95: Navigating the Toxins Hiding in Plain Sight

Narrarator 0:04

How would you like to improve your health and keep your family safe? You're listening to the Healthy Home Hacks podcast where we firmly believe in joining optimal health shouldn't be a luxury. Healthy Home authorities and husband and wife team Ron and Lisa will help you create a home environment that will level up your health. It's time to hear from the experts. Listen in on honest conversations and gain the best tips and advice. If you're ready to dive in and improve your well being and increase your energy, you're in the right place. All right, here are your hosts, baubiologists, authors, media darlings, vicarious vegans and avocado aficionados, Ron and Lisa Beres.

Lisa Beres 0:49

Today's episode of Healthy Home Hacks is brought to you by Suzanne Adams Inc. For the woman that has a story to tell. She knows her path, her pain, her love her intuition, and her own unique magic can and will serve the world and powerful ways. This woman is you. You don't do anything halfway aren't excited to go all in this year and speak your soul on stages both big and small. Suzanne's TEDx talk has now reached over 3 million of people. She spent the last nine years mastering the art of speaking her soul and spreading positivity and inspiration far and wide. And she's on a mission to help those that are ready to do the same. Because you have a story to tell. Join Suzanne Adams for a transformational four days speaker soul masterclass, designed to catapult you into the confidence and clarity you need to rock the stage both in person and online. If you're desiring to share your soul in a more powerful way through speaking live, or virtually hosting workshops, your own or at corporations, then this is the perfect opportunity and conversation for you. Together, you'll dive into how to perfectly craft your story to magnetize any audience how to attract more abundance and speaking opportunities. Plus how to eliminate the fears that are holding you back on stage, Facebook and iG count as stages to head to the shownotes right now for the link to sign up. This is the year for your story to be heard.

Ron Beres 2:32

If you have struggled with your health, despite months or even years of investigation, and intervention, you're in the right place, guys. So be sure to stay till the end with us.

You know, I just read an interesting article in The New Yorker titled all the carcinogens we cannot see. And the article focuses on the known carcinogens that cause cancer, but also how a toxic environment and inflammation plays a role in cancer. According to the article, a range of agents including fine particulate air pollution present in the air we all breathe every single day may promote cancer by inciting an inflammatory cascade and spring new cells previously dormant to form tumors.

Lisa Beres 3:27

It is without question that environmental toxins are wreaking havoc on our health today. The prevalence of these toxins is posing a significant threat to public health, affecting everything from childhood development to adult chronic illnesses. In fact, very few people realize that there is an average of 186 different foreign chemicals found in the umbilical cords of newborn babies today. Yes, babies are coming into the world today pre polluted. Wow, here's the bad news and don't kill the messenger. You and your family are increasingly being exposed to various environmental hazards often without your knowledge. The good news though, our guest today is going to guide us through understanding the unseen threats in our everyday environment while offering practical solutions for safeguarding the health of our families, and especially our children. Dr. Tom O'Brien is a renowned functional medicine expert and Environmental Medicine and a leading voice in the field of holistic health and wellness with an impressive career dedicated to uncovering the hidden impacts of environmental toxins on family health. He is an internationally recognized speaker focused on food sensitivities, environmental toxins, and the development of auto immune diseases. Dr. O'Bryen is considered a Sherlock Holmes or chronic disease

He is the author of you can fix your brain and the auto immune fix.

Ron Beres 5:05

Welcome to the show, Dr. O'Bryen. Yes.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 5:11

Thank you so much. Pleasure to be with you what a great introduction. Thank you.

Lisa Beres 5:15

Thank you and welcome Dr. O'Brien. We are thrilled to have you with us today. I know listeners are gonna get so much out of this show. This is such a hot topic. Everybody's dealing with something it feels like these days, whether it's them, their children, their relatives, almost impossible to avoid some of these things. So and you have a lot of wealth to share. So just want to dive right in. In starting from the beginning, what inspired you to focus on environmental medicine?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 5:41

Well, we have to go back 44 years. And how is that possible? Dr.O'Brien, you were so young.

Young in heart,yes. I was an intern at the time and my ex and I could not get pregnant. And I called the seven most famous holistic practitioners I'd ever heard of. And I was able to reach them all and ask them, What do you do for infertility? They all told me what their approach was. I put a protocol together. We were pregnant in six weeks. Whoa, my neighbors and married housing who had been through artificial insemination. You know, we lived on campus, they'd been through artificial insemination. Nothing had worked. They asked if I'd work with them. And I said, Well, I don't really know what I'm doing. But I don't think it'll hurt you in any way. They were pregnant in three months.

Ron Beres 6:26

Wow.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 6:27

So now we're four months pregnant, we're hot to try, you know, to go out and tell the world and we tell our friends and our friends sister in Wisconsin, I was in school in Chicago. In Wisconsin, she'd had three miscarriages and she can't come down. Please can't talk to you. I talk to you. So I started I started treating patients out of my dorm room. No, you're not supposed to do that. But I was.

Lisa Beres 6:52

And were you in med school at the time?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 6:54

Chiropractic school? Yes.

Lisa Beres 6:55

Oh, okay.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 6:56

And what I learned there's not much in medicine, that's all or every. But this was every, every couple that had problems with fertility. Every couple, irrespective of what the symptoms were one of the contributing complications in every single case was they were eating foods they did not know were a problem for them. Because it didn't give them gut pain. They felt fine when they ate the food, right. But we now know the science is really clear. For every one person that has gut symptoms with a sensitivity to wheat as an example, there are eight people that don't, they've got brain symptoms or skin symptoms, they've got psoriasis, or acne, they've got asthma, they've got abnormal pap smears, they've got joint pains, but they don't have gut symptoms. So they eat the food and they think it's okay, I feel fine. When I eat sandwiches, they think it's fine. So if you use your gut as the marker of whether or not a food is safe for you, you'll get it right one out of eight times. And you'll get it wrong seven out of eight times. And so what we discovered was that every single person had as a contributor, foods they were eating that we're fueling more inflammation. Now, the Center for Disease Control tells us that 14 of the 15 top causes of death in the world today are chronic inflammatory diseases. The only one that's not is unintentional injuries, car accidents, things like that. But everything else is an inflammatory disease. So the 101, the basic 101 that everyone needs to think from is how am I fueling more inflammation in my body, it doesn't matter. If you have a family history of dementia, and you carry the ApoE4 for gene which makes you vulnerable to Alzheimer's. It doesn't matter if your mother had asthma, and your father has cardiovascular disease and you likely carry the genetics, it doesn't matter what your vulnerability is. What matters is if you're fueling that vulnerability, right? And we don't think like that. And we have to start thinking like that, how am I fueling inflammation in my body or in my child's body? Your child is diagnosed with attention deficit. That is the easiest thing to fix. When you know a big picture view. Yeah, I have to stop throwing gasoline on the fire that's manifesting in your child's brain.

Lisa Beres 9:44

Right? These kids are eating like the worst food.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 9:47

Exactly.

Lisa Beres 9:48

On the history of ever and the parents are feeding it to them without even thought in the schools are to the parents.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 9:55

The parents don't know because the parents parents, you know my age generation, we just believed all the marketing that trick is for kids. Right? Every spoonful of tricks is 50% Sugar, 50% pure teaspoon of sugar. So that's the trick. That's the trick. Right? Wow.

Lisa Beres 10:19

Yeah, I was spared that trick. And then we spent our adult years trying to undo all that right, that damage exactly right.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 10:24

And that's the key to a higher quality of life is learning how to undo all of that, learning the habits that we develop that we thought were okay, because nobody told us. And the way you can tell about all of this, it's really easy. It's your immune system. The immune system is the armed forces in your body, the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard, we call them IgA, IgG, IgE, IgM. They're just the armed forces, they're there to protect you. So when your immune system gets activated, producing more inflammation, the question is, what's it trying to protect you from? Right. And when you identify what is overwhelming your system, and your immune systems having to fight it, and you eliminate that trigger? Your inflammation markers go down. When your inflammation markers go down. Every cell in your body regenerates every single cell, we have an entire new body every couple of years. So are you regenerating more sick cells? Or are you regenerating healthier cells? When the inflammation goes down? You regenerate healthier cells.

So six months later, you go to church, you don't use somebody you haven't seen in awhile? What happened to you? You look great. Did you have surgery? Oh, no, no, I just found out what my triggers of inflammation were. And I gluten free dairy free added sugar free. We got the plastic containers out of the kitchen. You know, I've got glass containers in the kitchen. Now, I've got organic nail polish organic cosmetics. And you just go down the list and your friends say, wow, wow, because they're overwhelmed.

They're overwhelmed to hear this. But that's the secret. so vibrant and healthy. That's the secret. How do I reduce my triggers of inflammation? Right.

Lisa Beres 12:19

So important. So well said Dr. O'Bryen, this food sensitivity thing? Would you say? Because we've talked a little bit about this on the podcast, people who go out and get a food allergy test, should they also do a food sensitivity? Do you think those tests are pretty accurate?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 12:35

Or really good question. Really good question. Sure. You know, I'm holding this thing in my hand, we call it an iPhone, right? And back in 1990. If I were to tell you, you know, in about 25-30 years or so, I'm going to hold this little thing in my hand, it's about the size of my wallet. And I'm just going to push on the face of it a little bit. And within five seconds, I can tell you that the air particulate matter in Chicago today is 41. And in San Diego is 37. It's a good day to exercise outside, but San Antonio, Texas Whoa, whoa, who had said 89 do not exercise outside today in San Antonio, I can tell you anything you want to know in the world because I've got the encyclopedia in my hand. And if I had told you that 30 years ago, you would have thought I was watching too much Star Trek. You say Well, that's impossible. What are you talking about? Science changes, science improves. And technology improves technology with laboratory testing has improved. And what people don't know is the tests your doctors are using. Most of them were developed in the 1980s, the 1990s. And they're okay. But they're nowhere near the accuracy and the comprehensiveness of the tests of today. The tests of today are called silicone chip technology. But it's a whole nother world. And the accuracy. Mayo Clinic wrote the first paper that I saw about this in January of 2016. So it's been seven years now that we've had these tests available, and they're changing the face of medicine. More and more doctors are learning about these tests. And they're including these tests, and once they include them, they stopped doing the old tests because these are much more accurate. They're called Zoomers for example, the Wheat Zoomer, okay, because you zoom in on the problem, and there's nothing like it and I lecture all over the world. You know, in October, I was in San Paulo, Brazil. In December, I was in Rome. In two weeks, I go to India. I traveled all over teaching physicians about this. And they don't know this. But I look at the labs that are always at the conferences and they're in the vendors area for doctors to see who they are, what their services are. They offer and I look in all the catalogs there's nothing that compares to the Zoomers. So what I tell people all the time in interviews is go to my website, thedr.com. The dr.com. Just don't spell the word doctor out and look at the blood tests. Look at the Zoomers. Download the information, take it to your doctor and say, would you order this test, please?

Lisa Beres 15:16

Oh, that's all you have to do.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 15:18

Yeah, yeah. But unfortunately, most doctors will say no, because they don't know what it is. And you know, they don't want to try something new. And if that's the case, you can order it on my website. That's fine. I prefer the doctor's order them, you know, so they learn about it. But you get those tests back there's a Wheat Zoomer a Dairy Zoomer and Eggs Zoomer records, who are lectins Zoomer?

Ron Beres 15:42

Well, what's the price point, Dr. O'Bryen for these tests?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 15:44

It depends on the test. But they're so inexpensive compared to, for example, in the Wheat Zoomer. There are 26 different markers it looks at for a sensitivity to wheat. And most doctors are using tests that look at one marker, maybe two, and you pay $125 for that or something. Well, what about if you're looking at 26 markers? How much is that test? It's about $400. The laboratories made it really competitive, because they want the business. They're really smart business people. I wish I could have bought stock in that. But that was not possible. But their technology is just cutting edge.

Lisa Beres 16:25

Just $400 for one test just for the week.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 16:28

You get 26 different variations.

Lisa Beres 16:30

I know. But if you don't know what your trigger is, that could get expensive if you're having to order all right?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 16:36

What happens usually for people, depending on their symptom patterns, I will see on Zoom, I'll see one patient every two weeks or so, because I just teach now I feel I can have more impact teaching around the world. But I just love being a Sherlock Holmes for really difficult cases, you know, and there are four tests that I recommend be done for anyone that's having a hard time with their health. Doesn't matter what it is, you start with these four tests, it's the introduction to the world of understanding what's going on in your body. And that is the Wheat Zoomer, the total tax burden, because it looks at all the toxic chemicals, you're exposed to the Gut Zoomer. And because it looks at the microbiome, and the Neural Zoomer Plus, because it looks at 53 markers of inflammation in your brain. Wow. And I can promise you, you know, we never get a normal back on a first visit on the Brain Zoomer. Everyone's brain is inflamed everyone's now It better be normal and follow up tests after we've done our protocols. But people don't know. Oh, you know, I'm getting older. I don't remember the way I used to sometimes I don't know where my keys aren't. I have to look for it. Well, how old are you? I'm 36. No, that's not supposed to happen. That's brain damage. Right now. That's what's going on.

Lisa Beres 18:03

You get use to that. We normalize that and society.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 18:05

Exactly. To do all those tests. I think it's about $1,400 or so. But then you've got a big picture of what's going on in your body

Lisa Beres 18:16

Would insurance cover that?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 18:17

No, absolutely not. Absolutely none of it. That's I don't know you know, some health plans like at end of year health savings accounts. Yeah. Those you can you bet. But you know what I say to patients when that comes up, look, it's up to you. But there's no way to know what's going on in your body and you can't address it until we find out what's going on.

Lisa Beres 18:39

Sorry, I'm going down a little tangent here but could the inflammation be from parasites.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 18:46

Absolutely that's why you do the Gut Zoomer because it looks at not only your good bacteria, but the bad bacteria and parasites. You bet. Okay, very very common. Very common.

Lisa Beres 18:57

I was gonna say, I know I've been reading so well. I mean, Ron and I did our first parasite cleanse when Ron probably gosh, a while ago, 20 years ago, like when I first met you. I was reading a book, and I was like, we were dating and I'm like, you need to do a parasite cleanse with me. He's like, what?

Ron Beres 19:14

I was smitten. So I did it right away.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 19:15

That's an usual type of foreplay.

Ron Beres 19:19

Alright, yeah, you have no idea. I had to go through a lot of hurdles. Dr. O'Bryen for sure. It worked. It was it was worth it. And I got healthier in the process, which was good. Dr. Bryan, I'm curious, what are the most common environmental toxins affecting family health today?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 19:37

Yeah, that's really good question. The most common source of environmental toxins is what's on the end of your fork? most common and most prevalent. Now, if you're living in a moldy house that may take priority because you're breathing mold 24/7 but the most common is what's on the end of your fork. And you don't know it's a problem. Because of the one out of eight rule. You know, if you eat something and you get sick every time you eat it You'll stop eating it pretty soon. Or if you drink something and you throw up when you drink it, you'll find something else to drink. Right? But when you don't have symptoms, when you eat a food, you assume it's okay. It's not, it's not. And it's the most common source and you get the most bang for your buck, in terms of change in your health direction, when you identify the foods that you're sensitive to that's most common. But the answer to your question is really two part. Because it depends on what generation I'm talking to. If I'm talking to couples of childbearing age, that's a whole nother ballgame. And I don't know if you guys want to go down this path. But women, young women are so toxic today. And they have no idea that the nail polish that they're putting on their 10 little fingers and 10 little toes for the last 25 years. The fan blades and the nail polish are in your bloodstream in four to five minutes. Every time you apply it or the makeup you're using that they got the laws passed, they don't have to say what's in the makeup. So you're putting this stuff on your skin, you have no idea what it is, and these toxic chemicals accumulate in your body. And you store leftover food and plastic storage containers in the refrigerator. The next day the food has pallets in it from the plastic containers and all of this accumulation accumulation accumulation, that by the time women are of childbearing age. Here's what happens. Chicago 2016. 346 pregnant women in the eighth month of pregnancy they check urine tests on them for phthalates chemicals used to mold plastic. And they looked at five phthalates. There are many more but they just looked at five, including BPA or Bisphenol A the one in plastic bottles that many people have heard of. They put the results into quartiles, the lowest the next, the third and the highest. They follow the pregnancies and the babies of those pregnancies until the children turned seven years old. When they turned seven years old, they did Wechsler IQ tests on these children. Once again, not much in medicine. That's all or every but this was every. Every child whose mother was in the highest category of phthalates and urine in pregnancy. Compared to the children whose mothers were in the lowest category of phthalates and urine and pregnancy. Every child the highest category, their IQ was seven points lower 6.7 to 7.4 points lower. Now, that doesn't mean anything to anyone. Until you understand a one point difference in IQ is noticeable. A seven point difference in IQ is a difference between a child working really hard getting straight A's in school, and a child working really hard, really hard. Getting straight C's, this child doesn't have a chance in hell of ever excelling. Now you just go to Google and you type in phthalates and neurogenesis nerve growth. Here come the studies, the higher the phthalate level, the more inhibition in brain cell and nerve cell growth. So babies brains never develop properly in utero, because mom is so full of toxins. Baby is swimming, the amniotic fluid is a toxic soup, that affects baby's brain development. That is a primary reason why autism is going through the roof, in terms of the number of kids, and why children at six years old are on antidepressants. And anti anxiety is because their brains never developed properly. So I have to get to the younger generation and get this message across. So women of childbearing age, you do not get pregnant until you've gone through a six month to one year detox program. We clean out first, then you have a chance of a healthy baby.

Lisa Beres 24:04

Yeah, it's interesting. I know we have talked quite a bit about that. And the new moms, their whole focus is on everything new right and new crib new nursery paint, carpet, new clothing, everything that's going to off gas VOCs volatile organic chemicals, which can have carcinogens and then like you're talking about the phthalates and all the kids products because it makes the product soft, the plastic soft, you've got phthalates and fragrances that makes sense longer and everything's fragrance for the baby. And so there's so much focus on when the baby gets here and no focus. People rarely talk about what preparation to do before the baby comes in while before you get pregnant like you're talking about.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 24:44

Yeah that's critically important. You're absolutely right. Because no one's ever taught them. And this is all science. I'm not making this stuff up.

Lisa Beres 24:52

I know. We have been studying this from 2005.

Ron Beres 24:54

Can IQ points be recovered?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 24:57

Can they be recovered? Yeah. Again, you changed the environment, you have an entire new body every few years. And as children, you're growing so quickly. The question is, what kind of cells are you generating? Are you generating more sick cells, more dysfunctional cells? Are you generating healthier cells, and that is determined by the environment around the cell is called epi genetics around the cells around the genes. And so when you create an environment of more, I don't like the word purity. I mean, clean this not toxic chemicals, but more clean, healthy chemical environment, and you generate healthier cells. So yeah, there's one more point, if I may, the journal, the American Medical Association came out with a paper, they took Attention Deficit kids. Now, I have to explain this so you understand what the paper was about. I'm going to date myself. Of course, when we'd go to the doctor's, as kids, you pee in a cup in the bathroom, and you put the cup on the shelf on the wall. And this thing turns around, and a cup goes over to the other room. On the other side of the wall. That's where the nurses that does the urine test. That's called a lazy Susan. And the same devices and Chinese restaurant tables, the big round tables, there's a lazy Susan, the senator to pass the food around to everybody. So they can serve themselves. Your brain cells communicate to each other like lazy Susans that the chemicals made in one brain cell go through the wall of the chemical into the next brain cell, and it gets modified a little bit. And then that modified chemical goes through the wall to the next brain. So like lazy Susan, your brain cell walls are made up of fats. When you eat bad fats, that's the raw material that your brain cell walls are made from when you eat good fat. And fat is not a four letter word. Fat is really healthy for you. When you eat good fat, then your brain cell walls are made up of the good fats.

Lisa Beres 27:05

Give us a shout out to person good fats.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 27:07

Avocado, fish, nuts, olives, olive oil. Those are the types of fats. So when mom is eating french fries, and mom is eating fast foods and prepared foods, mom's raw material that baby's brain is being made from, you know, it's like cheap lumber. You don't use cheap lumber to build the frame of a house. If you do. Well, your whole house is unstable, your brains unstable. We call that attention deficit. Right? That's all it is. There's an instability of function. And you build new cells every day, every single day. So when you supply healthy, vibrant raw material, your body will use these healthy materials to make new brain cells. And the result is a paper came out of the journal, the American Medical Association a number of years ago, they took Attention Deficit kids, they gave them 1000 milligrams of omega 3 That's the good oils from fish. And six months later, the kids their attention deficit was in remission, the vast majority of the kids were functioning so much better in school. They weren't true. And they weren't violent. It was dramatically different just by giving him 1000 milligrams of fish oils because it changed the composition of the lazy Susans in the brain cells.

Lisa Beres 28:28

Yeah. And then you've got all the food dyes, too, right, that are linked to the hyper activity. We we interviewed somebody not too long ago on he became an addict to Adderall. Adderall as an adult, you know, became an addict.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 28:45

Do you guys know why Adderall and Ritalin. Their speed. Yeah, that's what they are. They are speed.

Lisa Beres 28:51

They're like amphetamine based, aren't they?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 28:54

Yeah. Why do you give speed to a kid or a person whose brain is not working very well. This is why I had 13 cars in my undergraduate years. That all costs less than $100. I had no money. No, you buy a $75 car last year for a few months, and then it dies. So you take the plates and you get another one. What are those cars? Those cars were in such bad shape? That they'd stall at red lights, and it needs a tune up. But you don't pay for a tune up for a car like that it costs more than the car. Right? How do you stop a car from stalling at the red light? You push the clutch in and you rev the engine or you put it in neutral and you rev the engine. You're not hot rod and you just stop it from stalling. light turns green, you drop it drive and off you go.

Ron Beres 29:43

Ah, okay.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 29:45

Ritalin and Adderall is revving the engine, trying to push the communication from one brain cell to the next brain cell. Because the lazy Susans are so frozen. They don't work very well. Now that's not quite exactly What happens, but it's a good visual? Yeah to understand, well, how am I going to change my function of my brain? You change the architecture of your brain? Yeah, we can function better? Well, how do I change the architecture of my brain? You supply the raw materials so that as cells rebuild, you build healthier, stronger selves.

Lisa Beres 30:19

Yeah, getting to the root, getting to the root cause it always comes back to that, because we're still in a society where Western medicine is still treating the symptoms, you know, with their quick pills and a quick fix versus like lifestyle we need to get back too.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 30:33

You know, we all trash Western medicine. And I think that most doctors who go into study Western medicine, they really have pure heart. I mean, some of them going for the money, but most of them have pure heart, they really want to help humanity, I would add, they go into an education system that just beats them down. It beats them down, and it makes them think the way they want them to think. And it makes them act and answer the way they want them to answer. And it's based on symptom relief. And so every doctor that comes out of their education is drilled into this line of thinking, and they just are not exposed. They're starting to actually Harvard Medical School is changing. They've got a lot of comprehensive, holistic health care in the curriculum now, which is really great. But I don't want to blame our doctors. It's not their fault until they're exposed when they have three or four or ten patients say I gave up gluten and I feel better. And they just ignored.

Lisa Beres 31:39

Right? Yeah, exactly.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 31:41

Shame on those guys. Shame on them.

Ron Beres 31:43

Right.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 31:43

Until they're exposed. But when they're exposed, and if they just put their toe in the water to learn a little bit. Wow. I didn't know this. Wow. Wow. And then they want to learn a little bit more. I mean, they had I have found so many of them medicine. Yeah. Our courses are always sold out. Medical doctors just flood to us because they learned so much. And then these. And they often say sometimes with tears, they say, This is why I went into medicine. And they cry. Usually, it's some of the women who are more connected to their emotions. And they say, This is what I wanted to do in my life. And I'm so grateful. Yeah, the opportunity, because it's like, functional medicine is the coolest.

Lisa Beres 32:26

It is that is Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we've interviewed a lot of doctors on our podcast, and I would say that's very common with all of them. They either started off traditional route and changed. Right, right. I mean, I don't think it's pretty rare that we interviewed anybody that kind of didn't have that light bulb.

Ron Beres 32:43

Oh, for sure. Yeah, there was always a story or something behind why they did that.

Lisa Beres 32:47

Yeah And speaking of, we lost our sister in law to breast cancer a couple years ago, we tried to get her to do the functional route. And she kind of did, she did do that. And simultaneously was still going the traditional route. So it was she was kind of doing both her traditional doctor told her, she asked about diet, because the functional medicine doctor was telling her you got to eliminate sugar and do the Keto and starve the cancer. And she went back to the regular doctor and said, What do you think about my diet? And he's told her? Oh, your diet has nothing to do with it?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 33:22

Yeah, the next question she should have asked is, How many courses in nutrition have you had?

Ron Beres 33:27

Yeah.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 33:28

And the answer is 0. 0 or 1 out of 126 medical schools in the US and Canada. 23% of them had three courses of nutrition or more. The rest of them? Don't they have a weekend course they just don't know anything about it. That's right. So they carry that out doesn't have anything to do with it. That's because they weren't taught.

Lisa Beres 33:51

They weren't right. Yeah. And they're passing on.

Ron Beres 33:53

Probably gonna say this to Dr. O'Bryan, How does your approach to Holistic Health addressed these environmental challenges?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 33:59

Oh it's really easy. You do the test to find out what is your armed forces fighting? What's your immune system fighting? If it's fighting volatile organic solvents, we have to get the volatile organic solvents out of your body and get them out of your environment. If it's fighting gluten, we have to get gluten out of your environment, because it's inflammation that fuels every single disease. It's always inflammation. So you have to stop throwing gasoline on the fire. The question is, is it gasoline or kerosene? Where is the inflammation coming from? It's that simple.

Lisa Beres 34:35

And you could have a gluten and sensitivity or allergy and not have gut issues. You could instead not even have a symptom. Are you saying?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 34:43

Oh my goodness,only one out of eight have gut symptoms. Only one out of eight. I can't say that often enough.

Lisa Beres 34:50

Okay.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 34:51

Professor Yehuda Shoenfeld. at Tel Aviv University in Israel, he's the godfather of auto immunity. What I mean by that when medical doctors want to go back and get a PhD in immunology, many of them go to Tel Aviv because they're world famous 26 of the graduates of that program, Shawn Phelps program. There are many, many more, but 26, Chair departments of immunology and medical schools and hospitals around the world. They're his students. This is the godfather. He published a paper last year, and the benefits of a gluten free diet in non celiac auto immune diseases. And he identified 28 Different auto immune diseases, looked at over 80 research papers and he said in 63.5% of the papers confirm that up to 87% of autoimmune patients get better on a gluten free diet. So it's not every patient every time, but it's more than half my patients get better on a gluten free diet. And that was autoimmune myocarditis with inflammation of your heart, all your immune Hashimotos thyroid disease, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, scleroderma of psoriasis, 28 different diseases from the Godfather, say, You know what, most of the people get better if they go on a gluten free diet. That's like what? Yeah, so you do the Wheat Zoomer test. And you see is my immune system fighting wheat? If it is, you're done with wheat, if it comes back negative, you're one of the few that haven't crossed the line of tolerance yet.

Ron Beres 36:42

Oh, that's interesting. What percentage don't subject themselves so we?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 36:46

Yeah, this test is extremely accurate, as long as you have total immunoglobulins, meaning your immune system has enough soldiers. If your immune system is depleted, you can't test the system to see if there's a problem or not. But as long as you have total immunoglobulins is a very, very accurate test 97 to 100%. And we've only had two normals come back in the last seven years.

Ron Beres 37:15

Oh, that's astronomical. Wow.

Lisa Beres 37:17

Well, the bigger question, Dr. O'Brien is, Should everyone eliminate gluten?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 37:23

Well, I can't say that because that might sound like a nutcase. But everyone who has a health condition, that's not getting better the way they wanted to needs to do the Wheat Zoomer, just to see you need to do the most accurate test out there. And it can be done with a finger prick. Oh, yeah, you don't even need a blood drawn. You can do a fingerprint and maintain the same degree of sensitivity.

Lisa Beres 37:46

Really? The Zoomer test, you don't even have to go to a lab. It's like an at home.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 37:51

That's correct. Oh, that's great. Some of the tests require a blood sample, not a finger prick. But the food tests will be just as accurate with a finger prick test.

Lisa Beres 38:02

Oh, right. Okay, we did that. Ron, we did that with an at home lab.

Ron Beres 38:05

Probably the old test.

Lisa Beres 38:06

Not this. Yes, it wasn't the Zoomer. It was an 80s.

Ron Beres 38:10

We tested ourselves right? Yeah.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 38:11

What if you guys are interested, I propose to you that both of you do a Wheat Zoomer, total tax burden, and a Neural Zoomer Plus, and I'll come on the show and interpret your test results for you.

Ron Beres 38:26

Oh, okay.

Lisa Beres 38:28

I'd be interested in that. Yeah, I have some gut issues. Minor, not major. And I don't eat gluten. For the most part. I don't eat bread. I very rarely will have gluten at all. And no dairy we're vegan, we'd have no dairy. And now we're in doing a parasite cleanse right now, actually, because we haven't done one in a while. And Ron is having a massive gout attack.

Ron Beres 38:49

I'm putting on a brave face right now. But yeah, my hand is quite swollen. Yeah.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 38:53

Understood.

Lisa Beres 38:54

And yeah, yeah. Well, we're very healthy.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 38:57

But if you guys want to do that, I'll interpret it for you. And then the whole world or your world.

Lisa Beres 39:04

Keep the darkest secrets what's going on in our gut? Well, yeah, we had a functional MD that we had listened to speak one time. You probably know who she is. Dr. Amy Myers. Sure. She said, You know, she sees people from all over the world and with autoimmune diseases and everything. She always takes them off dairy and gluten first, and usually, like almost always, the symptoms go away, regardless of what the issue is. Yeah, that's why I asked you, or greatly reduced, greatly reduced. Yeah, and even ADHD and autism, even autism. I've heard if they do this early enough with children and get them off gluten and dairy, you know, the first signs of autism. We know a woman who started a gluten free dairy free bakery here in Southern California and her boys were showing signs of autism at a very early age and she immediately cut that out and they actually did a complete 180 They are very healthy now. She opened a bakery to help support other moms who need that. Yeah. So that was a really good. So a shout out to sensitive sweets in Fountain Valley. Right?

Ron Beres 40:05

Yeah. Dr. O'Bryan Well, my respectful of your time here, can you share some strategies in the meantime for reducing exposure to environmental toxins the home?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 40:13

Sure, you know, I've written two books, just two books. One of them, the auto immune fix, one national book award is really a great book and has helped a lot of people. That's second one, you can fix your brain. And it was number one in seven categories on Amazon, in terms of rating.

Ron Beres 40:31

Oh, wow.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 40:33

So I'm very proud of them in You Can Fix Your Brain, I could have been titled it, You Can Fix Your Home Environment, You Can Fix Your Heart, You Can Fix Your Joints, it doesn't matter. It's these big picture concepts of how to clean up your life in You Can Fix Your Brain, there are 36 different to do's things to check and to do. But one of them the home detox guide that we put together room by room, you know, and you can get it on my website. It's at thedr.com/detox-by-room/

Ron Beres 41:10

We'll put that in the show notes at the end of the show. Yes, yeah.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 41:12

Great, great. You know, and I've just started talking about the things to do. You know, for example, this kind of blows people away, have you ever like cut yourself or something and you pour some hydrogen peroxide on it, and as little white bubbles killing bacteria, right? That's a good thing. Get a shot glass and put some hydrogen peroxide in it, and put your toothbrush in there. Okay, and notice what happens, there's a volcano erupt, on your toothbrush, your inoculating every day, when you brush your teeth with toxic bacteria.

Ron Beres 41:48

You throw away your teeth brush after one use, what's the best way to deal with it.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 41:53

There's two ways of approaching it. One is maybe once a week, to soak in some peroxide for less than a minute doesn't take long at all. Other people, some doctors recommend brush your teeth with hydrogen peroxide, because it kills bad bacteria doesn't kill good bacteria. Many people have heard of how important is the bacteria in your gut the microbiome. And it is critically important. If there's only one thing you're going to do to be healthy, or it's build a healthy diverse microbiome that's most important.

Lisa Beres 42:22

Right? Because isn't it 70% of our immune system is in our gut.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 42:26

That's correct. But there's over 800 families of bacteria in your mouth. And we swallow about a liter a day of saliva a full liter. So if you've got too much toxic bacteria in your mouth, you're inoculating your gut all day, every day with toxic bacteria, right? So you have to build a healthy microbiome. And so you learn how to do that. But why do dentists give antibiotics before they start working in your mouth, there's only one reason is because you know, when they squirt water and you lean over in the porcelain tub, and you spit the water out, and there's blood in the water, pink water, they just gave you leaky gums, and leaky gums take three days three to four days to heal. But in the meantime, all that bacteria that's in your oral cavity and your mouth can go through the leaky gums into the bloodstream and if you get too much strep in your mouth and many people do, we've heard of strep throats when it's really bad. If you have too much strep in your mouth strep gets in your bloodstream, if it starts to build up and colonize your immune system fights strep, but strep looks the amino acid structure of strep that's what the antibodies to strep fight, they look for the amino acid structure to kill the strep. The amino acid structure of strep looks like the amino acid structure of the valves of your heart. And the antibodies will attack the valves of your heart. That's rheumatic fever. That'll kill you. That's the only reason why dentists give antibiotics because if you've got antibiotics in your bloodstream, and then you get leaky gums, a little streps goes in but the antibiotics in the bloodstream to kill the strep so never has a chance to colonize and activate an immune response. Is that makes sense?

Ron Beres 44:16

It does. Yeah, a little off topic here. If you had a cut in your mouth, I've put Collodial Silver on there just to make sure it's you know, would you recommend that as well?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 44:25

Yeah, you bet. That's one of the great antibacterials

Lisa Beres 44:28

Oh, shout out to Collodial Silver, aren't they trying to take that off the market? Well, there's rumors of that. I don't know. When I heard that. Stock up guys.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 44:37

But you know, but in the bathroom, the next thing in your bathroom, put the toilet seat down before you flush? Yes, we do that. Because if you don't just go on Google and YouTube and type in toilet seat flushing and you see they use blue lights. And you see what comes splashing in the air. Yeah, it's gross and you just don't realize it because you don't see it. Right? Just little things like that or if you have sore throats or ear infections or nasal infections or sinus, you have to clean your showerhead. Showerheads are loaded with biofilm of pathogenic bacteria. They are loaded, if you're in a warm climate, you have to clean your showerhead every three months. And the handouts on my site tell you how to do that. And if you're in a cold climate, you have to clean the showerhead every year.

Lisa Beres 45:26

Okay, and could you just do vinegar? Or do you need like something stronger?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 45:31

You need a minimum 8% vinegar? Okay, stop at the grocery stores. 3% it's not strong enough. Okay, so Amazon's got it. It's got it. Yeah. Around 25 bucks for two years supply? I mean, very expensive. Yeah.

Lisa Beres 45:46

These are really niche, great tips that you've given that people don't think about. And I've noticed when we did this, sorry, guys a little TMI. But when we started closing the lids before flushing the toilet, I noticed the toilets were so much dirtier, like, what is all this stuff around the toilet that never was there before, right? All of a sudden, the toilets got really dirty. And you were like, oh, that's the stuff that was going in the air or on the counters or on the floor before? Yeah. And that's when I realized how powerful that was. I think they did studies where people leave their toothbrush on the counter, where that spray, the toilet spray was got getting on the toothbrushes. So it's like, okay, now you're putting that in your mouth.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 46:26

That's exactly right. Those are things we don't think about. So you learn these little simple tips. And once again, my book you can fix your brains got 36 of those different kinds of tips. But the handout detox-by-room. Yeah, I've got the kitchen, the bathroom, the bedroom, living quarters, you know, the house plants. NASA did the studies, NASA. They never talked about this with reporters, but the astronauts were going a little loopy in space. And you know, the app says, Hello, Houston, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and uses a hello shuttle. Can you repeat that, please. And they do it again. And then at Houston, they just looked at each other. It's like whoa. And what they found out was that they were losing focus in space. And it was because of the toxic air. And because everything's plastic in there, and the family eats from the plastic. So NASA finance the studies on how to build healthy air. And you build healthy air with houseplants. And they showed that to six inch house plants in a 10 by 10 room absorbs 74% of the toxins in the air. And so you go to the local nursery and you buy 20 Little houseplants you put too when you treat kids bedrooms everywhere. And not only do they absorb the toxins in the air, but they also generate more oxygen in the air.

Lisa Beres 47:51

Yeah, they are a little air scrubbers. Yeah. certain plants. I think it's 50 plants they found. Yeah, there's a really wonderful book written by the Dr. Wolverton that I oversee it. So that study and it highlights the plants and it's 50. Some are flowering the poinsettia, there's the philodendron. And I always tell people, it's such a great housewarming gift, you know, because you're literally giving someone the gift of health versus the bottle of wine. Why not bring a house plants? That is literally going to make them healthier? Bring in more? Yeah, well, this so great. Clearly, we could go on and on and on. There's so many other questions we didn't get to. We'll have to have you back, Dr. O'Bryen. But where can the audience learn more about you?

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 48:33

Thank you. Well, thedr.com. And there's all kinds of things there. We have an event coming up in a couple of months. You know, I've done two events in my life like this. The first one, we put together, what was called the Gluten Summit. And it was the first online health event ever, ever. And that was 10 years ago. And we made it out just how to do it. We just tried. And as a result, my friends said, How did you do that? And I said, I don't know. We just made it up. And they said, Well, can we talk to your team for specifics? And I said, Sure. My team came to me and said, Doc, your friends all want to do summits like Mark Hyman and Isabella and Deanna Mimich, that they all wanted to do something. So we should start a company. And it's a no, no, it's not my thing. But you guys go ahead. We did great together. Go for it. That was the start of a company called Health Talks Online.

Ron Beres 49:29

Oh, wow. Okay.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 49:31

It came from us. You know, we just made all this up. And then I did an event in 2016 called the betrayal, the autoimmune disease solution. They're not telling you, and over 2 million have seen that antastic it's helped a lot of people. So we're doing our third event. Now. You know, I'm not a professional at this. But when there's a passion, yeah, nothing gets in the way. So I've interviewed the world leaders like Schonfeld, and many, many others. There's on this topic of inflammation and how do we reduce all of the sources of inflammation in our body and is called the inflammation equation, decoding the path to optimal wellbeing. So that comes out in a couple of months, and we're really looking forward to that. Yes.

Lisa Beres 50:20

Okay. Well definitely put a link to that. We'll have to get that from you. And it's why, and we'll put that in the show notes. Yeah, guys. Don't miss that. And we'll put the links to your books and your website as well. Absolutely.

Dr. Tom O'Bryan 50:30

Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Yes.

Ron Beres 50:32

All right. As always, we'll have all the links in the show notes at Ron lisa.com forward slash podcast. See you in two weeks a get ready to uplevel your health. Bye Dr.O'Bryan, thank you so much.

Narrarator 50:46

Thank you. This episode of the Healthy Home hacks podcast has ended. But be sure to subscribe for more healthy living strategies and tactics to help you create the healthy home you always dreamed up. And don't forget to rate and review so we can continue to bring you the best content. See you on the next episode.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai