Metabolic Inflammation and the Single Most Important Supplement to Help
There’s a new term circulating these days: metaflammation (metabolic inflammation).
It refers to consistent low levels of inflammation throughout the body and is being linked with chronic metabolic diseases like obesity and diabetes. Think of it like a low grade fever that never goes away. Inflammation isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It’s a natural response that can actually help your body get through some tough times and then dissipate. However, it’s a different story when it never goes away. Even if it seems inescapable, there are simple (sometimes drastic) steps that can be taken to resist father time and the spiral towards poor health as we age.
Meet Jim:
On this week’s episode we’re speaking again with Jim LaValle R.Ph.,C.C.N.M.T.,ND (trad). Jim is an internationally recognized clinical pharmacist, author, board-certified clinical nutritionist, and expert and educator in integrative and precision health and is widely recognized for his work with metabolic disorders. This week is all about metabolic issues and how to combat them as we chat with Jim about his experience in helping with these issues and some emerging research surrounding these problems. We talk about metaflammation and inflammaging, how a specific diet and nutrition can actually decrease your risk, and how one supplement provides a multi-faceted approach to protect you against many of the things we talk about today.
Some Topics We Discussed:
What is metabolic inflammation? (5:53)
What are some markers that might be an indicator of metabolic inflammation? (8:08)
What is inflammatory aging or inflamm-aging? (11:25)
What diet is best to help lower inflammation and promote healthy aging? (16:33)
What blood levels should we check? (23:23)
What are some supplements we can take to help fight metabolic inflammation? (24:15)
The importance of an individualized approach to health. (32:19)
Key Takeaways From This Episode:
All the metabolic reactions going on in your body are doing one of two things. It's either pushing you towards future health, or pushing you towards future illness. (7:09)
People with diabetes have the equivalent of a low grade infection in their body 24 hours a day, seven days a week. (11:09)
When doing a higher fat diet, make sure you get enough fiber. (18:01)
Aged garlic extract has a myriad of benefits for people with metabolic inflammation. (24:35)
Products + Resources:
Thanks to today’s sponsor Kyolic
Get Social With Jim:
CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL SHOW TRANSCRIPT
Brian Strickland 00:37 Hello, friends and welcome back to The Holistic Navigator Podcast where we believe in the body's capacity for self healing, if it's given the proper nutrients and care it deserves. Thank you so much for tuning in today. My name is Brian Strickland. I'm the producer of the show. And here with me in the studio, as always is your host Ed Jones. And today we're speaking with Jim Lavalle once again. Jim is an internationally recognized clinical pharmacist, author, board certified clinical nutritionist and expert and educator in integrative and precision health. He's best known for his expertise in personalized integrative therapies, uncovering the underlying metabolic issues that keep people from feeling healthy and vital. Today, we talk a lot about those metabolic aging and inflammation problems and how to combat it with diet and supplements. And one supplement in particular that has a multifaceted approach to help with these issues. We have a lot of ground to cover in this episode. So I'm going to go ahead and hop off here and pass it over to our host, Mr. Ed Jones.
Ed Jones 01:38 And welcome toThe Holistic Navigator again. And today's podcast is from a person I actually call a friend, we've had him on The Holistic Navigator in February of 2020. And it was on blood analysis, actually, and is one of the topics that is near and dear to my heart. And very few people understand the value of what we can garner from getting the right blood testing, but also the right interpretation of it. And I will say that Dr. James Lavalle is written one of the most informative and fairly easy to read books on how to request and interpret your blood chemistry for optimal health. And I'm going to plug that episode just a minute because I now have 43 years experience watching people's health from every venue. And I see so constantly that the blood tests that are being given at their regular physicals is really nonsense. It's there to pick up overt, really acute conditions, which there's a value to that now. But if you think that that's the only blood test, you need to age gracefully, please listen to the February episode with Dr. James Lavalle on the blood testing and his book that is fabulous. So before I even say anything else about that, I want to talk a little bit about this gentleman. He is an internationally recognized clinical pharmacist, author, board certified clinical nutritionist, expert and educator in integrative and precision health. I love that word precision health, written 20 to 30 books. He's been nominated for so many awards, works with a whole plethora of professional companies from, you know, Chicago Blackhawks to Philadelphia Eagles, New England Patriots, he's a founder of Metabolic Code Enterprises. And just on and on and on. I mean, welcome, Mr. Hero, Dr. Lavalle, I appreciate you taking valuable time to spend it with Ed Jones here at The Holistic Navigator.
Jim Lavalle 03:47 Oh, I'm more than happy to this is great. The first time we got to have our chat, I was so thrilled to hear about all the I just think innovative and community outreach work that you're doing just to help people feel better and and really reach for what they deserve. Which is people deserve to feel the best they can through every stage of their life. So vitality at every stage in life. That's what I've talked about for the last 30 years or 40 years now. And and I think it's great that I you know, I got a brother in arms.
Ed Jones 04:24 That's right. That's right. And we both have lived the life and we've observed so many people and I love the way you said that. I've never truly mentally put those words together that people deserve to feel their best and they do. We are awarded a physical body that has an innate healing capacity that is beyond any drug, any surgery, any procedure, any computer. And we already have this in a pharmacy within us. But the problem is the conventional medical training does not embrace nor respect that kind of philosophy. So the public who is out there looking and listening will learn on their own and then find the team approach that will help them get to the goal that they want. What is the goal? The goal is to age gracefully. You know, I read the other day, and it reminded me, I've known this forever. One of the greatest risk factors of all of our lives, is getting older. Aging is the thing that's going to cause the worst damage, but we can slow the effects of that down significantly. And anyone who's listened to many of my podcasts or talks to me in person knows that when I recommend bloodwork, one of the two most important tests to me as fasting insulin, and then C reactive protein, and C reactive protein, high sensitivity looks at a type of inflammation. And today I want Dr. Lavalle, wants to speak about something called metabolic inflammation. And it is a key determinant of your future. And when we can balance this chronic inflammation, magic and miracles can happen on preserving our health and slowing aging. So Dr. Lavalle, I gotta shut myself up here because you're the man with tremendous knowledge. So let's talk about metabolic inflammation, what it is and what we can do about this.
Jim Lavalle 06:25 Yeah, so you know, when I first wrote the book, Cracking the Metabolic Code that was back in 2002, with the second edition coming out now, because it was still pretty relevant today when you read it, because it goes over things like insulin and glucose and gut health and inflammation and what goes on with stress and sleep disorders and detoxification. But, yeah, I wrote it. And there wasn't as much of it, everybody kind of looked at me and said, What are you talking about, you know, I'm the same way, you know what our body acts as a whole. Meaning that we can tear things apart into little subsections, like liver, or gut or pancreas. But in the end, all of our metabolism, where we are right now, you know, all the metabolic reactions going in your body is doing one of two things. It's either pushing you towards future health, or pushing you towards future illness. There's not a lot of gray, right? And so it's important for people to understand this, the new tournament's out now, which I think is great that it finally has come out is meta-flammation, metabolic inflammation. And it's interesting, because everything he just said, kind of fits into the, into this kind of pattern or model. And in meta-flammation, and this, I didn't make this term up, this is in the medical research, I mean, this is the, it's, there's all kinds of papers written on it. So your body's supposed to have an inflammatory response. And the inflammatory response is supposed to correct what's going on, and then turn it off and restore you back to kind of your homeostasis or your health. The problem is, is that when people will get it wrong foods, don't get enough exercise or exercise too much, you could get it either way. You know, don't get enough sleep, get infections, you know, get exposed to environmental pollutants, get under tremendous amount of work stress, it starts to trigger a process where your body stays turned on, it never turns off, the inflammation process doesn't turn off. And there's some key things that start to shift when that happens. So one of the things that happens is that, you know, you start to make a bunch of bad actor lipids. So a lot of times people go well, my doctor said, my cholesterol is good. Well, it's more than just your cholesterol. It's are you oxidizing your cholesterol? Are you making bad life of proteins, which are components to cholesterol, which are the things that actually are damaging your arteries and damaging your tissues and creating accelerated aging? So the first thing that goes wrong is you start to see lipids get abnormal. And you only hear a lot of people over in people other countries have normal, you know, high lipids and they have good health. Well, good, we're not living there. We're here and and we're not eating the way they're eating probably if they're in a European country like Switzerland, you know, where they're eating more whole foods, and they're, they're not eating as much processed crap. So that's one. The next thing that happens is that your iron stores start to get alternate, interesting. And I know as you guys have seen so many lab tests, you're seeing more and more people where they have normal iron, but their ferritin pool is low. And ferritin is a stored form of iron. It's really important. For people that helps your thyroid to work better, it stimulates your body to make what's called a retro polytune, which helps you to make new red blood cells. And so what happens when you get metabolically inflamed is you can't store your iron in your bone marrow. And in terms of ferritin, you don't have enough ferritin to help the thyroid hormone penetrate your cell membrane. And why that's important, of course, is because it dictates how you're going to burn lipids, it's going to dictate how efficient your metabolism is, whether you have energy or not, right. And so so this process starts to occur, where we start to lose bone, our insulin signaling. I know you and I are on the same page about how important it is to understand insulin, the glucose, but all of these things start going downstream together. And the net result of that is it damages your cells ability, because in that process, all these inflammatory compounds, they don't get turned off. So your immune system stays stuck, like revving your engine in you know, 8000 RPM all the time. And we've heard about this, right? People with diabetes have the equivalent of a low grade infection in their body 24 hours a day, seven days a week, the way their body is, is presenting its immune response. It's accelerated. It's jacked up. And so the net of that is, over time, it leads to another term that's hot out there in the literature now called inflamm-aging, and inflammatory aging, we are getting you said c reactive protein. One of the big compounds that accelerates the aging process and it damages our brain, it damages our arteries and damages our kidneys. Right. And so it's really important for people to understand that your way your body is positioned today, the kind of diet you choose to eat, the type of rest you choose to get, the kind of supplementation you do to optimize your blood chemistry and keep those metabolic markers in check. You know, all of those things add up to being able to recapture that vitality you deserve. But if you're not if you're not aware, or you're not looking at it, but they really did complete that test. You don't understand that, you know, yeah, your doctor says, Hey, your liquids are up a little and do your blood sugar's 98. No, wow, your kidney function? Well, you know what, you're not quite in renal failure, so we're not going to worry about that yet. When when all those kind of chess pieces get put on the board, you know, all of a sudden, you are accelerating yourself into the aging process. And that's why it's important to understand meta-flammation, your body's either managing its inflammation and maintaining health, or you're moving towards increasing your risk of, you know, all kinds of illnesses. And I think nobody looked at if the pandemic did anything for people, they finally realized that things like vitamin D, and zinc, and quercetin and vitamin C, and vitamin A, in addition to other nutrients, but that they're really important. That oh my gosh, it really does matter if you have adequate stores of these things. And so I think it's an interesting time where I think there's this final appreciation going on about the value of really taking care of yourself and what it really means.
Ed Jones 13:38 Wow, that was a phenomenal explanation that I think will be well understood. And I loved your analogy of like revving the engine up and also think of it like having one foot on the brake the other on the accelerator, pedal, I mean, you're just wearing yourself out for nothing but harm down the road. And the term you said, recapture your vitality. And I speak to you know, so many people all day long. I mean, we have about 300 to 400 who come into our store and or clinic setting. And you know a lot of them want to talk to me, I don't have a lot of opportunities these days because of being so busy, but I love helping to educate people. And I always say when people are struggling terribly, that there's hope, one. I think once you give up hope you're pretty much done for so we have to maintain and help other people to have hope when they're in despairing with their health and other areas too. But secondly, there is a window of opportunity that we all are given. Very rarely does someone get a blood test and they die the next week. I mean, normally it you have time to fix this issue and what we're talking about what you're talking about this metabolic aging and inflammation is a chronic disease. It's not an acute disease. That means that you know it's a long term and using common sense, and then embracing the information that people like yourself have, who not only personally do it, but I have witnessed so many others who have gone through this, this maybe even six months worth of really putting together the pieces to tune this orchestra up that's within us. And watch what happens. I challenge people very often these days, I said, you give me 60 days, you do what I recommend, and you take the supplements that I really feel are appropriate, you will never be the same person because once that door cracks open, you see so much hope of recovering your vitality again. And I said actually, this morning does someone on the radio I was being interviewed from a station in Tampa, Florida. And I was told the lady I said, you know, a lot of people live to be 78. But they actually kind of died when they were about 50 ish, they just didn't quit breathing till there were 78 because they were captured by the medical system. You know, they didn't feel well, they're on 17 prescriptions, they really didn't have a life. And she was like kind of laughing too. But it's you and I both see this. And it's sad, because it's not reality. We don't have to live this way 98% of all people. And so we're here, we know what metabolic aging is inflammation. So first off, I want to definitely get into the supplement protocol, because I'm huge into a advice that really is specific for people that can put the dots together pretty easily and go make it work. And then secondly, before that, just a little bit about diet, I do tend to lean toward a keto diet. I'm not into ketosis, but I do believe in high healthy fats, high healthy protein and modest low carbs Monday through Friday, then Saturday and Sunday, I switch it up. But what is your feelings on diet for this issue?
Jim Lavalle 16:52 Well, you know, what a great question. And well, we could talk about this a long time. And we I've got three dieticians with a probably a total of 70 years of experience on my staff that that are on the dietetic side of doing the research, and really looking at what diets work. I like I got our base diet is about 22% carb, and about 40% fat and the remainder in protein. So we get majority of carbs from plants. And depending on whether I've got an athlete or somebody who needs a little bit more carbohydrate, well, you know, we'll have them have to learn how to use what kind of grains. We typically look at things like food allergens, for example, I had one lady that we just did this on. And she lost 20 pounds over a period of a month just getting off of the foods that our immune system was reacting to another blood tests that can be invaluable. I actually did it and over the last 90 days, and I'm pretty fit. I mean, for a 60 year old guy. I mean, I'm training and running and pretty fit and I probably dropped a solid two inches off my waist. And I was like that I had that there to begin with. And I guess I did. And so I think that for me, I the only thing I like to make sure people do when they're doing like a higher fat diet, which should be included in that. They got to make sure they're getting enough fiber because the thing we know when people go fully ketogenic is they make more circulating endotoxin that the gut because you don't have enough fiber, the gut microbiome breaks down. And then it when the microbiome when you get these bugs that are dying off your bacteria, they release a part of their cell wall called lipopolysaccharides. And so lipopolysaccharide is like the big compound, your liver and lymph are supposed to clear it out. But if you're chronically metabolically inflamed, it can't. And that lipopolysaccharide attaches to your kidneys and your liver and your heart and your pancreas and all your tissues and triggers the genetic expression of inflammatory chemistry. So I'm like you. I like a little higher fat protein and moderate carbohydrate intake depending on what a person can tolerate. Because we also know that there's people that will vary their ability to tolerate a carb, but I'm pretty much I'm big on teaching what I would call sober carb intake. People get drunk with carbs, right? They gotta be realistic about it. If you're sitting around all day long. You don't need a bunch of carbs to run that mouse on your computer you know. And if you're sitting there watching TV and doing Netflix, you're not getting out doing your hour walk a day. And even then I would challenge people that they don't need a lot of carbs because you know, the average farmer in the 1800s is only eating a meal and a half a day. Right and so I'm big on teaching people one the first eating whole foods and eating foods that will nourish them. Secondly, if they do have problems like autoimmune disorders, or stubborn weight gain or irritable bowel, for example that I encourage them to do food allergy panels that are inclusive of the immune markers for food allergies, and then just just like what you said I tend to make if people are going to have their carb I have them do it in the evening because it helps her serotonin production, kind of like keep your fats and protein tighter in the morning and afternoon. But then we're pretty custom on it. But I'm pretty much in agreement with what what you said. I just like to make sure I emphasize to people, please make sure you get fiber that protects the microbiome because Ed you know, your guts, generating a ton of this inflammatory, you know, chemistry. You know 70% of your immune system, you know, gets, you know, rolls out from your intestine. And so it's just important to understand that you know what, it's not enough to just take supplements, or to just exercise, you gotta eat, right. You've got to eat healthy, you got to pick, you know, lots of you know, good quality vegetables. I'm moderate on fruit, I tell people eat three or four vegetables for every fruit, and that fruit better be low glycemic. So eat some berries, maybe a pear. But that's kind of how I do it.
Ed Jones 21:25 You're echoing me so closely, it's almost scary. And I love the fact that you're emphasizing this fiber. In fact, for my 63rd birthday, we did a huge promotion that was probably the most successful in my 43 year career. So we videoed myself doing 63 really good push ups on my 63rd birthday. Brian did that at the gym for me. And we came up with the thing that I've been doing for almost three years or more, or four actually, called Ed's breakfast drink. Because I really feel that if we start the day with the perfect amount of macros, which are protein, fats, carbs and fiber, that you actually can set a chemistry up for far more perfection than you can if you screw up breakfast and try to fix it later. So I use a keto powder. I use some MCT oil that's in it, and I use some greens powder, but I use hemp fiber. I just really like the hemp fiber for multiple reasons. And no, it doesn't have THC in it. So don't no one has to worry. But those four things put together. Again, I challenge people constantly. The amount of people who bought that special over that next two weeks, I'm still this was August of last year, I'm still getting probably a person every other day that comes in and says I cannot believe how much more energy I have, less cravings, and less brain fog from just doing the drink. And they many did not change anything else. But I think you would be in agreement that the breakfast has to be when you screw it up in the morning. You've kind of done your you've done yourself in for the day. So
Jim Lavalle 22:59 You're ruined. Yeah, I mean, the thing is, because your cortisol goes up in the morning, you're less insulin potentiated and if your body can't use the insulin, or really as efficiently when your cortisol is peaking in the morning, so you put a bunch of carbs in your tank and two hours later, you've just set up this glycemia and inflammation for the rest of the day. Absolutely. That's without a doubt. So yeah, you know, and I think that the other piece is, is I do think there are important nutrients so you get past the baseline of people should get their vitamin D levels checked, their zinc levels checked, their mag checked, you know. Make sure your essential nutrients are covered. I find most people are deficient in magnesium, super simple. And yet, you know, we've got the NIH saying that magnesium deficiency is probably the number one nutrient deficiency associated with development of metabolic syndrome and type two diabetes. notice is that and this is a cross studying 1000s of people in the US but yeah, we're you know, but I don't like vegetables. Well, you know, what are you gonna do breath it in? Nobody's putting magnesium in our catalytic converters shoving it in the air. You gotta take this stuff. So you know, I think that's important and when I go past that, probably for me the single most important nutrient for controlling metabolic inflammation and our studies to verify this actually a bunch of things have come out in the last year. And I made no bones about it. I'm I'm a you know, I speak for Wakanaga for aged garlic extract Kyolic. Kyolic Aged Garlic Extract is probably I think, the single most multi pronged approach, because it's been shown to lower interleukin six which is an inflammatory cytokine that people are overweight and people are diabetic, tend to make a lot of people with heart disease interleukin six goes up. TNF alpha, tumornecrosis factor alpha another and inflammatory compound, it goes up. So it, it's been shown in in people that were, you know, not as overweight, that it lowered that, that that amount of those inflammatory compounds by a third. I mean, that's unbelievable. So I really liked it for that. And then there were new studies that showed that, you know, in diabetics it helped to remodel their left ventricle so that, you know, the management of the heart goes down a little bit. That was Dr. Budoff's study. The obvious studies showing that and here's the thing that happened in meta-flammation. Remember, I said bone loss happens in metal formation, when you take aged garlic, they showed that it prevented bone loss and people when they were scanning their hearts and looking at their coronary arteries and looking at their they got to see their spine. And they saw that a lot of these folks that their lipids were distorted, that they could look at their spine and see that they're losing bone. Why is that important? When you lose bone, the calcium is what used to plaque your arteries. You know, so, so stopping that, stopping it reducing burn vulnerable plaque, literally reversing the vulnerable plaque that tends to burst open and cause sudden death and cause traumatic events in individuals heart disease, our number one killer. It reduced vulnerable plaque when you took it. I mean, that's incredible. And the other one is it It helps to lower those bad actor lipids. So oxidized cholesterol, oxidized LDL, lipoprotein B, you know, it helps with blood vessels to be more pliable, so that your blood pressure comes down. Because we always heard this, you know, back in the day, you and I are same age man, when I was 60, I didn't say I did. I just turned 60 this year, and I did a 40 years of Jim Lavalle and show pictures of me when I was you know, training when I was 20. And then pictures today. And people were like, holy cow, maybe I should think about doing what you're doing right. And it's like you Ed, it's like, it's not about the one magic pill we take. It's about the lifestyle that we adopt, so that we can grab our vitality. And so with aged garlic, what is really I think important is it has an effect on blood vessels, it has an effect on bone, and has an effect on helping insulin receptors to wake up. It helps to remodel the oxidative burden that goes on, you know, because when people think of aging, or metabolic inflammation, they only want to think about your rusting quicker. It's your rate of rusting, right? I mean, so I don't want to rust. And that means I need to reduce that oxidative process going on in my body. And so I think that's a big strategy right off the get go. But then people kind of need to think about things. As I said, whole body metabolism. What is your stress, like? A lot of people don't want to fess up to it. Oh, man, I'm feeling over committed and stressed out. And yeah, I go after those tortilla chips at five o'clock, I drink that drink in the morning, man, I eat a salad at lunch, but I get home from work and the kids are yelling, and I got a report due and all of a sudden that potato chip bag looks like love. And so it's like, you know, what can we do to help with that? So you think about microbiome help, blood vessel help, anti inflammatory approaches. And I think there's an important nutrients on the on the stress side, that can really help people too.
Ed Jones 28:30 What a, again, wonderful explanation. And you know, Kyolic has been a brand that I have endorsed for I know, probably starting in 1979, when I first began this journey. And when you look into the PubMed, and you look into the research, there is not another garlic company that even holds a candle to the amount of research that backs this product up. And you know, it does tend to always still frustrate me even at this age after this many decades of dealing with medical professionals who simply can't put these kind of things into their toolbox that they would recommend to every single patient but we know the system is kind of broken. It's not encouraging that. But so I've been taking Kyolic very religiously for a long time. But I can tell you and then I want to get a little bit to finish up here on the other supplements. But I know that just looking at people's blood work when when they get on and I love the blood pressure formula by Kyolic. But it's not it's not really high but you know, we always want to keep it as low as possible. And I do two twice a day and I love the nattokinase that's in there too. But But anything with Kyolic is going to be a winner. But I noticed people's you know numbers do improve even if that's the only single thing they do is take Kyolic garlic and and that's been impressive because the proof is in the pudding and when I see this it sticks with me. So, and it also has no odor. I mean, I've, honestly the two foods I despise in my whole life is the taste of garlic and cilantro. Absolutely. Not even a dislike it is a hatred beyond hatred. And so I never have a problem. It never bothers me. I never burp it. I really do well with that. And I know I had a really great couple interviews with a couple different physicians on the options for the pandemic and we talked about garlic and they said Kyolic at the same time. So even for regular colds and sicknesses. I love the fact, we all know garlic kills bacteria. You know, I talk a lot about what I call the Core 4 after this many years, I noticed so many people being so cross eyed when they would come into the store and look at 8000 products and not know where to begin. Well, I realized after looking at so many people in counseling so many, and listening to experts like yourself that there is a basic platform that we really have to embrace. And that does, I've labeled it core four, but it's actually five products. It's a great multivitamin, not a Centrum people. Two is a green drink made with organic greens, very low carbohydrate helps the liver, helps kidneys, helps protect the body, helps you be more alkaline. Probiotics, magnesium, and omega-3. Now the vitamin D is in the multiple at the one that we recommend pretty high dose. So those five things is the platform that no matter what else you do, that would be the key core program. I would like to have added Kyolic into that one, but it is in a secondary tier. Okay, you were used to this core four now let's expand this into a even more advanced program for the rest of our life. Well, colleagues in there for twice a day dosing. So tell me a little bit if we want to kind of one things up? Is that kind of would that be a good idea? My core four, does that sound reasonable to you?
Jim Lavalle 32:00 Yeah, I think I think it does. I mean, obviously, I think a lot of people don't like fish, you got to have omega threes. That's essential to regulating your you know, where you make a lot of inflammatory prostaglandins, if you don't have omega three, so I think you're core 4 makes no perfect sense. And, you know, I think for people they've kind of got to look at once again, it goes back to what your blood telling you, you know, are you you know, where are your liquids are great, but your glucose and insulin is your glucose is 98. And you know, you've got weight around your belly, we'll know maybe on that second tier, you got to add chromium and alpha lipoic acid, you know, because that helps your insulin receptors to work better. And for you, that becomes important, right. And, and once again, if somebody stressed out that I, you know, I teach stress chemistry a lot, because a lot of people look at it in something psychological instead of physiologic. You know, as soon as when your stress hormones go up, when your cortisol goes up, and your adrenalin goes up, and your noradrenaline goes up. So the neuro chemicals that drive fight or flight response, and the hormone cortisol, your insulin receptors are going to get sluggish, your blood vessels are going to get tight, you're going to you're going to deplete magnesium from your tissue. And you're going to trigger more of that inflammatory chemistry, you make more histamine and you get more allergic and your immune system gets sideways. And as you said, even aged garlic extract for the immune system, they did a study. I mean, people, you know, got back in and back after a cold and flu, they got back 50% of the time, you know, the recovery time was 50% of what normally would have been in there, the duration or severity, all of those things in terms of that, it works. It's a great universal thing. And the other thing that's interesting is it's good with feeding the microbiome. So if I'm so that, so that's why I think it's a top tier, you know, tier two, product for you know, on your own the way you approach it. And then the other thing is, is like what am I going to do about my stress? s Am I thinking too much at night making lists? Well, that's somebody that needs theanine. Am I somebody that I crave, like a man I get under stress, and I want food. I mean that potato chip, I have rubbed that bag in my head, you know? And so that's really helping me to eat those cookies. If they're gluten free and organic cookies, what do you still can't eat the box? You know, you if you know? So I think rhodiola is an ingredient works really well for people for stress induced craving patterns. So those are a couple that I think are big winners that people need to consider. And then it kind of gets your boy I think there's a lot of different things that could benefit, you know, individuals. Obviously K2 so you get k two in there with that D it's important. So let's you know it to me, it becomes interesting on where are really having trouble. It's why we developed a Metabolic Code platform. You know, take this questionnaire, get your labs point where your metabolism is the most broke, you know, do your core things, but then where's your metabolism most broke, so that you can point to it and say, oh, that's where I need to work with my nutrients. I find a lot of times people they don't get, what's what I love about what you're doing, Ed. I mean, people don't get pointed, guided and targeted advice on what to do, so that they can feel better. Because that in the end, I say, oh, wow, I'm taking all these vitamins for my genetic snips. Are you feeling different? No, well, okay, what did it accomplish? You don't feel any better. You know, you want to get to where you're feeling better.
Ed Jones 35:54 Absolutely. And it is so important to individualize a education and advice for each person, because we all are a mixture of so many different genetics and life experiences and damages we've already done to ourselves through lifestyle, but it's so similar to, you know, a retirement account. And if you wait till you're 60, to start saving money for retirement, you're pretty much you're out of luck, if you think you're going to retire as a millionaire unless you make tons of money, which is pretty rare. But if you started 20 years old, you can do quite well, if you're disciplined. Well, the same thing applies so much, and even more to this conversation of building our health, lowering the inflammation, being on the right supplements. And I want to tell people, this is not a tremendous hardship. It truly becomes a part of your life to a point where you really don't think about it much. When I think about it is when I kind of slip off and make a few mistakes, then a little bit of cravings come back and then you know, and then so only when I'm bad, do I think about it when I'm good. Hey, I'm rocking along most of the time, 100 miles an hour, doing great in the gym, feeling good at work six days a week, you know. I'm like you sound like you're as busy as I am. And it takes, you know, you can do this with self discipline. But it really takes being healthy to do this. And we all could drop dead tomorrow. We're all a blood clot away from it. But we're but you put the odds in your court so much more when you do the right supplement program, the right diet program, the right sleep. And on The Holistic Navigator, I'm trying to put together a type of I guess, legacy for me. I have 27 employees at the store, we have 17 practitioners. I'm not by any means the guru, but I have had four decades of experience. So I wanted to put those in a format. And I have a great one on sleep. And I mean, anyone who has insomnia because I am a chronic Insomniac, please listen to The Holistic Navigator on sleep. My biggest point on that whole podcast is not the absolute only is taping your mouth shut with the special tape we sell. And that has changed the life of so many people by not mouth breathing at night. So I'm throwing that out too as an enticing thing for the people to listen to my sleep when and then Brenda Watson who has been on PBS, she spoke eloquently about the gut microbiome. Again, and I usually say this in the show Dr. Lavalle, I will say right now. I separate the world into two classes of people. And that is learners and non learners. If you want to age gracefully, you want to keep your health, it is about learning and don't expect your regular health care worker and or Google to help you do that. Assemble a team. In fact, everyone listening you know, mentioned a Dr. Lavalle before we started this, we're hoping to partner with him so that he can actually maybe be doing some consultations to resume that could help all of you if you want from this location. So look for that on The Holistic Navigator. And then again, you know, nutritionw.com is the sponsor, you want to order things like anything from the Kyolic to the core four nutritionw.com. And I had to say which I've gotten into this kind of pattern of having to voice my strong opinion. This morning on the radio show in Tampa when they called me and she was asking, you know, what about supplements, you know, where should you buy them? I said first off, I really recommend honest local nutrition stores who have spent their life learning this. I think that's number one to go to. Two is not Amazon. Why? Because they use resellers. You never know for sure what you're getting. The Wall Street Journal if you google "Wall Street Journal, dumpster diving Amazon," you'll see how many supplements are being pulled out of dumpsters that are out of date. And these counterfeit people can change the dates. And also reselling means that they're stored who knows where and they ship them with no cold packs in the middle summer. So what do you think happens to these freakin probiotics and omega threes during 110 degree day in UPS trucks? They're ruined. We ship a nutritionw.com with cold packs, so I had to get that in Dr. Lavalle.
40:15 That's awesome. I mean, no, I mean, look, in the end, it really all starts with this product quality. One of the things that we're doing with product, I'm working on a project with something called True Trace where you'll have a symbol on it, where you can scan the bottle, and you'll get the complete point of origin and the quality of the product. I mean, it's pretty neat technology that we're looking at. Because in the end, all I want people to do is get a quality product that's going to have a good chance at working for them. Right. I mean, that's, that's why we look at the evidence and, you know, and really try to promote things that can help people to feel well, I mean, you know, it's not, it's not about who's going to treat your illness, it's about how well can you stay.
Ed Jones 40:57 Wow, bingo. And transparency is the guiding force in, in my journey of health, nutrition, whether it be education and or products. And, you know, again, we come back to you and I on the same exact pattern and thinking, and I just can't thank you enough, Dr. Lavalle and wish you all the best. And I know we're gonna hook up and speak again, and hopefully, also partner on some consultation options for listeners and clients. So all the best to you. And I do want to end this Holistic Navigator a little differently, I'm going to probably put this in the book, as Dr. Lavalle gave me this idea. Everyone, you deserve to feel your best and to be able to live the quality of life that you were given. And we are not being programmed for that. So step outside of that box where everybody's kind of contained in and know that there are options. But it does require you to be wanting to change, because the the momentum out there is really not for this it is for symptomatic treatment. It is for you know having a issue at hand and you go get some mainly Band Aid approach and put it's kind of like putting a piece of duct tape on the red light of your dashboard and kind of ignoring it. As long as the engines still running. And we you know people like Dr. Lavalle, myself, The Holistic Navigator, nutritionw.com. That's not why we get up in the morning. We do it for the other reason, which is I'm going to be here as long as I can to help everyone to know they deserve to feel the best in life and help them to do this. So thank you everyone, and please tune in for our next exciting episode of The Holistic Navigator.
Brian Strickland 42:45 The information on this podcast and the topics discussed have not been evaluated by the FDA or any one of the medical profession and is not aimed to replace any advice you may receive from your medical practitioner. The holistic navigator assumes no responsibility or liability whatsoever on behalf of any purchaser or listener these materials. The listing navigator is not a doctor board as claimed to be. Please consult your physician before beginning any health regimen.