Flax and Chia Seeds: Food First!

Transcript

[00:00:00] Tina: it's all kind of neat. We're much, we're much closer related to plants than we, we may think. And we don't look anything like,

[00:00:06] Leah: No, we do not. My hair might, my hair might look like a little plant today.

[00:00:11] Tina: Speaking of Chia pets, if

I'm Dr Tina Kaczor and as Leah likes to say I'm the science-y one

[00:00:20] Leah: and I'm Dr Leah Sherman and on the cancer inside

[00:00:24] Tina: And we're two naturopathic doctors who practice integrative cancer care

[00:00:28] Leah: But we're not your doctors

[00:00:30] Tina: This is for education entertainment and informational purposes only

do not apply any of this information

[00:00:36] Leah: without first speaking to your doctor

[00:00:39] Tina: The views and opinions expressed on this podcast by the hosts and their guests are solely their own

[00:00:45] Leah: Welcome to the cancer pod

Hey, Tina,

[00:01:04] Tina: Hey, Leah, how you doing?

[00:01:07] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: okay.

[00:01:08] Tina: I want to tell you, I know that today is going to be a good day. It's a fortuitous day.

[00:01:13] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: It's gonna be a good day. Yeah,

[00:01:16] Tina: and one of my comfort foods is egg on toast.

[00:01:19] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: you go crazy. Go

[00:01:21] Tina: I know, right? This is a, this is one of my junk foods. No, a couple of fried eggs, a couple of pieces of toast makes me

[00:01:28] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: Oh, Friday. That's good.

Okay.

[00:01:31] Tina: And so this morning I got a double yolk.

[00:01:34] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: Oh, no

way.

[00:01:35] Tina: I'm thinking that that means it's a good day.

[00:01:38] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: I don't think in all of my years of owning chickens, I don't have them now, but in my past years, I don't think I ever got a double yo.

[00:01:44] Tina: Oh, you're kidding.

[00:01:47] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: I thought you were going to say something about like you had chia pudding or something I thought that you were gonna like stay on brand.

[00:01:54] Tina: no, this is totally off topic, but it's genuine.

[00:01:57] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: Well, I wish you told me that before because now i'm like i'm psyched for you. It's gonna be a good day.

[00:02:03] Tina: Yes. It means a day. of abundance, right?

[00:02:06] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: That's totally

[00:02:07] Tina: ticket. All

[00:02:10] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: chicken is a Uh, not a medium. What is it? I don't know your fortune teller chicken.

Okay,

[00:02:19] Tina: But

the topic is not chickens

eggs.

[00:02:22] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: No, we're talking about chia and flax which are for some people breakfast foods.

So we're kind of rolling with it

Yeah

[00:02:31] Tina: if you're, not doing eggs for whatever reason, chia And flax can definitely be a nice protein source in the morning.

[00:02:37] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: And they, and they could be exciting. Oh, did you know that chia is a complete protein, but flax is not?

[00:02:46] Tina: Hmm. No. I did not know that.

[00:02:50] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: um, they have, well, chia has a little bit more protein per two tablespoons. It's got around, five ish or so? I did my research, I totally did.

[00:03:00] Tina: Five grams or so?

[00:03:01] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: five grams or so, I think, yeah. but flax is lacking lysine.

[00:03:05] Tina: Oh. Okay.

[00:03:07] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: Yeah,

[00:03:07] Tina: is important.

[00:03:09] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: so it's not a complete protein. I just thought I'd, you know, I'd share that with people.

[00:03:13] Tina: And a complete protein, in case people.

aren't familiar with that term, means that it provides all of the essential amino acids the human body needs.

[00:03:22] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: Yeah, so meat being complete proteins, but not all plant foods are

[00:03:29] Tina: Right. And many cultures that combine plant foods often will combine them in ways that complete the protein profile or complete all of the essential amino acids. So this is why there's rice and beans, for example.

[00:03:43] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: and corn and beans

[00:03:44] Tina: Mm hmm. So that all of the amino acids are found in that meal without meat.

And we are neither like pro meat or anti meat here. we

don't have any kind of meat agenda,

do we?

[00:03:57] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: speak for yourself

[00:04:00] Tina: Long pause

[00:04:02] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: Anyways, we're going off the subject already and we're just starting so, um, You know, I think I think at this point a lot of people have heard of chia if not from the the overnight chia pudding things that people make or adding it to, smoothies, flax, I think people have heard about, flax crackers and, and whatnot.

But, um, back in the day, all we knew about chia,

[00:04:30] Tina: and made a great pet,

[00:04:32] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: ch ch ch chia, yeah.

[00:04:35] Tina: such a cool, part of our culture growing up.

Ch ch ch

[00:04:40] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: yeah, I had no idea that, that chia was the same. Um, as fast forward decades later, the, you know, the, as they call them super foods.

[00:04:52] Tina: Yes. You know, the ch chia pet, chia pet, um, you know, it sprouts the chia seeds. And so I thought to myself, Oh, gosh, can I eat sprouted chia? And so I did, I put them on a plate and I sprouted them and I was kind of watching what they do as they turn green and are they edible and here to tell you, they don't taste real good.

[00:05:14] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: Oh, really?

[00:05:15] Tina: No.

[00:05:16] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: Are they bitter?

[00:05:17] Tina: Yeah.

[00:05:18] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: Yeah. Interesting.

[00:05:19] Tina: Yeah, it was pretty bitter. It was, of course, mucilaginous because that's what chia does in water, but I took pictures when I did it. So maybe I'll put those on our website.

[00:05:27] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: Oh, funny. Yeah. I was going to throw some seeds. I don't think they'll grow here in Oregon, but I was going to throw some seeds into this random garden that I'm creating. Um, So Chia originates in Mexico and Guatemala

[00:05:41] Tina: Oh,

[00:05:41] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: and it's been around for like, at least 5, 500 years. It's an ancient,

[00:05:47] Tina: I would love to know how they were used in. ancient,

cooking.

[00:05:51] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: I probably saw that in the article in which I learned about that, but um, I don't remember,

[00:05:56] Tina: Okay.

[00:05:57] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: but yeah, so that's the, uh,

[00:05:59] Tina: I'm going to put that on my to do list.

[00:06:00] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: yeah, it's Salvia hispanica is its botanical name.

Yeah.

[00:06:05] Tina: when I looked at flax seeds, I was curious because, flax grows in the wild, especially in high desert areas, and it's a beautiful plant.

And I looked it up, I was like, where does this originate from? And it's Turkey and that region before it was called Turkey, but basically the Middle East.

It's

[00:06:22] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: Can you pronounce its name?

[00:06:24] Tina: Oh, Usatissimum.

[00:06:26] Leah: Lin, Linum? Is it Linum? Linum?

Say it

again.

[00:06:30] Tina: Linum. Usatissimum.

[00:06:33] Leah: you did that.

[00:06:35] Tina: I actually used to say it a lot when we were learning herbs, because it was just such a fun word.

[00:06:39] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: Yeah, that, that's a hard one. so when I, going back to the chickens and the egg, um, when I had chickens, I would feed them whole flax seeds because chickens can break those down. I know we've mentioned before about seeds. You need to grind the flax seed in order to make it bioavailable and to take advantage of all of its benefits.

Chia seeds you need to soak, but chickens have gizzards and so they have little, uh, You know, rocks that break down those seeds. So I would just take handfuls of whole flax seeds, feed them to my chickens, it would help, you know, nourish the egg yolks. And then they would miss some that weren't inside of the pen.

[00:07:18] Tina: Mm hmm.

[00:07:18] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: And they would grow. And it's a pretty blue flower.

[00:07:21] Tina: It is. It's a beautiful flower.

[00:07:23] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: yeah, that brings everything full circle right there.

[00:07:26] Tina: Well, yeah. And let's talk about the difference between a seed and a nut for a moment. Because this is confusing, these are seeds, and what you're talking about is the seed coat that holds all the goodies inside. So these are the little embryonic part of a plant,

[00:07:40] Leah: It's the part

[00:07:40] Tina: these in.

[00:07:41] Leah: that creates the plant.

[00:07:42] Tina: Right. as opposed to a nut, which is A hard shell, Um, and a nut, by definition, is a type of fruit that has a hard shell that doesn't naturally open. You have to open it manually. So think walnut, hazelnut, chestnut, you gotta crack that thing open and get inside. Um Seed coats are thinner, The Seed coat keeps those omega 3 fatty acids from being oxidized, so this is why it's best to wait till the last moment when you want to break open that seed coat for a flax seed. You know, mill it or grind it or whatever you're going to do if you have whole seeds. They also stay longer if they're whole and not ground, right?

So you can put those in a jar and they'll stay a lot longer than if you've already milled it.

[00:08:22] Leah: Right. You could keep that in your cupboard as opposed to if it's already milled, then that needs to be in the fridge or the freezer

[00:08:29] Tina: Mm

[00:08:29] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: in a sealed jar.

[00:08:31] Tina: And even that will eventually go bad. And I I've had flax oil go bad, and it smells a lot like fish going bad.

[00:08:38] Leah: Yeah. And so that's one thing. So I've had patients who take flax oil and cause they don't want to do the flax seed for whatever reason. And not only do they have different benefits, but that's a real problem I have found with flax oil is that it does go bad quickly.

[00:08:55] Tina: Mm hmm. Yeah. Yeah, flax oil in particular, so you don't buy large amounts, um, and, And you can keep it in the freezer. It will not freeze. It'll stay fluid in the freezer.

[00:09:05] Leah: I think the other thing we should bring up is fairly recently seeds have been demonized.

[00:09:10] Tina: Yeah, this is something that you were informing me about. I'm so not on social media that I, I've kind of missed the boat.

[00:09:17] Leah: Yeah, and I do want to get a professional on here to to discuss this but from what I can figure out because every single time I think about seeds and I'm like, why are people so anti seed? I did find a website where there was a dietician who talked about that. It kind of started with the paleo movement.

I'm not quite sure

what that was about, but I think

part of it, and this is just me guessing, is because a lot of processed foods are made with seed oils

[00:09:45] Tina: Okay.

[00:09:45] Leah: and maybe it's just kind of being against processed foods or maybe it's against the imbalance of taking in a lot of those 6 oils from processed foods and not getting enough omega 3s.

I don't really know what it is. I'm sure

I demonize some foods, maybe more like ultra processed foods and okra. Um, but I think just kind of like knocking out all seeds and saying seeds are bad when they've been around for 5, 500 years and used as medicine and food in ancient cultures.

[00:10:19] Tina: hmm.

[00:10:20] Leah: Like get over it.

[00:10:21] Tina: Yeah, I think this goes back to the, the ancient culture's preparation. And so, like you mentioned, milling the flax is important. Soaking the chia seeds is important. And, and we should look at how they were prepared because even acorns, you know, can be eaten if prepared properly and soaked properly. So I guess, I guess my thought is they've been around, but we probably need to pay some attention to how we consume them over time. We didn't just pop them in our mouths.

[00:10:50] Leah: I do want to point out because I know that there are vegans who listen to us or plant based people who listen to us and They might take flax oil to get those omega 3s. I don't typically recommend doing exclusively flax oil. Maybe trying to do it through the flax seed, you know, but taking that flax oil, the conversion rate.

Of the ALA, which is found in seeds

to the EPA and DHA,

which is what your body, it's what your body needs.

[00:11:22] Tina: Ultimately uses, Yeah.

[00:11:23] Leah: And uses, um, yeah, it's, it's a really low conversion rate.

[00:11:27] Tina: yeah. Well, then I know there's some genetics to that conversion rate. So if your people were island people, they're less likely to convert flax oil, the ALA, the alpha linolenic acid in flax to the usable EPA DHA, because Your ancestors didn't need to do that, they ate fish, and so that gene gets silenced, and so you don't express that particular enzyme if your people hailed from an island, most likely, or they were along the seashores, which is a lot of the planet, because that's where we generally lived, because there was plentiful food.

So,

[00:12:02] Leah: So I would think that somebody who, Um, doesn't do, fish oil for their, you know, for their omega 3 fatty acids, you can use algal, I never know how to say that, algal oil, you can get oil from algae

[00:12:16] Tina: there you go.

[00:12:17] Leah: other sources. Yeah, that's, that's easier. So I just want to put that out there too.

[00:12:20] Tina: Yeah. So, So, go where the fish go. The fish got it from the algae, so you didn't just go, you don't wanna eat fish, just go where they went. Just get some algal oil.

[00:12:29] Leah: all right. So let's talk about, because we kind of touched on, you know, it was used in ancient times as medicine. I didn't delve. Too deeply into that because I want to talk about what people use Chia and Flax for now And we're kind of using them interchangeably because I kind of feel like they are they're you know, a little interchangeable

[00:12:47] Tina: In a lot of ways, yeah, because of the, essential fatty acids that they have inside as well as the fiber.

[00:12:53] Leah: Right,

[00:12:54] Tina: used a lot for digestive purposes.

[00:12:57] Leah: right bowel function,

[00:12:58] Tina: bowel function,

and I've always really liked both of them for that reason, because if you're constipated, they can give you some bulking and give you some relief of constipation.

Of course, as all fibers, you need to make sure you drink enough water with any fiber. And if you are the other direction, if you have loose stools, they actually soak up some of the excess fluid in the colon. So they firm up the stool. So it's kind of a normalizing effect.

[00:13:26] Leah: but it's dose dependent And so you have to kind of know what dose works for you for which function. Otherwise, you're gonna send yourself You In the direction you might not want to be in.

[00:13:37] Tina: Right.

[00:13:38] Leah: I think the other thing that people, at least they're, you know, they're doing the flax seed for is cholesterol,

[00:13:46] Tina: Mm

hmm.

[00:13:46] Leah: help to lower cholesterol.

[00:13:48] Tina: Yes. Yeah. And it is, it is considered a soluble fiber or has soluble fiber components and most soluble fibers will lower cholesterol because it grabs it in the small intestine and ushers it out into the stool.

[00:14:01] Leah: And the dosage, like the typical dosage for this, it's usually a couple tablespoons

[00:14:06] Tina: Mm hmm. Mm hmm.

Yes.

[00:14:08] Leah: to help with, you know, the various, the various medicinal, medicinalness in quotes.

[00:14:14] Tina: Yeah,

and, and I actually, of the two, I think flax seeds are more enjoyable to put on foods, like on my yogurt or whatever I'm eating. It's easy to put flax anywhere you would put a nut or a seed for flavoring, even on a salad. I feel like flax is easier to integrate kind of wherever

[00:14:30] Leah: the Chia needs a little more prep, so if you're going to like make smoothies overnight and you don't mind that sort of, I don't really like that in a smoothie, like It's not quite tapioca, but it's that kind of fish eyeball kind of texture.

[00:14:41] Tina: Yeah, it totally is.

[00:14:43] Leah: I don't mind it in chia pudding. I enjoy chia pudding. I usually put a little bit of flax in there too when I do make it.

Um, but no, I, I, I love the flavor of ground flaxseed.

[00:14:54] Tina: Mm hmm. Me too. Me too. I think it actually enhances the, the food, whatever I'm putting it on, just like a nut or a seed would. So that's why I feel like that's easier to integrate in a lot of ways. The chia pudding, since you touched on it, is delicious if it's prepared right though.

[00:15:07] Leah: Yeah, for sure.

[00:15:08] Tina: It's so good.

We should put a, can we put a recipe for that on our website?

[00:15:13] Leah: Yeah. I'll do a little blog. I say this every episode. I'll write something. No, I will. That'll be easy. I'll put, I'll do a flax recipe and a chia recipe on our blog.

[00:15:22] Tina: Great.

[00:15:23] Leah: I promise. Okay, so other functions, that these seeds are known for is they help you feel full, right?

They're fiber, and so some people use them for weight loss just because they help add fiber, which adds that feeling of fullness. diabetes. Type 2 diabetes helps with blood sugar control because it, again, it's a fiber, and so it helps stabilize your blood sugar. And then the one that, like, seen it with patients,

[00:15:55] Tina: Mm hmm.

[00:15:55] Leah: the evidence is so iffy, is menopausal symptoms.

[00:15:59] Tina: Is that for flax seeds

[00:16:01] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: Yeah,

[00:16:02] Tina: Mm hmm. Well, flax, it does differ from the chia seeds in that way, right? So flax has phytoestrogens. In one whose abbreviation is SDG in particular, we know if someone has the right bacteria in their gut, these components from the flax, this SDG in particular, which you can get as an isolate and a pill, or you could just eat the whole food flax.

is converted into a phytoestrogen So Yes, it can affect, it can affect that. I don't think that there's any reason to think it acts as an estrogen, so I'm not worried about people who have a history of breast cancer or who are avoiding, estrogenic substances, you know, plastics and, chemical compounds that are estrogenic or pesticides and that kind of thing.

It's not like that. It's not that estrogenic. It's a phytoestrogen, which is a little bit different.

[00:16:51] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: okay, so that is a big like flax myth And I still hear it from people where they're like I can't have flax I see it in social media people posting things about things five things I'll never do with my breast cancer diagnosis and one is like I won't eat flax

[00:17:05] Tina: Hmm.

[00:17:05] Leah: know why that rumor is still going around

[00:17:08] Tina: Yeah, probably because estrogen receptors and estrogens are very confusing. Right? I mean, first of all, we make three different estrogens. We've got all these different binding. We've got different receptors, right? we've got beta receptors and alpha receptors, and now we know there's delta receptors.

I mean. it's very inherently confusing. So I think what happens out there in the world is people are like, that's it. Just don't do it. it's easier just to avoid it than to like actually delve through, wade through all the information and come out with an informed decision at the end.

I actually think it's just out of simplicity of what to do and not to do.

[00:17:41] Leah: another thing that, um, Chia and Flax are both, Beneficial. You know, this is the cancer pod again. Let's talk about something having to do with cancer, um, prostate cancer.

[00:17:51] Tina: Mm hmm.

[00:17:52] Leah: So those seeds are also super beneficial to reducing your risk of prostate cancer.

[00:18:00] Tina: Yeah. Well, for flax seeds specifically, and this probably has to do with those lignins, the phytoestrogen compounds in there, There was Two analogous studies, they each, one was on prostate cancer, one was on breast cancer. after people had a biopsy for their cancer, so it was positive cancer biopsy, they either have breast cancer, prostate cancer, two separate studies, by the way, they were not published together. Then between the time of the biopsy and the actual surgery to remove the cancer, they gave people flax seeds, milled flax seeds, and I believe the amount was a lot, people were taking in like. a quarter cup, the equivalent of a quarter cup of flax seeds every day. The rate at which the cancer was dividing went down. So that number on the pathology report happens to be called a KI 67. That's just a technical term for how fast and how many cells are in the midst of division when we got this sample. And in both cases for breast and prostate that number went down, which implies that it lowered the aggressiveness or the, rapid nature of the cancer.

growth.

So that was an interesting study

because it was

the same person.

[00:19:03] Leah: What was the period of time that

[00:19:04] Tina: One month.

[00:19:05] Leah: huh,

[00:19:06] Tina: High dose, one month.

[00:19:07] Leah: the high dose part? That's hard.

[00:19:09] Tina: Yeah.

[00:19:10] Leah: A quarter cup?

[00:19:12] Tina: Yeah.

[00:19:13] Leah: I'm like, my voice is quaking. I'm just like,

[00:19:15] Tina: like,

[00:19:15] Leah: that's a lot of toilet time.

[00:19:17] Tina: that's a lot. Yeah.

[00:19:19] Leah: Huh, but that's interesting. Yeah.

Huh.

[00:19:22] Tina: I, I, I like that study a lot and I wish more studies were done this way with natural agents between the time of biopsy and the time that a surgical removal happens and we can see how the characteristics change in the tumor. I mean, it's a really nice study design to be honest. I'm like, why don't we do that more often?

Right? There aren't a lot of studies like that for whatever reason.

[00:19:40] Leah: Are there any studies showing, um, the consumption of flax and chia with reducing colon cancer, just fiber in general?

It's fiber in general.

[00:19:50] Tina: Most of the data on colorectal cancer has been on legumes.

[00:19:53] Leah: Hmm,

[00:19:54] Tina: Um, there are some studies on nuts, which is why nuts and seeds, I kind of put in one category for, for people to make sure they integrate into their diets, nuts and seeds. There's good data on nuts, um, mixed nuts in particular.

[00:20:07] Leah: and then they didn't have to be raw.

[00:20:10] Tina: No,

[00:20:10] Leah: That was wild when I read the study and I was like, They're not raw nuts because you would think they needed to be like raw freshly cracked nuts. No

[00:20:20] Tina: no.

[00:20:21] Leah: roasted

[00:20:22] Tina: No, when it comes to colorectal cancer, one of the byproducts of the good bacteria in the gut, the butyric acid, a lot of the fiber goes to feeding the good bacteria, the good bacteria then make, These short chain fatty acids, one of them is butyric acid and that confers protection. So we have to remember that whenever we put something in our mouth, we're feeding ourselves, yes, but we're also feeding our cultures.

All these organisms in our gut are taking up components of what we put in our mouth for food and they are creating something we may need. So some of the health benefits of the foods that we eat aren't direct, they're indirect. They go through the bacteria, bacteria spits out butyric acid or vitamin K or Whatever.

And we get to absorb that and get the benefits of the nutrients from the bacteria.

[00:21:08] Leah: anything else we need to add about chia or flax

[00:21:11] Tina: You know, the only thing we didn't talk about is the fact that flax

seeds will change how we metabolize our endogenous hormones. So

when people still have a menses every month and the estrogen is going high monthly, you have to metabolize that estrogen and there's different pathways.

Think of it kind of like a river that then splits into different directions. It can split into directions that are beneficial, where the estrogens will break down and be anti cancer, or it can split into a direction that is is pro cancerous, actually promotes cancer, whether it's breast cancer or uterine cancer or ovarian cancer.

So, what Flax does is it actually promotes the breakdown of our endogenous estrogens, the estrogens we produce in our body, into the protective form. And it's something that isn't talked about enough anymore. I think it's one of the many benefits and one of the reasons that Flax in particular is good for, protecting someone from those hormonal induced cancers or often hormonal

induced cancers Like

prostate and breast.

[00:22:11] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: seems to, you know, along with other, along with other recommendations, but, you know, it, it seems to help.

[00:22:17] Leah: I don't see the harm in adding it, except for

any of the caveats that we've

previously mentioned, but.

[00:22:24] Tina: Mm hmm.

[00:22:25] Leah: Yeah. I mean, it's just, like you said, you're, you're feeding your gut bacteria. So, you know, keep, a happy, a happy microbiome

makes for a happy I don't know.

[00:22:41] Tina: That's true. Tend your culture.

[00:22:43] Leah: There you

[00:22:43] Tina: You got to tend your culture. you're an incubator all the time. I, I like that part of nutrition too, that we more recently have really given a More mindful attention to in the, research, we kind of always thought the food was feeding us and breaking down amino acids and carbohydrates.

Might be more important of what those organisms are doing with it. It might be as important if not more because we can't live without them, Right.

We are truly symbiotic with our organisms in our gut to the point that a sterile gut means you don't get to live. It's, we are dependent on it. It's like, Complete symbiosis.

The only way you could live with a sterile gut is to be, um, in a bubble. Like you'd have to be, um, kept alive artificially.

[00:23:30] Leah: Ooh, that John Travolta movie. Boy in a plastic bubble.

[00:23:33] Tina: Mm hmm.

[00:23:33] Leah: The other thing that people will avoid flax with is if they have any sort of thyroid issues

[00:23:38] Tina: Yeah, that's, there's no reason for that.

[00:23:41] Leah: you heard it here first,

folks.

[00:23:43] Tina: yeah, there's reason to do that with, with soy and isoflavones, but there's no reason to do that with flax. Yeah. You're more likely to block thyroid?

production with, a high use of, um, cruciferous vegitables than flax.

[00:23:56] Leah: So with the cruciferous vegetables, you just have to cook them in order to reduce that. So with the flax, if you're worried, make sure it's cooked, add it to your baking, put it in your oatmeal.

[00:24:08] Tina: So that compound I mentioned, SDG, is, uh, The Phytoestrogenic compound It's very high in flax seed. So flax is to that compound as soy is to isoflavone. So soy is uniquely high in isoflavones, which is the phytoestrogen compound. And so we use these as representative foods for those types of phytoestrogens.

And phytoestrogen is breaking down. The word is a plant estrogen, right? So it's an estrogen-like compound that's found in plants.

[00:24:36] Leah: Many plants, many plants have And soy just happens to

have that.

the highest.

[00:24:41] Tina: Yeah. Okay. Isn't that kind of cool how many analogous molecules there are in plants and humans? Like hormones is one of them. And then they've got, legumes have a blood like compound. It looks a lot like hemoglobin, right? They have, they have, these plants have compounds that look a lot like human compounds. It's just like a fascinating concept, really. Right? I mean, I think that's so cool.

[00:25:06] Leah: Well, they need hormones because you, I mean, hormones are communicators. And so the plants have to, you know, their little cells have to be able to communicate with

[00:25:14] Tina: But I think in people's minds, a plant is something very different than a human. But here we are with almost identical molecules running around us. And you know, even the biome, they have little microorganisms in them that then we end up having in our guts because we eat them. So the plant. And, uh, and us, we have similar bacteria sometimes too.

Yeah, it's all, it's all kind of neat. We're much, we're much closer related to plants than we, we may think. And we don't look anything like,

[00:25:42] Leah: No, we do not. My hair might, my hair might look like a little plant today.

[00:25:47] Tina: Speaking of Chia pets, if

[00:25:53] Leah: okay. So, um, so we kind of covered, you know, a couple of different myths that I have seen out there on social media about, you know, if you have any, you know, if you have a history of breast cancer or if you have thyroid disease, you know, it's okay.

It's okay to consume flax and Chia, um, but there are some side effects that people can get. If they just start eating these or if they overindulge

[00:26:17] Tina: they just goes zero to 60, no, they don't eat much fiber at all. And they

suddenly start,

[00:26:22] Leah: yeah And then they listen to our podcast and they're like, oh, this is really intriguing that recipe Leia put up on the blog is really fascinating. I'm going to try it

And

it's

[00:26:31] Tina: three servings, four

[00:26:33] Leah: right. I mean this could happen if you eat like a whole box of Mary's crackers Which is crazy because they don't really grind them.

But anyway Okay, so diarrhea bloating gas

[00:26:47] Tina: Things fibers do

[00:26:48] Leah: yeah, it's your basic fiber fiber overkill side effects. I did see something that talked about interaction with medications

[00:26:58] Tina: Mm hmm.

[00:26:59] Leah: The only one of those that I thought was legit and I will explain what the other ones are but first the only one I thought is if you are taking fiber with Certain medications there, you know, that's the the The big thing is that you have to avoid taking fiber supplements.

These aren't supplements, but you avoid taking fiber supplements with certain medications because of the absorption issue. You just have to wait. So that one is probably legit. the ones that were listed that I thought were a little weird were, be careful if you take medications to lower your cholesterol because there could be some interaction.

And it's not, it doesn't work like that. Like. Over time, if you increase flax and chia in your diet, your cholesterol will lower,

[00:27:46] Tina: Mm hmm.

[00:27:46] Leah: not like if you eat a meal with it, it's going to plummet and your cholesterol is going to bottom out. So I thought that was kind of a odd. It was an odd interaction.

It also applied to, If you take medication for diabetes so the the the actions that chia and flax have on your body It's not like the minute you take it suddenly you're gonna like your blood sugar is gonna crash So just be aware that this is a beneficial interaction that may happen But it I don't know and I could be misspeaking, but I just don't see it being some sort of like black box, red alert

[00:28:26] Tina: Right.

[00:28:27] Leah: interaction.

[00:28:27] Tina: I think the only time I would be really concerned, as in this could be an immediate reaction, is if someone has diverticulosis. There is a chance, when you eat seeds and you have diverticulosis, that a seed gets caught in one of those little Diverticuli. and if that happens, you end up with diverticulitis, which is an inflamed little pocket.

So if you are someone who has diverticulosis and you know it, go slowly and make sure that doesn't incite any symptoms for you. But that's true of any seed. I mean, it could be any, any seed in any plant that does that.

[00:28:57] Leah: I would also say if you're going through treatment and you have been put on a low residue diet, obviously don't include these in your diet. That's probably something the dietitian has talked to you about.

[00:29:07] Tina: There have been weird case reports with flaxseed oil, and as all weird case reports go, it's usually people doing extreme amounts. Um, there was someone who had a rash after taking a lot of the oil, which, you know, it's a plant. And I will say that any plant, people can be allergic to any plant at any time.

So whenever you're taking in, whether it's a new food or it's an herbal medicine, be aware that, you Plants can cause allergies, And so you just have to make sure I always have people go slow in the in the beginning anyways, With these types of things, if you haven't been taking chia seeds or flax seeds, you go slowly.

You don't just suddenly do two tablespoons in a day or start doing massive amounts. Go slow and get your, your GI tract needs to accommodate. And that means the bacteria need to adapt and start, changing. There are populations in there and you actually increase the good gut bacteria, which means that everything improves your digestion should improve your production of vitamins from the other foods that you eat because the bacteria often will convert what you put in your mouth into necessary nutrients for you.

Um, it's a prebiotic, So as a, as a fiber that is taken up by bacteria in the gut, that is the definition of a prebiotic. So these fibers that are found in chia and flax feed your good gut bugs and those good gut bugs do good things for your health. So that's kind of a generalization, but a big way that they contribute to our health.

[00:30:29] Leah: Yeah. Okay, so I am bringing something back. It has been a really long time since We have done one of these. I promised probably last year, drum roll, please. Um, I promised last year that we would come up with a theme song for it. I have not written a theme song, but, um, Tina, I bring you a moment of Woo

I really want a theme song. If someone wants to write us a theme song, please

do.

[00:31:03] Tina: can't we just, like, get AI to do. this now?

[00:31:05] Leah: Oh, probably. But anyways, .

I'll have to look into it.

[00:31:09] Tina: Alright.

[00:31:09] Leah: One, add that to my list. Okay. So I am sure you've heard this from patients, and it's on the internets. I see it. Fairly regularly. Mixing flax oil and cottage cheese cures cancer.

[00:31:27] Tina: The BudVig protocol.

[00:31:29] Leah: Yeah, so I, I hear this from patients. I don't see a harm in someone taking it.

Because cottage cheese has protein and typically patients going through treatment can use the protein, but I don't give them any false hope that this is going to help.

If someone wants to do that in place of treatment, it.

[00:31:48] Tina: Right. I totally agree. Um, I've always said to people, if that's something you want to integrate into your overall integrative therapies that we're putting together, fine. No problem as long as they were tolerant to dairy and that wasn't causing, you know, problems for them. there are supposed to be some compounds, unique compounds that form between the flaxseed oil, and the dairy components, honestly, I haven't looked at this in well over a decade because I had enough people doing it.

This has been around my whole career, I'm going on 25 years now. so nothing happened, right? Nothing happened in either direction. I never noticed anything from it that was good nor bad. Ignored it in that sense of like, it doesn't sound like it does anything, but it.

probably doesn't do anything horrible either.

[00:32:36] Leah: Well, the combination is supposed to help with cellular oxygenation. I looked on, there is a website for the Budwig Center. Um, this has been something that's been around since the 1950s. Um, Joanna. Budwig came up with this, this protocol, there were never any clinical trials done.

This was just her observation. It wasn't just mixing. The flax oil with, it wasn't with cottage cheese at all. It was with quark, which is a fermented milk product. It's kind of like making farmer's cheese. If you've ever made farmer's cheese, which you know, it's kind of like that. So it's not even cottage cheese y'all.

It's quark. Um, but there, yeah, there was some sort of synergistic. Activity that happened by mixing these together, you had to eat it within 20 minutes of making it. You were also doing a plant forward diet. You were not consuming, um, sweets. I believe coffee enemas were part of the protocol. And you would do this several times a day.

You would ingest this several times a day. My favorite part of the protocol that you can add in is The addition of champagne.

[00:33:54] Tina: you know, there's reason right there. Do it.

[00:33:58] Leah: Okay, so She's recommended Dr. Joanna budwig recommended two to three glasses of champagne Especially for patients with brain cancer and those who are low on energy her claim was that champagne And sparkling wine, I think it had to be kava, um, had a positive influence on your intestinal environment.

[00:34:24] Tina: Okay.

[00:34:25] Leah: There also is a claim that the bubbles the properties of the flax go to the brain.

[00:34:33] Tina: Yeah, all that sounds, uh, not super plausible. So here's the thing. Here's the thing. With, with, with all woo, there's always a vein of truth running through it. I don't think that part is the vein of truth. Like there probably is some compound that has some anti cancer effect that worked on, I don't know.

a bacteria, a mouse or something along the way. Like there might be a compound that happens because there's anti cancer compounds in everything we eat. This is the, this is, this is a big issue. And people will take that little piece of information and say like, look at that broccoli contains an anti cancer compound.

if I eat 20 pounds of broccoli, you know, a day that will kill my cancer. And none of that actually works that way. Like, just cause you name a compound anti cancer, it doesn't mean it actually works in the human body at any

[00:35:18] Leah: But the rest of her protocol involved eliminating Bad things from your diet, including vegetables, you know, and good things to your diet. And so her patients may have fared better. I'm not saying they were cured, but they may have fared better because they were

[00:35:38] Tina: that's the vein of truth.

[00:35:39] Leah: eating healthy. I'm going with it. That's what I'm going to go with.

The champagne part. I have no idea, but that definitely piqued my interest. No,

[00:35:47] Tina: saying she had people eat more vegetables, clean up their

[00:35:50] Leah: that's part of the, yeah, that's part of the protocol. The protocol wasn't just you mix the quark and the flax oil and that's it. And you eat that several times a day. No, there was a whole, there, there, there's like, not a huge list, but there's a list of other things that people did, um, being outside, go outside, you know, exercise, walk in the woods, whatever it is.

Like, these are part of the protocol that I don't hear people necessarily incorporating as part of their budwig diet. Um, it is, uh, those things are things that are recommended, To most people for general health, maybe not the coffee enema part, but the, you know, the being outside, increasing vegetables, decreasing refined sugar in foods, you know, all of

[00:36:36] Tina: Mm hmm. Mm

hmm.

[00:36:37] Leah: better for overall health.

[00:36:39] Tina: There's always some truth in these. This is why they're perpetuated, right? There's something that's working. And whether it is real things and part of that protocol, like you were just mentioning, or it's placebo effects, which are strong. I mean, this is. That's the real deal. Your mind can change trajectories. All of it tells me that there's some level of some, something valuable there. But what are the valuable parts and can we pull those out somehow and then do that with the Budwig and then do that with Gerson and then do that with, you know, the Gonzales protocol So you want to pull out the parts that are most likely to be therapeutic and really a lot of it is for show.

to me. A lot of these, a lot of alternative medicine to me is, is like, yeah, it's almost, what's the word they use today? Now it's a, it's a narrative. They create a narrative around their protocol. So is it a giant parasite Like Halda Clark says, all these, there's, there's so many. Um, ways that alternative medicine creates some narrative around some cancer cure. Is it yeast causing all of it? and parts of each of one of them is, has some truth and none of them are fully like jump on board.

You can cure cancer with that protocol right there.

[00:37:53] Leah: you know, I'm disappointed about the champagne part.

[00:37:56] Tina: No. Well, maybe that's that. Maybe that was the best part.

of it. Maybe that's what was working. At least, at least we all are in a good mood, right?

[00:38:05] Leah: I like how it was also specific that it had to be champagne or cava, nothing else.

[00:38:09] Tina: Kava?.

[00:38:10] Leah: That's a Spanish sparkling wine.

[00:38:12] Tina: Oh, I'm like, I'm thinking kava kava when

[00:38:14] Leah: Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no. Cava. C A V A. That's Spanish. It's, uh, There's, cause champagne is only champagne if it comes from the Champagne region of France. Everything else has a different name.

Prosecco's Italy, Cava, anyways. So, I digress. Anyways, that's our, That's our moment of woo. Yeah. Definitely needs music. We gotta, we gotta,

um, need music. I don't want to promise anything. Um,

I was looking back at the, the

Budwig website and it's like sunshine, um, was important too.

[00:38:46] Tina: No argument there, huh?

[00:38:47] Leah: but, um, yeah, and it just basically said that her patients had more energy from doing the protocol.

[00:38:53] leah_sherman, nd, r_raw-audio_tina_& leah only_0099: So I'm thinking protein, sunshine, being outdoors. Vegetables. Less crappy food. her patients felt healthier.

[00:39:01] Tina: Mm hmm.

[00:39:03] Leah: On that note, I'm Dr. Leah Sherman.

[00:39:08] Tina: And I'm Dr. Tina KaKaczor

[00:39:10] Leah: And this is the Cancer Pod.

[00:39:12] Tina: Until next time.