Autoimmunity and Exercise (Part VII)

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At this point in the autoimmune series, you can understand why I was reluctant to write an article in the first place! It is so complex, complicated, and multifaceted. So, if I were going to touch on another lifestyle change someone can easily implement, it would be exercise. Unfortunately, exercise is one category where you can have too much of a good thing, especially if you suffer from autoimmunity. There is a point where movement is healthy, beneficial, and will IMPROVE your immune system. On the flip side, if someone’s system is under extreme demand, their adrenals are shot, and they are often stressed, you can easily overdo it. Then the question becomes, what types of exercise are best, and how much.
Exercise is very closely related to your adrenals and the production of cortisol. Cortisol is a steroidal hormone that helps you keep up with stress and is important in the fight or flight response. These spikes in cortisol production should be short-lived and not chronic by any means. However, many of us live stressful, hectic lives and some add tons of exercise on top of it. This is a recipe for adrenal fatigue, and if you want to read more on that, click here.  The more intense you exercise, the more cortisol you release.  This disrupts something we call the HPA axis, which is important in regulating hormones and the immune system.   The types of exercise that stimulate the HPA Axis disruption the most are chronic cardio and and high intensity exercise.  That means that if you have an autoimmune disease, you may be doing more damage than good if you try to run marathons (or any long distance) or Crossfit.  It doesn’t mean you can’t participate in these workouts, but it does mean you need to be smart about it!  Resistance training does not have the same effect on cortisol if it is practiced alone.  This means that weight lifting or body weight movements at lower intensities may be a great option for those with autoimmunity or adrenal fatigue! If you decide to participate in physical activity that is too strenuous for your body to keep up with the cortisol production, guess what, you can CAUSE LEAKY GUT.  We talked about how leaky gut is how this whole thing got started in the first place!  It’s a classic case of too much of a good thing.  Balance is key and more doesn’t always mean better.

As far as how exercise affects the immune system, it can cause a huge inflammatory response.  Any exercise someone does at more intensity that usual for longer than usual, is mobilizing neutrophils and natural killer cells.  This type of exercise also stimulates phagocytosis and increases the production of inflammatory compounds.  In studies, we see that following acute exercise,  the number of T and B cells (immune cells) drop below the levels they were BEFORE every working out.  This quickly recovers if someone has adequate recovery time.  However, if there isn’t sufficient days between these types of workouts, then it is common for athletes to get sick!

Now we understand that we may need to back off the intensity, how often should we be working out if we have an autoimmune condition?  I like to say High Intensity work should not be done more than 2 times a week.  That would include intervals, Crossfit, intense cardio.  You should leave at least 2 days between those sessions for proper cellular repair and recovery.  In between, yoga, walking, leisurely biking are all amazing, repairing options.  You can also add some resistance training  like weight lifting or body weight movements like squats, push ups, pull ups, etc to the mix.  The key here is to keep your heart rate down when you are avoiding high intensity.  This may mean doing less initially which seems counter-intuitive because we all want to look good naked. However, chronic cardio and too much high intensity activity are driving your adrenals into the ground.  Once that happens, your body will begin taking building blocks from hormone production in order to try to keep up with cortisol production.  It doesn’t care how fertile you are, heavy your periods are, or how horny you are if it is trying to survive a flight or flight experience! As far as our genetics are concerned, stressful situations are life and death.  That is why de-stressing is so important.

If you have cut out gluten, upped your fat soluble vitamins, addressed you stomach acid, and quit taking miscellaneous medications, this could be your next step in the equation.  Exercise should be a positive challenge to the body.  If overdone, it most definitely acts in the opposite direction.  Choose something FUN.  I like group classes because community makes every second fun for me.  I really enjoy sports. Join a sports club.  Take family walks.  Movement does not have to be a dreaded to-do on the endless list.  It should and could be something you ENJOY and LOOK FORWARD TO!  If you haven’t found that type of movement yet, then keep searching.  Different strokes for different folks.  The more you can do outside, the better, too.

Wednesday: The Day Anything (stressful) Can Happen

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I totally got schooled Wednesday morning by a patient about Wednesday being the day anything can happen.  Apparently that’s from the Mickey Mouse Club?!  I’ll take his word for it!  What he didn’t know was that even though it was first thing in the morning, many “anythings” had already happened!  Since the toll road is having issues, I have been taking an alternate route to the office I am filling in for, which extends the drive a little bit, but is worth it if I can avoid sitting in standstill traffic.  Monday: fine.  Tuesday: raining but fine.  Wednesday: accident that shut down 94!  Ok, I left myself time.  Just take the detour maps gives you.  Detour route…closed.  Umm…now I am DEFINITELY going to be late.

In my younger years, this would’ve been disaster.   I had an agenda, planned ahead, thought of all the possible issues and accounted for them.  I would’ve freaked out for two reasons: 1. I am going to be late!  How bad does that make me look?! 2. I’m being detoured off the highway into some random place in Gary!  How am I supposed to know where I’m going?!  In my older age, none of this even bothered me.  It was sort of life’s metaphor for having a path, but not being stressed about detours.  You’ll get to where you’re going eventually.  I planned ahead, I was doing everything I could, and it DOES NO GOOD TO STRESS ABOUT THINGS YOU CAN’T CONTROL.  Getting worked up, upset, stressed, worried would not get me or anyone else anywhere faster!  How many times a day do things not go as planned?!  A lot!  Do you find yourself stressing about the circumstances out of your control?  That unneeded stress is killing you.  Well, maybe not you yet, but your adrenals.  They can’t keep up with the constant barrage of stress!  Give them a break!  They already have to keep up with stress over things you CAN control, vigorous exercise, caffeine, and all that wine you are drinking.  Quit demanding more from them or you will find yourself in a heap of hormone hell, eventually.

I wanted to tell you this story because this is an everyday situation like many that my anxiety patients would get into a tizzy about.  Always evaluate a situation calmly.  Things don’t get done faster because you are yelling, or crying, or complaining about how it didn’t go as planned.  Ask yourself one simple question: Is this something I can control?  If not, relax.  Do your best.  It is what it is.  Silly human.  To think you could control things in the world, sort of makes the universe laugh.  In my case, I used the extra time to turn up the radio and sing to my jams.  Not because I didn’t care that I would be late, but because I couldn’t control an accident that shuts down the highway and puts me an extra hour and a half behind!  When I showed up, I was more than ready to give 100% to my patients, good vibes for days, and it all worked out in the end.  I would’ve made my biochemistry a mess by worrying, and what kind of doctor could I be to my patients if my mind is stuck in panic mode over something  I can’t control.  Breathe.  You’re a tiny speck on a spinning planet in the middle of the universe.  It’s going to be ok.  I promise.

Vitamin Deficiency and Autoimmunity (Part V)

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For this section, I am going to focus on fat soluble vitamins specifically, which means vitamin A, D, E, and K. Fat soluble vitamins can be stored for later use unlike water soluble vitamins and tend to be the most deficient in the American diet for various reasons.  Each one of the fat soluble vitamins has potent effect on the immune system and therefore, deficiency in any of them, can put us on the path to immune system disorders (if we aren’t already there).  Fat soluble vitamins are found widely in animal products, so this tends to be a sticking point in the world of plant power.  Don’t worry though, even if you are a vegetarian, you can still get these vitamins without having to eat meat.  If you are a vegan, however, this may a trickier component to address.

Vitamin A. Vitamin A is important in the scope of autoimmunity because it is important for maintaining mucosal barriers.  You know just how imperative this is for the avoidance of leaky gut which is the precursor to every autoimmune disease if you read my previous articles.  Vitamin A also plays a major role in inflammation due to its connection with neutrophils, macrophages, and natural killer cells.  If someone has depressed immune system due to Vitamin A deficiency, they are at great risk for repeated infections.  One can always turn to supplements, but I would rather have someone get this nutrient through food.  I will never quit saying “food is medicine.”  You can find it in grassfed butter, liver, and pastured egg yolks.  If the animals producing these products are not eating their appropriate diet, however, these are not present in nearly the same quantities.  This is the reason I hit home the idea of food quality being worth every penny.

Vitamin D. Vitamin D is my favorite to talk about because most patients come to me with standard blood work including vitamin D.  This is a testament to the agreement among most all health professionals how important it is! We have the most research on Vitamin D; therefore, we know it plays key roles in the expression of over 200 genes and the proteins associated with those genes.  We need it for mineral absorption and bone health.  Vitamin D is essential for healing via its pathways that help cell growth.  AND, it is important in immune system regulation.   Vitamin D is so closely linked to autoimmune diseases that it has been suggested the deficiency may be the  CAUSE (via environmental trigger) of lupus, diabetes type 1, MS, rheumatoid, psoriasis, and IBD.  We see geographic implication too when we consider RA.  We know for a fact that stats show higher rates of RA the further away from the equator.  Why would this matter?  Because most Americans are relying on sunlight as their source for Vitamin D production.  It is synthesized from cholesterol found in the cell membranes of skin cells when we absorb UVB rays from the sun. Someone reading this may be thinking “Great!  I’ll go get some Vitamin D supplements today!”  I wish it were that easy.  Vitamin D works alongside other fat soluble vitamins in addition to plant nutrients  and hormones.  Just taking a Vitamin D supplement doesn’t address the increased need for the other nutrients.  This gets crazy and complex in the world of supplementation.  You’d take 1,000 supplements and still not touch all the things you get from real food.  Additionally, if you didn’t address the dietary aspects like wheat, then you are ingesting foods that actually reduce Vitamin D in the body! Lifestyle matters.  There is no shortcut to going outside in the sun, ingesting healthy fat sources, and avoiding toxins and inhibitors.  Let me repeat: there is NO DRUG OR SURGERY that can make up for a lifestyle issue.  Period.  *Vitamin D levels for someone with an autoimmune disease need to much higher than the general population; therefore, being within normal range is not adequate!

I’m going to skip Vitamin E and say a quick word on Vitamin K because this one tends to be gaining clout in the health industry. Vitamin K is also essential for bone and tooth health and studies are being done on its link to osteoporosis for this reason.  It also plays a role in protecting against oxidative damage and regualtes the immune system.  Unlike other fat soluble vitamins, you can get this from fermented foods in addition to pastured animal products!  Bacteria produce this when they are doing their job and therefore, your bacteria in your gut can also make Vitamin K in your small intestines by converting K1 that they find in your leafy greens!  Let’s hope you haven’t been taking antibiotics regularly, or you may be at a deficit here, too.  Your bacteria levels are so important, and anything working against them is also helping the disease pathways catapult.

So, let’s just think about this full circle for a moment.  You were born with genes that give you a predisposition for some of this.  However, you don’t have it expressed necessarily unless you create the right environment.  You create that environment by taking antibiotics, heartburn meds, staying away from the sun (or blocking it), lacking grassfed animal products in your diet, eating things like wheat (possibly every meal!), and we haven’t even talked about the connection of stress! or exercise!  or sleep! or chemical exposure! You can now see why we have taken a massive wrong turn in our society when it comes to our food supply providing us nutrients, our lifestyles prioritizing stressful and depleting behaviors, and then our tools for correction are not addressing the underlying causes.  That is why we are not getting better.  That is why people get sick and stay sick.  That is why, despite the fact that I am ONE PERSON, I am on a mission.  Even if you read this and never do anything about it, I have done my job.  I am not here to make a decision for you.  But if you choose the same decision given all the information, then at least it’s informed decision making.  That’s more important to me than anything.

Adrenal Fatigue: Understanding Cortisol

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This is a condition that really doesn’t discriminate between healthy and unhealthy individuals.  I have had countless patients end up at my door with relentless fatigue when they believe they live a healthy lifestyle.  They workout, they don’t eat excessive carbs, they have successful jobs, and they take their daily supplements!  Then why are they SO tired all the time?!  These cases are almost always issues with cortisol production and the ability of the adrenals to keep up with stress.  Athletes especially can be affected by this issue because of overtraining, chronic stress, or lack of appropriate recovery.  Sometimes less is more, but let’s take a look at what actually happens in someone with adrenal fatigue.

Adrenal Glands: You’ve go these two little organs that sit on top of your kidneys that are responsible for releasing epinephrine and norepinephrine, aldosterone, cortisol, sex hormones, and precursors such as DHEA.  Cortisol is a steroid hormone that is responsible for all kinds of things in the body including:

  • mobilizing protein stores
  • water excretion and electrolyte balance
  • mobilizing fatty acids from adipose (fat tissue)
  • precursor to cortisone (and anti-inflammatory agent)
  • directing immune function
  • stimulation/inhibition of gene transcription
  • affecting bone calcium
  • affects behavior, mood, and hormones
  • affects numerous CNS biochemistry

Basically, it has a hand in tons of things.  Like most body chemistry, it is definitely not on an isolated island!  When stress levels are high, the demand for cortisol production goes up.  However, the building blocks are things like progesterone and pregnenolone which are needed for the production of other hormones.  When your body starts stealing these building blocks to keep up with stress, it will eventually let your other hormones like estrogen and testosterone suffer in order to keep up.  This is important because many people are known to have hormone imbalance, but if you never assess the adrenals, how do you know this isn’t the reason?  If it is, then the answer is not hormone replacement, the answer is stress reduction that will in turn lower cortisol demand.

When you start thinking about how important hormones are to the body, one may ask why on earth your body would make that kind of sacrifice?!  The simple answer is that our body is still expecting stress to be a short-lived event driven by a life or death incident.  In that moment, we would sacrifice anything in order to get out alive.  We never adapted a mechanism to take care of chronic stress.  Stress that never goes away. Stress that takes all we have.  Stress that leaves us feeling defeated at the end of the day and dread the start of the next.  Am I ringing any bells here?  Life is HARD these days!  We have all kinds of stress!  Work!  Kids! Relationships!  But, we also have stresses that people don’t think about like food sensitivities, sleep deficit, overtraining at the gym, and infections.  There are ALL stress to the body.

This is how people can function from day to day, still go to the gym, think they are doing it all, and still feel like crap.  When I run cortisol panels, it’s not uncommon for me to find cortisol levels that are in no way keeping up with the demand.  There are symptoms many complain about:

  • hypoglycemia
  • chronic fatigue
  • ligament/cartilaginous injuries
  • depression/anxiety (this one I see a LOT!)
  • insomnia
  • irritability
  • short term memory issues
  • pain that persists
  • poor wound healing and workout recovery
  • frequent colds
  • hypothyroidism (tons of my ladies out there have this along with adrenal fatigue!)
  • PMS
  • infertility
  • menopause symptoms (can we say hot flash club?!)
  • insulin resistance
  • fat around the trunk

The test for this is pretty simple, but it’s important to have it checked multiple times throughout the day.  So, many physicians will test it once.  That is not helpful unless there is pathology.  We are looking for optimal function.  Therefore, we want to see a high number in the morning and a gradual decrease until it bottoms out at night so you can go to sleep!  If we don’t see that, we need to assess where we are in order to know where to go from there.  In the early stages, people will make too much.  They usually don’t come in for help at this stage because they are “keeping up” as far as they’re concerned.  By the time we hit stage 2 or stage 3, we are starting to not be able to keep up and we start stealing those building blocks from other hormone pathways.  THIS IS USUALLY WHAT BRINGS THEM IN!  On top of fatigue, they now have stray hairs growing in random places, excessive fat that won’t budge, inability to recover from their workouts, trouble sleeping, up and down emotions, loss of sex drive.  At this point, we can’t just fix it with food, typically.  We need to “help your body over the hump” so it can catch up and produce enough cortisol again on its own.  This not only takes time, it takes lifestyle changes that may include cutting things out that are contributing to stress.  This is the toughest thing for patients to do.  If they don’t workout as much, say no to responsibilities, sleep more, etc, they feel LAZY!  You wouldn’t call a cancer patient LAZY!  This is taking care of yourself, and I can’t stress it enough (no pun intended).

If this sounds like you, and you like help, my door is open.  The saliva test I use to measure cortisol, DHEA, hormones, and melatonin is around $200 and it is done at home.  Doesn’t get much easier than that for a little piece of mind and direction.

Gluten’s Part in Leaky Gut and the Autoimmune Cascade (Part IV)

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If you have been following along, we have now established how an autoimmune disease starts, what gut permeability is, how stomach acid may be a problem, and now we can start talking about what causes it in our lifestyle that we can control!  On one hand, I am oversimplifying this part of the discussion so that I can focus on the aspects that you can actually have control over.  I am skipping over some of the things out of our control like certain genetic attributes, environmental exposures, and infections that may have been just bad luck in terms of wrong place, wrong time.  However, even those factors can be overcome most of the time with proper care.  So, lets get to it!

Gluten: Yes, I am starting with our beloved friend, gluten.  Why?  Because this is the most controversial topic that flies around and it’s simply hard for most people to understand how on Earth, eating a bagel and some bread can cause such a problem as serious as autoimmunity….especially if their physicians haven’t said a word about it, or may have even discounted the connection when a patient asks.  If I could have everyone start with A SINGLE change, this would be it.  Antibody production against gluten has been reported to affect as much as 30 percent of the population!  The mechanism by which it contributes to leaky gut has to do with zonulin.  Zonulin is a protein sent into the gut by that single layer of cells called enterocytes and regulates the opening and closing of the tight junctions (shout out to all my AP101 students!  remember those tight junctions I tested you over?!) that hold the cells together.  They are kind of like the pegs that allow legos to fit together in a flush manor.  Gluten has the ability to increase zonulin and therefore increase the amount of time those tight junctions are open, allowing undigested proteins, bacteria, and toxins to cross over inappropriately.

There are also pathways where a enzyme known as transglutaminase is affected.  Transglutaminase is an enzyme that is important in protein modification as they are produced in the cell.  (I promise to not start talking about transcription and translation!) This enzyme activity is increased in the lining of the intestines when we consume gluten.  Increase of this enzyme’s activity increases the likelihood of antibody production against gluten.  The bigger issue is that if antibodies are produced against this enzyme, we can’t perform tissue healing like we normally would. So, let’s say you have tissue damage and one of your body’s ways of helping heal it is to send transglutaminase to the site, but because of increased gluten ingestion, you have created antibodies against it.  Now you are sending this enzyme to all these sick parts and your immune system is going “OMG, what is he doing here?!  Produce more antibodies!  We are gonna need ’em to eradicate him!”   When you start eating a gluten free diet, you decrease the antibody formation against transglutaminase and you decrease zonulin activity, which allows those junctions to stay shut.

*This part is my opinion although is a topic of discussion.  Why now and not before?  Wheat has changed in various ways.  We have changed it from Einkorn wheat to dwarf wheat in order to increase crop yields and increase gluten levels for desired texture of baked goods.  We also now have an issue with Round Up Ready seeds causing damage to our DNA by damaging the microorganisms living in our gut.  We are also not preparing wheat products like we originally did.  We no longer, soak, sprout, or ferment grains.  We NEED to do that in order to get nutrients out of the bran.  Anyway, I don’t know what the largest contributing factor is, and it may just be a combo; but I do know, that many patients do extremely well without these products in their diet.

According to Dr. Peter Osborne (who is an expert on gluten sensitivity), there are 140 autoimmune diseases that science has identified and the ONLY SCIENTIFIC agreement for the cause has to do with gluten and its many mechanisms by which is can cause this cascade of events.  I chose not to focus on a few of the other pathways that I usually do in a health talk like lectins and their contribution.  However, know that there are even more reasons that gluten can cause changes to the intestinal wall!

I’m going to stop there and do another article on more causes because this could get overwhelming.  So, what can you do TODAY?  Try to cut out all of the wheat products in your diet and see how you feel.  No bread, pasta, pizza, donuts, beer, etc.  When you think about it, you may be consuming these things multiple times a day!  If it’s contributing to your issues, you can also understand just how damaging it may be to consume them so regularly.  This alone, will not likely cure anything, but it may give you a huge step in the direction of feeling BETTER.  Most people with autoimmune diseases are willing to entertain the idea that something can make them feel better, and you can only gain other health benefits in addition if you cut out all those junk foods often containing wheat.  Check out my blog recipes for more ideas, but there are so many options out there!  Don’t get overwhelmed.  Just start.

Heartburn and Autoimmunity (Part III)

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I can’t count how many patients I’ve worked with over the years that have heartburn.  Most take some type of buffering agent to neutralize the acid such as Tums.  However, for the more severe cases, they will be prescribed a Proton Pump Inhibitor.  This is such a huge deal that I make my physiology students look this up and write an entire paper on how they work!  You do NOT want to inhibit the function of your cell membrane’s proton pump!  Most people can get on board that shutting down a system in the body may not be a good idea, but they don’t know the alternative options available.  That’s where understanding exactly why stomach acid is getting in the wrong place is imperative to fixing the problem for good.  That topic may be for another time, but for now, we are going to make the general statement that most cases of heartburn are actually cases of NOT ENOUGH stomach acid.  Therefore, taking meds to decrease the production even further drives us into a hole that is tough to get out of.  If you just trust me on that statement for the time being, we can look into why decreased stomach acid may play a role in the development of an autoimmune disease.

The stomach is the first stop in the tube after you swallow your food.  It has been designed to have a very acidic environment by the production of HCl.  The reason we need such an acidic pH (around 2), is because that acidity will start the breakdown of your food, kill many bacterial organisms that we do not want making it into the small intestines because they could make us ill, and is needed for vitamin and mineral absorption.  This acid is specifically important in the breakdown of proteins into their legos, amino acids.  (Remember how we need to first breakdown all of our food into it’s smallest components in order to absorb it.)  If this stomach acid plays so many crucial roles, you can imagine the domino of effects that may occur if there is not enough of it around.

When you aren’t producing enough stomach acid, the pancreas and liver aren’t getting the signal to release digestive enzymes and bile, which will mean your food will further lack breakdown.  If these stages of breakdown don’t occur, you can end up with nutritional deficiencies because you aren’t able to absorb things in such large forms.  I see this a lot with Crohn’s patients; men especially can be so skinny because they simply aren’t able to get nutrition absorbed! So, now we have undigested food in the small intestine, which creates the perfect environment for opportunistic bacteria and yeast to grow out of control.  If you have heard the term SIBO (Small intestinal bacterial overgrowth), you know how this can be troublesome for patients who are “eating perfectly” because that specific case requires  therapeutic protocols to actually fix it.  Until the overgrowth is addressed, you won’t digest anything appropriately no matter how perfect your diet.

Low stomach acid specifically impairs the digestive process and creates the perfect environment for bacterial imbalance in the gut.  Remember me talking about how you have 10 times the amount of bacteria in your gut then cells in your body?!  It’s crucial to have abundant good bacteria, and minimize opportunistic microorganisms.  Without balance, we have something called dysbiosis.  Dysbiosis is at the root of so many health conditions including autoimmune diseases because of the risk of infections, nutrient malabsorption, and the impaired integrity of the intestinal wall.  We don’t want an environment where the wall can be leaky, we have bad bacteria hanging around, and large protein structures on top of it.  If those things cross over the wall of enterocytes and  come in contact with the immune cells on the other side, we have just triggered an immune system response to our food.  All of this being a domino effect of NOT HAVING ADEQUATE STOMACH ACID!  That Nexium or Prilosec isn’t helping matters.

I want to throw out a couple things that can be common in patients.  One is H. Pylori.  This organism can overgrown in patients with low stomach acid and the infection NEEDS to be addressed before you can move forward.  The test I use cost about $100 and is worth every penny.  The other thing is that patients don’t often need stomach acid reducing meds, they need supplements that encourage the production of more!  When your body produces enough stomach acid, it’s the signal to the esophageal sphincter to close.  The reason you feel burning in the esophagus is typically because that “door” between the stomach and the esophagus hasn’t closed adequately.  Stomach acid in the esophagus doesn’t feel good and if left alone chronically, it can cause Barrett’s esophagus and cancer.  No good.

You can increase stomach acid by taking HCL/pepsin supplementation with meals, eat digestive bitters, drink a glass of water with lemon juice or apple cider vinegar in it 20 minutes before a meal, or indulge in a little kombucha.  I would also suggest a good probiotic to patients in this situation because you need to rebalance the microbiome.  I have links to ones I like in the “store” along the top bar.  It will send you to the products through Amazon. While these are great tips, I want to caution people from taking this upon themselves because if HCl is taken in conjunction with asprin, Advil, corticosteriods, etc, it can actually cause serious damage to the gut lining and cause ulcers.  Also, if a pathogen is present such as H. Pylori or SIBO, then more steps have to be taken to address that.  Moral of the story is that if you are taking meds to lower stomach acid, you most definitely have an underlying issue that is not being addressed.  You are simply masking the symptom of acid getting into the esophagus.  I would encourage you to ask why it would get there in the first place?  That is not normal.  Stomach acid was created for proper digestion and nutrient absorption, so any substances that would try to increase the pH to be more alkaline, is going to have a detrimental effect.

If you have an autoimmune disease that you are taking an immunosuppressant for, can you imagine the environment we are setting up for disaster if you have stomach acid issues that are allow bacteria to overgrow AND the meds you take are shutting down your immune system?!  Oh my.

I want your heart to be on fire, but just not due to low stomach acid.  Love you guys!

Your Placenta: To Eat or Not to Eat

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Since I have approximately 100 friends having babies right now…ok, maybe not 100….I have officially turned into a maternity and pediatric doctor without asking for it.  Thanks guys.  One question that has come up that I didn’t necessarily have a good answer for is whether or not I thought it was a good idea to encapsulate your placenta and consume it.

The first question I always ask myself when I am not sure if something is appropriate for health is: “Did/do healthy populations do this?”  I have lived in other countries, done health work in other populations, and read extensively on hunter gather populations, and while some have rituals around what to do with the placenta, NONE OF THEM consume it (that I could find).  Other mammals consume their placenta after birth and there’s a lot of speculation and anecdotal evidence that doing so may help reestablish hormonal balance in women postpartum, but the science isn’t there.  I searched journals, asked some of the best ancestral medical professionals around, and contacted holistic women and children doctors.  No one could find legitimate research on the topic.

So, the science isn’t there, but does that mean you shouldn’t eat your placenta?  Not necessarily.  One good point that was brought up was whether or not you were administered drugs during the birth process.  Since the placenta acts as a nutrient transfer organ, there could be some real contraindications in consuming something that may have lots of residual chemicals present.  However, if you gave a natural birth without medication, you may be ingesting something full of nutrients.  As with any organ, there tends to be more fat soluble vitamins present in addition to mineral content.  Consuming any organ meats after birth could probably be a really good idea to restore some of these essentials, which play a role in energy, mood, thyroid function, adrenal health, and overall good physiology.  However, you may not be sh*t outta luck if you had an epidural or forgot to plan encapsulation.  If most of the benefit is potentially coming from the nutritional qualities of  the placenta as an organ, then it may be just as helpful to consume organs from grassfed cows such as liver.  If you don’t like liver, you can get similar nutrients from Cod Liver Oil.  I like the brand Green Pastures, and there is a link to their product in my amazon store across the task bar above.

Conclusively, things are inconclusive.  Did you like that statement?  I thought I was pretty clever.  But in all seriousness, I searched high and low for the research, I asked prominent professionals, I deferred to the actions of health populations, and there just isn’t a lot out there.  Therefore, I am left to assume that most of the benefits American women speak of is partly due to the nutrients they are gaining from consuming the placenta that could also be found in beef liver or cod liver oil.  Particularly, fat soluble vitamins like A, D, and K.  I’m not often left without an opinion, but my opinion here is very unsubstantiated.  If it’s a natural birth, you’re probably not going to hurt anything, so why not.  If it wasn’t a natural birth, then you may want to think about cod liver supplementation to aid your hormone levels after birth, especially since it’s a healthy practice for anyone to make sure they are getting these nutrients in their diet.

Macros vs. Micros: Why One Matters More

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I’ve been trying to avoid writing this post because I don’t want anyone to think that I am anti-macros.  I am very rarely anti-anything.  However, I think sometimes it gets confusing to the average public what they should be doing to gain health when most of the people they are following on social media don’t fit their demographic.  I have been seeing tons of buzz lately from the fitness community about tweaking their diets to fit macros.  I have been doing health talks for so many years now, that I almost busted out my very first powerpoint where I talk about macros!  Macros just stands for macronutrients.  When you hear this term, think carbs, protien, and fat.  Athletes of all kinds have been using these macros in certain ratios to reach their goals for so many years that I can’t even count.  This is not new territory.  It’s where the concepts of carb-loading for endurance races, protein shakes after lifting, making weight for a fight, or even leaning down before a figure competition come from.  Athletes are REALLY GOOD at manipulating macros in order to acheive certain performance results or certain aesthetic results.  However, if you only think about macros, you miss an entire piece of the health equation that makes me nervous.
I live in the world of micros.  When you hear the word micros, think nutrients, minerals, and vitamins.  This is where a huge majority of health really lives.  When you are eating for micros, you are creating sufficiency in the building blocks that your body needs to function, express health, and keep bad genes from turning on.  You can still have a few extra pounds and eat beautifully from a micro perspective…just like you can have a six pack and still get cancer. This is where confusion sets in….
Average Joe follows superstar athlete on social media and sees a ripped lean machine and tries to follow the superstar macros.  Problem #1, superstar athlete has a training schedule that demands a lot more carbohydrates than average Joe will ever expend.  So, average Joe could STILL be fat trying to follow someone else’s macros.  Problem #2, lets say average Joe has his macros tailored to his own unique situation, he is led to believe that as long as he is following those set macros, everything that fits that protein/carb/fat ratio is fair game.  All of a sudden, we have average Joe AND superstar athlete putting themselves at risk for nutrient deficiency and therefore diseases like cancer, heart attacks, autoimmune diseases, etc.  (Side note: a very well known TV personality that makes a living off looking the way she does just shared she found out she has an autoimmune disease and the doctors are changing everything about her diet….which was geared toward macros.  Not because the macros weren’t on point with how she wanted to look, but because they were off point in terms of nutrient supply.)  We have all heard of the marathon runner or the health nut that drops dead of a heart attack and everyone thinks “how could that be?!  He/she was so healthy!”  If you look at the diet, it was most likely tailored just for macros and not for micros.
If you see someone on social media with a six pack eating twinkies and ho-hos because they “fit their macros,” turn the other way.  These foods do not fit into micros, and that is where your health lives.  Micros determine your health, not your physique.  So, it becomes ultra tempting to want to follow along with someone eating certain ratios if you can still have fast food, cakes, and the like as long as it fits your macros.  Don’t be fooled.  If you are an athlete that wants to focus on tweaking your diet to the point of weighing your food, measuring everything, timing everything, etc to enhance performance or aesthetics, then please do it with the right foods.  The foods that still cover your micro bases.  If you are an average Joe, worry about eating healthy, nutrient dense foods first, then after a year of that, consider tweaking your macros for performance or looks.  Until you’ve covered your micro bases, your health is still at risk no matter how amazing your butt and abs look or how fast or strong you prove to be.