Weekly MRP Q & A with Alice and Dipa [May 5, 2023]

Good afternoon everyone. Hello. Hello. Happy Friday. Hope you're all having an amazing day so far. And I'm just going to put a quick reminder in our group chat that we've started. Give me a second. And Alice, I'm going to make you co host as well. Give me a second. Second here. Welcome everyone. As you're tuning in, let me know what you're grateful for today. One thing that you're grateful for today. Can type that in the chat. Welcome, welcome everyone. As you're tuning in, let me know what you're grateful for today. I'm just gonna put one final reminder that we've started our Q A.

Letting go of your attachment to yourself.

Lots of new faces today. Welcome everyone are. Okay, so today we're going to be doing a little bit of an exercise with you all. And before we do that, let's do start off with a little bit of breathing. Okay. So I know last week if you were all here, I know there's some new faces here today. But we'll usually start off with some sort of breathing technique. We find most people, right, we all have stress, right? No matter what stage of life we're in, we all have some sort of stress. And when we're able to regulate our breathing and when we're able to really mindfully approach our stress, then all aspects of our life improve, right? We're able to make better decisions, better choices for our health and our well being, for what we eat and what time we sleep, whether we decide to go for a walk or not, all of that improves when we breathe properly. So the breathing technique that we're going to do today is going to be judgment against myself, four seconds on the inhale and then we're going to hold for seven seconds and then we're going to exhale for eight seconds. Okay. And really extending the exhale can really help to activate the, what we call the parasympathetic nervous system, which is the rest and digest state of the nervous system. That's where all the healing and repair and regeneration occurs. So this is a great way to shift you more into the parasympathetic state. So I'll walk you through it, we'll do a few rounds. And so if you want to just start off by sitting comfortably wherever you are and if you can turn your camera on, that would be wonderful. That's fine too. And just start with really planting your feet on the ground firmly and you can close your eyes if you like. I feel like it just helps us to concentrate a little bit. Better. So just give, close your eyes if you feel comfortable. And you're going to just start focusing on your normal inhale and exhale. You don't have to change the way you're breathing at all. Just focus on your inhale and exhale. And now you're going to take an inhale for four seconds. So inhale, 1, 2, 3, 4. Hold, 1, 2, 3,4, 5, 6, 7. And exhale, 1, 2, 3,. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. 8. Inhale, 1, 2, 3 and 4. Hold, 1, 2 and 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. Exhale, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7, 8, 8. Inhale, 2, 3,4. Hold, 2, 3, 4, five, six, seven. Exhale, 2, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. Inhale, 2, three, 4. Hold, 2, 3, four, five, six, Seven. Exhale, two, three, four, five, Six, Seven, eight. Inhale, two, three, Four. Hold, two, three, four, Five, six, seven. ExhALE, two, three, four, 5, 6, 7, eight. Inhale, Two, three, four. Hold, two, three, Four, five, six, seven, Eight. Hold or sorry. Exhale, two, 3, four, five, Six, seven, eight. InhALE, two, three, Four. Hold, two, three, four, fifth, six, seven. Exhace, two, three, four, Fifth, six, seven, eight. And now you're just going to return back to your normal breath, Observe your inhale and exhale through the nose. And then whenever you're ready, you can open your eyes and come back to the room. Okay? How does everyone feel? Type in the chat, let me know how you feel. Hey, everyone feels relaxed. Ready to learn. Present. Okay, good. So what we're going to go through today, I think it's an important exercise for us to all do and revisit at times. Some of you may have done this exercise with me already, some of you may not have, but if you can quickly go grab a pen and a paper, that would be great. And what we're going to talk about today is our. And we're going to go a little deeper is our identity and our paradigm, okay? And, you know, we'll work on this or you can work on this a little bit more, you know, after we get off this call, but really want to talk about this a little bit more just because it's so important when it comes to our health outcomes. Okay? So just for some of you. So if you can, if you take a piece of paper, if you fold it in half, the top half you can write paradigm, and the bottom half you can write identity. So just as a definition for you all, our paradigm is kind of the lens through which we look at the world, okay? And our identity is basically kind of like the internal dialogue that we have with ourselves. Okay. And kind of how we define ourselves. Okay. And paradigm can also be your belief systems. And today we're going to specifically talk about our paradigm and our identity with regards to our health. Okay. So you might need a little bit more time to think about this. Right. Beyond this Q and A today, but what is your paradigm when it comes to health? Okay. Do you believe that as you get whole, as you get older, you're going to get healthier and wiser? Do you believe that as you get older, you're going to have some sort of disease or high blood pressure, gain more weight? Right. What are your beliefs and what is your paradigm when it comes to your health? You want to think about. A lot of our beliefs were instilled in us when we were children. Right. So from the ages of 0 to 8 is when our parents or our caregivers would have instilled a lot of these belief systems in us, pretty much usually subconsciously. Right. Based on how they spoke to us about certain topics with regards to health, or based on what they spoke to us about certain topics, even sometimes about money. Right. A whole bunch of different aspects of life. Right. So were your caregivers talking to you about your health in a way that you needed to rely on? Medications, perhaps? Right. Or that it didn't matter what you ate? Right. What you ate had nothing to do with your health. Right. So I know for. For us, for me, I mean, I'm probably. I'm not perfect, but because I'm aware of this, I try to use very careful language with my son when he's not feeling well. So I always try to empower him, and I always try to instill the belief that his body can heal itself. Right. So if he ever gets a fever or if he gets sick, I'll always try to encourage him to have the belief that the next day, after a good night's rest, after maybe perhaps taking some supplements, that the next day his body is going to feel so much better. And there's been plenty of occasions where at times he's complained of an earache. And then we tell him to lie down and rest. We'll put him on, you know, something that we have called a biomat, which basically increases your core body temperature, which can help, you know, fight bacteria and viruses. And within a couple hours, like, we're like, oh, Devin, how's your ear? And he's like, oh, it's gone. And we're like, do you remember which ear it is? And he's like, pointing to the wrong ear because he can't even remember which ear was hurting. Right? So these are the things that we try to instill in him because we're aware now, right? So try to think back to when you were younger. What were the messages around health and food that took place in your home? Right. Did you get rewarded or did you with food if you got a good grade in school? Or did your parents, you know, soothe you with food if you were upset? Right. Did they give you treats? Right, treats if you did well in school or if you were upset? Because a lot of these patterns subconsciously instill our beliefs around food and our health and our behaviors with regards to food as well. Okay? So you don't have to have something written in this moment, but give it some thought in terms of what was going on in your household and what paradigms and beliefs you have around health. And the nice thing is that all of these things can change, right? So if you think back and have that paradigm or belief that as we get older, we're meant to get sicker, we're meant to get disease, guess what, you can change that, Right? So you don't have to carry on with those beliefs and paradigms. But the first step is to become aware of that chatter that we have with ourselves. So give it some thought and really journal about that this weekend. Right, right. That down on your papers. And the second thing that I really want you to reflect on is what is your identity when it comes to your health? Do you identify with someone who's healthy and prioritizes their health and goes for a walk every day, perhaps tries to eat healthy meals, tries to drink enough water? What is your identity when it comes to your health? Do you try to get 10,000 steps a day? Do you try to eat whole foods, unprocessed foods? Do you try to get to bed at 10? What's your identity when it comes to your health? Right. What are those day to day decisions that you're making when it comes to your health? And our identity is important because it determines our reality, it determines our day to day decisions. An example is someone who identifies as being vegetarian. All their food choices are going to be surrounded by the fact that they're vegetarian and that they don't eat meat. If you identify with being healthy and making healthy choices, then all your food choices, maybe not all, but like 90% of them, will probably be aligned with being healthy. Right? So it's super important for us to actually think about these things and put them down on paper. Right? And once again, this is Something you can change. Right? So if your identity used to be someone who is inactive doesn't get up and move a lot, then you can change that. Right? That's the nice thing about all of these things is we can change them. We don't have to be stuck with old paradigms and old identities. Okay? And then another thing that I'd like you to all reflect on. You can maybe turn your paper over and do this. At the back is your why? Why do you want to be healthy? Why are you doing this program? And the key to this exercise is to go seven layers deep. Okay? So why do you want to be healthy? I want to be healthy because I want to lower my blood pressure. Why? Why do you want to lower your blood pressure? Right. So you're going to keep asking yourself why seven times after each response that you write down. Okay? Because usually it's not really about the blood pressure. It's something deeper. Right. Usually it's not about the weight. It's something deeper. Okay, so those are a few exercises. Like I say, you don't have to do it now. It might take some time for you to reflect and formulate what your paradigm and identity and what your why is, but it's a very important exercise for you to do. Okay? So take some time this weekend to write some things down. When we write things down, it's that much more powerful. Okay. Whether it's a journal, whatever it might be, take some time to do these exercises. Okay? Anyone have any questions with regards to what we just covered?

No?

Okay, so if you don't have any questions about that exercise specifically, we can move on to our Q and A. So you can type your question in the chat, or you can raise your zoom hand or just kind of wave me down and I'll unmute you and we can go from there. I know there are some new members here that are probably going to be starting here shortly once they get their package. So welcome, excited for you all. So if you, like I said, have questions, then please type them in the chat. Mary says, great activity. I will do this with my son, who is 28 when he is home. Okay. Awesome. Yeah, great activity to do with your children too. Right. It's never too late, right, to instill some of these paradigms in our children as well. Right. Even if we have older children. My children, my, my. My son is now 12.

Right.

So he's a little older now. But there's things that we learn every day, right. That we try to teach him and instill in him. And Alice and Annalisa, if you have any questions that clients have submitted this past week, please feel free to unmute yourselves and ask those questions. And I don't know if you wanted to add anything else to that exercise that we just did as well. Okay, what questions do you guys have for the new people? Do you want me to go over the program at all with you in a little bit? Just a general overview of what you're going to do? To start, say yes or no if you'd like me to cover that, or we can cover something else as well. What do you guys want to discuss today? You guys are so quiet today. Geez.

Cynthia has a question.

Okay.

She. Her question is, I have questions about what when to take supplements and medication. Once I begin eating the part. Once I begin the eating part of the program. And she would like you to go into some detail about the program overview.

Okay, awesome. So, Cynthia, I'm going to ask to unmute you. Okay. There you are. Welcome. How are you today? Good, good. Okay. So when it comes to medications, are you usually taking them in the morning with food?

Yes.

Okay, so if you're doing them in the morning with food, when you're on the release phase, are they like blood pressure medications? What type of medications are there, if you don't mind me asking? There's a blood pressure and a cholesterol.

But I also take supplements.

Okay.

And vitamins.

Okay. So have you ever tried taking the medication or the supplements on an empty stomach? No, but I could. So usually with medications, for the most part, the reason why people take them with food is to avoid any stomach upset. That's not to say that everyone will have stomach upset. So you could try. You could keep the timing the same and take them with an empty stomach with some water, or you could shift the time to around lunchtime. Okay. Okay. So you could just shift the dosing. If you feel like when you take them on empty stomach, it does cause you a little bit of stomach upset, then just shift it to lunch with food. Okay.

Thank you.

You're very welcome. And you can also, for some people, like on the release phase with the fasting, they'll just shift their whole eating window a little earlier. Right. So you can also do that, for example, like you can have your first meal at around 11 instead of waiting till 12 or 1 if you wanted to, just to get those medications and supplements in a bit earlier.

Okay, thanks.

Yeah, you're welcome. So when it comes to. When you guys, for the new people who, you know, are just starting, when you receive your package. You're basically going to determine when you're going to get started. And when you get started, you're going to start filling out the journals in practice, better, which is the app that you're going to download either on your phone or you can use the desktop version. Okay. When you download the app or when you, you know, start using the desktop version, you're going to start with inputting your food journal and your lifestyle journal. So the first two days of program are the loading phase, which is when you're going to try to eat, you know, up to 5,000 calories a day for two days, which is a lot of food. But try your best tips for the loading phase is going to be to try to eat smaller meals throughout the day rather than having three large meals all at once. If you haven't had your gallbladder removed, you're going to want to eat foods that are higher fat because they're more calorically dense. You're going to take your spray seven times, three times a day, 7am, 2pm, 9pm on the two loading days, and then the third day in the morning, you're going to take all your measurements and pictures. Make sure when you take your pictures, you know, week to week that they're consistent. So we try to encourage that you wear the same clothes, stand the same distance from wherever you know the person who's taking the picture is, so that we get the same perspective. And then you'll start the release phase. So for the release phase, you're going to drop the spray to five sprays three times a day. And then you will have your 4 ounces of protein, 4 ounces of fruit, 4 ounces of non free vegetables, and unlimited amount of free vegetables for lunch and dinner. And all the foods that you're allowed to eat are going to be listed in your guide. So you're going to continue that up until day 42. And then you'll transition to the maintenance phase, which will go into more detail. I don't want to overwhelm you with too much information, so the guide will have some instructions on how to do that. The other thing in practice, better that you will be getting access to is the program modules. Even for those of you who have already started your journey with us, make sure you take a look at those program modules because they're filled with actionable and valuable information with regards to certain topics. Okay? So make sure you review those program modules as well. Okay. Few other questions came in. So Layla has her hand up. So I'll address Layla's question first, and then I'll go to some of the ones that are in the chat. Layla, you can go ahead and unmute.

All right. Good afternoon, everybody. I wanted to ask about the breathing exercises. It's the first time I've really done them, and I found it hard to hold the breath for seven seconds and definitely ran out of breath and trying to exhale. And I just wanted to double check. When you're inhaling, you're going through your nose. What about when you're exhaling?

I recommend the inhale is obviously more important to go through the nose, but if you can, I always recommend trying to focus mostly on the nose for the inhale and the exhale.

Okay. And does it just take practice for the holding?

Exactly. That's exactly what I was going to say is it just takes practice. So for you, if you're finding. Usually most people can hold for about four seconds pretty easily.

Yeah.

So start with four, and then slowly, as you increase your capacity, you can go to five seconds and then six, and then seven.

And when you're breathing, are you taking the breath into your chest or into the lower diaphragm?

Great question. So when you're breathing, the proper way to do an inhale is to inhale with expanding the belly first and then the ribcage and then the chest.

Okay.

And that takes a lot of work. Like, even I, you know, we went to a breathwork retreat in March, and it's not easy because of the way, like, that's how a baby breathes. Right. And as we get older with, you know, all the stress that we go under and, you know, sometimes, you know, physical changes in our body, we, you know, start to breathe incorrectly. And many of us just breathe from our chest rather than using our. All our muscles. Right. The proper breathing muscles, like our ribs and our diaphragm. So it does take practice and does take awareness. As we're talking about breathing here is just regular breathing. If you're just sitting at your desk, it should be 6 seconds on the inhale and 6 seconds on the exhale. And there's a lot of great apps that you can download. One is called Eyebreath.

Okay.

Or I breathe. Sorry.

Okay.

And you can just like, if you're doing some quiet work, you can just set that, and you can set the interval to six seconds. Six seconds. And then it'll just kind of prompt you to inhale and exhale every six seconds. So that's really good practice, too.

And how about when you're eating so.

When you're eating or talking, like, even for me when I'm talking it's, you know, hard to obviously time my breath because, you know, it's a little more difficult. So, you know, when you're eating and talking, it's going to be a little different. But like for me, when I'm doing a lot of talking like this, I try to take pauses, right.

So that I can still through the nose or through the mouth.

So when I'm talking, like, I'll occasionally take breaths through my mouth because it's just easier to do that when I'm talking. But as soon as I can take a pause, then I'll go back to nose breathing.

Okay.

Yeah.

Thank you. Very welcome.

Very welcome. And we have a whole module on breathing. Like it goes really deep. So make sure you watch that module. It's like packed with like great tips and information about breathing and how it has such a ripple effect on our health.

That's great. Thank you.

You're very welcome. So Denise says any input about dairy free yogurts. Okay. So the problem with a lot of these dairy, dairy free yogurts is that many of them are very processed. So Denise, I don't know if you live in the US or in Canada because the brands obviously differ. So here in Canada, the only dairy free yogurt that I found to be like unprocessed. I mean at the end of the day it is still a little processed, but in terms of the ingredients being clean is a brand called Yogu. And this would obviously be for the maintenance phase, not for the release phase. This is a Canadian brand. I'll put it in the chat. And if you look at the ingredients, it's like very unprocessed. So where is it? Just on their website here. But it's, it's based, it's made from coconut cream. So. And it has some probiotics in it and it's. Yeah, it's very clean. So I put the link there and you guys can take a look at it. If you do live in Canada, that's a good option for a dairy free yogurt. Some of the brands that I know US and Canada both share are things like silk. Like a lot of those are going to have a lot of gums and things like that. So if you tolerate dairy, I rather you just eat like actual, you know, high quality yogurt because it's going to be way less obviously processed than a dairy free yogurt. So if it's like an organic like Greek yogurt, Then that's probably, probably going to be better than some of the dairy free yogurts that are out there. Of course, if you tolerate yogurt, that is, or dairy. Okay, so Mickey says I'm on the maintenance phase. I keep gaining, losing same three pounds, mostly due to inflammation. Can I look at tests that might hone in on what really shouldn't be, I shouldn't be eating. So as I had mentioned, as I've mentioned before, after you complete this program, the release phase, that's your body's new metabolic set point, right. So your weight is going to, for, I would say 90% of people stay the same plus or minus 3 pounds. So that response that you're having is normal. Okay. If of course, you start eating, you know, a lot of processed foods and a lot of refined carbohydrates, then it is going to go up again, right? Because your hormones are going to start to become imbalanced again and you know you're going to increase that weight, right? Increase that inflammation. But plus or minus three pounds, once you're done with the release phase is normal. There are some tests, like in terms of, maybe you're asking about food sensitivity tests. There are like in the US there's better one, it's called an MRT test in Canada. We can't run the MRT here, but there are some food sensitivity tests that you can do. But in general, for the traditional food sensitivity test, if you are sensitive to foods, then we always want to dig deeper and ask why, right? Is it leaky gut? Is it a digestive related issue that you're experiencing? So it can be valuable. But if you are sensitive to a number of foods, then we want to ask why, right? And usually it's the gut that needs some help if you are sensitive to a lot of foods. Okay. Leovi says I'm going into maintenance next week. Wow, that went by fast. LEO V. Do you recommend staying with the intermittent fasting or try to eat something in the morning? So off of the release phase, in terms of whether we should continue intermittent fasting, I usually recommend that some, that you maintain some level of intermittent fasting at least 12 to 13 hours, which for most people is doable. Right. So if you finish your dinner at seven, then that means you wouldn't eat your breakfast till eight. Right. So for most people that's doable. And in terms of the, you know, longer periods of fasting, like what you're doing on the release phase, 16 hours or even sometimes 17 hours, you want to find something that works Best for you. So for some people, they feel really good doing 16, 17 hours fasting seven days a week. Right. For some people they may do breakfast maybe three or four days a week and then do the fasting, you know, three or four days a week. So it just depends on finding something that works best for you. Specifically. For some women who are still cycling, then you might want to add a breakfast back in because that can impact our hormones a little bit if we fast for really prolonged periods of time. I would play around and see what works best for you, but I would try to maintain the 12, 13 hours at least. Number one, on a day to day basis, even if you are going to add breakfast back in three days a week, at least maintain that 12 to 13 hours of fasting. Sorry, I meant to say even though you're adding breakfast in seven days a week. Okay, so if you can't tolerate dairy.

Then.

I don't know if you're asking about dairy alternatives, But of course if you don't tolerate dairy, you would want to avoid it. For some people, they may be more sensitive to cow's dairy. So you could try goat dairy, like a feta for example. Goat feta, some people will tolerate that versus cow's dairy. And if you still don't tolerate that, then you know, once again, some of the plant based alternatives, you do have to be a little careful because they do contain a lot of gums and stuff like that. So for yogurt I would, you know, I know Leovi lives in Canada, so I would suggest the yogurt and then cheese. There really isn't a good cheese that's dairy free. They're mostly, they're really processed. So something like Alice put in, nutritional yeast can be a good option. So nutritional yeast has kind of like a Parmesan type of flavor to it. So you can sprinkle that on like let's say some zucchini noodles or something like that if you want it to have that cheesy flavor. And then butter. Most people are, I know we talked about this a few weeks ago about butter, but most people, if they are intolerant to dairy, they can tolerate ghee. Ghee is just the fat. It doesn't contain the dairy proteins. And if you are going to be intolerant to dairy, it's usually the dairy proteins that people don't tolerate well with the dairy fat, which is what ghee is. People tolerate well. Okay, Baruch put. I'm starting week six and I'm unsure of how to introduce foods with the maintenance phase. So we have a Google Doc, Annalisa, which I'll you probably have if you want to share that with Barucha in terms of. In which order to introduce the foods in to give you a little bit more guidance. Okay. And that is something that we're going to eventually add to the guide as well, just to give you a little bit more guidance in terms of the order. But typically you always want to start with the healthy fats first. So if it's some sort of cooking oil, whether it's olive oil that you use in your salads, or if it's coconut oil or avocado oil, you want to start with those type of healthy fats. Avocados, nuts, seeds. If you're eating things like salmon or, you know, fatty fish, you can introduce those. So always do the healthy fats first. And usually start with about a tablespoon. Let's. So let's say you wanted to do olive oil, you would do a tablespoon in your, In your salad. And then if you feel like you tolerate it well, you could do another tablespoon at dinner. And then if you felt like you did fine with it, you could do another fat the next day. Okay. After you introduce fats in, you can.

Do.

Some of the. You could try a starch, right? Like sweet potato. If you want to try some sort of grain. Usually I'll recommend trying to stay gluten free just because I find that most people don't do well with gluten. So you can try a grain or you can even try some legumes or lentils if you feel like you tolerate those. Of course, those who have, you know, any kind of digestive issues, then those legumes and lentils might be a little bit harder to digest. Okay, so I'll have Annalisa send that over to you. Yes. So I know there's lots of information. I know someone here put a comment I'm getting overwhelmed just listening to. Yeah. So wait for your package. Read the guide. And the first thing that you're going to focus on when you receive your package is just implementing the nutritional part of the program. And then slowly we can, you know, layer other things in as well. And the Google Doc that I'm referring to should be in your program modules as well. So when you get to the maintenance phase module, the Google Doc should be in there as well. Okay. So Jen, Jan is asking, does the Practice Better app indicated which week we are in? No, it does not, unfortunately. But our, whoever your coach is, Jan, whether I think it's Annalisa. She, she will, she's keeping track of what day you're on. So if you're just, if you're not unsure, just shoot her a quick message and she can let you know which day you're on. Hey, Sophia is asking, is gluten the only type of food you recommend not to reintroduce on the maintenance phase? So typically it's going to be processed foods, which we want to really minimize and avoid. So gluten is in a lot of processed foods like cookies and pastries and cakes, sugars as much as you can. Avoiding sugars, Avoiding sugary drinks, even drinks with artificial sweeteners like your Diet Cokes and things like that. And then for some people, dairy. Right. Not for everyone, but some people. And you want to, you know, the maintenance phase is, is a chance for you to try some of these foods just to see how you do with it. Right. Because you haven't had them for six weeks. And then let's say you wanted to introduce, let's say you wanted to try having, you know, a cookie, just throwing it out there. How do you feel? Right. Sometimes it's a good learning lesson. Right. Like, whoa, that didn't feel so good. Right. So it kind of reaffirms why we probably won't be eating those foods on a regular basis. Okay. So just mostly it's going to be processed packaged foods that you really want to keep to a minimum. Okay. Ed, should the Renfo health app scale link to practice better? So practice better is eventually, like within the next couple of weeks going to be linking with Apple Health and Apple Watch. So if you can link your remph with Apple Health or Apple Watch, and then eventually when they release that, you can then sync it with your practice better. That's kind of the indirect way to do it right now because right now they don't link. So the things that practice better does integrate with right now is an app called Chronometer. Some of you have heard of it. Fitbit and I think those are the two main things. Okay. Cynthia is asking, can we drink kombucha in any of the phases? Yes, you can try it in the maintenance phase in terms of fermented foods. On the release phase, you can do things like sauerkraut. Okay. And Sophia says, I guess gluten free is not an option because they're filling sugars. Yeah. So, you know, there's a couple ways to look at it at gluten free alternatives is, yes, it might not contain the gluten. So you might tolerate it better from like a digestive standpoint because it doesn't have the gluten. But the other flip side of that is a lot of the gluten free products are actually, from a blood sugar standpoint going to be worse because a lot of them contain things like tapioca starch and potato starch and all these other starches that actually spike your blood glucose more than just having a piece of wheat bread would have. So from a blood sugar standpoint, they're worse, but from a gluten standpoint they're a little better. Right. So it's still not the ideal thing, but once again, it's like, you know, where do we find that balance? Right? And so it's not about that you'll never have cake ever again in your life, Right? But how do you kind of stick to the protocol like 90% of the time and eat whole food 90% of the time and then maybe that 10% is when you might have something off plan. Right. And if you are going to have something off planets, well, how can we make or choose better, healthier alternatives? Right? So maybe it's a gluten free cookie that you make at home versus, you know, going to the store. So maybe it's like an almond flour cookie, right? Or Alice, I know, has some great, like dessert recipes. There's a blogger I know that she follows. Bakerita has some great gluten free whole food. Like a little healthier, right? Does have some sugar in it, but it's going to be a lot more healthier than, you know, getting something from, you know, here in Canada. Like if you went to like Loblaws and got a gluten free cake from there, it's probably going to be filled with crap. Okay. Denise says if we do a second round, we cut out all the foods we have reintroduced. So second round would basically be after four weeks of maintenance, you would do the loading phase again and then the release phase again. Okay. So it'd be repeating the exact same process again. But you do have to have four weeks in between to do another round. Jen's asking, does the Thrive supplement Gluten Away really work to help maintain gut health? So these type of supplements, I know there's lots on the market. I'm not sure what the exact ingredients are for this one. I'd have to look it up. But a lot of these supplements that help with digesting gluten better are more so for you to use if you're like a Celia, like if you have celiac for example, or you're highly, highly sensitive to gluten and you go out to eat and sometimes it's hard to avoid cross contamination, then you can use these. But it's not necessarily for you to use as a free pass to eat something with gluten, per se. So these products are basically going to have, for the most part, an enzyme called DPP4, which helps to digest gluten a little better. Okay. Or they might have different enzymes like proteases and probiotics to help help with mitigating some of those accidental exposures of gluten. Okay. Somebody's asking, can I use. Can I continue this plan with East Indian Gujarati food? Yes. So, great question. I'm Gujarati as well. I don't know. It says iPad, so I don't know who that is. But you're going to be given in your guide a list of approved foods, and you can kind of cook them any way you like. So I'm just trying to think of, you know, there's going to be a list of vegetables, a list of proteins. I don't know if you're vegetarian or not, and then a list of fruits, and you can cook them any way you like. So you can add all your Indian spices to those foods and still, you know, and this goes for any cuisine. Right. If you enjoy, like, Mexican or, you know, Chinese or whatever it is, you can still, for the most part, cook the food and use the spices as long as they don't have sugars in them and make them taste the way your traditional foods taste. As long as you're following the list of the approved proteins and vegetables and fruits. Okay. So you might have to pivot a little bit, but you can definitely still make them taste like your traditional foods. Hey, Jan's asking, are there peptide supplements that will help more effectively maintain gut health? So there's lots of supplements out there. It depends on the individual, what you're struggling with. Right. For me, when it comes to supplements for gut health, my philosophy is always test, don't guess. So, like, what are you using it for? Right. So we don't want to just throw random supplements without knowing what's actually going on in the gut and why we're using it. So for some of our clients, after they're done this program, we, if you wanted to dig deeper, can do like a GI map test and, you know, dig a little deeper to see what's going on and what specific supplements you may or may not need. Thanks, Alice, for chiming in about that. Do you want to speak to that at all.

Sure. So keeping consistent with your oral routine is really important in keeping a healthy gut microbiome. So making sure that you're using clean products, using a toothpaste that does not contain fluoride, ideally you want to even make it at home yourself. So there's some great recipes that I can share in the Facebook group if anybody is interested. And it's very quick and simple to make as well. But if you have any kind of additional maybe mouth diseases that you're working with or maybe gingivitis using something like Biocidin. So that's a really awesome toothpaste that's going to help to balance out your oral microbiome. Making sure you're not using again any sort of preservatives or too many additives like Deepa mentioned, I think a couple of weeks ago. You can even make your own mouthwash. So taking filtered water, adding in a pinch of Celtic salt to remineralize it. Additionally you can put a silver liquid that is sold by Designs for Health. So again, just quickly cleaning up the microbiome and and then additionally there is the On Guard essential oil. So using that one from Doterra is, is really, really great. You also want to make sure your tongue scrap use a water flosser. So it's not going to irritate your gums either. It's kind of just pressure washing your teeth. It's very satisfying. It gets a little bit messy, but you know, it's, it's definitely well worth it. And sometimes you can even do oil pulling with coconut oil as well. So that kind of helps to draw any sort of bacteria that might be lingering in between the gums, in between the teeth. So doing that for even 10 minutes. And yes, you can do it on the release phase since you're not consuming the oil.

So.

So just swishing it around. Start with five minutes because it is an intense workout for your cha and for your mouth. So slow and easy does it. But doing it a little bit is better than doing none of it. So meet yourself where you're at and I can also post that whole routine as well. I've posted it in the Facebook group before, but I'll repost it for whoever else is interested.

Awesome. Thanks for sharing. Yeah, and I know we get a lot of questions about the toothpaste we use. So there's, as Alice said, there's the homemade ones. There's also the toothpaste that I've really switched to in the last few months is a toothpaste that contains hydroxyapatite. So hydroxyapatite helps to remineralize the teeth and keep them strong. So there's a company called Wellness that sells it. So I can put a link to that in the chat here. Okay. Bruka has a question. I'm going to go ahead and unmute. You go ahead and unmute.

So can we use the OURA ring to help figure out what foods we're sensitive to?

You can. So basically the Oura ring measures two parameters called resting heart rate and heart rate variability. So when, like, obviously you want to pay attention to any symptoms you might experience. Right. And when you're reintroducing foods in, if you are intolerant to them, then it can be anything. Right. It doesn't always just have to be digestive. So it could be a headache, it could be a skin reaction, it maybe you felt really tired or sleepy afterwards. So it could be any of those reactions. Okay. But if you don't have one of those reactions, then you can, you know, there doesn't necessarily always mean that you didn't, didn't tolerate the food because there could be some, you know, inflammation that's going on at a cellular level that might not really cause any symptoms. Right. So if you use your OURA ring as a marker, if your day was pretty, you know, stress free, there wasn't anything, you know, abnormally different that happened minus the fact that you introduced that new food in and you saw that your resting heart rate drastically increased. Right. So that would mean like at least four or five points from what it normally is and your heart rate variability drastically decreases. Then that could mean that that food was a stressor on your body.

Okay.

Okay. So those are two parameters that you can kind of use to determine if that food is causing an additional stress to your body or not.

Okay.

What are any other questions or comments? Okay, well, I will let all you wonderful ladies and gentlemen get back to your Friday. It was great connecting with you guys today. Hope you found that exercise helpful. And we'll see you all next Friday. And as always, if you have any questions, let us know. We're here to support you, here to make sure that you get the best from this program and we'll do our best to be of service to you and, and support you along this journey. So thanks for being here, I really appreciate it and we'll see you next Friday.

Thank you.

Okay, bye everyone.

Bye everyone.

Happy Friday. Have a great weekend.

Have a great weekend. Bye.