Topics
- Introducing our guest, Dr. Terry Wahls [2:12]
- Quick update from Diane [5:03]
- Updates from Dr. Wahls [5:34]
- Listener comments for Dr. Wahls [6:42]
- How the Wahls Protocol works [14:20]
- Summary of the Wahls Protocol [17:35]
- A question of nightshades [22:05]
- Supplementing with seaweed [30:15]
- The Wahls Protocol on a budget [35:04]
- Keto on Wahls Protocol [46:34]
- Wahls for TBI [49:43]
- Fungal infections and Wahls Protocol [51:19]
- More eliminations when there's not much left to eliminate? [54:33]
- Research papers coming from Dr. Wahls research [59:40]
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You’re listening to the Balanced Bites podcast episode 289.
Diane Sanfilippo: Welcome to the Balanced Bites podcast. I’m Diane; a certified nutrition consultant, and the New York Times bestselling author of Practical Paleo and The 21-Day Sugar Detox. I live in San Francisco with my husband and fur kids; and I’m beyond excited about my guest today.
I’m the co-creator of the Balanced Bites Master Class, alongside my partner in crime, Liz Wolfe, and together we’ve been bringing you this award-winning podcast for more than 5 years. We’re here to share our take on modern paleo living, answer your questions, and chat with leading health and wellness experts. Enjoy this week’s episode, and submit your questions at http://blog.balancedbites.com. Remember our disclaimer: The materials and content within this podcast are intended as general information only, and are not to be considered a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment.
Before we get started, let’s hear from one of our sponsors.
Liz Wolfe: This episode of the Balanced Bites podcast is sponsored by our friends at Primally Pure Skincare. Primally Pure makes 100% natural and nontoxic skincare products that support radiant skin, a healthy body, and a happy self. They use ingredients like tallow from grass-fed cows; organic and fair trade coconut oil, and organic oils, herbs, and extracts to formulate effective products that also smell amazing and look beautiful sitting on your bathroom counter. At www.primallypure.com, you’ll find their bestselling natural deodorant that actually works; face mists made from locally sourced and organic rose and orange blossom hydrosols, and their brand new baby line. You’ll also find Diane’s favorite Primally Pure product, dry shampoo, and Liz’s favorite, the Everything Spray with magnesium. As a special bonus for you, Primally Pure is offering a free lip balm with your first purchase of one item or more. Simply add a lip balm to your cart along with any one item, and use the code “balancedbites”, one word no caps, during checkout to receive one of their lip balms for free with your order. Head to www.primallypure.com and check out their range of safe and effective all natural skincare products.
1. Introducing our guest, Dr. Terry Wahls [2:12]
Diane Sanfilippo: Hey everyone! It’s me, Diane, here with a very special guest today; Dr. Terry Wahls. Welcome to the show!
Dr. Terry Wahls: Hey, thank you so much for having me.
Diane Sanfilippo: I’m so excited! So I’m going to give a little quick intro here. Dr. Terry Wahls is a clinical professor of medicine at the University of Iowa where she conducts clinical trials. She’s also a patient with secondary progressive multiple sclerosis, which confined her to a tilt recline wheelchair for four years. Dr. Wahls restored her health using diet and lifestyle, a program that she designed specifically for her brain, and now pedals her bike to work each day. She is the author of The Wahls Protocol: How I Beat Progressive MS Using Paleo Principles and Functional Medicine; and her new cookbook, The Wahls Protocol Cooking for Life: The Revolutionary Modern Paleo Plan to Treat all Chronic Autoimmune Conditions; which releases April 4th. You can learn more about her work from her website, www.terrywahls.com; W-A-H-L-S, that is.
She conducts clinical trials that test the effect of nutrition and lifestyle interventions to treat MS and other progressive health problems. She also teaches public and medical community about the healing power of the paleo diet and therapeutic lifestyle changes that restore health and vitality to our citizens. She hosts The Wahls Protocol seminar every August where anyone can learn how to implement the protocol with ease and success.
Dr. Wahls has actually been on our show twice already, so if you haven’t listened to those episode, I highly recommend that you go back and listen to those. Those are episodes 130 and 170, and we’ll link to them in our show notes, but you can grab them anytime through any podcast app. So now, officially, welcome to the show; after all of that.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Hey, thanks for having me. I’ve always loved chatting with you.
Diane Sanfilippo: It’s always so much fun. We ran into each other just a couple of weeks ago at the NTA conference, which was really fun. And somebody made a comment on Instagram about me roping you into coming on the show. I said, “No, Dr. Wahls is a fan of my work too, you know!” {laughs}
Dr. Terry Wahls: {laughs} Oh my goodness, yes I love what you do.
Diane Sanfilippo: It was so funny. I remember the very first time we met was at PaleoFx many years ago; and you came up to me and thanked me for mentioning you in my book; and I was beside myself because I was such a fan {laughs}. Here I was fangirling and you were thanking me; and I just think this community is just so interesting and fun that we have folks who are “fans” of us, instead of fans of, I don’t know, television and movie celebrities; they’re fans of nutrition experts and nerds and all of that. I just think that’s such a cool community to be a part of.
Dr. Terry Wahls: It really is a wonderful community. I think with a lot of deep respect for all the work that we do. Because it really takes a community to create this epidemic of health that we’re all so longing to create.
2. Quick update from Diane [5:03]
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah; and the energy and excitement is pretty awesome. One update I just want to give our listeners before we jump into our topic today, and just our conversation with you; folks have been asking; this is unrelated to Dr. Wahls, but folks have been asking about the 21-Day Sugar Detox coaches program and wondering when it’s opening. It’s opening in May this year, so that’s pretty soon. If you want to be informed about that, you can go to the Facebook group, which is 21-Day Sugar Detox coaches interest group; or go to www.BalancedBites.com/courses, and there’s an email list you can sign up, make sure you find out when we have that open.
3. Updates from Dr. Wahls [5:34]
Diane Sanfilippo: Alright, so Dr. Wahls, before we talk about everything that’s been going on with you; what are some quick updates? Because you’ve got a brand new cookbook coming out, and there are some preorder goodies, and I don’t want anyone to miss out on hearing about the exciting news about that before we get into our Q&A session here, so can you tell folks about that?
Dr. Terry Wahls: Well, you know I’m so committed to helping people get their epidemic of health going, and I’m so excited about getting people fired up about this radical thing known as cooking at home; we created some incentives, some very nice PDF tools to help people implement cooking at home. And we made some very, very fun videos as well that people have exclusive content to that as well. And I think you’ll have those links for those in your show notes, if I remember correctly.
Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome. Cool; you guys can look out for that. I know everyone has been highly anticipating what was coming next from you, so you can keep your eyes out for that cookbook coming up.
4. Listener comments for Dr. Wahls [6:42]
Diane Sanfilippo: So before we get to the questions, I want to share a few comments that we’ve received after just posting the photo of us at the NTA conference a few weeks ago. We have a comment from Primal Enlightenment, she said, “She is one of my inspirations; love her.” Jshell717 said, “AH! She’s such an inspiration!” {laughs} I mean there are literally; they are freaking out. They are just fangirling over you, Dr. Wahls.
Another one, “She’s incredible! So thankful for all of her hard work.” “A YouTube video of hers inspired my journey.” “Wow, a walking miracle. Pure brilliance.” And one that says “Oh my goodness, you two are the most instrumental people in all of my transition to paleo years ago; you’re both so genuine and generous. My heart skipped a beat when I saw this picture!” So, I’m really excited. And they’re just very grateful for all of your work; and likewise, myself as well. Grateful for you doing this work.
And one thing I just want to make a note about is, when we have medical professions who take the leap to speak to the public, it’s something that I think needs to be recognized more and more. Because a lot of folks who would have the expertise and understanding the science and how it works; or the capacity for it, either don’t make that leap whether it’s just, you know, they only want to be working in their practice with their patients, or I honestly think there’s a way of translating what you may research and discover in a way that everyday people can understand that’s a special kind of gift that not everybody who can read and understand science has. Someone like Robb Wolf, who is a research biochemist; for him to be able to speak to the public; and for you to be able to speak to the public about this stuff, I think that’s a gift and I’m grateful that you share that with the world, so thank you from all of our listeners.
Dr. Terry Wahls: You know, early on when I made this decision to start talking to the public, I didn’t have my research out yet, so I was just telling my story. And oh, I got a lot of pushback from the medical community, that I was creating false hope; that it was immoral that I was doing this. I got called in several times, warned to not do this. So I kept at it, and tried to be very, very careful about telling my story and not making claims. There’s a way of doing this; but it is a lot of work, and most physicians have to deal with pushback in the beginning. So I understand why many physicians are like; no, it’s too much work to take this on.
Diane Sanfilippo: I think that’s pretty common of, I would say the general population of anything that has this extra layer or level of responsibility and challenge and, you know, society telling you that you shouldn’t do XYZ; whatever it is. Different people experience that in different ways, and I think in the medical community, there is probably just a really heightened level of that, because other doctors may be afraid of being called out for having been wrong about something, or not telling a patient about this option.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Oh yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: Or what have you. I just think it’s the ultimate responsibility to take to share information that could help other people.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Well, you know my response was that it felt immoral to not share my story. That to me the only choice I had was that I had to tell my story; that if I could recover using this pretty simple diet and lifestyle thing. Simple, but hard; other people might be able to have a lot of improvements, as well, with whatever their illness. Because I couldn’t sit up; that’s how ill I was. So that inspires a lot of hope, and of course so many people thought I was creating false hope. We had that barrier to jump over. But it just felt so immoral to not put that out there. Because if you’re going to wait for the double-blind research studies; that’s 20 years.
Diane Sanfilippo: Right.
Dr. Terry Wahls: And that’s way too long.
Diane Sanfilippo: And I think one of the things that your approach really challenges; well two things that it challenges in the standard medical community are number one, that it’s not just about which prescription somebody might need; and number two, I think there’s an underlying, and hopefully it’s shifting, but I think there’s an underlying mindset of medical professionals that people won’t do the work; so if it’s at all hard. Like you’re saying; it’s simple but it’s not always easy to implement, it does take work. And I think there’s an assumption that people aren’t willing to do the work; and I think we are seeing they are. I literally have thousands of people who tell me every day about what they’ve done to change their own lives; and they’re thanking me, and I’m saying, “you did the work!” you know. {laughs} That is the hard work, is actually making those diet and lifestyle changes; especially around friends and family who may not be on board, or whatever the case may be. So, I think those two assumptions we have to push those aside and say; well this is still the truth, regardless of the assumptions you might want to make.
Dr. Terry Wahls: It’s still the truth. Wherever society is on that curve, like the tipping point. We certainly are moving further along with more early adaptors. We haven’t gotten all the way to the tipping point yet; but certainly in my time in this community, I’ve seen much greater acceptance in the public, and much greater acceptance; much, much greater acceptance, in the medical community.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah.
Dr. Terry Wahls: So we’re certainly moving along in that early adaptor curve. So the work is getting easier.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, and just kind of my last thought on it; the more there are folks for whom the medications aren’t doing everything, or aren’t the answer; and the more folks we have who are taking this approach and are showing their doctors, “this is helping me,” then we continue to push that whole movement forward; the epidemic of health, as you call it. We push all of that forward with both of those things, you know. It’s the decrease of the medications actually doing beneficial for anybody, and also the increase of people who; it’s kind of happening at the same time; right. People aren’t getting the benefit, and they’re also willing to try something because they’re at their wits end, because I can’t feel this badly anymore. I need to do something different.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Well the other thing that is beginning to happen, as people’s access to health care and their prescription drugs change; and now they’re looking at, “Oh my god, I’m going to have pay all this money for these prescription drugs,” it becomes a little more attractive to rethink that hard, although simple, diet and lifestyle message that I’m putting out there.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah.
Dr. Terry Wahls: So, the whole environment around health care is changing; and I think that is making it more attractive to think through. Maybe I do need to revisit diet and lifestyle with my patients, and be more forthright that yes, these drugs are incredibly expensive, you can’t really afford them; you need to spend your money instead on addressing your diet and lifestyle issues.
5. How the Wahls Protocol works [14:20]
Diane Sanfilippo: So I think that our listeners know that their stories; whether this is something that they’ve dealt with, or friends and family; all of the stories that people have are at the top of the list of what will help encourage others to do this. Which, I mean; again you’re the number one testimony to that with your TED talk; sharing your story is what continues to encourage people to share their story about this. But let’s get into some nitty gritty stuff.
What is really happening? Why is it that your protocol is working for people? What’s going on in the body that’s helping this protocol; what are the mechanisms behind it that are igniting that change?
Dr. Terry Wahls: Oh, sure. So I’m going to sort of walk you through my evolution of how I think all this happens at the cellular level. When I first designed the protocol, it was all about the micronutrients that I knew our mitochondria and brain cells needed. I was thinking about the work of Bruce Ames, where he talks about triage theory; that we’ll use our limited micronutrients to stay alive acutely, and we’ll not use them for the long-term things that we might need, which has to do with brain health and blood vessel health. So we’ll more likely have chronic disease and early dementia; but we won’t diet from bleeding to death in terms of our vitamin K stores, for example.
So that was all about micronutrient repair. Then as we began to understand; when we seek one’s DNA and realize that we only have 25,000 genes, that really it’s the complicated interaction with the genes we have and a lifetime of diet and lifestyle choices that are turning genes on and off. So I began to realize; well, wait a minute. Maybe another big factor is that the diet and lifestyle things I did were turning my genes on; the health promoting ones, and turning off the disease promoting ones. So I had two big reasons.
And then we began to realize how important poop is; that we have 20,000 genes ourselves; 25,000 genes. We also have 9 million genes from the bacteria, viruses, and yeast that live in our gut; that help us run the metabolic activity of our brains and our bodies and ourselves. So now my thought is; yes, it’s the micronutrients, yes it’s the gene expression; and yes, it’s all of the microbiome; the bacteria and yeast that are living in our bowels. And of course all of that was very important. And for each person, which one is the most important may vary. But when I’m teaching these concepts to our groups, I spend time talking about all three levels of the way the diet and lifestyle is talking to me and my cells, and letting my cells begin to repair my body.
6. Summary of the Wahls Protocol [17:35]
Diane Sanfilippo: So, for our listeners who haven’t yet; we do have a lot of new listeners, we’ve had some fun episodes recently with Dr. Cate Shanahan, all about fats and oils; it was an amazing episode. One with Robb Wolf recently; so I know we have a lot of new listeners who haven’t had a chance to go back yet. Can you give a very high level overview of what your protocol looks like for folks?
Dr. Terry Wahls: Sure.
Diane Sanfilippo: Knowing that our listeners are pretty familiar with the general paleo diet, so you can use the term pretty easily; just let them know what your protocol looks like in general.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Sure, sure. So, I did the paleo diet originally 2 years into my MS, and took out all grains, all legumes, all dairy. I put meat back in after 20 years a vegetarian, and it did not recover me. I continued to go downhill, but I stayed with the paleo diet because at least I was doing something. Then by 2007, based on everything that I’d researched with paleo and functional medicine, in my own search for the research; I had created a diet designed specifically for my brain in terms of what did I need to stress. So I had already taken out the gluten, dairy, grains, legumes; but I now started stressing lots more vegetables, in a very structural way. So I have 3 cups of greens every day; vitamin K turns out to be hugely important for how we make myelin and how we repair and maintain our brain. Of course with MS, the brain is really suffering, so I had lots of greens.
Then I had 3 cups of sulfur rich vegetables in the cabbage, onion, mushroom family. Because these vegetable groups will greatly improve the efficiency and effectiveness of removing the pollutants and toxins that are stored in my fat and brain. They also improve the health of my blood vessels. And the mushrooms in particular help prime what we call the adaptive and innate immune cells; so they do a better job of protecting me against foreign infections and of course internal cancers. And there’s some great research now, particularly with lion’s mane mushrooms that mushrooms stimulate the production of nerve growth factors, which are hormone signals to repair and maintain your brain cells. So again, really great stuff.
And then the third category I’ve got are deeply pigmented, and I make this really simple. You cut the food item in half; if it’s colored all the way through with pigment, that counts as colored. So peaches, pears, berries, beets, carrots, they would all qualify as colored. So I’m looking for 3 cups of that.
If you have a belly that’s bigger than your butt, you shouldn’t have fruit, or limit it to berries, no more than half a cup a day. If you’re really quite trim, you could have your color be fruits; otherwise you have 3 cups of greens and 3 cups of sulfur rich vegetables; so it’s still only a third of your fruits and vegetables. I want people to have sufficient protein, so 6-12 ounces. I’m not a heavy protein person, because I don’t want to have too much protein because that would be a stimulant for tumor grown and mammalian target of rapamycin. I want to have plenty of fats, and omega-3, omega-6. Nuts and seeds ideally have been soaked to start some germination to reduce phytates and lectins. And I talk about the benefits of ketosis for those who want a more aggressive approach.
And I talk a little bit about the elimination diet; but the vast majority of my folks do very well without doing the elimination diet. They can usually do level 1 or level 2.
Diane Sanfilippo: I actually really love the breakdown of how much of all of the different kinds of vegetables to get; because hey, I’m not immune to this struggle of eating the same vegetables over and over. I’m actually pretty good at doing greens and leafy greens, but when it comes to other colorful veggies, or foods in general, I feel like I’m mostly eating a lot of green stuff. So it’s a good reminder; and it’s a reminder for all of us, whether or not we’re dealing with MS or any other type of disease state; we’re all still looking to optimize health no matter what. So it’s great to hear that.
7. A question of nightshades [22:05]
Diane Sanfilippo: A couple of quick questions that I know our listeners had; there was a question about nightshades and I think you and I have talked about this before.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Oh yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: I think we talked about this on one of our previous interviews; or we talked about it in person.
Dr. Terry Wahls: This question comes a lot.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, because for your way of eating, bell peppers would be considered a richly colored vegetable, because you cut into it and you’re getting that color.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Yeah, it’s colored all the way through.
Diane Sanfilippo: And they’re super rich and vitamin C, lots of amazing nutrients in bell peppers. But what’s your take on nightshades and how does that work?
Dr. Terry Wahls: Sure. So a couple of things; if you have rheumatoid arthritis, or you have an autoimmune disease process that’s affecting your joints. So rheumatoid arthritis, psoriatic arthritis, sacroiliitis, ankylosing spondylitis; so all of these things is an autoimmune destruction of the joints. Those people probably have a much more severe reaction to the lectins; and for them, yes, I would take all nightshades out. And I’d have them take them out for 100 days; and I’d have them take out all grains, all legumes, and probably all nuts and seeds. After the 100 days, then we let them bring 1 ingredient back per week and they can assess their response. We give them a checklist to decide how well they’re responding; or they can just decide they’re going to stay nightshade and lectin free.
Everyone else; so if you have an autoimmune problem, your joints aren’t involved, I’ll put them on my basic level 1 diet. I may move them onto more organ meats and seaweeds, and then tell them any nuts and seeds have to be soaked and see how they do. If they have great response, then they continue to have the nightshades. If they don’t have as good a response as I’m looking for, then we talk about; are they willing to take the nightshades out. I will let people know that they can take nightshades out from the beginning; but I’m also very empathetic. I took the public health perspective; my diet is hard enough as it is.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah.
Dr. Terry Wahls: I want people to have success; and I would say pretty easily 90% of my folks, if we take out the folks who obviously have joint involvement, do great on level 1 and level 2 and they can continue to have the nightshades without a problem. Myself, I love eggplant. But if I have eggplant, my heart races. I know that that’s probably not something that’s good for me; so I don’t have my eggplant. I really like tomatoes, I can have fresh heirloom tomatoes and basil once a week during the summer and I do well. If I have tomato sauce over spaghetti squash; I can do that once maybe in a month. If I have it more frequently, I’ll have more MS pain. So I can sort of identify that how much tomatoes I can have. Peppers don’t seem to give me a problem, so I’m going to have grilled brats and peppers tonight, and that will be just fine. Potatoes; white potatoes I don’t do, sweet potatoes, yams, you know are different species; I do ok with them.
There certainly are authors who would have people avoid all seeds and seeded vegetables, and all skins, because they’re so worried about lectins. So if I had someone who had a severe disease process that was not responding to taking out the nightshades, I might even go and take all the lectins out, even more aggressively, and take out all seeds, even the seeded vegetables and the skins. But that’s a very, very tough diet. And it certainly is not a starting point.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, I think that’s basically what; you know, when I recommended an autoimmune protocol for folks based on the meal plan that I have in Practical Paleo, which is not to the level that your program is, where it’s very strongly indicating exactly how much of everything to eat; it’s really more of what to avoid and then some general recommendations. So it’s like super entry level; I don’t even have folks eliminate seed-based spices, because I have not seen that in the last 6 years of doing this stuff with folks; by and large haven’t seen that as an issue. Although, as you’re saying in this case of course for some nightshades are an issue. For some people, every food will be an issue, but we’re trying to look at what’s the most we can allow folks to eat and bring them in and allow them to try something before you keep limiting, limiting, limiting, because that is really tough for the general population. And nightshades are a big one; they’re really tough to avoid, especially when you dine out. Different pepper spices; red pepper spices end up on things, it is a tough one.
You know, eggplants a funny vegetable. I love it, as well; I’m half Italian, grew up eating eggplant parm. But you know what I looked up the nutritional value; there’s really not much in it, so it’s a tough one to convince folks that anybody needs anyway, so there you go. I was hard pressed to find much. Probably the skin has some kind of micronutrients in that purple skin, but other than that.
Dr. Terry Wahls: That purple skin is really good.
Diane Sanfilippo: That was all I was finding. {laughs}
Dr. Terry Wahls: I have had several people develop orthorexia. And I think we have to be very attentive that when we make things too restrictive, that we can create a lot of food fear. So I try to just be very gradual in what restrictions I have, and so there’s a very strong clinical indication to take people down that route.
Diane Sanfilippo: Mm-hmm. And I think also; sometimes folks assume that because eliminating X-number of foods is good, that X-number of foods times two might be better, and that’s not the case. And I think to your point about nightshades, for example; especially with bell peppers. Such a nutrient rich food group, or food type; but for people who don’t do well with them, not a good choice. But for people who do, we’re getting so much… I keep slamming my desk, I apologize. I’m talking with my hands, which nobody can see, but I’m getting excited! {laughs} So I keep hitting my desk.
We get so much nutrition value from them that we do have to balance that out, and part of that is also the balance of making the lifestyle easier, too. Like, do we have an ease of the lifestyle by including a couple of things that we’re not sure how people are going to do with them, but interesting.
One other thing that you mentioned was mushrooms, and I’m curious about this because we’ve seen tons of new dried mushroom supplements coming out. Drink powders and things like that. Do the dried mushrooms contain the appropriate nutrients; can folks be using that as a supplement if they can’t always buy the types of mushrooms that they’re look for fresh? Are those as powerful and useful?
Dr. Terry Wahls: Well, I’ll tell you. I have a canister of lion’s mane mushrooms that I put in my smoothie every day because of the research showing lion’s mane mushroom stimulating nerve growth factors. And there are certainly a number of blends out there with medicinal mushrooms; so I think they can be beneficial, they’re fun to add to soups and stews. They’re fun to use as a culinary spice, and they can be a lovely addition to my bone broth, coconut milk tea beverages; that’s really very yummy. Or I can put them in my membrane smoothie that I take every day to support my brain.
Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome. I’ve been sprinkling some dried mushroom powder; I’ve been using porcini because I’m not being too specific about it, it’s just one I happen to be using. But sprinkling that on kale that I’m cooking in the morning, and I feel like it adds good umami, and I’m sure I’m getting something from that.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Oh yeah, that sounds delicious.
8. Supplementing with seaweed [30:15]
Diane Sanfilippo: It’s great. Ok, so there was also; I’m just on this tip of all this special foods that folks are asking about. I figure I’ll just continue asking all these questions here. There was a question about seaweed. We know that you like to recommend seaweed, this one was from Maggie, she loved the episodes you were on in the past and her question is about the seaweed. The only thing she has liked so far are SeaSnax, which are toasted nori sheet, and those are made with olive oil. Is there still a benefit to eating those; she feels like they’re potato chips to her, so.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Well, they’re very tasty and occasionally I’ll indulge in those; very yummy. I like getting my seaweed from Main Coast sea vegetables. One of the things that they do, which I very much appreciate, is they test their seaweed for heavy metals and radiation. So I know that their seaweed is safe. They have some lovely flakes; you can get red seaweed flakes which are very handy to add to your vegetables, soups, casseroles. You can also get some of the seaweed blend as flakes. I have it in a big shaker, and I just shake that generously either on salads or in the casseroles I make. And my family loves that flavor.
I think what we’re responding to is that this is just a rich source of adding more minerals into our diet. Our soils are so depleted mineral-wise because of how we’ve changed our farming practice, that our food does not have the mineral content it would have had two generations ago, or even one generation ago. So many of us are mineral depleted, which is why sea salt tastes so good to us, and why seaweed tastes so good to us. It’s our brain responding to that mineral deficiency.
Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome. So perhaps they are not the most ideal source; probably not the most potent, but not a bad option. And I think sprinkling onto your food is probably a good idea getting some of the, you mentioned Main Coast.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Blends.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, and maybe blending that up with something. I know Michelle Tam, from Nom Nom Paleo, she uses a Furikake sprinkling, and we could probably make those at home really easily mixing some things together, so. Good tip there.
You know; I don’t know that I knew this part of your story, that you, and forgive me for missing it because I think it’s a pretty big part of your story. But that you were a vegetarian for 20 years. I don’t think I knew that before.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Oh, yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: Do you; and this is kind of random, off the cuff. Do you think that had anything to do with you state?
Dr. Terry Wahls: Oh, I’m sure it did.
Diane Sanfilippo: Ok.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Yeah, I’m sure it did.
Diane Sanfilippo: Were you a nutrient-rich vegetarian; what kind of food were you eating as a vegetarian, back then.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Well, I still had eggs, I would have some cheese. I did a lot of grains and legumes, I did have vegetables. So certainly looking on the outside; you’d think, oh my god, this is a fabulous diet. It doesn’t look that far off from a Mediterranean diet. But I wasn’t doing B12, I probably had enough protein but I doubt; it was so grain and carb-heavy, and my previous history of lots of antibiotics earlier in my life was probably fertile ground for yeast overgrowth. I’m sure a B12 deficiency. Probably some phytate and mineral deficiency. So at least for me, my interpretation of the vegetarian diet, I’m sure was part of the problem.
Interestingly enough, when I went grain free, legume free, dairy free; and I went back to eating meat. And that was a big transition for me; that was not easy. I had a lot of spiritual conflict, and just readjusting my palate. That took me several months to get through that. I continued to decline; the next year I needed the wheelchair. But I stayed with this because at least I was doing something. And I’d read Cordain’s book, and I thought, “Ok, there’s a scientific rationale here. It probably takes a long time for my brain to get repaired, so I’ll just hang in there.”
At that point, I was way focused on what to remove from my diet, as opposed to, “What is it that my brain needs.”
Diane Sanfilippo: Right. Which I think once folks get used to that, you end up doing what we call kind of crowding out the poor quality foods. By the time you get all the foods in that Dr. Wahls wants you to eat, there’s not much space in your stomach {laughs} for what’s left, right?
Dr. Terry Wahls: {laughing}
Diane Sanfilippo: So I think that’s a great thing.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Yeah, that’s right.
9. The Wahls Protocol on a budget [35:04]
Diane Sanfilippo: So one thing we want to cover before we get into a few more questions here; is how to implement; because we know just going paleo in general can be cost prohibitive for some folks, or at least perceived that way, I think, initially because to leave all else the same and just change your food without looking at {laughs} I mean, I’m one to point fingers at things, like car payments, and all the things that we spend money on, right, that some folks prioritize over food. But in a very practical sense; how do people implement this when money is really limited?
Dr. Terry Wahls: Sure, sure.
Diane Sanfilippo: And I would say, when it’s limited and it’s not just appropriate elsewhere, because that’s a priority shift that folks can make. But if it is really limited, what are your recommendations for that?
Dr. Terry Wahls: Let me talk some real experience. I worked at the VA for 16 years; I’m not there now. So while I was taking care of people at the traumatic brain injury clinic and my therapeutic lifestyle clinic, a lot of folks were on disability. They didn’t have money. Money really was difficult for them. And the supplements I could order were B12 and fish oil; that was it. I couldn’t order any functional medicine testing, and all I could talk about was diet and lifestyle. So help people understand what is the food budget; so that includes all the food you buy, I included alcohol and tobacco, and your restaurants, and your fast food. So all of that is what I call the food budget.
And then I said, “Ok, I want you to stop getting things that are harmful to your health out of there.” So take out the sugar, the white flour. And you’re going to buy vegetables, and if it’s meat and potatoes, and you didn’t have an autoimmune problem involving your joints, I let them have their potatoes. And if money was really tight, we would do some vegetarian meals with sprouted gluten-free grains and legumes. But I said; you can do this with conventional food. If you have to get canned foods; just don’t pour out the juice. Get frozen vegetables. We talked about hunting, fishing, gardening. And, the key thing is; we taught people how to cook at home. A lot of folks had forgotten how to cook at home. And so, if we got them to not go out to eat instead, making soups and stews at home, we had many, many of our folks came back and say; “well, you’re right doc. I’m probably spending less money.”
We also talked about how to use all the food. So if you have your cauliflower; you don’t throw away the leaves or the core, you grate that and you put that in a soup or in a stew. So we deal with food waste, we deal with menu planning, grocery shopping; in that 40% of the food Americans buy is thrown away. So if we teach people how to address all of that, they can save money. If we teach them that you don’t have to be organic at first; you don’t have to be grass-fed. First just make these changes; get foods that heal you, and as money becomes more available, you can improve the quality of your food and go more organic. You can go to grass-fed.
And the other very interesting thing, Diane, was that as people recovered, even my folks on disability started figuring out how they could get access to organic foods.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} Yeah.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Not until they're recovered, but as they recovered, they began to figure out how to do it in their community. And of course, they would find different ways. We’re fortunate in Iowa; once you begin to get into this, you can often find some local, sustainable farmers who may or may not be certified organic but have low pesticide exposure for their crops and their vegetables. And in Iowa, there are a lot of communities with way too many deer, and they have selected hunts. So there’s wild game in freezers available for the public. So it’s probably easier here in Iowa than it is in San Francisco.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} For that, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: I think also, as your entire mindset and lifestyle shift, and you’re cooking at home so much more and you’re finding that you’re buying certain foods and you want to try a little bit better, a little bit better; that’s just the natural human tendency, for self-improvement. Becoming more and more resourceful on that; now you have the time and capacity, the brain space to think about how to do it better once it’s no longer such a challenge to just eat at home and cook at home, once you’re through that initial challenge. I think it was somewhere in something that Tim Ferris wrote about; he said, “getting someone to change their diet isn’t just changing their diet; it’s changing the fact that they now shop at the grocery store, and they spend time doing that, and then they’re chopping food, and they’re cooking it, and they’re cleaning up after it.” All these things about your life that actually have to change in order to change your food; to say nothing of the people around you who may or may not be interested in what you’re doing; and may or may not be supportive or detrimental to it in some way. I mean, that’s totally another endeavor.
But it is a big deal, and I do think that folks end up having this capacity to find better ways to get the food besides just going to the grocery store and expecting to buy it there; right? That was kind of the initial, “I can’t afford it!” Well, if you can’t afford it at the grocery store, the last 20 minutes of the farmer’s market when the farmers don’t want to take that stuff back, then all of a sudden, the 3 for 5 kale is now 6 for 5 on a bunch of kale, those are the ways that we discover as we get more into it. Sometimes it’s just a little overwhelming at first.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Right. As you realize, if you go to the farmer’s market, and at the very end, as you say; when you just are willing to take whatever is not sold, you can be quite impressed with how much you can pick up.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah. And I bet, too, at the end of the market especially, you could probably even speak to them, and say, “Hey, I’m on a really tight budget, what’s the best deal I can get here.” You know? And that’s a great place to bargain in a situation I’m pretty sure Whole Foods will not really bargain with you. But also, a lot of farmer’s markets, depending on where you are in the country, they take all different sorts of government assistance or whatever it is you may have; EBT, I don’t know what it’s called all over the country, SNAP, different assistance, they take it. I know our farmer’s markets do, so that is another option, as well.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Iowa does that as well. Many community sponsored Iowa culture programs let people come and work instead of pay.
Diane Sanfilippo: Oh, awesome.
Dr. Terry Wahls: You can come do labor for your food, as well. So there are many options. A lot of communities have community gardening. I teach people how to garden and give them access to gardens. Many options are out there, once you begin to prioritize, “I need to figure out how to cook and make meals at home.”
And you know, we’re committed to having cooking classes, teaching people that bacon and greens really can be your favorite vegetable, and that green smoothies really can be quite delicious. And so, our veterans would be like, “Oh my god, this really is good!”
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah.
Dr. Terry Wahls: That’s why I think cooking classes are so powerful; is one, have people see how fast and easy it is to have a meal. And it’s also part of why I wrote my cookbook; I wanted people to understand you could have great tasting food that doesn’t have to be a high cost in terms of either cost, money, or complexity.
Diane Sanfilippo: I think that’s a really important lesson for our listeners who are practitioners; we have a lot of health coaches, NTPs, NTCs, nutrition consultants; a lot of listeners who are in this field, and myself included at one point in time; we get caught up in a lot of the therapeutic nutrition and we forget just how important teaching cooking can be, whether or not you even use heat. You could show somebody a raw recipe if you don’t have an environment where you don’t have a classroom with a stovetop. I mean, some of the first classes I taught were cooking classes. I think we get so far removed from it the further we get into this therapeutic nutrition application through all of our schools, but if you’re feeling a little stuck and you don’t know what to do to inspire and motivate and get people excited; teach them how to cook, because that’s really, like you said; either folks forgot, or I think a lot of people never learned.
We’re in this generation where; and I said to my husband the other day, I’m so lucky for the things I didn’t get from my parents about who I am. My parents are; I wouldn’t necessarily say they’re entrepreneurs, my mom was a school teacher; my dad works in sales, but I don’t think I got this from them. I don’t know where I got it from; but they taught me how to cook for sure, both of them. And I’m like, that’s probably the thing I’m most grateful for, and boy am I really glad that every day I’d leave the house, and I’d smell like red sauce that my dad was simmering, you know. {laughs} It was just engrained in my clothes, because it was just always on. Saturday morning you’d wake up; it didn’t smell like pancakes in my house, it smelled like red sauce. So I’m really glad that I learned that, but I do think that’s so critical, and our practitioners; don’t be paralyzed by trying to teach people about gut health if that’s not where you want to go right now. Teach them how to cook because you’re going to get so much response from that, and that’s going to change people’s lives.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Teach them how to make bone broth. Like oh my god; hugely successful class, and people were amazed at how yummy that bone broth was when you added chicken feet. That’s gross until they had a cup of the bone broth. Like, oh wow, that really is amazing.
Diane Sanfilippo: And how easy it is; and how, even if they don’t like to sip it, they can blend some carrot into it, and all of a sudden, it’s carrot ginger soup, and it’s amazing.
Liz Wolfe: Today’s podcast is sponsored by Vital Choice seafood and organics; purveyor of premium sustainably sourced seafood and a certified B corporation. Vital choice offers a wide range of fish, shellfish, humanely raised meat, protein rich bone broths, and paleo friendly snacks like organic dark chocolate, super antioxidant trail mix, and bison jerky. From weeknight dinners to weekend brunches, www.vitalchoice.com is your source for real food.
10. Keto on Wahls Protocol [46:34]
Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome. Ok, so we have a couple more questions here, and I think this one you basically answered. This one was from Amelia, just saying, “Is it possible to follow a ketogenic or lower carb diet on the Wahls Protocol?” But you have pretty much addressed that. It essentially almost is, depending on the vegetables that you end up eating.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Yeah. You absolutely can, and you can take it more formally into a ketogenic diet. I add coconut milk, coconut oil for the medium chain triglycerides, so you can have about 60-80 grams of carbs. My thinking on ketosis is, that for most people; I wouldn’t be in ketosis for longer than 18 months unless you have a very special circumstance, like brain cancer, then you might want to do it longer. Once you’ve done your 18 months, then I would go back to seasonal ketosis, and do ketosis over the winter for your ethnic background, and then over summer go back to a higher level of carb intake that’s seasonally appropriate. Which is what I do.
I’m coming out of ketosis now, and I’ll be adding soon before I know, the strawberries will be coming in and we’ll be having berries in garden produce, and I’ll be back to my usual diet.
Diane Sanfilippo: I think that’s a great way to introduce it. One of the things we noticed over the years of running the 21-Day Sugar Detox, which eliminates most fruit; over the summer, it’s really not fun to have people do that, because the farmers markets are berries, and peaches, and plums, and here in California even the end of the summer we’re getting figs, and all these things that hmm; maybe we’ll just do it in the spring and we’ll run it again in the fall, we’ll let people have the cherries. Cherries are my favorite. But yeah, pretty interesting to see how that works seasonally. I think that’s a good tip there.
Dr. Terry Wahls: You know, I think we really should pay attention to the seasonal changes. The other goal that I had that I didn’t mention is, I push people to try and keep track of how many different plant species they consume, and the goal is to hit over 200 in a year. So when I started doing that, I realized, even I have to pay attention to this. So I’m working on having more spices, more teas, so I can hit my 200 different plants species by the years’ end. It also makes me much more interested when I see a new vegetable showing up at the grocery market; “oh, I’ve got to bring this home and try that out.”
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, that’s awesome. I thing we need a poster for that, and when people travel and put a pin on where they’ve been on the map. Like, here’s all the plant species I need you to be finding or fill in everything, and then people will see the 20 that we’re eating all the time. Or probably 10 or 20 that we’re eating so often. I mean, kale. Kale on our grocery list; it doesn’t just say kale. It says, kale, kale, kale. {laughs}
Dr. Terry Wahls: Oh yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: Because I have a kale obsession; hopefully my food sensitivity test won’t come back telling me I’m sensitive to kale right now {laughs}.
Dr. Terry Wahls: {laughs}
11. Wahls for TBI [49:43]
Diane Sanfilippo: Ok we have a couple of other good ones here before we wrap up. One about food and supplements specific for traumatic brain injury. They’re just excited about your research and all of it.
Dr. Terry Wahls: So my protocol was really developed for my traumatic brain injury clinic, and for me. So as I was recovering myself, and I’m teaching these concepts to my traumatic brain injury folks, I started off with a long list of foods that I needed to stress. And I realized that they needed a simpler mantra so they could remember the stuff. I needed a simpler model to teach all these concepts, and still have people get the foods that they needed for their brains. And that’s how I came up with the 3, 3, and 3 in the categories that I did. So it’s a way for people to know what they need for their brain. This is a fabulous protocol for traumatic brain injury. We had great, great results.
The only things that I would add; higher dose of omega-3 oils and strength training. Because the strength training will help with nerve growth factor. There is a wonderful website for traumatic brain injury; I believe it’s www.brainhealtheducation.org. That has some downloadable protocols for acute traumatic brain injury, and some helpful for long-term. I think I would take that information and combine it with mine, and you’ll be well on your way.
12. Fungal infections and Wahls Protocol [51:19]
Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome. We have two more questions here that I love, so one is from Catherine. I mean, everyone and their comments {laughs}. First they kind of screaming in their comment about how excited they are. So she says, “Ah! I love Dr. Wahls!” {laughs} I mean, did you ever think you being a doctor talking about healing from MS that people would have;
Dr. Terry Wahls: No.
Diane Sanfilippo: It’s like a Kardashian effect or something, I don’t know what’s happening, anyway. I just can’t get over it. So she says, “Here's my question: I follow a Paleo/natural lifestyle and have read both Practical Paleo and The Wahls Protocol. I am in the process of being diagnosed and treated for a fungal lung infection and am nervous about the toll the serious antifungals prescription and die-off will take as I heal. Generally it seems like these take months to a year of treatment and there is some chance of liver toxicity from it. What ideas do you have for additional nutrition and lifestyle support; basically, what can I be doing to get through this as best I can? No amount of kombucha/coconut oil/probiotics seem to be helping, but should I just keep doing these things anyway?”
So, things I think about with fungal problems, depending on the person, they may have difficulty clearing fungus byproducts. So if you’ve got a fungal infection that you’ve been treated for a long time, I would probably stop the kombucha and I might even quit eating mushrooms for a while, to decrease your overall fungal exposure. You might, in terms of giving your liver more support during this time, milk thistle might be very helpful, and plenty of cabbage and onion family vegetables would be very helpful approach.
Be sure that your doctor is talking about glutathione, so there are some things you can do for the glutathione, but the cabbage family/onion family vegetables are your best approach there. Your doc might talk about a glutathione supplement or N-acetyl-cysteine in addition, as well.
I would also say that we’ve had many folks with chronic infections, be it fungal issues or Lyme issue, or chlamydophila who had been treated by their physician for years for their complicated chronic infections, and really not getting better until they discovered my protocol and did my protocol, which seemed to turn the corner for them. And I think part of that reason is that I’m so focused on the entire environment for the host; the maximal nutrition, the stress reduction, the detoxification, that we create the most healthy, vigorous host, and the most potent, immune stimulant you can have is a healthy, vigorous, cellular milieu, which is what the Wahls Protocol will help you provide.
13. More eliminations when there’s not much left to eliminate? [54:33]
Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome. I think that’s really helpful. And our last question here is from Leanne. I think you touched on this a bit, a little while ago, but I think it’ll be great for her to hear and her mum to hear. She says, “My Mum has MS, fibromyalgia, osteoarthritis, lots of joint pain, aspirin sensitivity, asthma, nasal polyps, and lots of fatigue. She works with a great ND (for years) but still is only able to eat 10 different things. She's relatively active but fatigue is a big problem. She'd like to know if she really needs to eliminate alcohol and caffeine, as these are the last two she hasn't cut out. She's gluten free, dairy free, and only eats a few vegetables, and some meats.”
Dr. Terry Wahls: Hmm. Well, again I want to be careful; I can’t give medical advice. But when I hear a story like this, able to eat only a few foods, I’m thinking leaky gut. Alcohol certainly contributes to a leaky gut, so I’d want that out. I’d be thinking about how I’m going to heal that leaky gut; so bone broths, glutamine, probably cod liver oil, zinc. And I would be working on food sensitivity testing to understand what’s going on, and realize that this sounds like a complicated issue. I would be wondering about exposures in the environment that might be continuing this going on; water damaged buildings, are there fungal issues, are there other chronic infections like chlamydophila, Lyme, borrelia, bartonellosis that might be contributing to this.
Another potential factor has to do with situational stress, so if there’s unresolved work conflict or family conflict or severe financial strain, that could set up this kind of long-term difficulty, as well. So many, many possibilities that you have to be thinking about when you have this kind of long-term struggle.
Diane Sanfilippo: I think that’s really good advice. The one other thing I was just thinking as I read this question; and this is something that I’ve sort of come across I think; when some folks work with one practitioner for a very long period of time, you almost; the things you’re dealing with, your practitioner may either lose; not lose sight of them, but things just become sort of normalized, and this is absolutely no discredit to whoever her practitioner is, because every practitioner; it’s a different situation every time. But I would encourage her maybe to consider having a second practitioner work for her.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Oh, absolutely.
Diane Sanfilippo: I think that just a new, fresh perspective; somebody who may ask different questions.
Dr. Terry Wahls: We see new things.
Diane Sanfilippo: Sometimes our practitioners of long periods of time takes things for granted about us, you know. Exactly, see new things. I think to your point; when there is a very long-term issue going on, sometimes; you know, I have a friend who is has something that’s like really long-term, it has nothing to do with the food. It’s all about lifestyle stress, and emotional stress, and things that sometimes we just, we go through all this testing with a practitioner, and we’re being super clinical but we get to be a little more emotional sometimes {laughs} and look at the person, you know, instead of what the tests say. So I do think that that would be an interesting approach as well, and the alcohol and caffeine, as you had said; alcohol is something I always tell people, people don’t want to give it up, but it is getting in the way of detoxification if it’s something that you’re trying to deal with.
Dr. Terry Wahls: It interferes with detox, it can add to the leaky gut issues, and if she has that many difficulties with food, leaky gut is certain part of that.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah; and how many years has she only been eating 10 foods; the stress level of that lifestyle is probably increasing month after month, year after year, you know. So interesting.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Liz Wolfe: The Balanced Bites podcast is sponsored in part by the Nutritional Therapy Association. The NTA trains and certifies nutritional therapy practitioners and consultants (including me; I’m an NTP), emphasizing bio-individuality and the range of dietary strategies that support wellness. The NTA emphasizes local, whole, properly prepared nutrient dense foods as the key to restoring balance and enhancing the body’s ability to heal. Nutritional therapy practitioners and consultants learn a wide range of tools and techniques to assess and correct nutritional imbalances. To learn lots more about the nutritional therapy program, go to http://www.NutritionalTherapy.com. There are workshop venues in the US, Canada, and Australia, so chances are you’ll be able to find a venue that works for you.
14. Research papers coming from Dr. Wahls research team [59:40]
Diane Sanfilippo: So, that’s everything we have this week. What else do you want to tell folks about what’s going on? We have your new cookbook.
Dr. Terry Wahls: New cookbook, research papers. There’s going to be another paper coming out very soon in the Journal of American College of Nutrition that talks about the improvements and mood and thinking ability that we observed in that first group of 20; that will be very fun to have out. And we’ll have a link to that paper when it comes out. It’s due in print in the March/April journal, so we’ll have it online sometime in this time window, as well.
We have another paper that we’re working, that we’re revising back and forth that goes over the changes in gait; and what is so exciting about this, Diane, is we’re putting this in an open access, if we could finally get two acceptance, which I’m hoping will be sometime soon. But you never know; these revisions yet could take a while. But if we get that accepted, then we’ll have the paper that will have links to the videos before and after.
Diane Sanfilippo: Those are amazing!
Dr. Terry Wahls: And that will be available so the public will see that now, so that, again will be very exciting. On Friday, I am meeting with our team. We’ve been looking at the MRIs, so in that first group of 20 we had 10 folks who had MRIs at month 1 and month 12; and so we’ve been analyzing that data, trying to decide how to write that up. I except it may be another year before that shows up in print, but that will be a very fun and exciting paper when that comes out.
We have the million-dollar study from the MS Society, where we’re comparing the SWANK Diet, which is low saturated fat diet, to the Wahls Diet; we’ll be recruiting 100 folks. I think we have 22 people enrolled so far, so that’s very, very exciting.
There is a researcher from Bastyr University up in the northwest who has a survey based study where they do survey’s twice a year on diet and lifestyle issues. They have one for Parkinson’s patients and one for MS patients, and they let people classify their diet, so they’re asking, are they following the Wahls diet. And they looked in on some of their data, and they told me that they could tell that the Wahls people were doing really, really well; so they asked me if I could spread this out to my community. So I doubled their N, so that’s up over 600 now.
Diane Sanfilippo: Wow.
Dr. Terry Wahls: So we have I think about 250 folks on the Wahls Diet in their cohort; so that will be really; the beauty about that study is, now because it’s another scientist studying my diet, there can be no question about conflict of interest.
Diane Sanfilippo: Right.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Because if they say; oh my god this diet is helpful, or whatever they observe, that’s going to be really fun to see. And I know from their comments originally when they did a quick look, they were impressed with, as no surprise, some very nice outcomes, both for the Parkinson’s and the MS folks. But yeah, that’s study will be going on I think for another 4 years, so that will be lot’s and lots of fun.
Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome.
Dr. Terry Wahls: One more thing; because we’ve had thousands and thousands and thousands of followers; we’ve had a lot of folks with ALS reach out to tell us that they’ve done, in their eyes, much better when they discovered my protocol and started following the Wahls Protocol. So we’ve written a little protocol, taking the diet that I’m using in the MS study, and putting it into a group of ALS patients, and I’m working with the ALS researchers here at the University of Iowa and now we’re out soliciting funding for this. I’m hopeful that we’ll be able to get funding through philanthropy to get this pilot study going. So many, many terrific opportunities that are happening; and that’s part of why I quit the VA, so I could spend more time doing research, because there’s just so much happening, and my lab is growing so quickly, that I needed to create more time for that.
Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome. So at www.TerryWahls.com you all can read more about everything Dr. Wahls is working on. You can find a Wahls Protocol health professional; she’s got some folks listed on there, by state I’m sure. I know there’s also at least a handful that work remotely, and some of the folks who are by state may also work remotely, that’s a possibility.
And also the Wahls Foundation; this is something that a lot of times folks ask me; what can they do to help this mission and this effort other than sharing the word, sharing their stories, buying the books, or whatever it is. And this is really something where if you’re looking to donate money somewhere that will really be productive in getting this message out there, definitely check out the Wahls Foundation. You can find that all at www.TerryWahls.com. We’ll link to all of it from our show notes. That’s definitely something I’ve recommended a lot of folks check out, so glad that you have that for folks to donate to the research.
Dr. Terry Wahls: Yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome.
Dr. Terry Wahls: You know, if we’re going to change clinical practice, we have to have published research. That’s bottom line. We’ll need public pressure, that will facilitate change; but to change clinical standards, we have to have published research, and that takes money and time.
Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome. Well thank you so much; always such a pleasure to chat with you. I know our listeners are thrilled about this episode and are super excited. So, that’s it for this week, you guys. Don’t forget, you can find me over at http://dianesanfilippo.com and Dr. Terry Wahls at www.TerryWahls.com. Don’t forget to join our email lists for free goodies and updates you don’t find anywhere else on our websites or on the podcast. While you’re on the internet, please leave us an iTunes review. We’ll see you next week.