What is the BIG Connection? | Dr. Peter Kan

Welcome everyone to another Women to Women podcast, everything adrenal, hormone, weight, and trauma. And today I'm pleased to have with me somebody that has great conversations with me, and his name is Dr. Peter Kahn. Peter and I have actually known each other for a while. He's board certified in integrative medicine, functional medicine, and board certified in chiropractic neurology. Which is amazing because it really connects the dots. He's a creator of NeuroMetabolic Integration, a science-based virtual online coaching program that identifies the root cause of autoimmune and other chronic conditions, as well as the BIG Masterclass, which we'll talk a little bit more today, launched several times and will now be available to attend via Health Talks online this January. And Dr. Kahn has a wonderful array of bonus gifts to share that we'll include in the show as well. So one of the things that's kind of interesting about both of us, Peter, is that both of us are immigrants. I was born in Australia in the outback, and you were born in Taiwan, and we came to America kind of with— I certainly came with dreams of making a difference. I've known that about myself since I was a little girl, and I wanted to transform lives and transform health. And here we are kind of doing some of that. So it's kind of fun.

Well, when I was a little girl, I didn't know what I wanted to do. So you're much better than me there.

That's because you were never a little girl. No, I really did. From the time I was just very young on the beach beaches in Australia when I was walking, no one was actually there. I just knew. I don't know where it came from. It was just deep in my soul. So, um, and I think that, um, there is something about us that, um, makes it even stronger within us to have a purpose. You know, I've certainly seen that in my family, um, all of us that were immigrants in that way that really had some purpose in life. It's kind of fun. Don't you think so?

I think, uh, you know, being an immigrant, uh, for me at least, it wasn't a cakewalk. Let's just put it that way. You know, I had to adjust, you know, a completely different culture, completely different language altogether too. So, you know, for me it was, uh, you know, I, I don't think— yeah, I mean, you say you knew what you wanted to do as a little kid. I don't think I, I don't think I knew what I wanted to do until I'm 30, you know. So it took a while for me to find out. But, you know, we all take our own roads. But I think as an immigrant though, you know, it's that there's certain things that you bump into, right? The hardship, the things that difficulties that, you know, other people may take for granted. Oh, you go to high school. Heck, when I went to high school, I feel completely out of place because I don't even speak the language. So trying to get popular, forget about it. Right. So, um, I think, um, you know, some of these hardships, you know, when I look back, it was good because it teach you how to be tough, teach you how to be persistent. And teach you how to, to just, you know, overcome, you know, difficult situations in life. And a lot of what we do with clients, you know, and patients in functional medicine is helping them to navigate that difficult situation. I mean, some people have really chronic issues that last, that's been around for a long time. And so I think one of the key things for people to come out of the other side is being patient and being persistent and not give up. So for what it's worth, you know, that's what I got out of that.

No, I don't know. I completely agree with you. I mean, I came, I certainly spoke English, but oftentimes some of the ways that I spoke English were very different. I was, you know, I skipped a grade, I went from 4th to 6th, and I was teased mercilessly. And it was horrible. And they were all into makeup, and I was wearing hoop skirts. And, you know, the math system was in the 12s, and here in America was 10. So it was much easier, and I couldn't get it. And Oh my God. And the song that was my favorite song was One Is the Loneliest Number. So I totally resonate with what you're talking about. And it was not easy. And it certainly taught me resilience of how do you kind of learn from those situations and being popular in high school is like, seriously, was not going to happen. Even though I was a cheerleader, I was like, not so much. And I agree with you, but it really, I think, helped me be who I am. And I think one of the things that's helpful for people, even listening to this today in a podcast, is that, you know, it might look like we have a lot of the pieces to the puzzle, but for both of us, it didn't come easily. It was something that we had to kind of work through and work, uh, work, you know, make a difference with. And I think it makes us better teachers that way, that it did not come easily for either one of us. So I completely agree with you.

Well, anything worthwhile doing, it's always going to be challenging and difficult, but that's what makes it worthwhile. So So, you know, same thing with people's health, you know, it's, there's nothing more important than your health. So it's a worthwhile, noble thing to improve it. And it may be difficult, but you know, you just gotta do your best and get the right help along the way is really helpful too. You know, I can think back so many times in my life, if I just had a mentor or somebody pointing me in the right direction, I probably wouldn't have, you know, partied as much or drank as much in college or would've spent my time wiser. You know, that's the same thing in functional medicine. If you have somebody that can point you in the right direction, uh, that has experience, I think you short— you, you can shortcut that process so you get there faster.

So let's talk about some of that. I mean, I think that's an interesting point is that we all need mentors, you know, and certainly for me, Jeff Bland was my mentor back, you know, 35 years ago when I heard him talk about, let's take a look at the cause of the cause. Let's take a look at biochemistry. Let's take a look at why everyone's a little bit different. And you know, when it comes to chronic diseases, I think there's many different things that can be similar, but there's also a common denominator for many of them, but also varied differences. Let's talk a little bit more about that, especially when it comes to kind of neurological issues as well.

Absolutely. Yeah, definitely. You know, brain, especially when it comes to brain, right? Because a lot of people, what people come in when they have chronic health issues, they complain a lot about symptoms within the neurological system. And sometimes they have symptoms that they don't even think it's a neurological issue. You know, for example, they have my digestion that's not working great, but that could be a neurological issue, meaning the vagus nerve is not functioning properly. So the brain, you know, has its antennas, its arms into almost every single part of our body. We experience our life through our brain. So, A lot of people with chronic conditions suffer and experience brain symptoms. And what I've learned over the years is that when you have neurological issue or symptoms that can impact brain function, usually there's some common denominators, right? So, and when you start to address these common denominators, complicated conditions becomes less complicated. It becomes not as overwhelming. It becomes where, you know, you may not have like 50 things wrong with you. You may just have one big thing wrong with you that's causing 50 different symptoms. So if we can just address that one big thing, then, you know, the 50 problems can kind of just resolve themselves a lot of times. And that's the approach we want to take because I think in, in this world of, you know, summits and Google and Dr. Google, there's just too much information, right? And what happens, people, they Google online and they Google their own symptoms. They say, oh, I find online, they're describing this. I have the exact same symptom that they're describing. Okay. Just because you have the same symptom as describing doesn't mean that's the root cause of your problem necessarily. It could, but it could also be not. So you have to kind of give yourself this objectivity in a sense to be able to see through it. And one of the ways that can help you do that is by having, you know, a concept, a roadmap that's guided by science and having these 30,000 feet view ideas and concepts that's, you know, that's grounded so that it's not causing you to chase 10 different things. So one of the things that I talk about, you know, in the Brain Immune Gut Summit that's, you know, coming up in January is this idea that there's a brain-immune-gut axis. And this is one of those things that helps people to, you know, reduce the complexity because the brain-immune-gut axis is where there's an intersection or inter connection between the neurological system, the immune system, and the digestive system. And they affect the— it's like a three-way triangle. They all impact each other. The brain can impact the immune and the gut. The gut can impact the brain and the immune, and the immune-brain-gut. So you can't separate them out necessarily, because when one aspect of this brain-immune-gut axis fails becomes a domino effect, a chain that tugs on the other two parts, and the other two parts invariably will start to get weaker and maybe even produce symptoms. So by looking at a lot of these chronic conditions through the lens of brain-immune-gut, we're able to bring order to chaos and be able to structure, you know, the way that we may solve this problem in a better way. Now You know, with when you have brain-immune-gut axis dysfunction, like I said, you know, when one goes, the other parts go. You get very typical or archetypical symptoms, or, you know, that's common among all people. And regardless of the diagnosis, which is your point, Marcelle, earlier, like, you know, there's a lot of condition and these symptoms and condition can overlap. So which is which? And that's exactly the point. So when you have brain-immune-gut axis dysfunction, you may have brain symptoms. So that— what are these brain symptoms that are common among people with all different type of chronic disease, whether it's Lyme disease or mold toxicity or Hashimoto's or celiac disease or chronic fatigue syndrome? I mean, they all have brain-immune-gut issues, and the brain symptoms can be fatigue, brain fog, short-term memory issue, depression, anxiety. Can also be peripheral nervous system problems like numbness, tingling, and, you know, neuropathy and so forth. So if you have these neurological symptoms, even just one or two, that means somewhere in the nervous system there's some kind of dysfunction. Now that doesn't tell you what's causing that dysfunction, but at least you know there's a nervous system component which can sort of tug on the other part of this brain-gut axis. And then we come to the immune system part of the brain-immune-gut axis. Symptoms in that category can include things like inflammation, can include things like, you know, chronic infections that you can't clear. It can include things like even chemical sensitivity and food sensitivity, which really are immune system mediated responses, right? People think food sensitivity is a GI problem, but really food sensitivity is an immune system problem. So we have to look at it from that lens. So, so those are immune system challenges. And again, you don't have to have everything on that list. You don't have to have chronic infection and autoimmune and inflammation and this and that to have a problem within the immune system. And then the last part of this brain, immune, gut is the gut. And then so problem there can manifest as heartburn, reflux, gas, bloating, diarrhea, constipation, alternating diarrhea, constipation, SIBO, SIFO. I mean, the list goes on and on. Now I'll bet, and those people, audience listening right now, You could just do a self-inventory. Do you have even one symptom in the brain category? You know, be it brain fog or fatigue or depression, anxiety. Do you have even one symptom in the immune system category? You know, inflammation, chronic infections, food sensitivity, chemical. Do you have even one symptom in the digestive category? If you have at least one symptom in, in each category, at the very minimum, you probably have brain immune gut dysfunction. And probably the audience all raising their hand says, I have multiple symptoms in multiple categories. And, and I'm not even talking getting— talking about the diagnosis that they have, right? Because all these people said, yep, I have brain symptom, I have immune symptom, I have gut symptoms. One person may have mold issue, one person may have Hashimoto's, another person may be chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, but yet they all have brain, immune, gut symptoms. Or very commonly they have multiple area that's malfunctioning. So that's the common denominator is that the brain, immune, gut dysfunction together, whether you have whatever diagnosis— diagnosis becomes irrelevant. It becomes what's the mechanism and the mechanisms that when you have brain, immune, when you've got dysfunction, things just kind of break and you start having these chronic issues.

So let's talk a little bit more about if somebody says, oh my God, that's so true, I have that. But I do want to give an example of something that was phenomenal in my practice that really follows suit with that. This is somebody who had actually parasites. She had a nematode and she had blastocystis hominis, chronic diarrhea, wasn't sleeping at night, blah, blah, blah. So we did testing. And I also really, spent enough time with her to understand that there was a vagus nerve issue. And I said, you know, I think these neuropathways of how you've always believed things to be is getting in your way. So she listened to my summit and started working with Annie Hopper material all online and had the most ridiculous food sensitivities. I mean, it was like she couldn't eat this, she couldn't eat that, she couldn't eat this, she couldn't eat that. And I just talked to her last week All of those symptoms are gone. Every one of them. Now, did we treat the nematode? Of course. Did we treat the Blastocystis hominis? Absolutely. But even after that, she had food sensitivities and still couldn't eat garlic and she couldn't eat this and she couldn't— it was really affecting her life. So I just want to bring us back to this notion that you described, which is also the vagus nerve piece that can really get in our way because people's lives are so affected and they're so frustrated. They think we've not— we've missed something.

What do you mean by that? When we say we miss something?

What a lot of people, you know, when I talk with them, I always do an ACE score on people, Peter. And I always want to know, because one of the things that I say in my practice, and I was the first online talking about this, if we don't deal with our stories, our stories will deal with us. And we know that when you have an ACE score, and if people aren't familiar with that, it's Adverse Childhood Events score. And it was really came to life in 1998, when Felitti and his group from Kaiser Permanente and the CDC looked to see if you had adverse events in your childhood, did you have long-term health issues? They did not anticipate the results they got. They thought there was not going to be a problem. And if you had a score of 4 or more on a scale of 1 to 10, your chances of having heart disease are 165% higher and many other issues. So Annie Hopper talks about if we continue to have this constant thought, I'm allergic to everything, I can never eat I can't eat anything. My stomach, blah, blah, whatever. And it always goes on to more than that, that it changes our cortisol production and changes our neuropeptides and it changes our neurotransmitters. And she was another example. And I see it in my practice all the time in which we did the work we needed to do with the gut, but it healed many of the other pieces in the, in, in her, in her brain and in her body as well.

Great example. Yeah, great example of how, you know, sometimes you, you work on one thing, either it heals another area, or you took the pressure off one area so that another area will become easier to, to recover or heal, right? So you treat, you know, of course, this person had to deal with the, the vagus nerve, but you, you did treat the nematode and then the blastocystis. Without that, even if she had dealt with the vagus nerve, she still had the nematode blastocystis, and she's still nowhere, you know, not going farther ahead. So that's a great example of, you know, what you just described, how you have to look at it holistically. You have to look at all the different factors. You have to step back sometimes because I think a lot of people get into the nitty-gritty, like, oh, I'm gonna like learn the 100 different ways to detox a parasite, and they forget to take a step back. What about my vagus nerve? What about, you know, uh, my blood sugar stability? What about, you know, some very foundational things that we can all pay attention to that'll just accelerate our results if we did those other things.

Yeah. And I think that it's, you know, what I love about the work that you and I do, it's really individual. You know, we're really looking at somebody as an individual to really start to understand what's true for them. Forget the diagnosis, forget, you know, those pieces, but you know, the gut-immune-brain, for example, is where are we in this kind of journey with them that we can help them get to the other side? And the beauty of that is we can. We just have to figure out the pieces along the way. And you're a master at that in terms of really helping people get to the other side of figuring out what's wrong, including things like mold or chemical sensitivities or whatever else is going along in the journey for them, which I appreciate a great deal. And why do you think that you came to this place to do this kind of work? How did you get here?

Well, that's a really deep question. I mean, I don't know why I'm here. Here to do this work. I know that I definitely feel a sense of purpose when I do this work. I think a lot of the why, you know, like as far as why, like did God call me to do this? I don't know about that, but I know I did a lot of this work initially because my own family had health problems and I was trying to figure them out. Right. So my father had liver cancer. This is before I even graduated from chiropractic school. He had stage 4 liver cancer and he was older and they say, well, you know, 6 months to live, you know, we don't do liver transplant for someone his age. So, you know, my brother and I, who's also a chiropractor, just took it upon ourselves to say, okay, what can we do to help him nutritionally or whatever we know how to do? And, uh, you know, with just a little bit, a little bit of protocol that we, we, we just search and then find out on our own, you know, he was able to live 4 years, 5 years symptom-free, even with stage 4 cancer when they say 6 months. So that taught me a lot about what's possible, you know, that this natural way of healing the body, you know, has something to it. And then my kids, you know, uh, 3 out of my 4 kids all have major allergy issues, and I have to figure them out. So that's what got me down in the road, you know, road of doing functional neurology and functional medicine to help my, my own family. So that, that's kind of how I stumble onto this. And I think I always had an affinity and an interest and curiosity about the brain and neurology as well as nutrition. So, you know, that, that kind of just fits right into my— where my interests and my, my, my why, my purpose and necessity all intersected. And that's how I got to do this.

So I think that's what makes you such a master at it though, Peter. You know, you're always digging a little deeper to figure out, okay, so this didn't work. So what's behind that? What's behind it? What's behind it? And certainly when we have family members or we have something that, that we're invested in to kind of push us, it's the piece that's amazing for us to really shift the dynamic. Which is incredible. So that's probably the contributor to you of why you put all the pieces together in the way that you do, which works so well.

Yeah, just being curious. And I think that will be something that all the listeners can take away from, you know, be curious. And being curious, meaning don't go in with specific notions of how it's supposed to work. Just go in with, okay, what does this mean? And how does that apply? And if it's not, if it's not this way, What about the other way, right? Always look at two sides of the coin. So then if one way doesn't work for you, you're not just stuck. Well, you know, like, I'm so invested in SIBO, it's not SIBO, like cognitive dissonance. It can't be, it has to be SIBO. What if it's not? What if it's something else, right? You have to— if it's not that, then what do I do? If I— what's my backup plan? What's my plan B if it's not that? So I think it's just curiosity and, and no, always after the truth is, is what kind of helps me to, you know, to accumulate these kinds of information.

But the beauty of that is that you're helpful for so many people. And I think the unfortunate part, as you and I both know, is in the conventional world, we come very, very quickly to a diagnosis. And then we very, very quickly come up with a treatment plan that oftentimes doesn't work. So you need more medication to support what that medication was. And your and my work is to find out what's upstream? What's the cause of the cause? What's going on with the mitochondria? What's going on with the muck in the brain or the immune system, or even the psychological pieces that contribute to the cortisol being up and the vagus nerve being complicated. It's really looking a little deeper, which is profound because that's what helps people get better.

Well, and that takes a lot of work. It takes a lot more work than just a 5-minute, 10-minute encounter and write a prescription and off you go. And if the treatment doesn't work, well, follow up in another month. That's just another office visit, bill insurance. So you could keep a livelihood doing that type of conventional practice, but ultimately, you know, it's about, you know, getting real results for people. And that takes work, you know, it takes, like, like you said, a lot of detective work, a lot of thinking. But I think also takes work on the, on the clients' or the patient's part, right? Because they have to participate. They become a participant of their own health. And sometimes people don't want to participate. They don't want to take personal responsibility. So this is— that becomes difficult. So that's why, you know, we only take on specific people, and we, we do our best to explain our philosophy of how we do things. So if it's a good fit, then we, we do this together and we get great results when we have that. But when people just want a quick fix or a magic pill, then that doesn't work. And so it takes work on both the practitioner and the, and the client's part in this type of model.

And the end result is amazing, but we have to have people show up. If you can't show up for yourself, it doesn't doesn't work.

Absolutely.

Yeah, absolutely. So tell us about this masterclass that you're having in January from the 10th to the 16th.

Yeah. And it's actually an outgrowth. It's actually called the Brain Immune Gut Summit. And it's actually a collection of all the best interviews, including yours, of course, Marcelle, uh, of what I've done in the past with what's called the Brain Immune Gut Masterclass. And so what's the difference? The Brain Immune Gut Masterclass is is kind of smaller. We only had a few expert speakers and more just, uh, you know, explaining the general concept of what we just discussed here today, but in a little bit more detail. The Brain and Gut Summit is a culmination of all the expert interviews. And then I also have special mastery sessions where I help people to tie the dots, connect the dots of what all these experts are saying. How do you make it useful for you? So I'm really proud and excited about this event. And I really recommend everybody to use the, uh, the link that Marcelle's going to provide you to register. In fact, there's a very big and important message on that registration page where I produce a special video. I recommend all of you to register and at least go to that page and watch the video. And after you're, uh, it's jaw-dropping actually, so please watch it. And then after you watch it, if you you agree that's jaw-dropping, then go ahead and pick your jaw off the floor and go ahead and register for the event. It's free for you to view. Starts January, the first week of January. It's a great way to start a new year. And I think you're gonna learn, come away with the, the big idea that there is a brain-gut axis, but more importantly, how to actually restructure and reframe your thinking so that you can make that work for you and leverage it so that you actually get your results in less time, less effort, less confusion. Because a lot of people are bumping their head into the wall doing too much, doing things that they shouldn't be doing, or, or think they had— they have certain problems when it's actually other problems. They're just completely down the wrong rabbit hole. Utilizing The Big Idea, you're going to get this clinical roadmap which will help guide you so that you have the— you have a much higher probability of hitting the right target than just flailing and trying 50 supplements and see what sticks.

Absolutely. Well, thank you so much. Um, and they will have the links below so they can kind of look at this summit as well as how can they get more information about you.

Yes, absolutely. So use the link to register for the big master— uh, big summit. And also my website's at askdrkhan.com, but probably the most useful area is the YouTube channel. My YouTube channel is really really, you know, thriving, very— a lot, a lot of free content. So people can find Peter Khan DC, just type in my name, K-A-N without an H, uh, and find my YouTube channel. There's a lot of free video there as well.

Awesome. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much.

Thank you, Marcelle Pick.