Get everybody Sam here. I know I'm here to inspire you, motivate you. Oh I'm so tired. China is just the most uninspiring, crappy thing to say to you all. I'm just being honest, just sharing modesty. I feel like I'm limping to the finish line of twenty twenty three, but we're going to get there, and we're going to get there strong. It's just been a massive few weeks with everything that has been going on, the launch of my new protein brand, twenty eight Go, which is now Woolly's
across the nation. I'm going to give it a plug. Yes I am, and yeah, kids and end of year and Evey finishing school and so much going on. But it's it's been a brilliant twenty twenty three in really excited about what the future holds, and really excited about today's episode because we have an old friend of mine who is just a bundle of joy, a barrel of laughs, and she's going to talk about a really important topic that is probably the big issue globally when it comes
to nutrition. So I'll give you a little teas there and you have to stick around and see what that's going to be. And then I'm going to answer some of your strength training questions. We're getting a lot of questions recently on strength training. There's a few of those that I really want to address because I think my answer will not only help you, but help lots of our listeners. That's all coming up next on the WOODLFE.
I'm thrilled today to be joined on the wood Life by an old friend of mine who is absolutely one of the nutritionists on a global scale that I look up to the most. She is wonderful, She's written three books and I actually talk to our guests today if I'm being honest, on thirty different nutrition topics for three days straight. But what I wanted to drill down on is a subject matter of hers that she's an absolute expert in. We are thrilled to be joined today by
Michelle Very Hedge. Michelle, welcome to the WOODLFE. And it's so lovely to hear from you again.
Oh Sam. It is absolutely my pleasure to be here and really really lovely to reconnect with you almost like full circle right, and meant to be meant to have this.
Conversation absolutely absolutely. It's funny when I first started my podcast, a year and a half ago. You've been on my list this whole time, and it's wonderful to finally get the opportunity to talk today. I just teased it a little bit to our audience because the topic I want to drill down with you today on is sugar, because I just I know you're an absolute expert in this area.
You've written Low Sugar Lifestyle book, you speak globally on this and a whole bunch of other critical nutrition education pieces, and I'd love to get your take on it because it's just a constant question that comes up from our listeners. You know, what about sugar? Am I eating too much? Is this the main reason I'm gaining weight? What about all the other ramifications from a health perspective that come with it? You can start anyway you like, Michelle, take
this conversation in any direction. I know how passionate you are about the subject.
Well, I was going to say that that's a pretty wild introduction there to say I can get going.
I might regret that you could, Yes.
Desay, living in Australia for thirty three years, I'm still a type a female from New York and who's deeply passionate about this topic. So if people only want the top thing that they could do to change their physical and mental well being, if there was only one thing that it could take a dive on, it would absolutely
one thousand percent be the conversation around added sugar. The great job at corporate you're doing at masking and marketing healthy quote quote healthy looking things that it's hard for us as adults to get our head around, let alone our poor kids. So yeah, let's talk about those added sugars that are still in a lot of these healthy smoothies, healthy sports strengths and things like that, and the ramifications of them.
Isn't it interesting, Michelle when you have that light bulb moment with someone when you tell them something that they have consumed regularly and always thought in their mind is healthy, and you go, you know that those muffins or musy bars or you know, smoothies are actually full of sugar and it's not that different from having a can of coco, you know, like it is, but you know there's some nutritional value in there, but they have no idea.
Absolutely, Sam and I always take this conversation from a non extreme approach. So, for example, the World Health Organization the greatest researcher, scientists, doctors in the world talk about optimal health maximum six added teaspoons a day. That means we're consuming six times the amount of added sugar on a daily basis. That's a weekly basis, that's a monthly basis, that's a yearly basis. Most people are consuming three to four to five six times the amount of added sugar.
So then once you get that aha moment and people go, wow, I didn't really think that was me. I say, first of all, number one, no beating yourself up like this is not about never having sugar again. That's dumb. That's silly, right. I mean, I have sugar, I have wine, I have coffee. This conversation is about awareness. And then I say, so, let's go to the awareness component, which, from an evidence based perspective, what does the added sugar really due to
us physically and mentally? What's this doing? And this type of added sugar. Number one, let's talk about gut health. Number one creates this, you know, dys biosis. Okay, that's a big word for what burping, farting, diarrhea, belching, poor Tommy bed, timmy dad. I got a puffy tummy. What's wrong with my tummy?
Dad?
I don't understand that type of IBS like symptoms that often a doctor will go, gee whiz, you have IBS. Not too much that we can do about that. But what we do know is that kind of added sugar can really create that dys biosis, that gut dysfunction. But here lies the biggest cracker of all of this, Sam. It is our gut that creates our serotonin. Our serotonin
is made in our gut. So does it not make sense when our gut is fed with real whole foods, fats, protein, smart carbs, lots of fiber, that we are maximizing the ability for our body to create our happy hormone, the very thing that we want for all of us as adults, but definitely for all of our kids.
Let's just let our audience have that sink in a little bit, because I think you've said at a lot there already. There's a few people don't understand how much they should be consuming. And it's really good that you've articulated has added so not just sugar in a natural sense,
but added sugar. How much you should be consuming and how much on average we are consuming then there's the tool, or at least the education to start to be more curious about how much you are consuming and how much added sugar is in these things that were potentially eating regularly.
But then there's the most important thing, because I've had that conversation to that point with lots of people, and particularly if they're not overweight, because it's kind of oh, yeah, exercise, you know, but it's actually doing all of these other things, you know, gut dysfunction and inability to create our happy hormone. I mean, what is the most important thing in life to people to be happy? And you've just joined those
dods beautifully. I mean I knew what you were going to say, and I still had an aha moment, genuinely, I was, I knew where you were going, and I still went, Oh that hits home so hard. It resonates, and probably more as a dad than thinking of myself.
Oh one hundred percent, Sam. I mean, I am a parent two of three children, and a former teacher and really passionate about my work in the school system. But can I go back, Sam to something that you mentioned about the slim person?
Yeah?
Please, Yeah, this is a really important conversation. This is something that I call the slender Ruster conversation. I almost feel Sam more concerned with people that have a fast metabolic profile, people that I called like race horses, right, Their metabolism is going really really rocking and rolling strong. So they eat whatever they want. They eat a lot of grab and go food, a lot of hidden sugars,
but they stay slim. But the slender Ruster is quite often someone we see in our clinical practice is Sam, who's this slim person and we end up doing blood pathology on them and they have insulin resistance, they're pre diabetic. There are thousands and thousands of young females becoming insulin dysfunction and developing polycystic ovary syndrome. Sam, And that is not the pathology of a dysfunctional ovary. That is a pathology that is linked to a dysfunction and insolent because
a lot of those people are slender rusters. In fact, the name for polycystic overy syndrome is probably going to be changed to metabolic reproductive syndrome. That is extraordinary, Sam, Like, if you were going to talk to your wife about this, and any woman listening to this podcast, they know tons of women with polycystic ovary syndrome and fertility issues and don't realize the ramifications that that sugar is having on your liver, your hormones and insolent dysfunction.
I mean, that's a wonderful you know, true, not even extreme, but a wonderful example. To really drew that point home. What did you call it? The slender ruster.
Slender ruster the person that's slim but is rusting and oxidizing on the inside. And it's quite alarming wile people get their blood sugar done or their their you know, all their blood pathology and things come back and you can see that there's severe dysfunction going on. But for years they've been able to get away with it, sam because outwardly they don't look like people that are gaining weight.
But it doesn't matter. You know, weight is just a measurement of gravity, sad it does not measure somebody's true well being. You can be two street kilos overweight, four kilos overweight and metabolically still fit. You could be a super slim person and completely unfit metabolically, and that is inflammation. That is that's liver dysfunction, that's hormone dysfrunction. That's all the things that we can't see underneath.
I couldn't agree more. And it was really interesting that you brought up the demographic of young females. I mean, I have an eighteen year old daughter. It's you know, an age group that I say a lot and I worry a lot about. You know, it's they love the diet everything. You know, the diet, drinks, the diet, it's all about, Yeah, I can eat that, I get the kick, I get the taste. It's a diet whatever. You know. They energy drinks, diet drinks, and just and very poor foundational nutrition.
Yes, I say to a lot of these young people, you know, this university kind of group, is say, if you can harness the power of nutrition, now, that is your X factor. If they start to realize the way they eat has an impact on their sleep, the way they exercise, and the way they stress, hack, they will realize that that is their superpower and it doesn't have to be extreme.
No, I love that. That's my regret. I wish I had this X factor as a twenty year old, and there was no reason I didn't accept that. I kind of just got away with it because I was exercising a lot and had a good metabolism and was you know, would have been one of these slender rusters. Absolutely, and I'm definitely I would definitely be a healthier version on the inside a decade down the track than I would have ten years ago. So I think that's a really
good point. I just what about the people out there? And I've spoken to thousands of them, and no doubt you've spoken to tens of thousands of them that say I've tried it, I just can't. The cravings are too bad a cave. What is your practical advice to beating cravings? Because that's something I get asked about all the time.
People everyone who's listening to this will know this, right. People are so aware of what is happening with nutrition and the evidence space behind it, and people are like, Wow, I want my skin to look better, I want my hormones to be better, I want my energy be better. I see the science. The science is loud and clear. This is amazing, interesting stuff. But boy, I can't go from where I am to that place because that jump is so big, it's so extreme. It's hard, that's punished.
I'm busy and I'm deserving and I don't deserve to be punished. Well, I totally get that right. So the key to make this happen and to move into a lower sugar way of life and a healthier way of life is by small, tiny hacks, things that are so darn doable that you do them every day. You finish the day and you go, hey, that didn't feel like punishment. I think I can do that tomorrow. Then you do
it the next day. By the end of the week, you're like, hey, man, I kind of feeling lighter in the head, and all of a sudden, this thing's got a rhythm to it, and you're like, wait a minute. This hasn't been punishment. This feels okay. I can take on one more task or one more step. It's these small, tiny hacks that all of a sudden, eight weeks down the track, you're kind of doing this thing and you're going, okay, I can do this. I'm not perfect, this doesn't need
to be perfect. I feel darn good. So where to start. First place I always say to people, and I know, Sam, you and I are speaking the same language here. First
place I say is beware of your packaged foods. If we can move to whole real foods mainly on packaged and on processed, even if it's just one week of going, okay, I'm just going to buy more real whole food, more chicken, more fish, more nuts, more vegetables, more rice, not even talk about portion size, not even talk about sugar, just the first week making an adjustment to real whole food. Real whole food has natural sugar, it doesn't have added sugar.
So when you start getting people to say, when I say to people, that's what I want you to do the first week, I don't want you to worry about your portion control. I want you to have a big handful of nuts.
Hey.
In fact, if you need to have two chicken breasts at dinner, I want you to have two chicken breasts at dinner. Because what happens then, Sam, as you and I already know when people start to fill up with protein and smart carbs and good fats, they lose their satiation for sweets. And people come into our clinical practice all the time, Sam and say the same thing. Never eat so much damn food in my life, never, never, never. I can't believe how much weight of loss and how good I'm sleeping.
It's so true. I mean that the one that I have a conversation with whether people really struggle is after dinner. So after dinner snacking, we're the window. You may have had that really big, high protein, good dinner. But if your dinner was at six thirty and you're not going to bed till eleven, there's a lot of time seeing and a lot of temptation within that time window to you know, get into the sweet snacks, the biscuits, the lollas,
whatever it might be. What's the best advice specific to that time if they have done what you've just said regarding a good, healthy, high protein dinner.
Yeah, and Sam, that is it's such a great question because I was the perfect example of that. And so what I had to do was shift a couple of things. And this is what we get our clients to do, and I talk about all the time. Is this behavioral change. First of all, one ask yourself, Hey, did I have enough fat or protein at lunch or dinner? Most people eat a bird like lunch like full of salad with no protein or smart carbs in it. As soon as they shift that they got three o'clock. Oh, I don't
feel the need for those sweets. But it's the same thing at dinner time, so shift that to make sure you put you know, you nudge up the protein, nud jump the fact, get your avocado out, get your olive oil, top up your dinner, your veggies with some you know, flax seeds, seeds and nuts. But then let's say you have this habit where it's the evening and you want
something sweet. I say one change your behavior. So if you if that's sweet craving comes while you're sitting and watching a Netflix just for a little while, just to break some habit, you know what, go jump in the shower, go have a bag.
Little circuit breaker as soon as it hits.
Yeah, circuit breaker from the habit. And then my next thing is I wish I had stock in this company. I believe so greatly in this delicious tea called Bengal Spice. It's by Celesteel Seasonings. And people always laugh at me. They're like, Michelle, you are such a nut. And I said, yes, I do know that. But if you want to break a sugar habit, you buy this Celesteel Seasonings Bengal Spice, and it's a cinnamon a tea. Put two or three tea bags in your tea, let it soak for two minutes,
take it out. It is so naturally sweet with chickory root, which is a prebody great for our gut function. But you will get the same effect with a licorice tea. But don't be shy. If you really are a sugar addict, then you need to break the sugar craving. And I get it because I was one of those people. Break the habit. Physically remove yourself from where you normally are, you know, having that sugar, create a different routine, but also get a nice big cup of one of those
types of sweet teas. And hey, if you need to have a half a teaspoon or a teaspoon of honey, well go ahead and have it, because it's not going to be the six seven, eight tea spoons that you get in some of these powdered drinks, these powdered chy teas, these powdered green teas that appear healthy looking but have buckets of sugar in them.
I love the attitude of let's not try and be too restrictive, you know, like if you move to real food, don't worry about your macros don't worry about your galleries, don't worry about your portion sizes. Just eat the real food. We are running out of times. I'm just going to finish with one more question.
I have a good topic Sam to kind of raise a little bit.
Would you mind not not at all?
Well, something that comes up all the time is okay, So Michelle, I'm moving to this lower sugar way of life. I want to talk to you about sugar substitutes, artificial sweetener and other things. What can I use? So first of all, what I say to everybody is please do not use artificial sweetness. I'm really not a fan. I'm all about evidence based research. I'm actually quite a research nerd, and we're looking at some of the scientific evidence and
the links to cancer and neurological dysfunction. So no, no artificial sweetness. And I don't say no to anything really like, but no to artificial sweeteners. Second thing is, if you need to bridge the gap as you're walking into a lower sugar way of life, think about using a bit of stevia or monk fruit. It's also called lohan. Right now,
monk fruit is really emerging. It's a little bit of expensive, but people like that a little bit more than Stevia because Stevie can tend to leave a bit of aftertaste. So go ahead and explore those types of things. And then the last part of this sugar equation is, hey, Michelle, what about sorbitol? What about all these sugar alcohols that
end with hyphen ol? I always say about that is okay, if you're going to have one of those sugar alcohols, you better have really good gut function because any of those things that end with ol, those sugar alcohol they really give you the windy pops and I mean, you know, burping, party booing. I mean, there's a reason why there's an
asterisk that says excessive consumption me cause diarrhea. So you know, and Sam, as you would know, one out of four people have got dysfunction or some type of digestive dysfunction, So just be aware of that. And Sam, I'm sorry. I know I could talk forevery but you can see I'm still so passionate about this topic. So if you ever want me to come back on again, bring me back on, because there's a million other things.
We give, and I will take you up on that because I do think this will scratch the surface for a lot of people and open up a really important conversation. What a lovely place to finish. Michelle, thank you so so much for joining us on the wood Life today. So wonderful to catch up with you again. And you have educated me and my wonderful producer, Indy. She's been sitting here taking notes and nodding, and I'm sure all
of our listeners have loved that chat. So thank you so much, and take care and we'll talk again soon.
Excellent Sam, thank you, Thanks Amy, thank you.
Oh wow, that really was a lightning bolt moment. When Michelle told us that we actually con chimed six times. That added sugar that we're meant to If you love that chat as much as I did, and you want to follow up Michelle's work, she does public speaking all over the world. She's got Brillian courses and information on her website, which is a healthyview dot com, so make
surely you check that out. We've gone from talking about Michelle's favorite topic to now going to be talking about probably my favorite topic, which is strength training, and we've had some great questions come through. That's coming up next. First question is from Beck.
Hey, Sam, I'm just wondering what ratio of my workouts should be weight training, and also how intense should it be.
Thanks so much, I think you should do three strength training sessions a week as a sort of an ideal foundation. If you love your weight training, you can do five or six, probably have one rest day, but if you also like cardio and Ballard's and whatever, try and have your foundation be three three days, or if time doesn't
quite laly do that at least two. So if I was to do two, I'd do an upper body and a lower body, and if I was to do three, I'd do a split where I do push pull lower body, which means I do all my pushing movements so chest, shoulders, triceps, bit of core work in there, all my pulling movements, so any deadlifting, pull downs, bicep curls, anything that sort of back biceps, glutes hemis and then legs your glutes hemies again, but also lots of quads and a bit
of carbs. So if you're doing a three day split, I love that push pull legs. And if you're doing a two day split, bit more volume in each workout, perhaps because you're only training it twice, you're only doing waits twice a week or is this trained twice a week and I do an upper body day and a lower body day. Next question is from Mitch. Hey, mate, I've been going to the gym for the last couple of years, but I'm really not getting the gains I was having for Is there a reason why? Great question,
mich It could be a few reasons. First of all, when was the last time you changed your program? Second of all, are you lifting heavy enough often, enough enough volume, enough intensity. Third of all, and probably the biggest one, are you getting enough recovery nutrition between the sessions. So it's all about breaking the muscle down with the intensity and the volume of the workout, and then it's about building it back up again by giving it the rest
and the right nutrition. And a big part of that nutrition is protein and it doesn't take that much adjustment to get things moving in the right direction again. You get great gains, great results in the first six weeks to six months because you've kind gone from a you were starting at a low base, so your body responds beautifully. Then as you get a bit more conditioned and you're in better shape to continue to move the bar, you've got to work a bit harder. You've got to do
a bit more. You've got to shake things up, you've got to change things. You've got to shock your body with drop sets, with different workouts, with changing your program, with being a bit more meticulous with your nutrition. If you really want to shape that last twenty percent, that's where the discipline and that's where the sort of shock
factor has to come into it. And the last question on strength training is from Renee, just wondering if I should be lifting weights when I'm pregnant and if so, how far into my pregnancy. First of all, congratulations Renee, and second of all, absolutely so. My advice when with all training when pregnant is don't start something new, So don't fall pregnant and then decide you want to do marathon training, or don't fall pregnant and then decide you
want to do powerlifting. But if you are already doing who are already running or are, then you can absolutely keep doing that in a safe manner. So the things you need to look at for is your body temperature doesn't get too high, so train in a nice ventilated cool area, stay really hydrated, don't get your heart rate up too high with long sort of cardio bouts, but from a strength training perspective, good form, nice and stable.
You lose a bit of stability through your hips as your hip shape is starting to shift to prepare you for having a baby, so hip stability becomes really important. You don't need to be going for pbs during this period personal bests, but it absolutely will help you during the pregnancy, particularly if you keep your core and your back really strong because you're going to be carrying extra weight at the front, and it will absolutely help you
through the pregnancy and then to recover post pregnancy. So I'm a huge advocate for doing some kind of resistance training well pregnant. Just make sure you're doing the right program at the right intent, Citty. And to answer your question to how long you can keep doing it for, there's always going to be different challenges through all different phases.
If you're pregnancy, you know, first tromester, second dremster, third tromester. Obviously, as you start to get bigger, it gets a bit trickier to do some movements and you're already carrying a lot of extra weight. But I've trained many women to thirty seven, thirty eight, even thirty nine weeks and the amount of thanks that they have given me after having the baby to say it really helped them mentally and physically during and after the birth has been always the case.
So it's a bit of an individual situation and you work with your doctor on it, but don't feel like there's a specific cut off at thirty weeks or something where it has to stop it. Really a lot of people can do resistance training and keep their exercise routine going, whatever it might be, you know, really deep into the pregnancy. Here you go, I feel like I've just had a little thought. I'm going to bring on a strength training
guru on an episode in a few weeks. In the next couple of episodes, I've got there's a guy that I've worked with. He was kind of the strength training guru on the gym floor when I came in as a little twenty year old from Tasmay and you're over to Melbourne. He taught me a lot and he continues to teach me a lot. Actually, the way he continually educates himself and evolves is just he really leads by example. He's one of the best strength training experts in Australia.
I'm going to get him on a future episode of The Woodlife, so look out for that because it really is a topic that I think we should talk about more and people need to understand. And with that in mind, if you do have other questions you'd like to pick this guru's brain, please send them through of course, with any other questions on any other topics that you'd like covered. Have a fantastic end of your week and weekend, and I'll see next week. Jeers