How to Reverse Type 2 Diabetes (What No One’s Telling You) | Ep. 268

In this episode of The Aging Well Podcast, Dr. Jeff Armstrong’s guest is Lewis Bertus, PA-C. Lewis shares his journey into diabetes management and reversal, driven by personal experiences with his wife's diabetes. He discusses the importance of understanding insulin resistance, the role of diet, and the impact of sugar addiction. Bertus emphasizes the need for a holistic approach to health, focusing on plant-based diets and the influence of the food industry on public perception. He provides practical dietary recommendations and encourages patients to take control of their health through informed choices. Jeff and Lewis discuss the importance of healthy eating on a budget, the mindset needed to overcome self-sabotage, and the critical role of social support in maintaining health commitments. Lewis emphasizes the first steps for reversing diabetes, the holistic approach to aging well, and shares personal insights into his diet and lifestyle choices for…aging well.Learn more about Lewis Bertus and Diabetes-180 at https://www.lewisbertus.com/https://www.youtube.com/@lewisbertusFind recipes for reversing diabetes at https://www.lewisbertus.com/250-recipes-for-diabetes-weightloss

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Episode Transcript

(00:05):
Welcome to the Aging Well podcast, where we explore the
science, stories and strategies that help us live longer,
healthier, and more purposeful lives.
Among the most critical pillars of Aging Well are nutrition,
metabolic health and prevention of chronic diseases, areas where
today's guest has dedicated his career to making a real
difference. Louis Burtis is a physician
assistant with a deep passion for empowering individuals to

(00:27):
take control of their health, particularly in the area of type
2 diabetes and pre diabetes. Since 2017, he has focused on
the profound impact of lifestylechoices, using evidence based
research to guide patients toward reversing their disease
and in many cases, eliminating the need for medication
altogether. His work emphasizes vitality,
energy, and long term independence, outcomes that

(00:49):
align beautifully with our passion Here on the Aging Well
podcast. Today, Lewis will share his
insights into some of the misunderstood factors
influencing insulin resistance, the true impact of diet choices,
and why critical information about diabetes reversal remains
largely absent from mainstream health discussions.
We'll also hear about a powerfulpersonal journey that makes his

(01:10):
message even more compelling. His conversation promises to
eliminate not just how we managediabetes, but how we can reclaim
our health in ways that ripple across every aspect of aging.
Well, Lewis, welcome to the Aging Well podcast.
To start, let's just have you tell us a little bit about
yourself and what drew you initially to focus so deeply on

(01:34):
diabetes management, particularly reversal.
And how is your passion evolved over your career?
Great, well worded question. So yeah, I was always into
health, you know, even from a from a young age, I knew I was
going to go towards the healthcare field.
But what drew me to diabetes specifically was my wife having
diabetes. And more specifically, seeing

(01:56):
that, you know, the traditional dietary advice, the first line,
second line, third line medications, you know, all
really failing to give her results or relief from her
diabetes just kept getting worse.
So that kind of forced me to lean into the what does nature
say? What are some natural ways to

(02:19):
reverse the root cause of this disease, which is something I've
always been firmly A believer. And there's always A cause.
And very often, unfortunately, we focus on the symptoms and
maybe that's the problem. So we figured it out in six
weeks. She was off medicine so.
Six weeks. Yeah, six weeks, 8 years of
diabetes, eight years, you know,so those who've been struggling
with diabetes a long time, a lotof times they think that this

(02:41):
can't be reversed. But even as of today, that was
about, I guess, you know, we've been in business about two years
ago. So yeah, going more than two
years, still medication free, you know, eats fruits for
breakfast, doesn't inject, you know, used to be insulin
dependent, you know, you know, doesn't need any medication,
insulin, nothing. Completely diet controlled.
Wow. And you've spoken about how your

(03:03):
formal education didn't really fully prepare you for what you
later discovered about insulin resistance.
So what were some of the biggestgaps you noticed when you when
it came to the role of saturatedfat and, you know, just
nutrition in general? Yeah.
So I think the the problem againis really symptom focused.

(03:23):
You know, in medical school and PA school, we learned the
symptoms of a disease. We're very good at diagnosing
what's wrong with you and then finding the right pill to
address the symptoms. So high blood pressure again and
blood pressure down, high blood sugar level again, the blood
sugar down high cholesterol level, you decreasing the

(03:44):
cholesterol levels. But we don't ask ourselves why.
Why is blood pressure high? Why is a cholesterol high?
Why is a blood sugar high? Because when you find out why,
then you can solve the real problem.
Take care of that. So, you know, within the, within
the time I, I started researching outside of PA
school, you know, you have to sift through the, the

(04:05):
overwhelming information on carbcentered, you know, approach
that carbs are the problem, that, that, that carbs are what
causes diabetes, which makes sense on the surface, but
there's actually studies that date back for a very long time.
I mean, we're talking maybe of course, 100 years.
That shows that it's actually saturated fat that causes your

(04:27):
body to become resistant to insulin.
And if that goes on long enough,eventually, you know, the
pancreas start to shut down. It's not producing in a
sufficient amount of insulin to deal with a carb intake and now
you become a diabetic. So, so it's so amazing how fast
once you start solving the root problem, you know, getting rid

(04:49):
of or limiting, I should say, the saturated fat in the diet,
insulin becomes sensitive again.Now it responds to the incoming
carbs from your food in a normalway.
And now you know, you could again fruits for breakfast you
could go back to a a diet that'snormal for without blood sugar
spikes. Yeah, it's been interesting.

(05:10):
It's just the path in kind of metabolic health and nutrition
of late. It's been kind of this
controversy between carbs and fats and not really looking at
what's the overall picture. And so, you know, the research,
as you indicated, has shown thatmetabolic health is just simply
crucial for aging. Well, could you explain how

(05:30):
insulin resistance fits into thebroader picture of aging,
vitality and and really just disease protection and
prevention in general? Yep, Yep.
So that's true whether you're a diabetic or not.
We all should know how insulin resistance works and plays a
role in our health. The main thing you know is that
when you have your body well, I guess the main thing is to

(05:53):
understand the importance of what insulin does.
So insulin is is a hormone that's responsible for energy
storage, right? It determines, you know, where,
where and how energy is stored. Now imagine how important that
is, right? Energy is what's keeping us
alive, right? So everything we are alive
because of an energy storage, right.
And so when we start to develop resistance to insulin, right,

(06:17):
then we start to store fat rightand excess amounts because the
body's trying to drive over overwell overcome the problem by
creating too much insulin. That insulin now is storing too
much fat. That fat now towards stores
toxins in the body inflammation it starts to occur all over the

(06:38):
body. I like analogy actually, I heard
recently that I've been sharing with people is that, you know,
we know what inflammation is, but you know, best explanation
for inflammation to me is like, you know, imagine construction
crew at work in your house 24 hours, seven days a week,
breaking down walls, destroying things that don't need to be
destroyed. You know, we need a construction

(07:01):
crew occasionally when you need to fix a problem.
But inflammation is a construction crew that's never
going away. And unfortunately, when you have
high levels of insulin resistance, you have a
construction crew, you know, in your body, inflammation causing
damage to tissues, to cells, cellular regeneration and health
longevity is impacted because the cells can't, you know,

(07:22):
function properly. And yeah, so we we need to
address insulin resistance, whether or not we're diabetics.
We need to know what causes it and how to.
Prevent and low carb and ketogenic diets are often touted
as solutions to diabetes management.
What are some of the drawbacks or limitations you've observed
to these approaches? So, and I, I guess I want to

(07:43):
acknowledge first the good things, right?
You know, if you have your, and you, you know, when your sugars
are high and you about eating carbs, right, you stop the carb
intake, the sugars come down. So for a long time, that's what
my wife did. She was actually on a keto diet.
She was on a low, very low carb diet.
And that was on for I would say,oh, maybe over a year, I can't
remember how long. It was the only thing that kept

(08:04):
her sugars under control becausewe didn't understand the fat,
that insulin connection. So going low carb keto, you
know, was the only thing that kept her sugars under control,
kept blood sugars from spot. She did experience the weight
loss that people, you know, raveabout, But unfortunately, other
things happened. Her cholesterol levels started,
her liver enzymes started to elevate.
So you're you're solving one problem, the symptom, but you

(08:27):
may be causing another, right. And studies show that low carb
diets high in fat and protein and low in carbs, the carbs we
need, especially the complex car, are basically tied to
mortality, right? Heart disease, in worsening
diabetes in the long run. So we're solving a problem for
the short term, but we're causing problems in the long

(08:47):
term. And yeah, we could talk about
the fact that, you know, when you look at the people who are
living longest in this world, the Blue Zones, they are not
limiting carbs. They're they're they're rich in
carbs, right? Carb rich, carb centered.
Those are the ones. Those are the societies that
have the longest lifespan. And it's really much more about
the quality of the carbs, the timing of the carbs and.

(09:08):
This, absolutely. And you you often address the
concept of sugar addiction. How powerful is Sugar's grip
over us and both physiologicallyand psychologically?
And what are some of the biggestchallenges that your patients
face in overcoming? Yeah, of course it's huge,
right? It's what's really the real
problem, I should say, one of the main problems because yeah,

(09:30):
we want to acknowledge the root cause being fat.
You know, getting rid of the animal food based foods out of
rich and saturated fat, increasing plant based foods.
But sugar still is a problem, right?
We can't give sugar a pass because it's easy to overeat
calories when you're when you'reindulging in, you know, refined
carbohydrates, sugar. And unfortunately, it's also

(09:52):
very hard to stop overindulging because it how it affects the
brain. You know, there's a dopamine
release spikes that makes you feel good, similar to drug
addictions, right? The same part of our body that's
stimulated by drugs is stimulated by the sugars and
these food companies, of course,they know how to make good cut
lifelong customers, right? It's it's the sugar that's added

(10:13):
to the product that keeps you buying it.
And so, yeah, that's for all my clients.
I haven't met a client that sugar wasn't a a big problem.
But it really comes down to knowing your, your reason why,
you know, why do you want to, you know, reach the health goal
of reversing diabetes, if that'swhat it is, or living healthier

(10:33):
even, You know, people say I want to live longer.
Ask them why. Why do you want to live longer?
The people that do well at overcoming addictions, they have
a strong reason why, right? Beyond the superficial, beyond
the external, it's something internal.
Maybe it could be something simple like I need to prove
something to myself that for me,that was from that was what it
was for me. I need to prove that I can do it
right. The character development that

(10:55):
comes from knowing that I accomplished this, that that I
don't have this chain holding meanymore that keeps you going
past. So finding a strong motivation
from a lot of people, it's theirkids, their grandkids, the hope
of seeing them in a healthy age,the, the hope of living over the
fear of dying, you know for sure.
But there is also the fear of dying.

(11:15):
You know, some people, people who get to the point where
they're on dialysis or the limbsamputated.
And unfortunately, that's when they usually are willing to pay
for a coach, right? And for you, that's you.
It's not too late, you know? But a lot of times it's because
they've gotten to the point where it's no longer convenient
enough to continue the sugar craving.
So that's where they finally find success.

(11:37):
And one thing we talked a lot about on this podcast, and I
talked about my classes too, that I teach, is that we also
have to go that next step of asking the question, what's our
why not, you know, because a lotof times we can figure out that
why, especially as we get to that point where, you know, our
health is so bad that it's life threatening.
But then you start looking at, OK, how are our community
structured, what food is available and all these

(11:59):
different societal things that, you know, we were talking before
we got online here that, you know, about the, the spies model
that we talked about in the podcast a lot.
And, and that, you know, that spiritual piece or that you know
the piece of the community and how are we looking at how we
developing our, you know, our local communities so that people

(12:21):
can have access to good healthy behaviors, so that they can
manage their diabetes because they want to and because they
have the ability to. That's, that's huge because, and
if you think it's really easy tocall, talk about the problem,
you know, like, you know what the problem is, but the
solution, right, the pot that the positives that come from the
solution are so much more powerful and motivating.

(12:41):
You know, to think that you havethe power every time you go to
the grocery store to affect someone else's decision, not
just yourself, but someone else.I mean, so many times, like, you
know, people see when I'm buyinga grocery store and they, you
know, we have conversations about eating, you know, so
there's that level, you know, motivating others, motivating
family members, you know, the family, but people around us,
right when they see us eating better, making healthier

(13:03):
choices, now they're going to bemotivated to do the same.
A lot of us are living with generational curses when it
comes to health problems, right?Family diabetes, high blood
pressure, obesity runs in a family.
But I always encourage my, my, my patients and clients that you
have the power to end generational curses.
You know, diabetes runs in your family.
You know that you have the powerto end that and you're, you

(13:25):
could be the one that stops that.
And so that the future generations that come after you
no longer are diabetic, right? I mean, we have the power to
change our family, our community, this world.
It starts with you. And I think, I think that's
something we need to focus on. Yeah, it's a really good point.
And one thing that you discuss when you discuss diabetes
reversal is, you know that it's often kind of considered in the

(13:46):
abstract. But you talked about your wife's
experience really kind of bringing it to life in a very
personal way. Do you mind sharing a little bit
more of her story and what you learned from that journey?
Yeah, yeah, for sure. So it was actually interesting
because when she was diagnosed with diabetes, I was in, I was
actually, no, she yeah, she was already had already been

(14:08):
diagnosed while I was in PA school.
But as I was learning about diabetes, I'm going home.
Like man, like this is horrible.We got to take care of this man.
You're you're going to die. You're like, I'm like, I'm going
to because they one thing about,you know, of course, our doctors
that we we're in medical school and PA schools, they do
definitely do emphasize the dangers of high blood sugars.
I mean, it's toxic. It's destroying every tissue in

(14:28):
your body head to toe. So, and it was a big transition
because before I knew anything about diabetes, I was like
oblivious, I didn't know anything.
And I was like, why are you, whyare you drinking so much water?
You need to stop drinking water and then you, then you won't pee
so much, right? Like, so I went from like
nonchalant, like, man, you, you know, just, you know, to really,

(14:52):
really understanding the, the dangers of this and, and then
emphasizing the drugs and the, the, you know, the drugs were,
were she was, she was really interesting because for her, and
I've had a lot of patients like this too, she had every side
effect every time. And you know how there's a list
of of side effects that comes with drugs.
She would have at least one or two every every time that she

(15:12):
would start a drug that she'd get the side effects that come
with it. You know, whether it be joint
pain or GI symptoms or headachesor whatever, you know, fatigue,
she would get all the symptoms for these drugs.
So she was constantly having to change drugs.
So it was really hard for her tomaintain some consistency with
drugs. But I would still encourage her
that, you know, there's a lot oftimes you stick with it, the

(15:33):
side effects and get better, youknow, but the problem was I
wasn't even when she did stick with the drugs, right?
And the dietary recommendations of limiting carbs, the sugar
stayed high. Her vision started to still
decrease. She still experienced all the
symptoms of of hyperglycemia. And I'm like, well, I don't
know, like, because it's one thing as a provider to hear your

(15:56):
patient tell you, well, taking the medications and I'm, I'm
eating healthy and their sugars are high.
What do you, what do you, what'sthe first thing you're thinking?
No, you're not right? Because you know, and that I, I
have to be honest, most of our provider, most providers like
me, when, when their sugars are elevated, it's like a scorecard
that you're not really doing, you're not really playing the
game right. You're not doing it right.

(16:16):
But here I am going home, seeingmy wife doing everything right
and it's still not working. So you could you could imagine
I'm thinking like, well, it's not working for her, that maybe
it's not working for my patients.
Maybe my patients aren't lying, maybe they are trying, maybe
maybe it's just not working. So that really what's pushed me
to say and what helped too, I should say, Jeff, is that I had
a background that really was on that understood the power of

(16:37):
plant based diets because being a 7th day Adventist.
So, you know, I actually, you know, was in a 7th day Adventist
college, you know, like my graduate was in theology.
And so the 7th Adventist church,you know, I was always
entrenched in, in that church and anyone who knows anything
about 7th Adventism, they're very pro plant based, right?
They talk about holistic healingand, and the power of being

(16:59):
plant based to heal the body as well as the mind and spirit.
And so I knew there was something to that, you know, I
was something to that. And so, but the problem was even
being plant based, it wasn't really working right.
I'm like, but she's plant based,we're vegetarian, we're vegan.
Even when we were vegan, it still wasn't isn't working,
Jeff. And you can imagine like, man,
if you're vegan and you're stillnot still not working, you're

(17:21):
just wait, right? I mean, what's healthier than me
and a vegan? But it was again, understanding
the fat connection because even on a vegan diet, you could have
too much fat in a diet. And the ideal fat percentage
going into more technical, the ideal fat percentage that we
learned through the scientific studies and research that's out
there is to get the bot, get thediet to no more than 15%,

(17:44):
ideally 10, but from 10 to 15% of your total calories should be
from fat. Once you do that, you know, for
all my clients, once they do that, the sugar start to get
normal, no matter no matter how long they've been diabetic.
And that just seems to be kind of so counter to what we're
hearing more and more in influencers and all that other
kind of stuff and indicating it oh, carnivore diet, the

(18:05):
ketogenic diet and in. The short term but not long term
not good idea long term. So one of the themes that
frequently comes up in the conversations about health is
the gap between evidence based practice and what is commonly
promoted in the mainstream circles.
As we've kind of been talking about.
What do you think information about diabetes reversal really

(18:29):
remains? Or why do you think that the
information about diabetes reversal seems so
underrepresented? Well.
I think I would say the main reason is food industry bias.
You know, there's a lot of food industry influence when it comes
to what's promoted in the publicbecause think about it, it's a
multi billion dollar and if any kind of messaging says stop

(18:51):
eating their product, they're going to stop that.
They have a vested interest in making sure it doesn't get to
the public. So whenever there's a study that
might say decrease milk, decrease dairy, right, decrease
milk consumption, they might fund a study that shows the
benefits of milk, right and pushthat in the public.
So now you're getting competed, you know, and they don't they
and the way they operate is actually just the same way the

(19:13):
tobacco industry operates and still doubt.
We don't need to refute the science, just make people doubt
the science. So for every maybe article you
see that, you know, decrease saturated fat, that meat is tied
to cancer, put out some kind of obscured study.
And usually it's a industry funded study that shows the
benefits of eating meat, right on the next website, you know,

(19:38):
not knowing that study was was is probably really obscured in a
lot of these studies when you look at them, you know how many
people we read headlines, but how many of us are really
reading, reading the studies to see is the study legitimate,
right? Was the sample size, you know,
what was the endpoint, right? Was there control?
You know who funded it was the biggest one is the biggest 1.
So I would say that is first, but also because think about it

(20:01):
man, it's hard. To change your diet, people say
it's easier to change your religion than to change your
diet. You know, So when and eating,
the idea of, you know, high fat,high protein is appealing,
right? And it's been and especially,
you know, for years we've been having this idea that protein is
a health food, right? It's like it's like isolated

(20:23):
nutrient that we're deficient in.
So there's a lot of misinformation because, you
know, let's face it, we like what we like and we don't want
to change that, right? So I think we need to check
ourselves first, you know, see, am I looking at this information
from an unbiased point of view, right object as objectively as
possible. But then the information itself
is information objective that I'm receiving.

(20:45):
Read the studies, right? See and and then compare them to
other studies. And if you do that, you do that,
then you're going to find the truth for yourself.
But unfortunately for the as faras the public goes, we're going
to get a lot, we're going to continue getting money
misinformation for many years. But I'm hopeful though, because
again, just like the tobacco industry, right?
You know, with time the people will receive the truth, right?

(21:08):
They'll still start demanding the truth, right?
Because we're hurting so much from the misinformation.
And then, yeah, things will change.
But things will change slowly. Yeah, I think we need to really
develop our science literacy a bit more in this country.
You know, we're so dependent on social media and even podcasts
like this. If anybody watches this podcast

(21:29):
and they don't qualify or, you know, follow up on the
information and we're providing here, then you know, you're
you're, you're not getting the right information.
And you know, we try and stress that a lot on here that, you
know, you, you read an article, yeah, it's in a reputable news
outlet or whatever, but can go to the study that's linked

(21:49):
there. And if it's not linked there,
you got a question. Where is this information
coming? Coming from yeah, look it up.
Don't take anyone's word for it.I think there's a lot of
influencer bias too. Like, you know, we follow
certain people and what if if say, they said it must be true,
right? But no, we need to be
independent thinkers. I think that's something we do
value, but how much of us do it when it comes to our health?

(22:12):
Like, what's more important thanthan your health, right?
When it I think we'll research so many things, like, you know,
the best outfit to buy, the bestplace to go on vacation, the
best place to spend your money, take that same energy and apply
it to your health. Because that vacation, that
money you're buying, those clothes, they can't add one day
to your life, right? Right.
But every single day you have a,you have a decision to make that

(22:34):
will either extend your life or cut it short.
Shouldn't you be researching what to put in your mouth?
Right? Like, yeah, I don't know.
And so how do we go about empowering your patients and
even, you know, the people on this podcast, how do I get them
to really start looking at taking control of their lives
and making the necessary behavioral changes?
Yeah. So I think keep it simple first,

(22:56):
right, One thing that I think isimportant to see what you can
change right now and what's one thing I could do better today,
right? And make a list, right?
And write down. I think it's important to write
down the changes you're attending to make because you're
more likely to hold it accountable.
How many of us say I'm gonna go more, I'm exercise more, I'm
gonna drink more water, right? And that was a even last year's

(23:17):
resolution. But write it down and put it
somewhere visible, right? And then challenge yourself,
ask. And I think there should be a
period of accountability, maybe once a day, a few times a day
where you check and am I keepingtrack with that commitment?
I don't care what it is, if it'sjust walking an extra 15
minutes, right? Just make a make small changes
now, right? What can I do right now?

(23:38):
Because there's a snowball effect.
What you do well now is going tosay, hey, you know, I'm drinking
more water, right? Maybe now I could add something
more specific, like maybe 6 servings of fruits a day, right?
And then you keep your fruits ina, in a, in a bowl on the
kitchen counter. So you make sure that you meet
your daily quote. So being intentional, being
practical is my first advice usually.

(24:02):
And then more specifically, I think if we're looking at
parameters as far as eating, what does a healthy diet look
like? Because a lot of people think
that just means eating broccoli,steamed broccoli all day.
You know, like I just got to eatbroccoli and spinach, right?
Isn't that that's it, right? Asparagus, right?
But you know, there's, there's always you have to check myself
how many? There's, there's 4 main food

(24:23):
groups, right? So there's fruits that I want
you to increase in your diet. Just start eating more fruit.
Obviously vegetables, right? Vegetables we know are healthy
for you. No one argues are vegetables.
So you're the green leafy vegetables and even the starchy
ones. OK, the the next group I would
say to we need to increase in our diet is legumes, beans, man
lentils, chickpeas, kidney beans, legumes.

(24:45):
There that is for any outcome, whether it be cholesterol,
weight, blood sugar, you know, bombshell legumes, whole grains,
right. So we're we're staying away.
And when I say whole grains, that's intact whole grains, the
ones that are not stripped of their fiber.
So you're doing brown rice instead of white rice, quinoa,
you know, you know these those whole grains.

(25:07):
Also, maybe you're doing hot whole grain pasta, whole wheat
pasta instead of traditional pasta.
So fruits, vegetables, legumes, whole grains.
And then the last, OK, so there's if there's five, I would
say add nuts and seeds. It's to your diet.
So that's what a healthy diet looks like.
Wow. What did I not include in those
five? No meat, no dairy.
Yeah, yeah. Where's the meat?

(25:28):
You know, where's the meat? How can I eat without meat?
So if you can't live without meat, then make sure it's a
small portion, not the majority of your plate.
Your plate should be colorful, right?
I would say the best advice I hear is 80% of your plate, try
to make it plant based. The other 20%, if you had put
some cheese and meat in there, fine, if that's the best you can
do, right? You know, start small and grow
gradually into that, right? So for it's not like an all or

(25:51):
nothing thing for a lot of our diet might now want to talk
about diabetes reversal. Jeff, don't get me wrong, if
you're a diabetic, you're tryingto reverse it.
Like if you just want to manage your blood sugar levels, fine,
you know, But if you really wantmost people who come to me, this
is Bernie. I want to know how to reverse
this thing. I want to get rid of it to be
real with you, your bodies in a disease state did this half
measures are not going to work. You might as well go all the

(26:12):
way, right, Because that is in itself is going to be rewarding
when you go back to your doctor and then I love this when a
doctor says what did you do? A1C is normal.
So you're taking, you know, the medications are working.
I, I tossed those medications months ago.
I'm not, you know, I'm just likelike so and then they want to
get my information because they know this is impossible.
You're not diabetic anymore. I mean, think of the joy of

(26:34):
that. It's much, I don't know.
There's no food product better than the joy of knowing you're
going to live longer, you're feeling better, and you're
disease, Freeman. So I don't know what kind of
percentages we put on in terms of the success and how
everything fits together, but itwould seem like at least 50% or
more of the success in reversingdiabetes is going to be just
getting to those five basic plant based.

(26:56):
Areas, yeah, definitely greater than.
Picking from those. Yeah, definitely.
And then maybe refining that a little bit more as you refine
that, you know, okay, just, you know, eat this kind, you know,
eat more fruits. Well, which fruits do you tend
to recommend, say, OK, because, I mean, there's a lot of crappy
fruits out there, you know, we could just eat, you know?

(27:16):
Bananas all day. Bananas all day.
Yeah, that's. The first thing as Americans,
yeah, they're going to, you know, eat fruit, can't eat
bananas and apples. That's the main thing, right.
But not to say this bad like, I mean, I do, my diabetes are
eating bananas. I mean, the ones who who are in
the program, they sleep bananas.They'll throw bananas in
smoothies. But there are definitely fruits
that are lower in the glycemic level.
So I think especially, well, there's two things.
How long have you been diabetic,right.

(27:38):
So if a person has been diabetic, you know, plus years,
they have to be a little more careful, especially with the
what they're not their sugars are going to take a little
longer to get normal, right. So you want to stick with low
glycemic fruits for sure. Berries are good.
Berries actually have a starch blocking effect.
So all your blurries, blueberries, strawberries, you
know, get berries in your food in your in your in your day

(27:59):
early on are going to be better.But check out and there you can
look online. There's, there's plenty of
websites that show you a glycemic index of foods.
Anyone stick with the ones that are lower in the glycemic level?
That'll give you a shopping ideaof which fruits that you should
increase in your diet. Some are very high.
It doesn't mean, again, this is different.
This is different. So if, if, let's say you're

(28:20):
still you're experiencing blood sugar spikes while increasing
your fruit in your vegetables, beans, you know, intact whole
grains, you're eating plant based essentially, then you have
to ask yourself, OK, well, am I keeping my fat percentage low
enough? Right.
That's where it comes a little trickier for diet diabetics.
Again, the fat percentage has tobe measured and if you're
keeping it 10 to 15%, what you're going to find it within

(28:42):
days or weeks. Some people takes longer, but I
once I haven't seen it a lot longer than six to six weeks.
What happens is your blood sugarstarts to be your body becomes
more tolerant of even the high glycemic fruit.
So we have the first question isnot the type of fruit.
First question is always going to be how much fat on your diet
are you still cooking with oil? Because that's definitely going

(29:04):
to set you over the 15%, even ifit's healthier oils like olive
oil, unfortunately, you know, ifyou really want to get to 15%,
you got to sacrifice oil, OK. If you're not, if you're
snacking on nuts all day, not that not not that nuts are are
are bad, but you can't overdo itif you're trying to get at a 15%
fat percentage a day. So it sounds very dogmatic, but
like this what I see work, you know, when people start seeing

(29:27):
telling me, man, my it's not working for me, Burtis, they're
not telling. Well, are you tracking your fat
intake? No.
All right. Can you do that for me for the
next few weeks? OK.
And once they do that and sugarsare normalized regardless of
what type of fruit they're eating.
So what are your priority fats? Do you even focus on fats?
Because it sounds like, you know, keep your fats low.
If you're not trying to eat any fat, then you're not going to

(29:50):
eat fat. Yeah, and that's what people
don't realize. There's fat and everything, even
the fruit has a certain obviously a small percentage
rate of fat. So you don't that's what I love
about this diet. You know, this lifestyle.
Let me say that, you know, wholefood, plant based and lifestyle
is that you don't need to reallyworry about OK, where, where am
I getting my gonna get my protein from my carbs and my
it's going to come naturally in the foods, the Whole Foods

(30:12):
you're eating. So if you're now, if you are
worried about, you know, gettingpeople talk about the importance
of mega threes, right? So I would say a tablespoon of
flaxseed is a great way to make sure you're getting a mega 3
portion just that's it. Flaxseed is what I always push.
So, but in general, no, it's notsomething that you would have to
worry about because you're goingto get, if you do track your

(30:34):
fat, if you use like apps, like I'm saying around Chronometer or
lose it, you know, there's apps that you could see what your
macro breakdown is and you'd be surprised, like you're hitting
all the macros, you know, even when you're trying to eliminate
the higher fat, fat First off, eliminating animal foods, that's
going to be the easiest way to get rid of fat because the main

(30:56):
source of fat in American diet is the meat, dairy, eggs and
cheese. That's a mean food.
Once you start getting rid of those, then, OK, well, maybe,
you know, we'll have to look at how much avocados are you, how
much nuts? Those and oils first.
I would say oils before. Not that you can't eat all your
avocados at all, but you're gonna have to limit the avocados
and the nuts. The only way, it's the only way
you're gonna know how you're gonna how you're doing is if

(31:17):
you're tracking. And what's beautiful is you're
gonna find a lot of people say, man, I can't eat anything.
Nope. You're gonna be surprised how
much food you're eating now, nowthat you're not worried about
carbs, because think about what the main source of food is when
you look in a in a garden or a grocery store, in a produce.
Now imagine you can eat carbs without limit.
You gonna there's a lot of foodsnow you can eat.

(31:38):
You can have a very colorful plate as long as you keep that,
you know, keep in mind your fat and.
Take and what do you say that people that say, well, it's so
expensive to eat healthy? Oh yeah, I love that question.
I've actually experimented with that, you know, So is it, is it
really? No.
You know, there's definitely things you can do to make it
cheat less expensive, right? You know, buying fruit and

(31:59):
season, buying in bulk, things like that.
There's but some of the cheapestfoods, number one are some of
the healthiest foods are cheapest are the cheapest foods.
But how much is a brown, a pack,a bag of brown rice or a can of
beans dirt cheap. You know, a sack of sweet
potatoes, right? You're talking.
I mean, I went I've I've actually gone to the store and

(32:19):
had a whole week of meals for literally and people don't
believe me. It's on.
I have a YouTube video on it. And this is just for myself.
I was cooking for myself $20 food for the week.
Obviously basic, huh? What's that?
It's very basic. This is last year, you know, but
it was very basic, you know, basically I was eating tacos
every day. Like I was like, you know, so it

(32:40):
was basically, you know, Taco, aburrito bowl, you know, So I
just added potatoes, beans, somelettuce, you know, But just to
show you that. Yeah, especially when you're
choosing the, you know, certain food items, it's plant based,
whole food, plant based or eating healthy.
That's that's an excuse, man. You could eat cheap.
You could eat cheap, you know, but regard beyond that, I

(33:02):
actually did an experiment with a colleague of mine.
So she had about she has about the same family size as I do and
we went to the store together. I said you buy what you
typically buy for your family. I buy what I typically buy for
my family. Guess who's bill receipt was was
lower. It was obviously it was you.
Right, obviously I wouldn't ragged and we looked at we

(33:23):
looked at each other's carts andwe said, So what do you think is
the difference is when you starteating healthy, what you're
doing now is you're eliminating a lot of the low calorie energy
poor foods from your diet. Let going of it.
Let go of the chips and the junkfood and the pastries and the
juices in the box. You know, you know, cereals of

(33:43):
that you go through in in 2 days, right?
You're saving a lot of money when you're eating Whole Foods
because Whole Foods, they fill you up longer, right?
These other foods are calorie rich and, and, and, and low in,
in fiber are going to go throughyour body like water and you're

(34:03):
going to be back in the store again buying another box cereal.
You know, so something simple like searching from oatmeal to
from switching from box cereal to oatmeal, man, you could save
money. You're going to save money.
Yeah. The reason I asked the decade
was when I moved to New York from Pittsburgh, and I think it
was like 1988. I took a job up there that they
were paying me far less than I needed to actually survive,

(34:26):
survive in New York. And I my food budget for the
week was about $25. And I tell my students, yeah, I
was able to survive in New York on that.
And, of course, that that was, you know, 30 years ago.
Yeah. But.
But now I could say, OK, well, you know, Louis here, he he did
it a year ago. Yeah.

(34:46):
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah, we can. We can.
Do it now. I mean, I'm not saying that it's
gonna be like, you know, standard, obviously that was
just an experiment. But yeah, just try it.
You know, unfortunately a lot ofus, man, if I'm gonna be real,
we, we will. And this is the mind thing right
here, right? The mind will do.
I always tell my people, you have another part of you, right?
It's not the best part of you, but it's a part of you, right?

(35:07):
Call your alter ego, but it's gonna self sabotage.
It's gonna convince you that youcan't do this, that it's gonna
come with every reason to survive and not die, right?
It's the flesh versus the spiritas we call as Christians, right?
That flesh is the spirit is willing, but that flesh is weak,

(35:28):
and it'll find any excuse to sabotage you.
You got to learn how to quiet. Quiet it and listen to the
higher power, right? The frontal lobe, not the, you
know, Yeah, the flesh. And that's why the back to our
spies, the spiritual and the physical have to be intertwined.
You know, the mind and the body have to be together.
You got to be on the same page. Still connected here.

(35:49):
But it is, I mean, you can't eatreally cheap.
You have to put a little effort into it.
I mean, you're not going to be able to have prepared foods,
things that are going to take you 15 minutes in the microwave,
fewer minutes in the microwave to be able to produce.
But beans are super cheap. It's like you can live on beans,
even canned beans. All that is relatively cheap.

(36:09):
Yeah. Say this too, Jeff.
I don't know the problem that I hear a lot of people say is
that, but you know that when they think about eating this
way, they're like, oh man, like that takes the fun out of food.
But I always ask people, are youseasoning your vegetables?
Like, I don't know. I know why people think that
they they have to eat vegetableswithout seasoning the same way
you season your meat, season your vegetables.

(36:29):
That right there could be a gamechanger for a lot of people
like, oh, I never thought of that, right.
Take some jackfruit or somethinglike that and you season that
up, right? That thing tastes like BBQ
chicken, like, you know, you know, I mean, like take your
mushrooms and season like you would do meat, right.
So mushrooms, beans, there are those things that kind of have a
texture profile at least close to meat that when you season

(36:51):
them, I mean, there's plenty of foods that you could put the
meals you put together. I've tricked people and think
they were eating meat, right. You take some tofu, you let that
thing sit in some soy sauce for a while and then put some, some
the right seasoning on there andslap that, you know, you know,
grill that, grill that mouth. You would think you're eating
meat, you know, like, so yeah, see, that's one thing too.
Like, you know, that's eating cheap and healthy, right?

(37:12):
Or trying to eat less expensive and healthy.
Spices are cheap. Spice up your food masks, spice
up your life, and you'll be moreconsistent for sure.
So what about to like fresh versus frozen, canned and do you
have any recommendations on thator does it matter that much till
you really get the most refined?Yeah.
So like you know, organic versusnot organic, I hear a lot of
that too. I think whatever you can do

(37:35):
consistently is most important, whether whether you're talking
about time or finances, whateveryou could do well consistently
stick with that. If all you can do is do canned
and frozen, then do that. Obviously fresh is going to be
better, but there's a lot of foods like there's nothing wrong
with with frozen vegetables. You know, you can you can you
can still get all the nutrients you know you need sufficient,

(37:56):
you know, for your needs in the frozen produce aisle.
So it's OK to is it better to cook your beans?
Yeah, but you don't want to stayin it.
Take you don't want to eat the time you don't have the time,
then get canned, right. You know, I try to get BPA free,
you know, try to get one withoutthat the the additives, you
know, try what I like. Well, the most important thing
is to look at the back end and try to get as least adding

(38:17):
ingredients as possible. Try to stick with products that
are don't just have what not anything else.
But even then, right, even then that should not be because you
know one thing too. You know, people don't realize
that when you talk about like environmental pollutants.
So I've read studies that I think they estimate about 90% of
environment pollutants end up inanimal foods, not plants, the
source of and pollutants, environmental pollutants are

(38:39):
really our animal products. Vast majority by far are coming
from those. So just by eliminating those,
right, Yeah, OK, you don't have,if you can't afford to get
organic and that's OK, you're doing great and eliminating 90%
of animal environmental pollutants, right, Right.
Right off the bat when you turn plant based right?
So what about societal connection and kind of just

(39:00):
emotional fitness? We talked about is being pillars
of aging well, how important is it for your patients that are
trying to reverse chronic disease to have strong social
support networks both by their healthcare system and in their
personal lives? I think it's a make or break it.
You know, it'll make or break your commitment going alone

(39:20):
unless you have a lot of grit, alot of determination.
It's very hard, right, without having somebody to keeping you
on task or rooting for you at least, because you know, it
could always comes down to it's I always say it's, it's it's you
first is you and God, it's between you, all right, And you
know, whatever you believe is a higher power, right?
That's just that's it. That's all you have.

(39:41):
But sometimes that gets really hard.
It gets really lonely. There's that food noise.
The the the toxic food environment were around us that
pulls us out of our commitments.So what keeps us from falling
backwards right from our commitments is a people having
people behind us to say, hey, keep going, man, keep going,
keep going. So many people who are, who are,
who failed in their commitments would have succeeded if they had

(40:02):
somebody, even if it was just one person that told them that
one time. No, you can do this right.
Keep going. So that's why I encourage, you
know, take advantage of Internet, right, Facebook
groups, There's so many groups that are supportive online,
depending on where you are, there's community meetups,
right? You know, maybe there's, you
know, just look, look for a group that's walking or
exercising together, going joining a gym.

(40:24):
That's why I encourage getting agym, not just exercising at
home. You, you know, then you have
people that are expecting you tobe there, you know, weeks
passing, like, Hey, Lewis, you haven't been in the gym in a
while. Where you been man?
Like, and I know there's people looking for me, you know, So you
know, we're social creatures, Jeff, you would agree that we're
social creatures. The more social we can be about
whatever that commitment is, themore likely you're going to

(40:46):
stick with it and enjoy it. It's going to be pleasureful,
right? Not painful.
And I imagine it really needs tobe a familial change if you're
going to, you know, live a lifestyle that's going to be
more plant based and, you know, reversing diabetes.
You can't come home to a family that, you know, is eating a bag
of chips. And yeah, you're trying to eat

(41:07):
kale chips, you know? Yeah, it's, I say like, for
sure, like that's one unfortunately a fall back
because you can't, especially when it comes to spouses, like
kids, you can influence a littlebetter, but if they're really
against like changing, it's crazy.
It's crazy the things that spouses will do to sabotage.
Like I don't get like like, oh, how one person starts to be
healthy sometimes the other likegoing like now, like it's so
committed to not changing that they start eating like out of

(41:29):
like like potato chips for breakfast.
I don't know. But like like so committed, you
can't change. You can only change what you can
change. Control what you can control.
But if you can, you know, involve the family, man, that's
going to be huge. Don't do this just for yourself
and figure out, you know, how you can incorporate more meals
for the family that are healthier.
And they'll be, you know, they'll be grateful for it,

(41:51):
obviously. So for the listeners who may be
newly diagnosed with type 2 diabetes or pre diabetes, what
are the first steps you encourage them to take if they
want to pursue a path toward reversal?
OK, very, very good question. So if they're newly diagnosed or
pre diabetic, First off, know that there's hope is not this is
not a death sentence. I would say that this this right

(42:12):
here, right knowing could be thebest thing that happens to you
because a lot of times people gothrough life not knowing what's
going on in their body that they're sick.
They don't even know they're sick until they get a stroke or
a heart attack. Diabetes is like a warning sign.
It's almost like a flashing gauge that says, hey,
something's wrong though, take it, take it as good news, right?
So, OK, well, I didn't know. Thank you for letting me know.

(42:33):
This is the time to change. Early on in the disease is the
best time to change because don't if you delay it, which
most people do, it only gets worse and it gets worse fast.
So I do want to scare you a little bit.
I want to encourage you and scare you a little bit.
Encourage you that yes, this is great news to act now.
If you delay, you're going to harm yourself even more and
you're going to need to do more to get out of it.

(42:54):
So people who are early on diabetic, a lot of times it's
small changes they need to make.Sometimes it's just stop eating
cheese and the sugars came down,look, and the A1C went back to
normal, right? So there's actually a lot less
involvement in and change. But you know, whatever your
change you're making, do it consistently and do it now.
And what are your recommendations in regards to
things like sleep and, you know,exercise, physical activity?

(43:16):
Yeah. So all of them, all of it do all
of it. So sleep as far as hours, you
know, so studies are saying 7 to8 hours are, is ideal.
And so you know, how many of us are getting at least seven?
That's, that's hard. But at least shoot for seven
hours of sleep consistently every day.
And then as far as physical activity goes, I would say I

(43:39):
want, I want you to do a mixtureof resistance training and
cardio, you know, so not one, not all or one of the only one
or the other. So a lot of times people stick
with the cardio and they forget their importance of building
lean muscle mass, especially as we age.
If you want to age well, the only thing that's going to keep
your, your bones healthy and strong through age impact

(44:00):
resistance training. That's something I want people
to do at least two to three times a week on a regular basis.
So finally, when you think aboutthe concept of aging well, what
does that mean to you? And how has your work in
diabetes management shaped your approach to living a long and
vibrant life? So I think it's a lot more than
numbers I reached reached reaching 100.

(44:21):
But how how you feel and how interconnected you are with
others at that age. And when you make the right
decisions health wise, right, you age well because you're
going to be more likely. You know, I would say by the
grace of God, right, none of us can add a hair hair to our head.
But by God's grace, you're goingto be thinking clearly, right?
You're going to be well enough to walk, you know, and and get

(44:44):
from A to B without pain. If you make decisions now,
you're going to age well, right?You're going to age well.
And not just living long, but feeling good in that old age and
being able to do the things you want to do, connect with others.
Don't sacrifice your future. Don't trade your future for now
for the pleasures of that. It's not going to be worth it.

(45:05):
And now the question I ask of all my guests and and you look
like you're pretty fit. So what are you doing personally
to age well? Oh yeah, yeah, So I love the gym
for sure. Of course, first diet #1II, I
stick with the whole food, plantbased diet.
So I have eliminated animal foods for my diet and I'm
sticking with, you know, the five groups I, I, I mentioned

(45:28):
and which shocks a lot of peoplebecause like, how do you gain
muscle without meats or protein,animal protein or protein
shakes? You don't need it.
And I was surprised when I learned that a few years ago.
Still gaining in the gym. So I, I work out about five days
a week, mainly resistance training.
I do some cardio as well. So I do have a, a series of
exercises if anyone's interested, I could send them

(45:49):
to. But yeah, exercising regularly,
eating healthy, practicing mindfulness.
I know a lot of people tell mindfulness today the importance
of being still and enjoying the present moment.
You know, I, I, I struggle with that.
I work on it every day. Like because I always like to
worry. I won't worry, but I like to
worry. But focusing on the present and

(46:10):
joint and realizing that, you know, I got this.
So is there anything we miss talking about today?
Well, I got a question. What what would your daily diet
look look like? You know when you get up, have
in the morning. What's your favorite meals?
So, yeah, so my favorite meals. That's good.
That's a good question. I love oatmeal.
I love oatmeal. Overnight oats is is really

(46:31):
convenient for me too, especially flavoring it up with
with all fruits I can get my hands on.
Usually some berries, blueberries, strawberries,
bananas, cinnamon. I like to put spring flaxseed in
there too, so it's a pretty richoatmeal.
When I'm talking about oatmeal, it's rich, it's heavy.
I love tofu so I like to do it scrambled.

(46:53):
Sometimes I get the Super firm blocks and I slice it and eat
like a sandwich, you know? As far as bread, I try to limit
bread use, but if I am, I'll tryto stick with either Ezekiel or
Daves Killer Bread. I love Daves Killer bread.
Yeah, yeah. Let's see.
What else? Of course, burrito bowls.
I love burrito bowls. Bean based, of course, instead
of me. I like to keep it simple.

(47:15):
Salads of all kinds. I dress up my salad.
People look at my salad and it'spretty rich.
So yeah, I want to think, what else do I like to eat?
I do. And I do avoid planted mock
meats. I try to avoid those.
But once in a while, on occasions, I'll enjoy maybe a
little possible burger. I'm splurging.
Yeah. So and that's what's nice is

(47:37):
that as long as you're consistent too on a daily basis,
you could splurge once in a while with some some veggie
meats. I used to be eating those like
all the time every day, but now they're more of an occasional
basis. But yeah, it's our jackfruit's
another thing. I like mushrooms.
Jackfruit I, I once in a while because it's hard to get
consistently. But mushrooms, I'm actually

(47:58):
going today to Asian market so Icould load up on some mushrooms.
And, you know, you, you cook themushroom upright.
You, you think it's meat? It's, it's really big.
Yeah, yeah. So that's, that's about it.
I mean, I could, I could probably talk some more if I
think about all I eat. I try to, I try to experiment a
lot too, because I want to show people, you know, how being
whole food, plant based. You, you, there's, there's so

(48:19):
many options out there. There's so many food that you
can learn to enjoy. I, I mean literally, if you
wanted to, you could probably beadding something new every week
to your diet. I should say this too.
So since I'm Haitian, I love rice.
I would say my favorite meal, though, my favorite meal for
sure is coming home to rice and beans, man.
It's something simple, man. Like every Haitian out there

(48:39):
will tell, Will, will concur. Man, there's nothing as as
comforting as a nice warm plate of rice and beans.
Yeah. That's interesting.
You see the cultures that live on rice and beans and what
separates them is the the spicesand the seasonings that they
use. Yeah, if you don't like rice and
beans, you, you haven't had Haitian rice and beans yet.
That's what's the problem. Yeah, seasoning.

(49:02):
That's what it is. And same thing.
Apply that same principle to everything you're eating, man.
See why? Why only season meat?
Why can't you season everything else season?
I remember going, I don't know how much time you got, but I
remember I was at a medieval festival and they do really
good. They have a really good plant
based option. They season their vegetables
really good. The next day I go to another

(49:23):
show, a pirate dinner show, and they have a vegetarian option.
And they gave me bland, like, there's no seasoning.
A little packet of salt, Like, hey, you guess you could have.
Like, why do they think it was? I was offended.
Why do you think vegetarians don't like seasoning?
Like, you don't think we're like, our food that tastes good?
Like, I was offended. Like yeah, but season your
vegetables bad. Yeah, I like the idea of the

(49:45):
flaxseed. I started putting that in our
coffee and we make that in the morning.
I just put, yeah, probably a couple tablespoons in there,
brew that through the coffee. So we're getting a little bit
more of those Omega threes and then I add it to my oatmeal.
I also started my wife for some recipe she was using.
She brought home hemp seed and it's high in the the megas.

(50:05):
And so I've been putting that inmy oatmeal and some I've started
adding chia seeds, chia seeds and really sturdying up that
oatmeal. I mean, that's that's kind of my
start meal of the day. If you go do anything like I, I
would say oatmeal is like so key, right?
I feel bad for those who like itman, but you could season it.
I mean you. I've never had savoury, savoury
oatmeal. You could change it.

(50:26):
Change how? You taste that?
Yeah. Yeah, a friend of mine said he
he he makes savoury oatmeal. But if you don't like oatmeal,
try to try a different flavor oror you know, ingredients on top.
Yeah, that that food budget whenI lived in New York was it was
primarily a lot of oatmeal and alot of whole grain brown rice
and just, I mean, I'd take the work just this big canister of

(50:47):
rice. I did eat eggs.
I don't know where you're at with the eggs because that's,
you know, again, a plant based protein, but I, I would, you
know, a few hard boiled eggs in there and then I, you know,
carrots were, you know, cheap vegetable.
Now, I didn't have probably enough variety in there and I
could have done a much, much better job.
But, you know, I was single and fast-paced life.

(51:07):
I didn't have a lot of time for stuff, but you know, I had time
to cook rice at the beginning ofthe week.
I had time to cook up a big pot of beans, you know, So it's just
a matter of planning some time to cook up these things that you
can eat throughout the week. And just do the best you can and
do the best you can. Treat yourself with grace.
Always like to tell people, Jeff, health is your journey.
It's not a destination. So we're all learning along the

(51:28):
way and getting better. As long as you're progressing,
you're on the right, you're on the right track, so.
Where can our listeners connect with you?
I see your diabetes 180° behind.Yeah. 180° diabetes 180 looking
up my name and that will probably find you can find me
online pretty easily on on crossall social platforms.
So diabetes 180180 my specific website is just my name.

(51:52):
I keep it simple. Louis burdis.com.
And anything else we missed today?
Man, we covered a lot. I think we did, yeah.
Yeah, you're a very good interviewer, man.
You know how to, you know, touchall the important points, man.
I think we talked about everything that we can or should
talk about, so I'm impressed. We did.
We did good, I think. I'm, I'm sure there's a lot more
we can talk about. So we'll have you back on here

(52:14):
sometime in the future. Again, just to kind of dive into
this little bit deeper because how about six months from now we
might need a reminder, you know,we need to change our diet team
so. I also like to encourage 2
people. Jeff, I don't know if you wanted
to give people like a freebie. I always like to give people
recipes, you know, somewhere to start.
So I do have a collection. We could probably give them a
link, maybe in a in a show, shownotes or something.

(52:35):
Yeah, we'll, we'll put that in the show notes and I want to see
that. I want I want some over. 250
I've collected over 250 recipes all low fat whole food, plant
based and so you can start off without having to think about it
just. That's awesome.
And I need to cut down on my meat a bit.
Quite a bit. And I have a daughter who won't
eat meat and we're trying to gether just eating more protein,
eating less crappy food. So I'm going to have her go

(52:56):
through the 250 recipes, pick out the stuff that you want to
try. Let's get to it and healthy.
Look at me as an example. You could still get get gain
muscle without the meat. You can't.
You're looking good. So you're making me feel.
Of course, I'm a lot older than you, so I have a little bit of
an excuse, but. Yeah, yeah.
No excuses. But yeah, health is a journey.

(53:18):
We're all we're all learning andgetting better along the way.
Yeah. Well, I appreciate you being on
the journey with us. Just keep doing what you're
doing and keep aging well. Yes, I will.
Thanks so much for having me. Thank you for listening.
I hope you benefited from today's podcast and until next
time, keep aging well.