6. Got Milk? Got Depression

Learn the surprising connection between milk and depression. Drawing from nutritional science, personal experience, and holistic health principles, Jennifer breaks down how breast milk differs from cow and goat milk, why most adults struggle to digest dairy, and how milk sugars can contribute to mucus, chronic illness, and mood challenges. She discusses raw milk versus pasteurized milk, the myth of vitamin D–fortified milk, and why whole milk may be less disruptive than skim varieties. The episode also dives into calcium myths, bone health, goat milk’s superiority over cow milk, nut milks, and how kefir can replace your antidepressant medication. It’s true: Preparing milk properly for consumption can actually lead to a life free of depression! 

View all LINKS and supporting content mentioned in this episode HERE: https://imaquarius.com/got-milk-got-depression-solo-5/

This episode of the Overcome Depression Podcast is for you if you want to learn:

• How milk, dairy, and digestion impact depression and mental health
• Cow milk vs goat milk vs breast milk for inflammation and mood
• Why lactose and milk sugars affect brain fog and gut health
• How kefir, probiotics, and fermented foods support depression recovery
• Calcium sources without milk for bone health and nutrient absorption
• The truth about vitamin D–fortified milk and food processing
• Why drinking milk actually depletes calcium stores in your body
• Natural nutrition strategies to help overcome depression

Transcript

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Welcome to the Overcome Depression Podcast where we offer tools and hope so that you can heal permanently from depression as I have. I am your host Jennifer Stirling-Campbell and in recent episodes we've talked about natural childbirth and trauma during birth and today we are moving on to nourishment after birth. Milk! I've got a little milk drinker here with me today so you might hear some cooing in the background. But today we will address whether milk is contributing to your depression, whether raw milk or pasteurized milk is better, and if raw milk is even safe at all, the best ways to get calcium, the value of cultured milk, and the science behind a mother's breast milk, which is what I'm going to cover first. So breast milk is an incredible food and God is so freaking creative. So babies, unlike adults, produce renin in their stomach. It's a chemical that allows them to break down cassien, which is a protein in the milk and which curdles the milk. Without getting too sciency here, I've learned this from A Healthier You podcast by David and Fawn Christopher. And they said that babies produce an enzyme, a salivary amylase called patein. I know I didn't say that right, but it's in their saliva. And it starts breaking down complex carbohydrates or starches into simpler sugars, while the milk sugar lactose is primarily broken down by the enzyme lactase which is produced in the small intestine. This allows infants to digest milk effectively. Breast milk itself also contains amylase, which helps the baby's digestion. ah I also learned something from that podcast, which is kind of random, but mother's milk also has natural opiates in them, which I found fascinating. It calms the baby and makes them want to eat. So when they're getting crazy and like, like viciously wanting to eat, It's not just because they're hungry. So moving on, the World Health Organization actually recommends breastfeeding for around two years. I personally have learned again from Dr. Christopher that nursing until the eye teeth come in is the better way to go. Why? Because the babies stop producing these things in their saliva and in their small intestine that breaks down the sugars in the milk after that. And what's interesting is that the WHO is acutely aware of mankind's most prevalent food allergies, which are also in baby formulas. um They contain either soy, or pasteurized cow milk products. which, frankly, 75 % of the population is allergic to. Why is this? Milk contains one primary sugar, lactose, which is complex sugar or a disaccharide. It's made up of two simple sugars, however, glucose and galactose. And when you digest the milk, your body's enzyme lactase breaks lactose down into glucose and galactose, which your body and cells use for energy. Some have the ability to break down lactose, which we all know is in milk. Most don't do it very well, however, galactose, no one can really break down. So the body creates mucus to trap it and get it out of the system. milk is considered one of those things that kind of makes people get more mucus in their system. And this is why, because the body literally cannot process this galactose. Nobody, after you're an infant anyway. so it's really not the best food, even though it's a complete protein. And I'll talk about ways that you can consume milk that are healthy. But before I get into that, I want to talk about all the reasons why milk, especially milk off the counter at the store, is really quite a bad idea. So again, back to babies, soy, pasteurized cow milk, and maybe even pasteurized goat milk, it's really not that great for babies. I can attest to that because have always been on my milk, mother's milk. And I want to say that their poop smells kind of sweet. Have you ever smelled the poop of formula fed babies? It's raunchy. Raunchy, because they're not assimilating it very well and it's a dead food. There's literally no living nourishing value in it other than it will keep your baby alive if you have literally no other choice. But literally no other choice is the only reason I would ever give a baby formula. Processing any milk, including formula, destroys the enzymes in the raw milk as it was originally intended that helps we humans break it down. In other words, by the time it gets to your breakfast cereal bowl, your body doesn't even recognize it as a food anymore. True story. It's actually more harmful to the body than helpful, and I'll explain that here in a minute, but processed milk. There's a few other things that we're lied to about processed milk, and one of those is that it has all this vitamin, fortified vitamin D in it. It's put in our milk. Well, it's possible that the milk from the store literally has no vitamin D in even if it is labeled as vitamin D fortified. Why do I say this? Light from the sun hits our skin and causes us to make our own vitamin D. Most of us know that. Cool. Light, whether it's from the sun or a lamp, however, also destroys vitamin D on contact. Did you get that? So with this in mind, think about the milk in the store, usually sitting in the fridge section under the lights in translucent containers. So yeah, if it's not in a cardboard box, which is probably better, you got to keep milk in the dark to preserve specifically the vitamin D in it. So any vitamin D that was once added or fortified into that milk is no more if it's been under lights. This is so anti-common sense and yet this has been done for years and continues to be done. Next thing I'm gonna talk about, whether we are talking about raw or pasteurized, it really doesn't matter in this case, using skim milk. A lot of people think they're gonna weight if they use skim or 1 % or 2%. This is not actually the case. And I'll tell you why. Whole milk is a whole product. The body recognizes it as, oh, this is milk. This is food. If it's raw, it's gonna recognize it as a food more. But even if it's raw and you try to take the fat off, you skim it off the top and you think you're being healthy, you're not. Whole milk really is what it sounds like. Whole, wholesome, okay? If you take the fat out, your body is going to be looking for that extra fat and going, where is it? Where's that extra fat I need to process this stuff? And it's gonna go looking for it. And what that means is that you're probably gonna get hungry again. and your body's going to be craving fat in other forms, whether that's chips or doesn't matter. Your body's going to be wanting more food. so I strongly suggest if you're going to drink milk at all, make sure you're drinking whole milk. Use whole milk. Buy whole milk sour cream. Don't do the skim stuff. It's really not better. Incidentally, The United States spends 50 times more on weight loss than the United Nations spends on famine relief. I got that stat from Dr. Christopher's podcast. I'm sure he's well informed on that, I'm guessing. Anyway, how sad. We could spend all that money that we're spending on weight loss and feed people with it. my gosh. 95 % of dieters also regain their weight within three years. whatever weight they lost on whatever program they did. So eating better and just making it a part of your life is better than dieting. Dieting really doesn't work. Back to fat Butter is a fabulous fat to use. Ghee is also great. they basically take all of the extra, whatever milk is, I don't know. It's supposed to be better for you than butter, but I use butter. I think it tastes better. and I respond to it great. I use it all the time without issue. But if you want to learn how to make your own butter from raw cow milk, I learned a trick from a neighbor years ago that keeps it from going rancid. And what you do is you shake it up, you get the milk, right? You can even put it in a blender. It'll rise to the top crazy enough. It doesn't get blended back in. It'll just sit there at the top of the blender. You take it out and then you get ice water. and you pour it over the butter while you're squishing it with a fork and it'll get all the rest of the milk liquids out so that you can put it in your cupboard and it won't go rancid. If you don't do this, it'll go rancid really, really fast. thank you, Christy, for showing me this because I would have had a lot of really awful butter or not even wanted to make it at all because it would go bad so fast. So there's a trick for you. As a side note, real butter from the cow is actually yellow. It is actually yellow. not white, and did you know that whole cow's milk raw is actually a yellow color because of the particular mineral found in cow's diet called beta-carotene? according to faunafacts.com, it lends its yellowish color to the fat found in natural milk before the fat is skimmed off and the milk is pasteurized for human consumption. So before the milk hits the shelves, it goes through processes that contribute to milk's white color. Skimming, where fat is skimmed from the top, and then homogenization, which is the pasteurization process. And I don't like homogenized milk. I don't think it's healthy. I don't think it has any value whatsoever. So I obviously am in favor of raw milk over pasteurized milk 100%. Even if there's a small chance that because it's not pasteurized and all the bacteria isn't killed before I eat it, I could get sick from the raw milk. But here's the thing. I've drank raw milk pretty much my whole life. I've never gotten sick from it, but I've also gotten my raw milk from people, including myself, who milk their cow or their goat in their own backyard. The animals are healthy. They know when the animal is not healthy or sick and they won't drink the milk at that time. these animals have lots of space to play and to graze. They're happy animals. happy animals usually make happy milk. It's healthier milk. Another fact is that if you take an aura photo of milk that has just been collected from your cow or goat, It's literally glowing. It's alive. 24 hours later, the glow is gone. So even raw milk is only a living food for about 24 hours. So the fresher, the better. So moving on, here is a mic drop moment for you. I don't drink milk anymore. Unless it's the occasional goat milk ice cream that I love so, much. And I'll leave link on my website where you can get the official recipe. It's amazing. my teenagers will even eat this, but not drinking milk keeps my sinuses clear and my mind happy. Milk can contribute to depression as well as acne, by the way. And the reason that I've already explained is the milk sugars that do not digest well, at all. And yet, FDA has told us that this is the greatest and best way to get your calcium. It's not true. It's not true. it's really bad for the eyes and for asthmatics. Pretty much the worst thing someone who struggles with asthma or eye problems can consume. Cheese. I love cheese so much and I only started not eating it very much in recent years because while it doesn't have the milk sugars in it after it's processed into cheese, it is the most constipating food known to man. And frankly, when I eat cheese, I know I'm going to have some problem pooping. don't get the dry constipation. It's more like soft serve ice cream version, but it's just yucky. So cheese does that to me. also can cause a lot of loading and gas. I do better with sour cream actually, which is cultured with bacteria, but some of the sugar is still left in it. However, my body seems to do okay with sour cream, whereas with milk, maybe not so much. So if I believe in all this stuff about avoiding milk after infancy, why do I have five dairy goats outside, who I milk morning and night every single day? You're probably thinking, Jennifer, that seems a little counterintuitive, right? Do I do it because I love milking and mucking out their stalls and spending all the money on their care? No. To be honest, it was always a childhood dream of mine to have goats, but that's not why I do it either. One reason I have goats and milk them is because they are the best pets ever for my toddler. He is very rough and take it. And they're the sweetest animals ever. They've never, ever hurt him. At least mine are Nigerian dwarf. They're amazing, but probably just as important is the fact that goat milk is the closest thing to mother's milk that I am aware of. In fact, one of the ways I was able to convince my husband to let me get goats was one, it'll great pets for our son. And two, if there's a milk shortage again for formula, I could feed at least a couple of babies, keep them alive. I mean, I could, It's also much, much, much easier to digest goats' milk than cow's milk. Cow's milk takes about three hours to digest. Goat's milk, what do you think it takes? How long? 30 minutes. 30 minutes, guys. That's quite a difference. so goat milk has become about one third of my diet. But wait, you just said you don't drink milk, Jennifer. That is true, but let me explain. There is a way to benefit from milk without signing up for mucus and general sickness that comes from drinking processed or even Raw milk and milk products. Well, what is it, you ask? We talked about the milk sugars and how they're not so great for you. Well, I do goat milk kefir literally eat it pretty much every morning, every day it's pretty much my brunch. And I put ton of superfoods in it and it's just, it's so good. Kefir a phenomenal food. I don't know where it. Kefir started as far as historically, but I know that even in recent years, Russians give Kefir to all the kids in all the orphanages because it keeps them so healthy. It's a probiotic. And the Kefir grains that you can buy at a health food store online, I like to get mine from Etsy, just from people who grow and sell it at their house. It breaks down those sugars. So the bacteria literally gobbles up all the sugar and leaves you with a beautiful yogurt-like food that I eat again almost every Incidentally, the next episode of the Overcome Depression podcast is going to be everything you ever wanted to know about kefir, which has been shown to act a lot like antidepressants. And it's delicious. So there's the part that can help you overcome depression. It's a very calming food. That is why It is my favorite food in the whole wide world. So again, be sure to tune in next week if you want to learn how you can eat kefir to overcome depression. One more thing I want to mention before I get into nut milk for a bit is that lot of people have a lot of fear surrounding raw milk. Okay, I get it. But milk that I milk from my goats every day, again, they're happy goats, they're healthy goats. I control what they eat. they've never actually been sick. So I've been really blessed there, but I pray my goats and my milk that I'm milking from my goats every single. day. And I think that makes a difference. The prayer that I say is rather extensive, and I can actually post that to my website for anyone who's interested in praying over their goats or any of their other animals. But basically, I ask the Lord in the name of Jesus Christ to please remove anything harmful from the milk and then ask protection over the milk that it will be both nourishing and safe to any and all who consume or come into contact with the milk. My hope is that this blessing that I'm blessing the milk with will be honored by God and that the milk will be full of light beyond what it would normally even of itself. So let's talk about nut milks really quick. Most of the nut milks you'll find at the store are also processed. They're dead. and they have a lot of fillers in them that aren't that great for you. So that's why the cheaper nut milks are so cheap. Nuts are pretty expensive. So if you buy a pure nut milk that actually doesn't use the fillers like Mooala, which is my favorite, I think the last one I bought ended up being about a dollar fifty her cup. And that's when I was like. Okay, maybe I can do something different to save some money. This is eating up my whole food budget. So I like to soak my nuts and then put them in my kefir as kind of a mix in. But then I thought, what if I blended up the nuts to make milk and then took the pulp that was left over from the nuts and use that in my kefir instead of the whole nut. And then I could drink the milk and it's like getting free nut milk because now I've just used the nuts twice instead of once. I don't know, that was my mentality. As far as a nut milk maker, there's lots of options out there, but I already have a great blender, Blendtec, and that's all you really need in addition to a strainer. So rather than spend the $400 on another appliance and some of the best nut milk makers do cost that much, I decided to just buy a strainer specifically for making nut milk. It cost me 27 bucks and it's going to save me a fortune. Lastly, I want to cover the question of calcium because again, people will say, well, if I don't get my kids milk, how are they going to get the calcium they need? They're growing, they need calcium for their bones and ah, well, here's the thing. Calcium from your milk doesn't absorb into the body that well. Honestly, it doesn't. 32 % it assimilatable and you pee out about 25 % after that. So It's really not as great as it's made out to be. the FDA, I haven't looked into it extensively, but I understand they were kind of bought out by the milk industry and then the milk industry got a slice of the food pyramid. This should tell you something, the fact that the United States consumes the most milk, which we have been told is great for our bones and yet we have the most osteoporosis in the United States of any other population in the world. Why? Why? can assimilate some of the milk, right? So why are we having so much trouble with this? Well, according to saveourbones.com, milk acidifies the body pH, which in turn triggers a biological correction. See, when your body is acidic, it releases calcium into the body. So eating anything acidic, even if you're drinking milk and it was good for you in terms of calcium, is gonna cause you problems with calcium because you need something alkaline to... counteract the acidity that you're causing in your body through eating lot of acidic foods like meat and sugar and dead things on your pantry that we call food. Moving on, calcium is an excellent acid neutralizer and the biggest storage of calcium in the body is, you guessed it, the bones. So the very same calcium that our bones need to stay strong is utilized to neutralize the acidifying effect of milk and might I add other things that we eat? Soda is a big one too. Once calcium is pulled out of the bones, it leaves the body via the urine so that the surprising net result after this is an actual calcium deficit. Knowing this, you'll understand why statistics show that countries with the lowest consumption of dairy products also have the lowest fracture incidents in their population. What? What? True story. So if not milk, how do we get our calcium? According to Healthline.com, I got some ideas. Greens, which we absorb about 50 %-ish compared to 32 % of milk. And if you're eating greens, you're probably gonna be more alkaline, which means you're going to be peeing out less in your urine and keeping for your bones. there's also beans and lentils. Seeds have a lot of calcium in them. Almonds, amaranth, is an ancient grain, tofu, figs is a good one. Herbal calcium like nettle, oat straw, dandelion, basil, chamomile, shave grass, lobelia, and comfrey. And I know they say don't take comfrey. I love comfrey guys. Just don't be stupid and take so much that you die. Okay. That goes with any herb. or any drug for that matter. Salmon with the bones is a good calcium source. Then we've got sardines and kefir. And kefir actually makes it easier to absorb the calcium. It's a more absorbable form of milk product. If you have kids, Kiddie-Calc is a great supplement for kids. It's in tincture form. And if you are a woman and you are pregnant or approaching menopause, I strongly suggest that you supplement with herbal calcium. You can make a tea out of it. And this Nikken Bone Density product that I'll leave a link in the description for, it's called Kenzen BDZ. And it's literally for my mom, reversed osteoporosis. And I've heard many other testimonials that have done the same thing. Under no condition whatsoever. should you take Foxamax. Your doctor may try to get you to take this. And I'm going to try to explain why this drug is so bad and why they still use it. So if you take Foxamax and you go back for a bone density scan, it will probably show that your bones are denser. However, people who take Foxamax traditionally have jaws that just shatter or break. Their teeth break. they will break their hips or their bones are just brittle. So it kind of defeats the whole purpose of using something that's supposed to prevent osteoporosis if it also leads to breaking bones. Don't you think? Why is this happening? Well, what happens when you take Fosamax is that there's this natural cycle that the body does where it's got calcium in the bones and it will release that calcium into the body needed and when the calcium gets old balance the acidity in the body and so forth and just to get rid of and then grow new calcium. Well, Fosamax disrupts this process by preventing calcium from leaving the bones. Why is this bad? if you have a bunch of calcium staying on the bones, and it never leaves, it just starts accumulating, but it's brittle. It's not strong bone. It's not balanced. You need a lot of different things to make a good bone. that's what Fossimax does. Please don't take it. You're welcome. As a challenge to you as we end this podcast for the week, consider ditching your milk consumption or or at least limiting it, maybe to 80 % of what you were doing before, at least half, and then buy some kefir grains, put them in the freezer so they don't spoil, and get ready to learn how to use them in our next episode. If you want more in-depth information about milk, I suggest reading Milk, the Deadly Poison by Robert Cohen, which you can actually find for free on Internet Archive. Woo woo! And according to his website, he's coming out with a new book soon called Murder by Milk. Sounds interesting. of I want to strongly encourage you to watch what Babylon Bee has to say about the food pyramid. They did a hilarious video. You can find it on YouTube. I'll link it on my It's just so funny. I can't give it adequate justice by explaining it here, so you really just have to watch it. You are listening to the Overcome Depression podcast, and I'm your host, Jennifer Stirling-Campbell. We'll see you next time.