It does seem like everybody I know has a gut issue. I mean, are you finding that in your clinical practice? Like the bloating and the IBS, all of which we're going to get into today, but gut issues seem like they're on the rise?

They're absolutely on the rise. And as a gastroenterologist, all I see are gut issues. So I've always seen a lot of gut issues. But if we look nationally, there was a study done last year by MD VIP, and they found that two-thirds of Americans suffer from gut issues. The highest number is in the 18 to 44 age group. Why? 73 3%. I think a lot of it has to do with the food that they're eating. They're eating more ultra-processed foods. They're busy, they're on the go. I think there's a lot of stress, and that has a profound impact on the gut. I think they're also more aware, which is good, right? I mean, it's good to be aware that this isn't functioning properly, but that's the highest percentage. What they found, the American Gastroenterological Association did a survey, and they found that 40% of Americans, and this is across the board, said that they had GI issues to the point where it was interfering with socializing, with running errands, with exercising, with having sex, with libido.

Wow.

To me, the really frightening part of all of this is the AGA launched a campaign called Trust Your Gut Around This. One in three Americans do not feel comfortable talking to their doctor about gut issues and will only raise it if the doctor asks. It's like, don't ask, don't tell. Because of embarrassment. And honestly, Mel, this was a reason when I read this last year, I was like, oh, no, I've got to do something about this. I want people to be a medical detective. You turn around and take a look at that poop. You tell me what it looks like. If you need to poke around in it with a stick, understand why do you have gas? Why are you bloated? Why are you backed up? We have to educate people about how this works. And the education that I see out there is mostly the biohacking, take this supplement, this crazy diet. That's not fixing things for people. I mean, the more that we have, I think the sicker people are. So what we really need is we need people to understand how this stuff works. The basics. The very basics.

We're going to just dive into all of it in detail with you. For the person who's listening, who is in the two-thirds, who are experiencing a gut issue, they love somebody who is, what is available to them if they truly take to heart everything that you are about to share today, Dr. Robin?

Not only is it possible for you to feel better in your gut, because your gut is your engine, it's possible for you to feel better in your whole body, for you to have a clearer mind and less brain fog, for you to feel less fatigued, for your immune system to work better so that you're not overreacting to things with food allergies or you're not underreacting to things where you can't clear infection. So the gut is a thing that unites all these different organs. And that's a thing that makes me so optimistic because unlike when you think about genetic diseases, you get what you get. You don't get upset, you're dealt a bad genetic hand. But our gut is changing all the time. When we think about our gut microbiome, which I know we're going to talk a lot about, we know from a study that was published in the journal Nature in 2014, they put people on a heavy, high animal protein, high fat, Atkins type diet, and then they rested them for a week and they put them on a diet that was more plant-focused. And they found that within 30 hours of the food the gut, things changed dramatically.

The bacterial composition changed, the genetic composition changed in terms of the genes that were turned on and off. And the great thing here is you don't have to be a vegan. You don't even have to be a vegetarian. You just have to eat more plants.

And drink more water.

And drink more water. You have to do some basics. And in fact, the American Gut Project study from 2019 that asked the question, What do you have to do to have a super healthy microbiome? They found that the label was completely unimportant. Carnivore, omnivore, vegan, pescetarian, lacto-averse. It was simply the number of different plant foods people ate with 30 or more different plant foods a week being the magic number. So you can have your porta house or whatever it is that you're going to have. I mean, all my vegan friends will be very upset. But from a health point of view, there are reasons to consider eating less animal protein in terms of the ethics and climate change, et cetera. But from a health point of view, you can definitely tolerate a little animal protein on the You can tolerate a lot of things on the plate if you are crowding it out with enough of the healthy stuff, with some plants and some water and some movement and some of these basic things.

I love it. You just said 30 plants. So are you saying 30 different types of plants, or are there 30 ones that are better than others? As the gut doctor, what should we do?

30 different plants per week. And when I say plants, you get credit for fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, herbs, spices, beans, whole grains, all of them.

Oh, well, if we include spices and nuts and grains like that, absolutely, you could get 30 different things because I would imagine the variety... Is the variety also important?

The Variety is important because they all contain different things when we think of these phytochemicals. So you think eating the rainbow is always a good way to do it. So you get different things from the oranges and you get the lycopine from the reds and you get something else from the green. And so eating a variety, eating seasonally is another great way to do that because you're not in the same pea, carrot, broccoli, heavy rotation for 365 days. And it doesn't have to be a lot either. I mean, you're getting enough from... A little handful of berries is plenty. You don't have to eat a whole quart of stuff.

So as the gut expert, Dr. Robin, what do you eat in a day? You walk us through, like breakfast, lunch, and dinner? Absolutely.

I like to start off with a green smoothie in the morning. And when I started doing the green smoothie, I really started this when my daughter was little because she was a C-section baby, minimally nursed because my breast milk dried up, and over 20 courses of antibiotics before she was two. And that experience with her going through all that, and as a result, being a very sickly child, forced me out of my comfort zone of colonoscopy and nexium to say, Okay, what's going on in her gut and what's going on with her microbiome and why she's sick all the time? She was always either had a cold, was about to get a cold, or recovering from a cold. Something is profoundly wrong with this child.

You'd take her to the pediatrician and they would just be like, Here's an antibiotic. Try this one. Try that one. Here you are, a doctor, and so you're like, Okay, okay, okay. And then all of a sudden, two years into this, you go, Something's wrong here.

Something's wrong. And this path we're down of more and more antibiotics is not working. I want to be very clear to tell people that you need to check with your doctor about the need for antibiotics. I am not giving medical advice to people. I had the benefit of being a physician so I could treat my own daughter. But this is always something you want to bring up with your health care provider. But you also want to push back a little bit. You want to ask some really important questions. I mean, I tell people the first question they need to ask is, is this antibiotic really necessary? What would happen if I didn't take it? You would be shocked at the amount of time that doctors are like, oh, yeah, you don't need it. It's probably viral. But, you know. So we need to... I have to stop here and ask you to repeat that because I lost my train with the question.

No problem. I was asking you about what you actually eat, and you started with the, I do a green smoothie first thing in the morning. And so you became fascinated by gut health because you realized that all the prescription medication had basically just destroyed the gut health of your young daughter. And that was what was causing the sickness because of the critical role that your gut health plays in the overall functioning of in your body.

Absolutely. In particular, the immune system. So we started doing smoothies, and in the beginning, the smoothies had a lot of fruit in them. They were strawberries and bananas, and they tasted sweet. I would gradually add in spinach, collards, kale. When you add in the greens, it changes a fruit smoothie from a nice pink color to a brown, more pou color. I would put it in this opaque cup. She was little, so that she wouldn't see because she's like, Where's my pink barbie smoothie? And her palate changed. So over time, so now she's 19, she's like, Hey, can you make me a smoothie? And she wants my smoothie, the green smoothie, the one with collards, kale, spinach, celery, parsley, mint, a little bit of fruit, usually green apple, lots of lemon. I like to use unsweetened coconut water for the base. So when I drink that, it's like a liquid salad in the morning. I mean, I feel so good when I have that. So I usually have that in the morning. If I'm still hungry, I'll usually have something high-ish protein, maybe a little bit smoked salmon, some eggs, or maybe a sweet potato and kale hash.

I love that, too.

And then what do you do for lunch?

Lunch is usually soup. A big soup person. Yeah, soup. And there are a bunch that I make. My husband makes really good soup, too. So it's usually split pees or lentil. Sometimes it's just a broth. I do a really basic soup that's leeks, onion, garlic, and scalium, sauteed. And then I just blend it up with some broth. Just sometimes a little curry powder, depending on how I'm feeling. But that's all the good stringy high inulin fiber that's really good for your gut microbes. So some soup, sometimes it's a hardier soup. And then dinner is usually protein, starch, veg plus salad. My husband's mostly vegan, not all the time, special occasions, he might eat some meat. So he's usually not doing the animal. He's almost never doing the animal protein. He's usually doing lentils, brown rice, sauteed collards and salad. And I'll have all of that, but I may have a little piece of fish or some broiled shrimp or something. But it's lots of legumes. It's lots of beans and greens, basically. And then some whole grains. Love brown rice, eat it probably most days, love squash, sweet potato yams, yucca, all of that stuff.

I wonder you're glowing. It sounds absolutely amazing.

I am so curious about your poop. Oh, what do you want to know about my poop? I have a feeling that you have wonderful poos. You really want to know? Yes, I really want to.