Dr. Jerry Bailey of Lakeside Holistic Health: 5 Lifestyle Tweaks That Can Dramatically Improve Your Wellbeing
Sleep: Set a scheduled bed and wake time for each day. And stick to it. Keeping your bed and waking time the same each day NO MATTER what happens each day is key to getting the amount of rest and recovery you need to establish strong brain, hormone and cardiovascular performance. Getting at least 8 hours each night is key to keeping HRV (heart rate variability) high. HRV is a marker for the adaptability of your heart and thus your physiology’s ability to adapt. We are losing our ability to adapt to the stressors of everyday life. This is evident in everyone from millennials to boomers and especially in my generation, Gen X. You want peak performance in every aspect of health, wellness, mindset, performance and business-Get REST!
As a part of my series about “5 Lifestyle Tweaks That Will Dramatically Improve One’s Wellbeing”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Dr. Jerry Bailey.
Dr. Jerry Bailey is a prominent expert on men’s medicine and leads the world in the emerging science of Poly-Hormonal Adrenal Testosterone Syndrome. He is an acclaimed speaker, former clinical and graduate educator, one of few practicing experts, and is considered a leading authority on men’s health. He holds degrees in Chiropractic, Acupuncture and Masters of Science in Human Nutrition and Functional Medicine. His prior background to Chiropractic school was in Health Promotion in Rehabilitative and Prescriptive Programming, Nutrition and Coaching from Central Michigan University. He has been in practice for over two decades seeing tens of thousands of patients in that period. His clinical experience and acute awareness of current research, as a former faculty at the University of Western States in the Graduate Studies department in the Masters of Science of Human Nutrition and Functional Medicine, affords him a unique ability to apply current research to clinical practice to be a truly evidence-informed practicing physician. Not only has he observed this new phenomenon in his patients but has also started to observe similar hormonal patterns in himself, thus leading to the deep dive into the discovery and research of this new syndrome. Even though he leads an active life, exercising regularly with HIIT training, competing in full and half Ironman events, along with Crossfit, and eats a specific personalized eating plan Dr. Bailey had developed PHAT syndrome himself.
He, along with his physician wife, have been the top Functional/Natural medicine practice in the inland northwest for many years. Their clinic is at the forefront of cutting edge evidence-informed practice along with the development of new protocols to aid in reversing most of the chronic illness and hormone imbalances seen today. He is a dad to two amazing sons. He is also a drummer, a gig his day job supports.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you share with us the story about how you first got involved in fitness and wellness?
In high school during the late eighties and early nineties, I was always into weight training and sports. My family health history was typical of the Midwest where we had cardiovascular issues, diabetes, obesity — all those things that were part of my family and people around me — you know, parents, friends, aunts, and uncles were having these major health issues. I knew that I did not want that for myself, my future kids, and my spouse. It really spurred me on to learn all I could about wellness, fitness, and nutrition. That’s what motivated me to earn my bachelor’s from Central Michigan University in exercise physiology — essentially, nutrition, athletic coaching, and then onwards to my chiropractic studies and my master’s in human nutrition and functional medicine. I’ve always been looking for the answers for those difficult cases, for why people can’t get better and conducting as much research as possible to find out those answers versus, “Well, we’re just not sure here’s a drug for you.” I never want drugs to be the answer. I saw that wasn’t the answer way back then and wanted to give everybody the opportunity to really make choices, to delve into their health and wellness and do the best things they can to prevent chronic health conditions that we see today. Most health conditions today can be attributed to lifestyle. And if we don’t correct that, we are headed down a path where millennials are not going to outlive their parents. And that’s a sad case of seeing an evolution of health based on today’s standards of living
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started your career?
I think for me, there’ve been a couple, but I think really being from the Midwest and you just go with the flow, you don’t try to stick your neck out in anything. I think the most interesting thing is getting recognized when I do talks or when I’ve done seminars or meeting people there that say, “Hey, I’ve been following you since one of your first podcasts you did way back or your first interview with supplement companies. When you’re talking about supplements, I followed you in that.” And so that’s always been interesting for me to see that people have an interest in what I say, and they’re applying it to their clients and getting success. That’s the most humbling aspect of what I do. I taught those methods over the years to other practitioners that they come back and say, “Hey, you taught me this. And it stuck with me and it’s actually helping my clients.” So, I think that’s really the most interesting thing that happened to me since starting my career — giving back pays off. And then when former students and other doctors come and say, “Hey, what you said really stuck with me and it’s really benefited me and my clients.”
Can you share a story with us about the most humorous mistake you made when you were first starting? What lesson or take-away did you learn from that?
There have been a few over the years, but not really mistakes, they’re just, you know, things that happen. The most humorous one was when a gentleman called and I was first in practice. I was by myself, answering the phone, doing everything, way back in 2000. He wanted to make an appointment and didn’t want to give his name, or any information. He just wanted to show up at the clinic. And we said, “You know, I can’t do that. I need to know your name. He was very restrictive in his speech, didn’t want to divulge too much on the phone and really wanted to talk to me in person. And I said, “Okay, well let’s schedule a time.” He said, “Oh, I don’t want my name on the list.” The gentleman was worried he would be in a system somewhere and be tracked and everything else. And so when he comes in for the visit, same thing just didn’t want to divulge much. It was like pulling teeth to get anything out of him. And it was a simple, low back issue and I spent about an hour with him. Most of it was me talking, just trying to get him to talk, but I thought, “This guy’s never coming back. I’ll never see him again.” It just didn’t feel like we clicked. Well, he scheduled for a second. He comes in and the guy wouldn’t stop talking. And 20 years later, he still sees me a couple of times a year, comes in and he never really wants any care. He just wants to sit and talk and ask some questions and then once he’s done, he says, “That’s all I got. I’ll see you later.” I’m like, “Okay.” So I think that’s the most humorous thing that happens sometimes in clinical practice is you’ll see somebody and think this first visit did not go well. And then next thing you know, you’re still seeing them 20 years later and they just come in for those questions. So what lesson or takeaway can you learn from that? Just be open to everything around you and the people around you. It will surprise you. That’s the big thing being there and being that ear. So they’re heard, they’re listened to, and that they can get the answers they’re looking for is really key.
Can you share with our readers a bit about why you are an authority in the fitness and wellness field? In your opinion, what is your unique contribution to the world of wellness?
Twenty plus years in clinical practice plus the degrees I have and the experience I have of seeing tens of thousands of patients over the years, really shows what we can do from taking that person from just starting out in the health realm like, they’re on medications, they’re overweight, they have all these chronic health conditions and just taking them step by step, changing their diet, getting them to walk. We really optimize their health with specific testing that we do and optimization to really find out genetically what they need and how we can boost their performance. Even at an elite level, a one to 5% change in performance is the difference between second and first place with the same training for somebody. That really gives me authority as the training I’ve had as an exercise physiologist, as a nutritionist, as a chiropractor, as an epigenetic specialist — that authority is built into those degrees. It’s also the experience of treating a wide range of the at-home person who doesn’t do exercise and kind of lays on the couch to optimizing them into the performance they want, whether it be onto a simple 5k or an iron man that I’ve done myself, to qualifying for the Boston marathon. It’s seeing that variety and knowing how to really get into their mind, to get them where they want to be, and where they need to be is really key. And that’s what brings my authority about, in my opinion, what is my unique contribution to the world of wellness? I think it’s that global view of a person — a fitness person, fitness trainer; we’ll look at them at a fitness level. A nutritionist will look at a nutrition level and nobody really puts the pieces together. And I’ve seen that from my bachelor’s days on to my masters and doctorate that nobody takes the time to put together your fitness. A trainer will say, it’s all about the exercise, your nutritionist, says it’s all about nutrition. And it’s really a combination of those along with the genetics and their mindset. And that’s my unique contribution is combining their fitness, combining their nutrition, combining their genetics, combining their physical attributes to really optimize their health and wellness. Thus allowing them to be the athlete they want to be, or the parent they want to be or the husband, the wife, the whole thing that they want to be and how to keep that mindset going when they’re at their darkest because we can really help them get out of that realm and into that bright light so they can go forward.
None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?
There are so many people that I am grateful for — during my training itself, from my bachelor’s days on, up through my master’s and doctorate level days that have helped to get me where I am. It’s hard to say a particular person. In the undergraduate days there were two professors that really stuck out Dr. Roger Hammer and Dr. Jeff Edwards, both at Central Michigan University. I loved them dearly, still talk to them to this day, 25 years, 26 years later, I still talk to them on occasion. Those two were there in my chiropractic days. So many wonderful professors again, I think the best I would say is Dr. David Panzer, who still practices close to 40, 50 years later, wonderful doctor, the breadth of knowledge there. The peacefulness in his nature of teaching — I was so grateful he gave me the confidence to know I was doing the right thing and made the right choice and become a chiropractor and help people. That soft hand of guidance and that ear to talk to when you need to, that’s really the people who’ve guided me. I mean, even way back to high school, I could say coaches and teachers that were amazing along the way really helped develop me to be the doctor I am today. Even in my nutrition training, Dr. Alex Vasquez, who is a phenomenal teacher and knowledgeable person that I’ve ever met in nutrition and medicine. His guidance and character really helped develop my nutritional understanding a lot more than I ever thought I would into the depth of knowing down to the cellular level, how nutrition really feeds the body and how nutrition and vitamins and minerals function in the body. There’s not a single person who’s driven me forward. It was that conglomerate of my inner circle guiding me along that way.
Ok thank you for all that. Now let’s move to the main focus of our interview. We all know that it’s important to eat more vegetables, eat less sugar, exercise more, and get better sleep etc. But while we know it intellectually, it’s often difficult to put it into practice and make it a part of our daily habits. In your opinion what are the 3 main blockages that prevent us from taking the information that we all know, and integrating it into our lives?
The three main blockages, I believe, is the knowledge of how to do it, implementing it on a daily basis, and then celebrating the success of that. Those three things are key in learning how to really just start incorporating vegetables into the diet, how to exercise a little bit more, how to get more sleep. Taking away things from, you know, getting the electronics out of your life, several hours before bed — that’s really key knowing in dietarily wise, like you can really eat less sugar, eat more vegetables by simply eating the rainbow, not Skittles the candy, but the rainbow of colors of vegetables. Eat those every single day that — you know, Roy G Bev, the red, orange, yellow, blue, green, indigo, violet, the colors we learned. Every single day, right there you have eight colors of vegetables and eight cups of food that you wouldn’t have before. That’s the simplest way to do it is pick that color each every day, pick a cup, pick those colors, pick a food form and eat them. That’s going to make you get those vegetables in every single day. And that’s a simple way you can incorporate eating more vegetables and avoid junk because you’re going to be full and have lots of energy and not want to eat sugar. How to exercise more, get moving, just get out and go for a walk, get into nature, celebrate nature by what’s called forest bathing. The Japanese study this for a long time and showed that those who got out into nature and walked around in nature actually had better health, lower cortisol, and stress response in their system, better cardiovascular markers and better neurological, better neurological function. Simply getting outside and walking, sleep wise, track it, use a tracking device to track your sleep. So you know how you’re sleeping, what’s disturbing you. You can see how exercise and nutrition affects your sleep. Those three main things are really key to doing that and that’s how you integrate it. Eating the rainbow for vegetables is really, really key. You’ll cut the sugar out cause you’ll be full from eating all those.
Can you please share your “5 Non-Intuitive Lifestyle Tweaks That Will Dramatically Improve One’s Wellbeing”? (Please share a story or an example for each, and feel free to share ideas for mental, emotional and physical health.)
The 5 top non-intuitive lifestyle tweaks to dramatically improve one’s well being are:
1) Sleep: Set a scheduled bed and wake time for each day. And stick to it. Keeping your bed and waking time the same each day NO MATTER what happens each day is key to getting the amount of rest and recovery you need to establish strong brain, hormone and cardiovascular performance. Getting at least 8 hours each night is key to keeping HRV (heart rate variability) high. HRV is a marker for the adaptability of your heart and thus your physiology’s ability to adapt. We are losing our ability to adapt to the stressors of everyday life. This is evident in everyone from millennials to boomers and especially in my generation, Gen X. You want peak performance in every aspect of health, wellness, mindset, performance and business-Get REST!
2) Food: Eat the RAINBOW-ROY GW BIV. Eat each color every day in vegetables and a couple fruits. Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, White, Blue, Indigo and Violet. If you hit six colors of veggies at a cup each and two colors of fruits for a cup each you won’t have the time nor the will to eat sugar-ladened processed foods! From lightly sauteed, to baked, to fresh, eat all these colors and you will have the nutrient density to meet most of your daily needs of vitamins, minerals and phytonutrients that we don’t even know the name of yet! Plus, you will naturally be in a caloric deficit but nutrient-dense diet high in fiber to stimulate better digestion, elimination, detoxification and energy increase thus leading to natural decrease in weight loss without even trying.
3) Infrared therapy: using red-light therapy that you can simply order on amazon has been shown to benefit mental, physical and spiritual aspects of health and wellbeing. Find a unit that is dual light wavelength of 660 and 850 nm as these hit the spectrums to greatly influence wellbeing and health. Using these daily for 15–30 minutes laying on the body in any area from the face/head (increase mental focus and alpha wave stimulation) to the groin (to increase testosterone in men and balance in women) to the feet (for plantar fasciitis). A simple easy tool to boost your health and wellness with little to no investment on you. You can tie this in with number 4 for a super neuro-boost to the brain.
4) Get and use an Alpha Stim unit. The alpha stim is a cranial electrotherapy stimulation (CES) device that delivers a natural level of microcurrent, via small clips worn on your earlobes, through the brain to stimulate and modulate specific groups of nerve cells. This little unit is key to decreasing anxiety, depression, insomnia and increasing alpha wave (our creative and peaceful waves) formation in the brain. I use this in conjunction with infrared therapy every day to get my brain primed for the day and at the end to chill the nervous system when I have an incredibly busy stressful day. The brain has five waves: gamma, beta, alpha, theta and delta. The alpha stim places in, of course, alpha waves, which are reflective and restful. When we are anxious or depressed and can’t sleep, we are in beta waves which increase these negative emotions and states. In today’s society we are stuck in beta not moving up to gamma nor down to alpha, theta or delta. This little machine primes us for peak state of performance and creativity.
5) Get Adjusted and Acupuncture! This is a no-brainer on how to increase wellbeing. Yet the majority don’t do either. Research shows those under the care of a chiropractor and acupuncturist are healthier and miss fewer work days than those under regular medically based care. Those that seek out these types of medicine are generally more willing to take care of themselves and are independent of sick care. After practicing both of these medicines for two decades and tens of the thousands of patient visits I can speak to this being true. My clients that get regular care from my clinic make better choices for their health and wellness while not needing medical interventions such as drugs and surgery. While each type has its place, the goal should be independence of care on health and only these functional or alternative medicines have that as part of their tenets of care. “Your body has the ability to heal itself, if given the right tools.”
As an expert, this might be obvious to you, but I think it would be instructive to articulate this for the public. Aside from weight loss, what are 3 benefits of daily exercise? Can you explain?
Three daily benefits of exercise are besides weight loss, of course is one you’re lubricating your joints. If you aren’t moving the joints they can’t lubricate themselves. The fluid in there kind of gets old and gritty like old car oil. And that lets the arthritis set in. Another benefit is improved cardiovascular flow, not only to the muscles and joints, but also to the brain. We’re going to improve brain function significantly by exercising every day and getting movement. You also increase blood flow to your adipose tissue, your fat cells, which will help you lose weight. You’ll trigger actual weight loss just by getting the movement in there. And really the third one overall is emotional. Not only mentally, are you better prepared, but emotionally you’re better to handle the day by being able to burn off calories and burn off energy in the system and bring the body out of that, bring the body out of the head and into the body. We are so stuck today in our heads because we sit at computers all day and don’t get much movement. The brain is stuck in this ever-flowing circle of stimuli, stimuli, stimuli, and we don’t get it out of our head and into our body. Those are the three things I believe are really beneficial for daily exercise.
For someone who is looking to add exercise to their daily routine, which 3 exercises would you recommend that are absolutely critical?
This one is epic. I love weight training. I do CrossFit. I’ve been doing weight training for close to 35 years now since like eighth grade. It’s one of the most beneficial things we can do to strengthen our body and research shows the more muscle mass we have as we age, the better we age. We used to think it was cardiovascular, but we’re seeing that this chronic cardio is really bad for the system and actually is detrimental to the cardiovascular system. So strength training is important to have muscle mass as we age; it’s actually anti-aging. Three exercises that I would recommend for sure are deadlifts as long as your back is good, squats, and bench presses. Body squats will work your back, your shoulders, and your legs immensely and bench press of course works your upper body. So those three things are really key exercises that you should be doing to really help your body grow.
Is there a particular book that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story?
The Celestine Prophecy — that book was so instrumental in my development and my wife’s too, because it gave us this view, like we had a lot of hard science on exercise and nutrition, but we were missing the mindset. That book gave me that intuitive look into people’s personalities to help them better develop a really good core lifestyle and mindset to their lives. So that way they could move forward and not be stuck in the perpetual circles they were stuck in. That book really impacted me in the sense of being able to look at people differently and not just kind of go, “Oh, this is this person. This is that person.” It really gave me that look of each person as an individual. And how do I reach that person individually based on what I’m seeing in their life. It really went through particular aspects of personality that gave me insight, how to communicate with people and how to really block those people that are the energy suckers, how to be able to block that and still communicate with that person and get them to have a better life and change how they are. That book really sent me down the path of natural functional medicine
You are a person of enormous influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
I’m working on that right now. Within men, I see a wonderful condition that I’ve coined PHAT syndrome, it’s poly hormonal adrenal testosterone syndrome. That’s what we’re seeing. There’s a lot of research on it, just hasn’t been named. They’re calling it PCOS in men. Although men can’t have PCOS because we don’t have ovaries. PCOS affects more than 10% of the population of women. We’re seeing it more and more, and I’m seeing it in men now, the same exact hormonal imbalances that we see in women; we’re seeing it in men. So that is my little niche you could say of what I’m seeing with men from not just the 35 to 55, my average patient, but we’re actually seeing it in younger men. It’s testosterone issues, it’s stress response issues. It’s neurological issues, it’s cardiovascular issues, it’s glucose issues, it’s increased adiposity or fatness in their body. It’s a conglomerate across the board, eight different things that are going on in their health that we see and often doctors will go, oh, it’s testosterone deficiency or it’s just diabetes. And no, it’s actually what we’re seeing every single day in men. We’re having to address it differently than just doing a pill for an ill. It’s really lifestyle medicine and it’s really balancing those systems to get them to heal that little trigger that I see is that this a PHAT syndrome in men, and really helping them get it out there.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Do you have a story about how that was relevant in your life?
I actually have two quotes there. One was from a high school coach, a football coach. We had lost a game and he gave this quote and it was: life has never been as good as it seems. Life is never as bad as it seems and in between his reality. And so I try to live that every day no matter how good life is. It can be bad at some time, but really, it’s living in the moment and living forward to the future. That’s how I interpret that is really living in the moment, living everything I can each day with my family, with my kids, my practice and patients, and everybody around me to cherish that daily life for them. So that’s that one. The other one, I use all the time. I use it as a hashtag, which is “let’s rock” and that’s how I wake up every day. I don’t do caffeine. I don’t do coffee in the mornings. I’m naturally energetic. People are surprised by that. They’re like, man, you must drink a lot of coffee. I’m like, I don’t like the taste of coffee. I like the smell of it, but I don’t like the taste of it. So my life is always let’s rock. Being a musician, also being a drummer, it’s all about rock and roll and that’s what gets me going. And so essentially living in the moment and then let’s rock are really the two key things that I like.
We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them 🙂
There are so many people I’d love to have lunch with to chat, talk and see their life story. I think most recently, kind of the big one that I would say is Gene Simmons of Kiss fame. I know he’s a busy person with all of his companies. I would love to take the time to sit and have breakfast or lunch with him. I would take the time to understand his mindset and drive he has had since the 70’s with the band along with his other companies. His consistent drive and constant work ethic really speaks to me. He delivers so much to his fans and his companies. My wife and I take our sons to concerts every year, since I am a musician I believe it’s important to support the arts. We saw Kiss locally here several years ago. The boys dressed up with facepaint and made signs. It was amazing. Kiss gave back to the local military support groups. That’s really key in helping others at all levels of success in your life and at that level they are I really dug their giving back to the community they play in. My parents always taught me no one’s better than you. No one’s worse than you. We’re all equal. You can learn something from everybody you meet and you can teach something to everybody you meet. That really helped me in my growth. I think definitely, like I said, Gene Simmons would be a good person to sit and chat for a little bit with to learn from him and give back to him things I have learned from him.
What is the best way our readers can follow you online?
You can follow me on Facebook under the guy show live. You can follow me at Dr. Jerrybailey.com and you can also find me on Instagram at Dr. Jerry Bailey. Those are the great places to follow me. You can get my newsletter along with all the videos I have on YouTube also, you can get me at the guy show on YouTube for my podcast, along with videos that I have on there too.
Thank you for these fantastic insights. We wish you only continued success in your great work!
Dr. Jerry Bailey of Lakeside Holistic Health: 5 Lifestyle Tweaks That Can Dramatically Improve Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.