Why Lowering Inflammation Changes Everything in Autism Care

Podcast Introduction and Autism Gut-Brain Connection 0:00

It seems pretty clear why this would be non-negotiable for a child that has autism, right? Why make other interventions if you're not doing these things that are necessary for the brain to decrease its inflammatory system, what would you say to the parent of children who don't have autism Your health is shaped by more than symptoms. Through real stories and expert insights, we explore how your genetics, environment, and daily choices affect your wellbeing. We uncover root causes and share practical tools to help you find the healing you need.

Welcome to the Forum Health Integrative Medicine Podcast. I want to ask, how connected are the gut and the brain in children with autism? Well, you know, there are several markers that I have on this panel that use. They're neurotropic panels. There's brain-derived neurotrophic panel, I mean, brain derived neurotropic factor, syn 1, and nerve growth factor. And when those are abnormal, you tend to see a lot of gut dysfunction. But functional practitioners know, but a lotta people may not know this, that for every one signal that comes down the vagus nerve to the gut, and there's only one nerve, that innervates the entire GI tract, that's the vagus nerve, there's four signals that go up through what we call the afferent branches of the vagus nerve.

And so influencing that is very, very profound. One of ways that we look at that, we looked at what the presenting symptoms are to begin with. I think one thing as functional medicine practitioners we tend to do is order too many tests all at once and we overwhelm everyone and medically can in person follow all those protocols. I feel like it's not really a wise thing to. We try to lower the inflammation first and when you hit that, then globally, then a lot of the gut inflammation will decrease too.

And, you know, so finding gut pathogens, a lotta times I'll start with their insurance, like a GI profile PCR from LabCorp, stool for ovum parasites, still culture and white blood cells, buccal calprotectin, through their And then if I get, you know, it just depends on, is this a problem? And we have poopy charts in all of our rooms.

Inflammation, Stool Health, and Digestive Basics 3:00

We have the Bristol stool chart literally in every room. So our kids know well, I'm doing that one, and some of them are like, Real quick, real quick Dr. Krupp said, explain the Bristol stool chart in a minute or less to our listeners. Sure. It's a description of seven different types of poop. One starts with rabbit pellets, which is for the very hard constipated people, then it can look like blobs of grapes, and then a corn on the cob, then like a banana or a sausage, it's kind of like chicken nuggets that float, a little bit of a looser porridge, I call it rocket butt.

It's diarrhea. Type 1 to type 7 and the perfect poop looks like corn on the cob or like a sausage or a banana and that's type 3 or type 4 and typically that is every day. And it's normal if you have a nice balance of fiber and water and hydration to poop snakes that are about, you know, poop snake that sink in the toilet 1-3 times a day and thats what we want. And so... So I got to interject here. Thank you so much because I have this conversation with my patients and it has blown my mind that most of the women that I see come in and they have a bowel movement twice a week and think it's normal.

Because no one's ever had this conversations with them. And they've been seeing their regular doctor for decades. Right. They're not detoxifying. If you don't detoxify, then you're going to have inflammation. But if you're an adult and you don't detoxify, you are going to develop fatigue and brain fog and headaches. So this is like the single most important thing you can do on your own without the help of a doctor. Make sure you poop twice a day and it looks like it's supposed to. Thank you for that.

And drink your water, eat your fiber. Squatty-potties are great. You get those knees up just a little bit above the hip joint and you're jamming. Squattie- pottie are what mimic our ancestors, how we used to poop. We didn't always have to sit and have a hole. we use to have sit on the ground. So squatty potty brings you up so you are ergonomically correct when you do your business. In eastern countries they still do it. Yeah. India, Korea, China, they still poop the right way. I got one. And you know, red raspberries have more fiber per cup than any other fruit, and dates are also a great way to get fiber in.

So, yeah, I've seen dates be the single most powerful medication I have used in some patients. Just have them eat dates and they're like, Yeah, it's great stuff. It really is. As a health coach, I would have people swap in dates instead of sugar. So they're getting so much more nutrition when they are baking and cooking. Yeah. The date lady chocolate spread and the date ladies syrup is a great way. Plus it is that complex sugar and There's something fascinating to me because I like the sort of the history of, like, just the, what is it called?

Anthropology or something where, how did people used to live? And dates are one of most important parts of our diet when we were all growing up in the Fertile Crescent, right? That's what ancient people ate, dates and fish. And olives. Yes. If we ate days fish and olives, we'd be healthy. That's right. So your question about the gut, yeah, it's a huge factor, but many times I'll just lean into things that lower inflammation throughout the body. Fish oil, D3K2, and I'd love to use something called palmitoyl ethanolamide.

It's PEA and It mimics a nanomide, which is called the bliss molecule, and it stabilizes the membranes of something called microglia in the brain. And then the micro glia of the gut are the Cooper cells in liver sinusoid. So it is PEA and usually helps with constipation and also helps calm these kiddos down. That's what I was going to ask is you see this, I bet when you treat an autistic kid and you give them PE their behavior changes within a few days. Oh my gosh, it's huge. We do a loading dose.

I've even seen it like get people off the ledge that are suicidal if we do like three, three and three. You know, load it and get them down in a pan flare. Yeah. It works phenomenally. What doses would you say people should take? When we load people, typically a cap, there's a white one that doesn't have any resveratrol in it, but I'd say 350 to 500 milligrams, 350 milligrams times three. So that's like 1,050 milligrams. A loading dose, three a day for three weeks and then one in one. 350,350 is typically what we use.

So you give them a thousand milligrams more or less three times a day for three weeks. And then after that, they can take 350 milligrams twice a. or a thousand milligrams once a day, or the three times a days. It depends on how inflamed they are. Yeah. So we, you know, are typical when we're not dealing with somebody that's suicidal is, around a 1000. And then we split it out and do 350, 350 after that. And I'll phrase that as a question instead of editorializing on it, but you've used this for both children and adults, correct?

Diet Changes, Dairy, Gluten, and Folate Issues 9:00

Yes, sir. And do you see similar results? It's a wonderful poop product, But it's also really great at calming the storm. When we identify certain receptors on the microglia and you can calm that, then those little micro glia can start their pruning. So I never did this and I'm curious if you did. Did you ever use this in long COVID patients? Because they have microglial activation like crazy. Yeah. Oh yeah. Used tons of it. Tons of. It was never part of any protocol that I saw. And I was not smart enough to connect the dots.

They added it, FLCCC, which is a different. Did they? Yeah, they added LDN. But yeah, no, I just never saw the PEA. Yeah. I think it was a late edition. We had been using that from like the get-go. Right. Because you're the autism expert, right? So you already knew and you probably just intrinsically were like, oh, we should include this. Yeah, in the arsenal. Good for you. Thanks. Okay. So inflammation is a big thing that it can be a trigger. Inflammation can come from all these different areas.

It can things for people as well. So managing and lowering inflammation is a really big tool for parents or people who have autism or neurodegenerative conditions. This can be a real big area. the gut being a place where you're putting food in. So there's control that you have there. I remember when I used to work at Ortho Molecular Products, there was a product, an immunoglobulin IgG protect that we did. And I don't know if it was you, but I know there is an account down in Houston who played with autism and they were one of our biggest buyers of IgG because it helped with the parents because, it's hard to control what goes into their mouth all the time.

And so they would prescribe a lot of IGG protects to bind in the gut to keep the immune system from seeing or what's floating around so that they're not triggering inflammation in the body. But what other recommendations or when you are working with parents and children who have autism, what are other lifestyle recommendations that are non-negotiable for you? That if you want your child to feel their best, What would those be? Well, typically we like, even if there's no risk to develop celiac disease, to be gluten-free and then also dairy- free.

Typically butter and ghee are okay, however, You know, a very common problem is something called the inability to deliver the right form of folate to cerebral foliate receptors. And when you consume gluten or it makes a short chain opioid called gliadorphin. crosses the blood-brain barrier, binds to opioid receptors, the food industry knows it, that's why they put it with fat and sugar and it's like a donut. And then the same thing with bluebell ice cream, casomorphin, casein is really the worst.

way not so much. It lights their brains up, right? Yes. And so these short-chain opioids are very addictive. So when people come in, they typically say, oh, what does your child eat? Chocolate milk. eat or drink, chocolate milk, goldfish, hot dogs, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. They're very, very picky. Well, it's like they're feeding them addictive things and it is true withdrawal. So typically we start with dairy and cheese. Cheese is the hardest because it has more casein. But my illustration is you never drive by a meadow and see a grown bull sucking mama's cow weathers.

You don't. Okay. So, so why are we consuming the milk meant for the baby of another species and we're a human being. And when you're, a baby, you get milk, but when we grow up, we get meat. Yes, that's right. Pulling in those biblical illustrations in there. You know, when short-term memory, focus, concentration, organizational skills, sleep stability, mood stability hormone regulation, detoxification, neurologic neurotransmitter development. These are all the things that methylfolate does, which is vitamin B9.

So if you block cerebral folate receptors because you have terrible methylation or you're consuming things that make folate binding proteins or blocking antibodies. That's what all this stuff is about. They're called FRAP testing, foliate receptor antibody testing. That's what we talk about being non-negotiables. But I will go ahead if somebody doesn't have like celiac snips, I'll check a celiat HLA and go, well, listen, the chances of getting celia are like next to nothing here. However, we know that you are blocking your child's ability to do all these things if you let them eat that.

Okay. Or consume that Let me ask a question along those lines because proteins when we eat them are these long chains of amino acids. And when they digest them, they become short chains and their morphology, their shape changes dramatically because now there's not this cross-linking. Casomorphin I had a, I thought fascinating case. I saw a middle-aged woman in her thirties and she was drinking literally six to eight gallons of milk a day. And when I confronted her and said, you have a casomorphine addiction, that's what this is.

She realized what was going on. I showed her the literature and we had to work through coming off of milk and she had opiate withdrawals, just like a person coming out of heroin. Fascinating to me. But so here's the question. If someone is adequately digesting these proteins, then what is the risk for them compared to someone who's not? And then couched in that question is if a personal says, okay, I see where you're coming from, but I'm not going to give that up. What would you do? Are there specific digestive enzymes that you would say, this will help?

Yeah. You know, the first part of the question is, can they digest it? Well, every patient that's neurodevelopmentally challenged or delayed, you have to assume that they have an open gut blood barrier and an opened blood brain barrier. So if they can digest it, you're still going to get cross over into the blood, brain, barrier across the, blood-brain barrier, and binding to those receptors. And then for those people that, let's say for, one thing I do, with a good physical exam, your looking at longitudinal ridging, If they have lunilla on their nails, these kinds of things.

I'll do chewable digestive enzymes that are pretty palatable. So when families go out to eat and maybe they're or their kids at school and they grab something or they, they steal something because they trade something with a friend and then like, Hey, I'm going to give you my celery, but I need some of those saltines. Yeah. Yeah. It's right. And it's that pull. So I like that documentary on Amazon Prime called The Magic Pill. it literally shows a girl going through withdrawal and it was like, it living hell.

She was screaming and raging and throwing things. Kid got hungry and she was eating chicken, grilled chicken and broccoli by day four or five. But it this horrible withdrawal. typically to prevent it so it's not awful. You know, I'm like, start with one thing, you know. Roma isn't built in a day. There's lateral shifts. Take your Greek yogurt and move it over to coconut yogurt. But just yesterday I met with a family, first appointment, And said, and dad's sitting there just in his brain going, Oh my gosh,

PEA, Long COVID, and Calming Neuroinflammation 18:00

I love my cheese. And I said you love your child more than life. You need to hide that or you need get it out of the way. So your kid is not consuming it because you're spending all this to come here to try to recover things. Let's work the magic and get them there. You know, so, and that's where health coaches are. I feel like they're your accountability buddy. They're you're, let me, help you implement this in real life. There's so many swaps. And like you said, like when you sit down for some of these appointments, you getting a whole care plan, right?

Like I used to health coach, I use to be. a health coach to physicians and you get a whole care plan. That doesn't mean implement everything on day one. You're setting yourself up for failure. It is one baby bit at a time. And each of those small micro changes make such a difference. Yeah, you are so right. And so I always say, Rome wasn't built in a day and it's all about habit stacking and, mom, dad, this can be very overwhelming trying to drink from the fire hydrant. We're giving you all of this, but not a moo ice cream.

It's made out of coconut milk, nada, no moo. So you're just doing these little shifts. And I always let parents know, don't fall into the gluten-free crap trap. Don't go down that aisle and get the corn, the sugar, and the yeast. Because you've got your gluten cross-reactive things too. Well, you are just trading today's problem for tomorrow's. Even if you didn't have cross reactivity, You're still going to end up sick with something else. And at the end of the day too, if you are a parent and you're like, oh my gosh, the cheat, like this is a healthy lifestyle for the whole family to adopt essentially.

Like it's hard. I live in Wisconsin. Hi, we are the cheese state. But it also, it is something for you and your child, for everybody. It's going to help everyone. Well, let me ask this for listeners. It seems pretty clear why this would be non-negotiable for a child that has autism, right? Why make other interventions if you're not doing these things that are necessary for the brain to decrease its inflammatory system, the parent of children who don't have autism, who they're trying to be healthy, but they also don t want to adopt an entirely gluten-free or dairy- free lifestyle.

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Yeah. You know, if they don't have celiac markers on their little wellness blueprint that I have here. then I'm like, it's good, better, best. You know, go with something that's organic and non-GMO, like Ezekiel bread, and don't major on those grains, you know? And go the grass-fed butter. Go with ghee. Costco has these beautiful containers of ghee now that, I mean, they're huge. So, you know, it's all about picking the better choice. And I'm like with packing lunches, don't put crap in there. The wider the bread, the quicker you're dead.

Like Dr. Eamon says that, Daniel Eaman, The Wider the Bread the Quicker You're Dead. So it is garbage in, garbage out. You are eating all that dairy. That's why you have the stinky parts in the diarrhea or the constipation. and the headaches. Fair to say then that these are non-negotiable for people that have this neuroinflammation and these good choices for other people but maybe not as necessary for their biology. Yeah, I would say I don't recommend dairy products for anybody after a year of age, other than butter and ghee.

That's me. And that's what we espouse in our practice because we are not baby cows, sheep, or goats. Okay. Well, you know, actually found out something interesting as well recently.

Amino Acids, Genetics, and Leukovorin Success 23:00

with respect to you because then there's we've got vaccine conversations the pasteurization conversation is one that would be interesting to have at some point and my son-in-law we were at his house over the weekend and he they have organic milk right and raw little no little did he know that organic This is the Horizon brand organic milk, rather than regular milk. There's two different pasteurization processes. Let's see, what's it called? High temperature short time. High-temperature short-time is the traditional flash pasteurization.

And that reduces what you're looking for is alkaline phosphatase should be entirely reduced, which means you've heated the milk up hot enough that you would kill the typical pathogens, salmonella, proteus, the things that are found in milk if the milking process is poor. but you have not damaged as many of the enzymes. Now, you've damaged all of beneficial clostrum and immunoglobulins, right? Well, those have been damaged regardless, but haven't damaged much of digestive enzymes, on the other hand, because organic milk is pasteurized at a longer, higher temperature because that way they'll kill more of enzymes that break down milk.

And they do this because fewer people buy organic milk and they don't want their products to go bad in shipping. So it turns out that organic is pasteurized at a higher temperature for a longer time, which means it has fewer nutrient capacity, less nutrient and fewer of the enzymes needed to digest milk, and what we're consuming as a normal Americans is either the slightly healthier version that is flash pasteurized. It does not any longer have the enzymes we need to break down lactose or to breakdown casein because those enzymes are actually in the milk.

But then if you drink organic milk, which presumably is going to be healthier, it's actually got, It's even more pasteuraized so that's It would be an interesting conversation or at least an interest study to say, hey, you know what, is the problem pasteurization? Is the how it's pasteured? The problem our age, the problems our enzymes? There's so much to it. And I think having, and it was just this weekend that I discovered all of these things with respect to the difference in length of pasteuration.

But right now, The way we drink milk, we have milk available to us, it is going to be slightly hazardous to us. That one, that's clear. Now, could it be healthier to use if it were raw milk? Perhaps, but there would be trade-off risks, just like the vaccine, right? Not getting vaccinated means you aren't getting aluminum. It also means that you might die of measles, anyway. Another tangent. Yes, yes. I have a question about, so we just recently did a podcast on amino acid therapy and I had a really fascinating conversation with a practitioner.

who uses amino acids in her practice for depression, anxiety, children, ADHD, all of those things. Do you guys leverage amino acid? Is that part of the therapy with you, guys, too? Yes, yes. One of common themes in kids that are on the autism spectrum, many of them lack the enzyme called glutamic acid decarboxylase. So they tend to have a lot of excitatory neurotransmitter glutamate. So when we give glutamine or L-glutamine, which is like everybody's answer to a leaky gut, it actually just causes all this anxiety.

So we tend to use a lot of amino acids that contained either within a shake type thing or within an electrolyte solution or in a bar that does not have a glutamine in it. You know, it's a necessary amino amino acid, but you just don't want too much of it. And so, yeah, not in the sense that, you know, like we don' use GABA. We just because we have so many people that have this GAB1. So it's like, oh, maybe a little bit in something, But yeah, we do. Is your genetic testing something that you've developed yourself or is there a genetic panel that use?

It's a company that allowed me to develop and label my own. It is something other physicians could use and use your proprietary version. Yeah, they could. The parent company is called Fagran Genomics and it's based out of Austin. And this is the little kit that it comes in. I have it on my little Shopify account, you know, so that if the parent wants to order it, we can do the genetic reviews because medical practitioners here don't do it. But I had two people that interpret the genetics and they can that anywhere in the world.

via telemedicine, but, you know, my license is just for Texas or Florida. Sure. So if practitioners did order this test, because I generally am not ordering a lot of genetic tests because, I don't really know what to do with the information. It doesn't change anything for me. I pay attention to methylation. And I paid attention the G6PD. There's not a lotta things, But it sounds to me like there's at least 15 things I should be paying attention too that I'm not. Or 108. But they're divided into systems and this company has a an online learning course on how to do it.

And when you do your first few, you can do a free consultation with one of their providers to via the company. But I'm just grateful that they allowed me to that because it really is transformative. I have to tell you, I I saw a little guy about three weeks ago with autism and pretty much non-verbal. I started him on leukovorin, which is a form of vitamin B9 that does cross the blood-brain barrier. The mom wrote back, well, the health coach met with the mom yesterday and they said that over Memorial Day weekend, he grabbed her hand and he said, mom, love you.

The parents are all of them are are on boarding and you know just in the period of like three weeks where this little boy didn't say anything before that and he's hitting his head and we've got other things we got to work on but the. The pharmacist at our compounding pharmacy also speaks Vietnamese. She's IFM certified. So it was really beautiful because this mom could talk to her and explain they were getting leukoborine commercially and crushing it. And it was deactivated like in water or whatever, and it wasn't working.

But the compounding pharmacies of America powder, this kid transformed. And how many parents want their kids to make eye contact? So the mom, the dad, other sibling, they're all on boarding. We're like, It's like you're going to change their lives.

Parent Support, Lifestyle Changes, and Closing Thoughts 31:00

Just a singular miracle for that mother was life-changing, but if it could be ongoing for her, that will be the most beautiful blessing that she's had. Yeah. You know, I walked into the room and her anxiety was just palpable. And it's like, you know what? I believe you. Just slow down and to try to understand her. Yeah, a lot of times that's the case when they first meet you, they're like am I going to get gaslighted again? Are you going believe me? Yeah I've read everything you've populated. We're not going recreate the wheel.

and we're going to start here, but let's do this and let to this, and it's one step at a time." So you're right, Amanda, having a health coach, that's the glue to help implement those things. But hearing that, I'm like, yay. That's what I get up for. that brings me to work every day. It's a joy to serve people and to see these families You know, their kids, they come alive, you know. It's huge. Yeah, that might actually bring us full circle to your near drowning experience that put you in a place where you could listen to people and wanted to, have that connection and you're doing that.

What a fantastic hour to spend with you. I don't honestly. I have a thousand more questions and I would love to have you on again. But I think that's really a good ending point. Well, I love that. And thank you so much for having me. Yeah, it's so beautiful. You know, when people take their kids in like to this, we have two premiered children's hospitals and they go, The only evidence-based therapy is applied behavioral analysis, ABA therapy, where it's like, not this way but that way, but if your brain's on fire, what are you going to absorb in all these therapies?

Why don't you just table the therapies Do 80% of what the power is in your kitchen. Start there, clean your environment and deal with your own trauma as a parent in you own roadblocks to gluten free and dairy free living. And, you know, talk to me, I was a food addict. I weighed 300 pounds and it's like I went through grief, so it was like, yeah, your taste buds changed. So, anyway. Thank you so much. I don't think it's intentional or nefarious necessarily that we are being poisoned, but we. And like you said, there's these are the, that this is what the experts say.

This is the only evidence-based thing out there. But that's because there is a lot of institutional inertia to prevent the things that you're doing from being looked at, evaluated, and shown to be acceptable, right? It doesn't mean it doesn' work. It just means that there's not an industry that has the means or power to say, let's look at this. The truth oftentimes doesn't have the power of business or industry behind it. Yeah, the pharmaceutical. It's a good thing. I own a business and we all need to feed our families at the end of the day.

But our purpose in life is not, it should not be to turn a profit. Our purpose and life should be, to love each other and to make each It can't all just be done through caring about each other. We actually have to do the right things. I can care about my kids an awful lot, but if I'm not willing to give up cheese so that their brain might not be on fire, my actions are speaking louder than my words. Yeah. Yeah, it's like what you said, Amanda, creating a sanctuary and that's what it is. And just, you know, getting people out of fight, flight, freeze or fear and just know what?

Just breathe, just breathe. We're going to walk alongside you with the glue of the health coach. So yeah, well, I'm really grateful for the privilege of me being here with you and talking about some of my favorite things. Well, I certainly hope we can have you back because this was such a good, great conversation. And I just want to say thank you again to Dr. Krebstad for joining us today and sharing such an important perspective on autism, pediatric health, and functional medicine. I think one of the biggest takeaways from today's conversation is that parents deserve answers, they deserve support and a deeper look into what may be happening beneath the service because every child is unique.

They deserve a voice and their healthcare should be unique also. So if this episode resonated with you or if you know someone navigating autism, developmental concerns, gut issues, unexplained symptoms in their children, share this episode with them. These conversations matter more than you think. So you can learn more about Dr. Kruppstead and her work at Get to the Root and hope for healing her clinic in Houston. Thank you so, so much. Thank you for joining us on the Forum Health Integrative Medicine podcast.

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