Rebekah: Hi everyone. It's Bex here and I'm here with Dr. Frank Lipman from DrFrankLipman.com
and Jennifer Mielke from Conservationista.com, which is such a great name. I love it.
We're talking about alternative medicine, integrated with traditional medicine. I know
it's something that you all ask me about all the time because you don't know what's real
and you don't know what works.
So we're going to clear it up for you today. You have a philosophy called "good medicine".
For the few people in my audience who do not know what that is, what does that mean exactly?
Frank: Well, good medicine just means good medicine. So you use Western medicine when
it's appropriate for trauma, for acute infections, for acute medical emergencies like heart attacks,
acute surgical emergencies if you burst your appendix.
But Western medicine is not particularly good at chronic problems, the day to day problems.
So what happens is you go to a doctor and you got a headache or you can't poop or you
can't sleep or you're getting bloated and they give you a drug and drugs don't really
help for those things.
So good medicine is using Western medicine which is basically drugs and surgery for when
it's appropriate, when you break your leg, when you have to go to the hospital, but using
alternatives or supplements, meditation, yoga, diet, for most other problems.
So there's lifestyle medicine for most problems and when that doesn't work, and that's a first
offense. When it doesn't work, you always have pharmaceuticals to resort to. Most of
the time you don't need them.
Rebekah: You say this with a very matter-of-fact tone.
Frank: Well, it is.
Rebekah: No, I know. But I go to my doctor and he's definitely not prescribing meditation
ever. When I was first struggling with depression, I went to my doctor and it was first visit,
they wanted to put me on antidepressants and that's how I got into fitness. So how did
you come to this realization or this method of practice that includes alternative medicine?
Frank: Well, to me it's not even alternative. It's just as I say good medicine. If you're
driving your car and the oil light goes on, do you put a Band-Aid over the oil light and
drive on or do you see why the oil light goes on? So if you're depressed or if you're bloated
or if you've got reflux, or if you can't sleep, do you just take a drug which is just like
a Band-Aid, just suppressing the symptoms or do you see why you have that symptom?
So to me those symptoms are lights going on, telling me something is off with the system
and the -- and what I try to do is how do you balance the systems that you don't have
those lights going off.
Rebekah: So let's say that the oil light, this warning sign that something is wrong
is not necessarily going off all the time. For me for instance, I have chronic Lyme disease.
So the oil light isn't going off all the time that I would have to rush back to the doctor.
But I need to manage my health from day to day.
Frank: Sure. Well, first of all, the oil light probably went on initially when you had Lyme
disease and then you need antibiotics. I'm not against antibiotics especially for Lyme
disease when you have especially acute Lyme disease. You need to treat it with antibiotics
and the whole school of thought that actually gives longer term antibiotics for chronic
Lyme disease too. So there's a place for antibiotics in Lyme disease but in terms of management,
Jennifer has got to address that because that has to do with lifestyle.
Rebekah: Sure, let's introduce Jennifer once again. So you're a health coach and this is
where -- this is a place where I would call you. How do I manage my day to day life? Explain
to me why it's so important to have a health coach if you're trying to get back on track,
stay on track.
Jennifer: Staying on track, right. I think for most of us we know that having a supportive
community around us is a really important element to being and staying healthy and making
sustainable changes in our habits.
So sometimes you can build that with your friends and family and like within your community.
But it's really useful I think. Just like you would have a yoga teacher, just like you
may have a personal trainer, to have someone who's there and like specifically to answer
your questions, to give you pointers.
You can go to the gym and lift weights and get something out of it. You can sort of look
online and figure out what to eat and do moderately well. But having a person who can help you
with shortcuts and can help you tweak when things aren't exactly working still even though
you think you're doing all of the right things. It really like forms this invaluable partnership.
Rebekah: That's interesting that you say personal trainer because I think that we spend money
on a lot of things in our lives that don't seem like extravagant expenses because the
argument that I already hear coming through this screen is I can't afford a health coach
and I think it's important to always invest in your health. But we don't realize that
there are so many coaches in our lives.
I'm a personal trainer, a yoga instructor. All of these people that you go to, to make
sure that you're doing the right thing, that you are addressing your individual needs.
It's so important so I think health coaching is a great resource.
Frank: I think what people then realize is the default choices in our culture are unhealthy.
So you go -- when you go shopping at the supermarket, 90 percent of the food is unhealthy. When
you go to a restaurant, it's unhealthy. So I think it's helpful to have a health coach
who can guide you through the specifics on how to stay healthy.
Most of your audience I assume are young and you're not really feeling the oil light going
off. But when you get older, the oil light starts going off a lot and if you don't look
after yourself, the oil light stays on.
Rebekah: Right.
Frank: So I think it's really important to get into these good habits and it's hard to
know how to eat healthily because we're not taught that well. Doctors don't teach us.
We don't learn that at school. You go to the supermarket. You watch TV. Whatever you do,
it's all -- it's promoting unhealthy foods. So I think it's really helpful to have someone
to help guide you.
Rebekah: See, I think from my experience that the oil light is going off with young people.
They're suffering from obesity and back pain at younger and younger ages and it's very
scary. So I talk a lot about prevention and what we could do and I know that you have
a wonderful line of supplements and what -- the main question I get about supplements is,
"Why do I need them? Can I just get the nutrients I need from the food that I eat?" So why do
you advocate for supplements?
Frank: Great question. I think maybe 50 years ago when the soil wasn't as depleted and the
food was organic. You maybe have -- you probably were able to get all your nutrients from food.
But in this day and age, the food we're eating is full of chemicals so that means we need
more nutrients. There's more stress in our lives. That means we need more nutrients and
the food we're eating is more depleted. We're not getting as many nutrients in the food
we're eating. So we're not getting enough nutrients from the food and our needs are
greater because of the stress in our life and because of all the chemicals we're exposed
to.
So that's why I'm a huge believer in taking -- I take a shitload of supplements. Am I
allowed to say that?
Rebekah: Yeah, you can say it.
Frank: Because I'm much older. I'm probably double your age but that's ...
Rebekah: Probably not, but OK.
Frank: The point is as you get older, it becomes more important too I think. Even young people,
I mean we see incredible results with people taking supplements. It doesn't mean you have
to take a lot and often it needs to be targeted. But when people experience how much better
they can feel, then they realize that.
So yeah, we get this argument all the time. Can't I get it in the food? Actually the culture
says so. Doctors say so. But the food generally is full of crap. You're not getting enough
nutrients in your food. You need those building blocks for your body to function optimally.
Rebekah: I think that's so important. I think people don't know that, that even if you're
eating organic foods, they are not as nutrient-rich as the foods that our parents and our grandparents
were eating because the soil has been depleted. This is an environmental issue as much as
a health issue.
So yes, supplements are definitely needed and I think it's something to definitely look
into for yourself. Address your own needs. Talk to a health coach. Talk about what you
might be lacking and supplement your diet with things that you can't get from just going
to your local grocery store.
Jennifer: Yeah, and I think just to jump in on that too, I mean I'm a health coach so
I'm pretty cognizant of this stuff and I would still say if I really look hard at my diet,
I'm not getting -- even though I consciously eat very well, I'm not getting five servings
of leafy greens in a day. I think most of us, we like to say, "Oh, I can just get it
from Whole Foods," but the reality is we're not really eating that much of the right kind
of foods anyway.
Rebekah: Right.
Frank: We're not saying don't eat really good organic food. We still encourage people to
eat healthier. This is not in lieu of a healthy diet. This is in addition to a healthy diet.
Rebekah: Absolutely, absolutely. I talk to my followers about growing their own food
and supporting local farms and really avoiding the pesticides, not just for your own body
but for the environment.
But definitely the supplementation, we're supplementing. I also want people to live
an excellent life, not just base level health. I don't want them to function. I want them
to thrive. So that's where it's important that we bring in coaches, that we bring in
supplements and we try to be our best selves, not just adequate selves.
That's a way a lot of people are operating from day to day. They're just plugging away.
They're just getting through.
Frank: Right.
Jennifer: Yeah, and they think that that's enough or that that's normal, that that's
all there is.
Rebekah: Absolutely. So parting thoughts, what would you say is the -- if you had to
make a ladder of the most important things that people can do in terms of their health
for themselves every single day, exercise, meditation, mindfulness, what are the most
important things that you really want people to practice on a daily basis?
Frank: Well, I think all of those are important, exercise, diet, stress management, sleep.
Those are your sort of pillars and then community and more non-specific things.
But it depends on what you're looking at. I mean most people for instance look at weight
loss and they think if they exercise more, they're going to lose weight. My experience
or in my humble opinion, but definitely been my experience, I say 80 percent of weight
loss comes from diet and only 20 percent of food [0:10:34] [Phonetic] for most people,
for most people. Everyone is a little bit different but my experience has been if you
want to lose weight, you've got to change your diet. Not that you shouldn't exercise.
In terms of -- but if I look at long term as we get older, I think exercise may even
become more important than diet. Not that the diet is not important.
Rebekah: Right.
Frank: When I look at older patients and I've come across a lot of old ones, the ones who
stay vital in their heads and not only their bodies, but whose minds are sharp, tend to
be people who have been exercising a lot.
Rebekah: OK.
Frank: I think in terms of weight loss, I think diet is more important. In terms of
vitality and keeping your brain going and staying functioning as you get older, exercise
may even be more important. But I don't think it's an either or. I think exercise, diet,
doing some yoga or meditation because we all need some type of stress management and then
sleep is a forgotten ...
Rebekah: Yes, I was going to point that out. Sleep. I love sleep.
Frank: So I think all of those are really important.
Rebekah: Cleanses have become very popular.
Frank: Right.
Rebekah: And I talk about juice cleansing, not so much to completely detox but to reset.
What do you recommend in terms of cleansing?
Frank: Well, I'm a huge fan of cleanses but I have very strong opinions on what a cleanse
is.
Rebekah: OK.
Frank: A cleanse really should be something that supports your body's own detox vacation
systems.
So juice cleanses are fine. I'm not against juice cleanses and you feel a little bit better.
But if you really want to reboot your system and you really want to feel better quickly,
do a proper cleanse like my cleanse.
Rebekah: So tell me about your cleanse.
Frank: So what my cleanse does is it -- not only do you eliminate -- so you are eating.
You can have two meals a day and then we have -- we give you three shakes, just not that
you're eliminating all food.
Rebekah: That's quite a bit actually.
Frank: Yeah, but they're small meals and then a shake. But you're eliminating the sugar,
the gluten, the dairy, the corn, the caffeine, the alcohol, all the irritants and the foods
that tend to trigger inflammation.
So you're removing those foods and at the same time the nutrients in the cleanse that
actually -- so there's fiber that cleans your gut up. The nutrients that support liver function
which is your main detox organ and most important there are antimicrobial, antibacterial, the
antimicrobial or herbal antibiotics as I call them that kill the bad bacteria in their gut
because that's a huge source of toxicity.
When we do that with people, after two weeks, people feel fantastic and they go, "Oh, I
want to feel like this." So it's a wonderful way. It's a wonderful entry point into a healthy
way of living because people feel so much better and once someone experiences that feeling
of vitality, then you got them hooked. They don't have to listen to you, Jennifer or me.
Rebekah: No more.
Frank: You're hooked. You feel that. You know that. Once you feel that, you got the bug
and the cleanse is a wonderful way to get people to feel really good really quickly.
Rebekah: I love that. I love that it includes getting rid of caffeine. It's something that
I'm a big advocate for. I'm not into it. You know that I've been on my off-coffee since
April and I am awake and alive and I'm waking up every morning with no headaches, whatsoever.
So you can do it too.
I want to thank you so much for sitting with me today and taking this time out of your
very busy practice. Thank you so much Jennifer. You can find links to everything that Dr.
Lipman has to offer in the video description below and then over on my blog at BexLife.com.
I will see you again soon. Love you guys.