The Microbiome: Mood, Metabolism and Appetite with Jared St. Clair

0:01

I'm Lisa Salsbury and you're listening to eat well, think, well live well, the podcast for women who want to stop obsessing about everything they eat and feel confident in their ability to lose weight without a diet app or counting and calculating all their food. Every time I have a new guest on, I think, wow. That was my favorite interview. But seriously. This one is really, really awesome. Today. I have Jared St. Claire who is an herbalist. Uh, natural supplement formulator. He is the owner of a health food store in bountiful, Utah called vitality nutrition. And really he is just an absolute wealth of knowledge. Specifically on this topic, which is the microbiome. We're going to be learning all about what it is, how it's developed. And more importantly, I know for you, my listeners, how it affects our mood, metabolism and appetite. Be sure to listen in to the end, because we're going to be talking about an amazing probiotic that Jared has graciously given us a coupon code for my listeners specifically. So you can give that a try. If you find that. This is something that you want to dive into after listening to this episode. I find this topic fascinating and i'm sure you're going to as well

Lisa: 1:21

Welcome to Eat Well, Think Well, Live Well; the podcast for women who want to lose weight, but are tired of counting and calculating all the food. I'm your host, Lisa Salsbury. I'm a certified health and weight loss coach and life coach, and most importantly a recovered chronic dieter. I'll teach you to figure out why you are eating when you aren't hungry, instead of worrying so much about what you are eating. all right. Welcome everybody. I have Jared St. Clair here as my guest today, so we're gonna start with a little introduction from him.

Jared: 1:52

I'm excited about being on your show. I'm so used to being the host that I don't even know what it's like to be a guest, but I'm excited to be here. So I'm Yeah, my name's Jared St. Clair. I started off in the natural products industry as a little boy. I was seven years old when I started working at my parents' health food store at 22 years old. I bought the store from them. I'm 50 years old now, so, you know, almost all of my life has been spent at a health food store talking about natural products. I actually started managing the store when I was 15 years old, so it's, you could say it's in my blood for sure. and about 15 years ago, I started talking about it on a radio show locally, and I've had my podcast, vitality Radio for the last three years, and that has been interesting. You as a podcaster know the amount of research it takes to before you do a show so that you sound like you know what you're actually talking about. So over the last 15 years, I've become much more well informed than I ever was before. Thanks to having to produce a show every week. It's been a real blessing in my life in terms of The, the background of knowledge that I've been able to obtain, so I'm excited to be here and talk about it.

Lisa: 2:56

Great. Thank you so much. So Jared proposed this topic to me and I am super excited because it's something I've definitely been wanting to cover. We are talking about the microbiome today. It's something I learned in my Health Coach training at Institute for Integrative Nutrition. I started talking about it. My family is like, you're crazy. But I'm like, no, it is so important. So most folks have probably heard this term, the microbiome, but they may not understand all that it encompasses because it's more than just what's in our gut. So tell us what the microbiome is and maybe how it is formed.

Jared: 3:36

Yeah, so a microbiome is pretty much all of the bugs. We'll say. Everything from bacteria to viruses to protozoas and things like that. Fungi that are not just in the body, but also on the body. So on the surface of the skin in the sinus cavity in places like that, we. Tend to think of it primarily as a gut thing. And it is very much a gut thing for sure. But it's not just there. It's all over our body. And there are some interesting facts that often blow people's mind when they hear 'em for the first time. The, the microbiome itself, the average human microbiome has about a hundred trillion. Different organisms or a hundred trillion total organisms, and about a thousand of those, maybe even as many as 2000 researchers are still trying to determine this are different species. So there's a ton of diversity within that microbiome. And genetically we are about 150 times more. Bacteria than we are human. We actually have at least 150 times more genes in our bacteria than we do in our human cells. So when you think about genetics and epigenetics and all the things we keep hearing about bacteria is a big deal.

Lisa: 4:47

Yeah, that's hard to conceptualize. Like when you're talking about the dna. I have a question to you. Are yeast included in the microbiome?

Jared: 4:54

Yes, absolutely.

Lisa: 4:55

Yeah. Okay. Because there's also like for women, there's a microbiome in the vagina as well, because that's what happens when you get like a yeast overgrowth, like a yeast infection. It's, it's a kind of a disruption of the microbiome there because you get less bacteria and more yeast. Is that correct?

Jared: 5:12

Yeah, basically I look at it as kind of a turf war in the, in the gut and in the sinus cavity and the vaginal and birth canal, All of these areas that are really rich in bacteria in flora basically have the potential to have an overgrowth of what would be considered negative bacteria or yeast, or fungus, or viruses or protozoas, and also have the potential to be very balanced. Then have the proper amount of good bacteria to kind of hold down the bad guys. We're always gonna have things like candida in the body. It's, in fact, it's a necessary component of a healthy microbiome. It's when we get way too much of that, that we end up with things like yeast infections.

Lisa: 5:52

Mm-hmm. But the as far as how the microbiome is formed, the vaginal birth canal is so important because is, is that not the first seeding of the microbiome for an infant?

Jared: 6:05

Absolutely when the baby is in the womb prior to the water breaking the baby is in a bacteria free zone. And when it passes through the birth canal, assuming that there's not a cesarean section performed, then it is getting exactly what you said, the first seating of bacteria. And it is a huge, huge amount of what becomes that child's microbiome. So in America, we do about a third of births as cesarean section, which means that a third of babies right out of the gate are born short on the good guys. I was actually a c-section baby myself. My mom was a little bit of a hippie, so she breastfed me for two and a half years to try and make up for it But if you miss it out of the birth canal, you are starting in a little bit of a hole. And, and conversely, if you're not breastfed, you're also starting out in a little bit of a hole and there's some ground to make.

Lisa: 6:57

Mm-hmm. Okay. So tell us more about how, aside, aside from a vaginal birth, how is the microbiome formed then? as a child, teenager, what can you know? Is it still forming as an adult or is it just, is it basically formed when we are really tiny?

Jared: 7:14

Those are great questions and they're questions that nobody thinks about, but they're really, really important. Oftentimes if I have a client come to see me at Vitality Nutrition, and they're asking me about you know, autoimmune illness, you know, maybe they've got rheumatoid arthritis or they've got Crohn's disease, or maybe they just get chronic ear infections or yeast infections or sinus infections, or things like that. The first question I always ask is, do you. First off, were you born vaginally or through a C-section? How long were you breastfed and were you given antibiotics as a small child for ear infections, strep, you know, those types of things. If we can understand that history, I call it the antibiotic history. We could call it the microbiome history as well, I suppose. Then we have a much better idea of why that person may potentially be struggling 20, 30, 40 years later with these illnesses based on what happened all the way back at birth. Breastfeeding is a huge, huge factor. It's about 12 to 15 months, according to most of the research, would be an optimal timeframe. So if you're under that year point in terms of how long you were breastfed, then again, you probably have a little bit of ground to make up. The, again, the vaginal birth is big, but the other thing that's interesting, and we live in a society, especially post covid, where everybody kind of got crazy about germs where everything is sprayed or wiped down or sterilized in some way.

Lisa: 8:34

hand sanitizer all the time.

Jared: 8:36

exactly. And you see it hanging off of people's handbags and things like that, and there's a place for sterilization. We certainly don't wanna, you know, cut up a chicken breast on the counter and, and let those germs sit there for the next time we make food. But we are overdoing it, in my opinion, in a big way. If you think about children, if, if those listening today have children at home or grandchildren, You can see what happens when they first start crawling and they have access to things. The first thing they do is grab whatever it is that's within their reach and they stick it in their mouth. And that is actually a big part of the microbiome being developed. We are becoming more More one. With our environment, we are actually gaining organisms that are going to be beneficial to us in the prevention of further illnesses. Everything from colds and flus to more serious things. They've even done studies showing that children born in homes with dogs have a much lower level of allergies later to animal dander because they were exposed to it at a, at an early age.

Lisa: 9:39

This reminds me of what my dad called Clean dirt and Dirty Dirt. So he was a, avid gardener. We had a huge garden, fairly large orchard. That was just his hobby. It not for sale or anything, it was just his hobby. And when he would come in from working. You know, he would be dirty, but he would always say that's clean dirt. Or when he would pick a tomato, often hand it to me to eat. You know, it's like, well, is this dirty? No, that's, that's clean dirt. But you go in like a public bathroom that's dirty dirt, like the ground there. And, and I think that when, when we're talking about kids putting stuff in their mouths, like I don't want to put a pacifier in their mouth that dropped on the floor of a public restroom, but actual dirt, dirt, like, you know, garden dirt. Those are, that's where the good stuff.

Jared: 10:27

Absolutely. And a little later I want to talk about the actual type of bacteria we can pick up from dirt that is incredibly helpful for for the human microbiome. And in the finish answering your question though, by the age of four our. Full adult microbiome has been formed. So that's, that's it. Unless we do things to enhance it later. But in terms of the natural process of building the microbiome, it's done usually by about three and a half, four years old.

Lisa: 10:54

Hmm. It's interesting because I'm like thinking about my children and their antibiotic history and the one that was the very healthiest as a child is the one with an autoimmune disorder now, which is kind of crazy. He has lupus, my. My second one, he had 17 ear infections before he was 18 months old, so that's a significant amount of antibiotics. And he got tubes and cleared that up. And then my third one had a kidney situation where she had to be on daily antibiotics for over two years. I know it's terrible. I'm like, ah, when I started learning

Jared: 11:30

history there,

Lisa: 11:31

Yeah. So but those two with the major antibiotic history so far are Okay. I have tried to get them to build it up and we'll talk about how to do that a little later too. So maybe, maybe I'll get them to listen to this and they'll be more inspired cuz they're older, teenagers, adults, and, you know, they get to make their own decisions. So so on that note, how do those antibiotic. And, and foods really affect our microbiome. And is it just those childhood antibiotics or is it all the antibiotics we take also as teenagers and adults?

Jared: 12:06

So I would say the most devastating ones are the ones as a child, because they're super disruptive in that, you know, initial process of building the microbiome. But there's plenty of evidence that even as adults antibiotics have the potential to be pretty devastating. One study that was done that was really fascinating and, and frankly kind of scary to read when I first read it years ago, is the amoxicillin, which is pretty much run of the mill, you know, ear infections, strep throat, type of antibiotic. It's not considered a super powerful antibiotic. More of a first line. 10 days on amoxicillin can literally cut your microbiome in half. Now

Lisa: 12:42

so two years on am.

Jared: 12:44

Yeah, yeah. People hear that and they're like, what? Which would, you know, if you're, if you're not thinking through the entire process, then you would think, okay, if I'm on 10 days of amoxicillin twice, I have no microbiome left. Well, if you had no microbiome, you'd die. So you do have a microbiome and these are living, breathing organisms, and they are. pretty resilient. They, they grow and they they multiply on a daily basis. And so even though we can knock it in half, in in 10 days, they are still growing back at a pretty rapid rate. The problem is what they found during the Human Microbiome Project, which was a multi-year trillion dollar study that was done by the N I H. is that we never really get all the way to whatever a hundred percent was after a run of antibiotics. So in other words, if you knock out 50%, and these are really basic numbers, just so people can understand kind of how it works. If you knock out 50% and let's say you're a year or two years before your next antibiotic, you might get to 90 or 95% of where you were, but you don't get to a hundred percent. all by yourself. There needs to be something done, some sort of intervention or therapy to get all the way back up to a hundred percent. And so if you have a child or an adult who, you know, let's just say as an adult a woman who gets a urinary tract infection every six months and has an antibiotic every six months and does that for two or three years, well, she's gonna have a very. deficient microbiome in almost every case. And the same could be said with a child with an ear infection or someone with strep throat or sinus infections, or whatever reason somebody might get an antibiotic.

Lisa: 14:20

Yeah, that's that's crazy. It sounds like I. I can't think that there's anybody in 2023 that has not had an antibiotic in their course of their lifetime. So everybody living in this modern world has had antibiotics.

Jared: 14:35

Pretty much, especially in America. Now, I will say this in America. It's an interesting thing. So I was raised again as a child of crazy health food store people back in the seventies. And so again, I was breastfed for a long period of time and although I was a c-section, my parents were doing all the things they could to try and help me, you know, build my microbiome and stuff with the limited knowledge they had way back.

Lisa: 14:59

hold on. I just gotta interrupt you. Did they know that C-section was gonna damage your mi? Like did they know about the microbiome at that point?

Jared: 15:06

Not the way that we know about it now, but they did know that that the bacteria, I mean back then if you looked at a health food store shelves, there was one kind of probiotic and it was called acidophilus. And that's all that existed on the market. And it was a single strain. And you think about it, we have. Over a thousand different strains and you know, of bacteria in the gut. So the, the knowledge then was very, very small. But as a young child, I remember my parents giving me acidophilus specifically for the purposes of building up my immune resistance and my gut health and all the things. So there was. Limited knowledge, but there was still some knowledge there. And, and they were doing their best. If, honestly, I don't know if they knew if a c-section was gonna do that. My mom had, there was kind of a emergent situation with my older brother that created the C-section. And back then once you'd had a C-section, you always had C-sections. Whereas nowadays that's not always the case. So all four of us were, were C-section babies. But the interesting thing about about that and about the microbiome being formed in those early years is that we do have a choice when it comes to antibiotics. So as a child, I never had an antibiotic. I never had my first antibiotic until I was 45 years old. And that was for a surgery and it was a kind of a minor surgery. That they literally wouldn't let me have the procedure unless I had an antibiotic. And so I was essentially forced into one, but for 45 years, I never had one. And it's not that I haven't had sinus infections or strep or a variety of other things. I've just known other ways to manage those things thanks to my, my upbringing and the, the research that I've done. So, We often resort to antibiotics way before we should in, in my view, and I'm not a doctor, so this isn't medical advice, but it is certainly my opinion that that's the case and it's frankly the opinion of a lot of doctors nowadays too. For instance, sinus infections. One of them, it is the most commonly prescribed antibiotic in America is for sinus infections, and 85% of sinus infections are not bacterial. So 85% of sinus infections can't be treated with an antibiotic successfully. But what happens is people listening right now that have had an antibiotic first sinus infection are saying, well, when I took my antibiotic for my sinus infection, it worked well. That's because the average sinus infection. It takes care of itself. The body fights it off naturally in seven to 10 days. So if you're on a seven to 10 day run of an antibiotic and you happen to get better about the end of that antibiotic, you're going to oftentimes say, well, the antibiotic cleared my sinus infection, when in reality 85% of the time the sinus infection would've cleared itself. Well more than 85% of the time, but 85% of the time the antibiotic literally doesn't have the ability to clear that sinus infection. So we are resorting to them far, far too frequently for things oftentimes that can't even be treated with them.

Lisa: 17:55

as I'm listening here, I'm thinking. feeling a little bit guilty, like, oh, I wish there's so much that I know now that I didn't know as a young mom. Like when, you know, when my son had an ear infection and he's like screaming like the antibiotic did work in that case, you know? And I was like, yeah, get the antibiotic quickly as soon as possible. And, and now I feel like guilty about that. And I, I'm sure there's moms who are like, well, if I hadn't had a C-section, like I wouldn't have the child. And I mean, that's how my nephew is. He wouldn't have made it, So there's no, there's no reason to feel, you know, any kind of guilt here. Or we just want to say like, okay, if this is your history, let's talk about what we can do. So the other thing is, does food affect the microbiome in a negative way or are there just foods that affect it in a positive way?

Jared: 18:48

Definitely both. So, and, and, and I'll, I'll echo what you said. We only can do, especially as parents, what we know how to do, right? I mean, if pick up, find a parent that doesn't feel like they've screwed up somewhere, right? Of course there's plenty of things that we can do that we could have done better or differently had we had the knowledge or the foresight or whatever. But listen. Raised four kids and there are so many things that I would take back if I could take 'em back, things that I would do a little differently. It is what it is and the reason for Shells like this is so that we can learn new things, that we can use and, you know, use that knowledge to do better in the future. That's, As simple as that for me. So I I, I'm glad that you mentioned that. So as far as foods go, there's definitely both sides. As far as building the microbiome we know about fermented foods. And if you're not familiar with fermented foods or what categories of fermented foods there are out there real fermented foods would be things like kimchi sauerkraut, pickles, but not pickled pickles that are just pickled and vinegar, but actual fermented pickles, which you're usually gonna find at a health food store. There are some grocery stores that carry them. They're gonna be refrigerated, not out on the shelf. Same with the sauerkraut. You can also make your own. There are a lot of at-home fermentation. That are really cool. Now my favorite one out there that a lot of people love is called Jim's Jar Top, j i m s, jar Top. He's actually a local guy here in Utah that I've met that makes the simplest little fermentation container. So if you're interested in, you know, fermenting your own look that one up. I don't have any affiliation with him. I just like the guy and I use his, his product. But that is one way that we can build. It's important to understand this, and I was gonna get into this a little bit later in the show, but I'll, I'll preface that right now. We have to recognize that the bacteria that's in the gut is in a very stable environment. The gut is, you know, always the same temperature give or take a teeny little bit of fluctuation. It's about the same moisture level, there's the same amount of oxygen. All of that stuff is very. The acidity level is the same. Once we take bacteria out of the gut, what are known as human strain bacteria, these are gonna be bacteria that are native to our human gut, and we try to put them back into the gut, whether it's through fermented foods or it's through a capsule of probiotic or something like that. There's a challenge. One is the bacteria has to be kept stable at you know, either in a refrigerator or maybe there's a bacteria. There are some bacteria that are relatively stable at room temperature, things like that. But then they also have to get through the mouth. through the stomach, and the stomach is not just known as the stomach, but it's also known as the acid barrier. It's designed to kill bacteria that could potentially kill us. You know, things like food poisoning, things, e coli and that kind of stuff. Our stomach acid is there to help prevent those kind of things, but that means it can also kill good bacteria that's trying to travel through the stomach and into the gut. What's interesting is that bacteria doesn't actually,

Lisa: 21:54

let me interrupt you here for a second. I think a lot of people think of their stomach as their gut when you're talking about the gut and where the bacteria live. We're talking really about primarily the small intestine. Is the, is the primary place, is that correct?

Jared: 22:07

is actually the, the biggest yeah, right down at the bottom of the intestinal tract is where most of that happens.

Lisa: 22:13

It's gotta make it all the way through, not just the stomach acid. Okay. So I think that's important that it's, when we're thinking about the gut, I think a lot of people automatically think, oh, that, that's the stomach, but it's not really.

Jared: 22:26

Right. Yeah. The gut, when I say the gut, I'm referring to the, basically the entire intestinal tract from the duo. Right at the right after the stomach is emptying into the intestinal tract, all the way down through the colon, but most of the activity of, of the microbiome is actually at the colon level, right at the very bottom. So, So, and I'm glad you clarified that, that's important. So in the stomach you actually have basically an bacteria free zone because the acid in there is consistently wiping that stuff out. But if you eat, say a cup of yogurt or you have some sare, or you take a probiotic capsule that has human probiotics in it, the stomach acid is gonna do its best to kill that stuff. And when it kills it, it's actually. We'll, it's kinda like the Princess Bride, if you ever saw that movie. It's most, it's mostly dead

Lisa: 23:13

mostly dead. It's not all the way

Jared: 23:16

it's, it's what's called li it's a li Bacteria. It's actually no longer active. But it does have what's called micro d n a and that micro DNA n a actually messages the DNA n a of our viable bacteria in the gut and gives it marching orders. And so you can actually get a lot of symptom relief from those types of probiotics. But as a general rule, sauerkraut or yogurt or things like that won't. The bacteria to a higher level, but it will create more activity so that the bacteria, at least temporarily, is helping with symptoms that you might have. So you can get really good relief of things like diarrhea, constipation, gass, bloating, things like that with those types of probiotics. But in my view, they're not the most effective way to actually rebuild the, so like he talked about one of your children who had 15 consecutive ear infections or whatever it was. Right?

Lisa: 24:08

It was

Jared: 24:09

lots of antibiotics. That you know, that microbiome was just under assault constantly, right? And so most likely there's a, a deficiency there. How big of a deficiency? Who knows you, you'd have to do a stool sample test and a bunch of other things to try and figure that out. But if there's a deficiency there and you're trying to rebuild and get back to that full hundred trillion and all the different diverse bacteria traditional probiotics like acidophilus and human strain probiotics and things won't really do that based on the research that's been done.

Lisa: 24:43

Hmm. Okay. So we've learned a lot about what it is, but why should we care? I think that's kind of what

Jared: 24:51

It's a good

Lisa: 24:51

oh yeah. That's, that's great. But why would I care what my microbiome is? And that's what I wanna get into next because it does affect things like mood, metabolism, appetite. So how does it do that? Because we can learn all we want about it, but if it doesn't, if if it doesn't impact us, we're not going to really care enough to rebuild it. So how does it impact our, let's start with our mood.

Jared: 25:19

All right, so the first thing that most people think about when they think about probiotics is not mood, right? They think about gassiness or bloating or diarrhea or you know, that kind of thing. Some people think about the immune system. There's been a fair amount of, of, you know, research done there and, and articles written about the immune system. But I think most people aren't thinking about their mood, their mental health, depression, anxiety. all of those types of things when they think about the microbiome. I get really weird looks from people when I'm in my shop and they come in asking me about anxiety and I start talking to them about their antibiotic history. But that's what I do because it's such a critical component. I will say this if you're listening right now and you struggle with mental health stuff, we'll say whether it's depression, anxiety, bipolar. O c d, you know, pick the, the d as I call it, the, the mental health, you know, disorder that you might be diagnosed with or may think that you're dealing with. Ask yourself this question. How's your gut health? Otherwise, do you also struggle when you eat? Do you get gas or bloating when you eat? Do you struggle with constipation or diarrhea or i b s type symptoms? One of the most common. Illnesses in, or, or illness pairings, we'll say in this country is i b s with major depressive disorder. I think they actually say it backwards. Major depressive disorder with I B S. But it, the reason for that, in my view and in a lot of researchers views is very simple, and that is because the major depressive disorder probably originated in the gut, not the brain. And i b s is just another. Set of symptoms associated with that problem, with that root problem and the reason we know that that's the case. Go ahead. Were you gonna

Lisa: 27:04

Oh, I just was gonna say the gut is often referred to as the second brain

Jared: 27:08

was just gonna say that.

Lisa: 27:09

okay. Yeah. Okay. You go.

Jared: 27:11

No, that's okay. You nailed it. In fact, I've heard a couple of researchers say maybe we should be calling it the first brain. And the reason for that is if, if you're familiar with brain cells, we all know about brain cells, but they're known as neurons and they're different than other body cells. And the highest concentration of neurons in the human body is in the gut. Not in the brain. We also have 'em in the lungs, interestingly enough. So our respiratory system, our digestive system, and our brain are where all the brain cells are. Neurons are what make neurotransmitters. Neurotransmitters are what signal. Every type of feeling you can imagine. Depression, anxiety, happiness, excitement, joy, love, all those types of things. So things like oxytocin, serotonin, dopamine. These are all signals that are made by neurons sent to other neurons to give us a specific. Feeling or an emotion that we're experiencing. So if we have, if we know about serotonin, the most common medical treatment for depression in this country is what's called an S S R I A. Serotonin Reuptake inhibitor. This keeps more serotonin cycling in the brain. but we have to recognize that 90% of serotonin made in the body is made in the gut, not in the brain. So if we're addressing what's happening in the brain without addressing what's happening in the gut, we're really missing root cause stuff by, you know, coming over the top of that. So every, every emotion that you can possibly imagine, the gut plays a role in the formation of the neurotransmitters that created that. So always think about the gut and, and, and think about how you feel in your gut when you're feeling anxiety. Do you feel butterflies? Do you feel nervous? Do you feel agitated in your stomach, in your gut, or just in your brain? Most of us feel it in both places.

Lisa: 29:02

Yeah, and that's a, actually something I talk about a lot with the model that I teach, circumstance, thought, feeling, action, result. When we're talking about the thought, that's the sentences in the brain, but the feeling line is that chemical reaction that's happening because of the thought and. You feel it in all different areas of the body. You don't just feel emotions in your brain when you really get into it. Like, where, where is that? It's, you know, sitting heavy on my chest. It's a lump in my gut. you know, we feel a lot of feelings in the trunk area and it's because I think that those chemicals are being released right there in those, those places, not just from the brain.

Jared: 29:42

Yeah, absolutely. It, it's a major, major player and I have found over and over and over again with clients who I've worked with one-on-one that you never get to where you wanna be when it comes to mood. By only addressing what's happening in the brain, you've got to look to the gut.

Lisa: 30:01

Yeah, and I think especially too when we're talking about little D, what I call little D depression, not big D clinical depression that needs a psychologist diagnosis, but the kind of like small D depression, small a anxiety that you're just kind of like low level, you're like, I mean I don't really need like a big clinical diagnosis, but a lot of those things can be addressed on our own with the this type of of thing, like addressing the micro.

Jared: 30:27

Absolutely. Yeah. And, and I've seen it time and time again, work really, really well for people. We know scientifically that it matters and now over the last 10 years or so, we've been able to figure out how to actually make a change down there that's more permanent that we can really look to as a true. Shift in our mental health by addressing the gut, not just a temporary relief of symptoms.

Lisa: 30:53

Okay, so next as we talk about, mostly on my show, we're talking about health in, in relation to our weight, our healthy weight. And so my listeners are always interested. In, how does this thing that we're talking about affect my metabolism and my appetite? So what is happening there with the microbiome and how, how does it play a role?

Jared: 31:17

All right. So there are a few of those neurotransmitters that we just talked about that play a critical role in appetite. Serotonin and dopamine are two of those for sure, but also grelin and leptin. You've, I don't know if you've talked about that on your show.

Lisa: 31:30

Well, I've actually, I have a, a interview recorded and so I'm not sure if that one will come out before this one or not, but if, if not, stay tuned. If, if yes, I'll put a link to that one in the notes. But yeah, we're definitely, definitely talk about leptin and grilling with my clients a lot. And so, yeah, it has been a topic here.

Jared: 31:51

Excellent. Sorein and leptin of course are if, if people are familiar with them, then I, I won't go into great detail on it, but we'll go into basics. They have a lot to do with appetite, appetite, cravings, things like that. They're signalers to basically tell the body you're full or you're hungry. And the problem that happens if people are familiar with, with metabolic syndrome or insulin resistance, if they're familiar with those terms, there's, that also can happen with leptin, where leptin would normally be a signal that the brain would use to say, oh, I'm not hungry anymore. I'm good. I'm satiated and my stomach's full and I've got what I need. If we, because of the way that we. Man, there's a, a bunch of factors here, but a lot of it is the, you know, what I call the sad diet, the standard American diet that most of us are subscribing to in America. The amount of stress that we have on top of that diet, the fact that we live often in fight or flight mode as opposed to rest in digest mode and that we eat often when we're in that stressed situation and not allowing our bodies to digest food. And again, we could talk about this for 20 podcasts, but, so I'll try and try and be brief. Those things can lead to leptin resistance, where our body is seeing leptin so often that it becomes resistant to, it's kind of like the boy who cried wolf scenario. It doesn't really believe it anymore. It's no longer going to listen to that signal. And so we're just kind of hungry all the time and, or at least we feel hungry all the time. More on an emotional level, a brain level, than on an actual stomach level because the Stu stomach can be full and we can still be reaching for no another bite or two or three or whatever it is. And so that has to do with ghrelin and leptin and when our microbiome is in control. And the good bacteria are established in such a way that there's the proper ratio of different species and things like that, then we can actually fight back that leptin resistance and regain control of our appetite and our cravings and things like that. It helps with the production of grin and leptin at the appropriate levels, at the appropriate times. as well as again, dopamine and serotonin, which have we know, play a pretty big role in cravings for sweets and things like that as well.

Lisa: 34:04

So with the cravings, is that where you're saying it kind of affects the appetite with those, the grelin and the leptin? Like just what I call that actually with the leptin resistance is over hunger. We're getting signals of hunger when we don't actually need food brought on board. Because when we're paying attention to our true physical hunger signals, we can actually get to our natural weight by just paying attention to those. But when we have these over hunger signals because our hormones are out of whack, then our appetite is sort of you. Messed up, for lack of a better word. So addressing the microbiome can also help. There's things I do with meal timing and, and other things I do with my clients to get that leptin back in, in line. But what you're saying is also we can work on the microbiome to also help the leptin.

Jared: 34:53

Yes, there's actually excellent research on multiple different probiotics specifically that have shown to benefit that leptin signaling. One of those is bacillus. Sub Tillis, which is a spore forming probiotic that has been shown to actually have an impact on proper signaling of grillin and leptin. And so we do know not only that the microbiome plays a role, but we now know specific species that can be added to the body that can help to increase the proper signaling of those uh, transmit.

Lisa: 35:27

Okay. Awesome. now we know why we care So how is it done then if we know, well, I've had some antibiotics, I was a, you know, C-section, or for whatever reason, you were like, okay, I definitely need to work on this. I need to rebuild and improve my microbiome. What are the ways that can actually, you know, more than just that acidophilus pill that you had in the seventies and eighties? What do we have now? What can.

Jared: 35:57

All right. So probiotics m might be as confusing of a topic as there is for people. All of the words are Latin you know, things like bacillus sub tillis and lactobacillus acidophilus and all this kind of stuff. And you and the marketing game is big with these things. All you have to do is spend a little bit of time. On Instagram or Facebook or Googling around to see ads for a wide variety of different probiotics, especially if you search for probiotics. Once, I promise your Facebook page will be covered with ads for various probiotics that will tell you that there's is the very best and here is why. And so it is confusing because the truth of the matter is I don't think that there's. A whole bunch of just crappy products on the market, and there's only one or two good ones. What there is is there's a wide variety of different probiotics and to a large degree, they all have all is probably too strong. Most of them have benefit in certain areas, but there are certainly some that I think are better than others in terms of actually rebuilding the gut. That's what I like to talk about the most because truth be told, Probiotic supplements on the market as long as they're, you know, a reputable brand that's actually putting in there what they say they're putting in there, that kind of thing, are going to at least give you some kind of symptom relief. If you're dealing with chronic diarrhea, for instance, you can pick any number of probiotics at your local health food store and probably really make a big dent in that symptom that you're experiencing. The question is, will they actually improve the microbiome? In the long term so that you can improve all of these other symptoms that we're talking about. Some of the deeper things like appetite and that kind of thing. One thing that's really interesting that I wanna mention, cuz before I dive into that topic just a little bit more, I had this in my notes because I thought you might, if you hadn't heard it yet, Lisa, you might be fascinated and I think your listeners will be fascinated. The gut microbiome. is different between obese and lean twins. So if you have two twin. Well, there's always two twins, right? So if you have twins, If you have twins, and one of 'em is heavier and one of 'em is lighter, one of the things that they can look at is the microbiome. Obese twins have a lower diversity of bacteria in their microbiome, a higher level of enzymes, meaning that the obese twins are more efficient at digesting food and harvesting calories from. Obesity has also been associated with a poor combination of microbes in the gut. Now they've even done studies in mice, not in humans yet that have there, there are studies underway and studies that have been done in humans with fecal transplant and things like that for other

Lisa: 38:38

I was wondering if you were gonna talk about this

Jared: 38:40

Yeah. Which is weird, right? It's

Lisa: 38:41

It's so weird, but

Jared: 38:43

else's poop and putting it in your body. I mean, that's what it is, right? But in mice, sorry.

Lisa: 38:50

it. it's been shown to be way more effective than a probiotic capsule,

Jared: 38:55

Oh yeah. I mean, you're, well, for one thing, you're putting the probiotic generally right into the colon. They do make fecal transplant in capsules, which is even more gross to most people. But when you're talking about a fecal transplant as a general rule, it's actually put into the colon directly. So there's nothing. in the way of it, getting in there and doing what it needs to do. Also, you're getting a mega dose of bacteria in mice though they've actually done studies on lean and obese mice and they've transplanted the bacteria from one or the, the feces from one mice, one mouse to the other. Both directions and lean mice get heavier. When they get the microbiome from a obese mouse and obese mice get thinner and lose weight when they get the bacteria from a lean mouse. So we know 100%. We know now that the microbiome plays a role in whether you're heavy or your, you know, optimal weight. So it could play a role in your B M I and all these other things. The question is, First off, it's important to understand if people are listening to this and saying, oh, well then I'm gonna sign up for a fecal transplant. And that's not even right now on the table as a drug in America, you can get it if you have c diff. And, and, and recurring c diff is the only time that they'll actually perform fecal transplant right now. But there are studies underway and it could potentially become a treatment for weight loss. We'll have to for obesity, we'll have to see.

Lisa: 40:24

I can't imagine that it won't. It is, there's so much work on it that's shown to be so effective that how can we not start doing this for people?

Jared: 40:34

Yeah, well that's, that's the question, right? And I guess what it boils down to, it, it seems like with science and the fda is usually how can somebody make a lot of money off of it? So we'll see if they figure that out. And then once they figure that out, maybe it'll be in a, it'll be something that happens. But I don't know. We'll see. Cuz the research is coming and I agree. I think at some point that's going to happen, but we're not there yet. So the question is, what can we do short of a fecal transplant? And, and is a fecal transplant really the, you know, long-term answer? We don't know cuz we, we don't have the research to back it up just yet.

Lisa: 41:07

Yeah. Cause we don't know how long that lasts. Like the person that gets it may lose weight. The the obese person from the lean, the lean person, microbiome, fecal. I'm not saying it right, but they, they will lose weight. But will that weight last? Will that microbiome last?

Jared: 41:23

Yeah. And there aren't long-term studies that show that either. You're right. So I think the studies right now are done over about 12 weeks as the longest term studies. So there's a lot to learn still for sure. So one other thing about twins that I think is fascinating, and then I'll jump back to answering that question you asked. is that they, they also have shown with twins, cuz you asked how this impacts mood. So what if we have identical twins, you know, they look the same. And everything on the surface is. Two of the same person, but we know that identical twins don't have the same personality. Even if they're raised in the same home with the same parents and go to the same school and have the same friends and all these other things, they start off with a different personality right outta the gate. Any parent of identical twins would tell you that, but what's interesting is the big difference in identical twins that we so far know when it comes to The differences that they do have is actually in the gut microbiome. It's about half different from their identical sibling

Lisa: 42:21

Well, when you go back to that first statistic when you said that, like our total dna n cuz we always act like twins have the exact same d n A, but if you include the microbiome, they're not.

Jared: 42:32

Yeah. They're gonna be a lot different if the microbiome's different. If the microbiome is the same, and this is the thing that I haven't read. That a researcher has ever been able to figure out why this happens, because let's say you have twins and they're born, they're both born vaginally and they're both breastfed for the same amount of time by the same mom, you would think that their microbiome would be the same. but it's not, it's actually different right at birth. And it continues to be different throughout their life. And of course it's gonna probably even vary more based on their life experiences, their diet choices, their antibiotics, and so on and so forth. So, but it's important to understand that if you think about personality, personality itself may have more to do with the microbiome than it does with the human. maybe that's what the research is indicating right now, which is wild. Yeah. So it's very, very interesting. And then when you think about how personality is related to things like anxiety and depression and all these types of things, and how some people have more of a, let's say, just kind of a predisposition or tendency towards those types of feelings and behaviors and things like that. Maybe most of that or a lot of it anyway. In what's happened in the microbiome, in that individual. So, and very likely it could, because these things tend to travel in families as well. It may have had a lot to do with mom and dad's. Microbiome as well before the child was even here. So really, really interesting stuff. Okay, so how do we actually rese or, or rebuild the microbiome? As I said, the human strain probiotics, the fermented foods, these are all really good things. Prebiotic fiber is a, is a big deal. Having your meals rich and prebiotic fiber, and because I think we're running a little short on time, I won't go into. Options there, but you can Google prebiotic fiber and you can find a lot of information about that and adding those foods because those will actually, they call it prebiotics cuz they're essentially food for the probiotics that the probiotic can actually grow on. All of that matters, but there's some really interesting stuff that most people I think haven't heard of just yet, and that's maybe you've heard of spore probiotics, you may have heard of soil-based organisms. Potentially these are some common kind of marketing terms. For really the same thing. There are a few of them, three in particular that I think have the most compelling research. There's one called Bacillus Coagulants, another one called Bacillus Sub Tillis, and another one called Bacillus quasi. Now you don't have to. Remember all those things, but those are the big three, and we'll talk about why they're important. But first, let's talk about what a spore probiotic actually is. These are probiotics that are found in our environment. They're not human, they're not native to the human gut. However, you've got 'em in your gut. Your pets have 'em in their gut. Your child is actively trying to get them into his or her gut when they're scrounging around on the floor for dirty things to put in their mouth. That's where these things come from and they're known as commensal strains and what that means, it's a really interesting term. I had to look it up when I first was researching this, and it kind of fascinated me. A commensal strain of bacteria is a bacteria that does no harm to the human body, provides a tremendous amount of benefit. But we actually aren't doing anything to, to benefit it or to harm it either so that bacteria actually is ingested into the mouth, whether it's in a capsule from a supplement or the more natural way through some sort of dirt that gets into our body, whether we breathe it in or get it on food or whatever. And while it's in the gut, it's doing a variety of different things. Bacillus Clai in particular has been shown to release a big variety of different natural antibiotics that are harmful to the pathogenic bacteria in the gut. But don't hurt. the good bacteria in the gut. So it acts like a natural antibiotic against the pathogens. Things like candida and yeast and e coli and those types of things, c diff and that kind of thing. So they're actually actively working against bad bacteria. And then bacillus co coagulants and bacillus subtilis have been shown clinically to increase the body's ability to grow all of the good. Bacteria by creating an environment that's very conducive to the good bacteria to grow while it's actually not conducive to bad bacteria growing. So I talked at the very beginning about this turf war that's happening in the gut. And what we're doing by adding spores to the gut is we're creating a much more positive environment for our good bacteria to take hold and overgrow the area. and fight off the bad bacteria and basically leave less space for it to hang out and do its thing. And the reason they're so effective is because, they're resilient, whereas our human bacteria is not particularly resilient. Again, the stomach acid, heat, all these things can wipe it out. These bacteria, these commensal spores, they're used to living in the dirt and they have different levels of acid and different temperature and different moisture levels. They're very, very resilient. You can actually heat them up to about 450. and they won't die. You can take 'em in the same handful as an antibiotic. You take those two pills at the same time, the antibiotic won't kill it, cuz antibiotics don't kill that type of bacteria and the stomach acid has no impact on them at all. So they go all the way down into the colon where we talked about the rubber hitting the road when it comes to the microbiome, and they create this environment where all of the good guys can grow, which is really, really important because. Diversity, not just the over num overall number, but the diversity of the strains is what's really, really critical. And if we have a thousand plus strains in there, there's no such thing as a probiotic that gives you a thousand different strains of bacteria. We haven't even isolated the vast majority of those strains yet. but the spores can allow our body to build whatever is in there already and build it up at a pretty equal level so that we can really level the playing field for the good guys. And what I've seen over the years is people with very severe what I would consider to be severe bacterial deficiencies in the microbiome. And that would be manifested in things like lupus and. Hashimotos and rheumatoid arthritis, all these different autoimmune diseases, Crohn's, ulcerative colitis, things like that, that the spores are the ones that really start to turn things around for those types of people because they actually truly rebuild a more diverse and rich microbiome than any other type of probiotic that I've seen.

Lisa: 48:57

that's really good to know. So we're looking for the, you wanna look for the spore type probiotic.

Jared: 49:04

this is important. If you Google, and this is just a, if you're a geek like me, and if you're listening to this show, maybe you're not a geek like me. I don't know I don't know how geeky your listeners are, Lisa, but if you're into this stuff and you like to learn this stuff and it's fascinating to you, like it is to me, Google spore, biotic dangers. and you'll see a bunch of people telling you, you shouldn't take this stuff. And Google's sp biotic benefits and you'll see a bunch of people telling you that you should be taking this stuff. There is some controversy, but let me explain why there's controversy cuz it's actually really, really simple. The studies that have been done that prove that these spores are beneficial have been done on just a handful of spores. There's about five or six of 'em that have really been studied significantly. Every other spore and there's a bunch of 'em out there, we don't. If they're beneficial to the human body or if they're detrimental or if they're neutral. We just don't know. And there are a lot of companies that are putting 10 or 12 or 15 different spores in a supplement thinking that, Hey, if these spores are good for you, this is gonna be great. But we don't have any. Real research to back that up. So I have a formula that I developed, it's called Precision Probiotic, and it only has three of those spores in it because I believe they're the three that we absolutely know are super beneficial and don't have that detrimental effect. And there are some other really good ones on the market too. But where you tend to get the controversy is with the companies that are thinking, well, if three or four are good, then 15 are better. And that's not always the case.

Lisa: 50:31

Yeah. Yeah. So make sure you're getting the ones that are well researched. So tell us a little more about that. You do have supplements. How can people get those, learn more about what you do connect with you?

Jared: 50:43

Yeah, so you can connect with me on, I'm kind of new to the game, but I'm on Instagram trying to do something daily on there at a couple of different handles because I didn't know what I was doing frankly when I started So I've got two that I try and stay pretty active on. There's one that's just at Vitality Radio, which is my podcast, and the other one is at Vitality Nutrition Bountiful, which is. Local store, but my local store, we have a website as well. It's just www.vitalitynutrition.com. My podcast has grown quite a bit over the last year or so, and I've got people from all over the country that order from us there as well. And one of the things that I like to do, cuz I'm still small enough and independent enough to do this, we have a chat feature on our website. Nine times outta 10. If you open up that chat feature, you'll actually chat with me sometimes after you've already gone offline, but then it sends you the answers in an email so that you can at least talk to me directly if you want to. You can also call our store from wherever you are in the country and ask questions if you want. That. Number's (801) 292-6662. So that's an option as well. But as far as this stuff goes, my feeling is education is really the key, most of us as consumers. I have had to learn this because I was raised so differently in the health food store. I've been around this stuff my whole life, but most people consuming, consuming supplements have a lot of confusion about, well, should I pick this one or that one? You go into the average store that sells probiotics, you might have 30 or 40 different options to choose from maybe even more, and that's. Thing to figure out. So I pride myself on education. If you wanna really learn, like you wanna go really deep on probiotics, I probably have 10 podcasts on probiotics on a, from a variety of D different angles where we focus today mostly on mood and appetite and metabolism, which are all. Awesome benefits of a healthy microbiome. I've talked on my podcast a lot about the immune benefits and you know, all the other benefits that come along with probiotics as well. Gut health benefits and autoimmune and things like that. But the product that I was talking about, like you say, it's called Precision probiotic. Vital Spores is the full name and it's the culmination of 12 years of research on probiotics. A lot of trial and error trying to figure out what would work, and we have had phenomenal results with it. So,

Lisa: 53:01

Awesome. Okay, well, we'll definitely put all those links in the show notes So thank you so much. This has been amazing, and I think we'll maybe have you back to talk about other supplements in the future, because I think you're right, there is a lot of confusion about what you should be taking and how do we know what we're deficient in. And so that might be great.

Jared: 53:21

Yeah, I'd love to do it. This has been a lot of fun. I, I would sit here and talk about this stuff all day long into a microphone, so I'd, I'll be back on anytime. Lisa, it's been a pleasure.

Lisa: 53:33

Great. Thank you so much.

Jared: 53:35

Oh, and one more thing real quick before we end up. You are gonna come on my show, vitality Radio. Let's not forget to tell your listeners that. So check that out. It'll probably air within a week or so of this episode, I'm guessing, depending on what your schedule's like. So yeah, we'll have you on and we'll talk about what you do as well.

Lisa: 53:51

Yep. Looking forward to it

53:53

Thanks again to Jared St. Claire for so graciously spending his time, teaching us about this topic. I just wanted to pop in here at the end. And remind you, Jared did offer my listeners a 20% discount on the probiotic that he mentioned while we were talking here. That is available from his vitality nutrition store online it's called precision probiotic. And it is that spore probiotic with those three strains that are highly researched and highly considered safe. Obviously this is not medical advice. You need to make your own decision, but if you decide to go with this, we do have that 20% discount code in the show notes. So I would love to know if you try this out or if you have any further questions for Jared, because I definitely think I want to have him back on to discuss supplements. So let me know what your questions are about supplements so we can definitely get those answered in a subsequent episode. Okay. Talk to you next week.

Lisa: 54:52

hey, thanks for listening today. If you're ready to get some personalized coaching from me, I'd encourage you to schedule a free strategy session. Visit www.wellwithlisa.as.me or it's easier just to find that link in the show notes. We'll talk about where you currently are with your weight loss goals. And I'll give you some actionable tools. You can start implementing right away. Before you go, make sure you subscribe to the podcast so you can receive new episodes, right when they're released. And if you're learning something new and enjoying the podcast, I'd love for you to leave me a five star rating and a review. Thanks again for joining me, Lisa Salisbury in this episode of Eat Well, Think Well, Live Well.