Change Your Brain Every Day - This Is Why You’re Not Losing Weight

Episode Date: August 8, 2018

At the Brain Warrior’s Way Podcast, we believe that you are in a war for the health of your body. The standard American diet we consume is making us sick, and it’s up to us to make the choices that keeps the fat off our bellies. In the third and final episode about loving your body, Dr. Daniel Amen and Tana Amen give you a weight loss program that actually gets results, and dramatically increases your health in the process.

Welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. I'm Dr. Daniel Amen. And I'm Tana Amen. Here we teach you how to win the fight for your brain to defeat anxiety, depression, memory loss, ADHD, and addictions. The Brain Warriors Way podcast is brought to you by Amen Clinics, where we've transformed lives for three decades using brain spec imaging to better target treatment and natural ways to heal the brain. For more information, visit amenclinics.com.

The Brain Warriors Way podcast is also brought to you by BrainMD, where we produce the highest quality nutraceutical products to support the health of your brain and body. For more information, visit brainmdhealth.com. Welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. Love your body week. So now we're going to talk about obesity. This is so important. With 40% of Americans obese, 70% of Americans are overweight. I just think it's the biggest crisis that we have had in America. I published two studies that showed as your weight goes up, the size and function of the brain goes down. And it's just the biggest brain drain.

And it's the whole reason why we call this podcast The Brain Warrior's Way. Right. And I think it's really important as we go into this that we want, because we've been talking about body shaming and a lot of things, we don't want you to body shame yourself. We don't want you to hate yourself. And we are not doing this from a body shaming perspective. We always want you to focus on being the healthiest person you can be because you love yourself. You have a purpose on this planet and you want to be your best so you can do that. So this is not a shaming thing. But I want you to have enough anxiety that you get serious about it.

It's important. Now now being too thin is problem yes in fact as you age that just there's not that many obese people in their 80s and 90s what really kills people in the elderly is frailty right I mean you saw that as a nurse in the hospital. A lot, yeah. But- Not being able to recover. But you're in a war for the health of your brain and your body. Tana and I talk about, in our course, The Brain Warrior's Way,

that the real weapons of mass destruction are highly processed, pesticide sprayed, high glycemic, low fiber, food-like substances stored in plastic containers. That our food industry has killed way more people than ISIS has thought about. And we need to get serious. And so the idea behind the Brain Warriors Way podcast is we want to help you be armed, prepared, and aware to win the fight of your life. And, you know, you see commercials nonstop on TV for Jenny Craig and Nutrisystems and Weight Watchers. And I think all of them sort of miss the boat. You just have to get the packages and read the labels for the packages. And they're loaded with pro-inflammatory ingredients.

Which will ultimately make it worse. Which will ultimately make it worse. Which will ultimately make it worse. Plus, I think you taught me that if you keep the yo-yo dieting thing, you're actually decreasing the set point of calories in your body so that you can just be eating 800 calories a day and still not- Yeah, you're just yo trash as your metabolism. Metabolizing things like you want. So in this podcast, what we want to do is really go over what are the rules of brain healthy eating and also talk a little bit about the types. I think that's one of the unique things I've contributed to the world of overeating. It's not everybody's not the same. I think that's one of the unique things I've contributed to the world of overeating. It's not everybody's not the same. Right. What motivates them isn't the same.

Well, that we have impulsive overeaters. It's really our attention deficit disorder group. They have low frontal lobe activity and they don't think about food all the time. But as soon as they pass the jack in the box, they're like, oh, I've got to get this or that sandwich or this or that shake or whatever. They don't have good impulse control. And fixing their ADD makes a huge positive difference for them. There are compulsive people where they have that little mouse on an exercise wheel in their head and they can't get off and they get the same thought over and over again. They walk by the refrigerator and the ice cream's

screaming to them. Well, and they go sit down. They're like, I'm not going to do it. And they go sit down and they're doing something else. But in the back of their head, it's just like constantly repeating. Right. And then there's impulsive-compulsive people

that they have traits of both. And then there are the sad overeaters and the anxious overeaters. So you want to know what your brain type is. And you can go to our free brain health assessment at amonclinics.com, and it'll tell you what brain type you are. And then there are supplements and behavioral exercises for each type.

But ultimately, to get your weight under control, you one have to care about your brain. You just, you have to like, go, I am not going to, that's how I lost the weight. I mean, like you said before. Yeah. I want to talk about that for a minute because you know, we don't want people to think, oh, we're just perfect. We've got all the answers. When I met you, you were frustrated. So talk to them about that a little bit. Yeah. I mean, I hadn't published a study yet.

But you also have genetics that set you up. My genetics say I should be fat. And my dad's overweight, was overweight. My brother's morbidly obese. I have a sister who's morbidly obese. So these genes run in families. And, you know, I mean, the most I've ever been overweight is about 30 pounds. But I'm like, why am I fighting this? But 30 pounds on your frame is significant. I mean, it's uncomfortable. I mean, it's like, why am I fighting this all the time? It's just irritating. And when I published those two studies that show

as your weight went up, the size of your brain went down. I'm like, oh no. But the first thing you did is made sure you're... because you said when you started taking vitamin D, it actually helped. My appetite went away. Right. I mean, you know, and I checked vitamin D, healthy level is 30 to 100. Mine was 17. And some simple nutrients really helped. So taking vitamin D really helped.

Being married to you really helps because we both have the same- Yeah, the same mission and the same goals. Values around food. And we're not perfect. No. But we're really good. We don't try to be perfect. We just focus on what's important to us.

And being healthy is really important. And so over the years together, we've developed our food rules, which is number one, it's really high quality food. So I think calories really do matter. Calories are like money, but the quality of your calories matters more, right? So you can go on an 800 calorie a day Twinkie diet and you will lose weight, but you'll be inflamed. And you'll start to gain it back. It's not right. Once the inflammation creeps up to a certain point, you begin your metabolism, your hormones get out of balance, and you start to put weight back on.

But if you chronically had problems with your weight, I know for me, when I gain five pounds, actually, for me, it's three. Me too. My window is three. It irritates me. On my phone, I actually start counting my calories. I know exactly how much I have in the morning. I know the calories in the almond milk cappuccino I make for 10 every morning. I don't like overspending. And even though we have plenty of money, when I'm at home and I see

lights on, it just irritates me. And I hate wasting money. I hate wasting calories because I know they're the currency my body uses to live and to be healthy and I'm not going to overspend. So that's principle number one. So, and I want to point something out. So I've helped a lot of people through this process because based on what you just said, I've helped people lose more than a hundred pounds doing this and they all acknowledge the same thing. And I always tell people it's going in, they don't believe me, but it ends up being true and they love it. When you eat the way we're trying to teach you to eat, like in the brain warriors way, the brain warriors way cookbook, it's our principles for the clinic. You get to eat more. Okay. Cause that 800 calorie Twinkie diet is messing up your

metabolism. It's making you hungrier. You're going to be inflamed and you're going to gain weight. When you eat really healthy, you actually will feel satisfied. You get to eat more and be healthy, but you won't be as hungry. That's the thing. And that's true, but you can't be dumb. No, no, no. When I say more, I'm not talking about 4,000 calories. 800, though, is not healthy. So that's my point. You get to eat a normal amount of calories, you'll feel satisfied and full, and you won't feel the need to go gorge on food once we get your hormones straightened out. The second principle is you want to drink lots of water.

Because when you're dehydrated, I just showed the Bill Phillips scan when Bill Phillips, the famous bodybuilder, came to see us. He purposely dehydrated himself for a photo shoot and his brain just looked terrible. And so you need to hydrate yourself because your judgment will be better. So drinking water throughout the day can be really helpful. I don't really like drinking water throughout the day can be really helpful. I don't really like drinking water, so I created something for BrainMD called Brain Boost on the Go that it tastes awesome, it's good for you,

and it encourages me to drink water. So two really important points that I want to make, that make it sort of solidifies it for people, because hearing, I know I used to hear like, oh, drink water, drink water, it's good for you. I'm like, yeah, so what? It was sort of abstract. This like made a difference for me.

One study showed that when you are hydrated, because I work out. So when you are hydrated, you are 19% more powerful. Like you are 19% stronger and more powerful. That's huge. That was one. I'm like, wow, that means I'm 19% less strong when I'm dehydrated.

That was one. And I like being strong. And the second one was a study done on pilots. And when they were only 2% dehydrated, just 2%, their cognitive functioning was greatly affected. So you want to give the pilot water as you get on the plane. Go, here, hey, I have an extra one. Drink up. The third principle is high quality protein at every meal because protein helps to balance

your blood sugar. And this means even if you are vegan, you need to have high quality plant-based protein if you're vegan. And protein is in vegetables, right? It's in spinach and broccoli. You just have to eat a lot more of it, but that's okay because it's not high calorie. And when we say high quality protein, we generally mean hormone-free, antibiotic-free, grass-fed free range if you can afford it. But we want you eating less of it anyways we want to eat more of a plant-based diet we don't want 50 of your diet to be like processed meats that's just not healthy i don't care how you look at it so we'd rather you cut back to a smaller percentage of really high quality protein and increase so you're saying it's the same cost. So if you eat half the amount, but it's twice the cost, it's the same cost.

And cut out a Starbucks and see what happens. I did the math with my daughter. We were trying to budget. And I'm like, do you realize that if you and I, because we're on the road a lot, so it gets really easy to stop at a Starbucks like several times a day, get a nice tea, whatever. And I'm like, do you realize that if we give up one drink a day, we decided to do this, we together made the decision to do this, one time a day we're gonna not do that.

And so we'll figure out another solution. We'll bring something or whatever. It's $300 a month between the two of us. Wow. One time a day for the two of us, for the month, 300 bucks. That's crazy. So I can help you budget. Well, please do that.

I'd be so grateful. We did. I'm so grateful. We've been doing it. The fourth one is healthy fat. Neither of us are fan of low-fat diets because 60% of the solid weight of your brain is fat. And so healthy fat, avocados, nuts and seeds, green leafy vegetables have healthy fat in them. So I have a really good story. So someone I was talking to up in LA recently, she like recognizes, she's like, oh my gosh, I want to get your book.

And we started talking about food. Her husband had a widow maker heart attack and lived through it, which is just crazy. It's like a really big heart attack. I thought he was married to someone. Oh, stop it. So anyways, he survived it. And so they put him on a really strict diet and he followed it because it was serious. He followed it. He lost a ton of weight, but he was eating zero oil, zero fats and oils. And his cholesterol got down to 110. And all of a sudden he not only felt frail, but he started to get depressed, like seriously depressed and anxious. And under 160 is associated with homicide, suicide, depression, and death from-

I'm like, you need to read our book. So you need some. But not processed fat. So healthy fat. Fat was demonized in the late 70s and early 80s, and it stayed that way. And the incidence of obesity just- Well, and they were trying to get rid of the unhealthy fats, and that you should do, but you should not get rid of. They're called essential fatty acids for a reason. You need them. And when we studied our patients at Amen Clinics, 98% of them were low in omega-3 fatty acids. I mean, it's just crazy.

And then carbs are not the enemy. You know, everyone goes low carb, low carb, low carb. It's low bad carbs. The carbs are just, they're filled with medicine, plant-based medicine, things called phytonutrients. They're like little anti-cancer agents. But we really would prefer you to limit or eliminate sugar, bread, pasta, potatoes, and rice because those quickly turn to sugar in your body, but really ramp up on colorful vegetables, low glycemic fruit. That means fruit that doesn't quickly

raise your blood sugar like dates are off the chart bad for you when it comes to sugar their sugar contents just so high and then we want you to eat clean clean is important and then use spices like medicine, like cayenne pepper increases blood flow to the brain. Rosemary increases blood flow to the brain. Turmeric has anti-inflammatory properties. And Tana talks about all of this in the Brain Warrior's Way and the Brain Warrior's Way cookbook. Yeah, the cookbook is loaded with information. None of this is hard. And ultimately, it's about love. And, you know, both Tana and I, in the past, we've been in bad relationships.

Thank God this has been the best 12 years of my life being with her. But I'm damn sure not going to be in a bad relationship with food. Something that I can control. That I am not going to be in love with any food that does not love me back. Yeah. No, I have a funny story about this. So, after having surgery, I started to get a little wonky and get a little down because I'm used to pretty intense exercise and being busy. And a few weeks after being down, I'm just like, okay, I'm done with this. Like I had brain fog and I didn't feel good and I was tired. And so, I started to notice I was getting a little lazy with my diet. Now for most people that would still look pretty clean,

I'm still gluten-free and whatever, but I was being lazier, like, right. You know, eating a lot, some gluten-free bread and pastas and things like that. And, um, my daughter walks in the kitchen one day and she goes, you know, I have a goal for you. And I'm like, what's that? She goes, you have to live to be a hundred. And I'm like, what's that? She goes, you have to live to be a hundred. And I'm like, what? Somehow it was like a slap in the face to me that it really pointed out to me that I was being lazy. She goes, yeah, no, you have to be, you have to take care of yourself because you have to live to be a hundred. I'm only going to be 65 then. And so I'm like that, I'm not really going to get into that. But anyways, it really was a slap in the

face pointing out to me that, you know, it is easy to fall into that rut. But when you're all of a sudden, my goal was the whole reason I do all this was put back in my face by her. You know, it's like, why am I doing all this? Why do you want to be healthy? Why do you want to be at a healthy weight? Why do you want to love your body and do the things for it as if you love it? I mean, for me, I love my wife. I mean, I'm madly in love with my wife. I love my children. I love my grandbabies. I have a new grandbaby.

Oh, she's so cute. Who's two weeks old. Oh, she's so cute. And I love the mission we have at BrainMD and Amen Clinics. I mean, I love my life. I don't want to. And if you're not serious, you know, I had a friend recently who was 61 years old and someone I just adore. And he had a massive heart attack and died. And the heartbreak for me, you know, much worse for his wife and his children and his 600 patients. And it was because he wasn't as serious as he could have been.

People get complacent. They think it's not really going to happen to them. They get in denial. So we have so many tools for you. If you take our brain health assessment to know your type, go to brainhealthassessment.com or amonclinics.com in the upper right-hand corner. Know your type. There are supplements to help your type.

Tana has cookbooks. We have Brain Food Life. The Brain Worry Cookbook is great. All of her recipes are on brainfoodlife.com. You can also go to tanahaman.com. I mean, we have all sorts of recipes to help you get healthy, to have a better brain.

And make it taste good. It doesn't have to be miserable. There is no suffering in getting well. People often go, you know, often go, well, was it hard? And they'll go, no, being sick was hard. Right. But they don't realize until they start to feel really a lot better.

And then they're like, wow, I didn't realize just... I mean, you know you're miserable. Like Angie, who I helped, she knew she was miserable. She knew she had suffered persecution from being overweight. I helped her lose 103 pounds. She kept it off. Last I heard was three years and she was still doing great. And so she was suffering, but she didn't realize how much better she would feel physically. She thought it was going to be the psychological part she'd feel better, but her ailments cleared up. She had energy. She felt so good. And she's like, I didn't realize how

bad I felt because I didn't, I had never felt as good. Food is medicine or it's poison. Stay with us. Use the code podcast 10 to get a 10% discount on a full evaluation at amenclinics.com or on our supplements at brainmdhealth.com. Thank you for listening to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. Go to iTunes and leave a review and you'll automatically be entered into a drawing to get a free signed copy of the Brain Warriors Way

and the Brain Warriors Way cookbook we give away every month.