"If you have a goal, write it down. If you do not write it down, you do not have a goal- you have a wish." - Steve Maraboli
Housekeeping
Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month ended on March 31st. I happen to think every month is CRC month. And if we make the conscious decision to eat with a gut-healthy approach, every day we eat, we're in test prep mode- preparing for our first or next screening.
What other test prep have you done that can have so many health benefits?
Tip of the Week
Sometimes these newsletters have a way of writing themselves. I typically have a tip of the week that drops in my lap but this week I sought it out.
It started at a 4-year-old birthday party for my nephew that was hosted at a local bowling alley. The bowling alley is connected to a Mexican restaurant but the doors connecting the two establishments have been permanently locked. (foreboding...this detail would prove to be painful)
My wife and her sister grew tired of the party refreshments and thought it might be nice to have margaritas. I offered to fetch them and off I went with my wife.
I traversed the 100 ft. trip along the sidewalk, secured the margs, and set out to return to the bowling alley.
Along the SAME sidewalk I just uneventfully traveled on, in deep conversation with my wife, carrying two styrofoam cups filled with tequila-infused sugar water, I managed to make hard, ricocheting, yet sustained contact with a Bradford Pear Tree branch.
This branch was the size of a small tree trunk.
I saw stars.
I was rocked like I took an RKO from Randy Orton.
But I gathered myself...without spilling a drop.
I made an immediate left turn to our parked car to retrieve a towel, surely needing to stop the bleeding.
Surprisingly, there wasn't much blood.
Now let me get to the tip:
The gut microbiome, if tended to properly, nourished with whole food, fermented foods, and fiber, has far-reaching tentacles- none more important than the skin microbiome.
We haven't talked about the skin microbiome a ton, but like the gut microbiome, it also has microbes that are in direct conversation with your immune system.
It's the largest organ in (and on) your body, measuring some 30 sq. meters, and also measuring only 2-3 mm thick.
This I knew.
What I didn't know was there is also such an animal as a wound microbiome.
"A Breach of the skin barrier and subsequent wound healing occurs in the context of microbial communities of bacteria, fungi, and viruses."
I uncovered this concept after a couple of people, on separate occasions, who both saw me frequently and commented on how quickly my head healed.
This is what they saw over a short 10-day period:
There's no way this could be yet another result of a healthy gut microbiome.
Surely this was only a coincidence?
But what if there was some sort of connection?
It turns out, there is. A study was done on this very subject. AND, they happened to study diabetics, since wound healing can be very problematic for diabetics.
It sounds like I should have been one of their subjects! Take a look at what they found.
Blog of the Week
I'm not a regular food diary guy, or at least not as often as I should be. But I can tell you without fail, every time I take the time to write down what I eat, it provides very helpful information.
If you've never done it, I recommend it at least a couple of times so you can actually see what you've eaten. Whether you're trying to lose weight, count calories, log grams of fiber (I did this one a lot), etc., this is a very valuable tool.
As is often the case, a Twitter follower of mine has a blog that makes this incredibly easy. And I highly recommend checking out his website if you're not on Twitter (still not calling it X).
The website is Nutrition Advance - Evidence-based Food and Nutrition Articles the majority of the articles are written by Michael Joseph. Michael is a nutrition educator and holds a Masters degree in Clinical Nutrition. His website is science-based and he gets into the weeds on all sorts of foods.
If you want to learn anything about a particular food, I'd start here first. Need to know the fiber content in black beans? Bingo.
Sure, you can try a quick Chat-GPT search or whatever your preferred AI search engine is, but this is by a live-breathing nutritionist.
Michael really is a wealth of knowledge. Check his site out today.
Blog of the Week
If you're a regular podcast consumer, there's a good chance you've heard of Dr. Peter Attia's The Drive. Dr. Attia covers a wide range of medical topics. I actually purchased his book, Outlive, The Science and Art of Longevity.
It's a fascinating read.
But his podcasts are where I tend to end up. The most recent episode I listened to was with Dr. Sarah Hallberg and I thought I was going to hear an hour about the Ketogenic diet and cholesterol but I was wrong.
The first part was as advertised. The subject of high cholesterol with the ketogenic diet, a diet used more and more to reverse Type 2 Diabetes is one that always catches my attention.
I'm not, nor have I ever been a "keto" dieter as I think it steers in the opposite direction of optimal gut health. I don't think I could ever stay in ketosis eating what I believe is needed to keep my gut in the best shape possible.
Others have had great success on a ketogenic diet and of course, I applaud their success and gains. I digress.
Back to Dr. Hallberg.
I had never heard of Sarah Hallberg so obviously I was not aware of her work, nor was I aware that she had terminal lung cancer.
It was an impactful hour of time. There was interesting science of course. But the glimpse into Sarah's story for a short time was powerful.
Give it a listen.
Wrap Up
I'll say it again because it's worth repeating. I was drawn to social media to learn and to share my story. And it can be a wretched place with some real pieces of work attempting and (failing) to be human beings.
But the connections I've made personally and the people I've encountered from afar have expanded my horizons beyond my wildest dreams.
It's about the people, people.
Thanks for reading,
Jeff
