Gabrielle Lyon

MUSCLE EXPERT
PODCAST

EP-63 : Gabrielle Lyon

Welcome to the Muscle Expert podcast with Ben Pakulski, one of the world’s top
professional bodybuilders – an expert on human performance and mindset
mastery. Ben dives deep to deliver the strategy of top experts to upgrade your
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control of your body, your brain, and create your greatest life!

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BEN

Hey what’s up ladies and gents? Muscle Expert Podcast, Ben Pakulski, and today, we’re going to interview Dr. Gabrielle Lyon.
She’s a fellowship-trained nutrition and cognition physician, she’s got her own center called The Ash Centre for Comprehensive
Medicine, in Manhattan. And this lady isn’t degrading everything when it comes to optimizing muscle, and you guys are going
to want to listen to this one because if you like muscle and you like longevity, you’re going to love this.
We dive on everything, as far as hormones, training environment, mindset, and you know I’m a geek around mindset. Dr.
Gabrielle isawesome, she’s got incredible message, ladies you’re going to love it, guys you’re going to love it. Don’t forget to
leave us a review and share, and I look forward to all of your feedback, have an awesome day and enjoy Dr. Gabrielle Lyon.
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I couldn’t be more excited about talking to you because you’re doing all stuff that I love. Like you’re talking about obviously
muscles and muscle protein synthesis, but also the cognitive aspect which is, where my brain is shifting now. I love it! It’s so
awesome. What do you get excited about? I want to hear about like getting you pumped up in the morning.

DR. GABRIELLE

So it’s really interesting, I’m a functional medicine practitioner, I have a practice on 61st and 5thAvenue in New York City, and it’s
really about optimizing muscle tissue for people. It changes the trajectory of their life, right? And if you think about it, I mean to
you who come from a sporting background, there is this kind of trajectory where people are really kind of like young and they
have a lot of bravado and they maintain all this muscle. And then something happens, the whole dad body or whatever.
Then the trajectory of agingreally decreases, and part of that is because they don’t do the right things to maintain the muscle
integrity. And with their loss of muscle integrity comes the loss of cognitive. It causes cognitive decline as well. I did my fellowship
at Wash UN in Saint Luis, and I did obesity medicine and geriatrics and cognition. So really kind of getting people on track to age
well, and have a lot of longevity is amazing.

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BEN

What is the cause? So from your obviously research and experience, what’s causing that degradation of the muscular integrity,
to use your term? Is it just lack of activity? Is it hormonal degradation?

DR. GABRIELLE

So there is a multi-factorial kind of complex issue that fibers that we typically lose as we age, are the bulk fibers, the strength
fibers, which is why you see people age, they kind of shrink. There’s that natural inclination to happen, but it doesn’t have to.
People tend to work less hard as they age, and then of course, you know the hormonal shift and then also the mind frame.
I know that you’re really interested in the mental capacity of training. The individual’s mind frame and ability to tolerate hard
physical labor and really having a person’s health, also changes.

BEN

You think it’s a fear thing because they are afraid of hurting themselves? Or is it because they no longer have an incentive to
look great?

DR. GABRIELLE

Yeah, I think that there is that loss of intrinsic motivation that happens, and I think that the society that we live in is so easy
to become complacent, internally complacent, unless you’re constantly sharpening yourself, you know, iron sharpens iron
and really to maintain the physical problem as in to really maintain that metabolic organ, which is muscle, requires a whole
different attention as you age.

BEN

I’ve been doing a lot of digging lately, just kind of personally geeking out about androgens effect on neuron transmitters. My
theory obviously is, everyone ages when mitochondria starts to downregulate and lose function and then thereby hormones
aren’t produced as well. And then it goes into neuron transmitters, it’s a massive cascade. I think it’s just has to be hormones
and if we just augment hormones, it seems as though our motivation would be increased because dopamine won’t drop. And
then maybe we’ll be more inspired to train and just be vigorous and rigorous in life.

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DR. GABRIELLE

Yeah, that’s absolutely right. We know that testosterone and estrogens are actually neuron protective. So having hormonal
balance is absolutely neuron protective. It’s really this complex symphony that is extraordinary. Aging does not have to happen
the way that we experience it. It’s crazy!

BEN

So what’s getting you excited about, how are you helping peoplemost? Because I know you’re doing a ton with functional
medicine, just helping people in your day-to-day practice. What are you seeing that’s moving the needle the most for people
and what are you excited about, as far as your direction?

DR. GABRIELLE

People come to me for various specific reasons. I see really two groups of people. I see some of the elite military; seals, special
operations, very specific kind of group. Obviously they have muscle mass and really were looking for medals and inflammation
and keeping their nervous system together. The other part of my practice is people with metabolic impairment. We’ve got
women that have yo-yo dive in their whole life, I have men with low testosterone that are now kind of transitioning to a higher
estrogen state. And really when people come to me, it’s all about muscle-centric medicine. So I’m a specialist.

BEN

I love that term. I want you to tell me all about that term, because that to me, I think you’re on this path to literally revolutionize
the paradigm of fitness industry. I’m trying to do the same thing, but we can talk about that later. But you have such an awesome
focus, and I want you to tell me all about it because everyone deserves to hear about this.

DR. GABRIELLE

Yeah, absolutely. So muscle is, you know, we always thought about muscle in terms of locomotion and strength, and kind of
the architecture of the body, but it’s actually the infrastructure.

BEN

So much more.

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DR. GABRIELLE

Right, it is responsible for metabolic regulation, it’s responsible for glucose metabolism, it’s responsible for lipid oxidation,
it’s anti-inflammatory, it’s responsible for growth, you were talking about hormones and all of these things. So we focus as a
society on being over fat, but we’re actually under muscled. Muscle is actually an organ, it’s an endocrine organ. It secretes
all kinds of things. You have a cardiologist, he’s a specialist for the heart, a pulmonologist for the lungs, but we have nobody
talking about this muscle, the organ of longevity.

And as you age, you have to eat and train in a very specific way, to keep that tissue healthy. You no longer can train the way
you did in your twenties and thirties. It doesn’t work.

BEN

I’mloving the message more and more. I love it. You’re preaching to the choir!

DR. GABRIELLE

It’s crazy. I do come from a community of functional medicine, and then within that community there’s also a lot of vegetarianism
and a lot of veganism. And I’m fellowship trained, so I trained at Wash UN Saint Luis, I did a clinical research and I did a patient
care. So what we found was, the people that really struggled later on in life, were vegans and really strict vegetarians because,
we know that bones and all of these things are made of proteins.

So that is a long winded way of saying what gets me excited, and it’s really about bringing the truth. Kind of eliminating the
bro-science and the opinion and the emotion, and really bringing true facts to the fore front to help these people. You know,
what you don’t know can hurt you, and especially as you age.

BEN

I feel as though you’re the only doctor that I’ve come across, or the only person that’s having this conversation from a holistic
perspective. You’re looking at it from all these angles. And that’s the way we should be looking at it, right? That’s the way I look
at it, and I’m like, “Why isn’t anybody else having this conversation?” and I literally think you’re going to be the one that’s shifting
the paradigm of the fitness industry because, or least being the catalyst for change. And making people aware of like, “Hey man,
you have to take care of this.” This is your probably – you can argue which is your most important organ – but it’s such an impor-
tant aspect to everything, and people are talking about like you said, diabetes and inflammation and those things, it’s so easy
to mitigate those things just by exposing yourself to a little bit of exercise. So what are the first intervention strategies you’re
applying? Let’s say you have a navy seal, because that’s a really interesting demographic that people are really diving into right
now. So someone who is high end, any type of army, navy, marine, whatever it is, what is the first kind of intervention strategy
to help optimize their performance? Because they’re not just normal people, they’re looking to be like cognitively sharp as a
knife.

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DR. GABRIELLE

So it’s really interesting, there’s kind of two extremes from my experience of treating these people. There are the ones that are
really into functional medicine, and are doing ozone therapy, and are very dialed into their macros, and are really aware. Those
guys are much easier. So their first line intervention is really about keeping their nervous system on track. And those guys are
meditating. So it’s really about adopt to genic herbs, and then measuring their vitamin status. Are their omegas where they need
to be? Where is their gludefion? [Timestamp: 00:10:56] What kind of nutrients are very specific to them?And then there’s more
of the, I don’t want to say reckless, but the more rough and tumble, that are not so open.

BEN

It’s the same thing like in my sport, right? You get the guys who are actually using their brain, you get the guys who are just
working really hard. And both of them make it really far but when you speak about longevity, it’s certainly something to be
said for someone taking care of themselves.

DR. GABRIELLE

Totally. And so the first line for the guys getting ready for buds, I just had a patient who had just completed bud, and then I have
an active navy seal right now, that we’re really working on doing some of the basic stuff. And that’s actually just cleaning up the
diet, making sure that the proteins and the calories are where they need to be, and reducing inflammatory-type things.

BEN

So you say cleaning up the diet, talk about that. What does that mean? What types of things are you removing? Because I think
people need to hearthat stuff, as much as you and I think it’s common knowledge, not everyone knows. When you say clean up
the diet, what are you removing to optimize the nervous function?

DR. GABRIELLE

It’s interesting because there’s a lot of questions as to whether this is bro-science or real science, but I can only tell you from a
clinical perspective, that there are a lot of people with gluten sensitivities, and a lot of people with dairy sensitivities. It doesn’t
mean that they are allergic, but it really creates a lot of brain fog because there’s kind of this inflammatory cascade and in my
clinic, we measure lymphocyte reactivity. So we have one of the original researchers, I shouldn’t say original researchers, but a
very prominent researcher in the NIH developed this study called the LRA.

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And so we utilize that when it comes to sensitivities for all kinds of foods. Eliminating gluten and dairy always seems to come up
for these people. And so really kind of just pulling that back, and putting in high quality protein and less of the packaged type
stuff, and high quality carbohydrates like sweet potato, brown rice, kinwa. [Timestamp: 00:12:57] Really kind of streamlining
their nutrition.

BEN

Great. As far as the gluten thing, it’s my argument with people, is this a bro-science or not, I don’t know. But 90% of the people
that I encounter have an issue with it. And it’s not helping you in any way, so just removing it can only be better, can only be
beneficial, right? There’s nothing good about it, it’s not like you’re weighing good and bad, it’s like either it’s going to be neutral
or it’s going to be bad. So just take it out for most people. Not everybody, some people can do okay with it, but it seems as
though, like many lectins, anything is obviously a dose depending on the type thing and if you’re taking too much, it’s going to
affect you.

DR. GABRIELLE

Yeah, absolutely. So really streamlining the nutrition is really important. And then of course basic fundamentals in terms of
getting your macros right, it matters. So whether a food is not inherently a bad food, whether it’s a ground bicenor sweet
potato, the imbalance of either or, you know, food is medicine, it’s a nutritional science. What you put in your body and the
amounts and the macro nutrient ratios, completely affect your insulin and your metabolism, and really sets you up for being
sharp cognitively, or it can also create kind of cognitive decline in all these inflammatory processes.

BEN

So what type of ratios are you looking at for optimizing, let’s say we say a navy seal? How individualized is this or do you have
like a starting baseline where you say, “Okay, start here and then we’ll adapt according to how your body responds.”?

DR. GABRIELLE

It depends on activity level and weight, in lean muscle tissue. So if it’s a big guy, I am definitely, I was trained on a Dr. Donald
Leighman, so I always error on the side of high protein, and that’s a gram, at least a gram for a pound of lean tissue. And then
we also know that you need 30 to 50 grams, especially if it’s a guy, to actually maximize the muscle protein synthesis. Because
we don’t want to just baseline stimulation of mTor, you really want to max up the system.

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BEN

How much are you considering, sorry to interrupt you, how much are you considering sources of proteins?

DR. GABRIELLE

That’s key.

BEN

Yeah, I know for you it’s huge, how much are you a proponent of avoiding pesticides and things like that? And how is that
playing into their overall performance in health?

DR. GABRIELLE

Whatever they can get in is really important, so it doesn’t really matter, I mean, obviously if it can be organic, fantastic, but if
not, that’s okay. And I also treat a lot of other athletes: I have a race car driver, PGA golfer, so really king of the core fundamen-
tals are the same for everybody. High quality protein, we know plant is totally different than animal protein. We know that
these protein digestibility scores, none of that matters. It really matters about the branch chain if you’re talking about you
know, muscle protein synthesis and optimization, you require lysine. There’s no question about it. No one is eating six cups
of kinwa, you know, to get your equivalent of a chicken breast.

BEN

I know you’re going down that road. Since my exit from bodybuilding, I’ve retired from bodybuilding for 12 months, and I’ve
been eating a predominantly plant-based diet, but I’ve been eating meat with every meal, but it’s like I eat plants and then just
a little bit meat, a little bit relative to what I was eating in my bodybuilding career. In the last three months, I’ve had ten people
come out and ask me if I would coach them for vegan bodybuilding, vegetarian bodybuilding. And I’m literally thinking in my
brain like, “If we were perfect with everything, could someone be successful as a bodybuilder?” Meaning we augment BCAs,
we augment essential aminos. Very curious in your opinion on that, because obviously you’re anmTor and MPK specialist.

DR. GABRIELLE

I’m actually really glad you asked that question, because I think that there are individuals that have a particular phenotype
that can do amazing vegan and vegetarian. I think the percentage of people that can do that well is very small, but I have seen
patients be keto-vegan and vegetarian and vegan and do phenomenal.

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BEN

Did you say keto-vegan? I didn’t know that was a thing.

DR. GABRIELLE

Yeah, the forefront and I’m actually just starting to do this, I have a good friend, Ralph Espazido, you should definitely have him
on. He worked under Peter Diodomo, and what we’re starting to look at is genes. So you run the 23 mean, or ancestry, and you
put it through the system called Orbit 23 and you look at the genetic capacity to handle really particular feeding, particular diet.
I am telling you, you can be vegan and vegetarian, and you’ll know within your genetic makeup if you can do that.

BEN

So is Orbit 23 is giving you the entire read of your genetic code? Or is it just specific to your nutrition?

DR. GABRIELLE

So I’m very new to it, and I use it very specifically for body composition optimization. And I am by no means an expert in gene
translation in these things yet.

BEN

I don’t think anybody is yet. To be honest, I’ve been discussing it, actually had Dr. Jerry Readon, who’s the guy who created
fitness genes. Obviously there’s the people who are actually in the lab doing the research and they’re obviously experts.
But as far as people in the fitness industry, I think it’s so diverse, and there’s so many interactions, like one gene is signal, is
coding for one thing, and then you get something else that’s completely knocking it out. So many interactions that I think
it’s just too new.

DR. GABRIELLE

And I had other people say that as well. They think that it’s very new. It’s definitely, if we can figure out who, and then of course
through clinical experience of trial and error, and you’ve gone more plant-based and feel amazing. I think that there’re…

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BEN

Just because I’m trying to loose muscle, to be honest. If I was not trying, sorry about that, it just sounds blasphemous I know, I
worked around at 310 pounds for 15 years. So now I’m down to 270, and I feel like I can run a marathon, right? Walking around
at 310 pounds for anyone is not healthy, so I’m trying to downsize a little bit. Not trying to get small, just downsize a little bit.

DR. GABRIELLE

Something that I utilize in my clinic is I do think intermittent fasting and fasting mimicking diet for say a week, five days, five to
seven days is phenomenal. I do think, I take breaks on eating protein. I would say, probably once every eight weeks, I go a week
where I’m pretty vegan, and very low calorie. And I think it’s important to not be so dogmatic in thinking I’m really being flexible,
medically flexible in your mind, but there is some really good research out there for accumulation of all kinds of things to help
longevity and the body reset hormones, everything.

BEN

So I’m given you my experience, not that you want to hear, but as a bodybuilder, I was so focused like most bodybuilders on
consumption and my energy sucked. My training started to fade sometimes, now, like I haven’t eaten yet today, once a week
I’ll fast, most of the day I might have one meal and my energy the next day you would presume would be depleted or down,
or my strength would be down. It’s actually not in any way, just my body’s adapted and learnt how to use the nutrients that
I’m eating, way more effectively.Now that I study more about mitochondria, I understand why. So many people, especially in
the fitness industry are anti-fasting, but now that I do it, it’s massive and I suggest everybody do it.

DR. GABRIELLE

I think that’s amazing. It’s the nutritional strategy of the future. It’s the intervention of the future.

BEN

So talking about MTor and MPK, because I know you’re big at optimizing this muscle organ, most people don’t understand
the intricate mechanisms. Can you give a little bit of insight to starting with those?

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DR. GABRIELLE

Yeah, I could give them the most important pieces that I talk to my patients about all the time. MTor signaling is required for
muscle protein synthesis.MTor signaling, they also say causes cancer in all of these things, right? What the biggest trigger of
MTor stimulus is insulin. The small feedings of carbohydrates through the day create this chronic stimulation of MTor. And that
is where you think about cancer, and that’s where you think about all of these things as opposed to having a balanced protein
meal, which requires a minimum of 30 grams, you know, two and a half grams of lucid, to stimulate this cascade, which this
cascade is essentially a growth mechanism.

Anything below that doesn’t trigger it in terms of muscle protein synthesis. And then you’ve got of course the high carbohydrate
feeding, which is negative in terms of chronic stimulation of MTorsynthesis, which they think is related to cancer. Although I
haven’t seen any complete evidence of that.

BEN

To be honest, that’s one of the reasons why I was so adamant about less protein in my diet now and even less regular feedings.
Because for 20 years, I was trying to be the biggest human on the planet, I know that I was constantly anabolic, MTor, insulin
like constantly. So there’s got to be some negative, I mean, my brain says there’s got to be some negative effects to try and
accumulate that much tissue, for 20 years. Any thoughts?

DR. GABRIELLE

I totally appreciate that and I thought a lot about it, and I don’t think that that is the issue in terms of negativity, I think that
when you are then over 40, the chronic stimulation of MTor then becomes an issue. But I think when you’re younger, it’s okay.
But back to what you were saying in terms of feeding and allowing the MTor signaling to reset, I think it’s key. But there has
been no evidence to link with cancer, in terms of protein in cancer is not true.

BEN

What is it about that, you know, over 40 demographic, in your opinion that says, we should start maybe not constantly stimulat-
ing MTor?

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DR. GABRIELLE

Because between 40 and 60, you’re really at that window for things to go wrong, oncogenically, [Timestamp: 00:23:12] cancer
wise. So you really want to limit any kind of external triggers that can cause that to happen. So the multiple protein boluses, you
know, I don’t know if that’s true. When I think of MTor and I think of Cancer, I think multiple carbohydrates and excess calories
being the problem. Because actually if you really think about it, is the bigger driver of MTor signaling.

BEN

I feel as though it’s all massively to do with mitochondria function. As long as you’re exercising, I tell this to people all the time,
your margin for error with nutrition, it goes so much greater because if your mitochondria are constantly turning over ATP and
constantly functioning properly and have proper cellular synthesis, does it seem as though it is as likely that these cancer things
are going to happen?

DR. GABRIELLE

When you think about cancer, it’s really, so that is true, exercises are absolutely anti-inflammatory, it’s the excess caloric load,
and it’s the excess carbohydrate that’s the problem. And I think that everyone demonizes protein and they shouldn’t. It’s very
agenda driven. It’s kind of like the obvious, we’re all missing the obvious. It’s the excess calories and the excess sugars. When
you think about insulin and cancer, it’s not actually protein.

BEN

We shouldn’t even go down the cancer road because that’s just going to be controversial all round. So you said the other
demographic that you’re dealing with is people with metabolic impairment, so I’m guessing that’s a slightly older population,
when I think about metabolic impairment, the first person that comes to mind is like female competitors.
And I want to go down, not to pick on anybody, but I want to go down that road because I’ve worked with so many female
competitors, they come to me because you know, ex-coach just screwed them up or somebody else has messed up their
diet or they can’t eat anything now because you know, they’d get fat or they have to do two hours of cardio. That’s massive
metabolic impairment and I get tons of women that approach me on that topic. So I’d love for you to talk about that.

DR. GABRIELLE

Absolutely. So we know with chronic dieting and over training you get an elevation of reversed T3. So you know TSH stimulates
the thyroid to generate T4, then T4 is converted in the tissue to either T3 or reversed T3. So when I measure these women
that have had a metabolic derangement, usually the reversed T3 is through the roof. Which means that their metabolically
activeaspect of their thyroid hormone is not working. And although I do come from a very functional medicine approach, I
want to get these women out of distress quickly. I often put them on straight T3, to help liberate those binding receptors.

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BEN

Do you think that’s the, so long term, what’s going to be the best strategy to start influencing the decrease in reversed T3?

DR. GABRIELLE

You definitely have to pull back their training and start to overfeed them a little bit.

BEN

And that’s so hard, it’s exactly what I think, right? And try and do the idea of reversed dieting for people, it’s such a mind game
for people to start saying, “We’re going to train less, and we’re going to eat more, and it’s progressive.” Most people have a
hard time. And I want to get into the cognitive aspect, because obviously that’s also right in your will house. So talking about
the cognitive effects or so, I guess the cognitive intervention strategies with that.

DR. GABRIELLE

So understanding the why. Why are you doing this? You know, ultimately finding something that means more to them than a
physical external experience, is really key.So what is the underlying driver of really kind of understanding how they got where
they are, leveraging that perspective and really changing their mind, help them facilitate kind of a mind shift or an aha moment.
Those are the people that get the biggest success. Because we all have to have short term sacrifice for long term gain. It’s just
the way that it is.

BEN

Any interventions as far as analyzing female hormones? Like you said, you’re my second female guest and I want to give the
female demographic a really valuable tit bit nugget of information regarding hormone optimization, physique optimization,
specific to women.Because I really get so many women that are angry with me that say I always talk to men on my podcast.
Because I’m like, you know what? I’m a man, I don’t want to claim to be the authority for women. You’re certainly an authority
for men and women.So giving the female demographics some insights as to how they can optimize thyroid, as to how they can
optimize, there’re so many levels, progesterone and estrogen. What should they be looking at?

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DR. GABRIELLE

So it’s really about if you can’t fix what you don’t test, so it’s kind of like, “How much do I weigh? I don’t really know.” How much
are you eating when you don’t really know? Because we’re not tracking it. So the first and most important thing that all your
women listeners can do is get a good functional testing. So for my women with any kind of endocrine issue, we do 28 days
saliva test, so you don’t just measure snapshot and time, if you’re going to do a blood test, it should be the week before their
period, but a lot of these women aren’t menstruating.

So you really want to take a look at what their hormones are doing throughout a 28-day cycle. I have one competitive cross fit
of a young athlete and we’ve really worked hard on getting her cycle back. And we did it through testing, and then of course you
want to measure your iodine, urine iodine. Another great test is an organic acid test, and that is absolutely good. So you kind
of look at the whole picture. You look at all their thyroid function, you look at all their hormones, and then you kind of assess
where they are at and where they are comfortable.

BEN
28-day cortisol test, is that once a day or you do that multiple times?

DR. GABRIELLE

Hormone test.

BEN

Explain that to me. I thought you said it was a saliva test. Is that what you said?

DR. GABRIELLE

It’s a saliva test, and it tests estrogen, progesterone, all the estrogens, all the progesterones, and what they do, through a
woman’s 28 days.

BEN

How accurate is saliva test? I’m not familiar.

DR. GABRIELLE

So a lot of the traditional MDs really like blood tests, but the percent accuracy I can’t tell you. We do know that it is pretty
accurate, and institutions like A for M really focus on saliva testing.

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BEN

Fascinating. I had no idea that it could be, I knew cortisol was very relevant in saliva, but I didn’t realize they could test for
progesterone and estrogen.

DR. GABRIELLE

So you can, and especially I do a lot of hormone replacement, and if you do hormone replacement that is topical, it’s much
better to do a saliva test. Unless they’re injecting themselves with something, then you would do a blood test.

BEN

Interesting, good to know. So you’re saying you’re doing hormone intervention, where does it start for most people? What is
the most common one you see? Is it going to begiving people estrogen or giving progesterone?

DR. GABRIELLE

The most common thing I see is estrogen dominance. So their estrogen is just through the roof and they’re not making proges-
terone. That’s the big thing.

BEN

Most competitors go to male coaches, we’ve talked about competitors, but most of them will go to male coaches and the coach
would say, “Go take Novid X, go take an Astrazol.” Can you talk about that?

DR. GABRIELLE

That’s a tricky topic because you know, I’m not sure it’s necessary…

BEN

I agree, that’s why I want you to talk about it.

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DR. GABRIELLE

From the very obviousness of why you are a woman, why would you want to do that?

BEN

But if they’re estrogen dominant we know we need to do something about it. Give people some really valuable takeaways,
you know, different strategies rather than having to go through the pharmaceutical…

DR. GABRIELLE

For example Dim or Calcium Deglucorate, there’s other ways to kind of rid the body of estrogens. The best athletes in the
world, the people with the most longevity, have a balance. Even if that balance is extreme, they can still have a balance of
lower estrogensand lower progesterone right throughout their time of competing. It doesn’t mean you have to be so drastic
in completing shutting down a female hormonal system, you’re going to be in for a world of hurt.

If you’re eating things like Christopher’s vegetables, if you’re even augmenting your progesterone to balance that estrogen domi-
nance, you should be able to get lean and as long as you’re training and eating well, there’s ways that you can do it to protect
yourself. The first thing that I would do is, I would not use obviously a Rumid X. I would use something like Calcium Deglucorate
or Dim, have them have Christopher’s vegetables, have them doing infra-red, having them have night time progesterone, even
low dose Naltruxon is an anti-inflammatory, helps regulate the hormonal system. So there’re other things. Without sounding
crazy, they have to process the whole visualization and really kind of programming what kind of athlete they want to be. How
are they seeing success of what they are doing?

BEN

That’s not sounding crazy at all. That’s the direction that I think the fitness industry needs to go. It needs to start realizing the
necessity of that. I don’t know how much you’ve paid attention to the conversations I’ve been having in the podcast, but grow-
ing up, we’re all attached to the external outcome, right? We’re all attached to the external stimulus. Run faster, jump higher,
whatever it is. When it comes to physique enhancement and longevity, it’s all about the internal response to the external
stimulus. So I really believe that the visualizations, the meditations, all those things are absolutely necessary interventions if
you’re trying to create this internal environment that mitigates stress, that allows your body to actually do what you wanted
to do. It’s massive, and people are just blind to it.

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MUSCLE EXPERT
PODCAST

DR. GABRIELLE

Absolutely, and it’s key. And I think that you’re right on that cutting edge, I think you’re right and I think that you’re having
insights and if through you talking about in your community, really raising awareness of that, that’s really going to push the
whole bodybuilding, the whole community to the next level.

BEN

It’s literally spreading the word and collaborating with people like yourself, who are also thinking on that level and just tying
all the missing pieces together, right? Like you seem, like I said, you’re looking at every aspect in creating this awesome
internal cascade to optimize longevity, to optimize muscle function and hormone function. And you’re doing exactly what
everyone needs to be doing, and people need to be listening to you. Walking into the conversation that you brought up
about infra-red sonus, [Timestamp: 00:34:00] I want to talk about that. I don’t know how uncomfortable you feel, but talking
about environmental strategies that people can start implementing to make the most of their muscles, their hormones,
their longevity, so not just dietary, not just training but other, to use the catch phrase, bio-hacks.

DR. GABRIELLE

That’s a great question. All of my patients use heat therapy. I stick them in a hot sauna…

BEN

Do you know the temperature?

DR. GABRIELLE

It depends, it’s either if they’re doing conventional sauna, it’s at least 176 or so, and then if they’re doing infra-red, I’m not sure,
I think that’s like 155, but it’s really about kind of the waves and that internal kind of ambient heat. What I utilize with that is, I
give them high dose Nyosin, for like flossing and flushing.

BEN

What’s high dose?

DR. GABRIELLE

It’s at least 500 over 1000, I push them up. Of course they can’t have hypertension or blood sugar issues, and it really just
opens up everything.

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BEN

It sucks. I do it all the time. I’m used to it now, but when I started, it’s terrible, it’s just so uncomfortable. You’re sitting there
itchy and burning in the sauna, it’s a terrible thing but it’s so effective.

DR. GABRIELLE

What dose did you use?

BEN

I was up to three grams, but I titrated. I started at 500 and I went to three grams.

DR. GABRIELLE

That’s amazing, I always use heat therapy, and then afterwards I give them some chlorella or clay, I give them some kind of
binder.

BEN

Beautiful. Are you doing anything pre-sauna to help their bodies start to flush toxins? Or is it just like hey get in there and
sweat it out with a Nyosin?

DR. GABRIELLE

Sometimes I give them Alpha Q Deglucorate and Nyosin, but Nyosin is really the big one.

BEN

Do you have all these therapies in your clinic?

DR. GABRIELLE

I do. We don’t have a sauna.

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BEN

Cool. Any thoughts on, this is just coming to mind, my brain and yours is this way too, the idea of getting away from the treat-
ment of illness and disease, and bringing people back to health optimization. Any focus or opinion on IV vitamin therapy?
Do you use any of that with you?

DR. GABRIELLE
Ten to seventy five grams. We really go for it, we have mold detoxification bags, we have everything.

BEN

I love that. So I’m the guy doing 75 grams of vitamin C, I do it about once a month. I’ve been doing it for years, I really feel as
though it works. I haven’t been sick in five years, but I feel awesome, and I don’t recommend most people this 75 grams, I’ve
obviously worked up to that.

DR. GABRIELLE

That’s a lot.

BEN

Yeah, talk about the mold protocol, because most people aren’t even aware that mold exists, and I live in Florida and mold is
everywhere, what concerns should people be having around mold?

DR. GABRIELLE

So mold is a huge problem. I’m seeing it in my clinic, I actually was exposed to it, I got really sick. It’s the new epidemic. Mold is
definitely, you know they’ve talked about lime, they’ve talked about all this stuff, mold is the new epidemic. I’m seeing people that
for example, can’t lose weight, totally fatigued, they’re eating perfectly, they’re training well, they feel horrible. They’re getting joint
pains, they don’t know why, they just are completely tanked. And after a while, I’m seeing these people thinking like, this is just
not right.

I have them, there’s a company called Real Time Labs, that does mold testing in the blood, and then I’m thinking of one girl
in particular, she is what you would absolutely think about as healthy. Trim, lean, eating everything perfectly, still not getting
better. Been to four functional medicine doctors, I had her home inspected, they said it was one of the most worst homes
of mold they’ve ever seen.People get really sick and actually it creates a stomach inflammatory response. So if they go to the
doctor, everything is fine, but the GI system is a complete mess. Mold is definitely an issue.

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BEN
So is that what is happening? Is it attacking the GI? Is it attacking mitochondria? From your opinion, what is it attacking and
what’s the first line of intervention?

DR. GABRIELLE

It’s attacking every system. I’ve seen tons of pashy motor patients that are actually underlying mold. The interventions, you
have to remediate, you have to get an air filter, you have to move. I usually put them through detoxification, saunas and then IV
therapy. So it has vitamin C, sodium bicarb, torine, B vitamins, trace minerals, you have to up regulate the body’s detoxification
process. And then of course you’ve got cholestiramine and then these binding agents.

BEN

And you’ve had some pretty successful interventions with people with removing mold?

DR. GABRIELLE

Yeah.

BEN

Good, because I know it’s a huge thing, I mean, we had mold in my house once I’m here in Florida and literally I was like, “Alright,
tear the whole thing out, we’re moving or are you taking this whole room out?” it’s literally legitimate like a scary thing, especially
if you’ve got little kids. So it’s a massive concern.

DR. GABRIELLE

Yeah.

BEN

So now I’m going to pry into your life. How do you train? My question is always, how do you work hard?

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MUSCLE EXPERT
PODCAST

DR. GABRIELLE

I work hard, I try to work as hard as I can every day. And it’s been really interesting. So I was a fitness figure competitor, for
a very long time, and then I started doing cross fit, and then I moved from cross fit to seal fit, I don’t know if you’ve heard of
Mark Divine?

BEN

Sure, I do know Mark very well.

DR. GABRIELLE

Mark’s amazing, he’s a mentor of mine, and I was training for kakoro, [Timestamp: 00:40:03] and I avulsed my hamstring and
my hip. So it has been 80% avulsed right hamstring, so it’s been about a two year rehab process. You asked me how I work
hard, I’ve had to really cut it back and I’ve had to do, I’ve done PRP, multiple rounds of stem cells and I’m at the last stem cell,
this would be number four.

BEN

And it’s still bad?

DR. GABRIELLE

I’ve one more to go and I should be totally healed. So in terms of working hard, for me, it’sabout working smart. So I do three
met cons a week, very short, high intensity and then in terms of lifting, it’s all about movement for me right now.

BEN

So tell me about your met con training.

DR. GABRIELLE

Rowing, right? So it’s 500 meter rows under two minutes, follow in between…

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MUSCLE EXPERT
PODCAST

BEN

Here’s my question, what’s your time for 500 meters? I need to get competitive with you now!

DR. GABRIELLE

Oar is geared, I’ll do multiple rounds of that, you know.

BEN

I’m doing the same.

DR. GABRIELLE

So it’s so much fun but I have to be so much smarter now, in terms of healing.

BEN

Awesome. And nutritionally, you talked about doing some fasting from time to time, night time routines that people obviously
know that sleep is a massive component, and I’m sure you’re a big proponent of optimized sleep. What should people be doing
to optimize sleep, to improve muscle function and longevity?

DR. GABRIELLE

In terms of sleep, having some great magnesium, right? So you have magnesium before you go to bed, really high doses of
Magnesium Malade, Magnesium Glycinate or Magnesium Threenate which crosses the blood/brain barrier. Those are the
external things that you can take. There’s also the internal work, which is kind of recapitulation, reviewing your day, writing
it down, identifying the things that really went well, and the things that didn’t go so well, and reformulating your day for the
next day.

BEN

I love that you bring this stuff up. And to be honest, you’re the most well rounded practitioner that I have talked to in the
last five years, so congratulations! Honestly, you’re doing awesome and I love what you’re doing, I’m listening to everybody
your way. Anything you want to tell people about, one last final thought on what they should be thinking about to live their
greatest life? Obviously we’ve talked about everything from hormone optimization to muscle optimization to training and
sleep and meditation. What is the one thing that you do that you believe creates your greatness?

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DR. GABRIELLE

I always review every day and my why. Why I’m doing what I’m doing. And every action I take, that has to be able to fit into that
why. Why am I calling this person? Why am I giving this recommendation? Why am I reading this? Why am I spending time doing
this? It has to relate back to my greater purpose.

BEN

Which is?

DR. GABRIELLE

To educate humanity and help them live well. Like to be a safe deposit. There’s so much false information. How can I help
people really take what they need, so they can be the best versions of themselves? Because ultimately we’re just a vessel.
How do they care for their vessels so they can have their highest purpose be expressed?

BEN

I love it. We’re talking the same language every day. This is fantastic, I’m so grateful to have connected with you Gabrielle,
where can people reach you?

DR. GABRIELLE

They can find me on Instagram, at Dr. Gabrielle Lyon or my website, and that’s www.dr.gabriellelyon.com. I’m on Facebook, I’m
just working on that, I’ve been kind of out of social media for a long time, there’s no other way.

BEN

What does 2018 have in store for you?

DR. GABRIELLE

A lot of teaching, so right now I’m going to be doing a lot of lecturing and teaching, and I really need to get my book finished.

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BEN

Me too. Are you travelling around teaching for yourself, or you’re teaching for like other organizations?

DR. GABRIELLE

February I am teaching for Charles Polyquin, muscle-centered medicine, so you guys should all come to that.

BEN

Where is that?

DR. GABRIELLE

That is in Phoenix, and that’s February 4th. Then I’m teaching for the National, I’m going to be on the panel of the National
Spine Conference,and that’s the end of February. So those are the two things that I’ve got planned right now, and then a few
other things in the works.

BEN

How far along is your book?

DR. GABRIELLE

Very well outlined, and the introduction is done.

BEN

I’m going to hold you free to the fire to get that out in the first half of 2018, because I’m doing the same.

DR. GABRIELLE

How far along is your book?

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BEN
About the same as you. I’ve got two full outlines, chapter outlines, table of contents kind of thing, and one is really extensive
and it’s long, so that one took me a long time. But the other one, I’m going to get done first. But that’s the problem, you did
the same as me. You have one idea, you’re like, “I really want to do this,” and the next week you’re like, “I need to do this too,
because they need to go hand in hand.” So that’s a big two, but they are my objectives to do too in 2018.

DR. GABRIELLE

Amazing. I will hold you to that!

BEN

Yeah, I know, you better. And I’m going to be the first one to be promoting your book. So get it out there so we can help it be
promoted.

DR. GABRIELLE

Thanks so much.

BEN

It’s been so great to connect, and I’m so grateful for what you’re doing. So please keep it up and let’s definitely keep in touch.

DR. GABRIELLE

Awesome, thanks so much.

BEN

Let’s get real!

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