Muscle Centric-Medicine with Dr. Gabrielle Lyon

Hi, I'm Natalie Jill, fat loss expert turned lifestyle and high performance coach. Welcome to Listen up the podcast. On this podcast, I do what I do best. Taking complicated information that is relevant to us now and breaking it down simply with actionable steps you can implement to level up your life. I also regularly interview some of the most inspiring and courageous men and women on the planet who at their worst, learned how to achieve success greater than anything they ever, ever dreamed possible. Creating everything from nothing. If you are new here, I encourage you to go back and listen from episode one, when this podcast was previously called Leveling up for the Full Transformative Experience. Today I'm here with my friend Gabrielle Lyon, Dr. Gabrielle Lyon. She's a functional medicine doctor and she specializes in muscle centric medicine. Dying to have her on because she makes some really interesting posts that can be taken quite controversial. But. But it's important information and I thought I've got to have her on and have this conversation real time. I had questions for her and I know you do too. So thanks for being on today so much. I'm so happy to talk to you.

Of course, of course. Thank you for having me.

Yeah. So I want to start with you're a functional medicine doctor. Can you explain what that is? Because I've had different types of doctors on and then I've had biologists, I've had naturopathic MDs. Like, what is a functional medicine doctor?

Well, a functional medicine doctor by definition is really root cause. And I can tell you from my particular perspective how I practice is it's the best of Western medicine in combination with more, I like to say holistic. But I do the best job that I can to create an interface between evidence based medicine, which is probably where my posts get very controversial, with taking a more gentle or natural approach. And your original question is what is a functional medicine physician? I think that we should differentiate between you can be a functional medicine practitioner, which perhaps is not a physician, or a functional medicine physician, which is medical school. And typically you would do residencies or a fellowship beyond that.

And so how much training does a functional medicine doctor have? Like how much training does that require?

This is a great question. When you think about functional medicine, that's not actually there's only a few residencies that would do what we call functional medicine, which is pretty much interchanged with integrative medicine. And I think that that's Arizona. So that person would do four years of medical school and then do some kind of additional training, whether it's, you know, likely three years and typically when you think about functional medicine, it is not a training in and of its own. So a physician would then go to, say, any specialty, whether it's family practice or emergency medicine, something else, and then do additional certifications in functional medicine.

Got it. Okay. So highly trained. In other words, depending.

Depending on the physician for sure. And I can share you with my training. So I did medical school and then I did two years of psychiatry training at the University of Louisville. Then I did three years of family medicine at North Shore Lij. And then I did a two year postdoc in nutritional sciences, obesity medicine and geriatrics at Washu.

Wow. Okay.

I don't recommend anyone ever doing that.

And she has two kids, FYI, she has two young kids.

Don't forget that. Two babies and a man child.

Oh, two babies and a man child. Your kids are young too, right?

Six months and two years old.

Oh my gosh, she's got her hands full. Total definition of working mom right here.

Yes.

Okay, so let's. I want to start with the main thing that really wanted me on here. You made a post recently and if you could, I wish you could, you all could see her right now. Some of you are watching video, some of you are listening to audio. But first of all, she looks like a supermodel. That's beside the point. But she's got the glowing skin and all that, but this girl is ripped. I mean, she's muscle crossfit. She looks amazing. Always from the. Even pregnant, she looked amazing. And what she posts a lot about is the importance of eating protein. And she tends to draw a lot of controversy to vegans. And it's amazing watching the divisiveness that happens on your page around it. So I want to dive right into that. Like, first of all, let's talk protein. What does that mean to you? Is all protein created equal? I want to hear it from you.

Yes. A protein is really a collection of amino acids. We have essential and we have non essential amino acids. Our bodies require protein in the form of amino acids. And that makes perfect sense. And there are some of these that we have to generate from the diet. We can't make them ourselves, but we have to get it in the form of food. There is a difference between plant based protein and animal based protein. And one of the reasons I'm so vocal about this topic is because of my training. I was trained by one of the world leading protein experts and it's been, you know, I've dedicated my life to this and really what it's about is about optimization. How can someone maintain a good body composition and how can they age well. Right. But, and you know, when I was in training, I started training 20 years ago. I, it was not controversial. Nobody talked about whether you should be eating meat or not eating meat. And that broccoli has the same amino acid profile as a patty, a beef burger. I would say within the last roughly seven years there has been this explosion of anti animal narrative. Protein is the most controversial macronutrient and it shouldn't be. Right. And so now you have individuals are saying that you should and listen, if you have a morality against eating meat, I totally understand. But the idea that you would give an individual advice to say further reduce their protein intake is the single worst piece of advice that I would ever give someone. And I am talking, you know, I'm a trained physician and part of my work was in nursing homes and patients towards the end of their life. Right. I trained as a geriatrician. Nobody argues whether these people need more protein. There is, it's the people in the middle that argue. Right. That haven't had the clinical experience or haven't been there.

So, okay, so I, and I'm with you, I totally, I respect when someone has a religious or an ethical and that's, that's their reason. I know for me, for one, I haven't eaten a cow since I was age 12 because I, for whatever reason I would have a cow as a pet. I'm attracted to them, I love them, I feel their feelings. But I'm not a vegan at all. I do eat fish, I do eat chicken, I do eat turkey. And I, and I feel better doing that. But I do understand when people have their reasoning. But I wanted to. And that's not what we're addressing today because that's, that's a whole separate situation. But we're talking specifically about health and what does that create? Like what does it create? And I want to also talk about what type of meat should people be eating. So let's start with that. What type of meat is the ideal and what type is not ideal?

So when, when you think about, I actually would be quite frank and say that there's a lot of push towards regenerative. You know, when you say beef regenerative. Beef regenerative agriculture. I personally believe that if you can get grass fed cattle, grass, you know, finished cattle, that's great. But I don't think that all, you know, meat needs to come from there. And when we say meat, we should differentiate. Are we talking you know, beef or bison. And then of course there's, like you said, there's turkey and chicken and fish. These are all fantastic forms of protein. I think that we need to really understand that getting that macronutrient in is the highest. If I think about the hierarchy, that's number one.

Okay, and why is that?

Because if you tell people to swap out protein or decrease their protein or that they should only have organic meat, they have to replace it with something. And you had asked me earlier, is all protein created equal? It's not. To get a three ounce chicken breast, you would need around six cups of quinoa.

Yeah.

To make up that amino acid profile. That's, that is metabolically disastrous.

And you're getting all the issues that.

Go along with getting all the carbohydrates. This is disastrous. And in the health and wellness space there is a lot of talk about organic. And if you can afford organic, which that can become very expensive. You know, my husband is a very large human. He would probably easily go through two pounds of some kind of animal product a day. You know, where we're fortunate that we can, you know, pay for that. It's, it's expensive. It's expensive and that's how we allocate funds. So we say that we, we're going to get the best source. But I think that when you tell people that it has to be organic, then they begin to limit their protein intake and that becomes a problem.

Do you personally choose? I do. I personally do choose organic and grass fed and finish. That's what I look for. So I'm curious if you do or.

Does that I do a mix. No, I don't have that. It doesn't have to be organic for me and it doesn't have to be grass fed.

So the concern that comes up with me, and maybe it's nonsense, but let me know, I'm open to learning is I think of like the antibiotics or what we've heard that they're eating, they're eating grains and so, and I don't want that. Is that myth? Is that, does that.

That's not myth. That's not myth. There are, you know, animals are, can be grain fed and it tends to make them fatter. As it relates to antibiotics. The antibiotics, we have to think there's, there's two things to consider here. The natural animal will live longer. It has a longer life cycle. It will contribute. You know, if we were worried about greenhouse gas, then the contribution as a life cycle is longer. Of course we can all agree that cattle is not the number one contributor to greenhouse gas. Right. That's electricity, transportation and industry.

Yeah.

When cattle is conventionally raised, the majority of cattle actually is raised by small farms. There is a subset that does, you know, that goes to feedlots and these animals are raised quicker. And that's oftentimes where antibiotics come in or grains come in that cannot, the antibiotics cannot be in the system when something comes to market.

Got it.

So it cannot be detectable when it comes to market.

So the, the argument that don't have that, that I just learned something too, that that's not necessarily an issue at that, at this point.

Correct. That makes sense.

Okay.

And these are great questions. I don't think anyone has ever asked me some of these questions. So I love the opportunity to talk about it. And in theory we have to, you know, it's always a balancing act. Do we want cattle to live longer? There's issues with that. Do we want them to live shorter? There's obviously issues with that. And people will say, well, a feedlot's not good. And the reality is there's bad practices in every industry. And it doesn't mean that that's the majority of the practices. Cattle are herding animals. They like to be together, they like to be in close contact. So if you were to put out cattle in, in a field, they would all huddle together.

So I have a woo woo question. I don't know if you've gotten any.

Woo woo in you, but I zero question.

I have like, I have like but. Or if there's part of you that's woo. I probably have 25% woo woo in me. So I mean I wear crystals and all the stuff so I like, I like woo woo.

Well, with our kind of friend group there's always a little.

Okay, I have a little woo woo question. So I believe in energy transfer. So like if you're eating an animal that was distressed, I believe that you can take that on. And when I was in Costa Rica, I was like distraught for days because they had the place we were staying. They talked about having grass fed cattle and they free roaming. And when I went down to go look at them, they were like tied to a fence neck in and I swear they were crying.

So I saw tears and I was.

I took it on, I felt sad for them. And what came over me and again I said it's a woo woo. So was like if they're distressed and scared and then we're eating that, do we take that energy on? Is that ridiculous or Is there something to it?

Well, I'm to say. Okay, I would be lying to say that I haven't if I said that I hadn't thought about that before. That's not true. Okay, Absolutely have thought about that. And I don't know that question, that answer, but I will tell you, I've had numerous patients say exactly the same thing.

Okay.

That they've had that experience and that. And those are typically. They're typically a subset of patients that are very feeling and.

Yeah. Empathic. Yeah, empaths. So that's what.

And so I would say that they're. I mean, there probably is. There's. There's things beyond what we know. Right.

Going back to your psychology, you know, training, I think even if we believe that, so it's. It kind of makes it so. So it's like regardless whether it's factual or not, if I am stuck in my head believing that that's something I would experience. Probably.

Yeah, absolutely. But listen, I think it would be foolish for us to say that there isn't some transfer of something. Right. At the end of the day, it is all energy, not to be too weird. So there has to be something, and we just may not be able to test for it.

Okay, I want to talk fat loss, aging, and science right now, when it comes to protein. Now, in my programs, what I teach constantly is a balance between protein, carbs, and fat. And I look at ideal carbs like fruits and vegetables. I'm a fan of those. I'm not such a fan of grains. I'm not a fan of dairy. I'm not a fan of sugar. But I am really big on talking about protein, the right carbs, and great for you, fats. That's the way what I teach an unprocessed natural food diet. But what comes up a lot is this question about can your plan be vegan? Can you do vegan? Vegan. Vegan, vegan. And I always say the same answer. Ethically, I understand where you are. I can't help you with fat loss from that angle, and I can't help you with that, with accelerating aging and pain and all of that. Right. I'd love to know from you as a doctor, your science, even if I'm wrong, I want to just hear, like, let's talk about that. Like, what diseases get created by not doing this.

What.

How do we rapidly accelerate fat and aging?

Well, you know, when you think about. Without going into the equation of calories in, calories out, which absolutely matter, we have to understand that each macronutrient affects metabolism differently. So there is this concept called the thermic effect of feeding. I'm sure, you know, we've all kind of heard about that. And that contributes to that calories in calories out equation, particularly calories out. When you eat dietary protein, which is one of the reasons I'm such a big advocate of it, is because it really does help maintain body weight. When you eat protein, high quality protein, the amount of energy it takes to eat that is roughly or processes roughly 20% of that total calories in, for example, 100 calories of steak, you might only net 80 calories from that.

Okay.

Because it takes 20%.

Wow.

Of that caloric, you know, of that calorie to actually metabolize the food.

Okay.

So number one for protein, if you are thinking about what foods versus a vegan diet, which is all carbohydrates and fats.

Yes.

And that their thermic effect of feeding is about 5% at its highest versus 20%. So you store more of those calories.

Makes sense, right? Makes sense.

So protein as it relates to, and this is really the most important is muscle mass. You need a protein threshold to be able to stimulate skeletal muscle.

Okay.

They're like, well, what does that mean? This goes back to your original question, are all proteins equal? There is a difference between plant protein and animal protein. We talked about that as it relates to the chicken, and that you would need a three ounce chicken breast versus six cups of quinoa. By eating that, you know, should be a little bit higher, say 4 ounces of chicken, you'll get roughly 30 grams of protein in that chicken breast. It has an amino acid, which is an essential amino acid called leucine. This leucine amino acid triggers skeletal muscles, so it triggers muscle protein synthesis. Why do you need that? Because if you want to age healthy and you want to change your body composition, like you said, in terms of being able to build muscle, keep muscle, and lose body fat, the quality of the weight loss is all about losing body fat, not total weight.

Okay.

By getting a bolus amount of protein, you protect skeletal muscle. And you do this for say three meals a day or four meals a day. Over a period of time, you have the best opportunity to prevent sarcopenia. Right. And we've all seen sarcopenia, which is decreased muscle strength, muscle mass. You know, we've all seen our parents kind of get older and you lose high quality weight.

Yes. Wow.

That's just. So those are two reasons why protein is really important for fat loss. The other Thing and your women will probably relate to this is appetite regulation.

Yes. And insulin, I'm assuming.

Yeah, yes, and of course, and insulin. There you go. Appetite regulation is. We know that there is a satiety effect, an effect on hunger from protein based on gut hormones. You are much less likely to overeat if you are eating in a protein forward manner. And then like you said, insulin protein stimulates only what we call a phase one insulin response, which is already the pre, firm preformed insulin, as opposed to eating, I don't know, a huge bowl of oatmeal, which you're going to get a much more robust insulin response.

And if you're, if somebody is listening, questioning this, I will tell you, for years I was the get up and have oatmeal for breakfast and a banana type of person and I'd be starving.

Starving an hour later.

So just try. If I get up and have eggs for breakfast and some turkey bacon or whatever it is, I'm not hungry for hours. Right. It's a whole different experience. It's a whole different experience. So for fat loss, totally makes sense. It makes sense to me. There's a huge misconception about cholesterol and heart disease from eating meat. Can we talk about that?

Yes. I think that, you know, we've all heard don't eat meat because it affects cholesterol. And I will say that high fat diets, perhaps when it relates to cholesterol, only make a difference in one aspect, and that is individuals that are already hyper responders. Right. Say, let's say they have familial high cholesterol. So it runs in their family. They eat a bunch of saturated fat or they eat a bunch of fats and you see their numbers go up. But the reality is for all the rest of us, we have a cholesterol set point and our body makes cholesterol. It is not from the diet and cholesterol protects us.

Cholesterol is a bad rap and it absolutely affects us.

Right. And if you really care about cholesterol, you really care about triglycerides in the bloodstream, and that's from carbohydrates. That's excess carbohydrates. You know, again, calorie control matters. And it's interesting that cholesterol is a total myth. And in fact, do you want to know what else? They took it out of the guidelines. They took out guidelines for dietary cholesterol.

Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah.

So it's not even in the guidelines. So if you go to your physician and they're like, hey, man, you need to really cut back on your dietary cholesterol. Then you should say, listen, I appreciate you being a physician. You should stick to positioning, and I will go somewhere else for nutrition.

Well, it always has baffled me, and I'm probably not explaining it right to people, but I think you might be able to help with this one. It baffles me that cholesterol is designed to protect us. And then what? And yes, if you have a high cholesterol number, it could be a precursor to heart disease or other things. However, by reducing the cholesterol through medication or whatever, that doesn't reverse the heart disease problem. That's just taking away the protector. Does that make sense?

Yeah. Yeah, totally.

And I don't know how to explain that.

No.

Because I'm not a doctor. No.

Really great point. And that's why you really need to do risk stratification. The point that you're bringing up cholesterol is extremely important because it is such a misconception. And what you're saying is also right. There are individuals that need to reduce the saturated fat or their overall caloric load, and there are patients that need to be treated. But yes, not just looking at their.

The number one thing.

No, it's not.

And I went through this because genetically, I do have high cholesterol, but my. Everything else is fine. And I've had the heart, coronary heart. I've done all the things right. And I know the way I eat keeps it in a safer zone. Okay. But every time I've gone to, like a regular obgyn check up wherever, I always have somebody that's not supposed to be focusing there, that's focused in one place, says, beyond cholesterol.

Eyes up here, buddy.

Yeah. And I'm like, no, I don't. And I'm not a doctor, so I haven't been able to have this argument. I'm going to send them this video now. But. But yes, that always never. That never really made sense to me. I'm like, but that doesn't fix the problem. That's just. It fixes the number.

And you're right. Getting a calcium score is right. And then doing, say, a Boston heart or an advanced partic size is fantastic. In fact, I believe that cardiovascular health is so important that we have a cardiologist in our practice, and that was the first additional physician that I brought in was a criteria.

Oh, that's amazing. Okay. Yeah, I love that.

He's amazing.

So let's talk about cancer. Okay. For a minute because there's a lot pointing lately towards be on a vegan diet to avoid cancer. Where to me this, if I really dig into the science, it's more sugar that could contribute.

You're absolutely right.

So when you're eating a highly processed food diet, lots of sugar, there's definitely a link to that. I can see that. But in my mind, again, not. This is just my logical thinking by changing to a natural unprocessed food diet that's going to reduce the likelihood and could possibly reverse cancer versus going strict vegan. But I want some help with that because I know with the documentaries out and all this stuff, so brutal.

Well, number one, let's talk about what kind of cancer. Are we talking about breast cancer? Are we talking about ovarian cancer? Are we talking about lung cancer, colon cancer? There's multiple different kinds of cancers. One of the biggest contributors to cancer, as if you know, is let's take out smoking, let's take out genetics. Guess what it is.

What?

Obesity.

Oh, okay.

Obesity is a risk factor. If you look on the, you know, the national cancer websites, they will tell you that obesity is a risk factor for cancer.

Okay.

Something happened along the line where again this vegan vegetarian push happened where individuals and really I believe that this is a narrative aspect. So this is a narrative to have people not eat animal products because, not because of science by any means, but truly because of maybe a moral belief. However, you have to have integrity when it comes to promoting science. When you look at the IR committee, the IR committee was, I think we all heard that, oh, process meets a carcinogen or red meats a carcinogen. And this came out of the IR committee, the IR committee, the way that they looked at data. This was a cancer committee, a cancer research committee. They looked at randomized control trials, which are considered the gold standard. And then they looked at observational data and correlation data, meaning you don't actually do an intervention, but an individual that is say smoking is also eating a higher processed meat diet and low fruits and vegetables. Okay, so this group is mostly vegetarian. And so even going into it, there's these biases. They took these, the randomized control trials and they threw out the majority of them. They threw them out because they were small in size. Well, if anyone who's ever done research knows that the, the chances are a ran a randomized control trial is going to be small in size. So they threw these out and then they looked at the observational data, which is very low quality data, where that pointed to a correlation of observational risk of eating meat and cancer. But yeah, well, if this person is smoking or this person is sedentary and then they decided that red meat was going to be a carcinogen.

Okay. I also noticed again, this is just me researching. So tell me, correct me if I'm not having this. Right? I think when I watched those documentaries what they were looking at was highly processed meat or burnt meat like char charred. And those to me that wasn't a fair comparison.

But even that the data doesn't support that.

Okay.

These are people that are really anti animal and they're looking for evidence to fit that narrative.

Okay.

And when you look at the Annals of internal medicine came out. Annals of internal medicine is like the super bowl of journal. It's one of the super bowls of journals. They question these very things. Just they question the same things. They question, you know what, we've been having this narrative come up. Does this make sense? So they used a highly regulated system, the same system that they use for drugs and it's called the grade system. And they looked at everything. I mean these were, this was a major, major undertaking. And what they found was that there was no evidence for individuals to be cutting back on red meat. There's no evidence significant risk between cancers and meat consumption. And that the best that ever, you know that. And this was. These guys were non biased. The vegan community went nuts. They tried to discredit the researchers that have. I mean these are researchers of a lifetime.

Yes, well, we're. What that happens in our world today seems like in a lot of different directions.

Totally. Yeah.

I feel like whatever, somebody, people are going to fight for what they believe and they will do anything to fight for what they believe. I do see that. Talk to me about people because there are a lot of vegans and.

But why not, but why not just say, you know what, I am vegan because of this? Not if you do this. Yeah, like you've seen my page. If you do this, you're a horrible murderer. If you do this, then you know, you're. How could you do this? As a doctor promoting this. And I'm thinking to myself, I don't. First of all, I don't even read my Instagram anymore.

I read your Instagram because it's like reality TV to me. You made it. She made a post the other day.

And I just don't even.

And was a girl that we both know was so sweet and she just chimed in, she said, I totally respect what you, what you're saying here. However, I'm a vegan that's all she said. And I couldn't believe how mean people were to her even. It was like, it was like they were mean to you. They were mean to her. They told her that they hope she died.

I was like, oh, my God, that's horrible. I don't even read. Like I said I didn't. I don't even read it anymore. But one of the reasons, and I just want to mention this, and I'm going to get back to your question, is that if I don't advocate for this stuff, who's going to do it? I mean, I, I feel responsible because I was trained by some of the finest scientists in this area.

Yes. I love me.

First of all, do you think it's fun for me to still talk about this stuff?

Maybe.

I mean, parts of it are fun, but yeah, you know, I'd love to talk about some of the other advancements in, you know, nutritional sciences, but if I don't advocate for this stuff, then the real information gets completely drowned out. I get it.

In fat loss, I talk about unprocessing your diet. That sounds so basic, but same kind of thing. Yeah, it gets washed over. People go so far to these extremes. I'm like, hold on, you got 50 plus pounds to lose. Let's start with unprocessing your diet. Like, let's eat foods. So I get what you're saying there with that. Why do people feel, people that decide to go vegan, it's like across the board, I noticed this. They feel, initially they say they feel amazing, their skin is better, everything's. And then I see that change with lots. But why is that? Why do people say I feel amazing initially?

I thought about this a lot because I see that as well. And there is some data. Well, one, typically you go through something called a methionine restriction, which is an amino acid. And so it upregulates a lot of processes, processes in the body. And perhaps it just does. I don't want to say reset, because that's really nebulous and, you know, incredible. But you restrict an amino acid when you go vegan. And it's possible that this methionine restriction creates a process that makes people feel. Well, the other aspect is you're removing a lot of food groups. You're removing a lot of heavy, heavy foods. And I will tell you, I do think that there is some benefits in cyclically going through a vegan experience. I do it myself, whether it's a week, every couple months, but I feel, and I can't tell you why. It definitely has an impact on the microbiome. Again, that might span longer than a week, but I don't think anyone knows exactly. You're also flooding with a bunch of different kind of nutrients. But I will tell you that they feel great initially and then they just. Hair falls out, their dentition, their gums. I mean, I have seen my sickest patients are. You know, I don't want to throw anyone under the bus, but my sickest patients have definitely been vegan and vegetarian.

Okay. Is it possible for someone to be a healthy vegan and what would they have to do to make that a reality?

So this would require supplementation, and I would typically supplement with creatine, some kind of a method.

It comes from meat. Why creatine comes from meat, though. Yeah. So have to stop that vegan then.

We are not designed, we are not designed to be ruminants.

You just said that they'd have to supplement with an animal product. So it's just interesting. So then it stops.

I mean, they have to, you know, I would recommend that they supplement with brown chain amino acids or essential amino acids. And then of course, you know, I would recommend, you know, vitamin D and omegas, like omega 3 fatty acids. You, you don't get good conversion from plant sources. That ALA situation, just you, you have to supplement.

And then I'm a huge fan of college vitamins. And you can't get collagen from plants. I know people are trying, but that doesn't. That's not.

How does that make any sense? I mean, that's. Collagen is for the structure and integrity of skin and hair and nails and things. And collagen is an incomplete protein, by the way, so it actually doesn't affect muscle mass. It's great for hair, skin, I swear.

By it for skin. So I like it for that. So you can be a healthy vegan, but you'd have to supplement. You'd have to do, I'm assuming, mega doses of vegetables and to. To try to combine.

Oh, you can't. You wouldn't even, even if you did mega doses, it's. You still need to supplement with selenium, zinc, B vitamins, essential fatty acids. Yeah, no, it would be tough to do on food. And then you're looking at an excess of carbohydrates.

Can we talk about dairy for a minute? What's your stance on that? Do you look at that as a good source of protein? Are you a fan of whey? Are you anti dairy?

What? Tell me about it depends on the person I am not anti dairy at all. I think whey protein is phenomenal. Either a whey isolate or whey concentrate. Whey protein has a lot of bioactive compounds that help with immunity.

Okay.

I mean it's amazing product. And then dairy I tend to find clinically, again this is clinical and anecdotally that dairy from cows tend to create mucus for people, you know, can create skin issues. But sheep and goat, they tolerate it well.

So for me personally, with an autoimmune and with my injuries and with the women I deal with who struggle with autoimmune or pain, typically I encourage them if they're going to do dairy, to do raw dairy or goats or sheep. So it sounds like I'm on track with what you just said right there. Because of the inflammation, I don't seem to see the same response with raw dairy or goats or sheep. Right.

Because it is much less processed. And.

Yes. So when you look at protein powders, are you a fan of somebody looking for whey first? Is that your first go to. So versus like a. We'll talk about that. Versus some of these like hemp and pea protein. And what are your thoughts on those?

I think that it's a good. I think that's a great question. Whey protein has been around for a really long time and it, the. The concept of a, a rice pea blend or a pea protein or hemp protein, we don't actually, I'm sure it's okay, but we don't know the long term effects. It is a highly processed food and it's an isolate. We don't actually know what the result of that would be later on. So it's not my first choice. If an individual can't basically if an individual can't deal with whey just with their body doesn't process it. Well, the next thing I might go to would be an animal based powder which could be egg, you know, egg whites and beef proteins. But it has to have a full complex of amino acids.

Okay.

And then. And then I would choose a plant based protein.

Okay. So that would be the second choice. The way one and then, then that or.

Yeah, no, that would be my third choice. Way an animal based. When I say animal based, I mean bone broth protein. No, it'd be like. So there's companies that make egg white kind of egg white with a combination of other kind of animal based.

But egg whites make you two. So I'm just saying just make sure you're alone if you do that one.

Yeah. And and then an animal and then. I'm sorry, then a vegetarian based.

Okay. I'm a fan of either away personally or I do. There is a plant based one that I do like because it does hit the check marks with all the things included in it and how I feel from it. I go heavily on how I feel like if I'm not hungry, if I'm not all those things is what I look at there. Okay, so talk to. Why do you think this is so flipping controversial? Why are people hating each other over this?

I don't know. I'm telling you. And I was thinking about this before and I made a post about this Food is the new religion. And I don't know why. Right. From a scientific perspective, I'm not sure why it's so emotional. The only thing that I can think of is that protein sources have a face and that can make people very emotional. Um, but that being said, you can't discount that it's one of the food sources that have really evolved our brains. Right. It's just true.

What can you tell me the difference between, like, I know that you talk a lot about beef, for instance.

Only because I like it. But it could be anything else. It could be bison.

Are you okay with anything?

I didn't.

Fish. And turkey. Could you be? Or like, am I missing something by not red meat?

I mean, you'd want to get your iron levels checked that your iron might be low, but that's really it. And that's an easy fix. And I, I, like I said, I talk so much about beef, number one, because I like it. Number two, it gets such a bad rap and is actually not true. I mean, I don't know if people are so controversial about turkey.

Yeah.

I'm gonna try a post. You know what, I'm gonna do that and I'm gonna see if people get really pissed off about me.

You know, it's funny because if you look at animals like it, like, look at a dog. Like, if I, if I open raw meat for my dog, he will go crazy.

Right?

Like he. But if I open a vegan dog treat, he's going to spit it out. I feel like innately, like the food chain works like what you crave. I know as much as I don't eat red meat, when I was pregnant, I craved it. I feel like there's something to be said for that, like their biology. We've evolved that direction. So.

Yes, yes.

Okay. So if I'm hearing you correctly, you respect all people's opinions, their choice. You're just going off of science data specifically for aging, for fat loss, for retaining muscle and for health.

That's where I've seen it. Because I don't care if an individual is vegan or not. I was vegetarian for years in college. But I mean, I don't care. But you can't say that it's healthier because that's simply not true. And I'm telling you, anyone who's been in the medical field at the aging end of the spectrum, you talk a lot about aging. You talk a lot about you can be fit at any age. You can't be fit if you're just running. If you're eating the same way that you did when you were in your 20s.

No.

Your body's not going to look the same.

No. And the biggest thing I see is I'm worried of Alzheimer's, dementia, type 2 diabetes. And what people don't know is that type 3 diabetes is actually another name for dementia and Alzheimer's.

That's right.

That's sugar related. That's insulin related. That's not eating a protein based diet.

No. And it's weight. It's really the more overweight an individual is, the more metabolically dysregulated they have the potential to be. And when that happens, happens, you know, it's. You are absolutely right. Dementia is type 3 diabetes of the brain. And this is what I did my fellowship in. So you have to. And that's where, that's actually where muscle centric medicine came from. Muscle centric medicine came from a woman in her 50s with three kids who had always cycled, always struggled to lose weight. She was now overweight. And I imaged her brain because part of the research that I did was I imaged individual's brain. We took them through cognitive testing and the changes in her brain looked like the changes in an Alzheimer's patient.

Wow.

And it. And I realized that I felt like we were failing everyone because we had just kept focusing on weight loss and not really about muscle health and the things that really could have moved the needle for her body composition. And that's where muscle centric medicine came from. And that's where that's how I was born.

So good. So good. One final question about protein here because I know I'm just thinking ahead of what people are going to be asking and thinking from this. How much protein should someone have in a day?

What I typically recommend is 1 gram per pound, ideal body weight. And that's on the higher end, ideal.

So if you weigh 200 pounds. She's not saying 200 grams.

Right.

It's ideal.

And that's actually on the higher end. But you can. It's defendable, right? Okay, there's good evidence. There's. It is defendable by science. That I would pick that. Could you go lower? Totally. Could you go based on your lean muscle mass? You can, but. Or your lean body weight. Lean body weight includes all the, you know, everything else other than fat. Um, yeah. So one gram per pound, ideal body weight.

Got it.

So, and then you, you separate that. So it should be 30 to 50 grams per meal.

Because you can't process more than that. It's not gonna.

Well, you can process it all. But again, you wanna max out that muscle protein synthesis and then you would waste it.

So talk about that for a minute. Cause I process when I think process. Like it's not going all towards your muscle, is what I mean by that. That's right. Can we. Yes. Can you talk that through? Like, what happens when you eat too much at a given time? Where does it go?

Yeah, there's only so much. So basically this leucine threshold, you need a certain amount that then begins this whole process of muscle protein synthesis. You digest and absorb all the protein that you consume, but it won't continue to stimulate that. That pathway, which is called mtor, because that is. Is saturable. It kind of taps out. So then if you have 75 grams of protein per meal, you'll get the max benefit out of your muscle, but you kind of waste that extra 25 grams in terms of, you know, stimulating the tissue. When you could take that protein and stimulate that healthy muscle another time. In addition, that thermic effect of feeding you want to then, you know, you could eat that later.

So, yeah, this was so helpful today. I want everyone go follow her. What's your Instagram handle?

Dr. Gabrielle Lyon.

Everyone go follow her. Give her some love. Because she's getting some controversy lately and her comments are like reality tv. They are for real. Where. And she just told me before we started, she actually work with patients all over the place. So you don't have to be where she is on the east Coast.

Right? So yeah, I have a concierge medical practice where it's a functional medicine practice, integrated practice. You can apply to be a patient. And that's on my website@Dr.gabrielleline.com. and you can sign up for my newsletter, which is highly curated. I write it, I pick studies, put resources, and then I have a YouTube channel.

Oh, I love it. Everyone's going to follow. Everyone's going to check out your website. Thank you so much for being here today. This was so helpful.

Thanks for having me.

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