Navigating Youth Mental Health Issues

Evan Transue, AKA Detective Ev, is the host of The Health Detective Podcast and owner of Bucks County Light Therapy and Functional Medicine Center. He graduated from Functional Diagnostic Nutrition (FDN) in 2017. Evan speaks professionally to middle and high school students about mental health challenges and to date has spoken to 50,000 students.

Gain incredible insights to help navigate youth mental health issues.

Accelerated Health TV & Radio Show is broadcast live Tuesdays at 4PM ET.

Accelerated Health TV Show is viewed on Talk 4 TV (www.talk4tv.com).

Accelerated Health Radio Show is broadcast on W4HC Radio - Health Café Live (www.w4hc.com) part of Talk 4 Radio (www.talk4radio.com) on the Talk 4 Media Network (www.talk4media.com).

Accelerated Health Podcast is also available on Talk 4 Podcasting (www.talk4podcasting.com), iHeartRadio, Amazon Music, Pandora, Spotify, Audible, and over 100 other podcast outlets.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Any health related information on the followingshow provides general information only. Content presented
on any show by any host orguests should not be substituted for a doctor's
advice. Always consult your physician beforebeginning any new diet, exercise, or
treatment program. Welcome to Accelerated HealthTV and radio show. I'm your host,

(00:32):
Sarah Banta. I'm a health coach, natural supplement expert, and a
busy mom of three. Make sureyou hit the subscribe button below so you're
notified every week with my new podcastson Mondays and Tuesdays. And if you
haven't already, join my free groupcoaching on Telegram with the link below.
I teach you on a daily basiswith tips and tools to enhance your health,

(00:53):
and you will be a part ofa like minded group to support you
on your journey. In addition totruly taking control of your health. My
goal is to reach everyone on earthwith eyes to see and ears to hear
my message of healing. So helpme with that goal. Share this podcast
with a few of your friends whomay need my help, especially this one
as we are talking about navigating theyouth mental health issues, which is truly

(01:18):
the pandemic, and we've got EvanTranceu here. He is the host of
the Health Detective podcast and owner ofBucks County Light Therapy and Functional Medicine Center.
He graduated from Functional Diagnostic Nutrition intwenty seventeen and he has suffered from
a variety of health challenges. Butwe're going to have him explain. Welcome,

(01:42):
Evan, how are you today?I'm doing great. Thank you so
much for having me. It's greatto get connected again. I'm super excited
about this topic and I just forall of you guys listening, I will
be releasing at the end of theweek. My hot topic on liver concerns
a fatty liver with our kids,and so this week is all about our

(02:04):
kids. We're going to be talkingabout mental health issues. And I'm a
mom of three. My kids wereborn in two thousand and two, two
thousand and four, two thousand andsix. I've seen it. I've seen
this explosion of mental health issues andit's affecting the normal kid that should not

(02:25):
be affected. And it's a topicthat I just am so passionate about as
a mom because I've seen it inmy own house and as a mom,
there's nothing worse. You will tradeanything you can to take on the pain
of your child. When they're suffering, and when they fall and they bruise

(02:46):
themselves, you know they're going toget up and they're going to be fine.
But when it's a mental health issue, it's navigating uncharted territories. So
super excited about this topic, andEvan, I'm super excited to have you
on to get through it. Butwhy don't you start by telling us why

(03:08):
you got so passionate about this andabout your journey. Yeah, so again,
thanks for having me. It wasreally before the whole COVID thing,
and I feel like that almost needsto be specified every time, because not
that it's a bad thing, butso many people came out to help during
the last several years, which Godbless them, that wasn't what I was
doing. It just happened to bevery timely. I actually got into this

(03:29):
about nine ten years ago now,after starting to discover some resolutions to my
own mental health challenges, and Sarahand I were talking off air. One
of the things that was kind ofstrange for me, and I'm sure many
other people were dealing with it butdidn't know. When I was in school,
so again twenty eight now we're goingback, you know, fifteen years
and just thinking about the mental healthstigma that was there at that time.

(03:52):
It was obviously a lot different thanit is today, and it's still not
perfect today. I was dealing withthese symptoms, but we didn't talk about
this in school. If I recall, I had like one drug talk in
high school and one suicide talk inhigh school. Very important. I'm glad
we did that, but we didn'thave the curriculum yet or the stuff going
on that talked about. Okay,this is what a panic attack is,

(04:13):
this is how major depressive disorder canpresent itself. And so I was really
dealing with these things genuinely believing,even as what I believe is a relatively
intelligent person, I like to believethat, at least I think we all
do. I believe genuinely that Iwas crazy. I thought something was inherently
wrong with me. It can't befixed. I did not know that these
were health conditions, and so Ihad a variety of experiences happened. I'm

(04:34):
not sure if we will touch onthose today. No worries either way,
but basically, some very powerful momentsoccurred at late seventeen years old and into
eighteen years old. That led meto realizing, Okay, not only do
I need to make a change,but thankfully I started to discover some things
that got me moving in the rightdirection, and it made me start to
realize that not for everyone, butfor me personally, and I do believe

(04:57):
millions of others out there, mymental health issues were actually more a health
issue than anything. And we treathealth issues differently than we treat mental health
issues, even in the functional medicinespace generally speaking. So that's kind of
the summary of how I got intothis. Once you get better and you
start feeling better, it is supernatural, as both of us know in
the natural health space, to wantto go share this with others. It's

(05:17):
like almost feels as if you can'tgo do any other work. Absolutely,
I've always said that every challenge I'vecome across and overcome with the health of
my children or me is such agod thing, and I've connected it to
literally changing the lives of other peopleand the feedback they get from my story

(05:41):
and what I've come up with solutions. I tell my kids now after my
son overcame leukemia through natural supplements,including the accelerated silver and I've talked about
that then. I've overcome mental healthissues with my children. High school's mean.
You guys girls are mean. Idon't know about the boys, but

(06:04):
the girls are mean. And Iremember sitting there with my daughter at the
age of sixteen, saying, Idon't know what God's doing with this,
but the strength and the muscles andthe mental muscles that you're going to get
through this is going to blow youaway and you are going to take that

(06:25):
and it is going to serve youand serve others in the future. And
if I had a couple hours hereright now to lay out how that story
has played out, it is sobeautiful and she wouldn't trade it for anything.
I wouldn't trade it for anything.And even for myself, any mental
issues that I've gone through, it'sonly been the seeds to help me grow

(06:50):
intrinsically and be able to strengthen thosemuscles that I needed for future things.
And you know, it's just likewith your physical body you need to strengthen
certain certain muscles. With your spiritualand your mental body, you need to
strengthen certain muscles to overcome things.But let's I want to hear about your

(07:12):
story. What happened when you wereabout seventeen years old and what did you
learn. So at that point Ihad been dealing with mental health symptoms actively
for twelve years. They started atfive years old for me, and almost
the lack of a better word,interestingly, the mental health symptoms started as

(07:32):
panic attacks. I don't remember beinglike generally anxious. I think I was
a nervous kid, but it wouldn'thave meant diagnostic criteria, and so it
was really panic attacks that were myfirst mental health system a symptom. And
just to be clear for those listening, because this will kind of matter later.
Two parent household, great parents.We weren't reach down and baw's in
the fricking parking lot, but Ihad food, I had a good house,

(07:53):
I was safe. I mean,there really wasn't anything environmental wise that
you would say would cause mental healthissues, let alone legitimate panic attacks.
And we went to the doctor atfive. And the reason I'm mentioning the
five year old thing for the seventeenyear old answer is because the reason that
those twelve years were so bad iswhat happened at five. I went into
this doctor's office with my parents,and I don't think I remember much of

(08:16):
anything else at five, but Istill remember this. We went in for
the symptoms I was dealing with.My parents had no idea what panic attacks
were. It's not a common phrase, I don't think now, but it
definitely wasn't a common phrase twenty threeyears ago. And when we went into
that doctor's office, well meaning guystill know him to this day. He
actually told us this wasn't something toworry about. Evan gets himself a little

(08:37):
too worked up and he's going tooutgrow this. I do not think he
was saying that about panic attacks.I'm thinking that he didn't realize it was
a panic attack because people don't getthis. Stigma doesn't just affect the lad
person like us. It also affectsthe doctors. Right. If they're expecting
every other person to come in withanxiety and depression, they're going to be
looking for that. It is nota statistical norm twenty three years ago for
a five year old with a goodhousehold to becoming with panic attacks. It

(09:00):
actually doesn't make sense. So twelveyears go on, and I would say
I was stable enough from about fiveto maybe ninth grade, So what does
that put you thirteen fourteen years oldroughly? And I could keep up with
the grades. I could put ashow on at school where I seemed normal
enough. But after that is whenit got bad. The panic attacks went
from these random things that happened everynow and then to legitimate panic disorder.

(09:24):
I remember the night it happened.It was just one panic attack too many,
I guess, and it led topanic disorders. So every day I'm
now dealing with these things. Therewas always a fear about, Oh,
I can't go here, or Ican't do this, I shouldn't leave the
house. For those that don't know, panic disorder is kind of characterized by
your entire life becomes this almost almostan obsession with fearing the next panic attack,

(09:46):
only for it to inevitably happen anyway. That's when I started turning to
drugs. Is very shortly after that, I would almost say, within that
few month timeframe where I was dealingwith panic attacks multiple times every single day,
never getting a break, depression kickedin. Also very common transition for
people to have anxiety disorders and thenget depression afterwards. Of course, can

(10:07):
happen other ways, but that's verytypical clinically, the depression really changed me.
That's when the drugs came in.That's when the negative coping mechanisms came
in, and that's when I couldno longer hide from the outside world in
the way that I had been.I couldn't keep up with the grades.
The grades went too failing from someonewho used to be straight a's I became
very mean to the people in mylife. I was the most mean to

(10:28):
myself, but I was terrible tothe people around me as well. You
really get this, at least itseems this way at the time, this
feeling of not caring. There's nopoint to this, it doesn't matter whatever.
I'll just figure this out. It'llgo away eventually, hopefully. Well,
fast forward a couple of years.It was basically fifteen to seventeen that
I started abusing drugs on a dailybasis. And that was not a solution,

(10:48):
right. It was a pispoor solutionto the actual problem, but it
was not a legitimate solution that hadgood results. I would say that the
drugs worked quote unquote for those listeningon audio. Eventually I got my air
quotes up. I would say itworked for a couple months. And that's
what people don't understand about drugs.People that use drugs don't do it because
it doesn't work. That would bestupid, right. You do it because

(11:09):
it did work at some point.It did make you feel better, It
did help you in the moment forwhat you were dealing with. But it's
like it's the devil in a veryalmost literal sense. It says, I'll
give you what you want right now, but the trade off is I'm going
to create new problems for you ifyou keep doing this. That's the devil
man. And so the drugs keepstacking on very stereotypical story of drug use.

(11:30):
Harder and harder things get added on. I now need money because I
can't afford it, so I choseto start selling drugs. That was my
bright idea. And of all things, Sarah, what happened at seventeen that,
really, looking back, is kindof fascinating that it took this route.
It was trying to stop the drugsthat led to some of the biggest
issues because I am taking this approachthis entire time for twelve years that I

(11:50):
am the problem. I kept rememberingat five years old, doctor couldn't figure
it out. Doctors smart, Imust be the problem, and I think
a lot of adults go through that, right, they're unintentionally, almost always
unintentionally a kind of gas lit bythe medical society making them feel like nothing's
wrong. So that's not a hitat western medicine. I know that most
people don't become doctors to gaslight people. In fact, you're doing it most

(12:13):
likely because you want to help people, and you have a good heart,
and you when it worked the hoursthat you did and take on the debt
you did in medical school, ifyou didn't kind of give a damn,
obviously you do. So this isjust me saying my experience. I'm not
blaming any one person or profession Sothat gaslighting, though, led to this
idea that it is me. Ican't talk about this stuff. Well,
that means when I'm trying to stopthe drug abuse too, I also can't

(12:35):
talk about that I had this wholeIt always makes sense to you when you're
on drugs. I had this wholeplan that I got to stop before the
age of eighteen because there has tobe someone watching me right now that knows
I'm selling drugs, and they're goingto wait until I'm eighteen so they can
charge me as an adult. It'san embarrassing to admit these things. Now.
I know there's crazier thoughts out there, but this paranoia was real.
I absolutely believed someone was waiting forme to turn eighteen so they could catch

(12:58):
me then can put me in jail. So said, I'm going to outsmart
them. I'm going to stop.Well, I didn't get help for that
drug withdrawal that I was about togo through. I didn't really understand drug
withdrawal. That's what led to thereal trouble. And I know I was
on a bad route anyway, don'tget me wrong, But that led to
trouble faster. I got into avery serious altercation at my school that day,

(13:20):
the literal day that I stopped tryingto use these things because of the
withdrawal, and that altercation had consequences. I was arrested that day, I
got put into JUVI and I spentmy eighteenth birthday on house arrest as a
result of this. Now, theproblem was, all of those situations are,
of course highly stressful. Well,I've only taught myself one coping mechanism
for stress. It was only amatter of time before I went back to

(13:41):
that coping mechanism drugs. I startdoing this same stuff I was doing before,
except now on probation or even housearrest, because I had people dropping
the stuff off at three in themorning to the end of my parents' driveway,
because I'm that desperate to get high. And I always like to disclaim
this, this is not just mebeing nice. My parents are some of
the best people you could ask forto have as parents. They are not

(14:01):
unaware people. If someone wants touse drugs, they're going to find a
way to use drugs. And it'spretty shocking to a parent to find out
that this kid was sneaking out atthree in the morning to the end of
the driveway to have these things done. That's not what you're thinking is going
on. So the probation thing,I get away with this for a couple
of months actively using drugs on probation, but you're not going to get away
with that forever. And the realbig aha moment came on of all nights,

(14:26):
New Year's Eve of twenty thirteen.The probation officer and my parents thought
I was doing well. One ofthe issues with probation is you're being monitored,
so it's really easy to do wellwhen you're being monitored. And of
course I wasn't actually doing well,but it's really easy to do it when
you're getting you're intested or whatever.So their whole thing was, Okay,
you are doing well, you canmaybe do certain things again and will kind

(14:50):
of I hate to sound like this, it makes me sound like an animal,
but it's almost like rehabilitate you backinto society so you can go live
a normal life and be productive,but also not do these things once you're
out of our control and monitoring.So on New Year's Eve, I was
actually allowed to go out. Butthey weren't born yesterday. They're not stupid.
So the rule was, Okay,you can see your friends, but
you're gonna get dropped off by yourparents. It's only going to be for

(15:11):
four or five hours, and thenyour parents have to pick you back up
at twelve am when they're going homefrom the party that they're going to.
My parents aren't drinkers, so theywere just hanging out. I made it
ten minutes into that New Year's Evethat night, and I was drinking intoing
drugs. I couldn't resist, andI promise I'm not that stupid. I
couldn't resist, it's all I know. Well, we get picked up at
twelve am, just like we're supposedto. I haven't said we yet.

(15:33):
We as myself and my girlfriend ofabout four or five years at the time.
Now, I loved this girl.I thought I was going to marry
her one day. I just didn'talways treat her like that when I was
using the drugs, and so Iconvinced her to do a lot of the
same things I did that night.She didn't do that stuff. When we
got into the car with my parents, we drove maybe a minute or two
down the road, and they knewsomething was wrong with her. She was

(15:56):
normally the most quiet, introverted personyou can imagine, and she had well,
she wasn't introverted that night, I'llput it that way. She had
a story to tell, and thatalone made it obvious something was wrong with
her. My parents flipped out.They were the most mad I have ever
seen them in my life, tothe point that they stopped the car in
the middle of the road, turnaround and start screaming at her. And

(16:19):
I'm waiting for my turn with this, and when they're going to get pissed
off at me and scream at me. And they never did it that night.
And I don't know if they reallycouldn't believe this, or maybe their
brains didn't want them to believe this. They didn't think I was on anything.
They thought it was her. Andperhaps some of the reason is because
they raised me better than this.They couldn't even comprehend that I'd be so
stupid is to get into their caron New Year's Eve drunken, high on

(16:41):
probation. And I think that's actuallyhow I got away with a lot of
this stuff. It was so dumbthat no one assumed I was doing it
right, Like who does that onhouse or us? That's crazy, perfect
time to do it. Well.My girlfriend didn't say much back, she
didn't argue at all, actually formy memory, and we continue driving home
once they're done yelling, awkward angryparents silence. We all know that.

(17:02):
We get home and my girlfriend andI end up by ourselves. And I
had one of two choices that night, and the first one was the correct
one. It was where I admitto all this stuff I had done.
And I was thinking in the car, starting to think, like really almost
positive in a certain way because Iwas having these realizations. I'm like,
dude, you love this girl.Dude, she's had your back through some
of the worst stuff in your life. Why the hell is she getting picked
up at twelve am. She shouldn'tforget, she should be having fun.

(17:25):
You're the one making her get pickedup, and she still has your back
through all of this. Have youever thanked her for that? Instead of
choosing that first option, though,I was so ashamed. I wasn't someone
who talked about my emotions and notto mention, I'm still on drugs,
and so I chose to blame herfor getting caught for the thing I made
her do. I had a PhDin blaming other people. I always say

(17:45):
that I have no degree other thanPhD and blaming other people. At the
time, I said things to heryou don't say to people, man,
let alone someone that you love.Thankfully, nothing physical, not that that
necessarily makes it much better, butI'm not capable of that, apparently,
And when I woke up in themorning, she had already left. Now
that wasn't like her. That waskind of weird, and so I realized

(18:06):
sober now, all the things thathappened night before, and I start to
think about all the good things thatI wanted to say, and I realized,
you better go say those things prettyquick because there might not be another
one of these times. Well,I was right. I was just a
little bit too late. So Icall her. It rings a bunch of
times, it goes to voicemail.Call her again, rings a bunch of

(18:26):
times, goes to voicemail. Anddon't worry. This isn't as tragic as
it's setting up to be. SoI want to disclaim that. But I
realized after about the tenth call,this wasn't like the other fights. She
was telling me that day. Ican't be in your life anymore because now
you're hurting me. I already knewyou were messed up. Man, You
think I didn't know that. Ithink this is a secret. Like to
me, it was a secret.To her, it wasn't. She's waiting

(18:48):
for me to get some help,and she wanted me to know through her
presence that she had my back throughall of it. I just didn't see
that at the time. So Sarahto summarize this, and I'm sorry because
it's the longest winded answer I'll give. I promise what happened that night.
I don't know if it was orthat morning. Rather, I don't know
if it was that pain stacked ontoeverything else, or just the pain of
the high school sweetheart, because thatkills a lot of us, right if

(19:08):
we've ever dealt with that. Thatsnapped me out of it. I was
in this funk for several years whereI could only think ten minutes ahead instead
of ten years ahead. And somepeople just call that being a teenager,
and fair enough, but it's evenworse when you're a teenager also using drugs,
like you literally only see ten minutesahead. And when I saw ten

(19:29):
years, which funny enough, isnow like almost to the day, in
two months, it'll be ten years, I realized, Okay, this isn't
working likev You can't just keep doingthe same things over and over again.
This is getting worse, it's notgetting better. And that girl saved my
life. It doesn't end with thestory of we got back together and everything's
happily ever after. It's not likethat. But she did save my life

(19:51):
because that gave me enough self awarenessto go take the right actions, get
to the counseling, try stuff inwestern medicine. I didn't know any better
at the time. I went toWestern medicine first, and it worked for
me, not against it just didn'twork for me, and it also led
to these unique solutions that we'll talkabout today with the holistic health stuff.
So I quite literally owe my lifeto this person because I was on a
terrible trajectory before it, and atthe best case, I would have been

(20:11):
in jail. There was no wayI wouldn't have gotten caught doing what I
was doing. Eventually, a worstcase, I wouldn't be doing this podcast
with you today. So I'm extremelythankful for that, despite all the pain
that it caused. But that's whathappened at seventeen and eighteen years old.
It was a wake up call.It's a pivotal point in my life.
I think we all have those thingsthat life was this way before this event,

(20:32):
and life was this way after thoseevents. Older you get, I'm
starting to realize the more of thoseyou accumulate. But that is probably one
of the most significant and profound onesI've ever had. Other than and I
guess you don't mind saying this yearbecause you already shared your beliefs. Other
than my relationship with Christ, thereis nothing else that is stronger than that
before and after I have the chillsall over my body. What You've just

(20:55):
opened a whole can of worms.The fact that when you were growing up
and I was growing up, anxiety, depression, suicide, you maybe knew
one person. It wasn't something thatwas talked about. Nowadays, it's like
anxiety is the buzzword. Oh God, I've got anxiety over the test I

(21:15):
have to take tomorrow. And sothere's this misnomer of what is true anxiety,
What is a true panic attack?What is true depression? So real
quick, will you go through?What are the diagnostic symptoms a parent or
a child should look for with panicattacks or anxiety? Okay, and obviously

(21:37):
for those that don't know, andI still appreciate the questions, I'm going
to answer it. But I'm nota psychologists, not account so I don't
have any formal credentials, so thereis a chance that what I answer could
be at least minorly inaccurate. I'malso in the space. It's not that
I haven't researched these things or don'thave friends that are PhDs and this stuff,
So I'm more aware than the averageperson. So I think I can
answer it overall accurately. I'm oneof the biggest things that I would look

(21:59):
for, and especially in regards todepression, because people don't realize that suicide
is now the second leading cause ofdeath in America from ages ten to thirty
five. But more importantly, thenumber one cause of suicide is untreated depression.
Now, whether you're into western orfunctional medicine, I don't really care
for a second. That's a treatablecondition, man, Like, there's a

(22:21):
lot to do for that. Andyou'll notice I even said untreated depression is
the number one cause of suicide,and that's the second leading cause of death
for ten to thirty five, andthat's pretty a wild statistic. So I
want to focus on depression if nothingelse, What can we look for with
that? It's the classic stuff sometimesthat you think about, but then there's
some hidden ones. The classic stuffis the withdrawal. Right, Hey,
this was a person who was enjoyingall of these things at one point,

(22:42):
or can at least put up withlife. Right, Maybe they didn't love
school, but they showed up whatever, and now all of a sudden,
there's that withdraw I think a lotof people interpret depression as sadness, and
quite frankly, it can be.I think this very much depends on the
person. I don't hear enough peopledescribing it as what it was. For
me and many others, it wasnumb. I didn't really sit around crying

(23:03):
all day. That happened occasionally.That was really rare. It was a
numbness, And so numb is differentthan sad. It sad implies you're feeling
something negative all the time. Numbmeans something bad happens eh, something good
happens eh. And there's a disturbingmental place that you get to with numbness
as well. It was also anger. I've always been someone that maybe had

(23:25):
to work on that. You know, my family, as good as we
all are and as great as weget along, that was one of our
things, right. Everyone is superextroverted. We're very loud. We might
as well be Italian despite no Italiandescent. We're like yelling and screaming,
and then we love each other.And so yes, that was present from
things I learned as a kid,but that also came from something deeper,
that was the depression, and Ireally acted out with that kind of stuff.

(23:47):
I became physically violent. So that'ssomething to look out for, especially
in men. It's less likely thata young woman would do that, but
it can happen. So those thingscheck out for and man watch for the
grades. And you'll notice a themewith these things. All all of these
things are actually stuff that would normallyrequire disciplinary action. And I'm not saying
let people get other than the withdrawalI suppose unless it led to failing grades.

(24:11):
I'm not saying don't discipline kids fordoing bad stuff. But I was
just speaking about this yesterday. Actually, I was telling these teachers that I
was talking to, we have toask a couple more questions. We want
to dig a little bit deeper intothe conversation. And quite frankly, there
are going to be some kids thatare just acting like idiots in school.
They have too much sugar and theyfelt like raisin hell that day, and
that's what they did. But ifyou start to see a kid as a

(24:33):
parent, teacher, whatever it mightbe, and you realize, wow,
this kid's almost completely different when we'retalking one on one, then they kind
of are in their group settings orwhatever it might be. Maybe something else
is going on here, And I'llgive a brief list for the panic attack
thing because I think this. Iwant to say this, right, the
panic attack term gets overused now nowit's so widespread that I mean, yes,

(24:56):
plenty of people still don't know whatit is, but especially the youth,
they'll use this all the time,having a panic attack. I am
not underplaying one's anxiety. A panicattack is a specific condition, though,
and I actually think it's wrong forboth the person describing it inaccurately to say
that they have that, because thatmight not be what they have. And
it's also wrong for people who dealwith this because they're going to get kind
of undermined. So a panic attack, one of the characteristics is a fear

(25:18):
of impending doom. That's a literalsymptom that will come up if you research
this on WebMD, healthline or whatever. Fear of impending doom means you feel
like something awful is about to happen. Usually you feel like you're going to
die. Those panic attacks convinced meone hundred percent that I was about to
die every single time they happen,no matter how many times they happen.

(25:40):
So you think you can rationale yourselfout of this at a certain point.
I mean, maybe it's just becauseI was young. It didn't work for
me. Every day it would happen, and every day I was convinced it
was the one that was going tokill me. The other thing is too
people can get this disassociation feeling.I actually didn't get that. That wasn't
one of the symptoms that I got. But they can feel almost like they're
not there, and I would imaginethat's some sort of coping mechanism. Your

(26:02):
hands are going to be beyond sweaty, they're pouring right, your heart is
pounding through your chest. It canfeel like a heart attack. You can
also get these sensations that you can'tbreathe, as if your chest is closing
in on itself, or you can'tswallow as if your throat's closing in on
itself. That's a panic attack,man. It's really severe symptoms. So
someone could have anxiety and not havea panic attack. But we need to

(26:23):
really make sure that we're saying thesethings accurately. And it's why I encourage
please, I'm not a doctor,go make sure that you double check with
this stuff, because we're not servinganyone if we don't have the accurate labels
for these things, because a panicattack does get addressed differently than generalized anxiety
disorder. Both are serious, bothget treated differently. Though. I want
to touch on the depression because Ireally focus a lot, as people know,

(26:48):
on thyroid health, and a lotof doctors when people are they're trying
and diagnosing someone with depression, alot of times it's because of hype,
both thyroid situation or suboptimal thyroid Andso I just wanted to put that in
there right now, because if youwere going to your doctor to get diagnosed

(27:11):
for depression, make sure you areasking for a full thyroid panel, not
just TSH. You need a fullthyroid panel. TSH is a pituitary hormone.
It doesn't tell you anything. Yougot to get the full thyroid panel,
So make sure that you do that. And I just wanted to touch
on that. So the panic attack, that's really interesting that you think you're

(27:36):
going to die. So is italways that you think you're going to die
or you think that something horrible isgoing to happen. I would imagine based
on the fact that, like I'veseen it listed as fear of impending doom,
I'm not suggests that it'd be atleast a little bit different for everyone.
So perhaps you just get this feelingsomething bad's going to happen, that's
not necessarily death. For me,it was always that, never an exception

(27:57):
other than if I don't do something, I'm going to die. And obviously
we know more about this now.There's the whole flight, fight, freeze,
fawn response. It was flight andfight back then or whatever. Hard
to go through. All of itwas live right. I was a flight
person for sure, and so Iwould always have to get up and go.
I'd be running up the stairs,pacing back and forth. I had

(28:18):
to get the energy out. Butwhat's interesting is I've heard some people,
I guess based on their genetics,what they display when they're dealing with a
panic attack. If they deal withone, they actually totally they crow up.
They don't move at all, AndI can't even imagine that. So
that just shows how different it couldbe for someone because that is the last
thing I would be able to do. I could be in a car and
I would have to be bouncing backand forth or like, let me out

(28:41):
of this thing with the fight orflight stuff that I got with the what
do you call it? With thepanic attacks. So I don't know if
it's always hey, I'm going todie for everyone, but the label is
fear of impending doom. And Idon't think any of us want that well.
And you said some words that hithome, and I've got loved ones
that have used the word numb before. I'm just totally numb. And when

(29:04):
something good happens, you know,there's no response. When something bad happens,
same thing. And then I knowof someone who does just freeze up
and cannot move with an anxiety attack. So all of the things you're saying,
as I'm going through the rolodex ofmy loved ones in my life,
these terms are are occurring. Sowhy heaven? What mental health? Why

(29:32):
is is it really getting worse?Are we just getting better at diagnosing it?
What is going on? And it'sactually it's so funny because to most
people out there, anyone nowadays,you could ask is it going up?
Everyone would say yes. It's notthat easy to prove, because in Western
medicine, we are getting better atdiagnosing things, no doubt, no doubt.

(29:55):
We have better screens for cancer andautoimmune disease than ever before. That
is true. So the whole questionsestion becomes is it actually going up or
did we not notice it before.The biggest argument, or the best argument
I should say that I have forthis is the suicide rates, and I
am I'm still willing to acknowledge anyonethat's into science would have heard this before.

(30:15):
Correlation is not causation. But thething I'm going to reference happen before
the pandemic to prove to you thatat least the suicide rates were going up,
that's for sure. So from nineteenninety nine to twenty sixteen, the
suicide rates in every single state inthis country of America went up significantly.
The average was like around twenty fiveto thirty percent. There was only one
state where it went down. Itwas Nevada of all places by a wapping

(30:37):
one percent decrease. The highest,to put this in perspective, was North
Dakota with a fifty seven percent increasein less than twenty years in suicides.
Now, the reason I mentioned thisagain acknowledging correlation is not causation. I'm
just saying this is the best argumentthat I have. If the number one
cause of suicide is untreated depression anduntreated depression typically happens because people do feel

(31:02):
stigmatized or they don't know what's goingon. Well, then we can ask
a couple of questions. From nineteenninety nine to twenty sixteen, did we
become more or less open to mentalhealth in this country? I think we
all know the answer is we becamemore open. So that implies that more
people with depression should be getting treated. And so that's kind of a strong
case for this in my opinion,because if it's like one thing, if
it just went up by five percentaround the country, they'd be tragic,

(31:23):
but it wouldn't be a good argument. When we're seeing twenty five thirty percent
increases country wide. I do believesomething's going on. Then the obvious question,
like you said, kind of youstarted with this, what's going on?
Because if this was happening even beforethe pandemic, and the pandemic is
just like, my gosh, it'sthe knockout punch after getting jabbed and hooked
a bunch of times, it isthe knockout punch. What is going on?

(31:45):
It's the modern lifestyles and that's nosecret to anyone listening to this.
So some of the stuff that Ihave found to be the most relevant to
the people that are dealing with thiskind of stuff. I do believe light
is one of the most involved things. And this was already being discovered back
in the nineteen seventies, which isfascinating. There was a doctor named doctor

(32:06):
John Ott and he owned the EnvironmentalHealth and Light Research Institute. By the
way, he lived to ninety despitebeing born at a time when the life
expectancy was fifty, so take thatas you will. He took a group
of kids in Sarasota, Florida.So there was four windowless classrooms. And
my first question always is why thehell would you have a windowless classroom in
Sarasota, Florida, of all places, that alone should be criminal. But

(32:28):
nonetheless there was four windowless classrooms.It's nineteen seventy three when this occurred,
and all classes had the same whitefluorescent tubes. Now, he had been
studying light for years with plants,and he wanted to see its effect on
humans. He had already seen somestuff happening happen with him anecdotally. He
wanted to get some data. Sowhat he did is he put two of
the classrooms. He left them withthe white fluorescence changed nothing, and then

(32:51):
two of the classrooms got full spectrumbulbs with radiation shielding around them. Now,
for those who don't know, fullspectrum is more like it's trying to
mimic day. We cannot do that. That would be playing god. I
don't know if our science is evergoing to be able to mimic the sun.
So we are way far from thesun to be clear, but we
are certainly closer than a white fluorescentAnd what happened in a month of him

(33:12):
changing these things out is that thepeople who had the full spectrum bulbs with
the radiation shielding, those kids startedbehaving better. There was less falling asleep
in class, there was less irritability, there was less outbursts, to the
point that one class had no outburstsanymore. And probably the most interesting thing
was you could say, oh,that's subjective. Here's what's not subjective.
The letter grades went up by afull letter in one of those things,

(33:35):
and you say, well, okay, well maybe the teachers we're focusing differently
because they knew it was going tohappen. Okay, here's what you can't
fake. And I know this isn'tmental health related. But it will prove
to you that this actually had aneffect physiologically. These other doctors heard about
what doctor John Ott was doing andthey got on board, and you know,
we're starting to conduct their own studies. Dentists started looking at this.

(33:57):
They ran the study for three months, and they found out after the three
month mark, the kids that wereexposed to the full spectrum bulbs all day
at school versus the white fluorescence developedone third the amount of new cavities that
the ones under the white fluorescence developed. And you're like, what I thought
that was Hershey bars and Coca colaand stuff. I mean, and don't
get me wrong, this above mypay grade like ten times. But it's

(34:20):
like, wow, what is thisdoing to our bodies that we don't fully
understand. It's really fascinating stuff.So that's one of the biggest things.
Kids that stay up past twelve am. So kids being eighteen and under are
forty two percent more likely to bediagnosed with depression. Now, I guess
you can't correlate that directly with light. Is correlations not causation, But at
the same time, one has toask why do you stay up past twelve

(34:42):
am? Are you just sitting inthe dark by yourself, or do you
do it because you have an artificiallight stimulating you. I think there's something
there. Forty two percents a hellof an increase. There's also studies showing
that people that are exposed to evena minor amount of light at night,
it was actually around like five toten lucks. So ten lucks would be
like looking at a candle from abouta foot away, So five to ten

(35:04):
lucks could also be having a streetlight come in behind the curtains, having
the bathroom light on in the background, or gosh forbid, having the TV
on and you're falling. You're waypast ten lucks at that point, and
this is very normal now in today'sworld. Or falling asleep with the phone
on, you're watching YouTube, Netflixis on, whatever it might be.
People that slept just with the fiveto ten lucks had noticeably more depressive symptoms

(35:27):
than those who slept in total darkness. And we have people sleep in in
insane amounts of light now, sothat's kind of crazy. And again,
just to prove the point further withthe physical health side, you guys have
to look this up as you willnot believe me if I say this to
you, I don't expect you tobelieve me. Look it up and research
it yourself. It's right on.I forget if this one's actually pub met.
I should know that off the topof my hand. But these are
scientific articles. This is not hippisciencedot org right where the theory people that

(35:52):
are exposed to artificial blue light atnight while they're sleeping. Men are one
point five times more likely to developprostate cancer. Women are one point five
times more likely to develop breast cancer. Those are two of the most common
cancers. How is this not news? Why is this not the first thing
that you're seeing today? And said, you know, we're still kind of

(36:12):
going on the COVID thing, whichis important and it is a strong thing,
but one point five time risks.Wow, holy cow, I just
can't understand that. So I'll pauuse for a seconds. I don't want
to just keep going off. Butone of the first things to answer your
question about what the hell's going on? We changed our light and I don't
think we have any idea what wedid when we chose to do that.
So a few things I want tojust touch on. This last weekend,

(36:35):
I went to a football game,to go see parent and my daughter at
college and super fun. I didn'tdrink, I didn't eat non organic food.
I did everything I normally do sofood, diet, exercise, all
the same. Right, Okay,So I came home, I went to
bed at midnight. Normally go tobed at around eight o'clock. Yes,

(36:59):
I know I go to bed early, but I also normally get up at
about five o'clock because my dog saysit's time to wake up. Well,
this morning, she actually let mesleep into six am, so I got
six hours of sleep instead of myeight hours of sleep. I felt more
hungover than I ever felt in college. And I never drank, did anything

(37:22):
whatever. That night. My bodywas inflamed. I literally was functioning at
fifty percent that whole day. Andthat next night, I literally put myself
to bed at seven thirty, andI made sure I slept until five thirty
and got more than enough sleep.I woke up on Monday morning, I

(37:42):
fell back to myself and felt greatsleep. Sleep sleep. And when you've
got that cell phone by your bed, or you've got it in the bathroom,
and oh, I have to gopee real quick, I'm going to
check to see if I got anytext or what's happening on Instagram. That
stimulus is completely creating wreaking havoc inthe body. And we haven't even gotten

(38:05):
the updates on the cell phones onwhat the risks are has not been updated
since nineteen ninety six. I wantall of you to go back to think
about what your cell phone looked likein nineteen ninety six. Mine was this
big. It was a motorola.I didn't even iPhone didn't exist. Now

(38:25):
we've got these handheld computers with fiveG that we're walking around that are part
of our appendage now. And whatyou're saying as far as we've changed our
lifestyle, I mean, my onedaughter who's seventeen, has chosen not to
be on social media because she hasseen what it's doing to the mental health

(38:49):
of all of her friends and it'sand I'm also in reference to the light,
all three of my kids chose asport rowing, which is outside.
They're on the water, they're innature for at least three to four hours
a day. And during COVID,that was the biggest blessing in the entire
world because they were not in gyms, they were not stuck at home,

(39:13):
for the afternoon. They actually gotto go do something physical in nature with
light, and so there is asmuch as they actually suffered because a lot
of other things are were happening.That was one of the saving graces to
help give them a balance of somesort of mental stability. So we I

(39:36):
can't believe that we only have tenminutes left I can talk. Maybe,
I'm sorry, I know it's fantastic. So what are the primary causes we
talked about, light, social media, anything else that you want to touch
on for this mental health epidemic?Yeah, and you know, I mean,
my gosh, with what you've probablytalked about in the show and the

(39:58):
people you've had on you don't wantto sound like a broken record. But
my point is if you hear whatI'm about to say and you're like,
oh, I've heard this before,well maybe you should go do it then,
you know, because it's like thatimportant the food thing man, the
leaky gut thing. To me,you know, ten years ago you said
this, it was like borderline conspiracytheory to say leaky gut, and we're
fascinating yesterday, Sarah. So thetwo groups of teachers I spoke to is

(40:19):
like, maybe sixty in the firstpresentation and maybe forty in the next.
I asked everyone to raise their hands, not if they knew what it was,
just had they heard the term.Ninety percent of the rooms had heard
the term leaky gut. These areteachers, they're not medical professionals, and
so the average person actually has heardabout this. Now and the reason this
is relevant to mental health if well, two things really one the simple one,

(40:40):
if you can't digest the food thatyou're eating properly, these are the
building blocks to build the neurotransmitters.And so this is like one oh one
stopped. This is not overly complicated. You need protein to break down into
amino acids, and then the aminoacids can convert into neurotransmitters to all the
wonderful things that happen in the body. It is so profound, in fact,

(41:00):
that neurotransmitters are still used as supplementsfor rapid changes in mental health stuff.
And not to mention the drugs thatthey use, such as xanax or
an ssri. If you actually breakdown what those are, those are all
things that are playing on neurotransmitters.Now that narrative has also been challenged over
the last several years. So Isaid there was two parts to the Leaki

(41:21):
gut thing. I don't think we'rewrong that a neurotransmitter theory or hypothesis is
not a part of this. Ijust think it's incomplete. I think the
other thing that happens with leaki gutis not only can you not break down
the food right, and just togive an analogy to people, because analogies
help them remember it right. Thiswould almost be the equivalent of you know,
you have your gas tank and halfwayup there's a hole in it,

(41:44):
so you put in fifty dollars worthof gas or probably seventy eighty nowadays,
but you only got twenty five.And so imagine that you actually start eating
right and you try to eat enoughprotein, which by the way, no
teenagers are doing anyway, unless they'rean athlete and being told to by their
coach or their parents. You're noteven needing enough to begin with, and
then you're not digesting enough to actuallymake something meaningful with it. So it's

(42:05):
quite scary. But the other partis that inflammatory aspect. And this was
one of the coolest studies I everfound, Sarah. It was a meta
analysis that was done to try toprove that things like n said, so
for those that don't know non steroidalanti inflammatory drugs, that would be your
neprexons, that would be your advils, those would fall under that category.
And the meta analysis showed in twentysix out of the thirty studies that they

(42:29):
looked at, that advil and theseother anti inflammatory drugs had temporary use for
mental health issues, as in ittemporarily relieved the symptoms of anxiety and depression.
And again, I really try toplay Devil's advocate with stuff, so
someone might take that at face value. You can't do that in science.
The first thing you have to dois say, well, wait a second,
what if it's an unknown side effectof advil? What if advil,

(42:51):
for whatever reason, actually increases seratonin. I know that sounds very unrealistic,
and I do believe it's unrealistic,but you have to look at that and
always challenge yourself because correlations not causes. Well, these guys were smart.
They ran this study. They alsolooked at omega threes, so supplementing with
mega threes, and they also lookedat tumeric, specifically kirkhuman, the active
ingredient in it. Well, I'mnot buying that it's just a side effect

(43:14):
now that we don't know of aboutadvil. Those are known anti inflammatory agents
and they relieved these symptoms of mentalhealth issues for people. Is that going
to work the same way for everyone. No, that's why this stuff's so
damn complicated. But the leaky gutthing to me comes down to this.
We have a malabsorption issue. We'revery literally not getting enough nutrients. And
number two, when your gut isleaky, it causes systemic inflammation, including

(43:37):
neuroinflammation. So some people are goingto be predisposed to the mental health issues
because those genes will load the gun, the environment pulls the trigger. Plenty
of people will get plenty inflamed intheir life and they will never have a
bad mood. That's like actually goingto meet a diagnostic criteria. I think
that's less than not. But we'veall seen that person that is maybe dealing
with a really serious diagnosis and they'rethe most positive person in the room.

(43:59):
We all know that person as theystand out. Maybe that's just not in
their genetics, man like, maybethey just don't get that way, but
for a lot of us, wedo feel that way. So if you
can just focus on getting the lightright, researching that, getting the food
right, and working on the gutstuff, I mean, man, you'll
be so far ahead. We canget into some complicated things, but start
with that and then add the otherstuff on because the other stuf's really useful,

(44:19):
but you got to start with somefoundational things too. I love that
you talked talked about leaki get becausethis is a huge passion of mine,
is that the processed foods sixty sevenpercent of kids dietary intake is not real
food. It's this processed foods andit causes leaky gut. And what you
just said you touched on it issay you eat that corn dog at the

(44:40):
game, right, and that processedfoods causes leaky gut. But then the
next morning you go, Okay,I'm gonna do it. Sarah and Evan
say I'm going to eat whole food. Well, you've ripped up your gut,
so you're not even absorbing the goodnutrients from the real food you're eating
the next day until unless you've preparedyour leaky gut. So I'm going to

(45:01):
just touch on a couple supplements tohit home and get that basic foundation,
and that is the leaky gut bundle. You've got the megaspore biotic, the
megapre and the mega mucosa. Itfeeds the right gut bacteria to help produce
the serotonin, gabba, dopamine,the good new neurotransmitters. Heal that leaky

(45:22):
gut much more quickly so that you'reabsorbing the nutrients from the good protein that
you hopefully are going to start fillingin. We're not talking about paleo or
keto or vegan or whatever. Justeat real whole food. Let's start with
that. Get rid of the sodas. Let's start with and if you need
to switch to a different caffeine todrink away from the monster drink and the

(45:45):
coke, go for coffee, gofor a iced tea. There's a step
down, right. I'm okay withcaffeine a little bit, but for you
you teenagers, do remember that caffeinemight make you shorter. So that's just
some thing to think about. Sothe leaky gut bundle is one place to
start, and you can add inwhat's called the zen biome. This is

(46:07):
actually a spore biotic that is specificfor that gut brain access and helps with
the psychosis or the psychological anxiety ordepression. That is this feedback loop between
the gut and the brain, specificallyfor mental health issues. Zen biome I

(46:27):
take it daily. I have everyonein my family on it, and they're
all on the Leaky Gut bundle becausewe're being bombarded by all these toxins that
we don't even know about in ourfood supply, in our water, in
our environment, and our gut isbeing attacked. And so that is a
great place to start. And theacceleratine iodine. Kids need this more than

(46:49):
ever. It is iodine is knownas the number one spiritual element or mineral
in the world. It helps withbrain fog, depression, depression is there's
the number one predictor for depression isiodine deficiency and over ninety six percent of
the United States is deficient and iodine, so it is a great place to

(47:10):
start. Will also help with IQand with thyroid health, which we mentioned
at in the middle of the showthat a lot of times depression and anxiety
are caused by thyroid issues, Sothat's somewhere something to think about as well.
And lastly is the cognoblast and thisis my brain supplement. It has
gotten kids off of ADHD medication.I've got family members who have said,

(47:34):
Sara, this is so amazing comparedto the Riddlin that I used to take.
I don't have the side effects andI actually am focused. And then
I've got people on it for Alzheimer'sand dementia. But I've also had people
that are getting off of their antidepressantsbecause of this, with the guidance of
their doctor, of course, butthey've been on antidepressants for over twenty years.

(47:58):
Never thought they could you break thatrelationship with their drug that they are
holding on to so tightly, andthey're getting off of their medication with the
cognitive last so I wanted to mentionthose before we go. And Evan,
do you have any last thoughts andplease tell us where we can find you.
Yeah, so I can actually answerboth of them in one You know,

(48:20):
I like to think of podcasts,and I say this even on my
own I like to think of podcastsas TV shows. Right, you don't
watch or just listen to one,you get these different perspectives. And I'm
sure there's things if Sarah and Italked to enough we probably don't agree on
and that's good. We need intelligentthought and respectful people because we're both respectful
to each other continuing to enhance thisconversation. So the podcast I do for
Functional Diagnostic Nutrition is called the HealthDetective Podcast, and that would be a

(48:45):
podcast you'd listen to. It iseducational and people like Sarah have been on.
But to me, I focus onthe stories there so you know,
if you're wanting like an inspirational thingthat day, that could be where it's
really useful. And the reason I'msaying that answers both questions is because you're
saying, like, oh, well, is there something else they need to
know? I need you to knowthat there's hope, and the proof of

(49:05):
that is those stories. That's oneof the reasons that I decided to format
the podcast in such a way isbecause you know, some people, Sarah,
they love the science like us andthey really get it, and then
others, man, it's just thatdoesn't resonate, even if they're totally smart
people, it just doesn't resonate forsome reason. But when they hear about
someone that had cancer, that hadan autoimmune condition, that had these mental
health issues and came out on theother side, you know, you might

(49:27):
not fully understand what they did,you might not be able to recite it,
but hearing that allows you to hangon because I genuinely believe that one
of the biggest things that's happening withsuicide, it's not that we're in so
much pain. It's that we arein pain and we perceive that it's never
going to end. And that's whena human being kind of gives up.
So when you can hear the hopeor feel the hope, that's when you
can kind of go through stuff.I mean, we're tough species, man,

(49:50):
we didn't get here by doing nothing. We're a resilient species, but
we got to have that hope.So check that out. FDN training dot
com slash Accelerated Health to learn moreabout the Functional Diagnostic Nutrition Program. So
it's kind of a way that youmight be able to do work like Sarah
and I do. It's it's ablessing. Man. I shouldn't even call
it work. That's probably an accurate, right, I think there's just you

(50:12):
know, by definition, it's work, but it doesn't feel that way.
So fdntraining dot com, slash AcceleratedHealth fd and training on Instagram. That's
really all that you need to knowin terms of finding us. Thank you
for allowing us to shout it out. Thank you Evan, and definitely check
out that link. I offer affiliateprograms and wholesale programs for a lot of
FDN training coaches, So it's definitelyan opportunity if you have a story to

(50:37):
tell, and if you've had deepexperiences that have been so dark but that
now you have the light and youwant to share, that is a great
opportunity. I know so many ofyou are wanting to help other people.
So anyway, thank you Evan,and thank you for joining us today.
Everybody. If I can help youwith your health issues, contact me directly
through the website Sarah Bantah health dotcom. Join the group coaching on the

(51:00):
on telegram with the link below.I teach you on a daily basis with
tips and tools to in your handsyour health. There's no downside, and
you can follow me on Facebook andInstagram under Accelerated Health products across over one
hundred channels under Accelerated Health TV andradio show, and like I mentioned,
according for Evan and I, ourgoal is to reach everyone on Earth with

(51:24):
eyes to see and ears to hearour messages of healing, so help us
with that goal. Share this podcastwith a few of your friends, so
many need to see this episode.Thanks again and have a great week.