Unbreakable Episode 23 - Denise Alvey

She's the nutritionist for Unbreakable. Denise Alve Welcome in, Denise. Hello, thanks for having me and the reason why I wanted Denisan Today you're saying nutrition, huh, Well, your gut is your second brain. So I didn't know how much what I was consuming, what I was eating was affecting what goes on between my ears. So I wanted to come on.

She has so much wisdom and knowledge to give us about what we eat and the inflammation that it causes, the anti inflammation that certain foods can actually help you with, could affect our brains and con affect our mental health. And so she has something for everybody for you know, people who can afford price, people who can't afford her price. So but I want to get into my journey. Okay,

which blew my mind. And I did a blood test, which is not a food allergy test, right, it's a food sensitivity test to determine what is affecting what's causing me inflammation? Right? And folks, I was blown away the things that were not just affecting me, but these were like killing me. Right. Were I'll tell you what for me it was bad for me? Was spinach, green apples, lemon. Wait, there's something else in there that would blow your mind. Spinach,

green apples, lemon, ginger, No, soy peanuts was was in there? Carrots? Right? These were killing me. They were causing me all sorts of inflammation. And it was also turned out they were causing me to have plaques, arriasis, sorrisis across my chest. It's coming on my head. I was taking an inject Doble and a pill to slow my psoriasis. Denise found out by this blood test what was causing me all its inflammation, and within thirty days my psoriasis is completely gone.

My body fat was choop like I just the size of my head shrank noticeably. And you think that if I told you I was going to go on a cleanse and just have green apples, spinach, carrots, and lemon. You think I be the healthiest guy in the world. Instead it was killing me. So to these chime in here. Yes, So when it comes to food sensitivities, there can be

a delay in a response. So you might be eating foods and feeling fine right now, but you might experience symptoms a couple of hours from now or a couple of days. So for you, if you're eating something like apples and not I do great with apples, but you might actually be releasing what are called chemical mediators towards apples. Just to break it down, because your body is protecting you, it's an immune response that is pro inflammatory, which then

over time causes symptoms. So that could be something that was causing the plaque, psoriasis, or even it could be bloating or headaches. In so many different ways that you wouldn't connect to food. When you first got me on and I was and I've done it twice now because I did with you, and then when I went to Thailand, I had to do it again. And but when I did it, I remember I was I was hosting Bella to R M M A and the producers came out and said, we don't know what you're doing, which the

clearest you've ever sounded. Yeah, it definitely can help brain fog, focus energy. It's fascinating. I felt like it was also making my vocal cords inflamed, yeah, inflammation, and getting me to slur. And I used to think I slurred a lot from getting hit the head so much, and it turned out it was more from this than getting my you know, my head beat in for all those years. So you know, again, give us and this is just for me, folks. It doesn't mean that green apples are

bad with your, spinach is bad with you. And there are things that, by the way, like lamb was great for me, right, there are things that were like you'd be like, what, how could this be red meat? Oh my gosh, no, And I know you try to get me off red meat. She also makes you when you do it, you can't drink for that month, no bread whatsoever, right, no deal whatsoever. So why is that? What are you

trying to do to my my whole system? So what we did is we tested a hundred and seventy different foods, chemicals, and flavor enhancers. So it could be anything from caffeine main foods such as you know, it could be chicken, salmon, and flavor enhancers all the way down to the nitty gritty of black pepper, garlic, rosemary, these things that you wouldn't think would cause an immune response, but they can.

So once we looked at that full profile of all the hundred and seventy items we tested, we get a report back that lets us know if you had an immune response to any of them, and that immune response is pro inflammatory, and then that's where symptoms over time

start to build up. Now, out of the hundred and seventy foods that we tested, we took all the foods that you had no immune response to, and you only ate those for the first couple of weeks almost a month, so we could calm down that inflammation start healing your system.

And then during that time we also keep out all the untested items because there's over forty thousand ingredients in a grocery store, so obviously we can't test all of those, so you're having only the low you know, non responsive foods, no untested items, no alcohol, which is inflammatory, so we have full control to calm down your system. Now when it comes to dairy, even individuals that may not come back sensitive to cow's milk or yogurt or any dairy products.

We still keep it out at the beginning because a lot of how is our grass fed but grain finished and in the grain could be corn, could be wheat, and other foods that you are sensitive to. So we get it down to that small detail. So we do have full controlled common inflammation that is food induced. How did you get involved in this in the first place. Well, I've I've been a dietitian now for almost eighteen years,

and I specialize in two areas. I am a certified specialist in sports dietetics, so I work with professional athletes, and I'm also a certified lifestyle, eating and performance therapist working with food sensitivities. Now, when I worked with athletes for fourteen years, some of these individuals have a great team. They have a personal chef, they have a dietitian, they have coaches, performance specialists, and I would notice that their

performance and their recovery wasn't where it should be. So I noticed, you know, if you're eating quote unquote perfectly and you have all these great team members helping you, and if you're not getting the results that you really should be. There was a piece that was missing, So that's when I went back and started researching food sensitivities to find that missing piece. Talk about your brain, yes, it absolutely does. Um there's also what's called a gut

brain access and that's a two way communication. So if we have inflammation and it's food induced. To any inflammation, really it can interrupt and cause disturbances between cell communication, nerve communication, and systems. All the communication gets out of whack and the brain might not be able to produce neurotransmitters, which are serotonin, dopamine GABA. Those are your feel good,

your your mood enhancing neurotransmitters. So if the inflammation is not allowing our brain to produce those neurotransmitters, it can affect our mood. But also if inflammation is present, it can break down the bacterial floor. Are the good bacteria in our gut, and that bacteria does produce serotonin itself up to the serotonin in your body is produced in your gut, and also that bacteria metabolizes it and directs

a certain amount to the brain. So if you don't have good amounts of healthy bacteria from inflammation being present, it can affect the amount of neurotransmitters that are released for people who don't have to, you know, use your your services, give us a you know a lot of things that can help us from gods that can just help the normal person absolutely. So first of all, cleaning

up the diet the best that we can. So we may not know the triggering pro inflammatory foods, but we want to make sure that we're increasing fiber through good whole grains, fruits, vegetables. We also want to make sure that we are decreasing sugars, decreasing unhealthy fats, and there are some supplements that can help with healing the intestinal track and also boosting different neural transmitters. So we could

bring in some probiotics the healthy bacteria. The fiber feeds those so that keeps them very healthy and producing what we need them to produce. And also we want to make sure that if we're experiencing a lot of GI distress, bloating, cramping, you know, any of those GI symptoms. We also want to make sure that we are hydrating that some supplements such as L glutamine that might help with the healing of the intestinal track. Bringing some of those items in

and It really depends on each person. I always make sure that there's no family history or any allergies that we would have to make sure to alter the protocol for the supplements. Where where does my good health affect my depression the most? Um Well, if you are eating foods that are inflammatory, so ones that we find out through the testing, or if we don't through the testing, we look at anti inflammatory foods and boosting those, so

it's gonna fluence your depression. If you're not eating well, then we're not able to have our systems functioning well. So your central nervous system isn't working well either, so that gut brain connection. Individuals with depression, it is very common that your brain might communicate to your gut that you're not hungry. You might lose your appetite others, so

you're losing nutrients that also fuel the brain. Now, individuals with anxiety, your brain might trigger the intestinal track to stimulate diarrhea because it just makes you feel angst and it can cause diarrhea. Now, again, calming down inflammation by eating good foods, hydrating, exercising, even good breathing techniques, it can boost all of this so that your mood can can go up. Is there any food because I'm talking about foods that seem like they're be great for people

that cause me inflammation? Are there any foods that are universally great for all of us? Yes? I mean there are a lot of foods such as avocado, eggs, salmon, pineapple, whole pumpkin seeds, Sesamese seeds. They have a good amount of L tyresin, which is actually an amino acid that can boost neurotransmitters. Okay, what about the supplements that all

of us supplements? Yeah, probiotics. Um, you have me on like a gut health regimen, yeah, and which would help me a lot because that you also, we found out that I had leaky gut. Yeah, leaky gut syndrome. Right, Yes, leaky gut is a lot of things can influence leaky gut. It's not a scientific term. It's more of a nickname for when you're intestinal lining becomes uh horace, so things can slip through into the blood and that triggers an

immune response as well. So when it comes to leaky gut, individuals can can have that due to genetics, can be due to a lot of antibiotic use as a child. Let's say chronic air infections are struck throat um. It also can be influenced by the foods that we eat and food that might be causing a pro inflammatory response. So what happens is partially digested food slips into the

blood stream and you have an immune response. Food should be fully digested all the way down to the small intestine, absorbed into the bloodstream and then we have nutrients for energy that will fuel your brain. Now for leaky gut, we have to definitely clean up our diet and some supplements that we gave you, um L glue tomine, We gave you vitamin D, probiotics, fish oils, and yours. We

look specifically I revived. Yeah, so that had that had multiple components in there that were the L glue tomine, especially that we're helping heal your gut, so that we didn't have things slipping through causing another immune response that's pro inflammatory. And when you first told me, I had it with the leaky gut and there's something else you

guys called it what was the other thing? Candida? Right, So with both of them, you're you and our friend Ja who helps me with my brain, helpful at all. So I was like, Hey, this is what's causing a lot of your system to be off, and that's causing you to overcompensate with a lot of your anxiety, with a lot of your depression. That your your systems off, starting in your gut to everything else is going to

be off as a result. Yes, So candida is yeast, so a yeast over growth um in your intestinal track, and that's just showing there's dyspiosis, meaning an imbalance of bacteria yeast. And again the bacteria is helping us and helping our brain. So if we have bad guys coming in,

it's suppressing the good guys. And you've been working on something else requently also kind of the other day you're like, oh, I want to give me another week because I'm learning about something else new because it's it's kind of yes, so it's very new when it comes to research, So I'm not gonna go to in depth. But they are looking at something called leaky brain where chemicals are actually going through the blood brain barrier, which is causing disruptions

in the brain as well. No, I want you to get more specific than the how do you know this? Like, how do we we don't know. It's you know, it's all about it's all about calming down the system. So right now they don't know exactly how this might be happening, and that's where the research is new. So if chemicals are going into the brain where there should be a

barrier that that should not be happening. If chemicals are going into the brain, it's causing disruptions and that goes back to the brain in the central nervous system, communicating to all systems of the body, and that can affect depression, anxiety, and other mental health conditions. Before I let you go, give me if you give me some examples of like the biggest transformations you've seen by people just figuring out what was causing them inflammation and taking it out. Absolutely,

there's such a variety. It could be individuals that have been experiencing extreme stomach pain and in intestinal pain since they were little and now they're in their thirties and forties, only a few weeks on the program of calming down the system, it is gone. The pain is actually gone. They've been going to doctors for years and years and years,

so that gastro intestinal pain goes down. Other individuals that experienced severe migraines um getting a couple of them per month, and they could last a week, so they're debilitated there in bed in the dark. The migraines almost completely go away by calming down that inflammation. But some of the ones that were the most interesting to me, the most actually,

I have an individual who had a bump on his leg. Okay, he came to me for gastro intestinal distress, but he did tell me I have this random bump on my leg and I went to the dermatologist and she said, it's benign, will track it, don't worry about it. We're not sure what it is. After two weeks on the program, it was gone, and it had been there for two and a half years. That was the one that really blew me away. So a pocket of inflammation, like what

is that? It's inflammation and the tissue. The dermatologists that I have no idea how this program made that go away, but keep doing what you're doing. And a couple others that were really eye opening to me. I worked with someone who had restless leg syndrome and one of the chemicals that we tested was sorbic acid. So the another name for that in foods is sorbital. Have you seen sorbital. It's a sugar alcohol. You even have it in let's say, toothpaste to make it sweeter, but it's not sugar. You

find it in a lot of different supplements. You find it in different products. If it's protein, powders um process products. And she was taking a vitamin C pack in the morning to boost her immune system. And she's seventy five years old. She's been taking this for years. And she looked at it and she said, oh my goodness, it has sorbital, and I am highly responsive on the food sensitivity test to sorbital. She took it out and her

restless leg syndrome completely calmed down. She's able to sleep again. So little things like that, tiny changes, you know, the big getting as you know, the program is hard at first, but we transition it into a lifestyle. So that one really stood out to me. And I'll give you one more.

I have a seventy eight year old client client and I have I work with one year old up to seventy eight right now, and the seventy eight year old client has been having a lot of dental work done and he's been going in every few months, and he went in last month and the dental hygiena said, what have you been doing differently the inflammation in your gums. They're not bleeding, they're not swollen. What have you been doing?

And he said, the only thing that I've done is this program to identify foods that were causing inflammation in my body. It really is. I mean, I could go on and on. I'm fascinated by it. It's It's completely changed how I've looked at nutrition. Again, I've almost been a dietitian for twenty years and this has It's been life changing for so many So it's something that I'm so passionate about because I I take off of helping people. I want to personally thank you. And that's why I'm

having you on here, because he changed my life. Man certainly helped me. And I look, I fell off the wagon halfway through the football season because that's just just

happens during football. But I'm going back to Thailand the day after the shoot ball, getting back on exactly, back on your regiment and anything, hoping to make that more of a lifestyle change for me when I come back from Thailand and not in the middle of the season, and I've already seen how much it's It's helped me again between the years, its depression, anxiety, the brain fog by vocal cords. I ute to be real raspy, and all of a sudden now I'm not as raspy because

of this. The psoriasis all gone. So if anybody wants to sign up your program to have Denise tell people how to get in touch with you. Yeah, I mean well, you can reach out to me via email It's Denise at end as a Nancy p is and Paul and as a Nancy three six five dot com, or give

me a call at seven to eight nine six seven seven. Denise, I appreciate you so much, and again for everybody out there, I'm gonna bring whatever right hand to the table to help us in any way with what's going on between our ears, and again, our our gut is our second brain. So Denise, thank you so much for walking. Let's walk together. You're very welcome. Thank you for having me on