Episode #112 Featuring Microbiome Scientist and Expert DR. COLLEEN CUTCLIFFE! The most comprehensive explanation of the gut, microbiome, leaky gut, and how to create longevity through gut health!

Today I just want to give you a little bit of insight on this interview because this is extremely valuable and special.

I have interviewed experts all over the world specifically some of the most brilliant and well known when it comes to the gut in the microbiome. Dr. William Lee, Dr. Stephen Gundry, Dr. Jeffrey Bland, the list goes on and on and on. These are some of the most world renowned experts but today's interview with Colleen Cutcliffe and she's the founder of Pendulum. She is the most brilliant scientist that I have ever yet to speak to, especially when it comes to the gut in the microbiome.

“This episode is going to be so clear and concise to give you every single piece of information that you need to learn,”

straight to the point easy to understand yet filled with knowledge and power and I say power because this knowledge will provide you power to take control of your health in the right way.

We get into every single aspect of the gut and she gives a clear precise understanding of what Lee Kigut is, how to treat it, how to take care of it and so, so much more. So, I urge you to listen to this entire interview, it is a life changing and I would argue life saving, plethora of knowledge. I am not affiliated with Pendulum but I've been using their products for several months and I have to tell you. These are my new daily staples and they gave me a link for this particular episode where you can save 20% off your order.

I'm not affiliated, but they are my new favorite company and Colleen is one of my new favorite people. So stay tuned, you do not want to miss this episode. All right, everybody, welcome back to the Dylan Jemeli podcast. So, I have a very, very knowledgeable and special guest today. She has impressed me abundantly with all of the different aspects that she's covered, not just on her specialty, which is more gut and microbiome related. But we've had a couple discussions and we're going to talk about a lot.

And I like to show people that have a high level of knowledge in one category, how much else they have to offer as well.

“And I think today's episode is going to really spotlight and accentuate versatility to the highest degree and that's what I'm excited about and that's what I love to do.”

So my guest today, she is the co-founder and CEO of Pendulum Therapeutics, and she's a trailblazing microbiome scientist and biotech leader and she has more than 25 years of experience guiding high performing biology teams across academia, farm of bicycles and biotechnology. Now she has a PhD in biochemistry and molecular biology from Johns Hopkins University. She's got a slew of different things that she is good at, knows, et cetera, and we are going to get into that all today. So without further ado, my guest today, Coleen Cutcliffe.

Thanks so much for having me. Absolutely, Coleen. Thank you for coming here and as I said, we are going to get a lot of knowledge today.

“And I'm excited because when I spoke to you before seeing the passion you had and what you do with Pendulum, but also in many other degrees of health that we talked about.”

So let's just talk a little bit about the background first and then we're going to date deep because I've discussed got microbiome importance a lot, but I really like to get more intricate into it.

And I've really only had a couple people that get into it as opposed to just saying gut and how great it sounds. So let's start a little bit with your background here because you got a lot of credential. A lot of letters and years of studying. Yes. So I sort of decided a long time ago in my early 20s that health is how I wanted to make my mark. And so everything I've done all the different paths I've taken have all been really focused on that vision and what are the most kind of smarter, interesting ways that we can really help people improve their health at a at a global scale. And so I got my PhD at Johns Hopkins, it has a the number one school of public health that has for a long time.

And the work that's being done there is not just incredibly credible science and research, but also how do we help humanity and how do we help all communities to really elevate health around the world. So that was a very inspiring place to go to school to be also intimidating with all these smart people around you. And then I did a pretty traditional postdoc at Northwestern. I joined a pharma company after that working as a researcher. We were developing drugs for Parkinson's disease. So I learned kind of the blueprint for developing drugs in farm and land.

And then after that I joined a startup company. I was leading biology there. We were building a DNA sequencing instrument. And DNA sequencing is sort of a really cool technology when it comes to the microbiome and discovering new things there.

And we all were trying to understand how could we use the latest and DNA sequencing to go after this entirely new area of health called the microbiome.

And I was super excited about getting back into developing interventions and the microbiome for the last 20 years has just been this incredible exponential learning curve for everybody around the world. And so it's an exciting place to be. It seems to me over the past three to five years, let's say. And for you obviously longer, but I'm talking mainstream two things that constantly pop up mitochondria and gut is that it is like the biggest craze and rightfully so the problem is is there's a lot of people that say a lot of stuff without a lot of substance.

There's confusion and I would like to take some of this time to really get into the good and the bad like what is the good information what do we need to know and what is maybe some of the things that are said that are false or misleading because I think it's prevalent and sometimes I don't think it's on purpose.

“I think it's just people repeating what they hear what I would like to know first and foremost is when it comes to the God especially.”

If you were to rate things of importance on our health that have the most impact.

Well, I mean, you're talking to me. So I'm a hammer that sees everything as a nail. So I do think that the good, you know, is it the most important system in your body.

Clearly many of us can live with a deficient gut that isn't optimally performing. And so. But I think that what we're learning is that through the gut, you can actually impact all of the 11 biological systems in your body. So when it comes to not just GI issues like constipation and diarrhea, certainly the gut microbiome plays an important role there. But it also plays an important role in your metabolism in your brain function like your stress and anxiety and even Parkinson's disease in your immune system.

“So allergies and asthma and then in your even your food sensitivity. So when you start to become allergic with certain foods, many of us as we age, become more sensitive to different foods.”

And so all these different systems, your metabolism, your brain function, your cardiovascular health actually can be tied and impacted through the gut microbiome. So in that sense.

Because it's connected to everything, it's so important. So it's fair to say that it has a drastic impact on so many different aspects of our health that if it is off that we could have several functions that are off because of a gut issue. That's right. And I think that's actually one of the biggest learnings, which is that things that you might have been attributing to other stuff. You can start to point back to the gut as maybe the reason why you're not feeling like, "Oh, man, my memory is just getting worse."

Or, "Oh, my metabolism is slowing down." Or, "I'm just more tired all the time." Or, "I have that post-lunch brain fog." And a lot of these things we chalk up to just aging.

“Well, as you age, that's just how it is, that's how it goes. And that doesn't necessarily have to be the case. And so that is the huge opportunity of the gut microbiome.”

Well, you just took the words out of my mouth because I was going to say to you, one of the things that I can't stand is it's inevitable because you're aging or it's idiopathic, meaning we just don't know what the hell is wrong with you. And how often do you think that people are suffering a gut issue where general practitioner doctors really don't look at it? All the time, if you're going to a doctor and you've got these symptoms and you're trying to get help, they are not trained in the gut microbiome.

I mean, in some senses, it's a relatively new science. And the interventions are not proven out in the way that they are for some of these pharmaceutical drugs. But they're certainly not trained. They're not using diagnostic tests regularly. They're not learning about what the different metabolites are that should a microbiome is involved in. And they're certainly not learning about interventions that are non pharmaceutical drugs. And so when you're if you're working with a traditional medical doctor.

And I don't want to slam medical doctors too much. My husband is actually one, but if you're working with a traditional medical doctor, you're not getting that. So if you're working with a practitioner who's more thinking about integrative and functional medicine, you're probably getting a lot more than information and more to more holistic look at your body. But generally speaking, you're not getting that and to your point, the things that you're being prescribed while they may solve one problem. They could be creating all kinds of other problems, including wreaking havoc on your gut.

And your gut will actually adapt to everything that you're ingesting, including drugs. So you can have a different microbiome if you're taking drugs. But one of the telltale things for you, if you're wondering about this, is many people when they go on a new medication, they experience GI issues. So you've ever gone on a medication, most commonly antibiotics is where people experience it. And you're like, "Oh man, all of a sudden my stomach is like really upset all the time. You've definitely impacted your gut."

But if you have a high end foreign car, you're not taking it to a regular mechanic, right?

There's a specialty for everything. So when we have a, like for me, when I had a cardiology problem, I wasn't going to my general doctor for that.

“I'm going to a specialist. That's why they're called general, because they just work on general medicine.”

And then there's people like yourself that are specialists. And that's why you do what you do. And so general, whatever, just normally send you to somebody else. And that's part of their job. Definitely, well, and what I hope is that the general practitioners will start to learn about this, because it is connected to so many different symptoms.

And oftentimes your generalist is the only one your internal medicine doc is only that knows all the different stuff you're taking and doing.

Right. And it's there to pull it all together. So I think that's an important group to start to get educated. I agree. You know, when I got the most discouraged, I went to Mayo Clinic and all be all. And when in there and I had an LP little A problem, which is off topic here, but when they told me, well, we don't have enough information on that. And it would be bad practice to give you this medication. And I sat there and I looked at my wife and my mom and kind of gave them that look and was like, you know, like, really?

Because I have mounds of information here. I've been studying.

“Yeah. And that was disheartening to me. And that's why I love specialists so much that and functional doctors and alternative will just call it alternative medicine and ideas.”

And when people get so angry and so turned off by it, it's like, hey, man, you do you, you know, like nobody's forced in anybody to do anything. We're just providing what I feel and I'm sure you do is life changing information. Absolutely. And, you know, the medical field, and we can we're stepping into outside of got microbiome territory here, but the medical field, you know, each of those doctors has taken a note. They really are trying to benefit our health and they're really trying to help all of us in the best way that they can.

But all they have been taught are things that have been interventions that have been created and developed by pharmaceutical companies and here in the United States is particularly egregious. And so pharmaceutical companies make drugs. Those are the only things the FDA will approve. If you see FDA approve, that means it's a drug. Otherwise, the FDA doesn't approve approve, you know, supplements and things like that. And so the FDA approved drugs that are developed by pharmaceutical companies that are then covered by insurance companies and those are the products that doctors learn about when they're medical school.

Yeah. So how much time do they spend even learning about nutrition? How much time do they spend learning about supplements? How much time do they spend learning about the gut microbiome? How much time do they spend learning about any natural products? And so the fact that they don't know it is is a kind of a consequence of the system. It's not an excuse. I hope they all learn it as as we start to get more information, but when you go to your general practitioner, you should know that's all they learned.

Yeah, I know because I've talked to several friends that have gone through medical school and I also have a close friend that does pharmaceutical sales like a very close friend. So I know all of this stuff that people like to get angry about that say, oh, they're just saying that no, no, no, no. We know because we know these people personally and to your point pharmaceutical sales, they go in to clinics and they give their long speech just what's the movie.

“We meet the fuckers like when they just watch one of those. That's actual reality. That's what happens.”

They go in there, give their speech, try to sell their stuff to whatever the clinic is. And also, and I will bring this up and you can don't have to answer this, but this I know I'm privy to this information because I have a close friend and drug sales that actually develops them. And, and he's talked about if they put because I say, why don't they prescribe certain medications? Why don't doctors prescribe these? Why is it so hard to get repatha like that I had to go way out of my way to get? Because if they start writing these scripts too often, insurance places will drop their ass from the and then what happens.

Yeah, they're done. Yep. They're on a business. If they write stat and prescriptions all the time and sorry stat and lovers, that's okay. That's what's encouraged. So they're kind of in a jam. Yeah, I mean, because insurance companies are so heavily involved in pharmaceuticals and what get recommended and who gets covered and even hospitals, you know, getting their coverage. It ends up being sort of a conflict of interest or a gross misinformation that, you know, we as the patient or the consumer of that stuff ended up being on the short end of the stick.

Yeah, but it nicely.

Well, how do you? I'm curious how you feel about the lack of intricacy when it comes to blood panels because I've always been so bothered to why aren't we taking cardiac IQ panels.

Why aren't we looking for heavy metals and parasites and other things that we know for sure can absolutely destroy lives?

That's true. But do you think that's like a just gross lack of care?

“I think it is for so, but I also feel hope because there are a lot of new clinics that are coming out that really have a focus on integrating all the different types of tests.”

And then integrating all the different kinds of care. And I think we'll start to see those if they are successful and I think they will be. Then we'll start to see that integrated into larger hospital systems, but the large hospital systems like Mayo Clinic, who I love, they are investors in us. And they really are doing cutting edge research there. But they're going to be the last adopters of new protocols. So we kind of, you know, for all of us, we have to start with the more cutting edge places. And then it's going to trickle down to the electrical network.

Yeah, it's like the old coach that just stuck in his ways that never looks and then gets fired because it doesn't work anymore.

Right. What science? I mean, you're brilliant science, person. What science isn't science? Ask asking questions looking for new ways and things that could we may have been wrong about and trying to see if there's a better way. Or am I crazy?

Yeah. No, absolutely. And I think, you know, one of the interesting things is we've talked a lot about personalized medicine and your own individual. But it hasn't really come to fruition in any sort of meaningful way. And one of the amazing things about the gut microbiome is it is almost a fingerprint of every person.

“When people started researching the microbiome, they're like, why do all these? Why does everyone have basically the same strain?”

It's slightly different. Like, what is the purpose of this? And we're now discovering that you may have the same functions in your microbiome that I do. But you have almost a fingerprint of your microbiome that's different from mine.

And so it's actually really interesting to think about how who we are, who we're born as, how we've evolved.

All the choices we've made kind of show up in your gut. Really? So here, I'm going to ask you, this is going to sound crazy to you and maybe a little stupid, but this is important. Can you? Because we save microbiome all the time. You know how many people don't know what that means. Can you just give us simple explanation? What is microbiome?

Yes. So microbiome is comes from the word "microbes." So if you think back to seventh grade biology class, it's all the little bacteria and viruses and fungi. They actually live on us and in us. And there's a ton of them in our guts, in our nasal passages on our skin, everywhere. And we've co-evolved with them and they play a massive role in our health. We are constantly trying to kill them through antibiotics, antiseptic wipes, any bacterial soaps,

but they're actually mostly incredibly beneficial for us. And so, for example, we are all supposed to be walking around with a layer of microbes on our skin. And those microbes are a barrier between our immune system and all of the kind of triggers in the environment around us to think like pollen and grass and dust. And so we've evolved these microbes. They're supposed to be on our skin so that when our body encounters dust, for example,

the microbes are metabolizing it, they're kind of a barrier force. But most of us are showering once a day. Some people's twice a day. Most people have skin care routines that involve clearing off your skin on a very regular basis.

“We're a hygienic society and so that's what we do.”

And effectively what you're doing is every time you do that, you're stripping those microbes off of you. And then we wonder, how come everyone's getting allergies? How come as I get older? I'm allergic to more things. You're constantly barraising your immune system with things.

It's never supposed to be seeing.

I see. Wow. Okay. We'll see. That's brand new to me. I'm like skin care. It's impossible to get someone to change their skin care routine. Even when they know that, but it's just sort of knowing it doesn't make you think twice, especially coming out of the COVID craze.

It does make you think twice about, do I really have to have antibacterial gels in every room with my house? I mean, we really don't. No. I would agree thoroughly. Okay. So now understanding that. And I'll relate this to fats, like thinking fats, making fat.

So we think that the bacteria is just bad. I mean, it's easy to assume, right? So how good is it, like, especially for our gut? I mean, how important and good is it? It's incredibly important.

And some bacteria are definitely bad. So that's true. But you know, interestingly, a lot of those bad bacteria. So E. coli is something a lot of people know. And you would ask if I asked you.

We think that E. coli, good bacteria, bad bacteria. They're like bad, bad. But the fact is we all walk around like some E. coli in us. And it's not doing anything bad. It's part of an ecosystem. It's being held at bay.

It actually produces small molecules that are important for us. And so when it is in the ecosystem and it's in society, it is actually fine. It's when you kind of take it out of society and you let it go wild and free

And so we should all be thinking about our microbiome as an ecosystem that has both these good and these bad players. But when you think about your gut microbiome in particular, it's like this massive manufacturing plant, this factory that has all these different departments that are doing all this work and converting everything that you eat

“into all these different things that are important for you.”

Some of those things are it stimulates your GLP1. It stimulates immune system. It stimulates your inflammatory system when you need it. And so you have all these similar departments that are doing very specific jobs. And so if you are understaffed in a department,

you will start to have health issues coming out of that. And so that's really, I think the importance of understanding what is that ecosystem, who am I understaffed in? And how do I start to, you know, buff that team back up? Okay, so let's, I want to really get into this now.

I want to talk everything microbiome related. And I want to start with you kind of getting into what are some of the biggest culprits that cause a problem. What are some of the foods, daily habits, things that we do? I'm assuming inflammation is because it's everything.

But it means it's bound upon that if you would. Yeah, so I think there's, there's two big things that we do to ourselves that are, that are not great for our microbiome.

The first is anytime you take an antibiotic, it's like a nuclear bomb to your microbiome.

It kills everything.

“So if you have an infection, you should take an antibiotic.”

But don't go ask your doctor for an antibiotic. Unless he said, you have a bacterial infection and you need to be prescribed that. A lot of us get viral infections that we want, you know, our Z pack. And so when you take antibiotics, you are completely decimating your microbiome. When your microbiome recover, it's oftentimes not the same microbiome you started with.

And so what is interesting is farmers have known this for decades. They've been feeding their cattle antibiotics not because they had some kind of infection or because they were worried about their gut microbiome or anything like that. But they observed that if you give your cows lots of antibiotics, they gain weight. They become more obese.

And so that is basically a cheap way to create more obese cows. And if you're a farmer, that's great news. Well, it's not just true in cows, it's also true in people. And so studies have shown in children who take a lot of antibiotics later on in life. They're more prone to obesity and diabetes.

So just be aware that when you take antibiotics, you are completely altering your microbiome. And you might not get back what you started with initially.

The second really big thing that we do is eat certain foods.

And so when you think about your microbiome, it doesn't have a way to get any nutrients except you. You're completely in charge of what it eats. And so what you eat is what you're feeding it. And so all the obvious stuff, like you want to be having a diet that's high in fibers and polyphenols and all your fruits and veggies and all that good stuff and lentils.

But process foods can be detrimental for the microbiome. We know that effectively when you go to the grocery store, the middle part. It's like fat, great for your microbiome. The outer part is good. So those are the two things that we have some level of control over when it comes to microbiome.

But there are other things that can be caused your microbiome to become depleted. So we talk about understaffed and department. That depletion is problematic. And that can happen when we literally, as we age, our microbiome becomes depleted. When we go through periods of intense stress, our microbiome becomes depleted.

When we travel in our circadian rhythm changes, day becomes a night night becomes day. Our microbiome becomes depleted. And when we have hormonal changes, so when we go through puberty or when we women go through menopause, our microbiome becomes depleted. So those are things that are just part of being a human and life and living that cause you become depleted.

And so it may be things you've done, but it may be things that are completely outside of your control, but either way the good news is that you can change your microbiome. So you deplete them. You cause havoc. You do all of these bad practices behaviors.

All of the things that you talked about, it's still something that if you stop correct it.

“It is fixable or is it something that is going to be problematic forever?”

You can fix it. It's like the ultimate redemption story. You can fix it. So you know, whatever you've done in the past is that that you can fix your microbiome. You could today decide, I'm going to focus on that.

And I am going to work on figuring out how do I get my microbiome to have all the diverse functions I want. And you can literally change your future health.

Here's what I'm going to do.

I'm going to rapid fire you a couple things. And you're going to tell me yes or no and maybe get into why or why not. They don't affect the microbiome because it's just popped into my head. Oh man, okay. No, that's just how I roll.

Okay. So because I know you know right away. So alcohol. Man, I don't need any studies on what alcohol does to your microbiome. I don't think it's good for it.

Okay. I just think that alcohol can do so much damage. And that's where I thought, man, I bet it relates to microbiome. It does. What about smoking?

Interestingly, you know, I don't know that I've read too many studies. Well, so first of all, there are a ton of correlative studies out there, where

than than people who don't.

But I won't. That's different from saying that you're smoking is what led you to have a different microbiome. And that requires you to have some functional link between the two things. So smoking is an interesting one. I don't know that I've seen anything about smoking in the gut microbiome,

but certainly the lung microbiome. What about overtraining? What's her size? Too much exercise. Definitely that, well, because your microbiome is also involved in helping, you know,

creating small molecules that help rebuild your muscle. And so certainly that does have an impact on the microbiome. What about bad sleep, lack of sleep, uneven sleep patterns, like you mentioned about circadian rhythm? Yeah, the two are definitely tied to each other.

So when you get bad sleep, that impact your microbiome, but your microbiome can also impact your sleep. So those two are definitely in Kahuts. Okay. So microbiome being off is going to throw your sleep patterns off.

Yeah. Yeah.

“And we can get more deeply into it if you want to.”

But one of the big things is about how your body metabolizes shooters. And so if you are experiencing a bunch of kind of, I don't want to call it dysfunctional, but you're experiencing, you know, glucose spikes and crashes. When you're supposed to be sleeping, especially a little bit more stable, a lot of that can actually be because your microbiome is sort of off-kilter.

And so it's creating, forming activities and creating problems that you really shouldn't be having in sleep. I was going to say sugar. Yeah. I know sugars. Sugar's another one.

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“All right. Well, I think I gave you the randoms there enough.”

But I think that all of those things are, I think people sit down and look in the mirror. A lot of those things I mentioned, their problems, you know, people do. And I think it should be addressed. Marijuana. Anything on that at all? I don't think I've seen anything on that. That doesn't mean it's not out there.

I don't think I've seen anything on that. I only ask because it's got more prevalent, only accepted more prevalently used. I'm not going to get into street drugs. I think that's pre-obvious. Just a couple medications that are used quite often. One would be ibuprofen or said type because that is a problem.

Those are used way more than people. I think sometimes even realize they're using. So what about that? Because I know liver kidneys bad, bad, bad, bad. But what about microbiome? I don't think I've seen anything to really show a large detrimental impact from ibuprofen.

But I would just say this with the caveat that, you know, we are still in the very early phases of learning about this body part. And so just because it hasn't been studied yet doesn't mean that it's not going to be. And just because I don't know it doesn't mean it's not out there. Right.

“And what about are there any supplements or, you know, powders or anything like that protein powders creatine?”

Anything that too much of or anything that would be shocking that has actually a negative effect on microbiome that you could point out. Aside from toxicity from too much vitamins or something like that, I mean just generally. Yeah. I think it's actually relatively difficult to change the ecosystem of your microbiome by kind of like overdosing. Yeah.

Because you know, there's a lot of, because first of all, if you're taking natural probiotics.

And so because your body has natural systems for curbing and controlling the levels. So, but that being said, you know, all the supplements that are out there have had to go through. Toxicity studies or classic talk studies. But I don't know that I've seen a case of a overdose situation that impacted the microbiome in a sustainable way. And are there any foods that would surprise somebody that are bad for the microbiome that we just assume are like good for you foods?

I think, you know, we know the process and all of that crap. But is there anything that would shock somebody or that you know of or is it more or less the common stuff that we already know? Well, I think one of the things that might be surprising is that spices. So all those, the whole spice section. If you like spicy food and you like playing around spices, that's actually really great for your microbiome.

So that might be a little bit, you might feel like, oh, but when I eat spicy food, that really like upsets my stomach.

But actually, all those different spices are good for you. Okay. All right. See, I'm not as, like, I can't do spicy and I've really been trying to do a few and like implement them. And I can see differences in how I feel.

It's, it is. I just moderation moderation. Okay.

“So how about some things that will benefit the microbiome?”

I'm looking at all the negative. Let's switch it. Let's be positive people here. What are some things that maybe aren't so obvious and maybe are that you would recommend aside from when we'll get into like probiotic post-biotic type of stuff.

But I'm, I'm looking more food and natural stuff right now that people can do on top of supplementing.

Yeah. Well, first of all, you don't necessarily have to supplement a lot of studies have shown that through food alone.

If you're low or, you know, I just don't have enough of certain microbes. Food alone. Nutrition alone can really ramp them up. So I don't know that anyone should jump to supplements as your first solution. I would say, let's start with food.

Always. And so your, your produce section is your best starting point there.

“So all of your fruits and veggies, things that are high in fiber, those fruits that have natural”

sugars, but they're mixed with fibers, right? So not the juice, but like actually eating the fruits. Those are all really, really fantastic for you. That whole section is, everybody's in there is great. So those are wonderful. Then if you kind of go over into your bean section. So lentils, black beans, all of those are really great for you. They're high in fibers. So if you, if you love beans, that's awesome. Those are great for you.

And then green tea. Green tea is really great for, it's a good source of polyphenols. And then all your spices. These are all really, you know, if you can have, if you can hang out on your produce section and your bean section, and then have some tea and spices added in there, you're great. And in a lot of ways, you can cure any gut issues almost through diet alone. Now the caveat is that it's really hard to be have a good diet all the time, all day long, every day, forever.

And so there are things that are going to push your microbiome towards being depleted. So supplements are an easy kind of, hey, let me, let me supplement this thing because like, I can't get, I'm not really going to get that into my diet at the levels I need to. The other thing is that all those are the things that we talked about, stress, hormonal changes, travel. I mean, those can also push your microbiome in one direction.

So while you can do it likely through food as the major way, supplementation can just help you with that one too, punch. Absolutely. One of the things that I really, really drive home and especially because I come from this background of training so many body builders that just want the quickest answer and fix and everything. It's every single thing should start with food first. Yeah. The term supplement just say it.

It means to supplement what you're using. Right. Don't depend or rely on exactly. Right. I mean, it's there as a tool.

But there's so much abuse in everything everybody does anymore, especially more is always better.

And we want this right out right now right now and it's just not reality. I know, unfortunately, got to work at it. Yeah, of course. And so now I'll say for every rule there is a rule breaker. So there's an exception. So there is one strain that has actually not been found in any foods or beverages and,

and people have been looking for it around the world. And it's called acrimansia, Mucinophila. And this strain has only been found in in one food source. And that is Mother's breast milk. And so the idea is that your mom gives it to you and then you spend the rest of your life trying not to lose it.

And so in that case, if you're low or completely missing acrimansia, you, supplementation might be the primary way you want to go. Okay. All that makes sense. You're going to screw it there and that's fine in that store. Okay. No, that's great. So, all right, till we've addressed commonalities, what helps, what doesn't help.

And so what I would like to do then is kind of get into what I find to be extremely confusing even for myself.

“Sometimes, honestly, and that is what do we take for a probiotic, post-biotic prebiotic?”

What is the differentiating factor between the three and do we need all three? Great. We'll do the 101 here. So probiotics, that's the bacteria in the virus and the fungi that we've been talking about. That's the living organism. The probiotic is the living organism. The prebiotic is the food that those organisms eat.

And the postbiotic is the stuff that they produce. So if you think about like, you know, your organism, the food you eat and then the stuff you make. So the bacteria are the same. So they're the probiotics. Their food is the prebiotics and the stuff they make is the postbiotics. Yeah. What should it? Is that easy? The principle is easy. Now what do you do about it? That's the hard part.

Yes, please discuss what we need, what we should be taking and why. Well, I think, you know, prebiotics, this is the foods we've been talking about. These fibers and things like that, you know, those are really great for you.

And if you've ever tried to actually eat that amount, I think only 5% of us Americans are eating the amount of fiber we're supposed to eat, it's actually work to figure out how to get all those fibers. And then you're supposed to have a diversity of fibers. So that becomes like a full-time farming job.

“If you're like trying to find, how do I get this diversity of vegetables into me?”

And so I think in a lot of ways supplementation of fibers makes a lot of sense. Absolutely. I do the same thing. And I mastered how to get the right amount of fiber and my dikes and nutritionists and my obsession with everything. Everything food, but it's not easy at all and it fills you up extremely fast. Yes.

And it doesn't always feel well in your stomach either.

That's right. Yeah, and interestingly, you know, a lot of people, they have sensitive microbiomes to the exact fibers that they need that are the prebiotics. And so that's true. And actually, you know, the incidence of IBS is getting worse. Here in the US, I think a third of people have Earl Bell syndrome. And so, and some people have a really extreme case of it where they're like, okay, when I go out of the house, I need to know where all the bathrooms are.

And then other people have mild cases of it where they're like, okay, I have to be thoughtful. I had to take Pepsi before I go, you know, I mean, I'll have my friends. And so, but IBS is a huge problem. And so there's a low-fod map diet. So if you, if you know what low-fat map is, I'm sorry, that means you probably are struggling with IBS.

But it's really about a problem that people have with actually eating fibers. And so, one of the things and what we might talk about this later, but one of the things for us when we think about the supplementation of fibers is to also take into consideration this low-fod map requirement, because there are fibers that are low-fod maps. So you can close that fiber gap with things that aren't going to totally wreck your stomach. I want to get into a little bit of that if you don't mind, let's finish what we were talking about with the pro and pre and post here.

But I want to discuss fiber because that does not get talked about at all. And I know people that are like even telling people that eat fiber, and I'm just completely lost on that. But I want to finish this one. So in your view and recommendation, what do you recommend that most people do obviously address the foods that you're eating, but then supplementation wise, because I do think that it's important to implement that in your right.

You're never going to be perfect with diet, I don't care who you are.

And I like to be as perfect as I can, and it's just not reality. What would you recommend? Okay, and I'm highly imperfect. So all the products we make are just to like supplement for my bad lifestyle.

“So I think the closing the fiber gap is really important, as I said, most of us are not eating in a fiber.”

Fiber supplementation. If you have a sense of stomach, look for that low-fod map, you know, on these different fibers. There's not a lot of things out there that have that, but it's just something to consider. And then when you start on a fiber supplement, do not go whole hog into the full serving right away. I mean, that, I just want to give everyone that warning. Because if you do that, you're going to never eat that fiber thing again.

No. Us to just, you know, ease into it. Micro dose, your fiber to begin with. So yes, I think fiber supplementation is super important. And then the other supplementation, you know, with these different probiotics has a lot to do with, you know, what is the problem you're trying to solve?

Where do you think that you have a depletion? That could come through microbiome testing. That could come through. I'm trying to have, you know, better digestion. I want to really be able to metabolize these fibers that I'm eating.

I want to be able to have regular bowel movements. It could be on trying to boost my metabolism. To be honest, the vast majority of probiotics that are out there have only really shown that they can help you with GI issues. Yeah. And that's one of the things that we were really interested in.

“Can you start to explore metabolism and create products that can help people with their metabolism?”

So there's not a lot of options out there. You know, there's this big promise of the microbiome. It hasn't come to fruition quite yet. So there's that issue. And then postbiotics.

Postbiotics are tough one for me because. I think they're a little bit of bullshit. No. Please expound. Because I don't disagree.

Because the fact is that if you're using your prebiotics to grow your probiotics and you're supplementing the probiotics you don't have, they're going to make the postbiotics. They're going to be doing the job. You've got all the manufacturing plan in here. You're feeding all of them. They're going to do their jobs.

Um, and moreover, the delivery of postbiotics is a huge problem. So let's take beauty rate as an example. You can buy beauty rate at almost every vendor sells beauty rate. And there have been a lot of studies showing that beauty rate can help you with calonic health and with metabolizing glucose in mice. Let me just repeat that.

A lot of amazing studies on how can help you with colon health and your blood glucose in mice.

And they have not really translated into humans. Like find me a great clinical trial of beauty rate supplementation in humans that actually shows that kind of efficacy that they've seen in animal models. It does not exist and I have been looking. I would love to find that.

So your calonic cells are the only cells in your body that use beauty rate as their primary energy source. Everybody else uses glucose, but your colon cells use beauty rate. And so when you take a beauty rate supplement, just realize that all those calonic cells are fighting for it before it actually gets to its targets. So it would be sort of like if I said,

I'm going to give you a million dollars.

Would you rather I put in a suitcase, not on your door and hand it the suitcase to you? Or would you rather me call you up and say, hey, I scattered it all over highway 101. You just go pick it up if you want to. You'd be like, are you going to give it to me, please? And the, and scanner going over highway 101 is like what you're doing when you take the supplement all along the way.

Everyone is getting out of their car, taking your dollars. All those calonic cells are grabbing all that beauty rate before it gets to the receptor, which is actually what's going to have all these beneficial effects. And so the beauty rate is not getting to the receptor because of that delivery. On the other hand, if you're eating the foods that are going to increase your beauty rate producing microbes,

then you're really using your body's natural system. Those microbes are in the microbiome. They're producing the beauty rate and handing off right to the receptor right there. So that is the suitcase of a million dollars. That's beautiful.

Thank you for explaining that.

It's a slap of reality to some people.

“And I love that. That's what I'm all about.”

No, you're right. And things get marketed and sold a certain way and it sounds great. It does. It does. But nobody breaks down what you just did.

And that's why I wanted the explanation because it, it makes total sense when it's explained that way. But people don't do it and they don't ask. Yeah. I mean, for some people, there is some efficacy. But it's like a weak mechanism.

It's a weak way to go about it. And we can talk about the placebo effect. Really. And so if you're getting, like, just say, like, if it's working for you, you should keep doing it. But the placebo effect still is a good effect on the body.

So lived in the world of placebo effects for so long. Could you just explain what that means, please? Well, it just means that your psychological state can affect your health. Thank you. Okay.

If you believe that it's working, it may for a little while or it may feel like it does for a little while. But I dealt with this for years, like when I said, working with body builders and then tell me that this is great. And I'm like, no, it's, it's not. But okay, as long as you feel good on it. But if you believe in it's working for you, that's real.

Yeah. I mean, like, it's been very much shown on the other side of it that if you're sad all the time or you're depressed. Oh, yeah. You're more likely to get sick. I mean, your brain can impact your health in so many ways.

So if you're like, this makes me feel good. And I feel like it's having positive, but go, go for it. You're doing it. As long as it's not hurting, yeah, by all means. Yeah.

We just, I just want people to feel healthy and to be healthy. So that work. No, and I listen, I am a million percent behind you on the attitude and the belief set and system. I know for a fact. Yeah.

And the more people complain and the more that they are always sad or down guaranteed.

Their blood panels are a mask compared to somebody that's not. It's a certainty. Yeah. Oh, mechanistically, they're, they're bullshit. Yeah.

Yeah. So the fiber thing. This is what I want to talk about. There's different kinds of fiber, like you said, like soluble fiber or, I mean, there's all kinds of different fibers.

“Can you kind of discuss the ones that we need that are important?”

And maybe some kind of foods that I've done several pieces of content on high fiber foods. But it would be nice to hear from somebody like you. Yeah. Well, I think, you know, you want both soluble and insoluble fibers. We think a lot about the insoluble fibers because those are the ones that, you know, interact with a fair number of microbes.

And then we also think a lot about the soluble fibers because those interact with kind of another set of microbes. And so I think. So you want both. So if you're reading about insoluble and soluble, you want both of them in there. The insoluble fibers can really help you with that feeling of fullness.

So we talked early about, oh, man, you can eat all the fiber, you know, all those vegetables and things. And then you just feel full really fast. It's those insoluble fibers that give you a feeling of fullness. And so that can help you if you're trying to work on, you know, reducing your cravings and trying to work on reducing how much food you're eating the volume of it. If you start your meals with those insoluble fibers, that can be like a little bit of a life hack.

There are fibers that have been shown to have benefit to your, you know, cardiovascular and metabolic health. So resistant potato starches, which are part of this RS2. Family, those are have been shown to have healthy benefits for cardiovascular health. And then one of the other ones that is sort of interesting is oat beta glue can. And so that also has some pretty good studies showing its benefit to cardiovascular health.

“Definitely. So what's the difference between soluble and insoluble fibers?”

Well, it's almost exactly like what it sounds like. So insoluble in part of the reason that it helps you with a feeling of fullness is that.

When you are trying to dissolve sugar into hot tea, it's super easy. It's soluble. Yeah, when you try to dissolve sugar into cold tea, it's insoluble. So that's just the definitions of soluble and so I got it. But for anybody who's tried to I grew up in the south, so there's a lot of making of sweet tea. Sure.

So, and the fibers are sort of similar in that you're really thinking about things that dissolve well versus don't dissolve well.

“So if you're buying us a fiber supplement and you're like, why doesn't this thing dissolving?”

It's because it's likely an insoluble fiber. So, you know, psyllium husk or metamusyl is a good example of an insoluble fiber. Try to mix that thing in water, you know, you're mixing and drinking at the same time. What is your opinion then on psyllium husk? Do you find it to be something that we should be using or because I was just going to ask you that? Because it's very, very highly recommended by many people. Yeah, it's one of the most well studied and old school fibers that is it's like, you know, your grandma's metamusyl.

Yeah, it turns out it's still good for you. And so I think there's been sort of a rediscovery of psyllium husk and it's great for you. It's fantastic. It's not easy to drink or ingest because of that insoluble thing, but it's great for you.

I've always liked it when I put it in stuff.

“We're weird. Yeah, I'm weird. I mean, Queenie would always be like, huh? I'd be like, I don't know, should I like it?”

I used it for heart health. Really is one of the reasons that I used it for, but it definitely for microbiome health as well. Really good. A lot of people are sensitive to it. So again, like, just ease into it. Yeah. Oh, yeah. No, I put it in yogurt or when I used to eat oatmeal. I used to mix it in all the time. I thought it was tremendous. I don't crazy. I don't know. No, no, it's great for you. Yeah, and I put it in drinks that I, you know, just but you're right, you know what? It's funny because when I do put stuff like that in there, it's the last thing I put in a shaker cup and man, you got a very little ice or it clumps at the bottom.

Yeah, and it, you're just, it's going to be a big mess and you're there to miss it. Well, it's one of those you get to the bottom of your glass and there's just this, you know, thick thing. You're like, did I eat any of it?

I get any of it in. No, and then I would always, this is gross, but I just put a little bit of water then it just slam it real quick.

“That's what I'm saying. You're mixing and drinking at the same time.”

Yeah, you have to. You want to make sure you're not making a large glass of that stuff in there. Straighten, I mean, the oatmeal or the yogurt idea. That's that's great. Yeah, it's perfect. Yeah, and honestly, like I said, I like to taste of it in there, but I put protein powders and stuff in there to make it palatable. Okay, so what I would like to do then, and I don't do big product stuff here. I just don't. That's not what I'm about unless it's something I really, really believe in. I'm not going to name a bunch of names, but I'm just going to say that I've been worked potentially worked with because I really want in.

My repertoire of stuff that I believe and and represent. I want something like I have with timeline, which is my to conduit. And I think they're the best of the best of the best and I'll stand by that forever. I like my neuroscience stuff, which is why I work with Dr. Dave, you know, and everything that it comes to simulating Vegas nerve and things of that nature. So the people that I work with, it's very calculated it's something I believe in. I've been through the ringer with microbiome stuff with probiotics with probiotics, biggest names that you can think of.

Like I said, I'm not going to say it. I'll have the discussion with you later, but I do want to talk about your company because I find the innovation. The glucose control, for example, and you have a new product I'd like you to talk about a little bit and like I said. This was not something I even planned on doing, but I find through after I met you and then looking into it more. Trying some of the stuff, realizing the differences comparing against some of your biggest names out there that I've all kinds of money and marketing and everything else.

But about the why you have a differentiation in products, what you're addressing specifically the glucose control, which really drew my attention immediately. Because that's not something that is seen, but I'm curious as to the development process here and why you picked which you did.

Yeah, well, first of all, we thank you for that. We approached the microbiome initially to try to understand where you could affect human health through the microbiome.

And we almost, because of, I think I told you earlier, I didn't know anything about supplements when we started this company and what I knew is I didn't want to do anything that had already been done. Well, it turns out that only represents a very small fraction of microbiome, so it's like actually I didn't have to move very much in the pie. There's a lot more left, but I don't want to do anything that had already been done. And I mean, we knew that there was going to be opportunity to go after a wide variety of things.

And we chose metabolism, not just that I'm selfish and I want to boost my own metabolism. But we chose metabolism because of that study that I told you about that showed that kids were on a lot of antibiotics were more prone to obesity and diabetes.

I didn't know anything about the microbiome when she was born. They gave her all these antibiotics, not because she had an infection, but it's a protocol for premies because she was born at four and a half pounds. And they worry if they get an infection, they're not going to be able to survive it. And so she got on the antibiotics. We went home with this like, you know, tiny little baby. And as she got older, I realized she had food sensitivities that the rest of us did not have. And she wasn't metabolizing her foods the way the rest of us could. And so for me, I felt like, okay, I want to understand how the gut microbiome.

“What is that depletion that she experienced? What's missing? How can the gut microbiome help you the metabolism? What can we do here?”

And so that's why we really started studying metabolism. And of course, as scientists, when you think about studying metabolism, you don't worry about like, oh, the person who's optimizing their metabolism, you really go all the way to the end of the spectrum. People with type two diabetes, they have metabolic syndrome, metabolic dysfunction. Can we help these people? Because if we can help them, we can help all the way through the entire spectrum. And so we started with type two diabetes. You have full on type two diabetes. And we started looking at what's the difference between healthy people and people with diabetes.

We looked at twins or discordance. So you're genetically identical, but one of you has a great metabolism and one of you doesn't. And so, and it wasn't just our research. This research has been done globally. People were sharing data.

One of the huge advantages of, I think, academic research is that it's always published and you really get to look at all the state and pull it together.

And this is even before AI was trending. We are definitely looking at all this data. And so, and what we found was that people with diabetes were low or entirely missing, very specific strains. One of these very specific departments that is responsible for stimulating your body's GLP-1.

“Really? So that was a decade ago. And we were like, holy shit. GLP-1, even though it's sort of new to our world as consumers, GLP-1,”

we've known about it for decades and decades. And so, we were like, these microbes stimulate GLP-1. And we know that a high fiber data is really good for you. And that those fibers are helping these strains grow. And we know GLP-1 and insulin are really good for you. And these strains are stimulating that whole pathway. What's been missing is these strains. And so, we had a list of 20 of them. And then we were like, great. We're off to the races. We're just like, have somebody manufacture them.

There's people all around the world that manufacture probiotics. Nobody could grow these strains for us. And what we learned is that when you're talking about the gut microbiome, it's in the distal colon. That's the, you know, get through this stomach, you go through the whole intestinal tract. And the distant part of that is the distal colon. Well, in the distal colon, there's no oxygen there. So these strains cannot grow in the presence of any oxygen. That is a huge differentiator from all the strains around the shells right now.

They can grow with some oxygen in them. And so, when we gave these manufacturers our strains, and they put it through their processes, they all were dying because this oxygen exposure. So, we haven't, having to build our own manufacturing plant and creating these end-to-end systems with no oxygen. It's actually really crazy because there's oxygen in the ear all around us. So to keep oxygen at us, like, not nothing.

Right. So, and then really, after we figured out how to grow these strains, we made all these informal relations with them. We said, okay, well, the gold standard is a placebo-controlled, double-blinded randomized clinical trial.

“And we're going to go around that. Remember, I had a pharma upbringing. That's how you do it.”

And so, we ran a clinical trial on people with type 2 diabetes, most of them were on metformin already.

And this paper was published in BMJ, and that's where it showed, this is the first and the only probiotic out there in the world.

I can lower your A1C and your blood glucose spikes. And when you compare the efficacy of that, compared to placebo, because there is a placebo effect. After 90 days, people who were on glucose control had a lowering of their A1C by 0.6. And that can mean the temperature in having diabetes and not having it. That's significant. And a lowering of blood glucose spikes by 33%, so the area under the curve of the glucose spikes went down by 33%.

And so, we were like, holy smokes, we have a product. And we brought that product to market. Here are all the wonderful things about that product. It had to be refrigerated all the time. From the beginning to the end, it had to be stay refrigerated. It cost a shit load to make that those strains, because nobody else could make them. And so, we were like, these little guys trying to like manufacture strains.

And so, it was super expensive for us. Nobody's giving us any like bulk discount codes or anything like that. And because it was expensive to make, we headed at this like that when we first launched, it was $165 for 60 pills for one month. And so, this is a terrible business model. So, that is what happens when you let scientists go out and discover and create innovation.

You're like, this is amazing innovative product and nobody can afford or wants to buy.

And so, what we've had to do over the years is figure out, okay, how do you actually get these strains more viable?

How do you go out there and try to figure out how to lower cost at every angle while maintaining the integrity and the quality of the product? Which is actually kind of a tricky thing to do. And so, now that product sells for $9. So, we've taken it down significantly. It's still expensive.

And in the second half of this year, we have also figured out how to get it to be room temperature stable.

And now it won't have to be a new refrigerator. But this is like, we invest a lot in the innovation, but then we had to invest a lot in making it something that a consumer would buy. We're saying most companies start with what would a consumer buy and how much margins do I need to make on this product?

“And that's how they come up with their product lineup, which is why nobody would ever do what we did.”

Why would you ever run a clinical trial? Why would you ever go try to build these strains and build a manufacturing? It's just insanity. It's like having kids without having ever seen a child. I don't know what it takes to raise a kid. Yeah, but see, this is the thing that I, as a person that's been involved in this so long, appreciate. It also understands where many people that just look at the price of something.

And that's it. And they don't comprehend or understand what goes into it. And I am not. By any stretch of the imagination, giving my concession to people that are bad actors that go charge an arm and a lay for something that's not worth it. Because they're out there, they're sharks and they're everywhere. So you have to be careful and I get it with a sticker shock, but you also get what you pay for.

You know, and I want something and I will always spend extra on the healthiest foods or whatever's going into your body to get what works.

So I appreciate that you do what you do and that you've got so intricately detailed and explaining so people understand.

“Like, this is what it takes to make these claims and to do what it does. That's what no one else does it.”

Yeah, yeah, thank you. And I think we're probably the only company that, you know, over the years, even with tariffs and interest and all that's weird. The only company that has actually lowered our prices. Because we really do want, I mean, the mission of the company and my personal mission is, how do we help millions improve their health? And you can't do that when the product is so expensive, but we're also running a business. So when we first launched our product, every bottle we sold, we lost money on. That's how bad it was.

My investors are like, what kind of businesses this? Look, what are you doing? And so yeah, so once we start scaling, we will figure this out. We'll start being profitable at some point on the bottles sold. And so I think that is, but we are committed to that mission. And so we definitely get taken over the closer the price point of our products, but they really are super expensive to make. Well, to do what to be innovative and to do something, no one else has done.

“I mean, you have to ask yourself as a person with any sort of logic, you think that's going to be cheap.”

And generally speaking, I would hope most people would say no, but common sense is not always as common as it should be.

So I digress, but I guess we have gone on our time here. It was very fast. Is the hook coming? Well, because it was so when stuff flies, you know, the time flies when it's extremely good. There's like shit. Well, I guess I just want to thank you because so insightful and so easy to understand the way that you break it down. And you know, when you're, when you live it, it comes very naturally, but sometimes people can talk really fast. And don't realize that just because you know something, not everybody else does.

So I appreciate the way that you break it down with the understanding of, okay, I'm an expert, but that doesn't mean everybody else is so I appreciate your whole approach. Thank you so much. It's because I have to keep explaining and justifying to both my parents and my kids, what I do for a living. Well, I'm glad that I resonate. So I'll link everything in the description best place to find you to follow you to get pendulum products, etc. Great. Thank you so much. And also thank you for what you're doing. I mean, this isn't an easy job and you're out there really

minding through all the different junk and in the supplement space, there's so much. And so I appreciate you helping to bring what we're doing to the world. I'm happy to do it. You know, I got so jaded over all the years that I'm on a mission. I'm on a God's mission for everything, but especially with stuff like that. So I want to really shine the light on people that do it right. Thank you. Absolutely. So yeah, work and we follow you. So please come check us out at pendulumlife.com. We have a lot of content on there. So if you're just trying to understand more about the gut microbiome, what studies are out there.

We actually have a section if you're a healthcare practitioner. We have protocols that other healthcare practitioners have written about how they're integrating our products into their plans. And we have a lot of stuff around nutrition because that is a really important part of a healthy microbiome. So if you're just looking to learn please check us out at pendulumlife.com. And if you're trying to figure out which product is right for you, we have a quiz. If you are just a healthy person who just wants to boost your gut microbiome metabolic daily tends to be the one that's that's right for if you've got diabetes, you know, you should go for the pendulum glucose control.

But we have all that on the website. And so encourage everyone to go there and check it out. And ask us questions.

And that wraps up another one. So I really hope that everybody gained a lot of insight here and also seeing how things should be done. So appreciate everything. Thank you for coming. That being said, stay tuned for Plain Mortocom, Dylan Jamelli, sign it off.