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Gut Healing Through Simplicity: Lee Holmes’ Food-First Approach · Wellness by Designs - Practitioner Podcast

• 0:14
  Speaker 1: Music.
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: This is Wellness by Designs, and I'm your host, andrew Whitfield-Cook.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: This is Wellness by Designs and I'm your host, andrew Whitfield-Cook.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: Joining us today is Leigh Holmes, who's a clinical nutritionist, a yoga teacher, a whole foods chef and an author.
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: Leigh also runs a four-week online program called Heal your Gut.
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Wellness by Designs, leigh.
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: How are you?
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: I'm great.
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: Thank you so much for having me.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: It's really good to be here.
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: Absolute pleasure to have you on the show Now, lee.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: Firstly, I've got to thank you for your time today.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: I know you're very busy, but let's go back into history.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: What first got you interested in gut health?
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I've always kind of been interested in health.
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: But I was working at the ABC in Sydney about 12 years ago and I got really sick, sort of really quite rapidly Lost a lot of weight.
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: My hair was falling out, I was covered in hives, I kept on going to work as you do I was a parent kept on pushing myself till eventually I couldn't really go on any further and I went through the medical system, which I found to be really quite complex because I felt like I was being pushed from one doctor to another with no real answers to anything at all.
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: So then what happened was I eventually was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease which eight years later was diagnosed as Crohn's, and something called fibromyalgia, which was, I felt, really achy and stiff when I got up.
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: So from there I was put on this concoction of different prescription medications which really messed me and threw me around a lot and I started to get really interested in gut health.
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: Back then I said to them do you think you know this has anything to do with diet?
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: Because I noticed when I eat certain things my symptoms really flare up, especially things like MSG and a lot of the preservatives in foods.
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: I was putting lean cuisine in the microwave and, you know, for lunch at work and it would just make me feel really itchy and tired after eating.
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: And they said, no, no, nothing to do with your gut whatsoever, even though I have since been diagnosed with Crohn's.
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: So I was sort of on that sort of journey of learning about natural health and I really intrinsically thought it was my gut.
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: So I went home after being in hospital at St Vincent's for a little bit and started to cook really simple foods, because I just felt like I needed to just pare everything back and just go back to simple eating and whole foods and things like that.
• 2:41
  Speaker 2: And I did that and it really helped a lot.
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: And I was using garlic instead of a lot of the antibiotics I was given and curcumin and turmeric and, as you know, even my gastroenterologist is prescribing them to his patients now, which is amazing.
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: So I started to look at different food and food ingredients and it really helped me and I got so passionate about gut health.
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: I went back to study.
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: For six years I studied clinical nutrition and I did two courses in clinical nutrition and then I started my blog, supercharged Food, and yeah, I kind of just went from there and I really do feel like the gut is the epicenter to health and that was kind of where I knew everything was stemming from.
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: That's how I got into it.
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: Lee, can I ask you because this has been something of interest to me for some years you mentioned pairing back the foods for a certain time, so keeping them simpler.
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: I've seen um, a gastroenterologist, for instance, uh, in the mid north coast of new south wales.
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: Uh, uh, putting his now I think it was ulcerative colitis patients on.
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and, and this was a milk-based, uh protein, high calorie, uh liquid, but it was.
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: It was only for a short period of time.
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: Now, admittedly, it was dairy-based and a lot of people react to dairy.
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: I get it.
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: I get our preponderance to try and avoid dairy, but I wonder if all of these different types of things, even like the carnivore diet for autoimmune disease, whatever sort of diet it is, when they're paired back into a simple thing, is it that it's oligoantigenic?
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: Is it that part of this rest for the gut is just saying can you just leave me alone for a bit and just give me one or two things to think about, rather than 20 million?
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: yeah but then the job of healing begins.
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: What take me through this?
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: I I actually completely agree with that and everything that you're saying.
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: I know for me personally and a lot of my clients.
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: When you pare things back, I think less is more we can really overwhelm our gut and especially with taking things and lots of different things and it's just the the system.
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: When it's when you, when you have in a basis of inflammatory issues or you have immune dysregulation, which obviously you know the immune system, a lot of it is kind of produced.
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: Your immune cells are produced in the gut.
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: When you think about that, pairing it back and going really simple with food for me definitely helped me so much.
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: And then trying to do things that are cooked or or, um, like smoothies, just something really gentle on the digestion, so you're not then digesting lots of salads and nuts and really harsh things.
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: I found for me that really helped as well with things like bloating and things like pain after eating and things like that.
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: So I think just going back to basics and very, a very simple diet, even just for a little period of time, allows the body and the gut to sort of reset itself and calm down and really calm down any inflammation and what have you for the Crohn's.
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: It really helped me a lot, and then trying to eat more sort of whole foods, if you can.
• 6:00
  Speaker 2: I found that that was really helpful because I wasn't then trying to process artificial sugars and all these other things that kind of are quite difficult for the body to actually process.
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, I completely agree with you.
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and so obviously, though, at some stage you have to start reintroducing foods, and you know we need to think about healthy choices rather than unhealthy choices.
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: So so how do you do that with patients, particularly when they've got bad habits that they've hopefully we'd love to say they've left them behind, but their habits you know.
• 6:43
  Speaker 1: How do you prevent patients?
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: from falling back into the same old rut.
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think certainly, if you give them too many things to do, it's overwhelming for them.
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: So I try and change one thing a day.
• 6:51
  Speaker 2: So, whether it's getting up in the morning and having a smoothie with lots of different like fibre-rich veggies or some fruit or some good fats, flaxseed, that kind of thing I find that that kind of sets them up for the day, whereas if they start going back to their old habits some flaxseed that kind of thing I find that that kind of sets them up for the day, Whereas if they start going back to their old habits and in the morning especially, just eating cereal with lots of sugar and lots of dairy and what have you it kind of just they're like oh, I feel terrible.
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: Anyway, I may as well just eat what I want.
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: So I try and just start with simple things.
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: Simple things like just having a smoothie, or maybe just cooking meals ahead, or maybe just having a food prepared, or just very, very simple things, and definitely nothing too much for them.
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: I find that they just they're busy, everyone's busy and working, and they have families and things like that.
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: So it is very difficult.
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, pairing it back, going back again to simplicity.
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: What do you think?
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: Well, I totally agree with you, like the.
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: I mean, we know from historical data that people who tried and break a habit very often fall back into the same habit.
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: And I think you're right in that.
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: People try and change the whole thing, the whole thing in one fell swoop, and then they get confused and fall off the wagon.
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: So this gentle change, you know, and I think also a knowledge of why they're changing that thing a day or even every week, whatever they're doing about okay, this is why I'm doing that, that's why I'm doing this then that can give them the reasoning for changing their habits to healthy habits.
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah, lee, can I ask you, can I ask you?
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: At the beginning you mentioned the two diagnoses.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: One of them was Crohn's and, forgive me, I missed the other one.
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: Oh, fibromyalgia, which is sort of like feels like arthritis.
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: So I was waking up in the morning so stiff I felt like a 99-year-old woman.
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: I was like, why am I so stiff?
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: And fibromyalgia is a really funny one, because you can also feel it when the weather changes or the barometric pressure changes.
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: It's a really bizarre thing.
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: You feel stiff and you feel achy, a little bit like arthritis.
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: So yeah, and you also you have gut issues with it too.
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: It was all kind of interrelated and I feel that I've done a lot of research on this and Crohn's, and you also have gut issues with it too.
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: It was all kind of interrelated and I feel that I've done a lot of research on this and Crohn's, and it's almost like a triangle where you have some kind of irritable bowel disease and then you have fibromyalgia on top of that and some kind of inflammatory issue or a bladder issue as well.
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: It's like a triangle.
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: I've noticed with clients as well.
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you were mentioning also, you know, being a mother trying to push through once the symptoms appeared and, of course, it just ran your body into the ground, this whole stress response being one of the major drivers of inflammation, certainly in the 21st century.
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah, take us through that.
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: How do you talk to your patients?
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: yeah, um, I think that stress is.
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: There's research out there, as you know, that stress can actually strip the body of good, of good bacteria, so your microbiome goes out of balance.
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: And when your microbiome goes out of balance and your gut's out of whack, there are so many things that happen.
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: Your sleep's affected, as you know, your skin, you many things that happen.
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: Your sleep's affected, as you know, your skin.
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: You get skin disruptions, all of that sort of stuff.
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: So what I say to them is just to, yeah, again, just go back to basics.
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: And I became a yoga and meditation teacher when I was kind of like learning nutrition and I found that Vedic meditation, which is something that I do for like 20 minutes a day, was just a little thing that I could do in the morning.
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: That really set me up for the day and really helped with any kind of nervous system dysregulation, because I feel like nervous system dysregulation and feeling wired, a lot of people are stressed and anxious and wired.
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: If we can get to sort of the bottom of that, it's going to help all of the other things that happen.
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: So for me, it's like little things like breathing, doing some deep breaths, a bit of meditation, also mindful eating.
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: So I do talk to my clients a lot about mindful eating and also you know when a lot of them are, you know, working, they eat on on the run, they don't sit down, they don't chew their food properly, and then they're bloated, they gassy afterwards and they're like, oh, why am I so?
• 11:20
  Speaker 2: Why have I got all these symptoms?
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: So sometimes it's just simple things like that, like mindful eating and paying a little bit more attention to sitting down and chewing better, and that definitely those little things actually do really help digestion as well, I've found.
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: And also the other thing is going for a little walk after eating, which can help stimulate digestion, and that's that those little things have been very helpful for my clients and they find them easier than having a whole regime of things to do, you know.
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: One of the interesting symptoms I've seen in is they'll eat in a sympathetically stimulated state, but the feeling of bloatedness is not in the stomach area.
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: The feeling of bloatedness that they get immediately after a meal is actually in their lower abdomen.
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: Right, okay, that's a good point and I find that, hmm, like, are we talking about sympathetic, parasympathetic nervous stimulation?
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: Are we talking about, like, an immediate effect on fermentation?
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah, do we have an answer there?
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: Do we have any?
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: clues.
• 12:34
  Speaker 2: I don't know.
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: Is it to do with the small intestine and um the b12 and iron that you're kind of trying to get from your food, and because some, a lot of people like with microns, it's actually in the small intestine, so a lot of people have issues there and then you do get that like lower loading from that as well.
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: So it could be that, um, yeah, perhaps yeah.
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: So I remember going through this conundrum, going okay, do I give her a digestive enzyme because she's eating in the paris in a sympathetically stimulated state and talk about stress and vagus nerve stimulation and things like this.
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: Or do I give her something for the lower bowel like a uh, you know, an anti-bloating type?
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: Uh, uh yeah what do we call it?
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: a carminative, you know yeah, carminative yeah, um yeah, that's a good point.
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: A lot of people just stage me.
• 13:31
  Speaker 2: I feel like I'm pregnant.
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: I'm six months pregnant.
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: My tummy's so distended.
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: They haven't really made the distinction between the two.
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, that's really interesting.
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: Do you ever favour, like always starting at the top, or no, let's get things moving first and then we'll go back to digestion later.
• 13:50
  Speaker 1: Do you ever favour one over the other?
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: You know what?
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: I feel like everyone is so different and when I see that it's a stress-related response or a nervous system dysregulation, I kind of work more on getting them to try and relax and have more calmative approaches to what they're actually doing, rather than immediately jumping to things to give them, like supplements and things like that.
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: I try and work more on that, if that makes sense.
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely.
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: What about, though, herbs that support the nervous system during times of stress?
• 14:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I think a lot of people are now looking to ashwagandha like a lot.
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: You know how a lot of people talk about that at the moment.
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: Um, I think that that's been quite helpful for people.
• 14:43
  Speaker 2: Some people like if they're constipated and things like that and have a nervous thing sometimes.
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: Magnesium is something that I look to for clients as well.
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: Also, when looking at the whole microbiome, I would look at like a symbiotic type product with a probiotic, prebiotic, digestive enzyme and dietary fiber in one, because I feel like fiber is very underrated when it comes to gut health and you know a lot of people have been on paleo diets as well and they're not getting enough prebiotic rich fibers.
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: They're going, oh, I can't eat that sweet potato because I'm paleo, but then they're all coming to me with gut issues going oh, I was on paleo and now my gut's not working properly and they're not getting enough prebiotic rich fibers.
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, I talk to them about their diet a little bit.
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: We'll go through what they're eating and make a few little tweaks.
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: To start with, Do you know?
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: one of the things about paleo that interested me is that when I need to keep a person's name out of this, out of this, this person basically formulated the dietary requirements for a symposium, and when I went out there expecting to see meat upon meat upon meat upon meat, I was met with salad upon salad upon salad upon salad and there's some meat.
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: It was not the carnivore diet at all.
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: The paleo diet was largely plant-based and I thought about it and I thought hang on.
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: So while these neolithic humans were chasing down the meat prize, they had to eat along the way, and the things that were along the way were berries and tubers, and things like that.
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I thought so.
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: Is it that we actually got what we thought something was paleo diet?
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: Is it that we've just been doing it wrong?
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: I think, like I don't subscribe to any particular diets, like keto, paleo.
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: For me it's all about balance, whole foods, rainbow, eat the rainbow, things like that wrong and right like.
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: For me it's like the angel devil thing.
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: I think for a lot of my clients as well, they have that thinking and so it's very black and white like they, they're very much like them.
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: I can't eat this and it sets you up for a bit of, you know, eating disorder um territory.
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: When they're, they're kind of going down that road.
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: So I basically try and make things.
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: I don't try to subscribe to any diets and say we're doing it right or wrong sort of thing.
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: Does that make sense?
• 17:30
  Speaker 2: yeah, absolutely, and it's a very salient point about point about you make about the language that we use that can, in a susceptible person, lead them down an eating disorder time, um sort of framework yeah, I agree, and things like orthorexia, where I have some clients who they don't just eat clean, they eat squeaky clean and because of that they're anxious about what they eat, and then that anxiety sets them up for more dysregulation and it's just a cycle I've found.
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, I try and just keep things nice and gentle.
• 18:03
  Speaker 2: I'm a very gentle nutritionist and I just try and get them to choose for themselves and think a bit more for themselves, give them the options and and that kind of thing, but just say to them you know, don't be too strict on yourself, because that's just who wants to live like that.
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: Well, it's a good point.
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: You know Like it's something that certain cultures really get right.
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: You know the Mediterranean culture, it's not just about the food, it's about the social interaction.
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: In fact, amanda Arch archibald, she said the best word, and it was conviviality I like that there's this.
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: I love the word.
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, each meal was this family getting together and talking, discussing, even fighting and yelling and getting rid of energy and, and you know, like that sort of um I love that it's a real interesting word, yeah I don't know if you were the same, but remember growing up and like six o'clock was dinner and you would sit around the table and even if you were arguing with your siblings or whatever, you knew that six o'clock was dinner and you would sit down around a table and you'd maybe talk about your day or whatever, or have an argument with your sister or whatever, but still there was that beautiful coming together and connection around food, and I, for me, food is so important and it's something to really connect all of us, no matter what diet you just prescribe to or anything like that.
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: I feel like just coming together and enjoying food is so, so important for us as a society and I feel like we've really lost that because these days you look at a table and even if they're sitting down, there's someone on a mobile phone, there could be a computer open someone's TV.
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: We're kind of disconnected, don't you think?
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: Sometimes, in some places, Absolutely, absolutely.
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: We can go into the causes of that.
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: Started with TV maybe, but yeah, it's amazing, it's absolutely amazing this disconnection.
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: And so to ask a question about how do you approach that challenge with families.
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: So what I try and do is, it depends on, you know, whether they've got young kids, like with younger kids it's a bit easier, I think, because you know they do have that sort of meal time, but with older kids older kids at school and things like that they're kind of all over the place.
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: So what I say to them is one day a week, why don't you just cook a meal at home and then all have it together if it's a Friday night or a Thursday night, and just have that one day a week where you're all together?
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: At least that's starting something, something good, I think that.
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: So I just, yeah, that's how I kind of talk to them about it and they do enjoy it.
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I've had really good feedback on that.
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah, my wife, being the incredible human that she is, very early on got our well she is, she's amazing Very early on, got our kids interested in preparing meals and helping and seeing how you you know this lovely salad doesn't make itself.
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: There's a, there's a, a process you have to go through to to do this and you know you don't mulch it up, you just it's a light toss and you know when you're doing this, don't stir it in so there was this real interest and, um, both of my sons have taken that and they eat so healthily.
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: Now, they went through their time.
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: They did go through their time, but you know the sugar and the milk and all that sort of thing, but both of them are, so they're not, as you say, squeaky, but they're appreciative of good, healthy food and they enjoy.
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: It.
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: Oh, that's really good.
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: I think food culture there's a lot to be said for food culture and passing down beautiful things, like your wife is, to your children and hopefully they'll then pass it down to their children.
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: I think that if you've grown up in a food culture where it's instant pasta with a can of tomato sauce that you pour over the top, it's really hard to break the culture.
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: However, at any time when I do talks about this, actually at any time you can change your food culture.
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: You don't have to be stuck on.
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: You know how you grew up and I think that what your wife is doing is just so beautiful and I think it's really yeah, it's lovely, it's really lovely.
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: But it's missing.
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: Like I remember podcasting with Lisa Moan, who's a I'm going to get it wrong a feeding specialist, sos feeding specialist, a feeding specialist, um, sos feeding specialist, and she was making really good points to me.
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: That topsy-turvied what I thought we should be doing to help kids get to the table.
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and it was rich oh, she was so interesting because, well, I would say things like um you know, for instance, uh, don't feed the pet at the table.
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: And she said, no, no, no, I'll have arguments with parents about this.
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: She said, if that's a way that the child will enjoy food, that will normalise food.
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: I don't care if the dog eats it, if the child says I'm going to feed them.
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I agree with that.
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah, to get the good, nutritious food into our child that might have issues with texture or might have neuro atypical behaviors that you know heightens their anxiety and stops them eating healthy meals.
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: I don't care about so-called these.
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: You know manners that we grew up with.
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: I'm all for breaking.
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: And also kids need to have a diverse microbiome.
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: So if they're like touching the dog and then eating, I mean it's not too bad.
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: That's how we get the diverse microbiome.
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: Well, there's a beautiful segue to our next question Tell us more.
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: Tell us more about the microbiome.
• 24:12
  Speaker 2: So the way that I look at it is like an Amazonian rainforest, if you can imagine.
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: You know the birds and the butterflies and the flora and fauna and all that sort of stuff.
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: And I think when I talk to people about the microbiome, just in simple terms, I liken it to this rainforest where you've got to look after the soil, because it all kind of starts with the soil, don't you think?
• 24:33
  Speaker 2: So I talk to them about things like colostrum, zinc, vitamin d, vitamin c, things to really build that healthy soil, and then you've got the trees that are your probiotics.
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: So you want to be eating a lot of probiotic rich foods, if you can.
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: I know there's all different strains and the problem with probiotics, as you know, is some of them only last minutes in the gut, some last days, some last months.
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: There's everyone's got a particular different strain, different strains of them in the body.
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: So that's where prebiotics I think is so important.
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: That's where they come in to feed the good bacteria in the gut.
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: So I just say that the trees are, like you know, little babies with their mouths open.
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: You have to constantly feed them with great prebiotic rich foods sweet potato, chicory, dandelion, asparagus, onions, peas, those kinds of foods, and then your ecosystem will be thriving because it's working well, and then things will flourish, the trees will flourish and it is an ecosystem in there, and that's kind of how I personally look at it.
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally agree.
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: I was speaking with somebody else earlier and um mentioning a paper, one of my favorite papers, one of my favorite authors, catherine Lozapone, and she talks about how, um, we, we have, uh, our microbiota and we, we like to think of that as garden, even though it's not a flora.
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: But, anyway, we think about that as a garden, and what she was talking about in one of these papers was about it's not just one insult.
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: One insult is, like you know, a golf swing taking a divot out of the, out of the golf, um, fairway right, um.
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: but it's these multiple insults that keep chipping away at your garden, at your soil, and that's what changes the grass yeah, and I think for me a lot of and in with a lot of my clients, some of the things that really throw that balance off are things like smoking, alcohol, antibiotics, a high sugar diet, processed foods, inflammatory sort of foods and things like that.
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: So they can really throw that balance off and, yeah, I kind of talk to them about that and try and encourage them to eat a little bit more fresh if they can, and maybe look at a few recipes online if they like them, or in books, and then, yeah, try and start that way.
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: Just very simply yeah, what about?
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: we spoke earlier about probiotics, single versus, uh, you know mixtures, yeah, prebiotics included.
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: Um, do you have a, a phase where you might say, okay, let's start off with the prebiotic first, and where you might say, okay, let's start off with the prebiotic first and add the probiotic, or let's start off with the probiotic?
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: you also mentioned colostrum, so there's, there's now this non non milk, non-dairy serum yeah, immunoglobulin which I like I've fallen in love with it's actually saved me from and and it was and it was a dodgy prawn.
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: It seriously was the dodgy prawn thing wow now I'm interested now in this oh, this is great, but anyway.
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: So do you have a a time period where you'll start off on something and move to something else, like pre-bite?
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: first, yeah, a lot of my clients, um, you know they're on a certain budget and they don't um, want to go overboard with a lot of microbiome mapping and doing all the expensive tests and things like that.
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: So I do try and start with food to start with and take out some of the things that are disrupting their gut.
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: So, kind of, at a first thing we'll look at food, we'll try and do it through food and then see how they're going and things like that.
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: And then I would look to probably some kind of just low level multi-strain probiotic just to see whether that's going to help the engine work properly and get going and refuel them and give them energy and and create a microbiome that's actually generating energy for the body, which is what you want.
• 28:43
  Speaker 2: And then there are some immune system based probiotics that I am really interested in.
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: I'm learning more about them and I think they are good, because when you think about inflammation and the link between the immune cells talking to your microbiota, that is a real conversation that is happening there between the two and I think for me I would look at maybe some kind of multi-strain and see how they go, but definitely along the way, fiber and prebiotics and trying to get it through food.
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: I would recommend that soluble versus insoluble fiber need to need to cover that one I think, a balance of everything I think soluble and so insoluble.
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: I think resistant starch is also really important, like cooked and cooled rice is a good form of resistant starch.
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: Banana flour I would be looking at those as well like sort of a balance balance, sort of amount of fiber, but something easy that they can pick up from the supermarket, like banana fiber, banana flour you can buy in the supermarket now, which is really good.
• 29:49
  Speaker 2: Make some pancakes up.
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: I've got loads of recipes on my website for all these kind of foods, which is really good.
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: Um yeah, simple ways to get fiber, not not necessarily taking a big fiber supplement that your body will kind of start to get used to and rely on.
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: Um, yeah, okay.
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: So weaning off stuff, fiber, for instance.
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: You know like, for instance, you know, in the old days, when it was the only thing that we had fructo-oligosaccharides made from chicory, 40 percent of your patients got excessive wind and went nah and ibs yeah, so how do you, how do you introduce patients to fiber?
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: but you know particularly what you've spoken about banana, and for me it's again always goes back to the smoothie or the soup and so it's like fiber rich veggies or fiber rich fruit and veggies.
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: So when I make a smoothie, I'll put rocket in there, I'll put carrot in there, I'll put um.
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: I also put sometimes like coriander in there, and I put a little flat leaf parsley in there.
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: I do cucumber in there, I do.
• 30:56
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I try and kind of mix it up with something simple that they can just throw into a blender.
• 31:01
  Speaker 2: That's how I kind of start and then trying to have more fiber at each meal if they can.
• 31:06
  Speaker 2: So fiber rich veg or maybe some also like things like some lentils if they can manage them.
• 31:13
  Speaker 2: A lot of people with gut issues I've noticed lentils and and things like that are quite hard for them to digest, so we go really slowly with that yeah, what about chickpeas?
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: chickpeas as well.
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: Sometimes bloating cause bloating, a bit hard to digest, but making them into a hummus and adding sometimes garlic as well is a bit hard for people.
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: But if they've got that microbiome which is unbalanced, sometimes garlic is actually quite good for them.
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: So it's just finding a balance with ingredients and I'll give them some little recipes to try and see how they go.
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: Do you ever find that adding things like turmeric into your smoothie?
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: Helps to like.
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: Take that inflammatory component that I'm going to be wishy-washy and say upsetting component out of sometimes those gas-forming foods.
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I really do.
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: I really really do.
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: A lot of those Indian spices are like that as well.
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: They're very farm-ad, farmative.
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: Ginger is also really good, so I'll throw ginger into a smoothie.
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: Obviously, the curcumin component of the turmeric is the potent ingredient that can really help with inflammation.
• 32:25
  Speaker 2: There's so much research now out there and I'm so happy about all the research on turmeric.
• 32:30
  Speaker 2: I take turmeric myself, or curcumin, every day, and I also take fish oil, and I found those two things are really great for inflammation.
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: Personally, that was another one Fish.
• 32:46
  Speaker 2: Yes.
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: Red Emperor, anyone, anyway.
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: So with regards to fish we're talking mainly.
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: Fish is healthy.
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: Great.
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: There are some people who have gastroesophageal reflux disease and fish sometimes upsets them, I agree.
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: There's a protein, I can't remember.
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: What do you do in that sort of instance?
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's really hard for people with reflux, especially with fish oil and fish oil capsules and concentrated fish oil.
• 33:19
  Speaker 2: So if you're looking for that anti-inflammatory component I would give them.
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: I have this great flaxseed cracker recipe which I make, or I'd give them something.
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: I'd get them to put flaxseed in their smoothie and try and see if they're okay with different types of fish like whitefish or salmon or things like that.
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: Maybe if they're okay with tuna for them, that could be helpful for them as well sardines, those kinds of things.
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: So we just do it in stages.
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: Got it, and I also have a question about the different forms of zinc.
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: It's like zinc karnnosine, for instance.
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: Have you used this, yeah?
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: No, I haven't.
• 34:03
  Speaker 2: And zinc is normally when I'm speaking to my patients, what I try and do is because they are trying to save money and they're on a budget and things like that.
• 34:12
  Speaker 2: I try and find if they've got issues, I try and find a supplement that will cut across a few different areas that they need.
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: So magnesium, calcium, zinc, together with you know, maybe something else with it as well, maybe turmeric, which is going to kind of help them in a few ways.
• 34:30
  Speaker 2: That's what I do, but I don't generally prescribe single ingredient or single vitamins or minerals like that.
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: And where can we learn more?
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: Leigh, you've got your book right.
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I have my book.
• 34:48
  Speaker 2: Oh, my book is here.
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: This is my latest book.
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: I've got 11 books, but this is book number 11.
• 34:54
  Speaker 2: Oh, my goodness, yeah, so it's called Nature's Way to Healing A Long COVID Guide, because I contracted long COVID after getting COVID and this book is for anyone that has post-viral fatigue, chronic fatigue, post-viral issues, so it's a really good one for that.
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: There's 30 recipes in there and there's a protocol in there, and I taught there's a protocol in there too.
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: So, and I worked with a naturopath on the book as well and I've done a nutritional component of it and I've worked with doctors from all over the world on this book and researched it.
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: So, yeah, that's it.
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: It's called nature's way to healing along cover guide I love your work, lee.
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: I love your practical approach to things about, because our, our whole civilization is based around eating, around food we need to recapture healthy habits, rather than the unhealthy habits that we see so often um so thank you so much for taking us through.
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: How you know, having a joyful experience with food can impact on our microbiota and therefore our health.
• 36:01
  Speaker 2: Thank you so much for joining us on Wellness by Design, my pleasure.
• 36:04
  Speaker 2: Thank you for having me.
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: It's our pleasure to have you on board.
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: Remember, we'll put up all of the resources we've discussed in today's podcast and there's the other podcasts on the Designs for Health website.
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: I'm Andrew Whitfield-Cook.
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: Other podcasts on the Designs for Health website.
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: I'm Andrew Whitfield-Cook.
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: This is Wellness by Designs.