January 31, 2025 • 31 mins
Join Captain Michelle Huntington and Guy 'The Clown' Newman as they dive into the mind-blowing world of gut health and mental wellbeing.
After discovering "The Psychobiotic Revolution" by Scott Anderson with Dr John Cryan and Dr Ted Dinan, Guy can't contain his excitement about the fascinating connections between what we eat and how we feel.
Through hilarious personal stories about dairy disasters, gluten mishaps, and ice cream adventures, our hosts make the cutting-edge science of the gut-brain connection both entertaining and accessible. They explore how our trillions of gut bacteria influence everything from our moods to our memory, and why comfort eating might actually be our microbiota calling the shots.
Whether you're curious about the science behind your food cravings or wondering why chocolate makes you feel better, this episode of Captain and the Clown serves up serious science with a side of laughter.
The duo shares their own experiences with fasting, food intolerances, and the quest for mental clarity, while unpacking how this revolutionary research could change our approach to mental health.
Enjoy!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
G'day leaders. Recently I heard two terms I hadn't heard before. The first one is psychobiotic
(00:08):
and the second one is the gut microbiota. I've heard of the gut microbiome but not the biota.
Anyway, fascinating science and a great book that we spoke about in the podcast about the link
between what you eat and your moods and the amazing science that's coming out. Enjoy.
(00:30):
Why did it count backwards? Oh no, we're now recording. What? Hello captain.
Come fly with me, let's fly, let's fly. What are we going to talk about? I don't know.
So leadership, life and everything else. Yeah.
(00:58):
And we're live. Oh you got in too quick. I was just about to say and we're live and I feel learned.
Learned. Learned. Learned. Yes I've learned something and I feel learned. Right. Yes.
Or educated as some would say. Yeah I thought I'd go with an obscure reference.
Got this new book. Yes. Yeah called the Psychobiotic Revolution, Mood, Food and the New Science of the
(01:26):
Gut-Brain Connection. And we don't normally do this so let's give the authors a shout out because I'm
pretty slack at this. So it's Scott Anderson with Dr John Cryan and Dr Ted Dinan. Anyway, I within
seconds was hooked on this book. Yeah because we read out the front every morning and this is a new
(01:49):
book for you and yeah you've been stopping me every page and telling me. You're trying to read and I'm
going hey hey hey did you know this? Did you know this? Yeah I know I'm a bit annoying. I'm like that
little puppy dog in that cartoon. Remember the little puppy dog that was always chasing after the
bigger dog? Yeah. So for example a single bacterium given enough to eat could multiply until its
(02:09):
brethren, its family, reached the mass of earth in just two days. If it was given enough food.
Yeah so bacteria. Yeah they love to eat. Yeah but then okay so going on from that. Yeah you told me
yeah another little tidbit that you told me was that at every hour. Oh every hour yeah it's new.
(02:35):
It's brand new. So thankfully within two days it's not going to happen. No. Because it changes over
every hour. Yeah yeah so it's this book is about the relationship between our gut and our I guess
mental health. Which those of us who have gut issues absolutely agree with that possibly don't
(02:56):
know the science behind it. Well I didn't. Well I can read some of that while we're going through
this but tell me about your experience with gut related issues. So when I was young we lived
overseas. We grew up in Asia and we didn't have access to fresh milk and so it was either powdered
(03:17):
milk. Yummy. Yeah or none or condensed milk. Sweet. Yeah so we didn't have milk. Okay. And then we came
back to Australia and then just went crazy with milkshakes and ice cream and cheese and milk,
Milo and things and quick and we then built we had an absolute intolerance to dairy to lactose. So
(03:43):
we then you know and it came up as rashes and all different symptoms but one of them was foggy brain
and we were young. Yeah. And how did you know? Well that's right that's it exactly. But why isn't
Barbie talking to Ken? But we were we were very active in sport. So our parents made us do sport
(04:05):
every single day we were in something else. Wise. So it didn't actually show until as teenagers
we stopped sport because we were too cool and which is probably when we should have done it more. Yes.
But we would also sneak because it was cool to have you know ice creams and milkshakes and things
(04:26):
and just started to not feel great. So it felt foggy. Yeah so finally you know we came to our
own conclusions my sister and I that maybe it wasn't the best. But only a few years ago I had
treatment for an illness and it changed my tolerance to food. Some foods. Oh it was a big treatment.
(04:48):
Yes and so I have not been able to tolerate gluten which and there were quite a few other things.
What's your nickname for yourself? Yeah I know. Most waiters who hear it don't like hearing it.
I call myself a gluttard but which is no disrespect to any actual gluttards out there but. Gluten
intolerance. That's right. But the I'm trying I try and make light of it. Yeah. Because it's annoying
(05:13):
I know to everyone around you. It's your condition you're allowed to make fun of yourself. But it does.
What I'm what I'm getting at is it does affect my mental health and so I get physical symptoms but
I notice if I eat gluten but my my brain also it's not pleasant it's it I get brain fog but also
(05:35):
feel low. Low. So it's a whole raft of things and whether it's because of the physical conditions
I then start to feel low and and what you've been telling me in the chapters you've read so far
it's it's which one comes first but it's. Well by the sounds of it with you it's the gluten
which leads to the mood disorder. Yeah yeah but it's it's it's not pleasant so you you actively
(05:56):
avoid having it because you don't want to feel like that. And you say that water is your go-to.
Yes. I'm presuming that flushes your system. Maybe. Maybe. We've just come to that realization.
That's right I thought it was a brain chemical that it helped me and maybe Pavlov's dog thing
that if I take a glass of water it it. So you notice a significant difference if you if you
(06:19):
if you have gluten. What about dairy? Does dairy just make you feel foggy? Does it?
Ah I just don't feel feel good. Yeah well this book is showing that there's a very strong
correlation between maybe even a causation between what you eat and how you feel and so there's been
lots of experiments but just some of the stuff that's in this book is is blowing me away so like
(06:40):
in your gut today you're a host to trillions not not billions but trillions of bacteria
and they're online 24 seven duking it out with rogue microbes and even helping you produce vitamins
and sucking calories out of every bit of fiber that you eat and they're just working with you.
(07:01):
And I love in this book how it talks about the relationship between humans and or animals and
and bacteria so millions of years ago bacteria and animals struck up a deal so this is directly from
the book I love this quote in in return for a moist bed and a warm buffet beneficial bacteria took up
the job of defending us against the madly proliferating pathogens in the world because
(07:26):
it takes a germ to fight a germ. So we've got a whole bunch of bacteria in our body fighting off
pathogens for us in a symbiotic relationship. Yeah yeah but um okay what percentage of you is human
Michelle? I know. You know the answer but I found this one incredible so you told me that's why.
(07:47):
I think this is incredible so microbial genes which outnumber your human genes
they outnumber them by an amazing 100 to 1 so when you do the math it's basically saying that
you're a hybrid creature of the less than 1% and yet you are genetically only 1% human.
(08:10):
99% of you genetically not the mass of you but genetically 99% of you are microbial genes.
So it's not just my opinion of some of my exes.
What are you thinking about like potential neanderthal genes? I think I've got a bit of
neanderthal in me. I occasionally you know beat my chest and walk around on all fours. No I don't.
(08:37):
But yeah this this book is amazing because I had a similar experience with dairy to you but mine
came much later in life. I had a illness I couldn't get rid of so the doctor put me on
a course of antibiotics and after two weeks still there. It's another two week I think one week or
(08:58):
two week dose of this very strong antibiotic and I grew up unlike you loving fresh milk. I used to
go to the fridge every day after school, grab the carton and just drink straight from the carton a
liter of milk. That was my go-to thing. I loved it, loved milk and still to this day just the
memory of drinking milk is extraordinary. But as we discovered after that two or three weeks of
(09:21):
antibiotics my body doesn't like lactose anymore. In fact I developed let's put it this way I
developed a new propulsion method. I could get upstairs much quicker than I used to. I couldn't
take a step without having some extra propulsion. It became a bit of a joke but it was to me
(09:46):
it was funny and I'm glad you laugh. But oh I was so disappointed because that meant cheese, milk,
ice cream, gone. And I love ice cream and I love cheese and I love milk. I still partake. What I'm
trying to do because reading this book now it gives me hope because apparently if you're a guppy I am
(10:07):
changes every hour basically that there's hope that I can bring it back. But I really want to get
into some of the quotes that are in this book. I just find this extraordinary. I've heard about
the connection between the gut and the brain. Well isn't the gut the second brain? Yeah well
(10:28):
that's what they're saying in here and this is only a recent term that all of the, oh I've got
to find a bit in the book where it talks about this. But all right let's start with this. So
you've heard of the gut microbiome. Yes. That's the environment. That's the home. The home. Have
you heard of the gut microbiota? Well you've told me about it so yes. But before I told you that.
(10:51):
No neither had I. So the gut biota is the microbiome, the what is it the community of microbes
that are living in your gut. In the microbiome. In the microbiota. But the microbiome is the
environment, the environment that they live in. And it's so important because the biota
(11:16):
has a direct relationship to how we feel. And one of the examples it gave in the book, so have you
ever had food poisoning? Yes. Yeah so you've eaten something you know that's bad. So some
pathogen has come into your body from your food and then you start to get that feeling in your
stomach and in your intestines and you think oh oh this isn't good. So what does your body do?
(11:39):
Wants to get rid of it. It wants to get rid of it. Yeah so it kicks it sends signals to your
immune system but it's wanting to get this stuff out of you. So it actually changes your mood.
So when you have got food poisoning how would you describe your mood? Anxious. Anxious because you
want to get to a bathroom. To a bathroom. Good that's exactly what it's saying in the book.
(12:02):
So imagine this you eat a pathogen your body goes oh we don't want that. So your gut biome,
your gut biota kicks into gear, sends messages to your immune system. Hey we're going to flush
this system. So then it directly affects your mood. Your anxiety levels go through the roof.
Well sometimes it's you don't know which end to point. And it's going to come out. No exactly.
(12:24):
And so that anxiety is a mechanism to motivate you to get to a bathroom. Yeah. And so that's
kind of like proof that your gut biome has the ability to change your moods. It builds anxiety
to get you moving towards bathroom so you can you know clean it out. And then it also speaks about
(12:45):
that when we feel sick like so when we have an infection or something like that
that nature has wired us to lay low. So when you feel sick you just want to cuddle up in your bed.
Hide from the world. Hide from the world. Get under a doona. Please bring me soup and leave me alone.
Yeah. So it's called sickness behaviour. So that sickness behaviour when you think about it from
(13:10):
an evolutionary point of view it makes sense because you rest to give your body a chance to
heal but you isolate yourself from others. And the reason why you would do that is so that the
people around you don't catch the pathogen. Right. That makes sense. So lying down. That's clever.
It is clever. Yeah your body says go and lie somewhere else where you're in and request to
(13:34):
be alone. Bring me soup but then leave me alone. It's your body saying hey isolate yourself from
other people so you don't pass on the pathogen and rest so that your body can heal. I think that's
that's just brilliant. But it's so you retire to a quiet space yeah and then so you'll stop
spreading spreading the contagion. But sickness behaviour is better known as depression.
(14:02):
So when people are depressed what do they want to do? Hide away. Hide away. They isolate themselves.
They quite often go and lie down and they can't find themselves the motivation or the energy to
get up. And so if you endure that for any length of time that sickness behaviour is known as
depression but depending on the levels of inflammation that's happening in your body you
(14:26):
can suffer from both depression and anxiety and anxiety and it's basically all involved with your
gut. So a friend of mine many years ago he. Sorry can I just jump in two seconds. Yes. Really
important for me to say yes that there are other there is other depression. So like if you suffer
(14:47):
a loss or some significant event outside your body yeah that can also lead to more the psychological
depression. Yeah this is like a physical depression. So I just need to clarify that because
it's really important. We're not saying here that the only source of depression is what you ate.
That's right. Anyway sorry. Well a flying colleague or friend of mine from many many years ago he
(15:09):
suggested because every time I started to feel run down or on the edge of something you know a
cold or flu or something I would crave fried foods which are not healthy at all and it's not my my
typical go to. And he had an opinion that it was one it's your body getting fat stores for you to
(15:33):
go into hibernation. Now I don't know if this is true or if it was just something that he said to
make me feel better because I was sucking down heaps of fried potato scallops which those in
Victoria will think that's weird. What do you call them potato cakes. But yeah I couldn't get enough
fried food and then I'd go into the funk. So when you are sickly I'd imagine the type of food so if
(15:59):
you have your soup that will help you. So yes you're hiding you're resting you're recovering
soup and fresh foods or foods like that would help your your second brain your gut brain
heal. So if you're having chips and lollies or stodgy cakes and things that's not going to help
(16:21):
your gut brain get out of that. But it might give you a temporary high or temporary. True. So one of
the other things I read is that you ever had a craving for chocolate. Yeah. Yeah well I
well when you have that craving for chocolate that's your your microbiota saying hey
(16:42):
I like this stuff. So you get you eat the chocolate you get this this
change in your mood. So chocolate does elevate your mood. Yes. And I think that explains
comfort eating. Ah. So when when we go through a bad period in our lives quite often
(17:02):
who hasn't grabbed a liter of French vanilla Sarah Lee ice cream grabbed a crunchy bar and used
that as the spoon and eaten the whole thing. Oh just me. Sorry two crunchies. But just me.
It only comes in one liter I've always done four. Four? No the Sarah Lee French vanilla ice cream
is a one liter tub. If you're getting four liter I want to know your stockers. No I had the fancy
(17:24):
blue ribbon. Oh the blue ribbon. The near-pocket thing. Yeah and I like every flavor in the
near-pocket. Yeah me too me too. It was funny that some some kids would go for you know the
chocolate or the strawberry or the vanilla I'd go for all three. Yeah. I'd be scooping across
every every every scoop was a multi-colored delight.
(17:47):
This relationship to what we eat and how we feel so they've coined this term
psychobiotics which is a term to describe things like prebiotics and probiotics. Yeah.
That are helpful to changing your mood and they're they're doing a lot of research on this as to
(18:09):
how we can use food to impact our mood. But that's not a new thing so nutritionists
uh naturopaths, aovetic they are all this is like older medicine. Yeah. Have known. Anecdotally.
Anecdotally. Yeah. Yeah. Anecdotally. So um now we're starting to get some science to to prove it
(18:33):
that food will boost your mood. So have you heard about the the fecal transplants from humans to
mice? Have you heard about this one? No I've heard of fecal transplants in humans to humans.
Yes. Because we know someone who had that done. We do. We do. Took a literal had a literal shit
sandwich. It was a shit yeah but yeah it was in the form of a pill. Yes. Yeah a lot less. But it
(18:58):
made her better. Yeah it did it did actually help tremendously. But there was that they they the
way they were finding out the scientific evidence that proves this is so imagine this they took the
fecal matter from a very depressed human being and put it into a mouse or a rat and then that
(19:19):
mouse or rat or those rats started to display depressive um behavior. So they showed that uh
it goes it goes uh you know from one animal to another from humans to mice. We haven't tried it
back the other way which I don't think would be very healthy. Well we looked into it because of
of our friend who had it done. Yeah. And so um and there's also the thing of taking on the personality
(19:44):
potentially of the donor. Yeah well that's what they're saying here with regards to if you are
going to get a fecal transplant not only do you want to make sure that they don't have any hidden
diseases you want to check to see what sort of personality that they have. So if they're a
vicious vibrant happy person yeah thumbs up grab that fecal matter. But only if you want to be like that.
(20:04):
But if your if your resting state is not that you may not want that. Yeah but if your resting state
is not uh happy then potentially that's that's one way to do it. Yeah. But the um the the connection
to between food and mood has been established but also between food and memory improvements
(20:28):
and also um thinking improvements. Yeah. So they're showing that people who have again been supplied
with certain microbiota in in in their microbiome. I'll start throwing out these terms like I know what they mean.
I know you sound very scientific. Yeah have had uh improvements in memory improvements in thinking
(20:48):
problem solving abilities. So it just goes to show that what you eat um and the variety of what you
eat is so important. Absolutely. Well we recently we recently went to a weekend we did some sound
healing and prior to that we always uh cleanse. So we go off coffee we go off uh sugar. Processed
(21:12):
foods. We reduce we cut out all processed foods we reduce uh we cut zero alcohol we cut out
we cut out caffeine. Red meats. Red meats. So we're just very very clean so we still eat um you know free
range chicken and stuff like that and fish and uh what else anyway but we we cleanse. We don't even have
(21:33):
uh fermented so that means uh even um bananas that are overripe. Yeah avocados. So anyway we do this
um we were guided to do it and the difference in how you feel is yeah I find quite extraordinary.
I feel very peaceful and very uh present. Yeah yeah well very mindful of your food as well
(21:57):
and so it's mindful eating. Yeah because well what they're saying is that it's it's all linked to
inflammation in in your gut. I'm curious so when you get further along in the book. I'm only one
chapter in. I know about the fasting because we do fasting and the clarity of mind on day three and
day four is amazing. So and my memory and just and mood and everything I'm almost I'm going to say
(22:23):
ecstatic but uh mood elevated. Yeah yeah the endorphins are huge and I it's that I have this
tug of war with myself on day four as to whether or not to stop the fast or to keep going because
it's such a good feeling. It is when your body goes into autophagy. Yeah I always three days in I start
(22:46):
to struggle simply because um I get reflux and because your body doesn't stop producing stomach
acid because it thinks it needs to to digest food but the food's not coming but the acid is still
coming and so I get really bad reflux but I've been told I've been told um to eat celery potentially
ah um and there was something else you could have to reduce that but yeah the clarity of of mind is
(23:10):
is extraordinary. That's why when when um I do keynotes and I think you do something similar
I don't eat in the morning because when I'm on stage my brain needs to be on fire and so I I
always talk hungry I used to play hungry I used to play not the country I did play hungry um we beat
them once or twice but um yeah no without any food in my stomach and I find that my uh my brain
(23:34):
functions much much better. Yeah well fat dumb and happy often can be because you're full. Yeah
because you feel all foggy. Yeah so I am curious when you get to that chapter I'd like to
to know more. Yeah no absolutely. The other thing it's saying in the book which I found interesting
(23:55):
and I hope it goes deeper into this that it's not a one-way street so you if you eat bad things it's
going to affect your mood but they've also mentioned and hopefully they go deeper into it that if you
have a negative event in your life um this then can like so you've got anxiety you've got depression
(24:18):
those sort of negative emotions or moods it leads to negative changes in your microbiota and it I
think it's called dysbiosis um I'll have to look that up anyway but that that disruption um
in uh so your mood so you start to feel depression and anxiety because of external
circumstances it then affects your microbiota. Does it have a memory? So it goes well so it
(24:42):
goes back the other way is what they're saying and it's traveling up and down through your vagus nerve
um and I'm gonna have to go deeper into this book and this research because I'm finding this
fascinating so not only is what we're eating affecting our mood uh because did you know that
um the microbiota helps produce in your stomach serotonin dopamine and what was the other one um
(25:10):
well dopamine in your stomach I do know the dopamine in your stomach has a different effect
on your uh mind than what dopamine produced in your brain yes yes yes so that's what they're
saying oh the other one was GABA which is uh it's something amino butyric acid or something
anyway I'll have to again look it up but the so GABA is the uh I think it's a neurotransmitter
(25:36):
or it's I know it's it's got it's an acid but it basically it calms you down so people with
with low levels of it anxiety and depression people with higher levels but you can have too high
but yeah serotonin dopamine and then GABA uh produced because the bacteria um is really
(25:56):
yeah helps us that get those neurotransmitters and then using the vagus nerve connects or
communicates with the brain but like you said we don't think that those neurotransmitters go into
the brain but they communicate with the brain probably in the same sort of fashion so yeah so
it goes both ways external factors can make you feel depressed and anxious but also what you eat
makes you feel depressed and anxious so eating properly can can help us yeah well the good thing
(26:21):
about this book if it's out in mainstream so as I suggested before the um people the practitioners
that are complementary health practitioners that have known this and eastern medicine have has known
this the fact that it is now being studied and then put out into the world for mainstream to
(26:43):
to learn about it and maybe to introduce components if not all of it is a positive so a lot of our
stuff comes from eastern medicine or ancient cultural traditions that they've known and then
we come in and potentially big pharma without starting debates on big pharma but yeah um
this is a good this is positive it's very positive very very positive so the thing about
(27:06):
depression and anxiety and I I read this years ago that they're um they're very strongly associated
with brain atrophy so long-term depression and anxiety is very very unhealthy for us
because our brain will atrophy um and there's also they're now finding a connection between food
(27:29):
so what we eat and things like helping with autism um ms uh psoriasis a whole range of conditions
that they're finding a gut related um relationship or gut relationship a colleague of mine her mum
uh has ms and I haven't spoken to this colleague for many years but even 10 years ago her mum was
(27:55):
proactively managing her ms with diet so um she was very much and and doing she was doing ice
baths she was doing and this is all before it became fashionable she found that it helped her
I saw recently Michael Klim's daily ice baths are helping his condition that he has and also
(28:17):
diet managing so there's a huge relationship and I love that we're learning this yeah because
we weren't aware of any of this growing up we were eating processed everything well you see kids like
kids are easy they're easy litmus you give them too much sugar or too many um additives in foods
(28:38):
doesn't even need to be sugar no and they go a bit crazy and then you get the crash and the
moods and yeah hmm anyway this is early days from onion chapter the first chapter so I'm very very
interested in going down this pathway because if there is a a not a solution but something that
can dramatically help us improve our moods uh lessen depression and anxiety because it's a it's a
(29:03):
global epidemic depression and it sounds like it's an easy fix in the fact that we just a slight
adjustment in your diet yeah can have a huge improvement in your mood yeah and and so I've
heard this for a long time now that there is a huge global problem around depression and anxiety
without really a correlated cause we live in the most advanced civilization ever we have everything
(29:28):
that we need access to yeah we all have psychological pressures but the amount of
depression and anxiety in relationship to our quality of life is is disproportionate it it
it shouldn't be where it's at so hopefully this gives us some information and people who are out
there who suffer from uh these awful mood disorders that maybe there's maybe there's uh something that
(29:54):
can assist but again again the disclaimer that this is in no way any medical advice no not at all
um but it's but look into it yeah yeah yeah because if we can help people improve their mood
through eating better we should we should be doctors should be suggesting hey um have you
looked at your food have you looked at what you're eating obviously some people need to be on on
(30:19):
antidepressants there are people out there who suffer tremendously and this is not as limiting
or downplaying what they go through but this is for all of us who who food can affect our mood and
let's have good food so what was the book again okay so the psychobiotic revolution so i'm gonna
um learn more about this topic and start sharing the knowledge because i think the world will be a
(30:44):
better place when we all become our best self absolutely that was fun yeah that was good see
you bye well that was fun that was fun you're such a clown lady captain and who's gonna listen to this
G'day leaders. Recently I heard two terms I hadn't heard before. The first one is psychobiotic
(00:08):
and the second one is the gut microbiota. I've heard of the gut microbiome but not the biota.
Anyway, fascinating science and a great book that we spoke about in the podcast about the link
between what you eat and your moods and the amazing science that's coming out. Enjoy.
(00:30):
Why did it count backwards? Oh no, we're now recording. What? Hello captain.
Come fly with me, let's fly, let's fly. What are we going to talk about? I don't know.
So leadership, life and everything else. Yeah.
(00:58):
And we're live. Oh you got in too quick. I was just about to say and we're live and I feel learned.
Learned. Learned. Learned. Yes I've learned something and I feel learned. Right. Yes.
Or educated as some would say. Yeah I thought I'd go with an obscure reference.
Got this new book. Yes. Yeah called the Psychobiotic Revolution, Mood, Food and the New Science of the
(01:26):
Gut-Brain Connection. And we don't normally do this so let's give the authors a shout out because I'm
pretty slack at this. So it's Scott Anderson with Dr John Cryan and Dr Ted Dinan. Anyway, I within
seconds was hooked on this book. Yeah because we read out the front every morning and this is a new
(01:49):
book for you and yeah you've been stopping me every page and telling me. You're trying to read and I'm
going hey hey hey did you know this? Did you know this? Yeah I know I'm a bit annoying. I'm like that
little puppy dog in that cartoon. Remember the little puppy dog that was always chasing after the
bigger dog? Yeah. So for example a single bacterium given enough to eat could multiply until its
(02:09):
brethren, its family, reached the mass of earth in just two days. If it was given enough food.
Yeah so bacteria. Yeah they love to eat. Yeah but then okay so going on from that. Yeah you told me
yeah another little tidbit that you told me was that at every hour. Oh every hour yeah it's new.
(02:35):
It's brand new. So thankfully within two days it's not going to happen. No. Because it changes over
every hour. Yeah yeah so it's this book is about the relationship between our gut and our I guess
mental health. Which those of us who have gut issues absolutely agree with that possibly don't
(02:56):
know the science behind it. Well I didn't. Well I can read some of that while we're going through
this but tell me about your experience with gut related issues. So when I was young we lived
overseas. We grew up in Asia and we didn't have access to fresh milk and so it was either powdered
(03:17):
milk. Yummy. Yeah or none or condensed milk. Sweet. Yeah so we didn't have milk. Okay. And then we came
back to Australia and then just went crazy with milkshakes and ice cream and cheese and milk,
Milo and things and quick and we then built we had an absolute intolerance to dairy to lactose. So
(03:43):
we then you know and it came up as rashes and all different symptoms but one of them was foggy brain
and we were young. Yeah. And how did you know? Well that's right that's it exactly. But why isn't
Barbie talking to Ken? But we were we were very active in sport. So our parents made us do sport
(04:05):
every single day we were in something else. Wise. So it didn't actually show until as teenagers
we stopped sport because we were too cool and which is probably when we should have done it more. Yes.
But we would also sneak because it was cool to have you know ice creams and milkshakes and things
(04:26):
and just started to not feel great. So it felt foggy. Yeah so finally you know we came to our
own conclusions my sister and I that maybe it wasn't the best. But only a few years ago I had
treatment for an illness and it changed my tolerance to food. Some foods. Oh it was a big treatment.
(04:48):
Yes and so I have not been able to tolerate gluten which and there were quite a few other things.
What's your nickname for yourself? Yeah I know. Most waiters who hear it don't like hearing it.
I call myself a gluttard but which is no disrespect to any actual gluttards out there but. Gluten
intolerance. That's right. But the I'm trying I try and make light of it. Yeah. Because it's annoying
(05:13):
I know to everyone around you. It's your condition you're allowed to make fun of yourself. But it does.
What I'm what I'm getting at is it does affect my mental health and so I get physical symptoms but
I notice if I eat gluten but my my brain also it's not pleasant it's it I get brain fog but also
(05:35):
feel low. Low. So it's a whole raft of things and whether it's because of the physical conditions
I then start to feel low and and what you've been telling me in the chapters you've read so far
it's it's which one comes first but it's. Well by the sounds of it with you it's the gluten
which leads to the mood disorder. Yeah yeah but it's it's it's not pleasant so you you actively
(05:56):
avoid having it because you don't want to feel like that. And you say that water is your go-to.
Yes. I'm presuming that flushes your system. Maybe. Maybe. We've just come to that realization.
That's right I thought it was a brain chemical that it helped me and maybe Pavlov's dog thing
that if I take a glass of water it it. So you notice a significant difference if you if you
(06:19):
if you have gluten. What about dairy? Does dairy just make you feel foggy? Does it?
Ah I just don't feel feel good. Yeah well this book is showing that there's a very strong
correlation between maybe even a causation between what you eat and how you feel and so there's been
lots of experiments but just some of the stuff that's in this book is is blowing me away so like
(06:40):
in your gut today you're a host to trillions not not billions but trillions of bacteria
and they're online 24 seven duking it out with rogue microbes and even helping you produce vitamins
and sucking calories out of every bit of fiber that you eat and they're just working with you.
(07:01):
And I love in this book how it talks about the relationship between humans and or animals and
and bacteria so millions of years ago bacteria and animals struck up a deal so this is directly from
the book I love this quote in in return for a moist bed and a warm buffet beneficial bacteria took up
the job of defending us against the madly proliferating pathogens in the world because
(07:26):
it takes a germ to fight a germ. So we've got a whole bunch of bacteria in our body fighting off
pathogens for us in a symbiotic relationship. Yeah yeah but um okay what percentage of you is human
Michelle? I know. You know the answer but I found this one incredible so you told me that's why.
(07:47):
I think this is incredible so microbial genes which outnumber your human genes
they outnumber them by an amazing 100 to 1 so when you do the math it's basically saying that
you're a hybrid creature of the less than 1% and yet you are genetically only 1% human.
(08:10):
99% of you genetically not the mass of you but genetically 99% of you are microbial genes.
So it's not just my opinion of some of my exes.
What are you thinking about like potential neanderthal genes? I think I've got a bit of
neanderthal in me. I occasionally you know beat my chest and walk around on all fours. No I don't.
(08:37):
But yeah this this book is amazing because I had a similar experience with dairy to you but mine
came much later in life. I had a illness I couldn't get rid of so the doctor put me on
a course of antibiotics and after two weeks still there. It's another two week I think one week or
(08:58):
two week dose of this very strong antibiotic and I grew up unlike you loving fresh milk. I used to
go to the fridge every day after school, grab the carton and just drink straight from the carton a
liter of milk. That was my go-to thing. I loved it, loved milk and still to this day just the
memory of drinking milk is extraordinary. But as we discovered after that two or three weeks of
(09:21):
antibiotics my body doesn't like lactose anymore. In fact I developed let's put it this way I
developed a new propulsion method. I could get upstairs much quicker than I used to. I couldn't
take a step without having some extra propulsion. It became a bit of a joke but it was to me
(09:46):
it was funny and I'm glad you laugh. But oh I was so disappointed because that meant cheese, milk,
ice cream, gone. And I love ice cream and I love cheese and I love milk. I still partake. What I'm
trying to do because reading this book now it gives me hope because apparently if you're a guppy I am
(10:07):
changes every hour basically that there's hope that I can bring it back. But I really want to get
into some of the quotes that are in this book. I just find this extraordinary. I've heard about
the connection between the gut and the brain. Well isn't the gut the second brain? Yeah well
(10:28):
that's what they're saying in here and this is only a recent term that all of the, oh I've got
to find a bit in the book where it talks about this. But all right let's start with this. So
you've heard of the gut microbiome. Yes. That's the environment. That's the home. The home. Have
you heard of the gut microbiota? Well you've told me about it so yes. But before I told you that.
(10:51):
No neither had I. So the gut biota is the microbiome, the what is it the community of microbes
that are living in your gut. In the microbiome. In the microbiota. But the microbiome is the
environment, the environment that they live in. And it's so important because the biota
(11:16):
has a direct relationship to how we feel. And one of the examples it gave in the book, so have you
ever had food poisoning? Yes. Yeah so you've eaten something you know that's bad. So some
pathogen has come into your body from your food and then you start to get that feeling in your
stomach and in your intestines and you think oh oh this isn't good. So what does your body do?
(11:39):
Wants to get rid of it. It wants to get rid of it. Yeah so it kicks it sends signals to your
immune system but it's wanting to get this stuff out of you. So it actually changes your mood.
So when you have got food poisoning how would you describe your mood? Anxious. Anxious because you
want to get to a bathroom. To a bathroom. Good that's exactly what it's saying in the book.
(12:02):
So imagine this you eat a pathogen your body goes oh we don't want that. So your gut biome,
your gut biota kicks into gear, sends messages to your immune system. Hey we're going to flush
this system. So then it directly affects your mood. Your anxiety levels go through the roof.
Well sometimes it's you don't know which end to point. And it's going to come out. No exactly.
(12:24):
And so that anxiety is a mechanism to motivate you to get to a bathroom. Yeah. And so that's
kind of like proof that your gut biome has the ability to change your moods. It builds anxiety
to get you moving towards bathroom so you can you know clean it out. And then it also speaks about
(12:45):
that when we feel sick like so when we have an infection or something like that
that nature has wired us to lay low. So when you feel sick you just want to cuddle up in your bed.
Hide from the world. Hide from the world. Get under a doona. Please bring me soup and leave me alone.
Yeah. So it's called sickness behaviour. So that sickness behaviour when you think about it from
(13:10):
an evolutionary point of view it makes sense because you rest to give your body a chance to
heal but you isolate yourself from others. And the reason why you would do that is so that the
people around you don't catch the pathogen. Right. That makes sense. So lying down. That's clever.
It is clever. Yeah your body says go and lie somewhere else where you're in and request to
(13:34):
be alone. Bring me soup but then leave me alone. It's your body saying hey isolate yourself from
other people so you don't pass on the pathogen and rest so that your body can heal. I think that's
that's just brilliant. But it's so you retire to a quiet space yeah and then so you'll stop
spreading spreading the contagion. But sickness behaviour is better known as depression.
(14:02):
So when people are depressed what do they want to do? Hide away. Hide away. They isolate themselves.
They quite often go and lie down and they can't find themselves the motivation or the energy to
get up. And so if you endure that for any length of time that sickness behaviour is known as
depression but depending on the levels of inflammation that's happening in your body you
(14:26):
can suffer from both depression and anxiety and anxiety and it's basically all involved with your
gut. So a friend of mine many years ago he. Sorry can I just jump in two seconds. Yes. Really
important for me to say yes that there are other there is other depression. So like if you suffer
(14:47):
a loss or some significant event outside your body yeah that can also lead to more the psychological
depression. Yeah this is like a physical depression. So I just need to clarify that because
it's really important. We're not saying here that the only source of depression is what you ate.
That's right. Anyway sorry. Well a flying colleague or friend of mine from many many years ago he
(15:09):
suggested because every time I started to feel run down or on the edge of something you know a
cold or flu or something I would crave fried foods which are not healthy at all and it's not my my
typical go to. And he had an opinion that it was one it's your body getting fat stores for you to
(15:33):
go into hibernation. Now I don't know if this is true or if it was just something that he said to
make me feel better because I was sucking down heaps of fried potato scallops which those in
Victoria will think that's weird. What do you call them potato cakes. But yeah I couldn't get enough
fried food and then I'd go into the funk. So when you are sickly I'd imagine the type of food so if
(15:59):
you have your soup that will help you. So yes you're hiding you're resting you're recovering
soup and fresh foods or foods like that would help your your second brain your gut brain
heal. So if you're having chips and lollies or stodgy cakes and things that's not going to help
(16:21):
your gut brain get out of that. But it might give you a temporary high or temporary. True. So one of
the other things I read is that you ever had a craving for chocolate. Yeah. Yeah well I
well when you have that craving for chocolate that's your your microbiota saying hey
(16:42):
I like this stuff. So you get you eat the chocolate you get this this
change in your mood. So chocolate does elevate your mood. Yes. And I think that explains
comfort eating. Ah. So when when we go through a bad period in our lives quite often
(17:02):
who hasn't grabbed a liter of French vanilla Sarah Lee ice cream grabbed a crunchy bar and used
that as the spoon and eaten the whole thing. Oh just me. Sorry two crunchies. But just me.
It only comes in one liter I've always done four. Four? No the Sarah Lee French vanilla ice cream
is a one liter tub. If you're getting four liter I want to know your stockers. No I had the fancy
(17:24):
blue ribbon. Oh the blue ribbon. The near-pocket thing. Yeah and I like every flavor in the
near-pocket. Yeah me too me too. It was funny that some some kids would go for you know the
chocolate or the strawberry or the vanilla I'd go for all three. Yeah. I'd be scooping across
every every every scoop was a multi-colored delight.
(17:47):
This relationship to what we eat and how we feel so they've coined this term
psychobiotics which is a term to describe things like prebiotics and probiotics. Yeah.
That are helpful to changing your mood and they're they're doing a lot of research on this as to
(18:09):
how we can use food to impact our mood. But that's not a new thing so nutritionists
uh naturopaths, aovetic they are all this is like older medicine. Yeah. Have known. Anecdotally.
Anecdotally. Yeah. Yeah. Anecdotally. So um now we're starting to get some science to to prove it
(18:33):
that food will boost your mood. So have you heard about the the fecal transplants from humans to
mice? Have you heard about this one? No I've heard of fecal transplants in humans to humans.
Yes. Because we know someone who had that done. We do. We do. Took a literal had a literal shit
sandwich. It was a shit yeah but yeah it was in the form of a pill. Yes. Yeah a lot less. But it
(18:58):
made her better. Yeah it did it did actually help tremendously. But there was that they they the
way they were finding out the scientific evidence that proves this is so imagine this they took the
fecal matter from a very depressed human being and put it into a mouse or a rat and then that
(19:19):
mouse or rat or those rats started to display depressive um behavior. So they showed that uh
it goes it goes uh you know from one animal to another from humans to mice. We haven't tried it
back the other way which I don't think would be very healthy. Well we looked into it because of
of our friend who had it done. Yeah. And so um and there's also the thing of taking on the personality
(19:44):
potentially of the donor. Yeah well that's what they're saying here with regards to if you are
going to get a fecal transplant not only do you want to make sure that they don't have any hidden
diseases you want to check to see what sort of personality that they have. So if they're a
vicious vibrant happy person yeah thumbs up grab that fecal matter. But only if you want to be like that.
(20:04):
But if your if your resting state is not that you may not want that. Yeah but if your resting state
is not uh happy then potentially that's that's one way to do it. Yeah. But the um the the connection
to between food and mood has been established but also between food and memory improvements
(20:28):
and also um thinking improvements. Yeah. So they're showing that people who have again been supplied
with certain microbiota in in in their microbiome. I'll start throwing out these terms like I know what they mean.
I know you sound very scientific. Yeah have had uh improvements in memory improvements in thinking
(20:48):
problem solving abilities. So it just goes to show that what you eat um and the variety of what you
eat is so important. Absolutely. Well we recently we recently went to a weekend we did some sound
healing and prior to that we always uh cleanse. So we go off coffee we go off uh sugar. Processed
(21:12):
foods. We reduce we cut out all processed foods we reduce uh we cut zero alcohol we cut out
we cut out caffeine. Red meats. Red meats. So we're just very very clean so we still eat um you know free
range chicken and stuff like that and fish and uh what else anyway but we we cleanse. We don't even have
(21:33):
uh fermented so that means uh even um bananas that are overripe. Yeah avocados. So anyway we do this
um we were guided to do it and the difference in how you feel is yeah I find quite extraordinary.
I feel very peaceful and very uh present. Yeah yeah well very mindful of your food as well
(21:57):
and so it's mindful eating. Yeah because well what they're saying is that it's it's all linked to
inflammation in in your gut. I'm curious so when you get further along in the book. I'm only one
chapter in. I know about the fasting because we do fasting and the clarity of mind on day three and
day four is amazing. So and my memory and just and mood and everything I'm almost I'm going to say
(22:23):
ecstatic but uh mood elevated. Yeah yeah the endorphins are huge and I it's that I have this
tug of war with myself on day four as to whether or not to stop the fast or to keep going because
it's such a good feeling. It is when your body goes into autophagy. Yeah I always three days in I start
(22:46):
to struggle simply because um I get reflux and because your body doesn't stop producing stomach
acid because it thinks it needs to to digest food but the food's not coming but the acid is still
coming and so I get really bad reflux but I've been told I've been told um to eat celery potentially
ah um and there was something else you could have to reduce that but yeah the clarity of of mind is
(23:10):
is extraordinary. That's why when when um I do keynotes and I think you do something similar
I don't eat in the morning because when I'm on stage my brain needs to be on fire and so I I
always talk hungry I used to play hungry I used to play not the country I did play hungry um we beat
them once or twice but um yeah no without any food in my stomach and I find that my uh my brain
(23:34):
functions much much better. Yeah well fat dumb and happy often can be because you're full. Yeah
because you feel all foggy. Yeah so I am curious when you get to that chapter I'd like to
to know more. Yeah no absolutely. The other thing it's saying in the book which I found interesting
(23:55):
and I hope it goes deeper into this that it's not a one-way street so you if you eat bad things it's
going to affect your mood but they've also mentioned and hopefully they go deeper into it that if you
have a negative event in your life um this then can like so you've got anxiety you've got depression
(24:18):
those sort of negative emotions or moods it leads to negative changes in your microbiota and it I
think it's called dysbiosis um I'll have to look that up anyway but that that disruption um
in uh so your mood so you start to feel depression and anxiety because of external
circumstances it then affects your microbiota. Does it have a memory? So it goes well so it
(24:42):
goes back the other way is what they're saying and it's traveling up and down through your vagus nerve
um and I'm gonna have to go deeper into this book and this research because I'm finding this
fascinating so not only is what we're eating affecting our mood uh because did you know that
um the microbiota helps produce in your stomach serotonin dopamine and what was the other one um
(25:10):
well dopamine in your stomach I do know the dopamine in your stomach has a different effect
on your uh mind than what dopamine produced in your brain yes yes yes so that's what they're
saying oh the other one was GABA which is uh it's something amino butyric acid or something
anyway I'll have to again look it up but the so GABA is the uh I think it's a neurotransmitter
(25:36):
or it's I know it's it's got it's an acid but it basically it calms you down so people with
with low levels of it anxiety and depression people with higher levels but you can have too high
but yeah serotonin dopamine and then GABA uh produced because the bacteria um is really
(25:56):
yeah helps us that get those neurotransmitters and then using the vagus nerve connects or
communicates with the brain but like you said we don't think that those neurotransmitters go into
the brain but they communicate with the brain probably in the same sort of fashion so yeah so
it goes both ways external factors can make you feel depressed and anxious but also what you eat
makes you feel depressed and anxious so eating properly can can help us yeah well the good thing
(26:21):
about this book if it's out in mainstream so as I suggested before the um people the practitioners
that are complementary health practitioners that have known this and eastern medicine have has known
this the fact that it is now being studied and then put out into the world for mainstream to
(26:43):
to learn about it and maybe to introduce components if not all of it is a positive so a lot of our
stuff comes from eastern medicine or ancient cultural traditions that they've known and then
we come in and potentially big pharma without starting debates on big pharma but yeah um
this is a good this is positive it's very positive very very positive so the thing about
(27:06):
depression and anxiety and I I read this years ago that they're um they're very strongly associated
with brain atrophy so long-term depression and anxiety is very very unhealthy for us
because our brain will atrophy um and there's also they're now finding a connection between food
(27:29):
so what we eat and things like helping with autism um ms uh psoriasis a whole range of conditions
that they're finding a gut related um relationship or gut relationship a colleague of mine her mum
uh has ms and I haven't spoken to this colleague for many years but even 10 years ago her mum was
(27:55):
proactively managing her ms with diet so um she was very much and and doing she was doing ice
baths she was doing and this is all before it became fashionable she found that it helped her
I saw recently Michael Klim's daily ice baths are helping his condition that he has and also
(28:17):
diet managing so there's a huge relationship and I love that we're learning this yeah because
we weren't aware of any of this growing up we were eating processed everything well you see kids like
kids are easy they're easy litmus you give them too much sugar or too many um additives in foods
(28:38):
doesn't even need to be sugar no and they go a bit crazy and then you get the crash and the
moods and yeah hmm anyway this is early days from onion chapter the first chapter so I'm very very
interested in going down this pathway because if there is a a not a solution but something that
can dramatically help us improve our moods uh lessen depression and anxiety because it's a it's a
(29:03):
global epidemic depression and it sounds like it's an easy fix in the fact that we just a slight
adjustment in your diet yeah can have a huge improvement in your mood yeah and and so I've
heard this for a long time now that there is a huge global problem around depression and anxiety
without really a correlated cause we live in the most advanced civilization ever we have everything
(29:28):
that we need access to yeah we all have psychological pressures but the amount of
depression and anxiety in relationship to our quality of life is is disproportionate it it
it shouldn't be where it's at so hopefully this gives us some information and people who are out
there who suffer from uh these awful mood disorders that maybe there's maybe there's uh something that
(29:54):
can assist but again again the disclaimer that this is in no way any medical advice no not at all
um but it's but look into it yeah yeah yeah because if we can help people improve their mood
through eating better we should we should be doctors should be suggesting hey um have you
looked at your food have you looked at what you're eating obviously some people need to be on on
(30:19):
antidepressants there are people out there who suffer tremendously and this is not as limiting
or downplaying what they go through but this is for all of us who who food can affect our mood and
let's have good food so what was the book again okay so the psychobiotic revolution so i'm gonna
um learn more about this topic and start sharing the knowledge because i think the world will be a
(30:44):
better place when we all become our best self absolutely that was fun yeah that was good see
you bye well that was fun that was fun you're such a clown lady captain and who's gonna listen to this
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