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11 Diet Tips from the Probiotic Lifestyle: Why Feeding the Gut Microbiome Slows Down Aging and Can Save Your Life from Preventable Disease!

Bio-diversity is essential for human health and evolution!

Even though I can’t prove it, I believe more than 99% of all human diseases can be prevented or managed by nourishing the gut. My personal mission is to help your microbiome become more robust, diverse, and balanced. It will make your life way better and it will also have beneficial consequences for the collective human microbiome (another way of saying our collective health as a species).

Benefits of Diverse Gut Microbiome 

Shreiner et. al provide us with an overview of the evidence to show that a healthy microbiome supports the following:

  • Healthy metabolism, absorption of nutrients, and ability to inhibit tumor growth, particularly in the colon.
  • Microbiota promote immune homeostasis and, “influences immune functions at all levels from the initial innate defense to complex acquired responses.“
  • Use of antiobiotics are associated with increased cardiovascular risk factors. (Measured through plasma TMAO levels or trimethylamine-N-oxide)
  • “Clostridum difficile is a disease that results from critical changes to the gut microbiota and is effectively treated by microbiota-based therapy.”
  • Inflammatory bowel disease and Crohn’s disease is related to a lower microbial diversity and a dysbiosis or imbalance of the gut. Treatment by professionals may be focused on increasing the diversity and richness of beneficial micriobial species in the gut and biome.

Good news: The Gut has some plasticity.

By eating a diversity of healthy foods, you will get an abundance of antioxidants, fiber, and other ancient plant wisdom.

“The quality of being easily shaped or molded.”

“The adaptability of an organism to changes in its environment or differences between its various habitats.”

The not so good news: the older you are, the harder it will be.

Why it is harder for people who are older? It is not about your numerical age. It has to do with the fact that years of consuming high glycemic foods that have been stripped of fiber, antioxidants, and other vital essences have allowed undesirable bacteria species to overpopulate.

Furthermore, many people who grew up on cereal and processed foods are going to struggle more to reach their fitness goals later on in life. It’s not fair, at all. There is hope though, so read on.

Undesirable bacteria become squatters that you can’t evict. Once upon a time, they contributed something of value to your system, but now they are leeching nutrients from you and not giving you much back in return. Biologically, these bacteria create bio-films that protect their opportunistic environment inside your gut.

You can degrade these bio-films over time with herbs, enzymes, fermented foods and more (note: Amazon affiliate links). I’ll be covering this in depth in future posts as well.

Here are some general tips to think about when looking to enrich or improve the diversity of your microbiome.

For the pursuit of microbiome enrichment, you may consume the following:

1. Fruit from a tree that is tasty

2. Leaves from a plant that is hardy (kale).

3. Fungi from a birch tree (chaga)

4. Roots that also grow edible leaves (carrots, beets, etc.)

5. Red color leaves (chard), purple color leaves (purple kale), green color leaves (cabbage), and so on.

6. Nuts from a tree

7. Leaves that have been cultured (sauerkraut)

8. Dairy that has been cultured (Kefir, see my kefir post. I’ll be writing an extensive Kefir guide coming up because it is that important).

9. Fruit from trees that is fatty (avocado, olives)

10. Selections from the allium genus (onions, garlic, shallots, chives)

Benefits of onion and related species: full of enzymes, performance enhancing antioxidants, and minerals for blood sugar regulation.

11. Herbs / foods that make you hot or sweaty (peppers)

This should at least be enough to get you started and stimulated with some nutritional ideas.

It is important to note that one size does not fit all with nutrition. You are diverse, therefore you must learn what is best for you.

You can have guidance from practitioners who can support you in this journey. You can also learn from testing and experimenting — be mindful and honest about how your food is affecting you in order to make progress this way.

Stay tuned for more updates!

We’ve had an exciting time around here with a solid one post per day for three days straight! Let’s keep up the momentum.

The people who need us will find us, as long as we keep publishing. I hope you revisit here and join this growing community.

I invoke the powers of will to serve you in your fitness journey.

Sources:

Heiman ML, Greenway FL. A healthy gastrointestinal microbiome is dependent on dietary diversity. Mol Metab. 2016;5(5):317‐320. Published 2016 Mar 5. doi:10.1016/j.molmet.2016.02.005

Davis CD. The Gut Microbiome and Its Role in Obesity. Nutr Today. 2016;51(4):167‐174. doi:10.1097/NT.0000000000000167

Shreiner AB, Kao JY, Young VB. The gut microbiome in health and in disease. Curr Opin Gastroenterol. 2015;31(1):69‐75. doi:10.1097/MOG.0000000000000139

Body Composition disease prevention Fat Loss Nutrition, Immunity, and Digestion
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WARNING: Don’t Go Blind with THIS Eating Strategy

A heartbreaking headline crossed the screens recently.

“Teenager goes blind from years-long diet of french fries, potato chips and white bread!”

I am sorry!

fries

Science Says: Eating nothing but fries, potato chips, and white bread can make you go blind.

Apparently the doctors and people around him said that he looked healthy and no visual factors indicated that he was in serious condition.

You Can’t Judge a person’s health by their appearance alone!

Behavior is another important way to understand the potential health consequences occurring within a body. The behavior of selectively avoiding anything fresh or colorful in an eating habit could lead to dire consequences, such as blindness!

I have seen people in larger bodies do amazing things in a fitness setting and my experiences in fitness have led me to believe that you can be healthy and fit in so many different shapes and sizes.

That being said, you can also be unhealthy and unfit in so many ways too. Therefore, we should all strive to attain regular consumption of fresh greens and also veggies of the colorful variety because doing so can possibly lead to healthy normal function in all systems of the body.

Essential nutrients may be essential to living, while non-essential nutrients may be essential to well-being.

Personally, I love the feeling after I eat the Red Chard vegetable leaves, for example. Lately, I have been placing a layer of pico de gallo sauerkraut on top of the boiled red chard and the taste is quite palatable.

yummyredchard

To me, these are beautiful red chard leaves and I would probably boil them at home in my own comfort.

One reason I love red chard is because it provides many of the benefits of beets without the sugars. The red antioxidant can be strongly present in the veins of the chard leaves (if rainbow chard, you get more variety of antioxidant). The nutrients found within the green leaves also help to promote healthy blood sugar so that my body has the incentive to keep overall fat-mass on the healthy side.

Key Takeaway: Blindness is Caused by a Junk Food Diet.

Seriously, eat your damn vegetables. I have to tell myself this over and over. Trust me, I don’t want to eat vegetables every day.

Unfortunately for me, I have been in settings where I have seen the consequences of poor eating and I have witnessed a quality of life that I never wish for anybody.

Food literally interacts with our DNA and genetic expression. This processed environment that we often ingest is too over-stimulating for our bodies to handle, and may be strongly related to obesity, heart disease, cancer and more.

You may be able to change your life with nutritionally motivated eating

I will have more articles about how to use food for disease prevention coming up. Of course, I am still very interested in using nutrition for keeping body fat at healthy levels so there will be more content related to that as well.

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4 Health Benefits of Guacamole

Have you made guacamole or do you remember the first time you made it?

Guacamole for Fitness Gains

I’m passionate about food in a big way. I was blessed to be able to stuff food into my stomach and I’ve learned that some ways of eating are better than others.

^ New video! Watch me make my famous Guacamole! Also if you’re on YouTube, hit that subscribe button 🙂

Benefits of Guacamole for Health and Fitness

In this article, we’ll talk about some of the benefits of the particular ingredients in guacamole that may be relevant for a person interested in fitness, fat loss, and health.

1. High Fiber

People who consume higher fiber on average are at less risk for many types of diseases, especially obesity.

The mechanisms of dietary fiber on health is speculated to be a result of changes in intestinal viscosity, nutrient absorption, rate of passage, production of short chain fatty acids and production of gut hormones

All of the above benefits are exactly the mechanisms that support a healthy metabolism and the potential for a person to be able to experience the lean lifestyle.

Individuals with high intakes of dietary fiber appear to be at significantly lower risk for developing coronary heart disease, stroke, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, and certain gastrointestinal diseases. Increasing fiber intake lowers blood pressure and serum cholesterol levels. Increased intake of soluble fiber improves glycemia and insulin sensitivity in non-diabetic and diabetic individuals. Fiber supplementation in obese individuals significantly enhances weight loss. Increased fiber intake benefits a number of gastrointestinal disorders including the following: gastroesophageal reflux disease, duodenal ulcer, diverticulitis, constipation, and hemorrhoids… The recommended dietary fiber intakes for children and adults are 14 g/1000 kcal.

Let’s recap: less risk of metabolic diseases that millions of people are currently dying from, and less chance of getting hurt by bacteria, toxins etc that inevitably enter the gut. Also, MORE likely to have a healthy weight.

2. Minerals

POTASSIUM (Blood Pressure Control)

MAGNESIUM (Vascular Tone & Insulin Sensitivity)

3. Vitamin Powerhouse

The avocados contain high levels of natural Vitamin C and Vitamin E  which are seldom found together in significant concentrations. This vitamin combination promotes circulatory antioxidant protection and slows the breakdown of healthy LDL cholesterol so that you can keep LDL balance in the body longer.

Vitamin K1 from avocados may promote bone health and support blood coagulation mechanisms.

B Vitamins to prevent chronic inflammation of the cardiovascular system. Okay even if you don’t follow along with this, just know that the b vitamin folate (or folic acid) is a methyl donor which promotes greater homocysteine in the body and that actually helps the whole system run more smoothly with less stress to the body.

THEREFORE, with high folate consumption, you can age more gracefully and you could have healthier babies if you’re at that stage in life. Also, you can be possibly be more athletic because the pumps are on point.

4. Phytonutrients / Plant antioxidants

Okay even though I could list a ton of carotenoids, phenolics, and phytosterols here, I’m just going to say that these plant antioxidants go into every part of the body starting with the gut.

Who loves antioxidants? You gut, your heart, your eyes, your genitals, and basically every organ of the body. When all major systems of the body are receiving antioxidants from diet, the body will have a better chance to ward off mutations and eliminate mutated cells before they can cause a way bigger problem.

IMG_021guacsmall (2)

Of course antioxidants are great for metabolism! If takes a healthy, normal function of the body in order to achieve metabolic success. Take that into consideration.

Enjoy the Fresh foods.

If you’re reading from Seattle or anywhere that is not a food desert, why wouldn’t you eat mostly fresh foods?

Seriously, try increasing fresh food intake and then see how you feel starting with your gut feeling and think about the ability of your body to recover from hard workouts/life stressors when you eat fresh foods.

Of course there are lots of non-fresh foods that can be healthy too, I’ll post on that in the future.

Make sure to follow the blog and subscribe to the It’s Dre Fitness YouTube channel. Thank you for reading and I appreciate you.

 

 

 

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Brief insight into Dre’s Nutrition Philosophy

Let’s start with a brief overview and then we’ll dig deeper in the upcoming weeks and months.

When I was younger, I took a physical health class at a local college that changed my life. I learned about the basics of calories in vs calories out and then with the guidance of the instructor, I set physical goals for myself. I started out by walking a single mile in the neighborhood, over the next days, I would run the mile, then I would run/walk two miles and so on. At my peak, I could go out and run a half marathon anytime, no big deal — I slimmed down dramatically.

Over time, I’ve learned and come to appreciate so much more about food. I love food. Loving food is not an excuse to eat poorly! Take a quick look at my background over the last decade or so. We’ll be posting about more in depth topics soon (less about me, more about you).

Fat Loss Fitness Nutrition, Immunity, and Digestion