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Why More Fiber Could Make All The Difference Not Just for Your Gut But Weight & Mood · Doctor Turned Health Coach

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  Welcome to the Doctor Turned Health Coach Podcast. My name is Dr. Ashuri.
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  I'm a family medicine physician turned health coach. And today,
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  we're going to talk about fiber.
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  Well, you've probably heard already way too much about fiber.
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  And yet again, I think it's incredibly valuable to talk about the importance
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  of fiber and what it's going to do for your health in so many different aspects
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  that you may not even know about.
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  So let's start with what we know about fiber.
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  Fiber helps slow down the movement of food through the intestine.
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  It makes sure that you actually absorb more nutrients rather than more calories,
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  so it lowers the calorie absorption.
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  Fiber is also necessary to feed all of the many different gut bacteria you have,
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  which are essential for vitamin production, vitamin synthesis,
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  oxidation, decreasing inflammation.
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  Neurotransmitters that help you feel less depressed, less anxious, help you with sleep.
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  All of these things are essential and they're done by the gut bacteria.
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  If they're not getting enough fiber they're not
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  going to thrive and on the other hand if
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  they're getting too much sugar then the bacteria you
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  don't want to thrive will thrive and they will out compete your good bacteria
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  so fiber is absolutely essential and though i know that there's a lot of debate
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  online there's people out there saying fiber is actually not that big of a deal
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  we're getting too much fiber and all of these things it may be true that.
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  For a certain individual, but for the average person, and certainly most of
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  the patients I've taken care of, they have had a major lack of fiber in their diet.
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  Fiber also helps satiate you. You actually feel more full. You feel full longer with fiber.
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  You can also feel more full with protein. The downside with protein is that
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  it also comes with a lot of calories.
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  For people who try to satiate themselves with protein, they end up having to eat a lot less,
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  and that can be a little bit unpleasant to go hungry for that part of the meal,
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  even though you might feel fuller later.
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  Those are some of the downsides with doing it with protein.
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  Fiber comes from all of the different fruits and vegetables,
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  nuts and seeds, beans, right?
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  Those are the main sources of fiber. When you have white rice,
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  you're not getting any fiber.
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  When you have white bread, you're not getting any fiber.
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  When you have milk, you're not getting any fiber. When you have chicken breast,
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  when you have beef, steak, sausage, eggs, that's not a source of fiber.
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  In order for your plate to have a lot of fiber, we must include fiber some way, somehow.
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  One of the things I do with my health coaching clients is I rarely have them cut out any food.
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  What I do ask them of is that they introduce the important things in the food,
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  meaning here's the plate that you've always created.
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  The way we're going to redesign this plate is add a bunch of fiber to it.
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  The ratio of fiber to bland calories, to simple calories, has to be high enough
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  that you actually get the benefits of fiber for your overall health.
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  If, for example, somebody's having two boiled eggs for breakfast,
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  it's necessary to add in some vegetables.
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  Some 100% whole grain bread, in order for that to become a nutritious meal.
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  That is why oftentimes oatmeal can be
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  a better option now of course we can take oatmeal
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  and we have all the fiber and then we can
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  sort of delete some of the fiber effects by
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  adding in a ton of sugar but it takes a
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  lot of sugar to really cause problems so one
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  of the best steps you can take today is to figure
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  out how can you squeeze in a little
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  bit more fiber into your diet how you can
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  how can you sneak in a little
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  bit more fiber so if you got a club sandwich
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  and it's got a tiny slice of tomato tiny little
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  bit of lettuce a huge chunk of turkey huge blt or something and it's got a ton
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  of mayo and white bread could you substitute the bread for whole wheat bread
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  could you add in a lot more veggies
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  four more tomatoes bunch more lettuce could you cut back on the mayo?
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  Could you cut back on the turkey a little bit in size to shift the ratio to more fiber?
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  What you'll notice over time is that you can suddenly eat more food,
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  you can have larger plates, you can eat and feel more satiated.
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  In return, you'll also lose weight.
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  Your body composition will become healthier and better.
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  One of the big advantages of fiber is that you can have it in very large amounts,
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  and it's very rare for that to cause any kind of metabolic issues or problems
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  with your body composition.
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  So I hope I gave you a bit of a primer on fiber, and of course in one of our
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  deep dive topics, I'll come back to it and I'll address it in more detail.
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  If you'd like to work with me individually, send me an email, hello at drashori.com.
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  In the show note descriptions. You can find out more about working with me,
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  and thank you for listening.