How Your Gut Health is Effecting Your Brain

The Gut Bone’s Connected to the Brain Bone...

In this interview with functional medicine expert Dr. Ritamarie Loscalzo, we talk about the rarely acknowledged gut-brain connection.  With modern research, we are gaining a deeper understanding of how digestion and the gut micro-biome effects the brain, and common symptoms of mood disorder, and poor concentration.

You don't always connect that your:

• Headache
• Depression
• Anxiety
• Brain Fog

...are coming from the foods you eat or the damage that has been done to your gut.  When we get into habits of eating on the run, eating processed foods, eating gluten, etc, we may not notice a direct correlation between the meal and the brain symptom.  But in fact the internal inflammatory response could be increasing every time you eat.

Dr. Ritamarie is like a walking encyclopedia of health knowledge, and she is very generous about sharing it.  Here are some things we cover in the interview:

1.  How are the gut and brain connected?
2.  How do we make neurotransmitters and what do they do?
3.  What can go wrong in the gut that leaves us not digesting and absorbing nutrients?
4.  How do we come to have parasites and candida in the gut, and what damage do they do?
5.  What are some of the worst habits/things we do to our guts?
6.  What are a few reparative things we can start doing right away?
Dr. Ritamarie shared some helpful links both to help educate practitioners on this important relationship, and to give everyone more tools to nourish their own gut-brain axis.

Practitioner Gut-Brain Webinar

Gut Health Quiz

Happy Belly Recipe Book

Dr. Ritamarie also has an upcoming, affordable live event for practitioners called SHINE (Oct. 30 - Nov. 1, 2015.)  Please see this separate blog post for more details.

Here's Dr. Ritamarie's previous interview on blood sugar.

Listen below:

 For more info: http://www.bridgitdanner.com/

Testing Female Hormones with Ann Melin

Hormones are such a mystery! One month your cycle is behaving, the next month it's not.  Why I love lab testing for hormones is that it reveals the cold, hard facts, and from there you can take the best action to get great results.

Our expert today is Ann Melin, who is a Clinical Nutritionist, a Clinical Master Herbalist, a yoga teacher, and a Functional Diagnostic Nutrition practitioner.

I invited her over to talk to us about DUTCH, or the Dried Urine Test of Comprehensive Hormones.  

Here are some things we cover:

• What is the dutch test and why do you use it?
• How do you take a dutch test? 
• What does it include and cost?
• What can you learn from your DUTCH test?
• How would you develop a protocol based on these results?

Ann also shares two really interesting case studies that help you see how the symptoms, tests and protocols come together.

You can find out more about Ann at her website.  Ann offers a complimentary consult for prospective clients at this link.  

Listen to my interview with Ann through the player above, and be sure to also get subscribed to our weekly interviews at iTunes or most podcast players.

For more info: http://www.bridgitdanner.com/

Re-Thinking Women's Nutrition with Dr. Ann Childers, MD

Does what you eat matter for your mental health?  According to Dr. Ann Childers, MD, it sure does.

Dr. Childers is a child and adult trained psychiatric physician with a passionate interest in regaining our physical and mental health through nutrition and sleep. 

Dr. Childers was 'trying to eat right' when the whole low-fat craze was going on in the U.S.  Despite her best efforts, she was getting increasingly dizzy and anxious, and had become pre-diabetic.


Since then she's adopted a ketogenic (high-fat, low-carb, moderate protein) diet, with great results for her own health.  She also works with her pyschiatric clients to establish this diet, along with healthy sleep habits, for improved mental health.

We talk about her nutritional experiences, plus the new dietary guidelines for Amercians, in this episode.  Dr. Childers is thrilled that the new guidelines, based on scientific evidence, are letting fats back into our diets, while limiting sugars. 

Learn more about Dr. Childers, who blogs regularly and has a private practice in Lake Oswego, OR, here.
For more info: http://www.bridgitdanner.com/

Ketogenic Cooking with Maria Emmerich

Are you trying to reduce the amount of carbohydrates in your diet, but don't know what to cook instead?  Come check out this episode with Maria Emmerich, co-author of the Ketogenic Cookbook:  Nutritious Low-Carb, High-fat, Paleo Meals to Heal Your Body.

Maria has two young kids that she and her husband adopted both at once, and she stills manages to cook her little heart out, coming up with her own tasty, ketogenic recipes.

Her secret?  "Plan, plan, plan."  Ok, planning might sound like a drag, but once you get in the hang of it, you'll be a pro. Besides, most of us just rotate 12-15 meals, so you don't need to learn too many to eating well and low-carb daily

What is ketogenic?

Ketogenic describes a kind of high-fat, low-carb, moderate protein diet that results in the body primarily burning ketones for fuel.

Ketogenic diet has historically been used to treat epilepsy and diabetes, but also has benefits for things like:

•   Brain fog
•   Belly fat
•   PCOS

See our past podcast episode "Should You Try a Ketogenic Diet?" with author Jimmy Moore for more on the theory and practice of ketogenic eating.

Listen to this episode through the player below, or get yourself subscribed to our weekly podcast through iTunes or your podcast player on your smart phone.  Thanks!

For more info: http://www.bridgitdanner.com/

Functional Tests for the Gut and it's Relationship to PCOS

Why does the gut matter for PCOS?  Here are a few reasons:

•  Indigestion can equate to nutrient deficiencies
• An unbalanced bacterial environment in the gut can cause excess hunger & carb cravings
• The inflammation produced by internal parasites and food sensitivities stresses other body systems.

The tricky thing about the gut is that you may not complain of digestive symptoms.  But poor health in the gut can manifest in myriad ways- from headaches to moodiness and fatigue.

How Can You Learn if Your Gut is Stressed?

There are many types of tests for gut health.  I'll discuss three here:

 1.  Genova Intestinal Permeability Test

This is an easy at-home urine test that measures both how leaky your gut may be (letting large particles into your blood stream) and how well you are absorbing nutrients (if your gut surface too clogged to let them pass.)

To perform this test, you drink a sweet liquid in the morning, containing a small and large sugar molecule.  The small molecule (representing a nutrient) “should” get through your gut barrier.  The large molecule (representing a large peptide or immune complex) should not get through the gut barrier.

Seeing the amount of each type of molecule left behind in your urinary waste informs you of the health of your gut barrier.  You can then set about healing that gut barrier, reducing chronic inflammation and getting the most out of your food.

2.  Biohealth 401 H Stool Test

 

You know you’re getting down and dirty when you’re doing a stool test!  In this test, done at home, you collect stool (involving things like a paper plate, gloves and a spork) over three days or three bowel movements.

While collecting these samples may not be too fun, getting the results is definitely worth it.
This test is strong at identifying H Pylori infection, intestinal parasites, and a basic level of gut dysbiosis (bacterial imbalance.)  In some cases, it can pick up Candida as well.

These infections are much more prevalent than you think, and can go undetected for decades without proper testing!

If you have been dealing with irritable bowel syndrome, this test can be quite helpful in devising a protocol with your practitioner to finally resolve it.

3.  Leap MRT 150 Food Sensitivity Test

 

This final test does require a participating lab to collect your blood.  Your blood is then tested for it’s inflammatory reaction to 150 foods and food additives.  If your blood produces inflammatory cytokines, histamines, prostaglandins, etc., then you have a sensitivity to that food.

Imagine you are unwittingly eating 20 different foods that cause inflammation each time you ingest them.  That’s a real stress on the body, and could contribute to endocrine disorder.

Avoiding those 20 foods, however, can be sweet relief.  It’s advised to remove your food sensitivities for at least 3 months, then you may try eating them again if desired.  Your test results come with a handy laminated list of your food sensitivities, plus a book about how the test works, and what to do with your diet.

One thing I learned in the book was the categories of problem foods:

Food Sensitivities:  foods that cause an inflammatory response (what this test covers)

Food Allergies:  foods that trigger mast cells and basophils to produce a massive IgE reaction (think anaphylactic shock)

Food Intolerances:  foods that you can’t digest well due to your own digestive weakness
Helpful, right?

Getting functional tests run can really shed some light on your symptoms.  As our gut plays such a central role in our health, getting our gastrointestinal system in tip top shape can help to alleviate many conditions, including PCOS.

Chronic inflammation fuels the fire of a continual PCOS pattern.  Imagine what eliminating chronic stressors in the gut could do to eliminate that chronic inflammation and restore health.

A healthy gut can also help to prevent and manage autoimmune diseases, which commonly have a link to leaky gut.

In my opinion, this type of testing, followed by a lab-guided protocol, is one of the most powerful investments you can make in true, long-term healing.  To learn more about our services, please see our services page.

For more info: http://www.bridgitdanner.com/

 

Paleo for Women (The Get Real Version)

I get beyond "just eat paleo" and get real about a paleo lifestyle that is balanced and healthy for women in this interview with my guest Noelle Tarr, the Chief Empowerment Officer at Coconuts and Kettlebells.

Noelle is very savvy about nutrition and fitness but also very realistic about women's health, in the sense that we can't all look like super models and we can't be "perfect" about our diets 100% of the time. 

 

I love that Noelle crosses the bridge between, yes, let's have good nutrition and habits, and, yes, let's also embrace our bodies "as-is" and embrace a full life (without the need to count calories or miles run).  It's a bridge that's not crossed enough in conversations about women's health.

"I just want people to be happy."  Noelle Tarr

I hope you can check out this episode with Noelle Tarr below, and you can also check out the podcast she co-hosts, The Paleo Women podcast.  

You can listen to the podcast episode where Noelle and I were both guests on Low Carb Conversation with Jimmy Moore and Dietician Cassie here.

You can listen to the interview through by clicking on that arrow down there, and, even better, you can subscribe to our podcast through iTunes or most any podcast player.

For more info: http://www.bridgitdanner.com/