Good Life Project - How to Overcome Cravings & Reduce Inflammation | Spotlight Convo

Episode Date: July 18, 2024

Feeling powerless against hormone imbalances, insatiable hunger, and unrelenting cravings? This must-listen episode will transform your understanding as two brilliant pioneers in women's health - Dr. Aviva Romm and Dr. Amy Shah - blend ancient wisdom with cutting-edge science to demystify the driving forces behind hormonal chaos and food temptations.You'll gain profound insights into the interconnected web of your gut, hormones, mindset, and overall vitality unveiled in Dr. Romm's book Hormone Intelligence and Dr. Shah's I’m So Effing Hungry.Episode TranscriptYou can find Aviva at: Website | Instagram | Listen to Our Full-Length Convo with Dr. Aviva RommYou can find Amy at: Website | Instagram | Listen to Our Full-Length Convo with Dr. Amy ShahCheck out our offerings & partners: Join My New Writing Project: Awake at the WheelVisit Our Sponsor Page For Great Resources & Discount Codes Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We have the power to save ourselves because I think that if you understand your mind-body connection, then you can be the one to save yourself rather than waiting for some doctor pill device solution to come around. So have you ever felt frustrated or powerless against that constant tug of imbalances, insatiable hunger, relentless cravings, kind of like your body is waging a war against your health goals. Today, we're going to decode the driving forces behind this struggle and uncover a roadmap to food freedom and radiant well-being. So my guests today are two brilliant pioneers in integrative women's health, Dr. Aviva Ram and Dr. Amy Shah. With their unique blends of ancient wisdom and cutting-edge science,

they provide a really fresh perspective on reclaiming hormonal harmony from the inside out. Dr. Aviv Aram is a Yale-trained, board-certified family physician with a specialty in women's health and obstetrics. Referred to as the face of natural medicine in the 21st century, she draws from her expertise in botanical medicine, environmental impact, and mind-body practices to address the often overlooked factors impacting vitality. And Dr. Amy Shah is a double board certified medical doctor and renowned nutrition expert with training from Cornell, Columbia, and Harvard. She takes an integrative approach to cracking the code on food cravings. Her compassionate methods really empower people to transform their relationships with eating by aligning biology and psychology. In this

eye-opening conversation, you'll gain profound insights into the surprising interconnections between your gut, your hormones, your beliefs, and overall well-being. Imagine having the power to decode your body's monthly hormonal scorecard and make simply yet powerful dietary and lifestyle adjustments for radiance. So if you're ready to break from the feeling of hormone chaos and less hunger and defeat maddening cravings once and for all, then prepare to have your eyes open. These two trailblazers will guide you towards food freedom and hormonal intelligence from a place of deep wisdom. So excited to share this conversation with you. I'm Jonathan Fields, and this is Good Life Project. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here.

It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, So have you ever felt like there's more to women's health issues than what conventional medicine explains? Like the root causes behind hormonal imbalances, painful periods, other common concerns are just being overlooked or gaslit. Our first guest is Dr. Aviva Ropp, a Yale trained physician and integrative expert who sees health through a different lens. In her groundbreaking book, Hormone Intelligence, she is on a mission to shed light on

often ignored factors impacting women's vitality, from gut health to environmental toxins. Aviva really weaves together centuries-old wisdom with cutting-edge science. In this eye-opening conversation, you'll discover surprising connections between your diet, relationships, beliefs, and hormonal harmony. Imagine having the keys to decode your body's monthly hormonal scorecard and make simple adjustments for better health. Dr. Ram guides us there with a pioneering personalized six-week program for hormone health. Here's Aviva. There's a lot of misinformation about what actually is and isn't normal. And then historically, and this continues to be a problem, there has been significant lack of study of most phenomena in women's bodies. So most medical research on pharmaceuticals and interventions has actually

been done on men. And in my book, I say women are not just small men. We have different physiology. We are different size. We have different amounts of fat on our bodies. We have boobs and hips and butts. And those things, those parts of our bodies actually accumulate and store medication. We break down things and eliminate them differently. And we do that not just differently at one time in our life. We do it differently when we're in our puberty years to our menopausal years. We do it differently in pregnancy. So there's just been this real dearth of study that there are people who are taking action about that. I mean, there are people who are being activists for more medical research to happen in really important women's

health areas and in pharmaceuticals. So there have been a lot of layers of challenge to peel back. I'm a bit of a geek. I like to understand the why and the causes and really peel back and unpack what's really going on, what's underlying this phenomenon. So we do know that women's health concerns have escalated in recent decades. And one might say, well, why is it that that's happening? Well, if we look back at the last, let's say, 70 years, the entire food system has completely changed in the last 70 years. We did not have herbicides and pesticides that were in our food, most of our food. But also, there have been quite a lot of studies done from substantial universities and institutions documenting and demonstrating just basic things like the nutrients in our food now don't compare well to the nutrients in our grandmother's

food. So we think about the CDC with infectious disease now, but they actually do a lot more than that. They do a study called the NHANES study, and they look at a lot of different parameters on big surveys around the United States. And they found in one study in recent years that in every state in the United States, people were only getting 16% of their daily recommended fruits and 14% of their daily recommended vegetables. And it sounds so, oh, we need to eat more fruit and vegetables. But actually, we really do because the nutrients in them are doing biological things in our bodies that help us maintain hormones, that reduce inflammation, that keep our gut healthy,

that help us break down and eliminate the estrogen and progesterone and testosterone that we're naturally producing in our bodies. We also know from the world of toxicology that there are over 80,000 what are called new to nature chemicals in our environment that very few of which have ever been approved. They're just grandfathered in by the FDA and almost none of which have been reviewed in any way on their impact on women's reproductive health. And if you think about hormones, they're just tiny little nanoparticles. They're parts per million in our bloodstream. So people will say, oh, well, drinking out of plastic water bottles couldn't do anything because I mean, how much could you

get from that? But you don't actually need that much. You just need parts per million to mimic what's happening in your hormones or imbalance what's happening in your hormones. And this has been just beautifully studied. Here's a funny story. When I was applying to residency, I applied in OB-GYN at my alma mater for med school. And the interviewing gentleman who happened to be an endocrinologist and an internationally known researcher looked at my application and he said, I see that you're interested in doing specialization studies in endocrine disruptors. And he looked at me and he said across this big formal desk, you don't believe in that BPA crap, do you? Literally, just like these things that stick

because you will never forget exactly what someone said. And I was like, well, actually, I do. And the irony is about seven, eight years ago, there was a huge blow up of information at Yale from Dr. Hugh Taylor in the reproductive endocrinology department, identifying BPA as such a significant endocrine disruptor that two states immediately banned its use in cashier receipts and in airline tickets, because that thermo covered paper is actually was covered in BPA and most of the people handling it at cash registers or at airline counters were women. And it was significant enough to be affecting reproduction. So infertility, miscarriages, et cetera. So these are some of the things that are under the hood

that I look at, that we have really strong documentation from siloed areas of science. The microbiome is another huge one. If you just get into the piles of research on microbiome, let's just go to the good literature in the good journals, you can find powerful connections between microbiome and polycystic ovary syndrome, microbiome and endometriosis, microbiome and fertility, microbiome and preterm labor, and on and on and on. But this information is not making its way into conventional medicine in any more than maybe lip service, if anything, but certainly not in any clinical applicability. Where it's happening is in really more environmental science and toxicology. So there's an entire field of

medicine or science now called exposome science. And it sounds just like what you talk about, what you're exposed to and om meaning the realm of. So the microbiome is the realm of your microbes in whatever part of your body. The exposome is the sum total of everything we're exposed to. And they're documenting stress as a toxin, lack of sleep and circadian rhythm disruption, microbiome disruption, endocrine disruptors, and what we eat as core areas that really do contribute. So can I say that changing your microbiome is definitely going to heal this, this, or that? I can't say that. I mean, some studies do show really well what we can really do by changing our diet, changing these different factors. But what I do know is that why not try if it just means shifting your diet a little bit and doing things that are

gentle rather than spending 15 years on a birth control pill. And I'm not saying those things aren't incredibly valuable and that I don't prescribe them sometimes, but let's go as upstream as possible. Yeah. I mean, it makes so much sense. And it's good to know also that there is a part of medicine now that is really focusing more rigorously on what the environment around us does to and for us and trying to actually measure. I think oftentimes, you know, we try and rush to what do I do? And I think the step that we sometimes miss is, well, how do we actually really figure out how to identify, like, what are the things we're interacting with and how do we measure them in a way so that we can then really understand what's going into us, what's coming

out of us, and what's the effect that it's having in a meaningful way. And, you know, you talk about food, you talk about BPA chemicals that are in the environment around us. You talk about the microbiome. Most people will call that the gut these days. Although microbiome isn't just the gut. I guess that's one big fallacy too. Yeah. And the gut's not just the microbiome. There's intestinal lining. Yeah. So I remember the very first time I had exposure to the notion of the critters in the know, it was like this term leaky gut that was in the early days of functional medicine. And now it's, it is expanded and gotten so much more nuanced and granular to really understand what's going on. Yes. All these different things influence the body in ways that also either inflame or don't inflame, which it sounds like a lot of what we're talking about here is, and tell me if I'm totally getting this wrong because I'm a neophyte. You're my brilliant guide, which is why I'm always asking you questions. Um, inflammation has, it seems like it's just popping up everywhere you look in research,

in popular, um, articles and conversations. So I'm curious because it seems to underlie so many conditions and I'm curious what the relationship is between inflammation and things you were talking inflammation and hormones, inflammation and your microbiome. Is it, is it even, or is that like a whole nother conversation that will take us hours? Yes and no. Yes and yes. But so inflammation, I have a dear friend, she's a physician and an herbalist as well. There are actually two of us, believe it or not. And she says that inflammation is like a fire in the fireplace or a fire out of the fireplace. If it's in the fireplace, it's keeping you warm and it's cozy and it makes you feel good,

right? To see it. If it's out of the fireplace, it'll burn your house down. So we all need some inflammation, right? If you get a splinter, you want your body to be able to recognize that as a foreign object and get rid of it. If you get a cold and your body mounts a response, all those things that make you feel achy and kind of crappy, that's all inflammation. Those are inflammatory chemicals that are circulating that are doing their job. And the collateral of them is they make us feel achy and tired. And so we rest and then our body can really do its job, hopefully. But when it gets out of the

fireplace, when it starts to be consuming, it can overwhelm the body's capacity to maintain it or contain it. And so rather than just getting that splinter out because it's recognized that splinter as a foreign object, it might be recognizing your thyroid as a foreign object. It might be inflammation in your gut. You mentioned leaky gut. It's a real phenomenon called intestinal hyperpermeability. And when there's inflammation in the gut, it gets almost a little spongy, if you will. And it allows particles that are in your intestine that should stay there or be eliminated to get across the intestinal lining into this very rich tissue called the gut-associated lymphoid tissue or the GALT. And it sounds like a Yiddish term, I think, doesn't it? The GALT. But that tissue then mounts a reaction. And when that happens, it can become systemic. So a lot of the chronic illness that we see in our culture, diabetes, heart disease, dementia, there's a

strong inflammatory component that we know can lead up to those, perpetuate those, and also can then in a vicious cycle, particularly with heart disease and diabetes happen as a result of those. But even things like premenstrual pain, if it's normal to have a little bit of discomfort, your uterus is full, it wants to empty itself out, you might have a little aching, a little heaviness in your pelvis, that's normal. But if it's causing you to be doubled over in pain or have to take ibuprofen every month, something else is going on. I say being a woman is not a diagnosis just because you're a woman doesn't mean it's okay to say, yes, you're supposed to live with this. And that's often a reflection of increased inflammatory chemicals that are

actually causing irritation in the uterus, for example. I could go on with, that's where we would have ours. But yes, inflammation, I call inflammation the mother of root causes. Although it sounds bad because I like mothers. But it is the root of all root causes. And the result of most disruptions. So inflammation doesn't come out of nowhere. So we know, for example, that exposure to endocrine disruptors causes chronic inflammation. We know that when the gut microbiome starts to get populated with certain organisms that might not be our best friends, that can cause inflammation. We know that diets that are high in sugar and processed flour products in and of themselves cause inflammation, but then they can cause something called insulin resistance that causes inflammation. So it's kind of always tied in there.

And we'll be right back after a word from our sponsors. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch, getting you 8 hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series X, available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum.

Compared to previous generations, iPhone XS or later required, charge time and actual results will vary. Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman. I knew you were going to be fun. January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg.

You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die. Don't shoot him, we need him. Y'all need a pilot. Flight risk. It seems like part of the master regulatory piece of this also is you use the word endocrine disruption endocrine system a number of different times i think i phrase it as like your chemistry but the the notion that you know like we've got all these

symptoms that show up on the surface we have all these potential contributors but underneath it there's this sort of like there's a, there's a dynamically changing soup of chemistry that's happening in our body that is sort of like provides this regulatory role for everything. And if we're sort of like always looking at the stuff that's happening outside and always looking at just the symptoms, and we're never actually looking at this constantly changing chemistry system within our body, we never really get to what's going on. And it seems like that's where so much of your focus is right now is what's actually happening on that level. You know, it's really interesting about around 2007 and then again in 2013,

two major medical organizations, first the American Academy of Pediatrics, then the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, identified the menstrual cycle as women's sixth vital sign. So we have blood pressure, heart rate, respiratory rate, temperature, then pain is actually considered the fifth vital sign, and menstrual cycles as the sixth vital sign. So when our menstrual cycles are awry, too much pain, irregular periods, heavy periods, light periods, whatever it is that's going on, and not just menstrual cycles, but what we're going through gynecologically, which is a reflection of

what's going on hormonally. But what they identified is that what's going on hormonally is a reflection of yet underlying causes that if we can pay attention to early on, we may offset some of the downstream problems. So if you know that you're having heavy periods every month and they're really painful, we know that there's a very good chance you have excess estrogen. Well, where is that coming from? Often from these endocrine disruptors or the body's lack of nutrition or microbiome to break those down and eliminate them well. So you're overwhelmed by them. But we know that too much estrogen is a long-term risk factor for developing

uterine fibroids, breast cancer, endometrial cancer. So we actually have an opportunity to identify things early that may actually help us prevent some of those bigger chronic problems. And it's interesting, men don't actually have that. We have a monthly opportunity to kind of have almost like a scorecard that we can look at and go, check, check, check, that's going pretty well. Or, huh, this actually seems to be a little off or a lot off. Let me realign what I can do to bring myself back into some harmony here. And then you see it, you see the improvements or you see the changes. I just want to be careful to say that because of endocrine disruptors and a lot of other factors, sometimes these things are set in motion before a woman is even born, before she's even hits puberty. And then puberty is like the switch that sets everything

off. But we now know that things like polycystic ovary syndrome and endometriosis may actually be happening a couple of generations back. So it may be that our mother was chronically exposed to something or our mother had a medical problem that caused a lot of intrauterine inflammation that nobody identified. And now you're in your mother being gestated, you have all your ovaries that are forming while you're still in your mom. Hers formed while she was in her mother. So we literally have situations that can be intergenerational, like the tracks are laid down, but then when you hit puberty, it's like the train could go this way or the train can go this way. And now I'm doing hand gestures for those of you

guys who can't see me because I talk with my hands. So you can go left or you can go right. And it's like your nature wants you to go right, but all the tracks got laid down to the left. And then you add to it standard American diet, the number of antibiotic doses kids get by the time they're in their teens that alter their microbiome, the fact that teens are using a gazillion cosmetics that contain these endocrine disruptors. And it's almost like somebody pulls the switch and it goes down that track. So as we're talking about healing or transforming and taking back our health, I also feel, and this is something that I feel so strongly about because I think the wellness movement and even maybe a little of the functional medicine movement gives you this sense if you just do everything right. You do the diet right. You do

the yoga right. You sleep the right amount. You do your meditation app. You get out in nature. You're somehow going to have guaranteed perfect glowing health. And it can lead to people feeling like, what am I doing wrong? What am I not doing enough of? Or am I just broken? And it's so important for us to take a step back and say a healthy dose of self-compassion and self-love, but also perspective that this is not anyone's fault. And yes, doing all these things is really healthful, but it doesn't mean 100% or 80%. We have no measure of like, that doesn't mean you're going to need the medication or the surgery either. And I really want there to be like a no-fault, no-blame approach to healing. I think that's so, so important. And whether that's

fat shaming in medicine or fat shaming in the wellness space, that's got to stop for us to live more comfortably in our bodies and minds. As you were sharing that, I had this brief flashback. A number of years ago, I was at a conference, a really big event, and I was just sitting in the audience next to someone. And the person from the stage said, okay, we're going to take five minutes now and turn to the person next to you and share a bit about yourself. And I turned to the person next to me and shared a typical three-minute completely non-volatile line of stuff. And it was her turn, and her eyes start to well. And I don't know her at all, but there's for some reason that she felt safe enough so that in that moment, her eyes start to well.

And she just says to me, she's like, I just learned today that I have cancer. She's like, I have done everything right. She's like, I am the person who has done everything right. I never smoked. I never did this. I do yoga. I eat all organic. I take myself, like everything. And as you're saying that, that conversation flashed back to me. And I wonder how many people are like, have that storyline in their head. They may not be verbalizing it, especially to total strangers, but you know, which just, you take a situation and then if you start spinning that storyline, then you add shame and stress to your current psychological and physiological state,

which just adds to the spiral and decreases the likelihood of good outcomes. I can't even imagine the layers that go on top of the fundamental happenings within your body. I hear that story so often. I had one patient who came in, she had a diagnosis of very early breast changes that could become breast cancer. And she was having a mastectomy and medications recommended to her. And she just wanted to know what to do.

And she was in her early 40s, three children, very, very vulnerable on so many levels for her. And same thing. She said, I have been a vegetarian since I was 18. I am a yoga instructor. I live a clean life. I meditate. Yeah, I'm type A, but I mean, it's not like I'm stressed out all the time. We've got resources, everything. And she said, I just don't know what I'm doing wrong. And I said, this could be... And we were in New York City at the time, and I knew that she lived out on the island, Long Island. And I said, it could have been that your grandmother was a little girl and chased those DDT foggers that they used to use on Jones

Beach to clear the beach of weeds. This was a really big thing that was done in the 50s. And then your mother was through pregnancy exposed, and then you got exposed. And her jaw dropped. She said, I don't know how you knew that, but my grandmother used to tell us these stories about how they would chase this fogger on Jones Beach when they were kids. And it was just one of those lights going on. I still get chills when I say it. It was just random. I just randomly pulled on that, but maybe it's not. Maybe these things aren't random. But yes, there is so much going on. And it can also feel so doom and gloom, like, oh my God, there's 80,000 chemicals and our

microbiomes are screwed. And like, what do we, there's 80,000 chemicals and our microbiomes are screwed and like, what do we do? It's so overwhelming. And I do think that asking the why is really interesting, especially if that's something that you love. Like you and I, we're information seekers, so we like the why. But when you unpack the things to actually do, they are pretty simple. We know that you can restore a healthy microbiome in just a couple of weeks of eating a healthy diet. Studies show this. We know that you can reduce your exposure to certain things that you're using for body products and drinking out of plastic water bottles, and just that can reduce your blood phthalate levels. So the answers to me seem simplistic in a way when I say them, but getting better sleep,

stressing less, eating healthier diets, learning what that really means. And that's where I think for me, when you asked how I think about medicine, sometimes I think conventional medicine is like a pill for every ill and so much over-testing, but sometimes I think functional medicine, I jokingly say is a pill for every ill and so much over-testing. But sometimes I think functional medicine, I jokingly say, is a supplement for every symptom and also a lot of testing. And the answers when you get down to it are still the same. Change your diet, do this, do this, do this. And what I really love about this new medicine, if you will, is it's not new at all. If we go to every indigenous traditional culture around the world, they already know it's all connected, right? It's just all connected. So we can't tease out

what we put in our bodies from how we feel, but we also can't tease out how we're treating the environment from how we feel. And I feel like as women, our bodies are not to sound biologically reductive or romantic. I really do believe that our bodies are such a powerful mirror of what is happening to the planet. And in a sense, we're a little bit like the canaries in the coal mine. All of these symptoms that are showing up now in women's bodies are just telling us that there is a life out of balance. And how can we restore hormonal balance, if you will, without restoring a life in balance? And that's really more, I find, what I'm working with women around. Even if they are going to use a pharmaceutical to feel better or have the surgery. It's still about how do we reclaim this knowing that everything

is connected, that our relationships affect how our hormones show up. Our beliefs about our bodies affect how our hormones show up. They also affect how we advocate for ourselves when the doctor isn't listening, for example. So I love that part of this new way of thinking. Yeah. It's so interesting to hear you describe it that way and to share that. I've spent time with your most recent book, Hormone Intelligence, and I'm going through it. It's 400 pages of just chock full of... I stopped taking notes because it's just like, there's so much detail and so much information and so much nuance and a lot of detail and it's just like, there's so much detail and so much information and so much nuance and like, and, and a lot of detail and, and it's highly prescriptive. And, you know, you can look up very specific things. You can understand all the different systems in the body and lay it out in a

way that's powerful and compelling. And yet at the same time, it was interesting because there's a, there's this broader sense that everything that you're talking about is woven together into this bigger context, this bigger system, which feels organic and intrinsic and natural. And it's a really interesting experience of being able to dive into something. And like you said, we're both geeks. We're both scientists. We like to kind of deconstruct and then, but then also have this sense of, but there's an elegance and a naturalness to everything that you're talking about. And sure, you can get lost in the weeds or you can get very specific wisdom if you want. But at the same time, it's always

tethered to this understanding that there's a bigger thing, there's a bigger intelligence, and there's a certain simplicity simplicity which grounds all of this. And it's always going to be that way. Yeah. I've been reflecting. Well, first of all, thank you. That means the world coming from you. I have so much respect for you as a reader and a thinker and adore you and love you so much. So thank you for that. That really moves me. This thread that you talk about, one of the things I've been thinking about is when women are called hormonal or when we call ourselves hormonal, there's almost like this, not almost, we're kind of being told that we're

irrational and unpredictable and unstable. But one of the things that really came through for me as I was crafting this book is that it's actually exactly the opposite. There's this biological blueprint that has existed hormonally in women since the time immemorial. It hasn't changed. So why is it that suddenly it's entirely predictable? Certain things happen when you get into puberty. Certain things happen when you get into puberty. Certain things happen when you've been in puberty for about three or five years. Certain things happen when you get pregnant. Certain things happen when you go into menopause.

It's the same. It shows up a little differently for each of us, depending on our history, our medical stuff and all of that. But it's the most predictable human biological thread. So the idea that we're unpredictable is really fascinating to me. It's, I think I'm trying to reframe that for ourselves as women to like, oh, actually, no, I'm pretty predictable here. Yeah. I know what's happening. There's a certain sense-making element to it. Yeah. We could go a lot of different rabbit holes here, but I think this is actually a really nice place for us to come full circle.

I have asked you this question in the past, but it was a number of years ago now. So I'm going to ask you again because we are evolving human beings. So sitting here in this container of Good Life Project, if I offer up the phrase to live a good life, what comes up? You know, I remember when you asked me this the first time, and I remember saying presence, that being present was really so powerful and so important. And in some ways, Jonathan, I don't, I know, I mean, I've evolved and changed so much, but I really feel like if I would add to that presence, meaning that I am so here right now

in this moment, giving that time and experiencing that time and connection from you, I would say that if I would shift anything, I might just say authentic connection. Because I think when I was talking about presence many years ago, it was really about making time for that authentic connection. I think time and space for authentic connection in life to me is living a good life. Thank you. Thank you. So appreciate Aviva's take. I love how she empowers you to look beyond the conventional labels and quick fixes to uncover the real roots of hormone imbalances, her holistic vision for just connecting all the dots, gut health, environmental impacts, beliefs,

provides a profound new lens for true vitality. And we'll be right back after a word from our sponsors. The Apple Watch Series 10 is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch Series X is here. It has the biggest display ever. It's also the thinnest Apple Watch ever, making it even more comfortable on your wrist, whether you're running, swimming, or sleeping. And it's the fastest-charging Apple Watch,

getting you 8 hours of charge in just 15 minutes. The Apple Watch Series X. Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum. Compared to previous generations, iPhone Xs are later required. Charge time and actual results will vary. Mayday, mayday. We've been compromised. The pilot's a hitman. I knew you were going to be fun.

On January 24th. Tell me how to fly this thing. Mark Wahlberg. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die. Don't shoot him, we need him. Y'all need a pilot. Flight Risk. You know what the difference between me and you is? You're going to die. Don't shoot him. We need him. Y'all need a pilot.

Flight risk. And that brings us to Dr. Amy Shaw. So have you ever felt powerless against just food cravings and insatiable hunger? Like your body and brain are conspiring to sabotage your health goals? Amy Shaw is a medical doctor and nutrition expert who has pretty much cracked the code on why we crave what we crave in her book, I'm So Effing Hungry, Why We Crave What We Crave and What to Do About It. With innovative approaches drawn from Harvard, Cornell, and Columbia, she reveals eye-opening connections between gut health, hormones, and the biology driving our temptations and

cravings. Her unique mind-body methods provide a roadmap to regaining control. And in this discussion, you'll discover really surprising links between your mental state, gut bacteria, and appetite. Imagine having the power to fire your worst cravings for good by aligning with your body's inner wisdom. Here's Amy. Our gut bacteria are probably one of the biggest, if not the biggest contributor to cravings that we don't really even understand. So psychobiotics is this whole world that is exploding science that says that your gut bacteria can help shape your mental health. And it came from a series of studies that were done on both depressed, schizophrenic Alzheimer's patients. So they took

schizophrenic patients, the microbiome of schizophrenic patients, and then non-schizophrenic people. And they transplanted it into germ-free mice, mice that did not have their own microbiome. And they mixed them up and the researchers were able to tell with 100% accuracy which animals had received the schizophrenic microbiome just from the behavior of the animals without teaching anything about their brain, without doing anything else. And so this world of psychobiotics started to stem and they did it with depressed animals, same thing, autism, dementia, Alzheimer's, I mean, you name it. And these mental health diseases get transplanted just by changing that gut bacterial colonies. And I mean, it's just mind blowing,

right? The whole world of psychiatry is like, blown up because this whole concept of, you know, treating the brain now is no longer valid, because if you don't treat the gut, you're not going to achieve the changes that you're looking for. So that psychobiotic world is something I think is so interesting, and not because I want to create the billion dollar drug. And, you know, that's where the real interest is in the research world is like, what is this combination of, you know, bacteria that can reverse, you know, each one of these diseases, the potential is that we actually can already change some of this through ingesting bacteria, through being around people with healthy bacteria, through fecal transplants, which would be the most

aggressive way to transplant bacteria. But I think this is like the most interesting part of this whole thing is that our cravings, our mood, our mental capacity, even athleticism can be transplanted through these gut bacteria. Yeah. I mean, it's really such a wild concept to think that the bacteria that exists in our gut can affect so much of our psychological expression and also so many other things around wellbeing. Like we already know that being around healthy people, sharing food with healthy people, being in nature populates a gut in a way that is beneficial.

We know that exercise, for example, is like, I mean, your microbiome, those microbes love when we exercise, they produce these really beautiful anti-inflammatory compounds. When we exercise that they produce these really beautiful anti-inflammatory compounds when we exercise that give us some of that anti-long-term health benefit of exercise. So there's a lot of potential to apply what we know about how to grow good gut bacteria to this world of psychobiotics. Let's talk a bit about where we go from here. You offer sort of these

five ideas or a five-step path effectively. Let's move through the five different steps here. You start by talking about, you call it replenish, and you reference something that you call the super six here. Take me into this. So we always are talking about what to take out, right? I'll take out the ultra processed foods, take out the negative dopamine triggers and all this stuff. But I don't think we get enough clarity because of all the diet wars about what things actually are good for you, despite, you know, what category of vegan paleo, you know, carnivore they fit into.

And so I tried to look at the literature and say, okay, now that we know we're trying to grow a good gut microbiome because it's communicating with the brain, it's going to help us with cravings and hunger and long-term health. What are the things that actually grow a good gut microbiome? And it came down to these six things. And some of these things are familiar to people and some of these things aren't. You know, glucosinolates, for example, you might know it as like broccoli or cauliflower, but I think that putting it in that category together, the reason for me to do that is that the glucosinolate compound is the one that helps that bacteria grow. And so you can pick any one of the things in that category. So if you are allergic to

broccoli, then you have a different option. And there's all these kale haters online. And so I said, there's a lot of glucosinolates you can choose. And so that's one of them. And one of the other ones I actually talk about in there that I think you would really love is the dopamine boosting foods, because we know that gut bacteria makes dopamine and can help us with those cravings for negative things by replacing it with foods that actually produce it with positive things. So I kind of named some of the foods that you would want to include that kind of help boost up that baseline dopamine level. So we're not always just trying to dive into the bag of chips or cookies. I think that is really, really important. And then there's the, you know, fermented foods. There's basically what to include without all the noise

of, you know, what's the calories in this? What, you know, is this vegan? Is this pale? I just said, sure. You could be anything. You can pick your food within that category and you can find something that works for you. Yeah. I thought, I mean, seriously, you mentioned the dopamine supporting foods also, because the notion that you can eat something that will then have the bacteria in your gut to like produce dopamine. The fact that actually they produced dopamine was interesting to me also that it doesn't actually have to come from your body's own you know like chemistry said it can literally come from the critters inside of you and then move out and then the other thing i found really interesting was the notion that the dopamine that is generated in your gut can then move from your gut out into your body

and satisfy the same craving the same sort of like yearning that your brain, like it'll make its way up to your brain and give you what you need. Yeah. I was so confused because on one hand you hear most of the serotonin of your body, I think it's 90% is producing the gut. And most of the dopamine is also producing the gut. And, but then there was this notion of like, but that dopamine and serotonin can't get into the brain. It's like there's a blood-brain barrier, right? So what I learned was that there's this magical communication system between the brain and the gut that happens five different ways. As of today, we know five different ways. One is through the vagus nerve.

One is through secondary hormones that travel to the brain to kind of like knock on the brain and say like, hey, produce more dopamine. There's direct neuropod cells that send the signal. So there's at least four to five, I think it's five different ways now that we know that this dopamine and serotonin communicates with the brain. And that's also why that's where the immune system made it clear to me what's happening with the immune system. So I think a lot of people hear this word inflammation and they're like, okay, I know that's bad, but what does that even mean? So if you take it in the context of this dopamine bacteria gut brain connection lens, it basically means that when those gut bacteria see something that they don't like, or that they

don't recognize, or that seems dangerous, they signal to our immune system. They're like walkie-talkieing to the cells and they're like, I need your help here. I don't really know what this is. I need to heal this. It's usually a toxic substance, a foreign substance, a negative substance. Then the body sends all of its immune cells, a little group of them, and then they decide what to communicate with the brain. They say, okay, hey brain, there's a problem down here. We are, and that's literally inflammation that's happening. And so what happens is your brain will say, all right, when it's really inflamed in your gut or somewhere else in your body, your brain will shut off the functions of your brain that are unnecessary at that time. So it's like when you watch your dog, when they're sick, they're just

kind of lying around moping. They're sleeping a lot because they're giving that immune system a chance to heal. But then when we say, wow, this is happening so often with the food that we eat, then we wonder why we're tired all the time or that we can't have the clear, creative thoughts. A lot of that is coming from that inflammation that's happening in the gut that's communicated to the brain. Yeah. You talk about the second step in the pathway you call rewiring, which is all about stopping the addiction to hunger pathways. And you use this phrase intermittent reward scheduling. Talk to me about this. The best way to describe this is Vegas, right? You go to the gambling table and you keep losing, keep losing, keep losing. But that 17th hand is a big hand and

you win the big pot, right? That is the strongest trigger for dopamine wiring. So now you want to go back for more because you got that reward and you got that big burst of dopamine when you win, right? And you want to recreate that. So intermittent rewards are the strongest trigger for dopamine. So gambling both have that kind of, that's their advantage is that they can really offer you an intermittent reward. So when you want to start to rewire your brain, you can also use this science. So you can start to reward yourself intermittently. And the key here is not to anticipate it too much. So if you put it on

your calendar without remembering, that's the best. So put it on for next week, that on Monday, Friday, and Saturday, you're going to reward yourself with a healthy treat or whatever to rewire that brain or have someone else do it for you that's intermittent, unexpected. And then you basically, I go through kind of a three-to-one technique of how to best use that opportunity to rewire your brain. And part of it really comes down to noticing that there's something that is positive, that is giving you a good feeling, that is a better choice than the one you had before. So basically three days a week where you're intermittently rewarding yourself or you could pick what three days a month or whatever it is. And then doing

some kind of cognitive behavioral therapy makes real understanding why this was a better choice. This was why you're doing a better job because you really want to rewire that pathway. So you have to bring some consciousness to it. And that's why cognitive behavioral therapy is so great at changing behavior, because you can bring your consciousness to it. You learn why you're doing it, why this is so great. And then the one is just sit down and savor it for that one minute. And it's just an exercise in kind of getting, being able to save ourselves from this world that is trying to hijack our dopamine pathways and saying like, all right, but I'm going to do this for myself with positive things. It doesn't have

to be food-based. It can be, you know, a reward on your journey to publication or, you know, in your relationship or whatever it is, it's just a way to kind of help you start to make some better choices. Yeah. So while replenishing was more about like, here are positive things to add in, the rewiring part seems really like the focus is let's actually, let's get sort of aware, like let's do things that actually make us more aware and present in these behaviors and then just start to make subtle changes in them so that we can be more conscious in the activities and understand what we're doing. You talk about the importance of these natural rhythms that we have in our life. So often, and probably so many people have heard

this phrase circadian rhythm, like we all have this rhythm, which is natural to us. It's different in each person, although like they're general as you can make. But the relationship between circadian rhythm and our craving cycles, I think is interesting. Circadian rhythms runs most of the, at least 75% of the processes in our brain and body. So we are intimately tied to sunlight and darkness for everything we do. And there are receptors in your eyes that go straight to your brain when you see natural light that make all these changes right away. And one of the changes I think is so fascinating is the changes that happen when you see light, there's this melanocyte stimulating hormone, a hormone that's released in your brain that actually has the power to make you feel more

satiated and makes you feel more satisfied. And intuitively, we know this, right? You go on vacation, you're taking a sunny walk or you're somewhere warm and you just don't feel like craving or eating as much junk or you're just more satisfied from life in general or whatever it is. But there's actually science behind that. So you can actually mimic that on a daily basis where you can get a release of alpha MSH in your brain that's going to help you on your journey to having a better relationship with drugs, alcohol, chocolate, whatever it may be. This is interesting, right? Because one way to do is literally just to spend more time outside or

get outside as you recommend early in the morning to try and sort of like set your circadian rhythms. But even if you live somewhere where it's dark a lot, if you're in the Pacific Northwest, you have very different exposure to sunlight than you are if you're in LA Pacific Northwest, you have very different exposure to sunlight than you are if you're in LA or Arizona or where I am in Colorado, but you're not excluded because some of the internal, like the light therapy, the full spectrum light or blue light therapy, does that play a similar role? Yeah. It's really easy now to go onto Amazon and get something. I think you can just search happy light. And you want 10,000 lux of light at 12 inches from your face.

That's kind of the magic number you want to sit on under it for 20 minutes. But it has a great effect. And remember that for those people who live in the Pacific Northwest or live in a place that's kind of overcast a lot, it's still natural light. So when you go outside, it's still brighter than it is indoors. And even though it doesn't seem like that, even on a very cloudy overcast day, it's about 10,000 lux of light. And on a sunny, bright, sunny day, that's about 100,000 lux of light. And an indoor light is like a thousand. So we're talking a fraction of what you really need to activate the circadian receptors.

Yeah. Are you aware of any research that would connect light exposure to the makeup of your gut microbiome? Yeah, absolutely. Our gut bacteria need sunlight and they live in these like, in the very dark bowels in our body, but they absolutely, they have circadian rhythms and they need input. But what they do is they get the input from us because they're not outside. So when they, they get various inputs to know when it's daytime, when it's nighttime, and they need us to get sun, they need us to be in nature. And that's an absolute way to grow the gut bacteria. So all of this science is just mind blowing because how do they have, how do they know

what time it is or how do they, like they have, they have personalities, they have cravings for certain foods, they need sleep, they need sunlight. They're living beings. Yeah, it's on the one hand amazing and a little bit terrifying at the same time. A little bit terrifying. But as long as it's a symbiotic relationship, then that's all good. The one other thing I want to ask you under this category, and maybe it might not be the right category here, is the potential effect of time-restricted feeding or intermittent fasting. I know that you've spent a lot of time, you've spoken about that in a lot of different ways in the online space.

I've experimented with it. It's certainly variations have been a huge buzz. Is there some relationship to time-restricted feeding or intermittent fasting and cravings? And is resetting or the circadian rhythms the right category to even talk about that in? Or is it something different? In my world, yes. Because I consider circadian intermittent fasting the ideal way for someone who's trying to reset their cravings, hunger pathways, because one, we know the gut bacteria need circadian rhythms. They need sleep and rest, right? So taking a break from food, especially during the evening nighttime hours is highly beneficial for the brain,

for the digestive system, for the gut bacteria. Most people in America in the lay literature are doing it the opposite. They're eating late into the night, and then they're waking up and not eating for the first half of the day. It's not more. If you think about it, that actually goes against circadian rhythms. Although they may have some benefits, as we know, there's some benefits, maybe, you know, weight loss, you know, some other just because it's controlled calories. But I think if you really are trying to do it for these reasons to reset that mind body connection, improve that brain gut health, you have to incorporate it in a circadian pattern to actually help that kind of connection. Yeah.

I mean, it's interesting that you say that because so often when people talk about this thing of intermittent fasting, and for anyone who hasn't heard that phrase, it's generally a lot of people are talking about trying to restrict their feeding, like everything that they do to an eight or 10 hour window during the day. And most people that I've heard talk about it, just like the way you're described, say, well, I'll wake up and I'm not going to eat until noon, and then I'll eat between noon and eight. And what you're saying is maybe we should re-examine that. Maybe actually it makes sense to have breakfast

and just have a lighter meal and have it much earlier in the day, and then let that be the close of the day. That might align much better with your natural rhythms just as a human being and also with all the bacteria that helps contribute to let them function more healthily. Did I get that right or is there something different? There was this controversial article, a headline was something like, intermittent fasting is going to kill you or something. And the study, I mean,

the headline was talking about a study that looked at people who only eat one meal a day, and then they had higher rates of all-cause mortality, right? So it makes sense because everyone who I've ever talked to who eats one meal a day and this was true at the study, they were unintentionally skipping meals, and then they would have a huge late day meal and then eat all the way till they were going to bed or whatever, which fits into a lot of people's schedules. That's still called intermittent fasting, but that it was terrible for your cardiovascular system, for your hormones, and for all cause mortality. So there's a huge uproar because the title and also, you know, these people were unintentionally intermittent fasting. So there

were different reasons. Most of the people were working very difficult jobs. There's some food insecurity there. So it was a different population of people. And what were they eating when they broke their fast? Obviously, all that matters. So it wasn't a great study, but it just implies what we already intuitively know through circadian rhythm research is that you are supposed to be eating at certain times of the day, because even if we're working a night shift, every time we get light input into our eyes, our brain resets today. And so we're not nocturnal animals. You cannot switch your body's functions to become nocturnal, no matter how much you try. So your insulin, your pancreatic enzymes, your digestive hormones, they all kind of get to very, very low baseline levels after about eight o'clock for most people.

And so that is a nice way to say, hey, curb that nighttime eating and watch, do a circadian intermittent fast where you maybe stop eating at seven o'clock or, and then just do 12, 14, 15 hours. And so you're not just rolling out of bed at 6 a.m. and having your first orange juice and bar. You're waiting for an hour or two. And really, that's all it takes to do overnight circadian fast. Yeah.

I mean, it is so interesting because that is counter to the way that so many of us live our lives. And especially, you and I both lived in New York City for a long time. The notion of eating dinner before 7 or 8 at night often, you just, you and I both lived in New York city for a long time where the notion of eating dinner before seven or eight at night, often like you just didn't do it. Like you ate dinner almost right before you went to bed. And, and when in hindsight, you know, when you live in a culture and all of your friends and like all of your colleagues follow that same pattern, there's a social cost to opting out of that, that I think sometimes we don't honor. You're making a conscious decision, not just to do things that may be better for your health and

your wellbeing, but that may also have people around you raising their eyebrows and saying, why aren't you coming out to dinner with us at nine o'clock at night or doing this? And those are all things that we have to navigate and figure out how important is this to us, I think, and make those sometimes tough decisions. the health benefits, the social benefits. And most people I would say can compromise and maybe do a Saturday weekend nights or late dinner, but then go back to their earlier dinners on weekdays. It's like a nice compromise, I think. Yeah. So flowing from the idea of the fact that we all have rhythms, you talk about sleep also and the importance of sleep and the relationship between sleep and cravings. And I would have to imagine that anyone who has ever slept horribly, woken up the next day and ravenously for like anything that they could put in their mouths to make them feel better. And again,

I'm raising my hand here. Like we get that connection, but what's actually happening there? It's such a great way to describe it because we've all been there, right? I had two little kids and I was stressed with medical training. And I remember that all I wanted to do was snack. And when you actually look at hunger hormone levels, they're altered in people who have been sleep deprived. So your level of ghrelin, the hunger hormone is much higher and your level of leptin, which is the feeling of satisfaction is much lower. And same thing with CCK, neuropeptide Y. This is a phenomenon that actually is happening. It's not just in your head. I used to think that I was tired and I wanted sugar and caffeine to kind of

wake me up, which is partially the story. But this is saying like, no, it's actually your hormones that are flowing through that are telling you you're hungrier than you are. And that the leptin levels are much lower than they need to be. So there's kind of a double whammy there. Yeah. So sleep deprivation literally alters your hormone levels in a way that makes you think that you're much hungrier than your actual needs would suggest at that moment. Right. Which just makes you think, okay, I need to elevate my attention to sleep here. And you have a whole bunch of suggestions as well. And the last thing

that you talk about is this notion of retraining, and this brings in movement exercise. And I think so many of us have heard exercise floated increasingly as sort of, you know, this is the most powerful quote medicine for almost everything that ails us in some meaningful way. And again, of course, acknowledging that every individual has different levels of access to different ways of moving their body and possibilities and limitations. So we acknowledge that. And at the same time,

the research around exercise is powerful and you make an interesting connection between exercise, hunger, and cravings as well. Absolutely. Exercise is your best probiotic, your best craving controller, supplement. It is your best mood booster, as you know. And I think it's shown through the studies about the effects of exercise on the brain are countless. What we didn't realize is how much the exercise actually even affects your cravings and your hunger. And I think that we think of it intuitively as like exercise is good for your

body, but we don't often realize that it's actually taming those hunger hormones or that's actually helping us in this path to understanding and controlling our cravings in a positive way. And we get a dopamine burst with exercise. So not only are we producing more satiation and less of the hunger craving hormones, but we're also creating these chemicals in our brain and our gut that are making us feel better. And so when I read the research on cravings and hunger, and then how it affects the gut bacteria, like boost your mood and how

it's just a no brainer. It's the best probiotic, best mood booster, the best cravings buster or whatever. Every different form has been studied. People argue, oh, it's weight training. No, it's walking. No, it's this. I just say any exercise you can do is the best exercise and don't discount walking. A lot of what I do is walking and hiking. And it is a little counterintuitive because you think, well, if I go out for an hour and a half, a two-hour hike in the mountains and I come back, I should be ravenous. I've just, in theory, burned a ton of calories. And often I'm not hungry at all. Even if I was kind of hungry before I left and I come back and I'm kind of like, but shouldn't my body be craving something? And

there's something that was reset. And it's sometimes a signal to me that what was happening before I went out for a walk or a hike is that I was overwhelmed or I was tired or I was stressed. And something got shifted when I moved my body that released that feeling and made me realize when I came back, it actually, it wasn't a biological need for sustenance. It was just, I was trying to deal with something else that was going on by effectively medicating it with a dopamine hit, whatever it is. And for some reason, the exercise dissipated that need. And I came back and I just felt really good. In fact, often I am substantially less hungry after I exercise, at least for sort of

like a window of time. Then of course I'm going to eat. That's what the research says. It's going to calm your cravings and hunger and high intensity exercise, nature-based exercise. There's all these different versions of exercise that has been shown to help it. So I say to people, find the exercise that gives you the results that you want. Like you said, walking and going for hikes is a great way to lower cortisol and to increase that dopamine and serotonin naturally. I also love nature-based

exercise because I think it has a double effect of sunlight, circadian rhythms, but then also that mood boosting effect of just being in nature, as well as the mood boosting effects of moving your body, which almost like a multitasking thing when you do it outdoors. Yeah, I'm right there with you. Feels like a good place for us to come full circle in our conversation. So in this container of a good life project, if I offer up the phrase to live a good life, what comes up? Well, in the spirit of our conversation to live a good life, you have to learn how to save yourself. Thank you. So I love the take the insights of Dr. Aviv Ram and Dr. Amy Shaw as they really dive into hormone health,

gut wisdom, and transforming our relationship with food and our bodies. They have truly illuminated a pioneering path that weaves together ancient traditions with modern science and their compassionate, just whole person approach.

It provides profound new lenses for women to decode the driving forces behind hormone imbalances and cravings. And if you love this episode, be sure to catch the full conversation with today's guests. You can find a link to those episodes in the show notes. This episode of Good Life Project was produced by executive producers, Lindsay Fox and me, Jonathan Fields. Christopher Carter crafted our theme music and special thanks to Shelley Adele for her research on this episode. And of course, if you haven't already done so, please go ahead and follow Good Life Project in your favorite listening app. And if you found this conversation

interesting or inspiring or valuable, and chances are you did since you're still listening here, would you do me a personal favor, a seven second favor and share it maybe on social or by text or by email, even just with one person, just copy the link from the app you're using and tell those, you know, those you love, those you want to help navigate this thing called life a little better. So we can all do it better together with more ease and more joy. Tell them to listen, then even invite them to talk about what you've both discovered. Because when podcasts become conversations and conversations become action, that's how we all come alive together. Until next time, I'm Jonathan Fields, signing off for Good Life Project. Apple Watch Series X. Available for the first time in glossy jet black aluminum.

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