Lessons from the Ketoverse

Zoe's Journey to Stay as Young as Possible for as Long as Possible

• Graham • Season 1 • Episode 9

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Challenging everything you thought you knew about healthy aging, Zoe's story will make you question whether what we call "aging" might actually be inflammation in disguise. After spending more than two decades as a vegetarian, Zoe's life took an unexpected turn when her daughter developed severe epilepsy, leading her to research historical treatments that predated modern pharmaceuticals. What she discovered changed both their lives.

In this eye-opening conversation, Zoe reveals how transitioning to a carnivore diet transformed her health in ways she never anticipated. The mental clarity she experienced after just three months was revolutionary—eliminating the afternoon brain fog, boosting her energy levels, and allowing her to continue running when friends her age had long since stopped due to pain and inflammation. "I'm not really fat, I'm just really inflamed," she explains, capturing how misunderstood the connection between diet and physical symptoms often is.

What makes this episode particularly valuable is Zoe's practical approach to implementing this lifestyle. From her "three-bite rule" for handling special occasions to strategies for fasting and autophagy, she offers accessible entry points for anyone curious about carnivore eating. Her emphasis on progress over perfection creates space for real-world application without the guilt that often accompanies dietary changes. "This is not about being perfect," she insists, "it's about making changes that create momentum."

Whether you're struggling with unexplained health issues, curious about alternatives to the standard Western diet, or simply interested in maintaining vitality throughout your life, Zoe's journey offers powerful insights into how our food choices might be affecting us in ways we've never considered. Ready to rethink what healthy aging really means? This conversation might just be the beginning of your own transformation.

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Welcome to Lessons from the Keto-Verse. Join Stephen and Graham as they explore the keto lifestyle with tips, science and stories to boost your health. This podcast isn't medical advice. Consult your healthcare advisor for any health-related issues. Get ready to fuel your primal power.

Graham:

Hi everybody and welcome to Lessons from the Keto-Verse. This is episode nine and we have a special guest with us today which I'm very excited to introduce. And first of all, why don't we make sure that Stephen says hi, hello Stephen.

Stephen:

Hey Graham, Great to be here. Thank you.

Graham:

All right, excellent. So I am very, very happy to introduce our guest guest, zoe. Zoe, thank you so much for joining. Zoe has an incredible story to tell. I'm looking forward to Stephen and I asking her some questions and hearing all about her very interesting story. Thank you, zoe, for joining Stephen, and I can't wait to get into the story, but first would you be able to tell us a little bit about yourself?

Zoe:

Wow, that's quite an introduction. I hope I don't disappoint anybody. Yes, sure, I'm so happy to be here. Thank you so much for asking me to be here here, and how I would introduce myself, I guess, is I am, as we, as I believe we all are an evolutionary soul having a temporary human experience, and we all really need to honor our avatar, our vessel, and this became more and more apparent to me as I became older and so I started looking at how can I be as healthy as possible for as long as possible, and a very good friend of mine was also very keenly interested in this and, to be quite honest, you know he deserves a lot of the credit because he would send me things that were just really compelling.

Zoe:

And then, at around the same time, maybe a year later, my daughter got diagnosed with epilepsy, and that is basically a term for we don't know why you're having seizures. That's what epilepsy means and I.

Zoe:

She was prescribed all kinds of medication. Of course, they all have side effects, and the medications were not working. She was still continuing to have very, very intense, long lasting seizures where she would stop breathing, she would lose consciousness. We had staples on the front of her head staples on the back of her head. It was really concerning, and so I started to do some research myself on YouTube and I found physicians and history, I guess, of how epilepsy and seizures were treated in the 1920s with diet, and they were all on a carnivore diet or a keto diet high fat, low carb, high protein diet and this actually not only reduced seizures but many, many times eliminated them completely.

Zoe:

And there is a physician in Toronto, a Toronto Western Hospital, who is very dedicated to this, and all he does is he meets with people who have seizures and he helps them to be on the keto diet. He first assesses, of course, whether or not they're a good candidate for it, and so this is a testament, in my opinion, to the fact that this actually works. So, fortunately for us, we did not need to do that. Erin's seizures have stopped with naps, of all things, so we have not introduced her to this diet, but I am eating this diet as much, or this way of eating. I'm on this woe for as much of my days as possible, because I just feel so much better. Inflammation is reduced.

Stephen:

That's great, zoe. Thank you very much, stephen here. My first question to you, zoe, you initially explored the carnivore diet as a potential treatment for your daughter's absolute epilepsy, as you mentioned, a condition for which the ketogenic diet, as you mentioned, was originally developed. Can you share what led you to investigate this dietary approach for her, originally developed? Can you share what led you?

Zoe:

to investigate this dietary approach for her the research that I did on YouTube and the research that I did in medical journals talking about how epilepsy was treated in the 1920s, prior to pharma, and then also our urologist at Toronto Western asked us if we wanted to try that, and I said absolutely so. She referred us to Dr Bertolucci at Toronto Western, who does that.

Stephen:

Great yeah. Thank you Over to you, Graham.

Graham:

Yeah, so, zoe, you'd mentioned this earlier and along my journey I had learned about this as well around. The ketogenic diet being, you know, has a rich history in managing epilepsy. It was the original reason why the ketogenic diet being, you know, has a rich history in managing epilepsy. It was the original reason why the ketogenic diet was designed. I think most people don't know that, and so why do you think this treatment has faded from mainstream conversations, considering there was some success at the time, 100 years ago, and how relevant do you believe it remains today?

Zoe:

Oh my gosh, that is such an awesome question, graham. Because just a bit of backstory prior to Aaron's seizures stopping knock on wood we went to the what's called the EMU, the epilepsy monitoring unit, where they they gradually take everybody off their meds, they have electrodes on their heads and they basically, as seizures are induced, and then they record all of that to find out where the seizure is starting in the brain and how it's all, because it's very, very unique to everyone, and some people are eligible for brain surgery where they remove a portion of the brain a very small portion, of course and people have had really good results this way, and that's what we were actually hoping for. And nobody on the unit was talking about this diet. Nobody on the unit knew about this diet, and I've also joined at the time I joined several social media groups, different platforms, to support people with epilepsy and their seizures, because a lot of them, can't drive anymore, they can't work anymore, they can't even be alone anymore.

Zoe:

It really impacts people's lives and they didn't know anything about it either. Nobody's talking about it, they're just talking about pharmaceuticals. So you know, I don't think it's any secret that pharmaceuticals are playing more and more and more of a role in the human condition and you know, we've moved away from plant medicine and from doing what our you know, great, great grandmothers knew how to do. And it's just, yeah, it's really concerning.

Stephen:

That's a great response, zoe. That's a great response, zoe. So for my next question, if you don't mind, many epilepsy medications come with significant side effects. Could you share your daughter's experiences with these medications and how they shaped your approach to her health?

Zoe:

yeah, we're very, very fortunate. We have an amazing neurologist and I told her you know, one of the things that I love about my daughter and her happiness is just what a joyful being she is. Naturally, she wakes up happy, she goes to sleep happy, and her seizures come on when she's excited, not stressed. A lot of people get it when they're stressed, but she would get them when she was really happy and excited, sadly. And so I was very clear with the neurologist that I did not want her to be put on a medication that would impact her mood, because a lot of them do, and some of them quite severely. They can make people very angry, resulting in job losses, relationship breakdowns, and some of them can make them very sleepy because they're know, very sedating.

Zoe:

A lot of them anti-seizure medications. So, erin, we were very fortunate we didn't have too much in the way of side effects other than her hearing seems to be different. Her speech is definitely different. Is that the medication? Is that the seizures? You know definitively, I can't say um, because the two sort of happened at the same time, but she certainly has less energy on the medications, but we are gradually taping her off them now, so that is, uh, being resolved. But yeah, a lot of these medications have a lot of different side effects and they affect everybody you know very uniquely yeah.

Graham:

So one of the things that, um, I admire about you is you not only listen to healthcare professionals, uh, advocating um for for your family, um, at the same time, you also did your own research. Um, you know some people do that not. You know some people do that. Not everybody does that. Some people just trust the health care system implicitly. Some people want to be informed by the health care system and do their own homework to make sure that they're getting the right information for their family. This is connected. The next question I have is connected to that. How did you come about adopting the carnivore diet and how did you begin your own journey around it? We'd really, really love to was a vegetarian from the time.

Zoe:

My mom was a very big carnivore we're Australian and she would have lamb chops for breakfast, you know, and I, once I found out where meat came from, I couldn't eat it anymore. It was just a moral dilemma for me. I loved animals and I just couldn't imagine, you know. So I didn't. I was a vegetarian for I don't know over 20 years. Uh, I didn't eat meat. And, um, I had a hard time eating meat and I guess I just thought well, you know what do I have to lose? What I don't know, what I don't know, and maybe I'll feel even better on a higher meat diet.

Zoe:

So that's what I did. I kind of introduced more protein into my life, into my days, and then I just realized I guess I realized with my own digestion and my own issues that I was having, which were never really diagnosed, you know, ibs. Well, we don't know what's going on, but really it's probably oxalates coming from fruits and vegetables and everything is so, unfortunately. I don't want to sound depressing, but I feel like our soil is so polluted that we're growing these things in and with all of the pesticides and just the environment, I just don't feel like we're eating. When we're eating fruit and vegetables, it's having an impact on me and my gut because it ruined it, ruined my microbiome. You know, metabolic health is a really metabolic health is a really, really important thing, and when we are eating a high meat diet we are, or animal protein diet, we are getting lots of really good diversity in our gut with that bacteria which is so critical, and for the longest time I would try to replace it with the stuff and I would pay hundreds of dollars to have this stuff shipped in a cooler to keep it cold and to keep the bacteria alive, but none of it really actually works. So I'm just finding that I'm feeling better, I have more energy, I have more clarity, I have less digestive issues with the high protein diets, and so I have. I start my day with that.

Zoe:

Um, also, I found a woman on YouTube, the glucose goddess, who talked about how. You know the thing that's so important about insulin spikes. What hurts us more than anything is not just having high blood sugar or high hurts us more than anything is not just having high blood sugar or high whatever that. I think it's AIF, the, the acronym, but it's the spikes. And so when we have glucose fruit, for example, or fructose on a empty stomach, it really spikes our insulin and it makes it very, very difficult for our body to come back down again, for insulin levels to become, or sugar levels to become, normal again. And yeah, so that was another reason because I used to have a big bowl of fruit for breakfast. I thought I was doing the right thing, canada's Food Guide and all that good stuff. Right Turns out, no, not really, Because then I would want to have a big nap. I thought, oh my gosh, why am I so tired? I just had fruit because of the spike. And then the crash.

Stephen:

So yeah, yeah, that's absolutely a great insight. I mean, we've talked about this in previous broadcasts, about how we all found our way to this particular carnivore diet. I too, like you, was vegetarian at one point and it didn't work for me either. I was actually getting I noticed it in the gym and so forth. I was losing muscle mass and I was having difficulty pushing the same amount of weight, and I was attributing that to my age. So I definitely understand where you're coming from and, as you know, as you transitioned to the carnivore diet, zoe, what were some of the key benefits you noticed, especially when you contrasted to where you were formerly, as a vegan vegetarian?

Zoe:

Right, Well, certainly, energy wise, I just had way more energy. I didn't even know, see, I didn't know, but I didn't know. I didn't know because I like to run in the morning, so I didn't know when I was going for my runs, when I wasn't eating enough protein. I would say that I thought I felt pretty good, but now you know, eating a carnivore diet, I can realize how much more energy I have, how much more clarity I have to like I don't have that rain fog at three in the afternoon. The other wonderful thing about being on carnivore is cravings dissipate cravings, for, you know, stuff that really doesn't serve us. Um, it's, it's fun in the moment, I guess, or so we think it will be, and um, it just leaves us feeling like I would feel hung over, you know. So those are the main things the energy, the clarity, the mental clarity and the lack of digestive issues.

Graham:

So, zoe, I think this is such a big deal. Stephen and I have talked about this sort of brain fog and sometimes it gets to the point where you actually realize you're feeling this brain fog. But I think a lot of people may not even realize. They chalk it up to being old, they chalk it up to stress, they chalk it up to genetics, they chalk it up to a bunch of things outside their control, potentially, and I'm wondering if we can expand on that. So, reflecting on your experience through the carnivore diet, maybe you can compare that to your vegetarian diet. How did you know that you had this brain fog and at what point during the carnivore journey maybe it's an amount of time did you start to get this mental clarity and how has it improved your life?

Zoe:

So, with these physicians that I found on YouTube, who have left Western medicine to you know, help people understand much more about their physicality, their bodies, their metabolic health, because that's something that physicians in general just don't discuss. Through following them, I realized that fructose has been heavily linked to Alzheimer's. Fructose has been heavily linked to Alzheimer's. So I thought that that was very interesting, because I noticed that my father is eating more and more sugar. He's in his 80s now. He eats very little protein Because he's eating more sugar. His body craves more sugar Because he's eating more sugar. His taste buds are screaming for sugar, you know it's also everything in his body is screaming for more sugar.

Zoe:

So this is, this is the problem Sugar just begets more sugar and more, um, it causes stickiness in the, in the actual cells of our body and our brains, and it and then our cells don't know what they are. So this is, you know, part of the problem and this is how we get rogue cells and precancerous cells becoming cancerous. The cure for cancer is prevention people, and we do prevention with really healthy metabolic states, and we do that with our way of eating. So that's just my, you know, unhumble opinion, I suppose, and did I answer your?

Graham:

question. Yeah, no, you certainly did, and I'm interested in sort of that part too, because I broke that question up and into maybe more complicated than it needed to be, but the mental clarity, talk about that. You know how long did it take for? You to realize your mental clarity and how has it changed your life?

Zoe:

Okay, I don't know if I can. I don't know, maybe maybe three months or something, like it wasn't right away. I mean, there were days where I would think, wow, do I ever feel so much better eating all this meat, you know, eating all this protein, and I would try to get my dad to do it. And so I think too, I'm postmenopausal. So women who are perimenopausal or menopausal, they get told oh, it's just your hormones or it's just baby brain, blah, blah, blah when they're pregnant. And I just don't believe that. I really believe that if they were eating a carnivore diet or as close to it you know, not everybody can go full on carnivore, but like it's not even cheap either, too right, that's something else to take into consideration. Not every family would be able to afford to do this, but as much protein as they can, if they can even just replace one carbohydrate meal with more protein, I think that they would be better off. And and so that would be, you know, my, my message to people. It's not about being perfect, it's about progress and the clarity I would say maybe I felt after about three months.

Zoe:

But I think too that as people age like maybe listeners out there have parents who are, who are getting older and you're seeing that they're I maybe ask them about their diet. See, my dad's very independent and he doesn't live with me or anything. So I have to ask him okay, what'd you have for breakfast? Oh, a granola bar and grapes. Well, what did you have for lunch? Oh, I had a sandwich, you know, like lots of bread and lots of carbs. And then he doesn't even eat dinner sometimes, or he'll have a banana, it's just, it's just. Or a bran muffin, or you know, it's that easy kind of food. So I think that, if anyone's entrepreneurial out there and listening, it might be really helpful for us to have more carnivore snacks.

Zoe:

I find that there's a real gap in the market. The only thing that I've come up with and I didn't come up with it, of course I'm on groups and somebody else suggested it but the bacon rinds that are cooked in lard, they're really awesome. And that's another thing too, right, guys? Oils, seed oils they are really really bad. And according to Dr Eric Berg, what really creates obesity, even more than sugar, more than fat, is starch. There's modified starches in all of our processed foods. They come under a plethora of different names. So I highly recommend that you do some research on that, listeners, if you're interested, if you're feeding your families out there, especially your kids. I don't know why it causes such obesity. I don't know what. I just heard him say that, and Dr Eric Berg is amazing.

Graham:

So yeah, it's actually. Um, this is a brilliant point. So glucose, um, it raises blood sugar, a1c's. Uh, insulin needs to get that sugar into the cells, otherwise it stays in the bloodstream, which causes serious damage to the body. It can potentially kill you if you don't get that glucose into the cells. The problem with starches is that it turns into glucose so quickly that if you have a very starchy dinner, you are overwhelming the body with the amount of glucose that you're putting into the body. You've got an enormous amount of sugar in the bloodstream and your body is going into a danger zone to try and get that sugar into the cells. You do that enough times, you're ending up with insulin resistance and all sorts of problems come about from that. Stephen.

Stephen:

Yeah, actually I just build on that for a second.

Stephen:

We talked about this in a previous episode as well, zoe where you know the body can actually run on three grams of sugar in it in the system.

Stephen:

That's all it requires from a metabolic perspective, and I won't name a particular pop or soda for those in the us, but all you need to do is spin around a can at your local convenience store and see 29 grams, 31 grams, 32 grams. I'm not talking about the energy drinks, I've seen them over 100 grams. So your body has to metabolize that or try to metabolize that, and you know, as a diabetic, that's just a non-starter. I'd likely end up in the hospital, compromising my vision and possibly other issues with my organs. So I mean, that's a really good, good point. And then, just sort of bringing this back full circle, you know this episode sort of highlights your goal to stay as youthful and vibrant as possible through this process, and we've heard you speak to a few things like like how you went about that and why, ultimately, that's that's important to you. So, reverting back to the carnivore diet versus the vegan diet, how do you feel the carnivore diet better supports you with this vision of staying youthful and vibrant?

Zoe:

so, um, yeah, I, I kind of, I'm kind of rethinking the word youthful, because I feel like the word youthful is synonymous with how we look, unfortunately, right now. But I guess I mean, I want to feel as healthy as possible for as long as possible and carnivore, just. I don't have inflammation, I don't have, my back doesn't hurt, my knees don't hurt after a run. I was sitting at a table at a wedding a couple of years ago and I was sitting at the table, you know, with my guy and a bunch of other women who all would run, with the mother of the bride, who I was my friend and that's why I was there, and so we were all runners, but none of them were running anymore and they said, oh no, I can't, I haven't run in years.

Zoe:

And I looked at, you know, my person and I said, wow, like what's going on here? Like am I drinking from the fountain of youth or something? And it's just because I think that the the way of eating. Really, again, you know, if they would just cut out gluten, cut out fructose, sugar and all the stuff that, the seed oils, all the things that are creating the inflammation. It's not about eating anti-inflammatory foods, it's about cutting out the stuff that creates inflammation and getting off the meds, and then there's, you know, cholesterol and statins. Like that's a whole other you know conversation as well, or maybe it's part of this conversation, but I guess, yeah, I just, I love the fact that I don't feel inflamed and I was going to get t-shirts made that say I'm not really fat, I'm just really inflamed, because really that's what it is. You know, when you go on carnivore you end up releasing so much water out of your interstitial tissue that's been held there in the cells by all of this junk.

Graham:

It's interesting. You say that Zoe and I'll tell a little story Out of school. The first time we chatted, a long time ago, you told me how old you were. I didn't ask. You told me how old you were and my initial reaction was I didn't believe you. You look way younger old you were. I didn't ask, you told me how old you were and I, my initial reaction was I didn't believe you. Uh, you look way younger than you, said, um, but I, I'm. I.

Graham:

I see a theme here with a lot of people who are you know, cutting, uh, listen, whether it's a vegetarian, whether it's uh, uh, uh, somebody on a ketogenic diet, whether it's somebody on a carnivore diet, the people that have cut out the you know, the emulsifiers, the starches, the sugars out of their diets and understanding the foods that turn into glucose, which causes all these problems.

Graham:

They all have the same thing in common they all have a lot of energy and they all look a lot younger than they are, and that's apt to the title of this episode. I wanted to kind of dive into the carnivore diet that you're on. What advice would you have for people out there that are, you know, listening to this podcast and others thinking you know what, I got nothing to lose. Maybe I should give this a shot. Think back to when you were in that moment where you said you know what I got nothing to lose. Maybe I should give this a shot. Think back to when you were in that moment where you said you know what? I'm going to give this a try. What practical advice would you give somebody who said tell me what you know.

Zoe:

First and foremost, again, I would give them the advice to not beat themselves up, the advice that to not beat themselves up. If they're not able to do it perfectly, first run out of it, right out of the gate. It's, it's like anything we get better as we practice. So if you, if you're at an event and there's something there that you really want to eat, you know, don't beat yourself up. If you eat it, just start back on it again the next day or the next meal. Get back to carnivore or keto, as soon as you can Get back to the food that's really going to feed you and nourish your brain, nourish your organs, and so that would be the number one thing. This is not about perfection. This is just about making changes that create, you know, momentum for you, and that's how it happened for me. It wasn't all at once, it was introducing more protein into my diet and realizing, wow, I actually do feel better and my iron isn't low and my B12 isn't low, and I don't know if those two things go together, but I feel like they did for me. And then I would say, be as open-minded as possible too, because a lot of the groups that I'm on, they really talk about beef butter and eggs and beef butter and eggs and I don't know.

Zoe:

I love food. I love the way food tastes and feels in my mouth. I love seafood. So I don't just do beef butter and eggs, I also will have salmon. Sometimes I'll have a can of salmon for breakfast and I know that probably sounds disgusting to a lot of people, but I have it with a little bit of lemon juice on it or apple cider vinegar a little bit, and it's just delicious to me and I feel like a million bucks.

Zoe:

I go into a meeting, I know what I'm to me and I feel like a million bucks. I go into a meeting, I know what I'm talking about, I feel like I'm on my game, I'm able to be productive, I have a great. It just gets my my day off to a really great start. So, yeah, I would say be as be as creative as you possibly can with your meals so that you don't become bored and start looking for those things. And also remember people too that the longer you stay away from sugar, the less the cravings are. Those cravings will go away. It's just it's like the first three months are not easy, and I would also suggest that you join groups that are supportive. Maybe let family members know who can be supportive. Maybe even get someone to try and do it with you, if that's something that would be helpful to you.

Stephen:

Yeah, I think that's good advice, zoe, and certainly we appreciate that. We spent a fair bit of time focusing on food, and I'm wondering if we could potentially shift gears for a sec and maybe consider some of the other methods or tools that you've rolled into your overall health care plan.

Zoe:

Like to specifically touch on, if I may, is how you've worked or embraced fasting as part of this this lifestyle and if you don't mind sharing some of the benefits you experienced with fasting and how it, you know, complemented your carnivore diet overall yeah, yeah, I love fasting and and I'm referring to prolonged fasting and or intermittent fasting you know some people are doing one meal a day, 20 hours not eating and then four-hour feeding window. I started to do prolonged fasts when I was listening to Jason Fung physician Jason Fung on YouTube talking about the benefits of autophagy. I don't know if you guys have covered this before. Autophagy is when we don't feed our bodies any glucose or anything except for water, of course, and I also do supplements too. I do electrolytes that I make myself with pink Himalayan salt and magnesium, zinc and potassium, because most of them have most of the ones that you buy, even at a health food store, have sucralose and things like that in them, sadly.

Zoe:

So I started doing prolonged fasting for the autophagy benefits too, because your body will go, move through all of your cells and use up all of the cells the rogue cells, the precancerous cells, the cells the rat, the free radicals. We don't want them. So the body will use all of those up for fuel and will produce brand new cells. I mean, who doesn't want brand new cells cells in their brains and flowing through their bodies? So that's why I started to do to fast and again I joined groups.

Zoe:

I really love being with others of like mind, whether we're together physically or, you know, virtually or even, you know, just digitally. I find that extremely helpful. I feel like I'm not so alone and I just they inspire me a lot of these people. So I find that really, really helpful and I think everybody needs to kind of play with the fasting, you know, to see what suits them. Some people do rolling 48. Some people do rolling 24. Some people do a five day or a 30 day fast. I've only ever gone as long as eight days because I really like to be physical and I find that if I go more than eight days I don't sleep as well and I find it harder to go for runs and stuff like that. So I start to miss too much of my life, and so then I go back to feeding again.

Stephen:

I think too, like for those who are diabetics out there and also some others we've talked about similar to me that have issues with cortisol, I've done the extended fast. I dropped 53 pounds in total through intermittent fasting and this diet. But what I would say too to your comment comment it kind of builds on what you said, zoe is you couldn't run, there was other things. So it starts to affect really that sort of balanced approach like I can understand, like when it was like me at 235, going down to 183, uh, you know, there I had to get a little bit radical and and obviously experience antophagy. But what I would say too is now that my metabolic um stasis has changed and I don't know if you found the same, but because I wear a CGM, I'm able to see the consequences of cortisol affect my sugar on an empty stomach where I fasted 24 or 30 hours and I sort of have that sweet spot where I know I don't want to revert over to cortisol and have a negative effect. So I'd only caution those like me who are diabetics is, certainly, if you have quite a bit of weight to lose, you're going to feed on that fat and that energy burn. You're probably going to be okay. But if there's other factors that relate to your mental well-being, mental fitness, if you have PTSD or other things that are triggered or result anyway, then I would suggest is to start, for those people that are out there is, start small and see, see a large benefit and then, uh, you know, keep line of sight to how your body adapts over time. Um, what say you to that?

Stephen:

Uh, so, yeah, I.

Zoe:

I think that's such a great and such an important point to make, and in some of these groups that I'm in, there are people who are on mood disorder medications. You know, they might have bipolar, and so I think that it's very, very important to try and find a friend, a fasting friendly physician. They are out there. There are fewer and further between, of course, but there are some physicians out there that really do understand the benefits of fasting, and if you can find someone like that to help you, if you are on some kind of medication for a mood condition that you might have or any kind of other condition that you might have, I would strongly recommend that because, yeah, I'm not on any medication, I'm not on any pharma whatsoever, and you know so it's different for me, obviously.

Graham:

Yeah, how nice is it to be in your 50s and not be on any medications. I remember I'm going to do a follow-up MRI on my torn rotator cuff from 20 plus years ago playing baseball, and it was feeling 90% better and I wanted to figure out if I could do physio without doing any further damage. And when I went to the doctor, they make you fill out a form.

Graham:

When I went to the doctor, they make you fill out a form and it was so satisfying to click no, no, no, no, no, no all the way down the list and I wondered how many people in their, you know, 50s, mid 50s, late 50s and on were able to do that. So it was sort of a little bit of a personal badge of honor for myself to be able to say you know, I took my health into my own control. And that's a follow-up question, zoe, for you here. We've spoken at length, you know, in this podcast series about the importance of taking responsibility for one's health. I would say your first responder, your first health care professional, needs to be you, and then everybody else is a complement to that. What inspired this mindset for you in taking control of your own health, and how has it influenced your health choices ever since you started doing that?

Zoe:

Well, I guess you know, as we become more aware of what is really truly going on with our body as I became, by becoming more informed, you know looking for that information and I also have just never wanted to be dependent on anything and I remember going on a trip and I had all these medications. In my 50s I was on a few different medications and I had to have a note from the physician. You know as to why I was bringing these meds into like this resort you know, down in the Caribbean, and I just thought this is so.

Zoe:

It just felt very dehumanizing to me, I didn't like it is so. It just felt very dehumanizing to me, I didn't like it. And then I also just don't ever want to be in a situation where I'm dependent on something, and what if I can't get it, you know. So I just made it my mission to get off the medications that I was on, and a friend of mine, she was also on a similar medication for sleeping and she wanted to get off it too, and she paid a private clinic four thousand dollars to help her do it. And I, um, I did not do that, I just did it myself. I thugged it out and, um, she is still on them and, uh, I have been able to get off them. And there's nothing better than you know that feeling, when you're feeling nice and sleepy and and tired and relaxed and you just fall asleep naturally, like it's just a really great feeling, yeah, and supplements too, though, are very, very critical, as as we.

Zoe:

I mean, I do think there are things that we don't have as much of as we get older, um, no matter how fit or healthy we are, it's just, you know, it's part of the human condition, so supplements are really very helpful as well that's great, so I thank you for that.

Stephen:

Now, um, just uh, just thinking of, as we've gone over, a little bit of your routine. Like you certainly mentioned that, you started your meals sometimes at breakfast, for instance, breaking your fast, so to speak. So high protein Is that sort of common, or could you just maybe take a minute or two to walk us through what your typical diet might look like from a day to day as far as meals are concerned?

Zoe:

yeah, so I try to have my. I try to mostly do one meal a day. I find that works really well for me and I try to have it at around 4 in the afternoon. So I go through the day with my black coffee and salt. Sometimes I put a little bit of butter in it because I really love the fat and it really makes the coffee very yummy Grass-fed butter. Oh, that's the other thing too. I buy I started to buy my meat from local farms.

Zoe:

I'm very fortunate. I live, you know, 60 kilometers east of Toronto, so I'm very close to, I live, you know, 60 kilometers east of Toronto, so I'm very close to a lot of farms out here. They're, they're grass fed and and and they're, they're butchered there, you know, at the farm and so, yeah, I have one meal basically. And if I know I'm going to something where I might be tempted by different things, like even alcohol, you know, like sometimes it is really fun to have a drink with my friends, I might, I might switch up my, I might adapt my way of eating accordingly, so I might wait longer to eat or I might, you know. But it is something that I think about it, it's something that's a priority for me shopping, you know, meal prep, that sort of thing.

Zoe:

If I know I'm going to be away from home and I need to bring something with me in my bag to my son cause there won't be anything there, I've even um done. You know, hamburger patties from McDonald's Like I think you can get three patties. I forget how much they are now. But you know you can find ways to adapt. But I hope that at some point this culture of ours will become more carnivore friendly.

Graham:

Yeah, well said, you mentioned this earlier, zoe, and it really resonated with me around this idea of not feeling hungry.

Graham:

There was a moment where I think it was a couple of years into this lifestyle and I had one cracker that was like the size of two thumbs and about 15 minutes, in 10 minutes, in my stomach started growling and I hadn't heard my stomach growl in years and I realized I haven't felt hungry. Most people don't understand what this means because they're, you know, they, they, they take in the carbs, the uh, the emulsifiers, um, the anything that's going to turn into, uh, glucose, which then turns into an insulin response, uh, which uh, then eventually um, causes hypoglycemia, which is when you're very hungry. And then most of us, you know, we stop at a gas station and we get, you know, whatever bagel or whatever chips or whatever is closest to us. It's fast food for a reason.

Graham:

So when you say one meal a day, a lot of people at home their reaction is going to be I could never do that. I'd be grabbing at the bagels, I'd be grabbing at the you know toast, the peanut butter, the cakes, the, whatever. My favorite snack is the chocolate bars. Now that you're on this carnivore diet, do you feel that it's, do you find that it's necessary to snack or does your eating pattern kind of keep you satisfied throughout the day?

Zoe:

Oh yeah, it definitely keeps me satisfied. And I think in the beginning, of course, you know, I was carb addicted and I am always going to be a sugarholic. I mean, sugar is my kryptonite and I still have days where I struggle. You know, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna pretend that my diet or my way of eating is perfect every single day, but I don't beat myself up about it, you know. So what was the question? Again, Sorry.

Graham:

It's around not feeling hungry. Do you feel like you need to snack throughout the day?

Zoe:

No, no, no, no. And I and I feel sometimes, you know, in the beginning I would think about having a snack and then I would have less energy, right? So when I think about having a snack, I think about how I want to feel, and I really how I feel, how I want to feel, is more important to me than what I'm going to have on my tongue and my taste buds. And let's be real, how good is that dessert? Is it ever really that good? It's never that good. It never is After three bites.

Zoe:

So that's another thing, too, that I would highly recommend to people. Let's say you're at a wedding or a party or some sort of a special celebration and there are special things being put out that you love and that you don't have very often. Have three bites, you know, do the three bite thing and then just leave it, because after three bites it's diminishing returns and you know you haven't ruined things, you've just had like a little bit of a blip, and then it's so much easier to stay on that way of eating and not have those cravings come back again.

Graham:

I want to jump into that, stephen, something Zoe said around. You know, after three bites I find the exact same thing I, you know I tend to not have desserts, but every now and then, you know, I'll be in a situation where there is dessert and it's been well prepared. I generally have one bite and I really enjoy that one little bite. And one of the things that is unknown in the food industry is that there's something called emulsifiers. We've talked about this in the past.

Graham:

A lot of food have emulsifiers and what emulsifiers do is they instantly remove the taste of the thing that you just ate so that you eat more. An example would be next time you crunch into a chip, there's that satisfaction of the crunch and then you get the taste and then what you find is that chip is basically like tissue paper in your mouth. It's disappeared, you can't taste anything anymore and it's telling your brain go have another chip. There's even commercials about bet you can't just have one. The reason they bet you just can't have one is those emulsifiers are encouraging you to continue to eat, to continue to eat to try and get that taste. If you mindfully take a bite and you just enjoy it for a little bit and then you put it away because you're not hungry, because you've eaten enough protein and fat and you don't need to fill your belly. This is just about personal satisfaction and taste buds. You may find that that sugar addiction over time disappears, as you talked about earlier, zoe.

Stephen:

Yeah, that's a really good point that you made there. There, graham, and I know we've we've kind of touched on this actually. So, as you said, you know, your kryptonite is, in fact, uh, sugar. I can relate, I used to be called cake face in the family and obviously, uh, there'd be a high correlation between me and cake, and I love your three bite strategy and I'm also a huge fan of the um, of the glucose goddess, uh, grateful for her expertise. So it seems like you've modeled a lot of that.

Stephen:

But, um, you know, as, as we try to avoid these things, uh, do you find that, on in certain occasions, it's more difficult to steer away from sugar because it is so readily available? You're traveling, you're somewhere, your options are limited, like, would you, for instance, opt to go hungry and I'm going to build on this question. I want to get your response because I want to tell you a little bit about what I recently experienced but would you, would you accept being hungry and, uh, call it a more extended fast than you would ever revert back to having something with sugar? Do you have that discipline?

Zoe:

yeah, most of the time, like again, I mean, you know I'm not perfect, I guess, but most of the time, yeah, I would definitely rather abstain because I don't want to feel like crap afterwards. I don't want to have that sugar crash. The other thing I should mention, too, is that when I do the one meal a day.

Zoe:

I mean, it's a meal, man Like. It's not a snack, it's a lot of food I eat until I'm satiated. So I will have a ribeye with melted butter and three eggs, and you know, I might even have something else with it, but something protein scallops or something. I love seafood so much, um, so yeah, so that I don't typically get hungry. I guess my body's just got so used to fat burning and, um, cause, you know I'm pretty good at being fat adapted now, I guess, and it's just, I don't feel that hunger. I don't get the hunger. It's really even when I'm fasting. I used to be very, very hungry the first two days. I just don't feel hungry, I don't know.

Stephen:

Yeah, that's great. It's interesting because I recently had to travel to see my daughter, who lives several hours from here, and I showed up in that belly period between what would have been my first meal of the day and when she wanted to have dinner, and typically her style is to eat a little later than I would because, again, I try to manage my glucose prior to going to bed. So I thought and I haven't done this in years I thought, well, how bad could it be if I just had the burger with just a tiny little bit of bread? And I didn't actually feel great prior to wanting to eat, like I felt a little bit nauseous because I was probably about 30 hours into a fast. It was hot, as the weather is here, my body was stressed from sitting in the car for almost six hours and I'd only been consuming water. So what was amazing is I had sort of a little bit of heartburn, kind of like your growly stomach you're talking Graham. And then I committed the act and purchased, uh, just the burger.

Stephen:

And, um, I don't drink sodas, but that particular day I did, and 20 minutes after I ate it, I like immediately walked after graham, and I've taught this to to our audience in the past is go and walk. If you get, you're into something you know it's not going to be good for you. Manage that, spike down, take the head of the dragon off. Tried all that.

Stephen:

Uh, 25 minutes after I stopped walking I was still stable and then it shot from from approximately, I would say, about about six, eight. I went up to like 12.5, which is quite high. I felt so nauseous. I walked about three miles that afternoon because and essentially I consume sugar with a little bit of meat around it when you want to get right down to it, because of the starches and because of the condiments and all the bad stuff that they put in those. So to your point, I mean it's like being hungover, I think, was the best expression you had. I don't know if you want to comment about that. Hung over, I think was the best expression you had. I don't know if you want to comment about that. Otherwise, we'll turn the next question over to Graham.

Zoe:

Yeah, I think you covered that off really well. I think that we're always going to feel the ramifications, the negative ramifications, of giving ourselves a treat. It is not a treat, it's poison, it's white poison. It is not a treat, it's poison, it's white poison. Sugar is, anyway, and everything that turns into sugar, and I think that the more this becomes mainstream, the more awareness that's created around this, the less we're going to see ADHD and childhood obesity and childhood diabetes and all of the and even cancers. You know, I really, really believe that we're going to see a lot less of that.

Graham:

Yeah, here's hoping for sure, and I know Stephen has experienced this, so I have no doubt you've experienced this. When you tell somebody maybe they're close to you, maybe they're you know, a colleague, maybe there's somebody you you know, you're chatting with whatever at the water cooler and you let them know that you're eating you know a carnivore diet, or a ketogenic diet or a high protein fat diet, whatever you want to call it and the immediate reaction to that is you must have high cholesterol, you're going to get scurvy. No one can survive that way. Just as an aside, this week I watched a show about a woman in Western Canada who's been on the carnivore diet for 65 years. She can still jump over the fence in her early 80s, so she's probably still waiting for that scurvy to kick in. But the question for you, zoe, with that little sort of background, is, as you progressed on the carnivore diet is, as you progressed on the carnivore diet, what signs or changes in your body and health reassured you that you were?

Zoe:

on the right path. So I don't really see a physician on the regular. I mean, I do have tests done, as I need to as a 60 something year old woman, um, but I so I don't have any blood work, you know, to show you or anything like that. I just know, by um, how I feel, the energy that I have, my ability to think clearly and, um, I don't typically tell people what kind of eating regime I have. If they ask me, I offer that information and I find that the people who ask me are quite open to it and they want to hear more about it. So I'm not here to proselytize, you know, any kind of way of eating for anyone. But I love that you guys are creating this awareness and I'm so happy to participate in any way for anyone out there who might just want to try this.

Zoe:

Yeah, so I don't really tell people and I don't have any kind of solid proof. I can't say, well, you know, I had all this blood work done prior to being carnivore and this is what it looked like, and now that seems to be our very Western sort of way of, you know, demonstrating better health. But I just know, by my digestive situation, the peace that I feel in my body, the calm, and I think meditating and also being physical has something to do with that as well. I think that's really important. It's not just about what we eat, but that's a very, very big component.

Zoe:

And I really feel for all the parents out there who have young children, who everybody comes home and everybody's hungry, and I can understand how compelling it might be to drive, to go to the drive-thru right and order that family meal because everybody's exhausted, tired. Now you've got to go home prepare a dinner which probably a lot of people won't eat anymore. You know, when I was raising my girls, I used used to I cooked everything you know from scratch and they loved it. Because we didn't have fast food on every corner, we didn't have Uber Eats delivering it to us, we didn't eat out as much. Now I think we're you know we're competing with sodium laden and sugar laden foods, and that's the other thing too, stephen, to your point earlier about feeling hungry If I'm feeling hungry I actually get more salt into my body and I find that that's very, very helpful. I'll even just crunch some in my mouth and not just any kind of salt, like it's got to be a good high quality salt and I recommend everybody do their research on good high quality salt.

Stephen:

That's great, zoe, thank you. I'll turn the next question over to you, Graham.

Graham:

So last question, zoe, for you based on your experience, what aspects of health or vitality do you believe people can reclaim or enhance by adopting the carnivore diet? What should they perhaps be excited about as they start this journey?

Zoe:

I think they should be excited about how much younger they're going to feel, and so I don't know if it's an organ thing that after age 30 or 35, our liver and our kidney just says, okay, like I can't keep doing this for much longer. I don't know if it's a cumulative thing, but it seems that we can get away with eating a lot of garbage and poison when we're younger and it catches up to us and it ages us overnight. I mean, it just ages us so much we have all these aches and pains, Our waist become really big, Our muscle mass decreases, and so I would just say that people could look forward to having better sex, feeling more productive, feeling more confident, just feeling generally a sense of well-being, and especially when we're feeding our loved ones. You know, if we're feeding our kids stuff that we wouldn't eat, you know that's a problem. I think.

Graham:

I can't think of a better way to finish the episode. So first off, Stephen, I'd like to be the first to officially change your name from cake face to chiseled face, I think uh feel free to wear that uh from now on.

Graham:

Um Zoe, thank you so much for your transparency in sharing your experience, sharing your wisdom. Uh, I certainly learned a lot today. I think the listening audience is going to do the same. It's been fantastic to have you. Thank you so much for joining the show, stephen. Thank you so much for joining the show as well.

Zoe:

Thank you so much. That's so kind of you. I'm so glad you feel that way and I really do hope it helps even one person out there who's listening to this. That'd be awesome.

Graham:

All right, thanks everybody, and we'll see you at the next episode.