“It’s Just Who I Am” Is a Lie: What Your DNA Really Says About You with Dr. Tyler Panzner

Welcome back to Everyday Ancestral. I'm your host, James Barry. I'm really excited to share this next guest. He firmly believes that by aligning your habits with your genes, not only can you feel your best every day, but you can also lower your risk for chronic diseases in the long run. Dr. Tyler Panzner is a PhD scientist with a deep background In pharmacology, cancer, neuroscience, and inflammation research. His passion for how different substances affect the body has been lifelong, but about 7 years ago, he found his true calling in genetics and personalized medicine. So if you're one of those people listening to all the influencers out there telling you to do this or don't do that, guess what? It's time to buckle up because here comes Dr. Tyler Panzner telling you why it's not just a blanket statement, but you gotta be specific to you. Enjoy genetics. It's so funny. I always think about my mom who will say like, oh, this is just who I am. This is part of my genes, you know? And it's sometimes it felt like such a cop-out, like where's your choice in this?

Yeah.

But you, you have a very specific viewpoint on, on genes. So let's just go right into it. Why focused on genes?

I'll be the first to say as a genetic specialist, Genetics are not everything, right? I think a big issue in today's space is you have all these absolutist people saying, you know, my way's the only way, or always eat this, or never eat that, or everyone needs this supplement. If you guys listening, anyone that talks in absolutes, always or never, does not understand the complexity of the human body, and they're probably trying to sell you something. You know, I think by, by and large, There are some more general type things like, you know, I know you have Pluck, you know, I think organ meats, organ meats or like magnesium. These are relatively safe things that, you know, I think people can dabble with and experiment with to see how they feel. But by and large, it's very absolutist with people. And I'm the guy to help add that level of nuance. It's so much contradictory health information. People are so overwhelmed. And I'm the guy to help give you the nuance of what should you or shouldn't you be listening to based on your unique genetics. Genetics aren't a cop-out for everything, right? And it's funny when you mentioned your mother, I have a genetic mutation that means I break down adrenaline and dopamine a lot slower than most people. So it makes me very type A, very sensitive guy. You know, I, I throw my headphones in or I even think of my favorite song, I could give myself goosebumps, right? High dopamine guy, but. Also very prone to being startled. Like, I can't watch scary movies. It's not the gore or the ment— it's the jumpiness, right? Like the fight or flight goes, oh, I'm ready to like throw hands with the TV screen. Right. And it's funny, like I used to always say a lot how, oh, I'm overwhelmed. That's who I am. And I think that's true to some extent, but I don't think it's a universal cop-out. Right. Like it'll be, I sense things and feel things more deeply. And I have 2 mutations in this gene. Around 80% of the people I work with, 70, 80% have 1 mutation there. Maybe 8-ish percent or so have 2. So we're not talking about like 1 in a million mutations here. But yeah, I just see genetics expedite the process and help people get crystal clear on what they should and shouldn't be doing. So forget about saving the money on trying all these things that don't really work for you or make you feel worse. What's our most precious resource? Our time, the time it takes to experiment, flounder around this or that versus getting all of the answers upfront for you with the genetics.

Did you grow up feeling different, but not knowing what it was? And then once you started going down this path of studying genes and becoming a doctor, you know, like an expert at it, how did that help you with understanding yourself?

Yeah, like I mentioned that gene, and I'm talking about the COMT gene. That's that dopamine gene I was talking about. That was one of the first mutations I was looking at in my 23andMe data, trying to fix my own health. I had a lot of anxiety issues, brain fog issues, sleep issues, headaches. One of the first genes I looked at and I looked, wow, that works 4 times slower than in regular people. What does that need to function? Well, it needs magnesium to function. Maybe I should try taking some of that. And it needs something called SAMe, S-adenosylmethionine, to function. So I tried those 2 nutrients and they literally changed my life overnight. Granted, I was probably—

What was it that, what, what happened? Like how did it—

I felt noticeably more calm, cool, collected. My brain could be kind of neurotic at times, right? Like fixating on things. And I noticed just the baseline stress was a lot less. The overthinking will always be there, right? I'll always be a high dopamine type of guy, but it just really, I like to say every person is a unique shape. And the goal of, you know, helping people with the genetics, the supplements, the foods and things, it's not to change the shape of you. It's more so to like smooth out the edges, right? Because I'm not trying to change my personality type completely. Me being a sensitive guy is what makes me great in a lot of aspects too, right? It's more so. How do we learn to dance around, you know, some of our genetic shortcomings to support them? So a lot less fixation and a lot lower baseline stress. And I was like, holy crap, I really needed these. They helped me so much. Granted, I was probably deficient in magnesium too, right? That's a whole other aspect, right? Baseline deficiencies. But that's what led me to start doing this for friends and family for a few years. I've been doing this for 8 years at this point. But as an official business for around 2 and a half, I worked with over 700 people to do exactly what I did for myself. Utilize the genetics. It's not a once in a while. Every client I work with gets the genetics done because again, it really just expedites the process and helps 'em get clear on those answers and combine it with the proper supplement science. I mean, that could be a whole other episode. All of the horror stories, all these weird reactions to the supplements, I think people really underestimate how many people get damaged or harmed by natural supplements because it's like, who are you gonna call if you realize you're having panic attacks from this supplement, right? You don't go pick up the phone and call the manufacturer, right? Like you willingly bought them and put them in your own body.

Well, you probably don't even connect that you're having that issue from the supplement. So walk me through, if I were coming to you for the first time to work with you, like What is the process that you go through towards supporting people with their health?

Like I said, genetic testing, always what I do.

Which, which specific testing do you believe is, you know, the best?

Yeah. Yeah. So I work with the company SelfDecode. They test over 100 million mutations. It's very, very comprehensive. And it's not like these other tests that says, oh, we checked 50 mutations. You have one mutation in this gene. They'll map out like hundreds of thousands of mutations. I think it's around 800,000 mutations come into play to gauge your oxalate sensitivity. Have you ever heard of oxalates before?

Oh, sure.

Yeah.

I mean, well, I hear about them in food, right?

Yeah, exactly. And you know, you have the carnivore people screaming, they share a study, oxalates can cause gut issues. No one should ever have them. That's a bunch of crap. That's a bunch of crap, James. Like it, it's depends on the individual.

So people can't have vegetables? You're telling me people can't eat vegetables? Well, some people.

Based on their genetics, based on their gut microbiome, really wanna be mindful with oxalates. I've changed people's lives by educating them based on 800,000 different mutations. You're more sensitive to oxalates. You see how that's a lot different and a lot more accurate than just saying, oh, you have one mutation that's linked to oxalate sensitivity. You could have 3 others that make you less sensitive to them, right? So what is the net effect? You need really deep comprehensive data. AI machine learning helps a lot with it, but I see a missing piece is the level of nuance and really making it digestible for people. You don't need a 50-page report and you're so overwhelmed. So I actually use that analysis, some of my own tools. I hand-make my reports now, not super scalable, but right now I'm really focusing on what helps people the most, offering that white glove service. And we have a one-on-one call for an hour. going through everything point by point because you're more than just genes on paper. There's probably gonna be, depending on the person, you know, 30 to 50 supplement recommendations, but I would never put anyone on all those at once.

Right.

We need to have a conversation. I need to hear how you wake up in the morning. If you have anxiety and depression, how do those interact together? Are you more on the depressed side and it makes you anxious because you get nothing done throughout the day? Or are you so anxious all day trying to do everything and then some that you're burnt out and depressed at the end of the day. Right. So on paper versus talking to the person, I really think produces a lot better health outcomes by having that call, making sure you understand the language of your body, not just here's some pills, take them.

You just kind of like made me realize that we can really identify here with you. Like, so what are like the top 3 kind of misunderstood or current trends that are happening that you're just like, nope, I call BS on this. Yeah. This is not true. And, and you just mentioned one with the oxalates. Let's take that one first. Can you go a little deeper into that?

Absolutely. And you know, regarding the oxalates genetically, right? As I mentioned, there's a genetic component, but certain types of gut infections or bacteria or yeast, well, that wouldn't be picked up on a genetic test, right? More of like a stool type test, right? But that can also affect oxalate levels in the body. Then if we also think certain amino acids, hydroxyproline, that's very rich in collagen, glycine, very rich in collagen, both of those, your body can turn them into oxalates in the body. Now I take glycine high doses every evening. I do very well on it, but you see this level of nuance here. If I see someone that has a lot of oxalate mutations and that comes up, I'll mention to them, be mindful of the glycine or the hydroxyproline or collagen supplements. Not that any dosage is inherently bad, right? This is not a black and white, never have a collagen supplement again. But I have seen people, their joints actually feel better removing some of the collagen supplements. And again, this is a small subset of people, right? I work on the person in front of me. These are not sweeping recommendations. But again, you need to be educated. It's not just foods or supplements, right? It's all them together cuz we're linking it in for the perspective of your own cellular health. So the people that feel a lot better getting rid of oxalates, they're probably sensitive to oxalates. Plants have so many nutrients, carotenoids, things that you can't get through meat. So how are the carnivore people gonna get the carotenoids from, through, from their diet if they only have meat? They're gonna be deficient. That being said, some people do do well on carnivore, right? And as more data comes out, we could figure out why. But yeah, regarding the oxalates, you know, those people will say, and they'll say it just like this, those gut-busting oxalates, right? They say it like it's just so like it's the public enemy number one. It's fearmongering. It drives me insane. And it just drives me insane that how much fear sells nowadays. You have these pages with hundreds of thousands or millions of followers. Like Carnivore MD being so absolutist with everything. And what do you know, after a few years now he has to have fruit with his diet because his deep carnivore diet, he didn't say it was causing issues, right? But I feel better adding in fruit now. Well, you told everyone initially don't have any fruit. So you see how it changes over time. You know, not to go too far into him, you know, I like some of the messaging, but it's the absolutism of it, right? My way or the highway. You're wrong if you're not doing it this way. It drives me nuts. Some other things I see, some trends, vitamin D. A lot of people in the holistic space are saying, do not supplement with vitamin D. It's a hormone. We make it up by ourself on our own. Well, how do we make it? We make it with genes, right? That make proteins. So I have mutations in the gene that makes vitamin D in skin from sunlight. So my vitamin D levels struggle. To be where they need to be unless I'm supplementing year round. I have a harder time converting. So if you're listening here and you've taken a vitamin D supplement, your levels don't go up. Doctor doesn't know why it happened to me. My levels were super low. They gimme vitamin D, it barely went up. Gimme more, barely went up. I asked them what's going on? Like, oh, I don't know. We can do injections if you want. I did injections, didn't go up that much. They have no idea why. People in the holistic space will say, well, you need your boron and your magnesium to help it get processed. Absolutely true. But what else happens? You're taking one form of vitamin D that actually needs to be converted into another form of vitamin D by a certain gene. I have a lot of mutations in that gene. If your vitamin D levels don't go up no matter what, I'm 99.99% certain it's not an absorption issue. You can't convert it. The form we test on blood work is not the form you supplement with. So it's like, imagine you're supplementing with A and it gets turned into B and you test B on blood work. If you take all the A and B isn't going up, you can't turn the A into the B. So what do we do? We give you the B directly. And that I've seen truly completely change lives. Within a day or two, because throughout your entire life, these genes are locked in forever. Your cells have been starving for B, right? That other form of vitamin D. There's been the roadblock, even if it's through foods or supplements. So I don't think everyone needs to be on vitamin D, but for a significant amount of people, at least a lot of people that I work with, we add that form and it's truly life-changing. And it just bothers me. People will come to me. I even say the word vitamin D, they're like shaking. They're like, oh, I, I, I heard it's gonna cause calcification. I heard it's a hormone, so we shouldn't take it. It's like a lot of these practitioners that demonize vitamin D cuz it's a hormone, you make it yourself. They'll give people testosterone or estrogen. Hey, that's a hormone too. Why are you allowed to give them sex hormones? People don't really understand. It's really hypocritical.

It's like, well, why one, not the other? Yeah. Are you like pro kale? Are you kind of like, well, no, I'm just pro like, let's eat real food. And then if you have a response to it, then let's dig deeper. 'Cause obviously not everyone is going to get genetically tested right away, whether they should or not. Yeah. That's just not a reality. Yeah. Right. What is the lens people should be looking at in their day-to-day prior to getting genetically tested?

Yeah, I'm so glad you mentioned that. This is actually a new project I've been working on because you're right. Even though SelfDecode does not sell data, they don't structure their business that way. It's HIPAA, like I'm 100% confident the data's safe. They don't need to sell data. They make their money other ways through memberships and those types of things. Some people are never gonna get it done, right? Personally, I'm biased, right? I think it's a shame because when interpreted correctly, keyword interpreted correctly, it holds so many secrets to really expedite your healing. That being said, How do we learn the language of our body? Right? And what I've realized is starting to educate people one cell pathway at a time. Now, a cell pathway, vitamin D is one cell signaling pathway. You take vitamin D, it signals to your cells with that pathway, right? It tells 'em to make certain genes and make you feel better. You have things like histamine signaling. People may think that's just with regards to allergies. Allergies can release this histamine, but so many other foods we have, supplements we take, activities we do can actually raise that histamine in the body. Excess histamine. What does that look like in the body? So many things. Anxiety, ADHD, brain fog, headaches, migraine, joint pain, insomnia, things like glutamate. That's another signaling system in the body. Well, excess glutamate has a lot of the same exact symptoms as excess histamine. So if you're listening and you have headaches or migraines, is it a histamine issue? Is it a glutamate issue? Is it both? Right? So trying to teach people, I use this bucket analogy, right? What's filling up your bucket? What's filling up your histamine bucket? I can tell right away when my histamine gets elevated. That was a major factor for my brain fog, anxiety. Throughout the first 28 years of my life. And then I learned, okay, that weird feeling I have in my head, it's high histamine. I changed up my diet, I cleaned up my gut, but now I could tell right away, oh, what did I eat? Oh, I had some tomatoes. Those are high in histamine. So things like coffee, tomatoes, fermented things, these are high in histamine. Now, are they inherently bad? No. You're not gonna hear me on Instagram saying never have tomatoes again. They're bad for everybody, right? No. You need that level of nuance. But I'll give you an example. Someone wakes up in the morning and they have apple cider vinegar in the morning. Great for blood sugar. Also very high in histamine. They have black coffee, also very high in histamine. So they're fasting in the morning, have their apple cider vinegar, then they go to the gym. Exercise releases histamine, natural process. So no wonder why you're lightheaded, you're dizzy, you're anxious, you have a headache. You feel off. What you thought was a nice fasted workout was a massive histamine bomb, which filled up the bucket. So you kind of see it's, it's a different angle. Does that make sense?

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, in a sense, you're, you're saying sometimes these choices we're making, whether they're food or lifestyle, are overwhelming, like the cell pathways really. Right?

Exactly. Like I've, I've gotten people off of sleeping medication or off anxiety medication. Because they were more strategic about what healthy foods they're putting into their body. Think of it this way: anxiety, brain fog, ADHD, OCD, insomnia, chronic pain. I mentioned excess histamine, excess glutamate, things like excess sulfur, excess adrenaline. These are all pathways. Now, if I was gonna make a course or program How to address anxiety, I would talk about histamine, glutamate, sulfur, adrenaline. And I say those 4 because those are the 4 I've identified that are really in our control based on what we do in our day-to-day life. If I wanted to make a course about insomnia, I would talk about those 4 things again. If I made a course about headaches, I'd talk about those 4 things again. So you see, it's all the same things are just manifesting differently in different people. Some people get skin issues from the excess histamine. Some get more brain fog, some get hives. So you see, rather than just teaching in terms of the label, the issue you're having, what is the underlying cellular pathways that are messed up that are causing your issue? So then you can look at your life and see, okay, I have a lot of histamine in the morning. That's when I have brain fog. Wow. Let me make those changes. Within a day or two, I feel a lot better. Then I'm gonna try looking, wow. I have a lot of sulfur for dinner. Let me try lowering that sulfur for dinner. Wow. I sleep so much better. I sleep better throughout the night. I wake up feeling a lot more clear. It sounds wild, but outta the hundreds of people that I've worked with, I've seen these patterns. So again, it's how do we educate people about the cells without requiring that genetic test, right? 'Cause I can't work with everyone one-on-one. We gotta get this information out.

I mean, it is a bit challenging though, 'cause even as you're talking about, you know, just using like histamine, glutamate levels, it's like, I'm just imagining the person listening or watching who's never been genetically tested or even blood tested is like, but how would I know that it's histamine? Like these words are even foreign to so many people. It's kind of like my wife and I always laugh cuz like my kids will look at their plate now and they'll say like, well, what protein's on that plate? What carbohydrates? You know, what starches? And I'm just like, man, I never, when I was a kid, looked at a plate of food and thought, Protein, carbohydrates. Yeah. It's a very modern way of thinking. Like back in the day, it was more like, well, what meat is on your plate? What vegetable is— we didn't look at it as the more scientific, you know, name or label. Right. So in many ways, I guess I'm struggling with, well, how does, how does the person who's listening or watching this, who doesn't know their genetic, their genes?

Mm-hmm.

How do they take away from this episode something that they can apply to their day-to-day without obviously making sweeping generalizations. I mean, in a sense, do you almost have to kind of take, okay, well, I've, I've had this many clients over the years and you almost just kind of pick patterns that you see. I mean, is that kind of what you have to do?

Yeah. And you're absolutely right. And again, this is a newer project of mine, right? And it's a very detailed focus way of thinking, right? I'm trying to figure out how to distill that down. And I must say histamine is a major factor for people. That's because stress, EMFs, microplastics, these are all things that raise histamine in the body as well. Pesticides, right? We're all getting more and more and more of these, but I actually made, I released a course about the histamine pathway, everything in your control, what can fill up the bucket, what can empty it, right? I'm gonna be releasing these other ones. But my point is right now, what I like to tell people is if you're struggling with some of these issues, and again, I just named so many common issues for people, right? The aches and pain, all these, I call 'em the check engine lights, right? It's the warning signs that if you don't do something over the next several years, things could get a lot worse. That's how diseases start, right? But right now the genetics can help, but If you have a headache, what do you try first? Glutamate or histamine? That's why I believe educating about factors that elevate histamine or foods. There's a worksheet I made where you can look, you could write out what you put in your body, what time of the day, and go with a highlighter and say, wow, look at all that histamine.

You know what might actually help even is like, okay, let's assume no one even knows what glutamate or histamine is, cuz I always think of histamine as like just An allergy response.

Yep.

What is histamine?

It's a neurotransmitter in the body. So is glutamate. They're both functional units inside of the body. We are always releasing glutamate and histamine every day. They excite the brain. They help keep us awake and alert. And we know excess of either of those is linked to overexcitation of the brain. A lot of medications that lower glutamate or lower histamine Are linked to improving anxiety, depression, those types of things. Histamine is released during allergies outside of the brain. It's also released during general inflammation. So what makes you feel sick? Like when you're actually sick, a lot of times it's all that histamine being released. But what I'm saying is based on food supplements, lifestyle habits, you can raise your histamine and feel kind of sick. Except you're not actually sick because while being sick releases a bunch of other bad stuff, right? That histamine is what can make you feel irritable. It can make you have cramps or bloating. Fun fact, estrogen actually raises histamine. So if you're a female listening, a lot of PMS issues, it's most likely a histamine issue. Again, what are the symptoms of PMS, right? Irritability. brain fog, cramps, a lot of the similar stuff I mentioned that excess histidine can cause. But I'm with you trying to figure out how to educate the people about these things. They're naturally present in our bodies based on the foods that we eat or the supplements we take or the things we do. We can raise the levels or lower the levels.

Without someone having taken that test, what are some things that people should be mindful of? And let's just break it up. First, let's just talk about food. Like, what are some things we should be mindful of with our food choices? I know you are specifically passionate about even tying our food choices into our ancestral food choices. Mm-hmm. But like, what does that mean to you?

You know, we're on the Everyday Ancestral podcast, right? Ancestral's a big, big buzzword, right? And when I say buzzword, I don't mean it in a bad way, right? But it has gotten a lot of attention lately. But what people fail to understand, a lot of people fail to understand Is what's ancestral for me may not be what's ancestral for you. We all have the same ancestors technically when you go way, way back, right? Initially, we all evolved from the same descendants. But if you're someone that, let's just say you're, you're Russian, very, very cold. Your genes did not evolve to process fruits as well, right? And when I say that, that doesn't mean Russians shouldn't eat fruits, right? I'm not. Saying that, but my point is someone whose ancestors evolved in a very cold climate, over time they adapted, their genes evolved. Whoever was able, when these genetics happen randomly, let's just say thousands of years ago, you know, I'm a Russian child, I'm born, and when the sperm met the egg, I got a new mutation that made me process animal fat a little bit better, saturated fat a little bit better. Let's just say that. So when there was periods of famine, right? And there wasn't enough, a lot of food going around. If we all got just enough food to survive, I have a genetic edge because my mutations let me process the saturated fat better. So I'm able to survive when the food gets scarce. And if you didn't have that mutation, you were more likely to die off. So then I pass on my genes to my children. And then you see how over time, do that over millions of years versus if you're in the, if you lived in the Caribbean or grew up in the Caribbean, right? You're gonna be getting access to all these very high GI fructose carbohydrate sources from fruits and things. And when you're eating animals, they're not gonna have as much fat on them because they don't need like blubber to survive in that area. So when we say ancestrally, That doesn't inherently mean everyone just go out the wazoo with the organ meats. Organ meats are extremely nutritious for people, and that's why I love Pluck, right? Because it's, it's little sprinkles of it. I see a lot of people can actually get copper toxicity or vitamin A issues due to having 6, 8 pills of beef liver every single day for long periods of time. I had a client Her child was born with jaundice. Her child was born like orange because of all the copper that accumulated in his liver because she was supplementing with beef liver every day.

You bring up something I talk a lot about, and I'd love to hear your answer to it. So 2 things. So I'll, I'll ask one and then I'll ask the other. The first one is, well, it's just small amounts. So how, how do I know I'm getting enough?

You're saying regarding the organ meats?

Yeah. Like this is obviously not necessarily for people that are taking the supplements in capsules, but like who are sprinkling it on their food. They judge that for something to work, it has to be in excess or be in specific amounts.

How would you— Yeah. You know, that goes back to like the principle of synergy, right? Nutrient synergy as well. You don't need as high of doses of certain things when you have other complementary nutrients as well. If you're not taking any B vitamins, then yeah, maybe a little more organ meats could be useful for you, right? A little more of that. But it also depends what other nutrients are you getting? How do you know specifically if you're getting too much organ meats or not? I mean, you could check for things like iron levels, maybe a bit high copper levels. You can look into that, but I think going by how you feel can help a lot for people. But it's also understanding, don't add too many things all at once, especially if you're kind of just doing it on your own. But I think there's a lot of power in these lower moderate dosages of a more diverse nutrient set rather than just relying on a whole bunch of liver every day to get you what you need, right? Like, I'm not a big megadose type of guy. I like more supplements and nutrients, but That you need based on your genetics, but more minor, moderate dosages. It's like building the right football team, right? Or building the right orchestra of nutrients. You may tell me, oh, I tried that supplement in the past, it didn't do anything. But now when it's in the right context with the other team players that your body needs, then it's like, holy crap, this is working for me because nature isn't supposed to be done just in isolation like that. You gotta find the right isolated things that your body needs.

But don't you find though, and with your experience with genetics and then also your experience with your clients, that part of human nature is that the things that are sustainable are the things we get in small amounts so that in a sense, it's almost like it's very human. And even when you're talking about genes about how, oh, well, there you can get too much. There's excess. response that, is it possible that genetically or as just humans, just the genetics of humans that we are, we are going to be better off in getting small amounts of things, whether it's food or even intimacy, or they say like you need to take breaks in between knowledge and whatnot, but that maybe on a cellular level that We respond better and can maintain that response when things are in smaller amounts. Does that sense check with you at all?

Yeah, no, that sense definitely does check. Right. And of course my brain always thinks there's always outliers. If I have one mutation in a gene, like a studied mutation, and you have 10, you're probably gonna need high doses of that nutrient for the rest of your life. Right. But those, those are outliers. I hear what you're saying. I think a lot of it comes down to, I mean, call it just, I don't know if you wanna call it capitalistic brainwashing. It reminds you like the whole workaholic type thing too. It's all one and the same. Right?

Yeah.

It's like, it's the go big or go home with all these things. And, you know, I also think too, I think it's really interesting how vigilant people will be about what food they put in their body, yet in the same breath, they'll like blindly pop supplements like it's nothing because supplements are highly, highly, highly concentrated nutrients. And think about this, you're, you're, you're popping, you know, 6 pills of beef liver that's freeze-dried in like a powder.

Would you even be able to eat that much beef liver?

Right? So that's also too, like some of these multivitamins have like 80,000% of the daily B12 dosage. Now I've taken some of them and felt good on them for a period of time, right? It's not like they're bad for people, but yes, a lot of these supplements are so highly, highly concentrated and so much higher than what even the optimal diet we would get. ancestrally, right? As we're developing. So I agree with what you're saying, the sense of that there. It just depends, does the individual need more of this, less of that, you know, or more moderate amounts? But I agree with what you're saying. These supplements, not only are they high dosages, but some, a lot of them are such high, high dosages. All I've seen are people coming to me feeling like crap taking them. Of course, you're not gonna come to me and hire me if you feel great, right? Yeah. So there's a little bit of a, a little bit of a bias there, right? I do think I, I'm artificially selecting for more genetically sick people because let me put it this way. If a mutation is present in 20% of the population, but 3 quarters of my clients have it, you kind of see how, why are you coming to work with me? I'm never the PhD scientist turned into holistic genetic health coach or scientist or whatever. That's never the first stop. I'm used to being the end of the line for people. Why did none of the cookie cutter conventional medicine Or holistic medicine or functional medicine? Why did none of these protocols work for you? Because they're built around your label or your ailment. Let me take so-and-so's Lyme disease protocol, or this doctor's Lyme protocol, or that doctor's Lyme protocol. Don't get me wrong, they definitely help a lot of people, right? But why are none of these cookie-cutter things working? They're focusing on the label or the issue, not your body, right?

Yeah.

What, what do your cells need? You know, mold's a big thing now, and I work with a lot of families. And if a family of 5 is living in a moldy house, why are only 2 of them bedridden? The other 3 are pretty okay. Maybe just, you know, minor headaches or brain fog or something, right? You see how it's, it's not just the exposure to these things, it's how our cells, the biology of them, how well are they able to fight these things off and be resilient. You know, my approach isn't just about getting you feeling Better, it's providing yourselves with the right nutrients so you get better, but you stay better due to improved cellular resilience. It's like, you know, you should not need to do a parasite cleanse once a quarter. Let me put it that way. Like if you need to do them that, that often, there's other root cause things to figure out. We've all inhaled a mold spore. We have good parasites in us, right? Why does it go south for certain people? Of course, I'm gonna say, you know, the genetics, because if it was just the exposure, You wouldn't have a massively different response from the same family that live in the same household.

I really respect what you're bringing to the light, which is, you know, we're bombarded with absolutes as you started this with, and with kind of very do this, don't do that kind of mentality. But what you're trying to say is, well, it's, it's not so blanket and we really need to actually dig deeper with some genetic testing and get specific to you. I know that's the harder part for people to hear because then it's like, oh, I have to go do another test or this or that. They see the work that they're gonna have to do. But what, in a sense, what you're saying though is like, it's actually more simple than you, than you think because right now you're spinning your wheels and you don't know what's causing or not causing a reaction. And by just doing the testing, we can get really granular. I do wanna ask though, specifically around supplements, what's your take though on like natural supplements versus synthetic and, and the body's response to that? Do you, do you see a difference or does that matter to you, like what it's actually sourced from, or is the sourcing everything?

As a pharmacologist, to me, natural versus synthetic does not matter whatsoever. All that matters is the molecular structure of the nutrient. So the molecular structure dictates how it interacts with your cells. What receptors it binds to, what proteins it blocks. That's what pharmacology is. That's what my PhD is in. Now, that being said, then you need to make sure sourcing is important because if you had a totally pure molecule that was made synthetically of the same molecule that's present in nature, if they were actually totally pure, they're the exact same. But if you do cheap, you know, weird extraction methods, right? Maybe the synthetic form has other byproducts or other excipients or other additives, right? So you see how once there's other additives involved, what does that mean? There's other molecules in the mixture now, and now there's other molecules that cannot agree with your body and interact in an unfavorable way. Arsenic is one of the most potent toxins in the world, and that's a natural thing. And there's been a lot of synthetic things that have been made, like peptides are made synthetically and they're completely taking the world by storm. I wanna advance my education. I don't use them very often with my clients, but I'm definitely interested in them cuz I see the value. They're synthetically made peptides, protein sequences, but as long as you know What that protein sequence does in the body, then you can have a very favorable effectiveness to safety profile. So again, the natural versus synthetic does not matter. All that matters is the molecular structure. But if it's not cleaned out properly or there's other nonspecific things in there, well now you're, it's not an apples to apples comparison, right? You're comparing eating an apple to eating an apple, an orange, a strawberry, all these other things. And it's not an actual head-to-head comparison.

When you say the, what matters is that molecular structure, is that the same thing as like, I was just doing some research re recently, like around beta-carotene, for example. Sometimes you'll see supplements that have beta-carotene and others will have retinol, right?

Yeah.

And the, the idea is that, well, retinol is more absorbable in the human body, but is that the distinction you're making or are you saying like, no, beta-carotene or Retinol, it doesn't matter.

The reason why it's called beta-carotene or retinol is because they are 2 different things. They are different mo— in molecular structure. Now they're gonna be similar. The only way you get retinol is from that beta-carotene, right? Like that's how it works. But how does that work? So we get beta-carotene through plants, the BCMO gene. Back it up a bit. Genes, think, are instructions to make proteins. Proteins are the workhorses of your body. So think of it being like a factory or an assembly line. The BCMO gene makes the BCMO protein. What does that worker do? That worker's job from 9 to 5 is to convert beta-carotene into retinol. Now, if you have one mutation there, it may not be a big deal. If you have several, instead of that worker doing a 9 to 5, That worker does, you know, a 9 to 12 and doesn't come back after lunch. You're eating this beta-carotene and it's not being converted. Now, there are some unique benefits to just beta-carotene, but you also want that retinol. Very, very important, especially for eye health. Very important for liver health. Very, very important. So you see what I'm saying? They're not the same thing. They're similar. And again, where the genetics come into play, do you need more direct retinol? And who is that really important for? Well, A, people with these mutations. But imagine if you're vegan and all you get are plant sources. If you're vegan and all you eat are plants and no animal sources of any kind, if you have that mutated gene, you're gonna be struggling unless you take probably pretty solid dosages of retinol, right? Because how else is your body gonna get it? Your body cannot, not that it can't make any of it, you literally die, right? But again, if that worker's only doing a 2-hour workday, He's gonna be working, working, working, and you're gonna be experiencing those issues of that deficiency. So you see, it's not just supplements or foods or genetics. They all come together. And I like saying, I look through the lens of cellular health. To me, it's brain health, gut health, joint health, skin health. These are all cells in our bodies. And when we take a supplement, if we take a supplement for brain health, It doesn't just go to your brain cells. It gets distributed in your bloodstream to every cell in your body, right? So that's why I look like looking from the lens of what do your unique cells need more of nutrient-wise, every cell in your body. Let's give them more of those nutrients and limit what they're sensitive to. Our cells wanna make us happy and healthy, right? We just gotta give them what they need to get into that state.

That's a really great segue to this last question, which is If our cells want to be happy on a certain level, they know what they need and want, right? Where does swallowing a capsule and bypassing that communication, the lingual, you know, neural communication and eating food, where's the distinction there? Because in many ways, if we're eating the food and utilizing, you know, our biological senses that have developed hundreds of thousands of years to inform us.

Yeah.

Of is this food gonna nourish us or kill us, right? If we're eating the food and, and getting that communication, you know, shouldn't we get a little bit closer through that intuitive eating of knowing like, is this food right for me or wrong for me? Isn't swallowing supplements sort of a bypass of that intuitive knowledge?

Yes, absolutely. To some extent, I do agree with that. And here's the thing too, it's, we could have all the wishful thinking in the world that food is medicine always, and everyone's gonna eat perfectly, right? But the sad reality is, and I've realized this, as I've been doing this with people for the past couple years, a lot of people don't wanna make changes. And that's true. They're looking for the pill, right? And it's like, I'm totally, totally with you. Like, and then it also comes into a lot of the food is less nutritious than it was. And if you really wanna go even deeper, it's less nutritious based on what they're fed. But think about too how they're treated, right? This can go so, so deep. I mean, If the farmer is struggling, are the cows gonna pick up on the stress of the farmer? Right? We know that the stress levels of the cows, right, affect their meat quality too, right? Let alone the quality of the grass that they're eating. Right? So it's the foods aren't as nutritious as they used to be, and we're lazier than ever. So it's like, I'm totally with you. Like, I take the least supplements I've taken in years now, cuz I figure out what really, really works for me. I try to get it through food as much as I can. But also it's one thing when you are doing pretty well and wanna feel better, but when you're really, really sick and you've been chronically ill and you've been feeling like crap for a long time, you're stuck in a rut. I believe these nutrients, these more potent nutrients can really help be the catalyst to get you out of that rut. If you've been sick for a long time, I think it's less likely that just cleaning up your diet is gonna fix everything. And that's exactly why Most people I work with are already eating all organic. They already do all these things, right? They're doing all these things, yet they still feel like crap.

Why?

Then there's the whole toxins around us as well, right? Why do we need to supplement? Closing line here, we need to supplement because the food's less nutritious. We are inhaling pesticides every single day. We're exposed to more metals. We're exposed to more Viruses, right? We're exposed to so many more things that deplete our micronutrients because our cells have to work harder to detox all the time due to our toxic modern world. Then you throw in the genetics. Wow. Not only am I burning through this nutrient faster due to all the toxins, but now I also genetically don't absorb that nutrient as well. So you see, it can really stack on top of itself.

Yeah. Well, thank you so much, Tyler, for sharing your wisdom and, and perspective here. And I think if anything, what I hope people walk away from, not only just the fact that we are all individual and that we want to honor the, the, our own cellular individuality, but more importantly, like, don't, don't self-diagnose. Don't just spin your wheels, like, you know, using Google to figure out, oh, this is what's going on. I should just follow what, you know, Joe Schmo is telling me. I mean, influencer on Instagram. Just go get tested. Go to someone like Dr. Tyler. Go, go to someone you trust. Ideally, get tested for specifically you, because you, you will, in the long run, you will save money. Time is money, as he, you know, as you started out saying. And, and you will save money in the long run by just getting as specific as you can, specifically as you pointed out, when you are not feeling well and you've been in chronic disease for a long time, like You should not be in chronic illness for most of your life. This is a short life. We need to be thriving.

We all deserve to thrive. And a lot of us accept so much less than we really deserve because we're told it's normal. Oh, you're 35. It's part of aging. A bunch of crap if you ask me.

Yeah. Well, thank you so much for joining me. How can people find you? How can they work with you?

Yeah. So @DrTylerPanzner, I'm on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn. TikTok, www.drtylerpanzer.com. I do, as I mentioned, one-on-one genetic work. I just released the histamine course and I'll give you for the show notes, have a free cell signaling course, free genetics course. And I really want to give people these resources to begin to open their eyes to see health how I do. I have some practitioner training courses. I'm not running them currently, but Newsletter, all those things. A lot of really exciting stuff in the pipeline. And one last thing, I wanted to offer $150 discount to cover the cost of the DNA kit itself for any of your listeners. What would you want that discount code to be? I would say Everyday Ancestral might be a little wordy though.

Yeah, let's just do EA.

Okay. Yeah, we'll do EA150. Yeah, that covers the DNA kit. And then I do a couple different one-on-one packages. So any of you guys are interested. This isn't just for people that are very, very sick. I've worked with a lot of people that are doing pretty well that just wanna feel even better. Like whether it's entrepreneurs, all different types of people, we all have genetic mutations that can be supported naturally. I truly believe this can help anyone feel better. Just depends on where you're at on your journey and what type of support you need. Happy to set up a call and chat about that. Yeah, that EA-150, I'm saving that DNA kit. Thank you so much for having me on. I hope you guys learned something.

Thank you all. And thank you for joining us. Please share this episode with your friends, your loved ones. Stay curious, my friends. Thank you so much for joining me on Everyday Ancestral. If you enjoyed this episode, hit subscribe so you don't miss the next one. You could find the show notes, links, and resources mentioned at eatpluck.com. That's eatpluck.com. Tpluck.com. And hey, if you know someone who'd get something out of this, share it with them too. Stay curious, live well, and keep it ancestral.