METABOLIC DYSFUNCTION
What Is It?
Metabolic dysfunction can encompass a range of what we’ve come to know as chronic illness or syndromal conditions including chronic fatigue, long-covid, even autism, PANS, chronic inflammatory conditions. Alzheimer’s, autoimmune disorders, and what gets diagnosed as mental health issues such as bipolar disorder and depression.
And while this can feel like a generalized statement and each presentation may combine individual systems differently, we can benefit from seeing these conditions not as unique but, on a whole, a malfunctioning that can be corrected when given the proper conditions.
Systems work together and this approach intends to look at the parts but see them in relationship to one another.
For instance, when we heal the gut, we heal not only the brain as well but the whole system. No space remains unimpacted. Up to eighty percent of our immune system resides in the gut.
This is huge . . . and overlooked by many in today’s health and wellness industries and doctor’s offices.
So what are we going to do about this?
These Modern Conditions
If we continue to ignore them, our symptoms, syndromes, and illnesses persist, and we continually turn to expensive protocols and funtional medicine, frustrating doctor’s visits, and a medical industry that won’t acknowledge chronic conditions or remains baffled. Alternatively, when one takes things into their own hands, they’re often led down rabbit holes and may even spend decades that sadly go nowhere.
Tapping into the little bit of time, money, effort, and energy we may have, let’s begin with where you are at and get you on a path to truly healing from the ground up—literally, the terrain of your very being—your gut and microbes.
And while this can all be customized to individuals, beginning even in a general way will start to shift you—so much so that things will get easier and feel more natural as you heal.
All of us are born into this modern world compromised—whether from our mothers, deficient environments, and conditions such as our food supply, soil, and a modern world filled with stress, screens, indoor-living. We’ve all had exposures to toxins—some more severe than others—and suffer the downsides of antibiotics, vaccines, prescription meds, processed foods.
Where to Begin
The good news is there is a lot that we can do to reverse things. But it takes time. It takes commitment. And , honestly, in today’s world it’s counter-cultural. Which means we are swimming against the times; and, yet, we acknowledge that these times we live in give us plenty of opportunity to override the needs of our bodies and sacrifice our wellness. Each person needs to come to this on their own time and with a willingness to heal.
Once you make that committment, even with as much willingness as you can muster, I’m here to support you on that journey and to help you around whatever obstacles may arise. What I can say is that making these changes is every bit worth the gains you will begin to experience and ther reversals of syndromes and symptoms you may never thought possible.
Below are some suggestions and places to begin.
Remove Anti-Nutrients
Many of us may think we’re eating healthy (i.e., vegetarian, tons of veggies, gluten free, even dairy-free) or that we have “tried everything” and nothing works, but when we begin to gradually shift to a more ancestral way of eating and living, we start to more deeply understand that we are not actually eating foods that support our healing.
For one, plants can actually do more harm than good. That is one of the first ideas to begin to understand and apply. Many people will resist this after we’ve been conditioned to believe in plants as a source of nutrition and healing. It can take a lot of “de-programming” and even disbelief to wrap your mind around. I provide some resources below for further study. If you don’t eat meat are vegan or vegetarian, you can still apply other principles here, but it’s best to first undrestand the impact of anti-nutrients to our modern human bodies.
In short, lectins, oxalates, phytates, and other plant-dervied anti-nutrients can actually harm us. Some are like tiny crystals that keep our gut and other mucosal linings permeable; accumulations of these anti-nutrients can also prevent us from absorbing nutrients from foods. While there are many other negative consequences, those two alone can account for malabsorption, malnutriiton, and auto-immune conditions from leaky gut, not to mention inflammation and unresolving gut dysbiosis.
However, it should be noted that when one starts reducing these plant toxins, we may begin to “dump” stores of them from our systems; oxalates in particular can be pretty “gritty” and sharp and cause dumping symptoms that can lead to burning, rashes, itching, temporary increase in histamine or mast-cell activation. So we want to go slowly when removing them. And while this may seem uncomfortable, the wellness you can acheive will be worth it.
(see further resources below)
Remove Inflammatory Items
Remove Food Coloring: This goes for children especially but adults as well. Take any food dyes out of your diet immediately. They can have neurotoxic affects, deplete good bacteria in the gut, interfere with important brain neurotransmitters like serotonin. They stay in our system and are hard to remove so it is best to completely discontinue consumption of them.
Remove Seed Oils: These are huge drivers of inflammation and heart disease. When we talk about lowering fat, it’s the bad fats (i.e., seed oils, margarine, corn, etc ) not the good ones. We want to replace bad with good (tallow, ghee, etc) and then begin to slowly increase our intake of these fats. We should aim for zero seed oil in our diets when healing.
Remove Sugar: “The average American eats (or drinks) 34 teaspoons of sugars a day, which is equal to 500+ calories. This averages more than 100 pounds of sugars per person each year. Sugar intake has drastically increased over the last century. In 1822, the average American ate in 5 days the amount of sugar found in one of today's 12-ounce sodas. Now, we eat that much every 7 hours!" (Source below, even though here we completely remove any form of sugar eventually not just reduce).
Sugar is inflammatory, feeds pathogens and overgrowth in the gut, and will keep us sick and our brains on a rollercoaster. Even folks who eat healthier than the Standard American Diet, hidden sugars in simple carbs is enough to undermine our healing.
Sugar, however, is highly addictive and not an easy habit to break. One simple way to get sugar out of your diet is to be gradual and intentional about it. You can start using honey (or even coconut butter/manna) as a replacement—consuming more fat will also help sate us and prevent blood-sugar dysregulation, which can keep us in a vicious cycle and can be the source of many illnesses (including Alzheimer’s). So have anything sweet with fat (coconut butter already has the fat) to keep you sated and your blood-sugar stable as you gradually get off (and stay off) sugar. Once we start losing the microbial colonies that live off the sugars, we will crave less until they are gone. And then we will eliminate the cravings.
Next up: Eventually, we want to add more animal fat little by little, take out grains and starch, and replace with healing foods like broth, egg yolk, cultured dairy, meat close to the bone, simple veggies that support healing.
Consider Other Dietary Changes
If you’re considering going the distance and really making diet and lifestyle alterations that can change your life and reverse illness, join my online community (find link to waiting/interest list below).
Ketogenic diets often get a bad rap, but there are healthy methods of incorporating ketogenic living and incredible benefits as we switching fueling sources for our brain and body—from one of glucose-fueling to fat-fueling. For many, this can be life-changing and result in removing toxins, unnecessary weight, fueling the brain in a consistent and stable way, which can heal mental health conditions, ADHD, cognitive issues, neurologic challenges, seizures, Autism, Alzheimer’s, and more. It can also more easily enable therepeutic fasting, which has innumberable benefits.
In my own personal healing journey, I took a very gradual approach here. Everyone is different, but moving slowly by eliminating harming “foods” (as above) and introducing healing foods and then switching into ketosis (if this is what you decide) is encouraged.
Gentle Detox
Detoxing can mean a lot of different things to different people — i.e., things like parasite “cleanses,” and heavy metal detox.
However, here we emphasize simply opening detox “pathyways,” which means our elimination system — and nothing more. These are not fancy. They aren’t killing protocols or chasing toxins. They are simply supporting and enhancing the natural ways our body eliminates. So things like epsom baths (or other items that you tolerate like salt, baking soda), castor oil packs (for liver), skin brushing, gentle rebounding, red light, sauna and even cleansing and coffee enemas. Even being outdoors and in early-morning sun as much as possible can phenomenally impact our immune systems and micrbiome for good.
This way of eating, living, and healing is naturally detoxing; when we lose fat, we lose the toxins they were helping store and protect us from, so we want to keep the channels of elimination open.
And if none of these feel possible right now, limiting screens and getting outside even for 10 minutes in the first-morning light can do wonders.
Vitamins and Minerals
We want to slowly add in B-vitamins one by one. And of course have good minerals on board. Eventually we can add some others like iodine, lithium, microbes, and supplements that help with rebuilding the gut mucosa, replacing birth microbes, and reducing pathogen load.
Folks on health journeys tend to take handfuls of supplements. Some are looking to “take something” to fix their health. But we want to be sure they are truly working for our compromised systems—that our bodies are even able to utilize them. (Unfortunately, non-food/synthetic supplements are not often “recognized” and utilized by our bodies).
We will eventually be relying largely on healing foods and better nutritonal absorption.
Horomone Health and Circadian Rhythm
The single best and simplest thing we can begin doing for ourselves is to wake early and at the same time every day and get outside. You do not have to have perfect tropical conditions to do this. Even if you live in a cold climate or where there is not regular sun, the sun is still there. Your body will produce melatonin 16 hours later, which will signal that it’s time to sleep, and sleep well. This can take some time to adjust to, but it is so well worth it! When the rhythms and horomones of our body are on track, the rest can follow.
Nervous System Healing
At the heart of all of this is the beauty of becoming more whole, more human, feeling comfortable and safe in our skin, safe in the world and with one another. My passion is to support people toward these ends. I believe we can all experience tremendous healing through building our window of tolerance, growing our capacity, and regulating our nervous systems.
I provide this through individual, group support, and courses.
Interested in Healing and Want Support?
A new group for helping to support you on this journey is opening later this spring.
A Few Quick Sources
Oxalates
https://mastcell360.com/what-is-oxalate-dumping/
The book “Toxic Superfoods: How Oxalate Overload is Making You Sick” by Sally K. Norton
Food Coloring
(there is so much out there on this) here’s just one: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3261946/
Sugar
https://www.ars.usda.gov/plains-area/gfnd/gfhnrc/docs/news-articles/2012/the-question-of-sugar/
Dr. Robert Lustig, author of Fat Chance and a central figure in the sugar-as-poison anti-sugar movement, has said, “Sugar is not just empty calories; it’s toxic calories... the definition of toxicity is: the degree to which a substance can damage an organism. Poisons can be low-dose or high-dose, and acute or chronic. So sugar is a high-dose chronic toxin. It’s still a toxin. "
Ketogenic Diets
”Ketone bodies act as high-efficiency fuel for the heart, skeletal muscle, and kidneys, and cross the blood–brain barrier to support neuronal metabolism.[12] Red blood cells and hepatocytes, lacking mitochondria and the enzyme diaphorase, cannot utilize ketones.[13] Compared to glucose, ketones yield more adenosine triphosphate (ATP)—approximately 9400 g ATP per 100 g acetoacetate and 10,500 g ATP per 100 g beta-hydroxybutyrate, versus 8700 g ATP per 100 g glucose—making them an energetically advantageous substrate. Ketones also reduce free radical formation and enhance antioxidant capacity, improving cellular resilience.[12][14]” (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK499830/)
”The number of Americans suffering from obesity, diabetes, and metabolic syndrome is on the rise. The markers of metabolic syndrome include an increase in abdominal adiposity, insulin resistance, elevated triglycerides, and hypertension [4,5]. All of these negative health markers increase the risk of cardiovascular disease, diabetes, stroke, and Alzheimer’s disease. According to WebMD, there are currently 27 million people with Type 2 diabetes and 86 million with pre-diabetes. In addition, the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) also estimates that almost 40% of adults and around 20% of American children are obese [6,7]. Many researchers believe these diseases are a result of carbohydrate intolerance and insulin resistance. Thus, a diet that reduces the exposure to carbohydrates, including whole grains, might become a more logical recommendation for improving health” (https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8153354/)
Ketogenic Researchers and Institutes:
https://www.metabolicmind.org/
The Field of Metabolic Psychiatry
“Mental and metabolic illnesses frequently occur together with forty percent. of individuals with severe mental illnesses such as schizophrenia or bipolar disorder also having metabolic syndrome, according to recent studies. Metabolic energy deficits may be present in the brain even before a diagnosis of mental illness itself.” (https://www.metabolicpsychiatry.com/
Detox
“In one intriguing study, researchers found that urban preschoolers who took part in a program of outdoor nature-related activities not only showed marked improvements in mood, stress and mental well-being, but their gut microbiomes became healthier as well. Analysis of fecal samples collected at the start and finish of the 10-week study showed greater diversity of microbial populations. There was also an increase in a specific microbe that is associated with improved serotonin production and lower levels of inflammation.
In a different study, researchers compared the gut microbiomes of children who played indoors for four weeks with those who played outdoors only. The result saw similar beneficial changes in gut diversity in the outdoor children, as well as increases in the biomarkers of immune system health.
When you think about it, this all makes sense. Indoors, the primary sources of microbes are other people, pets, dust, water, HVAC emissions and indoor plants. Exposure to cleaning products, which slow microbial growth, also contribute to a decrease in gut diversity. Being outdoors, by contrast, provides exposure to a rich array of microbes from plants, animals, soil and air. They transfer to the body via contact with the skin and through the respiratory and digestive systems.” (https://www.uclahealth.org/news/article/time-spent-outdoors-helpful-gut-microbiome)
Good Fats
The book “Put Your Heart in Your Mouth” by Dr. Natasha Cambell-McBride, M.D.
Vegetarianism
The book “Vegetarianism Explained: Making an Informed Decision ” by Dr. Natasha Cambell-McBride, M.D.