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Here is a transcript of the interview above I did with Dr. Daniel Nuzum and Dr. Raj Banerjee and please let us know your thoughts in the comments below!

Using the healing secret of Hippocrates, how restoring your gut microbiome restores the health of your body and mind.

Today, I want to help you take a huge step towards healing your brain, your digestion, and your autoimmunity. And we're going to do that by going straight to the root of the problem. The root of mental and autoimmune issues.

And, as you're about to see, if you want to find healing from conditions like depression, anxiety, autoimmune issues, digestive issues, and fatigue, many times the solution is as simple as healing your gut.

And that's because your gut is a host to 70% of your immune cells. And science has discovered that our gut microbiome, or intestinal flora, has more than a billion neurotransmitters that regulate our moods, our mental health, and our behavior.

So much so that scientists have named our gut the second brain. This is fascinating. Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine, already knew this huge secret of human health, more than 2,000 years ago. He was the first to say that all disease begins in the gut. And now science backs up his vision.

In our gut, we have a super complex system, working as a performant computer, that actually communicates with our brains and our immune systems every single moment. It controls your mood, your hormones, and how well your brain works.

And just to give you one example: gut health connects to depression in a profound way. More specifically, your microbiota creates different chemicals and hormones that are identical to the one your brain creates to regulate mood, appetite, and immunity.

For example, our happy hormone, known as serotonin, and our pleasure hormone, known as dopamine, are produced in the gut. Once you regulate serotonin and dopamine, you crack the code of managing your mood and reliving anxiety and depression.

And that's only one part of the great role our gut plays in our overall health. Our gut's health is increasingly connected with autoimmune diseases, like multiple sclerosis, and rheumatoid arthritis, and also Alzheimer's and dementia.

Why? It turns out that more than 70% of our immune system lives in the gut. Your gut bacteria is what helps your immune system cells, called T, to develop. And these smart cells actually teach your immune system to differentiate between a bad substance, which needs to be eliminated, and our body's own tissue.

And, if you think about it, autoimmune issues are nothing more than a bad message that got to the T-cells, that have been instructed to attack our own bodies rather than a dangerous substance. So if you're suffering from autoimmune issues, these T-cells need to work properly. And that's what can happen once the gut is restored. Immunity gets restored too.

And the place you gotta start is with your diet. There's just no way around it. The challenge is, for most people, is that we're all under so much stress. And we know that with stress it causes havoc in the body.

We have these two different systems in the body. We have the parasympathetic nervous system, which is designed to relax things. And so this part of the nervous system is also part of the autonomic nervous system that runs everything. We don't have to think about digesting our food. We have the capability to digest our food. We have the cells that contact food being renewed every five minutes. We have a new liver every six weeks.

We don't have to think about these processes. We don't have to think about, when we go outside on a hot day, to break out in a sweat. Our body knows to do that to cool us off.

But when we get under too much stress, what happens is: the sympathetic nervous system takes over, and it creates all this tension in the body, and it starts to sabotage the body's ability to self-regulate itself.

So this homeostatic process that we have, the hypothalamus, the pituitary, the adrenals, this HPA axis that's able to regulate these different systems in the body, when it gets under too much stress, then you start to see that the systems that it regulates, including your digestive system, starts to have problems.

And when you start to have problems with your digestive system, that really is the beginning of poor health. People don't realize that. We're all told that you are what you eat. And that's true. I mean, what you eat, those chemicals, those vitamins, minerals, amino acids, essential fatty acids, those enzymes, those nutrients, turn into the hormones that make our brain chemicals that control: are we happy, are we sad?

But once this starts to break down, and you get problems with your ability to ... You know, when you eat, you take food in, what should happen is the food goes down into the stomach, and then it is starting to be broken down by hydrochloric acid, stomach acid, that then breaks down the food, and that initiates the pancreas, then, to release digestive enzymes to start to further break the food down.

But so many people have been under stress for so long, they deplete their stomach acid because of all the stress. And when that happens, we see people who are trying to eat healthy, but they can't even break down the food.

And what complicates that is people are taking prescription medications, 'cause they're told they have too much stomach acid, that's why they have reflux, or GERD. And when they take those medications, it actually blocks the ability of the body to absorb B12, or thiamine.

Unfortunately, though, with us being so bombarded with stress, we see that this whole system becomes compromised. I really believe that the place to start, to get healthy, and to stay healthy, is you've got to change your diet to change your diet to eat healthier.

But at the same time, Johnathan, I think you've gotta take ... At this point, for most people, you're gonna have to add some supplements to help you do that. Digestive enzymes. People are walking around with detoxification issues. Heavy metals. Fatty liver, maybe, from carrying around too much weight. Or maybe have elevated liver enzymes from taking medications.

In my practice, unfortunately, my patients, when they start with me, may be taking half a dozen to a dozen drugs in the beginning, until I can get them healthier, and get them off those medications.

And they have liver detoxification issues that have to be addressed. So you wanna start with diet, but I don't think that is the end-all, be-all. I think there's other things that you have to do to be able to get over the hurdle, to get back to good health.

Beneficial or friendly bacteria should make up about 85 to 90% of your total gut flora. But for many reasons, including diet, stress, antibiotic use, and other factors, the ratio can become skewed.

The first supplement you need is probiotic supplement. Taking this supplement can help maintain healthy gut flora, which directly benefits our mental health and immunity.

You cannot heal a gut without probiotics. You have to have those probiotics. Without probiotics, you'll just spin your wheels, okay? You'll spend lots of money, lots of time, lots of effort, and stay in the same situation.

It's the probiotics that get into the gut, and actually fix it, and keep it fixed, okay? If we don't recolonize the gut wall with the proper microbes, the gut wall will always stay irritated, okay? You'll reduce inflammation, and then it'll get irritated again. You'll reduce inflammation, get irritated again. All right?

And so it just becomes a cycle. And so if you actually wanna break that cycle: rotation diet, digestive enzymes, natural anti-inflammatories, and then, finally, probiotics.

Those are the things that will be the greatest. Okay, if I was to, regardless of what particular type of autoimmune condition someone was dealing with ... This would be the protocol that I would recommend for anybody with any type of autoimmune disorder.

There's more that would need to be done. There's detoxification that has to happen, okay? As long as there's accumulated waste in your body, that waste is a pro-inflammatory substance, and anybody with a autoimmune disorder cannot afford to have inflammation in their body. They have to remove inflammation.

Do you believe that digestive enzymes and probiotics in, say, two separate supplements do well together?

You wanna separate them.

'Cause you don't wanna take probiotics when you're trying to digest. 'Cause it's a numbers game at that point. You wanna take the probiotics, you wanna make sure you don't kill them off. So you don't really want your digestion to be happening at that point.

Got it. So how much time would you take between your probiotic supplement and your digestive enzymes?

I tell people either one hour before food, or two hours after food.

For the probiotic?

Yeah. So empty stomach, basically.

And then what about with the digestive enzyme?

Depends on the digestive enzyme.

But, generally, a digestive enzyme goes close to a meal, and probiotic goes outside of a meal?

Exactly.

Got it. And so that's a pretty safe measuring stick for most people.

Yeah, and, again, I try to keep things simple for most people. So if they're doing probiotics, I just say, "Do it on an empty stomach." If you're taking any kind of digestive enzyme, do it with your food.

Pretty simple.

And some people forget to take it before, if they need to, but at least do it with your food.

One of the things that probiotics do, they don't just colonize the gut and help us absorb our food. They cultivate the gut wall, okay? So, as they colonize, they take and mark their area, and they cultivate that, much like we would cultivate our lawn, okay? If you have a house, and you have a lawn, if you want a nice lawn, it takes some cultivation. You gotta work with it.

And that's what probiotics do with our gut. And so what we have to do is remove all the garbage outta the way, so they can do that. And that's what detox is.

Those are the basic steps, okay? So detoxification, particularly gut detoxing. So get as much inflammation out of the gut, as many irritants out of the gut as possible. We reduce the quantity of the irritation in our gut through detoxing.

And then we have to deal with infections. We gotta deal with what else is living in our gut that shouldn't be living in there, okay? First we gotta remove their food supply, by detoxifying wastes, eliminating waste. Second, we have to eliminate infections.

Once those infections are gone, we can very effectively start eliminating chemicals, and heavy metals, and those types of things, but while we're doing that heavy metal detoxing, and chemical detoxing, we need to be reestablishing gut health with probiotics, with enzymes, and things like that.

Detox programs ... Jonno's got a good detox program. That is where you have to start with 90% of your digestive health issues, okay? So gut issues have to start with detox.

Now, we have people that have inflammatory bowel issues, where their problem isn't going to the bathroom, their problem is to not go to the bathroom. They can't get out of the bathroom. They can't get far from the bathroom, okay?

Those particular cases need to start with large amounts of digestive enzymes, large amounts of probiotics to help settle and soothe that gut, help settle it down so it's not so inflamed and irritated. When it's inflamed, it doesn't take much more to make it more irritated, right?

It's kinda like you've had a bad day, you go home, and that one little thing you just kinda went off, because you had that whole day accumulated in your system. You hadn't let go of that yet, you know? And that whole day built up. You were already inflamed. And you get home, and you get that one little itty, insignificant little thing, and it just puts you over the edge. Right?

Well, that emotional response, okay, that inflammatory emotional response ... We have a very similar physical response, okay? So when your body is already irritated, and you do something else to make it a little more irritated, it can have a massive response to that.

So, in order to settle that down, things like digestive enzymes, probiotics, those would be my remedies of choice. For those folks that have more the inflammatory bowel issues where they just can't get far from the bathroom, and have the urgency, and all that kinda thing.

If you eliminate an infection, but you don't re-inhabit the house with something else, the moment you get exposed to that infection, it's gonna come right back, okay? It's not good.

So detox first. Purge that gut. Get all the waste out, get all the junk out. Then introduce large amounts of probiotics. Use digestive enzymes. Digest your food with those digestive enzyme.

I tell my patients that the most secure and fastest way to ensure that you'll develop an autoimmune disorder is: shut down your stomach, decrease the amount of acid your stomach's producing. That will create an autoimmune disorder in a heartbeat, okay?

So getting the digestive tract to function again is what you need to do after you've detoxed, okay? You first purge the gut, then you get it to restore its function. And you do that with digestive enyzmes, probiotics, and, again, I like fulvic acid minerals. Those are excellent, just excellent, for restoring the gut.

That's a great little triage of items there that people can use.

And so someone was just asking: what kind of minerals. So it's called fulvic minerals. That's F-U-L-V-I-C. It's not to be confused with folic acid. Fulvic acid. And so you can get fulvic minerals. You can get it in liquid, or in capsule forms, and then you're just looking for a good quality source, because you're really just getting, in this case, pure fulvic minerals.

And what this is going to do is [inaudible 00:15:26] the toxins and give the minerals that your body is lacking in an organic form, which is hard to find.

So it's been about five years ago now that I actually started healing my digestive issues. I had ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease for almost 20 years, until that point.

And through all those years that I was sick, I had been studying nutrition, and trying to figure out how to heal myself, and keep my children healthy.

I think I did a really good job of beginning the healing process, and getting myself through the hardest parts, until I got to this point, to where I just couldn't get over this last little bit. You know? I just kept sliding back slightly, and just feeling like: there's something I'm missing, there's just something that I haven't found yet, that could just be the key to finishing this for me.

Finally, I met Dr. Nuzam, and he introduced me to fulvic minerals. And that was the key, that was absolutely the key. Within a week of taking the fulvic minerals, it was done. My digestive system was healed, and I've been 100% ever since.

So I really have to say that that definitely is the key with all digestive issues. And we know that autoimmune is ... It all starts in the gut. Whether it's a brain issue, a heart issue, your pancreas. It doesn't matter. It all starts in the gut.

What do you think about humic and fulvic acid, and their ability to help with chelation of metals? And you can explain chelation as well.

Yeah, a very basic carbon form of organic ... It's a basic building block and structure of food, and of plants. And it does a good job of chelating, so, yes, that would be one of the chelating agents that I left out. It's-

What is it? Where does it grow?

Well, it's carbon, hydrogen and oxygen. It's a basic building block of plants. A lot of it is extracted from coal, because coal is compressed vegetation. And so you can extract it from coal. You can extract it from plants. You can actually make it. But you certainly want it to be organic, if possible.

Fulvic acid and humic acid, actually, it's from within plants, but it's coming from rock shale, which is a derivative from coal, which is almost like charcoal, but charcoal's just burnt wood, which has a similar property, but it's not as potent and effective, at this particular thing. But it is good for other things, activated charcoal.

But there's a similar ... Because they're both carbons. I mean, I'm a layman here. And then somehow it's drawing out toxins. If you could help me understand that whole piece.

Well, unless you understand organic chemistry, it's a little bit difficult, but ...

You can't talk about fulvic acid in the state of California, because they say it really doesn't exist. You have to talk about humic acid.

But fulvic acid has carbon, and oxygen, hydrogen ... They have bonds. They aren't physically connected. They're connected electronically, electrically. And so these bonds, fulvic acid is able to ...

Think of water. So if you just have one H20, that's vapor. But if you have a bunch of H20s together, they bond together, and stick together, and get sticky, and that's called water. So fulvic acid does a very similar thing, and it can kinda surround heavy metals, and complex, electrically, and bind it with it, so that then it can be removed from the body. Just like water, H20, is vapor, but when you put a bunch of 'em together, they bond together, and it turns solid.

So a similar thing happens with fulvic and humic acid, because of the bonding structure, and the formations that it's able to create. It can actually bind with heavy metals and take it out, so ...

That process we call chelation. And that comes from a Greek word that means "to claw," or "to grab hold of." Chelating. So what we wanna do is grab hold of the heavy metals with something that can carry them out of the body, either through the bowel or the kidneys.

And so that process, we call chelation. And, specifically, chelating heavy metals. I mean, you can chelate lotta things. Some nutrition ... Like you may see magnesium chelate. That means they've taken a substance that binds with magnesium, that's more easily absorbed the bowel, to carry the magnesium in. So you can chelate certain things to get them into the body, you can chelate certain things to get them out of the body.

In this case, EDTA, DMPS, chlorophyll, fulvic acid, are used to chelate metals to carry them out of the body.

Humic as well?

Humic acid as well.

Once you detox the liver, how do you keep it healthy? Not just maintaining it with detoxes every now and then, but what else do you do to keep the liver healthy once it's been detoxed?

My favorite is medicinal mushrooms, adaptogens, and fulvic acid. That's fulvics, fulvics, fulvics. They help rejuvenate the liver, they help with enabling it to detoxify. They help pull toxins out of the liver.

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