Top 10 Foods That Cause Dementia

Hello Health Champions today we're going

to talk about the top 10 foods that

cause dementia we also need to

understand some of the mechanisms that

drive the progression of dementia so

that we can understand what the foods

have to do with it and dementia

progresses very very rapidly with age so

that between 60 and 65 years of age we

have about

1.33% dementia between 65 and 70 we have

about 2.2%

between 70 and 75 it rises to 3.8%

between 75 and 80 it goes up to

6.5% 5 years later it's up to

11.6 and by the time we're 90 over 20%

of the population have dementia and then

after 90 more than 40% of the population

have dementia so as you can see it

progresses very very rapidly and we need

to understand what the causes are and

the foods are influencing that so we can

slow down this progression so there are

some things that the brain needs that

helps the brain stay functional and the

first thing is energy because the brain

is only 2% of your body weight but it

uses over 20% of all your energy so on

average it's 10% more metabolically

active more needing energy than your

body sells on average and the way the

brain makes energy energ of course is

from fuel which is carbohydrates and

ketones and in order to oxidize that

fuel it needs oxygen and most of this

energy is created inside your cells in

little inclusions little things called

mitochondria they make the vast majority

of all your energy and one more thing

that the brain needs that is absolutely

essential that virtually no one ever

talks about because they just talk

talking about how it makes energy but it

also needs stimulation because without

stimulation it's use it or lose it just

like a muscle if you put your muscle in

a cast if you break your arm put a cast

then after two weeks you have lost 50%

of that muscle that's the halflife of

protein and the brain is the same way so

when we're not stimulating when we're

not driving signals to the brain on a

regular basis then the brain starts

degenerating and deteriorating and

that's one of the mechanisms

contributing to dementia and then there

are the factors that damage that hurt

your brain that speed up the progression

of

degeneration and one of course is poor

genetics but we need to understand what

that means because most people think

that the DNA is is set it's fixed which

in one sense it is and another one It

Isn't So when we talk about your genome

that's your setup your makeup of DNA

that's half the chromosomes from your

mom and half the chromosomes from your

dad they combine and they become your

genome there's nothing you can do about

that that is what you're born with

however what most people don't realize

is that is just like the foundation that

really is not all that important

important because there's also

epigenetics which means on top of

genetics and that is how you express it

so you can have genes that are never

turned on you can have bad genes that

are latent that are never activated you

can have good genes that you express

well or that you express poorly and like

I mentioned disuse is very very harmful

we need to understand that exercise is

not about losing weight or staying fit

or looking good it's about stimulating

your brain and then we come to the

inflammation part of it which is the

biggest biochemical driver of

degeneration which is chronic lowgrade

inflammation and there's several

components to that one is oxidative

stress which we have to have some

oxidative stress because that's how we

make energy when those

mitochondria make energy they use oxygen

we create oxidative stress but the

cleaner things burn the more balanced

things are and if we get a lot of junk

in the body then those mitochondria they

tend to rust a little bit they they

don't burn as clean it's like a little

engine that starts smoking and now we

get excess oxidative stress and we get

less energy out of it and there are also

in enironmental toxins and those are

both the pollution as well as all the

things that we add to food like

preservatives and artificial colors Etc

then there is food allergies because if

you have a sensitivity to a food if it

causes a reaction that's an inflammatory

reaction so that contributes more to

that inflammation and then there is

disbiosis that we're only recently

starting to understand how important

that is is because if you have an

imbalance of bacteria in your gut if you

don't have enough of the good ones or

you have too many of the pathogenic ones

now you start getting a little war zone

you start getting chaos down in your gut

and that creates inflammation but it

also creates damage to the lining and to

the mucus layer so now we get leaky gut

and we increase the amount of food

allergies so you can see see how all of

these things are kind of tied together

that they depend on each other and when

one thing isn't working it makes the

whole worse food number one and these

are in no particular order is excess

alcohol drinking too much too frequently

will cause premature dementia because

alcohol is a neurotoxin it directly

damages brain cells in excess but it

also causes leaky guts now it

contributes to food allergies and to

inflammation one more way it also

contributes to fatty liver and once you

have a fatty liver that tends to

increase your degree of insulin

resistance which is another driver of

inflammation and over time because of

all these factors it can cause brain

shrinkage and we also have to remember

that it's dose dependent that it's not

alcohol per se it's excess alcohol so if

you have a glass of wine or maybe two a

few times a week then that has been

shown to have some positive effects but

if you have four five six drinks most

days then that is probably going to

speed up that brain degeneration food

number two is refined carbs and we

really need to understand what those are

because they usually only make a big

deal out of added sugar and we all know

to look at the label and if it has added

sugar we stay away from it but added

sugar that's the white sugar the

crystals but it also in any other form

like honey or glucose syrup or agave or

high fructose corn syrup or any of those

and what they're adding is

basically a sugar that consists of a

glucose molecule that is tied to a

fructose

molecule and these are both they're mono

saccharides meaning single and we we put

them together like in white table sugar

then it becomes a

disaccharide and this is what we're

talking about with added sugar and why

is this so bad because the glucose

portion of it will raise blood sugar and

because these carbs are processed then

they're going to break aart very quickly

and the glucose will raise blood sugar

the fructose will take a different path

it's not called blood sugar because it's

not blood glucose this is fructose and

that has to go through the liver to get

processed and in the in doing that it

causes fatty liver it is almost on par

with alcohol and how bad and how quickly

it causes a fatty liver and of course

alcohol is bad because it causes

intoxication but at the same time that

sort of sets a limit for how much

alcohol people consume sugar doesn't do

that so there's no limit in how much

people eat and therefore we also give it

to kids and kids now can get fatty liver

at a very very early age so we all know

to stay away from that however there is

also something called natural sugar so

when that occurs in Fruit it's okay to

have some berries it's okay to have

fruit occasionally if you're not insulin

resistant or you don't have type 2

diabetes but when they dry the fruit

then sometimes they add chemicals to it

sometimes they even add sugar to it and

now it becomes a very concentrated form

of sugar like raisins is about

70% pure sugar just like that the other

form is when we make juice out of it

because now we

remove the pulp we remove the fiber we

remove all the cell walls the bulk of

that fruit and now it just becomes a

liquid with sugar floating around in it

and that natural sugar is no different

it's exactly the same as the added sugar

so even if they don't list it on the

label we need to understand the

difference that there really is no

difference we need to understand that

sugar is sugar and then there's one more

kind of carbohydrate called starch and

if we get a little bit here and there in

a sweet potato or some tubers that's not

a big deal but when we get it in grain

we're getting way too much and we're

we're getting it in processed grains now

we removed a lot of the fiber everything

that slows it down so now that starch

raises blood glucose even faster than

the sugar does and starch is nothing

more nothing less than these little

sugar molecules and then when we link

them together two three and dozens and

hundreds and thousands now that's called

a starch but it's still only one type of

molecule and then we go when we eat

these we have something called Amala in

the mouth and that starts chopping off

these little glucose molecules the

moment we get them in our mouth so

within minutes we see a rise in in

glucose in blood glucose from eating

starch and like I said this is faster

even than sugar and the reason that we

want to understand this so well and

avoid excess carbohydrate whatever level

that is for you and your lifestyle and

your genetic makeup is that there's such

a strong connection between glucose and

insulin resistance and dementia that

it's sometimes called type 3 diabetes

and that doesn't mean that it is a

separate type of diabetes it just means

they're trying to focus and help us

understand how strong that link is and

to understand the link and that

mechanism we need to understand the two

types of fuel that the brain can use and

very often they talk about only glucose

if you do a Google search on fuels for

the brain the first million hits are

going to be for glucose alone and if you

talk to 99% of doctors they're going to

tell you that the brain can only use

glucose but ketones have been critical

in human survival and it's critical in

babies babies are born into ketosis and

that helps drive that huge brain so when

we eat a lot of sugar and we eat a lot

of starch now we raise blood glucose we

get excess blood glucose on a regular

basis and if we get excess glucose we

get excess insulin if we do that all the

time we become insulin resistant and

here's something that was not discovered

until very recently really like 50 years

ago they had no idea because we thought

back then that the brain was so

dependent on glucose that it could just

suck it up out of the bloodstream that

you didn't need insulin to get the

glucose into the brain well that proved

to be wrong because the brain does

depend on insulin so if your cells are

insulin resistant if your muscles are

insulin resistant then your whole body

also becomes insulin resistant to some

degree and your brain cells are insulin

resistant so for a given level of blood

sugar that means if your brain is

insulin resistant it gets less glucose

it can't properly get into those brain

cells so here is that

Paradox that is responsible for dementia

in people with insulin resistance and

that is that if you have too high a

blood glucose then that results in less

glucose in the brain so so the more

sugar you eat the more your brain

starves and some people would look at

that and say oh well the body is pretty

stupid sometimes that seems like a

defective design and I would beg to

differ I would say that it's a defective

LIF style that we have introduced

something in the last 50 years 50 to 100

years that humans have never ever seen

before we have never had the abundance

of sugar and starch specially processed

starch that we've had in the last few

decades food number three is sugar and

just like we talked about sugar is the

number one cause of insulin resistance

which keeps that glucose out of the

brain and if we keep eating sugar now

there's never going to be any ketones to

fuel the brain but if we cut back enough

on the carbohydrates now even if we're

insulin resistant we're going to make

some ketone that can fuel the brain and

start reversing that process and the

reason that Sugar this disaccharide is

even worse than the starch is that it's

50% fructose which causes a fatty liver

and also that it's very highly addictive

and another problem is that it

contributes to disbiosis it messes up

your biome and thereby it causes leaky

guts and more food allergies and so

forth but we still have to remember that

it is a very natural molecule that this

molecule the glucose and to some degree

the sugar is part of all foods but the

dose makes the poison so when we

concentrate it when we refine it when we

eat too much of something then that's

when it becomes very damaging it's not

carbohydrates per se because leafy

greens and non-starchy vegetables still

have some sugar but there's so little

and there's so much water and so much

fiber that those Foods behave nothing

like this food number four is fish and

this is a little confusing because on

the one hand if you get clean wild

caught fish then it can be incredibly

beneficial for the brain because it has

Omega-3s it has EPA and DHA and DHA is

the main building block for brain tissue

so we absolutely have to have that it

also provides really good source of

protein but while cfish can also have

mercury it's a heavy metal it's a

neurotoxin and it's incredibly

destructive it will literally chew away

and dissolve brain tissue in excess so

we want to make sure that we get the

fish that has very very low amounts of

mercury so the high amounts of mercury

is in the fish that are predatory that

eat other fish because all fish absorb a

little bit from the water but then the

large fish that eat the smaller fish

they concentrate that and when they're

predatory they're usually larger and

they live longer and the longer they

live the more they accumulate of this

Mercury this toxin so the safe fishes to

eat are typically very small fish like

sardine and Herring and to some degree

mackerel as long as you don't eat the

king mackerel that get huge also the

small flat fish like soul and Flounder

and cod are very safe and the ones you

want to avoid are sword fish and tuna

and any other large predatory fish or

any fish that lives for a very long time

and then there's farmed fish and in some

cases that could be okay if they f it

responsibly if they gave it good quality

nutrients like natural food for that

species and they keep it in good

conditions with clean water and no

parasites or mole or all the things that

can occur but for the most part they're

just trying to save a buck and the

conditions are usually very deplorable

so they feed the fish the lowquality

foods the cheapest thing that will keep

them alive and very often they also feed

them hormones and

antibiotics and chemicals and artificial

colors number five is what I call the

dirty dozen and those are the types of

plants that are most often using a lot

of chemicals a lot of pesticides to

produce them and pesticides are toxic to

the body and toxic to the brain and on

this year's list we have strawberries

nectarines and blueberries apples grapes

and peaches cherries pears and plums and

you want to check for what's going on in

your region because it's going to differ

between different countries between

different continents as there's

different farming practices and also

they change over time these items can

vary from year to year and among the

vegetables we have bell pepper hot

peppers and green beans Tomatoes

potatoes carrots spinach kale and celery

so these are the foods that you want to

pay extra attention to and either you

get them organic or you pass by all

together and eat something else now very

often they're going to say they're still

better than none so eating sprayed toxic

plants are still better than not eating

them at all because plants are so good

for you now that's just one of those

things that we've heard and they've been

repeated so often that nobody really

thinks about that and for some people

that's going to be true if they have a

good tolerance against toxins if they

have a strong gastrointestinal tract if

they have a strong liver they can

probably break down those pesticides

pretty well but if you have a genetic

weakness if you have various genetic

variants where you don't tolerate where

you don't break down toxins so well then

that's probably not going to be true for

you then it's probably better to avoid

them all together and if you have a weak

microbiome if there's imbalance or

dysfunction now you're going to be more

prone to food intolerance you're not

going to have that protective mucus

layer and you'll also be more sensitive

to various forms of toxins and the other

thing to understand is that all of these

pesticides all this spraying all these

chemicals it's a very modern thing it's

all happened basically in the last 50

years in the previous 50,000 or a

million years there were no pesticides

so our genetic makeup our genome has

never seen pesticides and even if one

isn't going to do all that much damage

today we have hundreds and thousands of

them and that body burden start piling

on top of each other so it's something

that we really need to pay attention to

and start really understanding what food

is and it always cracks me up when I go

into a store and I see a little sign and

a little section that says natural food

like they have a department for natural

food and I always ask myself if that's

the natural food then what's the rest of

the store number six is artificial sweet

sweeteners and I'm going to mention a

couple that are more common than the

others the first is aspartame that goes

under the brand name of neutr suite and

this is a well-established neurotoxin

and then when people did poorly on that

one and started complaining now they

brought out another one called sucralose

which goes under the brand name of

Splenda so now we have sucros in 5 to

10,000 different products and for sever

years they said well Splenda is the new

thing it's the clean thing it's made

from natural things it's not going to

harm you but of course it's artificial

so it will do damage and very recently

they found that it starts breaking apart

DNA and both of these will disrupt your

gut bacteria and in doing that they

contribute to leaky gut and more

inflammation and allergies Etc and the

biggest reason that they've brought

these to the market is that people start

understanding how bad sugar is but we

still have that sweet tooth and that

addiction so now they're marketing this

as a no calorie alternative and now

people see it as a good thing and they

start overc consuming it and the whole

idea was that if you drink or consume

these artificial ones now you lose

weight the sugar puts on the weight if

you stop the sugar you lose the weight

but unfortunately it doesn't work like

that but because it also tends to

increase Cravings you eat something

sweet but you're not getting anything of

substance now your body starts looking

for more and more and more and also

people confuse these artificial

sweeteners with Splenda and monk fruit

because they're all non-caloric

sweeteners but they're not all

artificial so the monk fruit and Splenda

they are natural they're plant extracts

now in moderation I would say that

they're okay if you start overc

consuming if you think it's a good thing

that you can eat it unlimited then there

some evidence that it may actually start

to disrupt your microbiome as well

number seven is bad fats and it's not

what you usually hear that saturated fat

is bad fat because saturated fat is very

stable and it is safe to consume it's a

very stable source of energy and it

doesn't cause any inflammation in the

body the bad fats are damaged fats and

these are trans fats primarily that they

realized how bad they are so now they're

moving away from trans fats but instead

they tell us to start consuming

vegetable oils and these are not

vegetable oils at all they're seed oils

they grain oils and their legume oils

and the problem with these is that they

have too much Omega 6 a little bit of

Omega 6 is okay but today we're getting

like 20 times more Omega sixes than we

should have and most of that is coming

from these so-called vegetable oils now

the problem even bigger problem is that

they're processed so harshly they have

to use high temperature high pressure

and chemicals to get the fat the oil out

of these sources and in doing that they

damage the oils and they oxidize it so

now we have another source of excess

oxidation and free radicals and another

source of bad fats is fried foods when

you use vegetable oils because these are

already damaged they're already high in

Omega sixes and now when you fry things

and you reuse that oil over and over

you're just increasing the damage and

that oxidation

over and over number eight is anything

that increases food sensitivities and

one thing that can do that is called

lectins and they're usually associated

with a group of plants called

nightshades and nightshades are things

like eggplant bell pepper tomato and

potato there's many more but these are

probably the ones that people consume

the most however it's not just these

night shades but grain like Rye barley

and rice also have lectins and the

biggest grain to stay away from is

modern wheat because it is processed it

is hybridized in so many different ways

it's not really a food anymore and it is

also the richest source of gluten and

the type of gluten that people tend to

react to and then there's something

called the gut brain axis so if we

disrupt the gut bacteria and we Dam

damage that mucus protection we get

leaky gut now all sorts of things start

leaking through getting into the

bloodstream and anything that gets into

the bloodstream anything that causes a

leaky gut will tend to create a leaky

brain and now the things that get out

into the bloodstream are going to

circulate and start creating brain

inflammation which can be very damaging

and really progress the development of

dementia but again this does not mean

that these are bad foods it's going to

be important for some people to avoid

this but if you start restoring your

microbiome if you start getting a

healthy gut again you can probably get

to the point where these things do not

become a problem number nine is excess

caffeine so here's one more thing that

can actually have some benefit in low

doses it tends to improve improve focus

and give you a little bit of energy

however if you start having high doses

if you start depending on it to stay

awake and get things done if you're not

limiting yourself to two cups but you're

having six seven eight 10 cups a day now

it becomes a stressor now it will drive

your endocrine system and your stress

hormones and anything driving the stress

hormones will also shut off melatonin

which is your sleep hormone that

regulates your sleep your circadian

rhythm number 10 is food additives so

these are things that we add to make

things look a certain way or feel a

certain way so we have artificial colors

we have artificial flavors and then

there's tons and tons of other additives

that are texturizers and keep things

from separating and so forth and then

there is preservatives and that sounds

like such a positive thing right we add

preservatives we preserve the food now

if you do canning and things like that

that's okay that's a totally different

thing but when they add chemicals

basically what they're doing is they're

making the food so

unattractive that no other living things

want it and you have to ask yourself is

that what your body is looking for is

that what you want to feed yourself if

it's so unattractive that not even even

the mold wants it if you enjoyed this

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