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YHM 075 - Anti-Aging 101 with Dr. Cara Slater
34 Plays1 year ago
Join us for an enlightening episode of Anti-Aging 101 with special guest Dr. Cara, a naturopathic doctor and functional medicine expert.
Discover simple diet tips and daily lifestyle hacks to promote longevity and vitality. Learn about essential nutrients and supplements for anti-aging and get ready to debunk common myths and fads. Tune in to unlock the secrets to aging gracefully!
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Transcript
Episode Introduction
00:00:12
Speaker
Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of Your Health Minute brought to you by Aqua Omega. I am your host Max Marion and with me as always is my co-host Calvin Morrow.
Meet Dr. Karis: Anti-Aging Specialist
00:00:22
Speaker
Hello. And also joining us today is our moderator, Lana.
00:00:28
Speaker
We have a very special show for you today. A pretty hot topic. I think that everybody's just what everybody's interested in. I know I'm interested in that. Let's have Dr.
Graceful Aging vs. Anti-Aging
00:00:42
Speaker
Karis later join the show with us today and talk about some anti-aging.
00:00:46
Speaker
Well, thank you guys so much for having me. I'm super excited to chat about one of my favorite topics, anti-aging or gracefully aging. Anti-aging sounds so negative. I like the term gracefully aging. It's going to happen. Let's just do it really well. That's right.
00:01:09
Speaker
So,
Influence of Naturopathy on Dr. Karis
00:01:10
Speaker
Dr. Cara, we always like to start the show by having you introduce yourself to our guests. Tell us, tell our guests why you have had an interest in naturopathic medicine, how you got started, and specifically your interests in this gracefully aging.
00:01:27
Speaker
Yeah. So I'm a licensed naturopathic physician. I live in Arizona, but my, you know, I actually have a kind of a different way that I kind of got involved in this is that actually both of my parents are naturopathic doctors. And so they were, you know, I grew up kind of in this medicine and then I always had a passion for healthcare. I decided I was going to go into nursing. I got into nursing school to get my master's and I just realized
00:01:57
Speaker
Man, I think that this isn't how health should be.
The Naturopathic Approach to Health
00:02:02
Speaker
I didn't want to just push a bunch of pills. There are amazing, amazing nurses and doctors and everything out there. I just realized my path was going to be a little bit different. So I left nursing school and decided to go back to medical school. Then here I am today. I never thought I would do what my parents did.
00:02:22
Speaker
It's so cool, right? We get that all the time. When it's almost like a family tradition, the roots really run deep and I feel like the health breeds health and it kind of spawns off new generations of kids that are really interested in health and in helping people. We see that a lot too, like a great passion and wanting to actually understand and help and get to the root cause. Like you said, not just
00:02:48
Speaker
push pills to people and cover it and cover up some health issues. It seems like there's always a pull. Yeah, there's a push pull for sure. Yeah, like naturopathic doctors, they get pulled into it. Like, okay, I want to help people and I want to help them in this way. So that's the way I'm going to do it. And I love that. Yeah. And I got to say what you said about
00:03:10
Speaker
The getting to the root cause is kind of like the end all be all point of naturopathic medicine And why I think a lot of us get into it. So I just love that you've been touched on that It's like let's address the root cause let's not just you know, cover up our symptoms and heal from you know Basically within which is so much more powerful right and hopefully long-lasting so we don't need all these different pills and things.
Personalized Care in Naturopathy
00:03:35
Speaker
Yeah, it's something that we see all the time. And that's why we love naturopathic medicine. We work really closely with the Canadian College of Naturopathic Medicine here. And we love that they get down to the root cause. And actually really, what I really think is cool is how naturopathic doctors really take the time with their patients to listen to them and to learn about them, which allows them to get to that root cause and do that additional testing and screening and stuff.
00:03:39
Speaker
I
00:03:57
Speaker
Very, very cool. Love it. I'm really interested to learn today about the anti-aging or aging gracefully because, you know, you could tell just by my beard I'm getting. I'm not young anymore.
00:04:14
Speaker
You know, and not just that, I think the older I get, the faster the years fly by. It's like they just really, you know, my wife showed me a picture of, of, uh, of us seven years ago and I was like, that was seven years ago. But did it, you know, we talked about it. It didn't, you can, it feels like a long time, but it doesn't feel like a long time anymore. And it's, it's crazy how fast things go and you know, how busy life gets, but how we still want to prioritize
Fears and Realities of Aging
00:04:44
Speaker
our health. And I don't think for me, I don't think it's as much of an aesthetic thing. It says it's more of like, I want to feel good. I don't want to worry about dying all the time because I want to know that I'm feeling pretty healthy. I want to protect my brain. I think it's very important to protect the brain because you know, I've seen some people that have gone through dementia, Alzheimer's and that is very scary. And I think that scares a lot of people.
00:05:12
Speaker
And I want to be able to maintain, I don't want to become old and frail. That is like, to me, that is like, it's, it might sound mean or maybe it's not the right term, but I don't want to, I don't, I don't want to live like that. I want to be mobile. I want to be able to get up and do things. You know, if my daughters decide to have kids, I want to be able to play with my grandkids. I want to, you know, I still want to travel with my wife when I'm like really old, you know, and still, and not be dependent on people. I think that's really scary too. I think for people to lose their independence.
Defining Aging Gracefully
00:05:42
Speaker
And I think that's you, you know, you're hitting the nail on the head of what in my idea of, you know, this anti-aging or aging gracefully is, is that it's feeling your best throughout your life. Like there's never a time where we want to say, okay, yeah, you know, when I turned 70, then I hang it all up and I don't do anything. Like we work so hard throughout our lives that, you know, when we do retire, when we can, you know, do all these things, you want to feel your best, right? And that's scary, right?
00:06:08
Speaker
something you just said there. I just, is that mean it's going off like that? That is ridiculous. How it's not. Um, I think you just nailed something. You said, you know, you're 70 years old, you're going to hang him up. But I saw a stat the other day and it's like, we work on average until we're like 65 years old. And the average age of like, I guess mortality is like 77. So you're like, you work
00:06:36
Speaker
the better part of your life to enjoy maybe 10, 12, and if those are quality years, you don't know if you're healthy at that point. Yeah. Hopefully you save money to like retire. Money aside, is your health okay, right? Right. I feel like it's all connected, right? So what are people turning to you? Like how are you helping people achieve this youthfulness?
Holistic Aging: Hormones and Lifestyle
00:06:56
Speaker
So I
00:06:58
Speaker
I mean, we want to take a whole, a look at the, you know, the holistic approach. I do a lot of hormone balancing because I think usually people come to me. They're not in there. It's not when they're in their twenties and they're feeling really good, right? It's when we're kind of starting to have that change and we're kind of like, Ooh, I'm reached my forties and maybe I'm just not feeling as great. So looking at people's hormone balance, um, I do a lot of that, but then hugely looking at what are diet and lifestyle and how can you do things every single day to prevent the, you know,
00:07:28
Speaker
kind of the downfall of your health to keep yourself feeling good. And then to promote healing and energy. And I think, you know, that that's a lot of what we want. We all want, we want to have energy. We want to be sleeping well. We don't want to have the aches and pains. So I focus hugely on diet, lifestyle, and also supplements because that, you know, nowadays is a piece of what we kind of have to do to be optimally healthy. Sure. So yeah, I think, um, you know, some of the, my favorite tips are that
00:07:58
Speaker
Like there's things we can do every single day. And if they become part of our habits, then you don't even think twice about them and you are reversing aging or at least slowing some of these aging processes that make us not feel as good.
Exercise: Key to Graceful Aging
00:08:12
Speaker
Um, one of my biggest things is exercise and movement. Like motion is lotion. If you're not moving, you're going to start getting, you know, creaky and feels good. I just felt that lotion. All right. Got it.
00:08:28
Speaker
But I mean, it's like if we keep on moving and I tell people like you need to lift heavy things and like granted doesn't have to be, you don't have to be crazy in the gym, like, you know, pump an iron, but like you need to do some resistance training. You have to be pushing yourself and challenging yourself because muscle is one of the greatest predictors of
00:08:46
Speaker
your health and your anti-aging long-term. So the more muscle you have, the better the health outcome. I think after you turn 40, your muscles start to turn to atrophy and you start losing a certain percentage of muscle mass every year, unless you're doing something to prevent
Yoga and Sleep: Max's Health Secrets
00:09:02
Speaker
that. And that, again, it comes with resistance training, but not just resistance training. Again, you mentioned lifting heavy things to stress the central nervous system to tell your body, hey, we got to create some bone density so that we're not... Yes.
00:09:15
Speaker
slip and fall and break our hip, right? So I'm down with that. You know what else I found is super helpful for me at least is I do yoga like every night almost religiously. And that actually, you know what that came from? It was, it was my acupuncturist
00:09:30
Speaker
He was explaining to me, I got really tight hips because I, I lift a lot. I run a lot. I do things that my tip, my hips tend to kind of want to get the pelvic tilt where they kind of come in. And he was like, he's like, listen. And I was like, man, sometimes it just feels like a lot of pressure, like up here, you know, I'm pretty healthy. I've done a bunch of tests.
00:09:46
Speaker
It's like, you know, my, my cholesterol is great. My triglyceride levels are super low. See react to everything's good, but I still feel this pressure. And he's like, Max, it's cause like when you're laying down flat and you're, you're, you're kind of, when your hips are tilted like that, it's like a King toes, right? So your heart's got to work so much harder to push it through. So he started to tell me to release my hips every night. And when I started to do that, I started to feel like I would sleep better and I wouldn't get up to pee.
00:10:11
Speaker
And I was like, and I was like, and I was good. I was like, Oh yeah, that, this is some good stuff. So there's like less pressure that's happening because no one likes having their sleep interrupted. Right. So for me, that was huge. And I need, and I need to, I need, I'm personally need a lot of sleep. I just feel like I need that eight, nine hours every night to kind of really function properly. Um, but that was huge for me. And if I don't do those things, I really start to, I, I feel like crap. Like I do not, my brain doesn't feel like itself. My body doesn't, it feels like I'm like,
00:10:40
Speaker
like almost like living outside of myself. It's really weird. Yeah. I don't know. It brings you into right like I think when we do movement, sometimes we are so much in our heads all the time, that movement brings you back into your body. And on top of that, it's like a good stress balancer, which once again is going to help us, you know, be more healthy, age better, like
00:11:00
Speaker
So I like, yoga's amazing. I think if everyone could have even a small yoga practice, right? Like five minutes before you go to bed. I do this like app online and it's like between 20 to 30 minutes and it's like different parts of your body. Like all the time. Yeah. My mobility is a lot. I feel better. I mean, I got a good squat. Like, you know, my knees feel better too. Like sometimes I swear I like, I feel like I'm still in my twenties.
00:11:25
Speaker
Yeah. But then if I'm not so strict or like, you know, like traveling a lot or something, I feel old. Yeah. Sleep. I mean, don't we all know it's like when you're in that rhythm and you're getting your good night's sleep and I'm a proponent of and myself need my eight hours. And it's like, if I don't have that, just not optimally functioning. But I will say, you know, the little, when you get into your habit, then you have these little tweaks where you're like, Oh, I'm
00:11:55
Speaker
I'm out of my routine, whatever it may be, and your sleep is off, it is horrible. And you start to realize it's all these little pieces that kind of fall into line to make you have this good habit of sleeping and unwinding and moving your body, right? I got a question. What are the main things that are like, we're talking feeling good, but I'm assuming you're also measuring some sort of form of metabolic age.
Diet's Impact on Aging
00:12:22
Speaker
What is increasing that metabolic age?
00:12:26
Speaker
the most disproportionate rate, like is it alcohol, lack of sleep, you know, drug abuse, diet, like all the above or like, what do you see as like this, this hits? The main thing. So, I mean, they all are going to affect it. But I think right now what I see as the biggest factor is diet and it's the processed foods.
00:12:48
Speaker
I mean, they are just everywhere. And it's, we've become this culture of like, so it's everything's fast paced, right? What's easy, what's convenient. And it is, I mean, it's killing us and that will age you faster. I mean, it makes you have achy everything, you know, I've got these joints, brain, bodies, brain fog, right. And if you were talking about that brain health piece, we don't have any treatment right now, you know, quote unquote for Alzheimer's, right?
00:13:16
Speaker
It's prevention. The only treatment is prevention for these things. And I would say diet is probably the number one factor at preventing the, you know, brain degeneration stuff and, and in general, like aging. And I'll say even like on labs and stuff, when I see labs going, you know, in the wrong direction, the quickest way to turn around is diet.
00:13:39
Speaker
Sleep's great. I mean, all these things, but if you eat better, you'll probably end up sleeping. What about water? Like there's like, there was a study that came out that was like, no, not just hydration. You're talking about the tap water. Like there's a lot of fluoride in these waters. And there's a lot of studies coming out showing about the impact of fluoride for Alzheimer's dementia. Yeah. I mean, I, I will say I, we got, we recently moved and I put a whole water, like a whole house water filter on our house because it's just,
00:14:09
Speaker
It's scary all the stuff that's in there and we don't even know. We live, we live just outside of a really kind of like deep wall that's tapped into like a vein and then we have like a good like.
00:14:22
Speaker
blue light osmosis system. But it's, it's so good and the water tastes so good. But you know, it's interesting too. Like even if we travel like different places in the country where they have different levels of, of, uh, fluoride or chlorine or whatever to purify. And we're all BC and BC water was saying that mountain water is so good. You could taste it. You could taste the difference, right? Isn't that crazy? I have to say though, one of my things that I find all the time with patients is that
00:14:49
Speaker
You might, everyone's drinking, well, you know, the bottled water. That's a whole nother thing because you have to make sure it's actually good. And it's not in this plastic bottle that's been leaching chemicals into it too. But is you, we don't get electrolytes. We filter it so much and then we take out everything in our water that we're not bringing back in the electrolytes. And that is such a huge piece for us. We, our body really needs those to hold on to our salts in their diet. Exactly. Like we've cut all this stuff out. So I have people all the time, like take a pinch of,
00:15:17
Speaker
you know, sea salt, Himalayan pink sea salt, whatever, some good healthy sea salt, and just plop a little bit in your water. It shouldn't taste water. It shouldn't taste salty, but it adds back in those electrolytes. Caltic salt or the, what is it, gray salt? That's, I'd use that. That's great. That stuff is really salty. Like it's like, I mean, I love salt. Like I like salt and I take the, the Caltic salt and I put a little bit of my water in it, man. It's like that pops. Yeah.
00:15:46
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, simple as that, but that's like what we need to do. Now we've had, it's like you've taken, we've put so much junk into stuff that now we have to take it all out and then we have to bring back in the stuff that's what we need in our diets. It's like, oh my God. The thing with foods, right? It's like a lot of the foods, like the soil where we grow our foods have been so depleted that those minerals and vitamins that you're expecting to get are that like even on the daily food allowance or whatever, like where they've measured them like 40, 50 years ago,
00:16:14
Speaker
Soil's not the same. You're not getting the same like output in your fruits and vegetables that you would normally have been getting. And so supplementation becomes, you know, really important. Like what are your main go to subs that you turn to? I know it's all individualized, but like, like, what do you feel are the most important? Yeah, I mean, I feel like I've got kind of like a basic that I feel like, you know, most of the population can benefit from. So that would be in general, like a multivitamin, just something that's going to have, you know, kind of a general
Essential Supplements for Health
00:16:42
Speaker
some, you know, minerals and nutrients in it, but vitamin D, most people need vitamin D. Yeah. And exactly if you're not, I mean, even, and I'll tell you, I'm in one of the sunniest places, right? I'm in Arizona. We get sun 300 something days a year. And on probably 80% of my patients' labs, I test vitamin D on everybody. It's low. And it's either one or suboptimal. And you think that's, I know, but you know, suboptimal up here, but like we,
00:17:11
Speaker
our winners, like the, the, the days are short and the winners. This year was kind of easy. We had a pretty easy winter. Like even today you would think it was like, what is like 16 Celsius something. Crazy, crazy, crazy nice weather. But yeah, we're super deficient in vitamin D. Right. And that's like, you would be surprised here, but I think the thing is we're
00:17:31
Speaker
to get the absorption of the vitamin D from the sun, you really need full torso exposure, or you know, more body. And so people aren't out getting that full exposure. They're outside, but they've got a hat on and they're covered up, so. Mine comes in all through here. Well, there you go. All these nurses like fully clean shaved head. Absorbed. I call this my five head, and I'm always like, see, so I get a little extra through here. So yeah, just picking up that vitamin D. Yeah, but vitamin D.
00:18:00
Speaker
Fish oil is huge. I mean, we, you know, because it's going to be anti-inflammatory, it's helpful for our cholesterol levels. Um, anything that's reducing inflammation, we all probably need a little bit more of because our life is inflammatory, diet is inflammatory. So we need some of those things to bring it down. Um, everything's so stressful, spiking cortisol. We're just living that inflammatory life. Yeah. Most of us are living that inflammatory life.
00:18:28
Speaker
So, um, I also, I also find that oftentimes like a probiotic is one of my go-tos that I think most people should be on and can benefit from.
Electrolytes and Processed Water
00:18:36
Speaker
Once again, like you kind of said with the soil, we don't have all the good microbes that we used to have, right? We've sanitized the hell out of everything. And there's plus, everybody was like, man, like, yeah, it's crazy. Wash your hands six, seven times a day. Yeah. And then in all of these, you know, the sanitizing things, which.
00:18:59
Speaker
You know, washing your hands. There's so much, there's toxins in those things. So, and not telling people don't, you know, clean and stuff, but, um, getting sick because they were using it so much. Right. Like it was like, yeah. From like that wood alcohol, making people blind and stuff. That was some scary. Huge business that exploded. Everyone was making sanitizer and it was, yeah. Like just the person next door is like, I now make a sanitizer. Right. And you're like, yeah, I remember seeing them like beer cans because they had no more bottles left over.
00:19:30
Speaker
Is there a difference in someone that's like a vaginal versus C-section birth and the dependence on a probiotic there? Well, I mean, studies have shown that you get a lot of your initial microbiome through being birthed through the vaginal canal because there's all of these really important microbes in there. So there are studies showing that you might have
00:19:54
Speaker
you know, more issues towards even like autoimmunity or things like that, because that can be important and linked to our microbes and our flora.
Infant Probiotics for a Healthy Start
00:20:04
Speaker
But you, it doesn't mean just, you know, if you have to have a C section or whatever, it doesn't mean you're out of luck. You can do it. Sometimes they'll even take some of that like vaginal secretion and just rub it on the baby's face. I know that sounds a little crazy, but like right after they're born, you know, cause even in the eyes and the nose and stuff like that. And then that helps to just create colonize them, you know,
00:20:23
Speaker
And then also you can always do, there's now like, there's infant, great infant probiotics that are a little powder. And I oftentimes have women, if they're breastfeeding, put a little bit on their nipple and then, you know, maybe get some of those.
00:20:38
Speaker
But, or if they're bottle fed, you can put a little bit on the bottle. Um, but you know, then it's just giving them that bacteria that a lot of us aren't getting now. So yeah, we're destroying it. Like a lot of the foods, like your processed foods you were talking about is destroying the microbiome and kind of off that healthy, like micro culture out the window. It's just forget about it ever. Like I would be interesting to know how many people are walking around with leaky gut that just have no idea, you know,
00:21:07
Speaker
What was that? Like it was, there was a crazy stat for people taking nonsterile anti-inflammatories. And it was like, it was shocking how many people are taking this and how many deaths it's actually causing on an annual basis just because of it completely destroys your gut. Yeah. And then you think about also like antibiotics. I mean,
00:21:27
Speaker
We throw antibiotics at everything. People come in with a viral infection. Antibiotics don't do anything for a virus. But we're like, oh, here, just take this, you know, whatever. And it kills, it's not going to differentiate between the good and the bad bacteria. It kills it all. So then you, you know, you wiped out. And when they're necessary. I was one of those, I was, there was a time where I was like, you know, I would have like a, get a, get a cold and we'd get a science infection, like all the time.
00:21:52
Speaker
And I would just, you know, turn the dog, give me some antibiotics, kill, kill it and stuff like that until like she retired and I got this other doctor and I, and I would just, I would, I would get science infection so much that I would just call and be like, they would send it in. And I call him, I call him and he looks at my files and I said, yeah, he said, no.
00:22:12
Speaker
I say, I say, what do you mean? No. And he's like, he's like, no. He's like, you just need to, you know, be able to fight this off. Drink some water, go get some saline spray. And you know, if it doesn't go away in four weeks, call me back. I haven't gotten one since. Wow. Yeah. Oh, that's crazy. Right. Yeah. I know. So I was mad at the time, but super appreciative now, you know, long-term. That's always a great short-term fix or long-term. Exactly.
00:22:41
Speaker
God, isn't that like the, it's kind of, that's like kind of the root of all of our evil, right? As we all want that short term fix, but sometimes you just have to put a little effort in, go for the long haul. And in the end, that's actually probably much more beneficial. I feel like what you just said really applies overall to like the aging gracefully, you know, like not, not anti-aging. I really liked the term aging gracefully because I think like we were talking about in the pre-show and you had mentioned it, Dr. Cara is like, it's a privilege to get to age.
00:23:10
Speaker
But you've got to put the work in if you want to age gracefully. Yes. Yes. I mean, I will oftentimes, you know, cause I think the thing is it takes, you have to invest in your health and you have to invest in multiple ways by, you know, putting in the time to eat healthy food and cook things.
Investing in Early Health
00:23:27
Speaker
You have to invest by putting in money to a certain extent, right? Cause you have to, you might have to get some supplements. You might have to see a doctor that, you know, may not
00:23:36
Speaker
right with your insurance or whatever. Maybe that's more of an issue here. Okay. Yeah. There's some around here, but it's oftentimes out of pocket. But what I tell my patients is I'm like invest in this and
00:23:54
Speaker
Later on, you're going to be saving money. That's the goal, right? It's like you don't want to be on a zillion medications. You don't want to be having to pay for long-term care or whatever it might be. It's like put it in now and little bits and then cut out some of the crap. If you don't go to your coffee shop and get your super fancy schmancy thing every single day, you've got five bucks. Full of sugar. It is crazy. Full of sugar, exactly.
Sugar, Processed Foods, and Aging
00:24:18
Speaker
crazy. I used to get chai lattes at Starbucks until Janelle showed me how much sugar was in there. I was like, I was like, what the heck is this? This is insane. I just drink black coffee. Hey, you're saving yourself both money and your, you know, your health, because I would say probably the number one thing that is making us age is sugar, you know, sugar. Yeah.
00:24:46
Speaker
does it, it's, oh my God. I mean the process stuff, the worst, it's horrible. It's horrible. It's oxidizing everything. But I think if you can invest in your health, you know, it's like, do the, do the fancy shmancy shoes and the big purse and like all the things, does that really matter down the road? If you feel crappy and you can't go out and enjoy these things.
00:25:11
Speaker
So isn't your health really the biggest investment you can make in your life? I think sometimes if you really sit down too, like I remember my friend that he was, my friend was an alcoholic, full on alcoholic. He got caught for a DUI and he was like so miserable because he was out of shape and he was on all kinds of like, he was on like a blood pressure medication, sleep medication, antidepressants, all this kind of stuff, right? He gets caught for a DUI.
00:25:41
Speaker
The wife gave him an ultimatum at the times like quit drinking or, you know, we're done. Yeah. Quit drinking. Had to find something new to take up his time. So he took up fitness.
00:25:52
Speaker
got himself in shape, lost like a hundred pounds. Oh, he looks great. It looks fantastic. But the point of my story was when he started cutting out all those bad foods because good habits attract other good habits. And so once he started to do that, he started to find that he was saving like 15 grand a year by not eating the eating out at those foods and drinking that alcohol.
00:26:14
Speaker
And so his healthy habits that he invested in actually ended up saving him money long-term. So I'm not necessarily of the mind that investing in your health is actually an expense because I think it will offset some of your other bad, like your, your bad habits or bad expenses because you won't want to do those as much anymore. And I would, I would absolutely agree with you. I think if you cook at home,
00:26:40
Speaker
We know you save a lot of money. And it feels good, right? Like you feel good. Yeah. We do meal prep on Sunday and stuff like that once we get all the things done and stuff like that. I'm like, like, I look at my, like my, my fridge in the garage that has all like our meal preps and stuff like that. And I just look at my, oh, that just feels good. You know, you look at your, your breakfasts, your lunches and stuff like that. And it's just, it's, it's nice to look at and it feels good to do. You know, you can do it together, get the kids involved a little bit. They start to learn some good habits. I think that's pretty cool.
00:27:09
Speaker
Um, but I think like, I think, you know, sometimes it feels, what is it? What's that saying? Suffer the pain of discipline or, or what is it? Yeah. It's a really good one. It's like either suffer the pain. Yeah. Either you suffer the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. And you know, a little bit of sacrifice now, your future self,
00:27:38
Speaker
Well, thank you. Absolutely. Well, if you can't go back in time, but you know, happen in the future. Right. And it's like, there's only, I mean, I will oftentimes tell my patients cause they'll be like, well that sounds hard to like prep my meals or whatever. Cause I think that's one of the biggest things you can do to be healthy as cook at home or prep your meals. Right. If we're all busy, if
Meal Prepping for Healthy Living
00:28:00
Speaker
you prep them,
00:28:00
Speaker
it's going to be just like going and getting a fast food. You just go to your fridge and there it is, your home cooked meal. But it's like choose your heart. I mean, and this is, I think you can make it fun. Like you said, right? You can involve kid, your kids, you can spend time with your family, but choose your heart because you can do this hard where it's like, yeah, I do have to take some time on a Sunday to cook, but then you could also choose your heart that
00:28:25
Speaker
later down the road, you're like, I can't, you know, I can't move like I want to, I'm not able to get out of the house and I'm too tired to go, you know, hang out with my friends or go travel. That's also hard. So it's scary to be dependent on people too. I think people take their independence for granted. It's like,
00:28:44
Speaker
Yeah. Well, I broke my leg and I realized just, well, one, it was, I got a young family and I felt terrible. Cause this was like, I was relying on my, my fiance to do everything. My kid, I couldn't help out. I couldn't get up and walk with him. I was like, oh man, this is terrible. I need to get better as soon as well. And now, and now Ivy beats 12 foot races. Oh, I know. I still can't beat my child. She's eight years old. She's beaten me to races and she's gloating about it. It's just like, but I'm just on the path to recovery.
00:29:13
Speaker
never ends. Yeah. Well, right. But let's, let's, let's put that in perspective. If you had, cause it wasn't a leg leg break. It was a, and then it was a meniscus, meniscus tear. Yeah. If you'd have been focusing on your yoga daily because it was a ridiculous injury. Like Calvin selling it really hard. Like it was something big. He was sitting cross legged and he stood up and his meniscus busted.
00:29:39
Speaker
God, that's horrible. Exactly, right? But if you were stretching, maybe future Calvin would have appreciated that. 100%. Right? Yeah. Choose your heart, right? So now you can do your regular stretching and you'll never have to go through that hard again. Now your heart is your rehab. Yeah. Yeah. I know it should be stretching. It's like all the doctors in my life are telling me to. And then I'm just tired at the end of the night. I'm sick. Choose your heart. Yeah. I like that.
00:30:09
Speaker
Yeah, I do like it too. What about things like, um, maybe, maybe they're myths, but like for anti-aging, maybe we can talk about some of the myths or, are you getting the ice baths? Is that what you're going to do? I wasn't going to say ice baths, but like we had, cause I'm crazy. Cause I only take cold showers. I think there's, I don't think that's a total myth. I think high, I call it, you know, hydrotherapy, right? Using waters therapy, but there's this whole, like the cold plunging is like,
00:30:36
Speaker
The thing right now, you know, it's this huge fat, but there are actually a lot of benefits to it. I mean, this is something that, you know, healers and naturopathic medicine has been doing for years and years and years that with, you know, using cold and then hot, but, um, water will help with circulation. And if you improve circulation, then all of those, you know, nutrients get everywhere, better blood flow, better brain function improves your, um, like immune system. But I think kind of some of them,
00:31:07
Speaker
the pieces of these myths are like, I remember, I don't know if you guys recall this time and this was probably a couple years ago or more, but everyone was drinking celery juice. Do you remember this? It was like, it's not like, it's not just celery. I never understood that. But it's not going to be like, we're celery in one class, right?
00:31:31
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. There's not that much nutrients in a stock of celery. No, there's really not that much nutrients in a stock of celery. And it's not going to reverse your aging, your people are like, and it's not going to cure every ailment.
Balanced Diet: Essentials and Extremes
00:31:43
Speaker
So there was like a watermelon diet this past summer too. Did you see that? They were just like emptying out the grocery stores with watermelon and eating nothing but watermelon. Which again, is just like mostly water. We tried the carnivore diet.
00:31:58
Speaker
It's good, but it's tough on your guts. Yeah. I think, you know, one of the things, it's kind of like everything in moderation, right? It's like you find the balance. I think I'm big on protein. I will say, I think having a good amount of protein. Now, whatever the fiber though, I think you need. Yes, exactly. And I think that's what in the carnivore diet, you're missing that fiber and you're missing all those antioxidants, like it should get with your, you know, your fruits and your veggies and all of those.
00:32:26
Speaker
It's not, I don't, I don't necessarily think you want to eat only, you know, fruits and veggies. You need to have some of those proteins and maybe you get those from your fruits and veggies. I have some very healthy vegetarian patients, but it takes a lot of work. And I would say most people that I, you know, that vegan vegetarian diet, it's hard to get really good fats too. It is, you miss out. And the fats are so important for your brain and for your blood sugar.
00:32:50
Speaker
You know, it's like slows if you have some fat with any sort of carb, it slows that spice. Yeah, your insulin levels. Exactly. So I think everything in moderation, but, um, you know, all any fad where you're told to eat a single food all the time, that's, it's, you're going to kind of have to, your little, you know, are you like a Mediterranean diet or are you Mediterranean or paleo or like,
00:33:19
Speaker
I like Mediterranean. So for someone who's listening right now and maybe they're grocery shopping too, what are some good foods they can throw in their cart right now that'll have some anti-aging properties? Goji berries. I mean, I think that for protein, I actually really like fish. I think a good
00:33:39
Speaker
Like salmon, fatty fish are a great source of protein. You have to be careful how much actual fish you eat, right? Because of all the pithy bees, dioxins. Now that's right, they found mycoblastics in some of those fish now. Oh, man. Yeah. And you've got to be careful where you're getting it from and how much you're getting of it. Anything- Yeah, where you're getting it from is- Yeah, you don't want farm flesh. No, man. No. That is not cool. No, it's really not. And even like beef and stuff, I think, so if you're at the store, it's like getting good protein and animal sources are, I think,
00:34:10
Speaker
healthy, but it's got to be organic or wild caught grass fed for your I agree. Just tilapia farms where they're like feeding them like, did you see that? I was like, they're feeding the tilapia shit. Yeah. Like what the fuck? Yeah, that was crazy. I saw the one where they were leaning the fish afterwards and just look like
00:34:33
Speaker
tumors and whatever else I'm still putting it. Yeah. Lots of substitution too. Like there was that scandal here. Like they were selling like the, the cod cheeks and they were passing them off as scallops. Oh, I love that for us. All right. This is a total side note, but, um, there's a radio show called this American life. I don't know if you guys ever have heard of it. Yeah. So there's, this is a really old show.
00:35:01
Speaker
This just reminded me of it. They were talking about how the, they called it bung, but it was, they call, it was like cow, you know, like what? They were passing it off as calamari.
00:35:18
Speaker
and the round. And so it was this whole, on the show, they make it hilarious. Cause they fall through and at the end of the test, they could not tell the difference between the two. We need to see if, if we can all tell the difference. Okay. I'll eat the calamari and you eat the blind taste test. Right. The blind taste test. And it's like, I feel like I could tell. I don't know. You sound like you know how I know I'm not getting burned. Cause when I eat calamari, I like it when it looks like the little squids. Oh, there you go.
00:35:48
Speaker
Don't eat the round pieces. I don't like eating the round ones. I mean, I think it's like where are you sourcing it from? You know, you can only know so much, right? Put a little trust in people. I saw something, just so much substitution in food. It's crazy. Like there was papaya seeds being passed off as like black pepper or something like that.
00:36:13
Speaker
It's tough, man. It's hard to try and eat healthy nowadays, I find. There's so many... I think you can. I think you still can. I mean, for sure. You just have to be more educated, I feel like, than ever before.
00:36:23
Speaker
I agree. You have to be really educated. And I always tell people too- Independent third party testing is so important with supplements. It's almost be like when you're choosing something, when you get to know the company and the product's brand.
Quality Supplements and Aging
00:36:34
Speaker
Yes. You really want to believe what the company's telling you, but having an independent third party certification to go along with it really helps to validate what they're saying. If you're not doing it and you're not willing to invest in it, it's expensive. Trust me, it's really expensive.
00:36:53
Speaker
It gives consumer confidence and I think it's really important. I think it's something like that. I'm very picky with supplements, so I'm so glad you mentioned that because if a company is not going to invest in getting that independent third party testing, then
00:37:08
Speaker
You know, they've kind of got to raise a little bit of red flags because there's so much out there that is like literally what it says on the bottle is not even remotely what is in those little capsules. And it also depends where you buy it. You know, people go and, you know, just buy randomly off of whatever website usually like you need to go to the actual website of the company and get it there and research your companies and make sure it's good quality because there's no regulation on this, right? Unless their companies are self-regulating.
00:37:37
Speaker
And people can be taking stuff that is probably more toxic than not doing it at all. Canada, we're fortunate. Canada's pretty strict. Very strict. Like, yeah, there's a lot of testing that's required to go in like in every batch and from, from stability to ID testing for the materials going in and things like that. And there's a lot of, that's it. That's it. That is not how it is. I think, I think.
00:38:02
Speaker
I think like I've seen a lot of progress with the FDA over the last year, year and a half. So I think it's got it. It has. And a lot of people can like apply for these things. And you know, if you decide to do it, then they are testing it and then you can say you're certified, right? So just making sure you're getting that sort of a thing. We test everything. All of our stuff is done through IFOS. Like through the American official standards. Like they, it was Dr. Bruce Olive who had started that long time ago. It's now changed hands a few times.
00:38:27
Speaker
But he had started that because he had seen an issue with omega-3 specifically, where they would see, you know, like PCBs, dioxins, heavy metals, totox levels, peroxide, just off the charts high. And like you're, you're, you're, as a consumer, you think you're buying something that's good for you and it's actually doing you more harm than good. It's important. Like you need to do your research.
00:38:49
Speaker
when you're, when you're buying quality supplements, because you want to make sure not only are you getting your money's worth, but you're not going to be deterring to your health. That's so important, especially like, you know, you're talking anti-aging and you're, you're aging well and stuff like that. You don't want to do something that's like you're investing good money into something that's actually accelerating that aging process.
00:39:11
Speaker
Absolutely. And like you said, you know, our, we don't have the same nutrient content that we used to have, you know, even 50 years ago. So you really do have to have supplements to be aging well and healthily and, you know, kind of keeping looking your best and feeling your best. And so I think that it's just so key to find good companies like your, you know, like your company where you're like, we are invested. We've done the research and we're making sure our product is quality.
00:39:38
Speaker
because you can buy a lot of junk out there. And still pay a lot of money for. How are you measuring the results, by the way, like when people are coming in and you're putting them on these protocols, is it the hormonal balance, insulin resistance, cortisol levels, just how they feel? Or is there an actual way to measure the metabolic age? Well, you know, I think that more and more we're getting, you know, a lot of companies are kind of coming out with different tests that can kind of look at things more like genetically and maybe how
00:40:08
Speaker
how your telomeres, which are like the little ends of our DNA are aging. So that's kind of one way, but that's more advanced testing than I usually do on my average patient. And really what I'm looking at is, like you said, hormone balance. I think CRP, high sensitivity, which is like an inflammation marker. I look at that on everybody, nutrient levels, and then your general stuff, yes, your insulin resistance, your cholesterol levels. I think, you know, something that is kind of related to
00:40:37
Speaker
The, um, the fish oil piece and this cholesterol we're talking about is that we're always like low, low, low, low, right? Everything's better if it's low, but that's not even necessarily accurate. I think, you know, you want to make sure you have a lot of the good cholesterol, that HDL, which is something that you would be measuring if you, whenever you get a cholesterol panel, um, and that fish oil really helps to boost the HDL. But to me, sometimes it's like, even if your cholesterol is a smoochie high, if your ratio is better and you've got a lot of the good HDL,
00:41:06
Speaker
That's way healthier. It's the building block for almost everything, right? It was funny. I remember reading that. When you said that, it just took me back to when I read The Great Cholesterol Myth and how they vilified cholesterol and how we had all this margarine and all these. And actually, that was the start of the spike in chronic illness and disease. Yes. It was crazy. You just hit the nail on the head because what we did is we took out all the fat of everything and we added sugar. And it accelerated our aging.
00:41:32
Speaker
made us feel really crummy. And we really need healthy fat and every single cell in your body. And you think about when we're anti aging, we want every single cell to be healthy. Every single cell has a cholesterol, you know, by layer. It's like basically every little membrane of your cell is made out of fats. And so it's vitally important to have good fat. Even your Yeah, your
00:41:57
Speaker
every cell, your brain. Yeah, especially your brain, right? Our brain like feeds off of fats and like so much of our brain is made of fat. So when we cut out all the fat and we added sugar, and then we just basically started this, I mean, that the rate of Alzheimer's and dementia and all that skyrocketed when we started doing that, if you have more healthy fats in your diet, it's actually much better for your brain health long term. Yep. What about, do you touch on the mitochondria at all when you're looking for like the
00:42:26
Speaker
I do. Yes. I mean, I will look and there are, you know, some tests you can do to kind of look at mitochondrial function. Um, and you know, are, how are they doing?
00:42:39
Speaker
A lot of that is also how people are feeling. And I think that there's a lot of great supplements. We do a fair amount of IVs at our office as well. So I don't know if anybody you guys or who's listening is familiar with kind of these nutrient IVs, but I find that those are great for mitochondrial health. I especially love NAD, which is basically just goes right in and it's like the little goes into the powerhouse of the cell.
00:43:07
Speaker
which is your mitochondria, right? And, and can kind of give it the energy it needs and revamp it. But yeah, mitochondrial function is huge. It's like how, how well are the engines in your cells working? We used to, we used to, I had met somebody when we were in, in Germany one time and they had come up with a product. It was, um, peptide protein made from porcine serum and, uh, and,
00:43:34
Speaker
This stuff was so good. We were using it. I tested it like four times because I thought it was growth hormones or steroids. It was crazy how good it was. And when I started talking to one of my friends about it who specializes in chronic illness and fatigue, he was telling me he thought it because so the proteins like the
00:43:54
Speaker
were almost an identical match to the amino acid profile of the porcine serum to the human DNA. It was almost perfect, but the heme iron that was on it, it was so potent that he felt it was actually feeding the mitochondrial cells and it was just like...
00:44:11
Speaker
crazy. And energy burst. I mean, like, I can't even tell you, we couldn't figure out exactly what he was doing. But it was insane. It was insane. Like I could work out like I was like a teenager and I take this stuff. And the next day I felt like, like nothing. And then the guy
00:44:28
Speaker
You know, and it was really interesting because it was actually, yeah, they were using it. No, it wasn't fiberomyalgia. They had developed it for like, um, people that were, um, for malnutrition, they'll fight malnutrition. So people that couldn't absorb proteins right away, they would, this, this powder form of protein was put into a drink and kind of like, so they could take it to like kind of strengthen their body and their stomach until they could actually start breaking down and digesting food again. This thing, this stuff was crazy. That's amazing.
00:44:55
Speaker
We tried to, we talked to our consultants to see if we could get a license for it domestically to be able to market the product. But they told us it would be classified as a biological drug. Really? Yeah. But it sounds magnificent. I'm like, I want some of that for my patients and myself. I'm telling you, it was called, what was it called? Regen or something like that? Regen, yeah. Regen peptides is what it was called. And it was coming out of
00:45:25
Speaker
Germany, the gentleman was South Africa. This stuff was crazy. I feel like we'll see it in the future. I don't know for it not to come back. Yeah. I remember there was some studies around it around like a beef peptide for similar. Um, it wasn't quite as good, but it was like, there was a drug company that was building like a drug application for it to help heal burn victims. And it was really similar kind of profile. This stuff was crazy. I would, I would do it again. Yeah. I would do it again. Part of my routine.
00:45:53
Speaker
Yeah. I would go out and train like a madman and feel like a kid still the next day. So we had opened up the floodgates. I should say we, uh, we let our community know that you were going to be on the show and if they had any questions about anti-aging. So maybe we can quickly go through them and you can kind of get like your opinion, whether it's helpful or not helpful for anti-aging. Um, so one was sunscreen. Is that something you suggest or avoid? So here's my thing with sunscreen for your face. I say yes.
00:46:23
Speaker
Um, for the rest of the body, I think if you, it's all about the time. Um, I think a little bit of sun actually on your body is actually good. You can absorb some nutrients, get that vitamin D. If you're going to be out for a long time, put some sunscreen on, but facial. Yes. Do it daily. And that will help with, you know, like natural, like a mineral sunscreen versus like the non, I prefer a mineral sunscreen because there's so many chemicals in the other ones and it's your wife.
00:46:53
Speaker
I know it's daily, like, even if you're not at the beach, kind of thing. I use it daily. Really? Mineral sunscreen every day? Yes. I do too. You put that on too? Really? Every day, like on my face. I just, that's my moisture. Let's test it out. I'm not doing that. No, it doesn't spread out well. And I'm going to end up like I'm all white and like, you know, it's like, it takes a minute to, you know, be absorbed. It gets a bit weird. It's like,
00:47:22
Speaker
Then I'm sweating and it's like little drops of white coming down. Okay. Next one here is acne medication. Is that good for anti-aging or where does that come from? Well, it depends. I mean, it totally depends what you're doing. I would say, you know, there, obviously if your acne is really, really bad, then, and this is what you need to treat it. But I'm just going to put a plug in here that a lot of acne there's root cause is going to be healing your gut and your diet.
00:47:47
Speaker
So that's going to be more anti-aging than actually the acne medication. So I would say find a doctor, get to the root cause. You can look at a lot of herbs, diet stuff that can heal it from the inside out, right? So you're not having to do the topical things that can be a little bit more harmful. Okay. All right. Yeah. And then the last thing is Botox.
00:48:07
Speaker
That's one of the first things that comes up when you're searching. That's so funny. We're trying to convince the guys here to get BroTalks. BroTalks, it's the new thing, man. I'm like, Andre, just get the BroTalks. I'll pay for it. It's so cool. We'll do a show on it. Okay, so here's the thing is that it is a toxin, right? It's not necessarily this totally natural thing, but I will say for the aesthetic piece of anti-aging,
00:48:33
Speaker
which you've got to be aging inside and outside. You can't just focus on the outside, but I will say it is probably the most powerful to keep away fine lines and wrinkles. Um, you know, so doing, you know, if you keep up with a really healthy diet, you stay hydrated, you do all that stuff and then you get a little Botox too. You will probably be looking. So it's like, it falls kind of like in the middle, kind of like in the middle. I don't think it's necessarily, I think it's, I would say it's a,
00:49:01
Speaker
thumbs up for the aesthetic piece of anti-aging. I don't think it's necessarily, you know, it's not something that I'm- Is there any health concerns from it? Cause like, isn't, I saw a thing that was click baiting on, but it was like, um, all these, all these women are, they're potentially going to develop some form of cancer because of all these carcinogens in these Botox. I have seen some stuff with like filler and things like that, but I haven't seen any, any studies that were,
00:49:29
Speaker
definitive, you know, a lot of these things, it's kind of like clickbait, right? That's what I thought. I didn't take time to read it, but I was like, no, I don't know how good this is. Yeah, I think it's fine. Honestly, I don't, I, I'm not opposed to Botox. Like I, I think it'd be great for helping people like look their best. And sometimes when you look better, you're actually more motivated to do the work to feel better inside. So I'm
00:49:58
Speaker
And it's probably, there's nothing that compares to it. So yeah, good questions.
00:50:05
Speaker
Yeah, those were good. Um, so I feel like everything I've learned today is like diet is probably number one, most important. You want to cut out processed sugars. Uh, you want to include some vegetables and healthy fats and a few supplements, vitamin D sunscreen every day, apparently is really good for your face, but not on the face. Hey, us ladies know the secret. You guys need to exercise yoga, some good sleep, maybe a few cold showers, not every day, unless you're a psychopath. What about a cold tub?
00:50:32
Speaker
I mean, I think it could be a good thing. I'm planning to do hot cold therapy before going to bed. I'm going to try cold. I get up early and I work out in the morning and I'm going to try cold tubbing before I work out. Cause I read this study that it can boost your testosterone.
00:50:53
Speaker
Yeah, you and my husband would be right on the same wavelength. He's doing it. Did it work? Yeah, sometimes at the gym, they've got a cold plunge thing. So now he's like, do I cold plunge first, then work out, then do the hot therapy, or do I try all the different ways? I think the guy was saying it's like people do it after for the anti-inflammatory. But if you do it before, you can spike your testosterone before you work out. I haven't heard that. Yeah. Oh, that is cool. I'm going to try that. We'll have to test that one out too. Yeah. I'm going to try that.
00:51:22
Speaker
Dr. Kerry, I want to thank you again for being on our show. I had such a great conversation with you, and I think our listeners are going to get a lot of value from listening to the show too. So I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for being on the show. It was such a pleasure. Thank you guys so much. This was so fun. I appreciate it. You guys were great. And yeah, I'm excited to keep following all the other fun guests you guys have on the show. Thank you so much for being on. We'll have to get you back next season. 100%. I feel like if you're into it, we are 100%. Cool. I would love to.
00:51:49
Speaker
And for all our listeners, if you made it this far, please be sure to give our, to give our podcast five star rating. Make sure to go follow Dr. Kara as well. Yeah. So where can, where can our listeners find you if they want to continue? You know, I'm probably most active on my Instagram and it's just at doctor underscore Kara. Um, and then, you know, otherwise if you're in, if you're in the States, then you can, you know, find me in Arizona, but really for,
00:52:15
Speaker
Lots of health tips and kind of all the fun things I'm doing. Instagram is the best way to catch me. Absolutely. Your content is fantastic. I want to say that. So you'll definitely get some value by following Dr. Cara on Instagram. Awesome. Thank you guys so much. This was such a pleasure. I appreciate it. Thank you again. Take care.