The Dylan Gemelli Podcast - Episode #15 Featuring Cynthia Thurlow! THE ULTIMATE WELLNESS GUIDE! The role of muscle in aging and health, hormonal influences on physical activity, ...

Episode Date: April 1, 2025

Episode #15 Featuring Cynthia Thurlow!! The ULTIMATE WELLNESS EPISODE! Get ready to improve your health and wellness today! Dylan and Cynthia dive deep into many topics including The role of muscle in aging and health, hormonal influences on physical activity, intermittent fasting, misconceptions on muscle gain for women, the importance of protein, understanding fats and their impact, the role of fiber and gut health, creatine, Urolithin A and much more!! This is an episode your health will thank you for listening to!!     Listen to Cynthia's Podcast Here https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/everyday-wellness-with-cynthia-thurlow/id1435214303   Visit Cynthia's Homepage Here https://www.cynthiathurlow.com/   Follow Cynthia on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/cynthia_thurlow_/?hl=en ______________________________________________________________________   Today's episode is sponsored by Apollo Neuro!   Get the Apollo Neuro for $90 OFF!! USE CODE GEMELLI to save https://apolloneuro.com/gemelli _______________________________________________________________________________ To PURCHASE MITOPURE visit Dylan's landing page and use code DYLAN to save 20% OFF!! https://shop.timeline.com/DYLAN     TONUM supplements for the MIND AND BODY!   USE CODE "DYLAN" to save!!  https://www.tonum.com/DYLAN     THE BREAKTHROUGH MIMIO HEALTH FASTING MIMETIC SUPPLEMENT!  20% OFF with code Gemelli  https://mimiohealth.sjv.io/c/6588260/3323599/30611     TRULY Increase Your NAD LEVELS with WONDERFEEL NMN: https://getwonderfeel.com/?utm_source=DylanGemelli&utm_medium=podcast     MESCREEN: The world's first and only at home mitochondrial efficiency test Save $100 with CODE   DYLAN   https://mescreen.com/cart/47561239626013:1?discount=&ref=DYLAN       HIRE DYLAN ON THE MINNECT APP HERE: expert.minnect.com/@DylanGemelli     Follow Dylan on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and Tiktok @dylangemelli and PLEASE SUBSCRIBE and leave reviews!!   MAKE SURE TO GO TO DYLAN'S YOUTUBE CHANNEL for MORE video content!!    https://www.youtube.com/@DylanGemelliBiohacking Email Dylan for booking, collaborations and/or to apply for the Dylan Gemelli Podcast [e-mail] Visit Dylan's Homepage https://dylangemelli.com

Today's episode is sponsored by Apollo Neuro. Apollo is the leading doctor recommended wearable technology. Apollo's award-winning smart vibes AI works effortlessly behind the scenes, automatically integrating into your life to deliver gentle, personalized vibrations that activate your vagus nerve, helping you fall asleep faster, stay asleep longer, and wake up balanced, focused, and ready each day. Not only that, but the Apollo Neuro is the first and only wearable that improves your HRV. Apollo is effortless. Simply wear it throughout the day and night and let it do the work

for you. It's safe for anyone and everyone with no side effects and is the only wearable that can be worn anywhere on your body. Optimal health requires both the mind and body to be in line and Apollo is the key to establishing that connection. Check the description below to save $90 with my special discount. Take control over your health today with Apollo Neuro. Welcome back to the Dillon Melly podcast, everyone, and I am extremely excited today. I have a very, very special guest to bring you. So I've got a lot to tell you about her. She is globally recognized as an expert in nutrition and intermittent fasting. She's an extremely highly sought after speaker. She is the CEO and founder of the Everyday Wellness Project. She's also a nurse practitioner with over 15 million views for her

second TEDx talk, which was on intermittent fasting, a transformational tech. She has over 20 years experience in health and wellness. She's a globally recognized expert in intermittent fasting transformation and nutritional health. She was featured on ABC Fox 5, KTLA, CW, and the Megan Kelly Show. And she has an amazing bestselling book called Interminute Fasting Transformation. It's a 45-day program for women to lose stubborn weight, improve hormonal health and slow aging. I could keep going on, but I'm going to stop there. So we'll get into everything else about her.

But my friends, this is Cynthia Thurlow. Welcome, Cynthia. So great to connect with you, Dylan. Thank you so much for taking the time. I know how busy you are. And I really appreciate you, you know, putting aside some time for me in my audience. Absolutely. Hey, I just submitted my second book manuscript.

So I feel like a thousand pound gorilla's off my shoulders. And so it's like my team is even excited for me because I feel like I can get back to connecting with people like yourself and being able to share really good information that helps women and men lead their very best lives. I truly, truly appreciate it. And we'll get into your book. Well, both of your books, too. So let's start with this because you've done a ton.

I've watched a ton of your work. You have a great podcast. I know I'm sure a ton of people out there listening are aware of a lot of the things you do. But you know this and I know this. We all have a story. Some of them are a little boring. Some of them are, there's a pretty extensive background to our stories on why we end up doing what we do. I've read yours, I know it, but I don't know enough detail.

I'd love to hear it in the audience. What were some things that transpired in your life that shifted your wants and desires to go in the direction that you've gone with health, intermittent fasting? Can you kind of just get into that and explain what happened? Yeah. So first and foremost, I'm an adrenaline junkie. I trained in inner city Baltimore. I was an ER nurse and later became a nurse practitioner and kind of settled nicely into cardiology. I love everything about acutely sick patients and kind of the intellectual rigor of medicine.

And, you know, I did both of the same things many of us do. I got through graduate school. I got married. I had children. And I had a child, have a child that developed life-learning food allergies. And as a traditional allopathic trained provider, we learn little to nothing about nutrition. And this little guy who's now six feet tall and plays college lacrosse, you know, at the time, the allergist said to me, carry an epipen and pray.

Honest to God, that's what she told me to do. Here, I'm looking at my little two-year-old. And I was devastated because I didn't realize, first and foremost, that having been an ER nurse, having worked in hospitals, I know what happens when people enjoy. foods they're allergic to, they can die. That's serious. Right. And at the time, kind of the food landscape was not like it is now, that there was not as much awareness around food allergies 20 years ago. Jack, it will be 20 in August. And it really shifted my perspective about nutrition. What was it about our food supply that was contributing to this increasing escalating rates of

food allergies? That was number one. And I read a book called The Unhealthy Truth by Robin O'Brien, which I recommend almost on a daily basis as being a book that changed my life. It made me so angry to understand, you know, food lobbying and a lot of the food legislation that went on and what could be some of the reasons why we're seeing greater amounts of food allergies, especially in children, and only 30% of kids while they're outgrow their food allergies. So I suddenly became very interested in nutrition. And that started to shift me a bit.

I thought initially, like, maybe I'm going to go to graduate, maybe I'm going to go back to school and I'm going to a PhD. And so I took one class. I honest guy, I took one class in one semester. I de-enrolled from the program I was in and went home and said, no, I don't want to do a PhD. Because all of the people that were there as lovely as they were, as smart as they were, they were interested in writing policy. And I was like, I'm a clinician.

I want to be able to direct patient care. That's what's most important. And then so I kind of sat on what was the next thing to do. I'm still very young. And then I read another book called Ethi Oaks. And Ethi Oaks kind of shifted everything. reached out to the woman who wrote the book, Liz Wolfe, and I said, where did you get your nutrition training from? And so she told me, and the next day I signed up for the certification

in nutrition, and that lit me up. And that really shifted everything for me. I was still going to work and writing prescriptions and admitting patients and dealing with sick people. But my mindset was starting to shift in terms of what I wanted my focus to be. And the power of nutrition was so clear that if I could get my patients to change the way they ate, that could be very transformative. And then the other piece was, like most middle-aged women, you know, I was in my early 40s. And I was dealing with weight loss resistance. I was never someone that had struggled with weight loss resistance and everything I was telling my patients, count calories, exercise more, eat less. None of those things were working. And then I stumbled upon Jason Fung's work. And obviously, he's a physician, he's a nephrologist.

And I was like, well, heck, if he's talking about this and he's talking about the science behind it, then it's clearly something I should consider. And so I started intermittent fasting. Now, I'll fast forward to probably a year later. And by then I was becoming increasingly disillusioned being in traditional allopathic medicine. And maybe I had a very small subsect of patients that were interested in changing the way they ate and were interested in eating less often. And so I took a tremendous leap of faith that's almost nine years ago. I left traditional alopathic medicine. to start kind of my own practice, if you will. And at that time, NPs were not, we're not autonomous in my state. So I really just talked about lifestyle. And I could legally do that. I could talk about lifestyle measures. And my practice kind of exploded. There were so many women in middle age that felt like their needs were not being met,

that they were not being heard, that the traditional alopathic model, although it has some benefits, we're not meeting their needs. And so that is like kind of where I ended up. And that's where I've humbly been the last nine years. and I feel like this is the work I was meant to do. This is what lights me up. I get to impact more people. And one thing that many people are surprised to hear, I'm an introvert.

So the thought of a talk that I did as a means to challenge myself, having the kind of impact that it does is very, very humbling. And I think for a lot of individuals, it's the realization that we have to do hard things. Like we have to be outside our comfort zone. And so the last nine years has really been. creating a platform, advocating for women in middle age, and having them to be educated, inspired, and empowered to be their best selves and to not get caught up in fearmongering. And gosh, there's plenty of nonsense that's out there.

There's a lot of trickery. And I was just saying to my, I have an internal audit going on in my business. And I was saying to this person that I'd hired, you know, everyone has to decide for themselves within their business, what focus do they want? you know, what's their messaging? Who are they serving? And I said, you know, depending on the individual, it might be appropriate for a 25-year-old to be in a bikini and be on social media.

And that's totally fine. But the stage of life that I'm in, I feel like the way that I show up is very authentically. So today I'm sitting here in yoga pants and a sweatshirt because that is my real life. Yeah. But I think for a lot of people, it's like remaining attuned to serving the individuals that you speak to. And so I very humbly and very gratefully sit back and look at the past nine years and say, without question, with the exception of being married for 23 years to my husband and having two beautiful, healthy boys, the other thing that I'm most proud of is the work that I've done

over the last nine years to help elevate awareness around the challenges that women deal with north of 35. Because prior to that, there was very little to no emphasis. And I think a lot of many women, I think my mom. mother's generation, probably our mother's generation, has really suffered at the expense of, in many instances, poor information and fear. Yeah, totally. Authenticity is one of the, and I haven't had the chance to meet you personally, but I am very good at picking out when I watch people and seeing who is probably a lot more authentic than others. And I, as I've gotten older especially,

and I've always, I'm an only child and like really tight-knit family person. And so I believe that that does help convey a strong message when you have that kind of, you know, moral code kind of, so to speak, or that belief in yourself on being tight-knit at home. And the authenticity, when you see somebody deliver a message where they're passionate about it, we all have to work for money. I hate that when people act like, well, you have to make money, but you can tell when it's not money-driven. It's more passion-driven. And so I see that and I appreciate that from people like yourself.

That's what I've tried to model myself after as well. It just goes a long way to help to deliver your message properly. It's going to get to more people what you're trying to get out there. And so that's why I'm proud to be able to meet and talk with people like you about these type of things. So one of the things that I know that really took off for you was you had like a viral discussion on the intermittent fasting. let's talk about that. What happened? Like, what made that so big and popped so much for you? What was it that something had to have happened to make that kick? What was it? What was the message that you delivered or what resonated so well at the time? I think it's a couple things. You know,

I had done a talk in 2018, a TED talk. And that was on the sexy topic of perimenopause. And I laughed because to this day, when people say, what was your first talk on? Perimenopause. unless you're a female, most people go, oh, okay. And so then I was offered the opportunity to a second talk in December of 2018. And you can't do two talks about the same topic. So I had to come up with a different pitch. And so I looked at my husband and I said, what do I know a lot about? And he said, intermittent fasting.

And I was like, okay, so I'm going to talk about intermittent fasting. And this wonderful organizer in Greenville, South Carolina said, you know, we've had this very stringent process of who we've selected to speak. and we want you to speak and we want you to talk about intermittent fasting and women. And I was like, okay, great. So I planned for this March 2019, not realizing the intermittent fasting would be the most Googled dietary strategy for all of that year. So that definitely helped.

I didn't realize that was going to be the case. And then just prior to that talk, I had a little bit of a health care hiccup. And this is relevant because there's nothing worse than being a health care provider and realizing you're really sick. And so I had a 13-day hospitalization where, right, a ruptured appendix and a slew of complications. And about five days into this hospitalization where I was just vomiting and sick and losing weight. I was very, very ill. And I remember saying, if I get out of this hospital, there's two things I want to do. Number one, I want to get home to

my kids. Number two, I want to do this talk because it was part of what was intellectually allowing me to process. Like, you're in this little cocoon state. You're sick, but you're going to get out. And so 27 days after I left the hospital, I did that talk. And I did the talk to show my kids I was okay. My kids were understandably, they were younger at that time. They were tweens. They were, you know, really young, like 11 and 9. And there I am lying in a hospital bed for almost two weeks. And so I got on the stage.

I did my talk. I stepped off the stage. I was like, phew, this is great. We're going to have a relaxing summer. But the sole intention of doing that talk was to show my kids I was okay. And I think sometimes when you have incredibly pure intent, you know, I had people say to me all the time, what did you do to make your talk go viral? I didn't. I mean, that can't be the way that you go into doing something like that because you're not doing it with pure intent.

And so, you know, in many instances, I think sometimes, you know, the universe takes and the universe gives. And, you know, whether you're spiritual or religious, I believe and embrace that fervently. And so through this near-death experience came this incredible opportunity to show up differently in the world. And that changed everything. Like that talk going viral changed everything about my business. gave me a voice validated to my husband that I wasn't crazy that I left a well-paying job to kind of become an entrepreneur. And so, you know, I sit back and again, I talk about gratitude a lot, but I'm grateful for that appendix. In fact, I think it's part of my, it's always part of my acknowledgments in my book. I talk about how the, my ruptured appendix kind of

changed everything for me. And so, yeah, I think it was timing about the topic. It was becoming something that was on the radar. This is now six years ago. I think for a lot of individuals, it then became something that people were searching for. And when they were searching for in a minute fasting, my talk kept coming up. But I had like the first day I had almost 90,000 views.

And I remember saying to my husband, I was like, something's different. Right. And then it was like a million views. And it was two million views. And it was three million. And then it just kept spiraling from there. And I was like, wow, this is pretty incredible.

And pretty impactful. I mean, isn't that ultimately why, if you're a public speaker, you want to be impactful. You want to be a change agent. And that validated for me that I was not crazy, that on April 1st, 2016, I left traditional allopathic medicine. And that was a hard decision to make, but it validated. It was definitely the right one. Love how you said, like, when you were asked, what was it you did? That's why I asked you what resonated, not what did you do?

because what you did or tried to come up with, if it was some kind of gimmick or you wouldn't be where you are today. It wouldn't, it would be like a one hit wonder song. It was one good one that could never be, you know, replicated or duplicated or expounded upon. What else that you said that I love? Now, I'm highly spiritual. I understand some people are not.

And that's, I don't push that on anybody. But what I will tell you is this. And I firmly believe this. We have sufferings or things that happen. that ultimately put us in a position for a reason. And you have to endure to achieve. I firmly believe that there's no such thing as success without failure or suffering without winning.

That's just part of life. And when you get tested like that and you endure it and then look what comes out from it. I had the biggest moment of what I thought was in my career in October where I was on stage with doctor speaking at Mr. Olympias. I don't like to call myself an influencer, but that's what I was viewed at. So I was put on that stage. I got home having all of this momentum in the world and got COVID. And I'm sitting here just going, why would this happen right now when I've got all this stuff going?

And during that time, I figured out I was in the completely wrong industry, shifted everything to biohacking because I sat and studied. And then my whole career is taken off. You know, but that's how it happens. Your worst, lowest moment could turn into your best, right? And so what you've done and shared is remarkable. Let me ask you this because I don't know that everybody will know we just assume. What is a TED talk? What is that?

So it's a platform of sharing ideas worth sharing. It's kind of like their tagline, like ideas worth sharing. And as an introvert in 2018, I decided to do this because it seemed like scary, but scary, but also safe. And so I did it as a challenge because I was like, okay, I'm not a memorizer. I never could have been an actor or an actress. Like that's just not the way my brain works. And so I was like, this is terrifying. I have to commit something to memory and not only do that and execute it, but TEDx, you know, over the past 10, 15 years, some of the most impactful.

And it runs a gamut, like very impactful talks to complete garbage, depending on who the organizer is, the quality of the speakers, et cetera. And so I think that there is or there was in the past. You know, certainly there are some very big names that have been attracted. You know, Brunay Brown, I think she has one of the most viewed TED talks out there. There are lots of famous mathematicians, scientists, thought leaders. And I sometimes hate that word too. Researchers, you know, regular people that just have incredible stories and they share it in a way that makes it interesting and within a certain soundbite. like some TED talks are shorter, some are longer.

My first one was really long. My second one was only 12 minutes. And if you think that doesn't sound like a lot of time, it's not a lot of time to explain anything, to be honest with you. So the way that TEDx organizations work, they're licensed through different venues, and they have some commonality in terms of rules around TEDx talks. One thing that I can assure you is, you know,

I was told that it doesn't matter where you do your TED talk. You know, I have some friends that were like, I have to do it in L.A. I have to do it in New York. I did one in Toronto and I did one in Greenville, South Carolina. And South Carolina's home, that's where I was born. And so for me, it was coming home. But I think for a lot of people, the main concept of a TED talk is that you, you have an idea worth sharing and you articulate it without notes, without a teleprompter. You get up there and you have committed this to memory. Some of us do a better job than others. At the time that I did both my talks. I was still, I had nervous energy, so I'd move around a lot, just tell people,

like, just know that I've gotten a lot of teaching and training since then. I'm not a mover when I'm speaking, at least not very much. But for many people, it can be impactful. It can be a way of conveying that you know how to speak publicly and in a way that's persuasively. In other, you know, venues, sometimes people are talking about cutting edge information and sometimes they get censored. So I think that it is progressive to a point, but in some ways, TEDx is not as progressive as some other areas in the health and wellness space or in the world. And so you have to kind of take it with a grain of salt. But I do think it's still a really amazing thing to have done, a tremendous sense of

accomplishment. And I think for a lot of people, it's just one of those things that they use and their toolbell to demonstrate that they can actually be a powerful public speaker. Would you say that that is what kind of propelled you to get on, say, like the Megan Kelly show and some of your other appearances? do you think that was kind of the tipping point that that put you out there to them and brought you on to those opportunities? Yeah, well, I would say that it definitely opened up doors. Like, I know that my first book proposal, first book deal was predicated on the fact that I had this viral talk and had a

sizable social media following. So I think it gave you some clout. But ultimately, I still had to prove myself. So if anyone is thinking that it's just the talk that opened the door, it's like it was a vehicle to more opportunities. And with those opportunities, I looked at it as more opportunities lead to more opportunities. I think in many instances, and certainly in the health and wellness space, a lot of it's who you know, like that opens up doors introductions to getting on bigger podcast as an example or, you know, bigger press. Megan Kelly, I think, was directly related to that talk. I do think that that played a role because she didn't ask, usually Dr. Jason Fong, what many of us think of as, you know, the modern day father of intermittent fasting.

He's usually the one that I see interviewed as people will go out to. But I do think the talk certainly played a role in Megan reaching out. And that was done completely organically. People will also ask me, how did you get on Megan Kelly? I was like, honest to God, her producer, I actually have the voicemail saved in my phone to this day. Because it reminds me when I'm having days where I'm kind of, which all of this have, you have a day where you're doubting yourself or you're like, I'm not sure if this. This is the right decision. I kept that to remind myself that sometimes life is very serendipitous.

And so that was one of those very serendipitous, really cool opportunities to do. And at the time, we were living in a rental. And I think I had a stack of boxes behind me sitting on a stool somewhere in this house. But yeah, that was a pretty cool. That was definitely up there with cool opportunities that I would say, if you get the opportunity to speak on Megan Kelly's show, it's definitely, it was definitely an incredible experience. That's awesome. Okay, so I would like to kind of get in, I want to get into like intermittent fasting and then some other topics. But first, I'm curious and to compare contrast here with you.

So one, when did you start your podcast? And two, would you say like, so because people ask me, what's your podcast about? And I'm like, well, it's in health and wellness, but it's such a wide variety of topics and everything. Do you kind of do the same with a wide variety? Do you have something specific that you're doing on your podcast? and how is it kind of evolved over time? Great question. So I actually co-hosted my podcast at the beginning.

So a friend of mine who's a clinical psychologist, Dr. Kelly, she and I decided to do a podcast together beginning in September of 2018. And in about a year's time, she felt like it wasn't in a line of what she wanted to be doing in her business. And I said to my husband, because it was just at the beginning of prior to the pandemic. So we're talking about, you know, 14, 15 plus months later, trying to make decisions, did I want to continue with the podcast or did I want to stop it? Because if I was going to do it solo. And what I found out for myself personally was I really liked solo hosting. Yeah. And this is my person. I like to do things my way, not in a selfish way.

I'm very collaborative, but I like to do things my way. And so when I was the only one that was interviewing the people, I had to show up differently. I had to prepare differently. And I look at that is like the greatest gift because what then happened was the pandemic and then people were really listening to podcasts. So I feel like some of what got everyday wellness really going was the pandemic was this incredible blessing. It allowed me, I reached out to everybody I could think of. And 99.9% of time, people said yes, because people were home. Yeah. A lot more time. And so I think that's initially how it started. Now at the very beginning, the reason why it was called everyday wellness was it was a a kind of a compilation of Kelly's business name in my own.

And I never changed the name because I felt like it was very inclusive of a lot of different topics. So yes, the lens of my podcast is always through perimenopause and menopause. So I try to make topics relevant to my community. But I go broad. Like I have scientists on. I have researchers on. I have thought leaders on. I have clinicians on.

But it's always with that lens. And so I'm very conscientious about listening to what are my people interested in listening to? Sure. Who do they want me to speak to? Who do they want me to connect to? And then I think the other thing, and I'm sure you're the same way, is that we say no more often than we say yes. Because we get 10, 15 pitches every day. Yeah.

More often than not, I say no. I have to really intrinsically be super interested in what that person's focuses or niches. So when it comes down to it, I trust my gut. I trust my intuition enormously. I'm a manifesting generator, if you're at all familiar with human design theory. And so when I trust my gut, things work out the way that they're supposed to, just like continuing the podcast, not shifting the name, at least not at that time. And then just intrinsically allowing our conversations to go in any direction that they might go in.

Like I always say I have, I've done all my research, but if we talk about one-tenth of this or 90% of this, that's okay. I can always bring me back. And that's always the invitation is always open. Like, I'd love for you to come back. Let's continue the conversation, especially if it's a good conversation. So I think that's how I would say that the podcast has evolved. And then the really cool thing is that with the pandemic, that kind of got things rolling.

Then all of a sudden I'd sponsorship. And then, you know, I have in certain times throughout the year, we just were full with podcast sponsors. We can't even. We have put people on a wait list. We have been able to increase our prices. We've been able to demonstrate why working with us is so mutually beneficial for sponsors. And then also getting very specific about which sponsors we work with. So I tell everyone, like, they're vetted even more strictly than the podcast guests are because I think it's very important.

I feel very protective of my community, as I'm sure you do for yours as well, which is why I don't, like, there are people that will just throw money at us. And I'll say very politely, like, thank you. I appreciate that. But I don't think this is in alignment with. my business and not something I could speak to in a way that would be authentic. And I think my listeners would pick up on that. And as I said before, I'm very protective and very transparent.

Like, if I think something works, I am happy to talk about it. If I don't think something works, it's going to be hard for me to sell it. And for that to be a mutual symbiotic relationship where it's a win-win on both sides. I love that. You know,

I have 30 to 30, to 35 affiliate codes, literally, because every single podcast I go on, everybody I talk to, they want to give me a code. And you know how many I use? I have one partnership with, that's an actual partnership with timeline nutrition. I make that no secret because I, it's a great product. Firmly, firmly, firmly trust, know and believe in it so much. I get approached all the time. I went and found them at A for M and approached them and told them I specifically was seeking them out. I love that. Yeah. I don't do that, you know, because I, I'm nothing special, but I don't have to do that, but I did that because of in my mind, I said,

I've been doing supplements for 20 years and I've never seen anything like this, what it's dressing. I guess the point is, is like you said, when you start flashing around so many different things, and it's not that I don't, I love these products. I absolutely love a lot of the affiliate codes I had. But if I'm representing 30 different things and having a hundred different sponsors on and then one of them goes bad or whatever, I mean, why does that look on you and I? People come to us for trust. Yes.

You know. Yes. And so that's why you don't hear me even really having podcast ads yet. I'm starting to sell them now, but I'm so picky. And it's like my agent, it's hard to work with me because I'm like, no, no, no. And they're like, well, I have to believe in it, right? So I love that you're like that and vet that because sometimes when you say no, you kind of, yes, I used to feel like, man, I shouldn't be doing that because it's a blessed opportunity. But at the same hand, all money is not good money.

You know. And I think you have to live with yourself ultimately. I just wrote a blog post about a company that I have had an ongoing relationship with for several years. And they took a little bit of heat last year because of an ingredient that had not been initially was not fully disclosed. And then they explained themselves. And then there was this huge fallout. And we took a period of time to kind of think about, you know, did we want to move forward with this relationship in the future? And I wrote a blog post about it and just said, this is where my head is like I finally got my book manuscript in and I have the the bandwidth to actually write a blog post and you know shared it with my team and then explain myself and said this is why I will continue using this product and my family uses this product and I feel like this is this is fine there were issues with transparency but they're working to rectify that and I was like as a small business owner there might come a time in a place where I might mess something up or there might be an error or there there might be something that was unintentionally not shown or or disclosed. And so it invites opportunities as a small business owner, as a podcast,

as to try to be as transparent as possible. And that's kind of like what this, this blog post tried to explain was that, you know, this is, this is how I feel about this. This is why we're continuing this partnership and why. And I think people can respect that. Now, there are other people that may decide they no longer want to, to purchase from that manufacturer. And that's totally fine. Like, I'm like, listen, whatever you choose to do is the right decision for you. This is the decision that my family and I made as a whole. And this is our explanation as to why. And here's other options.

Like here's other things you can do. If you want to avoid this ingredient, then here are these couple of things that you can try. You can make electrolytes at home. You can do this and this and this and this. And so I think that this is, again, one of those situations when you are in a position where you have a podcast or you're speaking on a platform of just sharing with your community, like just being honest. Like, I'll give you another probably a better example. I'm known for intermittent fasting. Right.

Well, last year was like 2019 and 2024 were kind of like the same year but in different ways. And so really hard year, my dad passed away amongst other family members. It's okay. I always say like my dad is one of my greatest teachers. But one of the reasons why my father fell and hit his head and ultimately ended up dying was because he became very frail. And so the reason why I'm sharing this in this context is important, it just reaffirmed for me like, what's the lesson here that I need to take to change what I'm doing in my personal life to ensure that I am not sarcopenic, frail and falling in my late 70s.

And so I kept saying to my dad, thank you for this opportunity to change what I'm doing right now. And so, I mean, literally like two weeks later, I was like, okay, I've been lifting for years, but now I'm working with a trainer to push myself a little harder. It's like sometimes you need that accountability. But the reason why I'm sharing this is, I think for a lot of people, it's, you know, we're constantly invited to have these opportunities, these insights in our lives to show up a little bit differently. And so I think that, you know, you take those lessons, like the lesson with my dad, like what was my dad not doing that he should have been doing? But muscle loss and frailty are, you know, in the forefront of my mind right now as I'm kind of navigating middle age and thinking about what are the things that. my husband and I need to be doing to ensure that we don't end up there ourselves.

So, you know, whether it's 2019, 2024, there's always incredible lessons that, you know, we can find the reframe and kind of move forward and in the process become stronger, more resilient, all the things that ultimately make us a better human being. Absolutely. And that's one of the things that I talk about quite a bit is how important muscle is long-term and how vital it is for you to live longer and healthier and people, and it's not just women either, because a lot of women do get the fear they're going to get big, you know, lifting. I try to explain if you're able to put on, and I coach a lot of bodybuilders,

I've coached a lot of steroid users, and I'm telling you, even guys that are on a ton, if you're able to hold and keep and add two to three pounds of muscle in a year, you have really, really done something special. Like, it is not easy to get that, hold it and keep it. Now, you and I both know, the more muscle you gain, the more fat you lose. So the scale may not move, but your BMI is going to move.

Your waist or comforts are certainly going to drop, and blood markers are going to change a ton, right? So let me ask you this then. What are some of the hurdles that you have run into with people that you talk to or discuss when it comes to explaining to them about how important muscle gain is, what are some of the things that you try to do, especially for women that are in menopause or maybe have never lifted or have lost their desire to lift? What are some of the things that you coach, preach, teach, and maybe some barriers you have to overcome?

Yeah, I mean, I would say number one is hormones influence everything. Absolutely. So sometimes my patients want to be more physically active and they want to lift. but as an example, like testosterone is your get off the couch. It's an executive function hormone. It is not just about libido. And sometimes I'll say to patients, I bet your testosterone is in the toilet because you'll tell me like I get dressed for the gym and then I sit on the couch and I lack motivation.

So some of it is helping them understand some of their behaviors are reinforced by hormones that are suboptimal. Right. So that's number one. So it was like, let's get a baseline. And not every provider in perimenopause and menopause likes to draw off hormones, but I like to have a baseline assessment of where someone is. So that's number one. Number two, as you already astutely mentioned, women fear are getting big.

It is physiologically impossible for you to get Arnold Schwarzenegger circa 1986 big unless you are taking anabolic steroids. Like it is not going to happen. No. So helping women understand that, you know, as we hit about 40, we start having this progressive decline in muscle mass. Like our peak bone in muscle mass for women is when we are much younger. So as an example, like you hit 40 and you start losing muscle mass. Now at first it's kind of insidious.

You don't notice it. But you get to 45 and you're like, huh, I'm not doing anything differently. And suddenly I'm, the scale is starting to go up and I'm starting to lose my waist. And I don't like how I have a little jiggle here and a little jiggle there. Now, I'm using words that they use. because I don't necessarily, I think of jiggle as like jello, but they'll use that word, and I understand what they're saying, but they'll notice the body composition changes. They know something is changing in their bodies. And so I always use the analogy of, because I'm all about

analogies. I love filet. My husband likes ribby steak. If we're going out, I will get the ribby, he will get the ribby, I will get the filet. Young muscle looks like filet. It's all meat. It's all meat. versus ribi has lots of marbling. It's delicious, but it's a fattier cut of meat. That is what starts happening as we start losing muscle fibers and gaining more adipocytes and more fat adipose tissue in that muscle. That's right. Now, this is weight related.

This is hormone mediated. It doesn't have to be that way. But as we get older, we have to be more deliberate with our protein intake. We have to be more deliberate with ensuring we are lifting properly. and that is not using five or two and a half pound dumbbells. That is actually lifting heavy weight. And if you are new to lifting, please work with a trainer that knows how to train women of a certain age.

That generally isn't the wonderful 20-year-old eager beaver guy at the gym. It's probably when I say older, 35-plus-year-old trainer who is going to know how to properly guide you. Yes. Properly guide you. But like when I, as an example, when I work with my trainer, it is we hit lift heavy for a shirt duration. So it's four to six reps.

And that is that, and it's, it's so that the last rep you are putting the weight down. So I think there's also this misnomer that women think if they just do Pilates, they just do yoga, they don't have to still strength train. So I remind women, I don't care if you lift one day a week, two days a week, three days a week, as a starting point. You need to make it part of, you have to prioritize it and you need to commit your off to doing it week after week after week because those choices in your 40s impact the way you age in your 50s, your 60s, your 70s and beyond. And the really cool thing is we have muscle

memory. Yeah, that's right. If you took a break from lifting because of life happening, which I get, I can tell you in 2019 when I lost 15 pounds and looked skeletal, I was not lifting for a long time because I just didn't have the stamina to do it. When I got back to lifting, my muscles had memory. So I remember when I was working with my trainer, my trainer was like, okay, we have to go a little slower because you've been off for a couple months, but your muscles have memory. They know what to do as you kind of restimulate them. So you have to strength train. You have to eat enough protein. I would say the other thing that's so common is that as women are navigating paramedipause, they become less stress resilient. So what worked for you in your 20s and 30s, aka when I was

an ER nurse in inner city, Baltimore, where it was like a train wreck came through the door every minute and I wasn't sleeping and I was working nights and doing all sorts of crazy schedules around everything that was going on. That wouldn't bear well for me in my 40s and 50s. So we become less stress resilient. And if you're not managing your stress, that will contribute to weight loss resistance. That will contribute to worsening insomnia. That will contribute to blood sugar dysregulation.

That will contribute to making it harder for you to build muscle because if your cortisol is up, you become catabolic, which means you break down your muscle. And so this is this ties into why I think intermittent fasting can be an important strategy, but if you're trying to actively build muscle, it can be like you're working in opposition. Like the fasting piece can make it hard to build muscle if you're not eating enough food. So I think that was my original intent. What I was talking about 2019 was that I went from fasting to not fasting back to fasting, then not doing as much fasting.

But I think helping women understand that if you truly want, want to build muscle, not only do you need to get rid of the old school scale, but you need to look at bio-impedance measurements or bod-pod, but really looking at your fat-free mass versus your muscle mass and stop being fixated on a number. I think it's much more important for me to say to my patient, you were at 27% body fat and now you're at 22%. That is what is important. Did the scale go anywhere? No, but now you have more muscle mass and you've lost fat mass. And so I think that that is a switch because those of us that grew up in the 70s, 80s and 90s, it was all about being skinny.

It was all about counting calories. It was all about avoiding fat because fat was bad, especially saturated fat. And so I think there's a whole generation of women that have to relearn a lot of terminology, methodology, and looking at instead of being skinny or thin, thinking about being strong. So those are like, I would say those are like kind of the things I repeat the most to patients and clients with tremendous frequency. Like I have a woman right now, very educated, very smart, has several kids, husband has a high power job.

I cannot get it. I cannot convey enough to her how much her lack of sleep and stress is really wrecking her body composition. And so I finally said to her, okay, we need to only weigh ourselves once a week. Now, I know you probably have other guests that will say weigh yourself every day. But for women that are starting to kind of spiral with getting preoccupied with, I put this weight on it, put this weight on it. And that's all they're hearing in their head. And one day, they're two pounds up and one day they're two pounds down.

And depending on what that metric is and whether it's up or down, their whole day is predicated on whether or not they're good or bad. Yeah, I know. And it is so destructive and so bothersome. And for me, I think if I do no greater thing is helping women understand like body composition weight, weighs more heavily, literally and figuratively, body composition is far more important than the number on the scale. Like I sometimes will say the scale is a liar. It is. Like, let's be honest, it doesn't tell you, unless you have a special scale, and they're definitely bioimpedant scales that are out there, but it doesn't tell you how much fat mass do you have, how much muscle mass do you have? Because those are

the two things that are far more important than, you know, the magic number of 120 pounds, which I don't know why that number is the magic number, but that's the number every woman aspires to be. That's right. Okay. So it's, it's time to slightly nerd out a little bit. So like for dudes, a lot, not all dudes, but a lot of guys, when you like meet somebody and you start finding, oh, we talk about sports and it's like, holy shit, we start going back and forth and it's like, whoa, whoa, whoa. So that's what I'm going to do with you on nutrition right now, because you and I have so many things that we see the exact same. And I want to go back and forth on some concepts. But really, really quickly, the fact that you brought up that you address and look at hormones before

anything else right automatically shows credibility because so many people don't even bother to go there or look at that. I would put like 75% of the people don't do that or address that when they're trying to find a problem. And it's always trying to look at something diet related and fix something first without you could fix a diet, but if the hormones are off, it's not going to matter, right? So what you said about testosterone and women, Perfect. Another one I just wanted to point out, which I'm sure that you do is progesterone is a big problem. Yeah. Huge, huge, huge one. One of the classes I'm in with Dr. Elizabeth Ureth, we did a big deep dive on progesterone, and I'm versed on it, but I realized, man, you don't know anything.

And I've just been, like, divulged into that now. So, but the fact that you brought that up shows so much credibility right off the jump. And thank you for that. Now, let's talk diet stuff. So I am. So I've never made it a big secret. Like I was a fashion model. And I've coached all these athletes. I've been with bodyblowers. I've had an eating disorder since I was like 11 years old. Okay?

Just like a body image issue, all of the above. I'm a nutritionist and I still struggle. So everything you talked about, I stare at the scale. I was on this. I teach people the importance of healthy fats that I was eating a low fat diet every day. Like, so what happens is, one, when you starve yourself, your body latches onto calories, right? because it's in starvation, which you're actually not losing weight. You're ruining your metabolism.

Two, you brought up about the sleep. Well, then you're going to wake up retaining water, for example, high cortisol. So you'll, like, I have a loom. I'm a big data guy, right? So I'll breathe in that in the mornings. I don't sleep enough or I go to bed too late. I'm burning way more carbs than fat when I wake up. And that's not good, right?

You want to be waking up in a fat burning stage. So, for instance, I was, I do, I train like three hours. hours a day and I do 90 minutes of cardio five days a week and then all my strength turn. I'm burning like between sedentary and Norm, I'm burning like 4,200 calories a day. I was eating like 1,600 calories day. So you can imagine. So I one day finally went into my wife right around the time I told you everything clicked for me and I said, hey, we're changing everything.

And she's just looking at me like, thank God. You know, she's been dealing with me for a decade like eating like this finicky little woman that's scared to gain weight. So I've upped my calories a thousand and I took my fat content from only peanut butter now to over 100 grams of fat a day, grass fed butter every day, SCT oil, like everything you would think. I have not been this cut up nor shredded nor cognitively like reticent since I was in my 20s. And I haven't been the shredded since I was actually taking PDs like seriously. And I'm 43. So my point is that you don't need to take shit if you got a good diet and you're working out hard.

You know, those other things help that everybody's thinking about. So I guess for you, I would like to discuss your view on carbohydrates, your view on like implementing healthy fats and the notion that like, because I can prove on blood work too that how good saturated fats and fats are on your LP little A, your APOB, like the cholesterol that really matters. What are your thoughts on all of that, like those myths and those things that get stereotyped or put out there? And why do you think that people are still on this about like demonizing fats and everything when it's completely backwards? Well, I think it's been part of the nutritional dogma for 60 plus years. So it's hard for people to understand. I mean, I feel like my parents' generation, like my mom is in her late 70s. And it has taken years to talk to her about healthy fats and how important they are.

because we had been conditioned to believe. And in fact, I looked at, I mean, a long time ago, probably five years ago, I came across handouts that I was required to give my patients in cardiology that were encouraging void butter, white avocado. I mean, because they had been standardized by the cardiology practice. I worked for Brummel and Brown. I mean, all those vegetable oil spreads. I mean, that was what we taught patients because we had this diet heart hypothesis, which we know now

was a direct influence by a gentleman called Ansel Keys, who unfortunately had a huge impact on not just the diet hard hypothesis, but impacted medical community, patients, the processed food industry, etc. But getting back to your original question, carbohydrates, this is my gestalt about carbohydrates. If you are metabolically healthy, unprocessed carbohydrates are not a bad idea. And this comes from someone who was paleo, then carb cycling for a long time.

I eat more carbohydrates now at 53 than I have probably in the last 10 years. Because I figured out when I start lifting heavy and I'm working out that intensely, what does my body need? It actually needs protein and carbohydrates. And that is what works for me. So when I am working with a patient or a client, and we have a sense of what her metabolic health is, means she's insulin sensitive, she's at a healthy weight, she's exercising, she's sleeping, she's managing your stress.

That person can tolerate more carbohydrate. And again, when I say carbohydrates, I'm talking about fruit, vegetables, sweet potatoes, root vegetables, things like that, lentils, if you tolerate those kinds of things, then someone who is obese, not insulin sensitive, probably pre-diabetic. Maybe this is someone who's got fatty liver. Maybe this is an individual has a history of polycystic ovarian syndrome. Maybe this is someone who is borderline high blood pressure. That person needs to restrict their carbohydrate intake.

And by that, I mean, stop drinking soda, stop eating sugary foods. You know, you can probably get away with, I always say it's a three to one ratio, three vegetables to one piece of fruit. So if they'll say, like, I really need that piece of fruit, I'm like, okay, but here's the deal. You have your broccoli, your asparagus, your Brussels sprouts, then you get to have your piece of fruit. And by that, I mean low glycemic berries. I'm not talking about the tropical fruits unless you, like, I love just green bananas, which makes me weird. They're grape or resistant starch, but like my whole family makes fun of me because I'm the person.

We go to the grocery store. I'm like, I want the greenest banana I can see, and I will eat it because it's not sweet. Right. So carbohydrates are dependent on insulin sensitivity. That is my feeling. there's also a role of bioindividuality. I have some patients who just do really well with more carbohydrate. And they'll tell me when their sleep is impacted, it's too low carbohydrate.

So I think when we're talking hard, fast numbers, we're always talking about total carbohydrate. We're not talking about net. Net is a byproduct of the process food industry and it's a cheat. And yes, that includes the least dark chocolate, which I have in my house and I have on occasion we'll consume that in lieu of like higher quality dark chocolate. But when we're talking about hard and vast numbers, I think if the average American is consuming 200 to 300 grams of carbohydrates a day,

a reasonable amount of carbohydrates, for someone who is insulin sensitive, might be 150, it might be 100. It depends on like, where are you in your cycle? How physically active are you that day? If you are not metabolically healthy like that other kind of avatar I spoke about, that may be someone who needs to be under 100, maybe under 75 grams. unfortunately we have conditioned our entire society that they need copious amounts of processed carbohydrates bread pasta i'm trying to think about some of the other like most of the protein bars that are out

there cookies crackers like they all have a place like don't get me wrong do i occasionally have a siette almond flour tortilla yes and i savour every bit and i love it but i don't eat those every day and so women in particular as they are navigating perimenopause and menopause they are losing insulin insensitivity, they have changes in sex hormones. Suddenly, they are finding that what they used to eat is no longer working for them. So we always go back to the same thing. Are you insulin sensitive? If the answer is yes, more discretionary carbohydrate. The answer is no, less discretionary carbohydrate. Now, the most important macronutrient in my world is protein. And we know that as we are navigating the aging process, there's the protein leverage hypothesis. And in particular for

women, understanding that as your estrogen levels are lower and lower and lower, so we're talking tail end of perimenopause and a menopause. And just remember, average age of menopause here in the United States is 51. Women spend 30 plus percent of their lifetime in menopause. So this is important. You need more protein to stimulate muscle protein synthesis, meaning my teenagers who are super lean and athletic can sneeze at a piece of protein and probably get by with 10 or 15 grams that will stimulate muscle protein synthesis. I would actually advocate you need way more. Like the minimum is, 30, but ideally it'd be at least 50 grams. So when I am helping women understand, not only is this

more protein-centric diet going to help you with satiety, blood sugar regulation, sleep, hormones, etc, you're suddenly going to be able to push that plate away and be like, I'm done. I'm full. I feel great. So no less than 100 grams of protein a day as a woman. Ideally, you know, people like Dr. Gabrielle Lyon will talk about things like one gram per pound of idle body weight. A lot of my patients can't get to that much. So we work towards 100 grams and then we try to tailor it from there. I'm about 120 pounds. Most days, I'm at 100 grams. Some days I can push to 120. But that is a lot. That is a lot of protein for me. So more protein. We know that animal based sources are going to be superior in terms of amino acid profile. But I do think some of the plant-based varieties,

like, you know, if I get kava, because Friday night we don't cook in our house. And sometimes that means I eat leftovers. And sometimes I might have kava from one of my, teenagers wants that for dinner, I will usually do a combination of beef with some lentils because it gives you some plant-based protein. And there are benefits to the gut microbiome of consuming some of these fiber-rich foods. So that's number one. And then the other thing to think about is when we talk about fats, it's helping people understand that fats are not intrinsically bad. It's the quality of the fats that are certainly important. And when I'm thinking about fats, you know, there's plant-based fats and then there are animal-based.

fats. I am someone personally that does better with plant-based fats. Usually you don't hear me say plant-based anything is what I lean towards. But what makes my body feel good is avocado, olive oil, nuts, and see, don't do well with fatty meat. I just don't. So when I talked about my husband having the rib-eye, it's because if I ate that steak, I would really not feel good. And I have a healthy gallbladder is just the way that my body is made. And so I'm also a hyper-absorber. So I am someone that when I eat a lot of fat, my body absorbs all of it. So it's one of the things that can drive some lipid abnormalities, which you kind of alluded to earlier. So lard, tallow, duck fat, all good sources. And if someone tolerates those, it's great. But what I find is a common mistake, whether someone's trying

to lean into a ketogenic diet or someone is trying to eat more healthy fats, fat is much more calorically dense than protein or carbs. And that's an important thing to understand. It's not that I want everyone measuring every bit of food because that may not be sustainable and may make you feel crazy. Like for me personally, if I had to weigh every bit of food I'd put in my body, it would make me feel neurotic and crazy. Just me personally.

I have other clients and patients who love doing that and I'm like, knock yourself out. But we're talking about fats, if you have fat in your protein, like let's say you have a duck where you're having that rib eye or you have a piece of salmon, you already have held fats in the protein, it does not then mean that you have three avocas with your dinner. I have, right. I've met people who will tell me crazy things like, oh, I had three avocados today. And I was like, well, this might be why you're not losing weight. It's a lot.

Versus if you have like a leaner like filet or cod or you have a piece of chicken breast, which tends to be leaner protein, you can add a bit of healthy fats. Now, for me personally, I'm a big fan of olive oil and I will sometimes put that on my protein just to kind of like buffer up the the healthy fat content but in terms of fat portions that is where I will generally say hey just be cognizant if like I love salted pistachios oh my god it's like one of my favorite things in the world or salted macadamia nuts I will measure out a quarter cup and put it in a bowl and I put the rest away because it's so easy to overeat these delicious fats same thing with avocado like when I'm making homemade guac or I'm just putting avocado on a burger

I'm like, okay, I'm not using a whole avocado for me personally. I have to be more conscientious about like fat portion. So I think that's that's the way that I would explain carbs. And then the other piece with carbohydrates that I didn't really touch on is fiber. Fiber is really important for satiety. It's again also very important for that gut microbiome because it feeds the beneficial bacteria. Now, I was full carnivore for about nine months after my hospitalization because the IV

antibiotics and antifungals like just destroyed my gut. I had diarrhea for nine months just to give you some perspective. And carnivore was the only thing that allowed me to start getting back to having solid stool. Why is this relevant? Because I have many friends in the carnivore community who believe that if you are not full carnivore, somehow they've convinced themselves that they do not need any fiber in their diet. And I would actually argue that we need a bat. We're designed to be omnivores.

I think we are truly designed to be omnivores. And I think when you exclude an entire class of. of, you know, whether it's plant matter, I think ultimately based on the research and certainly after finishing this, writing this book, the research certainly suggests that there's a lot of benefits for buterate production, which is a short chain fatty acid. All the people understand what these plant-based molecules or signaling molecules like urolithine A, other polyphenols, nitric oxide, how important these signaling molecules are for optimizing gut function. And so I would actually argue like fiber should be part of that. I like to get my fiber from food, but there are

obviously people that maybe they're struggling to get enough vegetables into their diet. There's certainly some supplements that can be helpful and beneficial for that. Absolutely. And you know, like you said, you understand your certain tolerances to animal fats, right, to meats. And everybody's got to understand that just because something may work for one, it doesn't work for the other. There's a lot of things that, yes, they're accurate if you look at them, but everybody's different. We're made up differently. It's, it's one of the things that I've always said to deal with when it comes to people I'm coaching on supplements or PEDs or whatever they're using or obviously diet related. Everybody's different. And, you know, sometimes we are at a stage where we might have a condition or

allergic. I mean, there's a million things that are that are out there. I'm a big proponent of protein as you are because of the way I train and everything and how much I'm burning. I'm at like 275 gram mark. I weigh about 185, but that's different because I'm like, you know, the way I'm training. One of the things that I've kind of struggled with is people that say, oh, it's so hard to get that amount of protein, but then I can, I always come back with this fundamental breakdown of one meal and I'm like, look how much proteins in this. Like, I understand not everybody's going to do 12 ounces of salmon like I do, but I do that. It's like 70 grams of protein like this. You brought up chicken, eight ounces of chicken. You're at 52 to 55, depending on what kind of cut you have or whatever,

but it's not as difficult, I think, as people maybe think it is if you look at it and break it down. Now, some people just can't eat that much. It fills you up too fast. You've got to space it out a little bit. But I'm with you 100% on all of that. That's why I wanted to go back and forth with you on it because I could go into this for days. But I wanted to touch on some other things, all I have you. One thing I, not to interrupt you, one thing I do want to mention that I noticed for myself is when I was in my early feast,

my intrinsic hunger changed enormously. Now, whether or not that was a byproduct of changes in muscle mass, changes in estrogen, I'm not sure. But I remember that that was such an enormous shift because I would jokingly say, like, when I was younger, I could eat just like my kids could. Like, I never had a, I could eat anything. And I ate healthy. So let me be clear, I wasn't eating like McDonald's five days a week.

It was more like I was hungry all the time and felt like I was, always chasing that hunger. And then there was this little blip in my life where I was like, oh, that changed. And so I have not been able to find research to suggest that I certainly have spoken to a lot of experts that talk about, yes, that does start to change with the aging process as people will become less intrinsically hungry. So I think we have to remind ourselves, like, this is one of the reasons why fasting is one of many strategies, but it's not ever a reason to under eat habitually and chronically. So I think that's one of the things that women and will say to me, well, I can't possibly eat 50 grams of protein in a meal.

I'm like, okay, aim for 30 and then slowly increase it because I like you, like fish to me is not nearly as heavy in my stomach as eating a steak. Like for me, I get to, you know, eight ounces of steak. For me, I am full, but like my teenagers could eat 12, 15 plus ounces of steak and, you know, they'll be hungry two hours later. So I think like at least like reminding people that you do get these changes in hunger patterns as you're getting older. but to me it's really that much more important to make sure, like, I'm very conscientious

about making sure I get enough protein. Like, that is a very conscious effort. Now, sometimes when I travel, and I'm sure this probably happens with you, I generally don't eat while I'm traveling. And so sometimes on those days, I have to kind of buffer what I'm, what I've done to make sure that I've, you know, I'm not going through a day where I'm just totally catabolic and just breaking down muscle trying to buffer the lack of intake that I've had over there the course of the day. I literally don't travel without, I will only travel where we have our own

kitchen and literally before we go check into our Airbnb or whatever, we go right to Whole Foods and stock up what I can. I do my best. It's hard when you're traveling and working, but I tell you what, I do my damnedest to stay as on point as I can. And I have everything measured out and brought and weighed out with me that I can brought. Like, I'm one of those people, but not everybody can do that. So let me ask you this. So, And this is kind of an obvious thing, but I think that one of the things I've noticed with the far more fat intake, I am far more less inclined to ever be desiring any kinds of foods that I shouldn't be wanting throughout the day or thinking about being hungry.

And the way that I'm locked in, even when I'm tired, as opposed to I was snacking on vegetables all day long, literally like 13 to 14 servings of vegetables a day just throughout the day. And every 30 minutes, I'm up hungry walking around, like, can't. can't stay focused. So the other benefits of the fats, like in general, just mentally on top of it. Yes. But what you said, and this is funny, so I could eat a piece, like I said, the big piece

of salmon, same amount of fat as I eat. I'm eating like a half a pound a day of either like Benison or bison or elk, really. Same amount of fat, you know, pretty same amount of calories. even sometimes the salmon will be more than certain cuts. Yet I don't, I feel like I am far more full or it's taken a lot longer to like have that less heavy feeling with the fish than the meat. I mean, the meat will, you'll make you feel full for hours. Yes, yes.

I would agree with that. Yeah. And it's interesting because I will sometimes say, you know, sometimes my biggest meal the day is lunch. And today is a good example. That was not the case. It'll be after our interview, like that will be my big meal for the day. but it's also like for me personally I do so much better eating a larger I hate to use the word bowl list but a larger amount of food midday than I do if I eat it at dinner time and so it's kind of

become like that was one of the blessings of COVID was the realization my body wants to eat their a larger meal earlier and it wants me to close my feeding window earlier than I had been and that was surprising because I think especially for people if they're listening if they have kids it's like you're doing carpool and you're like trying to get your kid in the bath or trying to get them the shower if they're older and get them fed and get their homework done. And so it's like you start getting in this habit of like not thinking about yourself until like eight or nine o'clock at night. And for me, oftentimes I would just eat something small and go to bed because I was too tired

to make a big meal. So I think for a lot of people, it's inviting the opportunity to change things up if you feel like or perceive that maybe your current, I don't know, schedule is not working for you and your lifestyle. Yes, 100%. I want to get to a couple of things because I know. we're getting short on time for you. So there's two things that I would like to incorporate into one here.

So I was at eudamonia this year, and Andrew Huberman had listed his, like, top five important supplements. And then a couple other people, and this was when I got turned onto timeline, especially with uralith and A, had uralitha listed as their like dark horse for their, like, ones that you should be taking every day. And that's when I really started to study it and then approach them, you know, and start working with them. So let's talk about creatine and uralithinae thoughts. Because I absolutely, those are like my two biggest staples every single day. I've got my 70-year-old mom on creatine.

I've got my wife on uralithinae and creatine. I'm on them. I got my kids on them. I've got teenagers that are friends of mine on creatine. Let's talk about both of those. Let's start with creatine. You put a post up that I, I laugh because I was like, she's, I dislike my clone on this, I'm thinking we have here.

Let's talk about the obvious mess, water retention, harm on the kidneys, I'm going to get so big and gain all of this weight. Can we just talk about why those, like, and not get angry about it, but because it's annoying, just, just tell people why that's not true. Yeah, so creatine monohydrate, and I very transparently tell everyone, creatine monohydrate and mitapure, and might appear. or urolithin A are foundational supplements for men and women. My husband and I both take them. My kids all take creatine, trying to get them to take more than, you know, just the creatine every day is a bit of a challenge because they're teenagers.

But when I think about creatine is one of the most well-researched supplements or ergogenic AIDS that's on the market, it is a very high safety and efficacy profile. The other thing to think about is that when you're looking at creatine monohydrate, quality is important. So when people complain to me, women in particular will say, well, it makes you feel I gained weight. And I'm like, well, we're using Crea Pure, which is the purest formulation of creatine monohydrate, which is much less likely because of the way that it's actually water extracted as opposed to acid extracted. That might be the case. But if you understand mechanistically

how it works, so the word monohydrate, it's hydrating the muscles. So if you look at the research, women actually need more creatine than men just by virtue of the way that our bodies work. we have less muscle met, depending on where we are in our menstrual cycles. Well, actually, I'd make the argument that all menopausal, perimenopausal women should be taking creatine for strength, but also for bone benefits, brain benefits, jet lag if you travel like I do. And when I think about some of the common other concerns other than like weight gain or bloating, quality of creatine is important.

That's always number one. Number two, if you have healthy kidney function, it is not going to, and you're using the recommended dosage, which could anywhere from three to five grams a dose, day, and I would make the argument that if you are vegetarian and vegan, you need five. Most women seem to need five. If you're eating a ton of meat, like you eat quite a bit of protein intake. You may physiologically need just three grams because your muscles may be well stocked with creatine reserves. But oftentimes when I'm talking to people, it's helping them understand it is a multifunctional product

that hits many different areas. So bone mass, we peak in bone mass by the age of 30 as women. That same hormonal imbalance of estrogen relative to progesterone actually speeds up bone breakdown as opposed to bone remodeling as we navigate late perimenopause and menopause. So there's research that's suggesting that even creatine monohydrate can be beneficial for bone mass benefits from help with mood disorders. Again, I'm not a clinical psychologist. So I always say, you know, have a conversation with your mental health professional. But if you understand mechanistically how creatine works, it's helping with ATP production.

So it's helping with energy regulation inside ourselves. And so that is why this is a multi-purpose ergogenic aid and one that I think most people benefit from. Now, other than concerns about kidney function, I hear things like, you know, is it safe to take regularly? Yes, there's no evidence to suggest that it is problematic. There's no evidence to suggest it induces either hepatic or renal function issues. Now, if you do have baseline chronic kidney disease, it might not be the supplement for you. It's worth talking to your nephrologist or your specialist.

But I think for most other people, they really do benefit. They feel like they're stronger. They feel like they sleep better. We know it helps the sleep architecture. To me, it is truly multifaceted. The other thing to note is that if you want somebody to cross the blood brain barrier, and I know with your supplement background, you know this, that you need higher doses.

So when we talk about higher doses to cross the blood brain barrier, like when I'm taking creatine to help with jet lag, I am taking 10 grams a day because that high. helps to cross that blood brain barrier, you need a higher dose of creatine to be beneficial for that. But it is easily one of my favorite supplements and it is a supplement that has very few contradications, very few concerns that I have. But the most common concerns expressed to me are I gain weight or I'm bloated. And my first question is, what quality of creatine are you consuming? Because unless it identifies either on the website or the package or the product that it's

Creepure, you might be getting the cheap stuff that is made in China that is acid extracted. And if you understand anything about the processing, quality is important, just like the quality of pharmaceutical agents are important. So you want to work with companies that have very stringent standards for how they extract their products and bring their products to market. Absolutely. So Creepir, too. I've been on that. And some people argue it's not necessary and and yada, yada, yada, yada. And you know all of these things that we have to overcome that people do. I mean, and you can always feel free to test it out yourself and just see how it works for you.

Power of N of one. Yeah, absolutely. I'm really big on how I've felt because I've taken creatine forever because I've known. You know, it's gotten more popular. What do you think? I'd say in the past like three to four years, it's especially gotten more popular like biohacking community or just more prevalent. used or like more study or accentuation's been put on it. What's funny is when I was always talking about it, it was so cheap.

And it was like the cheapest thing in the world to buy. And now the price, it's not expensive, but it's certainly gone up now. The more popular it's gotten and been taking advantage of. So the urolithinease side of things. Now, I'll keep it very short. I want your opinion on it. But just so people understand, it's stimulating mitophagy. So when, especially as we age,

the mitochondria is the powerhouse of ourselves and these start to degrade and they will basically either be damaged or destroyed as we get older. And so in short, uralithinae is stimulating that repair, which is of course then slowing down the aging process. It's obviously giving us more energy. I have noticed definitely the endurance help. I'm doing 15 miles to 20 miles a day on the elliptical or when I am running, it's 10 miles a day. So trust me when I tell you, I know if anything helps me or hinders me. And even on my bad days, it's helping me. I'm not saying it's shaving a minute off my mile time, but I can certainly tell the difference.

And I can tell it. I would tell you more energy and then the cream side, I can definitely tell. My wife keeps asking, can you get some more? Can you get some more? Like, shit, man, I can't buy everything we try. But I guess the point is, is that it is one of the, to me, Beyond the fact that it's so well studied, one of the more innovative and like, it gives me more hope on us living longer or having better quality of life. And that's why I love it so much.

I mean, what is your experience or feel of it on your side? Yeah. I mean, I've been using, gosh, for probably three years. So I really do fervently believe that it is help with energy, help with VO2 Max. Yes. Help of recovery. Like I said, I have a new, I've had a new trainer over the past eight months. and she kicks my butt twice week.

And being able to recover and not be as sore, you know, you get those muscle tears. It'd be very uncomfortable between irritation of the fashion and just overall inflammation. I think topically, what I find really interesting is, you know, urolithin A helps with epidermal thickness, which, you know, I think a lot of people are now looking at hormonal modalities. We know, you know, estrogen can be beneficial for both collagen and elastin upregulation. but I think it's really interesting to see not just oral absorption of urolithinae, but also application to the skin. I think we're just starting to see the tip of the iceberg of how it can be used clinically.

Yeah. I think for a lot of individuals, again, it goes back to like simplifying our supplement regimen. And that's why, to me, I mean, with the exception of when my dad was sick, you know, I took adrenal glandulars and things like that. But to me, it is a consistent aspect of I don't miss it. I mean, meaning I don't miss taking it every day. I take it every single day. And if I don't take it, I do feel a difference.

The other thing is, you know, in this fasting space, you know, a lot of people get focused on autophagy, my topogy. And I'm like, listen, there's so many other ways to evoke upregulation of disease, distorted organelles like the mitochondria. I would much rather take a supplement so that I don't encourage myself to fast for three days, which will lead to muscle loss, which is so precious at the stage of life. Yeah. This is where I think it can really be.

very helpful to ensure that we are, you know, supporting our health and our longevity in ways that, you know, they make sense. There's solid science behind it. It's not some guru out there spouting nonsense that they don't really understand the science. I certainly have interviewed the CMO of timeline several times. The other thing is your allithine A is a signaling molecule and you can't get enough for nutrition. That is always the question I get from people, whether it's about creatine and. steak or about urolithin a and pomegranates.

I'm like, do you know how many pomegranates you would have to consume to get enough urolithinae? So I'm all about a food-centric, focused lifestyle measures. Yeah. If I can't get enough from my food, because let's be honest, I'm not going to peel eight pomegranates a day or six or whatever it is. And 20 to 30 percent of us don't have the optimal microbiome to actually produce uralithine. That's the other piece. And I think it's probably even higher than that.

I agree. 20 to 30% sounds conservative. I bet you it's probably 40 to 50%. And so I think that for those reasons, it makes sense because you can't do enough with diet alone. Diet is very important. And I do not want to discount that. But I think it's equally important to say these are measures that I think can be beneficial. I can simplify your supplement regimen because let's be honest, I have, I had patients that were this way,

but sometimes I'll meet people and they're taking 50 supplements. And I'm like, what's working? Like if you know your vitamin D levels low, it makes sense. If you know that your gut microbiome is not optimized and you need that your allotene, great. If you know that your magnesium levels need to be supplemented, that's different. But sometimes patients will write out 50 supplements that they're taking. And I'm like, wait a minute, we need to like make this curated smaller, be strategic. Just because someone on the radio said you needed this doesn't mean you necessarily need that.

And so I think we just have to be thoughtful in our approach to supplementation. So glad you said that I'm just going to tell you this real quick. I found that I had like a very, very high LP little A and I had found some plaque in my arteries. And this is obviously you and I know LP little A is something genetic. You can't. Clearly, I'm not doing anything wrong in my eating and training. My point is that so when I panicked at the time, I was taking everything under the sun that I thought was going to help me. And I was the guy taking 50 supplements.

And then, you know, my liver value skyrocketed. I started to get some breakout. And I'm, you know, we were like, okay, we got to just start picking these apart and, you know,

stop doing this and going insane. Because there will be like one, you said, you don't know what's working and what's not in two. You don't know what's causing the problems that are going to happen. So, you know, find your staples.

If you're lacking, like Cynthia said, get what you're lacking, but don't go crazy because it's not going to be helpful at all. Yeah, someone said it's expensive urine. And I do. It would be very clear.

I think strategically, like one of my kids had a Nutraval done, which is a test that's done through Genova that looks at, you know, where are fatty acids lacking, where your vitamins lacking. And now he takes probably six supplements a day, but it's kind of buffering back up some fatty acids, omega-3s, things that, you know, as a kid who doesn't like to eat flaxseed or chia seeds or fish, kind of challenging to get his omega-3-to-a-6 ratio optimized. And so I think if there's a true deficiency, then I think that's fine, but I think for so many people, they're just taking whatever. Like, they don't even realize that they're spending hundreds and hundreds of dollars every month.

And to me, there has to be some good research and there has to be some indicators of how things can be efficacious to make sense. I agree. I hate this, but I love this because I feel like I've been talking to five minutes and I'm going past your time and I didn't get to a fraction of what I wanted. But it's been amazing and awesome. I would do this another two hours if we could. I'd have to do another podcast together. I would love to.

I know that you're busy, but if we could, that would be so, so great. Because we have a lot of other stuff to get into, and it clicked really well for me. So I appreciate it. You're welcome. So real quickly, I'll link everything in the description, but what are good places to follow you, find you, and keep track of what you're putting out there for content? Yeah, I would say start with my website. So www.

W. Cynthia Thurlow.com. I'm active on Instagram. I have a free Facebook group that's called the Midlife Paws, black slash my name. It is true. It is men and women in this group. It is a very, very healthy, drama-free zone. I would say everyday wellness is a really good sense. My podcast is a really good way to get to know me as an individual. And obviously, you know, really bringing the best and the brightest minds in the health and wellness space to my community three times a week. We now publish on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays, which is really cool that we're in a position to be able to do that. And if you follow me on X, just be forewarned, I can be a little snarky. I love it. That's, that's, we want authenticity.

So, you know, you get what you get, right? Absolutely. Absolutely. I love it. Well, thank you again. It was a pleasure and honor to have you here. I really appreciate your time. Everybody, I hope that you got as much out of that as I did, which I'm sure you did. And hopefully we'll get Cynthia back on here again. So stay tuned for plenty more to come. Dylan Jameli and Cynthia Thurlow, signing on.