Speaker 1: (00:00)
Hey everybody, what's going on in Dr. Chad Woolner here and Dr. Buddy Alan. And this is episode 25 of the health fundamentals podcast. And on today's episode, we're going to be sharing with you a simple trick to burning more fat. So let's get started.

Speaker 2: (00:13)
You're listening to the health fundamentals podcast. I'm Dr. Chad Woolner and I'm Dr. Buddy Alan. And this show was about giving you the simple but powerful cutting edge tools you need to change your health and your life. So sit back and enjoy the show as we show you the path to your best life down to a science.

Speaker 1: (00:32)
So, hey everybody, hope you guys are having a great day on today's episode. We've got kind of a fun topic. We're going to be talking about a really cool, simple trick to helping you burn more fat. I think most people would agree that anything we can do or use to help us, uh, burn more fat, uh, improve our overall weight, uh, and or health. Uh, we'll look for anything that we can use. Absolutely. That's, that's healthy and helpful. And, uh, this is really interesting because, uh, there was a study, uh, that was done, uh, not too long ago. This is back in 2015 and they showed, uh, doing something quite simple that can trigger fat loss, but the mechanism that, that it's showing behind three's loss is kind of crazy. Yeah. Um, basically they talk about cold exposure and using cold exposure as a means of triggering a fat burn, uh, burning fat in our bodies.

Speaker 1: (01:28)
Now, many of us, uh, those listening right here might be familiar with this concept or this idea of using cold exposure to help us burn more fat in our body. Um, but some of us are, I would argue and say many of us may not realize the mechanism behind it. This is what they said. They said exposure to cold temperatures is known to mimic the effects of exercise, protecting against obesity and improving metabolic health. Uh, study now reveals the beneficial health effect of cold exposure are mediated in part by Gut microbes. The researchers found that cold exposure dramatically alters the composition of intestinal bacteria in mice, and that this microbial shift is sufficient to burn fat, improve glucose metabolism, and reduce body weight. So they basically say that the cold exposure helps, uh, in a trigger trigger in a beneficial way, alterations or changes in our microbiome, which is our microbiome, is the healthy, healthy bacteria in our guts.

Speaker 1: (02:31)
Um, and that, that, uh, that is what in part leads to these changes that help us to burn fat, to improve our overall metabolism. Uh, you know, and, and then obviously reduce overall body weight. Yeah, I've actually even heard that, um, the cold exposure also activates brown fat. Correct. Which is essentially the fact that animals who hibernate, uh, that's, that's the fat that helps kind of metabolize so they can live while they hibernate. Right. And so if we can, and we, we have more of that when we're babies. Correct. But as we get older, we have much, much less of that Brown fat. But that cold exposure also triggers that Brown fat, which helps us to metabolize our atomos. So in terms of cold exposure, you might be wondering, okay, well that's good. How do we, how do we do that? What are some simple ways that you can do cold exposure?

Speaker 1: (03:24)
Oh Gosh, there, well, you could very easily do a cold shower or maybe even finish like you said, you do. Yeah. I'm, you'll finish your shower with a cold, a dousing. You could do ice baths. Honestly, I mean if, if, if you have it available to you, get out in nature and swimming some rivers, jumping some legs, do some, yeah. Do stuff like that because, uh, you know, all of that best exposure I ocher is getting real cold exposure in nature. Jumping into, I'll tell you what we frequently do. There are a summer rafting trips down what's called the south fork of the Payette river. And it is, it's freezing cold. It is this gotta be in the forties, I'm guessing. And uh, and I'll tell you that when we get tossed out or when we jump off the big rocks into the river, um, man, afterwards, just feel amazing.

Speaker 1: (04:17)
Like all day, all the whole rest of the day. I just feel like invigorated and energized. Amazing. Yeah. Cold has really powerful effect. I've noticed in my life, like, like Dr Island said, you know, I've, I started not too long ago, uh, you know, ending my showers. I'll take a morning shower and then at the very tail end of it, for the last minute or so, uh, at least I try to, uh, sit in cold water. I'll typically turn it to the various cold. I'll usually, uh, rinse off, uh, in a, in as cold as I can get it. Um, and, and, and just sit there and let that wash over me. And I find that little simple trick of have 30 seconds to a minute of, of kind of final cold exposure there at the very tail end does something very profound and powerful for me in terms of giving me a boost of energy.

Speaker 1: (05:07)
It does. It's, it's palpable. I can totally feel it once I'm down, I'm just like, boy. Um, and, and maybe it's just from the fact that when you're exposed to call to get you moving a lot more, you know what I mean? Maybe, but all I can tell you is that it, it, uh, it seems to work for me. It increases my energy level and, uh, and so, uh, you know, for those who have available to them or near them, uh, doing cryotherapy, uh, that's a relatively new, um, uh, treatment therapy that is available to some people. If you're in a city where there's cryotherapy around, uh, doing cryotherapy sessions. Sure. Um, what's powerful about cryotherapy is you're able to get a much, much colder, uh, exposure than say, water. And the reason it has to do with, and I'm this is beyond me in terms of my understanding, but it's because of the exposure is in the form of gas.

Speaker 1: (06:00)
Uh, you're, you're being exposed to nitrogen, uh, gases basically. Um, and so you're able to get, uh, uh, a much, much colder exposure. I mean, it's like negative in the negative degrees. It's just ridiculous. And for whatever reason, because of the way of the conductivity of the cold of gas versus say, water, um, you're able to tolerate it and handle it, um, much better. Um, and so with, with cryotherapy, you get even colder exposure. And that definitely, um, has beneficial effects. I did a, I did cryotherapy over at my friend's house. I have a good, good friend of mine who has his own cryotherapy chamber at his house, which is kinda crazy, um, in and of itself. But I, I tried it and yeah, it definitely gets, it gets pretty cold and uh, you can see how that can help for sure. Uh, in terms of, again, energy, but then also fat loss.

Speaker 1: (06:55)
But, um, I think the, the, the bigger topic, the at play that we kind of want to at least touch upon is this concept or this idea of, uh, exposing ourself to, um, controlled doses of stress, right? Because at the end of the day, that's kind of the irony I think in, in all of this that we'll find is that some of the most highly beneficial things for our health are stressors, but not stressors in the, in the way that most people think of stressors. We're talking about con dose controlled exposure to stress, right? So short, short doses of cold exposure, right. If you were to stay in a, in a freezing cold river or lake or whatever, that's not going to be good for you. You've, you know, you'd develop hypothermia and you die, you know, so that's not good. That's, that's too prolonged of exposure to health.

Speaker 1: (07:47)
But a short dose of that is highly beneficial. Same thing with heat, right? We do Saunas. If, if people, if you've ever done saunas before, a heat therapy, yoga, hot yoga, exactly these things, these exposures to controlled stressors can be very good. Exercise is a, is a stress upon your body, you know, um, and that actually kind of brings up, I think really hits home. Um, like how's, how these different doses of stressors, you know, from various, uh, angles if you will, you know, exercise. If we do the same exercise over and over, we get less benefit from the same exercise. Right. Cause it's all stress. It's not stress. Exactly. And that's why they change it up from, you know, maybe heavy lifting to, you know, where you're, you're doing long distance or, you know, high ex, you know, just the hit exercise, high intensity.

Speaker 1: (08:40)
Um, there's a, but that, those, those shocks to our system triggered different metabolic processes. They trigger our body's ability to adapt and the problem and the same, same with, you know, hot versus cold, um, eating lot of food versus fasting or, or doing, I remember restricted calories. Right, right. I remember back when did it first come out P90x with Tony Horton. Oh Gosh. I was like early two thousands, probably mid two thousands when P90x first came out. The term that they used, and I think it's their like proprietary term was they use the term muscle confusion. You remember that? Yup. And it's the same concept you're talking about there is that they made sure deliberately in the way that they programmed, uh, the course was such that your, you never really truly got used to or sufficiently or fully adapted to be overall program. You know, and, and, and that's the, the idea is you want a certain degree of adaptability because that's necessary to feel like you're making the right changes, right?

Speaker 1: (09:41)
That you're capable of handling a higher level of stress upon your body. But at the same token, you never want to be fully adapted to the point where it's, it's no longer has the same impact or effect on you. Right. And so, um, I think there's something to be said for the variability of it, right. Keeping keeping our body and our mind on, on its toes at all times so to speak. You know, so exercise, all of these different biochemical pathways that our bodies have to be able to manage these stressors. Yeah. So it's just like exercise in our muscles. We need to exercise all the muscle on their part and in every way of our body. Yeah, no, absolutely. So that's kind of an interesting kind of point here and I'd be interested to know moving forward, future wise, if the same mechanisms are impacted from other forms of stress, not just cold exposure, right.

Speaker 1: (10:36)
If heat exposure, uh, triggers our gut biome as well. If exerciser episode, right. Triggers our gut biome. Yeah. We'll look into that and see, you know, because I wouldn't be surprised if that's the, if that's the case, because what we're finding more and more the research is showing us is that that gut biome place such a huge role in our overall health and wellbeing. And not only that, but our overall identity, they refer to our gut and where the microbiome is that second brain, you know. And so, you know, my, my theory, it would only make sense to me as the answer would be a resounding yes. That our gut biome is triggered in positive ways from various forms of dose controlled stress, whether it be cold exposure, heat exposure, a intermittent fasting exercise, you name it, you know, any of these forms. My guesses would say, uh, my, my gut, no pun intended, would say that, uh, that these things would be positively triggered as well.

Speaker 1: (11:38)
So anyways, uh, so yeah, consider that, you know, in terms of if you're not currently doing cold exposure, um, consider doing one of those different types of exposure and it's a lot easier to do cold exposure in the warm summertime, at least introducing it to yourself than it will be in the winter. So give it a shot, let us know what you think. Yeah. Now, yeah, now is a good time to yeah, for sure. It's a lot harder to motivate yourself to do cold exposure in the wintertime than it is this. Absolutely. For sure. So, anyways. Okay, well hopefully this has been a helpful for you guys giving you maybe some new food for thoughts to help yet in terms of, uh, either burning fat, losing weight or just improving overall health. Uh, share this with others that you feel could benefit and we'll talk to you guys on the next episode.

Speaker 2: (12:22)
Thanks for listening to the health fundamentals podcast. Be sure to subscribe so that you stay in the loop. And in the note with all of the cutting edge health information that we share, if you know other people that could benefit from this information, please share it with them as well. Also, be sure to give us a review. These really help us to ultimately help more people. Last but not least, if you have questions that you want answered live on the show, or if you have ideas for topics that you would like us to cover, please shoot us an email and let us know at info@thehealthfundamentals.com.