Upgrade Intervention: Combat Cravings & Candida, Remove Toxins & Feel Your Best

[00:00:00] Dave: You’re listening to The Human Upgrade with Dave Asprey. Today’s episode is a special intervention episode where I work with a member of the Upgrade Collective, my mentorship and membership group. You can join the group, and you get access to be in the live audience for all of my podcasts and with calls where we all get together and help each other biohack whatever needs biohacking.

[00:00:27] The reason that you’re listening to this episode right now is that it’s going to teach you how to think about how to hack your own health and your own performance. So we’re going to talk to someone who has a specific problem, and it’s going to illustrate all the different pathways that you can use to get the results you want. And today we’re going to talk with a woman who’s looking to lose some weight. So if you’re looking at what could be holding you back, let’s see what it might be. Nayda, welcome to the show.

[00:00:58] Nayda: Hi, Dave. Thanks for having me.

[00:01:02] Dave: Now, you are calling from Sweden, which is interesting. Thanks for staying up a little bit. I know it’s a little bit later out there. Let’s get into the details. So how old are you, and what’s going on?

[00:01:18] Nayda: I’m 40, 41 this year, and the history of how I arrived to this point is I was always a skinny kid, always, yet I was diagnosed pretty early with fatty liver. Through the ultrasound, it wasn’t any particular issue, but it was all good. I was skinny, great, active, etc. At about, maybe I was 22, 23, I had a very stressful life, university, bad marriage, second bad marriage. And then I found myself in a situation where I was just constantly tired. All my friends were out, uh, having fun, and I just couldn’t wait to go back home from work and sleep.

[00:02:06] Dave: Wow.

[00:02:08] Nayda: So then I found, uh, my current husband, we had a child, and that was just a complete train wreck. I gave birth at 35, and I was so depressed. Not because I was depressed, but because I simply couldn’t put one foot in front of the other. And I thought, well, is that just all there is in life? I was so tired constantly, and irritated, pissed off. Went through diagnosis that was my first looking into it. Figured out I had a mild Hashimoto’s. My, uh, TPO was only 57. 

[00:02:48] Dave: And for listeners, Hashimoto’s is when your immune system starts to attack your thyroid, and your thyroid controls your energy levels. So that might explain why you were tired and depressed, right?

[00:03:01] Nayda: Yeah. And so, um, that’s when I started to look into more things, and that’s where I got your book and started figuring out more and more and more, and then my energy started to come back slowly. I figured out I’m very insulin resistant, but it doesn’t matter what I do. I’m one of those people who look at carbs and gain weight. Okay, I need to go strictly zero carbohydrates to start shifting the needle.

[00:03:29] Dave: When you say you need to do that, do we have evidence that you need to do that? That that’s the only path?

[00:03:37] Nayda: This is my reason. I wrote my, um, message to you, and that was the last straw. So this is what happens. My follicular phase, everything is great. I’m losing weight because I’m low carbohydrate. As soon as I start eating carbs, I stall, and I start to gain. And I start to crave more. And, uh, it’s just a roller coaster. Yet, if I don’t eat carbs as it comes post my ovulation, I bonk. My mood is terrible. I scream at my husband and my child. The whole world collapses. And so it’s up and down. I’ve developed a huge carbophobia.

[00:04:31] Dave: That’s what it sounds like.

[00:04:33] Nayda: Yeah.

[00:04:34] Dave: So do you know what happens to people who go keto and stay keto all the time?

[00:04:43] Nayda: Yeah, the thyroid gets destroyed eventually.

[00:04:46] Dave: Oh, it doesn’t quite get destroyed, but it does get inhibited. They also get insulin resistant. So what I am certain of is that when men or women go on a keto diet, without any carbs for long periods of time, it’s not good for your metabolism. And women tend to have problems with it before men. I call it the keto trap.

[00:05:10] And it’s something that I really first became aware of as a dominant pattern early in the days of keto and all. I’d already figured out I had to cycle in and out of ketosis for it to work. And I went to a low carb cruise with a guy named Jimmy Moore, who I think still is podcasting. Jimmy’s a nice guy. I just haven’t talked to him in a while.

[00:05:34] And at this event, there were a ton of very heavy people, 300 pounds, like I used to weigh. And I’d say, it seems like this might not be working. There’s a lot of like, oh, no, I used to weigh 500 pounds. I lost 200 pounds on the keto diet. It’s the cure. And I’m saying, well, okay, what’s happening now? So I’ve been plateaued for two years, but I know it’s because I’m just eating too many carbs. I think I had 13 grams of carbs yesterday. If I could just get it to 10, I know I would lose the rest of the weight. 

[00:06:02] That was a belief that wasn’t a reality. And that was why the plateau was happening. So what would happen if we talked about the effects of different carbohydrates on you? Because when you say eating carbs, you look at a carb, you get fat. Well, prebiotic fiber is a carb, and I’m pretty sure that doesn’t make you fat. Right?

[00:06:22] Nayda: Yeah.

[00:06:23] Dave: Okay. So what are the carbs that are your weaknesses?

[00:06:27] Nayda: I love dark chocolate. 

[00:06:30] Dave: Barely a carb. That’s mostly fat.

[00:06:33] Nayda: And I love Swedish ice cream, and that’s also–

[00:06:36] Dave: That might be a carb and a fat.

[00:06:39] Nayda: Yeah, it’s a low-level carb. 

[00:06:45] Dave: Yeah, I mean, it has sugar, but not that much sugar. 

[00:06:48] Nayda: No.

[00:06:49] Dave: I actually now, even in the Bulletproof Diet, it’s like you can have up to 24 grams of fructose if you need to on a daily basis if you’re not trying to be in ketosis. And I don’t think fructose is particularly good for you. But that’d be the upper limit for the negative effects of it. But if you’re active and all, and you’re looking to make enough serotonin, which comes from carbohydrates, if you don’t respond to the dairy in it, you probably can have a scoop of Swedish ice cream after dinner when you have protein in your body.

[00:07:23] And it should not make you gain weight unless your gut bacteria are really seriously disordered or you have something else going on. What do you eat the rest of the time? Are you doing processed meat? I see a lot of smoked stuff in Sweden, and things like that, when I go, but what’s your diet look like?

[00:07:41] Nayda: So, my, uh, normal day starts with Bulletproof coffee, but I load it with other things, prebiotic fiber and collagen.

[00:07:50] Dave: Okay, so you’re doing protein and fat in the morning. Okay, cool.

[00:07:52] Nayda: Right. Yeah.

[00:07:54] Dave: Which I like.

[00:07:55] Nayda: And to be honest with you, I have it at 7:00 AM, and I’m not hungry until 2:00 PM. Then I’m too lazy to do any carbs, so I eat just meat. It’s just the simplest way, and I always order. I have my own butcher who delivers me grass-fed beef and lamb, so that’s not a problem. Sometimes chicken. Evenings, I guess, is a downfall. It’s a family time. It’s mainly sweets. I mean, I just love my chocolate and fruit. Fruit is a big thing for me. It’s a deprivation thing.

[00:08:35] And so what I also started to do is to, um, when I really struggle, for example, after the luteal phase, when my body screams at me, carbs, carbs, more carbs, I started to add exogenous ketones just to help me get back on that train, as bad as it sounds.

[00:08:58] Dave: It doesn’t sound bad at all. What it sounds to me is that your body actually needs some carbs. You just need to find the right kind of carb, the right timing for the carbs. And when you see it screams at you, there’s a craving, and then there’s hunger. Are these like, if I don’t eat it, I’m going to die kind of feelings?

[00:09:18] Nayda: It’s almost like, I really want it, why not? Come on. It’s a craving. It’s not a hunger.

[00:09:24] Dave: So it’s a voice in your head. All right. So at this point, it gets really interesting because people develop this, and certainly, I did, where there’s something biologically disordered. And you’ve told yourself you’re not going to eat a carb because that’s what you chose to do. But then your body is like, eat a carb. And you’re saying no. And it goes, eat a carb. No. And pretty soon, it’s screaming like, eat a carb. 

[00:09:48] And you get in this little fight, and then you’re just like, I’ll just have a couple of carbs. And then you think you’re a bad person. So that is a biological thing, and there’s reasons that your body is craving the carbs, and we’re going to go into those reasons, but we’re not going to go to those reasons so that you can avoid carbs because it sounds like your body actually needs some carbs, and that’s okay.

[00:10:08] Especially during your follicular phase, okay, great. If that’s when your body needs some carbs, that’s okay. You can do that. You don’t want to eat 80 grams of sugar because you ate two pounds of Swedish ice cream. But if you have the ability to control it– so that’s one side of cravings. The body needs it metabolically. 

[00:10:30] Another side of cravings is toxins, which we’re going to talk about, and these can be toxins your body makes or toxins from somewhere else. And then the other kind of cravings can be, I got in a fight with my partner. I’m feeling lonely. I’m feeling sad. And then that’s an emotional eating thing. And I have had all of those, just to be really clear.

[00:10:52] Nayda: Yeah. It’s funny you said about emotional. I attended a Dispenza workshop last summer.

[00:10:58] Dave: Oh, cool.

[00:10:59] Nayda: And I came back from it. I could eat whatever I wanted. I lost weight. Nothing affected me. So I think the emotional part is a huge deal, and I didn’t even crave anything, to be quite frank.

[00:11:14] Dave: Okay. So that’s a pretty good sign that that might be some of what’s going on. And then that affects cortisol levels and things. There’s something else in the stuff you shared with me. And for listeners, guys, look, I’m not a doctor. I am an unlicensed biohacker because there isn’t a biohacking license. And I created biohacking, so there.

[00:11:33] But what I am doing here is I’m talking about things that are about you having control of your own biology, which means having the knowledge about this stuff. So you can work with your doctors, or your shamans, whoever you want to work with. Or your mother-in-law. It doesn’t matter. You get to choose who you work with.

[00:11:48] So just a little disclaimer for people listening. And also I’m not a medical expert, so a medical expert can say that I’m wrong, and then you have to decide based on the weight of the evidence whether I’m wrong or whether they’re wrong, because it turns out having a diploma isn’t actually evidence. So weird how that works. 

[00:12:05] What you’ll find is when you look at people with PCOS and endometriosis, which you mentioned you’ve had, there’s two things that come up regularly. One of them is fungus or toxic mold, especially candida. In fact, that’s intimately tied with endometriosis in a way that a lot of people don’t know about.

[00:12:29] The other one you’ll find quite often is you’ll find some trauma, emotional trauma. So a lot of times, for women, when there is trauma, the trauma shows up. Like they say, the issues are in the tissues. And they can be in the uterus. And look, it goes from meat robot medical science, which I very much like. I just wrote about the meat operating system in the new book, Smarter Not Harder.

[00:12:55] But there’s also this whole level of bizarre emotional stuff in the body where you can, like massage therapists tell you, hold their hips down and just ground them, and then women start crying,  some men too, for no reason that we can discern, because there’s stuff stuck in our bodies.

[00:13:14] And so it’s hard to know. Are you dealing with, oh my gosh, every time I walk in this room, there’s formaldehyde from that Ikea furniture? See how I had to work that Sweden angle in? Maybe that’s it. And there are people I know who get profound sugar cravings from those. And for me, if you asked me to sign your book and you give me a Sharpie, I’ll sign your book.

[00:13:36] You asked me to sign a 1,000 books with a Sharpie, those markers that smell bad, after an hour of sniffing Sharpie, I’m high, and I just desperately need coffee and sugar because I am dealing with toxins in my body saying, can you give me more sugar right now so that I can actually oxidized all those toxins in the liver? And I have brain fog until I get sugar.

[00:13:59] Or if I’m under bad lighting, after a while, my brain gets tired. It’s like, could you just give me sugar? Because I used all of my normal metabolism, and it’s not working. So those are environmental causes of sugar cravings. And then it sounds like you may have an unresolved issue with candida.

[00:14:14] I see you’re taking Saccharomyces boulardii, which is a really cool yeast that feeds on candida. It’s a probiotic yeast. I used it for years, which is a sign you’re probably looking at treating candida. Do you know if you have an issue with yeast?

[00:14:30] Nayda: I’ve had it for as long as I can remember.

[00:14:33] Dave: Okay. So I struggled with yeast for years. And I generally don’t like saying I struggled with something because what that means actually is that I wasn’t very effectively dealing with it. So struggle is wasted energy, but it might be more accurate to say that I lived with yeast and worked to solve it desperately for years. And I don’t have it anymore. 

[00:14:57] When you have active yeast in your gut, it’s going to ask for sugar. And the way it asks for sugar is when it gets sugar, it’s like, yay, things are happy. And as soon as it doesn’t get sugar, it starts making toxins because it gets stressed. And when bacteria, or yeast, or anything from the fungal kingdom has a nutrient shortage, it looks at it as a famine, and then it says, oh, what am I going to do here?

[00:15:25] Since now there’s a shortage, I’m going to make toxins to make sure that whatever food is here is mine and nothing else will eat it. So if you have a sugar craving thing in gut, it’ll turn up the production of either lipopolysaccharides in the case of bacteria or other fungal toxins in the case of candida.

[00:15:43] And then you get really, really strong sugar cravings. And since we know that candida is tied with autoimmunity, it’s tied with endometriosis, it’s tied with sugar cravings, I know when I had candida going on, that was an issue. So what people normally do is they say, okay. I’m going to starve the candida, and I’m not going to eat any carbs. It may not be news to you, but it’s news to most people. Candida can eat ketones. You cannot starve candida by going on a low carb diet. Did you know that?

[00:16:21] Nayda: Yeah, you mentioned that before.

[00:16:22] Dave: Okay. Good.

[00:16:23] Nayda: Because that’s what I would–

[00:16:24] Dave: I thought you didn’t know it. So what are you doing about the candida?

[00:16:29] Nayda: So I’ve made a test, and I figured that I need grape seed extract that’s reactive to my candida, which is funny because I’ve never really used it. I used everything else.

[00:16:39] Dave: Oh my god, that was the thing– grape seed or grapefruit seed?

[00:16:42] Nayda: Grapefruit seed.

[00:16:43] Dave: Yeah, that was the thing that saved my butt in the late ’90s and early 2000s. I figured out it worked because caprylic acid is one thing. By the way, that’s also called brain octane oil. The C8 MCT oil is antifungal for some. There’s GSE, grapefruit seed extract. There’s oregano oil you can take that works some of the time. And those are the primary things until we get pharmaceutical. So you tested yours for cross reactivity or for reactivity too. And the only thing that worked was GSE? Even nystatin and antifungals didn’t work?

[00:17:17] Antifungals as well, uh, was it– Nystatin or flucon– 

[00:17:22] Nayda: Fluconazole. Fluconazole was the one. And I just can’t take, uh, long term, um, antibiotics like that.

[00:17:32] Dave: What do you mean long term?

[00:17:34] Nayda: Well, I mean, even a week to 10 days, it’s a task. I get nausea. Um, it just makes me feel like crap.

[00:17:45] Dave: So fluconazole makes you feel like crap. That’s so interesting. 

[00:17:49] Nayda: It’s maybe my liver, something. I don’t know.

[00:17:52] Dave: Let’s talk about this for a minute. There’s a group of people out there, many of whom follow me, who believe that any pharmaceutical is just bad and you should never do it. And I am not one of those people. I believe that any pharmaceutical is probably useful some of the time, and probably harmful some of the time, and probably both at the same time.

[00:18:11] So what that means is, is it worth it now for whatever you’re dealing with? I have seen nothing over 20 years of talking to people about this, including a lot of medical professionals and myself, nothing works better for candida than pharmaceuticals. And nystatin works pretty well, which has very low incidence of side effects. And fluconazole, for 30 to 60 days, can have profound effects. 

[00:18:40] Problem is a small percentage of people have a problem with their liver metabolism, where they take it, and then their liver doesn’t work very well, and it can be harmful to the liver. But it’s about 2% of people. So what you do is you take fluconazole, and you take it under a doctor’s orders. Usually, it’s about 200 milligrams a day, and you take it for 30 days.

[00:19:05] But when you’re doing it, you take glutathione, which makes the liver stronger. And you test your liver the first time you do it to see if you’re one of those people who are highly susceptible. And you take activated charcoal 12 hours away from it. Because what’s happening when you take an antifungal, or even GSE, the grapefruit seed extract, you’re going to kill a bunch of candida.

[00:19:27] Dead candida particles floating around in your body are going to give you massive sugar cravings. Because your body’s going, look at all this inflammation. What am I going to do with all this dead yeast everywhere? So it’s going to ask for extra energy, an extra quick energy to deal with a toxic overload.

[00:19:42] So you support your detox pathways while you do it, and magically, it goes away. So yeah, I have done the 30-day protocol. I even did an anti-mold protocol that involves Sporanox, which some people take. This is anti-mold more than anti-yeast. Fluconazole is a yeast drug, and Sporanox is a mold drug, but they’re so similar.

[00:20:06] I did a protocol where I took Sporanox for eight months because I’ve lived in toxic mold buildings, so that I could get rid of mold growing in my body. And it worked profoundly well to the point I’ve never been this resilient in my life towards molds, because I got it out. So problem is it makes you feel bad. I think it makes you feel bad because you’re toxic, and I think you got to deal with the toxins when you take it. And even if you feel really bad, Nayda, you feel really bad a lot according to your notes. So it might just be worth sucking it up. I mean, you live in a Viking country.

[00:20:41] Nayda: I’ve got a whole bunch of fluconazole in my drawer from my, um, friend pharmacist, and, uh, I just actually tested my liver, so I’m going to do it. 

[00:20:51] Dave: I mean, do it with another liver test a week after you take it, is what the doctors have always recommended. Again, I’m not a doctor, and you’re not my patient. We can’t do that.

[00:20:59] In terms of getting rid of candida, given the endometriosis and PCOS things, and the fatty liver, I don’t think that you’re doing your body a favor with an all-keto diet. And if you were, you wouldn’t be having the symptoms you’re having. Some of the things you’re having may be circadian rhythm related. Um, I couldn’t live in Stockholm, even in Canada, which was about the same northern latitude. I was there for 12 years, but I had to do a lot of work with lighting in order to be able to deal with it.

[00:21:29] I just needed to be a little bit further south in order for my brain to work better. So you could be dealing with some circadian disruption. That’s a part of it, because it is really dark in winter. But it sounds to me like you have a yeast issue. Well, that’s resolved. A lot of stuff won’t work, but going no carb is probably going to make you more depressed.

[00:21:49] If you go no carb for three days or for four days, and then you have– people are going to go nuts for this. Then you have some Swedish ice cream that night because you like it. The value of liking something is okay as long as it’s not causing more harm than benefit. And the benefit is it was creamy and delicious.

[00:22:10] Now, I am going to cautious you. Cow’s milk may be an integral problem because people who have had candida oftentimes have allergies to cow’s milk. So you may need to have like Swedish sheep’s milk ice cream, or I know it’s sacrilege, but the vegan ice cream made out of coconut. Milk is probably your best bet.

[00:22:28] That’s what I go to if I’m going to eat that. And yes, I have coconut ice cream made with actual sugar in my freezer. I just don’t eat it very often. I’d rather have dark chocolate. I eat that every day. So yes, I probably have 10 to 20 grams of sugar, whether it’s from honey or some refined sugar on a daily basis in my chocolate or something else I eat, and I’ve never been healthier. 

[00:22:52] And if I go low carb for long periods of time, I like my life less. If I go low-carb for three days, I just get a little bit more lean, and ripped, and eat more steak. But you don’t have to do it all the time. And I feel like you might’ve gotten into a perfectionism trap around that. Any chance that feels accurate?

[00:23:08] Nayda: Totally. Yeah, I mean, I’m a Soviet Union kid. Perfectionist as, uh, you mentioned something about activities. That you feel fairly active. 

[00:23:17] Dave: That I’m fairly active? No, I’m not fairly active. Are you kidding? Are you saying you’re active? I’m not fairly active. I mean, I run Upgrade Labs. I don’t have to be fairly active. I do five minutes of exercise on a regular basis, and I walk when I want to and there’s a reason to walk, but I don’t know. I’m 8% body fat.

[00:23:36] I have muscles, everything tests right. I’m healthier than I’ve ever been, but no, I’m not one of those guys who invest two hours a day being active. I, unfortunately, some of the time, sit here and do podcasts because I’m launching a new book. So you can maintain it, but for you, you’re detoxing, and I’m not. 

[00:23:54] You have to walk 20 minutes day, whether– I do hold by the vibration. I’ll be on a call or whatever, and I’ll vibrate, which is like walking. You’re in Sweden, though. You probably walk anyway. But if you don’t walk, you won’t get rid of the toxins via your lymphatic system. That’s critical for you.

[00:24:09] Nayda: Right. So strategic carb loading. Well, not loading, but rice, sweet potatoes, if I’m not nightshade sensitive, things like that, it’s beneficial rather than– I mean, I have Vitruvian trainer, but gosh, it’s a task. Carol as well, but Carol is a lot easier, so I can do that.

[00:24:31] Dave: So the things like Carol or the modified version of it that we use at Upgrade Labs, our AI bike, it improves your cardiovascular system. I highly recommend doing that, but it’s only five minutes, three times a week. So now you’re going to have less chance of being insulin resistant because you just have a better VO2 max and things like that.

[00:24:54] But unfortunately, the benefits of moving are different than the benefits of having cardiorespiratory fitness. And the benefits of moving our lymphatic drainage. So you’re dealing with dying yeast in your body or yeast toxins if you’re not in the process of actively killing it. So what that means is you just need to go for about a 20-minute walk every day and swing your arms. And what you’re doing there is you’re moving the lymphatic fluid around the body. You could also have a lymphatic massage, which is funny.

[00:25:24] It’s the opposite of a Swedish massage, which is deeper. A lymphatic massage is almost tickling, but slightly harder. They’re just petting you, um, because it doesn’t really feel like a massage because the muscles aren’t getting it, but it turns out it’s a layer above the muscles. And if you go into the muscle, you shut down the lymphatic system. So it’s like a petting, sweeping motion. You could try dry skin brushing as well, but walking is your best bet.

[00:25:48] Nayda: Vibration?

[00:25:49] Dave: Vibration is good for lymphatics as well. Yeah.

[00:25:52] Nayda: Vibration walking. 

[00:25:54] Dave: And you talked about how it shifts pretty dramatically with your cycle.

[00:25:59] Nayda: Yes. It’s a dramatic change. So Mindy Pelz, she recommends to move with your cycle, and so I– 

[00:26:09] Dave: Mindy actually wasn’t the first person to do that. There was Jolene, I think, came up with cycle syncing, if I’m remembering right, but I think a lot of people are talking about it now. So Mindy may have gotten the concept. Yeah.

[00:26:28] Nayda: Mindy, too, described it so specifically. I’m a mathematician. I need a schedule. So she just says, day one to three– and she explains it. And so it’s really, really worked so well because if you’re a low carb at the beginning of the cycle, so after menstruation towards your ovulation, it just builds your estrogen so nicely. Everything is just amazing. 

[00:26:53] I’m not going to go into details, but you know what I mean when estrogen goes up. Then ovulation happens, and then the luteal phase begins. And that’s just almost like my body says, man, stop this weight loss shit right now. So I start craving. Instead of planning for carbs that are nice for me, like you said, resistant starch and whatever, I just react. And so my last cycle was just so bad that I persevered because I was on the roll of the keto.

[00:27:27] I wasn’t craving or anything. So then craving started to hit me really hard, and my entire world collapsed emotionally, physically. I was just exhausted, feeling like, what the hell am I doing here? And it was just depressing. I was like, wow. And that’s where I started to question, is it really worth it even to be thin if that’s the price?

[00:27:51] Dave: Don’t eat for being thin. Eat for feeling amazing.

[00:27:56] Nayda: Yeah. 

[00:27:56] Dave: When you do that, you’ll be the right weight. And the right weight may be 10 pounds more than you think it should be. That’s probably societal conditioning. But if you eat for weight, eat to be thin, you have a very good chance of feeling really, really bad because one of the ways that humans get thin, all you need is a famine and to be hunted by wolves every day.

[00:28:23] And you will be lean, and ripped, and thin, and miserable as all hell. So if you eat with that as a goal, you’re inviting that into your life. If you eat to the point where I am just going to feel amazing, and after I feel amazing, I’m going to look amazing, then you realize that the feeling amazing made it easy to look amazing because then you have control over your food choices because you feel amazing.

[00:28:46] So I know that I went down the, I want to look a certain way path. I’m going to lose this weight no matter what, and I did all sorts of damage. That’s why I just wrote Smarter Not Harder. I’m like, 702 hours in the gym on a low-calorie diet. Man, that’s exactly what I told my body. You’re being hunted every day, and you have to pick up trees to get away. And then you get to have some lettuce as a reward. 

[00:29:11] So you can grind yourself down. And that doesn’t even account for emotional stress, and relationship stress, and all the societal stuff that we have. So for you, I think it’s recognizing that during the follicular phase, where, um, I think that’s where you’re saying that you have more carb cravings.

[00:29:31] Nayda: No, it’s the luteal phase.

[00:29:33] Dave: The luteal phase. Okay. Got it. 

[00:29:36] Nayda: That’s where you’re supposed to be pregnant.

[00:29:39] Dave: Yeah, exactly. I’m just thinking. So during the follicular phase, which is, before you ovulate, what are your cravings look like there?

[00:29:48] Nayda: It’s great. I mean, I can go low carb as I want. And in fact, if I do, the quality of my, um, the estrogen is just amazing. My, uh, libido is up. And it is a night and day difference if I start to abuse carbs in the first phase. I’m just, uh, I don’t know. It’s not great. 

[00:30:10] Dave: When you eat the carbs during the follicular phase–

[00:30:14] Nayda: Follicular phase. Yeah. 

[00:30:15] Dave: You feel good, you’re saying?

[00:30:16] Nayda: No, it doesn’t feel good.

[00:30:18] Dave: Okay. So then you’re naturally low carb then. Then when you’re ovulating, what’s it like?

[00:30:23] Nayda: During ovulation, that’s the first sign. Cravings begin.

[00:30:28] Dave: Okay. They come on then. Interesting. Okay. And then the cravings get worse and worse during the luteal phase. 

[00:30:37] Nayda: Yeah.

[00:30:39] Dave: My gut is still telling me that you’ve got candida in there that’s scrambling all these systems so much. 

[00:30:46] Nayda: Yeah. I mean, certainly, when I eat cheese, for example, man, it’s– and I started to notice, after reading your book and taking the course during Upgrade Collective, where it says, watch what your last meal was if you crave something. I mean, I went through the whole [Inaudible], and I know what it is. It’s cheeses. It’s milk products. 

[00:31:07] Dave: You’re dairy sensitive. 

[00:31:09] Nayda: Yeah. 

[00:31:10] Dave: So many people with candida become dairy sensitive. I thought that might be the case, and that was the clue. What that means is when you make your Bulletproof coffee, you got to make it with ghee instead of butter, even though butter tastes better. Because if you’re sensitive and you’re dealing with all this stuff, even the small amount of dairy protein in there may be enough to set you off. 

[00:31:32] And then you just are on the zero dairy, no caramel, which has skim milk in it. No dairy products at all, other than ghee. And if you try that religiously for two months and see if things shift for you,

[00:31:47] they very well may. And I think you might like that. It sounds like you’re getting adequate protein. So the weight you’re looking for, when you’re feeling your body, you feel normal, is about 110 pounds, or is that a little bit light?

[00:32:04] Nayda: That was great. Yeah, that’s my–

[00:32:06] Dave: Okay. So 110 is– but that’s not the super skinny look. That’s just, I like my body look.

[00:32:11] Nayda: Yeah.

[00:32:11] Dave: Okay. So that means you’re looking at about 110 grams of protein. Maybe slightly more even. And plant protein doesn’t count. It just doesn’t count. I’m sorry. The gluten in your muffin is not protein that matters. But vegans will tell you it is. And so will actually big food. So I’m talking about eggs. And have you been tested for egg sensitivity as well?

[00:32:36] Nayda: I am sensitive to eggs.

[00:32:37] Dave: Yeah, I thought so. Candida people have egg sensitivities very, very commonly. So that’s a bummer because they’re a cheap protein. So that means no whey protein for you either.

[00:32:48] Nayda: Yeah.

[00:32:48] Dave: That means you’re going to be on collagen, and meat, and some fish, and occasional chicken, if you’re into that. Those are going to be what you do for protein, and that means every meal– let’s say if the only mistake that I’ve been able to find in the Bulletproof Diet so far– when I retaught the course on it in the Upgrade Collective, I went through the book.

[00:33:07] I’m like, man, I nailed oxalate. I nailed lectins. I nailed intermittent fasting. I’m like, holy crap. I was giving myself a pat on the back going, I’d forgotten some of the stuff I put in there. So that book counted, but there was a part in it where I was looking on the infographic, and you guys can go to daveasprey.com/roadmap, and it’s the whole diet on one page. Just print it out. Put it on your fridge. 

[00:33:32] Problem was, to make it simple, I said, what percentage of calories should come from protein versus fat versus carbs at different phases of the diet? Protein isn’t that simple. And I think I oversimplified it in the graphic. You need to eat, in a meal, enough protein. And after that, percentages can matter. But if you eat only 300 calories in a meal or something like that, it’s actually a high protein meal. But if you eat a larger meal, it’s going to be a smaller percentage of protein. So what I like to see is 30, maybe up to 50 grams of protein in a meal.

[00:34:09] And that has to be there, at least 30. Otherwise, it doesn’t count. So nine grams of protein and a protein bar, even if it’s made by a company I founded, you’re going to need three of those. And that’s good quality protein. That’s collagen. But just one of those isn’t a meal. And so 30 grams is the minimum. And after that, you can have your veggies, and you can maybe have some carbs and have whatever fats you’re using. That’ll make a big difference. I also really want to see you on a high quality, broad spectrum, digestive enzyme if you’re not already taking one. Every meal.

[00:34:44] Nayda: Mo-Zyme, I’m taking that.

[00:34:47] Dave: Slimz is a good one. That’s going to work really, really well for you. I think you’ll like it. And something else you’ve done that I really appreciate is something that I first saw when I was 26 years old that changed my whole view. In fact, that was part of the creation of biohacking, was I saw an anti-aging doctor named Dr. Phil Miller. 

[00:35:11] And he’s the guy who ran the lab tests and said, Dave, you have lower testosterone than your mother. And he’s the guy who figured out I had Hashimoto’s and treated me for it first. And, uh, he wrote a guest post on my blog a long time ago. What he did is he said, hey, look, and he flipped his laptop around.

[00:35:28] He showed me Excel. And he said, here’s all your lab values, and here’s how they change over time. No doctors did that at the time. It was groundbreaking. It was unbelievable. And what you shared with me is you’ve been all on your own. You have an Excel spreadsheet. Yeah, it’s Excel. And you have all of your lab tests, and then you have the dates.

[00:35:44] And every time you’re out of value– so you’re like a data scientist-level tracker of what’s going on here, which makes it really easy for you to see how you change over time. So huge congratulations for doing that. And it’s hard to read because you have so much data in here, but it looks like it ends at 2017. Did you stop doing lab tests five years ago?

[00:36:06] Nayda: Yeah, I was, um, that’s where my son was born.

[00:36:11] Dave: You got busy being a mom.

[00:36:15] Nayda: But I need to update it, yes. It’s really handy.

[00:36:18] Dave: I would also ask you to take a look at in Smarter Not Harder, the chapters on minerals. Because there’s two things that a baby will do to it’s mother. One of them is it’ll steal all the omega-3 fats. This is why first children, it’s one of the reasons anyway, that first children typically have a slightly higher IQ. 

[00:36:43] And it’s because all that really attractive padding on a woman’s butt and thighs, that’s where a woman stores DHA. And this is an omega-3 fat that’s required for baby’s brains to grow. And so the baby’s like, give me the DHA. And then you actually take that fat, so you get all the hunger. You need to eat a lot when you’re pregnant.

[00:37:05]  But all the really good fats are getting sucked in there. And then the other thing that babies will do happily is they will steal your minerals with reckless abandon. Because Mother Nature is like, okay, if there’s not enough minerals in the diet, and that means bioavailable minerals– largely minerals from plants don’t count because they’re bound up by the plants. Some of them are available, but not as much as we might think. 

[00:37:28] So it says, all right, I need some of that. I’ll just take it from mom. And then this is a big cause of postpartum depression. It’s why we used to eat the placenta, because people knew that fixed it. And that’s what most animals do because you got to get those things back in mom, but we don’t do that. Uh, there are some companies that will turn it into pills for you. I highly recommend if–

[00:37:48] Nayda: I did that.

[00:37:49] Dave: You did do it? Look at you. You’re a super biohacker. Um, but you probably didn’t have enough in the first place. So I want to see your mineral tests or at least have you look at them with the doctor. And the thing I would look at really specifically is copper because people who get a little depressed after a pregnancy, it’s usually copper or thyroid.

[00:38:09] Those are the two big things. And we know you had thyroid issues. I would love to see your TSH underneath one. So for listeners, TSH is when your body’s asking for more thyroid to turn up your metabolism. That’s that number. So if that number is high, the body’s screaming for energy. If the body’s low, you’re healthy. 

[00:38:29] Generally, doctors are like, if it’s under four, you’re fine. Anti-aging doctors say they want it around one or slightly under one. And when you do that, you’re like, yeah, look at my energy. Oh, I’m so happy. So you might want to play around with that, but look at your copper levels as well as your other minerals and see if any of those are lacking.

[00:38:47] And if so, that’s worth addressing. And there’s a whole chapter in Smarter Not Harder about how minerals are becoming a bigger issue for us. And when you’re lacking certain minerals, nothing you do seems to work. And you feel like you’ve done a lot of stuff. It’s boring. It’s foundational. The other one that’s important for you would be vitamin A from animals. Not the– 

[00:39:08] Nayda: I love liver. I eat liver at every opportunity. Yeah. 

[00:39:13] Dave: Love it. 

[00:39:14] Nayda: At least every two weeks, I eat liver.

[00:39:17] Dave: Okay. Maybe you can do it twice a week for a while, and it might good.

[00:39:20] Nayda: But I mean, I cook it just for myself. Nobody else eats it. And I eat it the whole week. Yeah. Well, not the whole, but half a kilo of liver, for sure.

[00:39:32] Dave: Having been married to a Swede for many good years, one of my least favorite things was liver pie. And she would make these– and it wasn’t a little slurry. It was a big– I’m like, man, can I just take some pills already? This is never going to taste good to me.

[00:39:48] So I took the pill. But it is important for you to get the minerals, but you don’t know in that cow, if it has minerals because the food it ate may not have been rich in minerals. So cows are designed to extract minerals from plants in a way that humans can’t, but the plants are designed to extract it from soil.

[00:40:08] And if you’ve been growing grass in that same field and haven’t been managing it well, we have an epidemic of a lack of minerals. So sometimes supplementing is a good move. You’re in Sweden. We don’t do Danger Coffee over there, but do your trace mineral supplements, do your mixed mineral supplements. I think you’ll find that you’re much better off when you do that.

[00:40:26] Nayda: I guess the filtration of water is another right sign. And I’ve been doing this for so many years. We moved from UK where the water was just amazing in Scotland. And then fluoridated water in Texas, I was like, oh my God. So I got a filter and filtered for years and years and years and never added anything in back.

[00:40:46] Dave: I would recommend that everyone filter the crap out of your water because city water systems are truly unhealthy. But it does come at a loss of electrolytes, and it does come at a loss of minerals. So you just take those. Rock salt, and sea salt, mined salts, like Redmond or Himalayan, or Oryx.

[00:41:08] And there’s various salt mines around the world where you can get really good salt. You can add it to your water, and it works better. You just have a little sprinkle of it in there. I always do that. I have a really nice reverse osmosis machine, and I do structured water in it. And then I add salt back in.

[00:41:24] One thing you might be getting enough of in your diet, and it’s interesting, if you go to Sweden, there’s so much salt cured fish. And traditionally, many people– we didn’t have refrigeration until a 100 years ago. So if you wanted to have meat, it was soaked in salt full of minerals, and salted cod was what kept people alive.

[00:41:48] And the way you make salted cod is a layer of salt, throw a fish in there, and then pour more salt on it. Throw another fish in there, and then the salt sucks it out. And I guess you just rinse it off and eat it. So people used to get 10 times more salt than they do now, and they didn’t have high blood. So salt isn’t causing that, but they were getting a huge amount of trace minerals, uh, in the food. And I think we’re all trace mineral deficient.

[00:42:10] What else is going to be helpful for you? I’m getting the mineral thing for you. I’m getting candida is intimately related to what’s going on in some circadian disruption, and a lack of good carbs. I don’t think sugar is your best carb. I think raw honey might be better for you, uh, than sugar. And I think that the cow’s milk is a major cause of why you’re not losing weight. So if you just religiously are like, okay, if I’m having a craving, I’m going to have the coconut ice cream–

[00:42:39] Nayda: Okay.

[00:42:40] Dave: Give yourself permission, but just no milk except for ghee. Just religious avoidance. And since you’re a perfectionist, you can do that. Do that for two months and see how you look. Because one of the things that happens with milk protein, if you have that setup is it sticks to opioid receptors in the brain. So in your digestive tract, your enzyme system turns it into something called casomorphin, and it sticks to your opioid receptors.

[00:43:09] And I had a thing happen to me. I was in Dubai a few months ago, and someone gave me a chocolate thing, and they said it didn’t have milk in it, and it did. And so I’m sitting at dinner. I have control of my own biology. I can stay awake and focused pretty much for two days straight without losing a beat if I want to.

[00:43:31] And it is such a gift, but I know every tool I can use. Cortisol. I can use modafinil. I can use certain bioflavonoids. I have these broad tools, and I carry them with me. I have nicotine. Look, if I want my brain on, it’s on, and maybe I’m overreacting to all the chronic fatigue and fibromyalgia when I couldn’t make my brain work no matter what I did, but now it’s this beautiful thing, and I’m so grateful for it. 

[00:43:55] So I eat this little freaking piece of chocolate that has milk in it that I know I’m sensitive to, but I didn’t know I ate it. And I’m sitting at dinner going, it’s weird. I don’t get jet lag. What is going on? And my brain starts turning off. So I’m like, espresso. So I have the espresso. I put sugar in it because casomorphin, when your brain starts to shut down, you want sugar or something. 

[00:44:13] All right. I’ll take some sugar right now. I’m going to wake up. I take four milligrams of nicotine. Nothing. I take a modafinil. Nothing. All the big guns don’t work when you give me milk protein. That’s why I don’t eat it. It’s just not worth it. And of course, I crave sugar. And then the sluggish feeling is there. 

[00:44:29] And it has other inflammatory effects on me that it might not have on someone else. But that casomorphin thing, it will make you sluggish. It will make you tired, and it will make you profoundly crave sugar because your brain’s going, I can’t function because your opioid receptors all got clogged up by casomorphin. That may be going on with you. It may not, but I’ll bet it is because of your candida. 

[00:44:49] Nayda: It is. It’s totally how I feel. Mm-hmm.

[00:44:52] Dave: You may find that sheep’s milk doesn’t do that. It’s the most compatible with humans. So get some Manchego if you need to, but for this first two months, I want you to have no dairy from any animal except for ghee. And if you wanted to be really pure about it, you could actually eliminate ghee as well.

[00:45:10] But since it’s such a major part of your Bulletproof coffee, I can tell you avocados taste terrible in coffee. Please don’t do that to avocados or coffee. You’d have to then have, black coffee and smoked salmon or something, not blended. So I think you’ll be fine if you do ghee. Most people are, but some people have to eliminate ghee even in order to get all the way down.

[00:45:28] Nayda: Okay, I will try ghee. I don’t really crave anything even with butter. That is a solid ritual I have with– 

[00:45:35] Dave: It changed my life too, right?

[00:45:37] Nayda: Oh, it’s just such a blessing, seriously. From 7:00 AM till 2:00 PM, I’m free to do whatever I need to do.

[00:45:50] Dave: Okay.

[00:45:52] Nayda: So I think ghee would be fine. It’s just to be purist.

[00:45:57] Dave: Yeah. 

[00:45:57] Nayda: What do you think about GlycanAge? I sent you a test, and I came up 19 years younger, and I’m thinking maybe that’s related to my oestrogen dominance.

[00:46:07] Dave: GlycanAge is one of the many ways of looking at the age of your body. It’s really hard. And I’ve talked with Steve Horvath, who makes the Horvath clock, and there’s TruAge, and DNAage, and Viome test, I think is very interesting for aging as well, because looking at all these multifactorial broad systems things. I can’t tell you that one’s better than the other because no one can tell you that one’s better than the other.

[00:46:31] We don’t know, but they’re all better good data points. And they’re all based on good thinking. With estrogen dominance, there’s one supplement that we haven’t talked about that might also be really helpful for you, and that is calcium D-glucarate. When you get your copy of Smarter Not Harder, I write about that very specifically because it’s so underappreciated for its ability to clean estrogen and estrogen-like toxins out of your body.

[00:47:00] That’s one of the two major things that manages my estrogen levels, because I’ve always had high estrogen because I was obese for whatever genetics. So if I don’t get extra estrogen out of my body, whether or not I’m using testosterone, I will grow man boobs, which I had most of my life that I don’t have now. But if I stop my estrogen stuff, this is all non-pharmaceutical, just like calcium D-glucarate, and an herb like [Inaudible]. 

[00:47:24] Within three, maybe four days, I’m like, oh, sensitive nipples. And then I have bigger nipples. I’m like, I’m growing boobs. What the hell? So this is how my body works. I know it. And since I choose to not have man boobs right now, I do an estrogen metabolizing supplement, which is called calcium D-glucarate. I think that that would be beneficial for you because glutathione is the first level and glucarate is the second level. And especially for estrogens, and BPA, and all these pesticides, and things like that, everyone should be on calcium D-glucarate as a part of their standard thing.

[00:47:58] Nayda: Yeah, I used to take it regularly. I probably need to–

[00:48:01] Dave: I think it will help with the situations you’re in.

[00:48:04] Nayda: Keto Prime was amazing for my energy.

[00:48:07] Dave: Oh, so you have a mitochondrial blockade as well. Keto Prime is based on something I formulated for Bulletproof. And then it’s something that I formulated based on a compound called oxaloacetate or keto succinic acid. And what it does is it allows the Krebs cycle to restart. 

[00:48:23] So what that means is somewhere in the process of running through the Krebs cycle, you’re losing an electron, which is going to inflammation instead of going to making electricity or to doing something useful. And that means you don’t have what it takes to restart the cycle. And that’s the compound that lets you restart the cycle. 

[00:48:41] Nayda: It’s funny. 

[00:48:42] Dave: Go ahead. 

[00:48:42] Nayda: When I started taking it, it was making me so nauseated. I was just almost throwing up, and then I was like, no, I’m going to keep on doing it. And eventually, it just was like a breakthrough. I don’t know whether it’s a taste, or it’s a process I went through when it’s unblocked.

[00:49:01] Dave: What I think was going on is your body is very toxic from candida or something else. You have a lot of toxins. So when you restarted the Krebs cycle, it’s like if you have an old diesel car and you start it up, and there’s like a cloud of black smoke for a minute. That was your mitochondria.

[00:49:19] Nayda: Yeah, totally.

[00:49:20] Dave: I could see that. And then also sometimes when reality shifts quickly, you can experience nausea. So some psychedelics will do that as well. And what’s happening is if the brain’s been running at– I think mine was down to 10% of its capability in terms of mitochondrial function when I was at my worst. I was really, really not well.

[00:49:41] And when you go from 10% back up to 50%, it’s disorienting. Like what? Like, oh my God, reality is moving more quickly again. I got my brain back. But when there’s a sudden shift, that can create a nausea sensation as well. So you might’ve had some black smoke in your mitochondria and a little bit of, oh my God, look, I’m moving again. It feels like motion sickness if your brain was stagnant. So those are things that can happen. Well, Nayda, has this been helpful for you?

[00:50:08] Nayda: Very. Thank you so much. Yeah. I have everything I need.

[00:50:13] Dave: Awesome.

[00:50:14] Nayda: I’ll see you in a year.

[00:50:15] Dave: I’ll see you in a year, but hopefully you’ll come to the Biohacking Conference. And guys, biohackingconference.com is a place to go. I don’t know if you’ll make it over from Sweden or not. I hope you do. And that’s an area where many followers from the Upgrade Collective get together. Well, we’re looking at 4, 000 people and some really big speakers and just a really cool, fun party, but I would encourage you, if you enjoy this kind of thing, come to the Biohacking Conference and join the Upgrade Collective because then you get to hang out with Nayda on the podcast.

[00:50:47] Literally, there’s a Zoom meeting during every podcast, at least almost every podcast, and the collective is there, whoever is available for that time. So you get to hear the podcast. You hear all the behind the scenes stuff, and you get to chat with me on the Zoom chat, during the show and say, Dave, ask this question. Ask that question.

[00:51:04] So it’s, it’s a really fun thing to be able to do. And of course, you can be selected for doing this kind of thing. So Nayda, thank you for being on today’s topic of conversation for sharing your info so openly, and I think you’ve got a path forward.

[00:51:18] Nayda: Thank you so much, Dave. Thanks.