I don't want you to be in this mindset of

I need to get rid of all these foods for my heart health.

Because when you are focusing, for instance, I've had clients who say the

doctor told me to lose weight in order for my heart health. They've had two

to three heart attacks, and the doctor's like, you just need to lose weight. So

they go on whatever diet they want and they have another heart attack because what

you're eating is not feeding and optimizing your vascular

system. Welcome to a special October

edition of open heart surgery with boots.

All month long, we're diving into heart healthy

eating with none other than my cardiac

dietitian, Michelle Rothenstein. Each

Tuesday, we are serving up bite sized ten to

15 minutes episodes to give you practical tips

to keep your heart in tip top shape. Whether

you're recovering from surgery or just looking to show your heart a

little extra love, Michelle's got you covered. Don't

forget to check out our

patreon@www.patreon.com

openheart surgery with boots. There we are building

a community of fellow heart buddies where we are going

to start meeting up on Zoom and being of support to each

other. And I'll be curating special, special

playlists to help you get started on your heart

journey if you're just starting out. So thank you so

much for being here. Thank you for supporting this podcast.

I am so excited to bring Michelle to

you every Tuesday for the month of October. So let's get

right to it. Hello. Welcome back to another

episode of Open Heart Surgery with Boots. If you've been

listening for a little bit, you know I've brought on my

extremely extraordinarily talented, brilliant

cardiac dietitian, Michelle, who has

been dropping truth bombs for us in the last two episodes,

and she's back for a third. We're doing this all month, and there were several

reasons why I wanted to do this. I've just experienced so much

success with Michelle, and I explained in

our first of this series how integrity is everything

to me. And if I am going to suggest anyone to you,

if I'm going to elevate any healthcare provider,

it's going to be because I directly benefited. And

I cannot believe how much Michelle

has graced my life, mind, body,

spirit when I first started working with her as a

client. And Michelle, feel free to jump in from your

perspective, but we had some serious work to do. My

gut was messed up. I was on a heavily restricted diet

for a variety of reasons. I had come to

fear food because I had developed such

an intense case of IB's, and I

was hardly eating anything, I was getting hardly

any nutrients, I was taking too many supplements, I wasn't

able to pee well at night because my kidneys were freaking

out and I would have like four bowel

movements every morning. And so it was just

amazing how much my body was just so

dysregulated. And Michelle and I have done so much good

work together that I take virtually no supplements,

minus like some magnesium and a B vitamin. And

then I only have one bowel movement in the morning,

which is been just life changing. And I have

no problems peeing before bed. Like, I, I

mean, and that's just the start of it. And, and then on top of it,

I am tolerating most foods now, and I look

forward to cooking. And, like, that doesn't

even talk that, you know, don't get me started on like, all the positive

effects on my heart, but like, that's like the 50,000 foot

view. But let me tell you people, when your gut is messed up and you

are pooping so much, it really affects your quality of

life. And I'm not trying to be crass, but it really does.

It's okay to talk about poop. Let's normalize that.

We have to. It's so important for heart and health. It's all correlated.

It's a sign of inflammation. You know, I really appreciate you being

vulnerable and sharing this with many individuals, because it's

too often where I see someone come to my office and being

like, I don't. This is a whole list that my functional medicine doctor told me

I cannot eat right. And so, you know, I asked you the first time,

you were on like maybe twelve restrictions. It was like,

low histamine, low fodmap, low

oxalate, low, literally low everything. And I go to

you, so what are you eating on a regular basis? And you looked at me

on that first call and you're like, nothing. I actually give up because

it's so restrictive that I eat whatever I want, which is probably

not even what I'm supposed to be eating. And the

biggest thing was, for me, was that you weren't just

going to the bathroom frequently, you were seeing food

in your stool, meaning your body was not absorbing these nutrients,

which is a sign to me that there was a lot of inflammation

and a lot of gut health issues that we needed to

address. And I think it's important to really

put this into the context of every single person and

majority of people. When you ask them what are you

eating? They will talk about what they're not eating, right. So if you

ask someone, what's your diet? What do you follow? It's always talking

about, oh, I don't eat this. Oh, I don't eat this. Of course I don't

eat that. But it's never about what you're actually eating

and the balance and the way it's cooked and how

you're eating it in terms of metabolism that actually

allows for your body to digest it, absorb

it, put it into the cell that belongs, and excrete what it doesn't need to

excrete. And so when you aren't urinating or when you're not

going to having good, effective bowel movements,

you're going to be a nutrient deficient because you are

kind of excreting too much of things that aren't solid. But

b, your body's not having a good detoxification

system, right. Your body gets rid of toxins

naturally when you feed it and fuel it properly.

Talking about having good bowel movements, urinating well

and regularly without issue. And then the other one is

sweating. And I remember in our work together, you mentioned,

Michelle, I'm having magical poops. Like, that was a wahoo

moment. You were like, I'm actually urinating at night. Like, I used to, like, feel

like I had to go to the bathroom, but I couldn't go. That was a

positive. But then in about a month into our work, you're like,

Michelle, I've sweated for my first time in a very

long time. And I'm like, yes, because that's a, the signs that your

body is working for you. And so I really,

really appreciate you sharing this story. And I think it's important for people to

recognize that what you're eating is so important

for combating inflammation and optimizing your gut

health and optimizing your heart health and your vascular health so

your heart can pump blood easily and effectively without

overstressing. And so instead of having this restricted

mindset of, nope, I don't eat this, I don't eat that. I don't eat this.

It's, well, what are you eating? Are you nutrient sufficient? One

more thing that I want your audience to take from this too,

is I don't want you to be in this

mindset of, I need to get rid of all these

foods for my heart health. Because when you are focusing, for instance,

I've had clients who say, the doctor told me to lose weight in order for

my heart health. They've had two or three heart attacks. And the doctor's like, you

just need to lose weight. So they go on whatever diet they want and they

have another heart attack. Because what you're eating is not feeding and optimizing

your vascular system. It's not improving your cardiometabolic

metrics. So while weight loss is one risk factor of heart disease,

it's important that we are also considering, well, what is that? What

are we eating to allow for a caloric deficit? When you focus only

on calories, you don't focus on nutrients and nutrient

quality. That's really going to help improve your heart health, too. Wow. And

that was really revelatory for me. And I just want

everyone to just take a second and think about

how it feels to have a restrictive

diet. Like, really check in about that and think about

just living in life of restriction

versus. Okay, now think about

adding, adding in for your heart

health. Adding, like, yummy, soul

filling foods. Like, when Michelle gave me my meal

plan and I read through it all and I started

experimenting with all the great recipes she gave me,

I felt like I was eating a

hug. Now, bear with me. I know that sounds a

little on the corny side, pun totally intended, but,

like, it matters. Like, how we approach our

meals and, like, the mindfulness and the intention of what

we put in our bodies, it really does

matter. And so when I make the fun

sauces and, you know, just thinking about how,

like, I. My heart deserves this extra little bit

of effort I'm putting in to my breakfast, lunch and dinner,

and I'm intentionally using the turmeric and all these

other yummy things, and it's. I cannot tell you how

much happier I am. And that whole

saying, you are what you eat has never felt more

true. By putting joy behind my cooking

and putting intention behind my cooking really

has had a positive effect on both me and my

husband. And that's so important to recognize.

I think a lot of times when it comes to food, it's hard

because it's complicated. Right. You may love cooking and find

joy in cooking and cooking for you and your husband and just

smelling the smells and enjoying all what you're eating and the

right balance and how it makes you feel and how it lowers inflammation in your

body, et cetera. But to someone else, that might sound intimidating. Oh, no. I have

to cook all of my meals. So I always kind of like to start with

saying that or really bring up the point that you

don't need to be cooking for hours in the kitchen to be heart

healthy. It needs to be something realistic. For you,

but I really wanted to emphasize on the ability to really focus

in on, if you are on a restricted diet, really

hone into, well, what nutrients do you need to add from

other things to get your needs in, right? Like if you avoid

dairy for instance. Well, are you getting calcium from other food sources to

meet your needs to prevent osteopenia, osteoporosis and bone

mineral density, which also increases vascular calcification. If you

don't have enough calcium, are you getting enough probiotics? If you're

eliminating dairy, there's certain nutrients found magnesium,

potassium, there's certain nutrients found in certain food groups. And if you are

in a restrictive mindset, you really need to, or you have to restrict because

of allergies, intolerances. It can all be worked in from

a heart health perspective, but we must understand what we need to

replace those foods with to make sure that you're having a nutrient

adequate diet. A lot of times people will come to me and go,

oh, are you going to put me on a vegan diet? Are you going to

put me on a keto diet? Are you going to put me on a diet?

And I say no. I say, I want to understand you and then I'm

going to make sure that your nutrients sufficient so I can personalize the

science. If everybody goes on the same exact diet, it doesn't

work. There's so much cultural emotion day to

day, there's so many variables for a diet to work. And

my goal is for you to optimize your cardiometabolic metrics. It's

to optimize your, and lower inflammation, oxidative stress,

insulin resistance, all the things that cause havoc in the blood vessel.

But by doing this in a way that's enjoyable in a way that you, in

that you actually like the food you're eating and you're not complaining that it's bland

or tasteless or just disgusting or too restrictive,

I want you to enjoy it. There's so much emotions that come with

food and we need to take that into account. So that's

why I don't prescribe the same diet, because a, it doesn't

work and b, a lot of times it gets lost in

translation. If I were to just say, everyone go on the mediterranean

diet, well that's 21 regions across the Mediterranean. Which one are

you talking about? They're all, they all have different foods and cultures. It doesn't give

you, I mean, I had a client who came to see me and said, oh

yeah, I follow mediterranean diet. I don't know why I have heart disease. And when

I went into what he was doing, his mediterranean diet definition was drinking a

cup of olive oil every day. That was how he defined it, which is not

a healthy volume of olive oil for anybody to consume.

Wow. So I say this to really put into

perspective that what you're eating is

important and the nutrient composition and

the nutrient adequacy is what we need to be focusing

on for you and making it something that's

doable. I want this to be something that you can

implement, not just for the time I'm working with you, but really

for the rest of your life. So when you understand the why, when you understand

the pairings, when you understand how it gets metabolized in your

body in certain volumes and certain times, et cetera, you're more

likely to implement it for the long term because you have the

understanding and the knowledge to do so. Yeah, love

that. And before we end for today, I just also

want to say I was not perfect out the gate

and still am not like it is. It has been such

a sea change for me on so many

levels. Mind, body, spirit. And

so if you're listening and your eyes are really

big as you're driving down the road, wondering, like, how can I

institute change? Well, you can. It's just

one. I have this motto, 1% better

every day except for Sundays. And

Michelle is so patient. She re explains things.

She's been accessible to me via email because of the way I, like,

work with her. She has different ways that you can work with her where

she makes herself self available to you. But she gave me

such a great resource guide and I have

probably, I think I've read it six times, seven times now might

be seven. And every time I read it, there's like a

new thing that jumps out of the page and your body is going to let

you know when it's ready for that, like, next level

of healing. And I'm really glad that I. That

I have a great therapist. And if you've been listening to this podcast, you hear

me talk about my therapist. I've been with her for ten and a half years

now. It's been the greatest gift I've ever given to myself and

my family is me working on my side of the street.

And my side of the street lately, in the last few months, in

conjunction with Michelle, is healing my relationship

to food. And so when you start on this

journey for your heart, on behalf

of your heart, you are going to heal in unexpected

ways that are going to be so beautiful. You

just have to be willing to be a little uncomfortable for a minute

while you make these changes. That's been my experience.

And slow and steady. You don't need to be perfect. There's no such thing as

perfect. You don't need to have a perfect diet. You don't need to eat

perfect meals. It's no such thing. It's really

about really instilling, and I talk about this in all of my work

together. Let's prioritize two to four goals

every two weeks. Let's see how they do. Let's address those

challenges. If it's working really well, great. Add another one.

Before you know it, you're doing 70% to 80% of this seamlessly. It's

becoming part of your lifestyle. You're seeing really great results, and

you're reaffirming. I don't need to be perfect because the

perfect mentality of a diet leads to failure. And you

don't need to be perfect to see results. Nope. And I love how

recently I. One, a struggle of mine has been emotional

eating. And recently, in conjunction with

you, and I read, like, a quote somewhere, some meme, what would we

do without memes now in the world? But anyway, it was just talking

about, and you've helped me see this. Like, if I'm gonna have a little bit

of ice cream or a little bit of chocolate, like, be mindful about that

and be like, no, just enjoy the chocolate. Enjoying it.

Yeah. Yeah. And it's like, oh, right. I don't

have to feel shame about enjoying some chocolate or a little

ice cream. Right. Like, of course. Take the shame out of

it. Exactly. This is. That was, like, mind blowing to

me. Yes. I'm wearing big. This is the other thing.

If you have that ice cream and you're like, this doesn't taste good, then it's

not worth it. You want to savor it because it makes it so much

more enjoyable. And you also then take out the guilt. You're like, this was

great. This was enjoyable. And then you move on to your next meal without over

obsessing over, oh, my God, I can't believe I ate that much ice cream. Why

did I eat the ice cream? You start, we're so mean to ourselves that we

need to be better in terms of positive talks. So enjoy the ice cream. That's

so important. And it's important to balance this out, out so that you are

living your life and having good quality of life is so

important in your heart health journey, too. So. Yeah. Well, thank

you. That's a great place. To stop for today. I hope y'all are

enjoying this series that Michelle and I are doing. We've got two

more, so be sure to come back next week. And

again, take a look in the show notes. There's great ways to find

how to work with Michelle in there. And I'm just so glad that you are

coming along with us on this ride. And we'll be back next week. Thanks so

much.