Home · The Dr. Axe Show · Ep. 386
Episode 386 · The Dr. Josh Axe Show

The Toxin Nobody Checks For (It's in Your Clothes & Bed) | Alex Clark

Your clothes, your mattress, your cleaning products — they're all off-gassing chemicals into your body 24 hours a day, and most people have no idea. Alex Clark has spent the last year on the front lines of the MAHA movement, testifying at the White House on glyphosate, exposing what's hiding in cotton tampons, and building one of the most-followed health podcasts in the country — and today she's bringing all of it to this show.

61 minwith Alex Clark
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Alex Clark

We shouldn't be farting. And that if you're passing gas, it's a sign that something is not right in your digestion and you've got some gut issues that need to be worked out. I thought tootin' was good.

Josh

They gave you a smoothie recipe. You took it to a whole nother level, and news channels started saying that you're a little bit crazy for the smoothie recipe.

Alex Clark

I do something kind of crazy, which is every morning I make— I think it might be like a $60 smoothie. Wow.

Josh

You have done so much for speaking out, especially against glyphosate. How it's lurking in so many different places that people wouldn't realize.

Alex Clark

Clothes and tampons, those are saturated with chemicals and heavy metals and microplastics and microplastics. They did a big test on baby clothes from Shein. They were filled with lead. So again, trust the science that we paid for, you know, that we controlled. Trust that science, but don't trust any other science.

Josh

What is the thing that you've implemented in your life that you feel like has had the most Profound and positive impact on your own health?

Alex Clark

I think a couple things.

Josh

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Alex Clark

Thank you so much for having me again.

Josh

Yeah, but round 2.

Alex Clark

Round 2.

Josh

All right, I wanna start off with this because I was on your show and you were on my show. This is maybe about a year and a half ago. And we were talking about smoothie recipes. I gave you a smoothie recipe. You took it to a whole nother level and it went to such a, you know, a stratosphere that news channels started saying that you're a little bit crazy for, for, for the smoothie recipe.

Alex Clark

Yeah. So I do something kind of wacky, which is ha— I do something kind of crazy, which is every morning I make, I think it might be like a $60 smoothie.

Josh

Wow.

Alex Clark

And I know this is excessive, but hear me out. So what happened was, I blame you and I blame you because you were talking about with my, uh, Hashimoto's, different foods that I should be eating and not eating. And so you kind of gave me some ideas for morning smoothie recipes. And so the bones of it that you gave me was some protein powder. And then you said to do, uh, goji berry powder.

Josh

Yep. Uh-huh.

Alex Clark

And then, uh, beet powder. That's right. And so you gave me some of those things and then I, oh, and pumpkin pie spice.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

So I took that and then I added some stuff. So my morning smoothie that has gone completely viral and Fox News has covered it because they think it's obscene is, A scoop of strawberry protein powder from Taylor Dukes Wellness, a scoop of unflavored protein powder, the Agent Natture Holy Mane Collagen, the Camu Camu vitamin C powder.

Josh

Yeah, yeah.

Alex Clark

Pumpkin pie spice, goji berry, beet. I do some, oh, I do some creatine.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

I do some cowboy colostrum.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

I do an avocado, one avocado. And, um, water. I also do aloe vera juice because I've heard that aloe vera juice is really good for Hashimoto's.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

And you, maybe you know why. I don't even know why. This is just something I heard. So I'm like, splash that in there. And then I do a little bit of lemon and I do a, about a cup of frozen strawberries, uh, some frozen peaches, frozen pineapple, and frozen cherries. And I blend it all up, and it's like 55, 60 grams of protein.

Josh

Wow. Yeah.

Alex Clark

So, some health practitioners tell me this is out of control. This is too much potions and powders. You don't need all of this. It's too much protein. You don't necessarily need to start your day with that much protein. I'd like your thoughts.

Josh

Well, here's my first question for you is, How do you feel?

Alex Clark

Well, I feel fine. I think I, I definitely feel better than having nothing in the morning, which I was usually a skip the breakfast person. Yeah, because I'm filming, I've gotta get to work, I have a million things going on. I don't have time in the morning to sit there and cook a steak.

Josh

I mean, listen, I, I, I, I've, you know, we've hung out a few times together. I think you're the healthiest I've ever seen you.

Alex Clark

Well, thanks.

Josh

I mean, maybe it's 'cause you have a wedding coming up and you've got the, the glow, but overall, I mean, you look, I, I think the biggest thing there is, is Listening to your body. If you feel like your body's responding well, I mean, that's the thing, of course. And, by the way, I don't have a problem with doing a lot of different things in a smoothie because they're food. I mean, most of what you said to me is food. Colostrum, in a way, is a food. Doing a collagen powder, doing plant protein powder, doing goji berries, doing fruit. I mean, these are predominantly foods. I mean, the only thing that's really not considered maybe a food food is creatine, but creatine is found naturally in red meat and liver and heart tissue. Right. So, so overall, it's a just, you know, it's a lot of foods that I think, um, all have a lot of benefits.

Alex Clark

But is it setting me up for some kind of crazy blood sugar crash?

Josh

Well, I, I think that's the only thing that you'd have to be concerned with. Here, here's what I would say.

Alex Clark

Oh, I also do a scoop of, uh, glyphosate-free oats.

Josh

Yeah. I mean, I, I, I would say, you know, you could probably get away with, cuz you, you have a fairly, with your body type, a fairly high metabolism. I mean, very similar to mine. So all that being said, you know, I think that— so, so there's 2 ways to find out. One, do blood work. You could do your fasting glucose, fasting insulin, and that'll tell you. I mean, that'll tell you pretty quick, or, or wear a continuous glucose monitor. So that's the fastest way, really doing a CGM, a continuous glucose monitor. You would know really quickly. And I would say that smoothie, there's nothing wrong with it if you're working out around that time within an hour or 2 of, of, of doing that.

Alex Clark

Oh, I'm not doing that.

Josh

Now, if you're not working out, It sounds probably like a little too much carbohydrates, but at the same time, you know, it, it's probably likely maybe around, I don't know, I'm, I'm ballparking here, 60 grams of carbs. And I would say if you are gonna have it, the best time to do it's breakfast. So, so that's the only thing. And you might play with that. Hey, what if I back down just the fruit a little bit? But outside of that, I think it sounds, you know, pretty, pretty excellent.

Alex Clark

I will take it. I will take it that I've got the Dr. Axe stamp of approval on this, cuz I, it's so controversial now. Um, I don't expect everybody to be able to spend that much on all stupid potions and powders. And I, I know that's completely unrealistic. Listen, I have a disposable income. I'm not married yet. I have no kids. And so this is just where I've chosen to, to, to spend my money and blow my money on this, on this morning smoothie. Um, but I think there's still plenty of benefits. You could do just a protein powder. You could do an avocado and a couple, you know, things of fresh fruit.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

And, and still get a nice little protein smoothie before workout. Yeah. And that's, you know, a fraction of the cost of what I'm doing. And, and that might change once I have kids and I got other mouths to feed. You know, we can't always be spending that much on a smoothie. So I understand. I just wanna put that disclaimer out. I know I'm gonna get mean messages.

Josh

Well, what I just wanna let you You know, I'm proud of you because a lot of people, you know, I give them health advice and they don't do it. You did it and took it to another level. So bravo. That's, that's what I have to say.

Alex Clark

All right.

Josh

One thing that I've really respected about you is you've been on the very front lines here of Maha helping change things. I think you've got such an amazing heart and our friends like Courtney and, uh, you know, Swan and Vani Hari and so many people in the movement, Dr. Will Cole. And this is something I've been honored to be a part of as well. But you have done so much for speaking out, especially against glyphosate.

Alex Clark

Yeah.

Josh

And one of the things I've heard you talk about on your show before is how it's lurking in so many different places that people wouldn't realize. Talk to me a little bit about glyphosate, sort of what you've learned over the past year about it, and even some of the stuff you've been doing on the, you know, on the government front.

Alex Clark

Yeah, so let me start with this. In July of 2025, it was the very, very first time that I had heard that different chemical companies, they're foreign by the way, were working to pass pesticide liability shields in different states across the country.

Josh

Oh yeah.

Alex Clark

A pesticide liability shield essentially would prevent citizens, farmers, families, children from suing foreign chemical companies if they are made sick or get cancer or tumors, what have you, from their products.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

I thought this was terrifying.

Josh

It is.

Alex Clark

It was completely un-American. It was protecting foreign companies over American citizens. I was very upset about it. And I went to Charlie Kirk and I said, we've got to do something about this because one thing about the Republican Party, which, you know, I'm openly conservative. Turning Point USA houses my podcast. That's not a secret. I worked for Charlie Kirk for 7 years. Republicans are captured by big chem and big ag.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

The Democrats are captured by pharma. And so what I mean when I say captured is that these different entities, lobbying groups, companies, corporations are funding a lot of campaigns for these politicians. And so they're going to vote accordingly and be in lockstep.

Josh

Yep.

Alex Clark

Just to protect those companies. And Republicans, because we're all about the farmers and all of that, it's all kind of convoluted with the Farm Bureau and all of these different companies that are really just shields for people like Bayer.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

And ChemChina. And Charlie had me on his show at the very end of August of 2025. This is like a couple weeks before his murder. And I was just saying, this is the number one thing that we need to be looking at as conservatives and be wary of are these pesticide liability shields coming down the pipeline. And we've got to start sounding the alarms to people in Congress and saying, we are not voting for you and going to keep you there if you are gonna protect these companies. Like, like I, and he was in full agreement, was very concerned by this. Fast forward to January of this year of 2026, and we have the pesticide liability shields going crazy, popping up in Tennessee where you live. live. Yep. In, in Florida, in Kansas, a bunch of states. And so myself and, and Vonnie Hari and Dr. Alexandra Munoz, who is a toxicologist, and Courtney Swan, all of us, we're all doing the best that we can to sound the alarms on this and, and alert people.

Josh

And by the way, and I put out something and we got so many signatures, it was crazy saying we don't want this. And But, you know, things didn't go the way we wanted in terms of when it got to federal.

Alex Clark

Yeah, so in your state, in Tennessee, we were able to kill it. We killed it in Florida. Florida was in particular really scary because what almost passed in Florida was gonna be a shield that not only protected the chemical companies, if someone was made sick from their products, you wouldn't be able to sue them. It also was gonna prevent free speech. You would not be allowed to criticize ultra-processed food companies or chemical companies. So the Florida situation was really scary. And people are like, well, I was going nuts on this on social media. I was calling into Florida news radio shows alerting Floridians about, do you understand?

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

How anti-free speech this is in the red state of Florida? And they were like, well, why do you care? You don't live in Florida, so this wouldn't affect you. That's where you're wrong because there's gonna be a loophole there where basically they can say, oh, Dr. Axe, do you have listeners in Florida while you're criticizing sugar and ultra-processed food?

Josh

Oh, yeah.

Alex Clark

Sorry, we're coming for you. You can't be talking about this. So it was going to affect anyone who spoke out about, you know, these different ingredients or food products. which was really scary stuff. And that would've set a very, very dangerous precedent for the entire country. 'Cause of course they were gonna try it anywhere if they can pass it in Florida. So that being said, we really started speaking out about this. The White House was not very happy. There were a lot of very angry phone calls made in regards to me in particular.

Josh

I mean, you guys got like semi-banned from—

Alex Clark

Oh yeah.

Josh

For a period of time.

Alex Clark

We were getting banned from events, just told like, for me in particular, because I work in politics, she's never gonna be allowed to be involved in anything political ever again if she doesn't stop. And I said, I'm not beholden to a political party. I am beholden to American families and my future children.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

And their health. And this is what I'm worried about. So I don't really care if I piss off the current White House admin.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

The future White House admin. This is the truth. It's important to me. I will not be able to sleep at night if I don't speak out about this. Now, this did end up, because we wouldn't shut up, it did end up with us getting invited to a roundtable meeting at the White House to meet with the president and basically everybody that's top in the admin, from Susie Wiles to Caroline Levitt and Stephen Miller, and of course Secretary Kennedy, to kind of lay out what the problem was with how the current administration has handled Glyphosate Matters, as well as the recent executive order that called protecting glyphosate a national security issue. And people were very upset. I have never received so many angry messages from conservative voters as I did when that executive order went out. And that's because the president and Secretary Kennedy really campaigned in 2024 on, we're going to look into lots of things, but pesticides were mentioned.

Josh

That's right.

Alex Clark

Yeah. And so a lot of these moms, were outraged by this executive order. And I'll tell you why. It's because we do have a certain amount of control over what our kids eat or what vaccines our kids will take, right? There's certain decisions as a parent that you can have a say in. When it comes to glyphosate exposure for your kids, there is nothing you can do really to completely protect them from glyphosate.

Josh

And let me say, this is such a problem because glyphosate, it absolutely disrupts and harms your gut microbiome dramatically. There's a study that came out saying I wanna say it's like 52% of the microbes in your gut are disrupted. That's half of them, of your good guys are ha— are damaged by glyphosate. I mean, so it's really, really toxic, not only the gut microbiome, to the liver, to the kidneys. I mean, it's been associated with cancer. I mean, so it's really, really not, uh, obviously really unhealthy.

Alex Clark

Very. Um, and by the way, people say, well, there's no proof that it's dangerous, it causes cancer. If there's no proof that it's dangerous, uh, why has there been over $16 billion with a B dollars in settlements.

Josh

That's right. Exactly. From Bayer. Exactly.

Alex Clark

Don't, what are you settling if it's not a dangerous product? Where's, what is this money for? What are all these cancer cases for? But that's what they'll say. They'll say, well, it's never been proven. That's what they'll say.

Josh

Well, and what the government came out with is basically, they basically said, hey, we're giving you immunity. It reminds me of the Fauci thing. And Biden was like, hey, you've got, like, you, you help, you know, you were responsible for lying to the public, killing a lot of deaths. and a number of things, but I'm, but I'm gonna give you immunity. And that's essentially what was done by the government and Trump for the, towards the, these chem companies.

Alex Clark

Yeah. So there was a Supreme Court case this spring called Monsanto versus Durnell. And essentially the Supreme Court ruled in favor of Monsanto Bayer. Yeah. And so it is going, it is going to be very difficult to sue them if you are harmed by their product. Yeah. Unfortunately. So we did lose that case. We protested at the Supreme Court, we rallied, we really tried to drum up a lot media attention. But those, but those companies are just so great at fudging science. By the way, all of the recent science that they do have that Monsanto has put out there, Bayer has put out there saying that, you know, there's no proof that our product causes harm. The science that they used was rescinded in November of 2025 because it came out that they had bought and paid for the science.

Josh

Yes. Yeah.

Alex Clark

So again, trust the science that we paid for, that we control, trust that science, but don't trust any other science. So the White House did hear us out. They wanted to know why we were so upset. We laid out all the facts and essentially we told them, we're not asking for glyphosate to be banned in the United States.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

We understand that you would have a complete food supply collapse overnight because so much of our crop, so many of our crops are reliant on this chemical to farm. This is really a multi-year, probably $12 trillion process of helping American farmers transition over to regenerative farming, which would be ideal.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

It's not an overnight thing. It's got to be baby steps slowly over time. That being said, there are certain things that we could be doing in America that would still make these products at least a little bit safer for American usage. For example, Roundup in Europe has completely different ingredients than Roundup in America. Would I say that you should use it at all? No, I would not. Just like I would not say that you should eat Froot Loops just 'cause it's the European Froot Loops that are dye-free.

Josh

Exactly.

Alex Clark

I still don't recommend Froot Loops, but the point is some people are gonna use it, right? And so Americans should have the same standard as everybody else in the world. And for some reason, of course, these companies cut corners on Americans, but they abide by these rules for everybody else. And so, you know, one suggestion we had was, for the Trump admin to come out with an executive order saying, we will say that Roundup in the United States has to have the same ingredients as elsewhere. Another one was focusing on regenerative farming, ending pre-harvest desiccation. We're extra spraying our crops with glyphosate in the United States that other countries are not doing, which is unnecessary. That's just more glyphosate exposure. We said, let's just make this announcement. This'll be a nice olive branch to the people that are upset about the original executive order.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

Right? Well, they did come out recently with an executive order essentially saying there's going to be help for farmers that do want to transition to regenerative farming. That's about it. I'm very interested to see how this plays out in the midterms. So just as a conservative who works for Turning Point USA, very, very supportive of the Maha movement, heavily into the Maha movement. My audience on my show is mostly Maha moms.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

And my warning was if we botch the pesticide stuff, beware of how these women vote in the midterms, if they vote at all.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

And what I've heard is a lot of women saying, I'm not even sure that I'm gonna be voting because I'm so upset. Not that they'll vote blue, but they're just like, I'm not voting at all.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

And so that's what my concern is. So it'll be really interesting to see how that plays out. But, you know, as far as places that glyphosate can hide that a lot of people don't think about, clothes and tampons. You know, when you're using a feminine product in the most absorbent area of the body, mm-hmm, those are saturated with chemicals and heavy metals.

Josh

And microplastics.

Alex Clark

And microplastics. If you are not using organic cotton, yeah. What do you think that cotton tampon is sprayed with? So that's all really important to know. And, and your vagina is more absorbent than your mouth. And a lot of people don't realize that. Um, another thing is clothing. So when it comes to clothing, clothing. We have not updated our chemical clothing laws and the chemicals that are allowed in our clothes since the 1940s in America. I believe the only thing that's not allowed in, in clothing is lead. But if you're ordering clothes from Shein or Amazon, who knows where some of this stuff is coming from? They did a big test on baby clothes from Shein. They were filled with lead. Uh, socks in America have BPA in them. Um, they It's astronomical. We have this label that we find on food ingredients that has every single thing that's in your food. We should have the same thing for our shirts. Your skin is an absorbent organ of the body as well. So whatever is sitting on your skin, that's being absorbed. The underwear that you're wearing, you know, whatever's on that's being absorbed.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

So it's very important. Obviously, if you can only afford just cotton, not necessarily GOTS, 100% organic cotton, um, which would be ideal. cotton is still better than polyester plastic.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

That's also contributing to hormone disrupting, um, you know, endocrine disruptors and all of that going on. So if you can do 100% organic cotton, that would be ideal. Um, but it's sad. This is how we used to dress. We, everybody used to wear these natural fibers and then we started to melt down plastic and make clothing.

Josh

Yeah. It's, I mean, that's essentially what polyester is. And I don't think people, people realize that.

Alex Clark

Yeah, it's plastic. And if you're using those giant throw blankets that, that women love, they're super viral on Instagram that influencers are always promoting that have all the fur on them. If you look at those, they're 100% polyester. Now, what do you think happens to those little fuzzes? These are microplastics and nanoplastics that are, are spread all over your home. Yeah. In the air. You're breathing it in. Your pets are breathing it. Your babies are breathing it, and you're just covering your body in it. Um, and you know, it's a blanket, so your body is warm and heating it up.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

And, and, and it's being absorbed. So to think that this stuff isn't adding to our toxin load.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

would be ignorant. Now people will say, I have a 99-year-old grandma, she's worn polyester all her life. Okay, of course. But if all— when you are taking into consideration all of the exposure of all of the chemicals, um, and unnatural things that, that, you know, we touch and eat and drink and absorb on a day-to-day basis, that stuff is all adding up to, to be harmful.

Josh

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I absolutely agree. You know, I think when I look at the original, I mean, people were wearing mostly wool. And then along with that, you know, in, in, you know, after that cotton. So, I mean, I think that that's where people should be. I mean, I actually switched to wearing almost all wool all the time. I mean, there's a few things I have that don't, that, that are more cotton, but for the most part it's, it's wool.

Alex Clark

Well, remember when people used to talk about mothballs? Like you would open a cedar chest of wool sweaters and you would smell like this mothball smell. Yeah. Nobody talks about that anymore. Because the bugs don't wanna eat the cancer clothing. So you don't ever hear about moths eating clothes.

Josh

Yeah. Why?

Alex Clark

It doesn't happen because we're not wearing natural fibers.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

And, and I think that's like a huge sign, you know, if you are eating things that animals or bugs or whatever, like I wouldn't touch that. Or like mold doesn't grow on it. Like, you know what I mean? Like you have a loaf of bread on your counter for a month straight and like there's no mold. It's not real food.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

Real food, real clothing. This stuff goes bad or, or, you know, animals wanna eat it or bugs want it. Like, If, if nothing is being touched, you have to wonder, what is this I'm eating or putting on my body?

Josh

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Alex Clark

One of the biggest episodes I ever did was with Sue Becker. She's this grandma from Georgia, and she teaches people how to make their own bread with freshly milled flour. She is all about milling your own flour because she says it's not necessarily that everybody is allergic to gluten, and it's not even necessarily the glyphosate, which isn't good, but the reason so many people cannot eat conventional bread anymore or gluten anymore is really because of the types of flour that we use in America.

Josh

Mm-hmm.

Alex Clark

What we do to flour to have it be shelf-stable, um, the things that we're putting in it, things we're taking out of it, all of that is not ideal for the body. It's not the way that God intended us to eat bread. So she talks about how, you know, bread, the Bible says it's supposed to be the bread of life. Like, it's not supposed to be peasant food or something that nobody could have. It's supposed to be a very, very nutrient-dense food item on your plate. And when she talked about the health benefits of milling your own flour, everything from warts being healed to, yeah, she says there's a vitamin in freshly milled flour that you don't get elsewhere, that usually when you have a wart explosion, there's like a vitamin deficiency.

Josh

Yeah, well, I mean, potassium is really high on that list. There's a number of other, you know, I don't—

Alex Clark

it's vitamin E or A, but I can't remember which one.

Josh

Yeah, I mean, it's— well, I mean, they're both important for the immune system. I mean, vitamin A is actually the most— now, this is more in third world countries, but it's actually the vitamin that we're most deficient in across the globe, along with vitamin D. And vitamin A is critical for immune health and skin health. So that would— it would make sense. And this also reminds me of, you know, when I looked at— when you look at all the research on, you know, foods being sprayed with things like pesticides very early a lot of foods are harvested sometimes 1 month or at least 2 weeks before they're actually ripe. And what that does is, I mean, a lot of these foods, only that last 2 weeks or month of ripening is when so many of the vitamins and minerals and the antioxidants like polyphenols are coming to, uh, are really developing. So a lot of these, and then you bring it home and you may not eat it for another week. So a lot of these foods, by the time we're eating them, are completely depleted. But it makes it— that makes sense with flour too. I mean, a very similar thing where if you're— if you are milling it yourself there right then, that, that's when the nutritional bioavailability and the nutrients are gonna be by far the, the highest.

Alex Clark

Yeah. And, you know, I think a lot of people hear that milling my own flour, like, oh my word, I don't have time for this. They think of it like washing your clothes with like a scrubber in the backyard, you know? Um, and she says, no, it takes literal seconds. You, you just mill whatever you're gonna need for that particular recipe. So if you're making, I don't know, cookies, then you're just going to mill the amount of wheat berries that you need and it, She's like, it takes like literally 10 seconds. It's just boop, there it is. There's your flour.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

And you just stick it in the recipe. She's like, it's not this intensive long process, but by doing that, you're just giving your body so many nutrients that it's not getting from modern food and bread. Um, so that was a mind-blowing episode. And then, you know, if you're interested in the clothing stuff that I just briefly talked about, I interviewed this girl, Hannah Dunning, which you have got to have on your show. Hannah is an activist on clean clothing and the stats and the truth bombs that she drops about modern American clothing will have you, your, I mean, your mouth on your jaw on the floor basically. Wow. And so that was a super viral episode that I did. And then of course, like, I mean, one of the most controversial episodes I've ever done, and I have no idea how you feel about it, is I had Dr. Brian Artis on to talk about the benefits of nicotine patches.

Josh

I've got, I've got a strong opinion on it.

Alex Clark

What's yours?

Josh

So, so nicotine, and by the way, for me, this isn't like, like this is a principle I'm sharing Chinese medicine. It's 3,000 years old. So, nicotine, let me just give this summary first. If you're using nicotine once a month in a small dose, that's fine. But, if you're using it daily, it's creating heat and it's actually in a similar way to THC. So, if you look at hemp or cannabis, CBD is known in Chinese medicine as the yin. So, it's very cooling, it's moistening, it helps you sleep better, it calms inflammation. THC is sort of the opposite of that. It's the counterbalance to that. It's more yang energy. It's more going to drive heat in that way. So, if you're doing a lot of THC over time, the danger there is excess heat, especially in the liver, causing inflammation. Nicotine is the very same thing. It's a stimulant that's very driving and causing heat long-term. It's going to dry up your fluids is my point. That's going to be the big problem there. Now, again, if you do that once a month and your diet's clean or even once a week in a small dose, your body's probably going to get away with But for people doing nicotine pouches, if they're doing it daily as a sort of natural, you know, like you'd use coffee or something like that, you're going to dry out your fluids over time. It's going to cause your skin to age more quickly. It's going to cause dehydration. So again, I think there's this quote, and I use it for almost everything, is the dose determines the medicine or the poison. So I think nicotine done occasionally is not a problem for almost anybody, but I think doing it as a daily habit, I, I don't, I don't think is healthy.

Alex Clark

Yeah, that's fascinating. He, he talked about just how it can help chronic pain issues. And he was talking about, by the way, the smallest dose. It was a patch that you wear on your skin. Yeah.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

You can order on Amazon, you get like 7 milligrams, and then you cut that 7 milligrams into like 3 or 4 pieces. Yeah. So it's like a sliver. I mean, it's very small. Yeah. And he was saying long COVID symptoms that people struggle with, um, or, you know, joint, chronic joint pain, things like that. And I, I will say, I have received hundreds of messages since that episode came out of members of my audience saying like, for the first time, I don't have this, you know, severe back pain or whatever. Sure. Which is, which is great. I'm, I'm happy for them. Now, I've been too chicken to try it.

Josh

I, I wanna say this though too about that. You know how many people could take a steroid and be like, wow, I don't have this pain. I haven't had this pain in years. So I, my point is, I'm not worried about it for short-term use. I'm worried about it for just daily long-term use.

Alex Clark

Yeah. Yeah, that's fair.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

So I haven't done it, but that's been a, a huge one. Something shocking that I learned. Oh yeah. Um, and then recently I did this episode with, uh, my friend Amy Magdalia. She's a health practitioner and she says that we shouldn't be farting. Oh my gosh. And that if you're passing gas, it's a sign that something is not right in your digestion and you've got some gut issues that need to be worked out, that you've got leaky gut or, or something else going on. And so that was the first time I ever heard. I thought tooting was good. I thought you gotta have a meal and then walk around and then that's, that's a sign of health. she's saying the opposite.

Josh

Yeah, well, well, really, really what's happening there is, is your body, if you're, if you're having gas and to a degree bloating, there, there, there is, you don't have the right balance of microbes typically, or enzymes to break down the food. And that's what's causing gas. Now, I'll say this, let's say somebody is going from a low fiber diet to a higher fiber diet. Let's say the average person does 15 grams of fiber a a day. That is way too low. That's not good at all. You want to be closer to 30 to 40. But when you're increasing your fiber dose, you are going to have gas because your body over time is going to say, oh, I need— you're eating more fiber now. Well, now I need to create— you know, we need to change what's in this gut microbiome in order to better digest and break down this fiber in the future. The same as protein. Anybody knows that's ever in their life switched to a higher protein diet knows they're going to have gas at first for the very same reason. Oh, we have all this protein down Now we need more of this certain type of bacteria and enzymes to break down these amino— this protein and amino acids. So here's what I, here's where I would agree with her. Here's where I would disagree. Lemme say that first, is it can be normal and healthy if you are changing your diet and making your diet better. However, it's not healthy if for— this is just a continuous long-term thing and you're dealing with gas and bloating. So I, I, I agree with her. If you, if you're dealing with a lot of that over time, your body doesn't either have the acidic, the proper pH in your gastrointestinal tract, or it's missing microbes, or you're not producing enough enzymes. There likely is some sort of problem with that.

Alex Clark

Yeah.

Josh

That long-term.

Alex Clark

Another fascinating thing that I learned recently in the last few weeks was cradle cap is not normal. That's not an anomaly. Like, it's not nothing. It is saying that there is some, some stuff going on, probably just that the baby has inherited from you and your mom and, and whatever is passed down in the toxin load bucket. But it is a sign of some sort of disruption.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

Which I thought cradle cap just happens and that's just, I don't know, stuff that is gooped on the baby. I don't know anything. I've never had kids yet. But that was crazy to learn.

Josh

We had our, our oldest daughter had that and Chelsea changed her diet to— I mean, I felt bad for her because She pretty much changed her diet to beef and sweet potatoes or beef and rice and some steamed vegetables. And that's all she ate. Because when she ate other things, it would cause some gas or it would cause— we had the cradle cap. By the way, topically for cradle cap, now you obviously don't want them to eat it under 1 year old, but Manuka honey topically fixes that faster than anything, anything else. If a parent is having that issue and you want to know the right thing to do topically, Um, very, very effective.

Alex Clark

So what is it? 'Cause I forget now, what is it that is going on that causes cradle cap?

Josh

Yeah, so it, it's, it's a fungal issue and, and so it typically starts in the gut, right? So I think, you know, doing everything you can to, I mean, the other thing we did is we did probiotics internally and, and it's so important for kids. I mean, this is another thing. I mean, this is something I've seen just chronically over the years is so many kids today have gut issues, which is causing food sensitivity. I mean, food sensitivities now compared to 100 years ago are radical.

Alex Clark

Yeah.

Josh

I mean, I mean, so many kids today, of course we know, and there's other reasons for this, but issues with, with, you know, with autism, with ADHD, with just kids having, you know, autoimmune conditions, even eczema is chronic and serious for so many. And this is where personalized medicine is really important in figuring out and finding a practitioner that can really work with families and kids to find out exactly what the root is. And typically, you need to change the internal environment, right? So, one thing that— this was maybe the most surprising thing to me when I first started practice, this was nearly 20 years ago, is that what you're taught in school, what a lot of leaders did for a long time, and this still happens predominantly, it's always in conventional medicine. First off, they don't even think diet helps that much. In functional medicine, some doctors will still say things like, oh, every patient that comes in, I'm going to put them on keto or carnivore or vegan or just gluten-free. What I found is, no, everybody is unique and we need to customize something for them. So, if I have a child, typically a child with eczema, in Chinese medicine, we would call that damp heat. And so, we need to reduce. And so, bananas are very dampening, eggs are very dampening, sugar in general is very dampening. So, dried fruit, that would be problematic. And then, you want to do things that are a little bit drying. Now, of course, kids don't like this. this, but bitter foods would be the best thing they can do. If you could do some steamed veggies that are a little bit bitter like broccoli rabe or— anyway, there's a number there, artichokes and that sort of thing. So, I mean, those are hard to forget. But my point is that there are things that will clear out and change that internal environment that'll then help clear up the eczema. But you got to be— I mean, again, it takes a level of being pretty diligent there. By the way, I remember before we were about to start recording here. Uh, so you're very close to getting married. You guys have already been having discussions about your kids. And did I hear something like you guys are not going to feed your kids like this, a, you know, a specific type of produce for their first 2 years of life?

Alex Clark

Yeah. So my fiancé and I have an idea, and I know that once you become a parent, things change and you go in with these great goals and yeah, then, you know, life happens, which is totally fine. But this is just an idea that we have, you know, as something we would like to try to adhere to as much as we which is not giving our kids fruit for the first 2 years of life. The reason is, and this is his belief, so he has put this into my head and I'm like, I mean, I'm down to try, is he really thinks focusing on, you know, substantive food like bone marrow and meat and—

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

Veggies and things like that, or fermented foods like sauerkraut, pickled onions, whatever. It would be better to start a kid— liver. It would be better to start a kid on those foods and set their palate up than adding in sweetness, even natural sugar.

Josh

Mm-hmm.

Alex Clark

And he kind of has the same mentality even around music. He's like, you know, for the first few years of your kid's life, like if you are only exposing them to the greats, uh, you know, of classical music and, and beautiful, you know, instrumental classical songs, like you're setting up, you know, their taste for music too, without adding in all this junk, you know, JoJo Siwa, whatever. He's like, you, you honestly are, are creating what their palate will be for foods, for music, for, for entertainment, all of those things. And so he's like, if we can, if we can avoid fruit for the first 2 years, then introduce it in. It's just, even though it's natural sugar, you're getting your kid to just prefer the sweet type of sugary foods over the more bitter fermented types of things. things. What are your thoughts on that?

Josh

Well, one I would share, first off, I think from a philosophical standpoint, there's a, there's a lot of wisdom there. Now, I'm not going to totally agree with it, but I will say I think there's a lot of wisdom. And because here's what I found as a parent. So I have a 2-year-old and a 6-year-old, and then I've taken care of just thousands of kids in my practice over the years. And, and, um, there is no doubt that what they eat when they're 1 and 2 years old, they tend to like later on in life. Like, our kids right now, like, like, they will sit down there, and before they'll eat anything else, they're pounding zucchini and carrots and broccoli like you've never seen. I'm like, like, honestly, my daughter started having stomach cramps at night because she ate way too many, way too many raw veg— way too many vegetables that we would steam. And I'm like, hey, we need to, you know, back down because this specific type of fiber is causing you to have some stomach pain. And so, um, we absolutely see that. Like, our kids, they love salmon, they love grass-fed beef, they love— they love fruits, you know, too, but they, they love these foods. And, um, and they also love sour food. Like, they'll sit there and sometimes eat a lemon, and you're like, what? Just because they started doing that when they were, you know, or just after 1 year old.

Alex Clark

So he's like, let's do liver pâté, let's do oysters and bone marrow before we do, uh, you know, grapes and bananas.

Josh

Let me say this, I, I generally agree with that part of things. I mean, I want to say the first foods for our daughters were things like carrots and green beans, and then we did, I think, even I think egg yolk. We did salmon. We did avocado very, very early. That might have even been the first. That was up there with carrots and green beans. And, we do a mono diet. We start with one at a time for quite a few months and then add a second every maybe 3 days or week or something like that. So, we had a protocol there. By the way, we even exposed our kids to peanuts early on so they wouldn't have these allergies because a lot of this stuff acts as natural immunization over time. That way, they don't have allergies. They're actually kits you can get for that. I would say this, you know, and this is a little bit of an ancient Asian perspective. I would want to expose them to all 5 flavors and have them crave all 5 flavors. You want them to crave the umami. So, even to your point, I mean, liver pâté, of course, is going to be in that realm. Certain types of milk are going to be in that realm.

Alex Clark

Like kefir and stuff.

Josh

Yep, exactly. So, I think you're covered there. The sour, of course, Now, you can get that from pickled foods to your point like sauerkraut. You want them to do the salty. Of course, they're going to naturally get that everywhere. And then, you want them to do a little bit of some savory foods and you also want them to do— or bitter. And then, you want them to do a little bit of sweet. Now, of course, they can get a little bit of sweet from beets and from carrots. There is a little bit of naturally occurring sugar in breast milk as well. So, you know, I, I would say that, and listen, that's gonna be better than what 90% of people do with their kids.

Alex Clark

Yeah. No, I like that idea about all 5 flavors. I think he'd like it too. He's a big fan of yours. So if you say it, he'll be like, I'm on board.

Josh

But, but I think if you do it, yeah, introduce those fruits wisely. I mean, I think generally speaking, some of the easiest to digest, and I mean, blueberries of course would be just a natural sort of, um, great food cuz you're getting sour and sweet and high polyphenol intake, which is great for the gut microbiome. So, I mean, I, I think you could, you know, sprinkle on a few there.

Alex Clark

He also said, in all of life, our kids will never be allowed to have pouch things. No pouches sucking on yogurt and applesauce and all this, I guess, 'cause he thinks there's tons of sugar just sitting on your teeth.

Josh

Well, well, let me say this. So, so 2 things here, and I've discovered this even with our, the reason why I, I'm a little bit conscious of food packs as well, there's plastic, and even if it's BPA-free, there's quite a bit of plastic there. But yeah, I mean, you know, I do think it is, it is higher in concentrated sugar. I mean, I would prefer a whole piece of fruit to a food pack in most cases.

Alex Clark

It's crazy. Even like mashed banana baby food and stuff, like in a jar at the store, how much sugar's in it? Yeah, there's all kinds of sugar in this stuff.

Josh

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, this is why just mashing up the fruit yourself, I think there's an element of it still being better. And so the other thing that I think I'm conscious of that I'm seeing is dried fruit, because like, you know, if you're buying dried strawberries and other things, Things that they're a big cause of cavity cuz they stick to your teeth.

Alex Clark

Mm-hmm.

Josh

Eating fresh strawberries is amazing. Do it all day, you know, but some of the dried fruit that's fully dried, you're, you're seeing it stick to teeth. And I think this is a reason why it's increasing cavities. Now, now, now I do wanna say this, it's way better than feeding them fast food or conventional fruit juice or eating Lucky Charms, right?

Alex Clark

I mean, conventional cereal.

Josh

So do dried fruit before that. But overall, I, I do think if you're doing it all the time in high amounts and not doing the fresh stuff, it's, it, it's not quite as ideal as doing the, the fresh.

Alex Clark

Yeah, I'm into it.

Josh

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Alex Clark

Yeah. So we— I mean, there's definitely some controversial things. I think that we kind of have ideas of like what we'd like to do. But we, we know that life comes fast, right?

Josh

And so, oh yeah, it does.

Alex Clark

And all you'll see me and I'll be like, look at all of our applesauce pouches, you know? So I'm, I'm fully aware of that. I mean, all my friends have like 5+ kids. All my best friends have very large families. I know all the, the goals you go into it and then how you change your mind. So we're not, we're not too proud to, to, you know, admit like, of course that that can happen.

Josh

Yeah. What is the thing that you've implemented in your life that you feel like has had the most profound and positive impact on your own health?

Alex Clark

I think a couple things. One, really making a conscious effort to read more than scroll.

Josh

Wow.

Alex Clark

And I am totally addicted to Twitter. So I, that is a really big thing for me. I love to read. But you can just get in this trap. And I mean, that's what the algorithm is for. It sucks you in and you like can't set it down. Sometimes I have to put my phone on do not disturb so that those notifications are not popping up and I can set it down and I can read. And man, I feel so much better, more productive, even if it's just a fiction book.

Josh

Okay. Yeah.

Alex Clark

By reading than scrolling. So that's, that's one thing. Another thing I would say is, is changing out my bedding to be all natural fibers.

Josh

Mm-hmm.

Alex Clark

Has been so impactful. There is a reason we, we used to say phrases like healing linens when we talked about like hospitals. We would say like, we need to put healing linens on. There is power in, in natural, true, you know, linen and cotton to, to really heal, um, the sick. And, and I think that I have the best sleep of my life. sleeping on all-natural bedding. It's made a big difference, I think, than having a polyester down comforter or something.

Josh

I'm so glad you're saying— I mean, one, the mattress you sleep on is incredibly important and the sheets are too. I mean, think about this is 8 hours you're rubbing against this thing, you're laying on something. I just had Gary Breck on my podcast and we talked about this for a while. It's something like 98% of mattresses are covered in flame-retardant material. I mean, that's a whole nother topic, that I think is, you know, kind of interesting. No, it's similar to the clothing, you know?

Alex Clark

So that's something I haven't done yet. That's on my to-do list once we get married, cuz I want him to come pick out a bed with me. So I'm like, let's, let's go pick together. But, um, we'll probably get something from Avocado or something like that.

Josh

Yeah, that's a great brand.

Alex Clark

Um, so that's one thing. And then another is, uh, natural light, you know, in the morning.

Josh

Yes.

Alex Clark

As, as much as I can help it, you know, take my dog for a walk, getting out within 30 minutes or so of waking up has been, That has been exponentially life-changing. Just the way I feel. I feel like I'm crazy, but I just feel like it also helps with like curbing cravings.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

Am I nuts?

Josh

No, no, no. I think, listen, it's balancing cortisol. I mean, cortisol as a hormone is gonna impact insulin maybe more than any other hormone in terms of, and then impact your hunger hormones. So no, I think that's absolutely accurate.

Alex Clark

Better sleep at night. And then, I mean, full disclosure, shout out, they do sponsor my show, but I'm obsessed, obsessed with my Jasper air purifier.

Josh

And, uh, we have 4. We had, uh, so in January, uh, we, uh, this happened in Nashville. We had an ice storm and lost power for 4 days. I, I had all the, all the sinks tripping. Everything went back to our house, turned, turned the heat on, went back the next day and whole house flooded. Oh, whole house flooded. And we had just remodeled it and moved in 6 weeks before.

Alex Clark

Oh my gosh. I'd be freaking out about the mold.

Josh

Oh yeah. So, so we were, so we have, people there, and we— I, I literally have— I might have 8 Jaspers in my house going all the time, air filters. And we had other big heavy, heavy ones going the whole time too. So I mean, we were very obsessed about not having mold. But to your point, that's a— what a great product.

Alex Clark

It's such a great product, and, um, I won't travel without it. So now if it's one night, I'm not worried about it, but if I am going to be somewhere for a couple nights, I will have a Jasper either mailed or sent to the hotel and then I leave it there and I gift it. I did, I tell the hotel, hey, this is like a really life-changing product. Everybody deserves clean air. I'm gifting it, gifting it to you. There it is. If you wanna take it home or if you wanna have it available for, for people when they check into the hotel, do that. Um, but I just, you know, call myself the Airy Godmother. So I do that or I check it, you know, when I'm flying and then I, and I bring it. But like if you're gonna be staying, you know, on a family vacation for a week, Airbnb, Um, people in my audience do the same thing. They're like, oh, we packed the Jasper in the car with all of our other stuff and our groceries and everything to go to Florida. Like you, when you do not have that fresh clean air, you notice it.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

Oh yeah. But I sleep so much better. Um, I love that my house doesn't have a smell. Um, unless I'm lighting my Primally Pure, you know, natural candles.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

Non-toxic candles. That's the only smell. Like when my team has to come to my place and, and do social media content with me, I al— I'm always like, what does my, what does it smell like in here?

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

'Cause does my house have a smell? 'Cause growing up, like I would always know, like that friend of mine, like her, I know what her family's house smells like. It's like weird 'cause all the chemicals that you're using and, and whatever furniture off-gassing and all that cleaning products. And you know, with the Jasper, they're like, your house doesn't have a smell unless you're lighting a candle. It smells like nothing. And that is honestly ideal. That's what everybody should be striving for. We have been conditioned by cleaning companies that your house isn't clean if it doesn't have a clean smell.

Josh

Yeah, that's right.

Alex Clark

That's synthetic That's not, that has nothing to do with being clean. You can get just as clean of a house with something that is completely fragrance-free, you know, whether that is Branch Basics or Molly Suds or I don't know, whatever you're using. Um, I, I am a Branch Basics, um, freak, so that's what I'm using. But you, it's plant and mineral based. You can wash your produce with it and literally eat it. You're not gonna get sick if your kid, you know, obviously you don't want to just sit there and chug this stuff, but I'm just saying if your kid accidentally got a little bit in their mouth, you don't have to call poison control, right? Like, and, and what people don't realize is your, your cleaning products in your home, even capped. So let's say you go to Target, you buy Branch Basics, but you still have Clorox and bleach and all that under your sink capped. It is still off-gassing chemicals into your environment. So without having an air scrubber or whatever, I mean, that stuff is floating around. You're still breathing it in. And there are families where their kid has severe eczema issues. They realize they've changed everything in the house, but they still had a box of old old toxic cleaning products. They take the box out, they set it outside. They're like, we're just gonna do an experiment. Let's put the cleaning products in the garage. Let's see what happens. Within days, that kid's, uh, skin completely clears up.

Josh

Wow. You know, the, this is, there, there are numerous studies on this, but on average, our indoor air is at least 2 times, if not 5 times more toxic than the outdoor air. So it's so funny. It's like, especially if you're in California, no offense to Californians in, in the summer, but you know, you go outside and you're like, Oh, you know, or they have the things like, don't, you know, don't, you know, air quality alert, you know, in these areas. Well, your indoor air's like that all the time.

Alex Clark

All the time.

Josh

It's not way worse. So overall, yeah, cleaning air is so important. You know, you know what it reminds me of? So when I was in college, uh, this was when I was working on my, my doctorate and I was, uh, probably a year before I went out and opened my practice in, in Nashville. I went and started doing blood work. In fact, one thing, one thing I did the couple years before Uh, in school, before I even opened my practice, was, is I went into a clinic every week and I would do all the blood work there and go over all the nutrition consults and the blood work reviews. And I ended up doing blood work on myself, and I had a couple markers that were absolutely through the roof of toxins.

Alex Clark

Hmm.

Josh

And I'm like, what is going on here? And I finally, you know, was able to search online and find, okay, well, what is this exposure from? And it was from dishwashing detergent. So like, I'd be in the kitchen and, you know, cooking food while, you know, the dishwasher, you smell the fumes coming out from the dishwasher. Well, at the time, I mean, I, I had switched to a lot of natural things, but I was still using conventional dishwashing detergent. That dishwashing detergent was causing me to have incredibly high levels of toxicity, messing with my brain, causing low-grade—

Alex Clark

Whoa.

Josh

Yeah. I mean, so, so there are, so to your point, I mean, there are, these toxins can really, really damage your cells and body. And so really going through your whole house And by the way, it's not that expensive typically to switch over to a brand like, you know, Branch Basics and some of these others.

Alex Clark

It's cheaper. It's literally cheaper.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

And what people don't realize is it's one product that does everything. 'Cause you know, they have their, it's called the Concentrates Orange.

Josh

Yep.

Alex Clark

And you just, um, for different areas of your house, so windows, floors, um, all-purpose spray for your countertops, whatever, bathroom cleaner, they just have you fill it with different amounts of water. So it's one product with water. Yeah.

Josh

We use the brand. Yeah. It's excellent.

Alex Clark

So that's it. So it's like, it's one product taking one space in your sink and it does everything and it's completely non-toxic. Uh, people use it I use it as windshield wiper fluid. You can use it for anything. Wash your car, inside your car.

Josh

It reminds me of like, so also when I was in college, I had this Dr. Bronner's thing and I wanna say—

Alex Clark

Oh my gosh, he's a weirdo. That guy's a freak.

Josh

Okay, well, I've never met him. I do know though that there was a product at the time and it was like, this might be overboard, but I did something like brush my teeth with it, wash my hair with it, wash my— like it was sort of one of those things that kind of had everything.

Alex Clark

The product is great, so don't freak out if you're using it. He's just a person, like read the bottle. He's also like a furry. He's a strange guy. Yeah, he's a weirdo guy.

Josh

There, there are some strange— especially the old school people that were in the natural health space. Oh yeah, OGs. They are— there, there's some strangeness there. Okay, I want to ask you about this. How has getting blood work done— because I, I've seen you post and talk about this— how has getting blood work done improved your health and life?

Alex Clark

Well, it just gives you a window to understand what's actually going on. It's like, first of all, before I did that, The biggest mistake that I've ever made with my health— well, there's been many. One of the biggest mistakes I've ever made with my health was spending $1,200 a month on supplements before doing blood work.

Josh

Yes. Wow.

Alex Clark

I was drinking herbs here, herbs this, herbs that. Who knows?

Josh

Yeah, right.

Alex Clark

You're throwing stuff at the wall, seeing what sticks, and you have no idea what you actually need. need to spend money on. And so getting blood work done, testing, you know, 90+ biomarkers, being able to see, okay, exactly where do I have problems, what needs fixing, or what needs a little help here. A lot of it you can get from a food.

Josh

Yeah.

Alex Clark

You don't have to use a supplement either. You can just change some of your diet. You need, you need a little bit more of this vitamin, you need to eat a little bit more of this. You know, you're all about that. It is so helpful, and I think a money saver, to spend a little bit of money on blood work versus hundreds, even thousands on supplements. I think we are too, we are, we are too reliant on supplements in America. Yeah. It's just too much. It's like overboard. Yeah. I can't stand it. And so that was a huge thing for me. Other mistakes I've made, you know, flu shot every year, fully vaxxed, birth control for almost a decade, ultra-processed food exclusively almost my entire life until like 5 years ago. Yeah, there's been a lot. Yeah.

Josh

I mean, yeah, 5 years ago you just had a whole, you know, epiphany and turnaround. Yeah. It's pretty amazing.

Alex Clark

I just like went through my pantry with a garbage bag and I was just throwing everything out. This spice isn't organic, it's out of here. This spatula is plastic, it's out of here. I just had to do the whole overhaul because if I don't— I'm black and white. If I don't go all in, I'm not doing it.

Josh

Yeah, you're an all-in personality. Yeah, blood work is something I've done with so many— every patient now almost, because it's one of those things where it's test, don't guess. Because if not, you're guessing on so many things and being able to pinpoint, oh, this is the thing I need, is so valuable. And, I have more and more people Yeah. Groups of people that maybe weren't focusing on blood work in the past that are doing it. I have a lot of women before they want to conceive or get pregnant, they're doing blood work, especially knowing what certain nutrient levels are can prevent all the morning sickness, the nausea. Of course, it's better health for the baby. And then, really just every group can benefit from knowing what are my nutrient levels. Also, having it read from a functional medicine standpoint, not conventional of looking at, hey, what are optimal levels, not what are average, is important. So anyways, I think it's been just so incredibly beneficial that more and more people are doing blood work. I think you want to do the right markers because a lot of these more traditional markers like LDL cholesterol, they're just not as helpful as the more advanced newer markers like ApoB. But anyways, all that being said, I agree. I think it's incredibly beneficial for so many people.

Alex Clark

Rapid Okay. Okay.

Josh

All right. Butter or olive oil?

Alex Clark

Butter.

Josh

Well, okay.

Alex Clark

I have to say that my fiancé's Substack is running on butter.

Josh

Okay. Okay. Makes sense. All right. Raw milk or pasture-raised eggs?

Alex Clark

Ooh, that is such a good one. I'm gonna say raw milk because I have an egg allergy, but both are fantastic.

Josh

All right. I, I agree. Air filter or water filter?

Alex Clark

I'm gonna say air, and then I'm spending money on glass bottled water.

Josh

Okay. All right.

Alex Clark

Obsessed with Lunan, by the way. Oh wait, can I just say this? I know it's supposed to be rapid fire. Have you heard about, and I'm not sponsored by them, have you heard of this company called Lunan?

Josh

I don't, I don't know.

Alex Clark

Okay. It's, it's a glass bottled water company. They're brand new. But what's really cool, and I'm just like hype about it, first of all, it's like adorable packaging. It's like super chic. And so I'm obsessed. I'm like a sucker for cute aesthetic. But this water has never touched plastic. Like even how they store everything, it's tested for BPAs, heavy metals. There's no plastic exposure. It's like the cleanest water. So I love it. And you know, even Mountain Valley, they're coming after Mountain Valley with heavy metals or something.

Josh

Really?

Alex Clark

I can't keep up. I still drink Mountain Valley too. But anyway, I just had to say that. So yeah, I'm obsessed with this Lunan Water brand. Even the Wall Street Journal just came out with a post yesterday at the time of recording this and said like, this is like, this Lunan Water is blowing up. going up. It's like the ultimate status symbol 'cause it's like the, the cleanest water.

Josh

Oh my gosh. All right. Salmon or grass-fed beef?

Alex Clark

Salmon. If I could eat one type of sea— if I could eat one type of food for the rest of my life, it's seafood. I am a seafood freak, which I know you disagree with 'cause I love my oysters and my mussels and all those things.

Josh

No. Well, no, I agree with the salmon. In fact, if, if there's one perfect food, I think the healthiest food on the planet is, is a, is sockeye salmon or king salmon. And I think it's the healthiest food on the planet. Yeah. The mussel shellfish, you, you know my stance on that. from biblical diet, but overall, it's, uh, no, I, I, I like the salmon. It's grass-fed beef is great, but I love salmon. Well, thanks so much for coming on.

Alex Clark

Thank you for having me again. And you're gonna be on my show too.

Josh

I can't wait. Yeah, it's gonna be awesome. Hey everybody, thanks so much for tuning in here to the Dr. Axe Show, where each and every week we're diving deep into the science and principles of how you can heal naturally. Thanks so much to Alex Clark here for sharing just her amazing experiences. I mean, she's interviewing some of the top people in the world and trying a lot of things on herself, including her $50 to $70 smoothie. And so much. And we'd love to hear, hey, if you're watching on YouTube, what is the biggest thing you learned from the episode? What is something that maybe surprised you, something you agree with or disagree with? We'd love to hear from you there as well. And don't forget to subscribe. It's the number one thing you could do to support the show. And share this with a friend. You may just change and transform their life. Thanks so much for watching. We'll see you on the next episode.

The Dr. Axe Show is educational and not a substitute for care from your clinician. Disclaimer

Reviewed by specialists in endocrinology, functional medicine, cardiology, nutrition and longevity.Our protocols and source library are reviewed against current clinical evidence by our medical advisory board. Dr. Axe AI grounds its answers in that reviewed library and shows the sources behind every response.
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