Journey to the Sunnyside

Mike: 00:00

Welcome to Journey to the Sunnyside, the podcast where we have thoughtful conversations to explore the science of habits, uncover the secrets to mindful living, and, of course, inspire your own mindful drinking journey. This podcast is brought to you by Sunny Side, the number one alcohol moderation platform. And if you could benefit from drinking a bit less, head on over to sunnyside.co to get a free 15 day trial. I'm your host, Mike Hardenbrook, published author, neuroscience enthusiast, and habit change expert. Have you ever wondered how changing your diet could impact your relationship with alcohol?

Mike: 00:35

Today, we're joined with doctor Brooke Scheller, an expert in nutrition, and we'll explore how nutrition plays a pivotal role in overcoming challenges with alcohol, the importance of gut health, and the benefits of a personalized nutrition plan. Doctor Scheller will share practical tips, success stories, and insights from her book. So stay tuned. This is one conversation you won't wanna miss. Today, I'm excited to have doctor Brooke Scheller here with us.

Mike: 01:06

Brooke, thanks for coming

Brooke: 01:07

Thank you so much for having me, Mike. I'm excited for our conversation today.

Mike: 01:11

Yeah. It's especially exciting for me because, you know, as an author myself and somebody who's gone through it, it's exciting to talk to somebody that who has is also an author, has gone through this in their personal journey. And also you bring this expertise of being a doctor. So, I mean, this is gonna be an amazing episode.

Brooke: 01:30

Yeah. Thanks for having me. You know, I I definitely didn't anticipate writing a book when I first began on my sobriety journey, but it's amazing how sobriety influences us and changes us. And I was just sharing with a friend of mine this morning. We were chatting and for me, getting sober was the thing that helped me unlock all the doors I had been, like, trying to figure out how to open for years.

Brooke: 01:53

And I got sober and like, I was like, oh, you just turn the the handle and that's how you open the door. Right? So Yeah. I share that because, you know, for people who are on this journey and struggling, like, this is, you know, it's a life changing thing to get sober, and I really believe that it opens up doors that we don't even know exist.

Mike: 02:16

A 100%. I couldn't agree more. I mean, I think some of the fur the best books come out of personal experience and not even bother the audience hearing it again. But I didn't even plan on writing a book. I just started writing it in a journal for myself long handed, and then it turned, you know, into a book.

Mike: 02:29

And, you know, myself long handed, and then it turned, you know, into a book. And if I didn't adjust my my habits and just continued on, that would have never happened. And not just, of course, that subject, but I don't think in any subject, so I couldn't agree more. And so I wanna jump into the interview with a question because you're a specialist on health and a doctor, of course. So many people here, when it comes to alcohol are for focusing on their behaviors to change their relationship with alcohol.

Mike: 03:02

But I think overlooked is the physical effects. So on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being the most impactful, how important does nutrition and then maybe supplementation play into changing our relationship with alcohol?

Brooke: 03:16

Yeah. So this is such a great question, and I've never been asked this question before. So it's a really interesting one for me to think about. And of course, like, in some ways, it's a little subjective, right, based on my experience and the work that I do, which is almost 100% at this point around supporting people in a sobriety standpoint. I used to work more as a generalist and then over the last few years transitioned to doing this full time.

Brooke: 03:41

I would say that it's probably an 8 out of 10. And that number might surprise people, but over the course of this discussion today, I think that your point of view and perspective might change because one of the things that people don't realize is how disruptive alcohol is to nutrient levels, how disruptive it is to the gut microbiome, how disruptive it is to the brain and our neurotransmitters. And so when we are on our recovery journey or we're trying to quit or cut back, this is an area that if not addressed and supported can make it really, really challenging for us to stick to these goals.

Mike: 04:24

I mean, I in my own personal experience, it's so incredible how we don't realize how impactful it is on the body. And I've always been a person of, like, of health. It all these are coming to light, which is great. But I think back, I remember I was always a person that worked out, ate well. I didn't smoke cigarettes or any of that.

Mike: 04:45

I remember where this one time I was going for a hike, and I overheard these 2 older gentlemen talking. And he was like, I think you're gonna be just fine. You know? You don't smoke. You don't drink.

Mike: 04:55

And I remember thinking, what what is the drinking matter? I mean, they sell it in the stores. It's what big of a deal I mean, that's how ignorant I was at that time.

Brooke: 05:05

And listen. It's how we've all essentially been trained to believe. I just had an article that I was interview you interviewed for, excuse me, come out today on medical news today, and it's in regards to a new publication that is coming out, new journal article on, the health effects of alcohol and the kind of previously held belief that small amounts, low volume drinking is, quote, unquote, good for you. And there's been a few studies that have shown, or really put to bed the previous notions around alcohol and health, but it's still not common knowledge. And unfortunately, because there's been such a campaign around alcohol's health benefits in the past, we, we never thought about it in the way that we're starting to think about it today.

Brooke: 05:50

This is why I'm so passionate about this topic because, You know, if you understand the science behind alcohol and you understand what it actually is, there's no way that drinking it, it has positive benefits. Right? So, sure, you could argue that there's resveratrol in red wine, but the amount of resveratrol that you would need in order to have benefits is not what you're getting in a glass of wine. And unfortunately, the ethanol part of the alcohol is really disruptive to all these different systems of the body. So it's we've all been that way.

Brooke: 06:24

I mean, even me as a doctor of nutrition, it took me going through my own sobriety journey to recognize like, oh, wait. This is not good for us. And it's not even that, you know, a lot of us maybe drink for the health benefits, but I know in my case and so many of my clients that the, quote, unquote, health benefit kind of, like, allowed us to say, well, it's not that bad for me. Right? And, like, keep doing.

Mike: 06:51

Yeah. We're always looking for external validation of what we're doing. So if we see it somewhere, then in our minds, it's just fine. And you mentioned your own journey. So let's take a step back because I wanted to jump in to the overarching around alcohol, nutrition, and your stance on that, which is really unique.

Mike: 07:09

And we're gonna get into that. But first, before we do that, let's go back into your story. Like, where did this all start?

Brooke: 07:15

Yeah. So it's an interesting story. And the more that I work on my recovery, the more I recognize, like, just all of the alignment and all of the things that need to happen and, and the way that everything, came together for me is really, really fascinating. And it, it really helps motivate me and inspire me on my sobriety journey. But I was a big drinker for a long, long time.

Brooke: 07:39

I started drinking young as a teenager and continued that behavior into my twenties and early thirties. Was very high functioning, you know, got several degrees, including a doctorate in nutrition. And unfortunately, we still never even really talked about alcohol, even getting a doctorate in nutrition, which, you know, not everyone thinks of alcohol in a new, as a nutrition kind of topic, but technically alcohol is considered a macronutrient because it provides calories, macronutrients like carbs, proteins, and fats. Right? Well, technically alcohol is classified in nutrition settings as a macronutrient.

Brooke: 08:15

So anytime our body is metabolizing or, processing food or beverage, it is it is a nutrition topic. So, you know, I was big drinker for a long time, and it wasn't really until the pandemic that I felt like things I started to lose a little bit more control. It always been maybe, like, a 5 or 6 day a week drinker. And during the pandemic, I I escalated my drinking quite significantly as a lot of people did. And there's research that shows, especially in women, possibly because of stress and homeschooling and, you know, all of that contributing.

Brooke: 08:54

And so in June of 2021, I thought my life was going to be over, but I decided to get sober and went into 12 step program and really had no idea that any of this would come of it. I didn't expect that it would, you know, change my life so significantly or that it would become my life. But I was 3 months sober, and had really, the only way I can describe it, is a light bulb moment where I thought I have to write a book on this. I had been starting to follow Sober Influencers on Instagram and was getting really integrated into the sobriety world, and I was looking around and nobody was talking about nutrition. No one was talking about the gut microbiome.

Brooke: 09:37

No one was talking about all of these, like, underlying systems and how that plays into why we crave alcohol, why it's hard for some of us to stop, why some of us experience anxiety and depression that we're looking to mask with alcohol. And, ironically, the last part of the story is prior to getting sober, I had authored a textbook chapter in a book on integrative approaches to substance use disorders. And I wrote a textbook chapter on nutrition and supplementation for substance use disorders in the throes of my own substance use disorder. And when I got sober, I used these tools. I used some of the supplements.

Brooke: 10:19

I used some of the nutrition tips that I had researched. And, you know, when I look at all of this, it's just like so clear to me that this was my path. And, it's been a really, really beautiful journey. I wouldn't trade it for anything. And I'm just really grateful for the experiences I've had, even those with alcohol.

Brooke: 10:41

Right? Because they brought me here.

Mike: 10:43

Yeah. That's incredible. And it's so refreshing to talk to you because this is an overlooked topic in almost every single book that I see out there. And it's a topic that in my own journey you know, I told you that I was into health. I worked very closely with my naturopathic doctor, and he also worked in substance, use programs as well.

Mike: 11:06

And I'm when we were mountain biking buddies also, and I was like, are there things I can take that can make this easier? And we started working on this, and and that actually did help me a lot. Like, it was part of the journey, and and that is what I included in the book as well. And so, you know, I think we all both were kinda writing at the same time. Of course, I don't bring the expertise that you do.

Mike: 11:27

I had to go out for that, but I just I don't see it enough, and I think it is part of the whole picture. And a lot of people will go and blame themselves for things that are going on in their physical body that affects their brain, that that then affects their behavior and their outcomes.

Brooke: 11:46

A 100%. And I can tell you from spending many years working in clinical practice that I could recommend supplements. I could recommend all these crazy wellness, cold plunges, the saunas, you know, all these things. Right? And people are like, yes.

Brooke: 12:02

Yes. Let's do it. I'll take the supplements. I'll change my diet, all of that. You say, stop drinking.

Brooke: 12:08

And everyone's like, I'd rather treat my right arm than give up my drink. Right? And why is that? Why is that happening? Right?

Brooke: 12:16

Well, because we are we rely on this for regulation. And it's just so ingrained in our culture, in our habits, in our social landscape, and all of that, that it seems so unrealistic for people to quit drinking or to cut back. And the reality is that it really has a big impact on our health and our health outcomes. And, you know, in, in this instance where I can remember like a specific client who was like, do not take my alcohol away from me. I will literally do anything else except take away the alcohol.

Brooke: 12:50

You know, looking back and looking back at her specific kind of health picture and what she was experiencing and dealing with, very likely the result of alcohol use, right, affecting the gut, causing or contributing maybe to an autoimmune condition she that she was experiencing, nutrient deficiencies. And so I really think that one of the cool things about understanding more about the health effects of alcohol is that it's another really good reason as to why you might want to stay the course, right, that so many of my clients find that the health piece of it can really become like a really tangible thing for them to hold onto that helps them say no in situations where they're feeling tempted. Or even if someone asks and they feel uncomfortable, like, I'm not drinking, you know, people worried about, do do they think I have a problem or any of that? Well, you can simply say I'm doing this because I'm on a health journey. I have a health thing that I'm working on and alcohol is really holding that.

Brooke: 13:52

That usually shuts people down pretty quickly.

Mike: 13:54

Yeah. That is a really convincing reason. I mean, I know early on me thinking about having to do blood panels would definitely keep me on track even if mentally I wanted to. And I think, you know, taking it away from people, there's certainly a case for people that are using it in a self medicating manner. But then, also, like, people don't wanna take it away because they think they're gonna miss out, and I think that really comes down down to a mindset.

Mike: 14:18

And you really need to shift and realize that there is so much more to gain than than being taken away. And people tend to focus on what gets taken away, which is actually when you sit down, and I'm shooting a 10 minute Monday video on this today. Really, when you sit down and write out, like, what you stand to gain by keeping alcohol in your life and what you stand to gain or or or cutting back, whatever that picture looks for you and your goal. It's easier to say black and white. Or what you stand to gain from all these other things, you'll realize that that list is so much longer, and all of a sudden, what you think is being taken away, you're actually being handed something that is pretty incredible.

Brooke: 14:58

Yeah. And that's the thing is it really is about trying this. Right? Like I know for me, I have never really lived life without alcohol before. Like I had maybe 1 or 2 stints where I did, like, a couple of weeks of not drinking, but I had never, like, socialized without alcohol.

Brooke: 15:15

I'd never traveled without alcohol. I, I didn't really have a lot of friendships where alcohol wasn't involved. And so there's such a fear when we come into this journey that, yeah, we're gonna lose friends or we're gonna miss connections or, you know, I know for me and I, I wasn't even in a relationship when I got sober, but I, like, started thinking about my wedding. Right? Like, oh, well, I'm not gonna be able to champagne at my wedding.

Brooke: 15:38

Right? Now thinking about that 3 plus years into sobriety, I'm like, I can't even imagine drinking at my wedding. Like, I'm I'm grateful that I that I didn't get married. Right? Yeah.

Brooke: 15:48

And so I I share that because it really is, a pretty eye opening and profound situation when we do realize how good life is without alcohol and that it was really holding us back and providing this illusion that it was helping us in some way. But it's really, really good to know that on the other side, it's actually much, much better.

Mike: 16:15

Yeah. Absolutely. And to your point around your wedding, on special occasions, it's hard for people to resist. And I always think too, why would you want to mute or potentially forget some of the most special things in your life that are gonna happen. So you just gotta keep that in mind.

Mike: 16:34

Alright. I wanna get to your specialty here. And I think this is one of the first things I wanna jump into is a lot of people when they start adjusting their habits around alcohol, whether it be cut back or take a break or really, you know, go for the gusto if their goal is to just give it up forever, a lot of people will get that instant gratification. They feel good. This happened for me.

Mike: 16:55

Like, I was feeling good, clear, so much more energy. Of course, it took a while for for my full energy to rebound, but I was getting immediate feedback that was positive. While I see I'm in a lot of groups. I try to stay active with people and support them. And some people just have the opposite.

Mike: 17:11

Like, they feel horrible, like, you know, no energy, brain fog. So with your expertise, what's your comment on that? I I'm sure you have some feedback that that's the physiology of that.

Brooke: 17:28

Yeah. And and some of that is, you know, I I share this with people a lot because Instagram is like the highlight reel. Right? A lot of people who are talking about sobriety in places like that are speaking very positively about their experiences. You see a lot of these kind of high highs and people speaking positively, and it can feel really frustrating if you start this process and you're expecting to feel really good and you feel really yucky.

Brooke: 17:54

And what I share with people is that what this tells me is that your body needs more support. Right? Especially if you have maybe a heavier alcohol use history, There's a good chance that you're pretty depleted in your nutrients. You probably are having trouble with natural energy production because you might be deficient in some of the B vitamins. You might be deficient in many of the minerals like magnesium and zinc that run a lot of energy processes in the body.

Brooke: 18:25

There's a good chance that part of it is you are depleted and your body needs more support. So part of that is why I launched our functional sobriety supplements last year because I was making supplement recommendations for folks, but, I wanted to make it kind of easier to implement and be able to just, like, take one thing and not have to think about what that is. But starting by, you know, either adding in supplementation or focusing a little bit on nutrition and diet, getting more veggies, getting more protein, and stabilizing blood sugar. All of these things are, like, a critical part of this journey. So if you're listening and you are feeling that way, like you haven't felt the benefits and the energy just yet, it's telling me that there's a little bit more support that you can.

Mike: 19:17

Yeah. That makes perfect sense. And, I mean, it's rough to see that, but you like you said, like, you see the Instagram reels and you don't you don't see what the difference is or what happens between a and b. And it's not the same for everybody. Hey.

Mike: 19:31

Real quick, I wanna tell you about our 40 lesson master class on mindful drinking. This is put on by Sunnyside, taught by experts, and it's absolutely free for you to get access. Go to learn.sunnyside.co and get started today. So you have some ideas around, different types of drinker archetypes. So before we get in, further on the nutritional part, you outlined that because you think that there's a correlation between the 2.

Mike: 19:59

So let's get started with that. What are the drinker archetypes that you wrote about in your book?

Brooke: 20:04

Yeah. So this is a concept that was born out of me working with others kind of early on in my sobriety journey, early on in starting to do more of this work around and sobriety. And I launched the first version of our community, which is called the functional sobriety network in 2020, I guess it was the end of 2021, into early 2022. And, you know, when I started this, I kind of expected to mostly be working with people who drank like me, people who were drinking pretty often, maybe daily or almost daily, and really needed help and support something. But what I found was that I had a lot of people who were coming in who didn't drink like me, who drank maybe just on the weekends or drank more socially, and they were still expressing that they needed help and support to stop.

Brooke: 20:57

And my question as a scientist is why? Right? Why is it that my body becomes addicted and my body wanted more and more and more? And why is it that maybe one person can drink socially and no big deal, but another person drinks socially and once they start, they can't. Right?

Brooke: 21:16

So my brain goes, okay, well, why? What is the biology, the biochemistry? What is happening in the body that's, you know, contributing to these different things. So this is what what influenced the development of the drinking archetypes. And there's there's 3 kind of core drinking archetypes that I talk about.

Brooke: 21:35

And there's a 4th one that I don't, you know, directly I mentioned in the book, but don't talk about. That one is called the nonchalant drinker. This is someone who, like, truly orders a glass of wine, like, drinks half and walks away from it. The one that, like, might I

Mike: 21:50

don't understand those people are interested.

Brooke: 21:52

Well, like, this bug isn't necessarily for that person because they won't really need help and support in something. But the 3 core drinking archetypes are the social drinker, the stress drinker, and the habitual drinker. The social drinker is that social person. Right? So they're drinking mostly in social settings.

Brooke: 22:12

They're maybe drinking

Mike: 22:13

only on the weekends or a couple times a month,

Brooke: 22:14

but they feel like once they start, they can't than The second is the stress drinker who is drinking more for stress reasons. Right? So maybe it's the end of a long day. It's, you know, stressful thing going on at home and they're triggered to drink from that. And then the third is the habitual drinker.

Brooke: 22:40

And this is someone who's much more in alignment with having alcohol use disorder. So maybe they are drinking daily or almost daily. They're drinking for social reasons. They're drinking for stress reasons. Right?

Brooke: 22:52

But they're really drinking, for for no reason at all too. So the the goal around these archetypes was to give people something to identify with. So the book has a little quiz that you can walk through if you can't determine what your archetype is. I mostly identified as that habitual drinker, but I recognize also and what I see with clients too is sometimes we start as the social drinker. We kind of transition into that stress drinker and then finally into that habitual drinker over time.

Brooke: 23:26

So it's kind of common to to go through those different phases. And the book is really, designed so that each archetype has some different recommendations kind of woven into it depending on which type of drinker you are.

Mike: 23:41

Yeah. I love the way you did it. I looked, you know, when I read the different archetypes, labels are a really difficult way to approach it because, traditionally, we have a normal drinker and an alcoholic, and that that's it. Right? And we already know that's not to be true.

Mike: 23:56

There's varying degrees of everything. And whether or not we wanna say I'm normal or I'm an alcoholic also is debatable on the effectiveness. It's probably by person is my opinion. Some people, it's beneficial to some people, it's not. So I I really love the way that you laid it out because it's an identification.

Mike: 24:16

It's, but it's not necessarily putting a a noun on yourself with it.

Brooke: 24:21

A 100%. And I say early on in the book, like, this book is not about finding the answer to the question, like, am I an alcoholic? Or because that is so many people's concern when first kind of towing into this thick is like, so like, do I have a problem? Do I not have a problem? Am I an alcoholic?

Brooke: 24:39

Am I not an alcoholic? I'm, like, we're googling it. Like, am I an alcoholic queens? Right? And the reality is, like, it doesn't really matter.

Brooke: 24:49

Right? It doesn't really matter if you feel comfortable calling yourself that, that is perfectly fine. If you don't wanna call yourself that, that's fine too. My goal is I want you to feel good, and I want you to feel like you have, control over this thing in your life. And if you feel like alcohol is having negative effects in your life, that's enough for you to decide that you don't have to drink anymore.

Brooke: 25:15

You don't have to be at a certain point where you lose everything in order to stop. In fact, it's more empowering if you stop before, you know, things maybe come to a a tougher decision.

Mike: 25:27

Yeah. I couldn't have said it better than myself, so I a 100% agree with that. So let's get into some of the the things that come up when the challenges, I wanna say, when it comes to changing your relationship with alcohol, whether that's cutting back or whether or not you wanna take a break. Both of these work, by the way, correct, for whatever goal your

Brooke: 25:48

is? A 100%. Yeah. I mean, the the good news about this is, like, you never have to say you're never gonna drink again. You never you you never have to put that stake in the ground.

Brooke: 25:58

Even in programs like Alcoholics Anonymous, it's one day at a time. Right? So it's there's never any, like, need to put a stake in the ground. Part of the way that I designed the book of having a kind of 30 day program for people was to be like, just try this. Right?

Brooke: 26:16

Like, just see what happens when you explore it. You don't have to say that you're never gonna drink it.

Mike: 26:23

Great. So let's get into number 1. And this was a big one for me, a big challenge, and that is sleep. So I will say I'll give you my side, I'd usually side, I'd usually wake up at 2 or 3 and it was like sometimes I didn't even really wanna have that other glass of wine, but I would do it to fall asleep, through the night. But then I stopped and my sleep was just I could fall asleep, but I just couldn't stay asleep.

Mike: 26:55

And it persisted for, like, 6 months. It was really rough. My sleep's great now, and I did do a lot of supplementation. I think I just my body needed the time. But tell us, you know, how do we address sleep to start?

Brooke: 27:09

Yeah. So great question, And you're not alone. This is so common for people. Right? Because alcohol has initially a sedative effect.

Brooke: 27:17

Right? So it is going to help you fall asleep. If you've used it to help fall asleep, it is actually helping you to do that. The problem is the metabolism of alcohol is really disruptive on the body. So part of the reason why people wake up in the middle of the night is because there is fluctuation in REM sleep cycles.

Brooke: 27:36

There's fluctuation in your body's regulation of blood sugar, which is happening, you know, after you're having drinks. And so what a lot people find is exactly what what you experienced, right, that you take it away and you have these you have trouble falling asleep because you've relied on this. In in most cases, I would say, like, probably 90% of cases, the sleep normalizes within a couple of weeks. Not for everyone. So I'm sorry that you had more trouble troublesome time.

Brooke: 28:08

And what I find in working with a lot of my women who are in, the menopause, postmenopausal kind of time frame. They struggle a lot with sleep as well. And so what we usually do is focus on utilizing some type of supplementation to support that. So natural, like, herbal supplementation, things like valerian roots, passion flower, chamomile. I'm also a fan of using magnesium glycinate, which is helpful for relaxation.

Brooke: 28:37

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So I have we have a sleep pack that's actually designed nonmelatonin.

Brooke: 28:43

I actually don't typically recommend melatonin just because melatonin is is neuroprotective. So whenever there's inflammation, a lot of times, melatonin will be high. So I've actually seen high melatonin when I'm running tests on people, and that's that can sometimes be the case when, not only we have an alcohol use history, which is inflammatory to the neurological system, but it also can be indicated in people who take melatonin and feel really groggy. That's usually an indication that maybe melatonin is high. The other thing I wanna point out about sleep is alcohol is really disruptive on cortisol.

Brooke: 29:23

And this is another kind of hot topic right now. A when it it may be if sleep is still an issue that there's some cortisol dysregulation going on and actually supplementing or supporting that cortisol normalization can help too.

Mike: 29:45

No. That's great. So okay. We got challenge we got the first challenge, which is sleep. The next one is I have mood and emotional regulation.

Mike: 29:54

Let's talk about that.

Brooke: 29:56

Yeah. So this is this was a big one for me and for a lot of people. But, you know, alcohol was, like, the go to, like, deal with all of your problems. Right? I'm stressed, drink.

Brooke: 30:07

I'm anxious, drink. I'm depressed, drink. And then it's like this vicious cycle. Right? Because it's making us feel worse.

Brooke: 30:15

It is not actually helping with mood and emotional regulation in, in any way. In fact, it's probably pushing that off a little bit. The good news is that, you know, mood and emotional regulation is very, very tied into nutrients. Something that a lot of people don't recognize is that our neurotransmitters like dopamine and serotonin are still good neurotransmitters. And even GABA, which is our body's relaxing neurotransmitter, these are all built off of amino acids from protein, and they use vitamins and minerals as cofactors in order to produce our neurotransmitters.

Brooke: 30:57

Right? Well, what happens when we drink is we deplete out all of these key nutrients. Like, basically, the exact ones we need for our mood and our emotional regulation are out the window when we drink a lot. So this, again, is part of why nutrition can be really helpful when we're in those early recovery stages. Because if we are deficient in zinc, we're deficient in vitamin b 6, but vitamin b 12, vitamin d, vitamin c.

Brooke: 31:28

If we're deficient in these, we are not going to be able to produce dopamine and serotonin and GABA, truly, we're gonna really struggle with. And so, unfortunately, it's like this vicious cycle. Right? We drink. We deplete these nutrients.

Brooke: 31:43

We feel yucky. We drink. But nutrition can be the kink in the chain that can really help us to get to that place. And the other thing I'll say about that is that, and you know this for sure, Mike, right? Like, when we are on a recovery journey or we're trying to change our relationship with alcohol, it's really key that we get support and other tools of how we regulate ourselves without alcohol.

Brooke: 32:11

Right? Is it meditation? Is it exercise? Is it therapy? Is it something else that we can practice that is, going to change that habit for us?

Brooke: 32:24

Right? Because for so long, I know for me and what I see with my clients is alcohol was the thing that helped us get through anything. And when we take that away, it's like, oh my god. What do I do? How do I deal with this feeling?

Brooke: 32:41

How do I deal with this stress? How do I deal with this emotion? And it's learning, okay, how do I soothe myself? How do I cope with these feelings and emotions in a healthier way? It's okay to feel these feelings.

Mike: 32:56

Yes. I I mean, everything that was suppressed before is now up in the open in 10x, you know, the energy and also time. You know, you gotta you gotta fill the time. You gotta fill how what to do with all that energy and all those emotions that once before was suppressed. So, yeah, that's really just a big part of that.

Mike: 33:20

And so speaking of energy, I think energy levels, you know, when you're coming off or cutting back, they can be affected. So what are some things that we can do around energy levels?

Brooke: 33:32

Yeah. So supplementing with things like a b complex can be really helpful. Again, these are nutrients that are readily lost when we're drinking, and they're, again, the same nutrients that help to support energy production in the body. So we wanna start optimizing nutrient levels, whether that is taking supplements or improving nutrition. So getting more veggies, getting more, fresh foods, and trying to stay away from all the processed packaged stuff.

Brooke: 34:01

I know we're gonna talk about cravings. I won't dive into that one just yet. But, you know, the other thing is, and I talk a lot about in the book, is blood sugar regulation. And many of us don't realize how much blood sugar plays a role in energy and the, the blood sugar discussion, like, oftentimes gets woven into metabolic discussions and we get hangry. Right?

Brooke: 34:39

It's like the Snickers commercial is the the ultimate example. Right? We are, like, ready to chew someone's head off. We're irritable. We're tired.

Brooke: 34:46

We're, we're moody. Right? And sometimes that is because we've we're going long periods of time without having something to eat or we're eating the wrong foods that are causing drops in blood sugar. So one of the big recommendations I provide around this is actually just increasing protein intake throughout the day and making sure to have something to eat every 3 to 4 hours or so. Because if you're going longer than 4 hours, there's a good chance that you're starting to slip into that low blood sugar territory.

Brooke: 35:20

And once we're there, it's really hard to have will willpower, quote, unquote, to not grab a sweet or a treat, to not grab a drink. Right? Low blood sugar can actually manifest as alcohol cravings for some of us. So I also tell people that one of the most important things they can do for cravings is having an afternoon snack between 3 and 5 PM. Usually people struggle big time in that afternoon time frame.

Brooke: 35:51

And I always the first question you should ask yourself, you're having an intense afternoon craving, is when was the last time I ate? Have something to eat first, and I can guarantee you that the craving for alcohol is probably going to subside. So weaving that back into energy, making sure we're having these kind of stable blood sugar levels is going to improve energy for sure.

Mike: 36:15

Yeah. Well, that kinda reminds me of, like, sometimes when I was some pretty bad cravings. A good meal sometimes I think it has a dual effect. Number 1, it's something that has a reward tied to it that's gratifying. But certainly, the the effects of the protein and what you mentioned there are are playing a role there.

Mike: 36:32

And so another one I have here, which there's probably overlap here, but I have, like, cognition dealing with things like brain fog. Do you have any recommendations on that?

Brooke: 36:42

Yeah. So these recommendations will also help with that. Right? So having more consistent meals, getting some of this nutrition back into your body. You know, another area I talk a lot about is the gut and the gut microbiome.

Brooke: 36:57

And this is another one. Actually, the times just put out an article on this the other day, which I think is fascinating because until my book came out, no one was really talking about the gut's role, with alcohol, but the gut microbiome is pretty significantly affected by alcohol use. We see changes in probiotic levels. We see sometimes overgrowth of negative bacteria. We see changes to the health of the gut lining.

Brooke: 37:25

So alcohol is actually one of the main contributors to something called leaky gut, which is the breakdown of the gut lining. And the gut plays a really big role in our brain and our cognition. And so if we're not addressing this piece as part of that discussion, we're we're missing something here. And so that's another kind of critical part of the puzzle for people who have that long standing alcohol use.

Mike: 37:53

Yeah. I've heard it referred to as the second brain.

Brooke: 37:56

It is. It is. And and the reason why is because the gut and the brain, even though they seem kind of far apart, they're actually in constant communication with one another. And the fascinating thing is we think of our brain as the control center of our body. Right?

Brooke: 38:12

So we would assume, like, well, the brain controls everything else, but actually 95% of the communication between the two comes from the gut to the brain. So if we think of the brain as the control center of our body, the gut is controlling the brain, making that the second brain. So that is where that terminology comes from.

Mike: 38:35

Now that makes sense. So I actually wanna dig into this before we move to the last one, which is cravings management. But Yeah. This was on my list, and I think it makes sense for us to talk about it now. I think you hear a lot.

Mike: 38:46

Everybody knows, like, the gut's important. You see it on everything that's marketed in the store, you know, every, probiotic drink and, so but I think it's really misunderstood as to, like, what are the the health benefits of me, you know, having a healthy gut, and what are the potential symptomatic problems that it can cause if I don't? And since alcohol is affecting it and that makes total sense. I mean, you can use alcohol to clean and kill, you know, bacteria on your kitchen counter. You know, how does that like, an everyday person that doesn't really know too much about what, other than the gut exists, how can they better understand, like, the benefit of them actually taking care of this?

Brooke: 39:30

Yeah. That's a great question. And a lot of times, we associate the gut with digestion. Right? And I'll ask people, you know, how is digestion?

Brooke: 39:39

And many people, you know, who who do have reason why we might look at the gut don't necessarily have digestive issues. So if you're listening to this and you're saying like, well, I have good digestion, Everything's normal. I don't have a lot of issues, so my gut must be fine, isn't necessarily the case. It can manifest for some depending on what's going on. It can manifest it as digestive imbalances, and that can be anything from heartburn and reflux to bloating and abdominal discomfort to constipation or loose bowel movements.

Brooke: 40:13

I talk about poop in the book. I make everybody talk about poop with me because it's such a taboo topic, but I I think it's so important to talk about and break a little bit of that stigma. If you're not having 1 to 3 bowel movements a day, you are constipated. So if you skip days, if you skip multiple days, even if if that's your, quote, unquote, normal, that it it isn't necessarily normal. Right?

Brooke: 40:38

And we need to be optimizing and improving that. So one to 3 good poops a day is your ideal. But here's the thing about the gut is the reason why the gut is such a big topic today is because the gut influences all of the outward other systems of the body. Right? Imbalances in the gut can look like mood imbalances.

Brooke: 41:00

It can look like energy issues. It can look like hormone imbalances, skin issues. So if you have acne, eczema, psoriasis, hives, any of that is very likely tied to the gut. It can contribute to really almost any symptom in the body can actually have a gut influence. So even if your digestion is normal or mostly normal, I run stool testing on her right now has ADHD.

Brooke: 41:38

And one of my first goals with her was to do a stool test because there's a lot of ways that ADHD is linked to the gut and the health of the gut. And there's some interesting things that come out. She has really low probiotics. She has, leaky gut. But another thing that she has is she actually has a gluten sensitivity, a gut gluten sensitivity.

Brooke: 42:00

And gluten is very inflam when you are reacting to it, it is really inflammatory to the neurological system. Right? So looking at these tests and seeing this information in ourselves is actually a really good motivator to want to change and and start to take those supplements or start to make changes to your diet or your alcohol intake.

Mike: 42:24

Now that's great. I think that makes a lot more sense to me and anybody listening. And, I can see it now, your friend at a party. I want you to doc meet my friend, doctor Brooke Scheller. Let's go meet her.

Mike: 42:35

By the way, she might talk about poop.

Brooke: 42:38

Yes. You know, it's funny because I one of my old bosses at, like, you know, the CEO of a startup, like, I used to bake and say it, and he would get all flushed and, like, you know, nervous about it. And I'm like, come on. Like, we have to. But it's kind the same thing with alcohol too.

Brooke: 42:53

Right? Like, I I look at these two things, and I I understand why I like to talk about alcohol this way too because it's taboo. Right? But everybody pooped, a. Right?

Brooke: 43:04

Yep. So let's just talk about it. If we can get it all on the table, it's good. And it's the same thing with alcohol. Right?

Brooke: 43:10

It's taboo. It's like you have a problem or you don't have a problem. It's this kind of awkward conversation. It doesn't have to be an awkward conversation, and I like breaking that stigma.

Mike: 43:22

I'm really thankful that it's starting to become more of a talked about topic. You know, sure you see that as well. And so, let's get into the last one because this is really interesting that most people probably think that they need to resist their cravings or they need to do mindful practices or anything that's behavior related. But also, craving management can be done at a physical level. So let's talk about that.

Brooke: 43:46

Yeah. So, you know, anytime we have a craving, it's our body sending us a signal. Right? It's your body sending

Mike: 43:55

withdrawal symptom. Right?

Brooke: 43:56

It's your body sending you a text message and saying, hey, I need something. Right? Your job is not to just put pour anything in there that you think will work like alcohol. Right? It's to get better at learning what do I need right?

Brooke: 44:13

Do I need to eat something? Do I need to call someone? Do I need to take a nap? Do I need to, take some deep breaths? Right.

Brooke: 44:25

And nutrition can be a really important piece of this because a lot of times, cravings are physiological. Right? So low blood sugar, for example, very likely cause of a craving, whether that is alcohol or sugar. They work on the same mechanism. Right?

Brooke: 44:43

And so if you're having a craving for 1 or either, like I said, my first recommendation for you would say, when was the last time I ate? Right? And if you know that you get a craving at 5 o'clock every day, have a snack at work. Have something with some protein, some healthy carbs, and make it substantial. Don't just take a handful of nuts.

Brooke: 45:05

You know, have a more substantial robust protein shake. Have, a half a sandwich if that's helpful for you. Like, have something that has a good amount of food to it, not just a couple of little bites. So keeping that blood sugar stable can be a really good way to to overcome cravings. I also use supplementation a lot for cravings.

Brooke: 45:28

So we have a supplement pack called Craveing Crusher. I I keep it here, so I don't want you to whip it out of nowhere.

Mike: 45:37

Yeah.

Brooke: 45:37

It's good. But Craving Crusher has a blend of different ingredients, amino acids that can be really good for kind of stopping a craving in their tracks. And this is one of the first things that I used on my journey from doing that early research where, one of the things that you can use is amino acids like L Glutamine or L Theanine that have this kind of, regulatory effect. And in this instance, you could take something like L Glutamine. It's I talk about supplements a lot in my book.

Brooke: 46:09

I know I know you do as well. But for folks who are really struggling with the alcohol cravings, taking a 500 milligram capsule of l glutamine, opening it under your tongue, and allowing it to dissolve can really stop a craving. And I have a specific instance of early on my 1st week of sobriety and I was, like, ready to walk out the door and walk to the bodega and pick up something to drink. I took the l Glutamine and whether it was that or a miracle, I did not drink. And so I use these supplements a lot to help people with overcoming that very intense physiological craving, and, and they work really well.

Brooke: 46:52

So the last thing I'll just say about cravings again is, you know, it could be food or nutrition related, but it might also just be, like, yeah, you need to call someone. You need a nap. You need a meditation. Something else. So just trying to start to get more in tune with your body.

Brooke: 47:10

Because when we drink for a long time, we get so used to being able to just check out. And, and that's what this process is all about is starting to get more into.

Mike: 47:20

Yeah. I love the you got the one hack as far well, not hack, but the one solution with a supplement that can help, but then also agree. Like, we can couple that and give us a twice that likelihood of outcome by having some other things in our tool belt that we can pull out, like mindfulness practices. What's your favorite one? And I'll share my favorite one.

Brooke: 47:41

I mean, I'm a big meditator. I meditate usually 2 or 3 times a day depending on the day. If it's a stressful day, I do it more. And I I do tapping as well, emotional freedom technique, EFT, and find a lot of regulation from that. So for me, if I'm starting to feel that, like, stress or overwhelm start to build up, I always ask myself if I've eaten because I I'm a worker, so I will, you know, kind of pass lunch or pass a snack and all of that.

Brooke: 48:13

But meditation by far is is one of the top ones for me.

Mike: 48:17

Yeah. Me too. Well, I actually, I'm one of those people that has a hard time with meditation, but I love breath work. So I have a what I had to do was I chose a rule. So I picked one that had the most impact and one that, if it was different, one that I could do anywhere, like a restaurant or somewhere busy.

Mike: 48:33

So, like, the tapping EFT tapping, you know, you can pretty much excuse yourself to go to the bathroom if you're at dinner or something and do that. The most impactful for me was breath work, at home, which is kind of my meditation. Oh, well, I also laugh and say my mountain biking is meditation, so I do free mountain biking because you're That's it. Singular focused. You can't your mind can't go anywhere else.

Mike: 48:56

So even though meditation could be in different forms, not just sitting there quiet with yourself.

Brooke: 49:03

A 100%. And I do a lot of guided meditation. You know, I think people, like, over overwrite that or, like, write that out as, like, that's not real meditation or what have you. But I use the Insight Timer app a lot, and that has hundreds of thousands of different meditations. You know, you can search anxiety, you can search gratitude, you can whatever you want to search and find hundreds of meditations of all different lengths.

Brooke: 49:28

And, you know, let that person walk you through for 5 minutes breathing exercises or just quieting in and tuning in, can be really fun.

Mike: 49:38

Yeah. Totally. I mean, I I've done meditation. I couldn't imagine doing it without guiding. I mean, so that's great if some people can, but I think whatever works for you is the best solution.

Mike: 49:46

Whatever gets you doing it is the best solution. So, I mean, for the for the breath work, I use, the Wim Hof Hough app that walks you through it. And

Brooke: 49:56

I love the Wim Hof breathing. I used

Mike: 49:59

to do

Brooke: 49:59

that a lot even before I quit drinking, actually. I was trying to use the Wim Hof breathing method, and, that does give you, like, a spy.

Mike: 50:09

Right?

Brooke: 50:09

I know people, like, hear this and they kinda think, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But, really, if you get into these breathing techniques, like, you can tap into these feeling states and everything with breath, which is really cool.

Mike: 50:21

Yeah. Oh, I mean, we have so many overlaps. So, like, I actually was doing it. So, like, back in 2015 when Wim was still, like, an underground biohacker kinda guy, I was doing his breathing, techniques. And, yeah, it felt great.

Mike: 50:35

But you know what's incredible is that when I changed everything, I, you know, I took a extended break. My ability, my hold times were incredible, heart rate, probably, like I don't know. You could speak to this, but it's just, like, that just shows, like, a physical of I would know if I actually did drink the night before. My times would be shot.

Brooke: 50:57

A 100%. And I like that you brought that up too. I'll I'll say one thing about the, you know, while you're drinking, while you're not drinking. I had gotten an Oura ring before I quit drinking, And these wearables are interesting, right, because you find out a lot of data about yourselves and learn a lot. And what I found particularly in my situation and what I've seen with other clients who have tracked heart rate and things like that is on nights that I was drinking even 1 or 2 drinks, my heart rate didn't drop at all.

Brooke: 51:29

It would stay, like, in the nineties all night, which is really scary. Right? Like, normally, you should drop into the sixties or or upper fifties, and the heart rate was staying up. And so sometimes these wearables are are also good motivators. Like, again, tying some of the data back into your own story, part of why I run testing on my clients, and this is exactly why, right, because we're all selfless.

Brooke: 51:54

We all wanna know about ourselves. And when we can see the actual effects that are being had or the changes that are maybe being made, it helps motivate us and stay consistent.

Mike: 52:06

Yeah. We had the guest, Nir Eyal, who's a an investor adviser to the company. He wrote the book, Hooked and Indistractable, and he that was what got him to I think it was the the ring and was, like, the biomarkers were just, like, he thought he slept okay and it was just total shit and Yeah. Thought, you know, that his heart rate was off. So I mean yeah.

Mike: 52:33

I mean, it definitely is an interesting time to see that stuff stuff in real time to see how much it's affecting you.

Brooke: 52:39

Yeah. A 100%.

Mike: 52:40

So before we get going, I wanna talk a little bit more about your book. So we I think we crisscrossed over a lot of the subjects, but, why don't you just talk no, it's it's how to eat to change how you drink. And why don't you give us, like, the key takeaways about what you wrote so that it's a little more structured? And I I have it sitting here at the house. Highly recommend.

Brooke: 53:04

Thank you, Mike. I appreciate that so much. Yeah. So the book kind of walks through a couple of different parts. In the beginning, I start talking about the intersect of alcohol nutrition, a lot of what we've kind of covered here high level.

Brooke: 53:18

I do have a chapter on my story. It's called the doctor in the wine bottle, and it walks through my experience of of drinking and and how everything kind of came to a head for me and, you know, the story behind all of that and how I started doing this work. And then I start to talk about the drinking archetypes, which we dove into here because that's a brain work for much of the rest of the book. In the second part of the book, I talk through the key body systems that I cover. So the gut microbiome, I talk about blood sugar and the endocrine system.

Brooke: 53:49

I know we didn't talk about hormones today. We could do, like, a whole separate talk on hormones. So that's one piece of it. And then the third part is the brain and neurotransmitters. And then the last part of the book moves into the recommendations.

Brooke: 54:04

So, you know, there's there's journaling questions. There's kind of, you know, some some quote, unquote homework to do if you so choose, but then it moves into the food recommendations, the supplement recommendations, talks about lifestyle, integrating in these other things like meditation and exercise, and also the importance of community and why that's so important as part of our journey. And then, of course, like, the secret thing that nobody knows because it doesn't say on the cover is that there's 50 recipes. So 40 food recipes and 10 drink recipes, all incorporating in the recommendations that I provide, within the context of the book. So it's it's really robust.

Brooke: 54:46

It has a lot of information in it. And if you're looking for this kind of health or wellness focused addition to your alcohol free or mindful drinking journey, it's a really, really great tool. It does not say that you have to get sober sober and say stay sober forever. It's really just about helping to educate you more on the topic.

Mike: 55:07

Yeah. I love your holistic approach to it because, like, we've mentioned before that it's often overlooked and, I just think it's an incredible book. So thank you for writing.

Brooke: 55:19

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for reading it. And thank you for writing your book because it's a good compliment to this one.

Mike: 55:25

Yeah. It would make for a good conversation. And one thing you said is we didn't cover something. I think the only challenge with this interview was for me to keep us within a set limited time because there's so much that we could go through.

Brooke: 55:35

Yeah. Oh, and we can definitely have a second conversation too.

Mike: 55:38

Oh, that would be awesome. Well, before we go, what where can we direct some people if they wanna learn more or reach out to you?

Brooke: 55:45

Yeah. So you can learn more about me, about my online programs, about working with me at functional sobriety.com. And there you can learn more all about the supplements, about our online programs, about our 1 on 1 visits. And I'm mostly active on social media and Instagram, so doctor d r Brooke Scheller. And there I post lots of tips and tricks and motivation and good stuff for you, if you're looking for some free resources.

Mike: 56:12

Awesome. Well, thank you again for coming in. This has just been amazing.

Brooke: 56:16

Yeah. Thank you so much for having me. My great conversation today.

Mike: 56:19

Thanks for listening to Journey to the Sunnyside. And if you enjoyed this episode, the best way you could show your support is by going on whatever platform you're listening on and giving us an honest review. This is gonna help others find us. And to be honest, it would mean the world to me. So if you can do that for me, I'd appreciate it, and thanks again for listening.

Mike: 56:40

This podcast is brought to you by Sunnyside, the number one alcohol moderation platform, having helped hundreds of thousands of people cut out more than 13,000,000 drinks since 2020. And in fact, an independent study showed that Sunnyside reduced alcohol consumption by an average of 30% in 90 days. And as one of our members shared, Sunnyside helps me stay mindful of my drinking habits. It's not super restrictive. So if I'm craving a glass of wine with dinner, I just track it and I move on with my week.

Mike: 57:12

If you could benefit from drinking a bit less and being more mindful of when and how much you drink, head on over to sunnyside.co to get a free 15 day trial. You'll get access to everything that we offer, including tracking and planning tools, coaching from our experts, a vibrant community of people just like you, and the motivation and advice to stay on track with your health goals, all with no pressure to quit. That's sunnyside.co.