How to Fuel Your Metabolism

Are you fueling your body with the right “gas” to reverse metabolic diseases like obesity and type 2 diabetes?

In this episode of Metabolic Minutes, Nurse Practitioner Elizabeth unpacks the essential building blocks of a balanced diet and how they contribute to reversing metabolic diseases like obesity, prediabetes, and type 2 diabetes. Learn about the roles of macronutrients—proteins, fats, and carbohydrates—and discover why “premium fuel” like animal proteins and high-nutrient vegetables are key to healing your metabolism. Elizabeth also explores the hidden dangers of "dirty gas" from processed foods and GMO grains and shares practical tips for creating meals that fuel your health journey.

Whether you're battling a broken metabolism or looking to optimize your wellness, this episode offers actionable advice and empowering insights. Let’s gear up and crush your metabolic health goals!

What You’ll Learn:

• The three main macronutrients and how they impact your body.
• Why animal proteins are considered "premium fuel" for metabolic health.
• The differences between clean and dirty carbohydrates, including a breakdown of grains and fruits.
• The role of healthy fats and micronutrients in sustaining energy and repairing your body.
• Practical tips on meal composition for metabolic healing.

Notable Quotes from This Episode:

• “You are a fine luxury car. Don’t fill your tank with dirty gas.”
• “Everything you eat should be in balance. Aim for premium gas and high-mileage oil for sustained energy and healing.”
• “If your metabolism is broken, you need to retrain your body to metabolize carbohydrates effectively.”

Tune in now and take the first step toward repairing your metabolism!

Transcript

[00:00:00] Introduction to Metabolic Disease Reversal
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Elizabeth, NP: What is essential in the metabolic disease reversal process is that we are getting a variety of all these building blocks and the appropriate ratios. We will need to train your body to be able to metabolize them again.


[00:00:13] Welcome to Metabolic Minutes
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Voice-Over: Welcome to Metabolic Minutes, the show where veteran nurse practitioner Elizabeth is going to break down all the sciencey stuff about how to reverse metabolic syndromes like obesity, prediabetes, and type 2 diabetes, all without needing a biology degree or a nap. Ain't nobody got time for that. Just quick tips to help you build your battle plan to repair your broken metabolism. Let's crush this.


[00:00:38] Understanding Macronutrients
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Elizabeth, NP: So just to review, the primary food groups, or fuel, are broken down into three large categories. They are called macronutrients. They are proteins, carbohydrates, and their fats.

These three things are found in nearly all food, but in different proportions or ratios. Let me repeat that. These three things are found in nearly all food, but in different proportions or ratios. This foundational concept will be essential to understanding the metabolic reversal process. These three things also have different amounts of performance enhancing material, micronutrients, like vitamins and minerals.

Think magnesium, vitamin C, etc. And that keeps everything flowing in and out of our cell doors. We really want to be consuming the best fuel or gas for our fine luxury car.


[00:01:43] Animal Proteins: The Premium Fuel
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Elizabeth, NP: So let's talk about a type of premium grade fuel. It's called animal proteins, which we've all heard of. They have little to no carbohydrate in them if they are pure and unprocessed. So I'm not referring to deli meat, guys. There are lots of different animal source proteins. Meat, chicken, fish, eggs, milk, cheese, yogurt.

And these foods contain complete proteins. What makes animal proteins premium gas is that they provide all the small building blocks that you need to make DNA. and repair cells that are damaged. And this is what keeps you alive and functioning.


[00:02:28] Plant-Based Proteins and Grains
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Elizabeth, NP: The second source of fuel where there is significant protein plus some fat and carbs, let's call it plus gas, is going to be beans, lentils, chickpeas, peas, soybeans, Obviously, they are a vegetable type of protein.

They have a few of the building blocks that the animal proteins also have. A third source of fuel is going to be grains. They're lower in protein, they have a high ratio of carbohydrate, and less but present amounts of protein and fat. So that's going to be things like rice, wheat, oats, barley, quinoa.

Unfortunately, American grains are generally dirty gas. And if they are more pure, I would classify it as regular gas. This regular gas is the best fuel to just burn for a high speed joyride in your Bugatti, or when you want to show off at the gym, run a marathon, etc. I have many, many patients that will tell me that they traveled to Europe, and they might have been checking their blood sugar, and they noticed that it wasn't spiking as much.

with the Italian spaghetti compared to when they made it in America. And one of those theories about this phenomenon is that we spray pesticides on genetically modified grain in America, which then goes into our grocery stores. These pesticides and the GMO grains are banned in Europe. So what happens is.

With the American grains, the outer shell of the grain is different than your grandma's was in the 30s, and your metabolic functions do not metabolize it well. Well, honey, back in my day, our grains were so pure, they'd flirt with you before turning into bread.


[00:04:22] Nuts, Seeds, and Vegetables
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Elizabeth, NP: I'm going to move on to another source of fuel called the nuts and seeds.

So these have pretty moderate amounts of the building blocks that we need. Good fat, some protein, and low in carbohydrate. They don't have all the building blocks as the animal protein, but they work very well in combination with other plant based proteins. The other source of energy that you might be surprised about is going to be vegetables.

They have other components too, like insoluble fiber, which essentially cleans your GI system of food sludge or buildup in your pipes. And they also offer many vitamins and minerals. Most vegetables have small amounts of protein, carbohydrates, and fat, but lots of fiber and micronutrients. Some of these are broccoli, spinach, kale, brussels sprouts, you name it.

While they're generally low in protein overall, they have essential building blocks that are very important for your metabolic function. I think of vegetables like a high mileage oil, essential for disease reversal. Other very low sources of protein, but high in carb fiber and sometimes fats, sometimes micronutrients.


[00:05:34] Fruits: The Low Protein Source
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Elizabeth, NP: are going to be fruits. Just a few examples of fruits, as you well know, are oranges, apples, bananas, berries, many, many others. Unfortunately, if you have a broken metabolism, we have to repair it first before you can consume some of these. Fruits are very low in protein, high in carbohydrates, and they're low in what we call amino acids, which are those little building blocks that I mentioned earlier.

But some fruits are superior plus gas. Like an avocado, which is technically a fruit, but it has a higher protein and fat content to the carb ratio. What is essential in the metabolic disease reversal process is that we are getting a variety of all these building blocks and the appropriate ratios, except for some of the grains and fruits, which, again, are lowest in protein.

We are going to try to get all the building blocks from some of the other sources of food that I mentioned. If you're training for a marathon, you might be able to tolerate more grains and fruits beforehand. But if your metabolism is broken with obesity, prediabetes, and diabetes, We will need to train your body to be able to metabolize them again.


[00:06:50] The Impact of Dirty Gas
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Elizabeth, NP: Now I want to talk about dirty gas. One of the things that happened in America, especially since the 80s and 90s, as I mentioned before, is that we started using pesticides and developing genetically modified food, and this has affected how our body, our muscle, our liver, and our pancreas recognize. how to metabolize it.

In short, it has driven the obesity. It has driven what we call insulin resistance and the diabetes epidemic. Other obvious dirty gas is going to be candy, soda. which is GMO sugar mixed with chemicals that fry your nerves with artificial dyes and metals like titanium dioxide. Trans fats are also a dirty gas from a creepy gas station that will break your car engine.


[00:07:53] Recap and Key Takeaways
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Elizabeth, NP: So just to review, the primary food groups are broken down into three large categories. We call these macronutrients. They're proteins, carbohydrates, and fats. They are found in nearly all food, but in different proportions or ratios. We want to be consuming the best gas for our fine luxury car. The premium gas is animal protein.

The high mileage oil that lubes our system up and helps the parts or organs and cells is the high protein and high fat vegetables that are lower in carb content but are high in micronutrients. The plus gas is going to be fats. Fats are essential for energy storage. They contain elements that help make our hormones, and we all know about menopause and manopause.

Yes, that's a thing. And these are very important to keep in production. They keep a spry in between the sheets and just in our daily functioning. Examples of pure healthy fats are animal butter, raw or toasted unoiled nuts and seeds, avocado, fatty fish. There's also olive oil, avocado oil, ghee butter, and those kinds of things.

What I want you to take away from this episode is that you have to envision everything you consume in ratios. The highest ratio needs to be your premium gas and high mileage oil. This is what is going to sustain you. This is what is going to heal your body. We do not want to pollute you. Our metabolic vehicle with dirty gas.

So when you go in for a meal or snack, I want you to start thinking about ratios. Everything you see, I want it to be mostly premium gas, which is going to be either animal protein or vegetable protein and fats. and your fiber with micronutrients. It needs to be very low in proportion on the carbohydrates, which are going to come from those grains and fruits.

At this stage in your metabolic healing journey, trans fats, sugars, cola, candy, anything that is processed really should be a no no.


[00:10:18] Final Thoughts and Disclaimer
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Elizabeth, NP: Thanks for joining everyone. I'm Elizabeth, the nurse practitioner.

Voice-Over: The information provided in this podcast is not a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your qualified health care provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. Never disregard professional medical advice or delay seeking it because of something you have heard on this podcast. The opinions shared are our own and may not reflect the views of your health care provider.