What started this talk? It started in April that was a tweet by Bert Miller from Flashbots about a moonbird that was actually bought for 44 ETH and then immediately sold in one single transaction for 240 ETH and When I saw this I was like wow, this is pretty insane and we Really dived into the topic.  What is MEV? Basically, who can say here what happens if you click like swap on uniswap in a one sentence, maybe transaction gets submitted to the mempool and the technical View is you have the public mempool where you can submit the transaction and in traditional finance You only have like a centralized server and then the transactions get Executed with the public mempool though people can see your transaction and they can insert their own transaction before or even I mean the miner itself can insert the transactions manipulate them block them and Yeah, there's a more technical explanation about like what's different in POS in the last slide, but due time yeah, so basically MEV exists also in like all the auctions It's basically if you skip the auction make a contract with the seller itself in this case the seller is the block space and Yeah, what is an NFT? For me it was kind of interesting to understand that NFT is kind of like the same as an ERC20 token but with the ID that was much more understandable to me than like non fungible token and They're like if you look at Google search volume you will see that like one to ten thousand people Google how to create a ERC20 token each month and Like how people want to create an NFT. It's like ten thousand to hundred thousand people So you could assume that NFTs are like very mainstream and also The the gas if you look at Ethereum is kind of high from NFT project so like open C is always in the like top ten of gas benders you can see a beautiful NFT project on the side and So another question what happens if you like click make a collection bit on a NFT side It doesn't work on every marketplace, but maybe someone knows it but now so basically if you Click and make a collection bit On an NFT marketplace the usually the auction is off-chain, but once the the the the like the Contract gets settled in the mempool people can still like do arbitrage. So let's dive into this rabbit hole So what is an NFT arbitrage? Basically you buy the NFT at one marketplace and you sell it at the other marketplace What what is special about it is in crypto you can do it in a single transaction in one block There's some particular cases about like NFTs and MEV or in general like value extraction so the the Moonberg example is pretty extreme I find and also The Apecoin maybe you've heard of it. They had a token for every NFT holder and there was a Trader who basically lent the NFTs Claimed the tokens and then sold them immediately. So he netted more than like $600,000 I think so what what can we do about it because I mean if you look at the the the life cycle of NFT It's like pretty mainstream and I don't assume like Bill Murray knows like what happens in the mempool and So there's a couple of resources to educate yourselves. There's this like Website MEV tools which shows like also how to like mint an NFT or like submitted transactions through flashbots Which is basically making skipping the mempool. There's other ways you can avoid it, right?  That's basically the reason why So the life cycle of an empty you have the minting process Here it can like lead to gas wars. So I don't know. There was a soccer project that actually had like One million dollars and gas fees and like the NFT mint was like less valuable than like it's crazy, right? And if you like submit a transaction to flashports, and it basically if it fails You would you don't need to pay pay gas. So that's important but also There's been cases where an NFT project might be super successful and people were like bribing the miners to make sure that they minted So even if you're like a normal consumer, you don't have any chance to mint it, right? and the holding time of an NFT I mean it indicates basically if the NFTs are flipped and yeah, the transfer function is basically for like auctions and and Yeah, so what can we do and one one idea is we just fork the ERC 20 ERC 71 Contract and if you think about okay, what is atomic arbitrage? You sell it and buy it in one block So we just simply lock the last transfer and we Block that the ID from being transferred twice per block I mean, it says it's more like it's a very simple solution But yeah, obviously some some contracts might not work with it So what what are what else can we do? What are like conclusions? Yeah? First of all, there's different stakeholders. So the markets They just want to sell the the artist just want to sell the users I mean they want to don't maybe don't spend so much money And if he's a bit like long-tail there's been a case where somebody just wrote a function for I think it was a potato or something and The very the volume is like pretty variable. So it might not be the best trading for like a high volume Trading company and yeah, that's like different resources. We've been working on a extension which shows like MVV activity fishing activity and Yeah, time is over Here's the sources. Thank you so much thanks to Alan Burt Miller and So many more maybe I forgot some and you can find me on Twitter under film friends. Thank you so much


Hello, everybody. Good afternoon and welcome to another episode of Dr. Jill Live. I've got a wonderful special guest who's been a friend for quite a while in these fields of functional integrative medicine. We both teach at A4M. Dr. Jim Bellay, right? Bellay? LaValle. LaValle. My brain today. Thank you. I do want to formally introduce him. James LaValle is an internationally recognized clinical pharmacist, author, board certified clinical nutritionist, an expert and educator in integrative and precision health. James is best known for his expertise in personalized integrative therapies uncovering the underlying metabolic issues that keep people from feeling healthy and vital. He's a thought leader in drug nutrient depletion issues, has published four books and three databases in his area alone. And he has over 35 years of experience integrating natural and integrative therapies into various medical and business models. Latest research drug induced microbiome disruption. We'll have to touch on that. There are so many areas we could go to, but we have our title is like, how do we reinvent the metabolism, especially with nutrients and peptides? And I know, Jim, a lot of, like you probably you see a lot of patients who are really stuck, whether it's toxins or infections causing weight gain or dysmorphic body images and things. So first of all, though, let's start on how did you get into this field? Where was your start? Where was your start? How did you get excited about integrative functional medicine? Tell us your story. Well, you know, it was interesting. I was always in the training. So at age 13, I made my parents take my weight bench in my barbells, you know, on vacation, and I, you know, I refused to go on vacation without it.  I was a scholarship athlete and I, you know, I actually ended up qualifying for the Mr. USA, you know, as bodybuilding. But I felt, I looked incredible. I felt horrible. And I had this rich history of antibiotic use. And I thought a moxa cell was a part of my food plan, like the bubble gum flavored stuff. And then the dime tap was part of the food plan. So when I got to age 21, I was, I was having rashes and wheels and all kinds of reactions going on, feeling tired training. And I was going to a pharmacy school where we had a rich history in botanical medicine. So I, we actually got taught plant medicine, you know, in our pharmacy school training. So I ended up going to a doctor who put me on a rotation diet, cleaned up my gut, helped to work on restoring my diurnal pattern of my adrenals. This is in 1982. Wow. Lucky you. There were many around then, right? All this, this doc was amazing. Dr. Poland, God rest his soul. He was an amazing doctor. And so immediately I got out of pharmacy school and I was behind the counter and I was working in a, you know, actually a clinical setting with the city. And I just, you know what, I got to do more than just talk about medicine to people because I felt the power of nutrition and how it changed my life. And I literally went from, you know, being in a pharmacy program to walking into a doctor's office and saying, hey, I want to do integrated care and I want to start teaching people how to eat better and what nutrients to use. And that's kind of how it got started. I just jumped right in because the water was really good and cold. And so since not basically 1985, I've been full time. I had a practice where we did through three to 400 patients a week, have done programs where we worked on a quarter of a million people through lifetime fitness. And so I'm obviously I'm a little enthusiastic about it now turning 62 next week, feeling pretty pumped about still this area of integrative care, functional health, and really working with people, you know, understanding their chemistry so they can feel the best they can feel, right? That's all we're hoping for for people. Yeah. And I like I said, I want to dive into nutrients and peptides and all that. I love your story, though. And I remember just to be personal, and we met through a program, probably, but all kinds of other lecture areas, but sure we're a mainstay even before I came on the circuit. So I remember listening to your lectures, you know, at the beginning when you started getting there. So we're always great, always, always, always enjoyed that. So it's been a pleasure to learn from you as well. Oh, thank you. Yeah. So no, I mean, I think that when you think about it, most people that we're dealing with their metabolisms are stuck when you got 80% of the populations overweight, 50% of the populations diabetic, you've got all the folks that have the, you know, the surge complex from their biotoxin exposures. And, you know, it's this mix of inflammatory chemistry, hormonal shifts in failures due to stress, sleep, overtraining, whatever, and then hypometabolism. So one of the big areas I wrote, I actually wrote a book on it called Diabetes and Cancer Epidemiologic Links and Molecular Evidence. It's a great bedtime sleep. You have one page, you're out. It was a textbook with Cardiopress, and I felt so fortunate to get asked to write a chapter in it because I really learned about, you know, the big problem with people when they develop, you know, whether it's insurers or whether it's in people that are just flat out insulin resistance, is when you become inefficient with the way your body generates energy, everything slows down. And now I can't burn fat. I don't have energy. You could tell me to eat a lower carb diet, but as soon as I leave your office, even though I really like to, I'm not stopping at the broccoli shop. There's donuts and nachos on the way home and pizza. And when my energy ability to make energy is low, I'm going for the high carb energy, man. I got to have it because I feel so worn out and mung out. So I think for us, it's exciting when we get people to gain their vitality back. And at the cellular level, at the mitochondrial level, we restore that 38 packets of energy coming through oxfoss versus that two packets of energy that occurs through glycolysis when you shut down the ability of your body to utilize sugar efficiently. So anyway, I thought I'd introduce kind of, hopefully, how we can apply peptides and nutrients and that construct. Perfect. Because I see so many people coming in and I obviously deal with a lot of mold and sears illness. So that's one big component, this chemical toxicity that poisons the mitochondria and burning capacity causes. But let's talk through, so say we have an average, could be male or female, but say for just for an example, we have a 45 year old female who comes in and says, I've just gained 20 pounds. I've not really done anything different. What could be the problem? Take us through like the areas we might look at, because one of the things I hear all the time, and I'm sure you do too, it's probably my thyroid. Well, probably 90% of the time, sadly, we wish it's that easy, right? It's not the thyroid. That is one thing that affects us like the gas pedal on metabolism, but usually with the stuff we're talking about, that's not it. So what other things would you look at? And let's talk through that kind of case of what you would, how you would start. Let's build to the complexity of it, right? So the first step you look at, the very first step for me is what's your cortisol pattern like and what's your sleep pattern like? So that's one, because when we flatten our cortisol curve, when we lose the diurnal pattern of cortisol, meaning for those out there listening, cortisol goes up, supposed to go down in the middle of the day, go down some more in the evening, then go down at night. When we keep stuck in sympathetic overdrive or excess sympathetic tone, too many fight or fight chemicals, what starts to happen is that because with the event of cortisol creates more inflammatory cytokines like interleukin 6, for example, and IL-6 turns off your insulin receptor. So right away, your insulin receptors start to retract back into the cell membrane, and now you have to produce more insulin. And when I produce more insulin, lots of things start to happen. Chronic inflammatory chemistry starts to occur because more adrenaline pumps because of that insulin. I start to store fat beautifully, right? I'm getting really efficient at doing that.  And they just look at you and go, oh, I'm fine until four o'clock. I get home and I look for the laze bag because I'm going to hug that potato chip bag and tell them I love it. And that's because when we, right, it's because we got 40% of the population with some sort of dopamine SNP issue, at least one allele for dopamine. And that means when I get under chronic stress, I'm going to need reward. And reward is not broccoli.  No, wait, I'm going to eat two. No, wait a second. I don't like even numbers.   So stress causes issues around insulin regulation, fat storage, obviously more pushed towards sympathetic tone and your immune system getting activated. But then it also starts to trigger things like appetite. And then that also pushes into how we get a disturbed sleep pattern. And so when we have a disturbed sleep pattern, now that contributes to weight gain, obviously, because our brain doesn't get that, that rejuvenation cycle that it needs in order to reset the diurnal pattern for how the beta cells of your islets of longerhorns release insulin for the next 24 hours. So a lot of people don't realize that when your melatonin cycle was off, that is actually what creates the next 24 hour beta cell action from your pancreas to regulate insulin, right? So right away, cortisol, sleep, insulin, right? Very easy. Now, we can extend that what's your diet like, right? So when somebody comes in and say, I'm 20 pounds, I haven't changed my diet. Well, sure, maybe you weren't eating right all along. And now it's just caught up with you, right? So we have to talk about, well, what's what, how are you eating? And you know, I'm not, look, I've, you know, I obviously, on the advisory board for folks that, you know, with Prolon, I get the fasting limit diet stuff, I'm into time restricted eating, I understand all that. But in the end, I mean, we both know, I don't think there's any one diet that works for everyone. I think there's people should eat more plant food. And then as long as you're not sensitive to it, long as your guts not broken down, they're not having allergies to it. So, so if I have to think through the next step of why I gain weight, well, maybe your guts broken down. I want to say something really quick here, when I come back to the gut, but this is relevant, like you said, that first of all, then there's no diet that fits once, once I say it's all. So anyone out there who's saying, this diet is going to work for everyone. Don't listen, because it's not true. You and I personalized diet is so key, because each person is different. Number two, I love fasting in the right person. But I have seen, like you said, I want to actually make clear here, patients who have, you know, flatline cortisol or women who are in the changes of either post pregnancy or menopause, some of these categories, and I see women more than men, they don't do well with fasting. They maybe already have or they already have low hypoglycemic tendency. So I love that you said that because I'm a huge fan of that for the right category. And I think men in general do the physiology better than women. But I've been speaking out more and more because I hear a lot of, you know, books out there and new things out there about everybody should be fasting. Everybody should be intermittent fasting and not everybody should be right. Because if you have a flatline, like almost adversonian person, they are not going to do well on a fasting mimicking diet. Well, I always have said so time restricted eating, I think is funny because when I was a kid, I came up in an ethnic family, right? Very Italian. And you know, Jimmy, we have breakfast at seven, we got lunch at noon, you have dinner by 530.  It's a 1212 setup. That's the way we used to eat. And now we're making a big deal out of, yes, we've known the Chinese knew this, right? If you look at Shen cycles in Chinese medicine, it was clear that night was when your body repaired and you weren't to feed because the energy to utilize that food could not be utilized for repair cycles. And now we're finding out that that was completely true. The Chinese figured it out in TCM. So it's so bright on. And I also think one of the big things I try to work with people is try to get them to understand that it's not normal to have to be on, I'm on a modified ketogenic vegan FODMAP diet and I use gaps on top. So basically I can have water and occasionally a twig. We don't want that because our next topic is the gut and you and I know diet is starving the microbiome for a purpose for a limited time.  So no, that's it. And I'm really big about trying to get people to understand we need to get you back to as much diversity as possible. And yes, look, I'm somebody that can't tolerate cows dairy. I mean, that's what got me sick, my whole childhood, why I had ear infections, why I had sinus problems. But my whole childhood, I got a milkshake every night from my dad who worked a 12 hour day to bring me a milkshake to show me he loved me and I was sick. You're like all year round.  Oh my goodness. So you know, I think it's important for us to help people understand our goal is to get you back to normalcy. And the gut is important because look, there's a lot of ways that your gut can get permeable. A lot of drug therapies 24% of the drugs on the market are thought to disrupt the microbiome. That's our latest database that we're researching. We did all the research on drug and do that's huge. That's crazy. And look, it's not just the antibiotics, right? It's not just oral contraceptives. It's not just the PPIs. It's statins. It's metformin. So everybody thinks, oh, metformin, the greatest anti-aging drug, right? And I'm not saying it's not a fantastic drug and there's some value when you look at longevity medicine. But once again, when we look at people as individuals, we have to understand, was it going to be right for me? What's it doing to my gut microbiome? Am I getting a loose stool from it? What's my methylmalonic acid look like when I met metformin for a year? You know, a lot of times we don't do that. We just hear the highlights and then we start using it. And we should be digging deeper to just understand. Where am I going? I had a close, close experience with that. And 20 years ago when I breast cancer, I had three drug chemotherapy, which no surprise that chemo drugs could induce impermeability. But cytoxin, one of the drugs that I took, absolutely in the research, it shows maybe it's anti-cancer effect is by increasing permeability, stimulating immune function, right? So I had that drug and I chose to. And that was the right thing for me for the cancer. But within six months after I was diagnosed with Crohn's disease. And again, we don't have to go into my story, but it's relevant because I basically induced permeability to a higher degree. I didn't know I had celiac. I was eating a gluten-full diet. I had NOD2, which is a high risk for Crohn. So I had the perfect score for permeability to create another autoimmune disease. And again, just relevant to what you're saying, because a lot of drugs we don't think about. Like I wouldn't have thought about that as a creating a more permeable gut, but it did. And it's very, very real. Many, many drugs do that. Well, and there's a lot of people on PPIs. There's a lot of people on statins, anti-psychotics. I actually have, I just wrote a little e-book on that. I mean, I'll even share it with you. So because I got all the latest research on it, I'll be glad to send it to you. So the other thing is, is that you can get it from a TBI.  And people don't realize that these are the kind of things that are happening that, yes, the gut bone is connected to the brain bone. And it's also understanding that this is a really important thing. A lot of times people go, oh, what in doubt, begin with a gut. And I'm kind of good with that. That's what happened with me. It's how I got into this. But I also know that you can work on your gut forever. And if you're anxious, or you're depressed, or you perseverate, or you've got a lot of excess stress on you, and you're not doing things to countermeasure that, you're going to stay with a leaky gut, and you're just going to develop new food allergens as you rotate the old ones out. And you never get to the bottom of it.  You take out corn, soy, gluten, dairy, egg, sugar, alcohol, right? Like that's so common. Not a bad idea because what you're doing is taking the load off the immune system temporarily, giving your buddy time to rest and not be totally overstimulated so that you can heal that gut. But what you and I are both saying is you don't want to be in a completely restricted diet forever because you're going to starve some of those good microbiome components and all these other things, meds, chemicals. So how does the gut and weight and metabolic function connect?  Do you want to go into a little bit about how could people have guts and have weight gain? Like how does that connect? So it ends up that when your gut is starting to get starved, one, and when you're reducing blood flow too, and you're killing off good bacteria, the gram negative bacteria in particular, what starts to happen is that you circulate endotoxin, circulating endotoxin. And here is circulating endotoxin or lipopolysaccharide actually attaches to all your organs and triggers NF-Kappa-B. So it triggers cellular inflammatory signaling. So even for autoimmune thyroid, they're now showing that the lipopolysaccharide receptors on your thyroid is actually probably what's starting the triggering of autoimmune thyroid. So the gut gets leaky. Now your liver and your lymph are supposed to get rid of that lipopolysaccharide. The liver gets congested, it can't. The lymph is already overloaded with too many, you know, debris as byproducts of metabolism.  And so what they find is that you get microglioactivation, neuroinflammatory response, and then a change in your allostasis of how your hypothalamus and pituitary are signaling all the aspects of your metabolism, like adrenal, thyroid, and pancreas relationships. And that's kind of how the gut starts to really kind of weave its way. It's almost a metastatic model for obesity, if you want to think of it that way, right? The chemicals are covered from the gut, right? And they're going everywhere. And so that's how it's a big issue. So when that woman is 45, it's okay. We've got gut, cortisol, sleep, blood sugar, stress.  Have you been on oral contraceptives? You know, what's your estrone like? You know, how are, what type of estrogens are you making? You know, are there any other drug therapies that may have lowered or reduced the nutrients you need? For example, for your thyroid to function. And it's not just, do I have tyrosine and do I have iodine? Do you have enough chromium? Do you have enough ferritin? Because you need ferritin to make your thyroid hormone bind to the cell and cause that action of oxidative phosphorylation and burn fat. So it, you know, it's always amazing for me because I think it's incredibly easy. My brother was 476 pounds. My, my mother was obese. My father was a type two diabetic. It was obese.  I'm into it, you know, but if I didn't do that, if all I did was go out and ate what I wanted, I'd be kind of big. So, so I think it's important for people to realize, I think it's easier and easier because of the, what you said to start our discussion, environmental burden, look at pesticides, right? Pesticides. Jim, like that's the thing, I know you see this as well, but that's the thing that's exponentially increasing. And I really think even why we fared so poorly in the pandemic was because our toxic load is so weighting our immune system, weighting our metabolic system. Let's just talk just a brief bit about that. If you are overweight or trying to lose weight, how do you deal with the toxic burden in that? Cause that's a big piece of the puzzle, isn't it? Yeah, it really is.  Regular exercise, even walking can be helpful. I mean, those are, that's great. And you know what, for some people, if they're not, if they don't have the money or they're not going to someone, look to start out by cutting gluten and dairy out and count your carbs that you're currently eating and just try to cut it in half and see if you notice a change in your metabolism. And that can be beneficial. Now, I understand that some people are hypoglycemic. So you always have to say, well, how do I feel when I cut down some carbs? Am I getting dizzy? Am I getting lightheaded? You know, what's going on? Well, in that case, then I start to think about where your insulin receptors might not be working well. And the number one nutrient associated with the development of insulin resistance is magnesium. And so a couple of the things I like to get on the nutrient side is get magnesium on board, get chromium on board, get B vitamins on board, because those are all nutrients that can help you to make that insulin receptor work better, just like alpha lipoic acid can as well. You know, if you want to get into the world of peptides, there's a couple of very cool peptides, right? Yeah, transition peptides. I love peptides. You're going to have me running around the world here. So I think on the peptide side, MOTC, so MOTSC is a mitochondrial peptide that helps with creating more mitochondria within your cell, which is what disappears.  So that means you don't have any powerhouses, right? So that's the first thing. So MOTSC, what it does is it helps to kind of boost and trigger getting those mitochondria back in the cell, driving energy production. And then more importantly, it helps the insulin receptors to also start to open back up. Because of course, when the mitochondria work, your cells start to work. Now, real popular for people using things like semi-glutide nowadays. So semi-glutide or the trade name Mozambique, but compounding pharmacies are using semi-glutide, a GLP1 agonist, which is going to help you with that, you know, glucose disposal and utilization. The trick on that one is I like using Ipermorellin and CJC1295, which is a basically a growth hormone secretodide. Because it also that ghrelin stimulus helps you to keep from getting nauseous from the semi-glutide. And I have like you, what I found is that the left resistance with Sears and mold is so tricky. I think it's one of the hardest ones to overcome. And that GPL1 agonist is very effective for left in resistance. It's off label. So just know your interest is not going to cover this, it's off label usage. However, it works. Exactly. Well, and if you get it from compounders, it's about a quarter of the cost of you know, getting the trade name. And so, and then using that the Ipermorellin, why do I think that's important? Well, you know, a lot of people when you're as your free cortisol goes up, you inhibit gonadotropin releasing hormone and growth hormone releasing hormone. So Ipermorellin and CJC help when you've had people that have flattened their cortisol curve, they're hyper-vigilant, they're not releasing growth hormone like they should. And I'm not a big fan of elevated IGF ones. I'm a fan of effective IGF one. I couldn't agree more. 121.60. Yeah. Yeah. And I almost never prescribed growth hormone by itself because I feel like it's too suppressive on the axis. Like I feel like you can get a better job with peptides without suppressing the natural production. That's exactly right. And you re-kickstart it in people that have suppressed it due to their stress response, their allostatic load, and then on the other side for gonadotropin releasing hormone, chispeptin. Now, of course you could use HCG, but chispeptin is an interesting peptide, actually in fertility. I mean, I've had a few women here recently where we've used chispeptin that have had a very difficult time getting pregnant and within three to four cycles, they're pregnant, and which is very, very exciting. So I think what I like about peptides is that I think for those of us that are really looking for another tool in our toolbox, it allows us to kind of reconnect those broken enzymatic communications that have stopped people from maintaining homeostasis, right? They're broken. So they never can quite get the homeostasis. They've always got a little bit of dysfunctional metabolism. They're making too many inflammatory compounds, misfolded proteins are starting to aggregate. All this little stuff just keeps coming. I like peptides because we start to create this signaling ability to get people, you know, for their chemistry to remember, oh, this is how I was supposed to function. I love that because that's exactly, again, with the sears and the mold, unless it's real, first of all, I say we have to detox first because your body's doing what it's supposed to do and dilution is a solution to pollution. So you put on some weight so you protect that excess toxicity.  And it just is the way it is. I say about six months minimum, right? Do you agree there and then start the weight loss app? I mean, not that I totally agree with you. No, I've seen so many people were until you get their inflammation signaling down due to whether it's their sears or their or whatever toxic metals.  I find platinum in them, right? They're storing platinum in their bone and you got to get it out, right? So you got to get that stuff out. And it's almost as if when they hit this waterfall, if you've got enough of the inflammogens out of their body and all of a sudden, I lost weight this month. It's been four months. It's been six months. I'm starting to feel it. I'm not feeling puffy anymore, right? They're not feeling all that histamine fluid retention, right? And I think for sure that that's a key thing. No, I totally agree. And I love that you say that because it's always hard to tell them because they commend they want weight loss, right? And then we find the whole illness that there's toxic metals or there's another infection. And I always hate saying I'm so sorry, but it's going to be almost impossible. It's actually not in your best interest to start weight loss before you detox. Because what happens is this might be some experience for those of you listening. I'd love to ask your opinion, Jim, on this. When you lose weight loss, when you're very toxic, you can actually get much sicker because you have less dilutional effect. And so your chemical load is actually higher per square inch of your body. And people can get really sick. And then they often either gain the weight back or they say, I felt terrible. What's your thoughts on that if we lose weight too soon in the process when they're toxic? Well, I mean, I think there's several layers to that. I think first of all, you're exactly right.   And then for example, if you're, you're in acidic, if you're acidotic, you're not going to get rid of that through your kidneys.  And so I think there's several layers to that that you have to unpack for people because absolutely, they have to realize. For me, I always tell people, I want to lose weight slow. And I want to do it so that we're restoring your health. Because most weight loss programs, 30% of their weight loss is actually lean mass. And muscle is the metabolism of a, it's, it's our, it is our currency of metabolism. If we're going to age gracefully, we need to retain our lean mass. And when you don't lose weight correctly and you create a loss of lean mass, you're going against everything that is going to promote your longevity and your repair. If you're going through, you know, I've, you've been obese. And I took my brother from 467 to 285.   What else would you do? So say someone comes in and their primary goal is weight loss, but we may see toxin, we may see gut issues, whatever else. What would you do with the workup as far as suggestion for testing? Would you do stool? Would you do organic acids? Would you do, what would you do for kind of a basic for weight loss as a primary complaint, but you're wanting to check nutrients and these other things? Yeah, me too. Sure. So I mean, I always like, look, whenever I can get a digestive stool, I like it. If they have any kind of complaint, GI tract at all, of anything. If they're pretty resilient, you're saying, Hey, my bowel movements are good. I get absolutely no bloating, no gas. They stick their tongue out. It's not geographic. It's not coated.  They're not malabsorbent. All right, maybe I don't do the stool test right away, but I definitely start with, you know, I get, you know, all the standard things you would do.  I even like times being able to get stuff like collecting three in older men, because collecting three is showing kind of a systemic inflammatory response. It can be, you know, creating a lot of fibrosis, right? And then in addition to that, you know, obviously glucose and insulin, and I, you know, I have to get, you know, everything that's related to that. I like to look at red blood cell magnesium, red blood cell zinc. Sometimes I'll look at CoQ10 if they're on, if they're on meds that are depleting CoQ10 or if they're over the age of 45, I look at CoQ10 because if you're low in CoQ10, it's hard getting the mitochondria functioning. Obviously folate and B12. And then if, and then I love getting a salivary or urinary cortisol as well, then of course, all of their hormones, including, you know, four men, estradiol and astrone, and yes, DHT, and yes, testosterone, and yes, sex hormone by the guideline. And then I like advanced, I actually like advanced lipid markers. And the reason I like advanced lipid markers is I can see how much metaflamation is taking place, right? So the term metaflamation is dyslipidemia, loss of muscle mass. I like to look at ferritin and iron because you see where people have adequate iron, but they don't store their ferritin. That's because of inflammatory signaling, down-regulating ferroportin. And so you'll see that a lot with people where they're, wait a second, your iron's really good, but you've got no ferritin. That tells you they have metabolic inflammation underlying. And so I'm looking for those kind of traits, even looking at a mean platelet volume, mean platelet volume, it's on every lab test you get. Nobody looks at it. When it's elevated, that is a marker for metabolic inflammation. So I'm looking for all those kinds of things in my initial workup. And then I start to refine the process of what did you, you know, have you been in any kind of water damage buildings? You know, is there a serious component? What do I think of toxic mental possibilities? Typically, if I'm looking at organic acids, I'm actually more interested in like what's going on in the 2-3-IDO pathway and managing the mood of that person that's obese. Because the one thing I've learned, I mean, we did a weight loss program for a quarter of a million lives with lifetime fitness because they weren't getting people to lose weight.  And I also interviewed a huge clinic, Million Patient Chart Lives, and they always wanted to come back and get their biphetamine. Why? Because their focus wasn't good when they didn't take the biphetamine. So low dopamine and their cravings were out of control. So I always like looking at that 2-3-IDO pathway and finding out, hey, where's your kenyarinic acid? Where's your where's your quinolinic acid? And then more importantly, if they do have candida, I know because of their out of hydroxidase, they're holding histamine and they're also making more phenols in their brain. So the out of hydroxidase ends up creating problems. They make beta-carboline and salicicin on their brain instead of dopamine and serotonin. So I'm big on getting that brain right so that they're clear-headed and not craving. Yes. Oh, I love that because that's really one of the course too. It's this behavioral piece, but it's often granted. I mean, we do have free will and choice, but there's so many times when that met metabolism, methamerocansminers drive and they really are kind of a victim to their neurotransmitters. So I love that you say that because some people, they can really be trying hard and they have no dopamine or they have no serotonin and it's going to really mess with what they're eating, right? I love that. That's exactly right. I mean, for the biggest time for me, people, you know, I would hear it over and over again.  So we did preconception care, bio-dentical hormone.  And the self-esteem issues around, oh, I just can't control that craving pattern. I'm bad. I just don't want it bad enough.  And I think it's really important for people to understand that most of the time, for me, if it's, okay, I've got an overload of toxins, it's pesticides, it's metals, it's biotoxins. Okay, that's one category. Two, it's stress. Three, it's diet. Four, it's drug history. And a lot of times now it's people that are over-training. I've got people that are over-training and can't lose weight. So, you know, that, that's another area. That didn't used to be the case 20 years ago when I was doing this. Nobody was over-training, right? I mean, everybody was kind of on the team. But now we got, I'm doing the Spartan, I'm doing the Ragnar, I'm doing the Ragnar-Spartan combined. You know, I got all these people that are training like professional athletes. And I always share just a little of my, one of my stories is that probably about four or five years ago, I had been doing high-intensity interval running, like very high-intensity sports. And that was my whole life because I was like a dopamine cortisol-driven kind of person. But then when I hit about 40, yeah, surprise, surprise, oh, then I hit about 40. And I had the mold and I was inflamed and like things weren't working. I was losing muscle, gaining fat, gaining inflammation. And literally one of my really smart trainers told me, take 30 days off. I don't want to do any but walk.  But I'll tell you what, Jim, in that, like next six months, I lost 8% body fat. And I became the healthiest shape I've ever been in by basically stopping my workout regimen. Now I do weight training. I do walking. I do hiking. I don't workout like I used to anymore, not at all. Because when that shift in my hormones and cortisol and everything happened, it made me realize it's not, again, we think that we have to go do it. I was doing six, seven days a week. So completely overtraining for me at that stage in life. And I saw none of this was taught in medical school, right? Like I, I should have had a knowledge about that.  But for me at that age, and my life, it was overtraining. So I love that you said that because I learned. Absolutely. Yeah. Well, I mean, I've worked with cortisol. Well, I've got athletes in all five major league sports that work with spec ops.  And then the other half is just dealing with everyday folks and their problems. And a lot of people don't realize the difference between a professional athlete and someone who isn't, it's their nervous system. It's not how much muscle they have on them. It's how resilient their nervous system is to the stress. And if they can reset it, and for most of us, when we push ourselves out hard, just like what you say, your cortisol goes up under, out of control, you start to lose lean mass, you start to sore fat. And I'm, I'm a big fan of trying to get people to just look, just start moving, be moderate.  I mean, I love to hit it hard.  I got to get to 70, you know, I'm eight years away. I love that though, because it does change in our age categories to like 20s and 30s. That was perfect for me. But then when I hit 40, it was, I really needed to change. And like you said, I love that you mentioned that because at that time in life, I was recovering from mold illness. I was running a full time clinic. So because all the other mass stresses in my life were raising cortisol, I didn't need exercise to do the same thing. Like I needed exercise.  That's right. What's all about balance, right? In the end, it's about how do I, how do I create this chemistry that says adequate rest? And I love that people are using whoops. I mean, hey, aren't you happy that now we know what time it is to breathe? Exactly. I could, I didn't realize it. That's my aura ring, right? Like the moment I wake up, I want to, how did I sleep? Duh, I slept great, but like I have to know the daddy. Yeah. Well, what was cool about it, honestly, I mean, I think it's unfortunate that honestly, people don't breathe.  But I love it when people do their aura or whoops now or, or any, any wearable device because they're going, oh, I drank two cocktails. I didn't have a good night's sleep or, oh, I ate that piece of pie or, oh, I had that gluten. And wow, look at the way it affected me. So I love that for weight management as well, because it gets people aware of what's keeping them in tune with themselves and what's getting them out of tune, right? I think all those things are important when you're trying to get people to lose weight, when you're, even when you're using a peptide, if you're using a peptide at bedtime and you notice your, your, your REM and your deep sleep are off, well, maybe you need to change that, that, that dosing time up, right? So it's, it really is, I think an interesting, effective tool that will, you know, will continue to evolve our ability to apply it, but it's, it's pretty interesting. It is. I love that. I just told a family member who's kind of pre-diabetic to get a continuous glucose monitor, and it changed his life as far as seeing, oh, when I eat this, it does this or when I have an extra drink or, you know, so it was really helpful. Wow, Jim, we have covered a lot. No surprise. I knew we would. What's, what's any last bit of wisdom you would give to someone who's like stuck? I mean, obviously they need to find a good integrated functional, someone who can really test and treat, but say they're on their own. Is there like a first step you kind of talk about, maybe sleep or what would be your first kind of bit of advice for someone who's stuck out? My first bit of advice would be, first of all, don't give up and feel you're stuck. Search for answers that can change your life. And those can come at the most crazy places if you open yourself up to it.  But I think it's so important for people to understand. And this is something I say to my clients and my patients all the time. Your health is, you're the one that's empowered to change it, first of all. But most importantly, it's going to be work. It's work, but it's worth it. Because every little bit that you regain makes you appreciate what it's like to feel better rather than feel worse. And I think it's so important for people, even when you're feeling it, I know there's serious patients that, you know, man, they're having seizures and they're having electrical shocks and they're anxious and they've gain weight and they can't go into a building. I get it because I have those kind of folks too. So it's just important though that we give them hope and that we give them something to anchor on to. And if you're that person, I went through that when I was, you know, passing out after I ate and I'd have, you know, wheels the size of a football on my leg, look for those answers and don't give up. That's probably my number one step for people. I love that. And I love that. One thing I think we can both say, we're in, I feel like I'm in my 40s and I am in my best health that I've ever been in, better than 20s and 30s. And I feel like you could probably say the same thing where you're at. So there's hope, even as we age, that we can be in better and better health, not declining. Well, aging is a disease in my opinion. Let's fight back. Yeah, exactly. Thank you so much for your time. I know you're so busy and we're honored to have you here. Thank you again so much. Thank you, Joey. That was a pleasure. It really was.


Even though mainstream news pundits don't want to admit this, everyone can see Bernie Sanders is the frontrunner. The pundits in mainstream media know it and certainly the 2020 Democratic Party presidential contenders know it, hence why they have been attacking Bernie Sanders relentlessly as of late. Even though it may make us angry that they're attacking somebody who's fighting for justice, it's a good sign because it shows that we're winning and they have to attack him because they have no choice if they want to win. So we've seen Joe Biden attack Bernie and say that he has never gotten anything done or he doesn't get things done. We see people to judge ramping up the attacks on Medicare for All. We even see innocent little Elizabeth Warren going after her friend Bernie Sanders after previously saying, I'm with Bernie. Well look, things get ugly during the primary process and the attacks are always going to be directed at the frontrunner and this upcoming debate is probably going to be pretty brutal for Bernie Sanders. Because he's gaining a lot of momentum as he continues to rack up these wins. Now somebody who also decided to go after Bernie Sanders is Mike Bloomberg who is arguably one of the frontrunners. He hasn't won a single state yet, but he's spending hundreds of millions of dollars and after Super Tuesday, he can stay in the race all the way until the convention and never has to worry about running out of money. So I don't know if Mike Bloomberg is going to be a real contender, but he's a threat that we absolutely should take seriously. And like all the other Democrats, he is now directing his fire towards Bernie Sanders, but he is not just directly attacking Bernie Sanders. What he's trying to do is craft this victim narrative and suggest that, no, he's not attacking Bernie. He's just responding to the attacks of Bernie Sanders because understand this, you don't ever really want to be perceived as an aggressive candidate because when you attack someone, it can bring down their numbers, but simultaneously your numbers tend to go down as well, historically at least. So he doesn't want to directly attack because he is kind of creeping into that third place status and he doesn't want to lose that. So he's trying to position himself to attack Bernie, but not make his numbers go down as well. He doesn't want to be perceived as aggressive. So we all know he put out the, you know, attack at against Bernie Sanders supporters. And on top of that, he released this email titled Bernie's new bro Donald Trump. Now, before we read this, let's just pause and reflect on that headline. Bernie's new bro Donald Trump. Mike Bloomberg is literally friends with Donald Trump. They've been friends for years. He was on The Apprentice with Donald Trump. They've been friends for years. They're old golfing buddies. So that is a really, I guess we'll say interesting line of attack. And Bernie is going to utterly dismantle this, but let's just hear him out and read this email. In response to repeated attacks by Bernie Sanders, his spokespeople and supporters today, Mike Bloomberg 2020 responded against baseless charges espoused online in Prince and on TV. Quote, it's a shameful turn of events to see Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump deployed the very same attacks and tactics against Mike. But the reason is clear. At this point, the primary is Bernie's to lose and ours to win. Bernie knows this. Trump knows this. That's why they are united in the campaign against Mike said Bloomberg 2020 campaign manager Kevin Sheekey. Now we'll get to some of these quote unquote attacks by Bernie Sanders people and supporters. But like he's trying to say that Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump are attacking Mike Bloomberg in the same way. What is Donald Trump doing to attack Mike Bloomberg? He's calling him mini Mike and making fun of his height. What is Bernie Sanders team doing to attack Mike Bloomberg? They are correctly stating that he is an oligarch who's trying to buy this election. And he's also racist. So I mean, different tactics here. Nonetheless, he's saying that they're the same. And these are the attacks that he takes issue with quote. In the past week, Bernie Sanders, National Press Secretary Brianna Greyjoy, senior advisor David Serota and national campaign co-chair Nina Turner have referred to Mike as a racist and an oligarch. Both true.  All true. So if you call him a racist, if you call him an oligarch, both accurate claims objectively true. That's an attack. You can't point out facts against me. Otherwise I will take offense to it. Now, if I'm like Bloomberg's team, like it's indisputable, he is an oligarch. He's also racist. But if I'm like Bloomberg rather than whining about it and crying about these attacks, I'm going to own it. I'm going to say, look, yeah, I'm an oligarch. But guess what? Donald Trump is also an oligarch and I have basically unlimited money. So if you truly want to beat Donald Trump, you need an oligarch to take on Donald Trump. I will spend billions of my own money to defeat him.  That's what it's going to take to defeat him. Now that may not resonate with a lot of people, but for Democrats who are absolutely worried about electability that could get them to come on board. But instead, he's choosing to play this role as I'm the victim and they called me an oligarch.  So these are the specific quotes that he takes issue with. This one is from Brianna Greyjoy.  This is in response to audio revealing that he is explicitly racist. And this from Nina Turner. Oligarch of the Month, Michael Bloomberg. And also from Brianna Joy Gray. We have no reason to believe Bloomberg's newfound political commitments. He has demonstrated a willingness to change his stripes with the political wins and because he's self-funded, literally accountable to no one, the danger he presents cannot be overstated. Another one from Brianna. Trump will say he has a better record on criminal justice than Bloomberg and he may be right. Absolutely correct. This from David Sirota. I'm told Mike Bloomberg isn't an oligarch. He's just a billionaire who buys elections and is a part-time resident of a foreign tax haven. Also correct. And finally from Nina Turner. I may not have a PhD yet, but I do have the good sense of knowing what makes for oligarchy. Anyone caping for a billionaire with a media company able to buy endless ads and influence party rules halfway through is precisely a perpetrator of the corrupt system, i.e. an oligarch. Now in response to all of these quote-unquote attacks, the email reads, these attacks are unacceptable. All Democrats should focus on the critical task of choosing a candidate that can compete against Donald Trump and win. In the face of the most consequential election of our lifetimes, it is unfortunate that we are even talking about such slanderous attacks from other Democrats. And we do have some live footage of Mike Bloomberg reacting to all of these vicious attacks. I've cried like that since Titanic. You and me. No one's ever going to break us apart. So look, these are factual statements. Mike Bloomberg is a racist, Mike Bloomberg is an oligarch. Pointing these out doesn't inherently make them vicious attacks. It just means that they are giving you the blunt truth about Michael Bloomberg. And if you truly want to be Donald Trump, then running a racist oligarch isn't the best strategy because what you need to do to beat Trump is turn out the base. Make sure that people are excited and galvanized and ready to come out and support someone they believe in. Do you honestly believe that the Democratic Party base is going to be excited about Michael Bloomberg? A former Republican who supported George W. Bush and the Iraq War, who's made recently transphobic and racist comments, who defended Stop and Frisk.  Yes, I get he has money and you need money to beat Donald Trump. But guess what? Hillary outspent him by what a two-to-one margin and still lost. So maybe money isn't everything. Maybe you need a base who believes in the candidate that they're coming out to vote for. Otherwise, they might not vote at all. But I mean, this is strategy. Mike Bloomberg, again, he needs to find some way to defend himself or at least deflect. And he wants to attack Bernie Sanders, who is the frontrunner, but he can't do that directly. Otherwise, he's going to hurt his own numbers. So he has to cry victim. He has to make it seem as if he isn't attacking. He's not going on the offense if he's just defending himself and counter punching. Except he's really showing how clueless he and his well-paid staff is. Because look at that headline again. It says Bernie's new bro, Donald Trump. Yeah, about that. So Bernie Sanders responded to that email and he absolutely obliterated Mike Bloomberg. And he did this by not saying anything, by just putting this picture next to that email. And that's all he needs to do. You are going to seriously claim that Bernie and Donald Trump are friends when you have literally been friends with Donald Trump for years. And I mean to call these attacks by Bernie's team, Trumpian. No, you're the Trumpian one because like Donald Trump, you're self-funding your campaign. You're accountable to not a single person. You have no grassroots donors, nobody. And you're friends with Donald Trump.  So it's just, it's a laughable attack. And I don't know who he thinks he can convince here. Maybe, you know, he doesn't think he can convince anyone. Maybe by going after the front-runner strategically speaking, you know, he's making it seem like he's the best positioned to take on Donald Trump. Because, you know, if Bernie Sanders cares about Mike Bloomberg and Bernie's team is attacking Mike Bloomberg, well then maybe it's the case that everyone should be worried about him. Maybe even Donald Trump should be worried about him. But we just talked about this. Donald Trump claimed I'd rather run against Bloomberg than Bernie Sanders because there's no support with Bloomberg there. He's just buying his way into third place. The only people who are supporting Mike Bloomberg are ignorant about the fact that propping him up and supporting him, they are basically cheering on the collapse of democracy. As we devolve into oligarchy, they're okay with it because they think that he can be Donald Trump. Well, I mean, what are some of the biggest criticisms of Donald Trump? He is racist. He's authoritarian. He's sexist. I mean, everything that you can say about Donald Trump is also true about Mike Bloomberg. So all of the Democrats' criticisms of Trump is true of Bloomberg. So you can't possibly think that running him against Trump is a good idea. And the fact that so many Democrats are coming out to endorse Mike Bloomberg, it's just, it's embarrassing. Any Democrat who supports Mike Bloomberg should be primaried. They should be out of politics forever because they're showing that they have the capacity to be bought. And they don't care about policy. They don't care about democracy. They don't mind that our country is devolving into an oligarchy. If you want to even claim that it's Democratic at all, they don't care. They're just about maintaining their own careers and Mike's got the money. That's why they're supporting Mike. So look, this is embarrassing. I'm really glad that Bernie Sanders responded to this. Don't let this oligarch take advantage of you. Don't be dissuaded from criticizing him and calling out his racism and Islamophobia because he did surveil the Muslim community in New York.   I mean, what happened to all of that? It's just a joke. So Mike Bloomberg has absolutely got to be stopped. But, you know, he's communicating to us that it's going to be a little bit easier to stop him than we thought, even if he has all this money, because he is tone deaf. He's so out of touch with normal Americans. And if this is all that you've got, saying that Bernie and Trump are best friends when you're literally besties with him, not going to be so tough. We just have to make sure that we get the word out in spite of all the money that he's spending to prop himself up.