Speaker 1: (00:00)
Hey everybody, what's going on? Doctor Chad Woolner here and Dr Buddy Alan, and this is episode nine of the Health Fundamentals podcast. And on today's episode we're going to be discussing a surprising cause behind neuropathy. So let's get started.
Speaker 2: (00:13)
You're listening to the health fundamentals podcast. I'm Dr Chad Woolner and I'm Dr Buddy Alan. And this show is about giving you the simple but powerful cutting edge tools you need to change your health and your life. So sit back and enjoy the show as we show you the path to your best life down to a science.
Speaker 1: (00:32)
So, hey everybody on today's episode, we wanted to share with you a recent study that came out that showed up pretty surprising cause behind some types of neuropathy. Um, it's kind of, again, a background if you haven't watched, uh, I think it was episode four. I think it where we talked about, uh, neuropathy. Is it possible to reverse neuropathy, um, you know, to begin, let's kind of describe or define for those who aren't familiar with neuropathy. I would, I would say that probably if you have neuropathy, most of Noah Noah, right? Um, but, but how would we describe it in a nutshell? Neuropathy can come from many different causes. It's frequently and probably most frequently associated with diabetic neuropathy. And, and, and the reason what happens is because of a lack of control of blood sugar, over time your, the vasculature in your body starts to get damaged.
Speaker 1: (01:23)
And, and because of that, the nerves start to die off. And as nerves are dying off, they, they just, your body becomes very sensitized and very painful. You'll, it can be like pins and needles. It can be a numbness burning. Exactly. Ah, you know, uh, it basically, the culprit of the cause is inflammation due to uncontrolled blood sugar, which ultimately leads to that the damage, damage and deterioration. It can also be caused by, uh, chemotherapy you buy. It can be caused by different other chemical toxic exposures. Um, sometimes there are not necessarily any observable causes, but a recent study that was done showed a cause that maybe people may not, might not be familiar with. You know, because they, they, they may find that on testing. I wasn't familiar with it. Yeah. They're, their blood sugar looked fine. I did, you know, I did my blood sugar, I don't have diabetes.
Speaker 1: (02:18)
My blood sugar is under control. Everything looks good, but I still have neuropathy. And if that's the case, uh, this may be to blame, this may be not cool. We see a lot of this with, um, it's gluten intolerance. Yeah. So literally over time, if you are gluten intolerant and you continue to consume gluten, what happens is over time you can actually have a diabetic or not or neuropathy type pain caused by this gluten intolerance because of the of this, you know, reoccurring exposure or irritation that you're, you're creating in your body. And so, right. And so, yeah, basically what happens is your body, if it's intolerant to gluten, it responds, um, to gluten as though a, an era. And so what happens is it creates inflammation. And we're talking about that same kind of cycle, right? That inflammation leads to a damage to the blood vessels, which leads to poor a poor blood supply or poor circulation to those areas, which is a, those nerves depend upon that circulation to keep them alive and well and healthy.
Speaker 1: (03:22)
And then all of a sudden if those nerves start to die or dwindle or become unhealthy as a result of not getting adequate blood supply, then all of a sudden, um, that's when you start dealing with a lot of those symptoms that are commonly associated with neuropathy. And this, this research article, basically the, what they were doing was they were following individuals who were very strict and, and you know, observed, you know, a diet that was gluten free. And they did, they did much better, you know, significantly better with respect to their pain. Um, and one of the interesting things, um, maybe a little side note to that is those individuals who didn't eat a gluten free diet and we're in greater pain, also a scored worse on their mental, um, their mental health actually, right. So it actually, if they were, and significant effects of brain, you bet it affected how they were feeling.
Speaker 1: (04:14)
Yeah. And so, you know, and as we were talking about this, um, and we've talked about this, I'm pretty sure we've talked about in, if we haven't talked about it yet, we'll talk about in future episodes, but how is sugar in general? Um, and, and gluten generally comes from grain, from, you know, from our wheat. And it's a, it's a protein that's, that's created with, with wheat or that's found in wheat. And wheat is a carbohydrate, which as when it's refined is, you know, just like sugar. And so anyways, high carbohydrate, high sugar diets create inflammation in our systems. Inflammation in our systems creates damage and trauma. And so, um, it's, it goes without saying. If we can control and bring down the amount of sugar or carbohydrates that we consume, very likely we're gonna feel, you know, like the, the incidence of pain that we have will improve.
Speaker 1: (05:09)
Right. Yeah. And I, and I would say, you know, as just a general rule of thumb, a, if you're dealing with problems like neuropathy, it's never a bad idea to, if you haven't already, try going off of gluten for a week to two weeks to even a month and, and see how your body responds and see how you do. And, uh, and I think for a lot of people, especially the ones who can't necessarily identify, uh, a, um, a, a really clear answer as to what's causing their rock empathy, I think for them, uh, they, they may be one of these people that the study is referring to that it might be the gluten that's creating some of these problems. And the other thing too, you know, that, that a lot of people are finding to, I'll, I'll kind of extrapolate here. A lot of the latest research is showing too, that it may not necessarily even be the gluten per say, but, but that, um, uh, uh, the life life, I say, Oh yeah.
Speaker 1: (06:03)
A life estate in the, uh, in the pesticides that are used to try any agricultural, uh, process of, of, uh, growing and harvesting these, um, these grains, you bet. And so a glyphosate, uh, is obviously toxic to the body. Uh, we were not meant to consume glycosate and yet it's found a lot in a lot of these foods. Um, and so, uh, that could be a culprit as well. And so that could be the issue in terms of going off of, uh, you know, grains or at least just avoiding that toxin, just avoiding it all together. Yeah, exactly. So, uh, if you're somebody who's struggling with neuropathy, consider, uh, reducing or even all together, eliminating gluten out of your diet, see how you respond. Um, I would say probably more often than not, people would do better. I would agree. You know, anything we can do to reduce inflammation in the body, uh, reduce the intake of foods that create irritation, um, or inflammation, uh, the better, you know, in general, um, reducing, like you said, carbohydrates, increasing healthy fats.
Speaker 1: (07:09)
You know, the, the interesting thing is, uh, and this is going to be a generalization, but, uh, you know, if you look at, um, if you look at sugar and fat, and again, this is going to be a generalization, but you could almost look at sugar as a, an inflammation accelerator and you could almost look at fat as a break to inflammation, right? Slowing the breaks. Especially when we say fat, we're talking about like I'm specifically referring to healthy fats. Um, Omega three, yeah. Even more specifically Omega three, Omega three. If you look at the science behind it, it acts like a balancing mechanism to shift our body's internal chemistry away from inflammation instead of towards inflammation. Um, if you look at the, the sad diet, the standard American Diet, uh, one thing that is obviously clear that they know is that it is skewed way too heavy in, in favor of what they call it.
Speaker 1: (08:03)
Omega six fats and Omega six fats are primarily found in grains, in a, in meat where the red meets, where the, where the, the, the, um, the animals that you're eating fed off of grains, grain fed meat, um, as well as a lot of the other processed foods that we eat, processed carbohydrates. And so what happens is that skews things, uh, in favor of an Omega six slanted. You know, again, if you look at it like a teeter totter on one side, you've got Omega three on the other side, you've got Omega six. If things are skewed a far more towards an Omega six, what happens is the chemical pathways lead to eventually, uh, inflammatory byproducts as a result of it. And so if we can shift things towards more of Omega three level, it's almost like putting the brakes on inflammation. So eating more, consuming more things like Avocados, uh, fish, uh, you know, fatty fish, a fish like salmon is a great, great example of that.
Speaker 1: (09:03)
A Omega Three's also come from nuts. Um, anything else I'm missing there in terms of seed is pretty flaxseed. Chia seed is a great seat as one source Omega threes. Um, you know, so, so, uh, supplementing with those can be very, very effective for helping to reduce inflammation. So, so think about it like that. And I know it's an a maybe an overgeneralization but not only to reduce gluten or eliminated altogether, but also reducing carbs or reducing corroborates and sugars in your diet, but then also increasing fats to maybe help, uh, put the brakes on inflammation a little bit. So any other thoughts you wanted to share? A No. So hopefully this has been valuable for you. If you struggle with neuropathy, consider this. If you know somebody that does as well, share this with them. Uh, hopefully this gives you some new insights and information that maybe you haven't considered before. And more importantly, I hope this helps. So we hope this. Absolutely. All right guys, thanks for listening and watching and we will talk to you later.
Speaker 2: (10:04)
Thanks for listening to the health fundamentals podcast. Be sure to subscribe so that you stay in the loop. And in the note with all of the cutting edge health information that we share, if you know other people that could benefit from this information, please share it with them as well. Also, be sure to give us a review. These really help us to ultimately help more people. Last but not least, if you have questions that you want answered live on the show, or if you have ideas for topics that you would like us to cover, please shoot us an email and let us know at info@thehealthfundamentals.com.