[Daniel]

Hey ,

Before you joined? Do you mean the quiz you took? Or do you perhaps mean other forms?

[Daniel]

Hey ,

It depends a bit on where you would use it for. The drops are also a great source of magnesium. From the lable I can’t tell you what source of magnesium though. It also contains electrolytes.

Sole is also a source of electrolytes and is made from natural ingredients and has a rich mineral profile. It does also contain some magnesium, but it is hard to asses the amount. It is lower then used in the drops though.

I guess it is a matter of what you find important and what you prefer for taste!

[Daniel]

Hey ,

Thank you for giving me some culinary inspiration. I never made Arayis myself. Unfortunately, I can’t help you with the first part of your question though since I don’t exactly know what brands are sold in Dubai. I’m sure  could give you some advice. But here are some tips for the second part of your question.

Insulin, blood sugar and feeling tired after a meal.
A good meal should make you feel saturated and provide you with energy. Big meals, especially when they contain quickly digestible carbohydrates can make you feel tired cause they raise blood sugar fast and as a consequence, the blood glucose levels can crash. A second reason for fatigue can be caused by tryptophan (an amino acid) rich foods that then get converted into serotonin and melatonin.

Everybody responds a little differently to a meal. But since too many carbohydrates can make you feel tired, you have a way to assess if your meal was too big so you can adjust accordingly. You can test this by consuming fewer carbohydrates the next day.

Lifestyle factors play a big role in the ability to store sugars. Sugars in cells are stored in the form of a molecule called glycogen. Once glycogen gets depleted, your cell’s ability to store glucose increases and you can handle more carbs as a result. Lifestyle factors that decrease glycogen are for example active lifestyle, working out and fasting.

Reducing glucose spikes and crashes
It is possible to affect the way your body handles the carbohydrates from your meal. Here are some simple tips:
• Eat proteins with your foods. Proteins, but also fats can help slow down the absorption of carbohydrates. Peanuts are rich in protein but are usually consumed in smaller amounts. If you have a few peanuts in your food, I would recommend adding another source of protein. Bernadette often talks about the VPF principle. This is an easy way to make a balanced meal. In this video, the VPF principle is explained. Let me know if the link works since I know people in Dubai had a few problems with playing the videos!
• Eat proteins first and carbohydrates last. The order in how you consume your foods can also influence the speed at which you absorb glucose. Eating carbs first will raise blood sugar quicker.
• Walk after your meal. Having a 10-20 minute walk after your meal can help you with reducing a blood sugar spike as well.

Big meals and tryptophan
Some foods are rich in tryptophan & melatonin. The body uses tryptophan to convert this amino acid to melatonin. Bigger meals can influence the amount of melatonin causing fatigue as well. Milk for example is a source of tryptophan and melatonin and can induce fatigue. In fact, you might know this from experience. A cup of black coffee is quite stimulating, but a cappuccino or latté macchiato is much less energizing. 

Almonds are also rich in tryptophan and melatonin and can cause tiredness as well. If you like to know if carbs are causing your blood sugar to crash, I would recommend other plant-based milk.

So to summarize:
• You can use your ‘after-dinner’ dip to asses if your meal was too big.
• Having protein with your meal slows down sugar absorption
• Just make sure you aren’t combining too many tryptophan and melatonin-rich foods with your meal, since they can cause fatigue as well.

I hope this helps!

[Daniel]

Hey ,

You are on a roll! I’m proud of you! Let’s go over your question:

How long before I work out should I eat?
It depends a little bit on what you do. When you work out I would advise you to keep at least 4-3 hours between your meal and your workout. Depending on the intensity of your workout your body is going from rest-and-digest to fight-and-flight mode. This is by the way functional and what we want when we exercise.

Once you are in fight-and-flight mode, the body will divert energy away from digestion and prioritizes fueling the muscles. The 4-3 hours window helps you to optimize for digestion

Since life isn’t always presenting us with optimal circumstances you could also go for plan B: eating smaller meals in the way Bernadette mentioned.

What kind of warmups should I do?
We need stress hormones to come up during a workout for optimal performance. It takes about 10-15 minutes for the adrenals to increase cortisol production. This is the time I recommend you spend warming up.

There are so many options for warming up. But during the warm-up phase, you should start easy and increase intensity during these 15 minutes. You could start with a more old-school way of warming up, like biking, using a cross trainer/treadmill or rowing machine. If you like variation you could spend 5 minutes on a bike, 5 minutes on a treadmill and 5 minutes on a rowing machine for example.

There are infinite other ways to warm up. You could spend time with dynamic stretches (these are stretching movements in contrast to static stretches where you spend time in one position) or do more balance exercises. The goal should become warm, not tired though!

Here you can find some other variations that you might enjoy. There are some static stretches in the warming-up phase here. I prefer to leave them out, especially if you are starting with strength training.

You don’t need to memorize them all. You could choose a few exercises, learn them and add with a few other exercises once you have memorized the others. Go slow and give yourself the time to learn them!

A last thing I would like you to point out: you are building your routine. What can happen is that these warming-up exercises might already feel heavy.

Don’t worry about that!

Your body needs some time to adjust to your new healthy habits! Just go a bit slower and most importantly: don’t ever… EVER… be disappointed about your performance. Firstly, you are already doing much more than the majority of people.  Secondly, if you feel fatigued much earlier than you would like, being fatigued means your body received a training stimulus and will now try to adapt. This is already a great result!

Should I be doing a cooldown?
I honestly didn’t spend a lot of time cooling down after a workout with my clients. Your body will cool down perfectly on its own. It is not necessarily what I would recommend doing though. When I train clients, I train them for one hour. In this hour I always spend time on nutrition, lifestyle or other pieces of advice, which means I have less time for the actual workout.

The end of training is a great place to work on flexibility. Spending 10 minutes on stretching will help keep your flexibility at a later age. It is a present to your future self!

Should I drink sports drinks during/at the end of my workout?
Most people don’t need the sugar after a workout, although advertisements can give you another signal. Even I as a personal trainer don’t need sugar after an hour in the gym. I agree with Bernadette on replenishing your electrolytes. Fresh organic coconut water is also a great option. It does contain a little sugar, but much less as in for example Gatorade.

The most important factor for starting a successful workout routine is by starting with exercises you love. Focussing on losing fat in the midsection is a great goal. Cardio like walking, jogging, swimming or rowing are great choices. Keeping your heartbeat around 120-130 beats per minute will help you to perform longer. At this rate, it should be hard to hold a conversation with someone, but still possible.

When you feel more confident, I would recommend you add in some strength training as well – but only after you have built some confidence in the gym! If you need more tips for this, I can definitely help you with some recommendations!

[Daniel]

The link worked for me for some reason. I have added the handout below. But you can also find it here.

I know there are some technical issues with watching videos in Dubai. We are working on that!
[Hydrochloric acid supplement recommended dosage challenge.pdf]

[Daniel]

Hey ,

Sunflower lecithin is used to make the vitamin C liposomal. Since soy lecithin is often made from GMO soy, the sunflower choice is better since it is often not GMO. Dr. Mercola claims to be GMO free by the way, so with regard to that, you have made a good choice.

I often recommend to reduce yellow oils and have a rich diet in anti-inflammatory fats like Extra Virgin Olive oil and Omega 3 fats.

It is ok to have some good quality organic omega 6 fats in the diet that are used when inflammation is needed to heal the body, but it should be in balance with the amount of anti-inflammatory fats. If you don’t experience inflammatory problems and your diet contains mostly olive oil, fish (or fish oil… or algae oil) or other anti-inflammatory products, you will be fine!

[Daniel]

Hey @naslam1603  ,

Just some things to be aware of, since bio ADEK from biotics does contain a mix of nutrients. The Upper Tolerable level of vitamin A is 10.000 IU (or 3000 mcg retinol palmitate). That is exactly 10 drops.

I’m just saying this since if you have other supplements that contain vitamin A, you might want to correct the dosage for that.

Make sure you combine the drops with a meal preferably one that contains some fat. It is better for absorption!

But I am happy you are giving love to your immune system!

[Daniel]

Hey ,

One of my favourite evening drinks is a home made tea made from a few slices of ginger, orange peel (or citrus peel… or mandarin peel!) with a stick of cinnamon and some fresh thyme! 

It is really delicious!

[Daniel]

Hey ,

I love what  and  said. I don’t know exactly what kind of detox program you are following. Perhaps sharing details of your program can help us to give you more targeted advice!

It would also be great to learn what motivated you to do the detox and share if you had any symptoms before you started the detox.

With detox programs, we free up toxins that are stored in our bodies. These toxins can be stored in the more ‘safe’ spaces of the body to protect the more vulnerable organs for example.

Before toxins are excreted they enter the circulation where they can do more harm. I usually recommend my clients to slow down detoxification when many complaints start to present. All the tips above will optimize for detoxification, but removing toxins is an intense process for the body.

Toxins, once they went through phase 1 detoxification, are in an intermediate state. They are ready for phase 2 detoxification, but in this phase, they are often more reactive, not less. 

I mentioned phases 1 & 2 detoxification which primarily happens in the liver. In phase 3 detoxification the toxins are excreted for example through the stool. Bernadette’s tips are mainly to help you with this phase.

Although we explain detoxification often by explaining first what phase 1 detoxification is, then phase 2 detoxification and then phase 3 detoxification, in a program, we approach it exactly the other way: first optimize phase 3, then phase 2 and 1

I often recommend by checking if phase 3 goes well. For example, with my clients who don’t have 1 bowel movement per day, I don’t start detoxification. If this goes well, I will support the next 2 phases.

Phase 2 detoxification needs nutrients like glycine, taurine, glutamine, NAC, and cysteine. In my opinion, having a well designed detox program should therefore contain some form of protein. Does your program have this? These specific amino acids that I mentioned could also be in supplements that came with your detox program. Other things that support phase 2 detoxification are glutathione (Like Bernadette mentioned), sulfur (which you can find in cruciferous vegetables), methyl folate and B12.

To offer better protection against the intermediates I was talking about earlier you will need anti-oxidants as Bernadette mentioned. These intermediates are often free radicals and antioxidants neutralize free radicals.

Long story short:
• Slow down detoxification if the symptoms that present are too much.
• Support first phase 3, then phase 2 and 1.

I hope you feel better soon!

 

[Daniel]

Hey ,

For some reason I can’t open the attached documents. Do you have them in another format as well? For example jpeg of pdf?

And it will help enormously to know if you are experiencing any symptoms in order to interprete lab values. 

Are you aware of any symptoms? For example where you sick recently? 

[Daniel]

Hey ,

Thank you for sharing her labs!

Low Iron
Low iron can be caused by several things:
• It might be lacking in the diet. Cycling women need around 18 mg of iron daily. It also needs vitamin C in the stomach for the enzymes to free iron from food.
• Since enzymes in the stomach free up the iron in foods, low stomach acid can reduce the body’s ability to absorb iron. The hydrochloric acid dosing challenge test in this handout helps you to get clues about is stomach acid is low. It isn’t diagnostic though. Supplementing with enzymes might help her increase iron absorption if she is low on stomach acid.
• If you suspect she has low stomach acid, help her with proper eating hygiene. Chew, eating without distractions and taking time to eat will help the body to understand that the energy should be spent on digestion instead of working.
• H. Pylori infections can also lower iron absorption. There are some great herbal remedies like zinc l-carnosine, mastic gum and DGL licorice. A nice herbal blend that is often used for this is Gastromend-HP from Designs for Health. Another great herbal remedy is Matula Tea. To be sure you have an H. Pylori infection you need to test though.
• Inflammation in the gut or body can impair iron absorption as well. Iron can worsen infections and the body sequesters iron away and reduces the gut’s ability to absorb iron. This is why I asked about gut symptoms. 

That probably sounds like a lot of options. Start to implement the easy ones first.

Vitamin B6
On her labs from September 2022 she showed low liver enzymes. The body needs vitamin B6 to produce liver enzymes. If she was low on vitamin B6 she might have not been able to produce liver enzymes effectively. In such cases, it can even mask elevations in liver enzymes. It would be a good idea to increase vitamin B6, for example by using a B complex supplement like Thorne’s basic b complex. If you are going to use a B complex, fo slow and easy. Start with half a capsule a day.

Cholesterol
Her cholesterol values are elevated. Here are some reasons why cholesterol can be elevated.
• Dietary choices: high sugar and/or high fat diets can both increase cholesterol. If her diet is healthy, biliary obstruction could block the exit of bile. 
• Insulin resistance: you mentioned high ketones in the urine. This can be a sign of ketoacidosis which happens as the cells in the body are insulin resistant. Other reasons for ketones in the urine are more innocent, so make sure you ask her the right questions! A ketogenic diet as well as fasting can cause elevations in ketones. There are also ketone supplements on the market, so make sure she didn’t consume them before the test. 

My favourite test to measure insulin resistance is to measure fasting insulin. More commonly done tests are HbA1c and glucose although personally, I don’t find them to be the most reliable markers.
• Sex Hormones: Bile is how cholesterol leaves the body. Imbalances in female sex hormones can cause secretion issues with bile as well. Estrogen can increase cholesterol while progesterone can slow down gallbladder contractions. You could use this handout to explore symptoms of estrogen dominance.

Low Bilirubin
These labs are showing low bilirubin  (which is a breakdown product of hemoglobin). Low bilirubin can be temporarily lowered by coffee, antibiotics, NSAID and seizure medications, and birth control pills. I would suspect bilirubin to get lower with low hemoglobin, although there are other reasons. It would be wise to check bilirubin once she has worked on her low iron issues.

Toxicity and Zirconium
Bernadette mentioned toxicity as a cause of tremors. I agree that exploring this option is worthwhile. You mentioned zirconium implants.  Although zirconium toxicity is less heard of, it can cause skin irritations, fatigue, allergies and other health problems. Zirconium is also used in toothpaste, deodorants and mouthwash.   If you consider testing for heavy metals, for example, I would include zirconium as well since she is exposed daily to it.

I tried to find some documentation for you on zirconium, but it was kinda technical. This site provides you with information that is a little easier to read.

[Daniel]

 That’s fantastic! You should be proud! I hope you enjoyed it!

[Daniel]

Hey ,

It depends a bit on the goal and the person. When fasting, your body tries to keep your blood sugar level stable. Since there is no food, these sugars are released from the liver or made from fats and proteins from gluconeogenesis. This process is stimulated by cortisol production. Fasting therefore can increase cortisol production during the fasting window.

Performance or Muscle Mass
The increase in cortisol isn’t a bad thing by the way. It is functional, to keep you alive. But after a fast, your energy levels are depleted. The advantage of eating first and training second with strength training is that, if you have eaten and are hydrated, you are able to perform better. If the goal is increasing muscle mass or getting stronger, this is an advantage, however…

… some people sleep worse since fasting and training both increase stress hormones. With these people, I would advise them to train before dinner since a lack of sleep might make it harder to recover and fast the next day.

Fat loss
For a lot of people training before dinner can reduce the feeling of being hungry. This can impact the amount they eat after their workout leading to more fat loss. But you will have to ask your clients how their feeling of hunger is impacted since it doesn’t apply to everybody. Some people might feel too exhausted which can lead to poor performance. In these cases, I might recommend training after dinner since the benefit of the hunger suppression is often gone as well.

Personally, I don’t recommend a lot of liquid carbs before or during training. Most people don’t train hard and long enough for it to be meaningful. The only exception to this was when they had fasted. I personally liked to recommend carbs with a low fructose content. You probably already know this, especially if you follow Bernadette, but fructose isn’t used by muscle tissue and most of the fructose doesn’t pass the liver. 

Since the goal is to help stabilize blood glucose levels to optimize performance, I always educated my clients to stay off sugar-like drinks because of the high fructose content. In this context cyclic dextrin for example is a better choice than honey.

[Daniel]

Hey ,

I am curious: did the anti-histamine bring relief to her itchiness?

Fatigue
Your friend has low ferritin values. Ferritin is a stored form of iron. Since her storage form is depleted, her serum iron levels are probably low. Do you know if her doctor measured serum iron as well?

Iron is needed to make hemoglobin, the molecule that transports oxygen and is stored in red blood cells. If hemoglobin cant be made, this can cause anemia from which fatigue is a symptom.

Your friend already has iron prescribed. But usually, it can take a few weeks before she will feel improvement in energy. I would suspect that her doctor also ran a Complete Blood Count(CBC) Panel.

If part of her fatigue is caused by anemia, it can take around 6 weeks before she feels a noticeable difference in her energy levels. It can take 3 months before all red blood cells have been replaced and her anemia is gone. Once anemia is gone, only then ferritin starts to come up significantly. 

You could help her by exploring why her iron was low in the first place. Is she eating animal products? Does she experience heavy blood loss during her menstrual cycle? Does she experience heartburn? Is she constipated? Does she have diarhea? Does she feel bloated? Does she experience cramps?

These are all powerful questions that could help you find out why her iron might be low.

Important little side note: iron supplements could cause constipation. When you ask her about constipation, you should ask about the differences between pre-and post-iron supplementation.

If her doctor did measure her Red Blood Cells, feel free to post them as well! The more details we have, the better we are able to help!

[Daniel]

Hey ,

Strengthening the immune function of your children can be done. We even have a nice document (just click here) that could give you some tips!

Asthma
Helping kids with asthma can be done by avoiding typical asthma triggers. Asthma triggers vary from child to child. Common asthma triggers include:
• Colds or other respiratory infections
• Allergens such as dust mites or pollen
• Pet dander
• Exercise
• Cold weather
• Mold and dampness
• Cockroach exposure
• Cigarette smoke and other irritants in the air
• Severe heartburn (gastroesophageal reflux disease, or GERD)

Water in ears
I’m sure  might have some better tips than I do since I don’t have kids. If you tried drying the outer ear with a soft towel or cloth but it didn’t work, you could also try:
• Tip your kid’s head to one side to help the water drain. Gently pull on the earlobe so that the ear canal will be straightened. This can help the water flow.
• Turn your blow dryer on the lowest setting and blow it toward the ear. Hold it at least a foot away.
• Tilt the head sideways and seal it tightly with a cupped palm. Pushing your hand back and forth in a rapid motion against your ear creates a vacuum, forcing the water to drain out of the ear.
• A homemade ear drop combining rubbing alcohol and white vinegar in equal proportion helps the ear to get rid of that trapped water. It also acts as an anti-bacterial medication as helps in keeping the growth of bacteria at bay and thus prevents infection. Pour a tablespoon of this ear drop into your ear and let it drain out after 30 seconds tilting your head sideways. While the acid breakdown cerumen trapping the water, alcohol helps in taking out the water along with it.
• Performing the ‘Valsalva Manoeuvre. This is the method when tried to help in opening blocked Eustachian tubes, pushing water out of the ear. Just close your mouth and press your nostrils close with your fingers, taking a deep breath. Blow air out gently from your nose. While doing so if you hear a popping sound, this means your Eustachian tube is now opened. Be careful not to blow too hard as it may cause damage to your eardrum.

Again: Bernadette might have some better tips here, but right now she is travelling!

I hope this helps!