#134: Dr. Anthony Lim - From Paleo to Plants: Why this Doctor Made the Switch
Dr. Anthony Lim, Medical Director, The McDougall Health and Medical Center
Dr. Anthony Lim is no stranger to helping to inspire change. As Medical Director of the Dr. McDougall Health and Medical Center and former staff physician of True North, Dr. Lim helps his patients prevent and treat their chronic illnesses -such as obesity, diabetes, cancer, autoimmune conditions, and heart disease - all with a whole foods, plant-based approach.
Dr. Lim shares his own personal journey to plants (having gone down the paleo and keto route) and how he now works with his own patients to “meet them where they are on their own journeys.”
Every person has a story, he says, and, once you understand where they are coming from, it helps inform how best to help them succeed.
About Anthony Lim, MD
Dr. Anthony Lim is a board-certified family physician, and completed his M.D. degree while receiving honors at Boston University School of Medicine. He serves as Medical Director for The McDougall Program, Staff Physician for True North Health Center, and a Locum Tenens Physician for Permanente Medical Group. He has for years lectured and authored articles regarding health promotion subjects and plant-based diets. He is a firm believer in the power of a healthy, balanced lifestyle to both prevent and treat chronic illness. He has a special interest in whole food, plant-based nutrition and enjoys working closely with patients to help them adopt healthier habits.
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YouTube Transcript
Dr. Anthony Lim:
And so I have a lot of patients who have come to me saying, "I just couldn't do it. I couldn't do it." Meaning there is some it that they have defined in their head and if they can't do it, then they might as well just not do anything at all. And I think that can be dangerous. So I usually will say, "What's it?" Because I'm not necessarily saying that you have to do 100%, I'm saying, know yourself and know what you feel like would be the next logical step for you to take, know, like Dr. Ornish says, that the more you do, the bigger your results are going to be. But I don't necessarily think it's helpful for patients to go into a program thinking, I can never eat this food for the rest of my life.
Rip Esselstyn:
I'm Rip Esselstyn, and welcome to the PLANTSTRONG podcast. The mission at PLANTSTRONG is to further the advancement of all things within the plant-based movement. We advocate for the scientifically-proven benefits of plant-based living and envision a world that universally understands, promotes, and prescribes plants as a solution to empowering your health, enhancing your performance, restoring the environment, and becoming better guardians to the animals we share this planet with. We welcome you wherever you are on your PLANTSTRONG journey and I hope that you enjoy the show.
Rip Esselstyn:
Hello PLANTSTRONG pomegranates. I am Rip Esselstyn, and I want to welcome you to another episode of, you guessed it, the PLANTSTRONG podcast. Man, am I ever energized and on fire today? I feel like swinging from the ceiling fans. Last week, I was in Black Mountain, North Carolina, with over 92 intrepid souls who showed up and were willing to trust us, and by doing so, we helped transform their lives over the course of six short days. And it is truly magical to witness the changes that can happen on so many levels when you are surrounded by love, support, education, and of course, the right kind of foods. And let me tell you, our guests, the 92 people that attended, and the PLANTSTRONG team, we walked away so fulfilled and motivated that we just cannot wait to deliver our next immersion program, which is going to be in Sedona, Arizona in October. There's nothing quite as fulfilling and beautiful.
Rip Esselstyn:
Today's guest, speaking of a beautiful man, is Dr. Anthony Lim. He too is no stranger to helping others inspire change, as the medical director of the McDougall Program and a former staff physician of TrueNorth Health Center, Dr. Lim he helps his patients prevent and treat chronic diseases such as obesity, diabetes, cancer, autoimmune conditions, and heart disease, all with a whole food plant-based approach. On today's episode, Dr. Lim is going to share his own personal journey to plants, and you're going to see it was a very long and windy road and how he now works with his own patients to meet them where they are on their journeys. And every person has a story he likes to say. And once you understand where they're coming from, it's that much easier to help them succeed. And I love this approach because it illustrates very clearly the type of doctor that Anthony Lim is, namely, compassionate and invested in real patient care to affect lifelong habit change. What a radical concept, right? I hope you enjoy getting to know my friend, Dr. Anthony Lim. Anthony Lim, welcome to the PLANTSTRONG podcast. How are you doing today?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
I'm doing great, Rip. Thanks so much for having me. It's great to be here.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah, my pleasure.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
I'm looking forward to this.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah, me too. Where are you right now, this morning?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
I am in Santa Rosa, California, right around the corner from the Flamingo Conference Resort & Spa, where we used to run our in-person McDougall Program, but have since pivoted to the completely online.
Rip Esselstyn:
Right. Right. And how long have you been in Santa Rosa?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
I came out here from Boston in 2010 to do my family medicine residency at the UCSF Santa Rosa combined family medicine residency program, and I've been out here since.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah. With your wife and two boys?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yes, my sweetheart. I've got a 14-year-old boy, Joshua, and a 10-year-old girl, Julia. They're the light of my life. And my wife, Jean, she's a dermatologist at Kaiser here in Santa Rosa. And we met freshman year of college. I chased her for a year before she finally relented and gave in and said, "Fine." And we dated eight years and then have been married now for, oh my gosh, 18 years.
Rip Esselstyn:
Wow. And so you're both MDs?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yes, guilty.
Rip Esselstyn:
Now, you said you went to Boston University Medical School. Where did she go?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
She went to Harvard for med school.
Rip Esselstyn:
Okay. All right. So Harvard and Boston. And so you guys was that intentional? Oh, wait, when did she go to medical school? Was it before you went to medical school?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yes, it's kind of a funny story, we met at Stanford and we were both pre-med. She took a year off after graduating and then went straight on to medical school. I took this very long torturous path that traversed at least three or four different disciplines, including law, computer science, teaching, and then Asian language studies in China, before coming full circle back to where I belong, which is medicine.
Rip Esselstyn:
Why do you think it was? So you went to Stanford, you were pre-med, why do you think you didn't go straight to medical school? Did it just didn't feel right?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah. I come from a family of physicians. My dad's a retired OB-GYN. My brother's a surgeon, who's now in the biotech industry. My sister-in-law's an internist. My uncle's a nephrologist, my-
Rip Esselstyn:
Oh my gosh.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
... aunt's a pediatrician, my cousin's an internist in... I mean, you name it. There's at least 15, 16 different doctors. And so that was kind of all I knew growing up. And so believe it or not, I don't think I really took the time to seriously question, is this what I want to do? Is this what I'm called to do? And I have a restless nature. I need to experience and figure things out for myself in order to fully buy in. Because I wasn't fully bought in and was questioning whether I was doing it for the right reasons, I think I needed to explore some other areas before coming full circle and realizing, no, this is what I want to do with the rest of my life.
Rip Esselstyn:
That's wonderful. I know sometimes you got to go the circuitous route before it really speaks to you, and wow, from everything that I've read, that I've seen of you, when you came to Black Mountain for Plant-Stock a few years ago, you're up to your neck in this whole food plant-based world and I think you absolutely love what you're doing.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Oh yeah. As I tell the participants of each program, I feel like a kid at Disneyland. And I don't take for granted a single day what a privilege it is to be able to practice this kind of medicine. I fully appreciate that it's a unique setting and the opportunity and privilege to learn from one of the greats, Dr. McDougall, and work alongside Doug Lisle, and Jeff Novick, and Jack Dixon, our exercise trainer, and Heather McDougall, Mary McDougall, just such an awesome team is unbelievable. And then of course, not to mention just literally as I describe it, getting a front row seat to seeing people's lives transformed. That's what we sign up for medicine to do in the first place, but which often we become disenchanted when we find we're refilling medications and making referrals and seeing the revolving door of medical care.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah. Well, I want to come back to that a little later, but first, I'm fascinated with your particular journey to medicine. So after Stanford, what did you do first? Did you go to law school? Did you travel to China? What did you do?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Well, so my junior year of Stanford, I started thinking, maybe business is what I'm really interested in. So I did an internship at a management consulting company called Bain & Company. It's similar to like McKinsey, BCG, basically helping large Fortune 500 companies with various business issues that they have. And I enjoyed it. And so my first gig out of Stanford was working at Bain & Company. Originally, it was going to be in San Francisco, but when Jean, my wife, got into Harvard Med School, we just felt like that was an opportunity not to be passed up. And so I transferred my offer out to Boston and worked at Bain & Company in Boston.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
But before I did that, I pursued a lifelong dream of learning my mother tongue, which is Mandarin, which I didn't grow up learning because my parents speak different dialects. So I went to Beijing and studied one year of Mandarin, really intensively, like day in day out. And by the end, I was jamming. I was traveling all around the country for weeks at a time, all my own talking with people and really getting around just based on the new language I had picked up, which was incredibly fulfilling.
Rip Esselstyn:
Was it the dialect of your mother or your father?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
It's the root, it's Mandarin. There's so many different dialects. So my mom was born in Shanghai, my dad was born in Singapore, so they speak two different dialects, but the one common language that everyone speaks in China is Mandarin. So that was what I [crosstalk 00:12:04].
Rip Esselstyn:
So how cool was it to be able to go home and talk to your parents in Mandarin?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Oh, it was unbelievable. And especially my wife's mom, Mandarin was her first language. So to be able to talk with her and still to be able to talk with her, I mean, of course I don't have the same level of opportunity I do now as I did then, so it's declined, but still, to just be able to talk with simple things with her and order food at restaurants, it's cool.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
So then I came back. I came back from China where, and that was what started our stint in Boston, eight years in Boston. I graduated Stanford '98, so I came out to Boston in '99 and was basically there from '99 to 2010, so 11 years actually.
Rip Esselstyn:
Right. And you went to Harvard for law school, is that right?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
I went to Harvard for law school after realizing business. I still remember it would be like 2:00, 3:00 AM at Copley Place, which is a large complex in downtown Boston, and it's a high-rise beautiful view. It would be like 2:00 AM in the morning, and I was working on a PowerPoint trying to figure out how to help a large business increase profitability. And I'm like, "I'm not sure, this just doesn't cut it." And during that time I had been exploring other things like law, I was taking an introduction to law course at the Harvard Extension School. Next thing I know, I'm in law school.
Rip Esselstyn:
Man. Did you find law school to be challenging or at least a good education that helps you with everything you do now?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah, absolutely. I think what law school taught me to do is look at all sides of an issue really, really well. My focus during law school was actually mediation, which is helping the two sides come together. And I participated in something called the Harvard Mediation Program and even had a chance to do some mediations in small claims courts. And I think what I realized is that, and I even see it today these days with all the politics going on and us versus them, that usually each side has a valid point, but they are at cross purposes and not really knowing how to communicate with each other. And I found it very fulfilling to bridge that gap. One of the challenges is that to go into mediation, you usually need to earn your stripes through decades of litigation, which is a fairly adversarial pursuit. And I'm not by nature an adversarial person. So after a couple years in law school, I finished, in fact, I'm licensed in California. I was admitted to the bar, but I didn't see myself a happy fulfilled lawyer in the long term.
Rip Esselstyn:
So it didn't really resonate deep enough. And so you did the medical school and you got out of medical school in-
Dr. Anthony Lim:
2010.
Rip Esselstyn:
2010?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yep.
Rip Esselstyn:
And then what did you get your degree in? Or I should say, [crosstalk 00:15:38].
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Family medicine, family medicine was my specialty.
Rip Esselstyn:
Specialty. Yes. Not your degree, but your specialty.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
My degree was in human biology.
Rip Esselstyn:
Gotcha. And so when, as a physician, after coming out and specializing in family medicine, did you discover the power of whole food plant-based? And obviously that informed where you are now today.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Absolutely. Four years of med school, three years of residency at a wonderful residency, I only have good things to say about the Santa Rosa program. I never once heard the words whole food plant-based, not once. So in fact, people from residency will remember, I was the low carb paleo guy, or even staying after clinic to advise my diabetic patient to eat as much bacon, eggs and avocado as they want, as long as they held the toast. I'm embarrassed to admit it, but that's the truth. And the interesting thing is not one attending or colleague pulled me aside and said, "Hey, Dr. Lim, have you heard about Dr. McDougall or Dr. Esselstyn and this whole food plant-based revolution that's going on? You got to look at the research." Not a single colleague.
Rip Esselstyn:
Even in Santa Rosa where McDougall is basically a household name?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah. I don't know. There's just this divide. I think those walls are starting to come crashing down slowly but surely, but boggles my mind now when I see some of these landmark studies and just how clear the research is showing the benefits of this. I can't believe I wasn't exposed to this. Though, honestly, the more I learn about industry and just the way that the world works, there is a part of me that just become a little bit cynical. And I understand that money drives a lot of education and ways of thinking. That meat equals protein, dairy equals strong bones, I bought into it. So that was the other part of my dietary thing that's interesting for folks is I was the chubbiest kid in my grade growing up all the way up through fifth grade.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
So I ate a lot of unhealthy foods, spent a lot of time in front of the television and things like Wendy's Frosty's banana splits, Price Club, which is now Costco, their corned beef hash, these were like mainstays for me. So that was a difficult period being the chubbiest kid at that age, all the way up through fifth grade. But I'm thankful for that because what it did is it fueled a lifelong interest in nutrition that took many wrong detours, the whole low fat craze, Mediterranean, eat as much oil, chicken, fish, as you want, low carb paleo ketogenic, that whole thing. But finally, my last port of call and where I'm going to be the rest of my life, whole food plant-based.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
So to answer your question, it wasn't until after residency, one year after 2014, that I was watching PBS and Joel Fuhrman comes on the screen and he makes these... I had never heard of him or met him or seen him before. And just made these totally outrageous claims about this thing called a whole food plant-based diet and what it could do to not just prevent, but actually reverse chronic illnesses that I was seeing in my patients and feeling helpless to get to the root cause of. And I was like, "Well, I've got to at least check it out." And I still remember, I checked out his book Eat to Live from the library. I watched Forks Over Knives, saw you on there and your dad, learned of the work of Dr. McDougall right around the corner of Dr. Goldhamer at TrueNorth Health Center. And that was it.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
It was August of 2014, and I have not looked back since, each year only further reinforces that this is the right path. And then I think what's interesting over the years is how my concept of health has even evolved beyond that to the other aspects of health that are not just food, but at the center of it and at the core of it is this whole food plant-based diet.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah. What are some of the other things in that orbit, that sphere, that you just referred to, that you think are important as well?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Well, I have this diagram that I show my patients that it's got health epicenter, and then these circles with each of these major skiers, and it's the ones that you would expect, like exercise certainly, and movement, sleep, purpose and meaning, which we know from... I take my cue from the Blue Zones. I don't try to reinvent the wheel. So Dan Buettner's work is amazing, it's outstanding. And his nine power principles, I think they all hold true and included in that is sense of purpose and meaning, like why do you wake up in the morning? And your family and friends, your relationships. One thing that he mentions is, out of the 263 centenarians he interviewed, 259 of them had some form of spirituality, is something that they... Whether it's Seventh Day Adventist or ancestor worship in Okinawa, Japan, or Catholicism in Sardinia, Italy.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
It wasn't so much which religion, but it was just the concept of something outside of themselves that they came together to celebrate and worship in community. And so spirituality, I put there in that circle. And then a big one is stress. It's easy to eat well, Rip, when everything's going well in life and when you've got a solid support community. But what about when you're outside that community and the unexpected happens, then how strong are your convictions? And so patient's ability to cope well with stress is integral, is absolutely essential to long-term sustainability of a whole food plant-based diet.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah. I think it's fair to say that every one of us has stresses and stressors in our life. It's just I think a matter of how we deal with these stresses and overcome them, or just allow them to flow through us or deal with them. I just know from people in my life and have starting a business now that boy, the stresses never end. And having a young family and it's coming at you like bows and arrows. It's just trying to figure out.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Right. Right. Yeah. And I didn't used to have this as a talk I gave when I first started at McDougall, but now I do, it's a main talk I give at every program, emotional eating. That wasn't my... In 2015, when I first joined up with McDougall, I talked about diabetes, I talked about heart disease, I talked about osteoporosis. Now my talks, my three talks are diabetes, behavioral change, and emotional eating. And that very much has arisen out of my lived experience as the medical director of the McDougall Program for now turning into my seventh year. And what I noticed is that I wish I could say that 100% of the patients that come to a program, they adopt whole food plant-based, it's Cinderella story and all is well. And for many, that is the case, but I'm fascinated by the ones for whom they struggle and it doesn't quite take.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
And I would say easily over 90% of the time when I really get down to the root of what's going on with those patients, it is never a knowledge issue. It's not that they suddenly questioned whether broccoli, beans and brown rice was really good for them. It's what factors in their life interfered to make it difficult for them to put into practice what they knew to be good for them bottom line? And that oftentimes delved into the realm of emotional eating.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
I would always ask, what happened when they fell off track? One patient recently said it was a messy divorce. Another person I'm thinking of recently talked about the boredom of retirement, and eating is something to do. I can relate to that. Even when I was plant-based, there was a period of time that I just do stress eating. Even if it's carrots and hummus or Rip's Big Bowl, that's still not using food in its rightful place. I want to enjoy Rip's Big Bowl. I don't want to be eating it mindlessly out of stress. I've had a couple patients deal with hoarding behavior, either themselves or in loved ones, and that's a huge stress. And then-
Rip Esselstyn:
What does hoarding behavior look like?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
So hoarding behavior basically looks like the inability to let go of things, while at the same time continuing to accumulate to the point that they... Hoarders will have multiple storage facilities and you walk into their home and it's floor to ceiling stuff, stuff on the tables, stuff in the closets, stuff in the bedrooms. So I've had patients who said they cannot navigate their way around the home due to certain hoarding behaviors in loved ones. That is not something I was exposed to much at all, but in hearing, having the privilege of hearing people's stories, it's certain things like this have come up. A huge one... Oh, go ahead.
Rip Esselstyn:
No, no, I was just going to say, being in the position you're in and seeing patients every single day and having the ability to get intimate with them like that, what a gift?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Oh my gosh. Yeah.
Rip Esselstyn:
And it just enriches your craft that much more and you get to see it with a much bigger lens, pretty remarkable.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Absolutely. Yeah. Well, I like the way you described that, enriching the craft. It definitely feels more like a calling than a job. I even extended my time for appointments because I found that I couldn't fit, hear their story in this compact period of time. So I expanded the time and I think everyone has a story and that story explains a lot of their thoughts, their feelings and their actions and that the better we understand someone's story, the better position we are in to really meet them where they're at and help them to take the most logical next step.
Rip Esselstyn:
As Dr. Lim mentions, it is remarkable how a whole food plant-based diet can reverse so many chronic diseases. And that once you start making these changes, you'll see the positive ripple effects in so many areas of your life. This is also true in this email that I received from Rachel, a few weeks ago, here you go. My entire life, I ate the standard American diet while overindulging in alcohol and experimenting with other substances. I faced a lot of sadness and depression. Exercise was never a priority and neither was stress management. I was overworked, overfed, overstressed, and over-stimulated. I had no idea that the way I was living my life would catalyze into a disease. Fast forward to October, 2018, my health took a negative turn. Initial symptoms included, eye twitching, hearing loss, vision impairment, loss of strength, numbness, tingling in my extremities, balance issues and extreme fatigue.
Rip Esselstyn:
I went from doctor to doctor searching for an answer while continuing my unhealthy lifestyle. Before I knew it, I landed in the hospital and I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. I felt hopelessness, fear, and grief. I thought my life was being taken away from me. The next few months left me extremely lonely and depressed. So many unfamiliar symptoms continued to arise in my body. And I knew that I couldn't live this way for the rest of my life. I knew the conventional way of treating disease wasn't going to work for me. I knew I had to get sober and stay sober. I became dedicated to eating a whole food plant-based diet. I started working out, doing yoga and meditating consistently. I began seeing results and believing in myself more and more.
Rip Esselstyn:
I started treating myself with compassion and care and became a certified personal trainer, nutritionist, health coach, and meditation teacher. A disease that I thought would destroy my life has been my greatest gift. I'm now three years into the disease and I am healthier and happier than I've ever been in my life. Multiple sclerosis is now a companion that I get to take care of. I continue to follow a whole food plant-based diet while incorporating all aspects of lifestyle medicine into my life. I love listening to your podcast and hearing about all the wonderful things that plant-based nutrition has done for disease reversal and longevity.
Rip Esselstyn:
Rachel, thank you so much for taking the time to send that beautiful email. I am so grateful to hear that you are happy, healthy, and in such a wonderful position to inspire others. And the fact that you were able to take this autoimmune disease, multiple sclerosis, and turn it around and see it as one of the greatest gifts that life has given you, it's amazing, it's beautiful. And it has led you to where you are today. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Rip Esselstyn:
Well, so I feel like you touched upon compliance and that's the thing we're all looking for, right? How do we make it so that people can be compliant? And I guess my question to you is, do you feel like... You've been doing this a while now and you've seen thousands of patients between McDougall and TrueNorth. What do you think of this philosophy of all or nothing? Or do you think it's all or something? Or is it individualized?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Oh, I love that question. Yeah, I thought a lot about that because Dr. McDougall's famous saying, "Moderation is not an option."
Rip Esselstyn:
So does my dad. So does my dad.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Dr. Esselstyn, your dad, right? I'll be honest, I have a slightly different view, which is, know yourself. You got to know yourself. And it depends, right? There are some patients for whom the all-or-nothing approach is actually, I have found in some sense, their downfall. And let me tell you why, because imagine that a patient comes to one of our programs, they are gung ho, they are 100% on board and they don't touch anything that falls outside of Esselstyn or McDougall Program. And then Christmas comes or Thanksgiving comes, and this is the story I hear. "Oh, just one little bit won't hurt." But once that one little bit happens, guess what? If it's an all-or-nothing thing, what do you think they think of themselves after that one little bit?
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah. I failed. I failed.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
I failed, right? And once you feel you are a failure, your self-esteem plummets, and then you have the what the hell effect. What the hell, or who gives... Why did I think I could even really do this? And so I have a lot of patients who have come to me saying, "I just couldn't do I couldn't do it." Meaning there is some it that they have defined in their head and if they can't do it, then they might as well just not do anything at all. And I think that can be dangerous. So I usually will say, "What's it?" Because I'm not necessarily saying that you have to do 100%, I'm saying know yourself and know what you feel like would be the next logical step for you to take, know, like Dr. Oneal says that the more you do, the bigger your results are going to be. But I don't necessarily think it's helpful for patients to go into a program thinking, I can never eat this food for the rest of my life.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Now, on the other hand, there are some patients who just... That is what they need. They need those black and white lines, because they know about themselves, that if they have one little bit of something, like one piece of dark chocolate, that they're going to eat the entire box. And so then I think that's just wisdom. You would never tell an alcoholic, "Here, just have one glass of wine, it's fine." Because that's going to start a cascade of a downward spiral.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
And so I think for each person to know their limits and their own unique boundaries is critically important. I can have a piece of dark chocolate and a glass of wine. And I don't think about it after, I don't crave it after, I can really enjoy it. And I would say that it overall has enhanced the joy in my life. And so if someone from the outside was to say, "Anthony, you are never having another glass of this, or you never..." I think there would be a part of me that resists it. So I really feel out the patient and sense where they're at. And the thing that helps me not worry about whether moderation becomes too big of something, is the results speak for themselves.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
If they think they can do moderate, but they're not losing weight and they're obese or their blood pressure's not coming down and they're hypertensive, then when we reconvene, we're like, "Well, whatever you're doing, that's not enough. Good for you. You've made some progress, but you plateaued and you're clearly going to need to take it the next step." But now they're taking the next step from an internal place where they have experienced the limits of what they thought would get them the results. And they're like, "Okay, now I'm ready to give up that once, that twice a week eating out, and maybe make it a once a month." So that's just my approach.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah. No, I think it's very wise. I like it a lot. Thanks for talking about that. You're wearing that shirt, it said, it's the food. And I see that that's trademarked. Who trademarked that? Is that a McDougall trademark?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
That's a McDougall shirt. Here's the back. Can you see the back?
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah, I sure can. Drmcdougall.com.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
It's the food that's getting to the root of what? 80 to 90% of chronic illness. And it's simple and it's true. My only slight addition now that I tell certain patients is, for many, food is actually the symptom as well. So just in the same way that diabetes, heart disease, many autoimmune illnesses, many types of cancer, are symptomatic of an unhealthy diet, an unhealthy diet is often symptomatic of some other deeper issues. And that's what I have seen and experienced.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah. So along with being the medical director at the McDougall Programs, you also are on the staff at TrueNorth, right?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yes. I first joined on with TrueNorth and McDougall same time in 2015, and it was amazing combination working with Dr. Goldhamer, Dr. Klaper-
Rip Esselstyn:
Doug Lisle.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Doug Lisle. Absolutely. And witnessing the power of water fasting, seeing the slightly different variations within the plant-based world. TrueNorth is a no salt, no oil, no sugar, no flour, 100% plant-based. Whereas McDougall Program, very similar except flour, little bit of sugar, little bit of salt, it's usually fine. And seeing how... That was what took me a little bit off of there's only one right way. I saw that people need different things at different times in their lives and some work better for some patients and another type might work better for other types.
Rip Esselstyn:
Well, and there's so much overlap. I mean-
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yes, that's a big thing, is that with all these little things, 90% of it, the core is really what we need to be focusing on. That's why I'm a fan of Michael Pollan's Simple Seven Words. And to this day, that's what I tell most patients, I think really captures what a whole food plant-based diet is. Eat food, not too much, mostly plants. I'm a fan of simplicity.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
So 2015, I came on and I was working both of those, as McDougall responsibilities picked up, Dr. McDougall has retired from all clinical care. And given that both my wife and I are both physicians and father and mother of two very busy, active kids, I have dropped back my responsibilities at TrueNorth. I'm primarily lecturing there and devoting the bulk of my attention to McDougall Program, as well as lecturing at Kaiser, Santa Rosa, helping with their plant-based class offerings.
Rip Esselstyn:
Nice. I want to visit with you on both TrueNorth and Kaiser, would you say Kaiser is at the forefront when it comes to pushing plant-based out through their whole universe?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
I would say that they are at the forefront in terms of large healthcare nationwide institutions. But even if you were to go to any Kaiser, the minority of professionals within it advocates a whole food plant-based diet.
Rip Esselstyn:
Which is unfortunate. I know it might have been in 2014 or '15, they put out a white paper to their 16,000 physicians saying, "Hey, in light of this Titanic amount of research, we recommend that first course of action is to recommend a whole food plant-based diet to your patients." I don't know if you know the paper I'm referring to, but-
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah -with Tuso and Benjamin Ha. If that could become gospel for every Kaiser Center and basically the focus, I think it would be revolutionary.
Rip Esselstyn:
Very much. Well, anyway, I think it's great that you're doing that with Kaiser. With TrueNorth you've probably learned a lot about water-only fasting. For people that don't know anything about water-only fasting, can you tell us, who is a candidate for that and what are some of the benefits of it?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Well, I think that the best candidates are people who are not on a lot of medication, because we don't like to have people water fast, who are taking medications because the side effects could be extreme. So if they're on like diabetic medications and blood pressure medications that we could discontinue for the period of the water fast, that's ideal. And the range of conditions we have, the most common would be metabolic. So overweight, obese, hypertensive, coronary artery disease, high cholesterol, but quite a number of cancer, patients with cancer and quite a number of patients with various autoimmune conditions like rheumatoid arthritis. And I think water fasting, which is the absence of all food for some set period of time and only pure distilled water, for anywhere from couple days to as long as 40 days, that's the max.
Rip Esselstyn:
Really?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah, it's the ultimate in detox and the ultimate in allowing your body to do what it knows best, which is to heal itself. And I like that analogy of Dr. Gregor, if you hit your shin against a post once, fine, your body will recover if you leave it alone. But if you just keep hitting it day after day after day, it just gets worse and worse and never heals. Well, when you take out all the inputs from the standard American diet, and you're just drinking water, you are finally allowing your body to heal from the inside out. So in addition to massive weight loss for patients who are overweight or obese, people just feel a lot better, a lot of their aches and pains, headaches, joint issues go away. A lot of people coming in with skin conditions, their skin clears up.
Rip Esselstyn:
Right. Psoriasis, stuff like that?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Exactly. And then not to mention, of course, just the benefit of resetting their taste buds. So if they were to go straight from what they were eating to plant-based, no SOS plate of food, that would be a huge transition. But when they've only been having water for a period of time, then boy, sure tastes good, that first plate of food, absolutely.
Rip Esselstyn:
Right. It'll light them right up, doesn't matter what it is. Just a carrot and it'll be like, "Whoa, this is so sweet and wonderful."
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah, exactly. The other thing that's nice about it is it's so black and white. You don't have to make any choices or decisions. So it's like, imagine an alcoholic going into a detox facility, the absence of alcohol, you're going into a detox facility.
Rip Esselstyn:
No, it's really a remarkable community that Dr. Alan Goldhamer has created there. I went and visited him there. I think it was in maybe 2016, for half a day and walked around the facilities and had lunch, some of the most simple plant-based foods, but it was delicious. It truly was. And the chefs there create really, like you said, SOS-free, delicious whole food plant-based food. It's incredible.
Rip Esselstyn:
I'm trying to figure out where I want to go after that. So as a physician that has had... Let's just say seeing the whole food plant-based flight, when you come in touch with other physicians, how do they react when they... Like friends or family, or just people in general, when they know what you do, they know what you're an advocate for, are they open-minded? Are they wanting to change? Not change course, but maybe change their diet. Are they open-minded to that? Because you're doing what most physicians would love to do. And that is, you're actually getting to the root cause of the problem. You're probably trying to get them off medications. Seems like most physicians it's like, "Hey, we're getting you on this medication for the rest of your life." So you're practicing a paradigm that I would imagine in some ways is challenging to them.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah. Yes. But I will say it's been, honestly, universally received positive, when I think of the colleagues that I've interacted with, in part, because everyone has their different approach, but I tend not to be dogmatic with them and again, meet them where they are at. So I'm not threatening their views. And I'm just speaking from my own personal experience. So I've actually had, I would say a very positive influence on a lot of friends, family and colleague, many of whom have made much more significant strides in the direction of whole food plant-based eating because there's not an it. It's not like they're doing it or not. They're just increasing that percentage from 60% processed foods and 30% animal-based things with less than 10% fruit, vegetables, legumes and grains, to hopefully more and more of a percentage based on those four core food groups and less and less based on the highly processed foods and animal products. And the ones who are doing more experience greater gains.
Rip Esselstyn:
You mentioned at the top of the show, a lot of physicians in your family. Is your brother now plant-based?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah. I mean-
Rip Esselstyn:
Aunt, parents, where are they?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
The one of the first things I did when I became plant-based in 2014, is I remember going back to San Diego. And I was home for eight, nine days. And I said, "I only have one request this whole vacation, that as a family, my brother's family, my family and my parents, that together we watched Forks Over Knives." That was it. I'm not going to save him. I'm not going to... I just want us to watch that together. And that was enough.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
My sister-in-law, my brother, they have entirely changed their overall way of cooking. It's such a treat now to go back to San Diego because there's various... They have an instant pot, they're preparing all sorts of plant-based dishes and it's just so much easier and nicer when you can share in this together as a community. And same with my parents. The funny thing is we had all been... I mean, I went paleo in part due to my brother's influence originally. So just as our whole family had been on this low carb kick because of the absence of really good information, now that we're in the know, it's swung the other direction, which is awesome.
Rip Esselstyn:
So awesome. And your parents must be so insanely proud of you. And that you've found that job where you wake up in the morning and you have such a passion for it that I think I read in doing some research for you, that your father said, "Hey Anthony, find something where you love it so much that it doesn't feel like work, and then you never have to work a day in your life."
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah. And I have a strong... I mean, my dad, he's retired now, but he really enjoyed each day going to work and interacting with his patients, delivering babies. And that has really stuck with me. So especially with my torturous career journey where... I wish I could say it was all whoopty do, but the truth, it was a really difficult period, when you're trying to find what you want to do and you haven't quite found it, there's a lot of internal struggle there. So for them to see after that whole journey to have really have found a nice fit that I'm happy and derive a lot of meaning and satisfaction, they're extremely happy and proud.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
I want to have a special call out to my mom because she was the one that forwarded me the email back in 2015, that announced the job opportunity to work as a staff physician for both McDougall Program and TrueNorth. And I remember at the time I was like, "Oh, there's no way. I've been doing this one year." And I wasn't going to lie about it. I was going to say, "Look, I've just discovered this, but hey, I want to do this. And somehow they saw it within the [inaudible 00:52:34] to hire me and I haven't looked back.
Rip Esselstyn:
Well, I think both John McDougall and Alan Goldhamer, they met you and they're like, "This guy's got it. He's got it." [inaudible 00:52:47]. I have found that it's best to tell the truth and just let them know, "Hey, I've been doing this a year, but you know what? I am so jazzed and so passionate about this." And that's what they want to hear, as opposed to something else. Tell me this, it seems like a lot of people these days have a lot of anxiety, depression, have you found in your practice with people, does a whole food plant-based diet help mitigate that at all?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Oh, there's no question. There's no question. One of the patients I always profile, Robert, is a gentleman who was on antidepression medications. He was almost 300 pounds, on blood pressure, cholesterol medication. And this was back in 2014 and he adopted a plant-based diet right around the time that I did. And when I met him in 2016, he was off everything. He was off his depression medication, his blood pressure, cholesterol, his asthma inhaler. He had gone from sedentary to running over five miles per day. And his weight was 173. It was literally the word transformation. And I show that, I always share a story at the start of each 12-day McDougall Program, because I say, "This is what I see when I look at you, I see the transformation that is possible."
Dr. Anthony Lim:
So there's no question that I think eating better and the effects that that has on that whole circle of health, right? If you're eating better, you're going to feel better. You're going to exercise more, that may affect your sleep. You're going to sleep better. You're better able to handle stress, all of that. Brain chemistry's going to improve. So I think it can have a great beneficial impact, but I'm also careful to note that things like depression and anxiety are multifactorial. And so food, powerful as it is, is not necessarily sufficient in and of itself. And as someone, I'm very open, honest with my patients, as someone myself who has struggled with both depression and anxiety in my life, I feel like I'm able to talk with them about some of the other aspects that could be helpful for combating these challenging illnesses.
Rip Esselstyn:
Thank you. What have you had to eat so far today?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Oh, my favorite. Peanut butter on Ezekiel bread with a banana.
Rip Esselstyn:
Oh my gosh.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
That's my rich breakfast. That's my rich breakfast. The mainstay is my steel cut oats with frozen blueberries, bananas and some kind of walnut or hazelnut, and a big mug of black coffee.
Rip Esselstyn:
Do you usually have one cup of coffee a day?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah. One cup of coffee or a cup of tea. So for exciting events like this, I'll bust out the coffee.
Rip Esselstyn:
What about your kids? Are your kids following in the... Are they PLANTSTRONG?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
They are PLANTSTRONG. I give a bunch of lectures at my kid's school. I just gave one last week to second grade, which isn't even my daughter's grade now, she's in fourth grade, but because of the lecture I gave when she was in second grade, they called me back. And they eat far more fruit specials, legumes and grains than the average American kid. They're not 100%. And I'm thoughtful of that. It goes back to my thing about, I want people to make the decision from within, of their own choice so that they don't have some rebound reaction when they're off going to college. So they go trick or treating on Halloween. They have their gummy bears and their SweeTarts and things like that. And I try to be careful not to be strongly judgemental so that they don't grow up with major mood issues.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah. Well, we do the same. I've got three kids, seven, 12, and 14. They went trick or treating, and then we basically say, "Okay, you can pick five candies, and the rest are going to the dentist office and they can figure out what to do with them."
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah, that's good. Then you allow them some, but you set some healthy limits. And I think that's... Giving kids some freedom of choice while at the same time, helping them learn to set healthy boundaries or setting healthy boundaries for them until they're ready to do that, I think is the way to go because I've a lot of patients as adults who do not know how to set healthy boundaries. And so it's an important skill to develop.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah. Tell me this, your wife, you said was a dermatologist, right?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Rip Esselstyn:
There's such a connection between dairy and acne and even a high fatty plant-based diet and acne. Has your wife embraced any of that with her patients?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
She has. She's referred a lot of patients to my Kaiser plant-based 101 class. And we also have a monthly plant-based support group. So she has. I will say it's challenging because in the absence of some intensive program, this is not an easy behavioral change to make. And so we're not getting the volume or necessarily the results with acne that I think is possible, but whenever the opportunity arises and a patient seems open to it, she will absolutely talk about the connection and send them on over to me.
Rip Esselstyn:
Do you know the Nelson twins?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yes.
Rip Esselstyn:
They wrote The Clear Skin Diet?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah. Yeah. That's pretty remarkable.
Rip Esselstyn:
No, it's remarkable what they did and the person that really clued them into, because these girls had been plant-based since they were born. Because of Sabrina and Jeff. And it was Dr. McDougall that said... And they tried everything, medications, they've been to all the specialists and then Dr. McDougall said, "Listen, you need to stop the oils, the peanut butters, the tofu, anything that is overtly fat, you need to stop it." And literally it went away. And they had like the cystic acne that was just oh... Have you ever seen before and after photos?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
I know. Yeah. Photos speak for themselves.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah. They really do.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah. Without having to take medication or put any antibiotic creams or ointments on. Just food healing from within.
Rip Esselstyn:
Just food. I actually said, "Guys, do a pilot study like I did for my book, get like 40, 60, 70 people." And they did. And so they've got all these before and after results and photos of all these people that had acne and did their program and just wild success. So to me, again, it's so impressive to me how, when you stop, you said it earlier, when you stop insulting your body at a multitude of levels with all these inflammatory foods, the body has time to kick back and heal.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yep. Absolutely. At every level when you stop the insult and then instead pursue that which is good, true, and healthy, good things happen. So if you stop the Instagram, Facebook obsession, and instead, I don't know, go for a walk in nature or read some inspirational book, hey, you're filling your mind with positive uplifting things instead of, "Oh, what's this person up to? Oh, why can't I be more like that person?" When you stop the super long work hours that causes you to make poor food choices and compromise your health, and instead take some of that time, spending time with your family, building relationships and taking care of yourself, good things happen.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
And that's why health is not complicated. It's very simple. It's just not easy. That's what I say. It's simple, but it's not easy. But stop the insult, pursue the good. And my overall concept of what I view as success in health is the degree to which a person's actions, behaviors, align with their deepest values, internal values. So if they were to look at what they do and say on a daily basis, how closely does that match what they know to be their full potential and what they truly value? And the closer that's aligned, then you're living more fully into the life that you were called to live.
Rip Esselstyn:
Kale yeah to that. Kale [inaudible 01:03:02]. Before we go, can you tell me, just give us a success story, somebody that you've met through McDougall or TrueNorth, that came, they were sick because of probably the standard American diet, they embraced a whole food plant-based diet and they saw remarkable results. Can you share just one of dozens and dozens?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah, absolutely. One that I love sharing is a patient named Andrew. He's given me permission to share his story, who lives here in Sonoma and came to see me a few years ago with a hemoglobin A1C, which is a measure of your diabetic control, of over 10%, which is really poor control. And he was not on medication, but his doctor had written him a note saying, "Andrew, if you don't take better care, you risk blindness, kidney disease and even death." And guess what the doctor meant by take better care? He meant if you don't start medication.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
So he came to see me out of desperation and he was already eating a fairly healthy Mediterranean diet. So he is one where I said, "Hey, Andrew, I'm not usually like all or nothing, but I think that given that you're already eating a pretty healthy Mediterranean diet and your BMI, he was like 25.5, not particularly overweight, the only way we're going to know, see what's possible, is if you go 100%, 100%." And so he did, for the next couple months, he literally cut out all oil, all animal products. He even cut out flour and was just eating as much fruits, vegetables, legumes, and whole grains. He got his A1C check two months later and it dropped from 10.2% to 6.5%. And that's a huge drop in a short period of time, especially since at Kaiser, if you're over 10%, that's already reason to start you on insulin. And he-
Rip Esselstyn:
Isn't anything over 5.7 considered kind of diabetic?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
6.5% and higher is considered diabetic. So he's one where we think he probably has what's called type one and a half, where his body's producing some insulin, but not quite the amount that he needs, because he's lost a considerable amount of weight. He's at a healthy BMI, but his A1C continues to hover in that 6.0 to 6.5%. But he's just thankful because he doesn't have to inject himself with insulin and he's managed to turn himself around just by changing his diet, which is really encouraging. So we continue to stay in touch to this day. Jamie and Andrew have me over for awesome plant-based meals every so often. So [crosstalk 01:06:32].
Rip Esselstyn:
Way to go, Andrew, huge shout out to Andrew.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah. Absolutely.
Rip Esselstyn:
If people want to know more about you, what you're doing, any, where can they go?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
I think the best place is to go to the McDougall Program website. That's where I see the vast majority of the patients that I take care of. And some patients will sign up for an initial consultation to determine whether the program, the 12-day program is a good fit for them. And then if so, then they sign up for one of our 12-day online programs. We're running them about once every month to two months, it's completely virtual. So we've pivoted from in person to virtual and patients who have done both the in person and the virtual, they love both, but some have even enjoyed the virtual more because they're forced to make this a reality in their own home setting, which is part of the behavioral change that needs [crosstalk 01:07:35].
Rip Esselstyn:
And so that's why you've got that fancy headset there with the mic?
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah, absolutely. This is on my ears much of the day.
Rip Esselstyn:
Nice. Nice. Now, outside of the programs, are you doing telemedicine at all? Is that-
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah, so one of the benefits is when you sign up for McDougall Program, you're a McDougall patient for life. And so I will do a lot of... In a sense, we have a huge thousands and thousands of patients over the years. So I will see many of them for follow-up visits, whatever medical issues or behavioral issues they're grappling with and then the telemedicine through new patient consultations.
Rip Esselstyn:
Gotcha. Yeah. Well, Anthony, this has been an absolute pleasure. Thank you for joining me on the PLANTSTRONG podcast. You are a beautiful human being on the inside and the outside. And man, I wish you all the best and thank you.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Thanks Rip. It's good to be on the same team as you. Appreciate the work you're doing.
Rip Esselstyn:
Team PLANTSTRONG. [crosstalk 01:08:51].
Dr. Anthony Lim:
Yeah, team PLANTSTRONG, baby. Woo.
Rip Esselstyn:
All right.
Dr. Anthony Lim:
All right.
Rip Esselstyn:
Peace, Engine 2, keep it PLANTSTRONG. Again, I want to thank Dr. Anthony Lim for joining me today on the PLANTSTRONG podcast. What a absolutely beautiful gem of a man? Thank you to all of you for listening. You can find all of the links and resources from this episode on the episode page at plantstrongpodcast.com. We'll see you next week, but in the meantime, keep it PLANTSTRONG.
Rip Esselstyn:
The PLANTSTRONG podcast team includes Carrie Barrett, Laurie Kortowich, Ami Mackey, Patrick Gavin, and Wade Clark. This season is dedicated to all of those courageous truth seekers who weren't afraid to look through the lens with clear vision and hold firm to a higher truth. Most notably, my parents, Dr. Caldwell B. Esselstyn Jr. and Ann Crile Esselstyn. Thanks for listening.
