Ask the Nutritionist

Ask the Nutritionist Orthomolecular nutritionist & homeopath. I help people use food, herbals, and homeopathics for a healthy body and mind.

Access my services through my online health clinic, hope-health.ca, or my newsletter at askthenutritionist.substack.com.

Research shows how conflict affects children's brains. It's shocking.https://www.facebook.com/share/15fUfMW1Lm/
11/26/2025

Research shows how conflict affects children's brains. It's shocking.

https://www.facebook.com/share/15fUfMW1Lm/

Children who grow up in homes filled with frequent conflict can experience neurological changes that resemble those seen in soldiers returning from combat.
According to researchers at Stanford University, prolonged exposure to emotional tension triggers stress-response systems in the developing brain.
Brain scans in the study revealed heightened activity in regions linked to fear, vigilance, and emotional regulation.
These shifts suggest that even non-physical forms of conflict can have deep and lasting biological impacts on children.
The findings highlight the urgent need for supportive family environments and early intervention.

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One of the hardest things I face as a nutritionist that focuses on metabolism is teaching people the myths we have been ...
11/22/2025

One of the hardest things I face as a nutritionist that focuses on metabolism is teaching people the myths we have been sold about fats and cholesterol. This article sums up some of those difficulties.
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/16f7NShakL/

Statins Are Mitochondrial Toxins

And CoQ10 isn't enough to fix this.

This is educational in nature and not medical or dietetic advice. See terms in the link for additional and more complete disclaimers.

Blood cholesterol levels, along with LDL particle count, ApoB concentration, LDL particle size, LDL pattern, and the ratio of cholesterol between LDL and HDL are all governed centrally by the LDL receptor.

Genetic mutations in LDLR cause familial hypercholesterolemia by lowering LDL receptor expression. One in a million people are born with homozygous mutations, and this can cause heart attacks as young as 18 months old. One in 300 people are born with heterozygous mutations, which shifts heart disease forward from a phenomenon that primarily kills between the age of 60 to 80 to one that primarily kills between the ages of 35 and 60.

The LDL receptor is the main way you bring cholesterol from outside the cell to inside the cell. While the liver only makes about 16% of the body's cholesterol, it is overwhelmingly responsible for controlling the concentration of cholesterol in the blood by taking it up using the LDL receptor. That cholesterol can then be put to productive use, especially for the synthesis of bile acids to support digestion.

However, there are two primary governors of LDL receptor production:

Thyroid hormone governs it by signaling abundance. This causes the liver to take up more cholesterol than it needs to meet its basic needs, and this is what drives bile acid production to support digestion.

Cholesterol deficiency within the liver cell governs it by signaling scarcity. The liver takes up cholesterol from the blood not to put it to productive use but simply to replenish its own stores.

Statins work by inducing a cholesterol deficiency in the liver. The liver responds to this by taking up more from the blood to bring its stores back up to normal.

In his 1976 book, Solved: The Riddle of Heart Attacks, Broda Barnes reviewed the history of using thyroid hormone to control both cholesterol levels and heart disease risk. It worked extremely well, but it was discontinued due to what Barnes describes as irresponsible dosing that had killed a few people.

It is important to understand here that you do not need to be “hypothyroid” for thyroid hormone to lower your cholesterol. It will work at any dose. Practitioners using it did not realize they were playing with fire by using a hormone to signal a degree of abundance that was not present in the body. Thus, some of them let the dosing get out of hand because it had nothing necessarily to do with correcting a thyroid deficiency.

Nevertheless, their approach was the same as using statins because both thyroid hormone and statins increase the LDL receptor.

On the other hand, it was the opposite, because thyroid signals abundance while statins signal scarcity.

What everyone involved fails to fundamentally understand is that your LDL receptor does not work in a vacuum. It is powered by mitochondrial ATP production.

If your mitochondria are not working well, your LDL receptor simply will not work.

Doctors who use a pharma-first approach have little respect for nature and doctors who use a statin-first, mitochondria-never approach do so because they do not understand the most basic elements of cellular biology.

As covered in What Everyone Should Be Doing For Their Health, everyone must use a food-first, pharma-last approach, which means everyone needs their doctor to follow the same approach. Do your research until you find a good one.

Click through to read my article on how mitochondrial function optimizes your thyroid hormone and LDL receptor activity, how statins act as mitochondrial toxins beyond a simple impairment in CoQ10 synthesis, and what to do about it:

https://chrismasterjohnphd.substack.com/p/statins-are-mitochondrial-toxins

The CDC has quietly rewritten their stance on the link between childhood vaccines and autism. One can only hope this lea...
11/22/2025

The CDC has quietly rewritten their stance on the link between childhood vaccines and autism. One can only hope this leads to further studies for improved safety.

In a stunning shift, the CDC now says its own “vaccines don’t cause autism” claim was not evidence-based. By Maryanne Demasi, PhD Republished with permission from Maryanne Demasi, reports on Substack For the first time in a generation, the US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) ha...

11/14/2025

Honey Locust beans are edible!

Lentils are one of the crops highest in glyphosate. Experts think this is going to totally change birth rates.
11/14/2025

Lentils are one of the crops highest in glyphosate. Experts think this is going to totally change birth rates.

Think the problem is fat... No. It's sugar.
11/11/2025

Think the problem is fat... No. It's sugar.

11/11/2025
How much of your food is processed?. Don't forget breads!
11/11/2025

How much of your food is processed?. Don't forget breads!

Believe it or not, 2/3 of most children’s diets are made up of ultra-processed foods!

Most of these foods are very low in important nutrients yet high in carbohydrates. In turn, you get high oxidation and few antioxidants. This is like rusting out the inside of the body.

When you consume ultra-processed foods, you’re never satisfied because they are very low in nutrients. This potentially leads to overeating and obesity.

Check out my video on this topic: https://drbrg.co/4onophU

Download my free app to instantly scan your food for hidden ingredients and make a change for yourself and your family: https://drbrg.co/48sHASf

Vitamin D was suppressed.
11/07/2025

Vitamin D was suppressed.

Antidepressants and children... Is it about people or profit?
11/05/2025

Antidepressants and children... Is it about people or profit?

From Study 329 to today’s tragedies, Big Pharma’s cover-up of antidepressant risks continues. Award-winning investigative journalist Paul D. Thacker, writing in The Disinformation Chronicle, has reignited public attention on one of the most disturbing scandals in modern medicine: GlaxoSmithKline...

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My Story

I’m an Orthomolecular Nutritionist and published health writer with a clinic and apothecary (HOPE Health) in Bradford, ON, where I provide science-based, holistic healthcare for body and mind. My training includes holistic nutrition, orthomolecular medicine, functional medicine, herbal medicine, and classical homeopathy - which I am studying at the Ontario College of Homeopathic Medicine at present. Because of family experiences, I have a special interest in holistic therapies for mental and behavioural health, and many of my clients seek me out for this reason. I am passionate about a child’s right to try safe, holistic dietary and behaviour interventions before pharmacology is applied for difficult behaviour, and about the need for a national overhaul of our current mental healthcare model, where the most vulnerable in our society are forcibly drugged and released without adequate community or familial supports or even safe housing. They are left, not in their right mind, to fend for themselves in shelters and on the streets, then demonized in the media when they lash out in desperation. Surely we can do better! To this end I have spent years researching the holistic therapies families can use to help such individuals overcome the trauma they have experienced and address the underlying bodily dysfunction that so alters their perceptions.

I see clients in person and by video chat and can take emergency calls online for more urgent issues where holistic therapies can augment the benefit of medical interventions by addressing the underlying cause or tendency, or by helping to soothe or boost the body’s healing of the affected organs or system. These include emergencies like migraines, the pain of an ear infection until antibiotic kicks in, screaming babies, performance anxiety, fright and grief, colds/ flus, recovery after surgery, difficult labour, and holistic aid for injuries or physical or emotional trauma. My philosophy is that holistic healthcare is best used in combination with appropriate medical interventions, for truly integrative care that not only addresses the symptoms of illness, but also the underlying causes. Health isn’t just the absence of illness, but the resiliency of the body and mind to withstand the traumas of life and “bounce back,” without losing function or peace. I offer personal consultations and direction, as well as educational workshops, cooking classes in the community, and weekend reboots for caregivers. I also provide an easy access online menu planning tool, complete with recipes, to help clients with every step of dietary changes. My approach is to address health issues from the roots, drawing from the various disciplines I practice, alongside any medical interventions the client needs, to improve resiliency and create truly integrative, holistic healthcare.