I am delighted to have the opportunity to converse with Kristina Hess today! Kristina is a premier health coach, licensed dietician, and nutritionist with a functional and integrative approach.
Everyone should feel free to experiment with different types of nutritional dogma. However, we should always stay open-minded and lean into whatever our bodies need. I love that Kristina has married the trajectory of her life with genetics and nutrition. So I asked her to join me on the podcast to discuss nutrigenomics.
In this episode, Kristina shares her backstory and talks about growing up and living all over the world, her history of veganism, and healing her body with a nutrient-dense, whole food, primal/paleo diet. She gives some examples of genetic tendencies and low penetrants. She and I dive into gene variants, nutritional choices that include the use of ethanol or alcohol, seed oils, lifestyle choices, and testing. Kristina also provides recommendations for working with individuals trained in the unique form of genetics and study of nutrition and gene expression, known as nutrigenomics.
I hope you will gain a lot from today’s fascinating conversation with Kristina Hess! Stay tuned for more!
IN THIS EPISODE YOU WILL LEARN:
Kristina talks about the Keto Symposium, the very first low-carb conference on the ketogenic lifestyle and fasting. She explains why it is so special.
Kristina shares her interesting backstory.
How Kristina finally realized that the vegan lifestyle was damaging her body.
Kristina explains what nutrigenomics is.
Some gene variants are older and have not changed or adapted to more modernized food. Kristina explains how lifestyle choices can impact those variants.
What can people do to impact their gene expression?
It is important to take your gene data to a qualified professional for interpretation and talk to them about your lifestyle.
Kristina discusses some of the more common gene combinations she sees that could cause weight loss resistance.
Kristina talks about isolated low penetrant gene SNPs.
Be a detective and do some testing when in doubt.
Kristina talks about alcohol and how it could impact epigenetic signaling.
Why should you avoid consuming seed oils?
Some lifestyle habits everyone should adopt.
“I think statistically, a lot of kids end up with disordered eating if they have a parent with that issue.” “I went fully paleo, and that changed my whole life.”
-Kristina Hess
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Connect with Kristina Hess
On her website
Transcript:
Cynthia: Welcome to Everyday Wellness Podcast. I'm your host, Nurse Practitioner Cynthia Thurlow. This podcast is designed to educate, empower, and inspire you to achieve your health and wellness goals. My goal and intent are to provide you with the best content and conversations from leaders in the health and wellness industry each week and impact over a million lives.
Today, I had the opportunity to connect with Kristina Hess, who's a premier health coach and licensed dietitian and nutritionist with a functional and integrative approach. One of the reasons why I wanted to bring her on board was to talk about the impact of nutrigenomics, which is the byproduct of nutrition and gene expression. We dove deep into her backstory, which included things like living all over the world, and her history of veganism, and how going to a nutrient dense Whole Foods, primal/paleo diet helped heal her body, examples of genetic tendencies, and low penetrance gene variants, the role of nutritional choices, including the use of ethanol or alcohol and seed oils, the impact of lifestyle choices, as well as testing. She provided some incredible broad base recommendations, as well as ways to work with individuals that are trained in this very unique form of genetics superimposing on nutrition.
Today, I am delighted to welcome my friend, Kristina Hess. Before we dive into your backstory, we have a very special announcement to make about Keto Symposium for which I will be an honored guest to be speaking at this event along with other friends of mine like the amazing Ben Azadi. But Kristina, tell us a little bit about this event, why it's so special, and the fact it's in New York City, which I think most if not all of us would love an excuse to come visit the city because it's been a while since I was last there.
Kristina: Absolutely. The city in September is an absolutely glorious time to come to New York. It's not too hot, it's just beautiful weather, and of course, there's so much to do. And now, that things are back open in New York, Broadway, there're so many other things to do in addition to coming to the conference. Yes, the very first low carb conference on ketogenic lifestyle and fasting and yeah, lots of experts including you, so excited. I love going to conferences. I don't know, I love learning. I just consider myself a lifelong learner. It's been fun to put this together. This live in-person conference is three years in the making. This plan began in 2019. The first one was originally supposed to be in 2020 in Greenwich, Connecticut and was cancelled. So, then last year it was a virtual conference. And so, this year, finally, we are in person, yay.
Cynthia: Well, and I think everyone including people who speak on stages like myself, like you, we're just so grateful to be able to have the opportunity to connect with people again.
Kristina: Yes.
Cynthia: If you're in the tristate area, you definitely want to check this out. What I love is that it's a one-day event. So, it makes it a little bit easier. Some people struggle to be able to-- [crosstalk]
Kristina: It’s a one and a half day event.
Cynthia: One and a half. Okay.
Kristina: Yeah. We actually kick off Friday evening with a couple of keynotes, and we're going to have a reception, and you can register, and get your swag, and all that fun stuff, and then it's an all-day event Saturday. Yeah, so, you can still enjoy the city and do lots of other fun things, too.
Cynthia: Absolutely. We'll make sure in the replay and in our show notes that will include the discount codes that people can use. But before I forget, you have such an interesting backstory. We were talking about it before we started recording and I always feel that our influences of our parents, and where we grow up, and our relationships with food can really be instrumental in creating an environment of whether we have a healthy relationship with food or an unhealthy relationship with food. I think let's start from the beginning. Tell us a little bit about where you grew up, and how you grew up, and the influences of your family, and how you're eating trajectory, because I'm wanting you to talk about your period of your life when you were a vegan, which I think is relevant.
Kristina: Ah, sure.
Cynthia: And how that evolved into where you are today.
Kristina: Yeah, so, I grew up overseas. My dad worked in banking and my mom was a diplomat. We were overseas for most of my childhood and we moved back to the States when I was just shy of 13. Living abroad, really, we ate very just whatever was local, fresh, very healthy foods. We lived in South America for a period of time. In Venezuela, it was the 80s, oil, big business and then we moved to Milan, Italy. I lived on pasta, but really fresh, really fresh, fresh, fresh food and we would come back to the States in the summertime, and I would stay with my grandparents for a couple of months, and that's where I got all these processed yummy treats, the Doritos, and Entenmann's coffee cake, and Klondike bars for dessert, and I just have such fond memories. [laughs] All those Americans with the cereal, oh, my goodness. But we didn't have any of that when we were abroad, ever. So, it was when we come back to the States that we would have these indulgences.
I was interested in nutrition at a very young age, simply because my mom battled with her relationship with food and talked about it a lot. I had a different reaction. I think statistically, a lot of kids end up with also disordered eating if they have a parent with that issue. I actually went, I don't know, I had my own version of disordered eating, which was orthorexia, I think in college, but really, I was so committed to, I'm going to take care of my body because the other version which I just saw as this punishment like being on some terrible diet and suffering, and it was all about the quick fix, it seemed or I want to eat all the cookies, and then purge them, and I wasn't down for that. I read a lot of nutrition books, whatever was hot at the time. And so, I ended up going with the trends of the time. I was into the low fat, no fat period, and I just would scoop out my bagels, and eat my bananas, and wouldn't touch any fat, and really, things changed, but I did experiment with veganism, which actually evolved into raw veganism.
Cynthia: Wow.
Kristina: Yes, I went fully raw and I lasted four months and I did not have a social life. I would take sometimes 48 hours to prepare either dehydrated foods, right juice, all kinds of things, and then make these soup. Everything was very elaborate. What ended up happening was, I had some pretty severe nutritional deficiencies and I ended up fracturing bones. It really didn't click with me. I first broke my collarbone. I'm a skier. I grew up ski racing and falling, I don't know how many times, but let's say a lot and this is pre-helmet days.
Cynthia: That's real skiing, I grew up in that timeframe, too. [laughs]
Kristina: Yes. I fell on my head a lot and I never broke any bones. But I was doing this raw vegan thing and I fell. I thought, “Well, this is coincidence.” The first bone that I broke, it was coincidence. I recovered from that, and I started training for a marathon, and I was putting in miles, and I ended up fracturing the femoral neck in my hip.
Cynthia: Acetabulum.
Kristina: Yes, and it was just fully almost cracked, almost to the end. That is when it really, really clicked that, these vegan lifestyles really damaging my bone health. Later, not to jump too far ahead, but once I learned about genetics and testing genes, I realized I don't have any of the predispositions to be a plant-based person. I was not surprised much later and I could have saved myself decades of headache had I known about this whole genetic piece to what should I eat and this would be better for me.
I did have this vegan period and then ended up finding my way to CrossFit to recover. After all my injuries, I found my way to CrossFit, and I went fully paleo, and that changed my whole life. I really love the whole paleo approach and philosophy to just real food and hunter-gatherer. Again, that genetic piece, we're looking at what we're supposed to eat and some people have adapted to more modern food and some people haven't. My body responded amazingly well. I've always been a person that's had to really be mindful of her weight and didn't realize it, but that was the beginning of understanding that hitting my protein targets and being low carb was really good for me.
Cynthia: I always find people's journeys because at the time, it might not have made sense that you became a vegan, but now, looking back retrospectively, that allowed you to course correct and end up exactly where you were destined to be and I think it's such a beautiful story. I think for so many of us, I always say like, “I thought I ate such a healthy diet,” because I was telling my patients everything I learned in my medical training and it wasn't until I had a child with life-threatening food allergies that I started to question everything. Then that actually sent me down a rabbit hole of going gluten free, and then ultimately lower carb, and now, carb cycling and fasting. And so, it makes sense now, but I know at that time it did not.
I think for many people if they're recovered vegan. I have a family member. It's taken her years to course correct. Going back to eating meat, but she feels so much better. I think for a lot of people, it's okay to have experimentation with different types of nutritional dogma. But I think we always have to remain open minded to really leaning into what our bodies intrinsically need. I love that you've married your trajectory of your life with genetics and nutrition. I think the easiest way to start the conversation is to actually define what nutrigenomics is, then it'll make sense to people once they hear it. I think a lot of people don't necessarily recognize what it is, but it makes sense. Once you say it, it's like, “Oh, okay, the interplay of epigenetics, and nutrition, and how that can turn genes on and off.” This is actually what brought you into this nutrigenomics and probably the need for having individuals who are savvy being able to take the research, and combine it with nutritional recommendations and bio individuality is probably being a teacher, because that's where you started your career-career was probably, a normal extension of what you were interested in.
Kristina: Absolutely. I say, I was a teacher before I became a clinical nutritionist. I do have the heart of a teacher and I love to educate the people that I work with and really spend time, so that they understand the mechanisms of how their bodies work. Nutrigenomics is this marriage between nutrition and genomics. Genetics falls into three buckets. Everyone's heard of 23andMe or ancestry.com and that is really looking at where did you come from? Are you mostly European, or Asian, or African? That's one bucket of genetics. There's this whole other bucket of genetics, which is all about diseases. That bucket tends to look at one gene. That's a real anomaly, and how to treat this gene, and there is no amount of food or anti-inflammatory protocol that's going to treat that disease really. That kind of genetics is not what we're talking about here.
Nutrigenomics is really looking at these more, not these fixed genes, but the more malleable genes, where you have all the power in the world to influence their expression. What's really neat is that in this field, you can look at a family, a group of genes that will pertain to a particular area or system in your body say, detoxification or genes that pertain to fitness. I'm actually pretty injury prone and I didn't know that I have some variants on collagen genes that if you looked at that, there are genes that can tell you if you would do better with more endurance training or better with lifting, I didn't understand any of that until I got into this, but it makes perfect sense. If you give two people a marathon plan, let's say, and one person does great with it and the other person gets injured, that's based on your genetics. Someone like Usain Bolt, he has a very particular set of genes. That gene, your genes are just potential. They're not, oh, you're doomed to x, y, z. It's just potential. but if you don't, A, have the potential or B, use that potential, it's not going to express.
I find it fascinating. I think it's really the future of our profession to really understand this body of science. It's still so new and I'm constantly evolving with how I learned to translate these things and interpret them because it's so important to look at the whole person just because you do have what we say, spelling changes in your genes. That's all they are. It is how we make words, and then sentences, and we make meaning out of our language. That's all we're doing with looking at. Gene translation is we're now have four letters and you might have some changes on those letters. Are you doomed? No. And they might not even be expressing at the moment based on how you're living. So, I find it all fascinating, but it is important to really look at the whole person, and what's going on, and what is their family history, and what do they like to eat, how do they manage stress, all of those pieces are so important.
Cynthia: Well, and I think it's an important distinction. As an example, when I was preparing for this, the recognition as someone that was in graduate school and undergrad during the time of the Human Genome Project, I remember my faculty members that were especially in oncology research, we're really excited about this. I'm really dating myself, but it's relevant. When we're looking at these genetics, looking at differentiating between high penetrance, so like a BRCA gene, genetics that make people more susceptible to developing certain types of cancers versus things like MTHFR, which if anyone's familiar with that, I actually have two copies. That's considered to be, correct me if I'm wrong, low penetrance because-
Kristina: Totally.
Cynthia: -it doesn't necessarily mean you're going to have all these problems. What's interesting is, even though I myself, I think I'm pretty well versed in the very basics related to this. I have many family members not surprisingly, they're all homozygous for this particular gene, the MTHFR. And probably, 10 years ago, they've started all taking methylfolate and methylated vitamins.
Kristina: Which is all you need. [laughs]
Cynthia: What's interesting is, you could take 10 of us, and most of us were taking methylated vitamins, and then one person got sick from taking vitamins, and so-
Kristina: Really? Yeah.
Cynthia: Ended up going to the emergency room.
Kristina: Oh.
Cynthia: It really just speaks to the fact that there's no one size fits all philosophy.
Kristina: Sure.
Cynthia: We all have differing lifestyle choices that can influence whether or not these genes are activated or not and your work really focuses in on the low penetrance, so-
Kristina: Totally.
Cynthia: -the things, it's not correlation means causation.
Kristina: Totally.
Cynthia: You could have a gene and if it doesn't get turned on, you may not even have any issues, but really relevant in something that we were talking about before is things like recognizable-- MTHFR is one I think a lot of people are familiarized with. I think it’s about-- [crosstalk]
Kristina: It’s gotten too much attention, though and too much importance. A lot of these genes, this people are looking at them in isolation and freaking out. [crosstalk]
Cynthia: Do you think it is sensationalized by the media or do you think it's people who are trying to better understand what's going on and they want to fix? Haven't we conditioned our patients that a pill is going to fix whatever ails them and people think a supplement is going to fix everything. I always remind people, if you really have to lean into the lifestyle piece, it's still, there's, no quick fix.
Kristina: No.
Cynthia: You really do have to do the work. I love to just snap my fingers and make it easy, but the work is still the work.
Kristina: The work is still the work. I guess you really do have to look at so much more than just one. It's low hanging fruit to do that and panic. We've talked even about APOE, and there's so much attention around APOE, and oh, my gosh, and you're going to get Alzheimer's if you have-- It is true that it has been identified that there's a higher likelihood, especially and the reason for-- You get two copies. You get some from one parent and the other parent. With the four-four, if you have that or even three-four, yes, it's a higher risk. It's risk, but that's still a potential. Those are just older variants. Because they're older, what that means is it conferred benefits way back when and they haven't changed. They haven't adapted to this newer more modernized food that we're eating. And so, people who might have a three-four, four-four and are now eating a lot of grains, a lot of starch, and a lot of sugar, and have a lot of stress, and are drinking a lot alcohol, they just haven't adapted and it could potentially-- Again, we have to stress that potential, but also, again looking at maybe some other SNPs would be interesting to see if they have adaptations elsewhere.
Cynthia: Well, and it's interesting because my own experiences with the MTHFR, which I got to a point, where I just wanted to stop worrying about it, because I think if I weren't doing all the right things for me that it might have expressed or created other issues. I think this is really important to identify what are the things people do in their personal lives that can impact gene expression? Because there are probably people listening saying, “If this sounds like alphabet soup, I don't know how to make it relevant.” Let's make it really relevant, so that people understand. When we talk about doing the work, it is the most important work. It really, really is. I talk a lot about circadian rhythms, I talk a lot about circadian biology, a lot of this is around feeding and fasting windows, but in terms of relevance, what are the aspects of lifestyle that you feel make the largest net impact on whether or not that gene turns on or off?
Kristina: Well, it's a little bit reversed in that. Yael Joffe talks about this. She's a nutrigenomics expert and she talk about there's the insight. “Okay, now, you have all this data, you have all this knowledge about yourself, and then there's action. Now, what do I do with it? Now, that I know about all these genes, now, what can I do to your point to optimize my right lifestyle? What is my right eating window?” That's where the genes give you the data, the information. “Oh, you know what, you actually do just fine on a wider window.” This other person is glucose intolerant and not so insulin sensitive. With these particular variants they have they need to stop eating early. I've seen it, of course, you've seen it, too, in your practice, where you have people doing maybe a traditional 12 to 8 intermittent fasting window, but you move them to a nine to five and things start changing for them. All of that is based on their genetics.
One of the most interesting family of, I really call them transcription factors. They're like switches is that PPAR-alpha. It's the whole PPAR family. Actually, because it's alpha, and gamma, and there's delta. There's all these [laughs] Greek letters that go with them. But it's P-P-A-R and it has a lot to do with your utilization of fat. For people who have difficulty with their PPAR, well, fasting doesn't feel great to them. They might need to do that traditional three meals a day, and just start their day with some protein, and then other people just have no issues. They can do all this extended fasting, and they feel amazing, and have all the energy in the world. Again, it's genetics. It's really, really fascinating. With low carb, there's also a lot of nuances, because in the whole low carb space, we can find people who are like, “Oh, it's high protein. Oh, it's higher fat. Oh, can you tolerate more carb cycling or not? Which carbs are we talking about, should you be doing more saturated fats, can you have dairy, should you not have dairy?” And again, it's genetics. So, a lot of those questions really can get answered with a test from a good company, of course.
Cynthia: Well, I know 23andMe, because I've actually run that and then this is before they made some changes. Then I ran the data through genetic genie, which I'm not even sure if that's even out there anymore. Even then with all the training I have, I remember saying, it looks like alphabet soup.
Kristina: Yes.
Cynthia: So, I'm sure for people listening, they're like, “I don't know what any of this represents.”
Kristina: That's why I think it is important to take your data to a qualified professional to interpret it for you, and sit down with you, and ask you about your actual lifestyle because you want to put it into context. What is the family history, how do you live, do you sleep, do you have problems sleeping? Just because you have variants with melatonin and clock, maybe you don't have any sleep issues. Or, yes, I can validate that for you. I have your skates right here, and your genes, and so here maybe you do need to take some melatonin, maybe you do need to take some magnesium.
It is important to sit down with someone and have them look at this, so that you're not looking at just the alphabets, because you aren't just a bunch of letters. You're a human being with a whole bunch of things going on in your world, and you want to look at it in context, and then additionally, which I think is really important is, if you can add other data to that, too, are you wearing a continuous glucose monitor? Example, Cynthia, I do tend to use low carb ketogenic protocols for a lot of the people that come and find me, because it’s stubborn weight loss or maybe, they're recovering from cancer and things like that. It is a protocol I tend to use. Those are the people that typically are finding me, but I've had people where it doesn't work. Then we run their genetic profiles and boy, they really shouldn't be eating red meat and saturated fat, and they don't have issues with the grains, and it changes the dietary approach.
Cynthia: Well, as I'm listening to you, I'm curious because obviously after our discussion, I'm going to reach out to you and say, “Hey, I'd love to get your professional opinion,” because I'll give everyone an example. I lean carnivore-ish. I do cycle my carbs, but I feel best eating meat and I'm able to maintain being healthy and healthy life stage, even though I'm now middle aged. But what's interesting is, we're a family of four and so, half of my family loves fatty meat and the other half doesn't. I can tell you, if I eat a large bolus of animal-based fat, let's say, I go to a restaurant and I've duck fat fries, I will be sick. I have a healthy gallbladder. That's not the issue. But for me, I do best with lean protein and plant-based fats, whereas half my family does really well with like, they have a ribeye, I have a fillet. They have a piece of salmon, generally, I’ll have a leaner piece of fish. It's almost to the point where my older son is the same way. There's something about the way that fat feels on our tongue that is so unappealing and I'm sure there's probably a genetic piece to all of this.
Kristina: Yes.
Cynthia: And so, I find it fascinating. Anyway, I just wanted to interject that clearly there are genetic influences that will gravitate us towards certain types of foods and away from others.
Kristina: A 100% and it sounds like you just like I did. You found it by default and then you could later validate the information with looking at your gene SNPs. But wouldn't it be nice for some of you out there listening to save yourself the time and the experimentation with looking at this first and saying, “Well, this would really be more ideal for me,” and then take it or leave it. Of course, there are going to be times when you're not eating that way, but wouldn't it be nice to know what is best for you?
Cynthia: Absolutely. Yeah, and I think this whole optimization and personalization, I think that's where I see a lot of medicine going in that direction. The acknowledgement that-- I'll give you another example. I'm now in menopause. And so, the one size fits all that, once women hit a certain age, everyone needs the same hormone. Well, me going on HRT, I gained 10 pounds almost within two weeks. This speaks to a lot of things that weren't properly balanced, even though I was doing all these right things. I always remind people, it's like cooking. It's like trying to find that perfect balance for each one of us. It's why when I work with women, we never start with hormones first. It's always all the foundational work, because even then you can still run into these kinds of quandaries.
I would imagine when you're working with women, you mentioned weight loss resistance. That seems to be a huge pain point for women in perimenopause and menopause in particular. And so, in your clinical experience, what are some of the big things? Because I think about FTO. If you look at the research-
Kristina: Yeah, I know.
Cynthia: -and certain things. There isn't this genetic propensity, so, what are some of the more common alphabet soup, if you will, combinations that you will see? Sometimes that will lead you to believe like, it's not surprising this woman is experiencing this because maybe her body doesn't use fat properly. Maybe her genetics are set up that she's going to run like a lower basal metabolic rate than someone else. What are some of the more common things you will see that will increase the likelihood of being weight loss resistant?
Kristina: And keep in mind again. The science is still evolving. You are looking at a lot of different types of studies but here's what I can tell you with the information that I have to date. Coffee is a big point that people argue over and that is very easily determined with genotype. There's a fast metabolizer of coffee. It's alphabet soup of AA and the detoxification pathway, so liver detoxification and clearance of caffeine. Are you clearing it quickly or not quickly? Then the CC genotype is a slow metabolizer of caffeine and studies have shown that those slow metabolizers of caffeine, if they consume, if they're heavily consuming it, they're more likely to have a heart attack. But people may know this already about themselves if they having the heart palpitations, if they feel anxiety, but then there's the next layer, you want also look at COMT, which also has to do with metabolism of hormones, dopamine, estrogen, and with COMT, which also gets a lot of attention that can also drive anxiety or not lot depending on how quickly you're clearing things out.
But, yeah, detoxification is super, super interesting. You have a centenarian, who can live to be a hundred, and smoked pack of cigarettes a day, and then you have another person who never smoked, and gets lung cancer. The GST genes which are also in that detoxification pathway have been shown to respond very well to sulforaphane, to broccoli sprouts. And so that seems to be a really interesting nutrient and that's really what nutrigenomics is all about is how to impact your expression, again, by introducing the right nutrients. Then there's also the reverse too is, if you challenge the system with certain things, do your genes respond? There's some new research on AMY 1 and 2, that's amylase. It's the genes coding for enzymes that help you break down starch. With people who have multiple copies of that, that's shown that they can tolerate starch better if you have fewer copies than less so. That makes sense, because you're able to break it down better. So, yeah, it's really interesting stuff.
Cynthia: I'm thinking of my 16-year-old, who is a lacrosse and football player, and he's six feet tall and still growing. One of his favorite things in the world eat is a big bowl of bison or ground meat on top of a massive amount of white rice. My husband and I jokingly talk about the fact. We go through rice in our house, not because we eat it, but because he eats so much of it, but I would imagine he probably has--. I'm sure he has multiple copies because he's super lean, he’s also 16. So, he has time on his side.
Kristina: Yeah, he does.
[laughter]
Cynthia: Totally different.
Kristina: He's in that anabolic phase.
Cynthia: Yeah, definitely the building phase. You mentioned sulforaphane and so, I talk a lot about broccoli sprouts and cruciferous vegetables, what are some of the other things when you're looking at carbohydrate threshold, you mention the amylase? When you're looking at fats and protein what are some of the broad-base? Because I know we're not giving doing personal recommendation-- [crosstalk]
Kristina: No, and again, now we're talking about isolated gene SNPs that are low penetrance.
Cynthia: [laughs] Mm-hmm.
Cynthia: But TCF7L2 is another one that's really that highly linked to diabetes and type 2 diabetes and will also be another one of those that may be impacted by a high grain diet. I know that was true for me. So, I have variants on TCF7L2 and I ended up prediabetic, turning 40 and insulin resistance, just turned on despite my CrossFit, despite triathlon training and I, at the time, had taken a job as a nutrition director at a plant-based company, and had totally gone off my strict paleo diet and was eating all their food, and my weight just ballooned there in two years. And then I'm doing that but I was thinking, “It's okay, I'm doing all this triathlon training.” Not a single pan would budge. Then it was, “Huh, okay, let's test it.” When in doubt, I always do some testing. Be your own detective. Then I was in a conference sitting and listening to Professor Thomas Seyfried, and he just absolutely just blew my mind talking about cancer, and ketones, and ketogenic metabolic therapy and I said, “Okay, I don't know if this could be hard or not, but here we go.”
Cynthia: [laughs]
Kristina: It was amazing to just drop 15 pounds in six weeks and feel that keto high and just happy, and clarity, and not be obsessing about food. I had never been able to go two hours without eating prior to this. Fasting? No, I would have looked at you like you had 10 heads. Forget about it. I haven't eaten today, it's in the afternoon, I did have a cup of black coffee, and I feel great, I feel fine. That was never a reality for me in the past.
Cynthia: [crosstalk] powerful for you.
Kristina: It’s so great. It's freeing. It's very freeing.
Cynthia: Well, and that's one of the things about the therapeutic use of intermittent fasting that I think is so phenomenal because I have a group of women right now that are going through one of my programs and they're on day like 35 or 45. And the amount of women that have said, “I had no idea how much freedom I now have that I can go about my day, not fixated on when my next meal is, not craving food that I shouldn't be eating, I've changed my relationship with alcohol,” which is definitely something I want to talk about with you.
Kristina: Oh.
Cynthia: The more I talk about this and the more that I learn and do research on alcohol, I think that unfortunately, the past two years have been very hard on everyone, let me be really clear that many of us have developed healthier habits, some of us have not. But I do hear from many, many women that their alcohol consumption went up compensatory wise. Some people suddenly have little people at home 24/7 and that was stressful. I was a little bit more fortunate that my kids were older, a little more independent. But let's talk about alcohol, because this is something that I find fascinating. I grew up the byproduct of an alcoholic parent. And so, my relationship with alcohol has always been a cautious one, because I saw up close and personal some of the things that happened with this parent. And obviously, there's no judgement in anything I'm saying. I just think that we need to destigmatize talking about it, because it's very triggering. I find every time I do a post on this, I either get people on one extreme or the other and I always say, “There's no judgement in what I'm saying. I'm here to educate and inspire you to examine your relationship, if you have one.” And so, what have you found in your work, in your research about alcohol and how it can impact this epigenetic signaling and turning on and off of genes?
Kristina: Alcohol completely blocks fat oxidation. That's just a fancy way of saying, “You are not burning fat when you're drinking alcohol.” It is the equivalent of trying to drive your car with the e-brake up. You’re just like getting nowhere when at least for weight loss and that is something that a lot of people are either trying to re-composition their body or lose a significant amount of weight and have goals. Unfortunately, there's so much social pressure around alcohol and it's in our faces every single day as adults. I personally never like to drink because I didn't tolerate it well and I would get violently sick. I don't detoxify alcohol or metabolize alcohol well. It's been very easy for me to regulate that behavior.
If we're just talking straight genetics, yes, there are people at least in the APOE research that have the newer alleles, the two and if you're a three-three, which is the most common, they're more adapted to say, I have reaped the maybe cardiovascular benefit of a glass of wine or something. But I don't know if I buy into that because alcohol is so inflammatory. I can't think of an organ system that benefits from alcohol consumption. It's not good for your fertility, it's not good for your cognition, it's not good for your digestive tract. It's just all around just not great. It might be a little bit fun to take the edge off, if you've had a stressful day, but that's where I just invite people to find other coping mechanisms and maybe they need to get out for a walk, or take a nice hot bath, or learn to meditate, or call a friend.
Speaking of social life, it's like learn to be around your friends and really connect, because all the social interactions are about the people that you're with not about the food you're eating or the drinks that you're consuming. That's just an excuse to then just, “Oh, I'm so excited to go to this restaurant, so I can eat this food.” No, it's about who are you going to eat with, really.
Cynthia: I think that's an important point. I think for a lot of women in particular, when I'm working with women and they are weight loss resistant, one of the first conversations we have is, what's your relationship with alcohol? Because when you start talking about how your body prioritizes processing alcohol because it is a toxin first before everything else. It makes complete sense that alcohol blocks that oxidation. Let me be clear what this means. This means that your body is going to store fat. This means that if you're struggling with weight loss resistance, this may make it worse. The inflammation piece is pretty significant. I lived in a city for a long period of time and there was a very prevalent mommy drinking culture. In fact, I was part of a mom's group and it was evident to me, the meetings were always had during the week. Because I worked as an NP, I've always taken my sleep pretty seriously and I just always say, ”If I'm dealing with an emergency in the hospital, I don't want to be dealing with a hangover. That would not be a good combination as a healthcare professional.”
I was sometimes shocked at how much alcohol consumption went on during the week because you kept thinking, “This is weekday. What goes on the weekend?” People really blow off steam. I went to a high school reunion a few years ago, and a lot of women were talking very openly about how they were weight loss resistant, they're frustrated, and alcohol for me is oftentimes, the very first thing I'll suggest to people. Maybe, we need to reduce the amount of consumption, see how you feel, how your sleep goes, how your weight loss. For a lot of people, it's alcohol that will drive some pretty significant acute on top of chronic inflammation. It's an easy fruit to pick. It's an easy thing to say, “Let's pull this out. Let's eliminate it for a month and see how you feel.” More often than not people feel so much better, but it's such a socially accepted habit that it's-- Like you've said that we forget that when we get together with loved ones, it's really about the connection, it's really about investing in those relationships, it's really about relationship building. I'm starting to see more people in the keto space that don't drink. I initially felt a little uncomfortable. When I went to some events and then found out, I was one of many people that are not drinkers. That to me was very validating. I was like, “Okay, these are other health conscientious people.” It's nice to know, I don't have to explain myself. That's typically the situation I'm in. I have to explain why I don't drink alcohol. And again, no judgment, but--
Kristina: [chuckles] For your listeners, think about this. Alcohol, it goes in like a sugar, but then acts like a fat. It’s going through your liver, it's leaving behind fatty deposits in your liver, and leading to that cirrhosis or that fatty liver that you absolutely do not want.
Cynthia: Yeah, metabolic health is wealth and fatty liver is definitely a byproduct of nutritional choices and that includes alcohol, and processed carbs, and that was a conversation. If you have elevated triglycerides and a low HDL, elevated fasting insulin and glucose and blood pressure, guess what? You need to reexamine your relationship with alcohol. In fact, I'm doing a talk in July and my talk is called “Metabolic Health is Wealth.” There's too much focus on financial wealth and I remind people, you're going to get the biggest returns and how well you take care of your health for sure.
Kristina: Absolutely. Because then you can keep working or living your life. Yes, absolutely.
Cynthia: Do you have any thoughts on seed oils?
Kristina: Oh, yes.
Cynthia: [laughs]
Kristina: Well, let me tell you one thing. When people will say, “Oh, but it's so good for your heart,” it's interesting. The French cycling team who competes in the Tour de France are known for having some wine with lunch. But guess how much they have? One ounce.
Cynthia: Yeah.
Kristina: It's one ounce. Imagine taking a shot glass and pouring out one ounce of wine and then putting that in your glass. It's what a sip or two. That's just not what-- people can have entire bottles of wine. Then furthermore they say, okay because I work with a lot of middle-aged women as well. I'm 48 myself and all of which talking about has begun and they're saying, “Well, but in my 20s, I was this way and I was this way” and yeah, but you also weren't drinking the same way. You were definitely not even drinking this much in college. You're not consuming a bottle of wine every single night. In college, you would have been puking over the toilet, and you're also much more active, and you had a lot less stress. You hadn't had kids, all kinds of things. The hormones were in your favor. [laughs]
Cynthia: Yeah, now, we're in reverse puberty. It's very different.
Kristina: Yes, totally. Okay. Seed oils. Whoo. Well, I just love what Ben Azadi says about this, which he got from someone else which is that, seed oils are more toxic than smoking and will kill you faster than smoking. When I heard that because I knew they were bad, they're rancid, they oxidize in your body, they damage the lipid layer of your cells, but to hear that, that's really tangible that is going to shorten your life. I'm not here to live forever, but I'm here to really age gracefully, not just have lifespan but have health span. I want to add life to my years and I don't want my body breaking down on me. It seems like seed oils are just the fastest way to make your body deteriorate, fastest way to get wrinkles, it’s just fastest way to create cancer in your body. Yeah, do not consume canola, corn, soybean, sunflower seed. By the way, oat milk. You guys, oat milk, it's mostly sunflower seed oil. That is not a healthy plant-based alternative. Really, I was surprised. I was in North Carolina recently, I was looking, I was so curious, I was looking at the oat milk and I saw a brand that doesn't have sunflower seed oil. Well, that's good for the oat milk lovers if they were drinking this brand.
Cynthia: [laughs]
Kristina: I do not eat grains myself, but I also don't drink milk. I'll use almond or I love macadamia nut milk. That's my new favorite.
Cynthia: I'm obsessed with macadamia nuts to the point where I was always saying, I get up in the morning and I think about, “How can I consume an appropriate portion of macadamia nuts?” I think it's interesting. I think many people are not eating dairy and that's not per se a bad thing.
Kristina: I do eat a little bit of dairy.
Cynthia: I don't tolerate it.
Kristina: Okay.
Cynthia: I think there's this natural inclination that people are looking for alternatives and I remind them like the brand, Malk, M-A-L-K. They make clean nut milks. I try to limit the amount of nuts I eat because I tend to be more oxalate sensitive and ironically enough over the weekend, we had a pupil at her house and someone brought some crackers. And so, she was like, “Oh, these are gluten free crackers.” I was wondering later on my stomach was bothering me and I actually said to my husband, when I called to find out what crackers they were because I was like something's off. Well, they were an almond flour cracker and guess what they had in them, seed oils.
Kristina: Yeah.
Cynthia: I said, I don't know if it was the almonds plus the seed oils, but it was nut--
Kristina: Could be both.
Cynthia: I said, “So, it's a double whammy.” I think for each one of us finding healthier options like I tend to do coconut milk, I do much better with that. But just read food labels, that's a big thing. I think you can avoid seed oils if you are making your own food and reading food labels.
Kristina: Totally.
Cynthia: Those two things [crosstalk] can really limit your exposure to seed oils.
Kristina: I think there are just too many almond flour-based items in the low carb space that are getting consumed, and causing inflammation, and weight loss resistance as well. I think I made that mistake myself. I was like, “Oh, this is so nice keto treats” and you're not doing yourself any services by having a lot of that.
Cynthia: No, I agree. And so, for the benefit of listeners, what are some of the key lifestyle changes you, again, broad based? What are some of the key areas you'd like your patients to focus on? I would imagine, I probably know some of these very well myself, but I thought before we start talking a little bit about testing, I would love for you to touch on some of the high points that you think are really helpful for people to understand.
Kristina: One of the things that I say is good for almost everybody is stopping eating by 7 PM. Whether you're seriously glucose intolerant in the evening or not, it really just benefits your digestive tract to be done three to four hours before bed. Then I love the work of Dr. Panda and his fasting work. Yes, stop eating on the earlier side everybody. That's really good because you are just as soon as the Sun goes down, your systems are shutting down getting ready for sleep. Even if you're a super night owl and you go to bed at two. I get that question, too. But “Can I just eat until 11 PM, if I go to bed at two.” I'm like, “No, don't.” Because your metabolism is not working on full speed at that hour. Your body's getting ready to slow down.
Another thing that I have just about everybody do and this is really more for pH and blood sugar regulation is to wake up, have a big glass of water with a fresh lemon squeezed into it, and a couple capsules of apple cider vinegar, and they're welcome to maybe sweeten it with a few drops of stevia or they can add some electrolyte powder to that, but that concoction, I call it the morning cocktail. Studies have shown, it boosts your metabolic rate to just consume plain water even by 23%, first thing in the morning. Second, the apple cider vinegar is going to help just regulate your blood sugar. It's great for your stomach acid. And then lemon and apple cider vinegar are just really alkalizing and people can get very, very acidic. They're just really that pH balance gets a bit out of whack, especially if they tend to go more carnivore, and they're not eating as many vegetables, and they're not having fruits. So, plant foods are alkalizing and not the grains, though. [chuckles] Grains are not alkaline.
With stress causes acid in the body as well and sleep. Sleep is so important, right, Cynthia? It was just one hour of sleep deprivation makes you insulin resistant for the whole next day. I also recommend people walk every single day, whether you like to do SoulCycle, or CrossFit, or whatever, whatever sport thing you'd like to do. Walking though, we're deciding to walk. Waking is good for all of us. Just be in motion and get out for a 45-minute walk, get some fresh air, get some vitamin D, clear your head. That's when I like to listen to podcasts.
Cynthia: Yep.
Kristina: That’s my podcast time.
Cynthia: No, it's interesting. I was saying to someone the other day that it used to be just about that hour in the gym, whatever I was lifting or I was doing a tough conditioning class. But now, I focus on strength training, of course, but also flexibility work. Then day to day, I walk anywhere from 10,000 to 15,000 steps a day.
Kristina: Love it.
Cynthia: Not to mention the benefit of being more insulin sensitive because it's just important to be physically active. I had surgery on my hip at the beginning of May and so for me a lot of what I've been doing the last five weeks is a lot of standing because it's more comfortable than sitting. What that's really taught me is I was like, “Oh, my gosh, I’ve set up like a little mini office in my kitchen,” because we have a massive osland and I was like, “I actually don't mind being on my computer and just standing.” I spend most of my day standing when I'm working-
Kristina: It’s great.
Cynthia: -as opposed to sitting when I podcast because I feel it allows me to just be very focused. Now, for the benefit of listeners because they may not be familiar with some of the testing that you you've been alluding to, what are some of the more common tests that you're utilizing with your clients? Obviously, we will include links, so, if people want to work directly with you, but I know OATs testing and some of the genetic testing.
Kristina: I do.
Cynthia: What are some of the things you’re really focusing on?
Kristina: It’s funny. I even have some of the kids right here and in my office.
Cynthia: Love it.
Kristina: Yeah. This is a urine test and I like to do organic acid testing. What is that? It's a test of your metabolism, if you will, the byproducts of your metabolism, the metabolites that are excreted out of your urine. Whether it's your serotonin, breakdown your dopamine and the ratio there, the byproducts of even the bacteria and the yeast in the gut, the Krebs cycle, the beta-oxidation cycle, all the byproducts of that.
Cynthia: I’d be scared, [unintelligible [00:53:20] science classes in the past.
Kristina: I'm sure you have some nerdy people listening out there.
Cynthia: [laughs]
Kristina: It's just all those byproducts of different aspects of your metabolism. And so, that paints a really interesting picture, but it's a snapshot of the moment. Genetic testing is genetic testing. It is a one and done. You do it once. I use a test called the nutrition genome and there are many good tests out there. 3X4 is an excellent company. Yeah, genetic testing you do once and it's really fun to look at that with an organic acids test, because that's really metabolomics, a totally different omics area. You could, let's say, you have digestive issues, you could also look at that in conjunction with your microbiome. I do a test with Ixcela that tests your microbiome. You can do stool testing and then, of course bloodwork. If you're say insulin resistant, you want to be looking at fasting insulin, and A1c, and C peptide, maybe some other interesting markers there, and basic blood work, of course. But those are my top favorites. There's a lot you can do. I do heavy metals, hair testing, I love that, too. I got into mold and mycotoxin testing in the past. I would say, three years, because I had some tough cases. People with really tough skin issues, they were very itchy, they would break out in hives, and so, of course, start with food, anti-inflammatory diet.
With one person, we had to go down to three different foods that she could eat and then started to reintroduce things. But interestingly, with molds and mycotoxins, which are so present in food and we are not talking about black molds. We're talking about all these so many thousands of species of different molds that are in our world. It could be in the coffee that you're drinking, it could be if you are eating stored foods, beans, corn, grains, these dried foods, they get moldy, melons are very moldy fruit. Peanuts, super moldy. If you are a tough, tough case, [chuckles] if you have turned over every stone, and you are supremely fatigued, and you have pain all over your body or you're very, very itchy, I would encourage you to do a mold and mycotoxin test. I was shocked to go through this mold and mycotoxin conference led by Great Plains Lab, where one of the presenters talked about his dog. The dog was on its deathbed it seemed, and he had the presence of mind to run a urine test on his own dog, and the dog was testing super high for molds and turned out it was the kibble. Kibble, even if it's grain free kibble, it’s stored dried food and store dry food is moldy.
I worked with a woman who, she thought it was her thyroid. She had her thyroid medication dialed in. She lost 25 pounds doing low carb. That was great, but she was so fatigued. She couldn't work out and she has these almost Olympian kids, we did her genetics, she has all the Olympian genes, I'm like, “You should be working out. Your body's going to respond.” She said, “I just don't have the energy.” Finally, I said, “Let's do a mold and mycotoxin test on you.” Yup, off the charts and then she had her home tested. She lives on some wetlands and we're in New England, and it's very humid here, and her home, it wasn't black mold, but it was-- Yeah, she had an expert come in, she started running some dehumidifiers and things, and that really helped her a lot with her energy. But yeah, mold is an interesting, whole fascinating topic that people can specialize in.
Cynthia: Yeah, it's really interesting. I interviewed Dr. Aaron Hartman, who's a recognized mycotoxin expert. He talked a lot about mold and how 25% of the population is more genetically susceptible to mold. I happen to be one of them. Then the interrelationship with chronic inflammatory response syndrome and so, it's like this massive bucket. It's not just the mold, it's all these other things that you just really become much more sensitive to. I think this is just the tip of the iceberg. There's so much that's there and I happen to live in a very, very humid southern city. I didn't believe it. We’d lived in Washington, DC for almost 20 years and I was like, “It's two and a half hours south. How much more humid could it be?” Well, it is [laughs] very humid. Here, they don't have a lot of basements. We actually have crawl spaces. And so, one of the fun things we get to do this summer is encapsulate our crawlspace because we don't want the humidity to be coming up into the floor. Anyway, it's a whole separate, massively ridiculously expensive under-- but ultimately, one thing that we need to do for everyone's safety. Now, I want to be respectful of your time. So, let's talk a little bit again about Keto Symposium and then let my listeners know how to connect with you, if they want to work with you, if they want to do this specific testing, how to reach out to you?
Kristina: Wonderful. Keto Symposium is taking place in Manhattan, September 23th and 24th. The website is ketosymposium.com and tickets are on sale now. We have an amazing lineup of speakers. Right now, we're running a promotion for which Cynthia can put the code up. It's KETO10 for 10% off the tickets. The space only fits 200 people. 88 people have registered already from the prior years that we didn't have it. We're really looking at a hundred and say 15 seats approximately. The space is limited. Guys, so, take advantage if you want to come, sign up soon. Then if you want to get in touch with me, go to theketonutritionist.com. If you want to order the nutrition genome, you can go into the shop and order it there and then book a consultation with me through my website.
Cynthia: Awesome. Well, obviously, go get your tickets. It's in a great city. My husband and I will be going. I'm super excited to be able to see you again, as well as many of our colleagues and peers. I will be taking advantage of having Kristina take a look at my epigenetics, so that she can help me fine tune what I'm already doing. But thank you again for your time. It's always a pleasure to connect with you.
Kristina: It's been wonderful to be on your show. Thank you so much, Cynthia.
Cynthia: If you love this podcast episode, please leave a rating, and review, subscribe, and tell a friend.
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