Podcast > Episodes

episode #48

Interview with Judy Cho: How Carnivore saved her depression, Importance of Minerals, and Cholesterol’s role in the body

May 13, 2021 in Podcast

Intro

This week I interviewed Carnivore Cure Author, Speaker, and Nutritional Therapist Judy Cho. Judy has a functional nutrition and holistic health private practice and works with clients by focusing on the root cause of an array of health challenges. We discussed the following topics: – Judy’s health journey and how she dealt with depression – Her carnivore eating routine – Importance of Minerals – Role of Gut Health – Anti-nutrients in Plants – Importance of Mindset to Achieve Goals – Key’s to a Successful Fast – Cholesterol’s role in the body and her one tip to get your body back to what it once was!

0 (1s): Coming up on the get lean, eat clean podcast. 1 (4s): I trusted my doctor. I never ever thought that a doctor could be wrong ever. And so when they said you are just born with the wiring, that you were mildly, always depressed. I believe that. And knowing that that was so wrong and I never struggled with depression now it angers me because that person defined who I was and I just realized it was slightly like I just needed to heal my gut, get off laxatives, right. Heal my relationship with food and eat nutrient dense foods. And yes, you could probably eat a little bit of vegetables if you're tolerant to it, but it's at the core. We need to eat nutrient dense foods because our soils are getting depleted and animal foods have the most nutrient density. 1 (48s): Even if animal foods are also getting depleted. 0 (52s): Hello and welcome to the get lean, eat clean podcast. I'm Brian grin. And I'm here to give you actionable tips to get your body back to what it once was five, 10, even 15 years ago each week. I'll give you an in-depth interview with a health expert from around the world to cut through the fluff and get you long-term sustainable results. This week I interviewed carnival cure, author speaker, and nutritional therapist. Judy choy. Judy has a functional nutrition and holistic health practice and works with clients by focusing on the root cause of an array of health challenges. We discussed Judy's health journey and how she dealt with depression, her carnivore, eating routine, the importance of minerals and gut health. 0 (1m 34s): Along with the importance of mindset, when it comes to achieving goals, keys to a successful fast cholesterol, his role in the body and her one tip to get your body back to what it once was. I really enjoyed meeting Judy and I know you will too. This was a great interview. Thanks so much for listening and enjoy the interview. All right. Welcome to the get lean iClean podcast. My name is Brian grin and my guest today is Judy choy and she is a nutritional therapy practitioner and also the author of her new book carnivore cure. So welcome to the show. 1 (2m 13s): Thanks for having me. How's it going? 0 (2m 15s): Going great. Going great. Now you're located. Where in Austin is that right? 1 (2m 19s): Yes, Austin, Texas. 0 (2m 21s): Awesome. Awesome. Well, I'm excited to have you on I'm in cold Chicago, so I'm jealous. 1 (2m 27s): Yeah. We had a crazy winner for sure, with all the power outages and then it's like one day it'll be kind of close to summer weather. So almost 70 high seventies, but then like today it's in the 60. So it really, 0 (2m 42s): Yeah, it was snow right. Shut down the city or something. 1 (2m 47s): And it wasn't even that much compared to most cities, but we don't have any, you know, we don't have our city doesn't have any, any of the equipment to take care of the snow and it's yeah, I'm sure the rest of the city was laughing in a sense. I mean, other than the more serious issues of no water and stuff, but 0 (3m 5s): Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well let's well, before we get into it, why don't you just tell the audience, give them your background and then we'll go from there. 1 (3m 15s): Sure, sure. Well first thanks for having me again. So my name is Judy Cho. I'm known as nutrition with GD. I don't even know where to start really, but I'm a nutritional therapy practitioner I've been practicing for, I guess like two and a half years now. And before that I was a consultant, I was traveling a lot. I got really sick. I struggled with an eating disorder. I was plant-based for 12 years and I never considered that. It was the diet, the lack of fat, the lack of animal proteins that got me to struggle with depression after having like a breakdown and then having to stop nursing and getting on like psychiatric meds. 1 (3m 58s): They told me that I was always depressed. And, you know, even during these like eating disorder facilities, they'd never told me maybe you should be eating more fat or maybe you should be eating animal proteins. You know, they'd be like, no, you can't eat low carbon this facility, but you can eat vegetarian. And so I continued my vegetarian ways. And then when I was pregnant with my second son, I was just like, I don't want to get sick again. And I really had this fear that I'd get sick again. And so I just started researching nutrition and then that's how I found keto. Then I found carnivore and through, through being keto for at least a year, I realized, wow, everyone really likes me in this community. Or most people do at least. 1 (4m 40s): And then I just started stumbling into a lot of, you know, social media posts about how me to so nutritious. And, and then I just took a dive into it. I think keto helped a lot, but I was still mostly plant-based and I would have my belts up. I'm clean, clean, clean, and then I kind of stumble again and then I'd eat all the, you know, the foods that were like not eating keto. And so I finally just said, I'm just going to take the deep dive into carnivores. Maybe it'll stop some of that kind of on and off eating. And it did. So I think that eating meat based and now no longer considering, okay, what 20 carbs or 50 carbs or certain amount of carbs that can eat in a day when that's no longer a food, the kind of abstain or personality and me really shine. 1 (5m 28s): So it's like, I don't have to make the decision of wait, what, what chocolate or what, you know, what vegetable, or what XYZ can I eat it by the end end, end, end of the night, there is nothing. So I just feel with me and fats and then I'm good. And so the first year, obviously I struggled a little bit with carnivores and then keto and then back to carnivores. But in general, it's saved my life and I don't suffer from depression anymore. And then I got so passionate about nutrition that I went back to school and now I'm giving because, you know, there were days where life was really hard and I felt like I had everything materialistically in my life, but I was so, so depressed. 1 (6m 8s): And in those, you know, those facilities saying that, Hey, you were just born and wired to be depressed. And what's so wrong with taking some, you know, SSRI and antidepressants for the rest of your life. What's so wrong with it. And I tried and within a few months I was on the highest dose and it wasn't working and they were already trying to get me other medications. You know, it was just a simple fix of maybe you just need a better diet. Maybe you need to heal your gut. And it was a huge change for me now. I know not everyone gets off meds that easy, but to me was a very big eye-opener and it's just, I want to give back now and hopefully that people could get their lives back too. 0 (6m 51s): Yeah. That's quite the story, you know, it's interesting, you know, you hear plant-based and I think it's just this misnomer that, that means healthy and, and for some people that doesn't right. And, and for you, you, you have like the, you know, the ultimate elimination diet, right. With the carnivore eating carnivore. And I've, I sort of not the same exact story as you, but I used to be like a pescatarian and yeah, I got into a little bit into the carnivore community and started learning more about it and realizing that there's so many benefits to meat and I didn't was not getting enough protein on what I was doing before. 0 (7m 33s): And if I was getting protein, the bioavailability of it, wasn't what, what, you know, like, you know, what meat is. So I sort of a similar store and then I, I, I'm not pure meat, but I would say I'm carnival dish. When we can talk about different plant plants and plant plant toxicity, spectrum, per se, what made you get into carnival? Was there an individual or a book you read or was it just one of those things where you tried everything and you just decided to do it? 1 (8m 4s): You know, I was keto for a year, like I said, and I noticed like every few months I'd end up falling. And I, the, the thing is I was doing all the fat bombs, the keto bombs freezing all these little, you know, fat bomb treats. And then the, the desire for sugar just kind of never went away. So I was drinking a lot of diet sodas, a lot of sweeten, you know, all the keto treats. And I'd always noticed that I'd always be going back to the pantry at night. And then for most, for many months it'd be good. And then it's like, something would happen or I'd have a really stressful day, or I didn't have enough sleep or something, and then I'd fall back. And so I think I was just scrolling or I don't know if it was scrolling or maybe someone had mentioned, Oh, you should try a carnivore diet. 1 (8m 49s): Like people are getting a lot of healing. I think it was from a friend actually, but through social media. And so then I, I knew there was going to be a really stressful two week period in my life and I could not risk falling off the wagon type of thing. And so I decided to just try it and it was just going to be just to get me through the two weeks type of thing, and then I never left. So yeah, I mean, and then, you know, on social media, people share great information about how meat is nutrient dense and all that. And I just no longer vilified me and I realized how much nutrition there was and then just doing it myself. And then I'm such a data-driven, evidence-based like, I need to know the why's. And so I just started digging into, I started reading nonstop, listening to things nonstop, and, you know, that's how I got to know more about cars. 0 (9m 39s): Well, and, and your story is great in the sense that, you know, you, you searched for awhile and you found that, you know, maybe you should change your diet. I think a lot of times you, you know, Western medicine, they don't look at that first, right where you, you know, you didn't either. And then you realize that no one was giving you any answers and you had to do it yourself. And so you, you found diet now, as far as carnivores concerned, what is like a typical day for you for eating? And while obviously we'll get, maybe we'll touch a little bit. I know you've done some fasting journeys and we'll, I'll be interested to hear about that as well. 1 (10m 15s): Yeah. So when I first started, I did pretty much one meal a day and I probably try to eat about two pounds. Cause that was sort of the messaging back then. And I realized that didn't work for me, it's way too much protein. So I do believe that you should eat not too much in excess because it can actually cause like a, an uptick in your glycogen and you will go through gluconeogenesis and you'll have higher blood sugars. You may not sleep through the night. You can have like those meats, Wess people talk about. But so nowadays I eat two meals a day for one, it's better for digestion, but I try to incorporate more fish and like smaller fish. So maybe like sardines, some salmon. 1 (10m 56s): Sometimes I try to get oysters. I try to get the fresh ones that are obviously good quality. But if you look at the nutrient density of beef alone, there are certain nutrients that are just not as it has everything, but it doesn't have a ton of certain nutrients. And 0 (11m 13s): Yeah, so 1 (11m 13s): Minerals are definitely one, I think minerals in general, in all our foods, not only meat, even vegetables, I think iron, for example, in the last seven years for in 70 years in Apple has gone down by 90% in our food supply. So it's across the board, but specifically the one I'm thinking of is which we need to break down carbohydrates fats for energy. It helps with a lot of other things and it is very low and beef, even if you were to eat beef liver, it's not that high. Whereas if you were to eat like pork belly, if you ate just like, I think it was eight ounces, I'm pretty sure, but it covers the full daily value. 1 (11m 58s): Whereas even if you eat a pound and a half of steak, it will not cover your diamond levels. So there's certain things like that. And so that's why I started incorporating other meats as well. I probably eat about a pound a day and then I eat closer to 75% fat. So what that looks like is, so I haven't eaten yet. It's still early here, but so like for yesterday, for example, my lunch was I had a can of a wild sardines. I had some Cod liver and then I had two egg yolks with one egg, with one with the full egg, it's probably like 600 calories and that, and then there was like extra fat added. 1 (12m 38s): So it could be beef, tallow. I used butter yesterday. And I think that comes out to about 75, 80% fat. And then for dinner, I had some steak. So I just, it was really simple. I reheated or steak we had, and then I just added some butter on top. Cause I feel better eating a high-fat corner of reversion and yeah, that was all I ate yesterday. 0 (13m 1s): Yeah. And all the healthy fats and the proteins probably make fasting a lot easier for you. Yeah. Not dealing with the insulin swings and things like that. Right. 1 (13m 12s): So if you are ketogenic glee, like if you're a keto, if you're fat adapted. And so I it's tricky with carnivores. So if you eat a ton of meat, I don't think you're as in a ketogenic state, as if you are eating a high, fat, moderate protein version of carnivore. So there is a difference if I was eating three pounds of meat a day and I'm five, eight, so I could probably put it down. But if I did, I probably would not be in Quito in a ketogenic state. So I probably would have like 0.1 in ketones. Whereas right now I have probably one every morning. So that's one thing. But if you are in a ketogenic state, it becomes really easy to fast because you're already burning ketones. 1 (13m 57s): So it's not like you have to ramp up and fast and then go through your glycogen stores and burn your glycogen and then get into Quito, ketosis and burn ketones, which will happen on like a standard American diet. It might take somebody three days to get into a tautology burn ketones, whereas somebody that's carnivore or keto, I mean it's right away. Right. And so it becomes easier now with your eating circadian rhythm, the Mo the times that you normally eat, you may feel a little bit slight uptick of hunger, which is normal because it's hormones, but it passes. So it becomes much easier for sure. 0 (14m 33s): Yeah. I find that for myself as well. I don't like measure my ketone levels. I just like can tell, like, since I've been fasting and eating pretty clean, that I can go long periods of time. And even if you have some hunger pains, they come and go pretty quick. Right. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Go ahead. 1 (14m 54s): I think they said, I think it was Jason Fung and his team. I'm not entirely sure, but I believe they said that it was after three days, your ghrelin, your hunger hormone starts decreasing. It might be even actually 48 hours. And so between 48 and 72, you'll feel your hungriest because you're grilling your hunger hormone is going up. But after that it starts decreasing. So then once you hit that two three-day Mark, it should be kind of easy as long as you're managing your electrolytes. 0 (15m 22s): Yeah. And as far as managing electrolytes, what are the types of things that you do to do that? 1 (15m 29s): Yeah. So my clients, a lot of them struggle with electrolyte imbalance. So they're either they're taking a concoction of magnesium and potassium. So I get them off all of the, all of it initially. And then they'll start just drinking some solely water in the morning. So what it is is getting any unrefined salt. So it could be Redmonds, it could be Celtic, it could be Himalayan they use, and then they'll soak it overnight so that the minerals are Unbound from the salt. And then the minerals are more bioavailable for the body when you drink it. So they'll use about depends on the person, but it's between a teaspoon to a tablespoon of the solely water in water in the morning. And then they may have a second one in the middle of the day as needed. 1 (16m 11s): And so that takes care of a lot of the electrolytes for my clients. Some of them will use a magnesium spray at night because magnesium helps to calm the body. It's kind of slows it down, but then some people need more than that. So I would say, start with that. And if you still have heart palpitations, if you still get like muscle tightening, just weakness, dizziness, all of the electrolyte imbalances, then you may have to look into supplementing magnesium or potassium or sodium. The best way to know for sure is doing a hair mineral test. 0 (16m 41s): Hmm. Okay. Well, yeah. I was going to actually ask you some good tests. That would be good here, here in mineral is one, is there anything else? 1 (16m 51s): It depends. So I have clients that are mostly gut, so they've been carnal. So most of my clients are they've been doing, they did keto and then something wasn't working. So then they've had carnivore, they've been Carnover for probably three to six months, and they're still having loose stools, not sleeping through the night, just not feeling as well. Well, and so for most of those people, if it's really gut related, I'll have them first do my protocol. And if that doesn't help, then I'll get some testing. Cause I mean, it's just expensive. There are like GI tests. Those tests will test. If you have any parasites, any, you know, fungal overgrowth it'll show if you're like bleeding in your intestines, but you just don't know. 1 (17m 34s): There's a lot of things. And then it'll also show bacterial balances. So that's really good. You could do like a CBO test it, which is a breath test. It'll show. If you have small intestinal bacteria overgrowth, I also recommend a test called the organic acids test. It's a urinary test, but it tests for amino acid metabolites. Neuro-transmitter metabolites, if you have any oxalates. So there's all these metabolites. It also shows your nutrient levels. So that is one test that a lot of my clients, even though they're carnivore, they are deficient and B one B2 and B6 and some of them 12. And you would think eating so much meat. We are absorbing all our B vitamins. 1 (18m 16s): We need them for energy. So if a carnivore is not, if they don't have a lot of energy, they might, they may want to check their nutrient status because they might not be absorbing it. 0 (18m 27s): Right. Right. Just because you eat, it doesn't mean you. Right. 1 (18m 30s): It's very common actually. 0 (18m 32s): Yeah. And what was the name of that test again? 1 (18m 35s): Organic acids test. There are several companies that has, that offers it, but you normally have to go through a practice. 0 (18m 42s): Okay. Yeah. That's good to know. And as far as gut health is concerned, is that, is that, would you say that's the, probably the biggest impact it can make going maybe from a, a plant diet into, you know, like a carnivore diet. 1 (18m 58s): Yeah. So I think it's twofold. So one it's that if you don't eat like these irritating foods that basically destroy your lining, that damage, the gut lining that, you know, just cause a lot of bloat and gas in your intestinal tract, once you kind of remove all of that. And then you're also eating meats that are more nutrient dense. It just, those two factors really will give you better health. So it's getting, figuring out, like, how do you heal the gut? Cause some people literally will have holes in their gut or obstructions. It's one healing that, and then balancing the flora, which no one really knows what the answer of how to balance that is. You know, there's just certain supplements that help more than others. 1 (19m 41s): And then just making sure you're eating enough nutrients to even supply your body with the fuel. So your neuro-transmitters, most of it's created in your gut, the serotonin I'd say 90% is, and yes, it's not the one that gets to your brain, but they're all communicating. And if you have a weakened gut and then you're not eating foods that will create the neuro-transmitters then, which is a lot of amino acids, then you're not going to have the neuro-transmitters that will make you feel better. So it absolutely affects yeah. Gut health. 0 (20m 18s): Yeah. That's almost like the first step. Once you say for most people is focused on the gut and then go from there. 1 (20m 25s): Yeah. So anyone that comes to me, a lot of people have thyroid imbalance hypothyroid, but I focus on the gut first. So we work on healing, the gut. And then from there, we'll see what other issues, you know, are there still issues and stuff like that. 0 (20m 39s): And w what, as far as plans is concerned, what would you say is like, I know there's sort of a spectrum of what would be some good plans may be if they want to start implementing back into their diet, they should start with, 1 (20m 52s): Yeah, that's tricky. So when I was writing the book, I was trying to figure out, you know, what, what's the safest plans for everyone. And the reality is there is none only because all plants have anti-nutrients. And so it's really bio-individual right. So if you are metabolically fit and you have no issues with diabetes, you don't have like really insulin issues or insulin resistance. I think you may be able to handle some fruit, right? Obviously you probably want to peel off the skin. And then, cause that has a lot of the like pesticides and then even the anti-nutrients are in the skin. And then if you don't, you know, obviously you're not going to eat the seed in a fruit. So maybe for some people that works, but then for like, most of my clients are metabolically challenged, so fruit is not an option. 1 (21m 37s): And so then we have to consider, okay, what plants do you want to add? And so I would say if I were to rank anti-nutrients any foods that have high oxalates, high lectins and high phytates, which all of them are gut damaging, all of them bind to minerals. So if you're eating some of them, like, for example, if you're eating foods with like, if you're eating spinach, which is really high in oxalates and they are known to bind to zinc, and so, or maybe it's iron I'm forgetting, but if you were to eat it, then with some steak, it will also bind the minerals from your steak. And so that's where it becomes really tricky with these minerals. I mean, with these three anti-nutrients and they're just gut damaging. 1 (22m 17s): So if anything, you're not going to be absorbing a lot of the nutrients from these plants. Then they may inhibit the minerals from other foods you're eating and then also they may wreak havoc on your gut. And so all of those reasons, I think foods high in general and lectins, which are like nuts and seeds. And then some, I think like night shades as well, oxalates are like spinach, almonds, dark chocolate, and then phytates are in most grains. And I think some nuts as well. So I think I have a top 10 list in the, in the book, but it's not the greatest. Like I know that I included bok choy because it didn't have most of those that I just mentioned. 1 (22m 57s): It's permitted on autoimmune paleo, which is, you know, another elimination diet. That's pretty good. It's also allowed on the FODMAP diet, which is another clinically used diet for eliminations, for gut health. And so I there's a spectrum and I listed the reasons why, but I would say bok choy was one. I think a Rugola was another one 0 (23m 20s): I know. 1 (23m 22s): So avocado is high in salicylates. So again, this is where it's becomes really bio-individual. So if like I've tried avocado, I feel fine. But if you are, if you are sensitive to solicitate, it's high in that. And then it's also high in FODMAPs. So for people that have gut issues that cannot eat any of the oligosaccharides saccharides and basically chains of sugars, they cannot eat that. And there are some people I have clients that do not feel well eating off Ocado. So I am working on a database of all the plants that I've researched and like what they include. And then you can go in there ideally and see, okay, I want to eat an Apple. 1 (24m 2s): What does it have? And if none of those things affect you, then that's the food that you probably want to try. 0 (24m 8s): Yeah. Yeah. I think most importantly, like listen to how your body feels. And, but on the other hand, too, some people are, you know, like probably what happened to yourself is you get, you go down this road of eating, maybe plants and then realize, you know, for so long and you're feeling like not good for so long. You don't realize that, you know, what's causing the issue is all the things that you've been eating for. So, you know, for many years, and sometimes like, like you said, like an elimination diet is the best way to sort of, and then you can sort of put things back maybe into your diet, I would guess is which may be do with some of your clients. And after they're feeling better just to see how, how it affects them. 0 (24m 49s): Cause like, for me, I can tolerate most foods. And, but, but now if I could tell right away, if something's not right, I just won't go down that road anymore. 1 (25m 1s): Yeah. I mean, I, I always add, I'm not an advocate for you should only eat meat because that's the only answer. I actually think that if you are healthy enough, you should be able to try foods that you've never been able to tolerate. And if your body is more resilient and you're able to kind of, you know, slowly introduce it in micro doses, you can't just all of a sudden eat a bowl of broccoli and then be like, Oh, I, you know, I'm so healthy now I don't have any symptoms. You will feel it if you haven't been eating fiber, but you know, let's say you start with just like one broccoli florets at lunch, and then you increase the two at dinner and then you work your way to increase enough. But if you don't really have other symptoms, then you know, maybe a little bit of gas, which is normal when you're eating fiber, that's the goal, right? 1 (25m 43s): It's resiliency. It's the ability to say, Hey, I can eat all of that, but I'm choosing not to right on most days now, if I go to, like in my book, I specifically say, I would hope that you can go to France and you decide that, Hey, if I want to eat the baguette, I'm going to eat it. Right. And let's say, you're not gluten, let's say you have celiacs, but in general, like, Hey, I don't have an eating disorder so I can eat that. And then too, I know it's not the most ideal food, but Hey, that's what Francis famous for. And so I want to try it. And then I move on. Right? That's what I think is resilient eating. And, you know, I would say most of the days I eat carnivore, but now I'm not as rigid about, Oh, they're seasoning and there's plants and that's this and that. 1 (26m 24s): And that, and I can't eat it because I don't think that's resiliency. It's figuring out what makes sense for you. And then eating the foods that make you feel the best most days. But also having the flexibility that, Hey, if I go to London and I want to eat fish and chips and at least try it, then I, at least physically my body can tolerate it a little bit. Does that make sense? Yeah. 0 (26m 45s): No, I, I completely agree. What type of other things do you do for resiliency? 1 (26m 53s): A lot. So I think mindset is really huge. So I actually studied psychology. That's my real degree. And so I have been a huge fan of mindset. Social psychology was my favorite subject in school. And so it's about understanding how we kind of function together, how we work as a community, how, you know, if I see something, how it affects you and then how it can affect your day and then how it affects everybody you interact with. And, you know, it's kind of like the butterfly effect, but your mindset is so important into even healing into just how you kind of handle life and how life kind of throws things back at you. 1 (27m 34s): One thing I always close with my clients is you have to have hope, right? So if I get you on some gut healing supplements, whether it's the bed tain, HCL, or the digestive enzymes or the probiotics, and you're like, Oh, I've tried probiotics before. It's not going to work well, most likely your body will then feel the stress state or the parasympathetic statins and your body will sort of react to it and it could even be with food, right? So if you're starting to reintroduce dairy and you haven't been eating it and you have this anxiety of like, Oh my gosh, am I going to have a reaction? You'll likely have a reaction because your brain is kind of telling your body something foreign is coming in. So it's the mindset and the resiliency again, it's, it's not having. 1 (28m 15s): So in the book I talk about this, there's a whole lifestyle section, but you have to have a growth mindset where it's like, no, you're, you're your current state is not what will limit you. Right. You can always get better. You can always improve, right. We are not born with a ton of muscles, but we go to the gym and we use, we use hormesis to basically grow our muscles and we, you know, push your muscles to grow. And then it becomes bigger and stronger. And that's, that's resiliency. It's everything in life you can do better. And it's just, you have to put in that effort. 0 (28m 48s): Yeah. I mean, I think mindset is something that probably doesn't get discussed enough when it talks about like, you know, healing in, you know, for diet or whatever it is, gut health. It's almost like you made me think about it. Cause I have dogs and dogs consents. They have like that sixth sense that like, if something's not right, they'll, you know, they'll sense it from you. It's almost like, you know, you're, you're the same way in a sentence. If you, if you're not, if you don't have that mindset, whatever it is we want to do, if you want to lose weight or feel better, I interviewed drew Manning, you know, that fit to fat, to fit guy. And he, he, we talked a ton about mindset and how that was the biggest thing that helped get him through the tough times. 0 (29m 30s): And I'm sure with your clients that they have to sort of have a reason why that they want to get to where they want to go, or they're not going to get there. 1 (29m 37s): Right. And so I hosted like this part over 70 hard program of like a free public like program I did for, it was a mental fitness challenge. And the thing is it was a mental fitness. So, you know, we did the carnival or we did the fasting, but really there was a lot about being grateful and changing your perspective in your mind. Right? So there's a study that I cited in the introductory video, but I talked about how there's a study, where somebody was envisioning music playing versus somebody of versus that same person, imagining the music playing and the brain, the same parts of the brain were lighting up. So your brain is not really certain what's reality and what you're just imagining. 1 (30m 21s): And if that is a true thing, then we should emerge. And then there's other studies where there are people that are in the hospital and they imagine getting better through physical therapy and then walk envisioning days of just healing. And then those people were the ones that healed the fastest. So it just shows you how strong our minds are. And, you know, we do a lot of nonverbal communication. The reason why your dog feels it is yes. I think we send out things to the world, right? Like at least 70% of our communication is non-verbal. And so it's such a big deal. And I, I had a dog too, and same thing. She totally could read my emotions. And so the mindset is so important and that's why I talk about, you know, there are some people that come to carnival and think it'll heal their eating disorder. 1 (31m 6s): It will help a lot because you're fueling our body, but you need to work on your relationship with food. So no diet, no lifestyle change is going to fix something that's related to mindset habits. And all of that. That's a core thing that we need to work on. And it's hard work. It's, it's sticky, it's tough, it's vulnerable. And people don't want to really do that because it's hard, right. Having to go back to childhood trauma, like why do you feel that way? Why is your internal script? Why is your automatic behavior to do that? And you have to kind of go under, you know, really deep, dark levels. And sometimes it's uncomfortable. And I think that's why I'm a big fan of therapy. I think everyone should get a week's worth of therapy and just get to know yourself and figure out like, what motivates you? 1 (31m 51s): How, why do you, you know, and all these things. So yes, I think mindset is so important. So, so important. And in my, my clients, the people that I see heal are the ones that are like, I'm all in. So if it means I have to gain a little bit of weight up first, if I have to, you know, dedicate to eating a certain foods that I don't really want to eat, but that'll get me better. It's the people that are the most all-in and believing that there's an option to heal that actually heal. And that don't stick to, I am defined by my disease. 0 (32m 23s): Right. Yeah. So true. And another form of psycho hormetic stress is fasting. I know, I, I, I see on your podcast, you did an episode on, you did a five day fast, right. And I'm actually curious cause I'm to do one soon here, I fast every day and it's been a part of my life for years now. And I've done some, you know, a couple of day fasts here and there. I haven't done like an extended, let's say three to five plan. So maybe tell me your experience around that. 1 (32m 56s): Sure. So one thing I'll say is that men don't have to fast as long as women to get all the benefits and even, especially for weight loss. So that's one, but I too was like you where I started doing intermittent fasting. And then I was like at 24 hours, then I'd be at like 27 hours. Cause I was doing OMAD. And then I think a year and a half ago, maybe two years I did a seven or eight day fast. And the crazy thing is I was nursing and my milk never went away. So that is like one power of Aikido, genic, carnivore diet. So the first time I did it, you just, I would, my biggest things were just make sure that you have, you know, if you can do a full 24 hour day fast, then from there, just make sure that you're managing the electrolytes. 1 (33m 44s): So that's always been the hardest thing for me when I do an extended fast, I don't have a ton of extra weight on me. And so I don't know if I don't have as many electrolytes, I'm not sure, but I always start having electrolyte issues day two or three, but the seven day fast, I was able to do it. But this five day fast, I was not. So I just started feeling like literally my, literally my body inside felt like it was burning. It felt very acidic and I just wasn't pain. And so I had to stop it probably by day four and a half. A lot of the commoners on the YouTube video were saying you needed magnesium. Some people were saying potassium, I'm sure it was an electrolyte imbalance. I don't know the answer of like what to use. 1 (34m 25s): There's like keto, chow and elementary on flavor that you can use to kind of balance, but I haven't had the best success with them, but definitely electrolytes. And then for me during the periods where you do feel your hunger, where you're normally having your meal, the first two days, I drink plain sparkling water. And so the bubbly kind of help with the alum kind of feeling hungry. Yeah. But other than that, it's fine. You know, I would use magnesium spray at night to kind of calm because your cortisol is a little bit higher while you're doing extended fast. It's just giving you more of that energy. But in general, it's so good for your body to do self cleaning and doing a little, you know, just think of it. Your body doesn't have to filter through foods and okay, this is a toxin. 1 (35m 7s): So it needs to go through the kidneys. This needs to get absorbed by the small intestine. Right. It doesn't do any of that. So then your body is just focused on, okay, like what else can we do in the house? Right. Like let's clean up the house, let's fix things that are broken because Hey, we have all this time on our hands. So I think doing extended fast, at least once or two times a year is great. 0 (35m 27s): Right. Yeah. I agree. I mean, it is a stress in itself, but as long as you're not like underweight or have, have any other, you know, major issues are obviously for not pregnant and things like that. Yeah, yeah, no, it's, it is something you want to ease yourself into. And like you said, if you've been doing fasting for awhile and you want to push it a little bit, I think there's nothing wrong with that at all. You talk about resiliency and just being able to realize that having a different relationship with food, I think is the biggest thing that probably fasting has done for me because you don't, you, you don't have to rely on it as much, your life doesn't center around. When am I going to eat and what am I going to eat? 0 (36m 11s): Talk about maybe some of the misconceptions that people have around maybe carnivore and eating meat. I know you talk about a little bit, you have new do nose to tail, is that right? 1 (36m 24s): Yeah, I do. I don't eat like kidneys and stuff, but yes, I do nose to tail and I think I was it's because also I was sort of brought up with it. Our family had bone broth all the time. And so the bone broth, I always share on, you know, on social media and stuff is I grew up, my mom makes it that way. And that's how I learned it. We also ate like tripe and we had like different cuts, like the lots of the, the tendons and all of that. So that was very normal for me. But liver, we didn't really eat, but we had like, you know, the nose to tail type for the fish. So my dad would eat the I and I used to get so grossed out. But now I understand it. 1 (37m 4s): Right. So, yeah, but I actively try to eat more liver because it is just if you, for ounce to ounce, it's just very nutrient dense. I do try to eat a variety though, because for example, some people are copper toxic and some people don't have enough copper. And so again, it's, bio-individual, if you are a copper toxic or if you're a copper deficient beef liver is a great option because it's really high in copper. But if you are copper, if you kind of have too much copper and again, this is a hair mineral test, sometimes blood work shows, but here men are probably better in that. But chicken liver might be better because chicken livers, not as high in cover a Cod liver is a great option too, if you can't stomach beef liver. 1 (37m 49s): But yeah, I'm a fan of doing nose to tail because it just gives your body variety. Right? So if you I'm, I'm a fan of doing like two to three meals a day so that you don't put such a big stressor on your body to one break down the foods and then to try to absorb all of it. You're giving different chances of the body being able to do that. And all of us have impaired digestion. And then secondly, if you eat an array of foods, you just have different types of nutrients and nutrient levels. And it's just, you're just, you know, hedging your bets in terms of nutrition. If you eat the same thing over and over, which I know people do, they just eat steak, but you're going to risk other nutrient deficiencies. 1 (38m 30s): It may not ever show up, but you know, Y Y Y risk that, right. Just have like a few pieces of sardines or have some egg yolks, have some grass fed butter, eat some tallow, right. There's a variety you can eat and you will just probably feel. 0 (38m 45s): Yeah. And what would you say? I know there's some people out there that are like, Oh, I don't want it. You know, it's just the whole, they don't want to eat a lot of me cause they think they're going to have like high cholesterol or they're worried about, you know, LDL. And I know it's a lot different than that. 1 (39m 0s): Yeah. So it's a true statement. When you are eating carnival, your cholesterol will go up. I think even on a keto diet, it does. If I'm not, I'm pretty sure it does. And so there are certain fats and saturated fats and like butter and steak and other meats that will increase your LDL, but it's in context, right? So for example, framing, there has been studies in Massachusetts now probably running six decades or six generations. And they're called the Framingham studies. All they do is basically study everything about cholesterol. And what they found is that if your LDL goes up, there is a higher, higher chance of cardio real risk, but it depends on your HDL level. 1 (39m 44s): So if your LDL is going up, but your HDL is going up with it and your triglycerides are under a hundred, your risk of cardiovascular disease is not that much. So it's in context, right? So if I went to a standard care doctor and he saw my LDLs, which are in the two hundreds, he would be like, you need to get on Statens. Right. But my triglycerides are in the eighties or maybe lower than that. And then my HDLs would probably, I don't remember. I think it was like 65, so it's pretty good. And then I also check my CRP inflammation, which is an inflammatory marker. There's other markers you could check. Okay. Is it really cardiovascular risk or is it just that you're eating more saturated fats in that the context is different. 1 (40m 24s): So 0 (40m 26s): An LDL is protective, you know? 1 (40m 29s): Yes. And yeah, all the, all the cholesterol is good for us. We need cholesterol. This is one thing I say about like statins, which are, you know, cholesterol, removing medications and our brain is 60% cholesterol. And so when we are taking these medications that then remove cholesterol, how do we know it's not removing it from the brain, which needs it. And so there are even correlation studies where a lot of men that take statins, they're more angry. They have mood issues, they become more violent and you have to wonder, is it because it's also removing some of the cholesterol in the brain, right? We need cholesterol. I mean, every single cell in our body, the outer layer is made of fat. 1 (41m 12s): And so we need fats. And when we are taking medications that are reducing fat, it's just, it's a bad day to what is not the root cause issue. Right. And then you're going to cause mental health issues with that. And it's just not a great idea. I kind of lost my train of thought, but yes, it's, I mean, cholesterol is so important. Oh, we need fats and cholesterol because that, the reason why in heart disease, you see a lot of cholesterol is because our body uses cholesterol to help with inflammation. And it does that because there is a problem in that specific area. So let's say your knee, let's say you fall, you twist your ankle. You will ha it'll swell because it's, it's inflaming and it's your body's telling you, Hey, we're going to go to work there. 1 (41m 58s): We're going to send a lot of cholesterol for healing, but you need to get off your foot. Right. And that's what essentially is happening to the heart and the vessels. It's trying to make sure the vessels don't break down. So they bring cholesterol there and to keep it hearted. But then the more you don't kind of fix your diet, it'll overly, you know, get too much cholesterol there. And then it's just a by-product, it's not the reason why you had the heart disease. 0 (42m 24s): Right. And what would you say, I know obviously with your book that came out, w what's your biggest message that you send in the carnival work here 1 (42m 35s): That not that our food supply is not what we think it is. So, you know, I, the route I went with the book is not eat meat and here's all the reasons I kind of did it the other way around. So I said, let's talk about our food supply. Here are some additives that the FDA is already going to remove and here's then products or additives and fillers that other countries don't have, but the U S uses. And now let's talk about other like red dyes, right? So food coloring, it's so toxic for our bodies. And there are studies so many studies and then how much we're eating of it. So it's kind of like this elimination process of, okay, we know for sure we shouldn't be eating these FDA, like soon to be banned additives. 1 (43m 19s): And so that rules out a lot of the processed foods, here's all the reasons why you should probably probably not eat food dyes, and then there's that. And so when you go through the list and I even talk about organic plants, how they use double or triple the amount of pesticides or herbicides, because it's organic, but it doesn't work as well as like glyphosate and the GMO ones, right. It's not saying go eat the GMO plants, but it's just revealing that, Hey, maybe just because it's organic doesn't mean it's always healthy. Right? And I talk about the labeling and how you could technically get a steak from a, like a, like a farm that just feeds corn, the corn byproduct, because some of the corn is considered a grass and they can say, it's grass-finished even though, or grass fed grass finished, even though it only grew up eating like corn stocks, there's all these like little things like the USDA doesn't even mandate the organic rules. 1 (44m 19s): Now it's done by a private company. It's just bringing awareness. And then also talking about the mistress of a lot of meat and saturated fats, and then just kind of, Hey, if you are not feeling well, standard care has not been treating you. Well, you still have these aches, you have joint pain, you have low energy. Maybe it's time to just do an elimination diet based off of everything. I've just told you. And then it's like, as you heal, you should try to add more things and see if your body's flexible. Now, if you decide that 99% of the days, you're still gonna eat meat based. Great. But at least give your body that option. Right. And it's just, it's just reeducating understanding that plants aren't the most ideal foods. 0 (45m 4s): Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it sounds like you've done a lot of the investigating for the consumer because you can't really rely on marketers of all these food companies out there. Right. They're just trying to make margin and sell product. And even though a product says, one thing that doesn't necessarily mean it's healthy. And so it sounds like you sort of do a lot of the investigating for the consumer to, you know, the nurse, their body in the correct way. 1 (45m 33s): Yeah. I mean, I got sick eating the wrong foods and I was plant-based so I had occasional fish, but for the most part I was vegetarian. Right. And then I have young kids now. Right. And so I don't want them to go through what I do. I know that there's a chance if I struggle with mental health, that they can struggle with it too. And so I didn't know what to feed my kids. Right. And so that's what started my journey with, okay, what's the right things to feed them. Right? Like we believe that raw milk is so bad that if we have it, we're going to get sick off of it. You know, that's how we are taught from a very young age, but raw milk, especially if you have gut issues, it actually can support your gut. Cause it has all the right antibodies. 1 (46m 14s): I mean, imagine a mom breastfeed, feeding their child. And instead it's like, wait, hold on. I need to pasteurize my milk and I need to homogenize my milk. And then I need to filter it through all of these heating process. And then you could drink it. Your baby would die. So why do we do that with raw milk? If these cows are healthy, right? And like we're filtering out all these things that are actually nature's way. And then we were having this Frank and food that we actually add back nutrients and vitamins. And I mean, if you make that free milk, how does a fat soluble vitamin like vitamin D even survive? Right. It's just, 0 (46m 51s): Yeah, it's backwards. It's like, I tell people, I was, my wife made, deliver and heart and they look at you, like, they're crazy. But if, but if they knew what went into their foods, 1 (47m 1s): Right, exactly. Right. And that's the crazy thing. So when I was eating junk food, you know, no one said anything. Whether if I was going up and down and wait and clearly disordered eating, but as soon as I had only meat, it's like, you're going to die. Right. The worst, most wild, like you you're going to die without vegetables. And it's, you know, if you think about hundreds and thousands of years ago, they didn't have the ability to eat as many plants as we did. Right. My mom, I don't think she ever had a banana when she was young, because in Korea they didn't have bananas. Right. So it's just, it's so backwards. And it's just so ingrained in us. And this is where I think even like at the, you know, fundamentally it's education, right? 1 (47m 44s): So we are taught in America that we raise our hands before we talk, we raise our hands before we think we don't talk until we're spoken to. Right. These are some things are good, but we, at a very young age, we are taught like you trust authoritarians. And it's the right answer. And never once, do you ever question, Hey, maybe what's in the textbooks are not fully accurate of history. Right? It goes in the same way of like, I trusted my doctor. I never ever thought that a doctor could be wrong ever. And so when they said you are just born with the wiring, that you were mildly, always depressed. I believe that. And knowing that that was so wrong and I never struggled with depression now it angers me because that person defined who I was. 1 (48m 31s): And I just realized it was slightly, like I just needed to heal my gut, get off laxatives. Right. Heal my relationship with food and eat nutrient dense foods. And yes, you could probably eat a little bit of vegetables if you're tolerant to it. But it's at the core. We need to eat nutrient dense foods because our soils are getting depleted and animal foods have the most nutrient density. Even if animal foods are also getting depleted. 0 (48m 57s): Yeah. I completely agree. Where do you get a lot of your meat from? 1 (49m 2s): So I do, so I do a range, so I always joined Kalscheur his or her chairs. And I order a quarter steer because I have a freezer that I used for my breast milk. So we will buy a quarter steer. And then I always try to, you know, just get food's on sale. So it it's impossible for my whole family, a family of four to eat grass fed grass, finished revise all the time. So then we'll get steaks on sale. I know it's not ideal, but I think this is where it's balanced in real life. So just for my studies, it's just, you don't even know if you're buying the grass fed grass finished versions at the market, if it's really that. So I can't stomach paying an extra $10 a pound at the store to just get that. 1 (49m 44s): Not knowing if it's guaranteed, right? So, so I'll get this steaks on sale, but we try to get pasture-raised eggs. Ideally, no corn fed or corn or soy feed. Right. And then we always get the grass fed butters, but you know, we, I drive every month to get raw milk for my sons. It was great 0 (50m 5s): Wanting to try raw milk. I haven't yet, but I can get it in Illinois. I know some States can't even get it right. 1 (50m 12s): I know that they sell it in every state as a animal food. I know it's also bad, but I think if you were to contact the original source, it's actually human grade. It's just there. It's illegal to sell it as for human. So you'll just have to kind of find it. But I mean, every state will have it. It just might get tricky to find it for us. We can only get it from the direct source. So I have to drive to the farm and I have no problem. My son has been drinking my oldest. So I had to stop nursing at six months. At one year, he started drinking raw goat's milk. He's so healthy. So yeah, I definitely recommend it. And it, goats milk is actually more, the amino acid profile is the closest to human breast milk. 1 (50m 57s): So if your child is lactose intolerant or can't tolerate cow milk, you may want to try goat milk. I've seen moms that have not been able to nurse and they use, they make their own formula. They use the raw goat's milk and actually does they do their kid does pretty good. 0 (51m 15s): Wow. Yeah. I'll look into that. Yeah. There was a farm about an hour away so I can get some, some raw milk and I definitely want to give it a try. 1 (51m 25s): And then you could even, so since I only go once a month, we, we get frozen ones too. And I know it loses some of the nutrients, but it's still better than buying milk from the store. 0 (51m 34s): Right? Yeah. And now there's like 8 million nut nut milks. I know you avoid those. 1 (51m 42s): Yeah. It's crazy. It requires so much water to make nuts. And so this is something I just learned, but all mens, majority of them are made in California in an area that is very drought prone. Yet they blame the cows for using too much water. Right. So that's one. And then all of the almonds that are made in California has to go through the ultra pasteurized pasteurization phase. So it's going to use solvents. It'll use a lot of heat and just a lot of toxic stuff. So these nuts that are already toxic are just now more toxic and they, they never have to say, Hey, these almonds are pasteurized or gone through ultra high temperature, you know, hexane, blah, blah, blah. 1 (52m 28s): And they could just sell it as, Hey, these are raw almonds and it's such deceptive marketing. And so you have to wonder, why am I getting sick off of nuts? Maybe it's that they're not even true nuts. 0 (52m 39s): Hmm. You know, I asked this question to every guest towards the end. What would you, what one tip would you give someone that wanted to maybe get their body back to what it once was when you know, like 10, 15 years ago? Yeah. What one tip would you give that person? 1 (52m 59s): Would you say in terms of weight or in terms of health? 0 (53m 4s): Maybe both. Maybe both. Maybe they've put on an extra 10, 15 pounds and they're just not feeling themselves. 1 (53m 12s): Okay. Yeah. I would just have them. I think that easiest simplest way is, you know, shop the perimeter of the market. I know that's such a common thing to say, but if you remove all the processed foods in your diet, you will so much better. Not everyone needs to tolerate, remove all plants. I definitely think you should remove high oxalate foods. So almonds, spinach, if you are susceptible to kidney stones, that type of thing, you will have a higher chance. It's funny because a, if you go and get a kidney stone surgery there, their diet that they recommend is a low oxalate diet, but they don't say that it's low walks would be to say, here's the foods you shouldn't eat. Right. And they're all high oxalate foods. 1 (53m 53s): So in general, it's just eat, you know, closest to what nature intended. So fresh meats, if you're going to eat veggies, try to eat the ones that are less higher and, you know, anti-nutrients, and then, you know, I wouldn't eat a lot of greens, lagoons and seeds. I don't think they're that good for your gut. And I think if you, especially, if your gut impaired, I would not eat too many of those and just stick to meats and vegetables. And if you could tolerate fruits, then fruits are ideal. 0 (54m 24s): Yeah. Excellent. Well, Judy, this was good. Went by hour, went by fast. Where can, where can people find you? Yeah. 1 (54m 33s): So my book is called Carnover cure. And so you can find it@carnivalcure.com it's selling on Amazon. The ebook is, I guess, on most platforms, the audio book is coming out, I would say in the next couple months. So look out for that. And then I am found@nutritionwithjudy.com. You can also find me at Twitter, Instagram, YouTube on at Nutricia with Judy. 0 (54m 58s): Excellent. All right, Judy. Well, I appreciate you coming on and thanks so much for all the information. 1 (55m 4s): Yeah, no thank you for having me again. 0 (55m 7s): Hey, get lean equally nation. Are you a man between the ages of 40 and 60 years old looking to lose inches around your waist have significantly more energy throughout the day and gain muscle all while minimizing the risk of injuries? Well, I'm looking for three to five people to work one-on-one with in my fat burner blueprint signature program, which I've developed by utilizing my 15 years experience in the health and fitness space. This program is designed specifically for those committed, to making serious progress towards their health goals. Over the next six months, we will focus on sleep, stress, nutrition, meal, timing, and building lean muscle. 0 (55m 48s): If this sounds like a fit for you, email me@brianatbriangrin.com with the subject line blueprint. That's brian@briangrin.com with the subject line blueprint. Thanks for listening to the get lean eat clean podcast. I understand there are millions of other podcasts out there and you've chosen to listen to mine. And I appreciate that. Check out the show notes@briangrin.com. Everything that was mentioned in this episode, feel free to subscribe to the podcast and share it with a friend or family member. That's looking to get their body back to what it once was. Thanks again, and have a great day.

wanna talk to brian?

Schedule a free 15 min consultation
SCHEDULE TODAY