Long Term Solutions for Bacterial Overgrowth In the Gut
We have a lot of bacteria in our gut. Like, a lot.
But what happens when bad bacteria get to places they don’t belong? Gas, bloating, abdominal pain, diarrhea, constipation, indigestion, feeling full all the time? Yup, pretty much all of these. Bacteria are meant to stay where they belong, but sometimes despite our best efforts they end up causing trouble by populating in the wrong space.
Meet Brenda:
We’re talking to an expert in gut health this week to address this issue head on. We’re happy to welcome back Brenda Watson to the show, a gut health expert with a career spanning over 20 years. She’s an author, educator, public speaker and TV host that is passionate about sharing her own experiences in an effort to improve the digestive function of everyone she meets. We talk with Brenda about SIBO (small intestinal bacterial overgrowth) and the havoc it can wreak on our systems. Brenda graciously shares all her knowledge about natural remedies that will provide long-term results, the nervous system found in our gut, and how the expensive conventional treatment is likely not the best solution.
Some Topics We Discussed:
What is SIBO? (4:34)
What are the symptoms of SIBO? (10:44)
What is the effect of the nervous system on the gut? (13:59)
What diet should someone consider if they have SIBO? (20:17)
What product does Brenda recommend for SIBO? (31:50)
Key Takeaways From This Episode:
You can’t take a pill and be well tomorrow. SIBO is very easy to have relapses with and must be managed long term. (9:32)
Don’t lay down after you eat. Wait at least 3 hours. (16:09)
You need to support your liver when detoxifying because that’s your liver’s main job and it can get overworked. (22:39)
75% of our fiber coming in should be insoluble 25% soluble. (33:22)
Products + Resources:
Get Social With Brenda:
CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL SHOW TRANSCRIPT
Brian Strickland 00:15 Hey everyone 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. 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 on today's episode, we are happy to welcome back Brenda Watson. Brenda is a gut health expert with a career spanning last 20 years of educating people on the importance of keeping your gut healthy and happy. She's an author, educator, public speaker and TV host that is passionate about sharing her own experiences in an effort to improve the digestive function of everyone she meets. And today we're talking with Brenda about SIBO, small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, what it is, how to care for it, and how to do it naturally. So we have a lot of ground to cover on this episode. Thank you so much for listening. today. I'm going to go ahead and pass it over to the host of our show, Mr. Ed Jones.
Ed Jones 01:35 Thank you, Brian. And, again, welcome, everyone to The Holistic Navigator. And I have a guest today that we have had probably a year and a half ago, very renowned person, Brenda Watson, who has been on PBS, television back in the day when everybody watched television. And I remember seeing her year after year speak about colon health, and probiotics and foods that influenced the immune system. And then, and it was really her show started in about 2004. And she continued to educate people on PBS through 2016. She was probably one of the most influential individuals in a time when we knew far less about the impact of the microbiome gut function, what the importance of regularity foods, how they affect the gut, which is then affecting the immune system and the mental state of the humans. And of course, in 2020, we further our skill level and knowledge because of COVID. And that has really brought to the surface the importance of, again, the gut health. So I want to superduper welcome to the Holistic Navigator, Brenda Watson. Welcome, my friend.
Brenda Watson 02:59 Thank you, Ed. I'm so happy to be here today.
Ed Jones 03:02 Well, you know, you did the podcast with me a year and a half ago, you and your husband flew up here you. He's an aviator, as I am. And we had a wonderful time together. Of course, this time we're doing it on you're in Florida, I think where you live, and I'm still here in Tennessee. And it doesn't make any difference is actually I've gotten used to this communication form. And it works very, very efficiently. But we talked about a year and a half ago, you revealed so much information that despite the fact that I've spent four plus decades studying nutrition, health and holistic ways to optimize ourselves, you taught me so much about the intricacies of probiotics because it is a confusing whole area. And so I encourage people who want to know a lot about just probiotics to go back on The Holistic Navigator to the past Brenda Watson podcast. But today, I probably have, I don't know, two to five people a week, which doesn't sound like a lot. But you add that up in a year. It's a lot of people who come in and ask me about SIBO small intestinal bowel overgrowth. And I know that we have talked a little bit right before you came on. And we both realized the implications of having the incorrect or too much of the wrong bacteria in regard to our bodies in the gut in the small intestine. So without me going in and trying to explain it. I'm the amateur and you're the professional. Talk to people about what is SIBO and why it's vital that we know what it is and that we address it and the fact that you probably will not find very many health professionals that will be very skilled in this and that's why I'm wanting to empower people with education such as we're doing right now. So let's talk about SIBO, Brenda.
Brenda Watson 04:56 Okay the the term and it can be SIFO small intestinal fungal overgrowth, which we've heard about Candida for years, but it's really a when it turns into a fungus, and then the small intestinal bacterial overgrowth. And actually what it is, folks is when bacteria that should be in the colon gets displaced in the small intestine right after the stomach in the duodenum. So what happens is the the bacteria say, we never thought that there was bacteria in the small intestine at all other than what was passing through on the way out, you know, but then we began to, you know, many years ago Ed and you'll remember this, when we started, we never had heard the word irritable bowel syndrome. Never know, until probably maybe the early 2000s, I started hearing it. Well, if any of you out there have had been, you know, diagnosed with irritable bowel syndrome, it just means that, you know, they tested you and you had no disease. And so they just give you a name, hey, your bowels irratable? Well, great. But now what we've had due to science, and due to the great laboratories out there that have begin to because so many people have the symptom of the upper digestive bloating or abdominal pain, and then the lower colon cramping, and they may either have constipation, or they could have diarrhea, or they could swing back and forth. Now why does that occur? It occurs for several reasons. Like I said, You've got three, what I call sphincters, you have one in between the esophagus and the stomach, one between the stomach and the small intestine, and one between the ilium called the ileocecal, down between the small and large intestines. And these little sphincters are not just should close at certain times. So what happens, what can happen to create this is that the bacteria from the colon back washes the bacteria up into the small intestine. That's one thing. The other thing that happened Ed is that if it back washes, or if you eat. Now, we'll go into this in a little bit more detail. If you eat a lot of food late at night, and you go lay down, then there are certain things that the that the hormones don't operate properly. And so the the food coming from the stomach into the small intestine while you're sleeping, get stagnated there. And remember that small intestine if you feel you know, in between your your ribs that's sitting right beside your liver. Now what's happening is, fermentation is occurring. And that fermentation creates hydrogen or methane gas. And that gas is what is we think the number one cause of non alcoholic fatty liver disease because it's producing this methane. But the other thing that happens there is that people bloat. And people will tell you, they'll come in and say I can drink a glass of water in the morning and bloat. Well, that right there is an indicator that they've got some displaced bacteria that's in the upper gut and should not be there. So it is a really important way. Now how they started figuring this out, is through breath testing. However Ed I'm not a big fan of it because there's so many you know, false negatives, false positives on these testing because people take the kit home and they don't do it correctly. However, the treatment for it is the same. Okay, what they have found the natropathic doctors and functional medicine doctors have found is even if you went to a doctor and they diagnosed you with SIBO they would give you sometimes if you wanted to take it, it's quite expensive an antibiotic call Rifaximin. And they would say take us for 10 days and then you're well. You know, Ed that's the way it works, right? Well, this is a very relapsable condition. So what would happen is they found out now that you've got to have a longer term, more of an antimicrobial like what we're going to talk about today, oregano, and thyme and things like that on a longer term basis with diet changes, to be able to bring the level of bacteria down and also to be able to control the closing and opening of these notches. You know, the esophogeal, the pyloric and the ileocecal valve, those have to operate properly. People don't really realize that when you have a muscle contraction, you can have one forward or backwards, you see what I mean. And so, the SIBO and it can be fungus too. Yeast is a part of our microbiome and it's normal to have, you know, part of our mixture be yeast but when yeast shifts into a fungus, it grows a root and it roots into the intestinal tract and exasperates the leaky gut condition. So this is absolutely an epidemic. It is epidemic. And so you know, we've got to really get a grasp on it and start helping people more long term with it in the health food stores, I believe. You know, knowing like, you know, you can't take a pill and be well, tomorrow. That's exactly why I got into this, probably you too, I took so many antibiotics, antibiotics as a child, it destroyed my microbial footprint and my good bacteria. So the point is, this has to be done with some diet changes, of course, sugar is a big impact on this. But this fungus, and this bacteria cannot be in this upper gut, or you're going to sit there and ferment. And once you get non alcoholic fatty liver disease, and by the way, I want to say that you don't have to be overweight, to have fatty livers. I've seen some really small people with it. So that's just that's just sort of the symptoms are gas, bloating, cramping, and a lot of bloating.
Ed Jones 10:52 Well, what a perfect explanation that's very clear. And the thing is, again, if you're not coming from a background of this kind of information and training, it is, it's kind of foreign to say conventional medical people. I do a radio show every week with a physician and sponsored by hospital, I can assure you that I know all too well, I've done this for three years with them. My partner is very open minded, but he still can't take that information and actually utilize it for the patient. So sometimes, despite the fact they're personally open minded, the system's not encouraging this kind of education for the patient, because, again, they tend to always fall back on pharmaceuticals. And you're right, you know, even nutrition stores. And I've been doing this for over four decades, we sometimes fall into the same type of paradigm, that conventional medicine that I tend to sometimes talk negatively about, which is treating symptoms. We have people who walk in who want to feel better right now. And they're not super interested in the long term, it's really patching the tire that has the nail in it. And instead of really figuring out why do the nails keep getting in the tires or you know, putting new ones on or something. Or, you know, we have to dig deeper and functional medicine is what you know, the term I really liked these days and you don't have to be a physician to be a functional practitioner. Functional really means looking deeply into the whys of the body. In fact, the very last podcast two times ago was with Dr. Pucci from New York who is a functional medicine physician. I just love talking to these people as I do. You and You know, I tend to forget the the importance of realizing these sphincter muscles, and sphincter muscles are like gaskets. And yeah, eating dating too much at night, it loosens it having your kid your grandkids, jump on your belly loosens it, the wrong foods, alcohol, chocolate, peppermint, some of these things can loosen those sphincters, caffeine excessively, and then we wonder you know what's going on. But without diverting too much. So what are the main symptoms I know that have SIBO it because it's affecting the immune system. It you could fill a page with the symptoms of anxiety, depression, mood disorders, but as far as physical pains to I mean, it goes down to rosacea to fatigue, rashes, skin things,
Brenda Watson 13:24 Eczema.
Ed Jones 13:25 Eczema, you know, there's a young girl and I see her to a food store that I go to and she's about 23 and has one of the worst cases of acne I've seen in quite some time. I will and I think you would agree the chances are probably 99% she has SIBO and all she does of course, because she's young and doesn't know is she takes rounds of antibiotics Well, they get better than and what those drugs do is they dig actual deeper hole that becomes more challenging to crawl out of down the road. So again, we that's why we're here. We're educating people so
Brenda Watson 13:59 One of the things that I do want to explain on this is because what you said is very important, the anxiety and depression one of the things we're beginning to understand due to science is the effect of the nervous system on the gut. And I've never really taught this before Ed because you know, we know we have the central nervous system we have the parasympathetic side and the sympathetic you know, fight or flight but people don't know this, Ed. We have a separate nervous system that's embedded in the small intestine only is called interret nervous system. And this is controlled a lot by what's called is vegus nerve and you are going to see more and more and more information come out about this vegus nerve. They call it the wandering nerve because it's outside of that, you know, central nervous system is a part of it, but it can it can go into the heart or the kidneys or anything and give help. Well, what we found because this SIBO has so much to do with motility issues. So either you got fast motility or slow motility, if you've got constipation fast motility, if you've got diarrhea, the vegus nerve is really what's controlling the contractions in the small intestine. And I'll give you an example. This is really important. You should when you eat at night, wait three hours before you lay down. And the reason is, is this okay when you lay down to go to sleep, once this stomachs emptied, you secrete this hormone in the stomach has to be almost empty to secrete. It is called motilin. And motilin is a hormone. And it's what causes the small intestine through the vagus nerve to push or propel is not peristalsis like the muscle contraction, but it's a propulsion. They call it pushing the rest of that food down into the colon, so that you have a colon elimination in the morning. However, let's say there's intermittent signals coming from this vegus nerve. That's what causes these motility issues. And the stomach will not will not secrete motilin until it's almost empty. So it makes it's just common sense. Think about it, you lay down that food sitting in the stomach. The stomach does not allow food to leave in large amounts. It's not set up that way. It shoots out and smaller amounts so that the enzymes from the pancreas and the bile salt from the liver gallbladder can hit that food and help you digest it. Remember, it's not what you eat, it's what you absorb. So the point is this, we're now realizing that this nervous system that we've never known before is what's controlling the the motility issues that we're having and part of SIBO, SIFO is motility issues. The thing that's very easy to understand is, the B vitamins are very important to feed this nervous system just like it is your regular nervous system. And you know, your probiotics make vitamins B and K. So if your, your good bacteria levels are also low, then you're a sitting duck for the SIBO/SIFO. And if you're eating or, you know, too, too late at night before you lay down. So that's really important. And you know, then we have all the other things that affect it like acid blocking medication, which we can't get into all that too many antibiotics and things like that. So we're now going back to oh, we have a nervous system just in our gut. Wow, never knew that. Well, what do you think irritable bowel syndrome means? It means that that the colon either spasms, or it gets, you know, flaccid, it doesn't move. So you know, now we realize that this inherent nervous system that's only embedded in the small intestine, is what controls all of this movement, getting food into the colon, where it needs to be. So when you get up in the morning, you have an elimination. Does that make sense?
Ed Jones 17:59 That makes wonderful sense. You know, the motilin. I know of almost no health professionals that even have the concept of that term. And I as I age, I'm becoming more and more deeply convinced of the three words that really always resonated with me constantly. Now, as I'm getting older is sympathetic, parasympathetic nervous system and vegus nerve. Those are, you can't see those on an X ray, you can't really analyze those, but they are the one of the most powerful systems of the body. And, again, going back to everything, you're saying, you can't have a balanced system, unless you do many things, right. But the number one is the gut health. And I want to say real quickly. For those who want to get a SIBO test, you can go to theholisticnavigator.com. And under products go down to the lab that we have listed there, and they have a test for $239 from Great Plains. I love it. And if you do it, right, like Brenda says, if you do it wrong, you've wasted everything, but you follow the directions, and it will show whether you have these methane gases coming up. If you feel like you need a diagnosis. I really know that a lot of intuitive people, they don't really need to have this confirmation. They already know. And again, let's just say it's not SIBO, let's say it is a fungus, let's say is something else. The treatments that are there options that people use are healthy and safe. And most of us generally will know very quickly that we're turning the corner to a better place. It's odd because my daughter we know and I don't know specific because I can't dig deep enough yet to figure it out. But she has some real imbalances with the vegus nerve and parasympathetic, sympathetic. When she does these cleanses, some of which are similar to what you're going to speak about in a minute. She always feels dramatically better. When she doesn't do them, she doesn't she struggles with sluggishness and foggy thinking and fatigue and she's young. But as soon as she gets on these programs, I don't it doesn't really matter that I don't have a full explanation. I do know that they're helping her, they're positive. They're not like taking drugs that have some hidden nightmare somewhere that's going to crop up and and and tackle, you. No, these are going to be healthy options. So, if the person feels like they really perhaps have SIBO or SIFO, what is the step that they should start introducing into their life as far as diet and perhaps supplements or even a drug to get control of this.
Brenda Watson 20:31 Well, again, you know, Rifaximin is very expensive, it's probably about $1,000, to do a 10 day round. But yeah, it's very expensive. 800 to $1,000, very expensive. However, here's the point. The point is, as you just made it, you can't do these in short term spurts. These have to be long term programs. And I don't mean that you've got to like us laborious or anything like that, you know, what we have to do is we have to kill off that bacteria within the upper gut. And get the area repopulated with more good bacteria, make sure we got enough fiber going in there, and that we're rebuilding the leaky gut. But the most important thing to understand is, we have things that are very safe in the health food store, like the kit that we're producing, vital detox, which is, would be used for SIBO, overgrowth of Candida, C-diff, we, you I'm sure, you've got people come in with coming in with antibiotic resistance C. difficile, which is another bad bacteria in there. We use the same kind of herbs that you would use in all of it. And the most important ones are the oregano, the thyme, I use clove, I like black cumin seed and cinnamon. So you and one of the things we were able to do Ed which is such a blessing was we were able to put the liquid oils in a delayed release veggie cap. Because you know how people complain, I mean, some of the reg, it was hard to liquid as hard to get in, you know, what I mean is like, whoo. So we've been able to get those in a delayed release. So you they don't repeat on you, they go right into the small intestine, just like you want your bacteria your good bacteria to do. And, and they began to kill off all of this, you know, a lot of this negative yeast and bacteria. So, and the other thing that that's always happened with people Ed with cleansing is I go, I get a headache, or I get, you know, fatigue or whatever. What I did with this combo pack is I put in a detoxification of herbal and nutraceuticals for detoxifying the liver. Because guess what happens when this bacteria collects in the upper gut, and it's fermenting producing these gases? It puts off more waste. So bacteria is a living organism and it takes in your food. And the other thing that you get from this is malabsorption and malnutrition. Because guess what? That bacteria sitting in the upper gut is competing for your vitamins and minerals. So you get nutritional deficiencies, and then malabsorption, and then you don't feel good. So one of the things I wanted to do too, when when they're taking something like oregano, and these, what we call anti microbials herbs, I put in there something to help the liver with the extra flow of toxins that are going to be killed off. You know, once that happens, then that's more stuff going into the liver, that the liver has to detoxify. So this is a really important factor in this program. We got to support that liver, always, always always, because it's taking the hit on everything coming in and going out and recirculation of toxins that happens when there's low fiber in the diet. So the the system I set up here is easy. But again, and the diet with it is you know, no sugar, watching your simple carbs. They do have something called a fodmap diet. I'm not a fan of it long term, it's not that healthy. And but if you want to lower your you know, fermentable foods for a week or so that's fine. But I also have an instructions inside the box that gives people the ideas on the diet that we've been doing, and you've been doing these for a million years. You know what I'm talking about, and lowering that load and so with like, for example, C difficile. The reason and I did a I did a PBS show on fecal transplants and that was very interesting because I got to watch them in the hospital down in Boca Raton, Florida. But c difficile is absolutely deadly for people who get it especially if they're senior citizens. But now I see younger people getting it. And so what it causes, of course, is severe diarrhea, and that's dangerous. So first of all, I want to say if you have it, please be checked out by your doctor, I'm not trying to override a doctor on it. However, their solution for it's more antibiotics. And that's the problem. So the C diff has to be dealt with in the same way, we're dealing with SIBO. You've got to do it over a period of time. You know, the interesting thing about that I learned very early on in natural health was the body doesn't like quick changes, even if it's for the good. You'll go through this kind of like, I don't know, quandary sometimes different people are different. I'm not saying everyone's going to do this. However, you have to have this natural flow of doing something over a period of time to really rebuild the system when we do it naturally. And that's where we kind of have a void with people in the, you know, our consumers is, you know, we've been using it taking something and then we're better in the next few days. With this, this is a long term rebuilding of your immune system. And what do we need right now and the world we're living in is immunity. So if you're good bacteria levels are low, and you've got all this gas going on and creating the symptoms, and C diff is part of this, then you in you do have the diarrhea, then, you know, you got to do something about this. And I'll give you an example of a client I just worked with. Probably in her 70s had severe diarrhea, got around the SIBO system, got her on the right diet, got her on the fiber that we use, because we use an insoluble fiber for this. I'll get into that in a minute. But so I said do one thing for me because she she had a fairly decent diet. I said, stop eating gluten, just for a week. So she called me up, she said, I'm cured. I said, you're cured? She said, Yeah, I'm cured. And I said, great. You know, she's taken the detox, she said, we'll continue to detox. Well, she decided that she wanted to go back to eating crackers, and whatever she was eating. She calls me up three days later, and does his back. And I said, I was waiting on you to call me back. Because I know you can't do something in a week. And it's gonna like you're cured when you had a long term condition of diarrhea. So this is very important for people to understand. But you have a store there in your area, and health food stores, because I'm a big supporter of independent health food stores, who have knowledge. So you've got a support system, you know what I mean? To go in and say, Look, I'm experiencing this. And you know, we have installed here now at Vital Planet, we've installed a 800 customer service line. And actually, it's my sister that's on it, she's been answering consumer calls for almost 20 years with us, when we were from Renew to here. And and I'm just just excited again, because I get feedback from a consumer. So anyway, that's what you have to do. You have to take, you know, like the antimicrobial vital detox, you've got to support that with, you know, getting the good bacteria levels back. But first, you got to kill the bad. You have to.
Ed Jones 28:14 Well, again, I just like talking to myself when I hear you speak. And a couple points real quickly, because we're going to start winding down here. The thing is, yes, to everyone not because my histories with the local nutrition industry, these are the heroes. These are the people on the frontline that are only on the frontline that can discuss, talk and have intelligent conversation about true topics of how to build your health back. We're not trying to treat a specific acute medical condition. We're actually wanting to empower people with knowledge in order to help them help themselves. And you know, we speak about and again, like I said earlier, sometimes we are also guilty of treating symptoms without digging deeper. And sometimes you have to meet people where they are. And at least if we're doing it with natural products, we won't have the the terrific lethal side effects of some drugs. You know, the third leading cause of death in this country still based on the New England Journal of Medicine is pharmaceutical drugs that are written by the book and taken properly. So it's a very scary scenario. And I equate the balancing of the bigger picture you're speaking about for true health and healing, like a movie that I had seen coming back on a trip on big airline about two years ago called The Biggest Little Farm. I encourage everyone to watch this because these this couple went in and bought some barren land. And they after three and a half to four years had the most harmonious, well balanced ecosystem that every part fed the other part. This is our body what we have to encourage people to realize. And again, going back into the the kind of the gut microbiome. I like the analogy of a major parking lot, something that has a million parking spaces. And when you take an antibiotic, you basically are clearing out all your parking spaces. But guess what moves into those spaces very quickly, if you're not aggressive, or you're not healthy? The pathogens, the fungus, the the negative bacteria that you don't want. And once they incorporate their automobile into these parking spaces, you're kind of doomed again until you do something to help them move out. Now, if you help them to move out with natural remedies, then you immediately try to fill the parking spaces with the very, very healthy probiotics. Now, again, we're not gonna speak too much about the probiotics, but we can go back on The Holistic Navigator and listen to your other podcast. Now I want to say real quickly. So the products and, and nutritionw.com sponsors The Holistic Navigator, and we we offer every product that I think is valuable in the industry. And certainly when I saw yours, we chose to add that to our inventory list. One thing I'm getting really hyped up on right now, and I'm, I'm not going to spend more than 20 seconds here. But you know, when you order products from Amazon, just imagine that probably nine months out of 12, it's gonna sit in extreme heat on either the UPS truck, or the warehouse, or the problem is the resellers. You don't know where many of these products are coming from. When you order from a good local place, or people who really care, you know better about it. But what nutritionw.com is now doing for $1, you can add a cold pack to any of your items. So if you order four items, you want it four cold packs, that's going to preserve you during the summer, because these things can be destroyed in 110 degree heat. I don't care what you're doing almost. So I want to throw that plug out for nutritionw.com. So let's really narrow this down the product that you mentioned a few minutes ago that people number one would consider for SIBO was what?
Brenda Watson 32:00 Vital Detox and in the top of the box is a little card that slips out. And it says at the top SIBO system, because on the card, you can see, we have step one and step two. Step one is reduce the bacterial overgrowth. And that's with your vital detox and a particular kind of fiber. And I just want to spend 20 seconds on this. Most of the people are taking prebiotic fiber which is good, it feeds the good bacteria, blah, blah, blah. However, when you're doing this, we want to go towards more of an insoluble fiber that's like the, you know, the peeling your roughage, it's like appealing on the vegetables The inside is more of the soluble meaning it mixes up clear in water the insoluble though, is really really healthy for you. Because it bought it bulks up and it gives the the colon the ability to exercise and push against the fiber. And the vital fiber that we have is totally organic, and it's flax, pea and hemp and it to the servings on it is they get 13 grams of fiber. I usually have people start at half and then move it toward a full serving later. And the point being is it one of the things you have to watch with this and this is why go to the health food store and ask them is we've gotten a you know, really involved in the industry in the prebiotic fiber, which is what the good bacteria eats and that's fine. However, in real life 75% of our fiber coming in should be insoluble 25% soluble. So the soluble because it's feeding bacteria can create more gas and bloating, it's not that you quit taking it forever, Ed. It's just that right now you want to put more of the insoluble in so that you're not getting that, that more fermentation.
Ed Jones 33:55 That's fantastic because people do not realize sometimes, sometimes we get a little worse before we get better one. But two is we might need to tweak the system as it's healing. And I use the analogy many times of people who again, and the understanding and the public is better than it ever has been. But it's still, you know, they're not spending a lot of time learning these topics. And they come in and they say I want a probiotic because they think it's going to fix everything and you know, sometimes explain to them. If you have carpet at home and you throw grass seed on that carpet and you throw a little water on it, it's gonna grow some grass seed, but you don't have any food for that grass. And what's going to happen, you might get a week's worth of growth and it's all going to be gone. That's what happens when you don't eat enough fiber as a prebiotic for these bacteria. And I would have used your product. The best ever that I've ever put into my body because it was so agreeable and I've recommended it many many times over the past six months since you enlightened me about it, and it works extremely well. So that so that SIBO protocol. And of course, we don't have time to talk a whole lot about other intestinal issues, but, but this generally will help almost everything. And so this is so it's so, so important. And I'm a huge fan. I made a big video actually a year ago and caught a little flack for it, that psyllium is not your best friend always. One is it can be heavily sprayed with pesticides, because it's not controlled as a normal food. And unless you buy organic products, there's no telling what you're getting with fiber. And you do everything right at your company, and I'm just so thrilled. Tell people on like on face, they want to find you on Facebook and Instagram, how would they do that?
Brenda Watson 35:42 On Facebook is Brenda Watson CNC. That stands for nutritionist. And on Instagram, it's Brenda Watson Wellness and Ed's store will have the calendar every Monday this month. I'm doing five minutes. It's only five minutes, folks, a video on SIBO I started this week. And so and then on, you know, on Wednesdays, with this health month, so I'm doing stuff on Wednesday. And so the point is, is Instagram and Facebook, I'm doing these videos, I'm focused on keeping them under five minutes. And so what I had to do with the SIBO because it's kind of complicated it is I broke it down into four and five minute segments. And I do I move people along every week, you know what I mean? This week, we're learning this, now we're going to get a deeper and now we're going to get deeper, you know what I mean? Because there are contributing lifestyle factors that we need to teach on with this condition that's too much to go in here. Especially, you know, the low acid, the stomach and all the acid blocking medication that is just absolutely unbelievable. But having said that, I'm going through this every week. So if you go to Facebook, or Instagram, just follow me. And we send out the total like February calendar out to the stores at the beginning of every month.
Ed Jones 36:59 Well, and good fact that you are able to further educate because there's a good, great number of people now who want to know all the details. And even in 40 minutes on The Holistic Navigator, there's some missing parts to this puzzle, because we don't have two and a half hours and people's attention span is not that. And you're right about the proton pump inhibitors. The acid blocking drugs are devastating this country. And we did a podcast that it was just me talking, but it's called the truth about GERD. And I want to encourage people do not stop taking these drugs without a transition period, or you're going to have the worst damage, actually, and discomfort that you've ever had in your life. And I really feel that there's a weaning process that I kind of came up with, that has worked very well for most people. Again, we're not treating your medical condition, ask your doctor if you're getting prescription stuff. And if you need items, nutritionw.com. And I looked at your video just a few minutes ago before the show on the Facebook. Amazing work and I love the five minute types of small trainings, that's what I think helps people so much just have small bits of information that they can process as they can process it. But again, like you know, you and I both come from the world of basically Hippocrates, which said, you know, disease and health begins in the gut, and your whole life's been built on that and pretty much a big chunk of mine. And you're not going to find this most places if you have health professionals, so use those people for what they are good at. But then also bring into your team, your health teams, people like Brenda Watson, and hopefully people at your local nutrition store or functional practitioners, which is a growing group, or naturopaths. Those are the people I really tend to trust and lean toward, as far as the healing conversations that come and go. Well, Brenda, I think we've packed it in very, very well, gave people a lot of options. And you are such an educator, and you certainly exude that with our podcast here as you did on PBS. And you are basically world famous. So I'm very, very, very proud to say that twice, you have been on the Holistic Navigator, this probably is number 97 in our podcast. So we're coming up on 100. And I'm very proud of that. So we will, I know in six more months, I'm just mentally saying this, we are going to have another topic with you. Who knows what it may be just be leaky gut by itself. And again, leaky gut is similar to some of these things and what you're recommending also, you're going to educate them on that topic with some of your other readings, writings and books.
Brenda Watson 39:37 Absolutely, absolutely. Thank you so much for having me. I love working with you and listening to you. It's you know, you've got so much good input that you know, we can bounce it off of each other and have a good conversation and I think an educational conversation and it's simple and that's what people have to have.
Ed Jones 39:56 Beautiful, beautiful. Well you take care and be safe my friend and As always, thank everyone for spending their valuable time listening to The Holistic Navigator. And again, I separate the world into two classes of people learners and non learners. If you don't, if you're in the non learning category with health as we age, it's going to be a tough road people. So if you're listening to me, you are a learner and two thumbs up. So join us for the next podcast. We are posting once every week or every other week. At this point, it will continue to as long as I'm breathing. I will probably continue to do this because new information is always coming up. We're learning just like today, I learned so much from Brenda on this topic of SIBO. In fact, like the motilin that was something that I barely barely knew. So join us each and every week and become a more educated health journeyer. And you know, there's so many people who help their other friends and family with this kind of education to so it's not just one person. It literally spreads like a good virus. So take care everyone be safe and listen for the next Holistic Navigator.
Brian Strickland 41:10 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 of these materials. The Holistic Navigator is not a doctor board as you claim to be. Please consult your physician before beginning any health regimen.