Dr Rupy: Jessie, amazing to have you back on the pod. Let's start with a question you probably get asked a lot, which is, what are you eating in the day?
Jessie: Wouldn't you like to know?
Dr Rupy: I would love to know.
Jessie: What do I eat in a day? Especially when I'm travelling and busy right now, the first place I start, which is a total non-negotiable for me, is a savoury breakfast. So this morning I had an omelette with feta and tomatoes, super simple, even at any hotel they can make something like this for you. And this really sets me up for the whole day so that my glucose levels are nice and steady. Then lunch is very variable. It depends. Sometimes I'm not even hungry until two or three p.m. because I had such a satiating breakfast, but I'll grab a salad or a little sandwich or something for lunch. I don't usually have a lot of time, so I grab whatever's around me. And then afternoon, inevitably in the afternoon, I'm like, I could do with a little cookie right now. So inevitably in the afternoon, I'm going to find something little chocolatey to have, and I always have a vinegar drink before that to reduce the spike of the food. And then after I eat the little afternoon snack that I love, I try to go for a 10-minute walk or use my muscles to do something so that I soak up the glucose from that snack. And then dinner is when I have a bit more time. So at dinner, I will always, always start with a veggie starter. And generally I have, if I'm at home, I'll have some batch-cooked veggies in my fridge. So preparing the veggie starter will be very easy, very quick. And that way you harness the power of fibre from the veggies to keep your glucose level steady. And for the rest of the meal, I have some protein and some carbs at the end. But that's generally how my day goes.
Dr Rupy: Great. Well, you've basically gone through the major hacks in your book. And you are literally living the glucose way. Let's go into a bit more detail into this hack. So you mentioned the veggies and how the increased fibre blunts the glucose spike that you have after having a main meal. Talk us through a bit more about the mechanism behind that and perhaps some of the studies that are evidence.
Jessie: The first study that I'll mention, which is very interesting, it showed that you can eat the exact same meal, so the same ingredients, the same quantity, the exact same meal, but if you eat the elements of the meal in a specific order, you can reduce the glucose spike by up to 75%. Not changing how much you're eating or what you're eating, just how you're eating it. And the correct order for your glucose levels was shown to be veggies first, then proteins and fats, and then carbs and sugars. So let's say you're faced with a meal which has, I don't know, broccoli, salmon, avocado and rice, and then chocolate. The correct order for your glucose levels is going to be to have the broccoli first, then the salmon and the avocado, then the rice and the dessert. So that study made it very intriguing for me to try to understand what was going on. Why the veggies first? Why is that so powerful? And it's because veggies contain one of my favourite substances, fibre. And for me, fibre, she's just such a badass superwoman. I'm obsessed with her. So fibre is found in great quantities in veggies. And when you eat this fibre at the beginning of the meal, that's really important at the beginning of the meal, it has time to coat your upper intestine with a protective, gooey shield, and it stays in place in your gut lining for a few hours. And that protective shield then prevents any glucose molecules coming down from, let's say, pasta, rice, cookies, etcetera afterwards, it prevents those glucose molecules from passing too quickly into your bloodstream. So you can still eat the carbs that you love, but with less impact on your glucose levels.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, which is great. I mean, we've talked about having more fruits and vegetables in the diet per se, but I think this sort of nutrient sequencing, as it's referred to in papers, is just absolutely fascinating. And it's a really easy strategy to ensure that you're not having those big ups and down swings that can lead to cravings and lead to the hypo sort of.
Jessie: And the thing is, so in these studies, you have the sort of theoretical, very strict order, right? You have like veggies, then proteins and fats, then carbs and sugars. You don't need to do something that hardcore in real life. The one thing that I want you to remember though, is that the veggies first, that's where you're going to harness most of the power. So don't worry about separating out proteins and fats and blah, blah, blah. Just focus on veggies first, and you're going to get such a big impact on your health.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, absolutely. Have you come across anything other than vegetables first that could yield the same results in terms of glucose balancing?
Jessie: I mean, yes, because all my hacks are quite powerful in their own way. So for example, switching from a sweet to a savoury breakfast, that has a massive impact on your glucose levels because you could be going from a big glucose spike to virtually no spike at all. So in that sense, if you make such a big change, the impact will be even bigger. But veggies first is really easy and powerful. Then there was this whole thing about vinegar. Vinegar is another interesting one. People love it because it feels a bit like a magic bullet, but I want to remind everybody it's just one tool in your toolbox. And the studies show that one tablespoon of vinegar in a big glass of water, so we're talking, you know, a big glass of water like the one I have in front of me here, that can reduce the spike of your meal by up to 30%, right? And you have that, then you have moving after eating, which also has a tremendous impact on your glucose levels. But if I were to sequence the hacks in order of most important, most powerful, I would always start with the breakfast, actually.
Dr Rupy: Okay. Yeah, yeah. Well, let's talk a bit about, because you mentioned vinegar, let's talk a little bit about the science behind why vinegar can help with glucose, because I think, I remember we said this on a previous podcast, you have this incredible knack of distilling quite complex scientific concepts into something that everyone can understand, which explains why, you know, the glucose method has absolutely exploded. So perhaps we could talk a bit more about the vinegar and why vinegar can have this drastic impact on blood glucose.
Jessie: For sure. And it's interesting because most of us have vinegar in our kitchen and we don't realize we have this incredible ingredient. So vinegar contains another one of my favourite molecules called acetic acid. Acetic acid is pretty awesome. So acetic acid slows down how quickly food breaks down into glucose molecules when you digest it. So it's there, it's working its little magic. So as a result, if you have some vinegar and then you have, let's say, some pasta, the pasta will turn into glucose molecules more slowly. And that's really the key, Rupy, because what we want to do is we want to reduce how quickly glucose arrives into our bloodstream. We want to sort of taper the velocity, you know, so that yes, we get a glucose rise, but it's not a crazy Himalaya rise. It's more like a rolling, you know, Swiss mountains. That's what you want. You want to get glucose arriving in your bloodstream at a slower pace so that you don't get the crazy ups and downs. So that's vinegar. It's acetic acid. It's very straightforward. So one tablespoon, big glass of water before eating, and it's quite powerful. You can do it once a day, that's what I recommend. A lot of people ask me, what about lemon? Does that work? So lemon contains citric acid, and that's a different molecule. It doesn't work as well as vinegar, but it's still powerful if you are not a big vinegar fan. And then what you can do actually is make a vinegar dressing and put it on your veggie starter. So you can you can combine them. But that's why, you know, I'm French, and in France, we have this tradition of starting the meal with a salad and a vinaigrette, so a vinegar dressing. And as I was learning the science, I was like, goddamn, like all this stuff has been known for ever, actually. This is not groundbreaking stuff, but we've lost touch with so many of these cultural habits that are actually super good for us. I mean, you see this all the time, right? We have to go back to how we were eating.
Dr Rupy: Totally, yeah. I mean, you know, when we're talking about fibre and probiotics and vinegar, you know, the first thing I think about is pickles and traditional ferments and stuff that we generally start a meal with. And if you look at the sort of pattern of different cultural ways of eating, in Indian food, we have, you know, different sort of mango and lime pickles. In Washoku, which is that sort of traditional way of eating Japanese food, you start off with a ferment. In Italian, so my wife's Italian, you know, there's antipasti, there's all these different sort of, it's sort of like embedded in the code of like how our ancestors ate, which is why I find it so fascinating where science sort of adds another lens as to explain why.
Jessie: We explain why with the science so we can go back to those. And same with the breakfast, right? The invention of sweet breakfast food, essentially dessert first thing in the morning, that is a total invention of the food industry. This was not, we did not used to do this. We used to have, breakfast was a normal meal. It was not like, oh, in the morning we eat, you know, dessert and then. When you think about it, but it's become so commonplace. We all think it's normal to have cereal and orange juice in the morning when actually it makes no sense and it's really an invention for profit of the food industry.
Dr Rupy: Yeah. There was this really interesting article actually that was done by I think it was The Guardian and the New York Times, and a photographer went and sort of photographed what kids eat around the world.
Jessie: Really?
Dr Rupy: Yeah, and they went to sort of US, they went to obviously England, but India, Sri Lanka, Japan, Korea, and they just had wildly different starts of the day. And you could tell like which one was healthier. And if you sort of do a little bit more homework and map where the obesity issues are, whilst it is definitely growing in in nations like India and and and Southeast Asia, it's nowhere near as bad as it is in the US. And you can just see the patterns of eating for kids at the start of the day offers some sort of like, uh, suggestion as to what is going on at a population level. So I I find that fascinating. I think we sort of need to return to that traditional way of eating.
Jessie: Exactly. And I grew up, you know, in France, and every morning for breakfast, I had a Nutella crepe with orange juice. And my mom would have Special K with an orange juice. And then I remember so vividly, she would grab the pot of sugar and then sprinkle a butt, like three tablespoons of white sugar onto the bowl of Special K. And now when I think back, I'm like, no wonder I was so hungry by 10 a.m. in class. No wonder I felt exhausted. No wonder I woke up always with this pain in my stomach. Like I'm so hungry, you know? I was on the glucose rollercoaster my entire childhood.
Dr Rupy: Absolutely, yeah.
Jessie: And now my favourite breakfast is just to have dinner leftovers and crack an egg in the pan.
Dr Rupy: That's literally what I had this morning. I literally had like, uh, what, so when we got, because I got back from Australia yesterday.
Jessie: Oh, how are you doing?
Dr Rupy: I'm doing all right. I'm very impressed. I had a good sleep last night. But one of the most comforting meals that I like is something quite traditional. So it's chickpeas, lentils, a whole bunch of veggies, and it has some coconut milk and loads of different spices. And I literally had that for this morning with an egg cracked into it as well. So like for me, that's like a great start of the day, leftovers. But people sort of have this aversion, I think, particularly in the UK, to having something savoury or leftover from dinner for breakfast.
Jessie: But that's kind of like level two, I think. Level one is going from sweet to savoury and seeing how much better you feel and how the days when you have a savoury breakfast, you can actually take things off your to-do list. And you feel amazing in your clothes and you feel energized. And then you're like, this thing is interesting. And then level two is when people start having leftovers for breakfast. I even get messages from people who say that now they eat anchovies at breakfast. I'm very proud. But that's level two, guys. Just chill out. Just first savoury breakfast. And in my book, I even have recipes that are sort of savoury takes on traditional sweet, uh, breakfasts. So I have a savoury jam on toast, which is roasted peppers and feta on a sourdough piece. I have nut granola. So no spike granola and lots of these kinds of first steps into the savoury world.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, definitely. Actually, I think this is probably level two as well. You've also got a savoury smoothie, which I've started doing a lot more of actually, because I used a CGM a few months ago. Just I do it intermittently just to sort of like see how I'm responding, what kind of like, you know, insights I can gather. And I had a smoothie with, uh, I used to have it with oat milk, um, which unbeknownst to me, shot my sugar right up. And I had a corresponding crash and I would feel almost like trembly, uh, after like my smoothie. And obviously it was just my my glucose rollercoaster. And I I didn't really have the intuitive sort of sense to question the type of milk that I was putting in into my smoothie. So now, when I do have a smoothie, which is, you know, not particularly often, I do a savoury one, like you have actually in the book. So it's like almond butter, protein powder.
Jessie: I call it savoury, but actually there's fruit in there. So it's like, it's not real savoury smoothie, but it's it's a smoothie that keeps your glucose level steady because it has protein in it and fat and not too much sugar. On the topic of oat milk, I think people need to understand that the way oat milk is made is that it's just taking oats and pulverizing them into this juice. It's making oat juice. And similarly, you could make pasta milk. If you cooked pasta, blended it with a bunch of water until it was completely liquid, that would be pasta milk. And when you're having oat milk, it's just liquid starch, right? It's just thousands and millions of little tiny glucose molecules just running around in this raw water and creating a big glucose spike in your body. Because when you make milk from a starch, it's just starch juice. But if you make milk from, for example, almonds, coconuts, so nuts or pistachios, because nuts contain protein and fat, you're going to get a milk that is much steadier for your glucose levels. But I I I just went back to whole milk. Cow, whole cow's milk. Great source of protein. I'm not intolerant. I do great on it, so yeah.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, yeah. I think a lot more people are probably moving back towards that as well. And for those who have intolerances, yeah, there are like three ingredient milks out there that are, I think, are great and they won't spike your sugar, they won't lead to that rollercoaster. And it's certainly something that I'm doing more of these days when I have a smoothie. Um, last one, let's talk about movement because I think this one is super, super easy to do. And there are sort of like Ayurvedic sayings and there are a whole bunch of sort of um traditions, yeah, in like moving after eating that I think are are, you know, something that we've lost and you're bringing back to the surface again.
Jessie: Again, it's so traditional and it's not groundbreaking. But now we understand the science behind it. So why moving after eating? Well, first you have to understand that glucose is your body's favourite source of energy. And every single cell, muscle in your body uses glucose for energy. So for example, anybody listening, make a fist with your right hand right now and really squeeze it. As you're doing this, the muscles in your hand are using glucose to be able to contract. And so we can use this to our advantage. If after a meal, we contract our muscles for 10 minutes, some of the glucose from that meal is going to be used and burned by your muscles for energy instead of hanging around and creating a big glucose spike. And when people hear movement and contracting muscles, they're often like, oh god, I don't want to go to the gym, like what is this going to be intense thing going to be? It actually doesn't have to be intense at all. It can just be 10 minutes of walking. Just grab a colleague, grab a friend, go for a 10-minute walk after your meal. It can be cleaning your apartment. It's become a thing for me because I'm a kind of messy person. So I'm like, well, I just ate, so I have to clean my apartment for 10 minutes. So you make a little deal with yourself like that. It can be playing with your dog, it can be picking up your kids, it can be dancing to a few of your favourite songs. It can be if you're sitting at your desk, you can just put your feet on the ground and then do some calf raises. Nobody will even notice. You can do it during a meeting. You're like, I'm burning glucose molecules right now. And this is quite powerful because your calf contains the soleus muscle, which is very good at soaking up glucose from the bloodstream. So that's the the fourth hack I recommend in my method. 10 minutes of movement after one meal a day, make it super simple, easy, get a friend to do it with you, and that's going to help your glucose levels a lot.
Dr Rupy: Yeah. And you've done some research with your community based on this, right? I want to dive into that because that was something that I don't think we got to chat about last time. And we were doing a bit of work over the summer and you were telling me about it and it just sounded so impressive. So let's talk about some of those numbers because they are brilliant.
Jessie: Well, so for the second book, I, because I'm a scientist, I was like, I just really, it would be so cool to get some data. Now, if there are any scientists listening, this is not, I did not run a placebo controlled randomized trial. This was just an experiment. So what I did is I recruited people off my Instagram to test out my four-week method before the book even came out. So I gave them all the instructions, all the recipes, and at the end of each week, they would send me a little the answers to a questionnaire and I would just ask them how they're doing. So they just added four hacks into their life, savoury breakfast, vinegar, veggie starter and movement. And importantly, the rest of the time, they ate and drank whatever they wanted. So we're just adding things in. We're I'm not controlling anything else about your life. I'm just add these hacks in and see how you feel. So the results were amazing. Let me read you the stats. So after four weeks of the glucose goddess method, we have 90% of people were less hungry, 89% of people reduced their cravings, 77% of people had more energy, 67% of people said they were happier, which I think is so important. Mental health, how you feel about yourself. Then we have amazing stats on sleep, on mental health, on skin, 41% of people with diabetes improved their diabetes in these four weeks. 35% of people with hormonal issues also improved them in these four weeks. And so a note on weight loss. What I propose is not a diet, right? The objective is not weight loss. But however, when you steady your glucose levels, you're doing three things. You're reducing cravings, reducing hunger, and increasing fat burning. So naturally, a lot of people lose weight without even trying. And so in this experiment, 38% of people in these four weeks lost weight, lost fat on their body, which is something that a lot of people are looking for, without counting calories, without cutting out foods, just by adding these four hacks in.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, yeah. That's super impressive. I wanted to dive into cravings because cravings I think is something that you're paying a bit more attention to. Um, why don't we why don't we actually discuss what a craving is potentially caused by? Because I guess the scientific definition of a craving is like an intense desire for a particular type of food. What it in certain circumstances may be the reasons behind somebody has a craving.
Jessie: So I'll mention my favourite study of all time, which was done in the US at Stanford. So researchers recruited participants and put them in an fMRI scanner. You know, the scanners where you can see the brain activity. And while the participants were in the scanner, the researchers were showing them on a screen in front of their faces, images of foods. So like broccoli, burger, salad, cookie. And they asked the participants to rate how much they wanted to eat the food. So imagine you're in the fMRI scanner and you see a photo of a cookie, you have to say one to 10 how much you want to eat it right now. But that's not all. The researchers also were measuring the participants' glucose levels in real time. And this is what they found. They found that when people's glucose levels were steady, they didn't rate any of the foods very highly. It was like broccoli, five, cookie, five, burger, five. But when the people's glucose levels were dropping and were low, all of a sudden, they were rating the sort of junk food items really high. They were like cookie, 10, burger, 11, you know. And what the researchers found was that as the participants' glucose levels were low, there was a part of their brain that was activating. And that part is the part that is in charge of cravings. So the craving centre of their brain was going like, and causing this desire for these junk food items. So what did we learn from this? We learned that cravings can come from having dropping or low glucose levels. And when do we have low glucose levels? After a spike. So let's say you're having a breakfast that is just carbs. So let's imagine a fruit smoothie, an oat milk cappuccino, and some toast and jam. Okay? That's going to send your glucose levels on a big spike, and then a drop 90 minutes later. And that drop is going to activate your craving centre, and then you're going to be looking for a cookie or a chocolate bar. And that urge is not something that you can control because you're fighting against an evolutionary reaction in your brain. And so when you have a craving, you cannot suppress it. It's you cannot just apply willpower to it. It's really hard. It comes from within your biology. So if you're somebody who relates to this, understand that often your cravings can be caused by what you had at your previous meal. So if you steady your glucose levels, the the spikes are going to be less pronounced, the dips will be less pronounced, and then you'll have fewer cravings.
Dr Rupy: Yeah. Putting this into a practical context, I remember when I became a junior doctor, this is like 15, 16 years ago now, uh, and I would start my day with cereal, you know, something quick to eat as I rushed out the door, a quote-unquote normal breakfast. And then around 10 or 11 a.m., like after the ward round and stuff, I would have this intense desire to just eat anything. And usually in that environment, there are some cookies or like Haribo, jelly, sweets, whatever, at the nurses station that I just quickly grab as I carry on with my day. And I think most people can recognize a similar food environment, a similar context where they have that same sort of intense craving and that desire, um, with the opportunity of having something that's quite refined and sugar-laden. And so part of why I think I'm on the fence, or not on the fence, I'm more bullish around this idea of controlling glucose is because it does have a significant impact on the practical implications on a on a day-to-day basis of like how people interact with food.
Jessie: Yeah. And how are your cravings now?
Dr Rupy: Oh, my cravings are great. My cravings are great because I have protein in the morning. I have much less refined sugars. I'm much more aware of like spikes and stuff as I've learned more into nutrition and nutritional medicine. Um, and I don't really have that desire to have like, that also, I think part of it, um, Jessie, is my palette has changed significantly over the last couple of years that I've lent more into the bitter flavours of food and the spices and everything else. And actually, if I eat, you know, something that is really, really refined, I have almost an aversion to it. That doesn't mean that I don't have a sweet tooth. I literally just, as I was saying, I got back from Australia.
Jessie: Oh, you did?
Dr Rupy: And like, you know, I had Lamingtons. Do you know what Lamingtons are?
Jessie: No.
Dr Rupy: Oh my gosh. It's like this sponge cake that is covered in chocolate and it has a layer of jam in it and it has coconut flakes on top.
Jessie: Like the little cookies, but in cake form.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, basically, similar to that. But oh my gosh, it's like amazing. It's like in a square form and stuff and it has this like bounce to it and it's like a real sort of Aussie, you know, sweet thing. And obviously I'm going to have that and obviously I'm going to like enjoy, uh, you know, brunch in the mornings and all those like sugar-laden stuff. But I don't have that sort of intense craving on a every single day. That's the difference.
Jessie: That's the difference, right? Going from a space where you feel controlled by a desire to eat anything sweet around you to a space where you just are in pleasure mode. You're like, oh, you know what? Tomorrow, I'm going to go buy that bakery because I have a meeting at this place. I'm going to get my favourite cookie. And you feel excited and happy about it. You don't feel like, oh my god, like give me a chocolate bar. It's a very different experience of the sugar and of the food. And that's that's such a nicer way to experience sugar when it comes from joy and not, you know, shame and guilt and feeling controlled by the urge.
Dr Rupy: Totally. And within that context, so let's say, you know, we're having a healthy relationship with when we choose to eat something indulgent. What are the kinds of foods that you feel people are consuming that are leading to those, uh, spikes and crashes unbeknownst to them? So one of them we've already mentioned was oats and oat milk, I think, which is a, you know, a great sort of starting point given how popular it is. What are some of the other culprits that perhaps people don't really recognize at this point?
Jessie: Fruit smoothies. So you know, all those innocent smoothies you find at the train station and it says healthy on it and no added sugars, but actually, if you know how to decipher it all, you realize that's just sugar water, even if it's orange and it looks innocent, it's not. So those, uh, any sort of breakfast foods or breakfast bars, I think, I think those are not great, especially if you have them first thing in the morning. You know, those cereal bars with dates, etcetera, and rice syrup, etcetera. If you have that for breakfast, it's going to create a big spike. I think my, so my pet peeve are the food items that people think are healthy and marketing is very convincing, but actually are really bad for you and your glucose levels. For example, if you look at a chocolate muffin, everybody knows that has sugar in it, that's a dessert. But if you look at a, you know, a fruit smoothie or an oat milk something or, you know, an acai bowl or granola, a granola bar, you might not know that actually it's causing a big spike in your system. And everybody is trying to make healthy choices. And most people who drink, for example, fruit juices or fruit smoothies, they are doing that because they truly believe that that is good for them. And the marketing is very believable. So that's really what I'm trying to fix here, the issue of food products pretending to be healthy, but actually being really unhealthy. If you look at a, you know, chocolate, for example, nobody, there's no trick going on there. You know, there's no label on the chocolate bar that says, oh, gluten-free, no added sugar, good for your heart. It's chocolate. It's a chocolate bar. People know that it's, you know, it's sweet. The ones that I hate are the ones with the misleading marketing. And we need to teach people from the ground up, but we also need more regulation in the food industry so that ultra-processed food products cannot put on the label stuff that seemingly makes them look healthy.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, I agree completely. I think it's so easy to be duped, even if you are educated around food and you feel like you're reasonably educated enough to recognize what is good and bad, you can still get tripped up. One of the pet peeves I have, and I saw this at the airport, is these sort of like, um, immunity shots, right? So, you know, ginger and turmeric and all the rest of it. It's got those sort of like highlighted on the label. In reality, those only constitute less than 20%, and what's the majority of it is apple juice. It's just apple juice every time. And I always read it and I'm like, this is just pure sugar. And like, fair enough, it's a tiny shot, so the impact of that is going to be less than if it was a full sort of 300 mil.
Jessie: For sure, but it's not about that. It's about the tricking of the consumer.
Dr Rupy: It's the tricking, exactly.
Jessie: It's the tricking of the consumer. You know, another one that I hate are, uh, cookies or biscuits that say vegan and gluten-free. And of course, if you've heard that, if you're trying to be health-conscious, you see these labels, you're like, oh, it's vegan and gluten-free, that must be good. But actually, something vegan and gluten-free can be way worse for your body than something with eggs and gluten. So as what I tell people is, as soon as you see that kind of health halo on a food packaging, just consider it to be dessert.
Dr Rupy: Red flag.
Jessie: Red flag. It's like, this is dessert. Okay? This is for, this is for pleasure, dopamine release in your brain. It's not going to be healthy for your body.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, I agree. I think it's so easy to be, yeah, and I think a good heuristic actually is to, whenever you see that sort of like lovely dark green packaging with something that says healthy or like full of fibre or all these different flags, that's a red flag straight away. And then you should be a lot more sort of primed to, you know, decipher exactly what is in this bar or this product or whatever. And I think protein bars are probably some of the biggest culprits. I I've had a lot of people and patients in the past who had gut issues and, you know, you sort of dig into what they're eating and a, it's very, very restricted because, you know, it might just be like brown rice or broccoli or whatever because they're the type of people that eat a lot of these protein bars. But when you look at the ingredients of what's in these protein bars, it's a lot of emulsifiers, thickeners, things that are generally pretty bad for your gut, um, as well as all the refined sugars and stuff that are going to be sending your your glucose up and down.
Jessie: And another one I would say is the no added sugar label. This does not mean there's no sugar in it. This just means that the sugar was not added during the creation of the food product. It just means it was there since the beginning. So for example, an orange juice, which has as much sugar in a can as a can of Coke, can absolutely have the label no added sugar because the sugar is from the original orange ingredient. You see what I mean? So that's one I hate because no added sugar does not mean no sugar. It can it can mean a whole lot of sugar.
Dr Rupy: Totally, totally. We're basically talking about everything from the sort of assumption that keeping glucose levels flat is optimal. But there is some debate about this, isn't there? And I'm sure you're aware of some of the sceptics around whether we should even be measuring glucose and actually, you know, are oscillations in our glucose on a day-to-day basis responsible for the, uh, the the sort of a predisposition to type two diabetes and all the other complications that can occur when your average glucose level is raised over time. Um, why don't we discuss some of those sort of anti-glucose arguments?
Jessie: I'm so happy we're having this conversation. I love it. I think it's super important.
Dr Rupy: I think it's really healthy to have this sort of a pragmatic discussion without finger pointing to sort of like question, I mean, you're a scientist, you know that scepticism is important. Cynicism is something else. I always have this thing where it's like, you can definitely lean into the sceptics because they're there to sort of like ratify the truth. Cynics, despite the wealth of evidence to the contrary, will always be cynical. And I think there's a big difference.
Jessie: What what I like to say is don't turn cynicism into inaction. Right? Like it's great, it's great to question, but don't question and become cynical to a point where you don't even try new things.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, yeah.
Jessie: Okay, so great debate, super important, so many things to cover here. Um, I think maybe the first one we should look at is should everybody be tracking their glucose levels if you want?
Dr Rupy: Okay, yeah, yeah, that's a definitely a good place to start.
Jessie: So when I started my work five years ago, I was really pushing the glucose monitor thing. I was like, everybody should get one, it's amazing. It it changed my life and it's the reason I got interested in this in the first place. And then I realized, I don't think that's the right line because wearing a glucose monitor can be very confusing. The data is not simple to interpret. It's really not simple to interpret. Listen, even I sometimes I'm like, what the heck is going on with this data? All those fake lows and the spikes and I get messages from people every day like, my glucose is 86, now it's 94, you know, do I have diabetes? People don't know how to interpret this medical data. And I don't think it's a good idea for everybody to stop on a glucose monitor because it can lead to more stress and confusion than anything else. And another thing that I realized is that most people can get all the benefits from steady glucose levels without wearing a glucose monitor. If you use my hacks and you just track, like the participants in my study who were not wearing CGMs, if you just track cravings, energy, hunger, sleep, and mood, you're golden. You got it all. And you'll feel the difference in your body anyway very quickly when you apply the hacks. So, yeah, my my view on this has changed very significantly over the past few years. Well, how are you feeling?
Dr Rupy: I feel very similar to that. I think the benefits of CGMs are certainly there for people who respond well to, you know, what gets measured, gets managed. But I think in the same way, calorie counting can tip people over into anxiety. CGMs offer the same potential downfall as well. Um, I personally find wearing a CGM every quarter or every six months, you know, for a 10 days or so, just to sort of like see how I'm responding to food, I find it incredibly interesting. And I'm sort of of an education level being a medic and nutritional medicine master student, um, where I can interpret some of that. Some of the stuff I can't. Some of the stuff I'm like, I don't really understand what's going on here. And I think the other thing that is really important to ensure people are aware of is it's not always what's on your plate that can impact your glucose levels.
Jessie: Stress, hydration, movement, time of the month for a woman.
Dr Rupy: Totally. Yeah, time of the month is very, very important. That doesn't get enough airtime either. I think, you know, during that luteal phase, you're going to find that you're going to have more spikes regardless. And I think also the the impact of, uh, emotions whilst eating can certainly have an impact on your glucose levels. So that all being said, you know, as long as you're aware of the caveats of not everything is going to be nutritionally, uh, influenced, you know, on your your glucose levels, I think they can still offer some benefits.
Jessie: And we also have to say, like, the first time you put on a glucose monitor and you see, oh my gosh, my food is actually impacting my body immediately. That is a huge aha moment. And it's quite important to have that realization because it changes everything. So, I mean, there's pros and cons, right? And if you're somebody who wants to wear a glucose monitor, and this is not a plug for my work, I'm just saying, get my first book, Glucose Revolution, because it goes in depth into all the different patterns, what you see, what influences your glucose levels, because I just don't want you to put one on and become super overwhelmed and stressed out. Do you know? So, I mean, and I think people can self-identify with whether tracking something is going to make them feel good or not good, you know? Like I also see it in myself when I wear a glucose monitor, of course, it's motivating, but also sometimes I'm like, you know what? I just don't want to look at what this cookie did to my glucose levels. I'm just going to ignore this and not look at the data because I know it's not good for my glucose. And I use the hacks to minimize the spike, but also like, I don't want a machine to tell me, whoa, Jessie, you ate a cookie. I'm like, yeah, I know I ate a cookie. It's okay.
Dr Rupy: In the same way, actually. So I wear an Oura ring, um, and I've been wearing one for about five years and like full disclosure, they gifted it to me. And I I love it for a number of reasons because it helps me dictate the type and the intensity of workout that I'm going to be doing in the morning. I tend to work out every day and, you know, I want to know that I'm well rested enough that if I'm going to do this like long endurance bike ride, it it's going to be to the benefit of me rather than the detriment because I haven't rested and recovered properly, right? But if I know I'm going out for a friend's wedding, let's say, and I'm going to be up until 2:00 in the morning, I take this thing off because I don't want to know the impact on my sleep the following day. I'm not going to exercise the day afterwards. I know my sleep's going to be terrible. I also don't wear this when I'm on a flight either because I know exactly what's going to happen as well if it's like, you know, a red eye flight. So I think there's the same sort of degree of, uh, intuition and engineering that we can have around CGM use. You need to be a lot more sort of like responsible for how you use it yourself and understand the pitfalls.
Jessie: And do you ever have the situation where you wake up and you wore the Oura ring and you feel good and then you look at your data and it's like, you had a terrible sleep. And then your entire energy and emotion changes. You're like, oh, I guess I feel awful after all. Does that happen?
Dr Rupy: Yeah, yeah, that has happened to me actually, where I felt I've woken up and I'm like, oh, I didn't feel too bad. And actually, my data says something otherwise. And then I override my intuition because, uh, I I I and I'm getting much better at just leaning more into my intuition, how I feel, how my body is, am I feeling relaxed? You know, do I have any aches and pains? Do I want to do something a lot more than intense than what my Oura ring would otherwise dictate to me? I'm going to have the overall sort of decision on that. So again, you know, it really depends on what kind of person you are, what kind of character, what kind of personality.
Jessie: And you can get a lot of the benefits without wearing one.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, totally.
Jessie: And then I think another important point is we don't want people to over-index and only focus on glucose. Let me give you an example. Let's say that you had understood that the objective was to keep a really flat glucose curve and that became your single focus. Well, a lot of things can actually go wrong because if you add a lot of butter or a lot of processed oils to a meal, that's going to reduce the spike of the meal because the fat is going to slow down starch breakdown. So the spike will be smaller, but it won't be better for you. Another example, if you add alcohol to a meal, the more alcohol, the more you're going to see this effect, it's going to reduce the glucose spike of the meal because alcohol messes with your liver, which is the control centre for your glucose levels. So when you add wine, tequila, vodka, whatever to a meal, the glucose is going to be flatter than without the alcohol.
Dr Rupy: Oh, really? I didn't realize that.
Jessie: And sometimes when you exercise, you will see a big spike, a big glucose spike during exercise. And that's because your muscle is releasing a bunch of glucose into your bloodstream to fuel your, sorry, your body is releasing a bunch of glucose into your bloodstream to fuel your muscles. So if you're focused on your glucose levels, you might think, okay, I need to add a lot of processed oils, I need to add a lot of alcohol and never exercise. So you can see the limitations. We cannot, we cannot over-index on this one metric because that's can be detrimental, you know? There's so many other things that are important.
Dr Rupy: Totally.
Jessie: But I like to see glucose as a really good window through which to look at your diet. Because when you steady your glucose levels using my hacks, for example, a lot of other things fall into place. You eat less sugar, you eat more vegetables, you move more. So generally, we are operating in a space of things that most medical professionals would recommend, right? But with the glucose science and the visual aspect of it all, people actually make the first step. And that's what I care about. What I care about is behaviour change. How do I encourage people to actually do something? And if that's through glucose levels and showing you the graph and making it easy, then that's amazing.
Dr Rupy: Totally.
Jessie: So I I I really disagree with medical professionals who are like super cynical, oh, but glucose doesn't matter, blah, blah, blah. I'm like, who cares? The outcome is that people are eating more vegetables, more protein in the morning, moving more, less addicted to sugar. Like, give me a break. This is great.
Dr Rupy: And I I I think the visual aspect is very important there because in the same way, when I chat to patients, I give them a visual of what a healthy plate looks like. It doesn't necessarily mean that they need to have that visual in front of them every time they sit down to prepare a meal or order something whilst they're out. In the same way, giving them the sort of, uh, visuals of glucose and what happens when you when you sit down to eat a meal or when you eat certain foods, doesn't necessarily mean you have to have that every single time. Like you said right at the start, you don't need to have a CGM every moment of every day to have the same intuition around the types of foods that you should be consuming every single day. And I think context is very, very important here because I I think this is where the cynics kind of come out and like, well, you shouldn't have a glucocentric way of looking at your diet. That's not what you're, you know, arguing for. It's very, very easy to just be cynical about it. And I think, you know, having a a holistic idea of your diet that you talk about in the books is something that is going to be net beneficial to people.
Jessie: And you know, for every cynical person, there's a hundred doctors using my work and my visuals with their patients. So I'm like, like bring on the cynics. I'm happy to have a conversation, but also we have to make sure that we're not taking so much airtime with this cynicism that we're preventing people who really need this information from making changes. Ultimately, there's one billion people in the world today with type two diabetes or pre-diabetes. Kids are eating 85% processed foods in the UK. Like we need to make a change. We need to help individuals have more information and we need to, you know, work with the food industry to improve products. So we can talk a little bit about this cynicism. It's it's fun to debate, but also like, let's get to work. Let's get people healthier.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, definitely. Yeah. And I think there is a lot more evidence coming around the impact of oscillating glucose levels, actually having the highs and the lows attenuated.
Jessie: Oh yeah. On inflammation, heart disease risk, like all of that.
Dr Rupy: Totally, yeah. And it is coming out steadily. And perhaps it wasn't there like four or five years ago, but I think the more people are studying, particularly with the use of CGMs, that I think is pretty profound from a nutritional medicine point of view, um, the more information will come out about like why steadying your glucose level is a good thing.
Jessie: Completely. And for example, there's a bunch of studies done in people without diabetes showing that the bigger the the dip after a spike, the more hungry you're going to be before the next meal and the more you're going to overconsume food or junk food or whatever is around you. And in my book, I, you know, I I talk about 300 different scientific studies that underpin all this and that show you the the correlation between glucose and aging and skin and hormones and brain fog. I mean, the evidence is overwhelming and it makes sense. Blood sugar, and this is not really new, you know, one of the first people to talk about this was Mark Hyman 15 years ago. He wrote the blood sugar solution. So it's been around. People have known about blood sugar for a long time, but it needs to be so common sense now, so commonplace, just like drink water, brush your teeth, keep your glucose level steady. That's that's the goal really.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, yeah. I always get asked about specific supplements that can steady your glucose levels. Now, I think we've discussed before about these sort of, because particularly after popularizing vinegar, a lot of these like vinegar supplements came out and gummies and all that kind of stuff. And you were like, don't take those, they're full of sugar. And I remember looking at the ingredients, I was like, definitely don't take those because those will not steady your sugar.
Jessie: And you know, these companies have popped up and have ridden the wave of, oh, glucose is a trendy thing. And there's gummies out there that have two grams of sugar per gummy. And they say vinegar gummies, so you think, oh, that's going to be good for me. I'm going to be able to replace the vinegar drink with this. And for the past years, my my audience, my readers have asked me, Jessie, what do I do if I don't have vinegar in my purse or I can't have a veggie starter? I'm at a birthday party. My dad doesn't want to do the hacks. Is there a supplement I can take? So I have been researching this very extensively. I found a couple of things. I found that most supplements on the market that claim to steady your glucose levels are at best not very effective and at worst actually contain sugar and are bad for you. But I also found four very interesting plants that have been around forever that recently have been shown by scientists across the world to have a very powerful impact on your glucose levels. And so I got the highest quality ingredients, the highest quality plants, and I actually put them all in a capsule for people to use. And that's I created this capsule called Anti-Spike. And it is cinnamon, antioxidants from green vegetables, mulberry leaf extract, and lemon peel extract. 100% vegan, 100% natural. And what this supplement does, and this is supported by five years of clinical evidence, 25 clinical trials, it grabs 40% of the sugar from your meal, and instead of letting it go through to your bloodstream to create a big spike, it makes it pass through to your microbiome that feeds on it. So it's good for your microbiome and reduces the spike of whatever you're eating. Now, I know it sounds like a magic pill and it kind of is, but I don't want people to just take this and not do the food hacks. This is an additional tool in your tool belt for when you need it. But it's really amazing. So short-term impact, reducing glucose, reducing insulin, and long-term reducing fasting glucose levels and increasing GLP-1, which is the satiety hormone that Ozempic acts on. But Ozempic tricks your brain into thinking there's more GLP-1 in your body. It's a trick. You don't actually have more GLP-1. Anti-Spike actually increases GLP-1 after six weeks. So you feel fuller faster. So truly to me, this is like the ultimate sidekick. If you want one supplement that is the best in the game, this is the one to use.
Dr Rupy: Okay. So we've established that this is a supplement. So this is in addition to everything that you have in your diet. How how before we go into the individual ingredients, that sound fascinating, and I haven't come across the mulberry or the lemon peel stuff. So I really want to dive into that. Um, how do you use the supplement? Is it in a similar way to vinegar, like before a meal, or is it like one a day thing anytime?
Jessie: It's before the meal of your day that's going to be highest in carbs or sugars. You take two capsules right before eating. Just right before, puff, and that's it. Do that every day to unlock the long-term benefits also of the plants.
Dr Rupy: Fab. Okay. Cinnamon. So, uh, how much cinnamon is in it and what are the sort of.
Jessie: Well, cinnamon is actually, interestingly, one of the most studied compounds for improving your glucose levels. And it's been used for millennia. People used to make cinnamon tea, for example. And so I put it in here because it's so robust and it's so in a sense old school. It's not the most powerful thing. So we put 85 milligrams in here, but it's supporting you long-term, okay? And cinnamon has been trendy for a while, but it's not the one that I'm the most excited about. Because cinnamon, as I said, is old school. The new molecules, the new plants that really are taking centre stage and are so exciting is one, the lemon peel extract, okay? So that's just polyphenols from lemon, and that unlocks the long-term benefit on GLP-1. And the second one, which is really the star of the show, is the white mulberry leaf extract.
Dr Rupy: Okay.
Jessie: So, and actually, interestingly, this is completely off topic, but mulberry leaf is what silkworms eat.
Dr Rupy: Oh, really? I had no idea.
Jessie: Yeah, completely off topic. But so mulberry leaf contains a molecule called DNJ. Okay? And so DNJ is now one of my new favourite molecules. We love her. She's the best. What DNJ does is she tells your little enzymes that break down carbs into glucose to just like chill and work a little bit more slowly. And throughout this podcast, I've explained what you want to do is slow down the breakdown of food. And so DNJ does exactly that.
Dr Rupy: Ah.
Jessie: And so what happens is that instead of, let's say, pasta or cookies, by the way, this also works on oat milk. For any carbs, yeah, any carbs and sugars. So instead of those carbs breaking down really quickly and going through to your bloodstream, thanks to the mulberry leaf extract, they break down more slowly and more of them pass through to your microbiome instead of being all absorbed into your blood.
Dr Rupy: Oh, wow. Super interesting. So DNJ, that.
Jessie: DNJ, DNJ.
Dr Rupy: DNJ, sorry, DNJ.
Jessie: It's like DNA. It's like DN Jessie, DNJ.
Dr Rupy: DN Jessie. I would I would trademark that. That's brilliant.
Jessie: DNJ.
Dr Rupy: Okay. So mulberry, I I I mean, all I think about when I think of mulberries are the sort of ingredients that we use, usually dried mulberries and stuff like that. But mulberry leaf, that's that's fascinating.
Jessie: Yeah, mulberry leaf. And it's not just any mulberry leaf extract. So for each of these molecules that have been proven by all these trials across the world, I sourced the actual highest quality because you can there's cinnamon extract and cinnamon extract. You know, there's mulberry leaf and mulberry leaf. So I'm working with the absolute best scientists in the game. And I'm actually really excited to talk about this because it's been two years in the making now. And I'm so, so proud of this product. I'm just so excited. And yeah, I think it's fucking awesome. Sorry for swearing, but.
Dr Rupy: No, that's all right.
Jessie: It really is. I'm super excited. And I love the idea that some people will be able to give this to their parents or grandparents who don't want to change their diet but have diabetes, for example. And I'm excited for people to have something in their purse they can take with them. It works on people with diabetes, without diabetes, it works on everybody. So, yeah.
Dr Rupy: So the lemon peel, that's really interesting. So that's like a natural Ozempic, would you would you.
Jessie: In a way, in a way, if you want, yes. Uh, it's better than Ozempic because, so GLP-1 is this hormone in your body that tells you I'm full. You know, after you've had like a big meal and you just and your aunt is like, Rupy, have some more cake. You're like, no, I'm really full, Auntie. I really cannot. That feeling of being stuffed, one of the reasons you feel that way is because of GLP-1, the satiety hormone. And Ozempic, what it does is it tricks your brain into thinking there's more GLP-1 in your body. So it tricks your brain into thinking that you're really, really full. What the lemon peel extract does is it actually tells your microbiome, hey, let's make more GLP-1. GLP-1 is great, it's healthy. And as a result, over six weeks, you have a 15% GLP-1 increase in your body. It's not a trick. It is actually happening.
Dr Rupy: Right.
Jessie: And that makes me very excited because I mean, as you know, the Ozempic craze has been crazy. A lot of people want to feel fuller, but Ozempic is just a trick. It's not real. Whereas this is working with your microbiome to create more of that GLP-1.
Dr Rupy: That's fascinating. I'm I'm definitely going to look into that. And the the green veg extracts that you, because I I'm looking, we're looking into sort of green powders right now and and sort of like trying to decipher what the evidence for them, because green powders are like everywhere. I mean, Athletic Greens is the the OG and there's loads of questions as to whether people should be eating them, whether they actually have any benefits. There are certain green vegetables that we've come across, um, that certainly have some some evidence behind them. And I think they are good supplements, you know, supplement to a great diet. Um, what are the green veggies that you decided to put in here or the polyphenols from green veg?
Jessie: They're amazing. Okay, so we have purple carrot, spinach, broccoli, cabbage, asparagus, zucchini, cucumber, and artichoke.
Dr Rupy: Okay, great.
Jessie: So we have 100 milligrams of these antioxidants. And vegetables have so many great compounds in them, but the antioxidants is one that is quite easy to extract when it's done well, and it gives your body more capacity to fight against whatever crazy stuff you're feeding it and whatever crazy stuff is happening. So more antioxidants is always a good idea. And I wanted to do a veggie antioxidant blend because most people need to eat more vegetables. So it's a really good complementary molecule to put in anti-spike so you get some of that value. However, still eat your veggies. Okay? I'm not saying this is replacing veggies. It's it's an additive thing. Because one problem I have with a lot of the green powders is that people will have that and then the rest of the day will eat no plants.
Dr Rupy: Totally.
Jessie: Because they're like, oh, I had my veggie powder. Yeah, but it's not the same.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, exactly. And, you know, you talked about the food matrix, you talked about the added benefits of that complement of different compounds that are very hard to extract in their singular form. There's lots of unknowns and probably unknown unknowns about why eating vegetables per se are just so good for you. So like you said.
Jessie: The matrix is fascinating.
Dr Rupy: Yeah, yeah.
Jessie: Did you see I posted recently a graph on Instagram comparing 100 grams of lentils versus 100 grams of lentil pasta. Exact same ingredients. So it's it's like a spaghetti made with lentil flour.
Dr Rupy: They're really popular with gluten-free people.
Jessie: So exact same nutritional facts, okay? But the matrix is changed.
Dr Rupy: Completely, yeah.
Jessie: In the lentils, no spike. In the lentil pasta, big spike.
Dr Rupy: Ah.
Jessie: Because it's been blended and the fibre has been pulverized and it's much faster to be absorbed into your bloodstream.
Dr Rupy: Oh, wow. So do you recommend people not have lentil pasta anymore or?
Jessie: No, I mean, listen, it's so fine. That's that's where people go with it. I just wanted to show this cool experiment.
Dr Rupy: It's a yeah, it's a yeah, I think it's cool.
Jessie: Lentil pasta is still great for you. It's better for you than regular pasta, but also if you want to eat pasta, just eat regular pasta and you know, have a veggie starter with it. You know, I'm kind of on the on the side of just eat the stuff you like and add some hacks so it reduces the impact. But I think it's cool to show that the whole version of the food is always going to be better.
Dr Rupy: I I think there's a really interesting, you know, and I think I'm constantly questioning myself because we we did a podcast on um, uh, the food matrix and juicing and smoothies. And my sort of uh, heuristic or rule of thumb is, you know, go for a smoothie rather than a juice. With the juice, you're going to have like refining of the fibre and stuff. You're not going to have that sort of impact of slowing the digestion of sugars because it doesn't coat your intestines, etcetera, etcetera. They did a small study where they compared the impact of juicing and a juiced uh, fruit and and smoothie fruit, and they measured their glucose levels, and they found the exact opposite.
Jessie: Did they measure insulin?
Dr Rupy: No, they didn't measure insulin. No, no.
Jessie: Because a fruit juice really triggers high insulin release. Therefore, it can reduce the spike with a with a negative consequence. Because you can reduce the spike of a food by increasing insulin levels, but that's not good. So you have to measure both.
Dr Rupy: And they were also in healthy individuals. So you would you would anticipate a healthy insulin response to the same food, whereas if someone's insulin response is overwhelmed or impaired because of pathology, then yeah. So and one of the other explanations were the absorption of different polyphenols in the fruit that could be mimicking the sort of glucose flattening impact as well. So it's we're always sort of questioning things. And I think it's really important to understand the impact of the food matrix, even though we might not understand it completely at the moment.
Jessie: Yeah.
Dr Rupy: This has been fascinating. I wanted to ask you like, you know, you've impacted so many people. What is the most valuable thing that you're getting from the work that you're doing right now?
Jessie: Oh, interesting. I mean, um, purpose.
Dr Rupy: Yeah.
Jessie: You know? I mean, it's it's hard. You know, it looks all rosy on Instagram and stuff, but it's hard. I'm running a small team, you know, we're trying to make stuff. I have a big audience. I'm very careful. I understand, you know, the power that I have now with this big of an audience. So it's difficult and I try my absolute best so that everything I make is top quality. You know, in this book, every single sentence, padding on the on the boxes on a page, a photograph, like recipe quantity, I'm in there. I'm making every single thing. You know, Anti-Spike has been two years of complete and utter focus of creating a physical product, the amount of regulation, testing that has to go into this. You have, I mean, you cannot even imagine the logistical situation. This is launching globally at the same time. It's just like it's huge projects. So it's hard, but I love it. And it's purpose. You know, when I wake up in the morning, I'm like, oh, this is going to be a difficult day. I have to do all these things. But also I'm like, you know what? I would take this every time over my previous job, which was great, but didn't really fulfill me in the same way.
Dr Rupy: Yeah. And that lends a question that, you know, you're teaching us about how to keep our glucose levels steady. How do you keep yourself steady and grounded, you know?
Jessie: Like mentally?
Dr Rupy: Yeah.
Jessie: Um, I sleep a lot. I don't drink alcohol. I work out almost every day. I have a solid crew, you know, family, friends that I can count on. I cry a lot. Crying for me is a really good way to regulate my nervous system. It's a very, I have very easy access to crying. So when I feel stressed or overwhelmed, I'll just cry for 10 minutes and then I feel so much better. I write a lot. It helps me. I have an amazing therapist. All the boring things. You know, I don't have like a magic solution. And then if something is really hard, I'm just like, you know, today was a really hard day. And I sort of let it move through me. I don't want to store any of the stress. I try to move it as quickly as possible. So I have, I think I have good emotional hygiene. I'm always like, you know, if something is hard, I'll call up a friend. I'm like, today was really hard. Can I just vent for 10 minutes? They're like, yeah, sure, babe. So I just vent and like, and that helps. You know, processing, moving.
Dr Rupy: Definitely, yeah. I'm trying to lean into, uh, expressive writing where I will just write and write and write and not really think about what I'm writing. And it's pretty incredible what comes out on the page actually, because sometimes you feel that you need to be a bit, I mean, maybe you've got like really good friends and you know, you can just like tell them everything and everything, which is, you know, amazing. Sometimes I think, particularly, and this is me being, you know, uh, leaning to the stereotype of being a man, but it's easy to be reserved in front of people, even though you know that they've got your back. And so expressive writing for me has been like just no filter, right? Just like put it on the page and it just comes out. And you'd be really surprised at what actually comes out when you do that. But it's good to know, and I think people need to know.
Jessie: I'll give you my phone number.
Dr Rupy: I should. I'll just give you a voice note.
Jessie: I get it. My daily Jessie voice note.
Dr Rupy: No, seriously, if you ever need to vent, I'm here. I love it.
Jessie: Oh, great.
Dr Rupy: Great. Well, I'm glad we're having this conversation. Thanks so much for coming to the studio.
Jessie: Thank you. You're the best. It's always such a joy. Seriously.
