Top 10 Foods That DESTROY Your BRAIN

Hello Health Champions today we're going to talk  about the top 10 foods that destroy your brain and  

I think everyone watching would know the value  of keeping your brain for as long as possible  

and there's three mechanisms of damage when it  comes to brain and one would be something that  

has a direct toxicity for the brain cells two  would be something that affects the gut brain  

axis and we're going to talk about all these in  in detail and show you which ones do what and  

the third would be insulin resistance so these are  the three mechanisms and we're going to use these  

little color symbols over on the side here to sort  of point out which foods do what food number 10 is  

MSG monosodium glutamate and this is a substance  that can work as an excitotoxin because there is  

a compound in the body called glutamate just like  monosodium glutamate that's a neurotransmitter  

it's an excitatory neurotransmitter which means  it increases the activity of brain cells and when  

it happens in the body naturally or with small and  natural amounts of MSG occurring in food then the  

body has no problem managing and bowel balancing  and regulating this but when we introduce enormous  

amounts of MSG as they often do in various  processed foods now we throw this delicate balance  

totally out of whack and we overwhelm the body we  overwhelm these neurons and now this MSG becomes  

an excitotoxin meaning it excites that nerve cell  too far too much so that it just keeps firing and  

keeps firing until it burns itself out and in some  cases dies so MSG can be a direct Toxin and this  

affects people very differently so some people are  super super sensitive they just totally get wiped  

out at the smallest amount of MSG whereas others  can go and eat all this processed foods with tons  

of MSG and not really ever notice anything so we  have to understand the individual variability here  

and why do they add MSG to the food what does it  do well it adds savoriness to food basically it  

adds deliciousness so it exaggerates it enhances  whatever flavor the food already has and the way  

that it does that is taste is twofold whenever you  eat something there is an olfactory or there's a  

smell component to it so the olfactory bulb which  is cranial nerve number one up here gets affected  

it gets stimulated and also the gustatory The  Taste receptors which we have taste buds on the  

tongue get stimulated so the taste perception is  twofold as you probably know if you have a cold or  

if your nose is totally stuffy then food doesn't  taste as good so by introducing this excitotoxin  

we trick these nerve cells into thinking that  the food tastes much more and much better than it  

actually does and of course then people are going  to eat more and that's the reason that they add  

this to all sorts of different foods because  it helps sell junk food especially food that  

they've processed so hard that it doesn't really  have much flavor flavor in itself anymore if you  

add some MSG to it now all of a sudden the brain  thinks this is really delicious so what can you  

do about it well for starters you want to read  labels you want to make sure that it doesn't  

have any MSG in it unfortunately that's not  enough because the manufacturers cheat and they  

rename this compound over and over and over so as  people get more Savvy and they start avoiding it  

the manufacturers will try to trick you and  change it so it has more than 50 different  

names basically anything that says hydrolyzed  or autoized extract or something that has yeast  

extract in it is just a cover for something  that's MSG so MSG is an example of something  

that is directly toxic it has direct toxicity  and other reasons other things that could have  

a direct toxicity would be anything that decreases  or interferes with cell function with brain cell  

function it could be something like MSG that  over stimulates but it could also be something  

that decreases energy production that interferes  with energy production because that's the most key  

aspect of brain cell function is to have enough  energy available it could also be something that  

decreases the cell Integrity if the membrane  or some other component of that brain cell  

becomes less stable and more vulnerable that can  also be a toxin and if these are severe enough  

then that can lead to cell death or apoptosis  number nine is fish and this is really tragic  

because fish has things in it that the brain  really needs such as omega-3 fatty acids and  

protein both of those things are excellent the  brain needs those for building blocks and the  

omega-3 we're looking for is called DHA  it's a component of the cell membrane  

but unfortunately there is also something else in  fish called Mercury because of pollution we have  

saturated or we have heavily polluted the oceans  with Mercury and all the things that live in the  

ocean are going to absorb that so Mercury is a  direct toxin for the brain whenever the brain  

tries to do things and learn things and heal  itself it creates new synapses and Mercury  

directly interferes with the production and the  manufacture of these synapses so some fish are  

more prone to accumulating Mercury than others and  some of these would include tile fish swordfish  

king mackerel tuna and orange roughy and there  are others but these would be the main ones and  

the big thing that these have in common for the  most part is that they are large predatory fish  

that live a long long time so if they live for  a long long time they have time to accumulate  

more Mercury and if they eat other fish then they  accumulate the Mercury that those fish have eaten  

and so forth so the first four are relatively  large the last one is kind of interesting it's  

called orange roughy it looks kind of prehistoric  but this is a relatively small fish so when I tell  

people to avoid the large predatory fish very  often people miss this one because when you buy  

it in the store and it's delicious by the way it  it's flat and it's white and those are typically  

the fish like soul that would be safe for you but  this one it's about the size of your palm when you  

buy it in the store and the reason it's so toxic  is that it grows extremely slowly these fish can  

live for 150 years years and still not get much  bigger than a serving or a couple of servings of  

fish so this would be one to watch out for it is  super delicious so when it comes to these fish it  

doesn't mean that you should never ever ever eat  them but maybe once or twice a year or something  

like that number eight on the list is alcohol and  as delicious as it might be it is a neurotoxin  

and it also has the potential of creating leaky  gut it can be irritable on membranes so therefore  

it also has the potential of affecting your gut  brain axis which we'll talk about in just a little  

bit and it also has the potential of increasing  fatty liver I talk a lot about sugar and alcohol  

being two substances that only the liver can  process and therefore it creates a fatty liver  

so if you have insulin resistance if you have type  2 diabetes you probably also have a fatty liver  

and then drinking alcohol is going to add insult  to injury and make it much harder to reverse that  

so with alcohol there's actually three all three  deck mechanisms direct toxicity gut brain access  

and insulin resistance would be the case for  alcohol and what they have observed in people  

who are long-term consumers of large large amounts  of alcohol is that they have smaller brains so it  

does cause brain shrinkage but also we need to  remember that the damage is dose dependent so  

what they have found is that people who are light  drinkers meaning one or at the most two drinks per  

day they do not have this shrinkage relative  to non-drinkers but the more you drink the  

more pronounced that brain shrinkage is so let's  talk about this gut brain axis and why this is so  

important for your brain health there's a lot of  talk about leaky gut and the reason is that when  

we put things into our mouths it's not really  inside the body yet we put things into a tube  

and then the waste comes out the other end and on  the way we're supposed to only absorb very very  

selectively the things that the body wants but if  we have a leaky gut then a lot of stuff that's a  

supposed to be in the tube leaks out and gets into  the bloodstream and here's why that matters to the  

brain so if we have a person and this is really  going to challenge my artistic skills here and  

we have a body and a head and of course we  have legs and arms as well then this tube  

is where we put food in and if we have a leaky gut  like we said then things are going to get out into  

the bloodstream that are not supposed to be in  the bloodstream but here's the thing we talk a  

lot about leaky guts but we don't talk a lot about  leaky brain and the two go together so if you have  

a leaky gut then you probably have a leaky brain  as well because a lot of the same mechanisms a lot  

of the tight junctions that that seal things and  hold things together it's the same stuff in the  

gut as it is in the brain and the same mechanisms  that disturb them and make them leaky happen in  

the gut as they do in the brain so if we have  a leaky gut then these things will get into the  

blood circulation they will get into the brain and  now we're going to leak into the brain and there  

are lots of things that can do this one of the  most common would be anything that unbalances your  

microbiome a healthy balanced strong microbiome  will keep a mucous layer and it will keep these  

tight junctions sealed up but when we unbalance  the biome now that gut becomes vulnerable and  

now we're going to allow different things into the  bloodstream and some of these are biotoxins so if  

we have pathogenic bacteria in the gut so we have  path we have good bacteria and bad bacteria but  

we're supposed to seal these things into the gut  when we get a leaky gut some of these things from

number seven on the list is artificial sweeteners  and the main one here that there's been discussion  

about is aspartame also known as NutraSweet  introduced in the 80s and there's been a lot  

of documentation that it is a direct neurotoxin  but then there's also this new one that they try  

to put out as an alternative claiming that it was  safe and that sucralose also known as Splenda and  

people for the longest time said that yeah you  want to avoid aspartame and use sucralose instead  

and as a result now sucralose is in thousands  if not tens of thousands of different products  

but very recently they found out that sucralose  is not so safe it contains things that breaks  

up DNA it breaks DNA apart and now of course it  can create all sorts of damage so it is a direct  

toxin as well and one more thing that they found  about sucralose is that it can also create leaky  

gut so in addition to being a direct toxin now we  also have that gut brain axis to worry about but  

here's an interesting part that they introduce  these artificial sweeteners as an alternative  

to Sugar because they figured out sugar is bad it  makes people diabetic it makes people gain weight  

so they let them have low calorie or non-calorie  Alternatives as artificial sweeteners but what  

they find is that when people eat something  sweet that has no caloric value now that actually  

increases the cravings and if they have more  Cravings they're going to more and they're going  

to increase insulin resistance so even though the  idea behind these artificial sweeteners was to  

get away from sugar in the end it's not working  people are gaining weight and they're becoming  

diabetic just as much or even more than before  they had these artificial sweeteners so we also  

have a component of insulin resistance which we'll  talk about in a second what that does to the brain  

but on this note of artificial sweeteners I also  have to mention Stevia and monk fruit because I  

can't tell you how often I see these mentioned  in the same sentence they talk about artificial  

sweeteners like aspartame and Stevia as if they  were the same thing they are absolutely not  

the aspartame and the sucralose are man-made 100  synthetic out of labs whereas Stevia and monk  

fruit are plant products so people confuse these  because Stevia and monk fruit are non-caloric  

but they are not artificial they are natural  sweeteners and yes they process them to a point  

but that doesn't make them bad and Stevia and  monk fruit are perfectly fine for people unless  

it increases their Cravings so this is something  that you have to figure out for yourself if that  

sweet taste kind of keeps you keeps you hooked on  sugar then that's not such a great thing but other  

than that Stevia and monk fruit are totally fine  now what is insulin resistance have to do with  

the brain well the connection is so clear even  though they don't know the mechanism exactly the  

connection is so strong that the men is often  called type 3 diabetes just to illustrate how  

strong the association is but if we want to  talk about some possible mechanisms that we  

often hear that glucose is the only fuel for the  brain and that is not correct they're missing  

one part of that glucose is the only fuel for  the brain in a high carb state so if you eat a  

lot of carbohydrates then glucose is the only  fuel right however if you have a low carb diet  

and or if you're doing fasting now the body  starts making something called ketones which  

is an alternative fuel to the glucose you're still  going to be using both but the longer you fast the  

more your body switches to Ketone to where ketones  can be more than 75 percent of the energy for the  

brain now here's where it becomes a real problem  if that high carb diet leads to insulin resistance  

which it does eventually for most people like  80 85 percent of people are more or less insulin  

resistant then we create a situation because it's  high carb where the brain only has fuel through  

glucose but because of the insulin resistance that  glucose can't get into the brain in sufficient  

amounts so now we've created a situation where the  brain can only use glucose but we're starving it  

for glucose so now like we said the number  one resource for the brain because it's so  

metabolically active is energy and now that energy  can't get in there the the raw material for the  

energy can't get in there so the solution would  be to do more low carb and fasting so we make some  

ketones so we can bypass the dependence on glucose  dementia is a form of neurodegeneration that the  

brain cells aren't able to do aren't able to work  to the degree that they're supposed to the number  

one thing like we said is a lack of resources the  second thing would be that something's interfering  

the first lack of resource would be energy just  like we said glucose and ketones and when we're  

insulin resistant that's the number one reason we  don't get those resources that energy but there  

are other things the brain needs as well so if we  eat a diet that don't have enough essential fatty  

acids from fish or fish oil like we talked about  if the fish is too toxic to eat then we got to  

take some fish oil that has been cleaned up and  the Brain also needs cofactors when it makes all  

this energy it needs minerals and electrolytes  for all that signaling and the number one form  

of interference would be some form of toxin like  we said with the gut we can get it from biotoxins  

but there's also heavy metals and chemicals Etc  from pollution and inflammation in general into  

fears with the proper functioning of the brain so  neural inflammation or anything that creates more  

inflammation and of course insulin resistance is  one of the main things that does that so lack of  

resources is mostly due to insulin resistance and  interference is mostly due to gut brain issues and  

direct toxicity number six is grain and Grains  contain something called wheat germ agglutinen  

wga which is most pronounced in wheat hence the  name but this is something called a lectin which  

is something that binds to little antennas on  the intestinal membrane and by binding to it it  

creates damage but these lectins are also found  in many other things such as Rye barley and rice  

and when they create this damage then they  can promote a leaky gut which we talked a  

lot about and of course that gut brain access  get compromised it can also promote insulin  

resistance of course because it is pure starch  and starches get converted into glucose and race  

insulin number five is white bread which is of  course a grain so everything we just talked about  

is exactly the same except white bread is the  worst kind of grain is wheat and once we refine  

it and bleach it now it does all the same things  but worse number four is nightshades and this is  

kind of tricky because this is very unfortunate  that some really good things contain lectins as  

well so nightshades are in a family of plants  called eggplant bell pepper tomato and potato  

primarily and most of these lectins are in the  skin and the seeds so if you remove the skin and  

the seeds then you you've done away with most of  it and when you cook it then and it also breaks  

down some of these lectins so of course this  can affect the gut brain axis even though these  

are mostly Good Foods they are low carb they're  non-starchy and they can be fantastic for people  

on a low carb diet we have to understand that it  can be a big problem for some people especially  

if you already have a compromised gut if you have  a leaky gut if you have autoimmunity then it can  

make a big difference for some people if you avoid  these things but it doesn't necessarily mean that  

they are bad for everybody or that most people  should try to avoid them number three is trans  

fats which affect so many different things in the  body in a destructive way but one of the things  

the effect is your mitochondria and mitochondria  are super super important they're little things  

inside your cells that make almost all the energy  that that you use and your brain and your heart  

and your liver and your kidneys use the most  energy so they also have the most mitochondria  

and they're the most vulnerable for damage to  the mitochondria and the way we make energy is  

through oxidation just just like you put oxygen on  the fire you can't have a fire without oxygen the  

more oxygen you blow on it the hotter that fire  burns and the same thing happens in the cells that  

we have to have oxygen we have to oxidize the  food the fuel and in doing that an unavoidable  

byproduct is called reactive oxygen species Ros  so there's always this balance between making  

energy and making smoke so to speak but with these  trans fats they alter one of the Pathways in the  

mitochondria to where we dramatically increase  the amount of reactive oxygen species so it's  

like the fire doesn't burn as clean it makes way  way more smoke and it makes way more damage than  

it ever did before and it does that to a point  where it increases dramatically increases what's  

called apoptosis or cell death so trans fats are  definitely a direct toxin to mitochondria and to  

cells but also these trans fats they are altered  fatty acids and our cell membranes are made up of  

fatty acids and they're supposed to have certain  properties but trans fats are artificial man-made  

fats that sometimes get incorporated into these  cell membranes and now these cell membranes don't  

work as well as they're supposed supposed to  and everything about your function in your brain  

is about cell membranes that is how your brain  signals with a bunch of trans fats it doesn't work  

the way it's supposed to and because some of these  cell membranes are in the gut then these trans  

fats can also affect leaky gut and that gut brain  axis and we also have trans fats will affect your  

metabolism so they will decrease your fatty acid  your utilization of lipids and fatty acids and it  

will increase inflammation and type 2 diabetes so  trans fats will have all three of these mechanisms  

in play number two type food that destroy your  brain is fried foods and there's so many things  

wrong with that they start off with really  bad oils these harshly processed vegetable oil  

so-called vegetable oils and because they're very  high in omega-6s and they're very inflammatory  

they promote insulin resistance some people  believe that they promote insulin resistance even  

more than sugar I think there may be a toss-up  there and fried foods often use trans fats which  

we just talked about on the previous slide which  again has all three mechanisms in place so we have  

direct toxicity and gut brain access compromise at  the same time then of course for economy because  

they use this for cheap food is they reuse the oil  over and over and over all day long it just sits  

there bubbling and as it does that and they cook  over and over they increase the degree of toxicity  

the longer they go and as if that isn't bad enough  then of course most fried foods are going to use  

a coating called breading which is made up of  wheat in most cases which of course adds more  

insult to injury through insulin resistance and  more compromise of the gut brain axis and again  

it's not the fact necessarily that we're frying  the food it is how we're frying the food the you  

the oil we use the quality of food we use so if  you started out with really good quality foods and  

you didn't use the breading and you used something  like coconut oil or lard something that is very  

stable at high temperatures and not processed  and oxidized then it wouldn't be a bad thing I  

wouldn't recommend it all the time but you could  do it once in a while and the number one food that  

will destroy your brain is sugar and the reason  is that sugar is the number one cause of insulin  

resistance and insulin resistance is the number  one cause of dementia and you've probably heard  

me say this if you've seen my videos before but  sugar is different than other carbohydrates in  

that all carbohydrates have glucose but sugar also  has 50 percent fructose which is almost as bad as  

alcohol for the liver and it creates a fatty liver  and once you have a fatty liver that is where you  

really blow the roof off insulin resistance and  diabetes and that's why countries like China and  

India could eat rice for centuries and not develop  metabolic problems until in the last few decades  

when they added sugar to the equation so glucose  or starch by itself isn't great necessarily but it  

doesn't become a huge problem it doesn't become  a metabolic epidemic until you add sugar on top  

furthermore sugar is extremely addictive which  further contributes to overeating and more insulin  

resistance and sugar will also selectively feed  the pathogenic bacteria will upset the balance  

of your biome it will contribute to Leaky guts so  now we have that gut brain axis as well and what  

we need to understand about sugar is that if you  notice there is no green circle it's not a direct  

toxin sugar in itself is Perfectly Natural it's  in almost everything the reason it becomes the  

worst thing we have ever seen on the planet is  the dose the dose makes the poison and we went  

from eating a few granules a few grams here and  there in Honey and in naturally occurring fruit  

to having it become a staple and now it becomes  a true poison and one of the main reasons we are  

as sick as we are today if you enjoyed this video  You're Gonna Love that one and if you truly want  

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