The quality

Truck show platform personalities come and go, but Hope Zvara's mission to improve truckers' quality of life with a program that leans on small, incremental changes in their daily routines continues to gain traction. Founder and CEO of Mother Trucker Yoga, Zvara's the author of "Trucking Yoga: Simple Fitness for the Long Haul," a book in which Zvara gives us an unvarnished account of how her own struggles with addiction and depression drove a personal need to get healthy.

"I've struggled with depression and anxiety on catastrophic levels," she said. "Yoga, and movement, saved my life."

Find more information on Overdrive Radio sponsor Howes' warm-weather Diesel Defender fuel treatment, as well as Howes' well-known winter anti-gel formulas, via HowesProducts.com.Included in the book, too, is a regimen of down to earth, practical yoga exercises adapted to the ergonomics of a semi-tractor. At the Mid-America Trucking Show, as you can see in the thumbnail image with the Youtube version of today's edition of Overdrive Radio above, she led me through a few of them. And in our talk there, including in this edition, she offers answers to these questions relative to notions of a mental-health crisis all around the nation. "What if it's not a mental health crisis?" she said." What if it's a movement crisis?" Take a listen:

Also in the podcast: An audio diary from owner-operator Mike "Mustang" Crawford, who poses his own answers to what was a pressing question no doubt for some during this week of the CVSA's annual Roadcheck inspection event: Is it possible to get through the entire blitz week without passing an open scale? After Overdrive editor Todd Dills talked to the longtime flatbedder last week, his plans to spend much of the May 16-18 event at home in Long Lane, Missouri, changed. He got done early with what he needed to do at home, and the freight called him out. After he passed two closed scales early Tuesday, the first day of the blitz, on his way toward Chicago from the Springfield, Missouri, area, he started calling in with reports from the road.

Three days later in Florida, then ....

[Related: Roadcheck wraps in New York: What inspectors saw]

And: On the diet side of the health/quality-of-life equation, at MATS the CDL Drivers Unlimited group hosted family-practice physician Ken Berry, who spoke to principles of what he sees as the PHD, or "Proper Human Diet," akin in some ways to a Keto high-fat, very-low-carb diet. Trucker and CDLDU founding driver council member Scott Reed introduced Berry at MATS with some detail of his own experience with the diet. Reed's dropped well more than 100 pounds over the course of a year into it.

Upcoming Webinar: Catching elusive ‘work-life balance’ as an owner-operator, small fleet owner

DATE: May 23 at 1:00PM CentralMore are looking for that elusive goal of work-life balance with healthy profits and maximum time efficiency on the road to justify time spent on other pursuits. In this webinar — sponsored by Bestpass — two men who’ve been in those shoes in a variety of roles present strategies toward gauging and achieving balance to improve quality of life for yourself and/or your operators, whether you’re a one-truck owner leased to a carrier or with authority, or a small fleet owner hoping to deliver better balance to drivers and, ultimately, to yourself.

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Todd Dills: Hey, everybody. It's Todd Dills, your host for Overdrive Radio. We're opening a little different here today. It's Friday, May 19th, 2023. We're going to be detailing the Roadcheck experience of one Mike "Mustang" Crawford. Regular Overdrive readers have read his name before, no doubt. When I reported on the securement hotspots last week in advance of the inspection blitz, Crawford had planned on getting some work done on the truck, including scheduling his annual inspection so that he'd be off for the week. But he ended up being home by the Friday before the blitz and knocked the inspection out on that day a week ago. Then this past Monday, he got two tires put on the 1994 Freightliner Classic he hauls in and by the wee hours Tuesday, the very first day of the CVSA's Roadcheck Inspection blitz, he was on his way east from the Springfield, Missouri area towards Chicago for a load. What did he see? Stay tuned for a bit of an audio diary as it were from the Mustang. Here we go.

Mustang: You know my number, but anyhow, I'm just going to call you and keep track or tabs or count or whatever of the scales that I've crossed that have been closed. Nobody there, nobody home, not inspecting, not doing nothing. I crossed Missouri scale Eastbound 44 in St. Claire this morning. They were closed, locked up. I just crossed the scales on Eastbound 70 in I think Brownstown or Brownsville, Illinois at about the 72 yard stick. They were closed, locked up, nobody home.

Todd Dills: Crawford then loaded near Chicago, Wednesday morning and made his way south down 65 all the way into Kentucky with nary a hint of an inspection or scale house open on his route, too. By morning Thursday, he was staring down the possibility of inspection by Bluegrass State personnel at Elizabethtown, the run continuing south, but …

Mustang: Ghostwriter, it is Mustang again. I am the luckiest son of a gun in the world. It is 11:09 my time and I just went past the southbound Kentucky scales at Elizabethtown, Kentucky and they were closed, locked up, nobody home, nobody around. So anyhow-

Todd Dills: When he got down close to Tennessee line, the northbound scale in Franklin turned out …

Mustang: And they are open. There was one truck in there, and that was it.

Todd Dills: He didn't have to cross it, of course.

Mustang: So far, all the southbounds have been closed. A couple of northbounds have been open. Talk to you later. Bye bye.

Todd Dills: Just a few minutes later then crossing into Tennessee.

Mustang: Tennessee mile marker 121 or one... Yeah. 121. The scales there at southbound side are closed. Doing road construction. They are the scales that are being used for construction storage. Anyhow, so far I haven't seen a southbound scale open.

Todd Dills: Picked up the next call as Mustang took Tennessee 155 Briley Parkway around the north and east sides of Nashville to connect to I-24 East toward Chattanooga to I-75. Mustang let me know he was waving at me from about three miles as the crow flies down around the Opryland Hotel area. Then at Manchester, Tennessee on I-24.

Mustang: Just went past the southbound chicken house I-24, I mean eastbound chicken house I-24 and it is just parking area now. The building's all blocked off and everything. The westbound was open and weighing people. Trees were there. I could not see if they were doing any inspections, but that makes... So far I haven't found an open scale. Been my good luck, but I know what'll happen.

Todd Dills: Continuing on then coming into Georgia at Ringgold on I-75.

Mustang: Mile marker 343, I-75 southbound, nobody home. They were locked up. Nobody there. Looked over to the left side, northbound side. I didn't see anybody there either. Ghostwriter, here we go with another report. Mile marker 191 southbound Interstate 75, Forsyth, Georgia. Southbound chicken house locked up. Been my lucky day, but we'll see. I got one more here in Georgia and I get to play with Florida. So anyhow, I'll keep a close look. Bye.

Todd Dills: It was evening by then of course, and Mustang was getting close to his days ends. With a delivery set for Florida, but not without the possibility of a scale stop tonight or early tomorrow. Nonetheless, anybody else get the sense that this Roadcheck blitz might not be all it's cracked up to be? What was your experience over the three days? Leave me a message on the podcast line at 615-852-8530 with your story.

First one to do so and also leave your mailing address and let me know you can use a mostly brand new 19 MINI Compact CB set up from the Cobra Company. Let me know that and it'll be on its way to you. Again at 615-852-8530. What have you seen in the last three days during the Roadcheck inspection breaks? Now onto the principal subject of this week's podcast, our own Long Haul Paul Marhoefer's talk with Mother Trucker Yoga's Hope Zvara, who's taken elemental exercise training back to his perhaps most elemental nature coaching all manner of "her people", truck drivers onto a more healthy daily routine, improving quality of life for many just through basic movement.

Hope Zvara: What if it's not a mental health crisis? What if it's a movement crisis?

Todd Dills: She's the author of a book too called Trucking Yoga: Simple Fitness for the Long Haul, in which as Long Haul Paul put it, Zvara gives an unvarnished account of how her own struggles with addiction and depression drove her personal need to get healthy.

Hope Zvara: I was told by not one, not two, but three doctors, best case scenario, I learn how to function on medication indefinitely. I decided that wouldn't be my story. So huge mental health benefits.

Todd Dills: On the other side of a break, foreword from Howes, Overdrive Radio's sponsor. We'll dive in with Hope Zvara in conversation with Long Haul Paul at the Mid-America Trucking Show back in late March so keep tuned.

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Todd Dills: Find the fine folks at Howes at H-O-W-E-S howesproducts.com. Here's Hope Zvara and our own Long Haul Paul Marhoefer. Enjoy it.

Hope Zvara: Hope Zvara in Hartford, Wisconsin.

Long Haul Paul ...: And Hope, I've watched the platformers come and go and the trucks show space. They come and go. They give away the free beer and two years later, you never hear from them again, but you keep coming back. You've got genuine passion. Either that or you're a masochist, which is it?

Hope Zvara: Well, I don't want to... Maybe I shouldn't say because that maybe what's keeping people on their toes, but it's a passion. It is a passion for people. It is a passion for drivers. It's a passion for helping people feel good because I know what it's like to not feel good.

Long Haul Paul ...: So I read the foreword to your book with great interest because I thought it was just one of the most eloquent pieces of writing I've read in a long time. There's so much self-disclosure and honesty with it and that's what compelled me to be interested in it. And I'm going to be very honest, I have not applied your methods yet, but I'm needing to because I'm atrophying, Hope. I'm atrophying.

Hope Zvara: I think you're one among many drivers and really just many aging individuals in general that as we get older, our bodies do start to break down and there are small things that we can do to kind of preserve it and I'm happy to hear that.

Long Haul Paul ...: Well, I loved your talk today on the Radio Nemo where you were talking about these small cumulative, incremental steps you can make. And so I guess the converse of that, I remember when cell phones first came out. And within a month or six weeks, I gained five pounds because we were no longer forced to get out of the truck and walk into the truck stop to use the phone. There was just that little bit of activity that was taken away from you and it almost seems like this is the game. It's the game of incremental. It's an incremental strategy with your program, isn't it?

Hope Zvara: I agree. I always tell drivers the best worst invention was the swivel chair because when you're sitting at a desk, now you don't have to move. And it's the same thing with backup cameras. Well, now nobody looks over their shoulder. You think that's nothing but how many times a day otherwise are you rotating your neck and looking over your shoulder? Never now. And so we have to kind of counteract that with small little incremental changes done on purpose repetitively to really be able to continue to forge forward with health.

Long Haul Paul ...: Let's run a hypothetical scenario. Say there's some electrical shock that goes through this building. We're both touching the table at the same time and it's like... Let's go sci-fi on this and you wake up tomorrow trapped in my body, trapped in my life. What's the first thing you're going to do?

Hope Zvara: The first thing I'm going to do is wake up and look in the mirror and realize I'm not me and maybe scream. And then after I do that, I'm going to probably move my body a little bit. I'm going to reach my arms up overhead and stretch. I'm probably going to lean forward, stretch my back, stand up and try to touch my toes whether I can or not. I'm going to try to get my body going again like I do every single morning and probably recognize I probably haven't been getting my body going in a while, Paul.

Long Haul Paul ...: You're not trying to make people bench press 200 pounds, you're just trying to get the dopamines going. What are the advantages to moving your body? What are the actual scientific health advantages to moving your body?

Hope Zvara: Some of the biggest scientific health benefits to moving your body, well, movement is kind of like a generator for our whole body. When we move, it helps our digestive system. So drivers struggling with constipation, you might not be moving, helping all of your organs do what they're supposed to be doing. Movement also helps boost dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, neurotransmitters in the brain. And I look at our whole economy, the whole America, not just trucking. Mental health is such a big crisis. I said this on the show this morning. What if it's not a mental health crisis? What if it's a movement crisis? And I'm not saying that there aren't legitimate issues going on, but movement really can help boost mood.

I struggled with depression and anxiety at catastrophic levels and yoga and movement saved my life. I was told by not one, not two, but three doctors, best case scenario, I learn how to function on medication indefinitely and I decided that wouldn't be my story.

So huge mental health benefits. But also physically, let's just say when you're walking, so your calves are the hydraulic pump for your heart. So when you don't walk, there's no way for that blood flow to easily get back up to your heart and recirculate through your body. So movement literally runs every system in our body. Your immune system, when you're not moving around, your lymphatic system isn't working. The swollen ankles that we call, we blame age for, that's your lymphatic system not working. So when that's not working, your immune system is compromised. Now we're sick all the time. It all stems back to movement.

Long Haul Paul ...: So say that again. Your calves are the hydraulic pump of your heart.

Hope Zvara: The hydraulic pump.

Long Haul Paul ...: I didn't know that. Can you talk more about that?

Hope Zvara: Yeah. So your calves are kind of like the little sister to your heart. And the way the calf operates for your lower leg is it pulsates and squeezes. So whenever you walk, that muscle contracts and it's actually pumping the blood flow back up to your heart again. So when we're not walking, just basic walking, not even exercise, that's not happening. Blood clots, heart disease, high blood pressure. Walking literally is a miracle drug for everybody across the globe and we're not doing it enough. And it's free by the way. So you don't need any gym membership or anything. You don't need to buy an elliptical or you can just get outside and even just walk in place. And that's going to do that for your heart. It's going to do that for your body. And with so many people struggling with heart disease, struggling with high blood pressure, this is something that we can help reduce. I'm not going to say eliminate, but we can definitely help reduce.

Long Haul Paul ...: How did you get on this mission to take this message to the trucking community in particular? Is it because we are probably the most unhealthy demographic of any occupation?

Hope Zvara: I didn't look at the trucking industry five years ago and go, Oh, these are people that nobody's helping." In that sense, it really stems back to my dad and watching him break his body over years and years and years. And I didn't know it in the time, but he was so underserved. He didn't value himself. He didn't know how to take care of himself. He was from the army so he knew how to run, but then all of a sudden, he couldn't run anymore. And that just really stuck with me. And when I stepped into yoga, I was really just looking for healing and help for myself and I found that a lot of other people were struggling like I was. But I didn't feel like that was where I belonged. It wasn't my people. I'm a little rough. I'm a little cynical. I'm a little sarcastic. I'm a little bit more homegrown.

And when trucking fell into my lap five years ago, I looked around and I was like, "These are my people. I can relate with these people." And I started sharing my message and just kind of testing the waters and the feedback that I got was exactly what I was hoping it would be. "Wow, Hope. This is practical. I could do this. Your personality, your enthusiasm, your heart." I want to genuinely help truck drivers improve their health and wellness. It isn't like a cool, "Oh, I see an opportunity to make it big or grow a YouTube channel or do whatever." I genuinely want every single one of the drivers that I work with to improve their health because I know what it's like to lose your health. And I don't want that to happen to people.

Long Haul Paul ...: But it does seem like you're driven almost by not a manic need, but an actual passion to export what you've learned.

Hope Zvara: I feel like... I'm just speak candidly with you. I feel like it's a deep calling for me. I feel like this is something bigger than me that is driving me to do this. And trust me that when I first started my husband sitting here with me, it wasn't like I was making big money to be able to do... I was funding this. I was funding this mission and this passion because I felt so deeply about this mission and about my ability to help these drivers in such a sincere way that I was relentless enough to just keep on knocking at it.

I think for a lot of people in today's world, if they don't get instant gratification, if it's not just going to magically happen, they give up. And maybe that's also, it's a blessing and a curse or my best trait and my worst trait because I just don't stop. It's in me. I can't change that. And I actually do coin that back to my dad. He worked a job that he hated. He felt underappreciated, but he showed up every single day no matter what. And I'm so thankful that I got that gene from him.

Long Haul Paul ...: Yeah. That seems to me like a very Wisconsin type trait. In other words, there's something about the upper Midwest. There still is that ethic from your part of the country I believe.

Hope Zvara: A lot of people say that. I used to work at a lot of different vendor shows and outside of trucking yoga shows at the time, and they'd see I was from Wisconsin, they'd be like, "Oh, we know she's going to show up on time, leave an hour later than everyone else, do the job better than what we're asking to do." And I do think it's a little bit in my nature to do that and I think it's a great quality to have. But I think in today's world too, if you want to stand out and you want to make a difference and actually be heard, you can't just do the bare minimum. I don't think that's going to work. And like you said, people come and go I think across all industries because people show up and think it's going to be easy. I think people are just going to be like, "Oh, it's so great."

I've had a lot of people tell me no. I've had a lot of people tell me that "This is dumb" or "How are you ever going to make this work?" I've had a lot of companies call me up and ask for feedback and then take what I said and not want to work with me just so that they can go and implement it themselves. But that has yet to stop me because on the flip side, I know that it's working because people are listening. They're hearing it. They're applying it. And I have drivers that I've worked with that their lives are changed because of this and I want to make a big difference.

Long Haul Paul ...: So what is the most inspiring story or maybe give me two or three, if you've got them, at the top of your head about drivers who said, "Yeah. I applied what she said and these were the gains I was able to create for myself."

Hope Zvara: One of my very first drivers that tested our program was Idella. And a big shout-out to Idella.

Todd Dills: That's one owner-operator the Idella Hansen. As Hope Zvara has it, the...

Hope Zvara: Matriarch of the trucking industry. And she's like, "Okay. I'll see what you got going on." And she was struggling with a lot of arthritis, joint pain and I don't want to say that she wasn't hoping for much, but she was like, "What do I have to lose?" And we met after six weeks and I was like, "Okay. Tell me what your experience is like. What have you been doing?" She was able to get in and out of the truck without pain. She said her joints didn't hurt anymore. She was able to grip the steering wheel and her hands weren't going numb. I know these might not seem like big things, but when those are dictating how it is you live your life and it's literally taking you out of your life, those are some of the biggest wins for me. This is why being the strongest, fittest trucker on the planet is cool for some people, but that's not sustainable and that's not the goal for me for drivers.

So she's one of them. That was just something so awesome for me. But another one is Dean Key. I started working with him two years ago. He arrives for... Who does he drive for? Ron Trucking I think. And he was about 40 pounds overweight. And it's never about weight loss for me. I believe weight loss is a side effect to other changes and issues that you have going on. High blood pressure, diabetes. And we just started small. He just started doing five minutes at a time of exercise three times a day, just some short, easy little things.

He started reading the labels on the back of the food. The first three ingredients is what the main ingredients that food is made with and if you can't pronounce those and those aren't real, you shouldn't eat it. And he just started doing basic things like that. And the other one is drinking water, lost 30 pounds off two of the three of his medications. His blood pressures down, sugar levels are down. And this isn't like a magic plan, you guys. This isn't like some fancy thing, ride or die follow. These are just basic lifestyle strategies and those are just two guys. They're two people that have dramatically changed their life through small simple changes.

Long Haul Paul ...: That's awesome. I do have an Idella update for you. She is actually the romantic lead in an upcoming music video.

Hope Zvara: I saw that on Facebook.

Long Haul Paul ...: After we get done with this interview, I'm going to just give you a sneak preview of some of Idella's work and she was moving quite well. And I guess you're part of why that happened. Last year, we've got an old Hyundai, but it's dependable and we drive it to truck shows, but it's brutal. Compared to a nice truck seat, that thing is brutal after a 10 hour drive. And Idella sees me getting out of this Hyundai after the trip. She goes, "Paul, you're old and you're stoved up. You need to start talking to Hope Zvara. She doesn't pull any punches with me."

Hope Zvara: No, she does. I love Idella. Thank you for that, by the way. But there are a lot of Idellas out on the road. There are a lot of Dean Keys out on the road. Cheryl and her husband are another example. They drive for Hobby Lobby. Their team driver, husband and wife lost a hundred pounds, quit smoking. More importantly, Cheryl never thought that she could cook on the truck and she never thought she'd be able to get her husband to eat anything that wasn't out of a package. And on our calls, he'd start listening and then he'd be like, "Oh, what's that? What are you eating? Oh, I should do that." And now they collectively are a tag team, a force to be reckoned with. They're in their fifties, but they're in better health than they've been in their whole life.

But the best thing is for people like Idella and Dean and Cheryl and her husband, it's the life that they get outside of trucking. It's the life when they go back home that they get to spend with their friends and their family and their pets and do all of the activities outside of trucking and not be in pain and feel like they have the confidence and the ability to do that. I believe in quality of life and this is something that can be sustainable. It's not just a once and done and it is the small simple changes.

Long Haul Paul ...: So how does a driver secure your consultation services? Do they get ahold of you and is there a fee and how does all this work?

Hope Zvara: Yeah. They have a couple options. One, if you're just like, "I just want to start small and just feel you out, Hope, and see what it's like," you can grab my book, Trucking Yoga: Simple Fitness for the Long Haul. Can check that out and read more about it and see what we're like. But if you're like, "Okay. I want to get my feet wet," we have our membership app, so it's the Mother Trucker Yoga LIFESTYLE JUMPSTART. That's just what it is. We're jump starting your lifestyle. And these are just simple, easy, three to five minute videos showing drivers what they can do in the cab of the truck. That was something I recognized five years ago. Anyone can work out in front of a semi-truck and be like, "Hey. It's fitness for truck drivers." But I saw the gap there and nobody was doing that. Sure, they might be watching the videos, but I don't see that when I drive and do a truck stop.

And so I really wanted to adapt fitness and wellness, basic stretching, basic ergonomics, basic strength training for drivers in a way that help boost their confidence and make them feel like they can do this. I think that's one thing that is really unique about me is my ability to break things down and make them really tangible. So all that happens in our LIFESTYLE JUMPSTART app. And then we also have a 90-day program that I usually run twice a year, and that's where I meet with drivers every single day. We get on a call. I teach them a lesson for the day. Each week has a different theme, and after 90 days, you have a full toolbox of tools, practical things that you can implement into your life for the better. You can find me on social. So Mother Trucker Yoga, that's a great first step. Otherwise, just mothertruckeryoga.com.

We built our own app. I wanted to have something that made sense for drivers that was easy to use. We are in the process right now of completing our build out for Apple. Apple requires that you give your firstborn son, your blood type, also make sure that they know everything about you. So we're in that process right now. But we are available on Google or on Android, and we will be soon available on Apple. I'll leave you all with this. Your health matters and without your health, what do you have? Let's make that choice together today to move forward and make those healthy choices.

Long Haul Paul ...: Well said.

Todd Dills: A big thanks to Long Haul Paul and Hope Zvara for all of that. As noted, find Zvara, her book and all the exercise resources she mentions via her mothertruckeryoga.com website. Now, for a little more on the health front from the diet side of the equation, also at Mid-America, CDL Drivers Unlimited founding council member Scott Reed, among others hosted Dr. Ken Berry who promotes what he sees as the "PHD" or Proper Human Diet. Akin in some ways to a keto high fat, low carb diet. Here's Trucker Scott Reed, introducing Berry and Matt.

Scott Reed: Hey, we'd like to welcome you guys for showing up today. Thank you for coming to see Dr. Ken Berry present this diet to you, Proper Human Diet. My name's Scott Reed and the reason I'm up here talking to you right now is because I have done the diet that you can find on Dr. Ken Berry's YouTube page. He also has a website. But I was 503 pounds. Anyways, you can see what I am now. I'm at 360 pounds now. I've lost 143 pounds on this diet. It took right about a year to do so. But anyways, I'll just move on here and give the show back over here to Dr. Berry.

Ken Berry: That's a good man right there, what's left of it. Oh, good morning guys. Thanks for coming. Everybody that actually needs to be here right now is over at the food court, so that's okay. That's okay. So what if I told you that you and every trucker here has been fed a load of crap?

All of us have our entire life about what we should eat and what we should not eat. And the reason I know that is because I used to believe the load of crap and I used to teach it to my patients and I was 67 pounds heavier and pre-diabetic, severe reflux and all kinds of other medical issues that we won't get into. And I'm a country boy. You may have noticed I'm a redneck. And where I come from, you can't be a mechanic if your car won't start. Nobody's going to listen to you. Nobody's going to take advice from you about what they should do about their car if your car won't start. That's common sense, right? You're not going to go and get your hair done by somebody whose hair is janky. That'd be dumb. You just know better than that, right? So why do so many people take nutrition and healthcare advice from fat doctors?

That was the question I asked myself when I looked in the mirror, when I finally realized, "Dude, you're severely obese. You're pre-diabetic. You're supposed to be the guy that knows what to do and you can't even do it for yourself." That's an uncomfortable place to be for a common sense country. You're supposed to be the expert and you don't know. That's embarrassing. So I had to fix that and on my journey to fix that, I did a lot of reading, a lot of research, a lot of study, and what I've come up with are some basic principles of the proper human diet that not only help you lose weight like Scott, but also help you reverse type two diabetes, also help you lower your blood pressure, help you reverse fatty liver, help skin conditions, joint conditions, mental health conditions. All these things get better when you stop slowly poisoning yourself with the foods that are advertised in your face all day, every day.

So there's some basic principles I want to go over with you and with these principles, what they're going to do is basically make you bulletproof. Okay. There's three steps to adopt a proper human diet and then some basic principles that you have to remember. And that way, the next time you go to a restaurant, any restaurant, the next time that you go to a fast food joint, the next time you go that you pack food for your trip, the next time you go to your mama's house, you're going to know exactly what you should eat as a human being and exactly what you should leave alone.

Now, I'm a sheep rancher in addition to being a doctor and a YouTuber. And I'm out with the sheep all the time on the farm and it's amazing to me. The sheep just intuitively know what to eat and what they should not eat. And I'll watch them. They'll walk up to a weed and sniff it, walk away. Beautiful green sucking a leaves, but they just know. I'm not going to eat that. That's not good for me. Then they go over to a tomato bush, looks exactly the same. It's a weed, and they'll tear every leaf off that. They know intuitively.

How is it that we are the only species of mammal on the planet that doesn't know better, that doesn't know what we're supposed to eat? Why are 80% of US adults metabolically unhealthy? Why are 40% of people obese? Why is there a type two diabetes epidemic? Because we've been misled. We've been fed a load of crap because there's plenty of money to be made off selling crap food to people. But then on the other side of that, when the crap food, which is basically a slow poison when it's had time, a few years to work, then there's money to be made on the other side with prescriptions, doctor's appointments, surgery. Right?

So basically, where it leaves you is, you're a cash cow. Big food corporations make money off you and then big medicine, big pharma make money off you. They make money as you come in and as you go out. So with all those billions of dollars, there's really no financial incentive for them to tell you about a proper human diet. That's why you're having to hear it from me at a truck show. So if currently you have no idea what's a proper human diet, I'm going to give you three steps to get started. Step number one is eliminate all sugar from your diet. Both added sugar for sure, and then also naturally occurring sugar. Sugar needs to be a rare treat, a rare occurrence. There is no place in your diet for daily sugar of any kind. It's going to lead to hyperinsulinemia, inflammation and chronic disease.

Step number two is to remove all grains from your diet. There is no grain on the planet that is healthy for human beings. Wheat, rice, oats, corn, millet, soybean, amaranth, quinoa, these are great foods to keep you from starving to death. But if what you're trying to do is optimize your health and reverse chronic health conditions, they play no role whatsoever. In fact, before about 12, 13,000 years ago, human beings never ate grains ever.

Step number three is to remove all vegetable seed oils from your diet. Canola oil, corn oil, soybean oil, all of the seed oils, these are not the fats that you should be eating. Human beings have been eating animal fats for 99.99% of our time on this planet. That's what we evolved to eat. That's what our physiology knows what to do with. Beef tallow, bacon grease, sheep tallow, duck grease, fats from animals.

Those are the fats that human beings eat. Those are the fats that give you your best health. If you're eating plant butter, that's false advertising. Plants don't make no butter. Okay. Butter comes from milk fat. You're eating vegetable shortening or any of that stuff, Crisco, all that stuff is going to cause inflammation in your body. So that's three steps. That's all you have to do. Now let's talk about the principles of proper human diet. Principle number one is ancestrally appropriate, which means we've been eating that food for more than 15,000 years. If you look at something, and you don't have to be an archeologist or an anthropologist to know this. If you buy something and it's in a cardboard box or a plastic bag, do you think we were eating that 15,000 years ago? No. We were eating meat, mostly meat and some veg.

Okay. Meat was the food you tried to get every single day, and if you couldn't get the meat, then you would eat some veggie. When the berries were ripe, of course you ate those. When you found a honey tree, of course you ate that. But on a daily basis, we stuffed our bellies with fatty meat. If we found a nest of eggs, we ate them all, probably including the shell. So a proper human diet is ancestrally appropriate. That doesn't mean so anytime you see an ad, new from Kellogg's, that's them trying to make money off you on the front end so the medical and big pharma can make money off you on the back end. That's all that is. Okay. If it comes from a company that has huge factories and cargo ship stuff all over the world, that's not real food. A proper human diet is by definition low in carbohydrates.

Carbohydrates are great to keep you from starving to death, but nobody in this room is in danger of starving. Okay. A proper human diet is high in healthy animal fats and high in healthy animal proteins. That's what all humans, regardless of what country you come from, regardless of what language you speak, you are a Homosapien sapien. That's what you are, okay? The two people in this room that are the most distantly related, you look around and find somebody that looks nothing like you. You two are more closely related than average animals in the wild. We are very, very closely related as a species, even though we look very different.

A proper human diet by definition is noninflammatory. So many people when they start the diet that Scott's typically on, they'll say, "I used to have this knee, man, it just tore me up. It was stiff and hurt, and since I've been eating this way, my knees are way better. Does this diet do that?" Or they'll say, "I used to have this terrible skin condition, psoriasis, eczema." Those are just slow poisons. A proper human diet is noninflammatory. It doesn't cause inappropriate inflammation. 95% of all the inflammation any of you guys in this room are suffering from, whether it's in your joints, in your gut, on your skin, or mentally is caused by the foods that you're eating that are not really foods.

Scott's been doing this for a few months and has noticed quite a change in multiple things. The number on the scale for sure, but many other things that he can tell you about. He's happy to tell you if you ask him.

Todd Dills: You'd find Ken Berry via his YouTube page or the drberry.com website. That's D-R-B-E-R-R-Y.com website. Find Scott Reed via the CDL Drivers Unlimited group website. That's cdldu.com. I'll post links to Hope Zvara's websites in the show notes, which you can find wherever you're listening. If you're subscribed, leave us a raving review. We're on Apple and Google Podcast, SoundCloud and Stitchers, Spotify. Tune in and many more platforms. Any feedback for Overdrive Radio, dial into our podcast message line at 615-852-8530. This week's question for you, of course, is the Roadcheck blitz all it's cracked up to be?

Mustang: Good Friday morning, Ghostwriter. I'm in Valdosta, Georgia, mile marker 25, southbound I-75. The chicken house is closed, locked up, nobody home.

Todd Dills: Big thanks to you, Mustang.

Mustang: Ghostwriter, what'll it be so far, just went past the southbound scales in Florida at mile marker 449. They are closed, locked up, nobody home.