I want to start off with a question: do you actually suffer from stress? Haha, right? That’s a big joke these days. We all suffer from stress. Most of the time, we don’t really realize that we’re suffering from stress but it has a tremendous toll on our body. Many times, because we don’t pay attention to it, we don’t actually take into consideration the toll that stress is applying to our body. What I want to do is take the opportunity to talk about the Three T’s of Stress. The Three T’s of Stress are going to be trauma, toxins and thoughts. If you’re not accounting for those three stressors, then you’re not optimizing your health. Let me take each one individually here.

The Stressor that Accumulates with Age

The first T is trauma. We’ve all had some type of trauma as we go through our lives. Maybe we’ve been in some type of motor vehicle accident. Maybe you’re an athlete and you’ve had some type of sprain/strain injury or injured a joint or a muscle. If you’re athletic, the chances are, you’ve probably had some type of injury. Those things, over time, start to wear on our body. It takes a lot of energy to recover from those injuries. If those injuries aren’t taken care of properly, then one of the things that happens is we begin to create imbalances in our body. Those imbalances structurally change the way our body functions. That’s a significant stress that can put a lot of structural toll on our body if we don’t deal with those, even causing changes internally through increased inflammation. Inflammation affects all aspects of our health.

The Three T’s of Stress: You Can No Longer Run From These

The second of the three T’s of stress are toxins. Toxins are ubiquitous in our environment; they’re everywhere. If you think that you’re not being exposed to toxins, let me just clarify — you’re wrong. You are being exposed to toxins; there’s no way you can’t be. If you live in a metropolitan environment, you’re being exposed to the exhaust, to gases, to things that are found as normal, consistent pollutants in the air. If you’re not eating 100%-organic all the time, then you’re going to be exposed to different herbicides and pesticides. A great example of this is going to be Round Up. Round Up is applied to numerous crops, especially grains. This chemical, that herbicide that has pesticide-like effects, is actually absorbed into those foods. When that food is processed and refined, that Round Up is not taken out. So you end up ingesting some of that. That accumulates in your body over time. What does that do? That is going to be a fat-soluble or fat-like substance. That means it’s going to have an affinity for your fat tissue. It’s going to want to hang out in your fat tissue. Your body doesn’t want to get rid of that. As a result, it continues to promote proliferative negative effects, creates chronic inflammation and begins to deteriorate tissues in the body over time. Our bodies have to consistently work to get these toxins out.  This is just another reason the Paleo Diet is not an option, but a MUST if you are serious about improving your health.

The Stressor that is Between Your Ears

We’ve got trauma; we’ve got toxins. Now, the third T is going to be thought. Guys, listen. If you don’t step into each day and step out of bed, hit the ground with a positive mindset, you’re doomed. You’re going to have more stress than the person who has a smile on their face and has taken off each day on the right footstep. So you’ve got to approach life with a positive attitude. Listen, we all have our stresses. We all have things that are not ideal that we all deal with from day to day. It’s all about how you re-center and how you refocus yourself to keep going forward. If you’re not continuing to move forward, then those stresses are going to weigh on you. Those thoughts are going to weigh on you.

The Three T’s of Stress are Real

That seems very conceptual but what you have to appreciate about this is that it doesn’t really matter if it’s a physical trauma, if it’s a toxin or if it’s a thought process. Those stresses and they way your body deals with those and manages those are no different. You’re going to secrete cortisol. You’re going to negatively suppress your gastrointestinal function. You’re going to start having negative effects on your gastrointestinal tract. As we start talking about long-term health, if we can’t control our hormones, if we can’t keep our inflammation down, if we can’t keep our gastrointestinal tract healthy, that’s a recipe for a chronic disease to manifest.

Hear what I am saying. When you’re looking at your health and you’re thinking how do I try to deal with the different stressors in my environment, in the world that I function in, guys, look at the top three. You’ve got to deal with the traumas that you encounter and that you’ve succumbed to over an entire life span. You’ve got to deal with the toxins that are never-ending, that continue to accumulate more and more. Lastly, you’ve got to deal with between your ears. If you’re not stepping into that day with positive thoughts, you’re off the right track. Manage, not conquer, just manage, the three T’s of stress and you will significantly improve your health.

There are two problems with eating the same foods every day you must know about. Most people don’t even really realize that they’re eating the same foods. Most people have to write their diet down to recognize that their diet is pretty monotonous. They’re eating the same foods over and over and over again. There are two problems with this.

Problems with Eating the Same Foods – Number One

The first of the two problems with eating the same foods over and over again is that different foods have different nutrients in them. If you limit the number of foods that you’re consuming in your diet, you’re limiting the number of beneficial nutrients that you’re going to be consuming. For example, if one food is more predominant in B vitamins per se versus another food that’s more predominant in some of your minerals, you’re going to be shortchanging the intake of some of those nutrients because you’re not diversifying into these other food categories that increase the uptake of the additional nutrients, for example, the minerals. That’s a big reason and it’s also one of the reasons that are common in the promotion of nutrient deficiencies. Also, it leads to one of the reasons that I do micro-nutrient testing in my practice. It is critical to uncover hidden nutrient deficiencies.

Problems with Eating the Same Foods – Number Two

The second of the two problems with eating the same foods over and over that can be detrimental to your health —and probably maybe even more significant and a little bit more important— is that your immune system becomes very alert to the consumption of foods that are consumed consistently over and over. Think about this much like bacteria. The more prevalent bacteria is, the more recognition your immune system gives to that bacteria and the more it tries to mount a defense against that. We don’t typically think about food as being like bacteria in any way and indeed, they’re not. But what you have to appreciate is that food, especially foods that go undigested (and contribute to what some people refer to as a leaky gut), opens the door for us not to break those foods down efficiently, get them down to a small enough size and assimilate them to the point that they’re recognized as food. If this food leaks into our system, as the term leaky gut implies, then our immune system begins to target that food and it develops a response against it. Again, think about this as the more consistent the immune system sees that food. Even if you have a leaky gut scenario, if you have a diversity of foods, you’re less prone to develop consistent food sensitivities to those foods.

Problems with Eating the Same Foods – The Symptoms

Additionally, consuming a monotonous diet and over-consuming the same foods consistently is going to set up immune reactions. The significance of setting up immune reactions is these may lead to such things as joint pain. They can lead to breakouts on the skin. They can lead to headaches. There are a number of symptoms that this can lead to but one of the big categories that we tend to associate with this is auto-immune diseases.  A very common example of this would be autoimmune Hashimotos thyroiditis.  Auto-immune diseases are on the rise in the United States and worldwide. This is just one of the many reasons, but it’s also a reason you can easily control.

Diversity is King for Avoiding the Problems with Eating the Same Foods Repetitively

To make this a little more profound and put the whole picture together, we also want to keep in mind that the more nutrient deficiencies you have, the more dysfunction you have in your immune system, and the more it sets you up for this leaky gut scenario. If you can consume a diverse diet, then you’re going to have better overall nutrient status. You’re also going to be less likely to stimulate your immune system.

I want to make sure that you join us in upcoming videos because I’m going to talk about how the diversity in our diet also affects the bacteria. As we’re talking about today, keep that diet diverse so you can have a greater nutrient balance in your body and you can also prevent any type of food sensitivity and hopefully, food allergy as well. No diet is more beneficial in helping you do this than the Paleo Diet.  With the help of an easy to follow Paleo Diet cookbook resource, you will be on the road to a tasty and diverse diet in no time.

Today, I want to share with you how your cell phone may actually be making you fat. Believe it or not, that’s actually possible. What are we talking about here? This can be your cell phone. It can be your tablet. It can be the computer screen that you’re looking at every day. It can even, to some degree, be your television screen at home at night.

Is the Blue Light from Your Cell Phone Making You Fat?

Here’s what’s happening: those screens are actually projecting off blue light. Blue light is what we tend to think about as being from sunlight. When we think about daylight, daylight is that blue light range that we’re talking about. The reason that this is important is when we have exposure to blue light, blue light is actually stimulating the pineal gland in our brain to decrease the production of melatonin. It keeps melatonin production down. That is going to make us alive and alert during the day; it is going to keep us active. However, that is the exact opposite of what should be happening at night. During the night time, our melatonin production should be up; our blue light exposure should be down.

Think about this. We’ve all looked at that screen before; we see the light projecting off the screen, that luminescence off of the screen. That’s suppressing our melatonin production. Again, melatonin should be going up at night. The blue lights off of our electronic devices are going to promote fat gain and promote the development of body tissue fat stores as a result of the activity of not being able to put our body into a full state of rest. It’s very well-established now that the higher our cortisol level the more likelihood of fat gain — again, if our melatonin is not up, our cortisol is. These two are antagonistic of each other. We have to get melatonin up to get cortisol down. Cortisol should be low at night. If it is high, your melatonin is suppressed and you are going to have trouble managing your weight.  You also have a higher likelihood of increased hunger as a result of bluelight exposure that which will contribute to fat gain as well.  This has been verified in more than one study.

The Change in Cortisol is Causing Your Cell Phone to Make You Fat

What we know is that if your cortisol elevates into the night time hours, you are more prone to develop fat. You’re going to have a harder time losing weight. You’re going to have a higher likelihood of depositing fat stores around the body, especially in the abdominal region. So guys, think about this: when you’re sitting there and you’re winding down your night, it’s always better to grab a book and read that book that doesn’t have any projection off of the screen as opposed to looking at your phone, looking at your tablet, or looking at your computer in the hour before you go to bed.

Ways to Stop a Cell Phone Making You Fat

Now, there are a couple of tricks and ways that I’m going to share with you on ways you can get around this. There are a lot of programs that you can download. You can go into your app store and you can find blue light filters. A lot of them will have a red appearance to the screen and they will actually filter out the blue light. I still don’t recommend utilizing this for a significant amount of time before you go to bed. But if you have to work and you’ve got to do some work before bed time, the blue light filter is going to be one of your better options. However, read the book if you can.

We always want to get back to the basics. We don’t want to let the idea of Modernosis take us over. We don’t want to let these ideas or the things that we’ve begun to accept as just our normal lifestyle in our modern world impact our health and contribute to its decline. But, just as technology is working against us, we can also use that technology to protect us, too.

You have to get behind making these changes in your life. This cannot be something that you are going to do tomorrow. You need to do it today. Take the opportunity now to protect yourself against the electronic devices or cell phones that are making you fat.

One of the questions I get a lot of times from patients is “What’s actually in my multivitamin? What am I actually taking?” I think what we have to understand  is what is the original intent for a supplement anyway. The original intent for a supplement is actually to replace what’s in your diet. When we look at this, we have to ask what are things we optimally find from our diet? Is what we find in that supplement actually doing that? Is it filling that role for us?

That brings me to what you commonly pick up over the counter. One of the things I always challenge my patients to do is to actually go down the aisle and pick up different multivitamins and look at it. See if these are things that you would on your own, if you knowingly had the option, put in your body. Because I bet at the end of the day, most of you would look at those supplements and go, “I’m not taking that. That’s not an ideal thing for me to be putting in my body.” Let me give you a couple of examples.

What Color is my Multivitamin?

One that I point to right away is the coloring agents. If you pick up a multivitamin and it has some type of coloring agent in it, just know that coloring agents are known toxins. They actually promote irritability to our nervous system. They have also been equally shown to be an immune system stimulant and to be promoting of auto-immune conditions. Absolutely you don’t want to see any type of color in your multivitamin.

Tablets, Capsules and Fillers in a Multivitamin

Another category that you’re going to find is fillers. Fillers are really put in there to take up space, to maximize the real estate in a capsule, if you will, and they don’t add any true nutritional value to the product itself. Many don’t recognize that there’s a difference between a capsule and a tablet. You have to put a lot of pressure and a lot of heat on the tablets to manufacture them. When that happens, when there is high heat, you damage some of these vitamins. Minerals, not so much; minerals can handle pressure and heat but vitamins can’t. So your B vitamins, your fat-soluble vitamins like your A, E, D or K — those nutrients are going to be damaged so we want to try to avoid tablets as much as possible. Not to mention that, overall, most people don’t really like the way a tablet feels going down in comparison to a capsule. Always choose a multivitamin in a capsule if you can.

Questionable Minerals

Probably, the most important on this is bottom line, what ingredients are in there, the true ingredients, the active ingredients that you’re going to find? The first place that I recommend you look is the mineral section. If you look at a mineral, let’s say for example you’re looking at iron and that iron is shown as a ferrous oxide. Ferrous oxide is known to be irritating to the gastrointestinal tract. It causes nausea or some GI irritation. It’s generally because of the ferrous oxide. The better form is going to be what is known as iron bis-glycinate. That’s just one example.

That typically holds true for magnesium as well. Magnesium oxide is often found in products, calcium carbonate — these things are very, very poorly absorbed and not things you want to take. Again, at the end of the day, if you’re not absorbing it, you’re not getting significant benefit from it. You want to make sure we’re getting good quality minerals in your multivitamin.

Avoiding Cheap forms of B12 and Folate in Your Multivitamin

I’ll give you two more examples. Folic acid is a synthetic form of vitamin B9. Folates are what we derive from our food. Again, if the things that we’re taking in supplemental form are not consistent with what we consume as our food, then have we really met what our objectives are? The answer to that is going to be no. We always want to choose a folate versus a folic acid. If it’s a folic acid, it’s a cheaper option.

B12 should not be from cyanocobalamin. Cyanocobalamin is a form of B12. It’s the one of the four that you don’t find in the body. We find our adenosylcobalamin, our methylcobalamin, our hydroxocobalamin, but not cyanocobalamin. By and large, if you’re looking for a good B12 option, it has to be in a methyl or adenosyl form.

Listen, guys, I know it’s a lot of information but it’s definitely something that I want you as a consumer to know so when you’re trying to make the selection for you and your family, you’ll get the most from your multivitamin. Make sure that these are things you’re looking for.

Let’s go over what are the best protein options for you to help reduce inflammation. If you’ve ever been to the health foods store and you’re going down the aisle, you obviously see that there are a lot of different protein options. You kind of leave there scratching your head on which is the best protein option, especially if you’re trying to figure out what the best protein option is to reduce inflammation. What I want to do is talk about some of the different proteins out there and talk about how they might be of benefit when it comes to reducing inflammation.

The Best Protein to Reduce Inflammation and Cause it

The first one that we’re going to start off with is going to be whey protein. Whey protein is a dairy-based protein. It’s one of the two proteins that you find in dairy. Interestingly enough, the whey protein concentrates are beneficial in terms of helping produce glutathione, which is a big antioxidant and anti-inflammatory in the body. Glutathione keeps inflammation under control. The higher the antioxidant status, the lower the inflammation is going to be. So whey protein is a good option. However, it’s not such a great option if you’re an individual who has concerns about dairy allergies or you have some type of dairy sensitivity.

The Second Best Protein Option to Reduce Inflammation

Another option that’s out in the marketplace that’s really good, and has some of the similar benefits of whey protein such as high branched-chain amino acid content to promote good muscle tissue development is beef protein. Most people, when they think about beef protein, scoff. “Oh my goodness, does that taste like a steak or a hamburger?” In short, the answer to that is no. It’s simply just going to have, for example, a chocolate or vanilla flavor. What is great about beef protein is that it’s going to have not just a high amount of branched-chain amino acids, it’s going to have higher nitrogen content. The higher nitrogen you have, the higher protein development, the higher muscle tissue development capacity you have and the regeneration capacity you have. Also, because most of these beef proteins don’t simply come from just the meat portion of beef, but also from the bone and cartilage, you’re also going to get the benefit in helping to regenerate some of the cartilaginous tissue in our body. That’s a great option as well and makes beef protein the second best option to reduce inflammation, and maybe number one if you are an athlete.

Right along that same thought process, there’s collagen protein. Collagen protein is just that — it’s just protein derived from collagen. This is great because it doesn’t have a very high allergen profile. You’re not going to show immune reactions to collagen per se. That’s not something you typically find in the standard American diet or in the diet of most individuals even if they’re eating a pretty good diet. We just don’t typically eat an excess amount of collagen so you’re not going to develop potential reactivity to it. That’s a good one, especially if you have joint pain or joint aches or looking to try to recover from joint injuries. Maybe you’re just out there and you got some wear and tear on your joints that you need to support. If so, collagen protein may be for you.

Plant Proteins to Reduce Inflammation

Now, I’ll start to move away from some of the animal-oriented proteins and get into some of the plant-oriented proteins. Probably the most common one in the marketplace now is going to be pea protein. I like pea protein for the fact that, as a plant protein, it’s going to have high amount of the branched-chain amino acids. Again, if you’re looking for good muscle tissue development, muscle tissue recovery, these branched-chain amino acids are important. Pea protein, ironically as a plant protein, can deliver on that especially if you’re eating North American non-GMO yellow peas. Those are a great source if you are interested in a pea protein. Therefore pea protein tops my list of plants sources for the best proteins to reduce inflammation.

Right along that same thought process, you’re going to find rice protein. It’s an option that some have moved away from but it makes a good protein option. It helps diversify the diet. One of the things that can be a little concerning with both of these is that rice protein can have a little bit of a gritty mouth feel, but it’s not bad. Most of the time, you don’t really notice it, especially if you throw it into a smoothie. In regards to pea protein, for some individuals, can be a little bit hard to digest. It’s not everybody that has this concern but it does pop up from time to time and is often easily corrected with digestive enzymes.

The other protein options out there that I recommend are hemp protein. Hemp protein is good. It’s going to have a high fiber content usually associated with it.

The last one and this is one of the ones that is far less common, but I do find good clinical use for, is going to be the pumpkin seed protein powder.

The Best Protein to Reduce Inflammation is NOT a Single Protein

If you’re looking at all of these proteins and again, we’re trying to answer the question “What is the best protein to reduce inflammation?”, while each one of these proteins might on its own be a great protein to reduce inflammation, the true answer behind that is going to be all of them. The more consistently you consume a protein, the more likely you are to react to that protein. The idea here when you’re choosing a protein supplement is not to choose and get latched into one particular product; the better idea would be to use multiple different proteins. For example, if you walk into my personal pantry, you’re going to see I don’t just have a whey protein. I don’t just have a beef protein or just a pea protein. I have a lot of proteins in there and I rotate through these based on what my demands are. At the end of the day, when I’m trying to keep my own inflammation low and I’m asking myself “What’s the best protein that I should choose for me today to reduce inflammation?”, it’s not the same protein that I chose yesterday.

So don’t get locked into a one-size-fits-all for the ideal protein. At the end of the day, guys, it’s really more about the combination of proteins, the variety in your diet, looking at diversity and how that diversity enhances your overall gut profile, reduces potential immune reaction and keeps your inflammation low.

Have you ever walked through the health food store or the supplement section of the grocery store and thought,”What vitamins should I take?”  Most of us have done this at some point.  Often spurred by something we saw or read somewhere, most people are interested in vitamins with hopes of helping alleviate an ailment or preventing one.  Ironically, when trying to select a vitamin, most are often drawn to attractive wording designed more for catching the buyers eye than actually providing a solution or step towards prevention.  There are so many choices, where does one actually start.

Better yet, how do you know that the supplement that you are taking is actually right for you?  This is a big question and one that is often overlooked.  There are some supplements that most of the population are going to be okay with taking.  However, there are several supplements that should only be taken if you have a way of confirming that you actually need them.  This is best accomplished through lab testing.  So rather than you wondering through the supplement aisles wondering “what vitamins should I take” or having to take the advice of a sales person more interested in promoting their commission than promoting your health, let’s talk about the ones that are in general good for most people and will not cause harm.

What Vitamins Should I Take: Number One

The supplement that almost everyone should be on is vitamin D.  Remember that a supplement is meant to be just that.  It is not a replacement for good dietary choices.  I often tell my patients when emphasizing the importance of diet that regardless of how great of a nutrient repletion protocol I design for them, it is all for nothing if they do not follow through with a good diet.  But with that said, a good diet often does not provide enough vitamin D.  Vitamin D has many important functions that support the cardiovascular, immune and hormonal systems.  It does come in some foods, but not in quantities sufficient enough to meet the demands of nearly all of the population.  This is becoming more recognized as even maintenance recommendations have increased from 400 IU per day to now as high as 10,000 IU.  The consistency of the number of physicians checking vitamin D and diagnosing it as low suggest that we are facing a vitamin D deficiency epidemic.  And according to the Vitamin D Council, when you are not getting enough vitamin D from natural sunlight, supplementation is the best support.

The Second Most Important Supplement to Take

Not actually a vitamin, but to less important in terms of the way that your body functions and nearly as deficient within the majority of the population, omega 3’s should be a staple for most people.  Omega 3’s are just as important as any vitamin since they are essential for us to obtain through the diet or supplementation.  We don’t make them.  Omega 3’s, like vitamin D, has links to multiple systems in the body. There is not hardly a condition that does not benefit from omega 3’s, often called fish oils.  For the person with good eating habits, omega 3 needs can often be meet with the diet.  Yet, most individuals consume a diet that is high in the omega 6’s which can be disease promoting.  Therefore, when the diet alone is not getting the job done, you have to make up the difference with supplementation.  Unfortunately, even the right food choices may leave you imbalanced on your omega 3’s since many foods are not raised and harvested the way they used to be.  So when asking what vitamin should I take, omega 3’s should be the number 2 option on your list (even though they are not actually a vitamin).

This B Vitamin Might Surprise You that It Made the List

Over the years of testing patient’s nutrient status, one nutrient has been shown to be deficient more than any other.  What is surprising is that this nutrient is rarely talked about.  It is not considered a quick fix for giving energy or improving memory, but it indeed does both.  It also improves hormones.  In fact, it is this last point related to hormones that is the reasons so many are deficient in this nutrient.  Just ask,”Am I under stress?”  The answer is YES!  You are under stress.  And stress increases the demand for hormones.  As a result, we use up one nutrient more than any other to help manage the stress.  That nutrient is B5.  When you have the vitamin B5 to help you manage stress better, your energy is better, you age slower and you think better.  Not only that men have better testosterone and women have better balance of their hormones to continue to have that wonderful female glow.  Therefore, if you are asking what vitamin should I take, B5 is top of the list.  Even after years of seeing tests and working towards custom approaches for patients, when I personally ask what vitamins should I take, you will not catch me without B5.

No doubt we have all had stomach pain after eating at some point in our lives.  However, if you are one of the unfortunate ones that deals with stomach pain after eating routinely, you are ready for relief.  The impending feeling that your stomach is going to start hurting soon after eating creates worry and distress.  The sense that as soon as you consume a morsel of food, all those annoying sensations start returning again.  And to add insult to your discomfort, your doctor examines you and follows up with, “Nothing is wrong.  Try this antacid.”  You know something is wrong.  Stomach pain has not been present all of your life, so something has changed.

There are many causes for stomach pain, many of which are named diseases.  Ulcers, gall stones, and reactions to foods such as gluten and lactose in dairy top the list.  While these can be causes of stomach pain after eating, there is another reason you want to consider first.

The Most Prevalent Reason You Have Stomach Pain After Eating

Ingestion of food should not be followed by bloating and pain.  However if you are dealing with stomach pain after eating, especially if there is bloating, constipation or diarrhea, an overgrowth of bacteria in your small intestine should be your first consideration.  This is conveniently named, SIBO, meaning Small Intestinal Bacterial Overgrowth.  Most of us think negatively when it comes to bacteria, however, this is not a situation where you have too much “bad” bacteria.  Rather, a SIBO infection is too much of the bacteria that we should have.  The problem is that they are located in the wrong area.  They should be further along in the gastrointestinal tract in the large intestine.  Dr. Allison Siebecker, ND of www.siboinfo.com, accurately states the problem by saying,“The infection is of bacteria that normally live in the gastrointestinal tract but have abnormally overgrown in a location not meant for so many bacteria.“

The presence of the wrong types of bacteria can lead to several imbalances that change the way we digest food.  As a result of the intestinal environment being out of balance, symptoms manifest and ultimately pain can manifest.

Follow these Steps to Stop the Pain

Stomach pain after eating is annoying and takes the pleasure out of eating.  If you been feeling hopeless about getting your gut back under control and being able to eat normally again, don’t give up.  Here is the plan that I have refined and use with my patients.

Step 1: Go Paleo

The standard American Diet is contaminated with items that are often difficult to even call food.  The ingredient labels often mimic more of a science experiment list than what one should be eating.  Therefore, the first thing that I have my patients do is clean up their diet.  If you want stomach pain after eating to end, you have to change what you are eating.  Of course the stomach hurts.  It is attempting to digest “foods” that are at the same time poisoning it.  You cannot eat the same things and expect your stomach to react differently.  Your best bet at getting away from the numerous problems with the standard American Diet is to follow the Paleo diet.  This ancestral approach on modern eating eliminates many of the problems with today’s food.

Step 2: Remove the FODMAPs

Not all healthy food is good for you, well at least sometimes.  What I mean is when your stomach and small intestines are dysfunctional with too much bacteria, even foods that are otherwise good for you can cause symptoms.  For example, foods such as onion, garlic, avocados or cherries, cause stomach pain after eating them.  But aren’t these simply fruits and vegetables?  They are, and most of the time they would be highly recommended as part of a healthy diet.  However, when too much bacteria exists in the small intestines, you have to avoid these foods.  If these foods are not avoided, the bacteria ferment them and cause symptoms.  Once the bacterial overgrowth is alleviated, many are able to reintroduce the FODMAP category of foods with little problem.  Stanford University Medical Center offers a list of FODMAPs.

Step 3: Treat the SIBO

Once unheard of, probiotics are now a common word.  They are promoted on television and in health food stores just as much as vitamins.  Yet, these beneficial bacteria are not such a good thing when they populate the wrong area of the gut.  In the case of small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, or SIBO, bacteria begins to take over the small intestine.  This is not normal.  Most of the bacteria of the colon should be in the large intestine.  As a result of the overgrowth and wrong types of bacteria being located where they should not be, the digestion of food is affected.  The process of fermentation and gas formation takes place as can fat malabsorption, all of which can lead to stomach pain after eating.

The key to managing SIBO is reducing the bacteria.  Several options are available, including antibiotics, both natural and pharmaceutical.  The best pharmaceutical choice is Rifaximin.  Natural options include oil of oregano and garlic extracts.  However, ending SIBO permanently is dependent on replacing what is missing.

Step 4: Replace What’s Missing

If you don’t replace what’s missing, you have little hope of avoiding SIBO and ending stomach pain after eating for good.  So what exactly is missing you might ask.  There are 2 things that when absent increase the risk of SIBO.  The absence of these 2 digestive components also even increase the risk for non-SIBO stomach pain after eating.  They are acid in your stomach and bile from the liver and gall bladder.  These are first line defenses that we have to reduce bacteria and other organisms from entering our body.  With the reduction of bacteria, the overgrowth of SIBO does not take place.  However, when you have low acid and bile production, you are not going to immediately start making it again.  Therefore, taking a digestive enzyme that includes both of these is necessary.  It also helps re-establish your first line defense system and prevent the return of SIBO.

Is your lunch more likely to be made of fresh veggies, organic meats and nuts, or a cheeseburger and fries? For most, it’s safe to say that the latter is more of the norm. Convenience has generally taken the place of quality when it comes to food choices during the day. However, a few Paleo lunch ideas can help bring quality food back into your day.

If you haven’t heard, when going Paleo, you go back to the basics and eat like our ancestors did. The diet basically includes anything that can be hunted or gathered from our natural environment; think meat, vegetables, fruit and nuts. While you may be thinking that you don’t want to eat salad every day, there are a wide variety of Paleo lunch ideas to satisfy many palettes.

If you are ready to make the switch to healthier eating at lunch, let me help you prepare by debunking some common challenges people face:

Challenges of Eating Paleo at Lunch Time

“The diet is too hard to follow!”

The Paleo diet doesn’t include processed foods, which are very common and convenient. If you go to a fast food restaurant, it will be hard to find options that follow the Paleo guidelines. Our ancestors didn’t have chicken nuggets or Big Macs.

Find Delicious Paleo Lunch Ideas

Changing your diet is going to require changing your habits, but it can be enjoyable and fun. You need to find replacement foods that are just as satisfying, if not more so, than foods that you used to eat. Research Paleo lunch ideas, as well as snacks, as these are the foods that cause diet slip ups most often.

“I don’t want to be hungry all the time”

You may think that you just won’t be full enough on the foods which are allowed.

A balanced diet removes pesky food cravings

When eating Paleo, the natural foods you will eat are nutrient-dense and keep blood sugar levels balanced. This keeps you feeling fuller longer. Cravings for afternoon sweets come because of fluctuations in blood sugar levels which result from eating foods with a high glycemic index like donuts, sugary drinks, bread and sweets. Without these foods, you won’t have those cravings.

“I don’t have time to cook”

So many of us are short on time, especially during our lunch breaks. Paleo foods have been criticized as being time-consuming to prepare.

Plan Your Lunch

Once you have your Paleo lunch ideas lined up, pick a day to grocery shop and prep for the week. You can pack up your lunches so you don’t have to think about it again. This won’t take more than 2 to 3 hours typically and will save time during the week where you would have been trying to figure out lunch plans.

“I love bread, I just can’t give it up”

Bread is a staple in the American diet that can be hard to give it up. Many can’t imagine life without their cakes, donuts, hamburgers, hot dogs and sandwiches. What will your diet consist of without bread? Many people can’t imagine it.

Don’t Give Up Bread – Bread Replacement Recipes Exist

While you definitely want to stay away from wheat, bread alternatives can be just as satisfying! You can find Paleo lunch ideas which use Paleo bread to make sandwiches, or even Paleo tortillas for tacos. Just look at this tantalizing picture of one of my favorite Paleo Bread recipes. It tastes great and can be made into slices, as well as hamburger and hot dog buns.

There you have it! There is no reason to spend another day eating unhealthy lunches. Make the switch to Paleo and you will wonder what took you so long. How do you get your hands on a Paleo cookbook chocked full of Paleo lunch ideas and hacks? Simply click >>>HERE<<< and learn how lunchtime can be a meal you look forward to and feel good about.

You have probably heard someone say “necessity is the mother of invention”.  This was indeed true for me personally and ultimately what lead me to develop the perfect adrenal fatigue diet.  You see, I too had adrenal fatigue just like you.  I was the guy that got up in the morning feeling tired for no reason.  Regardless, I would push my self to get to work and by 11am my eyes were drooping because I was “out of gas”.  But I knew if I could just drag myself through the afternoon, my energy would perk back up in the evening once I got home.

Now you may be thinking that I was eating a bad diet and not exercising and that this was the reason I felt lethargic and found it difficult to stay motivated.  But you would be wrong.  In fact, my diet was extremely clean, a 100% Paleo Diet.  As for exercise, I was weight training 4 days per week and was even just a few months off of a natural bodybuilding competition that I been successful at.  What I realized after reading fellow doctor James Wilson’s book Adrenal Fatigue: The 21st Century Stress Syndrome, is that I was right in the middle of this condition.  But what was suggested for recovery were things that I was already doing, so I had to think outside of the box.  So I started with food and asked what should the perfect adrenal fatigue diet contain.

How Food Affects the Adrenal Glands

The adrenal glands are one of the most dynamic glands of the body.  They have to adapt to all forms of stress; lack of sleep, toxins in the environment or a stressful day at work.  These stresses add up and collectively take their toll on your adrenal glands.  But as stressful as these things are, there is one stress that trumps them all; fluctuations in your blood sugar, or glucose.  In fact, cortisol, the hormone we commonly think about as the stress hormone, is also called a glucocorticoid.  “Gluco” in the name glucocorticoid emphasizes the importance of cortisol in regulating glucose.  When glucose levels are low, cortisol kicks in to bring them back up.  Thus foods that help prevent glucose from dropping, also known as hypoglycemia, should be primary considerations on the adrenal fatigue diet.

Commonly Recommended Foods on the Adrenal Fatigue Diet

If you research adrenal fatigue diet, you will most certainly find some consistent recommendations, that by and large are good and that should be followed.  Most often food are broken down into categories of what do eat and not do eat, with more emphasis often given to what not to eat.  For example, sweeteners, artificial and natural, hydrogenated oils, caffeine and processed foods like those in the standard American diet.  Without question, these should be avoided, especially since they can also trigger inflammation, another stressor for the adrenal glands.

Then there is the common list of foods to include.  Included are usually fats and proteins from healthy sources and vegetables.  Such fats are coconut oil, avocados, olive oil, nuts and seeds.  Recommendations for protein are often fish and lean meats with extra emphasis placed on consuming them in the morning and in divided dosages throughout the day.  As I mentioned, I think each one of these is an excellent idea and absolutely should be part of your adrenal fatigue diet.  But there still remains one group of foods that I don’t often see making the list.

The Food Group That Deserves More Emphasis

If you suffer from adrenal fatigue, you have a higher likelihood of having low blood sugar.  This is the result of insufficient cortisol production.  Lack of cortisol means that there is no significant hormonal support to prevent your blood sugar levels from dropping.  So logic would suggest if your blood sugar is low, eat more sugar.  But this causes a spike in blood sugar which is another adrenal gland stressor.  So what you need is more carbohydrate, that does not spike your blood sugar, and that reduces the need secrete cortisol so as to help your adrenal gland recover.  How are your going to get all of that in one food?  Easy, starchy vegetables.

If you have adrenal fatigue, well times starchy vegetables should be a key addition to your diet.  While vegetables often make the adrenal fatigue diet list, it is the inclusion of starchy vegetables that takes that list of foods from average to exceptional.  Most vegetables do not have any significant carbohydrate contribution to the diet.  Starchy vegetables on the other hand do.  Now before you default to adding potatoes to your diet, realize that starchy vegetables includes far more foods than potatoes, or even sweet potatoes.  The starchy vegetables that will make up part of your meal include things such as okra, turnips, rutabagas, parsnips, large / winter squash, and beets just to name a few.  The adrenal fatigue diet would not be complete without these foods as they don’t spike blood sugar, reduce inflammation, reduce cortisol secretion and allow the adrenal gland to rest.  They are nature’s ideal food to help the adrenal glands recover.

To help you get these foods incorporated into your adrenal fatigue diet, I want you to have a comprehensive list of Starchy Vegetables that will help speed your recovery.  The more active you are, the greater the likelihood that you will need more of these foods.  If you are less active, you may only need a small addition of these foods to your diet.

Starchy Vegetables

Follow My Road to Recovery

While my road to recovery incorporated a few key supplements such as high dose pantothenic acid (B5), the addition of adequately timed starchy vegetables helped me refine what I now feel to be the perfect adrenal fatigue diet.  This diet has proven itself not only to me, but also to countless patients that I have helped overcome adrenal fatigue.  It was also one of the reasons that I wrote The Paleo Transition Cookbook that offers quick recipes that incorporate starchy vegetables.  Appropriate amounts of starchy vegetables should not make up the majority of your diet.  However, if you want to recover as fast as possible from adrenal fatigue, starchy vegetables should be routinely consumed as part of a balanced Paleo Diet, which will inherently be YOUR perfect adrenal fatigue diet.