MS “Wake-Up Call” Changed Everything: Whole Foods Healing With Elizabeth Yarnell

 

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00:00:05:04 – 00:00:29:16

Synergee

Welcome back to the Synergee Podcast, where we get to explore cutting edge health strategies to help you feel and perform your best. Today we’re diving into multiple sclerosis, inflammation, and the power of food as medicine with an extraordinary guest, Elizabeth Yarnell. Elizabeth is a traditional Cancer path, Award winning author and patented inventor on a mission to transform lives through anti-inflammatory eating and wellness journey in Ridgeland MS in natural healing in Ridgeland MS.

00:00:29:18 – 00:00:57:07

Synergee

Diagnosed with M.S. in 1999, she refused to accept the conventional path and instead pioneered a revolutionary approach to diet and wellness, one that has helped countless people with M.S. and autoimmune conditions reclaim their health. As director of the fight and as with food projects, Elizabeth empowers others to uncover the hippest triggers behind inflammation and discover how small daily food choices can make a massive impact on overall well-being and your wellness journey in Ridgeland MS.

00:00:57:07 – 00:01:13:06

Synergee

Her groundbreaking cookbook, Lori’s One Hot Meals, has sold over 60,000 copies, introducing an effortless way to eat healthily without sacrificing time or flavor. So grab a cup of tea. Get comfy and get ready for an inspiring and insightful conversation with Elizabeth Darnell.

00:01:13:06 – 00:01:23:15

Synergee

So, Elizabeth, thank you so much for being here. If you can take us back to 1999, kind of what was your start? Like what? What started your symptoms with them as kind of like sharing your story?

00:01:23:15 – 00:01:42:13

Elizabeth

Back in 1999, I was one of my hands full as a freelance journalist. And one night, I was working late in my apartment on a story from the Denver Post about cross-country skiing and it was getting very late, and I was like, okay, well, I’m almost done with this story.

00:01:42:15 – 00:01:58:18

Elizabeth

I’m just going to send it over to my printer and print it out. And then while I was brushing my teeth, I was kind of glancing over the sheets of my printer, and I found three places that I wanted to make edits to, and I thought, it’s late. I’m just going to go to bed and do it tomorrow morning.

00:01:58:20 – 00:02:21:13

Elizabeth

But when I woke up the next morning, it was a whole different world for me. When I looked at my pages from my printer and I had looked at the night before, I couldn’t really read any of them. It had looked like a goblin had come through the night and literally taken an eraser and erased huge swaths of text from it.

00:02:21:15 – 00:02:45:11

Elizabeth

What I could make out wasn’t making any sense to me. So even these words I had written just a few hours before weren’t familiar at all. And the worst part of it was I couldn’t figure it out. I knew there were three edits I wanted to make, and I couldn’t even find out where they were. Wow. And I knew I had to submit this article to my editor by the end of the day.

00:02:45:13 – 00:03:11:18

Elizabeth

And, as it happened that morning, my father called me. He’s a neurologist. He said. How’s it going? And I said, well, you know, there’s something wrong with my eyes. I just can’t, I don’t know what’s going wrong. And he said, okay, well, hang on, I’ll call you back. And he called me back in five minutes and he said, I just got you a point for the eye doctor down the hall from my office, and you need to come in and get your eyes checked out.

00:03:11:19 – 00:03:28:09

Elizabeth

And I went in and the eye doctor said, well, you’re having something of an optic nerve, right? Which is inflammation of the optic nerve. Right. And your father thinks you need to go in for an MRI right now, which I did, and I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis that afternoon.

00:03:28:09 – 00:03:33:14

Synergee

Wow. That rarely happens today. Right? Where the diagnosis is so acute.

00:03:33:14 – 00:03:42:14

Elizabeth

It does. Sometimes I like to joke that, you know, being in doctors, I get some VIP treatment. Right, right.

00:03:42:14 – 00:03:46:16

Synergee

Do you feel like looking back? You were having symptoms before that time? Do you feel like there was a program of symptoms that you probably just brushed off and thought, oh, that’s no big deal?

00:03:51:02 – 00:04:12:09

Elizabeth

Yeah. Some symptoms, which I think is probably what caused my father to suspect that maybe there was something more going on. Right. It happened. I had had, a couple of months before I’d had this tingling in my fingertips that was there for, like, six weeks. I asked one of my friends, who was a med student at the time, and I said, you know, this is really weird.

00:04:12:10 – 00:04:41:04

Elizabeth

I have these really weird pins and needles feeling in my fingertips. And he said, well, maybe you got drunk and you fell over. Was with the back of the chair or underneath your armpit. It’s kind of like a drunk from Saturday night’s sleep or something like that. I’m like, I don’t think I need to. Back out of the chair.

00:04:41:06 – 00:05:10:19

Elizabeth

But yeah. So there were some indications before, but we hadn’t really put it all together. The other thing, in retrospect, was that I had recently returned from a big trip to Asia, and I had come home with at least five parasites in my gut. And so I had been really struggling with parasites and an idea, which is managing parasitic medication, which is super strong and really blows away everything in your microbiome.

00:05:10:21 – 00:05:43:11

Elizabeth

It doesn’t just hit the parasites, it hits everything. And, I was still really recovering from that. And, now when I think about autoimmune conditions and I look at the incidence of potential or possible parasitic infection, I really think there is a link that is under recognized in our society that believes we are so pandemic that we don’t have parasites in this modern, sophisticated society, which is far from the truth.

00:05:43:11 – 00:06:02:00

Synergee

So how to bridge that gap to becoming and getting into macrobiotic medicine. Like were you already at the time that you were diagnosed? Were you already on a quest to look at your health differently, or was that the opening of the door towards digging into health and looking at it differently?

00:06:02:00 – 00:06:07:08

Elizabeth

So before that day when I woke up blind in my right eye, I really hadn’t given any thought to my health.

00:06:07:13 – 00:06:33:11

Elizabeth

I didn’t think at all about healthy eating, and that’s the only staple food I kept in my apartment. And gummy bears. Yeah. Wow. I was moving forward with my life. It worked out a lot, but I didn’t eat well at all. Like, either fast food or restaurant food or whatever.

00:06:33:11 – 00:06:57:01

Elizabeth

So I just simply skipped the meal. I wasn’t involved in the world of mental health. That wasn’t a goal. I really didn’t even know about the world of natural health because my father was a neurologist, my father was a registered nurse and psychologist, and I grew up in the medical world. And I didn’t even know that such a thing as natural paths really existed before that.

00:06:57:04 – 00:07:18:04

Synergee

Yeah. Yeah, it is consumed around the traditional way of looking at health. Right. Yeah. I, I’m curious, as you created these changes or began to look at your health a little bit differently. Don’t know how long that took. How well did your mom and your dad adapt to that? Just curious.

00:07:18:04 – 00:07:25:21

Elizabeth

That is a very good question. And I have to say, one that nobody has ever asked me before.

00:07:25:23 – 00:07:45:15

Elizabeth

My fiancé at the time, he was also on this trip to Asia with me, and also came back with a bunch of parasites. But his trajectory was very different because he was a competitive athlete and he was all into organic foods and cooking at home and all these things that I was not into for the entire decade of my 20s.

00:07:45:17 – 00:08:04:07

Elizabeth

And he was the first one, really, in that period of maybe a few days, that I was diagnosed where he said, you know, maybe your diet has something to do with that. You really eat like crap and I thought, oh, well, nobody I don’t even know what a healthy diet is, right? Just see what he eats like during the day.

00:08:04:08 – 00:08:31:13

Elizabeth

It’s basically a bag of Hershey’s Kisses that I feel like I have no problems with or any, any models to look at for what a healthy diet is. So that’s when I started digging into his looking and finding books. And these were the early days of the internet in 1999. Right. And to see, well, what is a healthy diet and maybe I should try to follow a healthier diet.

00:08:31:13 – 00:08:58:10

Elizabeth

And that’s when I started to become interested in the world of natural health. So I dragged my mother along, kicking and screaming in many ways, starting first with organic eggs and really pushing on her, my stepfather about buying cheap eggs and trying to spend more money on quality eggs, things like that. And to the point now, 25 years later, they’re much more amenable to that.

00:08:58:11 – 00:09:29:19

Elizabeth

My father still thinks there’s no connection between diet and health, even when he looks at me and I say, dad, but what about me? How can you find out why? I mean, we have some progress with us. And he’s like, well, I don’t know. Some people do. Some people go like, wow, for everything that I’ve done, including, you know, writing a catalog and inventing a healthy cooking mechanism and becoming a doctor and going into my own clinical practice.

00:09:29:19 – 00:09:32:13

Elizabeth

And my father still didn’t see any value.

00:09:32:17 – 00:09:52:17

Synergee

And that’s, You know, I know that I appreciate your transparency in that, and sharing that story, because, to be honest, I think, you know, Kelly and I have had multiple conversations in which the hardest people to change are the people closest to us, the people that we love. And we want to be well and we want to see them thriving.

00:09:52:19 – 00:10:10:20

Synergee

And, you know, we’ve even had conversations about healthy detachment that we’ve had to get to a place where we could, in a healthy way, detach from that and still love, you know, and let them be in that. But, you know, it’s your father, right? And I know how important it was for my father to be proud of me for that.

00:10:10:23 – 00:10:35:03

Elizabeth

And I’m sure he is. He’s very proud of that, you know. Right. He just doesn’t accept that there is this connection. So but on the it keeps the charge up because you know, I do I we’re with you. We truly believe that the way that you eat, the way that you drink, you know, the way that you move, you sleep and you think those things are they set the foundation to the way that you live and the way that your cells are.

00:11:14:08 – 00:11:31:06

Synergee

Yes. Yeah. So good for you. So what connections have you made? Lori and I both have a food first approach in our practices, and we see miraculous changes in the world of inflammation with our patients. What are you saying? What are the biggest drivers of inflammation that you’ve been able to identify?

00:11:31:08 – 00:11:34:00

Synergee

And then how do you address making those changes?

00:13:50:14 – 00:14:12:22

Synergee

And most people that are in functional medicine, integrative medicine, or are looking at health through a different lens, naturopathy actually. We have that personal story that definitely gives us charge. Right. That passion behind. And I love what you said. I don’t care, but that disclaimer up there because I’ll find out you just read a couple of years.

00:14:12:22 – 00:14:39:15

Synergee

And what we do know, it takes 10 to 15 years. And I think even more I know when I was in my training, they always said it takes ten years for research to catch up with clinical practice. I personally believe that regardless of the amount of knowledge that’s out there, that we can, you know, surf and find. I believe that there is a greater distance between that now upwards of 15 or so years because of the, you know, the fixed mindsets right around what I learned in school to be right.

00:14:39:15 – 00:15:02:09

Synergee

Right, and not ever changing and not being willing to open your mind to the possibility that there could be other reasons for that. So I’m super glad to see your passion around this and hate that it was a story in which you had to experience a major change in your life, but that’s where, you know, that’s where change happens.

00:16:13:23 – 00:16:25:06

Elizabeth

And everything that the gut microbiome has been exposed to from the start of in utero until that current time of onset, impacts how that immune system is behaving. Yeah.

00:16:25:06 – 00:16:28:18

Elizabeth

So I feel like we know more about emfs than ever before.

00:16:28:20 – 00:16:40:16

Synergee

And still we struggle for continuity of care and for the word to get out about, inflammation. That’s the primary driver. Right. So what would you say to that?

00:17:21:16 – 00:17:23:19

Synergee

So did you end up writing that book on inflammation?

00:18:30:12 – 00:18:55:07

Elizabeth

And I truly, I do agree that, there is so much that oftentimes people are wanting to, you know, diagnostically prove. Right. Got to do those tests. And, you know, I think what I hear you saying is very similar to what Kelly and I say is the foundations of foundation. You have to start there. Right. Change what you eat, what you drink, how you sleep, move and think.

00:18:55:09 – 00:19:24:06

Synergee

Then, as you progress or not. Then maybe we do have to dig deeper and investigate. As you just said. I heard you say it is. You know, testing is appropriate at points looking at the gut microbiome, looking at food reactivity. But always not circumvent, not skipping those foundational principles that are just so important. So what are some of those other foundational principles I heard you say talking to them through the language of what not to eat.

00:19:24:12 – 00:19:27:10

Synergee

Right. Keep those out. But what are some other things?

00:19:53:21 – 00:20:15:22

Elizabeth

Watching your stool. And the best way that you can personally assess your health on a daily basis and see how you are doing and that is really, a crucial thing. And for so many people with chronic ailments, their. That is not right. And if we don’t fix a guy, they’re never going to be able to achieve a healthy diet.

00:20:15:22 – 00:20:20:05

Elizabeth

And they’re hoping for the will to function the way that they should.

00:20:20:05 – 00:20:30:11

Synergee

So can we talk about poop for a little bit? I know some of our listeners are kind of cringing, but I think it’s a worthy topic.

00:20:30:11 – 00:20:38:03

Synergee

I want to hear one thing real quick and just say that, you know, one of the things that we say all the time is if you don’t have a healthy waste management system, you’ll never have a healthy immune system, right?

00:20:38:03 – 00:20:53:21

Synergee

Yeah. So, you know, we talk about waste management being a course here. You know, your detox organ systems, which we know the liver and the skin and all of that. But the start of it is that football field within your gut, you know, right in here, that midsection. So I’m with you. I think people are curious. You know,

00:20:53:21 – 00:20:58:23

Synergee

I, I have patients of course we talk about that every day in the clinic and it doesn’t bother me at all.

00:20:59:01 – 00:21:07:13

Synergee

And some patients are like, I cannot believe I’m talking about this. So maybe this discussion would be a preemptive to a visit, right where they can get comfortable

00:21:07:13 – 00:21:18:23

Synergee

knowing what they should be looking for. So tell us, what should they be looking for? What are some signs and symptoms that things are not okay? What is ideal versus what should be considered a problem?

00:21:18:23 – 00:21:35:13

Elizabeth

Such great topics and like you guys, I. I talk about food. And I always I always shock when somebody objects because I’m like that’s my whole world. You know,

00:21:35:13 – 00:21:45:02

Elizabeth

you have a mom is a nurse. So I think that’s kind of it’s here because we talked about it at the dinner table too, and became completely okay and almost entertainment

00:21:45:02 – 00:21:51:03

Elizabeth

I have with my father, who always has more about it than my mother.

00:21:51:04 – 00:22:23:21

Elizabeth

She’s more of a problem. I would think so, so one of the things that I give all of my clients is the birth of all struggles. Yes. So the first instance that I was involved in Bristol, England, and it’s basically a scale of 1 to 12, I can’t recall, week starting from going from the complete watery diarrhea all the way to solid rabbit pellets that can’t be fast, and in the middle is a perfect fit.

00:22:23:23 – 00:22:51:21

Elizabeth

And the perfect poop should be like, like kind of a and a little bit of an aged banana. Like a soft, brown, fully formed crescent, more or less that, that slides out easily from people when you are ready to poop. And that is a perfect tip. And so that is the goal, whenever you’re to be. But really to back that up, the goal is to have a poop every day, at least at least one poop every day.

00:22:51:21 – 00:23:16:18

Elizabeth

And if you don’t, you’re the person who says, I want to make this like my mechanism. That is not you’re accountable. And the doctor can tell you that because that is not healthy and not okay. And if you cannot take out the garbage on a regular basis, then that garbage goes back into your body and you become much more toxic and much harder to deal with.

00:23:16:20 – 00:23:39:11

Elizabeth

For myself, I had a chronic constipation problem for a long time, and now I can look back and really attribute it to parasitic infection, which can cause constipation or diarrhea or kind of, alternation between the two of them. And again, we are not part of parasitic infection in this country. And we’re not, we don’t even think about it.

00:23:39:11 – 00:24:14:07

Elizabeth

But it’s much more common than me and led to believe the CDC believes seven out of ten adults and parasites in their body, and the human body does not like to have foreign invaders in it. So it will do whatever it needs to do to prevent that. There, there. And if you’re not paying attention and are just going to grab her with air because the whole of a parasite or the role of a parasite is to find a host and set up residence and repopulate and travel more freely.

00:24:14:07 – 00:24:25:05

Synergee

So you’re saying something like that can either create constipation or diarrhea or going back and forth between the two. And so either of those challenges would be something to report.

00:26:33:00 – 00:26:57:17

Elizabeth

So these are common complaints that people will have and sometimes settle for because they think, oh, I just have a little arthritis or, you know, I’m prone to headaches, but they don’t really correlate what’s going on in the gut microbiome or perhaps what it is that they’re eating, because oftentimes food sensitivities will show up in the same way they’ll have an inflammatory response after that meal and not really connect the dots between the two.

00:26:57:17 – 00:27:21:03

Elizabeth

Exactly. I have a client who has restless leg syndrome, and she was just complaining, and she said that she’s just found her doctor and medication that she’s been on hasn’t stopped working. And, he said my next step is the opiates. And she’s like, I really don’t want to get on that. Yes. I’m like, well, you know, when you’re ready, we should look at your diet.

00:27:21:03 – 00:27:44:23

Elizabeth

Because I know, for example, that you drink a lot of flavored waters that have natural flavors. And, and I know for myself, when I drink those waters, I get restless bites and if I have at night and it’s very painful, I know what it feels like. And right for me. I know it’s natural flavors, so that could be something to investigate.

00:27:45:00 – 00:27:51:07

Elizabeth

But again, until they’re ready, you can’t force anybody to do anything. Right.

00:27:51:07 – 00:27:58:10

Synergee

So you have invented an interesting way of cooking and preparing things to help with autoimmunity. Tell us about that.

00:27:58:10 – 00:28:12:15

Elizabeth

When I met my fiancee who’s now been my husband for 26 years, he pointed out that my diet was probably and convinced me that really I wanted to improve my diet and eat and clean our diet.

00:28:12:15 – 00:28:38:00

Elizabeth

Not only organic foods, but a whole group. And when I did all of my deep dive into research from the Mayo Clinic and the FDA and things like that, what I synthesize from all of them with that, even though they were all kind of giving me slightly different advice for cancer, for heart disease or for diabetes, what they were really all saying is that if you stick with whole foods versus processed foods, you will be better off.

00:28:38:02 – 00:29:02:23

Elizabeth

So that became my mantra: all foods are better than processed foods. But I didn’t really know how to cook. So I started taking cooking classes and watching the Food Network, which was in its infancy at that time, and starting to experiment in the kitchen. Where it really took me wondering, was that to prepare all of your meals from Whole Foods is very kind and labor intensive.

00:29:03:01 – 00:29:25:14

Elizabeth

And I was very frustrated by that and spending three hours maybe preparing dinner and then 45 minutes coming up afterwards. And I hope I’m not a genius. One homework better than that. So that really wasn’t working well for me. But I was dedicated to cleaning up my diet and focusing more on the whole foods. So one night we were watching late night TV.

00:29:25:14 – 00:29:46:18

Elizabeth

In those days we only had three channels before we could afford cable, and this guy came on an infomercial and he said, what can I do? Can I have a plan to like and read? This whole meal is chemical plants because of dry rice and a can of tomatoes. And then he puts a metal grate on it like that barbecue for February and he puts chicken rice on top of that.

00:29:46:20 – 00:30:15:09

Elizabethn

And because another metal was right and put the brownies on top of that covers the whole incident and turns it off. And I thought, that was brilliant. I want to be able to make my whole Whole Foods based meal and 1 in 1 pot, but I don’t have one of those appliances that he’s talking about. I don’t have any of those metal grates in between things, and I really don’t care about the wrapping.

00:30:15:10 – 00:30:46:10

Elizabeth

So I went over to my oven and we had just received a gift. A wedding gift, a cast iron, a little cast iron Dutch oven. And we thought, oh, this is so cute, but what do we do with it? I never had a pot like this. And so based on what I had seen him do, I went to my freezer and I pulled out a couple of frozen fish for my eyes and my fridge, and I collapsed vegetable, but happened to have some fresh herbs from my garden.

00:30:46:12 – 00:31:10:23

Elizabeth

And I just literally layered them into this cast iron Dutch oven. And then I went to my stove and I thought, well, for my oven. And I thought, I bet that it gets pretty hot. So I turned my oven up to 450 degrees. Now, you might be laughing if you know how to cook your like you never know if you cook, but I didn’t know how to.

00:31:11:01 – 00:31:28:13

Elizabeth

Put everything in and I put the right on the cast iron Dutch oven. And I just put it inside the oven and then after about half an hour, it just all smelled like dinner. And that’s literally become the way that we clapped. It was just really easy to just take Whole Foods in my ears and then to look at and let me think about it.

00:31:28:13 – 00:31:49:06

Elizabeth

It was so easy until my college roommate came to stay for a week, and at the end of the week she said, would you please teach me how to cook? Why? Because I said, well, you know, kind of your mom’s from Italy, from the great food program, but it’s so, so much of a bigger delight. Your food is fresh and delicious.

00:31:49:08 – 00:32:14:22

Elizabeth

And I said, what? You saw me. I just literally think the things I’m like are better. But she said, well, I think there’s a little bit more to it than that. So I sat down and wrote what I considered to be an instruction manual and then spent a number of years trying to find a publisher and an agent to do it, and finally gave up and published it myself in 2005.

00:32:14:22 – 00:32:24:20

Elizabeth

And then sold 15,000 copies myself, and then sold it to a random House. And then we published it. So that’s the version of the gamble.

00:32:24:20 – 00:32:36:16

Synergee

That’s awesome. I love that it’s not a new appliance. Right. It’s just a different way of is it. Yeah. But it’s not like a yeah, tabletop appliance. It’s really something probably most people already have.

00:32:36:16 – 00:32:38:22

Synergee

I have a Dutch job. I have a couple of Dutch ovens that I use. I would think most people have a Dutch oven in their kitchen. And what a blessing to be able to learn to cook whole foods based on easy one pot meals. I mean, that’s awesome.

00:32:51:03 – 00:32:54:13

Synergee

Since everything in the cookbook, in the cast iron skillet.

00:32:54:15 – 00:33:00:04

Synergee

Or is there other cookware that you recommend as time has passed?

00:33:00:04 – 00:33:02:23

Elizabeth

Well, so not a skillet, a Dutch oven?

00:33:02:23 – 00:33:05:05

Synergee

Oh yeah. I’m sorry. Yes,

00:34:02:00 – 00:34:09:02

Synergee

What role? And this is just a question. What role do heavy metals and metals as a whole play in Miss?

00:35:03:15 – 00:35:26:13

Synergee

Yeah. And part of the reason that I ask beyond understanding that relationship is because you know, of, you know, just, you know, our brains and the relationship is, you know, cookware we, we commonly get asked, you know, what do you use for cookware. What is the safest? And I think, I guess we could apply some of the same conversation about what we know not to do.

00:35:26:17 – 00:35:37:01

Elizabeth

Right. And we’re learning what to do over time. But when you get asked that question, do you have a particular answer for that?

00:36:12:10 – 00:36:22:06

Elizabeth

I see a lot of cookware now being promoted as better options that are coated and maybe they are PFOA free, but what else do they have in that coating?

00:36:22:06 – 00:36:25:02

Synergee

That’s been my question that I haven’t really had clarity on.

00:36:25:02 – 00:36:30:23

Elizabeth

So I too am a fan of the cast iron, and I think that’s probably, for now, the safest way to go.

00:36:30:23 – 00:36:34:19

Synergee

I also like ceramic. I think ceramic can be really good.

00:36:34:19 – 00:36:38:23

Synergee

Do you have to be careful about the ceramic as far as, like the coating on the ceramic?

00:36:38:23 – 00:36:42:04

Synergee

Like what’s the what are the guidelines there for ceramic.

00:36:42:04 – 00:36:51:21

Elizabeth

And that’s where I feel challenged to be. Clear guidelines. Yeah. Yes it’s ceramic but the coating to make. Yeah. Yeah.

00:36:51:21 – 00:37:00:13

Elizabeth

And I think to your point I think to your point earlier I think the coating may be fine but it’s very very difficult to keep that coating intact.

00:37:00:15 – 00:37:10:01

Synergee

So then when that coating becomes not intact what are we doing. I mean that’s my question. I don’t know the answer, but I just am concerned about that because we know that,you know, these toxins do bio accumulate. And there is a threshold of tipping point for a person. And we don’t know what that is for each individual person.

00:37:18:16 – 00:37:26:10

Elizabeth

It is dependent on many, many things. But the more that we can do to control the things that we can control, for the better we do long term.

00:38:10:14 – 00:38:25:12

Synergee

And I heard you say earlier about artificial sweeteners, too. Do you have a list? You know, just one of the absolute nos. That is a common question. And, you know, we have a pretty hard stance on this, so I’m looking forward to hearing yours.

00:39:40:07 – 00:39:45:12

Synergee

Have you played around with allulose? Have you done any utilization of loss yet?

00:39:45:12 – 00:39:47:18

Elizabeth

I have not, what do you think? 

00:39:47:18 – 00:39:52:19

Synergee

Well I mean we’re using it. We just started using it a few weeks ago and we’re monitoring.

00:39:52:19 – 00:39:58:03

Synergee

We do a lot of continuous glucose monitoring, and we’re actually seeing lower blood sugars. Like it lowers blood sugar beyond, you know, if we’ve got people that were monitoring before and then monitoring after. And I’m just fascinated, you know, doctor matter kind of put it on the map as far as a way of lowering uric acid. And so I’m just curious at this point.

00:40:13:14 – 00:40:14:23

Synergee

I mean, I think time will tell.

00:40:49:23 – 00:41:14:09

Synergee

Yeah. We absolutely do not recommend sugar alcohols. They completely disrupt the gut microbiome. And so many of the other products that are out there like stevia are often cut with a product that’s a sugar alcohol right. To make it less expensive or for whatever reasons, you know, the manufacturers try to do some of that, you know, that shady stuff that they like to do trick us as consumers.

00:41:14:09 – 00:41:40:22

Synergee

But, we’re with you. Yeah. It’s, I think the, you know, the research is out that, you know, the verdict is out. I don’t think that we know yet about allulose, but we are doing continuous glucose monitoring, which we, you know, are fascinated around metabolic syndrome and just metabolic disorders. Right. And dysregulation. And so these, these, these continuous glucose monitors have allowed us to see point in time when you do something.

00:41:40:22 – 00:41:45:13

Elizabeth

How does the body respond to that? 

00:41:55:17 – 00:42:14:00

Synergee

Yeah. I don’t know that. Yeah. This is so new. Yeah. More to come. I was just curious about your perspective. So we know diet has a huge impact on inflammation. In fact the things that we put into our body, 90% of our inflammation comes from what we’re eating, right? What we’re deliberately putting into our body.

00:42:14:02 – 00:42:27:19

Synergee

So there’s huge power in that, right? I mean, I think there’s amazing power in the ability to change what we put in our body in the way of food. What other things, what other foundational things do you think are important for the patient with autoimmunity?

00:42:27:19 – 00:42:34:08

Synergee

To be embraced as lifestyle changes and lifestyle factors to be considered in their planning?

00:43:57:03 – 00:44:11:04

Synergee

And I would imagine that things like sleep play a role, too, right? So do you have a specific amount of time, or tell us a little bit about what you would recommend in the area of sleep for your patients.

00:44:58:16 – 00:45:19:04

Elizabeth

It is such an individual thing. And I love what you said about, you know, just we, we do have to honor the individuality of the people that we treat and meet them where they’re at. And we don’t, you know, reiterate, and we get into conversations like this a lot. Your value and worth isn’t your work, right?

00:45:19:04 – 00:45:38:11

Elizabeth

It’s. You don’t have to be working 24 over seven. You should be taking time to stop and do that. It’s just very, very tough. I think in the world we live in today, the demands are great, right? It’s pursue, pursue, pursue, and that’s leading us down a path amongst others. Right. Our exposures are one thing, but our choices are another.

00:45:38:11 – 00:45:40:14

Elizabeth

It’s just leading us down a bad path.

00:45:40:14 – 00:45:49:13

Synergee

So I think I’ve heard you say it’s like clean air, right? The things we breathe, we want to have clean air. We want to have clean food. I’m assuming clean water.

00:45:49:13 – 00:45:59:01

Synergee

I had an interesting situation this week. I had ordered a product. And I’m not going to say the vendor’s name, but it’s a very well-respected vendor in the nutritional nutraceutical world.

00:45:59:01 – 00:46:07:08

Synergee

It was a new product, with minerals. And, I got the product in and I looked at the label and labels didn’t make sense to me.

00:46:07:08 – 00:46:16:06

Synergee

And so I reached out to the vendor and I said, could you please stand over, send over the spec sheet? I want to see, like, what are these 84 different minerals in this product?

00:46:16:08 – 00:46:42:20

Synergee

Because all they had listed was potassium, magnesium and sodium. And I got the list back and on the list was arsenic and mercury and lead and cadmium and. Yeah. And they were showing like the, the legal threshold or that’s not the right word, but the, the threshold of reasonability, I guess. Exactly. Yeah. The acceptable threshold versus what was in the product and it was below the threshold.

00:46:42:22 – 00:46:55:22

Synergee

But then it really made me start thinking about our water. You know, it’s in our mineral supplement because it’s made from pond water basically. That’s how they harvested it. And that’s what’s in our groundwater.

00:46:55:22 – 00:47:07:01

Synergee

Right. And so unless we’re using some type of filter to filter our water, we’re getting exposed to that because municipal plants are only purifying.

00:47:07:03 – 00:47:12:08

Synergee

They’re getting rid of the bacteria at best. But they’re not filtering. Most of them aren’t.

00:47:12:08 – 00:47:27:20

Elizabeth

And so I think that filtration I don’t know what you talk to your patients about, but I’m constantly talking about clean air, clean food, clean water as a foundation. And I think the clean water kind of gets dismissed because they’re drinking bottled water and they think that that’s better.

00:47:27:20 – 00:47:47:02

Elizabeth

And we know that that’s not because, number one, the plastic exposure. But oftentimes it’s just chlorinated water that’s been put into those bottles, and still contains those heavy metals. So I just thought it was an interesting thing that happened this week, right? In the world of trying to do good things.

00:47:47:02 – 00:47:52:05

Elizabeth

You know, when I went to a natural health workshop and.

00:47:52:12 – 00:48:26:22

Elizabeth

Right around 2000 and in this natural health workshop, that was the first time I had really learned about an exposure to chlorine from our municipal water supplies, which are using it again in the bacterial, but all that fluorine is coming through all of our water. And it’s one thing when the chlorine is cold, but it’s another thing when you heat it up in your shower, in your back, and when you aerosolize and now you’re breathing in chlorine vapors, which is incredibly harmful for human health.

00:48:27:00 – 00:48:52:23

Elizabeth

So I think it was 2000. We put our first whole house water filter in the house, and now we have a seven step water filter that’s right where the water source comes into our house. So every faucet, every shower, every bathtub, everything has filtered water. And then beyond that, we further filter our drinking and cooking water.

00:48:53:01 – 00:49:15:19

Elizabeth

We have a gravity filter that creates alkaline water for that as well and adds minerals back in. But yes, water is a huge, huge factor. And when I see people drink which were attacked, I love the glass of water. I’m literally horrified.

00:49:15:19 – 00:49:21:02

Synergee

And you mentioned the minerals because, you know, when we do filter our water, we remove the minerals.

00:49:21:04 – 00:49:35:13

Elizabeth

And so that can be an area of mineral depletion over time. So we do want to be mindful of how we replace those minerals with what we’re eating or what we’re taking in. And so I do think that’s worth it. I’m glad that you have a filter that does that for you.

00:49:35:13 – 00:49:40:00

Synergee

So if you want to share the brands of those, I think that would be helpful for our listeners too.

00:49:40:00 – 00:49:44:16

Synergee

I have a full house filter, but I don’t have anything that re-mineralizes. 

00:49:44:16 – 00:50:02:21

Elizabeth

Yes, our full house filter is a system called handling it a lot. And I think it’s like a seven that. Yeah. You process and our first order and our first house was just from seeing her downstairs. Is this similar? But it was still something.

00:50:02:21 – 00:50:31:21

Elizabeth

Yeah. And then our countertop filter in the Lincoln Pi nine filter, which I really, really like. And we had for maybe 20 years as well. And we just replace the filter and the stem stands on the bottom. Speaking of minerals, that’s another thing we don’t learn in school, right? Like elementary school students, minerals are the foundation of life and minerals are the black.

00:50:31:23 – 00:51:05:05

Elizabeth

You’re not living well and not feeling good. It was, and I feel like such a learning point for me when I realize that we are part of this earth. We are part of this planet, and we are made from the same things that this planet is made from. And that is an important part to how our bodies, this amazing, complex biological, chemical, electrical system works.

00:51:05:07 – 00:51:31:10

Elizabeth

We need minerals. And especially as someone with multiple sclerosis, which is really an electrical dysfunction in our systems, when the nerves or the messages from the brain misfire go into the body, well, all those messages are carried through synapses, through our nerves. And those synapses travel just like lightning through a swimming pool. They travel through this interstitial liquid.

00:51:31:10 – 00:51:39:14

Elizabeth

And if there’s not enough and the right amount of minerals dissolved in this interstitial liquid. And I don’t have tricity, nor do I have a traveler’s wife.

00:51:39:14 – 00:51:53:10

Elizabeth

And minerals are the catalyst for hormones. Right. They’re the ions that help hormones get intracellular and work better. So for all of our patients that are interested in just hormone balance, better energy, the mitochondria needs minerals to fuel.

00:51:53:10 – 00:51:57:09

Elizabeth

And so minerals are really our spark plugs right.

00:51:57:09 – 00:52:12:13

Elizabeth

I still think the medical world is kind of behind on their stress about minerals. They don’t really focus on them, maybe as much as they should and they don’t really understand. Yeah.

00:52:12:13 – 00:52:20:08

Elizabeth

I just think that our environment has evolved a lot faster than we can evolve, genetically speaking, for sure.

00:52:20:08 – 00:52:41:07

Elizabeth

But also just from a mindset perspective. You know, our soil is not as rich as it used to be. So our vegetables are not as nutritious as they used to be. And, we just haven’t really accepted that. And learning like supplementation is often necessary to plug those holes because of what the extent to our environment has changed.

00:52:41:07 – 00:53:03:08

Synergee

In my clinic, I do like to try to reduce the inflammation first and then focus on supplementation just so that we can suss out what is actually sure pathway information, what is the cause of deficiencies, and what can we write about it? What information, and just allowing the body to really function. All that supposed to

00:53:03:08 – 00:53:06:02

Synergee

that you speak to is just having that strategic approach.

00:53:06:02 – 00:53:33:06

Synergee

Right. And I am pro pro-trade. Yeah. So well, it has been such a pleasure to talk with you today. Thank you so much for using your story to impact the lives of others and years and years and years of, I, I say blood, sweat, tears, you know. You have been a pioneer, if you will. Right. We’re just really grateful for the opportunity that we’ve had to talk to you today and for taking time out of your schedule.

00:53:33:08 – 00:53:41:09

Synergee

How do people find your books? Tell us just your website. Give us a little bit more information on how they would get in. Contact me.

00:53:41:09 – 00:53:56:23

Synergee

Well, I’m selfish. You have to be able to talk about today. This has been just a fantastic conversation and I’m so glad that we have done it, and I hope people learn a lot from it and give and take a lot of information because I think we covered a lot today.

00:53:57:01 – 00:54:31:04

Elizabeth

So the best way to reach me is at my website, which is yours. Now that and my book is called Glorious One Hot Meals. And if you go to Glorious One, you know, it’s glorious. Like how I met Gloria. You’ll see, there’s one way that you can sign up, and you can get a free gift to all your pantry in your freezer to make it really super easy to cook healthy Whole Foods meals all the time.

00:54:31:06 – 00:54:55:22

Elizabeth

And then my new book that will be coming out soon, that web page is this information connection and that home and you can go there and you can get, on a visit to here at when, when the book is coming out. And then I will be the first to know. So sweet. Right after me, because I have so many things on the horizon.

00:54:59:02 – 00:55:03:12

Synergee

So wishing you all the best in what’s to come.

00:55:03:12 – 00:55:20:16

Synergee

The Synergee Podcast is for general informational purposes only and does not constitute the practice of medicine, nursing or other professional health care services, including the giving of medical advice. And no doctor patient relationship is formed. The content of this podcast is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment but instead for natural healing in Ridgeland MS.

00:55:20:16 – 00:55:29:22

Synergee

Users should not disregard or delay in obtaining medical advice for any medical condition they may have, and should seek the assistance of their health care professionals for any such conditions and natural healing in Ridgeland MS.