This week I'm excited to welcome Chris Kresser to the podcast. He’s a globally recognised leader in the fields of ancestral health, paleo nutrition, and functional / integrative medicine. He is the creator of ChrisKresser.com, one of the top 25 natural health sites in the world, and the author of the New York Times best seller, Your Personal Paleo Code (published in paperback in December 2014 as The Paleo Cure). Chris has been studying, practicing, and teaching alternative medicine for more than fifteen years.
Chris’s work is informed by his own experience recovering from a chronic, complex illness which began while he was traveling in Southeast Asia in his early 20’s. After seeing more than twenty doctors around the world and spending thousands of dollars in an effort to diagnose and treat his condition, Chris decided to take his health into his own hands. Through extensive study and research, continual self-experimentation, and formal training in integrative medicine, he recovered from this debilitating illness and went on to share what he learned with others through his popular blog, podcast, and private practice.
Some questions asked during this episode:Stu
(00:14)
This week, I'm excited to welcome Chris Kresser back to the podcast. Chris is a leader in functional medicine and ancestral health.
(00:34)
He's a New York Times bestselling author and the creator of one of the world's most respected natural health websites. In this episode, we discuss the importance of nutrient density, including deficiencies, accurate ways to measure, and supplementation. Over to Chris.
(00:52) Hey guys. This is Stu from 180 Nutrition, and I am delighted to welcome back Chris Kresser to the podcast. Chris, how are you?
Chris
(00:59)
I'm great, Stu. It's a pleasure to be back with you.
Stu
(01:03)
Oh. Look, I really, I'm really looking forward to this conversation, because you are one of the big players, the heavy hitters in this industry with a voice, I think, that people respect, and you've had a whole heap of conversations that have been extremely thought-provoking. But for all of our listeners that may not be familiar with you or your work, and there won't be many, but I'd love it if you could just tell us a little bit more about yourself, please.
Chris
(01:29)
Sure. I'll give you the very short version. I was in my early 20s, traveling in Indonesia, not too far from you and doing some surfing, and I got really sick with a classic kind of tropical illness. It was actually near death in a little village in [inaudible 00:01:48] for a few days and, fortunately, an Aussie who was staying in that village had some antibiotics that helped bring me back from the brink, and that started what became a 10-plus year journey back to health. Along the way, I discovered functional medicine and a paleo type of diet, both of which were instrumental in my recovery.
(02:12) As I made progress in my own journey, people began to ask questions. They saw what was happening with me, and they saw how sick I was, and how I was recovering, and they got curious. I shared what I had learned along the way, and at some point a lo in that process, I decided to go back to school to study medicine, functional medicine, in order to translate that experience into something that could help other people. And so about 12, 13 years ago, I started my functional medicine practice, treated thousands of patients since then, and then in 2016 started a training program for other functional medicine doctors to train them in functional medicine, and then launched a health coach program and wrote some books. For full interview and transcript: https://180nutrition.com.au/180-tv/chris-kresser-interview2/