Transcript of Episode 492: Sal Di Stefano: The Morning Meal That Reduces Anxiety & Why Fasting Backfires

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This is actually a piece of information that I buy I'd buy, but I want to know if I'm off base here. Is it better to have a protein and a fat in the morning versus a carb and a protein?

Yeah, there's not even a debate on that. If you eat protein in the morning, your blood sugar levels, your insulin sensitivity, your blood glucose for the rest of the day is better if you start off with protein. So let's say same calories, same macros, identical diet, except a carb meal is in the morning on one day, and then the other one is protein meal, so you just switch out the meals. Otherwise, everything else is identical. Blood sugar is going to be better controlled by starting off the day with protein. Now, someone might be like, Why is that important? Who cares, right? Same calories, you'll gain the same fat or not. Here's why blood sugar is important, and I know there's a lot of debates, insulin sensitivity, mitochondrial health. I don't need to go down and break down. This is where the science nerds in the health and fitness space lose people because they start to argue the minutiae and the mitochondrial health. When the average person is like, whatever.

They don't understand it. Who cares?

I like that stuff. I think it's cool. But here's the important thing. The reason why you don't want high spikes in blood sugar and drops in blood sugar, because that affects your behaviors. It affects how you feel. Highs and lows mean you're going to feel anxious and fatigued, irritable and hungry, cravings and not hungry. So why do you want to control your blood sugar? Besides all the other stuff that they like to talk about, the main thing is it affects how you feel. Do you want to feel good or do you want to feel crappy? Do you want to have crazy cravings all day long or do you want to feel like you're in control? So start your day off with the protein. In fact, you're starting to see psychologists now start to recommend that their anxious patients start their day off with a high protein meal. That's now starting to become a prescription. When they say, Oh, you have lots of anxiety, whatever. And there's other stuff they look at, of course, but they'll say, Start your day off with 30 grams of protein. And then you'll see people report back like, Oh, my anxiety's so much better.

Right. Yeah, they were feeling anxiety from the blood sugar spikes.

Well, what about the fat? Would you believe in the idea that you should be eating your protein and fat or your breakfast 30 minutes upon waking? Or what do you believe in that?

Splitting hairs.

It doesn't matter.

Yeah, I think you're splitting hairs with something like that because I know what most people's mornings look like. So you know what I would... Okay, let's say somebody makes the argument that you should wake up and not eat for an hour. So they're like, okay, here's the science. The data shows that you wake up and don't eat anything for an entire hour. But let's say you're the average person. So like 97 % of the people watching this, they're going to be like, God, I wake up, and then I got to get the kids ready, and I got to get ready for work, and this is going on. And then maybe let's say they got sold by the person talking to the podcast. They're like, You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to get my alarm, and I'm going to wake up an hour early. Well, now what you've done is you've just taken away an hour of sleep, which is far more important for their health than waiting an hour to eat their meal. So it's like one of the problems that people face with their health and fitness isn't that they're necessarily doing the wrong things.

It's that they put things in the wrong priority. So it's like, Wake up an hour early so I don't eat for an hour, is a lower on the priority list than getting that extra hour of sleep. So don't trade dimes. Don't trade quarters for dimes. In advertising, they say, Trade dimes for quarters, right? Spend 10 cents, get 25 cents back. People are doing this with their health and fitness. They're giving 25 cents, getting 10 cents back. Yeah, I woke up an hour early, so I don't have to eat for an hour. But now you only got six hours of sleep, which is far worse for you.

It's totally true. But that's the problem that's happening, though. People are very confused, and they hear different people saying different things, and then they're not sticking to one thing. They're trying everything, and they're getting no It's the results, right?

Yes. This is how you should whittle it down. Will I do it? That's number one, because if you won't do it, I don't care how effective it is. It's nothing. There's no effectiveness if you don't do it. Will I do it? And you have to ask yourself honestly, Will I always do it, or only when I'm motivated or whatever. Will I always do it? Number one. Number two, what's the commitment of this? And is the commitment realistic for me? And then that's it. Those are the two big things. And then three is like, okay, effectiveness. Within that context, what can I do that's most effective within that context? So if somebody says to me, what's the most effective form of exercise? I'll typically say, well, what forms of exercise do you enjoy doing the most? Let's start there. And if they say, well, I don't care, then okay, I can give you a different answer. But if they say, oh, man, I love writing my bike. It's my favorite thing to do. I get so much joy from it. Okay, well, let's talk about how to make that as effective as possible for you because that's what you're going to do.

Yeah, that's what you're going to do. Exactly. But I believe that everything always shifts. The pendulum always goes the other way, even with fasting, intermittent fasting, Everyone was like, That's the best thing to do. It's the best thing in the world. I was never a person that liked it, and so I knew it wasn't going to be for me. And then people would basically shame me into the idea that I was eating breakfast and I was eating dinner. Can you tell us, what is your thought on intermittent fasting and who is good for it and who is not good for it?

Fasting is the oldest diet known to man. It was never intended. And the reason why... Okay, so things that have lasted a long time have passed the test of evolution in the sense of ideas, right? So ideas that humans have had that have stuck around for thousands of years typically means there's some value there. So why have cultures done this thing for thousands of years? Why is it common among multiple cultures? There's got to be value there. Fasting is present in every major world religion, both Eastern and Western, okay? It was never to lose weight. It was detachment. It was always a way to detach from worldly things. Most world religions will tell you that worshiping worldly things is a path to hell. It's like in the Christian Bible, it's idolatry, right? Or the Judeo-Christian religions don't have any other God before me. It's literally, do not worship worldly things because they will lead you down a dark path. Typically, it's money, power, pleasure, or Fame, what they used to call honor. But detachment is very powerful, right? Do you get value from spiritual value? From not eating for three days. Yeah, absolutely. Especially if you grow up like we live now, where food is everywhere.

You've never felt hungry before. You think you feel hungry, but no, that's cravings. You've never been without. There's spiritual value in that, okay? The problem is people take that and they say, Oh, wow, I lost weight because I didn't eat for three days. Here's how I'm going to market it. And so then it became a diet. By the way, we used to call it starving yourself when I was a trainer in the '90s.

I still call it that, by the way.

Okay, so why do people lose weight on it and find a lot of Because they're eating less. Bottom line. That's it. Because they're eating less. I mean, if you look at all the autophagy benefits and all the whatever benefits that they'll highlight, we have studies now comparing a calorie-restricted diet to fasting, and we find that the results are identical. There aren't cases where fasting may be beneficial for people with really severe gut issues, where they need to reduce inflammation, give their gut a break. These people work with a functional medicine practitioner. It's very specific. But otherwise, if you're fasting for weight loss, that is a terrible way to lose Because here's what you're encouraging with fasting. If you're doing it for weight loss, if you're doing it for spiritual purposes, it's great. It's good to test the time. If you're doing it for fat loss, it's terrible because what you're encouraging is a binge-restrict behavior with yourself. What you're encouraging is a restrict, restrict, restrict eating window, binge. Anybody who's fasted for long enough will tell you that this starts to happen. This is not a healthy behavior. You don't want to eat in this way where you have to fit all your calories in this window, and then I'm so hungry, but I got to wait till five o'clock type of deal.

Not good. Also, there's also the stress that it can place on the body. Women seem to be more sensitive to this than men. Men seem to be more resistant to the stress of fasting than women, probably due to evolutionary reasons, maybe because women bear children. But what you'll find with people who chronically fast is cortisol levels that don't look very good, estrogen progesterone levels start to go a little out of whack, and they'll start to display signs of... Even when their calories are adequate, they'll start to display signs of too much stress, hair loss, hot, cold, intolerance, that stuff. Fasting does, if you go for X amount, I don't remember what the hours are, eight hours or so, you start to see increased production of catecholamines, epinephrine, norepinephrine. This is why people initially get addicted, and they feel good. They're like, Oh, my God, I have all this energy. What's happening is your body's spiking up these catecholamines to get you more motivated to find food. If you're in nature and you go without food, your body spikes up like, All right, give this person some energy. We got to find some food. But people get addicted to this high.

But too many catecholamines, norepinephrin, epinephrin, cortisol. Cortisol even feels good. High cortisol feels good. Cortisol is an energy-producing hormone. That's why it's high in the morning and it starts to taper off at night. In fact, there's an argument to be said that there are people who are, you could refer to as cortisol junkies, where their stress levels have made their cortisol so high that they become resistant, that they actually seek out stressful situations to produce that feeling. So these people are like, they're typically a type A, but they'll get addicted to high-intensity exercise. They tend to be late all the time. They tend to be in stressful conversations all the time because without realizing it, they're causing spikes in cortisol that start to make them feel better. Over time, though, this causes you to crash.

It's like being a drug addict.

Oh, yeah, it's not good. It's not good. Not good at all. But I can pick out cortisol addicts now pretty easily when I meet people.

But also, it's not for why also cold plunge is, right? Because all the same things happen when you do a cold plunge.

Cold plunge. Also, if you're on the level of too much stress, a lot of things go into the stress bucket. Exercise is one of them. If you're in a calorie deficit, that'll go into one of them. Of course, conversations with people, lifestyle, lack of sleep, all goes into this stress bucket. If you have too much stress, adding more stress is just terrible. It doesn't matter if you think it's a good stress, like workout or cold plunge or fasting. So then you'll get these people who are overstressed already, and they're working out, and then they try fasting, and at first they feel good, but then they start to overstress their bodies, and then they start to get hormone imbalances, don't know what the hell is going on. They go to a functional practitioner, and they're like, You are in stage four, adrenal fatigue, what they used to call it, or HPA-axis dysfunction. And the first thing they'll do is they'll tell them, Eat breakfast. Stop fasting. Not good for you. So we've done several episodes on why you should not fast for weight loss. It's an absolute terrible approach. And we always get some pushback less now than we used to, because I think a lot of people have done it long enough to be like, Oh, yeah, this isn't great.

Yeah. I think that everything always has a bat. It always swings the other way. So do you think that the ice, the cold plunge, is more hype than real? Even though, like I said, it does have some benefits.

Yeah. If we took sleep, diet, activity, and lifestyle, which would include interpersonal relationships and stuff like that. So if we take those things, those four things, those make up, I don't know, 98 % of what is going to contribute to health, longevity, energy, all that stuff. The 2 %, you can put other stuff in the category, like cold plunge, red light therapy, sauna, supplements, and stuff like that. That's how little of an impact it makes in comparison to those other things. Now, why am I saying that? Because you're getting a lot of people who have crappy sleep, aren't eating well, whatever, and they're like, I'm going to go get a cold plunge. That's going to solve a lot of my issues. Now, if it leads to better behaviors, so sometimes there's this effect. This is the other thing, too. Sometimes people make that step, and then that step leads to better other behaviors. So someone will be like, They have a bad diet, they don't actually... But they get a cold plunge. But because they took that first step of cold plunging, now they start to work out, and they start... In that case, it's totally fine.

Basically, it could be like-Impetus. Yeah, an impetus or a catalyst to be doing all the other things right. Correct.

But it can be A cold plunge can be the wrong application. If you're border on the edge of too much stress, I do not think a cold plunge is a good idea. You're just going to cortisol yourself to death by doing it. You should do things that are relaxing, not shocking to the body. Like sauna. Even a sauna Because that can be too much stress. Because that can be too much stress. Even a sauna could be... You should do things like meditate, mindfulness, prayer, maybe get better sleep, place more focus on the quality of your sleep. Cold plunge is very valuable for people who have things already in balance, and they can handle a little bit more stress. Then there's some really good immune system boosting effects. It's very valuable for athletes who are constantly teetering on the edge of overtraining, and they want to practice more, but they just can't recover enough. A cold plunge can help give them another 3, 4% so they can go and do more training. But yeah, it's definitely been overhyped in that sense.

Isn't it crazy how popular it's become, this whole hot-cold therapy? Where there's now tons of studios popping up with cold Like Starbucks.

Most people would benefit from simply exposing themselves to the elements a little bit more. I do also want to say this, and I want to give credit to this, right? Our body's ability to acclimate to temperature changes is a muscle that is atrophied in us, okay? Because we're constantly in temperature-controlled environments. So there's definitely value in allowing that muscle to be exercised. So if you've ever lived in a very hot environment or a very cold environment, you know how you can get used to it. Years ago, I had a stake of an ownership in a gym in Palm Springs. In the summer, it gets hot as hell there. 120 degrees, okay? I lived there for long enough to where when I came back up here to San Jose, It'd be like 90 degrees, and I wouldn't feel that hot because I got used to the 120.

Right, got acclimated.

It is, right? Then I have friends of mine that came from like, Minnesota or Chicago. They'd come over here, it'd be 50 degrees outside, and they'd be in shorts and T-shirts. I'm like, What are you doing? It's freezing. Like, this is beautiful. The sun's out or whatever. So your body learns how to acclimate. That's a muscle that I think is important to strengthen, but it's under, let's get some activity, let's eat right, let's get good sleep, let's have good relationships with people. That's the order of priority with those kinds of things. Now, that being said, if you're doing everything right and you add cold plunge in sauna, there's definitely health benefits, and there's data, especially heat. There's vasodilating effects and cardiovascular benefits from using things like a sauna that are pretty awesome. There's also a detoxify. I hate to use the word detox, but if, let's say, you have heavy metal or mold toxicity, sweating is one way to get it out. So it just helps accelerate the process.

Is sweating a myth in the sense that I think, psychologically, that's why I do cardio. I like cardio because I feel like it makes me sweat. So therefore, I'm burning calories, I'm exercising. And I mean, even though I know, theoretically and just my knowledge base is that you don't have to be sweating. That's what I think. Why is it so connected? Is there any truth to the idea that sweating more burns more calories, helps you lose weight?

No. Not that, but are there benefits to sweating? Yeah, your body is getting... One One way your body detoxify, can detoxify, is through this sweating process.

But weight loss. I know there's a ton of benefits to sweating, but is there a correlation between sweating-It's hard to separate.

And- Here's why it's hard to separate.

Fat loss, weight loss.

Can improving your health help you with fat loss? Yes. So if sweating more through activity or heat is improving your health, then it probably will help. I don't think it's going to be this huge dramatic effect, though, where you're like, Oh, my God, because I sweat more now, I'm burning. I've lost three more pounds of body fat. The weight loss, typically on a scale, is water. Yeah, it's water. But I do think, I don't think, I know there's plenty of data to show that sweating is... There's some benefit. And functional medicine practitioners will often advise people to do things that induce sweating when they need to get rid of things like mold or heavy metals. And that's, by the way, in combination with other things. They don't just do that. They'll do things like they'll have them eat things that chelate or things like spirulina and chlorella to help bind.

Yeah, and pull it out. Yes. Okay, this is what I wanted This is something that I think I want to ask you about. I'm asking for a friend. Yes. Okay, so let's talk about this whole cardio weights conundrum here, right? So cardio, the interesting thing is the harder you push on cardio, the hungrier you get, and therefore you eat more, therefore not able to get that calorie deficit plus breaking down your muscle, okay? Versus the strength. How do you delicately balance doing cardio and not getting famished and starving to the point where you're eating 10 times the amount of calories?

So here's what's interesting. Again, a little caveat here, right? If you love cardio, and that's the way you work out, and you get lots of value from it, it's healthy. And you do it right. You don't overdo it or whatever. It's good for you. There's nothing wrong with it. Same thing with strength-srain. But let's just say the person's like, they don't care. Okay, so what's the difference?

What if they do care? It's more for the person who's trying to get away from cardio, move more into strength-srain.

So here's why cardio does that. When you're burning calories manually, your body aggressively tries to figure out how to balance out your caloric output with your caloric intake, or your caloric intake with your output, aggressively. So if you burn X amount of calories doing cardio, it will bump your appetite up to try to drive you to eat more. It'll reduce activity outside of the cardio. So they've actually done studies where they put trackers on people. They work out hard in the morning, they move less during the day, without even realizing it. So it'll try to balance it out that way. It'll also pair muscle down to reduce with calorie outputs to try and make you more efficient. So this is why weight loss in studies with cardio and calorie restriction results in above 40% of the weight being from muscle. So you lose 10 pounds, like 4 pounds come from muscle. And it's not burning muscle down. You said breakdown. That's not necessarily what's happening. It's more of an adaptation process. Your body is just trying to become more efficient with calories. So that's what cardio does. Now, why cardio? You need endurance and stamina, and while you do it, you do burn a lot of calories.

You burn more calories in an hour of cardio than any other form of exercise. So you need lots of endurance and stamina. You don't need a lot of strength. You're burning a lot of calories while you do it. Oh, let's get rid of muscle. We don't need a lot of strength. We just need stamina. And since we're burning so many calories, let's reduce the amount of calories we burn while we do it so that we can become more efficient cardio machines. So that's what ends up happening. Now, strength training is different. Strength training doesn't burn a ton of calories while you do it. It's actually one of the lowest calorie burning forms of exercise in a per hour. I'm talking about traditional strength training, not the Baloney strength training, where you're just cardio with weights, but like a real strength training, you do a set of eight reps, you rest for two or three minutes, then you do another one. You don't burn a lot of calories. But what you are doing is you're sending a very strong signal to the body, especially if you pair it with proper nutrition, that says we need strength.

The primary adaptation that we want right now, because the danger being posed upon us is requiring strength, and we're not burning a lot of calories. So let's add muscle. It's okay if we add some muscle. We can bump our... Because then you're also feeding yourself. So it's like, look, we got plenty of food. We need strength. Add muscle. So your body will build more muscle. And so those Those are the two signals that are happening. Both of them can increase your appetite. I find, in my opinion, this is my anecdote, cardio creates more of the strong acute cravings, where strength training can generally cause an increase in appetite from a boost in metabolism. So what you'll find with cardio is, I did a really intense cardio session this morning. Oh, my God. By lunchtime or dinner, I'm craving. I am starving. Strength training doesn't seem to cause that acute rise in appetite, but more of a slow rise in appetite that's coming from fueling this new added tissue. By the way, there was a study that was done, Jen, that I don't know if you saw this, but they compared strength training to cardio to strength training plus cardio to look at fat loss.

These were diabetic individuals, but they were looking at fat loss. Strength training outperformed the other ones. They even outperformed a little bit, slightly, even outperformed strength training plus cardio, but it definitely outperformed cardio for fat loss, for pure fat loss.

Oh, I believe it. It's just hard to get your brain to that place. I know.