Transcript Of Today's Episode
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Dr. Martin: Well, I want to do a little bit of teaching this morning on the 10th cranial nerve called the vagus nerve. Not Las Vegas, but the vagus [00:00:30] nerve. So let me just talk about that for a few minutes, and I think you'll find it interesting. The 10th cranial nerve attaches your brain to your gut. Okay? So, you know the expression about Las Vegas, right? What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas. Well, the 10th cranial nerve is not like that at all. As a matter of fact, it's the opposite. What [00:01:00] happens in vagus nerve doesn't stay there.
Dr. Martin: Here's what I mean by that. Our vagus nerve again, is part of your parasympathetic nervous system. Okay? And the best way to explain it is, have you ever had butterflies in your stomach? Yeah, that's the 10th cranial nerve. So [00:01:30] let me just explain the significance of this, if you can think about this for a minute. Your 10th cranial nerve, the vagus nerve, is a very, very important nerve because it's a connection between your brain and your gut. Now, remember what we've said. Leaky gut, leaky brain.
Dr. Martin: We talk about the gut brain access [00:02:00] because they're connected to each other. How are they connected? They are connected through the vagus nerve, the parasympathetic system, so it affects your brain, all the way down to the transverse colon. So when you're nervous, when you have high stress or cortisol, that can do a lot of things. Well, first of all, 80% of all [00:02:30] your serotonin... Serotonin is a what? It's a feel-good hormone. Your dopamine, your GABA, these are feel-good hormones that your body produces. But the vast majority of them are produced in your gut.
Dr. Martin: How does that affect your brain? Well, big time. Because if your feel-good hormones are produced in your gut, mostly... By the way, your [00:03:00] physiology, almost all your physiology... Remember Hippocrates, the father of medicine, says all disease starts in the gut. And the more and more and more we know now about the microbiome, your bacteria in your gut... When you step on the scale, take three pounds off because they're just bacteria. You're always going to have three pounds of bacteria. The issue with that is whether [inaudible 00:03:30] [00:03:30] have a balance.
Dr. Martin: We have a term in medicine called dysbiosis. Why is medicine always use big stupid names like that to keep you confused? Dysbiosis is an imbalance between your good bacteria and your bad bacteria. So if you take antibiotics... I'll give you an example of what I'm talking about here in terms [00:04:00] of the 10th cranial nerve. This is just statistic wise. A child is on antibiotics, ear infections, throat infections. You know, they've got a bad... Come on, I understand that. Mommy, yeah. A baby can't stop crying, got an ear infection. By the way, most of the time it's viral. But you go to the doctor, they put the child on an antibiotic. The problem with that antibiotic is it kills all [00:04:30] your good guys. Even if you have a bacterial infection, it'll kill the bad guys. And that's why antibiotics are a wonderful thing.
Dr. Martin: The problem is, it's a two edged sword because the antibiotic can kill your friendly bacteria. So what happens? You get dysbiosis. You get an imbalance between the two. And what happens there, and you won't see this too much, but this is what happens, is that [00:05:00] dysbiosis is when you have more bad guys than good. The third army, you get an invasion of candida albicans. And candida albicans is a fungal infection and you don't even know it. Women, you understand this because you know what a yeast infection is, right? Men, we don't know anything about... What's yeast, right?
Dr. Martin: Well, yeast outside of your body will [00:05:30] make bread rise. Yeast inside your body is a parasite. It's a living organism. It will flourish in moisture, and it loves the gut. And the problem with that is when you don't have enough good bacteria, the gatekeepers to your bloodstream plus the vagus nerve, the candida can travel up the vagus nerve into [00:06:00] your brain. What does that do? Well, you see, this is the issue with the vagus nerve. It's almost like, you ever hear Jacob's Ladder in the Bible, it talks about the connection between heaven and earth. Well, that's the connection between your brain and your gut.
Dr. Martin: So what happens if 80% of your serotonin is made in your gut, but your microbiome, you have dysbiosis. Now you're not making enough serotonin. [00:06:30] Or the fungus will travel into the brain and it can affect the neurotransmitters in your brain. And guess what happens? Now you can get depression. Why do we see so much more depression today? Why do we see so much more autism today? Why do we see so much more ADD and ADHD? It's that connection between [00:07:00] the gut and the brain. And guess what yeast wants? Sugar. And then you feed it. But it would never have come in your body in the first place without either an antibiotic, or somebody was asking about chlorine in the water.
Dr. Martin: Don't drink your city water. Filter it. If you're going to ever have water out of a tap... Most cities [00:07:30] in North America, they have fluoride in the water or they have chlorine. They have to have chlorine to some extent. They have to have chemicals to clean the water. In Sunbury, I think our hometown, there's hundreds and hundreds of chemicals that they use to clean the water. The problem with that is it kills your friendly bacteria. So filter it. Make sure you never drink anything but filtered water. I like [00:08:00] Springwater myself.
Dr. Martin: So all I'm saying is, you understand how what happens is that what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas. No, not when it comes to the vagus nerve. It's spelled with a U instead of an A by the way, vagus nerve. And it's that connection you see. And when you're stressed with cortisol, then add even more [00:08:30] problems. Because what cortisol does, if you're stressed, it releases inflammatory cytokines. What does that do? It creates inflammation.
Dr. Martin: Inflammation now can travel along the vagus nerve into the brain. And inflammation, it's not Houdini, it never appears on its own. But when you have high insulin, [00:09:00] when you have leaky gut, your microbiome directly affects the brain. This is why there's that gut brain connection that we, especially at the Martin Clinic, we like to talk about it because you know why? This is why we're so big on probiotics. If you listen to me, go back 20 years ago, I would've said to you, "Well, take [00:09:30] probiotics at least twice a year." I mean, I was always big on probiotics, so this isn't new for me, but I've changed my mind. The Martin Clinic changed our mind, I don't know, 10 years ago or whatever. I can't remember exactly when, but we said, "No, you know what? You need to take probiotics every day."
Dr. Martin: Because the more we learn about bacteria, the more we learn about your microbiome and how it affects [inaudible 00:09:55] got leaky brain, leaky gut, leaky joints, leaky gut, leaky [00:10:00] skin, anything you have on your skin, I don't care if it's acne, if it's eczema, if it's psoriasis, if it's dermatitis, I don't care what it is. If it's on your skin, your skin's another organ, it comes from your gut. Autoimmune comes from your gut. How does MS... Okay, let me just say this. How does MS? It starts in the gut, leaky gut. And one of the [00:10:30] biggest culprits, the greatest discovery of the 20th century has become the curse of the 21st, and it's antibiotics.
Dr. Martin: And listen, you know me, I'm not telling you not to take antibiotics. If you have an infection, you must take an antibiotic. So don't come after me and say, "Dr. Martin doesn't believe in antibiotics." Of course I do. They've saved millions of people's lives. The problem is they have a double edged sword. [00:11:00] The antibiotic and chemicals, we talked about this in the past when we talked about a crappy diet, it creates dysbiosis. You're feeding yeast, you're feeding the fungus, it proliferates and then it can go up to your brain through... It can go systemically in your bloodstream for sure. But usually the blood brain barrier won't let that stuff get across. Unless [00:11:30] of course you don't have enough friendly bacteria because that's what your blood brain barrier is made up of. It's made up of bacteria. Good bacteria, they're on your side.
Dr. Martin: So, isn't that incredible when you think about what we know today about your microbiome, those little weak critters, your bacteria, and how they can travel up and send a signal up through your parasympathetic nervous system exclusively [00:12:00] by your 10th cranial nerve. Stress aggravates that. Stress is, like Tony Jr. says, it's like pouring gasoline on the fire. It makes things even worse. So what do you do? Probiotics, broad spectrum probiotics. Broad spectrum probiotics. What's that mean? You've got at least 10 strains of bacteria at least. And especially when it comes to [00:12:30] candida, you need the L. Rhamnosus and the L. Reuteri. Those are two specific bacterial strains. They're the good guys. They get rid of that yeast, they help to get rid of fungus, they help with the cranial nerve. So you see, these things are very significant.
Dr. Martin: So I just wanted to do a little teaching this morning. I think that I tied in everything that I wanted to talk about here on the cranial nerve. But [00:13:00] take care of your gut. If you have to take an antibiotic, you must, must take a probiotic. And I suggest even with kids. Because kids, you wonder where did they get their depression? Why do kids suffer with anxiety the way they do, and depression like it's going out of style today? It's so prevalent. Well, it starts in the gut, and the gut is changed [00:13:30] today because of the overuse of antibiotics and the underuse of probiotics. And a bad, crappy diet that feeds candida albicans, which is yeast, which is a fungus.
Dr. Martin: And I was going to talk to you about artificial sweeteners, because artificial sweeteners, sucralose and aspartame and the stuff that's in all the diet stuff, you see this crappy artificial sugar. You know what, we didn't [00:14:00] know this when it came up because people used to ask me in the 1970s, they used to ask me, "Dr. Martin, what do you think about aspartame?" Well, I said, "It's not good." Well, they said, "Well, what do you think it does?" I said, "Well, we're not quite sure yet, but it's a chemical. It's not good for you." But you know what we know now? Here's what we know more than anything else. It changes your microbiome [00:14:30] in the gut. It has a negative effect on your good bacteria.
Dr. Martin: You see what I'm saying? This is the issue. So, I talked about it in previous podcasts, this invisible war that goes on inside of your body. You're constantly in a battle. If you read the Bible, it talks about an invisible war there. It talks about, there's things [00:15:00] you can't see, right? It says in Ephesians, "We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly places." Well, for me, this is what happens inside your body. You have a bacterial war going on. You don't see it, but it's always a battle between good and bad. And as long as you have more good guys than bad guys, it's called 'You win.' So this is very, very important. [00:15:30] I can't emphasize this enough, leaky gut goes to leaky brain. Thanks for listening.
Announcer: You've reached the end of another Doctor is In podcast with your hosts, Dr. Martin junior and senior. Be sure to catch our next episode, and thanks for listening.