The Missing Piece in Your Hormone, Mood & Longevity Puzzle

Mark Hyman, MD

Dr. Mark Hyman is leading a health revolution—one focused on using food as medicine to support longevity, energy, mental clarity, happiness, and so much more. Mark Hyman, MD is a practicing family physician and an internationally recognized leader, speaker, educator, and advocate in the field of Functional Medicine. He is the founder and director of The UltraWellness Center, Founder and Senior Advisor for the Cleveland Clinic Center for Functional Medicine, a fifteen-time New York Times best-selling author, and Board President for Clinical Affairs for The Institute for Functional Medicine. He is the founder and chairman of the Food Fix Campaign, dedicated to transforming our food and agriculture system through policy.

He is a co-founder and the Chief Medical Officer of Function Health. He is the host of one of the leading health podcasts, The Dr. Hyman Show with 150+ million downloads. Dr. Hyman is a regular medical contributor to several television shows and networks, including CBS This Morning, Today, Good Morning America, The View, Fox, and CNN.

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Full Transcript

Automatically generated. Please forgive any typos or errors in the following transcript. It was generated by a third party and has not been subsequently reviewed by our team.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Coming up on this episode of The Doctor Hyman Show. Now after age 30, you lose as much as 5% of your muscle mass per decade. Most men will lose 30% of their muscle mass in a lifetime, but muscle is the organ of longevity. Before we jump into today's episode, I want to share a few ways you can go deeper on your health journey.

While I wish I could work with everyone one on one, there just isn't enough time in the day. So I built several tools to help you take control of your health. If you're looking for guidance, education, and community, check out my private membership, Hyman Hive, for live q and a's, exclusive content, and direct connection. For real time lab testing and personalized insights into your biology, visit Function Health. You can also explore my curated doctor trusted supplements and health [email protected].

And if you prefer to listen without any breaks, don't forget you can enjoy every episode of this podcast ad free with Hyman Plus. Just open Apple Podcasts and tap try free to start your seven day free trial. Why is it important to focus on strength training or resistance training or weights or body weights where you have to build muscle? Why is that important? Well, we have a metabolic health crisis.

That's why ninety three percent of Americans have a busted metabolism or metabolic dysfunction. Six in ten Americans have one chronic disease and four in ten have more than one. Even worse, one in ten Americans have type two diabetes and probably one in two have prediabetes or maybe even more if you're looking at the ninety three percent depending on how you define it. So that's terrifying. Forty three percent of Americans who are adults in here have obesity, which is terrible.

That's frightening to me. We also have a diet of too much ultra processed foods, about 60% of our diet. We also have those foods accounting for about 90% of the added sugar in our diet or about a 150 pounds per person of sugar per year. That's a lot of sugar. Fewer than twenty three percent of Americans are actually meeting the recommended amount of exercise, which is defined as one hundred and fifty minutes of moderate or seventy five minutes of vigorous exercise per week.

Our diet combined with our sedentary lifestyle is absolutely wreaking havoc on our metabolic health. And metabolic dysfunction is the root cause of obesity, of type two diabetes, of Alzheimer's, other dementias, fatty liver, kidney disease and early death. So it's just basically the thing that kills most of us, right, from cancer, heart disease, diabetes, dementia, kidney disease, many, many other things. Even high blood pressure is caused by this. Now metabolic dysfunction leads to certain things that go on in your muscle.

It becomes filled with fat. It's more like a rib eye than a filet mignon, which you do not want. Maybe to eat it, it tastes good, but not to have it in your body. Now intramuscular fat, which is basically what most of us have, it's called being skinny fat if you're not overweight or being overweight with marbled fat. It's really associated with this phenomenon of insulin resistance, which is the biggest driver of all age related disease and aging.

It's also associated with lower amounts of strength and loss of muscle. We call it sarcopenia, one of the biggest drivers of all diseases and aging, but almost never gets diagnosed. We're gonna talk about how to diagnose it and what to do about it. It also drives more inflammation. So the less muscle you have, the more inflammation in your body you have and the more risk for heart disease and many, many other diseases like dementia, cancer, diabetes.

All these are inflammatory diseases. It also makes you more tired because your mitochondria aren't working. When you have this problem of insulin resistance in the skeletal muscle, it can often be there decades before you ever see a rise in your blood sugar or get type two diabetes. So what if building up lean muscle mass with resistance training could help us avoid this metabolic health crisis? Well it can.

Muscle is more than just about looking good or portraying a fitness aesthetic. It's really a metabolic organ that secretes molecules that promote health or create disease depending on its health and functionality. There's something called myokines. Probably never heard of, maybe you never heard of them. You probably heard of cytokines, cytokine storm from COVID.

Well, myokines are molecules that help regulate inflammation and your muscles secrete their own messenger molecules. There's over 600 peptides that have been identified to be secreted by the skeletal muscle. This is huge. These are called myokines. They're messenger molecules that regulate everything in our body and they're released in response to healthy muscle contraction.

And the good news is they exert health promoting and metabolism enhancing effects and they're also anti inflammatory and that's good for us. Myokines talk to our bones. They talk to our brain. They talk to our fat tissue. They help balance our hormones, our blood sugar.

They support our detox system. They help our blood flow and our mental health. Now, many of the protective benefits of exercise in short and long term come from the secretion of myokines. Now these myokines are particularly effective in the elderly. It's really important because they go down when you get older and you wanna build up more of them.

So let's talk a little bit about muscle and longevity. I wrote about it in my book Young Forever. It's a really important topic. It's something I actually didn't really wanna pay much attention to till I was older, but I bit the bullet and I've done a whole effort for myself on strength training, has really transformed my own agility, strength, stability, capacity to do things. And it's quite amazing.

I wish I'd gotten into it earlier, but better late than never. Now, after age 30, you lose as much as 5% of your muscle mass per decade. Most men will lose 30% of their muscle mass in their lifetime. That's a lot. But muscle is the organ of longevity.

It's the currency of longevity. Those with lean muscle tend to live longer. Those with more lean muscle tend to live longer. Having and using muscle is one of the most effective ways to slow the whole aging process. Now what else is exercise good for in strength training?

Well, it's good for your brain. Now one of the things we see a lot in people with Alzheimer's and dementia is sarcopenia and the loss of strength. And that's why in studies resistance exercise has been shown to improve cognitive function and memory in the elderly with cognitive decline. So what's the mechanism here? How did it actually do this?

Well, boosts something called BDNF that stands for brain derived neurotrophic factor. It's like miracle growth for the brain. Now in human studies, resistance exercise for about twelve weeks to about six months has been shown to increase this BDNF or brain derived neurotrophic factor. And that promotes neuroplasticity, which is the reorganizing, rewiring of your brain's neural networks, which is good connections between brain cells. It also helps stimulate neurogenesis which is the formation of new nerve cells.

Basically you get new brain cells and you get better connected brain cells that are smarter. One study found much higher levels of BDNF even just after one resistance training session. That's not bad. Now it also reduces the expression of pro inflammatory cytokines that are bad for your brain. Exercise also enhances the clearance of something called amyloid beta plaques, which is one of the known pathologies of Alzheimer's.

And it it doesn't just hold up for older folks. Right? We don't just want older folks to exercise. Everybody needs to do it. It also works on young people too.

A systematic review and meta analysis reported a small but positive effect on the cognitive and academic performance in adolescents who participated in resistance training and association between muscular fitness and academic achievement. So that's pretty interesting. If you're more muscularly fit, you do better in school. Not bad. Same as reported for university students.

Resistance training is associated with improved attention, concentration, memory with enhanced language and math skills. Not bad. And the way it works is it's it's regulated by the production of certain neurotransmitters and neuromodulators, things that affect your brain function that are resulting from exercise, like lactate, BDNF, something called IGF one, which is a growth hormone regulator, Vascular endothelial growth factor or VEGF, which helps your blood vessels stay healthy. Acetylcholine, which is a neurotransmitter. Dopamine, epinephrine, serotonin, all these are neurotransmitters.

So that's all good. It also increases blood flow in the brain. Now there is something called a healthy user bias so that may be a factor but maybe it's the students who do resistance training tend to be more physically active, maybe they eat healthier, maybe that's why they're doing better in school possible but I guarantee exercise is having a role. What else is strength training and exercise good for? Well, your mental health.

We know that resistance training has antidepressant effects and research actually tells us that exercise is as or more effective than counseling or medication for alleviating depression or anxiety. That's pretty damn good. So better than counseling would make you cheaper and better than medications, often have side effects. In fact, one review published in the British Medical Journal included more than a thousand randomized clinical trials. There are about 120,000 people in those trials.

It was the most comprehensive study on mental health and exercise ever done. And what they found was moderate intensity and what we call HIIT training, which is high intensity interval training, offered more mental health improvements than lower intensity exercise. So workouts weren't long, just thirty minutes daily most days of the week. And I did one this morning was a super high intensity workout with bands and strength training where I also did cardio as part of it because I'm doing it very quickly. And you get your heart rate up like mine was up to 167.

All that counts. Now, all types of physical activity were helpful, but resistance training offered the biggest benefit for depression. Now, report greater self acceptance. They report personal growth, flow state, social affiliations and connections and autonomy in your life from lifting weights. Not bad.

What else is strength training good for? Well, the list goes on and on. It's good for your heart. The American Heart Association recently released a scientific statement that resistance training can actually reduce all cause and cardiovascular mortality. It means death from any cause and death from heart disease.

Now, you combine resistance training with aerobic exercise, you get double the benefits, A forty to forty six percent reduction in all cause and cardiovascular mortality versus about a, twenty nine percent, benefit from spring training alone or eighteen percent from cardiovascular exercise alone. A resistance training also improves other factors that relate to cardiovascular health like blood pressure. It reduces your diabetes risk. It improves your triglycerides and cholesterol. It helps your mood, your body composition, your blood sugar control, inflammation, sleep, blood vessel health, the quality of your life and overall level of fitness.

So it's pretty darn good. And what else is strength training good for? Well, sex. It's good for your sex hormones. Aging beyond thirty to forty years is associated with a one to 3% decline per year in circulating testosterone concentration in men.

So as you get older, your testosterone levels drop if you're a guy. Now this decline really results in a condition known as andropause, which is like menopause, but for men. And studies show that immediately after resistance exercise training, your testosterone levels can increase significantly depending on the intensity and duration of that strength training. The acute spike is temporary, lasts about thirty, sixty minutes after exercise. But over time, resistance training and doing it regularly has increased resting baseline testosterone levels in men, especially when combined with adequate nutrition recovery.

And that does a lot of good things for you. It improves your libido and sex drive, your blood flow, sexual performance. So when resistance training is combined with aerobic exercise in a series of trials, men experience a 50% improvement in their erectile dysfunction, which is great. You don't need a Viagra. Resistance training helps counteract age related declines in testosterone because it preserves muscle mass and strength as men age and maintaining lean muscle mass is really important to maintain and sustain healthy testosterone production because that's what happens when you exercise your muscle, you make more testosterone.

On the other hand, endurance based exercises like steady state cardio don't really increase testosterone levels as much. In women. Same thing. Resistance training stimulates the release of testosterone. It also helps increase estrogen, which is important for maintaining bone health for postmenopausal women.

And it balances the ratio of estrogen testosterone and improves insulin sensitivity, which helps a lot of women's health issues like PCOS and irregular menstrual cycles. So in a review on resistance training women with PCOS which is common and causes infertility, irregular cycles, acne, facial hair and a lot of things, researchers found that resistance training interventions improved insulin sensitivity in these women, improved their functional strength and led to fat loss around the belly we call visceral fat which is really important for managing PCOS because it's really not an ovarian problem, it's a nutritional problem related to insulin resistance. Exercise and strength training is also good for your immune system. Now resistance training boosts immune function, it helps the body better fight infections, it reduces inflammation throughout your body so it's great. And it also has been shown to improve the function of various immune cells such as your natural killer cells which are roaming around fighting cancer and infections and your T cells which enhances your body's ability to fight infections and all sorts of diseases.

It also boosts your body's production of antioxidant enzymes, your body's own antioxidant system like superoxide dismutase or SOD, glutathione peroxidase. These are enzymes your body makes but when you exercise with strength training it increases their activity. And by enhancing these antioxidant defenses, resistance training lowers your oxidative stress levels, it protects your cells, it helps your mitochondria stay protected and helps them from all the damage that can accelerate aging. Okay, so that's a lot of benefits. Your heart, your brain, your mood, sex, pretty much everything, weight loss, metabolism.

It's just kind of a panacea, right? It's amazing. If there was a drug that did all that, it would be a trillion dollar drug, trust me. And yet, you know what? It's available to you anywhere, anytime.

All you need is your body weight and you can do it. I mean, you can do other stuff too but it's easy to get started. So let's talk about how to get started with strength training. You don't have to lift like a bodybuilder to get the benefits. You don't have to be in the gym all day.

Studies actually show that people can maintain strength and muscle with as little as 30% of their one rep max as long as they push themselves to momentary fatigue. So you've got to kind of get your muscles tired. So what is a one rep max? I think of it as a point where you can't do another repetition with good form. You might be able to get the weight up one or two more times by sacrificing technique and contorting your body, but that's not necessary and it also puts you at risk for injury.

So you don't need to worry about the amount of weight you're lifting. That's why bands, light dumbbells, even your body weight can all be effective ways of working out. Now, how much resistance training do you need to do to see results? Well, in terms of minimum effective dose, it's actually not a lot. You just want to maintain the strength you have.

Research shows that just one workout per week, one set per exercise is gonna do the trick. So it's really a minimum viable dose. I don't recommend that low a dose, but that's just to maintain where you are. Now, the caveat here is that the one set needs to be all out. So again, you push your muscles to fatigue so you can't do another rep or if you didn't, it would be bad form.

Now if you're a beginner, can just do a full body workout plan using all the muscle groups in your body, all the major muscle groups one day a week. And you can do more. And there's just common simple exercises. Right? Squats, push ups, we call bent over rows, lunges, planks, dumbbell shoulder press, bicep curls, tricep dips.

Super simple set of things. You might not need to know everything about how to do them. You can learn on YouTube. You probably wanna get someone to show you if you don't know what you're doing, but, it's really important. Now what about maintaining your muscle?

So you just wanna maintain your muscle, you know, basically one day a week for 20, 35 year olds is fine. But as you age, you're gonna need more. It's just the way it goes. That's the bad news about aging. You can stay fit and healthy and strong, but you need to eat more protein and you need to do more exercise, so not less.

60 75 year olds will need two workouts a week with two to three sets per exercise. And I encourage people to actually do more, probably three to four times a week. One day you can do upper body like bench press, bent of a rows, overhead press, bicep curls. One day you can do lower body like squats, dead lifts, lunges, leg press. What about increasing strength and muscle size?

If you just want to increase and not just maintain, for most people lifting weights three to four times a week is going help you significantly increase muscle and strength and give you lots of the health benefits that we talked about associated with resistance training. It's also a good strategy when you're trying to lose weight. Now, some resistance training is better than none. So make sure you set realistic goals that align with your life, break down bigger roles into smaller parts. Where are you currently?

Where do you want to be? What's the best way to get there? Take baby steps and so forth. You know, actually never liked resistance training. I never liked the gym.

I thought it was smelly. I was intimidated because I was kind of a skinny guy and I didn't really feel good going to the gym with all the big guys with bald muscles. So I kind of avoided it. But I started doing straight training. I joined the gym.

I got a trainer. I learned the basic mechanics. I worked, then with Dan's, especially during COVID, and I got really strong, just doing, three to four days a week at home. It took me thirty minutes in and out, really simple. And I didn't have to drive to the gym.

So I think I encourage you to learn how to do this. It's it's critical. And there's just so many resources out there. There's just no excuse. So how do you make resistance training work with your schedule?

Well, I travel a lot. I bring my bands with me everywhere. They're basically a pound or less this big, and I bunch them up and they fit in my suitcase even a day carry on or a light suitcase. You can use body weight workouts, planks, squats, pushups, and also block out the time that works for you. Even if it's only fifteen minutes broken up into five minute chunks throughout the day, just do something, right?

Maybe you look at your roadblocks, work, your kid's schedule, events, holidays. You know, I want to start doing pushups and I just was busy and I just didn't like exercise. I'm like, okay, I'm gonna I'm gonna take it every day. I take a shower and I usually takes a minute for the shower to heat up my house. So I have like a couple of minutes while it's warming up.

And in those couple of minutes, I would get on the floor and I would do push ups as many as I could possibly do. And that was great. And it really helped me get into the restraint training at a very low friction level. Or I would do tricep dips just in my bathroom on the bench. So really simple stuff to get started.

So you just make sure you do a commitment to yourself and hold yourself accountable. Do something, A fast paced walk around the neighborhood with weights on your body. Just do 15 push ups, 25 air squats, something. Just do something. Okay.

Now, what else do you need to do to build muscle? Strength training for sure. And 75% of our muscle mass is related to strength training. But the other 25%, and this is a key 25% comes from our diet. Now we need to make sure we're eating enough protein to build muscle back up.

You need to eat muscle to build muscle. It's just how it goes. It needs all the building blocks to build muscle. You can get plant protein but you have to supplement it with amino acids that you find in animal protein in order to act the right combination to build muscle and turn on the muscle building switch or what we call muscle protein synthesis. And you need about one gram per pound of ideal body weight if you're trying to build muscle.

You can do point seven if you're already there and maybe you don't need as much, but basically point seven to one gram per pound of ideal body weight is what you wanna do. If you don't like working out at the gym, I don't really like, try other things. You can do rucking. It's probably the best exercise most people don't know about. That's putting a backpack on with weights.

It add loads for your muscles and bones, increases demand on your heart for a brisk walk, so it's great. And it's been shown to be helpful for back health and it doesn't require a lot of special skills. You just get a weighted vest or, something that actually maybe is better. You can throw weights in a backpack that can be a little hard on your body sometimes. And just go for a hike somewhere where there's mountains or hills.

Yoga also can be helpful. I did a lot of yoga for my life. I didn't find it to build a lot of muscle. But if you're really aggressive with it, I think you can. Now, does all this sound too intimidating?

Maybe you don't have time in your schedule. Maybe you can try exercise snacks. Now, what are exercise snacks? Well, exercise snacks are isolated bouts of vigorous exercise. You can last in about less than a minute and then performed periodically throughout the day.

Just like snacking. Right? But this is a good kind of snack. Exercise snacks can help offset the effects of sitting all day. Now the feasibility and time efficiency of exercise snacks makes them really suitable for incorporating between activities of daily life, right?

And it leaves you the need for planning and advocating all kinds of leisure time for structured exercise. So every hour, maybe have 10 to 20 air squats, stand at your desk, get your heart rate up by going for a brisk walk, take the stairs, bring resistance bands to your office. You know, do all those things. It's all possible to incorporate into your life.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
I have individuals that I see them go to the gym, and I watch them train. I know that they're not training in a capacity that they need to be. Even though they're doing fun stuff like ropes and battle ropes, and they're trying to jump on a bosu ball, and all of these fancy, feel athletic type things. But at the end of the day, they're not able to generate enough power. They're not able to generate enough force.

They're not focused on strength and or hypertrophy. Strength is obvious. Hypertrophy is muscle I would argue that if you focus on muscle growth, you're going to get stronger, you're going to get more force, you're going to get more power, you're going to able to do these things. And he said, Gabrielle, think about high ground activity. I'm like, Pat, what the heck is high ground activity?

Dr. Mark Hyman
Right.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
He said

Dr. Mark Hyman
When you're on a mountain?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Exactly. I'm like, are there sherpas here? Like, what are we doing? I don't know what high ground is. And he said, focusing on muscle hypertrophy is the most important thing.

If they build and target the growth of healthy skeletal muscle, they will get stronger. They'll have better metabolic control. They will have a better ability to generate more of a VO2 max, they'll be able to do everything better, and go back to the basics. And so high ground activity, and people are gonna be like, wait, I didn't think we should use machines. Our high ground is exactly that, lots of contact.

For example, a hack squat. A hack squat is a squat that has a backrest. Your feet are on something, your legs or your arms are touching something. It's a lot of contact and a lot of feedback. So when you are able to engage in that exercise, you are fully focused on the muscle of choice.

And by choosing those type of things, and that is what we consider a compound movement, you are putting in effort in the right place, as opposed to going and doing bicep curls, which would be considered a low ground activity. You are not supported. Maybe you're standing up. Maybe you're swinging your arms. Maybe you're instead of working

Dr. Mark Hyman
It's better to use these big machines, is what you're saying?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Yes. And it's called high ground training.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So you need to, I need to buy these expensive machines, or go to the gym?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
But think about it. It has to matter enough. Could you do resistance training, body weight, and bands, and all of those things? Absolutely. Do we need to do that?

Totally. But if we are really serious about our health and wellness, we have to put some effort in to do those things.

Dr. Mark Hyman
And

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
I get a lot of pushback when people say, do I have to go to the gym? No, you don't have to if you're certainly more advanced, and you know that you can move and do things in a way that is safe. Because here's the reality.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So basically I should get a trainer to go to the gym, is that what you're saying?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Yes, until you learn.

Dr. Mark Hyman
How to do it myself.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Until you, and another high ground activity. So people think about lunges or split squats. So that's one leg in front, one leg in back. But another way to do that would be one leg in front, and then have your foot back up against a block. So now you've

Dr. Mark Hyman
got And why does that work better?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Because now you've got your foot fully flat, instead of a split squat in in the way that you're doing it. Or, you know, like an assisted deadlift where, you know, a single leg RDL. Basically what I'm saying when you increase contact, you are now training the muscle with the intensity. Again, declines as we age. It doesn't have to be heavy.

You do have to go to a level of fatigue, because you're looking for stimulants.

Dr. Mark Hyman
And what these other kind of tools for people who have injuries, or who, you know, sort of, their hacks to get the intensity without the injury or hurting yourself? Like electrical stim exercising, or a blood flow restriction, or these vasper cooler kind of things.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Wonderful.

Dr. Mark Hyman
How effective are those? Because I'd rather probably, at my age, get a bunch of blood flow restriction devices, or electro sims, so I don't have to hurt myself. Because I have a bad back, and I don't want to hurt myself. So is that as effective?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
I can't say, you know, I haven't seen any data. You know, this is very difficult to do over time. You can't it's very difficult to follow someone in control for everything. You know, I've worked with a lot of special operations community. They use a ton of blood flow restriction and injury.

I know a lot of physical therapists that use it. Individuals use it to help with rehabilitation, slowly loading up tendons. Again, it's not always muscle injury. It can sometimes be tendons. It can sometimes be ligaments.

How do we go in a slow, progressive way to eliminate the potential for injury. So yes, do I think a stim suit is great? I do. Do I think blood flow restriction is great? Absolutely.

Do I always

Dr. Mark Hyman
Does that allow you to do the intensity without the It the risk

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
of The stim suit is, it's different. It's different because it's

Dr. Mark Hyman
When you get the muscle hypertrophy and the Yes,

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
you will. I mean, again, I'm saying that as if I know everything about it. I'm assuming, yes. I've seen some data to support yes. I've also seen rhabdo from it.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Which means damage to muscles. Yeah. From electrical stim, yeah.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
From electrical stims.

Dr. Mark Hyman
But you also get that from just training. I've seen people with high muscle enzymes after Yeah.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Absolutely. Yeah. Think that the real magic

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Is going to be the interface with fitness professionals and medical professionals. The true interface, because we can't do what we do without that component. Know, and I

Dr. Mark Hyman
have That's why, you know, I don't know if you know this, Function Health, right, which I co founded, to be able to test all your biomarkers, we partnered with Equinox because

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
I didn't know that.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Where was

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
my invitation? How come I get it later? What is it?

Dr. Mark Hyman
It just got announced. There's a membership, and there's a whole thing, but the idea is that you need to look under the hood and deal with the medical aspects, not just the training aspects too.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Yes. I fully agree with that. And then I think that the other thing is that people feel like strength training, resistance training is interchangeable. That they could go do a class, or do something else. And I would say there's nothing more important from my perspective as a geriatrician than strength training.

To really focus on resistance exercise, everything else, I love the idea of having a great VO2 max.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Cardio.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Which is cardiovascular activity. Here's how I would prefer someone do it. Do high intensity interval training to compress the time, because sometimes people can't manage the length of time it takes and the effect on joints or even the interest. Yep. You should do things

Dr. Mark Hyman
So how long, just practically Yeah. As we wrap up, practically, much time a week should people devote to strength training?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
The more intense an individual works, the less time it takes.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So you could do once a week super intense?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
I wouldn't recommend it. I don't think that's optimal. Twice a week,

Dr. Mark Hyman
three times a week.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
If I were to design a new lifter, or even advanced lifter, I consider myself an advanced lifter, I train three days a week. And twenty

Dr. Mark Hyman
minutes, thirty minutes, forty

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
five minutes. Shout out to Carlos Matta, my trainer. You should come in and get some push ups with us. But seriously, full body, three days a week, very intense. We do push, pull, hinge.

Those are all actions. You know, someone could look that up. We do sled pushes. We do things that are dynamic and hard that continuously challenge me. But for a beginner Yeah.

They are going to get the biggest bang for their buck. They're going to improve the

Dr. Mark Hyman
most. Yeah. Yeah. When I saw that, it was amazing actually.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
What happened? Three days a week, two days a week, full body. It's not about the time, because you could go there and you could be on your phone.

Dr. Mark Hyman
It's about the intensity.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
It is about the overall volume, the overall amount of work that

Dr. Mark Hyman
you're You're doing lighter weights, more reps.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Exactly.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So that can be considered intensity?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
It could be, as long as you're going close to Failure. Failure.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
You know, and I never believed that until I started seeing the stuff out of McMaster University. I was like, nah, you gotta lift heavy, you gotta But you don't. Two days a week, full body. Ideally, that's enough to maintain. If you're going to, you know, five to, I don't know, pick a number, 25 reps.

Again, there's so many different ways to do it right, which is amazing. The only one way to do it wrong is to not do it.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah. That's a good line. The only way to do it wrong is to not do it. And I'll should hear that out there, because I I I was a late starter, and I regret not doing this when I was younger. Yeah.

I really regret

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
I tried.

Dr. Mark Hyman
I know. I was bad.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
At least ten years ago, was like, Mark, you cannot be doing all this yoga. Yoga is wonderful. Yeah. But come on.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah. Yeah. I know.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
But And by the way, it is wonderful.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So let's talk about the now that we've talked about the the need for training and the amount and all the different varieties of kinds of things we can do. And this by the way, all of this is in your book, Forever Strong. So people can check that out and check out your website, is doctorgabriellelyon.com.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
My YouTube. I have training programs.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Training programs.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Check out your YouTube.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Definitely follow this lady. She's amazing, and she's going places. Like that doctor

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
You gotta read.

Dr. Mark Hyman
It's like that doctor Seuss, but go to the places you'll go, that's her.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
I'm going to the gym after this.

Dr. Mark Hyman
I'm going to the gym, okay. Well, I'm going to a concert. Are you really?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Yeah. So Grateful Dead.

Dr. Mark Hyman
There you go. And the next piece I wanna talk about, and we talked about this when you were on last time quite a bit, about protein and about diet and about diet and and and muscle. And and I think, you know, your perspective has changed over time. We're learning things over time. And I think, you know, the question is really when, what, and how should you be eating to to optimize your muscle health?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Great question. Probably my favorite topic. Although I think that I I might eventually, I don't know, talk about underwater basket weaving. God, killed that joke. But in the meantime

Dr. Mark Hyman
Underwater basket weaving.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Protein is the most controversial macronutrient. It just is that way. And I think that it is and it will continue to be that But what is the reality of why we need dietary protein? We need dietary protein because we need these amino acids. We often only hear people talk about protein as the building blocks.

I would say let's scrap that and let's talk about dietary protein when it comes to each of these essential individual amino acids do different metabolic things in the body. They are not interchangeable. I'll just give you a few examples. Threonine is an essential amino acid for mucin production in your gut. I remember some of the first patients I saw with you, they all had quote

Dr. Mark Hyman
leaky gut.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Right. Threonine for mucin production. Arginine for nitric oxide production, which is

Dr. Mark Hyman
a To dilate your blood vessels

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
and inflammation, You know, tryptophan for serotonin production for your brain. Leucine for skeletal muscle stimulation. As you can see, they all do different things. They're not interchangeable. So then the next question is, well, that's confusing.

How do I eat for that? I would say, you're right. That does sound super confusing.

Dr. Mark Hyman
I think God nature took care of it for us.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
They did. First most important thing that someone understands is how much protein that they are getting, and that trumps everything. If I were to say, what is the protein hierarchy? That would be 1.6 grams per kg, which is point seven grams per pound ideal body weight.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Which is double what the RDA is.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
The RDA

Dr. Mark Hyman
Which is the minimum amount you need not to get to disease. Correct.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
And that's point three seven grams per pound.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Or point eight grams per kilo.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Exactly. Which is also based on only high quality proteins. Yeah. So that's not based on plant proteins.

Dr. Mark Hyman
They're not based on plant and you're saying plant proteins are not high quality proteins.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Based on the definition digestibility and amino acid profiles. It's just, you know, people get very offended by that. It is purely biological numbers. It's not, this is better, this is worse, this is purely based on the spectrum of amino acids. So the first most important thing is getting enough protein.

And people will say, well, get a ton of protein. Well, get a ton of protein for what? Do we get a ton of protein to overcome the minimum deficiency? Yes. But do we have enough protein with an appropriate amount of calories to maintain healthy aging and metabolic correction?

And I would say we have some work to do. The average individual, the average male gets about maybe 90 to 100 grams of protein. Average female is probably around 70 grams of protein. And we know that in order to protect skeletal muscle, that we're really looking at closer to 1.6 grams per kg, so point seven grams per pound, or closer to one gram per pound ideal body weight.

Dr. Mark Hyman
If I'm one hundred and eighty pounds, you're talking about like 150 grams of protein a day.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
That's reasonable. Now, that's the first and most important aspect. Whether it's coming from plants or animals, if you choose to, and this is just protein, this is not talking about where you're getting your iron, or creatine or B12. We're purely talking about protein, not the other micronutrients that are diminishing and we have deficiencies of, like none of that.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah. Iron And they're different in animal versus Right. Plant protein.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Plant protein has a lot of fiber and phytonutrients and lower protein quality. If someone wants to get their protein from plants, they are likely going to need a certain percentage more, depending on the source. Maybe it's 30% more. Overall calorie consumption is going to go up, but you can get enough of these amino acids necessary for muscle health. However, you have to be careful if you are older and you are not highly active than if you if your idea is to eat whole foods, and eat whole foods from plant based proteins, and you have to watch total calories and carbohydrates.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah, mean, you could you, you know, if you want to get know, four ounces of chicken is a few 100 calories, and the equivalent of that in quinoa is like six cups, which has got like a thousand calories.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Correct.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So how do you manage that?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Right. And the way in which you manage it is you choose things like tofu or rice pea blend protein powder.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So you have to eat processed proteins in order to actually maintain the level of protein you need as you get older? That what you're

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
saying? Would say

Dr. Mark Hyman
that unless someone is

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
very active. So unless someone was very active, then I would be concerned about the ability to dispose of the carbohydrates and overall calories. I I would have certainly concerns about that, just from a metabolic perspective.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So basically, if you, like, run five miles a day, and you do all this stuff and then you eat more calories, it's fine. But if you're just an average person who's not doing that and you're trying to build muscle, the amount of protein you need is gonna kinda put you over the calorie limit and end up causing metabolic issues.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
I mean, it it definitely depends. There's many ways to do it well. But what I would say is that understanding that the total protein intake is most important, understanding that that first meal of the day is critical because you're coming out of an overnight fast. There's only two ways to stimulate skeletal muscle, and you have to protect it. And that is through resistance training and dietary protein.

We know that when you are in an overnight fast, are catabolic. The body is using liver glycogen and potentially pulling from amino acids from skeletal muscle, because these processes, protein turnover throughout the whole body has to be going on.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah, can't like, your body just stops like repairing tissues and making new cells and proteins all night long. It still has to do that, and you do that in a state by using kind of recycling protein. That's called autophagy. It's a good

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
thing. You recycle proteins, you know, you recycle an enormous amount of proteins, you oxidize, you replace, it is a very dynamic process. Understanding that that first meal of the day is most important. I don't care when you have it, but coming overnight fast.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So we should be having like what, French toast,

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
a If you want a completely

Dr. Mark Hyman
new store, want macchi frappa lotta moccolino.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Yes, yes, exactly. But you know the evidence is very interesting from a satiety standpoint. So there's a skeletal muscle standpoint. You want to hit between thirty and fifty grams.

Dr. Mark Hyman
In the morning, when you wake up.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
And that's also the same amount.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So it's kind of the opposite of what we do in America, is we don't eat protein for breakfast, we eat sugar for breakfast.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Right. You know, I worked on some of these early studies, and one of the, it was two groups, and one of the groups, they filed the Food Guide Pyramid, which was 55% carbohydrates, the RDA of protein, and 30% fat. And they were both isocaloric, and then the other group was roughly 40 grams of protein at breakfast. It was a fortythirtythirty split, like the zone diet. So 40, yeah.

Well, anyway, it was a fortythirtythirty split. And what we saw was that those that were isocaloric but just adjusted

Dr. Mark Hyman
The macronutrients.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
The macronutrients actually lost body fat, maintained lean tissue, and with exercise, there was this fantastic synergistic effect that the majority of weight that they lost was fat.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So basically eating is to put that in English. Basically eating protein in the morning

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Combine

Dr. Mark Hyman
with exercise. Starches and carbs combined with exercise got the most benefit. Yeah. Even eating the same exact amount of calories. Yes.

Right.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
That's amazing. So you switch from the standard American eating trajectory to a more balanced distribution. And this is kind of where we don't have time to talk about this one. But this is kind of where that whole thirty grams of protein three times a day came in. There's actually no evidence to support that.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So does it matter, like, to get you're saying, like, I need 150 of protein. Could I have, like, a 900 gram rib eye steak and that gets me going for the whole day?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
You'll probably do 70, I mean I wouldn't suggest that because then you're stimulating tissue once a day, and we've seen that, so there were some

Dr. Mark Hyman
Did you want it more evenly spread out, did you have to do it before exercise, does this matter?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
It it matters.

Dr. Mark Hyman
And after exercise? Long after exercise? So

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Great question.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So, like, I just like, people need to know, like, the practicalities of how do

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
you Okay.

Dr. Mark Hyman
How do you apply this to get the most benefit?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
If you are

Dr. Mark Hyman
there's a lot of science behind

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
this. There is. If you are young and healthy, it really doesn't matter. As long as you're hitting your total protein target, it doesn't matter. I don't care when you get your protein.

I don't really care what kind you get your protein.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So you're have cereal for breakfast on your kid and be fine?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
I mean, I

Dr. Mark Hyman
don't know. I know it.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
My kids don't, but it doesn't really matter.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
As long as you're getting your total protein intake in, I don't care if you have it around exercise, frankly I don't care.

Dr. Mark Hyman
That's because there's a lot of hormonal activity as you're younger that drives growth.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Your tissue is highly anabolic. If you are more mature, if you have weight to lose, if you have underlying inflammation, then understanding first, the total amount of protein is critical. Recognizing that that first meal of the day, which is where all the data's been, all the data is from, to my knowledge, is on that first meal of the day. Again, I worked on some of these early studies, and what we saw was changes in body composition with carbohydrates managed. That first meal of the day is critical.

The second meal a day, I don't really care about. It's just to get in that protein, and there should be some kind of a one to one ratio of carbohydrates to protein. You don't want to overshoot your carbohydrates for no reason. And then arguably, one could consider that last minute of the day being very important because now you're going into an overnight fast.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So what would that be?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Same thing. Between thirty and fifty five grams. But here's the thing. You are

Dr. Mark Hyman
And protein also makes you feel full, and it also takes more energy to burn protein in your Well,

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
it stimulates muscle protein synthesis, which is a this is where the thermic effect of food comes in, thermic effect of feeding. So fats, maybe 3% of the calories from fats are utilized for the utilization of fatty acids. Carbohydrates might be It

Dr. Mark Hyman
takes energy to metabolize It's

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
10%. Protein can be 20%.

Dr. Mark Hyman
So you eat 100 calories of protein, 25 of those calories, or 20, goes into actually processing and metabolizing and breaking down and burning those calories.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
I actually believe

Dr. Mark Hyman
So the net net calories less

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
is what you're Yes, And I believe that it's actually from the stimulation of muscle tissue and not the disposal of urea or nitrogen, which are the byproducts of of protein. It is from the leucine stimulation of muscle. But what's let's let me close out with some very practical things. If you are young, I don't care what you're doing. You can have five grams of protein in the morning, in the afternoon, doesn't matter, as long as you're getting your total protein in.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Yeah.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
If you are older, and let's define older, inactive, have weight to lose, or under protein, you are protein deficient or you're eating a sub amount, then understanding that total amount of protein matters first. Let's just shoot a high one gram per pound ideal body weight, but the evidence is perfectly fine with 1.6 grams per kg or 0.7 grams per pound body weight. You're going to ask me, is your ideal body weight? Pick the last time you felt great. This is human science, which is not a perfect science.

Then the first meal of the day should be between 30 grams. Could be higher. If you wanted to eat twice a day, let's say you needed 75 grams at that first meal. I don't care. Go right ahead.

I just want to make sure that you're really hitting between thirty and fifty. Now, does it matter that's around exercise,

Dr. Mark Hyman
not That's what I do. I noticed when I do my morning goat whey protein shake, which is my healthy aging shake that I wrote about in my book Young Forever, and I'm working out at home, and I have my routine, it's amazing to see the gains I have in muscle very

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Let's talk about why that is. This is one of the nuances that if you look at the International Society for Sports Nutrition, they will say it doesn't matter when you eat protein. And I would say I appreciate that, especially if someone is young and healthy. When you are more mature, Mark, you're more mature.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Thank you.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
We have to overcome anabolic resistance. Yeah. How do we make your skeletal muscle respond like younger skeletal muscle? You do that by resistance training and the synergistic influence of also the amino acids.

Dr. Mark Hyman
The protein with the The

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
protein and the strength training, if you look at the data, it looks like this is, you've seen this in Bob Wolf's lab, you've seen this in Katsano's lab. Your muscle responds exactly like youthful muscle. So you wouldn't be able to tell the difference from a metabolic perspective. If someone is listening and they're like, well, should I train fast? Go right ahead.

But now after you're done training and you wanna take advantage of blood flow, give yourself thirty minutes, and within that thirty minutes to an hour, because now your muscle is primed to receive nutrients, have your protein.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Can't be right after?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Sure. Of course.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Or you wanna you don't have to wait thirty minutes. No. But you shouldn't wait three hours.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
If you are young and healthy, I don't care.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Well, not gonna be. I don't care about all those young people. For you. For you.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
No. But for you, if we wanted

Dr. Mark Hyman
to My joke is everybody's favorite radio station is WIFM. What's in it for me? Asking for a friend.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Asking for a friend. Then for you, I would say that that would be a benefit. If someone wants to lose weight, if they have low grade chronic inflammation, this is a great way to help get nutrients to the muscle. That second meal, I don't care so much about. Could it be 30 to 50 grams of protein?

Sure. Does it have to be an even distribution? No. Could it be 20 grams of protein? Easily.

That last meal of the day, I like making sure that there's two meals that are robust in protein, because now you're stimulating that tissue going into an overnight fast. Is there evidence to support meal is the key to metabolism? No.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Well, you shouldn't eat late, that's for sure.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Well, it'll affect affect

Dr. Mark Hyman
your sleep. It'll cause you to gain weight.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
Now, I'm gonna leave you with one more thing. Yeah. Because I think this is really important.

Dr. Mark Hyman
Okay.

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon
And that is if you fail to do the practical, the practical becomes impossible.

Dr. Mark Hyman
You know, what does protein do? Well, why do we need so much of it? Well, it's an essential nutrient because it's the stuff we're made of. Right? We make proteins.

That's all your DNA does. The DNA is very simple. It basically transcribes the sequence of amino acids that are needed to build a particular protein. That's all your DNA does. So it assembles amino acids to proteins.

Proteins are the structural material for your body, muscle, bone, you know, pretty much everything. Your immune system is made from protein, for example, the antibodies, your peptides are made, which are these thousands of cellular communication molecules. It's critical that we eat adequate amounts of protein. It's also the most essential thing we need to build and maintain muscle and prevent muscle loss. And as you know, I've been very focused on longevity.

Of course, I'm gonna be 64 this year, so I get more and more interested in as time goes by. And you need adequate types of the right protein to make sure you don't get what we call sarcopenia, which is muscle loss. And that is one of the biggest drivers of age related disease, and we're gonna talk more about that. So you need to optimize your nutrition, you need to make sure you're eating the right amount for you, and you need to make sure that we understand protein and and and get out of the weeds of the ideological view and talk about the science. So today we're gonna talk about the science.

We're gonna talk about how to up your protein intake. We're gonna talk about, you know, why the guidelines for protein intake are wrong and, confusing for people, and even give you a delicious smoothie, protein rich smoothie that you can use, that I often use to start my day. Alright. So we've known for years and decades that protein is a critical part of our diet because they're basically the building blocks for our body. It makes everything from muscles, organs, our skin, neurotransmitters, cytokines, peptides, all the things that our body is doing to actually run everything.

It's, it's really one of the most essential things because we can't get all the amino acids from, you know, eating other foods. We have to eat the protein in the right amounts, and we have to have the right amount of amino acids. Our body doesn't make make them. Some are derivatives, so there's some core essential amino acids. And we have to make sure we get them from our diet in the right amounts and the right time.

And when we look at the research on longevity, there's a lot of controversy. Some people say, oh, don't eat protein because it's gonna actually activate mTOR, or what is the known as one of the key regulators of longevity. If you activate mTOR, it increases protein synthesis, it increases muscle mass, it can actually accelerate human cancer growth. So it's not good in certain ways. But, if you inhibit mTOR, you actually cause autophagy and self cleaning and the longevity process.

So what should you do? Well, I wrote a lot about this in my book. It's like anything else. You want periods of fasting and not eating, like overnight at least, twelve, fourteen, sixteen hours, and then you wanna make sure you have enough protein during the day so you actually can do the functions of protein in your body, for example, muscle building and so forth. So we, you know, it's not like it's all bad or all good, it's really about how and when and what.

So we're gonna get into the how and when and what. And if you look at the biggest risk factor for age related decline, it's loss of muscle. Because when you lose muscle, you, increase inflammation, you increase insulin resistance, your sex hormones go down, your cortisol goes down, your growth hormone goes down, means cortisol goes up. I mean, so you basically end up in this hormonal chaos of levels of inflammation, prediabetes, it's really bad. Now let's talk about how it affects our appetite, our metabolism and so forth, and why it's important.

So we're gonna talk about a little bit more about why protein matters, but, in terms of hunger, when you eat protein, it actually inhibits, ghrelin and increases the production of a hormone called peptide YY or PYY, which is a gut hormone or peptide that makes you feel full and satisfied, right? So higher amounts of protein can decrease the ghrelin, which is the hunger hormone. It also increases your metabolic rate. There's something called a thermogenic effect of protein. You basically, you know, takes more energy to break down protein.

So you burn more calories metabolizing protein. So in a way, even though you're eating, let's say, a 100 calories of sugar, maybe it takes like three calories to, to actually metabolize it. Whereas protein, it might take 20 calories to metabolize. So your net net calories is lower when you're having protein. So it's been linked to weight loss also.

Having protein in each meal provides a way to regulate your appetite, helps with weight management, helps with maintaining muscle mass. Because often people lose both muscle and fat when they lose weight. And then you end up having a slower metabolism, which people say, Oh geez, I don't know why I lost weight. And I have to eat less because if I eat a little more, I gain weight. Or people are overweight and say, I don't really eat that much.

And sometimes that's true because they lost so much muscle, their metabolism is so slow that they can't burn the calories. So the protein is critical and your muscle burns a lot of calories. It Actually burns about seven times as much calories as fat. So the more muscle you have, the more calories you burn, the easier it is to maintain your weight. And then analysis, for example, in 2020 found that a high protein diet can increase weight loss and help the weight stay off and prevent obesity and and various related diseases.

So that's really important. Also, you know, the the the requirements that the, government has, the, Recommended Dietary Allowance or RDAA or ID RDI, reference dietary intakes. They change the terminology all the time. But essentially, we're told that we need about point eight grams per kilo of protein. Now how do they come up with that number?

Well, that number is based on how much protein do you need to not get a deficiency disease. In other words, how much protein do need to not get quasi or corps or marasmus, which are these protein deficiency diseases. And, and that's not that much, right? So it's not the amount we need for optimal health. And people go, Oh, I don't eat more than point eight grams per kilo.

Well, no, that's the floor for most people. So what do we actually need? Depends on your activity level, how much strength training you do, your life goals, and your age. But as we age, we don't actually build muscle as easily. We have something called anabolic resistance.

So we actually need more protein as we get older. I tell a story in my book about Emma Morano, my book Young Forever. She was 117 years old when she died. When she was in her nineties, was starting to get frail and her doctor told her to eat, I think 150 grams of, of meat a day, which sounds like a lot, but it actually, it's not as much as you think. And, and she was fine and she got strong again and she ended up living to 117 years old.

So, I think, you know, we have to kinda look at that and go, wait, go, maybe maybe they're onto something. So the, the amount we need is probably more like up to a gram per pound, or one point six or even up to two grams per kilo, in a day. And that may seem like a lot, but there's a way to do it, and it's not as much as we think. For example, you know, a small, you know, chicken breast, like four ounces, which is not that much. It's probably like half of what people normally eat, is is actually 40 grams of protein, almost 40 grams of protein.

So that that's important to understand. You don't have to have huge amounts of of steaks or meat or anything like that. It's really relatively small amounts that gives you a big bang for your buck. Now here's here's another really important point. Quality matters.

Not all protein is the same, just as not all fat is the same or carbs are the same. Broccoli is a carb, but so is Coca Cola. Right? Trans fat or Crisco is fat, and so is omega three fats, but they have profoundly or olive oil. They have profoundly different effects on the body.

Same thing with protein. Not all protein is equal. Now part of the problem is right now, I think people think that eating meat is bad for your health and bad for the planet. I've written a lot about this. I've talked a lot about it.

I I think it's a complicated subject. But from a health perspective, the data just isn't there to show that meat is bad for your health. It really is not. When you look at these population studies, they're confounded, there's problems with them. And, there's been a lot of reviews of this.

I go into it in-depth in a number of my books, including Food, What the Egg Should I Eat and The Pegan Diet. You wanna read more about it, we'll we'll link to those. But I think it's it's, it's a whole another podcast to get into that conversation. But the the reality is that that when you, for example, for example, look at meat eaters and vegetarians who shop in health food stores, and they did a study of 11,000 people. They found that their risk for death was reduced in half by for both groups.

It's not the meat. It's what you're eating it with. If you're having, you know, hamburger, fries, and a Coke, it's different than having, you know, a grass fed piece of meat with tons of veggies. For example, when I have a grass fed steak, or a regenerative steak, I'll I'll have like three or four different vegetable dishes. So I have a lot of phytochemicals.

I don't need a ton of sugar and starch with it, and it's a very different kind of, approach. Now industrial meat is not good, so we should not be eating feedlot meat, we should not be eating industrial agricultural products. And and, you know, when you have, industrial meat, it's got hormones, antibiotics, they feed it, you know, grain and soy and so forth, because they're not used to their diet and they get different types of fats and more inflammatory process, but grass fed meat is far superior. And so is, regenerative meat. Regenerative is way better.

And there's a company called Force of Nature, which you can go on forceofnature.com. I I don't have any financial ties to them, but they're they're a great resource for finding regeneratively raised meat from around the world that actually is delicious, whether it's venison, bison, beef. And it's it's amazing because they're raised in their natural environments. They have higher levels of omega-three fats. They have higher levels of minerals, higher levels of antioxidants, and it's powerful.

So, also if you're eating fish, and you want to eat fish, yeah, I know wild caught fish can be great, but there's also regenerative fish that can be, regeneratively farmed, which again is unusual, but fish is delicious. Another company called Setopia. Fish, we'll put that in the show notes. Again, no relationship to them, but I just love their products. And, and, here, here's the other part about protein.

You know, if you're a vegan, it's it's problematic because not all protein has the same types of amino acids. And one of the things in in, in, building protein in your body that's so important in activating muscle synthesis and protein synthesis for muscle is an amino acid called leucine. And leucine is very low in plant proteins. Now you can get enough, but you have to eat a lot. In other words, eat, to get enough of the same you get, for example, in four ounces of chicken, you'd need like two cups of beans or six cups of rice or four cups of quinoa.

It's a lot. So you can't really eat that much. It's very tough to get the right amounts of leucine unless you supplement. Now, if you want to be a vegan and you're committed to that, you have to optimize your health by adding certain amino acids. And you can do that.

You can make smoothies, you can put in branched chain amino acids, you can, you know, have, make sure you have the leucine you need. It's doable, but it's a lot harder. And you, you see often as, as people, stay on a vegan diet, they tend to have muscle loss. And that's, that's a big concern, particularly as we age. So make sure you're getting, you know, plenty of the right kinds of protein, you're supplementing with amino acids, and, and, consider, you know, maybe even becoming a vegetarian and having grass fed, goat whey for example, which is a really great source of protein, which I use.

So let's talk about how we can get more more protein in diet. What's what are a few ways to get more protein? Well, it's not hard if you actually know what you're doing and you have a plan, you think about it. First is and this is a really important thing. You wanna get at least 30 to 40 grams of protein per meal.

And and usually, you know, you can think about for for your size, the palm size of of a piece of protein is probably what you need. So I'm six three, a hundred and eighty pounds. It's different than if some five'two and you know, one hundred and ten pounds, right? So we need different amounts depending on our size, but basically whatever your size of your pump is a, is really a good amount. And, and you can focus on, you know, things like four ounces of chicken, four ounces of meat, you know, probably more like six ounces of fish because it's the lower.

And you can use whey protein, I like goat whey really, it's a powerful whey protein that doesn't have as much allergenic properties where you can get regeneratively raised grass fed goat whey, a two cows, a little harder to find. So, basically, you wanna make sure you get adequate protein. Now it can be any of those things I just mentioned. For example, for lunch, I grab some a can or two of sardines. It's really easy.

It doesn't have to be that hard. And the other thing is when you eat what. For example, if, if you eat sugar and starch at the beginning of your meal, for example, you go to a restaurant, they give you bread, basket and wine, the worst thing you could possibly do. You wanna eat protein and fat before you eat starch and any carbohydrates, because it blunts the effect of the absorption and insulin secretion, which leads to sort of less weight gain and more, more feeling full and so forth. So you wanna make sure you start with protein in your meal.

And then the last thing is, you know, we have the worst breakfast in America, and the most important time to eat protein is on a fasted state. So it's not just the fasting that works to help your body, right? When you've had this overnight fast of, you know, twelve, fourteen, sixteen hours, you activate something called autophagy, which is a process of self cleaning and repair. But what matters also is what you eat after. Right?

If you have the typical American breakfast, which is basically sugar for breakfast, cereal, muffins, bagels, pancakes, and then I could go on and on. You know, Pop Tarts even. Used to eat Pop Tarts for breakfast. That's okay. It's it's amazing.

I'm still as healthy as I am. You wanna not eat sugar for breakfast. You want protein for breakfast. And and and you want a good load of protein. And when you refeed is when you activate muscle synthesis, activate stem cell production, produce all sorts of important benefits that are downstream from eating protein in the morning.

So make sure you have at least thirty, forty, even 50 grams depending on your size of protein in the morning. If you love this podcast, please share it with someone else you think would also enjoy it. Don't forget, there's a way to listen completely ad free. With Hyman Plus on Apple Podcasts, you can enjoy every episode without any breaks. Just open Apple Podcasts and tap try free to start your seven day free trial.

You can find me on all social media channels at Doctor Mark Hyman. Please reach out. I'd love to hear your comments and questions. Don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe to the Doctor Hyman Show wherever you get your podcasts. And don't forget to check out my YouTube channel at Doctor Mark Hyman for video versions of this podcast and more. Thank you so much again for tuning in. We'll see you next time on the Doctor Hyman show. This podcast is separate from my clinical practice at the Ultra Wellness Center. My work at Cleveland Clinic and Function Health, where I am chief medical officer. This podcast represents my opinions and my guests' opinions. Neither myself nor the podcast endorses the views or statements of my guests.

This podcast is for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional care by a doctor or other qualified medical professional. Professional. This podcast is provided with the understanding that it does not constitute medical or other professional advice or services. If you're looking for help in your journey, please seek out a qualified medical practitioner. And if you're looking for a functional medicine practitioner, visit my clinic, the Ultra Wellness Center at ultrawellnesscenter.com and request to become a patient.

It's important to have someone in your corner who is a trained, licensed health care practitioner and can help you make changes, especially when it comes to your health. This podcast is free as part of my mission to bring practical ways of improve