0:10

Hello and welcome to the MDN

0:12

Chef Team Podcast . This is your

0:14

culinary nutrition expert and brain

0:16

health coach , Chef Michael , along

0:18

with my beautiful wife , my hottie

0:21

bride Isabel

0:23

, your Dr Isabel , I

0:25

love it when you introduce me like that , your

0:27

hottie bride , you are 43

0:30

years of being together and 37

0:33

plus plus , plus to go right

0:35

, yeah , yeah . Many , many

0:37

, many more . Yes , I'm excited about that , yeah

0:40

, excited about the future , and we'll talk

0:42

about the future for everybody here today , hopefully

0:44

make a difference in their lives . So

0:47

, my dear somebody new

0:50

coming onto the show might ask a question

0:52

Well , what's this podcast all about ? I mean , what are these podcast

0:54

all about ? I mean , what are these guys all about

0:56

? What would you have to say

0:58

to that ?

0:59

Well , the reason I would encourage

1:02

you to stick and listen is because

1:04

what we're going to be doing is looking through

1:06

a window , a window into

1:08

your future , a window into the kind

1:10

of life you can be having right

1:13

now . I've been a doctor

1:15

now since 1991

1:17

. That's more than 30 plus years and I've

1:19

seen over a half a million people face

1:21

to face . And what I've come

1:24

to understand from my personal experience

1:26

and from the latest , most up-to-date research

1:28

, is that medicine is changing . We're

1:30

not focusing on what's your diagnosis

1:33

, we're focusing on why

1:35

is this happening to you ? And

1:37

once we figure out why , then we can

1:39

start figuring out how to

1:42

reverse it and fix it

1:44

, so that , look , I'm not saying that you

1:46

need to be fixed , I'm just saying let's

1:49

get well so you can live your best life

1:51

.

1:51

So that's what we're for is just

1:53

to look at things differently

1:55

right now , and I know you have a great analogy

1:57

on that that you got from one of your mentors

2:00

, dr Mark Hyman . He talks

2:02

about basically

2:04

the upstream and the downstream , and

2:07

what's that great analogy that he's

2:09

known to say ?

2:10

Yeah , he says it's kind of like mopping

2:13

up the floor when the sink is overflowing

2:15

instead of just turning off

2:17

the faucet . Well , the faucet

2:20

is upstream . Let's learn to turn

2:22

off the faucet so we don't have

2:24

a kitchen full of water .

2:26

Just let it keep coming and keep mopping

2:29

, no , no , no .

2:30

And when we say a kitchen full of water

2:32

, we're talking about the downstream . And

2:34

when we say a kitchen full of water , we're talking

2:37

about the downstream , like for instance

2:39

anxiety

2:47

, depression , suicide , heart attacks , strokes , diabetes , dementia all those non-fun things that we don't

2:49

want to get to . That's right , and we can prevent by taking

2:51

care of our upstream issues

2:54

, which is all . It all starts with

2:56

our number one muscle , our

2:59

brain . Yeah , the brain .

3:02

Well , you know we've got a little bit of a different

3:04

type of show today because

3:06

you know a lot of folks might be is what Really

3:08

Happened ? Because

3:17

we get that question a lot of times

3:19

, where you know people might

3:21

catch little snippets about us , little snippets

3:23

about some things we're doing , but

3:25

we do get the question , michael

3:27

and Isabel MD and Jeff

3:29

, what really happened

3:31

along the way ? So we want to kind of fill in a little

3:33

some of those gaps today of what really happened along the way . So we want to kind of fill in a little

3:35

some of those gaps today of what really happened

3:38

. Would you like to start that off , my dear yes

3:40

, with a little bit about your story

3:42

, yes , or a lot about your story

3:45

, however you feel like , and we're going to do your

3:47

story . Oh .

3:48

I get to come in .

3:49

Yeah , so people know both our story

3:52

and then it's really a combined story

3:54

. Yeah , all right .

3:55

What do you got ? And we've done it all together , babe

3:57

. We've done all of this together , isn't that

4:00

amazing ?

4:00

43 years of the story .

4:02

Yeah , yeah , yeah , a lot of people

4:04

divorce , oh , and it's just so easy .

4:06

You know , just la-di-da butterflies

4:08

and rainbows cruising along

4:10

.

4:21

Dee-dee it along , no , no , yeah , so go ahead , all right . So I've read a lot of

4:23

stories about people's lives and they seem so distant when they're sharing

4:25

it and I'd wonder , come on , what really happened behind

4:27

the scenes that helped

4:30

them win . Because now I'm

4:32

seeing them as a winner and

4:34

I wanted the granular stuff , the real

4:36

, raw , messy , human side of it

4:38

, to learn how I could win

4:41

through it . So I

4:43

was trying to figure out how to put this together

4:45

for you so that I

4:47

just want to let you know that I'm doing my best to offer

4:50

that to you to

4:52

help you win and not deal

4:54

with the pain that

4:56

I went through . Hopefully prevent that

4:59

. Michael

5:01

always introduces me as

5:04

Dr Isabel , md and suicide

5:06

survivor , and then we dive into

5:08

our talks and there's

5:11

a lot to being a suicide survivor

5:13

and there's a lot to being

5:15

a suicide survivor . When I was five , five

5:18

years of age , I remember telling

5:20

my mom that I wanted to be a doctor , just like

5:22

my uncle Tio Julito Uncle

5:25

Jules , he's from Cuba

5:27

, so we call him Tio Julito

5:30

. He was the kind of doctor who would

5:32

come into the room and just light

5:34

it up with his sunshiny

5:37

face . He was a true sunflower

5:39

, wouldn't you agree ?

5:40

Oh yeah , amazing man , beautiful

5:42

man . Yeah

5:44

, just one of those people . If you were having a yucky

5:47

day and you got around the Olito

5:49

, he just smiled yeah .

5:51

And just made you feel better by smiling . Yeah

5:53

, and you know , we know , that smiles

5:55

mean I accept you . Oh

5:58

yeah , yeah , that's what a smile means when somebody

6:00

smiles Okay . I accept you and

6:02

you're okay . Yeah , so

6:05

I don't know if he knew that but anyway he

6:07

was my inspiration . Yeah , I've been studying

6:09

smiles , the power

6:11

of smiling , the smile study . Yeah , the smile

6:14

studier , and I'll do a talk

6:16

on that , the research on smiles . So

6:18

Tionito was my inspiration

6:21

. And fast forward from

6:23

five years of age to 1991

6:26

, I graduated from medical school

6:28

in Colorado and

6:30

I began my in hospital training

6:32

for four years . And

6:34

I began my in-hospital training for four years

6:36

and

6:39

there you do your 36 hours on for a shift and then you're awake

6:41

. You get to sleep

6:43

for maybe two to three hours

6:45

during that 36 hours , but the whole

6:47

36 hours you're in the hospital with a beeper

6:50

and the nurses and the doctors

6:52

in the emergency department doctors get to

6:54

call you and say , hey , we've got somebody

6:56

else for you to review and

6:59

it was a badge of honor not to sleep

7:01

. I mean

7:03

, for me it was where

7:05

my living hell began . I

7:08

never realized how much sleep affected

7:10

, lack of sleep affected me and

7:13

I would go home after being awake for most

7:16

of the 36 hours and then try to get

7:18

back into my sleeping rhythm , very

7:20

unsuccessfully , yes , yeah

7:22

. And then two days

7:25

later back into my 36-hour

7:27

shift in the hospital . And that was for three years

7:29

, three to four years . That

7:32

was four years . That was four years of

7:34

that stuff . Insane and

7:37

the real me , with anxiety and

7:39

self-doubt , would cry myself to

7:41

sleep and only to

7:43

sleep , a few hours before getting back

7:45

up and going back into my hospital

7:48

training , and I

7:51

know you didn't realize what was going on because

7:53

you were busy doing your

7:55

work .

7:56

Yeah , yeah , At the time I was an executive

7:58

chef . In a huge organization

8:00

, different organizations doing . You know

8:03

, it was kind of our own personal joke where

8:05

I'd do 70 to 75 hours

8:07

a week , or maybe even 80 . And you'd

8:09

say well , I just did 116 hours

8:11

or 110 hours , something like

8:13

that . Okay , I guess I didn't do that

8:15

much this weekend , I guess I've been

8:18

just kind of hanging out , but

8:20

we were two ships passing in the night

8:22

, aren't ? We yeah , as you can . Imagine .

8:24

For four years . Huh . At that time , yeah yeah , it

8:26

was crazy , and so the

8:28

doctor .

8:29

I ended up going to see the doctor and

8:37

they put me on vitamin P , also known as Prozac .

8:38

Yeah , because you had a Prozac deficiency , right . Right , I had

8:40

a Prozac deficiency back then . That's a joke , everyone

8:42

. Yeah , I did not have a Prozac

8:44

deficiency , but the point is it

8:47

did help me with my insomnia and it relieved

8:49

a lot of the anxiety , because when

8:51

you don't sleep you get anxious

8:54

. So the medicine helped me sleep

8:56

. So therefore it

8:58

helped me not be anxious . But I

9:00

was an emotionless doctor

9:03

, full of shame , and

9:05

I just had this quiet secret , like I

9:07

could not share this with my class

9:09

, with my colleagues , because I

9:11

would have been an outcast and bullied

9:14

, and I thought for sure , babe , that you

9:16

would leave me because I was truly a hot

9:18

basket mental case . But

9:21

I kept it quiet that whole time

9:23

and back

9:25

in my training as a medical doctor , there was

9:27

no education about sleep hygiene

9:30

, just drugs During

9:33

my hospital . Actually , after

9:35

I graduated and I

9:37

was a family practice doctor during

9:40

my second pregnancy , it was very

9:42

stressful and my sleep was terrible also

9:45

and I remember crying at night

9:47

just to exhaust myself and

9:49

be able to fall asleep because I did not

9:51

want to get back on the Prozac , because

9:53

I had weaned myself off and I got off

9:56

of it and I was afraid that the Prozac

9:58

. If I took the Prozac it was going to affect

10:00

our baby in

10:03

utero and

10:05

I didn't want that . But we now

10:07

know that the fetus can feel

10:10

and does feel experiences all

10:13

of the emotions that the mother

10:15

is experiencing in the

10:17

womb . And that

10:19

child was born , a very anxious

10:22

baby who had colic and slept terribly

10:24

for the first year . Remember , do

10:26

you remember ?

10:27

Oh yeah , I was there I cannot forget

10:30

that . Yeah , yeah , that was a terrible time

10:32

.

10:32

Really tough time and then fast

10:35

forward to 2013 . Michael

10:37

and I moved to New Zealand to

10:40

raise our children here in New Zealand

10:42

because I was really unhappy

10:44

with medicine in America . You

10:46

know , in America you had to have health care

10:49

to get health care , which

10:52

is crazy . You had to have health insurance to get

10:54

health care . And I wanted to be a doctor

10:56

for everybody . And in 2013

10:59

, I just came

11:01

to the realization that I was a frustrated

11:03

physician who wanted to help people prevent

11:05

disease instead of managing it , and

11:08

all I was doing the whole time before

11:10

that point was just managing

11:12

people's diseases , which

11:14

is nuts . And a

11:16

year later , doctor on a mission

11:19

was not growing as fast as we wanted

11:21

. I was menopausal , I was 53

11:24

, and I was experiencing severe

11:27

insomnia and anxiety

11:29

severe , and I didn't even realize

11:32

that it was a side effect

11:34

of being menopausal having

11:37

problems sleeping .

11:38

Well , you'd even got to a point where you were afraid to go

11:40

to bed just to

11:42

pose and sleep , because you were

11:44

worried that I might not sleep , meaning

11:46

you , you were worried that you wouldn't sleep . So

11:48

you're like I don't want to go to bed because I don't think

11:51

I'll sleep .

11:51

Right , I had sleep anxiety , sleep anxiety , yeah yeah , which is pretty wild to bed because I don't

11:53

think I'll sleep .

11:54

Right , I had sleep anxiety , sleep anxiety , yeah , yeah , yeah , which is pretty wild

11:56

. I was like , oh my god , I mean , I didn't know

11:58

I know I kept it quiet from johan

12:00

.

12:00

I was very ashamed .

12:02

I mean , I was experiencing that , but I mean also even

12:04

from myself . I was just like uh

12:07

, you know , I don't know anything about

12:09

this . I didn't have experience of that

12:11

at the time . The last 10 years we

12:14

totally turned that around and

12:16

become experts in that area , but at

12:18

that point it was like whoa , what's

12:20

going on ?

12:21

Mm-hmm and I would only

12:23

sleep two hours every

12:25

night for 17 straight nights

12:27

and the thoughts that

12:30

I was having is I am no good for my

12:32

family , I'm a burden . I

12:34

can't let them know that I want to kill myself

12:36

. So I was very , very secretive

12:39

because I'm telling you , if

12:42

you don't sleep , you do become

12:45

suicidal .

12:46

Yeah , and psychotic , and psychotic yeah

12:49

.

12:50

And by the end of that , 17 nights

12:52

, 17 nights of only two

12:54

or three hours of sleep , I did try

12:57

to take my life twice in three days and

13:01

by the grace of God that plan was stopped

13:03

and you took me to our pastor

13:05

and the pastors prayed

13:08

over me and then went

13:10

to the hospital and

13:12

saw the mental health folks , the psychiatrist

13:16

who , um , who

13:18

said , isabel , you're going to be on prozac

13:21

and sleeping tablet for the rest of your life

13:23

. And I was , like you know , at that

13:25

point I I had totally surrendered , like okay

13:28

, my secret has been found out , I

13:31

am not gonna be able to kill myself Now

13:33

. I'm staying alive and I gotta

13:35

figure this out . And

13:37

nobody who has ever been

13:39

, who's never been in that space , will

13:41

ever , ever , ever understand

13:44

what it's like to be suicidal .

13:46

Yeah , yeah , ever To

13:49

be that sleep deprived

13:51

and just to have those types

13:53

of psychotic thoughts that

13:57

it takes you to that point of

14:00

an end . Like

14:03

you said , thank God you're here today

14:05

.

14:05

Yeah , by the grace of God , that plan was stopped

14:07

.

14:07

I know , and I know part of that was

14:09

I was there during that and first

14:12

thing they did when you came in was they checked

14:14

you for drugs because , I mean , you were like a

14:16

caged wild animal just because

14:18

of lack of sleep . Not because you were on anything

14:21

, it was just this

14:23

lack of sleep had driven you to psychosis

14:26

.

14:26

Yeah , my cortisol was up . I

14:29

was like a wild person . Yeah

14:31

, yeah , my eyes were bugged out . They

14:33

thought I was on

14:36

methamphetamine . They tested me for methamphetamine

14:38

.

14:38

Yeah , yeah , of course I was like

14:41

I'm not on methamphetamine . They're like

14:43

okay , gee , okay

14:45

, we got to knock this lady out , yeah , but

14:49

you know , and at the time I mean , this is one .

14:50

We're laughing about it now because we can

14:52

, because we can , but at the time it was

14:54

10 years ago .

14:55

But also , you know , just from a relational

14:58

point of view , it was a crossroads

15:00

for us because the psychiatrist

15:03

looked at me and said okay , michael , you got

15:05

a choice We'll

15:08

admit Isabel into

15:10

the mental health section here of the

15:13

hospital or

15:22

she can go home with you and you are responsible for her . And you know , I hesitated

15:24

for , I don't know , maybe five seconds , maybe it was 10 , maybe it was 15

15:26

. I don't know . It was fairly quick and

15:29

you turned to me , my dear , and were like don't let

15:31

them take me . I know what happens

15:33

in here . I was

15:35

like , oh my God , I mean , you looked

15:37

almost like a child

15:39

, was like don't let me , don't let them

15:41

take me . Yeah , and

15:43

I looked at you and I was like , well

15:46

, no , there's no choice here . You're coming home with

15:48

me . We're going to get through this together . We're going to

15:50

work through this , right , I'm not sure

15:52

how it's going to happen . We're going to take it day by

15:54

day , but there's something

15:56

going on here . We can work on this together

15:58

. We've

16:08

got to figure this out . And we can use this mess because , also , we call this mess to mission .

16:10

Yeah , we can use this mess as a mission to save a lot of other lives . But we didn't know that . We didn't

16:12

know it at the time . But now we know that . But it did reveal

16:14

itself .

16:14

Yeah , the whole purpose did reveal

16:17

itself , yeah but I , yeah

16:19

, you came home and you know with me

16:21

and , uh , we're stronger and better ever

16:23

since .

16:24

Yeah , yeah that was pretty wild . Pretty

16:27

wild and we've gone through

16:29

that together . And during

16:31

that I do remember when the psychiatrist

16:33

said , isabel , you're going to be on Prozac and a sleeping

16:36

tablet for the rest of your life . Deep

16:38

down inside I was like , hmm , we'll

16:40

see about that . Yes , I took the

16:42

medication and , yes , it put me to sleep

16:45

and I started to sleep very , very

16:47

well . I think I was knocked out for

16:49

two weeks .

16:49

Yeah , that's right . Whenever I was

16:51

, I was like , okay , wow

16:54

, that's tough , I'm going to check and see if I can wake you up here

16:56

.

16:56

The mental health nurse would come and visit

16:59

me , remember , like every other

17:01

day and report back to the psychiatrist and

17:03

said you need to lighten up

17:05

on this sleeping ?

17:05

Yeah , she's caught up in her sleep now

17:08

. Yeah , she's caught up .

17:11

We've got to allow her to wake up again .

17:13

Yeah , so she can walk . Oh , my gosh

17:15

yeah .

17:16

Now , during this

17:18

whole journey , one

17:21

of my mentors appeared in my life Dr

17:23

Dale Bredesen , who's a medical

17:25

doctor and neurologist , who's been studying how

17:27

to prevent and even reverse Alzheimer's

17:31

early Alzheimer's and he's written

17:33

this book called the End of Alzheimer's . And

17:36

when I was reading this book I

17:38

read he said that the research

17:40

shows that antidepressants increase

17:43

your risk of dementia . Well

17:45

, at the time , antidepressants

17:49

increase your risk of dementia . Well , at the time I was on an antidepressant and I was like what

17:51

? I'm not going to be getting dementia

17:53

of the Alzheimer's type . That's not going to be

17:55

my life . So Michael and I really

17:58

started to dive into the latest

18:00

, most up-to-date research

18:03

on brain health and how

18:05

to support it . And I just want to say

18:07

that now I am off

18:09

the medication and I'm saying this

18:11

to you for you not to

18:13

just come off your medication . I'm giving you

18:15

hope and encouragement that

18:17

you know what , wherever you are right

18:19

now , you can get through this

18:22

and over to the other side and have victory

18:24

. You're just in a messy

18:26

middle and you can get

18:28

through .

18:29

And so Michael and I learned about

18:31

the latest issues

18:34

about brain health and how to work upstream

18:37

and turn off the faucet Right , turn off the faucet

18:39

and just learning

18:41

some of those contributors about brain

18:43

health and how to support it , would

18:47

you say gut health is one of them .

18:49

Yep , Yep , Absolutely Gut

18:51

, as you hear out there in

18:53

the world . Your brain is your

18:55

stomach . Your gut is

18:57

your second brain . That is true

18:59

.

19:00

And how about ? I mean this is one I'd never heard

19:02

of what's called ACE Adverse

19:04

Childhood Experiences .

19:06

I had no idea the effect

19:08

of adverse childhood experiences on

19:10

our brain health . I had no idea

19:13

that if you score greater than four then

19:16

you've got a 1,200%

19:19

increase of suicide . Who

19:22

knew ? I was never taught that in medical

19:24

training .

19:25

Hey , here's another one for you . I imagine

19:28

you didn't get much in this in your medical training

19:30

. How about nutrition ? Can

19:32

that support our brain health ? Well , chef

19:34

, what do you think ? I'll just

19:37

say 100% , yeah

19:39

, 100% , absolutely . And exercise

19:41

? I mean , we hear about exercise and physical

19:44

health , but can exercise

19:46

support our brain health ?

19:50

I love what Dr Perlmalter says

19:52

. He says the number one supplement

19:54

is a pair of walking

19:57

shoes to get your

19:59

exercise in .

20:00

Yeah , yeah , yeah . And

20:02

another biggie and

20:04

I know this is for you during your

20:06

menopause , because it was your

20:09

menopause years when this hit hormones

20:11

. Does that something have

20:14

to do with supporting brain health ?

20:16

I was never taught the importance of hormones

20:18

in our brain health , and I never

20:20

also knew that

20:22

the highest rate of women

20:25

who commit suicide are

20:27

between the ages of 35

20:29

to 44 . That's perimenopausal

20:33

, the time around menopause

20:35

, and then the next highest

20:38

rate of suicide occurs

20:41

to women between 45

20:43

and 54 . That was

20:45

me , and it had to

20:47

do with our hormones

20:49

, and not only for women , but men

20:52

. Men go through menopause too . You

20:54

know low testosterone . But

20:56

hormones such like vitamin D , thyroid

20:59

, estrogen , progesterone , dhea

21:01

, cortisol all those hormones

21:04

they affect our brain

21:06

.

21:06

Yes , and another

21:09

one is relationships

21:11

. Is that something

21:13

that's important for our brain health ?

21:15

Yes , and learning how to implement

21:18

boundaries to protect yourself .

21:19

Nice , you know yeah .

21:22

A lot of people don't know that they

21:24

need to have boundaries .

21:25

Yeah , A lot of people don't know that they

21:27

need to have boundaries . Yeah , and how about I

21:30

find this one so important is productive

21:32

thought management the

21:34

way we think in

21:37

our brain .

21:38

Yeah , we have to control our thoughts

21:40

or they will control us

21:42

, and that is a job

21:45

in and of itself . While you're awake

21:47

, pretty much . Yes . Constant course

21:49

correction , constant course correction . Babe

21:51

, you and I have been working on having

21:54

productive thought management , at

21:56

least for the last 25 years .

21:58

Oh , by the way , babe , that's me .

22:02

And you know , look , today you and I were walking

22:04

and you're like ah , you're going

22:06

off course .

22:08

Constant course correction yeah , and

22:11

spirituality is that a

22:13

way to support brain health too ?

22:15

Yes , depending

22:18

on what people believe . I can only

22:20

speak from what you and I

22:22

believe . And at the time

22:24

I thought that it was

22:26

in my strength that was going

22:28

to grow Doctor on a Mission . It

22:31

was in my strength , it was all on my shoulders

22:33

. But during this whole

22:35

experience I've learned that it's not

22:38

on my strength , it's in God's

22:40

strength , with Jesus and the Holy

22:42

Spirit . And just

22:44

being able to cast my cares unto

22:47

God and knowing that he's there every

22:49

step of the way really , really helps

22:52

me . It keeps me light . It

22:54

keeps me like Tigger . That's T-I-double-ger-er

22:58

in Winnie the Pooh

23:00

. That's my normal personality .

23:03

And what we discovered for everybody . It's just important

23:06

to have something you believe in

23:08

beyond yourself , right , yeah

23:11

, so it's not all on you , yeah

23:13

.

23:14

And my favorite prayer to God is

23:16

God , use me , you

23:19

kept me alive .

23:20

Kept me alive , used me in a great

23:22

way .

23:22

Yeah , big , use us big

23:24

now here's one .

23:27

We've seen a lot with people in

23:29

brain health . Is toxins and

23:31

toxicity important

23:34

? What do you think ? Oh yeah , yes

23:36

, yes yes , are you on 100

23:38

?

23:38

yeah , to

23:41

pesticides

23:44

, to glyphosate , to mold

23:47

, to so

23:49

many toxins

23:51

that our body has to clean out . I

23:54

forgot what the data showed , hon , but you

23:56

had mentioned it in one of our podcasts

23:58

that the umbilical cord

24:00

has how many toxins

24:02

in it .

24:03

Yeah , when the baby's born , just on

24:05

average , I think it's like 217

24:07

toxins or something like that on

24:10

average when the baby child is born

24:12

that's insane . The child just from

24:14

from mom , uh

24:17

, and that's just on average , and it's not mom's

24:19

doing anything wrong . It's just what we're

24:22

exposed to these days anymore . Yeah

24:24

, so we have to be aware of that , and that's

24:26

a whole other topic , and , of course , there's a few

24:28

other contributors , but these are all areas

24:30

that we have to turn off the faucet or

24:33

even find out . You know what's going

24:35

on in our lives . These are contributors

24:37

.

24:37

When we go upstream , yeah , and

24:39

if I start making poor choices , I

24:42

start heading downstream , so

24:44

I get back on track because I

24:46

never want to be in that place

24:48

again , and I

24:50

hope that this is going to help you

24:53

so that you don't have to suffer unnecessarily

24:55

like I did , because there

24:57

are , and

25:00

this is not being taught in medical schools . This

25:04

is just not being taught . It may change .

25:06

It may change . Yeah , it will . It's

25:08

going to take about 20 years . Yeah , we're in that

25:10

time where it's an exciting time

25:13

in the healthcare and medical field , where

25:15

there are changes coming . How

25:19

fast that will be we don't know , but

25:21

yeah , there's changes coming .

25:23

Yeah , how about you , hon ? Can

25:26

you tell us about your story , because I've said

25:28

so much about my story .

25:30

Well , I usually I keep

25:33

mine to . Let's say

25:35

, I guess you would call the title what jeans

25:38

are you wearing ? And

25:40

with the jeans , it's not like putting

25:42

Wrangler blue jeans on , I'm talking about jeans

25:44

like G-E-N-E-S

25:48

. What type of jeans are you wearing

25:50

? So , in the traditional

25:52

medical sense , I've

25:56

been trying as an adult they try

25:58

to put me into a box , and

26:00

what I mean by that is because of both

26:02

of my parents died young I

26:04

consider very young from chronic

26:07

disease at 53 and

26:09

69 . That's so

26:11

young , that's young .

26:12

Yes , that's young .

26:14

And because they died of chronic diseases

26:16

. As we probably have all noticed

26:19

, anytime you go somewhere you have to fill

26:21

out a form , whether it's health care , medical

26:23

insurances . There's

26:25

always going to be something on there to tick the boxes

26:28

and write it out , like your family

26:31

history , because they want

26:33

to know , oh , what jeans are

26:35

you wearing , what jeans do you have

26:37

in your family history ? That's

26:40

going to put you in a box and say , oh

26:42

well , it looks like you're

26:44

probably going to die young , early too . That's

26:46

what the box they were trying to put me into

26:48

. Now , unfortunately

26:51

, I was confirming that

26:53

box because by

26:55

the age of 50 , after about 25

26:58

years of doing that 70

27:00

to 80 hour working and

27:03

having very poor habits

27:06

poor nutritional habits , no

27:08

exercise , just working , overstressed

27:10

, so many

27:12

poor lifestyle factors that by the

27:15

age of 50 , I

27:17

was heading toward an early death . I

27:20

was heading toward either strokes , heart

27:22

attacks . I was already pre-diabetic

27:24

, stepping into diabetes , very

27:28

overweight , obese , and

27:32

mentally I

27:34

was a mess myself and it wasn't that

27:36

I was suicidal , but I

27:41

did not have good thoughts , didn't

27:43

have good thoughts about myself , and have good

27:45

thoughts about the world Was

27:48

just , you know , pretty much

27:50

negative , and that wasn't my background

27:52

is . I was always a good , positive person

27:55

but as the years went on that just

27:57

kind of eroded because of the stress

27:59

and the lifestyle I was

28:01

leading . I would call you cynical

28:04

? I was cynical , yes .

28:06

Yeah , cynical would be your personality .

28:08

Probably , it started coming out into my face

28:10

and my attitude was cynicism

28:12

. And , like

28:15

I said , at the age of 50 , it was my awakening

28:18

, where , fortunately , I

28:20

don't know if I was looking in the mirror or whatever we can

28:22

use that metaphor looking

28:24

in the mirror and seeing the look of my wife's

28:27

face , my beautiful wife looking

28:29

at me , going like , oh my gosh , what has happened

28:31

to this guy ? Who is this guy

28:34

? And also for me

28:36

, I had to understand

28:38

. Well , wait a second . I don't want

28:41

to die young . I have this amazing

28:43

beautiful wife , I have these two

28:45

amazing beautiful daughters . I

28:48

love them all so much . No

28:51

, I don't want to go down that track . So

28:54

I had to learn , okay , what's

28:56

going on and that analogy

28:59

of mopping up the floor while

29:02

it's flooding . I

29:04

went on my own . I guess you would call it

29:06

journey , but basically I went on

29:08

my own process of turning

29:11

off the tap , finding

29:13

out what were the contributors to , how

29:15

the heck did I get to be that mess

29:18

at 50 , because I wasn't that mess at 25

29:20

, but by 50 I was . So

29:22

it didn't happen overnight , it didn't

29:24

happen in a year , it happened in a couple decades

29:27

. And so , in doing

29:29

that for me personally , I

29:32

sought research , I sought mentors

29:34

, I sought conferences , I sought audios

29:37

, I sought books . I

29:39

just went after everything to kind of learn

29:41

. You were hungry , I was hungry , you were hungry , I

29:44

was hungry , you were hungry to learn , yeah

29:46

. And I

29:48

wanted to see our daughters

29:50

grow up . I wanted

29:53

to be with my beautiful wife

29:55

, isabel , who I'm sitting next to now , for many

29:57

, many , many years . And

29:59

I was like , no , no , I

30:01

know what it's like to lose

30:04

a parent at a young age , because

30:06

that happened to me and I did not

30:08

want that to happen to my

30:11

two daughters and I didn't

30:13

want to see Isabel lose

30:15

me at a young age , because my

30:17

mom died young and I saw what happened

30:19

to my dad . He became a very unhappy

30:22

man when he lost his beautiful

30:24

bride at a young age and I didn't want that

30:26

to happen . So I needed to change

30:29

what was going on in my life

30:31

. So what did I

30:33

change ? Well , like I said , I was

30:35

hungry , went after it all , invested my

30:37

time and money into learning

30:40

my craft of being a certified

30:42

culinary nutrition expert , a brain

30:44

health coach , and that was a process

30:46

of probably around

30:48

10 years or so .

30:50

Yeah , because all the while you were implementing

30:52

this stuff , yeah , so probably 10 to 15

30:54

.

30:55

Yeah , and I guess one of

30:57

the best things I can say and this is

30:59

not about me , but it's just to let everybody

31:01

know no matter where you are in life

31:03

, no

31:12

matter what age you can change , you can change it in the good . You can

31:14

change whether those genes of your family are being

31:16

expressed in a bad way

31:19

or you are turning

31:21

them off . You said , no , they're

31:24

just going to . Yeah , they might be there

31:26

, but they're not going to be turned on .

31:28

And I just want to interject here , if I can honey

31:30

Like type two diabetes . You

31:32

have that in your DNA and your

31:34

family , but you turned

31:37

it off , like you

31:39

had it turned on , but you turned

31:41

it off . You turned that expression off

31:43

. By the way , you decided to

31:45

choose to live , yeah , and your lifestyle

31:48

choices , yes .

31:50

And so what happened in that process

31:53

, just to give you an idea is

31:56

I slowed down , I actually

31:58

reversed my aging . Now

32:01

that might sound crazy , but here's what I'm

32:03

talking about . So my

32:06

chronological age at 50

32:08

, meaning my calendar age was

32:10

50 . But

32:13

my physiological

32:16

age , my biological age , meaning

32:18

my body the way

32:20

it was aging and all its

32:22

body systems , my

32:24

body the way it was aging and all its body

32:26

systems I was probably in my mid-60s

32:28

. So

32:33

here I am , 50 , but I'm already aging

32:36

as though I'm in my mid-60s . So I was speeding up the aging process

32:38

of my body . Well , as you can

32:40

imagine , that's not good . That's not good , but

32:42

what I was able to do in the next 15 years

32:45

now , at the time of this podcast

32:48

, I'm 66 recently

32:50

, having done the biological aging testing

32:52

. That's all out there available body composition

32:55

stuff you can do . Uh

32:57

, at 66 , my biological

32:59

age is 51 and and

33:02

it could be less , it's just the body

33:04

comp we did only goes 15 years

33:07

younger or 15 years older , so I'll

33:09

go with 51 . So

33:13

at 50 , the calendar age of 50 , I had a biological

33:15

age of mid-60s . But

33:18

now , when I'm in my mid-60s 66

33:20

to be exact my biological

33:22

age , my body aging is

33:25

at 51 . So

33:28

in a way , I reversed my aging

33:30

by a cumulative

33:33

of 30 years , which

33:35

I did

33:37

that by lifestyle factors , and

33:40

that's not me being something special

33:42

. It's just what

33:45

we can do when we turn off the genes

33:47

and understand what's going on , and we have

33:49

a why and a decision and we say no

33:51

, I am not going

33:53

there , and that's

33:56

what can happen . And I love

33:58

that , to know that we can do that

34:00

, and I will

34:02

continue to slow down

34:04

the aging process and

34:07

that's all about that

34:09

. Over the next year you will be

34:11

chronologically a

34:13

year older , but are

34:15

you biologically maybe

34:17

a month older , maybe

34:20

six months older or maybe

34:22

five years older ? Older

34:26

, maybe six months older or maybe five years older . That's what we can

34:28

do by turning off the faucet of those contributors that are making

34:30

us age faster . We

34:32

can do that and that's exciting , and you can do

34:35

that . You , the listener

34:37

, you can do this I say we , that means

34:39

all of us .

34:39

That means you , you out there .

34:41

Yes , it's the proverbial we meaning all of us . All means you , you out there . Yes , it's the proverbial

34:43

. We meaning all of us , all of us as a

34:45

society , anybody listening and anybody

34:48

you talk to .

34:48

You just need to make the decision

34:50

and get hungry , for

34:53

where do you want to be ?

34:56

Right , so that's what happened .

34:58

So that's what happened , and there's more

35:00

to the story . Just hang around we're

35:03

training for 100 plus .

35:04

Well , the story's being developed every

35:06

day as we speak yeah , hey

35:09

, thanks for hanging out with us here on the MD

35:11

and Chef Team Podcast .