Midlife Myths Busted: What Science Actually Says About Food & Aging | Dr. Federica Amati

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Episode Transcript:

Jonathan Fields: [00:00:00] So have you ever felt like you’re doing everything right when it comes to nutrition, yet still struggling with all these nagging issues, especially as you get further into life? What if I told you that the keys to vibrant, aging and living might lie in surprising places, especially on the nutrition front that you haven’t really thought about? In this conversation, I am joined by Doctor Federica Amati. A true pioneer in the field of nutrition across lifespan and head nutritionist at Zoe, the science and nutrition company. She holds a PhD in clinical medicine research from Imperial College London and is an Association for nutrition registered nutritionist. She’s also the author of the Sunday Times bestseller Every Body Should Know This The Science of Eating for a Lifetime of Health. So in our conversation, we’re on a bit of a myth busting adventure today, exploring popular advice around protein, calcium, brain health, and more, Federica draws from cutting edge research and years of clinical experience to reveal some eye opening connections between the gut diet and graceful aging. So imagine if the so-called, quote, inevitable cognitive decline, muscle wasting and other challenges of growing older could be prevented or slowed down or even reversed by what you put on your plate. Federica shares some groundbreaking insights into the gut brain axis, and how nurturing your microbiome might be one of the most powerful ways to stave off neurological conditions like Alzheimer’s, and you’ll discover some surprising insights about things like calcium supplements and bone health. And for anyone who’s felt guilt or stress around, quote, perfect eating, her balanced approach is really sort of like open minded, forgiving approach favors consistency over perfection. It’s an invitation to enjoy food again as a source of vibrancy. So whether you’re concerned about aging while yourself or just supporting loved ones, this conversation will leave you inspired and equipped with practical dietary strategies. So excited to share it with you! I’m Jonathan Fields and this is Good Life Project.

Jonathan Fields: [00:01:56] I’m really excited to dive in. I have so many questions like what I would love to focus our conversation on today is really exploring nutrition through midlife and then later in life. And I know that’s something you spend a lot of time really deepening into. I have questions, I know there’s a lot of where our audience lies, and there’s probably a whole bunch of myths that are out there that I want to dive into with you. So I’m curious, you know, when you think about nutrition during midlife and later years and how that can really profoundly influence health and wellbeing? I’m curious, just on a personal level, what drew you to want to explore those critical life stages in your work?

Federica Amati: [00:02:34] Really good question. I think that a lot of my interest in that area of life comes from the fact that I grew up with my grandparents, so I grew up in a Italian Italian family. So our grandparents moved in with us when they were when they fell sick, essentially. And that’s always made me very interested in how can we improve quality of life, enjoyment of life. And actually it’s what we would call sort of secondary or tertiary prevention when we talk about lifestyle medicine. People who are older and in later stages of their lives still want to have a good quality of life. And I felt that that’s a conversation that’s often missed. So especially in the space of health optimization and all these wonderful things where you talk about, like the last 1% improvement, that’s great for a lot of people, and it’s accessible for a very few. So my interest really is in helping the majority to harness the power of diet to improve their health, no matter what their age. So it’s I think my grandparents had a big influence. I also lost my father when he was in his 60s. And so I’ve seen sort of firsthand what happens if you sort of don’t look after your nutrition and your lifestyle in your midlife. It can actually have quite horrible effects. And so my life experiences have shaped that.

Federica Amati: [00:03:55] And I think also the fact that I see that there’s a lack of conversation around it. And of course, like, I know I’m, I’m still I’m like in my late 30s. So it’s not it’s not what the life stage I’m at, but it’s a life stage that I’m interested in supporting. And, and now my mum, she’s my sort of number one patient. She, she has transformed her her life and her diet and her health. It’s very rare that I’m very lucky to have a mother who actually listens to my advice. Um, and it’s really great to see that there’s so much you can do later in life. And, you know, in my research, I’ve had a lot of interest looking at pregnancy and the first 1000 days of life. So on the other end of the spectrum, before we get started, what can you do? But my real passion for life course nutrition comes down to this fact that actually, every life stage offers us opportunity to improve and to make the most of our health and make the most of our enjoyment of life. And so, yeah, I’m very glad to be talking more about all of the stages of life, not just the ones where you’re kind of already in your at your sort of peak.

Jonathan Fields: [00:05:03] Yeah. It’s so interesting. Right? Because I think I so agree. I think so often the cultural conversation is, you know, when you’re younger or when you’re sort of, you know, in your mid 20s and 30s and you know, it ranges from weight to athletic performance to now cognitive performance. And there’s so much there’s so much of a consumer marketplace that serves that demo and also all of those needs. It’s massive.

Federica Amati: [00:05:30] Yeah.

Jonathan Fields: [00:05:30] I wonder if you see sometimes like there’s this assumption that says kind of like when you get a little bit further into life, when you’re 40, 50, 60 or beyond that, you’ve sort of like you’ve passed the point where you can really do much. So even if you’re like, okay, so I want to make a change. I’d love to reclaim my health or my vitality, my mobility, my, that people hit a moment where they’re like, well, but isn’t it just too late? Is this something that comes up in conversation with you?

Federica Amati: [00:05:57] Oh, yeah, all the time. So especially, you know, people often like, oh, it’s too late for me or I haven’t done this, or there’s a narrative of, you know, there is a lot of research that shows that your dietary patterns in the first, like three decades of your life, have an impact on your cognitive function. It’s true, but it doesn’t mean it’s too late to change it. And so actually, there’s some some really lovely research that’s been done looking at what is the potential gain in healthy life years if you make a diet change aged 40 and age 70, right. And age 40, we see that there’s the potential to add 11 life years to your life by just switching from a sort of standard fairly poor diet to a mediterranean dietary pattern. Right. So and it’s so we’re not talking about changing to a very difficult to achieve protocols set out by a multi-millionaire. It’s like a very well understood evidence based dietary pattern that’s very affordable. And similarly, the same model applied to like a 70 year old person still looks to improve length of life, to increase life years by like seven years. That’s 10%. That’s a lot. So, um, I do see that people are often, oh, is it too late for me? Or the other side of the coin is also people say, well, I already have like this condition. I’ve already had this diagnosis. Does it mean it’s too late? And that’s where I think we don’t often talk about the role of lifestyle medicine and nutrition for not just primary prevention.

Federica Amati: [00:07:25] So not just that like let’s prevent this from happening in the first place, but actually secondary and tertiary, huge role and huge potential to improve not only longevity and like the remainder of the health in your life years, but also quality of life. So we mustn’t lose sight of that because it’s actually never too late. Some of my favorite trials. Right. There’s this one randomized controlled trial that was run in, uh, a care home in participants were like, in their 70s and 80s with existing frailty. And they it’s called the New Age one trial for anyone who, like, likes reading papers. And they gave these participants a mediterranean dietary intervention and looked at frailty markers, cognitive function. And it was beautiful. So within a few weeks there was all these improvements across the board. And what was really nice about this particular study is that they looked at how the gut microbiome mediated some of these changes in their physiology and cognitive function. There’s some lovely examples of where you can have transformative impact at any age, to be honest, and at any state of existing health condition. So it’s never too late. And I really hope people feel encouraged to know that, that it’s like it’s always worth making that change and embarking on a journey to improve your health.

Jonathan Fields: [00:08:45] I love that it removes the barriers of futility and fatalism and saying, well, this. I guess I’ve just reached a point where there’s so much damage or there’s so much to reverse that why even bother? You know, it’s not going to be possible, or it’s just, you know, there’s too much that I have to deal with. And it’s like, no, actually, there’s plenty that we can do no matter where you are. It’s interesting. I think there’s probably a month or two ago from when we’re recording this. There was a paper hit, a lot of sort of like the public conversation that sort of showed that we don’t age in a linear fashion, the way that we thought that there are these two really big bursts of aging. I think it was in the early 40s and then right around 60 where you saw these sort of like big declines in, in all sorts of things. It wasn’t this linear, like every year is a little bit more, a little bit more, a little bit more. I wonder if you saw that data and if in your mind there is any tie in to nutrition there.

Federica Amati: [00:09:34] Yeah. So I think that certainly what we see for the 60s, it tends to be this cumulative effect of nutrition. So poor nutrition, poor dietary choices, they tend to manifest themselves in metabolic disorders in the 60s. So sometimes referred to here as sniper’s alley. I don’t know if you’ve heard that.

Jonathan Fields: [00:09:56] Um, I haven’t heard that. No.

Federica Amati: [00:09:58] It’s quite awful. But it does. It does.

Jonathan Fields: [00:10:00] It really is quite visual.

Federica Amati: [00:10:02] So, um, it’s this idea that you get to a certain age where you’re biologically you’re still young, but suddenly the you, you see the slight uptick in, in sort of deaths at this age, chronic conditions. So this is where before 60, it’s often the higher incidences of death come from accidents or so like infections, things that are sudden. Whereas suddenly you see this uptick in chronic deaths at 60 and they are diet related chronic diseases that lead the pack. So it’s, you know, the heart attack due to undiagnosed untreated hypertension. It’s the colorectal cancer. There’s this uptake. And so we see that for the 60s. I think I haven’t actually looked at the data the original data set. So I’d be interested to see whether the uptake in the 40s is likely to be more related to it’s things like early deaths from I don’t know, actually. I’d be interested to see what that that is. Is it deaths or is it is it diseases? In that paper.

Jonathan Fields: [00:11:07] I’m trying to remember what they actually were measuring as like the fundamental metric. I just what sticks in my mind is that they were looking at the progression of markers for aging and not necessarily disease.

Federica Amati: [00:11:17] Interesting.

Jonathan Fields: [00:11:18] And that they saw like this, this big sort of like, you know, these two cliffs basically.

Federica Amati: [00:11:22] Yes. So it’s interesting. So we do see like in the late 30s, early 40s is when you start seeing a big uptick. So when we’re thinking about markers for aging, if we’re thinking about the classic markers. So things that you’d correlate to cardiometabolic markers. So HbA one C in this states your cholesterol levels, your blood pressure. All of these start to play out in your 30s and 40s. If your lifestyle has been such that you haven’t supported your health. So and I would say, of course, nutrition plays an absolutely pivotal role in this. But what’s quite interesting is that from the work I’ve done clinically, and I have a few fair few patients who fall into that bracket of, you’re young, you know, you’re like mid 30s, early 40s, and you see this increase of the markers that we’re looking at. So it’s like your cholesterol levels are not great. Your high sensitivity CRP, which is a measure of inflammation is not great. And all of these markers start going up fasting glucose levels. And actually often it’s a combination. So it’s like a diet that’s not ideal. So like it’s often eating out a lot quite irregular in terms of the patterns. Very very often more than 90% of adults in the US and in the UK don’t get enough fiber every day, and that is fundamental. Fiber is so fundamental for maintaining healthy blood pressure and healthy cholesterol levels, and that’s a really big trend that you see. There just isn’t a focus on fiber, but also really high stress levels, less time spent socializing with loved ones.

Federica Amati: [00:12:58] Very high pressured jobs. A lot of like economic stress. So there’s it’s a combination of factors I would say for for the 40s increase in risk. But it’s interesting to see how these risk factors and these markers are now being paid more attention to. It’s a good thing. I think. So we’re at this point where people are interested and understanding where they sit in terms of risk. Risk is much better understood than it used to be, and I see that there’s more interest in actually trying to move that risk back before it becomes a full blown issue. And that’s exciting. So even though it’s not exciting to think that you can be as young as 40 and at risk, but it’s important for people to be aware of that, because I think by being aware of that is how you avoid snipers alley. So if you if you know to look out for the initial red flags in your 40s and to act on that, then it can prevent you from becoming one of the statistics in your 60s and here in the UK. The one paper that got loads of attention a few months ago was a paper that said, essentially, your diet at the age of 4647 was the best predictor for dementia risk age 69. And everyone was like, oh my God, I’m like 53. What does this mean?

Jonathan Fields: [00:14:19] Too late.

Federica Amati: [00:14:20] Right. It’s not so much that like, it’s not the magic. The magic is not in the age of prediction. The point is, is that lifestyle and in this paper, particularly dietary choices, were pointed out as the biggest factor. So it’s about understanding that your everyday food choices have a compound interest on your health outcomes later in life. If we can get if we can understand that, if we can treat it in that way as an investment in our health in the future, then it’s also easier to understand why small incremental deposits into your health bank are brilliant. It doesn’t have to be perfect. There’ll be times when you’re withdrawing some cash, but if you’re constantly investing, then you know your compound interest will be in your favour later.

Jonathan Fields: [00:15:07] I remember actually hearing about that paper also, and, you know, my eyebrows were raised, but it really just reinforces the fact that I think when we think about lifestyle so often, which is a great thing, no matter when you think about it, it’s a great thing to start really thinking about and taking action on. But so often the time horizon that we think about affecting is it’s fairly short, you know, months to a handful of years, you know, not realizing that we’re setting in motion patterns, levels of inflammation, physiological changes that, if sustained on even the lowest level over decades, can lead to these really profound limitations in our lives and illness and chronic conditions like 20, 30 years later. And that it really I think we are waking up. I mean, at least I hope in a sense we’re waking up a little bit more to the the genuinely long term impact. Like, sure, it’s great to feel better in the next couple of weeks, months and years. That’s amazing. And I think especially when you hit a certain age or a certain season of life, you’re starting to wonder about because maybe you’re seeing your parents, maybe you’re in your 40s or 50s. If you’re fortunate, you still have your parents with you, and but you’re starting to see declines and you’re starting to think, huh? I’m realizing because I’m living through these, you know, like as the child of a parent. And I’m seeing sometimes the devastating effect of this thing. And you’re starting to wonder, is there something I can do now to stave this off or to avoid or to minimize this happening. And I feel like oftentimes it’s us entering sort of like a certain season of life, seeing the effect on those we love that really lands the plane on on making a change.

Federica Amati: [00:16:40] I agree, and I think what I often see is people who have lived through losing a parent, or that if there is a specific disease that they are afraid of because it runs in their family, that activates that a bit sooner. So that sort of response of like, okay, what can I do? Like, what are the things that I can put in place to try and minimize risk? And it’s, you know, I think it’s about striking a balance between being aware that there’s so many things you can do to help reduce the risk, but at the same time, making sure that those changes that you’re making are accessible to you to make sure that you’re still unlocking joy. So what happens sometimes is that people become very hyper fixated about being healthy all the time. And actually, then you’re tipping into unhealthy behavior because part of the magic of having a good relationship with what our health might look like is to actually embrace the fact that life is unpredictable and that there is a very good level of resilience that our body has. So our bodies can take some challenge, and leaving yourself open to that unpredictability and leaving yourself open to the fact that some days won’t be perfect and that sometimes you won’t be able to move your body how you want it to, or you won’t be able to eat the foods that you’d planned.

Federica Amati: [00:18:05] But if you’re if the majority of the time, if you’re consistent with your health behaviors, if you offer your body that lovely safety net of knowing that the majority of the time you’re looking out for it and you’re helping it achieve its goals of homeostasis CIS and allostasis and responding to the environment in the best way possible. Then you’ll leave yourself sort of less stressed to achieve perfection, and also leave yourself space for joy. Because when we have conversations around lifestyle and diet, you know, people often ask like, what’s the perfect time to have dinner and and listen, the science tells us that ideally we don’t eat past 9:00 at night if you’re going to bed at sort of 10 to 11, but if you’re going to your best friends dinner and you’re spending time with loved ones and you’re enjoying, then that’s okay. Like have go do that and then you can go back to your regular, regular schedule tomorrow so that we have to make sure that we approach it with some common sense and forgiveness. Right? It’s sort of like forgiving. Your humanity along the way as you’re describing that. I’m like, if you live in Barcelona, you’re just so busted. If you try and follow those guidelines, it’s like

Federica Amati: [00:19:20] right. It’s like, but so in Barcelona people go to bed at like 1 or 2 in the morning.

Jonathan Fields: [00:19:25] So they eat dinner at 9 or 10, you know. Right. So everything shifts. Yeah.

Federica Amati: [00:19:28] It’s relevant to your lifestyle, to what you can do. People often say, well, okay, I’m a shift worker. I’m like, okay, well, then this that time frame is different for you. And what’s going to work to support your body through that work is going to be different. So understanding your context, understanding what your needs are is really important. And that comes with having that level of flexibility to embrace the fact that life is not the same for all of us. Otherwise it’d be very boring.

Jonathan Fields: [00:19:56] Yeah. And also, I mean, you brought up the idea of stress and perfectionism, right? And this is stress is a is a major potential contributor to all of the things that we don’t want to happen in our lives. So when we hold ourselves to this ideal of perfect exercise, perfect nutrition, and then we fall short because we’re going to fall short, that’s life, right? Then the stress of you then telling yourself, I have failed at being the perfect human that I am. It actually probably does equal, if not more damage. If you keep repeating that, then like that occasional like thing that you just you’re out with friends and you want to have something that’s good.

Federica Amati: [00:20:31] Yeah.

Jonathan Fields: [00:20:31] So it’s like it’s being just human and forgiving about this. I think that really matters. And we’ll be right back after a word from our sponsors. I’d love to dive into some specifics, like focusing in on on midlife season here. And I guess let me let me just ask the question to start out when we’re talking about midlife here, like around what age is. You know, what’s the window we’re talking about here when you think about it.

Federica Amati: [00:20:54] Thinking about midlife, really, we’re talking about mid 40s onwards. Life expectancy now is sort of 86, 87 years of age creeping upwards hopefully again soon. It hasn’t been creeping upwards for a while, but we’re hoping to return to a public health state where that does start creeping up again. So if we think, say, like you’re aiming to live to 90 is a good aim. Then mid-life, mid 40s. You’re sort of approaching mid-life, right? And we think about this life stage as well, because for women, certainly it’s nearing the end of the reproductive phase of life and entering perimenopause and menopause. And there is obviously a less marked change for men. But there is also a shift for men, sometimes called the andropause, where physiology and hormones and a lot of other factors start to change. So that’s the sort of typical sort of say, 45 to 65 is what would consider midlife. I think 60, some people might say 65 is generous. Often midlife is called up a bit earlier. But I think the way that our perception of living longer is changing how we refer to older people as well.

Federica Amati: [00:22:11] So there’s, there’s a there’s a lot of narrative now to say that age 65, many people are really still very active, still working, caring for their kids, caring for their grandkids, caring for loved ones, incredibly active society members. There’s some beautiful work done around the economic contribution that people in the age bracket of 65 to 75 make in looking after the communities in unpaid childcare, frankly, for their growing. So I think that that bracket is slightly stretching. And when I refer to older adults in my book, I mean, I’ve had people write in to me saying, hey, I’m 75 and I’m offended by how you like, talk about looking after old adults. And it’s like there’s a real range. Of course, there are some people who will enter their 60s with already 1 or 2 or more chronic conditions. So there is a really big spectrum. But if we think about midlife, 45 to 65 ish, where there are these pretty major shifts in physiology hormone, and there’s also major shifts in our body composition. So the way that our metabolism starts to work. Yeah.

Jonathan Fields: [00:23:16] Yeah. I remember years ago I was actually in the fitness industry, and I owned a facility, and I would go to the events and everyone would you you’d read about people trying to attract different demographics and stuff like this and, and back then, sort of like the hot demo that everyone wanted in their facilities was what was called the, quote, silversneakers generation. And that was designated as 55 and above. I’m above 55. So I’m like, wait a minute, I am not a silversneakers guy.

Federica Amati: [00:23:43] Like, wait a minute,

Jonathan Fields: [00:23:43] I’m a hiking six hours a week in the mountains. I’m like. Like, really? Are you serious? But it is. And this was probably 20 years ago. It’s like perceptions have shifted really dramatically over the last chunk of time. Let’s talk about some specific things to think about then. And sort of like this season of life. I think one of the things that comes up on a really regular basis, and I know you’ve done some work around this and spoken about it is protein protein needs. We’ve got, you know, in the US we’ve got the RDAs, we’ve got a bunch of research now, some of it coming out of Stanford Longevity Center that actually says those numbers are way too low for the 50 plus generation. You know, it really needs to be boosted. How do we think about protein? The mid-season of life?

Federica Amati: [00:24:26] I love talking about protein because I think what happens and I still sometimes it’s hard to get the nuance right with this. So people are very interested in protein. There’s a very big industry around protein and lots of marketing now. Protein is essential for life. It’s essential for good health. It’s essential for longevity. And no one debates that. Everyone’s on board with that, I think. But the question here is really like how do we advise on protein needs and protein levels in a way that’s helpful to the individual and that doesn’t impact negatively impact the rest of the dietary pattern? So I think the research around, I would say more 70 plus. So the really compelling research and evidence I’ve seen around increased protein needs in any sort of significant way has been for people 70 plus or. And this is another big caveat. Or people who have existing conditions, which means they can’t nourish themselves appropriately or don’t absorb food efficiently, which obviously happens from the 6060 plus. It is a problem now. Protein requirements across the lifespan vary quite a lot. So the highest protein needs in terms of grams, grams per kilograms or pounds per kilogram or whatever, where you guys gram grams per pound are highest in childhood. That’s obvious when you think about it, because there is so much tissue being built, your these little humans are literally growing at incredible speed. Now, we don’t talk about protein deficiency in children.

Federica Amati: [00:26:10] Luckily, in high income countries that have access to food, even though they have the highest requirements. And that’s because if a child is eating enough food, they will be absorbing enough protein. And that’s even with these much higher requirements, right? For building new tissue. As we age, that requirement starts to come down in terms of like how many grams per body weight you need. The exception to this rule is in pregnancy. So pregnant women have a sudden increased need for protein because they’re building a whole person and a whole new organ to house the new baby in. Right. But interestingly, supplementing with protein in pregnancy can be dangerous. So you would never recommend that a pregnant woman takes a protein supplement because counterintuitively, it can actually cause intrauterine growth restriction. So there is something about the availability of protein from food and the way that we have designed our evolved to absorb it, which means that we actually don’t want to supplement it. Okay, so that’s like an interesting fact. I want people to hold that in their minds as we age. The biggest factor that that is front of mind for a lot of people is this sarcopenic effect of aging. So after the age of 30, we all start to lose the ability to build and retain muscle mass. And why does anyone care about that? Not because we all want to look like Baywatch on the beach, but because actually our musculoskeletal mass is what keeps us upright and it’s what keeps us independent.

Federica Amati: [00:27:44] So again, thinking ahead, like in your 80s and 90s, you want to get out of your own chair unassisted. You want to be able to walk down the stairs. You want to be able to pick up your shopping bags and take them home. All of these seemingly mundane movements that you might take for granted in your 30s and 40s become the difference between independent living and dependent living in later life. And they are very heavily reliant on your musculoskeletal system functioning well. So to make sure we maintain that there’s two things need to happen. We need to have regular movement that challenges our musculoskeletal system to keep strong. And that’s number one. Okay. So if you’re not moving every day and I would argue that this needs to start ideally it starts in childhood regular movement. And then in your 20s and 30s and 40s you make it a practice where you’re like, I’m going to challenge my body to make sure that my muscles are strong and they are flexible, and they can do different movements in different ranges of motions on different planes. So really varying that up and secondary to that increased movement or that regular movement and that challenge to our bodies comes the need for protein. Now I say it that way around, because if you’re somebody who exercises regularly and moves their body regularly, our body is very clever.

Federica Amati: [00:29:06] It makes us hungrier. So if you’re somebody who regularly engages in strenuous exercise of whatever weight it might be dancing, it might be weightlifting, it might be running, it might be a combination of these things. You will feel hungrier than if you don’t move. So our body naturally encourages us to eat more food when we do this kind of exercise. And more food contains protein. So naturally we start to actually eat more protein. The critical factor here is the quality of the food. If we eat a variety of whole foods plants, animal based, if we animal based doesn’t have to be. Plants contain all 20 amino acids. It is slightly. You have to think a bit more about getting adequate protein amounts from plants, but it’s completely possible to do. There are plenty of examples of vegan athletes that do this very well. But we have to be eating quite good quality food to help our body achieve not just the protein requirements it needs, but also all of the other macro and micronutrients and bioactive compounds that either aren’t even part of the macro micronutrient list. Now, when we think about. So I don’t like to think too much about the 0.83g/kg recommendation. Or is it 1.1 or is it two point? You know, the reason I don’t. And there is listen, there is good evidence to support that. Actually the 0.83 goes up to 1g/kg after the age of 60.

Federica Amati: [00:30:39] And then there’s good evidence to support that. Actually, women who are exercising to maintain muscle mass can go up to 1.6g/kg. And if you’re an athlete, an endurance athlete, then actually it’s two grams. Because what I’m saying is like it depends. So like your Recommended amount of protein depends on your life stage. Depends on your activity level. It also then depends. We add other layers in like do you have a gastrointestinal issue which means you have malabsorption? I think fixating too much on there’s a big argument in academia of should it be higher or should it actually be lower? There’s a whole field of nutrition science that that actually suggests that lowering protein recommendations could help improve longevity. The way I look at this is to say, look, there’s disagreement within science about what the perfect number is. There is consensus that the 0.8g/kg recommendation ensures that 97.5% of the population are getting more than they need for good health maintenance. There’s a bit of a myth going around that that number is what’s needed to not be deficient. That’s not the case. The deficiency number is 0.7. So the 0.8 recommendation is above that. And it covers the vast majority of the population. But to your point, Jonathan, like when we start thinking about later life. So if you’re somebody who’s like late 60s, early 70s, then it is worth prioritizing protein when thinking about the foods we’re eating.

Federica Amati: [00:32:20] And we still need to ensure the movement part is there. So like movement is still critical. But it is true that later in life. So after our 60s, mid 60s, our ability to absorb protein starts to wane. So we just become a bit less efficient. And we also our appetite starts to wane. So that natural way that our body would normally say, oh, I’ve actually exercised, I’m a bit hungrier than usual, starts to serve us less. So knowing that it becomes less of an issue of like, oh, we need to increase protein, have protein supplements and more of a make sure you’re eating regularly and make sure you’re having plenty of nutritious foods that are high in protein, but ideally are also nutritious and lots of other ways, because your body is just getting a little bit less efficient at absorption and your hunger signaling is becoming a bit less efficient. So that’s how I frame it. Um, now I want to caveat it loads because it’s a complex topic that no athletes ever care, because athletes are so used to thinking about their nutrition on a personal level for their specific performance and their specific sport, and whether they’re competing or not. They know this stuff. Like they know that it’s nuanced and that it depends. But yeah, just caveating that, of course, athletes have special considerations to make with tissue repair and tissue maintenance.

Jonathan Fields: [00:33:42] Like the big quote here is it’s complicated. And there’s there’s no one number that is consistently right for anybody. And in fact, there’s no one number that’s consistently right for a single person over a window of time. Right. Maybe you’re in a season where you’ve been really sedentary. You know, like that’s going to affect it. Maybe you’re in a season where you’re just like, you’re really excited and you’re recommitting to your lifestyle and you’re, you know, you’re you’re working out on a on a daily basis. And, um, and your body is then going to ratchet up the demands. Um, but I like the way that you tie these two together and that you start by saying, like, movement is actually the first thing that we talk about here, because that is what sets up and helps determine what your actual demand for protein is. And then as, as we age, like, so if we start out in midlife saying, like, we really just need to like, let’s focus on movement a lot. And we have hunger signals that are better correlated to the deficit, the caloric deficit, maybe, or whatever the other signals are in our system that could trigger to make us hungry and want to eat more and have more protein naturally when we’re exercising, when removing our body.

Jonathan Fields: [00:34:51] But that that correlation from what? Tell me if I’m getting this right, the correlation starts to break down or those signals start to break down a bit when you move into your late 60s, maybe 70s and beyond. So we need to be more conscientious about saying I need I actually now need to pay more attention. And also, I guess I’ve seen some of the research in your 70s where they mentioned this thing they describe as anabolic resistance, where, if I understand it correctly, it literally takes more protein. I’ve seen this compared to 20 year old and a seven year old, and it takes literally twice the amount of protein to effectively wake up your body system and let it know it’s time to actually use this protein to build muscle or to sustain muscle so that you’re not dropping into sarcopenia and lack of mobility and disability. Do I have that right?

Federica Amati: [00:35:41] Yeah. That’s right. So the stimulus needed and actually, you know, it starts early. So the stimulus needed to build muscle is gets higher and higher and higher as we age. So like both from the exercise front. So you need to put much more effort in to build muscle mass as you get older from an exercise perspective and from a protein availability perspective. So like yes, as you get older, not only do you actually have to like lift heavier if you will, but also you need to make sure that you have more than enough protein so that your body can use it more efficiently. And it goes back to this concept that we just become a little bit less efficient at absorption. If you think of, um, the way that our nutrients are distributed in the body. So there’s a central post office, which is the liver, and it just as we age, it just gets a little bit less efficient as packaging things up nicely and sending them out to the tissues and the tissues themselves, like the locks and the doors to access the cells are a bit jammed. So it’s the whole picture is that it just needs a bit more work, a bit more encouragement. But again, like if you have maintained metabolic flexibility well in your life, for some people, that’s going to be much later than others. So you can’t even really put a cut off point. It’s just a gradual thing. But it’s worth having that in mind. And you know, the appetite, the loss of appetite is a really well-known factor in why people in older age, especially those who live alone or who suffer from loneliness, they are at much higher risk of undernutrition and malnutrition because the actual stimulus, the actual appetite stimulus, really goes down.

Federica Amati: [00:37:20] So just being aware of that can help. Even if you’re supporting someone you love, right? You can say, oh, okay. That’s why this person I love has like forgot to eat today because their actual physical stimulus has gone down. So making the time and the effort to say, right, okay, it’s lunchtime, I’m going to eat something even if I’m not super hungry, which is different to earlier in life. Right? And going back to what you said, I love how you kind of played back the appetite increase with movement. So what I love to focus on with people is okay, you’re going to do more exercise. It’s going to stimulate your body to need more protein to build the muscle that you’re stimulating it to build or to maintain. So there is a caloric deficit. There’s a caloric need, of course, but there is also a nitrogen balance. So our body is very well equipped to maintain good nitrogen balance, which of course comes from amines and proteins. That system like the amine, the nitrogen balance system actually calibrates quite slowly. So it takes about six weeks. So if you’re someone who wants to feeling really motivated, actually, I really want to work on maintaining my muscle mass this year. So I’ll use myself as an example. Right. So I’ve like decided that this show, I’m going to up my weight training schedule and do it more frequently. I like to engage in lots of different types of exercise, but I’ve decided that this is the year I’m going to lift heavier. Now, I haven’t consciously, rapidly increased my protein intake because what we don’t want to do is be in a position where we overindex on protein, because we’re in this like frame of mind, where we want to really focus on that.

Federica Amati: [00:38:58] And then our body takes about six weeks to get to a place of like, okay, this is our new nitrogen balance. This is how much we expect, and this is how much we expect to get rid of. And then after, like, I don’t know, two months or three months, I’m like, oh, actually I’m quite tired and I have a couple of weeks off because I, my kid catches a virus and I don’t train. Suddenly my nitrogen balance is impacted. I’m eating instead of like taking my protein supplements. I start because I’m not training and it goes back down. It takes another six weeks to recalibrate. And this is something that bodybuilders are like, hugely aware of because they see it. So you know, in bodybuilding you have this massive ramp up phase just before the competition, huge amounts of like protein and tissue and water retention. And then after the competition, it’s like right when the nitrogen balance is impacted and it falls off a cliff, it goes down very rapidly. Our body is always trying to maintain homeostasis. It doesn’t like big things changing. And so you can imagine that if you suddenly go from having lots of protein every meal, because that’s what you’re indexing on to suddenly not your body tries to keep that that nitrogen balance by finding nitrogen from somewhere to maintain it. Now, why do you think it gets it from if we’re not eating it.

Jonathan Fields: [00:40:10] In body tissue? Muscle?

Federica Amati: [00:40:12] Yes.

Jonathan Fields: [00:40:13] Yeah.

Federica Amati: [00:40:13] So what we really want to avoid is getting into a place. And I see this a lot with, um, clients of mine who do have been on a yo yo dieting journey, and they’ll sort of go really big on gym and protein shakes and protein for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and then they’ll get tired of it, and then they will start eating like more normally again. And they’ll see this body composition change. And it’s because your body is trying to understand what’s going on and trying to recalibrate. So remembering that there’s a six week window is really important. So start your training and instead of obsessing about protein really think about the quality of your food. Are you eating whole foods that present a variety of nutrients. So when your appetite goes up, are you eating this like wonderful variety of foods that’s supporting your body? For lots of reasons. Because if you’re also someone who’s suddenly training a lot harder, you also want to have plenty of bioactives that reduce inflammation so that you’re less sore and your muscles recover faster. You also want to make sure you’re getting plenty of minerals and electrolytes and salts to help you replenish after, like a really sweaty workout. And that does not mean you have to take supplements. You get that from your fruits and your vegetables and your nuts and your seeds. So if we actually help people to engage with what are the foods that offer all of the elements to support your health journey, then it’s going to work so much better for your body and it’s going to be much more sustainable, because one thing that I have seen in my clinical practice is that having chicken breasts for breakfast is not fun. And and there’s a point at which you just get a bit tired of trying to reach the really high goals.

Jonathan Fields: [00:41:51] I think I tried that once. That was like I lasted maybe half halfway through it. That was it.

Federica Amati: [00:41:58] Yeah.

Jonathan Fields: [00:41:58] I mean, I love sort of like just the realistic approach here. And also it’s so good to know that, you know, like when you really think about it, our body wants to maintain a certain homeostatic and there’s, you know, and there are delays in the way that the systems function together. It takes time to ramp up. It takes time to ramp down. And when different things fall out of sync with those sort of like ramping windows, then stuff goes a little bit haywire and we probably just notice it in our physical body and we have no idea what happened. And we just think, like, everything I’m doing is wrong and just shut down. And because it’s too confusing, I can’t even figure it out. Rather than saying no, let me actually just take a longer term. Here. So much of what we’re talking about is actually taking a more forgiving, expansive, longer term horizon and being really grounded in what you’re thinking about.

Federica Amati: [00:42:42] And I think if we could make consistency the word. So it’s like instead of striving for to my optimal or like perfect or consistent, it’s it sounds quite boring doesn’t it? But actually consistency is king. So if you can just be really consistent with the quality of the foods, with the kind of variety consistent with thinking, like being really quite conscious of the way that you’re feeding your body and it’s not just you. When I say body, by the way, it’s body and mind, right? It’s all connected. So if you’re thinking that way about food and about your diet and about your lifestyle habits, then you’re not posing your physiology constant challenges of huge change. Because as we said earlier, it’s like often people will start something and they’ll ramp up, ramp up, ramp up, and then they’ll, oh, failed and they’ll stop completely and then it’ll be something else. Ramp up and fail. And if you look at that from your body’s point of view, it’s like, oh, new thing, new thing. Oh my God, the thing’s gone. Oh new thing, new thing. Oh my God, the thing’s gone. It’s like panic. What’s happening? Because I think people often forget that our bodies don’t know what we’re doing.

Federica Amati: [00:43:54] They just get the signals from what we’re eating, what we’re drinking, the air we’re breathing. So our body functions on the way it reads, the external environment. You know, the perceived stresses and the real stresses all have the same impact internally. Because if we’re stressed about a meeting that we have with the really important client, the stress signals are the same as if we’re stressed because we’re being chased by a lion. So we have to remember that our body’s interpreting signals without knowing what the thought process is behind them. So our body doesn’t know if we’re just going on a juice cleanse, or if we’re actually starving because the changes are similar. And so if we think about that and we think about how kind consistency is for our well-being, it changes the way people think. We’re not here to punish ourselves, right? We’re not here to strive for perfection and then fail. And then we’re here to just offer as consistent and kind and approach to our health as possible. Because at the end of the day, that’s way more sustainable as an approach. And it also means that you’re likely to enjoy it along the way.

Jonathan Fields: [00:45:02] That makes so much more sense. And again, we’re not putting our physiological and our our mental states through the stress of having like, dun dun dun dun dun falling off a cliff, fail, judge ourselves, stress like piling on. And then then the next thing just kind of repeating that cycle, which does its own damage. And we’ll be right back after a word from our sponsors. So we’ve gone pretty deep into this fascinating relationship between protein, muscle, sarcopenia, whole foods, how to get it in all sorts of different ways, and how that shows up through different age cycles. One of the other thing that I think starts to come up fairly often as we move into midlife and then later in life is bone density. Bone loss. Like, I think this is and I think it’s an increasing thing that’s coming up earlier in life for so many people as nutrition that is not wonderful and so much sedentary living. There was a time where if you went to your doctor, you got your physical and your late 40s and you got your first bone density test. And there was a little questionable immediately the first word out of the mouth was, okay, you need to start taking calcium. Yes, it sounds like the research on that has changed pretty radically over the last decade or so. So take me into this.

Federica Amati: [00:46:16] Yes. Now it’s, uh, not considered best clinical practice for most people. Again, caveat that if your doctor has prescribed this for you, there will be a reason. But calcium supplementation itself carries risk for cardiovascular disease risk. So we don’t generally recommend calcium supplementation, which is I think actually this is a really nice example of where we see that there’s a real benefit of calcium rich foods to improve bone density. But if you then just take the calcium out and give that as a supplement, it does not have the same effect. So there are like in some cases vitamin D with K magnesium and calcium as a combination supplement can be beneficial. It really depends on like life stage, the the stage at which your bone mineral density is as well. So there’s a, there’s a scale of course, where you intervene. The researchers that’s coming out now really suggest that there’s mechanisms by which you can improve or at least maintain bone mineral density without further rapid deterioration with a combination of things. Again, so when we think about bone tissue as a live tissue, often people just think, oh, it’s there, it’s dry, it doesn’t do anything, but it’s a very live, spongy, blood vessel filled tissue that has lots going on, and there’s cells that are continuously breaking it down, building it up, breaking it down. But it’s just that as we age, the break down definitely supersedes the build up. And but there’s really like so the availability of calcium for the build up is very important. But there’s other signaling involved. You know, the one I find most fascinating is the relationship between the gut microbiome and the bone.

Federica Amati: [00:48:03] So there’s a gut brain axis and gut microbes. Specific gut microbes produce metabolites that essentially either encourage the bone tissue to remineralise and to increase bone density or the other way around. So there’s a lot going on with signaling outside of the simple like calcium in build the bone. And as with a lot of supplements and a lot of like recommendations, we have to tailor it to the individual. So for instance, if you had somebody who had an increased risk of cardiovascular disease, or I would struggle to to think of an example where that would it would be a good idea to supplement with calcium in that case. Right. But would you recommend that they eat calcium rich foods? Absolutely. Does that mean drinking glasses of milk? No, actually. So there’s again, like dairy as a as a bucket of food is so diverse, it’s almost counterintuitive to put it all together. So you have dairy milk by the glass and butter that don’t seem to have anywhere near the same beneficial effects as cheese, yogurt and kefir. So butter. Right? Unfortunately, high saturated fat will put up your cholesterol if you eat it like, a lot. And actually, glasses of milk don’t seem to have this really sizable beneficial impact on the bone, on the health. Whereas regular yogurt kefir cheese consumption. Good for the gut, good for your bones, good for lots of things. So we have to understand that. And also remember that calcium is present in so many other foods outside of dairy green leafy vegetables, nuts and seeds. So getting it from a variety of sources with different minerals within that same food, and ideally that also support your gut health for that gut bone axis to be helpful, helpful.

Federica Amati: [00:49:51] And Jonathan, you won’t be surprised to hear me say that again. If you want to maintain your bone mineral density, the bone needs a physical stimulus to continue staying strong. So you refer to sedentary lifestyles. Massive culprit for this. You know, some I spoke to a wonderful doctor who’s a specialist, a CPA will come back to me later. And she was telling me that in her clinical practice she has seen women as young as like 24 come in with low bone mineral density, and that’s a combination of sedentary lifestyles and undernutrition, malnutrition, so restrictive dieting, avoiding foods really detrimental, like taking away the building blocks for healthy body. So we need to stimulate that bone to want to repair and grow and then offer it the right minerals, including calcium. But it’s not the only thing the right pathways need to be activated to make sure that then that bone mineral density is maintained or sometimes even improved. So that we had a wonderful specialist, an expert in osteoporosis and bone health on the Zoe Science and Nutrition podcast. And I think it’s the best explanation I’ve ever heard of how bone mineral density is maintained. So I would encourage anyone interested in this specific topic to really go and listen to that, because the science has evolved. We understand bone mineral density much more now than we did sort of ten, 15 years ago. And again, we’re trying to take a more holistic approach in how we advise people to maintain good bone mineral density, because it is important for, again, maintaining that independence later in life.

Jonathan Fields: [00:51:34] It’s so fascinating how so many things are tying back to the gut microbiome these days. Also, you know, like I never actually heard the phrase that there’s like there’s like a bone gut axis. I’m just so excited for the research that’s going on there. It seems like we’re so in the beginning of that, but the data is coming fast and furious like I in ten years. I think it’ll be really exciting to see what it’s really telling us on a prescriptive basis, especially like when we can go more from correlation to causation and then from causation to like if you do this like then. So that’s calcium. Calcium matters. But just taking it basically as an isolated supplement, probably not the thing to do. Unless again, if you have a qualified health care provider who has given you this, don’t just stop doing what you’re doing, like consult them and have a conversation about this. The other thing that that I think, you know, we really are starting to think about as we move through midlife and then into later in life, is how nutrition impacts. We touched on this a little bit earlier in our conversation, how it impacts our cognitive health. You know, like our whether it’s just a slow decline in cognitive function or whether it’s risk for Alzheimer’s or dementia. What do we know about how to think about nutrition and and this both in midlife and then later in life, if we’re already starting to experience something?

Federica Amati: [00:52:51] Yes. I mean, this is one of the areas I think is the most exciting. So brain health and, you know, we’ve moved now away from this idea that the blood brain barrier kept everything out and that the brain was somehow magically encapsulated away. We’ve moved past that, and we now understand that, But especially what we eat has literally a direct connection to our brain. And this is in actually several ways. So there’s a lot of people will have heard of the gut brain axis. And this idea that our gut microbes, our gut microbiome, talks to our brain and impacts it. And it’s true. But it’s like in several ways, right. So the first thing to know is the the main way we think about the gut brain axis in terms of neuronal connection is the vagus nerve. And the vagus nerve is like huge and it’s massive. It goes through the entire body. It connects to other organs as well, but primarily it connects to the gut. And what I find fascinating is that the majority of the traffic in the vagus nerve. So if you think of the vagus nerve as like a massive highway, the majority of the traffic of information used to be thought to be going from the brain to the gut. So like telling the gut what’s going on and how to react. Then it was thought that it was about 50 5050, and now it’s well established that it’s about 80% gut up and 20% brain to the gut.

Federica Amati: [00:54:16] So there’s this real I was sort of talking earlier about this idea that our body reacts to external stimuli to understand what to do and what’s going on. A major part of this is our gut telling our brain, like, this is what we’ve come into contact with. This is what we’ve swallowed. This is what’s in our food. Like so many things, this is the these are the drugs that we’ve got in the system. This is how much excreted cholesterol we have from our blood back into the feces. Like there’s so much going on. Right? There’s this, like, really interesting connection. There’s a relationship between the enteric nervous system. So this second brain, as we call it, huge network that feeds into vagal nerve, vagus nerve communication and the brain. And then there’s the chemicals that the gut microbes actually produce. So the chemicals that they produce directly impact the signaling, but they also impact how well regulated the inflammation in the gut is. So the gut barrier is one cell thick. It’s fairly fragile considering how much goes on there. And it relies really quite heavily on having a really lovely thick mucin layer that keeps the excretion products inside the gut away from the gut barrier and away from the immune system cells that sit just outside the gut barrier, ready and waiting just in case a pathogen comes through.

Federica Amati: [00:55:42] And we need to sort of react. Right. So this mucin layer is critical. And a lot of the mucin layer is is encouraged. So the cells that make it feed off of short chain fatty acids, which is one of the primary metabolites of gut microbes, by the way gut microbes make hundreds. So I should state that they make neurotransmitters and enzymes and vitamins for us. But short chain fatty acids have this really specific and important role in providing energy for the gut cells to do their job. When our diets don’t support this sort of activity and the mucin layer becomes degraded, what happens is that so the gut microbes that are starved of the prebiotic fibers of the polyphenols in diet, they actually start to eat the mucin, which is not what we want. And then the barrier becomes compromised. And we have what is sometimes referred to as increased permeability. Some people love calling it leaky gut. I hate that term, but you know it gets the picture right. And this directly impacts inflammation of the gut. Now this is important because it’s not comfortable. And it leads to, you know, gastric effects. So like irritable bowel syndrome obviously has increased inflammation. But for the brain this is especially important because those inflammatory cytokines in the gut which are the proteins that send out the signals saying, hey, something’s wrong here.

Federica Amati: [00:57:07] Like we’re not happy. Travel to the brain and inflammatory cytokines are small enough to cross the blood brain barrier. They affect the inflammatory status of the brain. Now, this is a huge. This is not actually a massive. It’s not a brand new theory. It’s a few years old, but it’s so powerful that there is now a real understanding that increased inflammation and systemic inflammation, which is often in most people, driven by gut inflammation. Now there are obviously conditions like rheumatoid arthritis, where it’s systemic because of autoimmune conditions is directly linked to your risk of brain health diseases including depression and anxiety, but also risk of Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s and other diseases. What’s really amazing about brain thinking about the future of brain health is actually brain health and gut health are becoming so interconnected. And I love thinking about evolutionary theory, and I love thinking about how we form in the womb. And when you think about how we form in the womb comes from the same tissue, like the initial folding, right? So when you think about it that way, it’s not that surprising, but it is to think that we can directly impact the risk of brain diseases by influencing gut health.

Federica Amati: [00:58:30] And you already you probably already know this, Jonathan, but, you know, there’s theories around the origins of Parkinson’s disease in the gut. And now Alzheimer’s is the more recent theory that we think there’s actually certain. So Professor John Cryan, University of York, he’s the leading world expert in this. And he recently wrote a paper explaining his, you know, one of the working theories that there’s microbial translocation from the gut to the brain that is causing inflammation, that is triggering plaque formation as an inflammatory response. I mean, that changes the way we think about Alzheimer’s. So in some ways, what this means is that we can actually act to change this risk. So we know this genetic predispositions for some of these diseases. But these are predispositions, their risks. They’re not necessarily they’re not certainties. There’s very few purely genetic conditions. That means you will 100% get this right. Huntington’s disease is one of them. One of the most famous. But there’s less than 2% of diseases have that. Now we have this clear picture building up of how the brain brain health is affected by the gut. It helps to explain why diet plays such an important role on brain health. Like, why is it that certain dietary patterns seem to reduce the risk of dementia so much? How is it that an intervention giving people with severe depression.

Federica Amati: [00:59:59] A mediterranean dietary intervention reduces the depression risk by a depression score by 30%. Like how did that how? So what the gut microbiome offers is understanding the pathway that what is the mediating factor between consumption of this food and a health outcome. Now, of course, it’s not purely through the gut microbiome and the gut brain axis. There are also important factors in the diet that are themselves cognitively protective because they protect the neurons. So neuroprotective elements. One of the most famous is that caffeine consumption, which is known to be neuroprotective to improve cognitive function. The other. But some people are caffeine sensitive. So it’s like we don’t want people to heart palpitations and lose out on sleep. There’s lots of other ways that we think about how food protects the brain. Having a healthy dietary fat profile in your diet is incredibly important for brain health. So making sure that you are getting a variety of omega three fatty acids in the diet of poly and mono unsaturated fatty acids in the diet. Blood flow to the brain is incredibly important. How can we protect cardiovascular health to make sure that your brain is getting enough oxygen, essentially because your arteries are blocked? So how can we make sure your vascular vascular health and brain health are like that, like they coexist, right. So again, it’s like thinking thinking about all these different things.

Federica Amati: [01:01:22] Hypertension is huge risk factor for cognitive decline. The last thing that I think is talked about. But sometimes it’s missed. And I’m fascinated to see in clinical practice not just my own but others, how this can sometimes hold the key to transformative cognitive improvement in in older people specifically sort of over the age of 65. And that is alcohol. So there’s a sort of narrative, I think, that exists that having a drink a day, if you’ve had a drink a day or all of your life and you’re okay, then you can continue to do so into older age. But the effects of alcohol, especially the neurotoxic effects of alcohol, are worse when we’re older. So like you might be able to drink quite regularly in your 20s and 30s and 40s and still go to work and function and have, you know, it’s not ideal for anyone. Let’s be honest, it’s a class one carcinogen, a neurotoxin. It is a teratogen. It’s not something we definitely want to have every day. But the effects, the neurotoxic effects get worse as we age. So you can sometimes have a transformative impact on someone’s life by just asking them to reduce their alcohol intake later in life. And that’s worth mentioning for anyone who’s listening who thinks, huh, maybe I do drink every day and maybe I shouldn’t.

Jonathan Fields: [01:02:38] Yeah. And maybe, for reasons different than they were thinking about, if we zoom the lens out, it’s like so much of what we’re talking about. I think we’ve learned so much more about the the mechanisms of why all these things are happening now. We can now draw these connections that we haven’t been able to draw before and measure things we haven’t been able to measure before. And a lot of myths have sort of fallen by the wayside. But it’s funny because, you know, if you really zoom the lens out here and you say, okay, so like, what do we do? It’s kind of what, like, you know, parents have been like sort of like telling their kids to do like 50 years ago. It’s like, you know, go move your body on a regular basis, you know, like challenge your mind, be social, and then just eat a lot of really good whole foods that are, you know, like as close to the earth as you can get and, and clean proteins. It’s funny. It’s like we’ve become so obsessed with measuring everything and finding all of the individual nutrients and supplements and vitamins and micronutrients and macros and like that. But at the end of the day, it sounds like what you’re really talking about is, is so much more basic than where I think so, so often we’re headed.

Federica Amati: [01:03:50] You’re so right. So it’s so funny because I think there’s two faces to nutrition. There’s food wisdom. I love that term. Food wisdom is what your grandma would have told you to eat. Like eat your greens first or, you know, make sure you get you have some fruit today. So things that a lot of people listening would be like oh yeah. Like actually in all cultures, by the way, there is always like this food wisdom of eating herbs, eating greens, eating vegetables, eating seasonally. It’s really interesting because a lot of the science we have now explains the complex mechanisms behind why these things work, right. But the actual advice is not massively different. So we I think we have to give credit to ourselves and our ancestors that we evolved as a species, centering our entire lives around the food we eat. So when we think back to hunter gatherer times. We would spend many hours of our day hunting and gathering food, and then we would come back to our tribe and we would share the food, and then we would draw pictures on the cave walls of how we found the food. Okay, now there’s also this beautiful theory that we co-evolved with the gut microbes that we have, which is why we have such an unusually long, large intestine with an unusually large surface area for mammals.

Federica Amati: [01:05:18] And the most recent theories around why we evolved to have such big brains and be so smart actually center around the role of the gut microbiome in helping us to achieve that. So we’ve literally co-evolved with this wonderful community of microbes that allow us to absorb nutrients from the plants and the roots and the fruits and the nuts and the seeds that we use to forage, that we do not code our genetic code does not code the enzymes to break down. So we would have never been able to extract nutrients from these foods had it not been for the coevolution with our gut microbes. Right. And now here we are many thousands of years later. And what’s happened is that we’ve our food culture has shifted very rapidly in the last 100 years, away from food being a central tenet of what we do and towards convenience. And it’s suddenly like, you don’t need to think about what you’re going to eat because you can just drink your lunch. Whoa, that is not what we evolved to do, right? So what’s happened now is that our science is actually bringing us back to, hey, look at how clever that evolution thing was, and look at all the mechanisms in place that allow us to thrive and survive eating this variety of foods and making the most of this variety of other foods that are actually less accessible historically and have a very resilient system that can store different things in different ways.

Federica Amati: [01:06:49] So when we start to appreciate that, I think we start to view food differently as well. So sometimes the narrative that like, oh, science is just telling us what we already know. I think that’s wonderful. What science is helping us do is understand how this is working and why it’s working, like nutrition science is at the point now where we can literally say, okay, this pathway is leading to this, and this metabolite is causing this effect. And how amazing that we understand that, but it doesn’t change what works. So I’m always very cautious of people who try to overcomplicate nutrition advice. Nutrition science is complex. Sure. And that’s why it’s its own science. And that’s why we should always ideally seek nutrition science expert advice on nutrition, because it is its own thing, right? So I would never go to a gynecologist to ask advice on my cardiovascular health because it’s a different system. And so I would urge people to really look to nutrition professionals to find out about nutrition, basically, that I’m not taking that away. Nutrition science is complex, but the simplicity of good food advice and the simplicity of the diet that actually helps us thrive comes from our biology, comes from evolution.

Federica Amati: [01:08:07] When people try to overcomplicate, that is, for me, the biggest red flag. So when people are saying, you know, lectins are killing you, or the fructose pathway explains everything and therefore you should avoid all fruit, or this fear mongering around food is completely unfounded. It’s unscientific basically. So people just should be able to embrace the fact that food is there to literally support our health. It’s we have evolved to thrive off food. If you find yourself fearing food and embracing unregulated supplements, the balance is off. Like we need to return to what we know has helped us thrive and get her as a species now. There is also a lot of concern, specifically in the US, around the quality of our food, around the nutrient composition of food, around farming practices. And listen, these are very valid points. There is overwhelming science to suggest and not to suggest. There is overwhelming science to confirm that eating a whole food diet that is predominantly made of whole plants not all made. As I said, we don’t have to be vegan, but mostly plants, including nuts and seeds, whole grains, legumes, beans, chickpeas, legumes, all those wonderful foods mushrooms, aubergines, tomatoes, whatever you like to eat, herbs and spices is going to support our health and it’s going to allow us to thrive and continue to live a long and healthy life.

Federica Amati: [01:09:40] If you’re worried about the quality of the food that you’re eating, then there is always a way to slightly improve that. But for the majority of people, affording food is the primary barrier. And so if you find food that is affordable for you and your family, that is as many people as possible. That is the most important factor. Whether it’s organic or grass fed or from a biodynamic farm, is a secondary factor that we’re moving from a size effect that is big to a relatively small size effect. So I think the really important job we have now in public health nutrition, which is sort of my my branch, is to remove the fear of food and help people to reconnect with food as a really powerful ally that we need to embrace, because otherwise, the way we’re headed. Well, where we are now is that diet-related chronic diseases are the number one killers. So that’s not working. So we need to re-embrace the power of food as a health ally and do that in a way where we take personal agency. So as much as we can have power to choose, we do. But we also put huge pressure on government and on policymakers to make healthy food a priority for everyone, because we can make changes ourselves, but we don’t all have the same access to change.

Federica Amati: [01:11:12] So to level out the playing field, pressure needs to be put above to stop putting profit over people’s health and regulate some of the food industry. To make healthy food healthy, whole food accessible and equitable for everyone. Return to our roots. That is like the future of public health nutrition and that includes supporting our farmers. It includes making our food systems more efficient. It actually also includes working with the food industry to make processed foods healthier, because that is possible. And then the part that I’m passionate about and that I hope to be doing by talking to people like yourself, is to educate people on the power that food can have for them to help improve their lives, their enjoyment of life, their longevity, and that it doesn’t have to be complicated or scary. It can be pleasurable and fun. I mean, I love food, right? Some people don’t have the best relationship with food, but at a very primordial level, very, very sort of biological level. Food is enjoyable. Eating is pleasurable. So reconnecting with that, even if it means starting with a square of dark chocolate and letting it melt really slowly on your mouth. There’s so much to be gained from embracing food as a health ally on all levels social, physical, mental. Like. It’s amazing.

Jonathan Fields: [01:12:37] I love that. And it feels like a good place for us to, uh, come full circle as well. So in this container of Good Life Project, if I offer up the phrase to live a good life, what comes up?

Federica Amati: [01:12:48] I think for me to live a good life is to really I. I live my life enjoying every day, doing my best every day, knowing that I’ve been true to myself and my values. And that includes investing in myself for me to be the best person I can be for myself in my work, but primarily for my two children, my girls, because I want to be around to enjoy them and and enjoy life with them for as long as I can.

Jonathan Fields: [01:13:22] Thank you.

Federica Amati: [01:13:23] Yeah. Thank you.

Jonathan Fields: [01:13:25] Hey, before you leave, if you love this episode, safe bet, you’ll also love the conversation we had with Doctor Gabrielle Lyon about the muscle-centric approach to aging well, you’ll find a link to that episode in the show notes. This episode of Good Life Project was produced by executive producers Lindsey Fox and me, Jonathan Fields. Editing help by, Alejandro Ramirez and Troy Young. Kristoffer Carter crafted our theme music, and of course, if you haven’t already done so, please go ahead and follow Good Life Project in your favorite listening app or on YouTube too. If you found this conversation interesting or valuable and inspiring, chances are you did because you’re still listening here. Do me a personal favor. A seven-second favor. Share it with just one person. I mean, if you want to share it with more, that’s awesome too. But just one person even then, invite them to talk with you about what you’ve both discovered to reconnect and explore ideas that really matter. Because that’s how we all come alive together. Until next time. I’m Jonathan Fields signing off for Good Life Project.