Christian Healthy Lifestyle 

David Sandstrom 0:00
If you're confused about what to eat these days, you're not alone. In this episode, I'm talking with nutrition expert and functional medicine practitioner, Halle Brook. And we talk about fad diets and how they affect our health and how to break through the noise and discover what actually works when it comes to eating. It's a great conversation, I think you're gonna enjoy this. Here's a sample.

Hally Brooke 0:23
Totally, if you haven't, if you go to a doctor, and they prescribe you a drug without first asking you about your sleep, your exercise your nutrition and your relationships. You have a drug dealer, not a doctor.

David Sandstrom 0:34
Wow, powerful, powerful. That's a really good way to shift your thinking is

Hally Brooke 0:40
to shift your thinking and as a patient to help empower yourself like I am such a fan of Western medicine. We need it. It is it is necessary. And it is a miracle that we have so many things available to us. But as a patient, if you walk into a doctor's office, and they spend less than 15 minutes with you and don't actually ask you what's going on. Find a different doctor.

David Sandstrom 1:01
Welcome to the Natural Health Matters podcast where it's all about maximizing your health potential, so that you can look and feel your best at any age. I'm your host, David Sandstrom, Naturopathic Doctor and Biblical Health Coach, This is episode number 110.

David Sandstrom 1:23
Today we have in the show, Hally Brooke Hally is the founder and CEO of live nourished. She's a certified functional medicine counselor, nationally board certified health and wellness coach, and a fierce industry advocate. Her life's mission is to encourage empower, and free women by teaching healing. Hally, Welcome to Natural Health Matters.

Hally Brooke 1:45
So great to be here. David, thank you for having me.

David Sandstrom 1:48
Oh, it's a pleasure to meet you. I think you've got to have some great insights to share with the audience. So why don't you just tell us what it is that you do just give us a 35,000 foot view of what you do? Yeah,

Hally Brooke 1:57
absolutely. So I'm a functional health, functional nutrition counselor and health coach. So what that means is, I look at root cause. So what's happening in someone's body, instead of playing Whack a Mole with symptoms, we go after the root cause of those symptoms. And then instead of walking away with some really crazy overwhelming plan, I then step into health coaching mode. And we walk people through a healing plan, step by step, it didn't take, you know, you didn't get to where you're at overnight, you're not going to get out of it overnight. But we're going to make it a step by step journey so that you can get back not just to health, but to full wellness.

David Sandstrom 2:33
Very good. You know, when I had my office, the typical client that came to see me had already seen a couple of medical doctors, and they didn't find a resolution to their issues. So they find themselves in a natural practitioners office, and they generally want to know, well, can you give me some supplements that will do what the drugs do without the side effects? You know, that's a very common question. So what would you say to that, that client that comes to you? And that's their story, and they're just, you know, in that medical mindset of treating symptoms with with drugs? Yeah. What would you tell that person such

Hally Brooke 3:06
a great question, I always start with a story. So we had a client come to us, gosh, I think, three months ago now with a little tub of supplements, like one of those, you know, Costco size things. And she goes, you know, this is what I've gotten from my doctor, and my naturopath and my chiropractor, and all these things. And I'm taking all of them are like, okay, yeah, so what, what would I say to my client? What did I say that clients? I said, Well, let's start here. One, we're not a supplement company. So what we're going to look at is we're going to look at what's actually happening in your body, and we're going to go after healing those things. With that there will be some supplementation required because you there are probably some nutritional deficiencies that are hindering your body's own healing process. But this is not a symptom to medication system, where we're treating one symptom with one supplement or one medication, we're saying we're gonna go down to the absolute base of where all of this is coming from, and we're going to heal that. And with that, you might have three to five supplements that you're on in the short term, and then one to two that you're on in the long term. And that's it because we're going to do it with lifestyle, and supplementation is part of lifestyle, but it's not the answer.

David Sandstrom 4:17
Yeah, but Hally, you see my doc said that I need these. And you know, they do help some, but I'm just really tired of these side effects. Can you help me?

Hally Brooke 4:27
Yes, yes, we can help you the side effects are awful. You might need them in the short term, but what those drugs are doing in your body is they're putting a bandaid on what's actually going on. And so in order to, to get you off those medications or even get you off the supplements, we're going to look at what's going on. We're going to work slowly on decreasing medications and maybe swapping them out for supplements and then decreasing supplements so that your body is doing, what your body was designed to do. Whether you're going to a doctor or a naturopath or a nutrition just the only thing that we can do, no matter what practitioner you're going to is we can get your body in alignment with the way the Lord designed it. Because your body is designed to heal itself, I actually can't heal you, your chiropractor can't heal you, your doctor can't heal you, but we can help your body get in alignment with what it needs. And what those drugs are doing is they're making you feel better, but they're not actually making you better. They're not actually getting you in alignment with how your body was designed to heal itself in the way that God designed it. And so we're gonna put it in alignment, and we're gonna let we let your body and let the Lord take it from there.

David Sandstrom 5:34
Absolutely, that's great. You know, we're doing a little play, I love it. I just want the audience to know that if you are on a prescription Med, if you want to get off the drug, you've got to talk with your prescriber. Yep, that that's the law. And it's it's a good law, because there could be issues with getting off that med too rapidly or, you know, getting off meds is a great goal. But you have to do that with your prescriber. So that's not what I do. That's not what Haley does. But when you build health from the inside out, you will likely find that you have less of a need for those medications. So that's kind of the way the process works. I just wanted to make sure we're clear on well

Hally Brooke 6:12
Well said absolutely.

David Sandstrom 6:14
Yeah. So Haley, was there an event in your life that led you down this path into holistic wellness? Or how did you get into doing what you?

Hally Brooke 6:23
Yeah, absolutely. So I the really long story short, I came out of college thinking I wanted to go into medicine, I ended up going and did I did Teach for America, which I thought was going to be kind of a two year stint, and then med school and I ended up teaching math in the inner city for nine years. Totally crazy. During that time. Yeah, really tough job. Really tough job. really rewarding job, very high stress job. And because of that super high stress, I got really sick. I was diagnosed with IBD, which is a gastroenterologist quote says that's what we diagnose patients with when we don't know what's wrong with them. And we don't have a drug to fix it. So at least at least he was honest, I was that was that was one that I internships with later. So that's what I was told and kind of told, you know, chicken and lettuce is what its gonna look like for the rest of your life. And good luck with that. And I said, one, IBS is not the only thing I'm dealing with, like, I can't keep weight on I'm five, nine. And at that point in my life, I was 108 pounds. Like, that's just not cute. That looks like a victim of abuse. All cause Yeah, yeah, it was not good. I couldn't put on weight to save my life. My skin was gray, I had horrible acne, I was dealing with emotional dysregulation and anxiety and depression, which I hadn't dealt with before ever. And something in me just knew that there something else was going on. So I kind of stumbled into functional medicine, looking for answers for myself. And then the fun part of that story that I don't get to share on podcast very often, but I do here is so part of that journey is I found functional medicine, I found gut healing protocols. And I started working myself through that this was back before functional medicine was was more well known. There weren't really practitioners, I was kind of just going off of Google and NCBI research. So I put myself on an elimination diet, I started working with L glutamine and a handful of supplements to increase my mucosal lining and change my microbiome. And it was helping, but it didn't solve all of the problems. And there was there's a, I don't know what she is some sort of natural doctor or something in a town local to me called Manitou Springs, who had gone to one other time before. And it was it was not faith based, it was very, like, you know, hold the crystals and talk to the universe. And she helped me, but I also very, very common, very common in the space and I just got a check in my spirit that something was off. She helped me but it wasn't quite right. So I didn't go back to her. And then I hit this point in my healing journey where I was so sick, and I'd gotten no answers from doctors. And at this point, my own protocol wasn't working. And I was totally desperate. So I texted one of my kind of older mentors and just said, Hey, this is too close to my face. I just need you to listen to me like listen to the Lord for a yes or no Am I allowed to cope go back to this woman because she's the only person who has helped me before. And my mentor texted me back and said, I have a check in my spirit to I don't think so. But we have a healing prayer appointment tomorrow afternoon. Are you able to make it? And I was like, yes. So I went in for healing prayer, and ended up being healing prayer around my identity and someone that I had dated way back in high school in college. And as they were praying for the restoration of my identity, I felt something physically in my stomach go bloop, bloop, bloop, and out. And from that point forward, I have been better so I finished Yeah, so crazy. I mean, that is Yeah, I hear me Yeah, I hear miracle stories all the time. And and to have one of my own it is as mind boggling and crazy as it sounds. So I finished my elimination diet. And, you know, since then I've kind of gone back and forth, like, I'll do a healing gut protocol for myself once every couple of months just to keep things working well, but between the Lord and functional medicine, I am better. So I went back to school and started a practice. And here I am.

David Sandstrom 10:16
That's a great story. You know, if you're new to the show, I want you to know that we're talking about a faith based approach here. And it's my contention that we maximize our health potential when we align our lives more fully with God's natural design for spirit, mind and body. And it's nothing, it's nothing, you know, hocus pocus or anything like that. It's just that God has our well being in mind. And when he gives us an instruction, and he tells us to pursue relationships, pursue forgiveness, and to and to have connectedness with other human beings and, and he created nature for us to enjoy and spending time in nature, all these things are health promoting. So when we when as a practitioner, well we got to do is figure out, you know, we know that and Hally knows that, that our bodies are designed to heal themselves, our default setting is health. If we're not experiencing vibrant health, there's some obstacle that's blocking the body from doing what it wants to do, and what it already knows how to do. So our jobs as practitioners is to identify that obstacle, get it out of the way and sit back and watch the body do its magnificent thing that is to thrive. So I love it. I love when someone I think the best people to talk to about health and wellness are followers of Jesus Christ and have a biblical mindset. Because really naturopathy is is based in biblical principles. You know, I've been a follower of Jesus Christ for a little over 30 years, and I've been a naturopath for about 15 years. And when I started studying naturopathy or naturoapathy, I realized that there are so many parallels between the natural approach to health and biblical teaching and the way we're supposed to live our lives. So yeah, I just really excited to meet somebody that really understands those principles, and is putting them into practice and helping people.

Hally Brooke 12:12
Thank you. Well, the feeling's mutual.

David Sandstrom 12:15
Well, thank you. So So Haley, I know you're you're big on nutrition. One of the things that I know especially what by the time this episode airs is going to be shortly into the new year is going to be a lot of people thinking about diets and a lot of people thinking about losing weight. So we know that the traditional approach to dieting doesn't work, it falls on its face, in very short order. So can you talk to us a little bit about why that is and what we can do?

Hally Brooke 12:44
Yeah, absolutely. My favorite quote is the diet. The diet industry is a $300 billion industry with a 95% fail rate. And we just keep giving it more money, if anything else had a 95% fail rate, like if you went to your mechanic and was like, Yeah, I'll fix your car for foreigner dollars, it's 95% gonna fail, but like, we would find a different mechanic. But for whatever reason, when it comes to diets, and when it comes to our bodies, we just keep, like every New Year's just picking the same new one. So a couple of things that I talk to my clients about one, there's nothing new under the sun, the Lord tells us that we know that from Ephesians. We know that from Ecclesiastes, and that that goes with the diet industry. What is currently the keto diet is basically the same thing as what Atkins was 30 years ago, like there's nothing new under the sun. So if you're listening to this episode, and you're thinking about going on a diet, and there's some new fancy diet coming up for the New Years, it's not new. It's not new. There's nothing new about it. There's no new science, it's the same thing as what it was. And it has a 95% fail rate. So what do we do instead, the first thing that we do is we have to learn that we cannot outsource our own health and our own well being. Diets are notorious for outsourcing health to an app, right? We count calories and an app, something else tells me if I've had enough food or not something else tells me what I'm supposed to eat. And that's not how we're designed to live. And so we're we're short circuiting the most complex computer ever made, right our own bodies by the Lord and outsourcing it to a really simple dumbed down system that's not new, and it still doesn't work and it's not going to work. So number one is we have to learn how to learn what our own body is telling us what foods are right for us what foods aren't right for us. One of my favorite stories about that. We have a client who is Italian by birth, and had come to us after trying every diet on the planet to lose weight. She'd done keto she'd done Atkins, she'd done beach body she'd done. I mean, just name it, she'd done it. Most of which are all pretty low carb diets came to us. We did our intake we did a food mood poop journal with her and her food mood poop journal showed that she needed a higher ratio of carbs than she had been eating. And so we talked to her about it. Would you be willing just to try increasing your carbohydrate intake. And of course, she was terrified, because that's what every diet on the planet has told her not to do. And she did. And she started losing weight. Why? Because we listened to what her own body was telling her and our own body was telling us. So that's the first thing is learn to listen to your body. The second thing is, figure out what your body is actually asking for, you know, a high fat, low carbohydrate diet might be great for you. It also might work super well for your sister in law. And so worst thing you can do for your body. Figuring out what your body actually needs, how your body is converting calories to fuel is, is the second most important thing. And then the third most important thing is getting out of the diet mindset, which what we say live nourished is it's talking about food in four separate categories, not just one. So diet culture typically puts food into the category of energy, calories in calories out right calories give our body energy to run, it's the gas in the car. If we have too many calories, our body stores that as fat. That's one of four categories. And for the most part, it's the only part that the diet industry focuses on the other three. So the next one is information. Food is information, it gives our body a chemical reaction. And if you look at you know, some of the typical points based programs, they put a Diet Coke and broccoli at the same number of points. Those are not the same thing. I love that you're laughing like a Diet Coke and broccoli are not equal. Diet Coke gives our body the biological neurochemical message that we have a foreign invader in our body. That's what fake sugar is. And so it triggers an immune reaction. Broccoli gives our body the biochemical reaction that we're flooding it with sulforaphane and high prebiotic fiber. And so our body has a completely different chemical reaction. And if we're not thinking about the chemical information, information that food is giving us, we're missing at the very least 1/4 of the puzzle, if not more than that. So part of getting out of a diet and figuring out a diet that works is thinking about food as energy as information. And then we also think about it as connection. Connection, I think is one of the most important pieces, which is food is connection to ourselves, to our culture, to comfort to tradition, to religion, to history, and there's not a diet on the planet that works with that. And so people do a diet, and then it's their daughter's birthday, and they eat a piece of cake and they fall off the wagon, right? And then they're off their diet, and they don't do it. Because they weren't thinking about that piece of cake was actually a nourishing choice because you are choosing to nourish that connection with your daughter. Are you going to have a piece of cake every day? No. But are you going to have a piece of cake on your daughter's birthday? Yeah. Are you going to eat? You know, are you going to eat pie on Thanksgiving? Yes, and please don't think twice about it, because that's connection. And then the fourth category is medicine, which is where you and I really spend our time is food is the fastest way to heal yourself and the slowest way to kill yourself. So there are times when you need to be on a medicinal food plan to heal something really specific. And then you can go back to thinking about the other three categories. But that's those are the three reasons diet failed diets fail, because we're outsourcing our own knowledge about our bodies to something outside of ourselves. They fail because it's not taking into account what our individual bodies actually need. And three, it's not taking into account the four categories of food. And so we don't have a holistic picture of what food is. And I can absolutely think about food exclusively as energy for 30 days. I can't for 365.

David Sandstrom 18:44
Right? If you're trying to do the low calorie equals weight loss formula, eventually hunger is going to win that battle. You can't willpower your way through a sustainable lifestyle change. You just can't do it that way. It has to work and it has to be sustainable. You know, that voice? You said a lot. I'd like to hit just a couple of highlights here. One is calories in versus calories out. It's a simple linear equation simple. And if you're not losing weight, you just don't have the willpower. You're just you know, you're just a pathetic dweeb. No, that's not the way it works because our human body is far more complex than a test tube. Alright, calories in versus calories out, works in a laboratory in a controlled environment in a test tube, what they actually do is they take some food, and then they turn on a little Bunsen burner, and they measure how much flame they have to use to burn that food up. And that's that's a calorie you know, it's a one. I think whatever food burns up in one second, or one minute, I forget which but they're actually burning food, which is a simulation of what happens in the body because we are burning through the food when we digest it. But as you said, a calorie from a piece of broccoli is different from a Diet Coke is different from a T bone steak is different from a free range chicken or, you know, dare I say, a Chick fil A sandwich, it's different. And the body is so much more complex than that. You know, there's a lot of reasons why your body might choose to hold on to a few extra pounds. If your liver is toxic, well, it has to store some of those toxins somewhere in the body. And fat is the least harmful place to store toxins. So the body body's very intelligent, it's very smart in it, it wants to survive, it's programmed for survival and carrying a few extra pounds might just be what you need at that moment. But as you as you build health, you're gonna find that the weight will automatically come off, I tell people this, and that is we don't lose weight in order to get healthy. Yeah, we get healthy in order to win, because a healthy person doesn't have to think about their weight. So when you addressed the health issues, as I was talking about earlier, those obstacles that are getting in the way of your body doing what it wants to do. When you start, you know, chopping down trees, you start to get a path going and the body will run with that. And weight just becomes a non issue. If you're embracing a healthy lifestyle. So yeah, that this calories, it's amazing how long this calories in versus calories out. myth has been perpetuated forever. But I would suggest that we're up against a very well funded marketing machine. Yeah, right.

Hally Brooke 21:29
Oh, yeah, a very well funded marketing machine. I had a client who came to me, about a year ago, there's a really fancy food in a box diet that claims that they have health coaches, and you can lose super fast pounds. And she's like, Yeah, I lost 30 pounds in 60 days. And I said, Cool. Okay, why are you coming to me? And she goes, Well, I now have an autoimmune disorder. And I've gained 60 pounds back and I said, Oh, yeah. And that's what happens that like, you can lose 30 pounds in 30 days. Sure, you're not going to be able to keep it off, and it's going to do damage to your body. So how do we do this? healthy sustainable way? Yep.

David Sandstrom 22:06
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So couple more questions. So you said you did a food move and food mood and poop, just food move. So what is what does that look like? Can you explain? Yeah,

Hally Brooke 22:18
absolutely. So food, how, what you're eating how your body's processing it. So what's coming out the other end. And then the chemical response, your mood and your energy level are both a gold standard. And the easiest way to figure out what your body is doing. We can do 800 dollar microbiome tests we can do, you know, kind of extensive lab tests, but spending a week looking at your food, your mood, and your poop can tell us 99% Of what we actually need to know. So what is that we have our clients, when they first come to us, they track what they're eating their mood and their energy level immediately before eating immediately after eating. And then two hours after eating. And when I say mood, I'm literally talking about and emotions, we'll I'm happy, I'm sad, I mad, I'm angry, whatever energy level is zero to 10, 10 is I could go run a marathon right now zero is I can't get off the couch. And then they're tracking their poop, we have a little poop journal, they can say you know, poop type one through six, what happened? What time of day. And so with that the two hours after you eat is the most important that we look at. And that's how, for example, this client who needed more carbohydrates every time she had a meal that had a certain level of carbohydrates, two hours after she was still feeling energized, and she had a positive mood when she was in this keto kind of area. Two hours after she was absolutely crashing both energy and mood and she's a an OBGYN doctor, like you cannot be crashing while you're delivering a baby, not an option. So that's what we're doing. We're looking at the chemical process, how is it affecting your emotions and your energy? And then how is your body processing it? What's coming out the other end?

David Sandstrom 23:53
Well, very good. You know, that's, that's really a practical way of looking at it that actually works. Right? As opposed to the one size fits all. Right, there's no such thing as a one size fits all diet never has been, never will be get that idea out of your head, just like the linear equation for calories. You got, you got to drop this way of thinking, or you'll never get to experience success with your diet. And you mentioned emotions, that's a really important component of figuring out what foods are right and wrong for you. i And you said emotion wheel and I was funny. I was going through an emotion will yesterday, I lead a marriage group, my wife and I and we were talking about identifying emotions within the marital context. And there's there's a really good chart. It's called all the feelz. And I'll put a link in the show notes to this, but it's allthefeelz.app. And you can go to this website and you can actually put this stuff in online and record your emotions over the course of a week, which I think is kind of cool. So I'll put a link to that in the show notes. It's a really great way to explore what you're really feeling because a lot of times we're feeling something, but we don't really have a name yet. Right? We can't just put a handle on it. So this this chart is we'll is very useful. I'll put a link in the show notes. But yeah, you know, I'm I don't often mention this on the show, but I'm a certified Metabolic Typing Advisor. And it's based around the book, The Metabolic Typing diet by Bill Walcott. And I think it's one of the best books ever written on nutrition. And one of the things that you do when you when you take a training is you learn how to assess a client's condition before and after a meal, just like you were saying, and metabolic typing system uses what we call a diet check record. And you look at mood and you say, how did I feel before I ate? And then, you know, an hour or two later, what was my mood like? But we also looked at what was my memory? Like, did I did I have a brain fog afterwards? How was my appetite? Was I satiated? Or was I standing in front of the fridge looking for a snack an hour later? Right? Also, your energy level was I was the my energy uplifted, you know, you should have energy after the meal. If you're doing the head bob, 90 minutes later, it's a good reason to suspect something you ate was not right for you. And you know, what's right for me, might not be right for Halle. And it might not be right for you the listener. So you know, the Roman philosopher Lucretius said, One man's food is another man's poison. And that was a long, and he observed that this was, you know, centuries ago. And it's still true today. So we've got, as Hally was saying, We've got to get away from the fads, and we got to get on to timeless truths, because truth is there for all times. I like to say this about truth. Truth is applicable to all people in all places, at all times. And if you get a hold of a truth when it comes to lifestyle, and diet and nutrition, you won't be susceptible, as susceptible to the fad diets as the come along. Yeah.

David Sandstrom 23:53
Yeah, absolutely. And if you understand how your body works, ancient wisdom as well, Hippocrates, 2500 years ago, said, All illness begins in the gut. So yeah, one man's food is another man's poison, all illness begins in the gut. We have the research to back that up now, which is cool. But it's it's a truth. It's a baseline from the beginning of time truth.

David Sandstrom 27:23
Absolutely. Well, you know, that brings up another thing I wanted to get into Hally is the is the gut-brain connection. A lot of people are calling the gut the second brain these days, because there's a lot of lot more nerve endings there and a bigger part of the nervous system than we were we once believed. So could you talk a little bit about the gut-brain connection? Because I know this is this is the hot topic today. So can you shed some light? Absolutely.

Hally Brooke 27:47
It's a hot topic. It's one of my absolute favorite things to talk about. This is where I specialize and I can get so nerdy. So just to give you a couple little fun facts to get the conversation going. Our gut. So when I talk about gut I'm talking about mostly our large intestine, but also the whole system, our stomach, our small intestine and our large intestine, our gut lining, which is our large intestine lining, the epithelial lining is one cell thick. That's crazy. When you think about the, you know, thinnest part of skin under your eyes or on the inside of your elbow, that's about 30 cells thick, your gut lining is one cell thick. And that is the only barrier between your food particles, your fecal matter particles and the rest of your body. Gross. So and you're using that probably three times a day or more every single time you put something in your mouth, whether it's two m&ms or an entire dinner, you are using that system. And so the the importance of having a good mucosal barrier, and healthy bacteria to help break down and ferment food in that gut lining is so important because if you get one tiny tear in a one cell thick gut lining, now you have food, poop, all sorts of things leaking out, which triggers an immune reaction, which then triggers brain fog and all those other things. So that's one fun fact. The next fun fact is 95% of our serotonin is actually created in our gut in our large intestine, which is fascinating. So when we deal with anxiety and depression, that's typically a serotonin and norepinephrine dysfunction, your body is somehow not creating enough. And so with traditional Western medicine, we treat that with SSRIs, or SSRIs, selective serotonin and norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors, which for our listeners, just means it's preventing your body from reabsorbing whatever is already in your body. The problem with that is, if you're dealing with anxiety and depression, you already don't have enough of those things in your body. So the drug that you're taking isn't helping you create more, it's just helping you keep whatever's in your system in your system. If we want to create more, we have to go to where the more is created, which is in our gut. 95% of our serotonin is created in our gut. So let's start there. And then my third favorite functional medicine fact about the gut is when an embryo is developing And obviously, an embryo starts with just two cells. And then it starts dividing and all these crazy miraculous ways and cells start differentiating themselves and becoming specialized. The specialized group of cells that creates your brain is the exact same group of cells that creates your gut. From that specialized group. It was what comes those two things. And so your gut being your second brain or your gut being your first brain is absolutely true. From a neurobiological beginning of life level.

David Sandstrom 30:29
Wow, that's powerful. That is really good stuff. So there's a lot of people out there that are going to a psychiatrist who is an MD. And what MDS do they prescribe. Yep. They're not looking at, they're not trained to maximize your health potential. They're trained to look for disease states, and they've been taught and in a reductionist fashion, that human beings are nothing more than a random collection of atoms and molecules. So if you have a mood problem, well, you must have a chemical imbalance. Let's try to correct that with more chemicals. Which, you know, it can help some people, you know, I'm not saying there isn't a time and a place for psychiatric meds, they can be useful, but they shouldn't be our frontline of defense, they should be a last resort after you've tried, you've exhausted the natural approaches, you, you, you've, you've gone through all you can do with nutrition and healthy, healthy lifestyle changes and detoxification, and, you know, doing the Candida cleanse, which is, you know, dealing with a yeast overgrowth, overgrowth in the gut, looking for parasites, those kinds of things, get that gut function back the way it's supposed to work. And you might just find that your mood improves the depression lifts and the anxiety is more controllable. I'm assuming you do see that with your with your class,

Hally Brooke 31:59
we see that a lot I was gonna say to you said that chemical response should be our last resort. I agree it should be a last resort. But it can also be what I call a bridge resort. You know, sometimes in order to do some of those lifestyle changes, we have to get someone at least out of the hole. And so we can use an SSRI to get them out of the hole. And then we can start building up these lifestyle things. Let's actually get more serotonin in your body. And now we can get you off of those SSRIs we have a client who we're working with right now, who was put in put on an SSRI, I think when she was 17, because she went through a bad breakup. And her mom didn't like her being sad, which is so sad to me, because sadness is a legitimate emotion that Jesus himself experienced. And so, in our westernized society, we say that sadness is a bad emotion and we try to fix it, which just makes it worse. Sadness is not about emotion, if you're sad, feel it. sadness and depression are not the same thing. depression often comes from sadness that's been shoved under a rug. So if you're sad, cry, take a bath light a candle, cry. Anyway, so this client is 17 years old, got put on an SSRI, because she had a bad breakup, hadn't dealt with anxiety and depression ever since then, and then has just been on an SSRI ever since she's now 36, and is dealing with infertility issues. And it takes some digging through the research to get to one of the side effects of long term SSRI exposure is infertility. And it's just heartbreaking. Like, we're going to get her to a point where she can get off her SSRI, and then we can start dealing with some of these other things. But that that is so sad, like what she needed at 17 maybe wasn't SSRI to get her out of the hole. But then we needed to get her off that by the time she was 19, so that she wasn't just on it her whole life. So yeah, we see that a lot. We have clients who are coming to us who are either on those medications and want to get off or who are coming to us because they've been told that that's the only thing that they can do, and they want to do something different. One thing that I would that I say to my clients all the time, and I know you do, too, David is this is a quote from Dr. Frank De Iceland, I'm gonna totally butcher his name, I'll send it to you, you can put it in the shownotes. But if you if you have a doctor, and you go to a doctor and they give you a medication without asking you about your exercise, your sleep, your nutrition and your relationships, you have a drug dealer, not a doctor. And I think that's so powerful. Like when someone comes to us and they're dealing with anxiety and depression. The first thing that I asked them is where do you think that's coming from? Like, like, what is happening is that a situational life thing is that because you were bottle fed as a kid and not breastfed, so we've got a dysbiosis in your gut that we need to fix. Like, why why is that happening? Before we just go up? Cool. Here's the band aid. Good luck.

David Sandstrom 34:49
Wow. Will you say that in about the drug pushers?

Hally Brooke 34:52
Yeah, totally. If you haven't, if you go to a doctor and they prescribe you a drug without first asking you about your sleep, your exercise your niche Grishin in your relationships, you have a drug dealer, not a doctor.

David Sandstrom 35:04
Wow, powerful, powerful, that's a really good way to shift your thinking is

Hally Brooke 35:10
to shift your thinking and as a patient to help empower yourself, like I am such a fan of Western medicine, we need it. It is it is necessary. And it is a miracle that we have so many things available to us. But as a patient, if you walk into a doctor's office, and they spend less than 15 minutes with you, and don't actually ask you what's going on, find a different doctor, your relationship with your practitioner should be an expert to expert relationship. When someone comes to me, I'm the expert in nutrition, but you're the expert in your body, like you live in your body every single day, and you live in your life every single day. And so it needs to be an expert expert to relationship not a authority to peon relationship. And that's something to pay attention to when you're trying out any practitioner.

David Sandstrom 35:56
Yeah, absolutely. Well, you know, yeah, the practitioners should be part of your team, right? It should be a team member, not not the person in charge of your health because we need to be in charge of our Yes, right, we need to we need to be the ones in charge. Because nobody knows our bodies better than we do. Right? Doctors have a lot of education, and they serve a really good purpose. You know, I a few years ago, I was foolishly up on a ladder on a tree. And I was trimming some branches and I in the ladder came off the tree and I fell 26 feet. And I crushed my heel. And I'm not talking about a crack I'm talking about I crushed it. And it was a severe injury. And I was glad that I got with a great surgeon, and he literally put Humpty Dumpty back together now, and I'll tell you what, I am very grateful for what that surgeon did for me. So there is absolutely a time and a place. So we got some of the best emergency rooms and best doctors and nurses in the world here in this country. But we need to know when and how to use their services and use them appropriately when it's when it's right to do. So. If you're dealing with a chronic health condition, you're better served with natural principles. You're better served with lifestyle changes lifestyle interventions, and supporting the body coming alongside the body's natural systems and supporting that and letting healing take place on its own. Because as you said earlier, you said it well. Doctors don't heal you. Your body heals itself.

Hally Brooke 37:27
Yeah, your surgeon put you back together, and then it's the way your body designed is designed that glue those bones back together.

David Sandstrom 37:34
That's right. Yep, that's exactly right. But his services were very useful and very precise.

Hally Brooke 37:38
And and a miracle that we have them.

David Sandstrom 37:42
Yeah. Yep. Yeah, absolutely. So another thing. You're really good on nutrition. Haley, and I'd like to ask you, what are some of the nutrients that people need to be looking out for to make sure they get enough in order to enjoy fiber? Yeah,

Hally Brooke 37:58
so I say that there's four things that we should all be taking daily, regardless of where we're at in our health, because we're not getting enough of them. The first one is phytonutrients. So phytonutrients are the phytochemicals that make food colors. Ideally, we should be getting one of every single color in our body every single day. And that's just not possible, right. I'm a nutritionist, and I eat very well. And I very clean and I am not eating the rainbow every day, because of what I have at the grocery store, because what I know how to cook, etc. So phytonutrients are those there are multiple different supplements for that it's not a multivitamin. It's a Phyto nutrient supplement, I use Juice Plus, in my practice, there's like micro greens, there's all of these other things. But phytonutrients is one of the most important things. The next thing that I say that all of us need is vitamin D3 K2. So anybody who's living north of the 38th parallel, which is most of us in the United States, Canada, Europe, we are deficient in vitamin D, from October to May, because we simply cannot get enough sunshine, even if we are outside all day long. And that is a crucial supplement a crucial nutrient that our bodies need. If we work in an office, which a lot of us do, even during the summer, we need that because we're not getting enough. So vitamin D, and then we have to pair that with K2. This is something that has just driven us crazy in the functional medicine community. Because of COVID Doctors have been yelling from the rooftops take vitamin d3, which is a yes, take vitamin d3. It's really good for you. But vitamin d3. One of its functions is it helps your body absorb calcium. And if it's not paired with kg to your body absorbs that calcium wherever it is in your bloodstream, which means it's into your arteries and that causes atherosclerosis, which is the hardening of your arteries. Not good. You have to have K2 in order to direct it to your bones. The only exception for that is people who are on a blood thinner medication because Ketu counteracts that but D3 K2 gotta have it. The fourth one is magnesium Um, magnesium is in charge of 300 plus different functions in our bodies, some of which we don't even know. But we should have a significant amount of magnesium coming from our diets and coming from food. And even if you eat organic, the soil has been so depleted of magnesium sulfide and phosphorus, sulfurous, sulfur and phosphorus, there we go, that we're just not getting it even if you're eating really clean. So magnesium has become sort of my miracle drug I can cure like restless legs, and sleep apnea and insomnia, and all of these things with magnesium because we're just not getting it. So magnesium is the third one. And then the fourth one is d h DHEA. three omegas. So omega threes, same thing, unless you're eating at least three servings of mash fish a week plus walnuts and almonds and avocados, we're not getting enough of that. And that's crucial for healthy metabolism and healthy brain. So those are the four that I say everyone should be putting in their body phytonutrients, D3 K2, magnesium and an omega. And really, if you have that you're pretty set. You don't need much else unless you have a specific situation.

David Sandstrom 41:10
So you don't normally recommend a multivitamin for people.

Hally Brooke 41:12
I Don't? Nope. Yeah, I don't for a couple reasons. One, multivitamins are from food originally, at least the good ones are. So all we're doing is we're taking supplements and minerals, we're extracting them, we're chemically or heat denaturing them and then re binding them into a binding supplement. And even if you look at the back of the absolute best supplements on the planet, it pales in comparison to an apple, I have a picture that I can send you to put in the show notes if you want. But it shows you what the nutrition label of an apple would be. And so it's I mean, it's 500 different vitamins and minerals and nutrients and all of these things. And if you look at the best multivitamin on the market, it's like 25.

David Sandstrom 41:55
Yeah, that's awesome. Send that to me,

Hally Brooke 41:58
I Well, it's one of my favorite pictures. So that's a huge reason. If we're, if we're taking phytonutrients, which is where we're going to get the majority of our vitamins and minerals, we don't need a multivitamin. And then low quality multivitamins that we know can actually cause issues, synthetic vitamins that you're getting at your big department stores or your grocery stores that are, you know, $5 for a 300 pack there, they can actually cause damage in your body. So in that case, I would rather you just not take anything. But yeah, a phytonutrient something is where we want to go.

David Sandstrom 42:33
Alright, very good. So where do you sit on the vegetarian, carnivore equation?

Hally Brooke 42:39
I love that question. Um, I think I sit pretty in the middle. So the carnivore diet where you only eat meat, we have seen be helpful for clients who have massive food allergies. In the short term. I don't think the carnivore diet is something that you should do ever for more than 30 days. You're just not getting what you need. There's, there's nothing out there that shows that you're getting what you need. The carnivore diet was made popular by one guy on YouTube. And now it's this whole thing like that guy's not a nutritionist. He ate me and felt good. Yeah, yeah, so Nick's that we have seen people have success on a carnivore diet when they're dealing with SIBO when they're dealing with massive gastrointestinal issues. And when they're dealing with massive food intolerances because it just takes out so many potential chemical interactions in a very short term, so that we can heal, rebalance and then reintroduce. So that's the only time I would ever say do carnivore. Vegetarian, I typically go by the Michael Pollan quote, which is eat real food, mostly plants, not too much. I think the mostly plants is important. A plant heavy diet is going to get you more phytonutrients more nutrient capacity and fewer toxins, as long as you're eating organic. I don't think vegan vegetarianism in the long term is good for most people. We do have a handful of clients who are athletes or high level competitors, who do compete better on a vegan diet while they're competing, but they recover better on a real well rounded diet in between. So I would not say that it's a good thing long term that said, with inflation, we have some clients who are dealing with financial issues and we can get them incredibly good, healthy, well rounded plant based foods more easily than we can get them healthy, organic, safely sustained meat and so in that case, financially, yeah, financially speaking. Absolutely. Let's do organic beans and rice and not, you know, pesticide laden, RHB filled meet. So that's kind of a long answer to say. Both of those have absolute places in our life's in our journey. He's, I've been vegan for a time I've kind of experimented with that on myself. And, you know, overall eat real food, mostly plants, not too much.

David Sandstrom 45:11
Yeah, okay, that's that's pretty good. Man has a lot to say I know. But I appreciate your input on that in, you know, I think what Haley is saying here really is listen to your body and do what works for you. I think there's a lot of people that do really well on on a Keto type diet. I wouldn't, I wouldn't recommend solid keto for a long period of time, I don't think it's healthy. And then there's people that do well on a nearly vegetarian diet. And I found that to be true in my practice. And that's what I mostly did was nutritional counseling. But you know, most people are somewhere in between those two extremes. And you've got to do what works for you, everyone is an individual. And personally speaking, I do really well on a lot of fat and protein in my diet. I actually went vegetarian for a while. And I shifted from vegetarian to just, you know, an occasional piece of fish and some white meat chicken. And I did that for about a year. This was a long time ago. And, and I didn't do well on that my mood was was awful. But everything I was reading was saying, this is the healthiest way to eat, you know, I my energy was down, my immune was down, I got sick a lot of times that year, I really didn't do well. But I was really trying to tough it out because I believed that that was the healthiest way to eat. And this is a funny story. I I was really hungry one day, and I went through a Wendy's drive thru. And I ordered a double cheeseburger, and I ate that thing. And I gotta tell you, my energy lifted, like, in the mood, everything was like a cloud lifted off of me. And from that point on, I decided I'm eating red meat. Because it works for me. And to this day, it really does. But there are other people that doesn't work for that you could talk to your neighbor, you could talk to immediate family members and say, How do you think you would feel if you ate a sirloin? Steak for breakfast and nothing else? Yep. And you know, someone might say, well, I'd be really sleepy for the rest of the morning, you know, or someone else might say, I'd feel pretty good. You know. And then the same is true. If you try an experiment, try a glass of orange juice for breakfast. Yeah, some people will do well on that my father in law is one of them. He stayed with us last week for the holidays. And all he has for breakfast is a glass of orange juice. And he's good till about two or three in the afternoon before he needs any more food. And I can tell by looking at him his his energy and his mental clarity. It's all there. If I did that, I'd be crashing and burning violin 11 In the morning, there's just no way. So every one's different. You've got to listen to your body. Listen to those signals, your body's constantly talking to you. Right? They tell us when we're sleepy. They tell us when we're sweaty and hot. They tell us when we're cold. They they tell us when we're you know, itchy, you name it. There's a lot of ways the body communicates to us but start tuning into those those other cues of your your mood, your sense of well being your energy, your satiety all those things are clues as to how you should eat. But anyway, I don't want to go in circles here and repeat too much. But anyway, any thoughts on that Hally?

Hally Brooke 48:17
No, it's so good. I was just going to tie back to what we talked about earlier, when we were talking about diets and that idea of outsourcing what's right for you to an app or an article or the next thing on Google versus listening to yourself. If your father in law, read a bunch of articles, he probably wouldn't drink a glass of orange juice in the morning. And you probably feel like trash, right? And so it's tying it back to I need to figure out what actually works for my body. You need to figure out what actually works for your body, not what the next best trending article on Google is saying or the next best diet like it is about you and your body and how you're designed and you cannot outsource it, or you can't outsource it and feel really terrible. That;s fine.

David Sandstrom 48:58
Absolutely. You know what it might you know, that diet that your friend is on? It might work for you. Chances are it won't.

Hally Brooke 49:04
Yep, yeah. Right. And chances are it won't work for your friend long term.

David Sandstrom 49:10
That's true, too. Yeah. Yeah, very much. So. All right, Haley, this has been great. If you wanted to just sum up the most important point of what you made today, well, what would you say?

Hally Brooke 49:21
I think it's what we just talked about, you have to figure out what works for your body. And a huge piece of that is working with a practitioner who can help you figure that out. Because you're not going to find it on Google working with David working with me. And learning what is right for your body. You are unique. There is only one you ever in history from the beginning of time to the end of time and that is how God created it. So you have to figure out what is what is right for you. And that is if you take one thing away, take that away.

David Sandstrom 49:57
Haley, thank you so much. If someone's resonating with this message And they want to get a hold of you. What's the best way to do?

Hally Brooke 50:01
Yeah, absolutely. So we do free consults. And you can find that right on our website at www.LiveNourished.Coaching.com. free consult, just put in the thing that you found us on a podcast. And we'll also give you 20% off if you decide to work with us. But we are also a great place to start because we are not a sales team. We are a what's right for you, team. So we have a relationship with about 60 other practitioners who we refer out to you on a regular basis. So if you're not sure where to start, book a free consult with us start with us, and we'll help guide you in the right direction.

David Sandstrom 50:33
All right, and you don't have to be in your area you do online counseling.

Hally Brooke 50:37
Yeah. Thank you, COVID. We practice all over the United States, Canada and Australia.

David Sandstrom 50:42
Excellent. All right, Haley, thank you so much for sharing your wisdom with the Natural Nation.

Hally Brooke 50:46
Absolutely, David, thank you for having me on, it's been an honor.

David Sandstrom 50:50
For more, go to the show notes page at davidsandstrom.com/110. There you can find a full transcript and an audio as well as a video version of the podcast and more. If you're enjoying the show, I encourage you to subscribe on your favorite podcast listening platform, also on YouTube. And if you have a friend that you think might be like minded, I would appreciate you telling them about it. It's relatively hard to find this information from a faith based perspective. And I'll bet your friend will thank you for it. Well, that's it for now. Thanks for tuning in. I'll talk with you next time. Be blessed.