Speaker 1: Have you ever thought about how incredibly complex I spit is.
Speaker 1: It may only be water, but just aliva isn't simple.
Speaker 1: That remaining one holds incredibly meaningful information that could change everything.
Speaker 1: And I'm not just talking about your family treat hat.
Speaker 1: I'm barrettun Day Thurston and on this season of Spit
Speaker 1: and I Heart Radio podcast with twenty three and Me,
Speaker 1: we explore how DNA isn't just about ancestry, it can
Speaker 1: also be key to understanding your health. Hey hey, it's
Speaker 1: barrettune Day, Welcome back. It is hard to deny that
Speaker 1: family la familia is the most important aspect of an
Speaker 1: Italian's life. We've seen the movies, read the books, sat
Speaker 1: around the table family style, and we've witnessed the bond
Speaker 1: of this highly passionate community. The Italian family life can
Speaker 1: be characterized by loyalty and closeness, and Lowell Berlante's family
Speaker 1: it's no different. Loll is the host of the popular
Speaker 1: podcast Prodigy, a show that investigates human psychology. For this
Speaker 1: special episode, Lowell sets out to connect with his family
Speaker 1: after taking the twenty three and Me test, and they
Speaker 1: lightheartedly share stories of their pasts challenge each other on
Speaker 1: who's more likely to start balding earlier. This family connection,
Speaker 1: sparking all kinds of conversations, memories new and old, is
Speaker 1: exactly why so many families like Lowell's are drawn to
Speaker 1: taking the twenty three me test together. It's only when
Speaker 1: Lowell receives an unexpected call from his brother that he's
Speaker 1: forced to look beyond ancestry and the more playful traits
Speaker 1: and take a closer look at his own health history.
Speaker 1: It's a wake up call, he explains, one that will
Speaker 1: lead him to make smarter choices. He doesn't want to
Speaker 1: wait until he has an incident to start being healthier.
Speaker 1: Let's listen in as Lowell goes on a journey of
Speaker 1: personal health discovery, connecting with other family members to talk
Speaker 1: about what it means to understand your health and what
Speaker 1: your genetic makeup can say about you. You're listening to Prodigy.
Speaker 1: My name is Lowell brillianty Sorry, my name is Lowell
Speaker 1: real lante, real yante. I'm really not sure how you're
Speaker 1: supposed to say it, but it's one of the three
Speaker 1: Italian words I know. The others are bunjurn no and manga.
Speaker 1: I never gave it much thought until people started asking me,
Speaker 1: is that really your name? Yeah, it's not a pen
Speaker 1: name means brilliant in Italian. Because I come from a
Speaker 1: long line of geniuses or narcissists, we don't really look
Speaker 1: it in my opinion, but I'm told we're Italian. My
Speaker 1: dad can speak it fluently. He learned it from his
Speaker 1: parents while growing up in Brooklyn, New York, which I
Speaker 1: imagine was like the beginning of a source case film.
Speaker 1: He would tell me stories about his mom's loving hospitality,
Speaker 1: her wonderful cooking, and how quickly she could remove her
Speaker 1: shoe and fire it at you if you got out
Speaker 1: of line. It was less civilized time compared to today's standards.
Speaker 1: The shoe throwing was one of many stories my father
Speaker 1: would tell me. The passing of those stories felt like school.
Speaker 1: They were mandated not by his school board, but by
Speaker 1: the human need to pass things. One. Being Italian is
Speaker 1: a point of pride to my parents. Every Christmas Eve,
Speaker 1: I had the Dinner of the Seven Fishes and boogie
Speaker 1: at the Italian American Club's Christmas party. To this day,
Speaker 1: every time we go to an Italian restaurant, my dad
Speaker 1: will find a reason to chat with the owner while
Speaker 1: emphatically gesturing with his hands. On those occasions, he'll bust
Speaker 1: out the absolute fanciest pronunciation, but it's the earlier to me.
Speaker 1: But to be honest, I never really cared that much.
Speaker 1: I don't feel all that Italian. I was born in
Speaker 1: the South. I don't own a single gold chain, and
Speaker 1: my hair looks terrible when I slick it back. But
Speaker 1: I can't cook. I'm not sure if cooking was a
Speaker 1: genetic hand me down, but if it was, I got
Speaker 1: it from my dad. He can whip up a pasta
Speaker 1: dish to go with your second espresso in no time
Speaker 1: at all. Stereotypes aside. I think I was born just
Speaker 1: one too many generations removed. My grandparents all passed away
Speaker 1: before I was old enough to remember them. They didn't
Speaker 1: exactly leave behind many selfies. I have some old photographs
Speaker 1: of stiffly posed people I don't recognize in my father's stories. Honestly,
Speaker 1: I don't even recall how they died, but I know
Speaker 1: they are relatively young. I'm over here door dash and
Speaker 1: dunkin Donuts without any regard to what could be lurking
Speaker 1: in my genetic code. This episode was sponsored by twenty
Speaker 1: three and me, and to be completely honest, I don't
Speaker 1: really want to see the health or I never get sick.
Speaker 1: I'm not obese, I'm not charming, but some women do
Speaker 1: appreciate my arms. Mentally, I feel pretty decent about my health.
Speaker 1: Why mess with that? What if there's something in there
Speaker 1: I can't control? It's the fear of finding out the FOFO.
Speaker 1: It's fun to say. So for this episode, maybe I'll
Speaker 1: just focus on the ancestry part. I can connect with
Speaker 1: a third cousin that I'm not sure if it's okay
Speaker 1: to be attracted to, and learn how to make mozzarella. Oh,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, learn how to make mozzarella. My name is
Speaker 1: Lowell and this is prodigy. Alright. The reports are in
Speaker 1: time to find out if I'm actually Italian or just short. Okay.
Speaker 1: It's broken down into three main categories with several subcategories.
Speaker 1: I'm going around decimals here. In the first category, I'm
Speaker 1: European and that is Italian, mostly from Sicily, so my
Speaker 1: parents weren't lying. And oh look at this point Jewish.
Speaker 1: That gives me a few extra holidays. Next category is
Speaker 1: Western Asian and North African. The subcategories are a bit
Speaker 1: of a mishmash, but the main ones I see are Coptic, Egyptian,
Speaker 1: and Cypriot. I'm not sure to say that I couldn't
Speaker 1: point those out on a map, but luckily it shows
Speaker 1: you one. The final category is point seven percent sub
Speaker 1: Saharan African, specifically Ghanaian, Liberian, and Sierra Leonian. That makes
Speaker 1: me curious how many generations you have to go back
Speaker 1: to find that ancestor probably not many, since each generation
Speaker 1: you go up by multiples of two, two parents, four grandparents,
Speaker 1: eight great grandparents, sixteen great great grandparents. If I go
Speaker 1: up ten generations, there's one thousand, twenty four people contributing
Speaker 1: to my DNA. But anyway, I'm mostly Italian. I should
Speaker 1: I call my dad and hear one of those childhood
Speaker 1: stories I used to ignore. We had a little bodies
Speaker 1: market which was was was a chicken market. You're going
Speaker 1: on your pointed chicken. It would be awive and then
Speaker 1: you guy, I would take it, this is where you want,
Speaker 1: let's float and they put in a machine that would
Speaker 1: boil your real hot machines, take all the feathers off
Speaker 1: like a rotating machine, and you they were your chicken
Speaker 1: packages up there Oh my god, that's how fresh. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's that's good. That do you think you would pick
Speaker 1: the chicken he hated the most, or like our which
Speaker 1: one looked the most delicious? Well, when you went to
Speaker 1: the rooties, I don't know. My father always I know chicken, chicken.
Speaker 1: One guy was like, oh wait, wait, let me pick,
Speaker 1: and you're like, all right, watch out for that guy.
Speaker 1: How did your parents punish you? My mother was the one.
Speaker 1: My father never hit us at all. He would threatened,
Speaker 1: but you know that my mother would hit me with
Speaker 1: a shoe and she'd come after me. She grabbed man,
Speaker 1: you ran from her. She on the head where she
Speaker 1: had the shoes like a slipper, and it was wood
Speaker 1: inside of it, like hitting someone with a bat on
Speaker 1: the head. That's a harder. Still, when she could throw it,
Speaker 1: she was really really good at throwing it. You could
Speaker 1: be like fifteen peter away and she hit you in
Speaker 1: the head. She beat me with it. I mean she
Speaker 1: was pretty, she was really neat, but we loved it.
Speaker 1: She was someone that we absolutely loved. Even though she
Speaker 1: has loved every one of us, five of us, and
Speaker 1: everyone that knew her would love her. Anybody was invited
Speaker 1: to our house. The guy would be the mailman she'd
Speaker 1: invited to dinner. Anybody. Why. She just liked to do
Speaker 1: nice things for people. She was just very generous. That
Speaker 1: she was tough, but she was very very generous. What
Speaker 1: she did and how she treated people, everybody seek to
Speaker 1: like her, even in neighbors. He just went to the
Speaker 1: decent person. You're six, You brought you things you know
Speaker 1: she would take care of. Well, that clears things up
Speaker 1: a bit. Turns out I'm a descendant of a kind
Speaker 1: and generous woman that weaponized her footwear to beat her
Speaker 1: children better. I wonder if three and me will hear this,
Speaker 1: or if they're spending all their time on many Drivers episode. Oh,
Speaker 1: getting a phone call from my sister hang on, okay, yeah, Hi,
Speaker 1: So my cousin Josie is visiting and she did twenty
Speaker 1: three and me too. She wants to compare reports, So
Speaker 1: I'm gonna hit record and open up the website on
Speaker 1: my new custom built PC. Well you gotta get the
Speaker 1: hap alright, fine, but better not send me fifty entifications
Speaker 1: like door dash. That's how I just set your request
Speaker 1: or an invitation. I don't know what it's called. An
Speaker 1: invitation to share. Once you accept Lowell, we can do
Speaker 1: a side by side. It is really amazing that it
Speaker 1: knows like your second called one once removed. Ye okay,
Speaker 1: you're like, you're pretty Asian and me I guess Western
Speaker 1: Asian and North Africa. That's like a lot more than
Speaker 1: Josie is. So he is a lot more Arab, Egyptian
Speaker 1: and Levingine than I am. And one and a half
Speaker 1: and he's six and a half. Yeah, and then all
Speaker 1: this other stuff that I have zero he's Northwestern? Where
Speaker 1: where are They're in West Asian. They're pretty excited, and
Speaker 1: I'm kind of realizing why this is such a big
Speaker 1: deal for families. I just got a Google math. So
Speaker 1: this is so interesting. Jespine, you're like a super Neanderthal.
Speaker 1: I am, are you? What's that? From? Where? Said? You're it?
Speaker 1: Just as you're like five pirsont war that we are
Speaker 1: pretty sure it's that makes sense? Well, it explains a lot.
Speaker 1: Rachel really neanderthal? You think, I am? Check Rachel out.
Speaker 1: So the Neanderthal percentages are pretty funny because of how
Speaker 1: the word is commonly used, but it doesn't actually mean
Speaker 1: anything about Josie's intelligence, stature, or ability to make fire.
Speaker 1: I could look at this, Oh day long, it's so fun. Josie,
Speaker 1: how come there's no trait for you on your back
Speaker 1: hair or your bald spox. I'm not saying that food, Lowell.
Speaker 1: We're both predisposed to weigh more than average. I don't
Speaker 1: like that one. Oh man, that's a great laugh. But
Speaker 1: she's wrong. Yours says predisposed to weigh more than average.
Speaker 1: Mind says predisposed to weigh about average. Oh you're right,
Speaker 1: low Oh my god, early hair loss. No you don't
Speaker 1: have a hair law, Yeah no I do. I do.
Speaker 1: It was no early hair. Well, I don't know what
Speaker 1: early is, but like around colleges started to like get thinner,
Speaker 1: but I still have like hair on my head, you know. Yeah,
Speaker 1: well it's not lucky. And then your family, God would
Speaker 1: be so terrible to be bald. So Josie wants me
Speaker 1: to connect with other family members that have done it too.
Speaker 1: Call Phil and tell him to accept. Send Phil an invitation.
Speaker 1: I've never called Phil before or text him. I've never
Speaker 1: texted him. I don't even know if it is he
Speaker 1: in the app. I'm not. I don't know his number
Speaker 1: like in the message group, you know how I messaged,
Speaker 1: you just now the other number on there, so he's
Speaker 1: done it. So I sent philow request to connect and
Speaker 1: sign off. The next night, I get a phone call,
Speaker 1: but it's not Phil, it's my brother and sister. One
Speaker 1: side of my dad's face was drooping, so my mom
Speaker 1: took him to the hospital. I've been dreading a call
Speaker 1: like this. Losing a dog last year tore me apart
Speaker 1: with grief. I don't know how the process losing my father. Thankfully,
Speaker 1: it seems like he's doing okay, but they're keeping him
Speaker 1: in the hospital so they can run some more scans.
Speaker 1: My mom goes home for the night and my dad
Speaker 1: doesn't have a charger, so we can't reach him. He's
Speaker 1: probably resting, but I can't shake the thought that he's alone.
Speaker 1: The next day, my dad gets his charger and I
Speaker 1: have a brief chat with him. His speech is a
Speaker 1: bit slurred, but he's in good spirits. He gets excited
Speaker 1: telling me about a Netflix show he's watching, and I
Speaker 1: can hear a speech clear a bit. He's gonna be
Speaker 1: all right. We'll keep him another day for scans and
Speaker 1: then he can go home. Josie's mom had a stroke too.
Speaker 1: Is that my fate. Is it inevitable and I should
Speaker 1: just say screw it and continue to live care free?
Speaker 1: Where can I prevent or delay it? Well, it's probably
Speaker 1: time I look at my health report. My last physical
Speaker 1: showed high L d L cholesterol, so it wasn't much
Speaker 1: of a surprise to see an increased likelihood for that
Speaker 1: and coronary artery disease, which is what led to my
Speaker 1: father's stroke. I can't do anything for my dad at
Speaker 1: the moment, so I decided to call Phil. His mom
Speaker 1: is my dad's sister, aunt, Josephine. How you been. I've been, well,
Speaker 1: how about you? But before we started, how is your father? Oh?
Speaker 1: He's good, But yeah, I guess he had like a
Speaker 1: mild stroke or whatnot because of you know, like a
Speaker 1: blockage in the heart, and they're considering right now whether
Speaker 1: they have it cleared out surgically. April thinks he should
Speaker 1: do it. Your mother and father are still considering it.
Speaker 1: That's my information. Do you have any more? No, that
Speaker 1: was that's the same information that I have, because I
Speaker 1: guess the question is like, well, my dad actually changes
Speaker 1: diet and exercise and stuff, or from what he tells me,
Speaker 1: he has such a great diet vegan or vegetarian vegan. Yeah,
Speaker 1: well he does, but then he'll also you know, it
Speaker 1: goes off. Yeah, you know what, I do the same thing.
Speaker 1: My fear that it's the same age as Aunt Angela
Speaker 1: having a stroke. Yeah, I did the like the any
Speaker 1: three and meat plus one and it has an increased
Speaker 1: likelihood for coronary artery disease. And that I mean, I
Speaker 1: guess you know, we can lead to stroke. And what
Speaker 1: do you what do you look at to avoid that?
Speaker 1: I mean, do you look at your cholesterol? I don't
Speaker 1: know that's a good question. I mean, what do you
Speaker 1: think so you have a chance of getting coronary like
Speaker 1: chance higher than the average population. I think, so what
Speaker 1: do you do between now and seventy to prevent that?
Speaker 1: I'm on web MD actually for how to prevent um
Speaker 1: this end stroke And it says, you know, eat a
Speaker 1: balanced diet, cut back on sodium, sugar, and saturated fat.
Speaker 1: And I think sugar was a top one for my dad. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it just says like exercise healthy weight. Um, you know
Speaker 1: he's not super overweight now, but he was always overweight
Speaker 1: like his entire life. You know, you've always been thin,
Speaker 1: right end? And how you how you're judging me compared
Speaker 1: to who for this family? Yet in this family I
Speaker 1: would be considered thin. I have quite a bit of
Speaker 1: Neanderthal Wait, more than you. Jessie has a lot, so
Speaker 1: it's gonna make fun of her. But oh what does
Speaker 1: she really Josie? Yeah, you get that from Uncle Bill. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you have eleven percent more than everybody else? Are we?
Speaker 1: So in randers All? I mean I feel it feels
Speaker 1: like an insult. Why well, you know the the connotation
Speaker 1: of the word, you know, because you're a caveman. Yeah, right,
Speaker 1: like you're like the guy go commercial? Yeah, pretty much.
Speaker 1: Do you guys have anyone with like a d h
Speaker 1: D decide you and me? Do you? Because like do
Speaker 1: you and me? Right? Yeah, I guess have you been diagnosed?
Speaker 1: Pay attention? These are the jokes. I don't do anything.
Speaker 1: I can't say for sure. That's somebody in our family
Speaker 1: has been like I feel like that. Yeah. My father,
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, you know I'm always looking down too younger
Speaker 1: than me. Your your father has it. Yeah, he hasn't
Speaker 1: touch them, and he he does like to touch everything,
Speaker 1: and he doesn't He bounces around quite a bit a
Speaker 1: touch of it. He likes to touch everything, touches everything.
Speaker 1: One time I was traveling with your father, I just
Speaker 1: had We went to the keys together in like. It
Speaker 1: was a fairly brand new truck of mine, and we
Speaker 1: stopped at a rest stop, and your father thought it
Speaker 1: would be a good idea to take that you know,
Speaker 1: that dirty window cleaner by the side of the game,
Speaker 1: and washed the clean the window. But but on the
Speaker 1: inside of the truck. No, I can't believe that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I tread to God, I'm pumping against Mexican and it's
Speaker 1: dripping on my dash. You know, all that chemicals and
Speaker 1: the bug parts. What are you doing the inside? The inside?
Speaker 1: Did Rachel like connecting with people? Like why did she
Speaker 1: buy a you a test? She brought me a test?
Speaker 1: Because I asked her buy me a test. I said,
Speaker 1: you know, that would be a good Christmas gift for me.
Speaker 1: So I wanted to do it, and I didn't want
Speaker 1: to spend the money so that would be I thought
Speaker 1: it was a good idea. And what got me interested
Speaker 1: in it was the fact that she told me that
Speaker 1: she was fifty Italian. So I said, well, for you
Speaker 1: to be fifty percent time, I need to be a
Speaker 1: hundred percent Italian. I'm not sure exactly how the science works,
Speaker 1: but I was close to but not fully. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: guess it's it's like some kind of recommindation. I think
Speaker 1: um or maybe her mom had, like you know, some
Speaker 1: Italian Yeah, like just anymore. My dad told me he
Speaker 1: stayed at Phil's house once and there was no food
Speaker 1: in the fridge. That story made me think that Phil
Speaker 1: couldn't control his late night ice cream cravings, but turns
Speaker 1: out he does intermitute fasting. I sleep better when I fast.
Speaker 1: Then when i'm when I want to eat a lot
Speaker 1: and I get in the bed and then my body
Speaker 1: I'm like hot. You want to see something amazing. You
Speaker 1: fast and go to bed. You need to blankets. You
Speaker 1: eat all day. You can't have the sheet on you
Speaker 1: when I break that thirty six hours. This is I
Speaker 1: had to find this out the hard way is that
Speaker 1: if you go forty eight hours and then eat, you
Speaker 1: better be. You better be by a bathroom. Yeah, it
Speaker 1: seems like you've really focused on being thin, and how
Speaker 1: did you get into it? Oh, I think it looks
Speaker 1: better right, Vanity. That is a motivator though, Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: the same with me. I just wanted to rip so
Speaker 1: I could get lots of girls. You ain't a rock
Speaker 1: star that you ain't rich got going for you. I
Speaker 1: appreciate it. Thanks having a good one, philm Bye bye bye.
Speaker 1: Remember Josie. Her brother is my cousin Arnold. He's this
Speaker 1: crazy talented video guy. His mom was my dad's sister,
Speaker 1: Aunt Angela, and also suffered from strokes. So I rang
Speaker 1: them up. Actually this isn't a phone call because Arnold
Speaker 1: is one of those lovely guests that knows their audio.
Speaker 1: Whoa and to relax, be a goog girl. Ah Uh,
Speaker 1: your your mom had a stroke too, right, she had
Speaker 1: a lot. Yeah, well she had one massive stroke. Um.
Speaker 1: She was driving when she lived in the villages. She
Speaker 1: lived near Uncle Jerry and at lou and she was
Speaker 1: I don't know if she was going to the grocery
Speaker 1: store or something in the middle of the day and
Speaker 1: she had a stroke and ran through a red light
Speaker 1: and t boned another car. So she got into a
Speaker 1: really bad accident, and she called Uncle Jerry, and Uncle
Speaker 1: Jerry came and picked her up, and he thought she
Speaker 1: was just, you know, shaken up from the accident, so
Speaker 1: he brought her back to his house and she kind
Speaker 1: of stayed there and at dinner, this is a couple
Speaker 1: hours later, she was talking to him and she just
Speaker 1: kind of fell out of her chair onto the floor.
Speaker 1: That was when Uncle Jerry said, up, we're going to
Speaker 1: the hospital. So at the hospital they were like, no,
Speaker 1: you've had a quite a massive stroke. Actually, um, which
Speaker 1: isn't you know? It's if they had known that she
Speaker 1: had had a stroke and taken her to the hospital,
Speaker 1: there would have been less damage done. I guess right, um,
Speaker 1: from what I've read about strokes as you have like
Speaker 1: you know, a couple hours to you know, do some
Speaker 1: massive oxygen intervention and there's some other drug that they
Speaker 1: can give you two burst up blood clots and whatnot,
Speaker 1: you know. So I mean, really, if you know that
Speaker 1: you've had a stroke or even suspect, getting to the
Speaker 1: hospitals like the best thing that you can do. It's
Speaker 1: a horrible thing that, you know, when something happens to
Speaker 1: your parents and you know, here, there, here, and then
Speaker 1: they go down to here and they never quite make
Speaker 1: it back up to here. So this is the new baseline,
Speaker 1: and then the new baseline, and then the new baseline
Speaker 1: did ever make you think about like your own health?
Speaker 1: And uh, like trying to avoid something similar happening to you. Yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: absolutely so. My mom was not a fan of her
Speaker 1: medication whatever that you know, beside effects probably were not fun.
Speaker 1: I'm guessing I don't think it was that bad. I don't.
Speaker 1: I remember just at one point her telling me like, oh, no,
Speaker 1: I've decided I'm gonna cure myself with eating plants. Like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's great, Mom, don't don't you know why would you
Speaker 1: listen to medicine where they can make sure that, you know,
Speaker 1: because you know, she had um type two diabetes I
Speaker 1: think it was, and she was supposed to take whatever
Speaker 1: that medicine was, and she just decided one day she
Speaker 1: was going to stop doing it. And so I make
Speaker 1: you know, I'll tell you that, after seeing how my
Speaker 1: mom went downhill, I'm pretty serious about making sure I
Speaker 1: get to the doctor at least once a year for
Speaker 1: physical you know, get the blood work, what you know.
Speaker 1: But I'm only fifty, and you know, nothing really major
Speaker 1: has happened to me health wise. I'd imagine that that
Speaker 1: first health scare will probably more for me than it
Speaker 1: maybe did for my mom. I don't know. Growing up,
Speaker 1: Um of the five siblings, Uncle Jerry, uncle, Anthony, aunt Josephine,
Speaker 1: and my mom all lived within four hours of each other.
Speaker 1: Your dad moved away to North Carolina, so we would
Speaker 1: only see him like once or twice a year, and
Speaker 1: it was always like, you know, Fourth of July or Christmas.
Speaker 1: All of the children of Jerry, Josephine, Anthony, and Angela
Speaker 1: would see each other almost like a monthly basis. So
Speaker 1: I would constantly see tons of people that I was
Speaker 1: related to and have that familial bond. And I would
Speaker 1: get to see you know, you, April and Frederick once
Speaker 1: or twice a year, and that was about it. Our
Speaker 1: cousin Tom. I saw Tom every other weekend until I
Speaker 1: was fifteen years old, so you know, he and I
Speaker 1: had a tight bond. We were we're you know, six
Speaker 1: months apart, and I saw him all the time. He
Speaker 1: lives right down the street from me. Now, actually, oh
Speaker 1: that's great. I hope you get to see him a lot. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: like twice a year. Tom's dad is my uncle, Jerry. Wow, Okay,
Speaker 1: I literally just made that connection Tom and Jerry. God,
Speaker 1: I bet they hate that his parents are older than mine,
Speaker 1: but neither of them has had a stroke. They lived
Speaker 1: ten hours away in Florida, and Tom was older, so
Speaker 1: I saw maybe three times while growing up. A few
Speaker 1: years ago, I bought a house in the same area
Speaker 1: of Atlanta as him, Decatur. It's not uncommon for me
Speaker 1: to meet someone and get asked, are you related to Dr? Tom?
Speaker 1: He's so nice, he's their eye doctor, and they probably
Speaker 1: see him about as much as I do. Since I
Speaker 1: need something from him, I figured it was a good
Speaker 1: time to reconnect. Asked him to bring over his lovely
Speaker 1: partner Denise to fact check him. And because she gives
Speaker 1: me compliments. Here she is telling me about an open
Speaker 1: DNA database and then I can take your code and
Speaker 1: your code and plug it in and they'll cross reference
Speaker 1: everything and I'll say, either we have matches in common
Speaker 1: or we don't have any matches. So like that should
Speaker 1: be built into dating apps, right, absolutely, right, I didn't
Speaker 1: think of that. Everybody's probably distantly related. That everybody that
Speaker 1: creeps health is a perpetual concern of my parents because
Speaker 1: they are very healthy, and they you know, now my
Speaker 1: brother has gotten much healthier, but I am still very overweight.
Speaker 1: So they've tried various ways to incentivize me and Denise
Speaker 1: to you know, lose weight. The latest was like, you know,
Speaker 1: we'll give you some money for a personal trainer. I
Speaker 1: would love that, but I feel like, first I need
Speaker 1: to you know, lose weight before I start exercising. But
Speaker 1: you don't think that that's really the most important thing
Speaker 1: when it comes to like long term health, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: So I guess that My feeling is that something's going
Speaker 1: to catch up to every one of us eventually, sooner
Speaker 1: or later. So I had, you know, a pendicitis you know,
Speaker 1: all things considered, that really was not something that was
Speaker 1: to life threatening. So I feel like, if that's the
Speaker 1: worst that happens to me, well, you know that won't
Speaker 1: be the worst. But like I guess the idea is
Speaker 1: that over time, all the little things add up. I
Speaker 1: think he's under selling it by saying it wasn't life threatening,
Speaker 1: because if you saw the thought up that we had
Speaker 1: to do and the medicine that we had to give you,
Speaker 1: what not say that? Well, your side of the family
Speaker 1: is like always in such like positive spirits. You're not
Speaker 1: thinking it that good. I'm just thinking maybe you do
Speaker 1: if you think that that's part of it too. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think, um, you know, seeing a therapist on a
Speaker 1: regular basis. I think that's contributed a huge amount friendships
Speaker 1: as well as your you know, your partner family is
Speaker 1: like super important. And you think my mom nagged my
Speaker 1: dad into this trip. Okay, I'm sorry now, I'm just
Speaker 1: gonna say that. I think that's something that like I
Speaker 1: took for granted when I was younger. Now I take that,
Speaker 1: take it a little bit more seriously, and probably still
Speaker 1: not the best of keeping up relationships, but better hopefully.
Speaker 1: You know, it's my personally held belief that we should
Speaker 1: not hang around on this earth too long that you know,
Speaker 1: seventy five and out is I'm big believer in that.
Speaker 1: Um So he says that, he's like, so, maybe not
Speaker 1: be euthanized, but like, yeah, enjoy the amount of time
Speaker 1: you have here on this earth and then call it
Speaker 1: a day. My dad's him from the hospital and he's
Speaker 1: feeling better, so let's check in on him. Hey, Hey,
Speaker 1: how's it going. Okay, how are you doing? Good? Uh
Speaker 1: you hear me? Okay, good? Perfectly. Does it make you
Speaker 1: like I want to change here? Yeah, of course I
Speaker 1: would have gone totally planted more than I look at
Speaker 1: plant based eating more. I think that's a solution not
Speaker 1: to do. But I've always backed out. Well, I mean
Speaker 1: you put it all on plant based, but like, I mean,
Speaker 1: what about like you know, losing weight and stuff. Yeah,
Speaker 1: well that's that basically the same idea, right, well is it?
Speaker 1: Well if your plant based, great because it's like putting
Speaker 1: on this idea of plant based as opposed to be
Speaker 1: like I need a you know, blues weight and need
Speaker 1: less high stuff high and cholesterol. You know that too, Yeah,
Speaker 1: you don't want any cholesterol. A little cholesterol is possible,
Speaker 1: So Newer's cholesterol comes from animal products if you don't know,
Speaker 1: probably in cholesterol. And the worst thing I had surgery
Speaker 1: you call bladder that was he was laposcopic, was really
Speaker 1: really it's great. She said, pee pete. If you pick
Speaker 1: up pete, she said, go home. I went home. I
Speaker 1: couldn't pea anymore, so he sent me to the hospital.
Speaker 1: And what happens is when you get older, sometimes you're
Speaker 1: bladder goes to sleep with the anesthesia and doesn't work up,
Speaker 1: so you can't pee, and it's going in and get
Speaker 1: a freaking Catherine. That's disgusting. That was really painful. Are
Speaker 1: you in the bathroom right now? Yeah, because I'm recording
Speaker 1: this conversation. Oh are you what stuff would you have
Speaker 1: done or do you think would have been good? Like
Speaker 1: to do differently, like in a preventative way to avoid this. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but to watch what they eat. Watched a whole lot
Speaker 1: more what I ate, whether words, he just can't fried
Speaker 1: foods and cracked hamburgs, and I'd be careful what I ate.
Speaker 1: I mean, this just catches up with you over years.
Speaker 1: Especially if I knew that I was more subjective to this,
Speaker 1: then I would have came more careful. And I wasn't.
Speaker 1: I was just eating everything. Sometimes I get good and
Speaker 1: i'd be careful, and then sometimes I just eat a
Speaker 1: kind of shift. Yeah. So you think the knowledge, like
Speaker 1: knowing beforehand, would have made a difference. Sure would have,
Speaker 1: of course it would have. Well, I'm glad you're doing okay,
Speaker 1: and let me know what they say. All right, okay, thanks,
Speaker 1: So my dad's doing better. He's not dead or a
Speaker 1: different person, but he has to take his health deadly
Speaker 1: serious now. There is zero room for error, or that
Speaker 1: stroke will be the first of many. It happened to
Speaker 1: his sister, and according to my last physical and my
Speaker 1: DNA test report, I have the same dilemma, So it's
Speaker 1: pretty obvious what I need to do. Right, Let's go
Speaker 1: back to what my cousin said. Phil probably needs his
Speaker 1: own podcast. He's hilarious. He focuses on staying thin and
Speaker 1: intermitte fasting works best for him. Arnold isn't going to
Speaker 1: cut out the good stuff, but visits his doctor regularly
Speaker 1: to keep tabs on things. Tom's conclusion is that sooner
Speaker 1: or later, something catches up to you no matter what,
Speaker 1: so focus on a rich social and family life. My
Speaker 1: dad places it mostly on diet. He evangelizes the benefits
Speaker 1: of a plant based diet, which I'm pretty sure is
Speaker 1: a fancy way of basically saying to just eat vegetables.
Speaker 1: I know a buttload of vegetables would make me thinner
Speaker 1: and healthier, but is it something I can actually commit to.
Speaker 1: I honestly don't know, but I'm gonna try tonight. I'm
Speaker 1: having my first dinner of vegetables with a side of vegetables.
Speaker 1: I like tomatoes, cucumbers, and beats, so that's what I'm having.
Speaker 1: Then I'm gonna take my dog for a walk. I
Speaker 1: don't want to wait until I have an incident to
Speaker 1: start being healthier. I'm gonna start today, big shout out
Speaker 1: to the twenty three and me folks. I gave them
Speaker 1: a hard time, but they were actually really accommodating, and
Speaker 1: I really do recommend it, not just because they're sponsoring
Speaker 1: the episode, although I do wonder if they'd let me
Speaker 1: make an episode trashing them doesn't matter. It's a really
Speaker 1: fun gift, So grab a kit and spit and if
Speaker 1: no one's thought of that yet. M t M Prodigy
Speaker 1: was created and produced by me Lowell Berlante. The executive
Speaker 1: chef was Caroline Special thanks to Ben jer and Yvonne Sheehan.
Speaker 1: I'm signing off now, but it's been a beautiful ride,
Speaker 1: and that's it. On another dope show. Did this episode
Speaker 1: inspire you to take a closer look at your health history,
Speaker 1: your genetic makeup. Who new DNA could reveal so much
Speaker 1: about our past while also holding the keys to certain
Speaker 1: health insights that may impact our future. I continue to
Speaker 1: be inspired by these stories, and I hope you do
Speaker 1: as well. Catch you next time. Listen to Spit, an
Speaker 1: original podcast from I Heart Radio and twenty three in
Speaker 1: the on the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or
Speaker 1: wherever you get your podcast