Why Boosting Your Immune System During a Pandemic Can Kill You…Do This Instead! – Episode

Empowering you Organically – Season 10 – Episode 82

Title: Why Boosting Your Immune System During a Pandemic Can Kill You…Do This Instead!

Hosts: Jonathan Hunsaker, TeriAnn Trevenen

Description:  Coronavirus is forefront in all our minds right now. Tune in to find out from Jonathan and TeriAnn why BOOSTING your immune system right now may not be the way to go. We help you understand your immune system; innate and adaptive, cytokine storms, and the role of beta-glucans, or a β-glucans for short, play in SUPPORTING your immunity. Which leads you into the magic of mushrooms. Here’s a hint…they aren’t just for anti-aging!

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“Boosting” your Immune System may be the worst thing you can do during a pandemic…

The single best thing you can do for your health and the health of your loved ones is to take steps towards supporting the health of your immune system.

And I chose the word “support” carefully because new research is now showing that…

Immune SUPPORT is better than an immune BOOST during a pandemic!

Let’s Look at The Immune System

The immune system protects the body from possibly harmful substances by recognizing and responding to antigens. Antigens are substances (usually proteins) on the surface of cells, viruses, fungi, or bacteria. Nonliving substances such as toxins, chemicals, drugs, and foreign particles (such as a splinter) can also be antigens. The immune system recognizes and destroys, or tries to destroy, substances that contain antigens.

Your body’s cells have proteins that are antigens. These include a group of antigens called HLA antigens. Your immune system learns to see these antigens as normal and usually does not react against them.

Important Distinctions of Your Immune System

Innate Immune System

The innate immune system is made of defenses against infection that can be activated immediately once a pathogen attacks. The innate immune system is essentially made up of barriers that aim to keep viruses, bacteria, parasites, and other foreign particles out of your body or limit their ability to spread and move throughout the body. The innate immune system includes:

• Physical Barriers
  • such as skin, the gastrointestinal tract, the respiratory tract, the nasopharynx, cilia, eyelashes and other body hair.
• Defense Mechanisms
  • such as secretions, mucous, bile, gastric acid, saliva, tears, and sweat.
• General Immune Responses
  • such as inflammation, complement, and non-specific cellular responses. The inflammatory response actively brings immune cells to the site of an infection by increasing blood flow to the area. Complement is an immune response that marks pathogens for destruction and makes holes in the cell membrane of the pathogen.

The innate immune system is always general, or nonspecific, meaning anything that is identified as foreign or non-self is a target for the innate immune response. The innate immune system is activated by the presence of antigens and their chemical properties.

The Adaptive Immune System: Precision and a long memory

If the body’s first line of defense – the innate immune system – is unsuccessful in destroying the pathogens, after about four to seven days the specific adaptive immune response sets in. This means that the adaptive defense takes longer, but it targets the pathogen more accurately.

Another advantage: It can remember the aggressor and acts specifically against certain antigens. If there is new contact with an antigen that is already known, the defense response can then be quicker. This way the defense responses of the adaptive immune system are more efficient and faster than those of the innate defense, if the antigen is already known.

The adaptive immune system can remember the antigens because it produces memory cells. This is also the reason why there are some illnesses you can only get once in your life, because afterwards your body becomes “immune.” While after first contact with the pathogen it takes several days for the immune system to respond, a second infection often has no consequences, or at least the symptoms are weaker.

The adaptive immune system has several parts that react in different ways, depending on the place in the body where the pathogen is. Antibodies are made available for germs outside the cells (in the blood and in body fluids). To eliminate pathogens that are inside the tissue, a cell-mediated immune response is necessary.

These parts of the adaptive defense include:

• T lymphocytes
• B lymphocytes
• antibodies as soluble proteins in the blood
• cytokines in the blood and tissue as hormone-like messenger substances

Cytokines

Cytokines form a group of proteins that participate in cell signaling, intercellular communication and in many cellular and immunological functions. They are prominently involved in inflammatory responses and defense against viral infections.

If the other parts act like soldiers protecting you, then cytokines are like Navy Seals, sent in for only the toughest missions.

These cytokines are small molecules in the body that are released by certain cells to help coordinate the battle against infection. So, you might be thinking “Great! How do I get more of these hard-working cytokines into my system?”

And that makes sense. If they’re the best of the best for fighting illness, then you’d want more of them, right?

Well, it’s not so simple and now some doctors have recently made a startling discovery…

As it turns out, “boosting” cytokines during a pandemic like this might cause what some doctors call a “cytokine storm.”

And this cytokine storm might be the explanation of why some people rapidly decline in a pandemic, while others are able to stay healthy.

Scientifically speaking, a “cytokine storm” is when, in some cases, the body’s own immune system actually overreacts to an infection.

And that’s when problems can start.

While cytokines are generally a good thing for your immune system…

Too many of them at once might actually cause an overreaction.

This “overreaction” could cause more damage to the body’s own cells than to the invading disease cells it’s trying to fight off.

Your Cellular Immunity Defense System

There is one thing that almost every single medical doctor does agree on when it comes to diseases… A compromised immune system is the single biggest risk factor anyone can have.

You might be wondering… How do I build the foundation of my immune system without overloading it?

Fortunately, there is something you can do, and it has to do with what doctors and medical researchers call… your Cellular Immunity Defense System

Cellular immunity protects the body through:

• T-cell mediated immunity or T-cell immunity: activating antigen-specific cytotoxic T cells that are able to induce apoptosis in body cells displaying epitopes of foreign antigen on their surface, such as virus-infected cells, cells with intracellular bacteria, and cancer cells displaying tumor antigens;
• Macrophage and natural killer cell action: enabling the destruction of pathogens via recognition and secretion of cytotoxic granules (for natural killer cells and phagocytosis (for macrophages); and
• Stimulating cells to secrete a variety of cytokines that influence the function of other cells involved in adaptive immune responses and innate immune responses.

Cell-mediated immunity is directed primarily at microbes that survive in phagocytes and microbes that infect non-phagocytic cells. It is most effective in removing virus-infected cells, but also participates in defending against fungi, protozoans, cancers, and intracellular bacteria. It also plays a major role in transplant rejection.

THIS LITTLE-KNOWN NUTRIENT – Activates Your Cellular Immunity Defense System

It’s called a beta-glucan, or a β-glucan for short.

Outside of freshman chemistry class, you may never have heard of a beta-glucan.

But these β-glucans attach themselves to white blood cells and stimulate them to seek and destroy bacteria and viruses.

Your body already has natural bacteria killing cells called B cells and T cells, and dozens of research studies show that once β-glucans are in your system, they activate and strengthen these killer cells.

It’s like sending every little immunity soldier into battle with a rocket launcher packed with an unlimited supply of bacteria-seeking missiles.

And that’s not all they do…

Remember those little immunity defenders called cytokines?

We know that overloading the system with them can cause a “cytokine storm,” but striking the right balance of them can really fortify your immune system.

Well, that’s part of the magic of β-glucans…

β-glucans are what trigger natural and healthy cytokine production and those little cytokines are what spring to action in an immune response.

So, the more β-glucan you have in your body, the stronger your immune system. 

AND what’s more, β-glucans naturally regulate your cytokine production, so they won’t “overload” and cause a dangerous cytokine storm.

So, you might be asking, how do I make sure my β-glucans are strong and that my system has enough of them to fight off infectious bacteria?

Well, there is one superfood that contains extremely high amounts of β-glucan.

The #1 Superfood That Fortifies Your Cellular Immunity Defense System:

NUTRITIONAL MUSHROOMS – The Cutting Edge of Natural Immune System Research

• Just by using nutritional mushrooms regularly, researchers say you can increase your levels of β-glucans more than any other nutrient on earth.
• It’s like having a never-ending supply of reinforcements to send into the war against infectious diseases.
• Researchers have found that nutritional mushrooms contain 0.53 grams of β-glucans per 100 grams of mushrooms, which makes them far and away the most β-glucan-rich food you can find on the planet.

3 Mushrooms That Act Like “Turbo Shots” To Your Immune System 

SHITAKE

In a 2011 study, 52 healthy adults, aged 21 to 41, took home a 4-week supply of shiitake mushrooms. They were told to eat one 4-ounce serving of the mushroom every day.

Then after the 4 weeks were completed, they returned for some simple blood work.

Their results showed a decrease in inflammatory proteins which the researchers thought was a pretty good benefit in itself…

But then they looked a little harder at the data and saw that each patient’s B cells, T cells, and natural bacteria-killing cells had all increased.

When they finally figured out what triggered this response, it was no surprise that it was all connected back to the β-glucans that came from the shiitake mushrooms they had been eating.

“If you eat a shiitake mushroom every day, you could see changes in their immune system that are beneficial,” said Food Science and Human Nutrition Professor Sue Percival, who was the leader of the study.

She also said that those β-glucans were not only able to “Enhance the immune system,”

… but “also reduce the inflammation that the immune system produces.”

And the benefits of shiitake don’t just stop there, because these mushrooms flood your system with other nutrients like B vitamins, vitamin D, selenium, niacin, and 7 of the 8 essential amino acids.

Plus, the enzymes packed into shiitake also make it easier for your body to absorb almost any nutrient.

Which means if you’re already taking a vitamin C or D supplement for your immune system, shiitake will actually make those supplements work better!

REISHI

Known as the Mushrooms of Immortality, reishi mushrooms are packed with polysaccharides, antioxidant properties, and those crucial β-glucans that can help with immune function.

As early as 206 BC there are writings about reishi mushrooms being used to help people live longer.

Today’s researchers now know that they were living longer simply because their bodies were better equipped to fight off disease.

Simply put, they had super strong Cellular Immunity Defense Systems.

Again, it’s thanks to the high content of those powerful β-glucans!

In fact, reishi mushrooms have been shown to have as much as 5.8% levels of β-glucans, higher than any other mushroom strain on earth.

MAITAKE

Remember those important cytokines?

Well, we know it’s important to strike the right balance of them in your system…

So that you have enough of them to help your immune system fight off bacteria…

But not too many to cause a dangerous “cytokine storm”.

It turns out that maitake mushrooms may just be the secret to striking this delicate balance.

A 3-week study of a group of healthy young women taking Maitake mushrooms resulted in the benefits you might expect.

Similar to reishi and shiitake, they all saw improvements in their immune systems thanks to the increase in β-glucans…

But the study with maitake gave researchers some really exciting results with those cytokines

It turns out that maitake was able to trigger both stimulatory (IL-2) and suppressive (IL-10) cytokines.

That means they were able to increase the cytokines, but not past a certain level so they got out of control.

But here’s where things really start to get interesting…

Maitake is not the only mushroom researchers have studied for the immune response…

While it was by far the strongest in supporting the immune defense reaction…

There was one way they were able to trigger an even bigger response…

They combined it with shiitake!

And it was that combination that was stronger than any other.

MUSHROOM POTENCY CAN BE INCREASED EXPONENTIALLY WHEN THEY ARE USED TOGETHER!

Just look what happened when the research team from the National Institute of Complementary Medicine, the School of Chemistry and Molecular Biosciences, and Integria Healthcare started mixing mushrooms together…

They started with nine varieties of whole mushroom extracts.

They tried them each individually with some pretty good results…

But then they tried mixing a few of them together, and as you’d expect, the results dramatically increased.

And when their work was done do you know which 3 of the 9 mushrooms worked best for the immune system?

You guess it – the magical trio of reishi, shiitake, and maitake.

When these 3 were combined, the lead researcher told the media that they came together to create and immune system “super-force.”

“What we found that was surprising was that the (combination) gave three to four times the impact that what we would expect,” Associate Professor Joe Tiralongo said.

7M+ by Organixx

• 7M+ is a breakthrough proprietary formula that ensures you’re getting the most powerful combination of those 3 crucial mushrooms packed with those β-glucans at a level no other mushroom supplement can offer.
• The anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties of 7M+ give you what you need to help support your immune system like nothing else on the market.

And… It turns out there’s so much more that mushrooms can do for our bodies than just immune support.

That’s why Organixx added 4 other nutritional mushrooms into this formula….

CHAGA

Chaga has been used for centuries primarily in the East. It’s known for its immune support and soothing properties. Many traditional healers have used it as a soothing tea for a powerful and natural digestive support. It’s also shown the potential to help maintain healthy blood pressure levels that are already within the normal range. Chaga also has very powerful antioxidant properties that make it a powerhouse on its own.

CORDYCEPS

Cordyceps mushrooms have been shown to help regulate a healthy immune system. Cordyceps were at one time so highly valued that they were only allowed to be consumed by the Emperor of China (who lived to 100+ years old and still fathered children into his 100s). Also known for the ability to support sexual health and athletic ability, cordyceps have been the most sought after nutritional mushroom in the Orient.

LION’S MANE

One of the more interesting mushrooms coming from the ancient east. Lion’s mane is known to support brain health, support cognitive function, and aid against age-related memory loss. It also helps maintain mental focus and function, as well as promoting healthy digestive function through its powerful regulation of bacteria.

TURKEY TAIL

Turkey tail is considered one of the best-researched mushrooms on earth. Its benefits are just as strong as other nutritional mushrooms such as reishi, cordyceps and maitake. It contains powerful antioxidant nutrients and high levels of selenium, vitamin D, and vitamin B3, which are crucial for boosting and maintaining immunity.

 Fermentation INCREASES the Power of Nutritional Mushrooms

Most other mushroom supplements don’t take this into consideration. They simply get a basic mushroom formula and bottle it up.

That strategy does work a little better than just eating whole mushrooms…

But fermentation takes it to a whole other level of potency and that’s exactly what the team at Organixx has done with 7M+ and their proprietary fermentation process.

Fermentation is simply the process of breaking something down so that the highest amount of nutrients can be extracted.

Research found that fermented mushrooms are, indeed, the best way to increase the levels of those powerful β-glucans.

Fermentation also extracts all the healthy and beneficial other nutrients that are packed into mushrooms. This means that those nutrients can get into your system better because they’re more bioavailable.

The Ingredients in 7M+ Are Certified Organic – Why That Matters to YOU!

• Once a nutrient like mushrooms are harvested, they are then dried and concentrated down to a very potent dose.
• This sounds like a good thing because you’ll get a higher dose of the nutrients, as we discussed already…
• But if those mushrooms were not grown organically, that means pesticides and poisons were used on them.
• And when they are concentrated down, you’re not only getting high amounts of nutrients…. but HIGH CONCENTRATIONS OF POISONS too!

Why 7M+ for You and Your Family

• 7M+ is specifically formulated to give you everything you need to help support immunity and feel younger and healthier.
• This year, with the entire globe dealing with a health epidemic, maintaining your immune system might be something that makes all the difference.
• With 7M+, you get seven of the world’s finest beneficial mushrooms, jam-packed with β-glucans – nature’s powerful sickness-fighting ingredient.
• With the immune-supporting power of 7M+ working throughout your entire body, you can help increase your and your family’s odds of staying well even during times like this.
• Only two capsules a day provide you with a completely safe, 100% natural, and amazingly effective formula to support immunity… and help you live a longer and healthier life!

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Episode 82 – Why Boosting Your Immune System During a Pandemic Can Kill You…Do This Instead!

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Episode 82 – Why Boosting Your Immune System During a Pandemic Can Kill You…Do This Instead!

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Jonathan Hunsaker:

Welcome, everyone, to another episode of Empowering You Organically. I’m your host, Jonathan Hunsaker, joined by my cohost TeriAnn Trevenen.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Hey everyone.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

We have an exciting podcast for you today. We are going to talk about why you should not boost your immune system. Wait, what? What did he just say? Yes. Do not boost your immune system, especially right now during a pandemic. We’re going to talk about the difference between boosting an immune system and supporting an already healthy immune system. So let me first start the episode off by saying, this is not designed to diagnose, treat, cure, and any of the other craziness that we can be held legally responsible for, because we’re just sharing some information, we’re sharing some research, we’re sharing some health knowledge to help you be as healthy as you possibly can. So again, we are talking about why you should not boost your immune system and why just supporting your immune system is the best thing to do right now. So TeriAnn, do you want to start us off and just share the two different types of immune systems that we have?

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Sure. So a lot of people, we just put the immune system in one group overall, but you actually have the innate immune system and you have the adaptive immune system. So the innate immune system is made of defenses against infection that can be activated immediately once a pathogen attacks. So again, it is a defense system against infection that can be activated immediately once a pathogen attacks.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

This is the innate immune system. It is essentially made up of barriers that aim to keep viruses, bacteria, parasites, and other foreign particles out of your body or limit their ability to spread and move throughout your body. So physical barriers, defense mechanisms, general immune responses, when we’re talking about these things when it comes to the innate immune system, we’re talking about different aspects of the body that help to limit the ability of certain things to spread within your body.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Again, back to viruses, bacteria, parasites. The innate immune system is always general or nonspecific, meaning anything that is identified as foreign or non-self is a target for the innate immune response. And it’s activated by the presence of antigens and their chemical properties. So again, barriers and immune responses, it’s like defending your body. If you think about it in that context.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

The adaptive immune system has precision and a longer memory. While the innate immune system is the body’s first line of defense, and if it’s unsuccessful in destroying the pathogens that come into your body after about four to seven days, the specific adaptive immune response sets in. This means that the adaptive defense takes longer, but it targets the pathogen more accurately.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Another advantage to this is it can remember the aggressor and acts specifically against certain antigens. If there is new contact with an antigen that is already known, the defense response can then be quicker. This way, the defense responses of the adaptive immune system are more efficient and faster than those of the innate defense, if the antigen is already known as I said. So when I talk about having precision and a longterm memory in your immune system, longterm memory, it remembers what’s come into your body and in that sense protects your body even more.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Let’s say you already had some type of the flu and then it comes back into your body again. Your body just zaps it. “I’ve seen this before. I know what you’re trying to do. Get out of here.” So the innate immune system is immediate defense. If your immune system is strong and healthy, it’s more likely to be able to fight against some of these things that come into your body. But if it gets through and it goes into the adaptive immune system portion of the immune system, if it gets to that phase, it’s been in there for a few days and your body already knows what it is, it’s going to take it out. There’s no way it’s going to make it through. Your body’s used to it. It’s seen it before.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

The adaptive immune system can remember the antigens because it produces memory cells. Think about that for a minute. Our bodies are such amazing, amazing machines, if you will. The fact that it has its own memory cells to remember what it’s seen before. So it goes back to if it recognizes something your body’s seen before, it remembers it. And it also has several parts that react in different ways depending on the place in the body where the pathogen is.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

So we often just think about immune system like flu or coronavirus. That’s a hot topic right now, right? It’s not just that. But in different places in your body where things can get into your body that shouldn’t be in your body, it reacts in different ways based on where things come into your body. Antibodies are made available for germs outside the cells, in the blood and in body fluids. To eliminate pathogens that are inside the tissue, a cell-mediated immune response is necessary. So it just does all these different things for different portions of your body to fight things off that aren’t supposed to be there. An incredible aspect of our body that we don’t talk about. So again, the innate immune system, the adaptive immune system, there’s separation there. When we talk about immunity and immune system health.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

I mean, I think it’s so vitally important to have that distinction, because even myself, I mean, I’m not as educated as I like to be on some of these things and we learn more every day. It’s why I love being in this business, why I love these podcasts. We’re constantly learning more and more. I think the general public does not understand those two different sides of the immune system. It’s why we’re going to talk about why boosting is actually bad for the immune system here in just a second. So TeriAnn, do you want to talk more about cytokines as well? Would you like me to talk about cytokines?

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Absolutely. Sure, yep. And again, I mean keep listening in, because we’re going to talk about that connection, boosting the immune system versus supporting a healthy immune system and what you can do there. Let’s talk about cytokines permanent. They form a group of proteins that participate in cell signaling, intercellular communication in your body, and in many cellular and immunological functions of your body. They’re prominently involved in inflammatory responses and defense against viral infections that come into your body.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

If the other part acts like soldiers protecting you, then cytokines are like Navy Seals, and such good imagery thinking of it in that way, sent in for only the toughest missions. These cytokines are small molecules in the body that are released by certain cells to help coordinate the battle against infections. So it’s like a little army running around in your body, coming together to support you. So you might be thinking, “Great, how do I get more of these hardworking cytokines into my system?” And that’s a really good question, right? And it’s something that we need to be thinking about when it comes to our immune system. So cytokines are super important to be able to fight off infection and viruses in your body. And how can we get more of those? How can we help to support our immune system in that effort?

Jonathan Hunsaker:

Yeah. That’s where it really becomes important to understand, right? We start thinking, okay, well how do I get more of these cytokines? And that’s where the whole conversation of boosting the immune system comes from. Especially right now, coronavirus, COVID-19. Everybody’s running ads for supplements and all these other things that say, “Boost the immune system, boost the immune system.” And then they cite a bunch of things like, “This is going to increase the cytokines in your body.” And why doctors now and a lot of people are saying that’s not a good thing is because you’re getting what’s called a cytokine storm. That means now you’re sending all of these Navy Seals in and it’s an overreaction to the virus. Now there’s more war going on that’s needed, right?

Jonathan Hunsaker:

So now you need to go and infiltrate this house, and you’ve sent in millions of people to go in and do it. So it’s causing too much inflammation and too big of an inflammatory response. What’s really interesting is I’ve read some other things where they, a lot of people actually saying that some people’s experience is, that their experience a lot bigger decline because of the over-inflammatory response to the virus. Not saying that that’s happening because they’re taking stuff that’s increasing the cytokines, but that is one of the side effects of trying to boost the immune system, is you’re getting this whole cytokine storm going into your body now. It’s over inflaming things, and it’s over killing it, so to speak.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

If you think about the purpose of the immune system. Its purpose is to protect the body from harmful substances by recognizing and responding to antigens. So when we talk about antigens, they’re substances on the surface of cells, viruses, fungi, bacteria. It recognizes and destroys those things coming into your body. So it can be things like toxins, chemicals, drugs, foreign particles, viruses, bacteria, all those things that we’re talking about. Your body needs to be at a certain level to fight those things, but not over respond to that.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

If you think about that in the context with anything in your body, if you’re too low or you’re too high, you can have issues. And that’s also true with your immune response to things. You can have your body overreact to things by trying to fight these things off and create bigger issues as well. It’s not just like, well, I want it to be on overtime right now and work really hard. This is something people don’t understand about the immune system. You actually want to be careful with that balance. You want it to do the exact right job it’s supposed to do. Not overwork. Think about stress. You have too much stress. Everything just comes crashing down. Well you can overstress the immune system.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

Yeah, I mean, I struggle with this because I’m the kind of person that’s like, well if two is good, six has to be great. Right? And I suffer from it all the time. Whether that’s going on a run, like God, if two miles is healthy for me I might as well 20.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

[crosstalk 00:11:04] use the healthy example because for me it’s like, well, two scoops of gelato is good, then I should have 10 scoops of gelato because that’s what went through my head when I was thinking over indulgence. Not like I should run a little further. I should scoop a little more gelato into my bowl. That’s so nice that you thought about the healthy thing. I was [crosstalk 00:11:22]

Jonathan Hunsaker:

Well with gelato it is true. Maybe gelato is good for you so [crosstalk 00:11:27]

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Okay, well again, I was thinking all the unhealthy things. You were thinking all the healthy things.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

I think about it with supplements. I take some supplements. And there are some supplements that I do increase my dose right now because of what’s going on, and I’m very cautious not to overdose. Not that you can overdose on a whole food supplement. Because, for example, like we have a turmeric supplement, you’re not going to overdose on it. You’re just eating more turmeric, right? Or our mushrooms, you’re not going to overdose unless you’re already allergic to mushrooms and you take a massive amount. So that’s not really the case.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

But what I don’t want to do is I don’t want to overstimulate parts of my body that don’t need to be overstimulated, like the cytokines, by taking a certain supplement that might do that. It’s why it’s actually really interesting. Not many people talk about a benefit of turmeric helping with your immune system. But one of the benefits for turmeric, especially during a time like this, is it can help prevent your body from over inflaming to fight off the virus.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

And that over inflammation can actually cause as bad or worse symptoms than the virus itself, because now your body’s having to not just fight off the virus, but now it’s having to fight off having too much inflammation, which is also bad. We’ve done many podcasts all about that. So turmeric is a very interesting thing right now during this kind of pandemic, and a healthy solution, in my opinion, to help manage over inflammation of things. We kind of understand all of that. Let’s talk for a second about beta glucans and what b-glucans are.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Yeah, so the beta glucans, or b-glucan for short, outside of just chemistry class and hearing these terms, what they are is they attach themselves to white blood cells and stimulate them to seek and destroy bacteria and viruses. Your body already has a natural bacteria-killing cell called B cells and T cells, and dozens of research studies have shown that once b-glucans are in your system, they activate and strengthen these killer cells. So we’re talking about beta glucans in relation to the cytokine and having an overproduction that overstimulation of your immune system. This is where the magic of the beta glucans comes in and why they have a connection together. It actually helps to balance and trigger a natural and healthy cytokine production that we need for a stable immune response. Not an over-responsive of your immune system, not an under response of your immune system. They actually compliment the cytokines in giving just enough for what your body needs to fight off those nasty infections or viruses that get in.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

That’s what’s really important, is getting beta glucans is what’s going to help regulate the cytokine release that you have in your body, so you don’t have the cytokine storm. That’s why it’s really important, and we’re going to talk about where to get beta glucans, b-glucans, and which mushrooms have the best b-glucans for your body. Because that’s the most important thing to be taking right now, is getting the beta glucans in your system. That’s what’s going to give you a strong immune system because it’s going to regulate the cytokines and you’re not going to overdo it or overkill it, so to speak.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Absolutely. Yeah. So there’s, so you asked the question, and Jonathan brought this up, well how do I get this? How do I have a balanced immune system supporting what my body naturally needs to do to fight some of these things off instead of overstimulating your body? I think people think of like, the imagery in my head is I’m going to take more and more and more and more and it’s going to make me be protected against all these things that are happening. No. Get the right amount of things in your nutritional plan and your supplements to support your body the right way. And again, beta glucans are one of those things that can keep your cytokines in check.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

So the question comes into play, where do I get enough of this in my nutritional supplements, my food, everything I’m putting into my body? And one of the places we see it a lot are in mushrooms. And specifically today we’re going to talk about three mushrooms that really contribute to this conversation that we’re having today that you can add into your diet or that you can get through supplementation. And those three mushrooms are, and we’ve talked about these on the podcast before, we’re familiar with these, we love these mushrooms. Shitake, reishi, and maitake are all proven to support this balance of cytokines and beta glucan and really helping to support your immune system at healthy levels.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

Yeah, I mean mushrooms are phenomenal, and they’ve been studied so much that this isn’t just a hey, take some mushrooms and maybe something will help. These have been studied so much that there’s actually been studies where people have done the studies with just taking shitake, just having reishi, just having maitake separately and measuring the beta glucans in the body afterwards and being able to measure the immune response. And what they’ve actually found out is combining those three together gets you an exponential return on the amount of beta glucans that are in your body. So if you’ve already taking a reishi, don’t think, Oh well I’m just fine now. I would highly encourage you to take a maitake as well, to take a shitake as well.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

We could go through some facts of some of these mushrooms, but just quickly like reishi is five, let’s see it here. Reishi mushrooms have been shown to have as much as 5.8% levels of b-glucans higher than any other mushroom strain on earth. So we’re not, it’s not just go out and let me just eat whatever mushrooms. It’s important to take these specific mushrooms as well for your immune system.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

And I’m so trained to say boost your immune system because that’s what I’ve seen everyone, I want to say take this to boost your immune system, but that’s not what we want to do. Take these to strengthen your immune system and to support what your body already has. Don’t overdo it with … and listen, I know the fear tactics in the marketing of other supplement the companies that are out there. It can be very easy to fall into the trap of, oh, I’m going to buy this because this one makes this claim and I’m going to buy this because this one makes this claim, and now you have five different supplements on your table, all designed to boost the immune system. Now you’re taking all of those. It’s not the right blend.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

That’s where you get the cytokine storm. That’s where you’re actually doing your body much more harm than good by taking all five of these different ones. And that’s why the beta glucan conversation is so important, because if you’re looking to strengthen your immune system, that’s the number one thing to focus on, is getting the beta glucans right. You do that, then everything else has a better balance like it should.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Well and let’s dive into the mushrooms a little bit more. I want to talk about a few points on the mushrooms. Because you heard the three mushrooms, but let’s talk about why they’re important. There’s actually been research done on the three of these together, so the maitake, the reishi and the shitake. It’s actually been shown in research, and we’ll link this in the show notes so that you can read about it, that the three of them together are absolutely a powerhouse in this process of supporting the immune system to be at healthy levels. When we’re talking about shitake and reishi, this is where we’re really seeing the impact of the beta glucans. And then when the maitake comes into the conversation, that’s where we get into the conversation of the cytokines.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

I want to talk about it for a minute because there’s actually a really interesting study that was done in 2011 with the shitake where they studied 52 healthy adults age 21 to 41, and they took home a four-week supply of shitake mushrooms. They were told to eat one four-ounce serving of the mushrooms every day. Then after the four weeks were completed, they were returned for some simple blood work. Their results showed a decrease in inflammatory proteins, which the researchers thought was a pretty good benefit in and of itself.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

But then they looked a little harder at the data and saw that each patient’s B cells, T cells, and natural bacteria-killing cells had all increased. When they finally figured out what triggered this response, it was no surprise that it was all connected back to the b-glucans that came from the shitake mushrooms they had been eating. If, and they said in this study, one of the comments that was made, if you eat a shitake mushroom everyday, you could see changes in their immune system that are beneficial.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

She also said, this was from one of the people that participated, professor Sue Percival, who was part of this research, she also said that b-glucans were not only able to enhance the immune system, but here’s the kicker. Here’s the kicker that they found in this research. It also reduced the inflammation that the immune system produced. So as we talked about, you want your immune system to do exactly what it’s supposed to do but not overproduced in results, which can cause a negative impact. And what they’re seeing with the shitake, just shitake alone, not only are you getting that benefit of the b-glucan, but it’s also keeping the immune system exactly where it needs to be and not over-producing on results when it comes to the, we’re talking about cytokines and b-glucans keeping themselves in check.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Reishi is also one of those things where you get that massive benefit of the b-glucans. There’s tons of studies out there on that too, but similar to what we saw with the shitake. So those two are really powerful when it comes to the beta glucans. The maitake is where it comes in when we’re talking about cytokines. We know it’s important to have that perfect balance, as we’ve been talking about, so that your immune system is supported in the right way to fight off that bacteria and not have the cytokine storm that Jonathan was talking about earlier.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

It turns out that the maitake mushroom is that secret to striking that balance. In a three-week study of a group of healthy young women taking maitake mushrooms, it resulted in benefits that you’d probably expect based on what we’ve been talking about today. Similar to the reishi and shitake, they all saw improvements in their immune systems thanks to the increase in beta glucans. But the study with maitake gave researchers some really exciting results when it came to the cytokines.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

It turns out that the maitake was able to trigger both stimulatory and suppressive cytokines. That means they were able to increase the cytokines but not past a certain level, so that they got out of control. Here’s where it gets really interesting. Maitake is not the only mushroom researchers have studied for their immune response. While it was by far the strongest in supporting the immune defense reaction, there was other ways to be able to trigger an even bigger response. That’s when they combined it with shitake.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

So all these mushrooms work together when it comes to the beta glucans and the cytokines and how they work together. They’re seeing just the right amount of response with the immune system versus not going too far into the, down the path of what we’re seeing with some of the virus that’s happening right now where people’s bodies over respond and actually makes them even more sick. Because it’s not healthy. It’s an over-responsive, an overstimulation, and your body doesn’t have that support to know when to stop.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

It’s just so fascinating. I mean, I love when we go down the research rabbit hole and you start finding out all of these things. I mean, listen, because there’s all kinds of prescription drugs out there. There’s all kinds of things out there. But really nature has a lot of the solutions for us. I’m not saying there’s not a place for Western medicine and prescriptions and things like that. I just think that those are more last resort places. For most of us that are looking to get healthy and stay healthy, it’s just right there in nature for us. And so I love this study about these mushrooms.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

I love doing this podcast on it because there’s a lot of misinformation out there. There’s a lot of people just trying to sling a product, right? And I’m in the space, right? For owning a supplement company. I learned more about it. Even my manufacturer will reach out to me and say, “Hey, we just created this, this and this.” And I look at it and it seems great, but unfortunately it’s got a bunch of synthetic ingredients in it and this, that and the other. But it’s getting created because people are just following the demand right now. They’re following the hype around COVID-19 and here’s a bunch of stuff like, Hey, let’s hurry and boost the immune system. I just don’t want our listeners to fall into that trap because the solution is not boosting your immune system. The solution is supporting them. You can do it easily with these three mushrooms.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

Now with that said, I will say that we do have a mushroom supplement at Organicxx. It’s called 7M+, where we actually have seven mushrooms total. We’ve actually been familiar with the benefits of these three. But mushrooms are so powerful, they add a lot more. We weren’t just going to stop it three mushrooms. By the way, we created 7M+, and this isn’t going to be a long sales pitch for you, but it’s the first product we ever created in January of 2016. So this isn’t a bandwagon product or anything like that. This is the very first one we ever made because we know the benefits of mushrooms.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

For those of you that want to learn more about that, we have another podcast, I believe it’s episode 47, that talks all about our 7M, our other mushrooms. To give you just a quick rundown, the other seven mushrooms we have chaga in there, which is great for immune support, cordyceps, which is great for the immune system, lion’s mane, which is phenomenal for brain health we’ve included in there, and then turkey tail is another powerful mushroom. It’s one of the most studied mushrooms out there. So again, if you want to learn more about that, go to Organicxx. You can check out 7M+. Listen to podcast 47 for more about mushrooms.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

But the whole point of this podcast is to show you that you can just go eat some mushrooms right now. Add those to your diet that can give you the benefits that so many of you are seeking right now without spending hundreds of dollars on over-hyped products out there. And again, the big challenge here, too, is we fall down, we go down the rabbit hole of this supplement is claiming this and this one’s making this claim and that claim. There’s all of these claims and they all sound wonderful. Then we’re all scared by the media and other things about coronavirus and COVID-19 that we all want solutions. Here’s all these five products that offer all these great solutions. I encourage you to save your money and just go get some mushrooms, because that’s really going to give you a lot of what you need right now.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

Now I also want to put a caveat out there that it doesn’t mean that you can sit there and eat a whole bunch of gelato right now and sit on the couch and not do other things to be healthy.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Ten scoops of gelato.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

Ten scoops of gelato and be healthy during this time. Do other things like moving your body, taking deep breaths, meditating and de-stressing and all of that. And if you’re going to go down the route of I’m looking for a supplement or a food to support a healthy immune system, these three mushrooms are the number one place to start. Again and you can get those in supplement form. You can try 7M+. Whatever. But that to me is the place to go to right now.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

My second suggestion would be is looking at a turmeric and a turmeric supplement, simply because that really helps manage that inflammatory response that our bodies can often overdo when it comes to a virus. I’m not stating any scientific studies or things like that, but I feel like we’re all overstressed any way in our regular day to day life. Now we add something like coronavirus in it. It’s one extra thing that our bodies are so used to over responding anyway. We’re already over inflamed. So I personally think ingesting turmeric or good turmeric supplement is a good idea right now as well. TeriAnn, what are your thoughts? I know I just kind of went on a rant there for the last five or six minutes.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

There’s so much feedback and advice out there. I think that there’s a lot of good supplementation out there for your body. I highly, highly recommend, and I always say this to people, we talk about the word boosting and how dangerous it is. If you haven’t been on a supplement regimen and then all of a sudden you’re like, “I’m going to take 10 supplements and it’s going to save me,” I would be very careful, careful in that endeavor. My recommendation, because I’ve said this before on the podcast, I’m going to say it again. People are, “Well, you own a supplement company, so you just want people to buy every supplement you sell.” No, I actually don’t. And I frequently say to people, “You should take one supplement at a time and see how you feel and see how it impacts you.” Because it is not one size fits all and you will never hear me say that about health. It is different for everyone.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

You may have an immune system right now that is over-producing massively and causing inflammation responses in your body. You have inflammation. You may think, “Oh, I’m not healthy. I’ve got all these issues going on in my body.” And your immune system may be over producing to help you, based on what we talked about today. Or maybe it’s under producing. What do you need to do to get that in check for you? That’s going to be different for me or for Jonathan or for whoever’s listening in today.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

And so start with one thing. And I agree with Jonathan’s sentiment. My first thing I always tell people is you should be on a multivitamin, hands down, 100%. If you are wondering how to boost your immune system, a whole-food multivitamin is the first place to start. But second to that, I’ve been in this industry long enough to know and I’ve been around long enough to know that mushrooms are one of the most powerful things we can put into our nutritional plan for ourselves. Whether you’re supplementing, whether you’re putting them on your salad. Really doesn’t matter. We’re here to educate and give you information.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

If you’re worried about your immune system being completely supported right now and being healthy, yes, you need to be changing your lifestyle and your health overall, but adding mushrooms into your salad, into your food. Taking a supplement if you don’t like mushrooms. A lot of people don’t like mushrooms. These have huge benefits, huge benefits, for immune support and people have plenty of research out there to prove that people who are supplementing with mushrooms or adding them into their diet are seeing improved benefits of being healthier longterm overall, getting sick less, bouncing back faster when they’re sick. That would be my advice. Know what your body needs.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Work with a holistic doctor, a nutritional doctor, an herbalist. They will work with you not only on herbs but also on other foods. They know their stuff and know what your individual body needs. But I would 100% back the fact that a multivitamin, get started on one, take it for a few weeks, see how you feel, make sure it’s a whole-food based supplement.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Then mushrooms. I think mushrooms and what we’re facing right now in the world with a virus that’s so unknown and so foreign and we still don’t know how it’s going to play out. You can support your immune system in healthy ways with the addition of mushrooms into your regimen, and I believe that wholeheartedly. I’ve seen the research. I’ve seen the results in people’s lives that we help every single day. It would be a huge recommendation I would make to people in making sure, unless you have an allergic response to them, which you would need to know that in advance. I think mushrooms are a fantastic addition to your regimen.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

We wouldn’t be living our motto of empowering you organically if I didn’t say make sure your mushrooms are organic, make sure your mushroom supplement is organic. An additional thing that I would look forward to what we do with our mushrooms is we ferment them. Fermenting starts the breakdown process. It just makes them more bioavailable. So consider using a mushroom supplement that’s fermented. Definitely organic.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

And this is another reason why blends matter as well. And I’m not going to go down another rabbit hole. But the research shows you that shitake, reishi and maitkae together have exponential results. This is why we’ve added actually more mushrooms into ours because we’re going to get an even bigger result with our 7M. we do the same kinds of things with our turmeric 3D by adding the ginger, by adding ashwagandha, things like that. They compliment each other. They give you a much higher result.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

So consider that one way, if you’re looking to save money, is not buying all of your ingredients individually, but looking for good blends, synergistic blends. It’s why we do it. Because we know that organic ingredients are more expensive and one way we can save you money is by minimizing how many supplements you have to take by combining them together. Sometimes you get a better response and more benefits, but it saves you some money. So consider looking for those things.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

Anyway, I’m going to wrap up this podcast because there’s been a lot of information. Go check out empoweringyouorganically.com for our show notes. We have all of this written out for you so you can really understand more about the immune system, more about the beta glucans, about the different mushrooms. We also have the transcripts from the show there. You can watch it again there. Make sure you subscribe on iTunes. Give us a positive review if you like our episodes here. Give us a negative one if you don’t like it. Either way, go like go to iTunes and give us a review. The more people that subscribe on iTunes, the more people that we get in front of. And it shows us for other people who are looking for health information. So it’s one little way you can help give back to us if you feel like we’re giving you a lot of great content.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

The other things I would just say is, look at what’s important to you right now. We’re all kind of faced with this craziness of being stuck at home and a lot of changing going on in our life. And I think that a lot of people are becoming more aware of themselves and the health of their body. And now’s a great time to make a transition. You don’t need to change everything. But now’s a great time to focus on you.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

We have more time than we’re used to having. We’re not distracted by a lot of things. Allow this to be an excuse to focus on you, and don’t allow it to be an excuse to avoid you and to avoid what’s going on, and to just live in a state of fear and what’s going on. Let this be a state of empowerment and taking control of your health and control of your life. I just, I hope everybody really stays safe during this time. I know it’s different. We’re not all used to it. But no doubt we will come out of the other end. Who knows what it looks like when we do, but we will come out of it the other side, hopefully healthier than we were going into it. TeriAnn, do you have any last words here?

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Nope. I just hope everyone stays safe and healthy. We’ll keep being here every week with the podcast for you. Here at Organixx overall as a company, our team’s committed more than ever to your health and supporting you and your journey to health, empowering you organically, which is why we named this podcast Empowering You Organically. We look at this time in the world as an awesome challenge to become better both in our health and our emotions. In spirituality, whatever that looks like for you. It’s different for everyone. In your physical aspects of your body. And in your mind, your business, your relationships. I think this is a fantastic time to look within and say, “What can I do with the experience I’m having and move forward in a powerful way?” And Organixx is definitely here to support you. We’re not going anywhere. We are committed to you. Our team is committed to health and to a better world. We know that we’ll continue to be successful because of your support and our collaborative mission with our customers to change the world through health.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

Love it. We’ve all been working virtually for years anyway, so we’ve been in quarantine, we’ve been practicing for this for the past-

TeriAnn Trevenen:

We’re official. We are a professional quarantine.

Jonathan Hunsaker:

Thank you everyone for tuning in. Stay safe, stay healthy, and we will see you next week.

TeriAnn Trevenen:

Thanks everyone.

***

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