May 12, 2025 • 37 mins
It’s Monday, which means a brand new episode of Chiquis and Chill is coming at you! Today, we’re speaking with Dr. Julie Greenberg, a naturopathic doctor and registered herbalist – don’t worry, she’ll explain exactly what that means. I had such a great conversation talking about how we can achieve the clearest healthiest skin, and how we can do it without prescription medication.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Oliskmustan. Welcome to Cheeky's Chill Podcast, your favorite podcast. I
hope you all had a really great Mother's Day celebrating
the most important women in your life. I definitely had
a nice one, relaxing and celebrating Immedial's mom and of
course my mom. Even if she's not here physically, she
deserves to be celebrated.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Today we'll be.
Speaker 1 (00:24):
Focusing on a topic I'm super passionate about. I'll give
you a hint. We're going to be talking about the
largest organ in the body. That's right, We're going to
be talking about our skin. We all know it's very
important to drink plenty of water and to wear SPF
every day. Huge advocate for that, but what else can
we be doing? And for those of us who suffer
(00:47):
from skin conditions like rostatia, acne ezema, what can we
do to soothe that? To help us answer that question,
I'm bringing on doctor Julie Greenberg. She's a licensed naturopathic
doctor and a registered herbalist. Welcome to the podcast, doctor Greenberg.
I'm so excited to have you. I love anything that
has to do with skin, so you can't even imagine
(01:09):
how excited I am to have you on the podcast,
so thank you.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
Well, You're welcome and I love skin too, and thank
you for having me. It's an honor to be here.
I appreciate that.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
I know that the listeners, you guys, are going to
love this episode. I'm going to ask all the questions
for you guys, so I know we all want clear skin.
But before we get into that, I do want to
ask what a natural pathic doctor is.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
So naturopathic doctors here in the United States where I live.
It's a four year medical school degree and we're licensed
by state. So depending on the state, I could either
be a primary care physician or it really depends on
the state. And herbalist is not a doctor, but naturopathic doctors.
Our training is that we are herbalists, so instead of
(01:54):
just writing a pharmaceutical prescription, we're trained in the use
of herbal medicine. So we're doctor that are herbalis I
love that? Okay? Perfect? Okay.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
I have roseatia and I get it from my dad
and I saw him not so long ago, and I
saw how with time it can get thicker. If you
don't treat it, it is and correct me if this
is if I'm wrong, But it comes from the gut, right,
It starts in the gut.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
So rosesiha is what we call a complex multifactorial disease.
So there's not like one thing only that we can
point to and say, ah, that's the thing that causes roseesia.
But you are absolutely correct that we do see a
lot of what we call correlation between what's going on
in the gut and patients who have roseaesia. And there's
(02:42):
some particular species of bacteria we can see in the
gut of people who have roseesia, like something called Hpylori,
which is a bacteria that lives in the stomach, So
we know that the gut microbiome has a piece. And
then there's also topical things that can be a factor
in roseaesia. You talked about thickening of the skin, and
(03:02):
in the worst case scenario, there's something called rhinofyma where
people can get very bulbous, like very large noses with
a lot of skin thickening, and that we attribute to
something called dimadex mites. So it's a little gross when
people think about it, but we've all got like microscopic
creatures living on us, and we have these microscopic mites,
(03:25):
and there are ones that live in our face and
eat sebum or oil that we produce naturally in our skin.
And something seems to happen with rosetia where either there's
too many dimadex mites or there's an immune system kind
of inappropriate response where it can cause inflammation, thickening of
the skin. And again in the worst case scenario that
(03:47):
rhino fimo where people get like noses that can be
two or three times the size of a normal nose.
So there's a lot of things going on in roseatia.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
That we need to deal with, okay, And it is hereditary, right,
So there's a hereditary component. So yes, I mean when
we see rosesha, we certainly ask our patients.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Is there a family history? But you could also be
the first person in your family to have roseesha and
nobody you know and your family may have it, so
it can go eat your way.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Okay, Yeah, because I definitely get it from my dad,
and when I saw him, I did see that it
was a lot better. He said that they gave him,
i want to say, an antibiotic, and he said, since
then it has really diminished. So I was just wondering,
I'm like, Okay, that's when I realize. I'm like, oh,
it's in the gut. And I kind of knew that
because I'm like, I feel like when I eat certain things,
(04:41):
or I get in the sauna or spicy food, I've
noticed that it does flare it up. Which is why
I wanted to have this conversation with you, because I
think we're all striving to have better skin, and of
course topical creams and good skincare works, but I really
want to get into the nitty gritty of it of
really what it is that we are in and putting
into our bodies.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
Yeah, and you're so right. I think the approach so
often to skin care or skin problems is, well, we
can see the skin and touch it, so let's just
put things on top of it, which certainly can help
or make a difference. But we generate skin from the
inside out. If you think about it, we're a tube, right.
The outside of the tube is the skin that we
(05:22):
can touch and see, and we're connected at the mouth
and at the tush, at the anus, and the inside
of the tube is our digestive track and it's all
different types of epithelial or skin type tissue, and so
it's connected. What is going on in your gut controls
your immune system, and what is going on in your
(05:43):
gut will directly impact what's happening on your skin. So
in addition to paying attention to the things that we're
doing topically and putting on our skin, we absolutely want
to pay attention to what we're putting in our mouth
and what's happening with our gut microbiome or the organisms
that naturally live in our gut. And that's totally normal
(06:05):
and healthy. We've co evolved with those gut microbes, and
people are usually pretty sounded to learn how many microbes
are living in our gut. It's trillions. It's about three
to five pounds. So next time you step on the scale,
you look at that number and you think, wow, three
to five pounds that this are microbes living in my
(06:25):
gut and they belong there and we need them, and
we want the right gut microbes to keep you and
your skin healthy. If it's the wrong gut microbes, it
can make you sick and it can cause skin problems.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Oh mg, that's a lot. Three to five pounds.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
It's like a hand weight that we carry around at
all time, all with microbes.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
Okay, and I have a bunch of questions in regards
to that, but I did want to ask you a
little bit of a not personal but if you feel comfortable,
have you ever suffered with any type of skin condition? Doctor?
Speaker 2 (06:57):
Yeah. So it's funny because people definitely think, oh, because
I specialize in skin, maybe I had some sort of
like acne or egzema. But I didn't. But it's a
very naturopathic way I got to skin. So another part
of being a naturopathic doctor is we say treat the
whole person. You know, it's great. In conventional medicine, we
(07:17):
do have specialists, but sometimes we kind of try to
chop up the body like they're completely different. Right, So
it's like you go to your dermatologists, they're only thinking
about your skin. You go to the cardiologists, they're only
thinking about your heart. You go to the gaser entrologists,
they're only thinking about your gut. But it's all connected.
We're one body, and our body, mind and spirit is
(07:38):
all connected and all impacts our health. So from a
naturopathic principle, we say treat the whole person. Think about
the whole body. And the mind and the spirit. So
I actually got interested in dermatology because my first diagnosis
with the chronic health disease was a thyroid autoimmune disease
called hashimotos, which is very common in a lot of
(08:00):
your listeners, particularly female, are going to be shaking their
heads and saying, I have hypothyroidism or hashimotos. And when
I first got diagnosed, I lived in LA and I
went to a big, you know, famous center, and I
was just shell shocked that they said, well, we don't
know what causes it, we don't know how to fix it.
We're going to give you this medicine, but it may
(08:21):
not help and we can't do anything about it. And
I just walked out of there just really shell shocked, thinking,
we have like the best medicine in the world, the
best minds working on this, and this is the answer
that I'm going to be tired and overweight the rest
of my life and we don't know what caused it
or how to fix it. So I started doing research
and I tried to figure out like what could be
(08:44):
causing the thyroid problem. And the more I looked at it,
the more I found our food and then our personal
care products. So a lot of the products that we
put on our skin are what are called endocrine disruptors.
They're hormone disruptors, and they can affect our thyroid. And
with all the like lotions and shampoos and makeup and
(09:04):
deodorant and things that women put on their skin on
a daily basis, women can average five hundred chemicals a day.
Through these topicals, we absorb it and it can impact
things like our thyroid and cause hypothyroidism. So I started
researching and trying to make my own skin products and
trying to clean up what I was putting on my
(09:26):
skin and absorbing into my body. And then I fell
in love with skin in dermatology. But that's gone. That's
how I became a specialist just through my thyroid, which
is a very naturopathic thing because it was it was
actually a different organ system that was impacted by skin.
Everything is impacted by skin.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Well, look at that. I also have hypothyroidism, and I
take medicine every day, and my doctor said, I'm going
to have to take medicine for the rest of my life.
But I got off the medicine on the Okay, I'm
going to meditate my way through this, I'm and I
looked and went to a holistic doctor, and I've removed
(10:07):
gluten and I try not to have so much dairy,
and I do feel the difference. But as soon as
I stopped taking it, they are seven pounds two weeks later,
so I got right back on it. But I do
feel that we can heal our bodies exactly with what
you said, it's what we put I'm getting better, you know,
even getting my nails done. You know, I'm looking for
(10:30):
organic nail polish, and I mean, these are things that
I didn't really think about when I was younger, and
now I really I'm going to hit forty, like I
need to like take care of myself more and be
careful with what it is that I'm putting on my skin.
It's the largest organ in our body, you guys.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
It is, and you're like so many women. There's so
many pressures on women to beautify and do treatments and
all of these things. And I used to get my
nails done every week. I used to have acrylic nails
and never thought twice about it, never thought that could
impact health. And then you know, obviously now I'm a
naturalpathic doctor and all of that is part of my
(11:11):
job to know. But yeah, I mean learning that there's
formaldehyde in nail polish. Do we absorb things through the
nails into our system? Formaldehyde is what we preserve dead
bodies with. Well, we're alive. We don't want to be
absorbing formaldehyde, you know. So now they're trying to do
things like making formaldehyde free nail polish and other things.
(11:32):
But it is a little difficult because we identify and
take out one dangerous chemical, but then sometimes the things
that they put in can end up being worse. And
so it is just being mindful and asking like, well,
what is this doing to me? And do need this?
You know? Does this make me feel beautiful or do
I need it to feel beautiful or are there some
(11:53):
other options.
Speaker 1 (11:54):
Now I'm starting to be a lot more cautious and
really looking at the ingredients, and I do feel the difference.
I do feel like I have more energy, and my
goal is to eventually stop taking this medicine you know,
and and heal my body. But AnyWho, now, because I
do want to talk about what we are ingesting and
(12:16):
what we can What are some things that you recommend
us staying away from to have clear skin. So let's
start there. For instance, how do you feel about dairy?
Speaker 2 (12:27):
So personally, I don't like dairy, especially the way that
we manufacture and consume it in the United States. Many
there's any West Coast listeners and you've driven up I
five and you pass these stinky like enormous I mean,
those are the meat ones. But you know, cows live
in these what are called CAFOs, concentrated animal feed operations,
(12:49):
and they are not living normal lives. We're not feeding
them normal food. Cows are supposed to eat grass. We're
feeding them corn and things to fatten them up. And
so the milk from these cows is not great quality milk.
But even more than that, if we step back and
just think about it from like a thirty thousand foot picture,
and I go through this with patients, I say, what
(13:10):
is milk? Why is there milk on the plant? Right?
What is the purpose of milk? And you used to
drink milk? When did you drink milk.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
When I was a baby, when I was younger.
Speaker 2 (13:21):
And that was appropriate And the definition of being a
mammal is that the mother produces milk for an infant,
and that infant starts off life drinking milk. But then
at some point, every mammal on planet Earth since the
history of time transitions off of milk and onto their
main food source, whether that's grass for a baby cow
or you know, hunting antelope for lions. You come off
(13:44):
the milk, you transition to your food, and you will
never have milk again. Ever, as a baby mammal, you
will also never have milk of another species. A cow
is not going to allow an elephant baby to come
over and drink from it, or vice versa. So it
is not a normal thing biologically for adults to be
(14:06):
drinking milk or drinking the milk of another species. And
a lot of people have lost an enzyme called lactase,
which is the ability to digest milk. So people who
are like, oh, I'm lactose intolerant, they can't do it
because if they drink milk, they will immediately get like
tummy eggs or diarrhea or big problems. But the rest
of the population can digest it. But again, it's not
(14:28):
an appropriate food source because we are not baby cows
and we never will be and we never were, and
so milk, I think, can be a problematic food and
again the cows that are producing the milk here are
not particularly healthy. There's certain of my patients where I
really stress that they cut out milk. Those would be
my acne patients and my eggzema patients. Acne is driven
(14:49):
by something called overproduction of sebum cibam. I mentioned before
with the demodex mites, So every hair follicle and cleaning
the ones on our face, even women have little tiny
hairs all over their face. It produces sebum, which is
like an oil, and that's good, that lubricates the skin.
But an overproduction of sebum is the first step in
(15:11):
development of acne, and milk triggers a pathway that's gonna
drive the overproduction of acne. So any of my acne patients,
I say, take out all milk, and then the negotiation
becomes that they say, what about sheep or cow or camel. No,
any milk that came from a mammal mama I was
turned into anything, whether it's a glass of milk or
(15:32):
cheese or ice cream, it doesn't belong in your system.
Eggzema is the other one, because I really find that
my exhama patients really react to dairy. I mean I
have yet to meet an EXAMA patient who does well
on dairy and it manifests in further skin rashes for
their eggzema. So the milk can do different things. If
(15:53):
a patient doesn't have any skin issues and they can
digest milk just fine, you know, then great power to you.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
Is there a milk that you recommend, like almond milk
or oat milk or anything like that.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
So the problem is that starts to become pretty artificial.
There are like machines that people can make nut milks
at home, like almond cow or something like that. And
what I tell people is start, you know, reading the
ingredients of everything you eat. So look at the nut
milk that you're gonna buy in the store, and if
it has five or fewer ingredients, probably it's okay. Once
(16:31):
you start getting a long list of multi syllabic sounding
ingredients where you're like, I can't even pronounce it, let
alone know what that is, it is probably not good
for you because if you don't know what it is,
your system did not evolve to eat it. It was
developed in a lab, and it is probably not good
for you. But if you see, you know, cashews and
(16:51):
water and you know something like that, Okay, then then
you can drink it. Okay.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
So is that where the term gmo where non gmo
comes from.
Speaker 2 (17:02):
That's a kind of different pathway where they have messed
with the DNA and the genes of an organism, and
that can be you know, something like tomatoes that they're
trying to make seedless or other things. But yeah, genetically
modified is different.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
Do you recommend your patients to take prebiotics post biotics?
Speaker 2 (17:31):
Probiotic is like a micro organism, So it's a bacteria.
So when we say I'm taking probiotics, it can be yeas,
but usually we're talking about bacteria. And so a lot
of times the probiotics you'll find in the refrigerator section,
and the reason they're in the fridge is to try
to keep those bacteria alive. So again people might think like, oh, no,
(17:51):
I have three to five pounds of microbes in my gut,
Like that sounds scary. I want to get rid of them. No,
we don't. We need our good guy microbes. So the
probiotics are good bacteria and those can be really helpful.
The prebiotic is really the food for the bacteria. For
the probiotics, what is food for probiotics, Well, it's fiber.
(18:13):
So you could take like an artificial prebiotic supplement, or
there's symbiotics now where they do combination pre probiotics together,
but you don't need that. I work with my patients
on eating plants and getting thirty five grams of fiber
a day. That fiber is the prebiotic that feeds the
(18:35):
probiotic the organism, and a post biotic is the things
that the organisms make for us that are good and
that's why we've co evolved to have them. So, for example,
there's a bacteria called Ficali bacterium who lives in our
gut and we feed fiber, and Ficali Bacterium eats the
fiber and then it creates something called butyrate, a short
(18:57):
chain fatty acid, and we can't make the butyratem. Fuerate
feeds the cells of our intestines, keeps them healthy, and
it keeps everything including our immune system, nice and calm
in the gut. So it's a natural process of prebiotics.
You're eating the fiber post biotics. Hopefully you have a good,
healthy microbiome in there, and then the post biotics are
(19:20):
the things they're going to make, so we don't need
to take them in pills. Okay, But if people's diets
are like McDonald's and you know a lot of like
meat and carbs and alcohol and sugar and not a
lot of fiber, that's where a probiotic could be helpful
for them to try to kind of set things a
little bit right, because probably things are off if they
(19:42):
haven't been eating the healthiest, got it, And.
Speaker 1 (19:45):
So whole foods are always the best way to go.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
Yes, the produce aisle is where I recommend patients spend
a lot of their time, and I recommend that patients
play something called the Rainbow game, which is that they
go to the protosisle and do their normal shop for produce,
and then they look in their basket and they're going
to go through the colors of the rainbow red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet.
They're going to identify which colors are missing, and then
(20:11):
they go back through the produce aisle a second time
and get something from each missing color group. That way,
we've got the rainbow in their basket, and over the
course of the week, they're going to eat something from
each color group that's going to diversify the types of
plants that they're eating, get them to try new things.
But those colors are more than just beautiful. They're full
(20:31):
of things called polyphenols, which are these tiny little nutrients
that do things like help prevent dementia and also feeds
our gut microbiome and also makes your skin really beautiful.
So the reds and pomegranate or raspberries, those anthocyanins, the
blues and blueberries and blackberries, they do amazing things for
(20:56):
your skin. So eating the rainbow is a great thing
for all of us to practice. I freaking love that.
Speaker 1 (21:03):
I love how you said it so beautifully. And I
just went grocery shopping yesterday. I'm so proud to say
that my cart did look.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
Like a rainbow.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
I had collar greens, I had kill I had my blueberries,
my strawberries red. Oh my gosh, I'm doing good, guys.
I'm so excited.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
That's awesome. It's really fun to do with farmers' markets too,
because everything's changing at the farmer's market and kids. You
can involve your kids too, and then maybe they'll eat
it when they get home because they picked it out.
It's a little bit easier.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
I like that.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
You're right.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
Okay, So going back a little bit to the fiber.
What kind of fiber do you recommend for your patients.
Is it in the greens?
Speaker 2 (21:51):
Is it like a powder? Yeah? So the good news
is that any plant has fiber. So there's no fiber
in animal products. So if you're eating like a steak
or chicken or fish, no fiber. No fiber in dairy,
no fiber in eggs. But any plant item, so nuts, seeds, vegetables, fruits,
(22:11):
grains all have fiber. There's different amounts of fiber in
different foods. So beans, for example, are a super food
and beans have a ton of fiber. If you eat
a cup of like kidney beans, you'll get like fifteen
or sixteen grams of fiber amazing. If you eat a
medium sized apple, that's about usually about four grams of fiber.
(22:34):
So there's differing amounts in different foods, and I just
have patients go for diversities. What I aim for them
to get is thirty five grams of fiber a day
between all the different plants they're eating, and then we
aim to get thirty different plants a week. And that's
where that rainbow game helps is we don't just want
to eat like the same thing day in and day out.
(22:57):
You know, variety is the spice of life, and our
microbes willly crave variety too, So eating with the seasons,
getting those different colors in, using herbs and spices to cook.
And so many traditional cuisines already do this and do
it beautifully. Fortunately in America we've taken out herbs and spices.
(23:17):
It's a lot of beige fried food. But if we
go back to you know, the beautiful global cuisines of
the world, it's already built in there. So somebody has,
you know, an ethnic background, and they are from India
or Mexico, I tell them, like, go back, get your
(23:38):
grandmother's recipes, try to cook those. They're going to be
built in beautiful herbs and spices and plants and whole
nutritious foods.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
Yes, I did not know that there was fibert nuts.
I didn't have no idea. That's great because for a
long time I stayed away from nuts because it's, oh,
if you eat too many nuts, you're going to break out.
Speaker 2 (23:58):
But no, right, that's not necessarily true. I mean, obviously
some people have nut allergies or kind of intolerances if
they overdose it on nuts. But you know, a little
handful of nuts a day. Most studies show that people
who eat nuts tend to, you know, be healthier. It's
a wonderful whole food. Okay, good.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
I have nuts in my bag all the time now,
cashews and walnuts, and it's fun. I put a little
bit of dark chocolate in there because I have a
sweet tooth, so I trying to just do dark chocolate.
Speaker 2 (24:26):
It's been tough, and that cacal. That dark chocolate also
great antioxidants, great for your skin.
Speaker 1 (24:33):
Ooh, look at that, guys, No wonder. I feel like
my skin has been thriving. Ever since I changed my diet.
My roseatia hasn't been flaring. I am, and it has
to do with all the little, big changes that I've
been making, especially with seeing personally. Staying away from dairy
has helped me so much.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
Yes, it will.
Speaker 1 (24:53):
It's tough, not gonna lie. But now that I'm thinking,
I want to look and feel better. You know, I
I'm maturing, so I have to take care of my
body in a different way. And talking about that, is
there anything else that you recommend? For instance, I have roseatia.
And we did talk a little bit about the acne
and ezema, but are there like specific things that you'd say, Okay,
(25:14):
if you have this condition, this can condition stay away
from these foods so that you don't have a flare up.
Speaker 2 (25:20):
Yeah, So roseesiha and you mentioned it is famous for
spicy foods well make roseesia flare, so some people have
trouble with spicy foods. Alcohol can make roseesia flair. Sometimes
it depends on the type of alcohol for people. So
I have some roseaesia patients you can get away with
like a beer, but if they have wine, they'll flare
or vice versa. And it's not a food, but the
(25:42):
direct sun exposure u V radiation tends to make roseesia
flair as well. So those are kind of some big
ones to be aware with with roseaesia. You know, spicy
foods don't tend to affect my acne or exima patients.
We talked about dairy for them. Wheat and gluten can
affect my eggs patience. A gluten can affect zoriasis patients
(26:03):
as well, so I have patients kind of experiment with it.
Eggzema is called atopic dermatitis or allergic dermatitis. So there's
a whole host of foods that exzema patients may need
to stay away from, including like eggs or if they
know they're allergic to something. Okay, but really eating a
whole food, you know, plant based diet with healthy meats.
(26:27):
So we want to get our meats from, like if
it's fish, wild cut, if it's poultry, you know, pasture
free roaming, If it's meat, one hundred percent grass fed,
grass finished, And I make the distinction not just grass fed,
because it's this cat and mouse game between producers who
want to sell things cheaply and consumers who want to
(26:50):
be healthy and consumers, we're looking for grass fed beef,
obviously that's healthier. Grass is a normal food for cow,
that's the food they're supposed to eat. They don't do
well on corn, but the corn fattens them up and
makes them grow quickly so that they can get to slaughter.
But they get sick, so then they have to give
those cows antibiotics. So it's a whole problem when you're
(27:11):
not feeding an animal that they're meant to eat. When
a cow eats grass, it's very healthy and it contains
healthy omega threes even in the beef. But manufacturers, what
they'll do is try to gain the system and they'll
put the cow on pasture for a little bit of
time so they can claim that that cow is grass fed,
but they take them in and fatten them up on
(27:33):
the last four months with corn, and then that kind
of eradicates all the gains from putting them out on
the grass. So when you're looking for grass, make sure
you're looking for one hundred percent grass fed or grass
fed grass finished to make sure that that manufacturer isn't
trying to pull one over on you and that you
are getting that really healthy beef that was out on
(27:55):
pasture its whole life.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
Absolutely, I agree, and I know some of you are thinking,
oh my goodness, it's so expensive. Yes, it can be expensive,
but also I always say, these are things that are
we are putting into our bodies, you guys, that are
keeping us alive. We just have to change our lifestyle
a little bit. Stop doing i don't know, going out
(28:18):
and drinking and getting your nails done even so that
you can have more money to buy these whole foods,
you guys, and buy this quality meat. You guys have
to just kind of really make a better choice for
yourself so that you can live a healthier life one
hundred percent.
Speaker 2 (28:36):
And there is nothing more expensive than being sick. You
can't work, not only you have all these medical bills.
The number one reason for bankruptcy in the US is
due to medical expenses. Yeah, right, and that's due to
chronic disease. And just think about the last time you
had the flu or you were sick. Nothing else matters.
When you're sick, Now you're going to have a chronic disease,
(28:57):
nothing else matters. It's when we're healthy, we take it
for granted and we think we're never going to be sick.
But then when you're sick, sometimes we can't make people better.
And so, yes, it is more expensive to buy the
grass fed, but in the long term it's actually less expensive.
Speaker 1 (29:15):
Yes, there you go that part. And you are a
registered herbalist, So are there any herbs that you can
talk about and tell us about to help clear up
our skin?
Speaker 2 (29:26):
Yeah? So again depends what you know. Disease people have,
is it acne, eggs, amasoriasis, roseatia. I have very very
different treatment plans with different herbs, and I do got
microbiome testing on every patient. So before I see a
patient for the first visit, they have to do a
poop test, which does involve they poop into a tray
(29:46):
and then they collect the stool and put it in
a vial and they will send in that sample to
a lab. And then they also pee in a cup
and send that in and I get back to reports
which shows me they're got microbiome. I can see exactly
what's living in their gut. Is the good stuff there?
Is the good stuff there? And enough numbers? Is there
bad stuff there I need to get rid of. And
(30:07):
then depending on their unique gut microbiome profile, then I'll
prescribe herbs for them to take orally so that we
can fix things in the gut. Okay, So that is
like part of the prescription. You know. I don't prescribe pharmaceuticals,
not orally or topically. It's an herbal protocol and that
I think somebody needs to know and be directed by
(30:29):
a licensed naturopathic doctor or herbal list. But there's lots
of great herbal things that we could put on our skins.
When I was growing up and we get a burn.
First thing, your mom would say is go put some
alo veragel on it, and alo is wonderful. I mean
it's not the green, gloopy stuff that you find in
some pharmacies. It's actually a kind of clear, opaque liquid
(30:51):
and it comes from the alo plant and it is
a wonderful substance. It doesn't just heal sunburns. I mean
it will help with producing more collagen in the skin.
It can help with wrinkles, it can help with eggzema
and psoriasis. So all of the plant world, we can
use both orally and we can use topically. I use
(31:11):
beautiful plant oils. I'll do essential oil mixes. Hydrosols are
byproducts of the essential oil making process. It's like a
te so my toners, I'll spray hydrosols like from rosemary
or lavender. So the same as I'm prescribing herbs internally,
I'm prescribing herbs topically as well, and they're great.
Speaker 1 (31:33):
And where are you based?
Speaker 2 (31:35):
So my office is based out of Los Angeles, but
I am licensed in California, Oregon, and Washington. I'm often
full and closed to new patients, but I have a
training program. I train license healthcare providers, so everybody from
Board certified dermatologists to other naturopathic doctors are nurse practitioners
who are interested in skincare. And if your listeners want
(31:59):
to find a practitioner I've trained, they can go to
root Causdermatology dot com. I click on find a practitioner
and they've all been trained in my methods to have
a non pharmaceutical root cause approach where we figure out
what's going wrong in the body and let's fix that,
so we're not just doing suppressive medication forever and ever.
Speaker 1 (32:20):
Oh I love it, Oh my goodness. And what was
that a website again.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
Root Cause Dermatology and my clinic office site is Integrative
Dermatologycenter dot com. Perfect. Oh my goodness.
Speaker 1 (32:32):
I had such an amazing This was so informative, so
much confirmation, so thank you so much. I don't know
if there's anything else that you'd like to add that
we didn't touch on anything that I'm missing.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
We didn't talk about sugar, so just a word of warning, right,
I mean, we are sugar Nation, and sugar really is addictive.
But the food that will aide your skin the fastest
is sugar, unfortunately, So you know, in addition to we
know that other things. You know, it can cause diabetes
and other sorts of problems. Really think about reducing that
(33:05):
sugar for your skin, because skin we want nice supple collagen.
Collagen is a protein. We want nice fluid collagen. Obviously,
as we age, you know, we're going to develop things
like wrinkles and whatnot, but we still want to be
producing as healthy collagen as we can. When we eat sugar,
it kind of gets into the fibers of the collagen
(33:27):
and it makes the collagen crunchy. We don't want crunchy skin.
We want nice, suffle, fluid skin. So really one of
the biggest agers you know, I would say, is sugar.
And of course we're learning more and more about alcohol. Well, well,
I do like a nice drink every now and then.
You know, it really is a toxin and it's a
big ager, so it can lead to increased dementia and
(33:49):
all sorts of problems as well.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
That's one thing I've also stayed away from. I've been
staying away from for like a couple months now, and
I definitely see the difference in my skin. And going
back to to sugar, do you mean sugar like refined sugar, honey?
Is it all kind of because I love honey, so
I just I don't know. I wanted to ask about that.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
Yeah, I mean all sugar will do it definitely, Like
honey is healthier than like, uh, you know, high frictose
corn syrup, and if someone has allergies, going to the
farmer's market and getting raw local the honey can help
reducing the allergen to pollens in someone's area. But it
all eventually is sugar. So we just want to be
(34:32):
really mindful and you know, not overuse sugar in things
where we don't have to. And the less sugar you eat,
the sweeter things will taste. The more sugar you eat,
the taste receptors get like dolled to sugar, and then
you need more sugar to taste it.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
So oh wow, okay, that makes sense. Okay, and quickly coffee.
How do you feel about coffee?
Speaker 2 (34:55):
So? I love coffee. I used to drink my coffee,
you know, before I was an atropathic doctor, almost like
a dessert. There was so much milk and sugar in there.
I mean it was really like about, you know, a
dessert beverage. And I used to look at people who
drink just black coffee, no sugar, no milk, and think
they were absolutely crazy. But when I gave up a diery,
(35:17):
I took the diery out of the coffee. And then
I was still using sugar, and then I was trying
the artificial sugars. But there's no outer official sugar that's
good for us. And so I said, okay, I have
to get rid of this. And now I love bitter coffee,
like dark, bitter black coffee. And it is amazing what
the body can like change to when you start cultivating
(35:40):
the taste for bitter. And that's why a lot of
people don't like to eat their greens, because greens can
be bitter. But if you start eating it and cultivating
the taste, your body really will start to get used
to it and really love it. And now I love
dark black, bitter coffee. So I'm a fan. I think,
you know, not using plastics to make it. I like
(36:01):
to do a cold brew at home. It's a cold
water infusion. Yeah, you want high quality organic coffee, but
the number one antioxidant consumed in the US by Americans
is coffee. Is coffee.
Speaker 1 (36:14):
Yeah, okay, just wanted to see what that did. That
makes a lot of sense. It's not necessarily the coffee.
It's what we put into the coffee and add to
the coffee that causes all the other stuff the skin. Okay, perfect,
you know honestly, doctor Greenberg, you were a delight. Thank
you so much. I'm leaving this conversation so inspired and
I'm like, okay, I'm on the right track. I got
(36:36):
to keep going. Thank you so much. And you, guys,
I hope that you enjoyed this episode as well. Please
share it with everyone that you love because this is
this is this is what we're doing. We're sharing, We're
sharing life literally in a podcast. You guys, so thank you, doctor,
and I'll see you guys on the next episode of
Chickens and Chill. Let's get on with cho This is
(36:58):
a production of iHeartRadio and the Michael Dura podcast Network.
Follow us on Instagram at Michael Doura Podcasts and follow
me Cheeky's That's c h i q U i s.
For more podcasts from iHeart, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite podcast, and check
us out on YouTube.
Oliskmustan. Welcome to Cheeky's Chill Podcast, your favorite podcast. I
hope you all had a really great Mother's Day celebrating
the most important women in your life. I definitely had
a nice one, relaxing and celebrating Immedial's mom and of
course my mom. Even if she's not here physically, she
deserves to be celebrated.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Today we'll be.
Speaker 1 (00:24):
Focusing on a topic I'm super passionate about. I'll give
you a hint. We're going to be talking about the
largest organ in the body. That's right, We're going to
be talking about our skin. We all know it's very
important to drink plenty of water and to wear SPF
every day. Huge advocate for that, but what else can
we be doing? And for those of us who suffer
(00:47):
from skin conditions like rostatia, acne ezema, what can we
do to soothe that? To help us answer that question,
I'm bringing on doctor Julie Greenberg. She's a licensed naturopathic
doctor and a registered herbalist. Welcome to the podcast, doctor Greenberg.
I'm so excited to have you. I love anything that
has to do with skin, so you can't even imagine
(01:09):
how excited I am to have you on the podcast,
so thank you.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
Well, You're welcome and I love skin too, and thank
you for having me. It's an honor to be here.
I appreciate that.
Speaker 1 (01:18):
I know that the listeners, you guys, are going to
love this episode. I'm going to ask all the questions
for you guys, so I know we all want clear skin.
But before we get into that, I do want to
ask what a natural pathic doctor is.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
So naturopathic doctors here in the United States where I live.
It's a four year medical school degree and we're licensed
by state. So depending on the state, I could either
be a primary care physician or it really depends on
the state. And herbalist is not a doctor, but naturopathic doctors.
Our training is that we are herbalists, so instead of
(01:54):
just writing a pharmaceutical prescription, we're trained in the use
of herbal medicine. So we're doctor that are herbalis I
love that? Okay? Perfect? Okay.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
I have roseatia and I get it from my dad
and I saw him not so long ago, and I
saw how with time it can get thicker. If you
don't treat it, it is and correct me if this
is if I'm wrong, But it comes from the gut, right,
It starts in the gut.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
So rosesiha is what we call a complex multifactorial disease.
So there's not like one thing only that we can
point to and say, ah, that's the thing that causes roseesia.
But you are absolutely correct that we do see a
lot of what we call correlation between what's going on
in the gut and patients who have roseaesia. And there's
(02:42):
some particular species of bacteria we can see in the
gut of people who have roseesia, like something called Hpylori,
which is a bacteria that lives in the stomach, So
we know that the gut microbiome has a piece. And
then there's also topical things that can be a factor
in roseaesia. You talked about thickening of the skin, and
(03:02):
in the worst case scenario, there's something called rhinofyma where
people can get very bulbous, like very large noses with
a lot of skin thickening, and that we attribute to
something called dimadex mites. So it's a little gross when
people think about it, but we've all got like microscopic
creatures living on us, and we have these microscopic mites,
(03:25):
and there are ones that live in our face and
eat sebum or oil that we produce naturally in our skin.
And something seems to happen with rosetia where either there's
too many dimadex mites or there's an immune system kind
of inappropriate response where it can cause inflammation, thickening of
the skin. And again in the worst case scenario that
(03:47):
rhino fimo where people get like noses that can be
two or three times the size of a normal nose.
So there's a lot of things going on in roseatia.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
That we need to deal with, okay, And it is hereditary, right,
So there's a hereditary component. So yes, I mean when
we see rosesha, we certainly ask our patients.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Is there a family history? But you could also be
the first person in your family to have roseesha and
nobody you know and your family may have it, so
it can go eat your way.
Speaker 1 (04:18):
Okay, Yeah, because I definitely get it from my dad,
and when I saw him, I did see that it
was a lot better. He said that they gave him,
i want to say, an antibiotic, and he said, since
then it has really diminished. So I was just wondering,
I'm like, Okay, that's when I realize. I'm like, oh,
it's in the gut. And I kind of knew that
because I'm like, I feel like when I eat certain things,
(04:41):
or I get in the sauna or spicy food, I've
noticed that it does flare it up. Which is why
I wanted to have this conversation with you, because I
think we're all striving to have better skin, and of
course topical creams and good skincare works, but I really
want to get into the nitty gritty of it of
really what it is that we are in and putting
into our bodies.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
Yeah, and you're so right. I think the approach so
often to skin care or skin problems is, well, we
can see the skin and touch it, so let's just
put things on top of it, which certainly can help
or make a difference. But we generate skin from the
inside out. If you think about it, we're a tube, right.
The outside of the tube is the skin that we
(05:22):
can touch and see, and we're connected at the mouth
and at the tush, at the anus, and the inside
of the tube is our digestive track and it's all
different types of epithelial or skin type tissue, and so
it's connected. What is going on in your gut controls
your immune system, and what is going on in your
(05:43):
gut will directly impact what's happening on your skin. So
in addition to paying attention to the things that we're
doing topically and putting on our skin, we absolutely want
to pay attention to what we're putting in our mouth
and what's happening with our gut microbiome or the organisms
that naturally live in our gut. And that's totally normal
(06:05):
and healthy. We've co evolved with those gut microbes, and
people are usually pretty sounded to learn how many microbes
are living in our gut. It's trillions. It's about three
to five pounds. So next time you step on the scale,
you look at that number and you think, wow, three
to five pounds that this are microbes living in my
(06:25):
gut and they belong there and we need them, and
we want the right gut microbes to keep you and
your skin healthy. If it's the wrong gut microbes, it
can make you sick and it can cause skin problems.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Oh mg, that's a lot. Three to five pounds.
Speaker 2 (06:41):
It's like a hand weight that we carry around at
all time, all with microbes.
Speaker 1 (06:46):
Okay, and I have a bunch of questions in regards
to that, but I did want to ask you a
little bit of a not personal but if you feel comfortable,
have you ever suffered with any type of skin condition? Doctor?
Speaker 2 (06:57):
Yeah. So it's funny because people definitely think, oh, because
I specialize in skin, maybe I had some sort of
like acne or egzema. But I didn't. But it's a
very naturopathic way I got to skin. So another part
of being a naturopathic doctor is we say treat the
whole person. You know, it's great. In conventional medicine, we
(07:17):
do have specialists, but sometimes we kind of try to
chop up the body like they're completely different. Right, So
it's like you go to your dermatologists, they're only thinking
about your skin. You go to the cardiologists, they're only
thinking about your heart. You go to the gaser entrologists,
they're only thinking about your gut. But it's all connected.
We're one body, and our body, mind and spirit is
(07:38):
all connected and all impacts our health. So from a
naturopathic principle, we say treat the whole person. Think about
the whole body. And the mind and the spirit. So
I actually got interested in dermatology because my first diagnosis
with the chronic health disease was a thyroid autoimmune disease
called hashimotos, which is very common in a lot of
(08:00):
your listeners, particularly female, are going to be shaking their
heads and saying, I have hypothyroidism or hashimotos. And when
I first got diagnosed, I lived in LA and I
went to a big, you know, famous center, and I
was just shell shocked that they said, well, we don't
know what causes it, we don't know how to fix it.
We're going to give you this medicine, but it may
(08:21):
not help and we can't do anything about it. And
I just walked out of there just really shell shocked, thinking,
we have like the best medicine in the world, the
best minds working on this, and this is the answer
that I'm going to be tired and overweight the rest
of my life and we don't know what caused it
or how to fix it. So I started doing research
and I tried to figure out like what could be
(08:44):
causing the thyroid problem. And the more I looked at it,
the more I found our food and then our personal
care products. So a lot of the products that we
put on our skin are what are called endocrine disruptors.
They're hormone disruptors, and they can affect our thyroid. And
with all the like lotions and shampoos and makeup and
(09:04):
deodorant and things that women put on their skin on
a daily basis, women can average five hundred chemicals a day.
Through these topicals, we absorb it and it can impact
things like our thyroid and cause hypothyroidism. So I started
researching and trying to make my own skin products and
trying to clean up what I was putting on my
(09:26):
skin and absorbing into my body. And then I fell
in love with skin in dermatology. But that's gone. That's
how I became a specialist just through my thyroid, which
is a very naturopathic thing because it was it was
actually a different organ system that was impacted by skin.
Everything is impacted by skin.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
Well, look at that. I also have hypothyroidism, and I
take medicine every day, and my doctor said, I'm going
to have to take medicine for the rest of my life.
But I got off the medicine on the Okay, I'm
going to meditate my way through this, I'm and I
looked and went to a holistic doctor, and I've removed
(10:07):
gluten and I try not to have so much dairy,
and I do feel the difference. But as soon as
I stopped taking it, they are seven pounds two weeks later,
so I got right back on it. But I do
feel that we can heal our bodies exactly with what
you said, it's what we put I'm getting better, you know,
even getting my nails done. You know, I'm looking for
(10:30):
organic nail polish, and I mean, these are things that
I didn't really think about when I was younger, and
now I really I'm going to hit forty, like I
need to like take care of myself more and be
careful with what it is that I'm putting on my skin.
It's the largest organ in our body, you guys.
Speaker 2 (10:48):
It is, and you're like so many women. There's so
many pressures on women to beautify and do treatments and
all of these things. And I used to get my
nails done every week. I used to have acrylic nails
and never thought twice about it, never thought that could
impact health. And then you know, obviously now I'm a
naturalpathic doctor and all of that is part of my
(11:11):
job to know. But yeah, I mean learning that there's
formaldehyde in nail polish. Do we absorb things through the
nails into our system? Formaldehyde is what we preserve dead
bodies with. Well, we're alive. We don't want to be
absorbing formaldehyde, you know. So now they're trying to do
things like making formaldehyde free nail polish and other things.
(11:32):
But it is a little difficult because we identify and
take out one dangerous chemical, but then sometimes the things
that they put in can end up being worse. And
so it is just being mindful and asking like, well,
what is this doing to me? And do need this?
You know? Does this make me feel beautiful or do
I need it to feel beautiful or are there some
(11:53):
other options.
Speaker 1 (11:54):
Now I'm starting to be a lot more cautious and
really looking at the ingredients, and I do feel the difference.
I do feel like I have more energy, and my
goal is to eventually stop taking this medicine you know,
and and heal my body. But AnyWho, now, because I
do want to talk about what we are ingesting and
(12:16):
what we can What are some things that you recommend
us staying away from to have clear skin. So let's
start there. For instance, how do you feel about dairy?
Speaker 2 (12:27):
So personally, I don't like dairy, especially the way that
we manufacture and consume it in the United States. Many
there's any West Coast listeners and you've driven up I
five and you pass these stinky like enormous I mean,
those are the meat ones. But you know, cows live
in these what are called CAFOs, concentrated animal feed operations,
(12:49):
and they are not living normal lives. We're not feeding
them normal food. Cows are supposed to eat grass. We're
feeding them corn and things to fatten them up. And
so the milk from these cows is not great quality milk.
But even more than that, if we step back and
just think about it from like a thirty thousand foot picture,
and I go through this with patients, I say, what
(13:10):
is milk? Why is there milk on the plant? Right?
What is the purpose of milk? And you used to
drink milk? When did you drink milk.
Speaker 1 (13:18):
When I was a baby, when I was younger.
Speaker 2 (13:21):
And that was appropriate And the definition of being a
mammal is that the mother produces milk for an infant,
and that infant starts off life drinking milk. But then
at some point, every mammal on planet Earth since the
history of time transitions off of milk and onto their
main food source, whether that's grass for a baby cow
or you know, hunting antelope for lions. You come off
(13:44):
the milk, you transition to your food, and you will
never have milk again. Ever, as a baby mammal, you
will also never have milk of another species. A cow
is not going to allow an elephant baby to come
over and drink from it, or vice versa. So it
is not a normal thing biologically for adults to be
(14:06):
drinking milk or drinking the milk of another species. And
a lot of people have lost an enzyme called lactase,
which is the ability to digest milk. So people who
are like, oh, I'm lactose intolerant, they can't do it
because if they drink milk, they will immediately get like
tummy eggs or diarrhea or big problems. But the rest
of the population can digest it. But again, it's not
(14:28):
an appropriate food source because we are not baby cows
and we never will be and we never were, and
so milk, I think, can be a problematic food and
again the cows that are producing the milk here are
not particularly healthy. There's certain of my patients where I
really stress that they cut out milk. Those would be
my acne patients and my eggzema patients. Acne is driven
(14:49):
by something called overproduction of sebum cibam. I mentioned before
with the demodex mites, So every hair follicle and cleaning
the ones on our face, even women have little tiny
hairs all over their face. It produces sebum, which is
like an oil, and that's good, that lubricates the skin.
But an overproduction of sebum is the first step in
(15:11):
development of acne, and milk triggers a pathway that's gonna
drive the overproduction of acne. So any of my acne patients,
I say, take out all milk, and then the negotiation
becomes that they say, what about sheep or cow or camel. No,
any milk that came from a mammal mama I was
turned into anything, whether it's a glass of milk or
(15:32):
cheese or ice cream, it doesn't belong in your system.
Eggzema is the other one, because I really find that
my exhama patients really react to dairy. I mean I
have yet to meet an EXAMA patient who does well
on dairy and it manifests in further skin rashes for
their eggzema. So the milk can do different things. If
(15:53):
a patient doesn't have any skin issues and they can
digest milk just fine, you know, then great power to you.
Speaker 1 (16:01):
Is there a milk that you recommend, like almond milk
or oat milk or anything like that.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
So the problem is that starts to become pretty artificial.
There are like machines that people can make nut milks
at home, like almond cow or something like that. And
what I tell people is start, you know, reading the
ingredients of everything you eat. So look at the nut
milk that you're gonna buy in the store, and if
it has five or fewer ingredients, probably it's okay. Once
(16:31):
you start getting a long list of multi syllabic sounding
ingredients where you're like, I can't even pronounce it, let
alone know what that is, it is probably not good
for you because if you don't know what it is,
your system did not evolve to eat it. It was
developed in a lab, and it is probably not good
for you. But if you see, you know, cashews and
(16:51):
water and you know something like that, Okay, then then
you can drink it. Okay.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
So is that where the term gmo where non gmo
comes from.
Speaker 2 (17:02):
That's a kind of different pathway where they have messed
with the DNA and the genes of an organism, and
that can be you know, something like tomatoes that they're
trying to make seedless or other things. But yeah, genetically
modified is different.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
Do you recommend your patients to take prebiotics post biotics?
Speaker 2 (17:31):
Probiotic is like a micro organism, So it's a bacteria.
So when we say I'm taking probiotics, it can be yeas,
but usually we're talking about bacteria. And so a lot
of times the probiotics you'll find in the refrigerator section,
and the reason they're in the fridge is to try
to keep those bacteria alive. So again people might think like, oh, no,
(17:51):
I have three to five pounds of microbes in my gut,
Like that sounds scary. I want to get rid of them. No,
we don't. We need our good guy microbes. So the
probiotics are good bacteria and those can be really helpful.
The prebiotic is really the food for the bacteria. For
the probiotics, what is food for probiotics, Well, it's fiber.
(18:13):
So you could take like an artificial prebiotic supplement, or
there's symbiotics now where they do combination pre probiotics together,
but you don't need that. I work with my patients
on eating plants and getting thirty five grams of fiber
a day. That fiber is the prebiotic that feeds the
(18:35):
probiotic the organism, and a post biotic is the things
that the organisms make for us that are good and
that's why we've co evolved to have them. So, for example,
there's a bacteria called Ficali bacterium who lives in our
gut and we feed fiber, and Ficali Bacterium eats the
fiber and then it creates something called butyrate, a short
(18:57):
chain fatty acid, and we can't make the butyratem. Fuerate
feeds the cells of our intestines, keeps them healthy, and
it keeps everything including our immune system, nice and calm
in the gut. So it's a natural process of prebiotics.
You're eating the fiber post biotics. Hopefully you have a good,
healthy microbiome in there, and then the post biotics are
(19:20):
the things they're going to make, so we don't need
to take them in pills. Okay, But if people's diets
are like McDonald's and you know a lot of like
meat and carbs and alcohol and sugar and not a
lot of fiber, that's where a probiotic could be helpful
for them to try to kind of set things a
little bit right, because probably things are off if they
(19:42):
haven't been eating the healthiest, got it, And.
Speaker 1 (19:45):
So whole foods are always the best way to go.
Speaker 2 (19:49):
Yes, the produce aisle is where I recommend patients spend
a lot of their time, and I recommend that patients
play something called the Rainbow game, which is that they
go to the protosisle and do their normal shop for produce,
and then they look in their basket and they're going
to go through the colors of the rainbow red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet.
They're going to identify which colors are missing, and then
(20:11):
they go back through the produce aisle a second time
and get something from each missing color group. That way,
we've got the rainbow in their basket, and over the
course of the week, they're going to eat something from
each color group that's going to diversify the types of
plants that they're eating, get them to try new things.
But those colors are more than just beautiful. They're full
(20:31):
of things called polyphenols, which are these tiny little nutrients
that do things like help prevent dementia and also feeds
our gut microbiome and also makes your skin really beautiful.
So the reds and pomegranate or raspberries, those anthocyanins, the
blues and blueberries and blackberries, they do amazing things for
(20:56):
your skin. So eating the rainbow is a great thing
for all of us to practice. I freaking love that.
Speaker 1 (21:03):
I love how you said it so beautifully. And I
just went grocery shopping yesterday. I'm so proud to say
that my cart did look.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
Like a rainbow.
Speaker 1 (21:11):
I had collar greens, I had kill I had my blueberries,
my strawberries red. Oh my gosh, I'm doing good, guys.
I'm so excited.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
That's awesome. It's really fun to do with farmers' markets too,
because everything's changing at the farmer's market and kids. You
can involve your kids too, and then maybe they'll eat
it when they get home because they picked it out.
It's a little bit easier.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
I like that.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
You're right.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
Okay, So going back a little bit to the fiber.
What kind of fiber do you recommend for your patients.
Is it in the greens?
Speaker 2 (21:51):
Is it like a powder? Yeah? So the good news
is that any plant has fiber. So there's no fiber
in animal products. So if you're eating like a steak
or chicken or fish, no fiber. No fiber in dairy,
no fiber in eggs. But any plant item, so nuts, seeds, vegetables, fruits,
(22:11):
grains all have fiber. There's different amounts of fiber in
different foods. So beans, for example, are a super food
and beans have a ton of fiber. If you eat
a cup of like kidney beans, you'll get like fifteen
or sixteen grams of fiber amazing. If you eat a
medium sized apple, that's about usually about four grams of fiber.
(22:34):
So there's differing amounts in different foods, and I just
have patients go for diversities. What I aim for them
to get is thirty five grams of fiber a day
between all the different plants they're eating, and then we
aim to get thirty different plants a week. And that's
where that rainbow game helps is we don't just want
to eat like the same thing day in and day out.
(22:57):
You know, variety is the spice of life, and our
microbes willly crave variety too, So eating with the seasons,
getting those different colors in, using herbs and spices to cook.
And so many traditional cuisines already do this and do
it beautifully. Fortunately in America we've taken out herbs and spices.
(23:17):
It's a lot of beige fried food. But if we
go back to you know, the beautiful global cuisines of
the world, it's already built in there. So somebody has,
you know, an ethnic background, and they are from India
or Mexico, I tell them, like, go back, get your
(23:38):
grandmother's recipes, try to cook those. They're going to be
built in beautiful herbs and spices and plants and whole
nutritious foods.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
Yes, I did not know that there was fibert nuts.
I didn't have no idea. That's great because for a
long time I stayed away from nuts because it's, oh,
if you eat too many nuts, you're going to break out.
Speaker 2 (23:58):
But no, right, that's not necessarily true. I mean, obviously
some people have nut allergies or kind of intolerances if
they overdose it on nuts. But you know, a little
handful of nuts a day. Most studies show that people
who eat nuts tend to, you know, be healthier. It's
a wonderful whole food. Okay, good.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
I have nuts in my bag all the time now,
cashews and walnuts, and it's fun. I put a little
bit of dark chocolate in there because I have a
sweet tooth, so I trying to just do dark chocolate.
Speaker 2 (24:26):
It's been tough, and that cacal. That dark chocolate also
great antioxidants, great for your skin.
Speaker 1 (24:33):
Ooh, look at that, guys, No wonder. I feel like
my skin has been thriving. Ever since I changed my diet.
My roseatia hasn't been flaring. I am, and it has
to do with all the little, big changes that I've
been making, especially with seeing personally. Staying away from dairy
has helped me so much.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
Yes, it will.
Speaker 1 (24:53):
It's tough, not gonna lie. But now that I'm thinking,
I want to look and feel better. You know, I
I'm maturing, so I have to take care of my
body in a different way. And talking about that, is
there anything else that you recommend? For instance, I have roseatia.
And we did talk a little bit about the acne
and ezema, but are there like specific things that you'd say, Okay,
(25:14):
if you have this condition, this can condition stay away
from these foods so that you don't have a flare up.
Speaker 2 (25:20):
Yeah, So roseesiha and you mentioned it is famous for
spicy foods well make roseesia flare, so some people have
trouble with spicy foods. Alcohol can make roseesia flair. Sometimes
it depends on the type of alcohol for people. So
I have some roseaesia patients you can get away with
like a beer, but if they have wine, they'll flare
or vice versa. And it's not a food, but the
(25:42):
direct sun exposure u V radiation tends to make roseesia
flair as well. So those are kind of some big
ones to be aware with with roseaesia. You know, spicy
foods don't tend to affect my acne or exima patients.
We talked about dairy for them. Wheat and gluten can
affect my eggs patience. A gluten can affect zoriasis patients
(26:03):
as well, so I have patients kind of experiment with it.
Eggzema is called atopic dermatitis or allergic dermatitis. So there's
a whole host of foods that exzema patients may need
to stay away from, including like eggs or if they
know they're allergic to something. Okay, but really eating a
whole food, you know, plant based diet with healthy meats.
(26:27):
So we want to get our meats from, like if
it's fish, wild cut, if it's poultry, you know, pasture
free roaming, If it's meat, one hundred percent grass fed,
grass finished, And I make the distinction not just grass fed,
because it's this cat and mouse game between producers who
want to sell things cheaply and consumers who want to
(26:50):
be healthy and consumers, we're looking for grass fed beef,
obviously that's healthier. Grass is a normal food for cow,
that's the food they're supposed to eat. They don't do
well on corn, but the corn fattens them up and
makes them grow quickly so that they can get to slaughter.
But they get sick, so then they have to give
those cows antibiotics. So it's a whole problem when you're
(27:11):
not feeding an animal that they're meant to eat. When
a cow eats grass, it's very healthy and it contains
healthy omega threes even in the beef. But manufacturers, what
they'll do is try to gain the system and they'll
put the cow on pasture for a little bit of
time so they can claim that that cow is grass fed,
but they take them in and fatten them up on
(27:33):
the last four months with corn, and then that kind
of eradicates all the gains from putting them out on
the grass. So when you're looking for grass, make sure
you're looking for one hundred percent grass fed or grass
fed grass finished to make sure that that manufacturer isn't
trying to pull one over on you and that you
are getting that really healthy beef that was out on
(27:55):
pasture its whole life.
Speaker 1 (27:57):
Absolutely, I agree, and I know some of you are thinking,
oh my goodness, it's so expensive. Yes, it can be expensive,
but also I always say, these are things that are
we are putting into our bodies, you guys, that are
keeping us alive. We just have to change our lifestyle
a little bit. Stop doing i don't know, going out
(28:18):
and drinking and getting your nails done even so that
you can have more money to buy these whole foods,
you guys, and buy this quality meat. You guys have
to just kind of really make a better choice for
yourself so that you can live a healthier life one
hundred percent.
Speaker 2 (28:36):
And there is nothing more expensive than being sick. You
can't work, not only you have all these medical bills.
The number one reason for bankruptcy in the US is
due to medical expenses. Yeah, right, and that's due to
chronic disease. And just think about the last time you
had the flu or you were sick. Nothing else matters.
When you're sick, Now you're going to have a chronic disease,
(28:57):
nothing else matters. It's when we're healthy, we take it
for granted and we think we're never going to be sick.
But then when you're sick, sometimes we can't make people better.
And so, yes, it is more expensive to buy the
grass fed, but in the long term it's actually less expensive.
Speaker 1 (29:15):
Yes, there you go that part. And you are a
registered herbalist, So are there any herbs that you can
talk about and tell us about to help clear up
our skin?
Speaker 2 (29:26):
Yeah? So again depends what you know. Disease people have,
is it acne, eggs, amasoriasis, roseatia. I have very very
different treatment plans with different herbs, and I do got
microbiome testing on every patient. So before I see a
patient for the first visit, they have to do a
poop test, which does involve they poop into a tray
(29:46):
and then they collect the stool and put it in
a vial and they will send in that sample to
a lab. And then they also pee in a cup
and send that in and I get back to reports
which shows me they're got microbiome. I can see exactly
what's living in their gut. Is the good stuff there?
Is the good stuff there? And enough numbers? Is there
bad stuff there I need to get rid of. And
(30:07):
then depending on their unique gut microbiome profile, then I'll
prescribe herbs for them to take orally so that we
can fix things in the gut. Okay, So that is
like part of the prescription. You know. I don't prescribe pharmaceuticals,
not orally or topically. It's an herbal protocol and that
I think somebody needs to know and be directed by
(30:29):
a licensed naturopathic doctor or herbal list. But there's lots
of great herbal things that we could put on our skins.
When I was growing up and we get a burn.
First thing, your mom would say is go put some
alo veragel on it, and alo is wonderful. I mean
it's not the green, gloopy stuff that you find in
some pharmacies. It's actually a kind of clear, opaque liquid
(30:51):
and it comes from the alo plant and it is
a wonderful substance. It doesn't just heal sunburns. I mean
it will help with producing more collagen in the skin.
It can help with wrinkles, it can help with eggzema
and psoriasis. So all of the plant world, we can
use both orally and we can use topically. I use
(31:11):
beautiful plant oils. I'll do essential oil mixes. Hydrosols are
byproducts of the essential oil making process. It's like a
te so my toners, I'll spray hydrosols like from rosemary
or lavender. So the same as I'm prescribing herbs internally,
I'm prescribing herbs topically as well, and they're great.
Speaker 1 (31:33):
And where are you based?
Speaker 2 (31:35):
So my office is based out of Los Angeles, but
I am licensed in California, Oregon, and Washington. I'm often
full and closed to new patients, but I have a
training program. I train license healthcare providers, so everybody from
Board certified dermatologists to other naturopathic doctors are nurse practitioners
who are interested in skincare. And if your listeners want
(31:59):
to find a practitioner I've trained, they can go to
root Causdermatology dot com. I click on find a practitioner
and they've all been trained in my methods to have
a non pharmaceutical root cause approach where we figure out
what's going wrong in the body and let's fix that,
so we're not just doing suppressive medication forever and ever.
Speaker 1 (32:20):
Oh I love it, Oh my goodness. And what was
that a website again.
Speaker 2 (32:24):
Root Cause Dermatology and my clinic office site is Integrative
Dermatologycenter dot com. Perfect. Oh my goodness.
Speaker 1 (32:32):
I had such an amazing This was so informative, so
much confirmation, so thank you so much. I don't know
if there's anything else that you'd like to add that
we didn't touch on anything that I'm missing.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
We didn't talk about sugar, so just a word of warning, right,
I mean, we are sugar Nation, and sugar really is addictive.
But the food that will aide your skin the fastest
is sugar, unfortunately, So you know, in addition to we
know that other things. You know, it can cause diabetes
and other sorts of problems. Really think about reducing that
(33:05):
sugar for your skin, because skin we want nice supple collagen.
Collagen is a protein. We want nice fluid collagen. Obviously,
as we age, you know, we're going to develop things
like wrinkles and whatnot, but we still want to be
producing as healthy collagen as we can. When we eat sugar,
it kind of gets into the fibers of the collagen
(33:27):
and it makes the collagen crunchy. We don't want crunchy skin.
We want nice, suffle, fluid skin. So really one of
the biggest agers you know, I would say, is sugar.
And of course we're learning more and more about alcohol. Well, well,
I do like a nice drink every now and then.
You know, it really is a toxin and it's a
big ager, so it can lead to increased dementia and
(33:49):
all sorts of problems as well.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
That's one thing I've also stayed away from. I've been
staying away from for like a couple months now, and
I definitely see the difference in my skin. And going
back to to sugar, do you mean sugar like refined sugar, honey?
Is it all kind of because I love honey, so
I just I don't know. I wanted to ask about that.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
Yeah, I mean all sugar will do it definitely, Like
honey is healthier than like, uh, you know, high frictose
corn syrup, and if someone has allergies, going to the
farmer's market and getting raw local the honey can help
reducing the allergen to pollens in someone's area. But it
all eventually is sugar. So we just want to be
(34:32):
really mindful and you know, not overuse sugar in things
where we don't have to. And the less sugar you eat,
the sweeter things will taste. The more sugar you eat,
the taste receptors get like dolled to sugar, and then
you need more sugar to taste it.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
So oh wow, okay, that makes sense. Okay, and quickly coffee.
How do you feel about coffee?
Speaker 2 (34:55):
So? I love coffee. I used to drink my coffee,
you know, before I was an atropathic doctor, almost like
a dessert. There was so much milk and sugar in there.
I mean it was really like about, you know, a
dessert beverage. And I used to look at people who
drink just black coffee, no sugar, no milk, and think
they were absolutely crazy. But when I gave up a diery,
(35:17):
I took the diery out of the coffee. And then
I was still using sugar, and then I was trying
the artificial sugars. But there's no outer official sugar that's
good for us. And so I said, okay, I have
to get rid of this. And now I love bitter coffee,
like dark, bitter black coffee. And it is amazing what
the body can like change to when you start cultivating
(35:40):
the taste for bitter. And that's why a lot of
people don't like to eat their greens, because greens can
be bitter. But if you start eating it and cultivating
the taste, your body really will start to get used
to it and really love it. And now I love
dark black, bitter coffee. So I'm a fan. I think,
you know, not using plastics to make it. I like
(36:01):
to do a cold brew at home. It's a cold
water infusion. Yeah, you want high quality organic coffee, but
the number one antioxidant consumed in the US by Americans
is coffee. Is coffee.
Speaker 1 (36:14):
Yeah, okay, just wanted to see what that did. That
makes a lot of sense. It's not necessarily the coffee.
It's what we put into the coffee and add to
the coffee that causes all the other stuff the skin. Okay, perfect,
you know honestly, doctor Greenberg, you were a delight. Thank
you so much. I'm leaving this conversation so inspired and
I'm like, okay, I'm on the right track. I got
(36:36):
to keep going. Thank you so much. And you, guys,
I hope that you enjoyed this episode as well. Please
share it with everyone that you love because this is
this is this is what we're doing. We're sharing, We're
sharing life literally in a podcast. You guys, so thank you, doctor,
and I'll see you guys on the next episode of
Chickens and Chill. Let's get on with cho This is
(36:58):
a production of iHeartRadio and the Michael Dura podcast Network.
Follow us on Instagram at Michael Doura Podcasts and follow
me Cheeky's That's c h i q U i s.
For more podcasts from iHeart, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite podcast, and check
us out on YouTube.
Host
Chiquis
Popular Podcasts
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com