How To Heal From Surgeries Faster, The Fringe "Antihistamine Sleep Hack," Methylene Blue Nasal Spray & Much More With Tim Gray.

My name is Ben Greenfield, and on this episode of the Boundless Life Podcast, I got sent a device called Hume Health, H-U-M-E Health, and they are the first at-home body composition analyzer that is 95% accurate as a DEXA scan or InBody. It's very accurate because I did, uh, InBody scan at Dr. Dom's Health Optimization Lab in Germany when I was there, you know, 2 months ago, and he said, I can't believe how much stronger your leg muscles are than your upper body, you like, your legs are very strong. So I've got the measurement sheet of it and I compared it to that of the Hume Health, and it is so close, it is ridiculous. And he's got the full-on really expensive thing that you need to have in a clinic. I would say it's my favorite, let's say, biohack, because it's quantifying, of the year for sure.

Welcome to The Boundless Life with me, your host, Ben Greenfield. I'm a personal trainer, exercise physiologist, and nutritionist, and I'm passionate about helping you discover unparalleled levels of health, fitness, longevity, and beyond.

Tim Gray, he's back. How many times have you been on the show, man?

This must be my third or my fourth, dude, I think.

Yeah. I don't know. I lose track. For those of you who want the shownotes, I'll put all of Tim's previous podcasts at BenGreenfieldLife.com/TimGray. Texas Tim, BenGreenfieldLife.com/TexasTim. That's not a Texas accent that you have, Tim.

Definitely not.

We'll work on that. Tim's coming to Texas this April. That's one of the reasons we want to hop on a call today and shoot the shit about all things biohacking and health and let you be a little fly on the wall because Tim, he puts on these incredible biohacking conferences. The next one is Texas. Well, if you want to count Austin as Texas.

Well, it is kind of like an oasis in the middle of the desert, let's be honest. But no, it's April 12th and 13th in Austin.

Yeah. Yeah. And Tim, just for people who didn't hear our previous episodes, I mean, I always just introduce you as a prolific biohacker and health seeker type of guy from from the UK, so who also drinks tea, I guess. How do you describe yourself?

I would say into health optimization, leading health optimization. I don't know these days, actually. I used to go with the UK's leading biohacker, but to be honest, I've kind of evolved past the biohacker label into more health-oriented.

Ben, I don't know about you, but it always annoys me when I'm doing a podcast and somebody introduces me as like, America's top biohacker or for you, UK's leading biohacker. I'm like, what does it mean to be a top biohacker? I never wrote that title for myself, never claimed that title. It seems like an odd way to introduce somebody because biohacking is just so wide-ranging, right?

Yeah, it is. Yeah. And, it gets a lot of people turn up their nose at it because they don't understand what it is actually.

Yeah, exactly. It's like I'm the world's top toaster repairman or fax machine consultant. I'll just claim that. So, this is a regularly scheduled podcast. Seems like we hop on about once a year or so and talk about your deep immersion in the whole biohacking world. But, you and I were together last month at the beautiful Ibiza, or I think I have to say with a lisp, the Ibiza Six Senses. And, your mouth was blue and I thought you were just biohacking with methylene blue as usual. As UK's leading biohacker. And, you actually kind of told me you've gone through some very interesting dental and teeth and jaw issues that I was kind of intrigued by because you have a very interesting approach to dental care. So, tell me what actually happened. Yeah.

So basically, I had a shoddy dentistry work where he took a tooth out, it took parts of the jawbone with it, which then the next two, the jaw started dying off. It had been necrosis bone in there.. And then what happens is if you have a tooth taken out, the bone degenerates around where that tooth is because the bone's no longer needed there. So this is why biological dentistry actually does, for instance, instead of a root canal treated tooth, they pull the tooth and they put an immediate ceramic implant because then the bone osteointegrates around the ceramic implant. The thing is, is when I had this done, 10 or 12 years ago, this wasn't a biological dentist. He ripped it out, took part of the jawbone and caused me many issues from my sinuses because the tooth for me goes slightly into the sinuses and the sinus membrane comes around it. So what happened was I'd had stem cell surgery with our friend Dr. Dominik Schwitz in Germany. So had stem cells and a sinus lift surgery to help the bone regrow, but it didn't grow.

And just by the way, he's an actual dental— he's an oral surgeon, but one who is more of a holistic natural practitioner, right?

So, yeah. So he was, he was a traditional dentist. And then he realized that putting metal in the body and mercury and using fluoride and root canal-treated teeth and all this stuff wasn't the best thing for health, but it was good for bites. And so he created a whole, whole 360 concept. He calls it the all-in-one concept. And that includes oral microbiome, oral health, gut bacteria, micronutrients, macronutrients, biocompatible materials that your body accepts and heals around, and low toxic chemicals as well. So the results that he gets are fantastic, actually.

Right. So, so he's, so he's not a, he's not shoddy.

No.

And he's German. Shoddy guy. All right, great.

Yeah, he's definitely not the shoddy guy. He's German. This, this, this dentist was way back 10 years, 10, 12 years ago, the other one. And so anyway, I went to Dom. He did some work on me, but the site, the bone was so degenerated from so many years of degeneration that he referred me on to a maxillofacial surgeon and biological dentist specialist in Hamburg. So he went and opened up inside the cheek about this much through to the sinuses, cleared out the dead bone, and then placed an implant, a bone implant about this much because the sinus, the bone above the sinus was gone. And so it was causing me sinus and mouth issues. So they put the bone implant in and bolted it in, which now I have your upper jawbone here. Yeah, in my mouth. So basically, now I have enough bone to have 2 ceramic implants put in because my teeth, there was just gum there and no bone. So that's what I'd gone through. So it's a pretty major, actually a major surgery. It's not dental surgery, it's jaw surgery. And they literally cut you from here to here. If you saw the photos, you would not believe the size of the wound in the side of the mouth here. So yeah, so it's pretty major. And then that had been a month in when I saw you last. But in fact, 2 days after Ibiza, it got infected, unfortunately, and I had to fly back to Germany and have the surgery done all over again. And because the gum didn't quite close up together and it got a little gap and then bacteria got in. So I've been through pretty much 3 months now of quite intensive healing, but That means all the things that go with it, all the biohacking technologies and supplements and light therapy and stuff to go with it to speed up this healing now so I get it over the edge.

Ben Greenfield: Yeah, that's something I was thinking about. I actually tweeted out some of my tips that I had shared with a client recently for healing faster after his surgery. I was talking about some pretty simple things from increased collagen and amino acid intake, vitamin C, peptides like BPC-157, which are perhaps a little bit more advanced, all the way to red light therapy, PEMF, hyperbaric, all these things that go above and beyond just rest and having your feet up. So, I'm curious for you having fulfilled the, take no offense, British stereotype of having teeth issues, What did you actually do to enhance healing from a biohacking perspective? I'm certain that some of this could apply to people who are interested in recovering faster, not just from something like a jaw surgery or tooth issue, but just in general for healing from surgery or from an injury like that. What were some of your big wins?

Yeah.

Okay.

So, the fundamentals, are grounding, obviously. So making sure that you're grounding frequently so that you've got your flow of free electrons. That's the— for me, one of the fundamentals, because if you haven't got enough electrons, then your body isn't going to be using its energy correctly to heal. So there was actually a study done on cyclists, and I think— and don't quote me on the statistic— but it was around 25% faster healing for the cyclists' recovery than cyclists that weren't grounding.

And, when you say the cyclists were grounding, were they literally just hippie-style barefoot outside or laying on their back on the beach or were they actually using these grounding mats, grounding sheets, grounding pillowcases, stuff like that?

So, they were grounding, actually grounding, but they also had grounding sleeping bags as well. So, they slept grounded as well.

Okay.

So grounding, you know, obviously our bodies are electric and, you know, as time progresses, we're realizing how much more the body is electric. You know, even the book I can recommend, obviously Body Electric for this, and making sure that you have the correct or the optimal charge for your body in terms of the negative part of the energy process is grounding. So I found that to be actually last year at A4M where I'm heading tomorrow, Vegas. I had live blood analysis done before and after grounding. And, I've seen the studies on this where they have grounding before and after and you can see the red blood cells are equidistant after grounding but clumped together before. So, it shows how blood flow for healing is significantly better when you are grounding.

Ben Greenfield: Wow, incredible. Wow. I've seen that data for pulsed electromagnetic field therapy, PEMF therapy, which I sometimes describe as grounding on steroids because you're just amplifying that same healing frequency from the planet Earth but didn't know that you've seen those type of responses to red blood cell aggregation with grounding, which makes sense from an electrical standpoint. If you're increasing the charge, you're going to increase the separation between the cells, which would then subsequently increase or decrease inflammation, improve blood flow, decrease resistance of blood as it travels through the body, and increase oxygenation. So, that's cool, man. That's simple. Anybody can do that.

And I obviously have a Samina bed, which is grounded. So, you're grounded when you're sleeping, which is perfect.

Oh, the Samina bed is grounded?

Yeah. So, instead of connected silver-laced bedsheets that the cheaper ones have, they've actually got a magnetic earthing pad that goes under the topper. And then, it has a dirty electricity filter as well so that it filters out any of the dirty electricity in a household circuit, which is a big problem in London or the US in general because there's just so, there's so many, um, there's a lot of old wiring or there's a lot of obviously apartment, hundreds of apartments in one block. So there's a lot of dirty electricity.

Yeah, a lot of AC surges right through, through the electrical wiring system.

And in fact, I've got, um, a dirty electricity meter sent to me a few weeks ago to test my new apartment I've got. And, um, it was quite bad actually. And then I put the dirty electricity filters, and I've got 6 of them around the house now, and it measures almost nonexistent dirty electricity. And the funny thing is, is when I started grounding, when I first moved in with my bed sheets, I was buzzing, my head was buzzing and I was like, there's something not right in this house with the grounding. And then when I put the dirty electricity filters on that night, never had the buzzing problem again. So I took it off one night and I was buzzing and it's like literally my brain was super busy when there was dirty electricity being grounded. So having a dirty electricity filter, if you are using grounding bed sheets or, you know, grounding mouse mat like I have here, dirty electricity filter is a must.

Yeah, yeah. And companies like Stetzer or Greenwave or Shielded Healing sell them and they're not expensive to have a dirty electricity filter. So, the SAMINA bed has it kind of built in?

Yeah. So, you have the earthing pad magnetic, so it's magnetic grounding, one wire that goes out into the earth point of the socket with a dirty electricity filter on it. So, it's fantastic. But, I found that the other filters that I got are actually what I needed because I think it was so high in dirty electricity in this apartment block. And, there must be 100 apartments in this block.

Ben Greenfield: Yeah. I have an airplane hangar shed down in Viola, Idaho where I'm building a new home. In that shed is a large box on a wooden pallet that's been sitting in the hangar for 3 months. And, by the way, I don't have an airplane. The airplane hangar I'm actually going to be using for goats and chickens and the like. But, inside that box is a SAMINA bed that's just been waiting to go into my new bedroom in the Idaho home when I move in. And, I don't even know probably as much as I should know about the SAMINA bed besides it's very comfortable, it's grounded, it's all natural fabrics, et cetera. But, that's very interesting. I didn't know that about the dirty electricity component. I'm excited to sleep on that bed.

Oh man, it's amazing. It's amazing. Most people think sleep is just something you have to do, but in fact it's something that is a non-negotiable. And we are so underslept that when you're healing or even day-to-day life, if you are, if you are not sleeping enough and let's say 7.5 hours is probably the average, if you're not sleeping enough, then your body's not going to heal enough. And it's the best time you can have for your body to heal is while you sleep. And if you're grounded, with the free electrons and you're rested and you're sleeping well and it's like a clean environment with clean air, you're going to heal significantly quicker. So this is really, you know, the first part of my healing protocol. And it may sound boring and simple, but, you know, before bed, for instance, I take antihistamine called ketotifen.

Ketotifen. Why do you take that?

Just this one capsule, 1 milligram. And it's such a powerful antihistamine now bearing in mind I have the H1 and the H2 gene mutation, so I'm really bad with histamine levels. So my inflammation levels are quite high naturally. So an anti-inflammatory for me such as ketotifen is powerful and it's very sedative as well. So I found that every night I would take it 20 minutes before sleeping and then it would knock me out and I would sleep for 9 hours and my healing would progress very, very quickly. Now I've also tested this on my mum and I call her Mum Biohacker. She, she had post-viral syndrome for quite a while where she's running out of energy. She couldn't walk to the shops. She was just absolutely fatigued, like post, you know, like long COVID and her sleep was all over the place. So I gave her this ketotifen because she obviously has the H1 mutation and said to her, right, you're going to take this every night for 2 weeks. And, within a week, her sleep was so much better and she had dealt with the post-viral within the week.

Wow, wow. So, catartaphen, in terms of how powerful that— I'm assuming it's a pharmaceutical first, you need a prescription.

Pharmaceutical antihistamine, yeah. Okay.

Now, if I've got, let's say, some kind of common antihistamine over-the-counter that you'd take before you have a glass of wine or or just what you get from the average CVS or Walgreens. Do you know how much more powerful something like a prescription like that is compared to the average thing in a person's pantry?

It's quite a lot more powerful in terms of effect for— yes, but it works differently to the other antihistamines. And I can't, I can't say exactly, but I did research it quite heavily before taking it, and I had it recommended to me by a couple of practitioners, actually. But it is a different antihistamine to the newer versions which are slightly less strong. So, it's K-E-T-O-I-F-E-N, ketotifen. Ben Greenfield: Okay.

I'm writing that down and I'll put information about that in the shownotes. Now, you said you have this gene. I'd love to hear a little bit more about that, that H1H2 gene. But I'm curious not only about that gene but whether you think an antihistamine like ketotifen would help someone even if they didn't have that genetic issue. Does that make sense?

Yeah. So histamine, everyone deals with histamine differently, one depending on their genes. So H1 or H2, and there's specific gene names for those, but one is the H2, H2, H1 receptor, and one is for the H2 receptor. Now you can also have histamine issues from gut problems and stressed liver. And you can also have too many histamine foods on top of that. So I've got the H1 and the H2 gene mutation, which means I really don't break down histamine very well. I've had stressed liver for years. Again, this is because of my MTHFR gene and COMT status. And also when I first got into biohacking, I had been on 3 months of antibiotics and it was, you know, ciprofloxacin, which is the evil black block Box mitochondria-killing antibiotics, which destroyed me.

Kind of bad for your tendons too.

Really bad, really bad actually. And when I started getting tendinitis is when I stopped it, but it destroyed me. And that's when I realized I started getting histamine issues. So if I had avocado, I would be in bed with a migraine the next day. Or if I had red wine, my nose would get stuffy immediately. Or aged steak and how we both love a good aged steak.

Yeah. Geez. Can't, can't have leftovers at Tim's house.

Yeah, exactly. All bananas. So all of the things that, you know, are great foods, I consider great foods— avocado, banana, aged steak, not so much the red wine, but I do from time to time. I started getting really bad headaches from it. Migraines, in fact. And my brother and my mum both have a history of lifelong migraines. So what I did add in actually, there's a supplement, DAO, which I'm sure you're familiar with, and DAO, you can get it from peas or you can get it from kidneys, specifically porcine kidneys. And this DAO enzyme breaks down histamine. And so I take half a natural DAO enzyme in the morning and in the evening, which helps me break down my histamine much better. But taking the Catatiphen before bed, it literally is like a steam train going through and dealing with histamine, which then really reduces inflammation. It causes a sedation effect, helps you sleep better and reduces inflammation so you don't get the same histamine issues. However, if you haven't got the gene variations of H1 or H2, it will still work as a sedative with a sedative effect. But just not as powerful from what I have experienced with people.

Ben Greenfield: Yeah. Now, a lot of people will try something like NyQuil from the drugstore for sleep, but that seems to cause a lot of issues for people, restlessness and even restless leg issues, deleterious impacts on sleep architecture. I'm not a huge fan of that as a sleep aid. This catatiphan, I assume, is different than something like NyQuil.

Yeah, I mean, again, it's in the antihistamine category, but it's a different drug. And ketotifen is actually one of the— I think it was one of the earlier ones before the newer versions. And there's two specific antihistamine pharmaceutical types, one beginning with C, one beginning with L, but ketotifen is the earlier type. So yeah, I found it to be fantastic. So that really helped me sleep and recover much quicker. I also actually, before I move on, I'm just going to say anyone that drinks red wine or has steak or avocado and gets a stuffy nose and starts feeling lethargic or actually has a sudden bout of IBS or bad digestion, I would, I would get a gene test done and look to see if you have the H1 or the H2 or both gene variations, because there are things that you can do to support your body so that you don't get the same inflammation.

Yeah, or sardines or avocados or beef jerky or just about any kind of aged cured mildly processed salted type of ingredient that a lot of people in the health world eat. They don't feel well and they don't realize that they might be wired up to have a histaminergic reaction to those foods.

Yeah, exactly. And, for sensitive immune systems or people with you know, like multiple intolerances, sometimes it can just be down to the levels of histamine that they have in their body because it's a— I think they call it an excitogen or something or other like that, which is basically always stimulating the body. So the body's always in a fight or flight stage if your histamine is super high because histamine comes as a reaction to damage or inflammation and things like that. So if your levels are naturally high because of the genes or because of your diet or lifestyle or whatever, it will affect you quite heavily. So, that was a big win for me. But also, before bed, I would take 2.4 IU of growth hormones before bed as well.

Oh, you mean the injectable peptides like ipamorelin or something like that?

No, no, the proper stuff, somatropin from Pfizer.

I like how you say the proper stuff like I'm not messing around, I use the real stuff. So, what'd you call it again?

Somatropin is the name of it. Oh, yeah. So depending on your source of growth hormone, it's either 91 or 92 amino acids chained together and folded on themselves like this. So it's a very, very complicated, let's say, peptide compared to traditional peptides like BPC-157 and things. So it, it really has a great effect for fat burning, which is not why I take it because I do not have a fat problem, but it's also stimulates growth and repair of tissue very, very well. So, human growth hormones before bed and then lots of collagen.

Lots of collagen. You didn't use the collagen as a sleep aid, that was more to enhance repair.

Yeah, that was to help healing along with the growth hormones.

Yeah. When you talk about lots of collagen, I'm super into collagen and essential amino acids. I think you know that and just go through scoops and scoops of the stuff. A tub will last a week at our house because both my wife and I just mainline the collagen. I even realized this. I was reading a book. I believe it was Daniel Wallerstorfer just wrote a new book called "Unlock Your Genes." I don't even think it's out yet, but in that book, he even highlights how when you consume collagen orally, it is the breakdown of collagen peptides in the bloodstream that sends a message to your brain that then thinks that your actual muscles are breaking down and it upregulates muscle protein synthesis and repair based on the fact that you ate the collagen. And a lot of people think the collagen is just serving as like a building block for muscles and for repair, but it's actually a signaling molecule that tricks the brain into thinking that the body's being broken down, so it upregulates synthesis. Isn't that interesting?

It's amazing. I mean, this is actually— I've got some content going out over the next couple of weeks about peptides because I mean, I think peptides are the future of medicine and how that ties into collagen, because obviously collagen peptides and all the obviously the aminos that you have within it. And I think if you, if you look at peptides in their rawest format or in the easiest description, it's, you know, amino acids chained together that are messages, messages for the body to tell it to do different things, which is why it works so well compared to traditional medicine. And, and I think, you know, for me, collagen fits into that. So if you're doing growth hormones, you're doing BPC-157 for healing repair, you're doing TB500, for instance, collagen is an absolute no-brainer along with some good aminos such as, you know, the Kion ones to name, you know, the best probably.

Oh, thanks.

Blushing. You know, and, you know, I think you're giving yourself the building blocks, but also giving the body the signals it needs to repair. Along with the peptides and the collagen. So, it's interesting to hear that on collagen specifically as well as the peptides.

Yeah, yeah. And then, people might be wondering about dosage. I say about 20 to 40 grams. I mean, for people who are repairing, whether young high school football player who wants to put on muscle, I'm usually recommending around 20 grams of essential amino acids a day and 20 to 40 grams of collagen. In addition to the other protein that you're consuming throughout the day. And, a lot of people will get a tub of collagen and not realize a scoop sometimes is just 5 grams. So, you kind of got to eat a lot of the stuff.

Yeah, I do 40 grams a day minimum. And, I generally put 20 grams into a warm but not hot coffee for obvious reasons. And, I put it into any yogurt that I have as well. And so, I have Cherry fish-based collagen and I have beef-based collagen as well. So, I generally have 40 grams a day minimum.

I don't know if I told you this story, but the person who first turned me on to high-dose collagen saw me outside a coffee shop in Malibu. We hadn't seen each other for maybe 6 months. And, he walks up and we were just shooting the shit and talking about health and he said, "Ben, this one modification to my diet that I've made has absolutely transformed my recovery, my propensity to injury." He was playing a lot of frisbee golf. He's a very active person. And, well, I said, "What is it?" And, he said, "I've switched to 40 grams of collagen a day every day, day in, day out, the biggest game changer for me for years." And, you know who that was? Godfather of the health industry, Mark Sisson. That's the guy who told me this and turned me onto it. And then, ever since then, I've been into— at the time, I was already doing essential amino acids, but man, yeah, collagen is a game changer.

I love Mark. I aspire to be like Mark when I'm a little bit older. It's like, what a legend. I'm very happy actually he's going to be speaking at the Health Optimization Summit Austin.

Are you kidding me? You got Mark Hyssen to come?

Yup.

Yes, sir. Oh, dude. I want to get back into the healing, but who are some other biggies who you might be able to tease us with who are going to be there?

Oh, crikey. There's such a list of people. We got Stephanie Estima. Stephanie Estima, Gary Brecker, this dude called Ben Greenfield. Don't know if you've heard of him.

Got to be there. I got to go where the cool kids are going. Mark Sisson, obviously, you just said. Wow.

Okay. Well, it's Zach Bush.

Oh, yeah, he's great.

Speaking to Stephen Gundry again, he's just emailed me today to say, can I come along and speak? Which would be nice to see Stephen there again.

And by the way, for people listening, that's April in Austin. I'll put a link at bengreenfieldlife.com/texas, Tim, but it's called the Health Optimization Summit. So, dude, sounds like a good lineup.

Yeah. Oh, Max Lugavere. I'm just looking at the list now. Max Lugavere, Dr. Asim Maholtra, who I hope everyone has heard of, Bryan Sanders, Kali Means, Dr. Dominic Nischwitz, the biological dentist I was telling you about, Amy Horneiman, Dr. Amy Horneiman. Also, Very interesting one that I think that your audience will love, and I'm not sure if you know her, but her name's Claudia Muehlweg. She's a German lady that specializes in improving eyesight through lifestyle and nutrition, and she's had some fantastic, very fantastic results as well. So she's a real interesting one. I met her at J.J. Virgin's event Mindshare a few months ago and Yeah. And she was saying how a couple of the big podcasts she's been on, it was the most popular episode that they had had of 2023. So it's like, actually, I looked into her. It's fantastic that you can reverse eyes. And I'm just currently wearing reading glasses.

So, man. Okay, cool. It'll be a party. I'm excited. I'm excited. Okay, so, and that's, that's April for those of you listening in, in Austin. They're going to have to fly to London this time. You're still going to have the one in London in September, right?

Yeah, yeah. So Austin, April 12th and 13th is the— let's call it the Paleo Revival. So it's the OGs of paleo. It's the original gang that used to go to the big paleo show in Austin before unfortunately it was no more. So I wanted to get the original gang back together again, make it fun, loads of activities, loads of cool food brands, loads of the best speakers, and get everyone back together again. So I'm really excited to be getting the tribe back together again.

So, yeah. Ben Greenfield: Yeah. A lot of people who are listening might not even really remember the old Paleo FX. For years, that was the go-to health and fitness and healthy living and biohacking conference in the U.S. And then, it just kind of lost steam several years ago. But yeah, for years, that was the place to go to meet everybody, to party, to catch up on everything, to see all the latest cool shit. And so, So, that's cool that you're resurrecting that.

I dig it.

Alright, we better jump back into some of these hacks. So, anything else that you did that really moved the dial from a surgery recovery standpoint?

Yeah. So, I reached out to James Carroll who is the founder of Thor Lasers. I don't know if you know the Nova Thor, it's the big—

Oh, yeah, I've heard of that one, yeah.

They have the medically approved laser devices for surgeries and clinics and things like that. He spoke to Congress about— biophotomodulation. And, you know, I would say it's one of the leading brands in the world. I reached out to him and just said, James, this is what I've got going on with healing in my mouth. What do you recommend? And he said, I'm going to send you our laser clinic laser. And it's got something called the Lollipop, which is like a mouth device. I'm not going to do the action, but it's like a mouth device with laser technology in it. You put it in your mouth for 1 minute at a time. So yeah, so I was using the laser 3 times a day, pretty much the whole time, which was fantastic. And I noticed, you know, the tissue sped up quite significantly after I started using it. So, that was on the inside. And also, I've got a Red Light Rising, who's the brand in the UK for red lights, Target Lamp, which is near-infrared.

Now, some people might be wondering, Tim, with the laser thing, they can heat the tissue. It's obviously a medical device. Is this just something special for you or can people actually get laser devices at home that are handheld powerful devices to help your tissue?

Well, not all laser heats depending on the laser. And typically the ones when you go into a— like, for instance, the one that they use for snoring treatment, which is, you know, laser that actually heats and semi-burns and stimulates collagen production, which stops the snoring from tightening the tissues, is actually a very similar device to what they use for vagina rejuvenation. Probably Amy Killen, the type of thing that Amy Killen would use. On her clients. So there's that type of laser. Also, there's lasers that are less, let's say, less invasive, less heating, and just help heal. So I've got a handheld device here actually, which is, which doesn't heat, and the Thor laser didn't heat either. But if you do go into like a biological dentist clinic, they do actually have the one that heats. For instance, I had a cold sore come up on my lip a year ago and they do the laser treatment on it, which is quite hot, but it kills it off immediately and it hasn't come back ever since.

Ben Greenfield: Have you seen this little one? I've done a few videos about it. It's a wraparound device called a Kineon Move Plus. It's LED and laser. So, it's red light and laser, but you just wrap it around a joint and you can walk around, you can hang around your— I don't know if you use it on your jaw, but it's kind of a cool little device.

Yeah, I actually have one and I didn't feel like the application for my face was quite as appropriate. I've actually got it essentially literally right behind me down here. You can probably see it on the side, but I really like the Kineon laser actually. I lent it to my brother who had hip surgery and he found it really helped recovery actually. So I'm a fan of the Kineon. I actually did some content about it a few weeks ago as well. I like those guys very much. They actually— they will be at the summit. In Austin.

Okay, cool. Great. So laser combined with red light, you've got the grounding and the earthing piece. You got hormones, collagen, amino acids, and antihistamine before sleep at night along with that growth hormone peptide. I saw you with methylene blue in your mouth. Was that just for the infection?

Yeah. So, I was using it to keep the wound clean, which obviously I didn't get it clean enough, but methylene blue in the mouth. But actually, what I formulated last week was a nose spray to help repair the sinus membrane of DMSO, methylene blue, and colloidal silver, and then just squirt up. And that's been fantastic for healing my sinuses, actually.

And so you get a blue nosebleed.

Yeah, but I was walking along earlier on to an appointment and I did it and walking along and I was just like, actually cleared out all the gunk and I'm walking along with a massive great blue blue booger stringing down my face. So, it's powerful stuff.

I wonder what kind of effect that would have for people who have the MARCONS or mold in the sinus cavities because methylene blue has a little bit of antiviral, antifungal, antibacterial activity to it, especially if you combine it. So, you put DMSO, silver, and the methylene blue all in a nasal spray bottle and you just spray it in your nose.

Yep, yep, exactly, yep.

And, you obviously have to get liquid methylene blue for this.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So I've got the drops I get, I get shipped from South Africa, but DMSO is very easy. Obviously I did it diluted pretty well. Colloidal silver was good for watering it down, but I found this to be actually fantastic. I use the methylene blue drops, put it on my tongue and then put it onto the wound as well. And obviously methylene blue being fantastic for obviously, as you say, antifungal, antibacterial, antiviral, but also it denotes an electron for the electron transport chain. So, it really helps promote healing as well. So, it's a fantastic drug actually and I use it 30 days at a time and then I have 30 days off.

Ben Greenfield: Well, that's a great idea. I'm headed to Vegas, Satan's playground for mold and EMF and everything else for this A4M event same as you are. And, I've got that silver, the Sovereign Silver nasal spray that I often travel with. But, I also have this company BioBlue. They make a methylene blue with NAD and some different minerals and things in it. I could probably just put a few dropperfuls of that into my silver nasal spray and huff that in Vegas.

Yeah, exactly, exactly. Interesting. Yeah.

And, from what I understand, methylene blue, especially because in that environment, I would imagine penetrate neural tissue in addition to the sinus cavity. It has some pretty impressive effects. From a cognitive standpoint. So, so do you actually feel a little bit of a pick-me-up cognitively when you, when you spray it into the nose?

I do. I mean, each drop is only 500 mcg versus the capsules that I have when I'm traveling at 20 milligrams. And, you know, I take 20 milligrams a day minimum. So I find that those to be the 20 milligrams is fantastic for mental clarity, really fantastic. But when it's 500 milligrams mcg, sorry, and then it's diluted, you're getting a very small amount. So, it works very well for the antibacterial, antiviral, but not for the cognitive effects. It's just not high enough dose. But, the capsules which I'll bring to A4M with me if you want some, they're the best methylene blue capsules that I have tried to date.

Yeah. Okay. I'll have to try them. That same company I was telling you about, BioBlue, they do a capsule as well. They do a liquid and a capsule. So, yeah, we can compare notes. I'll probably have some with me there in Vegas anyways for this For those of you wondering about Vegas, they do this thing called a Longevity Fest every year, the American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine, also a fantastic event. So, that's where Tim and I are going to be next week. What else did you throw at your body there, Tim? Anything in the realm of kind of quantification, measuring, I don't know, HRV or body comp or anything along those lines?

Well, that's a great shout. I mean, obviously I'm tracking my sleep, my heart rate variability, my resting heart rate all the time. And I did notice when I had the infection after I saw you in Ibiza that— and this is an early sign for me— my heart rate variability tanked. And now I'm a sympathetic type, not a parasympathetic type. So my heart rate variability is generally, you know, in the lower side anyway. So average of about 48, maximum of 110. But I had noticed that my average went down to 15 before my infection., and then when I had surgery, the day of surgery, it was almost nonexistent. And then the next day, once the antibiotics kicked in and the surgery had happened, actually my heart rate variability went back to normal again almost within 24 hours. So I knew that it had dealt with the major thing. So obviously I've been tracking that all the way through. And I think, you know, respecting my sleep, as I said at the beginning of the podcast, was the most important thing for me of all because of the repair process. So quantifying my sleep and my average was 94 out of 100 through the first 2 weeks after surgery, giving my body the best chance to integrate the bone and heal. I also— it's funny you mentioned about the, the body composition because I love the gym and I'm an ectomorph, uh, as, as we've discussed before, and it's very hard for me to put weight on.

I have to work really hard and I have to eat a lot of food Ectomorph, by the way, for people unfamiliar with that phrase, skinny, hard gainer, naturally lean, etc.

Yeah. And so I was really concerned about losing muscle mass from not being— because I'm not allowed to work out, I'm not allowed to lift stuff, I'm only allowed to rest and stretch. So I was really worried about losing muscle mass and, and not so much the weight problem. And so I've got— actually, I got sent a device called Hume Health, H-U-M-E Health. And they are the first at-home body composition analyzer that is 95% accurate as a DEXA scan or InBody. So it's, it's absolutely fantastic. I thought it was just going to be, you know, another scale, but no. So you've got, you've got the handle which pulls up on a string to— for the sensors, you stand on it, it gives you a weight, and then it's got an app that then breaks down your muscle composition per muscle per muscle on the diagram as well. I can actually show you it because it's so, so good. So I've obviously been tracking this over the time of the surgery to make sure I haven't lost much. And it's actually been great. I've hardly lost any muscle just from stretching and doing a little bit of EMS at home.

Yeah. Electrical muscle stimulation, you mean?

Yeah, exactly.

And the HUM, you have it there with you?

Well, that's the app. Yeah.

So, you can see muscle. Okay. Oh, wow. Interesting. So, I mean, unlike a DEXA, it's not going to do bone density, but you're getting pretty accurate measurements. I'm assuming via bioelectrical impedance of muscle distribution.

Yeah, exactly. And so, you can track your trends. So, for instance, one thing that I really liked about it, it's fantastic that it served me during the healing process because I didn't obviously want to lose muscle mass. But what I think is now coming out of surgery and healing, going into the gym, I now know that I'm not just putting on muscle. I know where I'm putting on the muscle, and I know what I'm doing in the gym is actually working for the goals that I actually want for my physique. And so, um, so it's actually really great. And says, yeah, I've been doing upper body a bit too much and not enough of the lower half, like I think a lot of guys. It's like, actually, no, this I'm balancing my body. I've gone hard on this for a month. Now I'm going hard on this and I actually see how my body adjusts. And in fact, the one thing that it's very accurate because I did InBody scan at Dr. Dom's Health Optimization Lab in Germany when I was there, you know, 2 months ago. And he said, I can't believe how much stronger your leg muscles are than your upper body. You like your legs are very strong. So I've got the measurement sheet of it and I compared it to that of the Hume Health. And it is so close, it is ridiculous. And, he's got the full-on really expensive thing that you need to have in a clinic.

I'm assuming this is less expensive than something like an InBody scan. I mean, are we talking hundreds, thousands?

Yeah, a few hundred bucks.

Wow, interesting. Well, I mean, I have one of those old-school Withings body analyzers, but this sounds like it's far, far more insightful when it comes to the actual distribution of muscles. I'm going to bookmark that one. That's interesting. Will they be at the At the expo, do you know?

We're in talks with them for the UK. I don't know about the US.

All right, got them. But Hume.

Yes. And I would say it's my favorite, actually my favorite, let's say biohack because it's quantifying of the year for sure. And I didn't expect it to be. I just thought it was just going to be another scale.

Yeah, yeah. Are you doing anything from a blood testing, hormone testing, quantification of biomarker standpoint right now, or whether related to research for the expo or after this surgery?

So, I do anyway. I have a test every 14 days regardless these days.

Wow. That's pretty frequent.

Perks of the job. I check my testosterone every 2 weeks because I had tried TRT, which worked very, very well for me, but then my sperm count came down, motility came down, and I felt like it was a bit too high, so I came down off of my TRT and then started using KISS Peptin and HCG peptides and also one of the anabolic peptides from Level Up, the guys at Level Up.

We're using their Botanabolic.

Exactly.

This is the one. That one's great. I mean, for people who don't want to get on testosterone, I think that's one of the better shotgun formulas for male testosterone enhancement without impairment of fertility that's out there before you move on to enclomiphene and HCG and some of the more difficult to get items. That's just an oral capsule. It's fantastic.

Yeah. That's the beautiful thing about Level Up actually that they are capsules of peptides and you don't have to inject them like a lot of the other ones. And so, I think they're making peptides much more readily accessible for people that, you know, don't want to inject themselves. So, so yeah, so I went from my testosterone levels were in the UK scale, I think it's different to the German, to the American one, but it was my levels were 34 to 38 on a scale for my age that should be around 28. So when I came off of the testosterone and I came off hard just with using some Clomid to help recover and a little bit of HCG, my levels went down to 8. So this is— I was testing this, bear in mind, every 2 weeks. My levels came down to 8 and then within 2 weeks it was back up to 19. So like without any testosterone. So and now it sits at 29. So doing it every 2 weeks obviously is— testosterone is great, LH is great, FSH is great. But for me, post-surgery, it's been ESR, which I'll talk about a device for that in a second. And then CRP. And CRP is more, you know, acute infection, good marker. So you want to have a nice low level. Mine, mine after surgery was before surgery was quite high in the 30s. And then after surgery, it's now 0.6 showing that there's no acute infection, which is fantastic.

Actually, real, real quick before you jump into ESR, I think that's what erythrocyte sedimentation rate. Is that what that is?

Exactly, exactly.

Yeah. Nailed it. Alright. I remember some of college. The testosterone piece, just hit pause on that real quick. The strategy that you used, were you just taking Botanabolic or anything else?

Yeah. So, I was taking KISS Peptin and mixing that with HCG.

As an injectable peptide?

Yeah, injectable peptide.

Okay.

And, the Level Up. Anabolic capsule. That's it, 3 of them.

Wow, wow, good, good case study. Wow.

I mean, and the thing is, the funny thing is, is to go into details, and I imagine the majority of your audience are male, maybe, but, um, testicle size shrunk, you know, quite significantly from a normal size down to a very small size when I was on TRT. And then as I came off of it over the space of the 2 weeks, they came back up to normal again. And I, I had tested it without any assistance at all, and my levels stayed low and my body didn't kick back in. But with peptides, it did very quickly. So it's really fantastic to observe and then also feel how different you are as a man with optimal testosterone levels, because with lower levels, you just— no drive, not much motivation, a little bit more emotional and not caring about building so much. But as soon as you get your testosterone levels up, that's it. Build, build, build, build, build, build, build. I want to build this stuff.

I want to, you know, dopaminergic hardwiring for forward progress is one thing that adequate testosterone levels will give you for sure. Maybe that's why I got to walk on a treadmill during the podcast. I don't know. And, Tim's biohacking experimentation project mom will be happy that there's a higher likelihood she'll have little grandkids running around someday.

Yeah, yeah. This is the next goal.

Yeah. Alright. So, this ESR thing, tell me about that.

So, ESR is a blood measure of inflammation essentially.. And what it is, it's about the speed that your blood settles. I think it's the red blood cells specifically, how fast they settle. And it's something to do with the minerals and inflammation levels within the blood. So it's a very— it's a good measure of more chronic inflammation versus CRP, which is acute inflammation. And so I've always, I've always seen these two measures in my test and it's something I've always asked for because inflammation is important to me.. And I recently found a brand called Core Health, C-O-R Health, and it's a little device you've got at home that looks like a Nintendo Switch and you get test strips, you do your fingerprint test, you put it onto the test. So it looks like a kind of a COVID, you know, home test kit, but then you put it into this device. And it reads the Settle Rate. ESR? Yeah, exactly. It basically reads that and uploads it from the scanner that it has in there and emails you the results in real time and you have it in 20 minutes, your ESR. Now, the thing is the guy that runs it, Bob, I had a really in-depth call with him, several of them actually, about ESR and CRP and I was asking him, you know, why he doesn't do CRP and and all the benefits for ESR. Now, the interesting thing was he told me his levels of, of his, uh, for ESR, and he said they could be a little bit more optimal. And I said to him, do you ever ground? Do you ever get your shoes off and stand in the garden? Do you sleep grounded? He's like, no.

Coming full circle here.

Yeah. And he said no. I said, okay. And he's, um, is a very good techie guy that's been, you know, worked for Apple and all these things for years. And, you know, who's really, really up there in terms of technology and medical side of things. And I said to him, I challenge you to do some grounding and then retest it. And he came back to me, texted me like a week ago, and he said, Tim, I can't believe it. This is the most profound shift in ESR that I've seen just from grounding. And I really wouldn't mind looking at the message now just so I can read it verbatim.

Now, just to clarify real quick, he didn't like go out and buy a SAMINA bed and a PEMF. He just went outside barefoot or something like that?

No, no, just outside. I'll tell you exactly what you said here. Hi, Tim. I did a grounding experiment. Wow. I walked barefoot on dirt for 20 minutes on November 20th and then measured ESR, cut my ESR by more than half. 2 days later, it's still low. Mind blown.

That's incredible. Of course, you might have just stepped in some aspirin, but more likely he was earthed. Wow, that's incredible.

But from someone that has, has an ESR testing company and has tested many, many times and never seen that sort of a shift before. So anyways, I've got one, obviously I've got one at home and I'm using it quite frequently. So it's, it's really nice to see inflammation levels come down. So at-home test. He's going to be at the Health Optimization Summit in Austin and you'll be able to get your ESR tested in real time and check out the devices there as well.

That's incredible. Wow. Okay. So, Core Health. I am often getting random items sent to me. I think years ago, they sent me a prototype of that unit and I had trouble getting to work. I think they were still experimenting with it, whatever, but that's good to hear that they've actually developed it to that standpoint. So, I'm definitely going to try that when I'm down there in Texas. So, anything else from a technology standpoint that you're excited about as far as stuff that people might be able to try at the expo or things that you've seen kind of up and coming or supplements, beverages, anything that's kind of new out there?

I mean, I think the newest supplement out there that I love is actually the Level Up guys. And, I know I've spoken about them a fair bit, but I think peptides really are the future of medicine. So, I think this is one definitely to look out for.

Orally bioavailable peptides without the needles.

Yeah. Another brand that I'm testing out at the moment that I've really enjoyed is something called the Wavwatch. I'm not sure if you've heard of it before.

Like W-A-V?

Yeah, Wavwatch. Now it looks like a smartwatch and yet it's not a smartwatch. It's— think of it as sound healing or frequency medicine. And you put the watch on, you set what state you want to be in, you know, whether it's healing or recovery or whatever, whatever. And it plays the sound. You can just about hear it, but it's actually sending the vibration into your wrist.

Wait, is this different than— because there's a thing of the Apollo that I've talked about before, it's been around for years, little haptic sensation that you wear on your wrist, your ankle. It doesn't make sounds. This is different. This is using sound frequency?

Yeah. So, the Apollo works on vibration and treats you like music would, but it's under the conscious level of awareness. So, you don't actually hear or feel it that much. You can turn it up so you do feel it, whereas the WavWatch is more about the sound frequency itself, and obviously that comes with vibration. So, I like both devices, although I like the WavWatch more because you actually get to experience it a little bit more.

Now, I don't understand, are you hearing the sound through EarPods or headphones or just emanating from the watch?

Yeah, you just hear it a little bit on your wrist like this. Yeah.

I mean, let's say I was wearing it at a dinner party, would other people be able to hear it or is this more of a subconscious high-pitched sound that just me and my dog would hear?

Just about you hear it, yeah. And, it's quite soothing, it's really quite nice. And, there's so many different settings in it as well you can pick up. I mean, I don't know if you've talked about frequency medicine or bioresonance or whatnot much on the podcast, but I mean the body is, as we know, electric as we said earlier on. Everything has a frequency. And, you know, this is why some music can calm us, some music can make us cry, some music can make us angry. You know, all of this, it's state changing. And when we look at what it does to us on a cellular level, it really has a radical shift in, in our, in our chemistry from just from different sound types. And so electric medicine and frequency medicine, I think, you know, they are evolving very quickly with more longevity research funding going in. Around places and Big Pharma losing their grip somewhat. So I think, you know, devices like the Wavwatch, for instance, is one of my favorite picks of the now just because I think it's really advancing, advancing natural healing with how the body actually works.

And does it still— this has been my complaint with some of these quantification devices that you wear on your wrist is you got to have that and then a watch also. Does it tell the time or show the date or do the normal things that a watch might do?

Yeah, it does. Yeah, it tells the time as well. Yeah. Okay. That's great.

It's quite cool to watch.

And, there's no Wi-Fi on it or any of that stuff, so it's low EMF. It tests fine.

I got another question for you. It's just been on my mind because it seems like every time I'm traveling, you're where I'm at but then you've been at 5 other places between when I saw you last. You're a real road warrior. You're obviously not just a road warrior locally but all over the planet. Anything related to sleep or jet lag hacking? Obviously, most of my audience knows, keep the room cold, wear blue light blocking glasses at night, go outside, ground, eat at the proper arrival time in your destination, et cetera. But anything that's a new technology or new supplement or thing that you've found that really helps support you staying healthy when you travel?

I really like the BrainTap device because wherever I am, I know I'm safe and my fight or flight switch is off and I can relax. So when I'm on a flight, BrainTap is one of my, one of my go-to favorites.

You wear it on a flight?

Yeah. And I think the thing is, is that it's got Bluetooth on it. I think we under— we underrate how stimulated we are and how we need to calm our nervous systems down. And BrainTap is one of those devices that really helps, well, almost hypnotize you out of a wound-up state into a calm state.

And by the way, Tim, real quick, the BrainTap, that's light in your ears and light in your eyes and sound via a visor, a headset that you wear.

Exactly. Yeah, exactly. I've got one down here, funny enough. But, what I like about them is— and my background is psychology and hypnotherapy. And so, what I love about Patrick Porter's work, and I think you've actually got an audio track on there from memory on BrainTap.

I've recorded a few different prayer tracks, scripture tracks. I have a whole Christian section on that BrainTap device for people who want to meditate and enhance their prayer time or their devotion or scripture memorization with it. So, yeah, I recorded some of those several years ago.

Yeah. So I think calming the nervous system is, you know, you can do that through meditation and reflection, but also the Catotifen is fantastic for that as well. And so I tested various different sleeping tablets. So I'd get on a plane, I would sleep and I would be ready for the next time zone with less impact to my circadian rhythm. But I found that actually having the Catotifen has been so fantastic because it just means that I get deeper sleep and my nervous system is more calm wherever I may be. Whereas the sleeping tablets I found that made me groggy for hours and hours and hours afterwards and I it just never felt quite right from them. So, while I'm not a pharmaceutical-first approach, I am very happy utilizing them appropriately.

Ben Greenfield: Tim, obviously, we could talk for hours about all this stuff. And, that's what I like about the show, the Health Optimization Summit, is I show up and it's not dozens but I think now over 100 different things you get to try, people you get to listen to. Obviously, as we discussed, a great speaker lineup. So, folks, if you're listening and you're able to make it to Austin in April, definitely go. And, if you want more kind of random hodgepodge grab bag of biohacking tips, listen to my other podcast with Tim too. I'll put them all at BenGreenfieldLife.com/TexasTim. We're coming to Austin in April. Tim, dude, you're a wealth of knowledge as usual. It's always Always interesting to hear what's going on out there on the cutting edge.

Yeah. Thanks, man.

Yeah. Alright. Well, folks, Tim Gray, there he is again, UK's leading biohacker. I got to live down that title. And then, he's not only UK's leading biohacker, but now we also know that he's fertile and doesn't eat avocados. So, BenGreenfieldLife.com/TexasTim for the shownotes. Ben, thanks so much, man.

Thanks for having me, man.

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