558. Q&A With Dr. Martin

THE DOCTOR IS IN Podcast


Dr. Martin answers questions sent in by our listeners.

Today’s topics include:

  • Causes of low blood pressure
  • Muscle weakness and Sarcopenia
  • Intermittent fasting and adrenals
  • Autoimmune diseases
  • Bowel movements and carbs
  • Sodium nitrates in food

...and more!

Tune in to hear Dr. Martin’s responses!

TRANSCRIPT OF TODAY'S EPISODE

Announcer:  You're listening to The Doctor Is In Podcast, brought to you by MartinClinic.com. During the episode, the doctors share a lot of information. As awesome as the info may be, it is not intended to diagnose, cure, treat, or prevent any disease. It's strictly for informational purposes.

Dr. Martin:  Good morning. I hope you're having a great day. And welcome back to The Doctor Is In Podcast. We are live, back again after a few days of vacation. Okay, so let me go through some of the questions that were asked. Don't be shy guys, okay? I would think we're going to do question and answer Friday, so it will be twice this week. Okay. What causes low blood pressure? Good question. Now, let me just say this, okay? Because everybody's different. When you talk about blood pressure, generally what they like to see in 95% of people is 120/80. Okay? I always say look, the bottom number is the most important number when you look at your blood pressure. So for some people, normally for them they're not in that range. They're part of the 5% that come out of that range. I don't get too uptight about it if they have no symptoms. So symptoms of low blood pressure would be dizziness, lightheadedness, maybe some fatigue. For some people, that happens when they get up quickly. They call that orthostatic blood pressure. The only time it happens is if they get up quickly. Of course, you've got to be careful; you could fall, you could faint. 

Now what can cause low blood pressure is the question. That was from Lulu. And Lulu it's a good question; what can cause it? So remember, now, if you're not having any symptoms that I just mentioned, I don't worry about it too much. Because if you're taking your blood pressure at the pharmacy, or if you have a cuff at home and you're taking it, I'm not too big on overtaking blood pressure. One of the causes of low blood pressure, by the way, is medication. There's two or three types of medication that can cause low blood pressure. One of them obviously is when you're taking meds for high blood pressure. So that can be a cause. You know what is a common cause of low blood pressure? Dehydration. Another one is anemia. Might even not know you're anemic. That can give you low blood pressure. Low functioning thyroid might be within normal limits on the blood test, but that can drive your blood pressure down. So these are things to be careful of, we tell people to watch and make sure you're drinking enough water. A lot of people are dehydrated and they don't know it, because their thirst mechanism isn't turned on so much. But they have it in other symptoms. Water, water. Vitamin W is really, really important. So Lulu, good question.

Louise is asking what causes muscle weakness in the biceps. Well look, if it's just in the biceps that's weird. If it's sarcopenia, which is a generalized weakness and muscle wasting, that's usually Louise, a lack of protein in the diet. Protein, protein, protein, protein. Protein muscles. Protein is king for muscles. A lot of people don't eat enough protein. You know they think they're eating protein if they're eating soy and stuff, but these are not complete proteins. A lot of people have muscle weakness. I was looking at a guy the other day, and he had just muscle weakness. I felt like saying to him, "Man, you ain't eating enough protein!" Now look, I mean exercise too, obviously. You know what's more important than your biceps? Your triceps. You're going to use your triceps much more than you will your biceps. Biceps are for show, triceps are for functioning every day. So really, it's important. You know me on Vitamin E, I'm big on that. I'm big on resistant exercise. I'm big on weightlifting, including lifting your own weight, okay? So good question. 

Rikala, I hope I'm saying this right. I have Hashimoto's and I have an underactive thyroid. Well join the cast of millions, Rikala. She's been on medication since 1999 and I have read that intermittent fasting stresses the adrenals and therefore not good for people with my condition. Actually, there's two questions about this, on intermittent fasting. Well, let me say this, Rikala. Intermittent fasting is very good. The Martin Clinic endorses it, we like it. We recommend it. But you've got to make sure you feel good. For some people, intermittent fasting... Okay, let me just remind people that are just joining us, intermittent fasting is when you don't eat and it's got to be over 12 hours. So let's say, for example, you stop eating at 6:00 at night, and you went to 6:00 the next morning without eating. Any time after that you are starting to intermittent fast. 12 hours. Now even better, 14 hours. And even better 16 hours. And even better 18 hours in terms of intermittent fasting. 

Now some people can't do that. Diabetics, for example, we find generally diabetics got to have their breakfast. Their bacon and eggs in the morning. But then can intermittent fast for example if they stop eating around 4:00-5:00 and then go until let's say 7:00-8:00 in the morning have their breakfast. Well they intermittently fasted. Is that hard on the adrenals? No. It isn't hard on the adrenals. Not generally, okay? Now listen, if you're hypoglycemic, low blood sugar. By the way, that's insulin. I've mentioned this on this program many a times. Hypo or hyperglycemia. Hypo low blood sugar, hyper high blood sugar. Are two sides of a coin. They come from the same problem, it's called insulin resistance. So it's not a matter of eating carbs, but some people find they don't do well fasting. Most people do. Some people even with a little bit of training, a little bit of stretching themselves out a little bit, they're so used to eating more frequently. When you're eating, this is why the reset... One of the reasons for the reset is when you are eating nutrient-dense foods, the problem is when people don't feel good they have low blood sugar and whatever and they fluctuate. Plus they've got high cortisol, adrenals. They find they have to eat more frequently. They're craving foods. The reset is meant to fix that. It's fasting without fasting. 

Now if you can implement intermittent fasting anyways, even with the reset, well good for you. It's only beneficial. Because the idea with the reset is many reasons but one of the reasons it fixes your insulin. It fixes insulin resistance. 30 days to fix insulin resistance at the cellular level. And secondly, remember. As you lower your carbohydrates, your carbohydrates are coming down, your sugars are coming down. You're not eating any of what I call "crappy fuel". Everything that you put in your mouth, you're doing this now, you are replacing crappy fuel with high octane... This is not keto. Don't mistake this for keto. It's not the same. This is only animal products. Eggs, meat and cheese. EMC. What that does, again, you are having nutrient-dense food. Instead of putting 87 octane in your body, normal food, you are putting in jet fuel into your body. When you use jet fuel you'll find, if you read the testimonies of the reset, generally... There's always exceptions. When you're dealing with the human body, there's always exceptions. So just understand that. But generally when people go on the reset, they find once their body starts taking in that new fuel they find they're not hungry. They're not craving. 

So what happens? I'm not hungry. I can skip breakfast. Wow. You don't have to do it every day, but if you feel good and you're not hungry you're eating nutrient-dense food. So is intermittent fasting hard on the adrenals? No. Now fasting if you guys have been following me you know what I think of this. The only time I recommend that you fast for three days, if you get a diagnosis of cancer. There is some good research showing that if you do a three days fast, only water, I couldn't do a three day fast what I've got. Vitamin C. But just to reset the body completely and eliminate all sugars because of the diagnosis of cancer, that is what I recommend. Okay? But, generally I don't like fasting for a long period of time. Now some people can eat just once a day. They only eat once a day. So that's intermittent fasting, it's a 24 hour fast. They're only eating once a day. And they're perfectly fine with that. Good for you. There's no problem with it. You're shortening your eating window. 

See the idea with this, and let me just do a little bit of teaching. Now I know you guys don't do this, but let's say you had a bowl of oatmeal this morning. Dr. Martin I've got to have oatmeal otherwise I'm not going to go to the bathroom. I heard that 10,000 times over 46 years. But what happens is that you're squirting a lot of insulin by the way. Squirt, squirt, squirt. What does insulin do? It's taking sugar from the oatmeal. Oh doctor, there's no sugar added. No. Oats turn to sugar rapidly. Even steel-cut rapidly turn to sugar. Insulin, what's it's job? You guys know this. Insulin's job is to say to sugar, the traffic cop, hey you you can't park there in the bloodstream. Get over here. You're not parking in the bloodstream. Now I'm going to park you somewhere else. You guys know all that about insulin. You know that about insulin. The problem with that process is when you have let's say oatmeal or toast or whatever, you've stopped eating but insulin has just started to work. When you have a steak, insulin is the traffic cop sitting there with no traffic. It doesn't have anything to do. You have bacon and eggs, the cop is sitting there, the insulin, going [whistles]. I wish there would be some traffic, something to do, I'm bored stiff.

But when you have carbs in the morning (that's why I don't like carbohydrates, especially in the morning) is insulin is working, working, working. It's getting sugar out of the bloodstream from what you eat and parking it, in the liver, in the muscles and making fat cells. Then guess what? If you put sugar in your bloodstream, insulin's job is not only to take it out and park it, it is also what goes up must come down. Now you're hungry again, because your blood sugars have plummeted. Because you weren't eating protein and fat. You were eating carbohydrates. That's how your body works, guys. This is why you have the fluctuations in blood sugar. What does that give you? I'm starving, I'm craving again, I'm hungry. When you have hypoglycemia or low blood sugar and you need to eat frequently, you can correct it. How? By eating the right foods. That's how your body works. Okay? Does it stress you? It will only stress you if you are not metabolically well. So it's a very good question, Rikala. If you're not metabolically well, your blood sugars can plummet, give you stress for cortisol and cortisol raises your blood sugar. It's true. But you can fix this with the reset. You can literally fix this process and then intermittent fasting should not bother you. Okay? Thank you very much. 

Now look at Christy-Ann. She's saying early research has found that intermittent fasting may reduce the risk of diabetes. Yep. Cancer and heart disease. Yep, yep. Yeah, I like intermittent fasting. Martin Clinic is all for it. But Rumsey, to be honest I didn't look this up. Is that a Dr. Rumsey? Because honestly I've never heard of him. Now maybe it's because I'm having a senior moment, but anyway it doesn't matter. I'll go look it up afterwards. I didn't look it up before. Said depriving yourself of food for an extended period of time can increase levels of cortisol. So Christy-Ann, it's the same question. Very good. Is this true? Yes and no. Again, if you're metabolically unwell, if your hormones are not doing well, you're out of balance, you're out of whack, and yeah, it's true. I wouldn't start with intermittent fasting. I wouldn't. I would start with the reset. Get your body's adrenals, get your body's estrogen, get your body's thyroid, get your body's insulin fix that. It's amazing what happens. But it's a good question because don't start with intermittent fasting. I don't recommend that. If you're out of whack and you know it, you know it. Doc, I don't feel good. Well you're out of whack. 

If you don't feel good, there's a reason for it. It's usually in my Bermuda Triangle; your thyroid, your ovaries, men your low testosterone, adrenals, and especially insulin which is in the middle of the Bermuda Triangle. It comes from your pancreas. Insulin is a food hormone. I'm telling you, folks, 99% of the problems, well if you include the gut in there too, come from the Bermuda Triangle. As we state in the Martin Clinic, the unholy trinity between the thyroid, the ovaries, and the adrenals. Okay? Very, very good question. 

So Olga's asking can Dr. Martin discuss the benefits of the reset for MS. Well, yes, because MS is leaky gut. Why? It's autoimmune. Will the reset help? Yep. The reset helps. Remember what they find in the brain of MS, and Parkinson's very similar. Yeast travels up to the brain and cross the blood-brain barrier. So you know what I'm saying? Is fix the gut, fix the brain. MS. Now I know there's other factors like low levels of Vitamin D usually and those are factors. You know me on Vitamin D, I'm very big on that. But MS start with the reset. I love probiotics. I love Navitol because it crosses the blood-brain barrier and it increases your nitric oxide. I'm high on DH oil, the brain regenerates the brain. The brain is made up of DHA, 20% of your brain is DHA. A long chain fatty acid that is found in the animal kingdom. Good, good question Olga. 

Joanne, is it possible to get back the pigmentation I have lost in my skin with Vitiligo? Maybe. I've seen it happen. It's rare that it comes back. It usually does improve. Leaky gut, leaky skin. Leaky gut, leaky skin. Fix the leaky gut. No more yeast. That is very important. It's the third army invasion of fungal and I'm telling you that's a big, big factor. Look for low levels of Vitamin D. It can be another factor, okay? Can it come back? Well, it's rare that it comes back completely. But it's worth doing. 

Now, this is from an anonymous. My 15 year old son has extremely large bowel movement. Why? You want to have large bowl movements? Eat carbs. It just shows you how much waste there is. Now for some it's different than others, but seriously guys. You know what? It's one of the complaints of the reset. I've had people tell me, well doc, I'm constipated. I said, are you in pain? No. But I'm not going to the bathroom twice a day. My stool is low. I know, but if you're not wasting anything. Remember, what's in the toilet is waste. Your body didn't need it. When you're eating the right foods, you're not going to go like you used to go. You know what, so what? Now I don't want you never to go to the bathroom, okay please don't misquote me. All I'm saying is, your stool is garbage. Garbage in, garbage out. When you eat a lot of carbohydrates, you're going to have a big stool. Oh look at that! I had a big stool! Isn't that wonderful? Not so much. 

We got brainwashed in the 1960s. I'm old enough to tell you these stories. I watched the food industry do this to people. They took it hook, line, and sinker. Fiber, fiber, fiber. You need fiber. You see bacon and eggs? They don't have fiber. Our cereals have fiber. Fiber, you can't live without it. All Bran. Don't eat bacon and eggs, eat All Bran. True or false? The whole idea of eating All Bran was for you to go to the bathroom. True or false? True. It was a marketing campaign. Then all of a sudden, I'm not going to the bathroom like I should. I'm not eating enough fiber. You know how many times I heard that in the office? 10,000. 

We're going to do a teaching this week. There was a story that come out about the gut. I'm going to do some teaching now, okay. So just to say this. Large stools, everybody's different so please don't pigeonhole me and make me, Dr. Martin said if you have... Some people have larger stools than others, and I'm not too worried about that. But generally, I'm talking in generalities, this kid is eating way too many carbs. Your body is smart, guys. You eat crappy carbohydrates, guess what? Your body goes, there's not a lot of nutrition in that, man. Let's send it into the toilet where it belongs. Think about that for a minute. Your body's not stupid, you know? Your body's very smart. I don't want you to be constipated. Dr. Martin I'm bloated. Well that's different. That's different. That's true constipation. 

But this whole idea of going to the bathroom several times a day... I did a little bit of consulting for a company, I think I might have told you this story. Their whole thing was look in the toilet after you've gone to the bathroom number two, and look at your stool and analyze it. Oh, boy. I've never been big on that. Now look, you don't want to have blood in your stool. Sometimes I get patients with parasites and whatever. I say, well that's not a bad idea, just have a quick look. You might see some parasites there. Ew. Your body's smart. It's getting rid of them. Okay, so you know what I'm saying, okay? You know what I'm saying, I think. I get in trouble when I talk about this sometimes. What is Dr. Martin's opinion on sodium nitrates in food? Okay, so I get it. You'll see bacon with sodium nitrates. So what? That's what I tell people. So what? What does that do to you? Because if you're worried about nitrates, well then stop eating vegetables. Stop eating vegetables because you've got a lot of nitrates in vegetables. They use it as part of a preservation of the meat. But is it bad for you? I'm not too convinced. You're going to have to convince me. 

I know the gurus out there say it is. But it's because they don't like meat. They hate bacon. Poor bacon. It's got such a bad rap. As I've said to you a thousand times, olive oil oleic acid. Bacon? oleic acid. Six fatty acid chains. Olive oil, six fatty acid chains. Bacon. Now everybody would say, oh olive oil. That is so stinking good for you. Yeah. But so is bacon. Even with the sodium nitrates in it. Now, if you're really worried about that, you can always find bacon without the nitrates in it. But again, you're asking me I'm going to give you my opinion on it. I always tell people, when you start talking about nitrates then stop eating vegetables. That's one of the reasons that I put you on the reset, is there's no nitrates there. There's no cellulose. Good question. I'm glad you're thinking. I want you to think. Because when I get to the end, I'm almost at the end, but when I get to the end I want to talk to you for a minute about what this Mark is going to ask me and I'll finish with this. Maybe I'll do it right now. 

Here's what Mark... He's making a statement rather than a question, but that's all right. Dr. Martin is always talking about science. Not always, but I do. Where is the science to back his claims that red meat is good for you when the rest of the medical community does not agree? We can't go forward on blind faith. Well one thing, Mark. It's not really a question, it's a statement you made. But first of all, I do not apologize. I believe I am following the real science. You see science by the way, just by definition, science is observation. You know what? See this mind up here? I'm open-minded. You might think I'm not, but I am. I read every day. I read studies, I read 30, 40, 50 sometimes, studies a day. I'm always reading. I'm always studying. Always looking for new information. That's science.

But Mark, I understand. I just told you about sodium nitrates. There is a whole, and I call it religion not science. If you go back you started with the cereal companies and the food industry, and they got lots of money and the pharmaceutical industry, they're the two biggest industries and then of course social media. But the two big industries that affect the world like you have no idea is the pharmaceutical and the food industry, Mark. What I tell people is this. You know what? I will actually put this chart back on the private Facebook group afterwards. I'll put this chart back up there. I think I put it up there a couple of weeks ago. I'll put the chart back up. You know what they do? They take 100 grams of spinach and 100 grams of beef. 100 grams of spinach, 100 grams of beef. You want to know what science is Mark? It's what's in the beef and what's in spinach. There's no comparison. But the health gurus, 99% of them will tell you this: that spinach is better than beef. True or false? True. 

But it's not science. It's not science. Because all you have to do is take the nutritional value, let me get this here I've got it right here. Let me get this out. I think I have it in front of me here. Here's the chart. I do, I have it in front of me. All your B vitamins, you think they're in the plant kingdom? Not enough for a mouse. B12, Mark? Your body will not do well without B12. Your brain won't do well without B12. Your muscles won't do well without B12. Your nerves won't do well without B12. B12 is found in steak. Vitamin S. It's not found in the plant kingdom. Mice can't live on B12 from plants. Because it's not in them. Now, is that science? Or is that propaganda? It's science. It's just the facts, okay? All your B vitamins, I always tell people what are you taking a B complex for? Eat it! Eat your B vitamins. 

Now look, B12, it's a finicky vitamin. Some people need to supplement. Do you know what? 80% of the population is low in B12. You know why? Because they drank the Kool-Aid. 80% of the population in North America are low in B12 because they drank the Kool-Aid of vegetables are better for you than meat. 99% of the guys that I went to school with, I got a PhD in nutrition. There's not that many of us in Canada that have the Doctorate in nutrition and a Doctorate in natural medicine, which takes 4,000 hours of post-secondary education. That's me. There's about 30 of us in Canada right now. 99% of those it's religion, Mark. It's not science. You just have to analyze food. We're trained to analyze food. And yeah, but then they well if enough people say it, it must be true. It's not true. That's not science. It's not science. Just because people say it, I don't care who says it. I want it analyzed. 

If you think I'm wrong, come with me with data. Not with, red meat's bad for you. Red meat is carcinogenic. Says who? Says the gurus who don't like meat. Who are into climate change. You watch, they're going to tax our meat. It's coming to a theater near you. They're going to want to get the farmer and get him out of business. They'll only allow him to grow vegetables. If they could get rid of cows they'd get rid of cows. True or false, guys? It's true. But that's not science. 

So Mark, I'm glad you asked... Well, you didn't ask a question, you made a statement. You seem kind of skeptical. That's all right. Scientists should be skeptical. By nature they should be. You know what bugs me? Is how little skepticism there has been over this virus that we live with. I'm not saying it's not true. Don't misquote me. All I'm saying is, where is the media? Why aren't they doing their job? They should be skeptical. When a politician says anything, I mean since when do they listen to politicians? The media is meant to be skeptics. Scientists should be skeptics. You tell me something, I'm going to be skeptical. Let me go look into it. Okay? Again, bring me the best vegetable you can bring. Spinach? Popeye got muscles with spinach. Popeye was lying. Popeye wasn't telling the truth. Popeye was a cartoon. It wasn't true. You don't get big muscles with spinach. That's an impossibility. There's not enough protein to get big muscles with spinach. Popeye, he didn't want to tell you, but he was eating steak, man. He was eating eggs, meat and cheese. That's what Popeye was eating. 

Guys, that's science. I'm sorry, but that's science. You've got cancer? Then eat steak, not carbs. I know, it goes against the grain. But I'm telling you guys. Now you can talk to me, I know maybe there's hormones, okay I get that part too. But guys I'm talking again in generalities of science. Okay? So guys, listen. I like questions. I'm controversial. But that's all right, isn't it? Am I right? Yep. Anyways, you guys know me anyways, okay. I love you guys. I love you guys, and I mean that. I'm glad to be back on after a few days of rest. It wasn't rest, I'm always getting rest. We'll talk to you tomorrow, Lord willing. Love you.

Announcer:  You've reached the end of another Doctor Is In Podcast, with your hosts, Doctor Martin Junior and Senior. Be sure to catch our next episode and thanks for listening!

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