Passion Struck with John R. Miles - Dr. Kara Fitzgerald on How to Become a Younger You by Reversing Your Biological Age EP 174

Starting point is 00:00:00 Coming up next on the Passion Struck Podcast. It's up to you. It's up to how you live your life, which influences what genes are on and what genes are off. This is wildly important for us to understand and to embrace this reality, because we have to take responsibility for our health. We absolutely do. Biological age is looking at certain patterns of a key epigenetic mark called DNA methylation. These patterns of DNA methylation can reliably predict how fast our body is aging. Welcome to PassionStruct.

Starting point is 00:00:34 Hi, I'm your host, John Armiles. And on the show, we decipher the secrets, tips, and guidance of the world's most inspiring people and turn their wisdom into practical advice for you and those around you. Our mission is to help you unlock the power of intentionality so that you can become the best version of yourself. If you're new to the show, I offer advice and answer listener questions on Fridays.

Starting point is 00:01:00 We have long form interviews the rest of the week with guest-ranging from astronauts to authors, CEOs, creators, innovators, scientists, military leaders, visionaries, and athletes. Now, let's go out there and become PassionStruck. Hello, everyone, and welcome back to episode 174 of PassionStruck. Recently ranked by Apple is one of the top five alternative health podcasts, and thank you to each and every one of you who come back weekly to listen and learn, had a live better, be better, and impact the world. And if you're new to the show, thank you so much for being here, or you would like to introduce this to a friend or family member,

Starting point is 00:01:38 and we love it when you do that. We now have episode starter packs both on Spotify and on our website. These are collections of our fans favorite episodes that we organize into topics to give any new listener a great way to get acquainted to everything we do here on the show. Just go to cashinstruct.com slash starter packs to get started. And in case you missed my episode from earlier in the week, it featured Dr. Valerie Young, who's the co-founder of the imposter syndrome, and one of the foremost experts in the world on the subject. And we discuss everything that there is to do with imposter syndrome. Perfectionalism, why she thinks both of these are leading to the great resignation as well as to employ disengagement, and we cover so much more. In case she missed the episodes from last week, I had on Colin Obrady, who's an adventure

Starting point is 00:02:25 athlete, world record holder, an author of the new book, The 12-Hour Walk. And my episode before that was with another author, DJ Vannis, who's an Air Force Academy graduate, Air Force Veteran, as well as a speaker to Fortune 500 companies and tribal nations everywhere. And we cover his new book, The Warrior Within. In a case you missed my episode from last week, it's on how do you overcome the shattering consequences of abuse and heal from it. Now, let's talk about today's guest. Dr. Kara Fitzgerald is the first ever recipient of the Emerging Leadership Award from the Personalized Lifestyle Medicine Institute in recognition of her work on DNA methylation.

Starting point is 00:03:06 Dr. Fitzgerald directs a large in-person and virtual clinical practice in Connecticut and is engaged in clinical research on DNA methylation using diet and lifestyle intervention developed in her clinic. Her first study was published in the journal Aging. And earlier this year, she came out with a book Younger You Based on its findings, where she shows you how you can reduce your bioage and live longer and better through the use of an application-based program. In our interview today, we discuss the defining moments

Starting point is 00:03:38 that led her to this career in functional medicine. Dr. Fitzgerald provides a deep dive into the concept of biological aging. She breaks down the science of epigenetics and why DNA methylation is vital to our biological aging process. She discusses in detail the groundbreaking study that she did and the reduction that it had on participants' bioage. We then go into the different pillars from her new book, Younger You, with examples of some of the key things that you can put into practice immediately to help lower your biological age and so much more. Thank you for choosing PassionStruck and choosing

Starting point is 00:04:15 me to be your host and guide on your journey to creating an intentional life. Now, let that journey again. I am absolutely thrilled to welcome Dr. Cara Fitzgerald for the Passion Strike podcast. Welcome Cara. Oh, it's so good to be here with you, John. I love having guests on the show of all types, but I have been so fascinated in the work that you're doing and absolutely devoured your book when it came out, which I'll put up here for the audience,

Starting point is 00:04:48 if they're watching this on the YouTube, but it was just groundbreaking what I found in there. But before we jump into that, I like to start by allowing the audience to get to know the guest. And so one of the questions I'd like to start out with is we all have moments that define us. What is a moment that defines you? That's a great question. There are a few defining moments. I'm glad you gave me a little hints that you were going to ask this question. I'm going to mention two if that's okay.

Starting point is 00:05:20 The work in epigenetics was a defining moment for me. It was extraordinary. We're going to talk about that background later, so I won't go into detail. I am a functional medicine doctor. I educate other functional medicine physicians through the Institute of Functional Medicine. I have got a practice here in Connecticut, and that has been my trajectory. It was an interesting change for me to go headlong into epigenetics, and it absolutely is in lockstep with functional medicine, but that And it was a very defining and career-changing moment. Later we'll get to that story and what brought me to conducting the research that I did and continued to and what brought me to writing the book. I mean, it slows my mind. So that's defining very big, recent defining moment for me. And then the other one was just when I was in my 20s and looking at my medical training

Starting point is 00:06:09 and became sick with chronic fatigue, sort of a classic chronic fatigue, probably had mono in it too. I just a reactivated Epstein bar infection. I was doing too much as a 20-something people do. And I didn't get better. So I doctor hopped, doctor hopped, doctor hopped. And I didn't get better. So I doctor, doctor hop, doctor hop, doctor hop. And then finally got better when I saw a naturopathic physician. Actually, one of the

Starting point is 00:06:30 longest practicing naturopathic physicians here in Connecticut, his name is Dr. Jeff Klass. And it was my land lady who was healthy and hearty in her 90s who said, I needed to go see her doctor. And she sent me off to this naturopathic position and he got me better with very simple intervention. That was a big defining moment for me because that ultimately created the pathway. I mean, it just enlightened me to the possibility of training in naturopathic medicine. Yes. And then how did you go from there into having this obsession that you do for looking at the biological age? Well, that's many years. I've been practicing for a while. So, school was an extraordinary time.

Starting point is 00:07:15 I loved the training that I received. I was in the Pacific Northwest. I was able to access Dr. Jeff Blant, who's a nutritional biochemist, and an incredibly forward-thinking human being. I saw him lecture and he became my mentor when I was doing a postdoc position in laboratory science. It influenced my world. Like I don't practice traditional naturopathic medicine. I just became enamored of nutritional biochemistry

Starting point is 00:07:41 and ended up going into a laboratory. I did a residency in clinical integrative medicine as well, but my heart and soul, I loved clinical medicine, but I just loved being in a lab. I loved being in sort of the omics revolution that we find ourselves in now where we're looking and this is an epigenetics fits into the omic being the suffix for the microbiome, the genome, the epigenome.

Starting point is 00:08:07 Like we are in this revolution in medicine that's as revolutionary as the industrial revolution. I mean, we're able to see what's happening at the genetic level. We can look at genetic expression now. This is epigenetics and biological age. We'll circle back to this. We can measure the entire microbiome. We can measure the proteins our body, our genes transcribe and then get translated through the VR and A. We can look at those, that's called the proteome.

Starting point is 00:08:33 The technology that we have now in science and medicine is just mind-boggling. And my laboratory training was a precursor to where we are today. So it really very much set up in me a deep appreciation of our technology and the power of it. But layered directly on top of that, so this extraordinary ability to see is my nature of pathic training,

Starting point is 00:08:58 is this deep appreciation of how we evolved and what works best with us, how we eat, how we should eat, how we should live, how we interact with our fellow humans, et cetera. I had this very grounded, traditional, naturopathic education layered onto the training and the ability to see how this influences us. So then flash forward to biological age.

Starting point is 00:09:21 We measure the biological age by looking at what genes are on and off. And it's amazing. This is the field of epigenetics above the genes. It's the interaction of biochemical marks that turn genes on and off. Those biochemical marks are influenced by how we live our life. So here's our genes. They're not changing. We got what we got. They don't influence our health. Like we think that they do. They don't influence our health like we think that they do. They don't influence longevity like we think they do. These are huge points that we have to underline.

Starting point is 00:09:52 If you think you're going to live long and fabulous because your parents did or your grandparents did, that might influence 10 to 20 percent of your genes might be 10 to 20 percent effect on your longevity. Likewise, if your family was horribly sick, nope, you don't necessarily inherit that. It's up to you. It's up to how you live your life, which influences what genes are on and what genes are off.

Starting point is 00:10:16 This is wildly important for us to understand and to embrace this reality, because we have to take responsibility for our health. We absolutely do. So biological age is looking at certain patterns of a key epigenetic mark called DNA methylation. These patterns of DNA methylation can reliably predict how fast our body is aging.

Starting point is 00:10:42 A lot of people have heard of Ponce de Leon, the 16th century Spanish expeditionary who was on this massive hunt for the fount of youth, which he thought would be in Florida, but actually when you start looking at it, the search for the fount of youth has actually been going on for millennial. We are now seeing science that proves that although our chronological age, meaning the number of years that we've been here on Earth, is kind of a static thing that's not going to change, at least with today's science, there are ways that we can drastically influence the other side of that, which you just talked about biological age, which ultimately is what has the largest impact on which ultimately is what has the largest impact on chronic illness and other areas of your life. And one of the things I found really interesting is I recently had on the show

Starting point is 00:11:33 a behavioral scientist from the University of Pennsylvania named Katie Milkman. She gave out a statistic that when you start looking at premature deaths and you look at this pie chart, 40% of them are preventable based on behavioral change, or our behaviors in general. I think they all come down to these micro choices that we make every single day. Is that something that you have found in your research that makes a profound difference? I think that statistic is probably conservative. I think the way that we live our lives,

Starting point is 00:12:08 influences health outcomes, or so. I mean, if you pull out accidental cause of death, I think that microchoises are important. I think settling into the journey of longevity and a good life is the first step. And just, and yeah, it's settling into a rhythm with living the best life you can. I guess the one, the pause that I have on the micro-choices

Starting point is 00:12:33 is we need a little bit of wiggle room. Like we can't be perfect all. Like we need a little bit of give in that. But the net choice that we make has really needs to be favorable if our goal is robust health span and lifespan, the net choice that we make has really needs to be favorable if our goal is robust health span and lifespan the net choice.

Starting point is 00:12:49 And yes, that absolutely is consistent with what I've read on the literature. One of the things I like to talk about to just get people interested in taking charge is that one exercise event or one meditation event can actually favorably change gene expression. It can change DNA methylation in a favorable pattern. And this to me is very heartening for the individual who doesn't exercise or who doesn't practice

Starting point is 00:13:15 meditation. Start right now. Move your body, meditate for a minute, whatever. This is going to be favorable. However, it'll spread like wildfire, sell to sell to sell to sell to sell as cell divisions happen, if we continue this practice. And when you look at people who are regular exercises

Starting point is 00:13:34 or regular practice meditators, they are biologically younger. So there is something about consistency with the journey and those of us who are just starting, you're going to get benefits right out the gate. What's interesting that you brought that part up because in addition to Katie, I had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Michelle Seeger,

Starting point is 00:13:57 who's a behavioral scientist at the University of Michigan, but her focus is on health and exercise. And in her book, The Joy Choice, she brings up the point as you did that in society, we're often taught to start and stop, but we're not really shown how to sustain. And that's where I was getting to with the micro choices that we make every day. It's easy to say you want to do something. A lot of people have new years or resolutions, but actually making that habit stick is something different. So just for me today, I had the choice of walking my dog for three and a half miles or not. I had the choice of doing the spin class I did or not. I had the choice of having salmon with a mix of kale and other raw vegetables,

Starting point is 00:14:42 or I could have had a hamburger with french fries. So ultimately, it's those decisions that you factor into your life. One day isn't gonna alter that, but if you're not consistent in the practice, that's where I was getting at. That's where you can either go in a direction that's gonna bring you longevity

Starting point is 00:15:02 or in the opposite way, where your biological age is going to get older than your chronological age. And that's when I think chronic illness and other things will start hitting you. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, the reality is in this country and we should dissect what you're talking about because it's extremely, extremely important. Education is a piece of it and I think that we can

Starting point is 00:15:26 inspire people, at least I hope that we can inspire people by getting them the facts. I mean, in the facts are in our country, the majority of us will have two significant chronic diseases by the time we're in our early 60s. We will be on multiple medications. Make no mistake that you will, if you're choosing the standard American lifestyle, end up in this position. Your hard earned dollars, your lifetime commitment to your work, your kids inheritance will go to this journey. You will spend it.

Starting point is 00:15:57 I mean, Big Pharma will get your money, skilled nursing facilities, hospitals. They will inherit what should rightfully go to your kids and be yours in your golden years. That is the trajectory in this country. I mean, it's just the bitter truth. It's ugly.

Starting point is 00:16:11 It's so ugly. I don't think we get that. We don't take it in. We spend 16 years of our lives, our final years, really sick and compromised. For me, that raises my, I feel such indignation, such offense at that trajectory that it is motivating, it's motivating because it really pisses me off, frankly. No way do I want to end up in that arena. I do not want to live the standard American life. And it's very motivating for me to do right by my body and to make those daily micro choices.

Starting point is 00:16:45 So, I think education, really kind of understanding that the standard American life will put you in a skilled nursing facility, propped up and taking many medications. And that is where your heart and dollars will go. And if we can get enough people on board with that information and really pull the branch down to how you can live a quality life. It need to be that difficult. So here's the truth. The truth is not pretty in this country. And here's the alternative. It was an extraordinary finding that we were able to show that a simple diet and lifestyle program doesn't need to be out of the reach of any of us was able to reverse biological age.

Starting point is 00:17:25 This is broadly adoptable. On one of the peer reviewers at the journal we submitted to the journal aging said just that, that this is important information because we can all do it. It's not out of reach pluripotent stem cells therapy, $50,000 or $60,000. This is something that you can choose in your local regular grocery store and getting outside perhaps for a walk or whatever form of movement you want to do. It's not rocket science and it's not prohibitive. It needs to be prohibitively expensive to adopt some of these. But yes, we do need to get people engaged. I will add one more thing and then I want to hear your thoughts. Certainly the community environment helps. So this is what I have two thoughts on that. So in our study, I believe the reasons that it did so well were one. Our participants were excited about engaging in a study that looked at gene expression, that was an epigenetic kind, it was a first of its kind study. So they

Starting point is 00:18:23 were jazzed up about the content, but they also worked with our nutrition team. We've got a, like an elite ninja nutrition team here in our, in our practice. And actually it's a virtual nutrition team. We work with people around the world who are so well trained in the science and just getting people rolling in, however they need to eat.

Starting point is 00:18:41 So these nutritionists met with our study participants once a week, and I think that touch point was an essential piece to our success. Our hearing state on our participants is just very, very impressive. Most nutrition studies are kind of lousy and they get criticized for either poor adherence or just using dietary recall forms that people fill out every few months or even longer. So nutrition studies are notoriously flawed and I think

Starting point is 00:19:09 that we changed that by having our nutritionists stay in contact. So that's a little bit of maybe a community, but then once we launched the book we started a Facebook group for the book that has become a massive, really active, lovely, fun community where they post photos of their amazing meals and talk about issues they might be having that they need some brainstorming on. But so I think the community piece and I think regular, consistent support is both are very essential.

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Starting point is 00:21:05 And all those discount codes can be so difficult to remember. So we put them in one convenient place at passionstruck.com slash deals. Now, back to my interview with Dr. Cara Fitzgerald. Well, I couldn't agree more. And you asked me to comment. I thought one of the things that just jumped out of your beginning of your book was your reporting on the World Health Organization indicating that most people spend, I think it was 20% of their life's sick.

Starting point is 00:21:33 The other thing that's pretty eye-opening is that life expectancy given all the impermanence that we've made in health systems and everything else is actually declining. Yeah, significantly. And significantly, which is very alarming. So for me, what I'm trying to help the audience understand is how can they live their best life?

Starting point is 00:21:53 How can they achieve the best performance that they possibly can? And to me, everything that we're talking about here not only is going to impact your longevity, it's going to impact your cognitive capabilities, it's going to impact your cognitive capabilities, it's going to affect your energy levels and everything around it. So the things that you mentioned in the book are, to me, just groundbreaking in they build the foundation on which anyone who applies them can live this life that they want and ward off much of the chronic illness that they could potentially face later in life. And I think you just brought up a really interesting point

Starting point is 00:22:32 when you talk about the environment. And I'm not sure if you're familiar with Ellen Langer's study that she did of elderly men, but she took a group of eight men in their 70s. Are you familiar with it? Yeah, but tell, do tell. And she basically put them back in the environment. I think it was 1959, but not only did she do that, some of them were very arthritic, had other issues,

Starting point is 00:22:56 and they did nothing for them. They didn't carry their bags. They didn't help them in any way. And then she made the environment very much as if they were living at that time period. So they had no mirrors. There are all the pictures of them were of their younger cells and then they had to act as if they were in that exact time period and I understand there was a control group who pretty much lived in a similar environment but they were told

Starting point is 00:23:21 to kind of reflect back on time and what was interesting to me was that the results showed that both groups actually had significant improvements, but what was really eye-opening was the group that was in the experimental had significantly more profound changes. And one of the biggest ones was I think they had over 63 or 66% leap in cognitive test results than they did going in. And if I'm not incorrect, they had an independent body kind of look at pictures before and after both groups and those who were in the experimental one. Every single one of them was judged to look at least two years younger than they did going into

Starting point is 00:24:05 the study, and it wasn't even that long. But I bring that study up because our environment and what we surround ourselves with absolutely matters. And I wanted to use this because you were touching on this test that you did. And I think Davidson Claire in this space has gotten a lot of publicity. And most of his testing has been on fleas and mice and monkeys, et cetera. But in your case, your program actually involved human beings. And I think it was the first actual test that proved that you could reduce this bioage.

Starting point is 00:24:40 And your participants did it by reducing their bioage by three years. But I think it's helpful for the audience to understand the parameters that went into this so they could understand where you took these people from because they came from various levels. It wasn't like he brought in superstar, Iron Man, triathletes. I was hoping you could explain that just a little bit more. Just to be accurate, it wasn't the first human study. The first human study came out the year we were in 2019. So we were still in our running our study in 2019. The first study was the trim trial and that was a year-long intervention in nine men using growth hormone, metformin, DHEA and vitamin D. That was a year-long intervention, more aggressive treatment with growth hormone injections and just nine men, no control group and they did show a significant biological age vitamin D that was a year long intervention or aggressive treatment growth hormone injections

Starting point is 00:25:25 and just nine men no control group and they did show a significant biological age reversal. That study got huge attention from the scientific community even though it was very very very small and there was no control group because up till 2019 we did not think biological age was reversible. I mean it's extraordinary. When I talk about the medical scientific revolution, that's massive evidence of where we are. So that was 2019. It was a minute ago.

Starting point is 00:25:53 We were running our study then. We published our study in early 2021. So different from the trim study, the first one was called, our study included. It was still small to pilot study. It had 18 men in the control group. and we can talk about why men and not women after if you would like to. 18 men in our control in 20, excuse me, in the study group and then 20 men in the control group. So it was the first study of its kind to have, to be randomized control trial,

Starting point is 00:26:19 that's to have a control group, which was a big deal, got a lot of attention. And it was the first of its kind intervention. I mean, it's a unique intervention. I mean, and so we used our diet, the diet that we prescribe. It won't be unfamiliar to somebody eating a healthy diet. Lots of veggies, no processed foods, healthy fruits, berries, etc. We want some animal protein in there. If you eat animal protein, eggs, beans, mushrooms, higher fat, we prescribed a little bit of an intermittent fasting structure, just very gentle, time restricted eating. So 12 hours eating, 12 hours without food. So basically an overnight fast, an easy exercise protocol, minimum of 30 minutes, five days a week,

Starting point is 00:27:04 do whatever you want, whatever makes your heart sing perceived exertion of 60 to 80% of maximum. So 60% of your maximum, whatever that is for you, nobody's wanted people to sleep well and the nutritionists, as I mentioned earlier, who acted as study coaches, would brainstorm with the participant to make sure that their sleep hygiene was good, so that they set them up for achieving a minimum of seven hours. And we gave them a probiotic and a greens powder, basically an extra hit of those all important fruits and vegetables. So all of this was unique and continues to be. Our diet is designed specifically for optimal gene expression for optimal epigenetics. And to my knowledge, there wasn't another diet like this, and it was unique when we created it. We created it actually many years before we studied it before we were given a grant to study it and that's kind of an interesting story. More specifically of all of the epigenetic marks and

Starting point is 00:28:13 there's many of them. The most resilient and the best studied are I should say arguably the most resilient. We don't know for sure. There are enzymes that keep these marks and it maintained and reproduced etc. So it's it's resilient, we don't know for sure. There are enzymes that keep these marks and are maintained and reproduced, et cetera. So it's resilient and we can research it. It's called DNA methylation. So the epigenetic mark that we focus on and that a lot of scientists focus on is DNA methylation.

Starting point is 00:28:36 And so our whole program, every brick by brick, every piece of this program was designed with an eye towards favorably influencing DNA methylation. And all of those studies and sort of why it's important, I lay out an easy language in the book. It's unique because of that design. Well, I think it might be worthwhile to take a step back before we go deeper into DNA methylation, because one of the things that I have heard from talking to a number of neuroscientists

Starting point is 00:29:09 is they often give the analogy of the brain being the hardware and your mind is the software. And you use the same analogy to describe the difference between DNA and epigenetics. So I thought maybe we could start there and then we'll go do a deeper dive on DNA methylation. Yes, and we should also give the findings of the study if we haven't yet. Yes, well, while we start with findings of the study and then we'll go into the other things.

Starting point is 00:29:33 Yeah, so our study also got a lot of attention because again, it was its first of its kind. As compared to our control group, our participants in the eight week time period that we prescribed our protocol were 3.24 years younger. So biologically, they're biologically dropped considerably as compared to controls. That was pretty extraordinary. It blew our minds and blew a lot of people's minds. We got a lot of attention for it, very exciting.

Starting point is 00:29:59 And then we hopped right into publishing it as a book. It seemed to me that this knowledge shouldn't be in the Ivy Tower sort of hidden from view, but made available to everybody. Well, that's exactly why I wanted to have you on the show and to get this information out there as possible so we can help people of healthier lives. Yeah, thanks. I appreciate it.

Starting point is 00:30:20 Well, can we then dive into that analogy that I was talking about between the hardware and the software? Indeed. We can. Yeah. So, yeah, DNA is hardware. If you need, in order for our genes to express for them to produce proteins that, you know, help the body run or make the body and help the body run, build us, you know, and keep us going. This comes from our DNA. These are the proteins with the air. This is the hardware. It doesn't change and it needs a software interface to make the correct cell for the job. It needs this software interface and that is epigeno or the epigenetics. So DNA is kind of a nerd that hangs around and does nothing. It really sits in the middle of our nucleus and then epigenetics sort of epigenetic influences what gene is expressed and when and how.

Starting point is 00:31:07 And again, I will underline and sort of punctuate, we are in the driver's seat with influencing what genes are on and what genes are off. So we have a lot of say over epigenetics. And so we want ultimately to have our software be as pristine as possible. We want to be turning on the best genes. We want to be turning on longevity genes and anti-inflammatory genes. Genes like oxytocin, the love hormone, serotonin, dopamine. We want to be turning on things that help us feel good and help us thrive, help us be healthy, turn off inflammation. We want that.

Starting point is 00:31:41 Like, when you were talking about the study where the men were in the 1950s, and they weren't looking in the mirror so they didn't know that they were forgetting that they were actually in their 70s or however old they were. They were having love hormone, I mean, they were just having a cascade of feel good hormones, reparative hormones. These hormones actually that make us feel good tend to turn off inflammation. I mean, they do others. There's a far reaching favorable cascade of events

Starting point is 00:32:07 when these hormones are released. They're healing, they're calming, they turn off cortisol and stress hormones and take us out of the fight or fight place and allow us to repair. So it makes sense that there would just be this far reaching cascade of events when you put these individuals into their happy place, into a time when they knew when they were strong and excited and all of that.

Starting point is 00:32:28 So is that explain it? Is that a reasonable explanation? No, I think that's a great explanation. Earlier in the episode, you were talking about how there's a portion of us that we cannot change, but there's a lot that we can change. And I think the science that you're showing is really building upon some of the fundamental things that Darwin found, but in other ways, it's completely

Starting point is 00:32:49 throwing a different dimension that he never comprehended when he was looking at this. And I wanted to use that as a backdrop to discussing DNA methylation because it is absolutely linked to your bioage. And if people aren't familiar with it, it's something that is happening constantly in our bodies. And probably is one of the biggest life forces that's actually driving us. But if someone really doesn't understand DNA and methylation, can you explain it to them?

Starting point is 00:33:19 And maybe some of the markers behind it. Yeah, just ask me to clarify anything as I know you will. So it's actually more broadly, we'll just call it methylation. And DNA methylation is one type of methylation. So you're right, methylation is happening in all of ourselves all at the time. There are hundreds of methylation enzymes, the enzymes that catalyze the reaction. There's a methylation cycle. This methylation cycle, for us to make the methyl groups, let me keep backing up here, a methyl group is a carbon and three hydrogens.

Starting point is 00:33:50 If you can remember, basic high school, biochemistry, just a carbon and three hydrogens. And this simple foundational molecule can change the behavior of other compounds in the body. So, in talking TNA methylation, when there are a lot of methyl groups on a gene, it will inhibit that gene from being turned on. And conversely, when there's an absence

Starting point is 00:34:14 or few methyl groups, it will allow that gene to be turned on. In the methylation cycle, that's where we make this carbon and three hydrogen. This methylation cycle is worrying in the body all of the time. We're just making methylene methyl groups at a breakneck pace because there's hundreds of different reactions in the body happening all the time all over the place. And that methylation cycle requires a bunch of incredibly important nutrients, which your listeners are familiar with, nutrients like folate and B12, folate and B12 are good for you.

Starting point is 00:34:43 They help us make these methyl donors, this carbon and three hydrogens. Colline in eggs or in soy products is another key player in the cycle. Betaine in Beats is another key player. In the book, there's a huge epinutrient appendix. It's actually 30 pages of all sorts of nutrients that are going to help with DNA methylation.

Starting point is 00:35:05 And all the foods that have these methyl donors in them are listed. So, yep, we do want people to eat liver if they're open to doing it. You don't have to, but if you're open to it, it's a superfood. It's a multivitamin in a food matrix. It has a daily supply of P12 and folate. I mean, it's just so ridiculously nutrient dense. It's got coline and I mean, it's just so ridiculously nutrient dense, it's got colean and just a host of minerals. So in the appendix, there's all of these foods. And that's the methylation cycle. So the methyl groups are made and then they go

Starting point is 00:35:33 and act in the body. Beyond DNA methylation, they detox us. Methyl groups are used to clear the body out of certain, or toxic compounds that we're exposed to, including metals like arsenic, for example. It helps us make neurotransmitters, it helps us make feel good hormone. It helps our brain think, it helps our muscles fire,

Starting point is 00:35:53 it helps clear out estrogens that can be damaging when they're too high of quantities. And then it also helps us when we make adrenaline, so it helps us make adrenaline, our get up and go, but then it helps us metabolize adrenaline out. So methylation is happening everywhere. I think it's as fundamental as breathing. We think about the essentiality of oxygen,

Starting point is 00:36:12 but having sufficient methyl groups around is as important for sustaining life. Over in the realm of DNA, there's an enzyme, a family of enzymes called DNA, methyl transferases that put these methyl groups onto genes, and we can support that, and doing it right on the right gene, on the optimal set of genes. There's actually a family of enzymes called 10-11 translocase enzymes that remove the methyl groups, and we want to support that as well. That's called demethylation, and I talk about that in the book and cover the nutrients that are helpful for demethylation.

Starting point is 00:36:48 We just want to be working on getting it right with our habits and our dietary patterns. Yeah. And I think that's a good point because throughout the majority of the book, you're talking about things that help with a promote methylation. But then you have other things that promote deep methylation as well. So it's getting the right combination together that kind of produces this result. And that's where I thought we could take the next elements of the discussion. I wish I had three hours with you because I'd go even deeper into this because I love the science behind it. But I think it's important for the listeners to understand different aspects of the program, and I'm going to go through each one separately. Before I jump there, I did want to

Starting point is 00:37:30 ask you a question since you brought up that previous study about human growth hormone, and I know probably a lot of listeners are interested in human growth hormone because there's a lot of people promoting it, but I thought maybe I'd ask you, what are the positives and negatives associated with it? It's a good question. The positives of human growth hormone is that it helps with muscle development. It helps with cognition. It's something to think about it. It's a molecule that we have in abundance when we're young. It's a structure that we're using all of the time to build ourselves when we're youthful. So it has far reaching extremely beneficial effects. It helps with growth of all kinds. So when there's a growth hormone deficiency, people tend to be short stature, and there's the host of issues when there's insufficient growth

Starting point is 00:38:15 hormone. Growth hormone as a molecule that could be problematic is a little bit more nuanced in our understanding. I mean, it's a Walter Longo, you're familiar with his work, I'm sure he is researching fasting mimicking diet. He advocates for lower protein intake. So Walter is clear that excess growth hormone promotes carcinogenesis. So, and it makes sense, right? Too much growth is sort of the fundamental mechanism

Starting point is 00:38:43 of what cancer is, growth uncontrolled, and has a very compelling science-backed argument for evidence for this. And also one of the longevity, so one of the blue zones, so these people living healthy and hardy into their 100s, with low incidence of the chronic diseases of aging, including cancer, happens to be in a region of Central America,

Starting point is 00:39:08 actually Ecuador. There's a growth hormone deficiency among this particular population. So they're short, but they're healthy and they live long good lives. So there's an evidence for us to be conscious around promoting excess growth hormone and foods that promote growth like high protein diets

Starting point is 00:39:26 turn the volume up on growth hormone. So there's a reason for us to look at the literature and be a little bit cautious around ingesting excess protein or even taking growth hormone mimetics like nutrients that turn the volume up on growth hormone or using growth hormone injections themselves. There's reason for us to be cautioned. The interesting flip side of that is, of course, Greg Fahy study the trim trial where they used growth hormone injections and they continue to research it. They're onto their base two trial. I don't know the preliminary data, but I did hear anecdotally that the people taking growth hormone love it. They look younger, they're stronger, they've got more muscle definition, so they've got all of these defining characteristics of youth because they're using growth hormone injections. There's been some challenge to the fact that growth hormone causes cancers. I think the jury is out. I don't know that we know,

Starting point is 00:40:12 is it possible to use growth hormone with a particular diet that will mitigate the risk of increasing cancer? You know, maybe. I think that answer remains to be seen. So, Walter Longo and his science is ardently against turning the volume up on growth hormone, but Greg Faced is showing that it turns back the hands of time also. So, we need to pay attention. Well, some of the people I see who are using it, their appearance drastically changes. I see them in the gym and their lean muscle mass. It's just incredible. However, a short period of time, the changes are that apparent. But what has always scared me

Starting point is 00:40:52 was the downstream potential effects from it. I mean, they do sort of argue that they've looked at long-term growth hormone in this country with growth hormone deficiency and not necessarily seeing the fallout. But yeah, you're right. I mean, there's potential big downside. I think we just need to pay attention. And I think there are tons of things where we've been skeptical about using them in clinical practice.

Starting point is 00:41:15 Let's just take psychedelics, which are now phase three and phase two trials, showing almost a doubling of the efficacy over traditional cognitive behavioral therapy and other things. So I'm just glad that we're looking at all these different ways of approaching functional medicine and functional health and that people are becoming more open to it.

Starting point is 00:41:36 Yes, absolutely. Yeah, likewise with rap and my son, that's a likely longevity drug that may be something that routinely prescribed to promote life and health span. You'll see, I mean, I know all of the science thus far, the controlled studies have been in animals, but in Australia, they're finally recruiting for a human study. I think it's actually underway.

Starting point is 00:41:58 Well, I thought maybe an interesting way for us to discuss the thing is you should put in your life was maybe using me as a guinea pig. And as we talked about before the show, I've been very much trying to look at this because it's something that I wanted to understand myself. I want to perform the best I can. I want to live as long as I can,

Starting point is 00:42:21 ward off diseases. So a lot of the things that are in your book, I have been implementing into my life. And so I thought maybe we could do it that way, which might be a little bit more entertaining for the audience. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The backdrop for me, and I know your test is different than theirs, but I use a product by inside tracker called Interage,

Starting point is 00:42:41 which they have their own biomarkers. And in theirs, it's 17 for men. And I think they look at 11 or 13 for women. But basically, it came back with a report that showed I was a decade younger biologically than I was chronologically. So I'll go through some of the things that I tried to put in place. And maybe you can tell me if I'm doing the right things. So the number one thing I tried to put in place. And maybe you can tell me if I'm doing the right things.

Starting point is 00:43:06 So the number one thing I tried to work on was stress because for me, when I was a fortune, 500 corporate person, my stress level was out of control. And I ended up reaching this point where I was having health issues. And eventually I just became emotionally numb. I felt just completely out of whack and I think a lot of people feel that way.

Starting point is 00:43:32 So one of the most important things I've tried to do is to limit stress on the body, do things such as meditation, short walks. I try to do them probably every 45 minutes sometimes to an hour and a half, but I try to do them probably every 45 minutes, sometimes to an hour and a half, but I try to keep my body moving, try to take naps if I can or just shut my eyes and take breathers. But in reading your book, it seemed like stress was one of the biggest factors that influenced methylation. Oh man, it's such huge. Influence is biological aging. Yeah, I think stress is gasoline on the fire of aging. I mean, it's no joke.

Starting point is 00:44:08 And we don't take it seriously. Unless you face plant, like you're experienced as a C-suite guy, the statistics on C-suite burnout are horrible. I mean, everybody wants to be a CEO or COO or a top of the company. The price that is paid for that, we're actually going to be doing CEO or COO or a top of the company. The price that is paid for that, we're actually gonna be doing a YPO challenge

Starting point is 00:44:28 on where we're gonna be working with C-suite people exclusively introducing our program to them. And I can't wait. And you have the stress piece is huge. I just wanna say that when the clock that we used measuring DNA methylation, a full 25% of that clock is influenced by cortisol, by the ultimate stress hormone. And there's no other variable to my knowledge in any of the clocks. So there's next

Starting point is 00:44:54 generation clocks available now too, that influences it with such impact, such so broadly. So stress might prove to be the biggest piece of this puzzle. I mean, it really could. We always point to diet as the biggest piece, but man, stress is a potent driver of all things aging, the diseases, the aging journey itself, DNA methylation, epigenetic expression, etc, etc. Okay. Well, so what I'm doing, you seem really nice and laid back. I mean, I've really had a great time talking to you. Look fabulous.

Starting point is 00:45:28 You've made good changes. Well, the second one that I've working on, and it's a constant work for me because I've suffered a lot of trauma in my past has been sleep. Yes. And as I started looking at this, I've seen studies that show if you're not getting those six to eight hours of sleep on a consistent basis, it starts impacting your telemores and the lack of sleep can actually shorten the telemars, which then as I understand it,

Starting point is 00:46:01 directly impacts biological aging. So I don't think people truly understand how important sleep is. And I have a guest who's episode will be coming up here very shortly, Dr. Sarah Medneck. And she just put out a book, the power of the downstate. I think so much of what she's talking about in her book, in addition to her other book about napping,

Starting point is 00:46:24 is so vital is yes, you need that sleep, but you also need these down state periods, one for stress control, but two, for all the other things that are praying. So can you touch on sleep? Yeah, absolutely. And Dr. Mennick is awesome. Be sure to give her a big virtual hug for me.

Starting point is 00:46:38 I love her, and I love her work. She's such a great neuroscientist. She'll just be fabulous on your podcast. Sleep is essential. If you're not sleeping, you're aging. No doubt about it. And not just via a measured telomere length, but via negative changes to DNA methylation. And this is in animals and in humans.

Starting point is 00:46:54 There's quite a bit of damage happening. In animal studies, where we can like pop their brain out, dissect and look at changes in the brain tissue, you see neuronal genesis, the growth and viability of neurons just damaged. And this is after one lousy night's sleep. So again, the chronic problem is going to have far-reaching effects. So Machu Walker, another neuroscientist, studied sleep out of University of California as well, along with Dr. Mennick, just really says that argues that sleep is poor sleep is the driver of biological age. I think that it's multifactorial, but I definitely think that poor sleep is a big contributor

Starting point is 00:47:31 and conversely if you're sleeping well, you're healing and you're allowing healthy methylation patterns to develop. And so we wanted our participants to get seven hours. Like you, sleep was my weak link as well in the pillars of the younger you program and I became a mom later in life and kicked my sleep in my poor sleep into even higher gear. My daughter was waking up a lot and I had to train for good sleep like one would train for a marathon. In fact that's what we wrote in the book. It's true. I had to just take hack after hack after hack to figure out

Starting point is 00:48:04 what would finally enable me to get a decent night's rest. And micro hacks worked for me, many of them, getting to sleep on time, for instance, like giving myself enough runway to actually get enough hours. I know my kids going to be up at six, so I'm going to have to go to bed at 10 at the latest, right? Or maybe 10, 30 or something like that, like just structuring things making sure my room was cool, bed was comfortable pillows are okay, et cetera, there's all these

Starting point is 00:48:29 basic things that we can do to sleep. Not eating a happy meal, having nothing actually a few hours before bed. These add up, being mindful of exercise, there's a simple one, are you exercising too late in the day and or or are you somebody who does better with later exercise? I mean, you kind of have to find your sweet spot, but I covered quite a bit of these. I sleep so, so much better, not perfect. I use meditation a lot, but yeah, tonight, last night, I had a fabulous night sleep, and I needed it because I had a poorer night sleep the previous night, but it works.

Starting point is 00:49:01 I think the hacks work, and I think I cover them in my book pretty well. Yeah, you do. And for me, the biggest one that I've found that's been helpful for me is the more I can follow the circadian rhythm and be consistent with when I go to bed and when I wake up, the better my sleep needs tends to be in general. Yeah, anyway, we could go on about it, but we have other stuff to talk about. So the next one I wanted to hit on was exercise. What I try to do is I work out six days a week and even when I'm not working out, I walk probably five miles a day.

Starting point is 00:49:33 And I do one large walk and then multiple smaller walks throughout the day, but I try to incorporate three to four times a week cycling, which I know you're a fan of too, but I do either road bike a couple days a week, and then I'll do a couple days of spin class just so I get some of that more max cardio in, and then I supplement it with gym days. I think you point out something similar that Davidson Claire does, and that is just there's this need several times of a week to get as you brought up earlier in the segment

Starting point is 00:50:06 so much time being in a cardiovascular state, which there's more and more science that cardiovascular exercise does more for you than weightlifting when it comes to biological age. I don't think we can say one does more, honestly. There's always, so one study might come out that'll tip it one way and people will run that way and then another study will come out that will argue for resistance training.

Starting point is 00:50:28 We need both. There's just no doubt about it. I was way more in the cardio camp. I've been a cyclist for my entire adult life like a joke. Let's write hard. I competed and I still love it's still just incredibly important. It's my happy place. I was on my bike this morning. It's my happy place. I left now with a real commitment. I do resistance training. I do three days a week, but a good workout. Like I've been doing German volleyball training. It's funny. It's somebody who is so cardio. And now I'm doing German volume training.

Starting point is 00:50:56 I love it though. I absolutely love it. I love my body making muscles. And I think that both are good. In fact, when I was writing the section on exercise in the book, we caution about over exercising, but really the majority of the science out there is just the crazy amount of benefits.

Starting point is 00:51:15 One of the most important and important longevity elixirs that we can engage in, it's essential. And I like that you do spin class because you're with other humans, that community element, I think, for exercise is so important. I ride solo. I used to have a riding group, but I don't know. But my gym is this local garage. Our coach is key trains all the athletes, the high school athletes, and all of their parents come into. They work out. So I'm in like the mom, bud class. It's just so fun. It's just fun and friendly. And that community component is really important, I think, as well. Let me say a second about overtraining. I mentioned one study in the book where, and in my research

Starting point is 00:51:55 paper, where there's some evidence that overtraining will be a pro-aging phenomenon. And so where there's more evidence for this is like like if you look at athletes and myself, I experienced this myself after the season. So after whatever your sport is, you finish your season and many get sick. And you can measure their secretary IGI, one of the all-important immunoprotective compounds that are known as it's just all along our new coastline. So in our lungs and our nose and our gastrointestinal tract and our mouth, you can measure it in athletes after their season and it's low. It's suppressed.

Starting point is 00:52:29 So they're immunosuppressed after that intense season. And I used to get sinusitis every year. So there's evidence that over training isn't healthy. Not that I want to say you stop your competitive sport, do it and love it, but maybe at some point wind it down when you get older. Okay, good advice. So the last area I want to dive into would be what we eat. And so my routine is I intermittent fast,

Starting point is 00:52:57 six days a week, sometimes seven, which I just did an interview earlier this week with Dr. Dominica Dagostino, who's a predominant person in the ketosis world who told me I'm probably doing it too much, but it's working for me. But in addition to that, I... Many hours ago when you say you intermittent,

Starting point is 00:53:14 ask like what is your window? My window to eat is if I start at 12, I stop at seven to seven 30, if I would start at one PM, I end eight, and then I don't eat. So I try to get in 16 hours. And then someday I will do multi-day fasts, but it just depends on how much I want to detox. But every day I wake up, one of the first things I do is I hydrate. So immediately upon waking up, I have water. I take a greens. I typically have used athletic greens, but I'm now experimenting with others. And then I do a ton of supplements. So I do a lot of EPA and DHA, like very high. I do

Starting point is 00:53:55 chelated magnesium at night with a vitamin D. I do liquid zinc drops. I'm doing res-vezzatrol. In addition to that, I try to do, as I said before, the K2, the D, and in addition to that, I'm using a complex mushroom supplement and a beet supplement plus biotein. And then my diet is very heavily a lot of kale salads, vegetables, and proteins. And sometimes I'll go on very low carb diets, but that's generally what I've been doing. And I've probably missed sub supplement. Amicetial oil is something that I also do as well.

Starting point is 00:54:34 Yeah, awesome, that's great. So in our study, as you know, we only use the probiotic and a greens powder, but in the book, I cover a lot of additional supplements we want to consider and you've aligned yourself with our recommendations very well. I would do a little extra, you're probably doing some procurement or turmeric, or trying to get that in your diet. I think green tea is an additional player that, whose importance is,

Starting point is 00:54:58 there's plenty of evidence for. I actually use Himalayan Tardary Buckwheat from Big Bowl Health. That's Starter Joplans Company. It's not wheat, it's not a gluten-containing grain, but it is loaded with those nutrients that sort of direct where methylation is happening in our book, they're epi-nutrients. They're mostly phytochemicals,

Starting point is 00:55:17 so they're compounds from plants that seem to direct where methylation is happening towards an optimal pattern. And so Himalayan Tardari Buckweed is packed with it. But Respiratrol, as you mentioned, all of the leafy greens that you're doing, likely you're doing some berries and stuff like that, that again are very important directing traffic. What else? Now, the berries are one area that I don't do as much of. I do a ton of almonds and seeds and stuff like that. Yeah, it's great.

Starting point is 00:55:46 Yeah, you've definitely kind of embraced core pillars of our program. I know we're getting short on time, so I wanted to ask one last question, and that is if someone implements this and they can start addressing the upstream biological age, how much can this likely help them avoid chronic conditions as they get older or push them off?

Starting point is 00:56:10 That's a great question. We don't know. We're continuing to collect study data. I would ask people to come to youngeruprogram.com and visit us. In fact, we have a biological age self-assessment that is free. So you can do this little, you can do a questionnaire that'll give you an idea of your age to start you on the journey.

Starting point is 00:56:31 And you can join us on the journey if you go over to youngeruprogram.com. So we know that this program lowers biological age, but we also know that there's plenty of evidence on the pillars of this program, being anti-inflammatory, being heart smart, being brain supportive, being anti-cancer. So all of the chronic diseases of aging, we know that this dietary and this work is that we extend health span to be in lockstep with our lifespan, so that we live long, we experience what James Freeze coined in the 80s, a compression of morbidity.

Starting point is 00:57:14 So we have minimal diseases and when we die, it's sort of quick and relatively painless and unadventful. I mean, that is the goal that I have for this work and I'll continue to study it towards that end. Okay, well, down the line, I'd love to have you come back as you're studying more and learning more. And you already gave one way for people to find you. I know you've got a great Facebook group as well that people can join. What's the way that they can do that? You can find, if you come to our hub, youngerUprogram.com, we'll have a link to join

Starting point is 00:57:47 in our Facebook. If you have the book, if you buy the book, there are a million downloads that you'll have access to extra recipes, methods of methylation adaptogens. Just all sorts of cool good stuff is over at youngerUprogram.com. That's our hub and it'll get you where you need to go. Kara, thank you so much for coming on the show, man. It was one of my favorite episodes I've

Starting point is 00:58:12 ever done. Such fascinating work that you're doing. Thank you. I just really appreciate it. I appreciate the hard work that you're doing in this field and bringing this information forward. So thanks for having me. I thoroughly enjoyed that interview with Cara and wanted to thank Cara and Hatchet Books for giving me the honor of interviewing her. Links to all things Cara will be in the show notes at passionstruck.com. Please use our website links if you buy any books from the authors that are featured on the podcast, any proceeds that go from those purchases, go to support the show and making it free for our listeners. Videos are at YouTube at John R. Miles. Advertisers, deals, and discount codes are all in one place at www.pashinstruct.com slash deals.

Starting point is 00:58:52 Please consider supporting those who support the show. I'm at John R. Miles on Instagram and Twitter, and you can also find me on LinkedIn and Facebook. If you want to know how I managed to book all these amazing guests, it's because of my network. Go out there and build yours before you need it. And I did want to mention that almost all of our guests subscribe to the podcast and provide suggestions on topics and other guests that we should interview. So please come join this passion-struck community. You will be in great company. You're about to hear a preview of the passion-strike podcast interview I did with Dr. Ilett Fishback, an award-winning psychologist at the University of Chicago, Booth School of Business, and the

Starting point is 00:59:30 past president of the society for the Science of Motivation. We discussed her new best-selling book, Get It Done, Surprising Lessons from the Science of Motivation. One reason it's hard to choose our objective is that we are often planned for our future self and we have this policy where we think that our future self is going to be much more for superhuman than our present self, which means that when we plan for the future we are envision the person that doesn't get tired or hungry or frustrated or bored and that person of course will get up at 6 a.m. welcome to midnight well not really and so it's kind of hard to add plan because our plans suffer that, what we refer to as the empathy gap,

Starting point is 01:00:25 is lack of empathy for our future self. Remember, we rise by lifting others, so share this show with those you love. And if you found this episode useful, please share it with someone else who could use this advice on how to reduce your biological age that Kara gave here today. In the meantime, do your best to apply what you hear

Starting point is 01:00:44 so you can live what you listen. And we'll see you next time. Live life, Ash and Strong. you

Passion Struck with John R. Miles - Dr. Kara Fitzgerald on How to Become a Younger You by Reversing Your Biological Age EP 174

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