Dietitian Answers Your Inflammation Questions

Chronic inflammation can sometimes start brewing on its own because of the things that you're exposing it to on a day-to-day basis. So it's not always that it goes from acute to chronic. Sometimes it may just always be chronic because it's these things that the body perceives to be a threat that it is responding to. And then over time, it just continues to brew and brew that then manifests in a number of different symptoms. Knowing your omega-3 index is super important for understanding your inflammation. It's one of the strongest predictors from a nutrient standpoint of higher risk of inflammation. Being able to see a noticeable increase in their omega-3 fatty acid index is such a powerful example of using food as medicine. Insulin resistance increases our risk of inflammation, and inflammation then can make us more insulin resistant and make that a vicious cycle. And then it can also increase our risk of type 2 diabetes, of heart disease, of Alzheimer's disease, and cancer. When it comes to the fact that your fasting insulin and A1C are trending upward, that means that you're going to have more glucose spikes throughout the And every time that your glucose is spiking, you're releasing inflammatory cytokines. Inflammatory cytokines is that activation of inflammation. Today on the Being Brigid Show, we are doing an Ask Brigid series where I'm answering all of your questions on inflammation. So we're going to dive into the questions that you've submitted so that I can help you better understand what inflammation is, how you can improve it, how you can test for it, and other questions that were submitted. So let's start out with question number 1, which is, how can you test for inflammation? Now, there's a number of ways that you can do this, but the most effective ways are number 1, hs-CRP. This is high-sensitivity C-reactive protein, which can tell you whether you have underlying chronic inflammation. Anything greater than 1 will indicate that you are at risk of inflammation, which can increase risk of cardiovascular disease, which can increase risk of autoimmune disease, and a number of other things that are happening. But a lot of times, chronic Yeah. And so chronic inflammation is the heart of what happens in many different areas of the body. So testing this with an hs-CRP is the number one place that you can start. Number 2 is that you can look at a lab called homocysteine. Homocysteine is also a marker of inflammation that then can impact cardiovascular health and others. And having a healthy level of homocysteine can help to keep inflammation levels lower and also ensure that you aren't nutrient deficient in certain Nutrients that can impact homocysteine, like your folate and vitamin B12. Sometimes deficiencies in folate and vitamin B12 can then increase the elevation in homocysteine. And once a person has adequate levels of folate and vitamin B12, that level can naturally decrease. There's many other things that impact homocysteine, but that is another marker. So hs-CRP, number 1. Number 2, homocysteine. And number 3 would be omega-3 fatty acids. Knowing your omega-3 index is super important for understanding your inflammation. It's one of the strongest predictors from a nutrient standpoint of higher risk of inflammation. And most women that we work with that come into our community that are knowledgeable about inflammation still do not know what their blood levels show for their omega-3 level. So you wanna look at an omega-3 index and target an 8 to 12% for being in that therapeutic reference range. It is crazy because I have run thousands of these tests over the last 12 years of being in practice, and I literally started running this test in 2014. And being able to see a person change their diet and then see a noticeable increase in their omega-3 fatty acid index is such a powerful Example of using food as medicine, changing your— your diet, increasing maybe supplements for omega-3s if you end up being low, and then seeing in a very quick period of time how you can see a change in your fatty acid composition of your omega-3 fats. It's— it's crazy. So omega-3 fatty acids, and then if you can also look at your omega-6, that can be helpful too. And then you have a ratio of your omega-6s to omega-3s. When you have above a 4 to 1 ratio of your omega-6 to omega-3s, that's what puts us at a greater risk of underlying inflammation. So hs-CRP, homocysteine, omega-3s, omega-6s, and vitamin D would be another one because vitamin D impacts our immune system to such a great length and also our underlying inflammation, our metabolic health, so many other markers. Aiming for a vitamin D that's above 60, ideally a 60 to 80, would be that therapeutic reference range. So vitamin D would be number 5 for some of the ways that you can test for inflammation. Now, there's a few others, like fasting insulin can inadvertently indicate risk of inflammation because when you have more insulin resistance, it increases your risk of underlying inflammation. But the 5 more direct indicators of your risk of inflammation would be those 5 that I just mentioned. In addition to, you know, if you wanted to go deeper, those 5 that I mentioned, you can get through a conventional doctor out of a regular hospital if your doctor is willing to put those orders in. If they are not, then you can get that from Quest Diagnostics. You could walk into a Quest or go online and order those essentially for yourself. They have clinicians that will order them for you, and then you just pay the money out of pocket to get those levels tested. Those 5 are all available in that way. Now, the Other additional ways that we do test for inflammation when we're working more one-on-one with clients is through an organic acids test. An organic acids test, there's two markers that actually look at deeper levels of cellular inflammation, which is your lipid peroxides and your 8-OH-DG, which stands for 8-hydroxydeoxyguanosine. So those two markers look at deeper levels. Sometimes we'll have people come in where they have normal levels of hs-CRP, but they have high lipid peroxides. Or high 8-OH-DG, which can indicate inflammation that's happening on the cellular level. So to recap, 5 ways that you can test inflammation are: 1, hs-CRP; number 2, homocysteine; number 3, omega-3 fatty acid index; number 4, omega-6s if that's available; and number 5, your vitamin D. If you're looking deeper at cellular markers of this, you can look at an organic acids test that tells you your lipid peroxides and your 8-OH-DG. If you're doing any testing, I would absolutely recommend working with a practitioner to help you better understand that data so that then you can personalize your interventions based on your outcomes. Okay, the next question came from Megan. I pulled our TBC members for these questions, so members of the Bean Collective asked me these questions and I'm going through those exact questions. This is an example of what I do in our monthly Q&A calls in the Bean Collective membership where I go through and answer Basically like rapid-fire, every person's questions that they have as it relates to their own health or things that they're curious about or things that they've read about. Okay, so Megan asked, how do we get teenagers to understand the concept of inflammation? My son has tested positive for gluten and dairy allergies and still does not buy in. Can you explain inflammation and what it does so that we can get the entire family on board? When it comes to helping your kids understand inflammation, I think that Of course, explaining it in a very easy-to-understand way is important, but then also helping them understand how much inflammation impacts every single area of the body and being able to help them prioritize the areas that they care the most about. So we know that chronic inflammation increases our risk of things like Alzheimer's disease, type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and every chronic disease that then can lead to death. And a teenager may not care as much about that. So when it comes to the way that you can explain it, you can say inflammation is something that's happening underneath the surface where your body starts to essentially fight itself, where it's increasing the, the antibody production and is leading to the manifestation of a number of symptoms. Now, this can be everything from increasing acne to congestion to asthma risk to GI issues and symptoms to migraines and headaches. To fatigue and brain fog. It absolutely— inflammation manifests in the brain. And so picking the things that your child cares the most about or may be struggling with to help them understand this could be inflammation that's happening underneath the surface. There's a difference between gluten sensitivity and dairy sensitivity and actual allergies. So if they have a true gluten and dairy allergy, that would mean that they have celiac disease and they also have a dairy allergy, then that would mean that they have to avoid those foods because of them being allergies in order for them to be able to combat the inflammation that's happening. For people that have celiac disease, this can be life-altering. So if that has not been shared with them and they have allergies to both things, then I would even have their doctor try to explain why every single person that's diagnosed with celiac disease is recommended to avoid these foods in order to decrease the horrible GI symptoms and the brain fog and the insomnia and all these other crippling often symptoms that go alongside celiac disease. Now, it's possible that your son tested positive for a gluten and dairy sensitivity, which is different than an allergy. And if that's the case, then oftentimes they still may have symptoms, but they're just not gonna be as severe and life-altering. With food sensitivities, it's usually more of a delayed effect. And looking at the scale of how severe they are is also important in order to be able to say like, How much they really need to avoid them. Sometimes we'll see people get food sensitivity testing done by functional medicine doctors and then they say, never eat these foods again, but it's just like a small increase, like a 0.1 that may not necessarily warrant being fully gluten-free and dairy-free forever. Let me speak from my own personal experience because I, when I was 15 years old, was diagnosed with a neurological autoimmune disease, narcolepsy with cataplexies. I was having about 30 mini seizures per day. And my parents took me to a functional medicine doctor. I hated every single second of it. I said, we just need to listen to the real doctors and not these functional medicine doctors. And you guys aren't doctors. Meaning my parents. And I hated every second of it. My parents said, like, let us just try this so that we can see if this makes a difference. And then my parents, especially my mom, made every single meal for me that was gluten-free, dairy-free, and a number of other foods that I had removed at that time. Wow. Based on food sensitivity testing. I had a horribly leaky gut. Um, I had severe nutrient deficiencies. And so I said, okay, fine. I'll like, I'll do this. Even though actually I'm not even sure if I had a say. Um, but it was like they were making every food and I hated every single second of it. And I did not like them for having me do it. But it turned out to be one of the best things that ever happened to me because in a very short period of time, like I remember the first time that we were driving home from school. Mm-hmm. And I stayed awake for the entire car ride. I had, with narcolepsy, you can't control when you fall asleep or stay awake. And so I was falling asleep literally every single second of every day. I had gone years without watching a movie or having social engagements that I wasn't just always falling asleep for. At football games, I would have to fall asleep in the bleachers with my friend's parents. I almost died in my friend's, or not died, but I almost drowned in my friend's pool when I was having a cataplexy. It was very much impacting the quality of my life. And I remember My dad had picked me up from school one day and I had made it home without falling asleep in the car. And that was when I was like, whoa, maybe this is actually working. And I became a little less mean about it, um, to my parents where I was like, this is really insane that I've stayed awake for this entire car ride for the first time in a few years. And so I think that they also need to experience the benefits for themselves. Now, your teenager may not be in the place that I was in where it was so life-altering that, you know, we needed to figure out something that, that could be done. And I think that that then has to, depending on how old they are as a teenager and how severe it is, that that has to maybe also come from them. So you could think of it as like, okay, this is something that we're gonna do together, and I'd like for you to just test this for the next 4 weeks to see if you notice enough of a difference for this, for us to continue working in this direction. Um, or if, if he's not experiencing, he or she isn't experiencing Oh yeah. He, his son, um, enough symptoms, then it may be one of those things that you have to, you know, kind of like wait for him to have these realizations. And I know that as a parent, that can be very challenging. Not that I personally have experience with that, but I do have a number of clients that have had to kind of step back and, and let their kids make the choices and then eventually come back to like, oh my gosh, I really feel so bad. And maybe I do need to listen to these things that you're saying. Because I have seen instances where, you know, it can create an eating disorder if you're like being too obsessive about it or too restrictive. And so I wish that I had a good answer for how to navigate that in the perfect scenario, but I think that it's so person and family dependent. So those, that's my personal experience. And I thank God every day that that was my experience and that my parents fought as hard as they did for us really going against the grain. Because at the time, you know, these products, there wasn't a gluten-free section. Yeah. And I had to go to the gluten-free section at the grocery store. We had to call every single food company that I ever consumed because at that time, food companies didn't have ingredient lists on websites. There was no gluten-free certified symbol. There was no gluten-free section of grocery stores. And it was super, super hard. But I am like so grateful that my parents essentially forced me into that 4 weeks or 6 weeks because that was how I then was able to realize it for myself. And that may not be everyone's— that may not be the route that's best for everyone, but was the route that was best for me. Okay, next question came from Suzanne. At what point does a person's inflammation shift from necessary for healing to chronic and unmitigated? Do lab results like CRP generally indicate such a shift? So this is a great question because inflammation is not all bad inflammation. There is good inflammation when you have a wound or when you get injured. Inflammation is there to help you Not bleed to death, to help your immune defense protect itself and to support the body. So that is an important part of healing. And then there's a point at which acute inflammation, which is the kind that's designed to help to support us, then goes down this path of chronic inflammation where what should be switching off, meaning the inflammation should be switching off, does not shift off and it continues and it develops into chronic inflammation. So chronic inflammation can sometimes start brewing on its own outside of something like an injury or something along those lines because of the things that you're exposing it to on a day-to-day basis, like your food, like being sedentary, like your air pollution, like other things that you may be exposed to on a regular basis that your body views as a threat that's creating more of this inflammatory cascade. So it's not always that it goes from acute to chronic. Sometimes it may just always be chronic because it's these things that the body perceives to be a threat that it is responding to. And then over time, it just continues to brew and brew, that then manifests in a number of different symptoms. The best way to know this is, one, by tracking symptoms, because there's a number of different symptoms that are tied to inflammation, like fatigue, brain fog, GI issues, joint pain, period pain, migraines, and headaches can also be common. Hot flashes are another one. So tracking symptoms that are related to inflammation, there's more than 100 symptoms actually that can be tied to inflammation in addition to, as you're alluding to, tracking your labs. So CRP, or I prefer hs-CRP over CRP because hs-CRP means that it's highly sensitive C-reactive protein, can indicate a shift that your inflammation— you have higher levels of chronic inflammation. When it gets to be above 1, that's what it is indicating. Now, you can— there are scenarios where you have some kind of an infection or something like that that will drive your C-reactive protein up, and that's where it becomes harder to actually differentiate. Where is the reason that you have this extremely high level because of something that— because you're just sick right now, or is it because of something that's happening chronically? So having that trend over time will help to distinguish, being able to track that lab over time. And then the other thing is that CRP or hs-CRP is not selective. It doesn't tell you where the inflammation is happening. It's not specific enough to really say anything other than the fact that there's chronic inflammation that's happening underneath the surface. But hs-CRP is a great way to, to track that trend in addition to looking at your symptoms. I'm a big advocate— we often will have a 7-day food symptom journal, which is available in our membership, and the 7-day food symptom journal can help you track these symptoms in conjunction with your labs in order for you to be able to understand whether you're having an Okay. Kimberly asked something very similar. How do I know if I have inflammation? Will my GP do a blood test for it, or do I need to go somewhere else? So those markers that I asked— that I told you about, specifically hs-CRP and homocysteine and vitamin D, are the 3 that your GP would have the easiest access to be able to order. Now, But it depends on whether they feel comfortable ordering them, like if they are used to interpreting them and those kinds of things, and then you may get pushback. Omega-3 index should also be available in a traditional hospital. It was when I worked in the hospital setting, but some people may be less familiar with ordering it. And then omega-6s, actually, like in the healthcare system that I worked in, you could test an omega-6 to omega-3 ratio using the traditional, you know, like any doctor has access to these labs through your hospital system. Now, whether insurance will cover something like an omega-6 to an omega-3 ratio is another story because sometimes insurance will say that you aren't sick enough in order to run this test in order for it to be covered. In those instances, that's where running some of these on your own can be helpful even though it means paying out of pocket. It can avoid the circumstance where your doctor orders a test Like an omega-6 to omega-3 ratio, your insurance company says you're not sick enough in order for us to care about these numbers. So then they hit you with their cost of that lab and then you have to pay it. Now, when you remove insurance companies, it means that you remove a lot of times the cost that is elevated. It's increased when insurance is reimbursing. So when you pay out of pocket, for instance, like a fasting insulin costs about $5 if you pay for it out of pocket. If you have your doctor order it and then you, you aren't qualified because, you know, insurance only cares about being reactive in the way that they cover things instead of being proactive and actually preventing disease before it starts and giving you access to that information about your body, then it will be more expensive than $5. So for instance, you can order an omega-3 test. We use OmegaQuant. That's a company that you can do a blood prick test. They look at your omega-3s and they look at your omega-6 to 3 ratio in addition to a few other fatty acid markers. But outside of that, a vitamin D, a hs-CRP, and homocysteine are available to a GP. The next question that Kimberly asked is, how often should I do that blood work? And I would say at least yearly. If you're working to improve certain markers, then I would recommend every 6 months. And then her third question is, what are the top 2 most meaningful things that I can do to reduce inflammation? So I just interviewed Dr. David Perlmutter. The episode just came out last week, and he talks about how inflammation And insulin resistance are 2 of the primary underlying mechanisms that increase our risk of brain diseases such as Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease in the neurodegenerative space, but then also things like depression and anxiety because they're manifesting as inflammation in the brain, and that can lead to a host of different symptoms for people. Now, in the discussion that I had with him, he highlighted the power of nutrition and exercise as 2 of the most important. Eating one, an anti-inflammatory blood sugar balanced diet, which is for every guest that comes on the show what is highlighted as one of the most important things. This has been my focus from a nutrition lens for the last 10+ years because of how powerful it can be in addressing so many underlying things that are happening. So when I say anti-inflammatory and blood sugar balanced, it means that you're not incorporating a lot of foods that are spiking your blood sugar. That you're combining your proteins, fats, and fiber to help to decrease that blood sugar effect, that you're avoiding quote unquote healthy foods that may actually trigger increases in glucose, like a combination of beans and rice or rice cake and nut butter or rice cake and hummus and other foods that people think are quote unquote healthy that may really increase your blood sugar substantially. And then from an anti-inflammatory lens, Adding those polyphenol diversity. So having a variety of your vegetables, your fruits, your nuts, your seeds, and other things that we really focus on in the Bean Collective meal planning to be able to set you up with saving you 2 to 3 hours per week without having to put together your own meal plan in a way that hits all of these targets. So number one, nutrition is so important for decreasing inflammation and focusing mostly on whole foods. We know Whole foods have thousands of phytonutrients, polyphenols, and micronutrients that have what's called immune-regulating properties, and they can literally decrease inflammation-mediated conditions. So this can be foods like your berries, your cabbage, your bell peppers. They can literally help to modulate inflammation, and it's one of the most underdiscussed areas of nutrition. So focusing on that as number one, and then number two is exercise. So exercise meaning that you're strength training 3 to 5 days per week in addition to doing cardio and moving your body. The research is so strong that exercise helps to combat inflammation. And even in Dr. Perlmutter's book that I just interviewed him on last week, he had said that exercise contributes to improvements in our underlying brain mechanism by doing several things. One, that it's anti-inflammatory, that regular physical activity helps to take you from a pro-inflammatory state to an anti-inflammatory one, and decreasing the cytokine release that be pro-inflammatory. 2, enhances your neuroprotection to decrease and remove damaged neurons and debris. And that 3, it also improves your synaptic plasticity— the plasticity, the ability of synapses to strengthen or weaken over time— and then also enhance neurogenesis. So that is from a brain health standpoint, the way that that's targeting the brain through these mechanisms that are really targeting underlying inflammation. So those would be my 2 that are the most important to focus on. And then beyond that, you have other layers like, are you sleeping enough at night? Are you focusing on stress reduction? Are you taking time for joy and connection and other things in your life? And then outside factors like, one, is your blood sugar spiking all the time? Being able to focus on that through a fasting insulin, fasting glucose, and maybe even a continuous glucose monitor. Do you have a water filter that's helping to decrease environmental exposures in the water that you're drinking every single day? Are you using an air filter to help to decrease the exposure that you're getting in your air to other things that can increase inflammation? And so that goes beyond those 2, but the 2 that you want to start with is a blood sugar balanced anti-inflammatory diet. That is where the research is the strongest. And not just doing that for 2 weeks and then falling off track, but actually figuring out how you can create a system that changes how you're eating on a daily basis. Week after week after week, which is of course what we do in the Being Collective membership. And then second, the exercise piece, adding the strength training, adding the cardio in order to help to offset that inflammatory response. Orly asked, how do you know if you have lowered your inflammation? And I think I already answered that. Is one, tracking your symptoms over time, and 2, looking at your lab values. Some of the lab values that I already had talked about that can help to understand if what you're doing is moving the needle. But I, I really think that so much of it starts with symptom improvements that people report. Oh my gosh, I can finally wear my wedding ring because my fingers aren't as swollen. Or, oh my gosh, I can get up off the floor without having that joint pain. You wanna listen to your body. Our body is so intelligent, and when we start to move things in the right direction, you'll see a change in how you're feeling. Even earlier today, I was leading a coaching call for the Being Collective, and a woman had said that she is going into week 2 of the program into our membership, and that she is feeling better, that she's noticing less joint pain, but that she hasn't noticed any weight loss yet. And so, of course, this can feel discouraging, but it's a great sign that your body is moving in the right direction. And sometimes we need to improve our inflammatory response, improve insulin resistance, improve our gut health. Before our metabolism is in a place that you're actually then also losing weight. And oftentimes it takes more than just 1 week of following a plan in order for you to continuously see improvements. Now, in the Blood Sugar Reset, that's just a 7-day program that we run, and people report very quickly seeing significant symptom improvements, but that isn't always the case. So the other thing that I would highly recommend is instead of just focusing on the number on the scale, if you're someone like the woman that had said that she's doing you know, our program but isn't losing weight yet, that you look at your waist circumference because this is the first place that we see people notice a change in their body composition. And your waist circumference actually indicates your risk of underlying inflammation because the more visceral fat that we store, the more belly fat that we carry, the greater the risk of inflammation. So if you're noticing changes that are happening in your waist circumference by making changes in your lifestyle, this is a very powerful sign that your body is moving in the right direction and it may not present first on the scale. It's also important to look at a bioimpedance analysis, looking at the difference between your muscle and your fat, because muscle does weigh more than fat. So if you're gaining muscle and you are losing fat, you may not see a change on the scale. You— 2 people could be 175 pounds. One person has 35% body fat. The other has 25% body fat. They both have 2 different metabolic profiles. And unless you know your percent fat and your percent muscle, you're looking at the number on the scale very surface level. That isn't a true comprehensive measurement of the success and progress that you're making. Okay. Presley says, got my labs back and I have hemoglobin A1C and fasting glucose trending upward, and it says I'm at risk for diabetes. Also have quite high cortisol and other labs increasing in a bad way. How does inflammation play into this, and what are ways I can reduce inflammation and bring these labs down to an optimal range Without the medications my doctor will most likely try to prescribe? Okay, so one is thinking about the intersection between hemoglobin A1C and fasting insulin and then inflammation. So insulin resistance increases our risk of inflammation, and inflammation then can make us more insulin resistant and make that a vicious cycle. And then it can also increase our risk of type 2 diabetes, of heart disease, of Alzheimer's disease, and cancer. When it comes to the fact that your fasting insulin and A1C are trending upward, that means that you're going to have more glucose spikes throughout the day. Likely that's what's happening underneath the surface. And every time that your glucose is spiking, you're releasing inflammatory cytokines. Inflammatory cytokines is that activation of inflammation. And Dr. Tim Spector, who I interviewed in March, explained that this is exactly what they see in their research. And it's not to scare you. It's just to help you understand the control that you have when you're eating a blood sugar balanced diet. When you switch from having a bowl of overnight oats that are going to have 60 grams of carbs and not enough protein and potentially even additional sources of sugar from fruit and other things— not that fruit sugar is bad, but when it's combined in that full meal, it's going to increase your blood sugar spike, which will trigger inflammation. And switching that to having maybe a 4th of a cup of overnight oats Oats with then chia seeds mixed with some cashew butter and some protein powder that are giving you more of that fiber, healthy fat, and protein can make a huge difference in changing your hemoglobin A1C and fasting glucose levels. There's someone from our community who had joined the Bean Collective in January and said that in a very short period of time that she cut her inflammation levels in half and that her glucose levels substantially decreased, and she lost 16.8 pounds after not being able to lose weight for a very long time. So this is absolutely possible to reverse. I have seen it over and over and over again in the work that I have done in working with women and to— and really getting themselves back on track when it comes to the nutrition. The nutrition alone, even if you can't start with strength training and doing other, you know, intense exercise, the nutrition alone plus walking and making sure that you're sleeping enough can lead to drastic changes in your labs in a 3 to 6 month period of time. It does not take a long time. Now, if your labs— if you're in the type 2 diabetes range, it could take up to 2 years to reverse your type 2 diabetes depending on how much beta cell dysfunction is happening underneath the surface. And everyone is different, but this is absolutely something that you can control, and inflammation is absolutely at the heart of what is happening. There's an immense interconnection between inflammation, insulin resistance, and gut microbiome changes. That impact your hormones, that impact your metabolic health, and so many other things that we see over time. The research shows that chronic inflammation is a major driver of hormonal issues, fatigue, brain fog, weight loss resistance, joint pain, period pain, GI issues, hot flashes, and so much more. So being able to get this going in the right direction will also lead to likely many of those symptom improvements. So I would have a discussion with your doctor to say, is it possible for me to have the next 6 months to really dial in my nutrition, my sleep, and, and my walking. And if you're already walking, then my strength training, so that you're just taking it step by step in order for us to see if this is moving the needle enough before you actually prescribe those medications. And many physicians are very much willing to do that when they can see that the patient that they're working with is serious about making those changes to their health. Okay. And then Jen asked, my hs-CRP is 0.5. Are there other markers that might indicate inflammation in the body that I need to consider for optimal health? Which I think I shared, and I would actually add your waist circumference on top of the labs that I had already shared. And then the second question that Jen had was: If I do consume wine on occasion, does alcohol increase inflammation triggers? And if so, how long to detox or return to baseline? So yes, alcohol has been shown to increase our production of lipopolysaccharides, also called LPS for short, that can increase the changes that happen to the gut-brain barrier, which mean that when a person consumes alcohol, that they find higher levels of LPS in the bloodstream. And this can happen after just a few drinks, and it takes a few days for this to return back to baseline. I'm actually not sure the exact time, but it does take a little bit of time for it to return to baseline. So you want to keep alcohol to a minimum. I'm— I do believe that if you can decrease alcohol fully, that that is even better. But if you're a person that's trying to have alcohol 1, maybe 2 times per week, the less frequent the better. And maybe you have it like 2 to 4 times per month where it's not even once a week, it's once every other week. Now, all of that will depend on where you're starting from. Are you having alcohol 3 times a week or 4 times a week? Because if so, then the focus should really be on realistic steps to get you down instead of having an unrealistic expectation that you're just never gonna have alcohol again in your life. Now, for some people, going cold turkey for 30 days, like having a month, a dry January or a dry August, can help them improve those habits that they have then after that time period. But I would start with having a realistic goal that you're working towards, considering something like a dry August, dry September, dry October, in order for you to kind of like reset if that's something that you're working towards. So yes, alcohol does increase inflammation through a number of different mechanisms, and it does take a few days for that to return. To baseline. Again, I'm not sure on the exact number of days, but it does take a little bit of time, meaning that the less frequent you're consuming alcohol, the better. Okay, I think we got to all the questions. We got to Lauren, Jen, Presley, Orly, Kim, Megan, and Susan— or Suzanne— from the Being Collective. Thank you all for submitting your questions on inflammation. Thank you for being here for the Being Bridget Show. If this show has been helpful for you, if you can leave a review A comment, share it with a friend. That would mean the absolute world to me. Thank you for being here and being part of the Being Brigid Show, and I'll see you next time.