You know, you think about a protein powder, you think about an

electrolyte powder recovery powder, you think it's food. It's not.

It's actually a supplement. So it's not as regulated. So consumer

labs finds high levels of arsenic lead in a lot of these

foods, but they're also ultra processed. There was a

study that looked at individuals who are following the mediterranean diet,

the vegan diet, all these different diets for heart health, and they were looking

at the level of ultra processed foods they were consuming. And this wasn't

like your yodels and your junk food. This was actually like anything

that was defined by the Nova scale. So the nova scale kind

of looks at the degree of processing. So protein powders,

electrolyte powders, that all would go into that group. And

they found that it elevated a inflammatory marker called

cystatin C that causes plaque to rupture.

And those individuals had a higher risk of another heart attack

within five years from their previous one because of the high

levels of ultra processed foods in their diet.

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.

open heart 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

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. Hey, welcome back to another episode of

Open Heart Surgery with boats. I am your host, Boots Knighton. You know

that by now, hopefully. And you

hopefully have been joining me this month with Michelle,

my cardiac dietitian. We are doing a

five part series. This is part number four.

And if you are just now finding me in this

podcast, please be sure to go back and at least listen

to the previous three installments of

Michelle's wisdom because this is all building

up on top of each other to culmination. Next

week. Of Michelle's ultimate, like,

scream from the mountaintop. Advice for all of us heart patients.

But there's just so much to take into account when

you're thinking about your heart. And we just don't get the information

from our cardiologists, from our surgeons.

Everyone's kind of in their silos. I don't think anyone's

ever intentionally trying to leave out information. Michelle

just really seems to shine and glow

in her wisdom of what she is bringing to us from her role as

cardiac dietitian. And so today we are going to talk

about oxidative stress. And it's interesting,

because I'm thinking back to one particular incident just even

earlier this summer. So Michelle and I, you

and I, are recording this towards the end of September, 2024.

And I have had this mindset. I had been an

athlete prior to my heart journey and then kept trying

to get back to my old self. And

that has just been its own spiritual journey of

letting go and radically accepting where I'm at in my life now.

But earlier this summer, I was still a part of a

gym that I have now chosen to leave. But

there was just such, this atmosphere of pushing

ourselves and competition. And I attempted

to race in this running race

uphill to the top of a mountain, and it

caused me extreme chest pain for

a week afterwards. And you helped me

understand the role of oxidative stress and

its impact on the heart. Yeah, that was a tough

learning moment for me. I think it's not talks

about enough. Right? When you're an athlete, you want to push, you want to push,

you want to push. And a lot of times, people also had this

notion, well, I am an athlete, so I have a strong heart. You

know, I can do all of this. So my heart's strong. And

being an athlete and exercising is awesome

for heart health. It is really good for strengthening the heart

muscle, allowing for good blood flow. I fully support it.

But what a lot of times, people are not pairing and understanding

is that it is a stressor on the body, and it promotes

particularly oxidative stress, which is stress in the

cell that can actually make ldl become

oxidized and start the atherosclerotic process.

In research, we see that athletes have an increased

risk of coronary artery calcification. They have an increased

risk of having fibrosis, a thickening of the heart

muscle. And a lot of it comes to play, where

nutrition is not properly paired with exercise. And

so I spend a lot of time in all of my work together, whether someone

is sedentary or very active to understand the role

of physical activity and the importance of pairing

proper nutrition with exercise to combat

oxidative stress. I want to take a step back, though, for a second.

I think oxidative stress sounds like a big science word

and people are probably like, what is that? So I want to

visualize it for you in a way. So, you know, when you open up, you

cut open up an apple, you cut up open an avocado, you leave it on

your counter. That causes browning, that

causes oxidation. That's what happens in the

cells in your artery wall when they're damaged.

Ew. Yeah, but we can stop that. Have you

ever taken, like a lemon and squeezed it over the

apple or the avocado? Or if you've ever kind of paired it with a

sulfur containing food, like an onion, you stop the

oxidation. Why is that? Because those nutrients are

needed in the glutathione pathway, which helps

to combat oxidative stress before it even

starts. So my point here is that

we can't be looking at lifestyle components in

silos. You can be an athlete, but if you don't pair

nutrition with it, you're not going to get the best benefit you're going to. You

can still have oxidative stress if you eat well, you have

a heart healthy diet, you exercise, but your sleep is not

good. You have sleep apnea that's not controlled, you're going to have more oxidative

stress. Your body is struggling to recover from

the. From actual good sleep quality. You know, when you're awake,

your body is working, it's creating free radicals. It's

in an oxidative stress kind of standpoint, your sleep is

restorative. It helps to actually boost your antioxidant

defense system. So if we don't have good sleep hygiene, we aren't

getting the nutrients in our diet. That helps to promote

melatonin production. That's also going to increase oxidative

stress. So I want to bring this component

up because we can do something about it, but we have to be

intentional. If I have many individuals who want

to continue their athlete journey, and I support that, it's part of their

identity. As long as you're breathing through it, you're not spiking

up your blood pressure in the moments of those, and you're not over pushing

yourself, you can still do the things that you love to do from an exercise

standpoint, but you must pair nutrition with it, and you must be

fueling your body pre and post to support your

heart health alongside it. So we need specific

antioxidants, we need specific proteins, we need specific

carbohydrates to help replenish our storage and

to help combat oxidative stress. And when you have heart disease

alongside of it, oxidative stress can be increased. And

so the levels of the antioxidant pathways, like the

glutathione pathway, like the sod pathway,

the superoxide dismutase pathway, these pathways help

to really boost our antioxidant load, and they require

nutrients that we can get through our food supply. So that's what we want to

focus on. And that's a big part of the puzzle that I think is not

talked about enough and really should be. Wow. And

we don't need to rely on a trap.

As an athlete myself, a trap I have fallen

into is all the different recovery

drinks. Mm hmm. And the pro. And you and I have talked

at length about protein sources, like all these different protein

powders and the recovery drinks and the. During athletic,

you know, during cycling and prior, like, there's like all

this marketing. So marketing. Oh, my gosh, the

marketing. So those are considered supplements.

You know, you think about a protein powder, you think about an

electrolyte powder, recovery powder, you think it's food. It's not.

It's actually a supplement. So it's not, as regulated. Consumer

labs finds high levels of arsenic lead in a lot of these

foods, but they're also ultra processed. There was a

study that looked at individuals who are following the mediterranean diet,

the vegan diet, all these different diets for heart health, and they were looking

at the level of ultra processed foods they were consuming. And this wasn't

like your yodels and your junk food. This was actually like anything

that was defined by the Nova scale. So the nova scale kind

of looks at the degree of processing. So protein powders,

electrolyte powders, that all would go into that group. And

they found that it elevated a inflammatory marker called

cystatin C that causes plaque to rupture.

And those individuals had a higher risk of another heart attack

within five years from their previous one because of the high

levels of ultra processed foods in their diet. Not to say you have to

have no ultra processed foods or no convenience items. You can

have convenience items, but you can get a good

recovery drink, a good recovery drink, a good recovery

meal with real food. And that's what you should be really focusing

on. Because instead of the recovery drink. Exactly.

Okay. You know, there are some ones that are better than others, but from a

convenience component of it, we really want to avoid the high

machinery foods that add a lot of extra things that our body

does not need, and we need to really take a step back. I always

say, you also have to understand that if you're on any heart

medications, a lot of those can actually interfere with the heart

medications, too. So you should bring all of these to the attention

of your cardiac dietitian, to the attention of your doctor, so that

they can do a thorough evaluation to make sure it's not causing any

harm. But potential benefit supplements are one of those topics where

everyone wants that magic pill. They want the marketing to actually be

true. It's hard not to trust it. And so I'm not saying that it's

easy, but I do believe that you should get a third look on it.

So in my group program, in my one on one program, I say, hey, show

me everything. And usually I'll give you a whole explanation of why I

like it, why I don't like it, who it's good for, who it's not good

for. If you're on this medication, don't take it. So you understand

why. Why would I? I'm not just gonna say no. I'm not just

gonna say yes. I'm gonna give you an explanation because that puts an

empowered approach to what you're eating into your diet that's gonna help your

heart versus cause any potential harm. And you've been great

with that for me. Cause I'll show you something that I've taken in the

past or currently taking. And what you do is you just immediately go to the

website and you can just tell me right then and there, this is good. This

is not good. This is why. And, yeah, it just helps. It

helps it stick. If we humans, we need to

know the why behind things. Our nervous system needs to know.

I'd also just like to. I'd love how you just said, like, it's hard.

Like, when there's. We're. When we're. When we are wanting just to feel

better, when we want to lose the weight, when we want to get back to,

like, who we were before our heart event. It

is so easy to fall victim

to marketing that promises you

the world, like, that you can get back to that weight,

that performance metric. I've fallen for it.

And I give myself grace for that. Because when you go through

heart surgery, it's so epic, it is so traumatic

and so life impacting. I

know I have had days where I'm just so forlorn

and feeling out of hope, like, no hope.

And, oh, but if I just take this supplement. If I, you know,

I just get it. And I just want to, like, normalize that for people. It's,

and it's a shame that, like, the marketing industry, I don't want to

be so accusatory, but I mean, I know I have felt victim of

the. Marketing industry, so not to, it's hard not

to. And you know what? I like to also say that it's

good to have a plan. So a lot of my clients first come to me

and they're like, I'm scared to take my blood pressure. If it's high, what's going

to happen? And I go, but we're going to have a plan together. So when

you're ready, you'll take your blood pressure because it's an important metric to follow.

And if it's high, then we'll add this to your diet. If

we know every day at 02:00 p.m. you have a stressful meeting, we can add

this to your diet half an hour before, and we can find things within what

you like to eat to help with opening up the arteries and allowing for better

blood flow. We have an action plan. So I think that idea of,

okay, I need to take something to know that I'm doing better for my heart

can be applied to how you nourish your body, can be applied to how you

talk to yourself. It can be applied to how you move your body,

how you present yourself and prioritize your health.

Those are ways that we can take that. Okay, I am a

heart patient, but it doesn't mean I don't have the power to control my day

to day. And I want to really push that idea of,

hey, you can control more than you

think, but you need to have that mindset to say, I'm going to

do something positive for myself today. I'm going to nourish my

body and then also connect. Wow. When I nourished my body,

when I prioritized my health, I had more energy, I felt

better. I was not short of breath. I felt all of these

amazing things because when you recognize the link, you're

going to do it more and more. And so that leads to the longevity

plan of a heart healthy lifestyle. Because you feel

good when you nourish your body, you feel good when you give

and prioritize your health because you need it in order to

do the other things that you love to do. I love that. And

a nugget I'd like to leave everyone with today that Michelle

taught me a few weeks ago is make it a good

day? Like, don't just say, oh, have a good day. No,

like, we. We have a choice on for

the most part. I mean, unless, like, there's a planet in retrograde or

whatever. But, like, like, we have the choice

of making it a great day. We choose our attitudes,

we choose what we put into our bodies on a day to day basis

and just start with one meal a day. Just take those

smaller steps. Cause you are so worthy

of good health. You are worth it. All

right, so come back for our last

installment of this incredible series with Michelle

next week. Thank you for being along on this ride. Be

sure to find her. I will have all the ways to get in touch with

her in the show notes she is offering. Michelle, real quickly, you

want to just talk about your course that you are offering

up in November? Sure. Yeah. So I do a six

week heart optimization group program. I call it optimize. And it

is a six week live cohort where I do it

live. And this is going to be my 18th time that I'm doing it live

because of the sense of community. It gives you access to

ask me questions. It gives you access to really understand

what's going on in your blood vessels and what can we do about it.

So every week, for six consecutive weeks in this lecture

series, it's actually seven weeks. Cause we skip over the American

Thanksgiving holiday in terms of a lecture. But you still have access to

me. And we really dive deep into these understandings

of inflammation, endothelial dysfunction,

oxidative stress, lipid optimization,

micronutrient deficiencies, really focusing

in on the underlying root causes of heart disease and what can we

do about it? Right, so you have to understand what's going on.

Then you have to take an understanding of, okay, how do I know if that's

happening in my body? What are the signs, what are the labs? And then

what can I do about it? Through science based nutrition and lifestyle medicine, what's

the why? So it really gives you all that knowledge,

but I also want you to implement it. So I give you easy

ways to implement this into your diethyde. And then we

keep building on each week. And so you have access to ask me

questions. You are starting your knowledge journey, but

also really implementing it, so you're getting good results. So

I just. It's such a great community that comes together. Everyone has heart

like related goals, everyone screened before they join.

And it's just a lovely cohort. I love doing it. They're also recorded.

So if you can't meet the live lectures that are scheduled on Fridays at

12 00:18:35

00 p.m. eastern Standard Time. Don't worry, you can always watch

12 00:18:39

the recording. You can ask questions anonymously to the Google form,

12 00:18:43

or you can ask in the open community forum where I'm always

12 00:18:46

accessible to you. So everyone is really great in past

12 00:18:50

cohorts of sharing what they're doing, sharing supplements, sharing just questions

12 00:18:54

that they want to know, sharing anything that's helpful to

12 00:18:57

them. And everyone's learning together. So you're learning from other people's

12 00:19:01

questions and you have your own questions that are piggybacking off other people's

12 00:19:05

questions. So the cohort is just a really supportive place to

12 00:19:08

be and it helps you take action and take

12 00:19:12

an empowered approach in your heart health to really understand and build

12 00:19:16

your confidence on what's a truly heart healthy diet so that you can live a

12 00:19:19

long and thriving life. I love the cohort. If you want more information,

12 00:19:23

you'll put it down in the show notes as well. Yep. Awesome. Thanks for

12 00:19:27

that. All right, one more Tuesday to go, so

12 00:19:31

be sure to come back for one last nugget from

12 00:19:35

Michelle next week. Thanks for tuning in. Thanks so much.