773. FDA, Food Dyes + Our Health: Food Industry Secrets Revealed
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Welcome and welcome and welcome and welcome to Almost 30 Podcast. It's so good to have you here. It's Lindsay and Krista, your best friends, your big sisters in times of transition and change. Uh,

We talk about everything from health and wellness to spirituality, relationships, lifestyle. You know us. Just dynamic duo. Fashion. Beauty. Please don't. Don't. I don't know. Yeah. Oh, actually, I'm looking at the framing. The lower half is not on.

I don't think the opera half is great, but like we were talking about my ankle socks and what I'm wearing shoe-wise and my shoes. Oh, is it? Lord have mercy. No, it's not. You're a fashion icon. I'm an icon in my own world. Anyway. Mom icon. Here we go. Wink, wink. Mom. Hey, my claim to fame in fashion was getting best dressed in Ohio in my high school. In what year? Honestly, in 1914. No, you've had like a fashion revolution. Yeah.

Yeah. Fashion rebirth. Uh-huh. Fashion. It's called revolve. It's called working with revolve. Revolve. I was doing the three fashion words with my friends.

Olivia, she's my special girl. She just gets obsessed with something. And for a month, she'll be asking Olivia, Organic Olivia, she'll be asking everyone, what's your three fashion words? And just like, so she was like for a month being like, what's your three fashion words? And one of my other friends, Jesse, was like, revolve about me. Oh, that's hilarious. I was like, thank you so much. True. It was real. What would you be three words to describe your fashion? Um...

You should do this for me. Let's not go off of today. A sporty. Today we're not. I'm not as sporty anymore, dog. I think it's more like. You're wearing sneakers. Comfort and. Sure. But that's more for like. Comfort. Androgynous. I'm done. Sporty androgynous. Sporty spice. Yeah.

It's okay. No, you have great style. It used to be more sporty spice. I would say fitted or tailored. So there's something about you have nice fits. Your stuff always fits very well. Okay. And then I would say elevated. Okay. That's nice. Jesus Christ. Okay.

I would say, would you say, like, classic minimal? There's something classic and minimal. Yeah, there's something, like, minimal about it. There's a cleanliness. But then every once in a while, there's just something that, like, I order and I'm like, what the fuck? Oh, then there's some sleeves that you're going to bust out. Fuck. Yeah, there's sleeves that she's bringing to the sleeves. Like, watch out for, like, our press for this book, like, that we've already done. Like, go back and I'm sure we're recording this before, but...

I feel like there's going to be some moments where I just go off the rails. Oh, you're going to show out. We need to prepare then. I know. We need to coordinate. For what our level of showing out is. Yeah, I think it depends on the venue. Like, is it the Today Show? Is it, you know, manifesting in this moment? But it's like in the Today Show, I was thinking, I was like, you can't be shown too much. No. That's too much. You got to be classic, but like colorful. Yeah. It's interesting. It's very like classic, colorful fitted. It's like Tibby.

It's like Amanda Uprichard and Tibby. Totally. You know what I mean? Like those are the brands. Matching sets. I would say mine's trendy. Sexy. Sexy. Jesus Christ. It's true. It is true. It's now sexy. And then it's also very of the moment.

I like to wear for what I'm going. Like if I'm going to Venice, I'm wearing a hat. Yeah. If I'm going to Paris, I'm wearing – Gen Z party. I'm wearing a long cigarette. You have a beret. It's costumes. I would actually say trendy, sexy costumes. Going to London. London, need Mary Janes. Honestly, I was wearing Mary Janes in plaid the whole trip. Yeah.

Anywho, I'm so excited about this conversation today because we are a blast.

Yeah, Bridget's amazing. Bridget actually knows a lot of my friends from college. She grew up in the same hometown as most of my college girlfriends, which is a very special hometown in Cleveland. So we've been in each other's orbit for a really long time. So for her to know the people that I know feels like a very special part of me and very special to me. And she's been a listener for a long time. So having her on the podcast was so amazing. And she's so knowledgeable. She's such a clear speaker. Having an inspiring conversation about where health

stands today from a legal perspective, from an education perspective, and the things that we can really be mindful of in the future to make changes to our health for good is so inspiring. Yeah, she's incredible. She's a functional dietician.

She's the founder of Being Bridget, Functional Nutrition. And yeah, her work, like, you know, so many of us like started with her own story. She was told by a doctor, you know, in her teens that her nutrition has nothing to do with what she was going through, her condition. And, you know, she just didn't believe it. Like in that moment, she was like, no, absolutely not. Like, that doesn't make sense to me. Something feels off. And she just kind of took that alternative path of,

you know, getting well, doing her research, understanding the food is medicine connection. And yeah, she's just made it her life's work. And, you know, she's grown so much in her business and her impact. And it's just so, so cool to see. And she's so knowledgeable. Like I was watching her speak. I was like... Yeah, she's an amazing speaker. How do you fit that in your brain? I know. Oh my God. She spoke with your mom group, right? Yeah.

She spoke to, yes, new mom on the block. She did an incredible session on just, you know, postpartum health. I think we can just feel like we're floundering after we have a baby and feeling kind of disconnected from life.

what well actually feels like in that season of life. It's kind of a lower standard. You're like, yeah, I'm alive today. I'm good. Surviving, not thriving, as they say. Truly. But she was incredible and so, so helpful. So I'm really excited for you all to just learn from her and also dig into her work. She has a ton of different programs, but right now...

She is doing the Being Collective 28-Day Challenge. So this is really around like reducing your cravings, improving your energy. It's all about like blood sugar balancing, which we've talked about on the show. But to have like a support system and resources and meal plans and a coaching system.

container, I think is so supportive to like kick that off for you if it's something that feels overwhelming. Yeah. So if you guys want to tune into the latest in health and wellness, sort of where we're going as a country, learning more about that and then how we can serve our bodies now. We talked a little bit about the motherhood thing. I'm excited for you to listen. This is such a, it was just so fun. And I was jaw drop. Yeah. So much of it. Yeah. Because our girl knows some facts. Yeah. Learned so much. She worked at the Cleveland Clinic? Yeah. She was at the

Cleveland Clinic with Dr. Mark Hyman. Yeah. Yeah, which is really incredible. So yeah.

I think you'll love this one. You can go to beingbridget.com and the 28-day challenge is there where you can join. We also have the link in our show notes. Beingbridget.com. Thank you so much, Bridget. It's B-R-I-G-I-D, beingbridget.com. Thanks for coming on Almost 30. Enjoy this one. Share it with a friend to start conversation on these topics to educate one another and

It's such a fun way to create and sustain connection among friends. So excited for you guys to connect in that way. And thank you for getting the book. Thank you for being a part of our book process, for making it such a success and something that felt so unique to us and hopefully serves you for the rest of your life. Yeah. Thank you so much. All right. We'll see you on the other side. Love you guys. Bye. Bye.

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So as a being in the space that you're in, like doing what you do, and we're kind of rolling into it, but like, how do you, as a nutrition and health expert, who do you figure out how to trust?

Like these are your peers. And the reason why I'm bringing this up is because for the past couple years, there's been so much information and data that's come out in every single space as it talks to health and wellness, whether it's diet, whether it's lifestyle, whether it's supplement. Like there's just so much information. So how do you as a person in this space doing what you do figure out who to trust or who to listen to? That's a good question. You know, I think that it helps for me because I've worked with so many functional medicine practitioners that I understand that

like the character, I understand the reasons for why they would say things or like financial ties that could influence a person's recommendations or just their own indoctrination, their own inability to see outside of what they were taught in a textbook and not be able to apply it to a clinical space. Like one example would be in 2014, we started the Cleveland Clinic Center for Functional Medicine, which was the first functional medicine hospital in the world. And

And that was under Dr. Mark Hyman, and I started the nutrition department under him. And we were completely labeled to be this quacky department. We started in the basement of the Cleveland Clinic, and we had 2,000 people on the wait list within a month. And I'm living with...

my best friend that was in medical school at the time and was with all of these physicians in the other departments. And she'd come home and tell me, oh, we just send all the crazy people to functional medicine because you guys just handle all the crazy people. Even though I would come home with stories about like this person, we reversed their PCOS today. This person came in and doesn't have to take their antidepressants. Crazy stories that I was in my early career coming home with that it was

It didn't matter. It was like, well, this is what I've been indoctrinated to believe that, you know, if you believe outside of this box that we were taught in, then you're crazy. And so I think that you have to always...

There's a balance of people who really do follow unbiased science and then apply functional medicine principles. And I think that some people on the spectrum skew so much into follow the science that they lack common sense to say, well, if we're following the science, then why are our health outcomes so different?

deplorable. And then on the other side, the wellness influencers who don't necessarily understand the in-depth level of the science and then make claims because companies are telling them to or because they saw it on TikTok, that also can be dangerous. And so I think that

You know, looking at a person's credentials, but then not only caring about their credentials, you know, looking at their experience, how many years they've been doing this, what level of clinical experience they have. Because I will say that working with more people helps you better understand what works and what doesn't. Mm-hmm.

Beautiful. Can you start? Can we start? What is functional medicine? Someone asked me, they're like, I need a functional medicine doctor. I'm like, I don't know what that is. What's integrative nutrition? You're not a functional medicine doctor. It's a weird thing about me is sometimes I don't know stuff that's like very obvious that I should know. What's a functional medicine doctor? What's an integrative doctor?

Functional and integrative medicine are essentially very, very similar. Okay. Functional medicine. No, she was straight up shocked. My sister is his. I wasn't sure if you were trying to pretend like you didn't know. You know what? That's the Oprah method. I would say Oprah interview style. She'd be like, you know what? What's functional medicine? And she'd be like, so what's psychic? I'm being dead serious. I don't know what it is. Yeah.

Okay, so functional medicine, the entire field is all about getting to the root cause. So instead of going to a doctor and then being given a prescription for the condition in a 15-minute appointment, the goal is to start to ask more questions to be able to get to the root cause. Is your anxiety fueled by stressors in your life? Is it because you have an imbalance in your microbiome that's impacting your neurotransmitter production? Is it because you're consuming too much alcohol? Getting more of the history of anxiety

your life as far as like were you vaginal or C-section? Were you given a lot of antibiotics at birth? Could this have contributed then to more ear infections that led to more antibiotics that then led to acid reflux that then led to a proton pump inhibitor that then led to more health issues that led you to five different prescriptions and no one really acknowledging why any of that started to begin with. So functional medicine really digs deeper into the root cause of why something is happening. Wow. And then integrative is what?

Integrative is essentially the same thing. It's just branded a little bit differently. Oh, interesting. Okay. And I guess like how did you – because like you said before, like people can kind of choose one path where it's more like of a traditional Western medicine path. Like I guess what brought you to functional medicine – or sorry, functional nutrition rather than a more like quote traditional approach to it?

Right. So all dietitians go through the same undergraduate training and typically graduate training and your dietetic internship. And that was the case for me. I went through a more traditional training and then...

I went into the field because in 2005, I was diagnosed with a neurological autoimmune disease and I was having about 30 mini seizures per day that I reversed through my food and lifestyle intervention and my parents taking me to a functional medicine doctor. And the neurologist that we saw completely dismissed, no, nutrition has nothing to do with this. And at the time, you know, no one really knew what functional medicine was. So I

my parents were like, well, we believe that we should at least start with the foundations of seeing if she has nutrient deficiencies. Can we improve her diet before jumping to a new pharmaceutical on the market? So that's what we did. And then

After being dismissed so many times by our neurologist and then seeing the impact to my own life, I said to my mom, there has to be a million other people that are like me that are going to their doctor because they have a disease that's either driven by or exacerbated by their food and lifestyle that are being dismissed, that are being handed a prescription, that are being told there's nothing that you can do. This will only get worse as you age. And I want to help those people. And so I chose to become a dietitian, not realizing that traditional dietetics training

is very different than functional nutrition. So I love... It's like food pyramid based? Food pyramid. Now they call it MyPlate. Yes, that's the... I love every brand. Exactly. It is a brand. MyPlate, you have 11 servings of pasta. Six to 11. Six to 11. A day? Yes, that's the thing. Yeah.

No, no, no, no, no. It is. It is. So it's been updated to be decreased a little bit. But for about 20 years, the National Nutrition Guidelines were recommending 6 to 11 servings of grains per day and telling people about half of them should be whole grains. So essentially, the government has been recommending 50% refined grains in a person's diet, 3 to 6 servings per day, with a slice of bread being an example of one serving. Pasta, yeah, those...

It is true. How massive I would be if I was having 11 servings. That is so crazy. But then you wonder why 74% of the population is overweight or obese. But are people following... We did 74% now? 74% are overweight or obese, yes. But I guess...

So the dietary guidelines for Americans state that about 60% of people are following the recommendations. So if the recommendations were actually working, then 74% wouldn't be overweight or obese unless the way that they're collecting the data isn't as accurate as they believe. There's a lot of gray area. Wow. Wow.

Yeah. So I went in thinking that I would be using food as medicine. I did my high school senior project on food as medicine because I was like, I want to help as many people reverse their condition or improve it. So even if it means that they need medication, can they decrease the dose? Just using a food as medicine, food first approach should really be how healthcare is operated. It would drastically reduce our rising rates of healthcare costs that people

went from $3.8 trillion in 2019 to $4.8 trillion in 2023, a $1 trillion increase in a four-year period of time because the way that our conventional medicine system works is just handing out prescriptions. And when anyone has any disease without asking, what are you eating?

what is going into your body. And then we have the food industry that's fueling this entire epidemic and most doctors that are gaslighting their patients saying, "Oh no, nutrition has nothing to do with that." Or giving very generic nutrition recommendations instead of being specific about nutrition and supplements and things that people can do before they jump to these pharmaceutical interventions. And unfortunately,

Unfortunately, the food industry and the pharmaceutical industry and healthcare industry are profiting like crazy and it's at the expense of our population health.

So when I started realizing all of this, because my mom will even recall, my mom is really, my parents are the reason that I do what I do. And I would have conversations with my mom, like, mom, it's not actually evidence-based for me to have removed gluten from my diet. And I don't think like that it necessarily is important unless you have celiac disease.

because that's what they teach you when you're going through traditional nutrition training. And she'd be like, this is weird because it worked really well for you. What do you mean? Why are you questioning everything that we started to do? Or she even recalled recently, you came home and were like, mom, eating organic isn't evidence-based. And so even though I had the experience of these things that my parents did that helped me so much, once I started going through, they create this level of indoctrination that's like, no, this isn't evidence-based, so you can't recommend it.

And so I continued to, you know, kind of be led astray a little. Led astray a little. And you're being led astray in school. Led astray in school from what I believed to be true nutrition. Yes. As a trained as a dietician. I learned from my parents. Training as a dietician school.

Yes. Okay, perfect. So I just want to make sure it wasn't like high school or something. Yeah. Or in my master's program where, you know, at the time there was a huge story that had come out about heavy metals in apple juice and in rice. That was like 2014. And so I did my –

project on it and the head of our department, my recommendations were ways that you can decrease the heavy metals by doubling the water, for instance, so that you remove some of the water after you've boiled the rice. And she afterwards said, no, Bridget, that isn't what you would recommend. You would recommend telling people that our food system is safe and they don't need to worry.

No way. Because it creates more fear when you tell people these types of things. The way that I'm hyped up for this talk right now. Where is that coming from? So is she learning? Yeah, that's a good question.

Who's she being paid by? You know what I mean? What is that connection, I guess, from your perspective and being in this world for as long as you have? It's also super patronizing to be like, they're going to be scared. Like, everyone's so stupid. Well, that's the whole thing about food dyes right now is that the experts that are coming out saying, oh, no, you don't need to worry about food dyes are saying that it's fear-mongering to talk about food.

the role of food diets and increases in neurobehavioral issues like inattention and hyperactivity in kids that has been very well documented in the research if you look at the research. The largest review that came out of California in 2021, team of MDs, PhDs, they looked at 27 clinical trials that had been conducted and they came out saying this is...

So unequivocally, food diets are impacting neurobehavioral outcomes in kids. There is an association. Some kids are impacted more than others. But at minimum, we need to make strides to decrease it in our food supply. That was in 2021 and has gone largely unaddressed.

So then experts are coming out on the opposite end saying, oh, it's fear-mongering to talk about this. We just need to trust that the United States food supply is the safest that we have. And so I look at my own training and the ties to the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics with processed food companies.

And then, you know, the medical school education and the ties to the pharmaceutical industry. And it's very similar where you're learning important things like the science, you know, hopefully some of it is unbiased and core biochemistry and physiology and those types of things. But at the same time, you have to be able to

have your own level of discernment to be able to say, "How can I be a better practitioner to impact people in the most profound way possible?" And really that comes back to the basics of eating whole real foods that are unprocessed, that are as organic, as often organic as possible given a person's budget.

and changing the way that our food system is set up so that we're not adding so many food subsidies to, you know, corn and wheat and soy and our ultra-processed foods because really today our ultra-processed foods are hyperpalatable but also extremely inexpensive compared to whole, real, organic, regenerative farm foods because of our food subsidies. So then, you know, other people will say, oh, it's...

It's racist or unfair to talk about the need for whole, real, organic foods. And really the conversation should be how can we increase access to everyone by changing the way that our food subsidies work so that the government is actually helping people that are minorities who are more prone to these health outcomes, these poor health outcomes, chronic diseases that we're seeing in both adults and kids. I'm hiding. I'm hiding.

So can you just kind of explain to people, like, I guess the very subtle and sometimes not so subtle corruption in the education piece of it? Because I think people, you know, kind of assume that everything is kind of working separately. So when you said that your professor, you know, said like, you know, we tell them that everything's fine and it's totally fine and healthy and just not to stress them out, I guess...

What are the influences? Is it big food? Like, what do you know now being out of school and doing your own research? Like, who's influencing who and what? Like, what is the web? Big food, big pharma, and healthcare are very much, I would say, probably the core of it. And I believe that some people...

feel that they're doing the right thing. Like that's how deep the indoctrination is. It's not like there's all these people that are walking around. Yeah.

with corrupt minds being like, how can we make more money at the expense of people's health? I think that there are probably at the top a lot of people that have that mindset that are able to funnel it in a way to the people that work for them to spin it in a way that you're bought into the brand, whether it's the FDA or it's the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics or it's

Kellogg's or General Mills or whatever company, like people believe that they're doing good work. And that's where, or even the doctors that are, you know, just peddling out prescriptions that think that, oh, I'm doing such an important, such important work, which of course prescriptions are amazing and so necessary in so many different realms. But

If you've been a doctor for 30 years, you've seen a drastic change in people's health outcomes when it comes to who you were treating 30 years ago and what the health status of our children and adults looks like today. And so I think that teachers will even say this. Like, you don't even have to be a health professional. You just have to have common sense and be able to see patterns in people where teachers will say –

Kids 30 years ago did not have the same issues neurobehaviorally and neurologically when it comes to depression, when it comes to autism, when it comes to ADHD. Like there's so many kids that can't learn today. And this was not the case 30 years ago. Something is happening. And so I think that we get so drilled down to the science and what the evidence shows. And unfortunately, the United States has a problem.

a safe until proven guilty model, whereas other countries have a guilty until proven safe model as far as what's included in their food. And then also limits that they set for specific nutrients, or I don't know if you'd consider them nutrients, but things like trans fats, added sugar, where for years and years, this went on without being responsibly enforced by the

people like the FDA. So it's hard to say specifically who is responsible. I think that we live in a for-profit society that tries to profit as much as possible, and it's at the expense of people's health because it's more about their bottom line than it is about making choices that are in the best interest of people's health. And there are a plethora of examples of that. Like

One example would be just in 1965, the Sugar Research Foundation, they funded a study that was published in the New England Journal of Medicine that paid Harvard researchers to place the blame for coronary heart disease on dietary fat and cholesterol and then steer it away from sugar, decrease the concern that there was around sugar. So that was in 1965.

And that then steered generations of research towards dietary fat and cholesterol. It changed the food industry, increasing sugar. And it wasn't until 2015 to 2020 that the government finally made an added sugar limit saying we would recommend no more than 10% of daily calories be consumed by added sugar. That didn't happen until 2015. And so you go from 1965, that happening, to then 2015.

with added sugar being the largest driver of chronic disease, type 2 diabetes, coronary heart disease, cancer, the leading causes of death and disability in the United States. And there's been no regulation or oversight because of these lobbyists

that are lobbying against things like adding the added sugar line to the nutrition facts label, that didn't happen until 2016. So even though there was research coming out showing the risks and the harms of added sugar in the 2000s because of what happens with the corruption that happened in the 60s and then

the FDA kind of like turning a blind eye. We had decades and decades of people eating way too much added sugar, having no idea how much they were even consuming because there was no line on the Nutrition Facts label. When they presented the idea, they were petitioned in 1999 to add an actual line on the Nutrition Facts label. They didn't until 2016. So it took almost 20 years for that to happen where people had no idea how much added sugar they were even consuming.

So not only were they steering the attention away from sugar, but then they also weren't giving people the transparency. And the reason is because there's so much lobbying that goes into these choices and these decisions that slows the entire process down because the food companies don't want transparency. They don't want you to have the added sugar line. They don't want you to be able to see all of the things on the front of package, which is why it's taken so long for them to finally officially declare front of package.

SKUs that will then tell people like if it's too high in added sugar on the front of package. But these have been things that have been petitioned for decades that have taken a long time to actually be rolled out. Trans fat is another great example where trans fats, it was known 2008 was when California banned trans fats. It wasn't until 2015 that the government removed it from the generally recognized as safe list. 2018 that they removed it from the

the food supply, and then they gave companies an extra three years to remove it from their products as like a grace period to help to decrease the burden for them. So it wasn't until 2021 that trans fats were actually banned from the United States food supply. But they knew in the 90s that trans fats were increasing risk of coronary heart disease.

and only two grams per day. So you didn't even need to have a lot of trans fats in the diet in order for that to actually happen. And all these companies were Burger King, McDonald's, they were frying everything in partially hydrogenated

partially hydrogenated oils that are trans fats. And this even happened after there was a ban on partially hydrogenated oils. They ended up being taken to court because they were hiding the trans fats, the partially hydrogenated oils in the mid 2000s in their fryers.

So I think that people don't realize unless they really look at the history, like how much food companies really choose their own profits over people's health, even when it's glaringly obvious, like something like trans fats. You only need to eat two grams a day. And what they did is on the Nutrition Facts label, if there was less than 0.5 grams,

you could round down. So they'd put a partially hydrogenated oil in the ingredient list, but on the front of package, they could claim zero grams of trans fats. So let's say it was 0.4 grams of partially hydrogenated oils on the front of package, zero grams of trans fats could be stated. So a person's buying it thinking that they're not getting any. They don't know to read the ingredient list because there's not the education that there was today. You only need four servings of that particular food to get close to two grams that increases your risk of coronary heart disease.

So not only were they not removing it from the food supply, but they weren't adding the level of transparency that people actually needed. And then they were essentially allowing companies to lie. Saying zero grams of trans fats when there is trans fats in the food, it's a lie. And that went on and it continues to go on today with things like food dyes. Like food dyes are a big topic right now. And specifically red dye number three was shown in the 80s.

in animal studies to cause cancer. The FDA in 1990 said red dye number three has been shown to cause cancer in animals, which was why they banned it from cosmetics. You can't add red three to blush, to lipstick, to any cosmetic product or anything that goes onto the skin, but they allow it in your food that you're ingesting.

So they've been petitioned over and over again by health organizations to say, you need to ban red dye number three in food like you did for cosmetics. Under the Delaney cause, it's actually illegal for you to say that something is not allowed in our supply because it's carcinogenic in skin, but then to also at the same time say that it's safe in food because it's then very hypocritical. What's the Delaney cause?

The Delaney cause is essentially like a law that guides companies with what they're doing. So they were... This most recently came up when the Center for Science and the Public Interest petitioned the FDA in 2022 saying, you have to remove it from our food. It's in more than 2,000 products, especially products that are marketed to kids. When you look at like gingerbread houses and...

the some of the peppermint candies all of the halloween candy corns i mean all of them ladybugs crush ladybugs what's that you never heard that in ohio no that that the because just i'm just pissing is the way that you're just saying the smartest thing ever like i thought red was crushed ladybug in ohio they said that m&ms were red because they were crushed ladybugs

You never heard that? I never heard it. Dude. It's kind of dark. It is dark, but we were like, yeah. You're like, die, little ladybugs. Yeah, we were like, that's crazy. But maybe that was the lie by Big Food to try and make us think it's not Red Food Dive, but it's Ladybugs. Yeah, wow. Must have been. Continue. Oh, my God. That's so funny. On the Delaney. Okay, Food Dives.

So it's in 2000 plus products, a lot of them that are marketed to kids and it just continues to be allowed. So in 2022, CSPI petitioned the FDA saying, you need to remove this from being allowed in food, specifically red dye number three, because you've already deemed it to be a carcinogen. And it's been decades that we've been petitioning you and you continue to ignore it. So they've ignored it and not responded for the last two years. And they just officially had stated this past

week I saw in a Senate hearing that the commissioner of the FDA that oversees food had said that they're working towards addressing a petition that was made on red dye number three and that we should know more in coming weeks. So why do they want it in there? Is it the cheapest option? Do they want to kill us? Yeah, that's a good question. What is the reason? Because

To your point, it's just so... Like, it's shown to be incredibly harmful, causes cancer, et cetera. So why? Like... So...

Here's my perspective. I think that it's probably because they are working – they have so many food lobbyists that have so much power. And if they're making changes, they have to have an abundance of evidence to show it. Otherwise, it will probably lead to lawsuits from these lobbying groups. So for instance, the National Confectioners Association, they represent $37 billion in retail sales. So they're making changes.

So they have a lot of power. They represent the companies that are producing the high sugar products, the farmers, the manufacturers, like everyone across the spectrum to make sure that people have jobs and then that these companies are profiting. So the companies have ties with their congressmen and women. They have ties with all of these places that make it very challenging for regulations to

Yeah.

So when I was in 2014, I got my master's in public health nutrition before I went into functional medicine because I was interested in essentially like studying how you can improve population health with nutrition. And so everyone that was in my program ended up going to different government agencies. And I didn't want to go to a government agency because I understood that they were getting funding from so many food companies. So I went to the Center for Science in the Public Interest, which is this

lobbying, not a lobbying. It's a health organization that keeps petitioning the FDA on all these things. And when I was there, he's like, God, won't they shut the fuck up? Oh, I'm sure. They're just like, got them again. Like another thing from them. I'm sure they accept no money from nutrition companies. They're funded through their nutrition action newsletter that they have so many subscribers for and donations. And then they have a whole legal department that are, they sue companies for making false claims. They sue, they petition the FDA and

So that was a lot of the work that I was doing when I was there was like collecting the data. And I was like sitting in grocery stores just taking pictures on my iPad of the front and back of labels because at the time the internet didn't list the ingredient list and the nutrition facts panel on the actual products. So that was my job when I was there. Wow.

But I was at the NIH for a meeting in 2014 prior to the release of the dietary guidelines in 2015. So every five years, the dietary guidelines are released and there are national nutrition recommendations. And then they determine...

who gets money essentially from programs like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, SNAP, and the Women, Infants, and Children Program, the School Lunch and Breakfast Program. So if companies are meeting these nutrition recommendations, then they can receive money and essentially like $8.5 billion of what used to be called food stamps goes to soda companies because people can still purchase soda using SNAP, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance.

So there's lobbying. There's people that are trying to implement bills saying if you're using taxpayer dollars, then you cannot buy soda because this is a nutrition program. But there's these lobbying groups believe that SNAP dollars should be able to be used however a person wants and that it's unfair to tell a person that they can't use their dollars in the way that other people can use dollars. Right.

So they are against things like regulation around the SNAP program when it comes to the bills that have been proposed.

So the dietary guidelines, they set the tone for the National Nutrition Agenda every five years with the committee that's appointed with the quote-unquote nutrition experts of the country. So I was at the NIH for a dietary advisory committee meeting where the committee was there, and then they had about 70 people in the room that were presenting. They were giving public oral testimony on the food or beverage that they were there to represent.

So they had the American Beverage Association, they had someone there from the National Confectioners Association, which used to be called the American Candy Association, the Sugar Association, the National Association of Margarine Manufacturers, the Corn Refiners Association, McDonald's Inc., the Dan and Company, the American Meat Institute Foundation. And then they had one dietician and one doctor of all the people that gave those public oral testimonies that were there advocating for more plant-based guidelines.

And so that was really the moment when I was there that I was like, wow, the food industry is setting the agenda for our national nutrition recommendations that are causing us to get sicker, fatter, more depressed, more infertile, dying younger. Oh, let me just, let me just, so this was all, that was the crew that was setting the dietary guidelines, all those people you mentioned. That was the crew that was presenting to the nutrition committee to say, this is why you need to consider our food when you're making the guidelines. Wow. Yeah. Yeah.

Whoa. So it's like – It's deep. Yeah. It's deep. Well, who's the judge? Who's the person that's like yes or no? Well, now RFK. Oh, wow. Cool. So he would be the person that they would present to? No. So because he's the head, the people that they present to change every five years. Cool. Okay. And they have a new committee that they appoint. Okay.

The conflict of interest within the committee runs deep. So it's about 90% of people that are on the committee that have been shown to have conflicts of interest accepting money from processed food companies and to other big companies, drug companies too, like Eli Lilly and other companies. So when they set the nutrition agenda, it's also hard to know if their own bias is impacting what they're going for. Can you imagine McDonald's just be like, hey, guys,

Here to talk about the dietary guidelines for Americans. He's like, have you seen the playpen? Have you seen the ball pit? It's so sick. That is what is happening. Like if you had a camera in these meetings, that is what's happening. Like the person from the – it was either the Sugar Association or the –

Margarine person? Yeah. The fact that they have a seat at the table, which has margarine, is crazy. You're not actual food. Yeah. But they said sugar should be eaten in moderation because it provides joy and people are stressed and they need something to look forward to in their life. That's what the representative talked about. So I left that meeting being like, whoa, I think my mom is really right about a lot of this.

Yeah.

Wow. It provides more joy. That is, I mean, that would be a fascinating documentary to see all of their cases. Because none of it could be on nutrition. It would all have to be on emotion. Because processed food is a lot linked to soothing and emotion and addiction, right? Mm-hmm.

Right. Well, and I think, too, like that was 2014 when I was there, and a lot more research has come out showing the role that ultra-processed foods and high-sugar diets play in fueling depression and anxiety. So it would be interesting to see, like, what the representative from the National Confectioners Association is presenting to the Dietary Guidelines Committee this year. Yeah. Like, is it the same? Wait, that should be public. Yeah.

Yeah, it should be public. We watched the Johnny Depp trial. For some reason, that was public. Something like that should be public. Yeah, I agree with that. For people to see. Agreed. Like what we should have a say and understanding of what is going on for the dietary guidelines. That's how our taxpayer dollars are spent. So you can add – they add the actual proposal for the dietary guidelines. Cool.

that then people can respond to online to give their comments. And then they review the comments and then they formally publish the actual nutrition guidelines. I just don't know how much of it is actually listed to you. Because in 2014, when I was there and I was working for the Center for Science and the Public Interest, they were going at the FDA and the Department of Health and Human Services saying like, this needs to be added, this needs to be added. So a huge win was like adding the nutrition guidelines

adding the added sugar line on the Nutrition Facts label because that was something they were advocating for so hard. And added sugar in food was even higher at that time than it is today. So because of a change like that, you know, it made a really big difference. But that...

The Center for Science in the Public Interest is one of the largest organizations doing that work. There's not a lot of – you don't get money. And if the food industries and the drug industries aren't funding you, then how are you getting the money to be able to hire the lawyers, to be able to do the due diligence? And really, that's the job of the FDA. But unfortunately, there's such deep ties. And I know like even Bonnie Hari at Food Babe gets so much criticism for not being –

for not being a dietician or not being a health expert or having an MD or a PhD behind her name. And it's like she's doing more for the good of the American public than every single public health official that's working for the organization. Like she's actually holding people accountable and is advocating for changes when it's very clearly documented and nothing is being done largely likely because of corporate ties. Yeah. I guess...

You know, in those recent, what would you call them, hearings or like just with Kellogg's and like her whole movement, I guess why is it making a little bit of like mainstream news now, do you think? Like, I guess what is that like open window? Is it because like the potential of that changing administration now it's for sure, but...

I'm always so curious when things hit mainstream like why it's happening from your perspective. What do you think? I think that it was because of them doing the Senate hearing Yeah, you know the senator Ron Ron Johnson I believe is his name that had hosted the Senate roundtable in September where he had RFK and Courtney Max Lugavere Jordan Peterson and all

of them means yeah and that was when vani hari brought it up the food dies saying why is it that our own american companies aren't giving us the safer version that they're giving to every other country because it's not even like they have to reformulate the formulation exists

in every other company in every other country that are coloring their food with watermelon, with blueberry coloring from actual food versus synthetic dyes that are derived from petroleum and coal tar, which is what they're feeding in the United States. And so that she and Jason Karp had brought up in the Senate hearing. And I think that that was really what, you know, spurred it, because she said in the Senate hearing,

I'm going to Kellogg's to bring this to your attention, to bring petitions. She said that in the Senate hearing. And so that was really what started it. Oh, and they had written a letter to Kellogg's earlier that year. And Kellogg's had essentially said that they would only sit down with them with their lobbying group to debate on the science of the safety of food dyes because they said that they were following all the federal regulations.

recommendations and that the, you know, they're in compliance with all federal safety guidelines for our food. And so they'd like to debate the science.

And that was what spurred her then bringing it to the Senate roundtable. And then she got a lot of momentum. I went to the rally in Battle Creek, Michigan, where she had 1,000 people there, 400,000 signatures. The crazy thing is that Kellogg's completely ignored the petition. They didn't address it. They wouldn't let them in the building, her and Jason. And

It's interesting because like when she petitioned Kraft years ago and had, you know, way less signatures, they met with her. And she was like, just meet with me and talk to me without your lobbying group to talk to me about like why you won't change this. And it was a very weird situation where they had a security guard outside the building, a thousand people there that were, you know, peacefully protesting and waiting for them to be let into the building and to protest.

to deliver the petitions, the 400,000 petitions. The security guard was like, I'll take your petitions, but that's really all that we're able to do. And then there was a Kellogg's executive that held up a sign on a whiteboard in the window that said, get off our lawn. And that was what really sent her over the edge. So it's interesting, as a Kellogg's CEO,

to be that arrogant that you don't even have a meeting with someone when they have 400,000 petitions and

You think that you just can continue to... Like the worst marketing strategy in the entire world is to just completely ignore that this is happening. Especially because moms, I think moms more than anything see the impact in their kids. They see that when they're eating Red 40, Yellow 5, Yellow 6 at birthday parties, if they're not eating it at their own house, they see the impact that it's having with the hyperactivity with some kids having more of a reaction than others. And...

So what we've done since then is reached out to politicians in Ohio to say, if we're using taxpayer dollars to pay for these foods in schools, at the very minimum, you should add a standard where there are no food dyes that will be served to kids when we're using Ohio taxpayer dollars for the school lunch and breakfast program. I love that.

So, you know, that was just recently passed in California where California is banning those food dyes. And unfortunately, this is happening on a state level when the FDA should be the ones that are implementing these changes. And, you know, I think that there's just a lot of – these companies are large and they're powerful. And unfortunately, there's no recourse anymore.

It's like, you know, you see Pepsi buy Siete Foods. And for as much as that was like, oh, amazing, Siete, like, grinded it out and totally deserves that. But, like, Pepsi buying Siete Foods, it's so unfortunate. It's like, okay, so as Pepsi, you're –

strategy is going to be going from basically driving our chronic disease epidemic for the last however many decades and then pivoting when you find it to be convenient for consumers to care about their health, to continue making money without having to pay any financial price or to be in jail. Like really, it's criminal what has happened, especially with the soda industry, that there should be more accountability and there's not. So these companies now can just pivot because they find it to be convenient and they have more

they have more evidence that they can be profitable with companies that care about people's health. Like I was invited to Nestle a number of years ago. They had a bunch of dieticians invited and I almost didn't go because I was like, why would I go? But I was like, oh, I'll just hear out what they have to say. So they're presenting to these dieticians like all the changes that they're making, the reduction in sodium. And I was the only person there that was like,

Don't you think it's weird that reducing sodium in your Sofers mac and cheese is something that you consider to be a great nutrition achievement when it's an ultra processed food and that no one's getting healthier from that? And I did ask that question, maybe not in as direct of a way, but in a very direct way that, you know, made everyone uncomfortable. And they're like, well,

well, we'd love to live in this world that we could just serve vegetables to people. But unfortunately, that's not what people are going to buy. So if we chose to serve healthier foods, they would just sit on the shelves and then go bad. And so they make these assumptions about their consumers where it's like it actually just comes down to like you thinking that you can continue to get away with the same playbook that you've been using for decades. And like the game is up.

Too many people understand now the role that food plays in their overall health, either driving our chronic disease epidemic and increasing our health care costs by a trillion dollars in the last four years because the food industry is just largely unregulated. And they also understand in many cases that changing their diet and eating more whole, real anti-inflammatory foods can change their entire trajectory of their health.

You know, not only for them, but also for their kids. Like we have double the rates of ADHD in kids, double the rates of depression. We have 41% of kids that are overweight or obese. And as moms, it's apparent something is wrong. Something is not right. And what you have been doing in our food supply is not going to be okay to continue because we aren't going to buy your products.

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That's that mom ferocity. Yeah. That mother ferocity that only comes with motherhood. And I truly think that like from what I'm seeing, especially –

with these big food companies and just kind of the, you know, whether it's the Senate hearing or the peaceful protests, like moms are driving this. I saw Kelly Levesque the other day. She was speaking at her son's school interviewing someone about sugar, whether it's like bringing in cupcakes and snacks and cookies and what they're offering, you know, school lunches. And I really think as much as we want the –

FDA, et cetera, to change, and hopefully they will in the long run. But I think we need to be we, just the people. But, like, I do think moms are going to be kind of at the forefront, the boots on the ground, like really pushing this change, even if it's like a school-by-school level or, you know, just kind of on the local level.

level because I don't I don't know if we should just depend on it changing at that high level eventually I'm so down with that and I'm just why is it moms have to do everything yeah why aren't the men fucking pissed about this why is a man of a company putting a whiteboard get off my lawn in the window and that's okay why is it that the women have to fight for their kids to be healthy

They're already doing everything emotionally, everything spiritually, taking care of everything. And now they have to be the ones that are fighting the fight to have their kids be well. Like where are the men in this? It's actually crazy to me that men do not care what their kids are eating. They don't care what their kids are doing. They don't care what their kids are consuming. And I love men. I've never, I'm not a man hater, but what is it that the women have to take so much of this responsibility? It's actually crazy. Why do you think that is?

Why is that? Why are no men? I think that's a generalization of all men. But yes, I think it's like the women that I know. But it's true. Like at the at the protest, it was predominantly women that were there. There were not a lot of there were some men, but there were not a lot of men that were there. It was mainly moms. And then a lot of them brought their kids.

So I agree. I mean, like my husband cares so much about the foods that our kids are eating. So 100% it is a generalization. But I think that it's the moms that are the ones fighting. Like it's the moms that are going to the schools that are like, you can't serve this in our school. Like, I mean, I would think that that would probably be more likely. But yeah, when you just said that, I was like, damn, that's so true. But where's the masculine brain protecting the family? This is my whole thing. Like I...

I just am like, so if you're the masculine and you are the provider and protector, why are you not protecting the family? Why is the mother in that role of doing literally everything now also being in the perfect or like a lot of moms are providers. They're making half the money. They're making some sort of income. And now they actually have to go outside and like protect their children because the men don't take it seriously or like don't think it's valid or like think it's like some sort of thing. What is that? No, it's true. I think that probably a better way of saying it is that it's like on the parents.

Because I do think that there's, you know, like Johnny has a lot of friends that like listen to Andrew Huberman and are, you know, like all about the quality of the foods that they're. Johnny's my husband. Yeah, yeah. Okay. Yeah.

that they're serving to their kids. So I think that it's on the parents really to do the advocacy work, to have the conversations with their friends, to have the conversations with the schools because as parents, like we are always having these conversations with people that we're friends with, with people who want to hear it or not. And I think some people are afraid to speak up. So it really comes down to...

Having to do the work to whether it's the mom or the dad and you make a very good point that it is like, why is it always on the moms to do so much? But I think that the job should be on the parents to go to the schools, to have the events about the role of sugar, to...

to talk about like serving no, nothing with food dyes, to talk to their friends about having birthday parties without the food dyes, like those kinds of things so that you're not put in a situation where you're like, do I let my kid eat the cake and be normal and like everyone else? Or do I like risk creating an eating disorder and not letting them? You know what I mean? Yeah. I think that's a good thing to be like to my kids. It's like, hey, we're not normal. Like we're just to acknowledge and accept that we're not normal because like I don't,

what is normal? Yeah. What is normal? Depressed, overweight, anxious, you know, all of these things. And I'm saying that with love, not like I'm wanting everyone to feel that way, but it's like normal is not a place that I think many people want to be. Like we all want to feel good and vital and happy and healthy. So, but I mean, it would be so hard. I can't imagine, you know, what it would be like to be a parent and kind of go against that. And the energy that a parent needs to kind of have consistent with kids, like, okay,

This birthday party. Okay, we got to talk about this thing. And then you got to check this label. It's a lot. I think there's also like a like a awareness of like the parent shaming that like, you know, I mean, I want to be talking about this fucking all the time. I want to talk about this to all my parent friends. But there are certain parents that I'm like, you know, I don't I'm like, I don't know if I want to die on this hill with them. For sure. You know, and just.

basically shame them. Yeah. It's not even just shaming them, but it's also like the opposite happens where they kind of shame you. And that even happens within my own family where it's like, you aren't evidence-based because this is safe. And it's like, okay, we'll just agree to disagree. Unfortunately, it's like...

You have so much data. I don't know how you would do that. I would be like, listen up. Pull up a chair. I'm going to talk to you about this. We talked about it. It's time in 2014. That's how it is. It's hard. It's hard.

So you're right. For as much as it is like have the courage to say it to everyone, there are people that you don't want to die on the hill because it's such a drain on energy to have to be doing it at all times even with people that are receptive to it that you do have to figure out like where you can get the most bang for the energy spent. Yeah. That's a really good one. Yeah. For people that are listening, I guess –

We just talked a lot about the system and sort of what's happening in this place, which is, I mean, I am jazzed and amped. So if we're talking about someone specifically getting banged for their buck nutritionally, what are some ways and things they can do to really just maximize their wellness and their well-being? Like what are some practices that you recommend, some food, some like nutrition levers that you pull?

Yeah, I think that the first is from a mindset standpoint, really fully embracing the idea that food is our most powerful form of medicine. And I think people sometimes believe like, yeah, it's important for us to eat healthy. And also I would say like I've worked with thousands of people

on every level, like moms, teachers, podcasters, best-selling authors, congressmen, like CEOs of Fortune 500 companies. It like runs the gamut. And I would say that most people that have the most success

really are bought in because there's so many opportunities for you to, in your head, downplay like, oh, maybe this isn't actually as important. Maybe we shouldn't care about buying organic. Maybe it's fine to do this and to have the glass of wine every night because I'm generally eating healthy. And so I think that creating your own standard for what you feel is truly improving your health

Because food, just after working with thousands and thousands of people, I would say that the dramatic effect that can take place in transforming a person's body on a cellular level, but then you see it physically when it comes to reversing every disease that has been stated to be not reversible by conventional medicine exists. And so I always think like if it's possible for one person, it's possible for any person. And you have to...

to really have that belief to consistently make those changes. And because it's all about your, your,

It's all about how you're eating most of the time and not the minority of the time, right? Like that 5% to 10% isn't what you want to focus on. You want to focus on the 90% that is going to move the needle with your health. And I think so many people really are not able to be consistent with a total lifestyle change because they're in this perfectionist mentality of like on the diet, off the diet, on the diet, off the diet.

on the organic off of it, you know, where it's easy to shift. And so it comes down to really like what you're doing 90% of the time and then being able to get right back on track anytime that you get off track that makes, it sounds so simple, but it makes the most profound impact on people who are able to like 10 years later continue with these habits versus people who are then struggling 10 years later. Mm-hmm.

So I'd say that that would be the start. From an actual nutrition standpoint, engaging in phytonutrient consumption, I believe, is one of the most important things that people can do because of the way that phytonutrients, you know, there's tens of thousands of phytonutrients in our food. And this is one of the downsides of taking like a turmeric supplement, for instance, and not eating the raw form.

is not that I'm against turmeric supplements, but that you're only then getting like one specific element or a better example would be like a vitamin C supplement where you're only then getting vitamin C. And the benefits that come from a food that's high in vitamin C is not just the vitamin C, it's the abundance, the thousands of phytochemicals that are in the food, many of which have yet to be discovered. Like we haven't even discovered all the phytochemicals that exist that in 10 to 20 years from now will be sold as different supplements.

That you can get from just eating the whole food right now before the science is even clear to understand like what those phytonutrients are. And phytonutrients are what? Phytonutrients are plant-based chemicals. So they essentially drive the color changes that happen between a red, a green, and a yellow bell pepper. Each of those phytonutrients has different phytochemicals that are driving that pigment change that are the protector of the plant from any kind of outside stressor that do the same essentially internally once you consume it.

So I would say that the more that you eat foods that can stain your cutting board, the deeper the phytonutrient content likely is. So when that comes to like turmeric, beets, foods that when you eat them, you can see the staining effects are going to have a profound impact on you internally when you actually consume them.

from an anti-inflammatory standpoint and a signaling standpoint, like knowing that food is sending signals. It's information that's impacting your cellular function and changing your epigenetics. So not only is this important for you, but also for your offspring because of the epigenetic changes that can happen from the foods that you're eating, where you pass on different gene expression to your offspring when you're consuming the right foods that have these abundance of phytonutrients. So

So I would say that that is an enormous place. Also, when it comes to blood sugar regulation, probably the largest missed thing is a person's overall color consumption, the easiest way to say it, eating the rainbow and how many colors you're getting because what's happening for a lot of people that are on these like

protein shake, low-carb diets is that they're missing a lot of the phytochemicals and the phytonutrients, which are essentially the same thing, phytochemicals and phytonutrients, that not only change our cellular function and our epigenetics, but they also change our microbiome. So they modulate our gut microbiome by feeding specific strains of bacteria and increasing our production of short-chain fatty acids. Short-chain fatty acids are one of the most important...

aspects of our overall metabolic health. So you could be following a low-carb diet but not getting a wide array of phytonutrients, and you're not actually giving your microbiome enough of these signals to produce the short-chain fatty acids that then impact your overall metabolic health.

So you could be eating a low-carb diet and then every time that you eat a carb, see a blood sugar spike when it comes to, you know, if you're wearing a continuous glucose monitor where you're like, why am I spiking to quinoa and to lentils and things that, you know, there is an individual response that maybe you just are genetically and that you're genetically set up to spike for certain particular foods. This is going to happen to every person.

But you'll spike more when you have poor metabolic health. So it comes down to setting the foundation for eating these phytonutrients that increase your short-chain fatty acid production, that help to regulate your overall blood sugar response and how you're responding to any form of carbohydrates where you have higher insulin sensitivity, which essentially, you know, metabolic flexibility as well.

to be able to know what to do with the carbohydrates so that your body can break it down, your pancreas can secrete the insulin that it needs, the insulin can efficiently get into the...can unlock the cell so that the glucose can get into the cell so that your blood sugar isn't spiking and it's not driving more of that inflammatory response that happens as a result of increases in blood sugar. So phytonutrients and mindset. Phytonutrients, mindset,

: I would say also dietary fiber. And this is one of the things that happens with an ultra-processed food diet. You know, some of the downsides of an ultra-processed food diet since ultra-processed foods are the leading cause of death and disability, chronic diseases that are the leading cause of death and disability in the United States officially surpassing cigarettes as far as the impact that they have on our overall health in a negative way.

80% of the foods that are sold in the grocery store are ultra-processed foods. 67% of a child's diet is made up of ultra-processed foods. 60% of the adult in America's diet is made up of ultra-processed foods. So the question could be, is it because you're consuming a diet that is filled with

with these synthetic food dyes, with pesticides, with preservatives, with these refined grains, with added sugars? Or is it because these foods are replacing things like the phytonutrients, the fiber, the protein that our bodies actually need to thrive? So I don't really see it as...

us needing to have an answer to that because really the answer is just to decrease ultra-processed foods so that you can increase the consumption of these whole unrefined foods. But I would say that as far as that's concerned, fiber becomes harder to get when you're not eating –

enough carbohydrates sometimes if you're on a super low-carbohydrate diet, and also if you're eating too many processed foods. So dietary fiber is one of those nutrients that Americans are falling drastically short of that slows down the blood sugar response to any food that you're consuming. That is really important also from a short-chain fatty acid

You know, the same thing with phytonutrients where it impacts short-chain fatty acid production and butyrate production, which is a short-chain fatty acid that impacts our overall metabolic health, which then, you know, anything that impacts your overall metabolic health is going to also lead to a more efficient metabolism. It's going to decrease levels of chronic inflammation and decrease your risk of nearly every single chronic disease. And not just chronic disease, but I would also say

Because a lot of people focus on chronic disease as the largest problem and it is because, you know, 60% of our adult population has at least one chronic disease.

Which is insane. And at the same time, you know, in people that we work with that have autoimmune diseases, gastrointestinal diseases, depression, anxiety, these are conditions that are more likely impacting the quality of a person's health and not necessarily shortening their lifespan like chronic disease. And so I think that when we are talking about nutrition and overall health, that we need to not only factor in like living longer, but

in decreasing our risk of chronic diseases that shorten our lifespan, but also decreasing our risk of diseases that impact our quality of life. Because most people are, I think that it's more generally recognized that type 2 diabetes is reversible through nutrition. Of course, some doctors would argue that, but it's becoming more accepted that that truly is a thing that you're able to reverse.

Whereas something like an autoimmune disease or gastrointestinal symptoms or even just IBS or inflammatory bowel disease like Crohn's or ulcerative colitis, there's more opposition as far as how much you can actually impact from a nutrition standpoint.

where you'd meet maybe with your endocrinologist or your gastroenterologist and be told, like, no, nutrition has nothing to do with this. You know, we had a client that had Crohn's disease for 20 years, and they have the means to see –

the top gastroenterologists in every hospital across America. And they went to every single one of them and she was injecting herself with the steroids that she needed for her Crohn's disease to manage it. And they asked every single one, does nutrition have anything to do with this? Should we try removing gluten or dairy from her diet? The answer was no from every single top gastroenterologist. And then she started working with us and within 30 days, her symptoms that she's had for 20 years started to go away from

anti-inflammatory principles and understanding like food sensitivities that were driving some of her symptoms. So I think that it comes down to also understanding that food plays a role in other diseases and symptoms outside of just the chronic disease landscape for people to really have that level of empowerment and

and agency over their health to know that even if they're being told by their doctor that this has nothing to do with it, knowing that most doctors get zero hours of nutrition education in medical school. And so they might not necessarily be the person that you want to be asking about that, even though they're an expert in disease and pharmaceutical interventions for that disease, like disease treatments.

they aren't getting exposed to any form of nutrition education. So most people go to their doctor for those kinds of questions, but it's really not the person that you should be asking, especially when you look at most doctors. And I'm not trying to be judgmental when I say this, but most doctors are not the picture of health. You know, they're not practicing the, the,

lifestyle habits that we're practicing and really like taking ownership of their health. And unfortunately, they're caught in a model that doesn't really allow for that to happen because they're, you know, 30 patients a day are shoved down their throat and they have 20 minutes with each person. And not only do they not have enough time with that person, but they don't have enough time to just like pee and eat lunch and meal prep for themselves. So it's...

you know, I think that it's just important for people to think outside of the box of this traditional model where it's just my doctor that I'm going to go to for these questions. It's like, you have to expand your healthcare team. And this is something that even like I... To your favorite wellness influencer. To your favorite wellness influencer. To the girl you love on Instagram. Expand your team. Yeah.

But I think that's what people are doing. Oh, I know that's what they're doing. Because they're trying to find out. It's like, we can't trust them. We can't trust them. And then, you know, our hope and intention is for people to find the power within themselves to either just find their center, find their core, question things, figure out what works for them, figure out what feels true for them, and not outsource so much of their power or so much of their intuition as it relates to food. A hundred percent. To any expert. We say that to every client that goes through our programs. Like,

you know your body better than anyone. So we're going to tell you like what our nutrition recommendations are based on research and then on the experience that we have in working with other people. But it might not – you need to tell us, you know, what works for you. And you need to be able to discern that for yourself. And so much of that comes into, you know, like reflection and intuition. And unfortunately, people are just –

Yeah.

They're not even thinking like when they get the migraine, what foods did I eat today that I might not have last week? How much coffee did I have today? Like what kind of air am I exposed to today that I wasn't exposed to? How much blue light have I been exposed to? Like we're unfortunately not taught these things and it's not necessarily second nature for people if they're not brought up in a home of parents who are teaching them how to do this. So it's really on them unless they're –

listening to your podcast and like learning how to do that for themselves. It's not necessarily something that people are ever taught to do. Conscious awareness. We're here about expanding consciousness and helping people find and be in their power. And I'm so grateful for you. I'm so grateful for this conversation. I feel so inspired and excited. And yeah, just like it's so great to have women like you doing what you do. Like it's just

you're so knowledgeable, so clear. There's so much that you're fighting for that's going to impact generations to come. And I just feel really lucky that we're on the precipice of a lot of change, you know, in the administration and just in general with things that are moving towards a better life and a better experience for all of us. And I think my hope is that we're going to have the and receive the change that we've been hoping for. So I'm so grateful to have you. Where can people connect with you? Where can they get more information about you?

So I on Instagram, I'm being Bridget. That's the B-R-I-G-I-D like rigid with a B. And that's also my website being Bridget dot com. And we run the 28 day challenge to the being collective that I'd love to welcome your audience to. That's 28 days of anti-inflammatory meal plans with group coaching and a course that walks you through the science of using food as medicine. So an open invitation that you can find at the being collective dot co.

That's amazing. So we'll have that in our show notes and then we'll also make sure to share that online because I think a lot of the women in our community are like, what is the next step? Like you get so excited about this information and it's like, where do I go? What do I do? And I think we're always about empowering ourselves first, you know, kind of getting the power back in. And I love that they have the opportunity to work with you. And having the accountability is so key. Yeah. The coaching piece is huge. I feel like, you know, with anything, just really having that expert and then also the community to kind of lean on and the

The container, that like six-week period or four-week period you said? Four-week. So 28 days. Yeah, lights a fire. I love it. People, I think, need more accountability than they realize. Most people think they eat healthier than they do. 100%. I mean, even myself, dude. Sometimes when I'm like…

Let's join. It's all brown today. I know. Join. What's the color today for us? This has been phenomenal. The best. I can't wait to have you back. I love you guys. We'll see you on the next one. Later. Bye.

Thanks, Bridget. We love you. We love you. You can go to beingbridget.com, B-R-I-G-I-D. And again, they have the Being Collective 28-Day Challenge going on right now. You can join right now. And this is all about balancing your blood sugar and just feeling really supportive with meal plans and one-on-one coaching, etc. Or actually meal plans, coaching, and more.

And thank you so much for everyone who has bought our book. Y'all, you've made this just such an incredible experience hearing from you as you've just gone through the book and

revisited it has been amazing. And we appreciate you. If you haven't gotten the book, you can go to almost30.com slash book. And it makes a great gift. I need a campaign about like all the people in your life turning 30, even though this is for anyone moving through change, but this is a perfect gift for someone. Yeah. When people give me books, it's so meaningful. So meaningful. I've even had, some people give me books where they've written in them.

It kind of was their book that they had and then they gifted it to me to kind of move through it. And you feel their energy. You feel their moment. So yeah, definitely a great gift. All right, y'all. We love you. We love you. See you on the next one. Bye.