House Call With Dr. Hyman

“Dr. Hyman, I’ve heard so much contradictory information about omega 3 fats,” writes this week’s house call. “Some studies show they help everything while others argue they don’t do much of anything. What’s the real story here?”

As I often say, food is information, not just calories. Food influences gene function, hormones, your immune system and even your gut flora. Literally, food controls every function within your body.

This is especially true with the omega-3 fatty acids found in foods like wild fish, flaxseeds and walnuts.

These fatty acids play critical roles in cognitive development and learning, visual development, immune strength, fighting inflammation, pregnancy, brain health, and preventing Alzheimer’s disease, heart disease, cancer, mental illness and so much more. They affect every one of your hundred trillion cell membranes.

“Dr. Hyman, I’ve been suffering from seasonal allergies for years,” writes this week’s house call. “Is there anything that I can do to make these go away or am I doomed forever?”

You are definitely not doomed; however, I do know how miserable seasonal allergies can be, especially in the spring and summer.

Conventional medicine treats seasonal allergies with injections and pills, which unfortunately, create side effects and fail to address the root problem. If you don’t address the root cause, then the allergies will never go away.

Eventually, I discovered I suffered from mercury toxicity and was completely exhausted from overworking. My brain health suffered the most. I had terrible brain fog and couldn’t focus for long periods of time. Here I was, a physician with brain fog: Some days I couldn’t even remember my patients’ names.

I knew things had to change. That’s when I discovered Functional Medicine. One huge benefit I experienced when I reversed chronic fatigue syndrome was how well my brain improved. Over the years, I fine-tuned my approach for a sharper, faster and better brain.

I want you to experience this same transformation. Whatever your situation might be, optimal brain health creates more opportunities and makes life better.

Happy Father’s Day! In this week’s house call, I want to tell you about one of the best gifts I ever received. It was actually from my kids and it was for my birthday.

The gift was a conversation with my kids – the most meaningful one I’ve ever had. I am sharing this with you on Father’s Day because I wish for every parent and every child the family relationships I now have as a result of this conversation.

And, I want to tell you how I got here.

When my life isn’t working, it spills over into all of my relationships including those with my kids. I have always had a great relationship with my kids. I raised them myself as a single dad. But I knew we had bumps along the way and there were things unsaid and unresolved, and that was keeping us from having the deepest relationship we could.

I knew I had made mistakes, so I wanted to clean it all up, say everything, hear everything from them in a safe way so we could heal from the issues that were in our way.

“Dr. Hyman, I’ve eliminated toxic foods, I exercise every day, and overall I live a healthy lifestyle, yet I haven’t been able to get anywhere near my goal weight,” writes this week’s house call. “What gives?”

I understand how frustrating this can become, especially when you feel like you’ve tried everything. You made a conscious decision to live a healthier lifestyle. You’ve cut out toxic triggers, ditched sugar and you’re eating all the right types of foods. You’re doing everything correctly, yet you can’t lose weight.

Over the years, I’ve had many patients complain about this problem. They feel like they’ve exhausted every option, yet when we dig a bit deeper, we often find a hidden cause for their weight loss resistance.

One big obstacle becomes nutritional imbalances. After reviewing major nutritional research over the last 40 years and doing nutritional testing with over 10,000 patients, I’ve concluded that Americans suffer from massive nutritional deficiencies.

“No matter what I do, I can’t seem to lose weight,” writes this week’s house call, who is also an Eat Fat, Get Thin challenge participant. “I think I’m cursed with a slow metabolism.”

I hear this often among patients, and the good news is that no, you’re not cursed and yes, you can fix your metabolism.

It’s important to remember that you are unique: Everyone was born with a different biochemical make-up. You have trillions of little energy factories called mitochondria that provide the fuel to run everything in your body. If you can remember high school biochemistry class, you know mitochondria convert the oxygen you breathe and the food you eat into energy for your body to use.

Think of mitochondria as little combustion engines. When scientists talk about metabolism, they often refer to mitochondria. Effective mitochondria mean your body efficiently burns calories and you have a fast metabolism. Ineffective mitochondria don’t burn calories and slow down your metabolism.

“Ever since I started using coconut oil, my cholesterol has spiked,” writes this week’s house call. “I’m afraid coconut oil with all that saturated fat is creating more harm than good. Should I continue to use it?”

Since I expressed my love for medium-chain triglyceride oil or MCT oil, I’ve received this question several times.

I call MCTs (found in coconut oil) a super fuel for your cells because your body uses this kind of fat very efficiently. Your cells burn MCTs for energy while storing very little as fat, boosting your metabolism and supporting your immune system.

MCTs also help balance many hormones, including the ones that control your appetite. They keep you feeling full and satisfied. They actually improve your cholesterol profile.

They also help your body burn fat. One study found that consuming MCT oils helped reduce body fat and triglycerides more than omega 6 vegetable oils. After eight weeks, the experiment showed the MCT oil group lost more weight, body fat and subcutaneous fat, all while experiencing a 15 percent drop in triglycerides and LDL.

At the same time, as MCT-rich coconut oil becomes more popular, it also becomes a concern among some folks because of its high amounts of saturated fat and potential for raising cholesterol.

The reality is, cholesterol is not black and white. Classifying it as “good” or “bad” vastly oversimplifies this molecule, which among its duties helps synthesize vitamin D and hormones while maintaining cell structure.

Some fats do raise cholesterol, whereas others lower cholesterol. Even when saturated fat does raise your cholesterol, the type of cholesterol becomes more important than cholesterol itself.