The Truth About Fiber and Feeling Full with Joanne Slavin

James Hill:

Welcome to Weight Loss And, where we delve into the world of weight loss. I'm Jim Hill.

Holly Wyatt:

And I'm Holly Wyatt. We're both dedicated to helping you lose weight, keep it off, and live your best life while you're doing it.

James Hill:

Indeed, we now realize successful weight loss combines the science and art of medicine, knowing what to do and why you will do it.

Holly Wyatt:

Yes, the “And” allows us to talk about all the other stuff that makes your journey so much bigger, better, and exciting.

James Hill:

Ready for the “And” factor?

Holly Wyatt:

Let's dive in.

James Hill:

Here we go.

Holly Wyatt:

Today, we're talking about something that's often treated, I think, like a side note in nutrition. But I think it can be a secret weapon, especially for weight loss and for energy, and for long-term health. We're going to talk about fiber today.

James Hill:

Oh, my gosh, fiber. Well, Holly, fiber is having a well-deserved moment. It helps you feel full. It helps keep your metabolism steady, supports gut health, balances blood sugar. And guess what? Most people aren't even coming close to getting enough of it.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah, that's right. I used to think of fiber as something my grandmother told me, get some fiber. But now I think we're seeing how powerful fiber can really be. So if you're feeling stuck, dealing with hunger, if you're trying to eat better without seeing the results you hoped for, fiber might be the piece that you're missing. So this episode is all about how to stop treating fiber like I need to or should do this and start using it as a real weight management advantage.

James Hill:

And to help us unpack all of this, we have the world's top expert on fiber and nutrition science, Dr. Joanne Slavin. Now, Joanne is Professor of Nutrition at the University of Minnesota. She's a registered dietitian. She's a trailblazer in research on dietary fiber and whole grains. She actually served on the 2010 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee, and she's authored more than 350 peer-reviewed publications. Her work has helped shape public health recommendations and directly influenced how fiber is viewed in the world of weight and metabolic health.

Holly Wyatt:

We are so excited to have you here, Joanne. You've been researching fiber for decades, but it kind of feels like the rest of the world is just now catching up. So why do you think that fiber is finally getting its moment? And how does that make you feel after studying it for so long?

Joanne Slavin:

I agree with you that most people think of roughage. My grandma told me to do it, so it's not very important. And it's exactly wrong. So if we go back in the history of fiber, It has been rediscovered and repopularized and, you know, hypocrisy, 300 BC, hey, eat more fiber because it clears out your gut. So it's been around forever. And then people, we discover it. It's like, hey, the Kellogg's discovered it. C.W. Post discovered it. People came in. They ate lots of fiber. It helped them prevent their diseases. And then it gets kind of hard because fiber is different. You know, it's different because it's what's left over and what's going on in the colon. And it's hard to study. And generally one of the reasons it's hard to study is how do we know about it? We have to collect fecal samples and look. And most people what's important they eat every day and they poop every day and if that's going well their life is good. So there's no question that it's important. So this is the nice thing is people I think it's hard to study and they're like okay, how do we label it, how much do we need, all those things. We kind of bog in the details but it's exciting now. I watch my students. I always say, go back and look in things long ago. We found out some of the TikTok videos where people say, hey, I throw this fiber into my diet and things happen. And that makes it popular and interesting as opposed to you've got to take this much fiber, this much every day, no matter what, take this much fiber. So I think it's nice to see it's become popular again.

Holly Wyatt:

Joanne, are you saying that you've got to study poop if you study fiber? Is that what I heard you say?

Joanne Slavin:

There's no way around poop if you don't study fiber and people love poop. But in this country, whether it's farting or pooping, it's kind of like, I don't want to talk about it, but I talk about it all the time. And the only way you can make poop is to eat food. And that's really important. And weight loss, that's one of the big issues with weight loss. And when people, they need to eat less food. So then they take when taking out less, you know, I'm not going to eat as much food. I take out fiber along the way. And we have to adapt to our long-term diets, too. So people get excited about fiber and say, Hey, I'm going to put it into my diet. They get too much gas. They have problems. They give up on it. So, getting it integrated into your life in a way that works for you. There's lots of ways to get it through your food, through over-the-counter laxatives. For every person, it kind of depends. And that's what's kind of exciting now, too, this idea that we can add fiber to snack foods and beverages. I'm a dietitian, so I would prefer people would eat all of the foods that have fiber. I still am committed to doing that, but I understand they're busy and there are other ways to get fiber. So opening it up to people, what's your life like? And we can be flexible.

James Hill:

We're going to walk through that, but do I have it right that we can expect some TikTok videos from you in the near future?

Joanne Slavin:

Just me being on a podcast is kind of stepping over where I'm comfortable as a science person, but it's so nice. I get to teach advanced human nutrition and have amazing students that challenge me all the time. And what they learn is on TikTok, and that's what they share. And that's what people, you know, so this is great to say in science, we used to keep everything. Oh, we're not going to tell the public with open access. The public knows a ton about nutrition and they want to know more. So meeting them where they're at and giving them the ability to ask questions, talk to people is really important.

James Hill:

I love it. A lot of people, well, most people have heard of fiber, but sometimes they're fuzzy on the details. Can you give us like the basic, what is fiber and why does it matter for weight management?

Joanne Slavin:

Yeah, it's really hard to measure because it's what's left over after digestion absorption. So rather than, is it a nutrient? I will argue forever that it's a nutrient, but it's not a nutrient in our usual way of thinking about nutrients. So what happens is, you know, you go through the stomach, the small intestine, and fiber is having functions throughout the digestive tract. We forget about, too, whether we're chewing, swallowing, stomach emptying, decreasing absorption throughout the small intestine of lipids and carbohydrates. So it has these effects throughout the gut, and then it gets down in the large intestine where there's this fermentation, and that's kind of where the magic is right now. And whenever, you know, it's like, how are we going to study that? It's hard to study, but that fiber can be extensively fermented by the gut bacteria that are in the gut or hardly fermented at all. So that the differences in fiber are real. So some of these soluble fibers or these readily fermentable fibers might get fermented too quickly and cause intestinal gas and people are like, that's horrible. Other fibers like the insoluble fibers that are in whole greens, in fruits and vegetables, they actually, some of them get fermented slowly throughout the colon and therefore they are going to increase stool weight, but they also have these benefits of these what are called now postbiotics compounds that get produced in the gut and have interesting effects. So it's very complicated. It's like this black box of magic that we have to work with all the time.

Holly Wyatt:

We're gonna have to unpack all those things. There was so much in there, but one thing I got confused and I wanna make sure the listeners are on. So you talked about fiber is what's left, but can't you eat fiber? Don't we put fiber in our food? So what is that fiber that we're actually consuming? Cause it's not what's left, it's actually what you're putting in.

Joanne Slavin:

Right. No, I think that's a really important thing. And as we've tried to, over time, to say, okay, how do we measure fiber, soluble versus insoluble, and help people out? When we eat foods, that fiber is just by definition is generally longer chain carbohydrates that don't get fermented or affected. So it's a fermentation process versus a digestion absorption process. But that is really hard to understand. I get this question a lot when people say, oh, if I blend up my fruit in a smoothie, does fiber break down? No. Fiber is, this is carbohydrate that does not get digested and absorbed properly. At the small intestinal level, it's going to actually get to the large intestine. So even some things like, you know, sugar alcohols, are they fiber? They're different, but they're poorly digestible carbohydrates. How about lactulose, you know, a disaccharide that is not digestible. It functions like fiber because it gets down to the large intestine and has these effects. And I think that's really confusing for consumers. Sometimes it's useful on the carbohydrate world to say, think about net carbohydrates. And all these concepts, I think consumers are interested in them and a lot of our labeling doesn't really help them. So net carbohydrates, how much carbohydrate calories do I get in from sugars and starches?

Joanne Slavin:

That's the interesting thing. But even like resistant starch, which is resistant starch, chemically, it's exactly like starch. It's a bunch of glucose molecules, but when it's resistant, it doesn't get digested and absorbed at the small intestinal level, it becomes fiber, which makes it really confusing to measure fiber and help consumers. So a lot of starchy foods you eat, like potatoes, you boil a potato and you get resistant starch, you actually get some fiber from potatoes, you get some fiber from pasta. A lot of our traditional carbohydrate foods, if we cook them and then cool them, we get fiber from that. So there's a lot of ways to get fiber and just food structure. I think that's the other thing too, the chewing. If fiber is in your product, it's in your food, you're going to chew it, and it's going to have effects throughout your gut. But the interesting thing that we're most interested now is this fermentation in the gut.

James Hill:

So, Joanne, how does fiber help with appetite control and weight management?

Joanne Slavin:

I would have been very fortunate to do some sabbaticals around the world, one of them with Dr. Hill, which is somebody asked me a question. It's like, how do I find this out? So I did a satiety, and this was like back in 2006, went to Switzerland to find out about that question. Like, how does fiber work? And some of my most published papers are these review papers of digging out this information. And it works in a lot of different ways, but it really does work well. So if we look at some of the data we have that if people are allowed free choice, these are your hard experiments to do, but some of them have been done long ago. So what happens is that people feel fuller when there's fiber. And so like the classic study that I'd like to, even though it's like, hey, it would never get published today is where you give people apples, you give them applesauce, and then you give them apple juice and all the calories are controlled, right? And you put them in a room and say, eat as much as you want, eat as much as you want. You know, how many apples do people consume? One.

Joanne Slavin:

And apple juice, if there's gallons and it's hot, they're gonna keep chugging it down in applesauce. They just keep putting it in. So there's no question that fiber slows us down, right? It tells us, hey, I'm fuller. I don't need more than one apple. And how does that mechanism work? Well, there's a lot of ways. I always had some wonderful students, Holly. Willis, one of my students, we did a study with a smart pill just to show how does fiber work. And in that study, what we did is we put together two totally the same diets. So the fiber is the same. All of the macronutrients are the same. And we give those to people that come in. And then we're going to look at, you know, how do we look at satiety and how full I am? It's basically the people tell us. Really, they fill out an assessment.

Joanne Slavin:

So in this study, the interesting thing is that the soluble fiber, insoluble fiber, everything was controlled. So they were given this beverage that had fiber in it as opposed to a breakfast that had real food in it. And so that real food had oatmeal, nuts, blueberries, but everything else was controlled. So some of the mechanisms, and it's throughout the gut, the first mechanism is the real food diet staying in the stomach longer. So as opposed to beverage diet, which went straight through even though it had fiber in it. And then if you look at some of the other impacts within the gut, most of the fiber in the small intestine if we want to slow down glucose absorption and lipid absorption, generally the soluble fibers work better in that. And then how full do I feel in those subjects when they were given those breakfasts completely controlled for fiber and everything else? The real fiber, you know, food diet said, I feel fuller. Part of it is, as you know, we can't hide food. You know, when we try to do these studies and say, hey, we're going to hide food. So you're looking at a breakfast and just how long does it take me to consume that breakfast that has real food in it versus sucking down that beverage? There's differences there. So there's so many mechanisms that really help you with fiber that are beyond just fiber. And that's why when people say, let's just put fiber in a supplement, let's get it out of real food. It's just not the same game, right? And part of our new interest in processing is actually pretty good. You know, like that fiber diets are generally less processed.

Joanne Slavin:

There's more chewing involved. And I can see that there's a lot of food, you know, just this volume of food, the volumetrics. A lot of the concepts that we've learned in nutrition relate back to fiber in different ways. So there's just lots of mechanisms that are helping you to say, I feel fuller. I don't eat as many calories.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah, I think fiber does a lot of different things. And that's one of the confusing pieces is it's not just working through one mechanism. It's working through multiple mechanisms. And in some people, individual person, one of those mechanisms may be more important than someone else. But I like it that you take it and there's multiple ways I think it can impact you. And so let's put a little pie on the plate. How much fiber should people aim for in their day?

Joanne Slavin:

Yeah, you know, it's a really important question because we have to set regulations. So what do we have right now? 28 grams of dietary fiber is the recommended in the U.S. diet. 28 grams. Now you can get into different, you know, splitting hairs on that, but that is the recommendation and that is based on protection from cardiovascular disease. So how do we get to recommendations? If you look at the studies we have, we know that fiber really decreases risk of cardiovascular disease significantly. And so when we do the cohort studies, we have the prospective cohort studies. We look at who's at the highest quintile. They have less cardiovascular disease. And so the modeling says 14 grams of fiber per 1,000 kcals. 2,000 kcals is our reference diet in the U.S. So we now have 28 grams of fiber as how much you should consume. And of course, when we look at those numbers, how much do people consume? About half of that. And that is the problem.

James Hill:

Wow. So we've got a long way to go there.

Joanne Slavin:

The nice thing too about fiber, I love to be in the fiber world because it's the only place where I, hey, eat more, eat more, eat more. Everything else is eat less, eat less, less sodium, less sugar, less fat. And people are like, hey, is there anything I can eat more of? Fiber. Yeah, we need you to eat more fiber and fiber containing foods. So the foods that contain fiber, all of that, we want to promote like crazy. We want you to do that.

Holly Wyatt:

So when you say 28 grams of fiber, soluble, insoluble, does it matter? You count it all together?

Joanne Slavin:

You count it all together, and if you try to even figure out, we don't have great databases on soluble versus insoluble, but it is on nutritional labels. It's not required on nutritional labels, but it's optional. So if I'm a manufacturer, do I want to put soluble fiber? I think people used to think soluble fiber is the be-all and end-all, and the reason we got to that is to go back in the 80s that the soluble fibers are most likely to lower blood lipids. So oat bran, psyllium, they have the most data, barley, are the most data on lowering lipids, and they are soluble. But, okay, I'll give you that, and that's why it's on the label. If you look at some of the newer data, some of the soluble fibers like inulin, fructooligosaccharides, galactooligosaccharides, which are really good prebiotic fibers, don't lower lipids at all. So to say, hey, all soluble fibers lower lipids and insoluble don't, that's not true at all. And part of it, too, being in the whole grains world, spending a lot of time in the whole grains world and looking at that data, we want people to eat all types of fiber. And if you go into, okay, I'm only interested in lowering lipids, psyllium and oat bran, yeah, you want to load up on that. But I think also with some of the drugs that are available to lower my lipids, I'm not even going to bother.

Joanne Slavin:

And as we get into this, if I'm a consumer, am I taking fiber as a drug or am I taking it for overall health? So to me, the soluble versus insoluble is not very helpful for most consumers. And I don't worry about it because we just don't have much data on it to say, yeah, eat more soluble. We also did some recent work on where do some of the bioactives, you know, these plant compounds that are beyond fiber, they tend to be associated with insoluble fiber. So I don't tell people at all, hey, you need this much soluble and this much insoluble. I don't think that's useful.

James Hill:

So Joanne, our listeners who are now thinking they need to get more fiber, what are the types of food you would recommend when they go in the grocery store? What are the things that you think might be good things for them to select that they might not be eating enough of?

Joanne Slavin:

To me, I always go back to the plate. So we want to get enough servings off the plate and each of those you can make better choices. And then you're trying to play the game of, OK, I also need protein. I also need to worry about calories. But in the grain world, I'm always going to go with whole grains because they're going to have more fiber, right? So if I can make a choice, I'm going to go that way. A lot of the cereal products that are out there have additional fiber too. I think in the cereal category, the bread category, whether there's nuts, raisins or other things, those also are going to bring fiber along for the ride. So that's good. And I think part of the concern in the fruit category is that fruits if I'm trying to cut back on sugar and calories, I don't get that much fiber from fruit. And that's where I think consumers can't just play the fiber game. You're trying to cut, you know, because the more calories I eat, the more fiber I get, but that's really not what we want people to do. But in the cooked vegetables, stewed fruit, dried fruit, all those things bring together fiber. And to get to 28 grams, it's the same as everything. If I think of it, I get a snack and three meals. It's a lot of fiber to get in. So each meal, I got to put that together and make those choices rather than you go into the cereal. There are some fiber cereals out there that have 13 grams. And for a lot of people, the way I'm going to get fiber is I'm going to have that breakfast cereal to get me there. Or I'm going to take a fiber supplement in the morning. My dietician side says work the food angle first. Really try as best you can to make your best choices. Vegetables and then pulses, dried beans and peas, things that a lot of times cause intestinal gas. They do, but they also have quite a bit of fiber. So if you are putting those products back into your diet in salads and soups in any way you can. And a lot of traditional eating patterns for other countries do a better job of bringing these higher fiber components in. And so absolutely nuts, seeds, all these things can also generate fiber and not overdoing it. You know, one of my TikTok people that were like, hey, we're going to use all these chia seeds in a huge amount. It's like, you know, we don't need to do that. Some seeds good. We don't have data on, you know, a huge cup of chia seeds. It might affect laxation. It does give you some fiber, but you don't need to overdo it in any category. You really do.

Holly Wyatt:

I'm really glad you brought up the calorie aspect because a lot of people who listen to this are interested. They have to think about their calories and whether they're trying to lose weight or maintain their weight, they have to think about their calories. And, you know, there's probably some foods that you get some fiber, but you'll get a lot of calories with it. And that may not be their best choice for their situation. So I do like that you're saying, let's think about it and let's be strategic about it.

Holly Wyatt:

But that leads me to another question, because I recommend a little bit more than 28 grams. And in the new book Jim and I have coming out, we actually start with a really high fiber meal to set the tone for the day and I think help control the appetite. We call it an appetite reset meal that really kind of sets you up for success. And is there something, can you get too much fiber?

Joanne Slavin:

It's actually really hard to get too much fiber. We're omnivores. So we have really flexible guts. We can adapt to very high carbohydrate intake of resistant carbohydrates. If you go back and trying to study this, some of the colon cancer literature, the higher, the better. So to me, trying to figure out what's the most fiber people have consumed and do well, 75 grams, even up to 100. When people are eating high carbohydrate foods that are pretty sticks and seeds and all these things, they can get up to those levels and there's no reason not to. Our study with the real breakfast with blueberries, oatmeal, nuts, and people just, you know, the idea right from the beginning, get your fiber in in the morning. That gets you started. You're never going to get to 28. Most people were at 15. So yeah, everything counts, but getting you higher is absolutely the best thing to do and to try to get it with real foods, which you can.

Joanne Slavin:

And this is why a lot of people now don't cook. They don't know what's in their food, so they don't have that data. But putting together all the different food on the plate, on the protein, some of those protein sources, the plant protein sources do have a significant fiber. So you can get it that way. Get it in fruits, get it in vegetables, get it in nuts. But you're always playing this calorie thing, right? So you can't just say, hey, get fiber, because if you would eat a ton of dried fruit, you will get fiber, but you've got too many calories to come along. So everybody has to individualize it, but make it work for them, because most people do live in the snack world and the beverage world because they're at work. And so we don't need to judge your world. This is a nice thing about fiber. You can get it. And there are people that go up to 75 grams a day and vegetarians, vegans, and there's nothing wrong with aiming for that and helping everybody get more. There's no question.

James Hill:

More is better.

Joanne Slavin:

More is better.

James Hill:

Holly mentioned that she and I have written a book, Joanne, aim for people that lose weight on the new GLP-1-based meds, but then for whatever reason, stop the meds. And what we know is most people regain the weight. And we think it's a wonderful opportunity to give people some lifestyle strategies that may help them keep the weight off. And one of our top strategies is to increase fiber. So talk a little bit about the role of fiber, maybe while people are taking the GLP-1 medications. And then talk about our idea that after you go off, you're going to eat more, but increasing fiber may help you not eat as much as you were beforehand.

Joanne Slavin:

I totally agree. If I go back when I was on the sabbatical working on satiety, we did a lot on gut hormones and they do vary just with high fibers. So all of a sudden people are interested in this topic. But we already knew it on the nutrition side. So there's no question in my mind, it's really important with the number of people that are on these drugs to say, hey, this is a great tool to help you lose weight. While you're losing weight, obviously we're concerned about protein, making sure as you're picking, getting good protein sources in. But we also, you know, huge problems with gut health and just constipation and diarrhea. And so as you're on these drugs, remember fiber is important, figure out a way to do it. And then once you go off these drugs, we know that fiber, not only does it help us gain, you know, it's good for making sure we don't gain weight, but to keep weight off, we have good data that it works. You actually develop those things while you are on those drugs to make sure that these are foods that are part of my lifestyle.

Joanne Slavin:

The nice thing, too, with a local, owning a farm and living on a farm that foods that you like that are local, part of your thing, get them in right away. And because I believe most of the people that are on these drugs have huge problems, nothing tastes really good. So trying to find some higher fiber products that are part of your culture that are interesting to you, keep them going. To me, it is the usual problem in nutrition that nutrition, we got to make our diet every day. So we got to make good choices every day. So don't say I'm on this drug. I don't care about nutrition. As soon as I get off of it, I don't care about nutrition. It's like, that's not going to work. We already know that. And some of the studies that you have done with what keeps people weight loss, that's the most important data. People that have lost weight, what do I do to keep it off? I have to work just as hard, you know, and as I get it off these drugs, I'm going to have to work like 10 times as hard to do that. And so I believe that fiber is one of the most important tools to get them right from the beginning to say, hey, enjoy fiber, find fibers that you like and use these tools because once you get off, you're going to gain this weight back so fast. It's very discouraging.

James Hill:

Love it. Holly, I love it. She's talking our language.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah. And I like it because I think it does impact how much food you eat for multiple reasons. And I think it can impact your appetite, which is what you're wanting, you know, to help your appetite be controlled in a way off the medication, replacing the medication almost with some fiber. What I want to talk a little bit, it's such a hot, another hot, hot topic is this gut microbiome. And the fact that fiber is what, a prebiotic, right? Most of the time, a prebiotic giving the gut back, this is the way I understand it, please correct me, but giving the gut bacteria the food source to create different bacteria in the colon. And we don't even really understand that, but we think that could be really important. What do you think about that?

Joanne Slavin:

I believe that's why people are most interested. We know that the gut and the brain are talking all the time. So if I'm constipated, I'm not happy, right? So gut health is really associated with my mental health and my well-being. So I've got to get those things figured out. We've known it forever. It's just really hard to study. So now when we look at the prebiotic fibers that are out there, prebiotics is just fermentation. So those are the most fermentable fibers. So galacto-oligosaccharides, inulin, fructo-oligosaccharides, prebiotic fibers for sure.

Joanne Slavin:

One problem we have in that area is we don't have a lot of regulatory, right? So then we get into probiotics, which are live bacteria that are also going to get into my gut and have some positive health effects. So all these things are, the consumer is already interested in this, and there's no question about it. Part of fiber is signaled to my brain. And I always go back to this study because I think when you go back, 1981, there was a study in gastroenterology, an amazing journal, obviously. And it was from North Dakota, the USDA lab in North Dakota. They have collected fecal samples forever on people. People are on a completely controlled diet, which you hardly have in nutrition. And what they found is that even on controlled diets, exactly the number of calories, same amount of fiber, that certain people had twice as much fecal matter. And it's like, well, where is that coming from? And it was a really interesting finding because nobody had ever really looked. They did a multi-phasic personality interview on these people. And what do you think? Who had the biggest poop? The outgoing people. They said it's totally associated with your brain.

Joanne Slavin:

That you've got in your brain. They're talking all the time. There's no question about this. So for different people, the amount of fiber you need, your fiber really does affect how you feel. So I think this is important for everybody to, you know, this idea of personalized nutrition. There's no question that each of us has to figure out for ourselves, but we have these basic concepts that are really true. So we need you to get more fiber. It's gonna help you take off weight. It's gonna help you keep off weight and make sure that it works into your diet. And the person next to you may be eating twice as much fiber, three times as much fiber, but for you, you need more fiber and it's gonna really make you feel better for sure.

Holly Wyatt:

So you use some words, the prebiotic. What are the foods that have those prebiotic fibers that you mentioned, those big, long words you used? Give us some foods that the consumer, the listener will say, oh, okay, if I eat that, I'm getting it.

Joanne Slavin:

I would say some of the ones that are most obvious is inulin comes in Jerusalem artichokes, it comes in chicory, and then it gets isolated and put into your food. But what do you actually eat? Onions. Actually, wheat is one of our biggest sources of inulin just because we consume it. And that's, you know, a lot. So that's usually, I've had people say, okay, where do most of their kids get their fiber? They get it from white bread and they get it from potatoes. It's like, well, how could they get it? Because they actually consume those foods. So a lot of foods that are fermentable and cause gas have more of the prebiotic fibers in them. So we don't have great standards to say, hey, I need a health claim for that. But I would say any of, and breast milk for sure. I mean, that breast milk is full of galacto-oligosaccharides, which are, you know, fermentable carbohydrates. So if you breastfed a baby and they have yellow cottage cheese poop that doesn't stink, it's because there's all this fermentation. Then you give them real food and all of a sudden poop stinks and it's not. So I think this idea of fermentation, prebiotic fibers, there's a lot of it in our natural food supply. We want to make sure we get that in. And do I need a supplement? Generally not. I think a lot of people that take in too much inulin or fructooligosaccharides have too much intestinal gas because it's very fast fermentation.

Joanne Slavin:

So taking a supplement, probably not a great idea. And a lot of the fibers that are now added to foods or beverages, you want a mixture of fibers. You don't want it, you know, because inulin goes into products easily.

Joanne Slavin:

It's like a sugar replacer, a fat replacer. So you see it in a lot of diet products. But for a lot of people, it's too much of a particular fiber. It's kind of a balanced thing. That's the nice thing about getting it from your food. So if you're eating onions, garlic, all these wonderful Mediterranean foods to put together a wonderful pasta, you will be getting prebiotic fiber, but it'll be balanced. It won't cause so much intestinal gas.

James Hill:

Holly, you want to take some listener questions?

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah, sure. But I have one more question before we get to the listener questions. So, because I know this is actually a listener question. They want to know, how do you help people stick with eating high fiber, especially in the beginning when it can cause a little bit of digestion issues? Is there a trick or tip maybe to getting started and then staying constant if you can with a high fiber diet?

Joanne Slavin:

No, that's the number one thing about fiber. People get excited. They go on it and they go off it just right away. So it's kind of like weight loss. Hey, I lost the weight. I give up. Don't give up on it, realize there's a lot of individual variability. So start slowly, make sure you're drinking more fluids, and don't give up, that your gut will adjust to that. But if you keep switching it around, it's like drugs. If you're switching it around, you're not sure what's causing your problems. The other thing to remember too is allergies. So when people have allergies to a milk protein, or do they have allergies to lactose, the sugar that's in milk? So a lot of times when people are trying to figure out, okay, I'm going to add more fiber, what types of fiber should I consume if they're having GI problems and this gets into the fodmap you know this if you get questions about fodmap fermentable carbohydrates getting to the gut can cause intestinal problems. So, don't just keep using more maybe it's that you're picking the wrong fiber too.

Holly Wyatt:

How long then? How long do you think it takes for the gut to adapt so they can kind of say oh if this goes on beyond this many days maybe it's something else that won't be a clue.

Joanne Slavin:

Yeah, I would say it takes longer than, you know, it takes a lifetime. It's the same thing about, you know, when people get on the fiber, they get really excited and say, I'm going to double my fiber. I'm only at 14. I'm going to get to 28. Don't do that. I'd say even like going up five grams in a week and just making sure none of those products bother you because there might be other issues.

Joanne Slavin:

No matter which kind of fiber from real foods, you might be having GI problems from that. So I would say start slowly and don't, you know, this idea that there is fermentation going on, so there'll be more intestinal gas and that should, your body can adapt to that for sure. People so often just start slowly and, you know, it's the usual thing with food allergies. If there's a certain food that's bothering you, you can take that out and see, is it that food that's bothering me or just overall fiber? And that's why a lot of people I think go on to a over-the-counter fiber and say I'm going to take 10 grams of that and adapt to that and that may be their best option but you know my dietician side say you can get it with diet. But don't say so-and-so can eat broccoli and they love it and they eat all this amount and that's what bothered me about the chia seed too that okay you might have an allergy or there's might be too much heavy metals in these products that when we eat food there's all these potential risks and benefits and balancing that is really important. Don't go overboard right away. And if you have, back off. But I think it's going to be weeks to adapt because how long does a week better transit time? It takes about three days for things to move through. So a couple weeks before you would expect adaptation.

Holly Wyatt:

All right, Jim, start us with some listener questions because I want to make sure we get through them.

James Hill:

All right, Joanne, here's the first one. I'm trying to get more fiber, but I hate vegetables. Am I out of luck?

Joanne Slavin:

Not at all. If we look at vegetables, what they bring together for other nutrients too. No, absolutely. And I don't think you do. I think that's the other thing is that if you look at all the vegetables that are out there, you might like starchy vegetables. So you might like those, put those into your diet. I think so often people say, I don't like kale. That's okay. It's just one. This idea that there's a magical vegetable. So part of your culture if you're eating soups or salads, it's not a big deal. Obviously, from our dietetic side, we like you to get this variety of foods. But there's a ton of people that don't eat vegetables. Find some within the category, but it's not a big deal. We can get fiber done without it.

Holly Wyatt:

All right. Well, I got a follow-up to that. Here's another listener question. What's your favorite fiber-rich snack that doesn't taste like cardboard? So if you can't have vegetables and you don't want it to taste like cardboard, where do you go?

Joanne Slavin:

Well, obviously, you can join the people that say, I'm going to get it in my beverages. I'm going to get it in my snack foods, but remember those fibers that easily go into foods sometimes don't, they're mostly soluble fiber. They may cause more intestinal gas. So, you know, to me, don't give up on the food category, really try to do the food category as best as you can. One of the problems with a lot of these high fiber snacks and high fiber beverages is they have too many calories in them, but there's also alternatives. I work with all of these people, and so I have a conflict of interest because do I want fiber and pop? I really don't, but for consumers that want a pop that has very little sugar and fiber that those products are out there, that might be the best tool for you. I just think of it as a toolkit.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah.

Joanne Slavin:

It depends on what you're most committed to and what's in your family, what are you most committed to? If you want to lower calories and still get fiber, there's a lot of products out there that might work for you. But is that short term? Is that forever? I like the no judgment idea.

Holly Wyatt:

Okay, good, good. No judgment. Because I got to admit, I'm one. The new pops out there that has the fiber in it that's low sugar, that's about 20 calories or something like that. I drink it in the afternoon and it's a way I kind of boost my fiber. And then some of the tortillas, now that they've really upped the fiber, those have been game changers for me. I still get fiber other ways. That's not the only thing, but I'm really trying to boost my fiber and having some tools that can add, you know, not doing 10 sodas a day but using it smartly to kind of push it up there. I think that we're kind of being smarter about it and using some technology and tools that maybe can help us.

Joanne Slavin:

That's my frustration too, with all of a sudden people saying you cannot use alternative sweeteners. That's a crutch. That's terrible. It's like, no, it's just one tool in the toolkit. So we need to reduce calories and we need to increase fiber and we have some new tools here, are they perfect? No, I can criticize them on other ways, but for a lot of people, they're the best solution. And they have pretty good data too that they have picked those fibers responsibly to give you amounts of fiber that are significant and pick the best fibers that are out there.

James Hill:

All right, Holly, you want to move to the next section, the vulnerability, the stuff we really like?

Holly Wyatt:

Yes, I like this. So you want me to go first, Jim?

James Hill:

You go first.

Holly Wyatt:

All right. So you teach this stuff every day. You live it. I can tell you know this. But what's one thing you've personally had to work on in your fiber habits?

Joanne Slavin:

Well, that's always tough. People are like, oh, I've looked in your car and there's candy wrappers on the floor. And there are, okay?

Joanne Slavin:

You're right. There are. I think with fiber for me some of the the idea of planning has been really hard whether it is a slow cooker or leftovers and, you know, your idea with tortillas, whole grain bread, some of the tools that are out there to just help yourself out. So whenever you have a choice for breakfast you're going to get a lot of fiber in for breakfast and that could be high fiber cereals, raisins, nuts, all these things, building it up right there for sure. But also always when you have a choice going for the higher fiber and this is what's nice with food processing. I'm in a food science and nutrition department, so I live in the food science world of helping people make better choices to get more fiber in their products. So some of the other ethnic foods too if you look at a lot of, you know, when you're talking about the tortillas, I can get beans in that. All these things that are ways of getting more fiber. So it depends. But if I don't have a preparation and I go to a, I was just at a meeting and they said that, you know, these are younger people than me, that 25% of calories were coming in through a gas station as our people are getting their calories.

Joanne Slavin:

So, to me, anything we can do if 25% of calories for the younger generation is at a gas station, we want to make those products as good as possible. So make it easy for people. So I find anytime you have a choice if fiber is added to something that you're normally eating, I'm going to probably pick the higher fiber version of it.

Holly Wyatt:

Nice.

James Hill:

Okay, my turn. So, Joanne, you and I have known each other for a long time, and I'll let our audience know that you're basically a farm girl, and I think you still have a farm.

Joanne Slavin:

That is correct.

James Hill:

My question for you is how has your farm background influenced both your research and how you interact with the public around nutrition?

Joanne Slavin:

I got to say, too, when I first started at Minnesota, I was 100% extension for my first five years. So I was in every county in Minnesota talking nutrition and food science and basically food safety. So it would be, hey, I just butchered, you know, I just shot a deer, how do we make sure we process it? So learning that and being in 4-H and preparing food. So we butchered chickens, we milked cows, we did all of that. So I know how hard it is to do that, to bring food to the table for everybody.

Joanne Slavin:

So I think that it's really good to go back and we don't have the cows anymore, but maybe eventually they'll come back. How things have gotten bigger. And so I think people think bigger and, you know, a family farm is a terrible thing. Most people don't have a connection to agriculture. And some like the nicest people live in rural America. And I really appreciate that. I think having that background and going back and connecting with people and understanding that a lot of regulations if they're not bringing better food to everybody is really bad. So, it's kind of a lot of these regulations and whether it's the WIC program, SNAP, all the programs are out there to make sure people get the best food they can. And sometimes when we micromanage the diet to death, so like no added sugars, only this much fiber, we forget about the importance of cultural food. So it's interesting to me that all of a sudden regular milk is coming back because it makes sense for a lot of cultures, that's what they want to have. To have more holistic view of our diet and the enjoyment of food and making sure that we're not disrespecting people that really do make our food supply, you know, work in plants and make sure that we have the food that we need.

James Hill:

Cool. I want to give you a last chance to give our listeners one key takeaway message on fiber and weight management.

Joanne Slavin:

One key message. I would say you're probably doing a few things right, but for the average person, you need to double your fiber intake. So all the tools that are in the toolkit, you might need to use them. I respect that for you. I am not going to say you're going to be able to get 28 grams with your regular food. It might be difficult. So there's lots of tools out there, but it's incredibly important. So don't just say, Hey, grandma told me and I'm not going to do it. It's a dated concept. It's still, you know, its concept is moving forward and it's going to affect every aspect of your life. So go for it.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah.

James Hill:

Cool. And if you're trying to keep weight off, 28 is a number you might think about going beyond. More can be better.

Joanne Slavin:

More will definitely be better. And especially if you can get more without adding a lot of extra calories too. So some of those tricks of the trade are really useful.

Holly Wyatt:

Definitely. All right, Jim, sum it up. Put the pie on the plate as we come to the end.

James Hill:

The pie on the plate here is that people don't get enough fiber. They probably need to at least double their fiber. And doing this is probably one of the if maybe not the single best thing people can do to improve their overall health and weight management. Fiber is that important. Everything we know about it, it just does such good things. It helps with appetite control. It helps avoid metabolic disease. So again, Joanne's advice is start out slowly, increase fiber, look for foods that have more fiber in it. And I think what you'll find is this is a wonderful way to get a huge bang for your buck.

Holly Wyatt:

Yeah. So Joanne, thank you so much for joining us today. I really think you've helped us reframe fiber, bring it, make it current, not something that our grandmother talked about, something we can be talking about right now. And to everybody listening, we hope you're walking away with some fresh ideas and real science and something new on your plate. And if there is a fiber strategy that's working for you, tag us at weightlossand. So go to our website and give us the strategy and we would love to maybe talk about it on the show.

James Hill:

Yeah, and don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, and share this episode with someone who's ready to feel full, strong, and in control. We'll see you next time because weight loss is just the beginning. Thanks, everybody.

Holly Wyatt:

Bye, everybody.

James Hill:

And that's a wrap for today's episode of Weight Loss And. We hope you enjoy diving into the world of weight loss with us.

Holly Wyatt:

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James Hill:

We'd also love to hear from you. Share your thoughts, questions, or topic suggestions by reaching out at [weightlossand.com](http://weightlossand.com/). Your feedback helps us tailor future episodes to your needs.

Holly Wyatt:

And remember, the journey doesn't end here. Keep applying the knowledge and strategies you've learned and embrace the power of the “And” in your own weight loss journey.