Episode #98 Featuring Dr. Robin Berzin! THE ULTIMATE HEALTH GUIDE! Anything and everything you need and want to know about functional medicine and taking control of your health!!

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Alright everybody, welcome back to the Dillinger Valley podcast.

So I have a great story about my guest today and how I met, well didn't meet you, but

new of you immediately.

It's like I kind of told you, so you know, found me.

I did find me.

And my wife pointed out she said, who is that we need to interview her and I'll tell

you what happened.

So I told you, I'm a partner with Dr. Dave Raven and you were on that AI panel, kind

of moderating just handling it and you did tremendous.

And I set her a video home and I took a video because I was doing it for Dave to post

and she said, who is that about you?

And I said, I don't know why I'm not 100% sure.

So I found, I figured it out.

Okay.

And so we found you and then I, like two weeks later, I get this email of one of your representatives

asking if I wanted to interview you and I said, yeah, and the university, yeah, exactly.

It found us, you know, it did.

And I was thrilled when I saw it and I was like, yeah, sweet, I don't even have to try

to reach out here.

He's always going to ask Dave for help, but I don't like to ask for help from anybody.

I just, you know, we're going to have to talk about that.

Yeah, I know it.

I know it.

But anyway, to introduce her, to give her a little bit of her accolades before we really

get into it here, she's a Columbia trained board certified internal medicine physician,

but well known as being the founder and CEO of Parsley Health, which we're going to get

into pretty good here because now that I've learned more about it, I really want to stress

everything that's done here because it's solving so many problems.

And she's a pioneer in functional and personalized medicine.

She's done a ton.

She's going to continue to do a ton.

She's going to make a huge impact.

And I'm here to help her make the biggest impact possible.

So my friends welcome Dr. Robin Burzen.

Hi.

So I'm good to be here.

Thank you for coming in on short notice, especially to come and see me.

I appreciate it.

And I am thoroughly looking forward to this interview.

Me too.

All right.

So, all right, functional medicine.

We talk about this.

We hear the term, I know what it is quite well, very important in my life.

What is it?

And what does it mean to you and where you involved in it?

You know, when I was in my medical training, I looked around the hospital and I saw that

our healthcare system was really good at keeping us alive, but not good at helping us thrive.

And I saw that all those people were in the hospital largely, not entirely, but largely

because of the ways in which we're eating, we're moving, we're living, our environment.

And I saw that our healthcare system was like drowning under the tsunami of cost and

overwhelm.

And we can't even get to people.

And meanwhile, everyone's insurance premiums are going through the roof.

And meanwhile, everyone's trying to be healthy, but our healthcare system isn't helping

them do that.

And I was fortunate enough to learn early in my career about functional medicine.

And it just hit for me.

It was like, okay, this is it.

And functional medicine is really just about getting to the root cause of disease instead

of treating the symptom.

So you're not lying awake at night because you have an ambient deficiency.

That is not why you can't sleep.

There are many reasons you may not be able to sleep, okay?

You're looking at screens, you have anxiety, you have high blood sugar, you're inflamed,

your circadian rhythms off, there's a hormonal imbalance, right?

Like we can figure out why.

I'm being a little flip because of course we want to use medications when we need them

to achieve goals, but we can't only use medications to achieve goals.

And when it comes to things like we are just talking about heart health, blood sugar,

depression, infertility, hormone issues, when before we started, you were talking about

testosterone.

And the reasons people have low testosterone in the first place, functional medicine just

digs in and I call it the medicine of why.

We figure out why you have these issues and then we treat them with the best possible

tools.

And sometimes that tool is a drug and sometimes it's a food and sometimes it's nervous system

resilience and stress management like Apollo.

And we can get into all the ways we do that, but that more holistic approach, it works

so much better and the results are incredible.

And so once I saw that, I was like, this is what I have to do.

And that's what I love about it is the actual digging into the problem.

I can't tell you how many times that I had questioned when I was far younger, why is

it every time that we go to the doctor that all that ever happens is I get a moxacillin

or now Z-pack like when I was into my teenage years.

Why is it no matter what I have, this is what I'm getting and why does it never work?

And you don't understand, you don't know and most people just do what they're told.

And they think doctors are the end all be all that you go to and know everything and

anything that's kind of like when you get older, when you thought your parents knew

everything and you realize that's not the case.

So I find that now it's becoming more and more prevalent that people like yourself are

changing from regular practice or coming out on their own, etc.

I think the important thing now is to educate them on why this is necessary and how to

add life to your years, not yours to your life type of thing, is that kind of your goal

and what you do.

Absolutely.

I mean, what I love about functional medicine is both about optimizing your health so that

you can live longer and live better and about treating the conditions you have right now.

We talk a lot about longevity right now.

It's like a big buzz word, right?

But like, partially my practice has been around for almost 10 years or 10 year anniversaries

coming up.

I've been doing functional medicine for a decade.

And before we called it longevity, we called it health optimization.

So different words, same thing.

And we've been doing this for a long time.

But what I love about functional medicine is that we're not just doing peptides and

GLP ones and looking at, you know, how are you going to live 30, 40, 50 years from now?

We're actually addressing the health issues that you have right now.

And 60 plus percent of adults in America are dealing with something.

They have high cholesterol.

They have depression.

They have hormone imbalances.

They have PCOS and fertility, PMS, autoimmune, gut issues, can't get pregnant.

Whatever it is, people are living with stuff.

And functional medicine addresses what's going on right now.

So we diagnose, we treat, and we optimize.

And what I love to do is I get to do all three.

So if I'm working with a woman in her 50s, and I'm working on hormone replacement therapy,

and weight gain, and yes, we're adding to GLP one, and yes, we're addressing depression

and anxiety through meditation, through psychedelic work, through supplements, and then sometimes

through medication, I'm also looking at her calcium score and saying, what are we going

to do to make sure you don't develop heart disease in 10, 20 years?

And so I get to look into the future, but I also get to help her feel better right now.

And I think that those two things together are what make this medicine awesome.

Yeah, I totally, totally agree.

So let me ask you this.

I always looked at everything kind of through an improper prism, so to speak.

So I had the one side was the fitness and the nutrition, which is what I've dedicated

like 20 some odd years to, but I never, until I met Dave and started working together

with him, I never really looked at the mind side.

I know I had a lot of anxiety and a lot of stress, and it was, it would accumulate, but

I never pieced together the importance of the balance in both, and how it takes both

to really be fully healthy, because you and I can fix everybody's diet, their hormones,

everything.

But if this is really off, we're really not getting anywhere, are we?

At all.

And this beautiful, my book called State Change is all about how we heal the mind through

the body and how much so much of our mental health actually starts in the physical health

and how people kind of get stuck.

I liken it to, if you're dealing with depression, anxiety, chronic fatigue, insomnia, all

of these things that so many people are experiencing day in and day out, and you're not addressing

inflammation, blood sugar, nutrient deficiencies, lack of exercise, sleep, if you're not addressing

some of these physical things, it's like trying to climb Everest, but not getting to base

camp.

You're just going to get stuck.

And yet, in when we address mental health, we sort of ignore the physical and act like

your brain has, you know, got a concrete wall between your head and your body or something,

and that's just not, that's not what's happening.

It's all deeply connected.

And then when your nervous system is on fire, it's like, we're all running from a lion

all day long with the lion as our email and our text messages, you get stuck in fight

or flight.

That's what Dave Raven and Apollo really work on.

You get stuck in this, you know, stretch should go up and it come down, go up and come

down.

Like that sign way from physics from high school.

And we get stuck up here where it's always on.

And then the body can never begin to heal itself because when we're in sympathetic fight

or flight, we can't heal because that's our running go mode.

What we have to do is to get into parasympathetic, which is your rest digest, relax and heal

side of your nervous system.

And when we can get there, the body can actually start to heal itself.

Yeah.

It's just that in our daily lives, we're not getting it, giving it a chance.

And so that's also why I love functional medicine is because we don't look at just physical.

We look at my body spirit and every single patient.

If I have a mom and she's not sleeping and she's anxious and stressed, I know that

anything I try to do for her gut health is like game over.

It's not going to work.

I have to address these other things first.

Yeah.

100%.

I haven't taken it serious enough.

I'm like that super type A that's seven days a week.

And so I have this ongoing constant.

I operate with a sense of urgency at all times.

And it's not good.

It's good to accomplish stuff, but then it becomes a problem.

So I have like, de-stressed wearing the Apollo and through prayer.

And I swear to you, I know this is going to sound immature and crazy and I don't care

because it works, but I bought myself a gaming PC and put it in my office.

And when I need a break, I switch the screen and I'm very controlled.

See, I'm a very controlled person, but I start to play that thing 30 minutes and I come

right back down and totally stress goes away.

So I found something that made me feel like a cat again for a few minutes that took away

from it.

And I don't obsess like a gamer, but I find that if you can find something, it can just

slow you down a little bit.

And that's why I love the Apollo because it does that.

And it stay.

See, I didn't understand Vegas nerve stimulation and that role that it plays in everything.

But like you said, why do you think that people get stuck?

And that fight are like constantly.

What is the main cause that is it trauma?

Is it workaholic?

What is it?

I mean, I think you just said it for so many people, it's our patterns.

And we don't, we learn to tire shoes and brush our teeth, but we don't learn constructive,

healthy ways of managing our stress and our emotions and our nervous system.

And we teach people that when you feel stressed, work or do drugs or drink alcohol or zone

out in media or TV or scroll on your Instagram, right?

We have all of these frankly unhealthy ways of managing our stress and we don't actually

teach people the healthy ways, but exercise goes head to head with almost all anti-depressants.

In fact, it says better.

I agree.

And 95% of people respond to exercise when it comes to mental health only, you know,

it does study is very, but somewhere between 30 and 60% is from some of the Medicaid,

common medications.

And it's not to knock the medications, those can be powerful too.

But exercise works for pretty much everybody and it works just as well.

And so if you look at the data, like we should be prescribing exercises, our top mental

health tool, but it's just not what happens in the medical community.

And so I think when we teach people these skills and give them tools, whether, you know,

or we both love David and the Apollo, it's a device that helps through these vibratory

patterns, stimulate your vagus nerve and your vagus nerve, everyone is, you actually

have two of them, one on each side of your brainstem and they come down in your body and

they innovate everything that does, that happens for you automatically.

Your heartbeat, your breathing, your digestion.

I was going to remind people because I find we're often at war with our bodies.

This human body is the most sophisticated, beautiful, incredible machine that has ever

been created.

It is so cool.

So much is happening for you at every second of your life that you don't have to think

about or direct or ask for.

It's just automatically happening in the vagus nerve is a big piece of that.

And if we can take care of this thing, this only vehicle that we are given for life,

then everything else unlocks.

And so for my patients and what I see, it's teaching people tools that are healthy and constructive

to manage stress and to get out of fight or flight.

And when people realize they can do that instead of say, drinking or some of these less

helpful things, people start to feel a lot better.

Yeah.

So I've been learning about so many people that are providing health by just fixing what

you're talking about, fixing the state of mind, getting people, like rewiring basically

their brain.

I've talked to multiple people about that and the significant impact that it has on everyday

life.

I need that ton of time too.

It's what I'm working on.

I mean, meditation has been shown on functional MRI studies to truly remap the brain.

It fills in the ruts in the road of the brain so that your thoughts, instead of

going in that same unhelpful pattern, can go into new directions.

And so I meditate for 15 minutes every single morning.

And if I don't, things are off the rails that day.

And if I do, it completely sets me on the new trajectory.

And like usually I have a kid or two kids like sitting on me, it's like 630 in the morning.

But I really, I'm religious about it.

And my meditation practice, my prayer practice, my yoga, my exercise.

These are all ways in which I am neuromodulating myself so that I can do all of the things

I want to do.

And they are as important as my gluten-free, dairy-free, high-fiber, high-protein, high-healthy

fat diet.

Absolutely.

I just had this conversation before you came here and I said, you know who I have the

most conversation with every day is in prayer.

That's where I have the most conversation with anybody.

I thought about it and I was like, okay, I do one, two, three, four.

And I started going online and that's when I met my most peace.

When I'm actually not thinking about work most of the time, unless, and turn the notifications

off of the phone away, it's only time I'm really a strong peace.

And I don't think people take that silence or that understanding of the most important

is to just slow down and like rationalize a little bit and relax.

I'm going to sign in my office and it says slow down five mile an hour because as you're

talking, I'm like, I think you and I are built from the same materials and slowing down

fixes a lot of things.

It's not easy.

It's really hard.

Yeah.

I know it.

And it's not reinforced around us, right?

We're just constantly told to go, go, go, go.

And then the message is to fuel to go, go, go, go.

And that's why we have a food system that is fueling us to go, but it's making us

sick.

Somebody was just asking me because I said, oh, my birthday is coming up at the end of

the month.

What are you going to do?

Like, what are you going to do with my barber?

What are you going to do?

What are you going to do?

I said, you know what?

All I want is just a day off.

Do not have to do shit.

Just a day to just do nothing and I would be the happiest guy on the planet.

You know, I'm going to do it.

Do it.

Probably not.

Oh, line.

You have to do it now.

All right.

You're turning.

44.

Oh, my gosh.

I'm 44.

Really?

Yeah.

Well, see.

I think for me, I'll still work out, but I think other than that, I'm going to, I left

my day blank.

I can't not, on my workout days, I'm going to do it.

I do it on Christmas.

I do it.

Unless it falls on a non-workout day, but I think other than that now, the older you get

sometimes, you get so fed up where you're just like, okay, I'm doing this.

You know, four or five years ago, I wouldn't have.

I would have lied to your face and told you I'm going to do it and then not to.

Not to.

All right.

Well, holding you accountable people.

If you have one day off.

So I want to get into more of the parsley side because I asked you, is it similar to function

health?

And you just gave me a full blown education on it because I think function is very popular

and people know a bit.

The marketing is good on it, but you do something similar, but very different, which I really

appreciate as you explained it.

And I wasn't necessarily going to go deep into parsley, but I want to now, because of

learning more about it, it's more intricate, it's more personalized.

So just talk about what you filled me in on earlier.

Totally.

So, you know, like many of the lab testing companies out there, we have a full comprehensive

blood work panel, longevity labs that you can get with us nationally.

You've got them through Quest.

And you can do those labs with us and we'll give you a whole breakdown of what your labs

mean, what your results mean.

We look at hormones, we look at heavy metals, we look at heart health, blood sugar, all

the things.

And you do that with us, like you mentioned function, there's lots of other companies

out there.

Also, I'm on whoop, the wearable company's medical advisory board, they have comprehensive

labs as well, which is awesome, and I'm all for it, by the way, I think that we are data

should be in our hands and getting your lab tests and knowing what they mean is a great

starting point.

So whether you get them through parsley, which we offer or whether you get them through

one of these other companies, great, it's a great place to start in your health.

So what happens over and over again and what I see with all these lab tests is that people

get the results and they get the AI report and you know, they look at it and they kind

of understand some things, okay, understand, they're like, how do I do with this information?

I don't know.

And then they throw it into chat, GPT or clot or whoever your favorite, you know, AI platform

is and they get some more information and maybe the vitamin D's low and maybe the AI gives

them seven ways to fix their vitamin D and they're like, I don't know what to do.

What do I do next?

Like how do I make decisions around this and God forbid it's not vitamin D, it's heart

health or it's autoimmune, it's fertility or hormones, it's like, what do I do with

this information?

Right.

And then what happens is they go to their primary care doctor, the regular doc who is wonderful

and well-meaning, but who's like, why did you, what are these tests?

I don't have time to review these tests.

I'm not trained to connect the dots across all these different tests because in my conventional

medical training, which you, you know, introduced me at amazing places like Columbia, Nonsana,

I wasn't trained there to think about the body as ecosystem, to connect the dots between

your lab results and your nutrition and your mental health and your physical health.

And so, you know, regular doctors people are coming to us all the time at Parsley and

being like, yeah, they either didn't have time for me or maybe they blew me off or maybe

they just didn't answer my questions or they didn't give me a plan.

And so when I'm seeing over and over again, as people have results, they have data, but

they're not taking action.

And so what Parsley offers in addition to those lab tests is actual medical care with

board-certified functional medicine doctors.

And we do it online nationwide, so 50 state, you can just zoom with us over from your house,

your car, your work or whatever.

And our doctors will, we have a visit you can buy where you will just go over your lab

results so they could come from any of the companies, any other company doesn't have

to be us.

And we not only tell you what your labs mean, which is a great starting point, but we also

do a little bit of our own health assessment and we look at what you're eating and how

you're moving.

We look at your symptoms severity, we look at your symptoms across your whole body.

And our doctors put the pieces together and give you an action plan because if you get

all this data, but you don't do anything with it, you're not getting healthier because

you have data.

You're getting healthier because you do something.

And so we have this visit we call it BYO labs where you can do a 30 minute doctor visit

with us and we'll give you this plan and tell you what everything means and answer your

questions and hear you, right?

Because like the AI is in hearing you or listening to you or in conversation with you or understanding

that because your house is under construction, you don't have a kitchen, you can't eat this

way or because you're working too hard, you need help navigating the healthcare system.

And so we do that and then we also have our annual program for clinical care and so lots

of people come to us, not just for labs, we do the labs, but they come to us to work with

our docs on fertility and menopause and heart health and low testosterone and depression

and weight and inflammation and autoimmune.

We do a lot of gut health, a lot of autoimmune, a lot of hormones, a lot of weight and metabolism.

And it's, you know, I like to make fun of some of these really fancy pants doctors who we

all know and love.

Some of them have big podcasts.

Let's just say and they have fancy pants, medical practices where they see like 50 patients

a year for 250 grand a month, yeah, I know it.

And if you're like, well, I could never have that.

My answer is to you is yes, you can, it's called Parsley Health.

And one of the doctors who used to work for me at Parsley went to work in one of these

$250,000 a year clinics and I saw him a couple years ago and I said, hey, it's great to

see you.

What's it like over there?

Are they doing anything different than we're doing at Parsley and he said no.

And so everyone, everyone should have a functional medicine doctor.

Everyone should have a doctor who understands nutrition and sleep and fitness and supplements

and advanced testing and who will talk to you and hear you and give you guidance so that

you actually take the actions that get you healthier and that's what we do.

So we do it all online.

And so it's yes, it's the labs, but it's also the actual care and the care is what

is missing and that to me is the gap to close and that's what we're here for.

Yeah.

And that's just it.

It starts with the data.

You've got to have the data.

Yes.

Interpretation of the data can be tricky and you can get so many different pieces of information.

And you and I both know these ranges go all over the place anymore too and you got to be

careful on those because they change with what they say is healthy, which I don't even

know what that means anymore to be honest with you.

I think the gaps that are like this should be more like this.

I mean, personally.

Yeah.

Well, because we're functional medicine, we tell you not just what's in range, but we

tell you what's optimal.

Right.

Right.

And we do explain to you in the lab product like what that means and this is good.

This is great.

This is out of range.

Yeah.

That's great.

And but then here's the thing about the outer range.

I have a, you know, people bring us these tests from all over the place and people have

out of range tests, but then they just don't know what to do about it.

Yeah.

So it's like great to go pat on your back if you're optimal.

I got the optimal magnesium level of my ABOB is optimal.

Woohoo.

Right.

Right.

Like, you know, do that like Saturday night fever walk.

Sorry.

Yeah.

Leviton's looking at me.

But then what about when things are not optimal?

Right.

And why is my HRCRP high?

Why am I inflamed?

Well, now we got, we got to have investigation because there's a lot of reasons your HRP

and inflammation could be high.

Right.

And we now need to take the next step.

And to take the next step, you need a doctor to help you navigate because what is right

for you may not be what the AI spit out as an answer.

And that's just it.

And what you just said, a lot of people don't even know what that is nor understand what

it means.

Then they look it up and they don't realize the correlation that has on every damn thing

that could be wrong.

Right.

Because if you're inflamed, that could, that potentially could cause anything, right?

I mean, it's more than likely the culprit of whatever problem you have.

Exactly.

And it could be indicative of something deeper.

It could be a heart health issue.

It could be an immune system issue.

It could be an injury.

It could be because you had a cold and flu when you got these lab tests, like there's all

sorts of stuff going on.

When I, you know, I see patients on Thursday mornings and I'm always amazed that, you know,

somebody will have been seeing me for like six months and will have totally fixed their

GI issue.

They'll have come in with gas, bloating, all these things.

They turned out to have small intestinal bacterial overgrowth.

We treated it.

There's better.

That's the number one cause of most of like GI distressed today, but it goes under diagnosed.

We do a breath test to diagnose it.

We treat it.

And it's six months later and I'm like, how you do it?

And they're like, I cannot lose these 10 pounds.

And I'm like, remember when you came here and you were bloated and couldn't poop and

like, have reflux and all these things?

And it's like our memories of even how we feel felt six months ago.

It's like gone.

It's like, oh, yeah, I don't care about any of that.

That's great.

But like now I'm onto this thing, right?

And that's how we as human beings work.

And so it's hard for us then to expect us to take all of this data even with the AI

and the AI is amazing.

I mean, I use it every day, but to then sort of self navigate and connect the dots across

like my health history, my family history, the condition I had five years ago that could

actually be informing why I feel the way I do know why people have SIBO because they took

all these antibiotics for sinus infections and ear infections and the destroyed their

microbiome.

Right.

But like, they're not connecting the dots between the bloating I have now and the crazy

amount of antibiotics I took for sinus infections five years ago.

And so that's where the guidance can help you to that next step and to actually feel better.

You got live in like a more is always better type of society.

So you could rob Peter to pay Paul and think you're fixing one thing and causing a whole

other issue somewhere else.

And I see it all the time.

I've done it a million times myself.

I mean, when I was telling you about the LP little A, you know how many things I threw

at that thing under the sun and created like liver problems, kidney problems.

I was taking everything that I thought could fix it.

And I was, and my wife would look at me and she go, are you really taking that much

stuff?

I mean, the pile was like this.

Yeah, but it does this.

But it does this.

But it doesn't.

I even know better.

But you can't help it.

That's why it's important to have somebody that's taking care of you or watching over you.

Even if you know or think you know, you know, everybody comes to us with a supplement

graveyard.

I'm sure.

And it's like, I took it a little bit for a little while and then I took this other

thing for a little bit for a little while and I'm always like, yeah, that's not how

supplements work.

No.

You're going to take them consistently, start one thing at a time and then I took all

these things and something was making me sick and I didn't know what it was.

So I stopped all of them.

And then I'm like, okay, cool, we're starting over.

Clean this late.

Oh my gosh.

And that's the thing too, some things that work necessarily aren't going to work for

everybody because it can like what I was telling you, what I'm going through now with

the jar audience.

I think those are just magnificent drugs.

What I was telling you before is it's gotten to the point now where the past like two or

three weeks, my heart's jumping out of my chest constantly because I can't keep electrolytes.

I can't keep potassium and when your electrolytes are off, you get irregular heart beat.

I know the pattern because I carried low potassium before I even took it and it's gotten to

the point now where I had to just stop.

And in three days now that it's kind of out of my system, I feel like, okay, I can breathe

again.

I'm back to normal.

Yes.

So many of these medications that are targeting one thing, they have full body effects.

And the doctor that prescribed the one thing for the heart doesn't really care about the

skin or the hair loss or the bloating or the, you know, the other or whatever else that

happens.

I was making fun of her this week, my best friend from childhood and, you know, she's

complaining to me about her bloating and her sort of waking and her hormones being off

and we're in her mid 40s now.

And I've been telling her for 10 years to try stopping gluten.

And she was having all this hair loss and so she or doctor put her on my doxidil and

she's doing PRP in her scalp, but the medoxidil made her whole body puffy and she's a

jewelry designer.

And so now she can't wear her rings and like, I'm just like, okay, spinely.

I don't know what I said 10 years of being in my head against the wash.

I was like, I went gluten free this week and, you know, it's funny.

All my bloating went away and I, you know, don't feel so foggy and I had a really stressful

week and I was a lot calmer and I'm just like, I want one of the slow motion videos of

me just like banging my head into like a wall, you know, just like, but I'm like, cool.

Well, let's stick with this for a few months and then maybe let's taper off the medoxidil

because actually some of your, you know, global low grade hair loss might just be from chronic

inflammation from eating a food that's inflaming your gut and therefore, inflaming your

whole body.

And then we don't need this drug that makes you puffy and that makes you can't wear your

rings.

Right?

Getting to the root cause, right?

And that is what I did not learn, even in my incredible medical training.

It's what I learned in functional medicine.

And when we take a beat to try to get to that root cause and let the body heal, sometimes

we don't need all these medications.

Sometimes we don't need all these supplements.

Yeah.

We can get ourselves into a state where the body is actually regulating on its own.

Absolutely.

And it goes with every single condition and everything.

I'd learned about this, not in this field, but training bodybuilders.

Like I was kind of getting into before and everybody wanted to be on testosterone replacement

therapy.

And I was learning about it in my later 20s, early 30s.

And I was coaching steroid users and seeing what they were doing to themselves and eradicating

things.

But then there were people that were following their suit, well, they're taking TRT.

So we're going to take it.

And it's like, well, yeah, but if we fix your SHBG, it's high.

If we get that in range, your testosterone is going to boost right back up probably.

If you're not taking anything else because it's bounding up your testosterone.

And sometimes it's easy.

Like it's a simple fix, but you wouldn't know if you don't talk to the same thing.

I think so many men are living sedentary lifestyles.

They've got metabolic syndrome, high blood sugar, they're inflamed, they're whole system

is out of whack.

Their digestion is completely off.

They're not exercising.

They're not doing anything.

And then if you are like that, your testosterone is going to be low.

Absolutely.

So we're going online and these places will just give people testosterone nowadays.

And what happens is then they don't realize that it's going to kill their fertility.

Yeah.

And I'm like all four TRT and HRT and we prescribe a lot of hormone placement therapy,

especially for women at Parsley.

I mean, we see men too, but we see a lot, you know, a lot of women who are going through

menopause and very menopause and prescribing hormones.

And I'm a huge fan of testosterone and including testosterone when appropriate for women and

moderation for women.

But I can't tell you how many people could have had their own testosterone levels just rebound

if they just addressed some of these root causes.

And by addressing those root causes, they not only get higher testosterone, they get better

everything.

Their energy, their clarity, their focus at work, their digestion, their weight.

And so I'm all for using medications, whether it's a GLP1 or hormone replacement, but

I'm seeing is everybody like skipping the step.

They're going straight to the medication without addressing the underlying core health issues.

No drug will ever outrun an underlying health issue.

Like it will never outrun it.

I always talk about like if you're eating, you know, sugar and all-to-process foods and

you add metformin or you add GLP1s, it's kind of like there's a fire burning in your

basement and you're stuffing a towel in your kitchen door and just like hoping it doesn't

burn down your house.

Eventually the underlying illness or the underlying disease process will outrun the drug's ability

to keep up with it.

And GLP1s are the same thing.

They're very powerful tools.

They're awesome.

I use them in practice, but they're not a miracle drug.

They can only do so much and they do not make up for eating an ultra-processed, high-sugar

diet and a sedentary lifestyle.

They just don't.

I think a lot of people are confusing them and thinking, well, I can just take this and

then I can keep doing what I'm doing.

And the reality is you can't, your body will get sick.

There's no golden ticket to just eating them.

There's no golden ticket.

Yeah.

I mean, you can think that and you may look it for a little while, but then when we look

internally, it's kind of like when you're a kid and it's like, oh, Joe can eat Burger King

every day and never get a pound.

Yeah, well, let's check Joe's cholesterol in his 20s and 30s and see what's going on

there.

Yeah.

And how does he feel?

Probably not great.

No.

100% not.

And that's the other thing.

It's the glorification of some of these drugs by celebrities or people on influencers or

whatever that make it appear to be something that it's not and never, ever, ever explain

to you what goes along with it.

You notice you never see like steroid users.

You never see the downside.

You think they're going to go on and tell you every single thing that they've got going

on.

It's a problem.

And these people that take the GLPs, do you think they're going to get on and tell you

the side effects and the stuff that's going on or they want to look great?

Nobody ever talks about any of that.

And it's just not the reality.

Do you find that GLPs right now are the most maybe abused drugs that are out right now

or the ones that maybe are even the most polarizing because there are a ton of benefits there

if you used properly and everything, but I think that we're creating more negative perspective

on them by the way they're being used.

Yeah.

I agree with that.

I don't know if I would use the word abused, but I think they're the most DIY drug out

there that is being DIY dangerously.

Right.

And I mean, you can go online.

You can go to like Eli Lilly's website and you can get your own JLP one.

Right.

Easy.

And, you know, I do think that these are powerful tools and I'm glad we have them.

You know, I have a mom and her early 40s who just all of a sudden gained like 60 pounds

and we address thyroid, we address diet, we address gut health, we address inflammation,

alcohol stress, nothing was touching it.

She just went into a paramanopausal set point shift where her weight went through the roof

and I'm so grateful to the GLP one because it's the only thing that's actually helped us

allow her to get back to herself.

Mm-hmm.

And then the goal is to get her off of it and allow her to reachieve like her new set point

along with some port on estrogen and progesterone.

So they do have like incredible uses and then for folks who do have diabetes or are morbidly obese

and stock like I've seen incredible results, I've seen incredible results for folks who are

really have some level of like, you know, really deep seated emotional eating that like nothing

has touched.

But at the same time, there's a lot of people just using them, not understanding the side effects,

not changing their underlying diet, not doing anything to ensure they're getting adequate protein,

not doing anything to build lean muscle mass.

And who are sort of relying on the drug to make up for all ills.

Yeah.

And also not having anyone, you know, it does increase her skin cancer risk.

They're not seeing a doctor.

There's no one sort of looking globally at.

Well, what else is this doing to you?

Because just as you said earlier, every single drug as great as the

Giardians may be for one thing, it hits all parts of your body and it's like a seasaw.

It's great for one thing, but then it is sometimes not so great for something else.

And that's where I think like people are, it's sort of like cowboy medicine, like

frontier town, like DIYing their GLP ones and that can get tricky.

Yeah, it's dangerous.

It really is.

I've seen it in so many different things and I just,

it's troubling and I wish more people would come to places like you have.

I want to shift here.

I want your thoughts on the flipping upside down of the food guide period.

I've started to talk about this with some people, but I'm a heavy nutrition guy.

So I really like to hear differing opinions on this because I know how I feel about it and I know

like I battled in the eating disorder even as a nutritionist and I fell into this

living low fat category for so long and I know I wrecked myself.

I don't need anybody else to ever tell me because I already know.

And I finally was able to get out of my own way like year and a half ago.

And my diet now kind of more so correlates with the way this flipped.

But there are a lot of people that still say, oh, you can't eat this,

where you can't eat these fats, you can't do this.

It's going to cause x, y, and z with cholesterol and everything else.

So I want your thoughts on the flipping of it and isn't that wild that we did that,

but then do you, do you find it to be pretty accurate the way it's laid out now?

Yeah, I mean, the way that it is now is how we've been guiding nutrition at parsley health for a

decade. And what we see in clinical practice, we have treated over 50,000 patients.

So you would know we would know.

Yeah. And what we see is that when you get rid of our fine sugars and flowers,

when you get rid of ultra processed foods, and I think that's the biggest thing everyone's

talking about the protein and we can get into the protein. But what you take those two things

out of your diet, your body starts to heal itself. When you eat whole foods and vegetables

and nuts and seeds and whole grains, and you get closer to 30 to 50 grams of fiber a day,

as opposed to the part, part, the measly 15 grams that the average American gets barely.

Not good.

What do you fix with that? You fix your heart health, you fix your hormones, you fix your blood sugar,

you fix your digestion. When we eat healthy fats and we eat those fats, even if they're saturated

from butter or dairy products or meat. When we eat those fats, not alone, not with a burger bun

and fries and sugar filled ketchup. But when we eat them alongside brussels sprouts in a salad

and nuts and seeds and whole grains, our body metabolizes those fats beautifully. And when we

get adequate protein, we can actually build lean muscle mass. And when we don't get enough protein

and the former food pyramid or food guideline recommended daily protein was too low.

When we get too little protein, we can't build lean muscle mass. And we have a population

that if you look at full body dexab body composition is maybe we're getting a lot of calories,

but we're under nourished from the standpoint of we have low muscle mass and we have high fat

mass, which is a recipe for poor health, regardless of what your weight is.

And so, you know, getting adequate protein. Now, as a woman, I'm so I'm 44 and I

got diagnosed with osteophenia this past year on Dexascans. So I'm losing my bones already,

which is lit a fire under me. And I'm lifting and I'm lifting heavy and part to

reduce bone loss and part to build up my lean muscle mass before I go into menopause, because I'm

actually not in perimenopause or menopause yet. And as I do these things, I know that I have to

eat adequate protein, otherwise I'm not going to be able to like really build any lean muscle mass.

Right. And so for me, my targets are around I'm not targeting one gram per pound of body weight,

because that's just a freaking lot. And I'm targeting around 0.7 grams per pound of body weight.

And what I see for myself and what I see for a lot of my patients is that that's really enough

for most people to build lean muscle. Now, if you're trying to like be a body builder and

pack it on at the gym and add pounds and pounds and pounds of lean muscle, yeah, you may need to

eat more protein than that. But I think that and you would know. So you can be the expert on that

for me. But the reality is, you know, you do have to pay attention to it. You do have to get

adequate protein, but you don't have to like drown yourself in protein shakes to get to a body

that can put on lean muscle mass. Mm hmm. Well, I don't think a lot of people realize just how

difficult it is to I'm not talking about gaining weight. I'm talking about adding sheer lean muscle

mass. I mean, really, because this gets lost in the shuffle and I battled this for years to get

like two or three pounds of muscle that you keep all year long and keep it is very, very difficult.

It takes a lot of muscle manipulation and how you lift it takes a very strong diet. You've got

to mix up how you're lifting the types of lifts. You can't let your body get stagnant and desensitized

to what you're doing. This is a tricky process, especially as we get older. And so, yeah,

prioritizing protein is very important. And for me, I have to eat a lot more because of the

output. So I'm burning like 4,000 calories a day with all the cardio and everything. So I do

a pound and a 1.5 to a pound, but it's easy for me in the way that I structure my diet because

I'll have a 12 ounce piece of salmon and boom, I got 70 or 80 grams of protein. Right. But that's

not for everybody. I'm able to do that because I'm so hungry from the output, not everybody's doing

that. So I think structurally and then the concept of how do we actually put this on and keep it on?

And it's tricky when you get older. Creatine's important. You know, things like that, but not

over supplementing, not relying on protein shakes, which are not the answer. Yeah. I mean,

they can help you. You got it. You got to eat real food. Right. And first and balancing that

with getting good quality animal protein. I struggle because I'm sensitive to dairy. You know,

the way protein is actually a very good protein. Like the way protein is a very good protein source.

But for a lot of people, way is tricky and dairy is tricky because it causes for me, it's acting

in eczema for a lot of people. It's asthma, chronic sinus infections, GI issues. I can't tell you

how many people in the performance world who are like living on way, way bars, way protein shakes.

And they don't realize that they're being super inflamed from dairy. So just if you're somebody

out there who's eating a lot of way and are experiencing a lot of these like allergy, chronic nasal

congestion, snoring, breakouts, digestive issues, it might be that dairy is not for you.

Right. And then you have to find well, like how else am I going to get the protein in? The other

thing I see is that, you know, I, so okay, I don't need the dairy. I do eat meat. I do eat fish.

But I need something else to get like to my protein target. So I'll have like a plant-based protein

powder that I make a smoothie out of. And a lot of people don't realize that most of the plant-based

proteins, like the pea and rice blends or the rice protein, the pea protein, unless that protein

powder has had branch-tain amino acids, including losing added to it. It's not a complete protein.

And it's not even close to the usability called bioavailability that a way is or that like an

animal protein is. And so be careful, everyone, because a lot of these like chain smoothie places,

not going to name names, that you have at the airport or you have the mall. A lot of these places

have these plant protein powders. And I've, I've like, remember recently I talked to the CEOs of

one of these big groups. And when I mentioned to them, I said, well, as your plant-based protein

powder, is it, you know, is it optimized with branch-tain amino acids? So it's a complete protein.

They had no idea what I was talking about. And so you're getting, quote, protein, but it's really

low quality and it's not something your body can use. So as people start to sort of focus on protein,

actually on my flight here to Phoenix to see you from LA, I walked by Starbucks a place I do not

consume anything from everyone. But I noticed the corner of my eye on the menu, it said protein,

something or other. And I'm like, oh my god, they've already jumped on this bandwagon. And I guarantee

whatever that source of protein is at the Starbucks, sorry Starbucks, and as I am in a name name,

I just, nothing quality is happening from a food and beverage standpoint from that store.

Whatever that protein source is, I would bet you and I can bet like a thousand bucks right now

that it is not what it's a name. I've been in this. I didn't read the fine print. I'll

go back tomorrow one morning and a lot. You bet your ad that's not. Yeah, it's not quality. I learned

um, 2011ish probably the way protein powders worked and how they were, how they were really made

and what you were getting from the big name companies. I won't say anything, but the biggest names

and why they're so cheap and then why they're in cost go and everything. I'm not saying it's

bad. You want to cause worry, but you have to be able to cut the cost to be put in those stores

and those facilities. You have to understand what you're getting and structurally how they make

them over they come from now. What I changed was that I, I still have way, but it's like 25% of the

protein intake I take from a powder and I custom everything with beef and beef protein isolate

and then a little bit of bovine collagen protein and I customize and synthesize these myself

and that's 75% of what I take it. I don't rely on protein powders honestly. I use it my coffee twice

a day and in my yogurt. And that's the only way I don't drink shakes at all. And um, when I made

that switch, I did notice less bloating, less water retention and my blood panels actually,

I wouldn't correlate it all to that, but I would say that that did have some sort of benefit for me.

And by the way, everyone way is a great protein course. Yeah. If it's high quality, if it's coming from,

you know, pasture raised and organic cows and so forth, just know where the way is coming from

and then just know that some subset of people don't tolerate way and are super inflamed and

don't realize it. So that's like really my call out on way. It's not a way is bad. It's that some

people like myself, if I eat that, I have acne, I have eczema, like I can't do it. And that's why

I split it because there is good purpose to it. Yeah. But I found that for me personally, it was

too much for what I wanted to take. But I'm like a scoop and a half a day guy. You know what I mean

at the most. And so I think several things you said, Whole Foods first prioritize that this is a

supplement, meaning you use it as a supplement for what you're missing or lacking, but don't try to

overcompensate. Right. I hate this term meal replacement. It's not a meal. It's not really

replacing a meal. It's just supplementing some hunger or some nutrient lacking in my view.

Make it your snack. Yes. Or make it your post workout. Absolutely. Yeah.

You know, it's funny because we're talking about the fats and I kind of told you, I went from

my last 20 years, eating like 25 grams of fat a day if I was lucky. And it was strictly

from peanut butter or something of that nature, almond butter, one of the nut butters.

Now I do about 130 grams of fat a day. And I went from like 1500 calories to 3000. And I haven't

been this lean or felt as good or skin or just focus even on non-good sleep days type of things.

Diet runs everything. You can train all you want. If you have a shit diet, you cannot work it.

100%. I mean, in our medicine and functional medicine, nutrition and food is the first thing

on the prescription pad. And yes, of course, we prescribe drugs and medications and we prescribe

supplements in some cases and we prescribe exercise and neuro resilience and mental health

practices, but we also prescribe food first. And you can you can address so many of today's top

health issues and symptoms with food and getting people again off of the sugar and the ultra-process

foods, getting the fiber content up healthy fats. You know, we we can go down the seed oil rabbit

hole if you want, but we you know, forget when we were in that sort of era of, you know, low fat,

fat free and that messaging that, you know, cholesterol is the building block of all your hormones.

Exactly. It's what makes your testosterone and estrogen and progesterone. And so

getting really good sources of fat and having fat in your diet is really important. And

fat doesn't make you fat and fat for most people doesn't really increase our cholesterol.

Um, it's there are some people and we talked about this before we started who have

genetically high cholesterol, either very genetically high total cholesterol numbers across the

board or genetically high lipoprotein little A. It sounds like you have and that one actually

tends to be genetic if you have it and you're not really impacted by lifestyle or diet much at

all. Um, and I do have some patients with what's called familial hypercholesterolemia that like

everything's high because it's just genetic. And occasionally those people like accidentally

do keto or something and it just sends them into like a terrible, terrible place. Yeah. And I

explained to them, you know, and sometimes they're statin resistant. They don't want to take

statins, which I respect. But I explained to them, you know, you can live on twigs and brambles in

the forest forever. Like don't, don't go to modern life. Don't go to a restaurant like forage forever.

And that will probably bring your cholesterol down. Right. If you are for some reason unwilling to

do that, then I'm sorry, but you're going to be on a statin and let's go. Yeah. Um, and I've

actually, you know, I've actually come around on statins, I will say I used to be in my earlier

in my practice and career kind of more anti them. And as I've, as I've aged and as I've matured,

maybe I just see them as another tool. I don't see the, I don't see the med negative metabolic

impact, meaningfully impacting people too much. Um, they can really get your APOB to where we want

it to be. And for some people, we try everything else. And just to low dose statin because you don't

need to go into high dose statins because the once you get in higher and higher doses, they sort of

effectively don't work as well. No. So I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm using them more liberally than I

used to. And it's really personal and patient dependent. And we do everything else to mitigate any

kind of metabolic or negative effects. And we take to coach you 10 and make sure that we're also

balancing blood sugar in other ways. But for most people, you can accomplish so much of what you

need to accomplish through food. Yeah. And then occasionally, there's people where we hit the wall,

not all the like the diet sort of reaches its limit because genetically they have a predisposition.

Mm hmm. And then we add the meds on top to get where we want to go. Yeah. And you know, sometimes

you, I would do this all on the exception, even though I hate, I hate that. And I was doing that

to myself. And I just despise it. I took a, have you heard of the Pinouille, the one that measures

your breath and shows you? So that's one of the things I did that at Udomonia two years ago. And I

took that and he's like, man, you were just like burn and ripping through fat. And that's kind of

when I was changing my diet a little bit, working on it. And then I was in my head and I was like,

man, I'm going to just try this out and see what happens because I always felt like I'm overdoing

carbs. When I sit back and look at everything I was eating, it was just 100% carbs, vegetables,

like 13, 14 servings a day, two or three bowls of oatmeal. And I sat and I thought, man, you're

eating a shit ton of carbs and that's all you're eating. Like it. And then I did that and I changed

it. And it's just like changed my life. My HDL went up 40 points. Seriously. That's incredible.

Last time I checked it was 80. I've always been low 40s. The problem with the statin for me was

it took me down to like 30 on my LDL because I was taking a repat the two. And I panicked. And I was

like, yeah, well together, that's too much to see. Yeah. I stick with the repat. I mean,

too much for you. Yeah. Somebody else is not, but for in your case, with the LP little a

knowing repat that can help a little bit with it. I know it's not going to do drastic. Yeah.

Well, there's some there's a new drug that's in kind of phase three vinyl trials for LP little a

that I think for those folks who actually have good lipid levels otherwise and we don't want to

stand. I actually see statins lower late LP little a little bit, but they just don't do very much.

Um, you know, for those people that everything else is good, they don't want to be in a statin,

they don't want to be in a lipid lowering drug, but they're LP little a genetically super high.

Mm-hmm. I'm hopeful that this new medication works. I've been following for two years recently.

Yeah. You just wake up every morning. It's the first thing you check. Some people check the price

of crypto. You check the status of this phase three. I get every couple months an hour and just

look at it. Early on, it was really like inundating myself with everything that I could learn.

And so I have a pretty good understanding of stuff now, but my problem with statins was the

over prescribing of them. Yes. That's my major problem with it. I feel like they just want to put

everybody on it and they just want to do just drain people's cholesterol levels and I don't think

that's healthy. Yeah. I totally agree. And I also find it frustrating that so many people were

just put on statins without any assessment, like true nutritional assessment. Yeah.

True lifestyle assessment. Because for most people, like you said, if you reduce or eliminate

the alcohol, the triglycerides come down. If you reduce the sugar and the ultra-process foods,

the cholesterol comes in check. If you add fiber, protein, healthy fats, most people, not everybody,

but most people's cholesterol numbers get in a really healthy place and everything else in

their body works better and they feel better and they can sleep and they can poop and they can have

babies. And so it's like, why do we not do that first rather than, you know, we manned or treating

you as a whole person in functional medicine. We're not treating numbers. So the numbers again,

back to the lab test thing, they're helpful. They're a great starting point, but they're not your

end point. You have a specific like, I don't know, five essential supplements and I'm not talking like

the basics that people need to take. We need to take magnesium. We need to take certain vitamins.

I'm talking stuff like creatine or something. Five supplements that you find that are proven,

beneficial that are most people should or you could see taking that are going to have a benefit

in their life. Yeah, absolutely. Number one is vitamin D, vitamin D3K2. I know that falls into

the basics category, but most people are deficient. Vitamin D is a pro hormone. It is important for

mental health, is important for immune function, is important for bone health, and if you're pregnant,

it's important for your baby's future teeth. So it's just something that still somehow,

like not enough people are taking, and has profound effects on overall body function.

One question on vitamin K side. Yes. Sometimes it's also K2 or 3 or 7. Which one was the

difference? Vitamin D3K2 is my preference. And the reason people add the vitamin K, this gets

missed a lot, is that it has to do with how the calcium that you absorb, one of the things that vitamin D

does is help you, helps you absorb calcium from your diet, and you need calcium for your bones,

you need it for the functioning of your cellular membranes, like you need calcium for everything,

everyone. But we, where we don't want the calcium to go is into the heart. And so the K2 helps

with where directing where the calcium goes is how I put it. So the vitamin D3, I take is the

vitamin D3K2 drops. I just put them right in my mouth every morning, all my little kids,

that little birds, they all open their mouths, and mama goes around and sprinkles the vitamin D

and everyone's mouth in my husband, then our nanny, I'm like, you know, we're,

and so that's one that I absolutely recommend. Creatines up there for cognitive function,

and for all of us who are trying to lift heavier, my version of lifting heavy, and your version

of lifting heavier, very, very different everyone. But I'm like, whoa, 25 pounds. But I'm working

on it. But yes, creatine, I definitely think, and we're learning more and more about the other one

that I see be really game changing for people is, is the right kind of B vitamins. So methylated B

vitamins, methylated cobalamin, and M5MTHF, which is methamethylated form of folate. Okay.

A lot of the B vitamins out there, and the multivitamins that have B vitamins in there,

they're not the methylated forms. And about two thirds of our population has a genetic variant.

It's not a mutation. It's not a disease. It's just a variant. I have two copies. Some people

have one copy that mean you don't methylate as well. And why do we care? Well, methylation is

happening a billion times a minute in our bodies, and it's important for all sorts of things,

including making neurotransmitters like dopamine, serotonin, and orapinephrine. I have personally

a huge mood impact when I'm not taking my methylated Bs. You know, I had some depression and anxiety

in my college years. And like now in my later life, I have all of these tools to manage that.

But one of the things that I found consistently over the years since I learned and trained

in functional medicine was that the methylated Bs, for me, like are an antidepressant. And I,

when I stop, I've tested this many times, and you see it in the population, and there's great

data on it. So it's not just the end of one of me. But I can't tell you how many patents I see

start them and just see some of the fog clear and like the uplift.

Methylation is also really important for detoxification. We so many people are eating all this,

like grocery store sushi or fancy pan sushi I don't care where it comes from and they're full of

mercury as a result. And they're not detoxifying it well. And when these heavy metals get into our

bodies, where do they go live? They get to like to sit in our fat and stay. Most of our brain

is made of fat. And so a little bit of mercury here and there fine, but a lot of it are consistently

over time, which is bio accumulates. A bio accumulates in the tuna, bio accumulates in us. And when we're not

good at methylating, we're not good at detoxifying. We also, when we're not good at methylating,

we don't every day your body, especially for women, but men too, you make estrogen and you break

it down. Methylation is important for that breakdown. So for folks with like PMS and PCOS and

endometriosis and symptoms of estrogen dominance or regular periods, all of these things, again,

our methylated B vitamins can help our bodies kind of break down and work through our hormones

in a better way. So this is one that's like in the basics category, but that methylated

version I see have outsized impacts versus what people talk about. Oh, just take a B vitamin

for energy. That's not what I'm talking about. Is this like a B complex then? A B complex,

which is make sure that the version of it when you look on the back and you look at the fine

print, it says methyl METHYL cobalamin, or when it talks about the folate, it says the number five,

the letter MTHF. And you can test genetically for the MTHFR gene variant to see if you have it,

the kinds that make you less likely to methylate well that I have two copies of. So that means I have

a 66% reduction in my methylation speed. And so I do see those really being interesting. And then

something that I'm experimenting right now with and seeing is your life in A. And improving

mitochondrial function because now that I am over 40, improving my mitochondrial function as I

look to slow the clock and give myself more energy to run out around after my children is very

important. So that's one that I'll be honest with you. I'm not ready to say it must be a staple

for everyone. But it has not been kicked to the curb like NAD plus yet. So I'm taking it and I'm

discovering and seeing what it does as we get it out more into the population regardless of

the claims of any, you know, anyone who makes it. So like, what about you? I want to hear your

answer to this question. My biggest partner, my first partner I signed with when I went to biohacking

was timeline. And so I went to freaking Harvard and studied cellular health at night. And I took a

cellular health coaching class. So I'm a big believer in it. The more understanding of I saw how

it worked and what it did and what I've seen it do for me. So I do find that is definitely a staple

for me. Yeah. And I'm taking it by the way. And I'm taking that brand. Like the data and the

research on it is good enough for me to take it. And my question about it, not that specific brand,

but just uralythane in general. And my question on a lot of these things is something like omega-3s

or magnesium glycinate or methylated bees, we know what happens when you eat them. You absorb

them into your body and they get into your cells. And with some of these sort of newer supplements where

the data and the underlying research behind them is really strong. But we don't fully yet know how

eating them in the form of a pill, for example, fully plays out in a large population.

Like I'm convinced enough that I am taking it. Yeah. But I'm also looking to see over time,

like how does this play out in the data and actual humans more? And I did some work with

me screen and I know the founders of me screen. So we were talking about different ways to improve

mitochondria health and they firmly backed it too. So that was encouraging to me. You said NAD

plus. Now here's what I say to you. And for people listening, because I've talked about this

multitudes of times, your body, if you take NAD straight NAD cannot absorb NAD. It does not get into

the cell. It is too large. If you do not take a precursor, it will not work. So you take NMN or NR,

it can get into and penetrate the cell, which can then release NADs. And so many people don't get

that. And they don't understand. My wife takes to NMN. She loves it. I'm a little cautious now

on everything I take, but I've used it. I like it. But NAD, like you said, I'm glad you said that.

It does not work. It does nothing. Yeah. I don't take it. I don't recommend the IVs. No.

The other thing, and I'm going to, you and I might be in a slightly different camps on the NMR

and the precursors, Nikita and my riboside, I haven't seen compelling data that taking those

while you can absorb them and they can get into the cell once it gets there does any great shakes.

Yeah. That's what I'm not convinced of. Well, the C-3-A is a problem too.

Doing anything. Yeah. So our bodies, when we make this through our natural

workings and metabolism, can use it. And I find the science on this particular area to be

more theoretical than actually clinical, clinical meaning. We actually show that it improves

health and cellular function in some way in humans when we take these supplements. So that's

the part that's like patchy for me. So I'm not a no, but I'm not yet. I'm just glad you

brought the NADO because people get tripped. Yeah. They do.

Creatine obvious. Now dilucine, b-tane, these are really key for muscle growth without having to

use an anabolic steroid or anything like that. These actually work. They do quite well and they

are safe to use because I'm trying to, I'm looking more on the safe side as opposed to the reckless

side. But when you talked about folate, I don't think people realize how important that is.

And if you're low, how significant of a problem that particular vitamin can be. So I'm glad

you brought that up too. I have been looking at making sure I'm more on level with that as I've

understood more. I'm going to send you my favorite one. Okay. Please. I've looked into more

intricate stuff, the more problems I've had with the Giardians. It's made me look at vitamins more

than I did because I'm so, I'm so focused on the obscure shit that I don't focus enough on the

core stuff. And that made me take a step back and go, okay, this is stripping me and I know that,

but maybe I've been missing something this whole time too. That is just exacerbating a problem

that I already have. And I think sometimes we look so obscure, we forget the basics. I'm all

about the basics right now. You know, I get asked about peptides all the time. And I call them

not peptides as entropy ones, but peptides isn't like the longevity stacks. And I call them not

the icing on the cake, but the writing on the icing on the cake. And I see too many people

writing their names and icing peptides and missing the cake and the icing. And the cake is the

nutrition and the exercise and the sleep and the getting the environmental toxins out of your

system and your life. The icing is the supplements that we're talking about, the vitamin D3s,

and the omega, the omega's and the creatine and the, I'm going to say they're the uralythane

and there I'll put that in the basket for now. It's in the icing basket until it gets kicked back

to writing. We'll see, maybe it won't. And you can't, those things will not work and they will

not be enough. And some of them are straight up placebo effect. And some of them have some validity

that's coming and getting better and better. And I think are interesting. And I'm all four peptides

as an act of technology, like nothing against them. I'm excited for them. But I just see too many

people skipping the cake and the icing and going to the writing. And it's not, it's not benefiting

their long term health. And it's not, it's not really even benefiting how they feel that much right

now. Well, let's uh, want everything now and not understand it's a marathon, not a sprint.

Things have to be taken care of first. I've been battling this for 15 years with people.

I've found peptides in 2011, along with SARMS, along with everything else. And people just don't

get it. They just want, want, want, but they don't ever get what they're supposed to out of them

because their bodies aren't ready. Just like what you're saying, if you get optimized first,

then you take a look at that stuff. But I digress. I'm with you. I'm with you.

I have had such a great conversation with you. I enjoyed every second of this. Thank you for

all of the extensive knowledge. We knew we'd get into all kinds of things if you were asked.

I didn't know where this is going to go. Nobody ever does when they come here. I just try to bring

out the best in everybody and let you talk about stuff that you may not talk about. I don't want

you to have to talk about the same old, same old. Of course, there are certain important things,

but I want, I want to show your versatility. I want to show that you have an extensive knowledge

base and let it shine. Thank you. Well, my goal, my purpose in this world, or let's say my

professional purpose in this world is because family and being a mother and a partner in all these

things are also my purpose and being a light is also my purpose. But my professional purpose is

really around transforming the health of as many people as possible and is showing and helping

people understand what I know and what I've seen in practice and what I've had the privilege of

seeing in a practice like parsley where we've been able to treat tens of thousands of patients

and so we're able to see what really works and really doesn't kind of beyond these tiny little

practices. That just that privilege of having seen that is huge. And so I'm honored to be here

and to get to have this conversation with you and to cover everything from peptides to prayer.

In one, I don't know how long we've been here, people. It could be hours, it could be days.

But however long it is, it's just an honor to be here and thank you so much.

Thank you. We'll tell everybody and I'll link all of this in description. What are the best places

to find you? Yeah, parsleyhealth.com and parsley health on all the socials. You can do a free 15-minute

consult call with one of our team members to learn more about our medical care or you can just

sign on up up to you. And then for me, robinburzenmd.com, I have a newsletter that's really focused

on female longevity. Sweet. That's kind of my passion project and people seem to really like that

and robinburzenmd on all the platform, your platform of choice. I love it. Yeah. Well, thank you

for coming again. I am always just humbled when people come see me and I appreciate it.

And I am excited about what parsley does and what hopefully is going to continue to make changes

for health and everybody. So thank you for everything. Thank you. And when you go on your

Instagram, if you see me, I tagged you, I videoed myself outside dancing because I'm saying,

you need a waiting room and I'm dancing on the street. So I repost me making fun of your waiting

room situation on Instagram. I love it. I love it. All right, everybody. Well, that wraps up

another one. I am certain this will be highly impactful. So enjoy it. Soak it in and listen.

Listen to everything we said and improve your health, please. So that being said,

stay tuned for plenty more to come Dylan Jamelli and Dr. Robin Burzen signing off.