Exclusive Dr. Hyman+ Ask Mark Anything: Vasectomies, Reducing Cravings, And More

Hey, podcast community, Dr. Mark here. I'm so excited to offer you a seven day free trial of my revolutionary new platform called Dr. Hyman Plus. For seven days, you get special access to all the private content included in Dr. Hyman Plus entirely free. It's so easy to sign up. Just go to Apple podcast on your phone and click try free button on the Dr. Hyman's Pharmacy podcast. You'll get exclusive access to ad-free Doctors Pharmacy podcast episodes and functional medicine deep dives where a practitioner dives into topics like heart health, muscle health, insulin resistance and more to help you understand the root cause of specific ailments and walks you through the steps to improve your health today. You'll also get access to all my Ask Mark Anything Q&As where I answer the community's biggest health and wellness questions. Because I'm so sure you're gonna love this platform, I am offering you free access to all of this content for seven days and a teaser of my brand new Ask Mark Anything episode. Head on over to the Doctors Pharmacy Podcast on Apple Podcast and sign up for your free trial. Okay, here we go.

Hi everyone, welcome to an episode of Ask Mark Anything. My name is Hershel Perth and I'm the Dr. Hyman Plus Community Manager and I'm joined by Darcy Gross, one of the producers of the Longevity Roadmap docuseries. Hi, Darcy.

Hi, how are you?

Good. And we are here with our expert, Dr. Mark Hyman. Hi, Dr. Hyman.

Hi, Aarusha. Hi, Darcy.

So we're ready to get started and we've taken all of your questions that you've submitted for this month and we're ready to ask Mark anything. So let's go ahead and get started. All right. So our first question, Mark, is about vasectomies and what do you generally think about those and can they impact a man's long-term health?

I think they're important because, you know, women often carry the burden of contraception. So it's sort of often should be the man who also steps up. And the truth is that Vaginal Sesame are great technology. They're often done as outpatients today. They're done mostly painlessly, even without actually incisions. They call it incisionless mastectomy, which is kind of a trick, a little medical trick. And it doesn't have long-term effects on the health of the man in terms of sexual function, in terms of testicular issues such as cancer or prostate issues or anything like that, it obviously reduces or eliminates the possibility of fertility while you have vasectomy. And the new technologies are allowing vasectomy reversal. So I met a guy the other day actually who was a young man in his 30s, said, look, you know, I had a vasectomy. I don't want the women to carry the burden. And when I want to have kids, I'll reverse it. And I'm like, wow, that's a very enlightening view. so I, I think I'm a big fan of vasectomies. If you are looking for some more permanent contraceptive solution and, you know, don't want to, you know, have your partner be subject to the problems of female contraption, like the pill or IUD or all, all the things that are available, but that are often, you know, not, not side effect free. And I think the beautiful thing about vasectomies, other than the initial, you know, week of discomfort after the surgery is to just, because it's pretty much side effect free.

Awesome. That's a great answer, Mark. I feel like all of our women members are going to be super excited to hear that answer. All right, Darcy, over to you for the next question.

Yeah, for sure. So our next question is just kind of straight to the point and it's what's the best way to reduce cravings? I mean, I think we're all kind of wanting to know.

Honey, you should ask because I wrote an entire book on that. which is the 10-day detox diet all about sugar addiction. And I think when you mean cravings, you know, you know, people aren't craving avocados or broccoli sprouts. They're craving ice cream and cookies and soda and sugar, right? It's not, you're not, you're not craving the broccoli sprouts. So what is the driver of that and why do we get these cravings? Is it just a moral failing? Is it a lack of willpower? Is it you're just weak and, you know, can't deal with yourself? No, not at all. In fact, the science is so clear on this. And I think one of the worst messages or memes in our society is that weight loss is about eating less and exercising more. And it's all about moderation. There's no good or bad calories. And this is a mantra that's been put out by the pharmaceutical industry, the food industry, the government, nutritionists, doctors, The whole idea that all calories are the same is still the prevalent view in medicine, nutrition, and science today. However, that is a completely false assumption because of your hormones and your biochemistry and your brain chemistry that interact with the food you eat. If you look at calories in a vacuum, they're exactly the same. You burn a thousand calories of broccoli, a thousand calories of soda, they release a certain amount of energy. That's what a calorie is. No problem with that. That's the first law of thermodynamics. What people forget is that the law of thermodynamics is about energy being conserved in a system. So calories in, calories out only works in a closed system in a vacuum. The human body is not a closed system. And when you eat, you drive hormonal changes, brain chemistry changes, immune changes, changes in your microbiome. I mean, the amount of changes that happen with everybody is enormous. And so what happens when you eat starch or sugar, which is about 60% of our diet, maybe more in some cases, in fact, the average American eats about a pound of sugar and flour combined a day. which is staggering. I mean, I don't eat that. So some of you out there are doing a lot more. So I think that maybe you, Darzy, I don't know. She's got that look on her face. But the truth is that we have a tremendous amount of understanding the science of how our appetite and cravings and hunger work. So a lot of things regulated. And the most important thing to do is to keep your insulin level low. Let's talk about how to do that. Insulin is the hormone that gets triggered when you eat starch or sugar and it causes this cascade that leads to increased blood sugar, increased insulin, increased hunger, increased fat storage, slower metabolism, all the stuff that you don't want. So when you look at the biology of cravings, the insulin is sort of the key linchpin. How do you keep your insulin low? Well, you basically cut out or eliminate starch and sugar. and you add in more fat and protein. Fat will not raise insulin off. A lot of protein can, but moderate amounts of protein won't really be an issue. So for example, in the morning, most people eat sugar for breakfast, right? They have cereal, which is 75% sugar, bagels, muffins, French toast, pancakes, you know, I mean, frappuccino, waffle cones, you know, like with 750 calories of sugar. It's like the amount of sugar that people have in the morning is staggering. and it is the absolute wrong thing to eat because it will make you hungry and crave all day long. So the key is to shut this off. And in the tendy detox diet, I really create a very simple short-term hack to break the cycle of sugar addiction and starch addiction, because it could be eating, you know, muffins or bagels or pasta, but it's still the same. Your body doesn't know the difference below your neck, you know, a bowl of pasta, a bowl of sugar. It's the same. A slice of whole wheat bread, a bowl of sugar, same. Or probably the bread's worse, actually. It has a higher glycemic index than sugar. So I think the key is to turn off. And the best way to do that is you start, you have to go cold turkey. You can't like, oh, I'm just gonna have one line of Coke or I'm just gonna have one little bit of heroin or I'm just gonna have like, I'm gonna have like five cigarettes. It doesn't really work like that. You have to kind of go cold turkey. And the beetle thing is that with the science we have around the 10-day detox, we can actually stop those cravings. Then a day or so, people start to feel better. And the key is one, cut out the sugar and processed food to start the day with protein and fat. So I have a protein fat shake that I recommended, but essentially it's nuts and seeds. It can put MCT oil in there, avocados, whatever you want, a little bit of berries, not too much. And basically the idea is to create a very protein and fat Rich morning breakfast. And it could be eggs and avocados and olive oil. It can be a smoothie, whatever, whatever you think. But you'd be careful with smoothies are really, really high in sugar. The second thing is fiber. Fiber is so key. So I often put people on we'll call PGX or PolyGlycopleX, which is a very highly absorbable fiber that soaks in a lot of water. It's comes from cognac root from, from actually from Japan. They use it a lot. They make Shirataki noodles, which are these miracle noodles you can get now that have no calories and no carbs and all they are is fiber. And it makes your poops really big and fluffy. So that's kind of a side benefit. So getting the fiber in even before you eat is key. So I have people take the powder. I mean, even Metamucil works, by the way, if you just take a glass of Metamucil before you eat, it'll expand, fill up your tummy, you can use flax seeds, you can use chia seeds, there's all sorts of options. So fiber is really key. And then, and then you're making sure you get enough fat. So the antidote to cravings is fat. Um, and, and so olive oil, avocados, nuts and seeds, or you can get MCT oil. I often use that. That's really important and good quality protein, whether it's, you know, grass-fed, meats or organic chicken or pasteurized chickens or, you know, plant proteins, you really need to get the right amount of protein. So I often, well, people are really stuck. I'll get them off all starch. That's beans, grains, obviously sugar, dairy, because dairy can raise insulin quite a bit. And there's a lot, there's a lot of hormones in dairy that are quite metabolically problematic. Um, so I, I just recommend basically that. And you eat, you know, breakfast, lunch and dinner. And then also exercise plays a huge role because that regulates your hormones and makes you more insulin sensitive. Sleep is another huge one around Cravings. I used to work in the ER, and I know that you know, at two in the morning, i'd be like, ah, where can I get my fix? Ah, you know, and i'd go to mcdonald's, no place open. I'd get, like, an apple strudel thing or something. Or big french fries. It was back in the day before I was dr. Hyman. I was working in the er, just trying to stay alive. And. And so I. I really, you know, look at the science around the sleep thing. It's fascinating. If you take healthy young college males and you deprive them of a couple hours of sleep at night, they're going to eat more, they're going to crave more, they're going to want more. and they eat more carbs than sugar. So it's really quite striking. So the key is really using science, not willpower, to actually regulate your biology, to keep your hormones and brain chemistry even so you can actually quit the sugar. And then after 10 days and you do the 10-day reset or 10-day detox, we've got different programs online, you actually can kind of break that cycle. And I had a patient come to, not a patient, but someone come to one workshop I did years ago. and she was like, look, Dr. Hyman, I've been addicted to sugar my whole life. I'm never gonna get off this. I'm gonna, I go crazy. It's hard. I don't know. So I said, look, fine, that's fine. Just, just do the program. So we had shakes. We had, you know, bone. We had vegetable and bone broth. You know, we had regular good meals. We, we did all kinds of stuff for, like, a day. And she kept the second, second day. She's like, I don't know what happened, Dr. Hyman. All my sugar cravings are gone.

It's a miracle. I said, no, it's not a miracle. It's just science.

So anyway, that's my spiel on cravings. I went a little overboard, but whatever.

Yeah, no, I love it. That that was an amazing answer. And I think there's so much hope there because so many people just feel like they're, like they're just not strong enough or not, you know, like, I don't have enough willpower, Etc. But there's just so much hope to just know that, like, there's so much that is in our control in that. You know, cravings are something that we can, there's just so much that we can do. So thank you for going overboard on that answer. That was great.

I mean, listen, I literally could talk for about six hours on that subject.

Hey, listen, we are all here and we would listen to you for six hours on that.

Oh, no, I would be bored.

But yeah, awesome. Well, thank you so much, Dr. Hyman, and over to Hershel.

All right, so our next question is about subhairy dermatitis. I hope I pronounced that right.

Right?

So what is that and what is the best way to treat that?

Well, doctors like to give common problems, complex and complicated names like seborrheic dermatitis, otherwise known as dandruff. So dandruff is a big problem and what's the cause of dandruff? And typically in medicine, I'm just going to give my dermatology spiel. Dermatologists, work from the outside in. Functional medicine works from the inside out. Skin problems usually don't start on the skin. They start inside, and usually they start in the gut and they start with the immune system, and they start with nutritional deficiencies, and they sort all sorts of things that we can actually modify. In fact, in functional medicine, we have a whole nutrition physical exam that we do to identify the imbalances in nutrition based on the clinical signs that you can look at on someone's body. So, for example, if someone has, you know, dry, flaky skin, like our sebaceous or eczema dermatitis, I might think, oh, maybe they have Omega-3 deficiency, maybe they have zinc deficiency, and they might have food sensitivities, they might have allergies. But also with dandruff is a big one is yeast and fungus. It's often a fungus infection. And the question is, why do people get fungal yeast infections? Well, it kind of leans back to our last conversation about craving because sugar and starch cause the basically fertilization of the yeast in your gut. so basically you're not only eating for you, you're eating for all the critters that live inside you. And those critters vary depending on what you feed them. So if you're fertilizing the wrong things and you're not feeding the good ones, for example, the good bugs like healthy food. They like all the polyphenols in plant foods. They like the colorful vegetables. And I mean, for example, pomegranate, cranberry, green tea, all this stuff is so, so important for fertilizing the healthy bugs. However, you eat starch and sugar, no fiber, you're gonna get a pathogenic bugs. like yeast. And so this is not often a, a local problem in the head. It's actually a systemic problem. So I really recommend people look at their diet, number one, to get rid of starch and sugar, get rid of processed food, look at your omega-3 fatty acid intake, make sure you have adequate levels of zinc, vitamin A, which are important for skin health. And also eating primrose oil can also be helpful, or which is an omega-6 anti-inflammatory oil. And then I, and then I recommend looking at diet, you know, is there food sensitivities that can happen? Is a dairy is a big one. Dairy is a huge one that can cause eczema and sort of different issues around the skin and inflammation. And then lastly, we look at fungal overgrowth. So we might do other diagnostic tests, but you know, even conventional medicine actually gets that it's fungal because the prescription for it is a topical shampoo called ketoconazole, which is a antifungal drug. So it's not like regular medicine doesn't know this. It's just that they don't, they don't actually think about, oh, well, why is there yeast? Not like, oh, there's yeast, let me kill it. No, no. Why is there yeast? Functional medicine is medicine. Why? Regular medicine is medicine. What dermatology goes, oh, what's wrong with your skin? Why is it flaky and itchy and, and, and, and all, all white? Well, you have seborrheic dermatitis. No, that's the name of having your scalp being itchy and you're like, it's flaky and white, right? It's not the God, so. we find out the cause. And again, it could be food sensitivities, but most likely it's fungal. And so we really work on the gut. We use an elimination diet, getting a starch and sugar, and we'll put people on probiotics, prebiotics, and we'll get people off and on omega-3 fats and in any fungal can be herbal antifungals like oregano, berberine. There's other ones we can use, tannic acid. There's a whole bunch of stuff we use and even prescription antifungals like diflu can, ketoconazole is a little harsh on the liver, but you can use it topically as skin. but if you just do it the outside in, you're not going to fix the problem.

It's going to come back.

So the other thing, I mean, the other thing about dandruff is that it's, it's really a sign of an imbalance in your body of inflammation and immune dysregulation and what's really going on. So you really want to get after it. It's not just a cosmetic issue with little flaky skin on your, on flakes on your shirt and in your black tuxedo. It looks bad. You got to figure out what's causing it. And alcohol will do it. Also, certain drugs will do it.

Like, instead of the birth control pill, steroids, antibiotics.

All that stuff will make it worse.

Well, I hope you enjoyed that teaser of exclusive content that you get every single month with Dr. Hyman Plus. If you want to listen to the full episode and get access to ad-free podcast episodes, plus Ask Mark Anything episodes, plus monthly functional deep dive episodes, I.

Guess that's why we call it Dr.

Hyman Plus, then head on over to the Doctor's Pharmacy on Apple Podcast and sign up for for your seven day free trial.

Hi everyone, just a reminder that this.

Podcast is for educational purposes only. This podcast is not a substitute for professional care by a doctor or other qualified medical professional. This podcast is provided on the understanding that it does not constitute medical or other professional advice or services. If you're looking for help in your journey, seek out a qualified medical practitioner. If you're looking for a functional medicine practitioner, you can visit ifm.org and search their find a practitioner database. It's important that you have someone in your corner who's trained, who's a licensed healthcare practitioner, and can help you make changes, especially when it comes to your health.