Di: 0:01

Hi and welcome to Bodyholic. Today I have the great honor once again to host my dear friend, Karl Sterling. He is the leading expert in Parkinson's training and the author of two fantastic books. The newest is Parkinson's Empowerment Training and, of course, the previous one is Parkinson's regeneration training. He is passionate about helping people with Parkinson's improve their movement, memory, cognition through exercise and neuroplasticity.

Di: 0:36

Before we dive into our conversation with Karl, I want to apologize for a technical glitch we experienced at the beginning of the recording. For those of you who are watching on YouTube, the video did not work for the first couple of minutes, only my video. The sound is great, though, and that is definitely what's important, and Carl's video works great. So now let's go ahead and dive into the conversation with Carl Sterling Podcast that helps you weed through the social media noise and bullshit so you can finally get healthy and stay healthy for good. No fads, no quick fixes, just straight talk and real world strategies. Let's cut through the crap and get you the results you deserve.

Di: 1:21

It's time to crush those goals, but hold up. Remember this is for your ears only. It's not to crush those goals, but hold up. Remember this is for your ears only. It's not a replacement for professional medical advice. Use your head, stay safe and always consult your doctor when needed. All right, let's get to it. Carl Sterling, I am so happy to have you here with us and, first and foremost, congratulations on your new book.

Karl: 1:50

Thank you. It's always great to see you and I'm really honored that you asked me to join you again. It's nice to meet Sarah too.

Di: 1:59

Thank you, absolutely, absolutely. So, carl, just maybe let's start with an inspiring story. So, uh, and I'll and I'll be more specific Um, you, we've spoken and you always have something inspiring to share. Like you, you have so many stories, and I've heard some of them, and your books really emphasize the importance of exercise and neuroplasticity in managing Parkinson's disease, and I wanted you to perhaps share a particular story that you have on your mind, that you can really think of right now, of someone who has been significantly impacted and benefited from this approach.

Karl: 2:56

Sure, thank you. Well, I have a business here outside of Syracuse, new York, that's in the central part of New York state, and it is called neuromotor training and we do a lot with, let's say, fall reduction, parkinson's disease, other. Actually, it's really all humans, because we all have nervous systems, we all have a brain and we can have various things that will, let's say, affect those things and bring us down in our functionality, whether it's cognitive, memory, coordination, movement. Our job here is to restore all of that to the best of our ability. And, you know, none of it's really all that complicated, but it also is a really great vehicle for creativity, which I need, or otherwise I pull my hair out, which you can see, I really don't have any, but if I did, I'd pull it out because I need to be creative. But it has to be creativity that makes sense. It's built on concepts and foundational concepts and approaches that are proven to be effective. So, um, I can give you a story I'll give you two, two real quick stories.

Karl: 4:20

I go to mexico and I teach a lot. I was in mexico six and a half years ago or so, my first trip of 18 so far to go there and teach, because nobody else goes there. I found out that nobody goes to teach there, so I do as far as what I teach anyways, it doesn't make me special, just makes me feel really grateful I get the opportunities to go there and teach. I was speaking at a conference, had my suit and tie on, I get done and five minutes later I had to be on the floor for a workout. So I run into the changing room, I change into workout clothes and I come back and I had absolutely no idea what we were going to do because I just didn't know. It's my first trip there. Well, what are we going to do? So I asked people um, what was your first challenge of the day? A lot of hands went up when I asked is it rolling over in bed? Yep, okay, that's it. We're going to start with that. Let's start your day off better, starting right away. So about 55 people there. We decided I was going to do a workout called the floor is your friend, because the floor is our friend. We get on the floor, help some people down and basically it was to teach them how to roll over front to back, back to front, both directions. A lot of people struggle with this, and it's easier on a floor than it is on a bed, because floors don't have give and beds do so the softer the mattress, the harder it is usually. So you know, we started in probably the easiest place for that.

Karl: 6:06

I look in the corner and there's this lady who I found out at the time was 42. Been living with Parkinson's for 17 years. Oh my gosh. Yeah, there's a very early onset in Mexico. That's a whole different hour, but anyways, 17 years, used to be a marathon runner. She's crying. I go over. You know how do you feel? Are you okay? Um, she says well, I found out a little while later.

Karl: 6:40

I didn't know at the time. That was the first time she had rolled over without assistance in five years. She had chosen to be mostly bedridden because she didn't believe she could do anything. So now that gave her hope, and hope can go miles. An ounce of hope based on one simple technique, which she just never thought of leveraging her limbs and body the way we taught and I didn't even make this up. I'm not that smart. I learned this stuff from Perry Nicholson, who wrote the foreword for my first book. Primal movement patterns, like primal rolling patterns. Watch a baby. You have a young baby. I'm sure your baby's probably rolling over months ago, right? Well, I have grandchildren. I have a 10-month-old and I have three other ones too.

Di: 7:27

I remember that my youngest is the same age as your youngest grandchild right.

Karl: 7:36

And you know, my youngest granddaughter is rolling over and I watch this and I watch. This is just how the body works. Intuitively, they don't think about this stuff, they just do. So. We get stuck in thinking too much a lot of times and not really allow our that intuitive thing from whatever primal aspect of being human. Uh, it gets short-circuited by thinking too much and so we just kind of dial it back, say okay, let's put the leg here, let's push here, let's pull this, let's reach there. Boom. Well, I went back two months later and this lady was started running that day that I was.

Di: 8:18

Oh, my God.

Karl: 8:20

And now she's done marathon since then. So I mean, she went from choosing to be bedridden because she thought she had to be because there was no hope to doing a marathon. And then another story here in my clinic a lady comes in I think it was late February Parkinson's low back surgery, cervical neck surgery, a lot of pain, wheelchair surgery, a lot of pain, wheelchair. After two weeks she ditched the wheelchair. After two more weeks of using a walker, she ditched the walker and since then she just uses a cane. But you know, they didn't think she would walk again.

Karl: 8:59

And I'm not a genius. No, I don't really even know that much. I just know that there are things we can do. I learned from other people and we have tools and techniques and strategies here that nobody else does around here. Anyways, it doesn't mean we're special or we're better, we're different. I am a different kind of guy because normal just gets normal results and I can't settle for that. So you know, I really love it when I see people starting to move better, people who don't fall down either as much, or maybe they never fall down anymore, but they used to fall once a week or twice or three times a week and this creates hope, and hope opens up doors.

Di: 9:48

I thank you for sharing that very much. That was so inspiring actually that it's kind of like who am I to ever say, you know, I don't feel like getting out of bed, right, you know?

Karl: 10:02

in comparison, you actually read the next.

Di: 10:12

Thing on my list. I did.

Karl: 10:13

Yeah, it's called perspective.

Di: 10:15

Absolutely. I do have to maybe backtrack and ask you to maybe give, give us a sense a little bit of what Parkinson's disease would do to a 42 year old, to make her think that she can't, or for five years that she can't, roll over oh well, you know parkinson's varies person to person people.

Karl: 10:51

Oftentimes they associate with the tremor. Not everyone gets a tremor, though now this lady, yes, she did have a tremor and um still does. But rigidity is another thing. A lot of times that enters into play just really being so stiff, freezing, like the akinesia, which is defined as a temporary loss of voluntary movement. Bradykinesia is slowness of movement, postural instability.

Karl: 11:24

So if you take all these things into consideration, along with the person, their personality and their spirit, let's say, of how much are they wanting to fight? What do they believe about the disease? What do they believe about their capabilities? What do they believe about their capabilities? What do they believe if their doctor says you know something negative, like you're not going to be able to run again or walk again, or this is going to be progressively getting worse every year, every year? But you believe that it's possible, that could happen, even when you fight back against it. So there are a lot of factors that come into this and in her case it was her belief and her doctor.

Karl: 12:15

I don't really think that neurologists knew about a lot of the possibilities for helping people and a lot of them don't, and it's not their fault. They just never knew because they were never educated on what they can do other than give a pill. So you know, and support from others or lack of support, all these things factor in and it just might end up like, well, I'm doomed, it's gloomy, I'm doomed, and oh, if they start moving less and they get muscle atrophy and then they're not as strong and they have more trouble getting, let's say, out of bed or up from a chair walking around, or they're higher fall risk because they probably have less muscle mass, is it a cascade of events that can lead to this kind of belief that I can't roll over and I should be in bed? It's going to kill me, I give up.

Di: 13:10

So you're in the business of helping people believe in themselves.

Karl: 13:17

You know, that's a really good way to put it, dee. That's pretty much the number one priority here is to get a perspective on where we're really at and what the possibilities really are. You know the heck with what people say out there. Absolutely, there's always somebody worse off than each one of us, and yet there are people not to shame anyone into this, because I have used this to shame myself, but I don't want to work out, which is pretty much all the time, but I just do it because I have to. I don't want to be obese again because I used to be. So the thing is, people hire me to help them and there are some cases where there is no hope period, especially with something like multiple system atrophy, another movement disorder, which is fast moving.

Karl: 14:12

It'll kill you, you know. I think diagnosis to you know dying is usually somewhere in the five to seven year range, but some people go faster. Als, Lou Gehrigid disease, ALS is horrible, but everyone's different. And yet they're paying me. They're never going to take a step again. There are some people with all the hope in the world and all the faith in the world. It just ain't going to happen. There's no way. Yet they're still fighting.

Di: 14:47

I remember our conversation. I think you were mentioning the, the atrophy.

Karl: 14:56

Yeah, multiple system atrophy is horrible.

Di: 14:58

Multiple system atrophy.

Karl: 15:00

Yeah.

Di: 15:04

You were with her until the very end.

Karl: 15:07

I was. I talked with her husband at one point and said I don't think there's anything I can do. She's not going to get better, and if you give me an empty cup, I'm going to still tell you it's half full, because that's how much of a delusional optimist I am. But I choose this. This is my choice. Right, I know reality too, though sometimes we have to face it and try to put a spin on it. That's something anything positive. He says no, you don't understand, she won't give up and you're helping her and it was a complete perspective shift for me.

Karl: 15:45

She'd give anything to get up and take one step, even utter one word, because by that time she couldn't talk anymore. In fact, her eyes used to shut and at first I didn't know, I thought she fell asleep. And then her daughter came in and said no, no, no, her, her eyelid muscles aren't working. Oh, and she can't lift up and open her eyes. And you have to. You know, you have to physically do this. So it did, and there's a couple times I said hey, hey, you're sleeping on me. And then you could see her body move, like like she's laughing so it was beautiful actually.

Karl: 16:25

Yeah, and I, you know, I'd open her eyes and I could tell by her eyes she was kind of smiling, but she wasn't giving up. I mean, you know, I have a radio.

Karl: 16:37

I also have a radio show I do here every Sunday that's very, very popular, called your Health Matters, and I started doing it in January this year. It's the biggest station and whatever, and I'm trying to impress anybody. But the thing is we talk about this stuff because there's always somebody worse off than any one of us. You know, I woke up on the right side of the dirt today, so that's a good start on the right side of the dirt today, so that's a good start.

Di: 17:08

This is the second time I've heard the story, cause I mean, after all, I did mention it, uh and um, it's it's the second time that I'm deeply moved by it. That's possible. Um, your book talks about, uh, parkinson's disease being a full body multifunction experience.

Karl: 17:37

Yeah.

Di: 17:38

And I wanted to um, perhaps you could elaborate on how this understanding, or first elaborate about the understanding and also how it shapes. Your approach to this is also. This is the book the Parkinson's Empowerment Training.

Karl: 18:00

Yeah, so that statement comes from 2016, portland, oregon World Parkinson's Congress. Somebody said it and I wrote it down Because it makes sense. When we look at each person with Parkinson's, they may have similarities in what they're dealing with, but each person is affected differently and uniquely. And what they're dealing with, but each person is affected differently and uniquely, for example, if they can't get started with walking. So this is I'm sorry, sometimes I get tongue-tied. Okay, so let's go back.

Karl: 18:43

There are four classic motor symptoms that people usually talk about, but technically there are five motor symptoms and we got the resting tremor, postural instability, bradykinesia and rigidity.

Karl: 18:56

Okay, the fifth one is akinesia temporary loss of voluntary movement. You may see a person in Parkinson's who wants to get moving, like they want to take a step. They know they want to take a step. They can't take a step because the message is not getting from the brain through the peripheral, central, peripheral nervous systems to tell the muscles what to do and move that leg. We have things we can do to work on that, to trick the body and the brain, basically the brain, but let's say it starts with that and they can't get moving, or they are moving and they come to, especially commonly a surface change in the floor, whether it's an actual change or a visual change, or a doorway or an obstacle or another person. Because of lack of dopamine in the retinas, this can create depth perception issues and contrast issues, so they actually don't know how far away they are from the change, the person, the object, the doorway, whatever.

Karl: 19:55

So this can cause them to freeze up. And if their feet freeze but their upper body didn't slow down yet, well they're a higher fall risk. If their chest keeps moving and, boom, they go down. That can be enough to keep people from going out and doing anything. Absolutely Maybe. They are tremors always enter the body unilaterally, one side, always yeah, and then eventually they'll probably go bilateral.

Karl: 20:32

This doesn't I didn't make this up. This is based on all research from the top. You know the top dogs out there in the neurology world. Let's say they're right-handed or they're left-handed and that the dominant side is where the tremor comes in. And now they want to go out to dinner and they're afraid of spilling food. You know the fork, the spoon, the drink, a glass of wine, and well, you know. Well, maybe they have to learn on the other side, but that's not as coordinated. You'll see. A lot of people try to learn to do something on their non-dominant side.

Karl: 21:08

But if they're bilateral tremors and this depends upon their spirit, depends upon who they are and their mindset and how much they are and their mindset and how much they care about what other people think about them, meaning visually, like, oh, if I spill wine on my clothes, how much will I care? Well, if you don't care, you're probably going to be more socially active and you'll be out there doing things. Well, a lot of people do care. Oh, no, I spilled, I tried to eat some soup and it went down the front of my shirt and on my face and I'm all messy and oh, I'm embarrassed. I can never go out again and this happens, I'm sure getting up, moving around, navigating through a house, whatever, anywhere visual can be affected coordination, death perception, I mean, and your whole psyche. That goes into how that makes you feel and how much you care about it. And it's a, it's a really a life-changing thing for for a lot of people, meaning everything changes, like your social, your social aspect of your life is gone because you're too embarrassed.

Karl: 22:31

There's a lady I love her dearly. I've known her 35 years, parkinson's. Her daughter's a doctor. I know her daughter well. I cannot get this lady to come in here because she's too embarrassed about how she walks and she can't talk anymore, hardly. But, judy, we love you, I love you, I just love you as a human so much. You know that there's no judgment, I know, but what if other people see me? They don't care, they're gonna support you. Oh, I can't do it, so that's an that's.

Di: 23:01

It's really heartbreaking yep, wow, yeah, um, it really is. And you also also describe it in such a way that, like I'm noticing that I'm taking a lot of deep breaths because my heart, my heart really goes out of everybody who is showing up and is doing it, and you post videos and you talk about the things that you see on a daily basis in your. Do you call it a gym, a studio, a clinic? What do you call it?

Karl: 23:51

I call it a clinic because in a lot of ways it is a clinical thing little pilot data studies here and white paper studies, so yeah, so I have the same feeling, you know, right now as we're talking, because these things really move me like I want her to come in here tell her that I also want her to come in there, please well, I also um. I know where she lives come over.

Karl: 24:20

But I'm not the kind of guy to just show up, you know because? Because I don't like it when people do that to me. So, but I'm tempted to drive by one day. Hey, I'm here right right.

Sarah: 24:32

Right, right, I'd love to add something. Carl is, my father's got Parkinson's.

Karl: 24:38

Oh.

Sarah: 24:38

I'm sorry, but he's got early stages and his didn't start with the tremor in his hands. He initially noticed that he was very emotional when talking about things and just slight notices with his walking. And then he went to his GP and he was referred to a neurologist and that's when he found out he had Parkinson's and the only thing that he showed me was he tapped his foot like his right foot, you know, just tapping. And then he tried to do it with his left foot and he couldn't do it. And then he did the same thing with his hands, you know, just like tapping his hands on a counter. He could do it with his right hand, but he couldn't do it with his left hand. And then he went for back surgery. He had to have a second back surgery because the first one didn't work.

Sarah: 25:30

It fused his arm so he had a second back surgery and things just went downhill from there. My father is 74 and he had to learn to walk again and I found that after a second back surgery he really, really struggles to learn to walk again and I found that I think with the Parkinson's it must have really played a role in him learning to walk again. But he has learned to walk again, albeit slower, but it's just affected his work. You know he's had to learn to work remotely but it is being monitored by his neurologist and he's able to talk and everything and to text, but he can't drive anymore okay, so let's talk about that for a minute.

Di: 26:23

First of all, I'm really sorry um I feel like, carl, you were the second you heard back surgery.

Karl: 26:29

I saw you go, I saw that oh, yeah, yeah, and it's not because of the surgery itself as much as the anesthesia and what that causes in people with Parkinson's. So I'm assuming for the surgery was he all the way under like he was not conscious.

Sarah: 26:46

Yes, and he had a complication afterwards. He had to go into ICU.

Karl: 26:51

Okay, so it's done. It's in the past, and a lot of doctors are not aware of the fact that when a person with Parkinson's or MSA or Lou Gehrig's disease or a bunch of other stuff go under general anesthesia, the time it takes them to come back out of that and be normal actually may never happen. It doesn't mean that you shouldn't have surgery. Sometimes it'll save somebody's life, of course. But one of the things we find is this correlation between general anesthesia, especially in people with Parkinson's, and it can be devastating for rehabilitation and it can just really make things worse, for people never get back to where they were before the surgery. Now, I don't say that to create well, hopelessness or anything like that, because there are always things we can do, but the best thing he could probably do is just keep on walking, man, keep on walking. And I mean we could connect privately if you want. I've got a slew of things up my sleeve I could send to you and, uh, he could try.

Di: 28:13

This reminds me reminds else, Sarah, that I know who actually refuses, and Carl things that you've already said refuses to get up and walk, and he's also after two back surgeries as well. You just clicked that memory. For me it really does go back to that mindset, the shift you really advocate for the holistic approach to managing Parkinson's disease and the other diseases that we've mentioned. You get into physical, you get into mental, you get into emotional well-being and I am interested in what does a training session with you look like that integrates all that?

Karl: 29:18

it's pure agony? No, it's not. It's actually usually a lot of fun, um, but we joke around that it's a torture session and this is a torture chamber, and, uh, because we have actually we do have a lot of fun here. Um, I want to go. I'm going to answer that. I want to go through some of the things that I try to instill, because this is what I'm going through in my life, um, and I don't. If we have, do we have five minutes? Maybe more than five than five minutes? Oh, okay, good, good, because this might take me a minute, I don't want to hog the microphone.

Di: 30:00

You can hog the microphone, please.

Karl: 30:02

Okay, so on a different note, but this will weave into the conversation here, a month ago my mother passed away and it's been the most difficult time for me of my whole life way, and it's been the most difficult time for me of my whole life. And actually that's all I can say right now, or I'll start to cry, and I don't want to do that on camera, not because I'm ashamed, it's just that I won't be able to talk about the other things. But one of the things that's happened from this for me, which I've been working on for years anyways and helping people with to the best of my ability I'm no, you know, psychiatrist or anything but is to examine where you're at, find out where you think you're at, and then shift your perspective if needed. Some people don't need it, some people do and then maybe look at things like this oh, you have to come here and work out with Carl. Oh, I have to go. I, carl, have to go and I have to work out. Oh, I have to work with this person. Oh, I have to do this, or is it? I get to work out. I, carl, I get to work out. Oh, guess what, I get to come here every day. I get to come here every day. I do have to come here, but I don't think of it like that because it's an opportunity in it and I'm right now I'm here. I don't have an hour from now, I don't have five minutes from now. I mean I hope I do, but I mean I can't say that I will. So now I get to be here. Do I have to work out though? No, but I get to.

Karl: 31:50

This is an opportunity to go over and pick up a dumbbell. This is an opportunity to do some kind of crazy balance board cognition stuff with the smart, fit lighting system and thinking and fatiguing my brain and doing half of it wrong. But because I'm focusing and focusing and focusing and getting fatigued, the neurochemicals in the brain. They create healing and better neuroplasticity and more solid connections between things. Those chemicals are being activated during fatigue, cognitive fatigue or physical fatigue too. I have neuroprotective hormones. I have neuroprotective chemicals. I'm going. I get to create those things Like. I get to do this. I don't have to personally, but I get to, so I choose to.

Karl: 32:42

So when people say I almost canceled today but I didn't, oh, wow, I'm glad you're here. Why didn't you cancel? Well, because I get to come here Really and I get to work with you. Are you kidding me? You actually think that getting to work with me is special? Yeah, because nobody else does what you do. I'm not trying to impress anybody.

Karl: 33:02

This is a perspective I get to. There are people who want to I get to. There are people who want to who can never get here because they can't do it. They either physically can't or they're in South Africa or something, and they're just not going to fly here every twice a week. I mean seriously. Or there's nothing like we are trying to go global with the brand, so we're working on that. Next year, we know what will happen. I have a satellite office location in Nashville, so that's our first one. But perspective I get to do the things I get to do, and some of them I don't want to do, but at least I get to do them because I'm not dead yet. So I look at it like this. I try to have people look at it like this, because there's always somebody who doesn't get to do what you do because of something Could be their mindset, but that's actually not real. Then it's fake If they physically can't. That's different, for some reason.

Di: 34:04

I just recorded a local podcast episode. I recently, due to all of the political issues, I also started a local podcast. Oh great. We were talking about endorphins and we were basically saying that there are so many keys to unlock our inner pharmacy oh my gosh thank you for that one.

Karl: 34:34

I knew you'd like that yeah, we are our own pharmacies, totally. When you say holistic approach, yes, there's time and place for medication. So I would never say don't take your medication. I'd say that get moving and doing things, because we know 100 for sure positively, based on peer-reviewed research all over the place, when you get moving, whether it's walking, cardio of any kind, resistance training, which is this is newer to me I didn't realize how much happens neurochemically from your muscles. They're a pharmacy too, so is the brain, absolutely.

Karl: 35:17

Yeah, and actually who taught me that was Dr Luisa Nicola, who I love. She's everywhere out there now and all the big shows, but she was on my show a couple of months ago.

Karl: 35:27

And so we unlock all these neurochemicals, let's say, in hormones, and then they, they uptake the medication faster into your body. So they're, they're doing stuff in Australia with chemo. When you do chemo, you get done. You go down the hall less than five minutes later you're on a treadmill, you're lifting weights, you're working out because the chemo gets. Uptake of chemo is so much faster and I don't know the math on it, but something in my head thinks it's like six times faster. Don't quote me, I could be totally wrong. Maybe it's 50% faster, I don't know. A lot faster.

Karl: 36:15

And then the lasting effects of the medications are longer, and so which is so important with chemo, yeah, so you don't just get the chemo, go home and lay down on the couch and sleep. Well, maybe you have to, maybe you can't, I don't know, but you got to try to do something. So we have people that pop their levodopa pill 20 minutes, 30 minutes before they come here, and then they have a good session because they're on, they're in their most on state and this is huge. So the holistic aspect for me just involves a combo with you know medicine as needed and hopefully you're being prescribed proper dosages and proper medications, because there are a lot of mis, misdiagnosis, happens a lot here.

Di: 37:08

We've discussed this and I can actually link the episode because we went pretty deep into this and it's a very important episode, so I would actually highly recommend people click.

Karl: 37:20

Yep, so I don't want to repeat that here. We can talk about other stuff In my list of things. I think that really I'm going to go out there and I can say you can do anything that you want to do. It requires discipline, you may have to learn a lot of things and it requires focus. Okay, we know that I am not going to go out and be an olympic athlete. You know I'm not going to be uh, you know, beating anyone on the tennis court, like you know, federer nadal, even though I don't know if they're retired or not.

Karl: 37:59

anybody no so no, I can't do anything I want, as far as that goes, but if you know what I mean. Conceptually, though, let's just say we want to do something better, something better. We're probably going to be able to do it better, and it starts with having that goal setting the goal, figuring out. What is it going to take to get there. Do I need help? Can I afford to maybe hire someone to help me? Can I get online and learn? Maybe I don't need to pay for anything, maybe I can find a $20 a month program or $10 or whatever. But finding a way to get yourself towards that goal and then making it non-negotiable it's like I have what I call my non-negotiables.

Karl: 38:50

I'm an alcoholic. I haven't drank in years. It's non-negotiable for me to have a drink. You get together I ever meet you in person and we go to a bar bar's fine, I don't care, it's fine with me. I'll have my club soda. It's non-negotiable for me to have a beer or tequila or anything. I go to mexico. I don't drink anything I can't I get in trouble.

Karl: 39:11

I just wouldn't be right. I would kill myself, probably meaning not on purpose, just it would be bad. It's non-negotiable for me in the morning to not do my yoga. I do it every morning and I never want to, but when I do it I feel good. Within a minute of doing it I start feeling good because I need that energy. Right, it's not negotiable, these are non-negotiables. You have to figure out the things you must do and you have to make an agreement and a contract with yourself that if you break this contract, well, you just can't break it, you just have to do it. Sometimes it takes support from other people and maybe community and accountability. I don't tend to need that very much.

Di: 39:58

It really is a personality type.

Karl: 40:01

Yeah, I'm just doing it because, well, pain, I tried to turn any. You know, I had blood clotting issues and I flatlined in singapore and I was supposed to be dead and I'm here. Well, thanks be to god, I am here, I have now, I get to, I get to know you. This is a real honor for me this is a real honor for me.

Di: 40:26

We can we can argue about this this is no.

Karl: 40:30

This is so cool. I get to know you. Stefan stillner connected us, I'm pretty sure yeah, it was stefan.

Di: 40:38

Of course, it was the addiction.

Karl: 40:41

Addiction can be turned into production. I mean, I spent 48 years being an idiot. Now, the past 15 years I'm not perfect, that's for sure. I'm so far from it it's unbelievable. You know what, though? I'm not going to go out and hurt anybody, and I'm not going to hurt myself. I am going to do things to help people. It ain't about me, though. It's about we, because when we do better, we do better as a community and individually. Three generations from now, nobody's going to know who the hell Carl Sterling is, and you know what. I don't care, I don't need anybody to know. I'm not so important People need to know anything about what I did. All I know is that, while I'm here, so important people need to know anything about what I did.

Karl: 41:30

All I know is that while I'm here, I am here to serve, yeah, and I'm going to do that, and I'm going to serve myself because I've got to be healthy, so I can be more for others these next generations are.

Karl: 41:42

So we need to feed our, our generations with hope and teach with all the technology, which I love. I love it. I love a. I use ai every day, but guess what? I'm not so into it that I'm gonna not hang out with my grandchildren and chase them around and tickle them and have pillow fights and all that. So I mean, I love that. So you have to give to yourself what it, what allows you to give to others, so that you can do, you can be kind, you can do it on the back to kindness, you can help other people because why not? The world's?

Karl: 42:27

a better place when we help.

Di: 42:28

And you're also saying that it starts with you. It starts within.

Karl: 42:37

Yeah it does.

Karl: 42:39

Become yeah, it's not wrong to take care of yourself. It's right. It's right to give to yourself and feed yourself the nursing things you need. I'm not even talking about the food, that's a no-brainer. I'm talking about the spiritual aspect, the mental, the emotional aspect, the people like you, who I love, who will feed me and inspire me in your wisdom, and your spirit is so beautiful and strong. Well, I'm better because of you. You make me partly who I am, so I mean, I'm so grateful and strong. Well, I'm better because of you. You make me partly who I am, so.

Di: 43:16

I mean, I'm so grateful for this, but now I can go be a little bit more. Is a caregiver involved? This is so important that if the caregiver reaches a point of burnout, that could be quite dangerous for everybody involved.

Karl: 43:43

Oh yeah, we're going to be talking about that on my show this Sunday. So, statistically speaking, 70% of caregivers get depression. They don't sleep well, they're on medications, they have health problems. A lot are overweight, they're not taking care of themselves. They believe that you know getting well some people if they don't have help somewhere. Somewhere. Let's go back for a minute. Let's take, let's take Val for a minute. Val doesn't mind if I use her name. She's the one who went wheelchair to walk her two weeks, walk her to cane in two weeks, and now she's walking without a cane sometimes. I mean, this is still, though, huge. She's not falling down hardly at all. We work on falling, like that's whole another conversation too. So she'll almost fall, but won't fall, because if whatever happens in the, in these walls here, this has to go out the door with you.

Karl: 44:40

So we make people almost fall without falling a lot. So they learn how to recover. So it becomes reactive like you, just boom, you do it before. You knew you do it a split second before. But let's just talk about what happened to her husband. He doesn't have to push her around in a wheelchair anymore and he doesn't worry about her falling as much. Guess what happens? He gained weight. He didn't get depressed. I've known him a long time, but he also wasn't that optimistic until starts walking again. Well, can I talk about a little a product here?

Di: 45:17

I don't have an affiliation are you going to talk about reacting?

Karl: 45:22

oh, I can. I was going to talk about new gate tell me about Newgate.

Karl: 45:27

N-E-W-G-A-I-T. Google it, go to their site and then just check it out. We use that and it's an amazing system. It helps the body to learn through being entrained, through feeling of how you should be walking, because all the verbal cues and all that in the whole wide world won't do a fraction of as good as entrainment through feeling. You get this thing on the person. It helps their body move exactly the way it's supposed to. That's what got her moving and countless others. Reaxing is awesome. We just did a neuro program for them, so that'll be out next year.

Di: 46:02

I don't know if it was a reel or a story that I put on Instagram, but I love Re, love reacting. I discovered it in um in Cologne and FIBO.

Karl: 46:14

Oh cool yeah, oh my God, and.

Di: 46:16

I and I went to FIBO with very high heels, because that's what people do, I love it. And um, and I was like, I was like I'm taking these off and I was barefoot and in my get up and and I loved it, loved it, loved it, and I know that you use it. I am all for talking about these products because they are game changers. They, they exist in order to change people's lives.

Karl: 46:48

Yeah, yeah, so we can get to change people's lives. Yeah, yeah, so we can get to them in a second. I want to finish on the depression thing, caregiver thing, because Mike's a really good example of okay, now Val's walking. Guess what this means? Mike gets a break, he doesn't have to take such care of her, meaning he can get out for an hour, go to the store, he out and do this. He can even go out to his garage, work on his car he likes to work on cars, I mean and he doesn't have to worry about her as much because now she's more independent. And so a little bit of change on the person afflicted with whether it's Parkinson's or whatever they're dealing with, who has a caregiver, A little bit of movement forward, positive change can help the caregiver so much. So this basically there's a ripple effect that happens and the positive stuff goes deep in the ripples co-workers, friends, family. You know it's cool.

Di: 47:55

It is, it is so cool and it is so true. And, um, of course, you know, I, I, we all view life through our own prism. So, uh, mommy, I had just given birth and for three months I really went under, also to do with the war, as I'm living in a war zone, so it was all simultaneous. And then I started coming up for air and then I started becoming extremely productive and then running to my kids for lots of smooches and hugs and you know, it really is a ripple effect.

Di: 48:36

It really is on so many levels, for caregivers, for parents, for I mean it really is. I mean it really is, Maybe because we're out of time, and I actually you wrote about this as well you teach, you advocate for Parkinson's empowerment and, because of the travel, can you share some cross-cultural insights on how because you did already mention one thing in Mexico, on how different communities approach Parkinson's disease management?

Karl: 49:37

Oh yeah, boy, where do I begin? Let's start in Uganda. Uganda is a country where many people still believe that Parkinson's is contagious. So you'll see for real people out on the street, homeless, who were kicked out of their homes and other people won't go near them, especially you know they have a tremor and it looks like Parkinson's is definitely not going to go near them because it is believed that it's contagious. Of course we know this is not true. There is another belief too. This is a belief for real If you have an argument with your mother-in-law not your mother, not your father, not your father-in-law, your mother-in-law you're going to get Parkinson's. These are beliefs that are so deeply rooted that even people who go back and live with a person with Parkinson's, who don't catch Parkinson's people, they just think they're lucky. So just think about that for a minute, wow. So just think about that for a minute. Wow. That means that a lot of people aren't even getting treated because the doctors don't want to catch Parkinson's. There are some doctors who believe it. Now. Most of them don't.

Karl: 50:58

But now you've got a health care crisis, right, can you get health care? Health care in Mexico is tough, health care in Uganda is tough, health care in Belize and El Salvador is tough, man. I mean, people say, why do the Mexicans come to the United States all the time? All these criminals? Well, yeah, you got some criminals. You also have some beautiful people.

Karl: 51:19

I'm not for open borders and I won't talk about politics because it's too crazy and I don't know if I even know what the truth really is in a lot of this stuff. Where do you get truth these days? I have no idea. So I just live my own truth helping people. But the thing is is I do know this People will come here for opportunity, because they can get some care, and I know this very, very well from people who've had family who've come here from Mexico because they can get care. They just want to have like anything, like a medication, something, anything right, some diagnosis, um, and there are a million, you know a million other reasons to people come here or whatever. But the thing is is, um, the just think about this have you ever been to mexico? I have not, okay, so they're gonna say don't drink the water right because if you do, you'll get diarrhea.

Karl: 52:19

You get sick. Well, there's a reason for that it's toxic. And if you do drink the water and then your system adjusts to it and you don't get diarrhea anymore, well good. Except that now it's in your body and it's probably going to kill your brain eventually. The water supply is absolutely horrible. So people with enough means always buy and drink and cook with bottled water, or maybe some I know who boil it and kill out the toxins, but I'm not sure they even get rid of all of them because there's so many. The water supply, the health care system is tough. So when we're looking at dealing with parkinson's um, there's a multi, multi-faceted, multi-layered uh situation depending upon where you're at.

Karl: 53:11

I know Mexico really well, so I know this. I know if you drink the water you're going to get sick, and after you get sick and get over the diarrhea, something else is going to happen and it could take 30 years or 10 years or whatever. But that's really bad. You don't want this stuff in your body. I love Mexico, by the way. It's my favorite place to go. I just love it. So I don't mean this disparagingly. I love the people, love the culture.

Sarah: 53:38

I've been adopted by someone.

Karl: 53:40

Yeah, I just love it. So I'm just looking at fact-wise. You can't get a disability income. You got to be missing two legs, not just one. Oh well, you still have one leg so you can move around. I mean, this is the way it is, is this true? Oh yeah, this is totally true. Yeah, I'm not kidding, this is a fact.

Karl: 54:05

Okay, so diagnosis of Parkinson's is happening at younger ages in places like Uganda. The youngest I know of is a 14-year-old diagnosed with Parkinson's in Uganda. No, I'm sorry, a nine-year-old and then 14. And that's because of toxicity in the environment. The water has a lot to do with it. When you look at a lot of the jobs in these places, like in mexico, there's a lot of mining. Mineral mining is really really, really big and with all the welding and the magnesium sulfate and all the toxins from whatever's going on underground, I mean the cancer rates, the Parkinson's, the brain damage, it's really bad. And that therein lies a large part of, let's say, the reason that the average age of diagnosis in Mexico is much younger than the United States. So that's one of the things I see when I travel. Wow, yeah, it's not unusual to see a 30 year old Parkinson's. I, every time I go and I teach I have late twenties, early thirties, mid thirties at my work.

Di: 55:22

Oh my gosh, yeah Gosh.

Karl: 55:31

Yeah, I don't want to keep you too long, I have another.

Di: 55:33

No, I'm just honestly, I'm imagining the nine-year-old, that's just, it's so hard. It's so sad yeah.

Karl: 55:55

So, basically, you're going to these places and you're creating change. Well, yeah, I guess. So I mean, we want to help them get up out of bed in the morning, teaching the rollover. I have this informal assessment that I do. I made it up. It's the only thing I ever made up in my whole life. I think it's called the take me through your day assessment. I do it with everybody.

Karl: 56:13

You open your eyes first thing in the morning. What's your first challenge? Oh, for some, it's rolling over, and then it's sitting up, and then it's standing up out of bed. Oh, for some people, that's no problem. They get to the stairwayway and now they got to go downstairs, that's a problem. Or maybe they have to go up a couple steps, that's a problem. Who knows? You know so, um, we want to take these things and we want to teach methods, techniques, strategies to help make it better to conquer these challenges.

Karl: 56:49

Don't let them defeat the person. There's usually a way to do it, at least for a while, and then, of course, by slowing disease progression. The best way, um, for any kind of brain related let's see, neuro neurological disorder, movement disorder, is get moving, please, everybody. I never want to move, but you gotta move, and do it preventatively too. If you don't have parkinson's or any problems, thank god for that, okay, and you get to move. Oh, oh, I get to go take a run. So guess what I get to do, that I might as well go do it for at least 10 minutes.

Di: 57:35

I, on that note, want to thank you so much, say amen to what you just said, and I also want to thank you for being one of those you know, don't get angry at me for saying this but really being one of those exceptional lights in the world. So thank you, and.

Karl: 58:01

I feel the same way about you.

Di: 58:03

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