the bossbabe podcast - 184. How To Regulate + Reverse PCOS/Hormonal Conditions With Tallene + Sirak Of PCOS Weight Loss

Episode Date: September 21, 2021

If you’ve ever dealt with PCOS or hormone-related issues, you know how exhausting it can be. So we invited Tallene and Sirak, founders of PCOS Weight Loss. to share how to holistically regulate (and even reverse!) your symptoms. In this episode, we cover the different types of PCOS, the wide range of symptoms to look out for, and share our stories on how we navigate a condition that so many people – including "experts"– know little about.  Plus, we’re unpacking our experiences with intermittent fasting, Keto, holistic lifestyle hacks and supplements you can try so you’re able to self-advocate for your own health.  Links: BossBabe’s FREE 30 Days Of Content Guide Soul CBD Use code BOSSBABE15 at checkout for 15% off Hello Fresh  Use code BOSSBABE14 for up to 14 free meals + free shipping Levels Health Follow: BossBabe: @bossbabe.inc Natalie Ellis: @iamnatalie Danielle Canty: @daniellecanty Tallene and Sirak: @pcos.weightloss PCOS Weight Loss: pcosweightloss.org A Cyster & Her Mister: A PCOS Lifestyle Podcast 

Once I was reversing my symptoms, I was like, how could people not be talking about this? How could I have gone so long suffering without being told one bit of information on how I could control this? Because like you said, we're told to go on birth control and we're kind of convinced that we can't control our own bodies or heal ourselves or you're broken and that's it. That's not the case. Like the body has this amazing ability to heal itself no matter what. Welcome to the Boss Babe podcast, a place where we share the real behind the scenes of building successful businesses, achieving peak performance and learning how to balance it all. So again, this week, you guys, we are balancing

time zones. So me and Danielle did this episode together, but it's just me for the intro. And I thought, well, why not do a quick little life update? I am currently in the UK. We just finished celebrating Stephen's 30th birthday up in Inverness in Scotland. And it was absolutely incredible. We put something together where we had 25 of our family members, two of whom actually work for Boss Babe, no, three of whom that work for Boss Babe. We just brought on a brand new family member. So it's kind of like a Boss Babe retreat, but it was really, really incredible. We had the best time and I just feel so grateful that we got to do that. It was one of those weekends that I just know we're going to remember forever.

We did so many incredible things and just really dropped in and spent time together. So that was amazing. And I'm just loving being home in the UK. It's been way too long. It's never going to be this long again. COVID got in the way, but yeah, I feel so happy being home. Before we dive into this episode, I want to let you know about something. So a lot of you have been DMing me for about a trillion years telling me that you're really struggling with Instagram content, what to post, content ideas, feeling like you do want to do it consistently, but you don't actually know what to post. So I've put together an epic, epic freebie for you. It's called 30 Days of Content. It's completely free, not pretend free, completely free. And what it is, it's a downloadable PDF where I'm basically going to be your social media

manager for 30 days. And in this PDF, I tell you every single day what to post and I outline why you're posting it. So hopefully if you do this consistently by the end of the 30 days, you don't need someone to handhold you and show you what to post because it's already given you that understanding of how to put content together so if you want to grab your copy of that I'm going to put the link in the show notes below make sure you grab it it's not going to be free forever but we've got it out there free for the next couple of weeks so make sure you grab it it's the 30 days of content freebie It's a PDF. It's going to be epic. So with that, let's jump into this episode. I'm really excited because we interviewed Tayleen and Sirach from PCOS Weight Loss. Now, as you're going to hear in this episode, we actually get really real

and we have a real conversation about PCOS and hormone imbalances because PCOS is something that Danielle and I both deal with and have you know tried different things to work with it and overcome it and it was really nice bringing all of our advice together and hearing from Taylene and Sirach who have done some incredible work in this space so I think you're really going to like it whether you have PCOS or you don't if you have any kind of hormonal imbalance or you're not even sure if you do and you want to know what those symptoms might look like, I think you're really, really going to enjoy this episode. Talene Sirac, welcome to the podcast. We're so excited to have you both

here. Hello, thank you for having us. Yes, thank you so much. Well, we are incredibly excited for this conversation because PCOS is something that both Danielle and I have experience with, which is so interesting and also not surprising considering how many women PCOS actually affects. So what I first want to understand, Taylene, is how you first got diagnosed with PCOS? Because I feel like everyone remembers that moment, you know, when they get diagnosed with anything, they really remember what that was like. And so I want to go back to when you first got told you had PCOS, what did that look like for you? I initially was diagnosed with PCOS after having a ruptured ovarian cyst. So after that experience, I was

just told to go on birth control. And I was around 18 years old, really struggling with a lot of symptoms and basically just told to go on birth control without any direction on how to manage my symptoms like weight gain and cravings and anxiety. That's so interesting. And also, I mean, a positive of that is that you were so young when you got diagnosed because for me and Danielle we were I um yeah I was 26 I think and Danielle how you were 30 maybe yeah my first got mentioned when I was around 24 25 but then literally I mean as you're going to share as well I kind of like just band-aided and then really kind of like kicked off the game when I was like 30. Wait I didn't know yours got

mentioned so young for you as well. Yeah well I mean like 25-26 when I first came off the pill and discovered I had a ton of symptoms but then mine was just like it was kind of not even fully diagnosed it was like and a lot of listeners my experience is like, it was kind of not even fully diagnosed. It was like, and a lot of listeners in my experience, it's like, well, you might, we're not really sure. It's a collection of symptoms. You have some of these, but don't worry about it. Just go and take this pill. Like you're getting married soon.

Just go take this pill and just go away. And that was what happened. So I went away for a few years, came off the pill again. I was like, oh no, all this stuff I tried to hide from before is back again. And I'm older. I'm still dealing with this. Acne was my main symptom. Oh my God. It's so interesting and even more of a reason why we need podcasts like this. Because I imagine there's so many women listening, thinking, well, I'm still on the pill. What's

going to happen when I come off it? Or I've some of these symptoms so Taylene can you break down PCOS symptoms a little more something something that people might be experiencing things that you experienced like Danielle mentioned for her it was acne same for me and there were so many different things I never had the weight gain so can you just kind of paint a picture of what it might look like yeah so typically women with PCOS first struggle with ovulation. So all the other symptoms can happen, but the core symptom is struggling with ovulation. And that can look like irregular periods. And then that can result in anxiety, cystic acne, weight gain or not weight gain, or hair loss. Hyperandrogenism is also a symptom of PCOS. So many women have facial hair, acne, hair loss as a side effect as well. And if you're wondering what requires to be diagnosed with PCOS, it's known as the Rotterdam

criteria and you need two out of three. So the first one is ovarian cysts. Second one is irregular periods. And the third one is hyperandrogenism. Now the big misconception is that you have to have ovarian cysts to have PCOS. And that's where like a lot of the misdiagnosis happens. And that's where like we need to spread the awareness because you can still have the other two symptoms and still have PCOS, but still go undiagnosed for years. Yeah that's so interesting I had three out of three but I didn't realize it until I came off of birth control because birth control does such a good job of masking it and with PCOS it's one of those things there's there's a few different types of it and so it might not look like a one-size-fits-all for me people looking at me I was so thin they

would never have thought that I had it. And so I know there are a lot of different types. Can you explain what the different types of PCOS look like? Yeah. So there's typically four main types of PCOS. So it's broken down with inflammation, the first one. Everyone with PCOS has a lot of inflammation. And then the second one is insulin resistance, which 80% of women with PCOS have it. And that really looks like cravings, anxiety,

feeling like you're hungry all the time. And then there's adrenal fatigue, which again, it's in the word fatigue. You feel like eight hours of sleep is not enough. You always want to take a nap. And then the fourth type is hypothyroidism, which you would know if you had lab work done, a complete thyroid panel, and specifically a functional lab test that will give you specific ranges. Can you have more than one or does everyone like fit neatly into a box? No, you can absolutely have more than one. In fact, a lot of women have all the PCOS types and one of them is more dominant than the other. For example, you could be very insulin resistant, but you could sleep totally fine and adrenal fatigue isn't as much of an issue. And maybe

you have just a slight bit of cortisol dysregulation, but not that much. So you would want to focus on healing the insulin resistance first. And this is so interesting as well, because like with a lot of conditions, you know, today's lifestyle as women, we tend to can be like juggling a lot, very stressed, very anxious. It might be particularly with COVID, you know, women had full-time jobs and had then children at home as well. And all of a sudden, hang on, I mean, everyone knows being a mother is a full-time job in itself as well as like managing a business or like having a career. And so how does stress impact PCOS and these symptoms? Because, you know, the ones that you've described, I, as my background in medicine and as chiropractic, can see how already you add stress into the mix of this and you get this negative loop

that starts occurring. Yeah, stress can trigger a lot of blood sugar issues and then that triggers PCOS symptoms. Stress is one of the major parts of managing PCOS, I'd say, because a lot of women, they don't realize that their lifestyle is triggering that stress or even their workouts that are super intense can be triggering that stress or even pieces of advice like intermittent fasting or keto that can be stressful on your body. And everyone's telling us to do that. And then as a result, we have cortisol dysregulation and wake up exhausted and then go to sleep and get poor quality sleep. Then that triggers more blood sugar issues and cravings and all the other PCOS symptoms. And so going back to the different types that there

is, you said with inflammation, a lot of people that have PCOS have inflammation. Can you describe what inflammation is or what symptoms of that might look like? Symptoms would look like weight plateau or skin issues like cystic acne or feeling bloated, having digestive problems. That can be a major sign of inflammation. And typically inflammation comes from the foods we're eating or our environmental conditions, maybe toxins in the environment that could be triggering it over a period of time. So oftentimes we see gluten and dairy being very triggering for inflammation in women with PCOS. Got it. So going back to your journey, you found out pretty young that you had it. You went on the pill and it sounds like you decided

you were going to stop taking the pill and you were going to take a more holistic approach. How did you identify what kind of PCOS you had? What did you then do to heal it? And what did you notice the results of that being? Did PCOS just disappear for you? Well, it took me a while of research to figure out that there were even PCOS types. So several years of PCOS management had passed before I realized that. So it was really a confusing journey for me. And that's why we're here to like make it more streamlined for people so that they can know what steps to take. But basically I had a lot of inflammation, a lot of insulin resistance, and a lot of adrenal fatigue. And I could tell from blood work too, because my inflammatory markers were like 10 times higher than they should be.

My glucose levels, my blood sugar was out of control, pre-diabetic. And then adrenal issues, I had cortisol dysregulation, we could tell on my blood work. So at the time, I didn't really know that there were PCOS types, but as a result, my naturopathic doctor did tell me, you have to change your diet to more anti-inflammatory foods, try gluten and dairy-free, see if it helps. Or for insulin resistance, once he said pre-inflammatory foods, try gluten and dairy free, see if it helps or for insulin resistance. Once he said pre-diabetic, I was like, I'm never eating sugar again. That's terrifying. And I was in college, I had no idea, I would eat whatever. And then again, being in college, the stress hormones, I really had to nail that at the time I think this

is the important thing as well like you know quite often we can kind of come into this okay you get that like diagnosis and that's an amazing thing to be like okay there's a label for it and then you're kind of waiting for this like okay there's this one thing I'm gonna do that's gonna fix this and that's what I think is so challenging with PCOS as well as I actually it's so many different elements that you kind of need to come at it from so many different angles and one thing I've really experienced with that is actually it's been really difficult to find out what works for me it's taken I mean I'm I'm on my journey right now and it's definitely taking lots of trial and error to try and understand my own body. So what was some of the things that you

did in a holistic way that allowed you to start piecing it together specifically for you? That's a great question. There's just so much advice out there and you have to try it and try it and try it and see what works for you. So it could be really frustrating. I can imagine. But for me, I did, for example, I tried keto and that was really stressful on my body. I was really miserable. And clearly that was a sign that that's not going to work for me. So can I just ask you, you're saying that was not working for you. So you're saying, was it just a feeling? You're like, oh, this just feels like I'm miserable. Or were you monitoring like your blood glucose levels? Like how are you determining that it

wasn't right for you? It was a feeling. I had adrenal fatigue. So when I was doing keto, I was like, I had anxiety and stress to a whole new level. Like it shouldn't be that way when you're managing PCOS, it should be healing and feeling better and feeling good while you do what you're doing, not miserable. So, you know, even if you're going to reduce your carbs, it's slowly reducing it, not being super restrictive all at once, because whatever you're going to do should be a lifetime approach. If you can do it forever, then you shouldn't be miserable forever doing it. Do you know what I'm saying? If I was miserable on keto,

I'm going to be miserable in 10 years on keto and that's not necessary. That's such a good way of looking at it. I really like that. What else did you try? I tried intermittent fasting, which did work for me. So I do a 12 hour fast in the evenings, most evenings that I can after dinner, you know, making sure I'm not eating for 12 hours or snacking at night. And that feels good for me. But for some women that might be stressful and they might not get good sleep because they're going to bed hungry. So for some women, it could be that they would drink tea with collagen protein in it and have a little like peanut butter before bed, a snack to help stabilize their blood sugar while they sleep. So again, it's different.

Yeah. And I can really relate too, because I tried keto and intermittent fasting and both of them didn't work for me. So I have lean PCOS. I generally have, you know, I'm blessed with good genetics around being pretty lean. And what happened when I took a meal away and I was reducing carbs, I lost so much weight. Like I remember going down to a really low weight number and I was finding it really hard to get enough calories in during my eating window. And I could feel the stress that was having on my system. And it's just so interesting how one thing might work so well for another. I know, Danielle, you do pretty well with fasting as well. And the minute

I try it, I'm just like, I feel really weak. I feel like anxious and sweaty. It's so interesting how there are like so many different approaches. Yeah. I actually do really well on fasting, but I don't do well on keto. Like it doesn't really suit me to have such high fats. Um, but one thing I'm actually doing right now is I actually have the blood. I'm monitoring my blood glucose levels via the levels monitor actually. Um, we'll have to put a link in the bio for that or link in the show notes, but I'm monitoring that. And it's been really, really interesting seeing like what spikes me and what's not and understanding why mine's really dropping. Cause I'm really curious as to what my blood sugar is doing is actually impacting my PCOS.

So this is kind of like a new avenue that I've explored from going through things and being like, hang on a minute, this doesn't quite feel right, but I don't know what's quite up. And so Natalie's utilized it previously. And I'm like, okay, I'm like gathering the data right now. I'm in it. I'm in this app going, ooh, interesting. Yeah.

And just to follow on that too, if anyone's really interested, we did a podcast with Casey, Dr. Casey Means from Levels. And it was really interesting when I started doing that, I had spikes up and down. I was just like the most crazy rollercoaster I've ever seen. And through using that, firstly, I identified I did have insulin resistance, which I kept telling myself for the longest time I didn't. And I managed to change my blood sugar into what looks like waves where there really aren't many spikes up and down, which again, had such a massive impact on me. And I'm curious, Helene,

what did you notice for you that helped with your insulin resistance and moved you out of a place that was pre-diabetic? Because I also got told that and I was the same. I'm like, I'm never touching sugar ever again. Oh my God. Well, I was definitely more mindful of my sugar intake. I was in college. So when they said pre-diabetic, I was like, I took that sugar out for sure. But it doesn't end there because inflammation, that PCOS type can trigger insulin resistance. So I had a lot of inflammation. It was clear from my blood work too, and my skin and everything. And when I went gluten and dairy free, not only did that reduce inflammation, but it helped with my insulin response as well because dairy is like a carb. It's spiking up your insulin every time

you eat it. Let's take a quick pause to talk about my new favorite all-in-one platform, Kajabi. You know I've been singing their praises lately because they have helped our business run so much smoother and with way less complexity, which I love. Not to mention our team couldn't be happier because now everything is in one place so it makes collecting data, creating pages, collecting payment, all the things so much simpler. One of our mottos at Boss Babe is simplify to amplify and Kajabi has really helped us do that this year. So of course I needed to share it here with you. It's the perfect time of year to do a bit of spring cleaning in your business, you know, get rid of the complexity and instead really focus on getting

organized and making things as smooth as possible. I definitely recommend Kajabi to all of my clients and students. So if you're listening and haven't checked out Kajabi yet now is the perfect time to do so because they are offering Boss Babe listeners a 30-day free trial go to kajabi.com slash boss babe to claim your 30-day free trial that's kajabi.com slash boss babe and also one of your favorite supplements ovacetol you found like to be really helpful with insulin resistance right yeah that was a game changer because it doesn't end with diet especially when your body it's a problem things are triggering and yeah okay you can change your diet but you still need to supplement it if you have the genetic disposition predisposition of pcos so ovacetol was a game changer yeah i really second that i've had

a lot of success with that supplement it's been really really helpful yeah i actually haven't tried it yet i've got it but i haven't added it in because i was like okay i want to see what it's like without first as i'm monitoring and collecting all this data right now and then my plan is to add that in and see how it kind of translates so i'll definitely keep everyone posted on our solos and that. I mean, I do. Yeah, I do. It's really interesting because ovacetol is basically an inositol supplement. And inositols are the most researched supplement for PCOS. So at least there is some very useful research on it.

And there's a lot of research comparing it to metformin. So a lot of people with PCOS are prescribed metformin as a first drug for insulin resistance. And the thing is that metformin can help with insulin resistance, but it comes with a lot of side effects. So research has shown that inositols work just as effectively as metformin, but metformin has five times the amount of side effects. So it's like a prescription versus like a natural. Of course, everyone's different, but it's at least the research is out there for anyone looking for it yeah yeah and i know you sell your own version too so people can definitely go and find that on your instagram if they're interested you sell a powdered version is that right i've only i've been taking the capsules

do you prefer one over the other yeah we are an affiliate yeah it's not it's not our supplement but we're an affiliate for ovacet's not our supplement, but we're an affiliate for ovacetol. It's basically what we mentioned earlier. I think you can take the powder or tablet, both the same. I take the powder. They don't have tablets for atherologics because the powder is 4,000 milligrams when you take it twice a day. And I do suggest that one because it's a combination of myo- and d-chiroinositol, 40 to 1 ratio, which is really effective with insulin resistance. And so you recommend 4,000 milligrams twice a day, did you say? 2,000 in the morning and 2,000 in the evening. So a total of 4,000 per day,

because that's the dosage that they use in the research studies. Yeah. And it's hard to get that dosage with pills. You'd have to swallow a lot of pills. So that's why they have a powder. Got it. Okay. Oh, that is interesting because I absolutely hate taking pills. So I'm always up for the powders and what I can combine them in. So this is good for me to know. Yeah. i love taking pills for some reason i mine is is that is that correct ratio i need to see how many milligrams is but i take four a day i'm gonna go check though um because i'm that kind of weird person i can saw like 10 at a time it doesn't bother me i know i'm the same way i have like i take four fish oils and like a multivitamin and like one in one gulp like i don't even have time to separate them i can't imagine some people look

at me they're like what's wrong with you so italian i'm super interested just because we've already spoke a lot about diet and i want to get to so many other elements of it but i'm really curious what a typical day of food looks like for you now now okay so Okay. So typically, let's see, in the mornings, I'll wake up, I'll have maybe a smoothie with lots of protein and almond butter and spinach, some cruciferous vegetables to like detox estrogen. And I'm always thinking of these things while I'm like putting the ingredients together. I just want to detox my estrogen. And then let's see. So after the smoothie, I'm pretty good until lunchtime. And lunchtime, I've been trying to do vegan lunches, or I do like a gluten and dairy free sandwich. And it's easy because like Sirach likes to eat

gluten and dairy, I mean, a regular sandwich. So I just swap the bread and then I'm able to make the same lunch for us. And then let's see. Afterwards, I'll probably have a snack around three o'clock or four o'clock because I can't really go from like 12 all the way to seven without eating something. So I'll probably have a piece of fruit and some nuts or a little like bite of leftovers from the night before. And then at dinner, I always make fresh dinner. I don't really order something. It's usually a 30-minute meal, really quick, gluten and dairy-free, steamed vegetables, quinoa.

What did you make last night? Explain what you made. Oh, Tuesday night, you made the salmon and millet or millet. Oh, yeah. I made millet. Do you guys know how to pronounce that grain? It's a gluten. No idea. I have no

idea, but I made millet with salmon and some like gluten-free teriyaki sauce on top. Um, and then steamed, uh, green beans with garlic. And it was just this easy 30 minute meal. Now I'm getting hungry. This is something delicious. so I was just gonna say and then you take the supplements like with the food or after the food or before how does that work you can take the ovacetol with the food I prefer with the food to help with blood sugar control because if you take it on an empty stomach it might drop your blood sugar so I take it with breakfast and then with dinner and then I take my other supplements just like in the morning yeah and one thing that we like to recommend is for breakfast is to focus on something with high

protein so 30 to 40 grams of protein for breakfast is ideal and that really helps with reducing cravings especially if you have insulin resistance what does that look like in practical terms like how much because i don't really know how much like protein is that it's kind of hard to get it all you have to put protein powder that sounds like a lot i don't think i'm eating that much protein it's not it's just you can throw in the protein powder and then you put in the almond butter and you're at 30 and it's like nor you you don't even realize they're even like chicken breasts, you've already hit 30. Not that you're having that for breakfast, but for lunch or dinner, you want to have protein.

Yeah, like for breakfast, you can have eggs with just the small protein shake. Yeah. It's good. You can put collagen in your eggs to amp up the protein. Oh, smart. Do you know how much protein, say like a tablespoon of almond butter or eggs might have on average eggs have seven grams each yeah and the almond butter is like seven grams of protein per tablespoon yeah okay got it so you could do like if you had i know the protein that i love is organifi and i think

it's 20 grams of protein so i could do like like a bit extra that's 25 and then like a tablespoon of almond butter and i'd probably hit it right yeah yeah that'd be pretty good okay i could probably do with upping my protein then i'm also really interested listening to this because i actually normally fast i like eat later and then i will fast right until 12 so So I never have breakfast, but I'm curious. So you actually start your fast more around like 8 p.m. And then you're fasting until 8 a.m. Yeah, exactly. Because for me, I find it stressful. But if you feel good and you're waking up rejuvenated and you feel fine,

then it works for you, you know? I think that's one big takeaway from this as well that I'm hearing. It's like listening into your body, listening into intuition and not necessarily doing things because it's worked for somebody else I mean Natalie and I have already established there's like big differences between how we function and what we like to consume and when and so I think like just like you say like understanding to understand your own body I feel like it's such a shame we don't all come with our own manuals it's like okay this is what's going to suit you but like starting to piece that that together and starting to you know I guess the other key thing is like tracking it maybe just keeping a little diary and hey like giving yourself

out 10 like how am I feeling today like how did I feel when I was outside of that routine or that or when I ate these pieces or using something like levels which tracks your blood glucose so yeah I'm really really interested and I want to talk a little bit now, Talene, about, you know, you are going through this journey and like we've discussed, like when you get diagnosed with PCOS and, you know, you might be lucky enough to have a doctor that like points you in the right direction or naturopaths, et cetera. But my personal experience was not like that at all. Like I said earlier, like I got kind of told initially, then just band-aid it, just go back on the pill, don't bother us, go away. And then when I came off the pill again, when I was like older, it being like, oh, actually I still have all the exact same symptoms

I had before. And now I'm in California. And again, my gynecologist did not want to know at all. She was just like off on your way. Like, yeah, you probably got this, like really had no advice, nothing to offer. So I'm really curious as to like, you know, you started doing this research and when did you start realizing that actually people needed to kind of hear what you were learning? Well, once I was reversing my symptoms, I was like, how could people not be talking about this? Like, how could I have gone so long suffering without being told one bit of information on how I could control this? Because we're kind of, like you said, we're told to go on birth control and we're kind of convinced that we can't control our own bodies or heal ourselves or you're broken and that's it.

That's not the case. Like the body has this amazing ability to heal itself, no matter what, you know, you can improve your symptoms with PCOS. So why shouldn't everyone know this? Why are we suffering? I feel like it's just for no reason. Yeah. I mean, the naturopathic doctors too, like, I didn't know what that was. I was in college, maybe like a freshman or sophomore. I had no idea that there was naturopathic medicine, but I knew that there had to be something other than the gyno. So then I looked into that and I saw this whole new world of people who are reversing PCOS for their patients. And I'm really curious when you talk about reversing PCOS, have you gotten to a place now where you have absolutely no symptoms of PCOS? And if so, have you ever gone through periods of time where you have found symptoms come back

and then go away? How has that looked for you? I can say now I'm at a point where my symptoms are reversed and I'm not struggling with any of them. My period's regular. My weight is not going up uncontrollably. I feel fine. I'm not bloated my skin, but as soon as I eat gluten and dairy, it's back. Or as soon as I'm not managing my stress and something happens and for a chronic period of time, it's back because PCOS is there forever. It's not going to just go away and then you can revert back to what you used to do and you'll be fine. No, it'll come back in its own ways. And so I even had lab work done and I found that everything was good. My thyroid was a little bit hypo. So now I'm taking supplements

for it. So I really suggest getting yearly lab work to make sure that everything's within range and see what you can do because life is dynamic like things are going to happen it's not going to be perfect and that's fine so it's good to keep up with your labs and see what you can do i feel like managing pcrs is kind of like you know we all understand the concept of managing our weight it's like you know if you're going to the gym you're only going to have that muscle for as long as you're going to the gym. Like if you stop going, you're going to get like that muscle wasting. And I guess it's the same kind of thing, right? As long as you are, you know, managing your PCOS is going to be probably hopefully quite dormant if you can get

it to that point. And then when you're not, yeah, you're going to have flare ups and you're starting to see the things that do cause that. So I think this will as well be a lot of mindset shifts for a lot of people who've been previously diagnosed because it's not like a diagnosis where it's like, okay, this is what it is. This is what it is forever. It's like, no, it's kind of has dormancies, right? It kind of can be active and dormant in like many ways for a lot of people if it's managed incorrectly or correctly. Exactly.

And that's why it's really important going back to what Talin said. She's able to put her symptoms into remission, but she has to manage what she's doing. And that's why it's really important to find a sustainable approach. Earlier, we talked about keto. And keto can be helpful at first, but imagine doing keto for the rest of your life, eating less less than 40 30 grams a day like is that really going to be sustainable for pcos so that's why we like we love recommending going at least trying to go gluten dairy free for 30 days to see if it can help you or at least finding a sustainable approach like finding your carb tolerance and things like that to help you find that approach yeah and did you notice on scans that your cysts completely

went away yeah after a good i think it was one year later i had an ultrasound done again and she said there were no cysts and since then i've had no cysts maybe for like 10 years i haven't had any cysts and there was like a string of girls like all over my ovaries. What about like your fertility? Typically the salmon story. This is so funny. The other, like a year ago, when I went to the gyno,

I actually go yearly to make sure there's no cysts. That's just the thing. Like I feel like doing, no one ever told me to do that, but I just do that. Anyways, I went like a year ago and I was ovulating when she did the ultrasound and she's like nope you're fine i see an egg you're as fertile as a salmon swimming upstream i was like oh my god and then this is after like whereas 10 years ago the doctor

had told you yeah you might have difficulty with fertility and things and yeah she said i was like premenopausal and just like not you know know, I should have kids immediately. I was like, what are you saying? I'm like 20. That's one thing I actually have found is that how they talk about your fertility can be super, super insensitive. And like, you know, just like you hearing that and, you know, I'm, I come from medical background, so I very much understand the importance of being in the know. And I also understand the effects of the placebo effect, right? Like if you're like, we know that your mind is also powerful in medicine. And I also like wonder, like, you know, when you're 20, just to be told that, like, how true is that in that

moment? Like, is that necessary to say to a 20 year old oh my goodness you have all these symptoms you should have children immediately as you're probably never going to have children like I remember being like told like some pretty like some pretty like scary stuff when I was like I said about 24 25 and I was like whoa um and I'm like how helpful is it to like actually hear this when you're not giving any advice and like putting context and putting it into, okay, these are the things where you're at now, but this is where you can move to and this is the control you can take and these things can change versus like, oh yeah, you might be infertile. Oh, great. Okay, fine. For some people, it can be really devastating and make them spiral.

Anxiety, depression. That's why women with pcos have 40 to 50 percent increased uh depression and anxiety like because of yeah it'll just make you spiral or for some people like motivate you to figure out other solutions but most people are just going to spiral and freak out yeah like why would you i think it's so unnecessary to say that i would say if i was a doctor i'd'd be like, well, it looks like your ovarian health is not like where it could be. So I think you should consider working with somebody to manage your blood sugar because that has a huge impact on your ovaries. Like if you can manage

insulin and inflammation really well for three months, you can change the whole picture of your ovaries. That follicle, that egg can ovulate, you know, but if your inflammation insulin are not under control, then it's going to form a cyst. It's going to be a problem, right? So you have three months to, that's why ovacetol comes in a three month supply because that's how long it takes consistent effort to change the picture of your ovaries. Nobody tells you that when you're diagnosed, it's like a sentence. It's like done. This is how you are. You're broken. Get out. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm, and I'm glad you mentioned the three month thing too, because that's something that I learned. And I think it's really important to know. Otherwise you Otherwise, you might end up thinking that

what you're doing isn't working. You do it for a month and you don't see results. When I was first on my healing journey, I would do a couple of things for a month or two and I wouldn't see results. But then a couple of months later, I would see a result. And I was starting to link that and realizing that if you do something for 90 days, then you will see results in your menstrual cycle. But just for anyone listening who needs optimism, also, I had the exact same issue when I first got diagnosed with PCOS. I got told I wasn't ovulating. I'd really struggled with fertility. And the last time I went to the gynecologist, I was ovulating. He was like, yeah, you're really healthy. This is great. This is exactly what we want to see. And so it's so possible to reverse it. It's just not buying into what you get told.

And I'm really curious, on top of dietary changes, are there any other things that you've added in or taken out of your lifestyle that you think has also really moved the needle with your healing journey? Yeah, definitely workouts. Like once I met my husband and he taught me weight training and PCOS friendly, slow weighted workouts, game changer. Because before that I was doing like kickboxing, CrossFit, oh my gosh, and not seeing any results and getting more anxiety. Yeah. And that goes back to like earlier what we said is like a lot of women with PCOS, when they go to the doctor, they're just told to cut calories and work out hard as possible to lose that stubborn weight gain or whichever symptoms that they're experiencing. And it just,

that can only make the issue worse because when you do, when you go to the gym and you're going there for hours and hours trying to like lose weight, you're really impacting one, your stress hormones, your cortisol levels, you're spiking those cortisol levels, which a lot of them with PCOS have cortisol dysregulation. So when you do those intense workouts, those cortisol levels don't come back down as easily. And then your left, you know, that impacts your sleep, your left feeling stress impacts your insulin levels so much more. And not to mention, like there's also insulin resistance when you, for example, run for hours, your body actually dumps a lot of sugar into your bloodstream to use for energy. But when you have insulin resistance, which 80% of women PCOS have, that sugar converts to fat instead. So you're

trying your best and it's like resulting in weight gain or weight plateau. I was cycling like crazy and running five miles a day and not realizing that it's having a worse effect on my blood sugar control. That's so, so fascinating. And what else outside of working out? Do you have any kind of daily practices or rituals or routines that are helpful? Yeah, definitely a nightly wind down. We like do that together, you know, just try to put the phones away as best as we can read, see that plays the guitar and, uh, try not to look at screens, light a candle, keep it calm so that when we go to bed, it's quality sleep, you know, eight hours of quality sleep because it's huge. You really want to focus on the melatonin production in the evening and

want to reduce the cortisol level. So that's one, removing blue light because the blue light is going to raise the cortisol level back up. And therefore, it can be harder to sleep or still have a full, you know, good night of sleep. So definitely put away the blue light after like 8, 9 p.m. if you can. And yeah, try to focus on reducing stress. Also things that touch my body, like products, for example, makeup or shampoo conditioner, or what's it called? Not dish soap, sorry. Laundry detergent. These things that are rubbing against your body. Endocrine disruptors. They're endocrine disruptors. It's absorbing into your skin. It's the biggest organ

in your body. You're just absorbing all this toxicity and you have to be careful what you're using, like these anti-aging products. What do they have in them? Why are they anti-aging? Are they affecting your hormones or even makeup? You know, I love makeup and like, especially if you have cystic acne, yes, like makeup is so much fun and it works so well, but what is it doing? Because it's absorbing into your skin every day. So I've totally transitioned my makeup routine, but look, it's like 10 years later, there's so many things you can do. Like 10 years later, I'm still doing new things for my PCOS. And I think that's the thing with female hormones. There's so much coming out year on and year on because we had Cindy Echo on the Boss

Way podcast twice, actually. She was the woman who was responsible for bringing the first female Viagra to the market. And she was just saying though, that the problem is for research into male hormones versus female hormones, the discrepancy spent by pharmaceutical companies is just like astronomically different. And so we're so far behind the times of ruin. And let's face it, female hormones are very, very complicated compared to men. So they also need that investigation too. And I think we're only just like at the tip of the iceberg to starting to understand it. And I think the more that we have these types of conversations, because that's certainly something I've never felt like.

I've never felt like this was an open topic. Like there was never a place that you found as well, Tilly and I, like, you know, who is having these conversations? How do I know that other women are suffering from this? Yeah, maybe I might mention it to one girlfriend that I go to lunch with, but like, where is the global conversation about this? And I'm starting to see that movement now where people are being more open. Like we're all open on here and not necessarily seeing it as like a detrimental thing with it. We're like,

oh my goodness, we have this problem. It's like more of an empowering thing. Like, hey, we have this challenge. We're working through it. We're taking ownership of it and like really starting to educate ourselves and hopefully more people like women, especially that do that and start going, actually, I'm not going to take, I'm not going to take the contraceptive pill as an answer to masking it and then having to deal with it 10 years later or five years later. I'm actually going to try and figure this thing out. Hopefully that's when we'll restart seeing those waves and like you were discovering, okay, yeah, detergents, that's going to make a difference. Makeup might make a difference. Blue light make a difference. So I'm excited for like where we'll be in five years time, you know, maybe even understanding

this even more. All the little things add up, you know, it's, it's not that like I changed my makeup and healed my symptoms. It's that I took the care to swap, you know, everything in the house to be more toxin free and like, even bpa is adding to your repertoire add to the repertoire of pcos management i love it and we also did if anyone's interested a podcast with ben greenfield and i said to him on there i'm like hey ben i don't feel very good when i'm fasting why like what everyone's telling me i should and said, what's really interesting is so much of the research, especially the biohacking research out there, if it's done on women at all, which a lot of it isn't, it's done on women who've already went through menopause. And the reason is when

women are menstruating at different points in their cycle, there's so many different hormone levels going on that it's really hard to conduct studies because there's so many variations so they'll either not use women at all or they'll use women who've gone through menopause and so there's a lack of real research for women who menstruate and so it's just so important to listen to your own body and just because biohackers or people on instagram are saying do this do that if you try it and it doesn't work for you just say no and continue like you say building your own repertoire and giving yourself the grace to do that right exactly and investigating i was gonna i was gonna mention those studies earlier too but danielle mentioned that she was intermittent fasting so

i don't want to mention because of that educate me i might not be after this uh wearing this levels i'm starting to see differences so i'm like absolutely and the studies done on like keto and intermittent fasting just as daniel sorry natalie mentioned was that they're done predominantly on men and on women who are in their menopausal or premenopausal stage so not on women who are in their reproductive stage so that's why you just have to be careful like just because the study says it like natalie said just like you don't have to automatically think it will work for you you have to just try it out and see if it works for you yeah yeah exactly well both of you i'm so grateful for you coming on the podcast and just having these open conversations you, healing isn't this linear journey

where you walk through a door and you're healed and things never come back. And it's so nice just to open up conversation and talk about where we're all at and what's working and what's not and showing people that every single journey is really different. Where can everyone find out about you both,

your programs, and also the the supplement that you recommend you can find us at pcosweightloss.org that's where you can join our membership program the sisterhood and we also have really very helpful free resources such as a quiz to help you find your pcos type so we talked about earlier the four main types of pcos if you're thinking which one you might be we we have a quiz. You answer some questions and it helps you get started on your PCOS journey. Of course, it's not a diagnosis, but still very helpful. And we have our podcast, A Sister and Her Mister. Sister is spelled-

Ooh, that's so smart. I love that. Sister, that's like polycystic ovarian syndrome. So A Sister and Her Mister can be found anywhere where podcasts are listened. And also our Instagram,OS dot weight loss. We have daily tips every single day, especially my wife telling she puts like what she eats every day, as well as like her nightly routine, all the fun stuff that if you click our link in bio, you'll find a link for ovacetol, the supplement we suggest for insulin resistance. Amazing. Thank you both so much. Thank you. Okay. Just quickly before we go, we have got something really exciting coming up for you with the Boss Babe podcast. I want to make sure you know about it so that you don't miss out

because several months ago ago Natalie and I were talking about this business and how we're wanting to see it grow and we both agreed that we wanted to make the podcast a top priority for us both. Now you guys already know the Boss Baby podcast is where we share the real behind the scenes of building successful businesses, achieving people's performance and learning how to balance it all. But now we're going even deeper. We're talking about divorce, we're talking about parenting, we're talking about money, sex, mental health and really just starting over. We're having conversations we've never had before, covering topics nobody else does and painting an even clearer picture for our listeners of what it really means

to actually be a boss babe. So I want you to do this one thing. Go straight to your podcast now, go into your subscription and mark subscribe, whether that's on Apple, on Spotify, wherever it is. And I want you to mark your calendar for October the 4th that week, because we have some freaking epic things coming up. Okay, so go and mark subscribe so that you do not miss out because trust me, you are going to want to make sure you're listening to this podcast every single week.