Reverse Chronic GI Issues w/ MCAS & Histamine Intolerance

Introduction and Guest Background 0:00

Welcome back to this episode of the Reversing Nasal Activation and Histamine Intolerance Summit. I'm your host Bethell here of Marcel 360. And I'm so happy today to have my colleague and friend Jill Cardigan with us, and she's going to share with us some really in-depth information about, bowel issues, GI issues, and Marcel's. And I think we're going to get some great clinical pearls here. And I just want to welcome you and thank you so much for being with us today. Thank you. Beth, I'm delighted to be here.

And as I mentioned before, but for the world to hear, I love the work you're doing and just so excited to be on your summit. Thank you. And vice versa. I love partnering with you. I want to tell people a little bit about your background, and then have you share some of your story with us, but, for you, all that, you know, most of you probably know who Doctor Jill Carnahan is, but she was duly board certified in family medicine 2006 to 2016 and also an integrative, holistic medicine since 2005. She runs Flat Iron Functional Medicine in Denver, Colorado, and this is a widely sought after medical practice.

People come from all over the country. People come from internationally. They have a lot of different types of clinical services nutritional consultations, chiropractic, naturopathy, medicine, acupuncture, massage. But Doctor Jill is also survivor herself of both breast cancer and Crohn's disease. And this is where her passion comes from. And teaching patients had to live well and thrive with chronic, complex and chronic illness. And her website and her interviews. If you guys haven't checked those out on Facebook and YouTube, they're just an amazing resource of information for people searching for answers.

I love to go there and finding information and listen to those interviews so I can encourage you to do that. And one of the things I always love talking to you, in talking to you, is that our stories have a lot in common, and I just love that. If you could share with our listeners some of your health story, it's just a beautiful illustration of how persistence can turn into recovery and a wonderful message of hope. Can you kick us off there? I would love to, Beth. I always love the story and I know you feel the same way, because what happens is we go through suffering and some really difficult things, but it gives meaning and purpose.

If we can turn that into knowledge and resources and then turn around and help, you know, hundreds of thousands of people, through our own experience. And I've learned over my lifetime that I learned very well through experience, unfortunately. So, the divine has given me a lot of experiences to learn through. So for me, it started I was in medical school and I actually chose to go to medical school, despite being, I always say, have the heart of a natural path because I really grew up with, organic food from a farm.

And, you know, my mom was a nurse and took care of us mostly at home when she could with herbs and things. So I grew up with a very holistic, like childhood. And, but what I realized was, our medical system is still fairly well reimbursed in kind of the standard. And I wanted to go into that medicine just so that I could make a change and actually shift the way things are done. And I've been, just grateful for that background because I feel like what we need, all of us working together, is to continue to push the envelope and shift things, to get patients help and to find root cause.

So that's the background. I'm in medical school, 25 years old, and my third year, and I found a lump in my breast and shortly thereafter was diagnosed with a very aggressive form. As you can imagine, in my 20s of breast cancer. So that just completely shocked me. What I did later was look into some of the root cause. And I grew up on a farm with lots of toxic chemicals and pesticides,

Jill's Health Journey and Recovery 3:43

probably in the well water. And then I have all kinds of genetic snips for detox that are not optimized. And so I think some of the toxic load led to that DNA disruption and cancer at an early age. And I did went ahead and had conventional three drug chemotherapy. It destroyed my gut, which is part of my story. Later on. And then, I had radiation, I had surgery, and I got through that, and I was just out of my, treatment, went back to my medical rotations. And within about six months, I started having weight loss, diarrhea, abdominal pain, and shortly thereafter diagnosed with Crohn's disease.

Now, some of you might be like, oh my gosh, that's terrible luck. But the truth is, with my genetics and, my gut microbiome, which probably wasn't healthy prior to that to begin with. And an undiagnosed case of celiac disease, this was kind of a set up because the drugs that are used for chemotherapy definitely increase intestinal permeability. And for someone with Crohn's disease like myself, one of the genetic factors there is that we have an abnormally, aggressive response to a normal microbiome.

So with this insult and we'll go into some of the detail today. But the leaky gut, made worse by the chemotherapy and then an underlying celiac where I was eating gluten, not knowing it, creating more inflammation just led to the perfect storm for the development of inflammatory bowel disease. And I share all that because now, almost 20 years later, I'm completely cured of Crohn's disease, which I was told is incurable. And it's all because of the stuff I learned along the way for the gut in treating the overgrowth of bacteria and yeast or parasites, or taking out gluten and changing the diet and changing the microbiome.

So a lot of that really led to my passions first for the gut and then for environmental toxic load. And what I do today, which is looking for a root cause of all of these things. And thank goodness that you had that holistic background to draw on. Oh my gosh, at such a young age, just dealing with those things. And it really breaks my heart. And I know from my own story how hard it is to be that young and facing these things and trying to navigate them. And it takes a lot of perseverance. And I've found that people who get through these things are the ones that keep putting one foot in front of the other.

What kept you going through that time? What what what what kept you not giving up because so many people give up. I love that you're talking about this because I think this is maybe even one of the most important things we give your listeners in the sense of I always feel like I'm a great scientist, but I also had faith that I took this thing that people think are dichotomous, which is faith and science. And I had both to a great degree. I tried to find the best research and use science and find answers, but I also held on to this faith that, number one, there's a purpose and meaning in everything that happens to us.

So there was never a time where I. I mean, granted, we all kind of say the why me thing, but I never got stuck there. I never got stuck in that, oh woe is me, why me? And it's easy to go there. It's okay if you're there. There's nothing wrong with that. But if you go down there, you come right back up and say, okay, what can I learn from this experience? There has to be lessons. So I found that the biggest, important thing that I that was every single experience has something to teach us. And when we go about it that way, we learn these great, insights and wisdoms.

And I know both you and I have insights and wisdom that we would never have from medical school or textbooks, because the experience teaches us things about the symptoms, about the process, about the journey, and about the causes, the root causes that we can only really gain from experience. So the number one thing that, kept me there was this combination of faith and that there was a meaning and purpose and science, like digging deep and finding answers. I don't see why, you know, mine was so similar because I was digging into everything I get my hands on.

And this was when functional medicine was still really new. And, you know, every textbook I could find. But I just no matter how hard it was or how many walls I had, I knew in my bones, I mean, just to my very core, there were answers. And if I kept searching, I knew it was out there. I didn't know for certain that I was going to find it. I knew it was there, and that kept me digging, and I really like that combination of that faith. However, it shows up for somebody and then the science side of it.

So we're going to dive into this role of mass cells in these different kinds of GI disorders. And GI issues are so common, whether it's a diagnosis, some kind of inflammatory bowel disorder or we've got things like colitis, we've got ulcerative colitis with that Crohn's or IBS, or even just people having a lot of abdominal discomfort, pain, constipation, diarrhea. What are the links with the mast cells and these kinds of inflammatory gut problems? Yeah. So the first thing is, there's a large amount of mast cells in our skin, in our gut, and I don't know the statistic.

So I won't quote for sure, but I'm guessing those are the two most, dense areas for mast cells. So in our gut, we have a lot of these mast cells which respond to many triggers. Again, as your whole summit is about toxins and infections and heat and cold and allergens and etc. and even the microbes can be triggers to these mast cells. So because there's such a large amount of mass cells in the gut, we can have a predominance of symptoms from histamine in mast cells that happen in our gut. One of the ones that kind of surprised me, that I see often in mold.

And people don't connect, is, heartburn. So often that increased histamine will cause heartburn in people. And that's a sign to me that there could be excess histamine, among other things, as well. And the same thing as I mentioned in my story, histamine will increase permeability. And so what often happens as well is there's a massive increase in leaky gut or intestinal hyper permeability. And this leads to the translocation of those bacterial coatings. Or if there's, excess fungi like yeast, into the immune system, into the bloodstream, it often triggers an even more exaggerated response, that mast cell.

So that leaky gut, is made worse. Symptoms are made worse. And things like diarrhea or constipation, heartburn, as I mentioned, increased intestinal permeability and that increased intestinal not only leads to an increased toxic load through the bloodstream on the liver, but also development of more food allergies because you're having more permeability and more food antigens that lead to the blood pressure. And that makes so much sense in terms of how mass is an autoimmune necessarily. And it doesn't mean somebody is going to develop autoimmunity, but there's a really close link with all the forms of immunity that's been studied with it.

Then we know that mast cell activation syndrome is where that two response that opens us up to teach 17 you're bringing this additional factor of smart cells are going to produce more inflammatory mediators, including histamine, more leaky gut, more things getting exposed to the immune system. Yeah. So this makes so much sense because basically, mast cell activation increases permeability. And we know from Doctor Fasano research, when he first published in 2012 that there's a triad of autoimmunity that always happens.

And that is the, in first of all the genetics. There's a genetic link and not everybody has that. Some people have it, and it's not something we can change a whole lot. And then there's often an environmental trigger. And that could be foods or that could be a toxins or infections or some other thing. For example, in the case of celiac disease, that gluten over time is the environmental trigger that will take someone from being prone to celiac genetically into full blown celiac disease, over time.

Mast Cells, Gut Permeability, and Autoimmunity 11:29

And that's that environmental trigger. And the third thing is what you touched on. And that's the gut immune interface. That's it. This link between our outside world and our inside world. So if you think of the gut like a tube from the mouth all the way to the anus, that is our interface with the environment outside and this on that lining, which is called enteral sites, the cells that line the gut and those permeable membranes, sometimes between them, a little, you know, tight junctions and the Xining line, if they open up, I always call it like Swiss cheese for gut to have these holes and permeability.

When that happens, all of a sudden you're dumping more antigens into the blood. And this barrier, this immune bloodstream gut barrier is where autoimmune disease starts. So that's why it's relevant. Because if you have a mass cell activation, a histamine trigger, something that happens which increases the permeability, all of a sudden you're having a lot more interaction between the gut immune interface. And that can lead to autoimmune disease development. So then there's also going to be this link with histamine intolerance.

And I know that's another area that you look at as well. We talk about that side of it. So we've we've got some interviews on how mast activation histamine tolerance are different. If people aren't familiar with that part, let's dive into specifically that role of histamine intolerance. And these, types of that disorders. Yeah. So there's a couple things that can play in here. Years and years ago I had no idea what a low histamine diet was, but I knew those foods like bone broth or fermented anything, or aged meats and cheeses or leftovers or, even avocados, they would bother me.

And I again, I had no idea what the reason was back then, but now I know. Oh, of course I did better on a low histamine diet. So a couple things. The gut microbiome and the composition can lead to excess histamine in and of itself. So there's certain species, typically the ones that are associated with Sibo, like Enterococcus, E.coli, Klebsiella, and even certain strains of Lactobacillus that can be more histamine producing or ferment fermenting, which also creates more histamine inside the gut.

Regardless of what you eat. And then often Candida yeast species and mold, whether you're colonized or exposed and often with a mold exposure. Because of that weakened immune system, you'll get excess overgrowth of yeast, which is opportunistic due to that weakened immune system. So this plethora of things that can happen in the dysbiosis or shift in the gut microbiome can lead to more histamine. And then there's multiple factors, whether you can't break down histamine or you're producing too much or you don't have Dao enzyme, all these things can lead to excess histamine.

And the gut, I really feel like is one of our biggest reservoirs for that histamine. And then that can create histamine intolerance, rashes, symptoms, congestion, etc.. And also the need for a lower histamine diet. Yeah. And I found this for myself. That's when I jumped into shifting my foods. And I started with I knew I had really terrible hypoglycemia. And so I started there. And then I went into the West and price movement. And that's a wonderful movement in terms of eating the way we used to eat, eating whole foods and all of that.

But there were a lot of ferments, and I'm somebody who jumps in 150% for better or for worse. So my kitchen looked like a little laboratory with my ferment and my keeper and all this stuff, but I was getting way more itching. I was getting a lot more diarrhea, acid reflux, rashes, sleep issues and all of this so that was a game changer. Start to shift the histamine. What kind of role does that have, particularly in things like Crohn's and IBS and other types of, bowel issues? Yeah. So my story was I was diagnosed with Crohn's 26, just six months after I finished all the therapy for cancer.

I didn't have a clue I was in medical school, but as we well know, traditional medical school does not teach you much about the diet or immune system or development of autoimmunity or functional medicine. So I really didn't know a lot. And I remember I've told this before, but my gastroenterologist, on my first visit, after I was diagnosed, I had lots of questions. He said, Jill, you're going to have this lifelong. You're going to probably need immune modulating drugs. You may need surgery. It's incurable.

And my question before I left was, does diet have anything to do with it? Is there anything I could do in my diet? And he looked at me point blank. It's a Jill diet has nothing to do with Crohn's disease. Now, what's funny is a research, even in conventional literature since then has proved that wrong 100%. But this was back to my intuition and kind of trusting myself. And I thought, gosh, that doesn't make sense. I don't know much, but I'm going to find the answer because that does not make sense.

And shortly after I came across, Elaine got a specific carbohydrate diet. And her work with that. She actually worked with a pediatrician from the 1920s. I don't remember his name, but he's the originator of this specific carbohydrate diet. And her daughter, who had ulcerative colitis, was healed by that diet. So she knew there was power sort of writing about it. And she's the one who made it kind of famous and similar to Weston Price. There are some fermented things in both gaps and steady diet.

But what I found in my own experimentation was getting that lower histamine, and getting low sugar and of course, gluten free, because I was undiagnosed celiac. So dairy free, gluten free, low sugar, low histamine, those were the big things, along with kind of a modified SCD diet. They transformed my Crohn's symptoms. And so I knew within just two weeks I had no bleeding, no pain. Now I wasn't cured in two weeks, but I had enough of a change with the dietary changes. I thought there is something going on here and now.

We've proven since then that all of these things do play into inflammatory bowel disease, because that histamine will, continue the vicious cycle of permeability. And as long as you have probability, whether it's IBS or Crohn's disease or colitis, you're going to have some symptoms and issues, and you're going to be more prone to develop autoimmune disease. And we get into these snowball events so that excess histamines triggering those mast cells, those mast cells are triggering. They're releasing more histamine.

Other inflammatory mediators. The inflammation is reducing the dough production in the small intestine. So we can't break down as much histamine. So it just goes round and round. And you talked about environmental toxins. Can you talk about the role. More of that. And things like glyphosate organic phosphates. Yeah this is huge. And again we don't think about it directly affecting our gut. But it may affect our gut more than anything. So we have the classes of like pesticides, herbicides, typical organophosphates like atrazine and some of the other chemicals that are used to control either weeds or pest on the field, those that have a massive endocrine disrupting effect.

But they also have an effect on the microbiome and what we're seeing. It's interesting. My my family still has a farm in Illinois. My brother's an expert, kind of a functional medicine expert of the soil. So we always talk about these things and those kinds of things, especially herbicides and especially glyphosate, actually change the composition of the soil.

Histamine Intolerance and Crohn's Disease 18:18

And so what we're seeing is the plants that are grown in these soils with chemicals are being altered as well in their mineral content and in their microbiome content. And so it's affecting our microbiome. And I always say, you know, 20 years what we see happening to the soils, we're going to see happening to our microbiome, because those are reflecting in one another as we eat the crops from the soils that have been changed, the composition has changed because of these chemicals. But those chemicals also have a direct effect on our ability for example, glyphosate was originally a mineral key leader.

So what that means is that blocks of minerals, it basically holds under the minerals. So the plant cannot get those. And therefore it kills the plant. The same thing. If we absorbed glyphosate into our system, it prevents us from absorbing minerals. And a lot of those minerals feed our microbiome. So what we see with glyphosate exposure is this excessive overgrowth of things like Clostridium, which can be a problem, and the die off of things that are really helpful, like lactobacilli and bifidobacteria we see in animal studies, like the cows are getting the equivalent of ulcerative colitis in humans when they eat the glyphosate rich feed, because most of the feed that is fed to animals has been sprayed with glyphosate.

And then the the hogs and the heart farmers are having this bleeding out like a gastritis, also from the glyphosate. So there's these really severe manifestations in animals. Can you imagine? But the humans and I always think it's so interesting because when the company that developed, roundup and glyphosate did studies on cells, it said, oh, there's no effect in human cells. What they did not study was the effect on the microbiome. And that is profound. And because it affects the microbiome, it dramatically can alter our health.

Well, that's a great, great piece of information, because we know that petri dish studies and cell studies don't always translate the organism studies. And I find to the. So I recommend chemical toxin panels in you two two. And I find I find these chemicals and in a lot of our clients and they're either getting convinced or produce. But it's in the water supply. So people think they've got a decent water filter. And we're finding like, nope, that's not getting enough out. And then people also many times think that will just because an insecticides being sprayed on the outside of their house that it's okay because it's not being sprayed inside.

But what do you see in there. Oh goodness, I in a case I see people who, you know, been just like you, who've been everywhere and tried everything and oh, I have several cases, probably a dozen where, a young, one case in particular I can think of where a college kid was in, apartment, and she had some roaches or ants or some sort of pest and the landlord called someone to come in and spray this chemical and this chemical. On the white paper, data was said to be sprayed, only sprayed every three months.

They sprayed for six days in a row. Her food was in the countertops, her water supply. She became so ill. She's literally disabled now. That was just one of those things. Just like in my case, there's all of these factors and one thing can take you over the edge. But she really, really was affected by that insecticide. And those are neurotoxins. So they can affect the nervous system and the signaling of cells, especially insecticides, because how they act is actually triggering the nervous system of the insect to go haywire and the insect dies.

So these are really big deals. And again, even like you said. So for example, years ago when I first learned about glyphosate, I thought, well, I'm going to test myself. And back then there wasn't a lot of options. There was an experimental data collection place that tested, and I did that test, and I found that my levels were higher than the levels of farmers who had sprayed on application day, and I was shocked because my diet was almost completely organic, free of pesticides. And so I thought, but I had two dogs that walked on a lawn, and I live in a condo, so I don't have control over what's put on the lawn.

And I suspect that they were bringing it in and they slept in my bed. And so there was these exposures that I didn't even realize, even despite the organic diet. Oh, that's a great tip. And I've also seen in kids where they had reverse osmosis water filters, they were eating all organic. We finally tracked it down to, oh, they were playing soccer on the soccer field. It was getting sprayed. Or they were going to this park where I always ask, no, you take your kids to the playground in the park. Are there dandelions?

Are there clover or is it like a, golf course kind of lawn? And I see it a lot. And people live on golf courses and in golf a lot too. I love that you say that. In fact, you talked to doctor breeders and I'm in a group, about Alzheimer's dementia. And we joked about writing a paper called Golf Course Dementia because so many of these chemicals also affect the brain. Of course, the whole system. And they're seeing increased rates that people who live around golf courses, because there's usually a lot more chemical sprayed.

So I love that you said that. I often asked to. Do you live near a golf course because that's a big one for pesticides. So we've talked about chemicals. We've talked about mold, we've talked about candida. I want to segue to the nervous system, and we know that there's a huge plexus of, of neuronal endings, the enteric nervous system in the gut, I like to think of we've got three centers of making decisions, even through centers, intelligence or minds or hearts, that because of how much nerve activities there and Marcel's line, those entire nerve endings, a nerve sheer.

So that's the role with mast cells and things like terminal pain and abdominal sensitivity to pain. Let's talk more about the nervous system role and these types of things. Because a lot of times with IBS and I was diagnosed with IBS at, I believe about age nine, and I was told it was stress, but it was kind of presented to me as if you're just too stressed at school, honey, you know, just do just relax and don't worry about making a sandwich and you'll be fine. That's much bigger than that. And it's neurological.

Yes. So, first thing on IBS is about 60% or more is actually underlying small intestinal bacterial overgrowth. So Mark Pimentel is in the research and really connected the two not all cases. And we'll talk about the mind body and the intimate connection. But there's a large percentage of people where especially what we call post-infection IBS, which wasn't necessarily a case of you as a child or anything like that, but someone will travel somewhere and get a food poisoning, and that food poisoning will trigger an autoimmune response in the Imsi, the complex that regulates small bowel motility.

And then all of a sudden there'll be altered motility and that cleansing effect between meals and at bedtime doesn't happen. And then you get like this pond scum, this overgrowth of bacteria. And that creates the symptoms of IBS, which with Rome criteria just, you know, more often than not, abdominal pain or diarrhea or distention, frequently it's it's a very generic diagnosis, but the root cause tends to be either bacterial and fungal overgrowth or as we mentioned, the intercom system.

Environmental Toxins and Gut Damage 24:58

So our vagus nerve controls motility of the gut. And what happens is in our high stress society where we're all going, you know, 24 hours a day and maybe not getting great sleep, and even things like infections. We know now that some tickborne infections like, or leukemia and some of these can actually infect the vagus nerve and affect function through an infection. So the vagus nerve, if there's dysfunction is not operating correctly, it will alter bowel motility as well. And you won't be able to digest or rest.

And then that can lead to the IBS symptoms as well. They did studies in mice and they put them under a stressful situation, which I think was like swimming in water. And they did ones that in mice that had a pretreatment with a probiotic called Lactobacillus, REM gnosis, and another group of mice that did not have that pretreatment. And then they did a variation where some of the mice had their vagal nerves intact and others did not. And what they saw was that probiotic actually stimulated the vagus nerve to calm their stress hormones and their bowel.

And so we saw in that study how probiotics through the vagus nerve can actually affect not only our gut but our sense of calm. And I thought that was profound because it's a probiotic affecting mood. That's crazy. Except it's not if we know how it works. Yeah, there's so much on that now. And it makes a lot of sense for sure. And we were talking about so so we talk a lot in this kind of, summit about things like vagal dysregulation, limbic dysregulation. We were talking before we started recording something that I don't think is being touched on enough, which is the the effects of being around toxic people.

And I find that so many of us with chronic illness or empaths. Yes. And then if we're empaths with spiritual practice, we're taught to put ourselves in everyone's shoes to understand where they're coming from and to have this acceptance of everyone, which is beautiful. But there's something missing around boundaries and around that. People who have pathology aren't playing by those same rules. So there's a piece there that comes in. I find a lot in these cases. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this.

So I love that we're talking about this. Because this is so relevant and I feel like, patients that are stuck, especially at the level often where they've seen a lot of other doctors, there often is. And again, I am included. So I'm including my own journey in this. Not saying anyone out there is any different from you or I, but, often there's these pieces of first of all, environmental toxicity tends to affect those who are more sensitive chemically, than others. And there is a connection. Elaine Aaron did work on The Highly Sensitive Person, one of my favorite books.

If you haven't read that and you're one of those 10 to 15%, it relates to our sensitivity to emotions and the empath gene and those things, but it also correlates with environmental sensitivity not only to chemicals, pesticides, foods, sound, light, stimulation, all of those things. And this, this, subset of the population is, is often even though it's only 10 or 15% the population, I think we see a large percentage of them because they are usually more environmentally aware, more chemically sensitive.

They're going to be the communities that get sick from mold or that have got symptoms related to environmental stress. And so often, again, we're seeing a larger percentage of these people. I happen to be one of those. And learn the hard way. And those those people and patients, including myself often are, again, they're more empathic. So the energy of the people around them, the energy, the world, the energy, the consciousness, will often be more, there'll be more sensitive to that. So back to your, comments on relationships.

I feel like addressing not only our limbic system, which I know you go into in the summit, but addressing our relationships in those that are toxic. And again, I have had personal experience with a couple of toxic relationships, and I had to really learn. When you think about auto immunity and you think of Gabor Motta's work, auto immunity at the core, on a metaphysical level is really attack of self, right? So often the healing at this level comes from finding your value in words. Number one, trusting your intuition, number two, loving yourself and, loving others.

But that loving yourself actually comes first. Which at least for me, coming from the kind of background conservative, place I came from, loving yourself was not right. You love everybody else. They don't love yourself. So I had to really relearned that because part of the healing of autoimmunity and this over reactivity is trusting our intuition about what we need or what we want. And being able to verbalize that in our lives with the people we love. And then the second part is loving ourselves enough to take care of ourselves and to put those boundaries up to protect ourselves, whether it is in a toxic relationship, you know, setting a boundary with a parent or child or whether it's, you know, what we can do or can't do, or even the things that we need to take care of ourselves because I've found those of, patients like myself that are sensitive.

I need a lot of things every day to take care of my health. I need my PMF met. I need 7 or 8 hours of sleep. I need good food. I need walking in air in nature. And I could go on and on. I need supplements and but there's a lot of things that I have to put in place to take care of myself so that I can function on the level I want to function. And same for me. You should see me when I travel and probably see exactly two cases in a road bag. For example, before you all with me. Yeah, I had to learn a lot of this as well, and I found that it was one of the things that was keeping me, my, my mask selves really fired up and especially my gut.

And there was this direct relationship between that kind of stress and being so sensitive, what might roll off of most people's backs from somebody who's dysregulated or really stressed out or toxic for me, was like being in the room with a bear, and my limbic system didn't know the difference. So that's one of the metaphors I'll use with people is to say, well, you're sensitive to and you may your limbic system may register this as being in the room with a bear. So if you know you're not going to heal that way, you gotta have really good boundaries.

And I got goosebumps when you were talking, because we've got to encourage people to to have that self-care and that self-love and to have whatever boundaries that they need. And they may need to be much stronger and empathic, need stronger boundaries, yes, than other people. And there is literature about the narcissist empath relationship. So some of us have had those kinds of experiences. The other thing I'm thinking as you're talking, it's so relevant is, when you grew up in a, you know, childhood or home or a place where you might be the only one that's super sensitive and you don't know that that's your, gift, which it is a gift.

You think it's a curse? Like, what is wrong with me? You often. At least for me, I suppress as difficult emotions of anger and sadness, and I dissociate it. I learned to really, quickly kind of dissociate from these things because it was so overwhelming to my system, so literally in my 40s, as I've healed and done the work around this,

IBS, Nervous System, and Vagus Nerve 31:48

I have had to go back and relearn how to feel. And even the difficult emotions like sadness and anger, and to love myself enough to express those in a healthy way and to know that it's okay, and that I didn't have to be small and and all of these things around that, like relearning to express ourselves. Because so often when we repress anger, fear, sadness, those negative emotions they actually cause harm physically to our bodies. So we have to relearn how to express them in a healthy way in order to get well.

And it's beautiful, and I find it often will show up in our guts. Why do you think that is? Do you think the nervous system link I do, and so many other, practices like are you better medicine or Chinese medicine or whatever their heart is actually their gut, or they're like the way they think about emotions is much more related to the enteric kind of gut system. I'm not an expert in any of the systems, but I'm always amazed at how they have that knowledge in their medical kind of system. And it's so connected to the gut.

Any other triggers we should touch on around these types of gut issues that have this Marcel connection? Yeah. So you mentioned stress. And we talk about stress. And we were like, yeah, stress. I have stress and whatever. I always love to bring in hand. Celia was the one who actually qualified and quantified stress with this research. And here's this really simple acronym that's easy to remember and kind of fun to remind us the kind of things that are scientifically proven to cause stress in our bodies.

And it's nuts and nuts. The end is novelty. So something that's new or we've never done it before the year is unpredictability. So something where we don't know what's going to happen. T is threat to ego, or it could be threat to health or threat to self, and that you can be these toxic relationships. Or it could be like the pandemic when we thought we might get Covid or get sick. And then the last one is, so n novelty, unpredictability, threat to ego, sense of control is. Yes. And that would be like when things are out of our control, we have, you know, we like to think we have control most and we don't.

But when those kinds of things, whether it's a job situation or a move across country or an illness of a family member, when the things are out of our control and all of those things that Nut's acronym can create stress. And very, frequently we manifest that in our gut. So I think that's interesting to remember. And check in with yourself of your experience. Any of the nuts, that might be causing your symptoms? I love that, and we don't. We've normalized the stressful lifestyles that we've had so much, I think about how 150 years ago, we weren't running kids to four different extracurriculars on the weekends and getting to PTA meeting and having, you know, and then having to have dinner on the table and having to do homework.

And we are so jam packed. And I think going coming out of the pandemic has helped highlight that. And people had to slow down. But it seems like we're just trickling right back to these old ways of being. And one of the ways that I take care of myself is I watch documentaries of people in traditional cultures, and I watch their pacing, and I watch how connected they are with the Earth. Because with so easily lose that. And we've forgotten that. I love that you're saying that because that is so true.

And again, especially if you're highly sensitive or an empath or having gut issues, it's even more important to really set those boundaries, to take care of yourself and to make time for nature, those important things. One of the other lies that we've been told, and I was in this pathway as well, is that we have to achieve or perform for love or worthiness. So there's often these patterns where we think if we're not doing enough or being enough for achieving enough or producing enough, that that we have no intrinsic worth or value without what we produce.

And again, the US, the nature of our society has really made that, I think ten times worse. Whereas we can just be value just being not for doing. And I had to relearn a lot of that too. But that whole treadmill or to keep up with our neighbors who have their kids each in three sports or those kinds of things, it's so easy to get caught in that mindset, especially in our country, because, like, I just talked to the my friend from Germany the other day and he's going to take a four week vacation because that's the norm and probably another one in the fall and like four weeks.

How do you do that? Right. And I love it because that's the norm for them. But for me, it's hard to get seven days off, let alone four weeks. It is. And then you feel guilty because you're not there in the clinic. And yeah, yeah. So we've covered a lot of possible triggers. How about we segway into ways to work with this? How do you get people started? We have a lot of really sensitive people in our audience. And, there's so many beautiful and wonderful ways of doing this. I'd love to hear. What are your approaches and what are you seeing working in your clinic?

Yeah. So some of the stuff we touched on in mind, body is so key. And there was a lot we covered. But just, getting to know yourself, getting to know your triggers, emotionally, checking in with your relationships, maybe starting a journaling practice or some spiritual connectedness practice, whatever that looks like for you. Those are real keys to start, because often when we first see patients, even giving them one herbal tincture will set them off. So we can't do a lot of interventions like we maybe would like to do.

So starting in the mind body place, that place where we love ourselves, trust our intuition, and start setting boundaries. That can be the place where we start. After that, granted, with mast cell activation histamine, we often need a layered approach. But frequently I'll start with diet first, because as you and I both discovered, there histamine between in foods will just add to the burden. And if we can take some of those burdens off the system, that's a great place to start. I usually do not start with, an intense detox or an intense infection treatment protocol, because those are later in the game.

So you start with kind of mind body stuff, limbic system. And then some of the first things I really like Chinese skullcap. I like, quercetin. Some of these kind of gentle herbs can work. And sometimes getting a good prescription antihistamine that works for the patient pretty early on can be important as well. And that can vary because not everybody tolerates it. But sometimes I find actually going with the prescriptions H1 blockers, H2 blockers, mast cell stabilizers can be pretty profound in the beginning just to get some traction on, you know, being able to move forward.

And particularly for people that have mold toxicity, there's more people who have salicylate intolerance.

Stress, Boundaries, and Mind-Body Healing 38:08

And I'm finding, a number of people have come into our clinic who don't tolerate herbs, but they'll tolerate some low dose medications, and then they're afraid to try them because they've had reactions, which I get because I have reactions to some recommendations that for a while I was really anti medication and, and just throw the baby out with the bathwater, which was a disservice to me. But I had to come back around. Can we talk about specifically the got some of your favorite go tos, whether there are supplements, medications?

Yes. So probiotics are huge and the right probiotic is huge. I remember getting 20 years ago I had I was clueless. I found this one strain called bacillus coagulant. I did not know anything about what it was, but it was the only probiotic for my Crohn's was very severe. That worked for me. Now I know it's a spore. It's just this one spore that's been around forever. Spores tend to work really well for people who are incredibly sensitive that have Sibo or CPO. That's bacterial or fungal overgrowth.

Crohn's or colitis. So often I'll use small bits of one spore. My other favorite is Bacillus subtilis, and these two spores tend to be really well tolerated. And the thing about spores that's unique is, number one, they're very resilient. So if someone were to be on an antimicrobial or intermediate regimen, they're going to be okay to take that probiotic with antibiotics without any sequelae. Number two, they're shelf stable because it's like a to a bulb where they just sit dormant until they need to be activated.

They don't require refrigeration or anything like that. Number three, often these patients with, histamine intolerance will have overgrowth, as we mentioned, of fungal or bacterial components in the small bowel. So adding more lactobacillus, especially certain strains that produce histamine will make them worse or make the Sibo feel worse. So I'm a huge fan of those spore probiotics. And again, there's multiple. And there's other companies that have like five spores and three spores and but those basic basic for your most sensitive patient bacillus coagulant, Bacillus subtilis really effective.

And those can actually start the process if that's all they can take. Bacillus subtilis has been studied. It actually actively fights pylori, candida and other bacteria so it can actually start the process of healing even without antimicrobial herbs or medications. The second thing I really like if patients have no sensitivity to bovine source, that's a caveat. Bovine immunoglobulins can be incredibly powerful kind of support that nervous system, support the integrity of the gut. I actually find that more powerful than glutamine in starting to heal a leaky gut.

So those two things can be great if there is overgrowth. Again, herbs can be triggers. So we maybe talk to them and figure out berberine, oregano. Some of these things again could be triggers for some people. And one really interesting thing I found if there is an underlying infection like tickborne infection say Lyme babka, bartonella, I'm always surprised that sometimes antibiotics are actually better tolerated and really the gut improves right away. So the subset that Lyme is predominant and that a Lyme disease or co-infection is causing histamine issues or bowel issues.

Surprisingly, sometimes they do very well on antibiotics, which is not typically my first line for everybody else. And that's a wonderful thing to share with people who are terrified of antibiotics to hear that even in your sensitive population, you're finding if they've got Lyme, they have some of these other things that might be helpful. And I think, again, we just it's so easy to throw that baby out with the bathwater when we've had a bad experience. And to bring back onto the table. No, we have to look at these agents individually.

We have to look at where this person is in their healing journey and match the right things to the right person at the right time. A few other basics I should have mentioned, but our EOS got almost goes without saying. But zinc is key for the gut zinc harnessing is a particular form that's really good at coating and soothing healing. If there's, gastritis or ulcer. A and critical in healing a permeable gut and typically a 5 to 1 ratio of eight to D is ideal for the first 60 days. That may be too high long term for A, but in the beginning, a 5 to 1 ratio of A to D is really critical.

And those two work together. And often if they've had good issues, they have fat malabsorption. So they have fat soluble vitamin malabsorption. So a D zinc. And then like I said this for probiotics immunoglobulins those are some of the core things. Those are great pearls. Anything else you want to share around this conversation. Anything we didn't hit on already? I know you're going to have experts talk about mold, so I won't go into that. And I have my own story with more, but mold is probably the most, common thing I find that's unknown.

The patient has no idea that they're being exposed to mold. And one of the clues to this is their box getting smaller. Are they getting incredibly hypersensitive to foods and to chemicals and to things?

Treatment Approaches and Mold Resources 42:38

Mold has a way of doing some really nasty things that weakens immune systems. So if you have other viruses or infections that weren't bothering you, all of a sudden those things could pop up and cause issues. It's probably, well, according to doctor Theories and Doctor Afrin, it is the number one trigger to muscle activation. So again, if you all of a sudden are super sensitive to histamines, you have mass activation that you didn't have before. Number one cause of that would be a hidden mold exposure.

So just want to bring that to light. Again I know you have more experts talking about that, because this is one of those things that people don't suspect if you just ask them point blank, do you have mold in your home? 99% of you were like, no, I'm fine. My phone was fine because you don't see it. You don't smell it. It's not obvious. But if you ask the right questions, have you had water damage? Have you had any damage to the wood in your sink? Have you had leaks of the dishwasher? Have you had, etc., etc.?

You know, moisture coming from inside out an attic that's not sealed properly. And there's so many more things. Often we'll find there's water damage in that home or that environment, and that's a huge trigger to histamine issues and methyl activation. Absolutely. And it's the number one root cause that we see. And even just inhaling that mold of spores get into the sinuses and then we swallow the mucus naturally makes its way into the GI tract. And now you've got that colonization. And one of the things that I really emphasize, as hard as it is to hear that mold is not like viruses or bacteria, mold actually releases enzymes like hydrolysis proteases to break down our tissues.

Yes, we get the nutrients out so they're decomposing and that's part of why they're so damaging. Well, this has been so much great information. Can you let people know where to find you? And then I know that you have a free download for them around mold that they can find in their bonuses section. Yeah. Thank you Beth. And again always a joy. Love the work you're doing. You can find me at Jill Carney Incom. I have like ten years of blogs and information all free, so please go there. You can find me on Instagram at, doctor Jill Carnegie.

And I'd love for you to follow me there. And, products and services, doctor. Jill. Healthcare. Those are my main places. And as you mentioned, we've done two interviews. I think we might have even another one coming up, on my YouTube channel again, all free. And you just find my name on YouTube and you'll see my channel with over 100 different interviews with experts. So those are all my places you can find me. And then the the download guide. I've had this out for a few years. It's just a really great.

Both you and I have patients who maybe can't see us and easily and need information, so I just made this available for free, and we'll make it available to all of your listeners. It's a more guide on how to get started. If you think you might be exposed to mold, what to do with your things, how to clean your house, some basic, basic nutrients you could start on. It's all there in that free guide. Thank you so much for providing that. And I know you've got a documentary coming out. You've got a book coming out to make sure to follow Doctor Tail so that you'll get notified of when those are available.

I'm really, really excited about it. And we're going to share those when they when they're over. Thank you. I appreciate the work that you do so much. And you have been a wealth of information for myself as well, watching your interviews, finding your website, just want to express my gratitude for your work in the world. Thank you both. It's mutual. I love what you're doing as well. Thank you so much for.