Tapping Innate Intelligence: Wisdom of the Body

Dr. Sharon Stills

Hi ladies. Welcome back to another interview in Mastering the Menopause Transition Summit. I am your host, Dr. Sharon Stills, and I know I’m always excited, but I’m like really excited because I’ve got a very special guest who I know well and I am really excited to talk about the topic of keto and diet. And for those of us that would like to lose some weight and have metabolic flexibility and how we can do that and what we shouldn’t be doing. And, you know, how we can reach our goals for our metabolism, the way we look. So, it’s such an important topic. I know this is one of the topics that the majority of you, including myself, are like, ooh, we’re gonna learn, we’re gonna learn and see how we can feel better and look better. And Ben Azadi is the king of keto. Look at ketosis on his shirt. He’s got his “Keto Flex” book in the back. Which, the last time I interviewed him for my podcast, I ran out and got that book. So, that’s a great book to have. And so, let me tell you a little bit about him before we start chatting. In 2008, he went through a personal health transformation of shedding 80 pounds of pure fat. 

Ever since, Ben Azadi has been on a mission to help one billion, not one million, one billion, I love it, people live a healthier lifestyle. He’s the author of four bestselling books, “Keto Flex” as I mentioned, “The Perfect Health Booklet”, “The Intermittent Fasting Cheat Sheet”, and “The Power of Sleep”. He’s been the go-to source for intermittent fasting and the ketogenic diet. He’s known as a health detective because he investigates dysfunction and he educates, not medicates, to bring the body back to normal function. He is the founder of “Keto Kamp”, a global brand bringing awareness to ancient healing strategies such as the keto diet and fasting. He’s the host of a top 15 podcast, “The Keto Kamp Podcast”, and the fast growing Keto Kamp YouTube Channel with over 130,000 subscribers and TikTok Channel with over a 200,000 subscribers. And I’ll add in his Instagram channel, ’cause that’s where I’m always following him. He does such great, interesting, informative videos. So, be sure to check him out on the channel of your choice or all the channels and help me welcome him to the summit. Hi, Ben, it’s so good to have you here.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Hey Sharon, thank you for that amazing introduction. Thank you for having me and hello to all you beautiful ladies.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Hi, yeah, it’s easy to give you an amazing introduction ’cause you have just done so many amazing things and are such a force in helping spread health and wellness to the masses. So, I definitely wanna start, you know, when you introduce someone and you say they’ve shed 80 pounds of pure fat, that story needs to be told. So, I’d love if you would just share your journey.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Absolutely. So, like many others out there, I followed a standard American diet growing up and we know that it’s a very toxic, highly processed diet, which is very inflammatory. So, that’s all I knew growing up, that was my awareness. And, as a matter of fact, my mom worked at a Kentucky Fried Chicken, which is a fast food restaurant for those who don’t know, and she was the manager at Kentucky Fried Chicken. So, she would bring me home Kentucky Fried Chicken. And, as a kid, you better believe I ate that Kentucky Fried Chicken. And that was, you know, just my lifestyle growing up. Hung out with the wrong crowd, developed really bad behaviors and habits, addiction to drugs and alcohol and a toxic environment, addictions to video games. So, I was always this kid growing up that was obese. I was bullied, I was picked on, low self-confidence, low self-esteem, depressed.

And this was my life growing up. And, as an adult now, this transferred into my adulthood where I found myself, back in 2008, I was a 24 year old obese man weighing 250 pounds going through a really difficult time in my life. Rock bottom, a bad breakup, working at a job that was not inspiring to me. And, you know, I wanted to give up on life. I was exploring ways to do so. And I kept thinking about my mom and the devastation my mom would have to deal with if I took my life and it stopped me. And I knew I had to figure things out. And it was a very challenging time in my life. It lasted for months where I was looking for ways to end my life, thinking about my mom, stopping myself, back and forth. And thank God a friend of mine gave me a book and said, I think this book will help you out in your situation. 

And I ended up reading the book and one book led to five books. Five books led to 20 books. And I really became obsessed with incredible authors like Dr. Wayne Dyer and Bob Proctor and Earl Nightingale and Tony Robbins and Jim Rowan and all these incredible authors out there. What the books did for me, Sharon, was a lot. It opened up a whole new world that I never even knew existed. But the most important thing the books did for me, it helped me take ownership and responsibility for my results in life. And I love that word, responsibility. And everybody on this summit is choosing that responsibility. The definition of responsibility is your ability to respond to life. My ability to respond to life, up until that point, was very poor. I was blaming my genetics. I was blaming my enabling family members. 

My mom who brought home Kentucky Fried Chicken. I was blaming my slow metabolism, whatever it was. But when you take responsibility, all that goes away. And in that second of taking responsibility, I became the victor of my destiny and I stopped being the victim of my history. And that’s the beginning of my journey. I started to move my body. I started to eat whole foods and I started to change my environment, my friends, and all the people I was hanging out with. And nine months later, I lost 80 pounds, as you mentioned. I went from 250 pounds down to 170 pounds. 34% body fat to 6% body fat. You know, I finally carved out a physical six pack, but the most important thing that I achieved was a mental six pack and what it did for my mental health and how important it is to understand those thoughts that go through our head that determine our health and our longevity. So, that was about 14 years ago and I’ve been in this space ever since learning and applying and teaching and et cetera.

Dr. Sharon Stills

That’s fantastic. I mean, 14 years isn’t that long ago. And to see all that you have accomplished is just phenomenal.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Thank you.

Dr. Sharon Stills

I’m just blown away. And, you know, for anyone who’s listening, ’cause we are a tribe of ladies here and thinking, well, he’s a guy. Don’t you worry, ’cause he understands women. He understands what we need to know about how we can do keto and how we can lose weight. So, don’t be deterred because most of us here probably don’t need to lose 80 pounds of fat. We might just need to lose that final 10 or the 15 or maybe it’s 25 or 50 or whatever it be. So, we’re gonna talk about those things that are gonna be applicable to you, for sure. So let’s just do it. I mean, talk about the keto diet. Talk about what, you know, for someone who’s like, I have heard about it, I’ve heard it works. I’ve heard that it can mess up my hormones. Like, what do we need to know?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, great way to start, because you’re you’re right, Sharon, there’s a lot of information on keto. And, let’s face it, the problem we have these days is not lack of information. The problem we have is too much information. I always say we’re drowning in information but starving for the truth. And it’s not really the information that’s gonna change somebody’s life, it’s the application of the right information. And that’s my goal for your audience. To give you the right information so you can apply it and notice a different result right away. So, keto, let’s unpack that real quick. If you go on Dr. Google and type in what is the keto diet, you’ll get over a hundred million results and each article and each video and whatever you see will be very confusing ’cause it’ll be conflicting to each other. 

So, the way that we teach keto with my company Keto Kamp is to understand that keto is not a diet, it is a metabolic process. And it has been around, Keto has been around, for as long as humans have existed. There’s nothing new about keto, it’s just nuanced. It is a natural metabolic process that all of our ancestors went through. And how do I know that? Well, our ancestors did not have food readily available to them. So, by default, they had to burn body fat, which is something y’all want to do and produce ketone. So, how it works is you drop your carbohydrates low enough so you could drop insulin, which is your fat storage hormone. And, when you do that, then your body starts utilizing your fat stores, your body fat, love handles, hips, et cetera, as an energy source. 

And those fatty acids are then sent to your liver. Your liver starts burning those fatty acids and then your liver produces ketones. It is a natural process that we’re designed to go through. And what we see here in America, and in the world, is actually a keto deficiency. Not enough people are experiencing this. And the benefits of ketosis are numerous because, number one, it’ll help reduce inflammation. And if you wanna optimize your hormones, if you wanna create sensitive hormones, which is the goal here, then reducing inflammation is the name of the game. So, when ketones are produced, ketones actually communicate with the mitochondria that are within your cells. And, for those who are not aware, the mitochondria are these energy factories that are producing energy called ATP in your cells. And the more energy you produce, the more energy you experience, you feel better. And ketones actually create 400% more mitochondria than if you were burning sugar. So, it produces more energy, number one. Number two, it actually lowers inflammation in these free radicals produced from creating energy from a process called mitochondria uncoupling. So, just to, you know, recap on what I shared here and then I’ll lead it back to you, ketones help reduce inflammation. So it helps lower free radicals at the same time, helping your body produce more energy. So, it is a win-win.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Mm, a total win-win. So, how does one get there? What do we need to do? Because that sounds like I want a cup of that.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, well you’re right, we all want cup of that. So, the average American is consuming about 300 to 400 grams of carbs per day. It’s a lot of carbohydrates and it’s very hard to get into keto, actually, it’s impossible to get into ketosis with that many carbs each day. And there was a study that came out, you might have seen this, Sharon, in 2018 from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. And they looked at over 8,000 people in this study, and it was a 10 year study, and they were looking at different metrics. Blood pressure, BMI, glucose, on medication, off medication. And they have found in this study that 88% of American adults are unhealthy, metabolically unhealthy. So, we have a problem. So, what do we do? What can we do? We could get them into ketosis and get their metabolism fixed. So, how do you get there? Simply reduce your carbohydrates gradually until eventually you have an upper limit of 50 grams of carbs or less per day. Now, I don’t recommend you do this on day one. 

If you’re one of the people who are eating 300 grams of carbs per day, don’t drop it to under 50 tomorrow ’cause you might experience symptoms and you might not feel that great. So, gradually decrease it each day, maybe a seven day approach where, in day seven now, you’re under 50 grams. And you want your carbs to come from non-starchy carbohydrates like green leafy vegetables, et cetera. So, at the same time time, you want to increase your healthy fats so your body becomes familiar with burning fat, fatty acid. So, healthy fats would include, and this is not an exhaustive list, but a few healthy fats would be a grass fed beef, grass fed butter, grass fed ghee, coconut oil, olives, olive oil, beef tallow. These are healthy fats that actually support your cells, support your hormones. And that would be the protocol. And in seven days from right now, if you take action on this, you’ll be in the great land of ketosis. You’ll be feeling good. You’ll get rid of your brain fog. You’ll reduce inflammation. You’ll start dropping some excess weight as well.

Dr. Sharon Stills

So a couple of practical questions and I wanna add avocados to healthy fats.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, definitely.

Dr. Sharon Stills

So yummy. And some women might be thinking, what is beef tallow? So, for someone listening, like how do you know how many carbs you’re having? And what’s the best way, practically, for someone to actually count and figure that out?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, and beef tallow is just fat from a cow and they sell it in a jar. You wanna make sure it’s like grass fed. They have it everywhere. So, good question. Yeah, you could do it a couple ways. So, you could always just download like a free macro tracker, a free app. There’s a few out there. Cronometer, MyFitnessPal, Carb Manager. Any of those will do. Just download a free app on your phone and start inputting your food. Now, this is not something you do forever, right? It’s just to get familiar with what you’re eating. And then it’ll give you a breakdown of how many carbs, proteins and fats you have. In the beginning, you just wanna focus on your carbs and you wanna focus on reducing that to under 50 grams. Or you can just go on Google and type in what you’re eating and kind of add it up yourself. But I have found the apps are a lot easier. So that would be my recommendation. Use a free app out there.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Okay, and then for someone who, so you mentioned some of those foods, like are there resources for figuring, you know, one of the biggest questions I get, as a physician as I’m changing someone’s diet, is what am I supposed to eat then? Because we’re so used to eating that, like you said, that standard American diet. And I was chuckling to myself and I was like, we had a very similar childhood except I just substituted in McDonald’s because we lived right down, it was a nice 10 minute walk to McDonald’s and that was a staple. So, are there resources or some advice you can give, like how do you, as you’re no longer eating rice or pasta or having a sandwich or having a cookie for a snack, what are some tips or where can you go to learn what to eat and not starve?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, good question. I would say let’s talk about what we should avoid in terms of, like, keto fats. Even if you’re not doing keto, I recommend avoiding these. And then I’ll give a list of where they could find a healthy list of keto foods. So, there’s a whole set of keto fats that are all keto friendly, but they’re not health friendly and they actually could be more inflammatory than sugar, processed sugar and, some experts say, even smoking. They’re called polyunsaturated fatty acids, PUFAs for short. They’re also known as vegetable oils and seed oils. And I’ll give your audience a list of eight of them, but let me just share real quick why they’re so detrimental. If you look at the chemical structure of them, they contain a lot of double bonds, which just simply means it attracts a lot of oxygen, which oxidizes that fat. So, oxidizes means oxidation, inflammation. So, if you bit into an apple and left that apple on the counter and came back five hours later, it turns brown, that’s oxidation. It’s kind of what’s happening to your cells when you consume these. And when I interviewed Dr. Cate Shanahan, who was the nutritionist for the Los Angeles Lakers when Kobe Bryant used to play. 

She wrote the book, “Deep Nutrition”, “The FATBURN Fix”, she’s awesome. She believes that these might be even more inflammatory than smoking cigarettes and they increase your risk of disease by a lot. You know, I gave out a number saying, you know, what are the chances of developing disease if you consume these every day within 28 years? And she said close to a hundred percent, right? They’re highly inflammatory. So, there is eight of them, and Dr. Cate Shanahan calls them the hateful eight. So, for your audience, I hope you have a pen and paper, write this down ladies. You have three C’s, three S’s and two others. So the three C’s are canola oil, corn oil and cottonseed oil. The threes S’s are soybean oil, sunflower oil and safflower oil. And the two others are rice bran oil and grape seed oil. Those are the hateful eight. 

So, make sure you’re not consuming them. And they’re all keto friendly, but they’re not health friendly. They’re not healthy for you. So, what do you eat? Well, we mentioned a few items earlier. The beef, the avocados, you know, pastured eggs are terrific. I do have a list, if your audience wants, like a keto grocery shopping list, they could download a free list. This is a free gift for your audience. It’s called the Keto Kamp blueprint. So you can get that over at ketocampblueprint.com. And, what it does, it gives you an entire list of healthy fats, healthy proteins, healthy carbs, and then a list of unhealthy fats, unhealthy carbs, unhealthy protein. Just eat the ones that are approved and you’re gonna be in the right direction on that list.

Dr. Sharon Stills

And when you’re eating out, do you bring your own oil? How do you handle that? Because I think a lot of restaurants are, unfortunately, using the hateful eight for their cooking.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

They are, even the most fanciest, most expensive restaurants are using them, unfortunately. So, the way that I handle it, it’s a great practical question, Sharon, the way that I handle it is when I go to restaurants, the first question I ask the waiter or the waitress is, hey, which oils do you use to cook your food in? And, to your point, 99% of the time it’s gonna be one of those hateful eight. Usually soybean oil. Or, if they say olive oil, which is a good fat, a good oil, I ask them, is it cut with something else? And it usually is cut with soybean oil and we don’t want that. So, what I tell the waiter or the waitress is I’m allergic to those oils. Do you have just real olive oil? Do you have butter? Most of the time they do or they could find some substitutes or kind of get creative for your meal. So, I know it’s not comfortable to do that, especially when you’re in a large group, but I’m telling you, your future self and your hormones and your health will thank you for it. So, you’ll get used to asking that. But that’s what I do. I request not to have those oils in my food and I request the substitutes.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Oh yeah, that’s perfect. My kids have teased me for years that whenever we go out to eat, I can never just order anything off the menu. I have to rearrange everything. And I’ve been doing that for a long time. But the truth is, as been mentioned, everyone’s doing it now, everyone’s allergic to something or getting rid of gluten or this. So, to be embarrassed, no, the waiters are used to it. The restaurants are used to it. And I love what you said and your future self, your cells are thanking you. So it’s actually a gift of health you’re giving to yourself and don’t feel like you’re, you know, you’re out to a restaurant, they’re there to serve. Let them serve you and let them make you healthier while enjoying a night out and not setting your health backwards.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

That’s right and give them a good tip. You know, I always give them a great tip if they’re accommodating, right?

Dr. Sharon Stills

Exactly, exactly. So, we hear about, I just wanna get this topic out of the way, because there’s a lot out there about keto is different for men and women, and it can mess up your hormones and should women do keto or can do they have to do it cyclical? So, just tell us the truth. What do we need to know?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, absolutely. Women should do keto differently than men. That is a fact. Chapter 12 of my book, “Keto Flex”, is all about that. It’s all about how women should do keto and intermittent fasting and how to do it differently. So, we’ll talk real quick about the women who still have a monthly cycle and then I’ll talk about you beautiful postmenopausal ladies out there. So, if you still have a monthly cycle, the week before your period is actually the week you do not want to be in ketosis and you do not wanna practice much fasting. And that’s because that’s the week for building progesterone. Progesterone is that hormone, as you know, Sharon, that helps you feel calm. It also is required for a healthy monthly cycle. And when you fast and do keto that week before your period, you don’t build progesterone. You actually deplete it. That’s why, by the way, so many women who do keto experience such intense cravings for sugar and chocolate and carbohydrates the week before their period. It is the innate intelligence telling their body we need insulin from healthy carbs to make these hormonal conversions including progesterone. 

So, that week before your period is an important week not to be in ketosis, not to practice much fasting. You want to eat healthy carbohydrates. Now, that’s not to say you eat pizza and donuts and all that, you just increase your healthy carbs and don’t practice much fasting. Once your period starts, that bleed week, you could be as aggressive as you want. You don’t need to build progesterone that week. You could do keto, you could do fasting, et cetera. So that’s a consideration. And then one more thing on the menstruating women, the second week, which is around day six through day 13 after your cycle have started, that’s when you have the most estrogen and testosterone. That is the best week for strength training. That’s the best week for, you’re gonna have more confidence, so asking for raise, speaking on stage, being bold with your actions, that’s your power week right there. So, you could eat more protein that week. And, yeah, you could do keto and intermittent fasting that week too, but that’s a good week for strength training and protein. So, those are the considerations and there’s more details to it, but those are like the general rules for the menstruating women. Now, post-menopause, let’s talk about you. Now, as you all know, and Sharon has taught you, when you are postmenopausal, the ovaries, this amazing organ that has done so much work for you has said, I’m retiring. I’ve put it in my work, I’m done.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Peace out.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, peace out, 45 years of work, I’m done. So, the question is, all right, the ovaries are quitting, who picks up the slack for the ovaries? Well, the adrenal glands do, and your body fat. So, we wanna support your adrenal glands at this time and find ways to produce oxytocin. The adrenal glands produce cortisol. Cortisol is not bad unless you’re producing cortisol all the time, but oxytocin helps to combat cortisol. Oxytocin is that feel good chemical hormone that puts cortisol at bay. So, how do you produce oxytocin? Well, several ways. You could hug your dog, hug your cat, watch funny movies. Having sex is another way to produce oxytocin. Hugging people for 10 seconds or more. Meditation, grounding, gratitude journaling. So many ways, but you want to develop some practice on a daily basis to get more oxytocin. But the cool thing about postmenopausal women, you could actually be more aggressive with keto and intermittent fasting than cycling women. 

So, I compare post-menopausal women’s hormones to like men’s hormones, right? Men’s hormones kind of regenerate every 24 hours and they could be more aggressive with keto and intermittent fasting. Postmenopausal women could also be more aggressive with keto and intermittent fasting. That’s not to say you should do keto forever for anybody, but you could do more keto and more intermittent fasting. So what I wrote about in my book for postmenopausal women, great strategy, I’m gonna share for your audience right now, is something called the 5-1-1 rule. Now, I didn’t come up with this. I want to give a credit where credit is due. My mentor, Dr. Daniel Pompa came up with this amazing protocol and it’s perfect for men and for post-menopausal women, which is your audience. So, it’s a seven day protocol. The five in the 5-1-1 is five days of intermittent fasting and keto. So, let’s say 16, 8, 16 hours fasting, eight hour eating window, eating keto in your eight hours for five days. The first one is a 24 hour fast where you just go dinner to dinner or lunch to lunch, but 24 hours just water, electrolytes. The final one is what I call a keto flex day, AKA a feast day. No fasting, high healthy carbs, get yourself out of ketosis, make some hormonal conversions. That is a solid strategy for postmenopausal women. You combine that with the oxytocin practices and you’re gonna feel incredible.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Hmm, so I have a couple of questions. I wanna actually just go back to when you were talking about like reducing your carbs. So, for some women, humans, it’s very difficult to do that because the cravings are so strong. So, do you have any strategies or tips of, I mean, sugar is more addictive than cocaine, so what can someone do where they’re like, yeah, I wanna do this and I’m good for four hours and then the cravings just take over, and before I know it, I’ve eaten a chocolates bar?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, yeah, so true. You’re right, there was that study that showed rats, I think it was rats or mice, preferred sugar over cocaine. Eight times more the sugar than the cocaine. So there’s a couple things. You could supplement with something called L-glutamine. I always say, L-glutamine will help you wean. It’s a powder or supplement that you could take that calms the part of your brain that lights up when you experience a sugar craving. Same part of the brain that lights up when somebody experiences a cocaine addiction. So, 500 milligrams of L-glutamine, two to three times a day could help, but, also, focusing on protein could be huge. Dietary protein, animal based protein, ’cause protein activates hormones and chemicals in your body that help you feel full and satiated. 

These are hormones called leptin and cholecystokinin and peptide YY. So, getting at least 30 grams of protein at all of your meals can make a big difference. And if you wanna find a general protocol for like daily protein intake, then find out what your ideal body weight is and then have one gram of protein per pound of ideal body weight. So, I’ll explain that just in case somebody doesn’t understand that. Let’s say somebody watching this is 160 pounds and she wants to weigh, her ideal body weight, her goal weight is 130 pounds. So, she has 30 pounds she wants to lose. So, 130 is your goal body weight. So, you want to consume 130 grams of animal based protein each day. That’s gonna help with the cravings. And then, as you get more metabolically flexible, and the ketones become produced, ketones are also satiating as well, ’cause it activates cholecystokinin. So, those are a few things you can do with the cravings.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Perfect, and that was one of my other questions was for you to talk about protein, but you handled that. And so, the keto flex the 5-1-1, well, is that something you could do for life, first of all, I guess is my question?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, I mean, I wouldn’t say for life, I don’t like anything forever. You could do that for, you know, a few months and then change things up. You could add in an additional flex day or you could be a little bit more aggressive with your fasting, but the 5-1-1 protocol is a good protocol for a few months until you, you know, your results start to slow down, then you could mix things up.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Okay. And what if you’re doing the 5-1-1 and you have a wedding to go to, or there’s a barbecue, or you just have a day and you fall off the wagon? How does that affect? Do you have to start over? Do you just keep going from where you were?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, so what I would recommend is, if you could structure it for you know, that one in the 5-1-1 which is the high, healthy carb day, you could designate that day for the day that you have the barbecue or the wedding or whatever it is ’cause you know, your diet’s not gonna be that great. So, let that be your one flex day. And then, right when you’re done with that, next day go right back on track. What I’ve seen, Sharon, and you’ve probably seen this too, is that a lot of people, let’s say, they mess up, and I’m putting that in quotation marks and they go off course for a day or for a meal or for an event. And they think they’re a failure. They’re like, oh my God, I messed up. And they beat themselves up and they take one bad meal and they turn that into one week of bad eating and then one month of bad eating. So, what I always say is it’s never about the setback, it’s always about the get back. Setbacks are setups for something great. Just forget about, get back on course. And if you could designate that day as your feast day with the event, perfect. And then you just go right back to what you were doing the next day. That’s what I would recommend.

Dr. Sharon Stills

That’s great. I love your little setback, get back. You’ve got great little quotes. So, what’s the best way, could you speak to, like, using a CGM and measuring your ketones? Like, what should the women know about these tools?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, so there’s three ways to measure ketones. There is breath meters looking at the ketone body acetone. There’s urine strips looking at the ketone body acetoacetate. And then there’s finger prick, blood finger prick, looking at beta-hydroxybutyrate. Out of those three ways to test ketones, I don’t like the urine strips, I wouldn’t recommend those. They’re not gonna be that accurate. Because once your cells are actually really getting really good at using ketones, the ketones will not spill out in the urine and it’ll give you some false readings. Breath meters can be great if you find a really good company, but the gold standard is blood, which is beta-hydroxybutyrate. So, there are finger prick machines that, you prick your finger and it’ll give you a ketone reading. If it’s .5 or higher, you’re in ketosis, congratulations. 

And the goal is not more ketones, by the way, we don’t chase ketones, we chase results. The goal is just to get yourself into ketosis. A good sweet spot for ketones in the blood is 0.8 to 2.8. I like that sweet spot. Now, CGM’s are also great, to your point, which is a Continuous Glucose Monitor. The drawback is that the CGM is not giving your ketones. There needs to be a continuous ketone monitor. That’s gonna be a multi-billion dollar industry. But using a CGM and a finger prick for ketones could be fantastic. I think a CGM, one of the best bio-hacking devices you can get to really optimize pure protocol. For those who don’t know what a CGM is, it’s a little device that you put on your arm, you put it on there one time. It has a needle that goes in there. You don’t really feel much, but it lasts for 14 days. And you pair it with an app on your phone and it gives you 24/7 look at your glucose, which is freaking amazing. 

You could see what stress does to your glucose. You could see what exercise, what food does. So, I love that. And you could really understand what’s happening. Now, when we’re looking at what’s called postprandial glucose, I like to look at that as well. Postprandial means after eating. So an hour after eating, your blood glucose should be under 120 milligrams per deciliter. And your CGM will show that, or even a finger prick glucose will show that, 120 or less. Two hours after eating, it should be under a hundred. If you’re hitting that and you’re in that ketosis range, your protocol’s working for you. If you’re not hitting that, then you know you have some changes to make.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Right. It’s really fascinating because it really individualize it. ‘Cause we are all biochemically individual. And we say eat a sweet potato, not a white potato, but there are some people who actually the sweet potato will spike them and not the white potato. So, it’s such…

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

So true.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Good feedback to really know what food is thy medicine for you.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

So true. Because, to your point, I mean, somebody might have a sensitivity to the sweet potato, but process the white potato fine. Or berries might be very glycemic for somebody, but somebody else might not. But the only way to know is to do these testing. It’s your unique individual biochemistry that’s gonna determine that.

Dr. Sharon Stills

And you get the, I don’t know if you can hear it, but the garbage truck just came picked up my garbage. So I’m thinking, oh, and it’s just so perfectly timed and you get the garbage out of your life. You get the garbage foods that you shouldn’t be eating right out of your life. So, I wanna shift to fasting, but before I go there, is it safe for everyone listening to do ketosis? Is there any contraindications? Are there any medical conditions that you should speak to your doctor if you have that or that it’s just not for you?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, well, I mean, none of this is medical advice, of course, but you know, if you’re pregnant, breastfeeding, probably not a good idea to do keto. If you’re a child and you’re still growing, you need more, you know, mTOR, which is the growth pathways, probably not a good idea to do keto. Other than that, I mean, most people will really benefit from tapping into ketosis. I think it’s one of the best ways to tap into this innate intelligence. And, like that study showed, 88% of Americans really need this process. So, most people could benefit from it.

Dr. Sharon Stills

We’re all gonna go to Keto Kamp, ladies.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

We’ll welcome all of you.

Dr. Sharon Stills

So, fasting, do you always couple and marry intermittent fasting to ketosis?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, I love fasting as well. It’s another ancient healing strategy that’s been around forever, like ketosis. The way that I teach it, it’s first get you into ketosis and then pair it, like you said, couple it with intermittent fasting strategies. So, yes. And, yeah, we pair it with intermittent fasting. And speaking of, like, the garbage truck, fasting is one of the best ways to get out junk from your body.

Dr. Sharon Stills

So, talk about some of the different intermittent fasting strategies. Where’s a good place to start and what are some other options?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

The best way to start is with 12 hours. And it’s simply this way. Let’s say you’re done eating at 7:00 PM. You take your last bite of food at 7:00 PM. You go to bed, wait until 7:00 AM until your first bite of food. That’s 12 hours of fasting. Very doable, right? And then you could push that breakfast from 7:00 AM to 8:00 AM the next day that’s 13 hours. And keep doing that until you get to like a 16, 18 hour, that’s the good sweet spot. 16 to 18 hour daily fast. So if you could get your eating window somewhere between like 12 and 6:00 PM as your eating window and then fast outside of that, that’s a great protocol. If that doesn’t work for your schedule, then you could rearrange that. Your eating window could be 8:00 AM to 2:00 PM or whatever you want to customize it with. But having a six to eight hour eating window and the rest of the time fasting is a good long term strategy.

Dr. Sharon Stills

So, what can you be doing? I get this question all the time. What can you be doing in the mornings? Can you be having coffee? Can you have Bulletproof coffee? What can you have that is considered not breaking your fast?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

You definitely have water and electrolytes and sea salt to keep your minerals up. Definitely have that coffee. And Bulletproof coffee could be okay. Here is the pros, here’s the cons. So, the pros with having coffee with healthy fat is that those healthy fats help build your hormones, your sex hormones specifically, your brain, and you feel good. It could be a good crutch to keep that fasting going. The drawback would be, for some people, coffee, or even Bulletproof coffee raises glucose. So you might want to test your blood glucose or have a CGM and test before you drink it. And then, 30 to 45 minutes after to see if there’s a glucose response. And then, another drawback is if one of your goals is to lose some extra weight, you do need to burn the calories, the fat calories from your Bulletproof coffee before your body goes back to burning body fat. So, it could slow down your weight loss effort. So, those are just some things to consider. With that being said, I have coffee in the morning, in my fast, with some healthy fats. I do well with it. I don’t have a lot of weight to lose so, for me, it works. But just keep that in mind. If you find that it’s slowing down your weight loss, so maybe just have the black coffee. If you find it’s jacking up your glucose, maybe change the coffee brand to a different brand and keep testing or maybe just have some herbal tea. That should be safer for you.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Mm, okay. And so, then with a eating window of 12 to six, is it a free for all? Or are you just having one meal or two meals? Talk a little bit about, I’m sure women are wondering, like, what happens during that time if I’m not eating all day like I’m used to.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

It’s not a free for all, right? You’re not gonna go to Kentucky Fried Chicken like I was doing, or McDonald’s like Sharon was doing. You’re ideally gonna eat food that’s focused on protein and healthy fats and you’re gonna eat less carbs during those meals. So, two to three meals within that window is ideal. And you want to focus on protein and healthy fats and keep your carbs low, it’s not a free for all. If you really wanna maximize the fast and your results, make sure it’s real food, protein focused with healthy fats as a side and carbs should be minimal.

Dr. Sharon Stills

What about condiments? Because there are some people who are condiment lovers. Condiment connoisseurs. I’m definitely one of those people. So what, you know, when you’re eating your keto foods, what are safe condiments to use to add for flavor and to give you satisfaction?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, I’m also a condiment connoisseur, I like that term. Primal Kitchen is a great brand that makes some great salad dressings and dips. So, they’re safe, they use avocado oil. So, anything from Primal Kitchen is great. I also like nutritional yeast from Bragg’s or any high quality brand. Put that on your eggs or avocados. It has great amount of B vitamins. So, nutritional yeast is great. Just be aware of ketchup that has high fructose corn syrup. You don’t want that. And then a lot of condiments have those seed oils. So, you gotta read the ingredients. Even, like, organic high quality, like high quality, air quotes, brands have those seed oils in them. So, you gotta read the ingredients. Primal Kitchen is a safe brand. Their ketchup, their mustard, their dressing. Those are great. And then nutritional yeast would be another good too.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Perfect, perfect. So, mistakes. What are the biggest mistakes women make with keto? Is there anything we should be looking out for to not get sucked up into to have the best experience?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, absolutely. So, a big mistake women make is they don’t really understand that the liver plays an important role with breaking down healthy fat and detoxification and so much more. That’s why I always call the liver the soccer mom organ because the liver does everything for us like a soccer mom. Probably somebody watching this is like, yeah, I’m a soccer mom, I do everything too. That’s like the liver, does so many things. So, one of the things the liver does, or two of the things, is number one, it produces bile. Bile, B-I-L-E, is a green substance the liver produces to break down fats like a detergent to break down dietary fat. The second role of bile is for detoxification. 

And a lot of people, a lot of women, have beat up their liver over their lifetimes. From medications to alcohol to toxins to processed carbs. And now the liver is fatty and it produces this thick sluggish bile, and you’re eating more fat, but it’s hard to break it down. That’s why a lot of people don’t feel that great on keto. So, supporting the liver is important. Now, the next question that you’re wondering is how do you support the liver? Okay, here’s how we support the liver. Bitters, bitters for the liver. And bitter rich foods is what I mean. So, arugula, fantastic. Dandelion greens, dandelion tea, ginger, ginger tea, apple cider vinegar, artichokes, oregano, thyme, rosemary. These are all great to have on a daily basis. If you’re really struggling even with these bitters, you might wanna supplement with ox bile, digestive enzyme with ox bile. Additional things you can do for the liver are castor oil packs, coffee enemas, PC pushes. So, yeah, the liver is gonna be important for you to really support because that liver is doing so many things for us.

Dr. Sharon Stills

PC is phosphatidylcholine, in case you’re…

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yes.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Wondering. The keto lingo and yeah, I mean, supporting the bile is such an overlooked activity. And so, I’m always starting with the bile, opening the bile so the liver has a place to dump to. And that’s a huge over overlooked process. And I love all those bitters you mentioned, and also using drainage remedies for the gallbladder and the liver. There’s so many things you can do to support, and that is gonna be a huge, huge help.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Huge, yeah, absolutely.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Gotta love your liver. You know, I won’t even put anyone on hormones unless we’re doing liver work. Otherwise, it’s just not okay. You’re gonna do more harm than good.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

I love it.

Dr. Sharon Stills

So you mentioned vitamin G. What is vitamin G.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Vitamin G, okay, I love that we could talk about this. So, vitamin G is the most potent strongest vitamin in the entire world. There is not a vitamin that comes close to the healing powers of this vitamin. As a matter of fact, Dr. Joe Dispenza, he did brain scans on a ton of people and observed what happened in their body and their brain when they were given vitamin G. And he noticed 1,200 different chemical reactions went on instantaneously that put them in a healing anti-inflammatory state when they took vitamin G. So what is vitamin G? Where can you get it? Vitamin G is vitamin gratitude. It is the practice of gratitude. It is a universal law, what you feed energy to expands and what you appreciate appreciates. And I’m telling you, ladies, if you could develop the practice of daily gratitude, you’re gonna put your body in an anti-inflammatory state. This is free, it’s easy to do, but easy not to do. 

But, I’m telling you, if you could write down right before bed what you’re grateful for and when you wake up in the morning, what you’re grateful for, 10 things each time, you’re gonna notice significant changes in your physiology, your psychology, and just overall wellbeing and health. And it doesn’t happen on the first take, but as you are consistent with this, it’s one of the best vitamins you could give your body. And it’s changed my life. I have notebooks stacked probably, like, to here of 20 notebooks just filled with gratitude and goals. I haven’t missed a single day in probably over six years, right? It’s one of the best things I’ve done. And I promise you, if you could develop a discipline and the habit of practicing vitamin G each day and getting your vitamin G it’s gonna make such a huge difference for you.

Dr. Sharon Stills

My favorite hashtag that I created is not all medicine comes in a bottle. And so, vitamin G, ladies.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

That’s it.

Dr. Sharon Stills

We have talked about gratitude and I think it’s really important to make sure you go back and read what you’ve written so you can really digest it and absorb your vitamin G. And I practice vitamin G throughout the day. There’s so many things to be grateful for, whether it’s, you know, having a home, having a desk, having a computer, having warm water to wash the dishes, having dishes, having a kitchen, standing up, being alive, having your breath, there’s so much. It’s all the simple things that go into making up our life. That when we really turn on that gratitude, I agree 145% with you that it just, you know, takes down our inflammation it helps us be healthy, or it helps us enjoy our journey more. So, I love that you named it vitamin G.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, you understand. I mean, I love that you live it yourself with your vitamin G practices. And you’re so right, Sharon, there’s always something to be grateful for. Always something to be grateful for. And challenges that somebody might be going through are really opportunities to grow. And you could be grateful for your challenges and find the blessings in them. There’s always a blessing. So, yes, it’s so important. The thing is that it’s not sexy, you can’t buy it. Like you said, you can’t put it in a bottle, but it’s one of the best medicines that is out there.

Dr. Sharon Stills

I guess we could make bottles that say vitamin G and then we could put little gratitude journals in them.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

That’s cool.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Or have a mantra of gratitude.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

That’s a good idea.

Dr. Sharon Stills

And be like, here it is. Wow, you are just so effective and efficient at really explaining things. I feel like you’ve given the ladies a lot and really not made it overwhelming. Made it very palatable. Is there anything else that I didn’t ask you that you wanna share that’s important or do you think we got it all?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, I mean, I’ll share one more, and thank you, Sharon. I mean, it’s easy to communicate with your audience because you’re such a great host and I love your energy and your audience is amazing, so it’s easy. Last thing I would say is don’t underestimate the power of your mind. And, when I say your mind, I mean your subconscious mind. I really believe this. 95% of your results in life, health, relationships, everything, 95% is mindset, only 5% is strategy. So, when you think about your mind, you have your conscious mind, you’re aware of your thoughts, but then you have your subconscious mind. The conscious mind, you could accept or reject thoughts or ideas. The subconscious mind could only accept. And out of those thoughts that we have each day, psychologists have determined that the average person has 60,000 thoughts per day, okay? That’s a lot of thoughts. And out of those 60,000 thoughts, they have determined that 90%, 9-0 percent, of those thoughts are negative thoughts. Excuse me, I said it wrong. 90% are the same thoughts, 85% are negative thoughts. And I always say, or Zig Ziglar said this, actually, if you’re thinking, your dreams are shrinking, right? 

So, if you think about your thoughts, Dr. Bruce Lipton has shown with his work that thoughts are a frequency, a sound wave, that have the ability to penetrate your cells, your cell membranes, and communicate with your DNA. If it’s a stinking thinking thought, a negative thought, a hateful thought, an angry thought, a resentful thought, that frequency tells your DNA to produce inflammatory proteins. If it’s a healthy thought, a grateful thought, an abundant, loving thought, that frequency tells your DNA to produce anti-inflammatory proteins. This is amazing because if there’s 60,000 thoughts per day, that means you have 60,000 opportunities to put your body in a healing anti-inflammatory state every single day. 

And what controls your thoughts is your environment. It’s the news, the TV, the social media, your friends, your colleagues, et cetera. So, if your environment is not serving your subconscious mind, then it’s time to change your environment. As you change your environment, you’ll change your subconscious mind. You’ll change your health and you’ll change your life. So, please don’t underestimate the power of thought. Something that I’m gonna share that may freak out your audience is this. I was studying, my mentor, Bob Proctor, who’s actually this gentleman right here, he passed away this year, but he changed my life, he saved my life, and he was sharing a story about being in a car, 1970’s on a road trip, looking at clouds and using his thoughts to make clouds disappear, right? Crazy. I thought this was insane. I’m like, Bob, I love you, but you’re losing me here with this craziness. 

So I said, all right, let me give this a shot. So I went on my balcony here, I live in Miami, Florida, and I’m out in my balcony and I’m like staring at a cloud. I picked the cloud and I’m like staring intently at it. And I’m just imagining with my thoughts, the cloud just dissipating before my eyes, right? I’m just picturing it, imagining it. And in about 60 seconds, the cloud disappeared before my eyes, okay? Before you think I’m crazy, I ran into the bedroom and I told my fiancee, hey, I just made a cloud disappear with my thoughts and she’s like, what are you talking about? And I took her outside and I said, pick a cloud, any cloud, and then I made it disappear. And then I did it again and again and again. And I encourage you, today, to go outside, pick a cloud, stare at it and watch how powerful your thoughts are. So, don’t underestimate the power of your thoughts.

Dr. Sharon Stills

That honestly, maybe the best advice we have heard the whole summit.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Wow.

Dr. Sharon Stills

So, yeah, our thoughts are everything. And you just gave us a great activity. I’m gonna go disappear some clouds.

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Do it. Let me know how it goes.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Here in Arizona, but I can see a few out my window. So, I’m gonna go put my mind to work. So, oh my goodness, thank you, thank you, thank you for all your contributions and for all your education and just all that you offer up. It’s just so fantastic. Where can we learn more about you?

Ben Azadi, FDN-P

Yeah, thank you, Sharon. I appreciate you, I’m grateful for you, honored to be on this amazing summit and I’m looking forward to having you on my Keto Kamp podcast very soon. So, that’s one place your audience can check me out. Keto Kamp podcast, Kamp is spelled with the K. My website’s probably the best resource, it’s benazadi.com. It has all of my social media, there’s a contact form, my book’s there, so benazadi.com is the best place to find me.

Dr. Sharon Stills

Perfect. Well, it’s been a pleasure as always. I do look forward to coming and joining you in your community. And this was a good one, ladies, this is a really good one. From practical things we can do with our bodies to using gratitude in our thoughts. I mean, this episode, this interview, has really been the epitome of the mind, body connection. So, so grateful we got to share it with you all. I know you enjoyed it as much as I did, and we’ll be back with another interview soon. So, be well ’til then.