Episode 25 of The Living Life Well Show: Mark Zahn's Diabetes Reversal Story
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[00:00:00] Welcome to the Living Life Well Show, the intersection of God's Word, today's science, and healthy living with common sense application, all based on the truth of the Word of God. I'm your host, Dr. Jon Skelton. Now let's get straight to the truth.
I am really excited today to have Mark Zahn on here with me. Mark has agreed to come on. He's had a tremendous success that he has done all himself in this program, and I really just want him to tell his story today, tell kind of His history, where he came from when he came to me, kind of what things were going on and where he's at now.
And then we'll even do a little bit of coaching, how to kind of help him [00:01:00] along to even get to those further goals that he has for himself. So, so Mark, welcome to living life. Well show. Thanks, John. And just, just, just one thing real quick is, yeah, it's. You say that it's all me. I've had a lot of help from you.
Your program is amazing. I've been trying to, I've been going through these health, some health issues over the last, I don't know, 10 years almost, and um, haven't had much success. with other things I've done and tried and, and prescription meds and everything else. And, and so now I've been with you for what, um, 10 months now, nine months.
Yeah. Nine months. I think it's end of August of last year's started working together. So yeah. Yeah. Okay. So, um, trying to lose weight during all this time period, the, the 10 years prior, and it was constantly up and down, um, with your program, I've [00:02:00] stayed. on track. I'm down 50. It fluctuates a little, sometimes more, sometimes less.
Um, but off all my medications, except maybe one or two. So, yeah, I'm real pleased. Well, I mean, you know, really, it's just given a little bit of a little bit of guideline.
So so that's really great. So. Mark, what I'd like you to do is kind of tell me where you were, what things that you were dealing with, um, as far as diagnosis wise, symptoms wise you know, prior to us kind of coming together back in August. Okay. Um, I guess one of the big things was that I had type two diabetes and, um, notice I said had yeah.
Um, [00:03:00] So that was getting worse. Um, that also diagnosed me with stage three chronic kidney disease, and it was going downhill. I won't say rapidly, but, um, it was, it was an issue. Um, anyway those were the two major factors that were occurring. Um, and that, that was what brought to see you. I have originally Um, met you and Sarah at a function one in and something was said about, Hey, if you want to buy a relative of mine said, Hey, if you want to say if, if John can help you through the living life well clinic, you might give him a call.
Yeah. Um, so I did. It took me a while. I kept on thinking, you know, I can beat this. I can, and finally I realized [00:04:00] that I was going to have to get some help. Yeah. Besides, I am too. So, um, anyway, that's, that's what started it all. Um, since then, I've, I've tried to follow the program pretty precise. Um, I, I've left out some steps because I forgot what I was supposed to be doing.
um, like with the fasting and things like that. Um, as to when to start the fasting. Yeah. And how long to go. Sure. Um, but other than that, um, just the change in eating patterns and I thought that I was eating pretty healthy before. Mm-Hmm. , um, started reading the ingredients on everything that I bought.
My wife got involved with it and. Decided that she was going to help me do this. And so she was reading the, everything as well. Um, we still eat out every once in a while. Good. [00:05:00] Um, if, um, if it's an occasion, birthdays or Thanksgiving or Christmas, um, I pretty much ate, you know, what was there, what, what had been cooked and provided, I was just real careful with what I ate and, and how much I was eating.
I've noticed since then is that there's a lot of foods that I really, really like that I don't really care about anymore, um, which was, which was one of the big, amazing things to me. Um, I come from a, a big country background, so, you know, living on the farm and things like that when I was younger, they, they cook for farmhands and there's a lot of food and, you know, it's, it's great.
Don't walk away from the table until you clean your plate. And a lot of times you didn't make your plate. [00:06:00] So, so, yeah, I mean, it was just. It's been a it's been an experience and a real learning experience on, on changing life habits. Well, that's awesome. That's awesome. What, what was, um, outside of, you know, just kind of the, the, breakdown of eliminating products and those things and and adding things back in.
Was there anything that kind of really stood out to you in the program that that really be kind of like a aha for you? Um, I used to drink a lot of diet soda and I thought, you know, this might be a little bit tough to break the habit on. Um, but it really wasn't. Um, where I used to work, you know, it was free drinks, sodas.
Teas, coffee, whatever you want. And so [00:07:00] it was a lot easier to grab that than it was to grab water out of the water machine. Oh yeah. And it tasted better. Yeah. Um, I accidentally picked up my wife's, um, diet drink the other day. We had two Sonic drinks. One was my tea and one was her, um, diet drink. And I picked hers up by mistake and drank it.
And I was not, not impressed. Yeah. It's amazing how those tastes change when you really, you know, plug into it. I have a, I have a a client that Keeps a list of how many days it's been since they've had their last Diet Coke. And so, you know, they're, they're up over 300 plus days now. So, it's, it's really, really, really fun to, to see people that are able to have that success and, and really kind of stick to those things and really like, as you said, how your tastes change over time because of just the addictive nature of all those things [00:08:00] that are.
Added to those processed foods and or beverages that we drink, so, right. And, and part of the other deal was, is that, excuse me, um, snacks, if I wanted a snack, I'd just grab whatever was handy. Um, snacks now are usually like an apple or some celery and, and I really go in and get a little upset if I don't find something in the refrigerator.
yeah. As far as that goes. Yeah. Um, so it's. I really thought that it was gonna be a lot tougher than it was. Um, but I think that once you make up your mind that this is a life change that needs to happen. Um, and then you have, you have someone that's going to, that sits there and takes the time to help guide you through a program.
It has made all the difference in the world. Well, that's great. That's [00:09:00] great. Well, what I'd like to do, if it's okay with you, I'd like to back up just a little bit and talk a little bit more about, where you were specifically when we, when we came together back in August. So, when were you diagnosed with diabetes?
How long ago was that? Do you recall? Um, 2014 or 2015. Okay. So you had basically been a diabetic essentially, you know, eight to nine years. Is that right? Okay. Right. And then, um, you also had obviously the chronic kidney disease. When were you diagnosed with any kind of kidney issues at all? Do you remember?
Um, late 15, 2015 or 2016, early 2016. So, around that same time, seven, seven to eight years basically. So, okay. And then, you know, also, and this is one of the things you didn't mention is that you had hypothyroidism as [00:10:00] well. Yes. You were on, on I believe Armor is right, right? Armour thyroid, is that what you were on?
Oh, you're gonna give me the line now. I don't even levothyroxine. Levothyroxine, okay, okay. And how long, how long had you been on that? Do you, do you remember? That started about the same time that the diabetes started up, so probably around 2014 as well. So, basically, anywhere from, you know, seven to nine years, kind of really struggling with, with these three issues.
And then there were a couple of other health issues too, right? I think we, you know, high blood pressure correct. Um, and then also atrial fib too, in the past. Is that right? Correct. I think that, you know, I, I don't know. I'm not a doctor, so I don't know all the backgrounds to all of this, but it was kind of the atrial fib that, that they think created all the other issues.
[00:11:00] So it's all the other issues that created the a fib because, you know, when you've got, you know, those issues with blood sugar, it's inflammatory is specifically inflammatory to the cardiovascular system. It's going to create high blood pressure. High blood pressure is going to flammable. flow back and not allow heart contractility to work nearly as well as it should.
And then that creates that environment for the AFib. Um, and then once you develop AFib, it makes it all worse. So, so yeah, so that that's, and most people have. insulin resistance or metabolic syndrome, increased blood sugar levels for about five years before they're ever really diagnosed. Now that time frame is coming down a little bit because we're screening and checking a lot more even in the traditional you know, medicine route.
But, but, you know, effectively, you probably had. Have had, and I [00:12:00] will say had diabetes for, you know, a decade or more before, you know, we started, started working together, you know, most, most people that have success with a kind of a program, like we're talking about. You know, most of it looks at about five years you know, people that have had diabetes for five years or less can reverse it, you know, 80 plus percent of the time, similar to people that have had like gastric bypass or, you know, big, big time surgeries like that.
So. It's okay if I talk about a little bit of kind of what your labs look like back in back in August when we started working together. Sure. That'd be good. Okay. So one of the things I'd like to check is I'd like to check a fasting insulin level. Fasting insulin, if it's elevated, tells us about, you know, insulin resistance.
even if your hemoglobin A1c is normal. So, a standard range for [00:13:00] fasting insulin is about 2 to about 20. The optimal range is really 2 to 5 when we're looking at fasting insulin. And so when you came in, your, your fasting insulin was almost 26. 9. So it was up there pretty good. Um, your hemoglobin A1c, which is where we actually diagnosed diabetes was at 9.
2. So we say anybody that's 6.4 or higher is, you know, diabetic. Okay the normal range is about, you know, 5. 6 to 5. That's kind of the non diabetic, non pre diabetic range. Okay, so between 5. 6 and 6. 4 is is kind of the pre diabetic. But We say that somebody has reversed their diabetes when they're below that 6.
4. So now your insulin level is down to 18. 5. Okay. From 26, it's gone down tremendously. And your A1C is all the way down [00:14:00] to 6. 2. So. That is absolutely fabulous. And there's tons of other numbers in here. We can look at, you know, your, your cholesterol, um, you know, your triglycerides decreased by about 40 points.
Um, you know, your, your thyroid, which is really amazing, is better than it was when you were on armor and now you're not on armor. or levothyroxine, I'm sorry, you were on levothyroxine. So, and then, you know, you're also, you were on Janumet, you know, you were on Losartan, and you were also on the Bidurion as well for the diabetes, and now you're off.
All of that, right? I mean, just absolutely amazing when you look at that. Um, and then one of the other things that we didn't talk about, you know, or we talked a little bit about the other day is, you know, your fasting blood sugar when we first met was [00:15:00] at 1 56. This last one was at 1 19. So you can drop 37 points in your, in your fasting blood sugar and your creatinine talking about the kidney function went from 1.
6 to 1. 5 and your GFR, which is really what we look at when we're talking about that chronic kidney disease went from 47 to 51. And so it's increasing and showing improvement in all these aspects. And so. This is a real testament to you. And what I love that you've said about this is that, Hey, we're still going out to eat, Hey, we're still, you know, celebrating when, you know, we have those big gatherings that you absolutely need to participate in.
And while you've done that, you've still done all this, it's just really amazing. It's, um, like I said, I, I was hoping for, for good results. I didn't, [00:16:00] I thought that it would take a lot longer to get to where I am now. I was, I was looking at probably two years or so is what my original goal was. So yeah, I'm, I'm real happy.
Yeah. Yeah. Well, do you mind kind of sharing what a typical day in the life is of Mark Zahn now? I know that you kind of recently retired. That's right. In, in flux a little bit. But, you know, just from a kind of movement standpoint, kind of what kind of things you do for food and, and, and those things and, and kind of what you're doing, you know, with regards to even, even you know, spirit, how you're helping to clear your mind and, and those things as well.
Oh, um, wow. I, I guess. Since I've retired, there is no normal day. It's kind of like whatever I want to do. Um, my wife's a school teacher. [00:17:00] So here in a couple of weeks, I'll be under new management. So, you know, check with me then. Um, but no, I have, I used to be up at five o'clock in the mornings. Um, now I don't get out of bed till six or 630.
Um, usually start out with, um, Bible study, Bible verses. prayer meditation time, um, eating breakfast. Which also encounters playing with my dogs. They want to eat whatever I'm having. Um, breakfast is usually pretty much the same every day. Um, with fruit, eggs, um, coffee, um, The rest of the day is I, I usually in the morning, sometimes [00:18:00] around between 10 and 11, I might do a little weights arm weights, 25 pound weights.
Um, we're still working on an issue with, with with some feet stuff, so not, not related to the diabetes, but completely separate. Um, once we get that worked out, then I'll, I'll pick up walking more. Um, I've tried the yoga route. As we discussed the other day, and, you know, maybe after this other deal that we're getting ready to do with movement, then, um, we'll see how that goes.
Yeah, yeah. The, um, lunch consists of, you know, whatever I find in the refrigerator. Usually, it's either a salad or Something like cottage cheese and fruit, things that I like to eat. Some people don't, but I like it. [00:19:00] And what I found out is also that if I eat something fairly light during lunch, um, I don't feel as heavy during the day, the rest of the day.
So my energy levels are higher. Um, and then afternoon supper is usually, I either grill or my wife makes something like maybe spaghetti, um, pizzas, with pizzas made with cauliflower. That is really good if you haven't tried that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's matter of fact, we don't even get the other kind anymore.
It's just the cauliflower crust. Um, they started eating it too, which is kind of bad because I don't have anything for lunch the next day. Um, but it's those type of things. We eat more vegetables. Um, the vegetables and the fruit. Actually, when I came to see you the first time, I thought, Oh no, I'm going to have to turn into a vegan.
Or at least a [00:20:00] vegetarian. And I was really surprised because I didn't. I mean, I still eat pretty much the same thing I want. If I'm eating, I still have chips and hot sauce. I Um, the chips are setas, setas, setes? Siete. Siete. Cassava flour chips. Yeah. Yeah. And they also make, um, tortillas. They do. They make, they make tortillas and taco shells.
So I can still have my Mexican food which was the thing I thought was gonna be one of the hardest to get rid of, and I still eat it. Um, so basically that's, that's the day. Um, you know, since I retired, it's a lot more yard work.
I want to do that. Um,
I have some outside activities, um, that I like to do, um, out on, out on a acreage we own. So it's that kind of stuff. [00:21:00] See that, that's what I love is that, you know, you, you, so a couple of things stood out to me, you know, you know, what, what you've said in this conversation is, you know, one, you were a diabetic.
And I was having you eat fruit, right? So, you know, a lot of times we're told, Oh no, you don't need to eat fruit. You, you know, that's, that fruit's bad. Now, if you're doing fruit juice, yes, I would agree with that. But you know, you're talking about eating, you know, real fruit. Yeah. And so, you know. You have eaten that the whole way through, and you decreased, you know, your A1c, your sugar, your insulin, all those things.
And so, when we're really consuming, you know, the, the unadulterated, if you will form of actual food we get these results. And so, you know, you're just a real testament to that. And I love how you start your day. And you know, you're not doing a crazy [00:22:00] workout, you know, I'm not having you spend an hour and a half, you know, doing some sort of workout or anything like that, you know, we just want some movement and functional movement, movement to where you're able to go outside, you know, on your property, do the things around your house.
are contributing to your health. And so, you know, that, that's, that's the way I, I want this to be is that you're just, you're living life. You're not doing anything too, too crazy as far as it goes. Yeah. And I like that. It's it's, it is living life because it's, I haven't made any really major, major changes other than not eating processed foods.
Um, everything that I do eat, I look to see what the ingredients are. Um, I pay a lot more attention to things, you know, no corn syrups. The only fruit I'm not eating is pineapples. That was one of the early on discussions that we had. And I love pineapples, but I haven't missed [00:23:00] it. Okay. All right. So, um, you know, talking about kind of where we're at now, and we're at that, you know, 6. 2. So I, you know, I, I know you and I know you want to get that, you know, even lower, um, you know, and so, so I want to as well. And so. One of the things that we talked about, you know, was really helping to increase that or decrease, excuse me, that insulin resistance by doing, you know, some strengthening.
And so, you know, when you've got some joint issues, especially feet, makes it a little bit more difficult. And so really getting that assessed well, especially if you're having other joint issues, be it knee, hip, back, you know, whatever the case may be. Um, we really want to focus on those big muscles. And so that's where John Murray, I think, you know, comes in.
I think he's, he's excellent. And we're going to kind of go down that route with him. He's going to assess the gait, which I think is always really big before you're, you're [00:24:00] looking at kind of really employing an exercise routine. And so. I think John's excellent. And so he's gonna do wonders for you, making sure those hips are aligned and, and that pelvis is, is in line and all.
And then, you know, we talked about kind of increasing your squatting a little bit, um, you know, as much as, as much as we can. And, and, you know, kind of going from, you know, doing it on the floor. bed to then maybe graduating to something that's a little bit lower to then eventually getting to where we're just able to do, you know, like air squats.
So, um, and so I think that's going to continue to help to decrease that insulin resistance and kind of, kind of knock that down a little bit more now, you know, some other movements that we can do some time, but I don't. I don't want to start there yet is like lunges. Lunges would be another thing, you know, to kind of incorporate.
And then the final thing is planks. Um, and so [00:25:00] I have people, when you're doing planks, especially if you're having knee issues or back issues, you want to hold off on that a little bit till we get there. But when we do start on planks and once you start on your knees, okay start with your knees wide.
And then as you get better, you're going to move those knees back into where they're touching. Once you can hold a plank for a minute while your knees are touching, then you can graduate to going out to a full all the way out to your feet. Okay. So that's kind of things that we're going to be working towards.
Now, when we're doing a plank and this is, you know, kind of, you know, I didn't really know this initially kind of working out and growing up, you know, playing football, lifting weights, doing those things. When you're doing a plank, really what you're wanting to do is you're really wanting to keep everything tight.
So you want to concentrate on keeping that core tight. You want to concentrate on keeping the butt tight and really kind of concentrate on just trying to flex those muscles and legs and butt and core. And then really. You know, [00:26:00] pushing away with your shoulders, keeping those shoulders way out there away and not letting them kind of roll back, but, but pushing them away.
And so if you can concentrate on those things while you're doing the plank, that's going to really activate that core, those biggest muscles in our body, which is really what we're going for so that we can help decrease that insulin resistance. So how does, how does all that sound to you? Sounds good.
Okay. Okay. So the, the next thing that I wanted to talk about, and we're kind of at that, at, at that stage is really fasting. Okay. So now that we're off of, you know, all the, the diabetic meds, no real worries at all about going to low blood sugars or anything like that. But the fasting will help to really decrease that insulin resistance and knock that A1C down.
So. I think right now you're you told me that you're fasting about 12 hours a day doing that a [00:27:00] couple of times a week. Is that right? Yeah, it's it's 12 hours a day every day some days Some days up to 15 hours. Okay. Okay. So one to two times a week up to 15 hours Okay, great. Okay. So our first goal, our first big goal is going to be to do one day a week of 24 hours of fasting.
Okay. That's our first big goal. The way we're going to get there is you're going to continue to do that extended fasting once to twice a week. Um, but we're going to increase it by two hours each time until we get up to that 24 hour mark. I only want you to increase it by two hours, once in that week.
So, so say, you know, you say next week you're going to fast on Monday, we're going to shoot for 17. Okay. And when we fast again, later in the week, we're also going to stay at 17. We're not going to push it to [00:28:00] 19. Okay. So each week you'll add two hours on until we get to 24 hours. Okay. Now, the big thing with that.
Anticipate a couple of things. You may have increased thirst and increased urination. That's normal. Okay. Associated with this. Things that aren't normal. If you're having palpitations. Okay. If you're feeling lightheaded, dizzy. Stop and eat something, we're going to want to do protein or nuts, avocado, you know, if you like any of those things, those are going to be all good.
Great. Go for it. So those are going to be the things that I'll, I'll want you to, to, to kind of, supplement with. So, um, what do you think about that? Do you think that's a reasonable goal to get to, or am I overwhelming you? No, no, I think it's real reasonable. Okay. Okay. All right. Okay. Well, great. Well, great.
Well, Mark, what else? What else do you think would [00:29:00] be a good a good help for you? Anything else that, that, you know, that you can think of? I think that, that this and what we discussed the other day is, is looking up to the next steps, which is the getting the movement down, um, working on the movement, working on the fasting.
Um, there's, there's no foods that I'm missing that I wanted. You know, we talked early on, I think about maybe adding some of the foods back to see I'm not missing anything. So, I'm just not going to add anything back. So I'm, I think I'm in a good place right now. Yeah, you are. We'll see how the next steps go.
Okay. Okay. Well, that's great. Well, so, you know, Mark, just thank you for coming on and telling your story. You have such a powerful story, in my opinion that I think it [00:30:00] can really help a lot of other people, if nothing else, to, to give them hope to, you know, seek out how to do it on their own. And if they, They do need some help if they experience kind of things like, like you experienced with trying to do it on your own and not having that success, hopefully it will spur them on to, to get, you know, a little bit of a, of a coach, if you will, the, to kind of help and, and get a plan together for them that can allow them to have success.
So I really appreciate you being willing, willing to come on here and share that with everybody today. Well, I appreciate the opportunity to share with everybody today. Like I said, it's, it's something that I worked on for a long time. I used to be pretty active, um, in some pretty rough sports. And when I kind of started to the point where I couldn't do any of that anymore, it was, you know, disheartening to say the least.
Um, but then as I tried to get [00:31:00] back into shape and not able to, um, and then finding this, this program and finding you and your clinic. It's just the mentorship. The friendship has been, um, is I think what pushed up, pushed my enough of my buttons to get it done. Well, good. Well, good. Well, that's awesome.
Well, again, thank you so much, Mark. And you know, for anybody else who's, who's interested in there, I would you know, if you, if you know anybody that might be suffering with other things like, like Mark has is you know, hey, if you don't mind sharing this with them sharing this story, cause I think Mark's story is a, is a powerful one to, to get out there.
So thanks. Thanks, Mark. And thanks and God bless. Thank you. That's it for this episode of the Living Life Well Show. If you like what you've heard and want to learn more, or want to know how to [00:32:00] put this into practice for yourself, go to livelifewellclinic.com. Until next time, this is Dr. Jon Skelton saying, go out and live the truth so you can live life well. The preceding is for entertainment and educational purposes only. It is not meant to be used to prevent, diagnose, treat, or cure any condition. The information contained in this show does not substitute the need for a qualified medical professional, nor is it meant to provide medical advice or services.
If you feel information presented in this show may apply to you, we recommend you seek out the help of a qualified medical professional who can evaluate and treat your specific concerns.
