Dr. O’Bryan: Thank you, James. It’s a real pleasure to be ... · about the importance of...

© Evolution of Medicine™. All rights reserved.

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Your Genetics and Autoimmune Diseases

Guest: Tom O’Bryan, DC, CCN, DACBN

The contents of presentation are for informational purposes only and are not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. This presentation does not provide medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition.

James: All right, a warm welcome back to the Interpreting Your Genetics Summit. And I am so excited to welcome back a three-time guest on the

Evolution of Medicine Summit. He’s been on all of our summits. And he’s got

something very profound to offer you here today, as it relates to interpreting

your genetic information. You may know him from his Betrayal documentary that I was a part of last year. He’s been leading the conversation on

autoimmune disease. And a warm welcome to the summit to Dr. Tom

O’Bryan. Thanks for being with us, Tom!

Dr. O’Bryan: Thank you, James. It’s a real pleasure to be with you and to

support your projects, and especially this topic. This is a great topic to talk

about.

James: Absolutely. So the purpose of this summit is really to give people who

are getting their genetic information some responsible starting points on how

to use that information. And from our last two conversations, I know that genetics is a big player in autoimmune disease, which autoimmune disease

you get. So I think for many people out there, they may not be aware that

autoimmune disease is a likely problem that they’re going to come across in

their lives. So let’s just start with that because I know that there are some particular things about the naming conventions in autoimmune disease that

make us maybe underestimate what a big impact it’s having.

© Evolution of Medicine™. All rights reserved. 2

Dr. O’Bryan: Yeah. So autoimmune means your immune system’s attacking your own tissue. And what most, even physicians, don’t know because they

can’t read all of the studies is that cardiovascular disease—heart attacks,

strokes—the number one cause of getting sick and dying is autoimmune in its

initiating phases and what fuels it to keep going. Cancer is autoimmune in its initiating phases. And then, we have the classic autoimmune diseases like

multiple sclerosis, and rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis. There’s over 80 named

autoimmune diseases.

But the mechanism, the autoimmune mechanism that starts this all off is

actually a foundational mechanism for practically every degenerative disease.

So when you understand that whatever disease you’re going to get in your life

most likely starts with your immune system being activated, it then opens up the conversation as to, “Well, why is my immune system activated?” And when

you ask, “Why my immune system is activated,” you’re looking.

And what you will learn is that while your genes are getting turned on and the

genes that you’re vulnerable to having activated to produce disease are these

particular genes, or these genes, or these genes. It doesn’t matter what the

genes are. The mechanism that’s activating the genes is what’s really the value to understand and to hold in the back of our minds when we’re asking the

questions about our genetics.

James: Absolutely. So cancer and heart disease get a lot of their like attention just because the numbers are so big when you stack them up. But obviously if

you add in those as autoimmune in the initiating phases and then you add up

all of the names. One of the things about autoimmune disease, which I

think—and we’ve spoken about this before—is the naming convention where it’s throat cancer. It’s brain cancer. It’s lung cancer. So cancer is after all of

them; whereas in autoimmune, you just have a range of names that people

don’t put them together.

Dr. O’Bryan: Right, exactly right. That’s exactly right. And everyone on this

summit already knows, I’m sure. But the genes that you have doesn’t mean

you’re going to get that disease. It means that you’re vulnerable to a particular disease. “Mrs. Patient, if you pull at a chain, it always breaks at the weakest

link. Always. It’s going to be at one end, the middle, the other end. It’s your

heart, your brain, your liver, your kidneys. Wherever your genetic weak link

is. And where’s your weak link? Whatever your genes are. Whatever the deck of cards you’ve been dealt in life, that’s the weak link in your chain.”


So when you have that basic understanding, the first thing that comes up is stop pulling on the chain so much, right. And then, the link won’t break. And

how do you stop pulling on the chain? Reduce the inflammation, reduce the

activation of your immune system, which is what turns on the genes.

James: Absolutely.

Dr. O’Bryan: So as you get that big picture overview, you start asking the

questions that all the speakers on this summit will give you specific information about. You’ll listen to one speaker and say, “Oh, my gosh, I’ve got

to do that.” Or, “Oh, my gosh, I’ve got to do that.” Or, “Oh, my gosh, I probably

have that.” But when you step back and understand, “Okay, where is the

weak link in my chain?” And when you understand, “Okay, that’s just the deck of cards I was dealt. Okay, how do I strengthen this link? How do I

reduce the pull on this link?” It doesn’t matter if it’s the Alzheimer’s gene or

the heart attack gene or the cancer gene. It doesn’t matter what the gene is. How do I reduce the pull on that link in my chain?

James: Beautiful. So towards the end of the interview, I’d love to just get into

how do we take pressure off the chain and talk about that. But maybe as a starting point, I know a really great analogy that you shared with me is this

triangle of autoimmune initiation. And so maybe we can just start there

because if I can help one person avoid an autoimmune disease that they

would have got through not knowing this, then this summit is good. This was like a good use of our time on this planet, right. But obviously, there’s tens of

thousands of people listening. So if you can share what the recent literature

says about what is initiating autoimmune, and what is under our control, and

what is not?

Dr. O’Bryan: You bet, with pleasure. The study started coming out in 2004—

so about 13 years ago—that there is a trilogy in the development of

autoimmune disease. Now, remember, autoimmune disease is the endpoint of the weak link in your chain getting looser, looser, looser. And it goes into an

autoimmune disease. But there’s a trilogy in the development of it.

First, you have to have the gene for that particular disease. Second, the

environmental trigger that sets it off, pulling on the chain. The straw that

broke the camel’s back. And the third is called pathogenic intestinal

permeability or the slang term is the leaky gut because it’s the dysfunction in the intestines, the leaky gut, it activates the pull on the chain in your body.

When you eat something that might not be good for you like wheat or dairy, if


you have a sensitivity to wheat or dairy, when you eat it, it’s in the tube, going down into the stomach.

“Mrs. Patient, your intestines are a tube that goes from the mouth to the other

end. It’s 20-25 feet long. It winds around there in your gut.” Think of a doughnut. If you could stretch a doughnut out, just one big long doughnut.

And you look down the center of the doughnut, that’s your digestive tract. And

when you swallow food, it’s in the doughnut. It’s not in the body yet. It’s in the

tube.

So food has to get through the walls of the tube to get into the bloodstream,

and go to your brain, and your kidneys, and everywhere else. So it’s that wall

that gets damaged and allows all of these environmental triggers to get through into the bloodstream. You also can inhale stuff.

And it’s the same type of wall in your lungs that lets stuff get through the tube. The concept is, it’s that wall on the inside of the tube. That’s where

pathogenic intestinal permeability or the leaky gut occurs or the leaky lungs.

It’s the inside lining. So when you address that inside lining and you

strengthen that inside lining, the result is you don’t pull on the chain. And if you don’t pull on the chain, you don’t activate the gene.

James: Yeah, like I said in the old way of thinking, the gut and working with

the gut was just something that would only affect the gut. Like, if you have an unhealthy gut, you’re going to have maybe an autoimmune disease of the gut

like Crohn’s or colitis. But the new research, from my understanding, is that

the gut is so connected to every part of the body that these kinds of issues in

the gut could end up manifesting in the joints, or in the brain, or anywhere else in the body because of this dynamic connection system that is the human

body, right.

Dr. O’Bryan: We just finished the Annual International Conference for the Institute of Functional Medicine. And it was the largest one we’ve ever had.

Sold out, of course, like they all do. And this one the theme was Regeneration

of Your Brain. How do you reverse some of the brain deterioration that’s occurring, if that’s the weak link in your chain? Almost every speaker talked

about the importance of addressing the gut to heal your brain. They weren’t

talking about if you have gut symptoms. They were talking about you want to

heal your brain, you want to turn around the degeneration that’s going on, you have to also address the gut. You have to address the microbiome, the

good bacteria in the intestines. You have to address the wall that I was talking

about that leaks through, almost every speaker.


And this is like the world’s leading geneticist from Harvard on brain function talking. And the world’s leading authority on reversing Alzheimer’s, Dr. Dale

Bredesen, who’s published papers on actually reversing Alzheimer’s in 9 out of

10 patients. That was in 2014. And now, it’s over 100 patients that they’ve

completely reversed it. It takes five years. It’s a functional medicine approach.

But at the top of the list, what you have to address is the gut because if you’ve

got this pathway where there’s tears in the gut—well, they’re really tiny, tiny

little tears called intestinal permeability—and all these environmental triggers that we’re exposed to in our food or in our beverages, if they get into the

bloodstream and start circulating, that’s the gasoline on the fire that pulls on

the chain that breaks at the weakest link. And that’s your genes. So the gut,

the gut is a critical component to address when you’re wanting to address your genetic strengths and your genetic vulnerabilities.

James: Beautiful. So the purpose of this summit is really to have people take a responsible interpretation of their genetics. So what I hear you saying is that

whatever your genetic test comes back, you want to be minimizing the pull on

the chain. And you want to be minimizing and repairing the holes in your gut

to make sure that you don’t end up with a broken-chain situation, which would be an autoimmune disease, which could manifest anywhere depending

on your genetic makeup.

Dr. O’Bryan: Let’s use the example of Alzheimer’s. What you said is exactly correct. Let’s use the example of Alzheimer’s. The main gene that’s been talked

about so many times, with regards to Alzheimer’s, is APOE4. The APOE gene,

there’s three versions. There’s a two. There’s a three. And there’s a four. You

get one from your mother and one from your father. She can be a 2/2, a 2/3, a 2/4, a 3/3, a 3/4 or a 4/4. Those are the options. APOE4, if that’s a gene

that you have, you have a…

First, the average in our society today, without looking at genes, if you reach the age of 85, 50% of us will get Alzheimer’s. That’s the numbers today—50%

of everybody. But if you have one of the APOE4 genes, so you’re a 2/4 or a

3/4, it’s 90% by the age of 85. If you have two APOE4 genes, one from your mother and one from your father, it’s 90% by the age of 65 that are going to

get Alzheimer’s. But see, all of those studies, which are very accurate, all of

those studies are based on people still eating Ding-Dongs, and Ho-Ho’s, and

drinking Coca-Cola, and pulling on their chain every day and not knowing that they’re active. They’re pulling, pulling, pulling.


So all of my patients that have a family history of Alzheimer’s, I recommend they get the gene test. And they say, “Well, I don’t want to know.” I say, “No,

you do. You do because when you see this, that’s the motivation for you to

learn, “What do I do?” And so what you learn is, “Okay, how am I pulling on

the chain in my life?” Whatever it is. “How am I pulling on the chain?” And then, you look at the biomarkers, the blood test or the urine test, that show

you’re pulling on the chain. You’ve got lots of inflammation going on. And

there’s a number of biomarkers.

But here’s your starting point. And you want to see that there are problems

here. And if there’s problems with the biomarkers, the patient says, “Oh, my

God.” I say, “No, no this is good because all of these are correctable.” So when

you apply this lifestyle change, or this environmental change, or whatever it should be that your body needs, when you apply that, you recheck the

biomarkers. And in six months, they’re down to normal. And when they’re

down to normal, as with all the science we have today, you’re not pulling on the chain anymore. And then, you just check those biomarkers every six

months or every year.

I have many, many patients now, APOE4’s, they were highly inflamed. They had symptoms that brought them to me. Now, their symptoms are gone. And

they check those biomarkers every year. You don’t mess around with this. I

don’t care how you feel because some people say, “I feel great. I don’t need to

do the test.” No, you don’t feel when you’re killing off brain cells. You don’t feel it until you’ve killed off enough brain cells that now it’s obvious because

you’ve got brain fog. And you’re not thinking the way you used to.

So you want to check these markers. These are like temperature gauges on the dashboard of your car, as opposed to a hot light on the dashboard of your

car. [Inaudible] The temperature gauges show that the problem is creeping up

there before your engine’s overheating. That’s why you use these biomarkers.

James: What are some of your favorite biomarkers, Tom?

Dr. O’Bryan: 8-hydroxy-2’-deoxy-deoxyguanosine. That’s a helluva Scrabble word. But just 8-hydroxy. It’s a simple urine test. I think it’s about 90 bucks.

I’m not sure. But it’s a measure of the DNA residue from damaged brain cells

or damaged nerve cells, mostly in the brain. So you just do a simple urine

test. And if your 8-hydroxy is up, you’re killing off brain cells. And that makes you say, “Well, why?” And then, when you’re with your doctor, you investigate

to find out, “How are you pulling on the chain?” That’s the first one.


Antibodies. Antibodies to your brain. You want to look at antibodies to the blood-brain barrier in your gut. The lining, that tube for intestinal

permeability. You have a simple type of lining on your brain that stops

molecules from getting in the brain that shouldn’t be here. So you want to

look for antibodies to amylase, antibodies to S100B. These are the technical stuff. But there’s a panel of antibodies that you could look for to see, “Is my

brain on fire right now,” because if you have elevated antibodies, your brain’s

on fire. You’re killing off brain cells. I don’t care how you feel. “Here’s the test

results. You want to do it again? All right, we’ll do it again.” But these tests are extremely accurate. The technology now is 99% sensitivity and 100%

specificity, which means they’re right on the money every time.

But if a patient goes, well, maybe the test is wrong. “Well, maybe, you want to do it again? We’ll do it again. That’s fine.” I’ve never seen it come back

different now. So you look at antibodies to your brain. You look at 8-hydroxy.

You look at urine lipid peroxides. You look at—and this last one is not so much a measure of brain deterioration, but—hs-CRP. High-sensitivity CRP is

a measure of inflammation in your body. So you look for the inflammatory

markers, in this example APOE4. You look at 8-hydroxy, antibodies to your

brain, urine lipid peroxides. Those are the three that I use. And there may be others, also. But the concept is you look for the biomarkers to tell you that

your engine’s overheating before you’ve killed off so much tissue, it’s now

obvious.

James: Yeah, this is the beauty of combining, I think, the genetic tests and

the biomarkers because obviously that seems like the most relevant way to

take a responsible attitude to it to see what the blueprint of the house looks

like, and then also to get an idea of like how the house is actually being built, and to be able to see that. So--

Dr. O’Bryan: I’d like to give you an example.

James: Sure.

Dr. O’Bryan: I was with a good friend of mine—one of my mentors—yesterday. And he’s just been diagnosed with an autoimmune disease that’s a nasty

autoimmune disease. And they tell him, it’s a type of cancer. So he went to an

oncologist who put him on steroids to keep it down. And I said, “What

happened?” And he said, “I don’t know. Six months ago, my blood test was completely normal. But now, this came up.” And I said, “Well, that’s great!

That means it’s fresh. You know, that means it hasn’t gone…” So his hot light

or the temperature gauge was on for a long time. It was on for a long time. It


had to be killing off cells, killing off cells. Now, this autoimmune disease is causing symptoms. And so he went back to the doctor. And boom, they found

it. But it wasn’t there six months ago. Well, yes, it was. But it just wasn’t bad

enough yet to be diagnosable, right.

So the oncologist has him on these drugs to calm down the symptoms. Great.

Perfect protocol to begin with in the short term. But I said to him, “So, Len,

the question is why is this happening? What’s the trigger that’s pulling on the

chain to cause this? Obviously, you’ve got the genes for this.” And it turns out his grandfather had similar symptoms and died from it. They didn’t diagnose

it back then. But he had the exact same symptoms that Len’s developed. And

so it’s genetic.

So what is the trigger pulling on the chain for him? He said, “Well, they didn’t

talk to me about that. They didn’t think about that, you know. They gave me

these drugs. And I know the side effects of the drugs. But I need to take the drugs.” I said, “Yes, you do. But let’s ask the question, where is this coming

from? And maybe, in three months, six months, a year, you’ll be able to get off

the meds.” And he’s a brilliant guy. So he said, “Well, that makes perfect

sense.” So now, he’s diving in to get the tests done to find out what’s pulling on his chain.

James: So what are the things that are classically pulling on people’s chain

the most? What are these environmental insults that are modifiable for most people? Because what I see is like some people need the tests to get fired up,

right, generally men, especially the genetic tests. And that’s one of the things

I’d like to reach more men in this summit because I think women intuitively

get it. They realize the process that happens from wellness to illness. And it’s not just something that happens overnight. And that’s why 75% of functional

medicine doctors and 75% of functional medicine patients are women.

So one of the things I’ve seen is that I’ve heard Jeff Bland talk about his own engagement into his health to a deeper level when he had the genetic testing. I

did it for myself. For this summit, I did the metabolomic testing, the genetic

testing, and went through all the results online in real time just to be able to show that this is not something that’s scary. This is something that is

ultimately empowering.

So what are the major things that are under our control? Because some people will want to do the test. But ultimately, whatever test you get, you’re

pretty much going to want to start to take some action. For those people who


don’t want to take any tests, but just want to get busy right now minimizing their risk for autoimmune disease, what’s the plan?

Dr. O’Bryan: Good. So the first thing to understand—and you said it

accurately—environmental triggers. So we have to think, “What does the word environmental trigger mean?” It means anything that’s outside your body in

the environment that gets inside and is a trigger. Anything. So what does that

mean?

Food is the number one environmental trigger. What’s on the end of your fork

is either going to be an anti-inflammatory or inflammatory. So for every

autoimmune patient, for every genetic patient who’s want to try to not pull on

the chain, you have to make sure that the foods you’re eating are healthy for you, and not healthy on this side, but not unhealthy on this side. And the

unhealthy side weighs more than the healthy side weighs.

For example, well, yeah, as you know, wheat. Wheat has saved millions and

millions of lives, millions of lives. When there’s a starvation in Africa, we send

a boatload of wheat over there. You save millions of lives. But the problem is

wheat tears the lining of the intestines. And there’s a whole cascade of what happens. So most people, when they’re tested properly find that their immune

system is telling them they’ve got a problem with wheat. So the most common

one is wheat. And dairy’s another, and sugar, and the bad fats. You just have

to check to see what is your body saying? So food is the first category.

The second category is the air. It was back in the late 1990s and early 2000s,

they were publishing the papers that said, “Every dog that they check in

Mexico City has early or advanced Alzheimer’s.” Every single dog has beta amyloid plaque in their brain. And they said, “Whoa!

Then, in the late 2000s, they had more tests available. And what they have

found is that every child that they checked in Mexico City has evidence of early Alzheimer’s. Every child! Let me say that again. Every child that they

check has evidence of early Alzheimer’s.

Why? Because the air pollution is so bad. And you breathe that stuff in. It

goes into your lungs. And just like leaky gut, you get leaky lungs. And this

particulate matter goes right through the lungs, into the bloodstream, straight

up to the brain, activating your immune system to fight this stuff. Tears the lining of the blood-brain barrier. The inflammation tears the lining of the

blood-brain barrier. Now, these molecules get into the brain. And a different

immune system is fighting it inside the brain. And then, there’s collateral


damage. And that’s where the beta amyloid plaque occurs is because of the collateral damage.

So the air that you breathe. So if you live in a city, what’s the one thing you

could do right away? Get the best air filter you can in your bedroom because you spend more time in the bedroom than anywhere else. James, I know you

and your family live in L.A. Get the best air filter you can for the house if you

can afford to get a whole house unit. If you can’t, you get a best unit possible

in your bedroom because if you spend a third of your life to a quarter of your life in your bedroom, breathe the best air you can. And your work

environment, if you’re working in an office, get a little air filter in the office.

And people will walk in and say, “Oh, it’s nice in here,” because the air is

different than in the rest of the building.

James: Yeah, absolutely.

Dr. O’Bryan: So the primary ones, the primary ones are the foods and the air.

Those are the primary. There are many others. There’s chemicals.

James: Yeah, what are some niche ones that you’ve seen see a particular trigger to autoimmune disease?

Dr. O’Bryan: My goodness! I recommend it in book. My book came out last

September, The Autoimmune Fix. And we have lots of little pearls in there like this. But why is it that we recommend you leave your shoes at the door when

you walk into the house? It’s not some Zen Buddhist thing. If you like Zen

Buddhism, great. When you want to burn some incense, it’s okay. Or make

sure it’s clean incense so you’re not poisoning the air with the incense you’re breathing.

But why do you leave your shoes at the door? Because you walked down the

sidewalk and up to your house. Your neighbor sprayed Roundup on the sidewalk to kill the dandelions yesterday. You’ve walked on the sidewalk. Now,

there’s Roundup on the bottom of your shoes. You walk in the house and walk

on the carpet. Now, there’s Roundup on the carpet. Your little one-year-old’s crawling around on the carpet. Or your teenage girls are laying on the carpet

doing their homework on their computers.

They now get Roundup on their hands and on their face. Roundup goes in and causes all kinds of damage to your gut. Lots and lots of damage to your gut

and to the rest of your body. There are so many studies on the dangers of


Roundup, and glyphosate, and the GMO aspect of all that. But that’s a trigger. And that’s why you leave your shoes at the door.

Here’s another one. You go to the coffee shop. And you order a coffee or a tea.

They give you the thing. They put a lid on it. And you walk out with it. But the steam from the hot beverages goes up to the underside of the lid. It condenses

and drips back down into the coffee full of Bisphenol-A. Bisphenol-A is a

chemical in plastic. And Bisphenol-A causes cancers. It causes a lot of

autoimmune diseases. There are hundreds and hundreds of studies on this.

And guys, what it does to men, aside from the cancers and the autoimmune

diseases, it reduces your testosterone levels. It’s one reason why—one reason

and a strong reason why—men today have 30% on average one-third of the testosterone their grandfathers had at the same age. Now, women may like

that men have less testosterone. But guys need testosterone, right?

James: Yeah.

Dr. O’Bryan: And so this Bisphenol A, and then you drink your coffee or your

tea—and the heat, the whole liquid hits the underside of the lid and funnels down into that opening full of Bisphenol A. And for those companies that are

now saying that their bottles are BPA-free, now they’re using BPS instead,

which is even a stronger carcinogenic than BPA was. So just don’t. And so

what do you do? You go to the coffee shop with your stainless-steel container and say, “Fill it up, please.”

So I’ve got three of them because I’m drinking the stuff. And I take it home.

And it’s sitting in the kitchen to wash. And then, I have to go out. Or I forget to get it the next morning. So it’s still waiting to be washed. So I’ve got three of

them so that there’s always one in the car. If I’m going to stop and get some

tea or I’m going to get some coffee, I take my stainless steel one in there and

say, “Fill it up, please.” So you need to learn these little kinds of tricks to reduce the environmental toxins that we’re being exposed to.

James: Absolutely. Yeah, there’s so much to unpack in that, Tom. And I think that one of the things that’s really empowering about this talk and your work

is that, in reality, genetic testing can cost a lot. Although, it’s coming down,

right. These other biomarker testing will cost something, depending on your

insurance profile and whether you can get your doctor to test for it or otherwise.


But ultimately, all of the things that you’re talking about controlling are reasonable to low cost, right. I know Ari Vojdani, all he’s doing is walking

around the conference and taking the lids off everyone’s coffee to make sure

that no one’s falling for it. And plastic and hot stuff doesn’t mix. Since I heard

him say that, since I was taught that, I, my daughter, we don’t go anywhere near that. And we’re a lot more conscientious about those things. So--

Dr. O’Bryan: Right. And you stopped using Saran Wrap. You stopped using

Tupperware. You get glass containers to store your food in at home. Don’t let it touch plastic.

James: Yeah, hot plus plastic is a problem.

Dr. O’Bryan: Yeah. And even cold food touching plastic like Saran Wrap, the

Bisphenol A leaks from cold food into the food. It doesn’t have to be hot.

James: Got it.

Dr. O’Bryan: So just glass containers at home.

James: So that’s one part. So the genetics is fixed. And the environmental and

the gut will determine how those genes are expressed. So we talked about

minimizing environmental stuff. Most people are on the path towards

intestinal permeability, if they don’t have it already. So what are the actionable items here to reduce the intestinal permeability and to have as

healthy a gut lining, as possible? It seems to me, and this is through

functional medicine or otherwise, is that the one thing that all of us could do

irrespective of genetic information that is like the most likely thing to keep you healthy longest is to maintain the integrity of the gut wall.

Dr. O’Bryan: Absolutely. You’re absolutely correct. That’s the take home. The

take-home message is maintain the integrity of your gut wall. How do you do that? Stop throwing gasoline on the fire. And so, “Well, I can’t afford to do the

testing to see what foods I’m sensitive to.” “Well, then, just follow the

guidelines.” And my book’s got a whole chapter on this. Try this for three weeks: no wheat at all, no dairy at all, and no sugar at all. Just try it for three

weeks and notice how you feel. Just notice what happens. “Oh, my brain’s

functioning better. Oh, my joint pain is a whole lot less. Oh, I wake up in the

morning, I feel refreshed. I’m not tired in the morning.” You just notice these things start happening.


Then you’re going to say, “Well, maybe I can have a little.” And you’re going to go back. And if there’s like a dial of a dimmer switch, and you’ve been

operating at a six, now all of a sudden, in three weeks, you’re up to an eight

and a half. And then you say, “Well, I can have a little once in a while.” And

then, you can’t feel it when you go from an eight and a half to an 8.1 or an 8.0. So you don’t feel it. But you start going down right away, and then the 7.9

and the 7.8. And then eventually, “You know, I’m getting tired again. Oh, I’ve

been…You know, that wheat’s been sneaking in.” So you go completely free.

And then, you go right back up into an eight and a half or a nine on that function of your body.

So the things that you can do is reduce the things that are inflammatory.

Reduce your exposure to those things that you know aren’t good for you like French fries, deep-fried onion rings. It’s a horrible, horrible, difficult thing to

do for most people is to learn how many things in their lives they’ve been

doing since they were born they thought was natural but are pulling on the chain. It’s really taxing. And most people have to get sick enough before

they’re empowered internally to do something about it. They’ll say, “Oh, I don’t

feel too bad.” We don’t have time to mess around anymore.

The World Wildlife Fund published a study about five or six months ago now

that from 1970 to 2012, in 42 years, there has been a 57% on average

reduction of all life on the planet. In 42 years, 57% of everything is gone. The

rainbow trout, the woodpeckers, the hummingbirds, the polar bears, 57% on average is gone. And you ask, “Why?” Well, the average is higher 78% for the

species that live near fresh water. “Why is that?” They’re drinking the water.

And if you were drinking the water coming out of streams or rivers, you’d get

cancer much quicker. You’d be unable to reproduce like they can’t. And your species would be fading out much quicker, also. But we filter our water so it’s

not as much exposure as the animals are getting.

So when I talk about this with my patients and on stage, I say, “You know, you can’t base the quality of your health on how you feel because by the time

you don’t feel so good anymore, you’re pretty much down the track to

autoimmune diseases. You’re down that spectrum somewhere.” So when you start cleaning this stuff up earlier, when you get educated like on summits

like this one, and you say, “Oh, that’s a really good point. I’m just going to ask

those questions. What’s throwing gasoline on the fire in my life?”

And if you can do the testing, you do the right testing. And if you cannot

afford to do the testing or insurance won’t cover it, then just try these things

and notice that you thought you were healthy, but notice how you feel in three


weeks when you go wheat-free, dairy-free, sugar-free. All of a sudden, in three weeks, you just ramped it up another level or two. And that’s closer to being

healthy.

So the definition of health—everyone needs to know this—from Dorland’s Medical Dictionary, word for word because I’ve said it so many time, “optimal

physical, mental, and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease

or infirmity.” So you ask somebody, “You healthy?” “Yeah, I’m healthy. I’m

pretty healthy.” And that means, “Yeah, I’m still walking around. You know, I’m not in severe pain. I don’t have any infirmities,” but optimal, physical,

mental, and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease.

So how many of us have optimal? You wake up in the morning ready to go. You’ve got the juice to handle your day. And at the end of the day, you’re not

ready to collapse. You say, “No, I’m a little tired. It’s time to go to sleep now.”

So we need to reframe how we judge our inner health. And it’s not by just getting through the day.

And why is this? I want to live as long as I’m going to live and have optimal

function until a very short period before I go. I don’t want to be going down, down, down, down, down. And now, I’m in a nursing home for two years, three

years, four years. And the quality of life just sucks. Excuse me. But I want as

optimal as possible. I want to plateau through middle ages and stay plateaued

as I go into senior years. Maybe lower a little bit because that’s life, but just optimal, as optimal as possible. And that’s the goal. That’s really the goal is

that the period of disability at the end of life, wherever that is, is just very,

very short. That’s the ultimate goal I suggest for all of us.

James: Absolutely. Yeah, I really echo that, Tom. And one thing I just, I guess

want to talk about is the ripple effects of one person doing this because one of

the things on that, you mentioned that conference. We did a show. And we

had a pediatrician on there, Dr. Nicole Shorrock. And her husband was diagnosed with MS at age 36. She was a pediatrician. She took a moment at

that moment to like check in with herself about this diagnosis, and realized in

that moment when she was really honest with herself—and sitting opposite the neurologist who was like, “Look, you’re going to have to have a daily

injection for the next years. And you’re probably not going to last that long,”

that she didn’t believe in the conventional medicine paradigm. And she had

that moment to sit with it and to realize that.

She says this on our episode, The Evolution of Neurology. You can watch her.

She’s incredibly powerful. Found Terry Wahls, did the Wahls Protocol,


completely recovered her husband in six weeks, not just recovered, but actually totally better like vital. Like you were just saying, “Doesn’t need—”

Dr. O’Bryan: Optimal!

James: Optimal. And now, he’s way better than he ever was. And now, the

ripple effect of that is that now she practices unconventional pediatrics and is

using the same principles to recover kids on the spectrum. And so all of those kids now have impact and are connected, too. So I guess, I think for men

especially, there’s this thing you don’t want to go there. But I just, I guess I

want to talk in to what is it going to take to rev this engine?

And I really feel like one thing that…You and I were both with Charles

Eisenstein last year on his talk. And he just talked about, “We have no idea

about the ripple effects and how cause and effect happens in a system because we’re very used to a linear cause and effect.” But just exactly what is

the impact of anyone who’s listening to this taking action and communicating

to their community that they’re taking action for this reason is significant and

powerful?

Dr. O’Bryan: Significant.

James: And so I’m going to need you to talk about that and like the ripple effects of like Betrayal and that all the work that you’ve done to get this out on

a bigger stage because it seems like the action of one person listening to this

does not affect one person. It affects many people in a causative web that we

can’t even understand.

Dr. O’Bryan: That’s exactly right. I don’t even know how to go there. In

Betrayal: The Autoimmune Secret They’re Not Telling You, we had over 500,000

people now that have viewed it. And I’m approached…Well, at the IFM Conference last weekend, and I counted—I just wanted to know by the end of

the weekend—78 different doctors came up to me to say, “Thanks for the work

you’re doing.” And they all said almost exactly the same word, not that, “Oh, that was a really good test you talked about earlier. That really helped.” Just,

“Thanks for the work you’re doing.” And that validated for me that the impact

and the sparkle in their eye, I now know, they’re carrying that message out to

everyone they see.

And so the ripple effect is just huge, James. In the work that you’re doing, the

ripple effect is hundreds of thousands of people benefit from every project you


do. And it’s because that person that’s listening, they post it. And they’ve got a few hundred or a few thousand people that see the post. And that just makes

those people, “Oh, well, my son’s got this problem going on right now.” So they

start looking in their world to find a pediatrician who’s going to look at their

son’s attention deficit in a bigger picture. It just keeps going out, and out, and out.

And one of the things I say a lot, I reference the movie Pay It Forward. And I

think it’s a really good habit for all of us to get into is when you’re standing in line in the coffee shop, and there is a line behind you now, just look back

there and tell the gal, say, “You know, here’s an extra $5.00. I’m buying the

coffee or whatever they’re buying for that person, three people back.” And then

just leave. And how would you feel if you came up to order your large green tea and a woman says, “Oh, okay, well, um, the guy that was here a few

minutes ago, he paid for that for you”? “What? What?” It’s just like, “Wow!”

Or the toll booth, if you’re not going through automatically, you have to pay.

Just say, “You know, I’m going to pay for that truck behind me.” And the

trucker comes up there to pay. Pay it forward, everyone. When you find

something that really fires you up, just pay it forward. Just pay it forward with no expectation of any response. Just knowing that you’re putting a little love

light into somebody’s day.

Our world sucks right now. The scientists wonder if humans can live on the planet in 50 years. We got people going into concerts with knives cutting

people up now. And the news just makes a big deal out of it, which puts that

thought into some kid in Iowa that’s been playing Nintendo since he was 2-

years-old killing 150, 200, and 300 people in his game in three hours. And now, he sees the news about what these guys are doing. And this kid’s got a

weird life. And they plant seeds in there. You have to plant another type of

seed.

It was 30 years ago when I heard, with the Palestinian/Israeli conflict, I heard

that the textbooks that the Palestinian kids were reading said, “Wipe out

Israel.” Thirty years ago, five year olds, six year olds reading these books that say, “They’re your enemy, wipe them out.” Now, that person is 18, 20, 25, 30.

How are you going to negotiate with that person for peace when their whole

life has been centered around this one premise. Like, how do you get in there?

I don’t know. I don’t know the answer. But what I do know that we can do is pay it forward every day.


I submit and request that everybody do one act of kindness every day. Whatever it is. Go out of your comfort zone to do one act of kindness. Share

the wealth. I think that’s how we’re going to change the planet. That’s the

ripple effect on a bigger picture than just genetics. That’s the ripple effect for

life on the planet.

I have a one-year-old granddaughter right now. The world that she’s

inheriting…And I’ve just been recently married. We’re going to have a family.

My kids, the world they’re inheriting, I don’t know what it’s going to be. But the scientists are saying we might not make it.

James: Absolutely. Yeah. And no, I totally get that, Tom. And I appreciate you

sharing that. And look one of the reasons why I think people are being inspired by your work is because you inspire people to take this kind of thing

seriously. So I appreciate you sharing all of that.

Before we finish up here today, I guess I just want to talk about the

encouragement of people to get their genetics tested, mainly just because I

know that it can be a jumping off point for having the…We’re always looking

for places for people to jump in to their health, right. And many times, what happens is people jump in when there’s a problem. When there’s an

emergency, especially medical, wait until way too long.

So I would just love to just get your thoughts as to is genetic testing an opportunity to do that earlier, to not wait until something goes wrong where

you said it’s too late? And just from your experience of all testing, but

particularly genetic testing, and particularly with men, what can they do to

start to really get an idea of what’s breaking down in what order so that we can get ahead of the curve?

Dr. O’Bryan: That’s a really good question. And the people that I recommend

genetic testing to are those that have a family history of a particular disease. And it might be your mother died of Alzheimer’s. And your grandmother, or

your grandfather, or an uncle had brain deterioration and Parkinson’s. And so

there’s some genes in there. So for those people, I recommend, “You might consider this. It’s not necessary for the symptoms you’re presenting with. We’ll

take care of them. But it’ll help empower you to change how you look at

health.”

Because once people understand, this is a weak link in my chain. That’s the

deck of cards I was dealt in life. I can’t do anything about that. I don’t care if

it’s the BRCA gene. That’s the weak link. And that’s the one for breast cancer.


That’s the weak link in the chain. That doesn’t mean it’s going to break. It means that it’s vulnerable to breaking, right. So for those people, especially

that have a family history, I think it’s of great value to do the genetic testing.

And for everyone, it’s of great value as long as you have a coach. You have a method of information that can be delivered to you like this summit. This is a

great place now, now that this summit will be out there in the world with all of

the experts that you’re curating, James, and making sure the message gets

clean and pure, people are going to get a platform foundational understanding of what to do with genetic testing. Not just freak out about it or not just jump

down the first person that markets, “I can reverse Alzheimer’s.” Or whatever it

is. But rather, they’ll learn a rational approach to addressing this weak link in

their chain. They’ll understand, hopefully out of this talk, “Okay, so that’s the weak link. So I just need to stop pulling so hard on that link. And what’s the

biomarker that will show me early when that weak link is starting to go?”

So you get the biomarker. You see where you’re currently at—temperature

gauge versus hot light. You see where you’re currently at. You apply the

protocols. And you go back in and check the biomarker again. The gene won’t

change. It won’t change. But that’s always going to be the weak link. But whether or not it starts manifesting, as a pathology, is where you go with this.

James: And once you have that information and you know all your weak

links, are there other things that you can then modify specifically targeted like either nutritional interventions or other specifics that you can go to if you

know where those weak links are?

Dr. O’Bryan: There are two critical categories of weak links that are very popular nowadays to be talking about. One is methylation. Methylation is one

of the primary ways we break down toxic chemicals that we’re exposed to. And

many people have the genes that say, “You don’t methylate very well.” So if

you know that that’s a weak link, then you’re going to check the biomarkers for methylation to see, “Am I methylating well or not?” And those--

James: —because we have two or three talks on methylation in this summit because it’s such a hot topic.

Dr. O’Bryan: Perfect! Exactly. Exactly. Methylation is no more important than

any other genetic vulnerability. It’s just that a lot of people are putting attention on it. And a lot of people have weak links in that chain. A lot of

people also have weak links in glutathione. Glutathione is called the master

antioxidant. It’s the number one response mechanism in our bodies for toxins


we’re exposed to. Number one is glutathione. And many people have weak links to not produce enough glutathione very well or not be able to use

glutathione very well.

So you want to look at the temperature gauge biomarkers for glutathione production and utilization. And so if that’s the weak link in your chain, then

you will dial in, “What are the biomarkers? All right, let’s get that test done.

Oh, my gosh, it’s low. Well, I feel fine. But wait a minute, that tells me when

I’m low on glutathione, mercury’s going to have a much bigger impact, and cancers, and brain disease, and all of that. Okay, so let’s fix the glutathione

thing.”

And then, you learn about whey protein and N-acetylcysteine, and alpha lipoic acid, and all these different things that can help you produce more

glutathione. So you include that lifestyle habit in there. And then, you go back

and check your biomarker. And you see you’re producing great amounts of the glutathione right now. You still have the weak link. But now, you’ve

compensated. And now, you know what to do for that weak link in your chain.

James: And that’s knowledge that lasts a lifetime. It’s very--

Dr. O’Bryan: A lifetime. A lifetime. You’ll check that biomarker once a year or

once every two years. And as long as it’s in the right zone, you’ll know that

what you’re doing is really working well.

James: Beautiful. Well, look all the way through the summit, we are going to

share with you other experts and hot topics around some of the things you’ve

spoken about. You spoke about methylation. We’re also going to share with you some of the genetic tests and also genomic tests that all are interesting

and can help you to get the feedback.

We’re also going to be sharing with you opportunities for learning, if you’re a physician, through the Institute for Functional Medicine and the Personalized

Lifestyle Medicine Institute. And more than anything, you’re going to hear

from other experts in the field about how to reduce your chance of getting all of these diseases. I think autoimmune disease is the disease category that will

open up functional medicine to the masses mainly because we can save so

much money for people who are on these expensive drugs that maybe be able

to come off them.

I salute your work, Tom, in leading this charge. And isn’t it exciting to see this

world coming around into our favor. You saw just the preliminary results,


from Cleveland Clinic’s Center for Functional Medicine, better outcomes at lower cost. It’s the half-term report. It’s not the full-term report. But part of

the reason why you come on these summits is so that you know what’s

coming down the pike. And what is coming down the pike is that functional

medicine is better outcomes at lower cost for the delivery of—especially for autoimmune disease.

And I’m super excited, as well, to be announcing you at this summit, as well,

because we want to be able to get functional medicine’s operating system into as many hands as possible. So thanks so much for all of your amazing work,

Tom. And isn’t it amazing to see the momentum that’s happening from the

whole team. Mark’s doing his thing in Cleveland. You’re doing your thing here.

I’m doing my thing. And this amazing team is coming together to create a new medical system.

Dr. O’Bryan: And it is, it really is just remarkable. And I’m very, very grateful to be in this world. Next year’s, IFM’s Annual Conference is going to be on

autoimmunity. So the world is coming up to realizing about this whole thing

about weak links, and the expression of those weak links activating the

immune system to attack, and then the collateral damage, all of that. So it’s just a wonderful, wonderful place to be right now.

James: Beautiful! Well, this has been an amazing interview, Tom. Thank you

so much for sharing your truth here. We’ve heard this conversation before. But I think in the conversation of interpreting your genetics, this is how to

interpret your genetic information. There are things that you can do. You can

be empowered. And you can choose to wait until the biomarkers get so bad

that you feel it. And you have a disease. Or you can just get started now.

And if you get started now, the ripple effects of you doing that will permeate

into your family, into your community, and will kick start, as Terry Wahl’s

likes to call it, an epidemic of health. And thanks for being part of the summit. And thanks so much if you’re listening, too. Lots of great takeaways from this.

And we appreciate you being a part of the community!

Dr. O’Bryan: Thank you, James.

James: All right, well, this has been the Interpreting Your Genetics Summit.

We’ve been here with Dr. Tom O’Bryan. Check out his book, The Autoimmune Fix. It’s available anywhere you can buy books if you’re interested in reversing

or avoiding an autoimmune disease. And make sure to check out the rest of


the summit. We’ve got amazing speakers all week. And share this interview and share these ideas with people because pay it forward.

The easiest way to pay it forward, like Tom was saying, send this link to a

dozen people that you care about. And if everyone who listens to this does that, we’re going to be in a good shape. And the ripple effect of the Internet

can multiply the world that we would like to see. The more beautiful world

that our hearts know is possible, I would say, Tom, is the way that I like to

describe that. So thank you so much for being a part of it. And enjoy the rest of the summit.

Dr. O’Bryan: Thank you, James. It’s a real pleasure to be ... · about the importance of...

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