being very strong when their cellphone is not in their energy fields, and then, I put their cellphones in their other hand and all of the sudden they’re completely weak. Their arm just collapses with very light pressure from me. Their arm just collapses against their body and then when I put the xZubi on this device, they don’t know that I’ve done it. They don’t know I put anything on their cellphone. They’re strong again. I did that many times, always blind, never told the person what I was doing, never let them see that I was doing something to their phone. It just worked every single time.
So, I became a believer in that patented technology that’s FCC tested and Independent lab shows that it protects human brain cells and human living cells 84 to 100 percent from the effects of these chaotic frequencies. What I’m really concerned about is children because their brains are more exposed than ours are. We get a harder skull, a thicker skull as we get older but children’s organs and brain matter are so very exposed. The younger, the more vulnerable. So, finding out where that SMART meter is on your place, I’m going to follow up with you, Ashley. I’m going to ask what you learned. I’m not worried about you because you’re going to protect your kid. You’re a total mama bear but if that SMART meter is right outside your child’s room, your child is more vulnerable than you are. We are seeing a meteoric rise in childhood brain cancer and I have to wonder if the exposure to radiation is one of the reasons.
[01:12:44] Ashley James: Or combination like Dr. Klinghardt says, “The heavy metals from the glyphosate,” because glyphosate is the key that binds the heavy metals in the soil and heavy metals in our body. Heavy metals wherever it comes in to contact with and it will release heavy metals when it changes PH. So, when it changes from the blood to the cerebral spinal fluid, it releases. It lets go of the mercury, lets go of the aluminum, lets go of whatever it’s holding on to the heavy metal and same with the kidneys when blood becomes urine and that’s why glyphosate deposits the heavy metals into the brain and into the kidneys. And then, we’ve got the tri-effect there, we have more heavy metals in our brain than we did 30 years ago because our food supplies contaminated with glyphosate, and on top of that, we have the high EMFs’ coming in that we didn’t have 30 years ago. We didn’t have this level on these devices and then that’s vibrating the heavy metals. It’s a perfect storm we’re seeing and it is so sad to see that the childhood cancers, like brain cancers going through the roof and that in one generation we’ve gone from I think 1 in 10 thousand autistic children on the spectrum to 1 in 40? I think I’ve heard it’s the latest number? It’s not because we weren’t diagnosing them correctly back then, that’s absolutely a complete smoke screen.
We have a problem and it happened in one generation and we need to figure out what the heck is going on? And I know we feel very disempowered when we think of the big industries. Who am I to stop 5G? That kind of thing. We feel really powerless but where we are empowered is the list that you’ve given us because it’s up to us individually to put xZubi on our devices, to turn off our WIFI and put our phone in airplane mode and just go down the list that you gave us. One piece at a time, we can lower our exposures as much as possible. If we live near Chernobyl or if we live near Fukushima a few years ago, we’d be taking measures, right? Because we know that there’s radiation happening to us, right? So, if you live near known radiation, you do something about it. But there’s radiation happening, it’s a different form and it’s supposedly safe but we’re way overexposed.
We need to just do everything we can to mitigate. If we’re cleaning up our diet, and we’re cleaning up our emotional mental health and we’re choosing to make all these healthy habits then, this is just one healthy habit that’s going to help us energetically and physically move in the direction of the best health possible. I’m really excited that you came today and you shared everything that you’re sharing. To complete our interview, are there any stories of success you want to leave us? I know you get so much great feedback, you have a wonderful podcast, amazing website and all the links to everything The Robyn Openshaw that’s going to be on the show on today’s podcast at learntruehealth.com. Are there any stories of success since you have been educating us and educating your listeners and all the followers that you have on EMF? Have you received any really great stories of success where you’re seeing that it’s making a difference?
[01:16:18] Robyn Openshaw: Yeah, I mean there’s the fact that I can sleep again. There’s the fact that my son could focus in school again but we also just get stories all the time about how these very simple, small actions that people are taking, following the EMF action plan or jumping in to the video masterclass that I did with Dr. Libby Darnell and just putting these actions into place results in a lot of peace of mind but also energy gains. It’s probably the most common thing that we’ve been told, is usually people would go to links of making these changes if they are suffering in some way, but it’s like a side benefit even if it’s not the thing that they were looking for by reducing the EMF in their energy field, in their home, in their work environment that they gain more energy. So, I should mention that you said if we live near Chernobyl, we would take major action. The thing is when Chernobyl happened, nobody knew yet what was going to be the consequence of it and when Fukushima happened, we didn’t know what was going to be the consequence of it. If we knew when the Chernobyl disaster happened, what we knew 20 years later? We would move.
We would do anything in our power to get our children and ourselves, but we would get our families as far from Chernobyl as possible at any cost. But you know? Joe Mercola has said that he believes that the EMF proliferation, the massive high chaotic frequencies in our environment is the new second-hand smoking. He believes that we will look back 20 years from now and we will see the amount of unmitigated EMF in our environment as more dangerous than we now look back and see second-hand smoking because you’re too young actually to have been there and been in restaurants. I was a waitress, I put myself to college waitressing in the smoking section in a restaurant. I sat on airplanes with smokers. It’s unthinkable to millennials. They’ve never seen people smoking in a public place but I would choose the smoking section over the others because smokers drink and drinkers tipped. Here’s a thing, let’s don’t wait 20 years from now when they’re saying, “Well, that’s what happens to brain cancer because we didn’t do anything about EMF. Or that’s what happens to all neurological diseases. Is it 10X?” We’re already are seeing it, we already seeing the early signs, let’s mitigate it now. If you’re going to do this, you’re going to be one in a thousand that’s even doing anything about it for their health. Let’s get ahead of that curve because I really don’t think the effects of all these radiations are going to be good.
[01:19:10] Ashley James: Our friends, our family might think we’re crazy. They’re not on the bandwagon yet. We’re early adopters and those who are listening are also early adopters and one day, they will all wake up and realize that we were right. So, let’s be the early adopters. I’d rather be the early adopter and be called crazy but be in better health because of it than be a sheeple and wait to get poisoned with everyone. I like to say this on the show if you’ll look at the statistics, the cancer rates are almost a 1 in 2 or 1 in 3 between men and women are expected to have a cancer diagnosis in their lifetime now. That 1 in 3 people is prediabetic. That 70% of the adult population is on at least one prescription medication, heart disease is one of the leading causes of death. It just goes on and on. If you want to live like a statistic, if you want the end of your life to be a statistic, live like everyone else, eat what everyone else is eating and do what everyone else is doing. Follow along with the mainstream media advice of health and do exactly what the majority of people are doing and you are going to end up like a statistic, of course, no one listening wants to be a statistic.
We want to beat the odds, we want to all life to be hundred and jogging, running marathons at a hundred and five. We want to be absolute optimal health. We have to be the naysayer. We have to go against the crowd. We have to be early adaptors and we have to do exactly the opposite of what the majority of people are doing in order to not be a statistic and this is a key component to that. So, thank you, Robyn, for coming on the show today and sharing with us some major health advice. Go to learntruehealth.com/emf to get Robyn’s free guide. I’m really excited to hear back from the listeners, to know what you think. Please comment in the Facebook group, Learn True Health Facebook group and let us know what you think about this as you implement Robyn’s actionable steps to lowering your EMF. Robyn, thank you so much for coming on the show again. I can’t wait to have you back when you’re ready to share with us how to mitigate 5G when it starts to infiltrate our neighborhoods.
[01:21:33] Robyn Openshaw: Yeah, it’s my pleasure and it’s an honor to speak to you and to your audience, Ashley. Thanks for having me.
[01:21:39] Ashley James: Hello, true health seeker. Have you ever thought about becoming a health coach? Do you love learning about nutrition and how we can shift our lifestyle and our diet so that we can gain optimal health and happiness and longevity? Do you love helping your friends and family to solve their health problems and to figure out what they can do to eat healthier? Are you interested in becoming someone who can outgrow their own business? Support people in their success? Do you love helping people? You might be the perfect candidate to become a health coach. I highly recommend checking out the Institute for Integrated Nutrition. I just spent the last year in their health coaching certification program and it really blew me away. It was so amazing. I learned over a hundred dietary theories. I learned all about nutrition. But if from the standpoint of how we can help people to shift their lives and shift their lifestyle to gain true holistic health, I definitely recommend you check them out. You can google Institute for Integrated Nutrition or INN and give them a call or you can go to learntruehealth.com/coach and you can receive a free module of their training to check it out and see if it’s something that you’d be interested in. Be sure to mention my name Ashley James in the Learn True Health Podcast because I made a deal with them that they will give you the best price possible. I highly recommend checking it out. It really changed my life to be in their program and I’m such a big advocate that I wanted to spread this information.
We need more health coaches. In fact, health coaching is the largest growing career right now in the health field. So many health coaches are getting in and helping people because you can work in care practical offices, doctor’s offices. You can work in hospitals, you can work online through Skype and help people around the world. You can become an author and go into the school system and help your local schools, shift their programs to help children be healthier. You can go into senior centers and help them to shift their diet and lifestyle to best support them in their success and their health goals. There are so many different available options for you when you become a certified health coach. So, check out the INN. Check out the Institute for Integrated Nutrition, mention my name, get the best deal. Give them a call and they’ll give you lots of free information and help you to see if this is the right move for you. Classes are starting soon. The next round of classes is starting at the end of the month. So, you’re going to want to call them now and check it out and if you know anyone in your life who would be an amazing coach? Please, tell them about it.
Being a health coach is so rewarding and you get to help so many people. Are you looking to get the best supplements at the lowest price? For high-quality supplements and to talk to someone what supplements are best for you? Go to takeyoursupplements.com and one of our fantastic True Health coaches will help you pick out the right supplements for you that are the highest quality and the best price. That’s takeyoursupplements.com. Be sure to ask about free shipping and our awesome referral program.
200 High Vibration Foods Shopping List
Vibe: Discover Your Energetic Frequency for Health, Love & Success (FREE!)