Hello, ladies and gents Roberts. Exclusive s.com to they have special guest, dr. Chris Palmer On the Line, dr. Chris Palmer is a Harvard psychiatrist and he just finished writing a book called brain energy, where he Dives deep into looking at neurological disorders. As a result of metabolic dysfunction, this is something that I'm very passionate about something that I've probably all of us have dealt with in some form or fashion.
Family members having dealt with depression schizophrenia OCD just mood disorder. Orders linked to metabolic dysfunction. So we Dove deep into his theories behind. What the cause of this is, what are some possible solutions. What lifestyle factors we can incorporate to mitigate this risk? I thoroughly enjoy the conversation. I've got a ton of respect for dr. Palmer and I learned a ton. So without further Ado, sit back relax and do the podcast with dr. Chris Palmer. And we are live, dr.
Chris Palmer. How are you, sir? I am. Well, how are you? I am doing wonderfully. Well, myself cannot complain. I have, I met you at the Hard to Kill Summit, that Jamie Seaman hosted, and I absolutely loved your presentation. I love to kind of dive deeper into. I'm assuming your new book is kind of a deeper dive into many of the topics that you were touching during the presentation, correct? In some ways. Yes. And in some ways, even bigger some ways, even if in some ways even bigger.
So this yeah, I know the book is kind of it looks at all of the science that has been accumulated in the mental health field for the past 100 years and tries to put put it together in one coherent way. And at the end of the day, the conclusion that I have come to that I think Think the science clearly leads to did actually mental disorders.
Are metabolic disorders of the brain and that leads to entirely new ways to understand Mental Illness, but it also leads to entirely new ways to treat it. When did that shift in? I mean, is that pretty well agreed upon accepting within your sphere of influence? Or is there a lot of controversy around that belief? Oh, there's going to be so much controversy of, but, but as I said, but the research connecting it. Well, let me, let me take a step
back. So, right now, if you ask any leading psychiatrists or neuroscientist, what causes mental illness, They're going to kind of shrug their shoulders and say, you know what, that's a really great question. And it's complicated and no one knows for sure.
And what they'll say is that, but we do know risk factors, and they lump into biological psychological and social risk factors or factors involved and that includes things like genetics or, you know, neurotransmitters hormones inflammation but also Logical and social things. Trauma stress, but if you ask them, well how do all those things fit together? And how exactly do they lead to mental illness? The prevailing answer right now
is that no one knows. And that is one of the reasons why we struggle so much in the mental health field, is because right now, nobody can say for sure what a mental illness is or what causes it, and more importantly, although we have many treatments to offer people. The hard reality is that they don't work or at least not fully and durably for the majority of
people. And so, you know, for people suffering from schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, you all know or if you know anybody with those disorders, you already know. Yeah, our current treatments are definitely falling short for those people. But even with bread and butter depression. The majority of people who get treatment for depression, do not get all the way better and stay all the way better over time.
So to give you an example, one study followed people with depression for 12 years and looked at well how exactly how many of them are getting all the way better and staying all the way better. And what that study found was that only 10% of the people getting treatment for depression, we're getting all the way better and staying
better. So what that mean, what that means is that people have to switch medications, they have to up their medications, they have to add Psychotherapy or other treatments because the depression keeps coming back out. And I feel like correct me if I'm wrong here but I feel like up to now or maybe largely now as well. People have placed this massive separation between the brain and the body like people.
When they look at this orders physical, you know, implications that they look at the body, they look at things from it, you know, the neck down in the neck up, like, they don't like to think of things in them being interconnected. I feel like that's kind of the general consensus. Like, people don't often times see them as being, you know. Directly correlated and connected when it comes to proper brain, health and function or a logical function and everything going on south of the neck.
That is absolutely true. And, you know, I in many ways, it kind of made sense, we know that mental illness is a neurological illnesses, largely reside in the brain. So it kind of makes sense that researchers would focus on the brain and try to figure out what the hell's going on there. What like, what is, what is going on with the brain? And why is it malfunctioning And I think one of the biggest complications in our field is that the brain is such a
complicated organ. Hmm. And and the reality is we don't even we barely know the basics about how it actually functions how neurons function and all the support cells. We are, we are only beginning to understand how the brain functions. And and I think that's part of the complication is that researchers have assumed well in order to solve the puzzle of
mental illness. We first have to figure out exactly and precisely how the brain works and once we do that, then we'll be able to figure out what's wrong. And the reality is we are probably hundreds of years away from actually knowing everything that we would need to know under
that model. But the really great news is that when you do an assessment of all of the research that's been done, You actually start to see precisely what you were talking about, it way these disorders that we usually think of as body disorders like heart attacks or diabetes. Those disorders actually have strong relationships and people with mental illness and they end up being bi-directional
relationships. And what that means is that, if I look at a group of people with heart attacks, they're much more likely to develop symptoms of mental illness, like depression. For instance, everybody look at a group of people with depression, they're more likely to have heart attacks.
Same goes for diabetes, same goes for strokes, same goes for obesity, actually, just obesity, plain old obesity, people who are obese, are more likely to develop a mental disorder and people with mental disorders, are more likely to become obese.
and when we let you know that those were some of the clues that I started to pursue when I was trying to better understand mental illness and what might be causing it And when you do a deep dive into all of those disorders, there's actually only one way to connect them all and in some ways, I would call it two ways. So the overarching way is, they are all metabolic disorders. But if people ask like well what
does that mean? But it really means is that there are problems in the way mitochondria function in cells. Gotcha, I'm assuming that correlation has always existed but it's only been here recently that people like yourself have been connecting those dots and looking at it from that angle. I mean, what has been the angle that that people have taken up? To this point, just simply separating the two and looking at all the neurological disorders and entity in and of
itself. Well. You know, I think a lot of researchers and certainly the overwhelming majority of clinicians. Either shrug their shoulders and say no one knows it's all complicated. Some researchers have their particular passions like it's psychological or you know, it's due to upbringing and Trauma in childhood or is due to, you know, a specific hormonal imbalance.
There are there psychiatrist who specializes in women's mental health and they're focused on preventing and progesterone and the roles they play in mental illness. But I think all of those specialists. I understand that. Well, I'm just focused on one aspect of mental health but I know that what I'm doing doesn't apply to everybody with a mental disorder. There have been researchers, you know, I would not have been able to write the book that I wrote without all of this pioneering
research by other people. So, so in many ways I'm just kind of standing up on their shoulders and putting it together in a unique way that I think actually puts it all together in a logical coherent and rational way But other researchers have definitely, you know, have definitely said that mental disorders are related to metabolic problems and or mitochondria and interestingly that research goes back over 80
years. So in the 1940s, we had research showing that people with bipolar disorder and schizophrenia are more likely to have signs of insulin resistance. And there are more likely to have problems or abnormalities in lactate metabolism. And so, for any people who are really into the science of metabolic problems, you know that those are kind of Hallmarks of metabolic problems, both
lactate and insulin resistance. And again, that research goes back to the 1940s by, by the time we the 1990s rolled around researchers were doing all these brain scans on people with mental illness. And most people have heard of these scans, they include things like functional, MRI are pet, scans are spect scans. All these other scams guess with all of those cans are measuring their all measuring brain
metabolism. And so, those researchers are going to hear my theory at first glance and say, well, duh, Chris Paul are we've known that for decades like everybody's known that the brains of people with mental illness, are kind of metabolically different, but I don't think they necessarily recognize that those metabolic differences are actually the root cause of the mental illness. I think that they saw them as just side effects of whatever
was causing the mental illness. So there's some unknown factor causing mental illness and it is just contributing to these metabolic differences. What I am arguing Is that the metabolic differences are? In fact the core problem, they are the root problem of mental illness. And it's, it's actually not nearly as complicated to figure out. Once you, once you see the big picture, like once you see the forest from the trees is actually not nearly as complicated.
As I think many researchers have assumed. It would be. Yeah. I feel like, you know, looking at it, through the lens of it being in a metabolic issue, makes a lot of sense. I read Sam apples book ravenous had him on the podcast. We're diving into Otto Warburg and his metabolic. Research on cancer cell growth Warburg effect.
And he was under the impression that a lot of This research on, you know, cancer being a metabolic disease was, was kind of put on, hold to some degree because of all the compelling research and just excitement towards genetics in like the Human Genome Project. When all that started becoming Paramount, I would imagine something similar has happened with regard to looking at these neurological disorders and people kind of sidestepping, it being a metabolic dysfunction
Can't more so from a genetic and epigenetic standpoint as well. Absolutely 100%. So, you know, and and again once again, there's good reason for that. So one of the things that we know with certainty is that many mental disorders run and family. So if both of your parents had schizophrenia, there's a much higher likelihood that you're also going to have schizophrenia. Same goes with bipolar disorder, or ADHD or A diagnosis. And so, for the most part, researchers assumed will, that
means it must be genetic. And so when we map the Human Genome Project, everybody assumed we were going to have me remember, Oculus things happening in the mental health field, because they were finally once and for all get to figure out exactly what genes are defective in all of these people and maybe we can use that basic science information to come up with more effective. Treatments. Maybe we could even prevent these disorders or even cure these disorders. It is the end of the day.
What they found? Is that there is no, there are no genes that confer any significant degrees of risk in the majority of people who have these disorders. Instead, there are thousands of genes, that confer tiny amounts of risk, usually less than one percent increased risk. And so thousands of genes that confer tiny amounts, Of risk. All much more importantly, is that there's no one gene for
anyone disorder not even one. So, we would assume that, you know, schizophrenia is different than bipolar disorder. So there must be schizophrenia genes and there must be different, bipolar jeans. But it turns out that's not true at all. That the genes that do exist, that confer risk confer risk for many psychiatric and often metabolic disorders. So one gene can confer risk for bipolar disorder but also schizophrenia and also depression and also alcoholism and also epilepsy, maybe even
obesity. The one Zine can confer risk for numerous different disorders and so the genetic information that we have make no mistake is invaluable because that research has been done and it's given us, clear answers, but the answers are not at all what we expected them to be. The answers are that mental disorders, even ones, like depression and schizophrenia are actually not so different from each other. After all.
And the answer largely is that genes don't explain most mental disorders in the overwhelming majority of people. Which if we if we use it as a segue to talk about looking through mental disorders, as a result of metabolic dysfunction, like, like pull the curtain back on. What? That entails exact like, I hear that and I feel like that is empowering because unlike, you know, your genetics, which you don't really have a direct hand in your kind of just what your parents gave you.
I feel like when you looked at to the lens with being a metabolic dysfunction, it's somewhat empowering because then you have much more control over your environmental factors. What you eat what. You're But the day-to-day, and that's going to have a pretty profound effect on whether or not these, these you're able to mitigate the adverse effects of these dysfunctions. 100%, I feel exactly the same way and That is
the thing. that has been shocking to me, and Because it is completely upended the way I think about mental disorders, even ones like, bipolar or schizophrenia. Hmm, But also ones like OCD are even PTSD or depression or anxiety that these disorders, represent the brain malfunctioning in a metabolic way. And what it means is that we can use metabolic strategies. Exactly like you described diet, exercise, but also things like sleep getting good sleep. Decreasing your stress.
When you're able to do that, those are all improving metabolism, or addressing metabolic problems. And I actually, genuinely believe that we can help the majority of Well probably not 100 percent of people, but I think we can definitely help more than fifty percent of the people who are currently diagnosed with a chronic mental
disorder. I think we can help them fully recover and even potentially get off all of their medications and be happy healthy productive citizens, human beings again. I wholeheartedly agree. If you're speaking with something like, what is your elevator pitch? So to speak. Like if you're talking with somebody that has been diagnosed with, you know, depression OCD schizophrenia and they are a lay person, that's not really. In the know when it comes to nutrition metabolism.
All of this stuff. Like how would you talk to that person to let them know that? Hey, look, this is likely a result of your lifestyle, factors your diet.
It's your your activities, how would you word that for them to, I guess give them like a Reader's Digest version of what's going on here, from molecular level and how they can be empowered to fix it. The simple version is that mental disorders are metabolic disorders and under the in order to understand what that means, you have to understand mitochondria. And mitochondria are influenced by numerous things. They are definitely influenced
by diet and exercise. They can also be influenced by trauma and stress. They can become dysfunctional through environmental toxins. They can even become dysfunctional through some prescription medications including some of the medications, some of the very men. Occations that we prescribe to people with psychiatric disorders and so you know, something like an environmental toxin. I want to just point out that's not necessarily anybody's fall
forgetting that. They probably didn't know they they may have done nothing, you know, there may have been nothing. They could have done to avoid exposure to that toxin But once that happens, then they can develop metabolic dysfunction. So, another clear example just to just to give you an example that kind of lets people completely off the hook from lifestyle.
We know that infections across the board infections are associated with higher rates of mental illness After The Infection, and this is particularly strong in children, but it, but it can start even with your mother when she was pregnant with you. If she got an infection with a virus or a bacteria that affects that child and leads to higher rates of mental illness in those children, Now, an infection is no one's fault. Nobody set out to do anything to
get an infection. For the most part, people can't help it, but that infection can take a toll on your metabolism.
once people understand the science of metabolism and mitochondria though and once you understand that's kind of complicated and I dumb it down in the BOK to I really try to make it understandable to as many people as possible but once you understand what the root of the problem is Then we can talk about Solutions and even if you have a metabolic problem because you got covid and now you have long covid which is resulting in symptoms of depression or brain fog as our mental symptoms.
So that person is going to say well, it's I wasn't eating a bad diet. The reason I have my symptoms is because I got an infection with probe it. I would say if you actually understand the detailed science, changing your diet and or changing your exercise routine and or paying attention to your sleep, or managing, your use of substances, can all play a role in your recovery.
So even if you were somebody who is relatively healthy metabolically and mentally speaking, and then you get covid and you have a horrible, severe case of it and it really beats you down, you can Bite your way out of that using metabolic and
lifestyle strategies. Now, obviously, as you hinted at or alluded to a lot of people are, in fact, developing metabolic problems because of their diets or because they aren't exercising, or because they aren't prioritizing an adequate amount of sleep or because they're over using a lot of drugs and alcohol or other things. And this solution is pretty obvious for those people. We need to clean up your diet. You need to start prioritizing sleep. You need to stop using all the
substances, all of that. Is there much consensus as to? What is the don't want to say optimal or ideal died? Because everybody's going to come at me from an individuality
standpoint. But is there a general consensus as to what diet is likely going to contribute to the least significant amount of metabolic dysfunction so right now I don't think there is a consensus on that and as you say we have to work with individuals and, you know, individuals have to be willing to do whatever diet we want to prescribe I think that, you know, one of the things that this Theory raises though is that we need a tremendous amount of research funding for diet for
dietary interventions for mental illnesses, the the diet that I have been most focused on. As a professional is, I've been using the ketogenic diet To help people and the reason I'm focused on the ketogenic diet. You know, I came across it just by chance. Random chance. Hmm. And, and the thing that set me actually on the path of all of this work was when I had a patient with schizophrenia use, the ketogenic diet just to try to lose some weight. And his symptoms.
Dramatically improved. His auditory hallucinations his delusions. Were dramatically reduced for
him. They didn't go completely away, but they were like 95 percent down I've seen many other patients subsequent to him, who did have chronic schizophrenia or chronic bipolar disorder who are now in full and complete remission on a ketogenic diet And it's not that I think everybody needs to be on a ketogenic diet, but I think the ketogenic diet has tremendous healing potential especially when it comes to metabolism in mitochondria. And and I have really seen some miraculous results.
We, you know, we do have five controlled trials underway, already of the ketogenic diet for serious mental illness. So, I'm particularly passionate and hopeful about the ketogenic diet, but I think that, for some people, like one kid that I described in the book, The only dietary intervention I did with him was actually to remove sugar during the school week and we also started using light therapy in the morning for him.
But those two things, light therapy in the morning and get rid of sugar during the school week. Those two things were enough to completely change the course of his life. Is school performance and his mental health And so, sometimes a fairly straightforward, simple
obvious intervention. Like let's get rid of all the sugar can work, but I think for other people, especially people who, you know, have schizophrenia or severe, bipolar disorder, I think those people are going to need probably more than just getting rid of sugar, they're probably going to need some kind of a ketogenic diet intervention, at least early on
What's interesting? I used to have, I used to suffer from just debilitating OCD like obsessive compulsive disorder, like Howard Hughes level shit and I adopt the ketogenic diets in 2015 and it has gone. I mean, it's definitely not nearly as rampant as it was back then and I still have some traits of OCD but I think it's kind of more habitual at this point more so than like, you know, Logical.
But like, just for me speaking and notably on that, I've noticed a tremendous positive Improvement after adopting. Can you drink diet with OCD specific at the time? I had no idea, they would possibly be interrelated. But I've noticed that personally, Yeah, you're and
you're not alone. I have several patients, who some of them actually had pretty crippling OCD and the ketogenic diet dramatically reduce their symptoms and with one or two of them as far as we can tell put their symptoms into remission. I you know, I'm happy to share a personally that I to I had OCD when I was a kid and it persisted into early adulthood and when I went on a ketogenic diet I definitely notice
significant benefits. And at this point, now, I really don't have any signs or symptoms of OCD. Like, I don't even have a twinge of it, like I can do that. Things that I would never have been able to do before terms of touching things that I might have considered dirty or contaminated or gross or whatever. Yeah, I I don't, I don't even have a hint of it anymore. Was that personal aspect of your life? One of the motivating factors for you pursuing this study.
You know, it's interesting because at that point in time. I was less concerned about the OCD I, so I, when I was in my 20s, I was diagnosed with metabolic syndrome and I so I had pre diabetes, high blood pressure, horrible triglycerides like through the roof over 300 and really low HDL cholesterol and I had a bit of a gut. So I pretty much had it all. And and I was doing a low fat diet and exercising regularly
I'd finished medical school. I was now doing residency and I was really doing my best to take care of myself. I was not a lazy slacker, I was not eating junk food, I was exercising, I was diligent about following this super low fat diet and those things were just not doing it for me. And and at some point I decided Added to try at that point.
It was called the Atkins diet, and I decided to try it in a last-ditch effort to try to, you know, before my doctor forced me on medications and you know, within three months my metabolic syndrome was gone. But the bigger thing that I noticed was Improvement in my mood and energy, you know, concentration and confidence and my sleep, like all of those things got Dramatically better. And You know, at that point, I didn't even really pair it with OCD.
I assumed these are all different disorders and they all have must have different causes but I didn't even pair it with the OCD. I was more focused on my mood and sleep and all of that. And but that was that experience actually, was the thing that set me on this calf. I, you know, I started recommending the diet to friends and family. They were a lot of them were
noticing these mood. Benefits and you know, mental benefits and then I started using it in patients with treatment-resistant depression and sure enough, I started seeing dramatic benefits and some of them but it was, it was that in it was that patient in 2016 who had schizoaffective disorder, who got dramatically better from it. That when, when I saw that, I could no longer kind of keep this quiet. Quiet because I was kind of on the down low with it. Like I'm a Harvard psychiatrist.
I can't be talking about a diet to treat mental illness. That sounds like a, you get fired for saying something like that. That's like, that's a quack for you. Yeah. And and as you know, and many others, know a lot of doctors and the low carb and keto Community have, in fact, been fired or threatened with being fired or lost their licenses and
I was well aware of that. I I want to be one of them, I was just like I'll just I'll just quietly help the patients in front of me and I don't need to make noise about this. It's just you know it's just depression but when I saw it work for schizophrenia, I was kind of like okay, this is way too important. This is this represents like a breakthrough in Takaya tree. Like I can't keep quiet about this because how many other people might benefit from it?
And and yeah. And then it just snowballed because is my first thing was like, wait, but this doesn't even make sense. Nobody's, even gonna believe this because you know, the keto diet is good for weight loss. A lot of people know that keto diets also good for type 2, diabetes. Keto diets getting study for Alzheimer's disease. Even and now I'm going to come out and say, it's good for depression and schizophrenia like that, that just sounds like snake oil.
There's no way in hell anybody's gonna believe that. So so I have it. Go on this deep dive of the science, try to figure out Are all of these disorders somehow connected. And if they are exactly how, like, how are they connected at the cellular level, and how can I explain this and understand this better? And what can it tell us about the cause of mental illness?
and, I think when I finally figured it all out, it was it really was Way Beyond anything that I had ever imagined I could do. It was way beyond anything I set out to do. Who is really just random chance that I made these observations over the you know over the last 20 years. And I kept kind of accumulating these observing. Like that's funny or that's unusual or wow, that's weird. And and then I finally just got to a point where I'm like I gotta put all this shit together
is just too important. Well it's so like when you're talking about anything neurological, it's just, it's just so much Nuance to it. And like, when I think of my personal space with OCD and yours to, it sounds like like when you look at what you're consuming on, what you're putting on your plate to eat every single day. It's hard to see how that could be the primary driver as to why you have this aversion to touching things with germs in
your case. Or for me, it was like my OCD kind of manifests itself in me having this fear of something bad happening to my loved ones. If I didn't do a certain thing for a certain number of repetitions, just weird stuff. Like people that are experiencing that are going to have a hard time seeing how, what they're consuming on a day-to-day basis is going to be the driving factor in those psychological thought. It's, you know. Absolutely, and well, and and here's the thing.
So this is one way, this is one area where I think I have a different perspective than maybe some other people in the low-carbon Quito community. So, a lot of, a lot of people would assume that if the ketogenic diet can effectively treat it, You know, in this case OCD then it must mean that what we were putting on our plate before was the cause of the OCD. And I think in some cases that might be true. But I actually firmly believe that infections.
Like we have an abundance of evidence over many many decades. Infections. Can cause OCD. And everybody assumes, well, that must be some autoimmune disorder or something going on, like, the infection is and there's even a class of OCD it's called and US related to streptococcal infections, where the thought it largely is. It's an autoimmune disorder to a bacterium and those antibodies start attacking the brain and cause OCD symptoms.
And you know, with other infections it might be the inflammation and so everybody's that's a big theory that everybody loves it brain inflammation. Brain inflammation is bad for you and it maybe it's causing these mental illnesses and what I'm here to say is, yeah, all of those things are true. And even if somebody's OCD is due to an infection, the ketogenic diet can be a really powerful treatment. And why do I say that? I say it based on Decades of Neuroscience literature that we
have in the epilepsy field. So it turns out that the ketogenic diet can affect neurotransmitter systems It reduces brain inflammation. It can stop chronic inflammatory or autoimmune diseases in some cases. I've talked to some people who have put autoimmune disorders, not they haven't cured them but they have dramatically reduced, the symptoms of autoimmune disorders when they're in ketosis. And when they get out of ketosis, the sometimes those autoimmune disorders, come right
back. But the ketogenic diet changes the gut microbiome, it changes, you know, gene expression, it does so many things. And so even if somebody developed a mental illness, Through a non dietary cause like trauma or an infection. Using a dietary strategy or I would say overall metabolic strategy can still be important and so an easy, another easy example of a metabolic treatment
would be exercised. So if so if somebody is relatively healthy, doesn't have really serious, metabolic problem doesn't really have a serious mental illness. And ends up developing a mental illness for any reason exercise can be a really powerful treatment. Now, I wouldn't say that the primary cause of that person's mental illness was the fact that they weren't exercising. Because there are plenty of people who don't exercise who don't have mental illnesses, right?
But once you develop that metabolic disturbance in your brain, you can use exercise as a powerful Intervention to correct, the metabolic problem that's occurring. And and I feel the same way about dietary strategies that you can use dietary strategies, to correct metabolic problems, even if a bad diet, wasn't the primary cause of your problem. And to be fair, you know, like you say, it may not have been the lack of exercise or the poor diet. That was the Catalyst for that mental disorder.
But if the infection for instance, was the lack of exercise and poor diet, likely didn't bode well in preventing. Our improving one's immune Health, to prevent that infection of take place in the first instance. Absolutely. I mean I think as a rule of thumb people who are following healthy diets. However, we wanted to find that and I would Define a healthy diet as a diet that confers Health.
Oh, it's if your diet puts you and I think it's now, the eight percent of the u.s. population that does not have a metabolic problem. Then whatever diet you're following. I'm going to say keep following it because clearly it's working for you. And if you're exercising, but as a rule of thumb people who are Health following healthy diets, people who are exercising regularly, they tend to be much more resilient to infections. They tend to be much more resilient to Major stressors or
traumas and life. It doesn't make them. Invincible, all of us are vulnerable. We're all living organisms. So that means we're all vulnerable. We're all going to die. So there's no, there's no immortality, there's no invincibility for anybody, no matter what you're doing. But but as a rule of thumb, if you're taking really good care of yourself, you are going to be more resilient. And that means, if you do get an infection, you're more likely to
bounce back. And we know this with certainty, with covid for ends, we have so much data, the people who are most vulnerable to experience it today. Dying from covid, Princeton. The number one group were the elderly, the older you are the more metabolically frail. You are. We know that. Then the second group with the highest mortality or people with
schizophrenia, really? Yeah and and then after them came, like people with metabolic disorders, obesity type 2 diabetes, Those people have much higher mortality rates as well. Now, again, this this isn't all or nothing. You could have schizophrenia and have gotten covid and maybe you fared just fine. And you could also be somebody who's really met a quote-unquote metabolically.
Healthy got a horrible case of covid, maybe your immune system just wasn't up to the challenge and it ravaged, your body. And you maybe some people may have died even though they were relatively healthy and I do know, one person in particular. I'm not going to name names but she was pretty vocal about it on social media that, you know, somebody who is following a very
healthy diet. Had been a, I think a professional athlete and got covid and really was set back from it. So you know, there's there are no absolutes. it's But you're right, as a rule of thumb, if you're taking good care of yourself, you are going to be more resilient and you're going to be less likely to have
illnesses. Now, I would imagine you're likely getting a lot of pushback from conventional, wetter mess, Western medicine and you know the pharmacology companies on this because it's going to put the power in the person's hands largely as opposed to the drug producers hands. I know like for me personally Personally I've got, I've had several family members, this hits home quite a bit for me.
I've had several family members that several but a handful that have struggled with severe depression and when they're in that state it's like it's strange that they're not in the nutrition space they don't think like you and I think they're just looking to fix the problem. They go to the doctor, the doctor tells them it's a hormonal balance imbalance in their brain and they are you know they push on this Cascade of different drugs, ssris to try and Fix this.
It seems to work for a week or two and they changed the formula. Is there any truth to this hormonal imbalance in these? These like I know what the cut when it comes to drugs, there's been some instances where it seems to make a positive Improvement, but often times more often than not, it seemed it doesn't really seem to move the needle forward. Any extensive Direction.
Yeah. So you know, the most prevalent theory for mental illness right now is the at this chemical imbalance Theory and the chemicals in that theory usually are referring to neurotransmitters. And so the cop, the common belief is that, you know, depression is due to a serotonin deficiency. And so, if you take a drug like Prozac or Zoloft or Paxil, then that'll boost your serotonin levels and that Make you feel better. And there are different neurotransmitters for different illnesses.
You know, norepinephrine, maybe for ADHD dopamine, you know, is that driver and addiction? But dopamine dysregulation is also a driver in schizophrenia and bipolar And for the most part, A lot of people still believe that you know there was a paper that came out you know earlier this year that largely refuted all of that but that paper wasn't new research.
That paper was a review, paper of research that has existed for 20 years and the author was simply kind of just putting it in everyone's face that you guys all you. People who are saying these, you know, depression is due to a chemical imbalance. It's not, we've got the evidence. We have tons of research on this and there is no chemical imbalance, it doesn't exist. Now. Just because the chemical imbalance doesn't exist, doesn't necessarily mean that ssris.
Don't were at least for some people. I think they do work for some people and I've seen them more and I really have seen them more. I don't say that. I don't say that lightly and I offer different explanations in brain energy. A about exactly how they're working. There's a lot of research that already exists that shows that some antidepressants actually can increase or enhance brain metabolism. And they are likely doing that through their effects on mitochondria.
And and so, although the explanation for why ssris might work was clearly wrong. It doesn't take away from the fact that ssris do work for some people. And I am not in any way trying to stand in the way of people's access to ssris if they are working for them. but as I shared with you earlier, Of all comers who get treatment for depression, only 10% get a sustained.
Remission of their depression. That means ssris are not working or 90% of the people, they can reduce symptoms but they're not putting the illness into remission and they don't last long term for the majority of people And you know people think that I'm being too pessimistic with that analysis like maybe you're one of the lucky people and you're on Prozac and it's working beautifully for you. And you're like, who the hell's is, Chris Palmer? Why is he being so negative?
the reality is that depression is now the leading cause of disability in the United States and on the planet There are no medical disorders that are more disabling or that disabled more people than plain old depression. And it's not that these people are not getting treatment. These people are getting plenty of treatment. They are trying till after pill. After pill, they are trying years or Decades of psychotherapy, they are trying
electroconvulsive therapy. They are trying transcranial magnetic stimulation, they're getting ketamine. Injections. Now they're all flocking to get psychedelics. And the reality is that they are disabled, they can't work. They can't function because their depression is so bad. We clearly need new ways to understand and treat mental illness. And you know Robert is you and I know the solution is easier than you all think. It's like it is within your
reach right now today. We don't have to wait 30 years for somebody to figure out a brand new treatment. That's going to come out on patent. We can do these things right now today. Yeah, 1000% agree with you. I have it's hard having these conversations people that don't I guess they just don't think
it's that easy like my cousin. For instance who hadn't played a bad prayer, she still has a really bad depression and he's, you know, trying these different ssris on a regular basis and you know, like when you stop and think about it, like 98 percent of the body's serotonin is producing the gut.
Like you gotta get your digestive health and nutrition dialed in in order to possibly hope to have you know, high functioning You know, chemical hormonal balance in the body and the Brain. But just simply laying that out there. Like, people don't want to hear that people that are in their Darkest Hour, simply want to reach for a bottle of pills to fix the solution because they
place that on so much emphasis. I don't know if it needs to be a shift in thinking on their part or just to shift in education. I don't really know what needs to happen. But when you look at it, like when you feel empowered in the sense of look, what I consumed, what my day-to-day activities are, you know, making sure I get quality sleep. Like, if you die All those things in and still nothing's working. Then yeah.
Maybe look towards the the, you know, antidepressants but it makes no sense in my brain to reach for antidepressants before. If you're following a terrible diet, you're not getting any sleep. You're drinking alcohol consuming drugs, recreational drugs, and you're just not doing the initial groundwork, 100% agree. And I think that I think that the next step that I am certainly going to be passionately pursuing is education. Because right now, people like him are being told it's chemical
imbalance in your brain buddy. You? Yeah exercise will be good if you if you if you want to be an athlete and sure you can change your diet if you need to lose a few pounds. But depression don't have anything to do with exercise or Diet. Depression is a chemical imbalance in your brain. It's neurotransmitters. Its serotonin. It's we know that we know that that we I'm a psychiatrist, I'm a neuroscientist. We know that with certainty.
And what I am here to say as a Harvard psychiatrist and neuroscientist is no, those people do not know that they are full of shit. Yeah, and we need to call the bullshit. and, The reality again, this isn't this is not an ego battle as far as I'm concerned. Millions of lives are ruined and devastated because people are not being given accurate information and we need to give people accurate scientific information.
We need to let people know, you know, all these pills you're taking, they actually are not working for the overwhelming. I mean majority of people who are taking them so let's call bullshit on our treatments and let's get real and talk about real solutions. And the reality is you know one of the biggest challenges is exactly what you brought up. Well how are you going to get a depressed person to do a diet? How are you going to get a schizophrenic to go exercise?
They're all, they don't have any energy there, so pessimistic there. Unmotivated they can barely drag themselves out of bed. How are you going to get them to do any of this? And what I am here to tell everyone is that I can get them to do this?
If you give them accurate information, if you can be patient with them, if you can encourage them and motivate them and give them strategies and not give up on them if they fall off the wagon in the first week or two because everybody does so just get over it. Yep. They're going to fall off the wagon. That's okay. We all make mistakes veins. In your whole diet is a hard thing to do.
So we got to be tolerant and patient people, but I am getting them to do it and how do I do that or why are they doing it? Because the real answer is, they are desperate to get better. They will do anything, they will but they need to be given accurate effective information and they need somebody to be patient and tolerant with them and help them through it. And I think when we do that, they will rise to the occasion,
they will. But bus their asses, they will bend over backwards to do what whatever they can do. Because the people that I work with want nothing, more than just to be normal, they just want to be normal and live normal lives. Yeah, I think that's that's beautiful man. I feel like if you are motivated by like if you're in the depths of hell and your mind and every single day is Darkness, then you will literally do whatever it
takes to overcome that. So if if they believe that their diet and their their exercise or activity can have a profound effect, they're much more inclined to actually do it as opposed to a doctor saying, that's not likely going to make a difference at all. Just take this pill. Going to be your shortest route of travel to fixing the
situation. I feel like if you flip the script on that like you are then like if they see if they're able to connect the dots to understand that this is going to have a direct impact on their ability to recover, they'll have all the motivation the world needed to make it you know, have it. Yes, and I want to empower clinicians to. I want clinicians to start offering these treatments to people I want clinicians to start giving people honest and accurate information.
Scientific information Because right now you're right. If your cousin goes to his psychiatrist and says hey my cousin, Robert said that, if I go on a diet it might help my depression, the psychiatrist, get a laugh and say your cousin. Robert sounds like quack is he is he is psychiatrist? Is he a medical professional? No. Well, then who the hell is he beyond the professional here? I'm the one who Who knows what I'm talking about?
You got a chemical imbalance and you need a chemical to fix it. and so we have to change the conversation but that conversation needs to go through out the mental health profession and You know I know some people listening might think that Chris
Palmer sounds pretty radical. He's a he's a fat he's like a rebel Maverick. Whatever reality is I am a Harvard Medical School psychiatrist assistant professor of psychiatry I'm currently the director of the Department of postgraduate and continuing education at what is now. Ranked the number one Psychiatric Hospital in the United States. And at least so far, I have the support of my Institution. In what I am doing.
I have endorsements from major leading psychiatrists neuroscientists and other Physicians for this book or this Theory, This is not quackery. This is simply putting the science together. And the shocking thing is that, yes, diet, exercise, other lifestyle strategies can sometimes result in miraculous Improvement in people with serious, crippling brain disorders. And this is going to require a sea change, like an entire transformation in the mental health field.
And so one of the while I'm on this bandwagon, I'm just going to go ahead and put in my plug if I can before man. I want your help if you are listening. And you know people who are suffering or if you yourself are suffering and you know that we need to change. We need a better way. I want you to join us. We I am working with a lot of other people. Now we want to start a Grassroots movement. And so I'm going to encourage people to go to brain energy.com, brain energy.com you go there.
I am hoping that that is going to be the landing base. Someday soon for a Grassroots mental health movement and we want we want to educate clinicians and patients and family members. We want to let them know that there is hope that you do not have a chronic lifelong disorder, more than likely that there is hope for you healing, and we can use strategies like diet and other lifestyle strategies right now to help you heal. But I want research, I'm an academic.
I understand that. People are going to want to see research studies and they're going to want to see this validated and clinical trials. I'm not I'm not standing in the way of that. Yeah so let's get research funding for it. I want insurance companies to start covering this I want insurance companies, start covering, not only a psychiatrist or a psychotherapist, the maybe personal trainer, or a physical therapist, or a dietitian, or a health and wellness coach.
Those are the people who are really going to put help with these illnesses into remission and insurance company, should be paying for it and in case you think, well, that's get a bankrupt. The system, dr. Palmer know it. Aim that is going to save the system, billions of dollars because those interventions over the course of one year are so much cheaper than putting people on pill, after pill, after pill, or pills and pills all the same time for the rest of their lives.
Doing those interventions for one year is a lot cheaper than paying people disability payments from all of our taxpayer dollars and these are people who want to work, they can't work. Their brains aren't functioning properly. If we can get their brains functioning properly, through these kind of strategies, we cannot only relieve their suffering, which is my primary goal is a psychiatrist. We can get them off disability,
we can get them back to work. And now we've taken somebody who is a burden to the system and now they will be attacks aimed, revenue-producing Citizen and what's not to love about all of it. Yeah, no, I'm in complete agreement. I mean, when I, when I heard you speak, when I saw you speak it hard to kill some. Like I could tell you were incredibly passionate about this topic and I never heard somebody speak on this from the Angela.
Brought the table. I feel like this is 100% the message that needs to be put out there. I love the angle that you're taking with it. You've got the credentials to mcenamey. People need to be here in exactly what you're saying and I want it to be a Grassroots movement.
I want it to be, you know, gaining the momentum that it should be because I feel like I'm in the day if people buy into this message, if they started cooperating this in their day-to-day life, I mean everything will improve like nothing you're saying is because you're, you know, vested in some, you know, patent for some SSRI on Table I call. This is just simply good quality information eating, right?
Have the right activity, you know, improving your body from the inside out as it. Always has been up to this point and should be going forward and I feel like if people buy into that, then everybody wins. Absolutely. Yeah and I forgot to mention but yeah at the same time we're doing these treatments for mental illness, guess what? We're also going to be reducing obesity.
We're also going to be reducing or preventing type 2 diabetes or going to be preventing heart attacks and strokes and Alzheimer s disease and because all of those things are interconnected and I go through the science of that if that sounds too like to incredible. Unbelievable. I go through the hard science of all of that. How all of the mental disorders are interconnected with all of those other things, obesity diabetes, heart attacks, and
even Alzheimer's disease. And and so if we get people healthier Then it's going to save the system so much money, but it's going to save so much human suffering. It's going to reduce so much human suffering. And I think as everyone knows when you look around the world today, the health and wellness of the population of the world is going down the tubes bass and we need radical changes and new
strategies. And the reason I'm calling for a Grassroots movement is because There are powerful forces that will not want these changes, so there are companies that are making billions of dollars off of the current model. I'm not here to say those are evil people. I'm just here to say that those are people making billions of dollars off the current model. If I were them, I wouldn't want it to change. I would like being a
billionaire. Why would I want some Chris Palmer guy coming along taken away? My billion dollars. I wouldn't like that. So, I would probably fight it. I would probably say, hey, no. This this ain't right. We can't we can't be changed and hold on here, folks. Let's just stick with the current plan. An because they've invested lots of money and time and they got a good thing going that doesn't make him evil. But it doesn't make him right? Yeah. And it doesn't end.
Does mean we should keep doing it because what we're doing ain't working and we got to do better, we've just got to do better. Well you 100% in my vote of confidence. I mean anything I could ever help do to spread the word. I mean, Count Me In and I'm super excited about your book. I'm excited to hear you. Continue to speak and spread this message. I'm going to be spreading it sounded from rooftops myself because I feel like this is, this is what the population
needs to hear right now. Thank you, Robert. Hi I appreciate. We're going to need all the help we can get. So we will take your, your voice, your platform, all of your energy and whatever you can do to help, we will take it. Well we will definitely have to have you back on the Pike as any point. You got an open invitation for sure. This, this is going to be great for the launch the book, those brain energy.com you said, right?
Yes, brain energy.com, perfect. And do you have a social profile as well? People can follow you on. I do so all my socials will be actually on brain energy out cam you can, I've got a separate website, Chris Palmer and d.com. That has some of the more specific research that I've been doing with ketogenic diet and other stuff. So if you want to check out more, Chris Palmer, specific things, you can go to that website and all my socials are there so you can follow me on Twitter.
Instagram, Facebook On. But yeah. Now, I am really excited and passionate about this. And the great news is that. A lot of people a lot of other people are too. Yeah. Other people that I'm talking to you are just as excited and passionate as you are because they look around and they see how the system is just fail. And so many people and we just gotta change something. Well I truly truly appreciate your passion. I appreciate your enthusiasm.
I appreciate you taking the time to jump on this podcast and speak your mind on this. I feel like you know this this is this is an epidemic of a scale that we haven't even seen before and I feel like people need to be equipped the right information to make a difference to feel empowered.
And I feel like when people feel empowered, they have the confidence in themselves to make a change know that the changes they make and have a lasting impact on their health and well-being, mentally and physically the world as a whole will improve. And I think you are incredibly Well Suited deliver that message. So, keep doing what you're doing keep fighting this fight. Thank you Robert. Thank you very much sir, until next time and you have a wonderful wonderful day, dr.
Chris Palmer. All right. Thanks