Geheimnisse der funktionellen Medizin. Mit Dr. Will Cole

Dr. Will Cole ist ein weltweit angesehener klinischer Experte für funktionelle Medizin. Er hat sich in seiner täglichen Praxis auf die Behandlung von Autoimmunerkrankungen, hormonellen Dysbalancen, Schilddrüsenproblemen, Verdauungsstörungen und Gehirngesundheit spezialisiert. Zudem ist er mehrfacher New York Times-Bestsellerautor von bekannten Fachbüchern wie Intuitive Fasting und Gut Feelings. Seit mehr als 16 Jahren betreut er über seine telehealth-Klinik Patienten auf der ganzen Welt. 

Mehr Informationen zu seiner Person sowie kostenfreie Ressourcen finden Sie unter: www.drwillcole.com 

[Dr. Will Cole] (0:00 - 0:52)

I would take a sugar inventory for anybody that's watching this is to think, look at a day in the life, a week in the life. How many grams of added sugar are you having in a day? And it's in the foods you're buying.

It's hidden in a lot of things. Become label literate, not just for sugar, but all these other additives. What you eat with breakfast, lunch, and dinner matters, of course, but what are we feeding our head and our heart on a daily basis?

And the head space and heart space in which you eat the meal is a ingredient to the outcome of that meal. Will that meal be a medicine? In theory, maybe it could be from a nutrient density standpoint, therapeutic standpoint, it could be, but that inner resistance to anxiety, that sort of negative relationship that person has with that meal, or maybe they just don't like it.

There's an inner resistance towards it. That's not going to be sustainable. It's going to be a source of dread.

[Jason Raffington] (0:53 - 2:24)

Welcome to HealthWise, the health and longevity podcast brought to you by Sunday Natural. My name is Jason Raffington, and in this podcast, we explore what it truly means to be healthy. Together, we'll dive into topics like medicine, exercise, nutrition, and emotional well-being, always with a wise perspective on what genuinely benefits us.

We live in an era of unprecedented nutritional noise, where the simple act of eating has become a source of anxiety rather than nourishment. We debate diet labels, food rules, and macro ratios, yet we often miss a very important truth. The same food can be deeply nourishing for one person and inflammatory for another.

So maybe the real question is not which diet is best, but how we learn to understand the unique biological language of our own body. To help us explore that, I am joined today by one of the most respected voices in functional medicine. Dr. Will Cole is a clinical expert specializing in autoimmune conditions, hormonal imbalances, thyroid health, digestive disorders, and brain health. He's the author of several New York Times bestsellers, including Intuitive Fasting and Gut Feelings, and he has dedicated his career to helping people find their own bio-individual path to wellness. Welcome, Dr. Cole. Thanks so much for having me.

Yeah, great to have you. We have this ritual here on the podcast where we start with a question related to Sundays. And my question to you is, is there a particular ritual or a kind of soul food that you lean into on a Sunday to start the day, stay grounded?

[Dr. Will Cole] (2:26 - 3:49)

Sundays are pretty ritualistic, I guess. I'm a man of routine anyways, any day of the week. But on Sundays, I wake up in the morning, I start my morning off, every morning off with either tea or coffee, and I alternate, you know, whatever I'm feeling on the day.

But I love a good Earl Grey tea. So that's not just a Sunday thing, but I'm envisioning what does the perfect Sunday look like? I let my golden doodles outside to go to the bathroom in the morning.

How granular do you want to get, Jason? But we go to church on Sunday morning. So I go with my family to church, and that's a special part of the day.

I would say food-wise, something that's grounding, nourishing, that's extra, you know, it's good any day, but certainly on Sundays, is sort of a hearty, bone broth-based soup that's filled with protein, easy to digest, sort of broken down to the soup. Could be grass-fed beef, something like that. My wife made it recently, so I'm thinking of the one we had most recently.

And lots of vegetables, but again, easy to digest. It's sort of a proverbial siesta for the gut and the immune system. So I would say, yeah, a good soup or stew is a good Sunday meal for me.

[Jason Raffington] (3:50 - 4:18)

Yeah, that sounds really good. I do enjoy a good broth myself every now and then. Now, I do want to dive right into, yeah, more diet topics.

So when people ask you, as a nutrition expert, yeah, what should I eat or what should I not eat? What do you usually tell them? I mean, I think you probably don't recommend a specific diet immediately, but rather a principle, a way of thinking about nutrition, about foods.

What do you tell them?

[Dr. Will Cole] (4:19 - 7:46)

Yeah, it's all subject, you're right, to the law of bio-individuality. We're all created differently, right? And there's some overarching things that are good for any human, certainly, we can talk about that.

But it's who are we talking about? What are they going through? Where are they at, even from a mental space standpoint?

Because you could theoretically, from a clinical nutrition standpoint, think, okay, based on their labs or health history, what their goals are, this would be the best route. But there's a lot of inner resistance or stress that's not there yet, for whatever reason. And what you eat with breakfast, lunch and dinner matters, of course.

But what are we feeding our head and our heart on a daily basis? And the head space and heart space in which you eat the meal is a ingredient to the outcome of that meal. Will that meal be a medicine?

In theory, maybe it could be from a nutrient density standpoint, therapeutic standpoint, it could be. But that inner resistance, that anxiety, that sort of negative relationship that person has with that meal, or maybe they just don't like it, there's an inner resistance towards it. That's not going to be sustainable, it's going to be a source of dread, it's going to be this arduous thing that's not going to be conducive for facilitating improving that person's lab and their lives.

So this is the science and art of what I do and what I have a passion to kind of explore that there's so much exciting science and clinical nutrition and health sciences, right? But let's be as an individual from a telehealth patient standpoint or a listener to a podcast or a reader of my book, be their own end of one experiment. Let's find out what works for them, what foods and things beyond food and health, what loves their body back and what doesn't.

So you're asking my sort of my philosophy on it is that feeding your body things that things that love your body back is a source of self-respect. And we have to look at that sort of ineffable space in between the macros and the micros and the calories and all of the nutrient density, all the exciting science that matters. But ultimately, the art of all of this matters too, because none of this matters if it's not a source of grace.

None of this matters if it's not something they can stick with, because consistency is that missing ingredient that you need to have to start moving the needle. Something that I talk a lot about with our telehealth patients is that you can't heal a body you hate. You cannot obsess your way into health.

You cannot shame your way into wellness. And I love the biohackers out there. I'm sort of on that biohacker spectrum myself.

But some of the best biohackers out there, God bless them. They're super smart. They're doing a lot of interesting things.

And I love a biohack just as much as anybody else does. But a lot of the biohackers can be kind of neurotic, not necessarily the happiest people at the end of the day, because I know a lot of them personally, and they're kind of neurotic, for lack of better words. And it can work for them.

And that's their path. I'm not judging them. But I'm saying for the average person that's listening to a podcast or reading a book or whatever, watch, following us on social media, it can be kind of overwhelming.

So all of this sort of distilling what actually matters and what moves the needle on sort of mere mortals lives, of which I am one as well, and not these sort of demi-god biohackers out there. So I think I just try to bring a sort of real life component to all of this.

[Jason Raffington] (7:47 - 9:18)

Yeah, I think it's great that you that you have this nuanced approach, because it's seemingly a simple question, what should I eat? What should I not eat? But framing it as yeah, eat the foods that love you back, avoid the foods that don't love you back, I think makes total sense, because we're all individuals.

And I think also what you said, context matters, even if I have a healthy breakfast, be it bone broth, or some eggs, or whatever, but I eat it in a rushed and hurried state, I eat it in my car, I'm not present, I don't chew properly, I don't digest it properly, then even the seemingly healthy meal is not going do what it could, if I would take the time to actually sit down and enjoy it slowly and mindfully.

And also about these biohackers, yeah, I think that for some of them, yeah, sometimes for me as well, like I try to do all the things, but it's difficult. You know, you can always think, oh, maybe I should meditate now, maybe I should do that ice bath, and then this becomes a source of stress. So yeah, it's pretty complicated sometimes.

But I wonder, it depends on who you ask. So what should I do? What should I eat?

Some people have these very radical views, and especially in nutrition, it seems like there are these dietary camps. And it seems almost like a religion to some people. So they fight over what's right, eat vegetables, don't eat vegetables, they poison you, eat meat, no meat causes cancer.

So why do you think these debates never end? Because it seems like there's a new diet every week, every month.

[Dr. Will Cole] (9:19 - 13:07)

Yeah, it is true. Oh, I think people, I've heard it said, and I think it's kind of some truth to it, it's probably easier to change someone's religion than the foods that they eat or the diet that they adhere to. It is deeply personal for people, right?

And especially when you get a certain personality where they can be slightly dogmatic or extreme personality, and they're very smart too. And they sort of double down, triple down in the research. And it becomes sort of the siloed, my way or the highway view.

I don't know very many clinicians, like people that actually see patients, of course, there's few, but I feel like that extreme dogma, one size fits all, black or white view doesn't adhere so many to the people that actually see patients for a living like myself. When you, if you hung your hat on one way to do something for everybody, you'd be proven wrong a lot. Again, there's an overarching things that are good for everybody.

We can get behind that, but there's so much bio-individuality to this topic. Yeah, I think it's a tale as old as time. People like to be part of a community and tribe.

And I think that whereas like maybe faith in God or spiritual path for some people, they kind of put food and nutrition and health in its place, and it becomes their community, especially when you talk about vegans and vegetarians, of which that can be tied to a religion or spiritual path too. But for many of them, it's not, but it's dogmatic in that mind. And that sort of cliche of the militant vegan, which isn't just a cliche, it's true.

I mean, there are very much militant people out there in that world. I feel like they've mellowed out in some ways, because I've been in this world for a long time. I used to get the worst hateful attacks, pictures of my kids on social media because they talked about grass-fed beef.

I mean, that's sort of the level of militancy and tribalism, toxic tribalism that can be when you're talking about food. I mean, this is how so many people have lost the plot with losing humanity with these topics. But I feel like they have mellowed out, or maybe I just don't pay attention as much.

I don't know. But I feel like the same can be said for some militant, like you said, a carnivore. They're not coming against, it's not equating it with murder.

And I think that's the difference with vegans, is that when you're super militant vegan, you're not just, that person that's an omnivore isn't just eating a different way, they are murdering. So how do you treat a murderer? And that's sort of the worldview that they have.

You're going to treat a murderer, especially when you have a keyboard bravado behind a keyboard, that anonymity, you're going to treat people really poorly sometimes. And I think that sort of combination of online with that worldview can be a really poor recipe for humanity. But carnivores are a bit different because they're not, it's not equating with murder, but they're just very dogmatic sometimes.

It can apply to any way of eating. It's across the spectrum. I think we need to remember that we're still humans.

It's a social media thing where it's like, they, people, most of these people would never say it to your face. They just like to get behind, they have that keyboard warrior bravado. So yeah, it's, it's not for me, for sure.

I can get passionate about, I mean, let's talk about polyphenols or healthy fats or protein. I have an opinion about all these things. I'm not saying let's be wishy washy, but at the end of the day, like, what are we doing this for?

It's actually to, should be to help people or to help yourself. And stressing about healthy things isn't good for your health. Throwing shame and negativity out into the world, that's biofeedback too, to your biochemistry.

And what we're feeding our head and our heart matters too, and sometimes more important than the foods that we eat.

[Jason Raffington] (13:08 - 13:31)

Yeah. Yeah. Speaking of helping people, I want to dig into this concept of bio-individuality a little more.

You've mentioned it a couple of times and you write about it in your books and maybe for people who don't really understand yet what it means, maybe you can kind of explain a little more and maybe explain how one food can be good for one person and actually inflammatory for another one. How, what, what lies underneath that?

[Dr. Will Cole] (13:32 - 17:39)

Yeah. So there's again, this overarching view where I could talk about, maybe I have what I would call the inflammatory core four. These are the four thing, four foods or food ingredients that are most likely to cause inflammation, but there's an exception to the rule.

There's better for you versions to the, to the rule, to the rules. There's, there's even, even if you don't have better for you versions, the exceptions to the rules for some people can have these foods and be completely fine. So we're having, we're have to, we have to look at the interplay between genetics and epigenetics.

And there's so much uniqueness to that person's health status and where they're at when you're meeting them as a clinician or just for the person that's listening or watching this, where they're at in their life, what loves their body back when it comes to food and any other habits that you're doing for your health. So we have to look at someone's microbiome status, their metabolic status. We have to look at food sensitivity, we have to look at hormonal balance, their nervous system, what's their relationship with food, that sort of stress and anxiety piece, unresolved trauma variables for some people of how that impacts the gut brain axis and the way their body digest things.

So there's a lot of uniqueness from a macronutrient standpoint. Is it moderate carb? Is it can be higher carb in form of whole foods?

Is it a lower carb approach? Is it a no carb approach that's going to be a best serving for that person? Healthy fats like the ketogenic diet has amazing science around it.

Does that mean everybody should be doing the ketogenic diet? A high fat, moderate protein, lower carb? No.

So that, but does that mean that ketogenic diet is equals bad for everybody? No, there's so much bioindividuality to these topics. Now there's some basic things like essential fatty acids, essential amino acids.

There's some things that we just need. We need to make sure we're nourishing our body enough to a certain threshold from a caloric standpoint. But beyond some basic things, I've seen what works for one person not work for the next person.

And then that take, that's not even taken into consideration. I'm just talking about macros, but like someone that has a food sensitivity to gluten and the next person doesn't have a gluten sensitivity, right? You can't say, well, gluten is bad for everybody.

Everybody should avoid it. Well, what do you say to the person that eats it and is fine? It's in the context of a nutrient dense diet.

You look at their labs, you look at their digestion, they enjoy the food. There's nothing wrong with it. So, I mean, that could apply to anything under the sun.

And then on top of that, I deal a lot with people that have autoimmune problems or what the world would call mystery illnesses. You really have to keep an intellectual flexibility when it comes to the uniqueness of those types of cases. Because then there's things like FODMAP intolerance and people that have SIBO, these digestive problems, oxalate issues, people that have lectin sensitivities.

There's so many things to take into consideration that apply for some people, but not for everybody. And this is the realm of all quote-unquote healthy whole foods, nutrient dense foods. I'm not talking about ultra processed foods.

I'm talking about the whole realm of whole foods. So, the advice of just eat whole foods, well, what whole foods are we talking about? What's the most clinically appropriate for that person or what to say it in the way that I keep saying it, what foods love that person's body back?

And then the second part to that is what loves their body back right now? Because as you improve their health, as you're improving resilience, that list of foods that don't love their body back, my goal would be to shrink that list and that foods that love their body back to grow. So, to not become again overly identify with one way of eating because as we improve resilience, as your body changes, as just time changes the body, what serves you in a season of your life shouldn't become your identity because it can evolve over time.

So, to have that sort of grace and lightness to these conversations.

[Jason Raffington] (17:40 - 18:24)

Yeah, I think the last point is also really important because we have different requirements at different points of our lives. And then when our goals change, we might need different foods. When I all of a sudden start working out, I might need more protein.

But when I'm injured, I might need something else. Or when I get older, I might need something else. So, this is, I think, really important to keep in mind.

Now, you mentioned there are four core food groups, I think, that I don't want to say most people should avoid because as you have just explained, it's always very individual. But still, I think there are certain groups that you say, at least in your books, are generally more likely to be problematic for some people. Could you tell us what those are?

[Dr. Will Cole] (18:24 - 22:09)

Yeah, sure. So, and then in no particular order. So, nobody should be offended or come at me in the comments and say, that should be number one.

I'm just like on the top of my mind rattling them off. So, a number one would be gluten-containing grains. Now, I say I just said gluten works for some people.

It does. So, for each one of these, we can get into the weeds of each and every one. There's a lot of better for you versions or exceptions to the rule.

But gluten-containing grains is on the list of the inflammatory core four because it's, all of this should be seen through the lens of ancestral health, in my opinion. And our genetics haven't changed in thousands of years. But our world has changed dramatically in such a finite period of time, but just a few generations.

So, what we're eating today from a wheat standpoint, it's the protein that's in wheat, rye, barley, spelt. It's not what it once was over just generations as far as what we're spraying on it, and then thousands of years as far as the change, the hybridization of the wheat supply. So, is it the wheat or is it what we've done to it?

I think it's a bit of both. I think historically it was used, it was actually properly prepared too. It was sprouted, it was fermented, and it was a different grain at one point, right?

And then on top of that, we're spraying it with herbicides and pesticides, which is another layer of the variables to consider. So, there's a lot of context and nuance, I think, to this conversation. And I see people on labs and just tracking things from a clinical nutrition standpoint, people reacting to this version of wheat, but not that version of wheat.

If it's prepared this way, they don't react it this way. It's a problem. And then for some people, no matter what version they have, it's a problem.

So, it is a lot of different reasons why this could be problematic for people. But historically, it was stored well in times of famine, so humans could survive. But is it really a thriving food?

Is it something that somebody needs from a, there's no essential carbohydrate or essential gluten protein that your body needs to survive. But it's there, it stores well. But now we're feasting on a famine food year round and not properly preparing it.

And it's not grown in the way that used to be grown. There's a lot of variables there. So, I would say gluten would be number one.

Number two would be industrial seed oils, which is more controversial in the nutrition world. But again, I've looked at labs for a living and I look at health outcomes. So, I don't, there are better for you versions to seed oils.

But things like canola oil, vegetable oil, soybean oil, is it the oil? Is it the over consumption of them? Is it the quality of them?

I think it's a bit of all of these things. I think the modern Western diet is too high in these omega-6 fatty acids that aren't the good kinds, right? We need omega-6, they're essential fatty acids, some of them are.

But we're over consuming these industrial seed oils, not in great quality. And they're implicated in ultra processed foods too. But beyond that, they're high in omega-6.

So, the omega-3-6 ratio is off for the average Westerner. They're not having enough long chain omega-3s from whole food sources and they're eating too many omega-6 fatty acids in these industrial seed oils. And on top of that, they're chemically extracted using things like hexanes.

And yeah, I just think that they're not really nutrient dense in these industrial seed oils. And on top of that, they could be oxidized with light and heat and become further inflammatory. So, I would look at them as on the list of like, are they a problem for you?

Are you over consuming these industrial seed oils or packaged foods that have these industrial seed oils more importantly?

[Jason Raffington] (22:09 - 22:20)

Yeah, I was just going to say, because you find them in pretty much all processed food. When you look on the label, there's always sunflower or some other vegetable oil in there that's problematic.

[Dr. Will Cole] (22:20 - 26:16)

So much. Yeah. And it's not just about the seed oils at that point.

It's a cocktail of different, like a perfect storm of different things when you're talking about ultra processed foods. But I think that like an organic cold pressed sunflower oil, it's technically a seed oil. Do I think that's the problem of Western society?

No, I don't. So, I don't like to make broad sweeping statements whenever I can avoid it. And there are better for you versions of even seed oils.

I know that's radical to the carnivore people out there. But yes, it is true. And then the third one would be added sugar, which is kind of, I think most people get good behind that.

It's kind of the United Nations as far as food ingredients go. Like most people can agree on kumbaya moment that added sugar in the form, processed sugar and the absence of it in its whole food form. We're not talking about fruit here.

And that kind of begs the question. I think lumping processed sugar, added sugar with fruit and said, and that is a problem in the nutrition world where it's like there's certain people that have fruit is bad and they're fearing fruit and they become sort of orthorexic about all this stuff, which is disordered eating or unhealthy food. The Western world has not become diabetic because of a fruit problem.

Like no one's become diabetic. Now, does that mean people that have insulin resistance shouldn't limit fruit for a time while they heal? Yes, certainly.

Back to that sort of low carb ketogenic approach, even carnivore approach for some people for a season of their life. Low carb can be needed and it is a great clinical nutrition tool. But I think we over correct oftentimes again, back to that sort of toxic tribalism and nutrition.

So looking at, I would take a sugar inventory for anybody that's watching this is to think, look at a day in the life, a week in the life. How many grams of added sugar are you having in a day? And it's in the foods you're buying.

It's hidden in a lot of things. Become label literate, not just for sugar, but all these other additives. And then the fourth would be dairy.

Back to that genetic epigenetic mismatch or an evolutionary mismatch as our researchers refer to it as, is the dairy we're consuming as a world today isn't what it once was. So we've crossbred cows. We've been homogenized and pasteurized the milk.

We feed them grain and not grass. So it's changing a lot of variables here that our body and the microbiome, all the trillions of bacteria in our gut haven't really changed, but our world has changed so much. So it's triggering these latent genetic predispositions.

It's triggering inflammation because it's our microbiome. Our body is living in a brave new world in many ways. And that we have to decrease that chasm.

We have to decrease that mismatch between our body and the world around us and the food that we consume. That's how we can put the body back into homeostasis. So dairy is a shell of itself, the poor thing.

It's not what our ancestors were consumed. And that's why A2 dairy is cropping up because it's the sort of OG dairy out there, the OG casein, the dairy protein. And on top of that, fermented dairies breaks down these proteins and make them more digestible.

So yogurts and kefirs, cheeses are more digestible. And then raw dairy has the enzymes to help break these things down. So if you put the whole back into the food, the body can actually deal with some of this stuff.

But look, you can get the best of the best A2 fermented raw camel milk and it still may not love a person back. So you have to keep an open mind to even the best of the best may not love everybody back, but it's going to love more people back. So that would be the inflammatory core four.

If I could add a plus one, it would be alcohol. But is that a food for some people?

[Jason Raffington] (26:20 - 26:42)

Do you think that when people consume these foods, and I'm sure many of our listeners, or at least some of our listeners think, I consume all of these and I don't have a problem, I don't feel any side effects, bad reactions or anything like that. Is it still a problem for them? Is there like a silent inflammation that's being fueled by these?

Or do you think some people can actually really consume them and there is no problem at all?

[Dr. Will Cole] (26:43 - 30:21)

I think some people can consume them in moderate amounts and there can be no problem at all, which again could be a radical position to have, but I've seen it. So there's a lot of nuance in context, these conversations I said. And I don't want to go looking for problems where there aren't any.

And I don't want to create any stress and anxiety when there shouldn't be anything, right? So you want to look at their labs and you want to look at how they feel. Now, a lot of people are normalizing things that aren't normal.

Just because something's common doesn't necessarily make it normal. Just because it's your everyday doesn't mean you should settle for or normalize it. So that's a bit different.

That is like someone that says, well, yeah, it's this low grade, whatever, digestive problem, this mild background anxiety, this mild brain fog that they've had for years that they just think it's their personality or that anxiety. They think I'm just an anxious person. Is that really a personality trait or is it a neuroinflammatory problem?

Is it your personality trait or is it a hormonal imbalance? Is it your personality or is there some dysregulation going on in your body? That's a bit different because people can get by, they can go to work, they can live their life, but it's not necessarily optimal health.

It's suboptimal. They aren't thriving in some way, in some insignificant ways. That's a bit different.

And then when you look at labs, you'll see it on the labs if you're running the appropriate labs too. So you have to look at both subjective and objective things. Like, how are they feeling, like truly feeling, like ask a lot of questions.

So I can have people, they'll put on their telehealth, like health history forms. Like I have this and this, right? It's two different health issues.

But then when you really talk to them for an hour and a half, you find out, oh, it's a lot more than that. They're just so divorced from their body and they're not even really realizing that this thing that they're experiencing every day is actually a proverbial check engine light, that something's off here and we want to explore what's going on here. Again, this isn't being fear-mongering or looking for problems where there aren't any, it's just being a little bit more curious about what the body's trying to tell you.

Because a lot of these health issues are, they're living on this inflammation spectrum, this continuum between optimal health and health problems. And by the time somebody is diagnosed with the chronic health issue, whether it be an autoimmune problem, hormonal problem, metabolic issue, mental health issue, it's about four to 10 years prior to that diagnosis that things are brewing on this continuum. So this is saying, look, the body's telling us these things don't happen oftentimes overnight.

Most of the time they don't happen overnight for people. So what's the body telling us at this point in your life? And then getting curious about how you're feeling, what your body's telling you by looking at the different systems of the body and looking at the difference between optimal and average.

The world is very average, but the world is struggling with chronic health issues. How can we be optimal? And then looking at labs, let's look and see what the lab is showing us.

Because there's a lot of, to use American history as a scenario, there is a lot of metabolic Paul Revere's. He didn't actually say the British are coming, but that's the sort of the legend of Paul Revere. There's a lot of warning signs on labs years before it ever becomes diagnosable that you can catch things that are brewing on this inflammation spectrum.

So this isn't a point of like, oh, let's be fearful. This is, wow, we have agency because we have to know what we're dealing with to do something about it. And all of this stuff are things you can overcome and heal from and optimize and reverse.

But again, you have to look at where the issue is to do something about it.

[Jason Raffington] (30:22 - 31:13)

Yeah. And I think it's an important point that you mentioned that what's normal is not optimal. And considering that we're living in such a sick society, we compare ourselves with others who are also sick and we think, oh yeah, they have it too.

So it's normal. Everybody has it. It's not a problem.

So yeah, that's, that's a big issue. But how do we actually go about reconnecting to our bodies and actually feeling that something is off? I mean, you mentioned running some labs, of course, but some people may not have the money to do it or may not know where to go.

I think it's similar in the US that conventional doctors are very hesitant when it comes to running labs. They only do it when it's really necessary. And it's the same here in Germany.

They don't like to do that and you have to pay out of pocket. So is there another way that we can kind of figure out which foods our body actually, well, yeah, which foods are good to us and which ones actually harm our body?

[Dr. Will Cole] (31:14 - 35:32)

Yeah, I think health history informs me what labs are appropriate. You don't want to just be running any lab under the sun. You want to actually get people information that's relevant and they can do something about it.

And not everybody needs all the fancy labs. Sometimes it's just basic stuff, conventional data even, that looks at optimal, not average. And I think that's the bigger point here, too, is that the labs reference range, whether it's your GP, PCP, any conventional doctor, rheumatologist, endocrinologist, gastroenterologist, hormone specialist, they're looking at the labs reference range largely.

The labs range is based on a statistical bell curve average of people who go to labs. People that are going to labs predominantly are not the healthiest group of people. So it's not the lab system.

It's helpful. We need to know where pathology is, of course. But it's not looking at optimal.

It's looking at average. So we want to look at optimal, not average. Where is the body functioning the best?

That's where we get our name, functional medicine. Where does thriving, vibrant wellness reside? Where does you feeling your best reside?

Where does health span reside? So we're looking at a tighter interval within that larger reference range, which a lot of my favorite labs are actually all conventional labs, but seen through the lens of optimal, not average. And then we can get into the environmental toxins.

I love those tests and gut health tests or expanded hormonal tests. There's a time and place for all of these labs, but it should be based on health history. It should be based on some sort of clinical acumen of saying, is this going to actually help this person?

Because these labs, as you mentioned, aren't covered by insurance largely. So we want to be comprehensive, but still be practical and cost effective and not overwhelming the person. So I would say beyond even the lab conversation, like you said, let's just say someone doesn't have access to labs.

They could reach out to us like our telehealth clinic. That's what I do. It's my day job.

So they can reach out. It's all at drwillcole.com. There's lots of free information for people, but also if they want to run labs, we run labs for people around the world and have done so for the past 16 plus years.

But let's just say they don't have access to someone in functional medicine. At that point, I would check in with their body. So because these different systems of the body can be, as I mentioned earlier, these check engine lights that something's off here, that are clues, pointers, as to what's the body trying to tell us.

So looking at your brain health, looking at your digestion health, looking at your energy levels, looking at your sleep, all of these, looking at your skin, your hair, your nails. These are all, can be, sources of clinical pearls, as we call them, of things the body's trying to tell us. So I'd actually adapted questions that I asked telehealth patients on one-on-one online consults.

I adapted them to quizzes, which is, like a quiz is no replacement for a health history, but it's at least if someone doesn't have access to somebody, they can at least learn about their body to say, oh, wow, and then educate themselves on different systems. Because that's the great thing about all this stuff is that maybe you don't even need a functional medicine doctor. Maybe it's something you can do on your own by changing the way that you eat, or just adjusting some things, or bringing in that supplement, or changing that mind-body by integrating a mind-body practice into your life, whatever is appropriate.

And that's why I think long-form conversations like this on podcasts like we're having now, or books, or articles that I've written, they've helped people. I met someone the other week. I was on a Disney cruise with my family, and this lady came up to me, and she said, I was going to bring your book, but I thought, how could a mom of three read a book on a Disney cruise?

So I didn't bring it. So she was kicking herself because she wanted me to sign it. But she said, your book and your podcast changed my life, and I was able to work with my doctor, and it transformed my life.

That's awesome. I'm so used to the clinical side, where it's like I'm tracking labs, and I know that person. I'm a part of their health journey actively.

But it's so cool to think about a conversation that we're having on a podcast, or a book, or an article. People can do it on their own, which is so amazing and such a blessing. So hopefully that's helpful.

I just think it's getting curious about your health, I guess, is the shorter way of saying it.

[Jason Raffington] (35:33 - 38:14)

Yeah. I think what people can also do is just journal and do a seven-day food journal where they write down what they eat and what symptoms they have. And then they can draw connections between, oh, every time I have this breakfast, I'm bloated afterwards, or I feel tired around lunch.

And also what you say, I think books can be really helpful. And this was actually part of my own health journey when I discovered your book, The Inflammation Spectrum, back in, I think, 2019, when it just came out. Because at that time, I had problems with my toe.

So I was diagnosed with osteoarthritis in my right toe. And I went to a conventional doctor, well, different ones, actually, and they always told me, well, there's nothing we can do. You have that now.

This is your problem now, and we can only give you cortisone injections. And then I heard you on a podcast, I think, and then I got your book. And the book, The Inflammation Spectrum, is about an elimination diet.

So you walk the readers through an elimination diet, which means that the readers eliminate different food groups, and you mentioned four of them already. So grains, added sugar, seed oils, and so on. And then you reintroduce the groups one after another after, I think I did two months without those.

I think I eliminated all eight. So there are actually more groups. So then I reintroduced them one after another.

And then I saw how my body reacted to these food groups. And I noticed that for me, gluten was a problem, at least at that time. Seed oils were a problem, sugar was a problem.

And some of the other food groups weren't a problem. I mean, alcohol was a problem. I think that's a problem for everyone, to be honest.

And there were also nightshades, those weren't a problem for me. But this is how I learned that food can be medicine. So you actually put me on this journey, because since then, I read up more on those topics.

And for me, I'm a little biased now, because this book helped me so much. But I think books can be really, really helpful for people. And it helps you also getting to know your body again.

And I don't know if this analogy is in your book, or whether I just started telling it ever since. But what I tell people when I talk about an elimination diet is that they can imagine their body to be like a dirty pool. So when you have a dirty pool, and you throw dirt in, you don't notice it getting dirtier.

But as soon as you clean it, and you have a clean pool, and then you throw dirt in, then you notice it. And this is like your body, you eliminate, for instance, alcohol for a while. And then you drink a glass of beer, and you're almost drunk.

I think some people can relate to that. So maybe it makes sense to get to know the body again, and see which foods actually love you back.

[Dr. Will Cole] (38:14 - 39:06)

Yeah, so good. Well, that means so much to me. Thank you for saying that.

Those kind words about the book. And yeah, I'm honored to be a part of your health journey. I didn't even know it.

That's so cool. You're right about that. It's a great analogy.

That's not in my book. So that's a great analogy about the pool. And it's so true.

Right? It's so true. And your advice of the journal is so smart.

We have every telehealth patient do a journal. You don't need a doctor for that. You just do it yourself.

And then you have these aha moments of like, oh, wait, I didn't correlate this. When I did this, I had this. Then you can give agency on your health.

Yeah. And the inflammation spectrum is a good resource for that. Those quizzes, some of them are in that book.

So they can kind of see where they're out in the inflammation spectrum. What system do they need to do? And then, yeah, the eliminate protocol versus the core four.

There's more advanced tracks for people who need them.

[Jason Raffington] (39:07 - 39:51)

Yeah, yeah. I think that's a really good resource. I'd love to get into some more nutrition controversies.

We touched on some of them already. I think the gluten topic is already kind of controversial, at least for some people. But there are some more out there that confuse people, at least that's the impression that I got.

So I'd like to get your take on, for instance, now that we spoke about gluten, we can talk about gluten free products, because I see people advertising them. People think they're healthy. Oh, this is gluten free.

I should get it. And I'm not talking about foods that are, of course, naturally gluten free. I'm not talking about tomatoes, but I'm talking about, for instance, gluten free pasta, gluten free breads.

Are they good for us? Or is this actually something that we should avoid?

[Dr. Will Cole] (39:52 - 41:41)

I think they can be a part of a balanced, diverse, nutrient dense diet. Yeah, I think that there's like rice, flour, pasta can be fine. But I think, should people be living on bright pasta?

No, nobody's going to say that, really. Maybe there's some Carbotarians out there. I'm sure there's a group for that.

But I think that for the average person, no, it could be a part of a healthy, balanced diet. Yes, certainly. Does it love your body back or not?

Now, it is true that there's a lot of, just because you're slapping something with a label that says GF on it, gluten free, doesn't mean it's healthy. So become label literate, even if it's gluten free. I have a friend, she used to be on my team.

We just had dinner the other night, some of my team members, and she said, I still go into when I go anywhere to eat, I just say, is it gluten free? And it's like the silliest thing. It's like a banana.

And she asks if it's gluten free, like this running joke. But it's just because it's gluten free, doesn't make it healthy. And you want to vet it.

And there can be a lot of really gnarly things. That's a technical term. It's unhealthy, inflammatory foods that are gluten free.

Cocaine is gluten free. It doesn't make it healthy. So we need to have some discernment on this.

But get to as much whole food as you can. And if grains love your body back, then the minimal ingredients where it's like maybe just rice and water and salt and maybe a few other things, and that's the pasta, that's different than something with 50 ingredients and it's gluten free. So I think that sort of label literacy, again, is important here.

[Jason Raffington] (41:41 - 42:00)

Yeah, I think it's so obvious when you hear it. But when you go to the supermarket, you see the vegan label, you see, oh, high protein, you see gluten free. So yeah, they're trying to manipulate us.

So it's not that easy if you don't consciously make an effort to actually read the label and think about what actually is inside that food.

[Dr. Will Cole] (42:00 - 43:30)

You hit the nail on the head. The high protein is the next one. I mean, it is the new gluten free because it's like a Starbucks, God bless Starbucks, but they will put like the protein in their cold foam.

I just went to Expo West not that long ago, which is the largest natural food expo in the world, like 60,000 people or something like that in Anaheim, California. And it was the running joke between all of us there is the amount of brands are just protein, that protein, that protein, that look, we need protein, but it becomes a sort of buzzword where everybody is just throwing some protein in it. I mean, to the point where they're concerned if there's going to be a protein shortage, because there's that many like these raw materials are going to run out because everybody's like downing the protein.

It becomes it's part of a good conversation, optimal versus average, making sure we're getting enough protein. I'm excited about the dietary guidelines here in the States, calling that out and looking at optimal, not average. But yeah, it's just because it's high protein.

The bodybuilding world will tell you that when they're just all they're worried about our macros or the keto world. It was the same thing with keto a couple years ago. If it was hashtag keto, it was high fat, low carb, it was automatically healthy.

The bodybuilding world, the same world, right? It's like the fitness world. If it's low carb and high protein, it's good.

No, there's a lot of chemical soups here that are high protein that people are consuming.

[Jason Raffington] (43:31 - 44:33)

So yeah, so what I'm hearing is that yes, protein is very important, but we should always stick to whole minimally processed food. And I think you would agree that most people could probably do a little or benefit a little more from actually more protein. And you mentioned this, you have new dietary guidelines.

I think you raised it to 1.2 to 1.6 grams per kilogram body weight. Yeah, that's pretty good. Because I think in Germany, well, I know that we're still pretty low on that.

And also here, most people could benefit from more high quality protein. Let's put it that way. Yeah.

So my next question is about sugar. It's one of those core four inflammatory foods. And I think everybody can get behind that.

You also mentioned that. But what about artificial sweeteners? This is quite controversial.

It seems some say they destroy your gut microbiome. Others say they're neutral. Others say they're very helpful, because it helps people lose weight when they switch from regular soda to diet soda, for instance.

What's your take on that?

[Dr. Will Cole] (44:34 - 48:52)

Yeah, these are these are good questions. You're good at this, Jason. So I feel like I personally, I don't consume them.

I think I had what did I have? I was in the airport. I'm just like speaking off the cuff here.

The first time in my life that I know of, maybe it was unknowingly given sugar. Well, you know what I'm talking about, like low carb sweeteners that I didn't know about. But that I knowingly picked up this drink.

I just wanted to try it. The ingredients were not the best. I was in an airport all day.

My flight was delayed. So I was like and I travel all the time for work. I'm not making excuses because I just would fast normally.

Right. But I just was like wanting to try this random thing and it had sucralose in it, which is Splenda. It's this organic chloride.

It's this low carb sweetener that isn't stevia, right? It's not a monk fruit or something like that. I never would have it's probably the first time I've ever had a sucralose in my life.

It tasted really good. So I actually understand why from a consumer and brand standpoint, these things are these like low sugar, but it's aspartame or sucralose or something like that. I understand why they're successful.

And I'm quite aware I've talked about the research for 15 years, so I know about the research. But you know, it's like those things like is at the end of the world if somebody has it here and there. No, it's not.

What I make it the bulk of somebody's diet they're having on a consistent daily basis because they think they're doing their body good because they're having this Splenda every day or sucralose or aspartame or whatever, fill in the blank of something else. I don't think it's something that someone should be dependent on daily because we look at the Weizmann Institute, other studies looking at the implication of these artificial sweeteners on the microbiome and the metabolism long term. It's not the best thing, but overdoing stevia isn't good for either.

So I think that even these quote unquote more natural or low-carb sweeteners, it wouldn't be artificial, but these low-carb sugar-free alternatives like stevia, monk fruit, xylitol, they all can be problematic in high amounts. So I think all of these should be looked at with a bit of use in limited amounts, maybe not at all when you have the option to go for stevia or monk fruit or allulose, which I think are going to be better options because they're more towards the natural options. But even in that camp, there are better for you versions like stevia.

Stevia is a plant. So is it a green powder that's just the leaf that's more just dried, desiccated, powdered stevia? Or is it white, powdered, bleached, mixed with other things?

And it's not the whole food form, but it's more whole food than the sucralose or the aspartame or something like that. So it's a spectrum. But all of these things should be used judiciously based on that person's gut health and metabolic health.

I can see the point of switching from if they're having lots of cane sugar or high fructose corn syrup and switching to a sucralose or something like that. You are going to, for most people, see better outcomes from an A1C standpoint and glucose standpoint. Your fasting glucose is going to improve.

Your A1C is going to improve. Yeah, maybe it's not the best for the microbiome. So if that person's severely insulin resistant and they're not willing to change their health at all other than swap to the low-carb sweetener, if that is that weird example, hypothetical, where they're just going to swap out, then maybe you could say it's going to be a net positive for that person because their A1C has come down, their glucose has improved, their metabolic health has improved to some degree. But is it just because something's better, does it make it optimal? And that's the bigger question here.

Yeah, you can find lesser evil things, but they're still evil. And I'm using that word loosely. They're not actually evil, but you know what I'm saying.

They're not optimal for human biochemistry. So that's kind of my take on it. I don't have them other than that random time at LaGuardia Airport like a month ago.

And that was my first one and done. I'll never do it again.

[Jason Raffington] (48:52 - 49:09)

Okay, it's good that you're not hooked because what I notice here in Berlin, where I live, is that a lot of young kids actually seem to be addicted to these energy drinks. And I don't know all the stuff that's in there. I know that can't be good, but it seems like they're actually hooked on them.

So I'm glad that you're not.

[Dr. Will Cole] (49:10 - 49:25)

It didn't hook me one time. No, it was like, you know what it was? It was like this random protein milk.

It's something that I've literally threw shade at for years. And I'm like, you know, I'll try it, just see what it tastes like. It was good.

I'll give it to you.

[Jason Raffington] (49:25 - 49:25)

I can imagine.

[Dr. Will Cole] (49:26 - 49:29)

Yeah, but it was not the best for you though.

[Jason Raffington] (49:29 - 49:44)

Yeah. So speaking of sugar and blood sugar, some people say that berberine is kind of like nature's ozempic. So it helps us lower blood sugar.

It can support our metabolism. What's your take on that?

[Dr. Will Cole] (49:46 - 51:35)

Yeah, I would say it's more of nature's metformin versus nature's GLP-1 agonists, as far as like the mechanism is concerned, but I get their point. They're saying from a metabolic health standpoint. Yeah, I think if it's dosed appropriately, it's pretty well researched.

It has been for years, even prior to the whole GLP-1 explosion. It's been part of the conversation as far as it's working on insulin resistance and its improvement of glucose levels, blood sugar levels. But you do have to dose it quite high to see that therapeutic dose and kind of equate it with something like metformin or glucophage, but you can do it.

But I don't, I would never want to try to supplement somebody's way out of a poor diet. I would always want to start with food because that's going to be a lot more modulating, like increasing fiber, improving gut health is actually nature's ozempic. Improving gut health is nature's ozempic because that's where your gut is making GLP-1.

So I'm like all for like, what are the ways we can improve somebody's gut health? Because that actually is endogenously naturally making GLP-1 on its own. Your body makes this peptide on its own.

So you don't depend on some exogenous peptide, even though I'm a fan of peptide research and utilize peptides, but food is first, right? And we can kind of have a both and not either or approach here. So berberine, other alkaloids, other herbs, botanicals, micronutrients, chromium, for example, all can help with blood sugar regulation and can be tools within the toolbox.

But I feel our best serving people when they're paired with food a piece and then even a mind body piece back to that earlier point too of like stress and anxiety that impacts blood sugar as well.

[Jason Raffington] (51:36 - 51:50)

Yeah, that makes sense. Now you mentioned fiber. That makes me think of another controversial topic, which are the anti-nutrients.

Are they problematic? Maybe you can explain what they are for those who don't know and who should be worried about them, if anyone.

[Dr. Will Cole] (51:51 - 56:08)

Yeah. So I mean, you read the inflammation spectrum, so you know, we talk about them. I mean, they're mentioned in there.

They're problematic for some people. There's a sidebar in that little box in the inflammation spectrum in that book. I remember reading, writing it.

I was at Barnes and Noble. My wife had friends over, so I went over to Barnes and Noble and was working on that book. And I vividly remember making that sidebar thinking, OK, yeah, well, there's that exception and that exception and that exception just to show people, yeah, there's a lot of bioindividuality to looking at genetics and epigenetics.

Some people genetically have these endocannabinoid gene variants, other methylation gene variants and HLA gene variants for some people, like mold issues, that some foods aren't going to love their body back because of genetics and epigenetics. So plant anti-nutrients are things like lectins, phytic acid, oxalates. These are plant proteins or plant compounds that are in things like grains.

They're in things like legumes and beans. They're in some vegetables in higher amounts, some in lower amounts. So they're in things like oxalates and things like spinach and kale.

But are they an issue? For some people, yes. And that's part of the food sensitivity conversation that people are having issues with these foods because maybe they're not just properly preparing them or maybe they have a problem even when they are properly prepared.

So there's that spectrum piece there. But soaking and sprouting, fermenting, washing, rinsing does a lot for things like legumes and grains and vegetables and even like pressure cooking these things down or the soups and stews, how we started the conversation out, breaks a lot of these plant anti-nutrients down. So then from a nutrition science standpoint, you can talk about, well, this grain or that bean or that plant in some way has these things that are plant defense tools and they are the defense mechanisms of the plant that makes their nutrients less bioavailable.

They make it more irritating to whoever's consuming them, like the person that's listening to this right now. But are they an issue for you if you're having it in a cooked, sprouted, pressure cooked version of it? Because something can be, the potential could be there in nature, but that's not how the end outcome for somebody that's consuming it.

And even if there is some issues, even if there is some plant defense mechanisms, is that even a worry for many people? No. And you could make the argument that some of these plants, some of their benefits could come from the defense mechanisms because it creates, this is more my theory than science, but I think there should be science on this because I think there's something to it, is could some of these herbs and plants that people are consuming create these sort of micro-hormetic effects on the body that actually makes the body more resilient? Because sometimes people go off of all these foods and they have no resilience. They can't even have anything because their digestion isn't able to adapt.

So I think you're not overdoing any of these foods, but they should be part of that sort of diversity of foods and it keeps the body more resilient. So there's a time and place for that. I'm not saying everybody should be going and trying to stress their body out, but I do think within reason, depending on your resilience, these things can be part of a healthy diet, no problem.

And then just try to properly prepare it. And back to your point when you did it in 2019, an elimination diet can be helpful here because for me, I don't do well with nightshades, right? And it has these alkaloids, which could be put into the same category.

So things like peppers, tomatoes, white potatoes, goji berries, eggplants. I don't have a problem with all of those, but I don't do well with the peppers. I used to, but I don't right now.

But I can have gluten just fine. So it just shows you I'm the opposite of you in that circumstance. So there's so much bio-individuality to this concept that there's no hard and fast rules for a lot of it.

[Jason Raffington] (56:09 - 56:46)

Yeah, totally. So when I think of anti-nutrients, one thing that comes to mind is the group of vegetarians and vegans who may need to be aware of phytates because they tend to eat more phytate-rich foods, which then binds zinc and iron. So because in the German nutritional recommendations, we have actually different recommendations depending on how much phytate-rich foods you eat.

So how much zinc you should consume because again, the phytates bind zinc and then there is a higher likelihood of developing a deficiency. So I think at least those people who follow these kinds of diets should be aware of a potential issue here.

[Dr. Will Cole] (56:47 - 58:34)

Yeah, 100%. I agree with you. The more plant-based somebody is, the more this could be an issue to look into.

Because even beyond the bioavailability conversation, which is meaning like, yeah, that plant food could have this amount of zinc or iron or whatever vitamin you're talking about, but is the body actually getting it? What's the bioavailability of that nutrient density? And then the form of that vitamin matters as well.

And then on top of that, the bioavailability component here is, well, one of the components is these plant defense mechanisms and are these phytates binding to these minerals? And you see a lot more nutrient deficiencies on average when the more plant-based somebody is, namely iron. I see that a lot on labs and running a whole iron panel, I would recommend anybody that's exclusively plant-based or predominantly plant-based to run an iron saturation, hemoglobin, hematocrit, ferritin, for sure run a ferritin or stored iron marker, what they call the MC series.

That's these mean corpuscular red blood cell measurements. Run all that. Total iron binding capacity, TIBC.

Get all those biomarkers. If I would say for anybody, all women should have that done. And definitely everybody that's plant-based should have those labs ran.

And I'm just calling out iron, but you want to look at all the nutrients. Look at magnesium, look at selenium, look at zinc, look at vitamin D, all these B vitamins, because all of these things can be more deficient in somebody that is plant-based. That doesn't mean somebody that's plant-based can't get around it, but they just have to focus on nutrient density and bioavailability, supplement accordingly where needed, and make the best of it.

[Jason Raffington] (58:35 - 59:31)

Yeah, we do also recommend regular testing here on this podcast a lot, because we always say, tests don't guess, because obviously we are fans of nutritional supplements, but we're also saying that not everybody should just blindly supplement, but rather actually figure out what they need, how much they need for how long they should take it. So yeah, it makes sense to actually get some lab work done. Now, we've talked about some of the big debates now, and I want to kind of bring it back to the everyday reality of some people who feel, for instance, bloated, fatigued, constipated after they ate something.

So if somebody presents with those kind of symptoms, or maybe has skin issues, brain fog, and comes to work with you, how do you start from a functional medicine perspective? So is it the lab testing? Is it that you mentioned this earlier, you have this conversation with them, you give them quizzes?

Or is there something else that you usually do in the beginning to figure out what's going on with them?

[Dr. Will Cole] (59:32 - 1:01:37)

Yeah, the quizzes are there at drwillcole.com, they're different systems of the body, and they're in the Inflammation Spectrum book. But they're adapted from questions that I ask patients. So the quizzes are in the health history, it's a lot more comprehensive in the health telehealth consultation.

So yeah, it's about an hour, an hour and a half spending time with somebody digging into their health history, and looking at the physiological and psychological component. So looking at things like gut health, hormonal health, metabolic health, environmental toxins, we look at all those things. And then we look at stress and trauma.

And like, is it really unresolved trauma piece that's part of that puzzle? You have to have a both and not either or approach and say, well, it's just trauma. And you'll see people on social media, and it's like, if you just dealt with the trauma or stress, then none of these food things matter, like none of the supplements matter.

It's just about trauma. Again, back to this sort of tribalism. It's like, that's their thing.

So they make every apply to everybody. You can't out meditate a moldy house. You can't, you know, breath work and do psychedelics when somebody has environmental toxins.

So it's a it's a ridiculous statement. On the other side, for someone that says it's just nutrition, or just whatever supplement you're talking about, when they're serving their body a big slice of stress every day, or have unresolved trauma stored in their body, they're failing that person too. So we have a both and approach here.

And we talk about that during that initial consult to determine yes, what food protocols appropriate what supplement, what peptide, what somatic, what mental emotional component, what vagal nerve stimulation protocols needed so we can sort of curate the best protocol for them. And then back to the art part, tracking over time and adjusting the protocol in real time as their body improves. So it starts with a health history, and then then appropriate labs, and then clinical monitoring and coaching and guiding and tweaking as time goes on.

So that's in a nutshell what we what we do on the on the clinical side.

[Jason Raffington] (1:01:37 - 1:02:34)

All right. Is there anything that people can do at home? So I'm a person who tries to do everything at home first, like I try to solve my own problems before I go somewhere, I learned that sometimes it's necessary to get outside help from a therapist or a practitioner, for instance, like a chiropractic adjustment like that you can't fix yourself, for instance, right?

Sometimes it makes sense to find someone to help you. But in terms of like, let's say I'm bloated all the time, or I have reflux. Is there something that you could generally recommend that people do or try at home first, because I really like this, this mental, mental health side that you included here, because often people, I think I would assume, don't actually know that this could affect their digestive symptoms or that, that it can influence their digestion when they're stressed all the time or whatever.

So is there something in that direction that people could do or in terms of food?

[Dr. Will Cole] (1:02:34 - 1:08:07)

Yeah, sure. So I would do let's, and I, my fourth book, my more recent, my most recent book, I have another book coming out in September. But that my more recent one was called gut feelings.

And I, we looked at both gut and feelings, the physical and the mental, emotional, spiritual. So just keep it simple for somebody that's like, okay, I just want to, to use your example, have digestive problems. It could be bloating, it could be constipation, it could be IBS, it'd be ulcerative colitis, Crohn's.

Whatever that I would pick. And this could apply to anybody. So we're just using this digestive problem as an example.

But if it's anxiety or brain fog or fatigue, this could apply to you too. So I would pick something physical, and then I'd pick something mental, emotional, spiritual. So a physical side, look at the inflammatory core for what's your relationship with them?

Is it loving your body back or not? And then focusing on more soups and stews, something that's a little bit easy to digest as sort of a therapeutic, put yourself on a souping protocol for a week or two weeks. Broth, soups, you can do a plant-based, you can do a bone broth based.

I do sort of an omnivore option, some plant-based broths, like a ginger broth or seaweed broth. And I love bone broth and I have mostly the bone broth. But soups and stews, hearty, there's a time and place for fasting in this time, but not all fasting, some just souping.

And it's easy to digest, grounding, calming, centering to the gut-brain axis, the gut-brain-immune axis as far as inflammation is concerned. And then on the feeling side of that gut feelings cross-talk, I would pick something active and something passive. That's what I tell telehealth patients.

So something active and something passive when it comes to nervous system regulation or metabolizing stored stress and trauma in the body. So something active could be journaling, right? It could be breathwork, meditation.

It could be something else, tai chi, yoga. But journaling is something that I find clinically really moves the needle if somebody is consistent with it. So 20 minutes a day, I prescribe this just as I would prescribe a peptide.

But prescribing 20 minutes a day with pen or pencil to paper, stream of consciousness, write out, not typing on your notes app on your iPhone. And that works different parts of the brain too. It actually works different parts of the brain actually writing it out versus typing, which a lot of our nervous systems are so weak in that area because we're just on our phones too much and not writing.

So that actually metabolizes things and works certain parts of the nervous system by writing it out. But a good prompt could be, what does it feel like to be me today? Or where in my life do I not feel safe?

Because the goal of this is to create safety. And healing your gut, calming inflammation through foods and supplements or peptides, that creates safety by calming and bringing homeostasis to the body. But then on a mental, emotional level, we have to do that too.

So journaling can be a form of clearing this stuff out, purging it from the body. You can even burn the paper afterwards if you want. But say the things you wouldn't say to anybody out loud, but you're getting it cathartically onto the paper.

And your hands are going to cramp. You're going to be kind of annoyed with the whole practice. But it's good.

It's a good therapeutic metabolic purge on a somatic level. And so journal, journal speak or ugly journaling, there's different methods around that, that's sort of based on that premise. Because there can be a lot of shame and rage and unresolved trauma when people are dealing with digestive problems or dealing with autoimmune problems or mental health issues.

So the journal would be something active, meaning you have to show up, you have to do it. It's a practice. They call it a practice for a reason, because we all suck at it.

And you have to stay consistent with it. And then something passive is something you don't necessarily have to quote unquote do. It's not this practice per se, but you do have to stay consistent with it.

And that is like a transcutaneous vagal nerve stimulation, like ones that go on your neck or your ear. There's ones that go on your wrist, your ankle, but that'll work either on stimulating the branches, the auricular branches of the vagus nerve or through vibration work on stimulating the vagus nerve, which is the largest cranial nerve in the body. It's responsible for that resting, digesting aspect of the autonomic nervous system.

Key word is the rest, meaning anti-anxiety and digest, gut health aspect, which there's poor vagal tone in most people that have digestive problems and inflammatory problems and mental health issues or nervous system issues. So I like these tools because they're things that you don't have to do them per se. They're working in the background.

You can be working, you can be doing something else. You can habit stack with other wellness practices, biohacks, while these things are working in the background. I've seen them really work on people's anxiety, their digestion.

I've seen it work on people's sleep scores. I've seen it work on their pain levels, inflammation levels. It's wild.

Just through toning this weak nerve and you're sort of balancing, you're calming the sympathetic fight or flight freeze, hypervigilant response, and you're activating this weaker spot response, this resting, digesting, parasympathetic. It's like going to the gym for the nervous system, but in a more somatic way, the way that your body needs it.

[Jason Raffington] (1:08:08 - 1:08:56)

Yeah, I think this is actually something that most people, even without symptoms, can benefit from, like promoting the rest and digest system, the parasympathetic nervous system, because we're just so stressed. I think most of us are more in the activated state and could benefit from taking it slow, maybe writing, practicing writing again. I wrote a letter recently and my hand also cramped because of what you just mentioned.

I thought I could relate to that. But what I do is journal, journal every morning, gratitude journal, and I think that is a good way to start the day and end the day. I bookend my day with gratitude.

So I think that is something that is more positive. I mean, this negative, quote unquote, negative journaling that you mentioned, I can imagine that this is also very helpful to get some stored emotions out.

[Dr. Will Cole] (1:08:56 - 1:09:20)

But there's great science around gratitude journaling and self-compassion too. And I think maybe even doing both, right? Or for a season of your life, like maybe you have to get the negative stuff out first and then to even feel grateful, right?

For some people that's true. Or a bit of both, like do sort of the purge in the morning and gratitude in the evening or vice versa, whatever works for you. But consistency is key with these practices.

[Jason Raffington] (1:09:21 - 1:09:33)

Yeah. We're wrapping up slowly, but I want to talk about one term that you mentioned in your book and that is shameflammation. Could you explain to us what you mean by that and what that is?

[Dr. Will Cole] (1:09:34 - 1:13:32)

Yeah, it's a made up word and people oftentimes have trouble pronouncing it because it's a made up word. I woke up one morning and I was like thinking about writing this book. It's in gut feelings.

And I was thinking about the research around shame and things that cause shame, like unresolved trauma and stress and how it impacts inflammation levels. So just shameflammation, health, things that are mental, emotional, spiritual, impacting our biochemistry on labs, i.e. inflammation. And more than that, but just dysregulation in the body as a whole.

So that's what it is. And we have to find antidotes to shameflammation in somebody's body. These are the things where people are gorging, feeding their head and their heart on a daily basis.

But they're the more nebulous, they're the more complex, they're the more nonlinear, but they're so important when you're talking about healing. And clinical nutrition matters. Biohacks matter.

Latest advancements in therapeutics and healing somebody matters on that level. But really these ineffable, the mental, emotional, spiritual stuff really matters for many people even more. Because actually when you start shifting their state and respecting themselves more because they aren't living in this negative ruminating feedback loop from their past, they can fully be present and grounded.

They'll start to respect themselves a bit more and choosing foods that love them back a bit more. So the analogy, I think I used this analogy in the inflammation spectrum. If not, I've used it in one of the books, is if somebody sees themselves as, well, we could just use this analogy.

If someone has a high-end, nice car, whatever that car is for you, and then there's the car that's like the old, beat-up, banger car, that may be a bad term, I don't know. What's the better term for this? Like a beat-up, secondhand car, right?

It's an old, rusted, dented car, right? And how are both of those people, they own both those different cars, how do they park? How do they wash their car?

What fuel do they fill up their car with? How do they treat it? And this mental, emotional work, like gratitude journaling that you mentioned, or purging the stuff from their past and metabolizing stored trauma, or self-compassion practices, or grounding, or meditation, or breathwork practices, or that vagal nerve stimulation that's training these aspects of the nervous system that's not really trained, that shifts their worthiness.

So they actually can start to choose foods in a more proactive way. They're not going to self-sabotage as much. They're going to have more self-respect in their life and not just choose the junk, inflammatory foods because their body's so reactionary, and these negative feedback loops.

So the shame-flammation piece, for many people, it is actually the missing piece because otherwise it's this, the nutrition protocols, all this other stuff is this rote list of do's and don'ts, and it's not this sort of deep owning born out of self-respect. And I think that's the difference here because those of us that get it, it is just natural. It's an aha moment, it's second nature, all of this stuff makes sense.

But if you are living in a state of unworthiness, if you're living in a state of pain and shame, you don't. You self-sabotage all the time. So I'm not saying that the worthiness and dealing with the shame-flammation has to be sorted out for you to change your foods.

That's a cop-out and an excuse. What I'm saying is you need to have a both-and approach and start leaning in to these aspects of healing, both the gut and the feelings, to really have sustainable healing and sustainable optimal health.

[Jason Raffington] (1:13:32 - 1:14:08)

Yeah, I think when you manage to do this mindset switch and realize that these foods are actually good for you or if you choose the right foods that's beneficial for you, you're not feeling like you're limiting yourself. You don't feel like you're missing out or restrict yourself when you eat that way. And I think this is something that I often hear when I say, thanks, I don't want to drink or I don't want to have this pizza, then people think I'm limiting myself or I'm missing out.

But to me, it's like I'm actually doing something good for myself and I enjoy that more than indulging in whatever is being offered.

[Dr. Will Cole] (1:14:09 - 1:15:10)

Yeah, 100%. No, it's like a poor trade-off. Continuing to eat something, it could be drinking alcohol, it could be any habit, it could be hanging out with certain people.

Continuing to consume or surround yourself with something that doesn't love you back, it's like staying in a toxic relationship and wondering why you're still miserable. Avoiding something that doesn't love you back or boundaries around something that doesn't love you back isn't restrictive, isn't boring, it's self-respect. It's just common sense, actually, because you will just, oh no, why would I want to have something that's going to dim my light?

It's just irrational. And that's sort of the aha moment that people can have when they start shifting their state around these things. There's discernment, there's clarity of what edifies you and what doesn't edify you and what edifies those around you and what doesn't edify and what does edify those around you.

So these are important things because it creates a clarity when you have an awareness on the way that things are.

[Jason Raffington] (1:15:11 - 1:15:36)

Yeah, I think those were great closing remarks. However, I do want to give you the opportunity, if you do want to share anything else with the audience, what you would encourage them to do or a negative thought or belief about food that you would like to let them or they should let go. I don't know, maybe you have something else that you want to share.

If not, then please also share where people can find you if they want to work with you and also where they can find your books.

[Dr. Will Cole] (1:15:37 - 1:18:14)

Thank you so much. No, I think nothing comes to mind. Maybe I'm tapped out of gems for people.

I'm just joking. No, I appreciate the opportunity. I would just say, if these things resonate with you, explore.

Explore the stuff we're talking about, not to overwhelm people, but just to empower them, giving them agency around their health. And we can't depend on nation states. We cannot depend on the medical industrial complex.

We cannot depend on anybody outside of ourselves for what's ultimately our responsibility. So, this is about self-empowerment and knowing what is serving you and what's not and having that sort of self-governance in that way. So, that's where the spirit of what I'm trying to communicate is coming from.

And I see so many people kept back from living the lives that God created them for because they don't feel like their best selves. When someone's dysregulated, inflamed, and foggy, they're not living their best life. They're not doing the talents.

They're not able to live their passions, right? Because they are kept back. So, we only have even the longest living of us, right?

And I'm into health span research and research longevity. Even the longest living of us, life goes by so fast. And it's like that cliche of the days are long, but the years are short.

And as a parent, I definitely see that. But looking back, my grandma recently passed away at 102 years old. And she said she felt like she was in her 30.

And youth gives us such an arrogance until we realize that we're not young anymore. So, what are we going to do with the time that we have? What's the legacy we're going to leave?

So, that's, to me, what's at stake here. We could talk about macronutrients and nutrition and phytonutrients and all this exciting stuff with food and wellness. But what's it for?

It's actually for you to live the life you were created for. That's what this is about. And I think when people have that vision of their why, and why are they doing this, and having a why that's bigger than their excuses, this is how you can have sustainable improvements in somebody's life.

So, thanks for giving me the opportunity. Everything is at, all the stuff that we're talking about here is at drwillcole.com. D-R-W-I-L-C-O-L-E.com.

My podcast is called The Art of Being Well. I'd love if you would come on, Jason, that'd be great. Sure.

[Jason Raffington] (1:18:14 - 1:18:15)

Yeah, I'll be tuning in.

[Dr. Will Cole] (1:18:15 - 1:18:47)

Yeah, anytime. And then the, yeah, my books are all there. There's tons of free resources for people.

We launched Longevity RX a few months ago. It's just a line of regenerative organic supplements, herbs, botanicals to work on these longevity pathways that I am such a fan of, like my autophagy and working on autophagy pathways and gut health and lowered inflammation levels and neuro-optimal nervous system health. So, those are some latest things that I've been working on.

[Jason Raffington] (1:18:48 - 1:18:55)

Nice. One last question. Now that you speak of supplements, what is your favorite supplement, if you could choose only one?

[Dr. Will Cole] (1:18:56 - 1:20:23)

Yeah, that's good. Right now, what I've been taking since it's come out, since we've had it formulated, is Live 120. So, it's this 30-plus regenerative organic superfood blend that has some rare things like blue turmeric, functional mushrooms, goji berries, regenerative organic goji berries, all these things that I'm not getting enough of from my food standpoint that really helps energy levels, sustain energy levels.

So, that's from Longevity RX. That's something that's new in the past couple of years I've been taking. We call it Live 120 because in the Bible, it said Moses lived 120 years old, but was of vibrant health when he died.

So, that's the whole ethos of Longevity RX, is adding life to your years, not just years to your life. So, what's longevity? It's not the promise of some future.

It's like, how are you living now? Are you living this longevity thriving life now? So, that's what Live 120 is.

But if you're talking about basic things that I take, that I think most people should take, a vitamin D, D3K2, a methylated B-complex, yeah, and magnesium, I would say a third. That's what I see deficient in most people, are those things on labs.

[Jason Raffington] (1:20:25 - 1:20:27)

Great. Dr. Will Cole, thank you so much.

[Dr. Will Cole] (1:20:28 - 1:20:29)

Thanks for having me.